Children of the Dear Cotswolds

The very first time that the baby went out the monthly nurse carried her to see Mrs. Birkin; and as she marched with slow and stately tread up the narrow garden path to the cottage, a swarm of bees settled all over both infant and nurse. Fortunately the nurse was a Cotswold woman, and knew full well that if a swarm of bees settles upon an infant during the first month of its existence, and departs without stinging, it is a very lucky omen. And people born in other parts of the world will agree as to the good fortune of the latter contingency.

Mrs. Birkin in her porch, and the nurse in her cloak of bees, stood like two statues in the hot sunshine of that September afternoon, the nurse hardly daring to breathe, lest by some inadvertent movement she should change so stupendous a piece of luck into disaster.

Presently the brown cloud lifted itself from the white bundle in the anxious nurse's arms and passed with its own triumphant music to some other place.

The baby still slept sweetly, oblivious alike of good or evil fortune. Mrs. Birkin, her ruddy cheeks pale under the weather-stains of years, came forth from her cottage as the nurse tottered to meet her, holding out the baby and exclaiming hysterically: 'Take her, take her, and let me sit down somewhere, for my legs won't bear me no longer!'

"The Lard be praised!" cried Mrs. Birkin, seizing the baby. "That there lamb 'll be lucky an' good-lookin', an' she'll 'ave a good 'usban' for sure. Bless 'er! Them bees knows what they be about, an' 'tis plain they knew as you was Cotsal barn an' bred, an' wasn't none of them faintin', scritchin' women as don't rekkerni'ze the Lard's voice, not when 'E 'ollers in their yer."

Then, seated on the little wooden seats on each side of the tiny porch, the women proceeded to sing the size and the exceeding beauty of the new baby, who seemingly preferred the soothing lullaby of the bees, for she woke up and "hollered" with surprising vigour.

A little later the baby paid her visits to Mrs. Birkin in a fine, white perambulator, and, as that worthy woman put it, "You didn't know where you was" before that remarkable infant toddled up the cobbled path to the cottage quite unassisted.

Time slips by noiseless and fleet-footed in a quiet Cotswold village, even as in noisier and more strenuous places, and "Squoire's little darter" grew into "our young lady." To be sure, there were other young ladies in the neighbourhood, for the village is large and cheery, with many nice places around; but the other young ladies were in no way remarkable. No swarm of bees had settled on any of them in infancy. For it really seemed as if some of the sturdy sweetness of the bees had passed into the baby they thus honoured. As was said of jolly Dick Steele, "she was liked in all company because she liked it."

And now the village was upside down with excitement, for our young lady was going to be married, and Mrs. Birkin was to have a new bonnet for the great occasion.

Mrs. Birkin felt that she had an unusually important part to play in the festivities attendant on this great event, for our young lady's father, who had an excellent memory for dates, had decreed that the wedding-day should be on the anniversary of the day on which, nineteen years before, the swarm of bees had distinguished his daughter. Such a thing had never happened since, though plenty of babies had come both to Mrs. Birkin's village and the other villages round about, and you may be sure that Mrs. Birkin knew all about every baby that arrived within a ten-mile radius. She is an authority upon babies. She is one of those women who is everybody's mother because she has no living children of her own. In the churchyard, under the green mound that now marks the humble resting-place of Mr. Birkin, there were once two tiny graves, where, side by side, lay Mrs. Birkin's twin sons. And for the sake of those two babies, dead these forty years, Mrs. Birkin's heart had kept young and kind, and full of love for all other babies. So that it came about that the very crossest infant ever born into a world it seemed to find singularly unattractive was good with Mrs. Birkin, and in consequence she was in great request with busy mothers.

Nor was it only the babies who loved Mrs. Birkin. Little girls brought their dolls for her to dress, and little boys, even bad little boys, whose grubby hands were against every other man, woman, or child in the village, refrained from pillaging Mrs. Birkin's garden, and had been known to weed it for her, all for love.

For months past, in fact, ever since our young lady's engagement was announced, Mrs. Birkin had pondered the great question of the Bonnet. She had not had a new bonnet for six years. Four years before that, again, she had indulged in a widow's bonnet, in which, on Sundays, she did honour to the memory of the departed Birkin; until the crape grew green with age, and our young lady herself suggested that the time had come when Mrs. Birkin's somewhat mitigated woe might find expression in head-gear less indicative of intense gloom.

In our village, except of "a Sunday," the question of costume is extremely simple. The men wear corduroy; the women, lilac or pink print, with sunbonnet to match. There are those who wish that the wearing of these uniforms extended to Sundays,-the villagers, in the week, are so much more in harmony with the beautiful, grey, old houses,-but those who, like "Squoire," love these people well, would not for the world debar them from the wearing of that finery dear to the heart of woman in cottage and castle alike.

Squoire drives a coach, and often on Saturday afternoons he will pull up in the very middle of our one street and shout, "Any one for the town?" And sure enough, three or four eager damsels and matrons bustle out of their cottages, are packed in as inside passengers, and away goes the coach to distant "Ziren," where country folk can see the shops and make their purchases, Squoire bringing them and their bundles home in the evening again, and never a penny to pay for carriage hire.

Three times lately had Mrs. Birkin made this journey to "Ziren," rightly so called from its many fascinations. She had flattened her nose against the plate-glass windows of that stately shop in the market-place where there were displayed hats of the most bewitching beauty, and fabrics so delicate that Mrs. Birkin fairly caught her breath at the mere idea of any one daring to wear them. It was undoubtedly an entrancing vision, that shop; but then nothing was priced, and there were no bonnets in that window, and for a bonnet Mrs. Birkin had come to look.

At the corner of Black Jack Street, not quite in the market-place, but facing it, was another shop. Here there were hats and bonnets in plenty, marked in plain figures for all to see, and there was one, manifestly a bonnet "suitable for a elderly person," that positively fascinated Mrs. Birkin. Of white straw was it, trimmed with scarlet geraniums and elegant excrescences of watered ribbon of a delicate mauve shade-a truly bridal bonnet, fitted to grace even the marriage of our young lady herself. But its cost was twelve and sixpence, a truly prohibitive price for Mrs. Birkin-"A'most a month's keep," she sadly whispered to herself. She went away from that window. She walked right round the market-place, she looked into every milliner's window, she gazed upon other bonnets; but there was nothing to compare with the creation compounded of scarlet geraniums and mauve ribbon in the shop in Black Jack Street. All the same, Mrs. Birkin went home with only three yards of scouring flannel to show for her day's shopping.

But she dreamed of the bonnet, and her waking hours were haunted by its beauties. "I can't afford no more nor ten shillin's," she said to a neighbour with whom she discussed the question. "Mebbe if I waits, her'll get a bit faded, and they'll put un down in proice."

Thrice more did Mrs. Birkin avail herself of Squoire's kindness and drive in the coach to Ziren, and on the third occasion she screwed up her courage to enter the shop, and in trembling tones demanded of the young lady behind the counter whether there was any chance of the bonnet-for it still graced the window-"bein' a bit cheaper for cash. I couldn't pay for un to-day," she added; "but next week I be comin' in again, an' if so be as her were two shillin' less, I med manage un."

The young lady was good-natured and approachable. She even lifted the bonnet from its stand in the window, and proposed that Mrs. Birkin should try it on.

This Mrs. Birkin did, though her knees knocked together during the process, and she was fain to confess that her handsome, sunburnt face was assuredly "uncommon set off" when framed in the scarlet geraniums and pale mauve ribbons.

"Of course I can't promise that it won't be gone before next week," said the young lady. "It's a very attractive article; but if it is still here, we might be able to meet you. You wouldn't like me to put it aside for you, to make sure?" she suggested.

But here Mrs. Birkin was firm. "No," she said; "if so be as you has a chanst to sell it, far be it from me to stand in your way. But if it be still yer, when I do come back, then, if I've got the money, I'll 'ave she. The ribbons is gettin' a bit faded," she added shrewdly; and with this parting shot Mrs. Birkin hurried from the shop to buy yellow soap.

She was not well off, even as such a term is modestly read in a Cotswold village community. For one thing, she was far too fond of giving. For another, although she "went out days" when she got the chance, and was as sturdy and healthy at sixty as many women are at forty, yet she could no longer work in the fields in summer, a long day's haymaking being more than she could stand. Squoire let her live in her cottage rent free, for the departed Birkin had been one of his labourers; moreover, his daughter was very fond of Mrs. Birkin, and that went a long way with Squoire. He also had obtained for her of late, from certain mysterious powers called "Guardians," an allowance of three and sixpence a week, so that with what she could earn Mrs. Birkin got onfairly comfortably. The bonnet money was money saved up for years against illness, but "Law bless you!" she said, "'tis only once in a way. That there bonnet 'll sarve me till I be put away in churchyard along of Birkin, an' if I don't go foine to see that there blessed lamb married to her good gentleman, when be I to go foine? You just tell me that."

The day of the wedding was drawing near. Only six days now till the great day itself. But Mrs. Birkin was still bonnetless. In vain did she count her savings over and over again; by no arithmetical process could they be persuaded to amount to more than eleven shillings and fivepence three farthings. Squoire sent round word that he would drive the coach into Ziren that afternoon and that anybody might go that liked. Mrs. Birkin went, carrying with her her whole worldly wealth.

Once in the market-place, she hurried to the shrine of the Bonnet. It was still there, and on it was a card bearing the reassuring legend, "Much reduced; only nine and elevenpence halfpenny."

Mrs. Birkin paused outside that she might savour the sweets of purchase by anticipation. For fully five minutes did she stand gloating over the bonnet-her bonnet, as she already felt it to be, and she was on the point of entering the shop when she caught sight of a neighbour on the other side of the road, one Mrs. Comley, who held by the hand a small and exceedingly dirty boy about ten years old. His free hand was thrust into one of his tearful eyes, and sobs shook his small frame. It was plain that Ernie Comley was in grievous trouble. Mrs. Comley, too, looked flushed and miserable. She was an unhealthy-looking, undersized little woman whose somewhat dreary days were passed in futile attempts to overtake her multifarious duties. Mrs. Comley was no manager; and it was not surprising, for one weakly baby was hardly set upon its bandy legs before another appeared to claim her whole attention. Comley was a farm-labourer with twelve shillings a week, so that the charitable made excuses for Mrs. Comley. Besides, she "did come from Birmiggum," and the Cotswold folk felt that that explained any amount of slackness and general incompetence.

It was not in the nature of Mrs. Birkin to pass by any one in trouble. She forgot her bonnet for the moment, and hurried across the road to inquire the cause of Ernie's tears. "We come by the carrier this morning," Mrs. Comley explained,-it was like her to pay for the carrier when "Squoire" would have brought her for nothing,-"I 'ad so much to do, an' Ernie 'e done nothing but w'ine and cry somethin' dreadful all the time because I told 'im plain 'e can't go to no weddin's, nor no treats after, neither. Do you know what that boy've bin an' done? 'E've gone an' tore the seat clean out of 'is Sunday trowsies, an' there ain't a bit of the same stuff nowhere. We've bin an' tried all over the place; an' go in corderoys 'e shall not, shamin' me before all the neighbours, as is nasty-tongued enough as it is. 'E be the most rubsome child I ever see. There ain't no keepin' 'im in clothes, that there ain't."

Mrs. Comley gave the "rubsome" Ernie a spiteful shake, which caused that unhappy urchin to burst into renewed and louder sobs.

"There, there," said Mrs. Birkin, soothingly, "don't 'ee take on so! There's sure to be summat as can be done, and I'm sartin of this, as our young lady 'ad far sooner 'e come in 'is corderoys than stopped away. She said most partic'lar as she 'oped heverbody 'u'd come. There, Ernie, then, don't 'ee take on so." And Mrs. Birkin patted the boy's shoulder with a kind, comforting hand.

"I tell you as there ain't nothing as can be done," Mrs. Comley retorted fretfully. "Them cloes is tore about shockin'. They wasn't new when 'e got 'em, an' 'e be that rubsome they've all fell to pieces. 'Tain't only the trowsies. And do you mean to tell me that 'e could go to hany weddin' like this 'ere?"

Mrs. Birkin fell back a step that she might the better regard the lachrymose Ernie, and sorrowfully she came to the conclusion that his mother was right; for, indeed, his appearance was the reverse of festal. Although his corduroy trousers had so far withstood his rubsome tendencies, his jacket had given way at the elbows, and he looked altogether as disreputable a small boy as could be met in a summer's day.

"I tried to get 'im a suit at the Golden Anchor, if they'd only 'ave let me take it on credit; but they be that 'ard-'cash with horder,' that's their style. An' it's no manner of use me a-goin' to any of the big tailors: they wouldn't so much as look at me. There, Ernie, do 'old that row. You'll never be missed in all that crowd. No one 'll know but what you was there."

This reflection seemed in no way to comfort Ernie, who burst forth into a loud howl, and was dragged down the market-place by his weary and incensed parent.

Mrs. Birkin stood where she was, immersed in thought. Across the road the bonnet shop beckoned beguilingly, and her work-worn hand tightened upon her purse. Slowly she crossed the road, and once more stood staring at the bonnet. How beautiful it was! How brilliant its geraniums, how crisp and dainty its bosses and twists of ribbon! "It be like the bit o' carpet beddin' under Squoire's drawin'-room windows, that 'a be," said Mrs. Birkin to herself.

She stared so hard at the bonnet that her eyes grew misty, and the card with "much reduced" danced before her; but still she did not go into the shop. She stood like a statue for nearly five minutes, still staring at the bonnet; but she no longer saw it. What she saw was her own potato-patch last autumn; and in it, hard at work, was Ernie Comley, digging her potatoes for her because her lumbago was so bad.

"What do it matter for a hold image like me what I do wear?" she muttered. Then she turned from the window that held her heart's desire, and hurried down the market-place after Mrs. Comley and the rubsome Ernie.

She found them staring gloomily into the window of the ready-made clothes shop.

"You come in along o' me," she cried excitedly. "There's a suit in that window, 'This style eight and eleven three,' as 'll just do for Ernie, allowin' for growth. I'll buy it for un, an' you can pay me back a bit at a time, as is most convenient. Come on in."

The suit was bought, and presently Ernie, dirty, and as cheerful as he had been tearful a few minutes before, emerged from the doorway, hugging a large brown-paper parcel.

"I must do my shoppin' sharpish," Mrs. Birkin said as she came out of the shop, "or else Squoire 'll be back before I be ready. Good afternoon to you. No; don't you never name it. 'Tis no more than you'd 'a' done for me."

To herself she murmured as she hurried up the market-place, "I don't suppose as she'll ever pay I, she's but a slack piece; but I couldn't abear as that boy shouldn't 'ave none of the fun. We're none on us young but once."

Mrs. Birkin's Sunday bonnet was black, and although a black dress for best is not only permissible, but suitable, for an elderly cottager even at a wedding, to wear a black bonnet upon so festive an occasion is to commit a solecism of the most glaring kind.

Mrs. Birkin was a woman of much resource. Once the bonnet of her dreams had become an impossibility, owing to the expense of Ernie Comley's wedding garment, she set herself forthwith to manufacture another as like the one in the shop window at Ziren as her means would allow.

To that end she purchased a small, a very small, pot of cream enamel; red flowers, of a nondescript kind it is true, but still red, and plenty of them for the money; and three yards of pale lavender ribbon. She then picked all the trimming off her old bonnet, washed it, dried it in the oven with the door well ajar, lest the precious thing should "scarch." When dry, she enamelled it cream, inside and out, and when the enamel in its turn had dried, she trimmed the rejuvenated bonnet with the new flowers and ribbon. And a very imposing confection it looked, and quite unlike anything to be seen in any window of the Ziren shops. Mrs. Birkin herself felt certain misgivings about it; but she had done her best, and by her best she must abide.

It happened that the night before the wedding our young lady's maid was packing her going-away trunk, talking the while about the villagers and their excitement over the morrow. This maid was "own niece" to Mrs. Birkin, but she was not proud of the relationship. She was a smart young woman who had travelled, and she looked down upon her simple old aunt with, at the best, a tolerant sort of amusement.

"You'll see some wonderful costumes to-morrow, Miss," she said as she folded dainty garments. "The whole village has got something new. My old aunt now-not that you'll have time to notice such as she-but you never saw such a bonnet as she's gone and trimmed for herself. A silly old woman, that's what I call her. She'd saved up quite a nice bit of money, and was going to have a new bonnet out of a shop in the town they sets such store by, though 'tisn't much more than a village to them as have travelled, is it, Miss? Well, what does she go and do but lend the money as she'd saved for her bonnet to a woman in the village to buy a suit for one of them nasty, mischievous little boys, so that he could come to your weddin' and the treats an' that. 'Twasn't aunt told me, else I'd have given her a piece of my mind. A fool and his money's soon parted."

Our young lady turned almost fiercely upon her maid. "I think it was perfectly lovely of Mrs. Birkin," she cried, with a ring in her voice that warned that sharp girl she had in some way offended. "I wish there were more people like her in the world. It would be a kinder, better place. There's nothing here one half so beautiful as that bonnet of hers."

The maid went on folding lace petticoats in silence, for there was a sound of tears in her young lady's voice. She wondered at the curious ways of the gentry; one never knew where to have them.

The church was packed for the wedding. Only the seats on one side of the central aisle had been reserved for the guests; by special request of the bride, the other side was kept for the villagers, first come, first served, with no distinctions whatsoever. Mrs. Comley was there, with Ernie, all new suit and hair-oil. Mrs. Birkin came a full hour and a half before the service, and secured a corner seat next the aisle from which wild horses could not have dragged her.

The priest had said his say, the organist was thundering the wedding-march, the wedding was over, and the bride, her veil thrown back from her radiant face, was coming down the aisle on her proud young husband's arm. Mrs. Birkin, tearful and exultant, stood in her place devouring the pretty spectacle with eager, kind old eyes. As the bride reached Mrs. Birkin's pew she stopped, slipped her hand from the bridegroom's arm, and turning, flung both her own, bouquet and all, round Mrs. Birkin's neck. She kissed the old woman before the whole church and whispered loudly in her ear: "Mrs. Birkin, dear, that's the most beautiful bonnet I ever saw."

In another moment she was gone. The last pair of bridesmaids had passed, and after them, visitors and villagers alike thronged into the sunshine. Mrs. Birkin, her bonnet much awry, owing to the heavy bridal bouquet, strayed out with the rest in a sort of solemn rapture. She had been honoured above all other women on that great day.

"Wot did 'er say to you?" asked Mrs. Comley, enviously, when they got outside.

Mrs. Birkin laughed. "Bless 'er sweet face!" she exclaimed triumphantly, "if her didn't go and think 't was a bran' new bonnet as I'd got on! I must 'a' made un over-smartish, that I must."