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 Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
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 http://www.archive.org7details/israelmortoverma01saun
 
 ISEAEL MOET, OVEEMAN 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 NEW NOVELS AT ALL LIBRARIES. 
 
 HEALEY : a Romance, By IMiss Jessie Fotheegill. 
 o vols, crown Svo. 
 
 •■ Mis; Katherine Healey' is a good deal after the style of " Jane 
 Eyre." ' — Spectator. 
 
 ' An interesting story, which shows the author possessed of no 
 small share of power.' — Graphic. 
 
 ' The plot of the book is well constructed and clearly worked 
 out . ' — Athex^um . 
 
 • We have no hesitation in saying that since Mrs. GaskelTs 
 unrivalled " Story of Manchester Life,'" there have been written 
 few more powerful stories than Miss Fothergill's •• Healey.'" ' 
 
 Manchester Examtsek. 
 
 THE HIGH MILLS. By Katheeike Sat-ojees, Author 
 of • Gideon's Rock," &c. 3 vols, crown Svo. 
 
 • Extremely well drawn.' — ATHEyjEOi. 
 
 • A good story.' — Standard. 
 
 ' Interesting to a very high degree.' — Graphic. 
 
 HENRY S. KlXa & CO., London.
 
 ISRAEL MORT, OVERMAN 
 
 A STORY OF THE MINE 
 
 JOHN SAUNDERS 
 
 Author op ' Abel Drake's Wu-e ' • Hirell ' etc. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES 
 Vol. I. 
 
 HENRY S. KING & CO., LONDON 
 
 1876
 
 {m Tight of translation and of reproduction is reserved.)
 
 So. 2^ 
 V. I 
 
 To the Right Sonourahle the Lord Aberdare, Late 
 Secretary of State for the Home Department. 
 
 My Lord, 
 
 In asking your permission to dedicate to you the 
 novel of 'Israel Mort, Overman,' permit me to give some 
 explanation. 
 
 I am one of those who think they already see the advent 
 of a time when our public men shall be judged, not by the 
 conspicuousness or power of their position — by the bias of 
 friend or enemy — by party triumphs or failures — not even 
 mainly by mere reforms of the instrument of legislation, 
 however necessary — but by the actual use they have made 
 of their opportunities to promote the social well-being of 
 their humbler fellow-men, and especially of those who most 
 
 rv 
 
 Co urgently needed help. 
 
 When, my Lord, that day comes, I venture to predict your 
 name will be most gratefully remembered, in connection 
 with the Act you succeeded in passing through Parliament, 
 in spite of the most adverse influences ; an Act which in 
 itself, or in its developments, will prove to be the miner's 
 ' Magna Charta.' 
 
 I have the honour, my Lord, to subscribe myself. 
 Your obedient Servant, 
 
 John Saunders.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 THE FIEST VOLUME. 
 
 PAGH 
 
 Introduction ...... 1 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 I. Spring-time and storm . . . .17 
 
 II. Showing now an Angel appeared to David . .34 
 
 III. In which the Reverend Horace Jones discovers 
 
 HE IS AN Orator . . . ,50 
 
 IV. Pekin 88 
 
 V. Coming to the Point .... 107 
 
 VI. The Last Holiday . . . .1:30 
 
 vri. The Battle of the Plans . . .144 
 
 VIII. David's first day in the Mine . . . 105 
 
 IX. The Fugitive ..... 205
 
 Vlll CONTEXTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 X. 'TwiXT Cup and Lip . . . .219 
 
 XI. Griffith Williams and Israel take Counsel 
 
 TOGETHER IN THE MiNE . . . 230 
 
 XII. Showing how Israel helped Mr. Griffith to a 
 
 Decision ..... 261 
 
 XIII. Dividing the Spoil .... 275 
 
 XIV. First Day of Power .... 295
 
 ISEAEL MOET 
 
 INTRODUCTION, 
 
 Borrowing, for a few brief moments, the wand 
 of the sorcerer Science, who can do what other 
 sorcerers only promise — raise up the dead — w^hat 
 does Science show in connection with that par- 
 ticular spot of ground where lies the scene of the 
 ensuing story ? 
 
 The hght, which almost needs some other word 
 to express its inconceivable splendour, is at first 
 too dazzling for the spirit-vision to see aught that 
 it can comprehend. 
 
 And when the eye has grown accustomed to 
 the fierce blaze of sunshine, and to its reflections 
 in the vast and near mirror, the sea, the difficulties, 
 while changing, grow rather than lessen. 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 2 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 It is a new world that is gazed on — a world in 
 which all objects are strange, unfamiliar, and seem 
 as unreal as a dream-picture — a world young, 
 and revelUng in its youth, and in all that youth 
 can give it of beauty, strength, profusion, and 
 riotous life. 
 
 Gradually this world, at first boundless as its 
 sea and sky, narrows to the sight, and displays a 
 forest rising from a lagoon, the water clear as 
 crystal, and, where its colour can be seen, of the 
 deepest blue. 
 
 A forest in which the grandeur and stately ele- 
 gance of the palm-like and other lofty trees, the 
 ideal perfection of loveliness in the tree-ferns and 
 other low-growing plants, and the amazing fecun- 
 dity of the exquisitely beautiful herbage, seem as 
 nothing in comparison with the novelty of their 
 forms and characters, or with the impressiveness 
 of the fact that actual human eye has never gazed 
 upon them, or their progeny of true lineal descent 
 (some few fossilised forms only excepted) ; that 
 they came into being — lived innumerable ages — 
 and then died, innumerable ages before the earth 
 knew man.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 But our guide fails us. Before sucli a scene of 
 enchantment Science itself cannot reveal worthily 
 the traits of that primeval time, except by taking 
 to its aid a still more potent auxihary — Imagina- 
 tion. Thus only can it restore something of the 
 infinite variety and of the wondrous structure of 
 the vegetation. 
 
 The scaly, and embossed, and medaUioned, and 
 interval-ringed giant stems ; the branches with 
 their endless varieties of expression and foliage ; 
 the gorgeous flowers ; the rich fruit-clusters ; all 
 more or less unknown to us now, but suggestively 
 indicated by the petrified remains of the few forms 
 that survive in that shape for our instruction and 
 delio'ht. 
 
 And so with the forms of animal, and insect, and 
 bird, and fish, and reptile life, seen perched in the 
 forest canopy, or winding about the tree trunks, 
 or roaming with vast bulk, crashing as they go, 
 through the dense jungle, or basking in the fierce 
 heat of the direct sun-rays, or cooHng themselves in 
 the depth of the waters of the lagoon, with pre- 
 posterous snouts just emerging from the surface. 
 
 It is the place and time for reptile and 
 
 B 2
 
 4 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 amphibious life, strange, grotesque, monstrous ! 
 And witli these, as with the plants, only the few, 
 and these the least important in the scale of 
 organisation, will survive, fossilised, for man to 
 know. 
 
 Such is the picture indicated by Science and 
 its ally. Our own eyes will help us to the con- 
 trast. 
 
 The broad lagoon has shrunk to a mere stream 
 descendins: from the mountain heis^hts to the 
 sea. 
 
 The luxuriant, graceful, beauteous, and magni- 
 ficent vegetable forms — above all, the palms and 
 the tree-ferns, most exquisite perhaps of vegetable 
 structures — where are they ? All shrunk to the 
 one unchanging garment of valley, hill-side, and 
 mountain-top — the humble British fern. 
 
 But the dazzling light and glory around that 
 lagoon, what have w^e in its place, to distinguish 
 the existing dell? 
 
 Here is the actual picture of the place as it is 
 — unexaggerated : 
 
 Where the centre of the lagoon v/as, is now a 
 black, grimy, dismal hollow — a resting-place be-
 
 INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 tween the winding incline of the still beautiful 
 valley above, and the rapid descent to the marshy 
 plain and sea below. 
 
 Man is there ; but hardly to give new dignity 
 to the scene of to-day, or to claim due honour for 
 his labours in having changed what was even a 
 century ago one of the loveliest of pastoral scenes 
 into that we now gaze upon. 
 
 Men and boys are passing to their work in that 
 blackened, grimy, bare-surfaced dell. Their hands 
 are black, their faces are black, and ghastly 
 through the unnatural glare thus given to the 
 white of the eye. They look haggard, and for the 
 most part are undersized. Their flannel garb is 
 fast assuming the hue of all around. - 
 
 Black sheds, with more important black build- 
 ings of brick, of all sizes and shapes and forms, 
 always excepting any form in the least approxi- 
 mating to picturesqueness or beauty, are grouped 
 in the centre. 
 
 Black pieces of new and old machinery, a chaos 
 of iron engines and parts of engines, and beams 
 and parts of beams, and wheels and parts of 
 wheels, and boilers and parts of boilers, and a
 
 6 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 hundred other unintelhgible things, he round the 
 buildings, leaving here and there little oases of 
 vegetation — that is to say, of grass — which, unable 
 to turn black, has done the next most appro- 
 priate thing, and faded to a lurid yellow. 
 
 Black flying bridges high in the air unite build- 
 ing with building. Eoads, with black mud, run 
 beneath and between. Flights of black steps 
 descend to the roads. A tall black chimney 
 stands towering near. 
 
 Through the indescribable ugliness and per- 
 vading atmosphere of sordid squalor that at first 
 glance characterises the place, three objects only 
 stand out in pleasant rehef : — the row of bright 
 red fires beneath the engine-shed, the hght pure 
 colour of the stone quarry in the background, and 
 the wheels that surmount the hideous scaffold-like 
 structure, built of great beams of timber with up- 
 rights, and a projecting angular arm from which 
 hangs a massive rope of wire to support the heavy 
 cage that is continually descending and ascending 
 between the black world above and the still 
 blacker one below. 
 
 These wheels are a study. They revolve in
 
 INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 opposite ways, they go at great speed, and are so 
 close, side by side, that the resulting motion is to 
 the eye something unique — charming in its sugges- 
 tiveness and beauty. They literally twinkle : no 
 other word can express their lovely and silent 
 motion. 
 
 There is one other trait, for the moment for- 
 gotten. On the black sludgy bridge that leads to 
 the deeper blackness of the pit mouth, a group of 
 birds, some of them of rare beauty and song, are 
 fearlessly hopping about between the very feet of 
 the tram drivers. They are picking up grains of 
 corn, and chattering, and quarrelling, and chir- 
 ruping, as merrily as if they saw not the actual 
 scene of to-day such as man has made it, but the 
 pastoral one of a former century; or even — if 
 birds, like men, dream of a golden age — of the 
 splendours of the still earlier primeval time, when 
 Mature, as apart from man, was all in all. 
 
 See then the two aspects of the same locahty ; 
 the black mine of Cwm Aber, and the dazzling 
 glory of the tropical forest and lagoon ! What is 
 the meaning of so violent a contrast and change ? 
 
 Would it not be remarkable if it were the very
 
 8 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 splendour and ashes of the dead beauty of the 
 one era, that gives all its ugliness and discomfort 
 to the other ? 
 
 Would it not be strancrer still if out of this 
 ugliness and discomfort should again come the 
 very essences of the light, and warmth, and glory 
 of that morning of the world ; colours which even 
 that time could not outvie ; means of enhancing 
 indefinitely human health, wealth, and happiness, 
 in all sorts of ways ? 
 
 And as man is the author of all the degra- 
 dation one sees here, so is he the hero who creates 
 from it so much that is truly precious. 
 
 Man wants coal. He has accidentally dis- 
 covered long ages ago how valuable a fuel it 
 makes. He has eagerly sought for the store- 
 houses of so precious a commodity. He has 
 pertinaciously solicited Nature to give to him the 
 keys. 
 
 She, on the contrary, appears to wish him to 
 understand she has intentionally hidden away the 
 coveted thing where he may never hope to get at 
 it ; far down in the very bowels of the earth,
 
 INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 where liiiman foot has never trod, where no form 
 of hfe, however humble, can possibly exist. 
 
 Man heeds her not, except in so far as he may- 
 learn how to circumvent her. Having dug out 
 whatever he can reach from the surface, he pre- 
 pares boldly to follow the coal, whithersoever it 
 may lead him, through any difficulties, any 
 dangers, to any depth. 
 
 Learned men come to his help ; and by the 
 study of the earth-rocks, where these happen to 
 be broken through by some primeval convulsion, 
 and exposed, as in great ravines, show him how to 
 track the unseen mineral, step by step, till at a 
 given point they say, ' Strike down boldly there, 
 and you will find it.' 
 
 He does so. He bores into the ground, some- 
 times through long, weary, and most anxious 
 months of unremitting and unremunerative labour, 
 perhaps to find there has been a deplorable 
 miscalculation and waste ; but, if so, he only 
 changes the arena where he means to fight out 
 this great battle. He again ventures ; and at last 
 succeeds.
 
 10 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 Who but those who have continually ex- 
 perienced the alternations of hope and despair 
 can tell the deliciousness of the moment which 
 brins^s the first tokens of such success — the little 
 handful of coal that emerges from the boring-rod 
 — not once, but continuously, through the space 
 say of a couple of yards ? Yes ; the promised 
 seam is there, is found at last ; and no star-gazer 
 ever looked on a new world discovered with 
 greater exultation than the mining engineer looks 
 upon the fragments of his earthly one; which now 
 ensure reputation to him, wealth to the enter- 
 prising speculators, employment to hundreds of 
 the needy, and a something of the glow and glory 
 of the sun, from which all its virtue is derived, 
 to innumerable hearths. 
 
 Yet Nature, with her sweet, impassive, sphinx- 
 like countenance, still hostilely confronts him, and 
 says, ' " Thus far and no farther." Thou knowest. 
 Be content with that, and ^vitli the fact thy know- 
 ledge has taught thee, that the treasure thou 
 seekest lies hundreds of fathoms deep. Go. 
 Leave me to the solitudes thou hast already too 
 much disturbed.'
 
 INTRODUCTIOiSr 11 
 
 And how does man answer her ? ' Where my 
 boring-rods have gone, I too can go, and will.' 
 
 So he digs a great shaft down from the surface 
 of the fern-clad soil, making its rounded sides 
 into safe and strong walls at every step of the 
 descent, until he can plant his foot at bottom firmly 
 on the coal-bed ; and thence look up as through 
 an interminable chimney to where, diminished to 
 a mere point of light, is the opening indicating the 
 spot where he quitted the safeguards of mother 
 earth. 
 
 Now then, surely he has only to strip, and dig 
 away with a will, and be content ! The strife is 
 over. Nature o^vns defeat, and gives up the 
 contest. 
 
 Ah no ! The strife is now only beginning in its 
 real intensity. 
 
 Water floods the bottom of the shaft, and 
 threatens at once ruin to the works, and death to 
 the workmen. 
 
 But this had been foreseen and provided for. 
 Man has already erected his powerful engines, and 
 stretched down his pumps, ever lengthening with 
 the depth of the shaft, and now laughs at the idea
 
 12 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 of inundation. With sublime audacity lie mocks 
 at Nature's law that makes water ever tend to go 
 down ; he takes it, as it were, into his hands, 
 even to the volume of a small river, and at once 
 sends it flowing perpendicularly upwards to the 
 surface, straighter than arrow could be made to 
 fly ; and having got it there, is only too glad to 
 let Nature reassert herself, and help him by carrying 
 it away in her own manner, and like Wordsworth's 
 stream, ' at its own sweet will.' 
 
 Even in this, however, he is often beaten, pros- 
 trated, rendered helpless ; but only uses the ex- 
 perience to make himself progressively ever 
 stronger, and still more strong, till he sees a dry 
 bottom, and has ample means to keep it so. 
 
 Nature must now retreat before her assailant ; it 
 is, however, only to He in wait for him in the deeper 
 recesses of the mine ; to make his every act of 
 locomotion, of labour, even of breathing, a source 
 of deadly danger, a cause of constant unrest. 
 
 How many of us sitting at ease in our light and 
 pleasant chambers, so carefully ventilated that 
 not even the slightest taint may be feared of suffi- 
 cient potency to shorten the natiu'al term of life
 
 INTRODUCTIOX. 13 
 
 even by the most infinitesimal amount, would 
 have the individual courage, the fortitude to con- 
 tinue such a contest, no matter how brilliant the 
 temptations, seeing that it is not for a day, for a 
 special efibrt or occasion, bringing with it its own 
 sufficing motive and reward, but for the whole life 
 through, of the actual working collier ? 
 
 Ah, yes! the world has yet to know, to feel 
 with, and to act justly by this humble, patient, un- 
 demonstrative, but truly heroic example of man- 
 hood. A model in some respects surely for the 
 whole of his kind. Watch him as he goes daily 
 to his labour, asking no inconvenient questions, 
 parading none of his unhappinesses through the 
 press unto the world, fainting before no obstacles, 
 losing heart at the contemplation of no perils. 
 He simply says, or, better still, feels it without 
 saying, ' This is the work I have got to do, and 
 which, please God, I mean to do ; ' and this work 
 he goes to do. 
 
 Not certainly rejoicingly, rather perhaps sadly, 
 but he goes. 
 
 And still the strife proceeds, to even more 
 tragical issues, but varied by incidents that lend
 
 14 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 a certain piquant, almost a humorous, interest 
 to it. 
 
 Meeting artifice by artifice, Nature one day- 
 plays the miner an odd trick. His pick strikes 
 into something that is clearly not coal, and the 
 unwelcome discovery is made that the treasure- 
 house is suddenly empty. 
 
 Incredulous miner! He is not thus to be 
 cheated out of his lawful prey. He guesses what 
 has happened — 'a fault' — geologically speaking, 
 but which he no doubt might like to express by 
 a stronger term. He guesses rightly. As if ex- 
 pressly to circumvent him whose whole hfe is 
 spent in circumventing her, Nature has here 
 broken the seam asimder ; and cunningly dropped 
 the yet untouched end some distance below the 
 other, and covered it with intervening rocks a& 
 useless as they are baffling to the miner. 
 
 Well, the boring-rod is again set to work ; the 
 lost treasure re-discovered that had been so cun- 
 ningly hidden, and down go sloping roadways 
 into it. Man is again victorious. 
 
 But at what a cost ! Some day or other — how- 
 ever distant, it will surely come, at least so fears
 
 INTRODUCTIOISr. 15 
 
 every thoughtful miner — an unhicky accident to 
 a lamp, or a vengeful swinging of it in a moment 
 of passionate anger against the head of a comrade, 
 or a criminal yet scarcely thought of negligence 
 or disobedience in exposing tlie naked flame to 
 kindle a pipe of tobacco, causes an explosion. 
 Nature during one moment of terrible vengeance 
 seems to make herself visible in all- destroying 
 flame, but those who see her — die. In the space 
 of a breath — a spasm, without even time for a 
 single cry or prayer, the whole of the busy 
 workers in that black hive may be plunged into 
 eternity, leaving not even one sohtary survivor to 
 narrate how the ghastly tragedy happened. 
 
 Then new eflbrts : — perhaps a new shaft made, 
 interminable inquests, legislative inquiries, sudden 
 spasmodic efforts to improve — then the old relapse 
 into inaction once more: — and so the conflict 
 goes on. 
 
 And will continue to do so, till the hour of 
 truer knowledge, of more Christian-hke faith in 
 the ultimate good attainable through brotherly 
 sympathy and help, shall reconcile the combatants. 
 
 But when that blessed hour comes, man will
 
 16 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 find how true and noble has been the friend he 
 has so long struggled with as his worst enemy — 
 how she has disciplined and elevated him — and 
 how necessary and vital it is to him to sit at her 
 feet in reverence, and learn from her what he so 
 much needs to know.
 
 17 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 SPRIXG-TIME AXD STOKM. 
 
 Though on tlie fifteenth of Marcli school was still 
 over at the early mnter hour, it was not till 
 past five in the afternoon that David Mort came 
 into the little path that led through Brynnant 
 Wood up to the village. An unusually companion- 
 able fit had made him loiter with some of his 
 schoolfellows, who were bird-nesting in the copse 
 below. 
 
 He had not assisted them ; but, sitting astride 
 on the topmost stone of the stile, had watched 
 their proceedings with a low, reflective whistle ; 
 occasionally ofiering lazily a word of advice^ 
 which he bore to have scoffed or laughed at with 
 unruffled good-temper. 
 
 He was going through the wood alone now ; 
 making every little movement in the brambles 
 
 VOL. I. z^c c
 
 18 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 below, or in the boughs above, an excuse for 
 loitering or standing still ; enjoying the warm 
 sun on his closed eyes ; and swinging his satchel 
 in a circle that kept an unseen nest of fledglings 
 open-mouthed with affright, so long as he re- 
 mained in theh^ view. 
 
 It was his twelfth birthday. For six years he 
 had passed through this wood four times almost 
 every day, yet it had attractions for him this 
 afternoon such as it never had before. The truth 
 was that never before had David been strong 
 enough to feel himself a part of the bright strong 
 life of the wood as he did now. 
 
 It had been on account of his physical weakness 
 that his father Israel Mort, Overman at the Cwm 
 Aber CoUiery, had, on finding him unfit for pit 
 work, apparently lost all recollection of his very 
 existence ; scarcely seeming to see him when he 
 crossed his path or when he sat opposite to him 
 at meal-times. Thus David had out-stayed nearly 
 all schoolfellows of his own age, had learnt almost 
 as much as his master was able to teach him, and 
 had arrived at his twelfth year and at a sound 
 state of health mth so little notice on the part of
 
 SPRIXG-TIME AXD STORM. 19 
 
 Israel, that David and his mother began to flatter 
 themselves this pleasant state of things might last 
 another five or six years. 
 
 David had dreams of slipping one day into the 
 schoolmaster's place ; and he cherished a wild 
 hope that nothing might occur to bring the 
 recollection of his useless existence to his fath*^ 
 absorbed mind till some such end should have 
 been obtained. 
 
 On one after another of his schoolfellows — 
 boys who had learned perhaps from the same 
 book as himself — the dread fiat had come. 
 Almost every week David's eye marked some 
 ruddy face grow prematurely old, and thoughtful, 
 reckless, and defiant — or pale, and full of vague, 
 unearthly fears. Then the face would be missing 
 from the familiar row against the white school- 
 room wall — and met no more — except hurrying 
 with the black swarm that passed between the 
 mine and Brynnant — all haste — blackness — 
 whites of eyes, and white teeth. 
 
 When David prayed ' deliver us from evil,' he 
 thought of the mine only. When he heard of 
 heaven being above the stars, nothing seemed 
 
 c 2
 
 20 ISRAEL MOKT. 
 
 to him so natural and certain as that the mine — 
 with all its horrors, destructive fires, and trea- 
 cherous waters — should be the very mouth of 
 the world of darkness, confusion, and misery be- 
 neath. 
 
 Wlien one of his companions passed into it, he 
 had his quiet way of mourning for him as if he 
 had been removed from the world by deatli. He 
 haunted such spots as the young miner had liked 
 best — made gifts to his little brother or sister, 
 remembered him at church and on his knees at 
 night, often woke disturbed by the imaginary 
 sound throbbing through his soft pillow of the 
 ' chip-chip ' of the pickaxe wielded by the black 
 hand of his playmate in some grim hole too 
 small for any bulkier form than his own to 
 work in. 
 
 A keen sense of gratitude for the safety and 
 peaceful sunshme of his own life in the midst of 
 such changes and dangers had had its effect on 
 David's character ; for it seemed to him that no 
 amount of patience, conscientious industry of 
 mind, self-sacrifice in little things, and profound 
 humility of soul, could ever repay God or men for
 
 SPKIXG-TIME AXD STORM. 21 
 
 the peace vouchsafed to him in permitting him to 
 remain upon the open sunny face of the earth, 
 mstead of forcing him down into its dark and 
 terrible mysteries. 
 
 He began to feel that he led a charmed life, the 
 spell of which a breath might break. 
 
 His enjoyment of it was usually quiet ; almost 
 hidden, as a thing to which he doubted his (^wn 
 right ; but in the wood that afternoon everything 
 seemed to help to deepen and strengthen it. 
 
 The sky which — each time the white clouds 
 rolled over it — was left clearer and fresher of hue, 
 like a beautiful eye after resting under its white 
 lid — the sky itself seemed tempting David to hope 
 anything, everything. 
 
 As this was the time his father would be home, 
 David on any other day w^ould have waited till 
 he saw the little parlour window obscured by 
 steam, so that he might slip in unnoticed, while 
 the Overman, stripped to the waist, was bending 
 — bhnd with hot water and soap — over a smok- 
 ing tub, and while David's mother applied the 
 scrubbing-brush or the flannels to his shoulders. 
 
 To-day, however, with an utter freedom from
 
 22 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 his usual timidity, David strode in, and looked 
 hungrily at the tea-table. 
 
 The Overman was taking a rest after his own 
 peculiar fashion, standing with his hands clasped 
 at the back of his neck, and his figure drawn up 
 and thrown a little forward on the toes. 
 
 As David on entering had thrown the door 
 wide open, the room was flooded with the light 
 of the March sun, that was just then sink- 
 ing behind the almost perpendicular wall of fir- 
 trees, shaking their ethereal new-born tassels 
 down the hill-side, across the valley, and making 
 all around look dark or dull by their vividness. 
 
 David went at once to examine the tea-table 
 without having noticed his father. Pleased with 
 what he saw there, he looked up with a bright, 
 appreciative smile at his motlier, who was touch- 
 ing the cups on the tray. With a most unusual 
 obliviousness she turned, and began to seek for 
 something on a high shelf with one hand, while 
 she held the other against her side. 
 
 A sad, patient, stricken-looking creature she 
 was. Calamity did not so much seem to have 
 smitten her by heavy but occasional blows, as to
 
 SPRIXG-TIME AND STOHM. 23 
 
 have kept on her one continual cruel unrelaxing 
 pressure, squeezing her very heart's blood out of 
 her, and leaving reaction impossible. 
 
 You could see as slie looked on her husband's 
 and son's faces, and as she moved away to put the 
 tea before them, that there was no spring or vital 
 impulse of any kind left in her. She could not 
 even complain. She could only bear in a kind of 
 dull way her Hfe of suffering. 
 
 Still a sharp observer might have noticed a 
 difference in the looks she gave to Israel and to 
 the boy. To the one it was a glance of perfectly 
 drilled obedience — that ever waited but to know 
 what was desired from it — without the faintest 
 suggestion of hope or desire that she might give 
 him or herself pleasure from the fulfilment of 
 his wishes. To the other it was at once a glance 
 of tender love and earnest fear, but both 
 shadowed and weakened by the sense of utter 
 helplessness. 
 
 Noticing her pecuhar behaviour, and seeing that 
 his father was making no preparations for his bath, 
 and must therefore be going back to the pit with 
 the nio^ht-shift of miners, David began to think
 
 24 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 something had happened there — an accident, a 
 death, perhaps. 
 
 The blood rushed to liis cheeks, which still 
 tingled from the cutting March wind ; and 
 he turned to his father in silent, humble 
 inquiry. 
 
 Israel Mort stood just in the stream of light the 
 open door admitted. He was still clasping his 
 hands behind his neck and standing raised on his 
 toes, as if the luxury of stretching was the most 
 complete rest he could have. The whole of him, 
 from the top of a sort of skull-cap to his boots, 
 was black, with the exception of his eyes with 
 their pupils of dull brown and large yellowish 
 whites ; with the exception, also, of a shght red- 
 ness at his finger-nails, and the redness of half his 
 Hps where his breath had moistened them. These 
 were well formed, as indeed were all his features ; 
 but there was on them a repose almost starthng. 
 It was not the repose of a face denoting inward 
 peace, it was the repose of stone. It was a face 
 that reminded one of the front of a house that, 
 from some whim of its inmates, has ceased to be 
 used as a front. If Israel's thoughts might be
 
 SPRING-TIME AXD STORM. 25 
 
 called the inmates of liis face, they certainly 
 seldom indeed (if ever) appeared there. They 
 led a hidden hfe. Their results might be known 
 in the outer world sometimes, but they themselves 
 were invisible ; none saw their coming or their 
 going. The very dulness of his opaque brown 
 eyes was the dulness of eyes that chose to be 
 dull ; to wear a blind of impassiveness, alnfost 
 stupor, through wdiich their owner might, unsus- 
 pected, study any face he liked as closely as he 
 liked. 
 
 The Overman's figure was, perhaps, even more 
 remarkable than his face. It was rather above 
 the middle height ; and though scant of flesh, had 
 no visible angle anywhere about it, but a kind of 
 hard roundness from head to foot. Perhaps his 
 clothes, made to suit his own notions of utility 
 and comfort, helped to this effect. Certainly 
 Israel Mort had less the appearance of a man 
 of flesh, bone, and blood than he had of an iron 
 worm ; round, lithe, and living ; and made to 
 work, and eat, and writhe its way through the 
 stony and carboniferous fastnesses of the earth. 
 He looked, in fact, a diver-born, ready armed and
 
 26 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 breathed, to dive again and yet again into that 
 underground, waveless sea of death. 
 
 As David looked at his father, questioning with 
 his wide, timorous blue eyes, Israel let the clasp 
 of his hands at the back of his neck snap ; and 
 stretching one towards David, laid it on his head 
 and looked at him steadily with those dull, im- 
 passive orbs of his. 
 
 David's breath quickened, so did the beating of 
 his heart. His mother looked on. 
 
 It was several years since the Overman had 
 taken so much notice of his useless son. 
 
 'Why, we shall be getting too strong, next,' 
 said he, in the loud deep tone of one accustomed 
 to hear his voice muffled and dulled by narrow 
 walls and low roof. 
 
 ' He is flushed,' said Mrs. Mort. ' Come to your 
 tea, David.' 
 
 ' Flushed ! ' echoed Israel, drawing his hand 
 over both cheeks. ' Cool as a cucumber ! ' he 
 added, with a slight smile, as he turned from the 
 boy, and went to wash his face and hands. 
 
 He had no sooner left the room than David's 
 eyes sought his mother's. He found them fixed
 
 SPRIXG-TIME AM) STORM. 27 
 
 upon him sorrowfully, passionately ; but no sooner 
 did they encounter his than they turned away 
 again. 
 
 David crossed to where his mother stood busy- 
 ing herself with some things on the top of an old 
 bureau. He touched her elbow. 
 ' ' Mother ! ' 
 
 Mrs. Mort looked round, not at David, but of er 
 him towards the door by which Israel had gone 
 out and would presently return. 
 
 There was a great resemblance between these 
 two, though David was a picture of health and 
 grace without blemish, and Mrs. Mort was wan 
 and angular. David, too, though blue-eyed, was 
 much darker than his mother, whose fairness had 
 now blanched into a dull, faint colour, which 
 possessed eyes, lips, cheeks, and hair. The thing 
 which made them so ahke was the long-endured, 
 never-absent dread, the unmentioned haunting 
 fear that both shared. 
 
 ' Mother ! ' said David again, in a more rousing 
 and comforting voice. 
 
 ' Go to your tea, David,' Mrs. Mort said sharply, 
 pushing him by the shoulder ; and glancing up,
 
 28 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 David saw his father coming into the room, and 
 looking straight at them with perfectly expression- 
 less eyes. 
 
 While they were at tea, David and liis mother 
 experienced a moment or two of the greatest 
 relief and peace they had ever known. Israel 
 began to talk of liis employer, Mr. Jehoshaphat 
 Williams, and his illness, of the quarrels about his 
 case between the Brynnant medical man and the 
 doctor who attends the people of the mine. While 
 he was speaking David asked himself if he might 
 not be as wrong and unreasonable in his sus- 
 picions this time as he had been so many, many 
 times before. But he remembered his mother's 
 anxious, timorous manner. What had she heard 
 to have looked as she did when he came in ? 
 
 Then he wondered might it not be that after 
 all she had taken her fears from Iiis own face 
 when his father had so startled him ? He looked 
 at her, trying to express his feeling that their 
 dread liad been groundless. The wan face lightens 
 suddenly. 
 
 David was assured. It teas after all, he felt 
 again, only his own cowardly fancy. His mother
 
 SPRING-TIME AND STORM. 29 
 
 woiild have feare J notliing if it had not been for 
 his fear. 
 
 He had come home with rather a better appe- 
 tite than even school, bird-nesting, and the March 
 Tvind might be supposed to impart. This had 
 vanished completely at Israel's unusual attentions, 
 but now it returned again in full strength. There 
 is no telling how long he might have gone pn 
 hacking at the quartern loaf with his vigorous 
 little clasp-knife, disregarding utterly his mother's 
 looks of hesitating remonstrance, if he had not 
 suddenly become awai'e of his father's eyes being 
 fixed upon him. 
 
 Israel nodded. 
 
 ' Eat away; said he : ' to work hke a man, one 
 miist eat like a man.' 
 
 The httle clasp-knife fell ; the great sHce it 
 had just cut lay across David's plate untouched. 
 
 He looked again at his mother, but her colour- 
 less eyelashes were down as if glued to her pale 
 cheek. 
 
 Israel turned to her and said carelessly — 
 
 'Mary, just bring that bundle I brought in 
 it's on David's bed.'
 
 30 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 She rose and left the room. While she was 
 gone, David sat without raising his eyes, and fully 
 conscious that his father was watching him. 
 
 When ]\fc. Mort returned, David rose at the 
 sight of her. She had nothing in her hands, but 
 her Hps were almost blue, and she seemed scarcely 
 able to drag one foot after the other as she went 
 to Israel's chair. 
 
 She laid both her hands upon his shoulder, and, 
 bending down, whispered something that David 
 did not hear. His father, however, noticed her 
 words in no other way than turning to look at 
 her, and saying in his Overman's voice — 
 
 ' I asked you to bring them here, Mary.' 
 
 She went again and came back with something 
 in her arms. David saw directly what this was — 
 a suit of mining clothes made of a size to fit him. 
 
 She went up to Israel with them, but instead of 
 letting him take them when he stretched out his 
 hand, she held them so tightly as she looked at 
 him, that he was obhged to rise and drag them 
 gently but firmly from her. 
 
 ' Now David, my man,' said he, throwing them 
 at the boy's feet, ' put those on.'
 
 SPRING-TIME AND STORM. 31 
 
 'Father!' cried David. 'Mother! what are 
 they for ? Oh ! you don't mean, father — ' 
 
 ' Put them on ! ' commanded the Overman, in a 
 certain pecuhar tone of his that was very rarely 
 disobeyed. ' Obedience first, David ; questions 
 afterwards.' 
 
 In two or three minutes Israel was contem- 
 plating, with grim satisfaction, what seemed lo 
 him a small but promising imitation of him- 
 self 
 
 One thing annoyed his eye as he surveyed 
 him : — 
 
 ' Mary,' he said, turning to his wife, ' give me a 
 pair of scissors : we must have nothing straggling 
 and ready to catch at things ; this hair might be in 
 the way.' 
 
 By this time, however, Mrs. Mort was perfectly 
 useless. She had fallen into a chair, and sat 
 watching them like one spell-bound. 
 
 David felt that, unfit as he was to speak, the 
 moment for his appeal had come. He would 
 make one desperate attempt to touch his father's 
 heart ; he would teU him all his hopes, his little
 
 32 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 plans of how he might be a man by other means 
 than this. 
 
 When Israel took the scissors from the bureau 
 and began to cut his hair, the boy considered that 
 perhaps it would be as well to wait till he had 
 finished, lest it should seem this trivial act had 
 anything to do with his emotion and resistance. 
 
 All at once, while he was wondering how nearly 
 his father had finished his novel task, David had a 
 leather cap drawn firmly down over his head, and 
 felt himself approaching the door in a grasp of 
 iron. 
 
 Two simultaneous cries, expressing aU the fears 
 that had tortured two hearts for years, were heard 
 from end to end of the rows of miners' cottages 
 known as Pekin. 
 
 Some of the neighbours running out from their 
 doors to learn what that shriek of ' Israel I ' and 
 ' Father ! ' meant, saw the Overman's figure, with 
 a smaller one beside it, passing swiftly in the 
 twilight. 
 
 Two women whispered together — and hurried 
 to the Overman's cottage. 
 
 Opening the door and looking in, they saw by
 
 SPRIXG-TDIE AXD STORM. 33 
 
 the firelight a woman sitting on the floor, looking 
 ^vildly at a little heap of light hair beside her. 
 
 Seeing them, she lifted her eyes and arms, crying 
 out — 
 
 ' Yes, it has come at last ! Oh ! God, have mercy 
 — have mercy upon him ! ' 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 SHOWING HOW AN ANGEL APPE.iRED TO DAVID. 
 
 The way to the mine was, for a short time, 
 through a wood, which was in parts so dense as 
 to create an artificial darkness. 
 
 Somehow David felt that this darkness was 
 necessary for the fearful occasion, and that such 
 a horror as putting a young shrinking soul and 
 body into the dark mysteries of the earth could 
 scarcely have been committed in broad open day- 
 light and sunshine. 
 
 He wondered feebly whether he might per- 
 chance be saved if, when they got free from the 
 wood, the sun burst out again and shone upon his 
 father's face, so as to shame the hard and cruel 
 resolution from his eyes, and slacken the iron 
 grip of his hand. 
 
 He looked up askance at him, and tried to
 
 HOW AX AKGEL APPEARED TO DAVID. 35 
 
 shape some faltering words that he would say to 
 him; but the hard features seemed to grow to 
 iron, and even to assume something of the tinge 
 of iron in the subdued light. 
 
 Israel noticed the effort, and said in a less 
 harsh voice than usual — 
 
 ' All right, boy, we're fairly off now. It'll soon 
 be over, and you'U laugh at your own fears when 
 you get back home. I dare say I was a bit 
 uncomfortable when I first went down, though I 
 can't say as I remember the fact.' 
 
 From time to time black figures, each one hold- 
 ing a lamp, or having it hung on the breast, met 
 them ; others were passed by them ; the former 
 leavhag the mine from their day's labour, the latter 
 going to it, to begin the business of the night.- 
 
 They all looked questioningly from Israel to 
 David, and back again to Israel ; while the boy 
 yearningly, passionately gazed into their faces, 
 seeking perhaps some familiar friend, and asking, 
 in that dumb but moving eloquence — was there no 
 one in all the world who could and would save 
 him? 
 
 He dared not speak. The colUers, on their 
 
 D 2
 
 36 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 part, knowing the temper of tlie Overman, and 
 conscious of his power, moved on, also in silence. 
 
 The pair emerged from the wood, and there, 
 immediately before and a little below them, was 
 the exterior of the mine of Cwm Aber. 
 
 David thought he knew the whole ugly picture 
 by heart, down to the smallest detail. It was a 
 fearful mistake he felt now. He had looked at it 
 before merely as a scene that being constantly 
 near or before him became necessarily familiar, 
 but about which he cared nothing, felt no curi- 
 osity ; and upon which his eyes never rested any 
 longer than they could help, though drawing from 
 it new zest for the enjoyment of his walks over 
 the fern-clad mountains, or through the lovely 
 neighbouring valleys and woods when wild flowers 
 were abundant. 
 
 But now he sickened at the sight of the awful- 
 looking place, and the dusky forms moving to and 
 fro, and crowding about the pit mouth. 
 
 All that poor David had ever heard and read 
 of heaven or hell, of angels or demons, came 
 vividly into his mind, as he thought of the beauti- 
 ful world and the playmates he was leaving
 
 HO^ AX AXGEL APPEARED TO DAVID. 37 
 
 beliind him, and of the hideous depths into which 
 he was about to descend, guided by these ghastly 
 spectre shapes. 
 
 He heard, as in a dream, the measured slow 
 beat of the engine, then its sudden quickening, its 
 violent pantings and rush, then its relapse into 
 slowness and momentary silent lull. 
 
 He saw, without being able even to wish to 
 understand them, the beautiful airy wheels re- 
 volve on high. 
 
 For he saw also the black cage ascend and 
 descend with its human freight, and the thought 
 that that would presently be waiting for him 
 seemed almost to deprive the lad of his senses. 
 
 Israel still strode on, pitilessly as Fate, with 
 David as the victim in his grasp. 
 
 The place of terror — the actual pit's mouth 
 was reached. 
 
 The colliers moved aside, in deference to the 
 Overman, and left the way clear. 
 
 A moment more, and father and son stood close 
 beside the cage, Israel almost touching it, David 
 striving with all his little strength to keep as far 
 from it as he could.
 
 38 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Then, seeing the sternness of his father's face, 
 and the look of indignant surprise and wonder 
 that accompanied the severe expression, David 
 ralhed what little courage remained to him, and 
 said in a trembling excited voice — 
 
 ' Please, father, let me go by myself.' 
 
 Israel scanned his face just for a single moment, 
 then said — 
 
 ' Certainly ! ' and waited for David to speak or 
 move. 
 
 The boy looked round desperately in every 
 direction, but did not attempt to fly, conscious it 
 would be useless. 
 
 Then he looked once more at the cage, and 
 shrank. 
 
 'What now?' asked Israel, threateningly. Then, 
 after a pause, he said with more gentleness, ' Come, 
 I shall get in first.' 
 
 Israel got in, and called to David to follow. 
 
 The boy did not answer, but stood panting, with 
 dilated nostrils and heaving shoulders. 
 
 Israel got out again without uttering a word, 
 and went to take hold of him, but David feU on 
 his knees, and, throwing back his brow, on which
 
 HOTT AX AXGEL APPE.\RED TO DAYID. 39 
 
 large drops of sweat had risen, began to shriek at 
 him. 
 
 Again Israel spoke to his son, asking him if he 
 would go quietly down. 
 
 Getting no answer, he suddenly Hfted David as 
 he knelt, and thrust him in the cage. 
 
 Here David clung to his neck so fiercely that 
 he was about to strike him with his clenched fist 
 to make him let go. 
 
 At that moment the unknown, unseen angel, to 
 whom poor David had been praying passionately, 
 even though half unconsciously, to come down 
 from heaven and save him — since from earth and 
 man there was no hope — suddenly interposed, and 
 stood between them. 
 
 Certainly a more unangelic-looking messenger 
 from the skies it would be hard to conceive. For 
 while, hke all the other colliers around, who were 
 busy having their lamps locked, or reclining on 
 coal heaps near the fire that burnt on an iron 
 tripod, everything about him looked preternatu- 
 rally black or preternaturally white, this man 
 was distinguished by his startling ugliness — due 
 to no natural defect, but simply to the burns he
 
 40 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 had experienced in an explosion. These had left 
 the surface of the cheek fearfully scarred and 
 bossed, and had altogether erased one eyebrow — 
 leaving in its place a ghastly line of white skin 
 that seemed rather silk than human cuticle. 
 
 But David saw nothing of this ; he saw^ only 
 the bright and kindly eye, and the sympathetic 
 expression of the features. He experienced an 
 instant and immense revulsion of feeling — from 
 utter despair to brightest hope. His guardian 
 angel was there ! And in the person of the man 
 next in authority under Israel — James Lusty, his 
 deputy. 
 
 'What, Master David,' said the cheery voice, 
 ' going to get a bit o' experience o' mining, and 
 larn to be as clever as your father? Ah, lad! 
 that ain't so easy ! But wait a bit, and we'll see 
 ■^vhat can be done — won't we. Master Mort ? ' 
 
 Then turning to Israel, he added — 
 
 ' Let the lad alone for to-night, and let him go 
 down with me o' Monday morning. I know the 
 ways of boys — I ought to, having had eight of 
 my own, and ahl on 'em down in mines in one 
 part o' the country or another.'
 
 HOW .iX AXGEL APPE.\KED TO DAVID. 41 
 
 ' I think, Lusty, you had better mind your own 
 affairs, and leave me to mind mine. There's the 
 shp in level No. 5 must be seen to to-night ; the 
 roof's o;ivino[. Now David ! ' 
 
 ' Stop, Mr. Mort ! Looking at you and the lad 
 I quite forgot what I came back to the mine for. 
 I have just seen the governor ; he sent for you, 
 and then, wdien they said you were away, he sent 
 for me.' 
 
 ' What for ? ' demanded Israel harshly, who 
 had his own particular reasons for letting every- 
 body about him understand there was to be no 
 currying favour with Mr. Jehoshaphat Williams, 
 the owner. 
 
 ' I wondered what for myself, but I had orders, 
 and of course I obeyed.' 
 
 ' Well ? ' said Israel, impatiently. 
 
 ' I found him very ill,' continued Lusty, ' and in 
 an awful temper, swearing more oaths than I ever 
 know'd the existence of afore, and between whiles 
 axing, " Where is Israel ? Why doesn't he 
 come ? ^Yhat business has the fellow to be 
 away ? " ' 
 
 ^ And what did you answer ? '
 
 42 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' " Well, sir," says I, " no doubt cuttin' coal, 
 and seein' it done is the first dooty o' life, but you 
 see it ain't easy to do this duty without a bit of 
 eating and a bit of washin' and a bit of sleepin' 
 now and then ; and it seems to me, sir, if I may 
 make bold to speak, that Israel Mort don't get 
 very much of any of these little wants of 
 natm^'." ' 
 
 ' You said that Jem ? ' 
 
 'Ask him if I didn't!' 
 
 ' And then ? ' 
 
 ' Well, he looked as I once seed a tiger look in 
 a showman's cage, when, having got hold of a 
 deUcate morsel in a child's finger, pushed between 
 the bars, he was obhgated to let go by a red-hot 
 bar of iron a-fi.zzing unpleasantly at his hind 
 quarters. And then he says to me, " It seems to 
 me, Jem, that ahl you fellows care more for my 
 Overman, and what he says and does, than for 
 me." That made me grin, as I said back to him, 
 " If we do, it ain't for want of his well workin' us, 
 I can tell you, sir ; no, nor for want of his makin' 
 us ahl do the work cheap." Then he laughed, 
 and owned there was summat i' that, and then,
 
 HOW AX AXGEL APPEAEED TO DAVID. 43 
 
 after rapping out another oath, too bad even for 
 me, who ain't partiklar, to repeat, he hustled me 
 off to seek you, and send you to him, and his last 
 speech to me was, " Tell Mort," says he, " these 
 damned doctors think I am dying, but ain't 
 men enough to say so ; and that if I do die 
 before he gets here, it'll be ahl the worse for 
 him." ' 
 
 Israel lost no time in indecision. Just for a 
 single moment he paused, in study, then gave Lusty 
 his orders : 
 
 ' Go to Eees Thomas, level No. 5. Tell him to 
 take as many repairers as he wants and begin 
 at the far end, choosing for the present only the 
 most dangerous bits. You do the same from this 
 end. So go on till the colliers come to work 
 in the morning, if you don't see me before. 
 Should anything particular occur that needs to be 
 acted on, act at once. Consult together, use your 
 best judgment, agree if you can, but agree 
 quickly ; and if you can't agree, let Eees Thomas 
 as night-deputy decide.' 
 
 ' Tickhsh job, Mr. Mort ! Them props and 
 cross beams are desperate bad ! '
 
 44 ISRAEL MOET. 
 
 ' I know that. But you're the very men to be 
 trusted with such jobs. Explain to Eees Thomas 
 why I can't come as I promised him. He has 
 been worrying me about the " danger," as he 
 calls it.' 
 
 Lusty "went away to get his men, tools, &c., 
 and his going seemed to David like a second and 
 more tragic withdrawal of the light and blessed- 
 ness of the sun. 
 
 He waited ; every limb trembhng with ap- 
 prehension lest the struggle was about to be 
 renewed. 
 
 He saw his father glance askance at him, while 
 he stood pondering over some idea about which 
 he hesitated. 
 
 'David,' he said, turning to the boy, and 
 speaking in more thoughtful, measured tones than 
 were usual with him in addressing dependants, 
 ' David, are you man enough to keep a promise if 
 you make one ? ' 
 
 ' What — what — promise, father ? ' faltered out 
 David, anxious to please, yet afraid of the con- 
 sequences. 
 
 ' Well, I can't go down the mine with you to-
 
 HOW AX .\XGEL APPEAKED TO DAVID. 45 
 
 night, and I suppose you'd rather go \vith me 
 when you do go ? ' 
 
 ' Y— , yes— father ! ' 
 
 ' On Monday morning I expect to have quite 
 other business to attend to, if, as seems likely, Mr. 
 Jehoshaphat dies before then. Are you hstening ? 
 Do you understand ? ' 
 
 'Yes, father!' 
 
 ' Now then I'll see if I can treat you as a man. 
 I'll make a bargain ^vith you, if only to see how 
 you can keep it. Give me your word you wiU go 
 down ^vith me quietly on Monday morning early, 
 just for an hour or two, to see the place and the 
 people at work, and get used to them, and then 
 you shall come up again with me, and go with me 
 to the Farm — if I go — but in any case you shaU 
 have the rest of the day for a holiday. Then on 
 Tuesday morning you begin in earnest, with no 
 more nonsense ! Now, David, that'll please your 
 mother.' 
 
 ' Oh no, father ! ' burst in David, impetuously. 
 
 'Well then, it'U please me. Are you man 
 enough to do this — to know the time has come 
 when you must act like a man ? Will you
 
 46 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 take my hand now, and say bravely, "Yes, 
 father"?' 
 
 David's heart was full, and Israel had at last 
 found the way to it. After a few natural spasms 
 of anguish at the renewed thought of the beautiful 
 world behind him and the hideous mine below, 
 he took his father's large outstretched hand be- 
 tween both his httle ones, tried to smile, then 
 burst into tears and stifled sobs, while saying, 
 
 ' Yes, father, yes, I will ! Oh, I will indeed ! ' 
 
 ' You promise me to go quietly down on Mon- 
 day morning for an hour or two.' 
 
 'I do, father!' 
 
 ' You promise me to begin work regularly on 
 Tuesday, and to let me be troubled with no more 
 nonsense ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, father,' cried David, still holding the hand 
 and pressing it convulsively against his panting 
 breast. 
 
 ' All right. Fulfil your promise and you shall 
 be a man — perhaps after all a deal luckier man 
 than your father, when you come to see all that I 
 see. Now then go home, and tell your mother 
 that I may be very late — ^perhaps kept all night.'
 
 HOW AN ANGEL APPEARED TO DAVID. 47 
 
 David's first impulse was to run, his next to go 
 very slowly indeed, lest his father might, because 
 he saw him run, stop him. 
 
 There was only a few yards to pass over before 
 he would get behind a building, and then 
 
 His father was still standing where he had left 
 him. He was sure of that, for he had hstened 
 with intensest expectancy for the sound of his 
 step, which he felt he must be able to distinguish. 
 Why did his father not move ? He must be 
 hesitating! And David knew instinctively that 
 this letting him escape was not an action natural 
 to his father. 
 
 With bounding heart and step he was just about 
 to pass behind the house which contained the 
 gigantic revolving fan for ventilating the mine, 
 when, like the voice of doom, came the one 
 word, 
 
 ' David ! ' 
 
 Should he turn or fly? This might be his last 
 chance ! No : his father had appealed to him — as 
 a man — he still remembered that ; he would turn 
 and go back. 
 
 He did so, and Israel met him, and looked and
 
 48 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 spoke as pleased in his grim fashion at the boy's 
 obedience. David saw his face, and noted the 
 tone of voice, and felt certain his father had done 
 this only to try him, and he was glad — almost 
 proud. 
 
 ' As I told thee, lad,' said Israel, ' I may be 
 very late. So thou hadst better hear now what 
 I was about to tell thee in the morning. Mr. 
 Jehoshaphat is to be prayed for at the church 
 to-morrow. I shall be there if I can. Tell your 
 mother you are to be there too — even if she 
 won't go.' 
 
 ' But, father — mother is so miserable if I don't 
 go to chapel with her.' 
 
 ' Be at the church early, a few minutes before 
 the service begins. You will larn to-morrow, 
 I expect, more than your silly school has yet 
 larned you in all these years. You will larn 
 all about a great man — and so larn, I hope, how 
 to be a great man yourself. Succeed — succeed — 
 succeed — my boy! That's the one thing I and 
 the parson are now going to try to teach you. 
 Now run home — fast as you like.' 
 
 David needed no second bidding. Away he
 
 HOW AX AXGEL APPEAKED TO DAVID. 49 
 
 went, with steps almost as fleet as those of the 
 hare, that, after escaping her hunters, suddenly 
 frightens herself with the fear they may again be 
 upon her, and therefore, though unpursued, again 
 takes madly to flight. 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 ISKIEL MORT. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 lis WHICH THE REVEEEXD HORACE JONES 
 DISCOVERS HE IS AN ORATOR. 
 
 The little cliurcli of Brynnant, in South Wales, 
 stands at the very mouth of a winding valley, that 
 is seen high up, emerging from behind and 
 betvreen two mountain-crests, then rapidly de- 
 scending, accompanied by the music of its own 
 wild stream, till it debouches through the church- 
 yard, as if that were its own particular gateway, 
 on to the broad marshy plain, which here skirts 
 the seashore, protected by a hue of sandbanks 
 far as the eye can reach. 
 
 The scene is one of no ordinary beauty. The 
 little river — rushing^ alono- in a kind of sweet 
 tumult of rejoicing — encircles nearly two-thirds of 
 the churchyard wall ; as thougli the living spirit
 
 AN ORATOR DISCOVERED. 51 
 
 of the water, coming fresh, pure, impulsive from 
 a thousand natural springs, and about to offer 
 itself for the use of the people of the village, 
 desired before its contact with humanity to obtain 
 the virtue and assurance of consecration. 
 
 To watch from inside the low churchyard wall 
 the circuitous descent of this water over its rocky 
 bed is a constant charm : so many little incidents 
 disturb its course ; so many voices seem born with 
 the incidents and die with them ; so many lights 
 and shadows make it a continual playground. 
 And then, as it approaches a weir, there is such 
 a sudden swirl and rush, as if it were about 
 to leap over rather than glide down across the 
 step-hke ledges of the tiny barrier. 
 
 Yet, if you lift your eyes but for a moment from 
 the minute details that enthral you, how great is 
 the contrast ! Noble mountains are on either side, 
 whose majestic bulk and contour dwarf every- 
 thing about them, and seem to reduce all but 
 themselves to utter insignificance. Even the 
 broad sea, in this its hour of peaceful repose, 
 seems but as a grander moat to these sublime 
 natural fortresses. , ^x "^"^
 
 52 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 It is Sunday afternoon, and people are slowly 
 gathering towards the church, stopping as they 
 meet, in groups, to discuss the all-important event 
 of last night, the dangerous illness of Mr. 
 Jehoshaphat Wilhams, the oldest living commu- 
 nicant, the founder of their schools, the employer 
 of the bulk of their labouring poor. 
 
 And is he really given over by the doctor ? 
 Will the curate pray for him ? Will he speak of 
 him in his sermon ? Does old Mrs. Jehoshaphat, 
 his wife, know? Will she be at church pre- 
 sently ? 
 
 So runs tlie ceaseless flow of questions which 
 no one attempts to answer, but which is instantly 
 arrested as an aged and infirm woman enters the 
 churchyard, her right hand grasping a strong 
 stick, her left- resting on the arm of a rustic- 
 looking youth, whose vacant face and limp whitish 
 diseased-looking hair, from which all traces of 
 vitality seem discharged, imply degradation] of 
 race, and ofier a significant commentary on the 
 bold peasantry, their country's pride, of which the 
 poet speaks. 
 
 He moves mechanically, just as she impels^him,
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 53 
 
 seeming, indeed, to have no business whatever in 
 creation but to hold that trembhng arm — do as it 
 bids him, by the language of hasty jerks or pulls 
 — and move on, with lips apart, and eyes that 
 would be full of wonder at w^hat is now passing, 
 but that their natural powder does not extend 
 quite so far. 
 
 As man and wife have long been divided, in 
 homes as well as hearts, the whole parish knows 
 of the sad state of the relations between this aged, 
 tottering, but still defiant-looking woman, and the 
 unhappy man, now stricken so low in his sohtary 
 dwelhng on a spur of the mountain-height. But if 
 their relations had been ever so secret, it would, 
 if we may judge from her present behaviour, have 
 mattered little to Mrs. Jehoshaphat, who is stop- 
 ping to speak to one of the men as he is going 
 towards the church porch. 
 
 'Wliat, Israel Mort come to church once more !' 
 
 ' So it seems,' responded Israel, confronting her 
 with a calmness that made the old lady irritable. 
 
 ' And when were you here last ? Shall I tell 
 you?' 
 
 ' As you please, Mrs. Jehoshaphat.'
 
 54 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Never since you came witli him, my husband, 
 when he was what you still are, an Overman on 
 six-and-twenty shillings a week.' 
 
 ' It's very likely,' said the imperturbable Israel, 
 who seemed rather interested than offended by 
 her attack. 
 
 ' Very likely ! ' repeated the shrill and angry 
 voice of the old lady ; which then sank low, 
 almost to a whisper before she went on. ' Hark 
 you, Israel Mort — was it also very Hkely that you 
 who was then his only friend, should try to trip 
 him up, and get his place ? ' 
 
 'He thought it uncommon hkely,' said Israel, 
 with a grim something passing over his features, 
 that looked like a shadow, but might be his 
 sardonic smile. ' I know, ma'am, he laughed con- 
 foundedly when he found it out, and owned he 
 should ha' done just the same.' 
 
 ' Ay, and he made you his slave ever since, 
 by way of punishment. While he has laughed 
 stiU more at that, many and many a time in my 
 hearing.' 
 
 ' Don't they say a wiUin' slave is the worst of 
 slaves ? ' asked Israel ; but finding she gave no
 
 AN ORATOR DISCOVERED. 55 
 
 answer, answered himself. ' I say lie is, and 
 that's what I have been. And now, ma'am, haYin' 
 had all your own way — as ladies like to have — 
 I hope you're pleased with me, and I wish you 
 good mornin' ! ' 
 
 Mrs. Jehoshaphat had begun her attack on 
 Israel in a tone of bitter scorn, but it was obvious 
 to him she was moved by quite different emotions 
 than those she allowed to appear. She had 
 continued to the last word to speak as if her 
 thought and her speech were as effectually 
 divorced as herself and husband; but seemed 
 suddenly to lose her self-control, and be seized 
 with a fit of passionate emotion which well-nigh 
 choked her. She shook as if with palsy. Her 
 almost toothless gums went up and down me- 
 chanically, as if she vainly strove to continue her 
 speech. After a brief pause, during which the 
 man she had addressed stood silent, gazing at her 
 as if he perfectly understood all she had said or 
 would say, but saw no sufficient reason to inter- 
 fere, she recovered herself as Israel was moving to 
 go away, stretched out her stick, and touched 
 him with it gently.
 
 56 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 He turned, and saw an expression in her face 
 that caused him to retrace his steps. 
 
 ' Israel, don't mind me. I can't help speaking 
 out a bit now and then. I should go mad if I 
 didn't. Tell me, how is he ? ' 
 
 ' Mr. Jehoshaphat was very ill indeed when I 
 left him this forenoon.' 
 
 ' Not — not dying ? ' 
 
 ' It's hard to say, ma'am.' 
 
 ' You know I went to him on Wednesday last, 
 and conjured him to let there be peace betwixt 
 us, and to allow me to tend him, and try to 
 comfort him ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, I heard of your visit, ma'am.' 
 
 ' And do you know the message he sent out to 
 me ? ' 
 
 ' No, ma'am.' 
 
 'He said if he did receive me, and he got 
 better, he knew he should only send me away as 
 before ; while, if he was going to die, no help of 
 mine could avail him.' 
 
 ' I won't defend his hardness, ma'am — no ; 
 but one can't help saying it's something to see a
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 57 
 
 man with a will in this world o' chattering 
 puppets.' 
 
 ' Shall I go again to him ? ' 
 
 ' If you like, but I can't say I think it'll do 
 the least good.' 
 
 ' Is his heart so hardened as^ainst me even 
 now — in what may be his last hours ? ' 
 
 'He's a strange man. He's been a puzzle to 
 me all my Hfe, although I begin to see my way 
 to the bottom of it. If you let him alone you 
 will find he wiU act better than you expect.' 
 
 ' You know something, Israel ! I see it in your 
 face!' 
 
 'There, ma'am, I must contradict. My face 
 hasn't the habit of betraying its master.' 
 
 ' But answer me — do you not know something 
 that might lighten my burden ? It is not the 
 money I want, even though I Hke money. No, 
 if he leaves me only the bare pittance he has 
 given me since we separated, but with it a few 
 kindly words or tokens, — ' 
 
 'Tokens, ma'am, not words, by all means,' 
 interposed Israel. ' 
 
 ' Has he done anything of this kind ? '
 
 58 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' If I knew, I should not tell you, ma'am.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 ' Because it's sartin he keeps his own secrets, 
 and would expect me to do the same.' 
 
 ' Israel Mort — man — remember ! He may be 
 dying now, while I may live many years.' 
 
 ' Yes, ma'am, and what then ? ' 
 
 ' Why then, fool that you are ! can't you see 
 that I may befriend you, or ' 
 
 ' The reverse, ma'am ! It's quite true. But if 
 the time should come that you want me, I put 
 it to yourself whether you'd prefer to know I'd 
 been false to one employer when goin' to join 
 another. Mrs. Jehoshaphat, I believe I know you 
 as weU as most folk, and my opinion is, that though 
 you're angry now, you'll be pleased hereafter.' 
 
 ' Not with you ! ' 
 
 ' With me, ma'am,' responded Israel, ' w^ith me.' 
 
 She looked at him sternly, fixedly, trying to 
 penetrate through the hard surface to whatever 
 might lie beneath, but made no further attempt 
 to speak. 
 
 He answered her look with one that still 
 further assured her he did know something — not
 
 AN ORATOR DISCOVERED. 59 
 
 unfavourable to her — of her interests, and the 
 sternness insensibly passed from her features. 
 
 She moved on, passed through the porch, and 
 her face had regained all its customary placid 
 rigidity by the time she sat down panting in the 
 corner of her comfortable high-backed pew. 
 
 Israel Mort looked after her with a kind of 
 admiration, as if the thought of confronting hard- 
 ness with hardness seemed to him hke a key-note 
 to his own nature. 
 
 The bell was still going, and he knew therefore 
 the service had not yet begun. 
 
 He stood musing for a little space, but appeared 
 the while to be simply reading a verse of poetry, 
 newly inscribed, without name or date, on a stone 
 also new, at the head of a little grass-covered 
 grave. 
 
 With some effort to abstract his thoughts from 
 the things that pre-occupied them before going 
 into church, he read the verse mechanically, with- 
 out, however, taking in its meaning — 
 
 Weep not for we, our parents dear. 
 
 Nor be for ever sad ; 
 The shorter time we lived here 
 
 The fewer sins we had.
 
 60 ISRAEL MOFvT. 
 
 Something in his recollection of the last two 
 lines, after he had turned to go away, caused him 
 to turn back, and see to what children the verse 
 referred. 
 
 If anything could startle Israel into emotion, or 
 move that somewhat immovable heart of his, he 
 must have been moved to feel now, as he suddenly 
 recollected that he had once seen these lines at 
 home in his wife's feeble handwriting not lonof after 
 the death of their two young children. Yes, he 
 remembered that ; and how, on the ground of ex- 
 pense, he forbad stone or memorial of any kmd to 
 be erected. She then obeyed him. Yet now, after 
 the lapse of three years, this memorial must have 
 been erected by her secretly. He knew the posi- 
 tion of the children's grave, even though he had 
 never seen the place since the day of burial till 
 now —yes, it was them about whom he had been 
 reading so carelessly. 
 
 But if he felt much, he said nothing, except to 
 ask himself where she had got the money. 
 
 He no longer stood to listen to the talk that was 
 still going on in low tones all about him ; but, 
 lifting his head to confront whatever face might
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 61 
 
 seem to ask liini why he came again to church 
 after so many years of absence, passed slowly in, 
 and sat down in a corner darkened by a pillar. 
 
 The afternoon service at Brynnant is not usually 
 a very impressive one. It is conducted in the 
 Enghsh language, for the residents of a neighbour- 
 hood who are mostly Welsh. It is a very short 
 service, as though experience, wdser than logic, 
 had taught the necessity of adapting its length to 
 the size of the conorref^ation. And the faithful 
 few who do attend seem to be actuated not so 
 much by their belief in any special benefit they 
 are themselves going to receive, as by the chari- 
 table desire to set a good example for the edifi- 
 cation of others. This consideration may explain 
 the w^andering glances often to be detected there 
 by a curious observer — for naturally those pious 
 philanthropists want to see how much good they 
 may happen to be doing. On the whole, it must 
 be confessed that minister and congregation are 
 alike respectable and listless. 
 
 But if no message is ever delivered there that 
 is likely to rouse the torpid as with the blast of a
 
 62 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 trumpet, let but some incident of the neighbour- 
 hood be touched on, and there is an instantaneous 
 quickening of the attention : eyes become sud- 
 denly riveted on the minister ; ears listen intently ; 
 something that is neither hush nor stir, but an 
 odd compound of both, seems to pass electrically 
 through the place. And then ? 
 
 Why then — perhaps — banns of marriage are 
 read for the first time between Jenkyn Thomas 
 of this parish, and Euth Eoberts, young mem- 
 bers of the church, who have kept their secret so 
 well that ' the news comes quite unexpectedly ' 
 on their neighbours — that is to say, the whole 
 congregation — and will engross them throughout 
 the sermon, as the curate unfortunately knows. 
 
 The general style of the Eeverend Horace 
 Jones, perpetual curate, is not eloquent : that 
 must be confessed. Neither are his views nor his 
 illustrations original. But even as he is, without 
 intellectual robustness or vivid colour, how might 
 he not rouse them to themes of the highest and most 
 vital import with his unquestionable earnestness 
 and sincerity, if he could but learn from such 
 accidents how first of all to interest !
 
 AX OKATOR DISCOVERED. , 63 
 
 To-day the lesson is easy to learn. It is his 
 patron Jehoshaphat Williams who is dying, and 
 for whom he is about to supplicate the Divine 
 succour and comfort. The same subject is touched 
 upon in his sermon, which he fondly thinks of 
 from time to time even while conductin^r the 
 service. It is the unforgiven wife, Mrs. Jehosha- 
 phat, and the neglected, perhaps also unforgiven, 
 brother, Griffith WiUiams, who will listen to him ; 
 to say nothing of the two or three colhers he 
 perceives among the congregation as represen- 
 tative of the hundreds outside, whose daily bread 
 depends upon the works Jehoshaphat Williams 
 has so loDg and so successfully carried on. 
 
 The curate catches a glimpse too, after a little 
 time, of a form he had never again expected to 
 see in that place. Yes, it is he, Israel Mort the 
 Overman, who stands half conceahng himself 
 behind a pillar, as if ashamed of his many years' 
 absence. 
 
 The sight of him stirs the curate's blood. 
 
 The two men in former days have discussed 
 religious topics, unwilhngly on the part of Israel, 
 condescendingly on the part of the curate, till he
 
 64 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 found the collier's bluntness of logic and speech, 
 and his resolute observance of the Christian rule 
 to be no respecter of persons, so unpleasant, that 
 he withdrew in a very dignified manner from the 
 controversy ; and did not even seem to hear the 
 parting shot Israel sent after him, of 
 
 ' Well, parson, whenever thee Hkest to have 
 another tussle I'm thy man ! ' 
 
 It is wonderful what life and vivacity a little 
 personal resentment puts into the souls of the best 
 of us under certain circumstances. All the neg- 
 lected counsel and ministration of so many years, 
 all the known hardness of Israel's character — 
 plainly due to his wanton neglect of Christian 
 brotherhood — all the contributions, individually 
 trifling, but noticeable through their growth in 
 the lapse of time — that Israel should have paid 
 there with a glad heart, remembering the curate's 
 constant text, ' For God loveth a cheerful giver ' 
 — aU these things seemed to grow in the curate's 
 imagination mountains high. When he also recol- 
 lected that the unseemly words referred to were 
 spoken immediately after Mort's last visit to the 
 church — the last visit, indeed, he had been known
 
 AN ORATOR DISCOVERED. 65 
 
 to pay to any place of worship — these things 
 roused the curate. He felt as though the hour 
 had indeed come for another " tussle,' but not of 
 the vulgar kind speculated on by Israel Mort. 
 
 No, this day must be a great one for him, but 
 for very different reasons. Let Israel Mort sink 
 back for the present into his natural insignificance. 
 Did he draw courage from the signs of apparent 
 fear exhibited by Israel in going behind the 
 pillar? 
 
 If so, it does not much benefit him ; for Israel, 
 watching his opportunity, of the general rising for 
 the hymn, emerges from his place of shelter, and 
 takes a seat near to, and straight in front of, the 
 reading-desk. 
 
 No wonder the curate's cheek mantles at the 
 hardened sinner's audacity. But he is master of 
 the position, and rather exults in the idea of 
 making this man, even he, a witness of his ' coming 
 triumph.' 
 
 He is too much engrossed by his own fancies to 
 perceive the true cause of Israel's change of place. 
 The Overman wanted, while seeming decorously 
 to look towards the minister, to watch the pew 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 G6 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 where sat one who would, in all probability, 
 become the future owner of the mine, Mr. 
 Griffith Wilhams, with his family ; who were, 
 apart from Mrs. Jehoshaphat, the only known 
 relatives of the dying man. 
 
 How it is no one exactly know^s, but whatever 
 the curate says or does, seems to undergo to-day 
 a kind of subdued unctuous change. His voice, 
 manner, gestures, the very look of his face, grow 
 in fervour and in authority ; and a corres^^onding 
 glow and acceptance kindles sympathetically in 
 the hearts of those who hsten. 
 
 Jehoshaphat Williams has been by no means a 
 model man in any of the relations of life ; but, on 
 the contrary, notable through the neighbourhood 
 as an unkind husband, a neghgent brother, a hard 
 master, and a reckless speculator with the lives of 
 the people in his general system of management. 
 
 But who can remember these things now ? 
 Or, if hey must be remembered, who can help 
 seeing them in new and more kindly hghts, when 
 they recall Jehoshaphat's benefactions to the 
 church, school and village ; when they see his 
 relatives come here to-day, full, no doubt, of pity
 
 AX OKATOR DISCOVERED. 67 
 
 and forgiveness ; and when, above all, tliey picture 
 liim as dying in his dreadful solitude, turning now 
 his wistful gaze upwards towards heaven, and now 
 towards them, and to their minister, his constant 
 friend, asking all to pray for him in that holy place 
 where he may never again be able to rejoin them ? 
 
 The congregation is therefore in an admirable 
 state of mind to respond to the fervent supplica- 
 tions of the curate for the recovery of their 
 common benefactor, and, at the close low ejacula- 
 tions burst from many lips of ' Amen ! ' ' Amen ! ' 
 
 Scarcely had the sounds died away when the 
 door opened, and a boy appeared on the threshold 
 relieved against the bright March sunsliine and 
 the green and lovely tresses of a willow outside 
 waving to and fro. 
 
 He looked flushed, and yet with a kind of boyish 
 confidence in his face. Xor did he seem troubled 
 by the fact of his coming in so late. 
 
 No one would have cared to notice the occur- 
 rence at another time, but now all eyes converged 
 upon him, as if instmctively divining the news he 
 brought. 
 
 The lad stole timidly and hesitatingly along, 
 r 2
 
 68 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 looking first one side then the other, in search of 
 some person whom he could not find, and colour- 
 ing violently as he became conscious of the uni- 
 versal attention directed to his proceedings. 
 
 Israel was just then engrossed by thinking over 
 a look given him by Mr. Griffith Wilhams, which 
 he had again and again vainly sought till now, 
 and which seemed almost to say, 'Let us meet 
 after the service/ 
 
 The Overman had not, therefore, noticed the 
 entrance of the new comer. Suddenly he became 
 aware of the general movement of curiosity, and 
 turned to see what all the people were looking at. 
 
 He saw his son David, and at once, in perfect 
 calmness, beckoned to him to come to where he 
 was. 
 
 ' What is it ? ' asked Israel in a whisper, and 
 bending low his head. 
 
 ' He is dead, father.' 
 
 ^ Did you see him ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, father.' 
 
 ' Sit down.' 
 
 David obeyed, and Israel, after a moment of
 
 AN ORATOR DISCOVERED. 69 
 
 intense pause and hush, rose to his feet as af 
 actually intending to make the news public. 
 
 Fortunately for the decorum of the place, the 
 curate was at the time retiring to the vestry, to 
 put on his gown for the dehvery of the sermon. 
 
 Israel sat down. Eemembering then the cause 
 of the curate's absence, in spite of the many years 
 that had elapsed since he had been accustomed to 
 these details of the service, he rose, and imme- 
 diately left the church, and went round to the 
 place where the minister was, who stared and 
 frowned at the intrusion. 
 
 ' Eeverend sir,' began Israel, in a hushed and 
 apologetic tone of voice ; ' I beg pardon for the 
 interruption, but I think you ought to know that 
 Mr. Jehoshaphat WiUiams is dead. My son 
 David has seen him.' 
 
 The curate took up the word : ' Dead ! Mr. 
 Mort ? Well, God's w^ill be done and not man's 
 will. The answer to our prayers has been given 
 and is not to be gainsaid. Accept my thanks for 
 this timely intimation. It may be of service as 
 regards my discourse to-day.'
 
 70 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Just what I thought, reverend sir,' answered 
 Israel. 
 
 ' Please to return to your place, Mr. Mort, and 
 let the fact be known with as little disturbance as 
 possible that death is in the house of Jehoshaphat 
 Williams.' 
 
 Israel lost not a moment in obeying the curate's 
 commands, and in consequence there was quite 
 a buzz in the church when the gowned minister 
 re-entered. 
 
 The curate has often since then confessed to his 
 intimates — in those confidential moments when 
 the dearest secrets of life are allowed just to 
 appear, be gazed on, and withdrawn perhaps for 
 ever — that it is still a source of wonder to him 
 how he became suddenly inspired to throw aside 
 the greater part of his sermon, that had cost him 
 so many painful hours of anxious labour, and 
 trust himself with only occasional assistance from 
 his MS. to launch out on the unknown sea of ex- 
 temporaneous delivery. But he did so resolve; 
 and surely he ought to be thankful for it, for it 
 was to be the one success of a lifetime, a comfort
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 71 
 
 to him in all future years, when grown diffident 
 — very diffident — as to the many other successes 
 that were to have followed. 
 
 He ascended the pulpit. He felt at once bold, 
 and yet full of fear ; clear in his determination 
 of what he was about to do, but feeling himself 
 tremble nervously, whenever he gave even the 
 most casual glance aside, at the idea of possible 
 consequences. 
 
 Mort's hard, almost ironical, glance met his 
 own as he raised his head fi^om silent prayer and 
 prepared to begin. 
 
 Was the Overman supposing that he had given 
 some hint as to the sermon, and waiting to see how 
 the curate meant to carry it out ? 
 
 The fact disturbed him ; and he did not 
 begin as he had half intended, by putting aside 
 his written sermon. On the contrary, he placed 
 it before him as usual, and looked at it lovingly, 
 most lovingly, as if he saw there reflected, as in a 
 glass, all the noble and sweet and pious images 
 that had filled his brain during the act of com 
 position.
 
 72 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Perhaps he needed that bit of help from the old 
 routine to see him fairly going on his new ad- 
 venture. 
 
 And then the sight of the manuscript suggested 
 the value of the first paragraph, which he always 
 learned by heart, so that he might be sure of 
 beginning well. 
 
 But if he used it ever so little, might he not be 
 drawn away from his purpose, and so lose this 
 solemn, this grand opportunity? 
 
 And then, while seeming only to be clearing his 
 throat, he tossed for a moment or two in an agony 
 of doubt and hesitation between what he might 
 lose of his wealth in actual possession, and his 
 hope of newer and more precious wealth to be 
 obtained by going boldly to seek it. 
 
 Compelled to act, yet unable to choose, he 
 resolved to make a sudden dash at something, if 
 only to put an end to the awful stillness that pre- 
 vailed around him, and which seemed to enter 
 into and chill his very marrow with apprehension 
 of a break-down. 
 
 He began by murmuring in an almost in- 
 audible voice a sentence or two. Then lisht broke
 
 AN ORATOE DISCOVERED. 78 
 
 upon him and he began again, and more suc- 
 cessfully. 
 
 Till the news of this awful event to their dear 
 departed brother in Christ had reached him (he 
 said), he had intended to direct their attention to 
 such and such points — which he began to enu- 
 merate with most unlucky facility, so that he not 
 only got out the first or opening paragraph of 
 his written sermon, but before he well knew 
 what he was doing, found himself far on into the 
 second, and was going, for aught he could tell, 
 right through to the end. 
 
 The absurdity of the business was overwhelm- 
 ing. He paused and shut up his manuscript, and 
 stood face to face with the unknown depths of 
 his oratory. 
 
 What happened for the next minute or two he 
 does not know, and has taken care never to 
 inquire, but the dread void was crossed at last, 
 and then in yet one other minute he seemed to 
 have entered on a new hfe — in a new world. 
 
 A new hfe ? Nay, a double hfe ; for he found 
 himself at one and the same time speaking with 
 irresistible eloquence, while also hstening with
 
 74 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 delight to the orator ; chastened, however, with 
 awe, as wondering how long it might last. 
 
 He reviewed the deceased gentleman's history. 
 He showed how he had begmi life as a coUier 
 boy at seven years of age, earning five shillings a 
 week, probably scorning to be a burden to his 
 poor parents. 
 
 Here he was broken in upon by a couple of 
 sharp, decisive coughs, and sounding so like 
 ' Hear, hear,' that he could not but glance towards 
 their source. 
 
 It was Israel Mort ! Dehcious to the curate's 
 heart was this first testimony of success. Israel 
 Mort of all men was moved ! Israel, however, 
 was thinking not of the ( urate but of David, his 
 son, whom he had ordered to be here to-day, 
 after the usual call to inquire about Mr. Jehosha- 
 phat's state, expressly that he might benefit by 
 the curate's praise of Israel's grand ideal man — this 
 Jehoshaphat ; and so begin at once humbly to 
 imitate him as Israel himself did. 
 
 The Overman's eyes were fixed sternly on 
 David's countenance at this critical period of the 
 sermon ; but the lad turned away sadly, gloomily ;
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 75 
 
 and gazed half in fear, half in hope, on the curate, 
 as if not only he, but all the little world about 
 them both, knew that to-morrow his father meant 
 to compel him to work in the mine, and cease 
 scholarship and play, unless the minister would 
 help him. 
 
 The interruption acted on the minister's oratory 
 as the weir outside acted on the little river — 
 made it flow on more cheerily, vigorously, 
 brightly. 
 
 Ah, this was hfe, he felt ; this was reality ! 
 The orator, now as ever, in moving himself moved 
 his auditory. Delicious moments ! His face was 
 a study — so full of natural truth and innocent 
 hypocrisy. It was cold in colour, and sad and 
 troubled in outward expression — as befitted the 
 words he had to speak ; while his soul all the 
 while revelled in the heat and glow and OTand 
 movement beneath — a sort of gulf-stream passing 
 below colder and stormier seas. Surely Jehosha- 
 phat Williams himself might have been more con- 
 tent to die than he was could he but have known 
 how, before his form was cold, the curate would 
 speak of him ; and, knowing nothing of Jehosha-
 
 76 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 pliat's very natural doubts about himself, fix liis 
 place, at once and for ever, alike on earth and in 
 heaven. 
 
 ' As a boy passing from one humble position to 
 another ' — here Israel gave David another of his 
 significant looks, and the curate another of his 
 equally significant coughs, to the good man's 
 great solace ; who began to think the devil really 
 was not so bad as he was painted — ' As a boy,' 
 said the curate, repeating his words, ' passing 
 from one humble position to another, but always 
 ascending a httle ; then hewing away at the coal, 
 while gathering the strength to hew out fortune ; 
 then appointed a deputy — that is to say, to the 
 first step in the government of his fellow- colliers ; 
 then in a very few months rising to the full 
 dignity of Overman.' 
 
 And there the curate turned full towards Israel, 
 as if to make an illustration of him ; while Israel 
 repaid the compliment by directing David's atten- 
 tion to the minister with a look that plainly said : 
 ' Mark that, boy. Listen to the parson.' 
 
 The curate went on with increased animation : — 
 
 ' Pausing not in the capacity of Overman, any
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 77 
 
 longer than sufficed to give him habits of com- 
 mand and larger practical knowledge, Jehoshaphat 
 Williams obtained at last the onerous and honour- 
 able and profitable post of under- viewer ; and 
 then all other steps were easy : agent or manager, 
 part owner, sole owner, till his chmax — liis hour 
 of apotheosis — as Member of the great British 
 Parhament of his country. 
 
 ' Here was another and signal example of the 
 men who, self-made, became heroic captains of 
 industry, giant pillars of our illustrious Temple of 
 State. 
 
 ' Doubtless there were spots even in Jehosha- 
 phat's sun. He was human and must err ; but, 
 then, how else could God exercise his divine pre- 
 rogative and forgive ? ' 
 
 He was reminded, too, ' that there had been sad 
 accidents in past times. But mining was an em- 
 pirical art, science only beginning to speak so that 
 she could be listened to authoritatively.' 
 
 And so the curate reached his peroration — a 
 glowing one (taken from the manuscript, and 
 conned by rote beforehand) — upon the deceased 
 gentleman's charities ; and finally wound up
 
 78 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 by asking himself why he repeated all these 
 things. 
 
 He would tell them. He wanted to recall to 
 their recollection the epitaph upon another great 
 man in a metropolitan cathedral. He wanted to 
 advise them, especially the young (here a kindly 
 glance at David), to take the meaning of that 
 epitaph to heart ; so that when strangers might 
 come from afar on pilgrimage to the great man's 
 grave in the churchyard outside these walls, and 
 ask what had been the doings of him whom they 
 so mourned, they might reply to them in a phrase 
 which he translated for their benefit : ' Look 
 around ! ' 
 
 There were many moist eyes and handkerchiefs 
 that afternoon in the little church. The curate's 
 own eyes were still red when he emerged from the 
 vestry into the churchyard with unusual celerity ; 
 and where to his palpable surprise everybody 
 waited to see him pass, the humbler members 
 content to gaze and admire, while the more im- 
 portant shook hands with him and offered their 
 congratulations.
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 79 
 
 One man only of the humbler class waited and 
 watched for an opportunity to speak to the 
 minister, and he was just that man whom the 
 curate before his sermon would have supposed the 
 very last to wish to speak to him. Israel Mort 
 went boldly up, and held out liis hand, which the 
 curate grasped warmly, as he Hstened to the 
 Overman's words : — 
 
 ' Eeverend sir, I haven't been much in the way 
 of sermons for a many years, but I want to thank 
 you for yours, which has done me good. Some 
 day I think you'll find out how without my 
 teUing. It's an old proverb — " Don't cry before 
 you're out of the wood," but I'd like to put another 
 by the side o' that one — " Don't cry before going 
 into the wood." Do you take me, reverend sir ? ' 
 
 ' Why— ah ! not exactly, Mr. Mort.' 
 
 ' Don't blow a trumpet to tell all the world of 
 the great things you're a-going to do.' 
 
 ' Ah, yes — exactly, very good ! ' responded the 
 curate with a dubious smile, wondering whether 
 the remark was intended for his or for tlie 
 speaker's^own particular use. 
 
 ' And David, sir, my boy, has also learned a
 
 80 ISRAEL MOET. 
 
 deal to day — or I'm much mistaken. Look up, 
 lad, in the parson's face, and tell his reverence 
 you mean to be a man some day.' 
 
 ' Why not? ' said the curate with a smile, while 
 taking the boy's trembling fingers in his own, and 
 noticing the wistful look in the lad's eye. ' Why 
 not? Jehoshaphat Williams did these things — 
 why not you ? ' 
 
 David could not speak. A tear was trembling 
 within his hds, but he turned away to hide it 
 from the curate's possible questioning, and from 
 his father's certain anger. 
 
 * Come, David,' said the Overman, ' his reverence 
 understands that you take kindly to the valuable 
 hints he has given you. Mind, lad, that it doesn't 
 want repeating. There may be too much of a 
 good thing. I wish your reverence good after- 
 noon.' 
 
 There was no emotion in the Overman's face. 
 His eyes were as dry as his manners; and the 
 tone and speech, though it seemed respectful — 
 nay, grateful — rather puzzled the curate. 
 
 He looked after the retreating forms of Israel 
 and David, and saw the former presently meet 
 Mr. Griffith Williams; and he heard the loud
 
 AJS" ORATOR DISCOVERED. 81 
 
 bluff voice of tliat gentleman telling the Overman 
 to give him a call to-morrow at the farm. 
 
 Just for one moment the curate wondered in- 
 dignantly what could be in Israel's mind to make 
 him so obviously seek an appointment to-day, 
 and to make it there of all places in the world ! In 
 those sacred precincts ! Was he ambitious ? — he, 
 the hard drudge who had never yet been known 
 to have a single aspiration beyond that of his 
 present post ? 
 
 But the curate forgot these thoughts in re- 
 verting to Israel's opinion of him, as shown by 
 his attentiveness during the sermon, and his words 
 since, which still puzzled him. 
 
 He was destined to be much more puzzled before 
 night closed. He could not keep at home. And 
 when out he could not keep in the solitary ways 
 where he usually walked. He yearned to know 
 what the world was saying about him — for his 
 village icas a world just then. 
 
 It was not, of course, that he wanted to be 
 praised, or even to know, that men were praising 
 him ; no, indeed, no ! But he was eager to learn 
 if they appreciated the truths of his discourse. A 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 preacher, like an orator, must study, not only what 
 he says, but how it affects those to whom he has 
 spoken. 
 
 These thoughts led him, as the darkness of the 
 evening grew, to pace along the banks of the little 
 river, where, having reached the plain, it glides 
 slowly between the colliers' cottages and the marsh 
 on its way to the sea. Occasionally he would sit 
 down on a piece of projecting rock under the high 
 bushes, and again revel in the delight of the many 
 fine things he was able to recall from the half 
 impromptu sermon. 
 
 He was thus engaged when voices and ad- 
 vancing footsteps interrupted him. Two men and 
 a boy became dimly visible as they emerged 
 through the darkness, and approached the spot 
 where he was reclining. Then they stopped as if 
 about to separate. 
 
 He recognised the speakers as the village 
 surgeon. Dr. Jolliffe, and Israel Mort. 
 
 They did not notice him, and he was glad, for 
 he wanted to hear if they spoke about the sermon. 
 
 And this was what he heard : —
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 83 
 
 ' Certainly a most able man,' observed the 
 Doctor. 
 
 ' And a wonderful memory,' responded Israel. 
 'He would recognise anyone he had once talked 
 to, aye, even twenty years after. I've known him 
 do it.' 
 
 ' I don't know much about his remembrances 
 of friends, Mr. Mort, but he certainly never for- 
 got an enemy.' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' said the Overman, ' a wise man ! a truly 
 wise man. He knew the world. Doctor.' 
 
 ' Do you know I never saw a man's face and 
 manners so unlike himself. The face round, 
 innocent, chubby, I was going to say cherubinical 
 — but at all events, if you couldn't mistake him in 
 that direction, you might easily suppose he was 
 a jolly, good-tempered, prosperous farmer, with 
 more live stock on his farm than ideas in his 
 brain. Then, as to his manners, they were not 
 merely agreeable, but there was this oddity about 
 them, they were always the most agreeable and 
 winning when saying or doing things that other 
 people found particularly disagreeable.'
 
 84 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Was it known, Doctor, at the last, who would 
 get the mine ? ' 
 
 ' Well, I know — and I suppose there can be no 
 harm in telling you who have served him so long. 
 He told me. And that was about the last com- 
 munication he made to anybody in the world, for 
 he died a few minutes after. He was obliged to 
 choose between his wife and his brother, so Griffith 
 Williams is in luck.' 
 
 ' Griffith Williams ! I thouc^ht so. I was rio'ht 
 then in my forecast. But, Doctor, did he say 
 nothing about his wife — no share, or ' 
 
 ' No,' said the Doctor shortly. 
 
 'Well, a great man has passed away. We 
 ought to make much of him even now.' 
 
 ' You admire him, Israel ! Why I tliought 
 you expected much from him, and got nothing 
 beyond your bare hard-earned wages ? ' 
 
 ' I knew him all along, and knew that he knew 
 me. So I wasn't so much disappointed after all. 
 There'll be a gTand funeral, I suppose ? ' 
 
 ' I expect so,' assented the Doctor. ' People 
 collecting from all quarters, no doubt, to do him 
 honour.'
 
 AN ORATOR DISCOVERED. 85 
 
 ' Can he make much out of that, Doctor, in his 
 grave in the churchyard yonder ? ' 
 
 ' Can't say, I'm sure. Hark'ye, Israel, nobody 
 knows better than you that all is not gold that 
 glitters. If I were to tell you my candid opinion, 
 I should say he would have a larger, grander, and 
 altogether more appropriate funeral if the ghosts 
 of all the people who have lost their lives pre- 
 maturely under liim were to come out of their 
 graves and foUow.' 
 
 ' I'd hke to see that, too ! ' 
 
 ' Would you ? You're a bold man, Israel, to 
 say so. But since you do say it, I beheve you 
 really would stand quietly by, and watch the 
 whole grisly procession pass.' 
 
 ' Ay, but Doctor, I'd care most to see how Mr. 
 Jehoshaphat looked at them — how he reviewed 
 his troops ! ' 
 
 ' Ah well, good night ! By the bye, does David 
 really go to the mine to-morrow ? ' 
 
 ' Well, if he doesn't he'll have to give uncom- 
 mon good reasons why.' 
 
 ' Good night, Mr. Mort.' 
 
 ' I'm going your way. Doctor. Come David.'
 
 86 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 The curate watched their retreatmg forms with 
 feehngs that it would be difficult to do justice to. 
 
 This, then, was the true Jehoshaphat Williams, 
 was it ? This the hero he had so glowingly 
 described ! 
 
 Oh ! — they were unjust — mistaken — prejudiced ! 
 
 And yet he felt in his secret soul they spoke 
 the truth — could have had no motive to do 
 otherwise. 
 
 He felt sick with shame and humiliation. 
 What! he of all men to have prostituted his 
 priestly office, just when he dreamed he was ful- 
 filling in all sincerity its legitimate demands ! 
 
 He bent down his head into his hands and wept 
 bitter, bitter tears. 
 
 How should he ever face the congregation 
 again — if they knew of these things. 
 
 The curate was a good man. He had intended 
 no wrong — no varnishing over of evil things. 
 Somehow lie had not only seen for the moment 
 the things the world generally sees in a successful 
 man, but he had also seen them under the kind 
 of halo that sorrow will at times cast round such
 
 AX ORATOR DISCOVERED. 87 
 
 persons — and that fact at once excused and 
 condemned him in liis own eyes. 
 
 After hours of sadness he went home, and 
 spent the entire night wakefully in his bed, com- 
 paring the Doctor's speech with his own sermon, 
 and with all the fine things he had said in it ; 
 striving piteously to see if they could in any way 
 be reconciled, by the aid of a little Christian 
 charity, in the interpretation of both.
 
 88 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 PEKIN. 
 
 After so painfully and so unconsciously enlight- 
 ening the curate as to the value of his eulogy on 
 the deceased Mr. Jehoshaphat, Israel and the 
 Doctor separated, on reaching the plank bridge 
 that crosses the stream. 
 
 From thence to Pekin may seem a long distance, 
 but Israel did not find it so, as he and his lad 
 plodded their way thither through the village 
 and entered a picturesque winding lane. This 
 soon began to ascend towards an exceedingly long 
 row of colliers' houses, that stood on a conspicuous 
 height far above all the other rows, and above 
 all the single houses scattered on the mountain 
 slope ; and commanded attention from every 
 passing traveller by the grandeur of the position, 
 and the bare homeliness of the dwellings.
 
 PEKIN. 89 
 
 The row had been built by Jehoshaphat 
 WiUiams many years before, and named by liim 
 in one of his more grotesque moods — when, 
 possibly, he thought he was playing the poet 
 or the artist in associating his row of cottages, 
 rented at a shilhng or so a week, with the beauty 
 and splendom^ of the great Chinese capital. 
 
 As they reached the ground in front of the 
 cottages, and passed along the row of dimly- 
 lighted windows, Israel stopped to speak ^vith a 
 colher, who was sittmg on a doorstep, smoking, 
 and looked — so David thoudit — as if he had been 
 on the watch for the Overman. He rose to meet 
 Israel, and they stood a little apart, speaking in 
 low tones ; but presently Israel spoke loud enough 
 to let the boy know they spoke of Mr. Barrett, 
 the manager of the mine under Mr. Jehoshaphat, 
 and who was therefore Israel's immediate supe- 
 rior. 
 
 ' I can tell ye, he has seen old J\lrs. Jehoshaphat ; 
 and what's more, that he has been hanging about 
 the farm, trying to see Mr. Griffith Williams,' said 
 the collier, with a mysterious air. 
 
 ' Ay, ay ! ' rephed Israel, with a sardonic smile,
 
 90 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 whichever on 'em gets the mine, he'll be right, he 
 thinks.' 
 
 ' But to be trying it on so soon, the old man 
 just dead ! ' added the collier. 
 
 'Barrett takes time by tlie forelock. He 
 doesn't mean to lose a comfortable berth, not if 
 he can help it,' said Israel. ' All right ! I should 
 do the same were I in his place.' 
 
 ' And that's where you ought to be, master 
 Israel, if everybody had their rights. You ought 
 to be in his place.' 
 
 ' Ah, thou always, wast a dreamer, Lewis ; I ain't 
 time for such intellectoal recreations.' 
 
 Obeying a hint, however, from Lewis, Israel 
 moved nearer to him and away from David, and 
 then they again conversed in undertones, while 
 Lewis looked more than once curiously at the boy. 
 
 A sudden sense of alarm ran through David's 
 breast. This man Lewis was in the habit of 
 making extra earnings by teaching raw lads to 
 cut coal, and had the character of being a cruel 
 taskmaster. 
 
 David never stopped to think that he was not 
 yet old enough for that kind of work. He
 
 PEKIX. 91 
 
 thought only he was going to be put under Lewis 
 — that they were arranging it now — and thus to 
 all his former horror of the mine there was now 
 a deeper tinge added ! 
 
 Israel, happening to look round, noticed the 
 lad's stricken look, for the hght of a candle, stuck 
 just inside a window, fell full upon him ; but he 
 did not trouble himself to enquire into the cause. 
 
 ' Go home,' he said to David, ' I will follow 
 presently.' He then went with Lewis into the 
 latter 's place. 
 
 David rushed on — right into his own home, 
 and to his mother, who had long waited for him, 
 and yearned to see and speak to him alone, and 
 now found her opportunity as she thought. 
 
 But David gave her no time. His face was 
 wild with excitement and affright. 
 
 ' Mother, he is talking to Lewis — it is about 
 me — I am sure of it. He will bind me to him — 
 and he will kill me ! 
 
 ' Oh mother, mother, don't let me go down. 
 Don't I don't ! Let me do anything, anything in 
 the world, but that I ' 
 
 ' But David, dear ! Now listen — calm yourself;
 
 92 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 do my darling boy, my child — will you not listen 
 to me ? ' 
 
 ' Oh yes, mother ; but do say you will not let 
 me go down to-morrow morning. Mother, you 
 must speak now. I can't go into the mine. I 
 won't. It would kill me. I can't sleep at nights 
 for it. And when I do, I jump up all at once out 
 of the most horrid dreams. Last night I saw that 
 boy who was lost only a few months ago in our 
 mine for eight days, and found dead. He came 
 to me, and whispered such things to me of how it 
 had happened, and what he had seen ! And when 
 I awoke I do believe I heard my own voice 
 screaming in fright.' 
 
 She noticed his hand was trembling, his eyes 
 dilated and wild, his voice strange, unreal. 
 
 To quiet him, rather than with the faith that 
 she could do any good, or even fulfil her promise, 
 she said — 
 
 ' David, dear, I will — I will indeed ! But be 
 patient. I have found that always best with him.' 
 
 ' Mother, I can't be patient if he makes me go 
 there ! ' He seemed to thrill and shudder as he
 
 PEKIX. 93 
 
 uttered the word ' there.' It inchided for him all 
 that man could devise of things most cruel and 
 most disgusting. 
 
 ' But did you not say you would ? Did you not 
 promise him you would go down ? ' 
 
 David turned his head, and laid it against her 
 breast, moaning with pain. He had utterly for- 
 gotten in his new fright the promise that had 
 been exacted. 
 
 The door opened, and Israel came in. 
 
 David and his mother hastily separated, the 
 former sitting down on a low stool, while the 
 latter got ready the supper. 
 
 ' You have heard the news of Mr. Tehoshaphat's 
 death ? ' Israel said to his wife, after a pause. 
 
 ' Yes,' Mrs. Mort replied. ' How will it affect 
 you?' 
 
 ' Fools can put questions that it takes wise men 
 to answer, and are sometimes too much even for 
 them. But, wife, I'll tell you. I've been ponder- 
 ing over that same question ever since I heard last 
 night how bad he was. And it's on account of 
 that I've been to church.'
 
 94 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' To cliurch ! ' interrupted Mrs. Mort, caught 
 for once in an expression of surprise. 
 
 ' To church ! ' he repeated doggedly. ' Have 
 yon anything to say to that ? ' 
 
 ' No, Israel ; except that I am glad.' 
 
 ' What do you mean by that ? Do you mean 
 
 to insinuate but there, if you did, it wouldn't 
 
 matter. Only don't interrupt me again. I think 
 slow. You put me out.' 
 
 ' I am sorry; again interposed unlucky Mrs. 
 Mort. 
 
 Israel's brow coloured with ire. lie no longer 
 cared to £fO further with his wife into the new 
 hopes that had been excited in him. And as he 
 had long lost the relish of the one bit of occasional 
 pleasure his married life at first gave him, the 
 power of obtaining a patient and respectful lis- 
 tener whenever he wanted for his own ease of 
 mind to talk himself out — he merely re- 
 marked : — 
 
 ' Come Da\^d, lad, eat ! Get on wi' thy 
 supper ! ' 
 
 But the lad pushed his plate away, and said he 
 wasn't hungry — he couldn't eat.
 
 TEKIX. 95 
 
 ' That's nonsense/ said Israel. ' I've told thee 
 before that those who do work, or mean to 
 work, must eat. Eat thy victuals, and make no 
 more ado.' 
 
 The lad's face flushed, and he seemed as if he 
 were about again to refuse ; but he caught the 
 pleading look of his mother's face, and did eat 
 enough to satisfy the stern, inquisitive eye, so 
 long as it thought it necessary to remain fixed 
 on him. 
 
 ' And now, wife, about David. Have you 
 made the lad understand about to-morrow ? 
 That I don't want to take a snivelling girl in boy's 
 clothes with me ; nor an idiotic coward, who sees 
 a ghost lurking behind every corner. You know, 
 and he knows, that my mind is made up. Is he 
 man enough to keep his promise, and do his 
 duty?' 
 
 ' Give him time, he's ' 
 
 ' Oh, I'll give him till to-morrow morning, half- 
 past five o'clock, certainly. That'll do, David P ' 
 
 ' And is he to go under Lewis ? ' asked Mrs. 
 Mort, tremblingly, but struggling to seem calm 
 and self-possessed.
 
 96 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Lewis ! Is the woman mad ? Lewis ! Cer- 
 tainly not ! ' said the Overman, with a tonch of 
 scorn. 
 
 'Israel — husband — we have had but three 
 children ; two are gone, and this one alone re- 
 mains. If not for my sake, or for his, then for 
 your own, be patient with him, hsten to him 
 and what he wants. He says he can w^ork ; 
 he will work! Sometimes, husband, the poor 
 silly lad talks of how he will yet grow to be a 
 great man if only ' 
 
 ' That's just what I want to put him in the way 
 of Do you suppose I mean to remain Overman 
 all my life long, or that I mean my only son — 
 heir to all I haven't got, but mean to get — to 
 remain where I shall first put him ? Xo. And 
 since I am in the mood to speak, you shall hear 
 my mind, and think of it afterwards, when you 
 see how things shall be shaped. 
 
 ' I want David to earn money because we are 
 so wretchedly poor, and I can't any longer do 
 without. That's one thing. 
 
 ' Next, it don't suit me just now, or for some 
 time to come, to look ambitious, and therefore I
 
 PEKIX. 97 
 
 choose to let everybody see my boy begin as I 
 began, as all colliers begin, at the bottom. That's 
 another thing. 
 
 ' And now for the last thing. And if either of 
 you dare to breathe a syllable of wliat I am about 
 to say, I'll — well, I don't need to threaten. You 
 both know me, so listen. I've been studying mines 
 and mining to some purpose all these years, and 
 now, if I don't miscalkelate, my time's come. And 
 if so, it won't be long before David's time will 
 come. He must get prepared then, as I have got, 
 by hard work, and by never minding whether it's 
 dirty work or ugly work. The gold'll be bright 
 that'll come out of it all, and then David and I 
 wiU see, wife, if things can't be made a bit more 
 comfortable at home.' 
 
 ]\Irs. Mort's face happened to be turned away, so 
 that he could not see it. But whether he had cfot 
 to like the sound of his voice, or that the flavour 
 of the ideal fruit he saw growing and glowing in 
 the distance for his hands to pluck somehow 
 humanized him a httle, he said a few words more 
 in the same strain, hardly thinking or caring, as 
 he did so, how it might affect his hstener. But 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 suddenly lie heard a kind of gurgling sound in 
 the throat, then a cry from David, and the next 
 instant she was on the floor, fainting; the boy 
 wild with alarm, and crying and sobbing to her — 
 
 ' Mother ! mother ! mother ! ' 
 
 Such a thing Israel was bound to confess to 
 himself had not happened before for many years ; 
 so, after he and David had brought her round 
 and quieted her, he gave her, in the shape of a 
 warning as to the future, his full forgiveness, and 
 kissed her. 
 
 Poor David soon saw there was no more hope 
 for him of escape from the threatened doom ; so, 
 taking heart from the thought Israel had so skil- 
 fully suggested to him without seeming to do so, 
 that he, boy as he was, might yet come to his 
 mother's aid, he spoke out right bravely — 
 
 ' Father, I will go to the mine in the morning 
 when you call me.' 
 
 It was sufficicDt. Israel held out his hand; 
 the lad came to it, took it, was lifted on to the 
 father's knee, and in the enjoyment of so novel 
 a position forgot all he had been so determined 
 upon a little while ago.
 
 PEKIX. 99 
 
 When David was about to go to bed, his father 
 said to him quite unexpectedly — 
 
 ' I am well pleased with thee, lad. And I'm 
 half inclined to give thee another day. The spring 
 flowers are just coming out. I saw some children 
 getting primroses and violets yesterday up by the 
 Nine Bells level. So if you like, the motto shall 
 be, " Play to-morrow, and work the day after." 
 It'll be your last chance for a goodish while, lad.' 
 
 ' No, father,' said David, in a grateful yet very 
 hurried voice, as, conscious if he did not say • No ' 
 quickly, he might not say it at all. ' No, father ; 
 if I am to go, I'd like to feel I'd done it. Thank 
 you all the same.' 
 
 ' And that's manly, too. But if you don't want 
 a day for your own sake, I think you'd better 
 take one for mine. I shouldn't hke to leave you 
 long alone in the pit the first day, and I must go 
 up to Griffith Williams early in the morning.' 
 
 David had heard enough. The words ' leave 
 you alone in the pit ' made him quite as anxious 
 as his father could be that the dreaded event 
 should be postponed to Tuesday. 
 
 As they parted for the night, Israel saw an odd 
 
 H 2
 
 100 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 expression on his son's face that annoyed him, it 
 seemed so plainly to say, ' Was my father trying 
 to deceive me when he seemed so stern and de- 
 termined about my going down to-morrow, and 
 then when he talked about giving me a day's play 
 for my own sake, so that I mightn't go down till 
 Tuesday after all?' And Israel saw dimly 
 ghmpses of something never even thought of 
 before in connection with aught belonging to him 
 — glimpses of that new and w^ondrous world, a 
 boy's mind in the first great era of development. 
 
 ' Wife,' said Israel, when the two were alone, 
 ^ go to bed. I mean to work for some hours — 
 perhaps all night. Don't disturb me.' 
 
 She went away in silent submission ; and if she 
 wondered w^hat he was about to do, took care to 
 give him no indication as to her thoughts, either 
 by word, look, or gesture. 
 
 He immediately cleared the table. Then he 
 fetched an old portmanteau, out of which he took 
 rolls of paper, pencils, pens, inks of different 
 colours, red, black, and blue, a pair of compasses, 
 a parallel ruler, and a variety of other things, the 
 uses of which migh^ not be very clear to a by-
 
 PEKIX. 101 
 
 stander, but which Israel perfectly understood the 
 value of. 
 
 Then unrolling and spreading out on the table 
 one of the bulkiest of the documents — a plan of 
 some kind — he began to work upon it ; his object 
 being to transfer to its surface certain memoranda 
 from his black, greasy note-book, the laborious 
 work of his leisure and stolen hours during 
 many years. 
 
 He went on thus, hour after hour, as patiently 
 as an automaton might do, constructed for the 
 purpose by some wondrous freak of science. 
 
 About daybreak his wife, who had not been 
 able to sleep even for a single minute, could no 
 longer resist the womanly impulse to go in, and 
 look upon him, and see if he was warm, his fire 
 burning, and whether she might not make him a 
 cup of tea. 
 
 But when she had hastily dressed for this pur- 
 pose, and got to the outside of his door, her heart 
 failed her, remembering how often such impulses 
 had ended in fresh bitterness of soul. 
 
 What might she not discover him doing that 
 he did not wish anybody to know? Nothing
 
 102 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 could irritate him more than that would. She 
 would go back to bed. 
 
 And she did move away, but again returned. 
 All the years of unhappiness she had passed with 
 him seemed to ghde away from her and be as 
 if they had never been, when she remembered the 
 kindly words of the last evening, and dwelt on the 
 possible future to which they might lead, if she 
 used them now with good sense and patient 
 love. 
 
 She went in. Israel stared at her for a moment, 
 whether in wonder or in sternness she could not 
 tell ; but then went on with the work in hand, 
 which was at that moment very interesting to 
 him, and which he desired greatly to finish before 
 stirring from his chair. 
 
 Timid, irresolute, she knew not how to speak ; 
 so stirred his fire very quietly, and then slid out 
 of the room. 
 
 In a few minutes she returned with a steaming 
 and fragrant cup of tea, which she placed near 
 him, on the one vacant spot of the table, and 
 again went away.
 
 PEKIN. 103 
 
 He took it up, almost meclianically, and as if it 
 were the most natm:al kind of thing to happen, 
 and drank it down as rapidly as the heat would 
 allow, and then again was absorbed in the work, 
 when Mrs. Mort re-entered, and took away the 
 cup, intending to refill it. That made the great 
 man speak : — 
 
 ^ No more, Molly ! I am quite refreshed.' 
 
 'Are you? I am so glad, Israel,' said poor 
 Mrs. Mort, terrified to death lest she should show 
 her gladness too demonstratively. 
 
 ' Molly, lass, I meant what I said last night. 
 Come here. Give me a kiss on the strens^th of 
 my promise to think a little more about thee 
 when I get time.' 
 
 She came, but could no longer restrain herself 
 from laying her head on his shoulder, and clasping 
 him within her loving arms and against that 
 panting, sobbing, half-stified breast, while she 
 murmured — 
 
 ' Oh, dear, dear husband. I don't think I shall 
 live a many years, so be kind to me, kind I mean 
 as vou can.'
 
 104 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Well, that's a reasonable request, and I'll do 
 what you ask. Do you know what I am at here 
 all this nioht ? ' 
 
 ' Ah well, wait and you'll see. Go back to 
 bed, and get some sleep, and mind David. For- 
 tify him for to-morrow.' 
 
 ' You have quite made up your mind about 
 him?' 
 
 ' Quite ! ' 
 
 There was a half sigh, and that was all, as Mrs. 
 Mort accepted her son's fate, unconscious how much 
 more, just then, she thought over and felt the 
 seeming amelioration of her own. 
 
 Israel did not finish his labours till just the 
 hour he had fixed on for his visit to Mr. Griffith 
 Williams, and which was the very earliest that 
 decency permitted. 
 
 He stood up and stretched himself to his full 
 height, and yawned as if the relief other men get 
 by a series of efforts, he was accustomed to take 
 at once and have done with it. He then knelt 
 down and dipped his bullet-head into a pail of 
 water, rose alert, fresh, and ready for the day's
 
 PEKIX. 105 
 
 work, -wliich he felt instinctively must be mo- 
 mentous. 
 
 When lie had cleaned himself and put on his 
 best clothes, and was ready to start, he took up 
 the plan on which he had been working for so 
 many hours, and which he had left till then to get 
 thoroughly dry, rolled it tightly up, and held it in 
 his hand with the air of a man who feels an un- 
 wonted treasure in his grasp. He felt something 
 akin perhaps to what the young officer feels when 
 his first sword is put into his hand, or the emotion 
 may be likened to that which the field-marshal 
 experiences when he knows the baton to be his 
 own at last, by the best of evidences, the exulting 
 clutch of the wand by the eager fingers. 
 
 Some such thought must have struck Israel, for 
 he stopped and mused to himself, — 
 
 ' Now if I wanted to persuade a man who 
 might either become a friend or an enemy that I 
 was myself unarmed, and particularly innocent 
 hke, should I go and flourish a sabre in his face 
 to begin with ? ' 
 
 Israel answered himself, as he so often answered 
 others, by silence and action. He had already
 
 106 ISRAEL MORT, 
 
 restored to the portmanteau all the things he had 
 taken out of it except the plan which he had so 
 long laboured over ; now he put that back too, 
 and set off without it to see Mr. Griffith WilHams, 
 expecting to steal a march upon Mr. Barrett, the 
 agent, whose business hours, and habits, he well 
 knew.
 
 107 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. 
 
 Left an orphan to tlie care of his vigorous but 
 very unsentimental brother Jehoshaphat, who was 
 many years his senior, Griffith Williams had at 
 first tried the hard labour of the pit, but given it 
 up, to his brother's great ofience, and become a 
 farm-labourer. 
 
 And so he remained, till the brother's more 
 fortunate career began to make the contrast un- 
 pleasant to the successful man, who then gave 
 Griffith a small but sufficient income — helped 
 him to his gTeat desire, a thoroughly good edu- 
 cation, and when that was attained, showed a 
 sort of pride in his recognition of the clever, 
 gentlemanly fellow he had, as he thought, at last 
 created out of a great hulking ploughman. 
 
 What else he might have done for him never
 
 108 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 came to the test ; happily, perhaps, for Griffith ; 
 who married a farmer's daughter, a notable, bus- 
 tling, domesticated woman, with good looks, an 
 excellent temper, and a considerable fortune. Her 
 father had concealed from her alike his power 
 and his will to enrich her ; fearing^ she mio-ht other- 
 wise become the victim of some marriageable bird 
 of prey. He was pleased with her choice, and 
 left them when he died ' The Farm,' and every- 
 thing in the world he possessed. 
 
 Griffith was now a gentleman. He read much, 
 travelled occasionally, spent money freely when- 
 ever appealed to in behalf of any good cause, and 
 then, after all, began, at the age of forty, to find 
 his life a burden, without knowing why. 
 
 His wife was an excellent woman, and he de- 
 votedly attached to her, in spite of her deficiencies 
 in the character of a lady. His three children 
 were of striking beauty, and revelling in good 
 health ; what, then, was the secret cloud that ever 
 veiled from him the true value of all his advan- 
 tages ? 
 
 It was this : Griffith was at once sensitive and 
 proud, and had discovered that others, in knowing
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. 109 
 
 tliese traits of bis character, took a malignant 
 pleasure in making the worst use of them. 
 
 He had fallen, he found, between two stools. 
 The gentry with whose tastes and means his 
 own were most in accord took no notice of him, 
 but seemed to think the poor farm-labourer of 
 yesterday was essentially the same man still, only 
 grown rich. The little fai^mers on their side, men 
 of hard laborious life and um'efined habits, ever 
 fighting against poverty, or the fear of it, looked 
 upon him as an upstart, even while they were 
 obhged to acknowledge he was no discredit to 
 their order. At every local agricultural show and 
 contest, Griffith and his labourers were always 
 foremost in showing what good farming meant by 
 practical examples, and by winning a large pro- 
 portion of the prizes offered ; incidents that scarcely 
 improved the temper of those whose inferiority 
 they illustrated. 
 
 Thus baffled in his very natural aspirations, 
 and resenting the injustice of his neighbours, he 
 grew restless, solitary, reserved m his habits, 
 took depressing views of things, became morbidly 
 suspicious. And, to make matters worse, he
 
 110 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 cultivated that troublesome thing, conscience, 
 till it became, according to its custom, a power 
 formidable to its owner, since he did not attempt 
 to make it formidable in a morejegitimate way, 
 that is, in using it for the conquest of the many 
 evils he saw about him. 
 
 There was one exception to this. He did once 
 attempt to open Jehoshaphat's eyes to the con- 
 dition of the children in his mine ; and that 
 gentleman made the interference so extremely 
 unpleasant to the offender, that not only was 
 the offence never repeated, but from that time 
 the brothers ceased to hold any but the most 
 formal and necessary communications with each 
 other. 
 
 Thus Griffith's impulsive goodness and con- 
 scientiousness came to nothing, or very httle ; 
 and at the same time he found men looked upon 
 him, on the whole, as having a keen eye to his 
 own advantage, and as ready to take deep offence 
 against insults or injuries, real or supposed. 
 
 Such was Griffith Wilhams, the man who now 
 owned the colliery, and who hves in the very 
 loveliest neighbourhood, and the most picturesque
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. Ill 
 
 old manor house, perhaps, that could be found in 
 half a dozen shires — ' The Farm ' — distinguishingly 
 so called, in reference to its superior dignity to 
 all the other and smaller farms of the neighbour- 
 hood. 
 
 The most striking feature of the range of moun- 
 tains that here for so many miles face the sea is 
 the undulations of their sky line. A mountain 
 rises to a considerable height, with a rounded 
 central crown ; the slopes, right and left, forming 
 valleys, which reascend to other and similarly- 
 crowned mountains — thus valley and mountain 
 succeed at near intervals, each after each; but 
 with such infinite changes in the general form 
 and direction of their intervening double slopes, 
 and of their lovely and ^vild streams of water, 
 that it is an unending pleasure to go from one 
 to another, finding ever fresh beauty the further 
 you go. 
 
 And what a world of sweet soHtude awaits 
 you if you go right up some of these valleys till 
 you reach their highest points; what a world 
 of picturesque splendour if you then also ascend 
 the heights near, and gaze over the interminable
 
 112 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 panorama of mountains and valleys, and the all- 
 encircling sea ! 
 
 On the very edge of one of these wild streams, 
 and near the bottom of one of these exquisite 
 valleys, Griffith's house and farm was situated. 
 
 All their beauty and grandeur, however, 
 are non-existent for Israel, as he approaches 
 the Farm through fields and by footpaths ; but 
 for all that he looks keenly around him, taking 
 note of every object that may help him to 
 understand better the habits and views of the 
 owner. 
 
 He meets people hurrying past in unusual silence 
 and gravity, but he knows them and asks no 
 questions. One is an imdertaker, another the 
 sexton of the church, another a woman a dress- 
 maker, all illustrating, to Israel's cynical mind, 
 the notion what new life death puts into many 
 people. 
 
 A high bank encircles the Farm on the side by 
 which the Overman approaches, and not being 
 deep in the mystery of the preservation of man- 
 gold wurzel, he wonders what can be the meaning 
 of the bulging slope stretching nearly to the top
 
 COMIXG TO THE POIXT. Ho 
 
 of the bank, and why it is thatclied so beautifully 
 across tlie whole breadth of the field. 
 
 Above this bank is the hedge, then over that 
 an oak-tree, now bare of foliage, through which 
 we can see a mound, which admits only the top 
 of tlie house to be visible, and which consequently 
 prevents those inside the house from seeing the 
 magnificent sweep of the sea, unless they go to 
 the mound for the express purpose. Israel dis- 
 covers this peculiarity ; and it seems greatly to 
 tickle his fancy. 
 
 He now reaches a wide gate, which he opens, 
 and in an instant half a dozen dogs are in full 
 bay, their voices resounding so as to charm a 
 huntsman, but which are not at all agreeable to 
 Israel, as he finds them closing in upon him, 
 snuffing at his clothes, touching his calves, and 
 seeming to be the more dangerous just as they 
 become less noisy ; a trait that Israel perfectly 
 understands. 
 
 He waits, however, calm, w^atchful, immoveable, 
 his hand ready, his eye passing over their eyes, 
 giving no sign of fear or hostihty, though pre- 
 pared to brain or to throttle in an instant, if he 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 had occasion, and behold ! the dogs are presently 
 at peace with him, and one of them even thrusts 
 his cold nose into Israel's hands. 
 
 That business over, the Overman pauses in un- 
 certainty as to the right way to go. He doesn't 
 want to show himself at the principal front, which 
 he can see a little way off, and he does want to 
 slip in by the servants' entrance which he cannot 
 find. 
 
 The noise of the dogs perhaps will bring some- 
 body out, so he will wait a minute or two. 
 
 The Farm is pretty well all before him now. 
 On his left, under arching oaks of the most pic- 
 turesque character, are ducks diving and wing- 
 shaking in the stream at the base of the great 
 trees. 
 
 On his right runs the shrubbery, w^here over 
 the evergreens are snowberries dancing gaily in 
 the sun and wind. 
 
 A second, but smaller gate, with an exceedingly 
 smooth path of the richest mahogany colour 
 inside, seems to lead to the part of the house 
 facing the mound. He tries the gate, but finds 
 it locked.
 
 comijS-g to the point. 115 
 
 He moves on, dubious as to whether he had 
 not better go right up to the chief entrance ; and 
 a few yards brings him within sight of the side 
 of the house, which is long, has quaint windows 
 half covered with ivy, and a high terrace-wall 
 pierced with arches right through the immense 
 thickness, immediately in its front. 
 
 Beyond this he sees another external gate, and 
 a very handsome Tudor arch, showing the hmits 
 of the farm on that side. 
 
 Still no one comes, and still Israel is fain to 
 look about him, and study a place so novel and 
 just now so interesting to him for many reasons. 
 
 But his eye wanders listlessly over the long 
 trough, that carries water rushing eagerly along 
 at a level below his feet ; at the thatched shed 
 raised on short squat pillars ; at the long low- 
 roofed line of stables ; at the grand-looking mas- 
 sive steps that lead after all only to a loft; at 
 the low walls on either side reaching to his knee ; 
 at the fresh series of odd-shaped places and 
 buildings that become suddenly visible at a lower 
 level ; at the quaint bell hanging just under the 
 eaves which calls the labourers to and from meals 
 
 I 2
 
 116 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 and work ; at the noisy cackling hens, and stately 
 crowing cocks, that are pushing their beaks in 
 everywhere, and mounting high upon everything ; 
 when suddenly a light step is heard behind ; he 
 turns and sees David. 
 
 The boy advances to meet him, and show the 
 way ; laughingly, yet also a little excitedly ; and 
 explaining that he had seen the squire (for so 
 people began to call Mr. Griffith Wilhams) while 
 he was seeking wild flowers, and that he asked 
 him about his father, and was pleased to hear 
 he was coming up to the Farm. 
 
 Israel looked at the lad so long and fixedly that 
 David changed colour, and wondered if he was 
 suspected of lying ; but his father's thoughts were 
 far away, travelling slowly but firmly towards the 
 promised land he had so long made the goal of his 
 hfe. 
 
 ' Do you know,' at last he said, ' if Mr. Barrett, 
 the manager, has been here ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, yes sure ! He's in there now with Mr. 
 Griffith WiUiams.' 
 
 ' I meant to have been first. I ought to have 
 been,' Israel muttered to himself. ' Go on, David.'
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. 117 
 
 David went on before him, through the loner 
 but narrow hall : the father seeing noticing of the 
 pictures between which he passed, or of the busts 
 over the doors, or of the painted glass window 
 that admitted a dim, rich light from the conser- 
 vatory, while his son not only saw all these, but 
 much more (for which he must have been in- 
 debted to his fancy), if we may judge from his 
 subsequent report to his mother of this, to him, 
 wonderful day. 
 
 At the further end David felt obliged to point 
 out to his father the noble stag-horns that were 
 suspended over the door through which they were 
 about to enter. 
 
 ' He killed the stag, father, and saved the life of 
 the huntsman,' cried David, enthusiastically. 
 
 'He— who?' 
 
 'J\Ii'. Griffith Wilhams, father.' 
 
 ' Oh ! ' responded Israel, and invited no further 
 particulars ; so David, obliged to be silent, opened 
 the door and went in first, as if already he felt at 
 home, until he remembered this was his last holi- 
 day ; then he went out again. 
 
 The place dazzled the Overman. Spending the
 
 118 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 greater part of all the daylight that life afforded 
 him in the mine, the blaze of illmnmation that now 
 burst upon his eyes ' dazed him,' as he said, 
 when he got home again, and found somebody 
 to speak to. The room seemed all window, and 
 to bring the glowing valley, the dancing wild 
 stream, the broad marsh, and the double and 
 vying splendour of the sea and sky into startling 
 closeness. 
 
 He found then the builder of the house had 
 known what he was about, and had only left the 
 view closed from one spot that it midit not 
 interfere with a still finer view from another. 
 
 Mr. Griffith Williams was a stout, handsome 
 man, with light curling hair and beard. He wore 
 a short brown velvet shoot in s^-coat, and had a 
 gun lying across his knee, as though he had been 
 interrupted while examining it. 
 
 He sat at a large round table, on which were 
 writinf? materials, and a bio^ tin box, labelled out- 
 side ' Jehoshaphat Williams, Esquire.' This had 
 evidently just come from the deceased gentleman's 
 lawyers ; and from it had been taken a number 
 of papers and bulky documents by a person who
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. 119 
 
 stood by as its custodian, and handed them as 
 required by the heir. 
 
 ' Our firm, sir ' — so the gentleman was saying 
 as Israel was introduced, and sat down immediately 
 in the most unobservable corner he could find — 
 ' thought, as you are sole heir, and as some of 
 these things may demand immediate attention, we 
 ought not to wait for the customary occasion of 
 handing everything over, but see you at once, and 
 take your instructions.' 
 
 ' Quite right. Many thanks. You will, of 
 course, continue to act for me as you did for my 
 brother.' 
 
 The gentleman gave a most profound bow, 
 breathed as if he lived again, and a heavy fear had 
 been lifted from his mind. 
 
 Israel also drew a deep breath. The affair 
 struck him as ominous and unpleasant. The same 
 sort of dealing would renew Mr. Barrett's lease of 
 office ; who, if he did not leave now, would pro- 
 bably stick to the colliery quite the natural term 
 of Israel's life. 
 
 He noticed, too, that Griffith WiUiams had seen 
 him, and had not thought proper to notice him.
 
 VAO ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 But where was the manager ? He saw no- 
 thing of hmi. Had he already settled every- 
 thing with Mr. Griffith Williams, and gone away 
 home ? 
 
 At that moment Mr. Barrett came into the 
 room ; and in a bustling, confident sort of way, 
 implying the best possible understanding with his 
 employer, went to him and the lawyer; and then, 
 after exchanging a few words with the former, 
 came across the room to where Israel was at its 
 furthest extremity, and said to him — 
 
 ' Mr. Griffith Williams can't see you to-day ; 
 l3ut to-morrow, perhaps, he may spare a minute 
 OT two.' 
 
 'Oh, very well!' said Israel, rising, hat in 
 hand. 
 
 ' Can I do what you want ? ' asked the manager, 
 not exactly in an offensive w^ay, but looking, Israel 
 thought, as if wondering at his impudence in 
 coming there. 
 
 * No, sir, thank you. My business isn't so im- 
 portant but it can wait.' And staying no further 
 question, away he went, in the direction of his 
 own home.
 
 COMIXG TO THE POIXT. 121 
 
 But not for long did he keep in that direction. 
 When he had got so far from the Farm as to be 
 sure no one from thence could distinguish his 
 movements, he turned short round by a lane, re- 
 entered the valley, but on the other side of the 
 stream, and favoured by the thick undergrowth, 
 was able to reach a spot within full sight of his 
 employer's house, without himself incurring the 
 risk of being seen. 
 
 He then sat down on the round trunk of a 
 felled oak-tree, took out his watch, and made 
 some calculations, then drew forth his pipe, and 
 began to smoke slowly, meditatively. 
 
 ' Well,' said he to himself, after a long pause, 
 ' Barrett has got his chance — and he liad best 
 make use of it, for he shall never have another, 
 not if ' 
 
 He puffed again in silence and anxious thought. 
 
 ' I'll stay here at any rate till he comes out 
 again — ay, if it be night first. Make your mind 
 easy on that point, ]\Ii\ Barrett ! ' 
 
 Half an hour passed — an hour — two hours — 
 and still no !Mr. Barrett appeared. 
 
 Israel, at his tree, felt something like the Indian
 
 122 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 at the burning stake, but like liim evinced no 
 emotion. 
 
 The labours, and sacrifices, and hopes, and dis- 
 appointments of long years were again being gone 
 through, as he saw that each hour's delay of the 
 agent with his employer made it more and more 
 sure that the ground was being cut away from 
 under his feet — that ground where he had proposed 
 to stand a new man, and from which he had in- 
 tended to start on a new career. 
 
 Still he puffed away with no perceptible emotion 
 or impatience, beyond the occasional shifting of 
 his legs, or the rise for a moment to one knee, to 
 look out through the opening he had found among 
 the bushes. 
 
 And even when he did see Barrett come out at 
 last from his long audience, only those who might 
 have noticed Israel's face dimly illuminated as 
 by a light suddenly passed across it and gone 
 would have perceived anything noticeable in the 
 way he rose to his full height, and stood ap- 
 parently considering, for a little space, which way 
 he should go. In reality, he was measuring with 
 exactness Mr. Barrett's retreating steps, so that
 
 COMIXG TO THE POINT. 123 
 
 he might judge how long he would be passing 
 out beyond the far gate ; and how soon Israel 
 might start forth again, without risk of being seen 
 by the agent, on his determined purpose to 
 confront Mr. Griffith Wilhams in his house. 
 
 That time soon came. Israel descended the 
 slope, leapt over the stream, and began to ascend 
 the vaUey a little, preparatory to a descent upon 
 the house, so as to evade all danger of a meeting 
 with Mi\ Barrett. And then, to Israel's great 
 satisfaction, he and Mr. Griffith Wilhams met in 
 the pathway leading past the Farm up towards 
 the mountain height. 
 
 The greeting on the squire's side was genial, 
 yet with a smack of condescension ; on Israel's it 
 was deferential, but manly, almost stern. 
 
 'Shall we sit down here — pointing to a little 
 knoU — or go into the house ? ' asked Griffith. 
 
 ' All places are alike to me, sir,' responded 
 Israel ; and, following his employer's example, he 
 sat down. And as his lack-lustre eye (when un- 
 excited) fell on the foliage and water of the beau- 
 tiful valley, he really seemed to see no diffisrence 
 between it and his own familiar mine.
 
 124 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Well now, Mort, what is it you want to say 
 to me ? Speak out, and straightforwardly, for — ' 
 
 ' Did you ever know me to do anything else, 
 sir ? ' asked Israel, as if really curious to be 
 answered, but with no show of anger. 
 
 ' Well — no. But you are aware it is against 
 all discipline for inferior officers to make com- 
 plaints against superior ones.' 
 
 ' Better that,' said Israel, interrupting the 
 speaker, ' than, for lack of complaining, to let 
 inferior and superior be all blown up together.' 
 
 ' Why, Israel, man ! you do not, cannot, mean 
 that things are so bad as that.' 
 
 ' I mean, sir,' said Israel, looking aside and 
 down, not at all as in fear, but as if engaged 
 in some mental effort, that required all possible 
 abstraction from externals, ' that for a long time 
 past the colliers have made the two deputies 
 miserable by their continual alarms, now about 
 one thing, now about another. I mean that the 
 deputies have been trying in the same way to 
 scare me, and I have felt obligated so far to listen 
 to them as to call Mr. Barrett's special attention 
 to a number of things that want to be seen to,
 
 COMIXG TO THE POIXT. 125 
 
 and which he does see to by treating the mine as 
 a tinker treats a tin-kettle with a worn-out bottom 
 — by soft sawder. I mean, sir, that as none of 
 us, therefore, can get satisfied without going to 
 head-quarters — wliy, to head-quarters I come, as 
 it's my duty to do. It's your property, you 
 know, sir, but it's our hves at stake.' 
 
 The eyes of the two men met — Griffith's trou- 
 bled with many thoughts, Israel's luminous ^vith 
 one thought ; he was coming to the point at 
 last. 
 
 ' And are the necessary operations so very 
 heavy ? ' asked the former. 
 
 'I want you, sir, to come to tlie mine and 
 judge for yourself.' 
 
 ' I ! What's the good of that ? I am no judge. 
 I hate the mine. I mean the details.' 
 
 ' You are owner,' said Israel, with something 
 like reproof. 
 
 Griffith's eyes glanced enquiringly, but uncon- 
 scious they were doing so, in Israel's, and then at 
 his own dress, and then again at Israel's, but 
 dropped them suddenly to the dog lying at his 
 feet.
 
 126 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 However slow might be tlie thoughts of the 
 Overman, his mstincts were keen and quick, and 
 he at once guessed and tested the nature of his 
 employer's speculations by sapng — 
 
 ' If, sir, you will say you will come down, I will 
 take care that everything shall be made as little 
 disagreeable as possible.' 
 
 ' Tell me, Israel, candidly, is there any danger ? ' 
 
 ' Certainly not/ 
 
 ' You can guarantee that ? ' 
 
 ' With my life,' said Israel with a smile — a most 
 unusual phenomenon on his face — ' if that were 
 any good to you.' 
 
 ' Don't imagine me a coward, Israel.' 
 
 ' Certainly not, sir,' responded Israel, passing 
 his hand over his face at the same moment. 
 
 'No, Israel, I don't think I am a coward. 
 I can hunt with a horse that most men would 
 refuse to mount, and leap anything that can be 
 leaped ; I can bear pain ; I could go into battle, 
 and decently, at least, play my part. These things 
 He, or might lie in my way. But the mine ! — 
 well, Israel, you know as much of my history as 
 most men, and know how I shrank from it in
 
 COMING TO THE POINT. 127 
 
 youth, and I don't find my love grow for it in 
 maturer age.' 
 
 ' Ay, but for all that there's more to be got out 
 of her now than as yet there ever has been gotten,' 
 remarked Israel, patting the sward with his right 
 hand, as if that were the mine below ; and follow- 
 ing the remark by such a glance at Griffith as the 
 marksman gives who fires at some noble prey, 
 and waits to see if it is about to fall. 
 
 ' What's that you say ? ' hastily demanded 
 Griffith. He had already risen to his feet, and 
 turned his face towards home, but again turned, 
 and stood rooted to the spot. 
 
 ' Will you come to the mine to-morrow, sir ? ' 
 
 "• Impossible ! it would not be decent till after 
 the funeral.' 
 
 ' Well, sir, when shall we meet ? ' 
 
 ' You and I to be alone ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no ; I think you should see the people, 
 and they ought to see you.' 
 
 ' And what about Mr. Barrett ? ' 
 
 * Of course he'U be there, sir.' 
 
 Griffith seemed more and more to be lost in the 
 tangles of his own thoughts, or else in the dis-
 
 128 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 turbed aspect tliat Israel's presence, looks, words, 
 and behaviour seemed to cast over them. This 
 reply puzzled him exceedingl3^ 
 
 Certainly he wanted to hear whatever Israel 
 had to say, and he saw he must let him say it in 
 his own time and manner. But he did also want 
 not to seem mean or ungentlemanly to his 
 manager, Barrett. He had been busily thinking 
 how to compass both ends at the same time, when 
 lo I Israel set at nought his forethought by saying, 
 as if it were the simplest thing in the world, that 
 of course the manager would be present. 
 
 After giving his employer ample time to realise 
 the force of this remark, Israel said — 
 
 ' I will, by your leave, sir, call on him as I go 
 home, and say I have asked you to meet him 
 and me, and that you have consented to come.' 
 
 ' If so, he will be here presently, and either 
 require the project to be given up so far as you 
 are concerned, or resign.' 
 
 ' Or — resign ! ' echoed Israel ; but Griffith 
 could not, for the life of him, tell whether the 
 tone meant something of wonder, or a good deal 
 of submission.
 
 COMi:^G TO THE POIXT. 129 
 
 .'What should I do, then?' asked Griffith, a 
 little mahciously, as he surveyed the Overman. 
 
 ' I don't think you will need to ask that ques- 
 tion, sir, after our meeting.* 
 
 So said Israel Mort, and not a tone, look or 
 gesture escaped him that could imply that he felt 
 trapped like a fox in his wiles. His employer 
 could, in fact, almost fancy the Overman's mind 
 was already far beyond the point where he 
 (Griffiths) was pausing in speculation. It seemed 
 to him that Israel was waiting impatiently for 
 them to begin together some new undertaking, 
 some grand commercial march, that might lead 
 to wealth, such as the owner of the Farm and of 
 the mine had never yet dared to think of. 
 
 He shook hands hastily with Israel, and then 
 they separated. 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 130 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 CHAPTEE YI. 
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 
 
 After leaving his father at the Farm, David knew 
 not what to do with himself. The excitement of 
 that visit had for the moment made him forget 
 his overhanging trouble, but now it all returned 
 upon him. 
 
 He no longer thought of the day as a holiday. 
 Should he go home? No, he dared not trust 
 himself to spend the time there. He felt that it 
 was better his mother should not have his pale 
 face before her, to strike fresh trouble into her 
 eyes whenever they chanced to fall on it. 
 
 He wandered hstlessly about, and his feet led 
 him, as if by a will of their own, to the little wood 
 he had passed through lately, so happy and con- 
 fident in his strength and sense of safety and 
 freedom.
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 131 
 
 He sat down on the root of a chestnut tree, 
 which had a thousand httle branches with silver 
 tips ghstening in the sun. 
 
 The birds sang in it, undisturbed by the mourn- 
 ful little form below — the sun shone very warmly, 
 the wild flowers smelt pleasantly in the breeze, in 
 fact all things in the wood went on — it seemed to 
 David — with the old story of ' Live and be happy ! ' 
 — ' Live and be happy ! ' hke the flattery of a hypo- 
 critical friend, unaware that he has been found 
 out. The boy lent a sullen ear to this old story, 
 and turned a pale, sullen cheek to the breeze, as 
 if he regarded its soft touch as the kiss of a Judas. 
 In liis suffering and unreasonable young heart, 
 David felt most bitter and angry against all the 
 sweet and tender influences which this little wood 
 had had over him ; making him for so many years 
 hope such peaceful and dehghtful things and 
 ignore stern facts and probabihties. 
 
 Some way below him he saw a little girl 
 gathering primroses that ht a narrow stream, 
 before the sun had time to reach it. His eyes were 
 just as gloomy as ever when they fell upon her, 
 though he knew her well, and had for her all the 
 
 z 2
 
 132 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 affection a brother] ess and sisterless lad could 
 have for his first friend. But he remembered 
 now as he watched her, that that fatal belief in a 
 charmed life, the hopes of being providentially 
 spared the hardship that had come upon most of 
 his schoolmates as childhood departed, had been 
 greatly strengthened and encouraged by the com- 
 panionship of this little flower-gatherer. So 
 David looked at her with bitter eyes, for he could 
 not help looking at her ; she was much too pretty 
 a. sight for him to keep his eyes away. Her tiny 
 wandlike fio'ure in her violet frock was the most 
 graceful thing in the wood, and would have been 
 the loveliest bit of colour there but for the hair 
 that fell over it, and that the wind blew in all 
 directions as she moved, and often drew it in one 
 golden cloud upwards, as if trying to lift her by 
 it from the earth, to which she scarcely seemed 
 to belong. Her hat had been taken off to form a 
 basket for her flowers. Her face was wonderfully 
 animated, considering her loneliness, and the 
 quietness of her occupation ; it kindled and waned 
 like a star down there in the wood all by itself ; 
 and it was impossible for David not to keep
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 133 
 
 looking at it, though he said in liis heart bitterly, 
 that this was one of the folse prophets which had 
 so misled him. 
 
 Suddenly the little primrose-gatherer caught 
 sight of him, and hailed him with a prolonged 
 bird-like ciy of his name, broken up into shakes, 
 and rising into the shrillest of silvery sounds at the 
 last syllable of it, after having gone almost start- 
 lingly low just before. 
 
 ' Da-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-vid ! ' 
 
 In the new dignity of his sorrow, David 
 leaned his head upon his hand, his elbow on 
 his knee, and tried to consider the childish 
 greeting as beneath his notice, unworthy his 
 attention. 
 
 He could not, however, resist peeping gloomily 
 through his fingers, to see how his Httle friend 
 took such unusual treatment. 
 
 She looked puzzled, then troubled, and was for 
 threading her w^ay up to him through the bram- 
 bles, when three small shock-headed children 
 coming along by the stream made her afraid to 
 leave her primroses. She ran back to them, and 
 busied herself in making them into two bundles,
 
 134 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 which, by dint of squeezing them out of all life 
 and form, she managed to hold in her small 
 hands. 
 
 Still appearing abandoned to grief and gloom, 
 David watched her coming towards him, dividing 
 her attention between her two bouquets, which 
 she carried well in front of her with great care 
 and pride, and indeed was so absorbed in them 
 as to fail to look to her footing, so that she slipped 
 several times before reaching him. 
 
 Coming close in front of David she stooped, and 
 her small face growing wide-eyed and excited in 
 anticipation of his enjoyment, touched his nose 
 with one of her bunches of primroses. 
 
 David turned his face impatiently away. 
 
 The child looked puzzled and grieved ; then, 
 as if with sudden inspiration, stooped again and 
 applied the other bunch. The nose was turned 
 away still more impatiently. 
 
 This appeared to astonish the little would-be 
 comforter beyond expression. 
 
 After gazing at his face with her knees still 
 bent before him, she glanced perplexedly first at 
 one of her closely-packed bunches, then at the
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 135 
 
 other, to see if ttie fault by any chance could lie 
 with them. 
 
 Assured apparently of the impossibihty of this, 
 she looked again at David, and comforted herself 
 with the thought that he was absorbed in some 
 difficult lesson, as she had often known him to be. 
 But he had no book — perhaps then he was only 
 pretending to be sulky, and would shout and jump 
 at her in a moment to startle her. She therefore 
 suddenly stepped aside a little, with her bright 
 eyes fixed on him in merry suspicion, one foot so 
 planted, and her body so leaning away from him 
 as to be ready for instantaneous flight. 
 
 David's continued silence, however, giving her 
 courage, she ventured to approach on tiptoe and 
 shout in his ear in the shrill fairy treble — 
 
 ' David ! ' 
 
 This having no elffect, she went round and 
 called in the other ear in the deepest fairy bass — 
 
 'David!' 
 
 The bowed head remaining apparently insen- 
 sible still, a slight frown of pain and perplexity 
 began to knit the delicate golden eyebrows, while 
 the hps quivered, and then compressed ; and giving
 
 136 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 way suddenly to her fear and wonder, the child 
 threw herself on her knees before David, uttering 
 passionate repetitions of his name with hysterical 
 laughter, and beating the primroses against his 
 arm — 
 
 ' David ! David ! David ! ' 
 
 * Go away. Miss Williams,' said David, looking 
 up suddenly, stung by the sound of her laughter, 
 and speaking with unkind vehemence — ' go away 
 — I hate unfeeling girls ! ' 
 
 At this the flowers were dropped, and the little 
 figure retreated till its back touched a stripling 
 oak-tree, against which it leaned, drawn up on 
 its toes, and gazing at David in the greatest 
 wonderment. 
 
 At last the eyes, wide with surprise and pain, 
 began to show the glitter of a babyish tear in 
 each, and a baby finger was placed on the lips 
 which tremblingly ejaculated — 
 
 ' Well, if ever— ! ' 
 
 The grief and amazement expressed in these 
 words, and the patient silence following them, 
 made David suddenly remorseful for the pain he 
 was inflicting in his own selfish sorrow.
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 137 
 
 ' I didn't mean to be cross, Nest,' lie said gently, 
 ' but I wish you'd go away.' 
 
 ' Why ? ' asked Nest, ' whatever have I done, 
 David?' 
 
 ' Nothing,' ansvrered David impatiently. ' Only 
 it's no use you staying here. You know nothing 
 about trouble. Go away. Oh ! I wish you'd go 
 away.' 
 
 A mournful intelligence danced in Nest's blue 
 eyes. She began to understand the grievance 
 David had against her. She knew she was very 
 ignorant in comparison with David, and often 
 offended him because she always preferred playing 
 to trying to learn the things he wished to teach 
 her ; and she felt that now he had indeed touched 
 upon a truth it behoved her to be very much 
 ashamed of. 
 
 ' Oh ! how much I wish I knew,' she thought, 
 'and then David would talk to me instead of 
 sending me away.' 
 
 She leaned her back against the tree, and looked 
 
 N^ sadly upward with her hands behind her, because 
 
 she had seen many a child at the village school 
 
 (which she often visited as an idle little lady)
 
 138 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 seem to find out a forgotten lesson by staring up 
 at a corner of the ceiling, and Nest used to wonder 
 if the angels wrote it there for the poor little 
 dunce, and then rubbed it out very quickly, for 
 Nest had seen nothing when she looked but the 
 fly-marks and the damp-stains. 
 
 But though Nest put her hands behind her and 
 looked up in the same manner she had seen the 
 little ones at school do, no clue to the mystery 
 that perplexed her met her earnestly seeking, 
 piteous blue eyes ; on the contrary, everything 
 seemed joyously evading the question of her heart 
 — what trouble might be ? 
 
 The bright sky bore no token of any such 
 thing; the birds seemed to know nothing 
 whatever of the subject, nor to think it worth 
 enquiring into ; the very young small leaves 
 about her, all looked as innocently ignorant as 
 Nest herself 
 
 Finding thus no enlightenment anywhere. Nest 
 turned to David suddenly, and sitting down beside 
 him, gave his arm a vehement grasp with her 
 tiny hands, and leaned a pale, determined face 
 against his shoulder.
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 139 
 
 ■ ' I know I don't know what trouble is David,' 
 she said, ' but don't send me away ; I want to 
 know — and I will know.' 
 
 At first David stared at her, then laughed, then 
 his eyes, with the laughter still in them, filled with 
 tears, and he laid his hands on her shoulders ex- 
 claiming with a voice as strong as if he had never 
 a grief in him, — 
 
 ' You don't know, and you shan't know — from 
 me — you dear, dear little thing ! ' 
 
 Nest, however, resisted such patronising pity, 
 and pressing to him, besought earnestly that he 
 would tell her what trouble was. 
 
 ' Yes, David — I do want to know — make me 
 know what it is.' 
 
 ' That I will never ! ' declared David still more 
 manfully, as he kissed her and smiled over her 
 entreating face. ' No ! she shan't know what it is 
 from me ; no, not if I had to be blown up in the 
 mine every other day, and drowned the days be- 
 tween, and come alive again every night ! ' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' cried Nest, with a sharp ring in her 
 baby voice. ' Now I know. Oh ! David ; you've 
 got to go and work in the mine ! '
 
 140 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Well, and if I have,' returned David, ' what of 
 that ? ' 
 
 Nest stared at him amazedly, for she had well 
 known his horror at such a fate. 
 
 ' You didn't suppose it ^vas that I was miserable 
 about, did you now ? ' asked David, firm in his 
 determination to deceive her. 
 
 ' Yes I did, David,' answered Nest frankly. 
 
 David laughed and said — 
 
 ' Oh ! you stupid ! ' 
 
 ' Then what is it ? ' enquired Nest, still dubious. 
 
 ' Why, Tom Evans will get the prize through 
 me leaving school of course ; that's what's put me 
 out.' 
 
 ' And that's all ? ' asked Nest. 
 
 ' There's twelve striking,' said David, jumping 
 up, ' and I've got to meet father soon ; — come 
 along — look sharp ! ' 
 
 Nest rose, and gave him her hand, and they 
 w^ent together through the wood. 
 
 They did not get along very quickly, for David, 
 in spite of his injunction to Nest to hurry, soon 
 slackened his pace, and showed a decided incli- 
 nation for loitering.
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 141 
 
 As they went, David chatted in quite a cheer- 
 ful manner, till some of the courage which he had 
 assumed for her sake began really to cheer and 
 strengthen his heart. 
 
 Nest, with a perception beyond her years, not 
 only suspected something of the truth, but also 
 understood it was better for David that he should 
 not know she suspected it. 
 
 On this account she answered to all David said 
 as cheerfully as possible. To do this her answers 
 had to be very prompt and very brief ; and she 
 kept her eyes widely open to the sunlight, so that 
 anything Hke tears might, she thought, be ashamed 
 to appear there. 
 
 No one watching these two, and hearing their 
 talk, could have guessed that they were both en- 
 gaged in trying to deceive each other as earnestly 
 as grown-up people might. 
 
 David now saw his father in the distance, and 
 fearing what he would say, moved to take leave 
 of Nest suddenly, as if he must hasten to him. 
 He therefore said good-bye almost more carelessly 
 than Nest could bear. 
 
 She clutched his hand very tightly, nor would
 
 142 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 all the staring she could do keep the tears back 
 any longer. David let her keep his hand, but 
 smiled, and would not trust himself to look at 
 her. 
 
 Both children suffered, though David's new 
 courage still remained with him, but the chill 
 breath of pain was blowing for the first time on 
 Nest's hfe in its all frail blossom, and shaking it 
 cruelly. 
 
 Both had a vague sense which neither could 
 have expressed, that the childish paradise the 
 wood behind had been to them was closed for 
 ever, and that some invisible angel stood there 
 preventing their return. 
 
 At last David took her hat from her trembhng 
 hands, and tied it on, pretending not to notice 
 how her httle throat swelled and tightened under 
 the strings. Then, looking at her brightly, he 
 patted her on both cheeks, and strode away as 
 fast as he could towards the Overman, feehng as 
 bold and triumphant as a soldier who, hastening 
 to hot battle, has half succeeded in persuading 
 the woman he loves that there will be no fighting 
 where he goes.
 
 THE LAST HOLIDAY. 143 
 
 Nest lingered a moment, then set off running 
 towards her home ; but as she went faster than her 
 strength would let her go for many yards, she 
 soon stopped and sat down in the grass at the side 
 of the road, where she allowed her tears to fall 
 as fast as she could wipe them away with her 
 pinafore. 
 
 After this she rose and walked homewards with 
 feeble but demure and womanly steps, looking na 
 longer for the angel's writing in the corner of the 
 sky.
 
 144 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 CHAPTEE YII. 
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLAXS. 
 
 While Israel, after leaving the farm, paced along 
 slowly through the little wood, in labouring 
 thought, towards the village to execute some 
 errand which had been entrusted to him by the 
 manager, and which had given him the oppor- 
 tunity to be away from the mine w^ithout danger 
 of exciting comment, who should he see but 
 the manager himself turn the corner by the 
 nearest houses, and begin to ascend the hill 
 towards the Farm. 
 
 Barrett was evidently hurrying his movements ; 
 his face looked red, and a long roll of paper w^as 
 in his hand. 
 
 A dusky light, the ghost of a smile, passed over 
 Israel's face as he said to himself, ' Plans, of 
 course ! I forgot that two could play that game ! '
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLAXS. 145 
 
 Israel moved a few steps aside out of sight ; 
 then, after a brief pause, he retiurned, took just 
 one glance after the fast-retreating figure, and 
 began himself to walk towards his own cot- 
 tage at a pace that would have excited the as- 
 tonishment of any of the neighbours who might 
 have seen him, and remembered that never in 
 their whole lives before had they beheld such a 
 spectacle as Israel sweeping along at the rate of a 
 prize pedestrian. 
 
 But even this speed did not appear to satisfy 
 him, for he stopped suddenly before an aged but 
 stiU hale man, who was smoking as he leaned 
 against the threshold of his door, and addressed 
 him — 
 
 ' Martin, I am wanted up at the squire's just 
 now, and have left something at home. Will 
 you fetch it for me, and bring it up ? ' 
 
 ' ay ! But I can't go very fast now-a-days, 
 Master Israel.' 
 
 ' No. How long must I give you ? You won't 
 have to wait there.' 
 
 ' Ten minutes '11 take me there, say five to stop 
 — that's a quarter — and then there's the hill, worse 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 luck, I can't manage that with my short breath, 
 under half an hour.' 
 
 'Three-quarters altogether, too much I fear. 
 But there's no help. Quick then. Go yourself 
 to my bedroom, unlock the big box you'll find 
 there — here's the key — and take out a roll tied with 
 red tape ! There are other rolls, but the one tied 
 with red tape is the right one. Eed tape, mind ! 
 When you have got it, lock the box again — bring 
 back the key, with the roll, and bring both up 
 yourself, unless you can find some one you can 
 trust who will move more quickly. David, my 
 boy, will do, if you can find him, or anyone who 
 is strong and swift, and can run the whole way 
 up. I shall give you a shilling, and if you can find 
 another to help I shall give him a shilling too. 
 But tlien I shall expect it at the Farm in half an 
 hour.' 
 
 He took out his watch. 
 
 ' It is now just upon twelve. You will send 
 it by half-past, or bring it by a quarter to one ? ' 
 
 ^will.' 
 
 Israel paused just to see the old man start, 
 which he did with creditable energy; then he
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLANS. 147 
 
 re-entered the wood, and saw in the distance 
 David, and a little girl, that looked like Nest, 
 just separating. David came running to meet 
 him. Asking no questions about his companion, 
 Israel bade him go as fast as he could home, 
 and bring up to the Squire's the roll that old 
 Martin had gone to take from the big box. 
 
 'Eun David, thou know'st not how much de- 
 pends on thy speed.' 
 
 Away went David, and then Israel himself 
 turned and ascended the hill with extraordinary ra- 
 pidity ; never pausing from fatigue, never panting 
 from want of breath, but with his why, muscular 
 frame evidently capable of far greater eflbrts than 
 any he was putting forth. 
 
 Presently he overtook the postman, who asked 
 him if he was going up to the Farm, and would 
 take the Squire's letters. 
 
 ' Yes,' was the reply. 
 
 ^^^lile the letters were being sorted out, Israel 
 put forth liis fmger and touched a letter that the 
 postman kept passing by. 
 
 ' For Lir. Barrett ? ' he asked. 
 
 'Yes.' 
 
 L 2
 
 148 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Well, he's up there ; so I'll take that too.' 
 
 ' Why, Israel, I don't know what's the matter, 
 but he came to me quite excited-like, the other 
 day, when you took his letters for him, and 
 almost swore they had been opened.' 
 
 ' Guilty conscience, Owen. Do you think I'd 
 do that ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 ' The Squire would like to see him have that 
 letter without delay.' 
 
 ' Well, Israel, he didn't directly order me not 
 to give them to you, so we'll try once more.' 
 
 The postman gave the letters, glad to escape 
 a toilsome walk, and Israel resumed his former 
 pace. 
 
 One moment only he stopped. It was to 
 eye the letter carefully all over. It was from the 
 same correspondent who had so frequently written 
 of late to the manager. 
 
 Israel knew that, for he had studied Mr. 
 Barrett's letters very carefully of late. The post- 
 mark indicated a place that was a perfect maze 
 of collieries. Israel had heard nothing — read 
 nothing — about Barrett's private affairs ; but he
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLANS. 149 
 
 had watched him closely, and come to the con- 
 clusion that the manager was seeking a new and 
 possibly more profitable post ; or else — and that 
 thouglit struck Israel in a specially sinister point 
 of view — he knev/ the dangers and future dis- 
 credits of the mine, and was intending to retire 
 safely before the day of that deluge which Jeho- 
 shaphat, wdth almost cynical enjoyment, had 
 anticipated. 
 
 ' There's a look about the writing of this address 
 I like,' muttered Israel. ' It means decision. 
 
 ' But then is it Yes, or No ? 
 
 ' I'm a fool to ask that, or to care about it. 
 Yes or ISTo matters httle ; but will the aSair get 
 to the knowledge of the squire ? That's the 
 question.' 
 
 He neither knocked nor rang when he reached 
 the Farm, but went in where he knew there would 
 be an open door. He met a servant, but the only 
 cognizance he took of the fact was to ask her, 
 under his breath — 
 
 ' Has Mr. Barrett gone in to the Squire ? ' 
 
 ' yes, directly he came.' 
 
 ' Somebody will bring me a roll of paper pre-
 
 150 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 sently. Let me have it — 'tis for the squire — the 
 instant it comes.' 
 
 ' Very well.' 
 
 ' Just tap, and leave it against the door. I 
 shall hear.' 
 
 Passing her without further word, he knocked 
 softly at the door, and receiving no answer, as he 
 expected none, went in. 
 
 His first act was to stand and look about him ; 
 his second, to take off his hat, which he had 
 hitherto forgotten. 
 
 Griffith WilHams was in his usual place, the 
 chair of state, holding up with both hands a plan 
 of some part of the mine ; while the manager was 
 leaning over him, and pointing out with his finger 
 certain portions of it concerning which they were 
 talking. 
 
 ' Israel back again ? That's lucky. Sit down.^ 
 
 Israel did so, and the conversation went on for 
 some time without seemins^ to interest him. Sud- 
 denly his posture changed. 
 
 ' Then,' the Squire was saying, ' apart from 
 minor operations and reparations generally through
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLANS. 151 
 
 the mine, levels number one, number five, and 
 number six, are the only ones about which we 
 need be anxious, or incur heavy expense for " dead 
 work.'" 
 
 ' That's correct, sir,' said Mr. Barrett. 
 
 ' And the new district you have just opened 
 out, and which promises to be so productive — are 
 you quite sure that will involve no great demand 
 on capital ? ' 
 
 ' Quite, sir,' responded Mr. Barrett. 
 
 * Only a new shaft ! ' said Israel from his corner, 
 in a deep sepulchral voice. 
 
 Now as a new shaft is in ordinary circumstances 
 about one of the most]costly operations the mining 
 engineer can engage in, it is no wonder that the 
 remark disturbed Griffith Williams's luxurious 
 equanimity. 
 
 * What does he mean by that ? ' he asked of the 
 Manager. 
 
 ' Can't say, I'm sure. I only know that the 
 ventilation is excellent at present, with the down- 
 cast and upcast in one and the same shaft.' 
 
 Again came forth the sepulchral voice —
 
 152 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' One shaft won't do for the new district. And 
 if it would, Parhament wouldn't let it. ^¥liy, they 
 say the bill's passing now.' 
 
 Griffith looked from Israel to Barrett, and back 
 from Barrett to Israel, and could not doubt, the 
 one had been making things pleasant, the other 
 was making them true. 
 
 He began from that moment to watch the two 
 men closely, while continuing the conversation. 
 
 ' As to these levels, numbers one, five, and six, 
 if we do not put them in a thorough state, is it 
 certain that' we can go on winning coal from 
 them for a considerable period ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, quite.' 
 
 ' Not in number six,' again asserted the sepul- 
 chral voice from the far corner of the room. 
 
 ' Why ? ' asked his employer. 
 
 ' Because folk have been before us there.' 
 
 ' Nothing of the kind, Mr. Griffith, I assure you,' 
 said the Manager ; ignoring, as he had done 
 throughout, Mort's presence, except when com- 
 pelled to reply to him. 
 
 ' Look in your map, Mr. Barrett,' said Israel. 
 
 ' I is you, Israel,' said Griffith, ' who must look
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE FLAJS^S. 153 
 
 there. Get up, and come here, where we can 
 s^^eak to you without shouting.' 
 
 Israel rose and walked slowly to the table, and 
 looked over the shoulder of the Manager, who 
 had leaned down to inspect the plan. 
 
 ' All right, ain't it, Mr. Barrett ? You find the 
 old works there — a little beyond the face of level 
 number six ? ' 
 
 'Pray look again, Mr. Griffith, for yourself a 
 moment,' appealed the Manager, half in scorn, yet 
 half in trepidation, for Israel's manner suggested 
 he knew not what cause of fear. 
 
 ' I do look, and see nothing indicated but a 
 most valuable field of coal. Stoop, Israel ; here, 
 over my arm. Don't be afraid.' - 
 
 ' 1 never was yet, sir.' Then, after a pause, he 
 added, seeing his employer's heightened colour : 
 ' Fear don't do for an Overman, sir.' 
 
 ' True,' said Griffith, appeased. ' Well, do you 
 find any abandoned works there, beyond the face 
 of level number six ? ' 
 
 ' I'm obhgated to say no ; and it ain't a plea- 
 sant thing to say.' 
 
 'Why, Israel?'
 
 154 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Because it ought to be there.' 
 
 ' Prove that, and ; ' the impulsive man 
 
 stopped in time. 
 
 Israel took no advantage — seemed to see none 
 that could be taken. He walked slowly and 
 heavily across the room, more slowly even than 
 was usual with him. He enjoyed for once in his 
 life the position of chief actor in a Httle drama, 
 which might turn out only a miserable wretched 
 farce — involving, however, quite enough of tra- 
 gedy to give it dignity to him — or might prove a 
 pleasant, agreeable comedy, with a most satisfac- 
 tory denouement of commercial sentiment. 
 
 It was to the door he went, to fetch his roll. 
 He knew it was there — he had heard the tap out- 
 side. He went, and returned with it. 
 
 Slowly he untied the red tape, and placed it 
 methodically on the table ; slowly unrolled the 
 bundle, which consisted of various papers ; took 
 one away from the rest, and placed it aside while 
 he re-rolled the others ; and then, and then only, 
 did he display to the astonished eyes of the two 
 men an entire plan of the mine, of the rudest 
 description of manufacture, vilely coloured, black-
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLANS. 155 
 
 ened with the stains from colliers' hands, greased 
 with drops from coUiers' candles ; but still a plan 
 that was vividly, staringly intelligible in every 
 detail, and showing, at the first glance of the in- 
 structed eyes that now looked upon them, most 
 important differences between it and the official 
 plan of Mr. Barrett, which still lay there under 
 the hand of his employer. 
 
 ' Who made this ? ' was that gentleman's imme- 
 diate enquiry. 
 
 ' I did.' 
 
 ' How, when, and where, in the name of hea- 
 ven, could you accomphsh this if you did not 
 take it from other maps ? ' 
 
 ' Actual survey, sir ; actual survey ! ' 
 
 ' Indeed ! And you were able to make such a 
 survey alone — with no help from others ? ' 
 
 ' It looks like it, sir ; don't it ? Hard work, 
 and uncommon difficult. I was more often wrong 
 than right when I began ; and so I found when I 
 had to put my calkelations together and make 'em 
 agree. I ought to ha' known better. It was the 
 iron in the mine that put me out. And I had to 
 take up the tramway, a bit at a time, as oppor-
 
 156 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 tunity offered ; or when I couldn't do that, I had 
 to get the rails covered with straw, and then, 
 again, upon the straw I had to put a tidy layer o' 
 small coal. You see, sir, iron and the magnetics 
 plays the deuce with the compass. They won't 
 work together in harmony nohow — not in sur- 
 veyin'.' 
 
 ' And at what times was all this done ? ' asked 
 Griffith, in undisguised admiration. 
 
 ' Not in my employer's time ; be sure o' that, 
 sir. I always worked at night ; my reg'lar occu- 
 pations, as you know, belongin' to the day. Mr. 
 Barrett can speak for himself as to whether or no 
 I have been a careless or a diligent servant.' 
 
 Mr. Barrett was not able to complain, and was 
 in no mood to comphment, so remained silent 
 and sullen. 
 
 And then, perhaps for the first time in his life, 
 was Israel's form seen to swell with pride, his 
 swarthy face to glow with conscious self-satisfac- 
 tion. After a pause he went on — 
 
 ' I've been waiting more than twenty years for 
 my time to come ; and this, and things like this, 
 naterally became my best helps to patience.'
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PL.\XS. 157 
 
 * And have you studied everything about mines 
 and mining in this thorough spirit ? ' 
 
 ' Try me, sir ; or let Mr. Barrett take me in 
 hand. I ni ready.' 
 
 Griffith smothered an inward laugh, as he said 
 to the Manager — 
 
 ' Barrett, have you looked at his map ? ' 
 
 ' He doesn't seem inclined to let me.' 
 
 This was not exactly correct. Israel, for reasons 
 of his OAvn, had rolled up a part of his plan, and 
 placed the remainder between Barrett and Griffith. 
 But the Manager, after a rapid glance at level 
 number six, and the ground adjacent, which it 
 was intended he should look at, put his hands 
 upon the paper, and moved one of them against 
 the rolled part, as if to unroll it for convenience. 
 This Israel instantly stopped, with the remark — 
 
 ' Your map is yours, Mr. Barrett, and mine is 
 mine. Let each crow upon his own dunghill.' 
 
 ' Well, how is it ? ' asked Mr. Griffith Wilhams, 
 after a significant pause. 
 
 ' I don't believe in his plan.' 
 
 * All right,' said Israel : ' to-morrow morning 
 I'll show the place where I once bored through,
 
 158 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 and nearly got into a mess ; and if Mr. Barrett 
 likes to have a swim without the necessity of 
 larning the art, he has only to say the word.' 
 
 ' You startle me, Israel ! Did you certainly 
 leave all safe ? ' 
 
 ' That, too, you shall see to-morrow, sir. That 
 level is the dryest in the mine, and has been for 
 years.' 
 
 ' Well, Barrett ? ' 
 
 ' Well, sir,' responded the Manager, ' he has 
 been here much longer than I have. Of course, 
 a manager who is more often out of the mine 
 than in it, must depend upon his Overman, who is 
 always there. But he deserves to be prosecuted 
 for not giving proper information.' 
 
 ' In my Overman's book,' said Israel, looking at 
 the agent, and then at a little memorandum he 
 took from his pocket, ' bearing on the fly-leaf my 
 name, and the date of the year (which he named) 
 — -the book which I gave you on your own re- 
 quest, on account, as you said, of various valeyble 
 memoranda in it — you will find entered, under 
 Wednesday, April 14, the particulars of tliis 
 very occurrence.'
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLANS. 159 
 
 ' I know of no such book. I never received it. 
 It's all nonsense ! ' exclaimed Barrett, loudly and 
 angrily. 
 
 ' Given to Mrs. Barrett,' began Israel, reading 
 monotonously, and with an air of utter indifference, 
 from another book, the place ready marked with 
 a card, ' on the 1st of January, the year after, at 
 the same time that she gave me five shillings, and 
 said it was a Christmas-box from Mr. B., and 
 remarked, with a laugh, she wondered which was 
 the best Christmas-box of the two — the book or 
 the money.' 
 
 ' If she took it, she never gave it me.' 
 
 ' Ah, indeed ! she said, when I asked her after- 
 wards, she had given it. Would the Squire like 
 me to fetch her ? ' 
 
 The Squire waited to see if Mr. Barrett answered 
 the question ; but, noting his silence and confusion, 
 did not think it necessary to say anything either. 
 
 And now Israel drew forth his letter. 
 
 'The postman gave me this for you with the 
 Squire's letters,' he said to Barrett. 
 
 The Manager snatched it from Israel's hand, 
 glanced at the writing, then at Israel's face, which
 
 160 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 met his own immovably; and then, with some- 
 what nervous fingers, thrust it, as he thought, into 
 his pocket. 
 
 Israel's hand, with the letter which he had 
 picked up, was thrust forth before him the next 
 minute, and the circumstance, though slight, 
 visibly increased the Manager's confusion. 
 
 'Don't stand on ceremony, Barrett, read your 
 letter if you like, while Israel and I study the 
 map,' said Mr. Wilhams. 
 
 Had Mr. Barrett really been sure that Israel 
 was incapable of tampering with his letter, as he 
 certainly was, he would have preferred to read it 
 at home ; but the thought that Israel, his deadly 
 enemy as he now considered him, might know 
 the contents, determined him to know them, too, 
 without delay, critical as he beheved they must be. 
 
 Should they be what he hoped, he might yet 
 let both Israel and the foohsh Squire know a bit 
 of his mind. 
 
 He read, and his face paled, ^he long nego- 
 tiations with the owners of a great colliery were 
 at an end ; something had disturbed them, per- 
 haps his too exacting demands, and so the letter
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLANS. 161 
 
 was simply a brief, moderately polite, and rather 
 curt note of rejection — unconditional, absolute. 
 
 Griffith could not fail to divine, by the aid 
 IsraePs attitude afforded, the nature of this letter, 
 but was too much of the gentleman to even hint 
 a question on the subject. 
 
 He was known to be generous, and ]\Ir. Barrett 
 seemed in these eventful moments to determine to 
 play a bold part, and trust to his employer's 
 generosity for success in it : — 
 
 'Mr. Jehoshaphat and I did not get on very 
 well together, and he did not fahiy put me on my 
 mettle as regards responsibility by giving me an 
 equivalent of power. Hence many shortcomings 
 on my part. I wished to leave him, and wrote 
 to an eminent firm. We negotiated, but I should 
 have at once put a stop to these negotiations 
 when you, su*, became the owner, had I had any 
 reason to rely on your favour. But this letter 
 definitely ends my chances there. I am free and 
 ready to devote myself to your service hence- 
 forward, and will promise you there shall be no 
 lack of zeal, care, or discipline.' 
 
 Griffith looked undeniably pleased, and 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 162 ISRAEL MOET. 
 
 altogether Israel's chances seemed hopelessly lost 
 to all eyes but his own. 
 
 ' Do you wish to examine any other part of my 
 map ? ' he asked, while carefully avoiding to dis- 
 play anything but what they had previously seen. 
 
 ' Does — does it differ much in other respects ? ' 
 asked Mr. Griffith Williams. 
 
 ' This — that you have seen — is perhaps the 
 least important of the differences. There are 
 questions of future profit here as well as questions 
 of future danger or loss.' 
 
 ' And there you think, Israel, you alone ought 
 to make not only the explanations, but the use ? ' 
 
 ' Twenty years is a long time to wait ; but I'm 
 content now.' 
 
 ' Ha 1 how is that ? ' 
 
 ' Because you are a just man and an enlight- 
 ened man, and can see that my time has come — 
 honestly come.' 
 
 • Upon my life, Israel, I cannot gainsay you. 
 Mr. Barrett, I shall pay you the equivalent of a 
 quarter's notice, and both I and Mr. Israel Mort, 
 my future manager, wiU gladly do our best to 
 promote your interests. And, by the bye, Israel,
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE PLAXS. 163 
 
 a day or two after the funeral is over, say this 
 day week, expect me at the mine.' 
 
 ' The world comes to him who waits.' These 
 words had met Israel's eye while yet a com- 
 paratively young man. They had been to him 
 as a sudden Hght in the darkness of his lot, which 
 he felt to be an infinitely deeper darkness than 
 any he had known in the mine. They clung to 
 him until, through some strong law of mutual 
 attraction between him and the truth they con- 
 veyed, they became a part of his daily life, his 
 one article of faith that nothing could shake. 
 
 And he had waited with invincible patience, 
 speaking to no one of what he was doing and ex- 
 pecting ; moving on, ahke without sympathy or 
 counsel; never going out of his way to make 
 weak, because premature, experiments for suc- 
 cess ; bearing his hard lot, not with gentleness or 
 Christian fortitude certainly, nor with the charity 
 that thinketh no evil, but bearing it with an un- 
 shrinking resolve, that lacked only noble motive 
 to be heroic. 
 
 How is he feehng now, as he descends tlie liill,
 
 164 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 full of the consciousness that his hour had come 
 — had passed, and that he had been equal to it, 
 had wrung out of it full payment, with interest, 
 for all fortune's debt ? 
 
 Does the heart, hardened by such long ad- 
 versity, begin to thaw ? 
 
 Is he moved, as he thinks of taking the news 
 to that poor wife at home, whom he, more than 
 his poverty, had so utterly crushed down ? 
 
 Will David now see the gloom that is fast 
 spreading over his boyish fancies, melt away, and 
 leave the world what it was before, beautiful as 
 youth's own dreams, full of promise as youth's 
 own desires? Will he be spared the ordeal of 
 the mine to-morrow morning ?
 
 165 
 
 CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 David's fiest day ix the mine. 
 
 While it was stiU dark, cold, and raw, David, who 
 knew nothing of his father's change of fortune, 
 was awakened to his great trial. 
 
 Israel had lain a heavy hand on him and shaken 
 him ; and the boy, who had been dreaming of 
 wandering in naked innocence all night on the 
 banks of a river with an angel, who told him at 
 last she was called Nest, opened his eyes in such 
 sweet trust and utter forgetfulness of what lay 
 before him, that Israel himself was somewhat 
 troubled to meet the change that must come as 
 memory came, and the stupor of sleep passed 
 away. 
 
 The yet unconscious eyes were swoUen with 
 last night's tears, in which the boy's soul had 
 drifted to tliat sweet sleep, that harbour of for-
 
 166 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 getfulness and peace, wliicli children, however 
 sorely thek burdens press upon them, scarcely ever 
 fail to reach. 
 
 David had reached it, and been welcomed and 
 cherished in it hke some ship resting at home on 
 the last night before a perilous voyage. 
 
 And there, as has been said, sweet dreams had 
 visited him, old childish joys that he had half 
 forgotten pressed softly to his heart again, and 
 without bringing the sense that they were taking 
 their last leave. 
 
 He woke at his father's hard touch, full of love 
 for all the world ; and springing to his elbow 
 smiled up sweetly in Israel's inexorable face. 
 
 ' Now, my boy — up with you ! No more 
 miss-fires ! The day has come when you are to 
 be a man.' 
 
 Yes, it had come — the day and moment of the 
 great change. The alternations of hope and fear 
 were for him no more. The blow had fallen. 
 From that moment the flower of David's child- 
 hood was crushed never to rise again. The bitter- 
 ness of a too early manhood came upon him. The 
 dew of his life's morning, which was sparkling in
 
 David's first day in the mine. 167 
 
 his eyes when his father woke him, rolled down 
 in two icy tears, and was gone for ever. 
 
 His teeth chattered ; he drew away his shoulder 
 from under Israel's hand ; slipped from his little 
 bed, and drew his clothes on him, and his misery 
 with them — like a man indeed. 
 
 He descended the stairs, and found his mother 
 blowing the fire. Not daring to glance towards 
 him, she went on with her task. 
 
 She sickened with the fear of hearing suddenly 
 the cry for help of those lips which might still be 
 taking their hfe from her bosom — so did their 
 least complaint thrill through it to her heart's 
 core. 
 
 But all was silent, save Israel's heavy monotonous 
 tread above, and the crackling of the sticks in the 
 fire over wliich she was trying to boil the milk for 
 this bitter breakfast. 
 
 At last, when she had succeeded, and was turning 
 to pour it upon David's bread, she turned and saw 
 him already dressed, sitting in his place, white as 
 death, in his pit-garb. 
 
 Before she could shape her lips to say a few 
 words to him — and while hesitating as to whether
 
 108 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 slie might kiss him without some new and dan- 
 gerous outburst of feehng from one or both — Israel 
 descended and joined David at the table. 
 
 From that moment she dared not speak. And 
 David never looked at her. And so in silence 
 they passed on to the moment when Israel rose, 
 and said, — 
 
 ' Now David, we must start ! ' 
 
 Then, as she saw the boy rise and take his cap, 
 and stand by the door waiting, she could bear her 
 anguish no longer, but went to him, and drew him 
 to her bosom, and kissed him. 
 
 He was as cold as frost. He did not return her 
 kisses, but his great blue eyes looked at her in 
 passive acknowledgment of her love and helpless- 
 ness. 
 
 As the pair reached the pit-mouth they found 
 themselves among a great crowd of roystering, 
 half-civihsed boys, youths, and young men, with 
 a very moderate sprinkling of older colliers — aU 
 waiting their turns to go down in the cage, which 
 was kept in rapid and incessant motion. 
 
 Some were drying their damp clothes by 
 the blazing fire ; some roasting potatoes ; some
 
 David's first day ix the mine. 169 
 
 smoking ; and as any left their places at the call 
 to go down, the vacancies were instantly filled by 
 new comers. 
 
 It so happened that David was left standing 
 alone by the pit-mouth while his father went 
 into the little grimy office to hear the news of the 
 night from the night-deputy Eees Thomas, and 
 to arrange with some of the colliers about their 
 work for the day. 
 
 Then, standing alone by the pit-mouth, David 
 felt a kind of horrible fascination come over him 
 in watching the cage, full of crouching, grimy men 
 and boys, glide down — down — do^vn — into that 
 narrow, yet awful, abyss ; which James Lusty, the 
 day deputy, who spoke to him cheerily from time 
 to time, told him was fifty times deeper than the 
 heiglit of the tallest ship's mast. 
 
 And then to see the empty cage ghde swiftly 
 up agam, and fit for a moment so smoothly and 
 noiselessly into its place, filling the entire aperture, 
 blotting out that hideous other world below, 
 as David would have liked to have seen the mine 
 itself blotted out from all creation, but concealing 
 it for a moment only ; and then the in-rush of
 
 170 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 another grimy mass of living beings, immediately 
 followed by the sharp sounds of the signal-hammer 
 — by the rush and roar and feverish gasps of 
 the breathless engine — panting as if in a deadly 
 race, and then its slackening pace and gradual 
 quietude, as the cage was nearing the bottom. 
 
 The sounds of the voices and laughter of the 
 colliers thrilled through the boy's soul, and strangely 
 excited his fancy ; they were at first so loud, and 
 clear, and brimming over with vigorous Hfe, and 
 then so hollow, faint, and sepulchral, till there 
 could only be heard a mere murmur, the last faint 
 breath, so it seemed, of dying humanity, ceasing 
 the useless struggle with fate, and sinking into — 
 What? There the boy's imagination refuses to 
 go farther, but stops with the instinctive feehng 
 it would be wisest so to do. 
 
 Suddenly he hears his father's voice speaking to 
 James Lusty. 
 
 ' David '11 want a couple of candles to light him 
 in and out of the pit.' 
 
 ' Ay,' said Lusty. ' But mightn't Master David 
 have a lamp to keep burning ? ' 
 
 * Let him have what others have — neither more
 
 David's first day in the mine. 171 
 
 nor less. Take that once for all. And as to 
 Master David, no more of that nonsense ; I'm the 
 only master here.' 
 
 ' Alil right, master ! ' said Lusty, who still retained 
 just a touch of his northern dialect. Squeezing 
 the hand of David, as he stood between the 
 two, he hung a pair of thin, wretched-looking 
 candles, hke a ghastly necklace, round the boy's 
 neck. 
 
 Israel, Lusty, and David went down together in 
 the lowest compartment of the cage. David raised 
 nor hand, nor voice, nor glance in resistance to 
 anything he was told to do. When his father 
 said, ' Go in, David,' he went in. When his 
 father told him to stoop he stooped, and then 
 found Lusty's arm encirchng him, and Lusty's ugly 
 and grimy, but not unkind face close to his, bent 
 most uncomfortably down, and twisted half-way 
 round through the efforts of the owner to accom- 
 modate his height and bulk to the limited space 
 afforded, and to the service of David. 
 
 Israel said nothing to his son in the descent ; 
 not from want of feeling, but from a true instinct 
 that nothing he could say would be hkely to do
 
 172 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 any good ; and he was, therefore, according to his 
 wont, silent. 
 
 Perhaps it would have been as well if Lusty had 
 followed his superior's example. But he was full 
 of sympathy with the pale, timid, scholarly lad, 
 and he could think of no other way of showing it 
 than by talking of the mine, and of those features 
 of it which Lusty always found so interesting to 
 strangers, and about which his own sensitiveness, 
 if he ever had any, had long passed away. 
 
 So with a sort of quiet glee he whispered to 
 David about these funny ' forrin ' chaps — the Bel- 
 gians — who called the shaft the grave ; and then 
 putting into David's mouth the query. Why? 
 answered by characteristically brief narratives (for 
 Lusty couldn't talk much, but blurted out at 
 once whatever he had got to say) about accidents 
 and adventures he and his comrades had experi- 
 enced in going up and down shafts — ending by a 
 most exciting account of a fight between two col- 
 liers while descending in a bucket, which story 
 was stopped short by the arrival of the cage at the 
 bottom, and by Israel's stern and dry command to 
 Lusty to hurry away to where a shot had to be
 
 DAVID'S FIRST DAY IX THE MINE. 173 
 
 fired. The story was stopped short and never 
 completed, for David when he again met his friend 
 had supped full of horrors, and had no heart to 
 ask for the conclusion, and was only wishing he 
 could tell Lusty without offending him how very 
 far from amusing he found such talk. 
 
 Meantime the deputy thought it but common 
 humanity to do his best to make the lad forget 
 his own particular troubles ; and seeing him gaze 
 with pallid, wonder-stricken eyes on the deep, 
 dark pool of water just at the bottom of the shaft, 
 could not help stopping for a moment to explain 
 that that was the sump, or pit, into which all the 
 water of the mine drained ; and that presently he 
 would see the great spears of the pump — those 
 enormous beams of timber, hane^inor in endless 
 succession from top to bottom of the shaft — begin 
 to work up and down to carry all the water away ; 
 and he finished off by warning David to be care- 
 ful, for a very nice gentleman had been drowned 
 there only a few weeks ago. 
 
 The boy's soul sunk within him. Every word 
 he heard seemed but to confirm the ideas of 
 danger with which he had come down. Still he
 
 174 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 moved on by the side of his father and Lusty 
 mechanically, now staring at the dead blackness 
 of the walls and roof, now at the faint gleams of 
 hght from the lamps reflected back from the sur- 
 face of the water through which he was wading, 
 stumbling at every few yards, and helped up 
 again by Lusty, who would cry, forgetting, perhaps 
 wilfully, Israel's recent injunction — 
 
 ' Ahl right, Master David ! Up and at it 
 again, as the Dook said at Waterloo ; ' or ' The mine's 
 a bit rough, Master David, at first, but will im- 
 prove on acquaintance ; ' or, again, ' Eh — what — 
 Master David ? — larning ahl the mine's tricks at 
 once, so as the better to circumvent 'un by and 
 bye ' 
 
 The lad heard with his ears, but had no more 
 actual comprehension of the meaning of the words 
 than he had of the meaning of those mysterious 
 sounds produced by the ventilating apparatus, 
 which ever and again alarmed him with vague 
 fears of some imminent catastrophe. Perhaps that 
 was the awful Gas, of which he had heard so much, 
 as a kind of invisible monster that would be quiet 
 in mines for months and years together, and then
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 175 
 
 break out in flame and fury, and destroy every- 
 body and everything within reach. 
 
 Not but what he struggled to cast off the 
 paralysing spell that hung over hira, and seemed 
 to take away all impulsive individuality of life. 
 As they passed on to where the colliers were 
 at work, swarming like black bees in a black 
 hive, David thought he would surely recognise 
 some of them, and that then he would feel easier, 
 and be able to talk ; but the very bustle of the 
 multitudinous industry of the place, the ceaseless 
 passage of long trains of loaded trams, the shouts 
 of the drivers of the horses, the hurried way in 
 which he was pushed suddenly into a little refuge 
 hole, that barely allowed him space to guard his 
 limbs from the dark mass thundering past, tended 
 to confuse his mind, to exaggerate his every fear, 
 to make the whole place at once as chaotic and 
 incomprehensible as it was terrible to him. 
 
 And his experiences, when he did succeed in 
 breaking for a moment the spell that paralysed 
 him, were not very encouraging to further at- 
 tempts in the same way. As they were passing 
 a stall, that opened on their right, David saw a
 
 176 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 shovel stuck with the handle in tlie ground, in the 
 very centre of the opening, and he noticed there 
 was a big cross chalked upon it. 
 
 ' Please, what is that for ? ' he timidly asked 
 Lusty ; who, delighted to find the boy recovering 
 himself at last, and seeing Israel as usual in 
 advance, and giving directions to some men who 
 were opening a drift-way into a new district, he 
 stopped and said, — 
 
 ' Ah, now, that's right ! If you only begin to 
 take notice, it's wonderful how interested you'll 
 be after awhile. That spade is a danger signal.' 
 
 ' Danger signal,' faltered the boy. 
 
 ' Yes,' said Lusty ; ' if the night deputy finds the 
 gas bad in a place where men are to work in 
 the day, he sticks a warning across the entrance, 
 a spade as you see upside down, or a couple of 
 sticks placed crosswise, or aught else that comes 
 easy to hand ; which is as much as to say to the 
 colhers, when they come to work, " Don't you go 
 in here, my boys, or it'll be worse for you." But 
 mind you, sometimes it's only a hint to be careful, 
 without stopping the work. " Ahlways keep the 
 work going, Master David, if it be in any way
 
 dayid's first day IX THE :.nxE. 177 
 
 possible ; " that's what the Owner says to the Man- 
 ager, and the Manager to the Overman, and the 
 Overman to the Deputy, and the Deputy to ahl 
 the folk under him. And now, Master David, 
 having done my dooty in teaching you that lesson, 
 suppose w^e go on.' 
 
 They went on, and for some time alone, for 
 Israel was called away ; and he had previously 
 given a hint to Lusty that one or other of them 
 was to be with David, till he had fairly made ac- 
 quaintance with the mine and been set to work. 
 
 Noticing the damp on the walls in certain 
 parts, and not on others, David again ventured 
 timidly to put a question as to the reason, having, 
 if truth must be told, overheard accidentally a 
 few words between two colliers, as they passed 
 him, which suggested quite other ideas than those 
 of mere scientific or utilitarian curiosity. 
 
 'Well,' said Lusty, taking advantage of the 
 exceptional height of the place where they hap- 
 pened to be to draw his form erectly up, and 
 enjoy a good stretch, 'that's a point of ventilation, 
 you see. The air as comes into a mine leaves 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 178 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 the walls dry, but that as goes out makes ahl this 
 moisture.' 
 
 ' Oh,' ejaculated David, with an umnistakeable 
 tone of relief. 
 
 ' Well now, what did you fancy about it, Mas- 
 ter David ? ' asked Lusty, with some curiosity, as 
 he held up his lamp to look at the boy's face. 
 
 'I — I thought I heard a man say there was 
 a deal of water about, and that he shouldn't 
 wonder if the sea some day didn't break in.' 
 
 ' I'd like to let a good cudgel break into that 
 fellow's head ; but come along, Master David,'_and 
 I'll show you something.' 
 
 They went on, David resisting with difficulty a 
 great desire to say he didn't just then want to see 
 anything he wasn't obliged to see. 
 
 Presently they stopped, and Lusty asked an odd 
 question. 
 
 ' Do you happen to know, Master David, when's 
 high tide to-day ? ' 
 
 The lad's heart misgave him again about what 
 he had heard the man say, and instinctively^his 
 eyes and hands went to the walls.
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 179 
 
 ' Dry as a bone, boy — dry as a bone. Feel I 
 Don't you find them so ? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' said David, confused and ashamed that 
 he had let his fear be so obvious. 
 
 Trying to push that thought away, he strove to 
 answer Lusty's previous question : — 
 
 ' It was high tide about six o'clock yesterday 
 evening, I — I believe.' 
 
 ' Then it's high tide now,' said the deputy. 
 ' Look about you — touch the roof — you have felt 
 the walls ; could there be a more cosy, comfortable 
 place. Master David ? I mean as mines go, you 
 know.' 
 
 David was fain to confess the place looked dry 
 but, for aU that, it was evident he already saw no 
 end of horrors about it, for he knew well Lusty 
 was going to startle him once more. 
 
 ' Well, Master David, if your mine larning were 
 to go no further, you can say what'U make folk 
 stare ahl through your life — that you have been 
 under the sea.' 
 
 ' Under the sea ! ' faltered David. 
 
 ' That you have walked about there, and chatted 
 n2
 
 180 ISRAEL MOET. 
 
 with an old friend, and weren't a bit obligated 
 to hurry away before you chose to go.' 
 
 ' Yes, yes, but please we'd better go. Father 
 will be looldniT for us.' 
 
 ' Listen, Master David ; can you hear anything ?' 
 
 Master David showed little inclination to listen 
 with the requisite degree of attention and inten- 
 sity of silence ; but, for all that, if his face might 
 be taken as an index, he heard enough and too 
 much. Again he wanted to hurry away, but 
 Lusty insisted on his making the effort demanded ; 
 and at last he was constrained to acknowledge 
 once more in effect his silly cowardice, by owning, 
 after fancying he heard many things, that he 
 really heard nothing at all. 
 
 ' Ah ! ' said the deputy, ' your young senses is a 
 deal quicker than mine, and I thought you might 
 now hear, as I have often heerd, the big waves 
 a breaking on the shore above us, and have heerd 
 'em comin' in and goin' out, and what's most ex- 
 tror'nary, Master David — and I do think that 
 strange — there ain't a many feet between us now 
 and the salt water.' 
 
 ' You don't work here now ? ' gasped David.
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 181 
 
 ' No, but we did, till we got alil the coal out. 
 Ah, Master David, I've had some awkward houi's 
 here. I mind well one day a collier came to fetch 
 me, saying the sea was so uproarious they could 'nt 
 stand it any longer. So I went to judge for my- 
 self. The noise was tremendous — awful ; so I 
 thought it best to take the hands away a bit ; but 
 next morning they w^ent at it again, and ever 
 since, the sea, as if put on its good behaviour by 
 that unnecessary stopping of so many folks' in- 
 dustry, and as if ashamed of the figure it might 
 cut in our annual statistics, has never once given 
 me the least occasion to find fault. And mind, 
 it's something, Master David, when a deputy says 
 that.' 
 
 'Yes, but please, oh do please come away,' 
 gasped David. 
 
 'I'm coming! I'm coming. Do you know, 
 Master David, I've heerd some mines goes as much 
 as three miles straight out under the sea.' 
 
 ' Yes, but mayn't we go now ? ' 
 
 ' Think o' lying down and smoking your pipe, 
 with ships in full sail sweeping along over your 
 head.*
 
 18 'J ISRAEL MOST. 
 
 ' Please do come.' 
 
 'To be sure. Falils, Master David, is bad, and 
 explosions don't bear a good character ; but, by tlie 
 lord, inundations bangs alil. Why there was that 
 mine at Workmgton, a most valleyable one, set- 
 tled a'most in no time. You looked, and there 
 was the mine ahl in working order, full of folk, 
 and producin no end of coal ; and again you 
 looked, and the mine was gone, was every bit on 
 it under water. And there it lies now, done for, 
 for evermore. No engines '11 ever be found to 
 drain that mine. The job's a deal too big. 
 
 ' Now, if this mine were to be caught one day 
 in the same fashion, and it's quite possible, we'd 
 soon have it ahl right again. Why, Master 
 David, what's the matter, you look quite scared. 
 I'm sure I'm doing my best to hearten you up a 
 bit. Come, come, lad, pluck up courage. Courage, 
 Master David, courage ; there's no getting on in 
 the world without that.' 
 
 So David thought too, and heartily wished he 
 were out of the world, for a coward he knew 
 lie was, and a coward he feared he should ever 
 remain.
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 183 
 
 Presently, in their onward course, tlie boy's 
 soul was again appalled by the unearthly sounds 
 he heard. It could not be the sea, for they were 
 no longer under it ; and yet David fancied no 
 storm he had ever known raging on his native 
 coast was more wildly tempestuous. 
 
 As they approached a canvas-covered door, 
 the sounds increased so much in violence, that 
 David in his fright could not even try to discover 
 whether the form he saw dimly crouching in the 
 corner by its side was one of his old school 
 comrades or no. 
 
 It was no longer the simply grand sound of a 
 stormy but distant sea he seemed to hear, but 
 that of a sea in its fury, striving with repeated 
 blows to overwhelm and destroy whatever might 
 lie in its way. 
 
 Every instant the boy looked to see the door 
 before him burst in with those mad spasms of 
 overwhelming rage. 
 
 He could not speak, but looked all his anguish 
 up in the face of the deputy, who once more 
 tried his hand at comforting, and with somewhat 
 better success than before.
 
 184 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 * Do you hear the mine, Master David, how it 
 sings ? ' 
 
 * Sings ! ' gasped the boy. 
 
 ' Ay, to be sure, and such songs are more wel- 
 come to the miner when in the mine than the songs 
 of ahl the throstles, and larks, and blackbirds that 
 were ever born or bred in our bonny England ! 
 Their warblings tickle the ear a bit, and there's 
 an end, but yon singing keeps us ahl alive, keeps us 
 ahl in breath, so that we can do some singing for 
 ourselves, when we've a mind to, at our leisure/ 
 
 ' But what — is — it — then ? ' iisked David, feel- 
 ing his confidence revive a httle, in spite of the 
 strangeness of the explanation. 
 
 * Only the ventilatin' apparatus at work ; that 
 big fan you seed in one of the houses above 
 ground, thirty feet in diameter, and revolving in 
 a second's time, and so despatching every bit of 
 air it finds near, — a sort of levy on mass as the 
 forenners calls it you know, to drive out ahl other 
 and worse airs it can find in the mine, and leave 
 the bettermost behind, singing like a million of 
 feathered creatures over its victory, till itself, like
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 185 
 
 human natur' begins to spile, and turn bad, and 
 gets drove out generally in turn.' 
 
 ' And is it — is it always so violent as this ? ' 
 asked David, whose fears again were returning 
 with the curiously intermittent rage of the wind- 
 blows. 
 
 ' Violent, Master David,' said the deputy with 
 a grin, and evidently conscious of a forthcoming 
 joke ; ' you must be a jesting.' So saying he opened 
 the fearful door ; and no change ever wrought by 
 an enchanter, could seem more miraculous to the 
 boy than the one Avrought now. Not a sound 
 was to be heard ; in one instant the raging tumults 
 were hushed and gone, and the whole mine seemed 
 buried in a repose that might not apparently have 
 been broken for years. 
 
 Lusty roared as he saw the wonder in David's 
 face, which brightened amazingly, and began 
 to wreath itself in smiles, when lo ! the door 
 was again closed, and all the roar began 
 once more, awful as ever to the boy's stricken 
 imagination. 
 
 'Oh, please, ]\Ir. Lusty,' he said, 'do let us 
 get to father.'
 
 186 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 They moved away, and for some time in deep 
 silence ; the deputy troubled that he could not 
 get on better with the lad, and the lad sick to 
 the soul with shame at what he knew Lusty must 
 think and probably would say about him, but too 
 much engrossed by the endless pitfaUs and dan- 
 gers in which he had to move to do more than 
 strive to get away from them all as fast as pos- 
 sible. 
 
 Not the faintest ray of light entered still into 
 the brain of the deputy, as to the true nature of 
 the comfort he instilled with such admirable in- 
 dustry and devotion ; and then, while he hterally 
 sweated with the unwonted intellectual exertions 
 he made to ' brighten the boy up a bit,' he began 
 again after a long pause with the remark — 
 
 ' This is a queer thing we're coming to, Master 
 David.' 
 
 ' Is it ? ' responded the boy gloomily. 
 
 ' You see we can't pass here, except on our 
 hands and knees. Well, ten days ago, you might 
 ha' stood upright at the same spot, though I 
 couldn't.' 
 
 ' What — what — is it then ? ' asked David, and
 
 David's first day in the mine. 187 
 
 in very mucli tlie same sort of tone with which 
 one of the tragic heroines of the antique drama 
 might, when marked out by destiny for ceaseless 
 misfortune, and while still throbbing with the pangs 
 of the last calamity, ask, ' What next? ' 
 
 ' Oh, it's only the swellin' up o' the floor of the 
 mine ; it's a bit soft here, you see, and the roof's a 
 trifle too heavy, and no wonder ! We shouldn't 
 like. Master David, to carry half a mile or so of 
 rocks and coal on our backs — leastwise, we 
 shouldn't like to do it long. And the mine feels 
 that, and is hurt hke at our puttin' so much on 
 its shoulders. So the pillars o' coal which bear up 
 the burden begin to press through the floor, and, 
 so to say, right into its very body, until its flesh 
 protrudes just like a piece of proud human 
 flesh, and pushes us ofi^ and shuts us up closer 
 and closer, as if it'd like, if it knew how, to get 
 rid of us ahltogether. We call it the creep, or 
 crush.' 
 
 Poor David needed no further explanation. 
 That word ' creep ' was enough. Every nerve 
 and sensation in his body seemed to thrill and 
 quiver, and creep too, in more than sympathetic 
 response.
 
 188 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Oh, when would the day be over, and he back 
 again home, in his mother's arms ? 
 
 That thought coming suddenly upon him made 
 him burst into a wild passion of tears, which he 
 managed, under the shelter of the darkness, to 
 conceal from Lusty. 
 
 His new fear, however, quickened his sensations 
 in one particular direction, and feeling his breath- 
 ing impeded, while there was no perceptible breeze 
 passing, as he had everywhere felt before, his 
 eager fancy suggested a new alarm, that they 
 were going into the innermost depths of the mine, 
 where the air could not reach them, and where 
 the ' gas ' might be. 
 
 ' Are we — going much farther in ? ' he faltered, 
 after much deliberation to choose his words, so as 
 to conceal the essence of his thoughts. 
 
 'No, Master David, we've just reached the 
 place where we are to meet your father, and close 
 by is the spot where he means to set you at work.' 
 
 He was to go to work then ! And now ! Was 
 to stay there after enduring all this ! 
 
 Vaguely he had begun to hope the intention 
 might be to show him the mine — get him used
 
 DAYID'S first day IX THE MIXE. 189 
 
 to it — and then let him out, so that he might try and 
 pluck up courage to go a step farther on the mor- 
 row. That silly and cowardly dream was ended. 
 He was presently to go to work, and witli all these 
 fearful thoughts in his mind that Lusty had in- 
 stilled as his only companions. 
 
 The deputy now began to snufF the air with his 
 nose, and peer about, and look at his lamp, and do 
 something or other to it, which David could not 
 understand. 
 
 But soon he saw the light in the lamp go down 
 under Lusty's manipulations, down — down — down, 
 till it got to a mere point. 
 
 The deputy then cautiously went a little apart 
 from David, towards the opening to a natural 
 recess, a kind of gigantic man-hole, before which 
 hung a loose curtain. He knelt down, and 
 slowly thrust the lamp forward, and David saw, 
 with a shudder, there was a sudden elongation of 
 the flame with a bluish tinge, and then a moment 
 after, as the deputy hfted the lamp higher, there 
 was an explosion, but inside the lamp only, and 
 therefore as harmless in consequence as it was 
 faint and insignificant in sound.
 
 190 ISRAEL MOFcT. 
 
 ' A toucli of gas here,' said Lusty, ' but we'll 
 soon get rid of it, as I've done of old times in this 
 very spot many a time afore. The way I'm going 
 to show you, for the fun of the thing, ain't per- 
 mitted now. But you won't tell tales out o' 
 school, Master David, will you ? ' 
 
 ' No,' said David, in silent anguish. 
 
 The deputy, on account of the oppressive 
 heat in those parts of the mine through which 
 they had lately passed, had taken off a thick 
 heavy overcoat. He put this down while he 
 hghted a candle, and mounted it upon a flat 
 piece of timber, so that it might travel with the 
 timber without upsetting. He next attached to 
 this strange apparatus a string ; and so prepared, 
 and drawing his overcoat across his Jiead, face, 
 and shoulders, he crept into the place where the 
 gas was, David looking on with all the fascina- 
 tion a bird may feel while conscious of impending 
 destruction. 
 
 He had previously told David there was a hole 
 in the ground iuside in which he should take 
 shelter, but that he, David, need not be frightened, 
 it would only be a puff and a flame, a bit stronger
 
 David's fikst day ix the mixe. 191 
 
 and noisier, and brighter, than the one he had seen 
 burst in the lamp, and that would be all : so 
 saying, he went in, dropping the cm^tain carefully 
 after him, on wliich David, while removing as far 
 off as he could, fixed his eyes. 
 
 Lusty got into his hole, di^ew some loose boards 
 around and partly over him, closed in his face and 
 head with the overcoat, till he could only just see 
 through a small aperture the hghted candle outside, 
 then pulled away very slowly at his cord. 
 
 David saw the Hghted candle begin its march, 
 rather stately at first, then jumping and oscillating 
 as it met obstacles, till it disappeared under the 
 curtain. 
 
 He held his breath in suspense as to what was 
 to happen now, but he bore pretty well the shock 
 of the explosion, and the flame which burst 
 through the opening of the curtain, but did no 
 damage whatever. 
 
 Very proud was the deputy of the lesson in 
 manhood he thought he had thus slily given to his 
 master's son, and which under any other aspect 
 he knew he ought to be ashamed of, as against 
 orders, and as setting an example to the men, if
 
 192 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 it happened to become known, that would be most 
 mischievous. 
 
 ' It's only the " Eider," ' he said to David when 
 he returned, and the ' Eider ' was then explained 
 to be a thin vein of coal, which, if accidentally 
 exposed, as this had been, gives off a good deal of 
 gas. 
 
 At that moment Israel joined them. 
 
 ' Now, David,' he said abruptly, and turned to 
 lead the way. 
 
 The boy followed, feeling the time w^as come 
 at last when he was to be placed in actual contact 
 with that labour of the mine he had so long shrunk 
 from in fear, and wdiicli the experiences of the 
 morning made a thousand times more appalling to 
 him than ever. 
 
 Presently Israel stopped, as in reflection, turned, 
 and called in a loud, clear voice to Lusty — 
 
 ' Jem, there's a shot to be fired in Morgan's 
 stall. Look to it yourself, to keep all safe.' 
 
 ' Ay, ay ! sir,' responded Lusty, using for the 
 first time a new mark of respect for his employer, 
 and dividing for ever the comrade-hke connection 
 that had so lono^ existed between them.
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 193 
 
 Passing a stall where colliers were actively at 
 work cutting coal, Israel again stopped for a 
 moment, and said to David, — 
 
 ' Wait here. Don't move, mind, or you may 
 lose yourself. I shall be back presently.' 
 ' But, father, mayn't I go with you ? ' 
 ' Come then.' 
 
 They went into the stall and followed its devious 
 course till they got to the face of the coal where 
 the heat was simply overpowering, and the space 
 so confined that every portion of tlie work had to 
 be done under great physical difficulty. 
 
 Here one collier knelt ; another next him had 
 the luxury of being able to sit ; a third lay on his 
 side ; while others were prostrate on their backs, 
 all nearly naked, all hewing away, all bathed in 
 copious streams of perspiration. 
 
 After giving some directions to one of the 
 colliers, Israel called David away, and went back 
 to the level out of which they had branched, and 
 resumed their former course. 
 
 Presently they came to a door, but instead of 
 Israel's opening it, or calling to the dark figure 
 sitting in the deep gloom by its side to open it 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 194 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 for him, he stopped before that dark figure, and 
 holding forth his lamp the better to see the youth- 
 ful but preternaturally aged face that looked up 
 to meet his, said — 
 
 'Willis, is that you?' 
 
 ' Yes, sir.' 
 
 ' How's the ventilation ? ' 
 
 ' It's been very violent, and then it stopped all 
 of a sudden, hardly a mouthful of wind to be got 
 anyhow.' 
 
 'It's violent enough now. I must see to it. 
 We're a long way from the fan, and a difficult 
 way to reach besides. How old are you ? ' 
 
 ' Fourteen next St. David's Day.' 
 
 ' And how is it you've found nothing better 
 to do than opening doors at that age ? Idle and 
 careless, I suppose ? Content to be whatever 
 gives you the least trouble to think about ? ' 
 
 ' I didn't want to be discharged by axing for 
 something better.' 
 
 ' Can you drive — pony or horse ? ' 
 
 ' I often do to help the others.' 
 
 'Very well. David, my son, will now take 
 your place. Stay with him a few minutes to see
 
 David's first day in the mine. 195 
 
 that he quite understands his duty. Then go to 
 Lusty and say you're to be moved a step upwards, 
 both in work and wages.' 
 
 The joyous hghtghstening inWilhs's eyes alone 
 told how pleased he was, for he said nothing, but 
 turned in a kind of boyish sympathy towards 
 David, whose face he did not know, and was 
 trying to make out. 
 
 'Now, David,' said Israel, in his usual harsh 
 tone of command, ' sit down where WilUs was 
 sitting, take the cord into your hand, and re- 
 member your duty is not merely to open the 
 door whenever the trams want to pass, but you 
 must listen for their coming, so that there may be 
 no delay. They are noisy enough. You can't 
 fail to hear if you are only attending. Mind that, 
 and mind that the door can't be too quickly shut 
 the moment the trams are through. Quick to 
 open, quick to shut, and there's the whole duty 
 of a diminutive man, my boy, described for you 
 in little. Do this well, and you'll go on soon 
 to do other things well, and then to do all 
 things well by and bye. Hark! Do you hear 
 anything ? '
 
 196 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 DavicVs confused senses made liim fancy he did 
 hear vaguely some distant-sounding shout ; so he 
 thought the trams must be coming, and he ought 
 to open the door. He pulled sharply and the 
 door stood open. Israel as sharply cried, — 
 
 ' Shut the door ! Pull the string, can't you ? 
 There was nothing coming; as you'd have known 
 if your wits hadn't gone wool-gathering.' Then 
 he added, — ' Too soon David's as bad as too late. 
 Well, no, too soon's a good fault. Willis will tell 
 you how to hit just the right point of time. Now 
 I leave you. At noon I shall bring you something 
 to eat. Quick to open and not too quick ; quick 
 to shut and not too quick; or you'll have the 
 doors smashed by the tram that has not passed 
 through. That's all I've got to say. Mind it all 
 well, and you'll have me here some day, not very 
 far off, on the same sort of errand to you that 
 brought me now to Willis.' 
 
 Israel went off, and perhaps for a space of five 
 minutes the two lads, who were left in the most 
 absolute darkness, scarcely spoke to each other. 
 Willis was silent from respect to his master's son, 
 and to David's scholarship, whilst David's soul was
 
 David's first day ix the mixe. 197 
 
 too full to speak, if he could help it, to anybody. 
 His heart throbbed and beat as if it would burst ; 
 his brain was seething in wild tumult ; his hands 
 and feet were cold ; his hmbs ached ; his body 
 was feverish ; life, in a word, just then was, taken 
 altogether, so painful and confusing a thing that 
 the wretched lad felt as thouo^h there would be no 
 happiness hke the happiness to die and l)e at rest, 
 if only his mother might hold him in her arms, 
 and Nest be near to see how manfully he, the 
 coward, could die. 
 
 Suddenly it struck David that perhaps Nest, 
 who was in many things a pecuhar girl, might 
 fancy it would be much more manly to show how 
 he could Hve. 
 
 Cogitating over that thought a little, he came 
 to the conclusion that Xest's fancy was not quite 
 so hopelessly silly as at first it seemed, and that 
 he was, after all, inclined to try whether he 
 really could do what his father wanted, and see 
 whether that did make a man of him. Oh, if he 
 could be that, he thought, he might endure even 
 the mine for a few months, or perhaps a year or 
 two.
 
 198 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Now then ! they're coming,' exclaimed Willis, 
 as he nudged David's arm. 
 
 David heard the train rattling noisily on, nigher 
 and nigher, and, with hand nervously grasping 
 the cord, waited for some signal to guide him as 
 to the right moment. 
 
 He hears a shout, but it sounds too far off, he 
 thinks, to be meant for him ; and while hesitating, 
 he hears another, as unmistakable as it was 
 uncomplimentary in its terms. He pulls the 
 cord, the door barely opens in time, and a horse 
 and driver at the head of some empty trams 
 appears and passes ; and as they pass there comes 
 a savage lash from the driver's whip right across 
 David's head and face, and cutting so keenly into 
 his cheek that David, \Ndth a cry of anger and 
 pain, puts his hand to the place and feels the moist 
 blood. 
 
 ' You'll be quicker next time mayhap,' shouted 
 the driver, as he made his horse move quickly on 
 and trotted away by his side. 
 
 ' He didn't know,' said Willis apologetically. 
 ' He thought it was only me. Never mind.
 
 David's first day ix the mine. 199 
 
 When you're a diiver yourself, you can do tlie 
 same to the httle 'uns. I shall.' 
 
 ' Not to me, I hope,' said David. 
 
 ' Oh no ! not if I know it. I shall tell that 
 big bully who you are, and he'll want to lick 
 your feet the next time he passes. I'd let him 
 for the fun of the thing. He is such a beast. I 
 mean to fight him when I'm four year older. A 
 sovereign a side, and if you like you shall hold 
 the stakes and see fair play.' 
 
 As David hstened to WiUis's voice in the 
 darkness, and listened with a sense of comfort, 
 his thoughts were again striving to realise what it 
 was he would have to go through to satisfy his 
 father. So he put a question to his companion, 
 who said, — 
 
 'This is the first job we all have to take to, 
 opening and shutting doors. The next is driving 
 the pony or horse. After that you come to 
 hitching the trams together and unhitching, and 
 then there's only one more move to put you up 
 to the top of the tree as a real working collier. 
 But, mind you, cutting coal ain't a art to be
 
 200 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 sneezed at ; you must begin under another collier, 
 who teaches you how to cut coal in the knowingest 
 ways, and at the same time, by taking the best 
 part of your wages, teaches you summat else, 
 which you larns others in due course, of course.' 
 
 The lads laughed over this jest, shook hands, 
 and Willis departed to seek his new post. 
 
 Again David thought, as he found himself 
 alone, he would resolutely strive to master 
 all the absurd fancies and fears that so unsettled 
 him, and try to pass his life in the mine as quietly 
 as he saw Willis did. He felt ashamed indeed as 
 he reflected how little incentive Wilhs had to play 
 his part in life in a manly fashion, and how much 
 he, David, had. The one had to learn all, and 
 endure all, and then have nothing to hope for 
 beyond ; while the other had to learn and endure, 
 merely that he might the better grasp the infinite 
 things that lay beyond. Where the one's higher 
 life ended the other's was to begin. 
 
 Insensibly his blood became calmer, his thoughts 
 clearer, his fears less ready to rush upon him 
 with a thousand new and horrible suggestions of 
 fires and water and explosions, and falhng roofs ; of
 
 DAVID 'S FIRST DAY IX THE MINE. 201 
 
 life-long deformities of limb or feature ; of ghosts, 
 and all the other terrible creations of a quick- 
 witted boy's vivid fancy. 
 
 He almost wished his father would come that 
 he might speak to him, and say he was now 
 going to begin in truth the business of man-making. 
 
 He longed for something to do to attest his 
 new courage, and show Jim Lusty that there was 
 good stuff in him after all. This sitting hour after 
 hour to pull a string was such cold-blooded work, 
 that no boy could grow strong in doing that ! 
 
 Musing thus, his attention was drawn to some- 
 thing that appeared distant and quivering through 
 the darkness. Soon he fancied it a light, but it 
 was still so faint he could not be quite sure. But 
 each minute it grew more definite and bright, 
 and was no doubt approaching. Soon David 
 heard voices, and at last he sees emerge from the 
 gloom two figures, each carrying a lamp and 
 some strange tools, which they set down only 
 some twenty or thirty yards from where the boy 
 was. 
 
 The promise of companionship was pleasant — 
 their voices and laughs pleasant — and David felt
 
 202 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 strangely cheered at the thought they were going 
 to work so near him. 
 
 But what were they going to do ? The tools 
 seemed to be a heavy long-handled hammer and 
 a kind of heavy solid spike. 
 
 Before beginning tbey opened their lamps, at 
 which David wondered, as he knew well that 
 naked lights were forbidden, and he did not 
 know how loosely as yet all these recent rules 
 for improvements were observed. A man vv^ould 
 say to himself, he knew quite well there was no 
 gas anywhere near him (which probably was 
 correct), and at once proceeded to legislate for 
 himself, so as to get as much hght as possible for 
 his work. 
 
 David was then able to see the whole pro- 
 cess of their special labour, while unnoticed by 
 them. 
 
 Stripping to their work, and one of the men 
 retaining nothing but a pair of drawers, David 
 saw the other take up the long heavy spike, and 
 hold it horizontally with its point against the 
 rock, guiding it with his hands, whilst the other 
 with the hammer struck so powerful a blow on
 
 David's fikst day ix the mine. 203 
 
 tlie massive end of the rod that the breath of the 
 striker came forth with it so loud and violent, 
 that it almost seemed to David as if the man 
 himself had been struck rather than the instru- 
 ment for penetrating tlie rock. Again came the 
 blow and the wheeze at brief intervals, till, 
 perhaps, some twenty or thirty blows had been 
 struck, when the man had to rest, exhausted, 
 while the other pulled out the pin to see how far 
 it had gone. A little more than three-quarters of 
 an inch ! That was all. 
 
 Somehow, the incident seemed to say to David 
 it was intended for his benefit. He felt ashamed 
 as he watched how unremitting and how good- 
 humouredly the men went on with their arduous 
 work, changing their tasks alternately, till they had 
 got the pin as far in as they seemed to desire. 
 But what could the hole be for ? 
 
 He saw them now close their lamps carefully, 
 and take from their pockets a httle packet and a 
 something narrow that seemed to hang, but did 
 not seem to be cord or string. The packet and 
 the pendant were with great precaution placed 
 in the hole ; and, it seemed to David, were both
 
 204 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 forced in as far as possible, while leaving a good 
 piece of the pendant hanging outside. 
 
 David's soul took fright in an instant. His 
 first guess that something serious was about to be 
 done, was confirmed as he saw one of the men 
 move carefully away, while the other began to 
 put a hght to the pendant. 
 
 He would have cried to them, if only that they 
 might know he was there ; but he was sufiering, 
 in waking hom^s, one of those terrible efiects 
 which he had known before only in dreams. He 
 felt he would give the world to speak, to move, 
 but his limbs and his voice were alike paralysed 
 by some inexphcable influence. 
 
 Suddenly he heard a loud cry of ' Fire ! ' from 
 the men. He saw a brilliant flame darting along 
 just where floor and wall join, and stop opposite 
 him. In a minute it would explode he thought. 
 He could bear no more. The new terror over- 
 powered the old one. He rose to his feet, drew 
 back the door of ventilation, and fled with the 
 wild cry of a maniac — he knew not, cared not 
 whither.
 
 205 
 
 CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 THE FUGITIVE. 
 
 WiTHix two or three hours it became known 
 everywhere in the neighbourhood of the mine 
 that David Mort, Israel's only son, had been lost 
 in the recesses of the pit, and was supposed to 
 have strayed into some abandoned working, from 
 whence he could not extricate himself, and where 
 in all probabihty he must have perished speedily 
 from the foul state of the air. 
 
 Thus the news reached Mrs. Mort, who rushed 
 frantically to the pit's mouth. Thus the news 
 reached Israel, who had gone into the village, but 
 who, as he went back at a steady pace with the 
 messenger, sternly bade the latter to say nothing 
 to anyone, but that the lad had missed his way, 
 and would be found all right again at his work 
 to-morrow. And thus the news reached, at a still
 
 206 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 earlier hour, the night-deputy, Eees Thomas, who 
 was in bed, and had just waked from his first 
 sleep when his landlady came to tell him the 
 news. 
 
 Within five minutes Eees Thomas was going at 
 a swift pace towards what he feared was to be 
 the grave of the poor boy ; and he was the first 
 of the important outsiders to reach the pit. 
 
 He found Lusty in dreadful trouble. He and 
 certain picked men had vainly ransacked every 
 part that it was at all safe to go into, and he 
 looked as if the case were a thoroughly hopeless 
 one, and that he was chiefly dreading the meeting 
 with Israel. 
 
 Taking all possible precautions for his safety, 
 and for the power of enduring for a short time 
 serious difficulties with the air, Eees Thomas 
 simply said, 
 
 ' The lad is in the Lord's hands. It is not as we 
 wiU, but as He wills. If aught happens to me, 
 remember me kindly to Israel, and ask him to 
 befriend the young maiden whose name I have 
 written here for his son's sake.' 
 
 Then starting for the place where David had
 
 THE FUGITIVE. 207 
 
 been located for his work, and avoiding the 
 ordinary level, he went from one old and 
 abandoned stall to another, wherever they were 
 not absolutely impervious to the entrance of a 
 boy, till he came to one in which the road 
 descended and passed through shallow water, and 
 where the gas was so bad and dangerous that he 
 felt sure Lusty and his companions had not 
 tried to go through. 
 
 Going on all fours, so that he was nearly 
 enveloped by the water, he entered into this 
 valley of the shadow of death, keeping his 
 mouth just above the water, where he knew 
 would be the most air. But he had not advanced 
 above a step or two across the hollow bottom of 
 the declivity before he felt something, which 
 brought with it the instantaneous conviction he 
 had found the lost boy. 
 
 His hands told him he could not be mistaken, 
 and his heart told him the lad was gone utterly, 
 unless he had been able to breathe where he lay, 
 which the darkness prevented Eees Thomas from 
 attempting to judge of 
 
 Almost fainting himself, he managed to drag
 
 208 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 the helpless body back into the airy level, to look 
 at it by the aid of his lamp, and then he became 
 insensible. 
 
 It was, however, but for a few brief moments. 
 He revived, prayed audibly, even while not 
 delaying an instant to attempt to discover if the 
 boy still lived. 
 
 'Ah, yes! the heart beats. He will recover. 
 Thy hand is in this, Father of mercies ! Thou 
 hast said Thy servant Israel shalt yet truly serve 
 Thee.' 
 
 Moistening the boy's lips, and using such other 
 gentle gestures as he remembered to be useful in 
 cases of drowning, for he knew not whether the 
 gas, or the water, or the simple fright had done 
 the chief harm, he soon had the inexpressible 
 happiness to see David's great blue vacant- 
 looking eyes open, then become filled with a 
 sudden sense of terror awful to look on, and then 
 recognise who it was that bent over him with 
 looks of love. There was a smile, a sob, and a 
 great rush of tears, while he found himself 
 folded to the heart of the good deputy. 
 
 By this time Lusty and others had found them ;
 
 THE FUGITIVE. 209 
 
 but Eees Thomas begged them to leave him alone 
 with David for a little while, and he would bring 
 him to the pit's mouth, if they would have all 
 ready for him to ascend. Meanwhile he asked 
 Lusty to go to Israel and his wife, and tell them 
 the lad was safe and coming up. 
 
 Lusty went away, and Eees Thomas gave 
 David something to drink which seemed to him 
 quite as good as the nectar of the gods he had so 
 often read about in his school, though he owned 
 afterwards he knew quite well it was only weak 
 tea. 
 
 He then ate a few morsels, and was so much 
 better that, by taking the deputy's right arm, he 
 could walk. 
 
 ' Do you know, Mr. Thomas,' he said, when he 
 was able to speak a little, ' that I don't know 
 how it was, but when I got to the water I felt so 
 strange, and suddenly I seemed to see the sky 
 and all the stars shining so brightly down upon 
 me, and I thought I was in the wood, and then 
 
 ' And then ? ' kindly guessed the deputy. 
 
 ' No ; I can't tell anything more. I saw the 
 
 VOL. I. p
 
 210 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 stars, and tlien — oli ! but it seemed such a time 
 after — I saw your eyes, and I was so confused 
 between them, as to which was which, that ' 
 
 ' I understand, David. Forget it all, lad, now. 
 It is but a little accident. We mustn't make too 
 much of such things. I want you to tell me 
 about yourself, and this leaving school, and 
 coming to the mine.' 
 
 The poor lad stared a moment at the speaker ; 
 it seemed so strange to be asked to relieve his 
 over-burdened soul. Mother, father, everybody, 
 whether pitying him or no, all alike seemed to 
 think it wise to say little about the event to him, 
 and manly in him to say nothing at all. 
 
 He revolted against that, and he had found 
 a sympathising listener at last. Little by little 
 Eees Thomas got him to converse freely, and so 
 to tell him all he had been thinking, feeling, 
 and suffering from, through his sudden with- 
 drawal from the school, and the enforced work m 
 the mine. 
 
 Eees Thomas hstened with the deepest interest 
 to the revelation, until quite moved out of him-
 
 THE fugitht:. 211 
 
 self David could no longer hide the one black 
 cloud that obscured his whole mental world : — 
 ' Oh, ]\Ir. Thomas ! I am so afraid that — that 
 
 ' Wliat, David ? Be afraid of nothing but not 
 telling the truth when it is a friend who hstens.' 
 
 ' That I am a wretched coward, and that I 
 shall never be fit for anything in the whole world.' 
 
 ' David, I don't believe that.' 
 
 ' Oh, it is true ! father says so. I didn't know 
 till he made me do this, and now — oh, I do so 
 wish I was dead ? Why did you come to me ? 
 I should never have had any more trouble if you 
 hadn't.' 
 
 ' David, lad, that is wicked talk, or would be if 
 you were in a fit state to guide and judge your- 
 self, but you are not. Come now, trust in me, if 
 only for a little, and let me see if I can't shape 
 things a bit for you. But we have said enough 
 for the present about these matters. I want to 
 think them well over. But if I do, and work for 
 you as a friend with all my heart, will you 
 promise on your part to be patient and thoughtful? ' 
 
 p 2
 
 212 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' Oh, yes, I will ; I will, indeed — if you tliink 
 I'm worth caring for.' 
 
 'Worth, my boy? Why it's as much as the 
 angels can do to calculate the worth of any 
 human soul, even the most ordinary, if only the 
 life that it is to lead be but in harmony with its 
 capacities. But you, David, are, if I mistake not, 
 not one of these merely, but unusually favoured 
 by God. However, that we shall see. I am now 
 going to try to show you the mine in a different 
 aspect.' 
 
 Eees Thomas first took him to the stables 
 where no less than forty horses were stalled at 
 night. Some were then in their places, eating as 
 heartily and looking as robust and full of enjoy- 
 able life as if the mine was the sole world into 
 which they had been born. 
 
 Then they went to a pleasant cosy place near 
 the bottom of the shaft, where many of the 
 colliers were at the moment dining. They sat 
 down with them, entered into conversation with 
 them, and whether it was the influence the 
 deputy exerted over David and them, or the 
 really agreeable chit-chat and banter, mixed at
 
 THE FUGITIVE. 213 
 
 once with good sense and feeling, that charac- 
 terised the meal in wliich David shared, the result 
 was a strange and altogether new lightness of 
 heart that came over the boy, and promptly 
 influenced all his surroundings. He laughed, he 
 jested, and might have grown uproarious, but that 
 he happened to see some of the colliers exchanging 
 significant glances of amusement, and he was at 
 once sobered, and carried back to the grimness 
 of fact. 
 
 Kees Thomas noted the change, and took him 
 away by a long rambling gallery till they stopped 
 at a great hole in the wall, a kind of big natural 
 cupboard in an out-of-the-way corner, where the 
 deputy had collected a number of pieces of stone 
 coal, of different shapes, with their surface so beauti- 
 fully polished, you seemed to see right into them. 
 
 David looked at one of these briUiantly re- 
 flecting surfaces by the aid of the lamp, and was 
 charmed by the exquisite forms he saw there. 
 Then Eees Thomas explained these were all 
 fossils, found in the mine at different periods, and 
 which by gift or purchase had become his. 
 
 He then told David the story of the origin of
 
 214 TSEAEL MORT. 
 
 coal, of the state of the world at the time, of 
 the state more particularly of his own immediate 
 neighbourhood, and of the things that then hved 
 and grew, examples of which lay before them. All 
 this became to David as one of the most ravishing 
 fairy tales he had ever heard. 
 
 'Is it true? Is it true?' Such was his 
 question, again and again repeated. 
 
 The instrument was tuned at last, and fit for 
 any music that the deputy might have the skill 
 to draw from it. He began in the gentlest way, 
 and using the most simple language, to suggest to 
 David that we can none of us shape the circum- 
 stances under which life must begin. We can 
 neither choose our parents, our homes, nor our 
 pecuniary positions ; neither can we choose our 
 friends or our future vocation — not, at least, tiU 
 we begin to gather knowledge, strength, power to 
 see things as they are, and power to so guide 
 ourselves that we may gradually and safely put off 
 the dependent child, and put on the independent 
 man. Fortunate but few are those who can pass 
 at once in boyhood to the preparation for the 
 precise kind of life they desire in manhood to
 
 THE FUGITIVE. 215 
 
 live. Unhappy are those who have no choice 
 either as boy or man, but must simply accept that 
 which lies next, however unsuitable to their 
 frames, their tastes, their special capabilities, or 
 their natural desires. To the first belong the rich 
 and favom-ed ; to the last the bulk of the labourers 
 here in the mine, as well as in a hundred other 
 departments of industry. 
 
 ' Do you feel for these unfortunates ? ' he asked. 
 
 ' Oh, yes ! Will they always be so ? ' 
 
 ' Ah, David ! what if I were to say that your 
 life itself may be one of many serious and most 
 important answers to that question P ' 
 
 ' Mine ? ' exclaimed the boy, in undisguised 
 astonishment, yet colouring deeply, as if vaguely 
 conscious of what must be meant. 
 
 ' Do you belong to either of the two classes I 
 have spoken of? ' 
 
 'Yes, ' 
 
 ' Stop ! consider well. Be just to yom^ father, 
 and fear not. Then answer.' 
 
 The boy became puzzled, confused ; liis coun- 
 tenance again began to darken. 
 
 ' Suppose now, David, let us only suppose it,
 
 216 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 that God has given you powers that are intended 
 for more than your own w^elfare and enjoyment, 
 but accompanied it with an inexorable condition, 
 that you shall discipline yom:self for this service, 
 and the service of your fellow-creatures, by a 
 period of pain, by labours disgusting to you, by 
 humiliations tliat you kick against, not so much 
 for their own sake as because you believe them 
 to be so unnecessary. Suppose all this, and one, 
 tw^o, three years even pass — longer I believe 
 quite out of the question — w^ould you not think at 
 the end of that time you were well repaid if 
 you had kept your owai conscience clear, had 
 conquered yom^ own wdll, w^on your father's 
 respect and help, and from that time had only 
 science in all its exactitude, beauty, and bene- 
 ficence to study, away from here, in London, 
 meeting daily with men whose names bm^n like 
 lights in the darkness of time. Ah, David, can 
 you doubt, my dear boy, that after all your 
 father is substantially right, that you must obey 
 him, learn practically all he wants you to know, 
 and then, too, you wdll have acquired by actual 
 experience what experience alone can teach, to
 
 THE FUGITIVE. 217 
 
 understand these hard-working httle-thought-of 
 heroes of ours, who do, without repining, for 
 others what others would not do for them. 
 David, David, the mine is to you yoiu* initiation 
 into a holy brotherhood, one in which some day 
 yom' name shall be never heard but with kindly 
 or gratefid recollection.' 
 
 The lad's face showed how deeply his whole 
 being was moved. Even where he chd not quite 
 understand all that was involved in the speaker's 
 words, he still could sufficiently guess at his 
 meaning. 
 
 ' Here, David, is the whole thing for you in a 
 nutshell. Tell me, had your father spoken to you 
 as I have done, had he gone differently to work 
 to attain the same end, don't you feel you would 
 have been easy at once, and have forgotten all 
 the horrors of the mine after an hoiu: or two's 
 acquaintance ? ' 
 
 ' Yes — I think so — perhaps,' faltered David. 
 
 'Had I been your father, were I now Israel 
 Mort thus appeahng to you, could you hesitate ? 
 do you ? ' 
 
 The deputy paused, and the two gazed earn-
 
 218 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 estly, longingly into eacli other's eyes, then 
 suddenly with a voice broken with emotion, the 
 lad threw himself into the deputy's arms, mur- 
 muring, 
 
 ' Help me ! watch me ! and I will do all I can, 
 all you say.' 
 
 ' And all yoiu* father says ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 And so the compact was sealed. 
 
 'Mnd, David, what I am going to tell you. 
 You don't know your father yet. I don't think 
 anybody knows but God. Sometimes I fancy 
 light has been vouchsafed to me, and that hght, 
 David, shows me Israel Mort as a true man, a 
 strong man, a great man. At all events, be to 
 him a son, heed not his harsh words, and time 
 — I promise you that at all events, and in any 
 case — will bring you a rich repayment.'
 
 219 
 
 CHAPTEE X. 
 'twixt cup and lip. 
 
 ' Has Israel Mort come ? ' asked Mr. GrifSth 
 Williams impatiently, the day after the funeral, as 
 lie entered through the French window into the 
 sitting-room with an open letter in his hand. 
 
 ' No, indeed,' said his wife ; who, in the very 
 deepest of mourning habiliments, was just then 
 whisking down an unfortunate spider from some 
 dim and hitherto undiscovered crevice with her 
 long feather-headed broom, and at once with her 
 foot putting him out of his pain. 
 
 Griffith rang the bell impatiently, and when the 
 maid-servant came bade her look out, and see if 
 Israel was coming. 
 
 Then he began to read his letter again, but 
 stopping short, he called out with just a touch
 
 220 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 of annoyance in the tone, as if it were an old 
 grievance — 
 
 ' Maggy, do stop that ceaseless bustle of spider- 
 hunting, curtain-flapping, and rearranging every- 
 thing. Such order becomes to me a kind of 
 chaos made tidy ; — do stop. Leave all that to 
 your servants, and to fitting times ; and sit down 
 here, I have something to say to you.' 
 
 She paused a moment — just where she stood 
 with the long feather brush raised high as she 
 could reach to dust the centre ornament on the 
 gilt cornice, — as if trying to understand him ; but 
 failing to do so, she completed her job, then sat 
 down near him with a smile on her genial face, 
 and holding the lono; wand-like handle of the 
 broom stuck upright, like an Amazonian spear 
 turned to domestic use. 
 
 He laughed as he saw her attitude, but said 
 with a grave face — 
 
 ' Brother Jehoshaphat, it seems, was not content 
 with astonishing people while he lived, but carefully 
 provided a fund of amusement for them when he 
 was dead. I have just received a letter by post 
 from the solicitor of his wife, old Mrs. Jehoshaphat
 
 'TWIXT aT AXD LIP. 221 
 
 Williams, to say that after the will made in my 
 favour, as regards the mine, he left another, 
 which has only just been discovered in a secret 
 drawer, expressly referring to and maintaining the 
 first, but saddling me with a charge on the mine 
 in the old woman's favour to the tune of three 
 thousand a year, she having already got all the 
 rest of his property ! ' 
 
 ' Griffith ! Griffith ! ' 
 
 ' You may well exclaim. But I fear the matter 
 is worse even than it looks, and that in the guise 
 of a friendly gift my brother has deliberately con- 
 ferred on me a most thankless labour and responsi- 
 bility.' 
 
 ' Dear, dear ! Yes, indeed ! Yes, indeed ! ' re- 
 iterated Mrs. Williams, with that rising inflection 
 at the end of the sentence that is so characteristic 
 of the Welsh, and so pretty in its women. 
 
 'Here,' continued her husband, 'just read the 
 letter, and see if I have mistaken anything, for it 
 has upset me greatly.' 
 
 The obedient wife puts down her weapon, and 
 takes the letter, rather a long one for a lawyer's, 
 as if Mrs. Jehoshaphat Williams had had a finger
 
 222 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 in the pie, in having so many details gone into. 
 She puts her left hand determinedly to her fore- 
 head while holding out in her right the letter, at 
 some distance, to read : but not long can she go 
 on without interruption, for silence and bodily rest 
 have already sent her mind's eye towards the 
 many subjects that require her domestic care. 
 
 As it is her habit, whenever she sees or thinks 
 of a bit of work to be done, to pounce upon it 
 like a bird of prey, no matter how important the 
 task may be that she leaves unfinished, how can 
 she read such long letters, or follow suchi new and 
 strange thoughts ? 
 
 This propensity of hers for flying from task to 
 task renders such times of domestic inactivity as 
 the present moments of great care and agitation, 
 for the ghosts of her unfinished works will rise up 
 before her and torment her. ^¥ho then can 
 wonder that she gives but a divided attention to 
 Griffith's letter this morning, or to the reflections 
 the letter excites in Griffith's mind, when such 
 a motley and bewildering assemblage perplexes her 
 brain. 
 
 ' The mine,' he is saying, ' I find, has been
 
 'twixt cxt axd lip. 223 
 
 producing about six tliousaud a year for some 
 years past ; so apparently there's three thousand 
 a piece for us, and the burden of management 
 upon me alone. Well ; perhaps that's not unfair. 
 But what do you say to this, Maggy? Israel 
 Mort has been at Barrett repeatedly about the 
 bad state of the mine, and the other day he came 
 to me, even at the risk of Barrett's sending him 
 adrift. And what do you think he said ? Why 
 that Jehoshaphat has so worked the mine — taking 
 everything he could get out of it, and putting 
 nothing he could help into it — that his motto must 
 have been the same as that of the famous Prince 
 Metternich — "After me the deluge ! " ' 
 
 Seeing his wife's eyes already begin to wander, 
 he rose and paced up and down the room, speaking 
 now to himself, now to her, while her thoughts, 
 however much she strives to detain them, are 
 again far away. Now they penetrate below 
 the crack in the floor, right down into the clean, 
 darkish cellar ; where, on a table, in their white 
 cotton clothes, He hams and flitches of bacon 
 waiting to be salted, and ribs and loins and 
 trotters to be wrapped up and sent to neighbours
 
 224 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 who have bespoken them, or, in special cases, as 
 gifts. 
 
 ' Don't you see, Maggy, my position ? I have 
 all the repairs, however elaborate or costly, to 
 make.' 
 
 ' Yes, indeed ! It's a shame, Griffith.' 
 
 ' So that if I have to spend the entire income 
 for a year — a year, do I say ? perhaps for many 
 years — her three thousand must go on being 
 paid ! ' 
 
 'But Griffith, she can't live long, you know. 
 No, indeed.' 
 
 ' And then it may be worse — for it is not a 
 mere life interest, but a permanent charge, which 
 she can and will leave to others. She may be 
 reasonable, and inclined to help ; but a stranger 
 will of course stick to his bargain, and ask me if 
 I am a rogue if I propose to modify it.' 
 
 Mrs. Williams sees not only the truth and force 
 of all this, but manages at the same time to see 
 besides, that there is a tap half driven into a beer 
 barrel: — that there is a dish of freshly-churned 
 butter set down on the stones, within reach of the 
 cat ; — that there is a pan of heaving and crackling
 
 'twixt cup axd lip. 225 
 
 dough at the kitchen fire : — The vivid imagination 
 can bear no more. She rises hastily, says : — 
 
 'Griffith, excuse me just a minute,' and dis- 
 appears, to return no more till her husband has, 
 as usual, forgotten her absence, and found new 
 avocations elsewhere. That was easy now. For 
 Israel's face appeared for a moment at the win- 
 dow, as he crossed and looked in, but was going 
 on to enter more humbly by the door. 
 
 ' Come in here ! Come in ! ' cried Griffith aloud. 
 Israel pushed open the glass door and stepped 
 in, greeted by the words, — 
 
 r 
 
 ' Have you heard the news ? ' 
 
 For a moment Israel did not look up. It was 
 a way with him, that of looking on the ground, 
 when pondering in thought, or when expecting 
 critical questions. 
 
 Slowly at last he raised his head, and looking 
 impassive as a piece of ice, said — 
 
 ' To what, sir, do you refer ? ' 
 
 ' My brother's new wiU.' 
 
 ' Just discovered ? ' 
 
 ' Yes. Giving his wife three thousand a year 
 as a charge on the mine.' 
 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 226 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Israel's eyes again sought the ground, as if he 
 could always at need there recruit his mental 
 forces ; then turning them steadily on Griffith, he 
 said : — 
 
 ' Well, sir, I will tell you. I signed that will, 
 I and a comrade brought by me, as witnesses, at 
 Mr. Jehoshaphat's request, for he had rather a 
 respect for me, even though he didn't choose to 
 promote me.' 
 
 ' You signed it ! you, Israel ! you astonish me ; 
 and did he tell you what you were signing ?' 
 
 ^Yes.' 
 
 ' And you did not remonstrate, not say one 
 word of the monstrous injustice of saddhng me 
 with all the dangers, expenses, and responsibilities, 
 while probably giving to her the bulk of all the 
 earnings ? ' 
 
 'How could I, Mr. Griffith? I am but an 
 Overman, as Mr. Jehoshaphat once was. But he 
 had become a great man, I remained a little one, 
 little and insignificant as when we first knew each 
 other. It was for him to say, " Israel, do this," 
 and for me to obey.' 
 
 ' And why did you not tell me before ? '
 
 'tWIXT cup AM) LIP. 227 
 
 ' Because he bade me hold my tongue till the 
 lawyer had said his say.' 
 
 There is no need to pursue the dialogue. It 
 ended once more to Israel's advantage, and in an 
 increased desire on Griffith's part for the meeting 
 in the mine, fixed for the morrow. 
 
 Meantime, Mrs. Williams' first business was to 
 discover what her 'lazy, loitering lasses,' the 
 servants, were about ; so she went round through 
 the little court, with its old, picturesque, ivy-clad 
 walls, that surrounded the kitchen and other 
 offices, and began to call in a shrill voice for 
 ' Euth ' and ' Gwen,' but called in vain ; so hurried 
 on to the kitchen door, prepared for any amount 
 of domestic calamity. 
 
 At the threshold she was met by Nest in 
 tears ; and the moment the poor child saw her 
 she ran to her and clasped her, and hid her 
 face in her dress as if her heart would break 
 with the distress that was too great for her to 
 explain. 
 
 With some efibrt Mrs. WiUiams extracted the 
 truth. Nest had just seen David — had met him 
 
 q2
 
 228 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 quite accidentally — and been so frightened at his 
 looks and his hideous miner-dress, that she could 
 not venture to speak to him. But then he had 
 come after her, and told her all his dreadful story 
 about his first day in the mine, and how kind 
 to him Eees Thomas had been, and how he meant 
 to try again. 
 
 'I sat down and cried I can't tell you how 
 long. And then he seemed sorry he had told me, 
 and said his father called him a mean coward, 
 and he supposed he was one, or he should never 
 have told me. And then he saw his father 
 coming, and he went av^ay, and never even 
 wished me good-bye.' 
 
 Mrs. Williams loved her child and knew 
 how to comfort her, and did so now, and 
 brought back all her bright gaiety at last by 
 explaining to her Israel's improved position, and 
 by promising to see what could be done for 
 David's future. 
 
 And then Nest prattled on, just like a bird in 
 the early morning, as if it mattered nothing what 
 was said, when the saying was so sweet, and 
 then —
 
 'twixt cup and lip. 229 
 
 Why then Mrs. Wilhams, while reluctant to put 
 away the child, sees once more in her excited 
 fancy the beer spirting from the tap, the cat 
 cooling her tongue in the fresh butter, the dough 
 rising to unheard-of heights ; she also sees in the 
 same way Jenkyn, the farm servant, coming for 
 his coat, from which she had cut a sleeve, and 
 only half finished putting it in again ; sees strange 
 dogs prowling about the cellar where she has left 
 her hams, and flitches, and ribs, and trotters un- 
 protected. 
 
 At these and a host of other disturbing visions 
 Mrs. Wilhams presses her feet together, kisses 
 Nest, bids her run and play, and herself rushes 
 off to examine into the actual state of things.
 
 230 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 CHAPTEE XI. 
 
 GRIFFITH WILLIAMS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL 
 TOGETHER IX THE MINE. 
 
 The day of the appointment for a meeting in the 
 mine having come, Mr. Griffith Williams dressed 
 himself with some care, conscious of the eyes that 
 were to look, many for the first time, on their 
 new employer. He had forgotten for the moment 
 the sort of place he was going through, and the 
 contact his clothes would have to endure. 
 
 When M]^s. WilHams reminded him of this at 
 their very early breakfast, he said carelessly, — 
 
 ' Israel will see to all that, no doubt.' 
 
 ' Griffith dear, don't forget to say a kind word 
 to Israel about Dcivid. Now he must do some- 
 thing better for him.' 
 
 ' He ought, at all events ; but Israel's a man 
 difficult to deal with in things that he considers as
 
 WILLIAIIS AND ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 231 
 
 belonging not to an employer s province, but his 
 own. As manager, I may tell you, Maggy, I have 
 immense faith in him, and expect great things 
 from him. It wasn't merely what he said and 
 did that influenced me the other day to put him 
 so suddenly in Barrett's place, but from a boy I 
 have known him, and have always had the same 
 idea of him. He's not a pleasant man, but a man 
 of real worth to those who know how to use him. 
 My brother acted brutishly to Israel. He knew 
 his abilities, and profited by them, just so far as it 
 suited his convenience, but hindered him from 
 getting one step higher, lest he might either get 
 too strong a hold and make himself too valuable, 
 or go elsewhere, and become as great a man as 
 himself. What's the time ? Half-past five ! What 
 a dark, gloomy morning ! I must make haste, or 
 I shall be setting a bad example at the outset. 
 Don't you know,' he said with a laugh, as he 
 kissed and parted with his wife, ' I am now one of 
 the captains of industry, and must mind my p's 
 and q's ? ' 
 
 As he approached the ugly group of buildings 
 that surrounded the pit's mouth, he saw Israel
 
 232 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 standing there to watch the colhers descend ; and 
 Griffith thought that as no one had yet noticed 
 liim, he would slip into a dark corner, and siini- 
 larl}^ watch Israel's own behaviour under his new 
 dignity. 
 
 The news of the Overman's elevation had rapidly 
 flown, and it was amusing to see the differing atti- 
 tudes of the colliers as they recognised him. 
 
 One man seemed almost inclined to kneel in 
 reverence for Israel's condescension in wishing 
 him ' Good morning,' till Israel's dry question, 
 ' Drinking last night ? ' caused him to collect him- 
 self, and hurry into the cage, followed by a laugh 
 from his comrades. 
 
 Another turned full face upon Israel, as he 
 said — 
 
 ' It's a fine thing to be in luck. Master Israel. 
 Luck's a very fine thing, ain't it ? ' 
 
 ' Give me time to try, lad,' said Israel quietly, 
 and without offence. 
 
 Wlien the last of the working colliers had gone 
 down, the night- deputy came up from below, 
 and seeing Israel, went to him and held out his 
 hand.
 
 WILLIAMS AND ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 233 
 
 Just for a brief space Israel delayed to take it, 
 but then the two hands met, and seemingly a 
 cordial grasp was given. 
 
 The deputy was a man whom the most indif- 
 ferent person could scarcely pass without noticing, 
 for the unearthly blaze of the eye ; which shone 
 out of the cadaverous, murky face like an unnatu- 
 rally beautiful star during some portentous aspect 
 of the heavens. He was of small, spare form, and 
 sharp, thin features. These were inexpressibly 
 sad, yet with a kind of darkened radiance upon 
 them, as though their natural hght were under 
 some partial and inexplicable echpse. 
 
 It was a face where, in the profound tenderness 
 of the gloom, in the great hollows under the eyes, 
 in the sharp extremities of the nose and chin, and 
 in the shrunken yet sensitive nostrils. Death's 
 fingers might have recently passed ; but with a 
 touch so stricken, kindly, and hesitating, that at 
 last he spared him to hve on ; without, however, 
 removing from that wan, worn countenance the 
 signs of the fatal sentence he had visibly stamped 
 there in token it was but a reprieve after all he 
 accorded.
 
 234 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 The same kind of effect was produced by tlie 
 contrast between the powerful expression of the 
 head, and the thin, skeleton-hke frame; which 
 looked in the bulky clothes as if raised from 
 some graveyard and reanimated, either to 
 benefit the owner by some new period in which 
 to expiate sin, or because his previous life had 
 been too valuable to be prematm^ely lost to his 
 fellow-creatures. 
 
 While engaged in his duties he was calm, col- 
 lected, and thoroughly efficient ; but when alone, 
 and he was able to retire into the mental solitude 
 he so much loved, his lips would be seen moving 
 incessantly in silent communion with his own 
 inner self. 
 
 Such was the man who had aided David in the 
 mine, and who now addressed Israel : — 
 
 ' I congratulate thee, Manager Mort,' he said, 
 after a prolonged pause, during which he looked 
 searchingly and wistfully into Israel's face. 
 
 'I congratulate thee^ Overman Eees Thomas,' 
 was the reply, with just sufficient emphasis on the 
 word Overman to indicate the new dignity. 
 
 The slightest tinge of colour seemed to appear
 
 WILLIA31S AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 235 
 
 on the pale, hollow cheek, as Eees Thomas spake 
 agam — 
 
 ' If thou sayest that seriously I thank thee ; and 
 shall try, with the Lord's help, to do my duty ; 
 but if thou madest the mistake of supposing I was 
 seeking my own advancement and vain-glory 
 when I offered my congratulations, thou didst me 
 wrong. J^o, friend Israel, I was yearning after 
 better things.' 
 
 'Which some day thou shalt talk to me about 
 once more.' 
 
 'Again thou mistakest. It is not thyself of 
 whom I speak, but of these benighted creatures 
 here below our feet. Israel Mort, dost thou re- 
 cognise the hand that has done this for thee? 
 Dost thou thank the Lord ? Art thou determined 
 to make this, the greatest event in thy life, 
 redound to His glory and honour, rather than to 
 thine own ? ' 
 
 ' Eees Thomas, I am not given to so much talk. 
 Do you accept the post of Overman ? ' 
 
 'Do you withdraw your objections to my 
 holding the men together for prayers at the 
 beginning of the day's toil ; they shall be brief —
 
 236 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ay, brief as may be the lives of every one of us, 
 wliicli we cannot depend upon for an hour ? ' 
 
 ' I have said No a dozen times, have I not ? 
 Again I say No ! ' 
 
 The speaker's voice was harsh, and the tone ex- 
 pressed the sense of habitual soreness on the subject. 
 
 ' Then I refuse. My sin of comphcity is great 
 enough already. I will undertake no higher re- 
 sponsibilities to make my neglect of His message 
 more criminal.' 
 
 Israel paused a moment to restrain his ire, for 
 he knew no man whose value he could for a 
 moment thmk of as equal in comparison with Eees 
 Thomas's. And even then, as the latter was 
 getting into the cage to descend again, on account 
 of the employer's visit, he could not but let the 
 words escape him — 
 
 ' Eemember, if I have to find a new Overman, 
 he may ask me to let him choose a new deputy.' 
 
 ' He may ; and if he does, you will displace me. 
 It is well. Perhaps it is to that God is guiding 
 
 me. Useless, here, I may ' At that moment 
 
 the signal was given, the cage descended, and the 
 two men were abruptly separated.
 
 WILLLOIS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 237 
 
 Pondering over this conversation, in which 
 he had been deeply interested, Griffith did not 
 care for the moment to comment upon it to 
 Israel. 
 
 Moving, therefore, slowly round some of the 
 buildings, he presented himself from a different 
 point to the new manager, and shook him by the 
 hand. 
 
 Israel's eye at once glanced at his employer's 
 dress. Then he strode away to a little office, 
 asking Griffith to follow him. Here the silk hat 
 was exchanged for one of leather, stiffened, so it 
 seemed, with centuries of dirt and perspiration ; 
 over his blue frock he put on an old waterproof 
 with sleeves ; and lastly, he exchanged his own 
 boots for a pair such as he had never before even 
 dimly conceived the possibility of, so ludicrously 
 clumsy and shapeless were they. 
 
 Israel, however, saw nothing in the transforma- 
 tion but its necessity, and could but vaguely 
 understand the practical jest which so tickled 
 Griffith. Israel was in no ordinary sense of the 
 word a humorous man. 
 
 The mirthful mood of Griffith was to undergo
 
 238 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 a great cliange as the cage would bear him down, 
 and lie begin to realise that dim, awful mystery, 
 the depth and darkness of the earth as laid bare 
 in the greater mines. 
 
 They moved on to the pit mouth. There 
 Griffith found an empty tram waiting for him, 
 lined througrhout with canvas, to defend him from 
 touching the dirty inside ; and with a roll of 
 canvas for him to sit on. 
 
 But though this attention to his comfort did 
 not escape Griffith's pleased eye, he was much 
 more, and unpleasantly, impressed with the cage 
 into which he was to go. It seemed to him 
 actually too low even to sit in upright. 
 
 It was a solid iron cage in three stages, so that 
 tlu-ee trams full of coal could be brought up at 
 once, or three batches of men or materials sent 
 down. Griffith found on enquiry this was the only 
 mode for ascent and descent in the mine ; and 
 he felt strongly inclined to remonstrate on the 
 unseemliness of it as regards the men, and its 
 extreme unsuitability in cases of accidents when 
 wounded and dying persons might have to be 
 brought up. He restrained himself, however, and
 
 WILLIA^IS AND ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 239 
 
 got in, helped by Israel and a couple of colliers, 
 who fairlv lifted him over the tram eds^e. 
 
 ' Sit down, sir,' said Israel. ' Lower ! Still lower ! 
 You really must incline your head a little more 
 down. That will do. Xow, please, don't move ! ' 
 
 He did not, but the tram did ; being pushed 
 forward into the lowermost compartment of the 
 iron cage ; the roof of which seemed, by a well- 
 known optical delusion, to slide over and shut 
 him as in a trap — only a few inches above his 
 face, and his painfully huddled-up form. 
 
 This, with the sudden darkness, and the apparent 
 absence of all air, excited so great a sense of op- 
 pression, of difficult breathing, of danger through 
 suffocation, that he almost decided to tell Israel 
 to stop, and refuse to go down, until he could do 
 so by some less alarming mode. But while he 
 hesitated about the unmanliness of it, and the 
 loss of caste it might bring him, the hammer was 
 heard ofiving the signal, and the caoje beoran to 
 descend ; slower than usual on account of Israel's 
 considerateness for his employer. 
 
 The moment Griffith perceived this he almost 
 cursed his manager's kindness, for he felt growing
 
 240 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 worse every instant, and could only hope to reach 
 the bottom with the least possible delay, and there 
 find the air he now prayed for as for dear life. 
 
 He had no organic disease, but there were 
 elements of disorder in his frame, that rendered 
 him pecuharly hable to physical suffering — per- 
 haps physical danger from the position he was in. 
 
 To amuse him Israel told him brief anecdotes 
 of his own and his fellows' history regarding 
 accidents in the shaft ; finishing with a bit of 
 statistics showing how large a proportion of all 
 minino^ calamities occur in the shaft, or connected 
 with it, especially in the going up and down. 
 
 But Griffith heard nothing he said. He was 
 feeling each instant that he should never reach 
 the bottom without fainting, and what that might 
 involve under such circumstances he could not 
 but foresee. But he kept silent, knowing that no 
 earthly power could shorten the ordeal for him. 
 He now only thought of death — of things that 
 should have been attended to, but had not been ; 
 of his ^vife and children and dependents ; and 
 then waited, conscious it was simply now a race 
 between the cage downwards to possible safety,
 
 WILLLOIS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUXSEL. 241 
 
 and the deleterious power that seemed bent on 
 destroying him before he could touch the bottom, 
 and hope at least for relief. 
 
 Will he ever forget the moment when it did 
 stop ; and that other moment when the tram 
 having been pushed away from the cage, he found 
 himself again where he could breathe, sit up, 
 stand, see dimly ; and above all, feel the delicious 
 life-giving breeze that came sweeping over and by 
 him? 
 
 He told his wife afterwards that, ludicrous as the 
 narrative then seemed to him if he viewed it as 
 others must do, he would not, as regards himself, 
 again risk it for the entire value of the mine. 
 
 When he was calm enough to look back on 
 the cage, he could hardly help wondering that he 
 should have been such an ass as to get into the 
 tram, which naturally excluded all air except such 
 infinitesimal portions as might come in over the 
 edge between that and the cage roof; whereas if 
 he had gone down, standing as the colliers did, 
 bending low within the open cage, he would at all 
 events have had air, and been spared the hideous 
 yet half grotesque suffering he had gone through. 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Israel no doubt had meant all for the best; 
 so Griffith simply told him, as if he wanted to 
 test and try all things to-day, he would go up in 
 the usual way. When he did so at the close of 
 his visit, he experienced no inconvenience of the 
 kind that had so alarmed him. 
 
 His uncomfortable thoughts and feelings soon 
 passed away, as the danger of the descent, which 
 had been a very real one, passed too ; and his 
 spirits rose as he remembered how carefully he 
 had kept himself from any the least outward sign 
 of affright. 
 
 As the cage rested at the bottom he was handed 
 out by Israel. At first he was confused by the 
 noise of the pumps, by the httle twinkling 
 hghts, by the gleams on the water pit, or sump, 
 and by the sharp rush of the air about him, moved 
 by artificial force. 
 
 Then, as he grew used to the place he heard 
 peculiar sounds ; and going on a little, and turning, 
 he saw in a rudely dug out arched recess of the 
 rock the dim forms of a number of colliers stand- 
 ing; bare-headed in a reverential attitude, candles
 
 WILLLi^IS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 243 
 
 or lamps in hand, and Eees Thomas reading from 
 a Bible with great fervour. 
 
 Griffith glanced round enquiringly at Israel, who 
 stood silent, grim, but took no notice of his em- 
 ployer's gesture. 
 
 ' He has disobeyed you,' whispered Griffith. 
 
 'And not for the first time,' was the stern 
 reply. ' But it shall be for the last ! ' 
 
 ' So ' — thought Griffith to himself — ' he means to 
 be master here of those under him, and gives me 
 a hint at the same time to that effect.' 
 
 He was wise enough, however, to understand the 
 worthlessness of responsibihty without power, and 
 his only remark came in the shape of a question : — 
 
 ' Why do you object to this ? ' he asked in a 
 low tone. 
 
 ' Because it sets men thinking, and fills their 
 hearts with vain imaginings. The best and 
 happiest miner is he who thinks of nothing but 
 how to win coal while in the mine, and of nothing 
 but how best to forget it altogether when out of 
 the mine.' 
 
 ' I'd let him alone.' 
 
 e2
 
 244 ISE.iEL MORT. 
 
 ' That man, an officer, has disobeyed positive 
 orders.' 
 
 ' Obhge me by saying nothing to him about it 
 at present, or till we have talked the matter over.' 
 
 After a pause, Israel said, dryly, ' Very well.' 
 Then he added, as with prudent afterthought — 
 
 ' We tried it once for nearly two years, in order 
 to please a lot of fanatics, but were obliged to 
 give it up through the rows that broke out between 
 them who did like it, and the hauliers who didn't.' 
 
 'Hush!' ejaculated Griffith, as, the reading 
 finished, the party began to sing with touching 
 homeliness and fervour the hymn which has for 
 its first line — 
 
 ' For a rock to build on.' 
 
 Then an aged grey-haired man began to pray. 
 His accents were feeble, but the spirit in his soul 
 made them penetrate far into the dim recesses 
 around. 
 
 A younger collier, his son, succeeded ; one 
 who had but lately joined the ' praying lot,' as 
 irreverent colliers called them. It was most 
 touching to watch the face of the old colher as he 
 listened for the first time in his life to the earnest,
 
 WILLIA^rS AND ISKAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 245 
 
 rough but manly tones and words in which his 
 son addressed others, using his own discreditable 
 experience in candid confession for their common 
 benefit. The grimy tears were rolhng down his 
 face as the son finished. 
 
 A third prayer followed — they were all brief — 
 and then they sang a second hymn, and the ser- 
 vice was over ; lasting a httle more than twenty 
 minutes. 
 
 As they separated and went each away to his 
 arduous and dangerous labour, Griffith could not 
 but ask himself which of these two classes — the men 
 who had a real abiding faith in something higher 
 than themselves, something nobler than this world, 
 or the men who had it not — were the likeliest to 
 be the best workmen, the best citizens, the best 
 husbands, sons and fathers ; and so asking, felt no 
 sort of doubt about the answer. 
 
 That morning's service then, in which he had 
 been deeply interested, should be another of the 
 various matters he reserved for the present to go 
 into at a later day with Israel, when he felt he 
 could more gracefully and more wisely interfere. 
 
 When the men had dispersed, Eees Thomas was
 
 246 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 seen to be waiting within sight of the two persons 
 on whom his future so much depended, as if to 
 say to them, ' Here I am if you want me ; ' but as 
 they made no sign, he went away through that 
 same low black arch through whicli the general 
 current of collier life had gone before him, and 
 which reminded Griffith of the famous line from 
 Dante — ' Abandon hope, all ye who enter here ! ' 
 
 A moment after he was angry at his own 
 thought ; it seemed so unpleasantly — so incon- 
 veniently suggestive. He felt as guilty as a king- 
 caught in the act of teaching his subjects dis- 
 loyalty. 
 
 While he followed Israel step by step through 
 the main level, or central way, he could but smile 
 at his own anticipations, which had been of some- 
 thing more than discomfort. It was not a pleasant 
 place to choose for a promenade certainly, for he 
 had to keep up a perpetual series of difficult strides 
 from sleeper to sleeper, as the timbers crossed be- 
 tween the rails of the tramway, or to walk with 
 easier steps in some inches of w^ater which was 
 flowing outwards from the recesses of the mine ; 
 w^hile in constant danger (if he moved in an up-
 
 WILLIAMS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 247 
 
 right posture) of knocking his head agamst some 
 irregular beam of wood placed for the support of 
 the roof where the natural rock was giving way. 
 
 Then, too, when the signal was given of trams 
 coming he had to huddle away his somewhat 
 luxuriant growth of person in a miserable httle 
 refuge hole at the side, and there crouch and 
 shrink as the train went past with its seemingly 
 interminable trams. 
 
 But when, proud of his own equanimity during 
 this preliminary experience, he began to reason as 
 against an imaginary antagonist, that after all the 
 disagreeables of mining had been absurdly exagge- 
 rated, he was quickly brought to silence by Israel's 
 leaving this central level to go through the side 
 ones — ' stalls,' as he called them — each of which 
 led, sometimes through long distances, and by 
 ways that seemed to become more and more low, 
 and narrow, and stifling, to the face of the coal, 
 where the miners were actually at work. 
 
 All these roads had been, as Israel explained, 
 excavated through the coal ; and the walls, or 
 ' pillars,' were masses of coal, still left for support 
 between the stalls for the roadways.
 
 248 ISKAEL MORT. 
 
 ' And you see, sir,' remarked Israel, ' that as the 
 vein of coal is but shallow, when we have got that, 
 we don't care to go on digging at the useless rocks 
 merely to give us grand approaches.' 
 
 Griffith saw the force of the los^ic without 
 exactly appreciating it ; for he was now, and had 
 been for some time, not walking, but plunging 
 along head foremost, his back painfully bent, yet 
 never for one instant getting a chance of relief by 
 an upright posture, his feet slipping now into pools 
 of water, now into black greasy sludge, his head 
 experiencing one incessant series of shocks, which 
 no past experience could guard him from while 
 having to move on so fast after Israel, who alarmed 
 him terribly with the fear of being left behind. 
 And, indeed, this did happen just for a minute or 
 two when Israel left him without warning alone in 
 the dark ; and he felt like a fly drawn by some 
 irresistible and hideous attraction along one of the 
 hues of the web of a gigantic underground spider 
 squatted in some unknown centre, from which all 
 these levels seemed to radiate. 
 
 The darkness was horrible to him. He would
 
 WILLIAMS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 249 
 
 have been obliged to shout loudly to Israel, had 
 the latter delayed his return much longer. But 
 he came, and explained that he had been desirous 
 to ascertain if the district they were approaching, 
 and which contained the only dangerous workings, 
 were as safe and pure as they had been when he 
 visited the spot a few hours before. He had, he 
 said, found a little gas, and cleared it away ; and 
 now Griffith might be perfectly satisfied there was 
 no dans^er of his croino^ on. 
 
 Griflfith thought on the whole he w^as tired, and 
 had seen enough. He could visit the mine again. 
 Of course, he should do so ; perhaps frequently — 
 that was his duty. Couldn't they rest somewhere? 
 He really must sit down, since he could not stand 
 up ; his back felt broken. 
 
 Israel was remorseless. There were other stalls 
 he must see — one, at all events. 
 
 Griffith consented to the one. 
 
 Presently they stopped before a door, which 
 was opened by a pull from some unseen hand 
 down in the dark corner by the side. 
 
 Griffith held forth his lamp to see who was
 
 250 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 there, and beheld a Httle fellow huddled up, cord 
 in hand, a picture of the saddest, blankest, most 
 hopeless-looking misery he had ever seen. 
 
 In the dark — hour after hour — no light per- 
 mitted, and nothing, therefore, to read; and as 
 to thoughts, God help the poor little creatures to 
 keep thoughts away from them which, for a time 
 at least, suggest nothing but explosions, burns, 
 ' lamings,' if they don't bring things even more 
 terrible still — the ghosts of dead men or boys 
 they have known, and who have been killed in 
 the mine. 
 
 Something else — though for the moment what 
 it was Griffith did not know — induced him again 
 to look at the little fellow, whose white eyes 
 glared spectre-like out of the dusky face and hair. 
 Then, hearing the call of Israel, who waited for 
 him, he passed on with a sigh, and the mental 
 remark, ' This, too. Master Israel, shall be seen 
 about by-and-by, or I will know the reason.' 
 
 When he came up to the Overman he said, 
 though merely for the sake of saying something to 
 cover his delay, and the thoughts excited by the 
 fate of such poor lads, —
 
 WILLIAMS AND ISRAEL TAKE COUIS^SEL. 251 
 
 ' Do you know, Israel, I fancy I have seen that 
 boy somewhere ; how ^vretched he looks ! ' 
 
 ' He'll get used to that. And as to your seeing 
 him — why, it's David.' 
 
 ' Good God, Israel, you don't say so. I must 
 go back and speak to him, if but for a moment.' 
 
 ' I beg you, sir, to do nothing of the kind,' said 
 Israel, arresting his arm with no very gentle touch. 
 ' He's quiet now — to excite him again w^ould be 
 cruel and useless.' 
 
 ' And do you really mean him to go through all 
 this ? ' asked Griffith, in undisguised astonishment. 
 
 ' Why not ? I did ! and mthout his advan- 
 tages. I had nothing to hope for ; he has every- 
 thing.' — 
 
 ' But what is your aim ? ' 
 
 ' To lam him to be a man — a strong man — one 
 who, having first been master of himself, and got 
 to know, shall then use his mastery and his know- 
 ledo^e to 0^0 further and his/her than I can.' 
 
 Do O 
 
 ' You surprise me ! You .' He was inter- 
 rupted. 
 
 ' Shall we go on, sir ? As I said, 'tis but one 
 place more.'
 
 252 ISE.\EL MORT. 
 
 ' I suppose so,' responded Griffith wearily. 
 
 And bitterly he reproached himself for his folly 
 when he found the way get still narrower, lower, 
 and more disgustingly foul with the black shmy 
 mud, so that at last he had to lie down and 
 wriggle his body over some foul rubbish that had 
 lately fallen from the roof and broken a man's 
 arm. It was an arduous and loathsome task that 
 had to be got through before he could reach 
 the place where Israel already was, and waiting 
 for him. 
 
 Whether his new manager had any secret aim 
 in thus disgusting him with the actual details of 
 mining hfe, Griffith had not yet formally asked 
 himself ; even while he felt that if Israel did seek 
 to achieve in that way a certain independence in 
 his future schemes of labour, he had already suc- 
 ceeded. 
 
 ' These falls of roof, Israel, are awkward things! ' 
 
 ' Yes, they cost a deal of money.' 
 
 ' I didn't mean that. I mean the injury to hfe. 
 But I suppose the danger looks worse than it is.' 
 
 ' On the contrary, the danger is far greater than 
 it looks,' said Israel. ' Out of a thousand Hves
 
 WILLIAMS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COL'XSEL. 253 
 
 lost yearly in the United Kingdom, between four 
 and five hundred are due to falls.' 
 
 ' Is it possible ! ' 
 
 ' A fall might even now take place, and on so 
 large a scale as to stop our return for ever — at 
 least alive.' 
 
 It was well that Israel could not just then see 
 Griffith WilHams's face, even though he — perhaps 
 accidentally — held up his lamp towards it. 
 
 Griffith restrained his tongue determinedly. He 
 was there, and must not lose caste with his servant, 
 and that servant Israel Mort ; but he mentally re- 
 solved that only some most pressing occasion 
 should ever take him again where he was. 
 
 Presently he had a great relief. Israel led him 
 to a gob, or receptacle for the rubbish, chiefly 
 loose stones that accumulate in working. There 
 he could fie down and stretch his aching hmbs, 
 and take any posture he liked, except the upright 
 one ; for in all other directions there was plenty 
 of room. 
 
 Sitting or rechning in the hollow face of the 
 gob, with a fresh breezy air playing about him, 
 and luxmiating in the secret consciousness that a
 
 254 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 most unpleasant task was now fairly got over, he 
 recovered his natural geniality. 
 
 ' May I smoke ? ' 
 
 ' No. Against the rules.' 
 
 ' Is it just now dangerous ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 'If I do smoke?' 
 
 'You'U be fined.' 
 
 ' And the fines go to ' 
 
 ' The colliers' benefit fund.' 
 
 ' Why, then, it's an eminently patriotic act to 
 do.' 
 
 He pulled out his cigar-case, and ofiered a cigar 
 to Israel. 
 
 ' Do you absolutely persist in spite of my warn- 
 ing ? ' asked Israel seriously. 
 
 ' Don't you see ? The thing's done — irre- 
 vocable.' 
 
 A puff of smoke passed towards Israel's face. 
 
 ' Very well. I shall record the facts in ^ my 
 book.' And he began to write. 
 
 ' Do, and add that, seeing no further harm could 
 possibly happen through your participation, you 
 had to levy two fines instead of one.'
 
 WILLIA^klS A^^D ISRAEL TAKE COUNSEL. 255 
 
 A grim smile broke out on Israel's face, and 
 soon broadened into a hoarse laugh, the only way 
 he could laugh, as he took the proffered cigar, and 
 followed the example set him. 
 
 They continued to smoke for some time in 
 silence. 
 
 ' Well now, Israel, give me some idea of what 
 must be done. What are these colossal under- 
 takings you dimly foreshadow as likely to turn me 
 into a new Croesus ? ' 
 
 ' A second shaft.' 
 
 Griffith groaned in spirit, and sighed aloud. 
 
 ' Go on,' he said. 
 
 ' Some thousands of new fir props must be ob- 
 tained and put up to make the levels even decently 
 safe.' 
 
 ' Costly job,' said Griffith, looking grave. 
 ' Eeally necessary ? ' 
 
 ' A knife cuts into them hke cheese in many 
 places.' 
 
 ' Proceed.' 
 
 ' Then the engine boilers are so worn as to be 
 dangerous ; the spears of the pumping apparatus 
 should be replaced ; and there are many other less
 
 256 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 important but still serious things to be attended 
 to ' 
 
 ' Costing money ? ' 
 
 'Yes; 
 
 ' In fact, Israel, you are preparing me — mildly 
 — for going to work to make wliat shall be equi- 
 valent to an entirely new plant — eh ? ' 
 
 ' Something like that, I own.' 
 
 ' Quite out of the question. Quite. So if that's 
 aU the prospect ' 
 
 'Wishing no harm to you, Mr. Griffith, I do 
 wish it might be in effect a new plant, as that 
 would admit of so many improvements, so much 
 greater economy in winning the coal, and increase 
 so immensely the annual production of the mine.' 
 
 ' Would it ? ' asked Griffith earnestly, again 
 lending himself to the thought inspired by Israel's 
 unmistakable earnestness and faith ; and half in- 
 clining to consider how capital might be raised 
 to do the job once for all in a masterly style. 
 
 Israel did not directly answer this query. 
 
 ' Do you know, sir,' he said, ' that the land in 
 which this mine lies was offered to an ancestor of 
 mine in exchange for a cow ? '
 
 WILLIAMS A^D ISRAEL TAKE COUxYSEL. 257 
 
 ' And of course he accepted ? ' 
 
 ' No ; the innocent dechned.' The depth of 
 scorn with which Israel pronounced the word in- 
 nocent was something to remember. 
 
 ' Surely that was never your ancestor ? ' said 
 Griffith, with unconcealed irony. 
 
 ' If he wasn't, he ought to have been, in ac- 
 cord with marriage law,' said Israel, and then 
 went on. ' Well, sir, as is the difference be- 
 tween the value of that piece of waste land in 
 the last century and now, so is the value of your 
 mine as it is, and as what it might be.' 
 
 'Are you serious? Do you know or weigh 
 what you say? Stop, I entreat you, and think.' 
 Griffith's voice trembled, his hands were damp 
 with perspiration, he was evidently losing his self- 
 control. 
 
 ' I say what I say, and know what I know,' 
 thundered Israel, yielding to the contagion of 
 Griffith's excitement ; and feehng the dramatic 
 instinct, that is so strong in the hearts of us all, 
 put him into artistic sympathy with his employer. 
 
 They talked on after that a long while, and with 
 increasing respect in Griffith WiUiams's mind for 
 
 VOL. I. S
 
 258 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 the knowledge and efficiency of Ms new manager, 
 and with increasing faith in his previsions of the 
 future goal to be reached ; but also with a certain 
 undercurrent of dissatisfaction at Israel's utter 
 disregard of and recklessness about the more 
 humane, religious, and philanthropic aspects of 
 mining affairs, which Griffith thought much of in 
 connection with certain projects for the comfort 
 and elevation and security of the workmen. 
 
 He tried to discuss them with Israel, but the 
 latter exhibited his contempt for the subject so 
 nakedly and so promptly, that Griffith found it 
 difficult afterwards to go on and explain himself, 
 and so for the moment let the question drop. 
 
 The sums required, too, were very large for a 
 man of Griffith's means, even if only reparation — 
 but sufficient reparation — were decided on ; but 
 hopelessly beyond him if the dead works and 
 machinery were to be made equivalent to those 
 of a new plant. 
 
 Buoyant with hope, yet burdened with the fear 
 of an overwhelming expenditure ; desirous to be 
 a real captain of industry, one who acknowledged 
 duties as well as claimed profits, and at the same
 
 WILLLl^IS AXD ISRAEL TAKE COUXSEL. 259 
 
 time afraid that Israel Mort would in that way be 
 as a perpetual thorn festering in his side ; loathing 
 the actual mine as seen with his bodily eyes, but 
 finding entrancing beauties and dehghts in it when 
 seen only through the spirit's vision of the fruits, 
 Grijfith Wilhams went home that day to find 
 everything about him already undergoing a 
 change ; — his rooms looked low — Httle — mean ; 
 his furniture shabby ; his servants vulgar ; his 
 wife — well, he loved her, but he must — he Avouid 
 — say, and with as little of bitterness as possible, 
 she looked and moved, and spoke more ' domesti- 
 cated ' than ever. 
 
 He wandered about all the rest of the day on 
 the mountains, stopping occasionally to lie down 
 on the slope and fill page after page of his note- 
 book with figures. Then he would go on again, 
 as if possessed by an unquiet spirit ; till feehng 
 his fatigue ahke of body and mind, he would 
 throw himself at full length upon a pleasant moss- 
 covered spot on the banks of the httle stream, and 
 ask himself in tribulation of spirit whether he was 
 not endangering by such speculations the good he 
 possessed and the peace that he yet might possess 
 
 s 2
 
 260 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 if he would but discipline and attune Hs spirit 
 properly, rather than enhancing the good or the 
 peace by the creation of the wealth he already 
 saw within his grasp. 
 
 The night he spent was certainly not one of 
 sleep, or rest, or comfort, or happiness. Whether 
 it was a night profitably spent may be better 
 judged when Israel and he shall meet again as 
 appointed, with full details before them of all the 
 manager proposes.
 
 261 
 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 
 SHOWING HOW ISRAEL HELPED MR. GRIFFITH TO 
 A DECISION". 
 
 If the woman who hesitates is lost, the man who 
 hesitates is often saved. 
 
 Griffith Wilhams had in him an instinct of 
 caution, which formed a valuable comiterbalance 
 to his impulsiveness and constant desire to relieve 
 the tedium of existence by change. 
 
 He and Israel laboured, day by day, w^eek by 
 week, through estimates, and proposals, and 
 histories of other successful colheries ; and thus 
 seemed to get nearer and nearer to that state of 
 satisfaction which springs from an exhaustive 
 enquiry. 
 
 But Israel himself, as a man, did not win upon 
 him as did Israel's general scheme.
 
 262 • ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Strange to say, one element of this result was a 
 half fancy, almost a definite suspicion, that Israel 
 reciprocated the personal want of sympathy. 
 
 This annoyed Griffith. It seemed at once so 
 humiliating and so grotesquely absurd. 
 
 He tried to convince himself he was mistaken ; 
 but the only result was confirmation of his dislike, 
 and behef in Israel's dislike, to which he thought 
 
 he found the kev-note in a little incident that 
 
 «/ 
 
 occurred. 
 
 They had been discussing the character of a 
 conspicuous man of the neighbourhood, and 
 Griffith, perhaps with a certain desire to talk at 
 Israel, had been praising his balanced mind, his 
 habit of looking at both sides of a question, and 
 deliberating calmly while others were urging him 
 to immediate action, when Mort interrupted 
 him : — 
 
 ' Yes, he deliberates so long, that when he 
 decides he finds his chance gone, and his decision 
 no longer worth twopence. I spit at such men. 
 Always half-and-half in everything — and no two 
 of his halves making a whole. A man who'll 
 never do any good for himself nor anybody else.'
 
 ISRAEL HELPS I^IK. GEIFFITH TO A DECISION. 263 
 
 ' You are severe,' said Griffith, colouring in 
 spite of his effort to seem indifferent. 
 
 ' I mean it,' retorted Israel, who was in a bad 
 humom* that day at finding no progress made. 
 
 What did, what could Israel want? Griffith 
 asked himself seriously. Did this look hke ex- 
 pectation of the acceptance of his schemes ? He 
 was bound to say, no. 
 
 What, then, could Israel be thinking of? Did 
 he want him to sell the mine ? Or did he want 
 to be discharged ? Had he lost, in a word, faith 
 in his new master, much more rapidly and de- 
 cisively than his new master in him, and was he 
 pondering new schemes ? 
 
 About this time a terrible explosion took place 
 in a neighbouring colhery, and for weeks together 
 the whole neighbourhood was full of lamentation 
 for the killed and wounded, who in numbers 
 almost equalled that of a small battle-field. The 
 villages were blackened with funeral processions ; 
 charges of the most painful, and some of the most 
 sinister character, were rumoured about as to the 
 causes of the accident, till Griffith, who followed 
 aU the details with an irresistible but most de-
 
 264 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 pressing fascination, felt that he would not for the 
 world occupy the position of the unfortunate 
 owners. 
 
 Precisely at that moment Israel began to press 
 upon him the absolute necessity of heavy and im- 
 mediate outlay, if he would guard his own mine 
 and his own people from a similar calamity. 
 
 No time could be worse. Griffith had just 
 satisfied himself that between philanthropy and 
 profit (such profit as alone attracted him) there 
 was no common ground, but that one must be 
 chosen and the other left. JSTeed we then wonder 
 that Griffith was wearied out with his importunity, 
 and told him so. 
 
 When three months had been spent in this 
 shilly-shally fashion, Israel came one morning at 
 a much earlier hour than was usual with him, to 
 see his employer ; and, as Griffith guessed, to 
 worry him with the old subject. As he noticed 
 the more than ordinarily hard, rigid, expressionless 
 character of his manager's face, he could not but 
 satirically say to himself, ' There's something up ! 
 That's the way and the only way in which Israel's
 
 ISRAEL HELPS JMR. GRIFFITH TO A DECISION. 265 
 
 face tells tales — it is so determined to say no- 
 thinor.' 
 
 o 
 
 Pleased witli his jest, however, he thought no 
 more of what might be the tales that Israel's face 
 thus told, if any, but addressed himself to his 
 own thoughts and objects, which had now at last 
 become pretty well defined. Quite suddenly, and 
 as though the thought had but just then occurred 
 for the first time, he put a question : — 
 
 ' Israel, if I were inclined to sell, do you think 
 you could get me a purchaser ? ' 
 
 Israel stared in his employer's face, and seemed 
 so veritably surprised, that Griffith grew half 
 ashamed of his little trick of testing by an abrupt 
 question whether his manager had or had not 
 already got such a thought in his brain. 
 
 'You are surprised, I see. And you have a 
 right to be so. But the fact is, my conscience and 
 my thirst for gain find they can't pull satisfactorily 
 together ; so as a Christian, you know, I am 
 bound to choose the better part. What say 
 you ? Should not one's faith and one's will go 
 together ? '
 
 266 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' He's a poor creature that doubts it,' drily 
 responded Israel. 'I didn't know before they 
 were two things — they arn't with me.' 
 
 ' Well,' said Griffith, after a disagreeable pause, 
 '- will you try to find me a customer ? You know 
 more about the mine than I do.' 
 
 ' What price ? ' 
 
 ' What say you to thirty thousand pounds ? ' 
 
 Israel gave vent to an exclamation — then with 
 an eloquent gesture of his hands, without saying 
 one word, made Griffith so heartily ashamed of 
 his proposal that he was embarrassed to proceed. 
 
 After an awkward silence, Israel said — 
 
 ' Seeing the old woman's interest, which must be 
 first satisfied — seeing the lot of capital that must 
 be put into the mine, before much more coal can 
 be taken out, would you, rather than let a customer 
 go, take half, that is, fifteen thousand ? ' 
 
 ' Pooh ! You are jesting ! ' 
 
 ' I say, sir, would you rather lose a customer 
 than take fifteen thousand?' 
 
 ' Eeally, Avhat a positive fellow you are. How 
 you stick to a thing when you have said it. Say 
 sixteen ! '
 
 ISRAEL HELPS :ME. GEIFFITH TO A DECISION. 267 
 
 ' Fifteen thousand pounds ! ' doggedly repeated 
 Israel. ' Will you take that ? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' said Griffith, with a sigh as of relief, that 
 he had at last decided something. ' Yes, I think 
 I would if I can get no more, but you must fight 
 for at least twenty thousand.' 
 
 ' I am but a new man at managing and agency, 
 and must expect to be dubiously looked on by 
 great folk, capitahsts, and colliery owners, if I go 
 on such a business without authority ; in fact, I 
 might do damage, but couldn't do good.' 
 
 ' That's true. What do you wish ? ' 
 
 ' Whatever 's best for the job.' 
 
 Both the men after this were silent for a minute 
 or two, dehberating ; — perhaps waiting each for 
 the other to begin again. 
 
 At last the impulsive man could be still no 
 longer : — 
 
 'You seem very cautious all of a sudden,' he 
 remarked to Israel. 
 
 ' A man's character may be hurt by things hke 
 this, unless he goes safe guarded. You ask me if 
 can find a purchaser. I say, however difficult the 
 job, one can but try.'
 
 268 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 Then came another pause, and the two scanned 
 each other's face furtively, until their glances met, 
 and Griffith laughed outright. 
 
 Then he began to write in his note-book, to rub 
 out, and re-write, until finally he satisfied himself. 
 
 ' What if I give you something like this ? ' he 
 said, and he read aloud the following letter : — 
 
 'Dear Sir, — I am so utterly inexperienced in 
 coUiery management, and so unwilling to embark 
 in it, without clearer light than I at present 
 possess, that I shall be glad if you can find a 
 purchaser at a fair price.' ' Will that do ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, for one letter, the one to be shown. But 
 I shall want another giving me authority to sell, 
 and fixing the lowest price.' 
 
 Again Griffith wrote, and afterwards read 
 aloud : — 
 
 ' Dear Sir, — If you can obtain for me — ' 
 
 ' Less commission of five per cent.,' interposed 
 Israel, as if that were the most matter-of-fact 
 thing in the world. 
 
 Griffith raised his eyebrows, but inserted the 
 words, and then again read : —
 
 ISRAEL HELPS ^m. GRIFFITH TO A DECISIOISr. 269 
 
 ' If you can obtain for me, less commission of 
 five per cent, for yourself, fifteen thousand pounds, 
 I will accept, and so settle the matter.' 
 
 Israel begged him to read the letter a second 
 time ; and when Griffith had done so, asked him 
 whether he would mind — as he, Israel, liked to 
 be clear in all things, and this v/as a weighty 
 business for a poor man to be engaged in — would 
 he mind saying he did accept, and not merely he 
 would ? A sale might go off in the very moment 
 of its prosperity on such an uncertainty as might 
 be here raised by a verbal quibble. 
 
 So Griffith, w4th many misgivings as to the 
 general propriety of his course, but seeing no 
 tangible reason for a refusal, as to mere details, 
 wrote : — 
 
 ' If you obtain for me, less five per cent, com- 
 mission for yourself, fifteen thousand pounds, I 
 hereby authorise you to conclude the sale.' 
 
 But Israel wanted something more — and sug- 
 gested this : — 
 
 ' And without waiting for you to communicate
 
 270 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 with me, I hereby guarantee to confirm and 
 complete your act as that of my agent and 
 servant.' 
 
 ' Please add that,' said Israel, ' and then I shan't 
 trouble you any further.' 
 
 Griffith could not at the moment look, as he 
 desired to do, in Israel's face ; somehow the man 
 overmastered him ; and though he did not own 
 that to himself, he did own to a sense of im- 
 pending danger, and he did try to evade it by a 
 few last moments of reflection, as he bent over his 
 note-book, while seeming merely to correct the 
 phraseology. 
 
 But the whole business had become an intolerable 
 burden. Why not, then, shake it off.^ What 
 could there be to fear ? Certainly he would get 
 the fifteen thousand pounds before parting with 
 the mine ; Israel could not be ass enough to think 
 of dodging him out of that by postponed pay- 
 ments ? 
 
 No, the thing was right he was going to do. 
 He had been alarming himself about nothing. He 
 would hesitate no more.
 
 ISRAEL HELPS MR. GRIFFITH TO A DECISION. 271 
 
 Accordingly tie wrote the two letters fairly out, 
 and left them on the table to dry. 
 
 And then what better could he do than give 
 free play to the secret interest he felt, and to the 
 amusement he gained as a student of human 
 nature in watching the development of such a 
 character and policy as Israel's under such excep- 
 tional circumstances ? 
 
 The sense of one's own superiority gives great 
 zest to this kind of thing. 
 
 So he chatted awhile with Israel, wondering he 
 did not seem more eager to get the coveted docu- 
 ments, if they were coveted. 
 
 And Israel chatted on, as if he had forgotten 
 them. 
 
 ' Well, I hope it won't be long before I get my 
 fifteen thousand pounds, and you your seven hun- 
 dred and fifty.' 
 
 ' Eeady and mlhn', sir, I assure you,' re- 
 sponded Israel. 
 
 ' Wliy you'll be a miUionaire ! Seven hundred 
 and fifty pounds ! Are you sure you know how 
 much money that is ? ' asked Griffith laughingly. 
 
 ' I have handled a few bits of paper when
 
 272 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 going to and fro the bank for Mr. Jelioshaphat on 
 some special occasion, that would ha' counted 
 seven hundred and fifty a many times over.' 
 
 ' And didn't you feel qualmish ? Eh ? ' 
 
 ' I reklect once wondering how it'd be if one 
 lighted one's pipe with 'em. And that's about all 
 I reklect.' 
 
 ' Come, Israel, take up yom* letters.' 
 
 Israel did as he was bid. He took up the letters, 
 read them in methodical order — number one, then 
 number two. After that he drew forth a capacious 
 greasy-looking pocket-book, and put them care- 
 fully into it one by one. 
 
 In the same methodical manner he drew forth 
 a couple of folded papers from the book, placed 
 them on the table, and then returned the book to 
 the safe-keeping of the breast of his coat, which 
 he buttoned closely up. 
 
 Taking up one of the two papers, he opened it 
 out, and placed it before Griffith to read. 
 
 ' Only my idea of the form,' remarked Israel 
 quietly. 
 
 And Griffith, who found quite a fund of enjoy- 
 ment in all these little traits of careful formality, 
 read out the form with grave decorum : —
 
 ISRAEL HELPS :^m. GRIFFITH TO A DECISION. 273 
 
 ' Israel Mort hereby agrees, on behalf of Griffith 
 Williams, Esquire, of the " Farm," as owner of the 
 Cwm Aber Colliery, to sell all his right and interest 
 in the said colhery of Cwm Aber, with whatever 
 privileges belong to it, to for the sum 
 
 of fifteen thousand pounds, in pursuance of the 
 authority confided to him by the said Griffith 
 Williams ; and the said hereby agrees 
 
 to buy the said colliery at the said price, and has 
 duly deposited five thousand pounds in advance, 
 as earnest money that the bargain is definitively 
 concluded, at the Bank of Tygroes, which sum now 
 waits the disposition of the said Griffith Williams, 
 and for which the said Israel Mort holds the receipt. 
 The other ten thousand pounds to be paid as soon 
 as the entire property shall be formally given up, 
 and the papers, deeds, &c., that may be found neces- 
 sary shall be duly prepared and approved on both 
 sides, and signed. The blank for the name of the 
 purchaser, Israel Mort has full authority to insert. 
 
 Signature 
 
 Witnesses I 
 
 Griffith laughed heartily as he read this docu- 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ment, wliicli seemed to show Israel was determined 
 there should be no question ,of payment, provided 
 only the sale could be accomplished. 
 
 ' Do you approve of that, sir ? ' asked Israel. 
 
 ' Quite, quite ! Only I fear your customer, if 
 you catch one, will think you ride an uncommonly 
 high horse.' 
 
 ' And if at any time from this present speaking 
 you receive a bond fide document like that, but 
 filled up and signed and witnessed, and the five 
 thousand banked, you will be satisfied to take it 
 as a settled thing ? ' 
 
 ' Not satisfied only, but pleased ; pleased, Israel, 
 to see how carefully you have secured me.' 
 
 Was it a sudden gleam of sunshine breaking- 
 through a cloud in the heavens that so suddenly 
 made Israel's hard face seem transfigured as he 
 di-ew forth another paper, a counterpart of the 
 first, hut imthout blanks^ and placed it before 
 Griffith Williams's astonished — incredulous eyes ? 
 
 ' A good servant likes to please a kind master, 
 even to the extent of anticipating his wishes. The 
 job is done. Old Mrs. Wilhams has, as you there 
 see, bought the mine, paid in the money, and got 
 a counter-part of that dockement.'
 
 275 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 DTVIDIXG THE SPOIL. 
 
 Few things are more calculated to try the temper 
 of our humanity than, while engaged in a process 
 of condescending benevolence towards some in- 
 ferior, to find him turn upon us and expose our 
 movements and motives not only to the ridicule of 
 the world but to our own. 
 
 Such was the fate of the amiable and excellent 
 Mr. Williams, when he realised the full force of 
 Israel's manipulation of him, as shown by the pro- 
 duction of the completed agreement — only one 
 moment after the right to make such an agree- 
 ment had been formally and irrevocably conceded. 
 
 And he had been studying Israel ! 
 
 Studying him ? Yes, as the natural philosopher, 
 from the serenest intellectual heights, may, in his 
 
 T 2
 
 276 ISEAEL MORT. 
 
 hours of recreation, study the ways and system of 
 an unfamihar animal when brought in contact 
 with it ; that is to say, with all the zest of novelty 
 and conscious skill, and self-possession, till sud- 
 denly he receives so severe, so well-directed, and 
 so utterly unexpected a shock to his ways and 
 system, as to suggest the idea that it was he who 
 had been the true subject of scientific study and 
 benevolent research. 
 
 Griffith's first impulse was to snatch up from 
 the table the agreement for the sale of the mine 
 and tear it into a hundred pieces ; but Israel's 
 watchful eye and composed look warned him to 
 pause and reflect before further committing him- 
 self. 
 
 The story was as yet known in its fulness only 
 to Israel, who would certainly not care to enlighten 
 the neighbours about the details if not provoked. 
 Was it wise, then, to give the provocation that 
 might lead to his being made the laughing-stock 
 of all who knew him ? 
 
 He saw, too, that Israel evidently did his best to 
 modulate his rough voice and soften his stony fea- 
 tures, in the desire to avoid anything like an aspect
 
 DIYIDIXG THE SPOIL. 277 
 
 of triumph. Still, Griffith's own features reddened 
 with shame as, in the hope of discovering some 
 honest loophole for escape from the bargain, he 
 found he was merely recalling, step by step, the 
 processes by w^iich Israel had guided him — as if 
 he were a mere puppet in his hands — direct to 
 an appointed goal. 
 
 ' You will, perhaps, sir, walk down to the bank 
 in the course of the day, and see that it is all 
 right about the money ? ' said Israel, after a long 
 pause — a most embarrassing one, surely, to any 
 one but himself. 
 
 ' Israel,' broke out his late employer in pas- 
 sionate anger, ' what is the meaning of this sharp 
 practice with me ? Have you suddenly discovered 
 that I am a liar, vagabond, or rogue — one whose 
 spoken word is not to be trusted ? ' 
 
 ' Xo, sir, by no means,' replied Israel, with 
 respect and deference. 
 
 ' Then it is you who are .' Griffith felt he 
 
 was going too far, and stopped. 
 
 ' It's just this, sir. Seeing for some time past 
 you had so much difficulty to make up your mind, 
 and finding the delay partickler inconvenient and
 
 278 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 dangerous, I thought I'd try to help you, when 
 you did get into the mood for action.' 
 
 The serious tone in which these words were 
 uttered, and the gravity of Israel's demeanour the 
 while, could not disguise from his former master 
 the contempt that breathed through them. 
 
 But it occurred to him that it might be Israel's 
 policy, perhaps, to force from him at once what- 
 ever violent things he might be tempted to say in 
 his present state of anger and suspicion ; so he 
 checked by a great effort the storm of bitter 
 reproach that was struggling to break forth, and 
 said to Israel with as much of calmness and dignity 
 as the circumstances permitted, while his voice 
 trembled, and his lips were unnaturally pale — 
 
 ' Israel, you have only yourself to blame if I 
 refuse at this moment either to accept or refuse 
 the bargain you now profess you have made for 
 me, even while you were also professing to be 
 only trying to make it. Wliat I shaU do after I 
 have had time to think, and to take counsel, you 
 will doubtless hear in due time. Good morning.' 
 
 He went to the door, opened it, and waited for 
 Israel to go.
 
 DIVIDING THE SPOIL. 279 
 
 Israel stood up, and just the slightest tinge of 
 colour — more yellow however than red — suffused 
 his face as he confronted Mr. GriflSth Wilhams. 
 
 He moved a few paces towards that gentleman, 
 as if he and not the door were his object. Then 
 as he came close, his tall form erect, his naturally 
 stern face deeper than ever Griffith Williams had 
 yet seen it, in dark mtensity and inscrutability of 
 purpose, he said — 
 
 ' You owe me, I think, seven hundred and fifty 
 pounds for commission. I will, if you please, call 
 on you to-morrow for that.' 
 
 He bowed in his somewhat ungainly fashion, 
 keeping his eyes fixed on Griffith Williams's face 
 till he was quite outside the door, whicli was then 
 suddenly slammed after him with terrific violence 
 and noise. This did not, however, prevent Griffith 
 Williams fi:om overhearing a sardonic laugh from 
 the retreating Israel. 
 
 That person's face was serious enough a moment 
 after, as he reflected on all that had been done 
 and said in so momentous an interview. 
 
 Presently he stopped at a house, one of the 
 most conspicuous in the village for size and showi-
 
 280 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ness. It stood apart on a little knoll, and was 
 reached by a road that had once belonged exclu- 
 sively to it, as was still shown by the two tall 
 stone gate pillars, without gates, between which 
 the road passed. 
 
 A large garden surrounded the house, where 
 fruit, flowers, and vegetables were inextricably 
 intermingled ; and seemed after long and arduous 
 contests, in which all weaklings had been killed 
 off, to have come to a kind of treaty of peace, 
 founded upon the fact that each had benefited 
 in some part of the place by the law of the 
 strongest. 
 
 But it was not for this the garden was famous 
 through the neighbourhood, but for the distorted 
 monstrosities into which some naturally fine ever- 
 greens had been trained by the perverse art of the 
 ^gardener. Animals were imitated with a kind of 
 grotesque success ; also columns, pinnacles, and 
 vases — some of which ap|)eared above the wall, to 
 the edification of all passers-by. 
 
 Perhaps the greatest oddity was a large round 
 table of growing box, placed before a real garden 
 seat, and looking so solid on its greenish-yellow
 
 DIVIDING THE SPOIL. 281 
 
 surface that you might fancy it capable of all the 
 uses of a table, till you placed your hand upon 
 it and foimd how hollow was the pretence. 
 
 Such were the horticultural recreations that had 
 for many years occupied the busy and unquiet 
 mind of Mrs. Jehoshaphat Williams, after her 
 separation from her husband, who had always 
 been liberal to her in money matters. 
 
 The garden was but a foretaste of the house, 
 with which it was in a kind of ugly harmony. It 
 was filled with curiosities from every clime. The 
 crews of the vessels that trade from this neigh- 
 bourhood in coals and minerals with all parts of 
 the world knew well where to take an extraordi- 
 nary shell ; a stuffed nondescript, that might have 
 been in life either a fish or an animal ; a Hindoo 
 god ; a talking parrot ; a Chinese oak, three feet 
 high, bearing acorns, which however refused to be 
 kept alive by Mrs. Jehoshaphat's ministrations ; 
 shark's teeth ; a baby Egyptian mummy ; a cage 
 of love birds ; — all these things, and others of the 
 same kind innumerable, were welcome to old Mrs. 
 Williams ; who, however, would have them at her 
 own price, which was sometimes absurdly low, but
 
 282 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 who on the whole paid hberally enough for her 
 fancies. 
 
 It was a risky thing for a stranger to wander 
 much about the principal room of reception, be- 
 tween the live valuables, that might any moment 
 attack you, and the dead valuables and other 
 curiosities, that you were every instant in danger 
 of upsetting. 
 
 But of all the curiosities of the place, the mis- 
 tress herself was the greatest curiosity. 
 
 She was of low origin, and had once actually 
 worked in the mine under all the influences that 
 accompanied such degrading female labour. 
 
 But her vigorous intellect and unstained char- 
 acter protected her ; and commended her to the 
 Overman, Jehosophat Williams, who offered mar- 
 riage and was accepted. 
 
 Too late, Jehoshaphat found that, though his 
 wealth raised him to an equality with his rich 
 neighbours, nothing he could do would persuade 
 the latter to invite his wife to their houses. 
 
 He hated her from that time — and did not 
 conceal his hate — and so separation became in- 
 evitable.
 
 DIVIDING THE SPOIL. 283 
 
 And thus her whole hfe led to the perversion 
 of tastes and activities that ought to have made 
 her a comfort to herself and a blessing to others. 
 Having no acknowledged duties or responsibili- 
 ties ; no friends or acquaintances ; separated from 
 her husband ; being unable, through bodily in- 
 firmity, to seek health of mind and body in an 
 out-of-door Hfe ; having no deep inner rehgious 
 faith or fixed moral j^rinciple to elevate or guide 
 her; the very strength of her mind and char- 
 acter, and the easy pecuniary circumstances she 
 enjoyed (her husband having engaged to pay her 
 five hundred a year when they separated), all 
 tended to make her eccentric, morbid, and find 
 pleasure in habits which, under more natural cir- 
 cumstances, she would have been the first to con- 
 demn and loathe. 
 
 Upon her, as upon Israel, the question of the 
 mine had come as one of new life. They met 
 frequently about it, at first without any kmd of 
 concealment, and on matters that were of no 
 particular moment to any but themselves. But 
 when Israel foimd her so much interested in the 
 mine, he opened to her the same view of a bril-
 
 284 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 liant future that lie had suggested to Mr. Griffith 
 Williams ; and thus by the time he had grown sick 
 of the hesitation and weakness of the one, he found 
 the other ripe to take the place which he soon 
 made for her. 
 
 All their later meetings and discussions had 
 been at night, and had been so skilfully disguised, 
 that Griffith Williams had not the least suspicion 
 of them till he found himself face to face with 
 their results. 
 
 Never had the aged lady looked with so little 
 interest upon her curiosities as now, on this morn- 
 ing, when she is expecting, with all the anxiety of 
 an unaccustomed and ardent speculator, Israel's 
 return to her with the news of his successor failure 
 as to the proposed purchase. 
 
 This is one of her ailing days, and she is in 
 bed. But she doesn't mind receiving company 
 on such occasions ! She will even do no incon- 
 siderable portion of her toilet before visitors — 
 Israel for instance — who certainly cares as little 
 about the matter as herself. From her bed, which 
 is disposed expressly for that purpose, she can see 
 far down the valley, and thus she saw Israel
 
 DIVIDING THE SPOIL. 285 
 
 at last, coming up the hill, and rated him in her 
 heart for his slowness and impassiveness. 
 
 ' Does nothing ever move him out of himself, 
 I wonder ? ' she says irritably. ' Why can't he 
 either shake his head, or give a joyous wave of his 
 hat ? Look now at his face. Wlio could guess 
 which way things have gone ? Ah ! I understand 
 — nothing is settled. And it is I who am an old 
 fool to be so eag;er ! ' 
 
 Then she remembered her nightcap, and threw 
 that off, and tossed over her grey hairs and her 
 shoulders a brightly variegated shawl, drew the 
 bed-clothes round her, and waited ; evidently 
 troubling no further about her personal appear- 
 ance. 
 
 When Israel entered the room, he attempted 
 something like a genial smile, and at once placed 
 before her the completed agreement, and the 
 guarantee he had received from Mr. Griffith Wil- 
 liams, which, without any kind of reserve, autho- 
 rised him to conclude the bargain for the sale of 
 the mine ; and which, therefore, he had concluded. 
 
 ' All settled ? Everything made quite safe ? 
 Are you sure he can't go back ? ' demanded the
 
 286 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 old woman, almost breathless with eagerness and 
 desire. 
 
 ' If you had seen his face when I produced the 
 complete agreement, and told him the money was 
 in the bank, you wouldn't ask that. He was 
 going to tear it up, but bethought him in time he 
 had better not.' 
 
 ' Well done, Israel ! Well done ! And now 
 for your reward,' said ]\Irs. Wilhams, settling her- 
 self in her easy -chair. 
 
 ' Ay ; now for my reward ! ' responded Israel. 
 
 ' Well ; I suppose it's a question of salary and 
 position — eh ? ' 
 
 ' And pray, ma'am,' was Israel's somewhat 
 evasive answer, ' what may you think about those 
 matters ? ' 
 
 ' That I shall be liberal — hberal, Israel, and 
 have done with the subject — I hate bargaining! 
 Don't you ? ' 
 
 ' That depends,' remarked Israel, whose eye 
 seemed to glitter in the dark corner where he was, 
 with light and significance. 
 
 ' True,' said the old lady laughing ; ' tliat's true. 
 I propose, then, three hundred a year.'
 
 DIVIDING THE SPOIL. 287 
 
 She paused and waited, as if expecting some 
 show of pleasure or gratitude. 
 
 ' That's fair,' said Israel ; but the tone would 
 have been just as suitable if he had said that's 
 unfair. ' And about the power, ma'am ? ' 
 
 'Well, you know I can't manage the mine 
 myself; but I may help by advice.' 
 
 ' Of course, then, you share the responsibility 
 of accidents, and so on ? ' 
 
 ' I ! Is the man mad ? What do I pay you for 
 but to keep me safe ? ' 
 
 ' That's what I thought, ma'am, but mines are 
 like wives, and can't afford two husbands.' 
 
 The joke, such as it was, tickled the old lady's 
 fancy hugely ; she laughed till she brought on her 
 cough, and when they settled again to business, 
 Israel had that which he strove for — undivided 
 power in the ordinary management. 
 
 ' And is that all ? Are you now satisfied ? ' 
 
 ' All ? Satisfied ? ' Did ]\fa. Jehoshaphat ever 
 forget the look Israel fixed upon her, in answer to 
 this very natural question ; a look that made her 
 truly believe for the moment she had, however 
 unintentionally, committed upon him some atro-
 
 288 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 cious wrong. ' Why, Mrs. Jehosliaphat, what 
 about my share ? Haven't I earned it honestly ? ' 
 
 'Share! Earned! Here! Dick! Dick! DICK! 
 I say ! ' She screamed out the last of her three 
 calls at the very top of her cracked voice, and 
 presently came lumbering in the youth with whom 
 the reader made acquaintance in an early chapter. 
 
 He did not seem alarmed nor excited, but 
 simply stood and stared, with stupid, half-sleepy 
 eyes, first at his mistress, then at Israel, and finding 
 no response, began to yawn, and heave his shoul- 
 ders, and look round as if used to such summonses, 
 and was already meditating a retreat. 
 
 ' Dick, you dolt, open your eyes and see if this 
 man's a maniac. You can shoulder a pitchfork, I 
 suppose, to protect me, can't you ? Why, Dick, 
 the man Avants me to give him my property ! 
 Wants a great slice out of the mine ! ' 
 
 Therewith she began to laugh, tiU again stopped 
 by her enemy the cough. 
 
 ' Have you done, ma'am, with Dick ? ' asked the 
 imperturbable Israel. 
 
 'Don't know,' responded the old lady, eyeing
 
 DIVIDING THE SPOIL. 289 
 
 Israel with a look where interest, almost admira- 
 tion, seemed to contend with suspicion and fear. 
 
 ' Well, ma'am, we can call him again, you 
 know.' 
 
 ]\Irs. Jehoshaphat turned her head away. When 
 she again turned, Israel was leading the gaping 
 rustic out by the ear through the door. He did 
 not resist, but fixed his eyes in a kind of horror 
 and stupendous wonder immovably upon Israel's 
 face till he was shut out. 
 
 ' I think, ma'am, you agreed with me that if 
 the mine couldn't be got for less than twenty-two 
 thousand pounds, it would be worth taking at that 
 price ? ' 
 
 ' But you've settled that — and got it for fifteen.* 
 
 ' I think, ma'am, too, you afterwards said you 
 would even stretch a point, and go to five hundred 
 more? That's my case, ma'am.' 
 
 ' The man's gone clean out of his senses, and 
 forgets he has but just given me the agreement for 
 fifteen thousand pounds only.' 
 
 'Xow, ma'am, I shan't trouble you much 
 longer, nor with many more words. Twenty-two 
 thousand five hundred pounds is the value you set 
 
 VOL. I. U
 
 290 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 upon the mine ; suppose we call that three shares 
 of seven thousand five hundred each. You take 
 two, for which you have paid the money, and I 
 take one — my own — ay, honestly mine ; for did I 
 not save it out of the bargain ? ' 
 
 ' And have you any document, letter, or witness 
 to prove any kind of right P ' 
 
 ' No ; only you yourself, ma'am. But then I 
 believe in you.' 
 
 'Oh, you beheve in me, do you.^' screamed 
 the old lady. 
 
 ' Yes, because you are a sensible woman, a 
 strong woman, and can understand the mine 
 would just ruin you — if you were left to it without 
 me — under all its dangers, and the need there is 
 for doing a deal directly.' 
 
 Then, after a pause, Israel told her the whole 
 story in detail of Mr. Barrett's discharge in con- 
 sequence of the discovery about the maps ; and 
 made her plainly understand no living man but 
 himself had the knowledge requisite for safely and 
 profitably working the mine. 
 
 Mrs. Jehoshaphat's face showed how thoroughly 
 she was enhghtened now. She gazed on Israel
 
 DIYIDING THE SPOIL. 291. 
 
 haughtily, defyingly, passionately; but if his fea- 
 tures had been of iron they could not have shown 
 less sensitiveness to her searching; looks. 
 
 ' And this is you, Israel, is it ? The man I so 
 trusted ? ' 
 
 ' No, ma'am, it's only a part of me — as you shall 
 find if you do right by me. I will be a faithful 
 servant to the concern — a faithful partner to you, 
 but only on these terms.' 
 
 'And if I refuse?' 
 
 ' Then I take myself and my plans off, and try 
 my fate elsewhere.' 
 
 ' After aU these years ? ' 
 
 ' Ay,' said Israel, and for the first time his voice 
 seemed to thrill with emotion. ' Ay, after all these 
 years ! That wiU be hard fines, ma'am ; but don't 
 deceive yom^self, I shall go, unless ' 
 
 ' And then,' suddenly burst out the old woman, 
 ' Griffith may dispute the sale, and my money be 
 locked up, and I be ruined ! ' 
 
 ' He can't — he shan't dispute the sale, whether 
 I go or stay,' said Israel ; ' I have nailed him fast. 
 He can move nohow against us except to his owu 
 
 u2
 
 292 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 injury. He'll try to-morrow to get off tlie com- 
 mission, but ' 
 
 ' Commission ! Commission from him besides ! ' 
 
 'Why not?' 
 
 ' How mucli ? ' 
 
 ' Five per cent, ma'am.' 
 
 ' How much is that ? ' 
 
 ' Seven hundred and fifty pounds ! ' 
 
 'Seven hundred and what?' screamed Mrs. 
 Jehoshaphat. 
 
 'His money, ma'am, not yours ! ' 
 
 ' Israel, I am beat — dead beat. You're a deal 
 too much for me. Get ready your papers as 
 partner, and I will sign them, and try you.' 
 
 ' Try me ? No, ma'am, trust me. That's the 
 word. No man ever did really trust me, in things 
 where it was right he should trust me, and was 
 deceived. The world fights for place and money 
 and power, and I fight too. I never once told 
 Mr. Griffith Wilhams to look for any other help, 
 or for any other bargain from me than exactly 
 that which he got. Ask him, ma'am, if that be 
 true.'
 
 DIYIDIXG THE SPOIL. "298 
 
 ' Do you want a memorandum at once, or \vill 
 you take my word ? ' 
 
 ' I'd like the memorandum, but ' here he 
 
 hesitated a moment. ' No, ma'am : say again that 
 one-third of the mine belongs to me, and I'll wait 
 the lawyer's time.' 
 
 ' I'm a great fool, I suppose ; — I must be — but 
 there — Israel, there's something about you I like, 
 and I shan't let you or your wife be in doubt. 
 Write me a few hues. Go there to the table. 
 There's pen and ink somewhere about. Ha, 
 monster ! ' she suddenly shrieked out, as a cry of 
 pain reached her from her favourite pug ; ' you 
 have trodden on my dog ! ' • 
 
 ' Beg pardon, ma'am, I'm sure.' 
 
 Israel for the first time grew confused, as he 
 saw the cringing creature at his feet, and he 
 stooped to pat it with as much of tenderness as 
 was possible to him, but received so vicious a 
 snap of his fingers as made the old lady laugh 
 heartily, and brought back Israel's stony look. 
 
 The document was written and signed, and 
 within five minutes Israel was again in the open
 
 294 I5EAEL MOKT. 
 
 air, hardly knowing for the moment which way he 
 was going, imable to think of anything but the 
 tremendous fact — here was he, the boy who had 
 slaved as the coUier's drudge, then as the collier, 
 then as the Deputy, then as the Overman, suddenly 
 emerging from the dai'kness and squalor of so 
 many years into the brightness and glory of wealth, 
 position, power ! Yes, it was true I All true ! 
 He — ^Israel — was a mine-owner, was worth seven 
 thousand five hundred pounds in mine property, 
 which he knew to be worth far more than it 
 cost; he had, meantime, seven hundred and 
 fifty pounds of hard cash to go on with, and 
 above and before all he was master in the domain 
 where he had so long toiled, and suffered eveiy 
 possible humihation.
 
 295 
 
 CHAPTEE XIV. 
 
 FIRST DAY OF POWEK. 
 
 For tlie first time for many years — more even 
 than he could remember — Israel had a sleepless 
 night, following the day that revolutionised his 
 fortunes. 
 
 For the first time also, after an equally long 
 interval, did he dream, or at least do the tiling 
 nearest to dreaming that his not very imaginative 
 nature permitted. 
 
 He gave way to the tide of emotion that flowed 
 in upon him, while letting his thoughts sway 
 hither and thither as they pleased, knowing how 
 easy it was for him to bring them back, and 
 compel them into the appointed channel. 
 
 He thought of David — his rebellious, and yet 
 timid boy, and as he thought, somehow the lad's 
 instincts as regarded the mine appeared less
 
 296 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 unmanly and more deserving of attention than 
 before ; and he went so far as to speculate as to 
 the possibilities before many years were gone of 
 raising him to be at once a gentleman and a mine- 
 owner — as his partner. 'Israel Mort and Son/ 
 he thought would sound well some day. 
 
 He thousrht also of his wife ; but that kind of 
 thinking was too much out of liis way for him to 
 dwell long on it. She was asleep, but he woke 
 her, to ask, 
 
 ' Do you think old Simon would take twenty 
 pounds a year for that house and garden ? ' 
 
 ' Yes. But nobody seems inclined to make him 
 
 an offer.' 
 
 ' As soon as you have had your breakfast, go to 
 him and say if he will I think I can find him 
 a tenant.' 
 
 ' Very well.' 
 
 Again silence. The wife rose and began to dress. 
 And, again, Israel spake after a Httle while : — 
 
 ' Barrett has left the neighboiu-hood and gone 
 far away into Scotland. He has let his house, but 
 hasn't managed to dispose of his furniture, which 
 would cost too much to remove. Set somebody
 
 FIRST DAY OF POTTER. 297 
 
 — not yourself, mind, for Barrett hates me — set 
 somebody, I say, to find out the lowest he will 
 take.' 
 
 ' I happen to know, for I have been all over it 
 with a neighbour.' 
 
 'How much?' 
 
 ' Sixty pounds.' 
 
 ' Sixty ! H'm ! Let me see.' And Israel, whose 
 memory was prodigious, who forgot nothing he 
 cared to remember, but would sometimes remark 
 almost plaintively, he also forgot nothing of things 
 he would be only too glad to forget, began to run 
 through the furniture item by item, and value each 
 as he went on. ' Too cheap ! Something wrong. 
 No. I see. He can't help himself. No market 
 here. So like a sensible man, he accepts the 
 inevitable. Buy it.' 
 
 ' Buy it, Israel ! ' echoed Mrs. Mort in wonder, 
 almost alarm. 
 
 ' I said buy it ! If they doubt you, refer to me, 
 or to Mrs. Jehoshaphat Williams.' 
 
 ' For you ! for us ! ' faltered the unhappy woman, 
 as if overpowered by these symptoms of coming 
 prosperity.
 
 298 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 ' For us ! ' said Israel. ' Pray attend. Get 
 tlie house as cheap as you can. Buy the furniture 
 for the price asked. Eemove from here as quick 
 as possible. Putting both lots together, the new 
 house should be decently well filled. But I 
 authorise you to lay out, to the extent of twenty 
 pounds more, to bring all things to a kind of 
 level ; also I authorise you to lay out ten pounds 
 for yourself in clothes, ten pounds for me in hnen 
 and things ; the tailor I'll see to ; and as to David, 
 we'll look to him afterwards.' 
 
 'Oh, Israel, Israel, Israel, has all this come 
 honestly about ? ' ' 
 
 ' Woman, dare you suspect otherwise ? But 
 there, I ought not to be surprised. You'll find 
 all right. Do you believe me ? ' he demanded, 
 looking her sternly, yet openly in the face. 
 
 ' Yes, yes ; I do now ! I do.' 
 
 As soon as she had gone downstairs Israel 
 rose. His first care, when dressed, was to go 
 to a httle table where he was often accustomed to 
 sit and write, and go over business matters con- 
 nected with the mine, when the one hving-room 
 below was occupied with the preparations for the
 
 FIRST DAY OF POWER. 299 
 
 meaL Taking his memorandum-book from his 
 pocket, he ^vrote in it as follows, in a bold large 
 hand^vriting : — 
 
 'June 1, 18 — . This day, at the age of 49, 
 after forty-three years of hard labour, and wages 
 beguming at bs. a week, and ending at 30^. 
 a week, I begin life afresh, manager at 30 OZ. a 
 year; with no debts, and cash in hand (com- 
 mission) 750/., and Mine-Owner to the extent of a 
 third share, valued at 7,500/. I write this down, 
 in order that when I look back, say after ten or 
 a dozen years, I may see whether I have made 
 as good use of the advantages of this position, 
 as I have made of the disadvantages of my old 
 one, 
 
 ' I say certainly I ought. I am strong, hardly 
 ever ill. I time now my pulse beating seventy 
 beats a minute, each one full, with not a bit of 
 hurry or jumping ; just the pulse to let a man go 
 anywhere and do anything that's in his nature to 
 do. Thanks be to God. ' Israel Mort/ 
 
 He read this after writing it, then paused with a 
 strange look of dissatisfaction, yet also of something
 
 300 ISR^iEL MORT. 
 
 higher, better, softening, and impro\dng his features 
 that was impossible to define. Then he took his 
 pen, and was about to strike out the last four 
 words he had -written, and in fact he did cross 
 with a hne of erasure half the word ' Thanks ' 
 before he stopped to reflect. 
 
 He seemed puzzled that he had written thus — 
 puzzled to remember that the words had dropped 
 unconsciously from him ; for he knew well how 
 httle he had been accustomed to ascribe anything 
 to a higher power ; and believed that people all 
 about him, who did this sort of thing, did it either 
 from motives of hypocrisy, or from the intellectual 
 weakness that makes the bulk of us accept as 
 impHcitly true whatever we are told. 
 
 But on reflection Israel could not discover that 
 he had ever precisely determined either that God 
 did not exist, or that existing, His relations with 
 men might not from time to time be calculated to 
 call forth a grateful acknowledgment from them. 
 In fact, Israel began to suspect he had only looked 
 at God, through the weaknesses, follies, and 
 selfishnesses of his fellow-men ; and in looking had 
 found the latter so engross him that his vision had.
 
 FIEST DAY OF POTTER. 301 
 
 failed of tlieir final solemn quest, and so he had 
 remained spiritually dark as ever. 
 
 He must look to this by-and-by. Meantime he 
 would let the sentence stand. 
 
 A voice at this moment ascended from below, 
 calling him. He went down and found the night- 
 deputy there, Eees Thomas. 
 
 The deputy looked sad, yet resolute, as if con- 
 scious he had come upon an unhappy errand. 
 
 ' Israel Mort, I must deal fairly with thee, so 
 I tell thee I went last night to ask Mr. Griffith 
 Williams to interpose between thee and me in 
 this matter of saying prayers before beginning 
 work at the mine.' 
 
 ' Ay, as usual, going wrong in one thing leads 
 pretty quick to going wrong in another,' replied 
 Israel sharply, yet as if not quite forgetting his 
 own recent movement against Mr. Barrett. ' And 
 what did he say ? ' 
 
 ' That he had ceased to be owner, and that I 
 had better go to ]\Ii's. Jehoshaphat Williams, to 
 whom it now belongs.' 
 
 'Is'ot entirely, Eees Thomas. I have a little 
 share in the job.'
 
 302 ISRAEL MOET. 
 
 ' You ! A share ! You ! partner ! ' 
 ' Ay, does the idea seem ridiculous ? ' 
 ' On the contrary, I know no man better fitted 
 for nor more deserving of such good fortune except 
 in the one thing needful, which lacking, all else 
 is worthless.' 
 
 'Now, Eees Thomas, this is my first day of 
 power, and I have neither time nor thoughts to 
 spare except for useful things. Do you apologise 
 for disobedience to orders ? ' 
 
 ' No,' responded the deputy firmly, yet closing 
 his eyes as in pain. 
 
 ' Think well. You know not what I intend.' 
 The deputy gazed eagerly in Israel's face, as if 
 new light had broken upon him. 
 
 'Do you mean that if I apologise — and my 
 Eather in Heaven knows how heartily I could do 
 that if only I can see my way honestly ; but I will 
 honestly, Israel, try — if that be all, I will try — ^Do 
 you mean that then you will yourself sanction — ' 
 Something in this speech jarred upon the hearer ; 
 he relapsed into his old imperiousness of conmaand, 
 and, whatever his thoughts or purposes, he simply 
 said, and with his ordinary harshuess of voice —
 
 FIEST DAY OF POWER. SOS 
 
 ' Eees Thomas, if you come here to question 
 me the sooner you go again the better. Apologise 
 and take the situation of Overman, which I will 
 make one unusually profitable for you — or take 
 notice to leave tliis day month.' 
 
 ' And may I the while do what I am called to?' 
 
 ' No ! ' thundered Israel, his patience utterly 
 exhausted. 
 
 ' Farewell, then ! I wish you no evil ; on the 
 contrary, I wish you every true good. Israel 
 Mort, I have felt strangely inclined towards thee 
 many, many times. I have thought about thee — 
 I have prayed for thee — I have asked God if He 
 would not do what I could not, make thee a 
 chosen vessel for His glory. Thou hast gifts that 
 might make thee a leader among men, but thou 
 pervertest them ; and I now tell thee, that until 
 thou changest, heart and soul, and hstenest to the 
 words that have been spoken to us all, but spe- 
 cially to thee and such as thee, I say, unless thou 
 bendest thy stiffened neck, and causeth the hard- 
 ness of thy heart to melt, thou never wilt, never 
 shalt, enter into the kingdom of heaven that thou 
 dost not seek, or into the kingdom of earth that
 
 304 ISRAEL MORT. 
 
 thou dost seek. Farewell ! I go not again into 
 the mine, but will seek my bread where else it 
 may be found. James Lusty and John Lewis can 
 do all between them that is needed till thou findest 
 a Deputy to suit thee. They have promised 
 that. Farewell I ' 
 
 Israel made no response, but gazed sternly and 
 bitterly at the retreating figure ; which paused at 
 the threshold and looked back, as if still hoping 
 for some change, but seeing none, went out, and 
 closed the door very softly after him. 
 
 EXD OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
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 51 
 
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