Chapter Three.
“The New School.”
When the family had occupied Park House about four months, a great deal of curiosity and excitement was felt by the inhabitants of Bridgepath, the little hamlet of five hundred persons in the rear of Riverton Park, in consequence of sundry cart-loads of bricks, stone, and lime being deposited on a field which was situated a few yards from the principal beer-shop. The colonel was going to build, it seemed,—but what? Possibly a full-grown public-house. Well, that would be a very questionable improvement. Was it to be a school, or a reading-room?
There was a school already, held in the parlour of the blacksmith’s cottage, where a master attended on week-days, weather permitting, and imparted as much of the three R’s as the children, whose parents thought it worth while to send them, could be induced to acquire under the pressure of a moderate amount of persuasion and an immoderate amount of castigation.
The master came in a pony-cart from Franchope, and returned in the same the moment the afternoon school broke up, so that his scholars had ample opportunity, when he was fairly gone, to settle any little disputes which might have arisen during school hours by vigorous fights on the open green, the combatants being usually encouraged to prolong their encounters to the utmost by the cheers of the men who gathered round them out of the neighbouring beer-shops.
As for religious instruction, the master, it is true, made his scholars read a portion of the Scriptures twice a week, and learn a few verses. But they would have been almost better without this; for the hard, matter-of-fact way in which he dealt with the Holy Book and its teachings would make the children rather hate than love their Bible lesson.
And what was done for the improvement, mental or spiritual, of the grown-up people? Nothing. Neither church nor chapel existed in the place. A few old and middle-aged people walked occasionally to the nearest place of worship, some two miles off; but nine-tenths of the villagers went nowhere on a Sunday—that is to say, nowhere where they could hear anything to do them good, though they were ready enough to leave their homes on the Sabbath to congregate where they could drink and game together, and sing profane and immoral songs.
So Bridgepath was rightly called “a lost place;” and indeed it had been “lost” for so many years, that there seemed scarcely the remotest prospect of its being “found” by any one disposed to do it good. However, even in this dark spot there was a corner from which there shone a little flickering light. John Price and his family tenanted a tolerably roomy cottage at the entrance to the village, close to the horse-pond. The poor man had seen better days, having acted as steward to the young squire from the time he came into the property till he disappeared with his infant son and an old nurse who had lived for nearly two generations on the Riverton estate. Poor John had served the squire’s father also as steward, and loved the young master as if he had been his own child; and it was known that, when ruin fell on the young man, the poor steward was dragged down also to poverty, having been somehow or other involved in his employer’s ruin. But never did John Price utter a word that would throw light on this subject to anyone outside his own family. All he would let people know was, that the squire had left him his cottage rent-free for his life,—which was, indeed, all that the master had to leave his faithful servant.
The worthy man had struggled hard to keep himself and his family; but now he was bed-ridden, and had been so for some five or six years past. However, he had a patient wife, who made the most and best of a very little, and loving children, some of them in service, who helped him through. And he found a measure of peace in studying his old, well-worn Bible, though he read it as yet but ignorantly. Still, what light he had he strove to impart to those of the villagers who came to sit and condole with him; while his wife, and an unmarried daughter who lived at home, both deploring the wickedness of Bridgepath, tried to throw in a word of scriptural truth now and then, for the sake of instructing and improving their heathenish neighbours.
It may be well imagined, then, with what interest all the villagers, but especially the Prices, including John himself, as he was propped up in bed and gazed through the casement, marked the numerous carts bringing building materials of all kinds to the village. All doubts on the subject, however, were soon brought to an end by a call from the colonel at John’s house in the early part of November. After a few kind inquiries about his health and family, Colonel Dawson informed him that he was going to build at once a school and master’s house in Bridgepath, with a reading-room attached to it, and to place there a married man of thorough Christian principles; one who would not only look after the ordinary teaching of the children, but would also, under the superintendence of the vicar, conduct a simple religious service on Sundays for the instruction of the villagers.
Bridgepath had from time immemorial been under the special supervision of the proprietors of Riverton Park, the whole hamlet being a portion of the property. The parish to which it belonged was extensive, and the parish church some five miles distant, Bridgepath being just on the borders of the next parish, in which parish the Park itself was situated. So, in former days, the chaplain at the house used to look after the people of the hamlet in a good-natured sort of way, by taking food and clothing to the sick and destitute, and saying a kind word, and giving a little wholesome advice, where he thought they were needed. But being himself unhappily possessed of but little light, he was unable to impart much to others, and the spiritual destitution of poor Bridgepath never seemed to occur to his mind at all. But now, for the last twenty years, neither squire nor chaplain had resided at Riverton; so that a very occasional visit from the vicar—who had more on his hands nearer home than he could well accomplish, and who, with others, was living in constant expectation of some one coming to the property and bringing about a change—was all that had been done directly for the scriptural instruction and eternal welfare of the benighted inhabitants of Bridgepath.
Now, however, a mighty change was coming, and the dwellers in the hamlet were supposed to be highly delighted, as a matter of course, with the prospect. And, certainly, the hearts of old John Price and his wife and daughter did rejoice; but not so the hearts of most of the inhabitants, for they were thoroughly conscious that much of the goings on in their village would not bear looking into by those who feared God and respected human law. Bridgepath had been now for a good many years a privileged place in the eyes of poachers, gamblers, and Sabbath-breakers, where the devil’s active servants could hold their festivals, especially on the Lord’s day, without fear of interruption from policeman or preacher. And the women were as bad as the men; they “loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” So the new school and reading-room arose amidst the sneers and loudly-expressed disgust of the majority of the population; the proprietors of the beer-shops being specially bitter in their denunciations of this uncalled-for innovation on the good old times and habits, so long the favoured lot of a primitive and unsophisticated people, who had been quite content when left to their own devices, and could do perfectly well without these new-fashioned schemes, if only good people would just let them alone. The good people, however, saw the matter in a different light; and so, spite of all the grumbling and outspoken dissatisfaction, the buildings were completed in the spring, and the new schoolmaster and his wife took up their abode in Bridgepath.
Colonel Dawson had chosen his man carefully, and duly warned him that he would find his post at first no bed of roses. To which the master replied that he was not afraid of encountering his share of thorns; and that he doubted not but that with prayer, patience, and perseverance, there would be both flowers and fruit in Bridgepath in due time. As for opposition, he rather enjoyed a little of it, and trusted to be enabled to live it down. The colonel was satisfied, for he knew that he had chosen a man who had already proved himself to be no mere talker. So Bridgepath looked on in sulky wonder; but soon was constrained to acknowledge that, in their new schoolmaster, the right man had been put into the right place.
And now the colonel was very anxious to get the help of some earnest-hearted Christian lady, who would visit the sick and needy in the neglected hamlet, carrying with her Christ in her heart and on her lips; for his sister was too old to undertake such a work. His thoughts turned to Mary Stansfield. He would go and have a talk with the old lady her aunt about it.