Rolf Boldrewood
Babes in the Bush
CHAPTER VIII
MR. WILLIAM ROCKLEY OF YASS
Upon his next visit to The Chase, which took place shortly after this conversation, the Reverend Harley Sternworth was accompanied by a pleasant-looking, alert, middle-aged personage, who, descending from the dog-cart with alacrity, was introduced as Mr. William Rockley of Yass.
‘Bless my soul!’ said this gentleman, looking eagerly around, ‘what a fine property! Never saw it look so well before. I’m delighted to find it has got into such good hands; neglected in Colonel Warleigh’s time, even worse since by rascally tenants. Nearly bought it myself, but couldn’t spare the money. Splendid investment; finest land in the whole district, finest water, finest grass. I ought to know.’
‘It is most gratifying to hear a gentleman of your experience speak so highly of Warbrok,’ said Mr. Effingham. ‘Our good friend here has been the making of our fortunes.’
‘Just like him! just like him!’ said the new-comer, lighting a cigar and puffing out smoke and sentences with equal impetuosity. ‘Always attending to other people’s business; might have made his own fortune, two or three times over, if he’d taken my advice.’
‘I know some one else who is tarred with the same brush,’ returned the parson. ‘Who bought in young Harding’s place the other day, when his mortgagee sold him up, and re-sold it to him on the most Utopian terms? But shouldn’t you like to walk round while you smoke your cigar this morning? We can pay our respects to the ladies afterwards.’
‘Just the very thing. Many a time I’ve been here in the old days. What a change! What a change! Bless my soul, how well the garden looks; never expected to see it bloom again! And the old house! – one would almost think Mrs. Warleigh was alive.’
‘The best of wives and mothers,’ said Mr. Sternworth with feeling. ‘What a true lady and good Christian she was! If she had lived, there would have been a different household.’
‘Daresay, daresay,’ said Mr. Rockley meditatively. ‘Precious rascals, the sons; hadn’t much of a chance, perhaps. Wild lot here in those days, eh? So I see you have had that mound moved from the back of the cellar.’
‘We couldn’t think what it was,’ said Mr. Effingham. ‘The excavation must have been made long ago.’
‘Not heard the story, then? Wonderful how some secrets are kept. Never mind, Sternworth, I won’t tell Captain Effingham the other one. Randal Warleigh, the eldest son, was one of the wildest devils that even this country ever saw. Clever, handsome, but dissipated; reckless, unprincipled, in fact. Old man and he constantly quarrelling. Not that the Colonel was all that a father should have been, but he drank like a gentleman. Never touched anything before dinner. He finished his bottle of port then, and sometimes another, but no morning spirit-drinking. Would as soon have smoked a black pipe or worn a beard. It came to this at last, that when he went away he locked up sideboard and cellar, forbidding the housekeeper to give his sons any liquor.’
‘The Colonel left home for a week in Yass, when Randal arrived with some cattle and two fellow-roysterers. No grog available. Naturally savage. Swore he would burn the old rookery down before he would submit to be treated so. Behaved like a madman. Ordered up his men, got picks and shovels, dug a tunnel under the cellar wall, and helped himself, ad libitum, to wine and spirits.’
‘The governor’s a soldier,’ he said; ‘I’ve given him a lesson in civil engineering. Here’s his health, boys!’
‘What an outrage!’ said Mr. Effingham.
‘You would have said so if you had seen Warbrok when the old gentleman returned. Every soul on the place – all convict servants in those days – had been drunk for a week. Cellar half-emptied, house in confusion. Randal and his friends had betaken themselves, luckily, the day before, to the Snowy River, or there might have been murder done. As it was – ’
‘I think we may spare our friend any more chronicles of the good old times, Rockley; let us go down and see the dairy cows, those that Harry O’Desmond sold him.’
‘All right!’ said his friend good-humouredly, accepting the change of subject. ‘I daresay Harry O’ had his price, but they are the best cattle in the country.’
Mr. Rockley was equally hearty and complimentary as to the live stock. Didn’t think he had ever seen finer cows, finer grass; he believed Mr. Effingham, if he went on as he was doing, would make a fortune by dairying. If old Colonel Warleigh had not been ignorant of rural matters, and his elder sons infernal low-lived scoundrels, a fortune would have been made before at Warbrok. Nothing could have prevented that family from becoming rich, with this estate for a home farm, and two splendid stations on Monaro, but the grossest mismanagement, incompetence, and vicious tendencies – he might say depravity – of course, he meant on the part of the young men. The Colonel was indiscreet – in fact, a d – d old fool – but everybody respected him.
The three gentlemen completed the round of the establishment, during which progress their mutual friend had praised the stock-yard, the wheat stack, the lake, the garden, and had pretty well exhausted his cigar-case. It was high noon in Warbrok, and the shelter of the broad verandah, which he eulogised by declaring it to be the finest verandah he had ever been under in his life, was distinctly grateful.
Upon his introduction to Mrs. Effingham and the young ladies, he was afflicted with an inability to express adequately his respectful admiration of the whole party. Everything elicited a cordial panegyric. It was apparent, even without the aid of a few guarded observations from Harley Sternworth, that Mr. Rockley’s compliments arose from no weak intention of flattery, no foolish fondness or indiscriminate praise. It was simply the outpouring of a spring of benevolence which brimmed over in an important organ, which, for greater convenience in localising the emotions, is known as the heart. Longing to do good to all mankind, with perceptions of rare insight and keenness, much of Mr. Rockley’s philanthropy was necessarily confined to words. But when the opportunity arrived of translating good wishes into good deeds, few – very few – of the sons of men embarked in that difficult negotiation with half the pleasure, patience, and thoroughness of William Rockley.
The friends had not intended to stay the night, the time of a business man being limited, but upon invitation being pressingly made, first by Mrs. Effingham and then by the young ladies, one after another, Mr. Rockley declared that he couldn’t resist such allurements, but that they must make a cruelly early start and get back to Yass to breakfast next day. He believed they would see him there often. Mrs. Rockley had not had the pleasure of calling upon Mrs. Effingham, because she had been away in Sydney visiting her children at school, as well as an aunt who was very ill – was always ill, he added impatiently. But she would drive over and see them, most likely next week; and whenever Mrs. Effingham and the young ladies came to Yass, or the Captain and his sons, they must make his house their home – indeed, he would be deeply offended if he heard of their going to an hotel.
‘Well, really I’m afraid – ’
‘My dear sir,’ interrupted Mr. Rockley, ‘of course you meant what you said about the need of recreation for young people. Your sons have not had any since you came here, except an odd slap at a flock of ducks – and these Lake William birds are pretty shy. Then the ladies have hardly seen any one in the district, except the half-dozen men that have been to call. Don’t you suppose it’s natural that they should like to know the world they’ve come to live in?’
‘We are such a large party, Mr. Rockley,’ said Mrs. Effingham, who felt the necessity of being represented at this important council. ‘It is extremely kind of you, but – ’
‘But look here, Mrs. Effingham,’ interrupted Mr. Rockley with fiery impatience, so evidently habitual that she could not for a moment consider it to be disrespectful, ‘don’t you think it probable, in the nature of things, that you may visit Yass – which is your county town, remember – at the time of the races? All the world will be going. It’s a time of year when there is nothing to do – as the parson here will tell you. There will be balls, picnics, and parties for the young ladies – everything, in fact. You must go, you see that, surely? You’ll be the only family of position in the country-side that won’t be there. And if you go and don’t make my house your home, instead of a noisy, rackety hotel, why – I’ll never speak to one of you again.’
Here Mr. Rockley closed his rapidly delivered address, with a look of stern determination, which almost frightened Mrs. Effingham.
‘You will really offend my good friend and his most amiable and hospitable lady if you do not accept his invitation,’ said Mr. Sternworth. ‘It is hardly an ordinary race-meeting so much as a periodical social gathering, of which a little racing (as in most English communities, and there never was one more thoroughly British than this) is the ostensible raison d’être.’
‘Well, Howard, for the young people’s sake, we really must think of it,’ said Mrs. Effingham, answering, lest her husband, in distrust of a colonial gathering, might definitely decline. ‘There will be time enough to apprise Mrs. Rockley before the event.’
‘My wife will write to you when I get home,’ said Mr. Rockley, ‘and explain matters more fully than I can do. – Everything goes off pleasantly at our annual holiday, doesn’t it, Harley?’
‘So much so, that in my office of priest I have never had occasion to enter my protest. The people need a respite from the toils and privations of their narrow home world, almost more than we do.’
The evening passed most pleasantly. The parson and the soldier talked over old army days. While Mr. Rockley, who had been a squatter before finally settling down at Yass as principal merchant and banker, gave Wilfred and Guy practical advice. Then he assured Mrs. Effingham that at any time when she or the young ladies required change, they had only to write to Mrs. Rockley – or come, indeed, without writing – and make their house a home for as long as ever it suited them. Subsequently he declared that he had never heard any music in the least degree to be compared to the duet which Rosamond and Annabel executed for his especial benefit. He charmed Mrs. Effingham by telling her that her son Wilfred was the most promising and sensible young man he had ever noticed as a beginner in the bush, and must infallibly do great things. Lastly, he begged that he might be provided with a cup of coffee at daylight, as, if he and Mr. Sternworth were not at Yass by breakfast-time, dreadful things might happen to the whole district. Annabel declared that she would get up and make it for him herself. Their visitors then retired for the night, all hands being in a high state of mutual appreciation.
‘Your friend seems a most genial and sterling person, Harley,’ said Mr. Effingham, as they indulged in a final stroll up the verandah, after the general departure. ‘Is he always so complimentary?’
‘He can be extremely the reverse, upon occasion; but he is, perhaps, the man of all others in whose good feeling I have the most undoubting faith. Under that impetuous, explosive manner, the outcome of a fervid, uncompromising nature, he carries an extraordinary talent for affairs, and one of the most generous hearts ever granted to mortal man. He has the soul of the Caliph Haroun Alraschid, and has secretly done more good deeds, to my knowledge, in this district than all the rest of us put together. His correct taste has enabled him to appreciate all my dear children here. From this time forth you may reckon upon a powerful, untiring friend in William Rockley.’
‘I know one friend, Harley,’ said Effingham as their hands met in a parting grasp, ‘who has been more than a brother to me in my hour of need. We can never divide the gratitude which is your due from me and mine.’
‘Pooh! pooh! a man wants more friends than one, especially in Australia, where a season of adversity – which means a dry one – may be hanging over him; and a better one than William Rockley will be to you, henceforth, no man ever saw or heard of. Good-night!’
So passed the happy days of the first early summer-time at Warbrok – days which knew no change until the great festival of Christmas approached, which closes the year in all England’s dependencies with hallowed revelry and honoured mirth. Christmas was imminent. The 20th of December had arrived; a day of mingled joy and sorrow, as more freshly, vividly came back the buried memories of old days, the echo of the lost chimes of English Christmas bells. But in spite of such natural feelings, the advent of Christmas was not suffered to pass without tokens of gladness and services of thanksgiving.
It had been decided to invite Messrs. Hamilton and Argyll, with Mr. Churbett and Mr. Forbes, to join the modest family festivities on this occasion. Old Tom had been duly despatched with the important missives, and the invitations were frankly accepted.
On the 24th of December, therefore, late in the afternoon, which is the regulation hour for calling in Australian country society, the visitor being aware that he is expected to stay all night, and not desiring, unless he is very young, to have more than an hour to dispose of before dinner, the gentlemen aforesaid rode up. They had met by appointment and made the expedition together.
‘Fancy this being Christmas Day!’ exclaimed Annabel, as – the time-honoured greetings being uttered – the whole party disposed themselves comfortably around the breakfast-table. ‘And what a lovely fresh morning! Not a hot-wind day, as old Dick said it would be. It makes me shiver when I think of how we were wrapped up this time last year.’
‘Are you certain it is Christmas, Miss Annabel?’ said Fred Churbett; ‘I doubt it, because of the absence of holly and snow, and old women and school children, and waits and the parish beadle – all the belongings of our forefathers. There must be some mistake. The sun is too fast, depend upon it. I must write to the Times.’
‘Old Dick brought a load of scarlet-flowering bushes from the hills yesterday,’ said Rosamond, ‘with which he solemnly decorated his hut and our verandah pillars. He wished to make Andrew a present of a few branches as a peace-offering, but he declined, making some indignant remark about Prelatism or Erastianism, which Dick did not understand.’
At eleven o’clock A.M. a parade of the ‘full strength of the regiment,’ as Effingham phrased it, was ordered. Chairs, with all things proper, and a reading-desk, had been arranged on the south side of the wide verandah.
To this gathering-point the different members of the establishment had been gradually converging, arrayed in garments, which, if varying from the fashion-plates of the day, were neat, suitable, and of perfect cleanliness. Mrs. Evans’s skill as a laundress, which was in the inverse ratio to her mildness of disposition, enabled Dick to appear in white duck trousers and a shirt-front which distanced all rivalry. They contrasted strongly with the unbroken tint of brick-dust red presented by his face and throat, the latter encircled by an ancient military stock. Mrs. Evans was attired with such splendour that it was manifest she had sacrificed comfort to fashion.
‘Old Tom’ had donned, as suitable for the grandeur and solemnity of the occasion, a well-worn pair of cord breeches, the gift of some employer of sporting tendencies, which, ‘a world too wide for his shrunk shanks,’ were met at the knee by carefully polished boots, the long-vanished tops being replaced by moleskin caps. A drill overshirt, fastened at the waist with a broad leather belt, from which depended a tobacco-pouch, completed this effective costume. The iron-grey hair was carefully combed back from his withered countenance; his keen eyes gleamed from their hollow orbits, imparting an appearance of mysterious vitality to the ancient stock-rider.
Andrew and Jeanie, of course, attended, the latter dressed with the good taste which always characterised her, and the former having in charge the sturdy silent Duncan, with their younger offspring. Of these, Jessie bade fair to furnish a favourable type of the ‘fair-haired lassie’ so frequently met with in the ballads of her native land, while Colin, the second boy, was a clever, confident youngster, in whose intelligence Andrew secretly felt pride, though he repressed with outward sternness all manifestations of the same.
Andrew himself, it must be stated, appeared under protest, holding that ‘thae Yerastian, prelatic festivals,’ in his opinion, ‘were no warranted by the General Assembly o’ the Kirk o’ Scotland, natheless, being little mair than dwellers in the wilderness, it behoved a’ Christians, though they should be but a scattered remnant in the clefts o’ the rocks, to agree in bearing testimony to the Word.’
Across the broad verandah the members of the family, with their visitors, were seated, behind them the retainers. A table covered with a cloth was placed before Mr. Effingham, with the family Bible and a prayer-book of the Church of England.
As he made commencement, and with the words, ‘When the wicked man turneth away,’ the congregation stood up, it was a matter of difficulty with Mrs. Effingham to restrain her tears. How the well-remembered sentences seemed to smite the rock of her well-guarded emotions as with the rod of the Prophet! She trembled lest the spring should break forth from her o’erburdened heart, whelming alike prudence and the sense of fitness. The eyes of the girls were dewy, as they recalled the white-robed, long-remembered pastor, the ivy-covered church, storied with legend and memorial of their race, the villagers, the friends of their youth, the unquestioned security of position, long guaranteed by habit and usage, apparently unalterable. And now, where stood they, while the sacred words proceeded from the lips of the head of the household, whom they had followed to this far land?
In a ‘lodge in the wilderness,’ a speck in a ‘boundless contiguity of shade,’ with its unfamiliar adjuncts and a company of strangers – pilgrims and wayfarers – even as they. For a brief interval the suddenly realised picture of distance and isolation was so real, the momentary pang of bitterness so keenly agonising, that more than one sob was heard, while Annabel, whose feelings were less habitually under control, threw her arms round Jeanie’s neck (who had nursed her as a babe) and wept unrestrainedly.
No notice was taken of this natural outburst of emotion. Jeanie, with unobtrusive tenderness and unfailing tact, comforted the weeping girl. Solemnly the words of the service sounded from her father’s lips, while the ordinary responses concealed the occasional sobs of the mourner for home and native land. She had unconsciously translated the unspoken words of more disciplined hearts.
Gradually, as the service continued, the influences of the scene exercised a healing power upon the group – the fair, golden day, the tender azure of the sky, the wandering breeze, the waters of the lake lapping the shore, the whispering of the waving trees, even the hush of
Beautiful silence all around,
Save wood-bird to wood-bird calling,
commenced insensibly to soothe the hearts of the exiles. Gradually their faces recovered serenity, and as the repetitions of belief and trust, of submission to a Supreme Benevolence, were repeated, that ‘peace which passeth all understanding,’ an indwelling guest with some, a memory, a long-forgotten visitant with others, appeared for a space to have enveloped the little company on that day assembled at Warbrok.
The simply-conducted service was verging on conclusion when a stranger appeared upon the track from the high road. In bushman’s dress, and carrying upon his back the ordinary knapsack (or ‘swag’) of the travelling labourer, he strode along the path at a pace considerably higher in point of speed than is usual with men who, as a class, being confident of free quarters at every homestead, see no necessity for haste. A tall, powerfully-built man, his sun-bronzed countenance afforded no clue to his social qualification.
Halting at the garden gate, he stood suddenly arrested as he comprehended the occupation of the assembled group. He looked keenly around, then easing the heavy roll by a motion of his shoulders, awaited the final benediction.
‘What is your business with me?’ said Mr. Effingham, closing his book, and regarding with interest the stranger, whose bold dark eyes roved around, now over the assembled company, now over the buildings and offices, and lastly settled with half-admiration, half-diffidence, on the bright faces of the girls. ‘I have no employment here at present. Perhaps you would like to stay to-night. You are heartily welcome.’
‘Come along o’ me, young man,’ interposed Dick Evans, as promptly divining the wayfarer’s habitudes. ‘Come along o’ me; you’ll have a share of our Christmas dinner, and you might come by a worse.’
‘All right,’ replied the stranger cheerfully, and with a nod of acknowledgment to Mr. Effingham he jerked back his personal effects into their position and strode after his interlocutor, who, with old Tom Glendinning, quitted the party, leaving Mrs. Evans to follow at her convenience.
‘Fine soldier that man would have made,’ said Mr. Effingham, as he marked the well-knit frame, the elastic step of the stranger. ‘I wonder what his occupation is?’
‘Horse-breaker, bullock-driver, station hand of some sort,’ said Argyll indifferently. ‘Just finished a job of splitting, probably, or is bringing his shearing cheque to get rid of in Yass.’
‘He appeared to have seen better days, poor fellow,’ said Mrs. Effingham, ever compassionate. ‘I noticed a wistful expression in his eyes when he first came up.’
‘I thought he looked proud and disdainful,’ said Annabel, ‘and when old Dick said “come along,” I half expected him to reply indignantly. But he went off readily enough. I wonder if he’s a gentleman in disguise?’
‘Or a bushranger,’ suggested Churbett. ‘Donohoe is “out” just now, and is said to have a new hand with him. These gentry have been occasionally entertained, like angels, unawares.’
‘What a shocking idea!’ exclaimed Annabel. ‘You have no sentiment, Mr. Churbett. How would you like to be suspected by everybody if you were reduced to poverty? He is very handsome, at any rate.’
‘Fred would be too lazy to walk, that is one thing certain, Miss Annabel,’ said Hamilton. ‘He would prefer to take the situation of cook or hut-keeper at a quiet station, where there were no children. Fancy his coming up, touching his hat respectfully, and saying, “I suppose you haven’t a berth about the kitchen as would suit a pore man, Miss?”’
Here the speaker gave so capital an imitation of Mr. Churbett’s accented tone in conversation that everybody laughed, including the subject of the joke, who said it was just like Hamilton’s impudence, but that other people occasionally had mistakes made as to their station in life. What about old MʻCallum sending him and Argyll to pass the night in the men’s hut?
‘The old ruffian!’ said Argyll, surprised out of his usual serenity, ‘I had two minds to knock him down; another, to tell him he was an ignorant savage; and a fourth, to camp under a gum-tree.’
‘What did you do finally?’ asked Rosamond, much interested. ‘What an awkward position to be placed in.’
‘The night happened to be wet,’ explained Hamilton; ‘we had ridden far, and were so hungry – no other place of abode within twenty miles; so – it was very unheroic – but we had to put our pride in our pockets, and sleep, or rather stay, in an uncomfortable hut, with half-a dozen farm-servants.’
‘What a bore!’ said Wilfred. ‘Did he know your names? It seems inconceivable.’
‘The real truth was,’ said Mr. Churbett, volunteering an explanation, ‘that the old man, taking umbrage somewhere at what he considered our friend Hamilton’s superfine manners and polite habit of banter, had vowed to serve him and Argyll out if ever they came his way. This was how he carried out his dark and dreadful oath.’
‘What a terrible person!’ exclaimed Annabel, opening her eyes. ‘Were you very miserable, Mr. Hamilton?’
‘Sufficiently so, I am afraid, to have made our friend chuckle if he had known. We had to ride twenty miles before we saw a hair-brush again, and Argyll, I must say, looked dishevelled.’
A simultaneous inclination to laughter seized the party, as they gazed with one accord at Argyll’s curling locks.
‘I should think that embarrassments might arise,’ said Mr. Effingham, ‘from the habit of claiming hospitality when travelling here. There are inns, I suppose, but they are infrequent.’
‘Not so many mistakes are made as one might think,’ explained Churbett. ‘Squatters’ names are widely known, even out of their districts, and every one accepts a night’s lodging frankly, as he expects to give one in return.’
‘But how can we know whether the stranger be a gentleman, or even a respectable person?’ said Mrs. Effingham. ‘One would be so sorry to be unkind, and yet might be led into entertaining undesirable guests.’
‘Every gentleman should send in his card,’ said Argyll, ‘if he wishes to be received, or give his name and address to the servant. People who will not so comply with the usages of society have no right to consideration.’
‘But suppose people are not well dressed,’ said Wilfred, ‘or are outwardly unlike gentlemen, what are you to do? It would be annoying to make mistakes in either way.’
‘When people are not dressed like gentlemen,’ said Hamilton, ‘you may take it for granted that they have forfeited their position, or are contented to be treated as steerage passengers, so to speak. In such cases the safer plan, as far as my experience goes, is to permit them to please themselves. I had a good look at our friend yonder, as he came up, and I have a shrewd suspicion that he belongs to the latter category.’
‘Poor young man!’ said Mrs. Effingham. ‘Couldn’t anything be done for him? Think of a son of ours being placed in that position!’
‘He is making himself comfortable with old Dick Evans, most likely, however unromantic it may appear,’ said Churbett. ‘He will enjoy his dinner – I daresay he hasn’t had many good ones lately – have a great talk with Dick and the old stock-rider, and smoke his pipe afterwards with much contentment.’
‘But a gentleman, if he be a gentleman, never could lower himself to such surroundings, surely?’ queried Rosamond. ‘It is not possible.’
‘Oh yes, it is,’ said Beatrice. ‘Because, you remember, Sergeant Bothwell was more comfortable in the butler’s room with old John Gudyill than he would have been with Lady Bellenden and her guests, though she longed to entertain him suitably, on account of his royal blood.’
‘Miss Beatrice, I congratulate you on your familiarity with dear Sir Walter,’ said Argyll. ‘It is a case perfectly in point, because Francis Stewart, otherwise Bothwell, had at one time mixed in the society of the day, and must have had the manners befitting his birth. Nevertheless in his lapsed condition he preferred the sans gêne of his inferiors. There are many such in Australia, who “have sat at good men’s feasts,” but are now, unfortunately, more at ease in the men’s hut.’
‘Of course you’ve heard of Carl Hotson, the man they used to call “the Count”?’ said Hamilton. ‘No? He lived at Carlsruhe, on the other side of the range, near the Great South Gap, where every one was obliged to pass, and (there being no inn) stay all night. Now “the Count” was a fastidious person of literary tastes. He chafed against entertaining a fresh batch of guests every night. “Respectable persons – aw – I am informed, but – aw – I don’t keep an hotel!” Unwilling to be bored, and yet anxious not to be churlish, he took a middle course. He invented “the stranger’s hut,” which has since obtained in other parts of the country.’
‘Whatever was that?’ asked Guy.
‘He had a snug cottage built at a short distance from the road. Into this dwelling every traveller, without introduction, was ushered. A good dinner, with bed and breakfast, was supplied. His horse was paddocked, and in the morning the guest, suitably entertained, but ignorant of the personnel of the proprietor, as in a castle of romance, was free to depart.’
‘And a very good idea it was,’ said Mr. Effingham. ‘I can imagine one becoming tired of casual guests.’
‘Some people were not of that opinion,’ said Mr. Forbes, ‘declaring it to be in contravention of the custom of the country. One evening Dr. Portman, an elderly gentleman, of majestic demeanour, came to Carlsruhe. He relied on a colonial reputation to procure him unusual privileges, but not receiving them, wrote a stiff note to Mr. Hotson, regretting his inability to thank him personally for his peculiar hospitality, and enclosing a cheque for a guinea in payment of the expense incurred.’
‘What did “the Count” say to that?’
‘He was equal to the occasion. The answer was as follows: —
‘Sir – I have received a most extraordinary letter signed J.D. Portman, enclosing a cheque for one guinea. The latter document I have transmitted to the Treasurer of the Lunatic Asylum. – Obediently yours,
Carl Hotson.’
The Christmas dinner, which included a noble wild turkey, a fillet of veal, a baron of beef, with two brace of black duck, as well as green peas, cauliflowers, and early potatoes from the now productive garden, was a great success. Cheerful and contented were those who sat around the board. Merry and well-sustained was the flow of badinage, which kept the young people amused and amusing. In the late afternoon the guests excused themselves, and left for home, alleging that work commenced early on the morrow, and that they were anxious as to the results of universal holiday-making.
