Mrs. Lang
The Strange Story Book
THE HANDLESS BRIGADE
Have you ever thought what it would be like to have no arms, and be obliged to use your toes for everything? If not, try it on a wet day, and see how much you can manage to do. Yet, there are plenty of true stories of people born without hands, who have contrived by practice to teach their toes not only to supply the place of ordinary fingers, but of very clever fingers, which is quite another matter! I myself once saw a young man in a Belgian gallery busily engaged in copying a picture, and as he had no arms he painted with his toes, seated on a high stool, to place him on the level he wanted. It was near the hour of closing when I happened to notice him, and after a few minutes during which I had watched him spellbound, he got down from his stool, kicked off one shoe, disclosing a stocking neatly cut across the toes, leaving them free. He then shut up his paint box, and picking up his brushes one by one dabbled them in a glass of water that stood near, and wiped them on a cloth, after which he put them carefully in their case, lying on a table.
At the sight of this, I forgot my manners and uttered a cry of amazement, which I think rather pleased the painter, for everyone likes to feel that he can do something better than his fellows. At all events he knew I did not mean to be rude, for he went to his box on the floor, opened it, took up the top card printed with his name, Charles le Félu, from a packet, and presented it to me. Then he put on his hat which was hanging on a peg, bowed and walked away, the sleeves of his coat being so fastened that he looked like a man with his hands in his pockets.
I kept that card till I was married, and obliged to throw away many of my treasures.
James Caulfield, about the beginning of the last century, collected many stories of handless people – who were 'handless' in a very different sense from what we mean, when we use the word. He tells us of a German called Valerius, who was born when Charles II. was on the throne of England, and like my friend the painter, had no arms. This would have seemed a terrible calamity if it had come alone, but before he was out of his boyhood both his parents died, and left him penniless. Happily for Valerius, his mother had been a sensible woman, and insisted that her son should learn to make his toes as useful as fingers. Perched on his high stool, he did his copies like another child, and in later life, when he became famous, often wrote lines round his portraits. But much better than writing copies, he loved to beat a drum. Now beating a drum does not sound nearly so difficult as writing copies, and perhaps he was allowed to do it as a treat when he had said his lessons without a mistake, but with practice he was able to play cards and throw dice as well as any of his friends. He certainly always shaved himself when he grew to be a man, but it is rather hard to believe that in fencing he used his rapier, which he held between his big toe and the next, 'with as much skill as his adversary,' standing on his left leg the while.
The admiration of his playfellows at his cleverness filled him with pride, and Valerius was always trying fresh feats to show off to his audience.
When it became necessary for him to earn his own living, he was able to support himself in comfort, travelling from one country to another, and always drawing crowds who came to see this Eighth Wonder of the world – for so they thought him. In his leisure hours he practised some of his old tricks, or learnt new ones, and in 1698 he came to England where he stayed for seven years. Many are the tales told of him during this time. Sometimes he would raise a chair with his toes, and put it in a different place; sometimes with the help of his teeth he would build towers made of dice, or he would lie on his back and, taking a glass of water in his toes, would carry it to his mouth. He could fire a pistol with his toes when seated on a stool, and using both feet he could discharge a musket. This must have been the hardest thing of any, for the musket of those times was a clumsy, heavy weapon, and it was not easy to keep your balance when it went off.
Then we have all of us heard of the famous Miss Biffin, who lived at the time when James Caulfield wrote his book. She went to the big fairs round London, and had a little booth all to herself. There, on payment of a small sum, visitors were admitted to see her sewing with a needle held by her toes, and sewing much more neatly than many of those who came to look at her would have been capable of doing with their fingers. And if they paid a little extra she would draw them, roughly, anything they wanted; or cut them out houses or dogs, or even likenesses of themselves on paper.
Miss Biffin, it is pleasant to think, thoroughly enjoyed her life, and, far from feeling that she was to be pitied because she had no hands, was quite convinced that she was much superior to anybody with two.
Perhaps the most wonderful of all the 'Handless Brigade' was a man called William Kingston, who was living in a village near Bristol in 1788. In that year a Mr. Walton happened to be staying in Bristol and was taken to see this marvel, of whom he writes an account to his friend John Wesley.
On the entrance of the two gentlemen into his house Kingston did not lose a moment in giving them their money's worth. He was having breakfast, and after inviting them to sit down, took up his cup between his big toe and the next, and drank off his tea without spilling a drop. After waiting till he had buttered his toast and eaten as much as he wanted, Mr. Walton then 'put half a sheet of paper upon the floor, with a pen and an ink-horn. Kingston threw off his shoes as he sat, took the ink-horn in the toes of his left foot, and held the pen in those of his right. He then wrote three lines as well as most ordinary writers, and as swiftly. He writes out,' continues Walton, 'his bills and other accounts. He then showed how he shaves with a razor in his toes, and how he combs his own hair. He can dress and undress himself, except buttoning his clothes,' which really does not sound half as difficult as many of his other performances. 'He feeds himself and can bring both his meat and his broth to his mouth, by holding the fork or spoon in his toes. He cleans his own shoes; can clean the knives, light the fire, and do almost every domestic business as well as any other man. He can make his hen-coops. He is a farmer by occupation; he can milk his cows with his toes, and cut his own hay, bind it up in bundles, and carry it about the field for his cattle. Last winter he had eight heifers constantly to fodder. The last summer he made all his own hay-ricks. He can do all the business of the hay-field (except mowing) as fast and as well with only his feet, as others can with rakes and forks; he goes to the field and catches his horse; he saddles and bridles him with his feet and toes. If he has a sheep among his flock that ails anything, he can separate it from the rest, drive it into a corner, and catch it when nobody else can; he then examines it, and applies a remedy to it. He is so strong in his teeth that he can lift ten pecks of beans with them; he can throw a great sledge-hammer with his feet as other men can with their hands. In a word, he can do nearly as much without, as other men can with, their hands.'
'He began the world with a hen and chicken; with the profit of these he purchased an ewe. The sale of these procured him a ragged colt and then a better; after this he raised a few sheep, and now occupies a small farm.'
It would be interesting to know how many of these astonishing feats Mr. Walton actually saw Kingston perform. But at any rate we put down his letter with the impression that to be born with fingers is a distinct disadvantage.
THE SON OF THE WOLF CHIEF
Once upon a time a town near the North Pacific Ocean suffered greatly from famine and many of the Indians who lived there died of hunger. It was terrible to see them sitting before their doors, too weak and listless to move, and waiting silently and hopelessly for death to come. But there was one boy who behaved quite differently from the rest of the tribe. For some reason or other he seemed quite strong on his legs, and all day long he would go into the fields or the woods, with his bow and arrows slung to his back, hoping to bring back a supper for himself and his mother.
One morning when he was out as usual, he found a little animal that looked like a dog. It was such a round, funny little thing that he could not bear to kill it, so he put it under his warm blanket, and carried it home, and as it was very dirty from rolling about in the mud and snow, his mother washed it for him. When it was quite clean, the boy fetched some red paint which his uncle who had died of famine had used for smearing over their faces, and put it on the dog's head and legs so that he might always be able to trace it when they were hunting together.
The boy got up early next morning and took his dog into the woods and the hills. The little beast was very quick and sharp, and it was not long before the two got quite a number of grouse and birds of all sorts; and as soon as they had enough for that day and the next, they returned to the wigwam and invited their neighbours to supper with them.
A short time after, the boy was out on the hills wondering where the dog had gone, for, in spite of the red paint, he was to be seen nowhere. At length he stood still and put his ear to the ground and listened with all his might, and that means a great deal, for Indian ears are much cleverer at hearing than European ones. Then he heard a whine which sounded as if it came from a long way off, so he jumped up at once and walked and walked till he reached a small hollow, where he found that the dog had killed one of the mountain sheep.
'Can it really be a dog?' said the boy to himself. 'I don't know; I wish I did. But at any rate, it deserves to be treated like one,' and when the sheep was cooked, the dog – if it was a dog – was given all the fat part.
After this, never a day passed without the boy and the dog bringing home meat, and thanks to them the people began to grow fat again. But if the dog killed many sheep at once, the boy was always careful to give it first the best for itself.
Some weeks later the husband of the boy's sister came to him and said:
'Lend me your dog, it will help me greatly.' So the boy went and brought the dog from the little house he had made for it, and painted its head and its feet, and carried it to his brother-in-law.
'Give it the first thing that is killed as I always do,' observed the boy, but the man answered nothing, only put the dog in his blanket.
Now the brother-in-law was greedy and selfish and wanted to keep everything for himself; so after the dog had killed a whole flock of sheep in the fields, the man threw it a bit of the inside which nobody else would touch, exclaiming rudely:
'Here, take that! It is quite good enough for you.'
But the dog would not touch it either, and ran away to the mountains, yelping loudly.
The man had to bring back all the sheep himself, and it was evening before he reached the village. The first person he saw was the boy who was waiting about for him.
'Where is the dog?' asked he, and the man answered:
'It ran away from me.'
On hearing this the boy put no more questions, but he called his sister and said to her:
'Tell me the truth. What did your husband do to the dog? I did not want to let it go, because I guessed what would happen.'
And the wife answered:
'He threw the inside of a sheep to it, and that is why it ran off.'
When the boy heard this, he felt very sad, and turned to go into the mountains in search of the dog. After walking some time he found the marks of its paws, and smears of red paint on the grass. But all this time the boy never knew that the dog was really the son of the Wolf Chief and had been sent by his father to help him, and he did not guess that from the day that he painted red paint round its face and on its feet a wolf can be told far off by the red on its paws and round its mouth.
The marks led a long, long way, and at length they brought him to a lake, with a town on the opposite side of it, where people seemed to be playing some game, as the noise that they made reached all the way across.
'I must try if I can get over there,' he said, and as he spoke, he noticed a column of smoke coming right up from the ground under his feet, and a door flew open.
'Enter!' cried a voice, so he entered, and discovered that the voice belonged to an old woman, who was called 'Woman-always-wondering.'
'Grandchild, why are you here?' she asked, and he answered:
'I found a young dog who helped me to get food for the people, but it is lost and I am seeking it.'
'Its people live right across there,' replied the woman. 'It is the Wolf Chief's son, and that is his father's town where the noise comes from.'
'How can I get over the lake?' he said to himself, but the old woman guessed what he was thinking and replied:
'My little canoe is just below here.'
'It might turn over with me,' he thought, and again she answered him:
'Take it down to the shore and shake it before you get in, and it will soon become large. Then stretch yourself in the bottom, and, instead of paddling, wish with all your might to reach the town.'
The boy did as he was told, and by and bye he arrived on the other side of the lake. He shook the canoe a second time, and it shrunk into a mere toy-boat which he put in his pocket, and after that he went and watched some boys who were playing with a thing that was like a rainbow.
'Where is the chief's house?' he asked when he was tired of looking at their game.
'At the other end of the village,' they said, and he walked on till he reached a place where a large fire was burning, with people sitting round it. The chief was there too, and the boy saw his little wolf playing about near his father.
'There is a man here,' exclaimed the Wolf Chief. 'Vanish all of you!' and the wolf-people vanished instantly, all but the little wolf, who ran up to the boy and smelt him and knew him at once. As soon as the Wolf Chief beheld that, he said:
'I am your friend; fear nothing. I sent my son to help you because you were starving, and I am glad you have come in quest of him.' But after a pause, he added:
'Still, I do not think I will let him go back with you; but I will aid you in some other way,' and the boy did not guess that the reason the chief was so pleased to see him was because he had painted the little wolf. Yet, as he glanced at the little beast again, he observed with surprise that it did not look like a wolf any longer, but like a human being.
'Take out the fish-hawk's quill that is hanging on the wall, and if you should meet a bear point the quill straight at it, and it will fly out of your hand. I will also give you this,' and he opened a box and lifted out a second quill stuck in a blanket. 'If you lay this side on a sick person, it will cure him; and if you lay the other side on your enemy, it will kill him. Thus you can grow rich by healing sick people.'
So the boy and the Wolf Chief made friends, and they talked together a long time, and the boy put many questions about things he had seen in the town, which puzzled him.
'What was the toy the children were playing with?' he asked at last.
'That toy belongs to me,' answered the chief. 'If it appears to you in the evening it means bad weather, and if it appears in the morning it means fine weather. Then we know that we can go out on the lake. It is a good toy.'
'But,' continued he, 'you must depart now, and, before you leave eat this, for you have a long journey to make and you will need strength for it;' and he dropped something into the boy's mouth.
And the boy did not guess that he had been absent for two years, and thought it was only two nights.
Then he journeyed back to his own town, not a boy any more, but a man. Near the first house he met a bear and he held the quill straight towards it. Away it flew and hit the bear right in the heart; so there was good meat for hungry people. Further on, he passed a flock of sheep, and the quill slew them all and he drew it out from the heart of the last one. He cooked part of a sheep for himself and hid the rest where he knew he could find them. After that he entered the town.
It seemed strangely quiet. What had become of all his friends and of the children whom he had left behind him when he left to seek for his dog? He opened the door of a hut and peeped in: three or four bodies were stretched on the floor, their bones showing through their skin, dead of starvation; for after the boy had gone to the mountains there was no one to bring them food. He opened another door, and another and another; everywhere it was the same story. Then he remembered the gift of the Wolf Chief, and he drew the quill out of his blanket and laid one side of it against their bodies, so that they all came to life again, and once more the town was full of noise and gaiety.
'Now come and hunt with me,' he said; but he did not show them his quill lest he should lose it as he had lost the dog. And when they beheld a flock of mountain sheep grazing, he let fly the quill so quickly that nobody saw it go, neither did they see him pull out the quill and hide it in his blanket. After that they made a fire and all sat down to dine, and those who were not his friends gave him payment for the meat.
For the rest of his life the man journeyed from place to place, curing the sick and receiving payment from their kinsfolk. But those who had been dead for many years took a long while to get well, and their eyes were always set deep back in their heads, and had a look as if they had seen something.
[Tlingit Myths.]
BLIND JACK OF KNARESBOROUGH
This is the story of a blind man who did more, without any eyes at all, than many people can do with two. For numbers of children need really to be taught to use their eyes, or they will never see things that are right under their noses; or else they will only see exactly what they are looking for, and nothing besides.
Blind Jack's proper name was John Metcalfe, and he was born in the town of Knaresborough in Yorkshire, in 1717. His parents seem to have been comfortably off – small farmers perhaps, as we are told that Jack learned to ride on his father's horses; and at four years old he was sent to school, exactly as a child of working people would be now. The boy was very quick and had a good memory and his teachers were proud of him, and prophesied that he would be a great scholar, and who knew if some day he might not be Lord Chancellor, or even Archbishop of Canterbury? The Metcalfes quite agreed that nothing was more likely; but a sudden end was put to these dreams when one morning Jack woke with a rash all over his face and chest, and the doctor declared he had got small-pox.
Now in those times, before babies were vaccinated, small-pox was a most terrible disease and very few lived through it without being marked in one way or another. Jack was very ill, but he does not appear to have been pitted like some of the other children who suffered from it, and only his mother observed that when the crisis was over and the boy was getting better every day, and beginning to chatter again, he did not, as was usual with him, make remarks on the things he saw around him or out of the window. Then a dreadful fear shot through her heart. Could it be that he was blind? With great difficulty she controlled her voice and answered the child's questions, but with every hour she understood more clearly that what she dreaded had indeed come to pass. By and bye Jack himself wondered why the curtains always seemed to be drawn in his room and asked his mother to pull them back. She invariably had some good excuse for his remaining in the dark, and little by little the truth dawned on him also. We cannot guess at the poor boy's horror at his fate, nor at his struggles to behave like a man, but as he grew gradually accustomed to his darkness and became stronger, he made up his mind, as other blind people have done, that if he was so unlucky as to have lost his eyes, he would learn to get on just as well without them.
The bare idea of all he would do was exciting. As Jack sat by the fire in the kitchen or lay curled up in the window-seat listening to the horses which went by, he began to make his plans for the future. How fortunate it was that he was able to ride already! – why, most of the boys at school, who were not blind at all, had never been across a horse's back, far less galloped at full speed up and down the street as Jack had loved to do! So he, blind though he was, could do something which they could not, and had the start of them! Now that he could walk about the room without falling down from weakness he must lose no more time, but try and learn the positions of the chairs and tables and count exactly how many steps there were on the staircase, so that he might soon run up and down them as fast as he did before. The next thing was to trust himself in the street, and find his way about. He was rather shy at first, and felt a little bewildered, but he would not go home till he had gone as far as the baker's shop – up and down, up and down, several times over.
'Well, I can go there all right, if mother sends me,' he said to himself, and walked home in triumph to tell his parents.
Having once made a beginning, Jack never let a day pass without learning to do something fresh, till by the time he was nine he could carry messages to any part of Knaresborough as well as another boy. He had a good many friends of his own age, and with them he would go on expeditions into the woods near the town, and even climb trees after birds' eggs. Very quickly the boys discovered that Jack was a better climber than any of them. He was so light, and then he could tell by his sense of touch if a branch was rotten, or whether he might trust himself upon it, and it was not long before it was Jack who was always sent to the top of the tree while the rest remained at the bottom. His mother suffered agonies of fear at first during these hours that the boy was away, but she knew it was no use trying to hinder him, and after a while she ceased to trouble, as Jack never came to harm, and she had too much to do in looking after the younger children to worry about him. It was impossible to keep Jack in the house; if he was not in a tree, he was on the back of a horse or exercising a couple of young hounds that his father had given him; but when, about thirteen, he showed a liking for music, she had him properly taught, in the hope of inducing him to stay at home in the winter evenings.
It was in the summer after this that Blind Jack made friends with some bad boys, whose chief delight consisted of robbing cherry orchards; not so much, if the truth be told, for the sake of the cherries, as for the pleasure of doing what they ought not. One hot night Jack stole quietly to the window of the room which he shared with his little brothers, and swinging himself down through the branches of a tree as lightly as a cat, was over the garden wall in a moment and in the street. Once there he ran quickly to the porch of the parish church, reaching it as the clock struck twelve, and just as the rest of the band, who were waiting for him there, had almost given him up. They set off silently to the orchard and soon had gathered a large basket of ripe cherries, which had been intended by the farmer's wife for the Knaresborough market next day. Enchanted with their booty, the young thieves hurried back in order to eat the cherries comfortably and warmly inside the church. They were in the highest spirits and felt that after their success they were capable of capturing a fort or holding an army at bay. So seizing the big iron ring on the church door which lifted the latch, one of the leaders exclaimed loudly:
'A tankard of ale here!' as if he was entering a tavern. Of course he meant nothing, but from within a voice answered:
'You are at the wrong house.' This so startled the boys that they were struck dumb, hardly believing their ears, till Metcalfe whispered softly:
'Didn't you hear something speak in the church?' This put their own fears into words, and, as one boy, they all turned and fled. When they had put a long distance between themselves and the churchyard they stopped, feeling quite brave again, and began to discuss the matter and what the voice could have been; but as none of their guesses satisfied them, they determined to go back and try to find out for themselves.
As soon as they were again in the churchyard path, they saw bright lights in the church and at once fancied it was on fire. This idea was delightful to them, as they foresaw all kinds of fun in helping to put it out. But before they even had time to open the west door in the porch, they heard once more the latch being lifted from the inside. All their old terror returned, and they rushed home as fast as they could, the sexton's son even jumping into his mother's bed for protection.
The laugh against him was loudest of all next day, when it was discovered that the supposed fire was only some candles lit by the sexton himself, who was in the church with the grave-digger, opening a vault for a funeral which was to take place early in the morning; and the voice which had so frightened the boys was that of the grave-digger. For some time the young thieves were jeered at by the whole town, and grew to hate the very sight of a cherry, so the adventure had one good result, for they let the orchards alone.
Metcalfe now had to amuse himself in some other way, and as many of his friends used to meet every evening in order to bathe in the pools of the river Nidd, he would not be left behind, and persuaded one of them to teach him to swim and dive. Of course, all those things would have been impossible if he had been the least nervous or frightened, but Blind Jack did not know what fear was of any earthly thing. At least he had thought at the time that the voice and the lights in the church were ghostly, and anybody might be afraid of ghostly manifestations. But with the air and the shouts of other boys about him, he was as brave as a lion, and soon could swim farther and dive deeper than any of them.
The Nidd is one of those rivers which easily rise and fall, and it is full of 'holes,' as they are called, where the water swirls and eddies, and whatever is swept over them by the current always stops for a moment and then slowly sinks. In some strange way which was never explained by him, Jack contrived to reach these holes without being drawn into the eddies, and it quickly became a regular trade with him to rescue with the aid of a hooked stick anything which had sunk in the pool. In this way he drew up several pieces of valuable wood, a quantity of wool swept into the river by a sudden flood, and even the body of a drowned man.
Jack was now about fifteen and was famous throughout Knaresborough, which had grown quite proud of him. He had continued to practise his violin, and everybody declared that never were country-dances danced with such spirit as when Jack was the fiddler. So very speedily he got an engagement as one of a band of four musicians to appear at the Assembly Rooms once a fortnight, where a ball was given, and was invited besides to many other places round about. In this very year too, 1732, he was offered the post of fiddler at Harrogate, for the old man who had held it for seventy years, and was now a hundred, could no longer play briskly enough to please the young people. Jack's only assistant was a boy younger than himself, whom he took about everywhere. Perhaps they both rode pillion – that is, one behind the other; for Jack had saved up his earnings and bought a horse, of which he was very fond. On its back he was to be seen at Ripon or Boroughbridge or many other towns, and when people were tired of giving balls, Metcalfe would run his horse at the small races, of which there are so many in Yorkshire. Here he met with some of the gentlemen who lived in the neighbourhood, and as they all admired the cleverness and courage with which he had triumphed over his blindness, and found him besides an amusing companion, they made friends with him and sometimes invited him to stay in their houses and hunt with them. To Mr. Barlow, of Middleton near York, he once paid a visit of six months, and while there became acquainted with a celebrated musician called Hebdin, who begged him to come and see him, so that they might practise together. Jack accepted the kind offer gladly, and when no hunting was to be had he went to York, and would play for hours in the old house near the walls.
He had been there one day at the end of his visit to Mr. Barlow, trying over a new piece of music before going home to his parents at Knaresborough, which was a long ride even for him. By this time he could find his way through all the principal streets, and as he was passing the George Inn, the landlord ran out and told him that a gentleman was dining there who wanted to reach Harrogate that night, but that as he was a stranger he must have a guide.
'You can be as good a guide as anybody,' added the man, 'if you are going that way.'
'Yes, I can,' answered Metcalfe; 'but you mustn't tell him I am blind, or he won't believe it.'
'Oh! I'll take care,' replied the landlord. 'Wait here! he will be out in a minute,' and the stranger was only too thankful to start at once, for it was getting late. He insisted, however, that Jack should be given a cup of wine before they set forth, as the landlord had made some excuse for his refusal to enter the inn.
The gentleman and his guide were passing the corner of Ousegate, when Jack was startled at hearing a shout of 'There goes Squire Barlow's Blind Huntsman,' but he perceived from the manner in which his companion continued the conversation that if the words had reached his ears, they had no meaning for him. They rode steadily on for some distance, Metcalfe carefully placing himself a little in front, so that the gentleman should only see part of his face when he turned to answer his questions. Once or twice he had some fears as to whether he was taking the right road or not, but by long practice he had so sharpened his other senses that the slightest sign was sufficient for him. He could tell by the feeling of the wind or the echo of the horses' hoofs if they were in the open country, or if a wall ran along one side of the road, and he could detect at once the presence of water. All through that long ride he only made one mistake and that his companion never guessed. He bent down to open the gate, but as it was seven months since he had passed that way he approached it at the wrong side, which he perceived instantly when his hand touched the hinges. However, he did not lose his presence of mind, and quickly backed his horse, exclaiming as he did so:
