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UNIVERSITY OF N.C. AT CHAPEL HILL
10003058094
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2012 with funding from
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
http://www.archive.org/details/jackanapes02ewin
Frontispiece— Jackanapes.
" * JACKANAPES, IT WON'T DO, YOU AND LOLLO MUST GO ON.'
See page 62,
rfSa
ACKANA
with
f'LLUSTRATIONS
RANDOLPH
CALDECOTT
^v/x AAA /V./
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
J. H. WlLLARD
HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY
PHILADELPHIA
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
The Story of a Short Life
50 Cents
Copyright, 1903, by Henry Altemus
T
Library, Univ. oi
North Carolina
INTRODUCTION
I
"TF there is a soul so dead that it does not
know 'Jackanapes', let it stop all other
reading until that is read. I do not know a
better short story." So says one who knows what
is good for young people to read ; and the dictum
is borne out by the unquestioned popularity of the
sturdy, honorable hero of the story.
"Jackanapes" made Mrs. E wing's name de-
servedly famous, for it not only contains her
highest teaching, but is her best piece of literary
work. It was not, however, her first "soldier
story," for in "The Peace Egg"— now incorpo-
rated into this volume, she first began to sing those
praises of military life and courtesies which she
afterward more fully set forth in "Jackanapes"
and "The Story of a Short Life.",
INTRODUCTION
The secret of the popularity of Mrs. E wing's
stories probably lies in her constructive ability.
She always had a clear idea of what she was to
write. With regard to the introduction of passion
into stories, she held that ' ' It was most necessary,
but that human feelings are elastic and soon over-
strained, and that this kind of ammunition should
be sparingly fired, with intervals of refreshment. ' '
One of the most important doctrines she held, and
in an extraordinary manner carried out, was, that
if a writer could express himself in one word he
was not to use two."
In the story of "Jackanapes," the captain's
child, with his clear blue eyes and mop of yellow
curls, is the one important figure. True, there are
the doting aunt, the weak-kneed, but faithful Tony,
the irascible general, the punctilious postman, the
loyal boy-trumpeter, the silent major, and the
ever-dear Lollo, but all these life-like figures group
around the hero in subordinate positions. In all
they say and do and feel they conspire to reflect
the glory and beauty of the noble, generous,
tender-spirited hero, "Jackanapes."
J. H. W.
vi
ILLUSTRATIONS
" ' Jackanapes, it won't do. You and Lollo must go on ' "
Frontispiece.
" . . . And teach them the goose-step " 13
" ' He has taken her to a Green' " 19
" Under the oak-tree on the Green " 21
" Now he was his own master " . . ^ . . . .27
"Very friendly with Tony Johnson" 31
" During the first round he waved his hat " . . . .35
" ' You should see it in Fair- week, Sir ' " . . . .43
" 'I can make him go,' said Jackanapes" . . . .49
" He and the Postman saluted each other " .... 55
" A Boy Trumpeter, grave beyond his years " . . . .57
" ' Can I do anything else for you?' " 65
" Lollo draws Miss Jessamine slowly up and down " . .71
" Wandering off into the lanes " 73
" She chose the Captain "
"The Captain's tenderness never failed "
" ' You must n't speak to a sentry on duty ' "
"He stood when we were kneeling"
"'Oh I'm so sorry'" ....
" It was her father, with her child in his arms '
"Walked into church abreast of the Captain "
. 78
. 85
. 92
. 98
. 120
. 124
. 127
(vii)
JACKANAPES
CHAPTER I
TWO Donkeys and the Geese lived on the
Green, and all other residents of any
social standing lived in houses round it.
The houses had no names. Everybody's ad-
dress was, "The Green," but the Postman and
the people of the place knew where each family
lived. As to the rest of the world, what has one
to. do with the rest of the world, when he is safe
at home on his own Goose Green? Moreover,
if a stranger did come on any lawful business,
he might ask his way at the shop.
Most of the inhabitants were long-lived, early
deaths (like that of the little Miss Jessamine)
being exceptional; and most of the old people
were proud of their age, especially the sexton, who
9
JACKANAPES
would be ninety-nine come Martinmas, and whose
father remembered a man who had carried
arrows, as a boy, for the battle of Flodden Field.
The Gray Goose and the big Miss Jessamine were
the only elderly persons who kept their ages
secret. Indeed, Miss Jessamine never mentioned
any one 's age, or recalled the exact year in which
anything had happened. She said that she had
been taught that it was bad manners to do so "in
a mixed assembly."
The Gray Goose also avoided dates, but this
was partly because her brain, though intelligent,
was not mathematical, and computation was be-
yond her. She never got farther than "last
Michaelmas," "the Michaelmas before that,"
and "the Michaelmas before the Michaelmas be-
fore that. ' ' After this her head, which was small,
became confused, and she said "Ga, ga!" and
changed the subject.
But she remembered the little Miss Jessamine,
the Miss Jessamine with the "conspicuous" hair.
Her aunt, the big Miss Jessamine, said it was her
only fault. The hair was clean, was abundant,
was glossy, but do what you would with it, it
10
JACKANAPES
never looked quite like other people's. And at
church, after Saturday night's wash, it shone like
the best brass fender after a spring cleaning. In
short, it was conspicuous, which does not become a
young woman— especially in church.
Those were worrying times altogether, and the
Green was used for strange purposes. A political
meeting was held on it, with the village Cobbler
in the chair, and a speaker who came by stage
coach from the town, where they had wrecked
the bakers' shops and discussed the price of
bread. He came a second time, by stage, but the
people had heard something about him in the
meanwhile, and they did not keep him on the
Green. They took him to the pond and tried to
make him swim, which he could not do, and the
whole affair was very disturbing to all quiet and
peaceable fowls. After which another man came
and preached sermons on the Green, and a great
many people went to hear him; for those were
"trying times," and folk ran hither and thither
for comfort. And then what did they do but
drill the ploughboys on the Green, to get them
ready to fight the French, and teach them the
ii
JACKANAPES
goose-step! However, that came to an end at
last, for Bony was sent to St. Helena, and the
ploughboys were sent back to the plough.
Everybody lived in fear of Bony in those days,
especially the naughty children, who were kept
in order during the day by threats of, "Bony
shall have you," and who had nightmares about
him in the dark. They thought he was an Ogre
in a cocked hat. The Gray Goose thought he was
a Fox, and that all the men of England were
going out in red coats to hunt him. It was no
use to argue the point, for she had a very small
head, and when one idea got into it there was no
room for another.
Besides, the Gray Goose never saw Bony, nor
did the children, which rather spoiled the terror
of him, so that the Black Captain became more
effective as a Bogy with hardened offenders.
The Gray Goose remembered his coming to the
place perfectly. What he came for she did not
pretend to know. It was all part and parcel of
the war and bad times. He was called the Black
Captain, partly because of himself and partly
because of his wonderful black mare. Strange
12
JACKANAPES
stories were afloat of how far and how fast that
mare could go, when her master's hand was on
her mane and he whispered in her ear. Indeed,
some people thought we might reckon ourselves
AND TEACH THEM THE GOOSE-STEP.'
very lucky if we were not out of the frying-pan
into the fire, and had not got a certain well-
known Gentleman of the Road to protect us
against the French. But that, of course, made
13
JACKANAPES
him none the less useful to the Johnsons' Nurse,
when the little Miss Johnsons were naughty.
"You leave off crying this minnit, Miss Jane,
or I '11 give you right away to the horrid, wicked
officer. Jemima! just look out o' the windy, if
you please, and see if the Black Cap'n's a-coming
with his horse to carry away Miss Jane. ' '
And there, sure enough, the Black Captain
strode by, with his sword clattering as if it did
not know whose head to cut off first. But he
did not call for Miss Jane that time. He went
on to the Green, where he came so suddenly upon
the eldest Master Johnson, sitting in a puddle on
purpose, in his new nankeen skeleton suit, that
the young gentleman thought judgment had over-
taken him at last, and abandoned himself to the
howlings of despair. His howls were redoubled
when he was clutched from behind and swung
over the Black Captain's shoulder, but in five
minutes his tears were stanched, and he was play-
ing with the officer's accoutrements. All of which
the Gray Goose saw with her own eyes, and heard
afterwards that that bad boy had been whining
to go back to the Black Captain ever since, which
14
JACKANAPES
showed how hardened he was, and that nobody
but Bonaparte himself conld be expected to do
him any good.
But those were " trying times." It was bad
enough when the pickle of a large and respectable
family cried for the Black Captain; when it came
to the little Miss Jessamine crying for him, one
felt that the sooner the French landed and had
done with it the better.
The big Miss Jessamine's objection to him was
that he was a soldier, and this prejudice was
shared by all the Green. "A soldier," as the
speaker from the town had observed, "is a blood-
thirsty, unsettled sort of a rascal ; that the peace-
able, home-loving, bread-winning citizen can
never conscientiously look on as a brother, till
he has beaten his sword into a ploughshare, and
his spear into a pruninghook. "
On the other hand, there was some truth in
what the Postman (an old soldier) said in reply;
that the sword has to cut a way for us out of
many a scrape into which our bread-winners get
us when they drive their ploughshares into fal-
lows that don't belong to them. Indeed, whilst
i5
JACKANAPES
our most peaceful citizens were prosperous chiefly
by means of cotton, of sugar, and of the rise and
fall of the money market (not to speak of such
salable matters as opium, firearms, and "black
ivory"), disturbances were apt to arise in India,
Africa, and other outlandish parts, where the
fathers of our domestic race were making for-
tunes for their families. And, for that matter,
even on the Green, we did not wish the military
to leave us in the lurch, so long as there was any
fear that the French were coming.
To let the Black Captain have little Miss Jessa-
mine, however, was another matter. Her aunt
would not hear of it; and then, to crown all, it
appeared that the Captain's father did not think
the young lady good enough for his son. Never
was any affair more clearly brought to a con-
clusion.
But those were "trying times;" and one
moonlight night, when the Gray Goose was sound
asleep upon one leg, the Green was rudely shaken
under her by the thud of a horse's feet. "Ga,
ga!" said she, putting down the other leg, and
running away.
16
JACKANAPES
By the time she returned to her place not a
thing was to be seen or heard. The horse had
passed like a shot. But next day there was
hurrying and skurrying and cackling at a very
early hour, all about the white house with the
black beams, where Miss Jessamine lived. And
when the sun was so low and the shadows so long
on the grass that the Gray Goose felt ready to
run away at the sight of her own neck, little Miss
Jane Johnson, and her "particular friend"
Clarinda, sat under the big oak tree on the Green,
and Jane pinched Clarinda 's little finger till she
found that she could keep a secret, and then
she told her in confidence that she had heard
from Nurse and Jemima that Miss Jessamine's
niece had been a very naughty girl, and
that that horrid, wicked officer had come for
her on his black horse, and carried her right
away.
"Will she never come back?" asked Clarinda.
1 ' Oh, no ! " said Jane, decidedly. ' ' Bony never
brings people back."
"Not never no more?" sobbed Clarinda, for
she was weak-minded, and could not bear to think
2—Ja.i kanapes. I /
JACKANAPES
that Bony never, never let naughty people go
home again.
Next day Jane had heard more.
"He has taken her to a Green ?"
"A Goose Green!" asked Clarinda.
"No. A Gretna Green. Don't ask so many
questions, child," said Jane; who, having no
more to tell, gave herself airs.
Jane was wrong on one point. Miss Jessa-
mine's niece did come back, and she and her
husband were forgiven. The Gray Goose re-
membered it well— it was Michaelmastide, the
Michaelmas before the Michaelmas before the
Michaelmas— but ga, ga! What does the date
matter ? It was autumn, harvest-time, and every-
body was so busy prophesying and praying about
the crops, that the young couple wandered
through the lanes, and got blackberries for Miss
Jessamine's celebrated crab and blackberry jam,
and made guys of themselves with bryony
wreaths, and not a soul troubled his head about
them, except the children and the Postman.
The children dogged the Black Captain's foot-
steps (his bubble reputation as an Ogre having
18
JACKANAPES
burst), clamoring for a ride on the black mare.
And the Postman would go somewhat out of his
postal way to catch the Captain's dark eye, and
show that he had not forgotten how to salute
an officer.
"'HE HAS TAKEN HER TO A GREEN.' "
But they were "trying times." One afternoon
the black mare was stepping gently up and down
the grass, with her head at her master's shoulder,
and as many children crowded on her silky back
19
JACKANAPES
as if she had been an elephant in a menagerie;
and the next afternoon she carried him away,
sword and sabre-tacJie clattering war-music at
her side, and the old Postman waiting for them,
rigid with salutation, at the four crossroads.
War and bad times! It was a hard winter,
and the big Miss Jessamine and the little Miss
Jessamine (but she was Mrs. Black-Captain now)
lived very economically that they might help
their poorer neighbors. They neither enter-
tained nor went into company, but the young
lady always went up the village as far as the
" George and Dragon," for air and exercise,
when the London Mail came in.
One day (it was a day in the following June)
it came in earlier than usual, and the young lady
was not there to meet it.
But a crowd soon gathered round the "George
and Dragon," gaping to see the Mail Coach
dressed with flowers and oak-leaves, and the
guard wearing a laurel wreath over and above
his royal livery. The ribbons that decked the
horses were stained and flecked with the warmth
and foam of the pace at which they had come,
20
JACKANAPES
for they had pressed on with the news of Victory.
r, Vu^-
:< UNDER THE OAK TREE ON THE GREEN."
Miss Jessamine was sitting with her niece
nnder the oak tree on the Green, when the Post-
21
JACKANAPES
man put a newspaper silently into her hand.
Her niece tnrned quickly—
fc "Is there news!"
"Don't agitate yourself, my dear," said her
aunt. "I will read it aloud, and then we can
enjoy it together; a far more comfortable
method, my love, than when you go up the vil-
lage, and come home out of breath, having
snatched half the news as you run."
"I am all attention, dear aunt," said the little
lady, clasping her hands tightly on her lap.
Then Miss Jessamine read aloud— she was
proud of her reading— and the old soldier stood
at attention behind her, with such a blending of
pride and pity on his face as it was strange to
see:—
"Downing Steeet,
June 22, 1815, 1a.m."
"That's one in the morning," gasped the Post-
man; "beg your pardon, mum."
But though he apologized, he could not refrain
from echoing here and there a weighty word.
"Glorious victory,"— " Two hundred pieces of
22
JACKANAPES
artillery,"— "Immense quantity of ammunition, ' '
and so forth.
"The loes of the British Army upon this occasion has unfor-
tunately been most severe. It had not been possible to make out
a return of the killed and wounded when Major Perry left head-
quarters. The names of the officers killed and wounded, as far
as they can be collected, are annexed.
" 1 have the honor — — "
1 < The list, aunt ! Read the list ! ' '
"My love— my darling— let us go in and—"
"No. Now! now!"
To one thing the supremely afflicted are en-
titled in their sorrow— to be obeyed— and yet it
is the last kindness that people commonly will
do them. But Miss Jessamine did. Steadying
her voice, as best she might, she read on, and the
old soldier stood bareheaded to hear that first
Roll of the Dead at Waterloo, which began with
the Duke of Brunswick and ended with Ensign
Brown. Five-and-thirty British Captains fell
asleep that day on the Bed of Honor, and the
Black Captain slept among them.
f 9F # # gp $fc ^F
There are killed and wounded by war, of
whom no returns reach Downing Street.
23
JACKANAPES
Three days later, the Captain's wife had joined
him, and Miss Jessamine was kneeling by the
cradle of their orphan son, a purple-red morsel
of humanity, with conspicuously golden hair.
"Will he live, Doctor V 9
"Live? God bless my soul, ma'am! Look at
him! The young Jackanapes !' '
24
CHAPTER II
THE Gray Goose remembered quite well the
year that Jackanapes began to walk, for
it was the year that the speckled hen for
the first time in all her motherly life got out of
patience when she was sitting. She had been
rather proud of the eggs— they were unusually
large— but she never felt quite comfortable on
them; and whether it was because she used to
get cramp, and go off the nest, or because the
season was bad, or what, she never could tell,
but every egg was addled but one, and the one
that did hatch gave her more trouble than any
chick she had ever reared.
It was a fine, downy, bright yellow little thing,
but it had a monstrous big nose and feet, and
such an ungainly walk as she Tmew no other
instance of in her well-bred and high-stepping
family. And as to behavior, it was not that it
25
JACKANAPES
was either quarrelsome or moping, but simply
unlike the rest. When the other chicks hopped
and cheeped on the Green about their mother's
feet, this solitary yellow brat went waddling off
on its own responsibility, and do or cluck what
the speckled hen would, it went to play in the
pond.
It was off one day as usual, and the hen was
fussing and fuming after it, when the Postman,
going to deliver a letter at Miss Jessamine 's door,
was nearly knocked over by the good lady her-
self, who, bursting out of the house with her cap
just off and her bonnet just not on, fell into his
arms, crying: —
"Baby! Baby! Jackanapes! Jackanapes ! ' '
If the Postman loved anything on earth, he
loved the Captain's yellow-haired child, so prop-
ping Miss Jessamine against her own door-
post, he followed the direction of her trembling
fingers and made for the Green.
Jackanapes had had the start of the Postman
by nearly ten minutes. The world— the round,
green world with an oak tree on it— was just be-
coming very interesting to him. He had tried,
26
JACKANAPES
vigorously but ineffectually, to mount a passing
pig the last time he was taken out walking; but
then he was encumbered with a nurse. Now he
"NOW HE WAS HIS OWN MASTER.
was his own master, and might, by courage and
energy, become the master of that delightful,
downy, dumpy, yellow thing, that was bobbing
27
JACKANAPES
along over the green grass in front of him. For-
ward ! Charge ! He aimed well, and grabbed it,
but only to feel the delicious downiness and
dumpiness slipping through his fingers as he fell
upon his face. "Quawk!" said the yellow thing,
and wobbled off sideways. It was this oblique
movement that enabled Jackanapes to come up
with it, for it was bound for the Pond, and
therefore obliged to come back into line. He
failed again from top-heaviness, and his prey
escaped sideways as before, and, as before, lost
ground in getting back to the direct road to the
Pond.
And at the Pond the Postman found them both,
one yellow thing rocking safely on the ripples
that lie beyond duck-weed, and the other washing
his draggled frock with tears, because he, too,
had tried to sit upon the Pond, and it wouldn't
hold him.
28
CHAPTER III
YOUNG Mrs. Johnson, who was a mother of
many, hardly knew which to pity more—
Miss Jessamine, for having her little ways
and her antimacassars rumpled by a young
Jackanapes, or the boy himself, for being
brought up by an old maid.
Oddly enough, she would probably have pitied
neither, had Jackanapes been a girl. (One is
so apt to think that what works smoothest works
to the highest ends, having no patience for the
results of friction.) That Father in God, who
bade the young men to be pure, and the maidens
brave, greatly disturbed a member of his con-
gregation, who thought that the great preacher
had made a slip of the tongue.
"That the girls should have purity, and the
boys courage, is what you would say, good
Father !" •
29
JACKANAPES
"Nature has done that," was the reply; "I
meant what I said."
In good sooth, a young rnaid is all the better
for learning some robuster virtues than maiden-
liness and not to move the antimacassars. And
the robuster virtues require some fresh air and
freedom. As, on the other hand, Jackanapes
(who had a boy's full share of the little beast
and the young monkey in his natural composi-
tion) was none the worse, at his tender years, for
learning some maidenliness— so far as maiden-
liness means decency, pity, unselfishness, and
pretty behavior.
And it is due to him to say that he was an
obedient boy, and a boy whose word could be
depended on, long before his grandfather, the
General, came to live at the Green.
He was obedient ; that is, he did what his great-
aunt told him. But— oh, dear! oh, dear!— the
pranks he played, which it had never entered into
her head to forbid!
It was when he had just been put into skele-
tons (frocks never suited him) that he became
very friendly with Master Tony Johnson, a
30
JACKANAPES
younger brother of the young gentleman who sat
in the puddle on purpose. Tony was not enter-
prising, and Jackanapes led him by the nose.
One summer's evening they were out late, and
Miss Jessamine was becoming- anxious, when
"VERY FRIENDLY WITH TONY JOHNSON."
Jackanapes presented himself with a ghastly face
all besmirched with tears. He was unusually
subdued.
"I'm afraid," he sobbed; "if you please, I'm
very much afraid that Tony Johnson's dying in
the churchyard."
3i
JACKANAPES
Miss Jessamine was just beginning to be dis-
tracted, when she smelled Jackanapes.
"You naughty, naughty boys! Do you mean
to tell me you Ve been smoking?"
"Not pipes," urged Jackanapes; "upon my
honor, Aunty, not pipes. Only cigars, like Mr.
Johnson's! and only made of brown paper with
a very, very little tobacco from the shop inside
them. ' '
Whereupon, Miss Jessamine sent a serv-
ant to the churchyard, who found Tony
Johnson lying on a tombstone, very sick, and
having ceased to entertain any hopes of his own
recovery.
If it could be possible that any "unpleasant-
ness" could arise between two such amiable
neighbors as Miss Jessamine and Mrs. Johnson
—and if the still more incredible paradox can be
that ladies may differ over a point on which they
are agreed— that point was the admitted fact that
Tony Johnson was "delicate," and the differ-
ence lay chiefly in this: Mrs. Johnson said that
Tony was delicate— meaning that he was more
finely strung, more sensitive, a properer subject
32
JACKANAPES
for pampering and petting than Jackanapes, and
that, consequently, Jackanapes was to blame for
leading Tony into scrapes which resulted in his
being chilled, frightened, or (most frequently)
sick. But when Miss Jessamine said that Tony
Johnson was delicate, she meant that he was
more puling, less manly, and~ less healthily
brought up than Jackanapes, who, when they got
into mischief together, was certainly not to blame
because his friend could not get wet, sit a kicking
donkey, ride in the giddy-go-round, bear the
noise of a cracker, or smoke brown paper with
impunity, as he could.
Not that there was ever the slightest quarrel
between the ladies. It never even came near
it, except the day after Tony had been so
very sick with riding Bucephalus in the giddy-
go-round. Mrs. Johnson had explained to Miss
Jessamine that the reason Tony was so easily
upset was the unusual sensitiveness (as a doctor
had explained it to her) of the nervous centres
in her family— "Fiddlestick!" So Mrs. Johnson
understood Miss Jessamine to say, but it ap-
peared that she only said " Treaclestick ! " which
3— Jackanapes. 33
JACKANAPES
is quite another tiling, and of which Tony was
undoubtedly fond.
It was at the Fair that Tony was made ill by
riding on Bucephalus. Once a year the Goose
Green became the scene of a carnival. First of
all, carts and caravans were rumbling up all
along, day and night. Jackanapes could hear
them as he lay in bed, and could hardly sleep
for speculating what booths and whirligigs he
should find fairly established, when he and his
dog Spitfire went out after breakfast. As a
matter of fact, he seldom had to wait so long for
news of the Fair. The Postman knew the win-
dow out of which Jackanapes 's yellow head would
come, and was ready with his report.
" Royal Theayter, Master Jackanapes, in the
old place, but be careful o' them seats, sir; they
're rickettier than ever. Two sweets and a
ginger-beer under the oak tree, and the Flying
Boats is just a-coming along the road."
No doubt it was partly because he had already
suffered severely in the Flying Boats, that Tony
collapsed so quickly in the giddy-go-round. He
only mounted Bucephalus (who was spotted and
34
JACKANAPES
had no tail) because Jackanapes urged him, and
held out the ingenious hope that the round-and-
round feeling would very likely cure the up-and-
down sensation. It did not, however, and Tony
tumbled off during the first revolution.
"DURING THE FIRST ROUND HE WAVED HIS HAT."
Jackanapes was not absolutely free from
qualms, but having once mounted the Black
Prince he stuck to him as a horseman should.
During the first round he waved his hat, and
observed with some concern that the Black
Prince had lost an ear since last Fair; at the
35
JACKANAPES
second, he looked a little pale, but sat upright,
though somewhat unnecessarily rigid; at the
third round he shut his eyes. During the fourth
his hat fell off, and he clasped his horse's neck.
By the fifth he had laid his yellow head against
the Black Prince's mane, and so clung anyhow
till the hobby-horses stopped, when the pro-
prietor assisted him to alight, and he sat down
rather suddenly and said he had enjoyed it very
much.
The Gray Goose always ran away at the first
approach of the caravans, and never came back
to the Green until there was nothing left of the
Fair but footmarks and oyster-shells. Running
away was her pet principle; the only system, she
maintained, by which you can live long and
easily, and lose nothing. If you run away when
you see danger, you can come back when all is
safe. Bun quickly, return slowly, hold your
head high, and gabble as loud as you can, and
you '11 preserve the respect of the Goose Green
to a peaceful old age. Why should you struggle
and get hurt, if you can lower your head and
swerve, and not lose a feather! Why in the
36
JACKANAPES
world should anyone spoil the pleasure of life,
or risk his skin, if he can help it?
"'What's the use?'
Said the Goose.'"
Before answering which, one might have to con-
sider what world— which life— and whether his
skin were a goose-skin; but the Gray Goose's
head would never have held all that.
Grass soon grows over footprints, and the vil-
lage children took the oyster-shells to trim their
gardens with; but the year after Tony rode
Bucephalus there lingered another relic of Fair-
time, in which Jackanapes was deeply interested.
"The Green'' proper was originally only part of
a straggling common, which in it's turn merged
into some wilder waste land where gipsies some-
times squatted if the authorities would allow
them, especially after the annual Fair. And it
was after the Fair that Jackanapes, out rambling
by himself, was knocked over by the Gipsy's son
riding the Gipsy's red-haired pony at break-neck
pace across the common. »
Jackanapes got up and shook himself, none the
37
JACKANAPES
worse, except for being heels over head in love
with the red-haired pony. What a rate he went
at ! How he spurned the ground with his nimble
feet! How his red coat shone in the sunshine!
And what bright eyes peeped out of his dark fore-
lock as it was blown by the wind!
The Gipsy boy had had a fright, and he was
willing enough to reward Jackanapes for not
having been hurt, by consenting to let him have
a ride.
"Do you mean to kill the little fine gentleman,
and swing us all on the gibbet, you rascal?"
screamed the Gipsy-mother, who came up just
as Jackanapes and the pony set off.
"He would get on," replied her son. "It '11
not kill him. He '11 fall on his yellow head, and
it's as tough as a cocoanut."
But Jackanapes did not fall.' He stuck to the
red-haired pony as he stuck to the hobby-horse;
but oh! how different the delight of this wild
gallop with flesh and blood! Just as his legs
were beginning to feel as if he did not feel them,
the Gipsy boy cried, "Lollo!" Round went the
pony so unceremoniously, that, with as little cere-
38
J A C K A N A P E S
mony, Jackanapes clung to his neck, and he did
not properly recover himself before Lollo stopped
with a jerk at the place where they had started.
"Is his name Lollo?" asked Jackanapes, his
hand lingering in the wiry mane.
"Yes."
"What does Lollo mean?"
"Bed."
"Is Lollo your pony?"
"No. My father's." And the Gipsy boy led
Lollo away.
At the first opportunity Jackanapes stole away
again to the common. This time he saw the
Gipsy-father, smoking a dirty pipe.
"Lollo is your pony, is n't he?" said Jacka-
napes.
"Yes."
"He's a very nice one."
"He's a racer."
"You don't want to sell him, do you?"
" Fifteen pounds," said the Gipsy-father; and
Jackanapes sighed and went home again. That
very afternoon he and Tony rode the two donkeys,
and Tony managed to get thrown, and even
39
JACKANAPES
Jackanapes' donkey kicked. But it was jolting,
clumsy work after the elastic swiftness and the
dainty mischief of the red-haired pony.
A few days later, Miss Jessamine spoke very
seriously to Jackanapes. She was a good deal
agitated as he told him that his grandfather, the
General, was coming to the Green, and that he
must be on his very best behavior during the
visit. If it had been feasible to leave off calling
him Jackanapes and to get used to his baptismal
name of Theodore before the day after to-morrow
(when the General was due), it would have been
satisfactory. But Miss Jessamine feared it would
be impossible in practice, and she had scruples
about it on principle. It would not seem quite
truthful, although she had always most fully in-
tended that he should be called Theodore when
he had outgrown the ridiculous appropriateness
of his nickname. The fact was that he had not
outgrown it, but he must take care to remember
who was meant when his grandfather said
Theodore.
Indeed, for that matter, he must take care all
along.
40
JACKANAPES
"You are apt to be giddy, Jackanapes," said
Miss Jessamine.
"Yes, Aunt," said Jackanapes, thinking of the
hobby-horses.
"You are a good boy, Jackanapes. Thank God,
I can tell your grandfather that. An obedient
boy, an honorable boy, and a kind-hearted boy.
But you are— in short, you are a Boy, Jacka-
napes. And I hope"— added Miss Jessamine,
desperate with the results of experience— "that
the General knows that Boys will be Boys."
What mischief could be foreseen, Jackanapes
promised to guard against. He was to keep his
clothes and his hands clean, to look over his cate-
chism, not to put sticky things in his pockets, to
keep that hair of his smooth— ("It's the wind
that blows it, Aunty," said Jackanapes — "I'll
send by the coach for some bear's-grease, " said
Miss Jessamine, tying a knot in her pocket-
handkerchief)— not to burst in at the parlor door,
not to talk at the top of his voice, not to crumple
his Sunday frill, and to sit quite quiet during the
sermon, to be sure to say "sir" to the General,
to be careful about rubbing his shoes on the door-
4i
JACKANAPES
mat, and to bring his lesson-books to his aunt at
once that she might iron down the dogs '-ears.
The General arrived, and for the first day all
went well, except that Jackanapes' hair was as
wild as usual, for the hairdresser had no bear's-
grease left. He began to feel more at ease with
his grandfather, and disposed to talk confiden-
tially with him, as he did with the Postman. All
that the General felt it would take too long to tell,
but the result was the same. He was disposed to
talk confidentially with Jackanapes.
"Mons'ous pretty place this," he said, looking
out of the lattice onto the Green, where the Grass
was vivid with sunset, and the shadows were long
and peaceful.
"You should see it in Fair-week, sir," said
Jackanapes, shaking his yellow mop, and leaning
back in his one of the two Chippendale arm-
chairs in which they sat.
"A fine time that, eh!" said the General, with
a twinkle, in his left eye. (The other was glass.)
Jackanapes shook his hair one more. "I en-
joyed this last one the best of all," he said. "I 'd
so much money. ' '
42
JACKANAPES
"By George, it 's not a common complaint in
these bad times. How mnch had ye!"
"I 'd two shillings. A new shilling Aunty gave
me, and elevenpence I had saved up, and a penny
" * YOU SHOULD SEE IT IN FAIR-WEEK, SIR
from the Postman— sir!" added Jackanapes with
a jerk, having forgotten it.
"And how did ye spend it— sir?" inquired the
General.
43
JACKANAPES
Jackanapes spread his ten fingers on the arms
of his chair, and shut his eyes that he might count
the more conscientiously.
"Watch-stand for Aunty, threepence. Trum-
pet for myself, twopence, that's fivepence.
Ginger-nuts for Tony, twopence, and a mug with
a Grenadier on for the Postman, fourpence, that's
elevenpence. Shooting-gallery, a penny, that's a
shilling. Giddy-go-round, a penny, that's one
and a penny. Treating Tony, one and twopence.
Flying Boats (Tony paid for himself), a penny,
one and threepence. Shooting-gallery again, one
and fourpence. Fat Woman, a penny, one and
fivepence. Giddy-go-round again, one and six-
pence. Shooting-gallery, one and sevenpence.
Treating Tony, and then he wouldn't shoot, so I
did, one and eightpence. Living Skeleton, a
penny— no, Tony treated me, the Living Skeleton
doesn't count. Skittles, a penny, one and nine-
pence. Mermaid (but when we got inside she
was dead), a penny, one and tenpence. Theatre,
a penny (Priscilla Partington, or the Green Lane
Murder. A beautiful young lady, sir, with pink
cheeks and a real pistol), that's one and eleven-
44
JACKANAPES
pence. Ginger beer, a penny (I was so thirsty!)
two shillings. And then the Shooting-gallery
man gave me a turn for nothing, because, he
said, I was a real gentleman, and spent my
money like a man."
1 ' So yon do, sir, so yon do ! " cried the General.
"Why, sir, yon spend it like a prince. And now
I suppose you Ve not got a penny in your
pocket?"
"Yes, I have," said Jackanapes. "Two
pennies. They are saving up." And Jacka-
napes jingled them with his hand.
"You don't want money except at fair-times,
I suppose!" said the General.
Jackanapes shook his mop.
"If I could have as much as I want, I should
know what to buy," said he.
"And how much do you want, if you could get
it?"
"Wait a minute, sir, till I think what twopence
from fifteen pounds leaves. Two from nothing
you can't, but borrow twelve. Two from twelve,
ten, and carry one. Please remember ten, sir,
when I ask you. One from nothing you can't,
45
JACKANAPES
borrow twenty. One from twenty, nineteen, and
carry one. One from fifteen, fourteen. Four-
teen pounds nineteen and— what did I tell you to
remember ! ' '
' ' Ten, ' ' said the General.
"Fourteen pounds nineteen shillings and ten-
pence, then, is what I want," said Jackanapes.
"Bless, my soul, what for?"
"To buy Lollo with. Lollo means red, sir.
The Gipsy's red-haired pony, sir. Oh, he is
beautiful! You should see his coat in the sun-
shine! You should see his mane! You should
see his tail! Such little feet, sir, and they go
like lightning! Such a dear face, too, and eyes
like a mouse! But he's a racer, and the Gipsy
wants fifteen pounds for him."
"If he's a racer, you couldn't ride him. Could
you!"
"No— o, sir, but I can stick to him. I did the
other day."
"You did, did you? Well, I'm fond of riding,
myself, and if the beast is as good as you say,
he might suit me. ' '
"You're too tall for Lollo, I think," said
46
JACKANAPES
Jackanapes, measuring his grandfather with his
eye.
"I can double up my legs, I suppose. We'll
have a look at him to-morrow. ' '
" Don't you weigh a good deal?" asked Jacka-
napes.
"Chiefly waistcoats," said the General, slap-
ping the breast of his military frock-coat.
' ' We '11 have the little racer on the Green the first
thing in the morning. Glad you mentioned it,
grandson. Glad you mentioned it. ' '
The General was as good as his word. Next
morning, the Gipsy and Lollo, Miss Jessamine,
Jackanapes, and his Grandfather, and his dog,
Spitfire, were all gathered at one end of the
Green in a group, which so aroused the innocent
curiosity of Mrs. Johnson, as she saw it from one
of her upper windows, that she and the children
took their early promenade rather earlier than
usual. The General talked to the Gipsy, and
Jackanapes fondled Lollo 's mane, and did not
know whether he should be more glad or miser-
able if his grandfather bought him.
' ' Jackanapes ! ' '
47
JACKANAPES
"Yes, sir!"
"I've bought Lollo, but I believe you were
right. He hardly stands high enough for me. If
you can ride him to the other end of the Green,
I '11 give him to you."
How Jackanapes tumbled on to Lollo 's back
he never knew. He had just gathered up the
reins when the Gipsy-father took him by the arm.
"If you want to make Lollo go fast, my little
gentleman— "
"Z can make him go!" said Jackanapes, and
drawing from his pocket the trumpet he had
bought in the fair, he blew a Wast both loud and
shrill.
Away went Lollo, and away went Jackanapes's
hat. His golden hair flew out, an aureole from
which his cheeks shone red and distended with
trumpeting. Away went Spitfire, mad with the
rapture of the race, and the wind in his silky
ears. Away went the geese, the cocks, the hens,
and the whole family of Johnson. Lucy clung
to her mamma, Jane saved Emily by the gathers
of her gown, and Tony saved himself by a somer-
sault.
48
JACKANAPES
The Gray Goose was just returning when
Jackanapes and Lollo rode back, Spitfire panting
behind.
"Good, my little gentleman, good!" said the
Gipsy. "You were born to the saddle. You've
"<I CAN MAKE HIM GO,' SAID JACKANAPES.
the flat thigh, the strong knee, the wiry back, and
the light, caressing hand; all you want is to learn
the whisper. Come here!"
"What was that dirty fellow talking about,
grandson?" asked the General.
"I can't tell you, sir. It 's a secret."
4 — Jackanapes. 49
JACKANAPES
They were sitting in the window again, in the
two Chippendale arm-chairs, the General devour-
ing every line of his grandson 's face, with strange
spasms crossing his own.
"You must love your aunt very much, Jacka-
napes ? ' '
"I do, sir," said Jackanapes, warmly.
"And whom do you love next best to your
aunt!"
The ties of blood were pressing very strongly
on the General himself, and perhaps he thought
of Lollo. But Love is not bought in a day, even
with fourteen pounds nineteen shillings and ten-
pence. Jackanapes answered quite readily,
"The Postman."
"Why the Postman?"
"He knew my father," said Jackanapes, "and
he tells me about him, and about his black mare.
My father was a soldier, a brave soldier. He
died at Waterloo. When I grow up I want to be
a soldier, too."
"So you shall, my boy. So you shall."
"Thank you, grandfather. Aunty does n't
want me to be a soldier for fear of being killed."
5o
J A CKANAPES
" Bless my life! Would she have you get into
a feather-bed and stay there? Why, you might
be killed by a thunderbolt, if you were a butter-
merchant ! ' '
^So I might. I shall tell her so. What a
funny fellow you are, sir! I say, do you think
my father knew the Gipsy's secret? The Post-
man says he used to whisper to his black mare."
' ' Your father was taught to ride as a child, by
one of those horsemen of the East who swoop
and dart and wheel about a plain like swallows
in autumn. Grandson! Love me a little, too.
I can tell you more about your father than the
Postman can. ' '
U I do love you, " said Jackanapes. "Before
you came I was frightened. I 'd no notion you
were so nice."
"Love me always, boy, whatever I do or leave
undone. And— God help me — whatever you do
or leave undone, I '11 love you! There shall
never be a cloud between us for a day; no, sir,
not for an hour. We 're imperfect enough, all of
us, we need n't be so bitter; and life is uncertain
enough at its safest, we need n't waste its oppor-
5i
JACKANAPES
tunities. Look at me! Here sit I, after a dozen
battles and some of the worst climates in the
world, and by yonder lych gate lies your mother,
who did n't move five miles, I suppose, from your
aunt's apron-strings,— dead in her teens; my
golden-haired daughter, whom I never saw."
Jackanapes was terribly troubled.
"Don't cry, grandfather," he pleaded, his own
blue eyes round with tears. "I will love you
very much, and I will try to be very good. But
I should like to be a soldier."
"You shall, my boy, you shall. You 've more
claims for a commission than you know of.
Cavalry, I suppose, eh, ye young Jackanapes?
Well, well; if you live to be an honor to your
country, this old heart shall grow young again
with pride for you; and if you die in the service
of your country— God bless me, it can but break
for ye."
And beating the region which he said was all
waistcoats, as if they stifled him, the old man got
up and strode out onto the Green.
52
CHAPTER IV
TWENTY and odd years later the Gray
Goose was still alive, and in full posses-
sion of her faculties, such as they were.
She lived slowly and carefully, and she lived
long. So did Miss Jessamine; but the General
was dead.
He had lived on the Green for many years,
during which he and the Postman saluted each
other with a punctiliousness that it almost drilled
one to witness. He would have completely
spoiled Jackanapes if Miss Jessamine's con-
science would have let him; otherwise he some-
what dragooned his neighbors, and was as posi-
tive about parish matters as a ratepayer about
the army. A stormy-tempered, tender-hearted
soldier, irritable with the suffering of wounds of
which he never spoke, whom all the village fol-
lowed to his grave with tears.
53
JACKANAPES
The General's death was a great shock to Miss
Jessamine, and her nephew stayed with her for
some little time after the funeral. Then he was
obliged to join his regiment, which was ordered
abroad.
One effect of the conquest which the General
had gained over the affections of the village was
a considerable abatement of the popular preju-
dice against ' ' the military. ' ' Indeed, the village
was now somewhat importantly represented in
the army. There was the General himself, and
the Postman, and the Black Captain's tablet in
the church, and Jackanapes, and Tony Johnson,
and a Trumpeter.
Tony Johnson had no more natural taste for
fighting than for riding, but he was as devoted as
ever to Jackanapes, and that was how it came
about that Mr. Johnson bought him a commission
in the same cavalry regiment that the General's
grandson (whose commission had been given him
by the Iron Duke) was in, and that he was quite
content to be the butt of the mess where Jacka-
napes was the hero ; and that when Jackanapes
wrote home to Miss Jessamine, Tony wrote with
54
JACKANAPES
the same purpose to his mother; namely, to de-
mand her congratulations that they were on
active service at last, and were ordered to the
front. And he added a postscript to the effect
w
"HE AND THE POSTMAN SALUTED EACH OTHER.' :
that she could have no idea how popular Jacka-
napes was, nor how splendidly he rode the won-
derful red charger whom he had named after his
old friend Lollo.
55
JACKANAPES
"Sound Retire !"
A Boy Trumpeter, grave with the weight of
responsibilities and accoutrements beyond his
years, and stained, so that his own mother would
not have known him, with the sweat and dust of
battle, did as he was bid; and then pushing his
trumpet pettishly aside, adjusted his weary legs
for the hundredth time to the horse which was a
world too big for him, and muttering, " 'Taint
a pretty tune, ' ' tried to see something of this, his
first engagement, before it came to an end.
Being literally in the thick of it, he could hardly
have seen less or known less of what happened
in that particular skirmish if he had been at
home in England. For many good reasons; in-
cluding dust and smoke, and that what attention
he dared distract from his commanding officer
was pretty well absorbed by keeping his hard-
mouthed troop-horse in hand, under pain of ex-
ecration by his neighbors in the melee. By-and •
by, when the newspapers came out, if he could
get a look at one before it was thumbed to bits,
he would learn that the enemy had appeared
from ambush in overwhelming numbers, and that
56
JACKANAPES
orders had been given to fall back, which was
done slowly and in good order, the men fighting
as they retired.
Born and bred on the Goose Green, the yonngest
A BOY TRUMPETER, GRAVE BEYOND HIS YEARS."
of Mr. Johnson's gardener's numerous offspring,
the boy had given his family ' ' no peace ' ' till they
let him "go for a soldier" with Master Tony and
Master Jackanapes. They consented at last, with
more tears than they shed when an elder son
57
JACKANAPES
was sent to jail for poaching, and the boy was
IDerfectly happy in his life, and full of esprit de
corps. It was this which had been wounded by
having to sound retreat for "the young gentle-
men's regiment," the first time he served with
it before the enemy, and he was also har-
assed by having completely lost sight of Master
Tony. There had been some hard fighting be-
fore the backward movement began, and he had
caught sight of him once, but not since. On the
other hand, all the pulses of his village pride had
been stirred by one or two visions of Master
Jackanapes whirling about on his wonderful
horse. He had been easy to distinguish since an
eccentric blow had bared his head without hurt-
ing it, for his close golden mop of hair gleamed
in the hot sunshine as brightly as the steel of the
sword flashing round it.
Of the missiles that fell pretty thickly, the Boy
Trumpeter did not take much notice. First, one
can't attend to everything, and his hands were
full. Secondly, one gets used to anything.
Thirdly, experience soon teaches one, in spite of
proverbs, how very few bullets find their billet.
58
JACKANAPES
Far more unnerving is the mere suspicion of fear
or even of anxiety in the human mass around
you. The Boy was beginning to wonder if there
were any dark reason for the increasing pres-
sure, and whether they would be allowed to move
back more quickly, when the smoke in front lifted
for a moment, and he could see the plain, and the
enemy's line some two hundred yards away.
And across the plain between them, he saw
Master Jackanapes galloping alone at the top of
Lollo's speed, their faces to the enemy, his golden
head at Lollo's ear.
But at this moment the noise and smoke seemed
to burst out on every side, the officer shouted to
him to sound retire, and between trumpeting and
bumping about on his horse, he saw and heard
no more of the incidents of his first battle.
Tony Johnson was always unlucky with horses,
from the days of the giddy-go-round onwards.
On this day— of all days in the year— his own
horse was on the sick list, and he had to ride an
inferior, ill-conditioned beast, and fell off that, at
the very moment when it was a matter of life or
death to be able to ride away. The horse fell on
59
JACKANAPES
him, but struggled up again, and Tony managed
to keep hold of it. It was in trying to remount
that he discovered, by helplessness and anguish,
that one of his legs was crushed and broken, and
that no feat of which he was master would get
him into the saddle. Not able even to stand
alone, awkwardly, agonizingly unable to mount
his restive horse, his life was yet so strong
within him! And on one side of him rolled the
dust and smoke-cloud of his advancing foes, and
on the other, that which covered his retreating
friends.
He turned one piteous gaze after them, with a
bitter twinge, not of reproach, but of loneliness;
and then, dragging himself up by the side of his
horse, he turned the other way and drew out his
pistol, and waited for the end. "Whether he
waited seconds or minutes he never knew, before
some one gripped kirn by the arm.
"Jackanapes! God bless you! It's my left
leg. If you could get me on—"
It was like Tony's luck that his pistol went off
at his horse's tail, and made it plunge; but
Jackanapes threw him across the saddle.
60
JACKANAPES
"Hold on anyhow, and stick your spur in. I'll
lead him. Keep your head down, they're firing
high."
And Jackanapes laid his head down— to Lollo 's
ear.
It was when they were fairly oif, that a sudden
upspringing of the enemy in all directions had
made it necessary to change the gradual retire-
ment of our force into as rapid a retreat as
possible. And when Jackanapes became aware
of this, and felt the lagging and swerving of
Tony's horse, he began to wish he had thrown
his friend across his own saddle, and left their
lives to Lollo.
When Tony became aware of it, several things
came into his head. 1. That the dangers of
their ride for life were now more than doubled.
2. That if Jackanapes and Lollo were not bur-
dened with him they would undoubtedly escape.
3. That Jackanapes's life was infinitely valuable,
and his— Tony's— was not. 4. That this— if he
could seize it— was the supremest of all the mo-
ments in which he had tried to assume the virtues
which Jackanapes had by nature ; and that now—
6i
JACKANAPES
He caught at his own reins and spoke very
loud—
"Jackanapes! It won't do. You and Lollo
must go on. Tell the fellows I gave you back to
them, with all my heart. Jackanapes, if you
love me, leave me ! ' '
There was a daffodil light over the evening
sky in front of them, and it shone strangely on
Jackanapes' hair and face. He turned with an
odd look in his eyes that a vainer man than Tony
Johnson might have taken for brotherly pride.
Then he shook his mop, and laughed at him.
"Leave you? To save my skin? No, Tony,
not to save my soul!"
62
CHAPTER V
COMING out of a hospital-tent, at head-
quarters, the surgeon cannoned against,
and rebounded from, another officer; a
sallow man, not young, with a face worn more
by ungentle experiences than by age ; with weary
eyes that kept their own counsel, iron-gray hair,
and a mustache that was as if a raven had laid
its wing across his lips and sealed them.
"Well?"
"Beg pardon, Major. Did n't see you. Oh,
compound fracture and bruises, but it 's all right.
He '11 pull through."
"Thank God!"
It was probably an involuntary expression, for
prayer and praise were not much in the Major's
line, as a jerk of the surgeon's head would have
betrayed to an observer. He was a bright little
man, with his feelings showing all over him, but
63
JACKANAPES
with gallantry and contempt of death enough
for both sides of his profession; who took a cool
head, a white handkerchief, and a case of instru-
ments, where other men went hot-blooded with
weapons, and who was the biggest gossip, male
or female, of the regiment. Not even the Major's
taciturnity daunted him.
"Did n 't think he 'd as much pluck about
him as he has. He '11 do all right if he does
n't fret himself into a fever about poor Jacka-
napes."
"Whom are you talking about?" asked the
Major, hoarsely.
"Young Johnson. He—"
"What about Jackanapes?"
"Don't you know! Sad business. Kode back
for Johnson, and brought him in; but, monstrous
ill-luck, hit as they rode. Left lung—"
"Will he recover?"
"No. Sad business. What a frame— what
limbs — what health — and what good looks !
Finest young fellow— "
"Where is he?"
"In his own tent," said the surgeon, sadly.
64
JACKANAPES
The Major wheeled and left him.
"Can I do anything else for you?"
CAN I DO ANYTHING ELSE FOR YOU?' "
"Nothing, thank yon. Except— Major ! I wish
I could get you to appreciate Johnson. ' '
"This is not an easy moment, Jackanapes."
"Let me tell you, sir — he never will — that if
he could have driven me from him, he would he
5— Jackanapes. 05
JACKANAPES
lying yonder at this moment, and I should be
safe and sound."
The Major laid his hand over his mouth, as if
to keep back a wish he would have been ashamed
to utter.
"I 've known old Tony from a child. He 's a
fool on impulse, a good man and a gentleman
in principle. And he acts on principle, which
it 's not every— some water, please ! Thank you,
sir. It 's very hot, and yet one's feet get un-
commonly cold. Oh, thank you, thank you. He's
no fire-eater, but he has a trained conscience and
a tender heart, and he '11 do his duty when a
braver and more selfish man might fail you. But
he wants encouragement; and when I'm gone—"
"He shall have encouragement. You have my
word for it. Can I do nothing else?"
"Yes, Major. A favor."
1 1 Thank you, Jackanapes. ' '
"Be Lollo's master, and love him as well as
you can. He 's used to it."
"Would n't you rather Johnson had himf"
The blue eyes twinkled in spite of mortal pain.
"Tony rides on principle, Major. His legs are
66
JACKANAPES
bolsters, and will be to the end of the chapter. I
could n't insult dear Lollo, but if you don't
care—"
"Whilst I live— which shall be longer than I
desire or deserve— Lollo shall want nothing, but
—you. I have too little tenderness for— my dear
boy, you're faint. Can you spare me for a mo-
ment?"
"No, stay— Major!"
"What? What?"
"My head drifts so— if you would n't mind."
"Yes! Yes!"
"Say a prayer by me. Out loud, please, I am
getting deaf."
"My dearest Jackanapes— my dear boy—"
"One of the Church Prayers— Parade Service,
you know—"
"I see. But the fact is— God forgive me,
Jackanapes— I'm a very different sort of fellow
to some of you youngsters. Look here, let me
fetch-"
But Jackanapes's hand was in his, and it
wouldn't let go.
There was a brief and bitter silence.
67
JACKANAPES
" 'Pon my soul, I can only remember the little
one at the end."
"Please," whispered Jackanapes.
Pressed by the conviction that what little he
could do it was his duty to do, the Major,
kneeling, bared his head, and spoke loudly,
clearly, and very reverently—
"The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ—"
Jackanapes moved his left hand to his right
one, which still held the Major's—
"—The love of God."
And with that— Jackanapes died.
68
CHAPTER VI
JACKANAPES' death was sad news for the
Goose Green, a sorrow just qualified by
honorable pride in his gallantry and de-
votion. Only the Cobbler dissented, but that was
his way. He said he saw nothing in it but fool-
hardiness and vainglory. They might both have
been killed, as easy as not, and then where would
ye have been! A man's life was a man's life,
and one life was as good as another. No one
would catch him throwing his away. And, for
that matter, Mrs. Johnson could spare a child a
great deal better than Miss Jessamine.
But the parson preached Jackanapes' funeral
sermon on the text, "Whosoever will save his
life shall lose it; and whosoever will lose his
life for My sake shall find it " ; and all the village
went and wept to hear him.
Nor did Miss Jessamine see her loss from the
69
JACKANAPES
Cobbler's point of view. On the contrary, Mrs.
Johnson said she never to her dying day should
forget how, when she went to condole with her,
the old lady came forward, with gentlewomanly
self-control, and kissed her, and thanked God that
her dear nephew's effort had been blessed with
success, and that this sad war had made no gap
in her friend's large and happy home circle.
"But she's a noble, unselfish woman," sobbed
Mrs. Johnson, "and she taught Jackanapes to be
the same, and that's how it is that my Tony has
been spared to me. And it must be sheer good-
ness in Miss Jessamine, for what can she know
of a mother's feelings? And I'm sure most
people seem to think that if you 've a large
family you don't know one from another any
more than they do, and that a lot of children
are like a lot of store-apples, if one's taken it
won't be missed."
Lollo— the first Lollo, the Gipsy's Lollo— very
aged, draws Miss Jessamine's bath-chair slowly
up and down the Goose Green in the sunshine.
The ex-Postman walks beside him, which Lollo
tolerates to the level of his shoulder. If the
7o
JACKANAPES
Postman advances any nearer to his head, Lollo
quickens his pace, and were the Postman to per-
sist in the injudicious attempt, there is, as Miss
Jessamine says, no knowing what might happen.
In the opinion of the Goose Green, Miss Jessa-
-rv
"LOLLO DRAWS MISS JESSAMINE SLOWLY UP AND DOWN."
mine has borne her troubles ''wonderfully." In-
deed, to-day, some of the less delicate and less
intimate of those who see everything from the
upper windows, say (well behind her back) that
"the old lady seems quite lively with her military
beaux again."
7i
JACKANAPES
The meaning of this is, that Captain Johnson
is leaning over one side of her chair, whilst by
the other bends a brother officer who is staying
with him, and who has manifested an extra-
ordinary interest in Lollo. He bends lower and
lower, and Miss Jessamine calls to the Postman
to request Lollo to be kind enough to stop, whilst
she is fumbling for something which always
hangs by her side, and has got entangled with
her spectacles.
It is a twopenny trumpet, bought years ago
in the village fair, and over it she and Captain
Johnson tell, as best they can between them, the
story of Jackanapes' ride across the Goose
Green; and how he won Lollo— the Gipsy's Lollo
—the racer Lollo— dear Lollo— faithful Lollo—
Lollo, the never vanquished— Lollo, the tender
servant of his old mistress. And Lollo 's ears
twitch at every mention of his name.
Their hearer does not speak, but he never
moves his eyes from the trumpet, and when the
tale is told, he lifts Miss Jessamine's hand and
presses his heavy black mustache in silence to
her trembling fingers.
72
JACKANAPES
The sun, setting gently to his rest, embroiders
the • sombre foliage of the oak-tree with threads
of gold. The Gray Goose is sensible of an atmos-
phere of repose ,and puts up one leg for the night.
. Ar^v
WANDERING OFF INTO THE LANES
The grass glows with a more vivid green, and,
in answer to a ringing call from Tony, his sisters,
fluttering over the daisies in pale-hued muslins,
come out of their ever-open door, like pretty
pigeons from a dovecote.
73
JACKANAPES
And if the good gossips' eyes do not deceive
them, all the Miss Johnsons and both the officers
go wandering off into the lanes, where bryony
wreaths still twine abont the brambles.
*******
A sorrowful story, and ending badly?
Nay, Jackanapes, for the end is not yet.
A life wasted that might have been useful?
Men who have died for men, in all ages, for-
give the thought!
There is a heritage of heroic example and noble
obligation, not reckoned in the Wealth of Nations,
but essential to a nation's life; the contempt of
which, in any people, may, not slowly, mean even
its commercial fall.
Very sweet are the uses of prosperity, the
harvests of peace and progress, the fostering sun-
shine of health and happiness, and length of days
in the land.
But there be things— oh, sons of what has de-
served the name of Great Britain, forget it not!
—"the good of" which and "the use of" which
are beyond all calculation of worldly goods and
earthly uses : things such as Love, and Honor,
74
JACKANAPES
and the Soul of Man, which cannot be bought
with a price, and which do not die with death.
And they who would fain live happily ever after,
should not leave these things out of the lessons
of their lives.
75
THE PEACE EGG
A CHRISTMAS TALE
"SHE CHOSE THE CAPTAIN."
Seep. 81.
THE PEACE EGG
A CHRISTMAS TALE
EVEEY one ought to be happy at Christmas.
But there are many things which ought
to be, and yet are not; and people are
sometimes sad even in the Christmas holidays.
The Captain and his wife were sad, though it
was Christmas Eve. Sad, though they were in
the prime of life, blessed with good health, de-
voted to each other and to their children, with
competent means, a comfortable house on a little
freehold property of their own, and, one might
say, everything that heart could desire. Sad,
though they were good people, whose peace of
mind had a firmer foundation than their earthly
79
THE PEACE EGG
goods alone; contented people, too, with plenty
of occupation for mind and body. Sad— and in
the nursery this was held to be past all reason—
though the children were performing that ancient
and most entertaining Play or Christmas Mystery
of Good St. George of England, known as The
Peace Egg, for their benefit and behoof alone.
The play was none the worse that most of the
actors were too young to learn parts, so that
there was very little of the rather tedious dia-
logue, only plenty of dress and ribbons, and of
fighting with the wooden swords. But though
St. George looked bonny enough to warm any
father's heart, as he marched up and down with
an air learned by watching many a parade in
barrack-square and drill-ground, and though the
Valiant Slasher did not cry in spite of falling
hard and the Doctor treading accidentally on his
little finger in picking him up, still the Captain
and his wife sighed nearly as often as they smiled,
and the mother dropped tears as well as pennies
into the cap which the King of Egypt brought
round after the performance.
80
M
II
The Captain 's Wife
ANY, many years back, the Captain's wife
had been a child herself, and had laughed
to see the village mummers act the Peace
Egg, and had been quite happy on Christmas
Eve. Happy, though she had no mother.
Happy, though her father was a stern man, very
fond of his only child, but with an obstinate will
that not even she dared thwart. She had lived
to thwart it, and he had never forgiven her. It
was when she married the Captain. The old man
had a prejudice against soldiers, which was quite
reason enough, in his opinion, for his daughter
to sacrifice the happiness of her future life by
giving up the soldier she loved. At last he gave
her her choice between the Captain and his own
favor and money. She chose the Captain, and
was disowned and disinherited.
6— Jackanapes. O I
THE PEACE EGG
The Captain bore a high character, and was
a good and clever officer, but that went for
nothing against the old man's whim. He made a
very good husband, too; but even this did not
move his father-in-law, who had never held any
intercourse with him or his wife since the day
of their marriage, and who had never seen his
own grandchildren. Though not so bitterly pre-
judiced as the old father, the Captain's wife's
friends had their doubts about the marriage.
The place was not a military station, and they
were quiet country folk who knew very little
about soldiers, whilst what they imagined was not
altogether favorable to " red-coats," as they
called them. Soldiers are well-looking, generally,
it is true (and the Captain was more than well-
looking— he was handsome) ; brave, of course, it
is their business (and the Captain had V. C. after
his name and several bits of ribbon on his patrol
jacket). But then, thought the good people, they
are here to-day and gone to-morrow, you "never
know where you have them"; they are probably
in debt, possibly married to several women in
several foreign countries, and, though they are
82
THE PEACE EGG
very courteous in society, who knows how they
treat their wives when they drag them off from
their natural friends and protectors to distant
lands where no one can call them to account?
"Ah, poor thing!" said Mrs. John Bull, junior,
as she took off her husband's coat on his return
from business, a week after the Captain's wed-
ding, "I wonder how she feels? There's no
doubt the old man behaved disgracefully; but it's
a great risk marrying a soldier. It stands to
reason, military men are n't domestic; and I wish
—Lucy Jane, fetch your papa's slippers, quick!
—she'd had the sense to settle down comfortably
amongst her friends with a man who would have
taken care of her."
"Officers are a wild set, I expect," said Mr.
Bull, complacently, as he stretched his limbs in
his own particular arm-chair, into which no mem-
ber of his family ever intruded. "But the red-
coats carry the day with plenty of girls who ought
to know better. You women are always caught
by a bit of finery. However, there's no use our
bothering our heads about it. As she has brewed
she must bake."
83
THE PEACE EGG
The Captain's wife's baking was lighter and
more palatable than her friends believed. The
Captain (who took off his own coat when he came
home, and never wore slippers but in his dressing-
room) was domestic enough. A selfish com-
panion must, doubtless, be a great trial amid the
hardships of military life, but when a soldier is
kind-hearted, he is often a much more helpful
and thoughtful and handy husband than any
equally well-meaning civilian. Amid the ups and
downs of their wanderings, the discomforts of
shipboard and of stations in the colonies, bad
servants, and unwonted sicknesses, the Captain's
tenderness never failed. If the life was rough
the Captain was ready. He had been, by turns,
in one strait or another, sick-nurse, doctor, car-
penter, nursemaid, and cook to his family, and
had, moreover, an idea that nobody filled these
offices quite so well as himself. Withal, his very
profession kept him neat, well-dressed, and active.
In the roughest of their ever-changing quarters
he was a smarter man, more like the lover of his
wife's young days, than Mr. Bull amid his sta-
tionary comforts. Then if the Captain's wife
84
THE PEACE EGG
was— as her friends said— "never settled," she
was also forever entertained by new scenes; and
domestic mischances do not weigh very heavily
on people whose possessions are few and their
THE CAPTAIN'S TENDERNESS NEVER FAILED."
intellectual interests many. It is true that there
were ladies in the Captain's regiment who passed
by sea and land from one quarter of the globe
85
THE PEACE EGG
to another, amid strange climates and customs,
strange trees and flowers, beasts and birds, from
the glittering snows of North America to the
orchids of the Cape, from beautiful Pera to the
lily-covered hills of Japan, and who in no place
rose above the fret of domestic worries, and had
little to tell on their return but of the universal
misconduct of servants, from Irish "helps" in the
colonies, to compradors and China-boys at
Shanghai. But it was not so with the Captain's
wife. Moreover, one becomes accustomed to
one's fate, and she moved her whole establish-
ment from the Curragh to Corfu with less anxiety
that -that felt by Mrs. Bull over a port-wine stain
on the best table-cloth.
And yet, as years went and children came, the
Captain and his wife grew tired of traveling.
New scenes were small comfort when they heard
of the death of old friends. One foot of murky
English sky was dearer, after all, than miles of
the unclouded heavens of the South. The gray
hills and overgrown lanes of her old home haunted
the Captain's wife by night and day, and home-
sickness (that weariest of all sicknesses) began
86
THE PEACE EGG
to take the light out of her eyes before their
time. It preyed upon the Captain, too. Now
and then he would say, fretfully, "I should like
an English resting-place, however small, before
everybody is dead! But the children's prospects
have to be considered. ' ' The continued estrange-
ment from the old man was an abiding sorrow
also, and they had hopes that, if only they could
get to England, he might be persuaded to peace
and charity this time.
At last they were sent home. But the hard old
father still would not relent. He returned their
letters unopened. This bitter disappointment
made the Captain's wife so ill that she almost
died, and in one month the Captain's hair be-
came iron-gray. He reproached himself for hav-
ing ever taken the daughter from her father,
"to kill her at last," as he said. And (thinking
of his own children) he even reproached himself
for having robbed the old widower of his only
child. After two years at home, his regiment
was ordered to India. He failed to effect an ex-
change, and they prepared to move once more—
from Chatham to Calcutta. Never before had
87
THE PEACE EGG
the packing, to which she was so well accustomed,
been so bitter a task to the Captain's wife.
It was at the darkest hour of this gloomy time
that the Captain came in, waving above his head
a letter which changed all their plans.
Now close by the old home of the Captain's wife
there had lived a man much older than herself,
who yet had loved her with a devotion as great
as that of the young Captain. She never knew
it, for when he saw that she had given her heart
to his younger rival, he kept silence, and he never
asked for what he knew he might have had— the
old man's authority in his favor. So generous
was the affection which he could never conquer,
that he constantly tried to reconcile the father to
his children whilst he lived, and, when he died,
he bequeathed his house and small estate to the
woman he had loved.
And thus it came about that the Captain's
regiment went to India without him, and that the
Captain's wife and her father lived on opposite
sides of the same road.
88
Ill
Master Robert
THE eldest of the Captain's children was a
boy. He was named Robert, after his
grandfather, and seemed to have inherited
a good deal of the old gentleman's character,
mixed with gentler traits. He was a fair, fine
boy, tall and stout for his age, with the Captain's
regular features, and (he flattered himself) the
Captain's firm step and martial bearing. He
was apt— like his grandfather— to hold his own
will to be other people's law, and (happily for
the peace of the nursery) this opinion was de-
voutly shared by his brother Nicholas. Though
the Captain had sold his commission, Robin con-
tinued to command an irregular force of volun-
teers in the nursery, and never was colonel more
despotic. His brothers and sister were by turn
infantry, cavalry, engineers, and artillery, ac-
THE PEACE EGG
cording to his whim, and when his affections
finally settled upon the Highlanders of "The
Black Watch," no female power could compel
him to keep his stockings above his knees, or his
knickerbockers below them.
The Captain alone was a match for his strong-
willed son.
"If you please, sir," said Sarah, one morning,
flouncing in upon the Captain, just as he was
about to start for the neighboring town,— "If
you please, sir, I wish you'd speak to Master
Robert. He 's past my powers."
"I Ve no doubt of it," thought the Captain,
but he only said, "Well, what's the matter?"
"Night after night, do I put him to bed," said
Sarah, "and night after night does he get up
as soon as I'm out of the room, and says he's
orderly officer for the evening, and goes about
in his night-shirt and his feet as bare as boards. ' '
The Captain fingered his heavy mustache to
hide a smile, but he listened patiently to Sarah's
complaints.
"It ain't so much him I should mind, sir,"
she continued, "but he goes round the beds and
90
THE PEACE EGG
wakes up the other young gentlemen and Miss
Dora, one after another, and when I speak to
him, he gives me all the sauce he can lay his
tongue to, and says he 's going round the guards.
The other night I tried to put him back in his
bed, but he got away and ran all over the house,
me hunting him everywhere, and not a sign of
him, till he jumps out on me from the garret-
stairs and nearly knocks me down. 'I 've
visited the outposts, Sarah/ says he; 'all's well.'
And off he goes to bed as bold as brass."
"Have you spoken to your mistress?" asked
the Captain.
"Yes, sir," said Sarah. "And missis spoke
to him, and he promised not to go round the
guards again."
"Has he broken his promise?" asked the Cap-
tain, with a look of anger, and also of surprise.
"When I opened the door last night, sir," con-
tinued Sarah, in her shrill treble, "what should
I see in the dark but Master Robert a-walking up
and down with the carpet-brush stuck in his arm.
'Who goes there!' says he. 'You owdacious
boy!' says I, 'Didn't you promise your ma you'd
9i
THE PEACE EGG
leave off them tricks V i I 'm not going round the
guards/ says he; 'I promised not. But I'm for
sentry-duty to-night.' And say what I would to
him, all he had for me was, 'You must n't speak
to a sentry on duty.' So I says, 'As sure as I
live till morning, I'll go to your pa,' for he pays
no more attention to his ma than to me, nor to
any one else."
"Please to see that the chair-bed in my
dressing-room is moved into your mistress's bed-
room," said the Captain. "I will attend to
Master Kobert."
With this Sarah had to content herself, and
she went back to the nursery. Robert was no-
where to be seen, and made no reply to her sum-
mons. On this the unwary nursemaid flounced
ino the bedroom to look for him, when Robert,
who was hidden beneath a table, darted forth,
and promptly locked her in.
"You 're under arrest," he shouted through
the keyhole.
"Let me out!" shrieked Sarah.
"I '11 send a file of the guard to fetch you to
the orderly-room, by and by," said Robert, "for
92
THE PEACE EGG
'preferring frivolous complaints.' " And he de-
" YOU MUST N'T SPEAK TO A SENTRY ON DUTY."
parted to the farmyard to look at the ducks,
93
THE PEACE EGG
That night, when Robert went up to bed, the
Captain quietly locked him into his dressing-
room, from which the bed had been removed.
"You 're for sentry duty, to-night,' ' said the
Captain. "The carpet-brush is in the corner.
Good-evening."
As his father anticipated, Robert was soon
tired of the sentry game in these new circum-
stances, and long before the night had half worn
away he wished himself safely undressed and in
his own comfortable bed. At half-past twelve
o'clock he felt as if he could bear it no longer,
and knocked at the Captain's door.
"Who goes there?" said the Captain.
"Mayn't I go to bed, please?" whined poor
Robert.
"Certainly not," said the Captain. "You 're
on duty."
And on duty poor Robert had to remain, for
the Captain had a will as well as his son. So he
rolled himself in his father's railway rug, and
slept on the floor.
The next night he was very glad to go quietly
to bed, and remain there.
94
IV
In the Nursery.
THE Captain's children sat at breakfast in a
large, bright nursery. It was the room
where the old bachelor had died, and now
her children made it merry. This was just what
he would have wished.
They all sat round the table, for it was break-
fast time. There were five of them, and five
bowls of boiled bread-and-milk smoked before
them. Sarah (a foolish, gossiping girl, who
acted as nurse till better could be found) was
waiting on them, and by the table sat Darkie, the
black retriever, his long, curly back swaying
slightly from the difficulty of holding himself up,
and his solemn hazel eyes fixed very intently on
each and all of the breakfast bowls. He was as
silent and sagacious as Sarah was talkative and
empty-headed. The expression of his face was
95
THE PEACE EGG
that of King Charles I, as painted by Vandyke.
Though large, he was nnassnming. Pax, the
pug, on the contrary, who came up to the first
joint of Darkie's leg, stood defiantly on his
dignity (and his short stumps). He always
placed himself in front of the bigger dog, /and
made a point of hustling him in doorways and
of going first downstairs. He strutted like a
beadle, and carried his tail more tightly curled
than a bishop's crook. He looked, as one may
imagine the frog in the fable would have looked,
had he been able to swell himself rather nearer
to the size of the ox. This was partly due to his
very prominent eyes, and partly to an obesity
favored by habits of lying inside the fender, and
of eating meals proportioned more to his conse-
quence than to his hunger. They were both
favorites of two years' standing, and had very
nearly been given away, when the good news
came of an English home for the family, dogs
and all.
Eobert's tongue was seldom idle, even at meals.
"Are you a Yorkshire woman, Sarah?" he
asked, pausing, with his spoon full in his hand.
96
THE PEACE EGG
"No, Master Robert," said Sarah.
"But you understand Yorkshire, don't you?
I can't, very often; but Mamma can, and can
speak it, too. Papa says Mamma always talks
Yorkshire to servants and poor people. She
used to talk Yorkshire to Themistocles, Papa
said, and he said it was no good; for though
Themistocles knew a lot of languages, he didn't
know that. And Mamma laughed, and said she
didn't know she did. Themistocles was our
man-servant in Corfu," Robin added, in ex-
planation. "He stole lots of things, Themis-
tocles did; but Papa found him out."
Robin now made a rapid attack on his bread-
and-milk, after which he broke out again.
"Sarah, who is that tall old gentleman at
church, in the seat near the pulpit? He wears a
cloak like what the Blues wear, only all blue, and
is tall enough for a Lifeguardsman. He stood
when we were kneeling down, and said, i Al-
mighty and most merciful Father,' louder than
anybody. ' '
Sarah knew who the old gentleman was, and
knew also that the children did not know, and
7— Jackanapes. 9/
THE PEACE EGG
that their parents did not see fit to tell them as
yet. But she had a passion for telling and hear-
ing news, and would rather gossip with a child
than not gossip at all. "Never you mind, Master
Robin, " she said, nodding sagaciously. "Little
boys are n't to know everything."
"Ah, then, I know you don't know," replied
Robert; "if you did, you 'd tell. Nicholas, give
some of your bread to Darkie and Pax. I've
done mine. For what we have received the Lord
make us truly thankful. Say your grace and
put your chair away, and come along. I want to
hold a court-martial." And seizing his own
chair by the seat, Robin carried it swiftly to its
corner. As he passed Sarah he observed, taunt-
ingly, "You pretend to know, but you don't."
"I do," said Sarah.
"You don't," said Robin.
"Your ma 's forbid you to contradict, Master
Robin," said Sarah; "and if you do I shall tell
her. I know well enough who the old gentleman
is, and perhaps I might tell you, only you 'd go
straight off and tell again. "
"No, no, I wouldn't!" shouted Robin. "I can
THE PEACE EGG
keep a secret, indeed I can! Pincli my little
finger, and try. Do, do tell me, Sarah, there's a
"HE STOOD WHEN WE WERE KNEELING."
dear Sarah, and then I shall know yon know.
99
THE PEACE EGG
And he danced round her, catching at her skirts.
To keep a secret was beyond Sarah's powers.
"Do let my dress be, Master Robin/ ' she said,
"yon 're ripping out all the gathers, and listen
while I whisper. As sure as yon 're a living
boy, that gentleman's your own grandpapa."
Eobin lost his hold on Sarah's dress; his arms
fell by his side, and he stood with his brows
knit for some minutes, thinking. Then he said,
emphatically, "What lies you do tell, Sarah!"
"Oh, Robin!" cried Nicholas, who had drawn
near, his thick curls standing stark with curiosity,
"Mamma said i lies' was n't a proper word, and
you promised not to say it again."
"I forgot," said Robin. "I didn't mean to
break my promise. But she does tell— ahem! —
you know what. ' '
"You wicked boy!" cried the enraged Sarah;
"how dare you say such a thing, and everybody
in the place knows he 's your ma's own pa!"
"I'll go and ask her," said Robin, and he was
at the door in a moment; but Sarah, alarmed
by the thought of getting into a scrape herself,
caught him by the arm.
ioo
THE PEACE EGG
" Don't you go, love; it'll only make your ma
angry. There; it was all my nonsense."
' ' Then it 's not true I ' ' said Robin, indignantly.
"What did you tell me so for!"
"It was all my jokes and nonsense," said the
unscrupulous Sarah. "But your ma would n't
like to know I 've said such a thing. And Master
Robert would n't be so mean as to tell tales,
would he, love?"
"I 'm not mean," said Robin, stoutly; "and
I don't tell tales; but you do, and you tell— you
know what— besides. However, I won't go this
time; but I '11 tell you what— if you tell tales of
me to Papa any more, I '11 tell him what you
said about the old gentleman in the blue cloak."
With which parting threat Robin strode off to
join his brothers and sister.
Sarah's tale had put the court-martial out of
his head, and he leaned against the tall fender,
gazing at his little sister, who was tenderly
nursing a well-worn doll. Robin sighed.
"What a long time that doll takes to wear out,
Dora!" said he. "When will it be done?"
"Oh, not yet, not yet!" cried Dora, clasping
IOI
THE PEACE EGG
the doll to her, and turning away. "She's quite
good, yet."
"How miserly you are," said her brother;
"and selfish, too; for you know I can't have a
military funeral till you '11 let me bury that old
thing. ' '
Dora began to cry.
"There you go, crying!" said Robin, impa-
tiently. ' ' Look here : I won 't take it till you get
the new one on your birthday. You can't be so
mean as not to let me have it then!"
But Dora's tears still fell. "I love this one
so much," she sobbed. "I love her better than
the new one."
"You want both; that 's it," said Robin,
angrily. "Dora, you 're the meanest girl I ever
knew ! ' '
At which unjust and painful accusation Dora
threw herself and the doll upon their faces, and
wept bitterly. The eyes of the soft-hearted
Nicholas began to fill with tears, and he squatted
down before her, looking most dismal. He had
a fellow-feeling for her attachment to an old toy,
and yet Robin's will was law to him.
102
THE PEACE EGG
1 'Could n't we make a coffin, and pretend the
body was inside!" he suggested.
"No, we could n't," said Robin. "I would n't
play the Dead March after an empty candle-box.
It 's a great shame— and I promised she should
be chaplain in one of my night-gowns, too."
"Perhaps you '11 get just as fond of the new
one," said Nicholas, turning to Dora.
But Dora only cried, ' ' No, no ! He shall have
the new one to bury, and I '11 keep my poor,
dear, darling Betsy." And she clasped Betsy
tighter than before.
"That 's the meanest thing you 've said yet,"
retorted Robin; "for you know Mamma wouldn't
let me bury the new one." And, with an air of
great disgust, he quitted the nursery.
103
"A-Mumming We Will Go."
NICHOLAS had sore work to console his
little sister, and Betsy's prospects were
in a very nnfavorable state, when a
diversion was cansed in her favor by a new
whim which pnt the military funeral out of
Kobin's head.
After he left the nursery he strolled out of
doors, and, peeping through the gate at the end
of the drive, he saw a party of boys going through
what looked like a military exercise with sticks
and a good deal of stamping; but, instead of
mere words of command, they all spoke by turns,
as in a play. In spite of their strong Yorkshire
accent, Eobin overheard a good deal, and it
sounded very fine. Not being at all shy, he
joined them, and asked so many questions that
he soon got to know all about it. They wer#
104
THE TEACE EGG
practicing a Christmas mumming-play, called
i i The Peace Egg. ' ' Why it was called thus, they
could not tell him, as there was nothing what-
ever about eggs in it, and so far from being a
play of peace, it was made up of a series of
battles between certain valiant knights and
princes, of whom St. George of England was the
chief and conqueror. The rehearsal being over,
Robin went with the boys to the sexton's house
(he was father to the "King of Egypt"), where
they showed him the dresses they were to wear.
These were made of gay-colored materials, and
covered with ribbons, except that of the "Black
Prince of Paradine," which was black, as be-
came his title. The boys also showed him the
book from which they learned their parts, and
which was to be bought for one penny at the post-
office shop.
"Then are you the mummers who come round
at Christmas, and act in people's kitchens, and
people give them money, that Mamma used to
tell us about?" said Robin.
St. George of England looked at his com-
panions as if for counsel as to how far they
105
THE PEACE EGG
might commit themselves, and then replied, with
Yorkshire cantion, "Well, I suppose we are."
"And do you go ont in the snow from one
house to another at night; and oh, don't you
enjoy it!" cried Robin.
"We like it well enough, " St. George admitted.
Robin bought a copy of "The Peace Egg."
He was resolved to have a nursery performance,
and to act the part of St. George himself. The
others were willing for what he wished, but
there were difficulties. In the first place, there
are eight characters in the play, and there were
only five children. They decided among them-
selves to leave out the "Fool," and Mamma said
that another character was not to be acted by
any of them, or, indeed, mentioned; "the little
one who comes in at the end," Robin explained.
Mamma had her reasons, and these were always
good. She had not been altogether pleased that
Robin had bought the play. It was a very old
thing, she said, and very queer; not adapted for
a child's play. If Mamma thought the parts not
quite fit for the children to learn, they found
them much too long ; so in the end she picked out
1 06
THE PEACE EGG
some bits for each, which they learned easily,
and which, with a good deal of fighting, made
quite as good a story of it as if they had done
the whole. What may have been wanting other-
wise was made up for by the dresses, which were
charming.
Robin was St. George; Nicholas, the Valiant
Slasher; Dora, the Doctor; and the other two,
Hector and the King of Egypt. "And now
we Ve no Black Prince ! ' ' cried Robin, in dismay.
"Let Darkie be the Black Prince," said
Nicholas. "When you wave your stick he '11
jump for it, and then you can pretend to fight
with him."
"It 's not a stick, it 's a sword," said Robin.
"However, Darkie may be the Black Prince."
"And what 's Pax to be?" asked Dora; "for
you know he will come if Darkie does, and he'll
run in before everybody else, too."
"Then he must be the Fool," said Robin, "and
it will do very well, for the Fool comes in be-
fore the rest, and Pax can have his red coat on,
and the collar with the little bells."
107
VI
Christmas Eve.
ROBIN thought that Christmas would never
come. To the Captain and his wife it
seemed to come too fast. They had
hoped it might bring reconciliation with the
old man, but it seemed they had hoped in
vain.
There were times now when the Captain
almost regretted the old bachelor's bequest.
The familiar scenes of her old home sharpened
his wife's grief. To see her father every Sun-
day in church, with marks of age and infirmity
upon him, but with not a look of tenderness for
his only child, this tried her sorely.
"She felt it less abroad," thought the Cap-
tain. "An English home in which she frets her-
self to death is, after all, no great boon."
Christmas Eve came.
1 08
THE PEACE EGG
' ' I ' m sure it 's quite Christmas enough now, ' '
said Robin. "We '11 have 'The Peace Egg' to-
night. ' '
So as the Captain and his wife sat sadly over
their fire, the door opened, and Pax ran in shak-
ing his bells, and followed by the nursery mum-
mers. The performance was most successful.
It was by no means pathetic, and yet, as has
been said, the Captain's wife shed tears.
"What is the matter, Mamma?" said St.
George, abruptly dropping his sword and run-
ning up to her.
"Don't tease Mamma with questions," said
the Captain; "she is not very well, and rather
sad. We must all be very kind and good to
poor, dear Mamma;" and the Captain raised his
wife's hand to his lips as he spoke. Robin
seized the other hand and kissed it tenderly.
He was very fond of his mother. At this mo-
ment Pax took a little run, and jumped onto
Mamma's lap, where, sitting facing the com-
pany, he opened his black mouth and yawned,
with a ludicrous inappropriateness worthy of any
clown. It made everybody laugh.
109
THE PEACE EGG
"And now we '11 go and act in the kitchen,"
said Nicholas.
"Supper at nine o'clock, remember," shouted
the Captain. "We are going to have real
frumenty and Yule cakes, such as Mamma used
to tell us of when we were abroad."
"Hurray!" shouted the mummers, and they
ran off, Pax leaping from his seat just in time
to hustle the Black Prince in the doorway.
When the dining-room door was shut, St. George
raised his hand, and said "Hush!"
The mummers pricked their ears, but there
was only a distant harsh and scraping sound, as
of stones rubbed together.
"They 're cleaning the passages," St. George
went on, "and Sarah told me they meant to
finish the mistletoe, and have everything cleaned
up by supper-time. They don't want us, I
know. Look here, we '11 go real mumming in-
stead. That will be fun!"
The Valiant Slasher grinned with delight.
"But will Mamma let us?" he inquired.
"Oh, it will be all right if we 're back by
supper-time," said St. George, hastily. Only,
no
THE PEACE EGG
of course, we must take care not to catch cold.
Come and help me to get some wraps. "
The old oak chest in which spare shawls, rugs,
and coats were kept was soon ransacked, and the
mummers' gay dresses hidden by motley wrap-
pers. But no sooner did Darkie and Pax be-
hold the coats, etc., than they at once began to
leap and bark, as it was their custom to do when
they saw any one dressing to go out. Robin was
sorely afraid that this would betray them; but
though the Captain and his wife heard the bark-
ing they did not guess the cause.
So the front door being very gently opened
and closed, the nursery mummers stole away.
in
VII
The Nursery Mummers and the Old Man.
IT was a very fine night. The snow was
well-trodden on the drive, so that it did not
wet their feet, but on the trees and shrubs
it hung soft and white.
"It 's much jollier being out at night than in
the daytime, " said Robin.
"Much, " responded Nicholas, with intense
feeling.
"We '11 go a-wassailing next week," said
Robin. "I know all about it, and perhaps we
shall get a good lot of money, and then we '11
buy tin swords with scabbards for next year. I
don't like these sticks. Oh, dear, I wish it
was n't so long between one Christmas and
another."
"Where shall we go first ?" asked Nicholas,
as they turned into the high road. But before
112
THE PEACE EGG
Bobin could reply, Dora clung to Nicholas, cry-
ing, "Oh, look at those men!"
The boys looked up the road, down which
three men were coming in a very unsteady
fashion, and shouting as they rolled from side to
side.
' ' They 're drunk, ' ' said Nicholas ; ' ' and they 're
shouting at us."
"Oh, run, run!" cried Dora; and down the
road they ran, the men shouting and following
them. Thev had not run far, when Hector
caught his foot in the Captain's greatcoat, which
he was wearing, and came down headlong in the
road. They were close by a gate, and when
Nicholas had set Hector upon his legs, St. George
hastily opened it.
"This is the first house," he said. "We '11
act here;" and all, even the Valiant Slasher,
pressed in as quickly as possible. Once safe
within the grounds, they shouldered their sticks,
and resumed their composure.
"You 're going to the front door," said
Nicholas. "Mummers ought to go to the back."
"We don't know where it is," said Eobin, and
8— Jackanapes. 113
THE PEACE EGG
lie rang the front-door bell. There was a pause.
Then lights shone, steps were heard, and at last
the sound of much unbarring, unbolting, and
unlocking. It might have been a prison. Then
the door was opened by an elderly, timid-looking
woman, who held a tallow candle above her head.
"Who 's there?" she said, "at this time of
night?"
"We 're Christmas mummers," said Robin,
stoutly ; "we did n 't know the way to the back
door, but—"
"And don't you know better than to come
here?" said the woman. "Be off with you, as
fast as you can."
"You 're only the servant," said Robin. "Go
and ask your master or mistress if they
wouldn't like to see us act. We do it very
well."
"You impudent boy, be off with you!" re-
peated the woman. "Master 'd no more let you
nor any other such rubbish set foot in this
house—"
"Woman!" shouted a voice close behind her,
which made her start as if she had been shot,
114
THE PEACE EGG
"who authorizes you to say what your master will
or will uot do, before you Ve asked him? The
boy is right. You are the servant, and it is not
your business to choose for me whom I shall or
shall not see."
"I meant no harm, sir, I 'm sure," said the
housekeeper; "but I thought you 'd never—"
"My good woman," said her master, "if I had
wanted somebody to think for me, you 're the
last person I should have employed. I hire you
to obey orders, not to think."
"I 'm sure, sir," said the housekeeper, whose
only form of argument was reiteration, "I never
thought you would have seen them—"
"Then you were wrong," shouted her master.
"I will see them. Bring them in."
He was a tall, gaunt old man, and Robin stared
at him for some minutes, wondering where he
could have seen somebody very like him. At last
he remembered. It was the old gentleman of
the blue cloak.
The children threw off their wraps, the house-
keeper helping them, and chattering ceaselessly,
from sheer nervousness.
ii5
THE PEACE EGG
"Well, to be sure," said she, "their dresses
are pretty, too. And they seem quite a better
sort of children; they talk quite genteel. I might
ha' knowed they were n't like common mummers,
but I was so flusterated hearing the bell go so
late, and—"
"Are they ready?" said the old man, who had
stood like a ghost in the dim light of the flaring
tallow candle, grimly watching the proceedings.
"Yes, sir. Shall I take them to the kitchen,
sir?"
"For you and the other idle hussies to gape
and grin at? No. Bring them to the library,"
he snapped, and then stalked off, leading the
way.
The housekeeper accordingly led them to the
library, and then withdrew, nearly falling on her
face as she left the room by stumbling over
Darkie, who slipped in last like a black shadow.
The old man was seated in a carved oak chair
by the fire.
"I never said the dogs were to come in," he
said.
"But we can't do without them, please," said
116
THE PEACE EGG
Robin, boldly. "You see there are eight people
in 'The Peace Egg,' and there are only five of
us; and so Darkie has to be the Black Prince,
and Pax has to be the Fool, and so we have to
have them."
"Five and two make seven," said the old man,
with a grim smile; "what do you do for the
eighth?"
"Oh, that 's the little one at the end," said
Robin, confidentially. "Mamma said we weren't
to mention him, but I think that 's because we 're
children.— You 're grown up, you know, so I '11
show you the book, and you can see for your-
self," he went on, drawing "The Peace Egg"
from his pocket: "there, that 's the picture of
him, on the last page; black, with horns and a
tail."
The old man's stern face relaxed into a broad
smile as he examined the grotesque woodcut; but
when he turned to the first page the smile van-
ished in a deep frown, and his eyes shone like
hot coals with anger. He had seen Robin's
name.
"Who sent you here?" he asked, in a hoarse
117
THE PEACE EGG
voice. "Speak, and speak the truth! Did your
mother send you here?"
Robin thought the old man was angry with
them for playing truant. He said, slowly,
"N-no. She didn't exactly send us; but I
don't think she '11 mind our having come if we
get back in time for supper. Mamma never
forbid our going mumming, you know."
"I don't suppose she ever thought of it,"
Nicholas said, candidly, wagging his curly head
from side to side.
"She knows we 're mummers," said Robin,
"for she helped us. When we were abroad, you
know, she used to tell us about the mummers
acting at Christmas, when she was a little girl;
and so we thought we 'd be mummers, and so
we acted to Papa and Mamma, and so we
thought we 'd act to the maids, but they were
cleaning the passages, and so we thought we 'd
really go mumming; and we 've got several
other houses to go to before supper-time; we 'd
better begin, I think," said Robin; and without
more ado he began to march round and round,
raising his sword and shouting,—
118
THE PEACE EGG
" I am St. George, who from Old England sprung,
My famous name throughout the world hath rung"
And the performance went off quite as credit-
ably as before.
As the children acted, the old man's anger
wore off. He watched them with an interest he
could not repress. When Nicholas took some
hard thwacks from St. George without flinching,
the old man clapped his hands ; and, after the en-
counter between St. George and the Black
Prince, he said he would not have had the dogs
excluded on any consideration. It was just at
the end, when they were all marching round and
round, holding on by each other's swords "over
the shoulder," and singing, "A-mumming we
will go," etc., that Nicholas suddenly brought
the circle to a standstill by stopping dead short,
and staring up at the wall before him.
"What are you stopping for!" said St.
George, turning indignantly round.
"Look there!" cried Nicholas, pointing to a
little painting which hung above the old man's
head.
Kobin looked, and said, abruptly, "It's Dora."
119
THE PEACE EGG
"Which is Dora!" asked the old man, in a
strange, sharp tone.
"Here she is," said Robin and Nicholas, in
..one breath, as they dragged her forward.
"She 's the Doctor," said Robin; "and you
can't see her face for her things. Dor, take off
your cap and pull back that hood. There! Oh,
it is like her!"
It was a portrait of her mother as a child; but
of this the nursery mummers knew nothing.
The old man looked as the peaked cap and hood
fell away from Dora's face and fair curls, and
then he uttered a sharp cry, and buried his head
upon his hands. The boys stood stupefied, but
Dora ran up to him, and putting her little hands
on his arms, said, in childish, pitying tones,
"Oh, I 'm so sorry! Have you got a headache!
May Robin put the shovel in the fire for you?
Mamma has hot shovels for her headaches."
And, though the old man did not speak or move,
she went on coaxing him, and stroking his head,
on which the hair was white. At this moment
Pax took one of his unexpected runs, and jumped
onto the old man's knee, in his own particular
120
THE PEACE EGG
fashion, and then yawned at the company. The
old man was startled, and lifted his face sud-
denly. It was wet with tears.
"OH, I 'M SO SORRY."
"Why, yon 're crying!" exclaimed the chil-
dren with one breath.
121
THE PEACE EGG
"It 's very odd," said Bobin, fretfully. "I
can't think what 's the matter to-night. Mamma
was crying, too, when we were acting, and Papa
said we weren't to tease her with questions, and
he kissed her hand, and I kissed her hand, too.
And Papa said we must all be very good and
kind to poor, dear Mamma, and so I mean to be,
she 's so good. And I think we 'd better go
home, or perhaps she '11 be frightened," Robin
added.
"She 's so good, is she?" asked the old man.
He had put Pax off his knee, and taken Dora
onto it.
' ' Oh, is n 't she ! ' ' said Nicholas, swaying his
curly head from side to side as usual.
"She 's always good," said Eobin, emphatic-
ally; "and so 's Papa. But I 'm always doing
something I oughtn't to," he added, slowly.
"But then, you know, I don't pretend to obey
Sarah. I don't care a fig for Sarah; and I won't
obey any woman but Mamma."
"Who 's Sarah?" asked the grandfather.
"She 's our nurse," said Robin, "and she tells
—I mustn't says what she tells— but it 's not the
122
THE PEACE EGG
,1
"IT WAS HER FATHER, WITH HER CHILD IN HIS ARMS."
truth. She told one about you the other day,"
he added.
123
THE PEACE EGG
" About me?" said the old man.
' ' She said you were our grandpapa. So then I
knew she was telling you know ivhat."
"How did you know it wasn't true?" the old
man asked.
"Why, of course," said Robin, "if you were
our Mamma's father, you 'd know her, and be
very fond of her, and come and see her. And
then you 'd be our grandfather, too, and you 'd
have us to see you, and perhaps give us
Christmas-boxes. I wish you were," Robin
added with a sigh. "It would be very nice."
"Would you like it?" asked the old man, of
Dora.
And Dora who was half asleep and very com-
fortable, put her little arms about his neck as
she was wont to put them round the Captain's,
and said, "Very much."
He put her down at last, very tenderly, almost
unwillingly, and left the children alone. By-
and-by he returned, dressed in the blue cloak,
and took Dora up again.
"I will see you home," he said.
The children had not been missed. The clock
124
THE PEACE EGG
had only just struck nine when there came a
knock on the door of the dining-room, where the
Captain and his wife still sat by the Yule log.
She said, "Come in," wearily, thinking it was
the frumenty and the Christmas cakes.
But it was her father, with her child in his
arms
125
VIII
Peace and Goodwill.
LUCY JANE BULL and her sisters were
quite old enough to understand a good
deal of grown-up conversation when they
overheard it. Thus, when a friend of Mrs.
Bull's observed during an afternoon call that
she believed that "officers' wives were very
dressy," the young ladies were at once resolved
to keep a sharp lookout for the Captain's wife's
bonnet in church on Christmas Day.
The Bulls had just taken their seats when the
Captain's wife came in. They really would
have hid their faces, and looked at the bonnet
afterwards, but for the startling sight that met
the gaze of the congregation. The old grand-
father walked into church abreast of the Captain.
"They 've met in the porch," whispered Mr.
Bull, under the shelter of his hat.
"They can't quarrel publicly in a place of
worship," said Mrs. Bull, turning pale.
126
THE PEACE EGG
"She 's gone into his seat," cried Lucy Jane,
in a shrill whisper.
"And the children after her," added the other
sister, incautiously aloud.
"WALKED INTO CHURCH ABREAST OF THE CAPTAIN."
There was now no doubt about the matter.
The old man in his blue cloak stood for a few
moments politely disputing the question of prece-
127
THE PEACE EGG
dence with his handsome son-in-law. Then the
Captain bowed and passed in, and the old man
followed him.
By the time that the service was ended every-
body knew of the happy peacemaking, and was
glad. One old friend after another came np with
blessings and good wishes. This was a proper
Christmas, indeed, they said. There was general
rejoicing.
But only the grandfather and his children
knew that it was hatched from "The Peace
Egg."
128
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