Chapter VII: Sir William Penn

BESSIE WESTLAND went back, feeling that, after all, the work she had felt disposed to despise at first might be as needful for the help and growth of the Society of Friends as preaching itself. Certainly if their friends in prison were to be supported by those outside, someone must work for their daily bread, and the thought that in this way she could be of real service to her own mother and father was a great comfort to the girl.

She had been to Bridewell to see her mother, and to Newgate to see her father, and she knew how both were looking forward to meeting her and the little ones in some colony across the sea; but how this was to be accomplished Bessie did not know, and it seemed altogether too good to expect that there would be a place where Quakers could live unmolested this side of heaven.

But as she reached the door she resolved to do what she could in the present, leaving the future in God's hands, for she could do nothing beyond helping to make hats as diligently as she could.

That Dame Drayton was ill and unable to take any share in the management of her husband's business, was soon known throughout the little Quaker community in London, and before night a man was found able and willing to supply the place of Master Drayton in finishing and superintending the work of the apprentices, for they had not forsaken the work, as it was anticipated they would do. It spoke volumes for the love they bore their master and his family, that they were willing to continue in the service of a man who henceforth would be branded as a Quaker, and Deborah was not slow to recognise this.

She resolved to keep the household going as nearly as possible in the way she knew her mistress would desire it should be done, and with Audrey in the sick chamber to look after the invalid, she could do the baking and boiling and attend to the housework. So before night the household had settled down to its new condition, and no one was more diligent than Bessie Westland in doing with all her might the lowly work she had suddenly found to be honourable, even among those who esteemed the work of the Lord to be the highest duty of a Quaker.

There was no formal gathering at the dinner table that day, but Deborah carried the apprentices a huge piece of pasty to the workshop, while Bessie ate her dinner in the kitchen with the children.

But when the day's work was over, Dame Drayton insisted that Audrey should go downstairs and tell Bessie and the children that she was better, and hoped to be up and among them the next day.

Supper had been laid in the keeping-room, and Deborah took her usual seat, and the children gathered to theirs; but they were more sad and subdued than at dinner time, for now mother and father were missed more as they looked at their vacant chairs. It must be confessed that the sight of Bessie Westland was not very pleasant to Audrey, for she regarded her as being the cause of the trouble that had befallen her uncle and aunt, and so she studiously looked away from where she was sitting, and devoted all her attention to her cousins.

But when it grew dusk, and Deborah came to put the children to bed, bringing a message from her mistress that she thought she might sleep if she was left alone, Audrey could not easily escape from the companionship of Bessie; and so, after sitting silent for some time listening to the distant sounds of carts and waggons that rarely came down Soper Lane so late as this, she suddenly said—

"How long have you been a Quaker, Mistress Westland?"

"Nay, I am but Friend Bessie," replied the other girl quickly. "We are a plain people, and use but plain speech. My father belonged to the Society of Friends many years; how many I know not, but I can remember a time when he was wild and often unkind to my mother, though that was before he heard our leader Fox preach."

"But what do Quakers believe? My nurse told me the other day that they were atheists, and did not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ," said Audrey, drawing her chair a little closer to Bessie's in the dimly-lighted room.

"Many have slandered us thus, not knowing aught concerning us," replied Bessie in an eager tone, for somehow, although this girl was in the world and partook of its ways, Bessie felt drawn towards her; and so she added, "We believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who came down from heaven to die for us. We believe, too, that the life He gave for us must be in us, or we can never be saved."

"Then you believe as we do, that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin?" interrupted Audrey, who was anxious to find out some points of agreement between her own faith and that of the Quakers, since her beloved aunt was a Quaker.

"Yes, perhaps that is it," answered Bessie slowly. "Only we say that Christ must be the inner life of every man, and that this life we must be careful to cultivate, in order to be saved from darkness and evil."

"But—but if you believe all that, why should you not come to church as I do?" said Audrey eagerly. "It is what my father teaches in his sermons. Won't you go with me on Sunday and hear him preach?" asked Audrey eagerly.

"Go to a steeple-house!" exclaimed Bessie, in a tone of horror. "Nay, verily, for my father would curse me, an he thought I had forgotten what he had taught me."

"You call a church a steeple-house, and think it such a dreadful place," said Audrey, in a tone of wondering amazement. "Why should you speak of it in this way? It is God's house."

But Bessie shook her head to this. "Nay, nay, it cannot be that," she said decidedly. "Only we who have the life of Christ within us can be the house of God. Your steeple-house, with its forms and ceremonies, makes men forget this true life within them. This light that God only can put into the soul of man can alone be a house of God. That is why my father hated steeple-houses, because they made men forget God, he said."

But Audrey shook her head.

"Thou art quite mistaken, Bessie," she said. "It is a help to me to go to church and join in the prayers. I can understand what you mean, I think; and it may be that some do think only of the church, and not of God or our Lord Jesus Christ, when they are there, but they might do the same in your Quaker meeting-house as well as at church."

"But there is nothing at our meeting-house to make us forget we go to listen to the voice of the Spirit, either in ourselves or spoken by the mouth of one of our brethren, as he is moved to speak at the time, either for our warning or our encouragement. We have no words written down in a book to be repeated over and over again, whether we like them or not. Nay, verily; such things are not for Quakers, who have learned the power of sin, and the power of God also!"

The girl spoke in such fierce scorn that Audrey felt rather displeased, and angry words trembled upon her lips; but she remembered the talk she had had with her aunt that afternoon, and she kept them back, for she really wanted to find out more than she knew about these people, and why they were so hated and despised.

"Then it is our churches you dislike so much?" she said at last, after a long pause.

"Your churches, your world, and your sin and wickedness, which are all tangled up together, hiding the light—the true light—that God would put into every man, if he did not smother it with this tangle of corruption."

"Nay, but, Bessie, the church is not the evil thing you think it. Is not my aunt a good woman? and she goes to church sometimes, as well as to your meeting-house."

"Martha Drayton is a right worthy woman; but, verily, she is a stumbling-block unto many, because she goeth to this house of Baal," said the little Quakeress fiercely; and Audrey saw that it was of little use arguing with her further, for, however they might agree in the more essential points of their religious faith, the outer forms of it they were never likely to appreciate truly, or the position of the other. Audrey might be a little more tolerant, but she was no less sincerely attached to the forms and ceremonies of the Established Church than Bessie, taught by her father to hate all such forms, was in her determination to see no good in anything but the simple meeting-house.

If the girls would have continued their discussion they could not, for they had scarcely spoken the last words when Deborah opened the door, and ushered in a tall dignified young man and the old Quaker whom Bessie had been to see earlier in the day.

"This is Friend William Penn," said the old man. "He hath come to make inquiries concerning Martha Drayton, for he hath heard that she is sorely stricken with grief and sickness at this time."

"My aunt is a little better now," said Audrey, wondering why Quakers would insist upon hurting the feelings of other people in their manner of speech. Why should this stranger call her dear aunt "Martha Drayton," instead of by her proper title?

The younger visitor seemed to understand something of what was passing in her mind, for he said in a courteous tone, noticing her dress—

"The Quakers are a plain folk and prefer plain speech. It may seem of small moment, and one that were better yielded than contended for; but we declare that this giving of titles and terms of respect that ofttimes we feel not for the person so addressed, is a device of the father of lies to sear the consciences of men, that their sense of truth may be blunted, and they more easily fall a victim to his wiles."

"Ay, friend, thou hast withstood even the king in the matter of giving empty titles," said the old man with a keen relish.

"I refused to remove my hat in the presence of the king, or the Duke of York, his brother; but it was a sore grief and pain to me, because the admiral, my father, saw in it so much of disrespect and want of loyalty that it well-nigh broke his heart, and he banished me from my home because of it."

"Ay, thou hast suffered for the truth, friend," said the old man, lifting his hat for a moment to scratch his bald head, but carefully replacing it again as he turned to Bessie and said, "William Penn hath good hope that he may be able to help thy mother and father, and thee also. Thy father is still in Newgate, and is like to stay there until a convict ship is sent out to the plantations in the spring. Should it carry many Quakers, Friend Penn or some other trusty man will go by another ship that will sail faster, so as to reach the port before the convict vessel, and there buy each Friend that is offered for sale. He is already in treaty with the king for a tract of country where a colony could be established, far enough from any other settlement to secure to us the right of worshipping God according to the guidance of the inner light, without let or hindrance from any man."

Bessie's eyes slowly filled with tears of joy at the anticipation, and she clasped her hands as she said fervently—

"It will be as the kingdom of heaven come down to earth, an the Friends may serve God and live as they desire."

"Nay, nay, I am not so sure of that," said Sir William Penn with a smile. "We are not perfect, although we are striving to learn the way of perfection as the inner light guides us. Still, for thee and thine it will be a blessed change, for ye have been so harried and tormented for the truth's sake, that to be able to abide in peace will seem as heaven to thee at first."

"Nay, not at first only," said Bessie with trembling earnestness; "think what it will be to dwell with my mother and father again, to comfort them for all the woes they have endured at this time of sore affliction and travail."

"Ay, and thou hast earned the right to comfort thy mother and father," said the old man, "for thou hast done what thou couldest for those who befriended thee in thy time of trouble. If thou hadst been content to idly bemoan thy lot instead of doing that which lay nearest to thine hand, the burden upon our Society at this time would have been almost greater than could be borne. But now thou canst do so much to the finishing of the hats that there is little fear Friend Drayton's business will fail to bear all the expense of the family, the charges he may be at for gaolers' fees and what not, while he is in prison. Thou art a right worthy daughter of a brave father," concluded the old man; and then he related to Sir William what he had heard from the workman who had undertaken to manage the hatter's business during his absence.

Audrey had heard nothing of this, and indeed had scarcely thought of how her aunt and the household were to be kept during the next six months; but her heart warmed to the girl who, in the midst of her own grief and trouble, could yet turn to labour—little as she could have liked it at first—with such good purpose, that in a few weeks she could make herself so useful in it as to be able to materially lessen the expenditure for skilled help, and by her example keep to their posts of duty those who, but for her, might have forsaken them at a time when it would be almost impossible to supply their places from outside.

Audrey learned all this from the talk of the two visitors, as they sat discussing whether they, as a Society, should undertake the direction and control of the household until Dame Drayton was able to get about, or whether, seeing Bessie was so effective a helper in the workroom and Deborah in the house, things should be left in their hands for the present.

To Audrey it was the greatest surprise possible, for by this time she had learned that one of their visitors was rich and able to live in the highest rank of society, and yet he was willing to concern himself in her uncle's affairs with the same sort of interest as a brother might be expected to do. He promised to go and see him in prison the next day, and arrange for his comfort there as far as possible.

"Everyone knows I am a Quaker now," said the gentleman; "but for one of our brethren to go would inevitably draw upon him the notice of the authorities, and there would soon be another for us to keep in Newgate or Bridewell. It will be a great comfort for our brother Drayton to hear that he is not chargeable to the Society during his imprisonment. Truly the Lord hath blessed him in his deed, for in taking these children he hath brought a blessing to his household. Doubtless the Lord hath spoken by him to me concerning the manner He would have me use that which He hath given me, for of all the plans that hath been devised, this for the founding of a new Quaker colony across the seas cloth commend itself to me as the wisest and most useful."

"Verily, it was through these children that the Spirit gave him that wisdom," said the old man. "He hath come to me sometimes, and told me how sorely his heart ached for the little ones, and how hopeless it seemed that they could ever dwell together again. It would cost Westland years of labour even to send for his wife, and he could never hope to be able to pay for all his children to go to the plantations to him. Yet it was the only earthly hope our martyr-brother cherished, and each time that Friend Drayton went to see him, his talk would be of the home he would make for his wife and children across the seas."

"Yea, and verily his hopes shall be fulfilled," said Sir William fervently. "We will have a free colony where no man shall dare to say, 'Ye cannot serve God after this fashion,' but where we may lift up our voices in prayer and praise, none daring to make us afraid."

Audrey thought that such a place might be a little heaven below to some people, but she was not so sure that Bessie's father would be happy there, for if there were only Quakers to live in the colony, there would be no scope for his preaching-power, and he would have to do as Bessie had done, turn the energy to a more practical account; and the fervour once displayed in preaching to sinners who would not hear, might be used in some way for the help and development of the Friends dependent upon each other for all the comfort and joy of life.

But seeing what Bessie had done in the way of practical work that lay nearest to her hand, there was little doubt but that her father would do the same; for some such thoughts as these had arisen in the mind of Sir William Penn when the plan was first proposed to him, and that was why he felt so much pleasure in hearing about Bessie and the homely work she had undertaken. Out there in his new colony there would be plenty of homely work for everyone who would do it, and those who could not stoop to that would be of little use to themselves or others, and therefore had better stay in England until they were wiser, or the king grew tired of fining and imprisoning Quakers. This was not likely to happen very soon, seeing that these people were a convenient scapegoat for the gradual curtailment of civil and religious liberty, which was slowly but surely being effected now in the new laws that were made and put into force so rigorously.