supper-table, feeling that he will get nothing to eat while he is
called upon to supply the inexhaustible demands of the two young
cormorants; and at the conclusion of the meal he hastily rids himself
of them, as he fondly hopes, for the night. Vain hope! As he strolls
in the garden smoking a cigar, dreaming of Alice Mayton, enjoying
the fragrance of the roses, and above all the perfect stillness of
everything around, he is roused from his reverie by hearing Budge's
voice overhead, and is met by a demand from a little white-robed figure
for 'stories.' Mr Burton is too tender-hearted to resist the wistful
expression of Budge's countenance, and he complies; but he fails to
compare favourably as a _raconteur_ with the absent papa; and Budge
assuming the position of narrator himself, gives _his_ version of
the history of Jonah. We cannot help laughing at his description of
the prophet, who 'found it was all dark inside the whale, an' there
wasn't any fire there, an' 'twas all wet, an' he couldn't take off his
clothes to dry, cos there wasn't no place to hang em.' Songs succeed to
stories, and at length Uncle Harry thinks he is free; but he reckons
without his host. Budge insists that his uncle shall hear him say his
prayers in the exact manner in which 'papa always does;' concluding
his devotions by an immediate and pressing request for candy. But
Toddie's prayer must be said first, in which a special petition
is offered for the welfare of his 'dolly.' Then, the candy being
forthcoming, there arises a clamour for pennies, drinks, and finally
for the 'dollies;' which tiresome objects being found, Uncle Harry
once more beats a retreat, and settles himself for a little serious
reading, experiencing, however, one more interruption from Budge, who
appears before him and requests his blessing before he finally turns
in. Papa says 'God bless _everybody_,' persists the boy, when his uncle
endeavours to satisfy him with a simple 'God bless you;' and we fully
echo Mr Burton's sentiment: 'Bless your tormenting honest little heart,
if men trusted God as you do your papa, how little business there'd
be for the preachers to do!' The remainder of the night is tranquil
enough, for we pass over such minor incidents as shrieks from Toddie
for his dreadful 'dolly,' which has been mislaid among the bed-clothes,
and the very early rising of Budge, who is up with the lark, doing his
best to rouse his uncle (whose room communicates with that of the boys)
from his morning sleep. Who could find the heart to be angry with the
small sinner who apologises for his misdeeds by saying: 'I was only a
lovin' you cos you was good an' brought us candy. Papa lets us love him
whenever we want to--every mornin' he does.'
We draw a veil over Mr Burton's feelings when, on the following
morning, it becomes manifest that Toddie (whom his mother believes to
have an artistic and poetic soul) has been seized with a passion for
investigation, and has dived deep into the mysteries of all his uncle's
most precious belongings, the result being--chaos. That after this
Mr Barton should insist upon locking the door of communication, can
scarcely be a matter of surprise; and accordingly an expedition is made
into the neighbouring town to obtain a new key--Toddie having dropped
the one belonging to the door down the well--during which the conduct
of the two boys is simply angelic. The more spiritual part of their
nature comes to the surface; their childish imaginations are impressed
by the lovely panorama of the distant city which lies outspread before
them glistening in the sunshine; and as the pure young voices speak
familiarly of the other world and of the dead baby-brother Phillie
who is up there with God, we feel how near those white souls are to
heaven. The uncle finds their conversation so improving that the drive
is prolonged to the 'Falls,' where, suddenly becoming all boy again,
they nearly madden their unhappy guardian, who has turned away for a
moment to light a cigar, by hanging as far as possible over the cliff,
trying hard to overbalance themselves. As he drags them away, his
heart is in his mouth. Budge screams: 'Oh, Uncle Harry, I hunged over
more than Toddie did.' 'Well, I--I--I--I--I--I hunged over a good deal
_anyhow_,' says Toddie in indignant self-defence. To chronicle all the
sufferings inflicted by the two dreadful yet irresistible young 'imps'
on their unfortunate uncle, would be impossible. Our deepest sympathies
are aroused when he despatches to Miss Mayton a box containing a
lovely bouquet, and he finds it is delivered to her containing only
Toddie's remarkable 'dolly,' which he has contrived to substitute for
the flowers. We groan in concert with Mr Burton when his nephews dance
frantic war-dances on his chest, a proceeding which with cruel sarcasm
they call a 'froolic;' and our pity follows him through the day, as he
is alternately ordered by those imperious young gentlemen to produce
candy and pennies, to tell them Scripture stories (the imaginative
Toddie evincing a decided leaning towards the ghastly), to sing songs,
to cut whistles, and to gather 'jacks,' a plant which grows where
there is plenty of mud, and whence they all emerge with their Sunday
splendour considerably dimmed, in which condition of course they meet
Miss Mayton.
In spite of their incessant mischief, their overpowering activity of
mind and body--which must have induced the feeling in Mr Burton of
being permanently located on a barrel of gunpowder lighted match in
hand--it is impossible not to love the honest little souls, whose worst
sins often proceed from the very best intentions; and accordingly we
do love Budge dearly, when, on the following day, he surpasses all
his previous achievements and covers himself with glory. Uncle Harry
announces his intention of taking the boys to see Miss Mayton, and
adjourns to the garden to arrange another bouquet, which Toddie is to
present as a propitiatory offering. The children take great interest
in the proceedings, and learning that Miss Mayton is the destined
recipient of the nosegay, Budge asserts that she is 'just like a
cake;' and announcing that he 'just loves her,' puts to his uncle the
embarrassing query: 'Don't _you_?' 'Well, I respect her very highly,
Budge,' replies that individual; and in answer to his interrogator,
explains the meaning of the word respect as applied to Miss Mayton
in such fashion, that that dreadfully acute infant comes to the
conclusion that ''spect and love means just the same thing.' Mr Burton
at this point judges it prudent to break off the conversation, and
the trio start on their expedition. The bouquet is delivered without
_contre-temps_; Miss Mayton is graciousness itself; and the visit
proceeds so satisfactorily that they agree to remain to dinner. Uncle
Harry has his misgivings; but beyond the upsetting of the contents
of a plate into Miss Mayton's lap, his nephews' conduct is so very
blameless, that it is with no feeling but that of lover-like ecstasy,
that he finds himself seated in the deepening twilight by the side
of the woman he adores, his eyes making confession of his weakness.
Suddenly a voice from between them murmurs in sweet tones: 'Uncle Harry
'spects you, Miss Mayton.'
'Suspects me! Of what, pray?' asks the lady.
'Budge!' exclaims the horrified uncle--and we can well believe his
statement that his voice rose nearly to a scream--'Budge, I must beg of
you to respect the sanctity of confidential communications.' But Miss
Mayton's curiosity is aroused; and Budge is not to be silenced, even
when his uncle explains to her that 'respect' is what the boy is trying
to say, owing to his endeavour to explain to him the nature of the
respect in which gentlemen hold ladies. 'Yes,' says Budge; 'only Uncle
Harry don't say it right. What he calls 'espect, _I_ calls love.'
After this, what can happen but that the confession should pass from
the eyes to the lips? And Budge is forgotten and left out in the cold,
until, waxing impatient, he gives his version of how he would behave
under the like circumstances: 'I--I--when _I_ loves any one, I kisses
them.'
We feel that from this moment the lives of those blessed boys will
be made all sunshine by their grateful uncle, and so doubtless they
would have been but for one persistently wet day, during which we
are sure no mortal power could have sustained Mr Burton, had it not
been for the recollection of Budge's recent good deeds. How he lives
through the rainy day--how Toddie twice places his own life in imminent
peril--how Mr Burton provides employment for his restless nephews--how
the artistic Toddie evinces a decided talent for wall-decoration--how
he scalds his arm, and devours the curative poultice--and how on the
following morning poor little Budge lets us peep into his childish
heart and see the yearning for the mother who is away (being comforted
by his uncle in a manner which induces us to offer to Miss Mayton
our warmest congratulations), we advise our readers to discover for
themselves. That Budge should be the first to inform Mrs Mayton of her
daughter's engagement, we, knowing that young man, find only natural;
and we are glad to be able to state that it is done with the same tact
which distinguished his efforts to bring the young couple together.
Toddie once more endeavours to put a period to his existence by
swallowing a bottle of paregoric, but is fortunately cured in time to
meet his father and mother at the station on their return, by a process
which causes him more to resemble the whale than his favourite Jonah.
For a time Mr Burton has been too busily occupied to chronicle any
more of the doings of the amusing 'babies.' He has married, bought a
house, and settled in the neighbourhood of Tom and Helen Lawrence.
We feel sure that Mrs Burton will prove no less admirable than Miss
Mayton; indeed, recently breaking silence, her adoring husband has
assured us that so it is; but as there are spots on the sun, so do we
find that Mrs Burton has one slight weakness--namely, a conviction that
she thoroughly understands how to manage 'Other People's Children.'
Entirely disapproving of the manner in which her husband had allowed
those two ridiculous children to tyrannise over him, and turning a
deaf ear to his energetic assertion that all his time was occupied in
saving their own lives and their parents' property from destruction,
that admirable woman announces her views on the subject of their
training. 'You should have explained to them,' she says, 'the necessity
for peace, order, cleanliness, and self-restraint. Do you imagine that
had you done so, their pure little hearts would not have received it
all and acted upon it?' Mr Burton seems doubtful; but his scepticism
only makes her rejoice still more in the prospect of speedily having
Budge and Toddie under her own hands, during their mother's unavoidable
seclusion in her own room on business of the utmost importance. Budge
and Toddie presently arrive with the exciting news that there is a new
little sister-baby at home, and that they have come to stay a few days.
Mrs Burton is determined that her system of education shall begin at
once, being anxious to prove its efficacy to her lord and master; but
the boys have immediately disappeared, probably in pursuit of the dog
Jerry (who has judged it prudent to retire into private life on their
advent), and are discovered pickling tomatoes for their aunt by means
of 'Mexican Mustang Liniment' and 'Superior Carriage Varnish.' We
imagine Budge may have had some reason for his remark: 'I don't think
you act _very_ nice about presents and surprises.' Toddie spends the
morning in a praiseworthy effort to hatch some chickens; but although
he sits down 'ever so soffaly' because he 'hasn't got fessers,' the
result is such as to necessitate a visit to the bath-room.
Undismayed by these beginnings, Mrs Burton, on preparing to go out
in the afternoon, leaves the boys as it were in charge of the house,
appeals in touching words to their sense of the beautiful not to
disarrange anything, telling them that people should always try to make
the world prettier, and departs with a quiet mind. Whether she thinks
her method is attended with unequivocal success when she finds, on her
return, that they have acted on her hint, and endeavoured to 'make the
world prettier' by manufacturing--of stones, road-dust, and a noxious
smelling weed--a fernery in her best drawing-room (it narrowly escaped
being watered), we will not too curiously inquire.
Our author's account of her numerous encounters with
Toddie--theological and other--from which she invariably issues
worsted, and with increased respect for the force of character which
Mr Burton had long since recognised in that young gentleman, is most
laughable. She tells the boys interesting anecdotes and stories full
of moral purpose, containing hints for their guidance, which the young
logicians never fail to act upon in a way which leaves her powerless to
reprove (if she does not wish to have her own lessons quoted against
her), and with a dismayed sense of failure. She eulogises generosity,
and forthwith the boys steal some hot-house grapes from a neighbour
with which to present her on her birthday. She gives them lessons on
the duty of making others happy, and they try to please her by lighting
a bonfire in the cellar; a proceeding which disperses her birthday
party. She sends them out of the room with a lecture on being quiet
when Uncle Harry has the toothache. 'Even the sound of a person talking
is annoying to him,' she says. 'Then you's a baddy woman to stay in
here an' keep a-talking all the whole time,' says the irrepressible
Toddie, 'when it makes poor old Uncle Harry supper so. G'way.'
She gives them instruction on the duty of working for others, the moral
of which is pointed by two small itinerant Italian musicians, who,
she informs the children, with beautiful enthusiasm, are doubtless
toiling for sick parents who are far away; the result of which lesson
on the dignity of labour is, that the two young monkeys perambulate
the streets with Uncle Harry's precious violin and a whistle; and earn
nearly a dollar with which to buy him a horse and carriage, which they
have been told he cannot afford to purchase. It is with a sorrowful
heart that Budge complains in his evening devotions that he has 'been
scolded again for tryin' to do somethin' real nice for other people;'
and that Toddie expresses his opinion that 'Aunt Alish ought to be
ashamed of herself;' adding a hope that she may be made so. Poor Aunt
Alice is gradually beginning to understand, having arrived at the
knowledge by a thorny path, how very little she really knows about the
management of other people's children. She tries to find out from Budge
why their uncle succeeds better with them than she does, and learns a
lesson on the art of making other people happy in their way and not in
ours, which she takes to heart, if we may judge by the buns and candy
which are manufactured by two small cooks in the Burton establishment,
not without many perils to life and property. Perhaps the creature
most to be pitied during the visit is the dog Jerry, who suffers many
things at the hands of the boys. At all events he seems to be the only
rejoicing member of the family at their approaching departure. Aunt
Alice begs for another day, in which they distinguish themselves by
ascending a precipice to get her a fern as a parting gift. Fortunately
a kind Providence watches over them, and nothing worse occurs than a
sprained ankle for Toddie. They are returned comparatively safe and
sound to their father and mother, for which mercy we should imagine Mrs
Burton offered a devout thanksgiving.
The last chapter is devoted to a conversation in which Mr Lawrence
favours us with his views on the bringing up of children. Surely he is
right when he says that 'love never faileth.'
We feel certain that, to those who have babies like Helen's to manage,
and who have wit to read between the lines, these two little volumes
will prove as instructive as they are amusing. We can accord them no
higher praise.
TEA-CULTURE IN INDIA.
The author of an anonymous tract printed in 1689, and obtainable gratis
'up one pair of stairs at the sign of the Anodyne Necklace, without
Temple Bar,' rather anticipated events in describing tea to be the leaf
of a little shrub growing plentifully in the East Indies. No Indian tea
found its way to Europe at that time, when haters of innovation were
beginning to complain that through drinking of tea Englishwomen were no
longer equal to eating beef of a morning. It was not until 1823 that a
Scotsman, bearing the historical name of Robert Bruce, discovered there
were tea-drinkers in Assam, who brewed their beloved beverage from the
leaves of a native tree growing to a height of forty and even sixty
feet; of which a few plants and seeds were subsequently carried by his
brother, Mr C. A. Bruce, to Calcutta, to excite a transient curiosity,
and that was all.
Time, however, brought Mr C. A. Bruce his reward. In 1834 a committee
was appointed to consider the question of introducing tea cultivation
in British India, and a scientific party under Dr Nathaniel Wallich--a
Danish gentleman, whose botanical industry had won him the post of
Superintendent of the Botanical Gardens at Calcutta--was sent to
explore the newly acquired province of Assam, and make special inquiry
respecting the tea-growing there practised. The result was that the
committee reported favourably as to the feasibility of cultivating tea
in John Company's dominions, Mr Bruce being selected to superintend
the formation of government nurseries; and with the aid of Chinese
seeds, Chinese plants, and Chinese cultivators, he set the possibility
of producing good tea in India beyond all doubt. One consequence of
the happy experiment was the establishment in 1839 of the Assam Tea
Company, which took over the greater portion of the government gardens,
started new ones on a larger scale, set about the cultivation of tea
in good earnest, and after various vicissitudes, is now a flourishing
concern.
The profitable industry is now fairly established in several of the
provinces of the Indian empire, but Assam still maintains its pride
of place, being credited with one half of the tea produced; the
tea districts of Cochin and Tibet supplying twenty-six per cent.,
Darjeeling thirteen per cent., the Himalayan districts six per cent.,
and British Burmah the remaining five per cent. Darjeeling prides
itself upon the superior delicacy and aroma of its leaf; but the rough,
pungent, malty flavoured product of Assam, which owes its character
to the use of native in place of Chinese seed, is the recognised
standard Indian tea. If the Assam planters may congratulate themselves
upon overcoming the old-time prejudice in favour of Chinese seed, they
have equally good reason to rejoice at having found a way to dispense
with Chinese labour, once a grievous necessity. By offering high wages
and constant employment, they are able to tempt Bengalese coolies to
leave their beloved villages, and by providing comfortable huts with
garden-ground in which they can install their wives and families,
insure their staying in their new home. That they may not be saddled
with useless hands, the tea-growers employ native foremen familiar with
the work to act as recruiting officers.
Twelve or thirteen years ago a violent tea-growing mania suddenly set
in. Companies were formed by the dozen. The value of available land
rose beyond all reason. Some unscrupulous schemers sold uncleared
forest-lands as plantations; others, more unscrupulous still, obtained
payment for plantations utterly non-existent in any shape, and genuine
'gardens' of forty acres fetched from twenty to thirty thousand pounds.
Things have long since found their level again; but the possession of
a tea-garden even now presupposes the possession of a capital of at
least three thousand pounds, a smaller sum being deemed insufficient
to start with, since no return is to be expected from a new plantation
for the first three years, and it takes six years for the plants to
attain maturity; then they will allow of eight or nine gatherings being
made in a year, and yield four hundred pounds of leaves per acre. They
improve with age; but planters of seedlings have little chance of
seeing their trees at their best, if the Chinese and Japanese speak
truly when they say the tea-tree lives to be five hundred years old,
and grows better as it grows older.
For very many years after its introduction into England, tea was the
subject of a double monopoly. The Chinese were the only manufacturers,
the East India Company the only importers. The opening of the trade
deprived the consumer of the benefit of the strict supervision
exercised by the Company's agents, and left the Chinese merchants
master of the situation. A deterioration in the quality of the teas
sent into the English market quickly followed; and every reduction in
the duty tended to the same end, by encouraging the importation of
low-priced leaf of little use save to mix with that of better class;
and so it is almost impossible to obtain at any price what those who
can remember it call 'old-fashioned tea.' At a late meeting of the
Indian section of the Society of Arts, Mr Burrell, after remarking that
India produced tea superior to any in the world in flavour, strength,
and purity, complained that it was rarely used in this country except
to mix with the inferior growth of China; and urged his hearers in
their own interests and as a duty they owed to their countrymen in
India, who had long toiled and struggled to meet their wants, to a
more direct and extended use of Indian tea, and thereby afford a fair
harvest of profit to its cultivators, for which nothing was now wanting
but an increased consumption of their produce in this country.
Mr Burrell, we think, should rather have appealed to the sellers of
tea; for unless they bestir themselves in the matter, but few of the
millions of British tea-drinkers can have the chance of tasting
pure Indian tea. We are aware that 'the trade' declare pure Indian
teas unsuited to the national palate; but we have no faith in their
judgment. If dealers in adulterable articles are to be believed, the
British public's taste is a monstrously depraved one, preferring
chicory to coffee, publican's to brewer's beer, turmeric and flour
to mustard, and clever concoctions of all kinds to the things they
pretend to be. It may be taken for granted that the Yankee vender of
wooden nutmegs was ready to swear his customers preferred the ingenious
imitation to the genuine article.
The tea-growers of India, however, have a hopeful prospect before them.
The consumption of the produce of their gardens has risen prodigiously,
since the arrival of eight chests of tea from Assam caused such a
sensation in the London market that the importers obtained from sixteen
to thirty-four shillings a pound for it, or an average per pound of
twenty-four shillings and sixpence. In 1851 the exportation of Indian
tea amounted to 262,839 pounds; by 1863 it had risen to two and a
half million pounds; in 1876 English buyers were found for 28,126,100
pounds. Every year sees an increase in the consumption of Indian tea;
and unless their Chinese competitors look to it, they will gradually
be beaten out of the field, for India possesses vast reserves of land
fit for conversion into tea-gardens, and could, if need be, supply the
wants of the whole world.
PROFESSOR TYNDALL ON THE SPREAD OF DISEASE.
We copy the following from our able contemporary, _Nature_. The views
propounded have been already noticed in our paper on the 'Germ Theory.'