Chantry House

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On which Clarence declared that he would let the doctor know that he
himself would be responsible for the cost of the attendance, and set
off for Wattlesea, a kind of town village in the flat below. He
could not get back till dinner was half over, and came in alarmed
and apologetic; but he had nothing worse to encounter than Griff's
unmerciful banter (or, as you would call it, chaff) about his knight
errantry, and Emily's lovely heroine in the sweetest of cottage
bonnets.

Griff could be slightly tyrannous in his merry mockery, and when he
found that on the ensuing day Clarence proposed to go and inquire
after the patient, he made such wicked fun of the expectations the
pair entertained of hearing the sweet cottage bonnet reading a tract
in a silvery voice through the hovel window, that he fairly teased
and shamed Clarence out of starting till the renowned Tom Petty
arrived and absorbed all the three brothers, and even their father,
in delights as mysterious to me as to Emily. How she shrieked when
Martyn rushed triumphantly into the room where we were arranging
books with the huge patriarch of all the rats dangling by his tail!
Three hopeful families were destroyed; rooms, vaults, and cellars
examined and cleared; and Petty declared the race to be
exterminated, picturesque ruffian that he was, in his shapeless hat,
rusty velveteen, long leggings, a live ferret in his pocket, and
festoons of dead rats over his shoulder.

Chapman, who regarded him much as the ferret did the rat, declared
that the rabbits and hares would suffer from letting 'that there
chap' show his face here on any plea; and, moreover, gave a grunt
very like a scoff; at the idea of slumbers in the mullion rooms (as
they were called) being secured by his good offices.

And Chapman was right. The unaccountable noises broke out again--
screaming, wailing, sobbing--sounds scarcely within the power of cat
or rat, but possibly the effect of the wind in the old building. At
any rate, Griff could not stand them, and declared that sleep was
impossible when the wind was in that quarter, so that he must shift
his bedroom elsewhere, though he still wished to retain the outer
apartment, which he had taken pleasure in adorning with his special
possessions. My mother would scarcely have tolerated such fancies
in any one else, but Griff had his privileges.

CHAPTER X--OUR TUNEFUL CHOIR

'The church has been whitewashed, but right long ago,
As the cracks and the dinginess amply doth show;
About the same time that a strange petrifaction
Confined the incumbent to mere Sunday action.
So many abuses in this place are rife,
The only church things giving token of life
Are the singing within and the nettles without -
Both equally rampant without any doubt.'

F. R. HAVERGAL.

All Griff's teasing could not diminish--nay, rather increased--
Emily's excitement in the hope of seeing and identifying the sweet
cottage bonnet at church on Sunday. The distance we had to go was
nearly two miles, and my mother and I drove thither in a donkey
chair, which had been hunted up in London for that purpose because
the 'pheeaton' (as the servants insisted on calling it) was too high
for me. My father had an old-fashioned feeling about the Fourth
Commandment, which made him scrupulous as to using any animal on
Sunday; and even when, in bad weather, or for visitors, the larger
carriage was used, he always walked. He was really angry with Griff
that morning for mischievously maintaining that it was a greater
breach of the commandment to work an ass than a horse.

It was a pretty drive on a road slanting gradually through the
brushwood that clothed the steep face of the hillside, and passing
farms and meadows full of cattle--all things quieter and stiller
than ever in their Sunday repose. We knew that the living was in
Winslow patronage, but that it was in the hands of one of the Selby
connection, who held it, together with it is not safe to say how
many benefices, and found it necessary for his health to reside at
Bath. The vicarage had long since been turned into a farmhouse, and
the curate lived at Wattlesea. All this we knew, but we had not
realised that he was likewise assistant curate there, and only
favoured Earlscombe with alternate morning and evening services on
Sundays.

Still less were we prepared for the interior of the church. It had
a picturesque square tower covered with ivy, and a general air of
fitness for a sketch; indeed, the photograph of it in its present
beautified state will not stand a comparison with our drawings of
it, in those days of dilapidation in the middle of the untidy
churchyard, with little boys astride on the sloping, sunken lichen-
grown headstones, mullein spikes and burdock leaves, more graceful
than the trim borders and zinc crosses which are pleasanter to the
mental eye.

The London church we had left would be a fearful shock to the
present generation, but we were accustomed to decency, order, and
reverence; and it was no wonder that my father was walking about the
churchyard, muttering that he never saw such a place, while my
brothers were full of amusement. Their spruce looks in their tall
hats, bright ties, dark coats, and white trowsers strapped tight
under their boots, looked incongruous with the rest of the
congregation, the most distinguished members of which were farmers
in drab coats with huge mother-of-pearl buttons, and long gaiters
buttoned up to their knees and strapped up to their gay waistcoats
over their white corduroys. Their wives and daughters were in
enormous bonnets, fluttering with ribbons; but then what my mother
and Emily wore were no trifles. The rest of the congregation were--
the male part of it--in white or gray smock-frocks, the elderly
women in black bonnets, the younger in straw; but we had not long to
make our observations, for Chapman took possession of us. He was
parish clerk, and was in great glory in his mourning coat and hat,
and his object was to marshal us all into our pew before he had to
attend upon the clergyman; and of course I was glad enough to get as
soon as possible out of sight of all the eyes not yet accustomed to
my figure.

And hidden enough I was when we had been introduced through the
little north chancel door into a black-curtained, black-cushioned,
black-lined pew, well carpeted, with a table in the midst, and a
stove, whose pipe made its exit through the floriated tracery of the
window overhead. The chancel arch was to the west of us, blocked up
by a wooden parcel-gilt erection, and to the east a decorated window
that would have been very handsome if two side-lights had not been
obscured by the two Tables of the Law, with the royal arms on the
top of the first table, and over the other our own, with the Fordyce
in a scutcheon of pretence; for, as an inscription recorded, they
had been erected by Margaret, daughter of Christopher Fordyce,
Esquire, of Chantry House, and relict of Sir James John Winslow,
Kt., sergeant-at-law, A.D. 1700--the last date, I verily believe, at
which anything had been done to the church. And on the wall,
stopping up the southern chancel window, was a huge marble slab,
supported by angels blowing trumpets, with a very long inscription
about the Fordyce family, ending with this same Margaret, who had
married the Winslow, lost two or three infants, and died on 1st
January 1708, three years later than her husband.

Thus far I could see; but Griff was standing lifting the curtain,
and showing by the working of his shoulders his amazement and
diversion, so that only the daggers in my mother's eyes kept Martyn
from springing up after him. What he beheld was an altar draped in
black like a coffin, and on the step up to the rail, boys and girls
eating apples and performing antics to beguile the waiting time,
while a row of white-smocked old men occupied the bench opposite to
our seat, conversing loud enough for us to hear them.

My father and Clarence came in; the bells stopped; there was a sound
of steps, and in the fabric in front of us there emerged a grizzled
head and the back of a very dirty surplice besprinkled with iron
moulds, while Chapman's back appeared above our curtain, his desk
(full of dilapidated prayer-books) being wedged in between us and
the reading-desk.

The duet that then took place between him and the curate must have
been heard to be credible, especially as, being so close behind the
old man, we could not fail to be aware of all the remarkable shots
at long words which he bawled out at the top of his voice, and I
refrain from recording, lest they should haunt others as they have
done by me all my life. Now and then Chapman caught up a long
switch and dashed out at some obstreperous child to give an audible
whack; and towards the close of the litany he stumped out--we heard
his tramp the whole length of the church, and by and by his voice
issued from an unknown height, proclaiming--'Let us sing to the
praise and glory in an anthem taken from the 42d chapter of
Genesis.'

There was an outburst of bassoon, clarionet, and fiddle, and the
performance that followed was the most marvellous we had ever heard,
especially when the big butcher--fiddling all the time--declared in
a mighty solo, 'I am Jo--Jo--Jo--Joseph!' and having reiterated this
information four or five times, inquired with equal pertinacity,
'Doth--doth my fa-a-u-ther yet live?' Poor Emily was fairly
'convulsed;' she stuffed her handkerchief into her mouth, and grew
so crimson that my mother was quite frightened, and very near
putting her out at the little door of excommunication. To our last
hour we shall never forget the shock of that first anthem.

The Commandments were read from the desk, Chapman's solitary
response coming from the gallery; and while the second singing--four
verses from Tate and Brady--was going on, we beheld the surplice
stripped off,--like the slough of a May-fly, as Griff said,--when a
rusty black gown was revealed, in which the curate ascended the
pulpit and was lost to our view before the concluding verse of the
psalm, which we had reason to believe was selected in compliment to
us, as well as to Earlscombe, -

'My lot is fall'n in that blest land
Where God is truly know,
He fills my cup with liberal hand;
'Tis He--'tis He--'tis He--supports my throne.'

We had great reason to doubt how far the second line could justly be
applied to the parish! but there was no judging of the sermon, for
only detached sentences reached us in a sort of mumble. Griff
afterwards declared churchgoing to be as good as a comedy, and we
all had to learn to avoid meeting each other's eyes, whatever we
might hear. When the scuffle and tramp of the departing
congregation had ceased, we came forth from our sable box, and
beheld the remnants of a once handsome church, mauled in every
possible way, green stains on the walls, windows bricked up, and a
huge singing gallery. Good bits of carved stall work were nailed
anyhow into the pews; the floor was uneven; no font was visible;
there was a mouldy uncared-for look about everything. The curate in
riding-boots came out of the vestry,--a pale, weary-looking man,
painfully meek and civil, with gray hair sleeked round his face. He
'louted low,' and seemed hardly to venture on taking the hand my
father held out to him. There was some attempt to enter into
conversation with him, but he begged to be excused, for he had to
hurry back to Wattlesea to a funeral. Poor man! he was as great a
pluralist as his vicar, for he kept a boys' school, partially day,
partially boarding, and his eyes looked hungrily at Martyn.

If the 'sweet cottage bonnet' had been at church there would have
been little chance of discovering her, but we found that we were the
only 'quality,' as Chapman called it, or things might not have been
so bad. Old James Winslow had been a mere fox-hunting squire till
he became a valetudinarian; nor had he ever cared for the church or
for the poor, so that the village was in a frightful state of
neglect. There was a dissenting chapel, old enough to be overgrown
with ivy and not too hideous, erected by the Nonconformists in the
reign of the Great Deliverer, but this partook of the general
decadence of the parish, and, as we found, the chapel's principal
use was to serve as an excuse for not going to church.

My father always went to church twice, so he and Clarence walked to
Wattlesea, where appearances were more respectable; but they heard
the same sermon over again, and, as my father drily remarked, it was
not a composition that would bear repetition.

He was much distressed at the state of things, and intended to write
to the incumbent, though, as he said, whatever was done would end by
being at his own expense, and the move and other calls left him so
little in hand that he sighed over the difficulties, and declared
that he was better off in London, except for the honour of the
thing. Perhaps my mother was of the same opinion after a dreary
afternoon, when Griff and Martyn had been wandering about aimlessly,
and were at length betrayed by the barking of a little terrier,
purchased the day before from Tom Petty, besieging the stable cat,
who stood with swollen tail, glaring eyes, and thunderous growls, on
the top of the tallest pillar of the ruins. Emily nearly cried at
their cruelty. Martyn was called off by my mother, and set down,
half sulky, half ashamed, to Henry and his Bearer; and Griff, vowing
that he believed it was that brute who made the row at night, and
that she ought to be exterminated, strolled off to converse with
Chapman, who was a quaint compound of clerk and keeper--in the one
capacity upholding his late master, in the other bemoaning Mr.
Mears' unpunctualities, specially as regarded weddings and funerals;
one 'corp' having been kept waiting till a messenger had been sent
to Wattlesea, who finding both clergy out for the day, had had to go
to Hillside, 'where they was always ready, though the old Squire
would have been mad with him if he'd a-guessed one of they Fordys
had ever set foot in the parish.'

The only school in the place was close to the meeting-house, 'a very
dame's school indeed,' as Emily described it after a peep on Monday.
Dame Dearlove, the old woman who presided, was a picture of
Shenstone's schoolmistress,--black bonnet, horn spectacles, fearful
birch rod, three-cornered buff 'kerchief, checked apron and all, but
on meddling with her, she proved a very dragon, the antipodes of her
name. Tattered copies of the Universal Spelling-Book served her
aristocracy, ragged Testaments the general herd, whence all appeared
to be shouting aloud at once. She looked sour as verjuice when my
mother and Emily entered, and gave them to understand that 'she
wasn't used to no strangers in her school, and didn't want 'em.' We
found that in Chapman's opinion she 'didn't larn 'em nothing.' She
had succeeded her aunt, who had taught him to read 'right off,' but
'her baint to be compared with she.' And now the farmers' children,
and the little aristocracy, including his own grand-children,--all
indeed who, in his phrase, 'cared for eddication,'--went to
Wattlesea.

CHAPTER XI--'THEY FORDYS.'

'Of honourable reckoning are you both,
And pity 'tis, you lived at odds so long.'

SHAKESPEARE.

My father had a good deal of business in hand, and was glad of
Clarence's help in writing and accounts,--a great pleasure, though
it prevented his being Griff's companion in his exploring and essays
at shooting. He had time, however, to make an expedition with me in
the donkey chair to inquire after the herdboy, Amos Bell, and carry
him some kitchen physic. To our horror we found him quite alone in
the wretched cottage, while everybody was out harvesting; but he did
not seem to pity himself, or think it otherwise than quite natural,
as he lay on a little bed in the corner, disabled by what Clarence
thought a dislocation. Miss Ellen had brought him a pudding, and
little Miss Anne a picture-book.

He was not so dense and shy as the children of the hamlet near us,
and Emily extracted from him that Miss Ellen was 'Our passon's young
lady.'

'Mr. Mears'!' she exclaimed.

'No: ourn be Passon Fordy.'

It turned out that this place was not in Earlscombe at all, but in
Hillside, a different parish; and the boy, Amos, further
communicated that there was old Passon Fordy, and Passon Frank, and
Madam, what was Mr. Frank's lady. Yes, he could read, he could; he
went to Sunday School, and was in Miss Ellen's class; he had been to
school worky days, only father was dead, and Farmer Hartop gave him
a job.

It was plain that Hillside was under a very different rule from
Earlscombe; and Emily was delighted to have discovered that the
sweet cottage bonnet's owner was called Ellen, which just then was
the pet Christian name of romance, in honour of the Lady of the
Lake.

In the midst of her raptures, however, just as we were about to turn
in at our own gate into the wood, we heard horses' hoofs, and then
came, careering by on ponies, a very pretty girl and a youth of
about the same age. Clarence's hand rose to his hat, and he made
his eager bow; but the young lady did not vouchsafe the slightest
acknowledgment, turned her head away, and urged her pony to speed.

Emily broke out with an angry disappointed exclamation. Clarence's
face was scarlet, and he said low and hoarsely, 'That's Lester. He
was in the Argus at Portsmouth two years ago;'--and then, as our
little sister continued her indignant exclamations, he added, 'Hush!
Don't on any account say a word about it. I had better get back to
my work. I am only doing you harm by staying here.'

At which Emily shed tears, and together we persuaded him not to
curtail his holiday, which, indeed, he could not have done without
assigning the reason to the elders, and this was out of the
question. Nor did he venture to hang back when, as our service was
to be on Sunday afternoon, my father proposed to walk to Hillside
Church in the morning. They came back well pleased. There was care
and decency throughout. The psalms were sung to a 'grinder organ'--
which was an advanced state of things in those days--and very
nicely. Parson Frank read well and impressively, and the old
parson, a fine venerable man, had preached an excellent sermon--
really admirable, as my father repeated. Our party had been
scarcely in time, and had been disposed of in seats close to the
door, where Clarence was quite out of sight of the disdainful young
lady and her squire, of whom Emily begged to hear no more.

She looked askance at the cards left on the hall table the next day-
-'The Rev. Christopher Fordyce,' and 'The Rev. F. C. Fordyce,' also
'Mrs. F. C. Fordyce, Hillside Rectory.'

We had found out that Hillside was a family living, and that there
was much activity there on the part of the father and son--rector
and curate; and that the other clerical folk, ladies especially, who
called on us, spoke of Mrs. F. C. Fordyce with a certain tone, as if
they were afraid of her, as Sir Horace Lester's sister,--very
superior, very active, very strict in her notions,--as if these were
so many defects. They were an offshoot of the old Fordyces of
Chantry House, but so far back that all recollection of kindred or
connection must have worn out. Their property--all in beautiful
order--marched with ours, and Chapman was very particular about the
boundaries. 'Old master he wouldn't have a bird picked up if it
fell over on they Fordys' ground--not he! He couldn't abide
passons, couldn't the old Squire--not Miss Hannah More, and all they
Cheddar lot, and they Fordys least of all. My son's wife, she was
for sending her little maid to Hillside to Madam Fordys' school,
but, bless your heart, 'twould have been as much as my place was
worth if master had known it.'

The visit was not returned till after Clarence had gone back to his
London work. Sore as was the loss of him from my daily life, I
could see that the new world and fresh acquaintances were a trial to
him, and especially since the encounter with young Lester had driven
him back into his shell, so that he would be better where he was
already known and had nothing new to overcome. Emily, though not
yet sixteen, was emancipated from schoolroom habits, and the dear
girl was my devoted slave to an extent that perhaps I abused.

Not being 'come out,' she was left at home on the day when we set
out on a regular progress in the chariot with post-horses. The
britshka and pair, which were our ambition, were to wait till my
father's next rents came in. Morning calls in the country were a
solemn and imposing ceremony, and the head of the family had to be
taken on the first circuit; nor was there much scruple as to making
them in the forenoon, so several were to be disposed of before
fulfilling an engagement to luncheon at the farthest point, where
some old London friends had borrowed a house for the summer, and had
included me in their invitation.

Here alone did I leave the carriage, but I had Cooper's Spy and my
sketch-book as companions while waiting at doors where the
inhabitants were at home. The last visit was at Hillside Rectory, a
house of architecture somewhat similar to our own, but of the soft
creamy stone which so well set off the vine with purple clusters,
the myrtles and fuchsias, that covered it. I was wishing we had
drawn up far enough off for a sketch to be possible, when, from a
window close above, I heard the following words in a clear girlish
voice -

'No, indeed! I'm not going down. It is only those horrid
Earlscombe people. I can't think how they have the face to come
near us!'

There was a reply, perhaps that the parents had made the first
visit, for the rejoinder was--'Yes; grandpapa said it was a
Christian duty to make an advance; but they need not have come so
soon. Indeed, I wonder they show themselves at all. I am sure I
would not if I had such a dreadful son.' Presently, 'I hate to
think of it. That I should have thanked him. Depend upon it, he
will never pay the doctor. A coward like that is capable of
anything.'

The proverb had been realised, but there could hardly have been a
more involuntary or helpless listener. Presently my parents came
back, escorted by both the gentlemen of the house, tall fine-looking
men, the elder with snowy hair, and the dignity of men of the old
school; the younger with a joyous, hearty, out-of-door countenance,
more like a squire than a clergyman.

The visit seemed to have been gratifying. Mrs. Fordyce was declared
to be of higher stamp than most of the neighbouring ladies; and my
father was much pleased with the two clergymen, while as we drove
along he kept on admiring the well-ordered fields and fences, and
contrasting the pretty cottages and trim gardens with the dreary
appearance of our own village. I asked why Amos Bell's home had
been neglected, and was answered with some annoyance, as I pointed
down the lane, that it was on our land, though in Hillside parish.
'I am glad to have such neighbours!' observed my mother, and I kept
to myself the remarks I had heard, though I was still tingling with
the sting of them.

We heard no more of 'they Fordys' for some time. The married pair
went away to stay with friends, and we only once met the old
gentleman, when I was waiting in the street at Wattlesea in the
donkey chair, while my mother was trying to match netting silk in
the odd little shop that united fancy work, toys, and tracts with
the post office. Old Mr. Fordyce met us as we drew up, handed her
out with a grand seigneur's courtesy, and stood talking to me so
delightfully that I quite forgot it was from Christian duty.

My father corresponded with the old Rector about the state of the
parish, and at last went over to Bath for a personal conference, but
without much satisfaction. The Earlscombe people were pronounced to
be an ungrateful good-for-nothing set, for whom it was of no use to
do anything; and indeed my mother made such discoveries in the
cottages that she durst not let Emily fulfil her cherished scheme of
visiting them. The only resemblance to the favourite heroines of
religious tales that could be permitted was assembling a tiny Sunday
class in Chapman's lodge; and it must be confessed that her brothers
thought she made as much fuss about it as if there had been a
hundred scholars.

However, between remonstrances and offers of undertaking a share of
the expense, my father managed to get Mr. Mears' services dispensed
with from the ensuing Lady Day, and that a resident curate should be
appointed, the choice of whom was to rest with himself. It was then
and there decided that Martyn should be 'brought up to the Church,'
as people then used to term destination to Holy Orders. My father
said he should feel justified in building a good house when he could
afford it, if it was to be a provision for one of his sons, and he
also felt that as he had the charge of the parish as patron, it was
right and fitting to train one of his sons up to take care of it.
Nor did Martyn show any distaste to the idea, as indeed there was
less in it then than at present to daunt the imagination of an
honest, lively boy, not as yet specially thoughtful or devout, but
obedient, truthful, and fairly reverent, and ready to grow as he was
trained.

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