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XII.

Next day brought the coronation ceremonies. It was an ordeal so trying for poor Jack that we will omit a detailed description of the proceedings. There were processions and speeches, prayers and blessings, dust, sunshine, flattery, glitter; all things turning about in a great social kaleidoscope of which the after-memory was to him an endless bewilderment. His keen sense of the ludicrous sometimes afflicted him sorely with mockery of his new position; sometimes strengthened him by making him endure with patience what he mentally denounced as "torn-foolery." But he had wit enough to keep his sense of the laughable invisible to the eyes of the adoring throng which was paying him all the honor and devotion in its power. The splendid Weariness came to an end at last, and His Majesty's circlet of diamonds (made of two twisted tiaras) was at least on honest brows. Many a secret vow and fervid resolution did he make in his own heart as to the single purpose and forgetfulness of self which he would show in the cause of these helpless crowds of human beings who looked to him in simplicity as their deliverer and director.

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In the afternoon of Coronation Day a proclamation was issued, printed copies of which were posted ail over the city, for be it remembered that Auckland had woman-compositors, and though their calling had fallen into disuse, the material was still available. The proclamation set forth that His Majesty directed the attendance of all adults in the Albert Park next day, without exception or excuse; that each should bring a slip of paper on which was the name of the person she desired to represent her in a Convocation or Parliament; that until the Parliament of sixty representatives assembled, the King assumed absolute power, and would maintain it; that it was his intention as soon as possible to divide the population into working parties, and anyone above the age of fifteen years failing to present themselves for registration would be considered as a rebel and treated as a criminal; that His Majesty was convinced that it was only through all working cheerfully and obediently in a common direction that the public safety could be secured, and that there was no reason to believe but that comfort and prosperity would be theirs in the future.

This proclamation brought together the whole of the inhabitants of the city the next morning. They crowded into the Park and its environs, no longer the place of many-hued flowers and plants, which had once made it such a beautiful sauntering-ground beloved of visitors, but now neglected and forlorn-looking. Jack, who had doffed all his finery, stood near one of the gates, and gave orders through some of the most intelligent of the first-comers that the women should form in close ranks. He then went to Government House, and surrounded by a bodyguard which had been selected for him by Miss Henley, returned to the Park. Every one was in page 82high spirits, and the girls of the bodyguard were inclined to giggle, but Jack soon made them understand that he meant business. They quickly took their tone from him, and became earnest enough, assuming an official air of great importance. Jack asked Miss Henley to introduce some of the women who would be most likely to be of service through their common sense and practical knowledge. With half a dozen of these, accompanied by Victoria Stanley, Jack proceeded up and down the long lines, and selected about two hundred of the most powerful and well-grown women he could discover among the thousands present. These he asked to withdraw apart from the others. He then addressed the remainder, reminding them that obedience was the first and most necessary step toward prosperity. He wished them to separate for a short time into two parties; those who had lived in the town and those used to country life; and requested the country people to move over to the Parnell side of the Park, and there again form in rank, so that they might be counted and organized into companies. Carrying out this request caused a good deal of confusion, but after an hour or two they were again in orderly lines. The country party was evidently the larger of the two. It contained about seven thousand individuals, while the town contingent hardly numbered one thousand. Some of the women, however, were absent in attendance on children and sick people.

Going first to the country party, Jack passed up and down along the ranks, anxiously looking for his lost Nelly; the proclamation having been issued by him partly in hope that if he could gather all the women together he might regain happiness with her page 83whose memory he held deep within his heart. In vain he gazed, in vain he searched up and down the ranks; one moment with his heart beating fast as he recognized a fancied likeness at a distance, the next with the shadow of disappointment on him as the hope deferred mocked him with the face of a stranger. He had to take up his official duties, so made his hearers a speech in which he desired them to form in companies of a hundred each and elect their officers. He made a similar oration to the town dwellers, asking them in forming their companies to unite if possible according to occupations; those who could manage boats especially to form separate parties. Jack then gathered the two hundred he had first selected from the whole population as choice specimens of womanhood, and taking them to an adjoining paddock told them that he had chosen them to act as constabulary; that hereafter their work would be to see the laws observed that their Parliament would frame; but in the meantime that they must see his orders carried out to the letter, at whatever odds and even at the cost of life itself. He had first in view the reduction of the criminal and disorderly element of which Miss Henley spoke in her historical sketch. There had been really few disorderly women in the town itself, but with the crushing of the population of the small towns into the city many who had hitherto been kept in check by social laws had given way with the withdrawal of all outward discipline, and maddened with despair and hopelessness had joined in frenzied orgies with the women of the worst character. This class of women could only be reduced by force, and it was as a disciplined and organized force that he wished to train his new bevy of constabulary. He commenced page 84at once to drill them with a few military movements, such as how to step together, form fours, wheel into line, etc. The women picked up the right manner of executing these movements with marvellous quickness, and, delighted to have something definite in the way of duty to do, showed great emulation, appreciating at once the value and beauty of the evolutions. Dismissing them before sunset, Jack hurried back to his house and ate a hasty dinner, then visited the place where the votes for parliamentary representatives were being counted.

The counting, it was evident, would not be finished that evening; it would take two or three days to sort apart the names of the candidates, so the young man put on some old clothes he had procured, and went off to the locomotives at Newmarket. There with the aid of a lantern he went carefully over the stock, making a detailed examination of the parts of the engines most exposed. It was evident that, although there was nothing virtually wrong with the machinery, he would need the aid of more hands than his own to take apart and clean some of the delicate portions. After spending some hours crawling among the wheels and clambering over masses of rubbish, Jack returned dirty, but happy, to his sleeping quarters. On rising, the programme of the preceding day in regard to the duty of his chosen ones was repeated, and a few of the more proficient were selected to drill the others and perfect the movements by instruction in his absence. Turning to Victoria Stanley, to whom he had resolved to give the command, he said, "Where are the rifles?"

"I don't know," she answered, "In the armory, I suppose. The volunteers had rifles, but I think each man had his own, and it would take some time to page 85collect them. Women had no use for fire-arms. It's a trial to most of them to 'let off' a gun, much more to hit anything with it."

"Well," said Jack, "you're going to let them off now to some purpose. There must be some guns in the militia store. Pick out fifty of the most resolute of your troops and march them down there."

Victoria stepped forward and picked out her little company, marching them off to the store. They found plenty of rifles, ammunition and accoutrements; then began instructions in their use. The women acquired the art of handling their rifles as quickly as they had the company movements, but the weight of the weapons soon fatigued the unaccustomed muscles of their bearers, although these had been selected for their athletic accomplishments. It would have been foolish to have attempted real precision, as they were unlikely to want to use the rifles in earnest more than once or twice. On the third day Jack led the little company of 'Guards,' as he called them, to the rifle range, and then through a course of blank cartridge he gradually led them up to firing a few rounds of ball without hitting each other or shutting their eyes. The recoil, they complained, hurt them, bruising the tender flesh of the shoulder. Jack saw that they would never become veterans, but sufficient had been learnt for his purpose. Their needles had been diligent also, for they were all clothed by this time in a neat grey uniform with jaunty little forage caps, and formed on parade quite a soldierly company. The fourth day after their formation Jack determined on a coup-de-main. After a search he found a quantity of special constables' batons, and with them he armed the hundred-and-fifty of his remaining police, providing them also with a number of pieces of clothes-page 86line cut into short lengths. Then, placing his company of Guards armed with their rifles at the head of his forces, he marched the whole party to the quarter of the town where one long street with several cross lanes bad been wholly given up and relinquished to the criminal or debased women.

Leaving a few constables to guard the ends of the streets, their leader rode through the filthy place, and ordered the denizens to surrender. He was answered with curses, and with numerous bottles and stones flung at him from the windows. To this Jack replied by ordering up the Guards and desiring them to fire at the windows. Half-a-dozen vollies, followed by scattered firing as the troops moved along, finished the battle; through the smashing of broken glass and screams of fright came appeals for mercy. The firing was stopped (nobody being killed on either side) and the inmates of the dwellings were ordered to come forth. The miserable creatures, to the number of one hundred and fifty, appeared and were handed on to the police who securely roped their hands and marched them off to Mount Eden Gaol. They were made to cleanse this building as a first task, and were informed that by the King's orders they were to be utilized the ensuing week as hands on the drainage works, to clear out and rebuild the main sewer, and thus to recover the lower part of the town from its filthy quagmire.