Weighed and Wanting, George MacDonald [ebook reader android txt] 📗

But bless you, I mean nothing by it! It's only my way. Ain't it now, mates-you as knows the old man?"

"Yes, father; 'tain't nothin' more'n a way you've got," responded the boys all, the little one loudest.

"You don't mind it, do you-knowin' as it's only to make you mind what you're about?"

"No, father, we don't mind it. Go ahead, father," said the eldest.

"But," said Franks, and here interjected an imprecation, vulgarly called an oath, "if ever I hear one o' you a usin' of sich improper words, I'll break every bone in his carcase."

"Yes, father," answered the boys with one accord,

"It's all very well for fathers," he went on; "an' when you're fathers yourselves, an' able to thrash me-not as I think you'd want to, kids-I sha'nt ha' no call to meddle with you. So here goes!"

Casting a timid glance at Hester, in the assurance that he had set himself thoroughly right with her, showing himself as regardful of his boys' manners as could justly be expected of any parent, he proceeded with his lesson from the point where he had left off.

As to breaking the boys' bones, there hardly seemed any bones in them to break; gelatine at best seemed to be what was inside their muscles, so wonderful were their feats, and their pranks so strange. But their evident anxiety to please, their glances full of question as to their success in making their offering acceptable, their unconscious efforts to supply the lacking excitement of the public gaze, and, more than all, the occasional appearance amidst the marvels of their performance, in which their bodies seemed mere india-rubber in response to their wills, of a strangely mingled touch of pathos, prevailed chiefly to interest Hester in their endeavor. This last would appear in the occasional suffering it caused Moxy, the youngest, to do as his father required, but oftener in the incongruity between the lovely expression of the boy's face, and the oddity of it when it became the field of certain comicalities required of him-especially when, stuck through between his feet, it had to grin like a demon carved on the folding seat of a choir-stall. Its sweet innocence, and the veil of suffering cast over its best grin, suggesting one of Raphael's cherubs attempting to play the imp, Hester found almost discordantly pathetic. She could have caught the child to her bosom, but alas! she had no right. She was already beginning to become aware of the difficulty of the question as to when or how much you may interfere with the outward conditions of men, or help them save through the channels of the circumstance in which you find them. The gentle suffering face seemed far from its own sphere, that of a stray boy-angel come to give her a lesson in the heavenly patience. His mother, whose yellow hair and clear gray eyes were just like his, covered her eyes with her hand, though she could not well see him from where she lay, every time he had to do anything by himself.

All at once the master of the ceremonies drew 'himself up, and wiping his forehead, gave a deep sigh, as much as to say, "I have done my best, and if I have not pleased you, the more is my loss, for I have tried hard," and the performance was over.

The doctor rose, and in a manly voice, whose tones were more pleasing to Hester than the look of the man, which she did not find attractive, proceeded to point out to Franks one or two precautions which his knowledge of anatomy enabled him to suggest, with regard to the training especially of the little Moxy. At the same time he expressed himself greatly pleased with what his host had been so kind as to show him, remarking that the power to do such things implied labor more continuous and severe than would have sufficed to the learning of two or three trades. In reply, Franks, mistaking the drift of the remark, and supposing it a gentle remonstrance with what the doctor counted a waste of labor, said, in a tone that sounded sad in the ears of Hester,

"What's a fellow to do, sir, when he 'ain't got no dinner? He must take to the work as takes to him. There was no other trade handy for me. My father he was a poor laborer, an' died early, o' hard work an' many mouths. My mother lived but a year after him an' I had to do for the kids whatever came first to hand. There was two on 'em dead 'atwixt me an' the next alive, so I was a long way ahead o' the rest, an' I couldn't ha' seen them goin' to the dogs for want o' bread while I was learnin' a trade, even if I had had one in my mind more than another, which I never had. I always was a lively lad, an' for want of anything better to do, for my father wouldn't have us go to work till we was strong enough, he said-an' for that matter it turned out well when the hard time came-I used to amuse myself an' the rest by standin' on my head an' twistin' of my body into all sorts o' shapes-more'n it could well ha' been meant for to take. An' when the circus come round, I would make friends wi' the men, helpin' of 'em to look after their horses, an' they would sometimes, jest to amuse theirselves, teach me tricks I was glad enough to learn; an' they did say for a clod-hopper I got on very well. But that, you see, sir, set my monkey up, an' I took a hoath to myself I would do what none o' them could do afore I died-an' some thinks, sir," he added modestly, "as how I've done it-but that's neither here nor there. The p'int is, that, when my mother followed my father, an' the rest come upon my hands, I was able at once, goin' about an' showin' off, to gather a few coppers for 'em. But I soon found it was precious little I could get, no matter what I could do so long as my clothes warn't the right thing. So long as I didn't look my trade, they regarded my best as nothing but a clumsy imitation of my betters, an' laughed at what circus Joe said he couldn't do no better hisself. So I plucks up heart an' goes to Longstreet, as was the next market-town, an' into a draper's shop, an' tells 'em what I wanted, an' what it was for, promisin' to pay part out o' the first money I got, an' the rest as soon after as I could. The chaps in the shop, all but one on em', larfed at me; there's always one, or two p'raps, leastways sech as has been my expearence, sir an' miss, as is better'n most o' the rest, though it's a good thing everybody's not so soft-hearted as my wife there, or the world would soon be turned topsy turvey, an' the rogues have all the money out o' the good folk's pockets, an' them turned beggars in their turn, an' then the rogues wouldn't give them nothink, an' so the good ones would die out, an' the world be full o' nothing but damned rascals-I beg your pard'n, miss. But as I was sayin', though I fared no better at the next shop nor the next, there was one good woman I come to in a little shop in a back street, an' she was a resemblin' of yourself, miss, an' she took an' set me up in my trade, a givin' of me a few remnants o' colored calico, God bless her! I set to with my needle, an' I dressed myself as like a proper clown as I could, an' painted my face beautiful, an' from that time till they was able to do some'at for theirselves, I managed to keep the kids in life. It wasn't much more, you see, but life's life though it bean't tip-top style. An' if they're none o' them doin' jest so well as they might, there's none o' them been in pris'n yet, an' that's a comfort as long as it lasts. An' when folk tells me I'm a doin' o' nothink o' no good, an' my trade's o' no use to nobody, I says to them, says I, 'Beggin' your pardon, sir, or ma'am, but do you call it nothink to fill-leastways to nigh fill four hungry little bellies at home afore I wur fifteen?' An' after that, they ain't in general said nothink; an' one gen'leman he give me 'alf-a-crown."

"The best possible answer you could have given, Franks," rejoined Mr. Christopher. "But I think perhaps you hardly understood what such objectors meant to say. They might have gone on to explain, only they hadn't the heart after what you told them, that most trades did something on both sides-not only fed the little ones at home, but did good to the persons for whom the work was done; that the man, for instance, who cobbled shoes, gave a pair of dry feet to some old man at the same time that he filled his own child's hungry little stomach."

Franks was silent for a moment, thinking.

"I understand you, sir," he said. "But I think I knows trades as makes a deal o' money, an' them they makes it out on's the worse an' not the better. It's better to stand on a fellow's own head than to sell gin; an' I 'most think it's as good as the fire-work trade."

"You are quite right: there's not a doubt of it," answered Mr. Christopher. "But mind you," he went on, "I don't for a moment agree with those who tell you your trade is of no use. I was only explaining to you what they meant; for it's always best to know what people mean, even where they are wrong."

"Surely, sir, and I thank you kindly. Everybody's not so fair."

Here he broke into a quiet laugh, so pleased was he to have the doctor take his part.

"I think," Mr. Christopher went on, "to amuse people innocently is often the only good you can do them. When done lovingly and honestly, it is a Christian service."

This rather shocked Hester:-acrobatics a Christian service. With her grand dawning idea mingled yet some foolish notional remnants. She still felt as if going to church and there fixing your thoughts on the prayers and the lessons and the hymns and the sermon was the serving of God. She turned rather sharply towards the doctor, with a feeling that honesty called on her to speak; but not a word came to her lips, for the best of reasons-that not a thought had arisen in answer to his bold assertion. She was one of the few who know when they have nothing to say. But Christopher had observed the movement of dissent.

"Suppose," he went on, but without addressing her more than before, still turning himself almost exclusively to Franks-"Suppose somebody walking along Oxford Street, brooding over an injury, and thinking how to serve the man out that had done it to him. All the numberless persons and things pass him on both sides and he sees none of them-takes no notice of anything. But he spies a man in Berners Street, in the middle of a small crowd, showing them some tricks-we won't say so good as yours, Mr. Franks, but he stops, and stares, and forgets for a moment or two that there is one brother-man he hates and would kill