A mile off, and a thousand feet down. So Tom found it, though it seemed
as if he could have chucked a pebble onto the back of the woman in the
red petticoat who was weeding in the garden, or even across the dale to
the rocks beyond. For the bottom of the valley was just one field broad,
and on the other side ran the stream; and above it, gray crag, gray
down, gray stair, gray moor walled up to heaven.
A quiet, silent, rich, happy place; a narrow crack cut deep into the
earth; so deep, and so out of the way, that the bad bogies can hardly
find it out. The name of the place is Vendale.
So Tom went to go down; and first he went down three hundred feet of
steep heather, mixed up with loose brown gritstone, as rough as a file;
which was not pleasant to his poor little heels, as he came bump, stump,
jump, down the steep. And still he thought he could throw a stone into
the garden.
Then he went down three hundred feet of limestone terraces, one below
the other, as straight as if a carpenter had ruled them with his ruler
and then cut them out with his chisel. There was no heath there, but--
First, a little grass slope, covered with the prettiest flowers,
rockrose and saxifrage, and thyme and basil, and all sorts of sweet
herbs.
Then bump down a two-foot step of limestone.
Then another bit of grass and flowers.
Then bump down a one-foot step.
Then another bit of grass and flowers for fifty yards, as steep as the
house-roof, where he had to slide down.
Then another step of stone, ten feet high; and there he had to stop
himself, and crawl along the edge to find a crack; for if he had rolled
over, he would have rolled right into the old woman's garden, and
frightened her out of her wits.
Then, when he had found a dark, narrow crack, full of green stalked
fern, such as hangs in the basket in the drawing-room, and had crawled
down through it, with knees and elbows, as he would down a chimney,
there was another grass slope, and another step, and so on, till--oh,
dear me! I wish it was all over; and so did he. And yet he thought he
could throw a stone into the old woman's garden.
At last he came to a bank of beautiful shrubs; whitebeam, with its great
silver-backed leaves, and mountain ash, and oak; and below them cliff
and crag, cliff and crag, with great beds of crown ferns and wood sedge;
while through the shrubs he could see the stream sparkling, and hear it
murmur on the white pebbles. He did not know that it was three hundred
feet below.
And all the while he never saw the Irishwoman coming down behind him.
But he was getting terribly tired now. The burning sun on the fells had
sucked him up; but the damp heat of the woody crag sucked him up still
more; and the perspiration ran out of the ends of his fingers and toes,
and washed him cleaner than he had been for a whole year. But, of
course, he dirtied everything terribly as he went. There has been a
great black smudge all down the crag ever since. And there have been
more black beetles in Vendale since than ever were known before; all, of
course, owing to Tom's having blacked the original papa of them all,
just as he was setting off to be married, with a sky-blue coat and
scarlet leggings, as smart as a gardener's dog with a polyanthus in his
mouth.
At last he got to the bottom. But, behold, it was not the bottom--as
people usually find when they are coming down a mountain. For at the
foot of the crag were heaps and heaps of fallen limestone of every size
from that of your head to that of a stage-waggon, with holes between
them full of sweet heath fern; and before Tom got through them, he was
out in the bright sunshine again; and then he felt, once for all and
suddenly, as people generally do, that he was b-e-a-t, beat. You must
expect to be beat a few times in your life, little man, if you live such
a life as a man ought to live, let you be as strong and healthy as you
may; and when you are, you will find it a very ugly feeling. I hope that
that day you may have a stout, staunch friend by you who is not beat;
for, if you have not, you had best lie where you are, and wait for
better times, as poor Tom did.
He could not get on. The sun was burning, and yet he felt chill all
over. He was quite empty, and yet he felt quite sick. There was but two
hundred yards of smooth pasture between him and the cottage, and yet he
could not walk down it. He could hear the stream murmuring only one
field beyond it, and yet it seemed to him as if it was a hundred miles
off.
He lay down on the grass till the beetles ran over him, and the flies
settled on his nose. I don't know when he would have got up again, if
the gnats and the midges had not taken compassion on him. But the gnats
blew their trumpets so loud in his ear, and the midges nibbled so at his
hands and face wherever they could find a place free from soot, that at
last he woke up, and stumbled away, down over a low wall, and into a
narrow road, and up to the cottage door.
And a neat, pretty cottage it was, with clipped yew hedges all round the
garden, and yews inside, too, cut into peacocks and trumpets and teapots
and all kinds of queer shapes, And out of the open door came a noise
like that of the frogs, when they know that it is going to be scorching
hot to-morrow--and how they know that I don't know, and you don't know,
and nobody knows,
He came slowly up to the open door, which was all hung round with
clematis and roses; and then peeped in, half afraid,
And there sat by the empty fireplace, which was filled with a pot of
sweet herbs, the nicest old woman that ever was seen, in her red
petticoat, and short dimity bedgown, and clean white cap, with a black
silk handkerchief over it, tied under her chin. At her feet sat the
grandfather of all the cats; and opposite her sat, on two benches,
twelve or fourteen neat, rosy, chubby little children, learning their
Chris-cross-row; [Footnote: Chris-cross-row is an old name for the
alphabet] and gabble enough they made about it.
[Illustration: THE OLD DAME LOOKED AT TOM]
Such a pleasant cottage it was, with a shiny clean stone floor, and
curious old prints on the walls, and an old black oak sideboard full of
bright pewter and brass dishes, and a cuckoo clock in the corner, which
began shouting as soon as Tom appeared; not that it was frightened at
Tom, but that it was just eleven o'clock.
All the children started at Tom's dirty black figure,--the girls began
to cry, and the boys began to laugh, and all pointed at him rudely
enough; but Tom was too tired to care for that.
"What art thou, and what dost want?" cried the old dame. "A chimney-
sweep! Away with thee! I'll have no sweeps here."
"Water," said poor little Tom, quite faint.
"Water? There's plenty i' the beck," she said, quite sharply.
"But I can't get there; I'm most clemmed with hunger and drought." And
Tom sank down upon the doorstep, and laid his head against the post.
And the old dame looked at him through her spectacles one minute, and
two, and three; and then she said, "He's sick; and a bairn's a bairn,
sweep or none."
"Water," said Tom.
"God forgive me!" and she put by her spectacles, and rose, and came to
Tom. "Water's bad for thee; I'll give thee milk." And she toddled off
into the next room, and brought a cup of milk and a bit of bread.
Tom drank the milk off at one draught, and then looked up, revived.
"Where didst come from?" said the dame.
"Over Fell, there," said Tom, and pointed up into the sky.
"Over Harthover? and down Lewthwaite Crag? Art sure thou are not lying?"
"Why should I?" said Tom, and leant his head against the post.
"And how got ye up there?"
"I came over from the Place;" and Tom was so tired and desperate he had
no heart or time to think of a story, so he told all the truth in a few
words.
"Bless thy little heart! And thou hast not been stealing, then?"
"No."
Bless thy little heart; and I'll warrant not. Why, God's guided the
bairn, because he was innocent! Away from the Place, and over Harthover
Fell, and down Lewthwaite Crag! Who ever heard the like, if God hadn't
led him? Why dost not eat thy bread?"
"I can't."
"It's good enough, for I made it myself."
"I can't," said Tom, and he laid his head on his knees, and then asked:
"Is it Sunday?"
"No, then; why should it be?"
"Because I hear the church bells ringing so."
"Bless thy pretty heart! The bairn's sick. Come wi' me, and I'll hap
thee up somewhere. If thou wert a bit cleaner, I'd put thee in my own
bed, for the Lord's sake. But come along here."
But when Tom tried to get up, he was so tired and giddy that she had to
help him and lead him.
She put him in an outhouse, upon soft, sweet hay and an old rug, and
bade him sleep off his walk, and she would come to him when school was
over, in an hour's time.
And so she went in again, expecting Tom to fall fast asleep at once.
But Tom did not fall asleep.
Instead of it he turned and tossed and kicked about in the strangest
way, and felt so hot all over that he longed to get into the river and
cool himself; and then he fell half asleep, and dreamt that he heard the
little white lady crying to him, "Oh, you're so dirty; go and be
washed"; and then that he heard the Irishwoman saying, "Those that wish
to be clean, clean they will be." And then he heard the church bells
ring so loud, close to him too, that he was sure it must be Sunday, in
spite of what the old dame had said; and he would go to church, and see
what a church was like inside, for he had never been in one, poor little
fellow, in all his life. But the people would never let him come in, all
over soot and dirt like that. He must go to the river and wash first.
And he said out loud again and again, though being half asleep he did
not know it, "I must be clean, I must be clean."
[Illustration.]
And all of a sudden he found himself, not in the outhouse on the hay,
but in the middle of a meadow, over the road, with the stream just
before him, saying continually, "I must be clean, I mast be clean." He
had got there on his own legs, between sleep and awake, as children will
often get out of bed, and go about the room, when they are not quite
well. But he was not a bit surprised, and went on to the bank of the
brook, and lay down on the grass, and looked into the clear, clear,
limestone water, with every pebble at the bottom bright and clean, while
the little silver trout dashed about in fright at the sight of his black
face; and he dipped his feet in and found it so cool, cool, cool; and he
said, "I will be a fish; I will swim in the water; I must be clean, I
must be clean."
So he pulled off all his clothes in such haste that he tore some of
them, which was easy enough with such ragged old things. And he put his
poor, hot, sore feet into the water; and then his legs; and the farther
he went in, the more the church bells rang in his head.
"Ah," said Tom, "I must be quick and wash myself; the bells are ringing
quite loud now; and they will stop soon, and then the door will shut,
and I shall never be able to get in at all."
And all the while he never saw the Irishwoman, not behind him this time,
but before.
For just before he came to the riverside, she had stept down into the
cool, clear water; and her shawl and her petticoat floated off her, and
the green water weeds floated round her sides, and the white water
lilies floated round her head, and the fairies of the stream came up
from the bottom and bore her away and down upon their arms; for she was
the queen of them all; and perhaps of more besides.
"Where have you been?" they asked her.
"I have been smoothing sick folks' pillows, and whispering sweet dreams
into their ears; opening cottage casements, to let out the stifling air;
coaxing little children away from gutters and foul pools where fever
breeds; turning women from the gin-shop door, and staying men's hands as
they were going to strike their wives; doing all I can to help those who
will not help themselves; and little enough that is, and weary work for
me. But I have brought you a new little brother, and watched him safe
all the way here."
Then all the fairies laughed for joy at the thought that they had a
little brother coming.
"But mind, maidens, he must not see you, or know that you are here. He
is but a savage now, and like the beasts which perish; and from the
beasts which perish he must learn. So you must not play with him, or
speak to him, or let him see you; but only keep him from being harmed."
Then the fairies were sad, because they could not play with their new
brother; but they always did what they were told. And their queen
floated away down the river; and whither she went, thither she came.
But all this Tom, of course, never saw or heard; and perhaps if he had
it would have made little difference in the story; for he was so hot and
thirsty, and longed so to be clean for once, that he tumbled himself as
quick as he could into the clear, cool stream.
And he had not been in it two minutes before he fell fast asleep, into
the quietest, sunniest, coziest sleep that ever he had in his life; and
he dreamt about the green meadows by which he had walked that morning,
and the tall elm trees and the sleeping cows; and after that he dreamt
of nothing at all.
The reason of his falling into such a delightful sleep is very simple;
and yet hardly any one has found it out. It was merely that the fairies
took him.
The kind old dame came back at twelve, when school was over, to look at
Tom; but there was no Tom there. She looked about for his footprints;
but the ground was so hard that there was no slot, as they say in dear
old North Devon.
So the old dame went in again, quite sulky, thinking that little Tom had
tricked her with a false story, and shammed ill, and then run away
again.
* * * * *
When Sir John and the rest of them had run themselves out of breath, and
lost Tom, they went back again, looking very foolish. And they looked
more foolish still when Sir John heard more of the story from the nurse;
and more foolish still, again, when they heard the whole story from Miss
Ellie, the little lady in white.
All she had seen was a poor little black chimney-sweep, crying and
sobbing, and going to get up the chimney again. Of course, she was very
much frightened; and no wonder. But that was all. The boy had taken
nothing in the room; by the mark of his little sooty feet, they could
see that he had never been off the hearth rug till the nurse caught hold
of him. It was all a mistake.
So Sir John told Grimes to go home, and promised him five shillings if
he would bring the boy quietly up to him, without beating him, that he
might be sure of the truth. For he took it for granted, and Grimes too,
that Tom had made his way home.
But no Tom came back to Mr. Grimes that evening; and he went to the
police office, to tell them to look out for the boy. But no Tom was
heard of.
So Mr. Grimes came up to Harthover next day with a very sour face; but
when he got there, Sir John was over the hills and far away; and Mr.
Grimes had to sit in the outer servants' hall all day, and drink strong
ale to wash away his sorrows; and they were washed away long before Sir
John came back. For good Sir John had slept very badly that night; and
he said to his lady, "My dear, the boy must have got over into the
grouse moors, and lost himself; and he lies very heavily on my
conscience, poor little lad. But I know what I will do."
So, at five the next morning up he got, and bade them bring his shooting
pony, and the keeper to come on his pony, and the huntsman, and the
first whip, and the second whip, and the underkeeper with the bloodhound
in a leash--a great dog as tall as a calf, of the colour of a gravel
walk, with mahogany ears and nose, and a throat like a church bell. They
took him up to the place where Tom had gone into the wood; and there the
hound lifted up his mighty voice, and told them all he knew.
Then he took them to the place where Tom had climbed the wall; and they
shoved it down, and all got through.
And then the wise dog took them over the moor, and over the fells, step
by step, very slowly; for the scent was a day old, you know, and very
light from the heat and drought. But that was why cunning old Sir John
started at five in the morning.
And at last he came to the top of Lewthwaite Crag, and there he bayed,
and looked up in their faces, as much as to say, "I tell you he is gone
down here!"
They could hardly believe that Tom would have gone so far; and when they
looked at that awful cliff, they could never believe that he would have
dared to face it. But if the dog said so, it must be true.
"Heaven forgive us!" said Sir John. "If we find him at all, we shall
find him lying at the bottom."
And he slapped his great hand upon his great thigh, and said:
"Who will go down over Lewthwaite Crag, and see if that boy is alive?
Oh, that I were twenty years younger, and I would go down myself!" And
so he would have done, as well as any sweep in the country. Then he
said:
"Twenty pounds to the man who brings me that boy alive!" And as was his
way, what he said he meant.
Now among the lot was a little groom-boy, a very little groom indeed;
and he was the same who had ridden up the court, and told Tom to come to
the Hall; and he said:
"Twenty pounds or none, I will go down over Lewthwaite Crag, if it's
only for the poor boy's sake. For he was as civil a spoken little chap
as ever climbed a flue."
So down over Lewthwaite Crag he went; a very smart groom he was at the
top, and a very shabby one at the bottom; for he tore his gaiters, and
he tore his breeches, and he tore his jacket, and he burst his braces,
and he burst his boots, and he lost his hat, and what was worst of all,
he lost his shirt pin, which he prized very much, for it was gold; so it
was a really severe loss; but he never saw anything of Tom.
And all the while Sir John and the rest were riding round, full three
miles to the right, and back again, to get into Vendale, and to the foot
of the crag.
When they came to the old dame's school, all the children came out to
see. And the old dame came out too; and when she saw Sir John, she
curtsied very low, for she was a tenant of his.
"Well, dame, and how are you?" said Sir John.
[Illustration: SIR JOHN SEARCHING FOR TOM]
"Blessings on you as broad as your back, Harthover," says she--she
didn't call him Sir John, but only Harthover, for that is the fashion in
the North country--"and welcome into Vendale; but you're no hunting the
fox this time of the year?"
"I am hunting, and strange game too," said he.
"Blessings on your heart, and what makes you look so sad the morn?"
"I'm looking for a lost child, a chimney-sweep, that is run away."
"Oh, Harthover, Harthover," says she, "ye were always a just man and a
merciful; and ye'll no harm the poor lad if I give you tidings of him?"
"Not I, not I, dame. I'm afraid we hunted him out of the house all on a
miserable mistake, and the hound has brought him to the top of
Lewthwaite Crag, and--"
Whereat the old dame broke out crying, without letting him finish his
story.
"So he told me the truth after all, poor little dear! Ah, first thoughts
are best, and a body's heart'll guide them right, if they will but
hearken to it." And then she told Sir John all.
"Bring the dog here, and lay him on," said Sir John, without another
word, and he set his teeth very hard.
And the dog opened at once; and went away at the back of the cottage,
over the road, and over the meadow, and through a bit of alder copse;
and there, upon an alder stump, they saw Tom's clothes lying. And then
they knew as much about it all as there was any need to know.
And Tom?
Ah, now comes the most wonderful part of this wonderful story. Tom, when
he woke, for of course he woke--children always wake after they have
slept exactly as long as is good for them--found himself swimming about
in the stream, being about four inches, or--that I may be accurate--
3.87902 inches long, and having round the parotid region of his fauces a
set of external gills (I hope you understand all the big words) just
like those of a sucking eft, which he mistook for a lace frill, till he
pulled at them, found he hurt himself, and made up his mind that they
were part of himself, and best left alone. In fact, the fairies had
turned him into a water baby.
A water baby? You never heard of a water baby? Perhaps not. That is the
very reason why this story was written. There are a great many things in
the world which you never heard of; and a great many more which nobody
ever heard of; and a great many things, too, which nobody will ever hear
of.
No water babies, indeed? Why, wise men of old said that everything on
earth had its double in the water; and you may see that that is, if not
quite true, still quite as true as most other theories which you are
likely to hear for many a day. There are land babies--then why not water
babies? ARE THERE NOT WATER RATS, WATER FLIES, WATER CRICKETS, WATER
CRABS, WATER TORTOISES, WATER SCORPIONS, WATER TIGERS AND SO ON WITHOUT
END?
Am I in earnest? Oh dear no! Don't you know that this is a fairy tale,
and all fun and pretense; and that you are not to believe one word of
it, even if it is true?
But at all events, so it happened to Tom. And, therefore, the keeper and
the groom, and Sir John made a great mistake, and were very unhappy (Sir
John, at least) without any reason, when they found a black thing in the
water, and said it was Tom's body and that he had been drowned. They
were utterly mistaken. Tom was quite alive; and cleaner, and merrier,
than he had ever been. The fairies had washed him, you see, in the swift
river, so thoroughly, that not only his dirt, but his whole husk and
shell had been washed quite off him, and the pretty little real Tom was
washed out of the inside of it, and swam away, as a caddis [Footnote:
The caddis worm, while it lives in the water, builds for itself a case
of stones or grass or shells, all bound together with silk When the time
for its transformation is near, the worm seals up with silk both ends of
its case, and remains withdrawn until it is ready to emerge as a caddis
fly.] does when its case of stones and silk is bored through, and away
it goes on its back, paddling to the shore, there to split its skin, and
fly away as a caperer, on four fawn-coloured wings, with long legs and
horns. They are foolish fellows, the caperers, and fly into the candle
at night, if you leave the door open. We will hope Tom will be wiser,
now he has got safe out of his sooty old shell.
But good Sir John did not understand all this, and he took it into his
head that Tom was drowned. When they looked into the empty pockets of
his shell, and found no jewels there, nor money--nothing but three
marbles, and a brass button with a string to it--then Sir John did
something as like crying as ever he did in his life, and blamed himself
more bitterly than he need have done. So he cried, and the groom-boy
cried, and the huntsman cried, and the dame cried, and the little girl
cried, and the dairymaid cried, and the old nurse cried (for it was
somewhat her fault), and my lady cried, for though people have wigs,
that is no reason why they should not have hearts; but the keeper did
not cry, though he had been so good-natured to Tom the morning before;
for he was so dried up with running after poachers, that you could no
more get tears out of him than milk out of leather; and Grimes did not
cry, for Sir John gave him ten pounds, and he drank it all in a week.
Sir John sent, far and wide, to find Tom's father and mother; but he
might have looked till Doomsday for them, for one was dead, and the
other was in Botany Bay. [Footnote: Botany Bay was originally the name
of a settlement established in New South Wales, in Eastern Australia,
for the reception of criminals from England. Later, the name came to be
applied to any distant colony to which criminals were transported.] And
the little girl would not play with her dolls for a whole week, and
never forgot poor little Tom. And soon my lady put a pretty little
tombstone over Tom's shell in the little churchyard in Vendale.
And the dame decked it with garlands every Sunday, till she grew so old
that she could not stir abroad; then the little children decked it for
her. And always she sang an old, old song, as she sat spinning what she
called her wedding dress. The children could not understand it, but they
liked it none the less for that; for it was very sweet and very sad; and
that was enough for them. And these are the words of it:--
"When all the world is young, lad,
And all the trees are green;
And every goose a swan, lad,
And every lass a queen;
Then hey for boot and horse, lad,
And round the world away;
Young blood must have its course, lad,
And every dog his day.
"When all the world is old, lad,
And all the trees are brown;
And all the sport is stale, lad,
And all the wheels run down;
Creep home, and take your place there,
The spent and maimed among;
God grant you find one face there,
You loved when all was young."
[Illustration.]
Those are the words, but they are only the body of it; the soul of the
song was the dear old woman's sweet face, and sweet voice, and the sweet
old air to which she sang; and that, alas! one cannot put on paper. And
at last she grew so stiff and lame, that the angels were forced to carry
her; and they helped her on with her wedding dress, and carried her up
over Harthover Fells, and a long way beyond that too: and there was a
new schoolmistress in Vendale.
And all the while Tom was swimming about in the river, with a pretty
little lace collar of gills about his neck, as lively as a grig, and as
clean as a fresh-run salmon.
Now, if you don't like my story, then go to the schoolroom and learn
your multiplication table, and see if you like that better. Some people,
no doubt, would do so. So much the better for us, if not for them. It
takes all sorts, they say, to make a world.