Various
International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1
The shoemaker neighbor was a stout protection to her against the greedy demands of these old people, and of others of the old Degs, and also against another class of inconvenient visitors, namely, suitors, who saw in Mrs. Deg a neat and comely young woman, with a flourishing business and a neat and soon well-furnished house, a very desirable acquisition. But Mrs. Deg had resolved never again to marry, but to live for her boy, and she kept her resolve in firmness and gentleness.
The shoemaker often took walks in the extensive town meadows, to gather groundsell and plantain for his canaries and gorse-linnets, and little Simon Deg delighted to accompany him with his own children. There William Watson, the shoemaker, used to point out to the children the beauty of the flowers, the insects, and other objects of nature; and while he sat on a style and read in a little old book of poetry, as he often used to do, the children sat on the summer grass, and enjoyed themselves in a variety of plays.
The effect of these walks and the shoemaker's conversation on little Simon Deg was such as never wore out of him through his whole life, and soon led him to astonish the shoemaker by his extraordinary conduct. He manifested the utmost uneasiness at their treading on the flowers in the grass; he would burst with tears if they persisted in it; and when asked why, he said they were so beautiful, that they must enjoy the sunshine, and be very unhappy to die. The shoemaker was amazed, but indulged the lad's fancy. One day he thought to give him a great treat, and when they were out in the meadows, he drew from under his coat a bow and arrow, and shot the arrow high up in the air. He expected to see him in an ecstasy of delight: his own children clapped their hands in transport, but Simon stood silent, and as if awe-struck.
"Shall I send up another?" asked the shoemaker.
"No, no," exclaimed the child, imploringly. "You say God lives up there, and he mayn't like it."
The shoemaker laughed, but presently he said, as if to himself, "There is too much imagination there. There will be a poet, if we don't take care."
The shoemaker offered to teach Simon to read, and to solidify his mind, as he termed it, by arithmetic, and then to teach him to work at his trade. His mother was very glad, and thought shoemaking would be a good trade for the boy; and that with Mr. Watson she should have him always near her. He was growing now a great lad, and was especially strong, and of a frank and daring habit. He was especially indignant at any act of oppression of the weak by the strong, and not seldom got into trouble by his championship of the injured in such cases among the boys of the neighborhood.
He was now about twelve years of age; when, going one day with a basket of clothes on his head to Mr. Spires's for his mother, he was noticed by Mr. Spires himself from his counting-house window. The great war was raging; there was much distress among the manufacturers; and the people were suffering and exasperated against their masters. Mr. Spires, as a staunch tory, and supporter of the war, was particularly obnoxious to the workpeople, who uttered violent threats against him. For this reason his premises were strictly guarded, and at the entrance of his yard, just within the gates, was chained a huge and fierce mastiff, his chain allowing him to approach near enough to intimidate any stranger, though not to reach him. The dog knew the people who came regularly about, and seemed not to notice them, but on the entrance of a stranger, he rose up, barked fiercely, and came to the length of his chain. This always drew the attention of the porter, if he were away from his box, and few persons dared to pass till he came.
Simon Deg was advancing with the basket of clean linen on his head, when the dog rushed out, and barking loudly, came exactly opposite to him, within a few feet. The boy, a good deal startled at first, reared himself with his back against the wall, but at a glance perceiving that the dog was at the length of his tether, he seemed to enjoy his situation, and stood smiling at the furious animal, and lifting his basket with both hands above his head, nodded to him, as if to say, "Well, old boy, you'd like to eat me, wouldn't you?"
Mr. Spires, who sat near his counting-house window at his books, was struck with the bold and handsome bearing of the boy, and said to a clerk:
"What boy is that?"
"It is Jenny Deg's," was the answer.
"Ha! that boy! Zounds! how boys do grow! Why that's the child that Jenny Deg was carrying when she came to Stockington: and what a strong, handsome, bright-looking fellow he is now!"
As the boy was returning, Mr. Spires called him to the counting-house door, and put some questions to him as to what he was doing and learning, and so on.
Simon, taking off his cap with much respect, answered in such a clear and Modest way, and with a voice that had so much feeling and natural music in it, that the worthy manufacturer was greatly taken with him.
"That's no Deg," said he, when he again entered the counting-house, "not a bit of it. He's all Goodrick, or whatever his mother's name was, every inch of him."
The consequence of that interview was, that Simon Deg was very soon after Perched on a stool in Mr. Spires's counting-house, where he continued till he was twenty-two. Mr. Spires had no son, only a single daughter; and such were Simon Deg's talents, attention to business, and genial disposition, that at that age Mr. Spires gave him a share in the concern. He was himself now getting less fond of exertion than he had been, and placed the most implicit reliance on Simon's judgment and general management. Yet no two men could be more unlike in their opinions beyond the circle of trade. Mr. Spires was a staunch tory of the staunch old school. He was for Church and King, and for things remaining forever as they had been. Simon, on the other hand, had liberal and reforming notions. He was for the improvement of the people, and their admission to many privileges. Mr. Spires was therefore liked by the leading men of the place, and disliked by the people. Simon's estimation was precisely in the opposite direction. But this did not disturb their friendship; it required another disturbing cause—and that came.
Simon Deg and the daughter of Mr. Spires grew attached to each other; and as the father had thought Simon worthy of becoming a partner in the business, neither of the young people deemed that he would object to a partnership of a more domestic description. But here they made a tremendous mistake. No sooner was such a proposal hinted at, than Mr. Spires burst forth with the fury of all the winds from the bag of Ulysses.
"What! a Deg aspire to the hand of the sole heiress of the enormously opulent Spires?"
The very thought almost cut the proud manufacturer off with an apoplexy. The hosts of a thousand paupers rose up before him, and he was black in the face. It was only by a prompt and bold application of leeches and lancet that the life of the great man was saved. But there was an end of all further friendship between himself and the expectant Simon. He insisted that he should withdraw from the concern, and it was done. Simon, who felt his own dignity deeply wounded too, for dignity he had, though the last of a long line of paupers—his own dignity, not his ancestors'—took silently, yet not unrespectfully, his share—a good, round sum, and entered another house of business.
For several years there appeared to be a feud and a bitterness between the former friends; yet it showed itself in no other manner than by a careful avoidance of each other. The continental war came to an end; the manufacturing distress increased exceedingly. There came troublous times, and a fierce warfare of politics. Great Stockington was torn asunder by rival parties. On one side stood preeminent, Mr. Spires; on the other towered conspicuously, Simon Deg. Simon was grown rich, and extremely popular. He was on all occasions the advocate of the people. He said that he had sprung from, and was one of them. He had bought a large tract of land on one side of the town; and intensely fond of the country and flowers himself, he had divided this into gardens, built little summer-houses in them, and let them to the artisans. In his factory he had introduced order, cleanliness, and ventilation. He had set up a school for the children in the evenings, with a reading-room and conversation-room for the work-people, and encouraged them to bring their families there, and enjoy music, books, and lectures. Accordingly, he was the idol of the people, and the horror of the old school of manufacturers.
"A pretty upstart and demagogue I've nurtured," said Mr. Spires often, to his wife and daughter, who only sighed, and were silent.
Then came a furious election. The town, for a fortnight, more resembled the worst corner of Tartarus than a Christian borough. Drunkenness, riot, pumping on one another, spencering one another, all sorts of violence and abuse ruled and raged till the blood of all Stockington was at boiling heat. In the midst of the tempest were everywhere seen, ranged on the opposite sides, Mr. Spires, now old and immensely corpulent, and Simon Deg, active, buoyant, zealous, and popular beyond measure. But popular though he was, the other and old tory side still triumphed. The people were exasperated to madness; and when the chairing of the successful candidate commenced, there was a terrific attack made on the procession by the defeated party. Down went the chair, and the new member, glad to escape into an inn, saw his friends mercilessly assailed by the populace. There was a tremendous tempest of sticks, brickbats, paving-stones, and rotten eggs. In the midst of all this, Simon Deg and a number of his friends, standing at the upper window of an hotel, saw Mr. Spires knocked down and trampled on by the crowd. In an instant, and before his friends had missed him from amongst them, Simon Deg was seen darting through the raging mass, cleaving his way with a surprising vigor, and gesticulating, and no doubt shouting vehemently to the rioters, though his voice was lost in the din. In the next moment his hat was knocked off, and himself appeared in imminent danger: but, another moment, and there was a pause, and a group of people were bearing somebody from the frantic mob into a neighboring shop. It was Simon Deg, assisting in the rescue of his old friend and benefactor, Mr. Spires.
Mr. Spires was a good deal bruised, and wonderfully confounded and bewildered by his fall. His clothes were one mass of mud, and his face was bleeding copiously; but when he had had a good draught of water, and his face washed, and had time to recover himself, it was found that he had received no serious injury.
"They had like to have done for me, though," said he.
"Yes, and who saved you?" asked a gentleman.
"Ay, who was it? who was it?" asked the really warm-hearted manufacturer; "let me know? I owe him my life."
"There he is!" said several gentlemen, at the same instant, pushing forward Simon Deg.
"What, Simon!" said Mr. Spires, starting to his feet. "Was it thee, my boy?" He did more, he stretched out his hand; the young man clasped it eagerly, and the two stood silent, and with a heart-felt emotion, which blended all the past into forgetfulness, and the future into a union more sacred than esteem.
A week hence, and Simon Deg was the son-in-law of Mr. Spires. Though Mr. Spires had misunderstood Simon, and Simon had borne the aspect of opposition to his old friend, in defense of conscientious principle, the wife and daughter of the manufacturer had always understood him, and secretly looked forward to some day of recognition and reunion.
Simon Deg was now the richest man in Stockington. His mother was still living to enjoy his elevation. She had been his excellent and wise housekeeper, and she continued to occupy that post still.
Twenty-five years afterward, when the worthy old Spires was dead, and Simon Deg had himself two sons attained to manhood; when he had five times been mayor of Stockington, and had been knighted on the presentation of a loyal address; still his mother was living to see it; and William Watson, the shoemaker, was acting as a sort of orderly at Sir Simon's chief manufactory. He occupied the lodge, and walked about, and saw that all was safe, and moving on as it should do.
It was amazing how the most plebeian name of Simon Deg had slid, under the hands of the heralds, into the really aristocratical one of Sir Simon Degge. They had traced him up a collateral kinship, spite of his own consciousness, to a baronet of the same name of the county of Stafford, and had given him a coat of arms that was really astonishing.
It was some years before this, that Sir Roger Rockville had breathed his last. His title and estate had fallen into litigation. Owing to two generations having passed without any issue of the Rockville family except the one son and heir, the claims, though numerous, were so mingled with obscuring circumstance, and so equally balanced, that the lawyers raised quibbles and difficulties enough to keep the property in Chancery, till they had not only consumed all the ready money and rental, but had made frightful inroads into the estate itself. To save the remnant, the contending parties came to a compromise. A neighboring squire, whose grandfather had married a Rockville, was allowed to secure the title, on condition that the rest carried off the residuum of the estate. The woods and lands of Rockville were announced for sale!
It was at this juncture that old William Watson reminded Sir Simon Degge of a conversation in the great grove of Rockville, which they had held at the time that Sir Roger was endeavoring to drive the people thence.
"What a divine pleasure might this man enjoy," said Simon Deg to his humble friend, "if he had a heart capable of letting others enjoy themselves."
"But we talk without the estate," said William Watson; "what might we do if we were tried with it?"
Sir Simon was silent for a moment; then observed that there was sound philosophy in William Watson's remark. He said no more, but went away; and the next day announced to the astonished old man that he had purchased the groves and the whole ancient estate of Rockville!
Sir Simon Degge, the last of a long line of paupers, was become the possessor of the noble estate of Sir Roger Rockville, of Rockville, the last of a long line of aristocrats!
The following summer, when the hay was lying in fragrant cocks in the great meadows of Rockville, and on the little islands in the river, Sir Simon Degge, Baronet, of Rockville—for such was now his title-through the suggestion of a great lawyer, formerly Recorder of the Borough of Stockington, to the crown—held a grand fête on the occasion of his coming to reside at Rockville Hall, henceforth the family seat of the Degges. His house and gardens had all been restored to the most consummate order. For years Sir Simon had been a great purchaser of works of art and literature, paintings, statuary, books, and articles of antiquity, including rich armor and precious works in ivory and gold.
First and foremost he gave a great banquet to his wealthy friends, and no man with a million and a half is without them—and in abundance. In the second place, he gave a substantial dinner to all his tenantry, from the wealthy farmer of five hundred acres to the tenant of a cottage. On this occasion he said, "Game is a subject of great heart-burning and of great injustice to the country. It was the bane of my predecessors: let us take care it is not ours. Let every man kill the game on the land that he rents—then he will not destroy it utterly, nor allow it to grow into a nuisance. I am fond of a gun myself, but I trust to find enough for my propensity to the chase in my own fields and woods—if I occasionally extend my pursuit across the lands of my tenants, it shall not be to carry off the first fruits of their feeding, and I shall still hold the enjoyment as a favor."
We need not say that this speech was applauded most vociferously. Thirdly, and lastly, he gave a grand entertainment to all his work people, both of the town and the country. His house and gardens were thrown open to the inspection of the whole assembled company. The delighted crowd admired immensely the pictures and the pleasant gardens. On the lawn, lying between the great grove and the hall, an enormous tent was pitched, or rather a vast canvas canopy erected, open on all sides, in which was laid a charming banquet; a military band from Stockington barracks playing during the time. Here Sir Simon made a speech as rapturously received as that to the farmers. It was to the effect, that all the old privileges of wandering in the grove, and angling, and boating on the river were restored. The inn was already rebuilt in a handsome Elizabethan style, larger than before, and to prevent it ever becoming a fane of intemperance, he had there posted as landlord, he hoped for many years to come, his old friend and benefactor, William Watson. William Watson should protect the inn from riot, and they themselves the groves and river banks from injury.
Long and loud were the applauses which this announcement occasioned. The young people turned out upon the green for a dance, and in the evening, after an excellent tea, the whole company descended the river to Stockington in boats and barges decorated with boughs and flowers, and singing a song made by William Watson for the occasion, called "The Health of Sir Simon, last and first of his Line!"
Years have rolled on. The groves and river banks and islands of Rockville are still greatly frequented, but are never known to be injured: poachers are never known there, for four reasons. First, nobody would like to annoy the good Sir Simon; secondly, game is not very numerous there; thirdly, there is no fun in killing it, where there is no resistance; and fourthly, it is vastly more abundant in other proprietors' demesnes, and it is fun to kill it there, where it is jealously watched, and there is a chance of a good spree with the keepers.
And with what different feelings does the good Sir Simon look down from his lofty eyrie, over the princely expanse of meadows, and over the glittering river, and over the stately woods to where Great Stockington still stretches farther and farther its red brick walls, its red-tiled roofs, and its tall smoke-vomiting chimneys. There he sees no haunts of crowded enemies to himself or any man. No upstarts, nor envious opponents, but a past family of human beings, all toiling for the good of their families and their country. All advancing, some faster, some slower, to a better education, a better social condition, a better conception of the principles of art and commerce, and a clearer recognition of their rights and duties, and a more cheering faith in the upward tendency of humanity.
Looking on this interesting scene from his distant and quiet home, Sir Simon sees what blessings flow—and how deeply he feels them in his own case—from a free circulation, not only of trade, but of human relations. How this corrects the mischiefs, moral and physical, of false systems and rusty prejudices;—and he ponders on schemes of no ordinary beauty and beneficence yet to reach his beloved town through them. He sees lecture halls and academies, means of sanitary purification, and delicious recreation, in which baths, wash-houses, and airy homes figure largely; while public walks extend all round the great industrial hive, including wood, hills, meadow and river in their circuit of many miles. There he lived and labored; there live and labor his sons; and there he trusts his family will continue to live and labor to all future generations: never retiring to the fatal indolence of wealth, but aiding onward its active and ever-expanding beneficence.
Long may the good Sir Simon live and labor to realize these views. But already in a green corner of the pleasant churchyard of Rockville may be read this inscription on a marble headstone:—"Sacred to the memory of Jane Deg, the mother of Sir Simon Degge, Bart., of Rockville. This stone is erected in honor of the best of Mothers by the most grateful of sons."
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[From Fraser's Magazine.]