Kingscote Stories

Front matter

■ I I I ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ N i WORKS BY THE AUTHOR. STORIES FROM OLD HISTORY. Sonnensohein and Co. THE SOVEREIGNS OF ENGLAND.* Sonnensohein AND CO. BERTRAM DE DRUMONT. Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co. KINGSCOTE STORIES. Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co. KINGSCOTE ESSAYS AND POEMS. Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co. KINDERGARTEN SONGS OF THE SEASONS (12). Music Publishing Company, 54, Great Marlborough Street, and Myers and Co., Berners Street. * Appended to ' A First History of the English People,' by Amy Baker, 4 vols. See Advertisement at the end. BY THE LATE ELLA BAKER, AUTHOR OF 'BERTRAM DE DRUMONT,' 'ESSAYS AND POEMS,' 'STORIES FROM OLD HISTORY,' 'THE SOVEREIGNS OF ENGLAND,' ETC. Truly — 'a sweet and holy soul Hath tints that never fly ; While flowers decay, and seasons roll, It cannot die.' Herbert. LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH & CO., 1, PATERNOSTER SQUARE. 1888. MEMORIAL

Preface

. Ella Baker, who died 14th July, 1888, from the sting of a bee, which brought on sudden syncope thirty-three hours after, was born at Kensington 29th May, 1859. On the 10th July, 1860, her father, Thomas Baker, of the Inner Temple, removed to Kingscote, Wokingham, where the rest of her life was spent, with the few exceptions of seven short visits, of about a week each, to friends in London, Brighton, and Ilminster ; and one stay of three months in the latter place. She had not a Collegiate education ; circumstances detailed in her father's autobiography account for this.* Hers was strictly a home training, mainly under the guidance of her sister Amy, author of 'A First History of the English People,'f which work the younger sister assisted to embellish, by selecting the hundred mottoes to the heads of chapters.^ These were furnished without an effort, during a few days, whilst pursuing her usual domestic avocations.

Her memory, indeed, was truly wonderful, and greatly con tributed to her extraordinary conversational powers ; for when at her ease (she was very modest and retiring, seldom entering what is called 'society'), no subject could be started without bringing some most apt quotation from Ella's lips. She had mastered (self-taught) French, * ' A Battling Life chiefly in the Civil Service.' Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co. f Swan Sonnensohein and Co. X ' The poetical extracts which stand as mottoes at the head of chapters,' writes a reviewer, ' are as apt and delightful as those of Sir Walter Scott himself.' MEMORIAL

PREFACE.

. VI German, and Italian. Altogether she was highly intel lectual, with a fine taste, and poetic imagination. One instance of memory, when about thirteen years old, may be mentioned : repeating to a cousin, who had challenged her, the whole of ' The Lady of the Lake,' it was observed that many words were substituted for others in the original ; but in every instance both the rhythm and the meaning were correct. It was, therefore, in no sense a parrot recitation. She never put herself forward. It is believed that not a single composition of hers intended for publication exists, but was done upon request — like ' The Sovereigns of England,' appended to her sister's history ; ' Kinder garten Songs of the Seasons,' and ' Stories from Old History' (all written at Amy's desire). It is much to be doubted whether she would voluntarily have published any of her writings.

In truth her quiet unselfish life seemed almost solely devoted to attendance on her excel lent mother ; yet, if Ella had any ambition, it was to do something towards improving and elevating the literary taste of the age, more especially as regards reading matter for young persons. For the benefit of these, the following posthumous pro ductions are published by a proud but sorrowing father. T. B. September, 1888. N.B. — The year in which the piece was written is affixed to each. CONTENTS. PAGE MEMORIAL

PREFACE.

V A MINE OF WEALTH - - - 1 TAKING THE SHILLING - - 73 A SPORTING ADVENTURE - - - - 99 FEATHERED FRIENDS - - - 109 GRANDMOTHER ----- 123 LOST - - - 136 THE NORTH STAR - - - 149 THE SENTINEL IN FEATHERS - 159 THE FRENCH INVASION - - 164 THE JEWEL (AN ALLEGORY) - - 168 MAKING BOTH ENDS MEET - - - -175 THE TOAD AND THE HAYMAKERS - - 181 OUT OF LONDON - - - - 184 BIOGRAPHICAL : OLYMPIA MORATA - - - - 197 DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON - - 201 JOHN HOWARD - 222 LORD COCHRANE - - 245 WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING, D.D. - - 274 GARIBALDI - - A MINE OF WEALTH (1887).

Chapter I. Gilbert Sets Out To Seek His Fortune

One crisp frosty October morning, almost before the sun was up, a ragged lad came out from a little cluster of tents pitched upon an open common, and walked away briskly towards the country road lying a hundred yards or so in front of him. As he went, he turned his head to take one last glance at the dirty, gipsy-like tents, which, wretched as they were, yet contained all that was left to him of a home. There was no regret in it, though he was leaving the place for ever ; it was a long, considering look, as though he meant to fix the picture so firmly in his mind that it should last through all the years that lay before him. Indeed, Gilbert Carey had nothing to regret in the home, if it could be called one, upon which he turned his back that morning. There were no parents, no kindred of his, however distant, among the inmates of those sordid dwellings ; since his mother and stepfather had died some months before, and left him in the midst of the wandering gang, half gipsy, wholly vagabond, of which they had been members while they lived.

There was no gipsy blood in the boy's veins, if his face and manner gave a true account of him. The curly light hair and gray eyes were thoroughly English ; so was the complexion, sunburnt as it was, and the square, sturdy figure, a little awkward as yet, but giving promise of greater size and weight than is often found among the Eastern races. But more than all, perhaps, it was the bold direct gaze of his eyes, and the look of purpose and determination in the whole face, that seemed to tell — if looks tell anything in these matters — that he came of a steady, thrifty, striving stock, and that a vagrant hand to-mouth life, like that of his late companions, was altogether foreign to him. Indeed, he had soon grown tired of being the drudge of the party, at everybody's call ; of having to carry their burdens, make the fires, carry round the wares for sale, do the tinker's work when ever the men did not feel inclined to do it for themselves ; in short, he must do everything that the rest were too lazy to do, and be abused if anything were left undone.

Having made up his mind therefore, he took the oppor tunity to leave them on a morning when one or two of the men were away, and the others buried too deeply in a drunken sleep to take any notice of him. Gilbert knew that they would have tried to keep him among them by all means in their power, for he was too useful to be parted with willingly. As soon as he had reached the high-road, Gilbert Carey turned his face towards London. He had come out to seek his fortune, and he was going to London, not because he had any reason for wanting to go there, but because people who have no other plans always do go to London, and it had never occurred to him to do anything else. He had a piece of bread in his hand, just twopence halfpenny in his pocket, and over his shoulder a blue spotted handkerchief, which held a ragged shirt and a pair of boots in not much better condition.

Gilbert carried his boots aud walked barefooted for the present, because he was afraid of wearing them out altogether, and he must make as decent an appearance as he could when he went to look for work. It was a fine autumn morning, and after the sun had come up to warm his chilled limbs, and make the whole world look bright, Gilbert's spirits rose high as he tramped along. It was so pleasant to feel that he was free, with his life in his own hands to shape it as he chose; and then the boy was very young, and had no failures in his past life to make him fear for the future. He had travelled over eight good miles before sitting down to rest upon a stile, and he looked with a hungry eye at the bread in his hand. Indeed, the bread was lifted to his mouth more than once, but came away again untasted. 'No, I won't eat it yet,' he said to himself ; 'I shall want it more before I've done.' So he laid down the forbidden breakfast, and sat swinging his legs, and staring eagerly before him, as though the London he was bound for lay before his eyes in sight already.

He jumped down before long, and walked on stoutly, whistling cheerfully, though he wanted his breakfast, and had no other prospect before him than a forty or fifty miles' tramp to London with twopence halfpenny for his fortune. But he thought, 'Perhaps I'll find a job of work on the way ;' and when he stopped at last to eat the dry warm lump of bread, with a handful of blackberries from tbe hedge, and one or two sips of not very clean water scooped up in his hand, he enjoyed the meal far better than he ever had his share of the stew out of the gipsies' kettle. Gilbert passed that night beside a haystack, and went on his way again a little less gaily the next morning ; he felt cold and tired, and it was a dull day too, which helped to dash his spirits. Still, he walked on whistling to keep himself in heart, and had done a business-like amount of walking before nine o'clock.

Then he stopped, for a large town had come in sight. He would have to pass through it, for the road went straightforward, but Gilbert looked down at his bare feet. He had no mind to walk through the streets looking ' like a gipsy,' as he said to himself. Over two or three fields he ran till he reached a place where the glitter of water was to be seen ; and here, in the green water of the pond, he first washed the dust from his feet, and then dragged on his broken boots. He next brought out a broken end of comb to put the tangle of his curly hair in order, and after he had also dashed the cold water over face and hands, he set his hat in a business-like manner over his brows, and felt more ready to face the world. As Gilbert passed through the busy streets of the town that day, a thought suddenly struck him.

Why might he not find work here as well as elsewhere ? Where was the use of wasting his time and strength in tramping wearily on to London, growing more ragged and beggarly looking every hour, when he had no more certain chances there than here ? Why, right over in the shop just opposite there was a card in the window, with ' Wanted, a boy,' written on it in such plain capitals that even Gilbert, though he had not much learning, could not mistake its meaning. He did not stop to see what sort of a place it was, but stepped in, and then he saw it was a grocer's shop, busy looking, and not very clean. ' If you please, sir, do you want a boy ?' The master of the shop looked at him from head to foot. ' Not such a one as you,' he said shortly, and turned away. Gilbert stepped into the street again rather cast down.

He tried a greengrocer's next, and here the master hardly looked at him at all. ' Got one this morning,' was all his answer, — as he went on sorting vegetables. Gilbert tried some other shops without cards in their windows. He went into a seedsman's, a baker's and some others ; but everyone said ' No,' and some laughed, which made him angry. Still he kept on. ' I'll go through all the streets,' he thought, ' and if there's nothing here I can go on to the next town, or get work on a farm, perhaps.' But he knew farm-work was hard to find in autumn, and he went through the streets steadily. This took the whole day, though there were not many boys wanted. But just as it was growing dark, he saw in a back street the window of a small ironmonger's shop, and read, by the light of the street lamp that had just been lighted, the words : ' Wanted, a steady lad.' Gilbert was inside the shop in a moment. ' Do you want a lad, sir ?' The light was rather dull in there, but he had cauo-ht sight of the figure of a man bending over his desk in the corner, and spoke to that. ' I want a steady, active, decent lad,' said a voice out of the corner ; ' I don't want lazy vagabonds.' ' I'm not a lazy vagabond, sir.' The ironmonger came out of his corner.

He was a little elderly man in a brown coat, grave, but not unkindly looking. He wore large spectacles, through which he gave Gilbert a long look, and then shook his head as if he didn't like what he saw of him ; but began to ask questions for all that. ' What's your name, and where do you come from ?' ' Gilbert Carey, sir. I come from the country near thirty miles out, where I used to live in the tents on the common. I set off yesterday morning, and have been walking ever since.' ' Tents on the common ! Why you don't mean to say,' exclaimed the shop-keeper, a good deal taken aback, ' that you're a gipsy ?' ' No, sir, I'm not,' answered Gilbert, growing rather red ; 'my father never belonged to that lot — he was an Englishman.' ' Father dead, I suppose ?' ' Four years ago, sir. I've gone about the country ever since with mother and her new husband.' ' Dead, too ?' questioned the ironmonger shortly.

Gilbert nodded. ' They're all dead ; there's nobody belonging to me,' he said. ' And what,' said the little shop keeper, leaning his elbows on the counter and looking hard at the boy across it, ' what sort of a life was it among your friends the gipsies ? What did they do for a living ?' 'All sorts of tinkering, sir, and basket-making, and sometimes poaching and thieving.' ' And you went poaching and thieving too, I dare say?' ' No, sir ; but I eat what the others brought home.' The shop-keeper was silent for a moment as if thinking, then asked abruptly : ' Why did you leave the gipsies, boy ?' ' I got tired of it,' answered Gilbert, ' and wanted to live respectable. It was nothing but drinking and swearing and quarrelling, and then the men used to knock me about. There was lots of hard work, but nothing to look to, and no chance to get on.

I'd rather live in a decent house, and learn a decent trade like my father. I don't want to live like a gipsy.' ' Well, Gilbert Carey, how old are you ?' ' Just fourteen, sir.' ' What can you do ?' 'I can mend pots and kettles,' said the boy after con sidering a minute, ' and cut withies for the basket-work, and I can carry a pack and tramp thirty miles a day, and make a fire and cook the supper, and peddle the wares.' Gilbert might have been going on longer with his list, but the ironmonger broke in : ' Can you sweep my shop and clean the windows ?' ' I don't know, sir, but I can try.' 'Have you been to any other shop before you came here ?' ' Yes, sir, a good many, but they wouldn't have me.' ' Why not ?' ' Sometimes they said they didn't want a boy ; or else I suppose it was because I was ragged, and had no one to speak for me.' ' So I'm to take you without a character ; do you suppose I'm going to do that ?

Come now.' Gilbert looked across at the little man, and answered straight out with a smile : ' Yes, sir ; I think you are.' ' You're a sharp boy, I see ; you may stay to keep the place decent and run the errands, if you behave your self ; and if I've trouble with you, it can't be worse than some young scamps out of decent houses. You've no money, of course ?' ' Nothing but this,' — and Gilbert showed a penny. 'No other clothes, I suppose ?' ' No, sir,' answered the boy, colouring. ' I can't have rags in my shop,' said his new master sharply. ' Well, come in with me, and I'll see what I can do.' ' Thank you, sir,' said Gilbert earnestly. ' You've no cause to thank m-3. I shall turn you off at a day's notice if you're not honest and willing.' 'Very well, sir.' Gilbert had found his fortune.

Chapter II

A NEW LIFE. Gilbep.t had a broom put into his hands, and soon learned to use it to his master's satisfaction. He polished the windows, too, till they shone, and was quick in running errands. A little cupboard of a room behind the shop was given him to sleep in ; he took his meals at his master's table, after his master himself had gone back to the shop ; and for almost the first time in his life he wore a suit of whole clothes, without a rent or even a patch any where about them. To be sure, they were a little too long in the arms, and too short in the legs, since the coat had belonged to his master, and the trousers had been out grown by a boy of his own age ; but they were neat and clean, and Gilbert's self-respect rose higher from the day he first put them on. He felt himself a person of far more importance now that he had a decent roof over his head and: honest work to do ; and it was funny to see the grave and business-like air with which he went on his errands about the town, or answered the questions of cus tomers if he happened to be left for a few minutes alone in the shop.

If ever, when he was in the streets, his mouth was suddenly pursed up for a whistle, or if he turned his head and walked slower for an instant to look at something that seemed interesting, the whistle died away upon his lips, and the steady, straightforward walk was taken up again, as though he scorned to let his thoughts be turned away from serious business for one moment. When he was quite alone, however, he could unbend a little, and his morning work in the shop was cheered by a constant overflow of whistling and singing, in low tones at first, but in a few days, when he had got a little used to the place, it was sent forth with the full power of a strong but untrained voice, so that his master, who was a light sleeper, was roused by it one morning at an un pleasantly early hour. ' Confound that boy, will he never hold his tongue ?' murmured the provoked sleeper, as he heard the first loud notes come through the floor before the sun was up ; but the boy did not hold his tongue, he would not have known what to do with his spirits if he had not worked them off in this way now and then ; and the tired tradesman had to listen to Gilbert's singing for a quarter of an hour longer, and then to a really clever and most life-like imitation of the songs of all the birds in woods or fields as it seemed, bound together and mingled like the notes of the mocking bird ; — till he gave up the thought of sleep, dressed and went downstairs.

Thrushes, blackbirds, robins, wood-pigeons, and many more seemed to have been holding a concert together in the shop, while the cry of a cuckoo or jackdaw came in now and then as a variation, and it had really been a curious and interesting performance ; but Mr. Griffiths, whose rest had been broken by ill-health, hardly looked upon it in that light. He began to think the boy would be an un bearable nuisance, but relented a little when he remem bered the trouble he had always had to get his idle lads out of bed in the morning, and saw Gilbert's bright face as he stood in the doorway, all the early work done, and the shop in perfect order at that unusual hour. ' Did you think I was deaf ?' asked Mr. Griffiths rather tartly, in answer to Gilbert's pull at the front lock of his hair. ' You've cheated me out of my sleep this morning with your shouting and whistling.' ' I'm very sorry, sir,' said Gilbert ; ' I never thought of that.' ' No, I should say not.

Let me see,' said the master abruptly, as he sat down upon his stool and looked hard at the boy from under frowning brows, ' you have been with me now, how long ?' ' Just two weeks to-day, sir,' answered Gilbert. ' And you want to stay ? Not tired of work yet ?' The boy looked up startled and a little alarmed. ' I'd like to stay, of course. You're not going to send me away, are you, sir ?' ' Why, no,' replied his master slowly ; ' from what I have seen as yet, I suppose, I might do worse. I said nothing about wages.' Gilbert's eyes danced expectantly. He had not looked for wages just yet ; if he could have his food and a shelter, with a cast-off garment now and then, he was quite content. ' I shall pay you two shillings a week for the present,' said Mr. Griffiths, after a rapid calculation of how much, or rather how little, would be needful to enable the boy to make a decent appearance. ' There's four shillings for you ; what will you do with it?' ' Save it up for a pair of boots,' answered Gilbert promptly, looking down at those which seemed likely soon to fall from his feet. ' Can you read ?' asked his master, bringing forward a new subject. ' Yes, sir.' ' Write too, perhaps ?' ' Why, not much to speak of, sir.' ' Well,' said Mr. Griffiths, showing him a paper, ' can you read this ?

It's a list of the places you must carry goods to, to-day ; and the things you must bring back.' Gilbert looked up and down the paper, and all round it, but Mr. Griffiths wrote a hand that might have puzzled far better taught persons than one whose learning had never gone very far. He shook his head and gave the list back, vexed at having to own his ignorance. ' If you tell me the names and numbers, sir, I'll carry them in my head, and have it all right, as I've done before,' he suggested. ' Mind you do then,' said his master, — and went on to give a string of orders, all of which Gilbert stowed away in his brains, and promised confidently to remember ; but there were more errands to be done, and those of a more complicated kind, than he had ever before had to attend to, and on his return he had to confess to several blunders, very annoying to his master, and still more so to him self. ' I could have done it,' he remarked in a tone of much vexation, ' if I hadn't been watching a horse running away, instead of minding my own business, and that sent it all out of my head.' ' I thought you were better to be trusted than those. other hare-brained young scamps,' growled his master ; and Gilbert could hardly have told whether the speech gave him more pleasure or pain, for it was the first hint he had had yet that his master thought well of him.

Never did any boy work harder than he did that day in the desire to prove that after all he could be trusted. But this accident, and the vexation it cost him, gave a turn to Gilbert's thoughts which grew to something in another day or two. ' May I go out sometimes of an evening, sir,' he said one day, ' at a spare moment, when there's nothing to do, to a night-school that they keep near by ?' ' You find it dull in the evenings, do you ?' ' It is a little lonesome sometimes, sir, but I can put up with that easy enough. It isn't that, but I want to learn writing and figures. I want to get on a bit.' That was Gilbert's constant longing — to get 'on, to move forward from the place where he stood. ' Oh yes, you can go if you like,' answered Mr. Griffiths ; ' a little more learning won't do you any harm, I dare say.' As he spoke he leaned his head down wearily upon his hand as if it ached, with a look of such unmistakable suffering that Gilbert ventured : ' Aren't you well, sir ?' ' I never am well, boy.' ' Never well, sir ?' ' No. I think, I may say,' said his master, ' that for twenty years I have never had a day's health.

However,' he contined, rousing himself with an effort, ' those accounts must be got through.' ' Perhaps I shall be doing that for him some dav,' muttered Gilbert, full of great expectations of the learning he was about to gain. ' What's that ?' said Mr. Griffiths' sharp voice, startling Gilbert, who had thought himself unheard. ' I thought, perhaps I could help you over it some day when I was clever enough, if you'd trust me,' he said shyly. ' I never trust anyone,' returned his master no less sharply than before ; and with a frown so dark as to silence the boy very effectually. Gilbert went to the night-school as often as he could after that, and worked so well, making good use, too, of all the spare half -hours he could get on evenings when the school did not open, that he very soon got over the difficulties he met with in writing and simple arithmetic.

It was the first schooling the boy had ever had, for this was a great many years before the days when every little hamlet in the kingdom could boast of its parish school. He had picked up some knowledge of reading, he himself could hardly have told how, by slow and painful degrees, seizing every chance that came in his way, but he had never been taught before. He now soon became not only an easy reader, but a good writer, and showed himself very quick at figures. He made one or two friends among his fellow-pupils, but had not much time to spend with them, for his work filled up his whole day ; but he thought himself well off in his new life, and uever regretted the old one.

Chapter III. Danger

It was in the summer after the time when Gilbert had been first given a home in the ironmonger's shop, that he was dragging his feet wearily home at the end of a sultry, tiring day, which seemed to have taken all the spirit out of him. It was very hot. The sun had been blazing down like a furnace all day ; the horses hung their heads and went about their work with a jaded and hopeless air ; while dogs lagged painfully along the streets with tongues hanging out and tails dragging. Away in the country the cattle gathered together in groups under any scrap of shade they could find, — for it seemed of no use to try to crop a meal from the brown withered grass ; so they lay on the ground lazily switching their tails to keep off the pitiless flies, and were wretched. Nobody did more than they could help that day, and everyone was in low spirits, ' We shall have a storm,' said Gilbert to himself, as he looked at the heavy sky which had been growing dark for the last hour, leaving the air still hot and stifling ; and he was right, for in five minutes rain began to fall, in a few heavy drops at first, then faster and faster, while, the sky was quite black.

Still Gilbert did not hurry home. He felt so worn out, for his day's work had been harder than usual, that it seemed as if he could not force himself to walk faster, however the rain poured down. He reached home dripping. Mr. Griffiths was frightened and uneasy, and looked really ill. Gilbert found him trying with trembling hands and a pale face to put up the heavy shutters. 'We shall have a thunder-storm,' he said in a shaking voice, as the boy took the shutters out of his hands and fastened them, ' and there is all the iron and steel in the shop. Ah, there it is !' he cried in terror as a blinding flash swept over the sky while he still stood in the door way. Gilbert hurried in after his master, and shut and barred the door. Then he turned to Mr. Griffiths, and looked at him in real dismay.