CHAPTER II
HALL CAINE’S CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH

Thomas Henry Hall Caine was born in Runcorn, Lancashire, on May 14, 1853. Runcorn is by no means a romantic town, and, fortunately for the future novelist, he only spent ten days of his life within its precincts. His father was a Manxman, and his mother a native of Cumberland. They were both of the people—hard-working, poor and thrifty; but they must have possessed some remarkable qualities of mind and heart if we are to give any credence to the theory of heredity, for not only has Hall Caine made his mark upon his generation, but his sister, Miss Lily Hall Caine, has won a by no means unimportant place in the theatrical world, and his brother, Mr Ralph Hall Caine, is, within limits, a charming writer of talent and ability. Caine is a Celtic name; Hall, his mother’s maiden name, is Norse, and is very commonly met with still in Iceland. The novelist himself has inherited the physical characteristics of his maternal ancestors, for, like the Norsemen, his beard and hair are red, and although he is the reverse of a strong man, his clearly-defined and well-developed features indicate to some extent the physical robustness of the Norsemen. His forefathers were farmers and fishermen, an old hardy family of great strength and physical endurance.

Though born in Runcorn, and resident whilst a very young child in Liverpool, Hall Caine’s earliest recollections are of the Isle of Man, of his grandmother’s cottage “Ballavolley,” Ballaugh, in the north of Manxland. It speaks much for his early development that even as a little child he loved the island which, in future years, was to be dearer to him than any spot on earth. “There is no place in America, Italy, Russia, Iceland, Morocco, or any other country I have visited, that is quite so beautiful as my own little island in its own little way,” he said to me only a month or two ago. And what he thinks to-day he has always thought.

There is a subtle, elusive charm about the Isle of Man which is obvious to the least observant of men, but there are few who are able to define its particular character, or who are able to define from what source it is derived. Once become a lover of that narrow stretch of land, and you are eternally lost; its beauty, its freshness and its fragrance will haunt you for ever, and each year when June comes round you will be impelled, by an irresistible desire, to tread once more the heights of Snaefell and Barrule, and wander again through the glens of Sulby and the Dhoon. It were worse than useless for me to attempt to paint any of the beautiful scenes which Manxland possesses, but the explanation of its distinctive charm lies in this, that it is an island. For not only is it an island, but a nation—a nation with manners and customs peculiar to itself—a nation that is, for the most part, occupied with itself and its own affairs. Its very aloofness attracts. It is in the world, but not of it; it lies apart surrounded by the ever-changing seas, and covered by a firmament which seems to be a part of its very self. The dim outline of the hills of other lands—England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales—only emphasises this sense of remoteness. It is only the vessels out at sea creeping steadily along the horizon, that act as a reminder of the existence of other lands, and not the far-off lands themselves. These vessels are the only disturbing influence of the island’s peace: they breathe forth the breath of the city, and remind one of that which one has been tempted almost to forget—that the world is not all beautiful, and that sooner or later the city will again claim us as its own.

But this island-charm was not the only influence that was at work upon the young child’s imagination. His grandmother, superstitious like all good Manx people, would tell him tales in the dusk of evening, that banished all sleep from his eyes, and set his fancy weaving stories of elves, fairies, gnomes and witches. The old woman had the folk-lore of her native country at her finger-ends, and so attentive a listener curled up at the fire of peat made a good story-teller of her. The first book he remembers reading was a huge volume on the German Reformation, about Luther and Melancthon, and other men who soon became his well-loved heroes. These days Mr Caine remembers well and the memory is sweet and pleasant. But the time came when it was necessary for him to go to school, and he returned to his parents who had settled in Liverpool. At the age of ten he entered as a “new boy” the public school in Hope Street, Liverpool. Among his fellow-pupils was a William Pierce who was afterwards to become one of the most prominent figures in the Congregational Ministry. I am indebted to this gentleman for the following schoolboy reminiscences of his companion.

“Many things served to make the entry of Hall Caine among us noteworthy. In the first place, he was easily distinguished among a crowd of schoolboys by his then bright hair—gold, turning to red—his clear, almost girlish complexion, and his large, luminous brown eyes. I think the almost instantaneous conviction in the minds of the rest of the class that morning was that our new friend would be all the better for a little wholesome persecution when their duties were over, if only to take some of the painful freshness out of him and tone him down to our own colour. This feeling on our part was heightened when he was called upon to read a passage aloud, which he did, as I clearly recall, in a very musical voice, and with much greater modulation than we had dared to employ—lest we should be thought to be giving ourselves airs! When our master was injudicious enough to praise Hall Caine warmly at the expense of the rest of us, the duty of taking him in hand became one of high moral obligation. And though I have no recollection of what happened, I have no doubt that, being so different from other boys in many respects, he did suffer some little persecution, without being, I hope, any the worse for the discipline.

“I think that probably, to the end of his school experience, Caine was somewhat scoffed at by the rougher boys; partly, also, because he was not addicted to settling his differences with other boys by giving or accepting challenges to fight. But he was not in the least a milksop. Among the trivial remembrances of those days, the only outstanding recollection I have of Caine is quite characteristic of him. At one of the terminal examinations we were set to write a short English composition. The report of the examiner stated that one paper was unusual, coming from a class of boys of our years. This youthful production was graced by apt poetical quotations, illustrations of the theme set us—a unique feature in the examiner’s experience of boys of our standard. I remember one of our class-mates remarking that it required some cheek to quote poetry in old ⸺’s composition; but my own estimate of Caine increased by this and similar circumstances, and when I left for one of the larger grammar schools in the city, we were already great friends.”