unwilling brother by the arm, and left the house. "Oh pray, pray don't be angry!" sobbed Sarah, who seemed to feel the insult to her aged relative as much as the young Greens evidently did. "I am not angry, my love, not at all," said the widow, wiping the tears from the helpless girl's face. "Poor Charles is quite mistaken, or he would not speak so. We must pray for him." "I never pray," observed the girl. "But you must." CHAPTER VI. A SCENE. So, you have come among us, ma'am, to try the comforts of the factory?" said one of the neighbours to the widow Green. "I have come to seek employment for these children, and for myself also; but more in the hope of gaining an honest livelihood than of finding greater comfort "I don't know how, grandmother; I than we enjoyed in the country." never learned." "There's another of your lies,” remarked Phoebe; "you went to church often enough." "Yes; but that's long ago, and I don't remember the prayers; so how should I pray ?" "Leave your nonsense," said her mother, sharply, "and don't keep your friends from taking off their bonnets." Upon this hint the visiters retired to their room, where they heard involuntarily the united scoldings of mother and sister, with a sob from Sarah between the pauses. She was evidently too weak to cope with anything so agitating, and the widow trembled lest it should induce a return of the fits. She kneeled down, with her little party around her, and in a low voice commended to the mercies of God in Christ Jesus the poor wounded, straying lamb that she ardently longed to gather into his fold. The two boys did not come back; and after a gloomy meal Phœbe went out also. On their return from afternoon service the widow engaged in a conversation with her son-in-law, her daughter, and two neighbours who dropped in, which, while she strove to make it subservient to their spiritual good, gave her an unexpected and startling insight into some details of the FACTORY SYSTEM, which we must reserve for another chapter. "The country!" ejaculated the other, a man of most cadaverous and care-worn aspect, "Why a breath of country air, and a day's liberty, such as a pig-driver gets, is worth all that the best of us know in this vile town." "But to those who are willing to work, such a market for their labour is a great advantage." "Them that are most willing to work are not always the most able," returned the man: "and to my mind it's a cannibal sort of life to be eating, as one may say, the flesh off our children's bones, and sucking the young blood out of their veins." "Hold your tongue, Tom South," said Mrs. Wright, angrily, "What business have you to talk so, having four children in the mills every day." "Yes, and three in the untimely grave, where you, neighbour, have five, besides the poor maimed thing yonder-and all through those murdering mills." "You are a discontented man, South," said the other visiter, a decent looking woman, "but certainly you've had cause to complain." "Ay, havn't I, Mrs. Johnson? I entered my younger children on the faith of these new acts, with their fine promises about schooling, short hours, inspectors, and all that. Bad as matters went, they told me it was because the acts hadn't time yet to work-all was soon to be fair and right; and so I neglected an opportunity of taking my poor family back to the blessed country labour, and here we may all die in ignorance and sin, as we live." Alarmed as the widow was by the former part of this speech, the conclusion called forth a stronger feeling and she said, "Oh, don't fancy that the mercy of in without any, and the owners that have Him who alone can remove ignorance a conscience above that, turn off the from the mind and wash away sin from young hands rather than the work should the soul is confined to any place. The be stopped. Then the children must go cry of want and penitence will reach Him to the silk-mills, where they are taken in as soon from the lanes of a town like at any age, and worked to death." this as from the village green." "Can all this be possible!" asked the widow. "I don't deny it, my good lady; but people who would become fit company for angels must begin by getting out of the way of devils." "Meaning your neighbours, I suppose?" said Mrs. Wright, crimson with anger. "He doesn't mean that," interposed the other woman he is talking of the mills, and the wickedness that his poor children are learning there." "It can't be denied," said Mrs. Johnson, shaking her head. "But surely the inspectors must discover such deceptions as to the schools, and punish them?" "The inspector comes once a year, and is bound to advertize his coming in the newspapers; so they take care to have all right just then. But if a complaint is "They hav'n't much to learn, I'll be made, and proved too, this fine law allows “ ་ bound," retorted Mrs. Wright. "Ah, that's too true," exclaimed South. "They are going to ruin as fast as they can drive." the father or brother of the offender to try the cause, and gives him power to dismiss it, if he likes. I'll tell you what: within the memory of that girl, the law made the for other such offence that was proved against a mill-owner, ten pounds, and forbade a near relation to try it; but now, as I told you, the worst case may be let off "Notwithstanding your good example." | lowest penalty for working overhours, or "Don't scoff at me, neighbour Wright. I know my example is none of the best: but if I see myself to be in a bad way is that any reason I should not wish my children in a bettter? With my bed-rid- | for half a crown, or set free, as the magisden old mother, and wife in a gallopping consumption, and myself hardly up to the little work I can get, and not a hand's turn at any other business for them, I can't take them out of employ. What can I do ?" trate likes. So much for our rights, and the redress of our wrongs!" The widow felt confounded: she looked at the children; and then at her daughter; but spoke not. South, with the readiness that we all feel to expatiate on ills "Do you send them regularly to the when a fellow-sufferer is present, resumed. school?" asked Mrs. Green. "What school? This act mocks us with an order that every child should go to school twelve hours in the week, and have a ticket for it; but when it comes to the pass, how do they manage? Why they give them an hour's leave or so at such times as no school is open, or else when there's only schools within reach where the masters and mistresses won't receive the little dirty wretches, covered with the filth of the mills, among their children. Then, to make out the twelve hours, they tell them to go to school on Sunday morning, afternoon, and night; as if the poor creatures did not want a day's rest, to say nothing of play: of course they won't go." "But how do they get vouchers ?" "They forge them fast enough, but in a great many mills they are allowed to slip Then, in the case of ill-usage, you see the master usually contrives to shift the blame from himself to the managers or overlookers, or spinners: he don't order the children to be beat; he don't see them beaten; and so he gets off, and the poor things have no real protection any where." By this time the three little Greens had drawn near the speaker, and were gazing in his face with looks of bewildered alarm: he observed it. "Ah, God help ye, poor dears! Little pleasure will you have, except in the ways of sin." "I'm not going into the mills," said Willy; "but Mary is. Will Mary be beat?" and his lip began to quiver. "Never fear," said Mary, stoutly; "neither master nor man shall beat me: and as for sin, I won't go into any sinful company.” "You can't keep out of it, my poor child." "If it is in the way of duty, sir," said Helen, modestly, " and we pray to the Lord to watch over us, and enable us to watch also, we shall be kept from evil ways, though we may be forced to have evil companions." Mrs. Wright tossed her head with a very scornful sneer. South looked at the two girls alternately, and muttered, "Two more lambs for the shambles." "Come, come, neighbour," said Mrs. Johnson, "you are too disheartening, quite. To be sure, not one girl in fifty keeps her character clean; and to be sure there isn't a small tradesman's wife would not think herself disgraced to take a factory girl for a servant; but what so many do doesn't look as bad as if only a few did it. I have seen some that turned out decently after all. My nephew married one, and she did very well." "Yes," returned South, "and died at the birth of her first child, as everybody said she would!" "No, not gospel at any rate," said Mary: "for there is no good news in it, uncle." "Gospel means truth, my dear." "The gospel is truth, uncle: but the word means good news." Mrs. Wright sharply remarked, "You need not set up, Miss Green, to teach your elders and betters: this comes of filling young heads with conceit.” Mary was ready with a reply, but the widow interposed. "I should be sorry Sarah, to hear a child presuming to teach; but in this case Mary only answered her uncle according to the sense of the word, without knowing he used it with any other meaning. It is indeed good news, and the blessed certainty that it is also truth, unfailing truth, is what makes it better than ing, but into our hearts by faith!" "The worst thing," proceeded Mrs. the best of news. God grant us all to reJohnson whose objection to discourage-ceive it, not only into our minds by hearments was not very consistent, "the worst thing is the accidents. You must think of poor Sarah there, and take care of the achines." "What machines ?" "Grandmother," said Sarah, "what is the news that you call so good?" Before the old lady could reply, Mrs. Wright turned fiercely upon the girl, and exclaimed in her loudest tone of anger, "If you dare to meddle or make with any of these canting tricks, I'll bundle you out of doors, to crawl through the streets, and beg your way." "Will you so, mistress mine?" exclaimed her husband, in a tone no less angry than her own: "you should bundle out yourself first, I promise you." Everything is done by machinery; you see, they are great things, ever so high and big, all going about and about, some on wheels running up and down the room, and some with great rollers turning about as fast as the steam can drive them; so you must step back, and run forward, and duck, and turn, and move as they do, or off goes a finger or an arm, or else you get a knock on the head, to re- A violent altercation ensued, in which member all your lives. As to sitting down South acted as pacificator, on grounds of there's no such thing." propriety and respectability, while Mrs. "No sitting down!" cried all the villa- Johnson poured oil on the flame, in her gers in a breath. endeavours to quench it. Several times "No, no," responded Sarah, in a melan- the widow attempted to speak, but in vain; choly tone, "no sitting down." "Ah, poor soul!" said South, "it was standing and standing all day long that makes you unable to stand for the rest of your life." At this juncture Wright entered, and looked with some surprise at the party. "Why you seem as if you had just run away from an earthquake, good people." and Helen, seeing poor Sarah trembling greatly, went over to soothe her. This turned the mother's ire upon her, "Stand off!" she vociferated. "None of your hypocritical ways here. You wheedled yourself in, to eat the bread of my poor brother's orphans, beggar as you are! But you shan't interfere in my house, I promise you." All reply to this savage speech was precluded by Sarah falling from her seat in convulsions. The widow told Helen to take the frightened children into their room, and then with an energy that would not be repressed, while the two men raised and supported the struggling sufferer, she exclaimed, "Daughter, as you value a mother's blessing, desist from this violence. Your enmity against the gospel, the Spirit of God can alone remove: but I have a right to interfere between your evil passions and the children under my care: and oh," she added, as the blackening face of the girl gave evidence of the danger she was now in, "is it not enough to see your own child sinking into an early grave, but will you stand between the Saviour and the soul that he died to redeem !" The entrance of the two boys now increased the confusion. Charles had evidently been drinking to a pitch of excitement, and Johnny looked more alert than he had yet done. The elder, who loved no living thing but Sarah, and was really fond of her, no sooner beheld her condition than he rushed forward, and demanded what they had been doing to his sister. ""Tis your mother's work," answered Wright; and the young madman instantly seized a heavy missile, which he would have flung at her, had not Mrs. Johnson caught his arm, and South, leaving his hold of Sarah, wrested it from him. A short struggle enabled the man to confine so weak a creature, and he proceeded to take the only vengeance within his reach, by uttering a volley of dreadful imprecations and threats directed against his mother. "Hold your tongue, you fool," said Wright, "the girl is coming to; and you'll frighten her off again. alas! it was not new. South, seeing the danger pretty well over, drew the old lady aside, and said in a low voice, "Now, ma'am, as they wished you to think I was making worse of the matter than I need do, just judge for yourself by what you see before you. There's your daughter, as nice, and respectable a young woman as ever came among us, turned into a stone, as I may say towards her own children by hardening her heart to their sufferings, that she might live on their toil and ruin. There's her husband, a quiet good-natured man, doating on his children, but forced to wink at what frets his very life; and only interfering when any thing so bad as this happens. There's the cripple, her legs useless by the over-fatigue of always standing at the frames, her arm gone, by being caught in the machinery, and she in a decline from fits brought on by her sufferings. Her sister-least said is soonest mended: only I can pretty well guess what sort of company she is in all this time. That boy is a devil incarnate; drinks, and swears, and cheats, and seems to hate all good for the sake of hating it. The little fellow he is leading in the same way; and it's a mercy for the others that they died young. A short life, and a sad one they had poor things, they are gone to heaven to be rewarded for it all. And now, Mrs. Green, have I said more than your own eyes can see to be the truth?" The widow could make no reply: her heart was overwhelmed with terror and distress. Meanwhile Sarah seemed to be entreating her brother, who after some objection whispered to his father, and he returned an answer accompanied by a halfsmile which drew a grin upon Charles' countenance. The boy then resolutely exclaimed, "Grandmother, poor Sarah "Here, lend a hand, and speak coaxing-was so pleased with the singing this mornly to her; she'll mind you best." He ing, she wants to hear more of it-nothing winked to South, who, seeing the effect of else will serve her now. Please to call these words, released his captive, and the Miss Helen and the young 'uns, and let's boy's whole attention was immediately have a devout Psalm." directed to his sister. Supporting her head on his shoulder, he whispered the kindest encouragements he could think of: only darting now and then a ferocious glance at his mother, who stood in sullen silence, apparently unmoved by a scene that dreadfully appalled the widow, and alarmed even the neighbours, to whom, The widow hesitated, and looked in the flushed scowling face of her daughter: but Charles reiterated the request in a more peremptory tone, and Sarah, in reply to her query, said she wished it very much. She therefore summoned the children and Helen, whose pale looks bore witness to their past alarm, and Charles, who seemed aelighted thus to annoy his mother, ranged them before Sarah, whom he still supported. "What shall we sing?" asked Mary: Helen whispered a reply; and they immediately began, in the softest tones of their sweet voices, There is a fountain filled with blood, For some time Charles kept his eyes on his sister's face, smiling at her delight, which she expressed by most eloquent looks, and frequently pushing his arm, as if to keep his attention awake. As the singers proceeded, however, and Helen's voice in particular proved how deeply she entered into every word of that exquisite hymn, his eyes became riveted on them, his features lost their dark expression, and the power of sacred melody for a few moments triumphed over the evil spirit that troubled him. "Sweet, sweet and beautiful cousins," said Sarah, "how I do love your faces and your songs." so late; and the rest took advantage of her rising to show in various ways their utter disinclination to any such procedure. The widow had hoped that South would second her proposal, but he was one of the many who see the disease, and loudly complain of its effects, and even talk of the only remedy, without desiring to know any thing experimentally of its power. She had, therefore, no alternative but to join in the general good night, and to retire. "Granny," said the youngest boy, as he climbed on her knee, "this Sunday was not like our Sundays at home." "Only while we were singing," remarked Mary; "and a great mercy that they let us; for cousin Charles was like a wild beast, and would have done somebody a mischief." “Hush, Mary, you must not speak harshly of your poor cousin, but pray for him." "Oh," exclaimed James, "I shall never bear the sight of him after the words he "We'll sing again, shall we?" said used to his mother. I heard them, and a little Willy, and a lively hymn, Come let us join our cheerful songs. When they had ended this, South, wnose tears were starting, hoarsely said, "Bless you, sweet dears; if ever innocence and a cotton-mill went together, may you be innocent still!" Mrs. Wright, who either from policy or some other cause had assumed her wonted composure, gravely addressed the widow. "It has struck me, mother, that as you don't send the little boys to the mill, you might turn a good penny out of them by letting them sing ballads in the street." "Or make an engagement at one of the small theatres," added Mrs. Johnson, who seemed to take it quite seriously. "Never mind their impertinence," said Charles to the party he was now pleased to patronize, "give us one more song." "Shall it be the evening hymn ?" asked Helen. "Not until we have read and prayed, my love," replied the widow, hoping by this means to introduce the scripture and family worship, at least for once ;—but the words put all in motion. Mrs. Johnson, in a great bustle,' turned to look at the clock, protesting she had no notion it was 10 VOL. II. great scuffle too; what were they doing?" "No harm was done, my dear. I was indeed shocked at what you speak of, but it is the grace of God alone that makes you to differ, so far as you do, from others who have not been so well instructed." "So Helen told him," observed Mary, "when he got into a passion at Charles's bad words. I wonder what Richard would have done if he heard anybody speak so to you, granny ?” "Dear Richard !" said the widow, glad to change the subject, "I trust this has been a day of peace and blessing to him.” The children took up the theme, and went over the details of what they sup posed to have been their brother's employments through the Sabbath hours. This restored their cheerfulness; and they gratefully joined in those exercises which had been rejected in the adjoining room. The evening hymn, chaunted in a low tone, closed the day; and the children could not repress their satisfaction that they were to spend no more Sabbaths in that house. "Mind," said Mary, as she repaired to her little bed, "mind, Helen, you call me in good time, as if we were going to milk old Buckle's cows." |