CHAPTER VII
Such a sight had never been seen in Cornwall before: on this Sunday morning an hour after sunrise every road leading to the village of Porthawn had its procession of men, women, and children, going to hear the preacher. The roads became dusty, as dry roads do when an army of soldiers passes over them; and here was an army of soldiers along, with its horse and foot and baggage-waggons—such an army as had never been in the West since the days of Monmouth's Rebellion; and this great march was the beginning of another rebellion, not destined to fail as the other had failed. Without banners, without arms, with no noise, with no shoutings of the captains, this great force marched to fight—to take part in an encounter that proved more lasting in its effects than any recorded in the history of England since the days of the Norman Invasion.
The Cornish crowds did not know that they were making history. The people had heard rumours of the preacher who had awakened the people of Somersetshire from their sleep of years, and who, on being excluded from the churches which had become Sabbath dormitories, had gone to the fields where all was wakefulness, and had here spoken to the hearts of tens of thousands.
The reports that spread abroad by the employment of no apparent agency must have contained some element that appealed with overwhelming power to the people of the West. The impulse that drove quiet folk from their homes and induced them to march many miles along dusty roads upon the morning of the only day of the week that gave them respite from toil was surely stronger than mere curiosity. They did not go into the wilderness to see a reed shaken by the wind. There was a seriousness of purpose and a sincerity about these people which must have been the result of a strong feeling among them that the existing order of things was lacking in some essentials—that the Church should become a stimulating force to them who were ready to perish, and not remain the apathetic force that it was when at its best, the atrophying influence that it was when at its worst.
That the ground was ready for the sowing was the opinion of Wesley, though few signs had been given to him to induce this conclusion, but that he had not misinterpreted the story of the Valley of Dry Bones was proved by the sight of the multitudes upon the roads—upon the moorland sheep-tracks—upon the narrow lanes where the traffic was carried on by pack-horses. There they streamed in their thousands. Farmers with their wives and children seated on chairs in their heavy waggons, men astride of everything that was equine—horses and mules and asses—some with their wives or sisters on the pillion behind them, but still more riding double with a friend.
On the wayside were some who were resting, having walked seven or eight or ten miles, and had seen the sun rise over the hills on that scented Spring morning. Some were having their breakfast among the primroses under the hedges, some were smoking their pipes before setting forth to complete their journey. Mothers, were nursing their infants beneath the pink and white coral of the hawthorns.
“'Tis a fair,” said Hal Holmes to his friend, Dick Pritchard, who was seated by his side in a small pony cart made by himself during the winter.
“Salvation Fair,” hazarded the water-finder. “Salvation Fair I would call it if only I was bold enough.”
The smith shook his head.