THE TWO ENDINGS.
THE trial came on very soon, and the evidence was quite clear against
all the prisoners. Turner, who had wounded one of the gamekeepers, and
had been committed on a previous occasion, was sentenced to twenty
years' transportation. Tom Haines, who was not proved to have used
violence, was condemned to five years' penal servitude; and Frank
Hardy, as the receiver of property known to have been stolen, was
sentenced to two years' imprisonment, with hard labour.
"I am going over to Forley to-morrow," said Mr. King to Walter, "and
shall try and get permission to see Frank before he is removed. You can
come with me if you like."
Walter gratefully accepted his master's offer. The prisoners were to be
removed to a distant part of England on the following day; but a letter
from the clergyman at Springcliffe to the governor of Forley Gaol
procured Mr. King's permission to see Frank.
The meeting was a very painful one on both sides. Short as the time
had been, Walter was shocked to see the change which had taken place
in Frank's appearance. His cheeks were haggard; his hair was cut quite
close to his head; and he wore a felon's dress.
He burst into tears at the sight of his old master and Walter.
"How good of you to come!" he sobbed. "Oh, what disgrace I have brought
upon myself and my family! You were right, Walter, and I was wrong;
yours was the right path after all, and mine has been my ruin. I didn't
deserve that you should come and see me, sir," he cried, seizing Mr.
King's hand. "I shall never forget your kindness; if I had only taken
your advice, if I had only kept from bad company, I should never have
been in this dreadful place."
"My poor boy," said Mr. King, who was deeply affected, "you are not the
first who has found out, alas! when too late, the folly and wickedness
of which they had been guilty. I am not come, however, to add to your
present suffering by any reproaches of mine; but rather to entreat you
to let this fearful lesson be a warning to you. If God spares your
life, a future will still be yours; during which, through His grace
strengthening you, you will have opportunity of proving the genuineness
of your present sorrow. Meantime, resolve to bear patiently and meekly
the punishment to which you are sentenced, and determine, should you
be permitted to begin life afresh, to shun bad companions, and to fled
from idleness as from the mother of all mischief."
"Have you seen father or mother, sir? I thought that perhaps they would
have come to see me; and little Gracie, how is she?"
Then Mr. King told Frank of his father's accident, and that his little
blind sister would never be well again.
"Ask them to think kindly of me sometimes, Walter. I know I have not
been a good son to them, and I can't expect them to care much about
me. How differently your mother would feel towards you, Walter, if any
trouble came to you. Ask father to forgive me, sir, and tell him, if I
am spared, I will try and be a better son to him hereafter; and Gracie,
poor little Gracie, I little thought I should never see her again! I
was never a kind brother to her; you were far more like a brother to
her than I was, Walter."
Walter could scarcely speak for tears, but he put into his old
companion's hand a small parcel, consisting of a neat pocket Bible.
"Will you keep it for my sake, Frank, and will you promise to read it
for my sake too?"
"I will promise, Walter,—and, Walter, I want to confess something to
you. It was I who left the tools out that—"
"Hush, Frank," interrupted Walter; "I'd rather not hear anything;
indeed I would. I think I can guess what you would say, and I forgive
you from my heart, and may God keep you in the right way for the time
to come!"
"There's only one right way, remember, Frank," said Mr. King.
"I know that now, sir, and Walter has chosen it."
Mr. King and Walter remained some little time longer with Frank, and
then came the moment of parting, and the prison doors were bolted and
barred, separating the two young lads who had for so long a time spent
the greater part of each day working side by side.
"The one shall be taken, and the other left." It is an awful thought!
Here were two lads, with precisely the same opportunities of
self-advancement: the one, by God's grace, keeping in the straight and
narrow way; the other, resisting God's Holy Spirit, and going the road
to ruin.
As Frank listened to the sound of the retreating steps of his master
and Walter, he threw himself upon his prison bed in an agony of remorse.
———————
During the two years that followed, Mr. King did not lose sight
of his former apprentice. From time to time he heard, through the
governor of Forley Gaol, that Frank was conducting himself well in his
imprisonment, and that the chaplain was pleased with the attention he
paid to his religious duties. As the term of his imprisonment drew
towards a close, it became a question with his kind, former master what
he would do when liberated.
There was a decided objection to his returning to his native village;
and, after much thought, Mr. King arranged with a friend of his, who
was captain of a merchant vessel, to take Frank abroad with him,
where he would have a chance of earning for himself a good character
in a place where the circumstances of his past life were unknown.
This benevolent plan was carried into effect, and Mr. King had the
gratification of hearing that Frank had obtained work abroad, and was
going on steadily.
Meanwhile, Walter had continued in the path he had chosen. When
the term of his apprenticeship was expired, Mr. Danvers sent him,
free of expense, to London, for the purpose of studying six months
at the School of Design. At the end of that period, he returned to
Springcliffe, where Mr. King, whose foreman had just left him, was glad
to take Walter in his place. In this position he remained a few years,
when Mr. King retired from business, and Walter succeeded him.
Springcliffe had, by that time, become a place of great importance, in
consequence of the railway passing within a quarter of a mile of the
village. This had given a great impetus to building; and Walter, whose
talents for drawing enabled him to combine the profession of architect
with the trade of a builder, had as much work as he could get through.
Some of the best and prettiest houses now in Springcliffe were designed
by him; and in one of them lives Mrs. White, who has long since given
up her shop, and concerning whom Walter's affectionate wishes have thus
been fulfilled. Walter lives with his mother, and so does Walter's
wife, the daughter of a respectable farmer in the neighbourhood. They
have three fine healthy children, and live in peace and contentment.
Frank Hardy remained abroad some years, earning a good character for
steady conduct, but suffering much from bad health, which kept him very
poor. Those two hard years of prison life had left their traces upon
a constitution never very strong; and there was no chance of his ever
being a robust man.
[Illustration: "I will take Frank on directly, if he will come,"
said Walter.]
At length his health failed so much that the medical men recommended
him to return to his native country, and, if possible, to his native
village. Frank wrote to Mr. King, who had, at that time, recently given
up his business to Walter.
"Read this, Walter," said Mr. King, without further comment, "and tell
me what you think of it, and what had better be done."
Walter read it through, and did not take a moment to consider.
"I will take Frank on directly, if he will come to me," he said.
Mr. King sent money out for his passage home, and Frank returned to
Springcliffe.
He was greatly changed, and he found great changes in his native
village. His father was dead, and his mother had removed to a distant
part of the county. Walter alone seemed unchanged. He received his
former companion with real kindness, and shielded him, so far as lay in
his power, from any unkindness on the part of his fellow-workmen. He
gave him constant employment, and, by degrees, Frank's health improved
considerably; but he never was himself again; and the want of a little
more education when he was a lad prevented his ever rising above the
rank of a common workman.
If not a very skilful, he proved, at least, a very trustworthy servant
towards his master, towards whom his gratitude knew no bounds.
"It has all come true!" he would say to himself, with a sigh, as he
contrasted his inferior position with that of Mr. Walter White, now one
of the most prosperous men in Springcliffe.
Frank did not forget the promise he had made Walter in prison, that if
God spared his life he would be a better son to his parents than he had
been. His mother, now his only remaining one, was very badly off, and
was glad to return to Springcliffe, where Frank took her to live with
him, and was able to make her old age comfortable.
Affliction had been blessed to Mrs. Hardy. She and her son Frank became
regular worshippers in God's house; and they both felt how much they
had to be grateful for; and in humble thankfulness they blessed God,
who had called them out of darkness into His marvellous light.
THE END.
THE EIGHT BELLS
And Their Voices
——————
IT was on a winter's evening, in Henry Ekworth's early childhood, that
the first voice of the Eight Bells fell upon his ear. He was seated
by a comfortable fireside at home, close to his mother's knee, when a
neighbour entered the room with a tale of horror which thrilled through
his young heart, though its full import was imperfectly comprehended
then.
It was a tale of death. An unhappy lady had that day been found
lifeless in a neighbouring river, and report spoke of self-destruction.
Henry had seen that lady, had heard her speak, had received trifling
gifts from her hand. Terrible it was to him to think of that hand as
cold in death—and such a death!
"The Eight Bells caused it!" said Henry's gentle mother, as she broke
out into sorrowful lamentations. "If it had not been for the Eight
Bells, this might never have happened."
Henry did not understand the connection between the Eight Bells and the
lady's violent and sad death.
The next day the child walked by his mother's side, and with her
entered a house of mourning. He clung closer to her hand when the
threshold was passed, for a painful scene was before them.
He saw a group of children gathered round a small smouldering fire—a
fire, it seemed, without heat. The little ones looked scared and awed;
traces of tears were on their faces; but the first outburst of grief
had ceased. Only one, the eldest, sobbed as though her heart would
break when Henry's mother spoke kindly and compassionately to her,
in subdued whispering. She was a fair and lovely girl, but thin and
sorrow-worn.
Henry's mother had a basket in her hand, and from it she took food, and
offered it to the children; and oh, how eagerly they clutched it!
"How hungry they must be!" thought the wondering child.
The unhappy children were thinly clad, and the room bore the look
of abject poverty. The uncarpeted floor, the worn-out rusher of the
chairs, the small and cracked looking-glass hung against the wall—if it
had not been cracked, it would not have been there—everything spoke of
destitution.
As Henry's mother spoke comforting words to the poor children, an inner
door slowly opened, and a woman mysteriously beckoned to the visitor,
who, rising to the summons, would have left her boy behind, but that he
clung still closer to her—terrified, he knew not why.
After a moment's thought, the mother moved slowly on, gently leading
her boy. They ascended to an upper room, and there, on a bed, lay the
lifeless body of the drowned lady, clothed in its coffin dress. Oh, how
sharped and pinched the features! How deep and hollow the eyes! How
thin and sharp the lips! Henry's mother was weeping bitterly; and the
boy, wondering what it all could mean, wept too.
They retired from the chamber silently; and when they re-entered the
room below, a man was there with a soiled and rusty coat. He was dirty
and unshaven, and his watery eyes glared restlessly on all around
him. He was seated by the fire, with his hands on his knees; and his
children—for he was the father of the children there—had dispersed
themselves, hither and thither.
Henry looked at the unhappy man, and dimly recognised in him a
gentleman whom he had sometimes met when he was walking with his
mother; but surely it could not be the same!
Yes, the same gentleman, for his mother spoke to him by name; and Henry
remembered the name; and it was the name of the lady, too, who now lay
pale and dead in the room above. The man groaned deeply when Henry's
mother spoke, and tears fell fast down his cheeks; but he answered not
a word.
Oh, how glad the child was to escape from that wretched dwelling!
They passed, on their way homeward, a house in the street, in front of
which was suspended a large sign-board, gaily painted. Henry looked up
at the sign, and his mother looked up too, and sighed deeply. It was
the sign of the Eight Bells.
There were sounds of laughter and music within, as they hurried by its
open door, and Henry wondered what his mother had meant last evening
when she said, "If it had not been for the Eight Bells, this might
never have happened!" What had the Eight Bells to do with the poor
lady's fearful death?
That evening Henry's father called him to his side, and pointing to a
passage in the Bible which lay open before him, he said, "Read, my son."
And Henry read, "'Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it
giveth his colour in the cup, when it moveth itself aright. At the last
it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder.'"
Henry's father then guided his son's eye to another passage on the same
page, and the boy read, "'Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide
thine heart in the way. Be not among winebibbers; among riotous eaters
of flesh: for the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty:—'"
Henry's father then turned over the pages of the Bible till he came to
a part of the New Testament; and once more, he pointed to a verse.
And Henry went on reading, "'Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor
drunkards, . . . shall inherit the kingdom of God.'"
The father took the child on his knee, and said, "The man whom you saw
to-day in that sorrowful house is a drunkard. By this he has brought
himself to poverty and shame, and the poor unhappy mother to death; and
except God should bring him to repentance, he cannot, when he dies,
inherit the kingdom of God; for God's Word says so. There is no room
for drunkards in heaven. Let us pray that God will forgive that unhappy
man; and that you, my dear boy, may always be kept, by God's grace,
from being a drunkard."
Henry heard in after years the history of that miserable man; how he
had sunk from a favourable position in society by becoming a sot;
had become a daily visitor at the Eight Bells, first at evening, and
then in broad daylight also; had forfeited a lucrative situation; had
sold his furniture and his garments, and, at length, even his wife's
and children's, to satisfy his appetites, till, driven to insanity by
ill-usage and destitution and despair, the poor lady had committed
self-destruction.
This was the first voice of the Eight Bells; and Henry never forgot its
awful warning tone.
———————
A few years passed away, and the boy heard a second voice, which seemed
an echo of that which he had heard as a child.
It was on a bright summer's day, as Henry, returned from school, that
he met a crowd in the street, slowly moving onward, while from open
doors and windows gazed men and women as it passed. And one said to
another, "This is what is got by going to the Eight Bells."
Henry looked on, and as the crowd partially opened, he saw a young man,
pale, and agitated with fear or remorse, led on—and he staggered as he
went—by other men whom he knew to be the peace officers of the town.
Henry felt a cold chill creep over him as he saw marks of blood on
the garments of the prisoner, and was told that he had grievously and
treacherously wounded a man in a fierce drunken quarrel at the Eight
Bells.
Henry passed on; and the next day it was told that the wounded man
was dead, and the manslayer was in prison. The tragical deed had been
wrought under the excitement of intoxication. There was a trifling
dispute; thence had arisen taunting words, then a blow was struck, and
then a stab with a knife was returned. The wives and children of the
slayer and the slain were plunged at once into the deepest woe. The men
had, until the fatal quarrel, been close companions and friends.
The slain man was buried, and, a few weeks later, the manslayer had
received sentence of transportation; and when Henry heard this, the
words once more came into his mind which he had first read as a child:
"'Look not upon the wine when it is red: at the last it biteth like a
serpent, and stingeth like an adder.'"
And he prayed in his soul, "'Lead me not into temptation, but deliver
me from evil.'"
———————
Other years passed away, and a third voice sounded in the ears of the
youth, like those which he had heard as a boy and a child; it told of
shame and guilt, and a prison's walls.
A prison for debtors! Henry went there as a visitor, and in company
with a messenger of mercy. Long before, in the days of his boyhood,
Henry had one playfellow whom above all others he loved. Frank,
open-hearted, and affectionate was Albert; and Henry loved him.
Albert's father was in business, and he was deemed to be a prosperous
man; but there had been one drawback to his prosperity—a worm in
the bud; and, at length, after many years of downward progress, his
business was closed, his family scattered, and himself an imprisoned
debtor.
The prisoner was moodily pacing the narrow yard of the debtor's court,
over the high spiked walls of which gleamed some doubtful rays of
autumnal sunshine, when Henry and his father approached him. Henry drew
back while his father spoke to the ruined man, and did not seek to know
the subject of their conference; but he perceived that tears glistened
in the prisoner's eyes, which told of thankfulness, and it might be
also of expressed contrition.
"Ah, Mr. Henry," said the imprisoned debtor, when the conference was
ended, and he held out his trembling hand to the youth as he spoke,
"your father is noble and generous. I shall never forget his kindness,
though I shall never have it in my power to return it. And Mr. Henry,"
he added, in a low, agitated tone, "look at me now, and think of what
you knew me to be in appearance and character once, and take warning;
it is the Eight Bells—ah, you know what I mean, I see—it is the Eight
Bells that brought me to be what I am."
And saying this, the unhappy man wrung the hand of his young visitor,
and then turning away, he wept.
———————
It was not many months after this that Henry accompanied his father to
London; and as they passed through one of the streets, Mr. Ekworth's
eye fell upon a countenance with which, as it seemed, he had once been
familiar; for he suddenly stopped, and spoke to the man by name. The
man was ragged and filthy; long straggling grey hair hung over his
haggard face; his eyes were red, his lips purple, and a bright red
spot on his cheek, while it contrasted with the death-like pallor of
his forehead, told of disease. His voice was broken by a short and
continued cough, and his hand trembled as he leaned it for support
against the buttress of a wall, as he stood.
"You seem ill, Hallet," said Mr. Ekworth, compassionately, after he had
expressed surprise at the unexpected meeting.
"Yes, sir, I am ill," said the ragged man.
"Have you been ill long?" inquired Henry's father.
"A long while, off and on, sir," said the man; "I have not been able
to work more than a day or so at a time for a good many weeks, or
you would not see me as I am now, sir," he added, looking down with
confusion on his tattered garb.
"You are in distress, I am afraid, Hallet," said Mr. Ekworth.
"Indeed I am, sir," said the poor man, with a deep-drawn sigh. "I am
indeed."
"And yet," rejoined Mr. Ekworth, slowly and sadly, "you have not
forsaken your old destructive habit. Your breath betrays you. And I
fear you are going on in the Eight Bells' fashion, bringing ruin on
your body and soul."
"It was only a drop, sir," said the man, hastily interrupting his
monitor, and speaking deprecatingly; "if you will believe me, sir, it
was only a drop that I had just now, to keep me from sinking in the
street. I was so faint, sir; and it was the last penny I had got. Ah,
sir," he went on, "I cannot do as I used to do, if I wished it ever so
much. I haven't the money, and I haven't the strength."
"I see you have not, my poor friend," said Mr. Ekworth, sorrowfully;
"and you are finding by terrible experience, 'the end of these things
is death.'"
The man did not reply in words; the muscles of his countenance moved
convulsively.
"Oh, Hallet," Mr. Ekworth continued, "if I could but hope that you had
seen the sinfulness of your past course, as you must have felt its
wretchedness."
"I know its sinfulness, and I feel its wretchedness, sir," said the
convicted man, in a tone of self-abandonment, as he looked down upon
the pavement; "and I see you have got the measure of me, Mr. Ekworth,
just as you used to have; but where is the use of talking? I am like
them that said, 'There is no hope: no; for I have loved strangers, and
after them will I go.'"
"Alas! And you can quote Scripture thus to your own condemnation! But,
my poor friend, far gone as you are in misery and sin, there is One who
can subdue your iniquities, and who says, 'Return unto Me, and I will
return unto you.' Think of Him, Hallet; and go to Him, even now, at the
eleventh hour."
The poor man shook his head despondingly and helplessly, and tears ran
down his cheeks.
"I dare not relieve you now and here," said Mr. Ekworth, after a
moment's painful hesitation; "for if you should promise not to misuse
the gift, I could not trust to your strength of mind to resist
temptation. But is your wife living?"
"She is, poor thing—she is," said the wretched man.
"Tell me where you live, then, Hallet."
"It is not a fit place for you to go to, sir, it is not indeed," said
Hallet, eagerly.
"I am sorry for it, for it is only through her that I can assist you."
The man's eager countenance fell. "I will tell you where we live, then,
sir," said he, reluctantly; "but you will find what I say is true; it
is not a fit place for a human creature to live in."
"I will call on you and your wife this afternoon," said Mr. Ekworth,
when he had obtained the information he sought. "Stay; you say you have
expended your last penny, and it may be you are hungry; or if you are
not, your wife may be. Will you carry home a loaf?"
"Oh yes, if you will trust me with it, sir," said Hallet, earnestly;
and the loaf having been obtained at a baker's shop close by, the poor,
wretched man hastened away, and Mr. Ekworth and his son went on.
"You do not remember that man, Henry," said Mr. Ekworth, after a short
silence. "He lived in our town when you were a child. He was a thriving
mechanic then. Poor Hallet!"
"The old story, I am afraid," said Henry; "the Eight Bells."
"Yes, my dear boy; this is another voice from the Eight Bells."
"Hallet," repeated Henry to himself; "I think I must have heard the
name."
"You have heard it, no doubt, Henry. Poor Hallet used to work for us;
he was a carpenter, and, as I have said, a prosperous man till he
became a sot. He had joined the church too. You may judge what he is
now, for you heard what he said. Poor Hallet! He came to London, as
he said, to better his circumstances; but I fear it was that he might
sin with less restraint. His character was already gone, and he had
apostatised. Poor Hallet!" Mr. Ekworth repeated with a sigh.
———————
It was early on a spring evening that Henry Ekworth and his father took
their way towards one of the eastern outskirts of London, and striking
out of the main and thronged thoroughfare of the busier streets, they
found themselves, after many windings and turnings, and some inquiries,
at the place they sought.
This place was a wretched, dirty court, containing about a score of
dilapidated dwellings, and hemmed in on all sides by higher buildings,
which shut out both light and air.
A thick, murky gloom hung over the court, and the broken ground beneath
their feet was covered with black, slimy mud. The sight was depressing,
and the odour was sickening.
There was life in that court. Half-naked children, many of them
bare-foot and bare-headed, with dishevelled hair, and coated with
filth, were playing, screaming, quarrelling, and fighting in the
road-way and on the pavements; and men and women, some fierce in
aspect, some moody, some dejected, but all dirty and miserably clad,
were moving to and fro, or lounging at the open doors and windows of
the houses.
The men were, most of them, smoking short black pipes; and at the
entrance of the court was a gin-palace, which, in its gay, flaunting
exterior, presented a strong contrast to the neighbouring dwellings.
Mr. Ekworth and his son noticed, as they passed by the half-open,
swinging double doors of the "palace," that it was thronged with just
such looking men and women as seemed to compose the population of the
court.
They passed on, and, after some difficulty, found the house.
"Does a person named Hallet live here, my little fellow?" asked Mr.
Ekworth of a boy who was sitting on the door-sill.
The child was probably eight or nine years of age, but from the
precocious cunning of his looks, he might have been an old man. He was
disgustingly dirty also, and pale and sallow.
"What will you give me for telling?" he asked, with a sly leer.
"Here is a penny, my poor child," said Mr. Ekworth, compassionately,
taking the coin from his pocket. "Now, will you tell me what I want to
know?"
The child's eyes glistened at the sight of the penny; and telling the
visitors that if they went "right up the stairs, as far as they could
go," they would find the person for whom they inquired, he ran off
with his prize, and Mr. Ekworth, with his son, slowly and cautiously
ascended the dark and broken stairs.
A violent fit of coughing from an apartment just beneath the roof of
the house guided Mr. Ekworth to the home of the Hallets; and on gently
knocking at the door, it was opened by the wife.
The chamber told of destitution. It was neat, however, and tolerably
clean, so was the poor woman, who wept when Mr. Ekworth spoke to her.
"I could not have thought, twenty years ago, sir," said she, when her
visitors had entered, and had with difficulty been accommodated with
seats, "that you would ever come to see my poor husband and me in a
place like this."
"What is the use of talking in that way, Susan?" interposed Hallet,
before Mr. Ekworth could reply. "We are born, but we are not buried
yet; and nobody can tell what they may come to before they die."
"We will not speak of what is past, and cannot be recalled," said Mr.
Ekworth. "Your husband appears to be very ill, Mrs. Hallet," he added;
it seemed the best way of opening a conversation with the unhappy pair.
"Yes, he was very ill," said the poor woman, "and had been failing in
health a long time." He had never, since they came to live in London,
been the man he was before; and now he was fit for nothing. It was a
bad thing for them that they ever came to London, she added.
The man again interrupted his wife, by asking, in a querulous tone,
"what occasion there was to talk about that?" He came to London, he
said, to better his circumstances; and if things had not turned out as
he expected, he did not want to be told of it.
Mr. Ekworth once more soothed the evidently perturbed feelings of the
irritable invalid, and led the poor wife to speak of their present
circumstances and means of support.
They were very poorly off, she replied to his inquiries, and often had
not enough to eat. They should long since have been starved, she added,
only that she was able to go out to work, and had got into regular
employment in some few families as a charwoman.
"You had two sons and a daughter before you came to London. Are they
not living; and is it not in their power to help you?" asked the
visitor.
The poor woman shook her head despondingly. Their children were all
living, she said; but, she did not know how it was, the boys, as they
grew up to be men, got into bad ways, and were often worse off than
themselves. The girl had married respectably, but she seldom came near
her parents. The poor woman spoke this with evident reluctance.
"She is an unnatural child," said Hallet, impatiently; "and I hope she
may find out some day what it is to have one of the same sort herself."
"Don't, John, don't!" remonstrated the wife in a low voice. "You know
there is a reason why she does not come here."
Mr. Ekworth hastened to change the subject. He did not wish to learn
more of the family history of his old workman.
It was not difficult to guess it. The boys, misguided by their father's
example, had probably followed in the course which had brought ruin
on him and them. And the daughter, he afterwards discovered, after
having borne much suffering, and privation, and degradation also, the
consequences of her father's evil habits, left home for service, and
eventually married.
It is true that she did not often visit her parents' miserable home;
but she often, though unknown to her father, relieved their pressing
necessities.
It was some little time before Mr. Ekworth could approach the subject
on which he had lightly touched when, earlier in the day, he had
unexpectedly fallen in with poor Hallet.
It was plain that his had been a downward course, that intemperance
had ruined him in his circumstances, had ruined his sons too, by evil
example, had alienated his daughter, and even the wife of his bosom,
from his affections, and was hastening him to the grave.
Cautiously, at length, the visitor endeavoured to rouse the conscience
of the wretched man, by speaking of his present position and prospects
for eternity.
In a low, but earnest voice, as he drew himself to the invalid's side,
he reminded Hallet of the days when he professed to know something of
the love of the Saviour, and the power of divine grace.
"It was all a delusion, all a delusion!" exclaimed the poor man,
impatiently.
"I fear it was, indeed," said Mr. Ekworth, sadly; "but the gracious and
omnipotent Saviour—"
"Don't talk about it, Mr. Ekworth," exclaimed the agitated man; "I told
you this morning what my state is; and there's a voice that says about
me, 'He is joined to idols; let him alone.' I know what the end will
be; you need not tell me about that. Don't talk about religion, sir;
anything but that."
"I must talk about it, my poor friend," said Mr. Ekworth, in some
distress of mind. "I came on purpose to tell you that Jesus is willing,
and waiting, and seeking to save the lost, and is able to save to the
very uttermost. Think of Him, my friend; and the more you think of Him,
the less reason will you find for despairing of His mercy."
The man wept. "I tell you what it is, Mr. Ekworth," said he, "I have
thought about it all, again and again. And I have made resolutions, I
cannot tell how often; but it has been of no use. I am like those whom
the apostle describes, 'Clouds without water; . . . trees whose fruit
withereth, . . . twice dead, plucked up by the roots; raging waves of
the sea, foaming up their own shame; wandering stars—' you know what
follows, Mr. Ekworth." And the man rocked himself in his chair, and
groaned deeply.
Once more did the pious visitor speak. "You cannot," he said, "surely
you dare not give up everything as lost! Think of eternity—of the
blackness of darkness for ever! and then flee to the strong for
strength. You have made resolutions in your own strength—you have not
sought the help of His Holy Spirit. You know you have not. I reminded
you this morning, I tell you again, that there is One who can subdue
your iniquities, and can cast all your sins into the depths of the sea.
Go to Him."
"It is of no use," said Hallet, impatiently. "There is nothing you can
say, sir, that I do not already know; but you do not know how hard my
heart is. I know as well as you can tell me, that I have brought ruin
on myself and my poor wife and family, and am killing myself by inches;
and you know well how it began, Mr. Ekworth, for you warned me twenty
years ago, when you first knew of my goings on at the Eight Bells; but
it is of no use. I am just what I have made myself; and know where it
is said, 'He which is filthy, let him be filthy still.'"
It seemed useless to urge with one who, while he knew what the
consequences of his sins had been—what the eternal consequences would
be, yet loved them too well to relinquish them; and at length Mr.
Ekworth gave up the contest.
"I cannot say more to you, Hallet," he said, "but I must pray for you
and with you."
And kneeling down, he poured out earnest supplications for the unhappy
slave of sin, and then he rose to depart.
He did not take leave, however, till he had, unobserved by the
infatuated sinner, placed a small sum in the hands of the poor wife as
she accompanied him to the door.
Henry Ekworth seemed to breathe a freer air when he emerged into the
dismal court below.
"I told you, Henry," said Mr. Ekworth to his son, as they walked on
towards their lodgings, "that poor Hallet's history is another of the
voices of the Eight Bells."
———————
Henry Ekworth had been a year or two in a solicitor's office. His
duties sometimes compelled his attendance at criminal courts.
One day, when he entered, a young man stood in the prisoner's dock
on trial for robbing his employer. Such trials, alas, are fearfully
common; and Henry would have paid little attention to the proceedings,
if, in the youthful prisoner, he had not recognised his old playfellow,
Albert.
With a heavy heart, he listened then. The trial was short, for the
witnesses were few, but the evidence was conclusive; and, without
leaving the box, the jury pronounced the prisoner guilty.
Henry Ekworth left the court in great distress of mind; and on the
following day he visited the young convict in prison.
"Ah, Henry!" said the unhappy youth. "If I had been brought up as you
were, I should not be here now. It is all the fault of my father."
"Do not say that, Albert," said Henry; "it is not, cannot be, right to
indulge in such thoughts."
"You would say, I suppose," returned Albert, "that the Bible tells us
to honour our fathers and mothers. Well, I have nothing to say about my
mother. She is dead; and if she had not been, this would have killed
her. But as to honouring my father, I cannot, and will not. And I say
that it is his fault that I am here."
Henry was much shocked, and he said so.
"I dare say you are, Henry," replied the young man, "but you need not
be so much surprised. I don't say that my father taught me to steal;
but you know how he came to ruin himself, and all of us. And if he did
not teach me to steal, he taught me to drink, and I say it is all his
fault; and now I do not care what becomes of me."
Yes, it was true enough, said the convicted prisoner, he had robbed his
employer.
He had pleaded "not guilty" at the bar, because he was advised to
do so, and it was a matter of course to do it; but he was guilty
notwithstanding. As to why he did it, it was infatuation, he supposed.
He had learned to like strong drink from his father's example, and had
stolen to obtain the means of buying it.
This was Albert's story; and as Henry Ekworth heard it, he thought of
the Eight Bells and their mournful voices, and this, not the least
mournful of them all.
Again and again did Henry visit his unhappy former companion, and in
kindly, affectionate tones did he strive to lead him to penitence
and prayer; to rouse him to hope; and to gird him—not in his own
strength—to strong resolutions for time to come.
Such are some of the voices of the Eight Bells; and many more were
heard, of which no record has been kept on earth; but which, in other
and more enduring records, will tell of shame, poverty sorrow, guilt,
death, and after that the judgment.