Part 4

We are all going to walk to Farmer Moreland’s, except Wentworth and Frederick, who are mounting their ponies to visit a friend just returned from Eton.

I am called--Yes, quite ready. Good day, dear mamma.

Well, mamma, evening has come, and I have but little to tell you about our Christmas visit to Farmer Moreland and his dame, which was happily accomplished; but a great deal to tell you about Wentworth and Frederick, and their adventures. When they had ridden about a mile, they were stopped by a little boy, who came running from a lane in the wood, crying piteously, “Mother, mother, oh! come to mother!” To all their questions he gave no other answer but “Come to mother; oh! do come, she is a dying.” The child was a very little creature, and seemed scarcely to know any other words.

My cousins, without hesitation, or any thought about their ride, determined to follow the child, who, though he could not say much, knew very well what to do. He led them along one of the green lanes a considerable distance into the wood, and there they found his poor mother lying, without any other shelter than that of a large spreading holly--without blanket or covering--her head resting on a little bundle, and looking deadly pale. The child ran towards her, and gently patting her face, cried, “Here, mother; look, look.”

As Wentworth approached, she opened her eyes, and seeing a benevolent countenance, smiled faintly. She tried to raise herself, but could not. In reply to his inquiries she made him understand that, having travelled two days with little rest or food, suffering much from grief, along with fatigue, she had grown so ill that she was obliged to stop there. Not seeing any cottage near, in which she could beg a lodging, and feeling totally unable to walk farther, she had lain there many hours, but had not seen any one pass, and fearing that the child would be starved, she had sent him in search of some kind-hearted person. She added that she was sure her illness was a fever; and as there was, therefore, little chance of her being admitted into any house, all she wished for was a shed to cover her, some water to drink, and some bread for her little boy.

My cousins, promising assistance, rode home instantly, in hopes of finding my uncle, but we were all at Farmer Moreland’s. They tried then to find some one who could erect a shed over the poor woman, but it was a holyday no labourers were at work; and the steward, who was the only person they found, had received orders not to leave the yards all day, because many idle people might be about. He told Wentworth he could easily supply materials for a shed, if there was any one to build it. Wentworth and Frederick looked at each other for a moment, and then both said together--“Let us do it ourselves, and give up the ride.” Each had been afraid of disappointing his brother by the proposal, but they agreed to it with equal good-will, and set about their new occupation so earnestly, that in a quarter of an hour the garden ass-cart was loaded with straw and stakes, and the necessary tools. Before they went away, they applied to my aunt’s housekeeper for bread and medicine; and she very good naturedly went herself to see what state the woman was in, and what could be done for her. She afterwards told my aunt that it was “a beautiful sight to see the kindness of the young gentlemen, just as careful, ma’am, not to disturb the sick beggar woman as if she was a lady, and they so happy, ma’am, and never seeming to cast a thought about their ride.” While they were at work, the housekeeper learned the history of the unfortunate creature; she thinks her dangerously ill, and has therefore procured a careful old woman to take care of her.

My cousins not being very expert in driving stakes into the ground, or in fastening on thatch, it was nearly dark when they reached home. We had long returned from our walk, and had been listening to the history the housekeeper gave. My aunt and uncle were very much pleased at hearing of the benevolence and the decision with which Wentworth and Frederick had acted; and they determined not to interfere with them till their task was completed.

The story of the poor woman can be told in a few words. When very young, only sixteen, she was tempted to leave her father’s cottage, and to go off secretly with an idle wandering man, belonging to a party of gipsies, to whom she was afterwards married. Her husband had lately grown very unkind, and last week he forsook her entirely. She heard that he had come to the forest of Deane, and without waiting to make further inquiry, she took her little son, and set off in search of her wicked husband. Her parents are dead, and she has no friends but the gipsies, among whom she has lived for several years; she says they are bad people indeed, and to leave her boy with them would be his ruin. Her only anxiety is about him; were she sure of his being in safe hands, she says she has no longer any wish to live.

The housekeeper inquired the name of the child; but his mother acknowledged that he had never been christened, as the people she was with did not attend to those kind of things. He has generally been called _Quick-finger_ amongst them, because he was so clever at little thefts; but she had intended, she says, to have had him baptized, and to call him Charley, after her own father. She then fell into an agony of grief at the remembrance of her father and the time when she was happy and innocent, as well as at the wickedness her poor little boy has already been taught.

_Dec. 28th._--During our passage from Brazil, Captain M. lent me one of your old favourites, Anson’s Voyage; and, next to Robinson Crusoe, it interested me more than any thing of that kind I ever read. You may guess then with what pleasure I have been looking over the account of a late visit to Juan Fernandez by Mr. Scouler, who was employed by the Hudson’s Bay Company to examine the natural history of the north-west coast of America. I think two or three little extracts will amuse you; and I must tell you, by the way, that Mr. Scouler seems to feel great admiration for _our_ city of Rio, and the bay, and the view from the Corcovado, and all our beautiful plants, birds, and insects.

“_Dec. 14, 1824._--The island of Juan Fernandez was approached with equal interest by every one in the vessel, but with different feelings; as classic ground by the seamen, and as a new field for research by the naturalist.

“We landed at a small bay at the northern extremity of the island. The level land near the coast had more resemblance to a European corn-field, than to a desolate valley in the Pacific Ocean, being entirely overgrown with oats, interspersed in different places with wild carrots. On penetrating through the corn-fields, we discovered a small cavern, excavated in the decomposing rock, and bearing evident traces of having been recently inhabited. A kind of substitute for a lamp hung from the roof, and the quantity of bones scattered about, shewed there was no scarcity of provisions. Near this, a natural arch, about seven feet high, opened into a small bay, bounded on all sides by steep perpendicular rocks, which afforded an inaccessible retreat to multitudes of sea birds.

“The next day, on approaching the landing place in Cumberland Bay, we were surprised by the appearance of smoke rising among the trees; and we had the pleasure of finding an Englishman there. When he first saw our boat, he was afraid it belonged to a Spanish privateer, and had concealed himself in the woods, as they had formerly destroyed his little establishment. He belonged to a party of English and Chilians, employed in sending the skins of cattle, which are now plentiful, to Chili. We were delighted with the beautiful situation where they had fixed their dwelling; close to a fine stream, and surrounded by a shrubbery of _Fuchsia_, mixed with peach and apple-trees, pears, figs, vines, and strawberries, rue, mint, radish, and Indian cress, besides oats, were all growing in the greatest profusion; and the sea abounded with fish.

“Our new friend had a little collection of English books; and one piece of furniture, which seemed particularly valuable,--an old iron pot, though without a bottom; but he had fitted a wooden one to it, and when he had occasion to boil any thing, he plunged the pot into the earth, and kindled a fire round its sides.

“We made an excursion to the interior, and found many beautiful plants and shrubs. The dry soil was covered by an evergreen _arbutus_, and a shrubby _campanula_, and every sheltered rock afforded a different species of fern, the greatest vegetable ornament of the island. We refreshed ourselves with strawberries, which were small and pale, but of a very agreeable flavour; and the vine plants were loaded with grapes; they were still unripe.”

I am quite disappointed at Mr. Scouler’s not mentioning the myrtle trees described in Anson’s Voyage, that tall wood of myrtles that screened the lawn where the commodore had pitched his tent; and which, sweeping round it, in the form of a theatre, extended up to the rising ground. I should like to have known what species of myrtle produced timber of forty feet in length. But above all, I felt disappointed at his account of the cavern; I was thinking of Alexander Selkirk, and could not help hoping that it was to prove the very one in which he had lived; or perhaps that some other romantic Selkirk was then its solitary master, instead of those Chilian cattle-killers.

_29th._--There was a long conversation to-day on corals, corallines, and particularly on the formation of islands of that substance, which seems to take place so rapidly in some parts of the world.

Mr. Salt, the traveller, says that the islands in the Bay of Amphila are composed entirely of marine remains, strongly cemented together, and now forming solid masses; the surface of which is covered by only a thin layer of soil. These marine remains are chiefly corallines, madrepores, and a great variety of sea-shells, of species still existing in the Red Sea. Some of the islands are thirty feet above high-water mark; a circumstance which, he says, makes it difficult to account for the process of their formation. When a pillar of coral rises to the surface of the sea, birds, of course, resort to it; the decay of fish-bones, and other remains of their food in time produces a soil, which is followed by vegetation, and then it quickly assumes the appearance of a little island, covered with a solid stratum of earth. But in the present case, large pieces of madrepore are found, disposed in regular layers, far above the sea; and for this no satisfactory reason can be assigned, he says, except that the sea must have retired since they were so deposited; for this tribe of animals cannot work in the air.

There is nothing more curious, my uncle observed, than the changes produced on the face of the globe by the operations of the coral worm, a little creature so small as to be scarcely visible. New islands, he says, produced by its means, are continually rising out of the sea, and old ones are becoming united to others, or to the continent. In reading about something else, I met with a singular instance of this, in the account of Saugor Island, and Edmonstone’s Isle, in the Bay of Bengal, Edmonstone’s Isle appeared so lately as 1818; it is already two miles long, and half a mile broad, and the channel between the two islands is so shallow, that, in a few years, they will probably be joined together. Vegetation had commenced immediately on the most central and elevated part; saltwort, with one or two other plants, had given it a verdant tint, and by daily binding the shifting sand, were contributing to form the basis of a more durable soil.

Coral was formerly thought to be a vegetable, and even the celebrated Tournefort considered it to be a marine moss; but it is now known to be the production of a race of animals, of which it seems as much a part as the shell is of the snail. Most of the islands in the South Sea are coral rocks covered with earth. My uncle says that late voyagers have asserted that the bays and harbours of many of these islands have been observed to be gradually closing up, by the progress of these extraordinary creatures; and that it may therefore be supposed that these separate islands will in time be connected, and actually become a continent!

He told us, that M. de Peysonnel, of Marseilles, was the first who proved by experiment the animal nature of the coral; and shewed, that those bodies which former naturalists had mistaken for flowers, were, in fact, the insects that inhabited the coral. When the branches were taken out of the water, these supposed flowers, which proceeded from a number of white points in the bark, withdrew and disappeared; and when the branch was restored to the water, they were again perceptible. The white specks he proved to be holes in the outer surface, or bark, and corresponding with a series of cavities within; and secondly, he shewed that from these holes a milky fluid issued, which was an animal juice, and must, therefore, have proceeded from an insect. By immersing coral in strong vinegar, he could dissolve the calcareous bark to a certain depth, so as to shew the tubular structure of the interior uninjured.

Carbonate of lime, my uncle says, is the principal part of the substance of the whole tribe of corals and corallines; but where these minute insects, or rather _polypi_, obtain that material, or how they can decompose such an extraordinary quantity of it from sea-water, is one of those secrets of nature which philosophers have not yet discovered, although it is constantly in operation, and on an immense scale.

_31st._--Frederick read to us, this evening, some of De Capell Brooke’s travels; and I ran away with the book afterwards, to copy for you this account of the cataract of Trallhätta, in Norway, which must be a singular scene.

“The whole water of the Gotha tumbles with fearful roarings down the rocky declivities, and in its descent forms four principal falls, the perpendicular height of which, taken together, is 110 feet. Yet the navigation is not obstructed; for locks with sluices, like those on navigable canals, have been cut in the solid rock, with incredible pains and labour; through them, vessels can be lowered to the level of the river below the falls, preserving their course with ease; and affording a strong instance of the power and ingenuity of man.”

In conversing about Norway, my uncle said, he thought the ingenuity displayed by the Norwegian peasantry was surprising. Living remote from towns, and scattered among their mountains, they become independent of assistance. The same man is frequently his own tailor, shoemaker, and carpenter, and sometimes even his own clock and watch maker. Most of them are very expert at carving, and the beautiful whiteness of their fir wood furnishes them with very pretty ornaments for their cottages. They work neatly in silver, brass, and other metals; and there are few things for the purchase of which they are obliged to have recourse to the distant towns.

Their methods of brewing and baking are very simple. The first consists in a simple infusion of barley, which, with the young shoots of juniper, produces a weak but pleasant beverage.--In making their _flad bröd_, or flat bread, they mix rye-flour with water, and when the dough is well kneaded, roll it out like a pancake, but not thicker than a wafer. As fast as they are made they are placed on a gridiron, and one minute bakes them. Prepared in this way, the rye loses its coarse taste, and the bread is agreeable.

You will not, probably, be inclined to imitate them, but I am sure you will admire the ingenuity of these people in the manner they employ the black ants to make vinegar. These creatures have gigantic habitations, which, in size and appearance, are not very unlike the _gamme_, or hut, of the coast Laplanders. The ant hills are five feet in height; and are composed of decayed wood, pine-leaves, and bark, mixed up with earth and strengthened by bits of branches, which must require the efforts of a vast number to move. Streets and alleys branch off in every direction from the main entrance, which is a foot wide; and outside, millions of the little negroes, as they are called, may be seen bustling along heavily laden. But now for the vinegar: a bottle half full of water is plunged to the neck in one of these hills; the ants speedily creep in, and are, of course, drowned; the contents are then boiled, and a strong acid is produced, which is used for vinegar by all the inhabitants of Norlanden.

_January 1, Sunday._--My uncle read to us the “Song of Moses,” after the escape of the Israelites from Pharaoh and his host. He then said; as nearly as I can recollect, “This beautiful composition is not only a thanksgiving for their memorable deliverance, but it contains also precise prophecies of the downfal of the nations of Palestine, with the settlement of the Israelites in their room; and of the establishment of the temple on Mount Zion, with the ultimate destruction of all idolatry.

“It is the most ancient poem now extant, and shews the early connexion which subsisted between poetry and religion: it is also a fine example of that species of composition in which the Hebrews excelled; namely, that of expressing in hymns of triumph their gratitude to God for his glorious protection.

“‘The mountain of thine inheritance’ alludes to Mount Moriah, or Sion, where Moses knew that God would fix his sanctuary; and which is prophetically spoken of here as already completed.

“The whole army seem to have joined with one voice in this song; and Miriam and all the women re-echoed it with equal rapture; yet while almost in the very act of expressing their gratitude, this capricious people began to murmur because there was a scarcity of water in the wilderness through which it was necessary to pass; and, because when they did come to a spring, the water was bitter. What a beginning for the new life on which they were entering! Let us act more wisely, my dear children; and, grateful for the blessings of the past, let us endeavour to deserve their continuance through the new year on which we are entering.”

We endeavoured to trace the march of the Israelites, on the map. My uncle shewed us that the wilderness of Shur was a part of that great sandy desert which divides Egypt from Palestine; and which stretches from the Mediterranean to the head of the Red Sea on both sides. It is supposed by the late celebrated traveller Burckhardt, that the place called Marah, from the bitterness of its water, is the present Howara. Its distance from the Red Sea corresponds with the three days’ march of the Israelites; and there is a well there, of which he says, “the water is so bitter, that men cannot drink it; and even camels, if not very thirsty, refuse to taste it.” Irwin, another traveller, says that in travelling 315 miles in this desert, he met with only four springs of water.

My uncle says, that Moses does not mention every place where the Israelites encamped between the Red Sea and Mount Sinai, but those only where something remarkable occurred. Elim, with its refreshing wells and shady palm trees, must have been delightful in comparison with the desert they had passed. Dr. Shaw, who visited that country the beginning of last century, found nine of the twelve wells described in Exodus; the other three had been probably filled up by those drifts of sand which are so common in Arabia. But the palm trees alluded to by Moses had increased amazingly, for, instead of threescore and ten, there were then above two thousand. Under the shade of these trees he was shewn the _Hammam Mousa_, or the Bath of Moses, for which the inhabitants have an extraordinary veneration, as they pretend it was the exact spot where he and his family encamped. From this place the Doctor could plainly see Mount Sinai, or, as it is called in some parts of the Bible, Mount Horeb. This seems to have been the general name of the whole mountain, while Sinai was appropriated to the summit, which had three distinct elevations: on the western one, God appeared to Moses in the bush; the middle one, which is the highest, is that on which God gave the law to Moses, and is still called Gebel Mousa, or the Mount of Moses; and the third and most easterly is called St. Catherine’s Mount, from the monastery which has been erected there.

_2d._--The poor wandering gipsy died in a very few days; and my aunt immediately put her son under the care of the Franklins and the old blind man. Charley is an intelligent little fellow, but will require great care and attention; he speaks a sort of incomprehensible gibberish, and understands but little of what is said to him. The housekeeper asserts that nothing can civilize those gipsies, however early they are taken in hand; but my aunt will try what mildness and steadiness can effect: she has desired him to be treated very gently, and his faults rather overlooked, till he can be made to understand the value of a good character. My uncle has written about him to some of his mother’s relations; but unless they are capable of taking care of him he will not abandon the child. Mary and Caroline have bought some clothes for him, and as just now I have no pocket money, not having managed my last quarter well, I begged to be allowed to contribute time and work.

What an extraordinary thing it is, that these odd people, the Gipsies, should have been wandering in the same unsettled manner about the world for three centuries; and always the same dishonest impostors. My aunt shewed us a passage in Clarke’s Travels, about the gipsies of Wallachia--where he says, though they are as well inclined to steal as the rest of their tribe, they are certainly of a more civilised nature. They are divided there into different classes: some are domestics, and are employed in the principal houses; others work as gold finers and washers; some travel about as itinerant smiths; some as strolling musicians, and others are dealers in cattle. They are skilful in finding gold, and smelt it into small ingots; using for that purpose little low furnaces, which they blow by a portable bellows made of a buckskin. The construction of the bellows is very simple; an iron tube being tied into the neck of the skin which is sewn up, and two wooden handles are fastened to the legs, by which it is worked.

I was very curious to know what could be the origin of these people--and why they have been always wandering about. My uncle told me, that ever since the beginning of the fifteenth century, when they were first noticed in Europe, the general idea has been, that they were Egyptians. It is said, that when Egypt was conquered by the Turks, several of the natives refusing to submit, revolted under one Zinganeus, and afterwards dispersed in small parties all over the world.--From their supposed skill in magic, they were well received; and being joined by idlers in every country, they became so troublesome, that measures were taken to expel them from England, France, and Spain. It is a remarkable coincidence, my uncle says, that in Turkey, the gipsies are called Tcheeganes; in Italy, Zingari; and in Germany, Zigeuner; all which seem to be derived from the name of their first leader in Egypt: but, on the other hand, they are sometimes found wandering about in that country, apparently a distinct race from the natives, and without the least affinity to them in features, customs, or language.