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(illustration)
BY
(printer)
CHISWICK PRESS:--PRINTED BY WHITTINGHAM AND WILKINS,
TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.
(contents)
ADVENTURE THE FIRST.
ADVENTURE THE SECOND.
ADVENTURE THE THIRD.
ADVENTURE THE FOURTH.
ADVENTURE THE FIFTH.
ADVENTURE THE SIXTH AND LAST.
Now a coal-cellar may seem a most curious place to choose to live
in; but then a Brownie is a curious creature--a fairy, and yet not one
of that sort of fairies who fly about on gossamer wings, and dance
in the moonlight, and so on. He never dances; and as to wings, what use would they be to him in a coal-cellar? He is a sober, stay-at-home household elf--nothing much to look at, even if you did see him, which you are not likely to do--only a little old man, about a foot high, all dressed in brown, with a brown face and hands, and a brown peaked cap, just the colour of a brown mouse. And like a mouse he hides in corners--especially kitchen corners, and only comes out after dark when nobody is about, and so sometimes people call him Mr. Nobody.
I said you were not likely to see him. I never did, certainly, and never
knew anybody that did; but still, if you were to go into Devonshire, you
would hear many funny stories about Brownies in general, and so I may as
well tell you the adventures of this particular Brownie, who belonged to a
family there; which family he had followed from house to house, most
faithfully, for years and years.
A good many people had heard him--or supposed they had--when
there were extraordinary noises
about the house; noises which must have come from a mouse or a rat--or a Brownie. But nobody had ever seen him, except the children, the three little boys and three little girls--who declared he often came to play with them when they were alone, and was the nicest companion in the world, though he was such an old man--hundreds of years old! He was full of fun and mischief and up to all sorts of tricks, but he never did anybody any harm unless they deserved it.
Brownie was supposed to live under one particular coal, in the darkest
corner of the cellar, which was never allowed to be disturbed. Why he had
chosen it nobody knew, and how he lived there, nobody knew either; nor what
he lived upon. Except that, ever since the family could remember, there had
always been a bowl of milk put behind the coal-cellar door for the
Brownie's supper. Perhaps he drank it--perhaps he
didn't: anyhow, the bowl was always found empty next
morning.
The old Cook, who had lived all her life in the
family, had never once forgotten to give Brownie his supper; but at last she died, and a young Cook came in her stead, who was very apt to forget everything. She was also both careless and lazy, and disliked taking the trouble to put a bowl of milk in the same place every night for Mr. Nobody. "She didn't believe in Brownies," she said; "she had never seen one, and seeing's believing." So she laughed at the other servants, who looked very grave, and put the bowl of milk in its place as often as they could, without saying much about it.
But once, when Brownie woke up, at his usual hour for rising--ten
o'clock at night, and looked round in search of his
supper--which was in fact his breakfast, he found nothing there. At
first he could not imagine such neglect, and went smelling and smelling
about for his bowl of milk--it was not always placed in the same
corner now--but in vain.
"This will never do," said he; and being extremely hungry,
began running about the coal-
cellar to see what he could find. His eyes were as useful in the dark as in the light--like a pussycat's; but there was nothing to be seen--not even a potato paring, or a dry crust, or a well-gnawed bone, such as Tiny the terrier sometimes brought into the coal-cellar and left on the floor--nothing, in short, but heaps of coals and coal-dust; and even a Brownie cannot eat that, you know.
"Can't stand this; quite impossible!" said the
Brownie, tightening his belt to make his poor little inside feel less
empty. He had been asleep so long--about a week, I believe, as was his
habit when there was nothing to do--that he seemed ready to eat his
own head, or his boots, or anything. "What's to be done? since
nobody brings my supper I must go and fetch it."
He spoke quickly, for he always thought quickly, and made up his mind in
a minute. To be sure it was a very little mind, like his little body; but
he did the best he could with it, and was not a bad sort of old fellow
after all. In the house he had never done any harm--and often some
good, for he
frightened away all the rats, mice and black-beetles. Not the crickets--he liked them, as the old Cook had done: she said they were such cheerful creatures, and always brought luck to the house. But the young Cook could not bear them, and used to pour boiling water down their holes, and set basins of beer for them with little wooden bridges up to the rim, that they might walk up, tumble in, and be drowned.
So there was not even a cricket singing in the silent house when Brownie
put his head out of his coal-cellar door, which, to his surprise, he
found open. Old Cook used to lock it every night; but the young Cook had
left that key, and the kitchen and pantry keys too, all dangling in the
lock, so that any thief might have got in, and wandered all over the house
without being found out.
"Hurrah, here's luck!" cried Brownie, tossing his cap
up in the air, and bounding right through the scullery into the kitchen. It
was quite empty, but there was a good fire burning itself out--just
for its own amusement, and the remains of a capital supper
spread on the table--enough for half-a-dozen people being left still.
Would you like to know what there was? Devonshire cream, of course; and
part of a large dish of junket, which is something like curds and whey.
Lots of bread and butter and cheese, and half apple-pudding. Also a
great jug of cider and another of milk, and several half-full
glasses, and no end of dirty plates, knives and forks. All were scattered
about the table in the most untidy fashion, just as the servants had risen
from their supper without thinking to put anything away.
Brownie screwed up his little old face and turn up his button of a nose,
and gave a long whistle. You might not believe it, seeing he lived in a
coal-cellar, but really he liked tidiness, and always played his
pranks upon disorderly or slovenly folk.
"Whew!" said he, "here's a chance! What a supper
I'll get now!"
And he jumped on to a chair and thence to the table, but so quietly that
the large black cat with four white paws, called Muff, because she was so
fat and soft and her fur so long, who sat dozing in front of the fire, just opened one eye and went to sleep again. She had tried to get her nose into the milk-jug, but it was too small; and the junket-dish was too deep for her to reach, except with one paw. She didn't care much for bread and cheese and apple-pudding, and was very well fed besides; so after just wandering round the table she had jumped down from it again, and settled herself to sleep on the hearth.
But Brownie had no notion of going to sleep. He wanted his supper, and
oh! what a supper he did eat! first one thing and then another, and then
trying everything all over again. And oh! what a lot he drank!--first
milk and then cider, and then mixed the two together in a way that would
have disagreed with anybody except a Brownie. As it was, he was obliged to
slacken his belt several times, and at last took it off altogether. But he
must have had a most extraordinary capacity for eating and
drinking--since, after he had nearly cleared the table, he was just as
lively as ever, and
began jumping about on the table as if he had had no supper at all.
Now his jumping was a little awkward, for there happened to be a clean
white table-cloth; as this was only Monday, it had had no time to
get dirty--untidy as the Cook was. And you know Brownie lived in a
coal-cellar, and his feet were black with running about in coal
dust. So wherever he trod, he left the impression behind; until at last the
whole table-cloth was covered with black marks.
Not that he minded this; in fact, he took great pains to make the cloth
as dirty as possible; and then laughing loudly "Ho, ho, ho!"
leaped on to the hearth, and began teazing the cat; squeaking like a mouse,
or chirping like a cricket, or buzzing like a fly; and altogether
disturbing poor Pussy's mind so much, that she went and hid herself
in the farthest corner, and left him the hearth all to himself, where he
lay at ease till daybreak.
Then, hearing a slight noise overhead, which might be the servants
getting up, he jumped on to the table again--gobbled up the few
remaining
crumbs for his breakfast, and scampered off to his coal-cellar; where he hid himself under his big coal, and fell asleep for the day.
Well, the Cook came down stairs rather earlier than usual, for she
remembered she had to clear off the remains of supper; but lo and behold,
there was nothing left to clear! Every bit of food was eaten up--the
cheese looked as if a dozen mice had been nibbling at it, and nibbled it
down to the very rind; the milk and cider were all drunk--and mice
don't care for milk and cider, you know: as for the
apple-pudding, it had vanished altogether; and the dish was licked
as clean as if Boxer the yard-dog had been at it, in his hungriest
mood.
"And my white table-cloth--oh, my clean white
table-cloth! What can have been done to it?" cried she in
amazement. For it was all over little black footmarks, just the size of a
baby's foot--only babies don't wear shoes with nails in
them, and don't run about and climb on kitchen tables after all the
family have gone to bed.
Cook was a little frightened; but her fright
changed to anger when she saw the large black cat stretched comfortably on the heath. Poor Muff had crept there for a little snooze after Brownie went away.
"You nasty cat! I see it all now; it's you that have eaten
up all the supper; it's you that have been on my clean
table-cloth with your dirty paws."
They were white paws, and as clean as possible; but Cook never thought
of that, any more than she did of the fact that cats don't usually
drink cider or eat apple pudding,
"I'll teach you to come stealing food in this way; take
that--and that--and that!"
Cook got hold of a broom and beat poor Pussy till the creature ran
mewing away. She couldn't speak, you know--unfortunate cat! and
tell people that it was Brownie who had done it all.
Next night Cook thought she would make all safe and sure; so, instead of
letting the cat sleep by the fire, she shut her up in the chilly
coal-cellar--locked the door, put the key in her pocket, and
went off to bed; leaving the supper as before.
When Brownie woke up and looked out of his hole, there was as usual no
supper for him, and the cellar was close shut. He peered about, to try and
find some cranny under the door to creep out at, but there was none. And he
felt so hungry that he could almost have eaten the cat, who kept walking to
and fro in a melancholy manner--only she was alive, and he
couldn't well eat her alive:--besides he knew she was old,
and had an idea she might be tough; so he merely said, politely, "How
do you do, Mrs. Pussy," to which she answered nothing--of
course.
Something must be done, and luckily Brownies can do things which nobody
else can do. So he thought he would change himself into a mouse, and gnaw a
hole through the door. But then he suddenly remembered the cat, who, though
he had decided not to eat her, might take this opportunity of eating him.
So he thought it advisable to wait till she was fast asleep, which did not
happen for a good while. At length, quite tired with walking about, Pussy
turned round on her tail six times, curled down in a corner, and fell fast
asleep.
Immediately Brownie changed himself into the smallest mouse possible;
and, taking care not to make the least noise, gnawed a hole in the door,
and squeezed himself through--immediately turning into his proper
shape again, for fear of accidents.
The kitchen fire was at its last glimmer; but it showed a better supper
than even last night, for the Cook had had friends with her, a brother and
two cousins, and they had been exceedingly merry. The food they had left
behind was enough for three Brownies at least, but this one managed to eat
it all up. Only once, in trying to cut a great slice of beef, he let the
carving-knife and fork fall with such a clatter, that Tiny the
terrier, who was tied up at the foot of the stairs, began to bark
furiously. However, he brought her her puppy, which had been left in a
basket in a corner of the kitchen, and so succeeded in quieting her.
After that he enjoyed himself amazingly, and made more marks than ever
on the white table-cloth--for he began jumping about like a pea
on a trencher, in order to make his particularly large supper agree with
him.
Then, in the absence of the cat, he teazed the puppy for an hour or two,
till, hearing the clock strike five, he thought it as well to turn into a
mouse again, and creep back cautiously into his cellar. He was only just in
time, for Muff opened one eye, and was just going to pounce upon him, when
he changed himself back into a Brownie. She was so startled that she
bounded away, her tail growing into twice its natural size, and her eyes
gleaming like round green globes, But Brownie only said, "Ha, ha,
ho!" and walked deliberately into his hole,
When Cook came down stairs and saw that the same thing had happened
again--that the supper was all eaten, and the table-cloth
blacker than ever with the extraordinary footmarks, she was greatly
puzzled. Who could have done it all? Not the cat, who came mewing out of
the coal-cellar the minute she unlocked the door. Possibly a
rat--but then would a rat have come within reach of Tiny?
"It must have been Tiny herself, or her puppy," which just
came rolling out of its basket over Cook's
feet. "You little wretch! You and your mother are the greatest nuisance imaginable. I'll punish you!"
And quite forgetting that Tiny had been safely tied up all night, and
that her poor little puppy was so fat and helpless it could scarcely stand
on its legs--to say nothing of jumping on chairs and tables, she gave
them both such a thrashing that they ran howling together out of the
kitchen door, where the kind little kitchen-maid took them up in her
arms.
"You ought to have beaten the Brownie, if you could catch
him," said she in a whisper. "He'll do it again and
again, you'll see, for he can't bear an untidy kitchen.
You'd better do as poor old Cook did, and clear the supper things
away, and put the odds and ends safe in the larder; also," she added
mysteriously, "if I were you, I'd put a bowl of milk behind the
coal-cellar door."
"Nonsense!" answered the young Cook, and flounced away. But
afterwards she thought better of it, and did as she was advised, grumbling
all the time, but doing it.
Next morning, the milk was gone! Perhaps Brownie had drunk it up, anyhow
nobody could say that he hadn't. As for the supper, Cook having
safely laid it on the shelves of the larder, nobody touched it. And the
table-cloth, which was wrapped up tidily and put in the dresser
drawer, came out as clean as ever, with not a single black footmark upon
it. No mischief being done, the cat and the dog both escaped beating, and
Brownie played no more tricks with anybody-till the next time.
like other children: but on the whole they deserved to have the pleasure of a Brownie to play with them, as they declared he did--many and many a time.
A favourite play-place was the orchard, where grew the biggest
cherry-tree you ever saw. They called it their "castle,"
because it rose up ten feet from the ground in one thick stem, and then
branched out into a circle of boughs, with a flat place in the middle,
where two or three children could sit at once. There they often did sit,
turn by turn, or one at a time--sometimes with a book, reading; and
the biggest boy made a sort of rope-ladder by which they could climb
up and down--which they did all winter, and enjoyed their
"castle" very much.
But one day in spring they found their ladder cut away! The Gardener had
done it, saying it injured the tree, which was just coming into blossom.
Now this Gardener was a rather gruff man, with a growling voice. He did not
mean to be unkind, but he disliked children; he said they bothered him. But
when they complained to their mother
about the ladder, she agreed with Gardener that the tree must not be injured, as it bore the biggest cherries in all the neighbourhood--so big that the old saying of "taking two bites at a cherry," came really true.
"Wait till the cherries are ripe," said she; and so the
little people waited, and watched it through its leafing and
blossoming--such sheets of blossom, white as snow!--till the
fruit began to show, and grew large and red on every bough.
At last one morning the mother said "Children, should you like to
help gather the cherries to-day?"
"Hurrah!" they cried, "and not a day too soon; for we
saw a flock of starlings in the next field--and if we don't
clear the tree, they will."
"Very well; clear it then. Only mind and fill my basket quite full
for preserving. What is over you may eat if you like."
"Thank you, thank you," and the children were eager to be
off, but the mother stopped them till she could get the Gardener and his
ladder.
"For it is he must climb the tree, not you; and
you must do exactly as he tells you; and he will stop with you all the time and see that you don't come to harm."
This was no slight cloud on the children's happiness, and they
begged hard to go alone.
"Please might we? We will be so good!"
The mother shook her head. All the goodness in the world would not help
them if they tumbled off the tree, or eat themselves sick with cherries.
"You would not be safe, and I should be so unhappy."
To make mother "unhappy" was the worst rebuke possible to
these children; so they choked down their disappointment, and followed the
gardener as he walked on ahead, carrying his ladder on his shoulder. He
looked very cross, and as if he did not like the children's company
at all.
They were pretty good on the whole, though they chattered a good deal;
but Gardener said not a word to them all the way to the orchard. When they
reached it he just told them to "keep out of his way and not worrit
him," which they politely promised, saying among themselves that
they should not enjoy their cherry-gathering at all. But children who make the best of things and try to be as good as they can, sometimes have fun unawares.
When the gardener was steadying his ladder against the trunk of the
cherry-tree, there was suddenly heard the barking of a dog, and a
very fierce dog too. First it seemed close beside them, then in the
flower-garden, then in the fowl-yard.
Gardener dropped the ladder out of his hands. "It's that
Boxer! He has got loose again! He will be running after my chickens, and
dragging his broken chain all over my borders. And he is so fierce, and so
delighted to get free. He'll bite anybody who ties him up, except
me."
"Hadn't you better go and see after him?"
Gardener thought it was the eldest boy who spoke, and turned round
angrily; but the little fellow had never opened his lips.
Here there was heard a still louder bark, and from a quite different
part of the garden.
"There he is--I'm sure of it! jumping over
my bedding-out plants, and breaking my cucumber frames. Abominable beast!--just let me catch him!"
Off Gardener darted in a violent passion, throwing the ladder down upon
the grass, and forgetting all about the cherries and the children.
The instant he was gone, a shrill laugh, loud and merry, was heard close
by, and a little brown old man's face peeped from behind the
cherry-tree.
"How-dy'e-do?--Boxer was me. Didn't
I bark well? Now I'm come to play with you."
The children clapped their hands; for they knew they were going to have
some fun if Brownie was there--he was the best little
play-fellow in the world. And then they had him all to themselves.
Nobody ever saw him except the children.
"Come on!" cried he, in his shrill voice, half like an old
man's, half like a baby's. "Who'll begin to gather
the cherries?"
They all looked blank; for the tree was so high to where the branches
sprung, and besides, their mother had said they were not to climb. And the
ladder lay flat upon the grass--far too heavy for little hands to move.
"What! you big boys don't expect a poor little fellow like
me to lift the ladder all by myself? Try! I'll help you."
Whether he helped or not, no sooner had they taken hold of the ladder
than it rose up, almost of its own accord, and fixed itself quite safely
against the tree.
"But we must not climb; mother told us not," said the boys
ruefully. "Mother said we were to stand at the bottom and pick up the
cherries."
"Very well. Obey your mother. I'll just run up the tree
myself."
Before the words were out of his mouth Brownie had darted up the ladder
like a monkey, and disappeared among the fruit-laden branches.
The children looked dismayed for a minute, till they saw a merry brown
face peeping out from the green leaves at the very top of the tree.
"Biggest fruit always grows highest," cried the Brownie;
"Stand in a row, all you children. Little
boys, hold out your caps: little girls, make a bag of your pinafores. Open your mouths and shut your eyes, and see what the queen will send you."
They laughed and did as they were told; whereupon they were drowned in a
shower of cherries--cherries falling like hailstones, hitting them on
their heads, their cheeks, their noses--filling their caps and
pinafores, and then rolling and tumbling on to the grass, till it was
strewn thick as leaves in autumn with the rosy fruit.
What a glorious scramble they had!--these three little boys and
three little girls. How they laughed and jumped and knocked heads together
in picking up the cherries--yet never quarrelled, for there were such
heaps, it would have been ridiculous to squabble over them; and besides,
whenever they began to quarrel, Brownie always ran away. Now he was the
merriest of the lot; ran up and down the tree like a cat, helped to pick up
the cherries, and was first-rate at filling the large
market-basket.
"We were to eat as many as we liked, only we must first fill the
basket," conscientiously said the eldest
girl; upon which they all set to at once, and filled it to the brim.
"Now we'll have a dinner party," cried the Brownie;
and squatted down like a Turk, crossing his queer little legs, and sticking
his elbows upon his knees, in a way that nobody but a Brownie could manage.
"Sit in a ring! sit in a ring! and we'll see who can eat
fastest."
The children obeyed. How many cherries they devoured, and how fast they
did it, passes my capacity of telling. I only hope they were not ill next
day--and that all the cherry-stones they swallowed by mistake
did not disagree with them. But perhaps nothing does disagree with one when
one dines with a Brownie.
They ate so much, laughing in equal proportion, that they had quite
forgotten the Gardener--when all of a sudden they heard him clicking
angrily the orchard gate, and talking to himself as he walked through.
"That nasty dog! It wasn't Boxer after all! A nice joke! to
find him quietly asleep in his kennel
--after having hunted him, as I thought, from one end of the garden to the other! Now for the cherries and the children--Bless us, where are the children? And the cherries! Why, the tree is as bare as a blackthorn in February! The starlings have been at it, after all. O dear! O dear!"
"O dear! O dear!" echoed a voice from behind the tree,
followed by shouts of mocking laughter. Not from the children--they
sat as demure as possible, all in a ring, with their hands before then, and
in the centre the huge basket of cherries, piled as full as it could
possibly hold. But the Brownie had disappeared.
"You naughty brats, I'll have you punished!" cried the
Gardener, furious at the laughter, for he never laughed himself. But as
there was nothing wrong; the cherries being gathered, a very large crop,
and the ladder found safe in its place--it was difficult to say what
had been the harm done and who had done it.
So he went growling back to the house, carrying the cherries to the
mistress, who coaxed him into
good temper again, as she sometimes did; bidding also the children to behave well to him, since he was an old man, and not really bad--only cross. As for the little folks, she had not the slightest intention of punishing them; and as for Brownie, it was impossible to catch him. So nobody was punished at all.
harm. For being only a Brownie, and not a man, he did not understand that the best way to revenge yourself upon your enemies is either to let them alone or to pay them back good for evil. It disappoints them so much, and makes them so exceedingly ashamed of themselves.
One day Brownie overheard the Gardener advising the cook to put sour
milk into his bowl at night, instead of sweet.
"He'd never find out the difference, no more than the pigs
do. Indeed it's my belief that a pig, or dog, or something, empties
the bowl, and not a Brownie at all. It's just clean
waste--that's what I say."
"Then you'd better hold your tongue, and mind your own
business," returned the cook, who was a sharp temper, and would not
stand being meddled with. She began to abuse the Gardener soundly; but his
wife, who was standing by, took his part, as she always did when any third
party scolded him. So they all squabbled together, till Brownie, hid under
his coal, put his little hands over his little ears.
"Dear me, what a noise these mortals do make when they quarrel!
They quite deafen me. I must teach them better manners."
But when the cook slammed the door to, and left Gardener and his wife
alone, they two began to dispute between themselves.
"You make such a fuss over your nasty pigs, and get all the scraps
for them," said the wife. "It's of much more importance
that I should have everything cook can spare for my chickens. Never were
such fine chickens as my last brood!"
"I thought they were ducklings."
"How you catch me up, you rude old man! They are ducklings, and
beauties too--even though they have never seen water. Where's
the pond you promised to make for me, I wonder?"
"Rubbish, woman! If my cows do without a pond, your ducklings may.
And why will you be so silly as to rear ducklings at all? Fine fat chickens
are a deal better. You'll find out your mistake some day!"
"And so will you when that old Alderney runs
dry. You'll wish you had taken my advice and fattened and sold her."
"Alderney cows won't sell for fattening, and women's
advice is never worth twopence. Your's isn't worth even a
halfpenny. What are you laughing at?"
"I wasn't laughing," said the wife, angrily; and in
truth it was not she, but little Brownie, running under the barrow which
the Gardener was wheeling along, and very much amused that people should be
so silly as to squabble about nothing.
It was still early morning; for whatever this old couple's faults
might be, laziness was not one of them. The wife rose with the dawn to feed
her poultry and collect her eggs; the husband also got through as much work
by breakfast-time as many an idle man does by noon. But Brownie had
been beforehand with them this day.
When all the fowls came running to be fed, the big Brahma hen who had
hatched the ducklings was seen wandering forlornly about, and clucking
mournfully for her young brood--she could not find them
anywhere. Had she been able to speak, she might have told how a large white Aylesbury duck had waddled into the farmyard, and waddled out again, coaxing them after her, no doubt in search of a pond. But missing they were, most certainly.
"Cluck, cluck, cluck!" mourned the miserable
hen-mother,--and "Oh, my ducklings, my ducklings!"
cried the Gardener's wife, "Who can have carried off my
beautiful ducklings?"
"Rats, maybe," said the Gardener, cruelly, as he walked
away. And as he went he heard the squeak of a rat below his
wheel-barrow. But he could not catch it, any more than his wife
could catch the Aylesbury duck. Of course not. Both were--the
Brownie!
Just at this moment the six little people came running into the
farmyard. When they had been particularly good, they were sometimes allowed
to go with Gardener a-milking, each carrying his or her own mug for
a drink of milk, warm from the cow. They scampered after him--a noisy
tribe, begging to be taken down to the field, and holding out their six
mugs entreatingly.
"What, six cupfuls of milk, when I haven't a drop to spare,
and cook is always wanting more? Ridiculous nonsense! Get along with you;
you may come to the field--I can't hinder that--but
you'll get no milk this day. Take your mugs back again to the
kitchen."
The poor little folks made the best of a bad business, and obeyed; then
followed Gardener down to the field, rather dolefully. But it was such a
beautiful morning that they soon recovered their spirits. The grass shone
with dew, like a sheet of diamonds, the clover smelt so sweet, and two
skylarks were singing at one another high up in the sky. Several rabbits
darted past to their great amusement, especially one very large rabbit,
brown, not grey, which dodged them in and out, and once nearly threw
Gardener down, pail and all, by running across his feet;--which set
them all laughing till they came where Dolly the cow lay chewing the cud
under a large oak-tree.
It was great fun to stir her up--as usual--and lie down, one
after the other, in the place where she
had lain all night long, making the grass flat, and warm and perfumy with her sweet breath. She let them do it, and then stood meekly by; for Dolly was the gentlest cow in the world.
But this morning something strange seemed to possess her. She altogether
refused to be milked--kicked, plunged, tossed over the pail, which was
luckily empty.
"Bless the cow! what's wrong with her? It's surely you
children's fault. Stand off, the whole lot of you. Soh, Dolly! good
Dolly!"
But Dolly was anything but good. She stood, switching her tail and
looking as savage as so mild an animal possibly could look.
"It's all your doing, you naughty children! You've
been playing her some trick, I know," cried the Gardener, in great
wrath.
They assured him they had done nothing, and indeed they looked as quiet
as mice and as innocent as lambs. At length the biggest boy pointed out a
large wasp which had settled in Dolly's ear.
"That accounts for everything," said the Gardener.
But it did not mend everything; for when he tried to drive it away it
kept coming back and back, and buzzing round his own head, and the
cow's, with a voice that the children thought was less like the buzz
of a wasp than the sound of a person laughing. At length it frightened
Dolly to such an extent that with one wild bound she darted right away, and
galloped off to the further end of the field.
"I'll get a rope and tie her legs together," cried the
Gardener, fiercely. "She shall repent giving me all his
trouble--that she shall!"
"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed somebody. The Gardener thought it was
the children, and gave one of them an angry cuff as he walked away. But
they knew it was somebody else, and were not at all surprised when, the
minute his back was turned, Dolly came walking quietly back, led by a
little wee brown man who scarcely reached up to her knees. Yet she let him
guide her, which he did as gently as possible, though the string he held
her by was no thicker than a spider web. floating from one of her her
horns.
"Soh, Dolly! good Dolly!" cried Brownie,
mimicking the Gardener's voice. "Now we'll see what we can do. I want my breakfast badly--don't you, little folks?"
Of course they did, for the morning air made them very hungry.
"Very well--wait a bit, though. Old people should be served
first, you know. Besides, I want to go to bed."
Go to bed in the daylight! The children all laughed, and then looked
quite shy and sorry, lest they might have seemed rude to the little
Brownie. But he--he liked fun; and never took offense when none was
meant.
He placed himself on the milking-stool, which was so high that
his little legs were dangling halfway down, and milked and
milked--Dolly standing as still as possible--till he had filled
the whole pail. Most astonishing cow! she gave as much as two
cows;--and such delicious milk as it was--all frothing and
yellow--richer than even Dolly's milk had ever been before. The
children's mouths watered for it, but not a word said
they,--even when, instead of giving it to them, Brownie put his own
mouth to the
"Now, little ones, now's your turn. Where are your
mugs?"
All answered mournfully, "We've got none. Gardener made us
take them back again."
"Never mind--all right. Gather me half-a-dozen
of the biggest buttercups you can find."
"What nonsense!" thought the children; but they did it.
Brownie laid the flowers in a row upon the eldest girl's
lap--blew upon them one by one, and each turned into the most
beautiful golden cup that ever was seen!
"Now, then, every one take his own mug, and I'll fill
it."
He milked away--each child got a drink, and then the cups were
filled again. And all the while Dolly stood as quiet as
possible--looking benignly round, as if she would be happy to supply
milk to the whole parish, if the Brownie desired it.
"Soh, Dolly! Thank you, Dolly!" said he again,
mimicking the Gardener's voice, half growling, half coaxing. And while he spoke, the real voice was heard behind the hedge. There was a sound as of a great wasp flying away, which made Dolly prick up her ears, and look as if the old savageness was coming back upon her. The children snatched up their mugs, but there was no need, they had all turned into buttercups again.
Gardener jumped over the stile, as cross as two sticks, with an old rope
in his hand.
"O, what a bother I've had! Breakfast ready, and no milk
yet--and such a row as they are making over those lost ducklings.
Stand back, you children, and don't hinder me a minute. No use
begging--not a drop of milk shall you get. Hillo, Dolly? Quiet, old
girl!"
Quiet enough she was this time--but you might as well have milked a
plaster cow in a London milk-shop. Not one ringing drop resounded
against the empty pail; for, when they peeped in, the children saw to their
amazement that it was empty.
"The creature's bewitched!" cried the gardener in a
great fury. "Or else somebody has milked her dry already. Have you
done it? or you?" he asked each of the children.
They might have said No--which was the literal truth--but then
it would not have been the whole truth, for they knew quite well that Dolly
had been milked, and also who had done it. And their mother had always
taught them that to make a person believe a lie is nearly as bad as telling
him one. Yet still they did not like to betray the kind little Brownie.
Greatly puzzled, they hung their heads and said nothing.
"Look in your pail again," cried a voice from the other side
of Dolly. And there at the bottom was just the usual quantity of
milk--no more and no less.
The Gardener was very much astonished. "It must be the
Brownie!" muttered he in a frightened tone: and, taking off his
hat, "Thank you, sir," said he to Mr. Nobody--at which the
children all burst out laughing. But they kept their own counsel, and he
was afraid to ask them any more questions.
By-and-by his fright wore off a little. "I only hope
the milk is good milk, and will poison nobody," said he, sulkily.
"However, that's not my affair. You children had better tell
your mother all about it. I left her in the farmyard in a pretty state of
mind about her ducklings."
Perhaps Brownie heard this, and was sorry, for he liked the
children's mother, who had always been kind to him. Besides, he never
did anybody harm who did not deserve it; and though, being a Brownie, he
could hardly be said to have a conscience; he had something which stood in
the place of one, a liking to see people happy rather than miserable.
So instead of going to bed under his big coal for the day, when, after
breakfast, the children and their mother came out to look at a new brood of
chickens, he crept after them, and hid behind the hen-coop where the
old mother-hen was put with her young ones round her.
There had been great difficulty in getting her in there, for she was a
hen who hatched her brood on independent principles. Instead of sitting
upon the
nice nest that the Gardener made for her, she had twice gone into a little wood close by and made a nest for herself, which nobody could ever find; and where she hatched in secret, coming every second day to be fed; and then vanishing again, till at last she re-appeared in triumph, with her chickens running after her. The first brood there had been twelve, but of this there were fourteen--all from her own eggs, of course, and she was uncommonly proud of them. So was the Gardener, so was the mistress--who liked all young things. Such a picture as they were! fourteen soft, yellow, fluffy things--running about after their mother. It had been a most troublesome business to catch--first her, and then them, to put them under the coop. The old hen resisted, and pecked furiously at Gardener's legs, and the chickens ran about in frantic terror, chirping wildly in answer to her clucking.
At last, however, the little family was safe in shelter, and the
chickens counted over to see that none had been lost in the scuffle. How
funny they were! looking so innocent and yet so wise, us chickens do--
peering out at the world from under their mother's wing, or hopping over her back, or snuggled all together under her breast, so that nothing was seen of them but a mass of yellow legs, like a great centipede.
"How happy the old hen is;" said the children's
mother, looking on, and then looking compassionately at that other forlorn
old hen, who had hatched the ducklings, and kept wandering about the
farmyard, clucking miserably, "Those poor ducklings, what can have
become of them? If rats had killed them we should have found feathers or
something: and weasels would have sucked their brains and left them.
They must have been stolen, or wandered away, and died of cold and
hunger--my poor ducklings!"
The mistress sighed, for she could not bear any living thing to suffer.
And the children nearly cried at the thought of what might be happening to
their pretty ducklings. That very minute a little wee brown face peered
through a hole in the hen-coop, making the old mother-hen fly
furiously at it--as she did at the slightest shadow of an enemy to her
little ones.
However, no harm happened--only a guinea-fowl suddenly ran
across the farm-yard, screaming in its usual harsh voice. But it was
not the usual sort of guinea-fowl, being larger and handsomer than
any of theirs.
"O what a beauty of a creature! how did it ever come into our
farmyard," cried the delighted children; and started off after it, to
catch it if possible.
But they ran and they ran--through the gate and out into the lane;
and the guinea-fowl still ran on before them, until turning round a
corner they lost sight of it, and immediately saw something else, equally
curious.
Sitting on the top of a big thistle--so big that he must have had
to climb it just like a tree--was the Brownie. His legs were crossed,
and his arms too; his little brown cap was stuck knowingly on one side, and
he was laughing heartily.
"How do you do? Here I am again. I thought I wouldn't go to
bed after all. Shall I help you to find the ducklings? Very well! come
along."
They crossed the field, Brownie running beside them and as fast as they
could, though he looked such
an old man; and sometimes turning over on legs and arms like a Catherine wheel,--which they tried to imitate, but generally failed, and only bruised their fingers and noses.
He lured them on and on till they came to the wood, and to a green path
in it, which, well as they knew the neighbourhood, none of the children had
ever seen before. It led to a most beautiful pond, as clear as crystal and
as blue as the sky. Large trees grew round it, dipping their branches in
the water, as if they were looking at themselves in a glass. And all about
their roots were quantities of primroses--the biggest primroses the
little girls had ever seen.
Down they dropped on their fat knees, squashing down more primroses than
they gathered, though they tried to gather them all; and the smallest child
even began to cry because her hands were so full that the flowers dropped
through her fingers.
But the boys, older and more practical, rather despised primroses.
"I thought we had come to look for ducklings,"
said the eldest. "Mother is fretting dreadfully about her ducklings. Where can they be?"
"Shut your eyes and you'll see," said the Brownie, at
which they all laughed, but did it; and when they opened their eyes again,
what should they behold, but a whole fleet of ducklings, sailing out from
the roots of an old willow-tree, one after the other, looking as fat
and content as possible, and swimming as naturally as if they had lived on
a pond--and this particular pond, all their days.
"Count them," said the Brownie, "the whole
eight--quite correct. And then try and catch them--if you
can."
Easier said than done. The boy set to work with great
satisfaction--boys do so enjoy hunting something. They coaxed
them--they shouted at them--they threw little sticks at them; but
a soon as they wanted them to go one way the fleet of ducklings immediately
turned round and sailed another way, doing it so deliberately and
majestically, that the children could not help laughing. As for little
Brownie, he sat on a branch of the
willow tree, with his legs dangling down to the surface of the pond, kicking at the water-spiders, and grinning with all his might.
At length, quite tired out, in spite of their fun, the children begged
for his help, and he took compassion on them.
"Turn round three times and see what you can find," shouted
he.
Immediately each little boy found in his arms, and each little girl in
her pinafore, a fine fat duckling. And there being eight of them, the two
elder children had each a couple. They were rather cold and damp, and
slightly uncomfortable to cuddle, ducks not being used to cuddling. Poor
things! they struggled hard to get away. But the children hugged them
tight, and ran as fast as their legs could carry them through the wood,
forgetting in their joy even to say "Thank you" to the little
Brownie.
When they reached their mother she was as glad as they, for she never
thought to see her ducklings again; and to have them back all alive
and uninjured, and watch them running to the old hen, who received them with an ecstasy of delight, was so exciting, that nobody thought of asking a single question as to where they had been found.
When the mother did ask, the children told her all about Brownie's
taking them to the beautiful pond--and what a wonderful pond it was;
how green the trees were round it: and how large the primroses grew.
They never tired of talking about it, and seeking for it. But the odd thing
was, that seek as they might, they never could find it again. Many a day
did the little people roam about, one by one or all together, round the
wood, and across the wood, and up and down the wood, often getting
themselves sadly draggled with mud, and torn with brambles--but the
beautiful pond they never found again.
Nor did the ducklings, I suppose; for they wandered no more from the
farm-yard, to the old mother hen's great content. They grew up
into fat and respectable ducks--five white ones and three grey
ones--waddling about, very content, though
they never saw water, except the tank which was placed for them to paddle in. They lived a lazy, peaceful, pleasant life for a long time, and were at last killed and eaten with green peas, one after the other, to the family's great satisfaction if not to their own.
The six little children got a present of something they had longed for
all their lives--a pony. Not a rocking-horse, but a real live
pony--a Shetland pony, too, which had travelled all the way
from the Shetland Isles to Devonshire--where everybody wondered at it, for such a creature had not been seen in the neighbourhood for years and years. She was no bigger than a donkey, and her coat, instead of being smooth like a horse, was shaggy like a young bear's. She had a long tail, which had never been cut, and such a deal of hair in her mane and over her eyes that it gave her quite a fierce countenance. In fact, among the mild and tame Devonshire beasts, the little Shetland pony looked almost like a wild animal.
But in reality she was the gentlest creature in the world. Before she
had been many days with them, she began to know the children quite
well: followed them about, ate corn out of the bowl they held out to
her; nay, one day when the eldest little girl offered her
bread-and-butter, she stooped her head and took it from the
child's hand, just like a young lady. Indeed, Jess--that was her
name--was altogether so lady-like in her behaviour, that more
than once, cook allowed her
to walk in at the back door, when she stood politely warming her nose at the kitchen fire, for a minute or two, then turned round and as politely walked out again. But she never did any mischief; and was so quiet and gentle a creature that she bade fair soon to become as great a pet in the household as the dog, the cat, the kittens, the puppies, the fowls, the ducks, the cow, the pig, and all the other members of the family.
The only one who disliked her, and grumbled at her, was the Gardener.
This was odd; because, though cross to children, the old man was kind to
dumb beasts. Even his pig knew his voice and grunted, and held out his nose
to be scratched, and he always gave each successive pig a name, Jack or
Dick, and called them by it, and was quite affectionate to them, one after
the other, until the very day that they were killed. But they were English
pigs--and the pony was Scotch--and the Devonshire Gardener hated
everything Scotch, he said; besides, he was not used to groom's work,
and the pony required such a deal of grooming on
account of her long hair. More than once, Gardener threatened to clip it short, and turn her into a regular English pony, but the children were in such distress at this that the mistress and mother forbade any such spoiling of Jess's personal appearance.
At length, to keep things smooth, and to avoid the rough words and even
blows which poor Jess sometimes got, they sought in the village for a boy
to look after her, and found a great rough shock-headed lad named
Bill, who for a few shillings a week consented to come up every morning and
learn the beginning of a groom's business; hoping to end, as his
mother said he should, in sitting, like the squire's fat coachman, as
broad as he was long, on the top of the hammercloth of a grand carriage,
and do nothing all day but drive a pair of horses as stout as himself a few
miles along the road and back again.
Bill would have liked this very much, he thought, if he could have been
a coachman all at once, for if there was one thing he disliked, it was
work. He much preferred to lie in the sun all day and do
nothing; and he only agreed to come and take care of Jess because she was such a very little pony that looking after her seemed next door to doing nothing. But when he tried it he found his mistake. True, Jess was a very gentle beast; so quiet that the old mother hen with fourteen chicks used, instead of roosting with the rest of the fowls, to come regularly into the portion of the cow-shed which was partitioned off for a stable, and settle under a corner of Jess's manger for the night; and in the morning the chicks would be seen running about fearlessly among her feet and under her very nose.
But for all that she required a little management for she did not like
her long hair to be roughly handled; it took along time to clean her, and
though she did not scream out like some silly little children when her hair
was combed, I am afraid she sometimes kicked and bounced about, giving Bill
a deal of trouble--all the more trouble, the more impatient Bill
was.
And then he had to keep within call, for the children wanted their pony
at all hours. She was
their own especial property, and they insisted upon learning to ride--even before they got a saddle. Hard work it was to stick on Jess's bare back, but by degrees the boys did it, turn and turn about, and even gave their sisters a turn too--a very little one--just once round the field and back again, which was quite enough, they considered, for girls. But they were very kind to their little sisters, held them on so that they could not fall, and led Jess carefully and quietly: and altogether behaved as elder brothers should.
Nor did they squabble very much among themselves, though sometimes it
was rather difficult to keep their turns all fair, and remember accurately
which was which. But they did their best, being on the whole extremely good
children. And they were so happy to have their pony that they would have
been ashamed to quarrel over her.
Also, one very curious thing kept them on their good behaviour. Whenever
they did begin to misconduct themselves, to want to ride out of their
turns, or to domineer over one another, or the boys, joining to-
gether, tried to domineer over the girls, as I grieve to say boys not seldom do, they used to hear in the air, right over their heads, the crack of an unseen whip. It was none of theirs, for they had not got a whip; that was a felicity which their father had promised when they could all ride like young gentlemen and ladies; but there was no missing the sound--indeed, it always startled Jess so that she set off galloping, and could not be caught again for many minutes.
This happened several times, until one of them said, "Perhaps
it's the Brownie." Whether it was or not, it made them behave
better for a good while: till one unfortunate day the two eldest
began contending which should ride foremost and which hindmost on
Jess's back, when "Crick--crack!" went the whip in
the air, frightening the pony so much that she kicked up her heels, tossed
both the boys over her head, and scampered off, followed by a loud
"Ha, ha, ha!"
It certainly did not come from the two boys, who had fallen--quite
safely, but rather unpleasantly--
into a large nettle-bed; whence they crawled out, rubbing their arms and legs, and looking too much ashamed to complain. But they were rather frightened and a little cross, for Jess took a skittish fit, and refused to be caught and mounted again, till the bell rang for school--when she grew as meek as possible. Too late--for the children were obliged to run indoors, and got no more rides for the whole day.
Jess was from this incident supposed to be on the same friendly terms
with Brownie as were the rest of the household. Indeed, when she came, the
children had taken care to lead her up to the coal-cellar door and
introduce her properly--for they knew Brownie was very jealous of
strangers and often played them tricks. But after that piece of civility he
would be sure, they thought, to take her under his protection. And
sometimes, when the little Shetlander was restless and pricked up her ears,
looking preternaturally wise under those shaggy brows of hers, the children
used to say to one another, "Perhaps she sees the Brownie."
Whether she did or not, Jess sometimes seemed
to see a good deal that others did not see, and was apparently a favourite with the Brownie, for she grew and thrived so much that she soon became the pride and delight of the children and of the whole family. You would hardly have known her for the rough, shaggy, half-starved little beast that had arrived a few weeks before. Her coat was so silky, her limbs so graceful, and her head so full of intelligence, that everybody admired her. Then, even Gardener began to admire her too.
"I think I'll get upon her back, it will save me walking
down to the village," said he, one day. And she actually carried
him--though, as his feet nearly touched the ground, it looked as if
the man were carrying the pony and not the pony the man. And the children
laughed so immoderately that he never tried it afterwards.
Nor Bill neither, though he had once thought he should like a ride, and
got astride on Jess--but she quickly ducked her head down, and he
tumbled over it. Evidently she had her own tastes as to her riders, and
much preferred little people to big ones.
Pretty Jess! when cantering round the paddock with the young folk, she
really was quite a picture. And when at last she got a saddle--a new,
beautiful saddle, with a pommel to take off and on, so as to suit both boys
and girls--how proud they all were, Jess included! That day they were
allowed to take her into the market-town--Gardener leading her,
as Bill could not be trusted--and everybody, even the blacksmith, who
hoped by-and-by to have the pleasure of shoeing her, said
what a beautiful pony she was!
After this, Gardener treated Jess a great deal better, and showed Bill
how to groom her, and kept him close at it too, which Bill did not like at
all. He was a very lazy lad, and whenever he could shirk work he did it;
and many a time when the children wanted Jess, either there was nobody to
saddle her, or she had not been properly groomed, or Bill was away at his
dinner, and they had to wait till he came back and could put her in order
to be taken out for a ride like a genteel animal--which I am afraid
neither pony nor children
enjoyed half so much as the old ways before Bill came.
Still they were gradually becoming excellent little horsemen and
horsewomen, even the youngest, only four years old, whom all the rest were
very tender over, and who was often held on Jess's back and given a
ride out of her turn because she was a good little girl and never cried for
it. And seldomer and seldomer was heard the mysterious sound of the whip in
the air, which warned them of quarrelling--Brownie hated
quarrelling.
In fact, their only trouble was Bill, who never came to his work in
time, and never did things when wanted, and was ill-natured, lazy,
and cross to the children, so that they disliked him very much.
"I wish the Brownie would punish you," said one of the boys,
"you'd behave better then."
"The Brownie!" cried Bill contemptuously, "if I caught
him I'd kick him up in the air, like this!"
And he kicked up his cap--his only cap, it was--which, strange
to relate, flew right up, ever so high, and lodged at the very top of a
tree which overhung
the stable, where it dangled for weeks and weeks, during which time poor Bill had to go bareheaded.
He was very much vexed, and revenged himself by vexing the children in
all sorts of ways. They would have told their mother, and asked her to send
Bill away, only she had a great many anxieties just then, for their dear
old grandmother was very ill and they did not like to make a fuss about
anything that would trouble her.
So Bill stayed on, and nobody found out what a bad, ill-natured,
lazy boy he was.
But one day the mother was sent for suddenly, not knowing when she
should be able to come home again. She was very sad, and so were the
children, for they loved their grandmother--and as the carriage drove
off they all stood crying round the front door for ever so long.
The servants even cried too--all but Bill.
"It's an ill-wind that blows nobody good," said
he. "What a jolly time I shall have! I'll do nothing all day
long. Those troublesome children sha'n't have Jess to ride;
I'll keep her in the stable
and then she won't get dirty, and I shall have no trouble in cleaning her. Hurrah! what fun!"
He put his hands in his pockets, and sat whistling the best part of the
afternoon.
The children had been so unhappy, that for that day they quite forgot
Jess; but next morning after lessons were over, they came, begging for a
ride.
"You can't get one. The stable-door's locked,
and I've lost the key." (He had it in his pocket all the
time.)
"How is poor Jess to get her dinner?" cried a thoughtful
little girl "Oh how hungry she will be!"
And the child was quite in distress, as were the two other girls. But
the boys were more angry than sorry.
"It was very stupid of you, Bill, to lose the key. Look about and
find it, or else break open the door."
"I won't," said Bill, "I daresay the key will
turn up before night, and if it doesn't--who cares? You get
riding enough and too much. I'll not bother myself about it, or Jess
either."
And Bill sauntered away. He was a big fellow
and the little lads were rather afraid of him. But as he walked, he could not keep his hand out of his trousers-pocket, where the key felt growing heavier and heavier, till he expected it every minute to tumble through, and come out at his boots--convicting him before all the children of having told a lie.
Nobody was in the habit of telling lies to them, so they never suspected
him, but went innocently searching about for the key--Bill all the
while clutching it fast. But every time he touched it, he felt his fingers
pinched, as if there was a cockroach in his pocket--or a little
lobster--or something anyhow that had claws. At last, fairly
frightened, he made an excuse to go into the cowshed, took the key out of
his pocket and looked at it, and finally hid it in a corner of the manger,
among the hay.
As he did so, he heard a most extraordinary laugh, which was certainly
not from Dolly the cow, and, as he went out of the shed, he felt the same
sort of pinch at his ankles, which made him so angry that he kept striking
with his whip in all directions, but hit nobody, for nobody was there.
But Jess--who, as soon as she heard the children's voice, had
set up a most melancholy whinnying behind the locked stable
door--began to neigh energetically. And Boxer barked, and the hens
cackled, and the guinea-fowls cried "Come back, come
back!" in their usual insane fashion--indeed the whole farmyard
seemed in such an excited state, that the children got frightened lest
Gardener should scold them; and ran away, leaving Bill master of the
field.
What an idle day he had! How he sat on the wall with his hands in his
pockets, and lounged upon the fence, and sauntered round the garden! At
length, absolutely tired of doing nothing, he went and talked with the
Gardener's wife, while she was hanging out her clothes. Gardener had
gone down to the lower field, with all the little folks after him, so that
he knew nothing of Bill's idling, or it might have come to an
end.
By-and-by Bill thought it was time to go home to his
supper. "But first I'll give Jess her corn," said he,
"double quantity, and then I need not come back to give her her
breakfast so early in the morning.
Soh! you greedy beast. I'll be at you presently if you don't stop that noise."
For Jess, at sound of his footsteps, was heard to whinny in the most
imploring manner, enough to have melted a heart of stone.
"The key--where on earth did I put the key?" cried
Bill, whose constant habit it was to lay things out of his hand, and then
forget where he had put them, causing himself endless loss of time in
searching for them--as now. At last he suddenly remembered the corner
of the cow's manger, where he felt sure he had left it. But the key
was not there.
"You can't have eaten it, you silly old cow," said he,
striking Dolly on the nose as she rubbed herself against him--she was
an affectionate beast. "Nor you, you stupid old hen!" kicking
the mother of the brood, who, with her fourteen chicks, being shut out of
their usual roosting-place, Jess's stable--kept pecking
about under Dolly's legs. "It can't have gone without
hands--of course it can't." But most certainly the key was
gone.
What in the world should Bill do? Jess kept on
making a pitiful complaining. No wonder, as she had not tasted food since morning. It would have made any kind-hearted person quite sad to hear her, thinking how exceedingly hungry the poor pony must be.
Little did Bill care for that, or for anything, except that he should be
sure to get into trouble as soon as he was found out. When he heard
Gardener coming into the farmyard, with the children after him, Bill bolted
over the wall like a flash of lightning, and ran away home, leaving poor
Jess to her fate.
All the way he seemed to hear at his heels a little dog yelping, and
then a swarm of gnats buzzing round his head, and altogether was so
perplexed and bewildered, that when he got into his mother's cottage
he escaped into bed, and pulled the blanket over his ears to shut out the
noise of the dog and the gnats, which at last turned into a sound like
somebody laughing. It was not his mother, she didn't often laugh,
poor soul!--Bill bothered her quite too much for that, and he knew it.
Dreadfully frightened, he hid his head under the bed-clothes,
determined to go to sleep and think about nothing till next day.
Meantime, Gardener returned with all the little people trooping after
him. He had been rather kinder to them than usual this day, because he knew
their mother had gone away in trouble, and now he let them help him to roll
the gravel, and fetch up Dolly to be milked, and watch him milk her in the
cowshed--where, it being nearly winter, she always spent the night
now. They were so well amused that they forgot all about their
disappointment as to the ride, and Jess did not remind them of it by her
whinnying. For as soon as Bill was gone, she grew quite silent.
At last one little girl, the one who had cried over Jess's being
left hungry, remembered the poor pony, and peeping through a crevice in the
cowshed, saw her stand contentedly munching at a large bowl fall of
corn.
"So Bill did find the key. I'm very glad," thought the
kind little maiden, and to make sure looked again, when--what do you
think she beheld squatting on the manger? Something brown, either a large
brown rat, or a small brown man. But she held her tongue,
since being a very little girl, people sometimes laughed at her for the strange things she saw. She was quite certain she did see them for all that.
So she and the rest of the children went indoors and to bed. When they
were fast asleep, something happened. Something so curious, that the
youngest boy, who thinking he heard Jess neighing, got up to look out, was
afraid to tell, lest he too should be laughed at, and went back to bed
immediately.
In the middle of the night, a little old brown man carrying a lantern,
or at least having a light in his hand that looked like a
lantern--went and unlocked Jess's stable, and patted her pretty
head. At first she started, but soon she grew quiet and pleased, and let
him do what he chose with her. He began rubbing her down, making the same
funny hissing with his mouth that Bill did, and all grooms do--I never
could find out why. But Jess evidently liked it, and stood as good as
possible.
"Isn't it nice to be clean?" said the wee man, talking
to her as if she were a human being, or a Brownie. "And I dare say
your poor little legs
ache with standing still so long. Shall we have a run together? The moon shines bright in the clear, cold night. Dear me! I'm talking poetry."
But Brownies are not poetical fairies, quite common-place, and up
to all sorts of work. So, while he talked, he was saddling and bridling
Jess, she not objecting in the least. Finally he jumped on her back.
"Off, said the stranger; off, off, and away!" sang Brownie,
mimicking a song of the cook's. People in that house often heard
their songs repeated in the oddest way, from room to room, everybody
fancying it was somebody else that did it. But it was only the Brownie.
"Now, 'A southerly wind and a cloudy sky proclaim it a hunting
morning!'"
Or night--for it was the middle of the night, though bright as
day--and Jess galloped and the Brownie sat on her back as merrily as
if they had gone hunting together all their days.
Such a steeple-chase it was! They cleared the farmyard at a
single bound, and went flying down the road, and across the ploughed field,
and into the
wood. Then out into the open country, and by-and-bye into a dark, muddy lane--and oh! how muddy Devonshire lanes can be sometimes!
"Let's go into the water to wash ourselves," said
Brownie, and coaxed Jess into a deep stream, which she swam as bravely as
possible--she had not had such a frolic since she left her native
Shetland Isles. Up the bank she scrambled, her long hair dripping as if she
had been a water-dog instead of a pony. Brownie too shook himself
like a rat or a beaver, throwing a shower round him in all directions.
"Never mind, at it again, my lass!" and he urged Jess into
the water once more. Out she came, wetter and brisker than ever, and went
back home through the lane, and the wood, and the ploughed field, galloping
like the wind, and tossing back her ears and mane and tail, perfectly
frantic with enjoyment.
But when she reached her stable, the plight she was in would have driven
any respectable groom frantic too. Her sides were white with foam, and the
mud was sticking all over her like a plaister.
As for her beautiful long hair, it was all caked together in a tangle, as if all the combs in the world would never make it smooth again. Her mane especially was plaited into knots, which people in Devonshire call elf-locks, and say, when they find them on their horses, that it is because the fairies have been riding them.
Certainly, poor Jess had been pretty well ridden that night! When, just
as the dawn began to break, Gardener got up and looked into the farmyard,
his sharp eye caught sight of the stable-door, wide open.
"Well done, Bill," shouted he, "up early at last. One
hour before breakfast is worth three after."
But no Bill was there; only Jess, trembling and shaking, all in a foam,
and muddy from head to foot, but looking perfectly cheerful in her mind.
And out from under her forelegs ran a small creature, which Gardener
mistook for Tiny, only Tiny was grey, and this dog was brown, of
course!
I should not like to tell you all that was said to Bill, when, an hour
after breakfast-time, he came
skulking up to the farm. In fact, words failing, Gardener took a good stick and laid it about Bill's shoulders, saying he would either do this, or tell the mistress of him, and how he had left the stable-door open all night, and some bad fellow had stolen Jess, and galloped her all across the country, till, if she hadn't been the cleverest pony in the world, she never could have got back again.
Bill durst not contradict his explanation of the story. Especially as
the key was found hanging up in its proper place by the kitchen door. And
when he went to fetch it, he heard the most extraordinary sound in the
coal-cellar close by--like somebody snoring or laughing. Bill
took to his heels, and did not come back for a whole hour.
But when he did come back, he made himself as busy as possible. He
cleaned Jess, which as half-a-day's work at least. Then
he took the little people a ride, and afterwards put his stable in the most
beautiful order, and altogether was such a changed Bill, that Gardener told
him he must have left himself at home and brought back somebody else.
Whether or not, the boy certainly improved, so that there was less
occasion to find fault with him afterwards.
Jess lived to be quite an old pony, and carried a great many
people--little people always, for she herself never grew any bigger.
But I don't think she ever carried a Brownie again.
it did happen; and it never lasted very long, for the winters are warm in Devonshire.
There was a little lake three fields off, which made the most splendid
sliding place imaginable. No skaters went near it, it was not large enough;
and besides, there was nobody to skate, the neighbourhood being lonely. The
lake itself looked the loneliest place imaginable. It was not very deep,
not deep enough to drown a man, but it had a gravelly bottom and was always
very clear. Also the trees round it grew so thick that they sheltered it
completely from the wind; so when it did freeze, it generally froze as
smooth as a sheet of glass.
"The lake bears!" was such a grand event, and so rare, that
when it did occur, the news came at once to the farm, and the children
carried it as quickly to their mother. For she had promised them that, if
such a thing did happen this year--it did not happen every
year--lessons should be stopped entirely, and they should all go down
to the lake and slide, if they liked, all day long.
So, one morning just before Christmas, the eldest boy ran in with a
countenance of great delight.
"Mother, mother, the lake bears!" (It was rather a
compliment to call it a lake, it being only about twenty yards across and
forty long). "The lake really bears!"
"Who says so?"
"Bill. Bill has been on it for an hour this morning, and has made
us two such beautiful slides, he says--an up-slide and a
down-slide. May we go to them directly?"
The mother hesitated.
"You promised, you know," pleaded the children.
"Very well, then; only be careful."
"And may we slide all day long, and never come home for dinner or
anything?"
"Yes, if you like. Only Gardener must go with you, and stay all
day."
This they did not like at all; nor, when Gardener was spoken to, did
he.
"You bothering children! I wish you may all get a good ducking in
the lake! Serve you right for making me lose a day's work, just to
look after you little monkeys. I've a great mind to tell your mother
I won't do it."
But he did not, being fond of his mistress. He was also fond of his
work, but he had no notion of play. I think the saying of "All work
and no play makes Jack a dull boy" must have been applied to him, for
Gardener, whatever he had been as a boy, was certainly a dull and
melancholy man. The children used to say that if he and idle Bill could
have been kneaded into one, and baked in the oven--a very warm
oven--they would have come out rather a pleasant person.
As it was, Gardener was anything but a pleasant person, above all to
spend a long day with--and on the ice, where one needs all one's
cheerfulness and good-humour to bear pinched fingers and numbed
toes, and trips, and tumbles, and various uncomfortablenesses.
"He'll growl at us all day long--he'll be a
regular spoil-sport!" lamented the children. "Oh!
mother, mightn't we go alone?"
"No!" said the mother; and her "No" meant no,
though she was always very kind. They argued the point no more, but started
off, rather downhearted.
But soon they regained their spirits, for it was a bright, clear, frosty day: the sun shining, though not enough to melt the ice, and just sufficient to lie like a thin sprinkling over the grass, and turn the brown branches into white ones. The little people danced along to keep themselves warm, carrying between them a basket which held their lunch. A very harmless lunch it was, just a large brown loaf and a lump of cheese, and a knife to cut it with. Tossing the basket about in their fun they managed to tumble the knife out, and were having a search for it in the long grass when Gardener came up, grumpily enough.
"To think of trusting you children with one of the
table-knives and a basket! what a fool cook must be! I'll tell
her so, and if they're lost she'll blame me; give me the
things."
He put the knife angrily in one pocket;--"Perhaps it will cut
a hole in it," said one of the children, in rather a pleased tone
than otherwise;--then he turned the lunch all out on the grass and
crammed it in the other pocket, hiding the basket behind a hedge.
"I'm sure I'll not be at the trouble of carrying
it," said he, when the children cried out at this, "and you
sha'n't carry it either, for you'll knock it about and
spoil it. And as for your lunch getting warm in my pocket, why, so much the
better this cold day."
It was not a lively joke, and they knew his pocket was very dirty;
indeed, the little girls had seen him stuff a dead rat into it only the day
before. They looked ready to cry, but there was no help for them, except
going back and complaining to their mother, and they did not like to do
that. Besides, they knew that though Gardener was cross, he was
trustworthy, and she would never let them go down to the lake without
him.
So they followed him, trying to be as good as they could--though it
was difficult work. One of them proposed pelting him with
snow-balls, as they pelted each other. But at the first--which
fell in his neck--he turned round so furiously, that they never sent a
second, but walked behind him as meek as mice.
As they went they heard little steps pattering after them.
"Perhaps it is the Brownie coming to play with us--I wish he
would," whispered the youngest girl to the eldest boy, whose hand she
generally held; and then the little pattering steps sounded again,
travelling through the snow, but they saw nobody--so they said
nothing.
The children would have liked to go straight to the ice: but
Gardener insisted on taking them a mile round, to look at an extraordinary
animal which a farmer there had just got--sent by his brother in
Australia. The two old men stood gossiping so long that the children
wearied extremely. Every minute seemed an hour till they got on the
ice.
At last one of them pulled Gardener's coat-tails, and
whispered that they were quite ready to go.
"Then I'm not," and he waited ever so much longer, and
got a drink of hot cider, which made him quite lively for a little
while.
But by the time they reached the lake, he was
as cross as ever. He struck the ice with his stick, but made no attempt to see if it really did bear--though he would not allow the children to go one step upon it till he had tried.
"I know it doesn't bear, and you'll just have to go
home again--good thing too--saves me from losing a day's
work."
"Try, only try; Bill said it bore," implored the boys, and
looked wistfully at the two beautiful slides--just as Bill said, one
up and one down--stretching all across the lake; "of course it
bears, or Bill could not have made these slides."
"Bill's an ass!" said the Gardener, and put his heavy
foot cautiously on the ice. Just then there was seen jumping across it, a
creature which certainly had never been seen on ice before. It made the
most extraordinary bounds on its long hind legs, with its little fore legs
tucked up in front of it as if it wanted to carry a muff; and its long
stiff tail sticking out straight behind to balance itself with, apparently.
The children at first started with surprise, and then burst out
laughing, for it was the funniest creature, and had the funniest way of getting along, that they had ever seen in their lives.
"It's the kangaroo!" cried Gardener in great
excitement. "It has got loose--and it's sure to be
lost--and what a way Mr. Giles will be in! I must go and tell him. Or
stop, I'll try and catch it."
But in vain--it darted once or twice across the ice, dodging him,
as it were; and once coming so close that he nearly caught it by the
tail--to the children's great delight--then it vanished
entirely.
"I must go and tell Mr. Giles directly," said Gardener, and
then stopped. For he had promised not to leave the children--and it
was such a wild-goose chase after an escaped kangaroo. But he might
get half-a-crown as a reward, and he was sure of another
glass of cider.
"You just stop quiet here, and I'll be back in five
minutes," said he to the children. "You may go a little way on
the ice--I think it's sound enough; only mind you don't
tumble in, for there'll be nobody to pull you out."
"Oh, no," said the children, clapping their hands. They did
not care for tumbling in, and were quite glad there was nobody there to
pull them out. They hoped Gardener would stop a very long time
away--only, as some one suggested when he was seen hurrying across the
snowy field--he had taken away their lunch in his pocket, too.
"Never mind--we're not hungry yet. Now for a
slide."
Off they darted, the three elder boys, with a good run; the biggest of
the girls followed after them, and soon the whole four were skimming one
after the other, as fast as a railway train, across the slippery ice. And
like a railway train, they had a collision, and all came tumbling one over
the other, with great screaming and laughter, to the high bank on the other
side.
The two younger ones stood mournfully watching the others from the
opposite bank--when there stood beside them a small brown man.
"Ho-ho! little people," said he, coming between them
and taking hold of a hand of each. His was
so warm and theirs so cold, that it was quite comfortable. And then somehow they found in their open mouths a nice lozenge--I think it was peppermint, but am not sure--which comforted them still more.
"Did you want me to play with you?" cried the Brownie,
"then here I am! What shall we do? Have a turn on the ice
together?"
No sooner said than done. The two little children felt themselves
floating along--it was more like floating than running--with
Brownie between them; up the lake, and down the lake, and across the lake,
not at all interfering with the sliders--indeed, it was a great deal
better than sliding. Rosy and breathless, their toes so nice and warm, and
their hands feeling like mince-pies just taken out of the
oven--the little ones came to a stand-still.
The elder ones stopped their sliding, and looked towards Brownie with
entreating eyes. He swung himself up to a willow-bough, and then
turned head over heels on to the ice.
"Hallo, you don't mean to say you big ones want
a race too. Well, come along--if the two eldest will give a slide to the little ones."
He watched them take a tiny sister between them, and slide her up one
slide and down another, screaming with delight. Then he took the two middle
children in either hand.
"One, two, three, and away!" Off they started--scudding
along as light as feathers and as fast as steam-engines over the
smooth black ice, so clear that they could see the bits of stick and
water-grasses frozen in it, and even the little fishes swimming far
down below--if they had only looked long enough.
When all had had their fair turns, they began to be frightfully
hungry.
"Catch a fish for dinner, and I'll lend you a hook,"
said Brownie. At which they all laughed and then looked rather grave.
Pulling a cold, raw, live fish from under the ice, and eating it, was not a
pleasant idea of dinner. "Well, what would you like to have? Let the
little one choose."
She said, after thinking a minute, that she should like a currant
cake.
"And I'd give you all a bit of it--a very large
bit--I would indeed!" added she, almost with the tears in her
eyes--she was so very hungry.
"Do it then!" said the Brownie in his little squeaking
voice.
Immediately the stone that the little girl was sitting on, a round hard
stone and so cold! turned into a nice hot cake--so hot that she jumped
up directly. As soon as she saw what it was, she clapped her hands for
joy.
"Oh what a beautiful, beautiful cake! only we haven't got a
knife to cut it."
The boys felt in all their pockets, but somehow their knives never were
there when they were wanted.
"Look! you've got one in your hand!" said Brownie to
the little one; and that minute a bit of stick she held turned into a
bread-knife--silver, with an ivory handle--big enough and
sharp enough, without being too sharp. For the youngest girl was not
allowed to use sharp knives, though she liked cutting things excessively,
especially cakes.
"That will do. Sit you down and carve the dinner. Fair shares, and
don't let any body eat too much. Now begin, ma'am," said
the Brownie, quite politely, as if she had been ever so old.
Oh, how proud the little girl was! How bravely she set to work, and cut
five of the biggest slices you ever saw, and gave them to her brothers and
sisters, and was just going to take the sixth slice for herself, when she
remembered the Brownie.
"I beg your pardon," said she, as politely as he, though she
was such a very little girl--and turned round to the wee brown man.
But he was no where to be seen. The slices of cake in the children's
hands remained cake, and uncommonly good it was, and such substantial
eating that it did nearly the same as dinner; but the cake itself turned
suddenly to a stone again, and the knife into a bit of stick.
For there was the Gardener, coming clumping along by the bank of the
lake, and growling as he went.
"Have you got the kangaroo?" shouted the children,
determined to be civil if possible.
"This place is bewitched, I think"' said he.
"The
kangaroo was fast asleep in the cowshed. What! how dare you laugh at me?"
But they hadn't laughed at all. And they found it no laughing
matter, poor children, when Gardener came on the ice, and began to scold
them and order them about. He was perfectly savage with crossness, for the
people at Giles's Farm had laughed at him very much, and he did not
like to be laughed at--and at the top of the field he had by chance
met his mistress, and she had asked him severely how he could think of
leaving the children alone.
Altogether his conscience pricked him a good deal; and when
people's consciences prick them, sometimes they get angry with other
people, which is very silly and only makes matters worse.
"What have you been doing all this time?" said he.
"All this five minutes?" said the eldest boy mischievously;
for Gardener was only to be away five minutes, and he had stayed a full
hour. Also, when he fumbled in his pocket for the children's
lunch--to stop their tongues perhaps--he found it was not
there.
They set up a great outcry--for in spite of the cake, they could
have eaten a little more. Indeed the frost had such an effect upon all
their appetites that they felt not unlike that celebrated gentleman of whom
it is told that
"He ate a cow, and ate a calf,
He ate an ox and ate a
half;
He ate a church, he ate the steeple,
He ate the priest,
and all people,
And said he hadn't had enough
then."
"We're so hungry, so very hungry. Couldn't you go back
again and fetch us some dinner?" cried they entreatingly.
"Not I indeed. You may go back to dinner yourselves. You shall
indeed, for I want my dinner too. Two hours is plenty long enough to stop
on the ice."
"It isn't two hours--it's only one."
"Well, one will do better than more. You're all right
now--and you might soon tumble in, or break your legs on the slide. So
come away home."
It wasn't kind of Gardener, and I don't wonder
the children felt it hard; indeed, the eldest boy resisted stoutly.
"Mother said we might stop all day, and we will stop all day. You
may go home if you like."
"I won't, and you shall!" said Gardener, smacking a
whip that he carried in his hand. "Stop till I catch you, and
I'll give you this about your beak, my fine gentleman."
And he tried to follow, but the little fellow darted across the
ice--objecting to be either caught or whipped. It may have been rather
naughty, but I am afraid it was great fun, dodging the Gardener up and
down; he being too timid to go on the slippery ice, and sometimes getting
so close that the whip nearly touched the lad.
"Bless us! there's the kangaroo again!" said he,
starting. Just as he had caught the boy, and lifted the whip, the creature
was seen hop-hopping from bank to bank. "I can't surely
be mistaken this time; I must catch it."
Which seemed quite easy, for it limped as if it was lame, or as if the
frost had bitten its toes, poor
beast; Gardener went after it, walking cautiously on the slippery, crackling ice, and never minding whether or not he walked on the slides, though they called out to him that his nailed boots would spoil them.
But whether it was that ice which bears a boy will not bear a man, or
whether, at each lame step of the kangaroo, there came a great crack, is
more than I can tell. However, just as Gardener reached the middle of the
lake, the ice suddenly broke and in he popped.--The kangaroo too,
apparently, for it was not seen afterwards.
What a hulla-balloo the poor man made! Not that he was
drowning--the lake was too shallow to drown anybody; but he got
terribly wet, and the water was very cold. He soon scrambled out, the boys
helping him; and then he hobbled home as fast as he could, not even saying
thank you, or taking the least notice of them.
Indeed, nobody took any notice of them--nobody came to fetch them,
and they might have stayed sliding the whole afternoon. Only somehow they
did not feel quite easy in their minds. And though
the hole in the ice closed up immediately, and it seemed as firm as ever, still they did not like to slide upon it again.
"I think we had better go home and tell mother everything,"
said one of them. "Besides, we ought to see what has become of poor
Gardener. He was very wet."
"Yes; but oh, how funny he looked!" And they all burst out
laughing at the recollection of the figure he cut, scrambling out through
the ice with his trousers dripping up to the knees, and the water running
out of his boots, making a little pool wherever he stepped.
"And it freezes so hard that by the time he gets home his clothes
will be as stiff as a board. His wife will have to put him to the fire to
thaw before he can get out of them."
Again the little people burst into shouts of laughter. Although they
laughed they were a little sorry for poor old Gardener, and hoped no great
harm had come to him, but that he had got safe home and been dried by his
own warm fire.
The frosty mist was beginning already to rise, and the sun, though still
high up in the sky, looked like a ball of red-hot iron, as the six
children went homeward across the fields--merry enough still, but not
quite so merry as they had been a few hours before.
"Let's hope mother won't be vexed with us,"
said they, "but will let as come back again to-morrow. It wasn't our fault that Gardener tumbled in."
As somebody said this, they all heard quite distinctly, "Ha, ha,
ha," and "Ho, ho, ho," and a sound of little steps
pattering behind.
But whatever they thought, nobody ventured to say that it was the fault
of the Brownie.
house to house, generation after generation--never any older, and sometimes seeming even to grow younger, by the tricks he played. In fact, though he looked like an old man, he was a perpetual child.
To the children he never did any harm, quite the contrary. And his chief
misdoings were against those who vexed the children. But he gradually made
friends with several of his grown-up enemies. Cook, for instance,
who had ceased to be lazy at night, and late in the morning, found no more
black foot-marks on her white table-cloth. And Brownie found
his basin of milk waiting for him, night after night, behind the
coal-cellar door.
Bill, too, got on well enough with his pony, and Jess was taken no more
night-rides. No ducks were lost--and Dolly gave her milk quite
comfortably to whoever milked her. Alas! this was either Bill or the
Gardener's wife now. After that adventure on the ice, poor Gardener
very seldom appeared; when he did, it was on two crutches, for he had had
rheumatism in his feet, and could not stir outside his
cottage door. Bill, therefore, had double work; which was probably all the better for Bill.
The garden had to take care of itself, but this being winter-time
it did not much signify. Besides, Brownie seldom went into the garden,
except in summer; during the hard weather he preferred to stop in his
coal-cellar. It might not have been a lively place, but it was warm,
and he liked it.
He had company there too, for when the cat had more kittens--the
kitten he used to tease being grown up now--they were all put in a
hamper in the coal-cellar; and of cold nights Brownie used to jump
in beside them and be as warm and as cosy as a kitten himself. The little
things never were heard to mew, so it may be supposed they liked his
society. And the old mother cat evidently bore him no malice for the
whipping she had got by mistake, so Brownie must have found means of
coaxing her over. One thing you may be sure of, all the while she and her
kittens were in his coal-cellar he took care never to turn himself
into a mouse.
He was spending the winter on the whole very
comfortably--without much trouble either to himself or his neighbours, when one day, the coal-cellar being nearly empty, two men, and a great waggon-load of coals behind them, came to the door, Gardener's wife following.
"My man says you're to give the cellar a good cleaning out
before you put any more in," said she, in her sharp voice; "and
don't be lazy about it. It'll not take you ten minutes, for
it's nearly all coal-dust, except that one big lump in the
corner--you might clear that out too."
"Stop, it's the Brownie's lump! better not meddle with
it," whispered the little scullery-maid.
"Don't you meddle with matters that can't concern
you," said the Gardener's wife, who had been thinking what a
nice help it would be to her fire. To be sure, it was not her lump of coal,
but she thought she might take it; the mistress would never miss it, or the
Brownie either. He must be a very silly old Brownie to live under a lump of
coal.
So she argued with herself, and made the men lift it. "You must
lift it, you see, if you are to sweep the
coal-cellar out clean. And you may as well put it on the barrow, and I'll wheel it out of your way."
This she said in quite a civil voice, lest they should tell of her, and
stood by while it was being done. It was done without anything happening,
except that a large rat ran out of the coal-cellar door, bouncing
against her feet and frightening her so much that she nearly tumbled
down.
"See what nonsense it is to talk of Brownies living in a
coal-cellar. Nothing lives there but rats, and I'll have them
poisoned pretty soon, and get rid of them."
But she was rather frightened all the same, for the rat had been such a
very big rat, and had looked at her as it darted past with such wild,
bright, mischievous eyes--brown eyes of course--that she all but
jumped with surprise.
However, she had got her lump of coal and was wheeling it quietly away,
nobody seeing, to her cottage at the bottom of the garden. She was a
hard-worked woman--and her husband's illness made things
harder for her. Still she was not quite easy at taking what did not belong
to her.
"I don't suppose anybody will miss the coal," she
repeated. "I daresay the mistress would have given it to me if I had
asked her--and as for its being the Brownie's lump--fudge!
Bless us, what's that?"
For the barrow began to creak dreadfully, and every creak sounded like
the cry of a child, just as if the wheel were going over its leg and
crashing its poor little bones.
"What a horrid noise! I must grease the barrow. If only I knew
where they keep the grease-box. All goes wrong now my old
man's laid up. O dear, O dear!"
For suddenly the barrow had tilted over, though there was not a single
stone near, and the big coal was tumbled on to the ground, where it broke
into a thousand pieces. Gathering it up again was hopeless, and it made
such a mess on the gravel walk, that the old woman was thankful her
misfortune happened behind the privet hedge, where nobody was likely to
come.
"I'll take a broom and sweep it up to-morrow. Nobody
goes near the orchard now, except me
when I hang out the clothes; so I need say nothing about it to the old man or anybody. But ah! deary me, what a beautiful lot of coal I've lost!"
She stood and looked at it mournfully and then went into her cottage,
where she found two or three of the little children keeping Gardener
company. They did not dislike to do this now--but he was so much
kinder than he used to be--so quiet and patient, though he suffered
very much. And he had never once reproached them for what they always
remembered,--how it was ever since he was on the ice with them that he
had got the rheumatism.
So, one or other of them made a point of going to see him every day, and
telling him all the funny things they could think of--indeed, it was a
contest among them, who should first make Gardener laugh. They did not
succeed in doing that exactly--but they managed to make him
smile--and he was always gentle and grateful to them; so that they
sometimes thought it was rather nice his being ill.
But his wife was not pleasant; she grumbled all day long, and snapped at
him and his visitors; being especially snappish this day, because she had
lost her big coal.
"I can't have you children come bothering here," said
she crossly, "I want to wring out my clothes, and hang them to dry.
Be off with you."
"Let us stop a little, just to tell Gardener this one curious
thing about Dolly and the pig."
"And then we'll help you to take your clothes to the
orchard; we can carry your basket between us--we can
indeed."
That was the last thing the woman wished; for she knew that the children
would be sure to see the mess on the gravel-walk--and they were
such inquisitive children--they noticed everything. They would want to
know all about it, and how the bits of coal came there. It was a very
awkward position. But people who take other people's property, often
do find themselves in awkward positions.
"Thank you, young gentlemen," said she, quite
politely, "but indeed, the basket is too heavy for you. However, you may stop and gossip a little longer with my old man. He likes it."
And while they were shut up with Gardener in his bed-room, off
she went, carrying the basket on her head, and hung her clothes carefully
out, the big things on lines between the fruit trees, and the little
things, such as stockings and pocket-handkerchiefs, stuck on the
gooseberry bushes, or spread upon the clean green grass.
"Such a fine day as it is! they'll dry directly," said
she cheerfully to herself. "Plenty of sun, and not a breath of wind
to blow them about. I'll leave them for an hour or two, and come and
fetch them in before it grows dark. Then I shall get all my folding done by
bed-time, and have a clear day for ironing
to-morrow."
But when she did fetch them in, having bundled them all together in the
dusk of the evening, never was such a sight as those clothes! They were all
twisted in the oddest way, the stockings turned inside out, with the heels
and toes tucked
into the legs: the sleeves of the shirts tied together in double knots, the pocket-handkerchiefs made into round balls, so tight that if you had pelted a person with them, they would have given very hard blows indeed. And the whole looked as if, instead of lying quietly on the grass and bushes, they had been dragged through heaps of mud and then stamped upon, so that there was not a clean inch upon them from end to end.
"What a horrid mess!" cried the Gardener's wife, who
had been at first very angry, and them very frightened. "But I know
what it is; that nasty Boxer has got loose again. It's he that has
done it."
"Boxer wouldn't tie short-sleeves in double knots or
make balls of pocket-handkerchiefs," Gardener was heard to
answer solemnly.
"Then it's those horrid children; they are always up to some
mischief or other--just let me catch them."
"You'd better not," said somebody in a voice exactly
like Gardener's, though he himself declared
he had not spoken a word. Indeed, he was fast asleep.
"Well, it's the most extraordinary thing I ever heard
of," the Gardener's wife said--supposing she was talking
to her husband all the time; but soon she held her tongue, for she found
here and there among the clothes all sorts of queer marks--marks of
fingers and toes and heels, not in mud at all but in coal-dust, as
black as black could be.
Now as the place where the big coal had tumbled out of the barrow was
fully fifty yards from the orchard, and as the coal could not come to the
clothes, and the clothes could not go without hands, the only conclusion
she could arrive at was--well, no particular conclusion at all!
It was too late that night to begin washing again; besides, she was
extremely tired, and her husband woke up rather worse than usual, so she
just bundled the clothes up anyhow in a corner, put the kitchen to rights,
and went mournfully to bed.
Next morning she got up long before it was light, washed her clothes
through all over again, and it
being impossible to dry them by the fire, went out with them once more, and began spreading them out in their usual corner in a hopeless and melancholy manner. While she was at it, the little folks came trooping around her. She didn't scold them this time, she was too low-spirited.
"No! my old man isn't any better, and I don't fancy he
ever will be," said she, in answer to their questions. "And
everything's going wrong with us--just listen!" And she
told the trick which had been played her about the clothes.
The little people tried not to laugh, but it was so funny. And even now,
the minute she had done hanging them out, there was something so droll in
the way the clothes blew about, without any wind; the shirts hanging with
their necks downwards, as if there was a man inside them; and the drawers
standing stiffly astride on the gooseberry-bushes, for all the world
as if they held a pair of legs still. As for Gardener's
nightcaps--long white cotton, with a tassel at the top--they were
alarming to look at; just like a head stuck on the top of a pole.
The whole thing was so peculiar, and the old woman so comical in her
despair, that the children, after trying hard to keep it in, at last broke
into shouts of laughter. She turned furiously upon them.
"It was you who did it."
"No, indeed it wasn't!" said they, jumping further to
escape her blows. For she had got one of her clothes-props, and was
laying about her in the most reckless manner. However, she hurt nobody, and
then she suddenly burst out, not laughing, but crying.
"It's a cruel thing, whoever has done it, to play such
tricks on a poor old body like me, with a sick husband that she works hard
for, and not a child to help her. But I don't care. I'll wash
my clothes again, if it's twenty times over--and I'll hang
them out again in the very place, just to make you all ashamed o