"THE LOFTY AND THE LOWLY."

New Zealand Herald, Volume IV, Issue 1111, 6 June 1867, Page 4

"THE LOFTY AND THE LOWLY."

The charity of tlic rick is much to be commended, but bow beautiful is the charity of the poor ! Call to mind tho coldest day you ever experienced. Think of the bitter wind and driving snow; tliink how you shook and shivered —how the sharp, white particles were driven against your face—how, within doors, the carpcts were lifted like billows along the floors, the wind liowled and moaned in the chimneys, windows creaked, doors rattled, and every now and then heavy lumps of snow camc thundering down with a dull weight from the roof. Now bear my story. In one of the broad, open plains of Lincolnshire there is a long, reedy sheet of water, a favourite resort of wild ducks. At the northern extremity stands two mud cottages, old and out of repair. One bitter, bitter night, when the snow lay three feet deep on the ground, and a cutting east wind was driving it about, and whistling in the dry frozen reeds by the water's edge, and swinging the brave willow trees till their branches swept the ice, an old woman sat spinning in one of these cottages before a moderately cheerful fire. Her kettle was singing on the coals : she had a reed candle or home-made rushlight on her table, but the full moon shone in, and was the brighter light of the two. The two cottages were far from the road or any other habitation ; the old woman was therefore surprised, as slie sat drawing out her thread and crooning an old north, country song, to hear a sudden knock at the door. It was loud and impatient, not like the knock of her neighbours in the other cottages ; but the door was bolted, and the old woman rose, and shuttling to the window, looked out, and saw a shivering figure, apparently that of a youth. " Trampers," said tlic old woman, senteniously; " tramping folks not wanted here," so saying, slic went back to the fire, without deigning to answer the door. Tho youth, upon this, tried the door, and called to her to beg admittance. She heard him rap the snow from his shoes against her lintel, and again knock as if he thought she was deaf, and he should surely gain admittance if he could only make her hear. The old woman, surprised at liis audacity, went to the casement, and, with all pride of possession, opened it, and inquired his business. " Good woman," the stranger began, " I only want a seat at your fire." "Kay," said the old woman, giving effect to her words by her uncouth dialogue, " thou'll get no shelter here; I've naught to give to a beggar—a dirty wet critter," she continued, wrathfully, slamming to the wr'ndow, it's a wonder where be found any water, too, seeing it freezes so hard a body can get none for the kettle, saving what is broken up with a hatchet." On this the beggar turned hastily away. And at this point in the narrative, the person who told it to me stopped and said: " Do you think the old womau was very much to blame P" " She might have acted more kindly," I replied ; " but why do you askP" "Because," lie said, "I have heard her conduct so much reflected on by those who would have thought nothing of it if it had not been for the consequences." " She might have turned him away less roughly," I observed. "That is true," he continued, "but in any case, I think, though we might give them food or money, we should hardly invite beggars in to sic by the fire." " Certainly not," I replied ; " and this woman could not tell that the beggar was honest." " JS T o," said he. " But I must go on with my narrative."

Tlie stranger turned very hastily away from the door, and waded through the deep snow towards the other cottage. The bitter wind helped to drive liim towards it. It looked no less posr than the first; and when he had tried the door, found it bolted, and knocked twice without attracting attention, his heart sank within him. His hand was so numbed with cold, that he made scarcely any noise ; he tried again.

A rush candle was burning within, and a matronly looking woman sat before tlic fire. Slie held an infant in her arms, and had dropped asleep ; but his third knock roused her, and wrapping her apron around her child, she opened the door a little way and demanded what he wanted. " Good woman," the youth began, "I have had the misfortune to fall into the water this bitter night, and I am so numbed I can hardly walk." The woman gave him a sudden, earnest look, and then sighed. " Gome in," said she : Thou art nigh the size of my Jem, I thought afc first it was him come home from sea."

The youth stepped across the threshold, trembling with cold and wet; and no wonder, for his clothes were completely incascd in wet mud, and . the water dripped from them with every step he took on the sanded floor. " Thou art in a sorry plight, " said the woman, " and it be two miles to the nighest house ; thy, teeth chatter so pitifully, I can scarcc bear to hear them."

She looked at him more attentively, and saw that he was a mere boy, not more than sixteen years of age. Her motherly heart was touched for him. " Art hungry ?" she asked, turning to the table; " thou art wet to the skin. W hat hast been doing ? " '* Shooting wild ducks, " said the boy. " Oh !" said his hostess, " thou art one of the keeper's boys then, 1 reckon?" He followed the direction of her ej'es, and saw two portions of bread set upon the table, with a small piece of bacon on each. " My master is very late," she observed, for charity did not make her use very elegant lanfuage, and by her master she meant her husand; " but thou art welcome to my bit and sup, for I was waiting for him; maybe it will put a

little warmth in tliee to cat and drink so saving, she took up a mug of beer from the hearth -dpushed it towards him, with her share of the' " Thank you," said the boy, « but I am so wet 1 am making quite a pool before your fire with the drippings from my clothes." " Ay, thou art wet indeed," said the woman and rising again she went to an old bos in which she began to search, and presently came to the fare with a perfectly clean check shirt in her hand an « good suit of clothes. "There," said she, showing them with no small P r ,?i " these be my master's Sunday clothes and it thou wilt be very careful of them I'll let thee wear them till thine be dry." She then explained that she was going to put her ' bairn ' to bed, and proceeded up a ladder into the room above, leaving the boy to array himself in these respectable and desirable garments. ° When she came down her guest had dressed himself in the laborer's clothes ; he had had time to warn himself, and he was eating and drinking with much relish. He had thrown his muddy clothes in a heap upon the floor, and, as she proceeded to lift them up, she said : Ah, lad, lad, I doubt thy head has been under water; thy mother would have been sorely frightened if she could have seen the a while ago. "Yes, said the boy, and in imagination the cottage dame saw this said mother a careworn, hard-working creature like herself, while the youthful guest saw in imagination a beautiful and courtly lady ; and both saw the same love, the same anxiety, the same terror at sight of a lonely boy struggling in the moonlight through breaking ice, with no one to help him, catching at the frozen reeds, and then creeping up shivering and benumbed to a cottage door. But even as she stooped the woman forgot her imagination, for she had taken a waistcoat into her hands, such as had never passed between tliem before ; a gold pencil case dropped from the pocket, and on the floor, amid a heap of mud that covered the outer garments, lay a white sliirt-sleeve, so white, indeed, and so fine, that she thought it could hardly be worn by a squire. She glanced from the clothes to the owner. He liad thrown down his cap, and his fair curly hair and broad forehead convinced her that he was of gentle birth ; but while she hesitated to sit down, he sat a chair for her, and said with boyish frankness : " I say, what a lonely placo this is ; if you had not let me in, the water would have all frozen on me before I reached home. Catch me a duck shooting again by myself!" "It's very cold sport that, sir," said the woman. The young gentleman assented most readily, and asked if he might stir the fire. "And welcome sir," said the woman. She felt a curiosity to know who he was, and he partly satisfied her by remarking that he was staying at Dean Hall, a house about five miles off/adding that in the morning he had broken a hole in the ice very near the decoy, but it had iced over so fast, that in the dusk lie had missed it and fallen in, for it would not bear him. He had made some landmarks and taken every precaution, but he supposed the sport had excited him so much that, in the moonlight, he had passed them by. He then told her of his attempt to get shelter in the other cottage. " Sir," said the woman, "if you had said you were a gentleman " The boy laughed: " I don't think I knew it, my good woman," he replied, "my senses were so benumbed ; for I was some time struggling at the water's edge among tho broken ice, and then X believe I was nearly an hour creeping up to your cottage door. I remember it all rather indistinctly, but as soon as I felt the fire and drank the warm beer, I was a different creature." While they talked the husband came in, and while he was eating his supper, they agreed that he could walk to Dean Hall, and let its inmates know of the gentleman's safetj'; and when he was gone they made up the fire with all the coal that remained to that poor household, and tho women crept up to bed and left her guest to lie down and rest before it. In the gray of dawn the labourer returned, with a servant leading a horse, and bringing a fresh suit of clothes. The young gentleman took his leave with many thanks, slipping three half-crowns into the woman's hand, probably all the money he had about him. And I must not forget to mention that he kissed the baby, for when she tells the story the mother always adverts to that circumstance with great pride, adding that her, child, being as " clean as wax, was quite frt to be kissed by anybody?" " Missus," said her husband, as they stood in the doorway looking after their guest," who dost think that be ?"

" I don't know," answered the missus. " Then I'll just tell thee. That be young Lord TV".; so thou mayest be a proud woman, that sits and talks with lords, and ask them in to supper— ha, ha!" So saying, the master shouldered his spade and went his way, leaving her clinking the three half-crowns in her hand, and considering who she should do with them. Her neighbour from the other cottage presently stepped in, and when she heard the tale, and saw the money, her heart was ready to break with envy and jealousy. "Oh, to think that good luck should come to her door, and she have been so foolish as to turn it away. Seven shillings and sixpence for a morsel of food and a night's shelter, it is nearly a week's wages!"

So there, as they both supposed, the matter ended, and the next week the frost was sharper than ever. Sheep were frozen in the lenny fields, and poultry on their perches, but the good woman had walked to the nearest town and bought a blanket. It was a welcome addition to their bed-covering, and it was many a long year since they had been so comfortable. But it chanced one day at noon, that looking out at her casement she spied three young gentlemen skating along the ice .towards her cottage. They sprancr on to the bank, took off their skates and made for her door. The young nobleman informed her that he had such a severe cold, ho could not come to see her before. "He spoke as pleasantly," she observed in telling the story, £4as if I had been alady, and no less I And then he brought a parcel ont of his pocket,' And Ivc been over to 8.,' ho say s, and bought you a book for a keepsake, and I hope you will accept it; and then all talked as pretty as could be for a matter of 10 minutes, and went away. So I waited till my master come home and we opened the parcel, and there was a fine bible inside, all over gold and red morocco, and my name was written inside ; and bless him ! a 10-pound note doubled down over the names. I'm sure when I thought he was a poor, forlorn creature, he was kindly welcome. So my master laid out part of the money in tools, and we rented a garden, and he goes over on market days to what we grow. So now, thank God, wc want for nothing." , i .1 r H i„ This is how she generally concludes tlie iitue history, never failing to add that the young lord kissed her baby. ~ " But," said mv friend, " I have not told you what I thought the best part of the anccdotc. When this poor Christian woman was asked what had induced her to take in a perfect stranger, and trust him with the best clothing her house afforded, she answered, simply, « eh, Jsaw him shivering and shaking, so I thou slialt come in for the sake of Him that had not where to lay His head.'" The old woman in the other cottagc may o^cn her door every night of her future li , forlorn beggar, but it is all but cer . , will never open it to a nobleman in di=gui=>e. Let U3 do good,-not to receive more in ret< "?> but as evidence of gratitude been bestowed. In a few aii for the lovo and nothing for the reward. Jean Ingelow.