Chapter THE TENTH: First Antagonism (6)

Mr. Aspinall, the Cannon Street cotton-merchant (who dined with the Scramble Club, instituted by business men whose homes were in the suburbs), was likewise a shareholder in the Portico; and from constant meeting at the long tables within the book-shelved, galleried walls of its lofty reading-room, he and Mr. Ashton had a tolerably lengthy acquaintance, although it had never ripened into intimacy—the men were so dissimilar.

Charlotte Walmsley was naturally troubled by the result of Madame Broadbent’s notions of discipline, and not unnaturally (considering the condition in which Ben Travis had taken him home) blamed her husband as the primary cause. As naturally he shifted the onus to the shoulders of Laurence Aspinall, and, taking him to task, plainly told him he ought to apologise. Laurence snatched at the proposal.

“My dear Jack, nothing would please me better! I’ll make a thousand apologies, if you’ll only introduce me.”

John Walmsley had had quite enough of introductions; besides, he stood in some awe of Mrs. Ashton, and did not know how she might take it, especially as his friend Aspinall had acquired the character of “a wild spark.” He emphatically declined. But if Laurence Aspinall once set his mind on a thing he would attain it, if within the range of possibility, whether by fair means or foul, whatever might be the consequences.

For a few days he was on his best behaviour at home; and having won his father over by expressions of deep contrition, and promises of reformation, and the assurance that he would never again do anything “unbecoming a gentleman,” he prevailed on him to introduce him to Mr. Ashton, with a view to making his own apologies in person.

“Well, Laurence, you can go with me to the Portico tomorrow morning, and if Mr. Ashton is there we will see what can be done;” the tone in which this was said clearly implying, “If _we_ seek an introduction to the Ashton’s for the purpose of making the _amende honorable_ as befits gentlemen, there can be no doubt of its acceptance.”

But when they met Mr. Ashton on the steps of the Portico the following morning, the self-complacence of the lofty gentleman received a slight but uncontemplated check. Mr. Ashton nodded to Mr. Aspinall with a beaming face, and would have passed his acquaintance with a mere “Good morning,” but the other stopped, and after shaking hands, and remarking that trade was slack, presented, with due formality, the handsome, elegant six feet of dandyism who bore him company.

“Mr. Ashton, let me make you acquainted with my son, sir—Mr. Ashton, my son Laurence; Laurence, Mr. Ashton.”

The young gentleman raised his stylish beaver from his rich coppery curls, and bowed with courtly grace in acknowledgment of Mr. Ashton’s formal bow, whilst his father continued, almost in the tone of one who confers an honour—

“The fact is, my son, sir, desires an opportunity of expressing to Miss Ashton his deep regret for the indiscretion of which he was guilty in the lobby of the Theatre Royal, some ten days back.”

The smile faded from the face of Mr. Ashton, who, with a reserve very foreign to him, put his hand into his pocket for his snuff-box instead of extending it to the young man, and, tapping it with a little impatience, caught at his words.

“Indiscretion, sir? What you are pleased to call ‘indiscretion’ has placed my daughter in the doctors’ hands with a broken collar-bone.”

Before Mr. Aspinall could reply, Laurence, better skilled to temporise, interposed.

“So, to my infinite regret, my friend Mr. Walmsley has already informed me, sir. And I assure you I take shame to myself that any word or action of mine should have led to consequences so lamentable. No one, sir, can deplore the injury Miss Ashton has sustained, more than myself—the unhappy cause. It is this, Mr. Ashton, which impels me to seek an opportunity to express the sensibility of my grave offence, and my extreme regret, to Mrs. Ashton and Miss Ashton in person. I cannot rest until I have implored their pardon!”

The tones in which this apologetic speech was delivered were at once so suave, remorseful, and sympathetic that Mr. Ashton, whose sternness was seldom of long duration, was considerably mollified. He looked at the handsome, dashing blade before him, whose blue eyes seemed full of gentleness and pity, and felt as though the boy he had seen torturing old Brookes, and the yeomanry officer who had slashed at Mr. Chadwick and Jabez Clegg, could never be one and the same. He reverted to the latter circumstance—

“I think, young sir, you owe an apology to someone else under my roof—the young man who received the sabre-cut you designed for my brother-in-law, Mr. Chadwick.”

Aspinall’s handsome face flushed. His father’s quick reply gave him time to think.

“You surely, Mr. Ashton, would not expect _my_ son to apologise to an apprentice-lad, a mere College-boy.”

“Just so! I would expect him to apologise to _anyone_ he had injured, were it a beggar!”

Here the son interposed: “My good sir, do not remind me of the horrors of that dreadful day! I shudder when I recall it. We acted under orders, and I swear I was utterly unconscious and irresponsible for my actions throughout the whole affray.”

And Laurence seemed desirous to wash his hands of the responsibility.

“The fact is,” said Mr. Aspinall, coming to his son’s rescue, “Laurence had taken more wine than his young head would stand on both occasions. It takes years to season a cask, you know, Mr. Ashton, and we must not be too hard on young fellows, if they slip sometimes. We have all had some wild oats to sow.”

This was a platitude of the period, but Mr. Ashton’s “Just so!” was not a cordial assent; and Laurence, fearing the conversation was taking an unfortunate turn, led it back to its original request. But Mr. Ashton tapped his box, and, offering it to his interlocutors, took a pinch himself, and then a second, before he came to a decision. It was evidently a debatable question.

“I will mention your request to Mrs. Ashton, young gentleman, and if I find her agreeable to receive you, I can take you across with me to-morrow morning, provided you meet me here. Good day.”

Mr. Aspinall’s “Good day” was somewhat stiff. He had held his head very high all his life, metaphorically as well as physically, and was not disposed to be snubbed by one whose status he considered scarcely on a par with his own. He was disposed to look on his son’s peccadilloes as some of those “wild oats” which young gentlemen of spirit were expected to sow, and considered his fine figure and beautiful features, his education, accomplishments, and prospects, passports to any society; and that Mr. Ashton should for one moment hesitate to open his heart and his doors to _his_ son, was an indignity not to be borne.

“The fact is, Laurence, that, if you make an apology to those people after this, you have less spirit than I take you to have!” was his conclusion.

“Never you mind, father, I know what I’m about. I want to get my foot in there,” answered subtle Laurence. And he managed it.

Mr. Ashton went home to dinner full of his conversation on the Portico steps, and set his romantic daughter’s heart in a flutter by mooting the point at issue in her presence.

“Oh, papa! do bring him; I want to see him again, he is so handsome!”

“‘Handsome is that handsome does,’ Augusta,” was Mrs. Ashton’s commentary on that young lady’s impulsive exclamation.

“Charlotte says he is very wild,” remarked Ellen, “and I feel as if I should shudder at the sight of him, after his conduct at Peterloo.”

“You don’t shudder when Captain Travis calls, and you don’t shut the door in John Walmsley’s face, and they may have done things just as bad, if you did but know it, Ellen,” retorted Augusta, standing on the defensive for the absent “Adonis.”

“Just so, my dear, so they might,” admitted Mr. Ashton, whilst Ellen held her peace, silenced by something in her cousin’s retort.

“Yes, William, but look on the poor bandaged neck and shoulders of our child, and think of that ruffian’s cruelty to Jabez and others when a schoolboy. I don’t think either John Walmsley or Mr. Travis could have done anything so bad.”

“Well, but, mamma,” argued spoiled Augusta, “Jabez forgave him; and I think Madame Broadbent is more to blame than Mr. Aspinall—he only offered to bring me home.”

Mrs. Ashton shook her head as she rose from table.

“Besides, mamma, he says he only wants to apologise, and you know you need not invite him again unless you like. It would be so rude to refuse.”

“Just so, just so,” assented Mr. Ashton, willing to humour his pet in her invalid state, “and perhaps it might do the young fellow good to see the consequences of his folly.”

As usual, where Augusta enlisted her father on her side, Mrs. Ashton’s dissent grew feebler.

The next day Mr. Ashton made at least _one_ false step in his life, and brought over his own threshold a blight.

Faultless were the curves of the stylish hat, faultless the fit of pantaloons, and coat, and Hessian boots, and York-tan gloves; graceful the figure they adorned; graceful the apology tendered so adroitly—more to the mother than to the daughter—but if ever a graceless good-for-nothing cast a shadow on a good man’s hearth, it was the wolf in sheep’s clothing whose hungry jaws were watering for the pet lamb of the fold, and who made so courtly an exit full in the sight of Jabez, as he crossed the end of the hall to his solitary dinner in his own room.

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH.

MANHOOD.

Young as he was, Laurence Aspinall was wont to say he “wouldn’t give a fig for any man who could not be anything in any society; and the Laurence Aspinall of the cock-pit, the ring, and the bar-parlour, was a very different being from the Laurence Aspinall of the Assembly or drawing-room. He could be a blackguard amongst blackguards, a gentleman amongst ladies.”

Nature had done much for him, art had done more. Nature had given him at twenty-one a symmetrical figure, and art an easy carriage. Nature had given him the clear pink-and-white complexion which so often accompanies ruddy hair, and art had trained his early growth of whisker to counteract effeminacy of skin. Nature had given him a lofty forehead, art had clustered his bronze curls so as to hide how much that brow receded. Nature had given an aquiline nose, eyes of purest azure, flexile lips with curves like Cupid’s bow; and art had taught that eyes set so close, whose hue was so apt to change as temper swayed him, and lips so cruelly thin, might be tutored to obey volition, and contradict themselves, if so their owner willed. To crown all, nature had gifted him with a flexible voice, and art had set it to music.

The Liverpool schoolmaster had obeyed Mr. Aspinall’s instructions to the letter; all that education and accomplishments could do to polish and refine the physical man into the gentleman, as the word was then understood, had been done for him; but under the stucco was the rough brickwork Bob the groom had heaped together, and which no trained or loving hand had removed.

Be sure Laurence Aspinall did not carry this analysis into society, written on his forehead. Instead, he had cultivated the art of fascination; and in the brief space occupied by this apologetic introductory visit in Mosley Street he not only contrived to dazzle the romance-beclouded eyes of Augusta, but, what was almost as much to his purpose, to win over Mr. Ashton, and to weaken the prejudice of Miss Augusta’s less pliant mamma. Ellen Chadwick was the only one on whom he made no impression, the only one who retained a previous opinion—confirmed. Possibly, as Charlotte Walmsley’s sister she knew something of his life below the surface, and had imbibed that sister’s notion that he “led John Walmsley away.” Possibly, too, as Charles Chadwick’s daughter, she contrasted the silken speech of the drawing-room dandy with the hectoring, sword-in-hand, yeomanry cavalry lieutenant who, in striking at her father, had wounded Jabez his deliverer instead.

At all events, she met the enthusiastic admiration of Augusta after his departure, the gratified encomiums of her uncle, and the more subdued approbation of her aunt, with the unvarying expression, “He would have murdered my dear father but for Jabez Clegg, and Mr. Clegg is worth a hundred of him.”

Mr. Laurence knew better than to presume on that introduction all at once. From their gardens and greenhouses at Ardwick and Fallowfield, he sent small baskets of early flowers and fruit to Mrs. Ashton, for her daughter, with courteous inquiries; but he allowed several days to elapse before he presented himself in person, and then his call was of the briefest.

He knew he had prejudice to overcome, and worked his way gradually. Meanwhile Augusta progressed favourably; and if Aspinall grew in favour with the family, so did Jabez.

May, sweet-scented month of promise, brought to Jabez Clegg in 1820 his natural and legal heritage—manhood and manhood’s freedom. He was no longer an apprentice bound to a master by the will of others. He had a right to think and act for himself, subject only to the laws of God and of the realm. True, that free agency brought with it a train of responsibilities, but the new _man_ was not the one to overlook or ignore the fact. He had thought long and keenly of the coming change, and all it might involve, months before it came.

His fixed wages as an indoor apprentice, according to indenture, were no great matter; but, supplemented by coin he extracted from his paint-box after business hours, he had found a margin for saving, besides contributing to the humble wants of his early fosterers. The latter duty he had never neglected, but Simon was as sternly just as the lad had been gratefully generous, and, even when poverty bit the hardest, would never accept the whole of his earnings.

“Si thi, Jabez, if thah dunnot keep summat fur thisel’ to put by fur a nest-egg, thah’ll ne’er see the good o’ thi own earnin’s, an’ thah’ll lose heart in toime,” the old tanner had been wont to say, when sturdily limiting the extent to which his foster-son should open his small purse.

So Jabez, leading a steady, industrious life, spending little on personal gratification, save what he invested in books, had quite a little store laid by—the result of very small savings—against the time when he might have to shift for himself. Two things had troubled him—the possibility of having to find a situation elsewhere, Mr. Ashton having said no word of retaining him, though, on the contrary, he had said nothing of his removal; and the necessity for quitting the house which had been to him a home so long that even the grumbling cook and the affectionate dog had welded themselves into his daily life, how much more the kind master and mistress, and that beatific vision, their beautiful, bewitching daughter, who had held him in vassalage from the very day of his apprenticeship, and tyrannised over him as only a wayward, spoiled beauty—child or woman—could.

The bright morning of the fifth of May set this at rest. He was called into the inner counting-house, and passed the high stools of inquisitive-eyed, quill-driving clerks with a palpitating heart, conscious how much depended on the issue of that interview.

As he opened the curtained glass door, to his surprise he found himself confronted by not only Mr. Ashton, but Mr. Chadwick, and Simon Clegg, who had been brought from Whaley-Bridge for the occasion.

Business men, as a rule, are not demonstrative over business, and after the first salutations and surprised greetings, the congratulations of the day were soon said, and the stereotyped “And now to business” put sentiment to flight. And yet not entirely so, as will be seen.

There was nothing luxurious in that counting-house of the past. Besides the high desk and stool, it contained an oilcloth-topped hexagon table, with a deep rim of partitioned drawers, three wooden chairs, a sort of fire-guard fender, and a poker; but there was neither carpet nor oil-cloth on the floor, and the walls had but a dim recollection of paint.

Mr. Ashton, snuff-box in hand, occupied one of these chairs; Mr. Chadwick, resting hands and chin on a stout walking-stick, another; the third, a little apart, had been assigned to old Simon (now on the shady side of seventy). Jabez remained standing.

Mr. Ashton, as was his manner, tapping his fingers on his snuff-box lid whilst he spoke, opened fire, “No doubt, Jabez, you have been expecting me to say something respecting your prospects and position when your indentures are given up?”

“Well, sir,” answered Jabez with a frank smile, “I believe I have.”

“Just so! I knew you would. It was but likely. And I should have spoken to you some time since, but for brother Chadwick here. Both Mrs. Ashton and myself have watched your conduct and progress, during the whole term of your apprenticeship, with entire satisfaction.”

Here a pinch of snuff emphasised the sentence, and both Simon and Jabez felt their cheeks begin to glow.

“You have been unusually steady and persevering—have not been merely obedient, but obliging, and your rectitude does full credit to the ‘honourable’ name Parson Brookes gave to you.”

This was quite a long speech for Mr. Ashton; he paused to take breath; and old Simon, proud of the young man as if he had been his own son, feeling the encomium as some sort of halo round his own grey head, exclaimed—

“Aw’m downreet preawd to yer [hear] yo’ say it, sir. It’ll mak’ ar Bess’s heart leap wi’ joy.”

But Jabez, blushing, half ashamed of hearing his own praises rung out as from a belfry, could only stammer forth—

“I’ve endeavoured to do my duty, that is all, sir.”

“A—ll!” interjected Mr. Chadwick, in his imperfect speech, “Nelson sa—said du—u—ty was all Engla—and expected of ev—ev’ry man, but it w—won the b—battle of Tr—Trafalgar!”

“Duty wins the battle of life, brother,” put in Mrs. Ashton, who had quietly entered the counting-house by the door behind Jabez.

“Just so, just so!” assented Mr. Ashton, as he rose and handed his chair to the lady whose stately presence seemed to fill the room; “and Jabez has only to continue doing his duty to win his battle of life, I take it. But to our business. You have hitherto served us well, Jabez, in the warehouse and out of it; you have been doubly useful to me as a designer and as a detector of the roguery and mismanagement of others. Then, to my daughter, who is far dearer than either warehouse or trade, you have rendered more than one service.”

“Oh, sir, do not name it, I beg. It has been my highest pleasure to serve Miss Ashton—or yourself,” Jabez exclaimed, the two last words rising to his lips simultaneously with the thought that his sudden outburst might fail of appreciation by Miss Ashton’s wealthy relatives.

“Just so! but I must name it, Jabez, as a reason for my proposal to retain you in my employ, and for assigning to you a situation and salary higher than is usually accorded to an apprentice just out of his time. But as you have shown stability and judgment beyond your years, and I know you to be honourable in _all_ respects, I feel I am justified in making the offer.”

Mr. Ashton then stated, with a little seasoning of snuff, the salary he proposed to give the young man, and the duties he required as an equivalent, if Jabez accepted his proposition.

The eyes of Jabez sparkled and his cheeks glowed. As for Simon, he seemed dumb with delight and astonishment at the good fortune of the foundling.

“IF!” cried Jabez, “there can be no ‘if,’ sir; you overpower me with an offer so far above my deserts. I accept it most gratefu——”

“Stay, Mr. Clegg,” interrupted Mrs. Ashton, as Mr. Chadwick raised his head from its rest on his hands and stick, and made an ineffectual effort to speak. “‘Think twice before you speak once,’ my bro——”

“Oh, madam! there is no need,” Jabez began, but she silenced him with a mere gesture of her raised hand; and Mrs. Ashton, acting as interpreter for her slow-tongued brother-in-law, resumed—

“You have done _us_ some services, Mr. Clegg, but ‘a man will give all he possesses for his life,’ and Mr. Chadwick feels that his debt to you is greater than ours.”

Jabez looked from one to another, bewildered.

Mr. Ashton took up the thread—“Just so! and that brings me to the point we have been driving at. You see, Jabez, Mr. Chadwick is not so capable of managing his business as he used to be; things go wrong he scarcely knows how, and he is desirous to bring some one into his warehouse on whom he can rely. He therefore offers to take you at a higher salary than I think at all suitable for so young a man, and if you prove your competence to take the management within a reasonable time, to give it over into your hands, and ultimately—it may be in a very few years—to give you a small partnership interest in the concern.”

It is difficult to say whether Jabez or Simon was the most completely stunned.

“You must not look on this altogether as a testimony to your business qualifications, Jabez, I think,” continued Mr. Ashton, “but as the outflow of a grateful heart, and the proposition of a man who had no son capable of keeping his trade together. Is not that so?”—turning to Mr. Chadwick.

“Cer—certainly!”

Jabez looked from one to another, then to Simon, but no help was forthcoming from that quarter.

Mrs. Ashton came to his relief: “I think, Mr. Clegg, you had better ‘look before you leap.’ Whatever decision you make will equally satisfy us. But I see you need time to consider. Suppose you consult your foster-father, and give Mr. Ashton your decision at the outcome-supper to-night.”

The hesitation of Jabez was only momentary. We are told that all the marvels and glories of Paradise were revealed to Mahomet before a single drop of water had time to flow from a pitcher overturned in his upward flight; and even whilst Mrs. Ashton spoke, Jabez had time to think.

“Thank you, madam,” said he, “but I need no deliberation. I know not for whose kindness to be most grateful; but I do know that I should be most ungrateful if I were to quit the master and mistress to whom both myself and my dear friends owe so very much, for the first tempting offer made to me. Mr. Chadwick overrates my service; Mr. Mabbott rendered quite as efficient aid; besides, I have no acquaintance with the manufacture of piece-goods, and have no right to take advantage of Mr. Chadwick’s extreme generosity, knowing my own disqualifications. And pardon my saying so—if Mr. Chadwick has no mercantile son, he may some day have a son-in-law better fitted in every way for the office and promise held out to me.—I trust, Mr. Chadwick, you will not consider me ungracious in declining your liberal offer, but indeed I have been trained to the small-ware manufacture, and here lies my duty, for here I feel I may be able to render something of a _quid pro quo_.”

Before anyone had time for reply, the Infirmary clock struck twelve; and as if simultaneously, there was a rush from the warehouse into the yard, an outcry and a din, as if Babel had broken loose, the sacred precincts of the counting house was invaded, and Jabez was carried off _vi et armis_.

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH.

ONCE IN A LIFE.

Customs change with the manners of the times, and as the apprentice is no longer the absolute bond-slave of his master, release from the seven years bondage is now seldom accompanied by the active and noisy demonstration which of old marked that epoch of a tradesman’s or an artisan’s career.

But, if the sudden uproar which chased quiet from the precincts of Mr. Ashton’s warehouse and manufactory when the Infirmary clock told noon, broke prematurely upon the conference in the counting-house, it was not unexpected. Every apprentice had been similarly greeted at the same period of his life. Until the clock proclaimed twelve, business routine had been undisturbed, but those twelve beats of the timekeeper’s hammer had been the signal for every apprentice and workman on the premises to rush pell-mell into the yard, each bearing with him some implement or symbol of his trade, anything which would clash or clang being preferred. Remnants of fringe, bed-lace, and carpet-binding, waved and fluttered like streamers from the hands of the women; umbrella sticks were flourished; strings of waste ferrules, brass wheels, brace-buckles, button and tassel-moulds, cops, and spindles were jingled and jangled together; tin cans were beaten with picking-rods, punches, hammers, leather stamps, and other tools, by apprentices and men; whilst Jabez himself, hoisted on the shoulders of the two smallware-weavers who had seized and borne him from his master’s presence, claiming him as one of their own body, a recognised lawful member of their craft, was paraded round and round that inner court-yard, with the crowd in extemporised procession, amid shouts, hurrahs, songs, and that peculiar instrumental accompaniment which was—noise, not—music.

The household servants had crowded to the scullery door, clerks stood aloof under the gateway, where Simon Clegg kept them company in an ecstasy of satisfaction; Mr. and Mrs. Ashton and Mr. Chadwick surveyed the proceedings from the counting house window, whilst even Ellen and Augusta were curious enough to look on from those back hall steps where they had once before received the hero of that scene, wounded, from a very different one.

More than six years had elapsed since the last indoor apprentice had been borne in triumph round that yard (Kit Townley’s indentures had been prematurely cancelled), and Jabez may be pardoned if he contrasted the two occasions, and construed the wilder excitement and enthusiasm of this in his own favour, when his employers and their daughter noticed it also.

“It is easy to tell what a favourite Jabez must be in the warehouse, by the uproar. The last outcome, I remember, was quite tame beside this.”

“Well, Augusta,” answered Ellen, “I believe he deserves it. I know my father thinks there is not such another young man as Mr. Clegg in all Manchester.”

“Yes, he’s very kind, and obliging, and clever, and perserving, and all that, and I like him very well; but then you know, Ellen, he is not a gentleman, and he is not handsome by any means,” responded Augusta, in quite a patronising tone.

Ellen looked grave.

“He is all that is good and noble, if he was not born a gentleman; and _I_ think him handsome. He has a frank, open, expressive countenance, and a good figure, and good manners, and what more would you have?”

Augusta turned her head sharply, and looked up archly in her cousin’s face.

“It’s well Captain Travis does not hear you, Ellen, or he might be jealous of the prentice-knight,” she said, banteringly.

Ellen coloured painfully.

“When shall I make you understand that Mr. Travis is nothing to me?” asked she.

“When my cousin makes me understand that she is nothing to Mr. Travis,” was the quick reply, as Jabez was being borne past for the last time, and the young ladies once more waved their handkerchiefs in salutation.

It may be very gratifying and very triumphant to be borne aloft on other men’s shoulders, but it is neither dignified, nor graceful, nor comfortable; and Jabez, being carried off bareheaded, had neither hat nor cap to wave in return. He made the best use of his right hand, his left being required to steady himself, yet I am afraid he was more desirous to make a good impression on the romantic young lady muffled in a shawl—to hide the swathing bandages—than on his less-attractive and elder champion by her side.

It was half-past twelve; the dinner-bell rang, Jabez was lowered to _terra firma_, and there was a general rush to the packing-room, which had been cleared out to receive tressels and planks for tables, and an abundant supply of cold meat, cheese, bread, and ale, provided by the master.

And then and there, before a mouthful was cut, Mr. Ashton, standing at the head of the table, with Mr. Chadwick by his side, and Simon Clegg close at hand, presented Jabez with his indentures, with many expressions of his good will and his good opinion, and an intimation to those assembled that Mr. Clegg would in all probability continue in his employ, an announcement which was received with loud acclaim: and the hungry operatives set to at the collation with right good will.

This was the master’s feast; that of the apprentice, for which it was customary to save up long in advance, was at night, and held at the neighbouring “Concert-Hall Tavern” in York Street, opposite to the then “Gentleman’s Concert-Hall.”

Prior to that, however, Mrs. Ashton had somewhat to say to the young man, and she chose his own sitting-room to say it in. Of course, his apprenticeship over, it behoved him to shift his quarters; and he had looked forward to his abdication with regret undreamed of by Mrs. Ashton, or she would certainly have hesitated ere she made the proposal she did.

As it was, she kindly and thoughtfully considered that Jabez had no good parental home to return to; that she had no other use for the rooms he occupied, so she proposed to him that he should continue to occupy them whilst he thought fit, since he had elected to remain in their service.

He had already looked at lodgings in Charlotte Street, close at hand; but this unexpected proposal came like a reprieve to an exile, and he was as prompt in his acceptance as he had been in that previous decision which had so thoroughly swamped all Mr. Chadwick’s plans for his advancement. His eager “Oh, madam, you cannot mean it! You overwhelm me with kindness. Remain under this roof! It is a privilege I had not anticipated, and I shall be proud to embrace it!” sent Mrs. Ashton away well pleased.

It was doubly satisfactory to find the comforts of their home appreciated after seven years’ experience, and to be able to refute Mr. Ashton’s theory that “all young men like to shake a loose leg, and Jabez would be too glad to escape from grumbling Kezia’s jurisdiction to accept the offer.”

Mr. Ashton, however, did not abandon the opinion he had formed. “I’ll wager my gold snuff-box against a button-mould,” asserted he, “that Clegg only said ‘Yes’ because gratitude would not let him say ‘Nay!’ It’s not likely a young man would care to be always under the eyes of a master or mistress, however steady he may be.”

Ah, but neither Mr. nor Mrs. Ashton knew there was a magnet under their roof, stronger than all the ordinary inducements which might otherwise have drawn him away—and perhaps it was as well for him they did not.

Simon, who was present at the time, seemed literally overpowered with gratitude for all the good which was falling into the lap of the child of his adoption. He, however, took his own views of the matter, views not calculated to puff Jabez up in his own esteem, and when Mrs. Ashton was gone he broke out—

“Oh, Jabez, lad! but thah’s lit on thi feet! Thah’s bin a good lad, aw reckon, an’ thah’s sarved thi master gradely; but thah sees many a lad does that as never gets a lift such as thah’s getten. an’ aw canno’ but thenk it o’ comes o’ that prayer o’ thy Israelite neamesake, as aw towt thee when thou wer no bigger nor sixpenn’orth o’ copper. yo’ hanna furgetten it, aw hope?”

No, Jabez had not forgotten it! It would be strange if he had. Nay, only that morning, in the flush of success he had carried from the counting-house, with the buoyant presumption of youth, a conviction that it was not so much a prayer as a prophecy nearing fulfilment.

Simon brought his soaring pinions down from their Icarian flight.

“Well, lad, it may be ‘the Lord has enlarge thi coast,’ but if so be He han, thah sees theer’s moore room fur thee to slip as well as to stond, and theer’s moore rayson whoi thah shouldn be thenkful and humble! for the big book says, ‘Let him that stondeth tak’ heed lest he fall,’ an’ aw shouldna loike t’ see thi young yead torned wi proide.”

His lecture was somewhat of a cold shower-bath to Jabez in his hour of triumph, but no doubt it was salutary in its ultimate effects. At all events, it kept the vaulting ambition of the new man a little in check.

People—especially work-people—then observed early hours. At seven o’clock the outcome supper was on the tables at the “Concert Hall Tavern;” and the elder apprentices, and all such of the workmen as were absolutely engaged on the premises, were there to partake when Jabez found old Simon a seat, himself taking the head of the table, with the two senior apprentices on his right hand and left.

The cost of such suppers usually fell on the apprentice, but sometimes, as in this case, the master added his quota. If plain, the provision was substantial and ample. Rounds of beef and legs of mutton, piles of floury potatoes, and red cones of carrot on pale beds of mashed turnip, smoked on the board, and the two-pronged forks and horn-hafted knifes were flanked with earthenware jugs and horns of ale.

It was the first essay of Jabez in the art of carving, and no doubt he made rather an unskilful president. But in the then condition of the lower classes a large joint of meat was a rare sight to a working-man, and so he cut away with no fear of critics. Amidst the rattle of cutlery and crockery, and the rapid play of jaws, beef and mutton disappeared, and were succeeded by a tremendous plum-pudding—the contribution of old Mrs. Clowes—and half a cheese, which came to the table in the then common japanned receptacle locally known as a cheese-biggin.

Appetite and the viands fled together, the noise of tongues succeeded to the noise of knives and forks, and Lancashire humour vented itself in jest and repartee, sometimes coarse, but seldom mischievous. Old Simon enjoyed it immensely. It seemed like a renewal of his own youth.

It was not, however, until the supper-table was cleared that the chief ceremonial of the evening took place. Then an arm-chair was mounted upon the table, in which Jabez was enthroned, the two eldest apprentices standing, also on the table on either hand as supporters. An immense bowl of steaming punch was brought in, which was held over the head of Jabez by the one apprentice (when he was said to be crowned), whilst the other, wielding the punch-ladle as a symbol of authority, with many a theatrical grimace, began to ladle the odorous compound into the glasses of the guests; and the head over-looker of the manufactory, from the opposite end of the table, prepared to propose the health of the late apprentice, as a new member of their craft.

At this juncture in walked their master, Mr. Ashton, closely followed by Mr. Chadwick, leaning on the arm of the Rev. Joshua Brookes, who with many a “pish!” and “pshaw!” and “pooh!” had professed to come reluctantly, “to see a sensible lad make a fool of himself.” Their entrance, and the volley of cheers which greeted it, made a momentary pause in the proceedings. Then Mr. Ashton, being duly supplied with a ladleful of punch, took his overlooker’s place, and the glass serving as a substitute for his snuff-box, he proposed and drank “Mr. Clegg’s health and prosperity,” and welcomed him among the confraternity of small-ware weavers.

This was succeeded by a prolonged cheer; and then, as one by one each man’s glass was filled, ere he touched it with his lips he sang separately (with whatsoever voice he might happen to have, musical or otherwise) the following toast to proclaim the released apprentice a freeman of the trade, the chorus being taken up afresh after every repetition of the quatrain:—

“Here’s a health to he that’s now set free,
That once was a ’prentice bound,
And for his sake this merriment we make,
So let his health go round;
Go round, go round, go round, brave boys,
Until it comes to me;
For the longer we sit here and drink,
The merrier we shall be.”

_Chorus_—“Go round, go round,” &c.

Mr. Ashton had ordered up another bowl of punch, and that being distributed with like ceremony over the new small-ware monarch’s head, Jabez, from his temporary throne, with all the warmth of freshly-stimulated gratitude, delivered a very genuine oration on the excellence of the master then present, and proposed as a toast, “Mr. and Mrs. Ashton, our worthy and esteemed master and mistress.”

Now-a-days I’m afraid the master would have been dubbed a “governor,” and the mistress ignored altogether; but though it is only fifty-five years since, servants were not ashamed to own they had masters and mistresses, and consequently were not above being amenable to rule.

During this digression, at a hint from some one (I believe old Simon), Jabez, whose eloquence must surely have come from the punch-bowl, dilated on the spiritual relation between the reverend chaplain and the party assembled, there being scarcely an individual present who had not been either baptised or married by the Rev. Joshua Brookes; and he wished “health and long life to him” with much sincerity.

A general shout rose in response, but Joshua made no other reply than to turn on his heel (the better to hide his face), and growl out, “Long life indeed! Ugh! pack of tomfoolery!” as he hurried from the room, before either Mr. Ashton or his paralysed brother-in-law could follow. Yet, in spite of his gruff disclaimer, he added another bowl of punch to the “tomfoolery”—at least, one was brought in soon after, and no one there was called upon to pay for it.

Relieved from the restraining presence of the gentlemen, tongues wagged freely, long pipes were introduced, song, jest, and toast succeeded each other, and as the fun grew and the smoke thickened, they mingled confusedly, until at length clear-headed Simon drew his arm through that of the novice, and watching his opportunity, led him unnoticed into the open air, with his head spinning like a teetotum.

Jabez awakened the next morning with a terrible headache, and a dim recollection of having encountered stately Mrs. Ashton in the hall overnight, when the very statues had seemed to shake their heads at him, and her mild, “Fie, Jabez!” followed him upstairs, apparently carpeted with moss or india-rubber for the nonce. It was his first dissipation, _and his last_. He never forgot it. And if anything was wanting to destroy the germs of self-sufficiency and elation, it was found in the consciousness of his own frailty, and the sense of shame and self-reproach it engendered.

Experienced heads knew that the surrounding fumes of liquor and tobacco had been more potential than the small quantity of punch he had imbibed. But he did not know it, and by the hail-fellow-well-metishness of those workmen who were most inclined at all times to keep Saint Monday, and who came to their work, or stayed from their work, unfit for their work, was a sensitive chord of his nature struck, far more than by the quiet caution of Simon, the light badinage of Mr. Ashton, or the jeers of captious Kezia.

In making light of it, Jabez felt they made light of him, and he was long after afraid lest those whose opinion he held in esteem should make light of him also—Augusta Ashton chief of these.

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-NINTH.[20]

ON ARDWICK GREEN POND.

It was in vain Madame Broadbent waited on Mrs. and Mr. Ashton, and solicited Miss Ashton’s return to her establishment on her ultimate recovery. The pupil was not more shudderingly reluctant to be re-placed under her despotic rule than the parents were peremptory in their refusal.

When her plea for the “maintenance of discipline” failed, and she tried cajolery as ineffectually, she gave way to the expression of her natural fears that it would “be the ruin of the Academy” if Mr. Ashton did not reverse his decision. He loved his daughter too well to yield, and Mrs. Broadbent went back to Bradshaw Street to find, as years rolled on, that she had been a true prophetess.

The injury done to Miss Ashton’s collar-bone had been bruited about, and slowly but surely it helped to sap the foundation of the once-flourishing seminary. It continued to exist for some years, but its prestige was gone, its glory departed. Yet she maintained her personal importance to the last, and exhibited her flock in the “lower boxes” of the Theatre Royal on Mrs. M‘Gibbon’s benefit nights with undiminished dignity through successive seasons.

The rapidly-ripening young lady had her will; she had done with the schoolroom for ever, and her lessons on the harp from Mr. Horobin, and on the piano from George Ware, the leader of the Gentleman’s Concerts, came under quite another category. Nor did she think it beneath her aspirations to retain her place in Mr. Bland’s fashionable dancing-room, where she practised cotillons, quadrilles, and the newly-imported waltz, with partners on a par with herself. But these were _accomplishments_, and we all know, or ought to know by this time, that accomplishments require much more prolonged and arduous application than the merely useful and essential branches of knowledge, theorists for the higher education of women notwithstanding.

Miss Augusta was desirous to be captivating and shine in society, and so proud was Mr. Ashton of his beautiful daughter, that he fell in readily with the expansive views of the incipient belle; and new steps or new melodies were paraded for his gratification week by week. But Mrs. Ashton, telling her daughter that “knowledge was light of carriage,” sent her to Mr. Mabbott’s to take lessons in cookery and confectionery, and into the kitchen to put them in practice under the eye of Kezia; and, exercise being good for health, according to the same sensible mother, she was required to assist in bed-making, furniture polishing, dusting and general household matters, for which the young lady had little liking, and was not to be spurred into liking by any citation of her cousin Ellen’s qualifications in these respects. She preferred to dress with all the art at her command to make her beauty more bewildering, and to take her place at harp or piano, or embroidery frame, ready to receive visitors either with or without her mother, and to be as fascinating as possible, especially when Laurence Aspinall was the caller; or she would sit in déshabillé in the retirement of her own chamber, and read Moore and Byron because they were tabooed and the handsome lieutenant quoted them so enchantingly; whilst Cicily, who had something to answer for in this respect, bustled about and overworked herself to spare her darling Miss Augusta, who, with all her faults, must have been a loving and lovable creature to win such devotion from a dependent.

It happened that the young lady received visitors alone more frequently than was desirable, Mrs. Ashton being unusually tied to the warehouse through the interest Mr. Ashton took in the establishment of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, and in the project for the widening of Market Street, and others of the cramped thoroughfares of the growing town—which necessarily took him much from home and his private business—to say nothing of the excitement consequent on the trial of Queen Caroline during its long progress.

But the year 1820, which had opened only to close the long volume of George the Third’s life, and to open that of George the Fourth’s reign at a chapter of regal wife persecution which has few parallels, had itself grown old and died, and 1821 had thrust itself prominently forward.

It came with a white robe and a frost-bitten countenance, which grew sharper and more pinched as weeks and months went by. It looked down on the currents of rivers and canals, on the secluded still waters of Strangeways Park, the oblong pond in front of the Infirmary, and the leech-shaped lakelet within the area of Ardwick Green, until their ripples curdled under the chilling glance of the New Year.

Sterner grew its aspect as the shivering weeks counted themselves into months, and the shrinking waters spread first a thin film, then a thick and a thicker barrier of ice between them and the freezing atmosphere. Every gutter had its slide, along which clattering clogs sped noiselessly; every pool its vociferous throng of boys, and every pond its mingled concourse of skaters and sliders. Of these, the Infirmary and Ardwick Green waters were most patronised; the former having the more numerous the latter having the more select body of skaters, and consequently the more fashionable surrounding of spectators.

The amusements of the town were then on so limited and exclusive a scale that long frost was quite a boon to the younger portion of the community; and during the sixteen weeks of its continuance, the Green became a promenade gay with the warm hues of feminine attire, as ladies flocked to witness and extol the feats of husbands, brothers, cousins or particular friends. There was no fear of vulgar overcrowding (except on Sundays); working-hours were long, and there were no Saturday half-holidays, so that only those whose time was at their own disposal could share the sport or overlook it.

Amongst these, much to the annoyance of Mr. Aspinall, his son Laurence chose to enrol himself, with less regard to the fluctuation of the cotton market, or the comparative value of American or East India staples than the Cannon Street merchant thought necessary to fit him for his future partner or successor. The younger man had chosen to construe liberally the word “gentleman,” which had been the be-all and end-all of his training, and to regard elegant idleness as its synonym. What availed his fine figure and proficiency in arts and athletics, if he had no opportunity for the display of his person or his skill? And to throw away the rare chance the Winter had provided was clearly to scorn the gift of the gods.

Accordingly he spent more time on Ardwick Green Pond than in the counting-house, varied occasionally with a visit to the Assembly Billiard-room in Back Mosley Street, or a morning promenade in the Infirmary Gardens, from the open gates of which he generally contrived to emerge as Miss Ashton descended the steps from Mr. Mabbott’s, and just in time to hand her courteously and daintily across the roadway, and bear her company to her own door, discoursing of recent assemblies or concerts, from the former of which she had hitherto been debarred, and of the last occasion on which he had “the exquisite pleasure of seeing her at Ardwick Green”—occasions which were seldom reported at home, any more than the chance meetings on her way from Mr. Mabbott’s; and the reticence, be sure, boded no good.

Dr. Hull had long ago advised “out-door exercise” for the rapidly-growing girl, and there was no embargo on her walks abroad, Mrs. Ashton suspecting no danger, and no surreptitious meetings. Her visits to the Green during the long skating season were quite as unrestrained, except that an escort became a necessity. Occasionally her mother accompanied her, sometimes Mrs. Walmsley and John (then there was generally a nurse and baby in the rear), sometimes Ellen and Mrs. Chadwick; and Augusta had always returned so exhilarated by her country walk, and so delighted with all she had seen, that once or twice, when imperative business withheld Mrs. Ashton from bearing her daughter company, as promised, rather than disappoint, the lady had made Mr. Clegg her deputy, an honour on which he perhaps set far too high a value.

Mrs. Ashton would have drawn herself up with double dignity, and repudiated as an insult the suggestion of any other of their salesmen or clerks as an escort for her beautiful daughter; but Jabez lived in the house, had lived there so long, had even from her childhood been the girl’s frequent guardian, and proved himself so worthy of the trust, that she committed her to his care now much as of old, and perhaps all the more readily because she saw, or fancied she saw, a disinclination on Miss Augusta’s part to be so accompanied.

In March the cold was as intense as in January, and Miss Ashton as eager to watch the skaters. One afternoon towards the close of the month, when the breaking up of the frost was anticipated, quite a family party had gone to the Green, wrapped in fur-trimmed pelisses of velvet or woollen, with fur-rimmed hats and Brobdignagian muffs.

It was not quite closing time when Mr. Ashton, always disposed to be friendly with Jabez, accosted him.

“The ladies are gone to the Green, Clegg. Suppose you lend me an arm along the slippery roads, and we go to meet them, eh?”

The sparkling eyes of Jabez confirmed his ready tongue’s “With pleasure, sir,” as, sensible of the honour done him, he left the sale-room, whistled his black friend Nelson from the yard, and they set off at a brisk pace, to keep the blood in circulation, the dog leaping, bounding, and barking before them, in token of good fellowship. As they passed the Infirmary pond, Jabez remarked that the ice began to look watery, to which Mr. Ashton replied,

“Yes; I think Jack Frost’s long visit is near its end, and there must be some truth in the old saw that ‘a thaw is colder than a frost.’”

At that moment Mr. Aspinall’s carriage rolled past them, bearing the merchant homewards in distinguished state (private carriages were by no means common), whereat Mr. Ashton observed with a shrug,

“How pride punishes itself! Fancy a tall fellow like Mr. Aspinall cramped up in a stifling box upon wheels on a day like this, when he has the free use of his limbs!”

Contrary to expectation, they did not come in sight of the ladies until they gained the Green, which they found a scene of wild hubbub and commotion; skaters and spectators gathering towards the centre of the Green, whence came a confused noise of voices, shouting, crying, and screaming.

The quick eye of Jabez was at once arrested by the figure of Augusta on the opposite bank, the centre of an appalled group, wringing her hands in the very impotence of terror, and as he penetrated the excited crowd, he saw the hatless head of a man, whose body was submerged, resting with its chin upon a ledge of the ice, which had apparently broken under him. At the first glance he failed to distinguish the head from the distance, and rushed forward, apprehensive lest it should be that of either Mr. Walmsley or his friend Travis, whom he knew to be of the party.

Recognition came accompanied by a shock that staggered him. If the ice had attractions for Aspinall and Walmsley, Ellen Chadwick had certainly as great attractions for Ben Travis; but it is certain that neither cousins, nor mother, nor aunt were sensible that they had been drawn thither simply as a sort of decorous train to Miss Augusta Ashton, whose inspiriting had in turn been the fascinating lieutenant, the most graceful and accomplished skater on the pond. Perhaps she hardly knew it herself, not being given to searching her own heart for its motives. But a hint from him had set her longing for “another sight of the skating before the chance was gone,” and her imperative will no less than her persuasive voice had swayed the rest.

Laurence had made the most of the occasion, glad of an opportunity to cultivate the acquaintance of the whole family, and display his graceful figure, and his skill to the best advantage. Now and then he joined the Chadwicks and the Ashtons on the bank, anon darted off, wheeling hither and thither, so swift in his evolutions, the eye could scarcely follow him.

Amongst the skaters the man and his feats stood out. He was the observed of all observers, and not vainer was he of his accomplishments than was Augusta at being singled out for attention in the face of so many damsels of his acquaintance, all, as she foolishly supposed, equally desirous to bask in the sun of his smile.