Part 12

It was necessary to proceed with great caution, so as not to excite suspicion in the minds of the masters, and as it happened to be the time of year for bird-nesting, the frequent sight of Dick swarming up a big elm tree was not sufficiently uncommon to arouse any remark. It is perhaps just as well that I cannot give you a description of how Master Dick arranged his numerous lines, and wires, and pulleys; I can only tell you the result, which was that one cold night, when a bitter gale from the east was blowing, the servant whose duty it was to ring the bell for evening prayers returned to say that the bell could not be found anywhere. ‘Nonsense, man,’ said the portly Doctor; ‘the bell _must_ be there.’ Poor old John went out again in the cold porch to have another unsuccessful hunt after the bell, and to return with the same story. It was too late and too cold to continue the search, so there was nothing for it but to go to chapel without the bell, and the boys were afterwards marshalled into their dormitories with extra precautions. Their names were called over as they passed the masters at the doors and these latter remained to watch that each boy got quietly into bed. No boys could behave better that night; indeed they were suspiciously good, if one may use such an expression in speaking of young gentlemen. But the peace of the establishment was broken about midnight by a loud ‘Boom, boom, boom,’ from the elm tree. This unusual sound aroused the Doctor, who threw his window open letting in such an icy blast. There was no mistaking the clang of his own favourite bell; but how on earth did it get up into the sky, for that was where the sound proceeded from. ‘I see, you Smith,’ roared the Doctor, ‘you shall pay for this, sir, to-morrow;’ and he shouted for a monitor, who announced on his arrival that, whoever it might be, Smith was not the culprit, for he was snugly tucked into his bed. ‘Well, then, it must be Jones,’ shouted the enraged Doctor. ‘Jones, if you don’t come down directly and bring the bell also, it will go hard with you to-morrow.’ The monitor of No. 3. dormitory appeared to assure the Doctor that Jones’s snores were keeping all his neighbours awake.

In the meantime poor Mrs. Doctor was shivering with cold, and entreating her husband to shut the window and return to bed; but the old gentleman was too much enraged to listen to her; and every time the bell sounded, which it did frequently through the night, he jumped out of his warm bed, and flung up the window again calling out loudly, ‘I see you sir, come down directly.’ He thought it safer not to mention any names. The consequence of all this exposure to a biting east wind was, that when the boys assembled in the morning, they very nearly got a flogging all round for the broad grin which saluted the Doctor’s appearance with such a swollen face. It must be very difficult to look calm and dignified if you have one side of your face tremendously swelled and red and shining. This was the poor Doctor’s plight, and his efforts to conceal his suffering ought to have touched his pupils’ hearts. I daresay their titters and grins did not really arise from want of feeling, only boys are such sad creatures for laughing at the wrong time!

The first thing the Doctor did was to make a long speech to the boys, telling them (as if the young pickles did not know it already) of the loss of the bell and of its re-appearance at the top of the tree, and urging them to confess how they had managed it; but a stony silence was all he met with, and each boy’s countenance looked more hopelessly vacant than his neighbour’s. When play-hours came the whole school was kept in to write a line of Latin verse so many hundred times over. This had a very sobering effect on the young gentlemen, and even the Doctor’s expression of face at chapel with his head tied up in flannel could not raise a smile from the depressed conspirators. However, when midnight arrived, ‘Boom, boom, boom,’ went the bell, and it continued to sound at intervals through the night, but in a jerky and spasmodic manner, not the deep regular tones of the night before. After chapel the next morning the boys were called over before the Doctor, and, in spite of one of his eyes being now quite closed up, and his voice sounding as if he had plums in his mouth, his demeanour was so stern that the stoutest heart quailed. His address was short but very much to the purpose. He said that, if the bell was not brought down in broad daylight and restored to its proper place by twelve o’clock, the whole school should be flogged, and all half holidays stopped for the remainder of the term. He gave them half an hour to decide, and full liberty to discuss the subject in the schoolroom without the presence of the masters. The moment he had finished his little speech, he got up and left the room, followed by all the masters and the monitors. I need hardly tell you how stormy was the debate which followed, or how soon it became evident that the funny side of the story was over for the present. Poor quiet old Dick saw the situation at once, shrugged his shoulders, and merely observing ‘I’m in for a good ‘un,’ was deep in a few minutes in some fresh invention, the model of which he took out of his pocket and began to examine. At first the general feeling was, that, as Dick had not originated it he should not bear the punishment; but Dick himself scouted the idea of being let off, and was the first to walk boldly into the Doctor’s study, and with a noble disregard of grammar, which even at that exciting moment made the Doctor wince, say, ‘Please sir, it’s me.’ ‘Me will catch it then,’ was the Doctor’s grim answer; and poor ‘me’ did catch it, and so did everyone concerned in the exploit in the remotest way. The boys declared that Mrs. Doctor was the most venomous of the two, and that it was she who stirred up her portly husband to go down to the village shop and blow up its mistress in no measured terms; but the woman’s sharp tongue could not keep silence very long, and she actually stormed at the Doctor in return till he was glad to get out of the shop.

Do you know there is one rather solemn-looking gentleman of my acquaintance whom I never can see without laughing. I am sure he must sometimes wonder why I should always appear amused when I shake hands with him, particularly if he happens to have his pretty, young-looking mother leaning on his arm. I dare not tell _him_ why I laugh, but I will tell you, in strict confidence, remember!

One day, when this Mr. F. was a small boy, he was locked up in his mother’s bedroom, there to repent of his transgressions in general, and of some recent offence in particular. Now it was a half holiday, and there was a delightful excursion to the woods in prospect. All the other children were wild with delight about it, for they were to have tea in gipsy fashion, with a fire out of doors, and all sorts of pleasant things; but an edict had gone forth that, until Mr., or rather Master, F. had repented of his fault and apologised, he was not to be allowed to go in the spring-cart to the place of meeting. The hours were passing away, and his mother was very uneasy lest her pet boy should be deprived of his share of the afternoon’s fun, so she thought she would try what her gentle persuasions would do towards softening his heart. I must explain to you that there was a sort of partition off this bedroom, and a glass door in it which did not fit very well, consequently there was a gap of a couple of inches between the floor and the bottom of the door. Mrs. F went close up to this, and began to expostulate through the chink at the side with her naughty darling. There was quite a little audience at her back, composed of the other children, who were eagerly listening for any signs of contrition on the part of the prisoner; and it caused great dismay when mamma turned her head round to the young ones and said, ‘I’m afraid he is not good yet.’ ‘Tell him to put the naughty pinnit (spirit) up the chimbley,’ suggested a tiny brother, who disposed of his little evil tempers very successfully in this way. Mrs. F. drew still closer to the door, and began a fresh entreaty to the culprit to make up his mind to confess and beg pardon; but at the most touching part of her discourse she suddenly jumped back upon her little listeners with a loud shriek of pain, and caught up one of her feet with many groans, hopping about on the other. What do you think this dreadful boy had done? He had found a hammer in the room, and when he saw his mother’s toes sticking out under the door, he had deliberately knelt down and hammered them!

I need hardly tell you that there was no gipsy tea for Master F. that evening, and I believe he was afterwards very sorry for his conduct; but it is not surprising that, whenever the recollection of this story comes over me, I should feel inclined to laugh. Sometimes I see Mr. F. taking great care of his mother at supper, getting her nice things to eat, wrapping her carefully up in her shawl when she is going away from a party, and so on; but instead of admiring his dutiful devotion to her, this unfortunate piece of naughtiness recurs to my memory, and I cannot help smiling at the wrong time; so you see it is very dangerous to do naughty things, even when you are quite little, for people are apt to remember them in after years.

‘_EDINBURGH CASTLE._’

This ‘Edinburgh Castle’ is not a castle at all in the first place, nor is it in Scotland! It is only a little mud hut on a hill, in the middle of a thick forest, in that beautiful island of Jamaica, about which I have already told you so many stories; but I did not like to mix up this shocking tale with the account of all our pets, so I have given it a separate chapter to itself. If you want to know more about it you will find it mentioned in a book called ‘Brydges’ Annals of Jamaica;’ but I was standing on the spot where it all happened, when I heard the story from my father’s lips. He, Jessie, and I had ridden for miles through the clearings in this forest; and I can hardly make you understand how delightful such an excursion is on a summer’s afternoon in these high uplands of Jamaica. Instead of the burning heat and hot air, which is called a breeze down in the plains, we had the most delicious fresh atmosphere; and, as we rode along under the shade of the tall mahogany and cedar trees, Jessie and I were never weary of admiring the beautiful creepers hanging in festoons from branch to branch; great blossoms of cacti, with brilliant gauzy-winged flies going busily in and out among the thick tassels which form the centre of the flower; orchids of every kind and description growing on the decayed timber, and making the shabby old trees more beautiful than the strong young ones; convolvuli of bright and delicate colour; slender tendrils laden with the sweet-scented blossom of the passion flower hanging down on our heads. Through all these lovely sights and sounds we rode, gaily talking and laughing, Jessie setting all the mocking-birds nearly wild by breaking out into snatches of song; and no sooner had one bird answered her, and the others begun to take up the chorus, than she would change her tune; then such an indignant chirruping and calling and whistling ensued, as much as to say, ‘Now, that is not fair, one song at a time;’ until Papa said, ‘O Jessie, do leave those birds alone; I never heard such a row. So, after that, we went on more quietly, and at last the track we followed led us to a clearing, and on our right was a little hillock with a tumble-down hut on it; but what attracted our attention were some large grey rocks around the hovel, which at a short distance had exactly the effect of the battlements of a castle. We both exclaimed at once, ‘How like an old castle! Who lived there?’ And then Papa said, ‘Have you never heard the story about this place?’ Jessie and I were quite as fond of stories in those days as you can possibly be, so we edged our ponies quite close to Papa’s horse, and listened eagerly whilst he told us this tale; and I remember so well, as he went on with it, how all the warmth and glow and beauty seemed to fade out of that summer evening, and it appeared to turn damp and chilly; all the tropical luxuriance changed with our changed mood into dank overgrowth; and even Jessie’s smiles and songs died away into a hushed, breathless silence.

About fifty or sixty years ago, a man calling himself Hutchinson appeared in this part of the country, and, after looking about him a little, finally selected this forest in which to buy a section of land; I think Papa said a hundred acres. Now it was very unusual to do such a thing in Jamaica where people generally have large sugar estates or grazing farms, and the land which Mr. Hutchinson bought was quite unfit for either of these purposes. However he gave no reason for his choice, but proceeded to cut down some trees, and to pile up all the available stones and rocks into the shape of rough battlements. When they were arranged to his satisfaction he built himself a small hut with a stable and outhouse, kitchen, &c. All that he did was extremely methodical, and, when finished, his new home looked perfectly comfortable and weather-tight. A few creepers against the cottage soon made it pretty, and his ‘provision ground,’ as the negroes call a kitchen garden, looked very picturesque with the yams climbing like hops over their tall poles, and the broad velvety leaves of his cocoa and arrowroot plants. His establishment consisted of one old negro slave, who appeared dreadfully afraid of his master. This was the more surprising, as Mr. Hutchinson’s manners were gentlemanlike and quiet, with no trace of ill temper on the surface. Inside the house, or rather cottage, everything showed signs of refinement. There were only two rooms, and visitors saw but one, which was used as a sitting-room, and contained books, mathematical instruments, a few curious weapons, and several specimens of birds and animals; but the most conspicuous object in it was a large telescope on a stand, placed so as to command the road through the forest. This road was really only a bridle path, but it was much used as a short cut from one part of the island to the other, and, though, seldom travelled by the negroes, often proved a great convenience to some gentlemen who wanted to get quickly across the country.

Nothing is more amusing to a new comer in most English colonies than the fine names the settlers give their places. I have known so many rough enclosures of a mere common or heath called after grand parks and castles in England, that the name ‘Edinburgh Castle,’ which Mr. Hutchinson gave to his little mud hut with its rude parapet, did not seem half so absurd to me as it probably does to you. At all events it soon became known by that name; and as Mr. Hutchinson was very hospitable and friendly, passers-by began to look upon it as a matter of course that they should call in at the castle and have a glass of sangaree (do you know what that is? A drink made of madeira and rum, lemons, and all sorts of things) with its master, leaving him perhaps the last English newspaper, and telling him whatever little local gossip they could collect. But in the course of a few months three things began to be noticed and talked of: first, Mr. Hutchinson _never_ left home, in spite of many invitations to pay a visit to his neighbours. At whatever hour of the day or night a traveller called, he was quite sure to find him in his house always glad to see him and apparently expecting a visitor. Then Mr. Hutchinson always betrayed great anxiety about the hour, which seemed rather odd in a person who had apparently nothing to do and nowhere to go. Another remarkable thing was the abject terror of the old negro. He would come to the door to hold the guest’s horse, shaking all over, and he could seldom refrain from some little speech which sounded inhospitable, such as, ‘It berry fine day now; mas’r best push on, plenty rain come ‘bout evening.’ People began to notice that if they said to Mr. Hutchinson anything about his servant not appearing glad to see them, or willing that they should dismount, a strange dark look would come over his face, and he tried to laugh off the idea, or to change the subject; but it was quite certain that poor old Pompey took much more pleasure in obeying the injunction to ‘speed the parting guest’ than he did in welcoming the new comer. The most extraordinary thing of all was that Mr. Hutchinson’s guests occasionally disappeared! A gentleman would leave an estate on one side of the great forest with the intention of riding through it, calling in of course at ‘Edinburgh Castle’ on his way, but it turned out afterwards that he seldom got beyond that point. There were no police in those old days of slavery, and very little communication between places; so months passed before any one could be quite certain that a traveller was really missing, and then it was hopeless to attempt to trace him. Everybody agreed, that although Mr. Hutchinson was an odd sort of man, and that it was very queer of him to live in such a place, still he was the ‘best fellow in the world,’ and very clever and well educated.

At last it happened that a passing traveller, whose journey as usual seemed to stop short at ‘Edinburgh Castle,’ was expected very anxiously by his solicitor at an estate a few miles beyond the forest; and when a day or two passed without bringing him, the lawyer got anxious for his arrival, and thought perhaps he might have been taken ill at the last house where he knew he was to have put up for a night, on his way to the place of meeting. He therefore took the important papers, which he wanted this gentleman to sign, in his pocket, and started off to ride through the forest. Of course he called in at ‘Edinburgh Castle,’ and, like everybody else, was asked the hour, and, on his producing a handsome gold watch, Mr. Hutchinson set his by it, and became very pressing in his entreaties to the lawyer to stay. But he said, No; he could not possibly stop because he was in a great hurry to meet his friend whom he expected to find at the next place. Upon this Mr. Hutchinson’s hospitable entreaties were renewed; in fact, they became rather like commands; and when he said, ‘Well, you can’t go now for your horse has got away,’ the lawyer felt very much like a prisoner. He was, however, a shrewd as well as a brave man; and although he said afterwards that he felt there was something wrong, at the time he pretended to give up all idea of going on, but in reality watched narrowly for a chance of getting away. The afternoon and even the evening passed without Mr. Hutchinson’s leaving him alone for a moment; but still the lawyer hoped and waited for a lucky opportunity. All this time the old negro kept going in and out of the room and trying to convey to the lawyer, by a sign now and then, the fact that he would do well to make the best of his way out of the house. Mr. G. gave him a nod, just to show him he was quite determined to follow his advice; and he particularly remarked how thankful poor Pompey seemed to find that at last some one understood what he meant.

During the evening Mr. Hutchinson frequently asked what o’clock it was, and every time Mr. G. produced his watch he noticed how his host seemed to gaze at it, and examine it as carefully as if he had never seen such a thing before. At last Mr. G. said, ‘My watch appears to have a great fascination for you.’ These harmless words produced a strange effect on the man; he turned first red and then pale; and asked angrily, ‘What do you mean?’ but, before the other could answer, Hutchinson left the room with some indistinct words about shooting pigeons. Mr. G. jumped out of the low window in a second, and set off down the hill as fast as he could; but he had the presence of mind to avail himself of every scrap of cover, and these battlements did him good service as shelter. Under their friendly lee he skirted the mound, and soon struck once more into the bridle path, with his face turned in the direction in which he meant to look for his client.