Collected Works of Frances Trollope

by Frances Milton Trollope

  CHAPTER XI.

  MISS BROTHERTON PUSHES HER INQUIRIES FURTHER — A WELL-ARRANGED SCHEME DISAGREEABLY DEFEATED — A VISIT, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.

  MARY BROTHERTON certainly did not return home that night with any doubts on her mind respecting the nature of Sir Matthew Dowling’s benevolence; but the fever of spirits which had seized her was greatly increased by the information she had gained.

  There was a vast deal of energy and strength of purpose in the mind of Mary Brotherton, but hitherto all this had lain latent and inert. The sentiment which in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred is the first to awaken the female heart to strong emotion seemed to be totally powerless to her. She had never yet felt the slightest approach to the passion of love; nor was it very likely she should, for one among her many peculiarities of character was the persuasion that every man who paid her attention was in pursuit of her fortune, an idea, which to such a temper as hers was calculated to act as a sevenfold shield against all amatory attacks upon her heart.

  Most truly therefore, up to this time, had she continued “In maiden meditation, fancy free.”

  But this could be said no longer; neither fancy nor any other faculty could be termed free in one whose thoughts fixed themselves by night and day upon one single subject, while feeling that to it she was ready to sacrifice every thing else in life.

  On re-entering her house on the memorable night of the Dowling Lodge theatricals, Miss Brotherton retired to her apartment without even the intention of sleeping. She laid her head upon her pillow deliberately determined not to close her eyes in sleep till she had made up her mind as to the best way of rescuing the pale trembling child, whose voice and form haunted her, from the horrible bondage of Sir Matthew Dowling’s charity.

  The question was not altogether an easy one. She could hardly doubt that very strong indignation would follow any open effort on her part to interfere with a child publicly held up as the favoured object of Sir Matthew’s loudly-vaunted benevolence, and moreover, privately marked out by his vindictive nature as a victim to his hatred.

  Whether as a rival in his munificence, or a champion against his hate, it was pretty certain that her interference would render her obnoxious to her pompous neighbour’s displeasure, and this she had no inclination to encounter if she could help it. For though at this moment she felt within her a strength and firmness of purpose not easily shaken, the poor girl knew that she stood alone in the world, with no friend to support her more powerful than nurse Tremlett, and nothing but her two hundred thousand pounds’ worth of this world’s, trumpery to enable her to have her way, and her will, in many matters that she feared might turn out rather difficult to manage.

  So she determined to avoid quarrelling with Sir Matthew Dowling as long as she could, and though the image of Michael struggling with his tears, and the plaintive sound of his voice as he pleaded for leave to labour again, absolutely haunted her memory, she determined upon being cautious, wise, and very deliberative in any measures she might eventually take to ensure his release.

  Under the influence of these prudential resolutions, Miss Brotherton for the present abandoned her purpose of seeking a conversation with the child himself, and determined to find her way to the cottage of his mother instead. Yet even this she felt must be done with caution. Her carriage and her liveries were about as splendid and conspicuous as carriage and liveries could be, and though she knew not precisely in what direction the widow Armstrong might be found, it was easy enough to guess that did she make use of her ordinary mode of conveyance in reaching her abode, let it be where it might, she would attract more attention than she desired.

  It was to Mrs. Tremlett that she determined to apply in this dilemma, and at their tête-à-tête breakfast on the following morning, she once more led the conversation to the factories.

  “You must not scold me, dear friend,” said she, “if you find that I have, as I told you I would, disobeyed your advice altogether, about thinking no more of the factory people, for I cannot get them out of my head, nurse Tremlett.”

  “I am sorry for it, my dear,” replied the good woman, gravely; “because I am quite sure that you will only vex yourself, and do no good.”

  “You ought to know me better by this time, Mrs. Tremlett, than to fancy that your manner of speaking on this dark subject is the way to check my curiosity. It was pretty effectually awakened perhaps before; but had it been otherwise, what you say would be quite enough to set me upon inquiring into it. Nurse Tremlett, I WILL know every thing that the most persevering inquiry can teach me respecting the people to whose labours all the rich people in this neighbourhood owe their wealth, and myself among the rest. And when I tell you that at the present moment this is the only subject upon which I feel any real interest, I think you are too wise to attempt turning me from it, by saying, ‘My dear you will only vex yourself.’”

  “I do indeed, my child, know you too well to fancy that if you have set your mind upon it, you will give it up; so I have nothing more to say, Miss Mary.”

  “Well then, my dear woman,” replied Mary, taking her hand, “if, through all the years we have passed together, I have shown such a determined spirit for no reason in the world but only to get my own wanton silly will, do me the justice to anticipate that I shall not be less obstinate in this one thing, that I believe to be right, than in all the many wherein it was most likely I suspected myself to be wrong. I do believe, nurse Tremlett, that it is my duty to understand this matter better than I do; and if this be so, I will trust to God to make up to me for all the vexation your prophecy threatens it will bring.”

  “If that is the way you think of it, my dear child, Heaven forbid that I should seek to hinder you. But rich as you are, dear Mary, if you was to give it all, and ten thousand times as much besides, what good could it do? The mills would go on just the same you know.”

  “I don’t want to stop the mills, nurse Tremlett. Why should I? Industry, ingenuity, science, enterprise, must of course be all brought into action by this flourishing cotton-trade, and, beyond all doubt, it would be equally wicked and wild to wish its destruction. That is not the notion I have got hold of, good nurse, very, very far from it, I assure you. What I want to find out is whether, by the nature of things, it is impossible to manufacture worsted and cotton wool into articles useful to man, without rendering those employed upon it unfit to associate with the rest of their fellow-creatures? This seems to me so gross an absurdity that I cannot give faith to it, and therefore I suspect that the depravity and wickedness you and Miss Martha Dowling talk about, must arise from these people having too much money at their command. This, perhaps, may lead to intemperance and extravagance. Don’t you think this may be the case, Mrs. Tremlett?”

  “Good gracious, no, Miss Mary! Why they are all the very poorest starving wretches upon earth.”

  “But they may be poor because they are extravagant, nurse. They must get a most monstrous quantity of money, for though none of the gentlemen ever talk much of their factories, I have repeatedly heard allusion made to the enormous sums paid every week to the workpeople. And it is quite clear that all the families must get a great deal, because all the little children work, which can hardly be the case elsewhere. Now, I cannot help thinking, nurse, that a great deal of good might be done by teaching them a little economy, and inducing them to lay by their superfluous money in a savings-bank. That is one great reason why I want to get acquainted with the people themselves. Now, for instance, that poor sick widow Armstrong — the mother of the little boy that Sir Matthew Dowling has taken; I am quite sure that she can have no wickedness to hurt me — and I am determined, nurse, to go and call upon her.”

  “Well, my dear, that can’t do no great harm, certainly; and, if you like it, I can go in the carriage with you.”

  “Most certainly I should like you to go with me, but not in the carriage, Mrs. Tremlett. I don’t want to have all the people in her neighbourhood staring at me, or at her either; and that they woul
d be sure to do if we went in the carriage. I mean to walk, nurse.”

  “Do you know where the woman lives, my dear?”

  “No; I must leave you to find that out.”

  “What is her name, Miss Mary?”

  “Armstrong. She is a widow, and lives somewhere in Ashleigh. Let us walk into the garden, and while I am looking after my seedlings, you can inquire of one of the under-gardeners, or the boy. And if you manage the matter well, the next prime blossom that I get from my experiment-bed, shall be called the Tremlett geranium.”

  * * * * *

  While this conversation was going on at Millford Park, the residence of Miss Brotherton, Dr. Crockley arrived to enjoy a tête-à-tête breakfast with Sir Matthew in “the study” at Dowling Lodge. This room, though not so splendid as some of its neighbours under the same roof, could, nevertheless, be made very snug and comfortable upon occasion, and an excellent breakfast was spread before them; while the two gentlemen sat in judgment upon little Michael’s contumacy, and consulted on the best method of bringing him into better order.

  “Confound the imp!” exclaimed Sir Matthew, as he selected his favourite dainties, “is it not provoking, Crockley, that I should have taken such an aversion to him? Upon my soul, I never hated any thing so much in my life. In the first place it is disgusting to see him dressed up, walking about the house like a tame monkey, when I know that his long fingers might be piercing thousands of threads for two shillings a week; and it is neither more nor less than loathsome to see him eat, at luncheon, sometimes when we have had him in before company, exactly the very same things that my children eat themselves; and then upon the back of it all, to know that the ungrateful little viper hates the very sight of me. I don’t believe, Crockley, that any good can come of all this, equal to what it makes me suffer in the doing. It is perfectly unnatural to see him close within an inch of my own legs. I’d rather have a tame toad crawling about by half. I must give it up, Crockley — I must, upon my soul.”

  “You are the master, Sir Matthew. I can’t stop you, if do it you will; but I can tell you this, I have been calling at fifty different houses, at the very least,’ since this job began, and I pledge you my sacred honour that in every one of them the only thing talked of was your benevolence and generosity. ‘Such an example!’ cried one; I So heavenly-minded!’ said another; It is enough to bring a blessing upon the whole country,’ whined a third; and, ‘ It is to be hoped that such goodness will be rewarded in this world and the next,’ observed a fourth. Think, Sir Matthew, how all this will tell against the grumblings about Miss Nance Stephens and her sudden demise.”

  “That’s true — devilish true, Crockley — and yet it’s no cure for my being sick at the stomach every time I see him.”

  “I don’t know about that; I should think it was, or, at any rate, if you’ll only bear it a little longer I should not be at all surprised if you were to be relieved by some other great capitalist setting up in the same way, and as your name has been sung out, that would do just as well. Upon my soul, I’m in earnest; I should not the least wonder if, before the end of three months, every one of your first-rates were to have a tame factory-child in their houses, to act like the hedgehogs we get to eat black-beetles for us. And they’d do their work well too, Sir Matthew: all the nasty, creeping, multiplying plagues, in the shape of evil tales against the factory system, would be swallowed up by the clearing-off effects of these nice little hedgehog gentry.”

  “You are as keen as your own lancet, Crockley; and I never turn a deaf ear to any thing you say. But it’s monstrous hard though, that I can’t walk about my own house without running the risk of seeing this odious little grub. By the way, Crockley, why could not my lady take a factory-girl in by way of charity? Some of the little wenches are sightly enough before they have worked down their flesh too far; and, though I can’t say I am particularly tender over the lanky idiot looking slatterns that we mostly get at the mill, I’ll bet what you please that I should never hate the sight of a girl, as I do the sight of this boy.”

  “Very likely not, Sir Matthew,” replied the doctor, laughing immoderately. “But what would my lady say? And what would all the other ladies say? No, no, leave that alone, and make up your mind to let the boy have the run of the house for a month or two; after which you may send him to the devil if you will; for the good will be done, and the boy himself forgotten.”

  “That’s all vastly easy for you to lay down, chapter and verse, wise man that you are,” replied the knight. “But if I tell all, I can let you into a secret, Crockley, that would make you change your mind, perhaps. The long and the short of it is, that I can’t keep my hands off him, and if the young black-hearted scamp — I know he is black-hearted, I’m quite sure of it on account of a look he has got with his eyes, that makes one always feel so uncomfortable — if he were to take it into his vile ungrateful head to go about the country telling every thing that I may have happened to say and do to him, when his nasty ways have pushed me further than I could bear, I don’t think the history of the charity job would do much good, doctor.” Doctor Crockley gave a long low whistle; and then, after a minute’s meditation, said, “That’s a bore.”

  “I know it is,” sharply responded his patron, “a devilish bore. But you don’t suppose that I am to stand bursting with rage, and not take the liberty of speaking my mind to a factory grub, do you?”

  “Heaven forbid! A whole factory full of wenches may all drop down dead, I hope, before it comes to that,” replied his friend. “But what you have stated is worth attention, Sir Matthew. I don’t like the notion of that child’s having tales to tell. It spoils all.”

  “I know it,” returned the vexed knight. “Martha told me just now, not ten minutes before you came, that Miss Brotherton said she should like very much to talk to the boy: she is as sharp as a needle, you know, and I’ll answer for it would find out all he has got to tell, and a devilish deal more, perhaps, in no time. Pretty work that would make! would it not? Augustus is sure of her, he tells me; and just fancy such a match as that spoiled by the forked tongue of this little viper! The very notion makes one mad.”

  “A cure must be found for that mischief, let it cost what it may,” replied Crockley; “and for the future it might be better, perhaps, for your charity, Sir Matthew, to show itself some other way. You are too honest-hearted, that’s the fact. A fine bold intellect, like yours, can’t descend to the paltry patience belonging to inferior minds. Is there no getting rid of the boy? No possibility of sending him ‘prentice some where or other?”

  “‘Prentice?” said Sir Matthew, looking with a very singular expression into the face of his friend. “Prentice?” he repeated, and stretching out his hand, he seized upon that of Doctor Crockley, which he shook with extraordinary ardour. “Send him as a ‘prentice! Upon my soul, Crockley, if you had laid down five hundred pounds upon the table, I should not have considered it as of one half as much worth as that one word ‘PRENTICE. Yes, by Jove! he shall be a ‘prentice. Oaf that I was for not thinking of it before! You don’t know half the good you have done me by that word. Tis but lately, my dear fellow, that you and I have come to understand one another thoroughly; and I have never yet talked to you about one or two points particularly interesting to all our capitalists. I never mentioned to you, did I, the Deep Valley Mills, not far from Appledown Cross, in Derbyshire?”

  “Never, Sir Matthew, as far as I can recollect,” was the reply.

  “Well, then, I will tell you something about them now, that will make you perceive plainly enough what a capital good hit you have made in talking of apprenticeship for my young darling. Deep Valley Mill, Crockley, is the property of my excellent friend Elgood Sharpton. He is one of the men born to be the making of this country. A fine, manly, dauntless character, who would scorn to give up his notions before any act of parliament that ever was made. His idea is, Crockley, — and I should like to see the man who would venture to tell me that it was not a glorious one, — his i
dea is, that if we could get rid of our cursed Corn-laws, the whole of the British dominions would soon be turned into one noble collection of workshops. I wish you could hear him talk; upon my soul, it’s the finest thing I know. He says that if his system is carried out into full action, as I trust it will be one of these days, all the grass left in England will be the parks and paddocks of the capitalists. Sharpton will prove to you as clearly as that two and two make four, that the best thing for the country would be to scour it from end to end of those confounded idle drones, the landed gentry. They must go sooner or later, he says, if the corn-laws are done away with. Then down goes the price of bread, and down goes the operative’s wages; and what will stop us then, doctor? Don’t you see? Isn’t it plain as the nose on your face that when the agricultural interest is fairly drummed out of the field, the day’s our own? Who shall we have then spying after us to find out how many hours a day we choose to make our hands work? D’ye see, Crockley? If we choose to work the vitals out of them, who shall say we shan’t?”

  “I never heard a finer, clearer line of argument, in my life, Sir Matthew,” replied the attentive listener. “That man, that Elgood Sharpton, seems born for a legislator. But I question not that when you two get together you act like flint and steel upon one another. Is not that the case?”

  “Pretty much I believe,” replied Sir Matthew; “and I promise you, Crockley, I give no bad proof of my confidence in your honour and friendship, by letting you into a few of our notions, for matters are by no means quite ripe for us to speak out, as yet. Our policy is, you must know, to give out that it is the operatives who are clamouring for the repeal of the corn-laws, whereas many among them, saucy rogues, are as deep as their betters, and know perfectly well, and be hanged to ’em, that our only reason for trying to make ‘down with the corn-laws ,’the popular cry is, that we may whisper in their ears, ‘down with the wages’ afterwards. Ay, doctor, if we can but manage this England will become the paradise of manufacturers! — the great workshop of the world! When strangers climb our chalk cliffs to get a peep at us, they shall see, land at what point they will, the glowing fires that keep our engines going, illuminating the land from one extremity of the island to the other! Then think how we shall suck in — that is we the capitalists, my man — think how we shall suck in gold, gold, gold, from all sides. The idea is perfectly magnificent! The fat Flemings must give up all hopes of ever getting their finical flax to vie with our cotton again! — Crockley,” but here Sir Matthew paused for a moment, as if half doubtful whether he should go on. The confidential impulse within him, however, worked so strongly in favour of the friendly smiling physician, that all reserve gave way, and winking his eye at him with a truly comic expression, he proceeded—” Crockley, they don’t understand spinning in Flanders: they don’t know yet how many baby sinews must be dragged, and drawn out to mix as it were with the thread, before the work can be made to answer. No, no, we have fairly given Master Fleming the go by in his own trade, so for the future he must just be pleased to go on hand-digging, and sewing every inch of his dung-muxen, till it teems with corn for exportation. That’s what he’s fit for; whereas science has put us rather in advance of all that, my good doctor. Our friends in Poland, too, shall plough away to the same tune, and Russia, from end to end, will become one huge granary at our service. Where will your aristocratic landholders be then, Crockley? Perhaps you can’t tell? but I suspect I can. They’ll just be in the factories, sir. Your manors and your preserves (we can get game enough from abroad), your manors and your preserves will be covered with factories, except just here and there, you know, where we capitalists may have taken a fancy to my Lord This-thing’s grounds, or the Duke of T’other-thing’s mansion, for our own residences. And this I maintain is just as it should be; and the reason why, is plain. We have got before all the world in machinery, and so all the world must be content to walk behind us. By Jove, if I had my way, Crockley, I’d turn France and the Rhine into a wine-cellar, Russia into a corn-bin, and America, glorious America, north, south, east, and west, into a cotton plantation. Then should we not flourish? Then should we not bring down the rascals to work at our own prices, and be thankful too? What’s to stop us? Trust me there is not a finer humbug going, than just making the country believe that the operatives are rampant for the repeal of the corn-laws.”