And so it was quite ready, and with what pride and satisfaction we
viewed it. We took little private excursions around it; we made
innumerable drives into it; we gave it affectionate little pattings, as
if it was a child; we smoothed down little inequalities; we utterly
denied the existence of a smell of paint, an idea hazarded by Madame.
Schillie had a doubt it was rather on one side, which doubt was driven
to the winds. Sybil suggested a wish that it had been made higher, for
which she was scouted by the older ones, and nearly tickled to death by
the younger ones. Not even the remembrance of our home put us out of
conceit of our new, but certainly most clumsy mansion. Oh home! That
lovely home? Are we to see it again, or is it only to be seen in a dream
of the past; and our kith and kin, our kind good neighbours, all that we
loved so much, were we to see them no more? But this was Christmas-day.
The young ones had swept and decorated our church, as well as they could
in imitation of the churches at home. Certainly nothing could be more
gorgeous than the long trailing creepers that hung suspended all round,
some with scarlet flowers, some bright blue, the magnificent hibiscus,
the beautiful bell-shaped datura, with innumerable others, to which we
could give no names.
This was to be a complete holiday. We dressed in silks and satins, we
exchanged gifts, we offered to each other the proper Christmas greeting.
Can I say that no heart was sad, that no remembrance of past Christmases
haunted the celebration of this day? It is but too true that sad
thoughts arose, but they were not for ourselves.
I must, however, proceed with the opening of the new house, which was
also to have a name given it. After church we all helped to get dinner
ready. Schillie cooked with Jenny, being determined to have some superb
turtle soup. I made by her orders some lime punch, Hargrave boiled
vegetables of all kinds, the girls got fruit and flowers, Madame
arranged them, and the boys were getting the fish. I went into the
kitchen to ask Schillie some question relative to the punch, and was
sent out with a word and a blow almost. Her face was blazing like a
warming pan, the soup was at its most important crisis. Gatty hearing
the explosion of wrath, came as was her usual custom to join in the
_melee_, also got a shower of invectives, but, knowing the soup-pot
could not be left, she stood her ground, and occupied herself in various
petty acts of mischief. For instance, the new cook had a perfect series
of cloths and such like articles pinned to her when she made her
appearance. Hargrave found all the gourds and pipkins into which she had
put the vegetables changed, and, not being naturally sweet tempered, she
declared, "Miss Gertrude was the most aggravatingest creature she ever
met, and she would not serve her for a pound a day." But all ended well,
and the dinner was served. We had boiled chickens at the top, and roast
chickens at the bottom, and we had roast ducks on both sides, and the
great bowl of turtle soup was in the middle, with two jugs of lime punch
each side, and we had guava jelly in two places, and a pumpkin pie, and
roasted yams, and rice and fruit mixed together of all kinds. In fact,
it was a perfect Lord Mayor's feast. Schillie had insisted on dining
like Christians, as she called it, with dinner napkins and finger
glasses. The rest of the dinner table was covered with fruits and
flowers, such as I am sure no Lord Mayor ever saw at his table. Grace
was said. Schillie, with the dinner napkin spread out with an air, her
face still glowing, but bland in the extreme knowing that she had
achieved a triumph of cookery, proceeded to serve the soup. I being the
first to taste it pronounced it delicious. Madame thought it the best
she had ever tasted! when we heard an exclamation from Schillie, "In the
name of all that's ridiculous what's in the soup?" said she, turning
wrathfully to Jenny. "Indeed, Madam, you poured it out of the pan
yourself, and I only brought it in." "What can it be, here is something
hard at the bottom rolling about, and I declare everything was stewed to
a sponge when I last stirred it," continued she in rising choler.
_Gatty_ (rising with great alacrity).--"If you please, little Mother,
shall I try to fish it out?"
_Schillie._--"Fish fiddlesticks out, indeed, Miss Gatty. Ah you may look
as demure as you like, I'll be bound you are at the bottom of this
mischief. I remember now, when I was taking off these rags you pinned on
me, my back was turned. Now, tell me this instant, you young crocodile,
what have you been putting in the soup?"
_Gatty._--"If you please, little Mother, don't be so angry, it's only a
stone, and I washed it quite clean."
_Schillie._--"Then take that stone for your dinner, Miss, and nothing
else shall you have."
This threat of course went for nothing, and Gatty had as much dinner as
any of us, and, perhaps, rather more, considering that she was nearly
the biggest of us all, and also never being still, she required more
nourishment to keep up the demand upon the constitution.
We made Jenny and Hargrave dine with us. Hargrave mincing her words,
looking dignified, and eating next to nothing, because she thought it
more ladylike; while Jenny sat between her two dear boys, and made
nearly as much noise as they did, swallowing all they made her taste out
of their own plates, though she was helped out of the same dishes they
were. The chattering on all sides could only equal the eating. I
proposed the health of the new house with the first glass of lime punch.
This was drank with great applause, and a discussion ensued as to what
we should call it.
_Schillie_ (with her mouth full of turtle).--"Pooh, pooh, use your
brains for some other purpose. It's a house, is it not? Then why not
call it a house!"
_Sybil._--"But all houses have names to distinguish them."
_Schillie._--"Alack, if you are not a young noodle. Pray, who has got a
house here besides? A great boon it would be to have some neighbours to
whom one could talk common sense."
_Serena._--"Oh, we will talk as much common sense as you like, little
Mother; and the first thing I shall say is, though there is but one
house in the island, we may just as well make it as like home as we can,
and call it the same name."
I nodded approvingly to the dear girl for her nice thought. Madame's
pocket handkerchief was in requisition, while Schillie, who seemed to
favour Serena's remarks with more attention than any of the others,
said, "Call it any name you like, my dear child, if it gives you the
smallest pleasure; only you will see house it is, and house it will be
called, until a hurricane blows it down."
"Oh don't, my dear Madam," murmured Madame. "Hurricanes will come,"
repeated Schillie. "I would oblige you if I could, but in this
particular I am not clerk of the works, and have no control."
"Then," said Sybil, "we will call it Maescelyn."
"No," said Oscar, "I won't have it called that. The real Maescelyn is a
castle, very large, airy, and handsome to look at, and this is a dingy
little house, with no windows in it."
What a start we all gave. It was too true. Even the clerk of the works
looked quite silly. The house that had cost us such infinite labour, on
which we looked with such pride and affection, had no windows of any
kind or sort in its principal room. It is true the door was very wide,
it is true that floods of light poured in through it, but, suppose we
had to shut the door (that is when we had made one) what could we do
then? It is true the little bed-rooms had each their little pigeon holes
for light and ventilation, and that the back kitchen was very airy, but
our hall, dining-room, drawing-room, school-room (the pride of our
hearts and delight of our eyes) had no windows whatever. No wonder we
all felt the remark was true. Felix spoke first, but only in a whisper,
which whisper passed round among the young ones, and marvellously
restored their equanimity. "There was no possibility of doing lessons in
the dark." As Madame became aware of this telegraphic dispatch, and saw
its effect, she grew quite nervous, which always caused her to lose her
voice. In vain she attempted an expostulation, and, what between her
efforts and the rising exultation, I began to apprehend she would have
a fit, so I comforted her, and said, "Never mind, Madame, we will have a
window without doubt somewhere, and at present you see we don't want
one, for the door throws in so much light, that we never found out we
ought to have windows." I don't think the clerk of the works spoke for
the next half hour, she was so annoyed; but, what we thought a great
misfortune proved afterwards a very desirable thing, for it was most
refreshing in the glaring sunshine and hot baking air to come into the
dark cool house, the walls of which being so thick, and filled up with
clay, preventing the heat penetrating into it.
So we carried on the discussion about the name; Madame, Sybil, Serena,
and Winifred all for calling it Maescelyn. Oscar, Felix, Lilly, and
Jenny all against it. The little Mother, not having recovered herself
gave no name, Gatty was waiting for her opinion before she gave any,
for, though in constant warfare, their similarity of tastes made them in
reality sworn friends. Hargrave also would give no name, principally
because she said, "It was a 'orrifying place, and very outrageous," by
which we suppose she meant outlandish. Though urged by the little ones,
whom she suspected were laughing at her, to explain, she would not, but
went off into a discussion upon dress, and, bidding the young ladies to
look at her Mistress dressed in Christmas robes, with her hair so
beautifully plaited in a basket plait, and her curls so smooth and
bright, and her black satin gown sitting and hanging so becomingly and
well. "And then to think she could like such a 'ole of an hisland, where
no one could see how she 'ad hattired her Mistress, and to give such a
'eathen place a name too, was more than she could bear." So the girls
who loved to tease her, declared her Mistress did not look one bit
better than the rest of the party, and that Madame's neat plain white
cap was the prettiest thing at the dinner table, or Jenny's smart blue
one, with bows and ends all over it. As she was too-matter-of-fact to
see any joke in this, and as her Mistress's hair was her weak point, she
waxed wrath, and began a splendid description, misplacing all the h's,
and making such a sad havoc amongst her parts of speech, that it was
difficult to make out what she wished us must to admire, whether her
Mistress, or diamonds, or black velvet, herself or hair. I had the
casting vote in giving a name to the house, but, previously, I thought
it as well that we should give a name to our island. "Certainly,
certainly," was said on all sides, and also most voices decided it
should be a Welsh name; therefore, in a glass of lime punch, after a
long discussion, we christened our island "YR YNYS UNYG," the last word,
Unyg, being pronounced as inig. This in English signified "The Lonely
Island." Much as I wished all my dear companions to feel happy, and to
be as much at home in our painful situation as circumstances would
allow, and, much also as I liked the notion of our calling everything
about us by home names, I yet shrunk from giving the name of our
beloved home to the hut in which we now seemed doomed to pass our days.
Several times I attempted to begin upon the subject, but it was too
painful and I dared not trust my voice, lest its faltering should show
my companions that this Christmas-day was not one of unmixed pleasure,
and I was the more anxious to restrain my feelings as I could easily
perceive that a little was only wanting to turn our day of feasting into
one of mourning. It was not, therefore, until repeated entreaties had
been urged, that, at last, I said somewhat shortly, and with an effort
of hilarity, "I think we will call our house 'Cartref Pellenig,' or 'The
Distant Home,' because--because--"
_Schillie._--"Well, why, because."
"Oh hush, hush, cousin Schillie," said Lilly, who was always impetuous,
and, throwing her arms round me, she continued, "Don't, dear Mama, my
own Mother, don't cry, I cannot bear it. We shall see home again, we
shall not always live here, we will be so good, we will do everything to
please you. Oh Mother, my own darling Mother, don't cry so."
And so all my efforts were in vain, we were all upset, and the little
house, so late the scene of merriment, now was filled with the voices of
lamentation and woe. Each in their different way mourned and wept, but,
as I said before, it was not so much for ourselves as for others.
We had been so busy, and had so much on our minds that we had thought
of little else than mending our own condition, and doing all we could to
make ourselves comfortable. To the olden heads it had been a time of
great anxiety and trouble, while the younger ones had been forced out of
their proper sphere of dependance, into that of companions, helpers, and
advisers. We had, therefore, but little time to think of those who, it
now struck us, on this Christmas-day, for the first time, would be
suffering under fear and anxiety for our fate.
The same feelings that were so forcibly striking us of the relations,
friends, and neighbours with whom we had always exchanged the happy
Christmas greetings, would, we now began to feel, also strike them. In
our family what gaps would be seen in the heretofore merry Christmas
party. I looked round, Schillie was separated from her children, Gatty,
Zoe, Winifred, Madame, even the poor servants, how many mourning
households would there be? Not because we were missing from the
Christmas party, as that was expected, but because they must be aware
that something had occurred. They must now be suffering under that worst
of all fears, doubt and apprehension. Eight months had passed since we
had seen them, and six must have gone by since they had heard from us.
There could be no doubt that, painful as our feelings were, they were
now most to be pitied. Oh how we longed for the wings of a bird to fly
over, and set them at rest. How the more we wept and talked about them,
the more unbearable and painful grew this feeling. All that we had
undergone; all that we seemed likely to undergo, appeared but as a drop
on the ocean compared to the mourning and sorrow which we knew were
filling the hearts of so many households, weeping, as they would be at
the mysterious and unknown fate of those they loved so much. We were
safe, we were well, we were comparatively happy, yet we could not tell
this, and, perhaps at the time, the very time, we were celebrating our
housewarming and Christmas dinner, they were lamenting us as dead.
Will it be wondered at that our Christmas-day ended in sorrow, and that
we wept for those weeping for us. We talked over all they might be
thinking and doing. Every speech, every sentence ending, "Oh if we could
only tell them, if they could only peep into the rude hut, and see the
healthy blooming faces contained therein, albeit each face was bedewed
with tears, each voice was choking with sorrow." This picture would they
see. The rustic rough house, with its wide open entrance, showing the
table strewn with the wrecks of our feast, but brilliant with flowers
and fruit. Lying on a rude grass cushion was the Mother, her hair all
dishevelled with sorrow, her face lengthened with woe; close by her,
with her face hidden from sight, was the little Mother; Madame leaning
far back in her chair, with a handkerchief over her face, was weeping
bitterly behind it; the six girls, in various groups, about the two
Mothers, were each, though deeply sorrowful, trying in their own sweet
ways, to speak of hope and comfort; the two boys, at a little distance,
were sitting on the ground, Oscar grave and sorrowful, Felix weeping and
crying while he fed his monkey to keep it quiet; the servants had
retired. Beyond, through the door, was seen the deep blue quiet sea,
over which we were so anxious to fly, while the rich dark foliage of the
trees appeared cool and refreshing against the glowing sky. But this
sadness could not last long in a party animated by christian hopes,
sustained by christian faith; ere the hour for evening service arrived
our sorrow grew lighter, each seemed to feel in the stored words an
individual comfort, and we retired to rest committing the consolation of
all near and dear to us to Him who had preserved _us_ through so many
and great dangers, for the sake of His Son Jesus Christ. Thus we sat for
hours on this Christmas-day, but what was going on at home?