SIGNS IN THE SKY.
A few years passed away, and Mrs. Ede was in possession of the blessings
she prayed for. Her children were all spared to her, in health, and, by
her and their own industry, secured from want. Upon the whole, she had
reason to be satisfied with them, though there was a wider difference in
their characters and attainments than she could have wished to see. She
did not grow restless about what, she supposed, came by nature. She
concluded it to be God’s will that Owen should be “as sharp as a briar,”
active in his business, ready about bringing home things pleasant and
wonderful to hear, and looked upon by his employer and the village at
large as a rising youth who would one day be a credit to his native
place. Nurse concluded it to be God’s will that Owen should be thus,
while his brother and sister were far from being like him. What had made
them dull she scarcely knew; unless it was being out so much on the
hills without companions, or anything to do but to look after the flock,
and knit. They had lost their little learning sadly, and did not now
like going to the Sunday-school, as they forgot during the week what
they had learned the Sunday before, and became ashamed of growing so
tall while they knew so little of what was looked for in a
Sunday-school. At home, too, it was a great temptation to nurse to apply
to Owen when she wanted to speak about anything that interested her, or
to have any little business transacted: he comprehended so much more
readily, observed so much more justly, and sympathised so much more
warmly than his brother and sister. But nurse was very conscientious
about making no differences in her treatment of her children; and she
took pains to bring forward the younger ones, continually saying to
herself, how very steady Ambrose was, and how thankful she ought to be
for a daughter who, like Mildred, made no difficulty of doing whatever
she was asked, as soon as she understood what was meant.
Contented as she thought it her duty to be, nurse could not be otherwise
than rejoiced when a change took place in the family arrangements, which
seemed to open to Ambrose some of the advantages which his brother had
enjoyed. Owen had risen from sorting rags in the mill to offices of
higher trust, and requiring greater accomplishments than were necessary
for the lowest operation of paper-making. He was now made a superior
personage in the mill. It was his business to superintend some processes
of the manufacture; to give the necessary notice to the exciseman when
any paper had to be changed, or to be reweighed by the supervisor before
it was sent out for sale; to see that the excise laws were observed as
to the lettering of the different rooms, and the numbering of the
engines, vats, chests, and presses; to remind his employer when the time
approached for purchasing the yearly license; and (fearful
responsibility!) to take charge of the labels which were to be pasted
upon every ream. Nurse used to call Ambrose to listen, and say how he
should like such a charge, when Owen related that if one label should be
lost, his employer would be liable to a penalty of 200_l._; and that, as
it was necessary to Mr. Waugh’s convenience to purchase five hundred
labels at a time, the destruction of one lot would subject him to be
fined 100,000_l._
Owen rather enjoyed his responsibility; and, with a new sense of
dignity, set about his studies in his leisure hours with more zeal than
ever.—What was better, he entered with all possible earnestness into his
mother’s project of getting his brother into the mill before his honest
influence with Mr. Waugh was exerted for any other object. Mr. Waugh had
not the least objection to make trial of another son of Mrs. Ede’s. He
had heard that the lad was not over-bright; but he could but try; and if
he did not succeed, there were still flocks to be kept on the heath as
before. So Ambrose, with a smile on his sun-browned face, made ready,
the next Monday morning, to set forth, with his brother, for the mill.
“If you find it rather close,” said his mother to him, “being under a
roof from six o’clock to six——”
“But I am to come out for breakfast and dinner, mother.”
“I was going to say, you can get a good deal of air in the two hours
allowed for meals. And you won’t think much of the air on the hills when
you have so much company about you. Think of there being thirty men in
the mill, and ten women, besides the children! You can never be dull;
and you must bring me home the news, as Owen always did.—The dullness
will be for Mildred, when she has not you for a companion any longer. I
say, Mildred, my dear; you must take care and not lose your tongue.”
Mildred did not know that she should have anything to say all day,
except calling to the sheep.
“Why, my dear, I have been thinking that you and Ambrose have never made
yourselves sociable with other young shepherds, as they used to do in my
father’s time. There must be plenty, I am sure, from end to end of
yonder hills; and why should you keep within such a narrow range as you
have kept hitherto? The sheep and you have legs to carry you farther;
and you have eyes to keep your flock from mixing with another. Why
should not you join company with somebody that may be sitting knitting
like you, all alone, and wishing for a chat?”
“There’s Maude Hallowell of the next parish, just above the Birchen
dale; but that’s a long way off,” replied Mildred.
“A long way! Well, I wonder what’s the use of young limbs, to call the
Birchen dale a long way! Try it, my dear; and tell Maude that she should
come over to your side in her turn. But she won’t see such a sight as
you may see, if the day be clear, when you come to the high point of the
ridge over Birchen dale. How I once saw the sea glistening, miles off,
through a gap of the hills!”
“And the island, mother?”
“Why, no. The island lies off there, they tell me; but it was too far
away, I fancy, for me to see it. But, do you try, when you go to look
for Maude Hallowell.”
The Isle of Man was spoken of with great affection by the people here,
as untaxed islands usually are by their neighbours of a taxed country.
Many were the little secret privileges enjoyed throughout this district,
even as far as the village of Arneside,—privileges of participation in
various good things slily brought from the island, in opposition to all
the preaching of the wine-merchants and wholesale grocers of L——, and in
Arneside, of the clergyman and Mr. Waugh the paper-maker. All the
children attached ideas of mystery to the island, which they perpetually
heard mentioned and had never seen; and the getting any nearer to it,—
the actually seeing the sea amidst which it lay, was regarded as an
approach to the revelation of a great secret. Mildred thought she should
like to go and look for Maude.
Nobody had imagined what an event these promotions would prove to the
whole family. It brought more new ideas into their minds than all their
Sunday schooling had done.
Maude was something of a scholar in her way. She might be found sitting
in the heather, her knees up to her chin, and her plaid drawn over her
head, poring over a particular sort of pamphlet, which was the only work
she was much disposed to read. Her distaff lay on the ground beside her,
while she was studying; and when she took it up, she was apt to look
into the sky, or far out seawards, instead of minding her spinning. She
invariably started when Mildred laid a hand on her shoulder, or shouted
on approaching her.
“Why, Maude, what makes your eyes look so big to-day?” asked Mildred,
one sultry afternoon, after having led her flock to a place where she
might possibly find a scanty shade under a birch.
“My eyes? I’m sure I don’t know,” replied Maude, winking, as if to
reduce her eyes to their natural dimensions. “I don’t know what ails my
eyes. But I’ve such a thing to tell you! It takes away my breath to
think of it.”
“The heat’s enough for that. The hill-breeze has hied away, and it is as
hot——Me! I wish the clouds would come up.”
“There will be clouds enough by-and-bye, or water enough at least,—
clouds or no clouds,” Maude solemnly averred. “Has your mother told you
anything about the comet?”
“No. If it is anything bad, I doubt whether she knows it; for she was
merry enough, this morning.”
“Merry enough, I dare say. Not know it! These are not the sort of things
your mother does not know, as I heard a person say last night. Do but
you ask her about the comet, in a natural way, and see what she will
say. No, don’t ask her. Safer not. I’ll tell you.—You see this book. If
you will believe me, there is a comet coming up as fast as it can come,
and it will raise a flood that will drown——O Mildred, ’tis awful to
think of.”
“What will it drown? Not our poor sheep?”
“Our sheep and us too. My dear, the sea will come pouring through that
gap, and fill up all below, and leave us no footing on all these hills.”
“Mercy, Maude! I must go and tell my mother; my poor mother!” exclaimed
Mildred, starting up from her blossomy seat.
“Your mother will be safe enough,” Maude replied constrainedly.
“Safe! How? Why?”
“Ahem!”
“Now, Maude, do tell me what you mean. Are you sure?”
“Yes, that I am; and you may know when it is coming, by the signs. The
book tells the signs; but you must hold your tongue about them, the book
says, for fear of bringing on the whole sooner than it need. There will
be black storms coming up first, with thunder and lightning. That is to
be this summer, while the stars stand in a particular way. I’m going to
stay out late to-night, to see how the stars stand. You’ll bide with me,
Mildred?”
Mildred shivered as she reminded her companion how far she had to travel
home: but Maude insisted that it would be necessary to see how the stars
stood, in order to find out afterwards when they began to move on and
cross each other. But before the three great stars came together in the
sky, a cruel enemy was to rise up against the land, and there were to be
some dreadful battles. This revived Mildred’s old terrors about the
Turks; and Maude looked more solemn than ever when she heard how many
years it was since nurse Ede had expected the Turks. By a natural
association of ideas, Maude went on to explain that those who were in
the confidence of the unseen powers, and who might be said to have
brought on these judgments, would be in no danger. They would be safe
amidst the storm they had raised, floating on the surface of the flood
like straws; while all others, as far as the flood should extend, would,
it was strongly apprehended, be drowned, unless they made use of “the
precautions recommended in the supplement to this pamphlet; sold, &c.
&c.” Those who were to be preserved would have warning of the approach
of the crisis by a tingling in the ancles, while the careless and
confident would have another warning given them by a slight, dull pain
near the nape of the neck. So, Mildred was to keep watch for any thing
her mother might say about her ancles, and to take fright directly if
she felt anything about the nape of her own neck.
When she was sufficiently recovered to lay hold of the book, she found
that it was a very curious-looking book indeed, with a great number of
little moons and stars, and the picture of a wise man, and of a large
comet with a fiery tail. She could not but believe now all that Maude
had told her.
How they were to get the other information,—about preserving
themselves,—was the next question. This book had come over from the
island; but not direct into Maude’s hands. It had found its way over the
moors from shepherd to shepherd; and no one now seemed to know to whom
it belonged, and who might be expected to procure the supplement. Owen,
who had so much to do with paper, and who knew all about printing and
books, was certainly the best person to apply to; and Mildred earnestly
begged the loan of the pamphlet, that she might show it to him.
“Ah, if I might!” replied Maude: “but William Scott is to have it next;
and then Bessy is to show it to her father. I dare not let it go direct
to your brother; but when the others have done with it——I’ll quicken
them in the reading, and then hide it under yonder big stone. See, here
is a dry chink where nobody will think of prying. You may find the book
here, early next week. But, for your life, don’t let Owen show it. If he
goes and blabs, there is no saying what will become of us all.”
Mildred did not know what worse could befall than, according to the
book, must happen at all events; and she thought Owen might as well be
trusted as the many people who were already acquainted with the
prophecy.
“I wish,” observed Maude, “the book said which quarter the first storms
would come up from.” And as she spoke she looked towards the sea.
“Ah, how black it is there!” Mildred anxiously observed. “It is coming
up for—for—rain. Don’t you fear so? O Maude, let us be gone! Maude, do,
for pity sake, go part of the way home with me.”
Impossible. Maude must make the best of her way to her own home. If
Mildred made haste, she might perhaps get to Arneside before the clouds
burst. And this affectionate friend hied down the hill as fast as she
could, saying she should send one of her brothers to look after the
sheep. The companion whom she had terrified to the utmost was left to
shift for herself and her flock. The cry of “Maude! O Maude!” followed
her far on her way; but she only turned and waved her hand, to advise
her friend to make haste homewards.
Mildred’s flock did not seem to have observed the signs of the sky. It
was still bright sunshine where they cropped the sweet grass; and they
were unwilling to leave their pasture. Mildred had never known them so
slow in their obedience; and when, at last, the overcast sky conveyed to
them that a storm was coming, they only huddled together, instead of
moving on, and began to bleat and frighten one another in a very piteous
way. Mildred began to cry a little in her flutter; but probably the
sheep did not find it out; for it made no difference in their
proceedings. Their mistress was not long in deciding that she must leave
them to their own wills, and take care of herself; and a crack of
thunder, nearly over head, confirmed her resolution. On she pressed,
along the ridge where there seemed to be no more air than in the closest
thicket in the dale. She panted with heat so violently that she was
compelled to stop, though chased by thunder-clouds, and dreading above
all things to encounter the lightning alone. It came in broad sheets of
flame, and not a drop of rain yet to put it out; as Mildred would have
said. When she reached the point of the ridge from which she must turn
into her own valley, she cast one more glance behind her towards her
flock. She had never seen the hills look as they did to-day. Their tops
were shrouded in darkness; and in the bottom all was nearly as murky as
if the sun had long set. The flock might just be seen in a cluster below
the mists upon the russet hill-side. At the moment when Mildred
discovered them, the clouds seemed to open, and let out a stream of blue
flame upon them. She shrieked; but there was no one to hear her. In
another instant, the poor animals were seen scattered far apart; and
their mistress believed that she saw one stretched on its side; the only
one now on the spot from which they had just fled. She loved every
individual sheep of her flock, more or less; but she could not at
present tarry to see which she had lost. She scudded on, tossed in mind
as to whether she should go home, or stop at some friendly house in the
village. Her mother’s presence had formerly been her refuge whenever she
was frightened; but now she hesitated between a desire to see what nurse
said about the storm, and a dread lest she should have had something to
do with it. She might have left the point to be settled by
circumstances.
It was impossible to walk the whole way with her hands before her eyes.
The next time she looked up, she found that the clouds had been too
quick for her: the storm was now before her. It seemed gathering about
the village, and the grey church looked almost white against the murky
back-ground. Another bolt fell,—fell into the midst of the large yew in
the churchyard, under which Mrs. Arruther’s handsome monument stood,
looking almost new with its bright iron rails round it. The tree was
riven, as if by magic. Mildred was too far off to hear the crash; and to
her it seemed as if the wide-spreading tree had been reached by a finger
of fire, at whose touch it fell asunder, and bestrewed the ground in a
circle. In horror she turned her back to the spectacle; and the dreadful
recollection came into her mind that some people said mysteriously, that
her mother had somehow obtained great influence over Mrs. Arruther; and
others, that it might have been better for Mrs. Arruther to have seen
less of nurse Ede latterly. At this moment, it seemed as if the storm
had been sent on a mission to Arneside churchyard; for westward all was
again bright; and the sea, which was seldom distinguishable from this
point, lay like a golden line on the horizon. Mildred could not but turn
again to watch the progress of the storm. On it sped over the hills,
giving out as yet no rain. It was a bleak and dreary district which now
lay beneath the mass of clouds. A single farm, two miles from Arneside,
was the only visible habitation. Once more the lightning came down among
the group of buildings; and before it had travelled far, a tinge of
smoke rose among the barn roofs, and a red glimmer succeeded, which
Mildred considered as kindled by some malicious power which wrought its
will through the elements. The rain now pattered heavily on the crown of
her head, and she ran, far more swiftly than before, down to the
village. Instead of turning to her mother’s house, she directed her
steps through the village street on her way to the mill. About the
middle of it she found Ambrose, standing very quietly with his hands in
his pockets, staring at a picture which headed a bill pasted up against
a dead wall.
“Look at the fellow! going to fly off from the sail of the windmill,
with a flourish of his long tail,” said Ambrose to a companion, as
Mildred came up. “I wonder what it means?”
“Why, read what it means, man; where’s the use of your learning?” asked
the other. “I am sure those big black letters stare one in the face so,
they might of themselves almost teach a child to read.”
“O, but I lost my learning while I was a shepherd. Mr. Waugh was right
mad with me the other day, because I could make nothing of the
directions of the parcels I had to sort out. I have been getting up my
reading a bit with Owen this week; but you may as well tell me what that
fellow is with the long tail. I shall be an hour making it out for
myself.”
“Well, then: ’tis a little rogue of a devil going out to see the world;
and——”
“O, Ambrose, the storm!” cried his sister.
“Ay, the tree is down in the churchyard. I have been seeing it; and here
is a splinter I brought away. Me! here comes the rain. A fine pepper we
are going to have.”
“I hope it will pepper hard enough. Farmer Mason’s barns are on fire.
Won’t you go and help?”
“Who told you so?—Which barn?—How did it get on fire?” and many other
questions which might wait till the next day, had to be answered before
anybody would stir to get the key of the engine-house; and then, so many
youths ran foul of one another, and differed as to where the key was
deposited, and were each bent on being the one to tell the clergyman,
that Mildred had given the alarm at the paper-mill before anything
effectual was done.
Mr. Waugh and Owen were together in the counting-house, looking at a
pamphlet which Mr. Waugh had just put into Owen’s hands.
“That’s the almanack, I do believe,” cried Mildred. “O, I wanted so that
you should see that almanack.”
Mr. Waugh explained (Owen being too much absorbed) that this was not an
almanack, but a tract which he was lending to Owen. Owen was going to
take it home, as he was very eager to read it; but Mr. Waugh feared
there would be little in it to amuse any of the family besides. It was
not so entertaining, he feared, as an almanack from the island: but he
hoped Mildred had nothing to do with those almanacks. It was not safe to
have anything to do with them, as they were against the law. It was all
very well for the island people to read them if they chose, as they were
not against the law there: but here people were liable to be put in
prison for them. “Put in prison!” exclaimed Mildred, forgetting for the
moment her errand. Yes;—Mr. Waugh knew of twenty-five people who had
been sent to gaol by one magistrate, in one month, for selling these
illegal almanacks.
“I don’t believe Maude has sold one to anybody,” Mildred thought aloud.
“Well; tell her (whoever she is) that she had better not. People should
never sell an almanack till they see that it bears a fifteen penny
stamp. The Government makes 27,000_l._ by the almanack-duty; and the
Government does not like to be cheated of the duty. It is but a small
sum, certainly, to punish so many people for; but let your friend Maude
take care of the law. No, no; your brother will tell you this is no
almanack; though it may tell him things nearly as wonderful as he could
find in any almanack. Bless me! the people are crying fire!”
“O, I forgot.” And Mildred explained what she came for. The tract was
thrust into Owen’s pocket: the population of the mill was turned out to
help; and all Arneside was presently on the road to farmer Mason’s.