“Come cropper lads of high renown,Who love to drink good ale that’s brown,And strike each haughty tyrant down,With hatchet, pike, and gun!Oh, the cropper lads for me,The gallant lads for me,Who with lusty stroke,The shear frames broke,The cropper lads for me!What though the specials still advance,And soldiers rightly round us prance,The cropper lads still lead the dance,With hatchet, pike, and gun!Oh, the cropper lads for me,The gallant lads for me,Tho with lusty strokeThe shear frames broke,The cropper lads for me!And night by night when all is stillAnd the moon is hid behind the hill,We forward march to do our willWith hatchet, pike, and gun!Oh, the cropper lads for me,The gallant lads for me,Who with lusty strokeThe shear frames broke,The cropper lads for me!Great Enoch still shall lead the van.Stop him who dare! Stop him who can!Press forward every gallant manWith hatchet, pike, and gun!Oh, the cropper lads for me,The gallant lads for me,Who with lusty strokeThe shear frames broke,The cropper lads for me!”
“Come cropper lads of high renown,
Who love to drink good ale that’s brown,
And strike each haughty tyrant down,
With hatchet, pike, and gun!
Oh, the cropper lads for me,
The gallant lads for me,
Who with lusty stroke,
The shear frames broke,
The cropper lads for me!
What though the specials still advance,
And soldiers rightly round us prance,
The cropper lads still lead the dance,
With hatchet, pike, and gun!
Oh, the cropper lads for me,
The gallant lads for me,
Tho with lusty stroke
The shear frames broke,
The cropper lads for me!
And night by night when all is still
And the moon is hid behind the hill,
We forward march to do our will
With hatchet, pike, and gun!
Oh, the cropper lads for me,
The gallant lads for me,
Who with lusty stroke
The shear frames broke,
The cropper lads for me!
Great Enoch still shall lead the van.
Stop him who dare! Stop him who can!
Press forward every gallant man
With hatchet, pike, and gun!
Oh, the cropper lads for me,
The gallant lads for me,
Who with lusty stroke
The shear frames broke,
The cropper lads for me!”
The song was chorused with gusto by most there, and it was plain enough to see that the meeting had more hopes from great Enoch, as the Luds called the hammer used in machine smashing, after Enoch Taylor of Marsden, than they had from either persuasion or threats. That something more than words was in their minds was evident enough later on when we all turned out into a field at the back of the Buck. There was a watery moon in the sky that gave a ghostly sort of light. By this light Soldier Jack drew up the twenty or thirty men who left their cups and followed him into the fold. And there did Jack put us through our drill. One or two had muskets, a few had pikes. They had been fetched out of the mistal, where by day they lay concealed on the hay bowk. It was rare to see Jack at his drilling. We were formed in line fronting him, and Jack did gravely walk down the line, commenting on our appearance, and trying to bring us to some fashion of military time.
And this was the style of drill.
“Hold thi head up, man; thi breast’s noan th’ place for thi chin.” This to No. 1.
“Dal thi, No. 2, will ta’ square thi shoulders back or will ta’ not? Hast ta’ getten th’ bellywark ’at tha’ draws thissen in like that?”
“Turn th’ toes ’aat, No. 3. I said heels together not toes, tha’ gaumless idiot.”
“Na’ then, tenshun! Eyes front. Shoulder arms, right wheel. Mar———ch!” And away walked Jack with his head up and an old sabre over his shoulder, disguising his limp as best he could, at the head of his little column, as proud, I verily believe, as though he captained a company. It seemed to me poor fooling, then and always, but it gave such huge satisfaction to Soldier Jack, I never had the heart to tell him so, nor to shirk my drill.
“A poor shiftless lot,” he complained to me as we walked near midnight across Cupwith Common, the three rough miles that lay between the Buck and Lower Holm. “A peer shiftless lot, but what could you expect from a lot of croppers?”
“What do you think to make of them, Jack?” I asked.
“Why, nowt,” he answered. “Just nowt; but then yo’ see they mun do something. It’s all very well to go to th’ Buck an’ drink ale an’ sing songs. I’ll back th’ croppers at drinkin’ ale an’ singing songs against th’ best regiment the Duke has in Spain. But if all this meeting an’ masking an’ speechifyin’ is to do any good and lead to owt, there must be action, sooner or later. And in that day it will be well for th’ Luds if there is even one voice which they have learned to obey. Do you think it’s the great generals that win battles?”
“Why, of course, it is?” I answered.
“That’s just where yo’re out,” said Jack.
“It’s th’ sergeants and th’ corporals. Yo’ see in a feight yo’ cannot see much further nor yo’r nose end. All yo’n got to do for th’ most part is to keep your eye an’ yo’r ear on th’ sergeant that’s drilled yo’ sin’ yon learned the goose step, an’ do as he tells you. As long as he keeps his head an yo’ hear his voice, calm an’ cheerful, just as if yo’ were in the barrack yard or on parade, yo’r all reight an’ yo do as you’re told, like Tommy Tun, whoever he wer.”
“I never heard on him, Jack. Whose lad was he?”
“Aw don’t rightly know, but aw reckon he were famous for keepin’ in step. Howsomever, mark my words, George Mellor’s a good lad, wi’ fire enough for hauf a dozen. That lad o’ Parson Booth’s, ’at ’ud be better employed if he wer’ at home helpin’ his mother to rock th’ craddle, is a rare ’un to talk. Thorpe’s a good ’un if it comes to fisticuffs, but it’ll be Soldier Jack they’ll all look to when th’ bullets is whizzing ovver their heads, an’ what little wit they have is scattered an gone.”
“But, surely, Jack, there’ll be no whizzing of bullets?”
“Oh! won’t there? Aye that an’ waur. Do yo’ know Horsfall, o’ Ottiwell’s, has got th’ soldiers billetted in th’ town, th’ King’s Bays. Aw’ve drunk wi’ sum o’ them, an’ had a crack about old times. Oh! curses on this gamey heel o’ mine that keeps me limping o’er Cupwith Common when I might be stepping out behind the colours to the merry music of fife an’ drum. Yo’ll never know, lad, the savage joy of battle. It is the wine o’ life. When yo’ve once tasted it, even love an’ liquor are flat beside it. But what can’t be cured mun be endured. Well aw say, aw’n talked wi’ a sergeant at th’ Red Lion i’ Marsden. They’re patrolling th’ district ivvery night. If we go to Ottiwell’s, there’ll be a warm welcome for us.”
“But why are yo’ in it, Jack, that’s what caps me?” I said. “Yo’re nawther a cropper nor th’ son of a cropper.”
“No. What o’ thissen Ben?”
“Well, yo see, I promised George. I cannot run off mi word. An’ George sees further, perhaps, nor I do. Then young Booth says its opposition or submission. Opposition may mean imprisonment or worse, but submission can only mean pining to death.”
“Then yo’r in for George?” Jack asked.
“Well if you like to put it so, Soldier, yo’ll none be so far off th’ mark.”
“Well then say aw’m in it for yo’ an’ for sport, an’ cause an’ its i’ mi natur. But most, Ben Bamforth, it’s for yo’ an’ another lad or two, ’at’ll need a true friend an’ a shrewd head an’ a tricky tongue before this work’s through. And so, good neet, an’ wipe th’ muck off thi boots, else that saucy Mary o’ yours ’ll be axing more questions nor yo’ll care to answer.”
CHAPTER V
THE last day of March of that year of 1812 was a big day for me. I came of age. It would little seem me to say what mariner of man I was in the flush and vigour of my early manhood, but I was such a one as simple habits and plain fare and mountain air make of most. I was tall above the common, though even then not come to my full stature. And I was strong with a strength that frightened me. Folk marvelled at my height, for my father was but a small man, though wiry, and my mother matched my father. I had in those days ever to be careful of my head when I visited at folks’ houses, for the doorways were low and there were joists in unexpected places, and many a rude knock did my poll sustain before I learned caution by hard dints. Many youths do overgrow their strength, but that did not I, and though I had not ’Siah’s skill in wrestling, nor knew the tricks of the fall, ’Siah could not throw me, and once I got him in my arms, though he was thick set and solid, I could strain him in my hug till his very bones could crack. But my inches, three Score and fourteen, were much mocked by the lads about, who would make a spy–glass of their hands, and fixing an earnest gaze upon the crown of my head, would ask with mock concern if it were warm up there.
Now on this, my birthday, nought would satisfy my mother but that we should have a tea–drinking. I was in no great mood for such doings, but my mother must ever have her way. She said it was no, ordinary birthday. A man became a man but once in a life–time, and moreover, and this settled the matter with her, in no decent family was such an event allowed to pass unmarked. Times were bad she granted, but it was not as though we were bound to live from hand to mouth. So I bid my friends. Of course, George must come, and a handsomer, brighter lad never set foot in Lower Holme than George looked that night, all fun and laughter, with a jest for everyone. And he brought with him Ben Walker, whom I made welcome, as I should have made welcome the Evil One himself had George brought him. And I liked Walker as little. From the very first I misdoubted that man. I disliked his toad’s hand, his shifty eye, his low speech. There was something sly in his very tread, and his laugh had no heartiness in it. Then he was so cursedly civil to everybody. He praised my mother’s cakes: never were such cakes, and though, God knows he was welcome enough to eat his fill, he did not praise them without fair trial. He praised the tea, he praised the pig–cheek, he set little Mr. Webster all of a glow by telling him how edified he was by his last discourse at Powle Moor, but he had like to have come to grief with Soldier Jack by belittling the great Duke. Then he fell to praising Mary, and here he had like to have spoiled all, for as he spoke of her good looks he let his eye dwell upon her features with a look so gross that Mary coloured red with wrath, and my mother told him sharply Mary was not a slave for sale in the market, and we needed no inventory of her charms. So he at Mr. Webster again on religion, and as Buck Walker, his father, had turned pious in his latter days, and was now a leader at the Powle, the good man and Ben hit it rarely together. But his eye, I noted, ever wandered to Mary, and it liked me not.
I had asked, too, John Booth and his sister Faith, a demure young maid as ever made a courtesy. She was just all that Mary was not, and yet she pleased, which, when you think of it, should set us marvelling at the great goodness of God that hath so fashioned our maids that even their very extremes are admirable. For Mary was rosy and plump, with auburn curling hair, that would never be kept by net or string, but would escape and wanton over her face and neck, and had a laughing eye of blue, with rosy lips, and a saucy tongue. A very ray of warm sunshine was Mary.
But Faith was dark as a sloe as to hair and eye, with a skin of delicate white, and slender as a lily’s stalk, and gentle of speech and somewhat shy of manner, yet with no awkwardness withal. My heart, did warm to her from the first, and I think too she favoured me from the very day her brother made us acquaint at his master’s shop in Huddersfield. Perhaps because I was so big and strong, whilst her brother, though wonderful far learned in books, and with as big a soul as was ever put in man’s body, was only a short remove from a woman in those things which women love in man. And strange as it is that two maids so unlike should both be so sweet to live with and to think upon, is it not stranger still that two men so unlike as Soldier Jack and myself should be at one about Faith’s sweetness and loveableness.
Jack, if we might credit his own word in the matter, had a wide experience in the lists of love, but chiefly, I fear, among the hussies that followed the camp and the warm and yielding beauties of sunny Spain. Yet did this tried veteran surrender the garrison of his heart without parley and without terms to the gentle assault of this pure and modest lass, but with no thought of other love than a father’s or a brother’s, for Jack was well into the forties, and had had his fill of the burnings of a warmer flame.
Now after our tea–drinking was done, my father and Mr. Webster settled down by the fireside to smoke their pipes and talk of town’s affairs and the ever pressing sufferings of the poor. Mr. Webster’s talk was heavy hearing. He knew every family on that hill–side, and scarce one was free from griping want. The parson’s voice would falter and tears come to his eyes as he told his tale, and I could see my father shift uneasily in his chair and his hand wander to his pocket, and my mother would break in with “Hear to him, now!” “The likes o’ that,” “God save us,” and so on. And presently she went into the outer kitchen where leavings of our feast were spread, and when Mr. Webster went home that night Josiah trudged by his side with a hamper of good things. Not, be sure, for Mr. Webster himself, for of his own needs, though these were rather suspected than known for sure, the good man spoke not at all; and I will go bail he proved a trusty steward of the comforts borne on ’Siah’s broad shoulders.
For us younger ones there was no lack of sport, Postman’s Knock and Forfeits and other games in which there is overmuch kissing to my present thinking though I did not think so then. And if, whenever the rules of the game did give me occasion, I chose Faith rather than Mary, had I not reason in that Faith was the greater stranger to our house, and I was ever taught to be civil to our guests. And I was no little nettled by the carryings on of Mary and George. In my heart I cried shame on Mary, and said to myself it was unseemly that a maiden of a respectable family should so set herself at any man. It was “George” here and “George” there, and “Cousin Mellor” and “Cousin Mary,” though what kinship of blood there was between them was so slight it was a manifest pretence and cloak to make so much of it. I do hate a forward girl, and it was not like our Mary to make herself so sheap. Why, but the week before, being moved thereto on seeing her more tantalizingly pretty than common, I had made to give her a cousinly salute, and she had smacked me smartly on the cheek and started away in a rare pet. But I took care this night she should see I could play the swain as well as any George among them, and Faith seemed nothing loth. Not that she was over–bold. When I would kiss her she would turn her cheek to me with a pretty readiness, and seemed in no wise to mind it; but when George could spare a thought for any but Mary, and choose Faith, the colour would crimson her cheeks and brow, and she would turn her face away, and then, lo! all her flush would fade and leave her pale and trembling.
But we were perhaps getting over old for such games not yet old enough for the whist to which our elders had betaken themselves. So Mary, after no little urging thereto, did seat herself at the spinnet, which was a new joy in our house and had been the occasion of some bitterness to our friends. And touching the keys softly thus she sang very roguishly:—
“Love was once a little boy,Heigh ho! heigh ho!Then with him ’twas sweet to toyHeigh ho! heigh ho!He was then so innocent,Not as now on mischief bent;Free he came; and harmless went,Heigh ho! heigh ho!Love is now a little man,Heigh ho! heigh ho!And a very saucy one,Heigh ho! heigh ho!He walks so gay and looks so smart,As if he owned each maiden’s heartI wish he felt his own keen dart,Heigh ho! heigh ho’!Love, they say, is growing old,Heigh ho! heigh ho!Half his life’s already told,Heigh ho! heigh ho!When, he’s dead and buried too.What shall we poor maidens do?I’m sure I cannot tell—can you?Heigh ho! heigh ho!”
“Love was once a little boy,
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
Then with him ’twas sweet to toy
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
He was then so innocent,
Not as now on mischief bent;
Free he came; and harmless went,
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
Love is now a little man,
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
And a very saucy one,
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
He walks so gay and looks so smart,
As if he owned each maiden’s heart
I wish he felt his own keen dart,
Heigh ho! heigh ho’!
Love, they say, is growing old,
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
Half his life’s already told,
Heigh ho! heigh ho!
When, he’s dead and buried too.
What shall we poor maidens do?
I’m sure I cannot tell—can you?
Heigh ho! heigh ho!”
Whereat my father and Soldier Jack shouted lustily “Heigh ho’! heigh ho!” and my mother shook her head but with a smile, and Mr. Webster must confess it was a pretty air and taking one, and trusted the singing thereof was not a holding of the candle to the Evil One. But Mary made a mouth at him and said, ’twould be time enough to be sad when she was too old to be merry.
Now after the singing of this catch it so befell that my mother had some occasion to desire from the village some small matter for the supper table, and Martha being intent upon getting ready the supper she bid Mary privily slip away and fetch the things she needed. This did Ben Walker overhear, though it was no business of his, and when Mary, watching her chance, had gone softly out of the one door, Ben, making some excuse, did steal away by the other, a thing we thought nothing of, deeming it but natural that a young man should seek to company a maid, and I not uneasy on Mary’s account, the night being fine and clear, and decent women being not molested in our parts, where strangers came little, and all were as friends and neighbours.
Now she had been gone some three parts of an hour, when I heard the front door open hurriedly and then slam to. My mother rose quickly and went into the parlour. It was in darkness, for we seldom used it save for company, and for our company of this night it was not large enough. But despite the gloom I knew it was Mary. My mother drew her into the house and placed her in her own rocking–chair. All had risen to their feet. Mary’s hat was hanging by its strings down her back. Her decent neckerchief that covered her neck and bosom had been torn aside, and some of the fastenings of her dress undone. She was panting hard for breath, and for a time could form no word.
“Where’s Ben Walker?” I said, and then Mary found her voice.
“Aye,” she cried, “where is he? Oh! the coward, the coward!” and then she sobbed and cried again “Oh! the coward, the coward.” And just then the sneck was lifted and Ben Walker walked in.
He stood in the door way; but I banged the door behind him; and Soldier Jack took him by the arm and drew him into the room, whilst Faith soothed Mary and straightened her dress.
“And now, Ben Walker, give an account o’ thissen,” said George, standing before the shrinking man, with clenched fist and a flashing eye.
And Walker shamed and faltered. His eye wandered from one face to another, and found no comfort anywhere.
“It’s noan o’ my doing, George. Tha’ needn’t look so fierce. Awn laid no hand on her, han aw Mary? Speak th’ truth, choose what tha’ does, it goes th’ furthest.”
“Oh! you coward, you pitiful coward!” was all that Mary could say; but she was calmer now.
“It wer’ this way,” continued Walker reluctantly. “We’d done th’ shopping at Ned o’ Bill’s, an’ had passed th’ church an’ got well into th’ lane comin’ back. Aw wer’ carryin’ th’ basket.”
“Where is th’ basket?” cried my mother.
“By gow, I reckon aw mun ha’ dropped it. Aw nivver gav’ it a thowt’, an’ aw nivver missed it till nah. As aw wer’ saying’, aw wer’ huggin’ th’ basket wi’ one arm, an’ aw’d axed Mary to hold on to th’ other.”
“As if aw’d link wi’ sich as thee,” said Mary, bridling again.
“An all at onst, about half–way up th’ broo’ a felly lope ovver th’ wall. He wer’ a big un, aw tell yo’, an’ ther’ wer’ more behind, aw heard ’em eggin’ ’im on. If he’d been by hissen aw’d ha stood up to him if he’d been as big as a steeple. He said nowt to me, but he gate hold o’ Mary an ’oo started to scream an’ struggle, an’ aw heerd him say he’d have a kiss if he died for it. Aw wer’ for parting on ’em, but he gav’ me such a look, an’ aw thowt aw heerd others comin, so aw just made off across th’ fields. Tha’ knows, George, duty afore everything, an’ if th’ soldiers is about they’re happen comin’ here an’ tha’ knows best whether tha’ wants to see ’em.”
“A soldier was it,” I cried. “What mak’ o’ man wor he?”
“Aw tell thee bigger nor thissen, wi’ a black poll an’ a eye like a dagger blade for keen, an’ ther’ were a scar across his face.”
“It were one o’ them chaps ’at’s stayin’ at John Race’s at th’ Red Lion i’ Marsden,” said Mary. “He stopped me once afore a week back, when aw wer’ walkin’ out that way on. But he spoke me civil then, an’ aw thowt nowt on it. But he’s been drinkin’ to–neet an’ used me rough an’ fleyed me. But aw reckon he’ll keep his distance another time. It’ll be a lesson to him.”
“How does ta mean, Mary?” said my mother. “Aw got one o’ his fingers between my teeth an’ aw bit him, an’ bit him, an’ bit him, an’ he had hard to do to throw me off. Then he called me a vicious little devil, an’ aw tucked up my skirts an’ ran for it. Aw wer’ more fleyed nor hurt. But thee! Ben Walker, thee!” and she turned from him, with a look of such contempt and scorn that Ben hung his head with a hang–dog look and mumbling something about outstaying his welcome and making his way shorter, he slunk off, no one staying him.
And thus was my birthday party dashed. We could settle down to nought after that. Mary was feverish, and laughed over much. My father talked of going down on the morrow to Milnsbridge and laying complaint to Justice Radcliffe. Little Mr. Webster said something, in a very half–hearted way, about praying for those that despitefully use us, and my mother flighted Mary, most unjustly I thought, for having ever spoken to the man at all, and so encouraged him. Soldier Jack said little, but I know he resented the outrage, for it is one thing for soldiers to make light with other folks’ women–kind and another guess sort of thing to have your own friends fall into their clutches. But George was warmest of all. He made us a grand speech agen the army and officers and men, which Soldier Jack swallowed with an ill grace. Hetty listened to him with all her ears, and you could see she liked to hear him rave on. And Mary, too, when first he began, harkened keen enough, but soon she turned away impatiently and busied herself with setting the supper, and I thought she had looked for something from George which did not come.
For me, I am slow of speech, stupid, Mary ever said. But I thought to myself: “A long, tall man, as big as a steeple, with a black poll, and a scar on his cheek,” and long after George and John Booth and pretty prim Faith had started for Huddersfield, and Soldier Jack and Mr. Webster had gone Powle way, I lay awake in bed thinking of a thing. The next morning I was up betimes. My father was away after the forenoon drinking, to try to sell a piece or two, a thing that every week became more difficult. There was no work to be done after the cattle had been foddered. We had almost given up work at our trade. We bad as many pieces in stock as we had room for it had gone hard with us to stop the output of country work, but what would you with the best mind in the world, you cannot go on forever making to stock. So our looms were still and time hung heavy on our bands. In the shippon I had had a word with ’Siah and when, dressed in my Sunday best, I struck off towards Marsden. I found him waiting for me on the road. “Yo’ mun keep’ yo’re head, Ben,” he said, “Watch his een. Face him square an’ watch his een. He’s a big ’un wi’ a long reach. He’ll likely come: at thee like a mad bull. Keep out on his way when he rushes. Let him tire hissen. Keep thi’ wind. Dunnot let him blow thee, let him blow hissen. He’ll be in bad fettle, wi’ no stay in him. Th’ way these sogers ha’ been living lately, he’ll ha’ more water nor wind in him, an’ more ale nor water. Then, when he shows signals o’ distress, work slowly in, and when tha’ gets a fair chance, hug him, break his ribs, squeeze th’ guts out on him. Glory hallelujah, he’ll gasp like a cod!” Then would ’Siah, after looking carefully round to see we were not observed, stop in his walk and feel my arms and legs as if I were a horse he wished to buy; then at it again with more advice. Once, with a wistful air, he surmised it might be better to fight by proxy, to let him pick a quarrel with Long Tom, as he said they called the soldier who had misused our Mary so. But he did not try long on that tack and had to content himself with hoping that some day or night, one of the red coats would try his game on with Martha and then—Glory Hallelujah! I smiled and ’Siah read my thoughts but he only said: “Oh! them sort’s noan particular. An’ there’s points about Martha, mind you, there’s points about Martha.”
At the Red Lion we found John Race, the little, round, red faced landlord in no very good humour. It was early in the day for drinking, to my taste, but ’Siah having a nice sense of honour in these matters, declared we must have some thing for the good of the house and offered, if I could not stomach a pint myself, to drink my share. So I called for a quart for ’Siah. Race handled my money very lovingly and then spit over it for luck.
“It’s little of the ready comes my way now, Ben,” he said.
“What! and a houseful of soldiers, John?”
“Oh! dun–not speak on it, Ben,” he cried. “It’s a ruined man I shall be if this goes on another month. It’s ‘John’ here and ‘landlord’ there from morning till night or till next morning rather. And paying for their drink is just the last thing they think of. Th’ kitchen door is white wi’ chalk, and, well I know it’s no use keeping the scores. It’s just force of habit.
“But surely, John, you need not serve them unless they pay.”
“It’s easy talking, Ben. Th’ law’s one thing, but a house full o’ soldiers is another. And aw cannot be everywhere an’ my dowter an’ th’ servant, an’ for owt aw know th’ missus hersen are all just in a league to ruin me. Their heads are all turned wi’ th’ soldiers an’ such carryin’s on in a decent man’s house wer nivver seen before or since.”
“But what about the officer in command?”
“What, him! Complaining to him is just like falling out with the devil an’ going to hell for justice. Sometimes he laughs at me, sometimes he swears at me, sometimes he sneers at me, and to cap all, when I turn, as a trodden worm will turn at times, he just tells me to go clean the pewters, and send mi dowter to amuse him. An’ th’ warst on it is ’oo’s willin’ enough to go. What will be th’ end of it all, is fair beyond me. But nine months ’ll tell a tale i’ Marsden, or my name’s not John Race.”
John would have run on for ever, but I was anxious to get my own business done so I bade him show me up to the Captain’s room. The landlord’s own private sitting room and an adjoining bedroom had been appropriated by the officer, and I followed John up the narrow, creaking, stairs. At a door on the landing he knocked, and a thin voice within called on us to enter and be damned to us.
The room was small and low and packed with furniture of all styles and ages, more like a dealer’s shop than an ordinary room. Folk said that many a quaint and costly ornament had found its way to John Race’s in settlement of ale shots and gone to deck the room which was his wife’s delight. But Captain Northman or his friends had treated it with scant reverence. On a table in the centre were a pack or two of cards and a couple of candles, that had guttered in the socket. A decanter half full of brandy stood by their side, whilst another, empty, and the fragments of a glass, lay on the floor. Boots, spurs, gloves, swords canes, were strewn about on the chairs, and the scent of stale tobacco reek and fumes of strong waters filled the room. A table, with an untasted breakfast set upon it, was drawn to the window, and by it, in a cushioned chair, sat a young man of some five and twenty years, dressed in his small clothes and a gaudy dressing–gown, yawning wofully and raising with unsteady hand a morning draught to his tremulous lips. He had evidently had a night of it and his temper was none the better for it. I raised my hand respectfully to my forehead as I had seen soldiers do, but he only stretched out his legs and stared me rudely in the face.
“Well, fellow,” he said at length, “what’s your pleasure of me that you must break in on my breakfast?”
“My name, sir, is Benjamin Bamforth.”
“Ben o’ Bill’s o’ Holme,” said the landlord.
“Well, why the devil can’t he stop at home?” said my lord. “Come, sir, your business.”
“Captain Northman,” I said civilly, and speaking my finest, nothing daunted by his captaincy, but nettled by his slack manners, for even Mr. Chew, the vicar, treated me with civility as my father’s son; “Captain Northman, you have in your Company, a soldier known as Long Tom, his proper name I know not, nor his rank.”
“Corporal Tom, well, what of him?”
“Sir, I complain that last night he did wantonly and without enticement or other warrant insult my own cousin Mary, as she was returning home late in the evening.”
“Well, sir?”
“And I lay this complaint that he may be punished as he deserves.”
“And is that all?”
“And enough too, it seems to me, Captain Northman.”
“Good God! was ever the like heard!” exclaimed the Captain. “Here I am half pulled out of my bed in the small hours by a giant boor, my head all splitting with this vile liquor not fit for hog wash, and all because Long Tom chooses to kiss a pretty girl, who ten to one was nothing loth.”
“Captain Northman,” I said, very quietly, “I may be a boor, but I am one of the boors that pay your wages. Neither is it the part of a gentleman to meet a request for redress by an added insult. But I see I mistook my man and now I shall take my own course.” So I turned on my heels and strode down the steps.
“Long Tom’s in the kitchen,” whispered ’Siah, and to the kitchen I strode.
Here were about a dozen men in shirt sleeves, lounging and lolling about, some smoking, some pipe–claying their belts and polishing their arms, others drinking and at cards even thus early. It was not difficult to pick out my man. He was stood with legs outstretched before the fire. I made straight to him, and by the look he gave I knew he guessed my errand. I strode straight to him and without a word I smote him with the back of my hand across the face. The angry blood rushed to his cheeks, and he clenched his fist. The other soldiers jumped to their feet. “Fair play” cried ’Siah. “Man to man and fair play.”
“A fight, a fight.”
“A ring, a ring.”
“Into the yard with you my bully boys” said one who seemed to have authority, and into the yard we went, the whole company behind us, in great good humour at anything that promised sport.
“Two cans to one on Long Tom,” I heard. “I lay even on the bumpkin,” said another, and I was grateful even for that bit of backing.
“Keep thi’ temper an’ bide your chance,” whispered ’Siah, anxious to the last.
And then we faced each other, Long Tom and I. He was stripped to the shirt and I stripped too. He was as big a man as I with more flesh and more skill. But all the loose living had told on him and he soon began to blow. He hammered at me lustily and I took it smiling. If he brayed my face to a pulp I meant to get one in at him. My chance came at last. I put all my force and all my weight into one blow full at his mouth. He guarded and made as tho’ to counter. But his guard went back on himself, and my fist went plumb on his month. He went down like a felled ox and rolled on the ground kicking his heels and spitting out blood and his teeth. Then ’Siah raised a great shout and even some of the soldiers seemed not sorry to see the mighty fallen. And ’Siah led me off, feeling dazed and weak as a woman, and with a strong bent to blubber like a baby, now it was all over, for I am not used to fighting, and would any day rather give a point or two than fratch.
John Race, in a quiet way, was as rejoiced as ’Siah, but dare not show it too openly, for fear of angering the soldiers, of whom he was in great dread. But as I put my head under the pump and swilled my face he brought me a stiff runner of brandy and would take no pay. And presently others of the company came a round me and pressed me to drink, and the little captain, who had watched us from the window, came down and urged me to take the King’s shilling. “Faith,” said he, “there’s blood in you, man. I thought they put sizing in your veins, but it’s blood after all.” “Aye, my little tom tit,” said ’Siah who had no reverence for dignities. “It’s blood ’at wouldn’t stand mastering by sich as thee. Tha’ need’nt fluster thissen. Aw’m noan bahn to hurt thee. But if tha’ can get any o’ these felly’s to back thee, aw’ll be glad to feight the two on you. Will’nt one on yo’ oblige me? Noa? Weel nivver mind, cap’n, aw’ll happen come across thee in a year or twi when th’art full grown, an’ if thi’ mother ’ll let thee, tha’ may happen ha’ a bang at me. Come, Ben, let’s go back to yar wark. This is nobbut babby lakin!” And so, ’Siah bore me off, with colours flying.
On our homeward way we had much scheming as to how I should account for my face, which began to puff and show divers colours.
’Siah was for telling the story as it was, but I had no mind that Mary’s name should be mixed up in it. So we kept abroad the whole day and to my mother’s great grief and my father’s anger we presented ourselves late at night; ’Siah really, and myself feigning to be drunk. And Mary was so disgusted that she would scarce look at me, saying the sight of my face set her against her food. But towards the week end, Martha musts have got the secret from ’Siah and passed it on, for one night when I sat brooding by the fire, with no light but the glow of the embers, a light form stole softly behind my chair, and a pair of warm arms went round my neck and a tearful voice sobbed.
“O! Ben, yo’ mun forgive me. But aw’ll never forgive missen.”
What is the magic of a woman’s kiss and how comes it that under some conditions the touch of her lips will stir you not at all, and under others will kindle in your heart a flame that lasts your life–time. Till that moment I vow I had had no love for my cousin Mary, save such as a brother may have for his sister, between which and a lover’s love is, I take it, the difference between the light of the moon, and the light of the sun. I had sometimes kissed her and she had submitted as not minding. But of late she had eluded me when I had sought to salute her, which skittishness I had put down to what was going on between her and George. And now, unsought, she had put her arms about my neck and drawn back my head to the warm cushion of her breast and pressed a kiss upon my brow. And lo! love, glorious love, full grown and lusty, leaped into the ocean of my being and ruled it thenceforth for even. And yet when I sprung to my feet and held out my arms and would have taken Mary to my heart, she sprung away and bade me keep my distance, and when I made to take what she would not grant, she grew angered, so that my heart fell and I was sick with doubts and sadness. And here, tho’ little given to preaching, I would deliver my homily anent all shams and make–believes. Here was Mary setting my thoughts once more on a wrong tack so that I had no choice but return to what I had taken for granted, that it was a made up thing between her and George Mellor. And but for that belief many things that happened might not have befallen. Then, too, after my fight with Long Tom, my father gave me a talking to on my loose and raffish ways, and yet the very next market day, I heard of his boasting to all and sundry of my deeds, and the rumour thereof grew so much beyond the simple truth that I should not have some day been surprised to hear that I had routed a whole regiment. My mother, too, scolded me not a little and wept over my bruised skin, but among the women folk of our parish she bragged so much of my strength and my courage that I had like to become a laughing stock among the men. Even little Mr. Webster, who spoke to me at nigh an hour’s length on the sinfulness of brawling and on the Christian duty of turning, the other cheek to the smiter, did ever after that honour me by asking the support of my arm when he returned late home, saying no one would molest him while I was by. Only Martha, among them all, was honest, for she made no secret of her delight in me, loading me with praises so that ’Siah began to look at me with an evil eye, and she insisted on giving me each day to breakfast a double portion of porridge and piling up blankets on my bed till I was like to be smothered.
But Mary spoke of my doings not at all, whilst Faith, when she heard of the fray, prattled prettily a whole afternoon, and said so many sweet things to me that Mary became waspish and told her I was set up enough by nature without folk going out of their way to spoil me by soft sawder. Then Faith must unsay half she had said and finished by opining that, after all, the proper course would have been to horse–whip Captain Northman before his own Company.
And this, she thought, was what George would have done.
CHAPTER VI.
It must not be supposed, because I have turned aside to tell of my own poor affairs, that the Luddites were idle all this while. Indeed it is very difficult for me to give any notion of the state of this part of the country at that time. Trade was as bad as bad could be. Nobody seemed to have any money to spend on clothes. It took most folk all their time to line the inside, and the outside had to make shift as best it could. It was cruel to see the homes of those who had no back set and depended on their daily toil for their daily bread. And yet some manufacturers persisted in putting in machines that could have but one effect, to turn adrift many of those who still had work. And with it all arose in the minds not only of the croppers but of all the working people for miles around a feeling of injustice, of oppression, a rankling sense of wrong. And the poor felt for the poor. They got it into their heads that the rich cared nought about them, that their only thought was to look after themselves, to fill their own pockets, and the working folk might rot in their rags for ought they cared. And added to this was a chafing sense of their own helplessness. They felt like prisoned birds dashing against the bars of a cage. You see they had no say in anything at all. They were Englishmen only in name their lives, even when times were fairly good, were none of the brightest. It was mostly work and bed and not too much bed. Hard work and scant fare and little pleasure. They had love and friendship, for these come by nature, but they had little else to bring a ray or two of sunshine into their lives. When people in those days met together to set forth their grievances they were persecuted for sedition; when they didn’t meet and were quiet and law–abiding our betters said we had no grievances. Nay, if there was no violence both of speech and action the wise–acres in London said and thought all things were for the best in the best of all possible worlds. You couldn’t talk sense into them, you just had to poise it into them. So what would you?
Anyway, before the Luddites had been banded together many weeks it was well understood that we existed for bigger things than to break shears and cropping frames. Booth was always dinning this into me when I hinted at the wastefulness of smashing costly frames and other such like mischief. “We must arouse the conscience of our rulers,” he said. “They cannot, or will not, see how desperate is our plight. Besides, nine tenths of them have a personal interest in war, in prolonging shutting our ports. Their sense of right will not move them: we must frighten them.” Then he would smile in his sweet, sad way and say something in the French which he explained to mean that folk cannot have pancakes without breaking eggs, and after that I never lifted a hammer to smash a frame but my mind went to Shrove Tuesday and I had a vision of Mary with sleeves rolled up and face flushed by the heat of the fire, her dress tucked between her knees, tossing pancakes up the big chimney, and catching them sissing as they fell with the browned side up into the spurting fat.
Not that I did much machine breaking myself. There is a canny thriftiness in my nature that made me dislike such wantonness. Besides George Mellor was really the soul of the whole affair: and where George was there was no peace. He seemed like one possessed. From the Shears Inn at Hightown to the Nag’s Head at Paddock, from the Nag’s Head to the Buck, night after night, swearing in men, arranging midnight visits, dropping into this shop, loitering by that, counselling one man, winning another, he seemed to be everywhere at once, to know every man’s wants and every man’s grievance. What master to leave alone, what to fley. How he did it all and when he slept is a mystery to me. And he never lost heart never wavered from his purpose and there never was a moment when we didn’t, all trust him and all love him —save only one.
I say I didn’t handle Enoch much myself. We called the big sledge hammer that we battered the frames with, Enoch, after Mr. Taylor of Marsden. George saw I did not like the work, and the distance of my home from Longroyd Bridge made a good excuse for me. But ’Siah gloried in the work and when I saw him of a morning dull–eyed and weary and his clogs dirty with fresh clay I guessed what he had been at, and so in time did Martha too. But I could not always shirk my share of this midnight work, little, as it was to my liking. ’Siah had brought an earnest, message to me from George. “Yo’ mun go, Ben. Th’ lads are talking,” ’Siah had said.
And so, after milking time one night in the first week in April I told my mother I must go down to th’ Brigg, and she must not be uneasy if I did not come home that night, as I should probably stay at my aunt’s; and my mother must needs send by me a basket of eggs and a cream cheese for her sister, and a rubbing bottle for her rheumatism with full directions for its use. I saw a look pass between Martha and Mary when I said I was going to th’ Brigg, and Mary said:
“Mind yo’ don’t bring a black eye home wi’ thee, i’ th’ mornin’, Ben. But if th’ art so set up wi’ thissen for feightin’, do it by daylight. It’s ill wark that winnot bear th’ sun’s face,” and then I knew Martha had been talking. But I reckoned not to understand her, and off I set with as poor a heart for my job as if I were going to be hanged.
Up by Kitchen Fold I came up with ’Siah and Soldier Jack. It was a darkish night, wet, drizzling and cold. We made off over by Crosland Moor, and never a soul did we meet till we were falling into Milnsbridge where Justice Radcliffe’s house was. Then we passed a patrol of horse. They challenged us, and each of us had to tell a different lie. But they had no ground for stopping us, and they went their way over the moor, their horses pacing slowly and the riders peering on either side into the darkness of the night. I never knew those horse soldiers one bit of use all the time, and with their loose ways they did much harm. Those that had a tale which could pass muster would walk past them bold as brass. Those that couldn’t face them just avoided them, which was easy enough whether by day or night, for stone fences are good for men to hide behind, and at the best it is a hard country for men on cavalry horses.
At the Nag’s Head, at Paddock, we found George Mellor, William Smith, Thorpe, Ben o’ Buck’s, his brother John, Tom Brooke, Bill Hall, and two or three others who worked at Wood’s. We had a glass apiece, and we needed it, or thought we did, which comes to the same thing in the end. These new–fangled teetotal fads hadn’t come in then, and when folk didn’t drink it was because they couldn’t get it. Anyhow a glass of hot rum and water, on a perishing night, warms the cockles of your heart, and for my part I should have been well content to stretch my legs before the big kitchen fire at the Nag’s Head and caress my stomach with another glass. But George was impatient for us to be off. So we up Paddock, by Jim–lane to the bottom of Marsh. There is a two–storied stone house there looking over to Gledholt, with a mill at the back of it. I knew the owner by sight well enough, a little spindle–shanked man, with a squeaky voice. I had seen him many’s the time at the Cherry Tree. Fond of his glass he was, and a great braggart when warmed with liquor. He was a foremost man in the Watch and Ward, and I had heard him boast oft enough of what he would do if the Luddites ever came his way. So I sniggered a bit to myself when we came on to the road in front of the house. The windows were all dark in front. We went up the house side to the mill yard. Here was a door barring the way into the yard.
“Give us a leg up, Ben,” whispered Thorpe, and over the top of the door he went, dropping heavily, and with a curse, on the other side.
“Did ta think aw were a cricket ball?” we heard him say. “Throw us a hammer.”
Then there was a sharp blow or two, the rattle of a chain, the angry yapping of the yard dog. The door fell open on one lunge, and in we pushed pell mell. We could see a light spring out of the darkness in the chamber window, and we began to bray at the kitchen door. Someone had fetched the dog a crack with a stick, and it had limped whining and growling into its kennel.
“Open the door,” cried George.
A bedroom window was opened about half–an–inch, and a piping voice, all tremulous, faltered, “What mean you, good gentlemen? What is your will? For heaven’s sake go away quietly. The Ward are on their rounds. They may be here any minute. My missus is shouting for them out o’ th’ front window. Go home to bed, good masters, and I’ll never tell.”
“Go stop her mouth, and come down and let us in. Quick now, or it will be worse for you,” said George, sternly.
We waited a while, only giving a reminder by a hammer tap on the door panels and breaking a window or two out of sheer mischief. Then there was the fumbling at a chain, the bolt shot in its socket, and the kitchen door was opened. And there in the kitchen, where the embers of the fire were still glowing, stood little Mr. ———(I won’t tell his name, for he was a worthy man, only with words bigger nor his heart) in his shirt, his pipe shanks all bare, and his knees knocking together quite audibly. Well! it was a cold night. Say it was the cold. And his hand that held the metal candlestick shook so, the tallow guttered all down the candle side, making winding sheets. At the bottom of the steps leading upstairs, I caught a sight of a vinegar–faced woman in night–dress and a filled cap.
The remains of the supper were on the table, a very frugal supper, some cheese and haver bread. An empty pitcher was on the table. George Thorpe got another candlestick from the high mantlepiece and went down the cellar steps, and we heard him blowing up a spigot and coaxing a barrel, and the ale coming into the pitcher with a gurgle, like you may fancy a man would swallow if he were half–throttled. It was a lean shop, I warrant you.
There was an old oak armchair by the Dutch clock, and George drew it to the fire.
“Sit down, Mr. S———,” he said. “And you, Mrs. S———, go back to bed and keep warm and quiet. It’s no use shouting. Th’ soldiers are away over bi Crosland Moor, th’ constables are over Lindley way. You’ll only catch a cold and spoil your sweet voice. But mind you, no noise, or I’ll send a man to keep you company. And now, Mr. S our business is with you.”
Poor Mr. S———. I smile even yet as I write of him. He trembled so, the rails rattled in the chair, and kept looking this way and that, and jumping at every movement. And yet how he used to strut about the Cherry Tree yard, cursing the ostler, and cuffing the boys that pestered him for pence.
“You have some of the finishing frames in the shed there?” said George.
“Y–e–e–s, good Mr. Ludd, y–e–e–s, but only little ones.”
“How many?”
“One, or mebbe two.”
“How many more?”
“Well, mebbe three or four.”
“How many men have you sacked lately?”
“A two or three.”
“And how many more?”
“Well, mebbe a score.”
“And how are they living?”
“I dunnot know.”
“And their families?”
“My missus gi’es ’em summot to eit whenever we’n more nor we can eit oursen?”
“Haven’t yo’ a pig?”
“Ay, well when th’ pig’s fed of course.”
“Yo’re one o’ th’ Watch an’ Ward. Where’s your staff?”
“By th’ looking glass there, with th’ lash an’ comb; oh! dear, oh! dear.”
John Walker pocketed the constable’s staff. “Where’s your gun?”
“I’ th’ chamber.”
“Fetch it, No. 20.”
And Soldier Jack hopped up the stairs, and we heard a shrill shriek and a cry of “Murder! Thieves!” and then Jack limped down again, whilst Mrs. S——— stood at the stair–head and hurled threats and bad language at his back.
“Where’s th’ key o’ th’ mill door,” went on George, as cool as if he were eating his dinner.
“Oh! dear, oh! dear, you surely winnot harm th’ frame’s. They’n cost me a hundred and fifty pound apiece, an’ I owe to th’ bank for ’em yet.”
“The key, the key.”
Then from a drawer in the dresser he drew the big, heavy key.
“No. 22, 23, 25. Do your duty.”
And John Walker, Thorpe and Bill Smith stalked across the mill yard with a lantern. The dog sprung at his chain again, poor animal. There was the creaking of the lock. Then after a pause a voice from the dark sounded:
“Stand clear, Bill,” and bang, came the hammer, crash went wood and iron, and the costly frames were wrecked beyond repair. Poor Mr. S— groaned as if his heart were breaking, and his wife at the stair head gave a shriek every time the hammer fell.
“And now,” said George, producing a horse–pistol, “but one thing remains. Here is a Bible. You must swear never to make complaint of what has been said or done this night, lest worse befall you.”
“Oh, yes, Mr. Ludd, I’ll swear. I’ll swear anything only go leave us. Oh! my poor frame’s! And if I don’t die of rheumatism after this night, it’ll be a miracle.”
“And to take back the men you have sacked?”
“Yes, yes.”
“And never more to put up machines to take the bread out of honest men’s mouths?”
“Never, never, so help me God. Oh! do go, good Mr. Ludd.”
And go we did; but not before George had very politely gone to the foot of the stairs and drunk out of the pitcher to Mrs. S———’s health, and said how sorry he was that business had compelled him to pay his respects to so worthy a lady so late at night. Then we hurried off, over the fields, into Gledholt Wood, where we took off our masks, and went by different ways to the Nag’s Head.
Now could you believe that the very next Market Day I saw Mr. S ——— at the market dinner. He was telling to a group of listeners how he had been roused in the night by the crash of machines, how he had jumped out of bed, seized his flint lock carbine, rushed down the steps into the mill yard, laid low one of the gang with the stock of his weapon, being anxious to avoid bloodshed, and the whole thirty or forty had fled before him carrying off their wounded, but not alas! till his machines had been broken.
It must have been some other night.
But Mr. S——— kept his promise. He put up no more frames, even when the troubled times were half forgotten and the Luddites no more a terror. Perhaps he had difficulties with the bank.
But that is ahead of my tale, for I have not done yet with the night we broke the poor man’s frames. Going down from Marsh to the foot of Paddock, Ben Walker must need fasten himself on to me, though with half an eye he might have seen, even in the dark, that I wanted none of his company. But he linked his arm in mine, and put on that fawning way of his that fair made my flesh creep.
“And how’s thi father, Ben, and yor good mother an’ all the friends at Holme?”
It was in my mind to tell him none the better for his asking, but remembered in time that civility costs nought, and so made him as civil an answer as I could fashion.
“And how’s Mary, sweet sonsy Mary?” he went on, taking no note of what I was saying about my father’s touch of asthma, which was plaguey bad at the back end of the year.
It was just sickening to have him mouthing her name as if he were turning a piece of good stuff on his tongue, so I answered him short enough.
“Yo cannot tell, Ben, how my heart warms to Mary and to you, Ben, for Mary’s sake, and to all that’s kin to her, even to the third and fourth generation,” he added, after a pause, to make it more solemn and convincing like.
“Aw’m sure we’re much obliged to you,” I said; “but yo’n a queer way o’ showing your liking.”
“Yo mean leaving her when Long Tom was so unmannerly. It isn’t like thee, Ben, to bear malice nor to cast up things in a friend’s face. Let byegones be byegones. Aw know aw’m not a warrior, Ben. Aw’st never set up to be a man o’ wrath. We’n all our failings, Ben, an’ feightin’s noan my vocation, that’s flat.”
“Well, say no more about it,” I said. “Let’s talk o’ summot else. It’s lucky for Mary she’s got somebody to stick up for her that’ll noan turn tail an’ leave her to do her own feightin’.”
“Meaning thissen, Ben; aw heard about th’ setting down tha gave Long Tom.”
“Nay, aw weren’t thinking o’ missen,” I said, “tho’ yo’ may count me in. But it’s no business o’ thine. Talk o’ summot else, aw say.”
“But it is a concern o’ mine, Ben. It touches me quick does ought ’at touches Mary. How would ta’ like me for a cousin–i’–law?”
“A what?” I said.
“A cousin–i’–law. Aw reckon that’s what aw should be if aw wed Mary.”
“Thee wed Mary!” I cried, half vexed but tickled withal “Thee! Why, Ben, lad, if aw know ought of a woman she wouldn’t look th’ side o’ th’ road tha’rt on. Besides she’s noan for thee, Ben.”
“Happen she’s bespoke nearer home?” he said.
“Aye, nearer thi own home,” I said, for George and Walker lived not so far off each other.
“What, George Mellor?” he cried.
“Aye, George Mellor,” I said, and strode on faster and would have said no more. And if I said more than my knowledge warranted me, I spoke no more than I deemed to be true.
“Nay, Ben, dunnot be angered wi’ me. It’s no shame to anyone to lose his heart to such a lass as Mary. Aw know tha’s set agen me, Ben. Aw know aw’m noan fit for her; an’ if it comes to that where will ta find th’ man that is?”
I never liked Ben Walker half so much in my life, or I’d better say I never disliked him half so little as just at that moment, for false as he was and mean, one glimmer of truth and nobleness he had about him, and that was his love for Mary. And yet it galled me to have him speak of Mary at all. But he would not have done.
“Aw could do well by her,” he said. “Better nor yon fine spark we call General. Why, man, his head’s full of nonsense, just pack full. All about the rights o’ man, and reform and striking down the oppressors of the poor. As if such as him can do owt! We’re all melling wi’ things too big for the likes o’ us, Ben, an’ fools as we all are, George is the biggest o’ th’ lot, for he hasn’t sense enough to know he is a fool.”
Now there was just enough in this to make it sting the keener. So I pulled up short and said:
“If that’s your opinion about George, go tell him so thissen. An’ if yo’ve ought more to say about our Mary go say it to hersen. Yo’ll get your answer straight.” And I spoke so rough any other man would have flared up; but Ben Walker could swallow more dirt when it suited his purpose nor any man I ever came across.
“Oh! it’s easy enough for thee to talk, Ben Bamforth,” he said. “Tha cares nowt about her. Aw thowt happen tha did. An’ yet aw might ha known different. Come to think on it, yo’d eyes t’other neet for nobbudy but Faith Booth. An’ yo’ll find her willing enough, an’ one man’s meat’s another man’s poison. A pawky ailing wench, but if yo’ fancy her it’s everything. Aw wish yo’ luck, Ben, aw do indeed.”
“Ha’ done with yo,” I cried in anger. “Faith Booth’s as much aboon me as our Mary is aboon you. And never speak again to me about such things as this. I want no secrets from you, and I’ll tell none to you. We’re in th’ same boat as far as this business we’re on to–night goes, but beyond that we’ve nought in common; and so, Ben Walker, without offence, give me as wide a berth as I’ll give thee.” And I fairly ran off and left him.
In the kitchen of the Nag’s Head, George Mellor and Soldier Jack and some score or more of those who had joined the brotherhood, mostly men of the neighbourhood, but some from Heckmondwike and Liversedge way, others from Outlane and the Nook, were already in warm debate. The fire was roaring in the grate, pipes had been lighted, pewters filled, and the buzz of conversation and bursts of laughter filled the low room. George was in great fettle that night. He was always best and brightest in action. Indeed he had much to put his head up. He was obeyed, without question, by many a hundred men; all bound together by a solemn oath, who had implicit trust in him. The military and the special constables were only our sport. They were never any serious hindrance, at first, to anything we took in hand. The mill owners were in fear for their machines, and would rather any night pay than fight. And for the great mass of the people, those who had to work for their living, they believed in General Ludd. In some way they could not fathom nor explain the Luddites were to bring back the good times, to mend trade, to stock the cupboard, to brighten the grate, to put warm clothes on the poor shivering little children. It is not much the poor ask, only warmth and food and shelter, and a little joy now and then. They are very ready to listen to anyone who will promise them this, and if they do not see exactly how it is all to come about, are they the only ones who mistake hope for belief? And George liked the people’s trust. When an old hag stopped him in the road and praised his bonny face and bid him be true to the poor, anyone could see the words were sweet to him, and he would empty his pocket into her skinny, eager hand. And he liked too the sense of powers. To command, to be obeyed, to be trusted, to be feared—by your enemies who does not like it? Find me the man who says he doesn’t and I’ll find you a liar.
Where George got his money from to treat as he did I don’t know. He nearly always had money with him, and when he hadn’t he had credit with the landlord. We never stinted for ale on the nights we were out on such jobs as that at Marsh, and this night was no exception. And his good humour was shared by all of us. Those who had been up to Marsh had to tell the tale to those who hadn’t, and there were roars of laughter as Soldier Jack showed the scratches left on his face by the sharp nails of Mrs. S———.
“We’re winning all along the line,” George cried. Th’ specials is fleyed on us. They take care to watch an’ ward just where they know we’re not. Th’ soldiers don’t like their job. It’s poor work for lads o’ mettle hunting starving croppers. Th’ people are with us. But we must strike a decisive blow that will once and for all show our purpose and our power. Every frame in the West Riding must be broken into matchwood; every master must learn that he has resolute and united men to reckon with. Let us once show our strength, and we will not rest till things are bettered for all of us. But we must strike a blow that will be felt the length and breadth of the land. It is baby work that we have been on to–night. We must go for the leaders of the masters, for those who hearten up such men as S———, of Marsh, the men who have both the brains and the pluck, curse ’em, not for the sheep who follow the bell–wether.
“Cartwright, of Rawfolds,” cried a Liversedge man.
“Horsfall, of Ottiwell’s,” said a Marsden cropper.
And then men laid aside their pipes and drained their pewters. And a man was set at the door to see no strangers entered, and we saw to the fastening of the shutters, and that no clink made a spy–hole into the room. And those who spoke hushed their voice, and those who listened strained an anxious ear. It was no child’s play now.
“Taylor’s have sent out a big order of finishing frames for Cartwright,” said one Marsden man.
“Aye, and Cartwright swears he’ll work them if not another mill owner in England dare,” said William Hall, of Parking Hole.
“I like his mettle,” said George. “That Cartwright is a game cock, and we must cut his comb or he’ll crow over th’ lot on us. If we can only settle such as him, we’st have no bother wi’ th’ others. Na, lads, my mind’s made up. Yo’ all know what this Cartwright is doing. Aw’ve nowt agen him except th’ machines. If we let him put up those frames he’s ordered, and work ’em, we might as well chuck up. One encourages t’ other, and if one succeed another will, nay must, follow suit.”
“There’s nowt to choose between him an’ Horsfall,” said the Marsden man. “Aw cannot tell what’s come over Horsfall. He allus used to be a decent master till this new craze came up. But naa’ he talks o’ nowt but machines, machines. An’ th’ way he raves on about th’ Luddites is enough to mak’ a worm turn. If he’s not lied on he said t’ other day at th’ market that he’d ha’ his own way i’ th’ mill if he had to ride up to his saddle girths i’ Luddite blood.”
“Well, well,” said George with an ugly gleam in his eye; “Horsfall can wait. What do you say, Ben?”
“Aye, Horsfall can wait,” I said, and would have said more if need were, for I shrunk from having part or parcel in any attack on Ottiwell’s.
“Well there’s an easy way to settle it,” said William Hall. “Let’s toss up.”
“Aye, that’s fair enough,” said several voices. “Heads for Horsfall, tails for Cartwright.” And so it was settled. I live again that moment of my life. Forty years roll away as though they had not been, and clear and vivid I see the group of eager men gathered round the hearth, with George erect and masterful in the centre.
“Who’ll call for Cartwright?” said George.
“That will I,” said Hall.
“Then here goes,” and George balanced a penny on his thumb and forefinger.
“Cry before it drops,” he said, and span the coin in the air.
“Tail,” said Hall, and every man held his breath as George tossed the coin and caught it. He had to stoop over the fire to see the face of the coin after he caught it.
“Tail it is,” he said, and thrust the penny into his fob.
“By jinks I’m fain,” said Hall. “Aw owe the b——— one, and now aw’ll straighten wi’ him. He’ll rue the day he sacked Bill Hall for drinking.”
And for me I too was fain. For Rawfolds seemed a long way off, but Ottiwell’s was close by home.
“We’n got our work set,” said George. “It mun be a reight do. Cartwright sleeps in his mill every night. He has soldiers there, too, in the mill with him. The gates and doors have been strengthened. There are other soldiers billeted in the village. Th’ mill bell will alarm the country. But we can do it, lads, if yo’ are the men I take yo’ for. No flinching and we’ll strike such a blow at Rawfolds as will make old England ring again. And now, lads, to business.”
It were quite beyond me to tell all the plans we made that night. We fixed Saturday the 11th of April for the job, and a man called Dickenson promised to let his mates on that side know our arrangements. We were to meet at the Dumb Steeple by the Three Nuns at eleven of the night. There were to be men from Liversedge, Heckmondwike, Gomersall, Birstall, Cleckheaton, and even from Leeds; and on our side we promised a full muster. Soldier Jack was to see that everyone was warned, and such arms as could be begged, borrowed or stolen were to be got together. The boys were keen enough for work, and nothing doubted of success. We had had it all our own way up to now, and who was Cartwright that he should check us?
It was in the small hours when we stole out into the raw morning air, taking our several ways homewards.
I had not far to go, for I was to sleep with George at the Brigg.
“I’m glad it fell on Cartwright,” I said to my cousin, as we doffed our things that night.
“Aw thought tha would be,” said George.
“It wer’ a weight off me when it fell tails,” I added.
“But it were a head,” said George with a quiet smile.
“A head!”
“Aye, a head. But I knew tha wanted tails, so I turned it i’ my palm when I stooped o’er th’ fire.”
And yet men talk about fate.
CHAPTER VII.
YOU may be sure such doings as those of which I have written were country’s talk. People talked about nothing else. Wherever you sent you heard of misery and want and of the men who were banded together to fight the masters. And the Luddites had the approval of the people. I mean the general run of the people. Not, of course, everybody. Mr. Chew, the church parson, was very bitter against them, and warned his congregation against them, and all those who loved darkness rather than light. But the working men, even those whose own handicraft was not threatened by the new frames, favoured the Luddites. I remember that in May of that year a poor woman at Berry Brow, that was thought to have given some information to Mr. Radcliffe, was nearly torn to pieces by her neighbours. Her skull was fractured by a stone. Perhaps because the Luddites felt secure in the general approval their secrets were ill kept.
I do not know how it came about, but at Holme I was soon made aware that I was well regarded. When I went to chapel at the Powle, people made way for me as though I were somebody, and the women folk, in particular, took care I should know I stood well with them. If my father and I stopped to swap the news of the day with our friends and neighbours, and the talk turned on the great questions of the time, men would look to me to know what I had to say, and my words would be quoted from house to house as they had never been quoted before.
Who blabbed? I don’t know. Not I, in very truth. ’Siah, I suspect, to Martha. For me, I hated most genuinely the secrecy and underhandedness of the thing. I hated to slink about in the dark, to drop behind a hedge when I heard the fall of a horse’s foot, the rattle of a scabbard, or the champing of a bit. I hated to put on a mask and a smock, and to steal about with my heart in my mouth, and I hated more than all to turn aside my face from the mute questioning of my mother’s eyes.
Once there was questioning that was not mute. It was a Sunday evening, about the time of the meeting at the Nag’s Head. We had been to chapel, and Mr. Webster was home with us to supper. John Booth and Faith were there. The nights were lengthening, and there was a warmer breath in the air, and the cuckoo had been heard on Wimberlee. After supper I had set myself to walk towards Huddersfield with John and Faith, and before we must start Faith had said she would like me to show her the roan calf, new come, whilst Martha made up a bottle of the beestings to carry home with her, so we went together into the shippon. The little straddling thing was in a corner by itself, warded off, and Faith bent over it and let the ruddy little thing suck and slobber over her hand, whilst the mother with patient wistful eyes looked over her shoulder and lowed lovingly. Then I must wipe Faith’s little hand with a wisp of hay, and I vow it was a monstrous pretty hand, white and thin, not like Mary’s, brown and firm and plump. And whilst I held her hand in my big palm, Faith looked up to my face in the obscure light of the mistal and said very softly:
“Ben, you know our John is soft and easy led, not big and strong as your are. And oh! if harm come to John it would kill my father and go nigh to break my heart. And now he has secrets from me. He is anxious and ill at ease. He is no longer frank and glad, and he tells me nothing. And Mrs. Wright, the saddler’s wife, where you know he is serving his time, tells me he is sore changed of late—stopping out to all hours, and strange men coming to their shop with letters and messages, and John whispering in corners with them as if he were plotting a murder. She says she cannot sleep o’ nights for thinking of it all. And oh! Ben, my heart tells me he is in danger, and what shall I do if harm befall him?”
“Nay, Faith, lass,” I said, stooping down to get a fresh wisp of hay, and maybe to hide my face from that gaze that seemed to read my thoughts too plain, “Nay, Faith, what harm should befall your John? You mustn’t set too much store by what Mrs. Wright says. What if John does stop out a bit late at nights? Saddlering’s a confining job, and most like John needs a long walk to straighten his limbs after being at th’ bench all day with his legs twisted all shapes like a Turk. An’ yo’re never sure, yo’ know, Faith, o’ young folk, even th’ quiet ’uns. Perhaps your John’s doing a bit o’ courting.”
“Ah! Ben, if I could think it were only that. For well I know if John were cour—; were doing what you say, you’d be like enough to know of it.”