LI E) RARY OF THE U N IVLRSITY Of ILLINOIS V.I BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE BY HOLME LEE, Author of ''Sylvan Holt' s Daughter;' ''Mr. Wyjiyard's Ward:' IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. SMITH, ELDER AND CO., LONDON M.DCCC.LXVIII. \The Right of Translation is reset ved.'\ Digitized by the Internet Arciiive in 2009 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/basilgodfreyscap01leeh 22? 3 CONTENTS OF VOL. I. I. May MoRXiNG 1 If) n. Breakfast at the Parsonage 17 ^ in. The Church Porch 34 ^ IV. The Cheap Jack 43 V, Joan's Home '. 56 VI. Guests at the Feast 72 i Vn. The Fun of the Fair 85 Vm. In the Morning Early 99 IX. In the Blind Curate's Stltjy 106 X. On the Cattle-Bridge 125 XL A Word and a Warning 134 XII. An Arch^ological Walk 146 «^ iv CONTENTS. PAGE XIII. The Pkospect of Changes 170 XIV. Sunday at Ashford 178 XV. L'HoMME Propose, Dieu Dispose 191 XVI. The Night before the Well-Dressing 205 XVII. The Well-Dressing at Ashleigh 223 XVIII. "Jealousy is the Devil" 242 XIX. "There's Love AND Love" 2,52 XX. Emmot Torre and the Artist 267 XXL The Trial 274 XXII. The Second Meeting on the Cattle-Bridge 281 XXIII. Olive's Birth-day 288 XXIV. Joan's Good-Byes 299 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPEICE. I. MAY MORNING. Mine host of '' The Dial " at Whorlstone looked complacently after his departing guest, setting out with knapsack on back and alpenstock in hand to walk to Ashford before breakfast. Mine hostess had said last night that it did her old eyes good to see such a gallant young gentleman, and mine host was of his wife's opinion this morning. He was, indeed, a magnificent youth. His grandly proportioned figure was muscular and active, instinct with health and vigour. The road vanished behind his swift, steady stride. A milkmaid meeting him on the bridge, smiled VOL. I. 1 2 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. with amazed delight in his bold, beautiful face, and turned to gaze as if a god had passed. His life, his character were in his countenance. Good luck shone lustrous in his clear brown eyes ; genius, passion, audacity, moulded the large sweep of his features : of his splendid brow, his full mouth, his short arched upper lip. He was a poet, sanguine and sensitive; he had rich imagination, and was a seer of stories and pictures everywhere. Beyond the bridge the road plunged at once into the country. The river Lea, on the right, shallow, turbulent, tressed with reeds and willows, kept it cheerful company ; now near, now further away ; now swirling wide and far round a lovely expanse of meadow, dotted and grouped with forest trees ; now lapping the green primrose bank, topped by a fence of loose stones, that skirted the path. On the left was a steep acclivity, terraced as a garden. Brilliant blotches of colour relieved the blackness of its trim yew hedges, and the Bridge House crowned it, — one of those picturesque homes of comfort and security MAY MORNING. 3 which are the charm of English wayside landscape. Ivy veiled its walls ; sun and weather had blended the red roof into all manner of soft gloomy tints ; its chimney-stacks rose from plump cushions of golden moss ; its bright windows stood open to the sweet May morning air. It was a background for a poem ; a scene for a pleasant pastoral, a tender idyl ; it was itself a pastoral, an idyl. The road stretched out long and straight : in sun, in shade. The dew lay heavy on the grass, on the tangled garniture of the stony fences : — may-dew enough to gather for anointing all the year's dead and dpng folk, if the ^Yhorlstone gossips still practised the old pagan rite. Soon the valley widened into broad, low levels where the cattle stood knee-deep in the sweet meadow grass, where the river rolled in and out like a silken ribbon, and the sky looked higher, reigning over all, blue as amethyst : a glorious, pure morning, serene as morning in Eden before the subtle victory of sin. A mile of this open country, and then the distant hills drew near again. The river flowed 1—2 4 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. in a narrower bed ; white boulders broke its even course, and fretted it into thousands of sparkling eddies. Ranks of trees, close, slender, bare to the crest, leaned over it : the advanced guard of Earlswood which presently clomb up the steep acclivities, and made them dark from base to crown. Here and there amidst the green gloom was an ugly scar where were thrown up vast heaps of slag : refuse of the iron works which mined the hills. By-and-by came signs of habitation. And first a wood-yard, cheerful with sounds of labour ; and then the mill, its great wheel for the nonce at rest ; and then in a shred of wayside shadow a basket-maker's caravan, with a name painted con- spicuously on the side : " Gideon Becket, Harrow, Middlesex." The entrance was at the back, under a deep pent, where hung a tiny cage and a canary warbling in it, emulous of the free choir of feathered songsters on every bush. A little brown lad was sitting half clothed in the door- way, and a dog lay asleep on the ground beneath. Everywhere, atop, at the sides, by the wheels, by MAY MORNING. 5 the shafts, hung cradles, chairs, clothes-baskets, work-baskets, toy-baskets, market-baskets, every- thing of willow-ware that can be made, and brushes and mats innumerable. A young gipsy mother was dashing from them the dust of the day before, and a gipsy man, with a short pipe in his mouth, was leaning over the fence and smoking meditatively at the river. By what sweet budding spring lanes and hedge- rows had he come from the Weald of Harrow to the heart of this stony midland shire, bringing home and household treasures with him "? The picture of vagrant life caught the young poet's fancy. He laughed to himself. A caravan-life with Lily would be pleasant for a summer. Poor Lily ! she was not his first love, nor his second, nor his third. A susceptible soul was his, and young blood quickly stirred, and his views were necessarily short. Lily was happy, was joyous, had the sunniest, innocent eyes : not for the world would he plant a thorn in her tender heart, or in any heart ; but a summer time with her and perfect freedom would be very 6 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. p sweet — sweet as summer time to the birds newly mated. His fancy frolicked with the light thought, extravagantly, ridiculously, as a puppy frolics with a ball. He improvised a song over it : — If life were but a summer day, And I were but a thrush, I'd woo my sweet-heart, come away, To nest in hawthorn bush. And we would sing and never sigh. And we would kiss and never cloy. And we would Kve so lovingly. With none of love's annoy ! And when the summer day was fled. And wind and winter weather, And frost and snow were come instead. We'd slip our easy tether ; And she would fly, and I would fly In quest of fresh adventiu*es, But we would part so lovingly With all our old indentures, That if at spring's return we met. In hawthorn bush or hedge-row, We'd feel each other tender yet, Yet warm with love's first glow. Though balmy summer days must pass. Need love gi'ow stale and weary ? The birds cry not " alas ! alas ! " Sweet heart, be we as cheeiy ! MAY MOKNIXG. 7 Sweet-heart, no doubt, was as cheery — a hundred miles away. He paused at the gate of a beautiful domain — Ash Hurst. " How these country squires are to be envied ! He must be rich who lives here ; the trees are old — those oaks are three hundred years at least. But perhaps he has the gout and no son." He went on with jubilant philosophy. Youth, strength, high courage, are not to be valued at money's worth. He knew himself a better man with his sound frame, warm heart, fine brain, knapsack and alpenstock, than many a lord of ten thousand acres. Fifty yards further was a cottage facing the road, with a naiTOW garden in front ; an irregular, overgi'own crow's-nest of a cottage, with a bay- Avindow projecting from one end on the upper story, and four queer little pointed lattices under the eaves. From one of these lattices a girl was hanging a garland out. The stranger looked up at her, and she looked down, resting from her pretty pagan task, and fi-ankly regarding him. It was the custom at Ashford then — nav, it is 8 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. the custom still — to hang flowers from the win- dows on May morning, and to carry in proces- sion poles of mountain-ash, decked with gaudy blossoms. But the place and its customs were both new to the early pedestrian, and that was his plea for stopping to watch. Errant gods, or men in their likeness, were also new to Ash- ford, and to the damsel who was commemorating the spring festival of Druidry, and that was her excuse for the startled, modest gaze she shed upon the beautiful stranger. He was like a revelation to her ; she also was a revelation to him. There was magic in it — such magic as takes captive young hearts, and holds them in bonds to the last moment of life. He saw a fine rustic countenance with dark level brows, two large, soft, speaking eyes, that met his like a child's, and then retired behind the modest veil of a rosy flush overspreading her whole face ; a forehead on which the abundant brown hair was braided low, a delicate nose, full ruby lips, cheek and chin modelled and dimpled in nature's tenderest wise mood, a clear fresh skin. MAY MORMNG. 9 a neck round and smooth, and arms of Juno, round and strong and fair enough to clasp a god. The stranger bethought him that he had come a long way, and was so tired as to need a roadside rest. A log of wood lay conTeniently near for combining rest and observation without obtrusive - ness, and he sat down and saw the damsel deck all the four lattices one after the other, and last the bay at the house-end, which he perceived must command a lovely prospect up the valley. When she had finished, she disappeared for a minute ; then she came out of the bushy porch, came out of the little gate, came out into the road to view the eflect, — a tall, erect, straight-poised, maidenly figure, bare-headed, short- skirted, with trimmest feet and ankles below her skirts. Perhaps she did not know the god-like stranger had lingered in sight, or perhaps she did know, for a shy glance, a palpable flush and flutter from her were answered by him with a merry smile, as he rose and asked her the way to the Parsonage. It was curious this self-consciousness, this attrac- tion, this mysterious sense of affinity between two 10 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. human creatures until ten minutes ago in total ignorance of each other's existence. And the strangest thing of all was that hoth understood it — she, simple and innocent, as well as he, who believed himself alread}^ an adept in all the airs and harmonies of passion. She did not answer quite at the moment — she had her wits to recover. He repeated the inquiry : **Will you tell me the way to the Parsonage?" And then, with the blush deepening from her white throat to the oval of her cheek, as it deepens from the outer petals to the heart of the rose, she said : "You passed The Hurst soon after the Mill : — the shortest way to the Parsonage is up the fields opposite The Hurst ; there is a stile by the road, and a well-beaten track to the church ; if you had looked, you would have seen the tower above the trees." He stood pondering, as if he found her directions incomprehensible ; perhaps her confusion confused him, or perhaps he wanted to hear again the sweet vibration of her purely- toned voice — it was a lovely voice. She hesitated an instant, and then added : "Or you can take MAY MORNING. 11 the road through the tillage — it is not far." He •intimated that he would take the road through the village. " Go straight on to the school-house which is at the foot of the hill," — pointing forward to a long grey building visible in the distance, — *' and then up the town-street as far as the Cross. The church and parsonage stand close together, about a hundred yards along the lane turning to the left." He thanked her, and lifting his hat as to a lady, marched briskly away, never looking back either, though the temptation was strong. " How comes she," thought he, " to look so rustic and to speak so well?" The girl, her blush slowly subsiding, but with the novel sensation of flutter- ing wings in her bosom still, went indoors. So were the nymphs of antiquity fluttered when gods descended from Olympus, and met them in the woods, by the fountains and silver streams. And be sure they never forget where they first beheld the deity and the celestial light. Three minutes brought the stranger to the school- house, upon which the steep, rugged village- street 12 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. looked down. It was a wise caprice of the founder to set it thus at the bottom of the hill. The children often met in a body at the Cross, and as the church clock gave warning to strike nine, set off with a rush and a scamper which landed them at the door just as the last stroke sounded — breathless, but with an exuberant air of delight at having got there ; and, at home-going time, on the contrary, they appeared to climb with painful labour up the paved and stony way, as if home were anything but the haven of their desires. The pedestrian found this last bit of his walk the stiffest, and regretted no occasion for a halt. The morning was gathering heat, and promised to be like midsummer ere noon. But a shallow rivulet, crystal -clear and ice-cold, babbling a cool rhyme under the garden-hedges on the right, tempered the dry sun-glow to his feelings ; carrying his fancy up to its source on the breezy heights, and down to the rushy meadows where it joined the Lea. The village had evidently been built along its natural course or the convenience of the delicious spring water. MAY MORNING. 13 Large flag-stones bridged it at each garden-gate, and vast stone troughs received the treasure of its purity at regular intervals — mossy old troughs built by long-dead generations ; the serious- minded generations who reared the Cross and the antique houses round it, which rise five stories high, and have gables and tiers of low, wide windows, and vast chimney-stacks like old houses of gentility. One of these houses is the inn — " The Red Lion " — and close by it is the forge, murky, crimson, always clamorous. The Cross is the centre of the town, and general rendezvous of business and gossip. As the stranger came within view of it, he perceived that it was in gala- dress — completely buried in green, and that all the windows thereabouts were garlanded or had pots or posies of flowers on the sill. It was quiet yet; only a few boys with mountain-ash poles were there, surrounding a pedlar sorting his wares : and the miller's man, who had halted his ' waggon at the forge : possibly to transact affairs with blacksmith Kempe, but more probably to hear and tell the news of the day, which was, 14 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. in fact, the great day of the year at Ashford, the day of the Feast. And at the Cross the four ways of the village meet : the town- street at the foot of which runs the high-road from Whorlstone to Ashleigh-in-the- Water ; the Church-lane which, beyond the Parsonage, narrows into the foot-path over the hills to Wye-Bridge ; the Quarries-gate, an almost precipitous road to the stone-pits, whence has been dug for ages the fine material used in building and restoring the churches of the Hundred of Whorlstone ; and Eidgeway, a wide grassy lane leading to the sequestered village of Ashleigh-on-the-Hill. The stranger took the road to the left, as he had been bidden. It was fringed on the upper- hand with neat cottages, and brought him soon to the lych-gate of the ancient Church, which stood in a cup of the hill- side with the village and valley outspread belo-w. The churchyard wall was continued along the garden of the Parsonage, placid, vivid, Elizabethan, bowered in noble trees. *' These pretty country parsonages are bulwarks of the Church of England," soliloquized he, ring- MAY MORNING. 15 ing at the door — the hell hung hy a long medieval iron chain. '"If I were FrankljTi I should feel every attack upon her damnable heresy." The door was opened by an old man-servant, very lean, rosy, well-shorn, and neat, in morning costume of drab shorts, gaiters, and pink striped linen jacket. The stranger inquired if Mr. Franklyn was at home. " He is, sir ; the family's just set down to breakfast. I'm sure, sir, you'll be very welcome. Mr. Godfrey, if I'm not mistaken ? Walk in, if you please, sir, and I'll call master." The master, however, did not need calling; he had heard the stranger's inquiry, and knew his voice. ''Bless my soul, Nelly, there's your brother Basil ! " cried he to his ^ife, and was in the hall shaking hands before old Duffell, who recognized the unexpected guest by his likeness to his mistress, could announce his arrival. Then came running out the parson's beautiful vdfe and two elder children. She kissed her brother with a flash of tears in her joyful surprise. " Oh, Basil, what a delight to see you here. Olive, Mervyn, 16 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. tliis is your uncle Basil. Come in, dear, what matters the dust ! I had begun to think that round and small as the world is you were never going to find your way home to us again." And so they re-entered the room, and the door was shut upon their re-union. ( 17 ) II. BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. " This is pleasanter than St. Chad's, Xelly — than London iovna ; it would almost content me, if I were of a mind to sit down and gather moss," blithely said Basil Godfrey, when, their eager greetings over, the parson and his wife made him a place at their breakfast- table. Irrespective of St. Chad's, it was truly very pleasant. A square south-looking room, fitted as a library ; the window opening on a little lawn, enclosed with shrubs from the rest of the garden for greater privacy, and the church tower almost over-shado^^ing it; the walls lined with hand- somely-bound books ; a bright landscape-subject above the fire-place ; the carpet and curtains crimson, toned down by several years of wear ; VOL. I. 2 18 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. and the furniture of solid, plain, unvarnished oak and leather. The hreakfast-table was a picture of comfort and nicety. Two wooden platters, with carved borders of wheat-ears, sustained two home- made loaves, brown and white ; the butter lay cool and fresh in a silver and crystal dish ; the eggs were flowers in silver cups ; the home-fed bacon was pink and crisp and curly under a silver cover. Without reminder, Duffell thought for the young traveller's healthy appetite, and brought in a lovely round of cold beef, for which Basil Godfrey glanced him appreciatory thanks. Mr. Franklyn was evidently a good master and well served ; also he was one of those parsons who bring more money into the Church than they take out. The silver, the china, were all of perfect polish, and all old, as belonging to a man who had ancestors : — who, indeed, can tell the original of the Franklyns? And then the faces round the table. The mistress at the head, fair, matronly, with benign eyes and sunny, sensitive, sweet mouth, elder than Basil by four or five years, but his sister in soul and spirit, as well as in blood ; and the parson, brown by BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 19 nature, and browner still by exposure to sun and wind in his pastoral walks about the hills. Their little daughter, Olive, was tawnv and slender, like her father ; but Merryn was a chubby, cupid-copy of Basil, taking after his mother's liberally moulded race in form and feature, colour and temperament. " It is dehcious to see an English country break- fast again, and English children," said Basil. " Ah, 3'es ; how could you live so long without them ? It is four years since you ran awa}' — OHve was just beginning to find her feet, and Mervyn was baby," " Miss Bess is baby now — we call her Miss Bess; and I'm a man ! " announced Cupidon with never a lisp in his bold speech. '''Olive has a pony — have you a pony?" His mother would have let him lead the conversation, and would have listened with deHght, but the parson inter- posed divers remarks and inquiiies, and Basil was soon in the full stream of his adventures. " Every day I bless the dons who decreed my rustication. Nay, Nelly, never shake your head 20 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. over my youthful escapades ; I've not a blusli for them — they were very innocent mischief. Three terms at Oxford were enough ; and these four years up and down in the world have done more for me than a double first. You cannot accuse me of coming home to you a hairy, disreputable foreign vagabond." *' No, Basil, indeed I cannot," replied his sister, and looked at him with affectionate approbation. Mr. Franklyn laughed. '' I never saw a more well-washed, well-shaven, well-dressed young gentleman. You must have the English instinct of respectability very strong, Basil." Basil laughed too. " I carry my nationality and clean breeding too obviously to be hail-fellow with those prodigals and ];uffians at large who call riotous living life. I prefer spring water to poisoned sack ; but I never met the man yet who was tempted to call me vuiff.'' His sister murmured that she should think not. " This suit of grey was bought and put on at Southampton ; I landed from Havre in French jean, and to spare Nelly's feelings, who I knew wouldn't like it, I left BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 21 it behind me. I replenished my kit also with native hosiery and shirts. You saw me enter, Franklyn, with all my worldly goods upon my back, but with a light heart and light heels." " And all the while you have been away, my gold pen has kept jon ? " said the parson's wife. "Yes, it has been house, fire, food, wine, clothing, horse, carriage, ship. Look at it — precious little tool," taking it from his waist- coat pocket. " With a drop of ink at the tip, and a sheet of paper under it, I was able to draw at will on a bank that never refused my drafts." "You have had strange good luck — I suppose you are one of the fellows born to it," said the parson. "Those first 'Letters from Paris' in The Constitutional Gazette, caught the popular ear; and the second series from the East were even better liked. You sometimes made a dash at a very big subject, and missed it — for want of that Oxford double first, and the preparatory discipline." Basil laughed again at this gentle sarcasm of the well-braced, orthodox scholar ; nothing could come amiss to him just then ; he was feeling in every nerve the pleasantness of his repose and his return. His welcome was exquisitely sweet and cordial : was bright on every face. " I am no politician," said his sister ; "I prefer your sketches and stories to your newspaper corre- spondence. Some of them are delicate and graceful as poems — they are poems in prose. I have promised Olive that one day she shall read them : have I not, Livy ? " The dark-eyed child glanced shyly in her young kinsman's face ; her lips mute, but her eyes full of questions. "Ah, and most of them are studies from life, Nelly," replied he, frankly enjoying the domestic incense. " Truth is not only stranger than fiction, but infinitely more various. I have seen many queer people and out-of-the-way places ; I have fallen amongst thieves when no Good Samaritan has come down my way ; I have slept without supper, and journeyed day after day without pros- pect where to lay my head at night ; I have been in peril by fire and peril by water, and have sufi'ered BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 23 wreck at sea. I ought to have come home in the winter, and during the long evenings you would have found me quite a treasury of travellers' tales." " The summer days are long too; we will hear them in the garden of an afternoon. You don't mean to leave us again in a hurry, I trust, Basil ? " " Only for a week or two of London and lionizing. You don't imagine what a popular character I am likely to become, Nelly ; my pockets are stuffed with invitations ; my memory is overburdened with names of people I met abroad, who exacted pledges that I would grace their hospitality at home." '' You have come to us first, so we will try to forgive your little glorious air," returned Nelly, smiling half proudly, half quizzically at her ])rother. " Don't grow above us, that's all ; we will never begrudge you praise and honour if you will not let them spoil your taste for common things." " No fear of that ! Looking at Franklyn, 24 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. I am tempted to seek me a fair country wife, and to sit down at once in pastoral peace and simplicity. Your gold pen would still keep us both, Nelly; and how charming it would be if it were always May." He thought of the crow's- nest cottage, and the pretty pagan hanging her garlands out at the lattices. '' Time enough yet to prune your wings," said the parson. " You have developed none but migratory tastes thus far : and, my dear lad, it is not always May." The children had made an end of their break- fast, and Cupidon began to testify his desire for release from quiet behaviour by divers small obtrusivenesses which his mother gently essayed to discourage until his father rang the bell, and the respectable nurse entered, and took them off for sport in the garden. Then the parson asked the tea-maker for another cup, and his wife arranged her countenance as for more serious and openly confidential chat. Basil's hint at mariying had roused her interest. She knew about Lily and Lily's predecessors. Her brother's versatility BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 25 and pleasure -losing nature were an anxiety to her constant womanly heart. She would fain have had him less sudden in passion and more steadfast in affection. But he would not follow her lead to grave thoughts just then, and letting a suggestive question of hers pass half answered, he began to inquire of his brother-in-law how the vegetative existence of Ashford agreed with him after Oxford and St. Chad's. " Capitally," replied the parson. " Nelly and the bau-ns thrive better too. The work at St. Chad's was over much for me — I felt help- less, lost, amidst that teeming town population. This parish is not unmanageably large ; besides the \*illage, which is always under my eye, there are only three faimsteads on the hills, and a cluster of cottages at the quarries. The people generally are a rude race, but not degraded by misery and guilt like the human refuse of St. Chad's. I like their character on the whole. There is a strong vein of dissenting piety amongst them that dates from Wesley's revival. My pre- decessor could not away with it ; it stank in his 26 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. nostrils worse than popery or infidelity. An ultra- orthodox apostle is he, and the very man for St. Chad's — young, enthusiastic, strong as Samson ; we exchanged our spheres of labour, and are now in our right places. Nelly and I know every face in our flock here ; and he with his self-devotion, energy, and talent for organiza- tion, is making an impression there that I never could have done. He has a stafi" of curates living at the rectory and eating at his own table, and I need not say, all single men. Some foolish people accuse them of monkery ; but it is excellent train- ing for London parish priests, those young deacons • get under Kenyon's guidance. He has a sister- hood of working-women at his direction too, and very useful they are in the schools, and amongst the poor and sick." " You should not forget to add that two of Mr. Kenyon's curates married last winter, and are now in charge of district churches of their own," interposed the parson's wife. " Of course, I ought not to forget it," rejoined the parson. "Nothing would more conduce to BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 27 the prosperity of Brotherhoods and Sisterhoods than frequent lapses into domestic life and matri- mony. PubHc opinion would then give up abusing them as nurseries for Rome. I admire Kenvon and men of his kind with all my heai-t ; but I lived too long in learned leisure at Christ Church to be capable of their work." " The donnish air is almost worn off now, Basil, is it not ? " said Mrs. Franklyn with a happy rallying look at her husband, who was at least fifteen years her elder, thousrh theirs had been a genuine love-match. Basil consented that it was, but professed to think his brother-in-law must often experience a prick of regi-et for his donnish days, in the dulness of Ashford. " But Ashford is not dull," retorted his sister. "We have desirable neighbours all round us. You like to study varieties of men, Basil ; we can introduce you to some fine types of human natui-e, as it occasionally crops up in primitive states of society. We can show you some excellent studies for stories here, in high life and humble life." '' Yes, 3-0U will not find us all alike," added the 28 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPKICE. parson. '' There is our schoolmaster, for instance, Reuben Abbott, a man who got his education at St. Giles's Free School at Whorlstone. He is the antiquary and popular poet of the district. Of peasant-blood himself, when well advanced in years, he married a handsome young peasant woman of Eyam, who is none the less wise or virtuous in her husband's eyes though she can neither read nor write. They have but one child, who has some reason to be original, and she is ; Joan Abbott is quite a genius in her way." " And beautiful, Basil, so beautiful," said his sister, " and modest and good — you will think her perfect — I expect that you wdll begin forthwith to weave a romance about her. There is ample suggestion in her surroundings. Do I excite your curiosity? " " My liveliest curiosity ! She lives at an old house on the road-side, not far from The Hurst?" "Ah, you have seen her then?" said the parson. ''No, she lives at home with her father and mother, but she spends the greater part of BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 29 the day there with my blind curate. He trained her himself to be his reader ; he has taught her to play the organ in church, and to sing — and she has an exquisite voice. I doubt she is spoilt for a poor man's wife. "What does a working man want with a wife brought up on patristic literature ?" Mrs. Franklyn smiled. '' She has abundance of practical sense as well, Basil," said she defen- sively for her favourite. "If she were a boy, we should call her powers God's gifts, and look to see her come to great usefulness and renown. Brains never stand in men's way, and I refuse to regard them as a misfortune for even a peasant woman. If her father could have had his will, Joan would have grown up a copy of his wife : a pious, tender, submissive soul, only dexterous at spinning and sewing, and clever at house- work ; but she has a large and restless mind, and patronized by Mrs. Paget and her son, she took to books as early and naturally as a duck- ling takes to the water. Her mother has told me how, with wonder and delight, she watched 30 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. her from quite a wee thing begin to set her feet in her father's steps. At four years old she could read ; at six, she could reel you off with a frequent lisp a score of hymns and rhymed pieces that she had learnt by heart ; at ten, she knew all the folk-lore and local traditions which were her mother's learning, and at twelve, she had begun to embellish the pale outlines with her own fancies. At this point Squire Hubbard and his wife interfered, protesting that her book- studies were no better than idleness in her con- dition of life ; but her father had now a pride in her, and upheld her as an obedient, industrious, loving lass at home, and Mrs. Paget kept firm hold on her jprotegee. When Olive is a year older, I intend to employ Joan Abbott as her governess, if we can arrange it with the Pagets." " I perceive," said Basil, with laughing irony. " This girl is too beautiful and gifted for a peasant's wife, and will never be allowed a free existence of her own. She will serve a nobler purpose as a reading and teaching machine for blind men and little children. Nelly, I am BREAKFAST AT THE PAKSOXAGE. 31 amazed at you : you deserve a sj^ell of hard labour at court to learn how happy women can be in servitude amongst their betters, \\'ithont mate and bairns. It would be a good deed to put sweet mistress Joan up to asserting her independence." "So it would," agreed the parson. " She is a lass of vdt and character, not too prone to self- negation. I hope some day I shall have the satisfaction of marrying her to her cousin, that fine fellow, blacksmith Kempe. He is her devoted servant, and theii- voices in the choir together are flute and bass viol. His brother Martin, whom Dale is so proud of at Ashleigh, does not beat our Nicholas." Mrs. Frankl}Ti firmly dissented fi'om the first proposition ; she did not think such a match was ever likely to come to pass, or was at all to- be desired by those who knew Joan Abbott well. " There is a feminine freemasonry in these matters which we may not penetrate, Basil," rejoined the parson good-humouredJy. " When 82 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. Nelly speaks in that solemn undertone, I know she is consulting the secret oracles. Now I would back Kempe to win Joan yet, if the other women would give her fair play. He is handsome, straight as a lance, steady, strong, and well-to- do. There is hardly a forge in the Hundred of Whorlstone that is not owned by a Kempe. They are a race of blacksmiths and choristers as long in the land as the Franklyns, Hubbards, and Gisbornes. Joan's mother comes of that stalwart peasant stock, and Joan is as like her to look at as mother and daughter can be." There was a rap on the window, and Olive's face making a sunny Spanish picture in the pane. '* The church key, papa ; Mr. Paget and Joan Abbott are come to practise," cried the child. The parson took the key from the chimney- piece, and gave it to her through the window. Having risen, he did not reseat himself, for breakfast was over, but proposed that while Nelly visited her nursery and household depart- ment, he and Basil should take a view round the house outside, and a view of the church. BREAKFAST AT THE PARSONAGE. 33 " We shall not disturb the singers," added he. " They will be too absorbed to notice us, and perhaps you may have another glimpse of Nelly's heroine." VOL. I. ( 34 ) III. THE CHURCH PORCH. The two gentlemen passed into the garden by a side door, and thence into the churchyard, which was kept with as scrupulous neatness as the parson's private domain. A magnificent yew of immemorial age spread its shade above a hospitable seat encircling its bole, where Sunday by Sunday the village folk congregated to hear and tell the news before morning service. The graves of thirty generations surrounded the church, one of the oldest in the Hundred of Whorlstone. It had suffered nothing yet at the hands of restorers. The external fabric had the rich, soft, mossy tints of centuries on the warm yellow stone ; and in the fine square tower hung a peal of four bells, named after the four evangelists, THE CHURCH PORCH. 35 which had been the gift of a pious descendant of the original founder in the reign of King Edward II. These bells rang their old-world chant, " Pray for us, Maiy ; pray for us, Mar}^," without offence in Protestant ears, just as the bells at Ashleigh-on-the-Hill rang, '' God be our Speed; God be our Speed;" and, amongst other remnants of the Catholic faith, a fervent belief that the supplications of the saints in glory avail men as much as the prayers of Christian brethren in the flesh, had kept fast hold of the devout side of the popular mind in Ashford. Primitive Metho- dism had flourished there abundantly, much to the amelioration of the morals and manners of the miners ; but druidical and medieval ideas had survived all newer spiritualisms, and still gave much of their tone and colour to the common life of the people. The interior of the edifice, which was of admi- rable proportions, was blocked by the orthodox high pews of the revolution period, and by a gallery facing the chancel. Whitewash prevailed everywhere in clean unsightliness. Basil Godfrey 3— «J 36 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. shuddered as he entered ; the aspect of the place was literally and physically chilling, and he re- treated to the porch after the briefest survey. Mr. Frankly u went on indicating noteworthy cha- racteristics of the structure for several minutes before he discovered that he had no auditor. " Your God's House is the most comfortless house in the parish, Franklyn," said Basil, as the parson rejoined him. " Dusty neglect harmo- nizes with religious faith in a fashion, but " " Hush ! Listen — that is Paget," interrupted Mr. Franklyn lifting his hand. The organ pealed forth in a noble voluntary. There were two seats in the porch, and there they sat down opposite each other, hearing the glorious music, and contemplating the picturesque, sunny prospect unrolled before them far and near. The young poet was a passionate lover of sweet sounds — wings to float his thoughts away to high, ethereal regions. Mr. Franklyn began presently to talk in an undertone of his intention to clear the church of its incumbrances next year, by which time he hoped to have gathered or saved THE CHURCH PORCH. 37 money enough to restore the building to its original grace and beauty. But Basil neither heard nor answered him a word, and when the voluntary ceased he was in a trance of silent, imaginative delight. Almost without pause, another strain burst forth, a strain simple, severe ; and then arose the tender pleading voice of a woman in a psalm of prayer. Sweet Saviour, bom of Blessed Mary, Tempted as man, but without spot of sin ; Great Son of God, in everlasting glory. Stoop down from Heaven, draw us, weary, in. Sweet Saviour, laid in lowly manger, Meek as tby mother, strong as God's right hand. Be thou our sword and sliield in time of danger, Helpless ourselves, in Thy strength let us stand. Sweet Saviour, in the desert tempted, Hungered, athirst, for forty lonely days, — When we are outcast, when oui- hearts are emptied. Keep us in patience through the stony ways. Sweet Saviour, weeping in the garden, Praying with sweat of blood the cup might pass, — When we recoil, remind us of our pardon, Bought with Thy tears, whose lives are but as gi-ass. 38 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. Sweet Saviour, crowned with thorns and scourged, Bearing to Golgotha thy painful cross, Up the dark road with cruel mocHngs urged, Give us thy faith to count no suffering loss. Sweet Saviour, from the grave uprisen, First Fruit eternal of the seed of time, Break Thou our bonds, and bring us out of prison, Steady our feet that to thy feet would climb. Sweet Saviour, born of Blessed Mary, Thou spotless lamb, one sacrifice for sin. Great son of God, in everlasting glory. Stoop down from Heaven, draw us, weary, m ! As the music and the voice ceased, the parson signed to his companion to come away. They crossed the churchyard slowly to pass through the lych-gate. Basil, always impressible, was profoundly touched. He had a large fund of natural piety and reverence in his disposition, combined with a perhaps ignorant disrespect for ecclesiastical systems and dogmas. No suffering, no sense of helplessness had brought home to him yet the need of a strength beyond his own to light well the battle of life. But though his shallow experience could give no full echo of response to THE CHURCH PORCH. 39 Joan's pathetic psalm, his Hvely imagination out- ran feeling, and intei*pretecl it for him justly. What sorrow there is in the world — what sorrow there has been from the beginning ! What hard striving after good, and what painful falling short ! Generation after generation of men trying to satisfy themselves with their own devices, and the most successful after long toil, which may have given them all toil can, ending in vanity ; or coming through great tribulation to the Preacher's conclusion that the truest wisdom is the fear of God, and the only permanent rest the peace of God. Here w^as he himself in the prime and pomp of youth, aware of no want, at his ease with time and fortune. Out of what ambush could calamity strike him ? He felt no weariness, no fear, no lack, no bonds ; his spirits were blithe, his heart was whole, his conscience was quiet. Yet he knew — and acknowledged that he knew — how little a matter would bring him down from his gloiy. A pebble in his path, a fiery blast in his face, a foul breath on his name, and he, like all 40 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. creation, if he would have help and comfort, must cry for them to God who has never yet consented to arm mankind against Himself. Basil Godfrey's grave thoughts kept him silent. Mr. Franklyn deciphered and respected them. They strolled along the pleasant lane beyond the church until they reached the stile and footpath across the fields to Wye Bridge ; and here they halted, leaning on the wall, and talking of many things. Now and again there came a drift of music on the air, sweet and exquisitely soft. There was an indefinable sadness in it also : a wailing like a dirge of angels. By-and-by the parson looked at his watch and said, the curate must have nearly done his day's practising ; if Basil wished to see Joan Abbott they ought to be going back to the church. So they went, and met the blind player and his beautiful guide in the porch. The children were there too, Olive and Mervyn, and their mother with her bonnet on — quite a little congregation. " We are all going down the village together," said the parson's wife, as he drew near. " You THE CHUECH PORCH. 41 and Basil will come with us ? " Of course they would. " Joan Ahhott says Cheap Jack is setting out his cart by the school, papa ; I want to hear Cheap Jack, and mamma has given me sixpence to spend," cried Olive, exhibiting her funds. Mr. Franklyn claspt the eager little hand held out for his, and then introduced Basil to Mr. Paget and to Joan, who held his arm to lead him. The curate was a tall, spare, shrewd-visaged gentleman of forty, with thin grey locks and brown eyes, that looked dim rather than sightless. He wore a long Oxford mixture coat and trousers, and a straw- hat ; his linen was delicately fine and clean, and his broad tipped, muscular hands were white as any lady's. He carried his head forward, and his attitude was gi-oping, Hke that of many blind persons, but his air and expression were those of a hard-minded, choleric, perhaps obstinate, man. Joan Abbott blushed vividly as Mr. Franklyn named her to the splendid young god she had directed on his way an hour or two before. She was dressed just as he had seen her before break- 42 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. \ fast, except that she had on now a brown ^mush- room-shaped straw hat. It was impossible to mistake her for the curate's daughter, or wife, or sister, or for anything but the peasant-girl she was, in her lilac printed dress, white collar and apron, stout leather shoes, sprinkled stockings, and no gloves. But what a beautiful soul looked out of her sweet eyes ! The whole party moved oif together; Mervyn mounted on Basil Godfrey's tall shoulder, his mother lending him a very un-necessary hand of support, and the parson and Olive falling into line with Mr. Paget and Joan, whose arm the curate retained, though Mr. Franklyn proffered his own. "Thank you, thank you," said he, quickly; " but I know Joan's step best, and we are going down the town-street." " Lift your feet, sir ; the lane has been newly stoned here," said she, and, checking him for an instant, she steered him to the soft edge of sward under the churchyard wall. A skilful and trusted pilot over rough ways evidently was Joan Abbott. ( 43 ) IV. THE CHEAP JACK. They passed the neat flowery cottages, and came to the Cross. Here, on the steps and an im- promptu stall, the pedlar now had his wares displayed to great advantage, side by side with a truck full of nuts, oranges, and gingerbread. The basket-maker's caravan had come up the hill, and was halted under the lee of the forge, and a travelling show had taken its station a few paces along Eidgeway. The Feast was in high prepara- tion at all points of the village, and with many a pause for chat with the elders of his flock, and many a bob-curtsey and respectful tug of the fore- lock from the lambs, the parson made his slow way down the street, more than once left behind by all but Olive. 44 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. Near the foot of the hill they met the gipsy basket-woman, carrying some of her lighter osiery for an excuse to gain the ears of silly women ; and then they came in sight of the school-house, and of the Cheap Jack's hooded cart, drawn up on the narrow space of sward in front of it. " There he is, Miss Olive, the fat little man in the hare-skin cap and red waistcoat, that's Cheap Jack," said Joan. The child abandoned her father's hand, and came round to hers. Basil Godfrey left his sister, and came too. Then the blind curate, being safe at the bottom of the hill, did, on a second invitation, accept his rector's arm, and left her free for the children. There was no gathering yet round the cart ; it was too early in the day. The horse was improv- ing his opportunities by making a meal from the tender shoots of the schoolmaster's garden-hedge, and the dog was taking his siesta out of the way of casual kicks. Cheap Jack himself, seated on the footboard of his cart, was laying in a reserve of bread and cheese and strong ale against the fatigues of his vocation. He was a popular cha- THE CHEAP JACK. 45 racter in the Hundred of Whorlstone— was known, indeed, throughout the shii-e, of which, for twenty years, he had attended all the wakes and well- dressings, fairs and feasts. Reuhen Abhott and he were very old friends, and the moment he espied the schoolmaster's daughter with Basil Grodfrey and the little ones, he sprang up on the footboard which served him as pulpit, and greeted them -^ith a mouthful of his sing-song patter. " Top o' the morning to you. Mistress Joan and gentles ! It's the early bird picks up the worm, an' the first buyers the best bargins. Don't try to bate me a penny, or I'll cheat you. What do ye lack ? Everything fi'om top -knots to shoe-strings, I'll be bound ! I ain't been round here this twal'month, an' who can please folks like Cheap Jack?" He blew a tantara on a huge tin horn, and out of the earth, as it seemed, a gaping, staring, admiring crowd of all sorts and sizes, young, old, middle-aged, infants in arms, and grandsires on crutches, drew fast together. OHve danced up and down on both feet to the din, and Mervvn, fi-om his 46 BASIL. GODFREY'S CAPRICE. proud elevation on Basil Godfrey's shoulder, added to it with shouts, laughter, and clapping of hands. They three and Joan Abbott took up a vantage post in front of the cart, and boldly maintained it ; but the parson and the j)arson's wife and curate went into the schoolmaster's garden, and looked on over the hedge. When the number of the assembly satisfied Cheap Jack, he gave one long shrill final blast to be heard a mile off, and then laying by his discordant instrument, cast a swift, scrutinizing glance over the throng, and resumed his patter with ever increasing volubility. " Here we are again at Ashford Feast as comes but once a year ! I alius makes better sales at Ashford Feast than at any wake or fair i' the Hundred. For why ? 'Cause you're such sensy folk at Ashford. You can see through a mill- stone furder than anybody, an' you alius know what you want — only give you time to reck'lect it. I'm in no hurry — there's till next week afore us, an' I expec's a fine competition for my lots — beautiful lots they are, as you'll say when you see 'em. Now speak fair — who's settled in life THE CHEAr JACK. , 47 since last May-day ? Who wants corals, creddles, rockers for cheers ? I've got 'em here, all handy. Corals o' Queen Yictoree's own pattern, as 'nil bring babby's teeth through easy as winking. If there's any 'o you as ar'n't cut his wise teeth yet, just try one .for a favour. Here, my lad o' wax, just obleege me by trying this to show the leddies" (addressing a very hirsute young quarryman), "an' I'll throw you in a Sheffield scrape-jaw for a make- weight. Don't be shy. Thank you, mem ; sold for sixpence ! Take the creddle too, mem ; goes of itself, it does, true as a Genevy time -piece ; wdnd it up an' set it off vri' babby in it, an' she'll sleep like one o'clock. Your pm-vided '? ^Tio bids for a creddle o' real oak, growed i' Windsor Forest ? swings as soft as the sad sea waves ; it's been in the best families, it has, an 'ull last to the day o' judgment. It 'ud be a certificate o' respec- tabihty i' any house — I'll toss you in wi' it a bundle o' nursery rhymes an' a tract or two, 'cause I got 'em for nothing. TMio bids for a creddle o' real oak. Take it on speckilation — it's alius useful or may be. Nobody bids. There's 48 . B^SIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. not a chap o' sperrit among you — lasses have a deal more spunk ! I won't flatter you : you're too sheepish to get a sweetheart, let alone a wife. Buy a looking-glass an' smarten yersels up a bit, then try agen. I'd have hopes o' you if you weren't stingy — stinginess gives such a bad set to the feeters. P'raps it's fairings you want to go a courting in yer hand ? Then look here — I'm your man for fairings. Here's buckles for their shoes, dear honies, worth their weight in silver monies, all the fashion with the swells, an' like- wise with the bonny belles. Here's ribbins for yer sweethearts' hair, pink for brown 'uns, blue for fair, silver buckles, satin ribbins, aU as cheap as lovers' fibbins." He paused and stood with arms extended, some remnants of gaudy ribbon thrown over both, and in one hand the tinsel buckles on a card which he held up and dexterously turned about to catch the glitter of the sun; but none of the broad-grinning swains had courage yet to come forward and buy, and the damsels, whatever their desires, were equally bashful. Cheap Jack took up his cue again in an injured, reproachful tone. THE CHEAP JACK. 49 " You don't want no fairings — then what do you want ? Tongues the most o' you — lucky she's that 'ull own you, if they don't go Hke bell- clappers at home ! P'raps fairings is out o' vogue — well, let's see another lot — here's dog-collars an' coupling-chains, comforablest ever was wore. Jack 'ull speak to 'em ; he's got one on this blessed minnit. If you don't believe me, try one — you'll find it easy as a leddy's necklace. No dog as knows what's what 'ud be seen in society without. The dook's dogs wear 'em, an' the squires' an' parsons', or oughter, an' her gracious Majesty's fav'rite poodle as is royally named Snap Dragon — he's descended from the dragon on the ha'pennies that King George killed or somebody o' his relations. Sold ; — thank you, little miss, a lucky dog yours is (to Olive very graciously with a red morocco collar in exchange for her sixpence), there's not another dog going but might envy him, I'm sure. Come now — business is business, an' I have only got two bids yet, though I came away from dinner promiskus 'cause I heerd somebody call ' shop.' " VOL. I. 4 50 BASIL GODFREY'S CAPRICE. Cheap Jack bated his breath, and looking round again, perceived here and there a listener on the outskirts of the crowd edging off ; his allusion to his dinner had suggested that their own might be cooling. " You're never going to ware your brass wi' yon knap o' a pedlar at the Cross ? " cried he shrilly as if the idea were too much for his feelings. " Such trumpery as he'll palm off upon yo'. Blunt knives, rizzors jagged as old saws, iilygree bits o' ear-drops an' brooches as a peck on 'em 'ud fill nobody's stomack ! Deal wi' a man you know 'ull give you yer money's worth — deal wi' me ! " The seceders did not return ; more followed them. " Oh ! but you're a light- minded generation, an' one must come down to you ! Song-books — what do you say to song- books ? — penny, twopence, threepence, sixpence, they're of all prices to suit all tastes an' all pockets. Are you for songs o' sintiment ? Then here, take a whole manual o' courtship in eight tunes — She says, 'Take, oh, take those lips away ! ' He says, ' Why, lovely charmer, tell me why? Kissing's no sin. In the merry month THE CHEAP JACK. 51 o' May. Come, live wi' me an' be my love, In summer time when flowers do spring, Pretty little Sue, My sweet sweeting.' There now ! is there a man among jou could do it better — more purpose-like ? No, not if you swore till you was black i' the face ! But all the world isn't young — A glass is good, an' a lass is good, an' we're all good fellows together, but 'appen there's some as likes the glass best. Well, I'm not agen a glass mysel — a bumper o' good liquor never can come amiss, an' here's Songs o' mirth and jollity for such as prefers 'em ; an' pastoral songs, an' sporting songs, an' songs o' folks gone mad for the sake o' somebody that war'n't worth it. When Barbary Allen's cruel, let her go, and thank your stars you're Fairly shut of her." The song-books proved acceptable. Cheap Jack had to deal them out almost as fast as a pack of cards, and soon had no more to dispose of. In the stir and movement to come at him and them, Basil, Joan and the children lost their vantage ground, and presently extricating them- selves fi-om the crowd, joined the parson, his wife 4—2 LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF 11 1.lNOI.