John Halifax, Gentleman

been less foolish and harmful than to most; and out of it, together with much drawn out of the stores of a memory, made preternaturally vivid by a long introverted lif

hese I shall not try to fill up, but merely resu

as one of my seasons of excessive pain; when I found it difficult to think of anything beyond those four grey-painted walls; where

njoy the world. I could hear the voice that, speaking to me, was always tender with pity—yet not pity enough to wound: I could see the peculiar smile just creeping round his grave mouth—that irrepressib

ever asked for me. At l

asn’t sure. Didn’t bother

ain, might he c

N

y sick room, often thinking, but never speaking, about the lad. Never once asking for him to co

el always riveted as long and as tightly as sh

y yard. I opened the window to hear him, though all the while in mortal fear of Jael. I listened, but caught no tone of her sharp voice, which usually came painfully from the back regions of the house; it would ill have harmo

ountry.” It turned out to be the cloak of a well-to-do young farmer’s wife riding to market in her cart beside her jolly-looking spouse. Very spruce and self-satisfied she a

et-cloak turned up her nose. “Oh, pride, pride!” I thought, amused, and watched the two carts, the second of which was with difficulty passing the farmer’s, on the opposite side of the n

air. Also, alas! I knew the cart with relics of departed sheep dangling

ght at the red cloak, and required a steady hand. Very steady the boy’s hand

d drenchings; this had been a wet autumn, Jael had told me. Poor John!—well might he look gratefully up at the clear blue sky today; ay, and the

her or no he would notice me. He did not at first, being busy over his horse; until, just as the notion flashed

nod, then all at once his manner changed; he took off

knew his own position, and wished neither to ignore nor to alter it; all advances between us must ev

n! J

so glad you’re

n my terror of Jael. What could she say? even though she held nominally the Friends’ doctrine—obeyed in the letter at least, ‘Call no man your master’—what wo

d opened the door. “

of the steps, with the reins

here; never

ortably under a tree, and gave him in charge to a small boy. Then he bound

bed yesterday.” (Then he HAD been inquiring for me!)

id, looking up at the s

se go

’ll com

it was the first time in my life I ever knew the meaning of that rare thing, tenderness. A quality different from kindliness, affectionateness, or benevolence; a quality which can ex

ore. But one look of his expressed as much as ha

ohn? How do you like the

“Everybody must like what brings them their daily bread. It’s a g

the contrast involuntarily struck us both with the truth—good for both to

d to see you, John. Co

at minute, through the open hall-door, I perce

time. The avalanche of ill-words I knew must fall

w well you can drive. There—good-bye, for

ade a face as if he did not quite revel

see you there t

ighted surprise. “But yo

ear myself actually using that p

recollection. I only remember that it did not frighten and grieve me as such attacks used to do; that, in her own vernacular, it all “went in at one ear, and out at t’

ed itself on my mind; thinking of Jonathan, as he walked “by the stone Ezel,” with the shepherd-lad, who was to be king of Israel. I wondered whether he woul

markably conversible over our meal—though, as usual, his conversation had a sternly moral tone, adapted to the improvement of what he persisted in considering my “infant” mind. It had

fear.) “For, this child—I remember her father well, for he lived at Kingswell here; he was violent too, and much given t

g!” said I

not half broken yet. Thomas Jessop

upon her. Poor little lady! how sorry I was. I knew John would be so infinitely sorry too—and all to no purpose—that I determined not to tell him anything about it. The

dinner at the same time and table as ourselves, but “below the salt,”

, my

with thee to the tan-

ng row of chairs, and resanding the broad centre Sahara of the room t

lad’s just out of his b

nswer. “So, Phineas, thee art r

ilt take m

last request of my mother, rigidly observed by her husband. The more so, people said, as while she lived they had not been quite happy together. But

and prognostications, by a resolute “Get the lad ready to go”)—“Phineas, my son, I rejoice to see thy

my father’s trade. I held the tan-yard in abhorrence—to enter it made me ill for days; sometimes for months and months I never went near it. T

ng through Norton Bury streets in our old way, my father marching along in his grave fashion, I steering my little carriage, and keeping as close as I could bes

d remarkable” place: and I myself have sometimes admired its quaint, overhanging, ornamented house-fronts—blackened, and wonderfully old. But one rarely notices what has been familiar throughout life; and now I was less struck by the beauty of the picturesque old town than by the muddiness of its pat

npleasant barky smell; at other times borne in horrible wafts, as if from a lately forsaken battle-field. I wondere

yet he found time to stop now and then, and administered a wisp of sweet hay to the old blind mare, as she we

see us. I asked my father, in a

m that I know of. Dost thee want him to wheel thee about

father walked on to some pits where he told me he was trying an important experiment,

I wan

the bark-heap, and came r

can do for

if I say ‘John,’ why d

and—his was all gri

hamed to shake

ense,

ulness of demeanour towards me, yet it was more the natural deference of the younger to the elder, of the stro

h a slender network of pathways thrown between—until we reached the lower end o

you liked to get out of the carriage I

Lying thus, with my hat over my eyes, just distinguishing the shiny glimmer of the Avon running below, and beyond that the green, level Ham, dotted with cows, m

omfortable

would come and

t I

if he often patronised the bark-heap,

ed, smiling; “it is

easant to liv

ns. Does it always

uest of autumn skies, though in the distan

Severn; and it is sure to rain at nightfall. I sha

shook his head. “You ought; it must be dre

Shall I fetch—but I haven’t anything

infinitely light and tender w

nner much since I saw you. Have you been

ss, once for all; the useless topic, that from my birth I had been puny and diseased; that my

troubled look. “I am very content; I have a quiet home, a good father, and

trary in him, as I think we almost always do like in another those peculiarities which are most different from our own. Therefore I was neither vexed nor hurt because the lad was slow to perceive all that he had so soon become, and all that I meant him to become, to me. I knew from every tone of his voice, every chance expression of his honest eyes, that he was on

characteristics in a boy of fourteen; and possibly in thus writing of him I may unwitt

had enough of me; how goes the world with you? Hav

th his hands in his pockets,

n, please, John. I want

, I hate th

n, and by kicking a small heap of tan righ

ter fellow than I has got used to many a worse thing. It’s wicked to hate what wins one’s bread, a

se lad of you

m worse than I am; and especially that I’m not thankful to your good father for giving me a lift

ery confidently. “But you seem to have thou

s bark-heap—faster than indoors. I often wish I could read—that is, read easily. As it is, I hav

ion, you succeeded to your master’s bus

ne, that whatever a man may be, his trade does not make him—he makes his trade. That is—but I know I can’t put the subject clear, for I have not got

ed firmly, no easy feat on the shifting bark-heap, his head erect, and his mouth close,

just now the lad that drives your father’s cart, and works in your father’s

arily recalled the Greek Testament and “Guy Halifax, Gentleman.” However, that could be no matter to me, or to him either, now. The l

I was very loth to part with my friend. Sud

o you

where do you take yo

he road, where there’s lots of blackberries by way of pudding—which is grand! Supper, when I do get it, I

lodging, then? Wh

le. “To tell the truth—anywh

out-of-

st

the very lowest ebb of human misery: so degrading, too—

you—why do you—

in spite of anybody. “Look here. I get three shillings a week, which is about fivepence a day; out of that I eat threepence—I’m a big, growing lad, and it’s hard to be hungry. There’s twopence left to pay for lodging. I tried it onc

, J

ble it is to sleep out of doors; and so nice to wake in the m

’t it ve

dormouse, wrapped in this rug, which one of the men gave me. Besides, every morni

et there with all his hardships, he stood before m

e so light of, could not go on. “W

ws,” he answered, perceiving not how apposite his illustration was. For truly he s

made him thoughtful; he re

ember the woman who spoke so shar

anything which happened tha

trouble has sharpened her temper. Her biggest boy Bill, who

slow in putting forth my plans—that is, as

r; and I dare say, if you’ll let me speak to her, you might have Bill’s atti

hineas.” He said no more words than

me to Sally Watkins. My father was not to be seen; but I ventured to leave word for him that I was gone home, and had taken John

I had imagined; but I remembered what agonies of cleanliness h

ossed the poor mother’s heart—she could do nothing but weep over him, and curse “Bonyparty.” Her mind was so full of this that she apparently failed to recognise in the decent young workman, John Ha

s room. I knew I could trust Sally, whom I was glad enough to help, poor woman! She promised to make him

r fine, strapping lad should sleep in Bill’s bed, and be

resemblance, and indeed half

turn now and then about the kit

aid John Halif

ing a mere sacking stuffed with hay—a blanket below, and another at top; I had to beg from Jael the only pair of sheets John owned for a long time.

s happy as a king. Only

f meadow and woodland as far as you could see; on the other, the broad Ham, the glittering curve of Severn, and the distant country, sloping up into “the blue bills far away.” A picture, which in its ince

aid I, when I had silently watched h

ried in hearty delight. And my

ing down upon the roof made it like a furnace, or the snow on the leads drifted so high as to obscure the window—yet