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Chapter III.

‘A quiet treeless nook with one green field,
A liquid pool that glittered in the sun,
And one bare dwelling, one abode, no more!
It seemed the home of poverty and toil,
Though not of want.’

Wordsworth.

The Bailey family seemed to have been overtaken by some sudden calamity when Mr. Wishart and Randall returned. The eldest son, a sturdy boy of twelve, was weeping in a most unbecoming manner, his brothers and sisters occasionally joining in a mournful refrain. Mr. Bailey was trying to look very dignified and parental, while Mrs. Bailey was bearing testimony of a convincing nature to the fact that no boy had been so carefully brought up as her eldest, notwithstanding his proneness to go astray.

‘So as I've warned you against disobedience,’ said the good woman. ‘O Sam, Sam!’

‘O Samuel, Samuel!’ sonorously declaimed Mr. Bailey.

‘What's amiss?’ inquired Mr. Wishart.

‘Why, sir,’ said Mr. Bailey, ‘this bad boy has been up to his tricks while I was away. He must page 32 get on your horse and ride it about, till at last, as served him right, he was pitched off, and the horse galloped away, no one knows where.’

‘I wasn't thrown,’ cried the boy; ‘I got off.’

‘You'd have got off sooner, my son, if I'd been about,’ affirmed Mr. Bailey.

‘Well, I'm horseless, it seems,’ said Mr. Wishart. ‘What's to be done? Can I hire or borrow of any one, Mr. Bailey? You don't happen to know of a horse? I'm not particular, so long as the animal isn't hopelessly aged, blind, or lame.’

‘I've no horse, or you should have it. The nearest place where you can get one is three miles off, and you won't want to walk that after being on foot half the day. Besides, it would make you so late in starting you could hardly get to town by midnight. If you don't mind our plain ways I think you'd better stay here and we'll find the horse in the morning, if he isn't spirited away altogether.’

‘You are exceedingly kind,’ said Mr. Wishart, ‘but really—’ He paused; he had been puzzled in the morning to imagine how a family of seven could find room in the little house; if two more were to be received into it he should expect it to burst open like an over tightly packed portmanteau. ‘I am ashamed to trouble you,’ he said.

‘No trouble at all,’ declared Mr. Bailey. ‘Mr. Randall, there's room for you too.’

‘Room!’ thought Mr. Wishart. ‘In the name of goodness, where?’

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‘Every one knows how elastic a settler's house is,’ said Randall laughing. ‘But I can go down to Steven's place.’

‘No indeed!’ cried Mr. Bailey. ‘Stevens isn't going to get you. Mother! is that kettle likely to boil before the day of judgment?’

‘Really, Sam,’ said his shocked wife, ‘you're rather irreverent, aren't you?’

Bailey said he meant no harm, which indeed was highly probable, and led the way into the combined kitchen and parlour of the house. It was not easy to find room for every one at the table. Those who took seats at one side of this hospitable board could not get out of them without the concurrence of every one else, as to provide for a safe passage between the table and the fire it had to be placed nearly close to the wall. The children always sat there upon a form, and when the table was pushed back upon them as far as it would go, they were safe from troubling their parents with any unseasonable activity.

A five-mile walk through the bush, and a climb over a range something more than a thousand feet in height, will dispose a man to think well of the meal set before him on his return. It inspired Mr. Wishart with the conviction that new soda bread and the blackest of black tea, sweetened with moist sugar, were delicious. Others must have shared this opinion, for there was a rapid disappearance of provisions that would have been scorned at a five o'clock drawing-room tea-party.

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Mr. and Mrs. Bailey conscientiously devoted most of the evening to drilling their children through their school tasks. The children were making great progress at the district school, and their parents were determined that their education should be thorough. Mr. Bailey dodged two of his sons through the tables of weights and measures; Mrs. Bailey heard the girls in English history; even Mr. Wishart caught the infection, and assisted the other child to explore a thorny path in grammar. He was surprised at the lucidity of his explanations, and thought he must be developing a latent talent for teaching.

‘They'll be fine scholars some day,’ said the gratified Bailey, when the last lesson had been grappled with, and the young Baileys had been consigned to some mysterious sleeping-place. ‘They're surprisingly clever children.’

‘Ah, they've advantages children hadn't in our time,’ said Mrs. Bailey.

‘Yes. But I remember no one could drive learning into me. Our old schoolmaster turned out many a fine young fellow from his school with a head chokefull of knowledge, but he was beaten with me. He said I'd feel the want of it some day, and so I do. I might have got along in the world if I'd been educated.’

‘Why didn't you get on in the world?’ thought Mr. Wishart, furtively glancing at Randall, who was silent, and looked tired. He noticed now that the page 35 clever expression of his face was marred by a dreamy, irresolute look. ‘Clever, but too impulsive,’ he thought. ‘Not one of your patient, cool, calculating men, who will have their opportunity though they may wait years for it, and who are as sure to come to the top in time as a cork-float. Poor fellow! he carries about enought useless talent in his brain to be the making of one or two other men. Don't know whether he is such a pitiable object though; some people have the knack of being happy when one would least expect it.’

Mr. Wishart's character readings were not very wide of the mark. Yet the face he had been studying was one that could hide well a mind ill at ease, burdened with all the unsatisfied cravings and vain regrets incidental to its lot. Pride would always forbid it to lay aside the mask of happiness. Pride compels one-half of humanity to deceive the other in such matters. Not to one's dearest friend can everything be told, and perhaps there never yet was a friend who merited such confidence. No confessor, however searching, ever possessed himself of the heart's deepest mysteries. The bitterness that it knows only too well is hidden from every eye save One of infinite pity.

‘Come, Mr. Randall,’ said the settler, ‘can't we persuade you to give us some music? You haven't asked after your fiddle?’

‘I knew it would be safe in Mrs. Bailey's care,’ said Randall.

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‘And I have taken special care of it,’ said Mrs Bailey. ‘I must bring it out.’

‘What is that,—a fiddle?’ said Mr. Wishart. ‘By all means let it be brought.’

Mrs. Bailey soon produced the fiddle. ‘I'm almost afraid to handle it since you told me how valuable it is,’ she said, giving it to Randall. ‘There must be a great difference in fiddles. My uncle had one—a nasty screaming thing. Yours is as sweet and clear as a bell.’

Mr. Wishart examined the fiddle rather curiously. ‘Ah-h,’ he said, after he had scanned it long and carefully, and drawn the bow across the strings a few times. ‘There! I don't want to be covetous, and I shall be if I hold it much longer. Where did you pick that up?’

‘Nowhere,’ said Randall. ‘It has been in our family longer than I can tell you. I think it was my father's grandfather, a collector of old violins, who bought it in Venice, or rather exchanged for it jewels worth a small fortune.’

‘If I were wealthy enough I would buy it of you for whatever he gave,’ hastily exclaimed Mr. Wishart.

‘I beg your pardon, you would do no such thing. It is not to be bought or sold.’

‘Perhaps I ought to beg your pardon,’ said the tender-hearted Wishart, noticing the slight flush on the other's face, and how his clasp had tightened involuntarily on this last and dearest of his earthly page 37 possessions. ‘It is pleasant to think there are some things which money cannot buy.’

They waited for the music. The violinist with bent head and thoughtful brow was trying to recall some half-forgotten piece. Presently it came back to him. As he played the desponding dreamy expression of his face was softened into contented tranquillity. His friends listened in unbroken silence.

It was no commonplace performance. It was not merely a display of skill that had resulted from years of practice. There was genuis here. The musician was a musician by nature not by art. He played because he could not help it, not because he had learned a system of notes and signs. And yet there was unmistakable evidence that his talent had been refined and cultured by careful study; but what would have been wearying drudgery to many had been to him only a labour of love.

‘Ah, but that was grand!’ said the simple-minded Bailey. ‘It was better than a concert.’

‘You have given us a great pleasure,’ said Mr. Wishart. ‘Isn't there a superstition that an old violin has but one master? only one who can bring forth its best and sweetest tones, and that it will never yield anything better than mediocrity to a stranger? I think yours has found its master. And pardon me, but was not most of that your own?’

‘Partly; but I am not always certain of my own,’ said Randall. ‘Sometimes it seems to me an old piece I have heard years ago, and can only remember page 38 partially. And again, when I imagine I am composing I often find that what I am playing is only half my own. Some familiar passage comes in and betrays the origin of the whole.’

‘Yes; it's so difficult to be original. I can never cheat myself for a moment in that way. Were my life to depend on it I couldn't compose.’

‘Yes, I wonder how it's done,’ said Mr. Bailey.

‘But now, Mrs. Bailey,’ said Randall, ‘wasn't there some agreement between us that whenever I played you were to sing?’

‘Oh, Mr. Randall, I am sure I should be ashamed to let my poor voice be heard after your beautiful playing.’

‘You've no call to say it's a poor voice, Mary Anne,’ remonstrated Mr. Bailey. ‘When we first knew each other it was as sweet as a nightingale's; a long way sweeter than Elizabeth Dobson's, who, some people said, had the finest voice in the village. To be sure, her's was stronger. I've heard it a good half mile and more; but she wasn't one you'd like to sit close to in a small room when her voice was at its best.’

‘Well, I haven't sung for a long time,’ said Mrs. Bailey.

‘But you haven't forgotten now. Come, let's have one of the old ones.’

Mrs. Bailey gracefully yielded, and sang some of the old songs in a voice that was really sweet and pleasant to the ear, though untrained. Mr. Wishart page 39 thought he had heard more unsatisfactory performances in drawing-rooms by ladies possessed of great confidence in their vocal talents, and Mr. Bailey was both charmed and affected.

These good country people kept early hours. Mrs. Bailey had prepared a very small chamber for Mr. Wishart, though he vainly endeavoured to obtain the privilege accorded to Randall of a ‘shakedown’ before the kitchen hearth, feeling sure that the room properly belonged to his host and hostess. His petition was not granted by Bailey, who seemed shocked at the idea. He was favoured with a tin candlestick scoured to the similitude of silver, ushered into his chamber, and left to the companionship of his thoughts. These were soon interrupted by sleep as sweet and sound as he had ever enjoyed.

He awoke in the early summer dawn to the sound of music, very faint, and blended with the twittering of the birds. It was only half-past four, so he allowed himself to doze again. His eyes opened the second time to a blaze of light. Old Sol had taken the liberty of rising directly opposite to his bedroom window, and was staring him out of countenance. So also was an inquisitive blackbird that had perched in the plum-tree before the window, alternately digging its beak into the juicy fruit and darting curious glances through the half-opened casement.

‘Delightful country,’ thought Mr. Wishart, as he brushed his hair, and contemplated as much of his page 40 countenance as four square inches of looking-glass could show him. ‘Here one can sleep with open window, the fresh air blowing on one's face all through the night, and no fear of vampire, snake, serpent, or other venomous beast intruding. Whatever, though, is the meaning of those little lumps all over my face? Bless me! the mosquitoes have been making a night of it. The little wretches must have feasted on me for hours. How odd those pictures look!’

The last observation referred to the prints cut from old numbers of the Illustrated London News, with which the whole room was papered. They had been pasted on without any attempt at orderly arrangement. General Garibaldi found a place by the winner of the Derby; the charming Empress Eugènie and the quite otherwise Lord Brougham side by side. Here was a battlefield and there a ball; and, in close proximity to each other, the prizetakers at a cattle show and the leaders of the House of Commons; while mingled among all the rest were the fashions of a bygone age—balloon-like crinolines, bonnets falling off the back of the head, bishop sleeves, flounces, puffs, and paniers, with other vestiges of the inflated style in dress. It it was curious to see these on the walls, it was yet more so to look upwards, and behold them gazing down on you. An exalted position in the very middle of the ceiling had been assigned to her Majesty. There were, indeed, no fewer than nine representations of our Sovereign Lady in the room, no two of which were alike.

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‘I shouldn't like to be ill in this room,’ thought Mr. Wishart. ‘What delirious fancies might not seize on one in such a chamber? If the pictures weren't enough, that patchwork quilt of about twelve hundred pieces, red, blue, and white, would hopelessly disorder the mind.’

Now, as he stood before the window, his eye sought the scene without. The ranges he had toiled over the other day were behind him and out of sight. He looked down a broad and level valley. There were fields here, some well grassed, others yet disfigured with black stumps and logs. In the distance were scattered little groves of trees, and each grove sheltered a house. Not trees spared from the bush which a few years ago had filled the valley. The first duty of a settler, if one may judge from his actions, is to destroy every tree or shrub around his dwelling, replacing them by the usually uglier and less interesting natives of other lands. So here had been planted gloomy pines, tall ungainly gum-trees, and thin stiff-looking poplars, in the ashes of many graceful and handsome forest trees, whose stately growth had been of centuries.

Outside Mr. Wishart found that Bailey had just returned with his truant horse.

‘I never heard of such a thing in my life,’ he was exclaiming to Mrs. Bailey. ‘Them Stevenses ought to be drummed out of the place. Fine morning this morning, sir.’

‘A beautiful morning. So you have found the horse?’

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‘Yes, and where I half expected he'd be. My neighbour Stevens—I don't like to speak ill of a neighbour, indeed I don't do it; but I must say he's as ill-mannered, idle, and untrustworthy a fellow as you'll find in a long day's ride—had actually shut the horse up in his stable, thinking he'd keep him safe, to get a reward if one should be offered. I gave him a piece of my mind, which I've been longing to do for some time. “Oh, yes,” says I, “no doubt you'll get your reward, Stevens, some day, but it'll be such as you won't take much pleasure in.”’

‘I don't see your friend Mr. Randall here,’ said Mr. Wishart. ‘Has he gone already?’

‘Oh, he left us before you were up,’ said Mrs. Bailey. ‘He's here one day and away the next.’

‘Then I was right, I suppose. I thought I heard his violin.’

‘Yes, he was taking his farewell of it. He prizes that fiddle more than anything, and, poor fellow, he hasn't much to prize.’

‘I should have liked to have seen more of him,’ said Mr. Wishart; ‘he interested me. He is a gentleman.’

‘Was one,’ said Mrs. Bailey.

‘Is one now,’ corrected Mr. Bailey. ‘A man can't alter his nature any more than the leopard can change his spots, which is Scripture. You take Stevens and dress him in purple and fine linen, to use a figure of speech, and let Mr. Randall be page 43 dressed as mendicant-like as possible, don't you think any one couldn't see the difference?’

‘There'd be a difference, sure enough,’ said Mrs. Bailey.

‘Well, I mean to say that Mr. Randall will always be the gentleman, though he does wear rough clothes and work like the rest of us.’

‘He does work, then? I fancied somehow that he didn't.’

‘Oh, yes, he works. Of course he can't live on air. He doesn't seem to care to plod on as others do, and save money. He'll do almost anything, but he'll not keep to anything for long.’

‘Ah!’ said Mr. Wishart reflectively.

‘If you are curious about him, I'll tell you all we know,’ said Mr. Bailey.

He did so when they had sat down to breakfast, and the time he took in telling it was out of all proportion to the substance of the story. In reality they knew very little of Randall. He had come to their house for the first time two years ago, and had lodged with them for a few days. He was sketching then; he was an artist at times. He was fond of wandering about, and they knew from his conversation that he must have travelled a great deal. He knew all New Zealand, he had walked hundreds of miles in Tasmania and Australia. He spoke two or three languages as well as his own, Mr. Bailey said, with awe of such erudition. And, so they believed, there was nothing he did not know some- page 44 thing of, nothing he could not do if he tried, such was the versatility of his talent.

‘A very bad thing for him,’ said Mr. Wishart, ‘a very bad thing indeed; men of that kind seldom succeed in anything. Pity he does not put his cleverness to some use.’

‘Use, sir? Why, what do you think he did once when he was staying with us? There was no school in the district then; it wasn't built. He was so good as to get all the children together and teach them himself for weeks and weeks, not for pay, but because he didn't like to see them lost in ignorance. Afterwards, when we heard we were to have a school-house and a teacher, I wanted him to apply for the post, as I knew he had no certain means of livelihood; but he said no—he couldn't be tied to one place for long.’

‘Just so,’ said Mr. Wishart.

They rose from the table. Mrs. Bailey set off the five children on their way to the school, which was two miles distant.

‘You ought to be proud of those fine healthy children,’ said Mr. Wishart.

‘Ay, that we are,’ said Mr. Bailey. ‘They can't help being healthy, living up here; and I've heard this country is the healthiest in the world. Why, I've read somewhere how few die out of a thousand. I forget the exact number, but I know it was surprisingly small.’

‘Aren't you making some mistake?’ asked his wife, doubtingly.

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‘Very likely; I've no head for figures. I must go and look at the maize. Them pheasants will be billing it up again. I'll lessen their numbers if they don't let it alone.’

‘Aren't you afraid of being prosecuted for shooting them out of season?’ inquired Mr. Wishart, remembering the pheasant stew of the day before.

‘Gracious! if I haven't a right to shoot them when I please I wonder who has. They've been brought up on my maize. Whenever I sow anything they make a dead set at it. I've often thought there's something supernatural about pheasants. How do they know when I've been planting corn? I could swear there hadn't been one in sight when I put it in and covered it nicely. Just leave it for a day or so and come back again. There they are, turning up the earth with their bills, and every now and then gulping down a corn, and giving a saucy little twist with their heads and a look with their eyes, as if to say, “Aha, old boy, you can't deceive us. Maize is uncommonly nice, only next time don't bury it quite so deep.”’

‘Then I suppose, in your indignation, you take aim and bring down the impertinent bird.’

‘Well, yes,’ sheepishly answered Mr. Bailey. ‘It's not lawful, but that doesn't prove it's wrong. They make so many laws nowadays, Moses himself couldn't keep them all. What did we want with game laws here? They were always a curse in the old country. I tell you, sir, when a poor page 46 settler wants a dinner—and dinners don't grow on trees—he's not likely to think twice about knocking over a pheasant, on his own land of course, or on Government land, which belongs to everybody. Law or no law, I'll shoot 'em.’

‘Well, good-bye, Mr. Bailey,’ said the gentleman, mounting his horse. ‘We shall be neighbours soon, and then I can show you I don't forget your hospitality.’

‘He's a nice gentleman,’ said Mr. Bailey, watching the retreating figure. ‘I'd better get to my work, which is good exercise, if it doesn't pay.’