The Coxswain's Bride; also, Jack Frost and Sons; and, A Double Rescue

It is certain that little Nellie did not understand the moral of the story, and it is uncertain how far the boys appreciated it; but it was old Nell’s business to sow the seed beside all waters, and leave the rest to Him who gave the command.

“Yes, dearies,” she said in conclusion, laying her hand on the basket, “I expected this gift this morning; but many a time does our Father in heaven send a blessin’ when an’ where we don’t expect it. Mind that—mind ye that.”

Jack had more than enough of mental food to digest that morning as he retraced his steps homeward through the deep snow; for he found that old Nell, not less than his mother, had treated him to a few puzzlers. Poor boy, he little knew as he plodded on that he was that day about to enter into one of the darkest clouds of his young life.

During his absence a letter had been received by his father, intimating that through the failure of a bank he was a ruined man. The shock had paralysed the farmer, and when Jack entered his home he found him lying on his bed in a state of insensibility from which he could not be rallied. A few days later the old man died.

Farmer Matterby’s widow had few relatives, and none of these were in circumstances to help her in the day of trial. They and her numerous friends did indeed what they could. Besides offering sincere sympathy, they subscribed and raised a small sum to enable the bereaved woman and her only child to tide over present difficulties, but they could not enable her to continue to work the farm, and as most of her late husband’s kindred had migrated to Canada, she had no one from whom she could naturally claim counsel or aid. She was therefore thrown entirely on God; and it was with strange and solemn feelings that Jack kneeled by her side, and heard her pray in tones of anguish for help, light, and guidance, and especially that, whatever might become of herself, her dear boy might be preserved from evil and guided in ways of righteousness.

A few months later, and the widow, gathering the small remnant of her possessions together, set off with her little boy to seek employment in London. How many poor souls, in various ranks of life, must have turned their steps, in days gone by, towards that giant city in the sanguine hope of bettering their condition! Mrs Matterby had no friends to whom she could go in London; but she could paint and draw and sing, and was fairly educated. She would teach. In the meantime she had a little money to start with. Entertaining a suspicion that it might be considered a wildish scheme by her friends and neighbours, she resolved to say nothing about her plans to any one, save that she was going to London for a time.

It was a touching scene, the parting of Jack and the Grove family. The sturdy fisherman was at sea at the time, but old Nell was in her accustomed corner in the lowly bed with the ragged counterpane, where her uneventful yet happy life was spent; and little curly-headed Nellie was there, playing with the cat; and Natty was there, cutting out a first-rate man of war with a huge knife.

“Granny,” (Jack always called her “granny” like the rest), “granny, I’ve come to say good-bye. I am going away f–f–for ever an’ ever!”

“Amen!” responded Natty, from the mere force of habit, for he was a constant responder at granny’s family worship.

“Ye don’t know that, darlin’,” replied old Nell. “The Lord leads us in ways that we know not, an’ it may be His good pleasure to bring you here again.”

“N–no; I’m quite sure I’ll never see you again,” returned the boy, giving way to the sobs which he could not restrain. “M–mother says we will never come back again,—n–never, never more—”

He broke down entirely at this point, and a few silent tears trickled over the kind old face of Nell. Natty was too much of a man to give way out and out, but he snivelled a little in spite of himself. As for Nellie, she stood there in open-eyed wonder, for she failed to quite understand the situation. We will not prolong the painful scene. When at length Jack had taken leave of them all—had kissed the two Nells and shaken hands with Natty—the younger Nell seemed to realise the facts of the case; for Jack saw her, as he glanced back for the last time, suddenly shut her large blue eyes, throw back her curly little head, open wide her pretty little mouth, and howl miserably.

Story 3 – Chapter 2.

Lost in London

London in a fog is too well known to require description. In an uncommonly thick fog, on a day in December of the following year, Mrs Matterby hurried along Fleet Street in the direction of the city, leading Jack by the hand. Both were very wet, very cold, ravenously hungry, and rather poorly clad. It was evident that things had not prospered with the widow.

“Dear Jack,” she said in a choking voice, as they hurried along the streets towards the wretched abode in the Tower Hamlets to which they had been at length reduced, “dear Jack, my last human hope has failed. Mr Block has told me that I need not go there again; he has no more work for me.”

Jack’s experience of life was too limited to enable him to understand fully the depth of distress to which his mother had fallen—with health broken, money expended, and work not to be had except on terms which rendered life a misery, and prolonged existence almost an impossibility. But Jack’s power of sympathy was strong and his passions were vehement.

“Mother,” he said, with tearful eyes, as he clung closer to her side, “I would kill Mr Block if I could!”

“Hush, dear boy! You know that would be wrong and could do no good. It is sinful even to feel such a desire.”

“How can I help it, mother!” returned Jack indignantly. Then he asked, “What are we going to do now, mother?”

For some time the poor widow did not reply; then she spoke in a low tone, as if murmuring to herself, “The last sixpence gone; the cupboard empty; nothing—nothing left to pawn—”

She stopped short, and glanced hastily at her marriage ring.

“Mother,” said Jack, “have you not often told me that God will not forsake us? Does it not seem as if He had forsaken us now?”

“It only seems like it, darling,” returned the widow hurriedly. “We don’t understand His ways. ‘Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him!’”

It seemed as if God were about to test the faith of His servant, for at that moment a cab drove furiously round the corner of a street and knocked her down. Jack was overturned at the same time. Recovering himself, instantly, he found his mother in a state of unconsciousness, with blood flowing from a deep cut in her forehead. In a state of semi-bewilderment the poor boy followed the stretcher on which Mrs Matterby was carried to the nearest hospital, where he waited while his mother’s injuries were examined.

“My boy,” said a young surgeon, returning to the waiting room, and patting Jack’s head, “your mother has been rather badly hurt. We must keep her here to look after her. I daresay we shall soon make her well. Meanwhile you had better run home, and tell your father—if, that is—your father is at home, I suppose?”

“No, sir; father’s dead.”

“Well then your sister or aunt—I suppose there’s some relative at home older than yourself?”

“No, sir; none but mother an’ me,” whispered Jack.

“No relations of any kind at all in London?”

“None, sir. We know nobody—at least not many, and they’re all strangers.”

“A sad case,” murmured the surgeon. “Your mother is poor, I suppose?”

“Very poor, sir.”

“But of course you have a home of some sort, somewhere?”

“Yes, it’s not far from here.”

“Well, them, you’d better go home just now, for you can’t see your mother to-night. We dare not let her speak, but come back early to-morrow, and you shall hear about her—perhaps see her. Here, put that in your pocket.”

Poor Jack took the shilling which the sympathetic surgeon thrust into his hand, and ran home in a state bordering on distraction; but it was not till he entered the shabby little room which he had begun to consider “home” that he realised the full weight of the calamity that had befallen him. No mother’s voice to welcome him; no bit of fire in the grate to warm; no singing kettle to cheer, or light of candle to dispel the gloom of rapidly approaching night.

It was Christmas Day too. In the morning he had gone forth with his mother—she in the sanguine hope of renewing an engagement in a clothier’s shop, which terminated that day; he in the expectation of getting a few jobs of some sort—messages to run or horses to hold. Such were the circumstances to which they had been reduced in twelve months, Jack had arranged to call for his mother and walk home with her. On the way they were to invest a very small part of the widow’s earnings in “something nice” for their Christmas supper, and spend the evening together, chatting about the old home in Blackby, and father, and Natty Grove, and Nellie, and old Nell, in the happy days gone by.

“And now!” thought Jack, seating himself on his little bed and glancing at that of his mother, which stood empty in the opposite corner—“now!—”

But Jack could think no more. A tremendous agony rent his breast, and a sharp cry escaped from him as he flung himself on his bed and burst into a passion of tears.

Child-like, he sobbed himself to sleep, and did not awake till the sun was high next morning. It was some time before he could recall what had occurred. When he did so he began to weep afresh. Leaping up, he was about to rush out of the house and make for the hospital, when he was checked at the door by the landlord—a hard, grinding, heartless man, who grew rich in oppressing the poor.

“You seem to be in a hurry, youngster,” he said, dragging the boy back by the collar, and looking hurriedly round the room. “I’ve come for the rent. Where’s your mother?”

In a sobbing voice Jack told him about the accident.

“Well, I don’t really believe you,” said the man, with an angry frown; “but I’ll soon find out if you’re telling lies. I’ll go to the hospital and inquire for myself. D’ee know anything about your mother’s affairs?”

“No, sir,” said Jack, meekly, for he began to entertain a vague terror of the man.

“No; I thought not. Well, I’ll enlighten you. Your mother owes me three weeks’ rent of this here room, and has got nothing to pay it with, as far as I knows, except these sticks o’ furniture. Now, if your mother is really in hospital, I’ll come back here and bundle you out, an’ sell the furniture to pay my rent. I ain’t a-goin’ to be done out o’ my money because your mother chooses to git run’d over.”

The landlord did not wait for a reply, but went out and slammed the door.

Jack followed him in silent horror. He watched him while he inquired at the gate of the hospital, and, after he had gone, went up timidly, rang the bell, and asked for his mother.

“Mrs Matterby?” repeated the porter. “Come in; I’ll make inquiry.”

The report which he brought back fell like the blow of a sledge-hammer on the poor boy’s heart. His mother, they told him, was dead. She had died suddenly in the night.

There are times of affliction, when the human soul fails to find relief in tears or cries. Poor Jack Matterby stood for some time motionless, as if paralysed, with glaring eyes and a face not unlike to that of death. They sought to rouse him, but he could not speak. Suddenly, observing the front door open, he darted out into the street and ran straight home, where he flung himself on his mother’s bed, and burst into an uncontrollable flood of tears. By degrees the passion subsided, leaving only a stunned feeling behind, under the influence of which he lay perfectly still.

The first thing that roused him was the sound of a heavy foot on the stair. The memory of the landlord flashed into his mind and filled him with indescribable dread—dread caused partly by the man’s savage aspect and nature, but much more by the brutal way in which he had spoken about his mother. The only way in which to avoid a meeting was to rush past the man on the stair. Fear and loathing made the poor boy forget, for the moment, his crushing sorrow. He leaped up, opened the door, and, dashing downstairs, almost overturned the man who was coming up. Once in the street, he ran straight on without thought, until he felt that he was safe from pursuit. Then he stopped, and sat down on a door-step—to think what he should do; for, having been told that the furniture of his old home was to be sold, and himself turned out, he felt that returning there would be useless, and would only expose him to the risk of meeting the awful landlord. While he was yet buried in thought, one of those sprightly creatures of the great city known as street arabs accosted him in a grave and friendly tone.

“My sweet little toolip,” he said, “can I do anythink for you?”

Despite his grief Jack could scarcely forbear smiling at the absurdity of the question.

“No, thank you,” he replied.

“Well now, look ’ere, my toolip,” returned the arab in a confidential tone, “I’ve took quite a fancy to you; you’ve got such a look, some’ow, of my poor old grandmother. Now, if you’ve no objection, I’d like to give you your breakfast. You’re ’ungry, I suppose?”

Jack admitted that he was, and, after a moment’s hesitation, accepted this surprisingly kind and liberal offer. Taking him promptly by the arm his new friend hurried him to a pastry-cook’s shop, and bade him “smell that,” referring to the odours that ascended through a grating.

“Ain’t it ’eavenly?” he asked, with sparkling eyes.

Jack admitted that it was very nice.

“So green, an’ yet so fair!” murmured the arab, casting a look of admiration on his companion. “Now I means to go into that there shop,” he added, returning to the confidential tone, “an’ buy breakfast for you—for both on us. But I couldn’t go in, you know, with this ’ere shabby coat on, ’cause they wouldn’t give me such good wittles if I did. Just change coats with me for a few minutes. What! You doubt me? No one ever doubted Bob Snobbins without—without a-’urtin’ of his feelin’s.”

Whatever might have caused Jack to hesitate, the injured look on young Snobbins’ countenance and the hurt tone were too much for him. He exchanged coats with the young rascal, who, suddenly directing Jack’s attention to some imaginary object of interest at one end of the street, made off at full speed towards the other end. Our hero was, however, a famous runner. He gave chase, caught the arab in a retired alley, and gave him an indignant punch in the head.

But although Jack had plenty of courage and a good deal of strength, he was no match for a street warrior like Bob Snobbins, who turned about promptly, blackened both his opponent’s eyes, bled his nose, swelled his lips, and finally knocked him into a pool of dirty water, after which he fled, just as a policeman came on the scene.

The constable was a kindly man. He asked Jack a few questions, which, however, the latter was too miserable to answer.

“Well, well, my boy,” said the constable gently, “you’d as well give up fightin’. It don’t pay, you see, in the long run. Besides, you don’t seem fit for it. Cut away home now, and get your mother to clean you.”

This last remark caused Jack to run away fast enough with a bursting heart. All day he wandered about the crowded streets, and no one took any notice of him, save a very few among the thousands, who cast on him a passing glance of pity. But what could these do to help him? Were not the streets swarming with such boys?

And in truth Jack Matterby was a very pitiable object, at least according to the report of shop-mirrors, which told him that his face was discoloured and bloody, his coat indescribably dirty and ragged, besides being out of harmony with his trousers, and that his person generally was bedaubed with mud. Hunger at last induced him to overcome his feelings of shame so far that he entered a baker’s shop, but he was promptly ordered to be off. Later in the day he entered another shop, the owner of which seemed to be of a better disposition. Changing his shilling, he purchased a penny roll, with which he retired to a dark passage and dined.

When night came on he expended another penny and supped, after which he sought for some place of shelter in which to sleep. But wherever he went he found the guardians of the public requiring him to “move on.” Several street arabs sought to make his acquaintance, but, with the memory of Bob Snobbins strong upon him, he declined their friendship. At last, wearied out and broken-hearted, he found a quiet corner under an archway, where he sat down and leaned his head against the wall, exclaiming, “I’m lost—lost!” Then he wept quietly, and sought to find temporary relief in slumber.

He was indeed lost, and more completely so, in the feeling of lonely isolation, perhaps, than he would have been if lost in the backwoods of America. Yet he was not utterly lost, for the tender Shepherd was on his track. Some such thought seemed to cross his mind; for he suddenly began to pray, and thoughts about the old home in Blackby and of the Grove family comforted him a little until he fell asleep on his hard bed.

But, for the time being, the poor boy was lost—lost in London! His disreputable face and discreditable coat argued a dissipated character—hence no one would employ him. Ere long necessity compelled him to accept the society of street arabs, and soon he became quite as sharp, though not quite as wicked, as they. But day by day he sank lower and lower, and evil at which he would have shuddered at first became at last familiar.

He did not sink without a struggle, however, and he would have returned to the place where his mother had died, to ask help of the young surgeon who had expressed sympathy with him, but, with the carelessness of boyhood, he had forgotten the name of the hospital, and did not know where, in the great wilderness of bricks and mortar, to search for it. As for the home from which he had fled, the memory of the landlord still kept him carefully clear of that.

But Jack’s mother was not dead! In hospitals—as in the best of well-regulated families—mistakes will sometimes happen. The report which had proved so disastrous to our poor hero referred to another woman who had died. A messenger had been at once sent, by the young surgeon before mentioned, to tell Jack of the error; but when the messenger arrived the boy had flown—as already described. Indeed, it was he whom Jack had passed on the stair.

It was long before Mrs Matterby recovered, for the disappearance of her boy caused a relapse; and when at last she left the hospital, feeble and homeless, she went about for many months, searching at once for work and for her lost treasure.

Christmas came again, and found Jack Matterby at nearly the lowest point in his downward career. It is due to him to say, however, that he had not up to that time, been guilty of any criminal act that could bring him with the grasp of human law; but in word and deed he had begun, more and more, to break the law of God: so that if poor Mrs Matterby had at that time succeeded in finding her son, it is probable that her joy would have been overwhelmed with terrible grief.

It was not exactly Christmas morning, but it was the Christmas season of the year, when our little hero, wearied in spirit and body with the hard struggle for life, sauntered down the now familiar Strand in the hope of finding some odd job to do. He paused before a confectioner’s shop, and, being very hungry, was debating with himself the propriety of giving up the struggle and coolly helping himself to a pie! You may be sure that bad invisible spirits were at his elbow just then to encourage him. But God sent a good angel also, and she was visible—being in the form of a thin little old lady.

“You’d like a bun, I know,” she said, putting a penny into Jack’s hand.

“God bless you, ma’am—yes,” burst from the astonished boy.

“Go in and buy one. Then, come and tell me all about you.”

The thin little old lady was one of those followers of the Lamb who do not wait for Christmas to unlock their sympathies. The river of her love and pity was always overflowing, so that there was no room for increase to a deluge at Christmas time—though she rejoiced to note the increase in the case of others, and wished that the flood might become perennial. To this lady Jack laid bare his inmost heart, and she led him back to the Saviour.

“Now, Jack, let me ask you one question,” she said; “would you like to go to Canada?”

With tremendous energy Jack answered, “Wouldn’t I!”

“Then,” said the old lady, “to Canada you shall go.”

Story 3 – Chapter 3.

The Double Rescue

And Jack Matterby went! But before he went he had to go through a preliminary training, for his regular schooling had ceased when his father died, and he had learned no trade.

In those days there were no splendid institutions for waifs and strays such as now exist, but it must not be supposed that there was no such thing as “hasting to the rescue.” Thin little old Mrs Seaford had struck out the idea for herself, and had acted on it for some years in her own vigorous way. She took Jack home, and lodged him in her own house with two or three other boys of the same stamp—waifs. Jack elected to learn the trade of a carpenter, and Mrs Seaford, finding that he had been pretty well grounded in English, taught him French, as that language, she told him, was much spoken in Canada. Above all, she taught him those principles of God’s law without which a human being is but poorly furnished even for the life that now is, to say nothing of that which is to come.

In a few months Jack was ready for exportation! A few months more, and he found himself apprenticed to a farmer, not far from the shores of that mighty fresh-water sea, Ontario. Time passed, and Jack Matterby became a trusted servant and a thorough farmer. He also became a big, dashing, and earnest boy. More time passed, and Jack became a handsome young man, the bosom friend of his employer. Yet a little more time winged its silent way, and Jack became John Matterby, Esquire, of Fair Creek Farm, heir to his former master’s property, and one of the wealthiest men of the province—not a common experience of poor emigrant waifs, doubtless, but, on the other hand, by no means unprecedented.

It must not be supposed that during all those years Jack forgot the scenes and people of the old land. On the contrary, the longer he absented himself from the old home the more firmly and tenderly did the old memories cling and cluster round his heart; and many a story and anecdote did he relate about these, especially during the Christmas season of each year, to his old master and to Nancy Briggs, in the log homestead of Ontario.

Nancy was a waif, who had been sent out by the same thin little old lady who had sent Jack out. She was very pretty, and possessed of delightfully amiable domestic qualities. She grew up to be a very handsome girl, and was a very bright sunbeam in the homestead. But Jack did not fall in love with her. All unknown to himself his heart was pre-occupied. Neither did Nancy fall in love with Jack. All unwittingly she was reserving herself for another lot. Of course our hero corresponded diligently with the thin little old lady, and gladdened her heart by showing and expressing strong sympathy with the waifs of the great city; more than once, in his earlier letters, mentioning one named Bob Snobbins, about whose fate he felt some curiosity, but in regard to whose home, if such existed, he could give no information.

Twice during those years Jack also wrote to the Grove family; but as he received no answer on either occasion, he concluded that the father must have been drowned, that old Nell was dead, and the family broken up. Need we add that the memory of his dear mother never faded or grew dim? But this was a sacred memory, in regard to which he opened his lips to no one.

At last there came a day when John Matterby, being in the prime of life, with ample means and time to spare, set his heart on a holiday and a visit to the old country—the thin little old lady being yet alive. It was not so easy, however, for our hero to get away from home as one might imagine; for, besides being a farmer, he was manager of a branch bank, secretary to several philanthropic societies, superintendent of a Sunday-school, and, generally, a helper of, and sympathiser with, all who loved the Lord and sought to benefit their fellow-men. But, being a man of resolution, he cut the cords that attached him to these things, appointed Miss Briggs to superintend the Sunday-school in his absence, and set sail for England—not in a steamer, as most rich men would have done, but in a sailing ship, because the vessel happened to be bound for the port of Blackby, the home of his childhood.