The Paper Cap. A Story of Love and Labor

“Would thou think Harry Bradley a good match?”

“I wouldn’t put him even in a passing thought with Katherine. Harry Bradley, indeed! I am fairly astonished at thee naming the middle class fellow!”

“Katherine thinks him all a man should be.”

“She will change her mind in London.”

“I doubt that.”

“Thou lets her hev opinions and ideas of her awn. Thou shouldn’t do it. Jane will alter that. Jane will tell her how to rate men and women. Jane is varry clever.”

“Jane is no match for Katherine. Dost thou think Antony Annis will be?”

“I wouldn’t doubt it.”

“Then don’t try conclusions with her about Harry Bradley, and happen then thou may keep thy illusion. Katherine’s fault is a grave one, though it often looks like a virtue.”

“I doan’t see what thou means. Faults are faults, and virtues are virtues. I hev niver seen a fault of any kind in her, unless it be wanting more guineas than I can spare her just now, but that is the original sin o’ women as far as I can make out. Whativer is this fault that can look like a virtue?”

“She overdoes everything. She says too little, or too much; she does too little, or too much; she gives too little, or too much. In everything she exceeds. If she likes anyone, she is unreasonable about them; if she dislikes them, she is unjust.”

“I doan’t call that much of a fault – if thou knew anything about farming thou would make little of it. Thou would know that it is the richest land that hes the most weeds in its crop. The plow and the harrow will clear it of weeds and the experience of life will teach Katherine to be less generous with both her feelings and her opinions. Let her overdo, it is a fault that will cure itself.”

“And in the meantime it makes her too positive and insisting. She thinks she is right and she wants others to be right. She is even a bit forceable – ”

“And I can tell thee that women as well as men need some force of character, if they mean to do anything with their lives. Why-a! Force is in daily life all that powder is to shot. If our weavers’ wives hed more force in their characters, they wouldn’t watch their children dying of hunger upon their knees and their hearths, they would make their stubborn men go to any kind of a loom. They wouldn’t be bothering themselves about any Bill in Parliament, they would be crying out for bread for their children. We must see about the women and children to-morrow or we shall not be ready for Faith Foster’s visit.”

“To be sure, but we need not think of it to-night. I’m heart weary, Antony. Nobody can give sympathy long unless they turn kind words into kind actions.”

“Then just call Katherine and order a bit of supper in. And I’d like a tankard of home-brewed, and a slice or two of cold mutton. My word, but the mutton bred in our rich meadows is worth eating! Such a fine color, so tender and juicy and full of rich red gravy.”

“I think thou would be better without the tankard. Our ale is four years old, and tha knows what it is at that age. It will give thee a rattling headache. The cask on now is very strong.”

“To be sure it is. A man could look a lion in the face after a couple of glasses of it.”

“I advise thee to take a glass of water, with thy mutton to-night.”

“No, I won’t. I’ll hev a glass of sherry wine, and thou can be my butler. And tell Katherine not to talk about London to-night. I hevn’t got my intentions ready. I’d be making promises it would not be right to keep. Tha knows – !”

“Yes, I know.”

Katherine had not yet been promoted to a seat at the late supper table, and only came to it when specially asked. So Madam found her ungowned, and with loosened hair, in a dressing-sacque of blue flannel. She was writing a letter to a school friend, but she understood her mother’s visit and asked with a smile —

“Am I to come to supper, mother? Oh, I am so glad.”

“Then, dearie, do not speak of London, nor the poor children, nor the selfish weavers.”

“Not selfish, mother. They believe they are fighting for their rights. You know that.”

“I doan’t know it. I doan’t believe it. Their wives and children ought to be more to them than their awn way which is what they really want. Doan’t say a word about them.”

“I will not. I am going to tell father about the Arkroyds, who owned Scar Top House so long.”

“Father will like to hear anything good about Colonel Arkroyd. He is the last of a fine Yorkshire family. Who told thee anything about him?”

“Before I came to my room I went to give Polly some sugar I had in my pocket for her, and I met Britton, who had just come from the stable. He turned and went with me and he was full of the story and so I had to listen to it.”

“Well, then, we will listen to it when thou comes down. Father is hungry, so don’t keep him waiting, or he will be put out of his way.”

“I will be down in five minutes, and father is never cross with me.”

Indeed, when Madam went back to the parlor, a servant was bringing in the cold mutton and Madam had the bottle of sherry in her hand. A few minutes later Katherine had joined her parents, and they were sitting cozily round a small table, set in the very warmth and light of the hearthstone. Then Madam, fearing some unlucky word or allusion, said as quickly as possible —

“Whatever was it thou heard about Colonel Ark-royd, Katherine?”

“Ay! Ay! Colonel Arkroyd! Who has anything to say about him?” asked the squire. “One of the finest men alive to-day.”

“I heard a strange thing about his old house, an hour ago.”

“But he sold Scar Top House, and went to live in Kendal. A man from Bradford bought it, eh?”

“Yes, a man with a factory and six hundred looms, they say. Father, have you noticed how crowded our rookery is with the birds’ nests this spring?”

“I doan’t know that I hev noticed the number of the nests, but nobody can help hearing their noisy chattering all over Annis.”

“Do you remember the rookery at Scar Top?”

“Yes. I often hed a friendly threep with Ark-royd about it. He would insist, that his rookery hed the largest congregation. I let him think so – he’s twenty years older than I am – and I did hear that the Bradford man had bought the place because of the rookery.”

“So he did. And now, father, every bird has left it. There was not one nest built there this spring. Not one!”

“I never heard the like. Whoever told thee such a story?”

“The whole village knows it. One morning very early every rook in Scar Top went away. They went altogether, just before daybreak. They went to Saville Court and settled in a long row of elm trees in the home meadow. They are building there now and the Bradford man – ”

“Give him his name. It is John Denby. He was born in Annis – in my manor – and he worked for the colonel, near twenty years.”

“Very well. John Denby and Colonel Arkroyd have quarreled about the birds, and there is likely to be a law suit over them.”

“Upon my word! That will be a varry interesting quarrel. What could make birds act in such a queer way? I niver knew them to do such a thing before.”

“Well, father, rooks are very aristocratic birds. Denby could not get a caw out of the whole flock. They would not notice Denby, and they used to talk to Arkroyd, whenever he came out of the house. Denby used to work for Colonel Arkroyd, and the rooks knew it. They did not consider him a gentleman, and they would not accept his hospitality.”

“That is going a bit too far, Katherine.”

“Oh, no! Old Britton told me so, and the Yorkshire bird does not live who has not told Britton all about itself. He said further, that rooks are very vain and particularly so about their feathers. He declared they would go far out of their way in order to face the wind and so prevent ruffling their feathers.”

“Rooks are at least a very human bird,” said Madam; “our rooks make quite a distinction between thee and myself. I can easily notice it. The male birds are in a flutter when thou walks through the rookery, they moderate their satisfaction when I pay them a call and it is the female birds who do the honors then.”

“That reminds me, mother, that Britton told me rooks intermarried generation after generation, and that if a rook brought home a strange bride, he was forced to build in a tree the community selected, at some distance from the rookery. If he did not do this, his nest was relentlessly torn down.”

“Well, my Joy, I am glad to learn so much from thee. How do the rooks treat thee?”

“With but moderate notice, father, unless I am at Britton’s side. Then they ‘caw’ respectfully, as I take my way through their colony. Britton taught me to lift my hat now and then, as father does.” The squire laughed, and was a bit confused. “Nay, nay!” he said. “Britton hes been making up that story, though I vow, I would rayther take off my hat to gentlemanly rooks than to some humans I know; I would that! There is one thing I can tell thee about rooks, Britton seems to have forgot; they can’t make a bit of sunshine for themselves. If t’ weather is rainy, no bird in the world is more miserable. They sit with puffed out feathers in uncontrollable melancholy, and they hevn’t a caw for anybody. Yet I hev a great respect for rooks.”

“And I hev a great liking for rook pies,” said Madam. “There is not a pie in all the records of cookery, to come near it. Par excellence is its name. I shall miss my rook pies, if we go away this summer.”

“But we shall have something better in their place, dear mother.”

“Who can tell? In the meantime, sleep will be the best thing for all. To-morrow is a new day. Sleep will make us ready for it.”

CHAPTER III – THE REALIZATION OF TROUBLE

“Beneath this starry arch,Naught resteth, or is still;And all things have their march,As if by one great will.Move on! Move all!Hark to the footfall!On, on! forever!”

THE next morning Katherine came to her mother full of enthusiasm. She had some letters in her hand and she said: “I have written these letters all alike, mother, and they are ready to send away, if you will give me the names of the ladies you wish them to go to.”

“How many letters hast thou written?”

“Seven. I can write as many as you wish.”

“Thou hes written too many already.”

“Too many!”

“Yes, tha must not forget, that this famine and distress is over all Yorkshire – over all England. Every town and village hes its awn sick and starving, and hes all it can do to look after them. Thy father told me last night he hed been giving to all the villages round us for a year back but until Mr. Foster told him yesterday he hed no idea that there was any serious trouble in Annis. Tha knows, dearie, that Yorkshire and Lancashire folk won’t beg. No, not if they die for want of begging. The preacher found out their need first and he told father at once. Then Jonathan Hartley admitted they were all suffering and that something must be done to help. That is the reason for the meeting this afternoon.”

“Oh, dear me!”

“Jonathan hes been preparing for it for a week but he did not tell father until yesterday. I will give thee the names of four ladies that may assist in the way of sending food – there is Mrs. Benson, the doctor’s wife – her husband is giving his time to the sick and if she hedn’t a bit of money of her awn, Benson’s family would be badly off, I fear. She may hev the heart to do as well as to pinch and suffer, but if she hesn’t, we can’t find her to blame. Send her an invitation. Send another to Mistress Craven. Colonel Craven is with his regiment somewhere, but she is wealthy, and for anything I know, good-hearted. Give her an opportunity. Lady Brierley can be counted on in some way or other and perhaps Mrs. Courtney. I can think of no others because everyone is likely to be looking for assistance just as we are. What day hev you named for the meeting?”

“Monday. Is that too soon?”

“About a week too soon. None of these ladies will treat the invitation as a desirable one. They doubtless hev many engagements already made. Say, next Saturday. It is not reasonable to expect them to drop iverything else and hurry to Annis, to sew for the hungry and naked.”

“O mother! Little children! Who would not hurry to them with food and clothing?”

“Hes thou been with Faith Foster to see any children hungry and naked?”

“No, mother; but I do not need to see in order to feel. And I have certainly noticed how few children are on the street lately.”

“Well, Katherine, girls of eighteen shouldn’t need to see in order to feel. Thank God for thy fresh young feelings and keep them fresh as long as thou can. It will be a pity when thou begins to reason about them. Send letters to Mrs. Benson, Mrs. Craven, Lady Brierley, and Mrs. Courtney, and then we shall see what comes from them. After all, we are mere mortals!”

“But you are friendly with all these four ladies?”

“Good friends to come and go upon. By rights they ought to stand by Annis – but ‘ought’ stands for nothing.”

“Why ought, mother?”

“Thy father hes done ivery one o’ them a good turn of one kind or the other but it isn’t his way to speak of the same. Now send off thy letters and let things slide until we see what road they are going to take. I’m afraid I’ll hev to put mysen about more than I like to in this matter.”

“That goes without saying but you don’t mind it, do you, mother?”

“Well, your father took me on a sudden. I hedn’t time to think before I spoke and when my heart gets busy, good-by to my head.”

“Mrs. Courtney has not been here for a long time.”

“She is a good deal away but I saw her in London last year every now and then. She is a careless woman; she goes it blind about everything, and yet she wants to be at the bottom of all county affairs.”

“Mother, could we not do a little shopping today?”

“At the fag end of the week? What are you talking about? Certainly not. Besides, thy father is worried about the meeting this afternoon. He says more may come of it than we can dream of.”

“How is that?”

“Why, Katherine, it might end in a factory here, or it might end in the weavers heving to leave Annis and go elsewhere.”

“Cannot they get work of some other kind, in, or near by Annis?”

“Nay, tha surely knows, that a weaver hes to keep his fingers soft, and his hands supple. Hard manual work would spoil his hands forever for the loom, and our men are born weavers. They doan’t fashion to any other work, and to be sure England hes to hev her weavers.”

“Mother, would it not be far better to have a factory? Lately, when I have taken a walk with father he always goes to the wold and looks all round considering just like a man who was wondering about a site for a building. It would be a good thing for us, mother, would it not?”

“It seems so, but father does not want it. He says it will turn Annis into a rough village, full of strangers, with bad ways, and also that it will spoil the whole country-side with its smoke and dirt.”

“But if it makes money?”

“Money isn’t iverything.”

“The want of it is dreadful.”

“Thy father got a thousand pounds this morning. If he does not put most of it into a factory, he will put it into bread, which will be eaten to-day and wanted again to-morrow. That would make short work of a thousand pounds.”

“Have you reminded father of that?”

“I doan’t need to. Father seems an easy-going man but he thinks of iverything; and when he hes to act no one strikes the iron quicker and harder. If thou saw him in London, if thou heard him in the House, brow-beating the Whigs and standing up for Peel and Wellington and others, thou would wonder however thou dared to tease, and contradict, and coax him in Annis. Thou would that! Now I am going to the lower summer house for an hour. Send away thy letters, and let me alone a bit.”

“I know. I saw father going down the garden. He is going to the summer house also; he intends to tell you, mother, what he is going to say to-night. He always reads, or recites his speeches to you. I have heard him sometimes.”

“Then thou ought to be ashamed to speak of it! I am astonished at thy want of honor! If by chance, thou found out some reserved way of thy father it should have been held by thee as a sacred, inviolable secret. Not even to me, should thou have dared to speak of it. I am sorry, indeed, to hev to teach thee this point of childhood’s honor. I thought it would be natural to the daughter of Antony and Annie Annis!”

“Mother! Forgive me! I am ashamed and sorry and oh, do not, for my sake, tell father! My dear, dear father! You have made it look like mocking him – I never thought how shameful it could look – oh, I never thought about it! I never spoke of it before! I never did!”

“Well, then, see thou never again listens to what was not intended for thee to hear. It would be a pretty state of things, if thy father hed to go somewhere out of the way of listeners to get a bit of private talk with me.”

“Mother, don’t be so cruel to me.”

“Was thou trying to compliment me or was thou scorning a bit about thy father’s ways? If thou thought I would feel complimented by being set above him that thought was as far wrong as it could possibly get.”

“Mother! Mother! You will break my heart! You never before spoke this way to me —Oh, dear! Oh, dear!”

For a few minutes Madam let her weep, then she bent over the crouching, sobbing girl, and said, “There now! There now!”

“I am so sorry! So sorry!”

“Well, dearie, sorrow is good for sin. It is the only thing sorrow is good for. Dry thy eyes, and we will niver name the miserable subject again.”

“Was it really a sin, mother?”

“Hes thou forgotten the fifth commandment? That little laugh at thy father’s saying his speeches to me first was more than a bit scornful. It was far enough from the commandment ‘Honor thy father and thy mother.’ It wasn’t honoring either of us.”

“I can never forgive myself.”

“Nay! nay! Give me a kiss and go and look after thy letters; also tell Yates dinner must be on the table at one o’clock no matter what his watch says.” Then Katherine walked silently away and Madam went to the lower summer house, and the dinner was on the table at one o’clock. It was an exceedingly quiet meal, and immediately after it, the squire’s horse was brought to the door.

“So thou art going to ride, Antony!” said Mistress Annis, and the squire answered, “Ay, I hev a purpose in riding, Annie.”

“Thou art quite right,” was the reply, for she thought she divined his purpose and the shadow of a smile passed between them. Then he looked at his watch, mounted his horse and rode swiftly away. His wife watched him out of sight and, as she turned into the house, she told herself with a proud and happy smile, “He is the best and the handsomest man in the West Riding, and the horse suits him! He rides to perfection! God bless him!”

It was a point with the squire to be rigidly punctual. He was never either too soon, or too late. He knew that one fault was as bad as the other, though he considered the early mistake as the worst. It began to strike two as he reached the door of the Methodist Chapel, and saw Jonathan Hartley waiting there for him; and they walked at once to a rude platform that had been prepared for the speakers. There were several gentlemen standing there in a group, and the Chapel was crowded with anxious hungry-looking men.

It was the first time that Squire Annis had ever stepped inside a Methodist Chapel. The thought was like the crack of a whip in his conscience but at that moment he would not listen to any claim or reproof; for either through liking or disliking, he was sensitive at once to Bradley’s tall, burly predominance; and could not have said, whether it was pleasant or unpleasant to him. However, the moment he appeared, there was loud handclapping, and cries of “Squire Annis! Squire Annis! Put him in the chair! He’s our man!”

Then into the squire’s heart his good angel put a good thought, and he walked to the front of the platform and said, “My men, and my friends, I’ll do something better for you. I’ll put the Reverend Samuel Foster in the chair. God’s servant stands above all others, and Mr. Foster knows all about your poverty and affliction. I am a bit ashamed to say, I do not.” This personal accusation was cut short by cries of “No! No! No! Thou hes done a great deal,” and then a cheer, that had in it all the Yorkshire spirit, though not its strength. The men were actually weak with hunger.

Mr. Foster took the chair to which the squire led him without any affectations of demur, and he was gladly welcomed. Indeed there were few things that would have pleased the audience more. They were nearly all Methodists, and their preacher alone had searched out their misery, and helped them to bear it with patience and with hope. He now stretched out his hands to them and said – “Friends, just give us four lines, and we will go at once to business”; and in a sweet, ringing voice, he began Newman’s exquisite hymn —

“Leave God to order all thy ways,And hope in Him whate’er betide,Thoul’t find Him in the evil days,An all sufficient Strength and Guide.”

The words came fresh and wet with tears from every heart, and it was a five minutes’ interlude of that complete surrender, which God loves and accepts.

After a moment of intense silence, the preacher said, “We are met to-day to try and find out if hand-loom weaving must go, or if both hand-loom weaving and power-loom weaving have a chance for the weaver in them. There are many hand-loom weavers here present. They know all its good points and all points wherein it fails but they do not know either the good or bad points of power-loom weaving, and Mr. John Thomas Bradley has come to tell you something about this tremendous rival of your household loom. I will now introduce Mr. John.” He got no further in his introduction, for Bradley stepped forward, and with a buoyant good-nature said, “No need, sir, of any fine mastering or mistering between the Annis lads and mysen. We hev thrashed each ither at football, and chated each ither in all kinds of swapping odds too often, to hev forgotten what names were given us at our christening. There’s Israel Swale, he hes a bigger mill than I hev now-a-days, but he’s owing me three pence half-penny and eleven marbles, yet whenever I ask him for my brass and my marbles he says – ‘I’ll pay thee, John Thomas, when we play our next game.’ Now listen, lads, next Whitsunday holidays I’ll ask him to come and see me, and I’ll propose before a house full of company – and all ready for a bit of fun – that we hev our game of marbles in the bowling alley, and I’ll get Jonathan Hartley to give you all an invitation to come and see fair play between us. Will you come?”

Noisy laughing acceptances followed and one big Guisely weaver said, “He’d come too, and see that Israel played a straight game for once in his life.”

“I’m obliged to thee, Guisely,” answered Bradley, “I hope thou’lt come. Now then, lads, I hev to speak to you about business, and if you think what I say is right, go and do what I say, do it boldly; and if you aren’t sure, then let it alone: – till you are driven to it. I am told that varry few of the men here present iver saw a power loom. And yet you mostly think ill o’ it. That isn’t a bit Yorkshire. You treat a man as you find him, you ought to do the same to a machine, that is almost a man in intelligence – that is the most perfect bit of beauty and contrivance that man iver made since man himsen was fitted wi’ fingers and thumbs by the Great Machinist of heaven and earth.”

“What is it fashioned like, Bradley?”

“It is an exceedingly compact machine and takes up little room. It is easily worked and it performs every weaving operation with neatness and perfection. It makes one hundred and seventy picks a minute or six pieces of goods in a week – you know it was full work and hard work to make one piece a week with the home loom, even for a strong man. It is made mostly of shining metal, and it is a perfect darling. Why-a! the lads and lassies in Bradley mill call their looms after their sweethearts, or husbands, or wives, and I wouldn’t wonder if they said many a sweet or snappy word to the looms that would niver be ventured on with the real Bessie or the real Joe.

“Think of your old cumbersome wooden looms, so hard and heavy and dreary to work, that it wasn’t fit or right to put a woman down to one. Then go and try a power loom, and when you hev done a day’s work on it, praise God and be thankful! I tell you God saw the millions coming whom Yorkshire and Lancashire would hev to clothe, and He gave His servant the grave, gentle, middle-aged preacher Edmund Cartwright, the model of a loom fit for God’s working men and women to use. I tell you men the power loom is one of God’s latest Gospels. We are spelling yet, with some difficulty, its first good news, but the whole world will yet thank God for the power loom!”