Yet, how few believe such doctrine springs
From a poor root,
Which all the winter sleeps here under foot,
And hath no wings
To raise it to the truth and light of things;
But is stil trod
By ev'ry wand'ring clod.
O Thou, Whose Spirit did at first inflame
And warm the dead,
And by a sacred incubation fed
With life this frame,
Which once had neither being, forme, nor name,
Grant I may so
Thy steps track here below,
That in these masques and shadows I may see
Thy sacred way;
And by those hid ascents climb to that day
Which breaks from Thee,
Who art in all things, though invisibly,
"_The Hidden Flower_."
HENRY VAUGHAN.
One of the causes which helped to develop my sister's interest in
flowers was the sight of the fresh ones that she met with on going to
live in New Brunswick after her marriage. Every strange face was a
subject for study, and she soon began to devote a note-book to
sketches of these new friends, naming them scientifically from
Professor Asa Gray's _Manual of the Botany of the Northern United
States_, whilst Major Ewing added as many of the Melicete names as he
could glean from Peter, a member of the tribe, who had attached
himself to the Ewings, and used constantly to come about their house.
Peter and his wife lived in a small colony of the Melicete Indians,
which was established on the opposite side of the St. John River to
that on which the Reka Dom stood. Mrs. Peter was the most skilful
embroiderer in beads amongst her people, and Peter himself the best
canoe-builder. He made a beautiful one for the Ewings, which they
constantly used; and when they returned to England his regret at
losing them was wonderfully mitigated by the present which Major Ewing
gave him of an old gun; he declared no gentleman had ever thought of
giving him such a thing before!
Julie introduced several of the North American flowers into her
stories. The Tabby-striped Arum, or Jack-in-the-Pulpit (as it is
called in Mr. Whittier's delightful collection of child-poems[30]),
appears in "We and the World," where Dennis, the rollicking Irish
hero, unintentionally raises himself in the estimation of his
sober-minded Scotch companion Alister, by betraying that he "can
speak with other tongues," from his ability to converse with a squaw
in French on the subject of the bunch of Arums he had gathered, and
was holding in his hand.
[Footnote 30: _Child Life._ Edited by J.G. Whittier. Nesbitt and Co.]
This allusion was only a slight one, but Julie wrote a complete story
on one species of Trillium, having a special affection for the whole
genus. Trilliums are amongst the North American herbaceous plants
which have lately become fashionable, and easy to be bought in
England; but ere they did so, Julie made some ineffectual attempts to
transplant tubers of them into English soil; and the last letter she
received from Fredericton contained a packet of red Trillium seeds,
which came too late to be sown before she died. The species which she
immortalized in "The Blind Hermit and the Trinity Flower," was _T.
erythrocarpum_. The story is a graceful legend of an old Hermit whose
life was spent in growing herbs for the healing of diseases; and when
he, in his turn, was struck with blindness, he could not reconcile
himself to the loss of the occupation which alone seemed to make him
of use in the world. "They also serve who only stand and wait" was a
hard lesson to learn; every day he prayed for some Balm of Gilead to
heal his ill, and restore his sight, and the prayer was answered,
though not in the manner that he desired. First he was supplied with a
serving-boy, who became eyes and feet to him, from gratitude for
cures which the Hermit had done to the lad himself; and then a vision
was granted to the old man, wherein he saw a flower which would heal
his blindness:--
[Illustration: TRILLIUM ERYTHROCARPUM.]
"And what was the Trinity Flower like, my Father?" asked the boy.
"It was about the size of Herb Paris, my son," replied the Hermit.
"But, instead of being fourfold every way, it numbered the mystic
Three. Every part was threefold. The leaves were three, the petals
three, the sepals three. The flower was snow-white, but on each of
the three parts it was stained with crimson stripes, like white
garments dyed in blood."
A root of this plant was sent to the Hermit by a heavenly messenger,
which the boy planted, and anxiously watched the growth of, cheering
his master with the hope--"Patience, my Father, thou shalt see yet!"
Meantime greater light was breaking in upon the Hermit's soul than had
been there before:
"My son, I repent me that I have not been patient under affliction.
Moreover, I have set thee an ill example, in that I have murmured
at that which God--Who knoweth best--ordained for me."
And, when the boy ofttimes repeated, "Thou shalt yet see," the
Hermit answered, "If God will. When God will. As God will."
And at last, when the white bud opens, and the blood-like stains are
visible within, he who once was blind sees, but his vision is opened
on eternal Day.
In _Aunt Judy's Magazine_ for 1877 there is another Flower Legend, but
of an English plant, the Lily of the Valley. Julie called the tale by
the old-fashioned name of the flower, "Ladders to Heaven." The scenery
is pictured from spots near her Yorkshire home, where she was
accustomed to seeing beautiful valleys blackened by smoke from
iron-furnaces, and the woods beyond the church, where she liked to
ramble, filled with desolate heaps of black shale, the refuse left
round the mouths of disused coal and iron-stone pits. I remember how
glad we were when we found the woolly-leaved yellow Mullein growing on
some of these dreary places, and helping to cover up their nakedness.
In later years my sister heard with much pleasure that a mining friend
was doing what he could to repair the damages he had made on the
beauty of the country, by planting over the worked-out mines such
trees and plants as would thrive in the poor and useless shale, which
was left as a covering to once rich and valuable spots.
[Illustration: ST. MARY'S CHURCH, ECCLESFIELD.]
"Brothers of Pity" (_Aunt Judy's Magazine_, 1877) shows a deep and
minute insight into the feelings of a solitary child, which one
fancies Julie must have acquired by the process of contrast with her
own surroundings of seven brethren and sisters. A similar power of
perception was displayed in her verses on "An Only Child's Tea-party."
She remembered from experiences of our own childhood what a favourite
game "funerals" is with those whose "whole vocation" is yet "endless
imitation"; and she had watched the soldiers' children in camp play at
it so often that she knew it was not only the bright covering of the
Union Jack which made death lovely in their eyes, "Blind Baby" enjoyed
it for the sake of the music; and even civilians' children, who see
the service devoid of sweet sounds, and under its blackest and most
revolting aspect, still are strangely fascinated thereby. Julie had
heard about one of these, a lonely motherless boy, whose chief joy was
to harness Granny to his "hearse" and play at funeral processions
round the drawing-room, where his dead mother had once toddled in her
turn.
The boy in "Brothers of Pity" is the principal character, and the
animals occupy minor positions. Cock-Robin only appears as a corpse on
the scene; and Julie did not touch much on bird pets in any of her
tales, chiefly because she never kept one, having too much sympathy
with their powers and cravings for flight to reconcile herself to
putting them in cages. The flight and recapture of Cocky in "Lob" were
drawn from life, though the bird did not belong to her, but her
descriptions of how he stood on the window-sill "scanning the summer
sky with his fierce eyes, and flapping himself in the breeze,... bowed
his yellow crest, spread his noble wings, and sailed out into the
æther";... and his "dreams of liberty in the tree-tops," all show the
light in which she viewed the practice of keeping birds in
confinement. Her verses on "Three Little Nest-Birds" and her tale of
the Thrush in "An Idyll of the Wood" bear witness to the same feeling.
Major Ewing remembers how often she used to wish, when passing
bird-shops, that she could "buy the whole collection and set them all
free,"--a desire which suggests a quaint vision of her in Seven
Dials, with a mixed flock of macaws, canaries, parrots and thrushes
shrieking and flying round her head; but the wish was worthy of her in
(what Mr. Howells called) "woman's heaven-born ignorance of the
insuperable difficulties of doing right."
In this (1877) volume of _Aunt Judy's Magazine_ there is a striking
portrait of another kind of animal pet, the "Kit" who is resolved to
choose her own "cradle," and not to sleep where she is told. It is
needless to say that she gets her own way, since,--
There's a soft persistence about a cat
That even a little kitten can show.
She has, however, the grace to purr when she is pleased, which all
kits and cats have not!
I'm happy in ev'ry hair of my fur,
They may keep the hamper and hay themselves.
There are three other sets of verses in the volume, and all of them
were originally written to old wood-cuts, but have since been
re-illustrated by Mr. André, and published by the S.P.C.K.
"A Sweet Little Dear" is the personification of a selfish girl, and
"Master Fritz" of an equally selfish boy; but his sister Katerina is
delicious by contrast, as she gives heed to his schemes--
And if you make nice feasts every day for me and Nickel, and never
keep us waiting for our food,
And always do everything I want, and attend to everything I say, I'm
sure I shall almost always be good.
And if I'm naughty now and then, it'll most likely be your fault: and
if it isn't, you mustn't mind;
For even if I seem to be cross, you ought to know that I meant to be
kind.
An old-fashioned fairy tale, "The Magician turned Mischief-maker,"
came out in 1877; and a short domestic tale called "A Bad Habit"; but
Julie was unable to supply any long contributions this year, as in
April her seven-years home at Aldershot was broken up in consequence
of Major Ewing being ordered to Manchester, and her time was occupied
by the labour and process of removing.
She took down the motto which she had hung over her hearth to temper
her joy in the comfort thereof,--_Ut migraturus habita_,--and moved
the scroll on to her next resting-place. No one knew better than she
the depth of Mrs. Hemans' definition,--"What is home,--and where,--but
_with the loving_--" and most truly can it be said that wherever Julie
went she carried "Home" with her; freedom, generosity, and loving
welcome were always to be found in her house,--even if upholstery and
carpets ran short! It was a joke amongst some of her friends that
though rose-coloured curtains and bevelled-edged looking-glasses could
be counted upon in their bed-rooms, such commonplace necessities as
soap might be forgotten, and the glasses be fastened in artistic
corners of the rooms, rather than in such lights as were best adapted
for shaving by!
Julie followed the course of the new lines in which her lot was cast
most cheerfully, but the "mighty heart" could not really support the
"little body"; and the fatigue of packing, combined with the effects
of the relaxing climate of Bowdon, near Manchester, where she went to
live, acted sadly upon her constitution. She was able, however, after
settling in the North, to pay more frequent visits to Ecclesfield than
before; and the next work that she did for _Aunt Judy's Magazine_
bears evidences of the renewal of Yorkshire associations.
[Illustration: SOUTH CAMP, ALDERSHOT.]
This story, "We and the World," was specially intended for boys, and
the "law of contrast" in it was meant to be drawn between the career
which Cripple Charlie spent at home, and those of the three lads who
went out into "the world" together. Then, too, she wished, as I
mentioned before, to contrast the national types of character in the
English, Scotch, and Irish heroes, and to show the good contained in
each of them. But the tale seemed to have been begun under an unlucky
star. The first half, which came out in the first six numbers of the
Magazine for 1878, is excellent as a matter of art; and as pictures of
North-country life and scenery nothing can be better than Walnut-tree
Farm and Academy, the Miser's Funeral, and the Bee-master's Visit to
his Hives on the Moors, combined with attendance at Church on a hot
Sunday afternoon in August (it need scarcely be said that the church
is a real one). But, good though all this is, it is too long and "out
of proportion," when one reflects how much of the plot was left to be
unravelled in the other half of the tale. "The World" could not
properly be squeezed into a space only equal in size to that which had
been devoted to "Home." If Julie had been in better health, she would
have foreseen the dilemma into which she was falling, but she did not,
and in the autumn of 1878 she had to lay the tale aside, for Major
Ewing was sent to be stationed at York. "We" was put by until the
following volume, but for this (1878) one she wrote two other short
contributions,--"The Yellow Fly, a Tale with a Sting in it," and
"So-so."
To those who do not read between the lines, "So-so" sounds (as he
felt) "very soft and pleasant," but to me the tale is in Julie's
saddest strain, because of the suspicion of hopelessness that pervades
it;--a spirit which I do not trace in any of her other writings.
"Be sure, my child," said the widow to her little daughter, "that
you always do just as you are told."
"Very well, mother."
"Or at any rate do what will do just as well," said the small
house-dog, as he lay blinking at the fire.
* * * * *
"For the future, my child," said the widow, "I hope you will always
do just as you are told, whatever So-so may say."
"I will, mother," said little Joan. (And she did.) But the
house-dog sat and blinked. He dared not speak, he was in disgrace.
"I do not feel quite sure about So-so. Wild dogs often amend their
ways far on this side of the gallows, and the Faithful sometimes
fall, but when any one begins by being only so-so, he is very apt
to be so-so to the end. So-so's so seldom change."
Before turning from the record of my sister's life at Manchester, I
must mention a circumstance which gave her very great pleasure there.
In the summer of 1875 she and I went up from Aldershot to see the
Exhibition of Water-Colours by the Royal Society of Painters, and she
was completely fascinated by a picture of Mr. J.D. Watson's, called "A
Gentleman of the Road." It represented a horseman at daybreak,
allowing his horse to drink from a stream, whilst he sat half-turned
in the saddle to look back at a gallows which was visible on the
horizon against the beams of rising light. The subject may sound very
sensational, but it was not that aspect of it which charmed my sister;
she found beauty as well as romance in it, and after we returned to
camp in the evening she became so restless and engrossed by what she
had seen, that she got up during the night, and planned out the
headings of a story on the picture, adding--characteristically--a
moral or "soul" to the subject by a quotation[31] from Thomas à
Kempis--_Respice finem_. "In all things _remember the end_."
[Footnote 31: Letter, March 22, 1880.]
This "mapped-out" story, I am sorry to say, remains unfinished. The
manuscript went through many vicissitudes, was inadvertently torn up
and thrown into the waste-paper basket, whence it was rescued and the
pieces carefully enclosed in an envelope ready for mending. It was
afterwards lost again for many months in a box that was sent abroad,
but the fragments have been put together and copied, as they are
interesting from the promise that lies in the few words that remain.
A GENTLEMAN OF THE ROAD.
The old schoolmaster sat on a tombstone, an ancient altar-shaped
tomb which may have been reared when the yew tree above it was
planted. Children clustered round him like bees upon a branch, and
he held the book wide open so that, if possible, all might see into
it at once. It was not a school-book, it was a picture book, the
one out of which he told tales to the children on half-holidays.
The volume was old and the text was in Latin, a language of which
the schoolmaster had some little knowledge.
He could read the dial motto pat,--_Via crucis via lucis_. The Way
of the Cross is the Way of Light.
He understood the Latin headings to the Psalms and Canticles better
than the clerk, for he could adjust the words to their English
equivalents. The clerk took them as they stood, _Nunc dimittis_, or
the Song of Simeon. It was put down so in the rubric, he said, as
plain as "Here endeth the first lesson."
The schoolmaster made no such blunders. He could say the Lord's
Prayer in Latin, and part of the Creed, and from his seat in church
he could make out most of the virtues credited to the last account
of one Roger Beaufoy, who in this life had been entitled to write
Esquire after his name. The name kept the title after
it--_Armiger_--though the man himself had long departed to a life
with other distinctions. If the tablet were to be believed, he had
been a gentle squire too. The schoolmaster was wont to murmur the
list of his qualities over to himself:
_fortis_--_mitis_--_suavis_--_largus_--_urbanus_:--_desideratissimus_
too, and no marvel!--_nobili genere natus_--and _tam corpore quam
vultus præclarus_!
It was a goodly list that the schoolmaster muttered over, and when
it was done he would add--"His very portrait, every line, every
word of it!" And then he would sigh.
Old as he was, the schoolmaster was not bearing testimony to the
truth of the inscription as regarded the man he referred to; that
Roger Beaufoy had gone back with all his virtues and his vices to
the Maker of Souls long before the schoolmaster could read what had
been written of him by the maker of epitaphs. It was to the
character of another Roger--the great-grandson of this squire--that
the old man adapted the graceful flattery of the epitaph. It fitted
in every fold, and yet he sighed. For in this Roger, as in that,
the sterner virtues were lacking. They had not even been supplied
upon the marble, though that is a charity not uncommonly granted
to the dead. But when the genial virtues abound, the world misses
the others so little!
[Here the sheet of paper is torn, but from the words on the part left
it is evident that there was a description of the frontispiece in the
schoolmaster's book. Apparently the subject of the picture was
allegorical, and the figures of "monstrous beasts" were interspersed
with "devices" and "scrolls with inscriptions," together with figures]
of kneeling saints, or pilgrims treading the Via Vitæ with
sandalled shoes and heavy staves; and between the lips of dolorous
faces in penal fires issued the words _O Æternitas! Æternitas!_
All these things the schoolmaster duly interpreted, but the rest of
the story he made up out of his own head, a custom which had this
among other advantages, that the stories were not always the same,
which they must have been had the good man been a merely fluent
translator.
At the schoolmaster's elbow nestled his little granddaughter. By
herself she could not have secured so good a place, for she was
fragile and very gentle, and most of the other children were rough
and strong. "First come first served" was the motto of their play.
First-come was served first because he helped himself, and the only
exception to the rule was when Second-come happened to be stronger
and took his place.
This fragment at any rate serves to show what a strong impression the
picture had made upon Julie's mind, so it will readily be imagined how
intensely delighted she was when she unexpectedly made the
acquaintance, at Manchester, of Mr. Galloway, who proved to have
bought Mr. Watson's work, and he was actually kind enough to lend the
treasure to her for a considerable time, so that she could study it
thoroughly, and make a most accurate copy of it. Mr. Galloway's
friendship, and that of some other people whom she first met at
Bowdon, were the brightest spots in Julie's existence during this
period.
In September 1878 the Ewings removed to Fulford, near York, and, on
their arrival, Julie at once devoted herself to adorning her new home.
We were very much amused by the incredulous amazement betrayed on the
stolid face of an elderly workman, to whom it was explained that he
was required to distemper the walls of the drawing-room with a sole
colour, instead of covering them with a paper, after the manner of all
the other drawing-rooms he had ever had to do with. But he was too
polite to express his difference of taste by more than looks;--and
some days after the room was finished, with etchings duly hung on
velvet in the panels of the door,--the sole-coloured walls well
covered with pictures, whence they stood out undistracted by gold and
flowery paper patterns--the distemperer called, and asked if he might
be allowed, as a favour, to see the result of Mrs. Ewing's
arrangements. I forget if he expressed anything by words, as he stood
in the middle of the room twisting his hat in his fingers--but we had
learned to read his face, and Julie was fully satisfied with the fresh
expression of amazement mixed with admiration which she saw there.
One theory which she held strongly about the decoration of houses was,
that the contents ought to represent the associations of the inmates,
rather than the skill of their upholsterer; and for this reason she
would not have liked to limit any of her rooms to one special period,
such as Queen Anne's, unless she had possessed an old house, built at
some date to which a special kind of furniture belonged. She contrived
to make her home at York a very pretty one; but it was of short
duration, for in March 1879 Major Ewing was despatched to Malta, and
Julie had to begin to pack her _Lares_ and _Penates_ once more.
It may, perhaps, be wondered that she was allowed to spend her time
and strength on the labour of packing, which a professional worker
would have done far better,--but it is easier to see the mistakes of
others than to rectify our own! There were many difficulties to be
encountered, not the least of these being Julie's own strong will, and
bad though it was, in one sense, for her to be physically over-tired,
it was better than letting her be mentally so; and to an active brain
like hers, "change of occupation" is the only possible form of "rest."
Professional packers and road and rail cars represent money, and
Julie's skill in packing both securely and economically was
undeniably great. This is not surprising if we hold, as an old friend
does, that ladies would make far better housemaids than uneducated
women do, because they would throw their brains as well as muscles
into their work. Julie did throw her brains into everything, big or
little, that she undertook; and one of her best and dearest
friends,--whose belief in my sister's powers and "mission" as a writer
were so strong that she almost grudged even the time "wasted" on
sketching, which might have been given to penning more stories for the
age which boasts Gordon as its hero,--and who, being with Julie at her
death, could not believe till the very End came that she would be
taken, whilst so much seemed to remain for her to do here,--confessed
to me afterwards she had learned to see that Julie's habit of
expending her strength on trifles arose from an effort of nature to
balance the vigour of her mind, which was so much greater than that of
her body.
During the six months that my sister resided in York she wrote a few
contributions for _Aunt Judy's Magazine_. To the number for January
1879 she gave "Flaps," a sequel to "The Hens of Hencastle."
The latter story was not written by her, but was a free adaptation
which Colonel Yeatman-Biggs made from the German of Victor Blüthgen.
Julie had been greatly amused by the tale, but, finding that it ended
in a vague and unsatisfactory way, she could not be contented, so took
up her pen and wrote a _finale_, her chief aim being to provide a
happy ending for the old farm-dog, Flaps himself, after whom she named
her sequel. The writing is so exactly similar to that of "The Hens,"
that the two portions can scarcely be identified as belonging to
different writers. Julie used often to reproach me for indulging in
what John Wesley called "the lust of finishing," but in matters
concerning her own art she was as great an offender on this score as
any one else!
Julie gave a set of verses on "Canada Home" to the same number as
"Flaps," and to the March (1879) number she gave some other verses on
"Garden Lore." In April the second part of "We and the World" began to
appear, and a fresh character was introduced, who is one of the most
important and touching features of the tale. Biddy Macartney is a real
old Irish melody in herself, with her body tied to a coffee-barrow in
the Liverpool Docks, and her mind ever wandering in search of the son
who had run away to sea. Jack, the English hero, comes across Biddy
in the docks just before he starts as a stowaway for America, and his
stiff, crude replies to her voluble outpourings are essentially
British and boy-like:--
"You hope Micky 'll come back, I suppose?"
"Why wouldn't I, acushla? Sure, it was by reason o' that I got
bothered with the washin' after me poor boy left me, from my mind
being continually in the docks instead of with the clothes. And
there I would be at the end of the week, with the captain's jerseys
gone to old Miss Harding, and _his_ washing no corricter than
_hers_, though he'd more good-nature in him over the accidents, and
iron-moulds on the table-cloths, and pocket-handkerchers missin',
and me ruined intirely with making them good, and no thanks for it,
till a good-natured sowl of a foreigner that kept a pie-shop larned
me to make the coffee, and lint me the money to buy a barra, and he
says, 'Go as convanient to the ships as ye can, mother: it'll ease
your mind. My own heart,' says he, laying his hand to it, 'knows
what it is to have my body here, and the whole sowl of me far
away.'"
"Did you pay him back?" I asked. I spoke without thinking, and
still less did I mean to be rude; but it had suddenly struck me
that I was young and hearty, and that it would be almost a duty to
share the contents of my leather bag with this poor old woman, if
there were no chance of her being able to repay the generous
foreigner.
"Did I pay him back?" she screamed. "Would I be the black-hearted
thief to him that was kind to me? Sorra bit nor sup but dry bread
and water passed me lips till he had his own again, and the heart's
blessings of owld Biddy Macartney along with it."
I made my peace with old Biddy as well as I could, and turned the
conversation back to her son.
"So you live in the docks with your coffee-barrow, mother, that you
may be sure not to miss Micky when he comes ashore?"
"I do, darlin'! Fourteen years all but three days! He'll be gone
fifteen if we all live till Wednesday week."
"_Fifteen?_ But, mother, if he were like me when he went, he can't
be very like me now. He must be a middle-aged man. Do you think
you'd know him?"
This question was more unfortunate than the other, and produced
such howling and weeping, and beating of Biddy's knees as she
rocked herself among the beans, that I should have thought every
soul in the docks would have crowded round us. But no one took any
notice, and by degrees I calmed her, chiefly by the
assertion--"He'll know you, mother, anyhow."
"He will so, GOD bless him!" said she. "And haven't I gone
over it all in me own mind, often and often, when I'd see the
vessels feelin' their way home through the darkness, and the coffee
staymin' enough to cheer your heart wid the smell of it, and the
least taste in life of something betther in the stone bottle under
me petticoats. And then the big ship would be coming in with her
lights at the head of her, and myself would be sitting alone with
me patience, GOD helping me, and one and another strange
face going by. And then he comes along, cold maybe, and smells the
coffee. 'Bedad, but that's a fine smell with it,' says he, for
Micky was mighty particular in his aitin' and drinkin'. 'I'll take
a dhrop of that,' says he, not noticing me particular, and if ever
I'd the saycret of a good cup he gets it, me consayling me face.
'What will it be?' says he, setting down the mug. 'What would it
be, Micky, from your mother?' says I, and I lifts me head. Arrah,
but then there's the heart's delight between us. 'Mother!' says he.
'Micky!' says I. And he lifts his foot and kicks over the barra,
and dances me round in his arms. 'Ochone!' says the spictators;
'there's the fine coffee that's running into the dock.' 'Let it
run,' says I, in the joy of me heart, 'and you after it, and the
barra on the top of ye, now Micky me son's come home!'"
"Wonderfully jolly!" said I. "And it must be pleasant even to think
of it."
There is another new character in the second part of "We," who is also
a fine picture:--Alister the blue-eyed Scotch lad, with his respect
for "book-learning," and his powers of self-denial and endurance; but
Julie certainly had a weakness for the Irish nation, and the tender
grace with which she touches Dennis O'Moore and Biddy shines
conspicuously throughout the story. In one scene, however, I think she
brings up her Scotch hero neck-and-neck, if not ahead, of her
favourite Irishman.
This is in Chapter VII., where an entertainment is being held on board
ship, and Dennis and Alister are called upon in turn to amuse the
company with a song. Dennis gets through his ordeal well; he has a
beautiful voice, which makes him independent of the accompaniment of a
fiddle (the only musical instrument on board), and Julie describes his
_simpatico_ rendering of "Bendemeer's Stream" from the way in which
she loved to hear one of our brothers sing it. He had learned it by
ear on board ship from a fellow-passenger, and she was never tired of
listening to the melody. When this same brother came to visit her
whilst she was ill at Bath, and sang to her as she lay in
bed,--"Bendemeer's Stream" was the one strain she asked for, and the
last she heard.
Dennis O'Moore's performance met with warm applause, and then the
boatswain, who had a grudge against Alister, because the Scotch
Captain treated his countryman with leniency, taunted the shy and
taciturn lad to "contribute to the general entertainment."
I was very sorry for Alister, and so was Dennis, I was sure, for he
did his best to encourage him.
"Sing 'GOD Save the Queen,' and I'll keep well after ye
with the fiddle," he suggested. But Alister shook his head. "I know
one or two Scotch tunes," Dennis added, and he began to sketch out
an air or two with his fingers on the strings.
Presently Alister stopped him. "Yon's the Land o' the Leal?"
"It is," said Dennis.
"Play it a bit quicker, man, and I'll try 'Scots, wha hae.'"
Dennis quickened at once, and Alister stood forward. He neither
fidgeted nor complained of feeling shy, but, as my eyes (I was
squatted cross-legged on the deck) were at the level of his knees,
I could see them shaking, and pitied him none the less that I was
doubtful as to what might not be before _me_. Dennis had to make
two or three false starts before poor Alister could get a note out
of his throat, but when he had fairly broken the ice with the word
"Scots!" he faltered no more. The boatswain was cheated a second
time of his malice. Alister could not sing in the least like
Dennis, but he had a strong manly voice, and it had a ring that
stirred one's blood, as he clenched his hands and rolled his R's to
the rugged appeal--
Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled,
Scots, wham Bruce has aften led;
Welcome to your gory bed,
Or to victory!
Applause didn't seem to steady his legs in the least, and he never
moved his eyes from the sea, and his face only grew whiter by the
time he drove all the blood to my heart with--
Wha will be a traitor knave?
Wha can fill a coward's grave?
Wha sae base as be a slave?
Let him turn and flee!
"GOD forbid!" cried Dennis impetuously. "Sing that verse
again, my boy, and give us a chance to sing with ye!" which we did
accordingly; but, as Alister and Dennis were rolling R's like the
rattle of musketry on the word _turn_, Alister did turn, and
stopped suddenly short. The Captain had come up unobserved.
"Go on!" said he, waving us back to our places.
By this time the solo had become a chorus. Beautifully unconscious,
for the most part, that the song was by way of stirring Scot
against Saxon, its deeper patriotism had seized upon us all.
Englishmen, Scotchmen, and sons of Erin, we all shouted at the top
of our voices, Sambo's fiddle not being silent. And I maintain that
we all felt the sentiment with our whole hearts, though I doubt if
any but Alister and the Captain knew and sang the precise words--
Wha for Scotland's King and law
Freedom's sword will strongly draw,
Freeman stand, or freeman fa'?
Let him on wi' me!
The description of Alister's song, as well as that of Dennis, was to
some extent drawn from life, Julie having been accustomed to hear
"Scots, wha hae" rendered by a Scot with more soul than voice, who
always "moved the hearts of the people as one man" by his patriotic
fire.
My sister was greatly aided by two friends in her descriptions of the
scenery in "We," such as the vivid account of Bermuda and the
waterspout in Chapter XI., and that of the fire at Demerara in Chapter
XII., and she owed to the same kind helpers also the accuracy of her
nautical phrases and her Irish dialect. Certainly this second part of
the tale is full of interest, but I cannot help wishing that the
materials had been made into two books instead of one. There are more
than enough characters and incidents to have developed into a couple
of tales.
Julie had often said how strange it seemed to her, when people who had
a ready pen for _writing_ consulted her as to what they should _write
about_! She suffered so much from over-abundance of ideas which she
had not the physical strength to put on paper.
Even when she was very ill, and unable to use her hands at all, the
sight of a lot of good German wood-cuts, which were sent to me at
Bath, suggested so many fresh ideas to her brain, that she only longed
to be able to seize her pen and write tales to the pictures.
Before we turn finally away from the subject of her liking for Irish
people, I must mention a little adventure which happened to her at
Fulford.
There is one parish in York where a great number of Irish peasants
live, and many of the women used to pass Julie's windows daily, going
out to work in the fields at Fulford. She liked to watch them trudging
by, with large baskets perched picturesquely on the tops of their
heads, but in the town the "Irishers" are not viewed with equal favour
by the inhabitants. One afternoon Julie was out sketching in a field,
and came across one of these poor Irish women. My sister's mind at the
time was full of Biddy Macartney, and she could not resist the
opportunity of having a chat with this suggestive "study" for the
character. She found an excuse for addressing the old woman about some
cattle which seemed restless in the field, but quickly discovered, to
her amusement, that when she alluded to Ireland, her companion, in the
broadest brogue, stoutly denied having any connection with the
country. No doubt she thought Julie's prejudices would be similar to
those of her town neighbours, but in a short time some allusion was
inadvertently made to "me father's farm in Kerry," and the truth
leaked out. After this they became more confidential; and when Julie
admired some quaint silver rings on her companion's finger, the old
woman was most anxious to give her one, and was only restrained by
coming to the decision that she would give her a recipe for "real
Irish whisky" instead. She began with "You must take some barley and
put it in a poke--" but after this Julie heard no more, for she was
distracted by the cattle, who had advanced unpleasantly near; the
Irish woman, however, continued her instructions to the end, waving
her arms to keep the beasts off, which she so far succeeded in doing,
that Julie caught the last sentence--
"And then ye must bury it in a bog."
"Is that to give it a peaty flavour?" asked my sister, innocently.
"Oh, no, me dear!--_it's because of the excise-man_."
When they parted, the old woman's original reserve entirely gave way,
and she cried: "Good luck to ye! _and go to Ireland!_"
Julie remained in England for some months after Major Ewing started
for Malta, and as he was despatched on very short notice, and she had
to pack up their goods; also--as she was not strong--it was decided
that she should avoid going out for the hot summer weather, and wait
for the healthier autumn season. Her time, therefore, was now chiefly
spent amongst civilian friends and relations, and I want this fact to
be specially noticed, in connection with the next contributions that
she wrote for the Magazine.
In February 1879, the terrible news had come of the Isandlwana
massacre, and this was followed in June by that of the Prince
Imperial's death. My sister was, of course, deeply engrossed in the
war tidings, as many of her friends went out to South Africa--some to
return no more. In July she contributed "A Soldier's Children" to
_Aunt Judy_, and of all her child verses this must be reckoned the
best, every line from first to last breathing how strong her
sympathies still were for military men and things, though she was no
longer living amongst them:
Our home used to be in the dear old camp, with lots of bands, and
trumpets, and bugles, and dead-marches, and three times a day
there was a gun,
But now we live in View Villa, at the top of the village, and it
isn't nearly such fun.
The humour and pathos in the lines are so closely mixed, it is very
difficult to read them aloud without tears; but they have been
recited--as Julie was much pleased to know--by the "old Father" of
the "Queer Fellows" to whom the verses were dedicated, when he was on
a troopship going abroad for active service, and they were received
with warm approbation by his hearers. He read them on other occasions,
also in public, with equal success.
The crowning military work, however, which Julie did this year was
"Jackanapes." This she wrote for the October number of _Aunt Judy_:
and here let me state that I believe if she had still been living at
Aldershot, surrounded by the atmosphere of military sympathies and
views of honour, the tale would never have been written. It was not
aimed, as some people supposed, personally at the man who was with the
Prince Imperial when he met his death. Julie would never have sat in
judgment on him, even before he, too, joined the rank of those Dead,
about whom no evil may be spoken. It was hearing this same man's
conduct discussed by civilians from the standard of honour which is
unhappily so different in civil and military circles, and more
especially the discussion of it amongst "business men," where the rule
of "each man for himself" is invariable, which drove Julie into
uttering the protest of "Jackanapes." I believe what she longed to
show forth was how the _life_ of an army--as of any other
body--depends on whether the individuality of its members is _dead_; a
paradox which may perhaps be hard to understand, save in the light of
His teaching, Who said that the saving of a man's life lay in his
readiness to lose it. The merging of selfish interests into a common
cause is what makes it strong; and it is from Satan alone we get the
axiom, "Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his
life." Of "Jackanapes" itself I need not speak. It has made Julie's
name famous, and deservedly so, for it not only contains her highest
teaching, but is her best piece of literary art.
There are a few facts connected with the story which, I think, will be
interesting to some of its admirers. My sister was in London in June
1879, and then made the acquaintance of Mr. Randolph Caldecott, for
whose illustrations to Washington Irving's "Bracebridge Hall" and "Old
Christmas" she had an unbounded admiration, as well as for his Toy
Books. This introduction led us to ask him, when "Jackanapes" was
still simmering in Julie's brain, if he would supply a coloured
illustration for it. But as the tale was only written a very short
time before it appeared, and as the illustration was wanted early,
because colours take long to print, Julie could not send the story to
be read, but asked Mr. Caldecott to draw her a picture to fit one of
the scenes in it. The one she suggested was a "fair-haired boy on a
red-haired pony," having noticed the artistic effect produced by this
combination in one of her own nephews, a skilful seven-year-old rider
who was accustomed to follow the hounds.
This coloured illustration was given in _Aunt Judy's Magazine_, with
the tale, but when it was republished as a book, in 1883, the scene
was reproduced on a smaller scale in black and white only.
"Jackanapes" was much praised when it came out in the Magazine, but it
was not until it had been re-issued as a book that it became really
well known. Even then its success was within a hair's-breadth of
failing. The first copies were brought out in dull stone-coloured
paper covers, and that powerful vehicle "the Trade," unable to believe
that a jewel could be concealed in so plain a casket, refused the work
of J.H.E. and R.C. until they had stretched the paper cover on boards,
and coloured the Union Jack which adorns it! No doubt "the Trade"
understands its fickle child "the Public" better than either authors
or artists do, and knows by experience that it requires tempting with
what is pretty to look at, before it will taste. Certainly, if praise
from the public were the chief aim that writers, or any other workers,
strove after, their lives for the most part would consist of
disappointment only, so seldom is "success" granted whilst the power
to enjoy it is present. They alone whose aims are pointed above
earthly praise can stand unmoved amidst neglect or blame, filled with
that peace of a good conscience which the world can neither give nor
take away.