Mr5, Q. lAnnmus LIBRARY UNIVE >SiTY OF CAt-iPOPiNIA SAN DIESO MES. BANKS'S KOYELS. THE MANCHESTER MAN J THE FIGHT IN THE COLLEGE TARD, THE MANCHESTER MAN. BY Mrs. G. LINNtEUS BANKS. Author of " God's Providence House, Glory,'' dr. i-e 'a>entli (EMtion. OLD MABKET STREET. QUanc^eefet: ABEL HEYWOOD & SOX, 56 & 5S, OLDHAM STREET, JSonion : SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & Co., Limited. STATIONERS' HALL COURT. 1897. CONTENTS. CiiAPTEiii Page. I. The Flood I II. No One Knows 7 III. How the Rev. Joshua Brookes and Simon Clegg in- terpreted a Shakesperian Text 14 IV. Mischief 22 V. Ellen Chadwick 28 VI. To Martial Music 36 VII. The Reverend Joshua Brookes 43 VIII. The Blue-Coat School 49 IX. The Snake 56 X. First Antagonism 64 XL The Blue-Coat Boy 71 XII. The Gentleman 80 XIII. Simon's Pupil 85 XIV. Jahez goes out into the World 91 XV. Apprenticeship 98 XVI. In War and Peace 105 XVII. In the Warehouse 113 XVIII. Easter Monday 121 XIX. Peterloo 128 XX. Action and Reaction Ij9 XXI. Wounded 146 XXII. Mr. Clegg 153 XXIII. In the Theatre Royal 161 XXIV. Madame Broadbent's Fan 166 XXV. Retrospective 173 XXVI. On the Portico Steps 181 XXVII. Manhood 18S XXVIII. Once in a Life 194 XXIX. On Ardwick Green Pond cci X^X. Blind ... .*• •«. ••• •«• ••• ••• ••• ••• ••• 210 «. Chapter. Page. XXXI. Coronation Day 217 XXXII. Evening: Indoors and Out 225 XXXIII. Clogs 233 XXXIV. Birds of a Feather 240 XXXV. At Carr Cottage 246 XXXVI. The Lover's Walk 254 XXXVII. A Ride on a Rainy Night 262 XXXVIII Defeated 269 XXXIX. Like Father, Like Son 276 XL. With all His Faults 283 XLI. Marriage 290 XLII. Blows 298 XLIII. Partnership •• 307 XLIV. Man and Beast 316 XLV. Wounds Inflicted and Endured 325 XLVI. The Mower with His Scythe 333 XLVII. The Last Act ,, 340 THE MANCHESTER MAN. CHAPTER THE FIRST. THE FLOOD. WHEN Pliny lost his life, and Herculaneum was buried, Manchester was born. Whilst lava and ashes blotted from sight and memory fair and luxurious Roman cities close to the Cai)ito], the Roman soldiery of Titus, under their general Agricola, laid the foundations of a distant city which now com- petes with the great cities of the world. Where now rise forests of tall chimneys, and the hum of whirling spindles, spread the dense woods of Arden ; and from the clearing in their midst rose the Roman castrum of Mamutium,f which has left its name of Castle Field as a memorial to us. But where their summer camp is said to have been pitched, on the airy rock at the confluence of the rivers Irk and Irwell, sacred church and peaceful college have stood for centuries, and only antiquaries can point to Roman possession, or even to the baronial hall which the Saxon lord perched there for security. And only an antiquary or a very old inhabitant can recall Manchester as it was at the close of the last century, and shutting his eyes upon railway-arch, station, and esplanade, upon Palatine buildings, broad roadways, and river embank- ments, can see the Irk and the Irwell as they were when the Cathedral was the Collegiate Church, with a diminuti\'e brick wall round its ancient graveyard. Then the irregular-fronted rows of quaint old houses which still, under the name of Half Street, crowd upon two sides of the churchyard, with only an * See Appendix. •f Trior to the close of the Fourteenth Century, Manchester was written Mainecester. 2 The Manchester Man. intervening strip of a flagged walk between, closed it up on a third side, and shut the river (lying low beneath) from the view, with a huddled mass of still older dwellings, some of which w< ••'t thrust out of sight, and were only to be reached by /lights of break-neck steps of rock or stone, and like their hoary fellows creeping down the narrow roadway of Hunt's Lank, overhung the Irwell, and threatened to tO])ple into it some day. 'I'he Chetham Hospital or College still looks solidly down on tiie Irk at the angle of the streams; the old (Grammar School has been suffered to do the same ; and — thanks to the honest workmen who built for our ancestors — tfie long lines of houses known as Long Millgate are for the most })art standing, and on the river side have resisted the frequent Hoods of cen- turies. In 1799 that line was almost unbroken, from the College (where it ccjmmenced at Hunt's Bank Bridge) to Red Bank. The little alley by the 'I'own Mill, called Mill-brow, which led down to the wooden INIill Bridge, was little more of a gap than those narrow entries or passages which ])ierced the walls like slits here and there, and offered dark and perilous passage to courts and alleys, trending in steep incline to the very bed of the Irk. Tlie houses themselves had been good originally, and were thus cramped together for defence in perilous times, when experience taught that a narrow gorge was easier held against warlike odds than an open roadway. Ducie Bridge had then no existence, but Tanners' Bridge- no doubt a strong wooden structure like that at Mill-brow — accessible from the street only by one of those narrow steep passages, stood within a few yards of its site, and had a place on old maps so far back as 1650. Its name is ex})ressive, and goes to j)rove tiuit the tannery on the steep banks of the Irk, behind the houses of Long Millgate opposite to the end of Miller's Lane, was a tannery at least a century and a half before old Simon Clegg worked amongst the tan-pits, and called William (llough master. To this sinuous and picturescjue line of houses, the streams with their rocky and precipitous banks will have served in olden times as a natural defensive moat (indeed it is noticeable that old Manchester kept pretty much within the angle of its rivers), and in 1799, from one end of Millgate to the other, the dwellers by the waterside looked across the streani on green and undulating uplands, intersected by luxuriant hedgerows, a bleachery at U'alker's Croft, and a short terrace of houses nea' The Manchester Man. 3 Scotland Bridge, denominated Scotland, being the sole breaks in the verdure. Between the tannery and Scotland Bridge, the river makes a sharp bend ; and here, at the e,bow, another mill, with its cor- responding dam, was situated. The current of the Irk, . if not deep, is strong at all times, though kept by its high banks within narrow compass. But when, as is not unseldom the case, there is a sudden flushing of water from the hill-country, it rises, rises, rises, stealthily, though swiftly, till the streaui overtops its banks, washes over low-lying bleach-crofts, fields, and gardens, mounts foot by foot over the fertile slopes, invades the houses, and, like a mountain-robber sweeping from his fastness on a peaceful vale, carries his spoil with him, and leaves desolation and wailing behind. Such a flood as this, following a hea\-y thunder-storm, de- vastated the valley of the Irk, on the 17th of August, 1799. Well was it then for the tannery and those houses on the bank of the Irk which had their foundations in the solid rock, for the waters surged and roared at their base and over j)lea- sant meadows — a wide-spread turlnilent sea, with here and there an island of refuge, which the day before had been a lofty mound. The flood of the previous Autumn, when a coach and horses had been swept down the Invell, and men and women were drowned, was as nothing to this. The tannery yard, high as it was above the bed of the Irk, and solid as was its em- bankment, was threatened with in\asion. The surging water roared and beat against its masonry, and licked its coping with frothy tongue and lip, like a hungry gi mt, greedy for fresn food. Men with thick clogs and hide-bound legs, leathern gloves and aprons, were hurrying to and fro with barrows and bark-boxes for the reception of the valuable hides which their mates, armed with long-shafted hooks and tongs, were drag- ging from the pits pell-mell, ere the advancing waters should encroach upon their territory, and empty the tan-pits for them. Already the insatiate flood bore testimony to its ruthless greed. Hanks of yarn, pieces of calico, hay, uptorn bushes, planks, chairs, boxes, dog-kennels, and hen-coops, a shattered chest of drawers, pots and pans, had swept past, swirling and eddying in the flood, which by this time spread like a vaSt lake over the opposite lands, and had risen a\ ithin three feet of the arch of Scotland Bridge, and hardly left u trace where the mill- dam chafed it commonly. 4 The Manchester Man. Too busy were the tan'icrs, under the eye of their master, to stretch out hand ur liook to arrest the progress of either furniture or live stock, though beehives and hen-coops, and more than one squealing pig, went racing with the cur- rent, now rising towards tlie footway of fanner's Bridge. Every window of every house upon the banks was crowded with anxious heads, for flooded Scotland rose like an island from the watery waste, and their own cellars were fast filling. There had been voices calling to each other from window to window all the morning ; but now from window to window, from house to house, rang one reduplicated shriek," which caused many of the busy tanners to quit their work, and rush to the water's edge. To their horror, a painted wooden cradle, which had crossed the deeply-submerged dam in safety, was floating foot-foremost down to destruction, with an infant calmly sleeping in its bed ; the very motion of the waters having seemingly lulled it to sounder repose ! " (jood Lord ! It's a choilt ! " exclaimed Simon Clegg, the eldest tanner in the yard. " Lend a hand here, fur the sake o' ih' childer at whoam." Half a dozen hooks and plungers were outstretched, even while he spoke ; but the longest was lamentably too short to arrest the approaching cradle in its course, and the unconscious babe seemed doomed. \\'ith frantic haste Simon Clegg rushed on to Tanner's Bridge, followed by a boy ; and there, with hook and i)lunger, they met the cradle as it drifted towards them, afraid of over-balancing it even in their attempt to save. It swerved, and almost upset ; but Simon dexterously caught his hook within the wooden hood, and drew the frail bark and its living freight close to the bridge. The boy, and a man named Cooper, lying flat on the bridge, then clutched at it with extended hands, raised it carefully from the tm-bid water, and drew it safely 1)etween thco])en rails to the footway, amidst the shouts and hurrahs of breathless and excited spectators. The l:)abe was screaming terribly. The shock when the first hook stopped the progress of the cradle had disturbed its dreams, and its little fat arms were stretched out piteously as strange faces looked down upon it instead of the mother's familiar countenance. Wrapping the i)atchwork (|uilt aroimd it to keep it from contact with his wet sleeves and apron, Simon tenderly as a woman, lifted the infant in his rough arms, and strove to comfort it, but in vain. His beard of three days growth was as a rasp to its sott skin, and the closer The Man'chester Man. 5 he caressed, the more it screamed. The men from the tan- nery came crowding round him. '• What dost ta mean to do wi' th' babby ? " asked the man Cooper of old Simon. " Aw'd tak' it whoam to my missis, but th' owd lass is nowt to be takken to, an' wur cross as two sticks when oi only axed fur mi baggin to bring to wark wi' mi this mornin'," added he, with rueful remembrance of the scolding wife on his hearth. " Neay, lad, aw'U not trust th' poor choilt to thy Sally. It 'ud be loike chuckin' it outo' th' wayter into th' fire (Hush-a-by, babby). Aw'll just take it to ar' Bess, and hoo'll cuddle it up, and gi' it summat to sup, till we find its own mammy," answered Simon, leaving the bridge. " Bring the kayther*^ alung. Jack," (to the boy) " Bess'll want it. We'n noan o' that tackle at ar place. Hush-a-by, hush-a-by, babby." But the little thing, missing its natural protector, and half stifled in the swathing quilt, only screamed the louder ; and Simon, notwithstanding his kind heart, was truly glad when his daughter Bess, who had witnessed the rescue from their own window, met him at the tannery gate, and relieved him of his struggling charge. " Si thi, Bess ! here's a God-send fur thi — a poor little babby fur thi to tend an' be koind to, till them it belungs to come a-seekin' fur it," said he to the young woman : " but thah mun give it summat better than cowd wayter — it's had too mich o' that a'ready." "That aw will, i)oor darlin' !" responded she, kissing the babe's velvet cheeks as, sensible of a change of nurses, it nestled to her breast. " Eh ! but there'll be sore hearts for this blessed babby, somewheere." And she turned up the Harrow passage which led at once from the tan-yard and the b.ldre, stilling and soothing the little castaway as adroitly as an experienced nurse. "Neaw, luk thi, lad," Simon remarked to Cooper; "is na it fair wc/nderful heaw that babby taks to ar Bess ? But it's just a way hoo has, an' theere is na a fractious choilt i' a' ar yard butll be quiet wi' Bess." Cooper looked after her, nodded an assent, and sighed, as if he wished some one in another yard had the same soothing way with her. But the voice of the raging water had not stilled like that of the rescued infant. Back went the two men to their task, and * Cradle. 6 The Manchester Man. worked away with a will to carry hides, bark and implements to l)laces of security. And as they hurried to and fro with loads on back or barrow, up, up, inch by inch, foot l)y foot, the swell- ing flood rose still higher, till, lapping the foot-bridge, curling over the embankment, it drove the sturdy tanners l)ack, flung itself into the pits, and, in many a swirling eddy, washed tan and hair and skins into the common current. Not so much, however, went into its seething caldron as might have been, had the men worked with less vigour : and, (|uick to recognise the value of ready service, Mr. Clough led his drenched and weary workmen to the " Skinner's Arms," in Long IMillgate, and ordered a sui)i)ly of ale and bread and cheese to l)e served out to them. At the door of the public-house, where he left the workmen to the enjt)yment of this improm])tu feast, he encountered Simon Clegg. The kind fellow had taken a hasty run to liis own tenement, "just to see heaw ar JJess an' th' babby get on ;" and he brought back the intelligence that it was "a lad, an' as good as goold." " Oh, my man, I've been too much occupied to speak to you before," cried Mr. Clough. " I saw you foremost in the rescue of that unfortunate infant, and shall not forget it. Here is a crown for your share in the good deed. 1 suppose that .vas the child's mother you gave it to ? " Simon was a little man, but he drew back with considerable r.ative dignity. " 'I'hcnk \o'. measter, all th' same, but aw connot tak' brass fur jusfrloin' mv duty. Aw"d never ha slept i' my bed gin that little un had bin tlreawned, an' me lookin' on loike a stump. Neay; that lass wur Ik-ss, moi wench. ^\'^J'n no notion wheer th' lad's mother is.'' Mr. Clough would have jiressed tlie money upon him, but he put it l)a< k with a motion of his hand. "No, sir; aw'm n i)Oor mon, a \arry ])oor mon, but aw Connot tak' money fur sa\ in' a (hoik's life. It's agen" mi conscience. I'll tak' mi share o' the bread an' cheese, an" drink vo'r health i' a sup o' ale, but aw cudna' tak' that brnss if aw wur deein'.' ;\nd Simon, giNing a scra])e with his clog, and a duck of his head, meant tor a bow, ])as.sed his master respectfully, and v.ent clattering up the stci)'^ of the "Skinners' Arms," lea\ing the gentleman standing tliere, and looking after him in mingled astonishment and admiration. CHAPTER THE SECOND. NO ONE KNOWS. WHEN tlie scurrying water, thick with sand and mud, and discoloured with dye stuffs, which floated in brightly-tinted patches on its surface, filled the arch of Scot- land Bridge, and left only the rails of Tanners' Bridge visible, the inundation reached its climax ; but a couple of days elapsed before the flood subsided below the level of the un- protected tannery-5'ard, and until then neither Simon Clegg nor his mates could resume their occupations. There was a good deal of lounging about Long ^lillgate and the doors of the " Queen Anne " and " Skinners' Ar.ns," of heavily-shod men, in rough garniture of thick hide — armoury against the tan and water in whicli their daily bread was steeped. But in all those two days no anxious father, no white-faced mother, had run from street to street, and house to house, to seek and claim, a rescued living child. No, not even when the week had passed, though the story of his " miraculous pre- servation " was the theme of conversation at the tea-tables of gentility and in the bar-parlours of taverns ; was the gossip of courts and alleys, highways and byways ; and though echo, in the guise of a "flying stationer," caught it up and spread it broadcast in catchpenny sheets, far beyond the confines of the inundation. This was the more surprising as no dead bodies had been Avashed down the river, and no lives were reported " lost." Had the child no one to care for it ? — no relative to whom its little life was precious? Had it been abandoned to its fate, a Avaif unloved, uncared for ? The house in which Simon Clegg lived was ^ituaced at the very end of Skinners' Vard, a cul-de-sac, to which the only ap- proach was a dark covered entry, not four feet wide. The 8 The Manchester Man. pavement of the yard was natural rock, originally hewn into broad flat steps, but then worn with water from the skies, and from house-wifely pails, and the tramp of countless clogs, to a rugged steep incline, asking wary stepping from the stranger on exploration after nightfall. Gas was, of course, unknown, but not even an oil-lamj> lit up the gloom. In the sunken basement a tri])e-l)oilcr had a number of stone troughs or cisterns, for keeping his commodities cool for sale. 1'he three rooms of Simon Clegg were situated immediately above these, two small bed-rooms overlooking the river and pleasant green fields beyond : the wide kitchen window having no broader range of j^rospect than the dreary and not too savoury yard. Even this view was sliut out by a l)atting frame, resembling much a long, narrow French bedstead, all the more that on it was laid a thick bed of raw (that is, undressed) cotton, freckled with seeds and line bits of husky pod. Bess was a batter, and her business was to turn and beat the clotted mass with stout lithe arms and willow-wands, until the fibres loosened, the seeds and specks fell through, and a billowy mass of whitish down lay before her. It was not a healthy occupation : dust and flue released found their wav into the lungs, as well as on to the floor and furniture ; and a rosy- cheeked batter was a myth. Machinery does the work now — but this history deals with t/ieii ! 1 )uring the week dust lay thick on everything ; even Bessy's hair was fluffy as a l)ursting cotton jwd, in si;ite of the ker- chief tied across it ; but on the Saturday, when she had carried her work to Simpsons factory in Miller's Lane, and came back with her wages, liroom and duster cleared away the film ; wax and brush polished up the oak bureau, the pride and glory of tlicir kitchen ; tlie two slim iron candlesticks, fender and poker Were burnished bright as steel ; the three-legged round deal table was scrubbed white ; and then, mounted o\\ tall i)attens, she set about with mop and pail, and a long-liandled stone, to cleanse the flag floor from the week'.s im])urities. She had had a good mother, and, to tiie best of her ability, Bess tried to follow in her footsteps, and fill the vacant place on her father's hearth, and in his heart. Her liiother had been dead four years, and Uess. now close ui)on twenty, had since then l(jsl two brrithers, and lamented as lost one dearer than a brother — the two former by death, the other by the fierce demands of war. She had a jjale, interesting face, with dark hair and thoughtful, deej> grey eyes, and was, if anything, too The Manchester Man. 9 quiet and staid for her years ; but when her face lit up she had as pleasant a smile upon it as one would wish to see by one's fireside, and not even her dialect could make her voice other- wise than low and gentle. Both her brotliers had been considerably younger than her- self ; and possibly the fact of having stood in loco parentis to tliem for upwards of two years had imparted to her tlie air of motherliness she possessed. Certain it is that if a child in the yard scalded itself, or cut a finger, or knocked the bark off an angular limb, it went crying to Bessy Clegg in preference to its own mother ; and she healed bruises and quarrels with the same balsam — loving sympathy. She was just the one to open her arms and heart to a poor motherless babe, and Simon Clegg knew it. Old Simon, or old Clegg, he was called, probably because he was graver and more serious than his fellows, and had never changed his master since he grew to manhood ; certainly not on account of his age, which trembled on the verge of fifty only. He was a short, somewhat spare man, with a face deeply lined by sorrow for the loved ones he had lost. But he had a merry twinkling eye, and was not without a latent vein of humour. The atmosphere of the tannery might have shrivelled his skin, but it had not withered his heart ; and when he handed the child he had saved to his daughter, he never stopped to calculate contingencies. The boy, apparently between two and three months' old, was dressed in a long gown of printed linen had a muslin cap, and an under one of flannel, all neatly made, but neither in make nor material beyond those of a respectable working-man's child ; and tliere was not a mark upon anything which could give a clue to its parentage. The painted wooden cradle, which had been to it an ark of safetv, was placed in a corner by the fireplace ; and an old bottle, filled with thin gjruel. over the neck of which Bess had tied a loose cap of punctured wash-leather, was so adjusted that the little one, deprived of its mother, could lie within and feed itself whilst Bess industriously pursued her avocations. These were not times for idleness. There had been bread- riots the previous winter ; food still was at famine prices ; and it was all a poor man could do, with the strictest industry and economy, to obtain a bare subsistence. So Bess worked away all the harder, because there were times when babydom was imperative, and would be nursed. ^° The Manxhester Man. She had put the last garnishing touches to her kitchen on Saturday night, had taken off her wrapper-brat,-'' put on a clean l}iue ,bedg(j\vn,t and suDstiiuced a white linen cap for the coloured kerchief, v.hen her father, vrho had been to New Cross Market to make Lis bargraas ov himself on this occasion, came into the kitchen, followed by Cooper, who having helped to save the child, naturally felt an interest in hiui. The iron j)()rridge-pot was on the low fire, and Bess, sifting tlie oatmeal into the boiling water with the left hand, whilst witli the other she beat it swiftly with her porridge-stick, was so intent on the pre])aration of their supper, she did not notice their entrance until her father, })utting his coarse wicker market-basket down on her white table, bade Cooper " Coom in an' tak' a cheer."' Instead of taking a chair, the man walked as quietly as his chigs would let him to the cradle, and looked down on the infant sucking vigorously at the delusive bottle. Mat Cooper was the ////happy father of eiglit, whose maintenance was a sore peri)lexity to him ; and it niay be supposed he spoke with authority wlien he exclaimed — " Whoy, he tak's t' th' pap-bottfe as nat'rally as if he"n ne'er had nowt else ! " And the big man — quite a contrast to Simon— stooped and lifted the babe from the cradle with all the ease of long prac- tice, and dandled it in his arms, saying as he did so, " Let's hev a look at th' little chap. Aw've not seen the colour o' his eyen yet," The eyes were grey, so dark they might Iiave passed for black : and there was in them more tl^an the ordinary inquiring gize of babyhood. " \Vell, thah'rt a ]:)ratty lad ; but had thah bin th' fowestj i' o" I-ankisheer. aw'd a-thowt thi mammy'd ha'speered§ fur thi afore this,"' added he. sitting down, and nodding to the child, which crowed in liis face. " Ah 1 one would ha' reckoned so," assented Bess, without turning njuiul. " What ar' ta gooin to do, Simon, toward fimdin' th' choilt's kin ? " next ([uestioned tiieir visitor. Simon looked ]Hi/zled " Wliov. :nv'\c liardlv gi'cn it a thowt." ihit the question, once staric-d, was discussed at some length. Meanwliile the porridge destined for two Bess poured into * A sort of close pinafore, f A sliort loose jacket. :}. Ugliest. § Inquired. The Man-chester Man. ir three bowls, placing three iron spoons heside them, with no more certnionv than, " Yc'll tak' a suo wi' us, ]Mat/' Mat apologised, feeling quite assured there was no more than the two could have eaten ; but Simon looked hurt, and the porridge was appetising to a hungry man ; so he handed the baby to the young woman, took up his si)oon, and the broken thread of conversation was renewed at intervals. What they said matters not so much as what they did. The next morning being .Sunday, Cooper called for Clegg just as the bells were ringing for church ; and the two, arrayed in their best fustian breeches, long-tailed, deep-cuffed coats, knitted hose, three-cornered hats, and shoes, only kept for Sunday wear, set out to seek the parents of the unclaimed infant, nothing doubting that they were going to carry solace to sorrowing; hearts. 'I'heir course lay in the same track as the Irk, now pursuing its course as smilingly under the bright August sun as though its banks were not strewed with wreck, and foul with thick offensive mud, and the woeful devastation were none of its doing. TJiere were fewer Ijauses on their route than now, and they kept close as possible to the course of the river, question- ing the various inhabitants as they went along. They had gone through Collyhurst and Blakely without rousing anyone to a thought beyond self-sustained damage, or gaining a single item of intelligence, though they made many a detour in quest of it. At a roadside public-house close to Aliddleton they sat down ])arched with heat and thirst, cilled fcr a mug of ale each, drew from their pockets thick hunks of brown bread and cheese, wrapped in blue and white check handkerchiefs, and whilst satisfying their hunger, came to the conclusion that no cradle could have drifted safely so far, crossing weirs and mill dams amongst uprooted bushes, timber, and household chattels and that it was best to turn back. In Smedley Vale, where the tlood seemed to have done its worst, and where a small cottage close to the river lay in ruins, a knot of people were gathered together talking and gesticu- lating as if in eager controversy. As they approached, they were spied by one of the group. '• Here are th' chaps as fund th' babby. an' wantn to know who it belungs to, " cried he, a youth whom they had interro- gated early in the day. To tell in brief what Simon and his companion learned by slow degrees — the hapless child was alone in the world, 12 The Manchester Man. orphaned by a succession of misfortunes. The dilapidated cottage had been for some fifteen months the home of its parents. Tlie father, mIio was understood to have come from Crumpsall with his young wife and her aged mother, had been sent for to attend the death-bed of a brother in Liverpool, and had never been heard of since. The alarm and trouble con- sequent upon his prolonged absence prostrated the young wife and caused not only the babe's premature birth, but the mother's death. The care of the child had devolved U])on the stricken grandmother, who had him brought up by hand, as Matthew's sagacity had suggested. She was a woman far advanced in years, and feel)le, but she asked no help from neighbours or parish, though her poverty \\as apparent. She kept poultry and knitted stockings, and managed to eke out a li\ing somehow, but how. none of those scattered neighbours .seemed to know — .she had " held her yt-ad so hoigh" (pursued her way so (juietly). She had been out in her garden feeding her fowls, when the flood came upon them without warning, swept through the onen doors of the cottage, and carried cradle and evcrvthiT-ig else before it, leaving hardly a v/all .standing. In endea\ouring to save the child she herself got .seriously hurt, and Avas with diffic-ilty rescued. ]!ut between grief and fright, brui.ses and tne drenching, the old dame succumbed, and died on the Thursday morning, and had been buried by the parish — from wivcli in lile she had ])roudly kept aloof — that \ery afternoon, and no one could tell other name she had borne than Nan. Jk'ss sobbed aloud when she heard her father's recital which lost nothing of its jiathos from the homely vernacular in which it was couched. "An' what's to be done neaw ? " asked Coojjcr, as he .sat on one of the rush-bottomed chairs, sucking the knob of his walk- ing-stick, as if for nil insj^iration. " Yo canno' think o' keep- ing th' choilt, an' bread an' meal at sich a i)roice ! " "Connot oi? Then aw conno' think o' aught else. Would.st ha' me chuck it i' th' ri\ er agen?> What dost thah say, Bess?" turning to his daughter, Avho had the child on her lap. '■ \Mioi, th' poor little lad's got noather feyther nor mother, an' thah's lost boath o' llii lads. Mel^be it's a Ciod.send, feytlier, after o', as yo said'n to me," and she kissed it tenderly. " Kh, wenrli ! " interposed Matthew, but .she went on with- out heeding him. The Manchester Man. 13 '•' There's babby clooas laid by i' lavei der i' thoase drawers as hasna seen dayleet sin ar Joe wur a toddler, an' they'll just :ome handy. An' if bread's dear an' n eal's dear, we mun just rite less on it arsels, an' there'll be moore fur the choilt. He'll pay yo back, feyther, aw know, when yo're too owd to wark." > " An' aw con do 'bout 'bacca, lass. If the orphan's granny wur too preawd to ax help o' th' j^arish, aw'll be too preawd to send her pratty grandchoilt theer." An so, to Matthew Cooper's amazement, it was settled. But the extra labour and self-denial it involved on the part of Bess, neither Matthew nor Simon could estimate. In the midst of the rabid scepticism and Republicanism of the period, Simon Clegg was a staunch " Church and King " man, and, as a natural consequence, a stout upholder of their ordinances. Regularly as the bell tolled in for Sunday morn- ing service, he might be seen walking reverently down the aisle of the old church, to his place in the free seats, with his neat, cheerful-looking daughter following him sometimes, but not always — so regularly that the stout beadle missed him from his seat the Sunday after the inundation, and meeting him in the churchyard a week later, sought to learn the why and wherefore. The beadle of the parish churcn was an important personage in the eyes of Simon Clegg ; and, somewhat i)roud of his notice, the little tanner related the incidents of tiiat memoral)le flood-week to his ([uerist, concluding with his adoption of the child. The official h'md and ha'd, applauded the act, but shook his powdered head, and added, sagely, that it was a " greeat charge, a varry greeat charge." •' Dun vo' think th' little un's bin babtised ? " interrogated the beadle. " Aw conno' tell ; nob'dy couldn't tell nowt abeawt th' choilt, 'ut wur ony use to onybody. Bess an' me han talked it ower, an' we wur thinkin o' bringin' it to be kirsened, to be on th' safe soide loike. Aw reckon it wouldna do th' choilt ony harm to be kirsened twoice ower ; an' 'twoud be loike flingin' tli' choilt's soul to Owd Scrat gin he wur no kirsened at o'. \Vhat dun yo' thinken'? " '' The beadle thought pretty much the same as Si men, and it was finally arranged that Simon should present the young, foundling for baptism in the course of the week. CHAPTER THE THIRD.* HOW THE REV. JOSHUA DROOKES AND SIMON CLEGG INTERPRETED A SHAKESPERIAN TEXT. MANCHESTER had at tliat date two eccentric clergy- men attached to the Collegiate Church. The one. Parson Gatlifie, a fiine man, a polished gentleman, an eloquent preacher, but a Iwn vivnnt of whom many odd stories are told. The other, the Reverend Joshua Drookes, a short, stumpy man (so like to the old knave of clubs in mourning that the sobriquet of the " Knave of Clubs " stuck to Inm), was a rough, crusted, unpolished black-diamond, hasty in temper, harsh in lone, blunt in speech and in the pulpit, but with a true heart beating under the angular external crystals ; and he was a good liver of another sort than his colleague. He was the son of a crippled and not too sober shoemaker, who, when the boy's intense desire for learning had attracted the attention and patronage of Parson Ainscough, went to the homes of several of the wealthy denizens of the town, to ask for ])ecuniary aid to send his son Joshua to college. The youth's scholarly attainments liad already obtained him an exhi- bition at the Free Grammar School, whicli, coupled with the donations obtained by his father and the helping hand of Parson Ainscough, enabled him to keep his terms and to graduate at l>razenosc, to become a master in the grammar school in which he had been taught, and a chaplain in the Collegiate Church. So conscientious was he in the performance of his sacred duties that, albeit he was wont to e.xercise his calling after a I^eculiarly rougli fashion of his own, he married, christened, buried more people during his ministry than all the other ecclesiastics put together. It was to this Joshua I'rookes (few ever thought of prefixing * Sec Appendix U. The Manchester Man. 15 the " Reverend " in referring to him) that Simon Clegg, brought "Nan's" ori)han grandchild to be bai)tised on Tues- day, the 7th of September, just three weeks from the date of his invokmtary \-oyage down the flooded Irk. It had taken the tanner the whole of the week following his conversation with the beadle to determine the name he should give the child, and many had been his consultations with Bess on the subject. That very Siuiday he had gone home from church full of the matter, and lifting his big old Bible from its. post of honour on the top of the bureau (it was his whole library), he sat, after dinner, with his head in his hands and his elbows on the table, debating the momentous question. " Yo' see, Bess," said he, '* a neame as sticks to one all one's loife, is noan so sma' a matter as some folk reckon. An' yon's noan a common choilt. It is na e\''ry day, no, nor ev'ry year, as a choilt is weshed down a ri\'er in a kayther, an' saved from th' very jaws of deeath.* An' aw'd loike to gi'e un a neame as 'ud mak' it remember it, an' thenk God for his marcifu' preservation a' th' days o' his loife." After a long pause, during which Bess, took the baby from the cradle, tucked a. napkin under its chin, and began to feed it with a spoon, he resumed — " Yo' see, Bess, hadna aw bin kirsened Simon, aw moight ha' bin a cobbler, or a whitster,t or a wayver, or owt else. But feyther could read tho' he couldna wroite ; an' as he wur a reed-makker, he towt mi moi ABC wi' crookin' up th' bits o' wires he couldna use into th' shaps o' th' letters ; an' when aw could spell sma' words gradely,§ he towt mi to read out o' this varry book ; an' aw read o' Simon a tanner, an' nowt 'ud sarve mi but aw mun be a tanner too, so tha sees theer's summat i' a neame after o'." Bess suggested that he should be called Noah, because Noah "was saved in the ark ; but he objected that Noah was an old greybeard, with a family, and that he knew the flood was coming, and built the ark himself; he was not " takken unawares in his helplessness loike that poorbabby." Moses was her next proposition — Bess had learned some- thing of Biblical lore at the first Sunday-school Manchester could boast, the one in Gun Street, founded by Simeon Newton in 1788 — but Simon was not satisfied even with Moses. " Yo' see, Moses wur put in' th' ark o' bullrushes o' purpose, * See Appendix E. f Bleacher. § Properly. ]6 Ti:e Manchestmr Max. ail' noather thee nor mi's a Pharaoh's dowter, an' di' ittle chap's not loike to be browt oop i' a palhs." Towards the end of the week he burst into the room ; ' Oi hev it, lass, oi hev it ! We'n co' the lad ' Irk ; ' nob'dy'll hev a neame loike that, and it'll tell its own story ; an' fur th' after- neame, aw reckon he mun tak' ours." Marriages were solemnized in the richly-carved choir of the venerable old Church, but churchings and baptisms in a large adjoining chapel ; and thither Bess, who carried the baby, was ushered, followed by Simon and Mat Cooper, who vrere to act as its other sponsors. At the door they made way for the entrance of a party of ladies, whom they had seen alight from sedan-chairs at the upper gate, where a couple of gentlemen joined them. A nurse followed, with a baby, whose christening robe, nearly two yards long, was a mass of rich embroidery. The mother herself — a slight, lovely creature, additionally pale and delicate from her late ordeal — wore a long, [jlain-skirted dress of vari- coloured brocaded silk. A lustrous silk scarf, trimmed with costly lace, enveloped her shoulders. Her head-dress, a bonnet with a bag-crown and Quakerish poke-brim, was of the newest fashion, as were the long kid gloves which covered her arms to the elbows. The party stepped forward as though precedence was theirs of right even at the church door, heeding not Simon's mannerly withdrawal to let them pass ; and the very nurse looked disdainfully at the calico gown of the baby in the round arms of Bess, a woman in a grey duffel cloak and old-fashioned flat, broad-brimmed hat. Is there any thrill, sympathetic or antagonistic, in baby- veins, as they thus meet there for the first time on their entrance into the church and the broad path of life? For the first time — but scarcely for the last. Already a goodly crowd of mothers, babies, godfathers, and godmothers had assembled — a crowd of all grades, judging from their exteriors, for dress had not then ceased to be a criterion ; and all ceremonies of this kintl were performed in shoals — not singly. The Rev. Joshua Brookes, followed l)y his clerk, came through the door in the carven screen, between the choir and bai)tismal chapel, and took his place behind the altar rails. And now ensued a scene which some of my readers may think incredible, but which was common enough then, and there. JT-'^-".^ The Manchester Man. 17 ami is notoriously true. The width of the altar could scarcely acconimodate the number of women waiting to be churched ; and the impatient Joshua assisted the apparitors to marshal them to their places, with a sharp '' You come here ! \ Ou kneel there ! Yon woman's not paid ! " accompanied by pulls and pushes, until the semi-circle was filled. But still the shrinking lady, and another, unused to jostle with rough crowds, were left standing outside the pale. Impetuous Joshua had begun the service before all were settled. " Forasmuch as it liath })leased« " His quick eye caught the outstanding figures. Abruptly stopping his exordium, he exclaimed, in his harsh tones, whicli seemed to intimidate the lady, " What are you standing there for ? Can't you fmd a i)la(-e ? Make room here ! " (pushing two women apart l)y the shoul- der), " thrutch up closer there ! Make haste, and kneel here ! " (to the lady, pulling her forward). " You come here : — make room, will you ? " and having pulled and pushed them into place, he resumed the service. Presently there was another outburst. There had been a liushing of whimpering babies, and a maternal smothering of infantile cries, as a chorus throughout ; but one fractious little one screamed right out, and refused to be comforted. The nervous tremor on that kneeling lady's countenance might have told to whom it belonged, had Joshua been a skill'nl reader of hearts and faces. His irritable temper got the better of him. He broke off in the midst of the psalm to call out, " stop that crying child !" The crymg child did not stop. In the midst of another verse he bawled, " Give that screaming babby the breast !" He went on. The <:lerk had pronouncecl the " Amen " at the end of the psalm ; the chaplain followed, " Let us pray ; " but before he began the prayer, he again shouted, "Take that sijualling babby out!" — an order the; indignant nurse precipitately obeyed ; and the service ended without further interruption. Then followed the christenings, and another marshalling (this time of godfathers and godiuothers, with the infants thev presented), in which the hasty chaplain did his part with hands and voice until all were arranged to his satisfaction. It so happened that the tanners group and the lady's group were ranked side by side. The latter was Mrs. Aspin:JI, the wife of a wealthy cotton merchant, who, with two other gentle- men and a lady, stood behind her, and this time gave her C iS The I^Ianxhester I\Ian. their ir.iich-needcd support. Indeed, wl^it witli the damp and chillness of the: church, and the agitation, the deUcate iady appeared ready to faint. '• Hath this child been already baptised or no ? " asked Joshua Brookes, and was i)assing on, when Simon's unexpected response arrested him. • ''Aw dun not know." '-'Don't know? IIow's that? What are you here for?" were questions huddled one on the otlier, in a broadei vernacular than I have thought well to put in the mouth of o man so deejjly lecrned. " ^^'hoi, yo" see, this is the choilt as wur weslicd deawn th' vh-er wi' th' hood in a kayther ; an' o' belungin" th' lad are deead, an' aw mun kirsenhim to mak' o' sure." Joshua hstened with more patience than might ha\e been expected from him, and passed on with a mere " Humi)h !" to ask the same question from each in succession, before i)roceed- ing with the general service. At length he came to the naming of several infants. '• Henrietta Burdelia Fitzbournc," was given as the proposed name of a giri of middle-class parents. "J/^7;;i', I baptise thee," &:c., he calmly proceeded, lianded the baby back to the astonished godmother, and ] Kissed to the next, regardless of ajjpcal. Mrs. Asjjinairs boy took his name of Laurence with a noisy ])rote.st against the sprinkling. Nor was the foundling silent when, ]ia\ing been duly informed that the boy's name was to be " /r/'," self-willed Joshua deliberately, and with scarcely a visiVile pause, went on — ^'' Jabt'z, I baptise thee in the name,'' (S:c.. and so overturned at one fell swoop, all Simons carefully-con>tructed castle. Simon attempted to remonstrate, but Joshua IJrookes had another infant in his arms, and was deaf to all but his own busi- ness. Such a substitution of names was too common a jjractice of his to disturb him in the least. lUit Simon had a brax'c .spirit, and stood no more in awe of Joshua JJrooke.s— " Jottv " as he was called — than of another man. WJun the others had gone in a crowd to the \estry tf) register the baptisms, he stoj)i)ed to confront the parson as he left the altar. '■ What roight had yo' to change the neame aw chuse to gi e that choilt ? "' " \\'hat right had yo' to sad'He the poor lad witli an Irksome name like that ? " was the quicK. rejc-'ntlei". The Manchester Man. 19 " Soiglit ! Avhy, aw wanted to gi'e th' lad a neame as should mak' him thankful fur bein' saved from dreawndin' to the last deays d' his loife." " An Irksome name like that would haA-e made him the butt of every little imp in the gutters, until he'd have been ready to drown himself to get rid of it. Jabez is an honourable name, man. You go home, and look through your Bible till you find it." Simon was open to conviction ; his bright eyes twinkled as a new light dawned upon them. The gruff chaplain had brushed past him on his way to tlie robing-room ; but he turned back, witli his right hand in his breeches pocket, and put a seven-shilling piece in the palm of the tanner, saying : " Here's something towards the christening feast of th' little chap I've stood godfather to. And don't you forget to look in ' Chronicles' for Jabez ; and, above all, see that the lad doesn"t disgrace his name." Joshua Brookes had the character, among those who knew him least, of loving money overmuch, and this unwonted exhi- bition of generosity took Simon's breatli. The chaplain was gone before he recovered from his amaze- ment — gone, with a tender heart softened towards the father- less child thrown upon the world, his cynicism rebuked by the true charity of the poor tanner, who had taken the foundling to his home in a season of woeful dearth. And, to his credit be it said, the Rev. Joshua Brookes never lost sight of either Simon or little Jabez. He was wont to throw out words which he meant to be in season, but his harsh, abrupt manner, as a rule, neutralized the effect of his im- promptu teachings. Now, however, the seed was thrown in other ground ; and, as he intended, Simon's curiosity was excited. The Bible was reverently lifted from the bureau as soon as they reached home, and, after some seeking, the pas- sage was found. Simon's reading was nothing to boast of, but Cooper could not read at all ; and in the eyes of his unlettered comrades Clegg shone as a learned man. He could decipher " black print," and that, in his days, amongst his class, was a distinc- tion. Slowly he traced his fingers along the lines for his own information, and then still more slowly, with a sort of rest after every word, read out to his auditors — Bess, Matthew, and Matthew's wife (there in her best gown and best temper) — c 2 20 The Manxhester Man. with slight dialectal peculiarities, which need not be re- produced — *' And Jabez was more honourable than his brethren : and his mother called his name Jabez, because she bare him with sorrow. And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, O that thou Avouidst bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldst keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me ! And God granted him that which he requested." * " }lh, Simon, mon, owd Jotty wur woiser nor thee. Theere's a neame fur a lad to stand by ! Ifs as good as a leeapin'- pow't that it is, t' help him ower th' brucksij: an' rucks § o' th' warld." Simon sat lost in thought. At length he raised his head, and remarked soberly — " Parson Brookes moight ha' bin a prophet ; th' choilt's mother did bear him wi' sorrow. I'he neame fits th' lad as if it had bin mcade fur him." " Then aw hope he's a prophet o' eawt, feyther, an' o' th' ■'est'll come true in toime," briskly interjected Kess ; adding — • " Coom, tay's ready ; " further appending for the information of their visitors — " Madam Clough sent the tay an' sugar, an' th' big curran'-loaf, when hoo heeard as feyther had axed for a holiday fur the kirsenin' ; an' Mestcr Clough's sen some ynle [ale], an' a thumpin' jnece o' beef" " Ay, lass ; an, as we'n a'ready a foine kirsenin' feast, won no change parson's seven-shillin' jjiece, but lay it ooj) fur th' lad hissen." lUit the chri-stening feast diti ni)t ])roceed without sundry noisy demonstrations from Master Jabez. If, as Siinon had once hinted, he was an angel in the hotise, he flapped his wings and blew his trumi>et pretty noisily at times. "Eh, las.s, aw wish Turn wur here neaw, to enjoy hisself wi' us. Aw wonder what he'd say to see yo" nursin' a babby so bonnily?" Simon was munching a huge jjiece of currant-cake as he uttered this, after a meditative pause. A look of pain passed over I'essy's face. She rarely mentioned the absent Tom, though he was seldom (jut of her thoughts. *' Yea, an' a7a wish he wur licre ! " she echoed with a sigh. * i Chron. iv. 9, 10. t Lea]Mn!^-pole. j Hrooks. § Heaps — impctliincnts. The Manchester Man. 21 the fountain of which was deep in her own breast. '' Aw wonder where he is neaw." " Feightin', mebbe ! " suggested her father. " Killed, mebbe ! " was the fearful .suggestion of her own iieart, and she was silent for some time afterwards. But the feast proceeded merrily for all that, and no wonder, where Charity was president. And there was quite as hai)py a party under that humble roof in Skinners' Yard as that assembled in the grand house at Ardwick, where Master Lau- rence Aspinall was handed about in his embroidered robes for the inspection of guests who cared very little about him, although they did i)resent him with silver mugs, and spoons, and corals, and protest to his pale and exhausted mamma that he was the finest infant in Manchester. CHAPTER THE FOURTH. M 1 S C II 1 E F. IT was a time of distress at liome and war abroad. Glory's scarlet fever was as rife an epidemic in Manchester as elsewhere. The town bristled with bayonets ; cori)s of volun- teers in showy uniforms, on parade or exercise, with banners flying, dotted it like spots on a peacock's tail ; the music of drum and fife drowned the murmurs of discontented men, the groans of poverty-stricken women, and the cries of famishing children. All nostrums were prescribed for the evils of famine except a stop[)age of the war. The rich made sacrifices for the. poor ; pastry was banished by common consent from the tables of the wealthy in order to cheapen flour ; soup-kitchens were established for the jioor, and in the midst of the general dearth the nineteenlli century struggled into existence. It was this war-fever which had carried off Bessy Clegg's sweetheart, Thomas Hulme, to Ireland, in Lord Wilton's Regiment of Lancashire ^'olunteers, three years before. The honest, true-hearted fellow could not write for himself, postage was expensive and uncertain, and in all those three years only two letters, written by a comrade, had reached the girl. 'I'o her simple, uninformed mind, Ireland was as foreign and distant a ( ountry as Australia is to us in these days. And to litiless peltings. He could not have selected a worse haven. It was a flagrant going over to the enemv. Thither .she followed him in her wrath, and in her blind fury assailed not only him, but liess, Simon, Mr. Clough, and Joshua T.rookes, whom she mingled in indiscriminate con- fusion, casting asftersions on the girl, which wounded nobodv more than her own husband. In the midst and in .sjtite of all ihis, Jabez grew apace. bile was not altogether sweetened for him by Mrs. Clough's kindness, only made a little less bitter, and certainly not less hard ; since almost his first ex}>erience with the go-cart was to tilt at the open doorway, and i)itcii head-foremost down a flight of three steps into the stony yard, whence frightened Bess raised him, with a bleeding nose and a great bump on his fore- head, amidst- t-l>e moi:king laughter of Sal (xK)i)er. A chair was overturned across the doorway as a barrier, until Simon could place a sliding foot-board there. l«ut Jabez had still many a knock against chair or table until Bess made a ])added roll for his forehead, as a protective coronal. Then every tooth cost him a convulsion, and any one less patient and tender hearted than 15ess would have abandoned her self- imposed charge in despair, his accidents and ailments made such inroads on her rest and on her time. But even patience has its limits, and .Sally Cooper strained the cable until it snapjted. At a war of words Bess was no match for her antagctnist : and. rather than endure a second contest, the Cleggs left the fiery .serpent l)ehind, and quitted the yard. Not willingly, for .Simon, contrary to the roving hal)its of ordinary weekly tenants, had nol (hanged his abode since his wedding-day, and the ri\er was as a friend to him. He de- The Manchester jMan. 25 dared he '' could na sleep o' neets witnout tlv wayter singin' to him/' However, he connived to find a very similar tenement, in just such another cuI-Jf-sar. with just such another tripe- dresser's cellar underneath, and that, too, without quitting T,ong Millgate. Midway between the college and the tanner)^ this court was situated, its narrow mouth opening to the ]:)reezes wafting down Hanover Street : they could still look out on the verdure of Walkers Croft, and the Irk laved its stony base as at that same Skinner's Yard, which Simon lived to see demolished. ]t was May; bright, sunny, perfumed May. The hawthorn hedges on the ridge of the croft were white with scented blossoms, and the Irk — not the muddled stream which improve- ment (?) is fast .shutting out of rer.-iembrance — went on its dimpled way, smiling at the promise of the season. The c-choes of the May-day milkcart bells, a.nd the flutter of their decorative ribbons, were dying out of all but infantile remem- brance ; — the month was more than a fortnight old. It was 1802, and Jabez was almost three years old. He was running, or rather scrambling, about the uneven court, gather- ing strength of limb and lung from their free u.se, albeit at the cost of dirt on frock and face, and the troul)le of washing for Bess She was singing at her batting-frame — not an unusual thing now, for rumour had whispered in her ear that the Lancashire Volunteers were on their homeward march. Even as sht.' sang, a stout young fellow in uniform stopped at the narrow entrance of the court, and questioned two or three gossiping women, who, with arms akimbo, blocked U]) the passage, if they knew the whereabouts of Simon Clogg, the tanner, and his daughter Bess. " What I th' wench as has the lo\e-choilt ? " answered one of the women. " The girl I mean had no child when I saw her last," responded he, betAveen his set teeth. "' Happen that's some toime sin', mester, or it's not th' .same lass. That's her singin' like a throstle o'er her work at the oppen winder." "And that's her choilt," said another, ending by a lusty call, '' Jabcz, lad, coom hither ! Jabez, taught to obey his elders, came at a trot, in answer to the woman's call. The volunteer looked down upon him. The child had neither Bess's eyes nor Bess's features ; but he 26 The Manchester Man. heard the voice of Bess, and over the woman's shoulder he caught a glimpse of her face at the distant window. It was Bess, sure enough ! Sick at heart, Tom Hulme, for it was he, leaned for support against the side of the dark entry. These women but con- firmed what he had heard in Skinners' Yard from Matt Coopers vindictive wife. The deep shadow of the entry hid his change of countenance. Without a condemnatory word, without a :Step forward towards the girl whose heart was full of him, he steadied himself and his voice, and mustering courage to .say, " No, that is not the lass I want," strode resolutely out of the •entry; and, bending his steps to the right, turned up Toad Lane, and so on to the '• Se\en Stars," in AVithy Grove, where he was billeted. He had come back from Ireland full of hope, and this Avas the end of it ! He had been constant, and she was frail ! She "whom he had left so pure had sunk so low that, though she bore the brand of shame, she could sing blithely at her work, unconscious or reckless of her degradation ! Tom had onlv been Another week, and Lord Wilton's Lancashire volunteer regiment had a man the less, the line had a i;ian the more. JPrivate Thomas Hulme had exchanged. CHAPTI'R THE FIFTH.* ELLEN CHADWICK. THE song of the human throstle was heard no more float ing across the batting-frame i)ut of the wintlow of its rage, in the dreary yard on the banks of the Irk. The swish f)f the wands might be heard wlien other sounds were iow, but no more snatches of melody flowed in between. Kind-hearted Mrs. Chadwick had not been content to leave ])Oor l>essy rit the breeches-maker's when her swoon was over; but, seeing thnt the girl continued in a dazed kind of stupor, sjiu Id the adjoining "Sun Inn" for cold brandy-and-water, to stiiiiulatL' the dormant mind. Bess drank, half unconsciously, and Mrs. Chndwick, leaving her little dau'i;hter Ellen to amuse astonished jabez, waited ])atiently until the young w()m:ui (Oil 1(1 collect lier ideas, and not only tell where she lived, but pre])are to walk home. Ijy that time the road was tolerably clear. Mrs. C'hadwick thanked the breec lies malur. ;md bidding Miss Ellen march in advance with httle jabe/, lu rself helped Bessy Clegg home- ward. She never asked herself why or wlierefore the girl had fainted, or whose the child she carried iii her arms. She merely saw a modest-looking young woman stricken down by illness or ■distress, and put out a Christian hand lo help her. it was past Simon's diimer-hour. and they found him on the look-out for the absentees. He was more bewildered than Bess when he saw her brought home pale and trembling by a -Stranger, whose dress and manner bespoke her suj)erior station. Mrs. Chadwick e-\])lained, .seeing that Bess was incapable. *' The poor girl fainted almost oi)i)osite to the College gate, as she watched Earl Wilton's regiment march past. * Sec Appciidi.\ C. The Manchester Man. 29 She reco\ered so slowly, I was afraid lo let her come through the streets uni^rotected, especially as she had so young a child in her charge." <, Simon thanked her, as well he might. Benevolence will relieve distress with money, or passing words of synipath}-, but it is not often silken skirt and satin bonnet walk through a crowded thoroughfare in close conjunction with bonnetless cotton and linsey. Yet Simon was utterly at a loss to account for her swoon. He could only conjecture that she had missed her sweetheart from the corps, and that the inquiring volunteer had been a comrade sent to announce Tom Hulme's death. Obser\"ing how much he was confounded, the good lady thought it best to retire, and leave them to themselves. " Come, Ellen, it is time we went home."' But Ellen, seated on a low stool in the corner, had her lap full of broken toys, which had found their way hither from the Clough nursery, and which Jabez displayed to all comers. " My daughter appears wonderfully attracted to your little grandson." " He's noa gran'son o' moine. Misses, though aw think aw love th' little lad as much as if he did belung to us. Aw just picked him eawt o' th' wayter, i' th' greet flood abcawt two year an' hauve back. Aw dunnot know reetly who th' young un belungs to." " And you have kept him ever since — through all the trying time of scarcity ? " " Yoi ; aw could do no other, an' a little chap like Jabez couldna ate much." " It does you credit," said the lady. " Mebbe. Aw dunnot know. Aw dunnot see mich credit i' doin' one's clear duty. But aw think theer'd ha' bin dis- credit an' aw hadna done it." " I wish everyone shared your sentiments," replied she. By this time the little girl had relinquished the toys, kissed the little boy patronisingly, and was by her mother's side, ready to depart. A word of sympathy and encouragement frcni Mrs. Chadwick, and father and daughter were left alone witli their new sorrow. Sorely puzzled was Simon to account for Tom Hulme'^v strange conduct. He could only come to the conclusion that he had picked up a fresh sweetheart in Ireland, and was ashamed to show his face. '3° The I^^rANCHESTER Mant. " An' if so, lass, yo're best off without him," said he. The stern, troubled look on the young volunteers face, ■which Bess had seen and her father had not, he could not understand, and therefore could not credit. One day the girl said, as if struck by a sudden thought — " Feyther, aw saw Turn look hard at Jaljcz. Dun yo' think as heaw he fancied aw wur wed ? " " He moight, lass, he moight," said he, knocking the ashes out of his pipe ; "but dunnot thee fret ; aw'll look Turn up, and set it o' reet, if that's o'." But there was no setting it right, for by that time Tom had left the corps and the town, and thenceforth Bessy's musical pil)e was out of tune, and stopped utterly. She worked, it is true, but she had no heart in her work ; and though before her father she kept up a show of cheerfulness, in his absence she had shed many and bitter tears. Smiles and tears are among a child's earliest perceptions and experiences. Of the mother's smile in its full sense Jabez knew nothing. VChh all her Avinning ways, Bess could never sujjply that want, if want it could be wlicre it was never missed, having so good a substitute. But of the change which came over her when she knew that Tom was mdeed lost to her, even the three years child could be sensible. He had been early taught to show a bra\-e front when he hurt himself, and the starting tears would subdue to a whimper ; but, for all that, tears to him meant pain or disap})ointment, and as they fell and wetted the (not always clean) little check laid lo\ingly against hers, a tender chord was struck; he would press his small arm tighter round her neck, and with a sympathetic " Don't ky, Beth ! " nestle closer, and try to kiss away the drops, which only fell the faster. Low-spirited nurses do not make lively children, and Jabez, after a .stout tussle with the whoo])ing-cough, began to droop as much as Bess ; so clear-eyed Simon instituted a series of Sunday rambles for tlie three, in search of plants and posies, to brighten their dull home, and of bloom to brighten the fading cheeks. -»* Sometimes Matt Cooper, with one or two of his youngsters, would join them, but not often ; Sal was so jealous of his friendship with the Cleggs, and the pleasant day was so certain to be marred b)- an unpleasant reception in the evening at home. These Summer walks seldom extended beyond Collyhurst Clough and quarries, or Smedley Vale, or through the fields to The Manchester Man. 31 Chetham Hill, stopping at the " Cow and Calf" to refresli, and rest the Uttle ones, l)efore they came back laden with wild flowers down Red Bank and over Scotland Bridge, to their respective "yards" in Long Millgate. At first, whenever they took the lower road through Angel Meadow, ihey did their best to ferret out the parentage and connections of Jabez, hoping by their inquiries even to kee]) alive the memory of his marvellous deliverance, so that in case the missing father should return, there might l)e a mutual restoration. These Sunday excursions did not di'O]) witli the sere autumnal leaves. A crisp clear day called them forth surely as sunshine had done, Jabez mounting pick-a-back on the shoulders of Simon or Matt when his little feet could no longer keep up their trot beside the bigger Cooper boys. Frames were invigorated, cheerfulness came back to face and home,, and Simon, who had a deep-seated love of Nature in his soul,, finding her so good a physician, kept up the acquaintance through rounding seasons and years. And from Nature he drew lessons which he dropped as seed into the boy's heart, as unconscious of the great woik he was doing as was Jabez hmiself. The boy throve and grew hardy. Companionship with older and rougher lads, sturdy fellows with wills of their own, made him sturdy too ; a lad who would take a blow and give one on occasion ; who would run a race and lose, and a second, and ■third, until he could win. But Bessy's gentle training was something very difterent from Sal's, and Jabez grew up tender as well as strong and bold. A persecuted kitten had taken refuge under Bessy's batting- frame in the foundling's go-cart days, and in care for that kitten, and for a wounded brown linnet brought home oiie Sunday, he learned humanity. Matthew's lads were given to bird-nesting, and Matt himself saw no harm in it ; but when that young linnet's wing was broken in a scuffle for the nest stolen from a clump of brushwood, Simon read the robbers such a homily they had never heard in their young lives, and as a corolkiry he took the bird home^to be fed and nursed by Bess and Jabez till it could fly, an event which never came about. In hot weather the lads pulled off clogs and stockings (there were no trousers to turn up — they wore breeches), and waded into pools and brooks, and Jabez wuuld be no whit behind. 32 The Manchester Man. On one of these occasions, either the current was too strong for the venturesome child, or the gravel slipped from under his feet, or his companions pushed him — no matter which, — but m he went, and, but for the presence of Simon, would have been drowned. Simon had been born on the ri\'cr-banks. and could swim like a fish. At once he resolved that Jabez should learn to do the same, and begin at once. *' Yo' see, Bess, if aw hadna bin theer he'd a bin dreawnded. sure as wayter's wet, an' th' third toime pays off fur o' ; so he mun lam to tak' care on himsel' th' iiext toimc he marlocks [gambols] among th' Jack-sharps." Jabez was not six years old when Simon Clegg gave liim and the young Coopers their first lesson in swimming, in a delight- ful and sequestered part of Smedley Vale, where the Irk was clear and bright. He had shown them, nearer liome, how a frog used its limbs, and then, after a few preliminary evolu- tions, to show how a man used his, took the lad on his back, and, after swimming with him awhile shook him olT into tiie water to flounder about for himself P>ess was often left at home on Sundays after that : and Jabez was not merely the better for his bath, but by the time he was eight years old was a fearless swimmer. Yet, although these countn,- raml)les had become an institu- tion, Simon Clegg never neglected his Sabbath duties. Sunday morning was sure to see him, clean-shaven, in his l)est suit, with Jai)ez by the hand, and mild-eyed Bess beside, on the free seats of the Old C'hurch, under the eye of parsons and churchwardens; and Jabez if he could understand little of the service, could gather in a sense of the beautiful from the grand old architecture, from the swell of the solemn organ, the harmonious xoiccs of the choristers — of the Blue-coat boys in the Chetham-gallery over the churchwarden's pew, and of the (irccn-coat children farther on. ' Then the silver mace carried l)efore the parson was a tiling to wonder at, and lill him with awe ; and no one could tell how the clerical robes, and choristers' surplices, transfigured common mortals in his admiring eyes. Hut those years of Jabez Clegg's young life liad been full of history for Manchester and P>urope. 'Jhe town had grown as well as the foundling. In\ention had l)een busy. Volunteer regiments had been one by one disbanded, a daily newspaper was started, and ])eaceful arts flourished. Then, ere another year expired. Napoleon The Manchester Man. 33 declared the British Isles in a state of blockade ; British subjects on French soil, whether civil or military, to be prisoners of war : British commodities lawful spoil ; and so War — red-handed War — broke loose once more. Again Man- chester rose up in arms to defend country and commerce. A " Loyalty Fund " of ;!^2 2,000 was raised for the support of Government. No fewer than nine separate volunteer corps sprang from the ashes of the old ones, and the town was one huge garrison. The commander of one regiment — the Loyal Masonic Rifle Volunteer Corps, — Colonel Hanson — a remark- able man in many ways, — was distinguished by a command from George III. to appear at Court in full regimentals, and with his hat on. Messrs. Pickford offered to place at the disposal of Govern- ment four hundred horses, fifty waggons, and twenty-eight boats. Loyal townsmen, with more money than courage of their own, sought to stimulate that of others by sending gold medals flying amongst the officers of the volunteer corps. " The British Volunteer " came from the press of Harrop in the Market Place, and once more the music of drum and trumpet was in the ascendant. To crown the whole, Manchester, which had never been called upon to entertain British Royalty since Henry VII. looked in upon the infant town, was visited in 1804 by Prince William, Duke of Gloucester, commander of the North-west District, and his son, to review this Lancashire volunteer army ; and the whole town was consequently in a ferment of excitement. Nothing was thought of, or talked of, but the visit of the Duke and Prince, and the coming review, the more so as reports differed respecting the appointed site. Market Street, Manchester, which a well-known writer has commemorated as one of the " Streets of the World," was then Market Street Lane, a confused medley of shops and private houses, varying from the low and ricketty black-and-white tene- ment of no pretensions, to the fine mansion with an imposing frontage, and ample space before. But the thoroughfare was in places so very narrow that two vehicles could not pass, and pedestrians on the footpath were compelled to take refuge in doorways from the muddy wheels which threatened damage to dainty garments ; and the whole was ill-paved and worse lighted. At the corner where it opens a vent for the warehouse traffic of High Street, then stood a handsome new hotel, the Bridge- u 34 The Manchester Man. water x\rms, in front of which a semi-circular area was railed off with wooden posts and suspended chains. V\'ithin this area, on the bright morning of April the 12th, two sentinels were placed, who, marching backwards and forwards, crossed and re-crossed each other in front of the hotel door ; tokens that the Royal Duke and his suite had taken up their quarters within. Beyond the semi-circle of chained posts, mounted horse- men kept back tlie concourse of spectators which pressed closely on the horses' heels. Among the crowd Avas Simon Clegg, with Jabez mounted on his shoulders, albeit he was a somewhat heavy load. Simon was a man of peace, but he was a staunch believer in Royalty, and that, quite as much as the spectacle, had drawn him thither. It was a mild and cheery April morn ; the windows of the upper room in which sat the Prince, the centre of a brilliant circle, were open, and the loyal multitude feasted their unaccustomed eyes with the sight. As Jabez looked on in a child's ravishment, a little dark-haired, dark-eyed girl, some six or seven years old, turned sharply round the narrow street by tlie side of the hotel on the flags where there was no chain to Ixir : passing unquestioned the sentinel on guard, who, see- ing only a well-dressed solitary child in Avhite muslin, with a sash and hat-ribbons of pink satin, concluded that she belonged to the hotel. Once there, she asked fearlessly — " Where is I'rince William? I want Prince William ! " Then the sentinel began to question ; but the little maid had but one reply — " I want Prince William ! " The soldier would have turned her back : but the disputa- tion had attracted attention in the room above. An officer's head was thrust out. " What's the matter ? " asked he. " I want to see the Prince. I want to know " " Bid the little lady come up hither." And the little lady went up, all unconscious of state etiquette or ceremoniiil. An officer in rich uniform, with jewels on his breast, took her on his knee, and asked what she wanted with Prince A\'illiam. " Oh, mamma and my aunts are wanting ever so to know if the review is going to be on Camp Field or on Sale Moor ; and Aunt Ellen sa}s it's to be in one place, and mamma thinks it's The Manchester Man. 35 the other ; and so, as I was dressed first, I just slipped out at the back door, and ran here to ask Prince WilHam himself, for I thought he would be sure to know." The gentleman laughed heartily, and the others followed suit. " And who is your mamma, my dear ? " " My mamma is Mrs. Chadwick, and I'm Ellen Chadwick ; and we live in Oldham Street." " Oh, indeed ! And Avhy are the ladies so anxious to know where the Prince holds the review ? " asked the officer on whose knee she sat. " Ah — that's just it. If he reviews at Sale Moor, he will go past our house ; and then we shall see all the soldiers from our own windows. Won't it be fine ? " Another gentleman asked what the ladies were doing when she left ; and Pm afraid Ellen made more revelations anent their toilettes than were strictly necessary, for the laughter was prolonged. She had not, however, lost sight of her self-imposed mission. Struggling from her seat, she said — •' Oh, please do tell me where is Prince A\'illiam ; I must go home, and I do so want to know." "Tell your mamma, Miss Ellen," said he, smiling, "that the Prince will review at Sale Moor ; and take this, my dear, for yourself," putting a shilling (shillings at that time were perfectly plain from over- long use) in her hand. " Oh, thank you ! But are you sure — quite sure it is Sale Moor ? " " Quite sure." The little damsel set off, as much elated with her news as with her shilling. As she ran briskly down the broad steps, and beyond the barrier, she came in contact with Simon, who made way for her exit ; and, as she looked up smiling to thank him, her glance rested for a moment on the boy he carried ; but no spark of recognition flashed into the eyes of either, and no one in all that crowd saw any connection between that dainty white-frocked, pink-slippered, pink-sashed miss, and the rough lad in the patched suit (a Clough's cast-off) and wooden clogs. D 2 CHAPTER THE SIXTH. TO MARTIAL MUSIC. A SECOND time Jabez and Ellen saw each other ere the day was out. She had rushed home with eager feet and eyes, through back streets, to startle Mrs. Chadwick, her newly-married sister, Mrs. Ashton, and a bevy of friends, with the confident assurance that the review would be at Sale, and to confirm it by the display of the plain shillim? which " an osifer had given her." New Cross, where the volunteers assembled, was not then a misnomer. A market cross occupied the centre space between the four wide thoroughfares, of which Oldham Street is one ; and the open area was considerable. The trumpets' bray, the tramp of troops, were heard long before the brilliant cavalcade was set in motion ; and every window — every house in Oldham Street (all good private residences of the Gower Street stamp) held its quota of heads and eyes, and costumes as brilliant as the eyes. The house of Mr. Chadwick was situated near the lower end, and commanded a good view of the Infirmary, its gardens, and pond in Piccadilly. To-day, however, the royal jjarty and the volunteers, many of whom had friends looking out for them, were the only prospect worth a thought ; and as they marched proudly on, to the gayest of gay tunes, kerchiefs waved, heads nodded, and eyes sparkled with delight and pleasure. As the Duke of Gloucester and his suite rode by, their chargers prancing to the music, Ellen, mounted on a chair by the Avindow between Mrs. Ashton and her mother, suddenly pointed to an officer in their midst, resplendent with stars and orders, and in an ecstasy of delight screamed out — " Mamma, mamma 1 that's the gentleman that gave mc the shilling ! » The Manchester Man. 37 The little treble voice pierced even through the clamorous music. ■=' A noble head was bowed, a plumed hat was raised, and lowered until it swept the charger's mane. " ^Vhy, child, that is Prince William ! " was the simultaneous exclamation, as all the eyes from all the houses across the street were turned in wonderment to see the Chadwicks so distinguished ; and Simon, who, still carr}'ing Jabez, was try- ing to keep pace with the troops, wondered too. Moreover, he recognised the lady and little girl, though seen but once ; for he earned his own living, such as it was, and had been too proud to call on the Chadwicks to say how his daughter fared lest they should think he sought charity. " Jabez, lad, si thi, yon's th' lady and little lass as browt yo' whoam, when yo' went seein' the sodgers afore ! " And Jabez, from his shoulder-perch, looked up at the little bright-eyed brunette, to remember the white frock and pink ribbons he had seen at the Bridgewater, but nothing beyond. The man's exclamation and attitude had at the same time attracted Mrs. Chadwick, who, smiling down on him and Jabez, spoke to Ellen ; and she, reminded of the little baby who had been saved from drowning in a cradle, looked down and, in the fulness of her new importance, nodded too. The momentary stoppage called forth a loud objurgation as a reminder from Sally Cooper, who was in advance with Matthew and such of her bigger lads as could step out ; and Simon, equally anxious not to lose sight of the royal party, hurried on. But Sale Moor is beyond the confines of Lanca- shire, and Simon found the five miles stiff walking, with a child nearly six years old on his shoulders, and Master Jabez had to descend from his seat, and trudge on his own feet. This caused them to lag behind their friends, Sally insisting on INIatt's keeping up with the soldiers, in order that they might get a good place on the Moor, and they were thus separated. Bess had remained at home. Never again could she look on march- ing troops without a pang. Sale Moor was alive with expectant sightseers. Stands and platforms had been erected for the accommodation of those who could afford and cared to pay ; there was a sprinkling of heavy carriages, and a crowd of carts, but the mass of spectators were on foot, vehicular locomotion being of very limited capacity. Of these latter were the Coopers and Cleggs, of course. Sally, with the elders of her turbulent brood, had reached the 3^ The Manchester Man. ground m time to be deafened by the score of cannon Lord Wilton's artillery fired as a salute to princedom. She had jilanted herself firmly against one of the supports of an elevated platform, where the crowd of hero-worshippers was densest. She was tightly jammed and crushed against the woodwork ; but what matter ? she had a fine sight of the field, and as she watched the evolutions of the volunteers, congratulated herself and Matthew on having left " that crawling Clegg an' th' brat so far behint." Almost as she spoke, there was a faint crackle, then another, and a yielding of the ])ost against which she leaned — a loud crash, a chorus of shrieks, half drowned by music and musketry, and the whole platform was down, with the li\ing freight it had borne ; and she was down with it. The fashion, wealth, and beauty of Cheshire and South Lancashire had their representatives amongst that struggling, swooning, Avrithing, shrieking, groaning mass of humanitv, heaped and huddled in indiscriminate confusion, with up-torn seats, posts, and draperies. Strange to say, only one person was killed outright — that is, on the spot — for in its downfall the stand bore with it many of the throng beneath. But of the injured and the shaken, those who went to hospital and home to linger long and die at last, history has kept no record. Amongst these, this story tells of two — two differing in all but sex. Mrs. Aspinall, ever frail and delicate, was borne to her carriage with whole limbs, but insensible, her husband and their son Laurence both uninjured by her side. Physicians were in attendance, and never left her until she was safely lodged in her own luxurious chamber, overlooking Ardwick Oreen, and could be pronounced out of immediate danger. Sally Cooper, with a sprained ankle, a dislocated shoulder, and many internal bruises, was i)laced in a light cart on a bed of straw procured from a neighbouring farm, with another of the injured, and carried to the Manchester Lifirmary, to try the skill and the i)atience of the doctors and nurses. Neither recovered. The unwounded lady, sorely shaken, succumbed to the shock her nervous system had received ; and Master Laurence, already petted and wilful, was left to be still farther sjjoiled by his widowed father and Kitty, his mothers old nurse. Sally, strong of frame and will, impa- tient of pain and of restraint, was restive under the surgeons' hands, and defeated their efforts to ascertain her injuries. The Manchester Man. 39 She exhausted herself with shrieks and cries, tossed about and disturbed bandatjes, rejected physic, which she called "poison,"' and soon put her case beyond the cure of phy- sicians. I'oo late, she became sensible of her own folly. Then, when recovery was impossible, she repented of many misdeeds, and of none more than her slander of poor Bess. And thus it was. 'When the mother was taken from the head of Cooper's home, Bessy's kind heart yearned to help the disconsolate man and his troop of children. Fortunately, the eldest was a girl of sixteen, and there was a younger girl of ten. Both of these had gone out to work, but now Molly had to stay at home and try to keep all right and tight there. And here Bess came to lier aid. Without scolding or brawling, she put the girl into the way of doing things quickly and ([uietly. She encouraged her to persevere, so that her cleanly mother should detect no eyesores when she came home re- stored. She tried to persuade the boys to be less refractory — to help, not to irritate, their sister ; and somehow Cooper's home began to miss Sal, much as one misses a whirlwind. The kindness of Bess o' Sim's was duly reported to the Infirmary patient, and at first chafed her sorely. She " hated to be under obligations, and to that lass o' all others."' But Bess, leaving her own work — and the loss of an hour meant the loss of an hour's earnings — herself went to see Sally ; and such was the influence of her gentle voice and touch, that Sally's chagrin imperceptibly wore away. Towards the last she grew delirious, raved of Bess and Tom Hulme and forgiveness, and in the short calm preceding dissolution, confessed to ]Matt Cooper and the attendant nurse that she had cast a slur on Bess Clegg's good name. Had made Tom Hulme beUeve that Simon had taken the lass from Skinners Yard to hide her shame. That everybody in the yard knew that Bess had a child. And that she had bade him inquire for himself. And almost her last word was a hope that Bess would forgive her. Matthew Cooper himself hardly forgave his dead wife. How, therefore, should he carry this confession to Bess, and ask her to forgive r He took a medium course ; and after a few days' consideration, while they and the rest of the tanners were eating their " baggin " (a workman's luncheon, so called from the bag it is, or was, usually carried in), sat down beside Simon on a bundle of thick leather, and told him as well as he was able. 40 The Manchester jMax. Simon was troubled ; but he was not vindictive. He would have been less than a man had he not been bitter against the cruel woman who had causelessly wrecked his good daughter's life. ^. But he was sorry for Matt, and broke out into no revilings. The woman was dead. The ill she had done had been fearfully punished, and neither curses nor reproaches could affect her or undo the mischief He left his cheese and jannock on the hides untasted, drew his hand across his forehead, and went down to the river-side and across the wooden bridge for a breath of fresh air and a waft of fresh thought. He was only a rugged tanner, but he had a heart within his breast ; he had a daughter on his hearth with a great wound in her heart, a blast on her good name, and he was called upon to forgive the author of this mischief ! Simon had long been used to commune with his own heart. He had built up a wall round it with the leaves of that one book on his bureau ; and whenever he was in doubt or difficulty, he read the precepts inscribed upon that Avail. He went back to Cooper, whose appetite had been no better than his own. " Aw mun think this ower, Matt. Aw connot say aw fur- give yo'r Sal o' at a dash. Hoo's done that as may niver be undone whoile thee an' me's alive ; an' aw connot frame to say as aw furgive her loike o' on a sudden. An' aw mun think it ower before eawt be said to eawr Bess, poor wench !" A week elapsed before the subject was broached again. Then Simon spoke to Matthew as they were leaving the tannery-yard. " Coom into th' ' Queen Anne ' " (he called it quean), " Matt, and have a gill ; awVe summat t' say to thee." There was nobody in the taproom. They sat down to their half-pint horns of ale — times were too hard to afford deeper draughts — and Simon said : " Aw've bin thinkin' o' this week, an' as aw connot forgive yo'r Sal, gradely loike, aw'U no put th' same temj)tation i' tli' way of eawr Bess. Hoo'd better think Tum's takken oop wi' some other wench, than ha' th' shame o' knowin' th' lad's toorned her up i' disgrace, Hoo's getten ower th' worst o' her trouble, an' awm not gooin to break her heart outreet, and mebbe set her agen little Jabez into th' bargain." Matthew could but assent to Simon's proposition. But Simon had not said all his say. The Manchester Man. 41 " But aw'm not gooin' to sit deawn wi' my honds i' mi' lap, an' that great lump o' dirty slutch stickin' to moi lass. Yo' mun help me t' find eawt wheer Tum Hulme's getten to, an' help to set o' straight afore aw forgive yo'r Sal, tho' hoo be dead an' gone." " Wi' o' my heart ! " responded Matt ; and he gave his huge hand to Simon in token thereof. When the Duke of Gloucester inspected the volunteers at Ardwick on the 30th of September that same year, not one of the people I have here linked together witnessed the show. The blinds were down at Mr. Aspinall's to shut out a sight the like of which had made him a widower ; and within the darkened nursery, wilful, obstreperous Laurence fought and kicked and bit at old Kitty, because she kept him within doors and from the windows at his father's command. There was a christening party in Mosley Street, at the Ashtons', at which not only the Chadwicks, but the Rev. Joshua Brookes — who had that day named the infant Augusta — were present. They had selected a public occasion for their private festival. It was a grand affair. Mr. Ashton was a small-ware manufacturer in a large way of business, his house and warehouse occupying a large block of buildings at the corner of York Street. And the baby Augusta, born the previous month, was a first child, his wife being younger than himself considerably. Miss Ellen, too, was there, her wonderful shilling, through which a hole had been drilled, suspended from her neck like an amulet. Simon and Matt had given up their hohday to fruitless inquiries after Tom Hulme ; and Jabez, after a stand-up fight with a boy in the yard in defence of his kitten, had come to have his bleeding nose and bruised forehead doctored by Bess, who shed over him the tears long gathering in their fountains for Tom Hulme's defection. And somehow at that stylish christening feast, where the baby Augusta was a per- sonage of importance almost as great as the celebrated Miss Kilmansegg, the orphan Jabez and his fosterers came on the table for discussion along with the dessert; Mrs. Chadwick, Mr. Clough, and Joshua Brookes concurring in the opinion mooted by the lady that something should be done to relieve the worthy tanner and his daughter of the cost and trouble of maintaining the boy as he grew older and would want educating. That they should talk of the cost of maintenance when bread was a shilling a loaf, was no marvel; but that 42 The Manchester Man. " education " should be named as a necessity for one of " nobody's children," can only be cited as a proof that either the boy's strange introduction to Manchester, or Simon's strange generosity, had excited an interest in both beyond the common run. Yet that " something " was vague. The only definite and practicable view of the subject was held by Joshua Brookes, and he kept his opinion to himself. CHAPTER THE SEVENTH.* THE REVEREND JOSHUA BROOKES. JOSHUA BROOKES had a child's love for toffy and other sweetmeats. These he purchased — or obtained without purchase — from an old woman as odd and eccentric as himself, a Mrs. Clowes, who occupied a bow-wmdowed shop in Half Street, which literally overlooked the churchyard, three or four steep steps having to be mounted by her customers. And how numerous were her customers, and how great the demand for her toffy, lozenges, and " humbugs " may be judged from the fact that her workmen and apprentices used up eight or nine tons of sugar every week. Yet she was only a shop-keeper, and had begun business in a very humble way ; but she was persevering and industrious, and success followed. She was active and energetic, and expected those around her to l)e the same. Yet she was kind to them, as may be sup- [)osed, for she gave every Sunday a good dinner to fourteen old men and women on whom fortune had looked unkindly, wait- ing upon them herself, and never tasting her own dinner until her pensioners had dined. Regular in her own attendance at the old Church, she required her household to be regular too, though she left them little enough time to dress — possibly because her own toilette was so scant. The dress in which she presented herself at church was certainly unique for a woman of wealth. Her gown of sober stuff was well worn ; a mob-cap (a fashion which came in with the French Revolution) adorned her head, over which, by way of bonnet, a brown silk handkerchief was tied. On rare — very rare — occasions, an old black silk bonnet covered all. Joshua Brookes, at odds with his clerical brethren, with his pupils, and half the world besides, was on good terms with * See Appendix. 4+ The Manchester Man'. Mrs. Clowes. Rough, prompt, and uncompromising was she ; rough, irritable and unmaimerly was he ; both impromising hard-husked nuts, with sweet and tender kernels. So rough, few ever suspected the soft heart : yet the woman who fed the poor before herself, and the learned clerg}Tnan who had a fancy for pigeons, and who cherished the drunken and abusive old crippled shoemaker, his father, to the last, must have intuitively kno\s-n the inner life of each other. The dav follo^^'insf Augusta Ashton's christening, it fell within the round of the Reverend Joshua's dut\" to read the burial senice over a dead townswoman in the churchyard. And now occurred one of those incidents in which the ludicrous and the profane blended, and brought impulsive Joshua into disfavour. As was not unfrequently the case, he broke off in the midst of the service, left the mourners and the coffin beside the open grave, threw his legs over the low wall, and, movmting the steps into the confectioners shop, said, " Here, quick, dame ? Give me some horehound drops for my cough."' On his entrance Mrs. Clowes broke off a narrative over which she and her shopwoman were laughing heartily, in order to reach the required drops, which went into a paper without weighing, and for which no pa}-ment was tendered. Back he strode over the church wall to resume the interrupted ceremonial. It must here be obsen-ed that Joshua had remarkably shagg}' eyebrows, overhanging his quick eyes like pent-houses, and that it was the wont of the schoolboys and others to annoy him by draA\'ing their fingers significantly over their own. A young sweep sat upon the church wall to witness the funeral, and — young imp of Satan that he was I — he could not forbear drawing a thumb and forefinger over each brow, full in Joshua's sight, just as he reached the passage — " I heard a voice from heaven saying "' The shagg}' eyebrows contracted ; he roared out — '• Knock that little black rascal off the church wall ! " The mischievous little blackamoor was off, with a beadle after him ; and the eccentric chaplain, whom no sense of irre- verence seemed to strike, concluded the ceremony with no further interruption. At its close, Mr. Aspinall and another mourner took the clerg}'man to task for his disrespect to the remains of the deceased Mrs. Aspinall, whose obsequies had beer, so irregularly performed. They said nothing of disrespect to the The Manchester ]\Iax. 45 Divinity profaned ; their own feelings and importance had been outraged, and they forgot all else even by the dust and ashes in the gaping grave ; and little Laurence, cloaked and hooded, forgot his grief in watching the chase after the sweep. " How dare you, sir, give way to these indecencies at the funeral of my wife? It has been most indecorous and insult- ing, both to the dead and her afflicted relatives." " She's had Christian burial, hasn't she ? " gruffly interrogated Joshua. " Hardly," was the hesitating answer. " She's been laid in consecrated ground, and I've read the burial service over her ; what more would you have ? Some folk are never satisfied." Emptying half his horehound drops into the hand of ^Master Laurence, Joshua turned on his heel, went to the chapter- house to disrobe, and then back over the wall to Mrs. Clowes. " I say, dame, you were not at church on Sunday." " No, Parson Brookes ; I was in Liverpool." " Oh ! " grunted he, " in Liverpool. Sugar-bu}dng, I suppose ? " " Yea ; an' a fine joke I've had." Joshua pricked up his ears : he did not object to a little fun. " You mun know I thought I'd give Branker, the new sugar-brokers, a trial, an' I went there and asked to see samples ; but the young whipper-snapper of a salesman looked at me from top to toe, an' I suppose, reckoned up the value of my old black bonnet, my kerchief an' mutch, an' my old stuff dress, and fancied my pocket must match my gown, for he was barely civil, and didn't seem to care for the trouble o' showin' th' samples. So I bade my young man good day, and said I'd call again." " And didn't, I suppose. Just like a woman," put in Joshua. " Oh, yea, I did. I borrowed my landlady's silk gown and fine satin bonnet, and put on my lady's manners ; and then !Mr. A\Tiipper-snapper could show his samples, and /it's best manners too. But when I gave my orders by tons, and not hundred- weights, he looked at me, and looked again, as if he thought I'd escaped from a madhouse ; an' at last he began to h'm an' ah, an' talk of large orders, an' cash payment, an' references ; an' I told him to make out th' invoice and bring it. An' when I pulled out this old leather pocket-book, and counted the bank-notes to pay him down on the nail, good gracious ! 4^ The Manchester Man. how the fellow stared ! I reckon Til not need to borrow a silk dress when I give my next order. It was as good as a play." '•' Um ! You women-folk think yourselves wonderfully clever. But come, I can't waste my time here." (Joshua had heard all he went for.) "Give me quarter-a-pound of humbugs ; I threw half the other things away,'' said he. " I don't think it's much you'll throw awa}', Jotty," replied the old confectioner, with independent familiarity, as she weighed and parcelled the sweets, for which this time he put down the money. " It's much you know about it. Mother Clowes," he jerked out, as if throwing the words at her over his shoulder, as he turned to leave the shop, putting the package in one of the large pockets of his long flap waistcoat as he went. His own house, not more than three hundred yards away, adjoined the Grammar School; a red-brick building, with stone quoins, now darkened by time and smoke, one gable of which overhung the Irk ; the other, pierced for four small-paned windows, almost confronting the antic^ue Sun Inn, at the acute angle of Long Millgate, and (]uite overlooking an open space, flanked by the main entrance to the College. From this, the east wing of the College, it is separated by a plain iron gateway and palisades on the Millgate side, and by a wall which serves as a screen from the river on the other side ; and the enclosed space between rails, wall, College, and the front of the school served as a playground tor such scholars as were willing to keep within bounds. It was divided into upper, middle, and lower schools, the last being in the basement, and designed for elementary instruction. The high and middle schools together occupied the .same long room above this. Joshua Ijrcjokes, as second master, i)resided over the middle sch(jol, and surely ne\er M.A. had so thankless an office. He was placed at a terrible disadvantage in the school, not alto- gether because he had risen from its lowest ranks — not alto- gether because a drunken foul-mouthed cripple interfered with their sports, or went reeling to his son's domicile next door — not because he was unduly severe ; other masters were that — - l>ut because his own eager thirst for knowledge as a boy had made him intolerant towards indolence, incredulous of in- capacity ; anil his constitutional impatience and irritability made his harsh voice seem harsher when he reproved a dullard. He lost his self-command, and with that went his comnKUid oyer others. Meaning to be affable to the poor, The Manchester Man. 47 from whose ranks he sprang, he became familiar ; and they reciprocated the famiharity so fully as to draw down the con- tempt of his confreres. He was a man to be respected, and they slighted him ; a man to be honoured, and they snubbed him. What wonder, then, that eccentricities grew like barnacles on a ship's keel, or that the boys failed in obedience and respect to a master when their elders set them the example ? This defence of a misunderstood man has not taken up a tithe of the time he gave to his refractory class, to whom he went straightway from the confectioners, whose " humbugs " had melted considerably, not wholly down his own throat, before the hour when the boys closed their Latin Grammars and Greek Lexicons, and poured as if they were mad down tlie steps, and through the gate, to the road. Yet even the sweets he gave to the attentive did not conciliate ; they only made the intractable more defiant ; and even the recipients felt they were bribed. Warned by the uproar of a large school in motion, as well as by the long-cased clock, Tabitha, his one servant, had her master's tea ready for him the instant he came in from the school, as he generally did, fagged and jaded, with the growl of a baited bear. That day he simply put his head into the house, and bawled, " Tea ready, Tab ?" and without waiting for an • answer, went on, "Keep it hot till I get back;" then, closing the door, took his way eastwards down Long Millgate. His journey was not a long one. It ended at the bottom of a yard where a sad pale-faced young woman was switching monotonously at a mass of downy cotton, and listening at the same time to the equally monotonous drawl of a youngster in the throes of monosyllabic reading. "Get larning, lad! — get larning ! Larning's a great thing. Yo' shan read i' this big picture-book when you can spell gradely," had been Simon's precept and inducement ; and Jabez, to whom that big pictorial Bible was a mysterious un- explored crypt, did try with all his little might. " J-a-c-k — Jack, w-a-s — was, a g-o-o-d — good, b-o " " And I hope you're a good boy, as well as Jack," said Joshua Brookes abruptly, as he put his head into the room, and put a stop to the lesson at the same time. " But, hey- day'' (observing the swollen nose and bruised forehead), "You've been in the wars. Good boys don't fight." 48 The Manchester Man. "Then what did Bill Barnes throw stones at ar pussy for? Good boys dunnot hurt kittlins," said Jabez, nothing daunted. Bess explained. " Um ! " quoth Joshua, when she had finished, " he's fond of his kitten, is he ?" and drawing Jabez towards him by the shoulder, with one finger uplifted as a caution, he looked down on the shrinking child, and said, impressively — " Never fight if you can help it, Jabez ; but if you fight to save a poor dumb animal from ill-usage, or to protect the weak against the strong, Jotty Brucks is not the man to blame you. Here, lad," and into the pinafore of Jabez went the remainder of the " humbugs." He patted the boy on the head, bade him get on with his reading, he did not know what good fortune might come of it, told him to come regularly to church, to love God and God's creatures, and went away, leaving Bess to prepare her father's porridge (tea was from twelve to sixteen shillings a pound, and beyond their reach). Almost on the threshold he encountered Simon. "Can't you keep that young sprig cut of mischief? If he begins fighting and quarrelling at six years old, what will he do when he is sixteen ? " he cried, gruffly, as he brushed past the tanner, and was far up the yard before the man could think of a reply. A couple of young pigeons were sent for Jabez about a week after, with a large bag of stale cakes and bread to feed them with. The name of the sender was unknown, biit anyone acquainted with the habits of Joshua Brookes (who contracted for Mrs. Clowes's waste pastry, to fill the crops of his own feathered colony) would not have been troubled to guess. Simon stroked his raspy chin, and seemed dubious, cost of keep being a question; but Jabez looked so wistful, his foster- father borrowed tools and answered the appeal by making a triangular cote for them, and Jabez found fresh occupation in their care. Yet occupation was not lacking, young as he was. He could fetch and carry, run short errands, and help Bess to clean. Their living-room no longer waited a week to be swept and dusted, Jabez did it every day, standing on a chair to reach the top of the bureau, where lay the cynosure of his young eyes. He still took his Sunday lessons in field or stream with Simon, and through the week clambered up from monosyllables to dissyllables with Bess. CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. THE BLUE-COAT SCHOOL. THE children of the poor begin early to earn their bread. Legislature has stepped in to regulate the age and hours for labour in manufacturing districts, and to provide education for the very humblest. Jabez Clegg was not born in these blissful times, and he only narrowly escaped the common lot. He was not eight years old, yet Simon, on whom war-prices pressed as heavily as on his neighbours, began to discuss with Bess the necessity for sending the lad to Simpson's factory (where Arkwright'':; machinery was first set in motion). " He mun goo as sune as the new year taks a fair grip," de- cided Simon, and 1805 was at its last gasp as he said it. But the VQw year brought Jabez a reprieve by the uncourtly hands of Joshua Brookes. Meeting Simon and Jabez at a stall in the Apple-market, where, the better to bargain, he had laid dov/n a pile of old classical school-books (Joshua was a collec- tor of these, which he retailed again to the boys at prices varying with his mood, or his estimate of the purchaser's pocket), he accosted the former. " Well, old Leathershanks, what are you going to make of young Cheat-the-fishes there ? I suppose he's to follow your own trade, he began to fan Jiides so early ? " And the glance which shot from under his shaggy brows caused the boy to blush, and shrink behind his protector. Simon's eyes twinkled, but he shook his head as he answered : " Nay, Parson Bruks, we'n thowt o' sendin' him t' th' cotton fact'ry ; but it fair goos agen th' grain to send th' little chap through th' streets to wark Winter an' Summer, weet or dry, afore th' sun's oop an' abeawt his wark. "But we conno' ket-p him bout it — toimes are so bad." E 50 The jNIaxchester Max. " H'm ! Then -what a stupid old leather-head you must be not to think of the College, where he'd be kept and fed and clothed and educated I — educated, man — do you hear?" Simon heard, and his eyes again twinkled and winked at the new idea presented to him. " And apprenticed ! " he echoed, with a long-drawn, gasping breath. "Ay, and apprenticed." The parson, cramming his pockets with apples, for which he had higgled with much persistence, handed one to Jabez with the question — " How would you like to be a College boy, Jabez, and wear a long l)lue coat, like that fellow yonder" (pointing to a boy then crossing the market on an errand), " and learn to write and cipher, as well as to read?" " If you jilease'n, aw'd loike it moore nor eawt." And his animated face was a clearer answer than his words. Joshua then read the lad a brief homily to the effect that onl\- good and honourable boys could find admission, winding up with — "]f you're a vc7y good lad, I'll see what can be done for you." He interrupted thanks with — " Easter's very near, .Sim, so you'll have to stir your stumps to prove that our JLonourable young friend came honourably into the world. I'll get the forms and fill them up for you, and his baptismal register too." He snatched up liis books and was off, the tassel of his col- legiate cap and the cassock he wore flying loose as he hurried away muttering to himself — " What an old fool I am to bother about the lad ! I dare- say he'll turn round and sting me in the end, like the rest of the snakes I have warmed. As great an idiot as old dame Clowes ! " Chctham's College, or Hospital, is a long, low, ancient stone edifice, built on the rock above the mouth of the Irk, with two arms of unequal length, stretching towards church and town, and embracing a large quadrangle used as a playground, which has for its fourth and southern boundary a good, useful garden. It is needless to grope upward from the time when the Saxon Theyn built a fortified residence on its site ; sufficient for us tliat Thomas de la Warr, youngest son of the feudal baron of The Manchester Man. 5^ Manchester, was brought up to the Church, and in tlie four- teenth century inducted into the Rectory of Manchester, his father being patron. His elder brother dying at the close of the century, the rector (a pious Churchman) became baron. And then he put his power and wealth to sacerdotal uses. He petitioned the king, obtained a grant to collegiate Christ Church, erected the College, endowed it with lands; 'and here at his death the Warden of the Collegiate Church had his residence. Of these wardens, the celebrated Dr. Dee, whose explorations into alchemy and other occult sciences brought him into trouble with Queen Elizabeth, was one ; and Dr. Dee's room is still extant — in occupation of the governor. In 1580, at Crumpsall Hall, Humphrey Chetham was born; and he, a prosperous dealer in fustians, never marrying, at his own expense fed and clothed a number of poor boys ; and, by his will, not only bequeathed a large sum of money to be expended in the foundation and endowment of a hospital for the maintenance, education, and apprenticing of forty poor boys for ever, but one thousand pounds to be expended in a library, free to the public — the first free library in Britain. The estate was vested in feoffees, and with them lay the jiower alike to elect boys and ofificials. From the townships of Manchester, Droylsden, Crumpsall, Bolton-le-Moors, and Tur- ton, the boys were to be elected between the ages of six and ten, and were required to be of honest, industrious parents, and neither illegitimate nor diseased ; and baptismal registers had to be produced. They had to be well maintained, well trained, and carefully apprenticed at fourteen, a fee of four pounds (a large sum in Humphrey Chetham's time) being given with them. The churchwardens and overseers were to prepare lists of boys, doubling the number of vacancies, stating their respective claims, which lists they had to sign. Easter Monday was the period for election, after which the feoffees dined together in Dr. Dee's quaintly-carved room. Joshua Brooks was as good as his word. He procured a blank form from the governor, and, Simon being no great scholar, filled it in for him. He found him the baptismal register without charging the regulation shilling, got the name of Jabez inserted in the churchwardens' list, and such influence as he had with the feoffees he exerted to the utmost, for the case was one involving doubt and difficulty. Nor had Simon Clegg been idle. He and his crony Mat- thew scoured Smedley and Crumpsall, and more successful E 2 52 The Manxhester Man*. than in their quest for Tom Hulme, discovered the nurse who presided at the birth of Jabez. Her testimony, so far as it went, was important. He had interested both Mr. and Mrs. Clough in the election of the foundHng, and where the in- fluence of the gentleman failed, that of the lady prevailed ; so that when the important Easter Monday arrived, two-thirds of the feoffees were fully acquainted with his peculiar case, and more or less impressed in his favour. It was on the i8th of April, bright, sunny, joyous. Com- pared with its present proportions, Manchester, then was but as a cameo brooch on a mantle of green ; and that green was already starred with daisies, buttercups, primroses, and cow- slips. By wells and brooks, daffodil and jonquil hung their heads and breathed out perfume. Bush and tree put out pale buds and fans of promise. The tit-lark sang, the cuckoo — to use a village phrase — had " eaten up the mud ; " and the town was alive with holiday-makers from all the country round about. It was the great College anniversary, not only election day, but one set apart for friends to visit Blue-coat boys already on the foundation, and for the curious public to inspect the Chetham Museum. The main entrance in Millgate (said to be arched with the jaw-bone of a whale) and the smaller gate on Hunt's Bank, were both thrown open. A stream of people of all grades, in festival array, poured in and out, and College cap and gown seemed to be ubiquitous. The pale, sad widow or widower, holding an orphan boy by the trembling hand, the uncle or next of kin to tlie doubly- or])haned candidate were there, standing in a long line ranged against the building, and representing hopes and fears and eventualities little heeded by the shifting stream of gazers. For the previous week Mrs. Clowes and her assistants had been working night and day : her shop was in a stage of siege. Every boy, and every boy's friend, seemed to have pocket- money to spend, and to want to spend it over her counter. Then it was the great wedding-day of the year, and the church- yard swarmed like a hive ; from every one of the many public- houses round College and Church, music and mirth, clattering feet, and loud-voiced laughter issued. "The Apple Tree," "The Pack Horse," "The Ring o' Bells," "The Blackamoor's Head," were filled to repletion with wedding guests ; whilst ''The College Inn," and the old " Sun Inn," held a less bois- terous quota of the Collegians' friends and relatives. The Manchester Man. 53 On those wet days when outdoor play was impossible, the boys, besides darning their stockings, occupied their spare hours in carving spoons and apple-scrapers out of bone, in working balls and pincushions with coloured worsted in fanci- ful devices, and a stitch locally known as " coUeging :" and with these, on Easter Monday and at Whitsuntide, they reaped a harvest of pocket-money, having liberty to offer them for sale. And when it is remembered that our notable female ancestors, poor and rich, wore indoors a pincushion and sheathed scissors suspended at their sides, it is not to be wondered that these found ready purchasers as memorials of the visit. But in that College Yard were anxious and expectant as well as buoyant faces. And there in that line, waiting to be called when their turn came, stood Jabez between Simon Clegg and Bess, with Matthew and the nurse on either hand. And ever and anon their eyes went up to the oriel window Avhich faced the main entrance, for in the room it lighted the arbiters of the boy's destiny sat in judgment on some other orphan's claim. At length the summons came for "Jabez With palpitating hearts — for any body of men with irrespon- sible powers is an awful tribunal — they passed under the arched portal at the western angle of the building, following their guide past the doors of the great kitchen on the right hand, and Dr. Dee's room and the boys' refectory on the left, up the wide stone staircase, with its massive carved oak balusters, along the gallery, at once library and museum, where gaping holiday-folk followed a Blue-coat cicerone past shelves and glass cases, and compartments separated for readers' quiet study by carven book-shelf screens, hearing but heeding little of the parrot-roll the boys checked off : " Here's Oliver Crummle's sword ; theer's a loadstone ; theer's a hairy mon ; theer's the skeleton of a mon ;" and so forth, but following their own guide to the nail-studded oaken door of the feoffees' room — that door which might open to hope, only to close on disappointment. The feoffees' room — now the reading-room of the library — deserves more than a passing notice. It is a large, square, antique chamber, with a deeply recessed oriel window, opposite the door, containing a table and seats for readers. There are carved oak buffets of ancient date, ponderous chairs, and still more ponderous tables, one of which is said to contain as 54 The Manchester Man. many pieces as there are days in the year. Dingy-looking portraits of eminent Lancashire divines stare at you from the walls ; but the left-hand wall contains alone the benevolent pre- sentment of Humphrey Chetham, the large-hearted clear- headed founder. Its place is o\'er the wide chimney-piece, which holds an ample grate ; and on either hand it is flanked by the carved effigy of a bird, the one a pelican feeding its young brood with its own blood, tlie other a cock, which is said (and truly) to crow when it smells roast beef But we smell the feoffees' dinner, and must not delay the ])rogress of Jabez and his friends. A large body of feoffees were i)resent, many in tlie uniforms of their special volunteer regiments. " So tliis is the little fellow who was picked up asleep in a cradle during the flood of August, 1799," observed rather than inquired one of the gentlemen, who appeared as spokesman. " "S'oi, yo'r honours," answered Simon, making a sort of bow. " ^^']lo can bear witness to that? " " Aw con " — " An' aw con," responded Simon and Matt Cooi)er in a breatli. '' It wur uz as got hnii eawt o' th' wayter." " Anyone else ? " Bessy stepped forward modestly. " He wur put i' moi arms on Tanners' Bridge, an' awVe browt him oop iver sin'." " Have you never sought for his parents?" " Ay, mony a time. Matt an' me have spent mony a day i' seekin' 'em," said Simon promptly, " an' we could fand no nioore than that papper tells" — referring to a sheet in the (piestioning feoffee's haiid. " Thc-n h(jw tio you date tlie boy's age with such precision?" The nurse now sidled confidently to the front. " If it please your honour's worship, aw wur called to stiff- backed Nan's dowter in the last ])inch, when hoo wur loike to die, an' that little chap wur born afore aw left, an' that wur o' th' fifth o' May, seventeen hunderd an' noinety-noine. j*"'^ know it, fur aw ])roke mi arm th' varry next day." " And the mother died." *• Yea ! — afore the week wur eawt." " And you think she was lawfully married ? Where was her husband?" " Ay ! that's it ! Hoo had a guinea-goold vv'cddin-ring on 5 The Manchester Man. 55 an' owd Xan said it war a ?ad thing th' lass had ever got wedded, an' moore o' the same soort. An' aw geet eawt o' her that they'n bin wedded at Crumpsall, an' a' th' neebors knew as th' husbant had had a letter to fatch him to Liverpool, an' had niver come back. Onybody i' Smedley knows that!" "And you think they were honest, industrious people?" "Ay, that they were, but rayther stiff i' th' joints, yo' know — seemed to think theirsel's too good to talk to folk like ; or mebbe we'd ha' known th' lad's neiime an' o' belongin' to him. I'hey owed nobbody nowt, an' aw wur paid fur moi job." Jabez was called forward and examined, and he came pretty well out of the fire. They found that he could read a little, knew part of his catechism, and they saw that he was a well- behaved, intelligent boy, with truthful dark grey eyes and a reflective brow. There was a long and animated discussion, during which the boy and his friends were bidden to retire. It was contended that the marriage of the boy's parents was not proven— that his very name was dubious, — and that the founder's will was specific on that head. Then one of Mrs. Clough's friends rose and grew eloquent. He asked if they were to interpret the will of the great and benevolent man, whose portrait looked down upon them, by the spirit or by the letter? If they themselves did not fee/ that the boy was eligible, as the nurse's testimony went to prove ? That this was a case peculiarly marked out for their charitable construction. And he wound up by inquiring if they thought Humphrey Chetham would expect his representatives to be less humane, less charitable, less conscientious in dealing with a bounty not their own, than that poor struggling, hardwork- ing tanner and his daughter, who had maintained and cherished the orphan in spite of cruelly hard times, and still more cruel slander. And then he told, as an episode, what Sally Cooper had confessed, and how and why Bess had lost her lover. This turned the (juivering scale. " Jabez Clegg and his friends " were called in ; the verdict which changed the current of his life, was pronounced — Jabez Clegg was a Blue-coat boy ! Before the night was out, while the flood-gates of all their hearts were open, Matthew Cooper, though nearly twenty years her senior, asked Bess to be his wife ! CHAPTER THE NINTH. THE SNAKE. HOWEVER ambitious either Jabez or his kind fosterers had been to see him a Blue-coat boy, the parting between them was a terrible wrench. They were to him all the friends or parents he had ever known. Then there were his playmates in the yard, with liberty to run in and out at will ; and lastly, there were his dumb pets — his kitten (grown to a cat), his pigeons, and the lame linnet, hopping from perch to finger, and paying him for his love with the sweetest of songs. He was not more stunned by the noise and Easter Monday bustle in the College Yard, or more awed by the imposing presence of Governor Terry and the feoffees, than by the mag- nitude, order, and antique grandeur of the building henceforth to be his home. Nevertheless, wide open as the gates were for the day, he felt that they would close, and shut him in among the cold strong walls and strangers, never to see his pets or his loving friends again until Whitsuntide should bring another holiday. They older, more experienced, with a better knowledge of all the boy would gain — all the privation and premature labour he would escape— felt only how dull their humble home would be without the willing feet and hands, the smiling face, and the cheerful voice of the sturdy little fellow who for more than seven years had been as their own child. He had given his last charge respecting his furry and feathered brood, exchanged the last clinging embrace under the dark arch, then tore away in quest of a deserted corner, where he might hide the tears he could not wholly restrain. At first the new dress of which he was so proud, the blue stockings and clasped shoes in place of clogs, the yellow baize The Man'chester Max, 57 petticoat, the long-skirted blue overcoat or gown, the blue muffin-cap, the white clerical band at the throat (all neat, and fresh, and unpatched as they were), felt awkward and uncom- fortable — the long petticoat especially incommoded him, But in a few days this wore off. There were other lads equally strange and unaccustomed to robes and rules. Fellow-feeling drew them towards each other, and with the wonderful adapta- bility of childhood, they fell into the regular grooves, and were as much at home as the eldest there in less than a fortnight. And from the Chetham Gallery in the Old Church he could see and be seen by Simon and Bess on Sabbath mornings from the free seats in the aisle, and that contented them. The training and education of the Chetham College boys was, and is, conducted on principles best adapted for boys expected to fight their own way upwards in the world. They were not cumbered with a number of "ologies" and "isms " (the highest education did not stand on a par then with the moderate ones of this day) ; their range of books and studies was limited. Reading, writing, and arithmetic, sound and practical information, alone were imparted, so much as was needed to fit the dullest for an ordinary tradesman, and supply the persevering and intelligent with a fulcrum and a lever. Nor did their education end with their lessons in the school- room, nor was it drawn from books and slates alone. Their meals were regular, their diet pure and ample, but plain. They rose at six, began the day with prayer, and retired to rest at eight. Besides their duties in the school- room, they darned their own stockings, made their own beds, helped the servants to keep their rooms clean, and six of the elder boys were set apart to run errands and carry messages beyond the precincts of the College. Strength of muscle and limb were gained in the open courtyard in such games as trap and football ; patience and ingenuity had scope in the bead purses, the carved apple- scoops and marrow-spoons, the worsted balls and pincushions they made to fill their leisure hours indoors. There was no idleness. Their very play had its purpose. Let us set Jabez Clegg under the kind guardianship of Christopher Terry, the governor, and under the direct super- vision of the Reverend John Gresswell, the schoolmaster, to con his Mavor, and make pothooks-and-ladles, on a form in the large school-room at the west end of the College ; and to rise, step by step, up the first difficult rungs of that long ladder 58 The Manchester Max. of learning which may indeed rest on our common earth, bu\ which reaches far above the clouds and human ken. Christmas and Midsummer vacations came and went, so did those red-letter days of his College life, Easter and Whitsun- tide, when he was free to rush to the old yard, so near at hand, and after hugging Bess and Simon, whom he astonished Avith his learning, could assure himself his dumb family had been well cared for. And if those passing seasons traced deeper lines on Simon's brow, gave more womanly solidity to Bess's form and character, they brought no change the foundling could mark. lom Hulme's whereabouts was still undiscovered. Matt Cooper was still a widower. But they and his masters could note the steady progress he made, and his chivalrous love of truth and sense of honour shown in many ways in little things. Yet there was one event a grief to him. His little brown linnet pined for its young friend, and died before the first Whitsun- day came. He was not much over ten years old when he was proved to possess courage, as well as truth and honour. For some time Nancy, the cook, had observed that the cream was skimmed surreptitiously from the milk-pans in the dairy, that the milk itself was regularly abstracted, and she was loud in complaint. She could scarcely find cream enough to set on the governor's table, and servants and schooll)oys"werc in turn accused of being the depredators. Complaints were made to Vlx. Terry ; servants and boys were alike interrogated and watched, and i)unished on sus- picion; but nothing could be proved, and no precautions could .save the milk. The lofty and spacious kitchen had its entrance almost under the porch, and close beside it was a flight of stone steps leading to the dairy, a cellar below the kitchen, ht by a small window high up on the side towards the river, and of course opposite to the steps. Stones tables occupied the two other sides, on which were ranged a number of wide shallow pans of good milk. In the extreme corner at right angles with the door at the head of the stairs was another entrance, a small o])en door in a Gothic frame, which opened on another and sliorter flight of steps, cut in the rock and washed by the river, which sometimes rose and beat against the cellar-door for admission, beat so oft and im- portunately as to wear away the oak where it met the floor. It was nearly breakfast time. Long rows of wooden bowls The Manchester Man. 59 and trenchers were ranged on tlie white kitclK-n-iable. llie oatmeal porridge was read)- to pour out. The cook ran short of milk. Through a window overlooking the yard she espied Jabez, whip in hand, driving a biped team of play-horses. "Jabez, Jabez Clegg ! " she called out at the pitch of her voice, " come hither." Down went the reins, and the prancing steeds proceeded without a driver. " Fetch a can of milk from the cellar, Jabez ; an' look sharp. An' see as yo' dunna drink none ! " "I never do," said Jabez, not overpleased at the imputation. " Well, see as yo' don't, for some on yo' do." Jabez took the bright tin can, without putting down the whip, and descended the unguarded cellar-stairs, whistHng as he went. He gave a jump down the last few steps, and to his utter surnrise, I cannot say dismay, saw that he had disturbed a great greenish-brown snake spotted with black, and having a yellowish ring round its neck. It lay coiled on the stone table opposite to him, and with its head elevated above the rim of a milk-pan was taking its morning draught, and in so doing reckoning without its host. " Oh, you're the thief, are you, ]\Ir. Snake ? It's you've robbed us of our milk, and got us boys thrashed for it ! " cried Jabez, without a thought of danger, planting himself between the culprit rmd the small postern door, as the snake, gliding from the slab, turned thither for exit, putting out its forked ':on'aie and hissing at him as it came. \\ithout thought or consideration — without a cry of alarm to those above, he struck at the threatening foe with his whip ; and as the resentful snake darted at him, jumped nimbly aside, and struck and struck again ; and as the angry snake writhed and twisted, and again and again darted its frightful head at him with distended jaws, he whipped and whipped away as though a top and not a formidable reptile had been before him. Cook, out of patience, called "Jabez Clegg!" more than once, in anything but satisfactory tones ; and then, patience exhausted, came to the top of the dairy-stairs. Then she heard Jabez, as if addressing some one, say : " Oh, you would, \vould you ? " and the commotion having drawn her so far down the steps that she could peer into the cellar and see what was going on, she set up a prolonged scream. This was just as Jabez, shifting the position of his whip, brought the butt-end ciown on the head of the snake with all the force of his stout 6o The Manchester Man. young arm, and his exhausted foe dropped, literally whipped to death. The woman's screams brought not only the governor and the school-master, but Dr. Stone, the librarian, to the spot. And there stood Jabez, all his prowess gone, with his back towards them, his head down on his arms, which rested on the stone slab, sobbing violently for the very life he had just destroyed. •' Oh, he's bin bitten — he's been bitten ! The vemonous thing's bitten the lad ! He'll die after it ! " cried the cook in an ecstacy of terror. " Stand aside, Nancy," said Dr. Stone ; " that snake is not venomous. If I mistake not, the brave boy's heart is wounded, not his skin." And, coming down, the kind, discerning librarian lifted the snake with the one hand, and took hold of Jabez with the other, simply saying to him — " Come into the governor's room, Jabez, and tell us all about it." And Jabez, drying his red eyes on the cuff of his coat, was ushered before the Doctor up the stairs, and into the governor's room, where breakfast was laid for the three gentlemen. There he briefly told how he had found the snake drinking the milk ; and having intercepted the reptile's retreat, had been obliged, in self-defence, to fight with it until he had whipped it to death — a consummation as unlooked for as regreted. He had not, as at first surmised, escaped unwounded in the contest ; but, as Dr. Stone had said, and the surgoon who dressed the bites confirmed, the terrible-looking reptile was but the common ringed-snake, which takes freely to the water ; and its bite was harmless. From the dais in the refectory both snake and whip were exhibited to the boys after breakfast. "My lads," said the governor, "I daresay you will all be glad to know that the thief who stole the milk has been uiken." I'here was a general shout of assent, with here and there 9 wondering glance at the vacant seat of Jabez, who, having his wounds washed and bound up, had not sat down with them, but had a sort of complimentary breakfast with the servants in the kitchen. " And I daresay you would like to see the thief, and know how he was caught." I'here was another general " Ay, ay, sir ! " The Manchester Man. 6i " Well, here he is," (and he held the snake aloft) ; " but I don't think any of you will be thrashed on his account again, Jabez Clegg, here " (and he pulled the reluctant boy forward by the shoulder), " caught the sly robber drinking the milk, and, with nothing but this whip and a fearless resolute arm, put a stop to his depredations, and restored the lost character of the school." There was a loud hurrah for Jabez Clegg, who, for the time being was a hero. Then, the snake being carried to the school- room, the Rev. John Gresswell improved the occasion by a lesson on snakes in general, and that one in particular. But when he dissipated the popular belief that all snakes were venomous, and assured the boys that the bite of this was innocuous, more than one of the Blue-coated lads thought Jabez was not such a hero after all. The heads of the College thought otherwise. The snake, and whip also, were placed high up against a wall in the College museum, close beside the " woman's clog which was split by a thunderbolt, and hoo wasn't hurt." They made part of the catalogue of the Blue-coat guides — nay, even Jabez may have run the rapid chronicle from the reel himself ; but the pain and shock of having wilfully killed a living creature neutralised and prevented the harm which might have followed self-glori- fication. The long unknown secret spoiler of the dairy had been such a blemish on the spotless character of the Chetham Hospital — such a scandal in its little world — that its capture became of sufficient importance for Dr. Thomas Stone to communicate to the Reverend Joshua Brookes on his next visit to the library, Jabez being considered a sort ol protege of his. Before the day was out the parson found his cough trouble- some, and of course went to Mrs. Clowes for horehound-drops. " Well, what do you think of young Cheat-the-fishes now ? " came raspily from his lips, as he leaned on the counter, evi- dently prepared for a gossip, shop-chairs being unheard-of superfluities in those days. Mrs, Clowes knew perfectly well whom the parson meant by " young Cheat-the-fishes " ; indeed, the boy, on his rare holi- days, had been a customer, as were the boys of College and Grammar School generally. " Now ! Why, what's th' lad been doing ? Naught wrong, I reckon ? " You see she had faith in the boy's open countenance. 62 The Manchester Man.ij " Humph ! that's as folk thuik," he growled, keeping his own opinion to himself. " I don't suppose I need to tell you the hubbub there's been over there " (jerking his finger in the direction of the College) " about the stoleu milk ? That tale's old enough." Mrs. Clowes nodded her mob-cap in assent. "Well, that lad Jabez found a snake, four feet long, with its head in the milk ])ans the other morning. The sly thief turned spiteful, and the two had a battle-royal all to themselves in the cellar. The pugnacious rapscallion had a whip in his hand, and he — lashed the snake to death ! "' Mrs. Clowes echoed his last words, and uplifted her hands in amazement. A snake was a terrible reptile to her. " Ah ! and then blubbered like acry-a-babby because he had killed it ! What do you think of that, Dame Clowes?" " Eh ! I think he was a brave little chap to face a sarpent, but I think a fine sight more of his blubbering, as you call it," said she, taking a tin canister from a shelf, and putting it on the counter with an emphatic bounce. " Ah ! I thought I could match the young fool with an old one," said he derisively, to hide his own satisfaction, as he took his short legs to the door. But Mrs. Clowes called him back, put a large paper parcel in his hand, and said, " Here, Jotty, see you give these sweetmeats to your cry-a- babby, and tell him an old woman says there's no harm in fighting in self-defence with any kind of a snake, or for his own good name, or to protect the helpless ; but, if he fights just to show off his own bravery, he's a coward. And you tell him from me never to be ashamed of tears he has shed in repen- tance for injury he may have done to any living thing. Now see you tell him, jxarson ; and maybe my i)reachment may be worth more to him than my cakes and toffy, or your sermons." And she nodded her head till her cap-border flapped like a bird's wings. " Ugh ! dame, you'll be for wagging that tongue and mutch of yours in my pulpit next," said he, gruffly. But he delivered the parcel and the " preachment " both faithfullv, and, moreover, turned over his stores of old school books for a Latin grammar, wliich he ])ut into the hand of Jabez, with a promise to instruct the boy ii' the language, if he would like to learn. Forthwith J abez, not caring to seem ungracious, though with- The Manchester Man. 63 out any special liking for the task, had to encroach upon his playhours for a new study, under-rated by the pupil, over-rated by the teacher. Could Joshua Brookes have put mathematical instruments within his reach, or given him pencils and colours, the boy's eyes wou'id have sparkled, and study been a pleasure. CHAPTER THE TENTH. FIRST ANTAGONISM. THE extensive oblong enclosure known as Ardwick Green, situated at tlie south-eastern extremity of the town, on the left-hand side of tlie highway to Stockport and London, was in 1809 part of a suburban village, and from Piccadilly to a blacksmith's forge a little beyond Ardwick Bridge, fields and hedges were interspersed with the newly -erected houses along .Bank Top. The Green, studded here and there with tall poplars and other trees, was fenced round with quite an army of stumpy wooden posts some six feet apart, connected by squared iron rods, a barrier against cattle only. A long, slightly serpentine lake spread its shining waters from end to end within the soft circlet of green ; and this grassy belt served as a promenade for the fashionable inhabitants. And there must have been such in that village of Ardwick early in the century, as now, for the one bell in the tiny turret of St. Thomas's small plain red-brick chapel, rang a fashionable congregation into its neat pews, to listen to the well-toned organ and the devoutly-toned voice of the perpetual curate, the Reverend R. Tweddle, if we irjay credit an historian of the time. Red-brick church, red-brick houses, hard and cold outside, solid and roomy and comfortable within as Georgian architec- ture ever was, overlooked green and pond, but, luckily, over- looked them from a reasonable distance, and, moreover, did not elbow each other too closely, but were individually set in masses of foliage, which toned down the staring brickwork. Time and smoke ha\'e done so more effectually since. One of the best, and best-looking, of these houses, near the church, was the one in which the delicate Mrs. Aspinall had presided for a few brief years. An iron palisade, enclosing a few shrubs and evergreens, separated it from the wide roadway, The Manxhester Man. 65 but- 'behin-d the screen of brick ran a formal but extensive garden and orchard, well-kept and well stocked, with a ftsh-pond as formal in the midst. Fish-ponds encourage damp, and damp encourages frogs, efts, and their kin. Here they abounded, and Master Laurence had a sort of instinctive belief that they were created solely for his sport and amusement. Mr. Aspinall, his father, immersed in business during the day, and occupied with friends at home or abroad until late hours at night, saw very little of his son, who was thus consigned to servants during those hours not spent, or supposed to be spent, at a preparatory school close at hand. The boy was quick and intelligent, had his mother's amber curls and azure eyes, her delicate skin and brilliant colour, but the handsome face had more of the father therein, and was too unformed to brook description here. What he might have been with other training is not to be told, but under the supposition that he inherited his mother's fragile constitution, he had been woefully spoiled and pampered. Opposition to his will was forbidden. " Bear with him, Kitty, for my sake, and do not thwart him, or you will break his fine spirit," had been Mrs. Aspinall's dying charge to her old nurse; and as every demonstration of temper was ascribed by both parents to this same " fine spirit," what wonder that he grew up masterful — and worse? His imperious disposition early ingratiated him into the favour of Bob, his father's groom ; and this man, thinking no evil, ignorantly sowed the seeds of cruelty in his young heart. When ihe horses were singed, the boy was allowed to be a spectator; if a whelp had his ears cropped, or the end of its tail bitten off, he was treated to a sight. If a brood of kittens or a litter of puppies had to be drowned. Master Laurence was sure to be in at the death. He was taken to surreptitious cock-fights and rat-hunts : and though, when too late, Mr. Aspinall turned the man away for inclining his son to "low pursuits," nothing was said or done to counteract these lessons of cruelty ! No wonder, then, that to him the sight of pain inflicted brought plea- sure, or that inhumanity went hand-in-hand with self-will. One incident — a real one — will suffice to show what Laurence Aspinall was, when Jabez Clegg shed tears over the snake he had killed perforce. Kitty was in the kitchen alone. The maids were in other parts of the house. She was sitting close to a blazing fire oa F 6 The Manchester Man. account of her " rheumatics," and was In a doze. The eve- - ing was drawing m. JMaster Laurence, coming direct from the garden and the fish-pond, burst open the kitchen door with a whoop which made Kitty start from her nap in a fright. Thereupon he set up a loud laugh as the poor old woman held her hand to her side, and panted for breath. In his hand was his pocket-handkerchief, tied like a bundle, in which something living seemed to move and palpitate. They were young frogs- in various stages of development. " Now, Kitty," said he, " I'll show you some rare sport ! "■ and taking one of the live frogs out of the handkerchief deli- berately threw it into the midst of the glowing fire. . " There, Kitty ; did you hear that ? " cried he in rapture, as the poor animal uttered a cry of agony almost human, whilst he danced on the hearth like a frantic savage round a sacrificial fire. " Oh, Master Laurence ! Master Laurence ! don't do that — don't be so cruel ! " appealed Kitty, piteously. But he had drawn another forth, and crying, " Cruel ! It's. fun, Kitty — fun ! " tore it limb from limb, and threw it piece- meal into the blaze. " There's another ! and there's another ! " he shouted in glee, as the rest followed in swift succession ; and Kitty, shrieking in pain and horror, ran from the kitchen, bringing the cook and housemaid downstairs with her cries. For the first time in his life Mr. Aspinall administered a sound castigation to his son, regretting that he had not done it earlier. No more was said of his son's fine sj)irit ; but, prompt to act, he lost no time in seeking his admission into the Free Cirammar School ; and either to spare him the long daily walk in tenderness for his health (Ardwick was more than a mile away), or to place him under strict supervision, boarded Laurence with one of the masters. Yet he gave that master no clue to his son's besetting sin ; so he was left free to tantalise and torment every weaker creature within his orbit, from the schoolmaster's cat, which he shod with walnut-shells, to the youngest school-boy, whose books he tore and hid, whose hair he pulled, whose cap and frills he soused in the mud. It was a misfortune for liiniself and others that his pocket money was more abundant tlian that of his fellows. Never had the apple-woman or Mrs. Clowes a more lavish customer, The Manchester Man. 67 or. one who distributed his purchases more freely. Boys in- capable of discriminating between generosity and profusion dubbed him generous ; and that, coupled with his handsome face and spirited bearing which they mistook for courage, brought him partisans. , Thus, long before his first year expired, and he was drafted from the lower school to the room above, w^here he came under the keen eye and heavy ferule of Joshua Brookes, he had a body of lads at his beck (many older than himself), ready for any mischief he might propose. As may well be supposed, there was a natural antagonism between the boys of the Grammar School and of Chetham's Hospital. As at the confluence of two streams the waters cliafe and foam and fret each other, so it is scarcely possible for two separate communities, similar, yet differing in their constitutions, to have their gateways close together at right angles without frequent collision between the rival bodies. In the great gate of the College, only open on special occa- sions, was a small door or wicket, for ordinary use ; and some of the Grammar School boys, under pretence of shortening their route homeward, finding it open, would make free to cross the College Yard at a noisy c".nter, and let themselves out at the far gate on Hunt's Bank. It was a clear trespas.s. They were frequently admonished by one official or another ; their passage was disputed by the Blue-coat boys ; but they persisted m setting up a right of road, and opposition only gave piquancy to their bravado. That which began with individual assumption soon attained tlie character of boldly-asserted jjarty aggression, and, as the Blue-coat boys were as determined to preserve their rights as the others were to invade them, many and well-contested were the consequent fights and struggles. And thus the two boys, Jabez Clegg and Laurence Aspinall, brought together first at the church door and the baptismal font, came into collision again. But now there was no deferential stepping aside of the humble foundling to make way for the merchant's son. They stood upon neutral ground, strangers to each other, equal in their respective participation in the benefits of a charitable foundation. Nay, if anything, Jabez had the higher stand- point. His orphanhood and poverty had given him a right to his position in Humphrey Chetham's Hospital ; the very wealth of the gentleman's son made Laurence little better than a usurper in Hugh Oldham's Gramuiar School. F 2 68 The Manchester Man. But it is no part ot the novelist's province to prate of the use or abuse of charitable institutions, or to set class in opposi- tion against class. It is only individual character and action as they bear upon one another with which we have to deal. On more than one occasion Jabez — since his conquest of the snake, the recognised champion of his form — had stopped Laurence Aspinall at the head of a file of boys, and had done his best to bar their passage through the quadrangle. Success depended on which school was first released. If in time, Jabez planted himself by the little wicket with one or two companions, and, like Leonidas at Thermopylae, fought bravely for possession of the pass, and generally con- trived to beat off the intruders. Sometimes the Blue-coat boys made a sortie from the yard, and, falling upon the others pell- mell, left and bore away marks of the contest in swollen lips and black eyes. At length matters were brought to a crisis. Thrice had Laurence and his clique been repulsed, and the shame of their defeat heightened by derisive shouts from a tribe of Millgate urchins — " Yers th' Grammar Skoo' lads beat by th' yaller petticoats agen ! '' " Yaller petticoats fur iver ! " " College boys agen Skoo' ! Hoorray ! "' Master Laurence might have ground his teeth, and harangued his followers, without obtaining an additional recruit, or spur- ring them to a fresh attempt, but for the taunts of the rabble. But the ignominy of defeat by petticoated College boys was too much for the blood of the Grammar School, and youngsters threw themselves into the party quarrel who had hitherto stood aloof. Laurence Aspinall was superseded. A big, raw-boned fellow named Travis, took the lead, and rallied round him not only the lads from the lower school, but the bulk of the juniors in the upper room. It is only fair to add that the senior students were in no wise cognisant of the league, or, being so, carefully shut their eyes and ears. As the result of this organism, on a set day, towards the close of October, when the dusk gathered as the school dispersed, the boys who ran down the wide stejis from the upper, and the juveniles who ran up from the lower room, instead of dart- ing forward with a " Whoop ! " and " Halloo ! " through the iron gate on their homeward way, clustered together within the school-yard, and made way for seniors and masters to pass out before them. Thb Manchester Man. 69 '* Get off home with you, and don't loiter there ! " cried Joshua Brookes, as he turned in at his own gate, and saw the crowd massing together in the outer playground. " Get home yourself, St. Crispin ! " shouted Laurence, but not before the house door had closed upon the irascible master. All books and slates not purposely left in school were con- signed to three or four of the smallest boys, duly instructed to carry them to Hunt's Bank in readiness for their owners. For a week or more the College boys had been unmolested ; not a forbidden foot had stepped within the wicket. The school-master had remarked to the governor, in the presence of his pupils, that he thought Dr. Smith must have prohibited further intrusion. All the greater was the surprise that dusky October after- noon when a troop of young ruffians, who had stolen quietly one by one through the wicket, and kept under the cavernous shade of the deep gateway until all were within, rushed, with vociferous shouts, from under cover, and tore across the large yard in the direction of the other gate, daring anyone to check them. The College boys, just emerging from their school-room door in the corner, were, for the moment, taken aback. Then, from the mouth of Joshua Brookes's new Latin scholar, rang, clear and distinct, Humphrey Chetham's motto — " Quod tuum tene ! " (What you have, hold !) and the Blue-coat boys, with one George Pilkington for their leader, threw themselves, at that rallying cry, like a great wave, headlong upon the intruders. They met the shock as a rock meets a wave, and down went many a gallant Blue-coat in the dust. Up they were in an instant, face to face with the besiegers ; and then, each singling out an opponent, fought or wrestled for the mastery with all the courage and animosity, if not the skill, of practised combatants. Ben Travis and George Pilkington fought hand to hand, and Jabez — not for the first liiiie — measured his strength with Laurence. Heavier, stronger, older by a few months, Jabez might have overmatched his antagonist ; but Laurence had profited by the lessons of Bob the discarded groom, and every blow was planted skilfully, and told. Then Bob's teaching had been none of the most chivalrous, and Laurence took unfair advantages. He " struck below the belt," and then tripping 70 The Manchester Man. Jabez up, like the coward that he was, kicked him as he lay prostrate, with the lury of a savage. Governor, schoolmaster, librarian, and porter had hastened to the scene ; but the assailants nearly doubled the number of the College boys, and set lawful authority at defiance, hurling ^t them epithets such as only schoolboys could devise. Fortunately, their own Blue-coat boys were amenable to discipline, and, called off, one by one, retreated to the house, often with pursuers close at their heels. Then the ■Grammar School tribe set up a scornful, triumphant shout, and, with Ben Travis and Laurence Aspinall at their head, marched out of the College Yard at the Hunt's Bank gate, exulting in their victory, even though they left one of their bravest little antagonists insensible behind them. CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH. THE BLUE-COAT P.OV. THOSE were rough days, when an occasional brawl was supposed essential to test the mettle of man or boy, so that bruises and black eyes (the result of an encounter for the honour of the school) were passed over with much lighter penalties than would be dealt out now-a-days, if young gentle- men in a public academy descended to blackguardism. At that time, too, the pupils of the Grammar School assem- bled at seven in the morning, and sure punishment awaited the laggard who failed to present himself for prayers. There were few loiterers on that drear October morning. Conscience, and perhaps a dread of consequences, had kept the preceding day's war-party sufficiently awake even where sore limbs did not. liut, with the exception of a few smart raps with the ferule, to warm cold fingers, and a general admonition — little heeded — the early hours of the morning passed quietly enough, and whispers ran along classes, and from form to form, more con- gratulatory than prophetic. That day went by, and the next. Laurence Aspinall, whose " science " had saved his head from more damage than a cut lip, was especially boastful, and, after his own underhand fashion, strove to stir big Ben Travis to fresh demonstrations. Then a cloud loomed in the horizon, and darkened every master's brow. Another whisper was in circulation that Governor Terry had been seen to enter the head-master's ancient black and white old house, and had been closeted with Dr. Smith for more than an hour. Still the quiet was un- I)roken, and, to the wise, the very calm was ominous. The second of November brought a revelation. On the slightly-raised floor of the high school, at the Millgate end of the room, sat, not only Dr. Jeremiah Smith, but the trustees of the school, the Reverend Joshua Brookes, and the assistant 72 The Manchester Man. masters ; and with them was Governor Terry, of the Chetham Hospital — all grave and stern. Dr. Smith's mild face wa* unusually severe, and Joshua's shaggy brows lowered menac- ingly over his angry eyes, The senior pupils, chiefly young men preparing for college, were ranged on either side. As the last of these awful personages filed m through the two-leaved door, and took his place, the palpitating hearts of the delinquents beat audibly, and courage oozed from many a clammy palm. The boys weie summoned from the lower school, and one by one, name by name, Ben Travis and his followers were called to take their stand before this formidable tribunal, Laurence Aspinall shrinking edgeways, as if to screen himself from observation. There was little need for Dr. Smith to strike his ferule on the table to command attention, silence was so profound. Even nervous feet forgot to shufiBe. Dr. Smith's commanding eye swept the trembling rank from end to end, as he stood with im- pressive dignity to address them. After a brief exordium, in which he recounted the several charges brought against the boys by Governor Terry, he proceeded to say that the good character of the Manchester (rrammar School was imperilled by lawless conduct such as the boys before hmi had exhibited the previous Tuesday, in forcibly entering, and then rioting within, the College Yard. One of the youths — most likely Ben Travis — blurted forth that they had a right to go through the College Yard, and that the College boys stopped them. " You mistake," said the doctor, sternly, " there is no public right of road through the College Yard. Permission is cour- teously granted, but there is no 7-ight. There is a right for the public to pass to and from the College and its library on busi- ness, within the hours the gates are open ; but even that must be in order and decency. Your conduct was that of barbarians, not gentlemen." At this ])oint of the proceedings Jabez Clegg came into the school-room, leaning on the arm of George Pilkington. The face of the latter was bruised and swollen, but Jabez looked deplorable. His long overcoat was rent in more than one place ; he walked with a limp : a white bandage round his head made his white face whiter still, showing more distinctly the livid and discoloured i)atches under the half-closed eyes. In obedience to a nod from Governor 1 erry, George Pilkington The Manchester Man. 73 led his Blue-coat brother to a seat beside him ; but Dr. Smith» drawing the boy gently to his side, removed the bandage, and showed Jabez to the school with one deeply-cut eyebrow plastered up. " What boy among you has been guilty of this outrage ? " he asked, sternly. There was no answer. Some of the little ones took out their handkerchiefs and began to whimper, fearing condign punish- ment. The doctor repeated his question. The l)oys looked from one to another, but there was sti'il no rei:)ly. Laurence Aspinall edged farther behind his coadjutor, but he had not the manliness either to confess or regret. His only fear was detec- tion, or betrayal by a traitor. There was little fear of that ; grammar-school boys have a detestation of a " sn^ak."' " Boys, we cannot permit the perpetrator of such an outrage to remain in your midst ; he must be expelled I " Still no one spoke. " Do you think you could recognise your assailant — the boy who kicked you after you were down ? " (a murmur ran round the school as the classes were ordered to defile slowly past Dr. Smith's desk). Ben Travis walked with head erect — he would have scorned such a deed — and Laurence tried to do the same, but his cruel blue eyes could not meet those of his possible accuser. There w^as a struggle going on in the heart of Jabez. It was in his power to revenge himself for many taunts and sarcasms, and much previous abuse. He called to mind — for thought is swift — that Shrove Tuesday when Laurence and his friends caught him as he descended Mrs. Clowes's steps with a penny- worth of humbugs in his hand, and snatching his cap from his head, kicked it about Half Street and the churchyard as a foot- ball. And he seemed to feel again the twitch at his dark hair and the dreadful pain in his spine and loins, as they bent him backwards over the coping of the low wall, in order to wrest his sweets from him, and held him there perforce till stout Mrs. Clowes, armed with a rolling-pin, came to his rescue, lay- ing about her vigorously, and kept him in her back parlour until he revived. " Forgive and forget " are words for the angels, and Jabez was not an angel, but a boy with quick beating pulses, and a vivid memory. There was a fight going on in his breast fiercer . than either.tbat in Half Street or that in the College Vard. His sore, stiff limbs and smarting brow urged him like voices to 74 The Manchester Man. " pay him off for all," and revenge began to have a sweet savour in his mouth. As he hesitated, watching the slow approach of his foe among his nobler mates, a harsh voice behind him called oiit " Jabez, why do you not answer Dr. Smith ? " The emphasis Joshua Brookes had laid upon the " Jabez " recalled the boy's better self. 'J'he oft-repeated text flashed across his mind, "Jabez was an honourable man," and it shaped his reply. " Well, sir, it was almost dark, and — and " — he was going to add too dark to distinguish features, but he recollected that that would be a falsehood, and lying was no more honourable than malice. " And you could not recognise him, you mean?" suggested Dr. Smith. His lip quivered. "No, sir, I do not mean that. It was very dark, but I think I should know him again. But, oh I if you please, sir, I should not like to turn him out of scliool. Vou see, we were all fighting together, and we were all in a passion, r.nd — and — it would be very mean of me to turn him out of school because he hurt me in a fight " (Jabez did not say a fair fight). " Ah ! " said Dr. Smith, and, turning to Mr. Terry asked, " Are all the Chetham lads reared on the same principle ? " Then there was a low-voiced discussion amongst trustees and masters. Finally, Dr. Smith turned round. His clear eye had uIsion of the ringleaders, but of all concerned ; and tliat even a fair fight between a Gramnxar School, and a Blue-coat boy should be visited with suspension pending enquiry, the offender to be ex})elled whether from school or College. "Good lad, Jabez ! — good lad!" said Joshua Brookes to him, as George Pilkington helped his limping steps from the room. The Manchester Man. 75 On the broad flat step outside the door they encountered Lig Ben Travis, who caught the hand of Jabez in a rough grip^ with the exclamation, "Give us your fist, my young buck J You've more pluck in your finger than that carroty Aspinall in his whole carcase, the mean cur ! An' look you, my lad, if any of them set on you again, I'll stand by and see fair play ; or I'll fight for you if it's a big chap, or my name's not Ben^' Travis." .^ "Who talks of fighting? Haven't you had enough for one while, you great raw-boned brute ? You'd better keep your ready fists in your pockets Travis, if you don't want to b^ kicked out of school ! " After which gruff reminder Joshua left them, and Jabez went back to the College with one more friend in the world; but that friend was not Laurence Aspinall. [^ He, smarting under a sense of obligation, shrunk away 19 bite his nails and vent his spleen in private, conscious thai' he was shunned by his classmates, and despised by honest Ben Travis. As months and seasons sped onwards, they plucked the hairs from Simon Clegg's crown, and left a bald patch to tell of care or coming age ; they stole the roundness from Bessy's figure, the hope from her heart and eyes. There was less vigour in the beat of her batting-wand, less elasticity in her step. The periodical holidays and cheering visits of Jabez. were the only pleasant breaks in the monotonous life of the Cleggs. Beyond the knowledge obtained at the billeting office in King Street that Tom Hulme had entered the army and gone abroad \\ith his regiment, no tidings of the self-exiled soldier had come to th^m. In the great vortex of war his name had been swallowed up and lost. But she never said " Ay " to Matthew Cooper, though he waited and waited, smoking his Sunday pipe by the fireside even till his own Mol'y was old enough to have a sweetheart, and to want to le ive her father's crowded hearth for a quieter one of her own. Those same months and years added alike to the stature and attainments of Jabez Clegg and Laurence Aspinall, though in very uneciual ratio. The former, though he had long since astonished Simon with his fluent rendering of the big Bible, was but a plodding scholar of average ability, the range of whose studies was limited, notwithstanding Parson Joshua's voluntary Latin 7^ The Manchester Man. lessons. The latter had an aptitude for learning, which made his masters press him forward ; and Joshua Brookes forgave the tricks he played, his translations were so clear and so correct. ' Yet, when he wrote stinging couplets or " SL Cris- pin " on the Parson's door, or put cobblers'-wax on the peda- gogue's chair, the covert reference to his parentage, stung the irascible man more than the damage to kerseymere, and in his wrath he birched his pupil into penitence. His penitence took a peculiar form. A discovery was made that a general dance in the school-room would shake the ])ewter platters and crockery down from dresser and corner lupboard in Joshua's house adjoining. Whenever the dominie had growled o\er bad lessons with least cause, Laurence was sure to propose a grand hornpipe after school hours. Back would rush Joshua fast as his short legs would carry him, s])luttering with passion ; but the nimbler lads disappeared when tht-y heard the crash, and, as a rule Joshua's temper cooled before morning. Laurence Aspinall's chief source of amusement from his first entrance into the Grammar School had been the crippled father of Joshua Brookes. As the old fellow staggered home drunk, the street-boys would hoot at him, pull him about, pelt him with mud, and mock at him, till his impotent fury found vent in a storm of vile and opprobrious language. Laurence was sure to enjoy a scene of this kind, but he was generally sly enough to act as prompter, not as principal. The old man was a great angler ; and that he might enjoy unmolested his favourite ])astime, his son had obtained from Colonel Hansom permission for him to fish in Strangeways Park ponds. Thither he had an empty hogshead conveyed, and the crippled old cobbler, with a flask of rum for company, sat within it, often the night through, to catch fish. The Irk had not then lost its repute for fine eels, and old Brookes — who, by the way, wore his hair in a pigtail — was likewise wont to plant himself, with rod and line, on what was the Water- worth Field, on the Irwell side of Irk Bridge, to catch eels. Returning one afternoon (Joshua was busied with clerical duties), Laurence Aspinall and his fellows met the old man staggering along with his rod over his slioulder and a basket of eels in one hand. He had called at the " Packhorse " for a dram, and went on, as was his wont, talking noisily to himself He had steered round the corner in safety ; but hearing one lively voice call The Manchester Man. 77 out, '• Here's old Fishtail ; " and another, " Here's St. Crispin's Cripple ; " and a third, " Make way for Diogenes," as he was passing the high-master's ancient house he gave a lurch, meaning to reprove them solemnly — the top of his rod caught in the promi- nent pillar of the doorway, and was torn from his insecure grasp. Striving to recover it, he pitched forward, and in falling dropped his basket in the mud, and set the writhing, long-lived fish at liberty to swim in the gutter swollen wiih recent rain. The lounging lads at once set up a shout ; but Laurence, with a timely recollection that the front of Dr. Smitli's was scarcely the most convenient place for his purpose, winked at his companions, and, with an aspect of mock commiseration, politely assisted the old man to rise, begged the others to capture the eels and carry the basket for him, and, under pre- tence of putting the angler's rod in order, contrived to fasten the hook to the end of his old-fashioned pigtail. Then he helped his unsteady steps until they were fairly out of Dr. Smith's sight and hearing ; but they did not suffer him to reach his son's house before they showed their true colours. Loosing his hold, Laurence snatched at the rod, and, darting with it towards the College gate, cried out in high glee, " I've been fishing ; look at the fine snig (eel) I've caught ! " And, as he capered about, he dragged the poor old cripple hither and thither backwards by his pigtail, to which hook and line were attached. Old Brookes screamed in impotent rage and pain ; the boys laughed and shouted the louder. The one with his basket set it on his head, and paraded about, crying, " Who'll buy my snigs ? Fine fresh snigs ! " with the nasal drawl of a genuine fish-seller. Once or twice the old man fell down, uttering awful threats and imprecations ; but Laurence only laughed the more, and jerked him up again with a smart twitch of the line, which was a strong one ; and the other three or four young ruffians put up their shoulders, and limped about singing — " The fishes drink water, Old Crispin drinks gin ; But the fishes come out When the hook lie throws in. Tol de rol." It may be wondered that none of the neighbours interfered. But it must be remembered that they were accustomed, not 7'^. The Manchester Man. only to the uproar of a boyisli multitude, but to the drunken ravings of Old Brookes, who was an intolerable nuisance. Public traffic then was not as now, and policemen were unborn. The satisfaction of Laurence was at its height. He kept hold of the line; one of his comrades, named Barret, dashed the persecuted man with an eel for a whip, and their mirth was boisterous, when Jabez (now thirteen) came quietly through the wicket on an errand from the governor. He took in the scene at a glance. He could not stand by and see injustice done. His dark eyes flashed with indignation as he dashed forward, ]>ulling the line from the hand of Laurence, and tried to disentangle the cruel hook from the unfortunate pigtail. ; "Who asked you to interfere, you petticoated jackanapes ? "" bawled Laurence, darting forward, his face as red as his hair, at the same time dealing Jabez a hea^■y blow on the chest, i " My duty ! " answered Jabez, stoutly, taking no notice of the sneer at himself " How could you gentlemen torment a poor old cripple like that? "' " He's a drunken old sot ! " cried Barret. • '■ It's downright cruel ! " continued Jabez, as he stood between the jabbering drunkard and his tormentors. " We're no more cruel than he is ! He's been catching fishes all day. We've only given him a taste of his own hook ; and we'll have none of your meddling ! " and out went the pugilistic arm of Laurence straight from the shoulder to deal another blow, when it was. caught from behind by the bony hand of Ben Travis, bigger and stronger by two year's growth, whilst the other hand gripped his jacket collar. "So you're at your cowardly tricks again, Aspinall ! " ex- claimed he, holding the other as if in a vice. But if 1 see you lay another finger on that lad, Lll report you to Dr. Smith." ''' Oh ! you'd turn sneak, would you ? " sneered Laurence, striving to twist himself loose, and disordering his broad white frill in the endeavour. " I'd think I did the Grammar School a service to turn either you or Barret out of it. I would ! Think of you setting on that noble chap who wouldn't turn tell-tale, though he'll <:irry the mark of your boot to his grave with him ! " Pointing with outstretched hand to Jabez, who by this time was handing Old Brookes over to the grumbling care of 1'abitha, and whose right eyebrow yet showed a red scan:,- The Manchester Mam. 79 Travis relaxed his hold of Laurence, and he shook himsek' free. Some ■warm altercation followed. There was a scowl of sullen defiance on Aspinall's face, and an evil glance towards Jabez, which Travis observing, with a significant nod he linked his arm in that of the lilue-coat boy, and never left him till he reached his destination, Mr. Hyde's ancient and picturesque tea-shop in Market-street Lane. CHAPTER THE TWELFTH. THE GENTLEMAN. THAT afternoon a gentleman who had witnessed part of the foregoing scene from the breeches-maker's window, •whither he had gone for a pair of buckskin riding-gloves — struck by the dauntless manner of Jabez, related what he had seen to his wife, Mrs. Ashton, the stately sister of Mrs. Chad- wick ; whilst Augusta, their eight-year old daughter, sat on a footstool by her side, hemming a bandana handkerchief for her father, an inveterate snuff-taker — occasionally putting in a word, as only spoiled daughters did in those days. " Mamma, I daresay that's the little boy Cousin Ellen told me about." " Pooh, pooh ! Augusta," said Mr. Ashton, tapping the lid of his snuff-box, and then, from force of habit, handing it to his wife, the wave of whose hand put it back — " pooh, pooh ! child. Do you think there's only one Blue-coat boy in the town ? Besides, he was not such a little boy. 1 know 1 thought something of myself when I was his size," said Mr. Ashton, dusting the snuff from his ruffles as he spoke. " But he would be a little boy when Ellen knew him first. She says it was before I was born." " He could not be a Blue-coat boy then, my dear," observed Mrs. Ashton ; " he was too young." " But Ellen showed him to me when we went to the College at Easter ; and she says he has killed a snake — a real live snake, papa. And Aunt Chadwick bought Ellen such a pretty pincushion he had worked, and, oh ! such a handsome bead purse ! " Mr. Ashton smiled at his daughter's enthusiasm. *' Ah ! I think I have heard of him before ; he is a sort of protege of Parson Brookes." " He is a very honest boy," appended Mrs. Ashton, as she The Manchester Man 8i examined Augusta's hemming by the hght of the nearest wax randle. " Ellen lost Prince William's shilling that same day. You know she always wears it dangling from her neck, absurd as it is -for a great girl of fifteen." " Well ? " said Augusta, looking up inquiringly. " Well, my dear, the very next afternoon the boy Jabez Clegg knocked at the door in Oldham Street with the shilling, which he said he had found in sweeping the library, and remem- bered seeing it on Miss Chadwick's neck. Many a boy, at Easter, would have spent it in cakes or toffy." " I suppose, to U3e one of your favourite maxims, he rapst have thought ' honesty the best policy,' " remarked her hus- band. " Yes ; and ' duty its own reward ' — for he refused the half- crown that Sarah offered him." Mr. Ashton took another pinch of snuff, with grave con- sideration, then put the box, after some deliberation, into his deep waistcoat pocket, and again flapped the snuff off ruffles and neck-cloth ends. " Wouldn't take the money, you say ? " " Would not take it," his wife repeated, folding up the finished handkerchief. After a pause, Mr. Ashton said, with his head on one side, — " I think I shall look after that younker. What is he like ? " " Oh, that I cannot tell ; I was not with them. But I think Sarah said he had got an ugly scar on one of his eyebrows." Mr. Ashton brought down his hand with a clap on that ot Augusta, resting on his knee. " Then, my little Lancashire witch, the poor cripple's cham- pion and Ellen's hero of romance will be one and the same. I must certainly look after that lad." But even as Mr. Ashton came to that conclusion Jabez was in mortal peril, and his romance and theirs threatened to end at the beginning. Laurence Aspinall was not of a temper to brook inter- ference with his sport, or to be treated as the inferior of a " common charity boy." Since the hour that Jabez had declined to single him out for punishment, he had resented the sense of his own inferiority which conscience pressed upon him. In refusing to tender either thanks or apology at Ben Travis's instigation, he lost caste in the school, and the know- 82 The Manchester Man. ledge rankled in his breast. Against the debt of gratitude he owed to Jabez he laid up a fund of envy and spite, out of which he meant to pay him in full the iirst opportunity. That opportunity had arrived. There were some birds of his own feather, who stuck by him, of whom Ned Barret was one. Old Brookes had been too drunk to swear positively who had molested him, or to obtain credence if he did ; but the in- opportune arrival of Jabez and Ben Travis had made detec- tion certain, and nothing was Joshua Brookes so sure to punish with severity as an attack on the father who made his life a burden to him. On the principle that they might " as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb," the noble five resolved to waylay the Blue- coat boy on his return, and either extract from him a promise of secrecy, or give him a sound drubbing for his pains. They were too like-minded for long conference. To put the old breeches-maker off the scent, all dispersed but one, Kit Townley, who pulled a top from his pocket and whipped away at it with as much energy as ever did his Anglo-Saxon an- cestors. Perhaps he thought he had a meddlesome College boy under his lash. After a time, the others sauntered back one by one, from contrary directions ; there was more top-whipping, and some of the whips and tops were new. Then when they saw they were unobserved, they adjourned to the school-yard, and laying a cap on the broad step, two or three of them sat down to a game at cob-nut, so that if any unlikely straggler did. come that way there might be an apparent reason for their presence. It was late in the year. The breeches-maker was seated at his early tea, and so were most of his neighbours. The twi- light was coming gently down, and the boys, tired of waiting were about to go home to their own — iVspinall expecting a reprimand for being late. Jabez, who had been delayed at the office of Harrop the printer in the Market Place, came briskly up with a ])arcel in his hand just as they reached the gate. One of tlicm snatched the parcel from him and ran with it into the school-yard. As a natural consequence Jabez followed to regain his ])roperty. That was just what they wanted. The light iron gate was p.ushed-to, and there they were, shut in and screened froni observation, between the deserted Grammar School on the one hand, and the College School-room on the other, which^ with the dormitory above, was ecjually sure to be empty at that hour. The Manchester Man. 83 They were free to torment him as they pleased. The parcel was tossed from hand to hand with subdued glee, and their whip-lashes and strung cob-nuts cut at his arms and shoulders, as Jabez sprang forward and darted hither and thither, per- plexed and baffled in his efforts to recover it. Once or twice it went down on the damp ground, and gained in grime what it lost in shape. " Oh ! dear, dear ! do give me my parcel ! " cried Jabez, in perplexity. " Our governor will think I've been loitering." " And so you have, you canting yellow-skirt. You stopped to put your long finger in our pie ! " was the swift retort of Laurence, as he interposed his body between Jabez and the boy who held his lost charge. "Eh! and you went off with Travis, wasting your time!" added Kit Townley. " I never waste my time on an errand." *' Oh ! Miss Nancy never wastes time on an errand." mimicked Ned Barret ; and still they kept the boy on the run until he leaned, out of breath, against the wall which served as a parapet above the river. Then, the disputed prize being kept by Kit Townley at a respectable distance, Laurence advanced to parley with him, offering to restore his parcel and let him go if he would take a solemn oath, which he dictated, to maintain silence on all which had transpired that afternoon. " I cannot ; I must account for my time," firmly answered Jabez, " and I must account for that dirty parcel." " Tell them you tumbled down and hurt yourself," suggested Aspinall. " I cannot ; it would be untrue ! " At this the lads set up a loud guffaw, as if truth were some- what out of fashion ; but the one who stood nearest the gate with the parcel looked restless, as if beginning to be tired of the whole business. Just then Laurence went blustering up to the College boy, and, thrusting his face forward, said — - " If you don't go down on your marrow-bones this instant, and sw^ear to tell no tales, we'll pitch you over the wall." " You dare not ! " boldly retorted Jabez, with a set face. " Oh ! daren't we ? We'll see that ! Lend a hand." " No, you dare not 1 " repeated he, planting himself firmly against the walk There was a sudden rush ; they closed round him, more in bravado than with any intent to do him bodily harm : sliding G 2 84 The Manchester Man, him up against the smooth-worn brick-work, they hoisted him above their shoulders, meaning to hold him there. But in their eagerness they had thrust him too far, and crowding on each other, one, being jostled, let go, and JaDez toppled o\ er the precipice ! There was a scream ; a splash in the water. Tabitha, taking clothes from a line in the back-yard, cried out, " What is that?'' Parson Brookes's startled pigeons tlew from their dove-cote, and wheeling round in widening circles cooed affrightedly. The white-faced boys stood aghast. Unless his fall had been seen from the opposite croft, their victim would be drowned before any aid they could bring was available ; a wide circuit must be taken before a bridge could be reached ! Buildings blocked up that side of the river. They looked at each other and spoke in whispers ; then, with an animal instinct of self-preservation, sneaked off in silence and terror, leaving him to his fate. Not all. Kit Townley, who held the parcel, had drawn near to remonstrate. With a shriek he threw down the paper, and, hardly conscious what he did, tore wildly through the gates, and across the College Yard, to starde the first he met with the alarm that a College boy was drowning in the Irk ! CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH. Simon's pupil. IT was fortunate tor Jabez that the late rains had raised the level of the Irk : otherwise, that being the shallowest part of the stream, there would not have been sufficient depth of water to buoy him up when he was pitched over the wall ; and had his head come in contact with rock or stone, falling from such an elevation, his history would have closed with the last chapter. It was doubly fortunate that sensible Simon had taught him that without which no boy's education — nor, in- deed, any girl's either — is complete, and that Jabez, from v^ery love of the water, had kept himself in practice whenever a holiday had given him opportunity. He had gone over the wall backwards, falling into the stream head downwards, but not altogether unprepared ; and to him head first, heels first, forward or backward, were all as one. Like a cork he rose, and struck out across the river. The slimy stone embankment seemed to slip from his touch ; there was no hold for his hand ; it was too steep and smooth to climb ; and he felt that the river, swift in its fulness, was bent on bearing him to the Irwell, so dangerously near. He raised his voice for " help." Tabitha, listening, answered with a scream and a shout, and, bolting into the house, disturbed the Parson and his besotted father at their tea by the outcry she made, as she rushed on into the street with the alarm of "a lad dreawndin," just as the conscious culprits slunk past to their own quarters. Doctor Stone, the first recipient of terrified Kit Townley's incoherent intelligence, was simultaneously racing at full speed, v.'ith a troop of College boys at his heels, down towards Hunt's Bank and the outlet of the Irk, with the swift consciousness that the only hope of saving life was in the chance of reaching er. As she filled the wooden piggin she had taken with her, she fancied she heard a moan, and listening breathless, heard another, and another, from the outside of a door which was (to her thought) inaccessible to mortal. Down went the piggin and the milk (she was not a strong-minded woman, and it was a superstitious age), up the steps she stumbled in her fright, crjdng — " Oh ! theer's a boggart in th' dairy ! — theer's a boggart !" Dr. Stone and his companions came in at the porch as she fled upwards towards the kitchen. The firelight gleam- ing on her frightened face caught his attention. Half faint- ing, she repeated her exclamation, adding — " It moaned like summat wick." " Moaned, did you ,sav ? Goodness ! If it should be ' Not stopping to finish his sentence, he snatched a light from the table, and was unbolting the cellar-door before the governor or anyone else could comprehend his movements. They understood well enough when he came back into their midst, burdened with the limp, dripping form of Jabez, white and insensible, and depositing him on a settle near the kitchen fire, cried out for restoratives. That was a terrible next morning, when the young mis- creants, as much afraid to play truant as to lace possibilities at school, sneaked to their places and set to their studies with industry out of the common. Laurence Aspinall, boarding with a master, had no choice in the matter. How^ Jabez got into the water was not clear ; he was too ill to be questioned over-night, and was in a fever and delirious by noon the next day. But he had never been known to loiter or go astray when sent on an errand. Kit Townley's impulsive cry of alarm had suggested foul play, and neither Joshua Brookes nor Governor Terr)' had let the night pass without an effort to dive into the truth. ' Dr. Stone had conjectured Kit Townley to be a Grammar School boy, although personally unknown to him ; and that conjecture recalled to Joshua his father's ravings of ill-u.'^nge, which he had at the time regarded as drunken maudling. The Manchester Man. 89 It was ascertained that the boy had been at Harrop's. Inquiry, and the search for the missing parcel, resulted in the discovery of a trampled play-ground, broken whiplashes, a string of cob- nuts, and, neatly marked in red cotton with his initials, one ot Laurence Aspinaiks cambric ruffles, torn and muddy. There was a conference with Dr. Jeremiah Smith before the night was out. A messenger was sent to Mr. Aspinall in Cannon Street the next mornmg, as well as to the trustees of the school. The following day saw such another conclave as before in the Grammar School. Dr. Stone, who was present, picked out the boy who had given the alarm ; and Kit Townley, trembling for himself, told all he knew Ben Travis, at the outset, in his indignation, proffered his evidence, which went to prove malice prepense. The boys, asked what they had to say for themselves, simply answered they had done it for " sport " — that they did not mean to throw him over, but only to frighten him to " hold his tongue," and excused their running home on the plea that they were " afraid." Laurence Aspinall boldly said that he knew the boy could swim, and did not think a duck- ing would do him much harm, and offered to jump off the wall and swim down the river himself. Liar as well as boaster, he received a summary check from Dr. Smith, apart from the reprimand administered to him as the proven ring-leader. In these days such a case of outrage would have been brought before a magistrate, and the offenders' names sent flying through newspaper paragraphs. Then, whether to spare the parental feelings of such influential men as Mr. Aspinall, or to save from tarnish the fair fame of the school, or to avert the further debasement of the boys from prison contact, and give them a chance to amend, the school tribunal was allowed to be all-sufiicient. Ignominious expulsion was dealt out not only to Laurence Aspinall and to Ned Barret, but to each of the conspirators — Kit Townley, honourably acquitted by them of participation in the final attack, alone escaping with a caution, a severe repri- mand, and as severe a flogging; which special immunity he had purchased by running white-faced to give the alarm. It is pos- sible he scarcely estimated the value of that immunity at the time. But the loud hurrahs which hailed this sentence testified how the Grammar School boys valued their honour as a school, and how proud they were to be purged of such offenders. go The Manxhester I^Ian. Mr. Aspinall, too much agitated to witness his son's puLhc disgrace, waited the result of the inquiry in the head-master's house ; and if ever Laurence Aspinall felt ashamed of his own misconduct, it was when his father refused to take his un- worthy hand as they left the door-step, and he heard Dr. Smiths closing words of reproof mingled with compassion for the father, in whose eyes were signs of tears a bad son had drawn. Long before Jabez was able to resume his own place in the school, Laurence Aspinall had been removed to an exi)ensive boarding-school at Everton, near Liverpool ; and this time the merchant laid stress on his tendency " for vicious and low pur- suits," and begged that no efforts or exi)ense might be spared to make him a gentleman in all respects. Still he tampered with the truth, lest the school-master (lie would be called a Principal in these factitious days) should refuse to admit a pupil with such antecedents, and decline the task of eradicating cruelty and ingratitude. Here Laurence certainly mixed only with boys of his own class, from whom money could buy neither flattery nor favour, and where only his own merits could procure either. And here we must leave him, to pursue the fortunes of the boy who.se life he had wantonly imperilled. Had anything been wanting to bespeak Joshua Brookes"s good-will, Jabez supplied it when he interfered to i)rotect the elder Brookes from the derisive indignities of others. Not only to Mrs. Clowes did he rehearse in his own peculiar manner the story, as told by Ben Travis, with its sup])lementary drama which had so nearly proved a tragedy, but at such tables as he fretiuented — Mr. Chadwick's among the rest. Mr. Ashton, who was present, spoke of being himself a wit- ness to the former scene, and, whilst presenting his inevitable snuff-box to the eccentric chaplain, repeated his pre\ious observation — " I must look after that boy — I must indeed." If the parson had been commonly observant he A\ould have noticed a pair of black eyes fixed in eager attention on his, as he, who rarely uttered a commendation, held forth in jjraise of his fitther's champion, the Blue-coat boy ; the said black eyes beiiig matched by the black hair, and somewhat daik skin, of the plain but intelligent daughter of his host. But girlsof fifteen were then counted in the category of children, and were taught only to "■ speak when spoken to," so Ellen ("hadwick ]jaiised no other commentary on the actions of Jabez than was expressed by her glowing cheeks and cloc^ueut eyes. CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH. JABEZ GOES INTO THE WORLD. A SHARP illness followed the precipitation of Jabez into the Irk ; but he was young, had a strung constitution, and, to the satisfaction of all in the College, and many out of i", was able to take his place in the refectory, and clear the beef or the potato-pie from his wooden trencher, before the month expired. Prior to this, he was allowed an afternoon, ere he was well enough to resume fully his routine duties, to show himself to the kind friends who had exhibited most anxiety for his recovery. Mrs. C'lowes was one of these. Jam, jelly, and cakes, never concocted within the area of the College, had found their way to his bedside. Grateful for kindness from so unlikely a quarter, Jabez paid his first visit to the shop in Half Street, to thank the queer old lady. But not one word of thanks would she hear. " Eh, lad, say naught about it ; you did } our duty, and I did mine, and so we're quits ; " and shook her open hand a few inches in advance of her face, as if she were shaking a dis- claimer out of it. " And where are you taking your white face to now ? " she asked quickly, the better to turn the tide of his stammering thanks. •' 1 o Aunt Bess's." " Why, lad, Bess Clegg'll have naught to gi\e thee fit for sick folk to eat. It's much to me if she'll have either a potato or a drop of milk. If she's a bit of jannock, or oat-cake, it's as much as the bargain, "\^'ar may be glorious for kings and generals, but it's awful for poor folk ; Mesters can't sell their goods, and can't pay wages bout money ; and I've heard that, since th' potato riots in Shudehill last Spring, the folk have been so clemmed that some on them couldna be known by their friends who hadna seen them for awhile ; they were naught but skin and bone, poor things ! " 92 The Manchester Man. Whilst indulging in this tirade against war and its concomi- tants, to distract his attention, she bustled about, often witii her liack to him ; then dived into her parlour, and returned with a basket, which she was handing to hini; vith a charge to •' take that to Bess, and be sure bring the basket back safe," when she found that Joshua Brookes was standing behind Jabez, amongst waiting customers, with a sharp eye on her pro- ceedings. '• I say, young Cheat-the-fishes, what have you got to say for yourself? A nice young ragamuffin you are, to go a-bathing without leave, spoiling your clothes, and giving yourself cold ! I hope they gave you plenty of physic, to teach you better," said Joshua roughly, taking the boy by the shoulder, and turn- ing him sharply round to confront him. "Yes, sir — they gave me plenty of physic," said Jabez, doffing his cap respectfully. " But I did not go bathing ; I got into the water by accident." '•' By what ? Do you call that an accident ? " growled the parson, to get at the boy's meaning. " An accident done a-purpose," chimed in Mrs. Clowes, whilst her scales jingled, and she and her helper weighed out her commodities for the people at the counter. "Yes, sir," answered Jabez, composedly; "it must have been an accident. I don't think they really could mean to push me over. I think they only meant to frighten me " " Well ? " queried Joshua, seeing that he hesitated. " I think one of them slipped, and let go, and then I slipped too, .sir," he replied, modestly. '• Slipped, indeed ! You'd very nearly slipped into the next world ! " exclaimed the jjarson. " I suppose you'll say next that my poor old father was dragged about by the young wretches by accident too ? " The colour of Jabez rose. " No, sir ; that was very cruel." " Oh, you do call some things by their right names (here, let that woman pass out). T su|.^pose youie glad enough the rascals have got their deserts ? " A dubious change came over the boy's face. He did not answer at once ; he hardly knew his own feelings on the subject. The question was repeated. " Well, sir, I'm glad they won't be there to torment me any more, but it must be a very dreadful thing for a young gentle- man to be turned out of school in disgrace, and 1 don't think The Manchester Man. 93 I ought to be glad of that. I should never get over it, if it was me." " Here, take your basket, and be off with you ! " said Joshu.i Brookes, hurrying him out of the shop, that he might stay and rate the old woman for " spoiling young Cheat-the-fishes," conscious all the while that he had been doing his best to get the lad a good home in the future. Bess and Simon received him with open arms, glad not only to see him well again, but thankful he had been placed where he was secure from the bitter want which pinched both their stomachs and their faces. To them Mrs. Clowes' basket l)rought what they had not seen for months — a white loaf and a good lump of cold meat, to say nothing of a tiny i)aper of tea, and some sugar — those luxuries of the rich — and half-a-crown in another paper. How those half-famishing hard-workers, whose home had been denuded of their goods to keep life within them, thanked cross old Mrs. Clowes ! She had made it a festival to them indeed, and all for the sake of the boy they had kept. There were no pigeons — these had been sold long ago. to pay for provisions, though much against Simon's will. The cat was there, lean and gaunt ; it managed to pick up a sub- sistence somehow ; and the big Bible was there- — Simon had not parted with that, though the bright bureau was gone, ay, and the cradle which had been an ark to the orphan. The change touched Jabez sorely. Snugly housed and fed within the College, rumours of outer poverty made no lasting impression ; but here he saw its grim reality, and sitting down on the three-legged stool, he covered his face with his hands to hide the tears called up by that insight into their im- poverished condition. Yet had they some alleviation of their pain. Poverty appeared to have lost half its bitterness for Bess. She had had a letter from her long-mourned Tom, and the joyful news served to brighten, up the visit for Jabez and all. It was a long and deeply repentant letter, of course written by a comrade. It was dated from Badajoz, and had been a weary while in reaching them. He had been wounded in that brilliant assault, and while in hospital had fallen in with another Lancashire lad, also wounded — no other than the boy who had lent a hand to rescue the infant Jabez, and who had been driven to enlist by the sharp pangs of hunger, only two years before. From this young fellow, Private John Smith (Tom 91 The Manchester Man. was himself a Corporal), he had learned how grievously his l^ess had been slandered ; but widi that knowledge had come the conviction that he had condemned her hastily and harshly on mere hearsay, and the letter was incoherent in its remorseful contrition. In his soldier-life he had been tossed hither and thither — known pain, and thirst, and famine ; and said he owed it all to his own jealous credulity, when he ought to have known so much better. He told of marchings and counter- marchings, battles and bloodshed ; but of never one wound to himself, thougli he had not "cared a cast of the shuttle" for his life until that bayonet-thrust which had laid him side by side with John Smith, who had lost an eye. But he wound u]) with a prayer for Bess and himself, and a hope for their reunion, if the war would ever end. He "was sick of it." All tliat letter was to Bess and Simon, Jabez could not com- prehend ; but he took Mrs. Clowes her empty basket, and went back to the College satisfied that one ray of sunshine lit up the poor home of his friends. And Matthew Cooper's last chance was gone. * * * * *- Mr. Ashton was what is known in trade as a small-ware manufacturer — that is, he was a weaver of tapes, inkles, fillet- ings ; silk, cotton, and worsted laces (for furniture) ; carpet bindings, brace-webs, and fringes. Moreover, he manufactured braces and umbrellas, for which latter his brother-in-law su])plied the ginghams. He had at work, both in Manchester and at Whaley-Bridge, a number of swivel-engines, the design of which came from those unri\alled tape-weavers, the Dutch, and which would weave twenty-four lengths of tape or bed-lace at one time. Otherwise, the bulk of his workpeople — winders, warpers, brace, fringe, and umbrella-makers — carried away materials to their own homes, and brought back their work in a finished state. Mr. Chadwick, as we have mentioned, was a manufacturer of ginghams — this included checks and fustians ; but nuich of his trade being foreign, the war had locked up his resources, and his anxieties preyed on his health. Mr. Ashton had suffered less in this particular, not having disdained to take his sensible wife's advice — " Never put too many eggs in one basket." Mrs. Ashton, be it said, had a leaning towards " proverbial philoso])hy " more homely and terse than Tupper's, which, vulgar as it is accounted now, was in esteem when our century was young ; and, had it been The Manchester Man. 95 otherwise, would have been equally impressive from her delibe- rately modulated utterance. This same lady had, moreover, an aptitude for business. Mr. Ashton employed a number of young women, and Mrs. Ashton might be found most days in the warehouse, either " putting out " or inspecting the work brought in by them, with a gingham wrapper over her " silken sheen." If the footman announced visitors, the wrapper was thrown aside in a moment, and she stepped into her drawing- room as though fresh from her toilette, and with no atmosphere of dozens, grosses, or great-grosses about her. She was wont to say, " The eye of a master does more work than both his hands," accordingly in house or warehouse her active supervision kept other hands from idling, and she certainly dignified whatever duties she undertook, whether she used hands or eyes only. In those days a seven-years' apprenticeship to any trade or business was deemed essential ; apprentices were part and parcel of commercial economy, and when Mr. Ashton spoke of " looking after that boy," it w?.3 that he thought Jabez Clegg bade fair to be a fitter inmate and a more reliable servant than others whose terms were about to expire. Through his friend the Rev. Joshua Brookes he ascertained the boy's age and other particulars, and sought the House- Governor Mr. Terry, and laid before him a proposition to take Jabez Clegg as his apprentice, on very fair terms. He then learned that Mr. Shaw, the saddler at the bottom of Market Street-lane, was also desirous to obtain the same Blue-coat boy as an apprentice, his friend the leather-breeches maker having named the lad to him. At the Easter meeting of feoffees both proposals were laid before them — Simon Clegg, as standing in loco parentis to Jabez, being present. After some little discussion Mr. Ashton's proposal was accepted, to the great satisfaction of the tanner, and in a few days Jabez was transferred to his new master for mutual trial until Ascension Day, when, if all parties were satisfied, his indentures would be signed. As the governor said, it had " been but the toss of a button " whether he had gone to Mr. Shaw or Mr. Ashton : — yet upon that toss of a button the whole future of Jabez depended. Jabez Clegg entered on his new career under good auspices — that is, he bore with him a good character for steadiness and probity, though nothing was said of brilliant parts, or any special talent which he possessed. Indeed his school-master The Manchester Man. had said that only his indomitable perseverence had enabled him to keep pace with others. If he had any latent genius any particular vocation, no one had discovered it ; his faculty for disfiguring doors and walls with devices in coloured chalks, picked up amongst the gravel, had been matter for punishment not praise, and none but the College boys themselves cared to know v.'here the fresh patterns for purses and pincushions came from. Steadiness, perseverance, probity — they were good materials out of which to manufacture a tradesman (so Mr. Ashton thought), and congratulations were mutual. Jabez went, with his new outfit, to his new home under good auspices, inasmuch as both master and mistress were pre-pos- sessed in his favour, and they stood in the foremost ranks of those who began to recognise that English apprentices were not bond-slaves in heathendom. Instead of being crammed to sleep like dogs in holes under counters ; left to wash at a pump and wipe themseh'es where they could ; obliged to sit at a table in a back kitchen, and dip their spoons into one common dish of porridge, or potatoes and buttermilk ; to eat such scraps and refuse as sordid employers, or ill disposed cooks, chose to set before their primitive Adamite forks — instead of a system like this, from which apprentices (of whatever grade) only emerged at the beginning of this century, the Ashtons' apprentices had a comfortable dormitory in the attic, there was a coarse jack-tOM-el l)y the scullery-sink for their use, they had their meals with the servants in the kitchen, where was an oak settle by the fire for them when work was over. But work did not end with the close of the warehouse. They were expected to keep their attic clean and in order, to cleanse the wooden or i)ewter platters, or ])orringers, from which they had dined or supped ; to rinse the horns which had held their table-beer ; to fetch and carry wood, coals, and water, for servants too lazy to do their own work ; and it was not much rest any apjirentice had from five or six in a morning until eight or nine at night, when he went to his bed. As the youngest a])prentice, the roughest of this work fell on Jabez, but, luckily, his training had made him ecjual to the occasion ; though Kezia, the red-faced cook, set herself stead- fastlv to dislike him, because Mr. Ashton had bespoken her favour for him. In the warehouse, too, the evident good-will of princii)als roused the jealously of underlings, so that "good auspices ■' had their corresi)onding drawbacks. It was iiot much of a pleasure to Jabez to find Kit Townley The Manchester Man. 97 also seated as an apprentice on the kitchen settle ; but the youth seemed disposed to be friendly, and Jabez forbore to create a grievance by recalling unpleasant reminiscences. With Kit Townley, who was his senior by a year, a heavy premium had been paid, and on this he was inclined to presume. But neither Mr. nor Mrs. Ashton made any social distinction between the twain, and Jabez ivas strong enough to hold his own. During the few weeks' probation Jabez was transferred from department to department, alike to test his capacity and his own liking for the business. Both proved satisfactory. On Ascension Day, 1813, there was another appearance in that ancient room before the College magnates, many of whom, as officers in volunteer regiments, were in full-dress uniform (a dinner pending). The indentures had to be signed, the pre- mium of ^4 (returnable to the boy when his term expired) had to be paid. Simon Clegg's best clothes had long been lost in the pawn- broker's bottomless pit : but some one unknown (mayhap Mrs. Clowes or Mrs. Clough) had sent him overnight a suit of fresh ones, pronounced by him and Bess " welly as good as new ; " and he presented himself for the important ceremony (over- looked by the painted face of the orphan's benevolent friend, Humphrey Chetham) as proud almost of his own restored respect- ability as of the part he was about to perform. When it came to his turn to sign the document, the little man took the pen with a flourish, as if he were a hero about to perform some mighty action. He stooped to the heavy oaken table, bent his head low, alternately to the right and left, and with bis fingers in an unaccountable crump, imprinted his self-taught signature in Roman capitals thereon, then handed back the quill as if to say, " The deed is done ! " Governor, school-master, and feoffees congratulated Mr. Ashton and Jabez both. Simon, with moist eyes, shook Jabez by the hand, and holding the boy's shoulder with his left to look the better in his clear dark eyes, said with deliberate emphasis — " Jabez, lad, aw'm preawd on yo' this day. But moind — thah's an honourable ncame : do nowt to disgrace it, an' yo'r fortin's made ! " Jabez was too abashed to make reply at the time ; but at the supper given in the kitchen, to mark his instaUation at Mr. Ashton's — to which Bess and Simon were both invited — Jabez contrived to whisper, "You needn't clem any more, Bess; I'll give you all my wages." CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. APPRENTICESHIP, JABEZ now began his work in earnest, in the packing-room — the very lowest rung of the ladder. Not long did he remain there. The bright colours in the lace and brace rooms had an attraction for him, and he argued with himself that the better he did the rough work assigned him the sooner he should mount above it. And Jabez the plodding Blue-coat boy, was ambitious. That ambition had a threefold stimulus. Manchester people were then, as a rule, steady church and chapel-goers. Mr. Ashton had two pews at the Old Church ; one for his family, the other for servants and apprentices, the attendance of the latter being imperative. Jabez thus came in frequent contact with his old-time friends, from the Blue-coat boys in the Chetham Gallery to the Cleggs, to whom went every penny of his earnings ; their distress, like that of others, having deepened with the continuation of the Napo- leonic war. Sometimes old Mrs. Clowes, meeting him in the church- yard, would grasp him by the hand, and leave something in it, as, in her old black stuff dress and coloured kerchief tied over her mob-cap, she hurried homewards to scold dilatory hand- maids, and put her Christianity in practice amongst her pensioners. Now and then Joshua Brookes crossed his path, and if he did not put his hand in his breeches pocket for Jabez — now a well-grown youth — he gave him more than sterling coin in sterling advice, though, unfortunately, in so alirupt and grotesque a manner, its effect was frec^ucntly lost. Yet one day when the Blue-coat boy had been barely two years at the ^losley Street manufacturer's, he put a spur into the sides of his ambition. The Manchester Mam. 99 "Young Cheat-the -fishes, were you ever in Mrs. Chadwick's green parlour ? " " Yes, sir^ — I was there once for half-an-hour." (The day he took back Miss Ellen's shilling.) " Well did you read the sermons on the walls ? " Jabez answered respectfully — " I did not see any sermons, sir. I saw some pictures in. tlack frames with gilt roses at the corners." " And didn't look at them, I suppose ? " in a harsh grunt. " Yes, sir, I did ! I was waiting till Mrs. Chadwick had done dinner. They w^ere about two boys — a good and bad apprentice." " Oh, then, you did use your eyes ! The next time they let you inside that room, just use your understanding too. William Hogarth, the artist, from his grave preaches a sermon to you and your fellows, as good as Parson Gatliffe preached from the pulpit this morning, mark that I " and he turned on his heel with an emphasising nod to fix /lis sermon on the boy's mind. The opportunity came before long. It was customary when an apprentice went with a message to leave him in the hall, or send him into the kitchen ; bu-: Jabez being sent by Mrs. Ashton with several samples of furniture-binding and fringes for her sister's use, he was shown with his parcel into the parlour, where Mrs. Chadwick, neatly attired in a brown stuff dress, with a French cambric kerchief lying in folds under the square bodice, sat at work wdth an upholsteress, in the midst of a mass of chintz and moreen, preparing for the new home of Ellen's elder sister Charlotte ; for, in spite of war, distress, or famine, people will marry and give in marriage. And had not a glorious peace just been concluded ? Ellen, a comely but not pretty girl, about seventeen, w^hose black eyes and hair were her chief attractions, sat there in a purple bombazine dress, with her sheathed scissors and College pincushion suspended by a chain from her girdle, plying her needle most industriously. He was not accustomed to parlours, and no doubt his bow was as awkward as his blush ; but he had a message to deliver, and ne did that in a business like manner. He had to wait until pattern after jjattern was tried against the chintz, and calculations made. Mrs. Chad- wick, seeing his eyes wander wistfully from picture to ])icture, courteously gave him permission to examine them. At once Ellen, who was sitting close under one, rose to act as interpreter. She was recalled by the mild ^'oice of her mother. loo The Manchester ]\Ian. "Sit down, Ellen; Jabez Clcgg does not require a young lady's help to understand those pictures — they explain themselves." Ellen went back to her seat and her sewing with a raised colour, and a private impression that the rebuke was uncalled for, though she spoke never a word. Perhaps Mrs. Chadwick thought condescension should have its limits, and did not ])elieve in a young lady's impulsive civility to an apprentice l>lue-coat boy. Yet that was not like Mrs, Chadwick. Miss Augusta had been staying with her aunt. Part of his commission was to convoy her home ; she was an only child, and too precious to be trusted out alone, though she was in her eleventh year, and the distance was nothing. But so many desperadoes had been let loose by the termination of the war that crime and violence were rampant, footpads infested high- ways and byways, and Cicily, Augusta's maid — ex-nurse — was no longer deemed a protection. He stood before the last engraving when Augusta — in no awe of her father's apprentice — came dancing into the room in a nankeen dress and tippet, a hat with blue ribands, long wash- ing-gloves which left the elbows bare, and blue shoes tied with a bunch of ribands. Bright, beautiful, buoyant — she was a picture in herself ; and jabez turned from the dingy engraving to think so. She often came tripping into the warehouse or the kitchen, and ex- changed a bright word with one or other, and away again ; but Jabez had thought of her only as a pretty playful child until that afternoon. Joshua Brookes pointing Hogarth's lessons had given the one spur ; that lovely brown-eyed, brown-haired jnaiden, with her simple, "Come, Jabez — I'm ready," had i;iven another. She put her little gloved hand in his, after bidding her aunt and cousin good-bye, and went dancing, skii)ping, and chatter- ing by his side down Oldham Street, and let him lift her over the muddy crossing to Mosley Street, unconscious of the < himerical dreams floating through his apprentice brain all the M-hile. His original ambition to make a home for Simon and r.ess, where neither penury nor care should trouble them,