Julian Cloughton, or, Lad-life in Norfolk

Front matter

OR LAD-LIFE IN NORFOLK BY GREVILLE J. CHESTER, B.A, M.R.A.I. Author of "Trans-Atlantic Sketches," "Songs for Music," &c. HonUon: MARCUS WARD & CO, 67, 68, CHANDOS STREET And ROYAL ULSTER WORKS, BELFAST IN MEMORIAM. L O U I S Æ, SORORIS DILECTISSIMÆ. PARE CONTENTS.

Introduction, ...... 9 Chapter I. — Cadger Cloughton — Godmother Grigs — The Forty Thieves — The Mangle — Gallinaceous Sterility — Our Neighbours — Gaffer, . . . .13 Chapter II. — Boys in Purple — The Good Bishop — Uncle Sam's — "Gripe, yer fule, look alive" — The Picture — Let me be a Chorister — School-days — In the Cloisters, . 19 Chapter III. — Greenstaith — Abaft the Line — Down! down! — Saved — The "Fisherman's Arms" — Eed-faced Ben — The Canon's Washing — Going away, . . .26 Chapter IV. — The Carrier's Cart and the Carrier's Dog — The Sea — Cousin Bill — I '11 be a Smuggler — St. Olave's, Highcliff — Ernsey Tower — Dame Goodram — The Gull, . 37 Chapter V. — Stormy Times — Wreck of the "Gabrielle" — Found Drowned — " Mary's" — The Graveyard by the Sea, 45 Chapter VI.— The Fish-Cart— The Sea-Urchin-Bill and Ben — Moses in the Bulrushes — The "Barley Mow" — Bill and Bessie — Home — Little Samuel — Answered Prayer, . . . . . 55 Chapter VII. — The Music of the Past — Saturdays — Jim the Poacher — Prisoners and Captives — Corky Joe — Funeral Rites and Funeral Wrongs — Exploding Canons, . 63 Chapter VIII. — The Heath — Chorale of Mendelssohn — Stephen — Never a Friend — Little Brother — Confession — The Midsummer Tea-Gardens — Lower and Lower, . 74 Chapter IX.— Stole Away— The Left Letter— The Gipsy- Sunday in the Country — The Mournful Past — Seeking the Lost — Hidden Sympathies, . . .88 Chapter X. — Three Years — The Mastodon — Ulla Borgen — Oysters and Porter — I see the Worst — Dead ! . .99 Chapter XI. — Poor Lad — The Devil's Bastion — The Living and the Dead — Sympathy— The Interruption — The Orphan's Home, .....

CONTENTS. PAGE Chapter XIL— Drunk and Unapproachable— Ulick Mullen — Hy Brysail— A Downright Providence !— Midsummer Lnkins — Now or Never — Good-bye, . • ■ H' Chapter XIII.— A Sop to Cerberus— Good-bye, Gripe— Farewell to Ulick— Pretty Gentleman— Rachel Petulengro— True Love never did run Smooth — Two Canons, . 128 Chapter XIV. — St. Olave's again — Beside the Graves — Ernsey Tower — The Raven ! the Raven ! — Marriage Lines — Stephen's Mother, . . . ■ .146 Chapter XV. — Dame Goodram's Story — Francesco of Italy —Stefano is dying — Rachel!

Introduction

AM a lone man, and as I sit night after night in the vaults of the Museum, of which I am Curator, I often find myself falling into waking dreams. It was not thus hefore she died — hefore I lost that loving, bright-eyed, quiet, yet ever-cheerful httle wife who was the "joy and crown" of my existence. Then, the long evenings passed quickly enough, for all that my work of labelling antiquities, classifying fossils, and cataloguing shells might seem dry and monotonous. But now, alas ! as I look up, no bright, smihng face meets me, and I remember that my heart's desire and love is lying in the dark churchyard of St. Leonard's Briory. And being, as I say, thus lonely, I fah into the habit of pondering long and often over the past, and of rebuilding the ruined castles B

INTRODUCTION.

. of my youth and early manhood. But although lonely and bereaved, I am not, thank God, unhappy. My occupation is not uncongenial to me, and the bread one earns by head-work or hand-work is sweet. Though poor, I am content, and have friends withal, whom, if I am spared, I may visit in my three weeks' holiday in the summer-time. Two nights in the week, too (and this is my greatest pleasure), I am present at a club of young mechanics — brave lads with fustian jackets and horny hands — to whom I impart what information I can from my scanty stock of knowledge of natural history, and to whom I read poetry and novels. On Saturdays, and mayhap on Sunday afternoons, I outwend from the smoky, manu facturing town wherein I dwell, and ascend that high, isolated, craggy hih, from whence, afar off, I can discern the faint blue mists that hang over the valley of the Trent.

And Trent, I know, falls into Humber, and Humber bears on its broad, brown bosom stately Baltic ships, and mingles its waters with that fresh, free Northern Ocean, beside whose waves I passed some of my happiest childish days. And these thoughts please me. Indeed, ah the recollections of past times bring with them sweet consolation as I do battle with the hving present, and so I cherish them. This dreamy reascending, however, and dwehing upon the first rungs of my life-ladder, to which, since my bereavement, I have become so much addicted,

INTRODUCTION.

. 11 albeit it is sweet and soothing, has begotten in me a wish to reconstruct, for the benefit, if not of others, at least of my little son, who sleeps up yonder in the garret wherein are stowed the bones of the whale and the camel and other unattractive curiosities — to reconstruct, I say, the true story of my life, or at ah events of my earlier years. Berchance, methinks, a true record of the sorrows and failings and fahs which I have survived, may, like a beacon, warn my httle boy to flee the sand-banks upon which his father struck. Berchance I, perhaps presumptuously, think I may have left — as a true poet, whose works I thank God I have hved to read, expresses it — " Footprints which perhaps another, Travelling o'er life's solemn main, A forlorn, a shipwreck'd brother, Seeing, may "4 I wih not say " take heart again," but take warning from.

To me, at least, it is sweet renovare dolores, and a pleasure to disinter buried joys. Whatever may be my future, the past is an heritage which no one — no, not even the almighty Aldermen who are Trustees of the Museum, and who so often sit upon me in committee because I know more about art and antiquities than they do themselves — can take from me. To me the " Dead Fast " is fuh of hfe, while

INTRODUCTION.

. the " Living Bresent " seems like a dream. I write, therefore, the record of my Lad-hfe, feehng that if I write at ah I must write the truth, and must teh things as they were, not as they ought to have been. At aU events, I trust that in what I have to relate there is nought of offence either to God or man. JULIAN CLOUGHTON. Midland Museum. JULIAN CLOUGHTON

Chapter I

Cadger Cloughton — Godmother Grigs — The Forty Thieves — The Mangle — Gallinaceous Sterility — Our Neighbours — Gaffer. J WAS born in the old city of Norwich, and was an only child. By birth I was a cadger — that is, I was a cadger, if cadgering or anything else but redness and flatness and a predisposition to squealing can be properly predicated of one of those uncomely " httle strangers," a new-born baby. What I mean to imply is that I was a cadger's son. My father, Beter Cloughton, although legally designated " a licensed hawker," called himself a "dealer," but to his intimate associates he was always known as " Cadger," or " Cadger Cloughton." My father's occupation was to hawk about the country with a cart drawn by two dogs, IULIAN CLOUGHTON. two great shock-haired, patient creatures, which I fear got many kicks and but little food.

The articles my father dealt in were miscellaneous rather than select, and they consisted chiefly of rags, bones, rabbit-skins, bottles, and bits of old metal. Some times, moreover, if report speaks truly, he had no objection, " in the season of the year," to give a lift into the old city to a wired hare or a poached pheasant. These, however, were always disposed of before he came home, perhaps from a lingering feehng of respect to his most faithful and most injured wife — that wife whose sole fault in the eyes of those who knew her was her loving and marrying him ; that wife to whose influence, uncertain though it was, might be traced whatever of good he either did or thought. When I was six weeks old, a great contention arose between my parents as to whether or no I should be christened.

For once my mother carried her point, and I was taken to the httle church of St. Julian, and there baptised. I was named Julian, after that most respectable saint, at the instance of Mrs. Grigs, my godmother, who was the wife of the clerk of the parish, and who, like a good Christian, always acted as godmother when the proper number of sponsors were not forthcoming. In fact, as the good old soul afterwards boasted to my mother, I was her fortieth godchdd, which she considered a highly lucky GODMOTHER GRIGS. number, as there were forty days of Lent and forty thieves, all of whom were scalded to death in boding oh by Morgiana the Clever. From this singular coincidence Mrs. Grigs proceeded to deduce the con soling conclusion that I, Julian Cloughton, would always be remarkable for the strictest honesty, an opinion which was instantly adopted by my mother as being creditable in its nature, and at least as likely as any that could be formed while I was yet unweaned and in "long clothes," and consequently pretty secure from breaking or being tempted to break the eighth commandment.

By the time I was between two and three years old, I began to perceive two things : first, that I was ah in ah to my mother; and, secondly, that my father had no affection for me whatsoever. In fact, his treatment of me was so brutal that I feared him, and dreaded his return at nights, and I was always glad to be safe in bed when he came home. Some time afterwards, I remember that my mother took me to Mrs. Grigs, and left me with that lady three whole days, and that she came back dressed ah in black, with a close-fitting white cap upon her head. And I recohect that she cried a great deal, and that she told me she had been away to a vdlage near Holt to bury my poor father, who had died suddenly How I wondered what that meant ! But I cried because mother cried. When, however, she told me that father would never come back again at nights, I dried my tears, and secretly felt strangely glad.

And then I have hazy recollections of the arrival of some great machine, with rollers and pulleys, amongst which I was continually pinching my fingers; and of our house being always fuh of steam, and always smelling of soap. My mother now took in washing. I must now try to describe our house. It was the middle one of a row of three cottages which stood on the verge of a steep hih just withinside the city, and which overlooked the river, with its sleepdy-busy wharfs, and, far beyond, its windings amongst the green meadows. The whole row was budt of faced flints and red bricks, but here and there old grey, weather-stained freestones were worked in, which, with the flints, were quarried from the ancient city wahs, which, close to an old bastion tower, ran down the hih at right angles to the last cottage of the row, and only ended at the river.

We had but two rooms — our living-room, and a sleeping-room above; but in each of these was a large hght closet. In the upper one of these I slept ; in that below we kept coals, candles, an old handleless bih-hook, and other household articles. In front we possessed a little strip of land separated from the street by a rading, and containing a httle green and white summer-house, a OUR NEIGHBOURS. 17 poplar tree, and an old wooden kennel, wherein my father's dogs had formerly been kept, but which was afterwards tenanted by an old cock, two elderly hens, and a stunted bantam of a curious, peaking, and irritable temperament. Types of sterihty were these fowls, one and ah, and guiltless of even an intention of egg-laying. But it must not be supposed we were altogether without flowers. A dusty tea-creeper chmbed over and enarched the door with its wiry leafage and strange alternate flowers of nankeen colour and purple, and we had one plant of the larger periwinkle, and (as if in derision of the barren fowls) two of the hen-and-chicken daisies.

In addition to these, my mother sowed annuahy on the fifth of May, her wedding day, a few scarlet-runner beans, more than one of which never came up, and in no year was any plant known to produce more than three pods and five beans. In front, a path ran down between two low stone wahs to the river, and behind, a dirty alley, " Bigg's Lane," connected us with the rest of the city. Next door to us, on the one hand, hved an old washerwoman, Mrs. Garrett, with her slatternly but handsome daughter Sahy, both of whom quarrehed with my mother when she too began to "take in" washing. Next door, on the other hand, hved one Michael or Mick Doughty and his two sons, three great idle fellows, who ostensibly gained theh hvehhood by dredging or didling in the river. To the Doughtys appertained a large bull dog named Gaffer, with whom I early made friends. Such was our house and such our neighbours, but with none of them, Gaffer excepted, had we any dealings. So Mother and I were ah in ah to each other.

Chapter II

Boys in Purple — The Good Bishop — Uncle Sam's — "Gripe, yer fule, look alive " — The Picture — Let me be a Chorister — School-days — In the Cloisters. MOTHEB had an uncle on her father's side, who lived at the other end of the city. He kept a small shop of second-hand goods and marine stores, and, although he hved very poorly, was reported to be rich. Now and then, but not often, I was taken to see him. Oh, well do I recohect the day, the first marked one in my life, and one which had some influence at least on my future lot, when I was eight years old ! A long-made promise to pay a visit to Uncle Sam was then to be fulfilled. It was past the middle of one of the last days of November when we started, and the weather was cold and dull and damp. After walking a considerable distance (we went out of our way to dehver a bundle of clean hnen), I noticed a vast budding, with whose exterior I was ■weh acquainted, but which I had never approached before.

I begged Mother to take me inside. She at length complied, and, seizing me by the hand, led me under a lofty portal. Even at that early age I was astonished and awed at the vast size and grandeur of the pde. On either side stood huge and massive columns capped by round arches, and spreading out far overhead stretched away a roof of fretted stone. We slowly advanced down the centre, when suddenly strains of deep music rang through the edifice, and I saw a procession approaching, headed by a number of little boys clothed in purple. Some clergymen in white vestments followed, and then, last of all, came a venerable but stih vigorous personage with snowy hah, dark eyebrows, and dark, piercing eyes. When this train had passed through an arched door into a space beyond dimly lighted by wax tapers, we followed, and then I heard a clear musical voice, and then Mother knelt on the ground, and made me fohow her example.

Then, rising, I again heard strains of music and waves of melody, which echoed around me and thrihed my every nerve. Long I stood rooted to the ground, drinking in the music with my ears, and as if I were in a happy dream. I was roused by hearing my mother sobbing, but she brushed away her tears and led me hasthy away. I could not speak at first, but when I could, I asked about ah I had seen and heard. Then Mother told me I had been in the great Cathedral Church, and that the strong, old, snowy-haired man was the good UNCLE SAM. 21 Bishop ; that the boys in purple were called choristers, and that their business was to sing the praises of God. " Let me be a chorister, Mother," said I ; but before she could answer, we turned in at Uncle Sam's. I have already explained that my mother's paternal uncle, whom I now introduce as Mr. Samuel Breeze, kept a small shop of second-hand goods and furniture.

In this very shop we found him. I hope I may not be suspected of being without natural affection, when I declare that my mother's uncle was as ill-favoured and foxy-looking an old gentleman as can well be imagined. He had narrow, cunning eyes and reddish hair, and his face was adorned by a great superfluity of pimples — a pecuharity which was ascribed by his enemies to his excessive fondness for gin and water cold. This, it may be, was only scandal, but it must be conceded, in favour of the hostile parties, that a strong smell of spirits pervaded the premises. As we entered, Uncle Sam was sitting in an old-fashioned arm-chair smoking a pipe, and between Uncle Sam's legs sat an ugly half-bred bull-dog, white, with brown blotches, which growled ominously on our appear ance. Uncle Sam did not get up, but he took his pipe out of his mouth with his right hand, whde he shook hands with Mother with the left.

Then, seeing that I looked frightened at the dog, he addressed me — " Well, young Kiddy, how are yer ? There, bor, don't go fur to whine and fret, or I'U set Gripe on yer in arnest. Gripe, yer fule, look alive there !" At this genial salutation I burst right out a-crying, which so angered Uncle Sam that he pushed Mother before him into an inner room, and shut to the door, leaving me in the front shop. I was terribly scared at this proceeding, as I fully expected to be forthwith worried by Gripe. Gripe, however, after smelling at me for some time, wagged his stump-tad, which encouraged me warily to pat his rough back, upon which he wagged his tad again. This second wag put ah my fears to flight, and I began to play with him, and soon found that he improved wonderfuhy upon acquaintance. For, not to mention that I discovered an extraordinary resemblance between him and Gaffer, he kept running about in the funniest manner imaginable (sometimes backwards) amongst the lumber with which the shop was filled.

When I tried to catch him, he dashed through the legs of old tables and chairs, and then turned round as if to laugh (which indeed I am convinced he did) at my vain endeavours to follow him. At last, just when I thought I had pinned him up in a corner, he suddenly rushed between my legs, and bolted out into the street. As I dared not leave the house, I was fain to remain looking at the goods which were piled up in every direction, and which to me were a complete mine of curiosities. During my examina- THE OLD PICTURE. 23 tion, I observed behind an old piano an ancient picture hung on the wah. In trying to reach this, I suddenly lost my balance, and fell across the keys of the piano. The noise of my fah added to the triumphant barking of Gripe, who, rushing in as fast as he had formerly rushed out, soon brought my mother and uncle out of the inner room.

The former, seeing that I was not hurt, asked what I had been doing. I answered that I wanted to get at the old picture behind the furniture, and that if I tumbled twenty times I would reach it at last. Then Uncle Sam cahed me " a gamey young shaver," and after some trouble in reaching down the picture, and the stirring up of suffocating clouds of dust, he told my mother that I might have "the old gay" for my own, if we could manage to carry it home. I was over joyed when she consented, and after a few minutes, having wished Uncle Sam and Gripe good-bye, we were on the way home. The night was frosty and the sky clear, and as I looked up at the stars which spangled the calm, shent heavens, I forgot all I had last seen, and my mind returned to the great church, and I thought how much more beautiful and vast the sky was than the roof of that huge phe, and how much more beautiful must be the songs of the Holy Angels in Heaven, whereof Mother had told me, than even the solemn music of the organ and the voices of the choristers, which stdl thrhled my very heart.

When Mother came that night, according to custom, to kiss me in my little crib before I went to sleep, I whispered, " Let me be a chorister, Mother." There was no answer, but a tear fell upon the wick of the rushUght which she held in her hand, and extin guished the light. Mother was crying ! Next morning, when I opened my eyes, I saw a sweet and gentle face looking down upon me. The great full eyes were dark, but soft and sad, and long masses of gold-gleaming hair feU down in waving tresses on either side of an oval face. The hands were clasped, as if in some great sorrow. So sweet a face I was not used to see, and the beauty of woman and the magic power of art made a deep and ineffaceable impression upon my mind, although I was so small a boy, and the son of a cadger and a poor washerwoman.

It was the picture given me by Uncle Sam, and the work, doubtless, of some long-dead Italian hand. When I sat at breakfast the next morning, Mother told me she had been thinking ah night about my wish to be a chorister — that she thought my wish a good one, and that she had resolved to make inquiries on the subject. Accordingly, she started after break fast to cah on Dr. Belton, the Cathedral organist, but soon returned with the bad news that he had declared that it was impossible to admit me ; " even," said he, " if I had the voice of an angel." There was no vacancy at present, and the next was promised to IN THE CLOISTERS. 25 the second son of the Dean's butler. This was indeed sad news, but there was no help for it. After this, when school was over (for I went to school now every day), I used often to run down to the Cathedral, and it was my greatest pleasure, eluding the crusty old vergers, to stand in some remote part of the church, and hsten whilst the majestic tones of the organ rang along the arched roof and pealed through the dusky aisles.

By-and-by, too, I made acquaint ance with some of the choristers, and many a merry game I had with them in the cloisters, and in the Cathedral-yard outside the southern door. Thus passed that winter and the next without incident worthy of note ; but at the beginning of the summer fohowing, an event occurred which I must record in the next chapter. c

Chapter III

Greenstaith — Abaft the Line — Down, down! — Saved — The "Fisherman's Arms "— Red-faced Ben — The Canon's Washing — Going away. BELOW the city, embosomed in rusthng poplars and aspens and huge willow trees, stands on the breezy river-bank the tiny hamlet of Greenstaith. Here dwelt an old friend of my mother, one Mrs. Huxtable, the landlady of a little waterside inn much resorted to in summer by the citizens of Norwich. It was to this inn that I was to be taken by Mother, at the special invitation of Mrs. Huxtable, on the last Saturday of June. We were to go down the river in a steamer, to spend the day at the Fisherman's Arms, to dine fish caught straight out of the river, to have country cream for tea, and to come home by the return steam-packet in the evening. The prospect of these varied treats excited me to such a degree that, as my mother observed, it seemed as if the house was not large enough to hold me for a week beforehand.

I hardly slept a A PLEASANT PROSPECT. wink the night before the great day, and early on the appointed morning got up to see whether the day would be fine. As I peeped out of my little window, a beautiful scene presented itself. The sun had just risen, and gilded the masts of the small craft lying motionless on the river below, whose gently-eddying surface was tufted every here and there with tiny wreaths of mist, which seemed to struggle against being carried under by the lazy current. No one was stirring as yet on the staiths save one sailor lad, in blue jersey and scarlet cap, who was playing with a water-dog. The vahey beyond, through which the river pursued its peaceful course, was covered with a dense low-lying mist of snowy whiteness, from which every now and then a lofty widow, or the taU mast and red streamer of a wherry, towered up into the sunlight.

On either side the richly wooded hills which bounded the valley seemed to rejoice in the heat of the summer sun. Over all hung a cloudless blue sky. The day would be fine, there was no doubt about it. All my anxiety was over, and I returned to bed and slept soundly until Mother came to waken me. The packet was not to start until half-past eight, but I succeeded in dragging my mother to the wharf by half-past seven. And here, although Mother was, as she expressed it, " well-nigh worrited to dead," I was delighted in the highest degree. I was about to embark in a steamboat, a vessel of vast size and mysterious construction. I did not believe that one of the choristers, nor even Uncle Sam, had ever been in one. The very moment the plank was placed, I succeeded in forcing Mother to go aboard. But now a difficulty ensued.

An inscription presented itself in all the magnificence of capitals and gold paint, declaring, Passengers going abaft this line to pay saloon fare. What " abaft " meant, and where the hne was, when the whole vessel seemed a perfect labyrinth of cordage, neither Mother nor I, in our profound ignorance of seafaring matters, could divine, and accordingly she at once conducted me to the stern of the vessel. Here, however, we were met by a good-natured-looking, red-faced lad, who wore a blue pdot coat and a low-crowned hat, with " Black eyed Susan" painted round it in gold letters, and carried a white pink between his teeth, who put us right, and caused us to retreat to the other end. The whole appearance of this young man inspired me with the deepest admiration and respect, the latter emotion being heightened by my observing that his right wrist was tattooed with the figure of a mermaid, two anchors, a heart pierced by six arrows, and the letters " M. A. H." Mother suggested that this pictorial effort was the work of " Indians," but my after acquaintance with the Fisherman's Arms and its inmates gave a surer clue to the MY FELLOW-PASSENGERS. 29 mystery.

Bassengers now came flocking aboard. First came a portly, elderly personage in shovel hat and knee-breeches, who supported on his arm a beautiful young lady, apparently his daughter ; then Mr. Grimble, a sallow gentleman who owned a cheap "tea mart" in the city and a villa near Greenstaith, and who always took the chair at teetotal meetings and at the anniversaries of Ana baptist meeting-houses; then two or three sadors, with their effects seemingly stowed away in bolster cases; then five or six labourers going to work in a chalk-pit; and then a bell rang fiercely, and we were off. Oh, the pleasure of that, my first voyage upon the broad, gently-eddying river, which the paddle-wheels dashed into silver spray ! Oh, the joy of passing rapidly between the green, green meadows, where the rich grass almost reached the udders of the placid cattle as they grazed, and whence the scent of the white, feathery meadow-sweet was borne to us upon the breeze with almost intoxicating sweetness !

And oh, how Mother entered into my joy ! When at last she pointed out the Fisherman's Arms, and fat Mrs. Huxtable and her fat, rosy daughter upon the httle pier, I felt quite sorry, and longed to go on in the steamer to its destination. As soon as we were directly opposite Greenstaith, a boat put off to land the passengers. First the clergyman and his daughter got out, then Mr. Grimble, then two of the labourers with their mattocks on theh shoulders and theh dinners tied up in old cotton handker chiefs, and, last of all, Mother and I. As soon as I had been lowered into the boat, it was shoved off suddenly, when I, who was leaning carelessly over the side with my hands in the water, lost my balance and fell into the river. The paddle-wheels whirled round at the same moment, and I was carried some way off the boat.