The family board was spread; the family kettle--an unusually fat one--
was singing on the fire, and the family chimney was roaring like a lion
by reason of the wind, which blew a hurricane outside, and shook the
family mansion, a small wooden hut, to its foundations.
The hour was midnight. This fact was indicated by the family clock--a
Dutch one, with a face which had once been white, but was now become
greenish yellow, probably from horror at the profanity of the artist who
had painted a basket of unrecognisable fruit above it, an irate cockatoo
below it, and a blue church with a pink steeple as near to the centre of
it as the hands would admit of.
The family circle, consisting of a stout good-looking woman of thirty or
thereabouts, and a little boy and girl, were of the fisher class,
obviously so to the senses of sight and smell. They sat by the fire.
It was an unusual hour for supper, but then it was an unusually wild
night, and the frequent glance cast by the woman at the Dutch clock with
the horrified countenance, showed clearly that the board was not spread
for the family meal, but that they waited up for some absent one.
I have said that the family circle sat by the fire, but this is not
strictly correct. One member of it, the little boy, stood in the middle
of the room, howling!--howling so violently that his fat face had
changed from its wonted bright red to deep purple. Looking at him--as
he stood there arrayed in his uncle's red night-cap, his own
night-shirt, which was also a day-shirt and much too small, and his
father's pea-jacket, which was preposterously too large--one could not
avoid the alarming surmise that there _might_ be such a thing as
juvenile apoplexy, and that that boy was on the point of becoming a
living, if not a dead, example of the terrible disease.
Oh! it was a sweet child, a charming infant, altogether a delightful
creature to look upon, that son of Stephen Gaff, as it stood there
yelling like a hyena, stamping like a mad bull, washing its dirty hands
in tears on its dirtier cheeks, cramming its little knuckles into its
swollen eyes as if it sought to burst the organs of vision in their
sockets, and presenting, generally, an appearance of rampant rage and
woe that baffles all capacity of conception, and therefore defies all
power of description.
This cherub's name was Billy,--Billy Gaff; more familiarly known amongst
his friends as "The Bu'ster," owing to his tendency to explode into
tears, or laughter, or mischief, or fun, as the case might be. He was
about eleven years of age.
My own name, reader, is Bingley. Having retired on half-pay from the
Royal Navy, I reside in a pleasant cottage in the suburbs of the
well-known and important seaport town of Wreckumoft, situate on the east
coast of England. My front windows command a magnificent view of the
sea; my back windows command an equally magnificent view of landscape.
I have a magnificent wife, and she commands the household, myself
included. There was a time--I reflect on it with melancholy pride and
subdued satisfaction--when I commanded a British seventy-four. I
command nothing now but my temper. That, however, is a stronghold from
which nothing terrestrial can drive me.
My friends style me "The Captain," but I am not the hero of this tale.
No, by no means. I am altogether unheroic in my nature, commonplace in
my character. If a novelist were to describe me, he would write me down
a stout little old gentleman, with a bald head and a mild countenance;
mentally weak in expression, active in habits, and addicted to pipes and
loose clothing.
Do not imagine that this is my account of myself; no, it is an ideal
resulting from the oft-repeated assurances of my wife, who is a
strong-minded woman, a few inches taller than myself, somewhat raw-boned
and much more powerful, physically, though less rotund. In fact, if I
were to attempt a brief comprehensive description of her, I would say,
without the most distant feeling of disrespect of course, that she is
square and skinny--singularly so!
Mrs Bingley's contempt for my intellect is excelled, I might almost say
redeemed, by her love for myself. How she manages to separate between
myself and my intellect I have never been able to understand; but then
she _is_ strong-minded, which perhaps accounts for her seeing farther
into this millstone than I can. She tells me, not unfrequently, that I
am weak-minded. She even goes the length at times of calling me
imbecile; but she is a dear good affectionate woman, and I have no
sympathy with the insolent remark I once overheard made by an
acquaintance of mine, to the effect that it was a pity Mrs Bingley had
not been born with a man's hat and trousers on--no, none whatever.
Before dismissing myself, descriptively at least, (for, being an
honorary agent of the Shipwrecked Fishermen and Mariners' Society, and
an actor in some of the scenes which I am about to describe, I cannot
conveniently dismiss myself altogether); before dismissing myself, I
say, it may be as well to explain that my strong-minded wife, in concert
with a number of variously-minded women, (all more or less strong), and
a good many weak and otherwise minded men, have come to form their
opinion of me in consequence of my holding rather strongly a few
opinions of my own--to the effect that there are a good many wrong
things in this world, (admittedly wrong things); a good many muddles; a
good many glaring and outrageous abuses and shameful things the
continuance of which reflects discredit on the nation, and the wiping
out or putting right of which ought, by all means, to be set about
earnestly and at once.
Now, curiously enough, it is the idea conveyed in the last two words--at
once--which sticks in the throats of my strong-minded opponents! They
agree with me as to the existence of the evils, they honestly deplore
them, but they charge me with mental imbecility when I suggest that
things should be put right _at once_. They counsel delay, and when the
dispute reaches a certain stage they smile at me with contempt, or pity,
or they storm, according to individual temperament, and usually wind up
with a rasping reiteration of their original opinions, highly peppered
and salted, and an assurance that I have been born at least a century
before my time.
If the men of the next century are destined to do good, "as their hands
find opportunity," without previous delay until thousands of
opportunities are lost and gone for ever; if those who put their hands
to a piece of work shall carry it out with vigour in their _own_
lifetime; if those who counsel delay shall mean due time for full
consideration by _themselves_, and shall _not_ mean an extended
procrastination which shall free themselves from worry, and leave their
work to be handed down as a legacy to their children, who shall likewise
hand it down to _their_ children, and so on _ad infinitum_ until "delay"
shall become a synonym for death and destruction to tens of thousands of
better men than themselves,--if this shall be the sentiment and practice
of the men of next century, then I confess that my sympathies are with
them, and I really suspect that I must have got into the wrong century
by mistake. But as the position is irremediable now, I suppose I must,
in an imbecile sort of fashion, go on my way rejoicing--if I can--
sorrowing if I cannot rejoice.
Mrs Bingley having more than once threatened to scratch my face when I
have ventured to express the last sentiment, it may be perhaps as well
to change the subject and return to Billy Gaff, the charming child,
_alias_ the Bu'ster.
Billy deserves to be somewhat particularly introduced, because, besides
being an actor in this tale, he was a boy of strong character. If I
were to sum him up and reduce the total to a concentrated essence, the
result would be a sentence to the following effect:--Billy Gaff had a
will of his own! Perhaps I should say a very strong will of his own.
For instance, he, on several different occasions, willed to screw off
the spout of the family tea-pot, a pewter one, and, having willed to do
it, he did it. Again he willed, more than once, to smash a pane of
glass in the solitary window of the family mansion, and he _did_ smash a
pane of glass in that window; nay, more, in consequence of being
heartily whacked for the deed, he immediately willed to smash, _and_
smashed, a second pane, and was proceeding to will and smash a third
when he was caught up by his mother, beaten almost into the condition of
a mummy, and thrust under the clothes of the family bed, which
immediately creaked as if with convulsions, and tossed its blankets
about in apparent agony.
On the present occasion the Bu'ster had awakened out of a sound sleep to
the conviction that he was hungry. Observing the loaf on the table, he
immediately willed to have a second supper, and arising, donned his
father's pea-jacket, in order to enjoy the meal more thoroughly.
It was the sudden removal of the said loaf by his mother to an
unreachable shelf that induced the youthful Billy to stand in the middle
of the room and howl, as already described.
He was still engaged in emulating the storm, and Mrs Gaff, utterly
indifferent to him, had cast another glance at the horrified clock, and
remarked to her little girl Tottie, that "Uncle John must have found
work on the shore, for he was long of coming," when a heavy tread was
heard in the little porch outside the door.
"Hold yer noise," said Mrs Gaff sternly.
Billy obeyed, not by any means in consequence of the command, but
because he was curious to know who was about to enter, and meant to
resume yelling immediately after his curiosity on this point should be
satisfied.
The door opened, and a strong-built seaman stepped into the room, and
looked at the family with a quiet smile on his sunburnt face. His hair
and garments were dripping with water, as if he had just walked out of
the sea.
On beholding him the family rose and stood for a moment speechless.
Billy sat down on the floor in that prompt manner which is peculiar to
young children when they lose their balance; simultaneously with the
shock of being seated the word "faither" burst from his lips. Mrs Gaff
uttered a suppressed cry, and ran into the wet man's arms. Tottie and
the Bu'ster each ran at a leg, and hugging it violently, squeezed a
cataract of salt water into their respective bosoms.
"Stephen, lad, is't you?" said the wife, raising her head for a moment
and looking up in the man's face.
"Ay, dear lass, wrecked again; but safe home, thank God."
Mrs Gaff was not wont to give way to the melting mood, but she could
not restrain a few tears of joy. Tottie, observing this, cried from
sympathy; and the Bu'ster, not to be outdone, willed, began, and carried
into execution, a series of true British cheers, that could not have
been surpassed, perhaps could not have been equalled, by any boy of his
age in or out of the Royal Navy.