CHAPTER I.--BREAKING UP.

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LUKE BARNICOTT.

by

WILLIAM HOWITT.

And Other Stories.

Twenty-Eighth Thousand.

Cassell & Company, Limited:

London, Paris, New York & Melbourne.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

THE STORY OF LUKE BARNICOTT 5

THE CASTLE EAST OF THE SUN 49

THE HOLIDAYS AT BARENBURG CASTLE 67

[Illustration: After Young Luke.]

THE STORY OF LUKE BARNICOTT

BY WILLIAM HOWITT.

The village of Monnycrofts, in Derbyshire, may be said to be a

distinguished village, for though it is not a city set on a hill, it is

a village set on a hill. It may be seen far and wide with its cluster of

red brick houses, and its tall gray-stone church steeple, which has

weathered the winds of many a century. The distant traveller observes

its green upward sloping fields, well embellished by hedgerow trees, and

its clumps of trees springing up amongst its scenes, and half hiding

them, and says to himself as he trots along, "a pleasant look-out must

that hamlet have." And he is right; it has a very pleasant look-out for

miles and miles on three sides of it; the fourth is closed by the

shoulder of the hill, and the woods and plantations of old Squire

Flaggimore. On another hill some half-mile to the left of the village,

as you ascend the road to it, stands a windmill, which with its active

sails always seems to be beckoning everybody from the country round to

come up and see something wonderful. If you were to go up you would see

nothing wonderful, but you would have a fine airy prospect over the

country, and, ten to one, feel a fine breeze blowing that would do your

heart good. You would see the spacious valley of the Erwash winding

along for miles, with its fields all mapped out by its hedges and

hedgerow trees, and its scattered hamlets, with their church towers,

and here and there old woods in dark masses, and on one side the blue

hills of the Peak beckoning still more enticingly than Ives's Mill, to

go there and see something wonderful. On another side you would see

Killmarton Hall and its woods and plantations, and, here and there

amongst them, smoke arising from the engine-houses of coal mines which

abound there; for all the country round Monnycrofts and Shapely, and so

away to Elkstown, there are or have been coal and ironstone mines for

ages. Many an old coal mine still stands yawning in the midst of

plantations that have now grown up round them. Many a score of mines

have been again filled up, and the earth levelled, and a fair

cultivation is here beheld, where formerly colliers worked and caroused,

and black stacks of coals, and heaps of grey shale, and coke fires were

seen at night glimmering through the dark.

Near this mill, Ives's mill, there is another hamlet called Marlpool, as

though people could live in a pool, but it is called Marlpool, as a

kettle is said to boil when only the water boils in it, because it

stands on the edge of a great pool almost amounting to a lake, where

marl formerly was dug, and which has for years been filled with water.

The colliers living there call it the eighth wonder of the world,

because they think it wonderful that a pool should stand on the top of a

hill, though that is no wonder at all, but is seen in all quarters of

the world. But the colliers there are a simple race, that do not travel

much out of their own district, and so have the pleasure of wondering at

many things that to us, being familiar, give no pleasure. So it is that

we pay always something for our knowledge; and the widow Barnicott who

lived on this hill near Ives's mill, at the latter end of the time we

are going to talk of, used to congratulate herself when her memory

failed with age, that it was rather an advantage, because, she said,

everything that she heard was quite new again.

But at the time when my story opens, Beckey Barnicott was not a widow.

She was the wife of Luke Barnicott, the millers man, that is, Ives's

man. Luke Barnicott had been the miller's man at Ives's mill some time;

he was a strapping, strong young fellow of eight-and-twenty. Old Nathan

Abbot had the mill before Ives had it, and Luke Barnicott was Nathan

Abbot's miller. There are many tales of the strength and activity of

Luke Barnicott still going round that part of the country. Of the races

that he ran on Monnycrofts' common side, and on Taghill Delves, amongst

the gorse and broom and old gravel pits: of the feats he did at

Monnycrofts and Eastwood wakes, and at Elkstown cross-dressing, where

the old Catholic cross still stood, and was dressed in old Catholic

fashion with gilded oak leaves and flowers at the wakes: of the

wrestlings and knocking-down of the will-pegs, and carrying off all the

prizes, and of jumping in sacks, and of a still greater jumping into and

out of twelve sugar hogsheads all set in a row, and which feat Luke was

the only one of the young fellows from all the country round that could

do. Luke was, in fact, a jolly fellow when Beckey married him, and she

was very proud of him, for he was a sober fellow, with all his frolics

and feats, and Beckey said that the Marlpool might be the eighth wonder

of the world, but her Luke was the ninth, because he could take his

glass and be social-like, but never came home drunk. And, in fact, no

millers get drunk. I can remember plenty of drunken fellows of all

trades, but I don't remember a drunken miller. There is something in

their trade that keeps them to it, and out of the ale-house. The wind

and the water will be attended to, and so there is not much opportunity

to attend to the beer or the gin-shop. Besides, if a miller were apt to

get drunk, he would be apt to get drowned very soon, in the mill stream,

or knocked on the head by a sail.

There's something pleasant and sober and serious in a mill. The wheel

goes coursing round, and the pleasant water sparkles and plunges under

it, or the great sails go whirling and whirling round, and the clear air

of the hill top gives you more cheeriness than any drink; and the

clapper claps pleasantly; and the mill keeps up a pleasant swaying and

tremor, and the flour comes sliding down the hoppers into the sacks, and

all is white and dusty, and yet clean; the mill and the sacks and the

hoppers and the flour, and the miller's clothes, and his whiskers, and

his hat; and his face is meally, and ruddy through the meal, and all is

wholesome and peaceful, and has something in it that makes a man quietly

and pleasantly grave.

Luke Barnicott was now the staid and grey-haired man of sixty: he had no

actual need of the hair-powder of the mill to make him look venerable.

On Sundays, when he was washed and dressed-up to appear at church, his

head seemed still to retain the flour, though it had gone from his

clothes, and his ruddy face had no mealy vail on it. Beckey, his wife,

was grown the sober old woman, but still hale and active. She came to

church in her black gipsy hat, all her white mob cap showing under it,

in large patterned flouncing gown, in black stockings, high-heeled

shoes, and large brass buckles that had been her grandmother's. On week

days she might be seen in a more homely dress fetching water from the

spring below, or digging up the potatoes in the garden for dinner. At

other times she sat knitting in the fine weather on a seat facing to the

evening sun, but giving shade in the earlier part of the day, under a

rude porch of poles and sticks over the door, up which she trained every

year a growth of scarlet runners, whilst around and under the windows

grew the usual assortment of herbs, rue and camomile, rosemary and

pennyroyal.

The Barnicotts lived at the old Reckoning House, so called because, when

the collieries were active, just in that quarter, the men were paid

their wages there. It was a very ordinary-looking brick tenement, now

divided into two dwellings, in one of which to the west lived Luke and

Beckey, and on the east side lived Tom Smith, the stockinger or

stocking-weaver, and Peggy his wife. Tom Smith's frame kept up a pretty

constant grating and droning sound, such as you hear in many a village

of Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, and Leicestershire, and in some parts

of Normandy, and it was almost the only sound that you heard about the

Reckoning House, for neither of the families had any children, except

one boy, the young Luke Barnicott, the grandson of the old Barnicotts.

The Barnicotts' only son Patrick had been a great trouble to his

parents, the shadow-spot in their lives. He had got amongst a wild set

of young fellows of the neighbourhood, had been sharply scolded by old

Luke, and in a fit of passion had gone for a soldier. He had died in the

war in Spain, and his wife had died soon after of a fever, caught in

nursing somebody suffering under that contagious affection. They had

left their only child to the old folks, who was now a lad of about

fourteen, and as mercurial and mischievous an imp as the neighbourhood

could furnish. From the moment that he could run about he was in some

scrape or some danger. He strolled about the common, plaguing asses and

sheep and cattle that were grazing there, hunting up birds' nests and

wasps' nests, hanging over the sides of a deep pond just below the

Reckoning House, surrounded by thick trees, and more than once had gone

headlong in, and came home streaming with water like a spout on a rainy

day. Old Luke said he would go after his father if he escaped drowning

or tumbling into some pit; and poor old Beckey was just like a hen with

a duckling with this one little vagabond. Sometimes he was seen climbing

on the mill sails, sometimes on the very ridge of a house, and looking

down the chimney for swallow nests, at other times he was up in trees so

high, swinging out on a long bough after some nests, so dizzily, that it

made his poor old granny's head ache for a week after. They put him as

soon as possible to the school in Monnycrofts to keep him out of danger,

but sometimes, instead of reaching the school, he had been wiled away by

his love of rambling into some distant wood, or along some winding

brook, and looking after fish, when he should be conning his lesson. At

others, instead of returning home at night after school, he was got into

the blacksmith's shop, watching old Blowbellows at the glowing forge,

and often in danger of having his eyes burnt by the large flying sparks,

or having a kick from a horse that was being shod. Sometimes poor old

Beckey had to go to the village of a dark stormy winter's evening to

hunt up the truant with her lanthorn, and would find him after all at

one of the pits sitting by the blazing fire, in a cabin made of blocks

of coal, listening to the talk of the colliers over their ale.

When, however, young Luke Barnicott had nearly reached the age of

fourteen, and had been set to scare birds in the fields, and to drive

plough for the farmers, and gather stones from the land, and had gleaned

in the autumn, and slid on the Marlpool in the winter, he took a fancy

to become a collier. He was arrayed in a suit of coarse flannel,

consisting of wide trousers and a sort of short slop, with an old hat

with the brim cut off, and was sent down sitting on a chain at the end

of a rope into the yawning pit sixty yards deep. There he was sent to

drive a little railway train of coal waggons drawn by a pony in these

subterranean regions, from the benk or face of the coal stratum, where

the colliers were at work, to the pit's mouth; but Luke soon grew tired

of that. He did not fancy living in the dark, and away from the sun and

pleasant fields, so one day, as the master of the pits was standing on

the pit-bank, up was turned Luke Barnicott, as invalided. He was lifted

out of the chain by the colliers, and as he writhed about and seemed in

great pain, the coal-master asked where he was hurt. He replied, in his

leg. "Show me the place," said the master. Luke, with a good deal of

labour and a look of much distress, drew off a stocking and showed a leg

black enough with coal dust, but without any apparent wound. "Where is

the hurt?" asked the master. "Here," said Luke, putting his hand

tenderly on the calf. The master pressed it. Luke pretended to flinch,

but the master did not feel satisfied. "Bring some water and wash the

leg," he said, and water was soon brought in an old tin. The leg was

washed, but no bruise, no blueness were visible. "Pshaw!" said the

master, "that is nothing to make a squeak about." "Oh, it is the other

leg, I think," said Luke. "The other leg!" exclaimed the master. "What!

the fox has a wound and he does not know where! Pull off the other

stocking." The stocking was pulled off by the colliers, but no injury

was to be found! "Come, Barnicott," said the master, "so you are playing

the old soldier over us! Why, what is the meaning of it?" "To say the

truth, master," said Luke, with a sheepish look, "the fact was--I was

daunted!"

At this confession the colliers set up a shout of laughter; and the

master, with a suppressed smile, bade him begone about his business.

After this Luke was some time at a loose end; he had nothing to do, and

nobody would employ him. The story of his being "daunted" flew all round

the neighbourhood, and he was looked on as a lazy, shifty lad, that was

not to be trusted to. He strolled about the common, the asses and the

sheep, and the geese, and the young cattle grazing there had a worse

time of it than ever. The old people were in great distress about him;

the grandfather's prediction that he would go after his father seemed

every day more certain of fulfilment. Luke was active enough in setting

traps for birds, and digging out rabbits, and even in setting a snare

for a hare, which came by night to browse in the pretty large garden of

cabbage and potatoes that surrounded the Reckoning House. And he was

pretty successful in noosing hares and unearthing rabbits, but neither

his grand-parents nor Tom Smith would let them come into their houses,

lest they should get into trouble, and because that would have wholly

confirmed the lad in his wild habits. Luke got through his days somehow,

and in the evenings he used to go up and play with the lads at the

Marlpool, and here he found plenty of people ready to take in slyly the

fruits of his poaching, and give him a share of the feast at night. Old

Luke meantime went in his mealy garb and with his care-marked and

powdered face, to his mill and back, and many an hour of sad cogitation

he had, as his clappers knocked and his sacks filled, on what was to

become of this wild lad. Many a tear poor old Beckey shed over her

knitting, and many a shake of his head gave Tom Smith, as he heard

Beckey and Peggy talk of him.

One day Luke had found his way to the common, beyond the Marlpool, where

the shaft of a new coal-pit was sinking. Nobody was to be seen on the

ground about the pit as he approached, but when he came up and looked

down, he saw a man at work in the bottom. The pit was sunk some thirty

yards or so, and he recognised a man of the Marlpool, named Dick

Welland, busy with his pick and shovel. It was evident that his butty or

mate had gone away somewhere temporarily, probably for beer. There stood

the windlass, with the rope depending, and the box at the bottom filled,

ready to be drawn up at the man's return. Till then Dick Welland was a

prisoner below.

Luke lay down on his stomach, and looked down the shaft. He called to

the collier, and drew his attention to a brick which he held in his

hand. "Dick," said he, "I've a good mind to drop a brick on thee!" The

man in great terror cried out to him not to do it; for he had no means

of escaping from the blow, which must kill him on the spot. There was

yet no horizontal working under which he might run and take shelter.

Luke was delighted with the opportunity of frightening the man, and

laughing, still held the brick over the pit mouth, saying, "Now, now!

it's coming. Look out!" The pitman was in agonies of terror; he

entreated, he shouted, he moved from side to side of the pit, but still

Luke, with the true spirit of a tyrant and an inquisitor, held aloft the

brick, and cried, "I'll drop it, Dick. Now, it is coming!" This scene

had continued for a quarter of an hour, during which time the man had

endured ages of agony and terror, when Dick perceived the other man

coming over the common with a little keg of beer: he quietly arose, and

disappeared amongst the furze and broom.

It was time for Luke Barnicott to be going. No sooner did the man below

perceive his butty above, than turning the earth out of the "cauf" or

box, he sprang into it, and called to him to draw him up with all his

might. Once on the bank, he cast a rapid glance round, and telling his

mate in a few hurried words what had happened, they both dashed in

amongst the furze bushes in quest of the culprit. They ran fiercely

hither and thither; they doubled and crossed and beat over the whole

common, as a sportsman beats for his game. But their game was nowhere to

be found. Luke, aware of the vengeance that he had provoked, had

securely hidden himself somewhere. His pursuers could discover him

nowhere. They returned to the Marlpool, and related the atrocious deed.

The whole place arose in a fury. All men and women vowed to pay the

young tormentor off. Dick Welland's wife, a tall, stout amazon of a

woman, the head taller than any woman of the whole country round;

strong, good-looking, and accustomed to walk with the stout strides and

the air of a virago, vowed merciless retribution on the culprit if ever

she laid hands on him. Tarring and feathering are a trifle to what was

promised him; he was to be dipped head foremost into the Marlpool, and

held to within an inch of his life. He was to be flogged and cuffed, and

pinched and nettled, and, in short, the whole blood of the Marlpool

boiled and seethed in vengeful anticipation of horrors to be inflicted

upon him.

But "no catch me, no have me!" A week went by and no Luke Barnicott

re-appeared. Old Luke Barnicott went to his mill and back as usual, but

with a much sadder and darker air; poor old Beckey's eyes were red with

weeping, and her frame seemed all at once withered and grown shaky. The

incensed colliers and the redoubtable virago, Doll Welland, his wife,

had been seen watching the Reckoning House, night after night,

suspecting that the culprit must steal there in the dark to get

something to live on, for he could not live on the air. But Tom Smith

solemnly assured inquirers that no Luke had been seen near home since

the day when he flourished the brick over the pit-mouth; and that the

old folks were miserable about him. How Luke lived or where, no one

could guess; but those who knew him best imagined that he managed to

keep soul and body together by nuts, and beech-nuts, and pig-nuts, which

last he was very expert in digging out of pastures. Besides, farmer

Palethorpe of the Youlgreaves, not far off, complained that his cows

were heard running about one or two nights, and he believed somebody had

been trying to milk them. "That's Barnicott!" said Welland, and he and

his gigantic Doll carefully hunted over the woods and copses near

Youlgreaves farm, but to no purpose. About a week after Luke's

disappearance, and when his grandfather and grandmother began to think

that he had gone quite off to seek his fortune, some boys who had been

nutting in the Badger Dingles, near Youlgreaves, came racing home out of

breath, saying they had either seen a ghost or Luke Barnicott, for he

seemed to start out of the ground amongst the bushes, gave an unearthly

shriek, and darted away through bush and "breer," and was gone. Poor old

Beckey Barnicott swooned away, for she said she was sure the poor lad

had been "clammed" to death in the woods, because he dared not come

home; but Welland took another view of the matter, and starting off to

the Badger Dingles, he and his strapping wife hunted the thickets again

well over. They were near giving up their search when it occurred to

them to examine an old hovel in a field up above the Dingles, and there

they found a heap of fern in which somebody had evidently lain for some

time, and in the very last night.

Sure that Luke was lurking somewhere not far off, they renewed their

search with fresh eagerness. They hunted the dingles all over again, and

just when they came to the end they saw something swing itself over a

gate and disappear. The Marlpool boys would have run off, thinking it

the ghost again, but Welland rushed forward, leapt the gate, and saw

Luke Barnicott sure enough racing at full speed to gain the dense

Hillmarton spruce plantations. Welland and wife gave chase. According to

their account Luke plunged into the plantation before they could come up

with him, but being hot on his trail they beat up the plantations, and

again started him. In the afternoon the people of the Marlpool saw an

extraordinary sight. It was Luke, ragged and haggard, without his hat,

and his light brown hair flying in the wind, running for his life over

the common, and Welland and his wife panting after him as if half tired

down, for they were people approaching their fiftieth year, though hale

and active, and stimulated by their vengeance to run to the last. Luke

was evidently aiming for the Reckoning House. All Marlpool was out to

watch the race. There was loud shoutings, and cries of "Stop him!" and

by others, "Nay, fair play! let the lad run." Old Luke Barnicott came

out on his mill-stairs, and cried with a voice which was never forgotten

by those who heard it to the day of their death, "Murderers! let the

child alone."

Old Luke came down the mill-stairs like a frantic man and ran to meet

and protect his grandson, who was now speeding along the banks of the

Marlpool in a narrow larch copse that bordered the path's side, and was

not two hundred yards from his grandfather, when Welland met and turned

him. Young Luke wheeled like a hare, and dashing through the pool, for

he could swim like a fish, reached the other side before Welland and his

neighbours could recover from their surprise. Old Luke was in the midst

of them; he aimed a blow at Welland which felled him to the ground, and

then he dealt his blows round him with such effect, that five or six

great fellows lay sprawling on the earth. Old Luke was too furious to

speak at first, but he at length burst out with, "Shame on you, cowards!

murderers!" Luke had such a reputation for strength and skill in the

arts of wrestling and boxing that, though an old man, not one of the

fellows whom he had felled dare touch him. But, meantime, Welland was

up again, and scouring through the copse along the pool-side like a

maniac. His tall wife was running along the other side of the pool after

the lad. Old Luke threw off his mealy jacket and ran too. It was many a

day since he had run before, but every one was amazed at the speed with

which he went. Down the hill towards Askersick well, in the direction of

the Hillmarton plantations, went Welland and his wife; down followed old

Luke, stout and elderly as he was, but with a vigour that seemed

wonderful. The young fugitive was seen to leap the fence into the

plantations; Welland and his wife were seen to crush through the fence

after him, and soon after old Luke followed headlong through the gap,

and all disappeared.

The people of the Marlpool stood on their hill watching this chase, and

when the flyers rushed into the plantation some ran down in that

direction. But the chasers were lost for nearly half an hour, when young

Luke was seen flying along the side of the Hillmarton dams--large

reservoirs of water that stretched in a chain along the valley amongst

woods and copses--and Welland was fagging after him like a dogged

blood-hound after a tired stag, or rather fawn. But pursuer and pursued

appeared dead beat with fatigue when they disappeared behind a mass of

trees. No old Luke, no Doll Welland were seen anywhere, for that wily

woman, as old Luke pursued through the plantation, had seized a pole

that lay on the ground, and, standing amongst some bushes, suddenly

poked it between the old man's legs as he ran, and caused him to tumble

forward and fall with a heavy dash on the ground, where, exhausted by

his unwonted exertion, and stunned by the shock, he lay breathless and

almost senseless. The huge woman then, as he lay on his face on the

earth, coolly seated herself upon him, and kept him there whilst her

husband pursued the boy.

Meantime the young men from the Marlpool, running in the direction in

which they had seen Luke and his pursuer, at length found Welland

seated on the bank of the lake, intently watching a part of the water

where a mass of reeds grew, and where the boughs of the wood overhung

the water.

"Where's Luke?" cried the young men. "He's there!" said Welland, red and

panting, and scarcely able to bolt the words from his chest. "He's in

the reeds!" Some of the young men ran round into the wood, and looked

down into the reed bed by climbing along the boughs of the trees, but

nothing was to be seen there. "He's not there, Welland!" they shouted,

but Welland stoutly maintained that he was there; he saw him go in, and

that he could not go out again without his seeing him. To make all sure,

one young fellow stripped and swam to the reeds, and beat all amongst

them, and declared that there was no Luke there. "Oh! the cunning beggar

is lurking somewhere up to the nose in the water!" shouted Welland; but

the young man paddled all about, declared the place very deep of mud,

but to the certainty nothing human was there. At this Welland rose up in

great wrath but after going round into the wood, said, moodily, "The

young scamp has done me again, but I'll settle him yet." And with that

he turned homewards, and the young men with him.

Old Luke had before this recovered his breath somewhat, and, rolling his

incubus from him with wonderful ease, had risen up and gone towards the

dams, followed by the virago, who furiously abused him all the way, and

flung stones and masses of turf at him. When old Luke reached a keeper's

lodge near the dams, old John Rix, who lived there, told him Welland and

a lot of men had gone up the field towards the Marlpool. Luke then

hastened back, with the vengeful grenadier of a woman still following

and saying all the evil things she could think of. She upbraided the old

man for his bringing up of both this young Luke and of his father. "Bad

crow, bad egg!" she said. "Old rogue! you were no great shakes, I

reckon, in your young days, and the son was no better; no good came to

him; and as for this wicked boy, he'll come to the gallows, I'll

warrant, if a tree be left in the country to make one on."

Old Luke went on, as King David did in his time when Shimei was hailing

stones and curses on him in his trouble, and took no notice. But he was

mightily troubled in his mind as he went on in silence. All his former

troubles with his son were brought back upon him, and he wondered how it

was that he was so much the more afflicted than other people with his

children. He began to think that he must have been a much more wicked

man than he had thought himself, and so he said, "Let her talk;

may-happen I've desarved it." But when he got home, and heard that young

Luke had been chased into the lake by Welland, and that he could not be

found, he sat down in his chair, and never stirred or spoke for an hour.

Poor old Beckey, who had enough to bear of her own, was terribly

frightened, and laid hold on him, and shook him, saying, "Luke, man!

Luke, speak! what ails thee? Hast a gotten a stroke?" But Luke neither

spoke nor stirred, but continued looking hard on the ground. The poor

woman was in the greatest distress, and began to call, "Peggy! Peggy!

come here! Peggy Smith."

But at that old Luke suddenly rose. "Hold thy tongue! dunna bring

anybody here. They've killed the lad, an' they've killed me!" and,

giving a deep groan, he began to stagger upstairs, and soon undressed

himself and went to bed. There was an end of old Luke. The violent

agitation of his mind; the violent exertion that he had made; the fall

that he had got; and, no doubt, the abuse and upbraidings that the great

virago had heaped upon him, all had done their part. He never spoke

after he was in bed: a stroke of apoplexy had indeed fallen on him, and,

though the doctor came and bled him, he only opened his eyes for a

moment, and then died.

When the death of old Luke was made known, there was a great sensation,

and the more so that nothing further was seen or heard of young Luke. A

great revulsion in the public mind took place immediately. These

transactions were the sole topic of conversation, not only in Marlpool

and Monnycrofts, and Shapely, but in every hall and hamlet and solitary

farm-house, the whole country round. They were the theme of discussion

in every ale-house, and at every barber's and blacksmith's shop, and in

every street-parliament far and near. They got into the local

newspapers, and assumed a variety of shapes the farther the rumours

spread. The Marlpoolians and Monnycroftians who had called young Luke

all manner of names as the most incorrigible of scapegraces, now pitied

him as a very ill-used and persecuted lad. "Why, all lads are full of

mischief," said Mrs. Widdiwicket of the Dog and Partridge public-house.

"I would not give a potato for a lad without a bit of mischief in him.

Poor lad! it was only his spirit, and what sort of a man is to grow out

of a boy without a spirit?" "True," said old Pluckwell, the gardener, as

he took his evening pot, "what's weeds in one place is flowers in

another. Why, they tell me flowers here are weeds in other countries;

and, as to this Luke, he must ha' grown into a prime spaciment with

cultivation."

"Just so," said Nasal Longdrawn, the parish-clerk; "it seems to me that

these Wellands had real downright mischief an' malice in 'em, to chase,

and worry, and threaten a poor fatherless and motherless orphant so.

Poor lad! he was often very aggravating when he got upo' th' church

after th' starlings, and loosened the tiles, but I canna help feeling

for th' poor chap, now he's gone."

"Gone!" said Mrs. Widdiwicket; "and where's he gone, thinken ye?"

All shook their heads, and Roddibottom, the schoolmaster, got up and

strode about the house, and then suddenly turning round, facing the

company, with his hands thrust into his waistcoat pocket,--"Where's he

gone? why, ma'am, why, neighbours, if they put me into the jury box. I

should give my verdict that Welland knows!"

"Oh, goodness me!" exclaimed Mrs. Widdiwicket; and all the rest again

shook their heads, and said, "Likely enough; that Welland is a savage

un. What but a hard un could chase a poor lad so?"

"And what was he doing sitting there by the bank, and pointing to the

water, and saying, 'He's there!' and that he could not have got out

without him seeing him? How do we know what happened after they were out

of sight? A knock on the poor lad's head with a stick or a stone, and a

plunge into the dam! Eh? eh? I think that pond should be dragged." And

with that Roddibottom drank off his glass of ale, and walked out with an

air of inconceivable sagacity, and leaving all the company in wonder and

horror.

"By leddy! what the mester says is right," said Pluckwell. "Who knows

what happened? and the boy has never been seen since."

"Ay, the dam should be dragged," said Longdrawn; "there's a mystery

there." And looking full of mystery himself, he followed the

schoolmaster out.

The feeling at the "Dog and Partridge" was the feeling everywhere. The

poor boy was invariably pitied, old Luke was pitied, poor old Beckey was

pitied, and the Wellands were looked upon as most savage and

bloodthirsty wretches. The excitement became great as time went on. The

dam was dragged where Welland had been seen sitting, but nothing was

found; search and inquiry were made after young Luke all round the

country, but not a trace of him could be found. The feeling that Welland

had killed the poor lad, and secreted his body somewhere in the bushes,

and only pretended for a blind that he had gone into the water, became

very strong. The Wellands were both taken up and tried for the murder,

his wife as accessary before the fact; and he was also charged with

contributing to old Luke's death, for though he had never opened his

mouth after his return but in one instance, it was--"They've killed him,

and they've killed me."

Doll Welland had boasted how she had thrown the old man down by putting

the pole between his legs, and having sat upon him after his fall, and

what more she might have done nobody could tell. Besides, both her

husband and herself had vowed most bitterly, or, as the country

neighbours said, "most saverly," that they would finish the lad if they

caught him. And the persevering animosity with which they had contrived

to hunt him up, and to hunt him down at the last, betrayed a most

murderous mind and intent. Luke never turned up, and, at the March

assizes at Derby, the Wellands were tried; and numbers of the Marlpool

people who had quite sided with them till after the boy was missing now

gave fully their evidence against them, repeating the vengeful

expressions which they had used against poor Luke, and that they had

said twenty times, "They'd finish him, if they ever laid hands on him."

All these things, and the general feeling of the country telling against

them, both husband and wife were condemned for the murder of the lad,

though there was no direct evidence of the fact. Nobody would believe

anything else after the fierce chase and the savage threats, and the

disappearance of Luke just where Welland was found sitting. As the

evidence, however, was but circumstantial, though very aggravated, the

husband and wife were condemned to transportation for life, and were

shipped off to Sydney, with the hearty expression of satisfaction of all

Marlpool, Monnycrofts, Hillmarton Hall and hamlet, of the farmers, and

all the world besides. As the Wellands had five or six children, there

was a subscription in that part of the country to send them out with

their convict parents, and thus to rid this happy land of the whole

"seed, breed, and generation" of the bloodthirsty Wellands, according to

the phraseology of the Marlpool.

Years went on: no Luke Barnicott ever re-appeared or ever was heard of;

and though the body was never found--never rose to the surface of

Hillmarton dam, nor was discovered in the wood--it became a settled

feeling that Welland knew if he pleased to tell, where the remains

could be found. But Welland and his family were broiling in the sandy

fields of Paramatta, cultivating the hot ground, and planting orange and

lemon orchards, which now embellish that neighbourhood, and show their

dark masses covered with golden fruit in mile-long woods to the people

sailing up the river past Kissing Point, and many another pleasant

promontory, with their mangrove trees standing in the water, and their

charming houses overlooking their rocky shores and well-kept lawns, dark

and lustrous with the Indian and Moreton Bay figs, the India-rubber

trees, and many a quaint Banksia and blooming shrub from sandy Botany

Bay.

Years rolled on: the story of these events was forgotten everywhere

except in the immediate neighbourhood, where it was getting less and

less frequently adverted to. It was stereotyped in every one's mind of

those of more than infantine years at that period; but it was only when

some strange murder or some mysterious occurrence took place in the

country at large that it was revived and talked of far around. Fifteen

years had passed: poor old Beckey Barnicott was now between seventy and

eighty. She was still living at the Reckoning House, but she was

blind--stone blind. She lost her eyes soon after the shocking death of

her husband and the loss of her grandson. It was supposed that she wept

herself blind; and no doubt her grief of mind helped to produce this

catastrophe. It was found that old Luke Barnicott had saved a small sum,

which brought Beckey in ten pounds a year; and she had been advised by

the clergyman of Monnycrofts to sink the sum in an annuity, as she had

no one to succeed her, and so she had an income then of five-and-twenty

pounds a year. She was well off in that respect; and she had a

middle-aged woman, a widow out of the village, Amy Beckumshire, to live

with her and take care of her. Tom and Peggy Smith were both dead, and

the new miller, John Groats, used that part of the house to store corn

in.

Poor old Beckey Barnicott used to get out into the garden by help of a

long wand, with which she felt her way, and she had learned to know

every part of the garden, and could feel the rosemary and lavender

plants, and used to sit in the sun in the rude porch and bask herself;

and when it was too hot, she took her place under a great elder tree,

which hung from a high bank on the far side of the garden, where a seat

was placed. There she used to knit diligently, for she could knit

without her sight wonderfully; and there for many a long hour she used

to think about old times, when her husband was full of health and

strength, and used to keep the mill up above spinning round like a great

giant, beckoning all the country round to come up and see something

wonderful. And when Tom Smith and he used to read the "Nottingham

Review," and all about Bonaparte, and Wellington, and Lord Nelson, and

talked over the affairs of the country. And then her thoughts would turn

on poor little Luke, as she called him, and her heart clung to his

memory with a wonderful tenderness; for he seemed to have been

misunderstood, and so cruelly used. She remembered many things that he

had done for her, and how he used to bring her heaps of nuts and

blackberries and mushrooms, and catch sparrows in winter to make nice

dumplings, and she thought to herself, "Ay, poor thing, he wasna so bad

after all! It was, Mrs. Widdiwicket always said, only his spirit; he

wanted more room for his life than he got here, and should have been a

soldier or a traveller, or something or another where he would always be

moving." She had often dreamt of her husband, who appeared to her and

said he was waiting for her in a very pleasant place; but he never

mentioned little Luke, and she never dreamed of him except as racing

before Welland and his giant wife, or plunging into Hillmarton dam, all

amongst the dark weeds and deep, slimy mud.

It was a fine breezy summer's day, Mrs. Barnicott was sitting under the

great hanging elder, and her knitting-needles were going very fast for

so old a woman. She was stooping and wrinkled and lean, but there was a

quick motion in her darkened eyes and their twinkling lids, and there

was a motion about her withered mouth, and she gave every now and then

deep sighs as she shifted her needles, and seemed to look down at her

knitting, which she could not see, and then paused awhile, let her work

fall on her knee upon her check-apron, and raised her sightless eyes

towards the sky and seemed to think. Just then she heard an active step

as if a young man came along the brick pavement along the garden to the

house-door. There was a knock, and she heard a young man's voice--she

was sure it was a young man--ask if Mrs. Barnicott was at home. Amy

Beckumshire said, "Ay, there she sits, sir, knitting under the elder."

The young man advanced, and old Beckey rose up in wonder who it could

be.

"Good day to you, Mrs. Barnicott," said the young man. "You don't know

me, but I have heard of you some years ago, and being in this part of

the country, I thought I should like to see you."

"You're very good, sir, to come to see an old blind woman like me!" She

guessed that it was all about the sad business of her husband and

grandson that the gentleman had heard. "Pray you, sit down, sir," she

added, "there's room on the bench."

"Thank you," said the young man. There was a little silence, and then

the young man said, "I've often heard of this neighbourhood, and I

always thought it must be very pleasant, and really I find it so. Why, I

seem to know all about it, as if I had seen it. The old windmill, and

the pool below here, and the Marlpool above, and the old church tower of

Monnycrofts."

Beckey was silent and pondering. "And pray," she said, after a time,

"where might you hear all this about this country place?"

"Well, it was very far from here. You must know Mrs. Barnicott, that I

have been a sailor, and have sailed nearly all over the world; and we

sailors make acquaintance in different ships with men from all parts. I

was on board the Swallow, bound for Pernambuco, in South America, for a

cargo of cotton and coffee, and I had a mate there that I took a great

fancy to; he came from some part of this country, Cosser or Hawsworth,

or some such place."

"Ay, ay," said Beckey, "these are places not far off; you may see 'em

from th' mill up yonder. But it's many a year sin I seed 'em."

"Ay, more's the pity!" said the young man; "but you can hear, and I

think I can tell you some good news."

"What good news?" said old Beckey, suddenly giving a start, and turning

her blind eyes fixedly on him. "What good news can come to a poor old

creature like me?"

"I should not like to agitate you," said the youth, "by going into

things long past, and very dark things too; but this mate of mine told

me several times of what happened here years ago; and I wonder," he used

to say, "whether any of the Barnicotts be living, and if they ever heard

of the lad that was lost?"

"What do you mean?" said old Beckey; "do you know anything of little

Luke? is he alive? can he be alive? Speak, man! speak!"

"Well, this young man thought he was alive."

"What!" said old Beckey, "what! oh laws! you've made my heart jump into

my mouth. What did he know? Did he know Luke, and had he seen him?"

"Well," he said, "he was alive and was a sailor."

"A sailor! alive!" Poor old Beckey trembled like an aspen leaf, and

dropped her knitting from her knee. "Oh me! if this should be true!" she

said; "but my strength fails me; it is more nor I can bear."

The young man took hold of her to support her, and bade her not agitate

herself; he believed her grandson was alive, and that they should be

able in time to learn more about him.

"And you dunna know where he is? Are you sure he is alive? are you

sure?"

"Well, I feel pretty sure. I know my mate said he was alive and well,

and a fine active sailor, five years ago; for he sailed to Ceylon, in

the Indies, with him."

"Luke alive! oh laws! this is too much. Amy! Amy!" Amy Beckumshire, who

was standing at the door all curiosity and astonishment, came the moment

that old Beckey called, and the poor old woman, shaking and trembling as

with the ague, said to her, "Dost hear? Luke's alive, and is a sailor,

and has been i' th' Indies, and this gentleman has seen a sailor as knew

him!"

"Is that so?" said Amy, in a voice of wondering inquiry, and looking in

distant respect at the handsome young gentleman.

"I quite believe it is true, missis," said the young man; "I never knew

Sam Birchin tell me a lie."

"He comes from Cosser or Hawsworth, that sailor does," said old Beckey,

all eagerness, "and knows all about this country, and all the old doings

here."

"Gracious me!" said Amy, "how wonderful!"

"O Lord," said old Beckey, lifting her sightless brow towards heaven,

"only let me once see Luke, and then take me--take me--that I may tell

my husband. But, laws-a-me! maybe he knows all about it."

Poor old Beckey then asked the stranger a hundred questions: if he knew

what sort of a looking lad Luke was? how tall he was, and how he looked?

if he had heard that he had blue eyes and a very fair skin, and hair

very light coloured? To all these questions the young man said he could

give no answer; but he would write to Sam Birchin, who would be in port

soon, and ask him all about it. He then rose up and said he had ordered

his dinner at the Dog and Partridge, and must go there, but that he

meant to stay a few weeks in the country, and go and find out Birchin's

relations at Cosser. He did not mean to go to sea again; he had been to

Australia, and got enough gold to live on, and he meant to settle down

somewhere in the country. He should often come and see her while he

stayed.

Old Beckey prayed God to bless him for the good news he had brought; an

angel from heaven could not have brought more blessed tidings; and as he

went across the garden she tottered after him, leaning on her frail

wand, and stood at the gate to listen to his steps going down the field.

Then she had to tell the wonderful news all over to Amy, and to ask a

hundred questions. What sort of looking young man was he, light or dark?

and how he was dressed, and how tall he was? Though he'd been a sailor,

she was sure he was a gentleman by his talk. Amy said he was a handsome

young man, and quite a gentleman in his dress. He was as finely dressed

as young Squire Flaggimore himself. His eyes were dark blue.

"Blue, says ta?" broke in old Beckey. "Luke's were blue."

"They are dark blue or black," said Amy.

"And his hair very light?" asked Beckey.

"No. Light! ravenly black."

"Oh, then, he's not like Luke. Luke's hair," said Beckey, "was very

light, and a little sandy."

"What! thou artna dreaming that this is Luke himself, Beckey"

"Oh laws, no!" said Beckey. "It's not Luke, Amy; I was only wondering

whether it was like him. But thinkster I should not know Luke's voice?

Ay, that voice I shall never forget; it's down in my heart as clear as a

bell, though it's fifteen years come Michaelmas since I heard it, poor

fellow! And to think as he's alive, and 's a been a sailing all over the

world ever since! And now, thou sees, Amy, that's the reason that he

never came, like his grandfayther, in my dreams. How could he come, and

was alive all the time? But thou mun run, Amy, and tell the parson, and

Mrs. Widdiwicket, and the schoolmaster, as Luke has been seen i' th'

Indies."

Amy was in a hurry to throw on her shawl and bonnet, and away to the

village; for we all like to tell a bit of news; it is a pleasure that we

enjoy immensely, and yet don't reckon it amongst our pleasures. But we

all feel like electric clouds charged with pleasant fire, and in haste

to let it off. No sooner is the word dropped in one ear than it is out

upon the tongue, and turns away to some other ear, and encircles round

the world like sunshine. Amy had the pleasure of stopping two or three

people before she got across the fields to the village, and telling them

that Mrs. Barnicott had heard of Luke, and that he was a fine young

sailor, and had been in the Indies and all over the world, and the young

gentleman at the Dog and Partridge had brought the news, and had seen

young Birchin of Cosser, who had sailed with him. Before Amy reached the

clergyman's the news had slipped down the village, and was all over it,

and flowing out at each end by people who were going to the neighbouring

villages. Mrs. Widdiwicket had heard the news from the young gentleman

in the parlour herself, and she said the young gentleman had hired her

horse, and was gone to Cosser to see Sam Birchin's relations. As Amy

issued into the street again, everybody was on the look-out for her, and

she had to stop, to her great satisfaction, and tell the story again,

and to correct some errors that had already got with it, for it was

already said that the young gentleman, who had been at Mrs.

Widdiwicket's all night, and had borrowed Mrs. Widdiwicket's horse, had

been with Luke, and had sailed with him to the Indies and all over the

world.

At the top of the village street stood Roddibottom, the schoolmaster,

and Longdrawn, the clerk, and Sandy Spark, the blacksmith, discussing

the whole affair, and they had already raised a great wonder how it

happened that Luke had never sent word to his old grandmother that he

was alive.

They were, moreover, now greatly disposed to lament the fate of Welland

and his wife, who had been transported for life for having killed Luke

when he was not killed, and were very near being hanged for it. The

whole of Monnycrofts was in a state of ferment on this great discovery,

and all the neighbouring villages soon partook of the excitement; and it

very soon communicated itself to the county papers, and very wise

reflections were attached to it on the dangers of condemning people on

circumstantial evidence. It was thought that no time should be lost in

recommending to Government to send out an order to recal Welland and his

wife home. Meantime old Beckey herself had managed to hobble up to the

mill, and thence to the Marlpool, where the story made the most amazing

stir. All the people were soon out of doors discussing the affair, and

those who had seen the chase on that memorable day pointed out all the

incidents of it. They showed where little Luke was running when old Luke

rushed down from the mill, and where he knocked down Welland and about

twenty more, according to their account, and so they went through the

whole story.

Beckey, and so indeed all the neighbourhood, was impatient for the

return of the young man, but he had sent back Mrs. Widdiwicket's horse,

and was staying a week with Sam Birchin's relations. When he re-appeared

he was beset on all sides with questions regarding Luke, but he assured

them he could not give them much further information, than that Luke was

alive three years ago. He soon went to visit old Beckey again, who was

delighted to see him, and had hoarded up a whole budget of questions to

put to him. He informed her that his name was John Webster, that he came

from Liverpool, and that he had sailed to many wonderful countries. He

had been in the Indies, in North and South America, in China and

Australia. As old Beckey sat and plied her knitting-needles, he asked

her all the particulars about Luke, and about his death, as it was

supposed to have been, and he assured her that he had written to

Birchin to let him know all that he knew; everything about Luke

Barnicott.

He continued to lodge at the Dog and Partridge, and had many

conversations with Roddibottom, the schoolmaster, Nasal Longdrawn, the

clerk, and all the rest of the village politicians who frequented that

house; and he heard many different versions of the story of Luke from

them, who all declared that, though he was very mischievous, he really

had no ill in him, though they could not account for it why he had never

let his poor grandmother know of his being alive. John Webster hired

widow Widdiwicket's horse and rode about, and commended very much the

country. The clergyman and Squire Flaggimore invited him to dine with

them, and were greatly entertained with his account of foreign

countries. But Webster used to go up to the Reckoning House as much as

ever, and talk to the old widow Barnicott, who was never tired of

hearing about the sea and foreign parts, because then she could imagine

what Luke had seen. Webster told her all about the enormous whales at

sea; how they used to see them come up near the ship, huge and black,

and rear themselves up almost as high as a house, and then souse down

again, and spout water up from their nostrils ever so high. And all

about sharks, and flying-fish, and dolphins, and the beautiful

nautiluses, and Portuguese men-of-war, that resemble the nautilus, but

are only like little ships of gristle, but are beautifully painted as a

rainbow, and they float about when the sea is calm as glass in the hot

climates, and look like beautiful flowers on a plain of crystal. And of

the sea-fire that rushes and flickers all round the ship at night, and

sails past like great lamps in the dark blue water; and of storms; and

wonderful birds; and of the mountains and great islands of ice that

float about as white as snow in the solitary ocean, thousands of miles

from land. And Beckey would drink it all in with hungry ears, and say,

"And all that Luke has seen! How wonderful! But I wonder whether he has

quite forgotten his poor old grandmother?"

Webster did not believe that he had. Sailors did not forget their

relations; but most likely he thought his grandfather and grandmother

were dead, and so he thought he had no connexions left. Then Webster

told her about all the wonders of India, of grand towns, and palaces,

and temples; and of its great nations of black people, and their pearls

and jewels; of elephants, and tigers, and serpents; of palm-trees; and

of the wonderful flowers and birds. He told her of the rich fruits,

bananas, and pine-apples growing in the fields, and wonderful

orange-groves and fig-trees. And then he told her of China and Japan,

and the strange swarming yellow people, and all about the

tea-plantations, where the tea she drank came from; and of the people

who always live in boats; and of birds' nests that they make soup of. He

told her at another time of the beautiful countries of South America and

the West Indies, and all their palm and cocoa-nut, and bread-fruit

trees; of their custard apples and sweet mangoes, and yams instead of

potatoes, and a hundred of luscious fruits, and such beautiful flowers

in the hedges--finer by far than in our gardens, or those Squire

Flaggimore had in his conservatory.

"All these," said the wondering Beckey, "thou has seen, and my Luke has

seen!"

"To be sure he has," said Webster; "and then the monkeys and apes as big

as men, and great snakes that wrap themselves round bullocks, and

squeeze them to death; and all the black men that are brought to those

countries from Africa to cultivate the cotton, and sugar, and coffee,

and spices, because it is too hot for white men."

Old Beckey was in a dream of wonder and of delight to hear what a world

this was--how big, and strange, and beautiful, and how little the people

of Monnycrofts and Marlpool knew about it; and yet Luke had seen it all.

"And I would not be surprised if Luke had got a good deal of gold, for

Birchin said he talked of going to Australia when he left the ship they

had sailed in together to India." Beckey did not know exactly, nor Amy

Beckumshire, who was always an eager listener to these stories,

whereabouts Australia was, and Webster told them that it was down on the

other side of the world, just under their feet.

"Lauks!" the women exclaimed, "why, the folks must stand on their heads

there, or at least with their heads downwards;" and it was in vain that

he endeavoured to explain to them, by showing them an apple, that if you

stick little pegs in it they would all have their heads outwards at

least. Beckey could not see this, but she felt very particularly at the

apple and the pegs, and she insisted that the Australians _must_ have

their heads downwards, because ours always _were_ upwards. It was

useless endeavouring to make them understand that anybody's head was

always upwards, except when they were in bed; and so Webster told them

all about the strange things in Australia. The kangaroos, with tails as

big as bedposts, and that could leap across Beckey Barnicott's garden at

two leaps. He told them all about the trees that never shed their

leaves, but shed their bark instead; about the black swans, and the

cherries with stones outside, and possums and flying-squirrels and

flying-mice, and a kind of cuckoo that sings at nights instead of days,

and of all the gold that lies in the ground, and in the rivers there;

and Beckey and Amy wondered that everybody was not as rich as the Queen

of England, if they could dig up gold out of the ground, and fish it up

out of the brooks. Beckey was proud to think that Luke had seen all this

too; and she felt sure that he would manage to bring home a ship-load of

gold, for he was, as a lad, as sharp as a needle with two points.

One day old Beckey had a nice jug of curds sent her up from farmer

Flamstead's, of Langlee, and she said, "Ah! that is that good Sally

Flamstead's doing. She is always very good to me." And she made Amy get

some sugar, and they had a delicious dish of cherry-curds, all three of

them, under the old elder. "Flamstead!" said Webster, that reminds me

that Birchin used to say, "Why, she must be as handsome as Sally

Flamstead," when any handsome woman was spoken of. And when I asked him

who Sally Flamstead was, he said, "Oh, that he had learned of Luke

Barnicott." For, whenever he saw a pretty woman, he was sure to say,

"Why, she is almost as handsome as Sally Flamstead." And now, I remember

Birchin told me that Barnicott had stated to him often when they were on

the night-watch together, quite a romantic story of his falling in love

with this Sally Flamstead when he was quite a little boy. He used to go

to Flamstead's farm at--at--where did he say? Lang--Lang--Lang--what was

it?

"Langlee?" asked old Beckey.

"Langlee! Langlee! ah, that was the name," exclaimed Webster. "He used

to go to Langlee, wherever that is."

"Oh," said Beckey, "you may see it as you sit here. There, down the

slope, all amongst a mass of apple-trees. You may see the chimneys and

the thatch-roof. I can't see them; only in my mind's eye I see them

there well enough."

Webster stood up and said, "Yes, he saw the place." Well, Barnicott told

Birchin that he used to go there to scare birds off the corn, and to

gather stones in spring off the pastures, and to watch young turkeys as

they fed in the field, and to fetch and carry in harvest time, and all

sort of things of that kind. And there was little Sally Flamstead, just

about his own age, something younger; and she Luke thought a regular

cherubim. All the ideas of angelic beauty that ever he had he got, he

said, by looking at Sally Flamstead. And she was such a good, kind,

little thing. You know, Luke used to say, that she was far above a poor

lad like me; she was the farmer's only child, and the old man was rich

for a farmer; he had flocks of sheep and cattle, and great fat teams,

and such corn and hay-stacks, and geese, and turkeys, and fowls, and

pigeons. Oh, he seemed to Luke quite a king. Yet little Sally Flamstead

took quite a fancy for Luke, and used to give him good advice; for, she

said, everybody said he was wild. Luke used to collect nuts and

mushrooms for her, and she used to give him ripe cherries and plums, and

often she would save her plum-cake and give him. She could always find

him, without seeming to seek him, when he was about the yard; for she

used to go skipping about to feed the pigeons, and ducks, and to chase

round and round with her little dog Tiny. Sometimes when he was going

out to scare birds on a very cold day in the wheat fields, she would put

some matches in his hat, that he might light a fire; or she would be

standing inside of the orchard hedge as he went by, and say, "Luke, look

under the bramble-bush by the paddock-gate," and there he would find a

good piece of pork-pie, or a little bottle of beer, or something of that

sort. Luke would have run his legs off to have obliged little Sally

Flamstead, and a regular courtship grew between these children. He used

to be sent to Monnycrofts to fetch Sally on an evening when she went to

take tea with her Aunt Heritage and her cousins, and Sally, as they

walked along, used to tell him wonderful stories about the Babes in the

Wood, and Robinson Crusoe, and Luke said that he declared he should like

nothing so well as to be on a desolate island, and have Sally there for

his man Friday. At length he got so enamoured that he vowed if ever he

should become a king, which did not seem at all improbable after the

wonderful things that happened in the world, according to what Sally

Flamstead told him, he would marry Sally, and that she should be his

queen. And Sally said she should like nothing so well. "But, Lord bless

you!" Luke used to say, "only to think of my foolishness. Why, Sally

Flamstead was far enough above me, and if she's grown up half as

handsome as she was then, she's married some great gentleman since then,

and rides a coach."

When Webster had finished telling this, old Beckey suddenly started up,

laid hold of him, and put her hand on his face and felt down it, and

then, as suddenly, she gave a great cry, "It's my Luke! it's Luke! it's

Luke!" and she hugged him with a force that he did not think had been in

her old arms. The next moment she released her grasp, gave a deep sigh

and a sort of groan, and fell in a swoon. Luke--for it was Luke sure

enough--caught her up and set her on the bench, and while he held her,

he shouted with all his might for Amy. Amy came running, and was greatly

frightened; but Luke told her not to be alarmed: she had only fainted,

and would come round by and by. He bade her fetch a cup of water, and by

the time it came poor old Beckey was recovering. She never stayed to

drink the water, but she laid hold on Luke again, and began to laugh and

cry; and Amy said, "So! so! Mrs. Barnicott, restrain yourself, or you'll

go into high-sterics. And, mi! don't pull the young gentleman so; he'll

think you are going 'utick,'" meaning lunatic.

Beckey took no notice, but catching Luke round the neck, to Amy's great

horror, for she thought now she was gone "utick" in reality, she began

kissing him, and then she laughed and said, "Amy, woman, it is Luke--my

own lad Luke. Oh! where were my eyes?"--Beckey always talked of seeing,

though she could not see--"where were my ears? But I reckon it's because

my own Luke has now gotten his man's voice and his man's look, and he

had only his lad's voice and his lad's look when he went. Black is his

hair, says thou, Amy? and it was as light and shiney as tow when he was

a lad. But so was his father's. When he began to tell me about Sally

Flamstead, all at once I heard his father speaking and himself speaking,

and my heart went with a great jump, and I knew it all. Ay, I'm blind

and deaf too, or I should ha' fun' that out before this. Luke, lad!

Luke, it is thee; thou wunna deny it?"

"No, dear granny," said Luke, using the old familiar term, "I won't

deny it; I am your own Luke, and I am come to live near you while you

are left to us."

"And yet, Luke," said the trembling old grandmother, "thou went away and

left us to think thou was dead, drowned, murdered; and all these years,

thou has neither written nor asked after me."

"Oh, granny," said Luke, "that's been a bitter thing to me. I was forced

to run away, for I saw that those Wellands would never cease till they

had made an end of me. I went right off, and begged till I found myself

at Hull. There a ship captain met me in the street, and eyeing me

awhile, he said, 'For shame, young scamp, to go about begging, a

clever-looking, active lad like you. Come, I'll take you with me to sea.

Eh? what say you?' I thanked him heartily, for of all things I was

delighted to go to sea, where I expected to find some Robinson Crusoe's

island, or the like fine country, such as Sally Flamstead had told me

of. He took me on board a great ship, and there I was stripped and

tumbled into a great tub of water, and well washed, and my old rags were

flung overboard, and I was togged out in a sailor's suit, and set to

work to sweep out the cabin and swab the deck, and do all that kind of

thing, with two or three lads of my own age. In a short time we set sail

for the Cape of Good Hope; but before I went I told the captain that I

wanted my grandad and grandmam to know where I was, and I begged him

earnestly to write for me, and he said he would; but one day he called

me into the cabin, and said, 'I have seen a gentleman here from Derby,

who has come to buy whale oil to light his factory with, and he says,

'That young fellow's history is known all over our part of the country.

Look to it, captain, for he is the very imp of mischief, and had to run

away for trying to kill a collier down a pit with a brick, and when he

was missing the collier was charged with having murdered him, and he's

transported for it, and his wife too. I heard him tried at Derby

Assizes, and the young rogue's grandfather and grandmother are both

dead of grief.'

"When the captain told me this I was ready to sink on the floor. Nobody

can tell how I felt. To think I had killed both my grandfather and

grandmother by my foolishness! As for Welland and his giant wife, I was

glad that they were transported, for they seemed to me to be so

malicious, and to have caused your deaths. At first I was stunned, and

then I burst out crying, and I thought my heart would break. I had

killed my only friends in the world; I was a wretch without a relative

or soul on earth that cared for me.

"'Don't stand blubbering there,' said the captain, 'but go and show

yourself handy, and turn out a farrently fellow. You may if you will;

and if not, there's a rope-end and the yard-arm for you. Quick! make

yourself scarce!' That was a bitter voyage for me. I suffered dreadfully

from sickness and from cold in the southern latitudes; and I got plenty

of kicks and cuffs from the mates and the sailors, and plenty of dousing

and sousing with salt water that came sweeping over the ship's sides,

and with hail and rain as we had to turn out of our hammocks at night

when storms were raging, and we had to go up into the shrouds, and out

along the slippering, reeling yards, hanging over the dark, boiling,

roaring seas below. Oh! I often thought of these pleasant fields and

farms, and all my old favourite nooks in the woods and dells, at those

times, and I was often tempted just to drop off the yard-end, and bury

all my troubles in the raging ocean. But I got better of that; the

captain began to notice me for an active, and, as he said, clever

fellow, and I began to like the sea. I've told you, granny, of some of

my wanderings in India, and America, and Australia, and we can talk

these over at our leisure now."

"But," said Beckey, "what made thee think of coming here if thou thought

us dead?'

"I thought I'd come and see your graves, dear granny. That was all I

could do; and I thought I'd put a handsome stone at your heads, such as

I used to see, when I was a lad, in Monnycrofts churchyard, with a nice

verse at the bottom, and a golden angel at the top, with a long golden

trumpet blowing for the resurrection. But when I got to Mrs.

Widdiwicket's, and began to ask about the old people that used to be

here in my time, just in a roundabout way, that I might not be known by

asking about you too soon, I really thought all the people in the place

were dead. Old Squire Flaggimore and Madame Flaggimore, and old Parson

Simion and Mrs. Simion, and old Johnson, and Broadbent, and Cullycamp

the mole-catcher, and Shears the tailor, and Kettlebender the cobbler,

and such a tribe,--all gone! And the Barnicotts of the Reckoning House,

I said, are, of course, gone too. But what a start went through me when

the landlady said, 'Nay, poor old Luke died directly after the affair

about his grandson, which is a long story, but the old grandmother is

living still.'

"Living still!" said I, starting up so that the landlady gave a jump,

and then she looked at me with such a look.

"'You seem acquainted, sir,' she said, 'with these parts;' and she

continued looking at me, as much as to say, Who in the world are you?

"I said, 'Oh, yes! I once was through here, and I was but a lad then,

and I heard an extraordinary story of a boy being killed by a collier,

or drowned in a dam or something.'

"'Ay, drowned, sure enough!' said Mrs. Widdiwicket, or smothered and

buried alive somewhere--he never was found--no, never.'

"I said I should take a walk and have some talk with you, for I was

curious about such things, and I inquired the way here. Now, I wonder

that Derby man never thought of telling somebody here about his having

heard of me being alive and on shipboard; but such men, with their great

mills and businesses, have so much to think of, they don't trouble their

memories with such things."

"We never heard a rumour of such a thing," said poor old Beckey, who

kept fast hold of Luke's hand, as if she could not be sure enough that

she had him.

"And what made thee pretend to be another, Luke, when thou came here?"

asked Beckey.

"Oh, granny! that was only to break it easy to you. I did not want to

frighten you all at once with the news, when you thought me dead so

long. That was all."

"Ah! that was good of thee, my Luke. 'And now, Lord, let me depart in

peace, since my eyes have seen thy salvation;'" and the happy old woman

again kissed her grandson, and shed some quiet tears.

"Luke! Luke!" she then said, "as soon as thou began to talk of Sally

Flamstead, that's my Luke's voice, I said--it's him, it's him, and

nobody else, for how should anybody else know all about those things?

And dost ta know, Luke, Sally has not forgotten thee? She has aullis

been kind to me, and often comes up with a bit or a sup, a nice pot of

preserves, or a jug of cream, or a nice plate of pickelets; and she will

bring her sewing, and sit and talk for hours, and she is sure to turn

the subject to the time when you were children. She's never married,

though she's as handsome a wench as any lady in all the country-side,

and rich she is, and manages her farm like a man, for the old Flamsteads

are dead; and as for followers and sweethearts, heaven love me! she has

had them all, I think, dangling after her in their turns. Nay, there

came a very fine gentleman from London here, and he offered to keep her

a coach and settle a fine estate on her; but no, thank you, she would

not have him. No, she'll never marry, Luke, unless thou marries her. She

has often said, 'Luke would be a fine young fellow if he was alive, and

a good fellow too. They say he was wild and mischievous, but he never

was with me. No, he was always as good as pie, and would have jumped

into a coal-pit to do me any kindness.'"

Luke said, "God bless her! I knew she was one in ten thousand, and if I

were----," but here Amy, who was as full of the news of Luke's being

alive and being come as an egg is of yolk, and had been out at the

garden gate to catch the first person going down the field-path and let

off her steam, came running out of breath, "Wist! wist! here is Miss

Flamstead coming up the field with a little basket in her hand, and a

nice white cloth on it. She's bringing you something nice, Missis

Barnicott; don't let us say who the young gentleman is, and see what she

will say. I warrant you she'll soon have an inkling of it."

Sally Flamstead was already in the garden. She came on lightly in her

nice light muslin dress, and her pretty white bonnet with a red rose in

it, and her little blue parasol dangling loosely in her left hand. But

as soon as she saw the stranger she blushed, and coming forward timidly,

she said, "Oh! Mrs. Barnicott, I did not know you had company." Her

sweet face was all blushes and roses, but it was smiling and charming.

Luke rose, took off his hat, and made her a polite bow. Sally returned a

respectful curtsey, and going up to Mrs. Barnicott, kissed her, and sat

down beside her. Poor old Beckey had hard work to contain herself. She

trembled, and tears rushed from her blind eyes, and she kissed Miss

Flamstead again and again. Luke and Amy stood; Luke gazing with a

respectful but fascinated gaze on the smart young farmeress, and Amy

looking nobody could tell how--half smiling a suppressed smile, and half

curious, and fit to burst out with, "It's Luke, Miss Flamstead, it's

Luke!"

"I hope you have no bad news, my dear Mrs. Barnicott," said Miss

Flamstead, wondering at her agitation.

"No! no!" said old Beckey. "Good news! good news!" and she shook her

head as with an agony of emotion, and then burst out, "Luke's alive!

I've heard of him--this--this--oh! he's seen him! he's seen him in th'

Indies!"

Miss Flamstead sprang to her feet, gave a look at Luke, and then

uttering a sort of shriek, she clasped her hands, and crying, "Oh! it is

he!" she sank on the seat. Luke sprang forward, seized her clasped

hands, kissed them passionately; and then Miss Flamstead standing up

and looking at him in wonder and as in a dream, they thus stood for some

time holding each others hands, while poor old Beckey and Amy cried

silently and plentifully for joy.

We may leave them awhile under the old hanging elder tree, and let some

days and weeks roll on, as they did roll joyously at the Reckoning

House, and at Langlee farm. All the old courtship of childhood was

renewed. Luke and Sally Flamstead have strolled about the old farm-yard

and the old fields. They have laughed as they stepped by the old

bramble-bush, by the paddock-gate, and remembered the hidden pork-pie,

and the hidden little bottle of beer, and of cold days there. The bells

have rung out merrily from the tall stone tower of Monnycrofts church,

and a gay wedding party has descended the long churchyard steps, and

taken its way through the swarming villagers, along the village street,

and down the lane to Langlee farm. There Luke and Sally live as happily

as if they were in a Robinson Crusoe's island, or more so; and more so

than if he had been a king and had made Sally a queen. Luke has bought

the old mill on the hill, Ives's old mill, and it still swings its great

arms as if beckoning everybody up to see something wonderful. Old Beckey

still lives in the Reckoning House, and Luke always looks in as he goes

up the hill to the mill, and often the old woman is fetched down to

Langlee farm to pass whole days and weeks with him. There she has a nice

tall-backed cushioned chair set for her in a sunny corner, and she

delights to ramble about the garden and smell the flowers, and about the

farm-yard, and listen to the fowls and ducks and geese and pigeons, and

fancy that she sees them.

"There's only one thing that troubles me," said old Beckey soon after

Luke had been recognised, "and that is, that Welland and his wife were

transported for nothing. Thou'st plenty of money, Luke, and if I were

thee, I'd send for them back."

"Granny," said Luke, "they would not thank me to do that. If I sent,

they would not come."

"No!" said Beckey, "do they like slavery better than Old England?"

"Slavery!" said Luke. "Why, granny, they live in a finer house than

Squire Flaggimore, keep a fine carriage, and their children are finer

gentlemen and ladies than the Flaggimores by half."

"Ah, say'st thou so!" exclaimed old Beckey in wonder. "How in the world

have they managed that?"

"I will tell you, granny," said Luke. "When I was in Australia, and had

got a good lump of gold, the first thing I did was to set sail for

Sydney in order to find out the Wellands and set them free, and send

them home. When I got there I found a very fine city, fine as London,

though not so big. There were fine shops, and carriages driving about,

and fine ladies and gentlemen riding and walking about, and fine

streets; and all round the city were the most beautiful gardens and

plantations, and houses like palaces, with beautiful lawns running down

to the sea-side. 'This a fine city,' I said to a decent man who stood at

a shop-door, 'but where are the convicts lodged?' The man smiled and

said, 'It just makes all the difference as to what convicts you mean. If

you mean those who are lately come, you may find some in the convict

barracks in the old town there, and some everywhere working on the

quays, and in warehouses, and many are up the country farming and

shepherding. But if you mean the convicts that came out ten or twenty

years ago, look round. They inhabit the greater part of the palaces you

see. 'There!' said he, pointing to a very fine carriage with a handsome

pair of greys, and a coachman and two footmen before and behind in rich

liveries, 'that is the equipage of a convict of past days. There! and

there! and there! all those are carriages of quondam convicts.'

"I was astounded. I then asked him if he knew a convict of the name of

Welland.

"'Do I know him?' said the man. 'Do I know the governor, or the

chief-justice? Do you want to see him?'

"I replied I did.

"'Come along then,' said he, 'I want a little walk; and he led the way

across a very fine street, called George Street, and up a hill, and past

the governor's castle, and so along the parks and garden beyond, and

then he stopped at a grand gate with a grand lodge, and said, 'Here

lives your man.'

"I stood in astonishment. 'Can it be true?' I said.

"'How long has he been out?' asked the man.

"Something like fourteen years," I replied.

"'Just so,' said he; 'and has he a very little wife?'

"A very great one," I said.

"'That's your man then,' he rejoined, and he bowed and bade me good day.

"I stood some time in doubt what I should do. I questioned how I might

be received by my old enemy, who had manifested to me so much malice,

and whom I had been the occasion of banishing into slavery. But I

thought, well, the transportation has been a lucky thing for him, and so

I will venture. I went in at the lodge gate, a woman told me the family

were at home. I advanced up a very fine gravel coach road, through the

most beautiful woods, and came at length into an open lawn and fine

flower-garden, where stood a grand white stone palace. 'Can this be the

mansion of Welland of the Marlpool?' I said to myself. 'Can the collier

have developed into a grandee like this, and through the chain-gang

too?'

"But I ascended a fine flight of steps, and rang the bell. A servant in

rich embroidered livery, and profusely powdered, came to the door. I

inquired for Mr. Welland, and was shown into a noble library, where an

old white-haired gentleman sat reading the papers. A magnificent

Highland greyhound, here called the kangaroo hound, crouched on the

superb Turkey carpet near his feet, and the spaces of the walls which

were not covered with books were filled with fine paintings. The old

gentleman politely rose, and bowing, begged me to take a seat on the

opposite side of the magnificent marble mantelpiece.

"I was puzzled how to begin my reason for calling. I looked in the old

gentleman's face, now calm and grave, and I was at a loss to determine

whether I was not mistaken after all. I thought I could trace a likeness

to the collier of the Marlpool, even amid that handsome suit of clothes,

that delicately fine linen, and under that snowy hair, but--could it be?

The old gentleman interrupted my speculations by mildly requesting that

I would oblige him by stating why I honoured him with a call. I paused

again for a moment. I grew still more confused, but I broke through my

restraint by an effort, and said, 'Was I right in opining that Mr.

Welland was a countryman of mine--from Derbyshire?'

"A cloud fell on his brow, and he replied, but coldly, 'I am from that

county.'

"'Then,' said I, reassured, 'you will not have forgotten the name of

Barnicott?'

"A flush passed over his features--a fierce one, it seemed to me. His

eyes flashed, and he demanded, in a short, stern tone, what was the

purport of my inquiry.

"'Because,' I said, 'I am that Luke Barnicott who was supposed to be

drowned in Hillmarton dam.'

"As I said these words, the old gentleman gave me a startled look,

turned unusually pale, and then springing towards me, seized my hands

convulsively, and exclaimed, 'Thank God! what a weight you fling from my

soul! Is it, can it be true, that you are that boy?'

"'I am he,' I said, 'and I have come six hundred miles to seek to make

amends for the unintentional misfortune of causing you'--I hesitated to

bring out the words of ignominy.

"'Of causing my transportation!' he said promptly. 'Thank God for that,

now I know that I am not guilty of your death; but all these years I

have borne in my soul the feeling that you were rotting in the bottom of

that dam.'

"The old man shook me vehemently by the hand. 'Thank God!' he ejaculated

again. 'Now all is right; now I shall live and die in peace. Now I can

say, Luke Barnicott, you did me the grandest day's work imaginable when

you caused my transportation, or rather when I caused it myself by mad

anger against you.' I asked his pardon a thousand times for my folly in

tantalizing him with the brick at the pit.

"'Don't mention it,' he said; 'we have both of us something to forget

and to forgive. God, I trust, has forgiven us both. He has prospered me

beyond all conception. I am one of the richest men in this colony. I

have lands that would make estates for half-a-dozen noblemen, and I have

ships on half-a-dozen seas. My story is no secret; everybody knows who

are emancipists here, and who are not But we have wealth, and friends,

and rising families who will one day rank with the first people of the

colony in education and worth. As for me, I feel I am no longer the poor

collier of the Marlpool. By trade, by study, by associating with men of

intelligence and mind, my own mind and views have expanded. I have grown

out of a black, crawling, ignorant caterpillar into a something more

noble--into a man and a Christian. I rank with a marked class here, it

is true, but I have wealth and friends, and a fine virtuous family; and

I have laboured hard to subdue that fierceness and rancour which once

disgraced me. You are the cause of this, and I bid you ten times

welcome. But come, I must introduce you to Mrs. Welland.'

"He led the way through a spacious hall into an equally spacious and

richly-furnished drawing-room, where I saw sitting a venerable lady,

reading with spectacles, and, like her husband, with hair white as snow.

She rose at our entrance, and I instantly recognised that remarkable

stature. But it was no longer the lofty, strapping figure, with a bold,

handsome face, and with an old slouched man's hat on, and arrayed in

dirty and negligent dress, as I recollected Doll Welland. The old and

venerable lady had the air of an ancient dowager empress. I could have

fancied her the Czarina of all the Russias.

"'My dear,' said Mr. Welland, 'I introduce to you a friend, who comes,

as it were, from the dead. You must go back to past times, to the

Marlpool, to the windmill, to--Luke Barnicott.'

"The venerable and stately lady stood in silent wonder. She gazed on her

husband, and then on me. 'What words, my dear, are these?' she said 'You

tear open old and very deep wounds.'

"'Let them all be closed and healed for ever, for this is the boy

Barnicott, who "was dead and is alive, who was lost and is found."'

"I will not," said Luke, "attempt to describe the venerable lady's

agitation, and, as that subsided, her joy. Like her husband, she seized

and held my hands, and wet them with streaming tears, and kissed them in

her emotion. All bitter feeling had long passed out of her bosom. They

had made a sharp expiation for their crime in persecuting me, during

their early years in the colony, and in the deep-lying sense of my

destruction in their souls up to this moment. This had softened and

ameliorated their hearts; they had become strongly religious; prosperity

had not spoiled them; and my arrival, and my errand to make a full

amends for my folly, now needless, cast a stream of heavenly sunshine on

the evening of their days.

"I was constrained to take up my quarters with them during my stay. They

explained to their sons and daughters, now all grown up, and some of

them married, and with mansions and equipages of great splendour, who I

was,--for my story was familiar to them all. I found myself at once

amongst a set of fine young men and women, highly educated, and in every

respect most estimable and charming. I visited them at their houses,

and accompanied them to those of their friends situated on the woody

shores and promontories that surround the delightful Bay of Sydney. I

rode with them across the sandy tract, carpeted with flowers and

thicketed with blooming shrubs of rare beauty, to Botany Bay. There we

sometimes took boats, and enjoyed the dangerous and exciting sport of

killing sharks. In that water, clear as crystal, we could see the

terrible monsters come with rapid sweeps up to the sides of our boats,

which they would seek to overturn, in which case we should probably all

have been snapped asunder and devoured. But throwing them a piece of

meat on a hook, they caught at that, and we drew them up to the boat,

and stunned them by striking them on the nose with the boat-hooks, and

dragged them in triumph to land.

"Sometimes we made a party at snake-hunting in the woods and thickets

around the houses of Mr. Welland, or of his sons or daughters, leading

down to the bay. Armed with whips, the ladies as well as the gentlemen,

and our legs defended with tall boots, we rushed into the wilderness of

shrubs, and starting the lurking serpents, most of them of deadly venom,

we gave chase, and soon cut them to pieces with our whips. Sometimes we

made long rides into the forests and encamped there in huts, and spent

whole days in shooting and in hunting the kangaroo. We visited the palmy

hills of Illawara, and saw the giant nettle trees, large as oaks, and

capable of killing a horse very quickly by their stings; or we roved

amongst the orange and lemon groves of Paramatta, and wondered how all

this enchanted life had sprung out of the collieries and the events of

the Marlpool, in Derbyshire. I can only say," Luke added when he closed

his narrative, "that I quitted my old cronies, the Wellands and their

children, with profound regret, and I feel that the regret was mutual.

The old collier of the Marlpool, now the millionnaire of Sydney, has not

forgotten his old friends and native place. I have brought with me £500

to build and partly endow a school on the spot where his humble cottage

once stood; and I shall feel it my duty and my pleasure to state the

facts that this is the gift of the Wellands, fifteen years ago

transported on the charge of having murdered me in consequence of my

disappearance. That, innocent of the charge, God has wonderfully

prospered them in their distant exile; that they have grown rich and

esteemed, and have sent by me, whom they were supposed to have

destroyed, this handsome token of their remembrance to their native

place. That is due to their justification, and to the wonderful means of

compensation existing in the immensely-extended British empire, where

even the man unjustly condemned at home, can find, in his unjust

punishment, the way to far superior fortune; and where those justly

condemned may expiate their offences against society by returning to

virtue, and by attaining to a position and a power which enables them to

diffuse the most salutary hopes and the most substantial benefits around

them."

This is the story of Welland the collier and Luke Barnicott, whom may

Heaven long preserve!

THE CASTLE EAST OF THE SUN.

AN OLD STORY, FROM THE DANISH.

There was once a king who had been very prosperous and happy, but he was

growing old. He had six sons and one daughter. His sons were very gay

and jovial young men, who spent their days very merrily; and when the

old king saw their vigorous sports and their enjoyment of life, he

sighed to think that he could not be young once more. His daughter was

beautiful and mild, and devoted all her days to amuse the old king, and

to make him forget that he was growing old. But there came a very

handsome prince from a far-off country, and he fell in love with the old

king's daughter, and asked her in marriage, and desired to take her away

with him to his own kingdom.

Now, the prince was very handsome, and had a very beautiful carriage,

and very fine horses, and many servants, and plenty of gold and jewels,

and everything which belongs to a prince. But the old king desired to

know where lay the kingdom of the prince, and what was its name. But the

prince said that it was the island which lay east of the sun and west of

the world, and that was its name; and that it was so far off that nobody

had ever been to it from this country, nor had any one come to this

country from it besides himself.

Then the old king was not willing that his daughter should marry a

prince from a country so far off that nobody ever before heard of it.

The young princes, his sons, were also opposed to the marriage. They did

not like the prince because he was so much handsomer than themselves,

and had more money, and appeared with so much more splendour than they

could. They said he was probably some adventurer and impostor, for no

one had ever heard of the country he pretended to come from, nor could

they see how any one could get thither from a place east of the sun and

west of the world.

Now, the princess felt a great affection for the strange prince, for he

was the handsomest man who had ever come to her father's court, and was

passionately in love with her; but she would not consent to leave her

father in his old age. Then said the prince, that he was bound not to

return to his own country, nor to take upon him its government, for

three years, and for that time he would stay in this country; and when

they went away at length, he would send the old king some of the water

which played in the fountain in the court of his castle, and some of the

apples which grew over the sides of the fountain, and were wetted daily

with the dew of its spray. This fountain was the fountain of

immortality, and the apples were the apples of youth; and whoever drank

of that water and ate one of those apples would be instantly young

again, and enjoy once more all the buoyancy and ardour of his freshest

years.

When the old king heard that, he was very glad, and gave his consent for

the prince to marry his daughter, for above all things he wished to be

young again, and to enjoy his life as he had done in his youthful years.

The princess, too, on learning this, was willing to marry the prince,

for she thought if her father could be young again he would find plenty

of sources of happiness, and she herself would not grieve to go away to

such a far-off country, if by that means she could thus purchase for her

father the great desire of his heart, and the renewal of his life.

So the prince and princess were married, and they lived in a splendid

palace near the old king, and were very happy. Every day the princess

found the prince more amiable and sensible, and desirous to add to her

felicity, and he promised himself a long and joyous life with her in his

own beautiful island east of the sun and west of the world--so long,

that nobody could tell the end of it, for they could drink of the

fountain of life and eat of the apples of youth daily.

But the old king was so impatient for a draught of this water, and a

taste of one of those apples, that he forgot that the prince said that

he was bound not to return to his kingdom for three years. He was

impatient for the prince and princess to begone, and to send some of the

apples and the water, for he longed with a longing unto death for the

renewal of his youth, which in his memory seemed so beautiful.

When the prince heard this he was very sorrowful, and said it could not

be done, for no one knew the way to his kingdom but himself, and that if

he returned before his time he should become a captive instead of a

king, and be miserable for ever. But the old king became very angry, and

redoubled his demands that the prince and princess should set out. The

old king's sons also insinuated that the prince did not go because he

had no kingdom to go to, but that he was what they had always asserted,

an adventurer and impostor.

The princess was very unhappy, and besought the prince to tell her the

way to his kingdom, and let her go and bring the apples of youth and the

water of life; but he told her that it could not be done. It was more

than both their lives were worth. He begged the princess to promise him

that she would never urge this again till the three years were up, or it

would cost them then happiness for ever. But the old king was very

pressing. He said he might be dead in less than three years, and then he

should lose the beautiful renewal of his youth for which his soul

longed, and of which he had made himself sure when he consented that

his daughter should marry the prince. He urged his daughter to prevail

on her husband to set out, and the princess, between the commands of the

old king and the assurance of the prince that to press him further was

the total ruin of their happiness, was the most miserable of women, and

wept day and night. For many months she resisted, however, all desire to

penetrate into the secret of the prince, and all the importunities of

the old king, her father, and the taunts of the princes, her brothers.

But when she saw how the gloom of despair hung heavier and heavier on

the king's brow, and heard him say that if she loved him she could help

him, she was ready to break her heart of grief. But her brothers' words

sank deeper into her soul, for they derided the prince, her husband, as

a mock prince and a pretender, and said that he was the Prince of

Nowhere, for no one had ever heard of his pretended country. At length

her anguish grew to that pitch that she burst out in her husband's

presence with the words, "O that I could but know where your kingdom is,

that I might go and save the life of my father!"

At these words the prince turned deadly pale, sprang up, and embraced

his wife passionately, saying, "Alas! alas! it is all true! We must

part, and for ever!"

With a deep groan he escaped from her arms, and issuing out of the door

was seen no more. It was a dark, wild night, but he passed hastily out

of the palace, followed by all his servants. The princess, in a state of

distraction, ran after him to detain him, but he and his followers had

already disappeared, and from that day no man saw them again.

Then the old king and the princes said that the pretended prince was in

reality a troll (wizard) or an evil spirit, and that they were well rid

of him. But the princess would not believe anything but that he was a

true and noble prince, who was bound by some solemn oath, and she was

overwhelmed with sorrow that she had thus broken his commands, and lost

him for ever. She hid herself long in the depths of her palace, and

wished that she were dead.

But the old king, though he had said that the prince was a troll or an

evil spirit, began soon again to hanker after the golden apples and the

water of life, and bade his sons go and seek for the island east of the

sun and west of the world. The sons declared that they did not believe

there was any such island, or any such apples or water, but that they

were willing to go forth and make a quest after them. They were indeed

glad to have plenty of money put into their hands, and to be able thus

to go from country to country, and see the world.

So the old king furnished two of them with money, and sent them out, and

they went away but never returned. Weeks and months, and then a whole

year went round, and the two sons neither returned, nor did there come

any news of them. Then the old king sent out two more, and they also

went out, but never returned. Weeks and months, and a whole year went

round, and they neither came back, nor any news of them. Then the old

king, whose desire for the golden apples and the water of life was only

become the stronger from his longings and disappointments, sent out his

last two sons, and bade them in Heaven's name to do their utmost, for if

they failed all failed him, and he had no son left to succeed him. So

they went, and, like the rest, they neither returned nor was there any

news of them.

Three years had now gone, the time to which the prince had limited his

stay, and now the old king thought that he might have had the apples of

youth and the water of immortality, and by his impatience he had lost

them and all his sons into the bargain. There was nobody now left him

but his daughter, the princess, and she too now declared that she also

would set out to seek her husband, and the apples of youth and the water

of life at the same time. The old king was rejoiced to let her go, for

he thought of nothing but of renewing his youth, and no price seemed too

great to pay it. He had lost all his sons in the quest, and now he was

willing to risk the loss of his daughter and sole child, the prop and

last comfort of his age.

So the princess kissed the old king, her father, and bade him be of good

cheer, for that if she was in life she would come back to him, and, if

possible, with the precious apples and water in her hands. Then she set

forth with the old king's blessing, and after she had wept herself weary

as she walked along, she wiped the tears from her eyes, looked

steadfastly into the wide world before her, and wandered on many, many

days, till finally she came to a mountain by which an old woman sat and

played with a golden apple. The princess asked the old woman if she knew

the way to the prince who lived with his stepmother in a castle east of

the sun and west of the world?

"How camest _thou_ to know him?" asked the old woman. "Art thou, indeed,

the maiden that he should have married?" "Yes," replied the princess; "I

am she."

"So! thou art really she!" said the old woman. "Yes! my child,"

continued she, "I would gladly help thee, but I know no more of the

castle than that it is east of the sun and west of the world, and

thither canst thou not go, I fear. But I will lend thee my horse, and on

that thou canst ride to my sister, and perhaps she can tell thee. When

thou comest to my sister, then strike the horse behind the left ear, and

let it come home again. Thou canst also take with thee this golden

apple, for it may probably be useful to thee. But before thou settest

out, thou must stay all night with me."

The princess thanked her, and stayed all night, and when it was early

morning the old woman said, "Stay a moment, I am queen of the beasts,

and we will find out if any of them know where the castle lies that is

east of the sun and west of the world." So the old woman went out before

the door, and whistled aloud three times; and there came the beasts

hurrying from all quarters--lions, and bisons, and wild horses, and many

another creature, great and small; but none of them could tell the way

to the castle.

Then the princess mounted on the horse, and rode on and on for an

immense way. She rode over vast grey heaths, and over stony hills, and

through ancient mossy woods, till she came to a very old woman who sat

at the foot of a mountain with a golden reel. The princess asked her

whether she was not the sister of the queen of beasts, and whether she

could tell her the way to the castle that was east of the sun and west

of the world.

The old woman replied that truly she was sister to the queen of the

beasts, but that she knew no more of the castle than that it was east of

the sun and west of the world, and that the princess would not, she

feared, easily get there. But, added she, "I am queen of the birds, and

in the morning I will ask them if any of them know the way to the

castle, for some of them fly very far. But, for my part, I have lived

here while the trees have grown up and rotted down several times, and no

one ever asked me the way to this castle before. However, I will lend

thee my horse, and on that canst thou ride to my other sister, the queen

of the fishes, if the birds know nothing. When thou comest to my sister,

strike the horse behind the left ear, and bid it come home again. And,

besides this, thou canst take this golden reel with thee, for it may

prove useful to thee."

In the morning the old woman went out before the door, and whistled

three times aloud, and from all quarters of the sky, from wood and

mountain, came the birds flying--hawk and eagle, swallow and swift, the

travelling cuckoo, and the ancient phoenix, came sweeping down with a

great rush of pinions, but none of them could tell the way to the

castle. The phoenix had once seen it, but so long ago, and in a former

life, that she remembered nothing more than that she was dreadfully

weary with her flight from it homewards.

The princess mounted the horse, and again rode on for days and weeks,

over huge, huge grey heaths and stony mountains, and through mossy

woods. At length she came to where another old woman sat at the foot of

a mountain, and spun from a golden distaff. The princess asked if she

were the sister of the queen of the birds, and whether she could tell

her anything of the prince who lived in the castle east of the sun and

west of the world?

"Yes," replied the old woman, "I am the sister of the queen of the

birds; and art thou indeed the princess that the prince married?" "Yes,"

said the princess; but the old woman knew nothing of the way more than

the two former ones. "East from the sun and west of the world lies the

castle," she said, "that is true, but thither canst thou never go. Three

times have the trees grown up and rotted down here, since I lived on

this spot, and thou art the first person that has asked the way to the

castle. Wait, however, till morning, and we will ask the fishes, for I

am queen of the fishes, and some of them swim very far."

So in the morning the old woman took the princess down to the sea-shore,

and she whistled three times, and the fish came swimming from all

quarters. The herrings which travel the shores of sunny countries came,

and the shark, and the huge whale, but none of them had ever travelled

so far; only the whale had heard that he had relations very far south,

and that there was an island east of the sun and west of the world that

they sometimes sailed round, but the way to it the whale knew not.

"So then," said the old woman, "there is nothing for it but to inquire

of the winds, for they travel farther than beast, or bird, or fish; and

first thou shalt go to the east wind, which is nearest. I will lend thee

my horse to ride thither, and when thou comest to the east wind, strike

the horse behind the left ear, and bid him come home; and take this

golden distaff with thee, for it may probably be of great use to thee.

God speed thee on thy journey, for it is a long one, and I know not how

thou canst get there, but shouldst thou ever travel this way again, I

pray thee let me know how it went with thee."

So the princess thanked the queen of the fishes for all her kindness,

promised if she lived to let her know what befel her, and, mounting the

horse, rode away to the east wind. Over many a moor and mountain, and

through many a mossy wood she rode on for a long, long time before she

came to the east wind. But at length she arrived, and asked him whether

he could tell her how she might come to the prince who lived in the

island and in the castle which lies east of the sun and west of the

world?

"Of the prince," said the east wind, "I have indeed heard, and of the

castle too, but the way can I not tell thee, for I have never blown so

far. But I will take thee to my brother, the west wind; very likely he

may know, for he is much stronger than I am, and blows farther. Thou

canst seat thyself on my back, and I will bear thee thither."

The princess seated herself on his back, and away he went. When they

came to the west wind, the east wind said, "I have brought thee a maiden

who has married the prince who lives in the castle east of the sun and

west of the world--canst thou tell her the way thither?"

"Nay," said the west wind, "so far have I never blown. But if thou wilt,

maiden, set thyself on my back, and I will carry thee to the south wind,

for he is far stronger than I am, and blows and wanders about

everywhere."

The princess seated herself on his back, and it was not long before they

were at the south wind; and the west wind said, "I have brought thee a

maiden who has married the prince of the castle east of the sun and west

of the world--canst thou bear her thither?"

"Nay," said the south wind, "I know not the way. In my time I have blown

about a good deal, but so far as that I never reached. But I will carry

the maiden to my brother, the north wind, who is the oldest and

strongest of us all, and if he cannot tell thee the way, then never wilt

thou find it."

The princess seated herself on the back of the swift south wind, and

away he went at such a rate that the very heath trembled. They were

quickly at the north wind, but he was so wild and furious, that long

before they reached him he blew actual snow and ice in their faces.

"What do you want?" growled he out, so that a shudder went through them

like cold water.

"Oh! thou must not be so rude with us," said the south wind, "for it is

I, thy brother, and this is a maiden who has married the prince who

lives in the island castle east of the sun and west of the world.

Thither will she, and would now ask counsel of thee how to yet there."

"Well," said the north wind, "I know the place well where it lies. I

once blew an aspen leaf thither, but I was so fatigued that I was not

able to blow again for many a blessed day. But if thou really wilt go

thither," said he to the princess, "and art not afraid, I will take thee

on my back, and see whether I cannot blow thee thither."

The princess said she must and would go if there were any possible way.

That she was not in the least afraid, and would dare everything, let it

be as terrible as it might.

"Here, then, must thou stay all night," said the north wind; "for we

must have the whole day before us if we mean to reach the place."

Early in the morning the north wind awoke her; blew himself up, and made

himself so huge and strong that it was quite terrible; and away they

went through the air as if they would drive to the end of the world.

There arose so tremendous a storm, that whole villages and woods were

blown down; and when they came over the great sea the ships sank by

hundreds. Away they went over the waters, and that so far that no mortal

could conceive the distance. But the north wind began to grow weaker and

weaker, so immense was the way, that he could scarcely blow any more;

and he sank lower and lower down, till he at last flew so low that the

waves of the ocean struck his feet.

"Art thou afraid?" demanded he of the princess.

"No, not in the least," said she.

And now they were not far from land. There lay the island, all beautiful

with pleasant palm and cocoa trees, lifting their airy heads in the

sunshine, and with green and flowery forests coming down to the edge of

the clear sparkling water. There stood the lofty castle with its

pleasant gardens and soft lawns sweeping to the sea, and many bright

birds and wonderful flowers all about. They had really reached the

island and the castle that lies east of the sun and west of the world.

But the north wind had scarcely strength left to reach the land, and, in

fact, he alighted on a rock which rose out of the sea at some distance

from the strand.

"Here will I lie and rest myself a little," said the great rough north

wind, "and, to tell the truth, I would fain be excused going any nearer

to the island, for they are not used here to such rough visitors as I,

and were I to settle as softly as possible, I should chill many of these

gorgeous flowers and trees to death, and make those birds and

butterflies fall senseless to the ground. Ho! there I see our friend the

whale I will ask him to carry you over. Ho there! friend whale," said

the north wind hoarsely, "come hither, and carry over to the island the

princess who has married the prince there."

The whale came somewhat surlily to the task, and blowing up a huge

stream of water to clear his voice, said,--

"If she go with me she mast go quickly, for I am in danger here. I have

pursued some tender herrings to this side of the island for my

breakfast; but if I am seen the people will shoot their arrows into me,

and probably come off in boats and with harpoons after me. It is rather

provoking that one cannot seek one's breakfast in peace without being

called on to become a ferryman."

"Be civil, friend whale, as becomes thee," said the north wind. "I have

blown along all day and night with the maiden, and surely it cannot

hurt thy strong back just to bear her to the shore."

"Waste no more words," said the whale, edging his huge bulk to the side

of the rock, "for there will soon be somebody spying us out."

So the north wind bade the princess good speed, and she began to climb

upon the whale's back; but it was so steep and slippery, that she found

it very difficult to ascend. Several times she slipped down again to the

rock, and the whale began to snort and blow with impatience. At length

the princess accomplished the ascent, and thanking the north wind, she

was borne away towards the island. Before they reached it, however, the

whale plunged down under water, and swam so far under the waves, that

the princess thought she should certainly never come up alive. At

length, however, the huge creature emerged, and the princess recovering

her breath, and wiping the brine from her eyes and nostrils, asked the

whale why he treated her so rudely?

"Why were you so long in getting up?" asked the whale. "Every minute of

your delay might prepare an arrow for my hide; and methinks that great

savage north wind, whom nobody can hurt, might just as well have carried

you to the shore, when he had brought you so far; but these northern

creatures are only barbarians."

The princess thought she knew which was the more civilized of the two;

but she was too prudent to speak, as she might have this time gone to

the very bottom of the sea. So she was silent, till the whale rubbed the

green edge of the island with his side, when she leaped down, and spite

of his rudeness, thanked him kindly for his good office.

The princess now approached the front of the castle, and seating herself

under the windows, played with the golden apple, and the first person

that she saw was the witch stepmother.

"What wilt thou have for thy golden apple?" demanded she of the princess

as she threw open the window.

"That is not to sell, neither for gold nor money," said the princess.

"If thou wilt not sell it for gold nor for money, what then wilt thou

take for it?" asked the stepmother. "I will give thee whatever thou

desirest."

"Oh, then!" said the princess, "if thou wilt do that, thou shalt have

it; and the price is, that I am admitted for an hour to see the prince

who lives in this castle."

"That shalt thou," said the stepmother, and took the golden apple. But

when the princess came into the prince's room, there he lay in such a

deep sleep that the princess could not wake him. She called to him,

shook him, wept and lamented aloud and passionately, but all in vain.

She saw that he was held fast under a spell; and as soon as the hour was

past came the stepmother, and chased the princess from the room and from

the castle.

The next day the princess seated herself again before the castle, put

yarn upon the golden reel, and began to wind it off into a ball. And now

it happened just as it had done the day before. The stepmother asked

what she would take for the golden reel, and she replied that it was not

to be sold for money or gold; but if she might for just one hour more

see the prince, she would give her the reel The stepmother gladly

agreed, took the reel, and conducted the princess into the hall where

the prince was. But he was, just as the day before, in so deep a sleep,

that, spite of all that the princess could do, she could not wake him.

She called to him, and shook him, and wept and lamented bitterly, but

all in vain; and the moment that the hour was up, the stepmother came

and chased her from the room and the castle.

The next day the princess seated herself with her golden distaff before

the castle, and the instant that the stepmother saw her she longed to

have the golden distaff. The princess would not sell it for money or

gold, but again bargained for one hour more in the presence of the

prince. But now the servants of the prince, who had heard the

lamentations of a woman in his presence on the two former days, had told

him, and the prince was full of wonder. He was under the power of the

witch stepmother, because in three years' wandering through the world he

had not found a woman who loved him sufficiently to ask him no questions

as to whence he came and what he was. Therefore must he alternately

sleep twelve hours a magic sleep, and twelve hours keep awake; during

all which time the stepmother ruled over his kingdom and did as she

pleased. But now, the servants having awoke his curiosity, when the

stepmother brought him the wine at breakfast which locked him for twelve

hours in unbreakable sleep, he pretended to drink it, but in reality

poured it behind him. He was, therefore, awake when the princess

entered, and was astonished and rejoiced beyond all bounds to see his

wife again. She then related to him how it had gone with her, and how

she had managed to reach the castle.

When she had told him all this, he said:--"Thou art come precisely at

the right time, for the stepmother has been exercising her witchcraft to

occasion me to marry another princess, which must have taken place if

she could have retained her power over me for a week longer. But now is

her power at an end, for it can endure no longer than till a true woman

asserts her right as wife in this castle. Henceforth must she flee to

her own kindred in the mountains of the mainland, and we are now free to

do whatever we please."

Then the prince called in all his servants and showed them his true

wife, and there was great rejoicing, but the false stepmother had

already fled away. The prince held a great banquet of ten days, and

showed the princess all the beauties of the castle and island.

After this she told him how her father, the old king, still longed for a

draught of the fountain, and a taste of the apples which grew in his

court, and begged that she might go and carry them. But the prince asked

how she could go, for the north wind had long blown himself back to his

place; and when the princess thought on this, and saw not how she was

ever to quit the island, she was very sorrowful. Then the prince smiled,

and said he would show her how she should go, and that he would go with

her. He therefore ordered provisions and wine for a long journey, and

commanded them to be carried down to the shore. But there was neither

boat nor ship to be seen. Yet the prince took the princess by the hand

and said, "Now we say farewell for the present to the island east of the

sun and west of the world, and we will set sail to see the old king, thy

father."

At this the princess wondered more and more. But when they were come

down to the waters edge, the prince took from his pocket a small thing

like a folded skin, and said, "This is the ship in which we shall sail."

The princess laughed and thought it a jest, but the prince opened it,

and behold it was like a small boat. He stretched it out so long as his

arms could reach, and then set it upon the water, commanding one of his

people to step into it. He did so, and there was then room for two.

Another stepped into it, and there was immediately room for two more.

Thus it continued to expand till twenty men were in it, when the prince

ordered the provision and awnings for the voyage to be carried in, and

then stepped in with the princess. And now the princess saw that there

was ample room for all, and she and the prince sat under a canopy of

blue and gold, and the ship seemed instinct with life, and impatient to

set sail.[1]

[Footnote 1: Odin had his ship of this kind, called Skidbladnir, or the

skating leaf, and in the Scandinavian Sagas such convenient vessels are

frequently mentioned.]

Then said the prince to the ship, "Away, over land and water to the

queen of the fishes!"

And the ship cut smoothly away over the sunny waves without oar or sail,

fleet as an arrow, till it reached the coast where the queen of the

fishes lived. She was greatly delighted to see the princess return with

the handsome prince, and in so wonderful a ship. The princess thanked

her for her kindness in enabling her to reach her husband, and gave her

one of the apples of youth, and a cup of the water; and no sooner had

the old woman eaten the apple and drunk the water, than her wrinkles

vanished from her skin, her hair from grey became black as the raven's

plumes, and she stood there as a beautiful and stately maiden. The

princess was not the less delighted than the queen of the birds, for she

now saw that her father would certainly regain his youth. With many

thanks on the part of the now beautiful queen of fishes, the prince and

princess took their leave, assuring her that they should call on her

sisters, the queen of birds and the queen of beasts, and give them also

the same youth-renewing fruit and drink. Thither the wonderful ship

sailed, and thence took its way at the prince's command to the court of

the old king.

The old king was now become very weak, and lay at the point of death.

All his six sons had returned, having spent all their money in riotous

living in a distant city, and declared that they had been all round the

world, and had inquired in all lands, and that nobody had ever heard of

the castle east of the sun and west of the world. They protested that

there was no such place, and no prince of such a place, and that his

daughter would never return.

At this news the old king groaned bitterly, and lay helpless and

sorrowful unto death. All his beautiful hopes of ever renewing his youth

died in his heart; and while he was about to give up the ghost, his sons

watched for his last breath, that they might seize on his treasures and

spend them in riot and folly.

But just as they thought the old king's breath was departing, the prince

and princess came sailing over the land in the ship, and stopped, to the

amazement of all the courtiers, at the castle gate. Then entered the

prince and the princess, who was weeping for joy. She bore in one hand a

crystal flagon of the water of the fountain, and in the other a golden

salver of the apples of youth; and kneeling by the old king's couch, she

kissed him with many tears, and wet his lips with the water. All at

once the old man's eyes gleamed with a sudden brightness; he raised

himself on his elbows, and saw his daughter, with the prince by her

side, stand weeping for joy, with the salver of fruit and the crystal

flagon in her hand. Then he knew that she had reached the castle east of

the sun and west of the world, and had come back for his sake. He

eagerly stretched out his hand for the fruit, and having eaten one

apple, he sprang from his couch with a bound such as he used when

springing into battle, and then drinking a cup of the glittering water,

he stood before them a stately man in wonderful beauty and strength. In

his joy he stretched forth his arms and strode across the floor, and

laying his hands on his sides as if to make sure how well he felt, he

laughed and said, "Now again I am a king!"

Then he embraced and kissed his daughter, and also embraced

affectionately the prince, praising them as the best of children that

ever king had. But suddenly his face darkened with a frown, and he said,

"What shall we do with those six nidings (worthless fellows) who call

themselves my sons? They shall all be put to death."

But the prince and princess said, "Not so. They would buy their lives as

the reward for having brought the king the renewal of his youth." The

prince also requested that he might have the six sons delivered to him,

engaging to make useful men of them in less than five years. To this the

king, no longer called the old, readily consented; and when the feast of

rejoicing was ended, the prince again took the wonderful ship from his

pocket, and placing in it the six unworthy brothers, he bade the ship

sail away to a region of wild and far-off mountains, where he delivered

them to the keeping of the Dwarfs, who made them hew stone in the

quarries, fell timber and shape it in the forests and work at the anvil

in their smithies. There they laboured from day to day severely, and

lived on the coarsest fare, till wisdom and better thoughts by degrees

came into them, and they sent and petitioned that the king, their

father, would forgive them, and place them in one of the lowest offices

in his kingdom, where they might practise before all men the humility

and gravity which they had acquired from the Dwarfs, and the solitude,

the labour, and the frugal fair.

The king, having consented to this prayer, and found them true to their

word, divided his kingdom amongst them, and sailed away with the prince

and princess in the wonderful ship to the island east of the sun and

west of the world, where he eats freely of the apples of youth, and

drinks daily of the fountain of immortality, and feels that he is a king

indeed.

THE HOLIDAYS AT BARENBURG CASTLE.

BY OTTILIE WILDERMUTH.

CHAPTER I.--BREAKING UP.

It was very hot in the school-room at Steinheim, almost as hot as in an

oven, although the faded green blinds were drawn down. Neither learning

nor teaching goes forward satisfactorily on such days; and, indeed, it

was as much as the good schoolmaster could do, especially during this

hot summer, to keep himself and his dear children awake over their

books. When he walked up and down the narrow space between his tall

chair and the school-benches, like a caged lion, the children asked one

another anxiously, "Do you think he is angry?" not knowing that he only

did so to prevent himself from falling fast asleep in his chair. There

was not much danger of this happening among the children, for if any one

of them dropped his head somewhat over his book, another was sure to

tickle him under the nose with a pen-feather, so that he suddenly woke

up again.

To-day, however, the children were not sleepy, but neither were they

industrious. Whilst they were reading, they kept looking up continually

from their books to the door, as if expecting somebody, and yet at this

time there seldom came any one, unless now and then an over-anxious

mother who thought that her Michael or little Jacob had been too hardly

dealt with. To-day, however, according to old custom, the schoolmaster's

daughter Mina, and the bailiff's Emma, were gone to the clergyman's to

ask about the breaking-up. For always as the time of the holidays

approached, Mr. Erdmann, the schoolmaster, drew up a very politely

expressed document in the name of the children, in which the clergyman

was requested, "now the harvest season was at hand," that he would give

permission to the children to discontinue their attendance at school "in

order," said the writing, "that we may be able to assist our parents in

the laborious business of the field."

These petitions were then beautifully copied out by the best-writer in

the school, and two little girls chosen to present them to the

clergyman, because they were so much gentler and better-behaved than the

unmannerly boy population.

It was never known that the clergyman had returned a negative to these

petitions for the school vacation, and yet there was always an

uneasiness and an excitement amongst the children which could not be

allayed. They might now almost have been on the eve of a little

revolution; even Fritz, the schoolmaster's son, could not keep himself

quiet, but fidgeted restlessly hither and thither. And yet Fritz was the

best and cleverest scholar in the school; he was destined for the

church, and had been instructed in Latin and Greek by the clergyman;

therefore it was his duty to set a good example to all the others. This

honourable post, it is true, had cost him an extra number of canings

from his father, till finally he was advanced so far that the

schoolmaster was able to say, with fatherly pride, when the others were

lazy or behaved ill, "There, look at my Fritz!"

At length the door opened, and the girls entered, who had on this

occasion an especial importance in the eyes of the boys, and who, with

their smooth, beautifully plaited hair and pink frocks, looked very

pretty.

"We are to break up!" said they, delivering thus to the schoolmaster,

with beaming countenances, the answer to the embassy. "We are to break

up!" was whispered loud and low throughout the school; but the master

struck a blow with the hazel stick upon his desk, and amidst an

instantaneous silence he said in a clear voice, "Silentium! that is to

say, keep your tongues still! The clergyman has consented to the

breaking up. Fritz, say it in Latin."

"Hodie feriæ habemus!" proclaimed Fritz in a shrill voice.

"Good! That is to say, to-day we break up," explained the schoolmaster.

"But you must, every one of you, write three beautiful copies; farther,

you must commit to memory the six hymns that are marked, and two pages

of selections, as well as ''Tis harvest time, the nodding corn!' Now,

behave well, all of you, and be industrious; and go very quietly home,

every one of you, like well-conducted children."

Yes, indeed, very quietly and well-conducted! The little troop burst

forth like a wild herd into the open air, as soon as the door was

opened.

"Hurrah! Breaking up!" shouted they, wild with joy; even the exemplary

Fritz set up such an unbecoming shout of exultation that his father,

who, however, was well pleased himself, thought it right to give him an

admonitory pluck by the hair. Soon after the wild herd dispersed; many

amongst them entering into such poor, joyless homes, that in comparison

the school must have appeared a paradise, and yet they rejoiced that

they had broken up, and we cannot be angry with them. It is the fact of

labour, of regular occupation, which makes the feeling of liberty so

like a golden blessing; the neglected lad, who lounges about idly one

day after another, certainly never experiences the happy sense of a

breaking up.

Arrived at home, the schoolmaster exchanged his thin school-coat for his

house-doublet, and seated himself comfortably on the wooden squab, for

which his wife had made a cushion, for he had neither a house-coat nor

yet a sofa.

"Now, thank Heaven, for again a short pause," said the weary and

hard-working man; "it will do me good to have a little rest, and look

after my garden; and the bailiff has promised me some beautiful

carnation-layers, it is not yet too late for them; we'll have it very

beautiful, won't we, mother?"

"Yes, yes, father," replied the acquiescent wife; "only early in the

morning, and not in the blazing heat of noon."

In the meantime, Fritz was earnestly and mysteriously whispering to Mina

in a corner. "Do _you_ ask," at length said Mina. "Nay, _you_ had

better," returned he.

Mina, who had this day been with the clergyman, might surely venture a

word with her father, and she began therefore, at first shyly, and then

more boldly, "But, father, is it true?"

"What true?" asked he.

"May we?" asked she again slowly.

"May you what?" inquired he again.

"Go to see Mrs. Dote at the castle!" exclaimed Fritz, now speaking quite

boldly, and astonished at his own courage.

"Yes, oh yes, father!" now besought Mina, earnestly and in a winning

tone. "You have no objection, mother, have you?" asked she, addressing

her mother; "and if mother is willing, father, you won't say no, will

you?"

"And Mrs. Dote has invited us," said Fritz decisively; "and you

promised, you know, father, and you always keep your word."

"Why, yes; what do you think, mother?" said the good-natured father,

somewhat undecidedly.

"I don't know what to say," replied the mother, thoughtfully, "whether

Mrs. Dote really meant it; and it is such a long way."

"Oh, mother!" exclaimed Fritz, "five hours' walk, the nearest way

fifteen miles; we can do that very well."

"But you can't spare Mina, can you?" suggested the father.

"Well, as far as that goes," said the mother smiling, "I think I can

manage; little Paul will soon run alone, and Adolf plays about nicely in

the garden. If you have no objection, father, we might give them the

pleasure for once; I can soon have their few things ready."

"Oh, mother, how kind and good you are!" exclaimed little Mina joyfully;

Fritz threw his cap in the air, and shouted, "Hurrah! all the world

over!"

The father's consent was silently given, and preparations for the

journey began as if it really were round the world that they were going.