JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER

LONDON: ROBSON AND SONS, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W.

JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER

A Novel

BY THE AUTHOR OF

‘LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET’

ETC. ETC. ETC.

IN THREE VOLUMES

VOL. II.

LONDON JOHN MAXWELL AND CO. 4 SHOE LANE, FLEET STREET 1876 [All rights reserved]

CONTENTS OF VOL. II.

[Pg 1]

JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER

CHAPTER I. ‘O, LET MY JOYS HAVE SOME ABIDING!’

Placid and happy, after its quiet fashion, was the Sabbath which followed. The scene of Joshua Haggard’s life was so rarely shifted, that he may be pardoned by the hearth goddess for feeling a certain satisfaction in finding himself away from home. The novelty of Sunday at Penmoyle was pleasing. It was a relief not to receive exactly the same greetings he had received last Sunday; not to hear precisely the same speeches, accompanied by the same tones and looks and becks and nods, and even the same oratorical flourishes of a stout green-cotton umbrella or a neatly-polished oak sapling; and a relief perhaps to the eye not to see those particular coal-scuttle [Pg 2]bonnets or bottle-green spencers which adorned his own Bethel. The differences between Combhaven and Penmoyle were only differences of detail; but he felt that he was in a strange land, farther west, among people still more simple than his own flock, and people who loved him no less.

His sermon was a success. Sixpences and shillings rattled into the metal platters which the smug-faced deacons, in their glossy Sunday coats, held at the doors of the chapel. The temple was crowded to its utmost capacity, and handkerchiefs were used freely for fanning ruddy faces or for mopping perspiring foreheads, while peppermint lozenges and smelling-salts were interchanged among friends.

In a corner of the Miss Weblings’ narrow deal pew sat Cynthia, in a straw gipsy-hat, her head thrown back a little as she looked up at the preacher. He saw those spiritual blue eyes gazing upward—saw and was moved by that unknown passion of joy or pain which had thrilled him last night. He tried to forget that intent face—tried to thrust every earthly influence out of his thoughts as he pleaded for his Creator’s glory, for due honour to be paid to [Pg 3]the Lord of heaven and earth, as he urged with warmth the duty of sacrifice and unselfishness upon that open-mouthed bucolic flock—the duty of surrendering something of earth’s enjoyments, some portion of their temporal blessings, to render homage to Him who gives them all.

‘If we had a friend who was always showering gifts upon us,’ he urged in his familiar way, ‘should we begrudge him some small offering now and then in return? Should we take all and give nothing? Should we not be miserly and mean if we did? Should we not secretly despise our own meanness, even if we contrived to hide it from the eyes of men? And we have a Benefactor who is always giving. Our sleeping and our waking, our uprising and our downsitting, our health, our strength, our household joys, our homes, our fields, our gardens,—all are gifts from Him. Shall we offer nothing for all these things, not even a house in which to worship the universal Giver of good? My brethren, the pagans, whose gods were foolishness, made their temples so beautiful, that the beauty of the tabernacle has preserved the memory of the god. Yes, [Pg 4]for two thousand years these childish fables have lived in the memory of men, because those who believed them spared neither gold nor silver to testify to their belief. The gods of the Greeks were as real

to the Greeks as your God is to you, and the splendour of their temples has remained to posterity as a testimony to the reality of their faith. These were foolish heathens, the children of darkness. Shall we, the children of light, leave nothing behind us upon earth to show our descendants that we too were in earnest—that the God of Truth has had as faithful followers as the god of lies?’

Verse by verse he read them—commenting as he went along—the description of Solomon’s temple, his picturesque mind revelling in the gorgeousness of the record. He was asking for funds for a chapel, which might be built for three or four hundred pounds; and as he enlarged in glowing language on the glories of that Jewish shrine—the carven cherubim and palm-trees and flowers overlaid with gold, the door-posts of olive-tree and the doors of fir, the floor overlaid with gold within and without, the pillars of brass and the chapiters of molten brass, [Pg 5]the nets of checker-work and wreaths of chain-work, the lily-work and pomegranates, and that mighty sea of molten brass standing upon twelve sculptured oxen—his hearers thought within themselves that it behoved Penmoyle to do something; not to be behind the Jews of old, people with hook-noses, and perhaps old-clothes bags and a plurality of hats, whom folks looked down upon nowadays. And Solomon, who at his best was only a Jew, had been able to build this sublime temple, nay, if tradition were

to be credited, sent as far as Penzance for tin and copper ore wherewith to accomplish this great work. This moved them much more than any idea about the Greeks, whom they depictured to themselves vaguely and variously, according to their several imaginations.

To Cynthia this sermon, which might have seemed trite and commonplace to that mordant modern intellect which, like the Athenian mind, spends itself wholly in going after every new orator, from Monsignor Capel to Moody and Sankey,—to Cynthia this sermon was full of colour and meaning. Of romance she knew nothing; poetry was a dark language to her, save the mute poetry of stars or flowers, earth’s [Pg 6]loveliness or heaven’s sublimity. She had never heard fine music or seen a stage-play, except the rude representations of showmen at a fair; eloquence, pictures painted in words, were new to her, and she listened spellbound. She could have given you no definition of greatness, yet in her mind she was assured that Joshua was a great man. She thought of St. Paul holding a vast and adverse throng by the magic of his discourse, and it seemed to her no blasphemy to compare Joshua with that saint and apostle. Her youth, her ardour, had nothing on which to fasten except this ideal of a good and perfect man. She was grateful to her mistresses for

their small kindnesses and indulgences; but she vaguely felt the element of ridiculousness in the little fidgety ways and petty particularities of these elderly damsels, and the flowers of her fancy did not entwine themselves around the images of Miss Deborah and Miss Priscilla. The garden of her young mind was a fertile soil, however, and the flowers that sprung there must have something about which to cling and blossom, so they wreathed their ductile tendrils round that sturdy oak Joshua.

[Pg 7]

The afternoon was occupied by a second service, in which the mild exhortations of Mr. Martin had a somewhat sleepy sound to those who had dined heavily. Spirits weighed down by roast meat and potatoes, and a regretful conviction that the Sunday joint had been a thought too greasy, joined languidly in prayers and hymns; and there was a sense of relief when the lengthy service came to a close, and the congregation poured out of the oven-like chapel into the sweet fresh air.

Several friends dropped in upon the Miss Weblings after service: some who had known Joshua of old, others who were eager to be presented to him. Mrs. Gibbs, the butcher’s wife, in her green watered silk, and with a gold watch—one of the few gold watches known to be extant in Penmoyle—reposing on her portly side, almost the grandest lady in the village. Miss Toothy, from the general shop, who was somewhat eccentric in her attire, but reported wealthy. Mr. and Mrs. Pamble, tenant-farmers of some importance, occupying a square stone house on the outskirts of Penmoyle—large people both, and given to pomposity, as conscious that they had never [Pg 8]been a day behind with the half-year’s rent, and could afford to trust in Providence when times were bad, having laid by a small fortune before the Peace.

These filled Miss Webling’s parlour to overflowing, and taxed the resources of the household in the way of teapots. If Cynthia had been less handy, things could not have gone off so genteelly; and the sisters might have been lowered in the esteem of Mrs. Pamble, who really condescended somewhat in visiting them, by sloppy tea; but Cynthia contrived to have a fresh brew in the every-day crockery teapot ready to replenish that silver vessel which adorned the tray. She brought in the rock-cakes hot, and nestling in a clean napkin, and she was never behindhand with bread-and-butter of the genteelest thinness.

‘That’s a handy girl of yours, Miss Webling,’ said Mrs. Pamble approvingly, when the chapel and the day’s sermons and the possibilities of the building-fund had been amply discussed.

‘And an uncommon good-looking one too,’ added the farmer, in his beefy voice. ‘You won’t have her long, miss, I fancy; some of the young chaps will be [Pg 9]wanting her to get married. These here pretty ones go off the hooks so soon.’

The spinsters bridled, taking this as in somewise a personal affront. They had been accounted personable in their time, they could have informed Mr. Pamble, though they had not gone off the hooks.

‘If she’s as sensible as I give her credit for being, she’ll be in no hurry to get married,’ replied Deborah, bridling. ‘Single life is not without its advantages.’

Miss Webling knew that Mrs. Pamble was one of those disagreeable women who are as proud of having secured a husband and added largely to the population as if those achievements were novel and remarkable facts in the history of womankind.

‘Ah, but they’re all glad to get a husband; even the sensiblest of them,’ chuckled the farmer. ‘They’re all ready to say snip to the first as says snap. It’s a feminine failing.’

At which vulgar speech Mrs. Pamble and Mrs. Gibbs laughed until their silk gowns, or the rigorous corsets under the gowns, creaked ominously.

Miss Toothy looked daggers. She had never [Pg 10]said snip to any one’s snap, and she felt that the conversation was becoming odiously personal.

‘Of course I’m not eluding to ladies like you,’ said the farmer, perchance perceiving that he was on dangerous ground, and accenting his speech by a slap on Priscilla’s spare shoulder. ‘You’ve had your offers and throwed over your sweethearts—you and Miss Deborah and Miss Toothy yonder; but servant-gals and suchlike ain’t so partickler. A husband’s a husband to their mind, so long as he’s got a hat, and ain’t blind or deaf. They wouldn’t object to his being dumb, I daresay, for the sake of havin’ all the talkin’.’

This being an old-established joke, everybody except Joshua laughed heartily.

‘She’s got very uncommon-coloured hair, that gal of yours, Miss Webling,’ said Mrs. Pamble. ‘I don’t know as I call it pretty for a young woman, though it’s very winning in a baby. My Jimmy has hair just that colour; and when he’s naughty it goes more against me to slap him than it does the dark-haired ones—he’s got such an innercent look with him. But I think flaxen hair’s rather too simple-like [Pg 11]for a young woman; it gives her a foolish look.’

‘What matter looks if she is not foolish?’ said Joshua almost sternly. ‘If you can bring up your daughters to be as sensible and as pious as that servant-girl, you will be a happy woman, Mrs. Pamble; and if God makes them as lovely, pray to Him to give them hearts as pure and minds as innocent as hers.’

From any one else such freedom of speech would have offended the farmer’s wife; but she had come to see Joshua as a great preacher, and one must expect hard sayings from prophets and privileged persons of that kind. She only sniffed dubiously, and looked at her watch, which, a homely silver one, compared disadvantageously with that shining golden timekeeper pendent from Mrs. Gibbs’s waistband.

‘I’m afraid we must be going,’ said Mrs. Pamble, as if loth to pronounce a sentence which must naturally afflict the company. ‘There’s the dairy never gets properly looked after unless I’m standing behind that girl of mine.’

[Pg 12]

‘Ah,’ grunted Mr. Pamble, ‘you women can do nothing without a lot o’ cackle. Missusses and maids is pretty much alike. There’s so much scolding goes on in the dairy I wonder it don’t turn the milk; no need for rennet, I should think, where there’s women’s tongues.’

‘It isn’t the women that sit arguing about nothing for three hours at a stretch in a public-house,’ observed Mrs. Pamble, as she drew her white Paisley shawl across her robust shoulders, and skewered it on her breast with a large mosaic brooch representing St. Peter’s at Rome; and after this home-thrust, she rose to depart, the farmer meekly following.

These magnates of the land being gone, after leave-takings at once friendly and ceremonious, Miss Toothy discovered that she was wanted at home, having promised her girl an evening out; and Mrs. Gibbs pronounced herself pledged to her domestic in the like manner. So there was a clearance of the smart little parlour, and the Miss Weblings folded their hands and leaned back in their chairs, feeling as exhausted after this unwonted assembly as a lady [Pg 13]of fashion when her reception of three or four hundred of the upper ten thousand is over, and life’s green curtain falls on the social comedy.

‘I hope I was polite to them all, Priscilla,’ said Deborah somewhat anxiously; ‘but I felt a little confused in my head by their all dropping in together. I’m afraid Miss Toothy might feel herself passed over. She’s rather hard to draw out; and the Pambles are so lively.’

‘Miss Toothy hasn’t seen much company,’ replied Priscilla excusingly. ‘You can’t expect her to be very conversable. But she’s a great reader, and knows more about politics and the Royal Family than anybody in Penmoyle. She has friends in London that send her a newspaper every week; and she’s got some nice books too, Mr. Haggard; she lent me the Romance of the Forest last winter, and I read it aloud to Debbie in the long evenings. I don’t see any harm in a good novel once in a way, if you take your time over it, and don’t loll by the fireside half the day, poking your nose into a book and letting your house go to rack and ruin.’

‘I have forbidden my daughter to read novels,’ [Pg 14]replied Joshua, finding himself thus directly appealed to, ‘lest the unrealities she would find in them should give her a false picture of life, and encourage her to form baseless hopes or foolish desires. But when she is married and the mother of a family she may seek amusement for an evening hour in some innocent fiction, and be none the worse for it. And, of course, at your discreet age, Miss Priscilla, an appeal to the imagination can do no harm.’

‘There never was a more particular man than my father,’ said Deborah. ‘He couldn’t abide the sight of a book, when once his children had learned to read, except the Bible on Sundays and Dr. Watts’s Hymns. He said books about a place were just an encouragement to idleness, and that as long as women had the use of their hands they ought never to waste time in reading. Yet, you see, Priscilla and I wouldn’t be as independent as we are if Providence hadn’t given us a taste for learning.’

Joshua bowed assent. He had been somewhat wearied by the tea-drinking, the fulsome compliments which Mrs. Gibbs and Mrs. Pamble had paid him, [Pg 15]the stuffy parlour smelling of toast and bread-and-butter. He was yearning for a breath of fresh air.

‘I think I’ll take a turn in that neat little garden of yours,’ he said, as if asking permission of the sisters, who both had a drowsy look, and regarded him blinkingly, like owls in a zoological collection.

‘Do, dear Mr. Haggard; and try and get an appetite for your supper. You made a very poor dinner.’

It was a minor duty of hospitality with the Miss Weblings to pretend to think that their guests had fared badly, just as it was the major duty to press the viands upon a visitor’s consideration until he was so obliging as to over-eat himself.

There was no way of reaching the garden save through the kitchen, so to the kitchen Joshua went. The door at the end of the narrow little passage stood open, and the westward-fronting casement was shining like a jewel at the end of the vista. The kitchen was newly swept and garnished; no sign of unwashed tea-things or broken victuals; the polished grate winking and twinkling in the red light from a neat little fire; the red-brick floor spotless as [Pg 16]if it were a floor in a picture; every pot and pan arranged with the grace that belongs to perfect order; a dark-brown jug of roses and seringa on the window-sill; but the figure Joshua had expected to see by the casement was not there. Cynthia had gone for a walk, he thought; had gone to meet and mingle with those other handmaidens whose privilege it was to enjoy a Sabbath-evening ramble; perhaps to keep company—odious phrase—with some rural swain. The idea was repulsive to him. It seemed to him that there was pollution in such contact.

He went through the tiny scullery and out into the garden, which he had surveyed from the window that midsummer evening just a year ago when he bade Cynthia good-bye. There was not much to admire in the garden, perhaps, save for those eyes which are in the habit of looking at all rustic things as pictures, and which can see a study in brown in an old well and an empty bucket, or a nocturne in purple and gold in a cottage thatch steeped in moonlight. To Joshua, whose only experience of landscape-painting had been derived from tea-trays, that sloping bit of garden seemed commonplace enough; [Pg 17]even for politeness’ sake he would not have gone so far as to say that he thought it pretty, and yet it charmed him somehow; there was a beauty in this vulgar rusticity which he felt, although he could not recognise or understand it. The picture of grassplot and flower-bed and crooked old apple-trees spreading their gray branches against the yellow sky; the sweet-pea hedge, the stocks, the sweet-williams, the blush-roses, the thymy potherbs; the little thatched

shed for the pig yonder in an angle of the hawthorn hedge; the steep bank where the strawberries grew,—the homely charm of this picture crept into his heart unawares. He walked slowly across the little grassplot, where a self-sufficing bantam was pecking at imaginary worms in dignified solitude; he ascended the narrow path, which had been cut into steps where the slope was steepest; and on the higher ground by the hedge discovered Cynthia standing by the pigsty, and actually exchanging endearments with the pig, whose black head lolled across the edge of his sty, and who expressed the gratification he derived from having his ears pulled in a series of confidential grunts.

[Pg 18]

‘I thought you had gone for a walk, Cynthia,’ said Mr. Haggard.

‘No, sir. I go across the fields sometimes, and as far as the copse’—pointing to a dark waving line against the sunset—‘and gather a bunch of wild flowers, when the ladies give me leave.’

‘You go with your friends, I suppose; some of the young women in service here?’

‘No, sir. I have no friends except my mistresses.’

‘And no sweetheart, Cynthia?’

‘No,’ she answered, with a curious little smile.

What a relief it was to find that her girlish fancy had not idealised some boor!

‘Ah, the time will come when you will begin to think of a sweetheart, I daresay; but I’m glad it hasn’t come yet. I am going for a stroll across the fields, as far as that wood, perhaps. Will you come with me, and show me where your wild flowers grow?’

‘Yes, sir.’