“There’s where you made a mistake, Antony. If Annie hed been a business woman, you would hev built yoursen a mill twenty years ago.”
“Ay, I would, if Annie hed asked me. Not without. When is Dick to be home?”
“Some time to-morrow,” answered Annie. “He is anxious to see thee. He isn’t on any loitering business.”
“Well, Josepha, there is no time for loitering. All England is spinning like a whipped top at full speed. In Manchester and Preston the wheels of the looms go merrily round. Oh, there is so much I want to do!”
They had nearly finished a very happy meal when there was a sound of men’s voices coming nearer and nearer and the silver and china stopped their tinkling and the happy trio were still a moment as they listened. “It will be Jonathan and a few of the men to get the news from me,” said the squire.
“Well, Antony, I thought of that and there is a roaring fire in the ballroom and the chairs are set out, and thou can talk to them from the orchestra.” And the look of love that followed this information made Annie’s heart feel far too big for everyday comfort.
There were about fifty men to seat. Jonathan was their leader and spokesman, and he went to the orchestra with the squire and stood by the squire’s chair, and when ordinary courtesies had been exchanged, Jonathan said, “Squire, we want thee to tell us about the Reform Parliament. The Yorkshire Post says thou were present, and we felt that we might ask thee to tell us about it.”
“For sure I will. I was there as soon as the House was opened, and John O’Connell went in with me. He was one of the ‘Dan O’Connell household brigade,’ which consists of old Dan, his three sons, and two sons-in-law. They were inclined to quarrel with everyone, and impudently took their seats on the front benches as if to awe the Ministerial Whigs who were exactly opposite them. William Cobbett was the most conspicuous man among them. He was poorly dressed in a suit of pepper and salt cloth, made partly like a Quaker’s and partly like a farmer’s suit, and he hed a white hat on. * His head was thrown backward so as to give the fullest view of his shrewd face and his keen, cold eyes. Cobbett had no respect for anyone, and in his first speech a bitter word niver failed him if he was speaking of the landed gentry whom he called ‘unfeeling tyrants’ and the lords of the loom he called ‘rich ruffians.’ Even the men pleading for schools for the poor man’s children were ‘education-cantors’ to him, and he told them plainly that nothing would be good for the working man that did not increase his victuals, his drink and his clothing.
* A white hat was the sign of an extreme Radical.
“Is that so, men?” asked the squire. He was answered by a “No!” whose style of affirmation was too emphatic to be represented by written words.