The Worlds Greatest Books - Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
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"Not till I've earned it, sir," said the Cornish lad. So Mr. Fletcher
slipped the money into his boy's hand and left them. Only a few words
were spoken between the two lads for a little while after he had gone,
and John Halifax stood idly looking across the narrow street at the
mayor's house, with its steps and porticoes, and its fourteen windows,
one of which was open, showing a cluster of little heads within. The
mayor's children seemed to be amused, watching the shivering shelterers
in the alley; but presently a somewhat older child appeared among them,
and then went away from the window quickly. Soon afterwards a front door
was partly opened by someone whom another was endeavoring to restrain,
for the boys on the other side of the street could hear loud words from
behind the door.
"I will! I say I will----"
"You sha'n't, Miss Ursula!"
"But I will!" And there stood the young girl, with a loaf in one hand
and a carving-knife in the other. She hastily cut off a slice of bread.
"Take it, poor boy! You look so hungry," she said. "Do take it!" But the
door was shut again upon a sharp cry of pain; the headstrong little girl
had cut her wrist with the knife.
In a little, John Halifax went across and picked up the slice of bread
which had fallen on the doorstep. At the best of times, wheaten bread
was then a dainty to the poor, and perhaps the Cornish lad had not
tasted a morsel of it for months.
Phineas, from the moment he had set eyes on John, liked the lad, and
living a very lonely life, with no playfellows and no friends of his own
age, he longed to be friends with this strong-looking, honest youth who
had come so suddenly into his life, while John had been so tender in
helping Phineas home that the Quaker boy felt sure he would make a
worthy friend.
It later appeared that John had heard of his own father as a sad, solemn
sort of man, much given to reading. He had been described to him as "a
scholar and a gentleman," and John had determined that he, too, would be
a scholar and a gentleman. He was only an infant when his father died,
and his mother, left very poor, had a sore struggle until her own death,
when the boy was only eleven years old. Since then the lonely lad had
been wandering about the country getting odd jobs at farms; at other
times almost starving.
Thus had he wandered to Norton Bury; and now, thanks to Phineas, Mr.
Fletcher gave him a job at the tannery, although at first the worthy
Quaker was not altogether sure of John's character.
Soon, however, the two lads were fast friends, and spent much of their
time together. John Halifax could read, but he had not yet learnt to
write; so Phineas became his friendly tutor, and repaid his devotion by
teaching him all he knew.
The years wore away, John Halifax labouring faithfully, if not always
contentedly, in the tannery; and in time, old Mr. Fletcher finding him
worthy of the highest trust, John came to be manager of the business,
and to live in the house of his master. In knowledge, too, he had grown,
for Phineas had proved a good tutor, and John so apt a pupil that before
long Phineas confessed that John knew more than himself.
_II.--Ursula March_
It happened that John and Phineas were spending the summer days at the
rural village of Enderley, where they lived at Rose Cottage. Enderley
was not far from Norton Bury, and every day John rode there to look
after the tannery and the flour-mill which had recently been added to
Mr. Fletcher's now flourishing business.
This Rose Cottage was really two houses, in one of which the young men
lived while an invalid gentleman and his daughter occupied the other.
John Halifax had noted this young lady in his walks across the breezy
downs, and thought her the sweetest creature he had seen. Later, when he
got to know that her name was Ursula, he was thrilled with happy
memories of the little girl who had thrown him the slice of bread, for
he had heard her called by that same name. He wondered if this might be
she grown into a young woman.
Ere long he came to know his pretty neighbour, to companion her in rural
walks. No artist ever painted a more attractive picture than these two
made stepping briskly across the wind-swept uplands; she with her
sparkling dark eyes, her great mass of brown curls escaping from her
hood, and John with his frank, ruddy face, and his fine, swinging, manly
figure.
Ursula's father, who had come here ailing, died at the cottage, and was
buried in Enderley churchyard. He had been the same Henry March whose
life John had saved years before when the Avon was in flood. He was
cousin to Squire Brithwood, who also owed his life to John on the same
occasion. Unhappily, Ursula's fortune was left in the keeping of that
highly undesirable person.
John was very sad at the thought of Ursula leaving the cottage for the
squire's home at Mythe House, for he knew that she had been happier
there in the sweet country retreat than she would ever be in the
ill-conducted household of her guardian. She, too, had regrets at the
thought of going, as John and she had become fast friends. He told her
that Mr. Brithwood would probably deny his right to be considered a
friend of hers, and would not allow his claim to be thought a gentleman,
though a poor one.
"It is right," he pursued, on her expression of surprise, "that you
should know who and what I am to whom you are giving the honour of your
kindness. Perhaps you ought to have known before; but here at Enderley
we seem to be equals--friends."
"I have indeed felt it so."
"Then you will the sooner pardon my not telling you--what you never
asked, and I was only too ready to forget--that we are _not_ equals--
that is, society would not regard us as such, and I doubt if even you
yourself would wish us to be friends."
"Why not?"
"Because you are a gentlewoman, and I am a tradesman."
She sat--the eyelashes drooping over her flushed cheeks--perfectly
silent. John's voice grew firmer, prouder; there was no hesitation now.
"My calling is, as you will hear at Norton Bury, that of a tanner. I am
apprentice to Abel Fletcher, Phineas's father."
"Mr. Fletcher!" She looked up at him, with a mingled look of kindliness
and pain.
"Ay, Phineas is a little less beneath your notice than I am. He is rich,
and has been well educated; I have had to educate myself. I came to
Norton Bury six years ago--a beggar-boy. No, not quite so bad as that,
for I never begged. I either worked or starved."
The earnestness, the passion of his tone made Miss March lift her eyes,
but they fell again.
"Yes, Phineas found me starving in an alley. We stood in the rain
opposite the mayor's house. A little girl--you know her, Miss March--
came to the door and threw out to me a bit of bread."
Now indeed she started. "You! Was that you?"
John paused, and his whole manner changed into softness as he resumed.
"I never forgot that little girl. Many a time when I was inclined to do
wrong, she kept me right--the remembrance of her sweet face and her
kindness."
That face was pressed against the sofa where she sat. Miss March was all
but weeping.
"I am glad to have met her again," he went on, "and glad to have been
able to do her some small good in return for the infinite good she once
did me. I shall bid her farewell now, at once, and altogether."
A quick, involuntary turn of the hidden face seemed to ask him "Why?"
"Because," John said, "the world says we are not equals; and it would be
neither for Miss March's honour nor mine did I try to force upon it the
truth--which I may prove openly one day--that we _are_ equals."
Miss March looked up at him--it were hard to say with what expression,
of pleasure, of pride, or simple astonishment; perhaps a mingling of
all; then her eyelids fell. Her left arm was hanging over the sofa, the
scar being visible enough. John took the hand, and pressed his lips to
the place where the wound had been.
"Poor little hand--blessed little hand!" he murmured. "May God bless it
evermore!"
_III.--The Rise of John Halifax_
After John Halifax had returned to Norton Bury he was seized with fever,
and for a time his recovery seemed doubtful. In his delirium he called
aloud for Ursula, and dreamed that she had come to sit with him, asking
him to live for her sake. Phineas, in his anxiety for his friend,
brought Ursula to him, and the dream came true, for she did ask him to
live for her sake.
Not long after his recovery John Halifax became Mr. Fletcher's partner.
Going to London on behalf of the business, he met there the great
statesman, Mr. Pitt, who was impressed with the natural abilities of the
young man. John's reputation for honesty and sound commonsense had now
grown so great at Norton Bury that when he returned there he found
himself one of the most respected men in the town.
Although still far from being rich, he was no longer a poor worker, and
as Ursula was willing to share his life, they boldly determined to be
married, in spite of her guardian, who asserted that John would never
touch a penny of Ursula's fortune. They contrived, however, to be happy
without it, for he refused to go to law to recover his wife's money, and
was determined he would work honestly to support her.
With the death of old Mr. Fletcher, however, came misfortune, for it was
found that the tannery was no longer a paying property, and there were
only the mills to go on with. At this time Ursula's relative, Lord
Luxmore, who was anxious to see the Catholic Emancipation Bill passed,
thought he could use John Halifax for his purpose by offering to get him
returned to parliament for the "rotten borough" of Kingswell, the member
for which was then elected by only fifteen voters. Twelve of these were
tenants of Lord Luxmore, and the other three of Phineas. But although
John would have supported the Bill, he was too honest to let himself be
elected for a "rotten borough." So he declined, and Luxmore next tried
to win him over by offering the lease of some important cloth-mills he
owned; but these he would not take on credit, and he had no money to pay
for them.
At this juncture, Ursula told Luxmore about the behaviour of his kinsman
Brithwood, with the result that his lordship went to Brithwood and made
him turn over the money to her. When John now purchased the lease of the
mills, his lordship thought that he had secured him firmly, and that
Halifax would use his great and growing influence with the people of the
district to further Luxmore's political schemes.
While all this was going on, young Lord Ravenel, the son and heir of
Luxmore, had been a constant visitor at the Halifax home, and delighted
in the company of John's daughter. Halifax had now three children: two
boys, named Guy and Edmund, and Muriel, who, alas! had been born blind.
Perhaps on account of her infirmity she had been the pet of her parents;
but she was of a gentle nature, and was beautiful to look upon, even
with her sightless eyes.
The time for the election of the member for Kingswell had come round,
and as Luxmore had failed to induce John Halifax to stand, he put up a
pliable nominee. But he was greatly mistaken in supposing that John
would use his influence to make the handful of voters, most of whom were
employed in his mills, vote for Luxmore's man. Instead of that, Halifax
advised them to be honest, and vote as they thought right; with the
result that Luxmore promptly evicted them from their homes. But John
found new homes for them.
As his riches increased, he bought a stately country mansion, named
Beechwood, not far from Rose Cottage, ever dear in memory to him.
Another son, Walter, was born there, and everything seemed to smile on
him in his beautiful country home. Luxmore now sought to injure him by
diverting the water from his cloth-mills, and leaving his great wheels
idle. Halifax could have taken him to law; but, instead of that, he set
up a strange, new-fangled thing, called a steam-engine; and his mills
did better than ever.
Finding it useless to fight against the resourceful Halifax, Luxmore
went abroad, and left his son, Lord Ravenel, alone at Luxmore Hall. The
young man, despite his father's unfriendly conduct, was still a frequent
visitor at Beechwood, and when poor Muriel died, his grief at her loss
was only less than that of her parents.
The years passed by, and happiness still reigned at Beechwood; but
Ravenel had deserted them, until one day John Halifax met him, greatly
changed from the gentle youth of the past, at Norton Bury. John invited
him to ride over with him to Enderley.
"Enderly? How strange the word sounds! Yet I should like to see the
place again," said Ravenel, who decided to accompany John Halifax and
Phineas Fletcher in their drive back to Beechwood. He inquired kindly
for all the family, and was told that Guy and Walter were as tall as
himself, while the daughter----
"Your daughter?" said his lordship, with a start. "Oh, yes; I
recollect--Baby Maud! Is she at all like--like----"
"No," said John Halifax. Neither said more than this; but it seemed as
if their hearts warmed to one another, knitted by the same tender
remembrance.
_IV.--The Journey's End_
Lord Ravenel had returned to reside again at Luxmore Hall, and his
visits to Beechwood became as regular as they had been in the old days
at the Halifax home, when Muriel was alive. It was the society of Maud
in which his lordship now delighted, though he never forgot the serene
and happy days he had spent with her blind sister.
Before long, Lord Ravenel sought to be regarded as suitor for the hand
of Maud, who would thus have become the future Countess of Luxmore. He
said that he would wait two years for her, if her father wished it; but
John Halifax would make him no promise, and urged him rather to
endeavour first to become a more worthy man, so that he might redeem the
evil reputation which the conduct of his own father had brought upon the
name of Luxmore.
"Do you recognise what you were born to be?" said Halifax to him. "Not
only a nobleman, but a gentleman; not only a gentleman, but a man--man
made in the image of God. Would to heaven that any poor word of mine
could make you feel all that you are--and all that you might be!"
"You mean, Mr. Halifax, what I might have been--now it is too late."
"There is no such word as 'too late' in the wide world--nay, not in the
universe."
Lord Ravenel for a time sat silent; then he rose to go, and thanked Mrs.
Halifax for all her kindness in a voice choked with emotion.
"For your husband, I owe him more than kindness, as perhaps I may prove
some day; if not, try to believe the best of me you can. Good-bye!"
It was not many weeks after this that the old Earl of Luxmore died in
France, and it then became known that his son, who now succeeded to the
title, had voluntarily given up his claims on the estate in order to pay
the heavy debts of his worthless father.
The home at Beechwood had lost another inmate--for Edmund was now
married--when Guy, first going to Paris, had later sailed for America.
Years passed by, and he became a successful merchant in Boston, and then
one day he wrote home to say he was coming back to the Old Country, and
was bringing with him his partner.
The ship in which Guy and his friend sailed from America was wrecked,
and Ursula, in her grief at the supposed loss of her eldest son, seemed
to be wearing away, when one day a strange gentleman stood in the
doorway--tall, brown, and bearded--and asked to see Miss Halifax. Maud
just glanced at him, then rose, and said somewhat coldly, "Will you be
seated?"
"Maud, don't you know me? Where is my mother?"
The return of the son whom she had given up for dead brought joy again
to the heart of Ursula, and her health seemed to revive, but it was
clear that her days were now uncertain. Scarcely less than the delight
in Guy's return was the discovery that his partner was none other than
the new Earl of Luxmore, who, as plain Mr. William Ravenel, had by his
life in America proved John Halifax was right when he said it was not
too late for him to model his life on lines of true manliness. He had,
indeed, become all that John had desired of him--a man and a
gentleman--so that Maud was, after all, to be the Countess of Luxmore.
But the days of John Halifax himself were now drawing to a close, and he
was not without premonitions of his end; for in his talks with Phineas
Fletcher, who had remained his faithful companion all these years, he
spoke as one would speak of a new abode, an impending journey. Death
came to him very gently one day at sunset, just after he had smiled to
Phineas, when his old friend, looking towards Lord Luxmore and his
future bride, who were with a group of the young people, had said, "I
think sometimes, John, that William and Maud will be the happiest of all
the children."
He smiled at this, and a little later seemed to be asleep; but when Maud
came up and spoke to him, he was dead. While he was sleeping thus, the
Master had called him. His sudden end was so great a shock to the frail
life of Ursula, that when they buried John Halifax in the pretty
Enderley churchyard they laid to rest with him his wife of three-and-
thirty years, who had been a widow but for a few hours.
* * * * *
GEORGE CROLY
Salathiel, or Tarry Thou Till I Come!
George Croly, the author of "Salathiel," was born at Dublin
on August 17, 1780, and became a clergyman of the Church of
England. After a short time as curate in the north of Ireland
he came to London and devoted himself chiefly to literary
pursuits. In 1835 he was presented to the valuable living of
St. Stephen's, Walbrook, London, by Lord Brougham, where his
eloquent preaching attracted large congregations. It was a
saying among Americans of the period, "Be sure and hear
Croly!" Croly was a scholar, an orator, and a man of
incredible energy. Poems, biographies, dramas, sermons,
novels, satires, magazine articles, newspaper leaders, and
theological works were dashed off by his facile pen; and,
according to Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd, he was great in
conversation. Croly's _chef d'oeuvre_ is "Salathiel," which,
published in 1829, created a prodigious sensation, Salathiel
being the character better known as the Wandering Jew. The
description of the fall of Jerusalem is a wonderful piece of
sustained eloquence, hardly to be squalled in romantic
writings. Croly died on November 24, 1860.
_I.--Immortality on Earth_
"_Tarry thou till I come_!" The words shot through me. I felt them like
an arrow in my heart. The troops, the priests, the populace, the world,
passed from before my senses like phantoms.
Every fibre of my frame quivers as I still hear the echo of the anathema
that sprang first from my furious lips, the self-pronounced ruin, the
words of desolation, "His blood be upon us, and our children!"
But in the moment of my exultation I was stricken. He who had refused an
hour of life to the victim was, in terrible retribution, condemned to
know the misery of life interminable. I heard through all the voices of
Jerusalem--I should have heard through all the thunders of heaven, the
calm, low voice, "Tarry thou till I come!"
I felt at once my fate. I sprang away through the shouting hosts as if
the avenging angel waved his sword above my head. I was never to know
the shelter of the grave! Immortality on earth! The perpetual compulsion
of existence in a world made for change! I was to survive my country.
Wife, child, friend, even to the last being with whom my heart could
imagine a human bond, were to perish in my sight. I was to know no limit
to the weight already crushing me. The guilt of life upon life, the
surges of an unfathomable ocean of crime were to roll in eternal
progress over my head. Immortality on earth!
Overwhelmed with despair, I rushed through Jerusalem, crowded with
millions come to the Passover, and made my way through the Gate of Zion
to the open country and the mountains that were before me, like a
barrier shutting out the living world. There, as I lay in an agony of
fear, my soul seemed to be whirled on the wind into the bosom of a
thundercloud. I felt the weight of the rolling vapours. I saw a blaze. I
was stunned by a roar that shook the firmament.
When I recovered it was to hear the trumpet which proclaims that the
first daily sacrifice is to be offered. I was a priest; this day's
service fell to me; I dared not shrink from the duty which appalled me!
Humanity drove me first to my home, where to my unspeakable relief I
found my wife and child happy and unharmed; then I went to the Temple,
and began my solemn duties. I was at the altar, the Levite at my side
holding the lamb, when suddenly in rushed the high priest, his face
buried in the folds of his cloak, and, grasping the head of the lamb, he
snatched the knife from the Levite, plunged it into the animal's throat,
and ran with bloody hands and echoing groans to the porch of the Holy
House. I hastened up the steps after him, and entered the sanctuary.
But--what I saw there I have no power to tell. Words were not made to
utter it. Before me moved things mightier than of mortal vision,
thronging shapes of terror, mysterious grandeur, essential power,
embodied prophecy. On the pavement lay the high priest, his lips
strained wide, his whole frame rigid and cold as a corpse. And the Veil
was rent in twain!
Fleeing from the Temple, I came into a world of black men. The sun,
which I had seen like a fiery buckler hanging over the city, was utterly
gone. As I looked into this unnatural night, the thought smote me that I
had brought this judgment on the Holy City, and I formed the
determination to fly from my priesthood, my kindred, and my country, and
to bear my doom in some barren wilderness.
I ran from the Temple, where priests clung together in pale terror,
found my wife and child, and bore them away through the panic-stricken
city. As we journeyed a yell of universal terror made me turn my eyes to
Jerusalem. A large sphere of fire shot through the heavens, casting a
pallid illumination on the myriads below. It stopped above the city, and
exploded in thunder, flashing over the whole horizon, but covering the
Temple with a blaze which gave it the aspect of metal glowing in a
furnace. Every pillar and pinnacle was seen with a lurid and terrible
distinctness. The light vanished. I heard the roar of earthquake; the
ground rose and heaved under my feet. I heard the crash of buildings,
the fall of fragments of the hills and, louder than both, the groans of
the multitude. The next moment the earth gave way, and I was caught up
in a whirlwind of dust and ashes.
_II.--The Son of Misfortune_
It was in Samaria I woke. Miriam, my wife, was at my side. A troop of
our kinsmen, returning from the city, where terror suffered few to
remain, had discovered us, and brought us with them on their journey.
On this pilgrimage to Naphtali, my native home, my absence from prayer
and my sadness struck all our kinsmen; and Eleazer, brother of Miriam,
questioned me thereon. In my bitterness I said to him that I had
renounced my career among the rulers of Israel. Instead of anger or
surprise, his face expressed joy. He pointed out to me the tomb of
Isaiah, to which we were approaching. "There lies," said he, "the heart
which neither the desert nor the dungeon, nor the teeth of the lion, nor
the saw of Manasseh could tame--the denouncer of our crimes, the scourge
of our apostasy, the prophet of that desolation which was to bow the
grandeur of Judah to the grave."
He drew a copy of the Scriptures from his bosom, and read the famous
Haphtorah. "Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the
Lord revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as
a root out of a dry ground; he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we
shall see him, there is no beauty, that we should desire him. He is
despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows!" He stopped, laid his
hand upon my arm, and asked, "Of whom hath the prophet spoken? Him that
_is to come_, still _to come?_" Then he left me.
Some years passed away; the burden remained upon my soul. One day, as I
dwelt among my kinsmen in Naphtali, I was watching a great storm, when
suddenly there stood before me a spirit, accursed and evil, Epiphanes,
one of those spirits of the evil dead who are allowed from time to time
to reappear on earth.
"Power you shall have, and hate it," he announced; "wealth and life, and
hate them. You shall be the worm among a nation of worms--you shall be
steeped in poverty to the lips--you shall undergo the bitterness of
death, until----Come," he cried suddenly, "son of misfortune, emblem
of the nation, that living shall die, and dying shall live; that,
trampled by all, shall trample on all; that, bleeding from a thousand
wounds, shall be unhurt; that, beggared, shall wield the wealth of
nations; that, without a name, shall sway the council of kings; that,
without a city, shall inhabit in all the kingdoms; that, scattered like
the dust, shall be bound together like the rock; that, perishing by the
sword, chain, famine, and fire, shall be imperishable, unnumbered,
glorious as the stars of heaven."