The Wonders of Science

CHAPTER I.. The Widowed and the Fatherless.

THE WIDOWED AND THE FATHERLESS.

“Well, gentlemen, I have gone over your several accounts, and find that the debts of the late Mr. Robert Davy amount altogether to the sum of £1300.”

These words were addressed to a little group of tradesmen and others who were assembled in a small room over a mercer’s shop, in the town of Penzance. There was Jan Penberthy, the neighbouring miller, who, though in his holiday clothes, had sufficient of the flour clinging to his black eyebrows and whiskers to indicate his calling; and Malachy Carteret, the carpenter and builder, who had slipped on his best coat, as he ran out from his work, to be present at the meeting, and had still the brass ends of his foot-rule projecting from the little fob at the side of his fustian trousers. There was Mr. Trevisky, too, the sporting lawyer, in his check shooting-jacket, all over pockets, and those at the hips large enough for game or law papers, and who held in his hand a square, horny-looking parchment deed; and close beside him sat the village apothecary, in a long, snuff-brown greatcoat, between the skirts of which might be seen, shining in the light, his high boots, that reached well up to his knees; and there were two or three other of the village tradespeople besides, all seated at the end of the little apartment, and who, when they heard the amount of their united claims, exchanged glances with one another in astonishment at the largeness of the sum.

At a table in front of the little assembly sat Mr. John Tonkin, the old gentleman who had addressed them. Nor was he the least remarkable among the company, for he was habited in the costume that had been fashionable in the previous century. Over his shrivelled and veiny hands flapped deep lace-ruffles, and the top of his head was white as a twelfth-cake, with the large powdered wig that surmounted it. The straight, stand-up collar of his Quaker-cut coat was as if mildewed at the back with the powder that fell from his peruke, and the large fan-like frill that protruded from his waistcoat—which was long as a modern groom’s—was speckled brown in places with snuff, as thick as nutmeg on a custard; while from underneath the table at which he sat peeped a pair of gold shoe-buckles and black silk stockings. On a chair by his side lay the cocked hat which completed his antiquated costume, and the underneath part of which was greyed with hair-powder and long usage.

Peculiar as was the old gentleman’s dress, yet it had more of a quaint than comical appearance with him; for his features, though creased with age, and his form, though slightly bowed with his load of years, were still of too manly a cast to excite any irreverent feeling, even in the lightest minds; indeed, he had too stern and austere a look to dispose any to smile at the oddity of his costume.

After a short pause the old gentleman continued his address to the company before him. “Now to meet this sum of £1300 there is the property of the farm at Varfell, which is valued at about £150 a year, and upon which Mr. Trevisky’s client has a mortgage to a small amount.”

At the mention of the name of the attorney, that gentleman proceeded to open the square deed before him, and to throw back the huge skins, that looked like large sheets of bladder, as he glanced his eye down them one after another.

“This little property, gentlemen,” proceeded Mr. Tonkin, “is all that the widow and her five children—the eldest of whom, you will permit me to remind you, is but sixteen years of age—have to subsist upon. Mrs. Davy, therefore, I think, has a claim to some little indulgence and sympathy at your hands. Some years must pass before her children are old enough to obtain a maintenance for themselves, and in the mean time they have to be supported, educated, and apprenticed. How this is all to be done upon such slender means is a matter that I need not tell you adds severely to the widow’s distress; for not only has she the grief to bear on losing the partner with whom she had lived in happiness for nearly twenty years, but she has the greater grief, if possible, of knowing that her children are fatherless, and that she herself lacks the means of providing for them in comfort. Her sorrow, then, gentlemen, has a double sting. It arises not only from regret for the past, but a dread of the future. I am sure, therefore, she will, under her great affliction, meet with every consideration from you.”

At this point Mr. Malachy Carteret—a little man, remarkable for the blackness and bushiness of his eyebrows, which grew so close together as to look like one long one, rather than a pair, and who, from his being considered a “good prayer-maker” at the chapel to which he belonged, was always glad of an opportunity of displaying his oratorical powers—ventured to observe, that he was sure all then present felt for Mrs. Davy under her trials, but they had most of them children of their own, and it was their duty to look at home first; for who could tell how soon they themselves might be called away, and their little ones left in the same distressing situation, unless their bills were duly paid? “Now my little account,” proceeded the carpenter, “has been standing so long as the new house at Varfell has been built, and that were the same year as Dolly Pentreath died—I mean her as were 102 year old—and that’s some time agone, you know; so I’m sure no one can’t say as I’ve been hard about my little matter. But we were a thinking among ourselves, Mr. Tonkin, that as you’d always been suchy kind friend to the family, and as we hadn’t no wish to trouble Mrs. Davy under her affliction, that maybe a—a—you—you—you wudn’t mind becoming security yourself for the debts, and then they cud stand over for another year or two if need be. You’ll excuse ma making maself so bould, sir; but I’m a plain man, and think plain speaking is better than double-dealing at ale times.”

The old gentleman’s brow fell suddenly, and looking the carpenter full in the face, he said, scornfully, “Though you have no wish to trouble Mrs. Davy under her afflictions, you would not object, it seems, to involve her friends in her liabilities. You allude, sir, to my past services, and surely the recollection of the melancholy occasion which, rendered such services necessary should have made you less eager after what is due to you, and less anxious to entangle in the family difficulties a person who, when he found that his assistance was needed, has never added to the distress by waiting till asked for it. In this very house, now thirty-seven years ago, it was my sad lot to see three young girls deprived of both father and mother in the same week. Mrs. Davy was one, and the youngest of those three—left almost in her infancy without a friend or counsellor to help her through the world. And now in her womanhood the same hard fate attends her—bereft of him whose affection had made him her protector, and finding her children fatherless, as she herself was, at the very time when needing most a father’s care. Surely the remembrance of a double bereavement like this, sir—for hardly is she out of her orphan age before she is doomed to enter on her widowhood—should teach you that Providence must have some special design in visiting so much misery upon this poor lady. Nevertheless, I am happy to say that Mrs. Davy needs no pecuniary assistance from her friends, and requires but little indulgence from those to whom her husband was indebted. It is proposed to increase the mortgage upon the farm at Varfell to the amount of £1300, though this—even if Mr. Trevisky can obtain the money at 4 per cent.—will reduce the family income to less than £100 a year; and immediately the mortgage is completed and the money paid, your accounts, gentlemen, will be discharged. The reason of my requesting your attendance here to-day was not to seek to make any compromise with you, nor to crave any unusual indulgence at your hand, but merely to ascertain the amount of the collected claims against the late Mr. Davy, and to inform you that steps were being taken for a speedy payment of them, so that you might not trouble his widow with any importunities on the matter. She, poor soul, has enough to bear with in the privation she has recently suffered, and those wordly ones which threaten herself and children in the future; but, thank Heaven, she is prepared to meet all her trials with resignation and courage.”

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