LANCASHIRE IDYLLS.
BY
MARSHALL MATHER,
AUTHOR OF
'LIFE AND TEACHINGS OF JOHN RUSKIN,'
'POPULAR STUDIES IN NINETEENTH CENTURY POETS,' ETC., ETC.
LONDON: FREDERICK WARNE AND CO.
AND NEW YORK.
1898.
INTRODUCTION.
While Edwin Waugh and Ben Brierley have done much to perpetuate
the rude moorland and busy factory life of Lancashire, little has
been done to perpetuate the stern Puritanism of the hill sects.
Among these sects there is a poetry and simplicity local in
character, yet delightful in spirit; and to recall and record it
is the aim of the following Idylls.
The provincialism of Lancashire varies with its valleys. It is
only necessary, therefore, to remark that as these Idylls are
drawn from a once famous valley in the North-east division of the
county, the provincialism is peculiar to that valley--indeed, it
would be more correct to say, to that section of the valley
wherein Rehoboth lies.
CONTENTS.
I. MR. PENROSE'S NEW PARISH:
1. A MOORLAND MACHPELAH
2. A CHILD OF THE HEATHER
3. OWD ENOCH'S FLUTE
II. THE MONEY-LENDER:
1. THE UTTERMOST FARTHING
2. THE REDEMPTION OF MOSES FLETCHER
3. THE ATONEMENT OF MOSES FLETCHER
III. AMANDA STOTT:
1. HOME
2. LIGHT AT EVENTIDE
3. THE COURT OF SOULS
4. THE OLD PASTOR
IV. SAVED AS BY FIRE
V. WINTER SKETCHES:
1. THE CANDLE OF THE LORD
2. THE TWO MOTHERS
3. THE SNOW CRADLE
VI. MIRIAM'S MOTHERHOOD:
1. A WOMAN'S SECRET
2. HOW DEBORAH HEARD THE NEWS
3. 'IT'S A LAD!'
4. THE LEAD OF THE LITTLE ONE
VII. HOW MALACHI O' TH' MOUNT WON HIS WIFE
VIII. MR. PENROSE BRINGS HOME A BRIDE
I.
MR. PENROSE'S NEW PARISH.
1. A MOORLAND MACHPELAH.
2. A CHILD OF THE HEATHER.
3. OWD ENOCH'S FLUTE.
LANCASHIRE IDYLLS.
I.
A MOORLAND MACHPELAH.
There was a sepulchral tone in the voice, and well there might be,
for it was a voice from the grave. Floating on the damp autumnal
air, and echoing round the forest of tombs, it died away over the
moors, on the edge of which the old God's-acre stood.
Though far from melodious, it was distinct enough to convey to the
ear the words of a well-known hymn--a hymn sung in jerky
fragments, the concluding syllable always rising and ending with a
gasp, as though the singer found his task too heavy, and was bound
to pause for breath.
The startled listener was none other than Mr. Penrose, the
newly-appointed minister, who was awaiting a funeral, long
overdue. Looking round, his already pale face became a shade paler
as he saw no living form, other than himself.
There he stood, alone, a stranger in this moorland haunt, amid
falling shadows and rounding gloom, mocked by the mute records and
stony memorials of the dead.
Again the voice was heard--another hymn, and to a tune as old as
the mossed headstones that threw around their lengthening shadows.
'I'll praise my Maker--while I've breath,'
followed by a pause, as though breath had actually forsaken the
body of the singer. But in a moment or two the strain continued:
'And when my voice--is lost in death.'
Whereon the sounds ceased, and there came a final silence, death
seeming to take the singer at his word.
As Mr. Penrose looked in the direction from which the voice
travelled, he saw a shovel thrown out of a newly-made grave,
followed by the steaming head and weather-worn face of old Joseph,
the sexton, all aglow with the combined task of grave-digging and
singing.
'Why, Joseph, is it you? I couldn't tell where the sound came
from. It seems, after all, the grave can praise God, although the
prophet tells us it cannot. Do you always sing at your work?'
'Partly whod. You see it's i' this way, sir,' said Joseph;
'grave-diggin's hard wark, and if a felley doesn'd sing a bit o'er
it he's like baan to curse, so I sings to stop swears. There's a
fearful deal o' oaths spilt in a grave while it's i' th' makin', I
can tell yo'; and th' Almeety's name is spoken more daan i' th'
hoile than it is up aboon, for all th' parson reads it so mich aat
of his book. But this funeral's baan to be lat', Mr. Penrose'; and
drawing a huge watch from his fob, he exclaimed: 'Another ten
minutes and there's no berryin' i' th' yard this afternoon.'
'I don't understand you, Joseph,' said Mr. Penrose wonderingly.
'We never berry here after four o'clock.'
'But there's no law forbidding a funeral at any hour that I know
of--is there?'
'There is wi' me. I'm maisther o' this berryin' hoile, whatever
yo' may be o' th' chapel. But they're comin', so I'll oppen th'
chapel durs.'
Old Joseph, as he was called, had been grave-digger at Rehoboth
for upwards of fifty years, and so rooted were his customs that
none cared to call them in question. For minister and deacons he
showed little respect. Boys and girls fled from before his shadow;
and the village mothers frightened their offspring when naughty by
threatening to 'fotch owd Joseph to put them in th' berryhoile.'
The women held him in awe, declaring that he sat up at night in
the graveyard to watch for corpse-candles. Even the shrewd and
hard-headed did not care to thwart him, preferring to be friends
rather than foes. Fathers, sons and sons' sons--generation after
generation--had been laid to rest by the sinewy arms of Joseph.
They came, and they departed; but he, like the earth, remained. A
gray, gaunt Tithonus, him 'only cruel immortality consumed.'
The graveyard at Rehoboth was his kingdom. Here, among the tombs,
he reigned with undisputed sway. Whether marked by lettered stone
or grassy mound, it mattered little--he knew where each rude
forefather of the hamlet lay. Rich in the family lore of the
neighbourhood, he could trace back ancestry and thread his way
through the maze of relationship to the third and fourth
generations. He could recount the sins which had hurried men to
untimely graves, and point to the spot where their bones were
rotting; and he could tell of virtues that made the memory of the
mouldering dust more fragrant than the sweetbriar and the rose
that grew upon the graves.
There was one rule which old Joseph would never break, and that
was that there should be no interments after four o'clock. Plead
with him, press him, threaten him, it was to no purpose; flinch he
would not for rich or for poor, for parson or for people. More
than once he had driven the mourners back from the gates, and one
winter's afternoon, when the corpse had been brought a long
distance, it was left for the night in a neighbouring barn. Upon
this occasion a riot was with difficulty averted. But old Joseph
stood firm, and at the risk of his life carried the day. This was
long years ago. Now, throughout the whole countryside it was known
that no corpse passed through Rehoboth gates after four o'clock.
* * * * *
'You'll happen look in an' see th' owd woman afore yo' go wom','
said Joseph to Mr. Penrose, as the minister finished his entry of
the funeral in the chapel register, 'hoo's nobbud cratchenly
(shaky).'
Joseph and his wife lived in the lower room of a three-storied
cottage at the end of the chapel, the second and third stories of
the said cottage being utilized by the Rehoboth members as
Sunday-schools.
Entering, Mr. Penrose saw the old woman crouching over the hearth
and doing her best to feed the fast-dying fires of her vitality.
As she raised her wrinkled face, crowned with white hair and
covered with a coloured kerchief, a gray shawl wrapped round her
lean and stooping shoulders, she smiled a welcome, and bade him be
seated.
'So yo'n put away owd Chris,' she said, as soon as Mr. Penrose had
taken his seat by her side. 'Well, he were awlus one for sleepin'.
Th' owd felley would a slept on a clooas-line if he could a' fun
nowhere else to lay hissel. But he'll sleep saander or ever naa.
They'll bide some wakkenin' as sleep raand here, Mr. Penrose. Did
he come in a yerst, or were he carried?'
'He was carried,' answered the minister, somewhat in uncertainty
as to the meaning of the old woman's question.
'I were awlus for carryin'. I make nowt o' poor folk apein' th'
quality, and when they're deead and all. Them as keeps carriages
while they're wick can ride in yersts to their berryin' if they
like, it's nowt to me; but when I dee I's be carried, and noan so
far, noather.'
This moralizing on funerals by the sexton's wife was a new phase
of life to Mr. Penrose. He had never before met with anyone who
took an interest in the matter. It was true that in the city from
which he had lately come the question of wicker coffins and of
cremation was loudly discussed; but the choice between a hearse
and 'carrying' as a means of transit to the tomb never dawned on
him as being anything else than a question of utility--the
speediest and easiest means of transit.
After the deliverance of her mind on the snobbishness of poor
people in the use of the hearse, she continued:
'It'll noan be so long afore they've to carry me, Mr. Penrose. I
towd Joseph yesterneet that his turn 'ud soon come to dig my grave
wi' th' rest; and he said, "When thy turn comes, lass, I'll do by
thee as thou'd be done by."'
'And how would you be done by?' asked the minister.
'Well, it's i' this way, Mr. Penrose,' said the old woman. 'I want
a dry grave, wi' a posy growin' on th' top. I somehaa like posies
on graves; they mak' me think of th' owd hymn,
'"There everlastin' spring abides,
And never-witherin' flaars."'
Now, Mr. Penrose was one of the so-called theological young
bloods, and held little sympathy with Dr. Watts's sensuous views
of a future state. His common-sense, however, and his discretion
came to his rescue, and delivered him from a strong temptation to
blast the old woman's paradise with a breath of negative
criticism.
'There's a grave daan at th' bottom o' th' yard, Mr. Penrose,
where th' sunleet rests from morn till neet, an' I've axed Joseph
to lay me there, for it's welly awlus warm, and flaars grow from
Kesmas to Kesmas. Th' doctor's little lass lies there. Yo never
knowd her, Mr. Penrose. Hoo were some pratty, bless her! Did yo'
ever read what her faither put o'er th' top o' th' stone?'
Mr. Penrose confessed he was in ignorance of the epitaph over the
grave of the doctor's child. As yet the history and romance of the
graveyard were unknown to him.
'Well, it's this,' continued his informant:
'"Such lilies th' angels gather for th' garden of God."
They'll never write that o'er me, Mr. Penrose. I'm nobbud a
withered stalk. Hoo were eight--I'm eighty. But for all that I
should like a flaar on mi grave, and Joseph says I shall hev one.'
* * * * *
The autumn gave place to a long and cheerless winter, which all
too slowly yielded to a late and nipping spring. The wild March
wind swept across the moors, roaring loudly around the old
conventicle, chasing the last year's leaves in a mad whirl among
the rows of headstones, and hissing, as though in anger, through
the rank grasses growing on the innumerable mounds that marked the
underlying dead, and then careering off, as though wrathful at its
powerlessness to disturb the sleepers, to distant farmsteads and
lone folds where starved ewes cowered with their early lambs under
shivering thorns, and old men complained of the blast that roused
the slumbering rheum and played havoc with their feeble frames.
Scanty snow showers fell late under 'the roaring moon of
daffodil,' whitening the moorlands and lying glistening in the
morning light, to be gathered up by the rays of the sun that day
by day climbed higher in the cold blue of the sky of spring. Young
blades of green lay scattered like emerald shafts amid the tawny
wastes of the winter grass, and swelling branches told of a year's
returning life. Just as the golden chalice of the first crocus
opened on the graves of the Rehoboth burial-yard, the old woman at
the chapel-house died.
* * * * *
The funeral was to take place at three o'clock, but long before
the hour old Joseph's kitchen was filled with a motley group of
mourners. They came from far and near, from moor and field, and
from the cottages over the way. Every branch of the family was
represented--sons and daughters, grandchildren, nephews and
nieces, even to babies in arms. As they straggled in, the women
attired in their best black, and the men wearing their top-hats (a
headgear worn by the Lancashire operative only on the state
occasion of funerals), it seemed as though old Joseph, like
Abraham, was the father of a race as the stars of heaven for
multitude, and as the sands by the seashore, innumerable.
An oppressive atmosphere filled the room, where, on a table under
the window, the open coffin rested, in which lay, exposed to all
eyes, the peaceful features and straightened limbs of the dead. As
the mourners entered they bent reverently over the corpse, and
moistened its immobile features with their tears, whispering
kindly words as to the appearance the old woman wore in death, and
calling to mind some characteristic grace and virtue in her past
life.
On another table was stacked a number of long clay pipes with
tobacco, from which the men assisted themselves, smoking with the
silence and stolidity of Indians, the women preserving the same
mute attitude, save for an occasional groan and suppressed
sigh--the feminine method in Lancashire of mourning for the dead.
The last mourners had long arrived, and the company was seated in
an attitude of hushed and painful expectancy for the officiating
minister. There was no sign, however, of his appearance; and the
mourners asked themselves in silence if he who was to perform the
final rites for the dead had forgotten the hour or the day.
The fingers of the old clock slowly crept along the dial-plate
towards four, the hour so relentlessly enforced for interments for
half a century by the sexton, who was now about to lay away his
own wife in the greedy maw of the grave. The monotonous
oscillation of the pendulum, sounding as the stroke of a passing
bell, gathered solemnity of tone in the felt hush that rested upon
all in the room--a hush as deep as that which rested upon the
dead. All eyes, under the cover of stealthily drooping lids, stole
glances at old Joseph, whose face fought hard to hide the emotions
running like pulsing tides beneath the surface. At last a woman,
whose threescore years and ten was the only warrant for her rude
interruption, exclaimed:
'Wheer's th' parson? Hes he forgetten, thinksto?'
'Mr. Penrose is ill i' bed,' replied old Joseph, 'but I seed Mr.
Hanson fra Burnt Hill Chapel, and he promised as he'd be here in
his place.'
The clock beat out its seconds with the same monotonous sound, and
the finger crept towards the fateful hour. Then came the wheeze
and whir preliminary to the strokes of four, conveying to familiar
ears that only eight more minutes remained. At this warning Joseph
arose from his seat, and, walking out into the graveyard, made
direct to an eminence overlooking the long trend of road, and,
raising one hand to shade his now failing sight, looked down the
valley to see if the minister was on his way to the grave. It was
in vain. Tears began to dim his sight, and for a moment the man
overcame the sexton. The struggle was but brief; in another moment
he was again the sexton. Returning to the cottage, he scarcely
reached the threshold before he cried out, with all the firmness
of his cruelly professional tones:
'Parson or no parson, aat o' this dur (door) hoo goes at four
o'clock.'
As the clock struck the fateful hour the old woman was carried to
her grave; and as they lowered her, Joseph, with uncovered head,
let fall the clods from his own hand, repeating, in a hoarse yet
tremulous voice, the words:
'Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.'
In another moment the old sexton reeled, and fell into the arms of
the men who stood near him. It was but a passing weakness, for he
soon pulled himself together, and accompanied the mourners to the
funeral tea, which was served in a neighbouring house.
Never afterwards, however, was old Joseph heard to rail at
mourners when late, or known to close the Rehoboth gates against
an overdue funeral.
II.
A CHILD OF THE HEATHER.
'What, Milly! Sitting in the dark?' asked Mr. Penrose, as he
entered the chamber of the suffering child, who was gazing through
the open window at the silent stars.
'I were just lookin' at th' parish candles, as my faither co's
'em; they burn breetsome to-neet, sir.'
'Looking at them, or looking for them?' queried the somewhat
perplexed divine. 'Can I bring the candles to you?'
'Yo' cornd bring 'em ony nearer than they are. They're up yon,
sithi,' and so saying the child pointed to the evening sky.
'So you call the stars "parish candles," do you?' smilingly
inquired Mr. Penrose. 'I never heard them called by that name
before.'
'It's my faither co's 'em "parish candles," not me,' said the
child.
'And what do you call them?'
'Happen if I tell yo' yo'll laugh at me, as my faither does.'
'No, I shall not. You need not be afraid.'
'Well, I co 'em angels' een (eyes).'
'A far prettier name than your father gives to them, Milly.'
'An' what dun yo' think hoo co's th' dew as it lies fresh on th'
moors in a mornin'?' asked the mother, who was sitting in one of
the shadowed corners of the room.
'I cannot say, I am sure, Mrs. Lord. Milly has such wonderful
names for everything.'
'Why, hoo co's it angels' tears, and says it drops daan fro' th'
een o' them as watches fro' aboon at the devilment they see on th'
earth.'
'Milly, you are a poetess!' exclaimed the delighted minister. 'But
do you really think the angels weep? Would it not destroy the joy
of that place where sorrow and sighing are no more?'
'Well, yo' see, it's i' this road, Mr. Penrose. They say as th'
angels are glad when bad folk turn good, and I suppose they'll
fret theirsels a bit if th' bad folk keeps bad; and there's mony
o' that mak' abaat here.'
Mr, Penrose was silent. Once more Milly was, unknown to herself
furnishing him with thoughts; for, again and again, from the
sickbed of this child had he gone forth with fresh fields of
revelation opening before him. True, the idea of heaven's grief at
earth's sin was not a pleasant one; but if joy at righteousness
and repentance, why not grief at wickedness and hardness of heart?
While thus musing in the quiet of the darkening chamber, Milly
turned from her contemplation of the stars with the somewhat
startling question:
'Mr. Penrose, dun yo' think there'll be yethbobs (tufts of
heather) i' heaven?'
'That's bothered her a deal latly,' broke in the mother, with a
choking voice. 'Hoo sez hoo noan cares for heaven if hoo cornd
play on th' moors, and yer th' wind, and poo yethbobs when hoo
gets there. What dun yo' think abaat it, Mr. Penrose?'
Mr. Penrose was not long from college, and the metaphysics and
dogmatics of the schools were more to his mind than the poetry and
religion of this moorland child. If asked to discourse on
personality, or expound the latest phase of German thought, he
would have felt himself at home. Here, however, he who was the
idol of the class-room sat silenced and foolish before a peasant
girl. True, he could enter into an argument for a future state,
and show how spiritual laws opposed the mundane imagination of the
child. But, after all, wherein was the use?--perhaps the child was
nearer the truth than he was himself. He would leave her to her
own pristine fancies.
In a moment Milly continued:
'Th' Bible says, Mr. Penrose, that i' heaven there's a street
paved wi' gowd (gold). Naa; I'd raither hev a meadow wi' posies,
or th' moors when they're covered wi' yethbobs. If heaven's baan
to be all streets, I'd as soon stop o' this side--though they be
paved wi' gowd an' o'.'
'Listen yo', how hoo talks, Mr. Penrose. Hoo's awlus talked i'
that feshion sin' hoo were a little un. Aar owd minister used to
co her "God's child."'
Mr. Penrose was a young man, and thought that 'Nature's child'
would be, perhaps, a more fitting name, but held his thought
unuttered. Wishing Milly and her mother a 'Good-night,' he
descended the old stone staircase to the kitchen, where Abraham
Lord sat smoking and looking gloomily into the embers of the fire.
'Has th' missus towd thee ought abaat aar Milly?' somewhat
sullenly interrogated the father.
'Nothing of any moment,' said Mr. Penrose. 'Of course she could
not; we were never together out of your daughter's presence.'
'Then aw'll tell thee. Milly's baan to-morn to th' infirmary to
hev her leg tan off.'
The strong man shook in the convulsive grip of his grief. No tears
came to his relief; the storm was deep down in his soul; outlet
there was none.
'Mr. Penrose,' said he, laying a hand on the minister's shoulder;
'Mr. Penrose, if I'd ha' known afore I were wed that gettin' wed
meant a child o' mine being tan fro' me and cut i' pieces by them
doctor chaps, I'd never ha' wed, fond o' Martha as I wor and am.
No, Mr. Penrose, I never would. They might tak' me, and do what
they'n a mind wi' me, at their butcherin' shops. But her--'
Here the strong man was swept by another convulsive storm of
feeling too deep for utterance. Subduing his passion by a supreme
effort of will, he continued:
'However, them as knows best says as it's her only chance, and I'm
noan goin' agen it. I shall go daan wi' her mysel' to-morn.'
* * * * *
Milly, or 'th' little lass o' Lord's,' as the villagers called
her, was one of those phenomenal child personalities which now and
again visit this world as though to defy all laws of heredity, and
remind the selfish and the mighty of that kingdom in which the
little one is ruler. A bright, bonny, light-haired girl--the vital
feelings of delight pulsed through all her being. Born amid the
moorlands, cradled in the heather, nourished on the breezy heights
of Rehoboth, she grew up an ideal child of the hills. For years
her morning baptism had been a frolic across the dewy uplands;
and, evening by evening, the light of setting suns kindled holy
fires in her rapturous and wonder-filled eyes. The native heart,
too, was in touch with the native heath; for Milly's nature was
deeply poetic, many of her questions betraying a disposition and
sympathy strangely out of harmony with the kindly, yet rude, stock
from which she sprang. From a toddling child her eye carried
sunshine and her presence peace. Unconsciously she leavened the
whole village, and toned much of the harsh Calvinism that knit
together its iron creed. There was not one who did not in some way
respond to the magic of her voice, her mood, her presence. Even
Joseph softened as she stood by the yawning graves which he was
digging, and questioned him as to the dying and the dead. The old
pastor, Mr. Morell, stern man that he was, used to put his hand on
her head, and call her his 'Goldilocks'; and he had once been
heard to say, after leaving her, 'And a little child shall lead
them.' Though somewhat lonely, there was neither priggishness nor
precocity in her disposition; she was just herself--unspoiled from
the hands of God and of Nature.
Shortly after her twelfth birthday she was caught on the moors by
a heavy autumnal shower, and, unwilling to miss her ramble by
returning home, pursued her way drenched to the skin. A severe
illness was the consequence, an illness which left a weakness in
her knee, eventually incapacitating her for all exercise whatever,
and keeping her a prisoner to the house. The village doctor
laboured long, but in vain was all his skill. At last a specialist
from the great city beyond the hills was called, who ordered the
child to be removed to the Royal Infirmary, where care, skill, and
nourishment would all be within easy reach. So it came to pass one
summer morning, as the sun lighted up the wide moors, and the hum
of the factories in the valley began to be carried upwards towards
the heights, a little crowd of folks gathered round the door of
Abraham Lord's cottage to take a farewell of 'th' little lass.'
About eight o'clock the doctor drove up, and in a few moments
Milly was carried in his and her father's strong arms and gently
laid in the cushioned carriage, and then slowly driven away from
the home which now for the first time in her life she was leaving.
The eyes of the onlookers were as moist as the dewy herbage on
which they stood, and many a voice trembled in the farewell given
in response to Milly's 'Good-bye.'
Throughout the whole of that dark day Milly's mother never left
the cottage; and when her husband, weary and dispirited, returned
at nightfall, she could scarcely nerve herself to question him
lest some word of his should add another stab to her already
sorely wounded heart. When ten o'clock struck, and Abraham Lord
laid his hand on the key to shoot the lock for the night, he burst
into tears, and turning to his wife, said: 'Never, my lass, wi'
Milly on th' wrong side'; and for months the parents slept with an
unbarred door.
* * * * *
'You have a remarkable patient in Milly Lord,' said Dr. Franks to
Nurse West one morning.
'I have indeed, doctor. I never met with another like her in all
my seven years' experience.'
'Does she talk much?'
'At times. But I should call her a silent child; at least, she
does not talk like other children. When she does talk it is to
make some quaint remark, or to ask some strange question.'
'Ah,' said the doctor, 'she's just asked me one. I referred her to
you and the chaplain. Religion, you know, is not much in my line.
But for all that, I must own it was a perplexing question.'
'Might I ask what it was, doctor?'
'Oh! she asked if I thought Jesus was sent here to suffer pain in
order that God might find out what pain was; and if so, was it not
queer that God should allow so much pain to exist. There now,
nurse, you have a problem. By the way, do you think the child
knows the limb has to be amputated?'
'She has guessed as much, doctor.'
'Does she seem to fear the operation?'
'Not at all. She talks as though it had to be. Do you think it
will be successful?'
Dr. Franks shrugged his shoulders, uttering no word by way of
reply.
'I should not like Milly to slip from us,' continued the nurse.
'Nor should I. We'll keep her if we can, and if she'll only help
us with a good heart we may possibly manage to pull her through.'
And with a mirthless laugh the doctor turned on his heel,
removing, when unobserved, his spectacles and wiping the moisture
from them and from his eyes.
From the day that Milly entered the great infirmary, the charm of
her childhood laid its spell upon all who came near her. Not only
was the gloomy ward brighter for her presence, but patients and
nurses were infected with her strange personality and undefinable
influence. Even the doctors lingered a moment longer at her
bedside, looking pensively into the light of those eyes whose
fires had been kindled under sunny skies, and at the beauty of
that face, kissed into loveliness by the wandering winds that
played around Rehoboth heights.
At last the morning of the operation came, and Milly was wheeled
into the theatre, where a crew of noisy students were joking and
indulging in the frolics which, from time immemorial, have been
the privilege of their order. As soon, however, as they caught
sight of the child every voice was hushed, and quietness
prevailed, for not a few already knew something of her winsomeness
and beauty. As she was placed on the operating-table the sunlight
fell through the lanthorn, and lighted up the golden clusters of
her hair, the welcome rays calling forth from her now pale
features a responsive smile. In another minute she lay peaceful
and motionless under the anæsthetic--a statue, immobile, yet
expressionful, as though carved by some master hand.
A burly-looking surgeon, with the sleeves of his operating coat
neatly turned up, approached the table on which Milly was
stretched, and in a business-like manner set about his task.
Carefully handling one of his cold and glittering instruments, he
paused; then bending himself over the patient, appeared as though
about to make the first incision, yet hesitated.
'What is the matter with old Rogers?' asked the students, under
their breath; and one or two of the doctors looked knowingly at
each other.
There was nothing the matter, however, with old Rogers for long.
He merely muttered something about it being a shame to cut into
such flesh as Milly's, and proceeded to go calmly through his
work, like the old hand that he was.
The operation was successful, and yet Milly seemed to make no
satisfactory progress. The old flow of life returned not, and a
settled gloom rested over her once merry heart. She was as one
suffering from an indefinable hunger; even she herself knew not
what it was she wanted. Unremitting was the attention shown,
nurses and doctors alike doing their utmost, even to works of
supererogation, on her behalf. Week by week her parents visited
her, while there was not a patient in the ward who would not have
sacrificed a half of her own chances of recovery, if by so doing
she could have ensured hers. All, however, seemed in vain; rally
she could not. The ward oppressed her, and the gloomy autumn
clouds that hung over the wilderness of warehouses upon which her
eye rested day by day canopied her with despair. She listened for
the wind--but all she heard was its monotonous hum along the
telegraph wires that stretched overhead. She looked for the
birds--but all she saw was the sooty-winged house-sparrow that
perched upon the eaves. She longed for the stars--but the little
area of sky that grudgingly spared itself for her gaze was oftener
clouded than clear as the night hour drew on. The truth was, she
was pining for her native heath; but she knew it not, nor did her
kindly ministrants.
In the next bed to Milly's lay a young woman slowly dying of an
internal malady, whose home, too, was far away among the moors,
and whose husband came week by week to visit her. On one of these
visits he brought with him a bunch of flowers--for the most part
made up of the 'wildings of Nature'--among which was a tuft of
heather in all the glory of its autumnal bloom. Turning towards
the sick child, the poor woman reached out her wasted arm, and
throwing a spray on to Milly's counterpane, said:
'Here, lass, I'll gi' thee that.'
In a moment Milly's eyes flashed light, and the bloom of the
moorland flower reflected itself in the blush of her cheeks.
Throwing up both hands, and wild with a tide of new life, she
cried:
'Nurse! nurse! Sithee--a yethbob--a yethbob!'
From that hour commenced Milly's convalescence. What medicine and
nursing failed to accomplish was carried to a successful issue by
'a tuft of heather.' For Milly did not die--indeed, she still
lives; and although unable to roam and romp the moors that lie in
great sweeps around her cottage home, she sits and looks at 'th'
angels' een'--as she still calls the stars--believing that in
those heavenly watchers are the eyes that slumber not, nor sleep.
III.
OWD ENOCH'S FLUTE.
It was a sunny afternoon in June, and old Enoch, sitting in the
shade of the garden bushes, called forth sweet tones from his
flute. No score was before him; that from which he played was
scored on his heart. Being in that sweet mood when
'Pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind,'
he was living over again, in the melodies that he played, his
chequered past. Forms moved before him to the music, and faces,
long since dust, smiled at him, and held converse with him, as the
plaintive notes rose and fell and died away. Winds, sweetened by
their sweep over miles of ling and herbage, and spiced with the
scents of the garden-flowers that like a zone of colour encircled
him, kissed his lips, and stole therefrom his melodies, bearing
them onwards to the haunts of the wild fowl, or letting them fall
where brooklets from the hills sang their silvery songs. Along the
path by which he sat, all fringed with London-pride, the leaves
spread dappled shadows--a mosaic of nature fit for the tread of
angels or the dance of fairy sprites. Beyond the fence that
fringed the little cottage rolled great waves of upland,
shimmering in the heat of the midsummer glare--that hot breathing
of the earth when wooed too fiercely by her wanton paramour, the
sun--while the horizon discovered lines of dreamy sweep all
crowned with haze, the vestibules to other hills grander and more
distant.
As the afternoon passed its golden hours, it passed them in
companionship with the notes of old Enoch's flute. Oblivious to
the time, oblivious to the surroundings, the musician heard not an
approaching step, nor knew that a listener stood behind the garden
bushes, with ear responsive to his melodies. How long he would
have played, how long his listener would have remained undiscovered,
it is hard to say--perhaps until the dews fell and the stars
glimmered. This was not to be, however, for forth from the cottage
door came his wife, who, with voice drowning the strain of the
flute, cried:
'Enoch, owd lad! dun yo' see th' parson?'
Ah, heedless Enoch! What was parson, what was wife to him? Was he
not soaring far above theologies and domesticities, over
continents traversed only by memory, amid ideals seen only with
the eye of hope? But a woman's voice!--what is there it cannot
shatter and dispel?
'Enoch! Enoch! dun yo' yer? Doesto see th' parson?'
'No, lass, I doan't,' said he, taking the flute from his lips.
'I welly think he's forgetten us this time, Enoch.'
'Nod he, lass; he's too fond o' thi butter-cakes and moufins
(muffins) to forgeet. He's some fond o' thi bakin', I con tell
thaa. Didn't he say as when he geet wed he'd bring his missis to
thee to larn haa to mak' bread?'
'Yi, he did, for sure!'
'And so he will,' said Mr. Penrose, stepping from behind the
garden bush. 'You see your husband is right, Mrs. Ashworth. I've
not forgotten it is baking-day, or that I was due at your house to
tea.'
'Theyer, Enoch, thaa sees what thi tootling on th' owd flute's
done for thee,' said the old woman, in her surprise and chagrin.
'Thaa cornd be too careful haa thaa talks. Thaa sees trees hes
yers as weel as stoan walls.'
'Ne'er mind, Mr. Penrose; I were nobbud hevin' her on a bit. Hoo
thinks a mighty lot o' parsons, I con tell yo'. Hoo's never reet
but when hoo's oather listenin' to 'em or feedin' 'em,' and the
old man quietly broke into a laugh.
'An' dun yo' know what he sez abaat parsons, Mr. Penrose? I mud as
weel tell tales abaat him naa he's started tellin' tales abaat
me.'
Mr. Penrose declared he had no idea what old Enoch's criticisms on
the members of the cloth were, but expressed a strong desire to be
made familiar with them.
'Weel,' continued Mrs. Ashworth, 'he sez as he never noather
flatters parsons nor women, for noather on 'em con ston' it. Naa,
then, what dun yo' mak' o' that?'
'He's very wise.'
'What saysto?'
'I only mean as far as the parsons are concerned. As to
women--why, I suppose I must be silent.'
'Ne'er mind, Mr. Penrose; tay's waitin', so come along. Yo' cornd
bridle women folks, and it's happen as weel yo' cornd; for if they
mutn't talk they'd scrat, and that 'ud be a deal wur.'
During tea Mr. Penrose apologized for hiding behind the bushes in
the garden while old Enoch was playing the flute: 'But,' continued
he, 'the airs were so sweet that it would have been a sin to mar
them by interruption.'
Upon hearing this Enoch's eye brightened, and a flush of pride
mantled on his cheek. These signs were at once detected by his
quick-eyed wife, who broke out in a triumphant voice:
'An' that's him as wouldn't flatter parsons an' women, cose, as he
sez, they cornd ston' it; and he's aside hissel cose yo've cracked
up his playin', Mr. Penrose.'
'All reet, owd lass,' good-humouredly retorted Enoch, looking love
through his mild blue eyes at his wife, who knew so well how to
defend her own, 'all reet; but if thaa durnd mind I'll tell Mr.
Penrose abaat Dickey o' Wams.'
'An' I'll tell him abaat Edge End "Messiah," and thi marlock wi'
th' owd piccolo.'
'Supposing I hear both stories,' said the minister. 'Then I can
apply both, and judge between you.'
'Oh! there's nowt in 'em,' replied Enoch. 'Sometimes, thaa knows,
when hoo's a bit fratchy, I plague her wi' tellin' o' Dickey o'
Wams, who wor talkin' abaat his wife's tantrums, when his maisther
stopped him and said, "Dickey, wherever did ta pike her up?" and
he said, "Oh, 'mang a lot more lumber up Stackkirk way."'
As this story was told with all the dry humour of which Enoch
possessed so large a share, both the old woman and Mr. Penrose
crowned it with a hearty laugh, the minister turning to his
hostess and saying:
'Now, Mrs. Ashworth, it's your turn. What about the Edge End
"Messiah"?'
'Mun I tell him, Enoch?'
'Yi, owd lass; id 'll pleeas thee, and noan hurt me. Brast (start)
off.'
'Well, yo' mun know, Mr. Penrose, they were givin' th' "Messiah"
at Edge End. Eh! dear, Enoch,' sighed the old woman, stopping
short in her story, 'it's thirty year sin' come next Kesmas.'
'Yi, lass, it is. There's some snow fallen sin' then.'
'There hes that, an' we've bed our share and o'. But, as I wor
tellin' yo', Mr. Penrose, they wor givin' th' "Messiah" at Edge
End, and bed just getten to "How beautiful are th' feet." Naa, it
wor arranged that aar Enoch mud play th' piccolo accompaniment,
and he started fairly weel. Happen he wor a bit flat, for th'
chapel wor very hot, an' most o' th' instruments aat o' pitch.
But, as I say, he started fairly weel, when th' conductor, a chap
fra Manchester, who thought he knew summat, said, "Hooisht,
hooisht!" But th' owd lad stuck to his tune. Then th' conductor
banged his stick on th' music, and, wi' a face as red as a
soudger's coite (soldier's coat), called aat agen, "Hooisht!
Doesto yer?--hooisht!" But he'd mistaan his mon, Mr. Penrose, for
Enoch nobbud stopped short to say, "Thee go on with thi
conductin'. If hoo'll sing I'll play." And hoo did sing an' o'.
An' Enoch welly blew his lips off wi' playin', I con tell thi.
But, somehaa or other, hoo never cared to come and sing i' these
parts after, and they never geet Enoch to tak' th' piccolo
accompaniment agen to "How beautiful are th' feet."'
'Nowe, an' they never will. I somehaa think I had summat to do wi'
spoilin' th' beauty of "their feet" that neet, Mr. Penrose, though
I've played in mony a oratory (oratorio) sin' then, an' mean to do
agen.'
After tea Enoch took Mr. Penrose for a stroll over the moors. The
sun was westering, and cool airs crept up from distant wilds,
playing softly as they swept among the long grasses, and leading
Enoch to say to Mr. Penrose, 'Theer's music for yo'.' The great
hills threw miles of shadow, and masses of fleecy clouds slowly
crossed the deepening blue like white galleons on a sapphire sea.
Along the crests of the far-off hills mystic colours were
mingling, deepening, and fading away--the tremulous drapery woven
by angel hands, behind which the bridegroom of day was hiding his
splendour and his strength. Soft herbage yielded to the tread, and
warm stretches of peaty soil lay like bars across the green and
gray and gold of what seemed to Mr. Penrose the shoreless waste of
moor. On distant hills stood lone farmsteads, their little windows
glowing with the lingering beams of the setting sun; the low of
kine, the bay of dog, and the shout of shepherd, softened into
sweetest sounds as they travelled from far along the wings of the
evening wind. It was the hour when Nature rests, and when man
meditates--if the soul of meditation be his.
After a silence of some minutes Enoch turned to Mr. Penrose and
said:
'Jokin' aside, Mr. Penrose, that owd flute yo' yerd me playin'
this afternoon is a part o' my life. Let's sit daan i' this nook
and I'll tell yo' all abaat it. Three times in mi history it's bin
mi salvation. Th' first wor when I lost mi brass. We lived daan at
th' Brig then, and I ran th' factory. I wor thirty-five year owd,
and hed a tidy bit o' brass, when they geet me to put a twothree
hunderd in a speculation. Ay, dear! I wor fool enugh not to let
weel alone. I did as they wanted me. Me, and Bill Stott's faither,
and owd Jerry o' th' Moss went in together heavy, and we lost
every farthin'. I shall never forgeet it. It wor Sunday mornin'
when th' news coome fro' th' lawyer. I wor i' bed when th' missis
gav me th' letter, and I could tell by her face summat wor wrang.
"What is it, lass?" I axed. "What a towd thee it would be," hoo
said. "We are ruined." "Thaa never sez so!" I shaated. "It's paper
as says so," hoo said, "noan me," and hoo handed me th' lawyer's
letter. I tried to get aat o' bed, Mr. Penrose, but when I set mi
feet on th' floor, I couldn't ston'. "I've lost my legs, missis,"
I cried. "Nay, lad, thank God, thaa's getten thi legs yet; it's
thi brass thaa's lost!" I shall never forgeet those days. Then
came th' sale, and th' flittin', an' all th' black looks. Yo' know
yor friends when th' brass goes, Mr. Penrose. Poverty's a rare
hond for pikin' aat hypocrites. It maks no mistakes; it tells yo'
who's who. We'd scarce a friend i' those days. I wor weeks and
never held up mi yed, and noabry but th' missis to speak to. Then
it wor th' owd flute coome to mi help. I'd nobbud to tak' it up,
and put it to mi lips, and it ud begin to speyk. Yi, an' it cried
an' o', and took my sorrow on itsel, and shifted it away fro' me.
I've played o' th' neet thro' on these moors, Mr. Penrose, when I
couldn't sleep i' bed, or stay i' th' haas. It's a grond thing, is
music, when yo're brokken-hearted. If ever yo' marry and hev
childer, teach 'em music--a chap as con play con feight th' devil
so much better nor him as cornd.'
Old Enoch took his cap from his head, and wiped his brow, and
continued:
'Th' flute were my salvation agen, Mr. Penrose, when our lad deed.
He wor just one-and-twenty, and he's bin dead eighteen year. Brass
is nothin' when it comes to berryin' yor own, Mr. Penrose. Poverty
may touch a mon's pride, but death touches his heart. When yo' see
yor own go aat o' th' haas feet fermost, and yo' know it's for
good an' o', there's summat taan aat o' yo' that nothin' ever maks
up for at afterwards. I wor a long time afore I forgave th'
Almeety for takin' aar Joe. And all the time I owed Him a grudge,
and kep' on blamin' Him like; I got wurr and wurr, until I welly
went mad. Then I coome across th' old flute, and it seemed to say,
"I'll help thee agen." "Nay, owd brid," I said, "tha cornd. It's
noan brass this time, it's mi lad." And th' owd flute seemed to
say, "Try me." So I tuk it up, and put it to mi lips and blew--yi,
aat of a sad heart, Mr. Penrose--but it wor reet. Th' owd flute
gi' me back mi prayer--grace for grace, as yo' parsons say,
whatever yo' mean by't. And as I sat on th' bench i' th'
garden--same bench as yo' saw me sittin' on this afternoon--my
missis coome to th' dur, and hoo said, "Enoch, what doesto think?"
"Nay, lass," I said, "I durnd know." "Why," hoo says, "I think as
thaa's fotched aar Joe daan fro' heaven to hear thee playin'; he
seems nearer to me naa nor he ever did sin' he left us." And so,
ever afterwards, Mr. Penrose, when we want to feel aar Joe near
us, I just taks up th' flute and plays, and he awlus comes.'
Old Enoch paused, for his voice was thick, and with his
handkerchief he wiped away the moisture from his eyes.
In another minute he continued:
'Bud, Mr. Penrose, I'd a wurr trouble than oather o' those I've
towd yo' on. A twothree year sin' I wor a reprobate. I don't know
how it coom abaat, but somehaa I geet fond o' drink, and I tuk to
stopping aat late, and comin' wom' rough like, and turnin' agen
th' missus. They coom up to see me from Rehoboth, and owd Mr.
Morell prayed wi' me; but it wor all no use. Th' devil hissel wor
in me. They say, Mr. Penrose, as yo' durnd believe in a devil;
that yo' co evil a principle or summat of that sort. If thaa'd bin
like me thaa'd hev no doubts abaat a devil. I've felt him in me,
an' I've felt him tak' howd o' me and do as he'd a mind wi' me.
One day, when they'd crossed mi name off th' Rehoboth register,
and th' missus were sobbin' fit to break her heart, aw coom across
th' owd flute as aw were rootin' in a box for some medicine. There
it lay, long forgetten. As aw seed it, tears coom in my een. Aw
thought haa it bed helped mi when I lost o' mi brass, and when Joe
deed, and aw tuk it up and said, "Can ta help me naa, thinksto?"
An' aw put it together, and went aat on th' moors and began to
play; and fro' that hour to this aw've never wanted to sup a drop
o' drink. Naa, Mr. Penrose, yo' preachers talk abaat th' Cross,
and it's o' reet that yo' should; but yo' cannot blame me for
talkin' abaat my flute, con yo', when it's bin my salvation? And
whenever awm a bit daanhearted, or hardhearted, or fratchy wi' th'
missus, or plaguey wi' fo'k, aw goes to th' owd flute, and it
helps me o'er th' stile. But it's gettin' lat'; let's be goin'
wom'.'
Arriving at the cottage, Enoch told his wife how he had given Mr.
Penrose the history of his old flute, whereupon the good woman
wept and said:
'Him and me, Mr. Penrose, has many a time supped sorrow, but th'
owd flute has awlus sweetened aar cup, hesn't it, Enoch?'
'Yi, lass, it awlus hes.'
That night, before Mr. Penrose left the moorland cottage of the
Ashworths, old Enoch took up the flute tenderly, and, with a
far-off look in his eyes, commenced to play a plaintive air, which
the old woman told Mr. Penrose was to 'their Joe,' who was 'up
aboon wi' Jesus.' And as the minister descended the brow towards
his own home, the sweet, sad music continued to fall in dying
strains upon his ears; and that night, and many a night
afterwards, did he vex his brain to find out why redemption should
be wrought out by a flute, when the creed of Rehoboth was
powerless.
II.
THE MONEY-LENDER.
1. THE UTTERMOST FARTHING.
2. THE REDEMPTION OF MOSES FLETCHER.
3. THE ATONEMENT OF MOSES FLETCHER.
I.
THE UTTERMOST FARTHING.
'Well! yo' and Jim may do as yo' like--but I'm noan baan to turn
aat o' th' owd Fold till I'm ta'en aat feet fermost.'
'Nay, gronny--don't tak' on so. Yo' cornd ston' agen law as haa it
be; a writ is a writ, and if yo' hevn't got brass it's no use
feightin'.'
'A, lass! I'm feared thaa's reet--naa-a-days them as has most gets
most, and their own way i' th' bargain.'
They were sitting over the hearth, the elder woman gazing wearily
into the dying embers of the fire, and nursing her chin on her
hand; while the younger, with her clog upon the rocker of a deal
cradle, gave to that ark of infancy the gentle and monotonous
movement which from time immemorial has soothed the restlessness
of child-life.
It was a pitiless night--a night the superstitious might well
associate with the portent of the downfall of the house around
which the storm seemed to rage. The rain beat upon the windows,
and the wind with its invisible arms clasped the old farmstead as
if to wrench it from its foundations and scatter broadcast its
gray stones over the wild moor on the fringe of which it stood.
Neither of the women, however, heeded the sweep of the tempest,
for their bosoms were racked by storms other than those of the
elements. With eyes heavy from pent-up floods of tears, and hearts
dark with foreboding, they listened for the footfall which both
knew would bring with it their impending fate.
'He's here,' said the old woman, quickly raising her head during
one of the lulls of the storm. Nor was she mistaken, for in a
moment the door was thrown open by a tall broad-shouldered man,
who, seizing the dripping cap from his head, flung it with an oath
into the farthest corner of the room.
'Then he'll noan give us another chonce, lad? But thaa cornd mend
it wi' swearin'--thaa nobbud makes bad worse by adding thy oaths
to his roguery.'
'Oaths, mother! Oaths didsto say? I can tell thee th' Almighty
sometimes thinks more o' oaths than prayers. Owd Moses'll say his
to-neet--but my oaths'll get to heaven faster.'
'Hooisht, Jim! hooisht! ne'er mind Moses and his prayers. What did
he say about th' mortgage?'
'Say! why he said he'd oather hev his brass at ten o'clock
to-morn, or skift us wi' law. And he'll do it--that he will.'
'A, lad--thaa says truth. Owd Moses'll keep his word; he never
lies when he threatens poor fo'k like us. But I never thought it
ud come to this. I could ha' liked to ha' deed in th' owd chamber
aboon, and left th' haas feet fermost when I left it for good.'
And the old woman rocked herself in her grief over the dying fire.
'Well, gronmother, wee'n all to dee, and I durnd know as it
matters where we dee as long as we're ready. It's where we're baan
to live as bothers me,' said the hard-headed daughter-in-law.
'I've lived my life, thaa sees, lass. I'm nobbud waitin' to go to
them as is gone afore; and I could ha' liked to foller them from
th' owd haas. And then thaa'rt noan o' th' owd stock, lass. Thy
folks ne'er rooted theirsels i' th' soil like mine. It's fifty
year come next Whisundy (Whitsuntide) since Jimmie's faither
brought me here; and as I come in by wedlock, I could ha' liked to
ha' gone out by berryin'.'