The Dreamer and the Worker; a story of the present time

Preface

. Since this work was written, there have appeared, and with great success, most fully deserved, the stories of Mary Barton, and of Alton Locke ; the Letters on Labour, by Mr. Henry Mayhew, and Mary Howitt's trans lation of Lamartine's Genevieve. AU these books are substantiaUy founded on the same subjects, or have the same tendency — the bodUy and mental condition, the social and pobtical position and progress of the working classes. Yet not one of these books bears resemblance in design or execution to the others. They are all of one famUy, but with no more than a famUy likeness. The subjects

PREFACE.

. are often identical, and so is the pobtical feeling and opinion about them, yet the point of riew from which they are seen and described — the general treatment and style are all so different, that it becomes evident that each work has been written from dbect knowledge, observation, reflection, and original impulse. But there is one important feature in which The Dreamer and the Worker differs from the rest of its family. It never fads, on aU fab opportunities, to claim for the literary man, and public teacher, a due recognition of his order. The Avorking classes are not eA-erything ; the thinker must precede the doer — or the latter may waste his strength, and do mischief besides. The working man must be educated ; a limited number may educate themselves, but the great mass need every help that the best, i. e. the most sympathizing and highly-informed in structors can give them.

Here, then, whUe I fairly "Avarn off" aU mere novel readers, and devotees of light reading from the foUowing pages, let me at the same time preA7ent, among the more earnest, any misinterpretation of the title of this book.

PREFACE.

. V I wished to com7ey a breadth of purpose in adopting this title, synonymous with the Ideabst and the Realist, the Poet and the Mechanic, Theory and Practice, Thought and Action, &c, and I only adopted the present as preferable to any of those others, though the meaning is nearly the same. Let no one, therefore, expect any violent antithetical contrasts of character from the Dreamer and the Worker; any setting up of our practical friends, the energetic and industrious artizans, by knocking down all abstract thinkers ; any repetition of the A-ulgarminded crusade against the poet or the speculative philosopher, by calling him a visionary and a dreamer. What things he sees and foresees, what practicable structures for the future, he may dream — that is the grand question for large-minded men, and all Avho wish to be just to the world's benefactors.

Bearing this meaning in mind, as " the chUd is father of the man," and thought the father of action, the epithet of the Dreamer is Avith me, more or less, according to his views, a term of honour ; for if he dream to good purpose, he also is in bat sense a Avorking man who knoAvs what he VI

PREFACE.

. is about; and though his daUy labours may display no fruit, his years, perhaps, seeming unproductive, yet his death-bed may stiU receive consoling glimpses of a noble future, and his efforts for humanity come to practical maturity in an age ripe to enjoy them. So much for one of my heroes. For the other — and the class to which he belongs — that I have had ample means of practical observation among saUors and shipwrights, brick makers and buUders, miners and mechanics, iron works and farm-lands — and not in vain — I trust wiU be sufficiently apparent in the foUow ing pages. There is an age of action in the world ; An age of thought ; lastly, an age of both, When thought guides action, and men know themselves, What they would have, and how to compass it. The obvious, yet seldom recognised fact, that aU this moving world is made up, equaUy, of dreams and substances — Aisions and reabties — is precisely what I have long since endeavoured to display in the poem of Orion.

However FKEFACE. VII different in its form, its characters, imagery, and detaUs, the elementary principles of this great fact of human nature are the same as those in The Dreamer and the Worker. "Hunter of Shadows, thou thyself a Shade," Be comforted in this, — that substance holds No higher attributes ; one sovran law Alike develops both, and each shall hunt Its proper object, each in turn commanding The primal impulse, till gaunt Time become A shadow cast on space, to fluctuate, — Waiting the breath of the Creative Power To give new types for substance yet unknown : So from faint nebulæ bright worlds are born ; So worlds return to vapour. Dreams design Most solid lasting things ; and from the eye That searches life, death evermore retreats. Orion, Book I. c. i. The characters introduced in these volumes, though not such as are often found in modern novels and tales, are peculiarly English ; and, excepting that they are moA7ed after a certain dramatic method, may be seen by anybody, any day, in theb respective local ities. To speak in general terms, the present work is by no means founded upon imagination

PREFACE.

. VIII and invention, but upon experience and actual observation. It should be added, that my friend Mr. Douglas Jerrold, (one of the very earliest, among living men of bterature, who boldly and publicly advocated the cause of the Avorking classes,) having requested me, some time since, to write a story for his Magazine, I proposed to him The Dreamer and the Worker ; the design of Avhich, and in a great measure the con struction, I fuUy explained before a bne AA-as Avritten. It met with his immediate sympathy and approval, and appeared in the succes sive numbers of the above Journal, though in a much less complete state than at present. Various stirring public events have subsequently occurred, which have formed the basis of con siderable interpolations ; and seA'eral chapters, Avhich the conditions of bmited space compeUed me to omit, haA-e hoav been incorporated as originaUy constructed. R. H. H, AND THE WORKER.

Chapter I. Wreck Of The Steam- Packet

'ENDEAVOUR,' OFF THE COAST OF WALES FORTY LIVES LOST THE RAFT ESCAPE OF THE REST OF THE PASSENGERS AND CREW. " Go below ! down in the cabin ! not I !" exclaimed a sturdy passenger, grasping the starboard bulwark with both hands, whUe the vessel, having every prospect of shipwreck on a lee shore, rolled and tossed amidst the surges. " Go below ! What ? among aU the screaming chUdren and ghost-faced women, fainting or faUing on their knees to pray — not I, indeed ! VOL. I. B I won't do it ; and it's of no use to Why ! weU ! If you are the captain of the packet, you are not my captain, and I won't stb from this place !" A violent cross-wave at this moment burst against the starboard quarter of the steamer, beating in a part of the bulwark — and, slanting off in a Ions: dense column, it then smashed dowm and fairly carried away before it the whole of the paddle-box and wheel, on that side.

The passenger who had just spoken, together A\ith the captain and several others, Avere _ aU driven along the deck, close to the larboard gangway ; but amidst the howbng of the wind, and the voices of the captain and mates, and the cries of alarm from aU sides, this one passenger's ejaculations, every now and then, broke through the dissonance around. " Go beloAV aU of us, do you say ? — below in the crowded cabin, to be drowned in the dark, bke so many blind groping things, struggbng and maundering one over the other ! Oh, it's of no use swearing — landsman or not, no matter for that, here I stand ! I'm not in your way — here I stand ! WUl you, though ? Let the sea wash me overboard ! I'm not in your way — I say I won't go below, and it's aU no use ! " Here the vessel struck against some rocks ; and the remaining paddle-wheel on the lee side, by the concussion, was broken clean off, and the next instant it was seen tossing away upon the boiling surface of the sea, like some chUd's plaything.

" Force us aU below, will you ? Not whUe I have a limb left. Let the sea wash us over board ! better so, than be drowned groping and struggbng about bke bbnd wrhelps and kittens in a water-butt ! I choose to stay on the deck at aU risks — to look my fate in the face, and meet it bke a man. I choose to have my chance — my fab chance of escape somehow. Below there is no chance. The sea ! Let the sea Avash us overboard, and be " The voice of the speaker was abruptly buried in the clattering faU of a mass of rigging and a broken topsaU-yard from aloft, Avhich knocked him flat upon the deck, together vrith several others Avho were standing near, aU of Avhom were B completely overlaid by the heavy tangled mass ; and a huge wave at the same time leaping up, like some great white-headed monster, upon the deck, the entbe heap was covered over by a white running sheet of foam, and SAvept off, like the merest rubbish, into the sea.

This dreadful spectacle so alarmed aU the other passengers who had remained upon the deck, instigated by the example and ejaculations of the man who had just Aanished from theb sight, that they now obeyed the orders of the first mate, and staggering and stumbling AvUdly across the deck, went huddling down below. It was eA-ening. The bghts in the dusky cabin flickered and flared with the fitful roU of the vessel, and often went out. The howling of the Avind and the dashing of the sea were by this time terrific. And below in the cabin — what a scene Avas there ! The hatches were closed aboA7e, and battened down. The passengers heard this; and the horrors of theb position instantly rushed with tenfold force upon theb minds. They saw they had done AATong to come doAvn into a dungeon to be strangled by the sea, or suffocated for want of air.

Boom ! came the sea up against the reebng sides of the vessel ! What a shriek burst from all below ! Hoav can any words describe the frantic dismay — the mute agony — the varied forms of pas sion, or prostration of mind and body — the dreadful and overwhelming confusion ! Men and women hurrying backwards and fonvards and across, bke frightened animals in a cage, hither and thither, without purpose, asking hur ried questions which they themselves do not understand, and not seeming to hear their own voices ; others standing with a fixed stare and open mouths ; and some sitting Avith bloodless cheeks and chattering teeth, and their knees jerking up and down with the same rapidity. Here, several men very busy in getting together theb valuables, which they cannot disentangle, or which they drop about and rush away from ; there, a man trying to secrete something under a table — something to save himself with — here, a group of Avomen on theb knees, praying aloud — others fainting, or in fits, or uttering, every now and then, shrieks of terror at each blow of a bursting wave against the vessel's side, and at each concussion upon the rocks beneath — with the constant cry of " Oh, God, save me ! — Oh, God, have mercy upon me !"

At this horrid moment, the prayer was made by the utterer for himself only. The sole exceptions were a wo man and her husband, who cried " Oh, God, save us !" and a mother — with her chUdren dinging madly round her — who constantly cried " Oh, God, save my poor chUdren !" This scene lasted a fuU hour. The vessel now rose upon a huge bUloAv, as if ascending a steep hUl, and was then pitched forward upon a rock : her bows were stove in, and the sea instantly fiUed the fore-cabin. The vessel, however, had a thick bulk-bead of oak between the fore-cabin and the engine-room, so that she did not fiU a' midships ; but the pas sengers in the after-cabin, hearing the cry of horror that accompanied the crash, fully believed the vessel was going down instantly. A general rush was made to the ladder. Nobody could ascend — the hatches had been securely battened down.

They struggled, and cried, and beat about in vain. All lights were extinguished in the disorder, and the scene below was one human chaos of horror and hopeless violence, amidst a darkness which lent aU its aid to theb abeady frantic imaginations. But presently several of the scuttles and cabin-windows were broken and burst through, and the sea, like so many serpents from various quarters, came gurgling and curling, and hissing in. Some of the passengers, believing the last moment had arrived, feU down insensible ; and the others ran in a wild herd over them. At this hideous crisis, one man, either stronger than any of the rest, or possessing the superior poAver of a definite purpose, in addition to his strength, grasping also some iron instrument in his hand, made his way with Avedge-like force through the dense croAvd on the ladder, and with redoubbng blow7s, each heavier than the last, smashed aU the wood-work above, and let the passengers out upon the deck.

He stopped to assist seA-eral of them up, and to clear the passage for the others, and then hurried away to another part of the deck, evidently Avith some design in his mind. The first emotion of the passengers, on emerg ing from theb horrible condition below, AA7as that of a gasping sense of recovered freedom and fife, and theb first impulse was to rush forward some where to escape somehow. But the next moment, a change, almost as terrible as the scene they had left, took possession of theb faculties. Above, in the sky, a discoloured smoky heap of driving clouds showed intervals of a clear and lurid bght through the scudding rack ; and now and then they caught a glimpse of the jagged moon, magnified and deformed by their alarmed imaginations into some high-dancing and deAilish meteor ; — the wind howling and rioting through and through the rocking masts, and the sea on the vrindward side, springing up in great spbes of white and gbttering foam, the points rising at the starboard quarter, and running rapidly along the vessel's edge, getting higher and higher, tUl bending a fierce dragon-like neck, they precipitated themselves across the fore castle, and plunged again into the sea on the other side.

The dismayed passengers ran about AvUdly, sometimes coming in violent colbsion with the sailors, or with each other, falbng upon the deck, and others stumbbng over them, tiU presently some became breathless and stiU, and others clung, moaning with horror, to Avhat ever was nearest to them. The A-essel had been carried over the first ledge of rocks, and was nearing the shore. She had parted aU her anchors. AU heavy mer chandize and packages had been thrown over board. A cry was noAv raised of " The boats ! the boats !" It was found that the sailors had been getting out, and were lowering the boats. Everybody rushed to the side. The first boat that Avas lowered reached the Avater head-foremost, through hasty mismanage ment — filled, and instantlysank. The next boat AA-as capsized in the confusion that pre vaUed — several passengers jumping oA-erboard, in a state of blind excitement, AvhUe the boat was sinking, in their terror of being left behind.

The boat, now lowered, which was the barge, and v-ery7 broad in the beam, and strong, reached the water in safety, and was rapidly filled by a crowd, so that not another individual could possibly be admitted ; but before they had succeeded in pushing her off, and whUe the OA-er-crowded boat was tossing high up the vessel's side, almost to a level A\ith the deck, and then descending as if to reach her keel, the foremast of the steamer snapped close off, and went crashing over the side. Instantly eight or ten more people leaped into the boat, upon the heads of the crowd, and as instantly the whole of them went down, before a single one had time to extricate himself from the densely-packed throng. It was the last boat they had ! And now aU of those on the high-pitching deck of the doomed vessel gave themselves up for lost.

Some uttered screams ; others groaned, and wrung theb hands ; some prayed aloud on their knees : some rushed to and fro, Avith loud, incoherent ejaculations, or gabbling to themselves like idiots ; — but the predominating, and most shocking characteristic, was a selfishness, which, from its utterly undisguised excess and bmtahty, was often frightful to behold, and took the form of ferocity rather than mere seU-preservation. It was as frightful in itself as the thing it feared. Two men happened to seize the same spar, and began to lash themselves to it, and, after a few confusing tangles of their ropes, they seized upon each other, and struggled savagely, though there were plenty of other spars close at hand ; others thrust themselves into positions of apparent advantage, forcing somebody else out, perhaps to immediate destruction.

Even women w7erc not exempt from this treatment ; whUe reckless and bewUdered men went trampling over the bodies of faUen parents with their chUdren, totally disregarding them, as though they were heaps of rope-yarn or refuse. Several passengers had two, and even three life-belts under theb great coats and cloaks, (one of these life-belts being enough to support anybody of ordinary weight), and other passengers were running wUdly about, offering aU they had in the Avorld for such a thing — but in vain. But let us be just to human nature. These dreadful circumstances, at the crisis, are unfab trials of humanity. The great masses of man kind, or average of human character, are not capable, either by their original nature or inteUec tual and moral habits, of sustaining themselves in such scenes as these.

Nevertheless, there wiU almost always be found some exceptions. How grandly does a man, who retains his hu manity amidst the general loss of it, stand out from aU the rest ! — how nobly, how divinely, do women often appear, even in theb passive, self possessed resignation and feeling for others ! Nor were such examples wanting upon the present occasion. The very passenger, who had been in violent altercation with the captain as to going below, just before they were washed overboard, was observed, whUe they Avere drifting away upon the sea, to help the captain upon the broken main-topsail yard, to which they both clung till out of sight ; — a saUor, who was the most expert in lowering the barge into the water, was the very last man w7ho fably got into it ; and a poor Irish emigrant, returning home from Canada, had been contbiuaUy assisting somebody, though excessively frightened himself, and frequently ejaculating " Och ! some good saint come down and help us, for the honour of God ;" but Avhen anybody near him wanted assistance, he instantly forgot his own alarm.

Besides these passing instances, hoAvever, there were others of yet more marked cha racter. On the centre of the deck, in front of the compass box, stood a man, Avith a cheek ashy pale, but an erect attitude and a steady eye. He bent his gaze alternately upon the hideous tumult around him on the deck of the vessel, — upon the raging sea, — and upon the equaUy turbulent commotion in the sky above. His look, however, was not very observing, nor speculative as to results, nor hopeful, nor resigned to his fate. It was rather the look of one who, not seeing any present means of escape, w7as waiting Avith a certain stoical fortitude for what might happen ; and, to judge by his frequent gaze over the sea, his fortitude was attended, if not assisted, by a degree of abstraction, apparently the result of an habitual high tone of thought.

By his side, a .ith one hand held in his, stood a lady of some two or three and twenty years of age, whose unruffled appearance, both in her behaviour and her attbe, in comparison with that of aU the other Avomen present, betokened a very considerable degree of self-possession. Her chief solicitude seemed to be devoted to a doubled-up figure, wdio sat on the deck at her feet, with his head enveloped in her shawl, and who remained — Avhether from age and infirmity of body, or weakness of mind — quite motionless. "Archer," said the lady, in an under-tone, addressing him who held her hand. He did not hear her. " Those flaws in the sky," murmured he to himself, " do not vouchsafe to us one faint gleam of the hope of escape. WUl they give us a brief glance into regions of the world to come ? No, no ; we must stare doA\-n into the black abysses of the sea, w-hich show us the actual maw of death ; — and aU our long account of a short life has to be AA7ound up in a moment, and in the dark !

Great God ! Avhy should the Here and Hereafter so confound us? Why were we not given minds too mean to comprehend this dreadful pinnacle of time, — or else large enough to take our two fives into our own steady A-ision?" " Archer !" repeated the lady. He bent his head close to her face. " Do you think my father could be got down into a boat, should one come to our rescue ?" " I think not, unless I could carry him down the ship's side, the safety of which to both of us Avould be very doubtful." " I shall not leave him." " Of course not." " But if you can save yourself you must not remain with us." " I shaU remain." " Dear Archer, to what purpose ? If you can save yourself by any means, pray leave us this instant." Archer pressed her hand. " I shaU remain with you," said he. His eye was again bent over the sea, with a painful, yet half-abstracted gaze.

From this he was presently startled by the violent faU of two men and a child close at his feet, the men being engaged in a deadly conflict. The cause ap peared to be, that one of them had a life-preserver belt, which he had fastened round the body of his little girl, and was in the act of attaching himself to the child by a piece of rope, Avhen another man rushed upon them, and tore the life-preserver away from the child. This ruffian being much the stronger of the two, had now got both father and chUd beneath him upon the deck, the former of whom he had grasped so fiercely by the throat Avith both hands, that his face was abeady turning black, and his eyes starting from the sockets. " Let go your hold !" exclaimed Archer, interposing — " Wretch ! let go your hold !" Saying Avhich he dragged the uppermost man backwards by the coUar of his coat ; but he had scarcely done this before two other men rushed upon the prostrate chUd and father, and seized the life-preserver as their prize.

Archer quitted the first assaUant, and sprang towards them ; — the first assaUant rose, and also sprang upon them ; — the father rose, and sprang upon them. Each one had a hand upon the bfe-pre seiwer ; and amidst the howling of the Avind, the dashing over of frequent bUloAvs, the pitching and thumping of the vessel upon the rocks, and the screams of the clbld who Avas trodden under foot, the life-preserver Avas torn in pieces. The first assaUant, with the largest fragment in his grasp, reeled backwards to the gangway, and feU headlong into the sea ; and one of the other assaUants, together with the father, both in a state of blind fury at the destruction of the thing that was to save theb lives, seized upon Archer, and would instantly have torn him to pieces, if they had but possessed claws and fangs, — so like wUd beasts Avas their assault upon him.

But a blow upon the head of each from some one standing above the struggling group, laid the two wUd beasts at their length upon the deck. It was the man who had broken his way out from the cabin, and liberated the passengers some time since. He was a strong, finely-formed man, of the middle height, and about eight-and twenty years of age. His only clothes were a pair of pUot-cloth trousers, tightly bound round his loins Avith a black silk handkerchief, and a Guernsey frock, fitting; close to his body and arms. In his hand he held a stout marbn spike. " Thank you !" exclaimed the lady, looking gratefully towards the man, as Archer rose from the deck, apparently little injured by the AvUd scuffle. Archer nodded his head expressh7ely towards him in recognition of the service. The vol. x. c man looked alternately from the lady to Archer, and from Archer to the lady, and then at the muffled-up figure sitting upon the deck at her feet.

" I think," said he, " I can manage to take you aU into my party, and get you ashore somehoAv." " What party !" said Archer hastily, " and how ashore ? The boats are aU lost !" The man paused a second or two, and then said, in rather an under tone, " I have been making a raft — a good strong one, considering the time and other things. I meant it to carry ten or eleven, and I have picked out the best for it — men who behave like men, and not bke sheep, nor wild beasts. And those ten are now sitting on the raft to guard it, whUe I came aft to see if I could find another or two, in which case I shaU add another spar or plank — and then launch her. Come this way — shaU I carry the old man ?" So saying he approached the recumbent figure, and stooped over him AAith extended arms, to lift him up.

" Stop !" said Archer, " we are most grateful to you for this offer of help ; but as your raft AND THE WrORKER. is made of pieces of timber fastened together, which may burst asunder, so is this vessel made of still more pieces of timber bound together far more strongly, and is therefore the safest thing of the two — at present." " That is true," said the man, " but AAith such a sea and wind as this, and the A7essel pitching and grinding upon the rocks, as she has been doing this hour, she may go to pieces suddenly, or with too bttle warning to give us time to launch the raft." " Then launch your raft and make it fast by ropes to the vessel, so that we may take to it at a minute's notice." The man smUed gravely. " It would be dashed to pieces against the Aressel, or torn asunder by the sea, even if the ropes Avould hold it.

No — Avhen the raft's once launched, away she must go to leeward Avith aU upon her." " But surely," exclaimed Archer energeticaUy, " ten or twelve good men, acting upon excitement, could launch half an acre of raft, if C previously placed in the most favourable position at a ship's side !" " WeU — perhaps you're right ! Come for'ard AAith me." He stooped, and catching up the old man in his arms, hurried along the heaving deck, drily muttering, " My raft is certainly not hah" an acre." A few7 fathoms abaft the stump of the broken foremast, sat a group of detached figures, look big bke old bundles of clothes, in the dismal, stormy darkness. SUent, immoA-able, theb heads hunched up in jackets and cloaks, each one clung fast to his place on the raft, at once its occupant and its guard, riding up and down, as the deck rose and feU, and recehing every now and then the shock of a bursting Avave rushing athwart the A-essel.

A piece of rope lashing was Avound round the left arm of each of them. Three of these dusky7 figures appeared to be Avomen, and the rest Avere not aU sadors.

Chapter II. Escape On The Raft Welsh Hospitality The Two Sisters

A HOT BREAKFAST AFTER SHIPWRECK WALK TO A FARM TALK BY THE WAY. To those who retain theb self-possession after a protracted period of personal perU, however great, in which the final Uoav of fate is continuaUy threatened, yet not struck, there comes at last a sort of carelessness, or caUous incredulity of the imagination, and a general hardening of the mind, — in fact, a fortitude which is very much the result of exhausted and deadened sensibUity. AU those who had taken up theb post on the raft, remained there throughout this most dreadful night Avithout much demonstration of apprehension or emotion. The wind howled, and the vessel pitched and tossed, and every now and then grated or thumped upon the rocks ; but it had been doing this for hours, and had not yet gone to pieces ; it might not therefore go to pieces few some hours more.