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Chapter 1: Discussion and Bed
Up at the League, says a friend, there had been one
night a brisk conversational discussion, as to what would happen on the
Morrow of the Revolution, finally shading off into a vigorous statement
by various friends of their views on the future of the fully-developed
new society.
Says our friend: Considering the
subject, the discussion was good-tempered; for those present being used
to public meetings and after-lecture debates, if they did not listen to
each others' opinions (which could hardly be expected of them), at all
events did not always attempt to speak all together, as is the custom of
people in ordinary polite society when conversing on a subject which
interests them. For the rest, there were six persons present, and
consequently six sections of the party were represented, four of which
had strong but divergent Anarchist opinions. One of the sections, says
our friend, a man whom he knows very well indeed, sat almost silent at
the beginning of the discussion, but at last got drawn into it and
finished by roaring out very loud, and damning all the rest for fools;
after
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which befell a period of noise, and
then a lull, during which the aforesaid section, having said good-night
very amicably, took his way home by himself to a western suburb, using
the means of travelling which civilisation has forced upon us like a
habit. As he sat in that vapour-bath of hurried and discontented
humanity, a carriage of the underground railway, he, like others stewed
discontentedly, while in self-reproachful mood he turned over the many
excellent and conclusive arguments which though they lay at his fingers'
ends, he had forgotten in the just past discussion. But this frame of
mind he was so used to, that it didn't last him long, and after a brief
discomfort, caused by disgust with himself for having lost his temper
(which he was also well used to), he found himself musing on the
subject-matter of discussion, but still discontentedly and unhappily. "If
I could but see it!"
As he formed the words,
the train stopped at his station, five minutes' walk from his own house,
which stood on the banks of the Thames, a little way above an ugly
suspension bridge. He went out of the station, still discontented and
unhappy, muttering "If I could but see it! if I could but see it!" but
had not gone many steps toward the river before (says our friend who
tells the story) all that discontent and trouble seemed to slip off him.
It was a beautiful night of early winter, the
air just sharp enough to be refreshing after the hot room and the
stinking railway carriage. The wind, which had lately turned a point or
two north of west, had blown the sky clear of all cloud save a light
fleck of two which went swiftly down the heavens. There was a young moon
halfway up the sky, and as the home-farer caught sight of it, tangled in
the branches
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of a tall old elm, he could
scarce bring to his mind the shabby London suburb where he was, and he
felt as if he were in a pleasant country place -- pleasanter, indeed,
than the deep country was as he had known it.
He came right down to the river-side, and lingered
a little, looking over the low wall to note the moon-lit river, near upon
high water, go swirling and glittering up to Cheswick Eyot; as for the
ugly bridge below, he did not notice it or think
of it, except when for a moment (says our friend) it stuck him that he
missed the row of lights down-stream. Then he turned to his house door
and let himself in; and even as he shut the door to, disappeared all
remembrance of that brilliant logic and foresight which had so
illuminated the recent discussion; and of the discussion itself there
remained no trace, save a vague hope, that was now become a pleasure, for
days of peace and rest, and cleanness and smiling goodwill.
In this mood he tumbled into bed, and fell asleep
after his wont, in two minutes' time; but (contrary to his wont) woke up
again not long after in that curiously wide-awake condition which
sometimes surprises even good sleepers; a condition under which we feel
all our wits preternaturally sharpened, while all the miserable muddles
we have ever got into, all the disgraces and losses of our lives, will
insist on thrusting themselves forward for the consideration of those
sharpened wits.
In this state he lay (says our
friend) till he had almost begun to enjoy it; till the tale of his
stupidities amused him, and the entanglements before him, which he saw so
clearly, began to shape themselves into an amusing story for him.
He heard one o'clock strike then two and then
three; after which he fell asleep again. Our friend
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says that from that sleep he awoke once more, and afterwards
went through such surprising adventures that he thinks that they should
be told to our comrades, and indeed the public in general, and therefore
he proposes to tell them now. But, says he, I think it would be better
if I told them in the first person, as if it were myself who had gone
through them; which, indeed, will be the easier and more natural to me,
since I understand the feeling and desires of the comrade of whom I am
telling better than any one else in the world does.
Chapter 2: A Morning Bath
Well, I awoke, and found
that I had kicked my bed-clothes; and no wonder, for it was hot and the
sun shining brightly. I jumped up and washed and hurried on my clothes,
but in a hazy and half-awake condition, as if I had slept for a long,
long while, and could not shake off the weight of slumber. In fact, I
rather took it for granted that I was at home in my own room than saw
that it was so.
When I was dressed, I felt
the place so hot that I made haste to get out of the room and out of the
house; and my first feeling was a delicious relief caused by the fresh
air and pleasant breeze; my second, as I began to gather my wits
together, mere measureless wonder; for it was winter when I went to bed
last night, and now, by witness of the river-side trees, it was summer,
a beautiful bright morning seemingly of early June. However, there was
still the Thames sparkling under the sun, and
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near high water, as last night I had seen it gleaming under the moon.
I had by no means shaken off the feeling of
oppression, and wherever I might have been should scarce have been quite
conscious of the place; so it was no wonder that I felt rather puzzled in
despite of the familiar face of the Thames. Withal I felt dizzy and
queer; and remembering that people often got a boat and had a swim in
mid-stream, I thought I would do no less. It seems very early, quoth I to
myself, but I daresay I shall find some one at Biffin's to take me.
However, I didn't get as far as Biffin's, or even turn to my left
thitherward, because just then I began to see that there was a
landing-stage right before me in front of my house; in face, on the place
where my next-door neighbor had rigged one up, although somehow it didn't
look like that either. Down I went on to it, and sure enough among the
empty boats moored to it lay a man on his
sculls in a solid-looking tub of a boat clearly meant for bathers. He
nodded to me, and bade me good-morning as if he expected me, so I jumped
in without any words and he paddled away quietly as I peeled for my swim.
As we went, I looked down in the water, and couldn't help saying:
"How clear the water is this morning!"
"Is it? said he; "I didn't notice it. You know the
flood-tide always thickens it a bit."
"H'm,"
said I, I have seen it pretty muddy even at half-ebb."
He said nothing in answer, but seemed rather
astonished; and as he now lay just stemming the tide, and I had my
clothes off, I jumped in without more ado. Of course when I had my head
above water again I turned towards the tide, and my eyes naturally
sought for the bridge, and so utterly
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astonished was I by what I sought for the bridge, and so utterly
astonished was I by what I saw, that I forgot to strike out, and went
spluttering under water again, and when I came up made straight for the
boat; for I felt I that I must ask some questions of my waterman, so
bewildering had been the half-sight I had seen from the face of the river
with the water hardly out of my eyes; though by this time I was quit of
the slumbrous and dizzy feeling, and wide-awake and clear-headed.
As I got in up the steps which he had lowered, and
he held out his hand to help me, we went drifting speedily up towards
Cheswick; but now he caught up the sculls and brought her head round
again, and said;
"A short swim, neighbour; but
perhaps you find the water cold this morning, after your journey. Shall I
put you ashore at once, or would you like to go down to Putney before
breakfast?"
He spoke in a way so unlike what I
should have expected from a Hammersmith waterman, that I stared at him,
as I answered, "Please to hold her a little; I want to look about me a
bit."
"All right," he said; It's no less
pretty in its way here than it is off Barn Elms; it's jolly everywhere
this time in the morning. I'm glad you got up early; it's barely five
o'clock yet."
If I was astonished with my
sight of the river banks, I was no less astonished at my waterman, not
that I had time to look at him and see him with my head and eyes clear.
He was a handsome young fellow, with a peculiarly
pleasant and friendly look about his eyes, -- an expression which was
quite new to me then, though I soon became familiar with it. For the
rest, he was dark-haired and berry-brown of skin, well-knit and strong,
and obviously used to exercising his
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muscles,
but with nothing rough or coarse about him, and clean as might be. His
dress was not like any modern work-a-day clothes I had seen, but would
have served very well as a costume for a picture of fourteenth-century
life: it was of dark blue cloth, simple enough, but of fine web, and
without a stain on it. He had a brown leather belt around his waist, and
I noticed that its clasp was of damascened steel beautifully wrought. In
short, he seemed to be like some specially manly and refined young
gentleman, playing waterman for spree, and I concluded that this was the
case.
I felt that I must make some
conversation; so I pointed to the Surrey bank, where I noticed some light
plank stages running down the foreshore, with windlasses at the landward
end of them, and said "What are they doing with those things here? If we
were on the Tay, I should have said that they were for drawing the
salmon-nets; but here -- "
"Well," said he,
smiling, of course that is what they are for. Where there are
salmon, there are likely to be salmon-nets, Tay or Thames; but of course
they are not
always in use; we don't want salmon every day ot the season."
I was going to say, "But is this the Thames?"
but held my peace in my wonder, and turned my bewildered eyes eastward to
look at the bridge again, and thence to the shores of the London river;
and surely there was enough to astonish me. For though there was a bridge
across the stream and houses on its banks, how all this was changed from
last night! The soap-works with their smoke-vomiting chimneys were gone;
the engineer's works gone; the lead-works gone; and no sound of riveting
and hammering came down the west wind from Thorneycroft's. Then the
bridge! I had perhaps dreamed
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of such a
bridge, but never seen such as one out of an dreamed of such a bridge,
but never seen such as one out of an illuminated manuscript; for not even
the Ponte Vecchio at Florence came anywhere near it. It was of stone
arches, splendidly solid, and as graceful as they were strong; high
enough also to let ordinary river traffic easily. Over the parapet showed
quaint and fanciful little buildings, which I supposed to be booths or
shops, beset with painted and gilded vanes and spirelets. the stone was a
little weathered but showed no marks of the grimy sootiness which I was
used to on every London building more than a year old. In short, to me a
wonder of a bridge.
The sculler noted my
eager astonished look, and said, as if in answer to my thoughts:
"Yes, it isa pretty bridge, isn't it?
Even the up-stream bridges, which are so much smaller, are scarcely
daintier, and the down-stream ones are scarcely more dignified and
stately."
I found myself saying, almost
against my will, "How old is it?"
"O, not very
old", he said; it was built or at least opened, in 2003. There used to be
a rather plain timber bridge before then."
The
date shut my mouth as if a key had been turned in a padlock fixed to my
lips; for I saw that something inexplicable had happened, and that if I
said much, I should be mixed up in a game of cross questions and crooked
answers. So I tried to look unconcerned, and to glance in a
matter-of-course way at the banks of the river, though this is what I saw
up to the bridge and a little beyond; say as far as the site of the
soap-works. Both shores had a line of very pretty houses, low and not
large, standing back a little way from the river; they were mostly built
of red brick and roofed with tiles, and looked, above all, comfortable,
and as if they were, so to say,
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alive, and
sympathetic with the life of the dwellers in them. There was a continuous
garden in front of them, going down to the water's edge, in which the
flowers were now blooming luxuriantly, and sending delicious waves of
summer scent over the eddying stream. Behind the houses, i could see
great tre
es rising, mostly planes, and looking down the water there were the
reaches towards Putney almost as if they were a lake with a forest shore,
so thick were the big trees; and I said aloud, but as if to myself:
"Well, I'm glad that they have not built over Barn
Elms."
I blushed for my fatuity as the words
slipped out of my mouth, and my companion looked at me with a half smile
which I thought I understood; so to hide my confusion I said, "Please
take me ashore now; I want to get my breakfast."
He nodded, and brought her head round with a sharp
stroke, and in a trice we were at the landing-stage again. He jumped out
and I followed him; and of course I was not surprised to see him wait,
as if for the inevitable after-piece that follows the doing of a service
to a fellow citizen. So I put my hand in my waistcoat-pocket, and said,
"How much? though still with the uncomfortable feeling that perhaps I was
offering money to a gentleman.
He looked
puzzled, and said, "How much? I don't quite understand what you are
asking about. do you mean the tide? If so, it is close on the turn now."
I blushed, and said, stammering, "Please don't
take it amiss if I ask you; I mean no offence: but what ought I to pay
you? You see I am a stranger, and don't know your customs -- or your
coins."
And therewith I took a handful of
money out of my pocket, as one does in a foreign country. And
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by the way, I saw that the silver had oxidised,
and was like a blackleaded stove in color.
He still seemed puzzled, but not at all offended;
and he looked at the coins with some curiosity. I thought, Well after
all, he is a waterman , and is considering what he may venture
to take. he seems such a nice fellow that I'm sure I don't grudge him a
little overpayment. I wonder, by the way, whether I couldn't hire him as
a guide for a day or two, since he is so intelligent.
Therewith my new friend said thoughtfully:
"I think I know what you mean. You think that I
have done you a service; so you feel yourself bound to give me something
which I am not to give to a neighbour, unless he has done something
special for me. I have heard of this kind of thing; but pardon me for
saying, that it seems to us a troublesome and roundabout custom; and we
don't know how to manage it. And you see this ferrying and giving
people casts about the water is my business, which I would do
for anybody; so to take gifts in connection with it would look very
queer. Besides, if one person gave me something, then another might, and
another, and so on; and I hope you won't think me rude if I say that I
shouldn't know where to stow away so many mementos of friendship."
And he laughed loud and merrily, as if the idea of
being paid for his work was a very funny joke. I confess I began to be
afraid that the man was mad, though he looked sane enough; and I was
rather glad to think that I was a good swimmer, since we were so close to
a deep swift stream. However, he went on by no means like a madman:
"As to your coins, they are curious, but not very
old; they seem to be all of the reign of Victoria; you might give them to
some scantily-furnished museum.
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Ours has
enough of such coins, besides a fair number of earlier ones, many of
which are beautiful, whereas these nineteenth century ones are so beastly
ugly, ain't they? We have a piece of Edward III., with the king in a
ship, and little leopards and fleurs-de-lys all along the gunwale, so
delicately worked. You see," he said, with something of a smirk, "I am
fond of working in gold and fine metals; this buckle here is an early
piece of mine."
No doubt I looked a little shy of him under the
influence of that doubt as to his sanity. So he broke off short, and said
in a kind voice:
"But I see that I am boring
you, and I ask your pardon. For, not to mince matters, I can tell that
you are a stranger, and must come from a place very unlike
England. But it also is clear that it won't do to overdose you with
information about this place, and that you had best suck it in little by
little. Further, I should take it as very kind in you if you would allow
me to be the showman of our new world to you, since you have stumbled on
me first. Though indeed it will be a mere kindness on your part, for
almost anybody would make as good a guide, and many much better."
There certainly seemed no flavour in him of Colney
Hatch; and besides I thought I could easily shake him off if it turned
out that he really was mad; so I said:
"It
is a very kind offer, but it is difficult for me to accept it, unless --
" I was going to say, Unless you will let me pay you properly; but
fearing to stir up Colney Hatch again, I changed the sentence into, "I
fear I shall be taking you away from your work -- or your amusement."
"O," he said, don't trouble about that, because it
will give me an opportunity of doing a good turn
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12]
to a friend of mine, who wants to take my work here. He is
a weaver from Yorkshire, who has rather overdone himself between his
weaving and his mathematics, both indoor work, you see; and being a great
friend of mine, he naturally came to me to get him some outdoor work. If
you think you can put up with me, pray take me as your guide."
He added presently: "It is true that I have
promised to go up-stream to some special friends of mine, for the
hay-harvest; but they won't be ready for us for more than a week: and
besides, you might go with me, you know, and see some very nice people,
besides making notes of our ways in Oxfordshire. You could hardly do
better if you want to see the country. "
I
felt myself obliged to thank him, whatever might come of it; and he added
eagerly:
"Well, then, that's settled. I will
give my friend a call; he is living in the Guest House like you, and if
he isn't up yet, he ought to be this fine summer morning."
Therewith he took a little silver bugle-horn from
his girdle and blew two or three sharp but agreeable notes on it; and
presently from the house which stood on the site of my old dwelling (of
which more hereafter) another young man came sauntering towards us. He
was not so well-looking or so strongly made as my sculler friend, being
sandy-haired, rather pale, and not stout-built; but his face was not
wanting in that happy and friendly expression which I had noticed in his
friend. As he came up smiling towards us, I saw with pleasure that I must
give up the Colney Hatch theory as to the waterman, for no two madmen
ever behaved as they did before a sane man. His dress was of the same cut
as the first man's, though somewhat gayer, the
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surcoat being light green with a golden spray embroidered
on the breast, and his belt being of filigree silver-work.
He gave me good-day very civilly, and greeting his
friend joyously, said:
"Well, Dick, what is
it this morning? Am I to have my work, or rather your work? I dreamed
last night that we were off up the river fishing."
"All right, Bob," said my sculler; you will drop
into my place, and if you find it too much, there is George Brightling
on the look-out for a stroke of work and he lives close handy to you. But
see, here is a stranger who is willing to amuse me to-day by taking me as
his guide about our
countryside, and you may imagine I don't want to lose the opportunity; so
you had better take to the boat at once. But in any case I shouldn't have
kept you out of it for long since I am due in the hayfields in a few
days. "
The newcomer rubbed his hands with
glee, but turning to me, said in a friendly voice:
"Neighbour, both you and friend Dick are lucky,
and will have a good time to-day, as indeed I shall too. But you had
better both come in with me at once and get something to ear, lest you
should forget your dinner in your amusement. I suppose you came into the
Guest House after I had gone to bed last night? "
I nodded, not caring to enter into a long
explanation which would have let to nothing, and which in truth by this
time I should have begun to doubt myself. And we all three turned toward
the door of the Guest House.
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Chapter 3: The Guest House And Breakfast Therein
I lingered a
little behind the others to have a stare at this house, which, as I have
told you, stood on the site of my old dwelling.
It was a longish building with its gable ends
turned away from the road, and long traceried windows coming rather low
down set in the wall that faced us. It was very handsomely built of red
brick with a lead roof; and high up above the windows there ran a frieze
of figure subjects in baked clay, very well executed, and designed with a
force and directness which I had never noticed in modern work before. The
subjects I recognized at once, and indeed was very particularly familiar
with them.
However, all t his I took in in a
minute; for we were presently within doors, and standing in a hall with a
floor of marble mosaic and an open timber roof. There were no windows on
the side opposite to the river, but arches below leading into chambers,
one of which showed a glimpse of a garden beyond, and above them a long
space of wall gaily painted (in fresco, I thought) with similar subjects
to those of the frieze outside; everything about the place was handsome
and generously solid as to material; and though it was not very large
(somewhat smaller than Crosby Hall perhaps), one felt in it that
exhilarating sense of space and freedom which satisfactory architecture
always gives to an anxious man who is in the habit of using his eyes.
In this pleasant place, which of course I knew to
be the hall of the Guest House, three young women were flitting to and
fro. As they were the first of the
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sex I
had seen on this eventful morning, I naturally looked at them very
attentively, and found them at least as good as the gardens, the
architecture, and the male men. As to their dress, which of course I took
note of, I should say that they were decently veiled with drapery, and
not bundled up with millinery; that they were clothed like women, not
upholstered like arm-chairs, as most women of our time are. In short,
their dress was somewhat between that of the ancient classical costume
and the simpler forms of the fourteenth-century garments, though it was
clearly not an imitation of either: the materials were light and gay to
suit the season. As to the women themselves, it was pleasant indeed to
see them, they were so kind and happy-looking in expression of face, so
shapely and well-knit of body and thoroughly healthy-looking and strong.
All were at least comely, and one of them very handsome and regular of
feature. They came up to us at once merrily and without the least
affectation of shyness, and all three shook hands with me as if I were a
friend newly come back from a long journey: though I could not help
noticing that they looked askance at my garments; for I had on my clothes
of last night, and at the best was
never a dressy person.
A word or two from
Robert the weaver, and they bustled about on our behoof, and presently
came and took us by the hands and led us to a table in the pleasantest
corner of the hall, where our breakfast was spread for us; and, as we sat
down, one of them hurried out by the chambers aforesaid, and came back
again in a little while with a great branch of roses, very different in
size and quality to what Hammersmith had been wont to grow,but very
like the produce of an old country garden. She hurried back thence into
the buttery, and came
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back once more with a
delicately made glass, into which she put the flowers and set them down
in the midst of our table. One of the others, who had run off also, then
came back with a big cabbage-leaf filled with strawberries, some of them
barely ripe, and said as she set them on the table, "There, now; I
thought of that before I got up this morning; but looking at the stranger
here getting into your boat, Dick put it out of my head; so that I was
not before all the blackbirds; however, there are a few about
as good as you will get them anywhere in Hammersmith this morning."
Robert patted her on the head in a friendly
manner; and we fell to on our breakfast, which was simple enough, but
most delicately cooked, and set on the table with much daintiness. The
bread was particularly good, and was of several different kinds, from the
big, rather close, dark-coloured, sweet-tasting farmhouse loaf, which
was most to my liking, to the thin pipe-stems of wheaten crust, such as I
have eaten in Turin.
As I was putting the
first mouthfuls into my mouth, my eye caught a carved and gilded
inscription on the panelling, behind what we should have called the High
Table in an Oxford college hall, and a familiar name in it forced me to
read it through. Thus it ran:
"Guests and neighbours, on the
site of this
Guest-hall once stood the lecture-room of
the
Hammersmith Socialists. Drink a glass to
the memory! May1962." It is difficult
to tell you how I felt as I read these words, and I suppose my face
showed how much I was moved, for both my friends looked curiously at
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me, and there was silence between us for a
little while.
Presently the weaver, who was
scarcely so well mannered a man as the ferryman, said to me rather
awkwardly:
"Guest, we don't know what to call
you: is there any indiscretion in asking your name? "
"Well," said I, I have some doubts about it
myself; so suppose you call me Guest, which is a family name, you know,
and add William to it if you please. "
Dick
nodded kindly to me; but a shade of anxiousness passed over the weaver's
face, and he said:
" I hope you don't mind my
asking, but would you tell me where you come from? I am curious about
such things for good reasons, literary reasons. "
Dick was clearly kicking him underneath the table;
but he was not much abashed, and awaited my answer somewhat eagerly. As
for me, I was just going to blurt out `Hammersmith', when I bethought me
what an entanglement of cross purposes that would lead us into; so I took
time to invent a lie with circumstance, guarded be a little truth, and
said:
"You see, I have been such a long time
away from Europe that things seem strange to me now; but I was born and
bred on the edge of Epping Forest; Walthamstow and Woodford, to wit. "
"A pretty place too," broke in Dick; a very jolly
place, now that the trees have had time to grow again since the great
clearing of houses in 1955."
Quoth the
irrepressible weaver: "Dear neighbour, since you knew the Forest some
time ago, could you tell me what truth there is in the rumour that in the
nineteenth century the trees were all pollards?
This was catching me on my archaeological
natural-history
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side, and I fell into the
trap without any thought of where and when I was; so I began on it, while
one of the girls, the handsome one, who had been scattering little twigs
of lavender and other sweet-smelling herbs about the floor, came near to
listen, and stood behind me with her hand on my shoulder, in which she
held some of the plant that I used to call balm: its strong sweet smell
brought back to my mind my very early days in the kitchen-garden at
Woodford, and the large blue plums which grew on the wall beyond the
sweet-herb patch, -- a connection of memories which all boys will see at
once.
I started off: "When I was a boy, and
for long after, except for a piece about Queen Elizabeth's Lodge, and for
the part about High Beech, the Forest was almost entirely made up of
pollard hornbeams mixed with holly thickets. But when the Corporation of
London took it over about twenty-five years ago, the topping and lopping,
which was a part of the old commoners' rights, came to an end, and the
trees were let to grow. But I have not seen the place now for many years
except once, when we Leaguers were shocked to see how it was built-over
and altered; and the other day we heard that the philistines were going
to landscape-garden it. But what you were saying about the building being
stopped and the trees growing is only too good news; -- only you know --
"
At that point I suddenly remembered Dick's
date, and stopped short rather confused. The eager weaver didn't notice
my confusion, but said hastily, as if he were almost aware of his
breach of good manners, "But I say, how old are you?"
Dick and the pretty girl both burst out laughing,
as
[Page 19]
if Robert's conduct were excusable on the
grounds of eccentricity; and Dick said amidst his laughter:
"Hold hard, Bob; this questioning of guests won't
do. Why, much learning is spoiling you. You remind me of the radical
cobblers in the silly old novels, who, according to the authors, were
prepared to trample down all good manners in the pursuit of utilitarian
knowledge. The fact is, I begin to think that you have so muddled your
head with mathematics, and with grubbing into those idiotic old books
about political economy (he he!), that you scarcely know how to behave.
Really, it is about time for you to take to some open-air work, so that
you may clear away the cobwebs from your brain."
The weaver only laughed good-humoredly; and the
girl went up to him and patted his cheek and said laughingly, "Poor
fellow! he was born so."
As for me, i was a
little puzzled, but I laughed also, partly for the company's sake, and
partly with pleasure at their unanxious happiness and good temper; and
before Robert could make the excuse to me which he was getting ready, I
said:
"But, neighbours" (I had caught up that
word), I don't in the least mind answering questions, when I can do so:
ask me as many as you please; and as to my age I'm not a fine lady, you
know, so why shouldn't I tell you? I'm hard on fifty-six. "
In spite of the recent lecture on good manners,
the weaver could not help giving a long "whew" of astonishment, and the
others were so amused by his naiveté that the merriment
flitted all over their faces, though for courtesy's sake they forbore
actual laughter; while I looked from one to the other in a puzzled
manner, and at last said:
[Page 20]
"Tell me, please, what is amiss:
you know I want to learn from you. And please laugh; only tell me."
Well, they did laugh, and I joined them
again, for the above-stated reasons. But at last the pretty woman said
coaxingly:
"Well, well, he is rude,
poor fellow! but you see I may as well tell you what he is thinking
about; he means that you look rather old for your age. But surely there
need be no wonder in that, since you have been travelling; and clearly
from all you have been saying, in unsocial countries. It has often been
said, and no doubt truly that one ages very quickly if one lives amongst
unhappy people. Also they say that southern England is a good place for
keeping good looks." She blushed and said:"How old am I, do you think?"
"Well," quoth I, I have always been told that a
woman is as old as she looks, so without offence or flattery, i should
say that you were twenty"
She laughed merrily,
and said, "I am well served out for fishing for compliments, since I have
to tell you the truth, to wit, that I am forty-two."
I stared at her, and drew musical laughter from
her again; but I might well stare, for there was not a careful line on
her face; her skin was as smooth as ivory, her cheeks full and round, her
lips as red as the roses she had brought in; her beautiful arms which
she had bared for work, firm and well-knit from shoulder to wrist. She
blushed a little under my gaze, though it was clear that she had taken me
for a man of eighty; so to pass it off I said:
"Well, you see, the old saw is proved right again,
and I ought not to have let you tempt me into asking you a rude
question."
She laughed again, and said: "
Well, lads, old
[Page 21]
and young, I must get to my
work now. We shall be rather busy here presently; and I want to clear it
off soon, for I began to read a pretty old book yesterday, and I want to
get on with it this morning; so good-bye for the present."
She waved a hand to us, and stepped lightly down
the hall, taking (as Scott says) at least part of the sun from our table
as she went.
When she was gone, Dick said,
"Now, guest, won't you ask a question or two of our friend here? It is
only fair that you should have your turn."
"I shall be very glad to answer them," said the
weaver.
"If I ask you any questions, sir, "
said I, they will not be very severe; but since I hear that you are a
weaver I should like to ask you something about that craft, as I am -- or
was -- interested in it. "
"O," said he, I
shall not be of much use to you there, I'm afraid. I only do the most
mechanical kind of weaving, and am in fact but a poor craftsman, unlike
Dick here. Then besides the weaving, I do a little with machine printing
and composing, though I am little use at the finer kinds of printing; and
moreover machine printing is beginning to die out, along with the waning
of the plague of book-making, so i have had to turn to other things that
I have a taste for, and have taken to mathematics; and also I am writing
a sort of antiquarian book about the peaceable and private history, so to
say, of the end of the nineteenth century, -- more for the sake of giving
a picture of the country before the fighting began than for anything
else. That was why I asked you those questions about Epping Forest. You
have rather puzzled me, I confess, though your information was so
interesting. But later on,
[Page 22]
I hope, we may
have some more talk together, when our friend Dick isn't here. I know he
thinks me rather a grinder, and despises me for not being very deft with
my hands: that's the way nowadays. From what I have read of the
nineteenth
century literature (and I have read a good deal), it is clear to me that
this is a kind of revenge for the stupidity of that day, which despised
everybody who could use his hands. But, Dick, old fellow,
Ne quid nimis! Don't overdo it!"
"Come now," said Dick, Am I likely to? Am I not
the most tolerant man in the world? Am I not quite contented so long as
you don't make me learn mathematics or go into your new science of
aesthetics, and let me do a little practical aesthetics with my gold and
steel, and the blowpipe and the nice little hammer? But, hillo! here come
another questioner for you, my poor guest. I say, Bob, you must help me
defend him now. "
"Here, Boffin," he cried
out, after a pause; here we are, if you must have it! "
I looked over my shoulder, and saw something flash
and gleam in the sunlight that lay across the hall; so I turned round,
and at my ease saw a splendid figure slowly sauntering over the
pavement; a man whose surcoat was embroidered most copiously as well as
elegantly, so that the sun flashed back from him as if he had been clad
in golden armour. The man himself was tall, dark-haired, and exceedingly
handsome, and though his face was less kindly in expression than that of
the others, he moved with that somewhat haughty mien which great beauty
is apt to give to both men and women. He came and sat down at our table
with a smiling face, stretching out his long legs and hanging his arm
over the chair in the slowly graceful way which
[Page
23]
tall and well-built people may use without affectation.
He was a man in the prime of life, but looked as happy as a child who has
just got a new toy. He bowed gracefully to me and said:
" I see clearly that you are the guest, of whom
Annie has just told me, who have come from some distant country that does
not know of us, or our ways of life. So I daresay you would not mind
answering me a few question; for you see -- "
Here Dick broke in: "No, please, Boffin! let it
alone for the present. Of course you want the guest to be happy and
comfortable; and how can that be if he has to trouble himself with
answering all sorts of questions while he is still confused with the new
customs and people about him? No, no: I am going to take him where he can
ask questions himself, and have them answered; that is, to my
great-grandfather in Bloomsbury: and I am sure you can't have anything to
say against that. So instead of bothering, you had much better go out to
James Allen's and get a carriage for me, as I shall drive him up myself;
and please tell Jim to let me have the old grey, for I can drive a wherry
much better than a carriage. Jump up old fellow, and don't be
disappointed; our guest will keep himself for you and your stories."
I stared at Dick; for I wondered at his speaking
to such a dignified-looking p
ersonage so familiarly, not to say curtly; for I thought that this Mr.
Boffin, in spite of his well-known name out of Dickens, must be at the
least a senator of these strange people. However, he got up and said,
"All right, old oar-wearer, whatever you like; this is not one of my busy
days; and though" (with a condescending bow to me) "my pleasure of a
talk with this learned guest is put off, I admit that he ought to see
your worthy kinsman as soon as possible. Besides, perhaps he
[Page
24]
will be the better able to answer my questions
after his own have been answered."
And
therewith he turned and swung himself out of the hall.
When he was well gone, I said: "Is it wrong to ask
what Mr. Boffin is? whose name, by the way reminds me of many pleasant
hours passed in reading Dickens."
Dick
laughed. "Yes, yes," said he: as it does us, I see you take the allusion.
Of course his real name is not boffin, but Henry Johnson; we only call
him Boffin as a joke, partly because he is a dustman, and partly because
he will dress so showily, and get as much gold on him as a baron of the
Middle Ages. As why should he not if he likes? only we are his special
friends, you know, so of course we jest with him."
I held my tongue for some time after that; but
Dick went on:
"He is a capital fellow, and you
can't help liking him; but he has a weakness; he will spend his time in
writing reactionary novels, and is very proud of getting the local colour
right, as he calls it; and as he thinks you come from some forgotten
corner of the earth, where people are unhappy, and consequently
interesting to a story-teller, he thinks he might get some information
out of you. O, he will be quite straightforward with you, for that
matter. Only for your own comfort beware of him!"
"Well, Dick" said the weaver, doggedly, I think
his novels are very good."
"Of course you
do," said Dick; birds of a feather flock together; mathematics and
antiquarian novels stand on much the same footing. But here he comes
again."
And in effect the Golden Dustman
hailed us from
[Page 25]
the hall-door; so we all got
up and went into the porch, before which, with a strong grey horse in the
shafts, stood a carriage ready for us which I could not help noticing. It
was light and handy, but had none of that sickening vulgarity which I had
known as inseparable from the carriages of our time, especially the
`elegant' ones, but was as graceful and pleasant in line as a Wessex
wagon. we go in, Dick and I. The girls, who had come into the porch to
see us off, waved their hands to us; the weaver nodded kindly; the
dustman bowed as gracefully as a troubadour; Dick shook the reins, and we
were off.
Chapter 4: A Market By The Way
We turned away
from the river at once, and were soon in the main road that runs through
Hammersmith. But I should have had no guess as to where I was, if I had
not started from the waterside; for King Street was gone, and the highway
ran through wide sunny meadows and garden-like tillage. The Creek, which
we crossed at once, had been rescued from its culvert, and as we went
over its pretty bridge we saw its waters, yet swollen by the tide,
covered with gay boats of different sizes. There were houses about, some
on the road, some amongst the fields with pleasant lanes leading down to
them, and each surrounded by a teeming garden. They were all pretty in
design, and as solid as might be, but countrified in appearance, like
yeomen's dwellings; some of them of red brick like those by the river,
but more of timber and plaster, which were by
[Page
26]
the necessity of their construction so
like medieval houses of the same materials that I fairly felt as if I
were alive in the fourteenth century; a sensation helped out by the
costume of the people that we met or passed, in whose dress there was
nothing "modern". Almost everybody was gaily dressed, but especially the
women, who were so well-looking, or even so handsome, that I could
scarcely refrain my tongue from calling my companion's attention to the
fact. Some faces I saw that were thoughtful, and in these I noticed great
nobility of expression, but none that had a glimmer of unhappiness, and
the greater part (we came upon a good many people) were frankly and
openly joyous.
I thought I knew the Broadway
by the lie of the roads that still met there. On the north side of the
road was a range of buildings and courts low, but very handsomely built
and ornamented, and in that way forming a great contrast to the
unpretentiousness of the houses round about; while above this lower
building rose the steep lead-covered roof and the buttresses and higher
part of the wall of a great hall, of a splendid and exuberant style of
architecture, of which one can say little more than that it seemed to me
to embrace the best qualities of the
Gothic of northern Europe with those
of the Saracenic and Byzantine, though there was no copying of any one of
these styles. On the other, the south side, of the road was an octagonal
building with a high roof, not unlike the Baptistry at Florence in
outline, except that it was surrounded by a lean-to that clearly made an
arcade or cloisters to it; it also was most delicately ornamented.
This whole mass of architecture which we had come
upon so suddenly from amidst the pleasant fields was not only exquisitely
beautiful in itself,
[Page 27]
but it bore upon it
the expression of such generosity and abundance of life that I was
exhilarated to a pitch that I had never yet reached. I fairly chuckled
for pleasure. My friend seemed to understand it, and sat looking on me
with a pleased and affectionate interest. We had pulled up amongst a
crowd of carts, wherein sat handsome healthy-looking people, men, women,
and children very gaily dressed, and which were clearly market carts, as
they were full of very tempting-looking country produce.
I said, "I need not ask if this is a marker, for I
see clearly that it is; but what market is it that it is so splendid? And
what is the glorious hall there, and what is the building on the south
side?"
"O," said he, it is just our
Hammersmith market; and I am glad you like it so much, for we are really
proud of it. Of course the hall inside is our winter Mote-House; for in
summer we mostly meet in the fields down by the river opposite Barn Elms.
The building on our right hand is our theatre: I hope you like it."
"I should be a fool if I didn't," said I.
He blushed a little as he said: "I am glad of
that, too, because I had a hand in it; I made the great doors, which are
of damascened bronze. We will look at them later in the day, perhaps:
but we ought to be getting on now. As to the market, this is not one of
our busy days; so we shall do better with it another time, because you
will see more people."
I thanked him, and
said: "Are these the regular country people? What very pretty girls there
are amongst them."
As I spoke, my eye caught
the face of a beautiful woman, tall, dark-haired, and white-skinned,
dressed in a pretty light-green dress in honour of the season and the hot
day, who smiled kindly on me,
[Page 28]
and more
kindly still, I thought, on Dick; so I stopped a minute, but presently
went on:
"I ask because I do not see any of
the country-looking people I should have expected to see at a market
-- I mean selling things there."
"I don't
understand," said he, what kind of people you would expect to see; nor
quite what you mean by `country' people. These are the neighbours and
that like they run in the Thames valley. There are parts of these islands
which are rougher and rainier than we are here, and there people are
rougher in their dress; and they themselves are tougher and more
hard-bitten than we are to look at. But some people like their looks
better than ours; they say they have more character in them -- that's the
word. Well, it's a matter of taste. -- anyhow, the cross between us and
them generally turns out well," added he, thoughtfully.
I heard him, though my eyes were turned away from
him, for that pretty girl was just disappearing through the gate with her
big basket of early peas, and I felt that disappointed kind of feeling
which overtakes one when one has seen an interesting or lovely face in
the streets which one is never likely to see again; and I was silent a
little. At last I said: "What I mean is, that I haven't seen any poor
people about -- not one."
He knit his brows,
looked puzzled, and said: "No, naturally; if anybody is poorly, he is
likely to be within doors, or at best crawling about in the garden; but I
don't know of any one sick at present. Why should you expect to see
poorly people on the road?"
"No, no," I said;
I don't mean sick people. I mean poor people, you know; rough people."
"No," said he, smiling merrily, I really do not
[Page 29]
know. The fact is, you must come along quick to
my great-grandfather, who will understand you better than I do. Come on,
Greylocks!" Therewith he shook the reins, and we jogged along merrily
eastward.