"At mischief again, of course: always at it."
Mrs Potter said this angrily, and with much emphasis, as she seized her
son by the arm and dragged him out of a pool of dirty water, into which
he had tumbled.
"Always at mischief of one sort or another, he is," continued Mrs
Potter, with increasing wrath, "morning, noon, and night--he is;
tumblin' about an' smashin' things for ever he does; he'll break my
heart at last--he will. There: take that!"
"That," which poor little Tommy was desired to take, was a sounding box
on the ear, accompanied by a violent shake of the arm which would have
drawn that limb out of its socket if the child's bones and muscles had
not been very tightly strung together.
Mrs Potter was a woman of large body and small brain. In respect of
reasoning power, she was little better than the wooden cuckoo which came
out periodically from the interior of the clock that stood over her own
fireplace and announced the hours. She entertained settled convictions
on a few subjects, in regard to which she resembled a musical box. If
you set her going on any of these, she would harp away until she had
played the tune out, and then begin over again; but she never varied.
Reasons, however good, or facts, however weighty, were utterly powerless
to penetrate her skull: her "settled convictions" were not to be
unsettled by any such means. Men might change their minds; philosophers
might see fit to alter their opinions; weaklings of both sexes and all
ages might trim their sails in accordance with the gales of advancing
knowledge, but Mrs Potter--no: never! _her_ colours were nailed to the
mast. Like most people who unite a strong will with an empty head, she
was "wiser in her own conceit than eleven men that can render a reason:"
in brief, she was obstinate.
One of her settled convictions was that her little son Tommy was "as
full of mischief as a hegg is full of meat." Another of these
convictions was that children of all ages are tough; that it does them
good to pull them about in a violent manner, at the risk even of
dislocating their joints. It mattered nothing to Mrs Potter that many
of her female friends and acquaintances held a different opinion. Some
of these friends suggested to her that the hearts of the poor little
things were tender, as well as their muscles and bones and sinews; that
children were delicate flowers, or rather buds, which required careful
tending and gentle nursing. Mrs Potter's reply was invariably,
"Fiddlesticks!" she knew better. They were obstinate and self-willed
little brats that required constant banging. She knew how to train 'em
up, she did; and it was of no manner of use, it wasn't, to talk to _her_
upon that point.
She was right. It was of no use. As well might one have talked to the
wooden cuckoo, already referred to, in Mrs Potter's timepiece.
"Come, Martha," said a tall, broad-shouldered, deep-voiced man at her
elbow, "don't wop the poor cheeld like that. What has he been doin'--"
Mrs Potter turned to her husband with a half angry, half ashamed
glance.
"Just look at 'im, John," she replied, pointing to the small culprit,
who stood looking guilty and drenched with muddy water from hands to
shoulders and toes to nose. "Look at 'im: see what mischief he's always
gittin' into."
John, whose dress bespoke him an artisan, and whose grave earnest face
betokened him a kind husband and a loving father, said:--
"Tumblin' into dirty water ain't necessarily mischief. Come, lad, speak
up for yourself. How did it happen--"
"I felled into the water when I wos layin' the foundations, faither,"
replied the boy; pointing to a small pool, in the centre of which lay a
pile of bricks.
"What sort o' foundations d'ye mean, boy?"
"The light'ouse on the Eddystun," replied the child, with sparkling
eyes.
The man smiled, and looked at his son with interest.
"That's a brave boy," he said, quietly patting the child's head. "Get
'ee into th'ouse, Tommy, an' I'll show 'ee the right way to lay the
foundations o' the Eddystun after supper. Come, Martha," he added, as
he walked beside his wife to their dwelling near Plymouth Docks, "don't
be so hard on the cheeld; it's not mischief that ails him. It's
engineerin' that he's hankerin' after. Depend upon it, that if he is
spared to grow up he'll be a credit to us."
Mrs Potter, being "of the same opinion still," felt inclined to say
"Fiddlesticks!" but she was a good soul, although somewhat highly spiced
in the temper, and respected her husband sufficiently to hold her
tongue.
"John;" she said, after a short silence, "you're late to-night."
"Yes," answered John, with a sigh. "My work at the docks has come to an
end, an' Mr Winstanley has got all the men he requires for the repair
of the light'ouse. I saw him just before he went off to the rock
to-night, an' I offered to engage, but he said he didn't want me."
"What?" exclaimed Mrs Potter, with sudden indignation: "didn't want
you--you who has served 'im, off an' on, at that light'ouse for the last
six year an' more while it wor a buildin'! Ah, that's gratitood, that
is; that's the way some folk shows wot their consciences is made of;
treats you like a pair of old shoes, they does, an' casts you off w'en
you're not wanted: hah!"
Mrs Potter entered her dwelling as she spoke, and banged the door
violently by way of giving emphasis to her remark.
"Don't be cross, old girl," said John, patting her shoulder: "I hope
_you_ won't cast me off like a pair of old shoes when you're tired of
me! But, after all, I have no reason to complain. You know I have laid
by a good lump of money while I was at work on the Eddystone; besides,
we can't expect men to engage us when they don't require us; and if I
had got employed, it would not have bin for long, being only a matter of
repairs. Mr Winstanley made a strange speech, by the way, as the boat
was shoving off with his men. I was standin' close by when a friend o'
his came up an' said he thowt the light'ouse was in a bad way an'
couldn't last long. Mr Winstanley, who is uncommon sure o' the
strength of his work, he replies, says he--`I only wish to be there in
the greatest storm that ever blew under the face of heaven, to see what
the effect will be.' Them's his very words, an'it did seem to me an
awful wish--all the more that the sky looked at the time very like as if
dirty weather was brewin' up somewhere."
"I 'ope he may 'ave 'is wish," said Mrs Potter firmly, "an' that the
waves may--"
"Martha!" said John, in a solemn voice, holding up his finger, "think
what you're sayin'."
"Well, I don't mean no ill; but, but--fetch the kettle, Tommy, d'ye
hear? an' let alone the cat's tail, you mischievous little--"
"That's a smart boy," exclaimed John rising and catching the kettle from
his son's and, just as he was on the point of tumbling over a stool:
"there, now let's all have a jolly supper, and then, Tommy, I'll show
you how the real foundation of the Eddystun was laid."
The building to which John Potter referred, and of which he gave a
graphic account and made a careful drawing that night, for the benefit
of his hopeful son, was the _first_ lighthouse that was built on the
wild and almost submerged reef of rocks lying about fourteen miles to
the south-west of Plymouth harbour. The highest part of this reef,
named the Eddystone, is only a few feet above water at high tide, and as
it lies in deep water exposed to the full swell of the ocean, the raging
of the sea over it in stormy weather is terrible beyond conception.
Lying as it does in the track of vessels coasting up and down the
English Channel, it was, as we may easily believe, a source of terror,
as well as of danger, to mariners, until a lighthouse was built upon it.
But a lighthouse was talked of long before any attempt was made to erect
one. Important though this object was to the navies of the world, the
supposed impossibility of the feat, and the danger apprehended in the
mere attempt, deterred any one from undertaking the task until the year
1696, when a country gentleman of Essex, named Henry Winstanley, came
forward, and, having obtained the necessary legal powers, began the
great work of building on the wave-lashed rock.
Winstanley was an eccentric as well as a bold man. He undoubtedly
possessed an ingenious mechanical mind, which displayed itself very much
in practical joking. It is said of him that he made a machine, the
spring of which was attached to an old slipper, which lay (apparently by
chance) on the floor of his bedroom. If a visitor kicked this out of
his way, a phantom instantly arose from the floor! He also constructed
a chair which seized every one who sat down in it with its arms, and
held them fast; and in his garden he had an arbour which went afloat in
a neighbouring canal when any one entered it! As might have been
expected, Winstanley's lighthouse was a curious affair, not well adapted
to withstand the fury of the waves. It was highly ornamented, and
resembled a Chinese pagoda much more than a lighthouse. Nevertheless it
must be said to the credit of this bold man, that after facing and
overcoming, during six years, difficulties and dangers which up to that
time had not been heard of, he finished his lighthouse, proved hereby
the possibility of that which had been previously deemed impossible, and
gave to mankind a noble example of enterprise, daring, and perseverance.
Our friend John Potter had, from the commencement, rendered able
assistance in the dangerous work as a stone cutter, and he could not
help feeling as if he had been deserted by an old friend that night when
the boat went off to the rock without him.
It was in November 1703, when Winstanley expressed the wish that he
might experience, in his lighthouse, the greatest storm that ever blew.
On the 26th of that month his wish was granted! That night there arose
one of the fiercest gales that ever strewed our shores with wrecks and
corpses. The day before the storm, there were indications of its
approach, so John Potter went down to the shore to look with some
anxiety at the lighthouse. There it stood, as the sun went down, like a
star on the horizon, glimmering above the waste of foaming water. When
the dark pall and the driving sprays of that terrible night hid it from
view, John turned his back on the sea and sought the shelter of his
humble home.
It was a cheery home though a poor one, for Mrs Potter was a good
housewife, despite her sharp temper; and the threatening aspect of the
weather had subdued her somewhat.
"You wouldn't like to be a lighthouse-keeper on a night like this, John,
would you?" asked Mrs Potter, as she busied herself with supper.
"May be not: but I would be content to take things as they are sent.
Anyhow, I mean to apply for the situation, because I like the notion of
the quiet life, and the wage will be good as well as sure, which will be
a matter of comfort to you, old girl. You often complain, you know, of
the uncertainty of my present employment."
"Ay, but I'd rather 'ave that uncertainty than see you run the risk of
bein' drownded in a light'ouse," said Mrs Potter, glancing uneasily at
the window, which rattled violently as the fury of the gale increased.
"Oh, faither," exclaimed Tommy, pausing with a potato halfway to his
mouth, as he listened partly in delight and partly in dread to the
turmoil without: "I wish I was a man that I might go with 'ee to live in
the light'ouse. Wot fun it would be to hear the gale roarin' out
_there_, an' to see the big waves _so close_, an' to feel the house
shake, and--oh!"
The last syllable expressed partly his inability to say more, and partly
his horror at seeing the fire blown almost into the room!
For some time past the smoke had poured down the chimney, but the last
burst convinced John Potter that it was high time to extinguish the fire
altogether.
This accomplished, he took down an old family Bible from a shelf, and
had worship, for he was a man who feared and loved God. Earnestly did
he pray, for he had a son in the coasting trade whom he knew to be out
upon the raging sea that night, and he did not forget his friends upon
the Eddystone Rock.
"Get thee to bed, lass," he said when he had concluded. "I'll sit up
an' read the word. My eyes could not close this night."
Poor Mrs Potter meekly obeyed. How strangely the weather had changed
her! Even her enemies--and she had many--would have said there was some
good in her after all, if they had seen her with a tear trickling down
her ruddy cheek as she thought of her sailor boy.
Day broke at last. The gale still raged with an excess of fury that was
absolutely appalling. John Potter wrapped himself in a tarpaulin coat
and sou'wester preparatory to going out.
"I'll go with 'ee, John," said his wife, touching him on the shoulder.
"You couldn't face it, Martha," said John. "I thowt ye had bin asleep."
"No: I've bin thinkin' of our dear boy. I can face it well enough."
"Come, then: but wrap well up. Let Tommy come too: I see he's gettin'
ready."
Presently the three went out. The door almost burst off its hinges when
it was opened, and it required John's utmost strength to reclose it.
Numbers of people, chiefly men, were already hurrying to the beach.
Clouds of foam and salt spray were whirled madly in the air, and,
carried far inland, and slates and cans were dashing on the pavements.
Men tried to say to each other that they had never seen such a storm,
but the gale caught their voices away, and seemed to mingle them all up
in one prolonged roar. On gaining the beach they could see nothing at
first but the heavings of the maddened sea, whose billows mingled their
thunders with the wind. Sand, gravel, and spray almost blinded them,
but as daylight increased they caught glimpses of the foam above the
rock.
"God help us!" said John, solemnly, as he and his wife and child sought
shelter under the lee of a wall: "_the light'ouse is gone_!"
It was too true. The Eddystone lighthouse had been swept completely
away, with the unfortunate Winstanley and all his men: not a vestige,
save a fragment of chain-cable, remained on the fatal rock to tell that
such a building had ever been.