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diff --git a/42092.txt b/42092.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 0b5de82..0000000 --- a/42092.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8229 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoirs of a Surrey Labourer, by -George Sturt (AKA George Bourne) - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org - - -Title: Memoirs of a Surrey Labourer - A Record of the Last Years of Frederick Bettesworth - -Author: George Sturt (AKA George Bourne) - -Release Date: February 13, 2013 [EBook #42092] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMOIRS OF A SURREY LABOURER *** - - - - -Produced by Melissa McDaniel and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - -Transcriber's Note: - - Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have - been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. - - Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and bold text by =equal - signs=. - - - - -MEMOIRS OF A SURREY LABOURER - - - - - MEMOIRS OF A SURREY - LABOURER - - A RECORD OF THE LAST YEARS OF - FREDERICK BETTESWORTH - - BY - GEORGE BOURNE - AUTHOR OF "THE BETTESWORTH BOOK" - - - LONDON: DUCKWORTH & CO. - HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN - 1907 - - - - - -_All rights reserved._ - - - - -TO MY FRIEND - -CHARLES YOUNG - - - - -INTRODUCTION - - -Bettesworth, the old labouring man, who in the decline of his strength -found employment in my garden and entertained me with his talk, never -knew that he had been made the subject of a book. To know it would -have pleased him vastly, and there is something tragical in the -reflection that he had to wear through his last weary months without -the consolation of the little fame he had justly earned; and yet it -would have been a mistake to tell him of it. His up-bringing had not -fitted him for publicity. On the contrary, there was so much danger -that self-consciousness would send him boastfully drinking about the -parish, and make him intolerable to his familiars and useless to any -employer, that, instead of confessing to him what I had done, I took -every precaution to keep him in ignorance of it, and sought by leaving -him in obscurity to preserve him from ruin. - -Obscure and unsuspicious he continued his work, and his pleasant -garrulity went on in its accustomed way. Queer anecdotes came from him -as plentifully as ever, and shrewd observations. Now it would be of -his harvesting in Sussex that he told; now, of an adventure with a -troublesome horse, or an experience on the scaffolding of a building; -and again he would gossip of his garden, or of his neighbours, or of -the old village life, or would discuss some scrap of news picked up at -the public-house. And as this went on month after month, although I -had no intention of adding to the first book or writing a second on -the same lines, still it happened frequently that some fragment or -other of Bettesworth's conversation took my fancy and was jotted down -in my note-book. But almost until the end no definite purpose informed -me what to preserve and what to leave. The notes were made, for the -most part, under the influence of whim only. - -Towards the end, however, a sort of progression seemed to reveal -itself in these haphazard jottings. His age was telling heavily upon -Bettesworth, and symptoms of the inevitable change appeared to have -been creeping unawares into my careless memoranda of his talk. I do -not know when I first noticed this: it probably dawned upon me very -slowly; but that it did dawn is certain, and in that perception I had -the first crude vision of the present volume. I might not aim to make -another book after the pattern of the first, grouping the materials as -it pleased me for an artistic end; but by reproducing the notes in -their proper order, and leaving them to tell their own tale, it should -be possible to engage as it were the co-operation of Nature herself, -my own part being merely that of a scribe, recording at the dictation -of events the process of Bettesworth's decay. - -To this idea, formed a year or so before Bettesworth's death, I have -now tried to give shape. Unfortunately, the scribe's work was not well -done. Things that should have been written down prove to have been -overlooked; and although in the first few chapters I have gone back to -a much earlier period than was originally intended, and have preserved -the chronological order all through, the hoped-for sense of -progression is too often wanting. It existed in my mind, in the -memories which the notes called up for me, rather than in -Bettesworth's recorded conversations. Much explanatory comment, -therefore, which I should have preferred to omit, has been introduced -in order to give continuity to the narrative. - -Bettesworth is spoken of throughout the book as an old man; and that -is what he appeared to be. But in fact he was aged more by wear and -tear than by years. When he died, a nephew who arranged the funeral -caused the age of seventy-three to be marked on his coffin, but I -think this was an exaggeration. The nephew's mother assured me at the -time that Bettesworth could have been no more than sixty-six. She was -his sister-in-law, having married his elder brother, and so had some -right to an opinion; and yet probably he was a little older than she -supposed. It is true that sixty-six is also the age one gets for him, -computing it from evidence given in one chapter of this book; but then -there is another chapter which, if it is correct, would make him -sixty-seven. Against these estimates a definite statement is to be -placed. On the second of October, 1901, Bettesworth told me that it -was his birthday, and that he was sixty-four; according to which, at -his death, nearly four years later, he must have been close upon -sixty-eight. And this, I am inclined to think, was his true age; at -any rate I cannot believe that he was younger. - -At the same time, it must be allowed that his own evidence was not -quite to be trusted. A man in his position, with the workhouse waiting -for him, will not make the most of his years to an employer, and I -sometimes fancied that Bettesworth wished me to think him younger than -he was. But it is quite possible that he was not himself certain of -his own age. I have it from his sister-in-law that both his parents -died while he was still a child, and that he, with his brothers and -sisters, was taken, destitute, to the workhouse. Thence, I suppose, he -was rescued by that uncle, who kept a travelling van; and the man who -carried the boy to fairs and racecourses, and thrashed him so savagely -that at last he ran away to become Farmer Barnes's plough-boy, was not -a person likely to instruct him very carefully about his age. - -The point, however, is of no real importance. A labourer who has at -least the look of being old: thin, grey-eyed, quiet, with bent -shoulders and patient though determined expression of face--such is -the Bettesworth whose last years are recorded in these chapters; and -it does not much matter that we should know exactly how many years it -took to reduce him to this state. - - - - -MEMOIRS OF A SURREY LABOURER - - - - -I - - -_December 7, 1892._--The ground in the upper part of the garden being -too hard frozen for Bettesworth to continue this morning the work he -was doing there yesterday, I found him some digging to do in a more -sheltered corner, where the fork would enter the soil. With snow -threatening to come and stop all outdoor work, it was not well that he -should stand idle too soon. - -"Oh dear!" he said one day, "we don't want no snow! We had enough o' -that two winters ago. That was a fair scorcher, that was.--There! I -couldn't tell anybody how we _did_ git through. Still, we _got_ -through, somehow. But there was some about here as was purty near -starved. That poor woman as died over here t'other day...." - -Here he broke off, to tell of a labourer's wife who had died in giving -birth to twins, one of whom was also dead. Including the other twin, -there were seven children living. Bettesworth talked of the husband, -too; but presently working round again to the bad winter of 1889-1890, -he proceeded: - -"I _knows_ they" (this woman and her family) "was purty near starvin'. -_I_ give her two or three half-bushels o' taters. I can't bear to see -'em like that, 'specially if there's little childern about. I give -away bushels o' taters that winter, 'cause them as _had_ got any had -got 'em buried away--couldn't git at 'em (in the frozen ground). Mine -was stowed away where I could git 'em." - -Accordingly, anticipating hard times, I set Bettesworth to work in the -sheltered spot where digging was still possible, and left him. The day -proved sunny on the whole, with a soft winter sunshine, dimmed now and -then by grey fog close down to the earth, and now and then by large -drifts of foggy cloud passing over from the north. By mid-day the -roads were sticky, where the sunshine had thawed the surface, but in -shady places the ground was still hard. Here and there was ice, and -odd corners remained white with the sprinkling of snow which had -fallen two nights previously. - -Towards sunset I went to see what Bettesworth had done. He had done -very little, and, moreover, he had disappeared. The air glowed with -the yellow sunset; the soft dim blue of the upper sky was changing to -hazy grey in the south-east; in the west, veiling the sunset, lay a -bank of clouds, crimson shaded to lilac. I turned to enjoy this as I -climbed the garden to find Bettesworth, where he was busy at his -yesterday's task. - -"Well, Bettesworth, how are you getting on?" - -"Oh, _cold_, sir." - -Overhead, one or two wisps of smoky-looking cloud were floating -southwards. In the sunlight they showed amber against the soft blue, -but from their movement and their indistinct and changing form it was -plain that they belonged to the system of those larger clouds which -had all day been crossing ominously out of the north. I glanced up at -them, and remarked that I feared the snow was not far off now. - -Bettesworth straightened up from his work. - -"Ah, that's what everybody bin sayin'." - -"Well, it looks uncommonly like coming." - -"Ah, it do. Didn't it look black there, along about nine or ten -o'clock this mornin'? I thought then we was goin' to have some snow, -an' no mistake." He chuckled grimly and continued, "I dunno how we -shall git on if it comes to that. But there, we've had it before an' -got through somehow, and I dessay we shall git through again." - -"It's to be hoped so. Anyhow, there seems to be no way of altering -it." - -"No, sir; there don't. I 'xpect we shall have to put up with it. Bear -it an' grumble--that's what we shall have to do. We've had to do that -before now." - -It was a blessing, I laughed, that we had the right to grumble; but we -hardly learnt to like the winter the better for being used to it. - -"No; that don't make it none the sweeter, do it? Still, we can't help -that. As my old neighbour, Jack Tower, used to say, 'Puverty en't no -_crime_, but 'tis a great ill-convenience.'" The touch of epigram in -Tower's saying seemed to please Bettesworth, and his speech flowed out -with a smooth undulating balance as he repeated slowly, tasting the -syllables: "No, cert'nly, puverty en't no crime; but it is a very -ill-convenient thing, an' no mistake." - - -To the same period as the foregoing piece belongs an undated fragment, -which tells how news came to Bettesworth of a certain boy's being -bitten by a dog. "Have he bit'n _much_?" was the first eager -exclamation, followed by, "These here messin' dawgs! There's too many -of 'em, snappin' and yappin' about. I don't _like_ 'em!" - -Then he went on, "I don't see what anybody wants to keep dogs for, -interferin' with anybody. Why, there's Kesty's dog up there--look at -that dog of he's! Why, that dog of he's, he've bit three or four of -'em. He bit the postman two or three times, till they sent to 'n from -the Post Office to tell 'n 'less he mind to keep his dog tied up he'd -have to send an' fetch his letters hisself.... Nasty sly sort o' dog -he is, no mistake. He goes slinkin' an' prowlin' about up there; he's -never tied up. And he don't make no sound, ye know. No, you'll never -hear 'n make no noise; but he'll have ye. And he en't partic'lar, -neither, about lettin' of ye go by, even if it's on the highroad, -onless he've a mind to. He'll come slinkin' round, an goo for ye, 's -likely as not." - -"Odd," I suggested, "that a man should care to keep a dog like that." - -Bettesworth shook his head. - -"There's too _many_ of 'em about, by half. And I en't partic'lar fond -o' dogs, nowhen." He looked up, and a knowing look came into his grey -eyes as he continued, "I was workin' one time for Malcolms up here, -and they had a dog, and one day he stole a shoulder o' mutton, -indoors. Sort of collie, _he_ was. And he took this 'ere shoulder o' -mutton and run upstairs into one o' the rooms, and he wouldn't come -out for nobody. I was at work out in the garden, and the servant she -come runnin' out to me, to ast me if I'd come an' get 'n out. 'I dunno -s'much about that,' I says; ''ten't a job as I cares about.' I can -tell ye, I wa'n't partic'lar about _doin'_ of it. 'Oh,' she says, 'do -come an' get 'n out. We be all afraid. And you can have a stick,' she -says. 'No,' I says, 'I won't have no stick'--'cause, what good's a -stick, ye know? He'd ha' come for me all the one for that. So I -_catches_ up a 'and-saw...." - -"A _hand-saw_?" - -"I did. I took this 'ere 'and-saw, and I went upstairs to 'n, and he -come for me sure enough. But I give 'n two or three 'cross the nose -with this saw, and he didn't like that. He went off downstairs quick -sticks." - -"H'm! I shouldn't have relished the job." - -"No, sir; I didn't _like_ it. I was afraid of 'n. I drove 'n out, but -I was afraid of 'n all the one for that." - - -_January 7, 1896._--A task reserved for this winter's leisure was the -making of an arched way of larch-poles and wire to cover a short -flight of steps in the garden. Two briars at the top of the steps, one -on each side, had overgrown them, and these were now to be trained to -the new framework, which was to slant down at the same slope as the -steps. - -Until we began the work, it seemed simple enough; but almost -immediately we plunged into bewilderment, owing to the various slopes -and slants to be considered. The steps go askew between two parts of a -zigzag path, and our archway, therefore, needed to be several feet -longer on one side than on the other. The consequence was that the -horizontal ties at the top not only clashed with all the gradients of -the garden, but converged towards one another, so that, seen from -above, they were horrid to behold. And then the slanting side-rails! -They agreed with nothing else in all the landscape save the steps -below them. Of course, when the briars covered these discrepancies, -all would be well; but just while Bettesworth and myself were at work -upon this thing, the farther we progressed with it the more distracted -it looked, as though we had gathered into one spot all the conflicting -angles of this most uneven of gardens, and were tying them up into one -hideous knot. The work became a nightmare, and for an hour or two we -lost our good spirits, and found it all we could do to keep our -temper. - -However, we got the framework together somehow, after which the -straining of wires over it, being, as we fondly imagined, an easier -task, released our thoughts a little. Bettesworth paid out and held -the wire while I fastened it. - -"Is that tight enough?" said he. - -"That'll do," said I. - -"Because," said he, "I can easy tighten it more yet." - -"No," said I, "that'll do." - -"Well, of course, if that'll _do_," he conceded; and then, not -finishing his sentence, he chattered on. "Only, I don't want to be -like ol' Sam Cook. He was 'long o' we chaps at work for Putticks when -they was a-buildin' Coswell Church. I was there scaffoldin', an' this -here Cook was s'posed to be helpin' of us. But we see as he never -pulled, an' so one day we got two ropes and fastened the ends of 'em -with jest black cotton. We made it look all like a knot, and he never -see what we was up to. An' when it come to pullin', there was he -makin' out to be pullin', leanin' back with his arms stretched out -a-gruntin' 'Ugh!... Ugh!' and all the time never pullin' a pound. Why, -if he'd on'y pulled half a dozen pounds, he'd ha' broke that cotton; -but it never broke. Mr. John Puttick hisself was there, and he says, -'Well, I never see the like o' that in all my time! Why,' he says, -'you wouldn't pull enough to pull a sausage asunder,' he says. Ye -see, he (Cook) always went by the name o' _Sausage_, 'cause his wife -used to make sausages, so Mr. Puttick says to 'n, 'Why, you wouldn't -pull a sausage asunder!' he says." - -Too soon, unlooked-for difficulties presented themselves in our -wire-straining. We began to agree that we hardly felt as if we had -been apprenticed to the work, and Bettesworth muttered, - -"I dunno as I should care much about goin' out to take a job puttin' -up wire." - -To get the first wire tightly fixed between two posts was easy enough, -but, to our dismay, the tightening of a second wire invariably -slackened the first. Bettesworth was jubilating over his second wire. - -"There, he's tight, an' _no_ mistake!" - -"Ah, but look at the first one!" - -"What! He _en't_ got loose, is he, sir? Oh dear, oh dear! That _do_ -look bad! Never can let 'n go like that, can us, sir?" Gradually his -memory began harking back to earlier instances of our difficulty. -"'Tis like when I helped Mr. Franks puttin' wires up for he's -ras'berries. We had just such a bother as this. Fast 's we got one -tight we loosened another. We did git in a pucker over 'm, an' no -mistake. I remember I told Bill Harris down 'ere what a bother we'd -bin 'avin', and he says, 'Ah, I knows you must 've had a job.' He'd -had just such a bother hisself, on'y he had all the proper tools an' -everything. He borried Mr. Mills's wire-strainers, and when he got the -fust wire up--oh, he thought he was gettin' on capital. He seemed like -makin' a reg'lar good job of it. But when he come to put up t'other -wire--oh dear, oh dear!--he got in such a hobble. 'There,' he says, 'I -was ashamed for anybody to see it, and I come away an' left it.'" - -I was in the humour to be glad of other people's perplexities, and I -laughed. - -"Oh, he came away and left it, did he?" - -"Yes. Don't ye see, 'twas a reg'lar fence, 'tween his garden an' the -next. An' he thought for to have it all jest right an' proper. But -everybody as come by could see, and he was that put out about it that -he come away an' left it." - -"Bother the stuff! I hope we shan't have to go and leave this." - -"I dunno how we be to do it. There, _'tis_ to be done, we knows that, -'cause I've seen it.... No, I en't never see 'em a puttin' of it up; -but I've seen the fences after it bin put up, an' very nice they looks -wi' the wire all as straight.... But how they doos it, I'm sure I -don't know." - -We finished at last, after a fashion, and Bettesworth went on to train -and tie the briars. If work had not been scarce, it would have been -cruel to let him undertake such a job. To make up for his defective -sight, it was his way to grope out blindly for a thing just before -him, and find it by touch; and in dealing so with this briar, with -its terrible thorns, his hands got into a pitiable state. He showed me -them on resuming his work the next morning, saying, - -"I shan't be sorry when I done wi' this customer. His nails is too -sharp for my likin'. When I went 'ome yesterday and washed my hands, -goo! didn't they smart wherever the cold water touched one o' they -scratches! My ol' gal says to me, 'What be ye hushin' about?' 'So 'd -you _hush_,' I says, 'if you'd bin handlin' they roses all the -aft'noon, same as me.' I tried with gloves, but they wa'n't no good. -You can't git to tie, with gloves on." - - -_March 26, 1896, 10.30 a.m._--There are deep cloud-shadows, and rapid -sun-glints lighting up the shadows like daffodils shining against -grass. And there is the roar of a big wind in the air, and majestic -clouds are sailing across, and beyond these the sky is a dazzling -blue. - -All growing things seem busy. Everywhere on the land men are at work; -the swift sunshine glistens on the white of their shirts, and shows -them up against the darkness of the new plough-furrows or the freshly -dug garden-ground. - -Bettesworth was sowing peas. Blustered by the wind, I went to him and -complained of the coldness of it. "A good touch of north in it," was a -phrase I used. - -"Yes, sir; she (the wind) have shifted there since the mornin'. She -was due west when I got up--when that little rain come. She've gone -round since then, but she'll git back again to the south, you'll see. -I've noticed it many's a time. Right south she was at twelve o'clock -when the sun crossed the line o' Saturday (March 21), and that's where -she'll keep tackin' back to all through the quarter--till midsummer, -that is." - -"Well, I don't know that she could do much better." - -"No, sir. Strikes me we be goin' to have a very nice, kind spring. I -don't say she'll bide there all the time; but if she gits away, that's -where she'll come back to." - -Again I expressed my dislike of this strong north wind. It would soon -make me sleepy, I said. - -"_Would_ it, sir? Oh, I do like to hear the wind! To lay and listen to -it when I be in bed--it makes me feel so comfortable. No matter what -'tis like outside, I feels that _I_ be in the warm aw-right." - - -_March 31, 1897._--At six minutes to five this morning Bettesworth was -lacing up his boots. The day is the last of March, which, for -gardeners in this village, is the middle of the busiest time of the -year. The early seeds have been in the ground long ago; the beans are -up two inches; the first sowing of peas shows well in the rows; others -were put in last week. Shallots are sending up their green spikes; -there are a few potatoes already planted; and now every effort must be -made, and advantage be taken of every opportunity, to get the -remainder of the ground ready and the main crops planted at the -earliest possible time; for in this soil, as Bettesworth says, "you -can't be much too for'ard." - -Late last night he and his old wife planted their potatoes in a few -rods of ground he has at the end of my garden. It was seven o'clock, -and dark, by the time they had finished; then they went home and had -supper--or, at least, the wife had, whose work had not been arduous -until the evening. She scolded her husband. - -"There you goes slavin' about, and gets so tired you can't eat." - -"It's true," Bettesworth confesses. "The more I works the less I -eats.... No, nor I don't sleep, neither. If I got anythink on my mind, -I can't sleep. I seems to want to be up and at it." - -Supper over, he lit his pipe, had one smoke, then kicked off his boots -and said, - -"Well, I be off to bed. 'Ten't no good settin' here, lookin' at the -fireplace." - -The wife grumbled again in the morning, urging him to rest. - -"But what's the use?" he said. "It got to be done, and I can't rest -ontil _'tis_ done." - -So he got up at the time already mentioned, and came to rake over the -potato-ground. - -It slopes down to the lane, this ground. Presently the man from the -cottage just across the lane came out for his day's work. - -"Why, you be for'arder than ever this year, ben't ye, Fred?" - -"No, I dunno as I be. I wants to git it done, though, anyhow." - -Then the Vicar's gardener passed. He laughed. "Be you determined on -gettin' all your ground planted in March, then, Fred?" - -Bettesworth laughed back. "I don't care whether 'tis March or April. -When I be ready it got to go in." - -Others, going by, chaffed him. "You bin there all night, then?" - -About a quarter past six he went back home, and met his neighbour -Noah. - -"Hullo!" says Noah. "What? You bin at work?" - -"Ah, and so you ought to ha' bin." - -But Noah, who has lived in London, "sits up till eleven or twelve at -night readin' the paper. He can't git into the habit of gettin' up -early." - -Gardening talk is now the staple conversation in the village, and the -public-house is the club-room where the discussions take place, the -times being Saturday night and Sunday. - -"You don't find many there any other time," says Bettesworth. -"Cert'nly, after a man bin to work all day, when he gits home he's -tired, and wants to go to bed. But Saturday night and Sunday--well, -you can't bide indoors solitary, lookin' at the fire. If you do, you -never learns nothin'. But to go and have a glass and a pipe where -there's others--that sims to enlighten your mind." - -The men compare notes, and give and take sage advice. "Where I had -that crop o' dwarf peas last year I be goin' to have carrots this," -says one. Another answers, "Well, then, if I was you, I should dig -that ground up now--rake off the stones" (carrots being "a very tender -herbage"). "Then, if it comes rain, that'll settle it a bit. After -that, let it bide an' settle for about another fortnight, and then as -soon as you gets a shower shove 'em in as fast as you mind." - -"Or else," Bettesworth explains in telling me this, "if you don't let -it settle the drill sows 'em too deep; it sinks in. Carrots is a thing -you wants to sow as shallow as ever you can." - -Somebody informs the company that he had "quarter of a acre o' carrots -last year, and he made five pound of 'em." Or was it that he had five -tons, and sold them for thirty shillings a ton? This was it, as -Bettesworth at last remembers. - -"I 'spose you'll soon be puttin' in some taters, Fred?" - -"I got most o' mine in a'ready." - -"_Have_ ye? I en't sowed none yet, but...." - -So says Tom Durrant, the landlord. - -"But cert'nly," as Bettesworth observes, "down there where he is it do -take the frost so--right over there in Moorway's Bottom. Up here, -though, we no call to wait. I likes to git taters in. You see, where -they lays about they spears so, and then the spears gits knocked -off--you _can't_ help it; or, if not, still, where you sees a tater -speared so, that must weaken that tater? About two foot two one way -and fifteen inches t'other--that's the distance I gen'ly plants -taters. Ten't no good leavin' 'em wider 'tween the rows. But old Steve -Blackman, up there by the Forest, I knowed he once plant some three -foot both ways. And law, what a crop he did git! 'Twas a piece o' -ground his landlord let 'n have for the breakin' of it up. And he -trenched in a lot o' fuzz--old fuzz-bushes as high as you be--and so -on. Everything went in. And such a crop o' taters as he had--no, no -dressin'. Only this old fuzz-stuff. _Regents_, they was. Oh, that was -a splendid tater, too! But you never hears of 'em now. They sims to be -reg'lar gone out. I got some o' these here _Dunbars_, down here. I -should like to see half a bushel o' they in this bit o' ground o' -yourn. Splendid croppin' tater they be. I ast Tom Durrant if he could -spare you half a bushel. He said he didn't hardly know. There's so -many bin after 'em--purty near half the parish. They be a splendid -croppin' tater, no mistake. He got 'em of some gentleman's gardener to -begin with, I reckon. Reg'lar one he is, you know, for gettin' taters -an' things, and markin' 'em and keepin' the sorts separate. He had -four to start with, an' they produced a peck. Then he got three bushel -out o' that peck. And last year he sowed 'em again--three bushel--and -he got thirty-nine bushel." - - - - -II - - -_May 13, 1896._--The Tom Durrant just mentioned was frequently spoken -of by Bettesworth, and always in a tone of warm approval. "A wonderful -quiet sort o' man," steadily "putting together the pieces," but not -assuming any airs, he managed his public-house well, and with especial -attention to the comfort of his older neighbours. "If any of the young -uns come in hollerin' about, 'twas very soon 'Outside!' with Tom. -'There is the door!' he'd say. 'I don't keep my 'ouse open for such as -you.'" - -So Bettesworth has told me, more than once--perhaps not exactly in -those words. - -But sometimes Bettesworth's talk was too thick with detail to be -remembered and written down as he said it in the time at my disposal; -whence it happens that I am able only to summarize an anecdote about -Durrant, which Bettesworth told with considerable relish. The publican -was the owner of two cottages which were supplied with water from a -good well--a precious thing in this village. These cottages had lately -been overhauled and enlarged--Bettesworth detailed to me all the -improvements, praising the new sculleries and sheds that had been -added--and then the tenants, as if stricken with madness, found fault -with the water-supply, and lodged a complaint with the sanitary -inspector. The inspector insisted that the well should be cleaned out. -Durrant thereupon examined the water, found it "clear as crystal," -cleaned out the well as he was ordered to do, and--gave the tenants -notice to pay sixpence a week more for their cottages, or to quit. "So -they didn't get much by _that_," said Bettesworth approvingly. - -After all, this was but a kind of parenthesis in a talk which, not -hurried, but quietly oozing out as we worked side by side in the -garden, fairly overwhelmed my memory with variety of subject and -vividness of expression. At one time it dealt with a certain road -which was to be widened--"all they beautiful trees to be cut down, -right from so-and-so to so-and-so"; at another, it discussed three -parcels of building land for sale in the vicinity, estimated their -acreage, and related the offers which had been already made for them. -From that, working all the while, Bettesworth would wander off to the -drought, and I would hear how long this or that neighbour had been -without water; how a third (whose new horse, by the way, "was turnin' -out well--but there, so do all they that comes from" a certain source, -where, however, "they works 'em too hard")--how a third neighbour was -obliged to keep his old horse almost constantly at work fetching -water, since he had twenty-two little pigs, besides other live -animals whose numbers goodness knows, and so did Bettesworth. At the -new schools, again, the water was failing; and how, and why, and what -the caretaker thought, and all about it, Bettesworth was able to -explain. - -The receptivity of the man's brain was what struck me. One pictured it -pinked and patterned over with thousands of unsorted facts--legions of -them jostling one another without apparent arrangement. Yet all were -available to him; at will he could summon any one of them into his -consciousness. A modern man would have had to stop and sift and -compare them, and build theories and systems out of all that wealth of -material. Not being modern, Bettesworth did not theorize; his thoughts -were like the dust-atoms seen in a sunbeam. But though he did not -"think," still a vast common-sense somehow or other flourished in him, -and these manifold facts were its food. - - -_September 26, 1896._--Nor was it only of current topics that he could -talk with such fullness of detail. Getting shortly afterwards into the -reminiscent vein, he succeeded in paralyzing my memory with the tale -of things he had observed many years before in just the same -unsystematic yet thorough fashion. My hasty jottings, made afterwards, -preserve only a few points, and do not tell how any of them were -suggested. The talk was at one time of Basingstoke Fair, "where they -goes to hire theirselves for the year." Of "shepherds with a bit o' -wool in their hats, carters with a bit o' whipcord, and servant gals," -and so on. "I went once," said Bettesworth, "when I was a nipper--went -away from Penstead; but I never got hired.... There's the place for -games, though! They carters, when they've jest took their year's -money, and be changin' 'racks,' as they calls it. 'You bin an' changed -your rack, Bill?' 'What rack be you got on to?' 'You got on for old -Farmer So-and-so?'... There they be, hollerin' about. And then they -all got their shillin', what bin hired...." - -I did not stop then to consider whether this hiring shilling, and the -token in the hat, might have any relationship, in the world of old -customs, to the "King's shilling" and the bunch of ribbons of the -recruit for the army. Bettesworth was talking; and presently it was -about a certain Jack Worthington, of a neighbouring village, who was -known as "Cunnin' Jack," and played the concertina at fairs, clubs, -and so on: "Newbury Fair, Reading Fair, Basingstoke Fair"--Bettesworth -essayed to catalogue them. Cunnin' Jack "learnt it all by hisself, but -I've heared a good many--travellin' folk and the like--say as they -never heared anybody play the concertina like him. He's the on'y one -'s ever I heared play the church bells--chimes, an' fire 'em, and -all--wonderful! _Blue Bells of Scotland_, too--to hear him play that, -an' the chimes, jest exact! No trouble to make out what 'tis. Oh, he's -a reg'lar musician! He've trained all his sons to same thing. One of -'em plays the fiddle; another of 'em got a thing what he scratches -along wi' wires, sounds purty near like a fiddle.... 'Ten't no good -for 'n in a town, 'less 'tis a fair or summat o' that; but in any -out-o'-the-way place. 'Relse, if he gets to a fair, there'll be three -or four landlords about tryin' to get hold of 'n; and they'll give 'n -five shillin's and supper, and his drink an' a bed, an' what he can -pick up besides. Very often he'll make as much as five-an'-twenty -shillin's in a night(?). And when he comes 'ome, he bring p'r'aps a -gallon o' ha'pence along with 'n. Never no silver, o' course. Often, -when his wife thought he hadn't got nothing but a pound or so, he'd -chuck her five or six pound. Then in the winter he'd go -gravel-diggin', onless there come a fair, or anything o' the likes o' -that. At these pubs where they dances, too, he'd put round the hat -after every dance, an' if there was a good many stood up, p'r'aps he'd -pull in half-a-crown or so." - -Cunnin' Jack had a contrivance of musical dancing-dolls, about which I -did not clearly understand. And I have quite forgotten how Bettesworth -spoke of the man's brother, a deaf-mute, who refused to work, and -"lived about at Aldershot, along o' the soldiers." - -Afterwards another "dummy" was mentioned: "terrible big strong -feller.... Spiteful.... Goes gravel-cartin' with his father." At a -difficult place in the gravel-pit the father reached out and struck -his son's horse. The "dummy" springs on him, throws him on his back, -making a noise "'bu-bu,' like a calf.... Sure way to upset 'n--if you -was in the gravel pit, touch his hoss...." - -Bettesworth had once seen "a dummy, talkin' with a friend of his," in -the finger alphabet. "Can't you understand it?" said the friend to -Bettesworth. "'No,' I says; 'how should I?' But, law! to see him! And -then write, too! Purty near as fast as you can talk. And all the time -his eye 'd be on ye, watchin' ye. But to see him write on his -slate--wonderful fast! and then" (here Bettesworth breaks into -dramatic action, licking his hand and smudging out slate-writing)--"and -then, when he'd rubbed it out, to see him write _again_! Spiteful, -though, _he_ was. So they all be, I s'pose." There was another dumb -man, for instance, who had been apprenticed to a shoemaker.... - -Unfortunately, I cannot reconstruct this instance. I only remember -that the man had become "a wonderful good shoemaker, but didn't sim to -care about follerin' it," and had "took to gardenin' now," instead. - - -_May 5, 1898._--On a morning early in May it was raining, quietly, -luxuriously, with a continuous soothing shattering-down of warm drops. -In the doorway of the little tool-shed I stood listening--listening to -the gentle murmur on the roof, on the long fresh grass of a small -orchard plot, and on the young leaves of the plum and the blossoming -apple which made the daylight greener by half veiling the sky. - -Beside and beyond these trees were lilacs, purpling for bloom, small -hazels, young elms in a hedgerow--all fair with new greenness; and -farther on, glimpses of cottage roof against the newly dug -garden-ground of the steep hillside. Above the half-diaphanous green -tracery of the trees, cool delicious cloud, "dropping fatness," -darkened where it sagged nearer to the earth. The light was nowhere -strong, but all tempered moistly, tenderly, to the tenderness of the -young greenery. - -I ought to have been busy, yet I stood and listened; for the earth -seemed busy too, but in a softened way, managing its many businesses -beautifully. The air seemed melting into numberless liquid sounds. -Quite near--not three trees off--there was a nightingale nonchalantly -babbling; from the neighbourhood of the cottage came, penetrating, the -bleating of a newly-born goat; while in the orchard just before me -Bettesworth stooped over a zinc pail, which, as he scrubbed it, gave -out a low metallic note. Then there were three undertones or -backgrounds of sound, that of the soft-falling rain being one of them. -Another, which diapered the rain-noise just as the young leaves showed -their diaper-work against the clouds, was the all but unnoticed -singing of larks, high up in the wet. Lastly, to give the final note -of mellowness, of flavoured richness to the morning, I could hear -through the distance which globed and softened it a frequent "Cuckoo, -cuckoo." The sound came and died away, as if the rain had dissolved -it, and came again, and again was lost. - -Framed by all this, Bettesworth stooped over his pail, careless of -getting wet. His old earth-brown clothes seemed to belong to the -moistened nook of orchard where he was working; so, too, did his -occasional quiet chatter harmonize well with the pattering of the warm -rain. And for a time the drift of what he said was so much a part of -our quiet country life that I took it as a matter of course, and let -it pass by unnoticed. - -But presently he raised his head. - -"Have ye heared 'bout young Crosby over here? He's gone clean off his -head. They took 'n off to the asylum at Brookwood this mornin'. Got -this 'ere religion. I s'pose by all accounts he went right into 't; -and that's what 've come of it." - -I suggested that religious mania was often curable. - -"Yes. I've knowed a many have it; and then they gets over it after a -time. Get 'em away--that's what it wants. If they can get 'em where -they can dummer somethin' else into 'em, then they be all right. Wants -to give 'em a change, so 's to get a little more enlightenment into -their minds." - -He came to join me in the shed doorway, for shelter from a temporary -thickening of the rain, and standing there he continued, - -"I was up to my sister's at Middlesham o' Sunday. She'd bin to -Brookwood to see her sister-in-law. If they hadn't let her" (the -sister-in-law) "'ome too soon that first time, she'd ha' bin all -right. Wherefore now she's there again, and jest like a post. If they -puts her anywhere, there she bides, and don't try for to do nothing. -'Relse, when she was there afore, they told my sister she'd work as -well as e'er a woman in the place. She see several there what she -knowed. Fred Baker's wife, what used to be signalman, for one. But -what most amused her was a old woman, when they was goin' out two by -two for their walk in the grounds, flingin' her arms about and liftin' -up her skirts an' dancin'.... She was havin' her reels and her capers -in highly deglee." The old man pondered a few moments, then concluded -pensively, as he stepped out to his work again, "What a shockin' -thing, this mind!" His accent on the last word sounded almost -resentful. - - -_May 6, 1898._--The next day he reported that the man Crosby was said -to have got "religious ammonium, is it? Some such name as that." - -The talk of religion reminded him of a former employer, of the Baptist -persuasion, who, when annoyed with him, was wont to say impatiently, -"Bother your picture!" So, of a dead pigeon, from whose crop -seventy-two peas were taken, "Bother he's picture!" said the Baptist. -Another imprecation of this man's was, "Drabbit it!" at which, -however, Bettesworth used to expostulate, telling his master, "Look -'ere, you Baptists may lie, but you mawn't swear! And so he could lie, -too," he added--"no mistake. And once he said anything, he'd stick to -it." - -A month or more passed, and I forgot all about poor Crosby, until one -delicious morning, when Bettesworth thought fit to tell me that he was -no better. A neighbour had cycled to Brookwood on Sunday to see him -and report about his family, Crosby's wife being in child-bed. But the -information quickened no interest. - -"All he kep' on about was the devil. The devil kep' comin' and -botherin' of 'n. 'Tis a bad job. I s'pose he went right into -it--studyin' about these here places nobody ever bin to an' come back -again to tell we. Nobody don't know nothin' about it. 'Ten't as if -they come back to tell ye. There's my father, what bin dead this forty -year. What a crool man he must be not to 've come back in all that -time, if he was able, an' tell me about it. That's what I said to -Colonel Sadler. 'Oh,' he says, 'you better talk to the Vicar.' -'Vicar?' I says. 'He won't talk to me.' Besides, what do he know about -it more 'n anybody else?" - - -Early in the summer of 1896 Bettesworth had been immensely proud of -his peas, which were ready for picking quite a week before other -people had any. The fame of these peas had got abroad in the parish; -it had reached a youth--a new curate fresh from a theological -college--and had appealed to his fancy so strongly that he sent a -servant to buy threepennyworth of the precious crop. And Bettesworth -had chuckled. - -"I bin a-laughin' to myself all the mornin'.... _Three penn-'oth o' -peas!_ I never heared talk o' such a thing! I told the gal to go back -and tell 'n to save his money till they was cheaper." - - -_June 13, 1899._--But three years later Bettesworth seems to have -changed his policy. On June 13 once more he had peas to boast of, and -already for some days his wife was itching to be at them. - -"Look, there's a nice pea, and there," she would say, handling the -dangling pods. - -But Bettesworth would answer, "Yes, they be; and you let 'em bide." - -"For the sake of a shillin' now," he explained to me, "I en't a-goin' -to have that haulm spoilt, and lose two or three shillin's later on." - -His brother-in-law agreed that he was right. It was all reported to me -in Bettesworth's own words. - -"'I thinks you be right, Fred,' he says. 'You better get along without -that shillin' now, and have two or three later on.'" - -Old Mrs. Skinner, too, commended him. She told of a neighbour who had -picked a few peas very early, and ruined his crop; for in the hot -weather the juicy haulm was sure to wither soon if bruised by -handling. - -The weather was glorious just then, yet ill for our sandy gardens. - -"As blue as a whetstone," said Bettesworth, in forecast of what the -cabbage crop would be, should rain not soon come. "And en't the grass -slippery and dry! _'Twas_ a hot day yest'day, no mistake! I was up in -my garden when Mrs. Skinner come up lookin' at my peas. She reg'lar -laughed at me. 'Well, Fred, you _be_ a purty picture!' There was the -sweat all trinklin' down my arms, an' the dust caked on.... But she -did admire they peas. Still, she reckoned I was right leavin' 'em. So -I says to my old gal, 'You let 'em bide.' So she'll have to, too. 'Tis -for me to give the word." - - - - -III - - -_October 7, 1899._--I have mentioned Bettesworth's neighbour Noah, the -young man who used to sit up too late at night reading the paper. -Notwithstanding this bad habit, he and Bettesworth had been on -excellent terms of friendship. It was to Noah that Bettesworth had -turned, for example, when I lent him those copies of the _Daily -Chronicle_ in which the first particulars of Nansen's voyage in the -_Fram_ were published. Unable to read himself ("I can't see well -enough," he said, "or else I be scholard enough"), he invited Noah and -Noah's wife to come on the Sunday and read to him the explorer's -narrative. - -"We started," said he, "about two o'clock, and there they was, turn -and turn about, as hard as ever they could read up to half-past five." -The evening was spent in raising the envy of other neighbours. "They -wanted to borry the papers, but I says, 'No, they ben't mine to -lend.'" - -The readers themselves seem to have conceived an intense admiration -for Nansen, whose bed of stones especially excited Bettesworth's -imagination. - -"_I_'ve had some hard lay-downs in my time," he exclaimed, "but -_that!_ Gawd! what they poor fellers must ha' suffered!" - -Not long afterwards, Noah was called in again to help enjoy a -seedsman's catalogue. It was read through from cover to cover. - -Yet Noah proved to be a treacherous friend, after all. I have no -record of the occurrence, but I think it must have been in the summer -of 1897 that he began to covet Bettesworth's pleasant cottage, and by -offering the owner a higher rent succeeded in getting possession of -it. Bettesworth was obliged to quit. He took a cottage in a little row -at three-and-sixpence a week, where he was comfortable enough for -about a couple of years. At the end of that period, however, certain -difficulties over the water-supply became acute--a laundress next door -was pumping the well dry--and other discomforts arising, he began in -the autumn of 1899 to look out for another home. - -It is a singular place, this parish. The narrow valley it occupies is -that of a small water-course commonly known as "The Lake," which in -summer is a dry bed of sand, but in winter becomes a respectable brook -of yellow waters which grow quite turbulent at times of flood. In -their turbulence through long ages they have cut deep into the -northern side of the valley, and now for some two miles that northern -side, all warm and sunny, slopes down towards the stream, and there -breaks off in precipitous sand-banks which in most places overhang -the stream and make it inaccessible. But not in all places. There are -various gaps in the sand-banks, where the rains and storms of -centuries have scooped out the upper slope into tiny gorges and warm -secluded hollows, down which footpaths wind steeply, or narrow bumpy -lanes, to some plank bridge or other thrown across the stream. In -these hollows the cottages cluster thickest; there they form little -hamlets whose inhabitants sometimes hardly know the other villagers. -Such, indeed, is my own case: hundreds of my fellow-parishioners half -a mile away are practically strangers to me. Hundreds, for it is a -large parish. The bluffs which separate the hollows are not unpeopled; -they have their cottages and gardens dotted over them without order at -the caprice of former peasant owners. All sorts of footpaths and -tracks connect these habitations, but there are few roads, and those -are deep in sand. For the labouring people do not interchange visits -and pay calls; they just go to work and come home again, each to his -own place. At home, they look out upon their own particular hollow, -and upon little besides; or, living high up on a bluff, they get -outlook upon the other side of the main valley, which is lower, tamer, -smoother than this. It begins--that other side--in narrow meadow or -plough land at the bottom, and so rises gently to a ridge fringed with -cottages. In addition to these dwellings, there are a few hovels down -by the stream itself, with their backs stuck into the sand-cliffs, -and with gardens between cliff and stream so narrow that a man might -almost jump across them. A second jump would take him over the stream -into the meadow-land just mentioned. - -With a rapidly increasing population empty cottages are scarce, as -Bettesworth now found. Moreover, his choice was restricted. There were -reasons against his going to the upper end of the valley. It was more -newly peopled by labourers from the town, who had never known, or else -had lost, the older peasant traditions which Bettesworth could still -cherish--in memory, at least--here in the more ancient part of the -village. Of course, that was not how he explained his distaste; he -only expressed a dislike for the society of the upper valley. "They be -a roughish lot up there," he would say. The fact was, he did not know -many of them intimately, from which it may be seen how curiously our -parish society is disintegrated. - -Besides, he wanted a cottage not a mile away, but near to his work, so -that he might go home to dinner and see how his wife was getting on. -If he was growing old, she was older; and what was worse, she was -subject to epileptic fits. There were days when he worried about her -all the time while he was at work, and went home uneasily, dreading to -find her fallen down in a fit. It was necessary, therefore, that if he -moved it should be not far away. His last move had been in the wrong -direction--from the adjoining bluff to a hollow further down -stream--and now he desired to get back. - -One of the steep and narrow lanes mentioned above is that which runs -down beside this garden, where Bettesworth's work lay. It is -picturesque enough, beneath its deep banks and hedgerows and overhung -by my garden trees; but that is of no moment here. Within -Bettesworth's memory it afforded access even for a waggon right down -to "the Lake," and so over into the meadow opposite; but the last -hundred yards of it, from Mrs. Skinner's cottage downwards, have long -been washed out into a mere foot-track, deeply sunk between its banks, -swooping down precipitously to the stream-level, and scarce two feet -wide. So you emerge from the sand cliffs, and the valley is before -you. Then the footpath winds along to the left (eastwards), having the -cliff on one hand and the stream on the other, to a wider stretch, -until with this for its best approach you come to a little hovel of -three rooms and a lean-to shed, standing with its back walls close in -against the sandy cliff. - -At the period we are dealing with, this cottage had a poverty-stricken -appearance, upon which Bettesworth himself had been wont to comment -severely, though the place was in reality no worse than others beyond -it and elsewhere in the parish. But it had suffered from utter neglect -under the previous tenant, a thriftless Irishman, while, after the -Irishman left, it stood empty for a time, and looked like falling -quite derelict. Then, however, the landlord had a few repairs done, -and at the end of September, to my amazement, I heard from Bettesworth -that he had taken it. He would save eighteen-pence a week by the -change: the new rent was only two shillings. - -Ought I to have expostulated? Perhaps I should have done so, but for -the queer expression in the old man's face when telling me his -intention. There was some shame, but more of dogged defiance. "You -think what you like," so I interpreted it--"that's the place I'm going -to." He was armed, too, with testimony in favour of the cottage. - -"Skinner" (the bricklayer) "says he don't see why it shouldn't make a -very nice little place for two. He done up the roof there t'other -week, and he ought to know." Later, the old man repeated Skinner's -opinion, and added, "I think _I_ can make it comfortable. Ye see, -there en't bin nobody to try before." - -This was true enough. The Irishman's tenancy had not in any sense -improved the cottage. The place could not be worse used, and it might -conceivably be fairly habitable in more careful hands. - -During the first week in October Bettesworth effected his removal. It -was an inauspicious time. He had been counting upon the stream-bed for -a roadway along which to cart his things, so as to avoid scrambling up -and down the devious pathways and tracks that led to the cottage, but, -unfortunately, the stream this week was in flood. A cart might, -indeed, have struggled along it, and one was, in fact, bespoken--Jack -Crawte's, to wit; but at the appointed time the cart failed to arrive, -and upon Bettesworth's going to inquire for it, he discovered that the -Crawtes were all gone into the town to the fair. - -Next day they promised to come "by-and-by." Bettesworth accepted the -promise, but he also chartered two donkey-carts, which were really -more suitable for getting out from the first cottage into one lane, -and then round and about, up and down, to the head of the gully by -Mrs. Skinner's. Farther than that even donkey-carts were useless. For -the last and worst hundred yards nothing but a wheelbarrow or a strong -back could be of any use. - -Fortunately (in these circumstances), poor old Bettesworth's household -goods were not many, nor yet magnificent; yet still they were enough -for him to manage. The main of them were shifted on the Thursday, and -I should not like to say how many times that day the old man slaved -down the gorge with loaded wheelbarrow and up with it empty; but Mrs. -Skinner witnessed his doings, and complimented him. - -"Why, Freddy," she said--"why, Freddy, you'd kill half the young uns -_now_, old as you be." - -There should have been a helper--one Moses Cook, familiarly known as -"Little Moser"; but little Moser was not a success. On the Wednesday, -promising to lend a hand "in five minutes," he delayed coming until he -had found time to get drunk and then arrived with the proposal that -Bettesworth should give him a pint to start with. "_Git_ out o' my -way!" was Bettesworth's reply. The next day the little man was -willing, but useless. - -"Couldn't even git up there by ol' Dame Skinner's with a empty barrer! -I says to 'n, 'Git in an' let me wheel ye up!' I says. Made me that -wild! Why, I'd lifted a chest into the barrer all by myself--and _he_ -must ha' weighed a hundred and a quarter, with what there was in 'n, -ye know--and wheeled 'n down. And then to see this little feller. 'You -be in my way,' I says. 'You better go 'ome and sit down, and then -p'raps we shall be able to git something done!' I _was_ wild. I told -'n, 'They says Gawd made man in His own image--you must be a bloomin' -counterfeit!'" - -At one time there was a threat of rain, and Bettesworth "whacked all -the beddin' he could on to the barrer, and down and in with it." -Fortunately, the rain held off. - -Towards night the cart came into action. It brought a load or two of -firewood--not along the stream itself, but beside it, through the -flooded meadow. The wood was tipped out on to the raised bank across -the stream, just opposite Bettesworth's new home, there to remain for -the night. But the old man could not rest with it there. - -"I got all that across," he said, "and into the dry. Crawte couldn't -hardly believe it when I told 'n this mornin'. But I _did_. Fetched it -across in the dark." It was an almost incredible feat, for the night -was of the blackest, and the stream four or five feet wide. "And then, -when I got in, I had to put up the bedstead, with only the ol' gal to -help me. An' if you told her one thing, it only seemed to make her -forget to do something else. Talk about _tired_! I never had nothin' -all that time--not even half a pint o' beer. Ye see, there wa'n't -nobody I could send, an' I couldn't spare time to go myself, 'relse I -_should_ ha' liked a glass o' beer. But I never had nothin' not afore -I'd done. Then I had some tea, but I was too tired to eat. P'r'aps, if -I'd ha' been able to have half a pint earlier, I might ha' bin able to -eat; but, as 'twas, I couldn't eat. And now this mornin' my back and -shoulders aches--with wheelin' down that gully, ye know." - -As it is not mentioned elsewhere, I may as well say here that -Bettesworth's endeavours to make this little place habitable and -respectable were for a time fairly successful. As it should have been -explained, after emerging from the gully the public footpath runs -close in front of the doorway of the place, leaving some eight feet of -garden between itself and the stream. Of old, in the Irishman's time, -this garden was an entanglement of weeds and stunted cabbages, while -the footpath was unswept, disgusting, and often blocked with a pail of -ashes or other household refuse. But now a spirit of order had -appeared on the scene. The cabbage-plot became comely; in due season -old-fashioned cottage flowers--pinks and nasturtiums--appeared in two -tiny borders under the windows on either side of the door, and the -mean doorway itself was beautified by a rough but sufficient arbour of -larch-posts before it, up which "canary-creeper" found its way. -Accordingly, I heard from time to time, but neglected to set down, how -this and that wayfarer had praised the old man's improvements. Did not -the Vicar himself say (I seem to remember Bettesworth's telling me so -with much gratification) that he would never have believed the place -could be made to look so well? Of the inside, perhaps, not so much -could be said; but even this was passable at first, before the old -wife's breakdown spoilt all. For several years, in fact, Bettesworth -was, I believe, very happy in this cottage. At any rate, it gave him -scope for labour, and he always liked that. He had hardly been in -possession a week before he was talking of an improvement much to his -mind. - -"There's a rare lot o' capital soil in the lake under they withies -just against my garden," he said; and he proposed taking it out to -enrich his garden. - -"It'll be good for the lake, too," I suggested. - -"Yes," he replied, "it wants clearin' out. Why, in some places there -en't no lake, and half the water that comes down got to overflow and -make floods." - - - - -IV - - -And now, Bettesworth being settled in this hovel, his story begins at -last to move forwards. For a while, indeed, little, if any, change in -the man himself will be discernible. We shall be aware only of the -quiet lapse of time as the seasons steal over him, and leave him -older, or as the progress of public events is dimly reflected in -occasional scraps of his conversation. And even of public events not -much will be heard. Such things, which had never greatly concerned -Bettesworth, were less likely than ever to attract his attention now. -For five days in the week he rarely got farther from home than the -lower half of the lane, where it degenerates into the gully between my -garden and his cottage. On Saturday afternoons he journeyed into the -town to get a shave and do his shopping; on Sunday evenings he -generally went to the public-house; and as this was all he saw of the -world, it is no matter for surprise if his interests remained -extremely parochial. - -And yet his ignorance of what was happening did sometimes surprise me. -Of course, I know that what was wanting was the opportunity of -enlightenment, and that he was not naturally deficient in the -instincts that make for it. His appreciation of Nansen's adventures -may be cited as a proof that he was ready and even eager to be -informed. But for all that, it is true that the affairs which excited -the rest of the world usually left him undisturbed, and the public -noise needed to be a great one to reach his ears. Mr. Chamberlain's -protectionist propaganda was not loud enough, incredible though that -may seem. As a peasant, Bettesworth had a theory which I have often -heard him affirm, that, for farmers to prosper, "bread never ought to -be no less than a shillin' a gallon," so that I expected to hear him -at least talk of "fiscal reform." But he never did. The proposal was -months old when I at last broached the subject to him, and all he said -was, "Oh dear! we don't want no taxes on food!" as if he had never -heard that such a thing was projected. And it is my firm belief that -to the day of his death he knew only what little I told him about it, -and would hardly have been able to say where he had heard the name of -Chamberlain. His home was down there by the stream bed; his work was -half-way up the lane. Walking to it, he might hear Mrs. Skinner -talking to her pigs; walking back, he could see Crawte's cows turned -out in the meadow at the bottom of the valley. He never read a -newspaper, and how should he have learnt anything about the political -ferment which was spreading through the towns of all England, and -engaging the attention of the whole world? - -At the end of 1899, however, he had not long been in his new dwelling -before his attention was effectually arrested by the war in South -Africa; and my next note is a remark of his on this subject, which -shows him taking not quite a parochial view of the situation. He did -not approve of war. Several years previously, at the outbreak of the -Spanish-American affair, he had spoken uneasily of the consequent rise -in the price of bread, and his concern now may therefore be imagined. -Still, there was one bright spot. - -"There's one thing I be glad of," he said: "all they reserves called -out. There never no business to be none o' they in the country." - -His reason was that in time of peace the reserves, with their -retaining pay, had been wont to undersell the civilian workman in the -labour market, and that such competition was unfair. - -This, of course, was soon forgotten in the interest of the war itself. -Our parish, so near to Aldershot, sent out perhaps a disproportionate -number of its young men to the front, men whom Bettesworth knew, whose -fathers and mothers were his good friends, and at whose deaths, now -and then announced, he would grimly shut his lips. Morning after -morning he asked, "Any news of the war, sir?" and listened gravely to -what could be told. But he did not so much think as feel about it all. -He knew nothing, cared nothing, about the policy which had led up to -hostilities; he was too ill-informed to be infected by the raw -imperialism of the day; his attitude was simply "national." "Our -country"--that was his expression--was in difficulties, and he longed -to see the difficulties overcome. Such was his simple instinctive -position, and it excused in him some feelings which would have been -less pardonable in a more enlightened man. At the close he would have -liked to shoot without pity President Kruger and the Boer Generals, as -the enemies of "our country." - -But how ignorant of the facts he was at the beginning of the war! Of -our many talks on the subject I seem to have preserved only one, but -that is so strange that now I can hardly believe in its accuracy. - - -_December 16, 1899._--Dated the 16th of December, 1899, it states that -Bettesworth had heard the week's disastrous news from the seat of war, -and was letting off his dismay in exclamatory fashion. "Six hundred -missin'! Look at that. What do that _missin'_ mean?" His tone implied -that he knew only too well. - -I said, "Most likely it means that they are prisoners." - -And then he said, "Ah, prisoners--or else burnt." - -It was my turn to exclaim. "Burnt? No, no! They are prisoners." - -"But they burns 'em, some says." - -Heaven only knows where he could have picked up such an idea. As the -war proceeded, he kept himself fairly up to date with its main events -by listening to other men's talk. He used, as we know, to go to the -public-house on Sunday evenings "to get enlightenment to the mind;" -and there is mention in the next fragment of another source of -information which he valued. To reach that, however, we have to enter -another year--the year 1900. - - - - -V - - -_February 13, 1900._--The winter was passing by, with the war, indeed, -to make it memorable to us, but uneventfully at home. January, like -December, had been mild--too mild, some people said, of whom, however, -Bettesworth was not one. February set in with more severity of -weather. On the third we had snow, and in the succeeding days frost -followed, and the roads grew slippery. - -These things no doubt provided Bettesworth with topics for many little -chats I must have enjoyed with him, although I saved no reminder of -any of them. But about the middle of the month a circumstance came to -my knowledge which made his good-tempered gossip seem rather -remarkable. I could not but admire that a man so situated should be -able to talk with such urbanity. - -He had been at the barber's the previous evening, where another man -was discoursing at large about the war. And said Bettesworth: - -"I _do_ like to hear anything like that. Or if they'll read a -newspaper. There I could 'bide listenin' all night. And if anybody -else was to open their mouths, I should be like enough to tell 'em to -shut up. Because, if you goes to hear anything, _hear_ it. Same as at -church or chapel or a entertainment: _you_ goes to listen, an' then -p'r'aps four or five behind ye gets to talkin'. I always says, if you -goes anywhere, go and be quiet. You en't obliged to go, but when you -do go, behave yourself." - -The talkers, I might have reminded Bettesworth, are not always "behind -ye"; there are those who take front seats who might profit by his -little homily on good manners. But he only meant that the discourtesy -is the more disturbing, because it is the more audible, when it comes -from behind. - -He passed easily on to a discussion of the weather, and again his -superlative good sense was to the fore. On Sunday, he said, he had -tried to persuade his neighbours--working-men, like himself, only -younger--to bring their shovels and scatter sand on the path down the -gully, which was coated with ice. Already he had done a longish piece -of it himself, but much remained to do. Several men had "went up -reg'lar busters," and "children and young gals" on their way to church -had fallen down. It would be a public service to besprinkle the path -with sand. So Bettesworth made his suggestion to his neighbours--"four -or five of 'em. They was hangin' about: hadn't got nothin' to do." But -no. They shrugged their shoulders and walked away. It was no business -of theirs. They even laughed at the old man for the trouble he had -already taken, for which no one would pay him. And now, in telling me -about it, it was his neighbours' want of public spirit that annoyed -him. They had not come up to his standard of the behaviour meet for a -labouring man. - -Who would have imagined that, while he was telling me this, and for -days previously, he was in a state of severe mental distress, -aggravated by bodily fatigue? I had no suspicion of it, and was -surprised enough when told by a third person. But it was true--too -true. He admitted it readily when I asked him. His wife was ill again, -worse than she had been for three years, since the time when she fell -down in an epileptic fit and broke her wrist. She had had many minor -attacks during the interval, but this was serious now. - -As I have already told the poor old woman's story, or at least this -part of it, in another place, I may not repeat it here; but for the -sake of continuity the episode must be summarized. Three years earlier -Bettesworth had obtained an order for his wife's admission to the -workhouse infirmary. Hateful though the merest suspicion of benefiting -by parish aid was to him, there had been no other course open at that -time; for what could he do for an old woman with a broken limb, and a -malady that made her for the time half-witted? And yet, owing to -overcrowding at the infirmary, amazed and indignant he had brought her -home again on the fourth day, because she had been lodged and treated -as a common pauper. Consequently I knew that he must be at extremities -now, when it came out that he was deciding again to send the old lady -to the infirmary. But he was at his wits' end what to do for her. He -could not afford to stay at home from work; yet while he was away she -was alone, since her condition and temper made neighbours reluctant to -help. Sometimes the fear haunted him that she would meet a violent -death, falling in a fit on to the fire, perhaps; sometimes he dreaded -that he would have to put her finally away into an asylum. What he -endured in the long agonizing nights when her fits were upon her, in -the silent winter evenings when he sat for hours watching her pain and -wondering what to do, no one will ever know. As best he could, he used -at such times to wash her and dress her himself--he with his fumbling -fingers and dim eyes; and wanting sleep, wanting the food that neither -of them could prepare, alone and unknown, he struggled to keep in -order his miserable cottage. Almost a week must have passed like this -before I heard of the trouble, and asked him about it. Then he laid -his difficulties before me, and asked for my advice. - -To men in Bettesworth's position it is always an embarrassment to -comply with the formalities of official business. They do not see the -reason, and they feel keenly the wearisomeness, of the steps which must -be taken to gain their end. Bettesworth now seemed paralyzed; he had -forgotten how to go on; moreover, he could not be satisfied--although -there was a new infirmary--that his wife would be more decently -treated there than in the old one. If only he could be sure of that! -But of course he was not important enough to approach, himself, anyone -so important as a guardian; and, accordingly, I undertook to make -inquiries for him. - -It is indeed a tedious business--I experienced it afterwards too--that -of getting a sick person from this village into the local infirmary. -It seemed that Bettesworth must lose at least a day's work in -arranging for the removal of his wife. She could not be admitted to -the house without a certificate from the parish doctor, who lived in -the town, a mile and a half away. But the doctor might only attend -upon Bettesworth's presenting an order to be obtained from the -relieving officer, two miles away in the exactly opposite direction. -The medical man would then come as soon as he found convenient, and -Bettesworth would be provided with a certificate for his wife's -removal to the infirmary. But he might not act upon that alone. With -that in his possession, he would have to wait again upon the relieving -officer, to get an order upon the workhouse master to admit the -patient, and to arrange for a conveyance to take her away. - -We talked it over, he and I, that afternoon, not cheered by the wild -weather that was hourly worsening. If all went well on the morrow, -Bettesworth would have some twelve miles of walking to do; but it was -most likely that, between relieving officer and doctor, two or even -three days would elapse before the desired relief would be -accomplished. However, the immediate thing to do was clear enough: he -must make his first visit to the relieving officer as soon as -possible. - -I forget on what grounds, but we agreed that it was useless to attempt -anything that night; and since the officer would be off at eight in -the morning for his day's duty in other places, Bettesworth proposed -to be up betimes, and catch him at his office before he started. It -would be just possible then, by hurrying, to get back over the three -or four miles to the town, and find the doctor before he too should -leave for the day. Otherwise there would be a sickening delay. - -The whole thing was sickening already, in its inevitable mechanical -clumsiness. Still, there was no help for it. The weather meanwhile was -threatening hindrance. A small driving snow had set in in the -afternoon, and was inclined to freeze as it fell; and for some time -before dark the opposite side of the valley had become all but -invisible, blotted out by the dreary whiteness of the storm. At -nightfall, the weather seemed to turn wicked. Hours afterwards, as I -sat listening to the howling gusts of wind, which puffed the smoke -from out of my fire, and brought the snow with a crisp bristling sound -against my window, I could not get out of my head the thought of -Bettesworth, alone with his crazy wife down there in that cottage, or -the fear that deep snow might prevent his morning's journey. And then -it was that recollection of his recent quiet conversations came over -me. So to have talked, keeping all this trouble to himself, while he -listened to the war news, and did his best to make the footways -passable--there was surely a touch of greatness in it. - -And it makes no difference to my estimate of him that, after all, he -did not go to the relieving officer the next morning. On the further -progress of Mrs. Bettesworth's illness at this time my notebook is -silent; but, as I recall now, she took a turn for the better that -night, and by the morning was so improved that thought of the -infirmary was given up. - - - - -VI - - -For eight months after this the account of Bettesworth's sayings and -doings is all but a blank. There was one summer--and perhaps it was -this one of the year 1900--when he joined an excursion for his annual -day's holiday, and made a long trip to Weymouth. Need it be said that -he enjoyed the outing immensely? He came back to work the next day -overflowing with the humour and interest of what he had seen and done. -Had not old Bill Brixton lost his hat out of the train? And some other -old chap sat down on a seat on Weymouth front, and stayed there all -day and seen nothing? Bettesworth, too, had sat down, and had a most -enjoyable conversation with a native of the place; but he had also -taken steamer to Portland, and there got a drive to the prison and -seen the convicts, and had a joke and a laugh with the driver of the -brake, and a drink with a party of excursionists from Birmingham, who -appreciated his society, and called him "uncle," and whose unfamiliar -speech he imitated well enough to make me laugh. And then he had -persuaded a seaman to take him out to the fleet and show him over a -man-of-war; and finally had enlivened the homeward journey by chaffing -old Bill, and sharing with him "a quarten o' whisky," which he -carried in a medicine bottle. - -This, I am inclined to believe, was an event of 1900, but I cannot -verify it, and in any case it accounts for but one day. The dimness of -the remainder of those eight months is but faintly illuminated--and -that, it may be, for me only--by two memoranda mentioning Bettesworth -as present at certain affairs, and by one all too short scrap of his -own talk. He was speaking of Irishmen, no doubt in reference to some -gallant deed or other in South Africa, and this is what he said: - -"Ye see, they makes as brave soldiers as any.... All I got to say -about Irishmen is, when you be at work with 'em, you got to think -yourself as good as they, or a little better. 'Relse if they thinks -you be givin' way they'll trample on ye. 'Xcept for that, I'd as lief -work with Irishmen as Englishmen.... I remember once when I was at -work on a buildin' for Knight, a Irishman come for me with his shovel -like this." Bettesworth turned his shovel edgeways, raising it high. -"He'd ha' split me if he'd ha' hit me; and as soon as he'd missed me I -downed 'n. Little Georgie Knight come down off the scaffold to stop -us; I'd got the feller down, an' was payin' of 'n. '_I'll_ give 'n -'Ome Rule!' I says; and so I did, too. He'd ha' killed me if he'd hit -me. I s'pose I'd said somethin' he didn't like." - -A March note, this last. As there is nothing else, I take it that the -daily conversation was of the usual kind, about being forward in -sowing seeds, and allowing enough room for potatoes, and so on. - - -_June 10._--A note of June names Bettesworth among other interested -spectators of an event no less singular than the death of a donkey. To -me, the name of him on the page of my journal, coupled with one of his -dry remarks, brings back vividly the whole scene: the glowing Sunday -afternoon, the blue loveliness of the distant hills, the look of the -grass, and all the tingling sense of the far-spread summer life -surrounding the dying animal. But the narrative has little to do with -Bettesworth, and would be out of place here. It just serves as a -reminder that one more summer was passing over him; that, among the -strong men who felt the heat in this valley that season, he was still -one. - -Carry that impression on, through the harvest time, and yet on and on -until the end of September, and you may see him (or I, at least, may) -one dark night, entering, all dazzled by the naked lamp, a little room -where the Liberals have summoned an "important meeting of Liberal -workers." He has come, like the present writer, in the expectation of -hearing some "spouting," as he said afterwards. But though he is -disappointed, and finds himself,--he, the least fanatic of men--the -witness only of excited efforts to arrange for canvassing the district -in readiness for the approaching election, still, conforming to his -own rule of "behaving," he sits respectfully silent, though looking -disconsolate and "sold," and his grey head, the home of such steady -thoughts, has a pathetic dignity in its dark corner, and surrounded by -the noisy politicians. - - - - -VII - - -So cramped-in as it was between sandbank and stream, Bettesworth's -garden had no place for a pigsty; and as his wife could not be happy -without "something to feed," he had bought her a few fowls to amuse -her. With stakes and wire netting he made a diminutive "run" for them, -which really seemed to adorn the end of the cottage, being stuck into -the corner made by the whitewashed wall and the yellow sand-cliff. The -fowls, it is true, had not room to thrive; but if Bettesworth made but -little profit of them, they afforded him much contentment; and the -afternoon sunshine used to fall very pleasantly on the little -fowl-pen. - -Needless to say, he was not exempt from the common troubles of the -poultry-keeper. I remember smiling to myself once at his gravity in -mentioning that one of the hens had begun to crow. He did not, indeed, -own to thinking it a sign of bad luck, but his looks seemed to suggest -that he was uneasy. As everyone knows, a crowing hen, if it does not -portend death, is neither fit for gods nor men; so Bettesworth -realized that he must kill the ill-omened bird, "as soon as he could -find out which of 'em 'twas." Another time there were some little -chicks, and his cat became troublesome; and, worse still, there came a -rat, which had to be ferreted out. - -And were there marauders besides these? I have stated that beyond -Bettesworth's own cottage there were others of the same class, one of -which was inhabited for a little while by a family whose honesty was -not above suspicion. Would these people interfere with his fowls? It -was a point to be considered. - -He considered it--it was on a day in October, 1900--and so strayed off -into a rambling talk of many things. The ill-conditioned neighbours -(he comforted himself by thinking) would leave his fowls alone, -because depredations of that kind were an unheard-of thing in our -parish. - -"There, I will say that," he observed, "you never no fear o' _losin'_ -anything here. If a man leaves his tool--a spud or anything--in the -ground, there 'tis. Nobody don't touch it. Up there at (he named a -near village) they say 'tis different. But here, I should think there -never was a better place for that!" - -For a certain reason I took up this point, and hinted that Flamborough -in Yorkshire must be an equally honest place. The Flamborough people, -I had been told, never lock their doors at night, for fear of locking -out the spirits of relatives drowned at sea. - -Would Bettesworth take the bait, and tell me anything he might know -about ghosts? Not he. The interruption changed the course, but not -the character, of his talk. He looked rather shocked at these -benighted Yorkshiremen, and commented severely, "Weak-minded, _I_ -calls it." Then, after a momentary silence, he was off on a new track, -with reminiscences of Selsey fishermen whom he used to see when he -went harvesting into Sussex; who go about, "any time o' night, -accordin' to the tides," and whose thick boots can be heard "clumpin' -along the street" in the dark. All men at Selsey, he said, were -fishermen. The only regular hands employed by the neighbouring farmers -were shepherds and carters. - -He had got quite away from the point in my mind. But as I had long -wondered whether Bettesworth had any ghost stories, I harked back now -to the Flamborough people, egging him on to be communicative. It was -all in vain, however. He shook his head. The subject seemed foreign to -him. - -"As I often says, I bin about all times o' the night, an' I never met -nothin' worse than myself. Only time as ever I was froughtened was -when I was carter chap at Penstead. Our farm was down away from -t'other, 'cause Mr. Barnes had two farms--'t least, he had three--and -ourn was away from t'other, and I was sent late at night to git out -the waggon--no, the pole-carriage. I set up on the front on the -shafts, with a truss o' hay behind me; and all of a sudden she" (the -mare, I suppose he meant) "snarked an' begun to turn round in the -road. The chap 'long with me--no, he wa'n't 'long with me, 'cause -he'd gone on to open the gate, and so there was I alone. And all -'twas, was a old donkey rollin' in the road. She'd smelt 'n, ye know; -an' the nearer we got, the more froughtened she was, till she turned -right round there in the road. 'Twas a nasty thing for me; they hosses -with their legs over the traces, and all that, and me down atween -'em." - -He was fairly off now. A tale followed of stumbling over a drunken -man, who lay all across the road one dark night. - -"Wonder's 't hadn't broke his ribs, me kickin' up again' him like -that. I went all asprawl; barked me hands too. But when he hollered -out, I knowed who 'twas then. 'Twas old...." - -Well, it doesn't matter who it was. There were no ghost stories to be -had, so I related a schoolday adventure, of a glow-worm picked up, and -worn in a cap for a little way, and then missed; of a glimmer seen in -the ditch, which might be the glow-worm; of a groping towards the -glimmer, and a terrified leap back, upon hearing from behind it a -gruff "Hullo, mate!" - -Bettesworth did not find this silly, like my Flamborough story. It -opened another vista of reminiscence, down which he could at least -look. Unhesitatingly he took the chance, commenting, - -"Ah! porchers, very likely, lurkin' about there for a meetin, p'r'aps. -They do like that, sometimes. I remember once, when Mellish was keeper -at Culverley, there was some chaps in there at The Horse one night -with their dogs, talkin' about what they was goin' to do. Mellish, he -slips out, to send the word round, 'cause all the men at Culverley was -s'posed to go out at such a job, if need be. So he sends round the -message to 'em--Bromley, an' Dick Harris, an' Knight, an' several -more, to meet 'n at a certain place, where he'd heard these chaps say -they was goin' to work. And so they (the poachers) set in there -talkin' about what they was goin' to do; and at last, when they come -away, they went right off into the town. While they'd bin keepin' the -keeper there a-watchin' 'em, another gang had bin' an' purty well -cleared the place out. _Bags_-full, they must ha' had. Mellish told me -so hisself. While he was expectin' to have they, they was havin' him. -He never was so sold, he said. But a clever trick, I calls it." - - - - -VIII - - -_October 17, 1900._-Two words of Bettesworth's, noted down for their -strangeness at the time, restore for me the October daylight, the -October air. He was discussing the scarlet-runner beans (I can picture -now their warm tints of decay), and he estimated our chances of -getting another picking from them. The chances were good, he thought, -because in the sheltered corner where the beans stood, uplifted as it -was above the mists that chilled the bottom of the valley, "these -little snibblin' frostis that we gets o' mornin's" would not be felt. -"Snibblin'" was a new word to me, and now I find it associated in my -mind with the earliest approaches of our English winter. - -Near the beans there were brussels sprouts, their large leaves soaked -with colour out of the clouded day. Little grey swarms of "white fly" -flitted out as I walked between them; and, again, Bettesworth's name -for that form of blight--"they little minners"--brings back the scene: -the quiet vegetable garden, the sad rich autumn tints, the overcast -sky, the moist motionless air. - -To this undertone of peace--the peace you can best absorb at labours -like his--he was able to discourse dispassionately of things not -peaceful. In a cottage higher up the valley there was trouble this -October. I may not give details of it; but, in rough summary, an old -woman had died, her last days rendered unhappy by the misbehaviour of -her son--a young labourer. Talk of his "carrying on," his late hours, -his frantic drinking, and subsequent delirium, crept stealthily up and -down the lanes. He was "a low blackguard," "a scamp," and so forth. -The comments were excited, generally breathless, once or twice shrill. -But Bettesworth kept his head. An indignant matron said spitefully, - -"'Ten't every young feller gets such a good home as that left to 'n." - -"Well, and who got a better right to 't?" was Bettesworth's calm -rejoinder. - - -_November 10._--A month later a ripple of excitement from the outside -world found its way down the lane. Saturday, November 10, was the day -when General Buller, recalled from the war, arrived at Aldershot, and -for miles around the occasion was made the excuse for a holiday by the -working people. It was a point of honour with them not to desert their -favourite under a cloud. They left off work early, and flocked to -Aldershot station by hundreds, if not thousands, to make sure that he -had a welcome. On the following Monday Bettesworth, full of -enthusiasm, gave me an account of the affair as he had had it from -numerous eyewitnesses. For, in truth, it had been "all the talk -yesterday"--on the Sunday, namely. Young Bill Skinner, in particular, -had been voluble, with such exclamations, such staring of excited -eyes, that Bettesworth was reminded not without concern of the -sunstroke which had threatened Skinner's reason two summers -previously. Nevertheless, the tale was worth Bettesworth's hearing and -repeating; "there never was a man in England so much respected" as -Buller, Skinner supposed. On alighting from the train, the General's -first act had been to shake hands with his old coachman--a deed that -touched the hearts of all these working folk. - -"And there was never a sign o' soldiers; 'twas all -townspeople--civilians, that is; and the cheerin'--there! Skinner said -he hollered till he was hoarse. He ast me" (Bettesworth) "how 'twas I -didn't go over; but I said, 'Naw....' Not but what I _likes_ the old -feller!" - -Bettesworth made no answer but that expressive "No" of disinclination, -but I can amplify it. He was not now a young man, to go tearing off -enthusiastically for an eight-mile walk, which was sure to end in a -good deal of drinking and excitement. His days for that were gone by -for ever. Prudence warned him that he was best off pottering about in -his regular way, here at home. - -There was another reason, too, to restrain him. It brings us swiftly -back for a moment from war incidents and the public excitement to the -very interior of that hovel down by the "Lake," to learn that poor old -Lucy Bettesworth was once more ill at this time. Her brother calling, -and exhibiting an unwonted kindliness, had thrown her into sudden -hysteria ending in epileptic fits. Even had Bettesworth felt inclined, -he could not have left her. He told me the circumstances, and much, -too, of her life history--the most of which has been already -published, and may be omitted here. The illness, however, was not so -severe as to engage all Bettesworth's thoughts. It allowed him to take -interest in Buller's return, and on the same day to discourse of other -outside matters too, in which all our valley was interested through -these months. - -Word had reached him somehow of the proposals just then announced for -the higher training of our soldiers; and he foresaw increased -difficulties in recruiting on these terms. There was too much work to -be had, and it was too well paid, to make young men eager to join the -army; and the service certainly did not need to be rendered less -attractive than it was. Bettesworth, it seemed, had already been -discussing this very point with his neighbours. As to the disturbance -of the labour market consequent upon the war, he viewed it with no -favour. The inflated prices of labour seemed to him unwholesome; they -were having an injurious effect upon young men, giving them an -exaggerated opinion of their true worth as labourers. And this was -particularly true, since the building of the new camp at Bordon had -begun. "Old Tom Rawson," he reported, had "never seen the likes of the -young fellers that was callin' theirselves carpenters an' bricklayers -now. Any young chap only got to take a trowel over to Woolmer (by -Bordon), and he'd be put on as a bricklayer, at sixpence a hour. And -you mawn't stop to show 'em nothing. If the clurk o' the works or the -inspector come round, 't 'd be, 'What's that man doin', showin' the -others?' Tom said he wa'n't _goin'_ to show 'em, neither. Why, at one -time nobody ever thought of employin' a man, onless he could show his -indentures. But now--'tis anybody." "The foreman" had lately come to -Tom Rawson "askin' him jest to give an eye to some young chaps," and -promising him another halfpenny an hour. And Bettesworth commented, -"But dessay he (the foreman) was gettin' his bite out o' the -youngsters." - -Not Bettesworth, not even that hardened old Tom Rawson, would have -countenanced such things had they been appealed to; but tales of this -kind only filtered down into Bettesworth's obscure nook, to provide -him with a subject for five minutes' thought, and then leave him again -to his homely occupations. What had he to do with the War Office and -inefficiency in high places? From this very talk, it is recorded, he -turned appreciatively to watch the cat purring round my legs, and by -her fond softness was reminded of his rabbits--six young ones--which -the mother had not allowed him to see until yesterday. And he spoke -wonderingly of her mother-instinct. The old rabbit was "purty near -naked," having "almost stripped herself" to make a bed for these young -ones, so that the bed was "all white fluff before they come," and now -she "kep' 'em covered up." "Everything," said Bettesworth, "has their -_nature_, ye see." - -In this fashion, with these trivial interests, the year drew on to its -close in our valley. December gives glimpses of trouble in another -household--that of the Skinners, Bettesworth being cognizant of all, -but saying little. It did not disturb the peacefulness of his own -existence. Events might come or delay, he was content; he was hardly -in the world of events, but in a world where things did not so much -"happen" as go placidly on. He worked, and rested, and I do not -believe that he was often dull. - - - - -IX - - -_January, 1901._--The winter, which so far had been mild and open, -began to assume its natural character with the new year; and on the -first Monday of January--it was the 7th--we had snow, followed by hard -frost. The snow was not unexpected. Saturday--a day of white haze -suffused with sunlight--had provided a warning of it in the shape of -frozen rime, clinging like serried rows of penknife blades to the -eastern edges of all things, and noticeably to the telegraph-wires, -which with that additional weight kept up all day a shiver of -vibration dazzling to look at against the misty blue of the sky. Then -the snow came, and the frost on top of that, and by Tuesday it was bad -travelling on all roads. - -Bettesworth grumbled, of course; but I believe that really he rather -liked the touch of winter. At any rate, it was with a sort of gloating -satisfaction that he remarked: - -"I hunted out my old gaiters this morning. They en't much, but they -keeps your legs dry. And I do think that is so nice, to feel the -bottoms of your trousers dry." - -I suppose it is, when one thinks of it, though it had never struck me -before. But then, I had never had the experience which had shown -Bettesworth the true inwardness of this philosophy of his. - -"I've knowed what it is," he said, "to have my trousers soppin' wet -all round the bottoms, and then it have come on an' freezed 'em as -stiff as boards all round." - -That was years ago, during a short spell of piecework in a gravel-pit. -Now, secure in his gaiters and in his easier employment, he could look -back with amusement to the hardships he had lived through. One of a -similar kind was hinted at presently. For the roughness of the roads, -under this frozen snow, naturally suggested such topics. - -"What d'ye think of our neighbour Mardon?" he exclaimed. "Bin an' -chucked up his job, and 's goin' back to Aldershot blacksmithin' -again. He must be in want of a walk!" - -"Regular as clockwork," Mardon, be it explained, had walked daily to -his work at Aldershot, and then back at night, for upwards of twenty -years. The day's walk was about ten miles. Then suddenly he left, and -now for six months had been working as bricklayer's labourer, at a job -about an equal distance away in another direction, to which he walked -as before every day, wet or fine. This was the job he had "chucked," -to return to his old trade in the old place. He might well give it up! -Said Bettesworth, - -"How many miles d'ye think he walked last week, to put in forty-five -hours at work? Fifty-four! Four and a half miles there, and four and a -half back. Fifty-four miles for forty-five hours. There's walkin' for -ye! And through that enclosure, too!" - -The "enclosure" is a division of Alice Holt Forest--perhaps two miles -of it--on Mardon's way to his now abandoned job. And Bettesworth -recalled the discomforts of this walk. - -"I knows what it is, all through them woods in the dark, 'cause I used -to go that way myself when I was workin' for Whittingham. 'Specially -if the fox-hounds bin that way. Then 'tis mud enough to smother ye. -There was a fancy sort o' bloke--a carpenter--used to go 'long with -us, with his shirt-cuffs, and his trousers turned up, and his shoes -cleaned. We did use to have some games with 'n, no mistake. He'd go -tip-toein' an' skippin' to get over the mud; an' then, jest as we was -passin' a puddle, we'd plump one of our feet down into 't, an' send -the mud _all over_ 'n. An' with his tip-toein' an' skippin' he got it -wuss than we did, without that. An' when we come to the Royal Oak, -'cause we gen'ly used to turn in there on our way home, he'd be -lookin' at hisself up an' down and grumblin'--'Tha bluhmin' mud!' -(this in fair imitation of Cockney speech)--'tha bluhmin' mud! Who can -_stick_ it!' Same in the mornin' when he got there. He'd be brushin' -his coat, an' scrapin' of it off his trousers with his knife, an' -gettin' a bundle o' shavin's to wipe his boots. - -"But a very good carpenter! Whittingham used to say he couldn't wish -for a better man. But he'd bin used to bench-work all his life, an' -didn't know what to make of it. An' we used to have some games with -'n. If there was any job wanted doin' out o' doors, they'd send for he -sooner 'n one o' t'others, jest to see how he'd go on. And handlin' -the dirty timber, an' lookin' where to put his saw--oh, we did give 'n -a doin'. But 'twas winter, ye know, and I fancy he didn't know hardly -where to go. We had some pantomimes with 'n, though, no mistake. - -"There used to be another ol' feller--a plumber--when I was at work -for Grange in Church Street; Ben Crawte went 'long with 'n as -plumber's labourer. Ben had some pantomimes with he too. He'd git the -handles of his tools all over dirt, for he to take hold of when he -come to use 'em. Oldish man he was--old as I be, I dessay. And he'd -pay anybody to give 'n a lift any time, sooner 'n he'd walk through -the mud. We never knowed the goin' of 'n, at last...." - -I, for my part, do not remember "the goin'" of these queer -reminiscences. They are like the snows of the past--like the snow -which actually lay white in our valley while Bettesworth talked. - -As to his heartless treatment of this unhappy carpenter, those who -would condemn it may yet consider how that gang of men could have -endured their miserable journeys, if they had admitted that anyone -had the least right to be distressed. Among labourers there is such -peril in effeminacy that to yield to it is a kind of treason. -Bettesworth had nothing but contempt for it. I more than once heard -his scorn of "tip-toeing," and shall be able to give another instance -by-and-by. - - - - -X - - -During this year 1901, until the last month or two, not much -additional matter relating to Bettesworth was recorded; it just -suffices to show his life quietly passing on in company with the -passing seasons. - - -_February 1, 1901._--We have already had a glimpse of the winter. And -now, although it is only February, there comes, as in February there -often will, a day truly springlike, and Bettesworth's talk matches it. -The first morning of February was clear and shimmering, the roads -being hard with frost, the air crisp, the trees hung with the dazzling -drops into which the sunshine had converted the rime of the dawn. Most -of these drops appeared blinding white, but now and again there would -come from them a sparkle of flame-red or a glisten of emerald, or, -best of all, a flash of earnest burning blue, as if the morning sky -itself were liquefying on the bare branches. The grass, although under -it the ground was frozen, had a brilliancy of colour which certainly -was no winter tint. It suggested where, if one looked, one would find -the green spear-points of crocuses and daffodils already inch-high out -of the soil. The spring, in fact, was in the air, and the earth was -stirring with it. - -In Bettesworth's mood, too, was a hint of spring. All through the -winter many hours which would otherwise have been lonely for him in -this garden had been cheered by the companionship of a robin. How -often he remarked, "You may do anything you mind to with 'n, but you -mawn't handle 'im"! For the bird seemed to know him, and he used to -call it his "mate," because it worked with him wherever he was turning -up the soil. - -And now on this gay morning, as we crossed the lawn together, he said, -"Little Bob bin 'long with me again this mornin', hoppin' about just -in front o' my shovel, and twiddlin' and talkin' to me.... Look at 'n! -There he is now!" on the low bough of a young beech-tree at the edge -of the grass. And as we stood to admire, "_There's_ a little chap!" he -exclaimed exultantly. Then he took up his shovel to resume work near -the tree, and "Little Bob" hopped down, every minute picking up -something to swallow. I could not see what tiny morsels the bird was -finding, and, confessing as much, felt snubbed by Bettesworth's -immediate reply, "Ah, _he_ got sharp eyes." Presently, however, the -robin found a large centipede, and suddenly--it was gone alive and -wriggling down the small throat. "He must ha' got a good bellyful," -said Bettesworth. - -At intervals Bob would pause, look straight at us, and "twiddle" a -little song in an undertone which, for all one could hear to the -contrary, might have come from some distance behind or beside us, and -could only be identified as proceeding from the robin by the -accompanying movements of his ruddy throat. - -"Sweet little birds, I calls 'em," said Bettesworth, using an epithet -rare with him. "And it's a funny thing," he continued, "wherever a -man's at work there's sure to be a robin find him out. _I_'ve noticed -it often. If I bin at work in the woods, a robin 'd come, or in the -harvest-field, jest the same.... Hark at 'n twiddlin'! And by-'n-by -when his crop's full he'll get up in a tree and _sing_...." - -The old man did a stroke or two with his shovel, and then: "I don't -hear no starlin's about. 'Relse, don't ye mind last year they had a -nest up in the shed?" - -I hinted that my two cats might have something to do with the absence -of the starlings, and Bettesworth's talk flitted easily to the new -subject. - -"Ah, that young cat--_she_ wouldn't care" how many starlings she -caught. "_She's_ goin' to be my cat" (the cat for his favour). "Every -mornin', as soon as the servant opens the door, she" (the cat) "is -out, prowlin' all round. And she don't mind the cold; you see, she -liked the snow--played with it. Now, our old Tab, as soon as I be out -o' my nest she's in it. Very often she'll come up on to our bed, -heavin' and tuckin' about, to get into the warm." - -What a gift of expression the old man had got! But almost without a -pause he went on, "The postman tells me he brought word this mornin' -to all the pubs, tellin' 'em they was to close to-morrow" (Saturday, -the day of Queen Victoria's funeral), "out of respect to our Queen's -memory. 'T least, they're requested to--en't forced to. But so they -ought to show her respect. Go where you will, you can't hear anybody -with a word to say against her. 'Tis to be hoped the new King 'll be -as worthy of respect." - -Again, without transition: "How that little tree do grow!" He placed -his hand on the stem of a young lime. "Gettin' quite a body. So-and-so -tells me he put them in overright Mr. Watson's forty-five years ago, -and look what trees they be now! They terrible wanted to cut 'em down -when they made that alteration to the road down there, but Watson said -he wouldn't have 'em moved for any money.... I likes a lime; 'tis such -a bower." - -So the pleasant chatter oozed out of him, as he worked with leisurely -stroke, enjoying the morning. With his robins and his bowers, he was -in the most cheerful spirits. At one time there was talk of the -doctor, whom he had seen going down the lane on a bicycle, and had -warned against trying to cross the stream, which the coming of the -mild weather had flooded; and of the doctor's thanks, since he -disliked wading; and of Bettesworth's own suggestion, laughingly -assented to, that the doctor's "horse" was not partial to water. - -It was all so spontaneous, this chatter, so innocent of endeavour to -get the effect it produced, that a quite incongruous subject was -powerless to mar its quality. He told me that, two days ago, he had -bespoken at the butcher's shop a bullock's head, and that when he went -to get it on this same glistening morning the butcher commended him -for coming early, because "people was reg'lar runnin' after him for -'em." So early was he that the bullock had not been killed an hour, -and he had to wait while they skinned the head and "took the eyes -out," Bettesworth no doubt looking on with interest. And he had -brought this thing home with him--was going to put it in brine at -night, "and then to-morrer into the pot it goes, and that 'll make me -some rare nice soup." - - -_March 1, 1901._--I am reminded, however, that this was not real -spring, but only a foretaste of it. As yet the birds were not pairing, -and before their day came (according to Bettesworth, St. Valentine's -is the day when the birds begin to pair) there was more snow. But -observe the advance the spring has made when March comes in. On the -first afternoon of March I noticed Bettesworth's "mate" with him -again, "twiddlin'," as usual; but I fancied and said that he looked -larger than before, and Bettesworth suggested that perhaps he was -living better--getting more food. Then I thought that the robin's -crest seemed more feathery, and was told at once, "That shows the time -o' year. Wonderful how tame he is!" exclaimed the old man. He added, -shaking his head, "But he goes away courtin' at times. He loses a lot -o' time" (from his work with Bettesworth). "Then he comes back, and -sets up on the fence an' _sings_ to me.... But he loses a lot o' time. -I tells 'n I shall 'ave to 'ave done with 'n." - - -_April 19._--Six weeks go by, during which the lawn grass has been -growing, and by the middle of April Bettesworth is busy with the -lawn-mower. There was a neglected grass plot, never mown before save -with the scythe, over which he tried this spring to run the machine. -But failing, and explaining why, he used an old word so oddly that I -noted it, whereby it happens that I get now this minute reminder of an -April occupation. - -"She," he said, meaning the machine, would certainly refuse to cut -some of the coarser tussocks of this grass. "Why, even down there -where I bin cuttin', see how she took they cuds in her mouth and spet -'em out--like a old feller with a chew o' baccer--he'll bite and -spet...." - -The "cuds" to which he referred were little tufts of grass, which only -persistent rolling would reduce to a level meet for a lawn-mower. - - -_June 22._--Omitting one short reference to somebody else's family -history, and one yet shorter observation on horses and their eyesight, -we skip right over May, nor stop again till we come to the longest -days. Here the record alights for a moment, just long enough to show a -wet mid-June, and Bettesworth keenly alive to the duties of husbandmen -in it. He glanced down towards the meadow in the bottom of the valley. -An unfinished rick of hay stood there, waiting for the remaining -grass, which lay about on the ground, and was losing colour. And -Bettesworth said, - -"Bill Crawte 'll play about wi' that little bit o' hay down there till -'tis all spoilt." - -In truth, it should have been taken up the previous day, as I ventured -to suggest. Then Bettesworth, contemptuously, - -"He told me he heared it rainin' this mornin' at three o'clock, and -got up to cover his rick over. _He'd heared_ it _rainin'_. Why, he -might ha' bin asleep, an' then that rain would ha' gone down into that -rick two foot or more." - -That is all. There is no more to tell of the old man's summer, nothing -for July and August. But in September we get a glance back to the past -harvest, a glance round at the earliest autumn prospects, and a -strange suggestion of the first-class importance of these things in -the life of country labouring folk. In brief compass, the talk runs -rapidly over many points of interest. - - -_September 6._--For if "the fly" was not on our seedling cabbage, as -we were inclined to fear, it had certainly ruined sundry sowings of -turnips, both in this garden and down there where Bettesworth lived. - -"We can't help it," so he philosophized, "and I don't care if we get -enough for ourselves, though I should ha' liked to have more." But -"Hammond says _he's_ turnips be all spiled, and Porter's brother what -lives over here at this cot" (the brother, that is, of Porter, who -lives over here), "he bin down to Sussex harvestin' for the same man I -worked for so many years. Seven weeks. But then he bin hoein'.... He -was tellin' me his master down there sowed hunderd an' twenty acres o' -swedes, and never saved twenty of 'em. Fly took 'em all, and he had to -drill again with turnips. Swedes, and same with the mangol'. - -"He says they've had it as hot down there as we have here. But, straw! -There was some straw, by all accounts. Young Collison what lives over -opposite me was 'long with 'n. Seven weeks he" (which?) "was away, but -it seems he had a bit of a miff with his wife, and went off -unbeknownst to her. She went to the relievin' officer, and he told her -_they'd_ find 'n, if she'd go into the union. He was off harvestin'. -He told me o' Sunday he thought 't 'd do her good." - -"Who was she?" - -"Gal from Reading. He was up that way somewhere for 'leven year, in a -brick-works. And she thought very likely as he was gone off into some -brick-works again; but he was down in Sussex, harvestin'." - - -_September 21._--Though only two weeks later, there is distinct autumn -in the next fragment, and yet perhaps for me only, because of the -picture it calls up. I remember a very still Saturday afternoon, a sky -curtained by quiet cloud, the air motionless, a grey mist stealing -into the lane that leads down into the heart of the valley. Certainly -it was an autumn day. - -As he always did on Saturdays, Bettesworth had swept up the garden -paths with extra care, and on this afternoon had taken the sweepings -into the lane, to fill up a rut there. Upon my going out to see him, -he chuckled. - -"You'd ha' laughed if you'd ha' bin out here wi' me at dinner-time. A -lady come up the lane, wantin' to know who you was. 'Who lives here?' -she says." He mimicked a high-pitched and affected voice. "'Mister -Bourne,' I says. 'Iss he a gentilman?' she says. 'You don't s'pose -he's a lady, do ye?' I says. 'What a beastlie road!' she says, and -went off, tip-toein' an' twistin' herself about--dunno how to walk nor -talk neither." - -I asked who the lady was. - -"I dunno. Strangers--she and a man with her. 'Iss he a gentilman?' she -says. I can't _bear_ for people to be inquisitive. What should she -want to know all about you for? Might ha' knowed you wasn't a lady. -There, I was _bound_ to give her closure, askin' me such a silly -question!" - -"What were they doing down here?" - -"They was down here hookin' down blackberries with a stick. And then -come askin' me a silly question like that! _Silly_ questions! I don't -see what people wants to ast 'em for. She went off 'long o' the man, -huggin' up close to him, an' twistin' herself about. Dunno how to walk -nor yet talk! 'Iss he a gentilman!'" - - -_November 10, 1901._--Two odd words--one of them perhaps newly coined -for the occasion, the other misused--were the reason for my preserving -a short note which brings us to November, and shows us Bettesworth -proposing to himself a task appropriate to the season. The sap was -dying down in the trees; the fruit bushes had lost their leaves, and -stood ready for winter, and their arrangement offended Bettesworth's -taste. He would have had the garden formal and orderly, if he had been -able. - -"I thought I'd take up them currant bushes," he said, "and put 'em in -again in rotation"--in a straight row, he meant, as he went on to -explain. "They'd look better than all jaggled about, same as they be -now." - -And so the currant-bushes, which until then were "jaggled," or -zig-zagged about, were duly moved, and stand to this day in a line. At -that time he could still see a currant-bush, and criticize its -position. - - -_November 22._--Towards fallen leaves, it is recorded a little later, -he preserved a constant animosity. His patient sweepings and -grumblings were one of the notes of early winter for me--"the -slovenliest time of all the year," he used to say. - -He even doubted that leaves made a good manure, and he quoted -authorities in support of his own opinion. Had not a gardener in the -town said that he, for his part, always burnt the leaves, as soon as -they were dry enough to burn, because "they be reg'lar poison to the -ground"? Or, "if you opens a hole and puts in a bushel or two to form -mould, they got to bide three years, an' _then_ you got to mix other -earth with 'em." As litter for pigs, he admitted, dead leaves were -useful; yet should the cleanings of the pigsty be afterwards heaped up -and allowed to dry, the first wind would "purl the leaves about all -over the place.... And that makes me think there en't much _in_ 'em," -or surely they would rot? - -But unquestionably leaves make good dry litter. "My old gal" (so the -discourse proceeded)--"my old gal used to go out an' get 'em," so that -the pig might have a dry bed; in which care the "old gal" contrasted -nobly with "Will Crawte down 'ere," who had little pigs at this time -"up to their belly in slurry." They could not thrive--Bettesworth was -satisfied of that. His wife, in the days of her strength, would "go -out on to the common, tearin' up moth or rowatt with her hands--her -hands was harder 'n mine--and she'd tear up moth or rowatt or -anything," to make a clean bed for the pig. - -I suppose that by "moth" he meant moss. "Rowatt" is old grass which -has never been cut, but has run to seed and turned yellow. With regard -to rowatt, it makes a good litter and a tolerable manure, said -Bettesworth; with this drawback, however, that "if you gets it wi' the -seed on," however much it may have been trampled in the pigsty, "'tis -bound to come up when you spreads the manure on the ground." - - - - -XI - - -A timely reminder occurs here, that with all its rustic -attractiveness--its genial labours in this picturesque valley, its -sensitive response to the slow changes of the year--Bettesworth's life -could not be an idyllic one. For that, he needed a wife who could make -him comfortable, and encourage him by the practice of old-fashioned -cottage economies; but Fate had denied him that help. From time to -time I heard of old Lucy's having fits, but I paid little heed, and -cannot tell why I noted the attack by which she was prostrated at the -end of this November, unless that again it was borne in upon me how -Bettesworth himself must suffer on such occasions. - - -_November 24, 1901._--On Sunday, November 24, the trouble was taking -its ordinary course. There had been the long night, disturbed by -successive seizures, in one of which the old woman could not be saved -from falling out of bed "flump on the floor"; there was the helpless -day in which Bettesworth must cook his own dinner or go without; there -were the dreadful suggestions from the neighbours that he ought to put -his wife away in an asylum; there was his own tight-lipped resolve to -do nothing of the sort, but to remember always how good to him she had -been. It was merely the usual thing; and if we remember how it kept -recurring and was a part almost of Bettesworth's daily life, that is -enough, without further detail. - -To get a clear impression of his contemporary circumstances is -necessary, lest the narrative be confused by his frequent references -to old times. Tending his wife, working unadventurously in my garden, -loving the succession of crops, humbly subservient to the weather or -gladdening at its glories, as he went about he spilt anecdotes of -other years and different scenes, which must be picked up as we go. -But the day-to-day existence must be kept in mind meanwhile. He -gossipped at haphazard, but the telling of any one of those narratives -which so often interrupt the course of this book was only the most -trivial and momentary incident in his contemporary history. He spoke -for a few minutes, and had finished, and his day's work went on as -before. - - -_November 26._--Thus, around the next glimpse of an exciting moment -forty odd years ago, one has to imagine the November forenoon, raw, -grey with pale fog, in which Bettesworth was at some pottering job or -other, slow enough to make me ask if he were not cold; and so the talk -gets started. No, he was not cold; he felt "_nice_ and warm.... But -yesterday, crawlin' about among that shrubbery after the dead -leaves," his hands were very cold. Yesterday, I remembered then, had -been a day of hard rimy frost, so that it had surprised me, I said, to -see "one of Pearson's carmen" driving without gloves. Bettesworth -looked serious. - -"You'd have thought he'd have had gloves for _drivin'_," he said. -Then, meditatively, "I don't think old _Wells_ drives for Pearsons -much now, do he? You very often sees somebody else out with his horse. -He bin with 'em a smart many years. He went there same time as I lef' -Brown's. That was in 1860. Pearsons sent across the street for me to -go on for they, but I'd agreed with Cooper the builder, you know." - -From amidst a confusion of details that followed, about Cooper's -business, and where he got his harness, and so on, the fact emerged -that the builder had the use of a stable in Brown's premises, which -explains how Bettesworth's former master makes his appearance on the -scene presently. For Bettesworth had still to work at this stable, -though for a new employer. - -"Cooper had a little cob when I went on for 'n. His father give it to -'n--or no, 'twas the harness his father give 'n. One o' these little -Welsh rigs. Spiteful little card he was. I knocked 'n down wi' the -prong seven times one mornin'. When I went in to the stable he kicked -up, and the manure an' litter went in here, what he'd kicked up. In -here." Bettesworth thrust forward his old stubbly chin, and pointed -into the neck-band of his shirt. - -I said, "There would have been no talks for me with Bettesworth if he -had touched you!" - -"No. He'd have killed me. I ketched up the fust thing I could see, an' -that was the prong, and 't last I was afraid _I'd_ killed _he_. A -bad-tempered little card he was, though. They be _worse_ than an -intire 'orse.... They be worse than an intire _'orse_." - -He was dropping into meditation, standing limply with drooping arms, -and fixing an absent-minded look upon his job. For his memory was -straying among the circumstances of forty years ago. Then suddenly he -straightened up again and continued, - -"While I'd got the prong, Brown heard the scufflin', and come runnin' -down. 'What the plague's up now?' he says. 'I dunno,' I says; 'I shall -either kill 'n or conquer 'n.' ... But he _was_ a bad-tempered one. He -wouldn't let ye go into the stable to do 'n. I had to get 'n out and -tie his head to a ring in the wall, high up, an' then I could pay 'n -as I mind to. Brown says at last, 'That's enough;' he says, 'I won't -have it.' But Cooper says, 'You let 'n do as he likes.' And I says, -'If I don't have my own way with 'n, you'll have to do 'n yourself.' -But a _good_ little thing on the road, ye know. Quiet! And wouldn't -touch no vittles nor drink away from home, drive 'n where you mind. -Never was a better little thing to go. I think Cooper give eighteen or -twenty pound for 'n. But a _nasty_ little customer--wouldn't let ye -go near 'n in the stable. They jockeys thought _they_ was goin' to -have 'n. They all said they thought he'd be a rum 'n, and so he was, -too. - -"One time Mrs. Cooper come into the yard with a green silk dress on, -and he put his head round and grabbed it" (near the waist, to judge by -Bettesworth's gesture), "and tore out a great piece--a yard or more. -Do what I would, I couldn't help laughin', though she was a testy sort -o' woman. And she did fly about, the servant said, when she went -indoors. - -"But I thought I'd killed 'n that time with the prong. Sweat, he did, -and bellered like a bull; and 't last I give 'n one on the head. I -made sure I'd killed 'n. _I_ was afraid, then. I thought I'd hit too -hard. And I sweat as much as he did then." - - - - -XII - - -_December 2, 1901._--In view of the hatred in which Bettesworth had -previously held the workhouse infirmary, and which he was destined to -renew later, it is interesting to observe how favourably the place -impressed him about this time, when he visited a friend there. - -The friend, whom I will rename "Tom Loveland," had been taken to the -infirmary in October, suffering with the temporary increase of some -obscure chronic disorder which to this day cripples him. Bettesworth -had gone to see him on Sunday afternoon, December 1, in company with -Harriett Loveland, the man's wife. - -The patient still lay there, "on his back," I heard on the Monday. - -"On Saturday they took off the poultices. Seven weeks they bin -poulticin' of 'n; but Saturday the doctor thought there was 'a slight -change.' But, law!" Bettesworth continued, in scorn of the doctor's -opinion, "they abscesses 'll keep comin'." - -"There was two more died, up there in that same room where he is, o' -Saturday." This made six deaths since Loveland's admission. "One of -'em was a man I used to know very well--that 'ere Jack Grey that used -to do" so-and-so at where-is-it. "They sent for his wife, an' she got -there jest two minutes afore he died. Loveland says, 'I tucked my head -down under the blankets when I see 'em bring in the box' (the coffin) -'for 'n.' 'What, did ye think he was for you, Tom?' I says. But he -always was a meek-hearted feller: never had no nerve." - -But it was in the appointments of the place where Loveland lay that -Bettesworth was chiefly interested. He was almost enthusiastic over -the whiteness of the sheets, the beeswaxed floor ("like glass to walk -on. I says to Harriet, 'You must take care you don't slip up'"), the -little cupboards ("lockers, they calls 'em") beside each bed; the -nurse, who "seemed to be a pleasant woman;" the daily attendance of -the medical men; and other advantages. All these things persuaded -Bettesworth that the patients were "better off up there than what they -would be at home." And out in the grounds, "You'd meet two old women, -perhaps, walkin' along together; and then, a little further on, some -old men," which all appeared to be very satisfactory. - -Were there any circumstances to give offence? Yes: "There's that -Gunner, what used to live up the lane, struttin' about there, like -Lord Muck, in his fine slippers. He's a wardsman. And Bill Lucas, -too." (This latter is a man who lost good work and a pension by giving -way to drink.) "_He_ books ye in an' books ye out. 'I s'pose this is -your _estate_?' I says to 'n." In fact, Bettesworth would seem to have -been publicly sarcastic at this man's expense; and other visitors, I -gathered, laughed at hearing him. "'You be better able to work than -what I be,' I says; 'and yet we got to keep ye. It never ought to be -allowed.'" - -To those in the infirmary "You may take anything you mind to, except -spirits or beer. Tea, or anything like that, they may have brought." -And so Bettesworth, having gone unprepared, gave Loveland a shilling, -"to get anything he fancied." - - - - -XIII - - -As yet Bettesworth's cottage by the stream still suited him fairly -well, but he had not lived there for two years without finding out -that it had disadvantages. Of these perhaps the worst was that the -owner was himself only a cottager--an old impoverished man who never -came near the place, and was unable to spend any money on repairing -it. Difficulties were therefore arising, as I learnt one Monday -morning. The reader will observe the day of the week. - - -_December 9, 1901._--"Didn't it rain about four o'clock this mornin'!" -Bettesworth began, with an emphasis which provoked me to question -whether the rainfall had amounted to a great deal, after all. But he -insisted: "There must ha' bin a smartish lot somewhere. The lake's -full o' water, down as far as Mrs. Skinner's. When the gal come after -the rent yesterday...." - -This day being Monday, I exclaimed at his "yesterday." Did he mean it? - -"Yes, they always comes Sundays. She says, 'Gran'father told me I was -to look to see whether you'd cleaned out the lake in front of the -cottage.'" - -In fact, a fortnight previously a message from the owner had reached -Bettesworth requesting him to do this. The answer given then was -repeated now: "You tell your gran'father he may come an' do it -hisself. I shan't." - -"'Oh,' she says" (I continue in Bettesworth's words), "'Mr. Mardon'" -(the tenant of the next cottage) "'said he'd do some.'" - -"'He may come and do this if he mind to,' I says. ''Twon't flood -_me_.'" Mardon's cottage was certainly in danger of flooding, should -there come prolonged rain. - -"Then I said to her, 'How about our well, then? We en't had no water -ever since I spoke to you 'bout it before.' - -"'Oh,' she says, 'they come an' looked at the well Saturday. But -gran'father says 't 'll cost too much. 'T 'll want a lot o' bricks an' -things. If he has it done, he says he'll have to put up your -rent--yours and Mr. Mardon's--'cause you be the only two as pays -anything. En't it a shame?' she says. 'There's that old Mileham--he -earns good money every week, and never pays a ha'penny.'" - -At this point I foolishly interrupted, and being told how Mileham -"won't pay, and poor old Mrs. Connor, she en't _got_ it to pay," I -interrupted again, not understanding. - -"Hasn't _got_ it to pay? How do you mean?" - -"Why, what _have_ she got, sir? All the time her husband was alive, -drawin' his pension, the rent was paid up every pension day. But now -she en't got nothin' comin' in, and that lout of a boy of hers don't -do nothin'. So there's only me and Mardon pays any rent." - -I laughed. "It's a fine encouragement to you to be asked to pay more." - -"Yes. I says to her, 'Then we two got to pay for four? You tell your -gran'father he may put it up, but I shan't pay no more for this old -hutch. And I shan't pay what I do, as soon as I can find another place -to go to. If he mind to let we get the well done, and we take it out -o' the rent,' I says, 'I'll agree to that. Not pay no more rent till -we've took it all out.' But she wouldn't say nothin' to that. Or else -generally she got plenty o' gab." - -"Who is she?" I asked. - -"He's grand-daughter.... That young Mackenzie was her father. She've -got plenty o' gab. 'You 'alf-bred Scotch people,' I says to her -sometimes, 'talks too much.' I tells her of it sometimes. She don't -like me." - -It seemed unlikely that Bettesworth would long continue to be a tenant -under such a landlord. The change, however, was not to come yet. - -As yet, indeed, difficulties like these were but trivial incidents of -the life in which Bettesworth continued to take an interest as virile -as ever. He had dealt with landlords before, and had no qualms now. It -might be that the great strength of his prime was gone, but his health -seemed unimpaired, and I believe he still felt master of his fate as -he went quietly about his daily work. - -It is true that my very next note of him contains evidence of a -digestive weakness which, having not much troubled him hitherto, -though he had always been subject to it, was growing upon him, and -beginning to undermine his forces. But it was for another -reason--because of a curious word he used--that I then recorded what -he told me. - - -The entry in my journal, bearing still the date December 9, is to the -effect that "on Friday afternoon" a horrid pain took him right through -the midriff, from front to back. "I begun to think I was goin' to -croak," he said afterwards, when telling me about it. "And I reached, -and the sheer-water run out o' my eyes an' mouth. I didn't know where -to go for an hour or more, I was in that pain. I 'xpect 'twas stoopin' -down over my work brought it on. I'd had a hot dinner, ye see--bit o' -pickled pork an' pa'snips. And then stoopin' down.... But that -sheer-water--you knows what I means--run out o' my mouth." I did not -know what he meant, until the next day, when I asked how he felt. He -was "all right," but, repeating the story, said, "and the water run -out o' my mouth, jest like boilin' water." - -During the last year or two of his life I think he seldom went a week -without a recurrence of this pain of indigestion, the disorder being -doubtless aggravated by the breakdown of his domestic arrangements. -But this is looking too far ahead. At the period which now concerns -us, he was far from thinking of himself as an invalid. He could joke -about his passing indispositions as he could defy his landlord. This -particular attack, unless I am much mistaken, was the subject of a -flippancy I remember his repeating to me. A neighbour looking in upon -him and seeing his serious condition said genially, "You ben't goin' -to die, be ye, Freddy?" And he answered, "I dunno. Shouldn't care if I -do. 'Tis a poor feller as can't make up his mind to die once. If we -had to die two or three times, then there might be something to fret -about." In relating this to me, he added more seriously, "But nobody -dunno _when_, that's the best of it." - -Knowing now how his attitude changed towards death when it was really -near, I can see in this sturdy defiance the evidence of the physical -vigour he was still enjoying. There was no real cause for fretting -about himself, any more than about his affairs; and so he went through -this winter, garrulous and good-tempered, even happy in his way. - -Accordingly, taking my notes in their due order, they bring before my -mind, as I read them again now, pleasant pictures of the old man. I -can see him at work, or taking his wages, or starting for the town; -often the very weather and daylight around him come back to me; and -the chief loss is in his voice-tones, which I cannot by any effort of -memory recover. - - -_December 10, 1901._--One such mind-picture dates from December 10. -The short winter afternoon was already closing in, with a mist--the -forerunner of rain--enveloping the garden between the bare-limbed -trees. Over our heads sounded the roar of wind in a little fir-wood; -but down under the oak-trees by the well, where Bettesworth was -digging, there was shelter and stillness, or only the slight trembling -of a few leaves not yet fallen. It was "nice and warm," he assured me, -and then paused--himself a dusky-looking old figure in the oncoming -dusk--to ask, whom did I think he had seen go down the lane just now? -It was no other than his former neighbour, "old Jack Morris's widow." - -And once again his talk shows how far he was, that afternoon, from -thinking of himself as an infirm person, or an object of pity. I am -struck by the contrast between his later view of things and this which -he professed, when still in good health. For, speaking appreciatively -of Widow Morris as "the _cleanest_ old soul as ever lived," he went on -to say that, though he did not know what she was doing at that time, -she had been in the workhouse. It puzzled him how she lived, and -others like her. And when I said, "She ought to be in the workhouse," -he echoed the opinion emphatically. "_Better_ off there than what they -be at home, sir." So with Mrs. Connor. "It's a mystery how she lives. -And there's that son of hers, mungs about with a short pipe stuck in -his mouth," and by sheer idleness had lost several jobs, at which he -might have been earning eleven shillings a week. "And that poor gal, -he's sister, got to starve herself to keep her mother and that lout. -Cert'nly, she ought to keep her mother," but, for the lout, -Bettesworth's politer vocabulary was insufficient. - -So we talked in the gathering winter dusk, able, both of us, in the -assurance of the comfortable evening before us, to consider the -workhouse as a refuge with which neither of us would ever make -personal acquaintance. If I was unimaginative and therefore callous, -so was Bettesworth. It was he who said, "I reckons that's what they -places be for--old people past work, and little helpless childern." -But as to the able-bodied, "That stoneyard's the place for they, _I_'d -put it on to 'em, so's it 'd give 'em sore hearts, if it didn't sore -hands." - -And then he told of a tramp--a carpenter--who had earned his tenpence -an hour, and now was using workhouses to lodge in at night, while all -day he was "munging about" (or "doing a mung"), cadging a few -halfpence for beer. - -"And that 'ere bloke down near we, he's another of 'em. Earns -eightpence-halfpenny, and his son sixpence. But they gets it all down -'em." They had not paid Mrs. Skinner for the pork obtained from her -the previous week; indeed, they paid nobody. "Never got nothing, and -yet there's only they two and the old woman." - -What a contrast were these wasters--that was the idea of Bettesworth's -talk--with those two poor old widow women, whom he could afford to -pity in his strength and comfort! - - -_December 24._--The next note brings us to Christmas Eve. The weather -on the preceding day had changed from rimy frost to tempestuous rain, -which at nightfall began to be mingled with snow. By his own account -Bettesworth went to bed soon after seven, although even his wife urged -that it was too early, and that he would never lie till morning. He -had heard the tempest, and the touch of the snow against his bedroom -window, and so had his wife. It excited her. "Ben't ye goin' to look -out at it?" she said. And he, "That won't do me no good, to look at -it. We got a good fire in here." - -Such was his own chuckling account of his attitude towards the storm -when I stood by him the next morning high up in the garden, and -watched him sweeping the path. He discussed the prospects for the day, -rejoiced that the snow had not lain, and, looking keenly to the south, -where a dun-coloured watery cloud was travelling eastwards, its edges -melting into luminous mist and just hiding the sun, he thought we -might expect storms. The old man's spirits were elated; and then it -was, when the western end of the valley suddenly lit up as with a -laugh of spring sunlight, and the radiance came sweeping on and broke -all round us--then it was that Bettesworth, as I have elsewhere[1] -related, stood up to give the sunshine his glad welcome. - -A narrative followed which helps to explain his good spirits, or at -least discovers the powers of endurance on which they rested. I said, -"We have passed the shortest day--that's a comfort." He stopped -sweeping again, to answer happily, "Yes. And now in about four or five -weeks we shall begin to see the difference. And that's when we gets -the bad weather, lately." - -He stood up, the watery sunshine upon him, and leaning on his broom, -he continued, "I remember one winter, after I was married, we did have -some weather. Eighteen inches and two foot o' snow there was--three -foot, in some places. I'd bin out o' work--there was plenty o' work to -do, but we was froze out. For five weeks I 'adn't earnt tuppence. When -Christmas Day come, we _had_ somethin' for dinner, but 'twa'n't much; -and we had a smartish few bottles o' home-made wine. - -"Christmas mornin' some o' the chaps I'd bin at work with come round. -'What about that wine?' they says. So we had two or three cupfuls o' -wine; and then they says, 'Ben't ye comin' 'long o' we?' 'No,' I says, -'not 's mornin'.'" Here he shut his mouth, in remembered resignation, -as if still regarding these tempters. "'What's up then?' they says. -'_Come_ on!' 'No,' I says, 'not to-day.' 'Why not?' 'Cause I en't got -no money,' I says. 'Gawd's truth!' they says, 'if that's it...' and I -raked in six shillin's from amongst 'em. I give four to the old gal, -and I kep' two myself, and then I was right for the day." - -He made as if to resume sweeping, but desisted to explain, "Ye see, -they was my mates on the same job as me; and they knowed I'd ha' done -the same for e'er a one o' they, more 'n once. - -"My old mother-in-law was alive then, over here" (he looked across the -hollow to the old house), "and they wanted we to go and 'ave the day -with they. But my temper wouldn't have that. I says to the old gal, -'None o' their 'elp. We'll bide away, or else p'r'aps by-'n-by they'll -twit us.' I'd sooner ha' gone without vittles, than for they to help -and then twit us with it afterwards, talkin' about what they'd done -for us at Christmas." - -FOOTNOTE: - -[1] Author's note. "The Bettesworth Book" (second impression). - - - - -XIV - - -One of Bettesworth's swift short tales about his neighbours interested -me considerably at this time, as illustrating the half-sordid, -half-barbarous state of the people amongst whom he had to hold his own -when not at work. I did not suspect that the same tale would put me on -the track of a curious discovery relative to his own past history. - - -_January 23, 1902._--It was a quiet, windless morning, and the sound -of the knell reached us through the still air. Bettesworth said, "I -s'pose old Jerry's gone at last, then." - -"Old Jerry?" I asked. - -"Ah, old Jerry Penfold. We always called 'n Old Jerry. He bin dead -several times--or, 't least, they thought so. Rare ructions there bin -over there, no mistake. They got to sharin' out his kit. One come an' -took away his clock, and another his chest o' drawers, and some of his -sons even come an' took away his tools. But the oldest son got the -lawyer an' made 'em bring it all back." - -"Rare ructions"--yes: but Bettesworth used the word "rare" as we -should use "great," and did not mean that the affair was very -unusual. He was not scandalized so much as amused by it. For my part, -knowing nothing of the family, who dwelt in another quarter of the -parish, I sought only to identify Old Jerry. Some years previously an -old man who walked along the road with me one night had interested me -with a tale of his shepherding and other labours on a certain farm. I -had never learnt his name, nor had seen the man since; but now it -occurred to me that perhaps he was old Penfold. I asked Bettesworth. - -Bettesworth decided in the negative. Old Penfold had never been a -shepherd, or worked for the farmer I named. - -Yet another old man then came into my mind: a diminutive man, upwards -of eighty, who was still creeping honourably about at work. Frequently -I met him; but he seemed so shut up in himself that I had never cared -to intrude upon him with more than a "Good-day" when we met. But now I -named him to Bettesworth: old Dicky Martin. Could the missing shepherd -have been he? - -Bettesworth shook his head emphatically. It turned out that he and old -Dicky were chums in their way: they knew all about one another, and -with mutual respect. "Couldn't ha' bin old Dicky," said Bettesworth. -"He never worked anywhere else about here 'xcept in builders' yards. -Forty-four year ago he started for Coopers, and bin on there ever -since. He was a sailor before that. He come out o' the navy when he -come here." - -Out of the navy! And to think I had been ignorant of such a thing as -that! I had not found my shepherd; but to have discovered a sailor was -something. Scenting romance, in the foolish superficial way of -outsiders, I resolved to improve my acquaintance with old Dicky, -little dreaming that the sailor was going to show me a soldier too; -little supposing that Bettesworth's information about this old man -would be capped by information from him, quite as surprising, about -Bettesworth. - -How I fell in with old Martin, early in February, is of no moment -here. He talked very much in Bettesworth's manner, and especially -about cruising in the Mediterranean sixty years ago. But when I said -at last, believing it true, "I don't suppose there is another man in -our parish has travelled so far as you," his reply startled me. - -"No, I dessay not--without 'tis your man, Fred Bettesworth." - -"He? He never was out of England." - -"Yes he was. He bin as fur as Russia and the Black Sea, at any rate." - -"You must be wrong. I should have heard of it if he had." - -"I dunno about that. P'raps he don't care to talk about it, but 'tis -right enough. I fancy he did get into some trouble. He was a soldier -though, in the Crimea." - -Old Dicky was so convinced that I held my peace, though far from -convinced myself. A vague sensation crept over me of having heard some -faint rumour of the same tale, years ago; but what might have been -credible then seemed hardly credible now. I thought that now I knew -all there was to know about Bettesworth's life; and I could not see -where, among so many episodes, this of soldiering was to find room. -Besides, how was it possible that, in ten years or so, during which -Bettesworth had prattled carelessly of anything that came uppermost in -his mind, no hint of this had escaped him? It would have slipped out -unawares, one would have supposed; by some inadvertence or other I -should have learnt it. But, save for that forgotten rumour, nothing -had come until now. Now, however, the man who spoke of it spoke as -from his own personal knowledge. It was very strange. - -One thing was clear. If there were truth in this tale after all, -Bettesworth's silence on the subject must have been intentional. Was -there something about it of which he was ashamed? What was that -"trouble" to which old Dicky so darkly alluded? Eager as I was to -question Bettesworth, I was most reluctant to hear anything to his -discredit. And the reluctance prevailed over my curiosity. Feeling -that I had no right to force a confidence from him, I tried to dismiss -the subject from my mind; and for a time I succeeded. - - - - -XV - - -_April 17, 1902._--We pass on to April, when bird-notes were sounding -through all the gardens. - -"Hark at those starlings!" I said to Bettesworth. And he, "Yes--I -dunno who 'twas I was talkin' to this mornin', sayin' how he liked to -hear 'em. 'So do our guv'nor,' I says. I likes 'em best when there's -two of 'em gibberin' to one another--jest like 's if they was talkin'. -An' they lifts up their feet, an' flaps up their wings, an' they -nods." The old man's words ran rhythmically to suit the action he was -describing; and then, dropping the rhythm, "I likes to hear 'em very -well. And I don't think they be mischieful birds neither, like these -'ere sparrers and caffeys" (chaffinches). "They beggars, I shouldn't -care so much if when they picked out the peas from the ground they'd -eat 'em. But they jest nips the little green top off and leaves it. -Sims as if they does it reg'lar for mischief." - - -_April 28._--This sunny, objective side of Bettesworth's temperament -may be remembered in connexion with some other remarks of his on a -very different subject. There was at that time a man living near us -whose mere presence tried his patience. The man belonged to one of -the stricter Nonconformist sects, and had the reputation of being -miserly. "Looks as miserable, he do" (so Bettesworth chanced to -describe him), "as miserable as--as sin. I never see such a feller." - -At this I laughed, admitting that our neighbour certainly did not look -as if he knew how to enjoy himself. - -"He _don't_. Don't sim to have no pleasure, nor 'sociate with anybody. -There! I'd as lief not have a life at all, as have one like his. I'd -do without, if I couldn't do no better'n that." - -Bettesworth's judgment was possibly in error; for there is no telling -what mystical joys, what dreams of another world, may have illuminated -this man's inner life, and made him suspicious of people like -Bettesworth and me. But if there were such compensation, Bettesworth's -temperament was incapable of recognizing it, and the point is -instructive. His own indomitable cheerfulness was of the objective -pagan order. The field of his emotions and fancies had never been -cultivated. His thoughts did not stray beyond this world. From such -deep sources of physical sanity his optimism welled up, that he really -needed, or at any rate craved for, no spiritual consolation. Like his -remote ancestors who first invaded this island, he had the habit of -taking things as they came, and of enjoying them greatly on the whole. -He half enjoyed, even while he was irritated by it, the odd figure -presented by this Nonconformist. - - -_May 7._--A week afterwards he exhibited the same sort of aloof -interest, annoyed and yet amused, in a jibbing horse. A horse had -brought a ton of coal a part of the way down the lane, and then -refused to budge farther; and Bettesworth could not forget the -incident. It tickles me still to recall with what a queer look on his -face he spoke of the noble animal. The expression was the result of -his trying to say his word for _horse_ (not _'oss_, but _'awss_), -while a facetious smile was twitching at the corners of his mouth. -This was several days after the event. At the time of its occurrence, -someone had remarked that the horse had no pluck, and Bettesworth had -rejoined indignantly, "_I'd_ see about his pluck, if I had the drivin' -of 'n!" But after a day or two his indignation turned to quiet gaiety. -"Won't back," he said, "and he won't draw." - -I suggested, "Not bad at standing still." - -Then came the queer expression on Bettesworth's face, with "'Good -'awss to _eat_,' the man said." Truly it was odd to see how -Bettesworth's lips, grim enough as a rule, arched out sarcastically -over the word _'awss_. - -And it was in a temper not very dissimilar that he commonly regarded -our Nonconformist neighbour. The man amused him. - -A pagan of the antique English kind, ready to poke fun at a bad horse, -or sneer at a fanatic, or be happy in listening to the April talk of -the starlings, Bettesworth had quite his share too of the pugnacity -of his race. Years ago he had said that a fight used to be "just his -clip," as a young man; not many years ago he had promptly knocked down -in the road a baker who had got down out of his cart to make -Bettesworth move his wheelbarrow out of the way (I remember that when -the old man told me of this I advised him not to get into trouble, and -he pleaded that it "seemed to do him good"); and now during this -spring--I cannot say exactly when--the fighting spirit suddenly woke -up in him once more. - -The circumstance takes us out again from the peace of the garden to -the crude struggle for life in the village. Looking back to that time, -I can see our valley as it were sombrely streaked with the progress of -two or three miserable family embroilments, squalid, weltering, -poisoning the atmosphere, incapable of solution. And though -Bettesworth was no more implicated in these than myself, but like me -was a mere onlooker, he was not, like me, an outsider. He was down on -the very edge of these troubles, and it was the momentary overflow of -one of them in his direction one night that suddenly started him -fighting, in spite of his years. - -I may not go into details of the affair. It is enough that during this -April and May our end of the parish was looking on, scandalized, at -the blackguard behaviour of a certain labourer towards his family and -especially his own mother. Of powerful build, the man had been long -known for a bully; and if report went true, he had received several -thrashings in his time. But just now he was surpassing his own record. -He was also presuming upon the forbearance of better men than himself, -and could not keep his tongue from flouts and gibes at them. Speaking -of him to me, Bettesworth expressed his disapproval and no more. -Others, however, were less reticent; and there came a day when I heard -of a quarrel this man had tried to fix upon Bettesworth at the -public-house one evening. He was summarily ejected, my informant said; -and something--I have forgotten what--caused me to suspect that the -"chucker out" was old Bettesworth. That was not explicitly stated, -however. Nor did Bettesworth himself tell me at the time any more than -that there had been a disturbance in the taproom, the man being turned -out, after insulting him. - - -_May 15._--But, alluding to the affair some time afterwards, he -placidly continued the story. "I cut 'n heels over head, an' when he -got up, and made for the doorway and the open road, I went for 'n -again. They got round me, or I should ha' knocked 'n heels over head -again. I broke my way through four or five of 'em. 'If I was twenty -years younger,' I says to 'n, 'I'd jump the in'ards out of ye.' Some -of 'em says, if he dares touch the old man they'd go for 'n theirself. -'All right!' I says, 'you no call to worry about me. I can manage he.' -And they told 'n, 'You got hold o' the wrong one this time, Sammy.'" - - - - -XVI - - -During these months, the story of Bettesworth's having been a soldier -in the Crimea remained unverified. I was watching for hints of it from -him, and he gave not the slightest; for opportunities of asking him -about it without offence, and not one occurred. And slowly the tale -receded from my mind, and my belief in it dwindled away. - -By what chance, or in what circumstances, the mystery suddenly -recurred to me is more than I can tell now. But one rainy May -afternoon--I remember that much--the old man was in the wood-shed, -sitting astraddle on one block of wood, and chopping firewood on -another block between his knees. He looked careless enough, -comfortable enough, sitting there in the dry, with the sound of rain -entering through the open shed door. What was it he said, or I, to -give me an opening? I shall never know; but presently I found myself -challenging him to confess the truth of what was reported of him. - -And I remember well how at once his careless expression changed, as if -he had been taxed with a fault, and how for some seconds he sat -looking fixedly before him in a shamefaced, embarrassed way, like a -schoolboy who has been "found out." For some seconds the silence -lasted; then he said reluctantly, "It's true. So I was." And the -circumstantial talk that followed left me without any further doubt on -the point. - -It was at the Rose and Crown--a well-known tavern in the neighbouring -town--that he 'listed. His "chum" (I don't know who his chum was) had -already enlisted at Alton, and "everybody thought," as Bettesworth -said, that he too had done so at the same time, for he had the -soldier's belt on, there in the Alton inn. But he had not taken the -shilling there. He returned home to his brother Jim, "what was up -there at Middlesham, same job as old Stubby got now--seventeen year he -had 'long with the charcoal-burners up there"--and Jim urged him to -"go to work." Bettesworth, however, was obstinate. "No," he said, "I -shall go to Camden Fair." "Better by half go to work." "No, I shall -git about." "And I come down to the town" (so his tale continued), -"and there I see my chum what had 'listed at Alton day before. 'Come -on,' he says; 'make up your mind to go with we.' ''Greed,' I says. And -I went up 'long with 'n to the Rose and Crown...." - -"How old were you then? It must have been before you were married?" - -"Yes; I was sixteen. I served a year and eight months." - -"Ah." I looked out at the May foliage and the kindly rain, and thought -of the Crimean winter. - -"You saw some cold weather, then?" - -"No mistake. Two winters and one summer." He was, in fact, before -Sebastopol, and now that the secret was out, he hurried on to tell -familiarly of Kertch, the Black Sea, the Dardanelles, so glibly that -my memory was unable to take it all in. What was most strange was to -hear these places, whose names to stay-at-home people like myself have -come to have an epic sound, spoken of as the scene of merely trivial -incidents. As it was only of what he observed himself that Bettesworth -told, this could hardly have been otherwise; yet it is odd to think -that Tolstoi, writing his marvellous descriptions of the siege, may -have set eyes on him. To this harum-scarum English plough-boy, -ignorant, rollicking, reckless, it was not the great events, on a -large scale, that were prominent, but the queer things, the little -haphazard details upon which he happened to stumble. Through the -narrative his own personality was to the fore; just the same dogged -personality that I was to know afterwards, but not yet chastened and -made wise by experience. - -It was here in the Crimea that, carrying that letter to post to his -brother, as already told in "The Bettesworth Book," he met his "mate," -and, opening the letter, took out the "dollar" it contained, and spent -it on a bottle of rum, tossing the letter away. "In those days," said -he, "I could drink as much rum as I can beer now. We had rum twice a -day: rum and limejuice. That was to keep off the scurvy. Never had no -cups nor nothing. We had knives, same as that old clasp-knife I got -now, and used to knock off the necks o' the bottles with they." - -He remembered well the hard times, and the privations our troops -endured. "Sixteen of us in one o' they little tents. We had a blanket -and a waterproof sheet--not the fust winter, though; and boots that -come up to your thigh, big enough to get into with your shoes on. -There was one little chap named Tickle, he got into his boots with his -shoes on, and couldn't git 'em off again. He was put under stoppages -for 'em. Fifty shillin's for a pair o' they boots. You got into -'em--they was never made to fit no man--and bid in 'em for a month -together--freezed on to ye." - -Again, "It was starvation done for so many of our chaps out there. -Cold an' starvation. I've bin out on duty forty-eight hours at a -stretch; then march back three mile to camp; and then some of us 'd -have to march another seven mile to fetch biscuit from the sea. And -_then_ you only got your share, same as the rest.... Sometimes the -biscuit was dry; and then again you'd on'y git some as had bin trod to -death by mules or camels.... That was the way to git a appetite.... -But there was plenty o' rum; good rum too; better 'n what you gits -about here." The system of pay, or rather the want of system, appears -to have made this abundance of rum a more than usually doubtful -blessing. The men went sometimes "weeks together without gettin' any -pay; and then when we got it, it was very soon all gone." Sixpence a -day--four and twopence a week--(Bettesworth figured it out)--a very -handy sum was this week's pay, I gathered, for buying rum by the -bottle. The price of a bottle of stout was half a crown. - -Reverting to the terrible weather, Bettesworth told how he had seen -"strong men, smoking their pipe," and four hours afterwards beheld -them carried by on a stretcher, to be buried. Ill-fed, I inferred, -they succumbed thus suddenly to the fearful cold. Green coffee was -provided, and the men had to hunt about for roots to make a fire for -cooking it. And then, just as they had got their coffee into their -mess-tins, they would be called out, perhaps, to stand on duty for -eight hours together. - -The dead were buried "in their kit," with their clothes on. Sometimes, -Bettesworth hinted, money would be found on them and appropriated from -their pockets, but "we wan't allowed no plunder," he added. As for the -graves, "I've see 'em chucked into graves eighteen inches or two foot -deep, perhaps--just a little earth put over 'em; and when you go by a -fortnight or so after, you might see their toes stickin' out o' the -ground. You never see no coffin." The only coffin that Bettesworth saw -was Lord Raglan's. "That was a funeral! Seven miles long...." - -At the close of the war Bettesworth came home "among the reductions," -yet not for several months, during which he was employed on "fatigue -parties" in collecting old metal--guns, ammunition cases, and so -forth--for ballast to the ships in Balaclava Harbour. He described the -Harbour: it was "like comin' in at that door; an' then, when you gets -inside, it all spreads out...." Storm in the Black Sea overtook the -troop-ship, where were "seventeen hunderd of us. Three hunderd was -ship's company.... And some down on their knees prayin', some cursin', -some laughin' an' drinkin', some dancin'.... And the troop-ship we -come home in--might 's well ha' come in a hog-tub. She'd bin all -through the war, and he" (the captain) "reckoned 'twas great honour to -bring her home, and he wouldn't have no tugs. Forty-nine days we was, -comin' home. And she leaked, an' then 'twas 'all hands to the -pumps....' Great pumps...." - -Yes, of course he remembered the pumps. It was Bettesworth all over, -to take a vivid and intelligent practical interest in anything of the -kind that there was to be seen. He had had no observation lessons at -school, and had never heard of "object studies"; he simply observed -for the pleasure of observing, instinctively as a cat examines a new -piece of furniture, and if not with any cultivated sense of -proportion, still with a great evenness of judgment. On one other -occasion, and one only in my hearing, he reverted to his Crimean -experiences; and as will be seen in its proper place, the narrative -again showed him observing with the same balanced mind, never -enthusiastic, but also never satiated, never bored. - -But what of the "trouble" into which he was alleged to have fallen? I -may as well tell all I know, and have done with it. From Bettesworth -himself no breath of trouble ever reached me. But his avoidance of -this period as a topic of conversation often struck me as a suspicious -circumstance; so that I was not quite unprepared for a statement old -Dicky Martin volunteered when Bettesworth had been some three weeks -dead. He had been "rackety," and had been punished: that was the -substance of the tale. "He got into trouble for goin' into the French -lines after some rum--him an' two or three more. They never stopped, -he told me, to ask 'n no questions, but strapped 'n up and give 'n two -or three dozen for 't." - - - - -XVII - - -I suppose that Bettesworth's Crimean reminiscences occupied in -narration to me something less than fifteen minutes of his life, so -that obviously the space they take up in this volume is out of all -proportion to their importance. For my theme is not this or that -recollection of his, but the way in which the old man lived out these -last of his years, while the memories passed across his mind. It is of -small consequence what he remembered. Had he recalled the Indian -Mutiny instead of the Crimea, it would have been all one, by that wet -afternoon of May, 1902. He would have sat on his block dandling the -chopper just the same, and the raindrops from trees outside would have -come slanting into the shed doorway and splashed on my hand as I -listened to him. - -And as they are disproportionately long, these day-dreams of -Bettesworth, so also they become too solid on the printed page, side -by side with the reality which encompassed them then, and is my -subject now. They provoke us to forget the old man, alive and talking. -They take us back fifty years too far. From the hardships of the -Crimean War it is a wrench to return to the reality--the shed in this -valley, the patter of the rain, the old gossipping voice. But all -this, so impossible to restore now that it too has become only a -reminiscence, being then the commonplace of my life as well as of -Bettesworth's, was allowed to pass by almost unnoticed. I let slip -what I really liked, took for granted the strong life that alone made -me care for the conversation, and saved only some dead litter of -observation which was let fall by the living man and seemed to me odd. - -Need I explain how of this too I was gradually saving less and less? -The oddness was wearing off; only the more exceptional things seemed -now worth taking care of. Unless there was something as surprising to -hear as this talk of the Crimean War--and such exceptions of course -appeared with increasing rareness--I hardly took the trouble, at this -period, to set down in writing any of Bettesworth's daily gossip. The -naturalist, having noted in his diary the first two swallows that do -not after all make a summer, has no record save in his brain of the -subsequent curvings and interlacings in the summer sky; and I, -similarly, find myself with little besides a vague memory of -Bettesworth's doings in this summer of 1902. In fact, it is not even a -memory that I have. There is only an inference that day by day he must -have done his work in the warm weather, and I must have talked to him. -But I am unable to restore this for a reader's benefit. "Imagine him -going on as usual," shall I say? Why, it is more than I can do myself. -A row of asterisks would serve the purpose equally well. - -So there is a void for two months--nay, with one exception, for more -than three, from the middle of May to the end of August; in which one -surmises that the summer flies buzzed in the garden, and Bettesworth -did his hoeing and grass-cutting, and was companionable. The one -exception, fortunately, has the very life in it which I am regretting. -It is but a short sentence of six words, yet they are as if spoken -within the hour, and are the clearer for the void around them. - -On the afternoon of July 15, the grape vine on the wall near my window -was being attended to by the pruner. He stood on a ladder, which was -held steady by Bettesworth at the foot; and presently through the open -window the old man's voice reached me, complaining of the recent -blighty weather: "There en't nothin' 'ardly looks _kind_." - -"No; not to say _kind_," the pruner assented. - -That is all. But precisely because there is nothing in it, because it -is a piece of normal instead of exceptional talk, it has the accent of -the season. Bettesworth's voice reaches me; the light falls warm -through the vine-leaves; the lost summer seems to come back with all -the accompanying scene, almost as distinctly as if I had but just -written the words down. - - -_August 28, 1902._--The harvest, of course, could not go by without -remark from him. From the garden we could see, beyond the meadow in -the bottom of the valley, a little two-acre cornfield, which had stood -for several days half reaped--the upper side uncut, the lower side -prosperous-looking with its rows of sheaves. Then there came a morning -when it was all in sheaves, and Bettesworth said, - -"Old Ben" (meaning Ben Turner) "done it for 'n" (the owner) "last -night. Made a dark job of it." - -I realized that in his cottage down by the lake, Bettesworth, going to -bed, had been able to hear the reaping in the dark, across the meadow. - -He proceeded, "Ben took his hoss and cart down into Sussex a week or -two ago, to see if he could get a job harvestin'. Was only gone three -days, though: him an' four or five more. But I reckon they only went -off for a booze--I don't believe they made e'er a try to get a -job...." - -"Our Will" (his brother-in-law) "says down there at Cowhatch they had -a wonderful crop of oats. But he reckons they've wasted enough with -the machine to ha' paid for reapin' it by hand. Stands to -reason--where them great things comes whoppin' into it over and over, -it shatters out a lot. Will says where they've took up the sheaves you -can see the ground half covered with what they've wasted." - -Not knowing what to say, I hesitated, and at last muttered -simultaneously with Bettesworth, "'T seems a pity." - -"It's what I calls 'pound wise,'" added he, misquoting a proverb which -possibly was not invented by his class, and was foreign to him. - - -_September 20, 1902._--I turn over the page in my note-book, but come -to a new date three weeks later. Quiet autumn sunshine, the entry -says, had marked the last few days, breaking through with a limpid -splash in the mornings, after the mist had gone. Amidst this, under -the softened tree-shadows, Bettesworth was cutting grass with his -fag-hook. - -And "Ah," he said, "it's purty near all up with charcoal-burnin' now." - -This was in allusion to the indifferent crop of hops just being picked -and the consequently small demand for charcoal; but it was a -digression too. We had begun talking of a wasp sting. From that to -gnats, and from gnats to a certain tank where they bred, was an -obvious transition. - -And now the tank suggested charcoal. For, according to Bettesworth, a -little knob of charcoal put into a tank is better than an equal -quantity of lime, for keeping the water sweet. Further, "If you got a -bit o' meat that's goin' anyways wrong, you put a little bit o' -charcoal on to that, and you won't taste anything bad. I've heared -ever so many charcoal-burners say that. And meat is a thing as won't -keep--not butcher's meat; partic'lar in the summer when you sims to -want it most--something with a little taste to 't." So, charcoal is -useful; but "Ah! it's purty near all up with charcoal-burnin' now." - -A good deal that followed, about the technicalities of -charcoal-burning, has been printed in another place, and is omitted -here. One point, however, may now be taken up. It is the curious fact -that all the charcoal-burners of the neighbourhood are congregated in -one district, and the numerous families of them rejoice in one -name--that of Parratt. - -"I never knowed anybody but Parratts do it about here," Bettesworth -said; and the name reminded him of a story, as follows: - -"My old brother-in-law Snip was down at Devizes one time--him what -used to travel with a van--_Snip_ they always called 'n. And there was -a feller come into the fair with one of these vans all hung round with -bird-cages, ye know--poll-parrots and all kinds o' birds. So old Snip -says to 'n, 'Parrots?' he says, 'what's the use o' you talkin' about -parrots? Why, where I come from,' he says, 'we got Parratts as 'll -burn charcoal, let alone talk. Talk better 'n any o' yourn,' he says. -'You give 'em some beer and _they'll_ talk--or dig hop-ground, or -anything.' Lor'! how that feller did go on at 'n, old Snip said!" - -Bettesworth knew something of charcoal-burning by experience, but he -owned himself ignorant of its inner technical niceties. Moreover, he -felt it right to respect a trade "mystery," explaining, "'Tis no use -to be a trade, if everybody can do it. 'Relse we should have poor -livin' then." - - -_October_ 31, 1902.--A memorandum of October 31 gives just a foretaste -of the approaching winter, and just a momentary searching back into -the experience gained when Bettesworth worked at a farm. For there -must have been hoar-frost lingering on the lawn that last morning in -October, to evoke the old man's opinion, "the less you goes about on -grass while there's a frost on it the better" for the grass. "If -anybody goes over a bit o' clover-lay with the white frost on it you -can tell for a month after what course they took." - - -_November 11._--Amid some personalities which it would be difficult to -disguise and which had better be omitted, I find in November another -reference to the harsh social life of the village, and it is in -connexion with that same bully whom Bettesworth had previously -chastised. As before, details must be suppressed; I only suggest that -in these dark November nights the labourers in want of company of -course sought it at the public-house. There, I surmise, the bully was -boasting, until Bettesworth shut him up with a retort brutally direct. -Even as it was repeated to me his expression is not printable. -Bettesworth was no angel. He seemed rather, at times, a hard-grained -old sinner; but he always took the manly side, whether with fists or -coarse tongue. In this instance his fitting rebuke won a laugh of -approval from the company, and even "a pint" for himself from one who -was a relative, but no friend, of the offender. - - -_December 16._--One dry, cloudy day in December Bettesworth used his -tongue forcibly again, but in how much pleasanter a connexion! A -little tree in the garden had to be transplanted to a new position, on -the edge of a bed occupied by old sprouting stumps of kale. One of -these stumps was exactly in the place destined for the tree, and -Bettesworth ruthlessly pulled it up, talking to it: - -"You come out of it. There's plenty more like you. If you complains, -we'll chuck ye in the bottom o' the hole for the tree to feed on!" - - - - -XVIII - - -The Old Year, so far as my notes show it, had run to its close without -event for Bettesworth, just as the New Year was to do, excepting for -one big trouble. Yet he was not quite the man at the opening of 1903 -that he had been at the opening of 1902. The twelve uneventful months -had, in fact, been leaving their marks upon him--marks almost -imperceptible as each occurred, yet progressive, cumulative in their -effect. On this day or on that, none could have pointed to a change in -the old man, or alleged that he was not so the day before; but as the -seasons swung round it was impossible not to perceive how he was -aging. It is well, therefore, to pause and see what he had become by -this time before we enter upon another year of his life. - -There was one silent witness to the increasing decay of his powers -that could not be overlooked. The garden gave him away. People coming -to visit me and it were embarrassed to know what to say, or they even -hinted that it would be an economy to allow Bettesworth a small -pension and hire a younger man, who would do as much work, and do it -better, in half the time. As if I needed to be told that! But then -they were not witnesses, with me, of the pluck--better worth -preserving than any garden--with which Bettesworth sought to make -amends for his vanished youth. His tenacity deepened my regard for -him, even while its poor results almost wore out my patience. He who -had once moved with such vigour was getting slow; and the time was -coming, if it had not come, when I had to wait and dawdle while he -dragged along behind me from one part of the garden to another. A more -serious matter was that with greater effort on his part the garden -ground was less well worked. I don't believe he knew that. He used a -favourite old spade, worn down like himself, and never realized that -"two spits deep" with this tool were little better than one spit with -a proper one; and he could not make out why the carrots forked, and -the peas failed early. - -But the worst trial of all was due to another and more pitiful cause. -I could reconcile myself to indifferent crops--after all, I had -enough--but exasperation was daily renewed by the little daily -failures in routine work, owing to his defective sight, which grew -worse and worse. There were the garden paths. With what care the old -man drew his broom along them, working by faith and not sight, blindly -feeling for the rubbish he could not see, and getting it all save from -some corner or other of which his theories had forgotten to take -account! Little nests of disorder collected in this way, to-day here, -to-morrow somewhere else, surprising, offensive to the eye. Again, at -the lawn-mowing, never man worked harder than Bettesworth, or more -conscientiously; but he could not see the track of his machine, and -seams of uncut grass often disfigured the smoothness of the turf even -after he had gone twice over it to make sure of perfection. It was -alarming to see him go near a flower border. He would avoid treading -on any plant of whose existence he knew, by an act of memory; but he -could not know all, and I had to limit his labours strictly to that -part of the garden he planted or tended himself. - -What made the situation so difficult to deal with was that his -intentions were so good. He was himself hardly aware that he failed, -and I rather sought to keep him in ignorance of the fact than -otherwise. I felt instinctively that, once it was admitted, all would -be over for Bettesworth; because he was incapable of mending, and open -complaints from me must in the end have led to his dismissal. For that -I was not prepared. He would never get another employment; to cut him -off from this would be like saying that the world had no more use for -him and he might as well die out of the way. But I had no courage to -condemn him to death because my lawn was ill cut. With one exception, -when I sent him to an oculist to see if spectacles would help him (the -oculist reported to me that there was "practically no sight left"), we -kept up the fiction that he could see to do his work. And his -patient, silent struggles to do well were not without an element of -greatness. - -But though the drawbacks to employing the old man were many, and such -as to set me oftentimes wondering how long I should be able to endure -them, it must not be thought that he was altogether useless. If he was -slow, he was still strong; if he was half blind, he was wholly -efficient at heavy straightforward work. During this winter, in making -some radical changes which involved a good deal of excavating work, -Bettesworth was like a first-rate navvy, and eagerly put all his -experience at my disposal. There was a trench to be opened for laying -a water-pipe. With a young man to help him, he dug it out and filled -it in again, in about half the time that the job would have taken if -it had been entrusted to a contractor. In one place a little pocket of -bright red gravel was found. This, of his own initiative, he put aside -for use on the paths which he was too blind to sweep clean. But, in -truth, a sort of sympathy with my desires and a keen eye to my -interests frequently inspired him to do the right thing in this kind -of way. He had identified himself with the place; was proud of it; -boasted to his friends of "our" successes; and like a miser over his -hoard, never spared himself where the good of the garden was -concerned, but with aching limbs--his ankle where he had once broken -it pained him cruelly at times--went slaving on for his own -satisfaction, when I would have suggested to him to take things -easily. - -I have said that there were those who considered him too expensive a -protege for me. There were others, I am sure, to whom he appeared no -better than a tedious old man, opinionated, gossiping, not over clean. -Pretty often--especially in bad weather, when there was not much he -could be doing--he went on errands for me to the town, to fetch home -groceries and take vegetables to my friends, and all that sort of -thing. At my friends' he liked calling; they owed to him rather than -to me not a few cookings of cabbage and sticks of celery, for which -they would reward him with praise, and perhaps a glass of beer or the -price of it. Afterwards I would hear lamentings from them how long he -had stayed talking. Once or twice--hardly oftener in all these -years--I had to speak to him in sharp reprimand for being such a -prodigious long time gone; for the glass of beer and the gossip where -he delivered his cabbages did not always satisfy his cravings for -society and comfort: he would turn into a public-house--"Dan -Vickery's" for choice--and come back too late and too talkative. It -was a fault, if you like; but the wonder to me is, not that he -sometimes drank two glasses where one was enough, but that, with his -wit and delight in good company, he did not oftener fall from grace. -Those two or three occasions when he earned my sharp reproofs, and for -half a day afterwards lost his sense of comfort in me as a friend, -were probably times when his home had grown too dreary, his outlook -too hopeless, even for his fortitude. Some readers, no doubt, will be -offended by his taste for beer. I hope there will be some to give him -credit for the months and years in which, with these few exceptions, -he controlled the appetite. Remember, he had no religious convictions, -nor did the peasant traditions by which he lived afford him much -guidance. Alone, of his own inborn instinct for being a decent man, he -strove through all his life, not to be rich, but to live upright and -unashamed. Fumbling, tiresome, garrulous, unprofitable, lean and grim -and dirty in outward appearance, the grey old life was full of fight -for its idea of being a man; full of fight and patience and stubborn -resolve not to give in to anything which it had learnt to regard as -weakness. I remember looking down, after I had upbraided a failure, at -the old limbs bending over the soil in such humility, and I could -hardly bear the thought that very likely they were tired and aching. -This enfeebled body--dead now and mouldering in the churchyard--was -alive in those days, and felt pain. Do but think of that, and then -think of the patient, resolute spirit in it, which almost never -indulged its weaknesses, but had its self-respect, its half-savage -instincts toward righteousness, its smothered tastes, its untold -affections and its tenderness. That was the old man, gaunt-limbed, but -good-tempered, partially blind and fumbling, but experienced, whom we -have to imagine now indomitably facing yet another year of his life, -and a prospect in which there is little for him to hope for. Nay, -there was much for him to dread, had he known. A separate chapter, -however, must be given to the severe trouble which, as already hinted, -overtook him in the early weeks of 1903. - - - - -XIX - - -While the advance of time was affecting Bettesworth himself, another -influence had begun to play havoc with his environment. A glance in -retrospect at this nook of our parish during this same winter of -1902-3 shows the advent of new circumstances, of a kind full of menace -to men like him. Things and persons of the twentieth century had begun -to invade our valley, where men and women so far had lived as if the -nineteenth were not half through. - -The coming of the new influence was perhaps too subtle for Bettesworth -to be conscious of it. Perhaps he marked only the normal crumbling -away of the old-fashioned life, by death or departure of his former -associates, and failed to notice that these were no longer being -replaced, as they would have been in former times, by others like -them. Of our old friends close around us four or five were by this -time dead, and others had moved farther afield. We missed especially -old Mrs. Skinner. Since her husband's death in 1901 her domestic -arrangements had not been happy, and in the autumn just past she had -disposed of her little property, and was gone to live across the -valley. But note the circumstances. Only some ten years previously her -husband had bought this property--the cottage and nearly an acre of -ground--for about L70. He may have subsequently added L50 to its -value. Now, however, his widow was able to sell it for something like -L220. The increase shows what a significant change was overtaking us. - -I shall revert to this presently. For the moment I stop to gather up -some stray sentences of Bettesworth's which, perhaps, indicate how -unlikely he was to accommodate himself to new circumstances. - -The purchaser of Mrs. Skinner's cottage was a man named Kelway--a -curious, nondescript person, as to whose "derivings" we speculated in -vain. What had he been before he came here? No one ever discovered -that, but his behaviour was that of an artisan from near London--a -plasterer or a builder's carpenter--who had come into a little money. -I remember his telling me jauntily on one occasion that he should not -feel settled until he had brought home his American organ (I was -heartily glad that it never came!), and on another that he had made -"hundreds of wheelbarrows" in his time, which I thought unlikely; and -I cannot forget--for there are signs of it to this day--how ruthlessly -he destroyed the natural contours of his garden with ill-devised -"improvements." He pulled out the interior partitions of the cottage, -too, wearing while at the work the correct garb of a plasterer; and -it was in this costume that he annoyed Bettesworth by his patronizing -familiarity. "He says to me" (thus Bettesworth), "'I suppose you don't -know who I am in my dirty dishabille?' 'No,' I says, 'and if I tells -the truth, I don't care nuther.' _He's dirty dishabille!_... He got -too much old buck for me!" Shortly afterwards he asked Bettesworth to -direct him to a good plumber. "'I can do everything else,' he says, -'but plumbing is a thing I never had any knowledge of.' So I says, 'If -I was you I should sleep with a plumber two or three nights.'" - - -_January 27, 1903._--Again, in the end of January, Bettesworth -reported: "That man down here ast me about peas--what sort we gets, -an' so on." (Remember that he had nearly an acre of ground.) "So I -told 'n, and he says, 'What do they run to for price?' 'Oh, about a -shillin' a quart,' I says; and that's what they _do_ run to. 'I must -have half a pint,' he says. I bust out laughin' at 'n. An' he says he -must have a load o' manure, too! He must mind he don't overdo it! I -was _obliged_ to laugh at 'n." - -Of course, such a neighbour would in no circumstances have pleased -Bettesworth. I believe the man had many estimable qualities, but they -were dwarfed beside his own appreciation of them; and his subsequent -disappointments, which ultimately led to his withdrawal from the -neighbourhood, were not of the kind to engage Bettesworth's sympathy. -Indeed, he had no chance of approval in that quarter, coming in the -place of old Mrs. Skinner, with her peasant lore and her pigs. - -But if this egregious man was personally offensive to Bettesworth, he -was not intrinsically more strange to the old man than those who -followed him or than others who were settling in the parish. There -were to be no more Mrs. Skinners. Wherever one of the old country sort -of people dropped out from our midst, people of urban habits took -their place. These were of two classes: either wealthy people of -leisure, seeking residences, and bringing their own gardeners who -wanted homes, or else mechanics from the neighbouring town, ready to -pay high rents for the cottages whose value was so swiftly rising. The -stealthiness of the process blinded us, however, to what was -happening. When Bettesworth began, as he did now, to feel the pressure -of civilization pushing him out, neither he nor I understood the -situation. - -Right and left, property was changing hands. A big house in the next -hollow, but with its grounds overpeering this, had been bought by a -wealthy resident, and was under repair, already let to some friends of -his. There went with it in the same estate the hill-side opposite this -garden, with two or three cottages visible from here; and everybody -rejoiced when the disreputable tenants of one of these cottages had -notice to quit. It was hoped that the new owner was sensible of the -duties as well as the rights attaching to property. - -Meanwhile, Bettesworth's hovel, too, was in the market, the landlord -of it being lately dead; and in the market it remained, while -Bettesworth clamoured in vain for repairs. At last he gave up hope. By -the beginning of 1903 he had resolved to quit his old cottage as soon -as he could find another to go into. - -He waited still some weeks, however--property was valuable, cottages -were eagerly sought after--and then what seemed a golden opportunity -arose. The cottage with the disreputable tenants has been mentioned, -adjoining the grounds of the big house. It must have been early in -February when the whisper that it was to be vacant reached -Bettesworth, who forthwith announced to me his intention of applying -for it. Too big, perhaps too good, for him and his wife I may have -thought the place; but there was no other in the neighbourhood to be -heard of, and it was not only for its pleasantness that the old man -coveted it. With his wife there he would be able to keep watch over -her while he was at work here, and there would be almost an end to -those anxieties about her fits, which often made him half afraid to go -home. I remember the secrecy of his talk. He wanted no one to -forestall him. The thing was urgent; and I had no hesitation in -writing a recommendation of him as a desirable tenant, which he -forthwith took to the owner. Why, indeed, should I have hesitated? -Between Bettesworth's punctiliousness on such matters and my own -intention of helping him if need be, there was no fear as to the -payment of the rent. And the improvements he had made to that place -down by the stream argued well for the care he would take of this -better cottage. - -My recommendation did its work. Bettesworth was duly accepted as -tenant; he gave notice to leave the other place, and began -preparations for moving; and then, too late, it dawned upon me that -perhaps I had made a mistake. I had forgotten old Mrs. Bettesworth. I -had not set eyes on her for months; for much longer I had not been -inside her dwelling, to see the state it was in. I only knew that -outside the walls were whitewashed, the garden and paths orderly. - -The first doubts visited me when I saw that repairs to the new abode -were being done on a scale too extravagant to fit the Bettesworths. -The next resulted from an inspection I made of the cottage at -Bettesworth's desire. He was beyond measure proud to have a place into -which he could invite me without shame; and he took me all over it, -and described to me his plans for improving the garden, without -suspicion of anything amiss. Probably his eyes were too dim to see -what I saw. Some of his furniture, already heaped on the floor in one -of the clean new-papered rooms, had a sooty, cobwebby look that filled -me with forebodings of trouble. However, it was too late to withdraw. -There was no going back to that abandoned place down in the valley. -There was nothing to do but hope for the best. - -Hope seemed justified for a week or two, while Bettesworth's new -garden, heretofore a wilderness, assumed a new order. He had sowed -early peas--probably other things too--having actually paid a -neighbour to help him get the ground dug; and he was extremely happy, -until a day came when he said, cautiously and bitterly, "I thinks I -got a enemy." He went on to explain that some one, he suspected, -wanted his cottage, and was trying to get him out of it. I have -forgotten what raised his suspicions. He did not even then realize -that himself, or rather his wife, was the only enemy he had to fear. - -That was the miserable truth, however. Down in that other place, -secluded from the neighbours, the old woman had grown utterly squalid, -though Bettesworth had not seen it. And now the owner of the new -cottage, perhaps from the grounds of the large residence destined for -his friends, had caught sight of old Lucy Bettesworth, and had been, -as anyone else would have been, horrified at her filthy appearance. -But he did not act on that single impression: it was not until kindly -means had been taken to ascertain the truth of it that he first -expostulated, and then told Bettesworth that he could not be permitted -to stay. Nay, I was allowed to try first if persuasion of mine could -remedy the evil. - -Unfortunately, remedies were not in Bettesworth's power, or he would -by now have employed them, being alarmed as well as indignant. He -listened to my hints that his wife was intolerably dirty, but (I write -from memory) "What can I do, sir?" he said. "I knows she en't like -other women, with her bad hand and all." (She had broken her wrist -some years before, and never regained its strength.) "But I can't -afford to dress her like a lady. I told 'n so to his head: 'I can't -keep a dressed-up doll,' I says." Neither could he, being so nearly -blind, see that his wife was going about unwashed, grimy, like a -dreadful apparition of poverty from the Middle Ages. To her it would -have been useless to speak. Her epilepsy had impaired her intellect, -and any suggestion of reform, even from her own husband, seemed to her -a piece of persecution to be obstinately resented. - -So there was nothing to be done. The prospective tenants of the big -house near by could not be expected to endure such a neighbour; the -cottage itself, which had cost L20 for repairs, the owner told me, was -no place for such a tenant. The Bettesworths therefore must go. They -received formal notice to quit; then, as nothing appeared to be -happening, a more peremptory notice was sent limiting their time to -three weeks, yet promising a sovereign as compensation for the work -done and the crops planted in the garden. In the meantime they had -probably done more than a sovereign's worth of damage to the cottage -interior, with its new paper and paint. - -But though nothing appeared to be happening, the two old people were -secretly in a state near to distraction. The reader will remember the -peculiar topography of this parish, with the tenements dotted about -for a mile or more on the northern slope of the valley. All up and -down this district, and then on the other side, where he was less at -home, Bettesworth hunted in vain for an available cottage within -possible reach of his work: there was not one to be found. And now he -realized his physical feebleness. Years ago, miles would not have -mattered; he could have shifted to another village and defied the -demands of our new-come town civilization; but now a walk of a mile -would be a consideration. His legs were too old and stiff for a long -walk as well as a day's work. - -For several days--and days are money, especially to a working-man--he -searched up and down, his despair increasing, his dismay deepening, at -every fresh disappointment. I began to fear he would break down. He -could not sleep, nor yet could his wife. She had been crying half the -night--so he told me after the misery had endured the best part of the -week. "She kep' on, 'Whatever will become of us, Fred? Wherever -_shall_ we go?'" and he, trying to reassure her that they would "find -somewhere to creep into," seemed to be face to face with the -workhouse as his only prospect. So they spent their night, and rose to -a hopeless morning. - -It was time, evidently, for me to take the matter up. Besides, the old -people's trouble was getting on my nerves. Across the valley there was -an empty cottage--one of a pair--which the owner had refused to let on -the strange plea that the tenants who had just left had been so -troublesome and destructive that he was resolved against taking any -others. Such a dry, whimsical old man was this landlord that the story -was not incredible. A retired bricklayer, and a widower, he lived by -himself on next to nothing, not from miserliness but from choice, and -his chief object in life seemed to be to avoid trouble. He had, -however, worked with Bettesworth in years gone by, and was, in fact, a -sort of chum of his, so that it seemed worth while to try what -persuasion would do to shake his resolution of keeping an empty -cottage. And where Bettesworth had failed, I might succeed. - -So, one fine morning--it was near the middle of March by now--I hunted -up this old man--a man as genial and kindly as I wish to see--and made -him a proposal. He showed some reluctance to entertain it. Why? The -truth came out at last: he did not want the Bettesworths for tenants; -he knew the indescribable state of the old woman; it was to her that -he objected; and it was to spare his old chum's feelings that he had -invented that story about being unwilling to let the cottage at all. - -But the case was desperate. How I pleaded it I no longer remember, nor -is it of any importance. I think there were two interviews. In the end -the cottage was let, not direct to Bettesworth, but to me with -permission to sublet it to him; and two, or at most three days -afterwards, Bettesworth was in possession, and the other cottage once -more stood empty. - -So the squalid episode was over. After such a narrow escape from the -workhouse, it was as it were with a gasp of relief that the old couple -settled down in their new abode, safe at last. The place, though, was -not one which Bettesworth would have chosen, had there been a choice. -Down there by the meadow where he had come from, though the cottage -might be crazy, the outlook had been fair. He had been peacefully -alone there; in summer evenings he had heard the men mowing; on winter -nights there was the wind in the withies and the sound of the stream. -But from this time onwards we have to think of him as living in one of -a mean group of tenements which exhibit their stuccoed ugliness -nakedly on a bleak slope above the meadow. As to the neighbours--some -of them resented his coming, for of course the scandal of his wife's -condition was public property by now. With a certain defiant shame, -therefore, he crept in amongst them. Fortunately, the people in the -next-door cottage--an unmarried labourer and his mother--knew -Bettesworth's record, and regarded him as a veteran to be cared for; -and not many weeks passed before the old man felt himself established -in their good-will, and was trying to persuade himself that all was -for the best. - -Of course, he was only partially successful in that endeavour. -Occasional bitter remarks showed that he still harboured a resentment -against the owner of the cottage from which he had been turned out, -and, in fact, there were circumstances which would have made it -difficult for him quite to forget the affair. Perched on one of the -steepest of the bluffs, high above the stream, the cottage in which he -was not good enough to live stood beside the path he now had to travel -to and from his work every day. Often, as his legs grew weary and his -breath short with ascending the footpath, he must have felt tempted to -curse the place. Often it must have seemed to taunt him with his -unfitness. Even when he was at work, there it was full in sight. In -bad weather, and as he grew feebler, it stood there on its uplifted -brow, not sheltering the wife to whom he wanted to go at dinner-time, -but like an obstacle in his way. Instead of being his home, it cut him -off from his home; and he took to bringing his dinner with him, -wrapped in a handkerchief; poor cold food which he frequently left -untasted, preferring a pipe. - -Yet it was not his nature to be embittered. When the peas he had sown -came up, though for another man's benefit, he looked across at them -from this garden and admired them. They were a fine crop and -remarkably early. If, however, they made him a little envious, he was -generous enough to be pleased too. Perhaps the sight comforted him, -proving that he would have done well there, at least with the garden, -if they had let him stay. And certainly he was flattered when the new -tenant, wholly grateful, asked him what sort of peas these were. -"Earliest of All," he replied, giving the name by which he had really -bought them. And by-and-by a joke arose out of the answer, because the -other man would not believe that the peas were really so called, but -thought Bettesworth was "kiddin' of 'n" with a name invented by -himself. The old man had many a chuckle over this piece of -incredulity. "I tells 'n right enough," he laughed; "but he won't have -it." - - - - -XX - - -As may be imagined, the troubles through which Bettesworth had thus -come did nothing to rejuvenate him. On the contrary, they openly -convicted him of old age, and made it patent that he was no longer -very well able to take care of himself. In fact, the man's instinctive -pride in himself had been shaken, and though I do not think he -consciously slackened his efforts to do well, his unconscious, -spontaneous activity was certainly impaired. It was as though the -inner stimulus to his muscles was gone. He forgot to move as fast as -he was able. Sometimes he would, as it were, wake up, and spur himself -back into something like good labouring form; but after a little time -he would relapse, and go dreamily humming about his work like a very -old man. In these days, my own interest in him reached its lowest ebb. -I found myself burdened with a dependent I could not in honour shake -off; but there was little pleasure to be had in thinking of -Bettesworth. Only now and again, when he dropped into reminiscence, -did he seem worth attention; only now and again, in my note-books of -the period, does he re-emerge, telling chiefly of things the present -generations have forgotten. - -To the earliest notice of him for the year an irony attaches, since it -begins by recording with extreme satisfaction the first of those -summer rains which were to make 1903 so memorable and disastrous. How -little did we guess, on that June 10, what was in store for us! My -note describes, almost gloatingly, "one of those gloomy summer -evenings that we get with thundery rain. There is scarcely any wind; -grey cloud, well-nigh motionless, hangs over all the sky; the distant -hills are a stronger grey; the garden is all wet greenness--deep -beyond deep of sombre green, turning black under the denser branches -of the trees. Now and again rain shatters down into the rich -leafage--a solemn noise; and thrushes are vocal; but these sounds do -not disturb the impressive quietness." - -So the entry proceeds, noting how stiff and strong the grass was -already looking after a threat of drought; how the hedgerows were -odorous with the pungent scent of nettles; how the lustrous opaque -white of horse-daisies starred certain grassy banks; and at last, how -all my neighbours who have gardens were as well pleased as myself with -the weather. - -And so the note comes round to Bettesworth. He too, with his head full -of recollections of past summer rains, and of hopes of rich crops to -result from this present one, was glorying in the gloom of the day. -As the old wise toads crept out from hole and wall-cranny and waddled -solemn and moist-skinned across the lawn about their affairs, so -Bettesworth about his, not much regarding a wet coat. He had theories -as to hilling potatoes, or rather as to not hilling them until the -ground could be drawn round the haulm wet. And here was his chance. In -the afternoon he took it, joyfully, and the earth turned up rich and -dark under his beck.[2] - -The tool set him talking. For hilling potatoes he reckoned, a beck is -much better than a hoe: "leaves such a nice crumb on the ground." He -was resolved to have his "five-grained spud" or garden fork turned -into a beck--the next time he went to the town, perhaps, "'cause it -wouldn't take 'em long, jest to turn the neck, and then draw the -rivets an' take the tree out an' put in a handle. 'T'd make a good -tool then--so sharp! - -"This old beck I'm usin'," he went on happily, "I warrant he's a -hunderd year old. He belonged to my wife's gran'father afore I had 'n; -and _I_'ve had 'n this thirty year or more.... He's a reg'lar -hand-made one--and a good tool still. That's who he belonged to--my -old gal's gran'father. - -"He" (the grandfather) "had this place over here o' Warner's--'twas -him as built that, you know." The property mentioned is a large -cottage and garden, adjoining that from which Bettesworth and his -wife had so lately been turned out. "And he was the one as fust -planted Brook's Field. He had Nott's, down here, and Mavin's, and -Brook's Field--and a _purty_ bit that was, too! He was the fust one as -planted it. Dessay he had a hunderd acres. Used to keep a little team, -and a waggon shed--up the lane here, an' come down this lane an' right -in there...." - -But we need not follow Bettesworth into these topographical details. -Returning, in a moment, to the prosperity of his wife's grandfather, -he hinted at the basis of it. The man was a peasant-farmer, producing -for his own needs first, and enjoying certain valuable rights of -common. - -"He used to keep two or three cows," said Bettesworth. "Well, moost -people used to keep a cow then, what _was_ anybody at all. Ye see, the -commons was all open, and the boys what looked after the cows used to -git so much for every one; so the more (cows) they could git the -better their week's wages was for lookin' after 'em. - -"They _was_ some boys too, some of 'em--when there got two or three of -'em up there in the Forest together, 'long o' the cows!" The old man -chuckled grimly. "I rec'lect one time me an' Sonny Mander and his -brother went after one o' the forest ponies. There was hunderds o' -ponies then. Deer, too. And as soon as we caught 'n, I was up on his -back. I didn't care after I got _upon_ 'n. I clung on to his -mane--his mane was down to the ground--and off he went with me, all -down towards Rocknest and"--well, and more topography. "He tore -through everything, an' scratched my face, and I was afraid to get off -for fear he should gallop over me.... And they hollerin' after 'n only -made 'n worse. He run till he was beat, afore I got off. - -"_Purty_ tannin' I got, when I got 'ome! 'Cause me clothes was tore, -and me cap was gone.... Oh, _I_ had beltinker! They had the news afore -I got 'ome, 'cause so many cowboys see me." - -Smiling, Bettesworth resumed work with his ancient beck, by dexterous -twist now right and now left turning the dark wet earth in to the -potato haulm. - - -It was about this time that, our talk working round somehow to the -subject of donkeys, Bettesworth remarked, as if it were a part of the -natural history of those interesting animals, and indeed one of their -specific habits, "Moost donkeys goes after dirty clothes o' Monday -mornin's." I suppose that is true of the donkeys kept by the numerous -cottage laundresses in this parish. - -From this he launched off into a long rambling narrative, which I did -not understand in all its details, of his "old mother-in-law's -donkey," named Jane, whom he once drove down into Sussex for the -harvesting. "She drinked seven pints o' beer 'tween this an' -Chichester. Some policemen give her one pint when we drove down into -Singleton. There was three or four policemen outside the public -there," Goodwood races being on at the time; and these policemen -treated Jane, while Bettesworth went within to refresh himself. "That -an' some bread was all she wanted. I'd took a peck o' corn for her, -but she didn't sim to care about it; and I give a feller thruppence -what 'd got some clover-grass on a cart, but she only had about a -mouthful o' that." In short, Jane preferred bread and beer. "Jest -break a loaf o' bread in half an' put it in a bowl an' pour about a -pint o' beer over 't.... But she'd put her lips into a glass or a cup -and soop it out. Reg'lar coster's donkey, she was, and they'd learnt -her. Not much bigger 'n a good-sized dog--but _trot_!" - -How she trotted, and won a wager, against another donkey on the same -road, was told so confusedly that I could not follow the tale. - -In Sussex, Jane was the delight of the farmer's children. "'May I have -a ride on your donkey?' they'd say, twenty times a day. 'Yes,' I'd -say, 'if you can catch her.' And she'd let 'em go up to her, but as -soon as ever they got on her back they was off again. 'You give her a -bit o' bread,' I'd say; 'p'raps she'll let ye ride then.' And they -used to give her bread," but she would never suffer them to ride her. - -People on the road admired the donkey--nay, the whole equipage. -"Comin' home, down Fernhurst Hill, I got up--'cause I rode down -'ills--I walked all the rest--and says, 'Now, Jane, there's a pint o' -beer for ye at the bottom of the hill.' So we come down" to the inn -there, named by Bettesworth but forgotten by me, "and three or four -farmers there says, 'Here comes the man wi' the little donkey!' And I -called out for a pint, and she thought she was goin' to have it; but I -says, 'No, this is for me. You wait till you got your wind back.'" - -We spoke afterwards of other donkeys, and particularly of one--a -lady's of the neighbourhood--which, as Bettesworth had been told, was -"groomed and put into the stable with a cloth over him, jest like the -other horses.... Law! if donkeys was looked after, they'd _kill_ all -the ponies (by outworking them), but they don't get no chance." - - -The harvesting expeditions into Sussex, and the keeping of cows on the -common, were parts of an antique peasant economy now quite obsolete. -In August of this year a further glimpse of it was obtained, in a -conversation which, I grieve to say, I neglected to set down in -Bettesworth's own words. - - -_August 21, 1903._--There was a time shortly after his marriage, and, -as I guess, between forty and fifty years ago, when he rented a -cottage and garden quite close to this house. The price of wheat being -then two shillings the gallon, he used to grow wheat in his garden; -and his average crop was at the rate of fourteen or fifteen sacks to -the acre, or nearly twice as much as local farmers now succeed in -growing. - -In making this use of his garden he was by no means singular. Many of -his neighbours at that date grew their own corn; and it was Mrs. -Bettesworth's brother (a man still living, and now working a threshing -engine) who dibbed it for them. The dibber ("dessay he got it now") -was described by Bettesworth--a double implement, made for dibbing two -rows at a time. It had two "trees," like spade handles, set side by -side, each of which was socketed into an iron bent forwards like a -letter L. On the under-side of each iron, four excrescences made four -shallow holes in the ground, "about like a egg"; and a rod connecting -the two irons kept the double tool rigid. Walking backwards, the man -using this implement could press into the ground two rows of -egg-shaped holes at a time, as fast as the women could follow with the -seed. For it seems that two women followed the dibber, carrying their -seed-corn in basins and dropping one or two grains into each hole. The -ground was afterwards rolled with a home-made wooden roller; and as -soon as the corn came up the hoe was kept going, the rows being about -eight inches asunder, until the crop was knee high. - -Is it wrong to give so much space to these haphazard recollections? -They interrupt the narrative of Bettesworth's slow and weary -decline--that must be admitted. Yet, following as they do so close -upon his wretched experiences in contact with more modern life, they -help to explain why he and modernity were so much at odds. He had been -a labourer, a soldier, all sorts of things; but he had been first and -last by taste a peasant, with ideas and interests proper to another -England than that in which we are living now. - -In course of time, but not yet, a good deal more was to be gleaned -from him about this former kind of country existence. I shall take it -as it comes, and, while Bettesworth is losing grip of life, let the -contrast between him dying and the modern world eagerly living make -its own effect. As now this detail, and now that, is added to the -mass, perhaps a little of the atmosphere may be restored in which his -mind still had its being, and through which he saw our time, yet not -as we see it. - - -Meanwhile, there is one reminiscence which stands by itself and throws -light on little or nothing, but is too queer to be omitted. Having no -place of its own, it is given here because it comes next in my -note-book. - - -_October 24, 1903._--It was the weather that started our talk. -Bettesworth could not remember anything like this year 1903 for rain. -But there! he supposed we should get some fine weather again -"somewhen?" - -Now, I had just been reading some history, and was able to answer -with some confidence, "Oh yes. There have been wet years before this." -And I mentioned the year after the Battle of Waterloo. - -Then Bettesworth, "Let's see. Battle of Waterloo? That was in '47, -wa'n't it?" - -I chanced to be able to give him the correct date, which he accepted -easily, as if he had known all the time. "Oh ah," he said. "But there -was something in eighteen hunderd and forty-seven--some great affair -or other?... I dunno what 'twas, though, now.... Forty-seven? H'm!" - -What could it have been? No, not the Mutiny. "That come after the -Crimea. 'Twa'n't that. But there was something, I know." - -I could not imagine what it could have been; but Bettesworth still -pondered, and at last an idea struck him. "June, '47.... H'm!... Oh, I -knows. Old Waterloo Day, that's what 'twas! There used to be a lot of -'em" (he was hurrying on, and I could only surmise that he meant -Waterloo veterans) "at Chatham. I see one of 'em there myself, what -had cut one of his hamstrings out o' cowardice, so's he shouldn't have -to go into the battle. So then they cut the other, too, an' kep' 'n -there" (at Chatham) "for a peep-show. He wa'n't never to be buried, -but put in a glass case when he died. - -"He laid up there in his bed, and anybody as mind could go up an' see -'n. They used to flog 'n every Waterloo Day--in the last years 'twas -a bunch o' black ribbons he was flogged with. He had a wooden ball -tied to a bit o' string; and you go up, and ast 'n about the 71st (?), -and see what you'd git! 'Cause one of the soldiers o' the 71st went up -there once, an' called 'n all manner o' things. O' course, when he'd -throwed this ball he could always draw 'n back again, 'cause o' the -string.... And every mornin' he was ast what he'd have to drink. They -said he was worth a lot, and 't'd all go to a sergeant-major's -daughter when he died, what looked after 'n. - -"He was worth a lot o' money. Lots used to go up to see 'n--I did, and -so did a many more, 'cause he was kep' there for show, and everybody -as went up he'd ast 'm for something. He'd git half a crown, or ten -shillin's, or a sovereign sometimes. But lots o' soldiers used to go -an' let 'n have it. - -"Ye see, he couldn't git up. He cut his own hamstring for cowardice, -so's he shouldn't go into battle, and then they cut the other. 'Twas -the Dook o' Wellington, they says, ordered it to be done, for a -punishment. And, o' course, he never was able to walk again. That done -him. There he laid on the bed, with waddin' wrapped all round to -prevent sores. And in one part o' the room was the glass case ready -for when he died, for 'n to be embarmed an' kep'--'cause he was never -to be buried. Fifty year he laid there! I shouldn't much like his bit, -should you?" - -FOOTNOTE: - -[2] A tool of which the iron part resembles that of a garden fork, the -handle, however, being socketed into it at right angles, as in a rake. - - - - -XXI - - -_November 4, 1903._--One morning--it was the 4th of -November--Bettesworth said, "I got a invitation out to a grand dinner -to-night, down in the town. Veterans of the Crimea. But I shan't go. -I'd sooner be at home and have a bit o' supper an' get to bed -early.... No; it don't cost ye nothin'--an' plenty _of_ everything; -spirits, good food, a very good _dinner_. Still, you can't go to these -sort o' things without spendin' a shillin'. And then be about half the -night. I don't care about it. If I was to go, 't'd upset me -to-morrer." - -All this bewildered me. For one thing, it was plain that the fact of -Bettesworth's having been a soldier was no secret after all. As he now -went on to tell me, he had actually attended two previous dinners. Who -were they, then, who knew his record, and got him his invitation? Who, -indeed, was giving the dinner? Rumours of some such annual -celebration, it is true, had reached me; but it was no public -function. Even by name the promoters were unknown to me; and yet -somehow they had known for several years before I did that my man had -been a soldier in the Crimea. - -At the moment, however, it was Bettesworth's refusal of the invitation -that most surprised me, although his alleged reasons were very good. -He so loved good cheer, and he had so few opportunities of enjoying -it--the Oddfellows' dinner was the only other chance he ever had in -any year--that I immediately suspected him of having been swayed in -this instance by something else besides prudence. He sounded -over-virtuous. And presently it struck me that there might have been -something offensive to him in the way the invitation was given. - -It had been received on the previous evening. He had just got round to -the public-house, "'long of old White," when "a feller come in," -inquiring for him. Bettesworth did not know the man; it was "somebody -in a grey suit." "Stood me a glass of hot whisky-and-water, he did, -and old White too." And, referring to Bettesworth's military service, -"'What was ye?' he says. 'A man,' I says. He laughed and says, 'What -are ye drinkin'?' 'Only a glass o' cold fo'penny,' I says." And -Bettesworth seems to have said it in a very meek voice, subtly -insinuating that "the feller" might stand something better. - -I inferred, further, that Bettesworth's conscience was now pricking -him for some incivility he had shown in declining the invitation. At -any rate, he made a lame attempt, not otherwise called for, to prove -that a self-respecting man would not humble himself to anyone upon -whom he was not dependent. He had evidently been the reverse of -humble; and possibly the invitation was patronizing, and raised his -ire. - -"Or else," he concluded, "I be purty near the only veteran left about -here. There used to be Tom Willett and"--another whose name I have -forgotten--"in the town, but they be gone, and I dunno who else there -is. And I knows there's ne'er another in this parish. Dessay they'll -get a few kiddies from Aldershot. 'Cause there's any amount o' -drink...." - -Well, Bettesworth did not go to the dinner, and I never quite -understood why. Possibly he really felt too old for dissipation, even -of a decorous kind: still more likely, he dreaded being at once -under-valued and patronized, among the "kiddies" from Aldershot. He -certainly did well to avoid their company. Long afterwards, when for -other reasons I was making inquiries about this dinner, I learnt that -the behaviour of some of the guests had been scandalous. Some had been -carried away, drunk. Others had taken with them, hidden in their -pockets, the means of getting drunk at home. So I was told; but not by -the promoters, who had shortly afterwards left the neighbourhood. - - -On this same date (4th November, 1903) Bettesworth informed me of -another circumstance which affected him seriously. It was that he had -lately been superannuated from his club, which he had joined in July, -1866. At that distant time, when he was still a young man, and a -strong one, how should he look forward to the year 1903? By what then -seemed a profitable arrangement, he paid his subscription on a lower -scale, on the understanding that he would receive no financial help in -time of sickness after he was sixty-five years old. He had now passed -that age. Henceforth, for a payment of threepence a month, he was to -have medical attendance free, and on his death the club would pay for -his funeral. - -He was mighty philosophical over this. For my part, it was impossible -to look forward without apprehension to the position he would be in -during the approaching winter. A year previously he had shown symptoms -of bronchitis. But what was to become of him now, if he should be ill, -and have no "sick-pay" upon which to fall back? - - - - -XXII - - -I think it must have been during the winter we have reached that the -village policeman stopped me in the road one night to talk about old -Mrs. Bettesworth. He told me, what I vaguely knew, that she was -increasingly ill. Once, if not oftener (I write from memory), he had -helped get her home out of the road, where she had fallen in a fit; -and a fear was upon him that she would come to some tragical end. Then -there would be an inquest; Bettesworth might be blamed for omitting -necessary precautions; at any rate, trouble and scandal must ensue. -The policeman proposed that it would be well if a doctor could see the -old woman occasionally, and suggested that through my influence with -Bettesworth it might be arranged. - -Although I promised to see what could be done to carry out so -thoughtful a suggestion, and meant to keep my promise, as a matter of -fact no steps towards its performance were ever taken; and the thing -is mentioned here only as a piece of evidence as to the conditions in -which Bettesworth passed the winter. In the background of his mind, -there stood always the circumstances which had inspired apprehension -in the policeman. I never noted down his dread, because it was too -constant a thing; and for a like reason, he seldom spoke of it; but -there it always was, immovable. The policeman's talk merely shows that -the reasons for it were gathering in force. - -Save for one or two other equally vague memories, that winter is lost, -so far as Bettesworth is concerned. We had some cold though not really -severe weather--nothing so terrible as an odd calculation of his would -have made it out to be. "For," said he, "we _be_ gettin' it! The -Vicar's gardener says there was six degrees o' frost this mornin'.... -And five yesterday; an' seven the mornin' before. That makes eighteen -degrees!" So he added up the thermometer readings; and, associated -with his words, there comes back to me a winter afternoon in which the -air had grown tense and still. Under an apple-tree, where the ground, -covered with thin snow, was too hard frozen for a tool to penetrate, -the emptyings of an ash-bin from the kitchen lay in a little heap; and -a dozen or so of starlings were quarrelling over this refuse, flying -up to spar at one another, and uttering sharp querulous cries. A white -fog hung in the trees. It was real winter, and I laughed to myself, to -think what a record Bettesworth might make of it by the following -morning. - -Seeing that every winter now he was troubled with a cough, I may as -well give here some undated sentences I have preserved, in which he -described how he caught cold on one occasion. "If I'd ha' put on my -wrop as soon 's I left off work," he said, "I should ha' bin aw-right. -'Stead o' that, I went scrawneckin' off 'ome jest's I was, an' that's -how I copt it." The word scrawnecking, whatever he meant by it, -conjures up a picture of him boring blindly ahead with skinny throat -uncovered. He took little care of himself; and considering how ill-fed -he went now that his wife was so helpless, it was small wonder that he -suffered from colds. They did not improve his appetite. They spoilt -many a night's rest for him, too. At such times, the account he used -to give of his coughing was imitative. "Cough cough cough, all night -long." A strong accent on the first and fourth syllables, and a "dying -fall" for the others, gives the cadence. - -Beyond these memories nothing else is left of Bettesworth's -experiences during those three months--December, 1903, and January and -February, 1904. Coming to March, I might repeat some interesting -remarks of his upon an affair then agitating the village; but after -all they do not much concern his history, and there are strong reasons -for withholding them. And suppressing these, I find no further account -of him until the middle of May. - -The interval, however, between the 3rd of March and the 16th of May, -was sadly eventful for Bettesworth. I cannot say much about it. As -once before when his circumstances grew too tragical, so on this -occasion a vague sense of decency forbade me to sit down and record in -cold blood his sufferings, perhaps for future publication. - -What happened was briefly this: that some time in March one of the -colds which had distressed him all the winter settled upon his chest -and rapidly turned to bronchitis. If his wife's condition is taken -into account, the seriousness of the situation will be appreciated. At -his time of life bronchitis would have been bad enough, even with good -nursing; but poor old Lucy Bettesworth was far past devoting to her -husband any attention of that sort. Even in her best state she was -past it, and she was by no means at her best just now. She needed care -herself; had a heavy cold; was at times beyond question slightly -crazy; and, to aggravate the trouble, she was insulting even to the -two or three neighbours who might have conquered their reluctance to -enter the filthy cottage and help the old man. For perhaps a week, -therefore, he lay uncared for, and none realized how ill he was. Only -the next-door neighbour spoke of hearing him coughing all night long. - -The old woman received me downstairs when I went to make inquiries. -She sat with her hand at her chest, dishevelled and unspeakably dirty. -And she coughed; tried to attract my sympathy to herself; assured me -"I be as bad as he is"; looked indeed ill, and half-witted. "You can -go up and see 'n," she said. I stumbled up the stairs and found -Bettesworth in bed, with burning cheeks and eyes feverishly bright. -The bedding was disgusting; so were the remains of a bloater left on -the table beside him, so much as to give me a feeling of nausea. As -for nursing, he had had none. He had got out of bed the previous night -and found a packet of mustard, of which he had shaken some into his -hand, and rubbed that into his chest, dry; and that was the only -remedy that had been used for his bronchitis, unless--yes, I think -there was a bottle of medicine on the mantelpiece; for he was still -entitled to the services of the club doctor, who had been sent for. -But in such a case, what could a doctor do? - -The next day the old man was worse, at times wandering in his mind. -And, as there was no one else to take the initiative, and as he looked -like dying and involving us all in disgrace, I interviewed the doctor -and--but the story grows wearisome. - -To finish, then: the workhouse infirmary was decided upon, as the only -place where Bettesworth could get the nursing without which he would -probably die. Fortunately, he received the proposal reasonably; he was -ready to go anywhere to get well, as he felt that he never would at -home. He merely stipulated that his wife must not be left. A walk to -find the relieving officer and get the necessary orders from him was -to me the only pleasant part of the episode. It took me, on a -brilliant spring evening, some three miles farther into the country, -where I saw the first primroses I had seen outside my garden that -year. It also enabled me to see how parish relief looks from the side -of the poor who have to ask for it, but that was not so pleasant. -However, the officer was civil enough; he gave me the necessary -orders; we made all the arrangements, and on the following day the two -old Bettesworths were driven off miserably in a cab to the workhouse. - -How fervently everybody hoped, then, that Bettesworth would leave his -wife behind, if he ever came out of the institution himself alive! And -yet, though it's true he was dependent on me for the wherewithal to -keep his home together, how much nobler was his own behaviour than -that we would have commended! Once in the infirmary, he recovered -quickly; and in ten days, to my amazement (and annoyance at the time), -word came that the old couple were out again. They had toddled feebly -home--a two-mile journey; they two together, not to be separated; each -of them the sole person in the world left to the other. The old woman, -people told me, was amazingly clean. Her hair, which had been cut, -proved white beyond expectation; her face was almost comely now that -it was washed. Had I not seen her? What a pity it was, wasn't it, the -old man wouldn't leave her up there to be took care of, and after all -the trouble it had been, too, to get 'em there! - -I believe it was on the day before Good Friday (1904) that they -returned home. When Bettesworth got to work again is more than my -memory tells me. I suppose, though, that I must have paid him a visit -first--probably during the following week; for I remember hoping to -see the old woman's white hair and clean face, and being disappointed -to find her as grimy as ever--her visage almost as black as her hands, -and her hair an ashy grey. - - - - -XXIII - - -_May 16, 1904._--"It is long," says a note of the 16th of May, "since -I wrote down any of Bettesworth's talk; but it flows on -constantly--less vivacious than of old, perhaps, for he is visibly -breaking since his illness in the spring, and is a stiff, shiftless, -rather weary, rather sad old man; but his garrulity has not lost its -flavour of the country-side; and many of his sayings sound to me like -the traditional quips and phrases of earlier generations." - -This was apropos of a remark he had let fall about a certain Mr. -Sparrow in an adjacent village, for whom Bettesworth's next-door -neighbour Kiddy Norris had been labouring, until Kiddy could no longer -endure the man's grasping ways. Stooping over his wooden grass-rake, -Bettesworth murmured, as if to the grass, "Old Jones used to say -Sparrows pecks." Then he told how Sparrow, deprived of the services -not only of Kiddy, but of Kiddy's mate Alf, was at a loss for men to -replace them; and, "Ah," Bettesworth commented, "he can't have 'em on -a peg, to take down jest when he mind to." The saying had a suggestive -old-world sound: I could imagine it handed about, on the Surrey -hill-sides, and in cottage gardens, and at public-houses, over and -over again through many years. - -Presently Bettesworth said casually, "I hear they're goin' to open -that new church over here in Moorway's Bottom to-morrer. Some of 'em -was terrifyin' little Alf Cook about it last night" (Sunday night; -probably at the public-house), "tellin' him he was goin' to be made -clerk, and he wouldn't be tall enough to reach to ring the bell." - -"Little Alf," I asked, "who used to work for So-and-so?" - -"Worked for 'n for years. The boys do terrify 'n. Tells 'n he won't be -able to reach to ring the bell. They keeps on. Why, he en't tall -enough to pick strawberries, they says." - -"He's got a family, hasn't he?" - -"Yes--but they be all doin' for theirselves. Two or three of 'em be -married. _He_ might ha' bin doin' very well. His old father left 'n -the house he lives in, and a smart bit o' ground: but I dunno--some of -'em reckons 'tis purty near all gone." - -"Down his neck?" - -"Ah. They was talkin' about 'n last night, and they seemed to reckon -there wa'n't much left. But he's a handy little feller. Bin over there -at Cashford this six weeks, so he told me, pointin' hop-poles for they -Fowlers. He said he'd had purty near enough of it. But he poled, I -thinks he said, nine acres o' hop-ground for 'em last year. He bin -pointin' this year. He says he might do better if 'twas nearer -home--he can't git rid o' the chips over there; people won't have 'em. -If he'd got 'em here, they'd be worth sixpence a sack--that always was -the price. He gits so much a hunderd for pointin'; and he told me it -was as much as he could do to earn two-and-nine or three shillin's" (a -day). "Then o' course there's the chips, only he can't sell 'em. -Cert'nly they'd serve he for firin'; but that en't what he wants." - - -_May 20._--"There's a dandy. You lay there." Bettesworth chose out and -put on one side a dandelion from the grass he was chopping off a green -path. "I'll take he home for my rabbits," he said. - -A sow-thistle in the near bank caught my eye. "Your rabbits will eat -sow-thistles too, won't they?" I asked. - -"Yes, they likes 'em very well. They'll eat 'em--an' then presently I -shall eat they." - -I pulled up the thistle, and another dandelion, while Bettesworth -discoursed of the economics of rabbit-keeping. "'Ten't no good keepin' -'em for the pleasure.... But give me a wild rabbit to eat afore a tame -one, any day. My neighbour Kid kills one purty near every week. He had -one last Sunday must ha' wanted some boilin', or bakin', or -somethin'." - -"What, an old one?" - -"Old buck. I ast 'n, 'What, have ye had yer teeth ground, then?' I -says. He's purty much of a one for rabbits." - -I was not so wonderfully fond of them, I said. - -"No? I en't had e'er a one--I dunno _when_. Well--a rabbit, you come -to put one down afore a hungry man, what is it? He's mother have gone -an' bought one for 'n at a shop, when he en't happened to have one -hisself--give as much as a shillin' or fifteenpence. 'Ten't worth it. -Or else I've many a time bought 'em for sixpence--sixpence, or -sixpence-ha'penny, or sevenpence. And they en't worth no more." - -During all this he was sweeping up his grass cuttings. The children -came out of school for afternoon recess, and their shoutings sounded -across the valley. "There's the rebels let loose again," said -Bettesworth. From where we stood, high on one of the upper terraces of -the garden, we could see far. The sky was grey and melancholy. A wind -blew up gustily out of the south-east, and I foreboded rain. "We don't -want it from that quarter," Bettesworth replied. "That's such a _cold_ -rain. And I've knowed it keep on forty-eight hours, out o' the -east.... I felt a lot better" (of the recent bronchitis) "when she" -(the wind) "shifted out o' there before." - -Meanwhile I had pulled up one or two more dandelions, to add to -Bettesworth's heap; and now I espied a small seedling of bryony, which -also I was careful to pull out. The root, already as big as a man's -thumb, came up easily, and I passed it to Bettesworth, asking, "Isn't -that what they give to horses sometimes?" - -He handled it. "I never _heared_ of anybody," he answered, perhaps not -recognizing it at this small stage of growth. "Now, ground _ivy_! -That's a rare thing. If you bakes the roots o' that in the oven, an' -then grinds it up to a powder, you no need to _call_ yer horses to ye, -after you've give 'em that. They'll foller ye for it. Dandelion roots -the same. Make 'em as fat! And their coats come up mottled, jest as if -you'd knocked 'em all over with a 'ammer. They'll foller ye about -anywhere for that. _I_'ve give it to 'em, many's a time; bin out, -after my day's work, all round the hedges, purpose to get things for -my 'osses. There's lots o' things in the hedgerow as is good for 'em. -So there is for we too, if we only knowed which they was. We shouldn't -want much _doctor_ if we knowed about herbs. - -"Old Waterson, he used to eat dandelion leaves same as you would a -lettuce, and he said it done 'n good, too. Old Steve Blackman was -another. He used to know all about the herbs. If you went into his -kitchen, you'd see it hung all round with little bundles of 'em, to -dry. _He_ was the only one as could cure old Rokey Wells o' the yeller -janders. Gunner had tried 'n--all the doctors had tried 'n, and give -'n up. He'd bin up there at the infirmary eighteen months or more, -till old Steve see 'n one day and took to 'n. And he made a hale -hearty man of 'n again. - -"That 'ere Holt--Tom Holt, _you_ know, what used to be keeper at -Culverley--_he_ got the yeller janders now. He's pensioned off--twelve -shillin's a week, and his cot and firin'. Lives in Cashford Bridge -house--you knows that old farmhouse as you goes over Cashford Bridge. -He lives there now. If old Steve's son got his father's book now, -he'll be able to cure 'n. He used to keep a book where he put all the -receipts, so 't is to be hoped his son have kep' it. They says Holt -'ve got the yeller janders wonderful strong, but if...." - - -_May 24._--In Bettesworth's opinion, an important part of the training -of a labourer relates to getting about and finding work. The old man -was at the Whit Monday fete with a man named Vickery, of whom he -talked, imitating Vickery's gruff voice with appreciation. -Vickery--sixty or seventy years old--came (I learn) from a village out -Guildford way--"that was his native," says Bettesworth--but was -adopted by an aunt in this parish, who left him her two cottages at -her death. All this, if not interesting to us, was deeply so to -Bettesworth. And Vickery, it appears, has worked all his life in one -situation, at Culverley Park. He began as a boy minding sheep. As a -man, he managed the gas-house belonging to the mansion; and when the -electric light was installed, he took over the management of that, -making up his time with chopping fire-wood, and so forth. And, says -Bettesworth, "They'd ha' to set fire to Culverley to get rid of 'n. He -never worked nowhere else. That's how they be down there. Old Smith's -another of 'em. He bin there forty year. He turned seventy, here a -week ago. Never had but two places, and bin at Culverley forty year. -Why, if they was turned out they wouldn't know how to go about. Same -when Mr. John Payne died: there was a lot o' young fellers turned off. -They hadn't looked out for theirselves; their fathers had always got -the work for 'em, and law! they didn' know where to go no more than a -cuckoo! But I reckon that's a very silly thing." - - - - -XXIV[3] - - -_June 1, 1904._--A cool thundery rain this first of June drove -Bettesworth to shelter. As usual at such times, he busied himself at -sawing and splitting wood for kindling fires. - -At the moment of my joining him he was breaking up an old wooden -bucket which had lately been condemned as useless. "Th' old bucket's -done for," he said contemplatively. "I dessay he seen a good deal o' -brewin'; but there en't much of it done now. A good many men used to -make purty near a livin' goin' round brewin' for people. Brown's in -Church Street used to be a rare place for 'em. Dessay you knows -there's a big yard there; an' then they had some good tackle, and -plenty o' room for firin'. Pearsons, Coopers"--he named several who -were wont to make use of Brown's yard and tackle. I asked, "Did the -cottage people brew?" But Bettesworth shook his head. "I never knowed -none much--only this sugar beer." - -"But they grew hops?" I asked. - -"Oh yes," Bettesworth assented, "every garden had a few hills o' -hops. But 't wa'n't very often they brewed any malted beer. Now 'n -again one 'd get a peck o' malt, but gen'ly 'twas this here sugar -beer. Or else I've brewed over here at my old mother-in-law's, 'cause -they had the tackle, ye see; and so I have gone over there when I've -killed a pig, to salt 'n." - -A suggestion that he would hardly know how to brew now caused him to -smile. "No, I don't s'pose I should," he admitted. - -I urged next that nearly all people, I supposed, used at one time to -brew their own beer. To which Bettesworth: - -"And so they did bake their own bread. They'd buy some flour...." - -I interrupted, remembering how he had himself grown corn, to ask if -that was not rather the custom. - -"Sometimes. Yes, I _have_ growed corn as high as my own head, up there -at the back of this cot.... But my old gal and me, when hoppin' was -over, we'd buy some flour, enough to last us through the winter, and -then with some taters, and a pig salted down, I'd say, 'There, we no -call to _starve_, let the winter be _what_ it will.' Well, taters, ye -see, didn't cost nothin'; and then we always had a pig. You couldn't -pass a cottage at that time that hadn't a pigsty.... And there was -milk, and butter, and bread...." - -"But not many comforts?" I queried. - -"No; 'twas rough. But I dunno--they used to look as strong an' jolly -as they do now. But 'twas poor money. The first farm-house I went to I -never had but thirty shillin's and my grub." - -"Thirty shillings in how long?" - -"Twal'month. And I had to pay my washin' an' buy my own clothes out o' -that." - -The point was interesting. Did he buy his clothes at a shop, ready -made? - -"Yes. That was always same as 'tis now. Well, there was these round -frocks--you'd get _they_"--home-made, he meant. And he told how his -sister-in-law, Mrs. Loveland, and her mother "used to earn half a -living" at making these "round" or smock frocks to order, for -neighbours. The stuff was bought: the price for making it up was -eighteen-pence, "or if you had much work on 'em, two shillin's." - -Much fancy-work, did he mean? - -"The gaugin', you know, about here." Bettesworth spread his hands over -his chest, and continued, "Most men got 'em made; their wives 'd make -'em. Some women, o' course, if they wasn't handy wi' the needle, 'd -git somebody else to do 'em. They was warmer 'n anybody 'd think. And -if you bought brown stuff, 'tis surprisin' what a lot o' rain they'd -keep out. One o' them, and a woollen jacket under it, and them yello' -leather gaiters right up your thighs--you could go out in the rain.... -But 'twas a white round frock for Sundays." - -At this point I let the talk wander; and presently Bettesworth was -relating perhaps the least creditable story he ever told me about -himself. In judging him, however, if anyone desires to judge him after -so many years, the circumstances should be borne in mind. The farm-lad -on thirty shillings a year, the young soldier from the Crimea where he -had been rationed on rum, marrying at last and settling down in this -village where the rough eighteenth-century habits still lingered, -might almost be expected to shock his twentieth-century critics. Be it -admitted that his behaviour on the death of his father-in-law was -disgraceful; but let it be allowed also that that father-in-law, the -old road-foreman, was a drunken tyrant--at times a dangerous -madman--at whose death it was natural to rejoice. However, I will let -Bettesworth get on with his story. - -The "white round frock on Sundays" reminded him of his father-in-law's -costume-frock as described, tall hat, and knee-breeches; and this -recalled (here on this rainy June day where we talked in the shed) how -tall a man he was; and how, lying on the floor in the stupor of death, -just across the lane there, he looked "like a great balk o' timber." -Confusedly the narrative hurried on after this. A cottage was -mentioned, which used to stand where now that resident lives who could -not endure the Bettesworths for his tenants. This was the maiden home -of Bettesworth's mother-in-law; and to this the mother-in-law would -flee for refuge, in terror of being murdered by her husband in his -drunken frenzies. Then would the husband follow, and "break in all -the windows"; for which he was "kept out" of the owner's will, and -lost much property that would have been his. Particulars of his -suicide followed: the man cut his throat and lay speechless for eight -days before he died. But at the first news Bettesworth, being one -son-in-law, was dispatched to a village some five miles distant, to -fetch home another. He borrowed a pony and cart; found his -brother-in-law, "and," he said, "we both got as boozy as billyo on the -way home.... ''Arry,' I says, 'the old foreman bin an' done for -hisself.'" At every public-house they came to they had beer, treating -the pony also; and finally they came racing through the town at full -speed. "We should ha' bin locked up for it now. No mistake we _come_, -when we did get away. And when we got 'ome, 'Arry stooped over to -speak to 'n, an' fell over on his face. I didn't wait for _my_ -lecture: I had to get the pony home. It was runnin' off 'n, when I got -'n down to his stable, with the pace we'd made, an' the beer he'd had. -We should ha' got into trouble for it if 't had been now. The old -woman come out, an' begun goin' on about it; but the old man says, -'You might be sure they'd travel, for such a job. And he won't be none -the worse for it.' We put 'n in the stable, an' give 'n another pint -o' beer, and rubbed 'n down an' throwed two or three hop-sacks over -'n; an' next mornin' he was as right as ever." - -"How long ago?" I asked. - -"I 'most forgets how long ago 'twas. A smartish many years. His -wife--she bin dead this--let's see--three-an'-twenty year; and she -lived a good many years after he." - -She had property--her husband's, no doubt--which her son Will -(Bettesworth's wife's brother, remember) inherited, yet only by the -skin of his teeth. For if some infant or other had breathed after -birth, that infant's relatives would have been the heirs. On this sort -of subject people like Bettesworth are always most tedious and -obscure. As to the household stuff, it was to be divided; "and when it -come to our turn to choose," Bettesworth said, "my old gal and me said -Will could have ourn. We'd got old clutter enough layin' about, and -Will hadn't got none, ye see, always livin' with his mother. So he had -the stuff an' the cot. They" (the rival party) "had two or three tries -for it; but 'twas proved that the child never breathed. My wife's -sister Jane thought _she_ was goin' to get it. But I says, 'No, Jane; -you wears the wrong clothes. That belongs to William.'" - -Bettesworth ceased. In the ten or fifteen minutes while he had been -talking we had got far from the subject of peasant industries; and yet -somehow the thought of them was still present to both of us, and when -he grew silent I nodded my head contemplatively, murmuring something -about "queer old times." "Yes," he returned, "a good many wouldn't be -able to tell ye how they _did_ bring up a family o' childern, if you -was to ast 'em." And so, with the rain pattering down upon the shed -roof, I left the old man to his wood-chopping. - - -_June 11, 1904._--The twentieth century is driving out the -old-fashioned people and their savagery from the village, but here and -there it lets in savagery of its own. Into that hovel down by the -stream, which Bettesworth had vacated, there had come fresh tenants, -as I knew; but that was all I knew until one morning Bettesworth told -me something, which I lost no time in hurrying down on to paper, while -his sentences were hot in my mind, as follows: - -"Ha' ye heared about our neighbours down 'ere runnin' away?" - -"No! Where?" - -"Down here where I used to live. Gone off an' left their little -childern to the wide world." - -"Well, but ... who...?" - -"Worcester they _calls_ 'n. But I dunno what his name is." - -"Where did he come from? I don't seem to know him." - -"No, nor me. I dunno nothin' about 'n. He bin a sojer an' got a -pension. He bin at work down at this Bordon. But his wife bin carryin' -on purty much. Had another bloke about there this fortnight. An' then -went off, an' give one of her little childern a black eye for a -partin' gift. He come 'ome o' Sunday, and didn't find nobody about -there; and took all there was and his pension papers and was off. And -there's them two poor little dears left there alone wi' nobody to look -after 'em or get 'em a bit o' vittles." - -Of course I exclaimed, while Bettesworth went on, - -"Ah ... I reckon they ought to be hung up by the heels, leavin' their -childern like that. I always _was_ fond o' childern, but if 't 'd bin -older ones able to look after theirselves I shouldn't ha' took so much -notice. But these be two little 'ns ben't 'ardly able to dress -theirselves: two little gals about five or six. Poor little dears, -there was one of 'em went cryin' 'cause her mother was goin' away, and -her mother up with her hand and give her one. Law! somebody ought to -ha' bin there with a stick and hit her across the head and killed her -dead! - -"There they was all day and all night. Mrs. Mardon went to the -policeman about it. He said she better take care of 'em. 'But I can't -afford to keep 'em,' she says. 'No,' he says, 'cert'nly not. 'Ten't to -be expected you should. But you look after 'em for a week, an' we'll -see if their parents comes back. And if they don't, we'll see the -relievin' officer, an' pay you for your trouble; and the children 'll -be took to the workhouse, and then we shall very soon _have_ 'em'" -(the parents). "And so they will, too. They says he's gone to -Salisbury. But they'll have 'n. Old soldier, and a pensioner, and all: -they'll find 'n." - -"What's his name, do you say?" - -"They _calls_ 'n Worcester: we dunno whether 'tis his right name, or -only a nickname. He ought to _ha'_ Worcester! He's like 'nough to cop -it, too!" - -FOOTNOTE: - -[3] The earlier portions of this chapter have already appeared in -_Country Life_. - - - - -XXV - - -_June 20._--On the afternoon of June 20th, once more Bettesworth was -at work among the potatoes, yet not in the circumstances of last year, -when we were rejoicing in the rain. According to my book, this was "a -real summer afternoon--Hindhead showing the desired dazzling blue; -soft high clouds floating from the westwards; a soft wind occasionally -stirring the trees." Blackbirds, it seems, were flitting about the -garden to watch their young, warning them, too, with an incessant -"twit-twit, twit-twit"; and no doubt, besides this June sound, there -was that of garden tools struck into the soil. - -And yet, for me, rather than the far-reaching daylight or the -vibrating afternoon air, another of the great characteristics of -English summer clings to this and the following few fragments about -Bettesworth. I might look away to Hindhead and rejoice in the sense of -vast warm distance; I might admire the landscape, and practise my -aesthetics; but he was becking in amongst the potatoes, and it is his -point of view, not mine, that has survived and given its tinge to -these talks. - -Forgetful, both of us, that the same subject in almost the same place -had occupied us a year ago, we spoke of his work; and first he admired -the potatoes, and then he praised his beck. "Nice tool," he said. I -took hold of it: "Hand-made, of course?" "Yes; belonged to my old -gal's gran'mother. There's no tellin' how old he is." - -He went on to explain that it was a "polling beck," pointing out -peculiarities hardly to be described here. They interested me; yet not -so much as other things about the tool, which it was good to handle. -From the old beck a feeling came to me of summer as the country -labourers feel it. This thing was probably a hundred years old. -Through a hundred seasons men's faces had bent over it and felt the -heat of the sun reflecting up from off the potatoes, as the tines of -the beck brightened in the hot soil. And what sweat and sunburn, yet -what delight in the crops, had gone to the polishing of the handle! A -stout ash shaft, cut in some coppice years ago, and but rudely -trimmed, it shone now with the wear of men's hands; and to balance it -as I did, warm and moist from Bettesworth's grasp, was to get the -thrill of a new meaning from the afternoon. For those who use such -tools do not stop to admire the summer, but they co-operate with it. - -The old man took his beck again, and I saw the sunlight beating down -upon his back and brown arms as he once more bent his face to the -work. Then our talk changed. Soon I fetched a tool for myself, so as -to be working near him and hear his chatter. - -He touched on scythes for a moment, and then glanced off to name a -distant village (a place which lies on a valley side, facing the -midday heat), and to tell of a family of blacksmiths who once lived -there. "They used to make purty well all sorts o' edge-tools. And they -earned a name for 't, too, didn't they? I've see as many as four of -'em over there at a axe. Three with sledge-'ammers, and one with a -little 'ammer, tinkin' on the anvil." "And he is the master man of -them all," I laughed. Bettesworth laughed too--we were so happy there -in the broiling sunshine--"Yes, but I've often noticed it, the others -does all the work." To which I rejoined, "But he keeps time to the -sledges; and it's he who knows to a blow when they have done enough." -"There was one part of making a axe," said Bettesworth, "as they'd -never let anybody see 'em at." What could that have been? We agreed -that it had to do with some secret process of hardening the steel. - -Another shifting of the talk brought us round to his -brother-in-law--that accomplished farm-labourer, who was then, -however, driving a traction engine, with one truck which carried three -thousand bricks. "That must do away with a lot of hoss hire," said -Bettesworth. "And yet," I urged, "there seem more horses about than -ever." "And they be dear to buy, so Will Crawte says," added -Bettesworth. - -"How many load," I asked ignorantly, "do you reckon three thousand -bricks? More than a four-horse load, isn't it?" - -Bettesworth made no effort to reckon, but said easily, "Yes. They -reckons three hunderd an' fifty is a load, of these here wire-cut -bricks; four hunderd, of the old red bricks; and stock bricks is five -hunderd. And slates, 'Countess' slates--they be twenty inches by -ten--six hunderd o' they goes to a load." - -Wondering at his knowledge, I commented on the endless variety of -technical details never dreamt of by people like myself; and -Bettesworth assented, without interest, however, in me or other people -or anything but his subject. "That's one o' the things you wants to -learn, if you be goin' with hosses--when you got a load. Law! half o' -these carters on the road dunno whether they got a load or whether -they en't. I've almost forgot now; but I learnt it once." - -"How do you mean 'learnt' it? Picked it up?" - -"No. 'Tis in a book. You can learn to reckon things.... If you be -goin' for a tree, or a block o' stone, or bricks, you wants to know -what's a load for a hoss, or a two or a three hoss load. A mason told -me once, when I was goin' for a block o' stone. He put his tape round -it, an' told me near the matter what it weighed. He said you always -ought to carry a two-foot rule in your pocket; and then put it across -the stone--or p'r'aps 'tis two or three bits you got to take...." - -As there is nothing in the talk itself to give the impression, it must -have been my working in the sunshine when I heard of these details, -that now makes them--the glaring stone-mason's yard, the village -smithy, the engine hauling bricks along the high road--seem all -sun-baked and dusty, in the heat which men like Bettesworth have to -face, while I am admiring the summer landscape. - - -Twice in the early days of July the old man's homely rustic living is -touched upon. By now, in the cottage gardens, the broad-beans are at -their best; and he desires, it is said in one place, no better food -than beans, served for choice with a bit of bacon. But there are peas -too; and one day he tells me simply that he "had peas three times -yesterday. There's always some left from dinner, and then I has 'em in -a saucer for my supper." - - -_July 29._--As July ran to its close, the weather, though still warm, -turned gloomy, and showers came streaking down in front of the grey -dismal distance. "They gives a _poor_ account of the harvest," says -Bettesworth. "What? have they started?" I ask; and he, "Yes, I've -heared of a smartish few." - -I supposed he meant in Sussex; but it appeared not. "No," he said, "I -dunno as they've begun in Sussex, but about here. Lent corn, oats, -an' barley, an' so on. There's So-and-so"--he named three or four -farmers reported to have begun cutting, and went on, "But 'tis all -machine work, so there won't be much" (extra work). "But the straw -en't no higher 'n your knees in some parts, so they says.... 'Twas the -cold spring--an' then the dryth. But it don't much matter about the -barley. I've heared old people say they've knowed barley sowed and up -and harvested without a drop o' rain on it fust to last. Where you -gets straw" (with other crops, I suppose, is the meaning) "there en't -no fear about the barley: 'tis a thing as 'll stand dryth as well as -purty near anything." - -He had "heard old people say"--things like these that he was now -saying. And Bettesworth's phrase will bear thinking of, for its -indication of the topics which the progress of the summer months had -always been wont to renew in his brain year by year. - -Unhappily, about this period something less pleasing was beginning to -force itself upon his attention. - - - - -XXVI - - -Into the peacefulness of Bettesworth's last working summer a -disquieting circumstance had been slowly intruding; and now, with -August, it developed into a subject of grave fears. I do not know when -I first noticed a small sore on the old man's lower lip, but I think -it must have been in May or early June. On being asked, he said it had -been there since his illness in the spring, and "didn't seem to get no -worse." Certainly he was not troubling about it. - -Weeks passed, perhaps six weeks, in which, though the ugly, angry look -of the thing sometimes took my attention, I forbore to speak of it -again, being unwilling to arouse alarm. Then it occurred to me that if -I was too fanciful, Bettesworth was not fanciful enough. In his robust -out-door life he had never learnt to be nervous and anticipate -horrors; and he might not be sufficiently alive to the dreadful -possibilities which were presenting themselves to my own imagination. -I urged him accordingly to see his club doctor. - -He did so, not immediately, though after how long an interval I am -unable to say, since none of this affair got into my note-book. The -doctor no sooner saw the sore than he said it must be cut out. "Do -you smoke?" was one of his first questions; and "Where is your pipe?" -was the next. Bettesworth produced his pipe--an old blackened -briar--and was comforted to learn that it was considered harmless. But -he must have the sore removed, and his two or three remaining teeth -near it would have to come out. When could he have it done? the doctor -asked. Bettesworth said that he must consult me on that point, and -came away promising to do so. - -Considering how sure he must have been that I should put no obstacle -in his way, I incline to think that by now he must himself have begun -to feel alarm. He waited, however, about a week, and then one morning -off he went again to see the doctor, half expecting, I believe, to -have the operation done then and there, before he came home. - -An hour afterwards I met him returning, looking worried. The doctor -was just setting off for his holiday, and could not now undertake the -operation, but advised him to go to Guildford Hospital. Perhaps -Bettesworth would have liked me to pooh-pooh the suggestion--he little -relished the idea of leaving his wife and his work, and taking a -railway journey to so dismal an end; but even as he talked, I was -watching on his lip that which might mean death. So I sent him off -straightway to the Vicarage, where he could obtain a necessary letter -of introduction to the hospital. - -Of what immediately followed my memory is quite blank. I only recall -that the old chap started at last all alone on his journey to -Guildford, not knowing how long he would be away, or what was likely -to happen to him. A niece of his had provided him with a stamped -addressed envelope and a clean sheet of note-paper, in case he should -need to get anyone at the hospital to send a message home. - - -_August 6, 1904._--So he disappeared for a time. Three or four days, -we supposed, would be the extent of his absence; but the days went by -and no word came from him. For all we knew he might never have reached -the hospital; and it began to be a serious question what would become -of his wife, and whether she would not have to be sent to the -workhouse for want of a protector. At last, I wrote for information to -the matron of the hospital. Her answer, which lies before me now, and -is the only piece of evidence I have preserved of the whole business, -is dated August 6th. On that day, it stated, Bettesworth was to be -operated upon, and, if all went well, he would most likely be able to -leave the hospital in ten days or a fortnight. - -Unless I mistake, the ten days or a fortnight dragged out to nearly -three weeks, in which I had the old wife on my mind. A visit to her -one Sunday morning reassured me. Poor old Lucy Bettesworth! I did not -anticipate, then, that I should never again see her alive. Dirty and -dishevelled as ever, alone in the squalid cottage, she received me -with a meek simplicity that in my eyes made amends for many faults. -She was more sane than I had dared to hope I should find her, eager -for "Fred" to come home, but contented, it seemed, to wait, if it was -doing him good. She did not want for anything; she ate no meat, and it -cost her nothing to live. Would I like a vegetable marrow? There was a -nice one in the garden that "wanted cuttin'." - -Perceiving that she desired me to have the vegetable marrow, I allowed -her to take me out into the garden to get it. "Could I cut it?" Of -course I could, and did. Then a qualm struck her: perhaps I shouldn't -like carrying it! But she might be able to wrap it up in a piece of -newspaper.... - -To that, however, I demurred. There was no harm in being seen with a -vegetable marrow on Sunday morning; and I took it, undraped by paper, -aware that the despised old woman had done me the greatest courtesy in -her power. And that was, as it proved, the last time I ever saw her. - -Bettesworth, meanwhile, in the hospital, was not quite forgotten. His -niece has been mentioned who gave him the stamped envelope which he -had not used. We shall hear a good deal of her, later on--a helpful -but delicate woman, who was Bettesworth's niece only by marriage with -a nephew of his, of whom also we shall hear. These two on that Sunday -morning--it being a quiet, half-hazy, half-sunny August day--walked -over to Guildford, and brought back news that the old man was doing as -well as could be hoped. They proposed to repeat the visit the -following week. It made a pleasant Sunday outing. - -But before that week was ended Bettesworth was suddenly home again, -unannounced. An odd look about him puzzled me, until I realized that -he had grown a beard--a white, scrubby, short-trimmed beard, which -gave him a foxy expression that I did not like. His lip was in -strapping, a little blood-stained, but he reported that all was going -on well. The surgeons had carved down into his jaw, and believed the -operation to have been quite successful. Satisfied as to this, I could -endure his changed appearance. - -Something about his manner was less satisfactory. Looking back, I -think I know what was the matter; but at the time a sort of levity in -him struck a false note. Besides, he seemed not to realize that his -wife might have suffered by his absence, or that others had put -themselves about on his behalf. He struck me as selfish and -self-satisfied. I forgot what a lonely expedition his had been, and -how he had had to start off and face this miserable experience without -a friend at hand to care whether he came through it alive or not. - -Left to himself (it is obvious enough now) and determined to go -through the business in manly fashion, he had rather overdone it--had -over-played his part. In refusing to admit fear, he had erred a -little on the other side, and he still erred so in telling his -experiences, perhaps because he was still not quite free of fear. By -his account, his stay in the hospital had been an interesting holiday. -Everything about it was a little too good to be believed. He had -jested with the doctors and the nurses. They called him "Dad," and "a -joking old man," and he felt flattered: they had had a "fire-drill," -and from his bed, or his seat under the veranda among the -convalescents, he had entered into the spirit of the thing. Grimmer -details, too, did not escape him: the arrival of new patients in the -night--"accident cases" brought in for immediate treatment; the -sufferings he witnessed; the hopeless condition of a railway porter, -and so forth. All this was told in his own manner, with swift -realistic touch, convincingly true; with a genuine sense of the humour -of the thing, he mentioned the operating-room by the patients' name -for it--"the slaughter-house"; but none the less his narrative had an -offensive emptiness, an unreality, a flippancy, unworthy, I thought, -of Bettesworth. - -A little more sense would have shown me the clue to it, in his -behaviour just before the operation. He was dressed in "a sort of a -white night-gown," waiting for his turn; and, he said, "I made 'em -laugh. I got up and danced about on the floor. 'Now I be Father -Peter,' I says." Then the nurse came to conduct him to "the -slaughter-house." "'Old Freddy's goin' to 'ave something now,' they" -(the nearer patients) "says. I took hold o' the nurse's arm. 'Now I be -goin' out for a walk with my young lady,' I says. 'We be goin' out -courtin'.'" And in such fashion, over-excited, he maintained his -fortitude, with a travesty of the courage he was all but losing. He -never confessed to having felt fear. The nearest approach to it was -when he was actually lying on the operating-table. Left quite alone -there (for half an hour, he alleged and believed), "I looked all -round," he said, "and up at the skylight, and I says to myself, 'So -this is where it is, is it?'" - -With these tales he came home, repeating them until I was weary. By -and by, however, he settled down to work, although one or two visits -had to be paid to the hospital, for dressing the lip; and as he -settled down, his normal manner returned. For some weeks--nay, for -longer--his friends were not free of anxiety about him. There were -pains in his jaw, and in his lip too, enough to draw dire forebodings -from those of pessimistic humour. But Bettesworth owned to no fears. -So it went on for a month or so, when that occurred which effectually -banished from his mind all remembrance of this trouble. - - - - -XXVII - - -_September 19, 1904._--Because they can so little afford to be ill, it -is habitual among the very poor to neglect an illness long after other -people would be seriously alarmed at it; and the habit had been -confirmed in Bettesworth with regard to his wife's maladies, by her -having so many times recovered from them without help. It was almost a -matter of course to him, when about the middle of September, and less -than a month after his return from the hospital, she became once more -exceedingly unwell. So she had often done: it was not worth -mentioning, and was not mentioned, to me. I knew of no trouble. If I -had been asked about his welfare at that time, I should have said that -the old man was rather unusually happy. I should have said so -especially one Monday morning (it was the 19th of September); because -on that day we were picking apples, and his conversation was so -delightfully in harmony with the sunshine glinting among the -apple-boughs. He told of cider and cider-making; and then of shepherds -he had known on the Sussex Downs, and of their dogs, and their -solitary pastimes upon the hills. Hearing him, no one, I am sure, -could have supposed that at home his wife had been dangerously ill for -nearly a week, and that consequently his own comfort there had for the -time ceased to exist. - -Later on that Monday his wife's condition (not his own) was somehow -made known to me. I suppose Bettesworth consulted me on the step he -was contemplating, of going to the relieving officer to-morrow to get -an order for medical attendance for old Lucy. At any rate, by Monday -night that is what he had resolved to do, and I knew it and approved, -remembering what the policeman had said to me. It seemed a wise -precaution to take, but evidently it could not be urgent. Bettesworth -was choosing Tuesday, because on Tuesday mornings the relieving -officer is in attendance in the parish, and the order could therefore -be got without a five-mile walk for it. - -From various circumstances it may be inferred that the early part of -Tuesday was an unhappy time for Bettesworth: a time of fretful -watching for the dawn, perhaps after a wakeful night; of impatience to -come and begin his day's work, and then of impatience for eleven -o'clock to arrive, and of brooding obstinate thoughts, until at eleven -he might go and get the miserable interview over. For it made him -miserable to have to sue in the form of a pauper, and he was prepared, -as poor folk generally are, to find in the relieving officer a bully -if not a brute. I may say at once that he was agreeably deceived, and -said as much afterwards--he was treated humanely and with -appreciation; but the relieving officer's account of the interview -sufficiently proves that the old man went to it in but a surly temper. -I imagine him standing up as straight as his crooked old limbs would -let him, rolling his head back defiantly, with tightened lips and -suspicious eyes, and answering as uncivilly as he dared. A compliment -was offered him, on his haste to get away from the infirmary in the -spring. "_I_ en't no workhouse man!" he answered brusquely. And he did -his best to persuade the relieving officer that he would never want -relief for himself, asserting that he belonged to a club, and -concealing the fact that he was a superannuated member of it, no -longer entitled to benefit from the club funds. - -And then, the interview over, and the order obtained, his cheerfulness -for the rest of the day is suggestive of an ordeal successfully -passed. True, I have lost record of how he pottered through the -afternoon--it was, of course, useless to go to the parish doctor at -that time of day--but he seemed to have suddenly lost the weakness -still lingering from the operation in the hospital; and being short of -money, he proposed an extra job for the evening. He wanted to clear -out a cesspit in my garden. I urged that he had better rest, and take -care of himself as well as of his wife. "_I_ be gettin' bonny!" he -said happily. - -He carried his point, too. As if he had no wife ill at home, at about -eight o'clock, which was usually his bed-time, he came back and began -his self-imposed task, with a young labourer to help. And he must have -been in merry spirits, for he kept his mate amused, so that from the -house I could hear the man laughing, in frequent bleating outbursts of -hilarity, at some facetious saying or other. One of these sayings I -heard, on going out to see how the work was progressing. "He must be a -greedy feller as wants more 'n one or two whiffs o' this," Bettesworth -remarked; and his companion let out another good-tempered laugh. From -the old man's manner I argued that his wife must be doing well; but -probably it indicated only a reaction from the moody temper of the -morning. The job was finished at about half-past nine, and conscious -of a good day's work done, Bettesworth once more crept over the hill -and across the valley, home. - -But not to go to bed, or to sleep. While he was at work in the -moonlight and making his friend laugh, I did not know, but he did, -what was in store for him. Having no spare bed, he began his night -downstairs and dozed for a while in an easy-chair; then roused and -went out into the moonlight to smoke a pipe; and so he got through the -night. Tobacco was his solace. He smoked, he told me, a full ounce in -the ensuing twenty-four hours. At seven in the morning--his usual -hour--he was here beginning work: at nine he left off, to go into the -town and present his order at the doctor's. - -That journey on the Wednesday morning proved the beginning of a period -of intenser wretchedness for the old man. He set out in apparent -equanimity; but the fatigue of the night was upon him, the glow of -yesterday's contentment had died out, and his nerves must have been -all on edge to take as he did a remark of the doctor's--"What do you -want of an order? You're in constant work, aren't you?" It seemed to -him that he was being insulted for coming as a pauper, and it was all -he could do to refrain from a rejoinder that would have resulted in -his being summarily ejected from the doctor's presence. And was he as -submissive as he fancied? It is more likely that the ungraciousness of -his manner was to blame for what he regarded as pure heartlessness in -the other. That he must be at home to meet the doctor was -self-evident; but it was important to him not to lose a whole day from -his work, and he desired to know whether the visit would be made -before his dinner-time or after it? I hazard a guess that he stated -the case in tones of defiant bargaining; at any rate, he could get no -answer but that the doctor would call during the day. With that he -returned here--a quivering mass of resentment; and in that temper, to -which nothing is so repugnant as waiting, by my persuasion rather than -by his goodwill he left his work and went home to wait. - -With what increasing bitterness he wore through the day, with what -fretfulness and final despair as of a man despised and forgotten, must -be left to conjecture. For the doctor did not come, after all. -Conjecture, too, must picture if it can the night that followed--the -attempts to sleep in the chair, the restless wanderings into the -garden to smoke, the repetition, in fact, of the preceding night's -misery, but with a great addition of weariness and distress. -Bettesworth, when he came round the next morning to tell me how he was -situated, did not so much as mention all this; he only let fall one -pitiful detail. Some time in the night he had given his wife a little -brandy; and about daybreak he went out to draw fresh water into the -kettle "so's not to have it no-ways stale," for making her a cup of -tea. But, partaking of a cup himself at the same time, he "hadn't had -it above five minutes afore he was out in the garden" to let the tea -come back again. After that, he appears to have abandoned the attempt -to get sustenance elsewhere than from tobacco. It was a dismal story -to hear: but there was nothing to be done; and having heard it, I sent -him home again to go on waiting. This was Thursday, two days after he -obtained the relieving officer's order for medical assistance, and by -now the state of his wife was causing him grave fears. - -But why had the doctor not been near? To Bettesworth's wounded -feelings the explanation needed no seeking: he was being made to wait -for richer people, because he was poor and unimportant. Meanwhile, -happening to meet with the relieving officer, I laid the case before -him, and heard that a call to a distance had obliged the doctor to -leave his work for a day or two in the hands of a _locum tenens_, who -must have blundered. And this proved to be the fact. On Thursday -afternoon a doctor who was a stranger at last found his way to -Bettesworth's cottage, and the unhappy old man's long suspense was so -far over. At once all his bitterness died out. The doctor "was as nice -a gentleman as ever I talked to," he affirmed. "He said she was very -bad. She wasn't to have nothing but only milk an' beef-tea an' brandy, -an' she wasn't to be left alone." Bettesworth therefore did not leave -home again that day. He got his niece, whose young family prevented -her from giving much help, to go to the town and bring home the -medicine, and so he settled down for another night like those that had -gone before. - -It was on the next morning (Friday) that he told me these few -particulars, and how his wife seemed a trifle--only a trifle--better; -how, too, he had "washed her as well as he could," and, being asked, -how he had not been to bed himself. And now he was on his way to the -town to buy a few necessaries. Who was with his wife meanwhile? That -was a question I dared not ask, because I knew that the distressful -old woman was a by-word for sluttishness among the neighbours, so much -that they would hardly go near her; and I knew that Bettesworth, -though silent on the subject, was sore about it. Without doubt the old -woman was quite alone, whenever circumstances compelled him to leave -her. - -The "necessaries" he was going to buy included beef-tea "and some -cakes," he said. At the mention of cakes I exclaimed, but he protested -reproachfully, "Well, but she en't had _nothin'_ to eat!" Clearly he -did not regard milk as food, or indeed anything else that was not -solid. In the matter of beef-tea, "I can't make it myself," he said, -"but you can buy it, can't ye, in jars?" He was perhaps thinking of -Bovril, or something of the kind. Fortunately there were those at hand -who knew how to make beef-tea, and undertook at once to relieve the -old man of this burden. - -Taking him apart then, I asked if he needed a shilling or two. He -almost groaned in deprecation, "I owes you such a lot now, and keeps -on gettin' into debt. I'd sooner rub along with jest as little as ever -I possibly can." It was of his rent he was thinking, which of course -was payable for those weeks of his own illnesses, as well as for his -absence from work now, when he was not earning any wages from which -the rent could be deducted. Perhaps he was unaware that I had no -account of the debt; in any case, it seemed to be preying upon his -mind. I did not press the point, therefore, and he started off for the -town without aid from me. - -In another way, too, the old man's reluctance to be a burden -manifested itself. What he had told me so far was told because I -wished to hear it, and he wished me to understand. He made no long -tale: he was brief, unaffected, and as for seeking compassion, it was -far from his intention. Of one thing only did he complain: a near -relative's indifference. "He was over by our place twice o' Sunday," -Bettesworth said scornfully, "and couldn't look in to see how the poor -old gal was. He was ready enough to send to me when he had his mishap" -(falling from a rick, and finding himself in agony at night), "and I -run off an' went all down to the town for 'n, late at night. But now -_I_ wants help--no: he won't come anear. That's the sort o' feller -_he_ is." So Bettesworth, uttering his sole complaint. But he did not -demand from others the sympathy he looked for from a relation, or seek -to inflict them with the tale of troubles which, after all, he would -have to bear by himself. - - -At this point, if the actual course of this over-crowded Friday were -to be followed strictly, the narrative would suffer a strange -interruption. For, having business of my own in the town, I set off at -the same time with Bettesworth, expecting little cheerfulness from him -on the way. But I had failed to appreciate the man's stoicism, or the -strong grip he had over his feelings. For several nights he had not -rested on a bed; he had taken during the same period next to no food; -he had been harassed by suspense, worn by indignation, baffled -constantly by the obstacles which his poverty set in his way; and it -would have been pardonable if he had proved himself but a gloomy -companion for a walk. Yet from the moment of our setting out he put -aside all his difficulties, and not only did he not distress me, but -for the half-hour before we separated he kept me interested in his -sensible conversation on local topics, or charmed by the pleasant -rustic flavour of some of his reminiscences. Here, therefore, would be -the natural place for inserting some fragments of this talk, which I -wrote down in the evening. It happened, however, that in writing I -gave precedence to an important change which by then had come over the -situation at Bettesworth's home; and as I propose to take the account -of this development and the issue of it straight from my note-book, -the bits of gossip too had better come in just as they stand there. - -It appears, then, to have been at about six o'clock in the afternoon -that I was writing, as follows: - -Bettesworth has just been over (from his home) to consult me, and -perhaps to have a chat and relieve his overburdened soul. When he got -back from the town this morning, he found the doctor paying another -visit, who was "wonderful nice," and offered to give him a certificate -for admitting the old woman to the infirmary, if he would care to have -it and would call for it at the surgery. Bettesworth only wanted my -encouragement. He is going down this evening for the certificate, and -hopes to get his wife removed to-morrow. - -It will be none too soon. The watching is wearing him out. Last night -he had left her and gone downstairs, and sat dozing in the chair, when -she tried to get out of bed, and fell heavily on the floor. He ran -up--and forgot to take the candle back with him, thereby adding to his -difficulties--and somehow managed to get her back into bed again and -covered up, without aid. But now, says he, "I said to Dave Harding as -I come up the road, 'What I should like to do 'd be to crawl up into -the fir-woods where nobody couldn't see me, and lay down an' get three -or four hours' sleep.' 'You couldn't do it,' he says; ''t'd be on your -mind all the time. You might get off for ten minutes, p'raps, an' then -you'd be up an' off again.' But that's what I sims as if I should -like, more 'n anything: jest to crawl away somewhere, where nobody -wouldn't come, for a good sleep. Then wake up and 'ave a floush--'t'd -freshen me up." - -Certainly he is overdone. Upon my renewing offers of a little help, he -became tearful, almost sobbing: "You be the only friend I got.... I -bin all over the country," and have faced all sorts of things, "but I -_be_ hammer-hacked about, now, no mistake." His grief consists in -being able to do so little for his wife. He has given her since his -dinner-time her medicine, then a sip of brandy "to take the taste out -of her mouth.... And then I said, 'Now here's a cake I bought for ye -in the town; have a bit o' that.' So she nibbled a bit, and I says, -'Eat 'n up.' No, she didn't want no more. 'But you got to _'ave_ it,' -I says. I a'most forced it down her throat. I do's the best I can for -her; but I en't got nobody to tell me what to do." - -And he is galled by turns, by turns amused, at her behaviour towards -himself. "I can't do nothink right for her. She's more stubborn to me -than to anybody else: keeps on findin' fault. Last night, in the -night, she roused up an' accused me o' goin' away. 'You bin away -somewheres,' she says. 'Oh yes, you 'ave; I heared ye come creepin' -back up the road.' And I'd bin sittin' there all the time." - -This and much more he told. I tried to get away (we were in the -garden), for I was busy; but he followed me, to talk still, and -wandered off into recollections of his experiences at Guildford -Hospital. - - -_7.30 p.m._ Bettesworth has called once more, coming from the town, to -show me the doctor's certificate (gastritis, it says), and to let me -know that to-morrow morning he will not be here at his usual time. He -proposes going to the relieving officer to obtain his order for a -conveyance to move the old woman. "I shall be over there by seven -o'clock," he says. The cumbersomeness of all these formalities is -sickening. Having got the order, he will probably need to go right -back to the town to arrange about the conveyance. - -He was very tired, and rather wet, the night having set in with -showers coming up on the east wind. So I got him a chair in the -scullery, for the wet was making his old corduroys smell badly, and -gave him a small glass of brandy-and-water. He refused a biscuit; "I -couldn't swaller it," he said. "I can't eat, for thinkin' o' she." - -He is not without a kind of pitiful consolation. "Seven or eight," he -says, have professed their willingness to receive him into their -homes, if need should be. One, even now, on the road from the town, -has said, "Don't you trouble about _yerself_, Freddy; you can have a -home with me, if you should want one." But the idea associated with -this, of parting from his wife, breaks him down. The doctor who -granted the certificate--the right doctor, this time--was sympathetic. -"He come out to me because he see I was touched, and says, 'You no -call to be _oneasy_, old gentleman; she'll be looked _after_ up there. -Everything 'll be done for her as can be done.'" - -But these nights, in which he does not go to bed! His ankles and -calves get the cramp, for he seems not to have thought, so little -practice has he had in making himself comfortable, of resting his feet -on another chair, while he is lying back in the easy-chair -downstairs.... He has gone home now, to make up a fire and get what -rest he may. "But then," he says, "she'll holler out, an' I got to -run." He told me again how she "fell out o' bed flump" last night, and -he stormed upstairs and found her on the floor, for "she didn't know -how to get in again, not no more'n a cuckoo." - -The group of cottages where he lives stands high above the road, which -is reached by steps roughly cut into the steep bank. On one of these -recent nights, having gone down the steps meaning to buy his wife -sixpennyworth of brandy, Bettesworth felt in his trousers pocket for -the shilling he had put there, and--it was gone. "Oh, I was in a way! -I went back, an' crawled all up they steps, feelin' for it," the hour -being eight o'clock, and moonlight. "As I went past old Kiddy's, I -called out to 'n, 'Kid!', 'cause I wanted to tell 'n what trouble I -was in, and I knowed he'd ha' come and helped me to find 'n, if he'd -bin about. But he was gone to bed, 'cause he starts off so early in -the mornin'." Thus the old man got back home, disconsolate, without -the necessary brandy for his wife; and, calling upstairs to her, "Lou, -I've lost that shillin'," he began to prepare for his night in the -easy-chair. But, first feeling in his pocket once more, he discovered -there (fruits of his wife's incapacity) "a hole," he said, "I could -put my finger through." - -He pulled up his trouser legs to the knee, "because I always ties my -garters up above the knee," and, with his foot on "the little stool I -always puts 'n on to lace up my boots--I've had 'n ever since my boy -was born--I thought I felt somethin' in the heel o' my shoe, and as -soon as I pulled 'n off it rattled on the floor. _Wa'n't_ that a -miracle? My hair stood bolt upright! I gropsed an' picked 'n up, and -hollered up the stairs, 'I've found 'n!' 'Oh, have ye?' she says. 'I -thought you'd bin an' spent 'n.'" Quickly he was off again to the -public-house--Tom Durrant's--and "I says, 'I lost that shillin' once. -I'll take good care I don't lose 'n again!' And I chucked 'n up on the -counter. Durrant says, 'Oh, did ye lose 'n?' So then I come back 'ome -with my sixpenn'oth o' brandy. But wa'n't it a miracle? My hair stood -reg'lar bolt upright, and I was that _contented_!" - -There was much, very much, that I am missing; but I must not quite -pass over the old man's talk on the way to the town this morning. He -did not once mention his trouble. All the way it was his ordinary -chatter--the chatter of a most vigorous mind, which had never learnt -to think of things in groups, but was intensely interested in details. - -It began at once, with reference to a cottage--a sort of "week-end" -cottage--we were passing, into which, Bettesworth said, new tenants -were coming. "How they keep changing!" said I; and he, "Well enough -they may, at the price." "What is it, then?" "Four pound a month. -Furnished, o' course; but there en't much there. And," he added, "I -can't see payin' a pound a week for a place to lay down in." - -Next--but what came next had better be omitted now. It related to the -family affairs of a certain coal-carter, and so led up to discourse of -other carter men who lived in the village. From them, the transition -to the employer of two of them was easy. He "got the two best carters -in the neighbourhood now," said Bettesworth; but as for horses, "he -en't got a hoss fit to put in a cart, 'cause he en't never had anybody -before as understood anything about 'em. Somebody ought to put the -cruelty inspector on to him, to go to his place and see. He _did_ go, -once; but he" (the horse-owner) "got wind of it and," as far as could -be gathered from Bettesworth's talk, is suspected of having "squared" -the inspector. But "there's a lot talkin' about the condition of the -hosses down there," and, indeed, things "down there" seem to be -generally mismanaged. The premises are "a reg'lar destructive old -place": the carts, "he won't never have 'em only botched up, an' they -be all to pieces;" and the harness is treated no better. "The saddles, -they says, the flock 's all in lumps: _sure_ a hoss's back an' -shoulders 'd get sore. That's where they do's all the work, poor -things. When I had hosses to look after, as soon as I got 'em in I -always looked to their back an' shoulders first. I'd get a sponge, or -a cloth...." - -One of the two good carters above mentioned "can trace up a hoss's -tail, you know, with straw. There en't one in ten knows how to do -that. I've earnt many a shillin' at it." But Bettesworth had known one -man who used to earn as much as thirty shillings in a day at this -work, at horse-fairs. Him Bettesworth has occasionally helped, I -understand; and also, "Old Bill Baldwin--I've sometimes bin down an' -done it for him." - -Now, I had thought Bill Baldwin knew all that was worth knowing about -horses and horse management; so I asked, surprisedly, "What, can't he -do it?" - -"He can do the tracin', in a straight run; but he can't tie up. I -could do it all: the tails, and the manes too--you've see it. I'd get -a bit o' live" (lithe?) "straw ... 't was when I was a boy-chap, a -little bigger 'n that 'n" (whom at the moment we were meeting) "down -at Penstead at Farmer Barnes's. I used to be such a one for the -hosses; and I could do it, because my fingers was so lissom." (Poor -old stubbed, stiff, bent fingers! to think of it!) "And then, I took -such a delight in it. And Mrs. Barnes--she was a Burton--she was as -proud o' them hosses! Used to get up at four o'clock in the mornin', -purpose to see 'em start off. And the harness was all as clean--the -brass used to shine as bright as ever any gold is, and she _was_ -proud. Twenty thousand pound, was the last legacy she had. She was -just such another woman to look at as old Miss Keen, what used to -live down in the town; and a better woman never was. - -"That's where I got all my scholarship.... Well, I could read--a -little--but not to understand it. But she--she give me shirts, an' -trousers--'cause we wore smock-frocks then--but she give me shirts an' -trousers to go to night-school in. Course, I couldn't have had proper -clothes without. 'Cause 'twas only thirty shillin's a year besides -grub an' lodgin'.... And 't wan't no use to talk about runnin' away. I -hadn't got no home. Besides, we was hired from Michaelmas to -Michaelmas." - -We spoke again of various neighbours, and thus drifting on (I am -omitting vast quantities) Bettesworth presently told of a recent -attempt at starting a village football club, or rather, of the -subsequent discussion of the affair at the public-house. An enthusiast -there wished to get "as many members as ever they could." "But how be -ye goin' to pick 'em for play?" asked another. "Oh, pick the best." -Bettesworth tells me this, adding, "I don't call that fair do's at -all. I can't see no justice in that, that one should pay to be a -member of a club, purpose for somebody else to have all the play. -That's the way they breaks up a club. Break up any club, that would." - - -_September 24._--Word was brought this afternoon (Saturday) that -Bettesworth was at the kitchen door, wishing to see me. Of course he -has not been to work to-day. I found him standing outside, patient -and quiet, until, being asked how things were going, he began to cry, -and shook his head, so that I feared something had miscarried and -asked, "Why, haven't you got your wife away?" - -"Yes, we got her away, but she was purty near dead when we got her -there. The matron shook her head, and said, 'You'll never see her home -again alive.'" - -There were repetitions and variations of this; but I, reiterating my -assurances that "she had got a lot of strength," and that in fine the -old wife would yet live to come home again, quite forgot to observe -exactly what Bettesworth said. His distress was too afflicting. - -It would take long, too, to tell of his morning in his own words, -beginning with the early walk to Moorways for the relieving officer's -order, and telling how old chums starting off to work were astonished -to see him thus unwontedly on the road, and what they said as he -passed them by as if with a renewal of vigour, and how one was -"puffed, tryin' to keep up." The long waiting at the office door (the -officer had been out in his garden getting up potatoes), and -Bettesworth's meditations, "I wish he'd come," and the instructions -furnished him as to how to go on--they were all narrated simply, -because they happened; but the touch of grey morning mist which -somehow pervaded the talk while I was hearing it could not be -reproduced with its words. The old man was back here soon after eight -o'clock, on his way to the town to order the fly which should take his -wife to the infirmary. He had had no breakfast. I gave him tea and -bread and butter; but he left the bread and butter--couldn't swallow -it, he said. He had had a glass of beer at the Moorways Inn. - -He went into the town, and I met him on the road, returning. The fly -proprietor had recognized him and behaved kindly. "Got a bit o' -trouble then, old gentleman?" Yes, the fly should be there to the -minute. - -At noon, to the minute, it arrived, the driver of it being a son of an -old neighbour of Bettesworth's. Meanwhile, Bettesworth's niece, "Liz," -and a neighbour's wife--a Mrs. Eggar--whom he spoke of as "Kate," were -there trying to dress the old woman--and failing. They got her -stockings on, but no boots; a petticoat or so, but no bodice with -sleeves; and for that much they had to struggle, even calling on -Bettesworth to come upstairs and help them. Then the fly came, "and -all she kep' sayin' was, 'Leave me to die at home. I wants to die at -home'" and she fought and would not be moved. - -To get her downstairs the help of two men besides the driver was -enlisted, Kate's husband being one of them. By a kindly policy, -Bettesworth himself was sent to hold the horse ("'cause he wanted to -start off"), in order that the sight of her husband might not -increase the poor old woman's reluctance; and so they carried her -downstairs, "bodily," he said, meaning, I suppose, that she did not -support herself at all. - -The doctor had advised, and the neighbours too, that Bettesworth -himself should not accompany his wife. But now the niece Liz, being -unwell, was afraid to be alone with what looked a dying woman, and at -the last moment Bettesworth jumped into the cab. As it started, the -old woman's head fell back, her mouth dropped open. A pause was made -at the public-house, to get brandy for her, which, however, she could -not, or would not, take. Gin was tried, and she just touched it. Liz -took the brandy; Bettesworth and the driver shared a pint of beer; -then they drove off again. Once, on the way, Liz said, "Uncle, she's -gone! Hadn't ye better stop the fly?" But he put his head down against -her cheek, and found that she was still living; and so they came to -the outer entrance of the infirmary. Further than that Bettesworth was -dissuaded from going: it was not well that his wife should be agitated -by the sight of him at the very gates; and accordingly he came away. - -So he is alone in his cottage, and may rest if he can. He is to have -meals at his niece's, but will sleep at home. The kindness is touching -to him, not alone of the nephew and niece, but of his neighbours -generally. "Kate said she'd ha' went down in the fly, if I'd ha' let -her know in time. An' she'd wash for me--if I'd take anything I -wanted along to her Monday or Tuesday, she'd wash it. I says to her, -'You be the first friend I got, Kate.' Well, Liz had told me she -_couldn't_ undertake it. She was forced to get somebody to do her own, -and the doctor come to see her one day expectin' to find her in bed, -and she was gettin' the dinner. There's Jack" (her husband) "and four -boys.... So Kate's goin' to do the washin' for me, and she and her -daughter's goin' one day to give the place a scrub out. More'n that -she _can't_ do--with eight little 'uns, and then look at the washin'!" -For Mrs. Eggar takes in washing, to eke out her husband's fifteen or -sixteen shillings a week. - -Besides these friends, there are those who are willing to find the old -man a home, "if anything should happen to the old gal." "'Tis a sort -o' comfortin'," he says, "to think what good neighbours I got;" but he -hopes not to break up his home yet. In an unconscious symbolism of his -affection for all the home things he bought this afternoon a -pennyworth of milk for the cat, who came running to meet him on his -return to the lonely cottage, and then ran upstairs "to see if the old -gal was there." - -He will keep his home together if he may, with warm feelings towards -his neighbours. "But as for these up here," and he points -contemptuously in the direction of the old woman's relatives, "I dunno -if they knows she's gone, and I shan't trouble to tell 'em." - -[So I wrote on the Saturday evening. Four clear days pass, without any -note about Bettesworth; then on the following Thursday the narrative -is reopened. It is given here, unaltered.] - - -_September 29._--Bettesworth's wife died at the workhouse infirmary, -about midnight of the 27th. - -She had been unconscious since her admission, and spoke only twice. -Once she said, "Bring my little box upstairs off the dresser, Fred;" -the other time it was, "Fred, have ye wound up the clock?" These -things were reported to him by the nurse, when he reached the -infirmary on Tuesday afternoon--the usual afternoon for the admission -of visitors. - -He had gone down then, with his niece Liz, to see the old lady. And of -course I heard the details of the expedition when he came back. -Stopping at a greengrocer's in the town, he bought two ripe pears, at -three halfpence each. "Did ye ever hear tell o' such a price for a -pear? What 'd that be for a bushel? Why, 't'd come to a pound! But I -said, 'I'll ha' the best.' Then I bought her some sponge-cakes at the -confectioner's;" and with these delicacies he went to her. - -She could not touch them. She lay with her eyes open, but unconscious -even of the flies, which he, sitting beside, kept fanning from her -face. There was no recognition of him; so he asked which was "her -locker," proposing to leave the pears and sponge-cakes there for her, -on the chance of her being able to enjoy them later. "Poor old lady, -she'll never want 'em," the nurse said; and he replied, "Now I've -brought 'em here I shan't take 'em back. Give 'em to some other poor -soul that can fancy 'em." - -They gave him permission to stay as long as he liked; but, said he, "I -bid there an hour an' a quarter, an' then I couldn't bide no longer. -What was the use, sir? She didn't know me." So at last he came away, -provided with a free pass, "to go in at any hour o' the day or night -he mind to." - -Yesterday (Wednesday) morning he was about his work here when a letter -was brought to him. It contained only a formal notice that "Lucy -Bettesworth was lying dangerously ill, and desired to see him." -Probably the notice was mercifully designed to prepare him for the -worse news it might have told, but of course he did not know it, even -if that was the case. He left here at once, to go and see his wife. - -Between two and three hours afterwards he was back again. "How is it?" -I asked, guessing how it was. "She's gone, sir"--and then he broke -down, sobbing, but only for a minute. He had already ordered the -coffin--"a nice box," he called it. The remainder of the day was spent -in getting the death certificate and observing other formalities. He -had the knell rung, too. Nothing would he neglect that would testify -to his respect for the partner he had lost; and I think in all this -he was partly animated by a savage resentment towards her relatives, -who had ignored her, and by a resolved opposition to those who had -contemned his wife while she lived. "Everybody always bin very good, -to _me_," he has said, with significant emphasis on the last word. - -In the evening he had the corpse brought away to his nephew Jack's. He -also slept at Jack's, and in numerous ways Jack is behaving well to -him. To spare the old man's weariness he spent the evening in going to -see about the insurance money; and to-day it is Jack who is getting -six other men to carry the coffin at the funeral on Saturday. - -This morning Bettesworth went to the Vicar to arrange about the -funeral. "He spoke very nice to me," he said. Thence he was sent to -the sexton, near at hand; and soon he came to me to borrow a two-foot -rule, because the sexton wanted to know the exact measurements of the -coffin before digging the grave; "and _don't_ let's have any -mistakes!" he had said, for there had been a mistake not so long ago, -a grave having been dug too small for the coffin. - -Knowing Bettesworth's fumbling blindness, and seeing him nervous, "Can -you manage it?" I asked, "or would you like me to go over and measure -it for you?" There was no hesitation: "It _would_ be a kindness, if -you don't mind, sir...." I have but just now returned. - -I think I will not record particulars of that visit. If I had not -previously known it, I should have known then that Bettesworth is--but -there are no fit epithets. Nothing sensational happened, nothing -extravagantly emotional. But all that he did and said, so simple and -unaffected and necessary, was done as if it were an act of worship. No -woman could have been tenderer or more delicate than he, when he drew -the sheet back from the dead face, to show me.... The coffin itself -(because he is so poor and so lonely)--a decent elm coffin--is a kind -of symbol, and so a comfort to him, enabling him to testify to his -unspoken feelings towards his dead wife. - - -_October 1._--I went to the funeral of Bettesworth's wife this -Saturday afternoon. In his decent black clothes and with his grey hair -the old man looked very dignified, showing a quiet, unaffected -patience. - -There were but few people present: four or five relatives besides the -bearers and the undertaker and sexton; while a young woman (Mrs. -Porter) with her little boy Tim stood in the background, she carrying -a wreath she had made. She is a near neighbour to us, and a very -impoverished one, to whom the old man has shown what kindness has been -in his power; while she on many mornings has called him into her -cottage at breakfast time, to give him a cup of hot tea. - - - - -XXVIII - - -Shutting his mouth doggedly, Bettesworth went back to his cottage, to -live alone there with his cat. There had been some talk of his going -into lodgings; but after all, this was still his home. Should he once -give it up, he reasoned, and dispose of his furniture, it would be -impossible ever again to form a home of his own, however much he might -desire to do so. To live with neighbours might be very well; yet how -if he and they should disagree? He would have burnt his boats; he -would be unable to resume his independence. Better were it, then, to -keep while he still had it a place where he was his own master, and -take the risk of being lonely. - -For some seven weeks after the wife's funeral there is next to nothing -to be told of him. I find that I am unable to remember anything about -him for that period, unless it was then--and it could not have been -much later--that he renewed some of his household goods, and amongst -them his mattress, being visited apparently by a wish to regain the -character for cleanliness which had been lost in his wife's time. It -must have been then also that he first talked of buying muslin for -blinds to his windows. It is further certain that he chatted a great -deal about his next-door neighbours--the Norrises, mother and son, -upon whose society he was now chiefly dependent; but of all this not a -syllable remains, nor is there any dimmest picture in my memory of -what the old man did, or even how he looked, in those seven weeks. - - -_November 22, 1904._--At the end of them, on a raw morning in -November, amid our struggles to heave out of the ground a huge shrub -we were transplanting, it was remarkable how strong Bettesworth -seemed, because of the cunning use he made of every ounce of force in -his experienced old muscles. How to lift, and how to support a weight, -were things he knew as excellently as some know how to drive a -golf-ball. Nor was my theory quite so good as his experience, for -showing where our skids and levers should be placed. It was -Bettesworth who got them into the serviceable positions. - -Something about those skids set us talking of other skidding work, and -especially of the extremely tricky business of loading timber on a -trolly. "I see a carter once," said Bettesworth, "get three big -elm-trees up on to a timber-carriage, with only hisself and the -hosses. He put the runnin' chains on and all hisself." - -"And _that_ takes some doing," I said. - -"Yes, a man got to understand the way 'tis done.... I never had much -hand in timber-cartin' myself; but this man.... 'Twas over there on -the Hog's Back, not far from Tongham Station. We all went out for to -see 'n do it--'cause 'twas in the dinner-time he come, and we never -believed he'd do it single-handed. The farmer says to 'n, 'You'll -never get they up by yourself.' 'I dessay I shall,' he says; and so he -did, too. Three great elm-trees upon that one carriage.... Well, he -had a four-hoss team, so that'll tell ye what 'twas. They _was_ some -hosses, too. Ordinary farm hosses wouldn't ha' done it. But he only -jest had to speak, and you'd see they watchin' him.... When he went -forward, after he'd got the trees up, to see what sort of a road he'd -got for gettin' out, they stood there with their heads stretched out -and their ears for'ard. 'Come on,' he says, and _away_ they went, -_tearin'_ away. Left great ruts in the road where the wheels went -in--that'll show ye they got something to pull." - -We got our shrub a little further, Bettesworth grunting to a heavy -lift; then, in answer to a question: - -"No, none o' we helped 'n. We was only gone out to see 'n do it. He -never wanted no help. He didn't say much; only 'Git back,' or 'Git -up,' to the hosses. When it come to gettin' the last tree up, on top -o' t'other two, I never thought he could ha' done it. But he got 'n -up. And he was a oldish man, too: sixty, I dessay he was. But he jest -spoke to the hosses. Never used no whip, 'xcept jest to guide 'em. -Didn't the old farmer go on at his own men, too! 'You dam fellers call -yerselves carters,' he says; 'a man like that's worth a dozen o' you.' -Well, they couldn't ha' done it. A dozen of 'em 'd ha' scrambled -about, an' _then_ not done it! Besides, their _hosses_ wouldn't. But -this feller--the old farmer says to 'n, 'I never believed you'd ha' -done it.' 'I thought mos' likely I should,' he says. But he never had -much to say." - -Sleet showers were falling, and a north wind was roaring through the -fir wood on top of the next hill while we worked. Dropping into the -vernacular, "I don't want to see no snow," said I. "No," responded -Bettesworth, "it's too white for me." "January," I went on, "is plenty -soon enough for snow to think about comin'." "April," he urged. "Ah -well, April," I laughed; and he, "Let it wait till there's a warm sun -to get rid of it 's fast as it comes." - -Then he continued, "That rain las' night come as a reg'lar su'prise to -me. I was sittin' indoors by my fire smokin'--I 'ave got rid o' some -baccer lately--and old Kid went up the garden. He see my light, and -hollered out, 'It don't half rain!' '_Let_ it rain,' I says. I was in -there as comfortable...." - -In the next night but one a little snow fell, enough to justify our -forecast and no more; and then we had frost, and garden work could -hardly go on. I was meaning to lay turf over a plot of ground where -the shrubs had stood; but the work had to wait: the frozen turfs could -not be unrolled. - -Bettesworth did not like the weather. I have told of those steps -connecting his cottage with the road. They were slippery now, and the -handrail to them was icy when he clutched it, coming down in the dark -of the mornings. At the bottom of the steps, before the road is -reached, there is a steep path, commonly known as "Granny Fry's." Boys -were sliding there after breakfast, and they called out to -Bettesworth, "Be you roughed, Master Bettesworth?" According to his -tale, he spoke angrily: "''Tis _you_ ought to be roughed,' I says; -'you ought to be roughed over the bank. You be old enough to know -better.' And so they be, too. They be biggish boys; and anybody goin' -there might easy fall down and break their back--'specially after -dark." - -When he came back from his dinner, he said, "Somebody 've bin an' -qualified old Granny Fry's." How? "Oh, somebody 've chucked some dirt -over where they boys had made it so slippery." - -He was obliged to admit, though, that in his own boyhood he had been -as careless as any of these. And a few minutes later he was confessing -to another boyish fault. In a cottage hard by, little Timothy -Porter--a chubby little chap about five years old--was on very -friendly terms with old Bettesworth. He had but lately started his -schooling, and almost immediately was taken unwell and had to stay at -home a week or two. I happened now to ask Bettesworth how little Tim -was getting on. - -"Oh, he's gettin' all right: goin' to school again Monday. He've -kicked up a rare shine, 'cause they wouldn't let 'n go. I likes 'n for -that. I likes to hear of a boy eager for learnin'--not to see 'm make -a shine and their mothers have to take 'em three parts o' the way. Not -but what I wanted makin' when I was a nipper. Many's a time I've -clucked up to a tree jest this side o' Cowley Bridge, and that old -'oman" (I don't know what old woman) "come out an' drive me. There -wa'n't no school then nearer 'n Lyons's--where Smith the wheelwright -lives now. He used to travel with tea, and I dessay half a dozen of us -'d come to his school from Cowley Bridge. We'd start off an' say we -wouldn't go to school; but we _'ad_ to." - -The frost, had it continued, would very soon have been calamitous to -the working people. As it was, I saw bricklayers--good men known to -me, and neighbours, too--standing idle in the town, at the street -corners. And Bettesworth said, - -"Some o' the shop-keepers down in the town begun to cry out about it. -They missed the Poor Man. And I heared the landlord down 'ere at the -Swan say he was several pounds out o' pocket by it." - - -_December 2, 1904._--Fortunately it was not to last. The men got to -work again; our gardening tasks could go forward. My notebook has this -entry for the 2nd of December: - -"Laying turf this afternoon, in wonderful mild dry weather." - - - - -XXIX - - -The thought came to me one of those afternoons, Was it I, or was it -Bettesworth, who was growing dull? It might well have been myself; for -at the unaccustomed labour of turf-laying, in weather that had turned -mild and relaxing, mind no less than body was aware of fatigue, and -perhaps on that account the old man's talk seemed less vivid than -usual, less deserving of remembrance. At the same time I could not -help speculating whether the livelier interests of his conversation -might not be almost over. Had he much more to tell? Or had I heard it -practically all? - -At this turf-laying the parts were reversed now. Time had been when, -at similar employments, I was the helper or onlooker; but now -Bettesworth's sight was so bad that I could no longer leave him to -unroll two turfs side by side and make their edges fit. I had to be -down on the ground with him, or instead of him. - -And yet he would not accept criticism. Did I say, "Shove that end up a -little tighter," he would rejoin, "That's jest what I was a-goin' to -do." Or, to my comment, "That isn't a first-rate fit just there," -"No, sir," he would admit, "I was only jest layin' it so ontil," etc., -etc. "You'll see that'll go down all right. That'll go down all -right.... Yes, that'll go down all right." And he would fumble -unserviceably, while the sentence trailed away into inaudible -reiterations. Still, it was a rich, creamy, very quiet and pleasing -old voice that spoke. - -The habit of repeating his own words was growing upon the old man fast -since his wife's death; and it irritated me at times, filling up the -gaps and interrupting my share of the conversation. Instead of -listening to me, he mumbled on, dreamily. Now and again, however, he -appeared to become aware of the habit. More than once, after relating -something he had said at home, he added in explanation, "I was talkin' -to _myself_, you know. I en't got nobody else to talk _to_." This was -almost the only indication he allowed me to see of that loneliness -which others assured me he was feeling. Did he, I wonder, fear that if -I knew of it I should be urging him to give up his cottage? For -whatever reason, he made no confidant of me on that point. Once, -indeed, there was mention of sitting indoors one evening by his fire, -"till he couldn't sit no longer," but got up and walked up and down -his garden, driven by crowding thoughts. Another time, "All sorts o' -things keeps comin' into my mind now," he said. And these were the -utmost complainings to which he condescended, in my hearing. - -It was very fortunate that he had excellent neighbours in old Mrs. -Norris (old Nanny, he called her) and her son, known as Kid, Kiddy, or -Kidder. While stooping over our turfs I heard many tiny details of -Bettesworth's kindly relations with these good people; and, as -pleasantly as oddly, between them and myself a sort of friendship grew -up, through the old man's mediation. We seldom met; we knew little of -one another save what he told us; but he must have gone home and -talked to them of me, just as he came here and told me about them; and -thus, while I was learning to like them cordially, I think they were -learning to like me, and it seemed to stamp with the seal of -genuineness my intercourse with Bettesworth himself. But it was truly -queer. Old Nanny Norris--the skinny old woman with the strange -Mongolian or Tartar face and eyes--took to stopping for a chat, if we -met on the road. In the town once, where I stood talking with some one -else, she, coming up from behind me, could not pass on without looking -round, nodding joyfully and grimacing her countenance--the countenance -of an eastern image--into a jolly smile. She wore a Paisley shawl, and -a little bonnet gay with russet and pink. - -Bettesworth was distressed only by Nanny's deafness. "_En't_ that a -denial to anybody!" he exclaimed feelingly. "There, I can't talk to -her. I always did hate talkin' to anybody deaf. Everybody can hear -what you got to say, and if 't en't nothing, still you don't want -everybody to hear it.... Old Kid _breaks_ out at her sometimes: 'Gaw' -dangy! I'll _make_ ye hear!' Every now an' then I laughs to myself to -hear 'n, sittin' in there by myself." - -He handed me another turf, and continued: "'Tis a good thing for she -that old Kidder en't never got married. But she slaves about for 'n; -nobody _could_n't do no more for 'n than she do. When I got home to -dinner she come runnin' round. She'd jest bin to pay all his clubs for -'n. He belongs to three clubs: two slate clubs an' the Foresters." - -"He doesn't mean to be in any trouble if he's ill," I grumbled up from -the turf. - -"Not he. Thirty-two shillin's a week he'll get, if he's laid up. -There's Alf" (one of his half-brothers) "and him--rare schemin' -fellers they be, no mistake." Particulars followed about this family -of strong brothers; but, in fine, "Kidder 've always bin the darlin'. -He's the youngest." - -Fearless, black-bearded strong man that he is, though very quiet, even -silky and soft in his ordinary demeanour, it was laughable to think of -Kid Norris as a "darling." Along with Alf he was at work all through -the summer on the new railway near Bordon Camp, they two being experts -and earning a halfpenny an hour more than the common navvy. Their way -was to leave home at four in the morning and walk the eight miles to -their work. In the evening the 7 p.m. up-train brought them within a -mile and a half of this village. Once or twice they overtook me, -making their way homewards, long-striding; and sometimes they would -work an hour or two after that in their gardens, in the summer -twilight. - -When the weather worsened and the days shortened, Kid threw up his -railway-work, and took a job at digging sea-kale for a large grower. -The fields were scattered about the district; some of them within two -miles, and the remotest not more than three, from his home. He was the -leading man of a gang of labourers; and at my paltry turf-laying I -heard of his work, which, it appears, was new to him. "They had to -save," he said (and the fact was interesting to old Bettesworth), -"jest the parts he should ha' throwed away.... It did take some -heavin': they stamms was gone down like tree-roots," especially down -there in such-and-such a field. "Up here above Barlow's Mill 'twan't -half the trouble." The master said to Kid, "You no call to slack. I -got plenty o' trenchin' you can go on at, when the kale's up." Then -said Kid to his gang, "Some o' you chaps 'll have to move about a bit -quicker, if you're goin' trenchin' 'long o' me." He sent one of them -packing--a neighbour from this village, too. "Not a bad chap to work, -so far as that goes, but too stiff, somehow," Bettesworth said, -evidently knowing the man's style. - -Towards the end of one afternoon, "It looks comin' up rainy," -Bettesworth observed, "but old Kid wants it frosty. Where he is -now--trenchin' up there at Waterman's--he says this rain makes it so -heavy; it comes up on they spuds jest as much as ever a man can lift." - -"And that's not a little," said I; "Kid's a strong man." - -"Well--he's jest the age; jest on forty. I says to 'n, 'Some of 'em 'd -go for you, if they knowed you was wantin' frost.' He laughed. 'We all -speaks for ourselves, don't we?' he says." - -Then Bettesworth added, "There, I never could have a better neighbour -'n he is. Always jest the same. He looks out for me, too." - -I grieve that I have forgotten the particular instance of looking out: -it was a case of Kid's mother telling him that she was short of some -commodity or other--hot water, perhaps, for tea; upon which Kid said, -"Well, see there's some left for old Freddy." On another occasion, "I -had," Bettesworth remarked, "my favourite dish for supper last -night--pig's chiddlins," and he owed the treat to his neighbours. -"They'd killed their pig, and old Nanny brought me in a nice hot -plateful. I _did_ enjoy 'em: they was so soft an' nice. There's -nothin' I be more fond of, if I knows who cleaned 'em. But I en't -tasted any since I give up keepin' pigs myself." - - -I could not spare many hours a day for it, so that our turfing work -dragged out wearisomely; but throughout it Bettesworth's conversation -maintained the same homely inconspicuous character. Once it was about -the celery in the garden: "'Tis the nicest celery I ever had--so -crisp, an' so well-bleached. I've had two sticks." (He had been told -to help himself.) "Last night I put some in a saucepan an' boiled it -up; an' then a little pepper an' salt and a nice bit o' butter." He -has no teeth now for eating it uncooked; "or else at one time I -could," he assured me. - -One after another his simple domestic arrangements were talked over. -He made no fire at home in the morning; Nanny gave him a cup of tea; -and so he saved coal, which he had been buying from one of the village -shops, half a hundredweight at a time. But the price was exorbitant, -and Bettesworth had found a way of buying for fourpence the -hundredweight cheaper. And "fo'pence--that's a lot. Well, there's the -price of a loaf _soon_ saved." "And a loaf," I put in, "lasts you...?" -"Lasts me a long time, and _then_ I gives the crusts and odd bits to -Kid for his pig.... One way and another I makes it all up to 'em." - -Of a well-to-do neighbour, "He don't shake off that lumbago in his -back yet, so he says.... Ah, he have bin a strong man. So he ought to -be, the way he eats. His sister was sayin' only t'other day how every -mornin' he'll eat as big a plateful o' fat bacon as she puts before -'n." - -A difficulty with a turf which was cut too thick at one corner made a -queer diversion. The old man was wearing new boots, and already I knew -how he had bargained for them at Wilby's shop, getting a pair of cork -socks, besides laces and dubbin, thrown in for his money. And now, -this little corner of grass obstinately sticking up, "Let's see what -Mr. Wilby 'll do for 'n," said Bettesworth, and he stamped his new -boot down hard and the thickened sod yielded. "Do they hurt you at -all?" I asked then. "No," he said, "not no more'n you may expect. New -boots always draws your feet a bit. That one wrung my foot a little -yest'day. When I got home, 'fore ever I lit my candle, I'd unlaced 'n -and fetched 'n off. I flung 'n down. But I be very well pleased with -'em. 'Tis jest across here by the seam where they hurts.... No, I en't -_laced_ 'em tight. I don't hold with that, for new boots. Of course -they en't leather; can't be for the money. When you've paid for the -makin' what is there left for leather, out of five-and-sixpence? No, -they _can't_ be leather.... - -"Little Tim" (Bettesworth's five-year-old chum) "jest got some new -uns, with nails in 'em. Nex' pair he has, he says, he's goin' to have -'em big, with big nails, jest like his father's. 'You ben't man enough -yet, Tim,' I says. But he got some little gaiters too. 'Now I be -ready,' he says, 'if it snows or anything.'" - -As a rule we endured in silence the minor discomforts incidental to -work like ours, in a raw winter air. But there were exceptions, as -when we agreed in hating to handle the tools with our hands so caked -over with the black earth. To me, indeed, the spade felt as if covered -with sandpaper, so that sometimes it was less painful to use fingers, -although of course they did but get the more thickly encrusted with -soil by that device. This state of our hands was the cause of another -small distress: one could not touch a pocket-handkerchief. And of this -also we spoke, once, when I all but laughed aloud at what Bettesworth -said. - -It began with his testily remarking, "My nose is more plag' than -enough!" There was, indeed, and had been for a long time, a glistening -drop at the end of it. - -My own was in like case, no pocket-handkerchief being available. So I -said, "Mine would be all right in a second, if I could only get to -wipe it." - -Then said Bettesworth, innocently (for he had no suspicion how funny -his reply was), "Ah, but that's what you can't do, without makin' your -face all dirty." - -With our noses distilling dew-drops, and our hands gloved-over with -mud and aching with cold, we may be pardoned, I hope, for complaining -sometimes of the weather. I believe that really we liked it; for down -there so close to the grass and the soil we were entering into -intimacies like theirs, with the cool winter air; but our enjoyment -was subconscious, whereas consciously we criticized and were not too -well pleased. After one interval of grumbling, I tried to cheer up, -with the suggestion, "We must be thankful it isn't so cold as -yesterday." Bettesworth, however, was not to be so easily appeased, -but replied, "We don't feel it down here, where 'tis so sheltered, but -depend upon it, 'tis purty cold down the road, when you gets into the -wind. I met old Steve when I was comin' back from dinner. 'How d'ye -get on up there?' I says." (_Up there_ is on the ridge of the hill, -where Steve works in a garden.) "''Tis purty peaky up there,' he says. -I'll lay it is, too. I shouldn't think there's anybody got a much -colder job than he have. 'Pend upon it, he _do_ feel it." - -"I was afraid on Sunday we were in for more snow." - -"Ah, so was I. I found my old hard broom. Stacked in he was, behind a -lot o' peasticks an' clutter. I'd missed 'n for a long time--ever -since our young Dave" (his nephew's son) "come to clear up the garden -for me. He'd pulled up the peasticks an' put 'em in the old -shed--well, I'd told 'n to. And I _fancied_ that's where the broom -must be. So Sunday I fetched 'em all out of it and got 'n out and took -'n indoors with the shovel, in case any snow _should_ come. - -"Little Dave's gone on 'long o' George Bryant, up at Powell's. Handy -little chap, he is...." - - -In this way, so long as the turf-laying lasted, Bettesworth's talk -went drivelling on. Was he really getting dull? I had begun by -fancying so; and yet as I listened to him, perhaps myself benumbed a -little by the cold open air, something rather new to me--a quality in -the old man's conversation more intrinsically pleasing than I had -previously known--began to make its subtle appeal. Half unawares it -came home to me, like the contact of the garden mould, and the smell -of the earth, and the silent saturation of the cold air. You could -hardly call it thought--the quality in this simple prattling. Our -hands touching the turfs had no thought either; but they were alive -for all that; and of such a nature was the life in Bettesworth's -brain, in its simple touch upon the circumstances of his existence. -The fretful echoes men call opinions did not sound in it; clamour of -the daily press did not disturb its quiet; it was no bubble puffed out -by learning, nor indeed had it any of the gracefulness which some -mental life takes from poetry and art; but it was still a genuine and -strong elemental life of the human brain that during those days was my -companion. It seemed as if something very real, as if the true sound -of the life of the village, had at last reached my dull senses. - -The themes might be trivial, yet the talk was not ignoble. The -rippling comments upon their affairs, which swing in perpetual ebb and -flow amidst the labouring people, lead them perhaps no farther; and -yet, should they not be said? Could they be dispensed with? Are they -not an integral part of life? Let me quote another fragment: - -"After that rain yesterday, old Kid says, up in that clay at -Waterman's when you takes your spud out o' the ground you can't see -whether 'tis a spud or a board. And it's enough to break your -shoulders all to pieces. He _was_ tired last night, he says." - -Well--to me the observation justifies itself, and I like it for its -own sake. It touched me with an elusive vitality of its own, for which -after our turf-laying I began generally to listen in Bettesworth's -talk, and which nowadays I hear in that of his neighbours, as when old -Nanny Norris meets me on the road and stops for a gossip. - - - - -XXX - - -Christmas was approaching near--was "buckin' up," as Bettesworth -quaintly phrased it; and that it contributed to the melancholy of his -existence will easily be understood. It is nowhere mentioned in my -book, but a remorse was beginning to haunt him, for having let his -wife be taken away to the infirmary, to die there. "I done it for the -best, poor old dear," I remember his saying several times; "but it -hurts me to think I let her go." In the long evenings before -Christmas, alone in his cottage and unable to pass time by reading, he -had too much time for brooding over his loss. - -The nights as well as the evenings were probably too long for him, and -I make no question that his happiest hours were those he spent at -work, when he could forget himself and still talk cheerfully. Thus -there is quite a gleam of cheerfulness in the following instructive -fragment, of the 17th of December. - - -_December 17, 1904._--"When the wind blowed up in the night I thought -'twas rain. I got out an' went to the winder--law! _'twas_ dark! But -the winder an' all seemed as dry!" - -"What time was that?" - -"I DUNNO, sir." - -"The moon must have been down?" - -"Yes, the moon was down." - -"Then it must have been getting on for morning." - -"I dunno.... But I'd smoked two pipes o' baccer before Kid called me. -I _have_ smoked some baccer since I bin livin' there alone. The last -half-pound I had is purty well all gone; and 'tent the day for another -lot afore Monday." (This was Saturday.) "But I shall ha' to get me -some more to-night. Why, that's quarter of a pound a week! - -"Old Kid says, 'Don't it make ye _dry_?' this smoking. 'No,' I says, -'that" (namely, to drink) "en't no good.' Kid don't smoke. Reg'lar -old-fashioned card, he is. 'Ten't many _young_ men you'll see like 'n. -But he's as reg'lar in his habits as a old married man. Ay, and he's -as good, too. 'T least, he's as good to me. So they both be." - -"Isn't he to his mother?" - -"Ah! an' she to him. No woman couldn't look after a baby better. Every -night as soon as he's home and ready to sit down, there's his supper -on the table. 'Supper's ready, Kid,' she says. 'So's yourn too, -Freddy,' she says to me. 'Ah,' I says, 'Wait a bit, Nanny, till my -kettle's boilin'.' Because I always has tea along o' my supper. Kid, -he don't have his till after; but I likes mine with my supper. So I -tells her to put it in the oven till I'm ready. Cert'nly, my little -kettle don't take long to boil. But I shall ha' to get me quarter of -a ton o' coal, soon as Chris'mas is over." - - -A faint memory, for which I have had to grope, restores a mention by -Bettesworth of three glasses of grog to which he treated Kid Norris -and himself and old Nanny. Perhaps this was at Christmas time; at any -rate I am not aware that the season was brightened for him by any -other celebration. It passed, and the New Year came in, and still he -was living the same broken life, yet telling rather of the few -pleasures it contained than of its desolation. I am sure he did not -mean to let me know that he was being constantly reminded of his wife, -yet the next conversation gives reason to suppose that such was the -case. - - -_January 10, 1905._--He had spent two vigorous days in cutting down -and sawing into logs an old plum-tree, and grubbing out its roots. -That was a job which he might still be left to do without supervision; -but I had to assist, when it came to planting a young tree in the -vacant space. A pear-tree, this new one was; and he asked, "Was it a -'William' pear?" It was a _Doyenne du Comice_, I said. His shrug -showed that he did not get hold of the name at all, and I fancied him -a little contemptuous of such outlandishness; so I added that I had -seen some of the pears in a fruiterer's window, and wished to grow the -like for myself. - -"Ah"--the suggestion was enough. He wondered if that was the sort he -had bought for his "poor old gal"; and then he told again how he had -given three halfpence apiece for pears to take to her at the -infirmary, and would have given sixpence rather than go without them. -"And _then_ the poor old gal never tasted 'em.... She wa'n't up there -long.... That Blackman what drove the fly that took her ast me about -her t'other day. He didn't know" (that she was dead), "or he _said_ he -didn't. 'She was only up there three days,' I said. Since then, he've -took old Mrs. Cook--Jerry's mother.... Jerry kep' her as long as he -could, but 't last she _'ad_ to go. Yes, he stuck to 'er as long as he -could, Jerry did. None o' the others didn't, ye see.... But he had -money: there was two hunderd pound, so they said, when his wife's -mother died, and nobody couldn't make out what become of it exactly. -But Jerry had some, an' purty soon got rid of it. Purty near killed -'n. 'Fore he'd done with it he couldn't stoop to tie up his shoelaces, -he was got that bloaty.... I reckon he bides down there by hisself, -now." - -In that he resembled Bettesworth, then. I asked if Jerry had no wife. - -"She died about two year ago. Poor thing--she'd bin through -_every_thing; bin to hospitals and all." It was one hop-picking, about -nine years ago, and just after she was married, that "they was larkin' -about--jest havin' a bit o' fun, ye know; there wasn't no spite in -it--and one of 'em swished her right across the eye with a -hop-bine.... I s'pose 'twas something frightful, afore she died; 't -had eat right into her head." - -The old man pondered over the horror, then continued, "There must be -something poisonous about hop-bine. Same as with a ear o' corn. How -many you sees have lost an eye by an ear o' corn swishin' into it! -En't you ever heard of it? _I_'ve knowed it, many's a time. There was" -(I forget whom he named)--"it jest flicked 'n across the sight, and he -went purty near mad wi' the pain of it. Oats is the worst. Well, as -you knows, oats is so thin, 't'll stick to the eyeball purty near like -paper.... But I'd sooner cut oats than any other; it cuts so sweet. -That was always my favourite corn to cut. Cert'nly I en't never had no -accident with it. Barley cuts sweet, but 't en't like oats." - - -The next day's chatter gives one more touch to the picture of -Bettesworth's pleasant intercourse with his neighbours at this period. -Apropos of nothing at all the old man began his story. - - -_January 11, 1905._--"When I went home last night I see my door was -open; but I never went in, because you knows I had to go on further to -take that note for you. But after I'd done that I come back same way, -and then I see a light in the winder. 'Hullo!' I says to myself. -'What's up now, then?' So I pushed on; and when I got indoors there -was old Nanny--she'd made up my fire an' biled my kettle, an' was -gettin' my dinner ready. Ah, an' she'd bin upstairs, too: she'd -scrubbed it out--all the rooms; and she says, 'I've made yer bed too, -Fred....' But I give her a shillin', so she can't go about sayin' she -done all this for me for nothin'. _She_ en't got nothin' to complain -of. Besides, 't wants a scrub out now an' again. Not as 'twas anyways -_dirty_, 'cause _t'en't_. She said so herself. 'If it's a fine day -to-morrer, Fred, I'll come an' scrub your floors out for ye: 't'll do -'em good. Not as they be DIRTY,' she says; 'I see 'em myself, so I -knows....' Well, so she did. She come in last week, and hung my new -curtains.... I've had new curtains" (little muslin blinds) "to the -winders, upstairs an' down--I bought 'em week afore last--and ol' Nan -'ve made 'em an' put 'em up for me. No mistake she is a one to work! -Works as hard as any young gal--and she between seventy an' eighty." - -I said, "Yes, she's one of the right sort, is Nanny." - -"One o' the right sort for me. 'Tis to be hoped nothin' 'll ever -happen to _she_!" - -Such were the makeshift, yet not altogether unhappy domestic, -conditions by which Bettesworth was enabled for a little while to -maintain his independence, and carry on the obstinate and now hopeless -struggle to earn a living for himself. He was a man with work to do, -and with the will to do it, as yet. On this same eleventh of January -we may picture him forming one of a curious group of the working men -of the parish, who gathered in a rainy dawn on a high piece of the -road, and looked apprehensively at the weather. "I thought," -Bettesworth told me afterwards, "we was in for a reg'lar wild day; and -so did a good many more. The men didn't like startin'.... I come out -to the cross-roads 'long of old Kid, and he said he didn't hardly know -what to think about it. And while we stood there, Ben Fowler come -along. 'I don't hardly know what to make of it,' he says. And then -some more come. There was a reg'lar gang of 'em; didn't like to go -away. Well, a man don't _like_ to set off for a day's work an' get wet -through afore he begins." - - -_January 17._--Not many more days of work, however, were to be added -to the tale of Bettesworth's laborious years. On the 17th of January -it appears that he was still going on, for old Nanny seen at an -unaccustomed hour on the road, spoke of him as getting about with -difficulty. This is what she said, in her gruff, quick, scolding -voice: "I couldn't git to the town fust thing, 'twas so slippery. -Bettesworth said he couldn't git down our steps this mornin', so I bin -chuckin' sand over 'em. Don't want ol' Freddy to break his leg.... All -up there by Granny Fry's the childern gets slidin,' an' makes it ten -times wuss than what 'twas afore, an' the more you says to 'm the wuss -they be." - -With this last glimpse of him fumbling painfully on the slippery -pathway, we finish our acquaintance with Bettesworth's working life. - - - - -XXXI - - -_January 22, 1905._--The 22nd of January was the date, as nearly as I -can make out now, of Bettesworth's being seized by another of his -bronchial colds, from which he had hitherto been tolerably free this -winter. An influenza attacking myself about the same time prevented me -from going out to see how he fared, and for about ten days I know only -that he did not come to work. Then, on the 3rd of February, leaning -heavily on his stick and looking white and feeble, he managed to get -this far to report himself. It would take over long to tell how he sat -by the kitchen fire that day and discussed sundry affairs of the -village. For himself, he was rapidly getting well, and hoped to be -back at work in a few days. I surmise that he had been lonely. Kid -Norris had not come near him, but had been audible through the -partition wall, asking his deaf mother "How old Freddy was?" Old Nanny -herself had an extremely bad cold. - - -_February 8._--A few more days pass; and then on February the 8th -there is the following brief entry in my note-book: - -"Bettesworth started work again yesterday. He planted some shallots, -and even while I watched him smoothing the earth over them, he raked -out two which, failing to see, he trod upon and left on the ground." - -And that was Bettesworth's last day's work. He never again after that -day put hand to tool, and probably some suspicion that the end had at -length come to the usefulness of his life prompted me the next morning -to make that entry in my book. - -On that day he had professed to be fairly well, and so he seemed. He -mentioned, however, when I asked if Kid Norris had yet been to see -him, that the kindness of the Norrises had "fell away very much. Very -much, it have. I en't _told_ nobody, but...." He talked of giving up -his cottage and accepting an offer to lodge with George Bryant. This -young labourer, who has been spoken of before, was now and to the end -a stanch friend and admirer of Bettesworth. With him Bettesworth -fancied he would be comfortable, and I thought so too, and encouraged -him in the project, for the old man's illness had shown that it was -not right for him to live alone. - -But the proposal came too late. On the following morning (the 8th: a -Tuesday) no Bettesworth appeared; but about nine o'clock a messenger, -who was on the way to fetch a doctor, called to say that Bettesworth -was very ill; and then I remembered that on the previous afternoon he -had spoken of having been shivering all through his dinner-hour. - -It was a wet day: the influenza had barely left me, and I dared not go -out to visit Bettesworth. Towards evening, as there had been no news -of him, a member of my family started out across the valley to make -inquiries, and had not long been gone, when one of his neighbours -arrived here. It was Mrs. Eggar--"Kate," as he called her: the same -good helpful woman who had volunteered to do his washing when his wife -was ill, and had despatched the messenger for a doctor this morning. -On this evening she had stepped into the gap again. Her errand was to -urge that Bettesworth should be sent off at once to the infirmary, and -to persuade me to write to the relieving officer asking him to take -the necessary action. Her daughter, she said, would carry my letter to -him in the morning, and would bring back any message or instructions -he might send. - -From her account of him it was evident that Bettesworth was in a -critical state. He ought not to be left alone for the approaching -night; but the question was, who would sit up with him? As it was out -of my own power to do that, and as the old man's life might depend on -its being done, my duty was clear enough: I could make it worth -somebody's while to undertake the watching; and accordingly I made the -offer. The woman hesitated, thinking of her family and her laundry -work, and of her husband's toilsome days too; and then, seeing that -with all their toil they were very poor (she told me much about her -circumstances afterwards), she finally decided that she and her -husband would see Bettesworth through the night. Her husband had work -three or four miles away, and was leaving home at four in the morning: -she herself had a young baby at the time; but, says my note-book, -"they did it." - -And on the following morning, as we had arranged, their daughter went -that weary journey to the relieving officer, and brought back to me by -ten o'clock his order for the medical officer's attendance. It seemed -that the old pitiful routine we had been through several times before -was to be entered upon once more; but to expedite matters I enclosed -the order for attendance in a note of my own to the doctor; and the -girl started off with it to the town, to add another three miles to -the five or six she had already walked that morning. - -That, one would have supposed, should have almost ended the trouble; -but though a man be dying it is not easy, under the existing Poor Law, -to get him that help which the ratepayers provide, for the machinery -is cumbersome, and the people who should profit by it do not -appreciate its intricacies, or know how to make it work smoothly. In -the present instance much trouble would have been saved, if -Bettesworth's neighbours had known enough to correct an oversight of -the doctor's. There was no delay on his side; but unfortunately it -was the _locum tenens_ again who called; and he contented himself with -giving his verbal assent to Bettesworth's going to the infirmary. -That, of course, was useless; but the women attending Bettesworth did -not know it. On the contrary, they supposed that the formal -certificate could be dispensed with, and that a note from myself would -satisfy the relieving officer. A message from them reached me, begging -me to write such a note, which, they said, Bettesworth's nephew would -take over to Moorway's in the evening. - -Of course the suggestion was utterly futile. The relieving officer -could not recognize a request from me as an order, and an attempt to -make him do so, if it effected nothing worse, would certainly delay -Bettesworth's removal for yet another day, although, as it was, the -unhappy old man must be left a second night in the care of his -ignorant if well-meaning neighbours. But worse might easily follow the -sending of Bettesworth's nephew for a long walk on such a fool's -errand. Strong passionate man that he was, it was more than likely -that he would quarrel with the officer; and to applicants for relief a -relieving officer is an autocrat with whom it is not well to quarrel. -These considerations, duly weighed, persuaded me not to do what I was -asked; but I sent the messenger back with the request that -Bettesworth's nephew should call upon me. - -He came in the evening: a black-haired powerful builder's-labourer, -tired with his day's work, but prepared to be sent on a five-mile -walk. As we discussed Bettesworth's condition, and the desirability of -getting him to the infirmary, the man's tone jarred a little. He said, -"It's the best place for him. But it strikes me he'll never come home -again." A feeling passed over me that a wish was father to this -thought: that Jack Bettesworth was not eager for the responsibility -which would rest upon him, if his uncle should come home. After events -seem to prove that I wronged the man: on this occasion I was chiefly -eager to secure his help. Almost apologetically I said, "It makes a -lot of running about." "Well, can't 'elp it," was the laconic answer. -We did help it to some extent, however, by sending him, not to the -relieving officer, which would have cost another five miles, but to -the doctor, at the expense of no more than three. The nephew was to -get the doctor's certificate, and post it in the town to the relieving -officer; and for this purpose he was furnished with a stamped and -addressed envelope, in which was enclosed a letter to the relieving -officer, begging him to attend to the case on his way through the -village in the morning. It was the best we could do. Should all go -well, not more than ten or twelve miles of walking (I omit the -carrying of messages to and from me) and not more than two days of -waiting would have sufficed for getting Bettesworth the help of which -he was officially certified to be in need. - - -_February 9, 1905._--And all did go well. On Thursday morning, the 9th -of February, I went to Bettesworth's cottage, and found preparations -in progress for his going away. There was more than preparation. With -all their kindliness, it must be said of the labouring people that -they want tact. Bettesworth's poor home had become a sort of show, in -its small squalid fashion. The door stood wide open; there were half a -dozen people in the living-room, where the old man had of late shut -himself in with his loneliness and his independence; and upstairs in -his bed he must have been aware of the nakedness of the place now -displayed. The unswept hearth and the extinct fire were pitiful to -see; yet there stood women and children, seeing them. Mrs. Eggar -("Kate") had a good right to be there. She had sat up a second night, -and, albeit sleepy-eyed and untidy, there was helpfulness in her large -buxom presence. Perhaps there were reasons too for her daughter's -being there with the baby. Another woman, tall, grave, and sympathetic -of aspect, had brought two more children; and she told me that -upstairs Jack Bettesworth's wife Liz was washing the old man. Liz, by -the way, was prepared to go with him on his journey. - -I went up into the little square-windowed dirty bedroom and saw him. -He was inclined to cry at the prospect of shutting up his home; but a -little talk about my garden--perhaps dearer to him now than even his -home was--brightened him up. It pleased him to learn that some early -peas had been sown. In what part? he wanted to know. And being told, -"Ah," he said, "and there's another place where peas 'd do well: up -there under George Bryant's hedge." When I left, it was with a promise -to go and see him in the infirmary on the next visiting day. Going out -I saw old Nanny Norris at her door, observant of all that went on, but -unserviceably deaf. She was wearing her bonnet and black shawl, looked -ill, and complained of cough and of pains across her shoulders. I -think there were two or three other women standing near. They were -probably waiting to see Bettesworth removed, as he duly was, at -mid-day. - - - - -XXXII - - -_February 10._--The day after his departure a rather annoying -circumstance came to light. The monthly contribution to the club was -found to be a whole year in arrear. As the sum was but threepence a -month, so that even now only three shillings were due, it seemed a -little too bad of Bettesworth to have neglected the payments which at -least secured him a doctor's attendance and at his death would produce -four pounds for funeral expenses. Perhaps, however, he was not so much -to blame as appeared; at any rate, the manner by which we learnt of -his carelessness offers to the imagination the material for an -affecting picture of the old man on his sick-bed. It was Mrs. Eggar -who, in some trouble for him, brought his club-membership card to me, -and told how he had asked her to find it. On the eve of his departure -he had taken her into his confidence, spoken of the possibility that -he might be going away only to die, and desired, in that event, to be -brought home from the infirmary and buried decently, "same as his -wife," with this sum which the club would pay. Of course the money for -the arrears had to be found, and Mrs. Eggar undertook to pay it to -the club secretary on the next day, when she went to the town to do -her Saturday's shopping. Bettesworth had further asked her, she said, -to find his discharge papers from the army, and see what reason for -his discharge was stated, since he had forgotten. I have never -understood why he should have been curious on that point, at such a -time. Defective sight seems to have been the unexciting reason -alleged. - -And now, its occupant gone and Mrs. Eggar's rummagings done, the -squalid tenement next door to the Norris's stood shut up, with the -door locked on the few poor belongings it contained. To the neighbours -there seemed to be all the circumstances of a death, except the death -itself. People began to remember, what I had failed to observe yet -could well believe, how greatly Bettesworth had changed of late; -others recalled complaints he had uttered of being unbearably lonely. -It was the general opinion that, even if he lived, he would never work -again, and never again come back to the place he had left. Three or -four men approached me in the hope of getting work in my garden; while -as for the cottage, had I cared to give it up, there were already (the -owner told me) four or five applicants eager to take it. What I should -do, and what Bettesworth, formed the subject of a good deal of -speculation. Old Nanny, meeting me in the road, plunged excitedly into -the middle of the discussion. In her harsh snapping voice she assured -me that the cottage was "as dirty as _ever_!" and that, as regarded -Bettesworth, the infirmary was "the best place _for_ him!" "Have ye -give up the cot?" she asked. "No." "Oh! ... Beagley" (the owner) "told -young Cook as you had?" "I haven't." "Well, he _said_ you had." For -some reason that was never divulged, Nanny had conceived a violent -animosity towards Bettesworth, which I then supposed to be peculiar to -herself; but in other respects her unmannerly questionings only -betrayed the attitude of almost all the other neighbours. Bettesworth -was done for: he had better stay at the infirmary and let others have -his work and his cottage. Such was the prevailing opinion. The people -were not intentionally unkind; but in the merciless working-class -struggle for life one may admire how long Bettesworth had held his -own. - -On the other hand, the opposite side, Bettesworth's side, was -championed probably by not a few labouring men, who had learnt to -appreciate his quality. Among these was George Bryant. Bryant had been -doing a few necessary jobs for me during Bettesworth's illness, and it -was to his interest, if anybody's, that the old man should not come -home again. When I repeated to him, however, what people had been -saying--namely, that Bettesworth ought now to stay in the infirmary, -he said "H'm!" and clearly did not agree. Finally, "Well, of course, -we knows 'tis a place where old people _ought_ to be looked after, -but--well, Bettesworth likes his liberty. And so should I, if I was -in his place!" - -With a cordial feeling which warmed me at the time and may give a -little colour now to the grey narrative, he spoke of the change he had -lately observed in Bettesworth, who had confessed to him that life had -grown so lonely "he didn't know how ever to put up with it." On the -very last Sunday evening Bryant had been over at the old man's -cottage, "and 'tis a _lot_ cleaner 'n what it used to be in the old -lady's time." But the difficulty was that Bettesworth could not see. I -assented, mentioning his last labours at planting shallots. Bryant -smiled; from his adjoining garden he had noticed the same thing a year -ago, with some peas. But, in general, he admired Bettesworth. "He's a -man that don't talk much till he's started, and then.... He was -tellin' me Sunday about the things he see in the war. I reckon that -got a lot to do with the way he is now: the cold winds, when the tents -blowed over, and he'd have to lay out all in the mud. He might think -'t didn't hurt 'n," but in all likelihood Bettesworth was now feeling -the effects of these sufferings of so long ago. The Crimean wind, as -described by Bettesworth, seemed to have impressed Bryant. "He did -tell me what regiment it belonged to, but I forgets which 'twas; but -one o' the regiments had the big drum lifted right up into the air an' -carried out to sea by the wind." - - - - -XXXIII - - -The remainder of Bettesworth's story may for the most part be told in -the notes made at the time, without much comment. I was unable to go -to the infirmary on the first visiting day after his admission, as I -had promised that I would; but I managed to get to him a week later, -namely on Tuesday, the 21st of February, when he had been there twelve -days; and on the next day the following account of the visit was -jotted down. - - -_February 22, 1905._--At the infirmary yesterday I found Bettesworth -still in bed, in a large ward on the ground floor. Out of doors, -though it was a day of fair sunshine generally, the north-east wind -was bitter, and a storm of sleet and sparse hail which I had been -watching as it drove across the eastern sky, and which had reached me -as I neared the gate, made it agreeable to get inside the fine -well-warmed building. From Bettesworth's bedside I could see, through -the tall windows of the ward, distant fields and the grey storm -drifting slowly over them. Trees on the horizon stood out sombre -against the sombre sky. - -Within, was plentiful light--plentiful air and warmth too, and cleanly -order. The place looked almost cheerful, although some twenty men lay -there, suffering or unhappy. One only was sitting up, who coughed -exhaustedly, not violently; he seemed able to do no more than sit up, -shaking with debility. In the beds the patients mostly lay quite -still. The man next beyond Bettesworth drew the counterpane up over -his ears, and I saw a glowing feverish eye watching me. There were but -few other visitors--only four, I think, besides myself. Somewhere an -electric bell sounded. A little nursing attendant with sleeves -stripped up came stumping cheerily all down the ward. She had been -washing dishes or something in a kind of scullery just outside when I -came in. As she passed through she said, as though to interest the -sick men, "This is how I do my work--see? Walkin' about like this!" - -My first impression of the place was favourable; all looked so -well-appointed, so sumptuous even. And there lay Bettesworth under his -white counterpane, himself wonderfully clean and trim, and wearing a -floppy white nightcap. I had hoped to find him sitting up; but -still.... - -"How are you?" I shook his hand--unrecognizably thin and clean and -soft--and he flushed and sat up, pleased enough. But, "I'm as well as -ever I shall be," he murmured; or was it (I don't quite remember) "I -shan't never be no better." Shocked, and not sure of having heard -aright, I asked again, and the answer came, "I shan't never be no -better, so long as I bides here." - -What was the matter, then? Everything. The interview turned forthwith -into one protracted, unreasoning grumble from the old man. He had not -food enough. Bread and butter--just a little piece at one time, and a -little piece more at some other time. And beef-tea--"they calls it -beef-tea, but 'tis only that stuff out o' the bottle--_I_ forgets the -name of it. Bovril? Ah, that's it. One cup we has at home 'd make -twenty o' these." - -I tried to reason with him, but it was useless. Evidently he was very -weak. He coughed at times, but said he had no pain now. What he wanted -was to get up, and be about, where he could obtain for himself such -things as he might fancy. If a man, he argued, feeling as he did, was -allowed to get up and put on his clothes for an hour or two, and have -a sluice down, wouldn't it brighten that man up? But last night--he -didn't know what time it was, and he got out of bed. One of the nurses -came in just then. "'What are you doin' out there?' she said; 'you -ought to be in bed.' 'And so did you ought to be,' I says." To judge -from his tone in narrating, he said it in no amiable voice. He added -petulantly, "There! give me Guildford Hospital before this, twenty -times over!" - -Thus he grumbled continuously. "There's old Hall in that bed over -there. _He's_ wantin' to go 'ome, too." Bettesworth spoke with a -sneer, not at our poor old neighbour Hall, but at Hall's pitiful -prospect of getting release from this imprisonment. He told me of the -other's bad cough, and of his age, and so forth, and for a minute or -two forgot his own grievances, but only for a minute or two. I asked -some question about the doctor. The doctor? They never set eyes on -him, for two or three days at a time. And he didn't give him any -medicine much, either. That bottle he" (Bettesworth) "had from the -club doctor before leaving home--he only had two doses out of it, but -that was a _lot_ nicer than this stuff. And the bed was hard--"nothin' -soft to lay on," and his back was getting sore. "Let's see--'twas a -fortnight last Thursday I come here, wasn't it?" "No, a week." "Oh, -only a week? I thought 'twas a fortnight. The time seems so _long_." - -A woman and a girl were at old Hall's bedside, farther down the ward. -I could see him sitting up, panting, white, the picture of despair. -Then the woman turned and came towards us; it was Bettesworth's niece -Liz. She was smiling a little bewilderedly. "He wants me to send for -the nurse," she said, alluding to Hall; "he wants to go home." - -She joined me in talking to Bettesworth. One or two things I told him -about the garden awakened but a faint interest in him; and meanwhile I -could see Hall sitting up, his under-lip drooping, his eyes abnormally -bright. Yet I think he could not see much. Usually he wears -spectacles, being eighty years old. And still we talked to -Bettesworth. His niece was as unsuccessful as myself in trying to -reason with him. To some remark of hers, suggesting that if he were at -home he would be without anyone to nurse him, he replied fiercely (and -I have no notion of his meaning), "No! and there won't _be_ none, -neither, once I gets home and got my key. I shall lock my door!..." -Liz argued then that this place was so comfortable and so clean. "'Tis -the patients has to do that," said Bettesworth. - -At last a nurse came to old Hall, and we listened while he proffered -his request to go home. "To-morrow," he said. "Oh, you can't go till -you've seen the doctor!" The nurse spoke pleasantly, though of course -with decision, and bustled away. But Bettesworth, with his sneer, -commented, "Ah! I _thought_ she'd snap his head off!" - -Weary of him, I went over to speak to Hall, who was now looking -utterly baffled. Until I was quite close he did not recognize me, but -then he shook hands joyfully. To him, as to Bettesworth, I counselled -patience. Ah, but he felt he shouldn't get on, so long as he bid -there. He couldn't get on with the food. The bread in the broth did -not get soft, and as for the dry bread--"I've no teeth at all in the -top row," he said, and therefore he could not masticate it. Another -reason for his wishing to leave was that his wife was ill with -bronchitis at home, and he longed to return to her. - -Well, I had no comfort for him, any more than for Bettesworth. And -when I left, they were still dissatisfied, and I was equally sure that -their grievances were unreal. What, then, was the matter with them? -The root of it all, I think, was in this: that they were homesick. The -good order, the cleanliness, the sense of air and space, the routine -of the institution, had overwhelmed them. They were no longer their -own masters in their own homes. They were pining for their little poky -rooms, nice and stuffy, with the windows shut and the curtains half -drawn; they missed their own furniture, pictures, and worthless -rubbish endeared to them by old associations. They did not care, at -their age, to begin practising hygiene and learn how to live to grow -old. They were old already, and wanted to be at home. - - -_February 28._--I have no record of my second visit to the infirmary a -week later; but, as I remember, Bettesworth was then sitting up in a -day-room, so that he was evidently better, although still extremely -feeble. - - - - -XXXIV - - -_March 7, 1905._--Bettesworth left the infirmary on Saturday morning, -March the 4th. I met him half a mile away from it, in the town, and he -was trembling with weakness where he stood. But he protested that he -should get home well enough; he had just had a nice rest, a friend of -mine having taken him into his house to sit down by the fire. My -friend told me afterwards how the old man, invited in because of his -pitiable condition, had seemed to crawl in a state of collapse to the -chair set for him. - -His tale to my friend was curiously different from the account he gave -me of his leaving the infirmary. To the former he explained that on -the Thursday he had desired to be allowed to go home. The wish was -communicated on the next day to the doctor, who asked, "Do you want to -go then?" and was answered ungraciously, "I shan't get no better -here." On Saturday, therefore, his clothes were brought to him, and -out he came. - -But this was not quite the same story that he told me. Perhaps I -should premise that I felt annoyed with him for coming out, since it -was plain who would have to provide for him; and he may have seen -that I was displeased when I said, "You have no business out! You're -not fit for work, and you ought to have stayed another week or two." -Somehow so I greeted him, none too kindly. He replied that there were -seven or eight "turned out" that morning, their room being wanted for -others. Nor did he forget to complain. His clothes, he said, having -been tied in a bundle with a ticket on them, and tossed into a shed, -had been returned to him so damp that he felt "shivery" getting into -them; and there was no fire by which to dress. - -What did he propose to do? was my next question. He was going home, to -make up a fire in his bedroom and air his bed. Already he had arranged -with Liz and Jack to come and help him do that. Such of his things as -were worth anyone's buying he should sell--Mrs. Eggar, for instance, -would take the Windsor chairs; and then he was going to live, -probably, at Jack's. But his first care was to go and air his bed. -Firing--coal, at least--he possessed; wood could be provided by -knocking up two old tables which were grown rickety. To my protest -against such destruction, he replied that already before his illness -he had touched one of the tables with his little axe. - -He trembled, but his mouth shut resolutely, so that I got the -impression, and that not for the first time of late, of something -desperate about him, something hard, fierce, suspicious. - -The discrepancy between his stories to my friend and to myself -strengthens the impression, and as I write this a hypothesis shapes -itself: that he fears to lose his employment with me; fears that I am -weary of him and anxious to get him permanently settled in the -workhouse. For this reason, perhaps, he reviles that hated place, -hurries from it, will not own to weakness though I see him shaking, -will be independent as to coal and the rest. I asked him how he was -off for money. He could do with a shilling or so; but he did not want -to get into debt. - -That was three days ago. I was from home to-day when he came to see -me, announcing himself vastly better. He has gone to live with Jack, -in whose house he has a room to himself and "a nice soft bed," and is -well looked after, he says. Liz has even been giving him a cup of tea -in bed--or desiring to do so. - -I understand him to have said that the old cot used to cost him as -much as six shillings a week to keep going. And that, he added, would -be nearly enough for him to live upon, in his new quarters. - - -_March 8._--I have promised Bettesworth (we walked down the garden -this morning to talk it over out of earshot) that when he finds -himself past work I will make him an allowance, to keep him from the -workhouse. He is to tell me, when the time comes; at present, he still -hopes to do a little more. - -I was wrong, it seems, in surmising that dread of losing his -employment made him so anxious to quit the infirmary. "Was it so?" was -a question put to him this morning, point blank. He denied it. "No," -he said; "I was afraid I should die. That's what made me so eager to -get away. I felt I should die if I bid there another week." So many -died, he said, while he was there--several in one day, I understood, -one being the man in the bed next to Bettesworth's. This man "made up -his mind" and was gone, in twenty minutes--one Freeland, from -Moorways. There also died there a certain old Taff Skinner, an old -neighbour whom Bettesworth, in his own convalescence, tried to get -upstairs to see. A nurse turned him back, he protesting that he -"didn't know as he was doin' wrong," and she explaining that he might -only visit another room or ward on visiting day. "Or else," he told -me, "Old Taff's wife an' daughter was there, and ast me if I wouldn't -go an' see 'n to cheer 'n up." - -Having got home and shifted a few things to Jack's, Bettesworth's -great joy was in his "nice soft bed." He has been used to feathers, -and found the mattress hard at the infirmary. He said with gusto, -"That was a treat to me, to get into that bed and roll myself over. -And my poor old back seemed almost well the next morning." Across the -loins and down the back of his thighs he is tender, and his elbows -were beginning to get sore from hoisting himself up on the mattress. -To ease the loins Jack has been rubbing in "some o' that strong -liniment." On the whole Jack seems to be treating the old man very -well. - -That he will continue to do so is devoutly to be hoped. For there are -not many refuges open to Bettesworth now, nor can the infirmary any -more be looked to as one of them. According to his last version of it, -when the doctor asked him if it was really his wish to leave, he -answered, "Once I gets away I'll never come here no more, not if -there's a ditch at home I can die in." - - -_March 12._--I find there is a steady set of public opinion--that is -to say, the opinion of his own class--against Bettesworth, which has -grown very marked since he came out of the infirmary, although -probably it is not quite a new thing. - -One of the first indications of it, besides old Nanny's animosity -already mentioned, appeared while he was still away, when Bill Crawte -spoke to me in the town, alleging that the old man had been -misbehaving of late in his evenings. I received an impression of -drinking bouts and disorder, which was conveyed in innuendo rather -than directly. "He spends too much money at the public-house; and he -can't take much without its going to his head"--such was Crawte's -expression, intended, it seemed, to warn me that I was deceived in my -protege. - -A few days ago I met old Mrs. Skinner. I remember that I crossed the -street to speak to her "because she was such a stranger," and she -looked flattered, but complained of "such a bad face-ache, sir," and -grimaced, holding her black shawl over her mouth. Then she hurried -into the subject of Bettesworth's home-coming, and did not hesitate to -assure me that he was "a _bad_ old man." Once again I felt that I was -being warned that the old man was unworthy of my help. I had heard -Mrs. Skinner before, however--months before--on the same subject. In -her way she is a good woman whom I like and respect, but she has a -taste for commenting on other people's faults. Moreover, there was -never much love lost between her and Bettesworth: his old tongue, I -suspect, has been too shrewd for her at times. - -Yesterday I met old Nanny, with a bundle on her back, and I stopped to -speak, partly sheltered from a driving rain by the umbrella she held -behind her. She, too, has not scrupled before to complain of -Bettesworth's behaviour, and always with the air of saying to me "he's -not the good old man you take him for." But yesterday her tongue knew -no reticence; she felt wronged herself, and she lashed Bettesworth's -character mercilessly, in the hope of hurting him in my esteem. Swift -and snappish, out came the long screed, while the old woman's eyes -were fiery and her cheeks flushed. Oh, but she felt righteous, I am -sure. She was exposing a blackguard, a scamp! And if she could injure -him, she would. - -I do not recall many of her words. His ingratitude to her was -Bettesworth's chief offence--after all she had done for him! So she -told what she had done: how she had cooked his supper night after -night, and got it all ready while he sat down there at the -public-house waiting to be fetched. She wouldn't have done it, but Kid -said, "Poor old feller, help 'n all you can. He en't got nobody to do -anything for him." And she had washed his clothes, and scrubbed out -his house; and he was such a dirty old man that it almost made her -sick. And when he was ill, Mrs. Cook watching (downstairs, I gathered) -was obliged to sit all night with the window open, because the place -so stank. I heard how many pails of water it took to scrub the floor; -how the boards upstairs--new boards "as white as drippen snow" when -the Bettesworths took possession--would in all likelihood never come -white again; and how the landlord had said that he should demand a -week's rent (from me, of course) to pay for cleaning, when Bettesworth -moved. And now Bettesworth was gone away, "taking his money" (his -wages or his allowance), and "I don't like it, Mr. Bourne!" said old -Nanny, vehemently. Not, apparently, that the money was an object to -her, but that all her good offices had gone unthanked, nay, minimized. -Had not Bettesworth complained that he had no one to do anything for -him? And all the time Mrs. Norris was slaving for him. Had he not told -me during his illness that he had taken nothing, when, in fact, Mrs. -Cook not long before had taken him up a cup of tea and two slices of -bread and butter, which he had eaten? "I don't _like_ it, Mr. Bourne." -No, I could see that she did not; I could hear as much in the emphasis -of the words, rapped out like swift hammer-strokes; and the old woman -looked almost handsome in the flush of her indignation. - -I left her and passed on, wondering what the original offence could -have been to produce such bitterness. Probably it was some harsh -speech of Bettesworth's, some antique savagery drawn from him in the -despair of his lonely situation, with his powers failing, the -workhouse looming. Suspicious, hard, obstinate, wrapped-up now wholly -in himself, he may easily ... but it is useless to surmise. - -Useless is it, too, to pretend that the repeated insinuations have had -no effect upon me. As a rule backbiters succeed only in making me see -their own unreason, while mentally I take sides with their victims; -but in this case fancies of my own were corroborated by the slanders -of the neighbours. I have believed, and think it likely, that -Bettesworth is ready to deceive me to his own advantage, just as I -have long known that he has not really been worth half his wages. He -is in desperate plight, dependent on my caprice, and he cannot afford -to be over scrupulous on a point of honour. As for old Nanny and the -others, I suppose their sense of justice is outraged by Bettesworth's -good fortune in having my protection. They are jealous; they resent -the imposition which they suppose is being put upon me, and imagine me -a blind fool who ought to be enlightened. - -To-day I fell in with old Mrs. Hall, whose husband is still at the -infirmary. She had nothing hopeful to tell me about that old man's -condition. He had been more contented, however, since his master had -written to him, though he did talk, bedridden as he is, of digging a -hole somewhere under the infirmary wall, so that he might escape to -the cab that would bring him back home. But Mrs. Hall didn't think--if -she said what she really thought--that he would ever come home again. -At his great age (why, he is eighty to-morrow!) how could she hope -that he would recover? Poor little dumpy old woman, with the plump -face, and dainty chin, and round eyes--her lips trembled, talking of -her husband and of her own difficulties. "For while he lays up there," -she said, "I got nothin' to live on," except a little help from the -Vicar. Her daughter, married and away in Devonshire, will pay the -quarter's rent, but.... - -"And Mr. Bettesworth's out, it seems," the old woman continued. "It -seems to me he's an ungrateful old man. For 'tis all nice and -comfortable up there. It do seem ungrateful." - -Such was Mrs. Hall's unasked for, unexpected comment, on Bettesworth's -behaviour. Poor old woman, to me too it seemed unjust that she should -be so unaided, and he, perhaps, so over-aided. He is no old woman, -though; allowance must be made for that. He could not away with the -sort of comfort so praised by Mrs. Hall. - - -Is, then, the last word about Bettesworth to be that he is dirty, -dishonest, degraded? He may be all three (he certainly is the first) -and yet have a claim to be helped now and remembered with honour. - -For, as another recent incident has served to remind me, our point of -view is in danger of growing too narrow. One of the kindest of -cultured women, going about her work of visiting the sick, asked me -how Bettesworth was doing. Then, in her amiable way, she talked of him -and of his wife, and soon was speaking of the extreme dirtiness in -which they had lived. As a district visitor she had once or twice come -upon them at meal-times, when their food on the table caused her a -physical loathing--just as once I had been nauseated myself by the -sight of a kippered herring by the old man's bedside. The district -visitor--being invited and finding no courteous excuse for -refusal--had sat down in Bettesworth's easy-chair, not without dread -of what she might bring away. Most cottages she could visit without -such terrors; most people, she supposed, "managed to get a tub once a -week"; but the Bettesworths.... The lady spoke laughingly. In her -comely life, an experience like this is afterwards an adventure. - -I smiled, and said, "They are survivals." - -"Of the fittest?" - -We both laughed; but when I added, "Yes, for some qualities," we knew -(or I at least knew) that indeed that squalor of an earlier century is -associated with a hardness of fibre most intimately connected with the -survival of the English people. - -Suppose that now in stress of circumstances, the toughness warps, -turns to ill-living, suspicion, selfishness and dishonesty, in the -grim determination not to "go under": is it then no longer venerable, -because it has ceased to be amiable? The onlooker should give an eye -to his own point of view. - - - - -XXXV - - -_March 13, 1905._--This (Monday) morning Bettesworth came, slowly -hobbling with his stick. Last week he had promised himself to be at -work again to-day; but no--he is less well, and fancies he has taken -fresh cold. - -He looked white, weak, pathetically docile and kind, as he led the way -from the kitchen door to the wood-shed, evidently desirous of a -private talk. - -He said he was "purty near beat, comin' over Saddler's Hill"; he had -never before had such a job, having been forced to stop to get breath. -It "felt like a lot o' mud in his chest; it was all slushin' and -sloppin' about inside him, jest like a lot o' thick mud." But he had -been worrying so: he wanted to pay me his rent. And then about his -club pay--that worried him, too. He need not have worried? Ah, but he -had done so, none the less; and Liz had said to him, "You better go up -an' see about it, and you'll feel better when you got it off your -mind"; or else he was hardly fit to be out in this cold wind. He had -stayed indoors from Saturday afternoon until this morning. At -tea-time, "about four o'clock yesterday," Liz had brought him a cup -of tea with an egg beaten up in it, which had seemed to do him good. -And she had got him half a quarte'n of whisky to hearten him up as he -came away this morning. But he could not eat. "Law! they boys o' -Jack's 'll eat three times what I do. I likes to see 'em. Jack says, -'What d'ye think o' that for a table?'" and indicates to Bettesworth -the plentiful supply. - -A hint brought the wandering talk back readily to the subject which -the old man had on his mind. "_I_ never owed that money to the club, -what you says Mrs. Eggar drawed from you.... She've done me out o' -that, ye see." Just as he had supposed, so it proved, he affirmed: he -had paid up to last August; and the inference was that Mrs. Eggar had -drawn the money from me for her own uses, and now Bettesworth must -repay it. - -He produced two membership cards in support of his statements. The -first was the same which Mrs. Eggar had brought me, at that time -bearing no receipt later than February, 1904, but now certifying a -further payment of 1s. 6d. up to August. The other was a new card, -giving receipt in full to February of this year. To judge by the ink, -these two receipts had been given at the same time; in other words, -they had been obtained by Mrs. Eggar in return for the money duly paid -in by her. But it took me long to satisfy Bettesworth (if he was -satisfied) that she had not "done" me out of three shillings on his -behalf. - -And then there was his rent, which had been running on all the time -that he was at the infirmary. He had brought the money for that now, -to get out of my debt. - -Of course it was refused. In consideration of this rent, I said, I had -not helped otherwise during his sickness, and I did not wish him to -repay it. What he said to that I regret that I do not exactly -remember, but it went somehow in this way:-- "You done a _lot_ for me, -sir; more 'n you any call to. And I thinks of you...." He was unable -to go on and express his meaning, but his tone rang very sincere. I -did not find any ingratitude in him; nor was there any dishonesty in -the purpose for which he had come to me. - -He, however, found dishonesty in the neighbours, who have bought his -household goods and now hang back with the purchase money. So cheap, -too, he had sold his things! "That landlord at the Swan said 'twas -givin' of 'em away.... But what could I do?" Bettesworth urged. His -brother-in-law had advised him "not to stand out for sixpence; 't -wa'n't as if they was new things," and had warned him against giving -trust. But what could he do? Even as it was, the trouble of attending -to the business had been too much for him in his weak state. So, one -had had a table, and another two saucepans, and so on; and now he -could not get the money. Instead of twenty-two shillings which should -have been received on Saturday, he found himself with no more than -five; and this morning only another five shillings had come in. - -Yes, the people had "had" him; he was sure of that. There was "that -Tom Beagley's wife.... She come to me Saturday sayin' Tom was on the -booze and hadn't given her no money, so she couldn't pay me.... -'That's a lie,' our Tom says; 'he en't bin on the booze. He bin at -work all the week, over here at Moorways.' So I told her I should have -the things back, if she didn't pay me this mornin'." Other instances -were generalized; Bettesworth thought himself cheated all round. - -By this time we had left the shed, and were standing in its shadow, -where the wind blew up cold and draughty. "Let's get into the -sunshine," I proposed. - -As we moved, "Wasn't it a day yesterday?" I remarked; and Bettesworth -assented, "No mistake!" It had in fact been a Sunday of March gales, -of furious rain and hail-storms, and then gay bursts of sunshine -hurrying down the valley. With none to sweep it, the path where we -stood was still bestrewn with a litter of dead twigs, which the east -winds had left, but this fierce westerly wind had finally torn out -from the lilac bushes. "It's a sort of pruning," I said, and was -answered, "Yes, that must do a lot o' good. Done it better 'n you -could ha' done, too." We found a sunny place, although still a -draughty wind searched us out, and fast-changing clouds sometimes drew -across the sunshine and left us shivering. "More showers," we -predicted, "before the day is out." - -There, in the sunshine, Bettesworth coughed--a little painful cough -without variety. It seemed as if it need not have begun, yet, having -begun, need never cease. "You must get rid of that cough," said I. - -"I en't got strength to cough," he replied. Then he put his hands -against the pit of his stomach. "That's where it hurts me. Sims to -tear me all to pieces." I advised care in feeding, and avoidance of -solids. "Bread an' butter's the only solid food I takes," he said. -"Liz wanted me to have a kipper. 'Naw,' I says, 'I en't much of a fish -man.' But I don't want it. I en't got no appetite." It was suggested -that the warm weather presently would restore him; but he returned, -very quietly; "I dunno. I sims to think I shan't last much longer. I -got that idear. I can feel it, somehow." - -"How long have you felt like that?" - -"This six weeks I've had that sort o' feelin'." He went on to repeat -what he had said to Jack in consequence. When he had got his bed and -other things into Jack's house, "'It's all yours now,' I says. 'You -take everything there is. All you got to do is to see me put away.'" - -His weakness was distressing to see, and he had to get back home -somehow. Would a little more whisky help him? We adjourned to the -kitchen, sat down there near the fire, and while the old man had his -stimulant he talked of many things. - -At first, handing me the key of his cottage, he told of his cat, how -plump she looked, and how she had welcomed him home in such fashion as -to make Liz say with a laugh, "No call to ask whose cat she is!" -Sometimes he thought of "gettin' old Kid to put a charge o' shot into -her"; sometimes, of "puttin' her in a sack an' drownin' her." Either -was more than he had the heart to do; yet he could not bear to think -of his cat without a home. Would not Mrs. Norris take care of her, -then?" Oh yes, she'd _feed_ her, but.... But Mrs. Norris can't _hear_, -poor old soul. She bin a good ol' soul to me, though; and so've Kid." -Of course I did not tell Bettesworth how old Nanny had lately talked -of him. - -What to do about his cabbages puzzled him. He had paid old Carver Cook -two shillings for digging the ground and planting them; and now that -he had given up the cottage, there was this value like to be lost! He -must get "whoever took the cot" to take to the cabbages too; they -ought to. He didn't like to cut 'em down--never liked to do anybody -else a bad turn, but.... Ultimately I promised to get the price -allowed, in settling with his landlord. - -Through devious courses the conversation slid back to his nephew's -family and household ways. Liz "don't sit down to dinner 'long o' the -others." There are six boys besides her husband for her to wait upon, -so that, were she to begin, "before she'd got a mouthful the others 'd -be wantin' their second helpin'." The custom sounds barbarous--or -shall I say archaic?--until one remembers that the husband and one or -two of the boys must get home from work to dinner and back again -within an hour. On Sunday afternoon "Jack was off to the town to this -P.S.A. or whatever it is. He brought home another prize too.... A -beautiful book--a foot by nine inches, and three or four inches thick! -Jack _can_ read, no mistake!" Unfortunately he reads in a very loud -voice, so that Bettesworth grows weary of it, in spite of his passion -for being read to. On Saturday night Jack was reading the paper, and -said, "'Like any more?' 'Not to-night, Jack; I be tired.' All about -this war" (in Manchuria). "Sunday he said, 'Shall I read ye the paper, -uncle? 'Tis nothin' but the war.' 'Then we won't have it to-day.'" - -Bettesworth's opinions on the war were tedious to me; he had so -greatly misunderstood. He thought that, after Mukden, the Russians -were retreating "right back into St. Petersburg," which would have -been a retreat indeed!" But it ought to be stopped now"; the other -Powers should interfere and say, "You've had your go in, and now you -must get back into your own bounds." For the Japanese, of course, -Bettesworth was full of admiration: "fighting without food!"... He -exclaimed at their pluck and their prowess. - -Gradually his own memories of war were awaking, and at last, "The -purtiest little soldiers I ever see was the Sardinians." He described -their smartness; their pretty tight-fitting uniform. "They camped -'longside o' we." Of their language "you could get to pick out a good -many words" (I think he meant English words they used), "but it -pestered 'em when they couldn't make ye understand.... But there, we -was as bad.... Every nation has their own slang." The funniest -Bettesworth ever heard was that of the Turks, "like a lot o' geese.... -I remember once a lot of 'em come up over the hill by our camp, with -about four hundred prisoners. They didn't let us have 'em, but was -takin' 'em on to their own camp; but they was so proud for us to see, -an' they was caperin' and cuttin' and dancin' about, jest like a lot -o' geese." - -Something reminded him of George Bryant and his present job; something -else, of his own coal supply, now removed to Jack's; and that brought -up the coal merchant's receipt, which he had found in his waistcoat -pocket. He had given it to Liz, with his wife's little box full of -receipts for coal, groceries, tea, and so on, and had recommended Liz -to "put 'em on the fire." "You _be_ a careless old feller!" Liz -retorted, and he repeated, laughing. - -He had been here nearly an hour, and at last I stood up. Bettesworth -took the hint. He was looking the better for his whisky as he went -off. But all the time, while he sat dreamily talking, he had had a -very mild, placid, old man's expression, and all my harsher thoughts -of him had quite slipped away. - - - - -XXXVI - - -_March 21, 1905._--There being no definite news of Bettesworth since -he crept away that day, this afternoon I knocked at the door of Jack -Bettesworth's cottage, where he is staying. Presently the old man -himself opened to me. His cheeks were flushed and feverish. He led the -way indoors, saying that he was all alone; and as we settled down (he -still wearing his cap) I remarked that he did not seem to be "up to -much," and he replied that I was right; "I got this here pleurisy, and -armonium or something 'long with it." He had got up from bed, quite -recently, to rest for an hour or two. - -He had seen the club doctor--Jack had fetched him on Sunday--"and you -couldn't wish for a pleasanter gentleman. He sounded me all over," and -sent out a plaster which "I'm wearin' now," Bettesworth said, "like -one o' they poor-man's plasters." This reminded him of a similar one -he had once had, of which he said that he "wore 'n for six months"; -and truly the old-fashioned "poor-man's plaster" was always alleged to -be unremovable. Once properly plastered, the patient had to earn his -name and wait until the thing should wear or "rot off," as -Bettesworth phrased it. How this six-months' plaster--right round his -waist, and "wide as a leather belt"--had been "gored" by his "old -mother-in-law, or else 't'd ha' tore flesh and all off," I will not -spend time in relating. - -Bettesworth had caught this new cold, he supposed, waiting for "they -old women" to come and pay him for his furniture; who did not come to -the old cottage at the time appointed, and kept him standing about. -Nor have they yet paid all. - -Not unhappily, but comfortably, he looked up to the mantelpiece and -said, "There's my old clock." I recognized the dingy old gabled -mahogany case; and the tick sounded familiar, reminding me of the -other rooms where I had heard it, and of the old wife who had been -alive then. "Mrs. Smith had my other," said Bettesworth, "and she en't -paid for 't yet. I shall have 'n back, if she don't. Jack persuaded me -to go an' get 'n back last week. 'That's all right,' I says, 'only I -can't get there.' He wanted to go instead of me, but I wouldn't have -that. He might get sayin' more 'n what he ought. But I shall have the -clock back if she don't pay." - -There also was his old mirror--he spoke of it--looking homely over the -mantelpiece; and I heard of a few pictures saved, which Jack had taken -out of their frames, to clean the glass, and had put back again. It -seemed to be comforting to the old man to have these relics of his -married life still about him; and in the midst of them he himself -looked very comfortable; for, as his back was to the light (he sat in -a Windsor chair with arms), I could not see the flush on his face. So -pleasant was it to find him at last beside a clean hearth, warm and -tidy and well cared-for, that I could not refrain from congratulating -him. Yes, he acknowledged his good fortune; he was swift to praise his -niece. "She looks after me," he said warmly, "as well as if I was a -child. I en't bin so comfortable since I dunno when." Perhaps never -before in his life. "Before I was bad myself, there was the poor old -gal. I went through something with she. When I was away at work, I was -always wonderin' about her." - -I had two shillings to hand over to him--the price obtained from his -landlord for the cabbages left in the cottage garden; and in answer to -inquiries as to his finances, he said that he had enough money to keep -him going for a fortnight or so. But he was paying Jack for his board -and lodging, and seemed fully alive to the desirability of continuing -to do so. - -On Sunday morning there had come to see him his sister-in-law from -Middlesham, to whom he complained of a brother-in-law's indifference. -The complaints were reiterated to me. "Dick en't never bin near so -much as to ask how I was gettin' on. I _told_ her he never come even -to his poor old sister, till the night afore the funeral. And after -all I've done for 'n, whenever he was in any trouble or wanted help -hisself, I was always the fust one he sent for, if there was anything -the matter with he, same as that time when he fell off the hayrick. -Sent for me in the middle o' the night to go to the doctor's for 'n, -when he'd got one of his own gals at home. It hurts me now, when I -thinks of it sittin' here.... If he'd only jest come and say How do! -But no...." We supposed that Dick feared lest he should be asked to -give help in some way. - -Pleurisy and pneumonia or not--it was hard to believe that he had -suffered from either, yet he had got hold of the words somehow-- -Bettesworth was at no loss that afternoon for interesting subjects of -conversation. An inquiry how his sister-in-law was faring led to a -talk about her two sons, of whom one is out of work. The other, a -basket-maker (blind or crippled, I do not know which) lives at home, -and has just got a lot of work come in. "Mostly stock work," -Bettesworth believed, "for some London firm he knows of." But besides -this, he has a hundred stone jars from the brewery, to re-case with -basket-work. The handles and bottoms are of cane, the rest "only -skeleton work, as they calls it." Bettesworth always loved to know of -technical things like this. - -Odd it is, I suggested, how every trade has its own terms of speech. -"Yes, and its own tools too," added Bettesworth; and with deep -interest he spoke of the tools this basket-maker uses for splitting -his canes, dividing them "as fine!" And the tools are "sharp as -lancets; and every tool with a special name for it." - -This reminded me to repeat to Bettesworth a similar account which a -friend of mine had lately given me, and will publish, it may be hoped, -of the Norfolk art of making rush collars. "Very nice smooth collars," -Bettesworth murmured appreciatively. But when I proceeded to tell how -the art is likely to die, because the few men who understand it keep -their methods secret, this stirred him. "Same," he said, "as them -Jeffreys over there t'other side o' Moorways, what used to make these -little wooden bottles you remembers seein'. They'd never let nobody -see how 'twas done. But I never heared tell of anybody else ever -makin' 'em anywhere." - -Yes, I remembered seeing these "bottles," like tiny barrels, slung at -labouring men's backs when they trudged homewards, or lying with their -clothes and baskets in the harvest-field or hop-garden. It was to the -small bung-hole in the side that the thirsty labourer used to put his -mouth, leaning back with the bottle above him. Whether the beer -carried well and kept cool in these diminutive barrels I do not know; -but certainly to the eye they had a rustic charm. So I could agree -with Bettesworth's praises: "_Purty_ little bottles they got to be at -last--even with glass ends to 'em, and white hoops. They used to boil -'em in a copper--whether that was so's to bend the wood I dunno. -Little ones from a pint up to three pints.... I had a three-pint one -about somewheres, but I couldn't put my hand on 'n when I turned out -t'other day. Eighteenpence was the price of a quart one--but they had -iron hoops.... But they wouldn't let nobody see how they made 'em.... -There was them blacksmiths over there, again--_they_ wouldn't allow -nobody to see how they finished a axe-head. - -"These Jeffreys never done nothing else but make these bottles, and go -mole-catchin'. Rare mole-catchers they was: earnt some good money at -it, too. But they had to walk miles for it. You can understand, when -the medders was bein' laid up for grass they had to cover some ground, -to get all round in time. I've seen 'em come into a medder loaded up -with a great bundle o' traps: an' then they'd begin putting' in the -rods--'cause they was allowed to cut what rods they wanted for it, -where-ever they was workin', and they knowed purty near where a mole -'d put his head up. 'Twas so much a field they got, from the farmer. I -never knowed nobody else catch moles like they did, but they wouldn't -show ye how they done it, or how they made their traps. - -"There was a man name o' Murrell--Sonny Murrell we always used to call -'n--lived at Cashford. _He_ was a very good mole-catcher. One time the -moles started in down Culverley medders, right away from Old Mill to -Culverley Mill--it looked as if they'd bin tippin' cart-loads o' -rubbish all over the medders. I never see such a slaughter as that -was, done by moles, in all my creepin's." (I think "creepin's" was the -word Bettesworth used, but his voice had sunk very low just here, and -I could as easily hear the clock as him.) "But they sent for Sonny. He -was a _clever_ old cock, in moles; they had to be purty 'cute to get -round 'n--some did, though; you'll see how they'll push round a -trap--but after he'd bin there a fortnight you couldn't tell as -there'd bin any moles at all." - -One other topic which we briefly touched upon must not be omitted. -Before my arrival Bettesworth had crept out to the gate by the road, -he was saying, tempted by the loveliness of the sunshine; and hearing -of it, I warned him to have a care of getting out in this easterly -wind. Ah, he said, we might expect east winds for the next three -months now, for this was the 21st of March, and "where the wind is at -twelve o'clock on the 21st of March, there she'll bide for three -months afterwards." So he had once firmly held; and he mentioned the -theory now, though apparently with little faith in it. For when I -laughed, he said, "I've noticed it a good many times, and sometimes it -have come right and sometimes it haven't. But that old Dick Furlonger -was the one. He said he'd noticed it hunderds o' times. We used to -terrify 'n about that, afterwards--'cause he was a man not more 'n -fifty; and we used to tease 'n, so's he'd get up an' walk out o' the -room." - - - - -XXXVII - - -During April I was away from home a good deal, and neither saw much of -Bettesworth nor heard about him anything of importance. He seems to -have recovered a little strength, to enable him to creep about the -village when the weather was at all fit, but the drizzling rains and -the raw chill winds of that spring-time were not favourable to the old -man, who had almost certainly had a slight touch of pleurisy, if -nothing worse, earlier in the year. - -May, however, was not a week old before the weather brightened and -grew splendid. The very sky seemed to lift in the serene warmth; and -now, if ever he was to do so, Bettesworth should show some -improvement. - -At first it almost looked as if he might rally. I remember passing -through the village, in the dusk of a Sunday evening (the 7th of May), -and there was Bettesworth, slowly toiling up the ascent to Jack's -cottage, even at that late hour. It was too dark to distinguish his -features, but by the lift of his chin and a suggestion of lateral -curvature in his figure, I recognized him. He had been to the Swan, -and was just going home, contented with his evening. The week that -followed saw him here twice; and again on the 15th he came, and, -finding me in the garden, was glad enough to be invited to a seat -where he might rest. - -And then as we sat there together it became clear to me that he would -never again be any better than he was now. The sunshine was soft and -pleasant, where it alighted on his end of the seat, and the shade of -the garden trees at my end was refreshing, but to him no summer day -was to bring its gifts of renewed life any more. When he arrived, I -had expected that presently, after a rest, it would be his wish to go -farther into the garden and see how the crops promised; but he made no -offer to move. To get so far had been all that he could do. His -thighs, as could be seen by the clinging of the trousers to them, were -lamentably shrunken. His body was wasting: only his aged mind retained -any of his former vigour. - -A curious thing he told me, in connexion with the shrinking of his -muscles. He had bared his thighs one evening, to show his -"mates"--Bryant, George Stevens, and others--how thin they were; and -by his own account the men had solemnly looked on at the queer piteous -exhibition, acknowledging themselves shocked, and wondering how he -could creep about at all. Bryant, by the way, had already told me of -the incident, speaking compassionately. He added that Bettesworth -offered to show his arms also, but that he had said, "No, Fred, you -no call to trouble. I can take your word for it without seein'." - -Sitting there weary in the sunshine, Bettesworth was in a melancholy -humour. "A gentleman on the road," he said, had met him the previous -day, and remarked "to his wife what was with him, 'That old gentleman -looks as if he bin ill.' 'So he have,' old George Stevens says, cause -he was 'long with me. He" (the gentleman) "looked at my hands and -says, 'Why, your hands looks jest as if they was dyin' off.' I dunno -what he meant; but he called his wife and said, 'Don't his hands look -jest as if they was dyin' off?' And she said so they did.... I dunno -who he was: he was a stranger to me. But what should you think he -meant by that?" - -Mournfully the old man held out his knotted hand for my opinion. He -was plainly worried by the odd phrase, and fancied, I believe, that -the "gentleman" had seen some secret token of death in his hands. - -The instinctive will to live was still strong in him, sustained by the -conservatism of habit, and in opposition to his reason. According to -Bryant, he said a day or two before this, "I prays for 'em to carry me -up Gravel Hill"; and that is the way from his lodging to the -churchyard. - - -_May 17._--Once more, on the 17th of May, he found his way here. Not -obviously worse, he complained of having coughed all night, and he was -going to try the remedy suggested by a neighbour: a drink made by -shredding a lemon, pouring boiling water over it, adding sugar.... He -was more cheerful, however. He sat in the sunshine, and chatted in his -kindliest manner, chiefly about his neighbours. - -There was Carver Cook, for instance. He was seventy-seven years old, -and fretting because he was out of work. "I en't earnt a crown, not in -these last three weeks," he had told Bettesworth. On the previous -afternoon, just as it was beginning to rain, the two old men had met -near the public-house, and gone in together out of the wet; and -"Carver" standing a glass of ale, there they stayed until the rain -slackened, and had a very happy, comfortable two hours. I asked what -Bettesworth's old friend had to live upon. - -"Well," Bettesworth said, "he've got that cot; and he've saved money. -Oh yes, he've got money put by. But he says if it don't last out he -shall sell the cot. He shan't study nobody. None of his sons an' -daughters don't offer to help 'n, and never gives 'n nothin'. His -garden he does all hisself; and when he wants any firin' or wood, he -gets a hoss an' gets it home hisself. But old Car'line, he says, is -jest as contented now as ever she was in her life. 'Why don't ye look -in and see her?' he says. But I says, 'Well, Carver, I never was much -of a one for pokin' into other people's houses.'" He paused, allowing -me to suggest that perhaps he preferred other people to come and see -him. But to that he demurred. "No.... I likes to meet 'em _out_; an' -then you can go in somewhere and have a glass with 'em, if you mind -to." - -Thoroughly to Bettesworth's taste, again, as it is to the groom's -taste to talk of horses, or to the architect's to discuss new -buildings, was a little narrative he had of another neighbour's work -in the fields. "Porter's brother," he said, "started down there at -Priestley's Friday mornin', and got the sack dinner-time." How? Well, -it was a job at hoeing young "plants" in the field, at which the man -got on very well at first; but presently he came to "four rows o' -cabbage and then four rows o' turnips," and there the ground was so -full with weeds that to hoe it properly was impossible. The hoe would -strike into a tangle of "lily," or bindweed, with tendrils trailing -"as fur as from here to that tree" (say four or five yards); and when -pulled at, the lily proved to have turned three or four times round a -plant, which came away with it. "So when the foreman come and saw, he -says, 'I dunno, Porter--I almost thinks you better leave off.' 'Well, -I'd jest as soon,' Porter says, 'for I can't seem to satisfy -_myself_.'" So he left off, and the foreman supposed they would have -to plough the crop in and plant again. - -It was pleasant enough to me to sit in the afternoon sunshine and -hear this talk of village folk and outdoor doings, but after a little -while I was called away, and did not see Bettesworth's departure. I -should have watched it, if I had known the truth; for, once he had got -outside the gate, he had set foot for the last time in this garden. - - - - -XXXVIII - - -_June 9, 1905._--Some three weeks later, not having in the interval -seen anything of Bettesworth, I was on the point of starting to look -him up, when his niece came to the door. She had called expressly to -beg that I would go and visit him, because he seemed anxious to see -me. He was considerably worse, in her opinion; indeed, for the greater -part of the week--in which there had been cold winds with rain--he had -kept his bed and lain there dozing. Whenever he woke up, he had the -impression either that it was early morning or else late evening; and -once or twice he had asked, quite early in the day, whether Jack was -come home yet. - -On reaching the cottage I found him in his bed upstairs. Certainly he -had lost strength since I saw him. At first his voice was husky, and -he was inclined to cry at his own feebleness; soon, however, he -recovered his habitual quick, quiet speech, though a touch of -weariness and debility remained in it. Stripping back the sleeve of -his bed-gown he exhibited his arm: the muscle had disappeared, and the -arm was no bigger than a young boy's. He shed tears at the sight, -himself. Nor was he without pain. As he lay there that morning his -legs, he said, had felt "as if somebody was puttin' skewers into 'em, -right up the shins"; but he had rubbed vaseline over them, and after -about half an hour the pain diminished. The doctor, visiting, had said -"Poor old gentleman"; and, to him, not much more. "Old age--worn out," -was the simple diagnosis he had furnished downstairs, to Liz. - -Another visitor had called--who but the owner of that cottage from -which the Bettesworths had been compelled to turn out two years ago? I -do not think Mr. ---- recognized Bettesworth. He had merely heard of -an old man in bad plight--an old Crimean soldier, too--and he wished -to be helpful. "And a very good friend to me he was!" Bettesworth said -heartily, in a sort of emotional burst, losing control of his voice -and crying again. Mr. ---- had "come tearin' up the stairs--none o' -they downstairs didn't know who he was," and had spoken -compassionately. "'What you wants,' he says, 'is feedin' up--port -wine!--and you shall have it.'" He was told that the doctor had -recommended whisky. "'Very well. When I gets home I'll send ye over a -bottle, the best that money can buy.'" Having left, "he come hollerin' -back again: 'Here! here's five shillin's for him!'" But, said -Bettesworth to me, "I never spent it on jellies an' things; I thought -it might be put to better use than that." - -Besides this unexpected friend, Bettesworth told me that a Colonel -resident in the parish was moving on his behalf, endeavouring to get -him a pension for his services in the Crimea. "But that en't no use," -the old man said; "I en't got my papers," or at any rate he had not -the essential ones. He tried to account for their disappearance: "Ye -see, I've had several moves, an' this last one there was lots o' -things missin' that I never knowed what become of 'em." - -He chatted long, and rationally enough, in his customary vein, but -saying nothing very striking or particularly characteristic. There -were some pleasant remarks on one "Peachey" Phillips, a coal-cart man. -Peachey "looks after his old mother at Lingfield," and is "a good chap -to work" (a "chap" of fifty years old, I should judge), but has been -hampered by want of education. According to Bettesworth, "he might -have had some _good_ places if he'd had any schoolin'," and he had -regretfully confessed it to Bettesworth. "Cert'nly he's better 'n he -was. His little 'ns what goes to school--he've made they learn him a -little; but still.... Well, you can't get on without it. Nobody ever -ought to be against schoolin'.... Yes, a good many is, but nobody -never ought to be against it. I don't hold with all this drillin' and -soldierin'; but readin', and summin', and writin', and to know how to -right yourself...." - -As Bettesworth lay in bed there upstairs, and unable to see much but -his bedroom walls and their cheap pictures, for the window was rather -high up and narrow, his mind was still out of doors. He inquired about -several details in the garden; and particularly he wanted to know if a -young hedge was yet clipped, in which he had taken much interest. It -chanced that a man was working on it that afternoon; and Bettesworth's -thought of it therefore struck me as somewhat remarkable. Evidently he -was longing to see the garden; and though we did not know then that -the desire would never be gratified, still that was the probability, -and perhaps he realized it. He was a little tearful, as the time came -for me to leave him. - -After this I tried to make a point of seeing him once a week. Friday -afternoons were the times most convenient, and the following Sunday -commonly afforded the leisure for recording the visits. I give the -accounts of them pretty much as they stand in my book. - - -_June 18, 1905 (Sunday Morning)._--I saw Bettesworth on Friday -afternoon. His voice was husky, and feebler than I have before heard -it; but then in every way he was weaker, and seemed to have given up -hope; in fact, he said that he wished it was over, though not quite in -those words. He complained of pain in his chest and about the -diaphragm, and in his legs. I did not acknowledge to him that he -seemed worse to me; but visitors of his own sort practise no such -reticence. He told me that Mrs. Blackman, Mrs. Eggar and others had -seen him, and they all said, "Oh dear, Fred, how bad you looks!" -Carver Cook's observation was yet more pointed: "Every time I sees ye, -you looks worse 'n you did the time afore." Bettesworth related all -this almost as if talking of some third person. - -The Vicar, lest the higher purpose of his visits should be overlooked -if he went to Bettesworth as alms-giver too, had entrusted me with a -few shillings for the old man, who received them gladly, but seemed -equally pleased to have been remembered. When I handed the money over, -and named the giver, "Oh ah!" he said, "he come to see me. I was -layin' with my face to the wall, and Liz come up and says, 'Here's the -Vicar come to see ye.' 'The Vicar!' I says, 'what do _he_ want to see -me for?' I reckon he must have heard me say it. He set an' talked...." -But Bettesworth did not vouchsafe any information as to the interview. -When well and strong, he had been suspicious of the clergy; now, I -believe, he was a little uncomfortable with a feeling that he had made -a hole in his manners. - -Feeble though he was, on the previous day he had crept downstairs, he -said, and even out and to the corner of the road forty yards away. I -think it must have been on some similar expedition that those women -saw him, and uttered their discouraging exclamations upon his look of -ill-health; but the desire to be up and out was incurable in him. -Yesterday, however, he fell, and had to be helped home, where he -literally crawled upstairs on hands and knees, exhausted and -breathless. So now, since the breathlessness troubled him, and since -he knew me to have had bronchitis, did I know, he asked, "anything as -'d ease it"? Eagerly he asked it, with a most pitiful reliance upon -me; but I had to confess that I knew no cure; and the poor old man -seemed as if a support he had clutched at had disappeared. Drearily he -spoke of his condition. He couldn't eat: a pint of milk was all he had -been able to take yesterday; the same that morning. Liz had said, "'We -got a nice little bit o' hock--couldn't ye eat a bit o' that?'" and -had brought him a piece, but he "couldn't face it." "But what's goin' -to become of ye?" she exclaimed, "if you don't eat nothing?" But he -couldn't. His mouth was so dry; he was unable to swallow anything -solid. Was there anything I could get him, that he would fancy? He -hesitated; then, "Well, ... I _should_ like a bit o' rhubarb. They had -some here t'other day--little bits o' sticks no bigger 'n your finger. -And they boys set down to it.... 'En't ye goin' to spare me _none_?' I -says." ... The story wilted away, leaving me with a belief that none -had been spared for him. So I promised him some rhubarb, and the next -day a small tart was made and sent over to him. The bearer returned -saying that Liz, seeing it, had laughed: "We got plenty, and he's had -several lots." If this is true, as it probably is, Bettesworth's -delusion on the point is the first instance of senility attacking his -intellect. - -For although on this Friday his usual garrulity about other topics -than his illness was noticeably diminished, still in his handling of -the subjects he did touch upon his strong mental grip was no wise -impaired. From Alf Stevens, who helped him home, he went on to Alf's -father, old George, who "en't so wonderful grand" in health, and to -Alf's brother, who "boozes a bit," being out of work and unsettled, -"or may wander off no tellin' where" in search of a job. Being now -quartered at home, "he don't offer to pay his old father nothin'. -P'r'aps of a Sat'day he'll bring home a joint o' meat.... But a very -good bricklayer." Bettesworth has the whole situation in all its -details under review before him. Moreover, this bricklayer out of work -led him to speak of a serious matter, not previously known to me -getting about the world, but to him lying in bed very well known--the -alarming scarcity of work this summer. He named a number of men -unemployed in the parish. I added another name to the list--that of a -carpenter. "Ne'er a better tradesman in the district; but en't done -nothin' for months," Bettesworth murmured unhesitatingly in his -enfeebled voice. "And So-and-so" (he mentioned a local contractor) "is -goin' to sack a dozen of his carters to-morrow, I'm told...." - -The old man lay there, aware of these things; and as I write the -thought crosses my mind that a valuable organizing force has been left -undeveloped and lost in Bettesworth. - -It looks more and more doubtful if he will linger on until the autumn. - - -_June 25, 1905 (Sunday)._--It did not occur to me at the time, but -after I got away from seeing Bettesworth on Friday a resemblance -struck me between his look of almost abject helplessness and that of -poor old Hall, whom I saw at the infirmary and who is since dead. - -In the morning, with extreme difficulty, and his niece helping him, -Bettesworth had got into the front bedroom while his own bed was being -made and his room cleaned. To that extent has he lost strength in the -last few weeks. Sometimes his niece chides him (kindly, I feel sure) -for being so cast-down, but he says, "I can't help it, and 'ten't no -use for anybody to tell me not. It hurts me to think that a little -while ago I was strong and ready to do anything for anybody else, and -now I got to beg 'em to come an' do anything for me." - -I suspect that he gives some trouble. Fancies and the unreason -characteristic of old age appear--for instance, about his food. He -cannot take solids: they go dry in his mouth and he is unable to -swallow them; yet he begged for some one to buy him a slice or two of -ham the other day. He "seemed to have had a fancy for it this -fortnight." All he takes, on his own evidence, is a little milk. - -He confessed to being occasionally light-headed. "I sees all the -people I knows, in this room here. After I got back into bed to-day, -there was three fellers leanin' over the foot o' the bed, lookin' at -me; and one of 'em said, 'I reckon I shall get six months if I don't -quit the neighbourhood.' I sprung forward--'I'll break your head if -you don't clear out of _here_!' and I was goin' to hit 'n, an' then he -was gone." - -In telling this the old man suited his action to the tale, and again -sat upright, his thin grey hair tumbled, his jaw fallen, his eyes -hopeless for very weakness. It was then that he looked so much like -old Hall. - -He was wishing to be shaved, but could get nobody to do it for him. A -labourer across the valley had been sent to: "He'd ha' come an' done -it right enough, only he has rheumatics so bad he can't hold the -razor." - -There was not much talk of the old kind; and for the first time in my -acquaintance with Bettesworth I had to search for topics of -conversation. One subject was raised by my mention of a neighbouring -farmer who proposed to begin cutting his late hay next week. "Ah, with -a machine," said Bettesworth; "he can't git the men. 'R else he used -to say he'd never have a machine so long as he could git men to mow -for him. Billy Norris and his brother" (elder brother to Kid Norris) -"mowed for 'n eighteen years" in succession.... "They'd _live_ in a -fashion nobody else couldn't. Never no trouble to they about their -food. They'd just gather a few old sticks an' bits o' rubbish, and -make a fire--nothin' but a little smoke an' flare--an' stick a bloater -or a rasher on a pointed stick and hold it up again' the flare an' -smoke jest to warm it, and down he'd go, and they'd be up and on -mowin' again. Then there was a barrel o' beer tumbled down into the -medder--they used to roll 'n into one o' they water-gripes and put a -little o' the damp grass over 'n, and the beer 'd keep as _cool_.... -And when he was empty then he'd be took away and another brought -in.... But 'twas tea--that's what they drunk for breakfast. Jest have -a drink o' beer when they started mowin'; then go on for an hour or -two. Then one of 'em 'd go back to where their kit was, an' make the -tea in the drum, an' get a little flare an' smoke; an' they'd jest -hold their bloater on a pinted stick again' the smoke--I've laughed at -'em many's a time. Dick Harding over here used to say 't'd starve he -to work 'long with 'em; he could do the mowin' but he couldn't put up -with the food. That was their way, though. If they was out with the -ballast-train or the railway-cuttin', they'd sit down on the bank--all -they wanted was a little smoky fire." Bettesworth laughed a little, -amused at these sturdy men, and at his own description of their -cooking. - -I asked: "You never did much mowing yourself, did you?" - -He hesitated, yet scarcely two seconds, and then replied: "Not much. I -helped mow Holt Park once. My father-in-law--_Foreman_, we used to -call 'n--was at it--what lived where Mrs. Warner is, and I lived where -Porter do. And the Foreman sent for me to go and help. I didn't want -to go--'tis hard work; anybody might have mowin' for me; but at last I -agreed to go. But law! the second mornin' I was like that I didn't -hardly know how to crawl down there" the three miles. "It got better -after an hour or two.... But if a feller goes mowin' for eight or nine -weeks on end, it do give 'n a doin'." - -Thus for a little while Bettesworth chatted, in the vein that had -first attracted me to him. Shall I ever hear him again, I wonder? We -tried other subjects: the washed-out state of our lane and the best -way to remedy it, the garden, the celery, the position of this or that -crop. It entertained him for a few minutes; then he failed to seize -some quite simple idea, and knew that he had failed, and said -despondently, "I can't keep things in my mind like I used to." - - -_July 2 (Sunday)._--Perhaps Bettesworth would have been more like -himself on Friday, if I had called at the usual afternoon hour, -instead of in the morning. As it was, he seemed fretful and -impatient, and his face was flushed. I did not perceive that he was -noticeably weaker, but rather that he was irritable. He had pain in -his chest and side; and he said that at night, when he lies with his -hands clasped over his waist, his chest is full of "such funny noises, -enough to frighten ye to hear 'em." His temper was embittered and -angry, especially angry, when some reference was made to his being in -the infirmary in the spring. For he affirmed, "If I hadn't ha' went -there, I should ha' bin a man, up and at work _now_. I told the doctor -there, 'If I was to bide here, you'd _starve_ me to death.'" -Embittered he was against his acquaintances, so that he almost wept. -"It hurts me so, to think how good I bin to 'em; and now when I be bad -myself there en't none of 'em comes near me." He instanced his sister -and her two sons at Middlesham; and his brother-in-law too: "Look what -I done for him!" If only he could get about! Get so that he could sit -and feel the air! But his bedroom is upstairs, and he is too weak to -leave it. The previous night, trying to get out of bed, he "almost -broke his neck," falling backwards with his head against the bedstead. -"I thought I'd split 'n open," he said, "but I never called nobody. -Jack said, 'Why hadn't ye called me?'" ... The old man's talk was too -incoherent, too rambling, to be followed well at the time or -remembered now. - -We discussed a local beanfeast excursion to Ramsgate, which was to -take place the following day; and he brightened up to recall how he -had joined a similar trip to Weymouth some years ago. It was his last -holiday, in fact. Even now it made him laugh, to remember how old Bill -Brixton had gone on that day; and he laughed a little scornfully at -the trouble they had taken to enjoy themselves, and the fatigues they -endured. Then there came just a touch of his old manner: "I had a -little bottle with me and filled it up with a quarte'n o' whisky; and -when we was comin' home it seemed to brighten ye up. I says to old -Bill, 'Put that to your lips,' I says. So he tried. 'Why, it's -whisky!' he says. But that little wouldn't hurt 'n. 'Tis a _lot_ o' -whisky you gets for fo'pence! 'Twouldn't have hurt 'n, if he'd took it -bottle and all." - -These monster excursions had never really appealed to Bettesworth's -old-fashioned taste. Rather than be cooped up in a train, I remember -he used to say, give him a quiet journey on the open road, afoot or by -waggon, so that a man may "see the course o' the country," and if he -comes to anything interesting, stop and look at it. And now, on his -bed, the ill-humour he was displaying that morning vented itself -again, in reference to a project he had heard of for another -excursion. The Oddfellows' annual fete was at hand; and, he said, with -a sneering intonation, "The secretary and some of they" (respectable -new-fangled people, he meant) "wanted 'em to go to Portsmouth. So they -called a full meetin', an' the meetin'"--ah, I have forgotten the -turn of speech. It suggested that these officious persons, interfering -to dictate how the working man should take his pleasure, had met with -a well-deserved snub, since the excursion was voted down and the -customary dinner was to be held. To myself, as to Bettesworth, this -seemed the preferable course: "It's really better," I said. Then he, -"So _'tis_, sir. It's the old, natural _way_. We _al_ways reckoned to -have _one day_ in the year, when we all had holiday. And then -everybody could join in--the women with their little childern, and -all. 'Tis _nice_...." - -Mentioning the endeavours of the Colonel and Mr. ---- to get a pension -for him, I said, "They're very interested in it." "More so than what I -be," he answered. Still, I urged, it was worth trying for; and as for -the lost papers, duplicates of them might be obtained, if we knew the -regiment. I was saying this, when with a sort of pride, though still -irritably, the old man broke in, "I can tell ye _all_ that: regiment, -an' regimental number, and officers, and all." At that I asked what -was his regiment? - -He stiffened his head and neck (was it just one last flicker of the so -long forgotten soldier's smartness?) and said, "Forty-eighth, and my -number was three nought nought seven.... I could name twenty people -that knowed about my service. There's old Crum Callingham. He used to -work for Sanders then, the coal merchant. The day I came back, didn't -we have a booze, too! He was at work in Sanders's hop-garden, and I -found 'n out, and two more, and I kep' sendin' for half-gallons.... -Yes, that was the same day as I got 'ome--from Portsmouth." - - -That afternoon I happened to meet old Beagley--the retired bricklayer, -and recently Bettesworth's landlord. He spoke of Bettesworth with more -than usual appreciation, saying that he had been a strong man, as if -he meant unusually strong. His sight must have been bad "thirty or -forty years," Beagley estimated. He (Beagley) remembered first -noticing it when he dropped his trowel from a scaffold, and sent -Bettesworth down the ladder for it. He observed that Bettesworth could -not see the trowel, but groped for it, as one gropes in the dark, -until his hand touched it. But, added Beagley, "he'd mix mortar as -well as any man I ever knew. I've had him workin' for me, and noticed. -I'd as soon have had him as anybody. He couldn't have _seen_ the lumps -of lime, but I suppose 'twas something in the _feel_ of it on the -shovel. At any rate, he always _done_ it; and I've often thought about -it." - - -_July 14 (Friday)._--I saw Bettesworth this afternoon, and it looks as -if I shall not see him many times more. - -Since my last visit to him a fortnight ago, the change in him is very -marked. His niece, downstairs, prepared me for it. He was very ill, -she said, and so weak that now they have to hold him up to feed him. -Of course he can take no solids; not even a mouthful of sponge-cake -for which he had had a fancy. His feet and the lower parts of his body -are swelling: the doctor says it is dropsy setting in, and reports -further that his heart is "wasting away." Hearing all this--yes, and -how Mrs. Cook thought he should be watched at night, for he could not -last much longer--hearing this, I fancied when I got upstairs that -there was a look as of death on the shrunken cheeks: they had a -corpse-like colour. Possibly it was only my fancy, but it was not -fancy that his flesh had fallen away more than ever. - -It has been an afternoon of magnificent summer weather, not sultry, -but sumptuous; with vast blue sky, a few slow-sailing clouds, a -luxuriant west wind tempering the splendid heat. The thermometer in my -room stands at 80 deg. while I am writing. So Bettesworth lay just covered -as to his body and legs with a counterpane, showing his bare neck, -while his sleeves falling back to the elbow displayed his arms. From -between the tendons the flesh has gone; and the skin lies fluted all -up the forearm, all up the neck. But at the foot of the bed his feet -emerging could be seen swollen and tight-skinned. His ears look -withered and dry, like thin biscuit. - -He did not complain much of pain. Sometimes, "if anything touches the -bottom o' my feet, it runs all up my legs as if 'twas tied up in -knots." Again, "what puzzles the doctor is my belly bein' like -'tis--puffed up and hard as a puddin' dish." The doctor has not -mentioned dropsy, to him. Enough, perhaps, that he has told him that -his heart was "wasting away." "That's a bad sign," commented -Bettesworth, to me. He said he had asked the doctor, "'Is there any -chance o' my gettin' better?' 'Not but a very little,' he said. 'If -you do, it'll be a miracle.'" At that, Bettesworth replied, "Then I -wish you'd give me something to help me away from here." "Why, where -d'ye want to go to?" the doctor asked; and was answered, "Up top o' -Gravel Hill" to the churchyard. "I told him that, straight to his -head," said the old man. - -He lay there, thinking of his death. Door and window were wide open, -and a cooling air played through the room. Through the window, from my -place by the bed, I could see all the sunny side of the valley in the -sweltering afternoon heat; could see and feel the splendour of the -summer; could watch, right down in the hollow, a man hoeing in a tiny -mangold-field, and the sunshine glistening on his light-coloured -shirt. Bettesworth no doubt knew that man; had worked like that -himself on many July afternoons; and now he lay thinking of his -approaching death. But I thought, too, of his life, and spoke of it: -how from the hill-top there across the valley you could not look round -upon the country in any part of the landscape but you would everywhere -see places where he had worked. "Yes: for a hundred miles round," he -assented. - -It came up naturally enough, I remember, in the course of desultory -talk, with many pauses. He had had "gentry" to see him, he was saying, -and he named the Colonel, and Mr. ----. "Who'd have thought ever -_he_'d ha' bin like that to me?" he exclaimed gratefully. And each of -these visitors had spoken of his "good character"; had "liked all they -ever heared" about him, and so on; and it was then that I remarked -about the places where he had worked, as proof that his good character -had been well earned. But as we talked of his life, all the time the -thought of his death was present. I fancied once that he wished to -thank me for standing by him, and could not bring it off, for he began -telling how the Colonel had said, "'You've got a very good friend to -be thankful for.'" But it was easy to turn this. The Colonel too is a -friend. He had left an order for a bottle of whisky to be bought when -the last one sent by Mr. ---- is empty; and he has not given up yet -the endeavour to get Bettesworth's Crimean service recognized with a -pension. - -I cannot recall all that passed; indeed, it was incoherent and -mumbling, and I did not catch all. He revived that imaginary grievance -against his neighbour, for drawing money from me to pay his club when -he went to the infirmary. It appeared that Jack had been going into -the matter, and had satisfied Bettesworth that the payments had never -been really owing; so they hoped that, now I knew, I should take -steps to be righted. Bettesworth seemed to find much relief in the -feeling that his own character was cleared from blame. "Some masters -might have give me the sack for it," he said, "when I got back to -work." To this he kept reverting, as if in the hope of urging me to -have justice; and then he would say, "There, I'm as glad it's all -right as if anybody had give me five shillin's." To humour him I -professed to be equally glad; it was not worth while to trouble him -with what I knew very well to be the truth--that Mrs. Eggar was in the -right, and had really done him a service. - -What more? He said once, "I thinks I shall go off all in a moment. -Widder Cook was here ... she was talkin' about her husband Cha'les. -They'd bin tater-hoein', an' when they left off she said, 'a drop o' -beer wouldn't hurt us.' 'No,' he said, 'a drop o' beer and a bit o' -bread an' cheese, an' then git off to bed.' So they sent for the beer. -And they hadn't bin in bed half an hour afore she woke, and he'd -moved; an' she put her arm across 'n an' there he was, dead." So the -widow had told Bettesworth; and now he repeated it to me--the last -tale I shall ever hear from him, I fancy, and told all mumblingly with -his poor old dried-up mouth. He added, almost crying, "I prays God to -let me go like that." We agreed that it was a merciful way to be -taken. - -It still interested him to hear of the garden, and he asked how the -potatoes were coming up, and listened to my account of the peas and -carrots, but said he was "never much of a one" for carrots. At home I -had left George Bryant lawn-mowing. Well, Bettesworth too had mown my -lawn in hot weather, and smiled happily at the reminiscence. He smiled -again when, recalling how I had known him now for fourteen years, I -reminded him of the great piece of trenching which had been his first -job for me. - -So presently I came away, out on to the sunny road, thinking, "I shall -not see him many more times." From just there I caught a glimpse of -Leith Hill, blue with twenty intervening miles of afternoon sunlight: -twenty miles of the England Bettesworth has served. - -Half-way down the hill the old road-mender, straightening up from his -work as I passed, asked, "Can ye keep yerself warm, sir?" And I -laughed, "Pretty nearly. How about you?" "It _boils_ out," he said. -The perspiration stood on his face while he spoke of motor-cars, and -the dust they raised; but to me dust and swift-travelling cars and all -seemed to tell of summer afternoon. And though the reason is obscure, -somehow it seems fit that possibly my last talk with Bettesworth -should be associated with the blue distant English country, and the -summer dust, and that sunburnt old folk jest which consists in asking, -when it is so particularly and exhilaratingly warm as to-day, "Can you -keep yourself warm?" - - -_July 21._--The weather was as brilliantly hot this afternoon as a -week ago; and Bettesworth's bedroom looked just as before; but the old -man was changed. He lay with eyes looking glazed between the half-shut -lids, and he was breathing hard. His niece accompanied me upstairs; -but he took no notice of our entry until she mentioned my name, upon -which he turned a little and put up a feeble hand for me to take. He -was in a sort of stupor, though he seemed to rouse a little, and to -understand one or two remarks I ventured. But when he spoke it was as -if utterly exhausted, and we could not always make out his meaning. In -the hope of helping him to realize that I was with him, I told of the -garden, and how Bryant was mowing again, though in this hot weather -the lawn was "getting pretty brown, _you_ know." "Yes," he said -feebly, "and if you don't keep it cut middlin' short, it soon goes -wrong." Next I reported on the potatoes--how well they were coming: -"the same sort as you planted for me last year." "Ah--the _Victoria_, -wa'n't they?" The question was a mere murmur. "No, _Duke of York_. And -don't you remember what a crop we had, when you planted 'em?" There -came the faintest of smiles, and "None of what I planted failed much, -did they?" Indeed, no. The shallots he had planted during his last -day's work had just been harvested; the beans which he sowed the same -day had but now yielded their last picking. I told him they were -over. "You can't expect no other," he said, meaning at this time of -year and in such dry weather. I mentioned the celery, reminding him, -"You _have_ sweated over watering celery, haven't you?" Again he just -smiled, and I fancy this smile was the last sign of rational interest -and pride in his labour. - -For after this he became incoherent and wandering. Dimly we made out -that he "wanted to put them four poles against the veranda," -apparently meaning my veranda. "What for?" his niece asked. "To keep -the wall up." Then I, "We won't trouble about that to-day," as if he -had been consulting me about the work, and he seemed satisfied to have -my decision. But I had stayed too long; so, grasping his hand, I said -"Good-bye." He asked, "Are ye goin' to the club?" (He was thinking of -the Oddfellows' fete arranged for to-morrow week, and had been -wondering all day, his niece said, not to hear the band.) "It isn't -till to-morrow week," we said. "How they do keep humbuggin' about," he -muttered crossly. "Yes, but they've settled it now," we assured him. - -I have promised to go again to see him--to-morrow or on Sunday, -because, according to his niece, he had been counting on my visit, and -asking for several days "if this was Friday." - -The thought came to me on my way home, that he is dying without any -suspicion that anyone could think of him with admiration and -reverence. - - -_July 25 (Tuesday)._--Bettesworth died this evening at six o'clock. - - -_July 28 (Friday)._--This afternoon I went to the funeral. - - -A week earlier (almost to the hour) when I parted from him, he seemed -too ill to take his money--too unconscious, I mean. I offered it to -his niece, standing at the foot of the bed; but she said, glancing -meaningly towards him, "I think he'd like to take it, sir." So I -turned to him and put the shillings into his hand, which he held up -limply. "Your wages," I said. - -For a moment he grasped the silver, then it dropped out on to his bare -chest and slid under the bed-gown, whence I rescued it, and, finding -his purse under the pillow, put his last wages away safely there. - -On the Saturday I saw him, but I think he did not know me: and that -was the last time. The thought of him keeps coming, wherever I go in -the garden; but I put it aside for fear of spoiling truer because more -spontaneous memories of him in time to come. - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoirs of a Surrey Labourer, by -George Sturt (AKA George Bourne) - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMOIRS OF A SURREY LABOURER *** - -***** This file should be named 42092.txt or 42092.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/4/2/0/9/42092/ - -Produced by Melissa McDaniel and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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