of the comfortable estate of Westbury, near Gigglesham, and of the
handsome mansion thereto belonging. Maggie, the young girl, is a
distant cousin--although she calls them 'aunt'--and lives with them.
There is also a young man, Ralph Grant, somewhere about the place, of
whom more anon.
Old Tom Hammond, the father of the two maiden sisters, was born in
the year 1740, and might have seen the heads over Temple Bar after
the rising of 1745. He lived till 1830. He had married late in life,
and left only these two daughters. Thus two generations bridged over
a space of time generally occupied by many successive lives; as in
the case of another branch of the family, the founder of which, Major
Richard Hammond (the uncle of the two old ladies), who had been
at the capture of Quebec when General Wolfe was killed, being the
great-grandfather of Maggie Lauderdale and Ralph Grant. Major Hammond
was the elder of the two brothers, and should have inherited the
Westbury estate; but he offended his father, General John Hammond, by
what was called a low marriage, and was disinherited in consequence.
Tom Hammond had done his best to remedy his father's injustice, as
far as he could without injuring himself and his own, by making a
settlement of the estate, in failure of his own issue, upon the lawful
descendants of Major Hammond, his brother; providing that if the issue
of his elder brother should fail, the estate should go to the issue of
a younger brother Henry, who, by the way, had been well provided for by
the small estate of Eastbury. This brother Henry was now represented
through the female line by a Mr Boodles of Boodle Court, who now also
held the Eastbury estate.
The descendants of Major Hammond are now confined to these two young
people, Maggie and Ralph. They are both orphans and without means,
their forebears having been mostly in the soldiering and official
lines. Ralph is a lieutenant in the artillery, and his battery is now
in India; but he is at home on sick-leave; and he has taken advantage
of his furlough to win the affections of his fair cousin. As the
Westbury estate would come to be eventually divided between them, it
was considered a most fortunate thing that the young people had come to
an understanding. Ralph was to leave the service when he married, and
take the home-farm. By-and-by he would fall naturally into his position
as country squire; and it was arranged that eventually he should assume
the name of Hammond; hoping to continue the old line.
This preamble being necessary, let us now return to the comfortable
old-fashioned drawing-room at Westbury.
'What do you think of that, Ellen?' cried Miss Hammond, having read
over once more the circular to herself with subdued emphasis. Miss
Ellen was sitting looking into the fire, her great wooden knitting-pins
and bright-coloured wools lying idle on her lap, as she shook her head
while talking gently to herself.
'Do you hear, Ellen?' cried Miss Hammond more sharply. 'What do you
think of that letter from Truscott?'
'I don't like the idea at all, Margaret. No, not at all. Why can't they
leave our ancestors alone? And I am sure I always looked forward to
being buried there myself.'
'La! don't talk about that, Ellen, and you five years the younger!'
said Miss Hammond briskly; 'and as we can't prevent its being done, we
must make the best of it. Ralph had better go and see to it.'
'Very well, sister; as you like,' said Ellen. Presently she resumed:
'Sister, I've been thinking that this would be a good chance to try to
get back Uncle Richard Hammond's ring.'
'Uncle Hammond's ring!' repeated the elder sister. 'I don't understand.'
'You must have heard our father talk about it. The family ring that
ought to have gone with the estates--a ruby and sapphire that General
Hammond brought home from Ceylon.'
'I ought to know all about it Ellen, I daresay; but you were so much
more with my poor father, and had more patience with his stories.'
'My father often tried to get the ring, and had offered to give Major
Hammond a large sum for it. But he was so vexed with father for
supplanting him, that he vowed he never should have it; and they say,
sister, that rather than it should ever fall into his brother's hands,
he had it buried with him, upon his finger. Our father always said that
if he had a chance he would have the coffin opened to see.'
Maggie, who had retreated to a sofa, and buried her head in a novel,
roused up at this, and joined in: 'I hope you will, auntie. I do hope
you'll have it looked for.'
'I don't know, my dear,' said Miss Hammond. 'I don't approve of
violating the sanctity of the tomb.'
With the elder Miss Hammond, a phrase was everything; she delighted to
bring a thing within the compass of a well-rounded phrase, upon which
she would then make a stand--invincible. So Maggie threw up her head in
a kind of despair, and ran off to look for Ralph, who when last heard
of was smoking a cigar on the terrace.
'Ralph!' said Maggie as soon as she had found him, and had submitted
to a very smoky kiss--they were in the heyday of their young loves,
when kisses were appreciated, even when flavoured with tobacco--'Ralph!
auntie is going to give you a commission--to go and see about a vault
at St Crispin's where some of our ancestors lie.'
'I know,' said Ralph; 'they are going to pull the old place down. All
right; I'll do it.'
Then Maggie went on to tell him about the ring, and how Miss Hammond
would not have it searched for. 'But it is a very valuable ring--a
family one too. It would be a great pity to miss it, if it's really
there.'
Ralph agreed.
'Well, then, mind you look for it, sir; only don't say a word to
auntie, or she'll put a stop to it.'
'I'm fly,' said Ralph, with a knowing wink, and attempted a renewal of
the oscillatory process; but Maggie escaped him this time, and came
fleeing in at the dining-room window panting into the presence of her
aunts.
Since she first left the room, a visitor had appeared--a Mr Boodles,
a distant relative, who had inherited some of the family property, as
before explained; a tall grim-looking man, with thin iron-gray hair,
carefully brushed off his temples.
The aunts were looking rather serious, not to say frightened, and both
started guiltily when they saw Maggie.
'Leave us, my dear, please,' said Miss Hammond gently.
Maggie had just caught the words, 'No marriage at all,' from Mr
Boodles, who seemed to be speaking loudly and excitedly; and she went
out wandering what it all meant. Some piece of scandal, no doubt, for
Boodles was the quintessence of spitefulness.
'It is very dreadful--very,' said Miss Hammond. 'I never had much
opinion of Uncle Richard, you know; but for the sake of the young
people, I hope you'll let it be kept a profound secret.'
'Sake of the young people!' screamed Boodles at the top of his harsh
voice. 'And what for the sake of old Boodles? I'm the next heir, you'll
remember, please, through my maternal grandfather, Henry Hammond.'
Mr Boodles had come to Westbury to announce an important discovery that
he had recently made. In turning over some of his grandfather's papers
he had come across some letters from General Hammond, in which it was
firmly asserted that his son Major Hammond had never been legally
married to the woman known as his wife.
'What end do you propose to serve, Mr Boodles, by bringing this ancient
scandal to light?' asked Miss Hammond with agitated voice.
'End!' cried Boodles. 'This is only the beginning of it. I am going to
a court of law to have myself declared heir to the Westbury estates
under the settlement.'
'In that case,' said Miss Hammond, rising with dignity, 'you cannot be
received on friendly terms in my house.'
'Oh, very well, very well,' cried Boodles, snatching up his hat and
whip, and sweeping out of the room without further ceremony.
As soon as the door had shut upon him the sisters looked at each other
in blank consternation.
'I always feared there would be a difficulty,' said Ellen tremulously;
'but oh, to think of Boodles having discovered it!'
'We must send for Smith at once; the carriage shall go in and fetch
him,' said Miss Hammond, ringing the bell.
Mr Smith of Gigglesham was the family solicitor, and the carriage
was sent off to bring him up at once for a consultation. But Smith
brought little encouragement. He had heard from his father that there
were curious circumstances attending Major Hammond's marriage, and if
Boodles had put his finger on the flaw---- Smith shrugged his shoulders
for want of words to express the awkwardness of the case.
'But search must be made everywhere; the evidence of the marriage must
be found; the children must not suffer, poor things, and always brought
up to look upon the property as their own!'
'Why, they could never marry,' cried Miss Ellen; 'they could never live
on Ralph's pay.'
'It's altogether dreadful; and not getting married is the very lightest
part of the calamity,' said Miss Hammond.
Smith undertook that every possible search should be made, and went
away, promising to set to work at once. But his inquiries had no
result. He had traced out the family of the reputed wife, who had been
the daughter of a small farmer living at Milton in Kent; but they had
now fallen to the rank of labourers, and had no papers belonging to
them, hardly any family traditions. He had searched all the registries
of the neighbouring parishes: no record of such a marriage could be
discovered. He had issued advertisements offering a reward for the
production of evidence: all of no avail. What more could he do? To be
sure there was a presumption in favour of the marriage; but then if
Boodles had documents rebutting such a presumption---- Again Mr Smith
shrugged his shoulders, in hopelessness of finding fitting words to
represent the gravity of the crisis. 'And then,' he went on to say,
'the very fact that Boodles is spending money over the case shews that
he thinks he has a strong one.'
Boodles did not let the grass grow under his feet; he instituted
proceedings at once, and cited all interested to appear. The thing
could no longer be kept a secret; and Maggie and Ralph were told of the
cloud that had come over their fortunes.
'I don't care if the property does go away,' said Maggie bravely. 'It
will make no difference. I shall go to India with Ralph, that's all. I
will be a soldier's wife, and go on the baggage-wagons.'
Ralph shook his head. He had never been able to manage on his pay when
there was only himself, and there were ever so many lieutenants on the
list before him, so that he could not hope to be a captain for many
years.
There was no use in sitting brooding over coming misfortunes; and Ralph
took the dogcart and drove over to Gigglesham, to see about the family
vault at St Crispin's. It was an occupation that agreed well with his
temper; the weather too seemed all in keeping--a dull drizzling day.
'Don't forget the ring,' Maggie had said to him at parting; 'that is
ours, you know Ralph, if we find it; and perhaps it may be worth a lot
of money.'
Ralph shook his head incredulously. And yet it was possible. The ring
might be there, and it might prove of great value. In misfortunes, the
mind grasps at the smallest alleviations, and Ralph consoled himself in
his depression by picturing the finding of a splendid ruby worth say
ten thousand pounds. No more artillery-work then--no more India.
Gigglesham boasts of several churches, and St Crispin's lies in a
hollow by the river, close to the bridge. A low squat tower and plain
ugly nave. But in its nook there--the dark river flowing by, the
sail of a barge shewing now and then, the tall piles of deals in the
timber-yard beyond, the castle-keep frowning from the heights, and the
big water-mill with its weirs and rapids, the noise of which and of
the great churning wheel sounded slumbrously all day long--allied with
these things, the old church had something homely and pleasant about
it, hardly to be replaced by the finest modern Gothic.
Workmen were swarming about it now. The roof was nearly off. There were
great piles of sand and mortar in the graveyard. Mr Martin, the plumber
and glazier, who took the most lively interest in the underground work,
even to the neglect of more profitable business, was on the look-out
for Lieutenant Grant, and greeted him cheerily.
'We've got 'em all laid out in the vestry, Cap'n Grant, all the whole
family; and now the question is, what are you going to have done with
them? Would you like 'em put in the vaults below, where they'll all
be done up in lime and plaster? or would you like 'em moved somewhere
else--more in the open air, like?'
'The least expensive way, I should say,' replied Ralph grimly. Somehow
or other his appreciation of his ancestors was deadened by this last
stroke of fate in cutting him adrift from his succession. 'But look
here, Martin,' he went on, taking the plumber aside; 'there is one of
the coffins, Major Hammond's, I should like to have opened. It can be
done?'
'Easy enough, sir,' cried Martin, who, to say the truth, was delighted
at the prospect of a little charnel-house work. 'He's a lead 'un, he
is. I'll have the top off in no time.'
Ralph looked gravely down at the last remains of the Hammonds. The
wife, if she had been a wife, on whom their inheritance hung, was not
here; she had died in India. But there was the Major's coffin, the
wood-work decayed, but the leaden envelope as sound as ever.
Martin was quickly at work with his tools. The cover was stripped off,
and for a moment the Major's features were to be seen much as they had
been in life; then all dissolved into dust.
There was no ruby ring--that must have been a fable; but there was
something glittering among the remains, and on taking it out, it proved
to be a plain gold hoop.
'Well, that's worth a pound, that is,' cried the practical Martin,
carefully polishing up the treasure-trove. It had probably been hung
round the neck of the departed--a tall bony man--for the ring was a
small one, and there were traces of a black ribbon attached to it.
It was a disappointment, no doubt; and yet somehow the sight of the
ring had given Ralph a little hope. It was the wedding-ring, he said
to himself, his great-grandmother's wedding-ring. The Major must have
been fond of her to have had her ring always about him; and it had been
buried with him. That had given rise to the story about the ruby. He
drove home, after giving directions about the disposal of the coffins,
feeling less sore at heart. He was now convinced that they had right on
their side, and there was some comfort in that.
When he reached home, he shewed the ring to Maggie, who agreed with his
conclusions.
'But there is something inside--some letters, I think,' she cried.
'It is only the Hall-mark,' said Ralph, having looked in his turn. 'But
stop. That tells us something: it will give us a date.'
'How can that be?' asked Maggie.
'Because there is a different mark every year. See! you can make it out
with a magnifying-glass. King George in a pigtail.'
The silversmith at Gigglesham turned up his tabulated list of
Hall-marks, and told them at once the date of the ring--1760.
'But it might have been made a long time before it was first used,'
suggested Maggie.
'True; but it could not have been used before it was made,' replied
Ralph. 'It gives us a date approximately, at all events.'
At first, the knowledge of this date did not seem likely to be of much
use to them. But it gave them the heart to go on and make further
inquiries. Ralph threw himself into the task with fervour. He obtained
leave to search the records of the Horse Guards; and ascertained at
last where had been stationed the regiment that Richard Hammond then
belonged to in that same year.
It was at Canterbury, as it happened; and that seemed significant, for
it was not so far from there to his sweetheart's home at Milton. Ralph
went over to Canterbury, and with the help of a clerk of Mr Smith's,
searched all the parish registers between the two places; but found
nothing.
The trial was coming on in a few weeks, and not a scrap of evidence
could they get of the marriage of Major Hammond. The other side were
full of confidence, and well they might be. Ralph had made up his mind
to return home, and was walking disconsolately down the High Street of
Canterbury one day when he saw over a shop-window the sign, 'PILGRIM,
Goldsmith; established 1715.'
'I wonder,' he said to himself, 'if my great-grandfather bought his
wedding-ring there?'
A sudden impulse sent him into the shop. A nice-looking old gentleman,
with long white hair, was sitting behind the counter, peering into the
works of a watch through an elongated eye-glass.
Ralph brought out his ring. 'Do you think this ring was bought at your
shop?' he asked.
'How long ago?' asked Mr Pilgrim, taking up the ring and looking at it
all round.
'About the year 1760.'
'Ah-h! I can't remember so long ago as that. It was in my father's
time; but for all that, perhaps I can tell you.'
He took up the magnifying-glass, and examined the ring carefully once
more.
'Yes,' he said, looking up, a mysterious expression on his face, 'that
ring was bought from my father, I have no doubt.'
Ralph questioned him as to the sources of his knowledge; and Mr Pilgrim
told him at last. It was his father's practice to put his private
mark upon all the jewellery he sold. He could do it in those days,
when his stock was small and all his own. In these times of changing
fashions, when much of a jeweller's stock is on approval, this would be
impossible.
Ralph listened to these explanations with breathless impatience. Had Mr
Pilgrim any books belonging to his father which might possibly shew the
sale? The old gentleman admitted that he had a lot of his father's old
account-books up in a garret; but it would be very troublesome to get
at them; and what would be the use?
'Why,' said Ralph, 'you might possibly make the happiness of two young
people, who otherwise may be sundered all their lives.' He explained
enough of the circumstances to shew the old gentleman that it was not
an affair of mere idle curiosity; and after that he entered into the
quest with ardour. Pilgrim his father had kept each year a sort of
rough day-book, in which he entered transactions as they occurred, with
occasional short annotations. And at last, after a long troublesome
search, they found the book for the year 1760 and 1761. Nothing was to
be made of the first; but in the second they had the delight of finding
the following entry: '25 March, sold ring, young Master Hammond, two
guineas saw y^{e} wedding afterwards at St Mary's, Faversham.'
That night all the church bells of Gigglesham were set a-ringing, for
the news oozed out that Ralph Grant had come home with full proofs of
the marriage that would make good his title to Westbury. For the young
people were liked by everybody, whilst Boodles was generally execrated.
Indeed the case never came on for trial, as Boodles withdrew the record
when he found that there was full evidence to refute his claim. Ralph
and Maggie were married soon afterwards; and the bride wore as a keeper
over the golden circle her own special dower, the long-buried but
happily recovered treasure, Major Hammond's ring.
LOST IN MAGELLAN'S STRAITS.
One might look all the world over without finding a coast more bleak,
desolate, and inhospitable than that of Tierra del Fuego and the
southern part of Patagonia. Owing to certain meteorological causes,
the cold is comparatively greater in the southern than in the northern
latitudes; icebergs are found ten degrees nearer to the equator. In the
Straits of Magellan, which are about the same distance from the equator
as Central England, the cold in winter is so intense as to be almost
unbearable. Here icebergs are found floating, and glaciers larger in
extent than any Switzerland can boast of; the land is entirely covered
with snow down to the very water's edge, while bitter piercing winds
rush down the clefts in the mountains, carrying everything before them,
and even tearing up huge trees in their passage. Not a pleasant coast
this on which to be cast away; and yet such, in 1867, was the fate of
two unfortunate men who formed part of the crew of Her Majesty's ship
_Chanticleer_, then on the Pacific station; and an account of whose
sufferings we propose to lay before our readers.
One day early in September a sailing-party had been sent off with the
hope of increasing the ship's stock of provisions by the addition
of fresh fish, which is here very abundant. The nets soon became
so heavy that extra hands were required to haul them; and as there
appeared even then little chance of the work being over before
sunset, the fishing-party obtained permission to spend the night on
shore. Tents were pitched, huge fires were lighted, with the double
object of affording warmth and cooking some of the produce of their
successful expedition; blankets were distributed, grog was served out,
and altogether the party seemed prepared to defy the cold, shewing a
disposition to be 'jolly' in spite of it that would have gladdened the
soul of the immortal Mark Tapley. However, after all these preparations
to keep off the effects of the biting frost, they were compelled about
nine o'clock in the evening to send off to the ship for more blankets
and provisions.
Two sailors, Henty and Riddles, volunteered to go on this errand in
the 'dingy' (a small two-oared boat), and having obtained the desired
things, they started to return; but when about midway between the ship
and the shore, the wind began to rise, carrying the boat to some extent
out of her course; shortly after which she struck on a sand-bank, and
in trying to get her off one of the oars was lost. Soon they were
drifted out into the strong current. It was now dark as pitch; the
wind continued to rise; and although all through the night they made
every possible effort to reach the shore, when morning dawned, to their
alarm they found themselves miles away from the ship, and powerless to
contend any longer with their one oar against the force of both wind
and tide. They were finally driven on to the beach in a bay opposite
Port Famine, a spot not less dreary than its name.
The sea was so rough, that here for a day and a night our two men were
obliged to remain; and when on the second day they ventured to launch
the boat, it was upset; nearly all their things were lost, and they
were left to endure the intense cold without the means of making a
fire, with no clothes but those they wore, and scarcely any food. For
a while they walked about, trying, not very successfully, to keep up
circulation; and by-and-by the feet of both began to swell and grow
so painful that it was no longer possible to keep on their shoes.
Still, although suffering both from hunger and cold (Henty's toes being
already frost-bitten), they kept up their spirits in true British
fashion, not for a minute doubting that sooner or later they would
be picked up; and true enough, on the fourth day the _Chanticleer_
was seen in the distance under weigh, and standing over towards them.
Taking the most prominent position that could be found, they made signs
and tried in every possible way to attract attention, but in vain.
If they had only possessed some means of kindling a fire they might
have succeeded; but although those on board were at the moment on the
look-out for their lost mess-mates, no one saw them; and the hope with
which the two poor fellows had buoyed themselves up, faded away as the
ship changed her course, grew smaller and smaller, and by-and-by, late
in the afternoon, while they still watched, altogether disappeared.