Part 17

Amidst the public calamity, one of a most grievous nature overtook the father of our heroine. The affairs of the laird, which had long been desperately out of order, and for some time were only sustained by the aid of his intended father-in-law, came to a complete stand-still; and, the whole wealth of James Hamilton being engaged in securities, he was at once reduced to the condition in which he had entered life. The stroke at first seemed likely to be fatal. Thus to lose the whole earnings of a laborious life—to forfeit, at the eleventh hour, by one miserable piece of imprudence, all the honours of the wisely spent day, was more, almost, than he could bear. He had, however, two comforters in his affliction—the worthy old minister, who in these calamitous times had been a succouring angel to his flock—and his daughter, an angel of a still more gracious kind, who, forgetting all the severities with which she had been treated, and thinking only of his present affliction, applied herself to the sacred task of soothing his wounded mind, and inspiring him with hopes of better times. The change of his circumstances produced a complete change in the mind of Hamilton. Having no longer wealth to care for, the jealous sentinels with which he had guarded it were withdrawn. The crust of worldly selfishness was broken off his character, and all its better affections were again called into free play. His eyes were now opened to the wickedness of which he had been guilty, in endeavouring to force the affections of his daughter, and he only wished that he were again as he had been a twelvemonth before, in order to make her happy with the man of her heart.

Weeks of partial famine passed on, and now the distresses of the villagers were suddenly doubled by the premature commencement of a very severe winter. With the exception of their small patches of potatoes and garden vegetables, there seemed hardly any resource for them during the whole winter. The minister, whose own income was exhausted in providing for their wants, thought it necessary, under these distressing circumstances, to call them all together, and join them in one solemn exercise of humiliation appropriate to the occasion. Just as this was concluded, a boy belonging to an inn about ten miles distant upon the Glasgow road, arrived, after a toilsome journey through the snow, and gave the joyful news that a cart filled with webs was storm-stayed at his master’s house, on its way to the village, the trade having suddenly experienced a slight revival. Transported with this intelligence, though no one could guess by whom the work could have been sent, they one and all resolved to proceed to Redcraigs, where the cart was lying, and aid in clearing a way for it through the snow. Every spade and semblance of a spade was then put in requisition, and the half of the bannocks in the village were brought forward, without the least regard to individual property, to provision the troop of pioneers. Thirty men set out early next morning on this expedition, graced with the blessings and prayers of all who saw them depart.

The snow, it was found, had only fallen to the depth of three feet, but it was drifted in many hollow parts of the road to six times that depth, so as to present an insurmountable obstacle to the progress of a cart. At all those places the weavers exerted themselves as they advanced to clear away the gelid heaps. The toil was most severe; but what these poor starved men wanted in strength, they made up by zeal—that zeal, above all others, which is inspired by the wish of answering the clamour of a hungry family circle with the necessary bite. The thought that work was before them, that money would again be procured, and, for that money, food to supply “the bairns at hame,” nerved every arm with superhuman energy; and as the country people every where lent a willing, though less enthusiastic assistance, the party had before mid-day cleared their way to Redcraigs. What was their surprise on being met there by their friend Adam Cuthbertson, of whom they had not heard ever since he left Daldaff, and who now informed them, with ineffable pleasure beaming in his eyes, that he had been the happy means of procuring them this supply of work. He had entered, he said, into the service of a manufacturer at Glasgow, and having divulged to him a plan of improving the loom, had been advanced to a very onerous place of trust in the factory. His employer having weathered on till the present revival of trade, he had used the little influence he had, to get his old master, of whose misfortunes he had heard, appointed to an agency, and was favoured with one of the very first parcels of work that was to be had, which he was now conveying to the relief of his old friends at Daldaff. “Let us on now, my friends,” cried Adam; “and, before night is far spent, we shall be able to tell the women and the bairns that the bad times are now blown by, and that every one will get his porridge and his broth as he used to do.” The cavalcade then set forward, the cart drawn by three horses in line, and every man more ready than another, either to clear away the drifted heap that lay before it, or to urge it with his desperate shoulder over every such impediment that might happen to be left. Though the way was long, and the labour severe, and the strength of the poor weavers not very great, yet every eye and voice maintained its cheerfulness, and the song, the jest, and the merry tale, were kept up to the very last. The wintry sun had set upon the snowy hills ere the procession came within sight of Daldaff; yet all the women and children were collected at the Loanbraehead, near the village, to see it approach; and when the cart was first discerned turning a neighbouring height, with its large attendant train, a shout of natural joy arose through the clear air, such as might burst from those who gaze from the shore upon a wreck, and see the crew, one by one, make their escape from destruction. James Hamilton was there, though much reduced by a recent illness; and the joy which seized him on being informed by the workmen of his appointment, was almost too much for his frame. He looked in vain, however, for Cuthbertson, to pour before him the thanks of a repentant spirit. That excellent young man had eluded the observation of all, and, diving through some of the lanes of the village, had taken refuge in the house of his uncle. He found that much as he had longed to see gladness once more restored to these poor villagers, he could not endure the scene at last. He had therefore escaped from their gratitude; and it was not till Hamilton sought him in his old lodgings, that he was at length discovered. The old man took him warmly by the hand, which he did not quit, till, leading him to his own house, he deposited it in that of his fair daughter. “Susan Hamilton,” said he, “twice have you been saved by this good youth; you are now fairly his own property—you are no longer mine. May you both be happy!”

FLITTING DAY.

Our readers will perhaps recollect a former article, in which we treated of the subject of removals—that is to say, the practice so general in Scotland (though otherwise in England) of shifting almost every year from one house to another, in a constant expectation of finding the TO KALON, as the Greeks call it, or, as we shall rather style it, the QUITE THE THING of house accommodation, which, however, is discovered at one year’s end to be exactly as remote as it was a twelvemonth before, and still, like general happiness, is “on before”—far looming over the horizon, like a vessel bound for some distant part of the globe, and not to be caught or overtaken, let us speed after it as we may. We have heard various individuals acknowledge that there were some good _home truths_ in that article, though we rather believe the housewives in general were surprised at our blindness to the beauties of a good back-green. Let that be as it may, there was one thing in which that article was totally deficient—to wit, an account of the particular horrors of _removing day_ itself, or, as we in Scotland call it, _flitting day_—a day styled in the calendar Whitsunday, and dedicated to we don’t know what sacred use, but which, without regard to its sacred use, whatever that may be, we think men might wish that, above all others, it were fairly blotted out of the calendar—expunged from the very year itself—utterly annihilated and forgotten, because of the unhappy secular use to which it has been put from time immemorial. The 25th of May, or Whitsunday old style, is indeed a day of peculiar agony amongst us. It is a day consecrated to the disruption of all local ties, to the rending of every kind of pleasant association, to the discomfiture of all the household goods. The very week in which it occurs, is black with its atmosphere of pain.

It may be surprising to persons unacquainted with Scotland, that the people should be so fond of removing, since the day on which that event takes place is apt to be so very disagreeable. They might as well wonder that people should ever marry, when they know so very well that the charge of a family is apt to be burdensome. Candlemas day, on which people take their houses, is a day of heedless joy, a day of fond and delirious anticipation; and Whitsunday is to it what execution-day is to the particular time when an unfortunate man was tempted to enrich himself at some other body’s expense. “On Wednesday I killed my wife, on Saturday I was hanged,” as the child’s rhyme goes: no one can doubt that Wednesday was in this case a very pleasant day, whatever might be the state of the honest man’s feelings at the end of the week. So it is with Candlemas and Whitsunday. On the former of these days we are actuated by a spirit of spite and dissatisfaction with our present abode; it is every thing that is disagreeable, and we must at all hazards get quit of it. Accordingly, the taking of another, and, as we think, better habitation, naturally appears as the opening of a haven of relief, and, of course, we have a great deal of either positive or negative pleasure in the day. Nor is this satisfaction confined to the day on which the new house is leased: it extends up to the very commencement of that week of suffering which involves Whitsunday—up to the first material disarrangement of furniture preparatory to removal. During the time which elapses between the leasing of the new habitation and our removal to it, we abandon all care for our present abode. Any thing that goes wrong about it must just remain so. If a lock were required for the door, we would scarcely put ourselves to the trouble of getting it, but remain content with some provisional system of security, such as putting a table behind it. A large piece of plaster might fall down from the ceiling, or half of the floor of the dining-room sink into the kitchen—a whole gable or side-wall, almost, might fall away, but we would never think of troubling ourselves with any attempt at repairs. It is a horrid house at any rate, and, for all the time we are to be in it, it does not matter. We’ll soon be getting into our nice new house, and I’ll warrant you no plaster will fall down from the ceiling _there_, nor either floor or gable give way. Every thing will be right when we get to —— Street. The house, under this system of feeling, begins to wear a desolate look. Every thing is permitted, according to the old Scottish phrase, just to hang as it grows. The whole bonds of household discipline are relaxed. The servants, who are to be changed too perhaps, as well as the house, begin to do things _any way_, and yet the mistress hardly chides them. The fact is, she has given up all idea of comfort in the condemned house, and lives entirely on the hope of seeing every thing trig in her new abode. She would make no great complaint, as we verily believe, if the servants obliged her by their carelessness to spend all the remaining part of the lease up to her knees in water. Every thing will be right when we get to —— Street, so we’ll just put up with it. Every now and then one of the children comes in, like the messengers in Macbeth, to tell her of the progress of mischief. One has to mention, that a boy throwing stones has just broken two panes in the drawing-room window, the lower chess having been up at the time. No matter; all will be right when we get to —— Street. Another “cream-faced loon” rushes in to say, that the girls in the kitchen have just broken down the grate, and snapped the poker in two. No matter; all will be right when we get to —— Street. Nay, it is not too much to suppose that, although she were told of the house having just begun to sink into the earth, she would take it all with the most philosophic coolness, and console herself for every present mishap by a reference to the joys which are to be experienced in that home of promise. The prospect of a removal, it will be observed, is thus enough even to revolutionise human nature. People abandon their most cherished objects of care, and disregard that of which they are in general most solicitous, under the influence of this prospect. Like the pilgrim of Bunyan (not to speak it profanely), they thrust their fingers in their ears, in order to shut out all lateral subjects of thought, and rush on—on—on towards the new house.

At last the throes of actual removal begin to be felt, and, for the time, all happy anticipation is deadened within us. You have long ago ascertained, by a ceremonious call upon the present tenants of your new mansion, that they cannot remove an hour before Whitsunday at noon, which gives you the comfortable assurance that your flitting will be, like a sharp fever, soon over. The lady who is coming to _your_ house soon after makes a ceremonious call upon _you_, and ascertains, of course, that you can only remove at that hour also. If matters should happen otherwise—if you are either going to a house altogether new, or to one which can be vacated a short while before the term-day, then what a convenience it is!—we shall have the painters in, and get it all put to rights before we flit a single stick; and after it is all right, we shall remove quite at our leisure. By this plan we shall not only avoid the risk of breaking things, which is always the case in a hurried flitting, but we shall get porters and carters a great deal cheaper, for these fellows, you know, charge three wages on the actual term-day, when every body is flitting. But if it should happen, as above mentioned, that you are limited to a few hours, so that your furniture, as it goes out, will meet the furniture of another person coming in, and, as it goes in, will meet, in tug of war, that of another person coming out, then the blessed anticipation of your future comforts in “that nice house” reconciles you to every thing, and you make yourself think that, after all, it is better, when one _is_ flitting, to have it all over in the shortest possible space of time.

Sometimes, even when you have a vantage space, you are strangely jockeyed out of it before you are aware. Say the house is to be painted before you go into it. Being quite at your ease, you are satisfied that the painters are engaged about two months before the term. You know very well that these men are the greatest of all rascals; that, indeed, they have no other principle within them but just to put people to as much trouble as possible. But two months! that must surely be sufficient. Well, the painters come all this time before the term, and, like the ancient Spanish navigators, take possession of a newly-discovered country, mark the job for their own, by planting a nasty pail in one room, and setting up a brush on end against the wall in another. You look in about a week after, and see the pail and the brush _in statu quo_: the fellows have as yet done nothing but taken _seisin_.[3] You think this is not just quite right, and calling in a cool easy way at the master’s as you go home, express your wish that the job should be immediately proceeded with, being anxious to get into the house as long before the term as possible. The painter is all politeness, and promises to _put men upon the house_ next morning, so that it will be got ready for your reception in _no time_—by which he appears to mean a space of time so brief as not to be worth defining, but which you eventually find to have signified that the job would be finished _not at all in time_. As you come home to your dinner next afternoon, you take a turn that way to see how “the men” are getting on. The house is as empty and desolate as ever; but, from a change in the relative situations of the pail and the brush, you see that they _have_ been there. On inspecting things more minutely, you find that one bed-room has been washed down, and is now, to use a kitchen phrase, _swimming_. Well, this is a beginning, you think. “The men” have been doing what they could to-day, and to-morrow they would be a good way advanced. On this supposition, you take no more thought about the house for three or four days more, when, dropping in as before, you have the satisfaction of seeing that there is _another pail_, and that the ceiling of the dining-room has been whitewashed. Still, dilatory as the rascals evidently are, you hardly think there is a sufficient _casus fœderis_, or breach of treaty, to entitle you to go and blow up the polite man at head-quarters. You suffer for another day; and then, dropping in again, you find a little Flibbertigibbet of a boy exerting himself with his tiny arms to whitewash the ceiling of the parlour. Well, my boy, where are “the men?” This is your question; but for answer you only learn that there have never been any men in the matter—nobody has ever been here but Flibbertigibbet himself. You feel, at this intelligence, almost as much bewildered and obfusculated as George the Second was when he asked an Irish sergeant at a review after the seven years’ war, where was the —— regiment? and was answered, “Please your majesty, I’se the —— regiment;” the Hibernian being in reality the only man that had survived the last campaign. Is this _the men_, you say to yourself, that Mr —— promised to put upon the house? You go of course instantly, and, Mr —— being, by his own good fortune, from home, you leave a note for him, expressed in such terms as you are sure must bring him to his senses, if any thing will. Dropping in next day to see the effect, your ire is soothed at finding three men at work besides Flibbertigibbet, and every thing seems going on so well, that you trouble them no more for a week. But it is needless to pursue this painful theme any farther. Suffice it to say, that, having once got these artists into the house, you feel by and by as if they were never again to be got out; you fear that, contrary to the catastrophe of the well-known jest, there will be no letting go the painter. Their pails, and buckets, and brushes, and all their slopery, are just as rife in the house a week before the term as they were a month earlier; and still to every remonstrance Mr —— replies, that all he can do is to _put on more men next Monday morning_. It is all you can do, perhaps, to get the odious varlets trundled out, “pots and all,” on the very day before you are compelled to remove; so that, instead of having ample scope and verge enough, as you expected, you find that you will be just as much hurried and flurried as if you had been going to a house not previously vacated.

Well, whatever be the foregoing circumstances, flitting day at last arrives in all its horrors. The lady of the household has for several days been storing all kinds of small things by into drawers and boxes, that they might the more safely be transported, so that the family finds itself already deprived of the half of those things which are necessary to comfort, and the whole of what minister to luxury. Your shaving-box is amissing two mornings before flitting day, and has to be fished up, like a “drowned honour,” from the bottom of some abyss of well-regarded trifles. When you come home to dinner on flitting day eve, it is any money for a boot-jack. You take your meals that evening without table-cloths; and unless you can bring down your proud stomach to a brown kitchen bowl, any thing like a comforting drink is out of the question. The crepuscular anguish of the day is already felt. You go to your bed that night off an uncarpeted floor, and in the midst of all kinds of tubs covered up with packsheet, and looking-glasses swaddled up in linen. If you get a nightcap, you may consider yourself lucky above all mortal men. You go to bed, but sleep there is none, for you have to rise next morning long before the usual hour, and the anticipatory sense of what you have to go through that day fills every nook and cranny of your mind. You awake to a rush of children and servants on the stairs; and though you exert every nerve of your memory to recollect the new geography of things in the room, it is ten to one but you stumble over some tub or chest in the dark, where you thought no tub should be; and, upon the whole, the feeling with which you thrust your poor cold distressed shanks into your vestments, is not much short of that which must possess a man about to walk to the scaffold. A breakfast composed of every thing but the proper materials, and taken out of every thing but the proper vessels, collects such a group of shabby slatternly figures as you did not before think yourself husband, or father, or master to. The meal is gulped in agonies of haste, for the carts were to be at the door at seven exactly, and it is now within a few minutes of the hour. Well, the carts come; one by one are your household goods displaced and packed up on those vehicles. Grates are placed on the breadth of their backs at the bottom, by way of ballast. Then mattresses go over them, to make an agreeable flooring for other things. Tables are tumbled a-top, with their legs reared high in the air, like cart-horses enjoying themselves in their Sunday pastures; and to the ropes with which the heaps are bound down, are attached fry-pans, children’s toys, and other light articles, all by way of garnishing. Though far above such things in general, you are obliged on this occasion to see after very mean details, lest your property should suffer some dreadful damage. The more delicate articles are necessarily entrusted to porters or other serviceable individuals, who carry them separately to your new house. “The boys,” glad to escape the school for a day, are employed, to their great satisfaction, in transporting single things, “which don’t break;” and the servants see after certain baskets of crystal and crockery, “which do.” To see all things properly disposed of—each to the individual best fitted for it—is your business, and no easy one it is. At length, after every thing is fairly packed off, the lady and yourself walk away together, the cat following in a pillow-slip under the charge of your second eldest daughter.