THE FATE OF THE NAVVIES
And now, having dispatched Alaric and his wife and bairns on their
long journey, we must go back for a while and tell how Charley had been
transformed from an impudent, idle young Navvy into a well-conducted,
zealous young Weights.
When Alaric was convicted, Charley had, as we all know, belonged to the
Internal Navigation; when the six months' sentence had expired, Charley
was in full blow at the decorous office in Whitehall; and during the
same period Norman had resigned and taken on himself the new duties of a
country squire. The change which had been made had affected others
than Charley. It had been produced by one of those far-stretching,
world-moving commotions which now and then occur, sometimes twice or
thrice in a generation, and, perhaps, not again for half a century,
causing timid men to whisper in corners, and the brave and high-spirited
to struggle with the struggling waves, so that when the storm subsides
they may be found floating on the surface. A moral earthquake had been
endured by a portion of the Civil Service of the country.
The Internal Navigation had--No, my prognostic reader, it had not been
reformed; no new blood had been infused into it; no attempt had been
made to produce a better discipline by the appointment of a younger
secretary; there had been no carting away of decayed wood in the shape
of Mr. Snape, or gathering of rank weeds in the form of Mr. Corkscrew;
nothing of the kind had been attempted. No--the disease had gone too far
either for phlebotomy, purging, or cautery. The Internal Navigation had
ceased to exist! Its demise had been in this wise.--It may be remembered
that some time since Mr. Oldeschole had mentioned in the hearing of Mr.
Snape that things were going wrong. Sir Gregory Hardlines had expressed
an adverse opinion as to the Internal Navigation, and worse, ten times
worse than that, there had been an article in the _Times_. Now, we all
know that if anything is ever done in any way towards improvement in
these days, the public press does it. And we all know, also, of what the
public press consists. Mr. Oldeschole knew this well, and even Mr.
Snape had a glimmering idea of the truth. When he read that article,
Mr. Oldeschole felt that his days were numbered, and Mr. Snape, when he
heard of it, began to calculate for the hundredth time to what
highest amount of pension he might be adjudged to be entitled by a
liberal-minded Treasury minute.
Mr. Oldeschole began to set his house in order, hopelessly; for any such
effort the time was gone by. It was too late for the office to be so
done by, and too late for Mr. Oldeschole to do it. He had no aptitude
for new styles and modern improvements; he could not understand Sir
Gregory's code of rules, and was dumbfounded by the Civil Service
requisitions that were made upon him from time to time. Then came
frequent calls for him to attend at Sir Gregory's office. There a new
broom had been brought in, in the place of our poor friend Alaric, a
broom which seemed determined to sweep all before it with an unmitigable
energy. Mr. Oldeschole found that he could not stand at all before this
young Hercules, seeing that his special stall was considered to be the
foulest in the whole range of the Augean stables. He soon saw that
the river was to be turned in on him, and that he was to be officially
obliterated in the flood.
The civility of those wonder-doing demigods--those Magi of the Civil
Service office--was most oppressive to him. When he got to the board, he
was always treated with a deference which he knew was but a prelude to
barbaric tortures. They would ask him to sit down in a beautiful new
leathern arm-chair, as though he were really some great man, and then
examine him as they would a candidate for the Custom House, smiling
always, but looking at him as though they were determined to see through
him.
They asked him all manner of questions; but there was one question which
they put to him, day after day, for four days, that nearly drove him
mad. It was always put by that horrid young lynx-eyed new commissioner,
who sat there with his hair brushed high from off his forehead,
peering out of his capacious, excellently-washed shirt-collars, a
personification of conscious official zeal.
'And now, Mr. Oldeschole, if you have had leisure to consider
the question more fully, perhaps you can define to us what is
the--hum--hm--the use--hm--hm--the exact use of the Internal Navigation
Office?'
And then Sir Warwick would go on looking through his millstone as though
now he really had a hope of seeing something, and Sir Gregory would lean
back in his chair, and rubbing his hands slowly over each other, like a
great Akinetos as he was, wait leisurely for Mr. Oldeschole's answer, or
rather for his no answer.
What a question was this to ask of a man who had spent all his life in
the Internal Navigation Office! O reader! should it chance that thou art
a clergyman, imagine what it would be to thee, wert thou asked what is
the exact use of the Church of England; and that, too, by some stubborn
catechist whom thou wert bound to answer; or, if a lady, happy in a
husband and family, say, what would be thy feelings if demanded to
define the exact use of matrimony? Use! Is it not all in all to thee?
Mr. Oldeschole felt a hearty inward conviction that his office had
been of very great use. In the first place, had he not drawn from it
a thousand a year for the last five-and-twenty years? had it not given
maintenance and employment to many worthy men who might perhaps have
found it difficult to obtain maintenance elsewhere? had it not always
been an office, a public office of note and reputation, with proper work
assigned to it? The use of it--the exact use of it? Mr. Oldeschole at
last declared, with some indignation in his tone, that he had been there
for forty years and knew well that the office was very useful; but that
he would not undertake to define its exact use. 'Thank you, thank you,
Mr. Oldeschole--that will do, I think,' said the very spruce-looking new
gentleman out of his shirt-collars.
In these days there was a kind of prescience at the Internal Navigation
that something special was going to be done with them. Mr. Oldeschole
said nothing openly; but it may be presumed that he did whisper somewhat
to those of the seniors around him in whom he most confided. And
then, his frequent visits to Whitehall were spoken of even by the most
thoughtless of the navvies, and the threatenings of the coming storm
revealed themselves with more or less distinctness to every mind.
At last the thunder-cloud broke and the bolt fell. Mr. Oldeschole was
informed that the Lords of the Treasury had resolved on breaking up the
establishment and providing for the duties in another way. As the word
duties passed Sir Gregory's lips a slight smile was seen to hover
round the mouth of the new commissioner. Mr. Oldeschole would, he
was informed, receive an official notification to this effect on the
following morning; and on the following morning accordingly a dispatch
arrived, of great length, containing the resolution of my Lords, and
putting an absolute extinguisher on the life of every navvy.
How Mr. Oldeschole, with tears streaming down his cheeks, communicated
the tidings to the elder brethren; and how the elder brethren, with
palpitating hearts and quivering voices, repeated the tale to the
listening juniors, I cannot now describe. The boldest spirits were then
cowed, the loudest miscreants were then silenced, there were but few
gibes, but little jeering at the Internal Navigation on that day; though
Charley, who had already other hopes, contrived to keep up his spirits.
The men stood about talking in clusters, and old animosities were at an
end. The lamb sat down with the wolf, and Mr. Snape and Dick Scatterall
became quite confidential.
'I knew it was going to happen,' said Mr. Snape to him. 'Indeed, Mr.
Oldeschole has been consulting us about it for some time; but I must own
I did not think it would be so sudden; I must own that.'
'If you knew it was coming,' said Corkscrew, 'why didn't you tell a
chap?'
'I was not at liberty,' said Mr. Snape, looking very wise.
'We shall all have liberty enough now,' said Scatterall; 'I wonder what
they'll do with us; eh, Charley?'
'I believe they will send the worst of us to Spike Island or Dartmoor
prison,' said Charley; 'but Mr. Snape, no doubt, has heard and can tell
us.'
'Oh, come, Charley! It don't do to chaff now,' said a young navvy, who
was especially down in the mouth. 'I wonder will they do anything for a
fellow?'
'I heard my uncle, in Parliament Street, say, that when a chap has
got any _infested_ interest in a thing, they can't turn him out,' said
Corkscrew; 'and my uncle is a parliamentary agent.'
'Can't they though!' said Scatterall. 'It seems to me that they mean
to, at any rate; there wasn't a word about pensions or anything of that
sort, was there, Mr. Snape?'
'Not a word,' said Snape. 'But those who are entitled to pensions can't
be affected injuriously. As far as I can see they must give me my whole
salary. I don't think they can do less.'
'You're all serene then, Mr. Snape,' said Charley; 'you're in the right
box. Looking at matters in that light, Mr. Snape, I think you ought to
stand something handsome in the shape of lunch. Come, what do you say to
chops and stout all round? Dick will go over and order it in a minute.'
'I wish you wouldn't, Charley,' said the navvy who seemed to be most
affected, and who, in his present humour, could not endure a joke,
As Mr. Snape did not seem to accede to Charley's views, the liberal
proposition fell to the ground.
'Care killed a cat,' said Scatterall. 'I shan't break my heart about it.
I never liked the shop--did you, Charley?'
'Well, I must say I think we have been very comfortable here, under
Mr. Snape,' said Charley. But if Mr. Snape is to go, why the office
certainly would be deuced dull without him.'
'Charley!' said the broken-hearted young navvy, in a tone of reproach.
Sorrow, however, did not take away their appetite, and as Mr. Snape did
not see fitting occasion for providing a banquet, they clubbed together,
and among them managed to get a spread of beefsteaks and porter.
Scatterall, as requested, went across the Strand to order it at the
cookshop, while Corkscrew and Charley prepared the tables. 'And now
mind it's the thing,' said Dick, who, with intimate familiarity, had
penetrated into the eating-house kitchen; 'not dry, you know, or too
much done; and lots of fat.'
And then, as the generous viands renewed their strength, and as the
potent stout warmed their blood, happier ideas came to them, and they
began to hope that the world was not all over. 'Well, I shall try for
the Customs,' said the unhappy one, after a deep pull at the pewter. 'I
shall try for the Customs; one does get such stunning feeds for tenpence
at that place in Thames Street.' Poor youth! his ideas of earning his
bread did not in their wildest flight spread beyond the public offices
of the Civil Service.
For a few days longer they hung about the old office, doing nothing--how
could men so circumstanced do anything?--and waiting for their fate.
At last their fate was announced. Mr. Oldeschole retired with his full
salary. Secretaries and such-like always retire with full pay, as it
is necessary that dignity should be supported. Mr. Snape and the
other seniors were pensioned, with a careful respect to their years of
service; with which arrangement they all of them expressed themselves
highly indignant, and loudly threatened to bring the cruelty of their
treatment before Parliament, by the aid of sundry members, who were
supposed to be on the look out for such work; but as nothing further was
ever heard of them, it may be presumed that the members in question
did not regard the case as one on which the Government of the day
was sufficiently vulnerable to make it worth their while to trouble
themselves. Of the younger clerks, two or three, including the unhappy
one, were drafted into other offices; some others received one or more
years' pay, and then tore themselves away from the fascinations of
London life; among those was Mr. R. Scatterall, who, in after years,
will doubtless become a lawgiver in Hong-Kong; for to that colony has he
betaken himself. Some few others, more unfortunate than the rest, among
whom poor Screwy was the most conspicuous, were treated with a more
absolute rigour, and were sent upon the world portionless. Screwy
had been constant in his devotion to pork chops, and had persisted in
spelling blue without the final 'e.' He was therefore, declared unworthy
of any further public confidence whatever. He is now in his uncle's
office in Parliament Street; and it is to be hoped that his peculiar
talents may there be found useful.
And so the Internal Navigation Office came to an end, and the dull,
dingy rooms were vacant. Ruthless men shovelled off as waste paper
all the lock entries of which Charley had once been so proud; and the
ponderous ledgers, which Mr. Snape had delighted to haul about, were
sent away into Cimmerian darkness, and probably to utter destruction.
And then the Internal Navigation was no more.
Among those who were drafted into other offices was Charley, whom
propitious fate took to the Weights and Measures. But it must not be
imagined that chance took him there. The Weights and Measures was an
Elysium, the door of which was never casually open.
Charley at this time was a much-altered man; not that he had become a
good clerk at his old office--such a change one may say was impossible;
there were no good clerks at the Internal Navigation, and Charley had
so long been among navvies the most knavish or navviest, that any such
transformation would have met with no credence--but out of his office he
had become a much-altered man. As Katie had said, it was as though
some one had come to him from the dead. He could not go back to his old
haunts, he could not return like a dog to his vomit, as long as he had
that purse so near his heart, as long as that voice sounded in his ear,
while the memory of that kiss lingered in his heart.
He now told everything to Gertrude, all his debts, all his love, and
all his despair. There is no relief for sorrow like the sympathy of a
friend, if one can only find it. But then the sympathy must be real;
mock sympathy always tells the truth against itself, always fails to
deceive. He told everything to Gertrude, and by her counsel he told much
to Norman. He could not speak to him, true friend as he was, of Katie
and her love. There was that about the subject which made it too sacred
for man's ears, too full of tenderness to be spoken of without feminine
tears. It was only in the little parlour at Paradise Row, when the
evening had grown dark, and Gertrude was sitting with her baby in her
arms, that the boisterous young navvy could bring himself to speak of
his love.
During these months Katie's health had greatly improved, and as she
herself had gained in strength, she had gradually begun to think that
it was yet possible for her to live. Little was now said by her about
Charley, and not much was said of him in her hearing; but still she did
learn how he had changed his office, and with his office his mode of
life; she did hear of his literary efforts, and of his kindness to
Gertrude, and it would seem as though it were ordained that his moral
life and her physical life were to gain strength together.