As the malignity of the devil would have it, we were kept abroad two years longer than our time, Mr. Pitt (England not being so tame then as she is now[7]) having knocked up a dust with Spain about Nootka Sound. Oh, how I cursed Nootka Sound, and poor bawling Pitt too, I am afraid! At the end of four years, however, home I came, landed at Portsmouth, and got my discharge from the army by the great kindness of poor Lord Edward FitzGerald, who was then the major of my regiment. I found my little girl a servant of all work (and hard work it was) at five pounds a year, in the house of a Captain Brisac; and, without hardly saying a word about the matter, she put into my hands the whole of my hundred and fifty guineas unbroken!
LIFE AT BOTLEY
[Sidenote: William Cobbett]
But, to do the things I did, you must love home yourself. To rear up children, in this manner, you must live with them; you must make them, too, feel by your conduct, that you prefer this to any other mode of passing your time. All men cannot lead this sort of life, but many may; and all much more than many do. My occupation, to be sure, was chiefly carried on at home; but I had always enough to do. I never spent an idle week, or even day, in my whole life. Yet I found time to talk with them, to walk, or ride, about with them; and, when forced to go from home, always took one or more with me. You must be good-tempered, too, with them; they must like your company better than any other person's; they must not wish you away, not fear your coming back, not look upon your departure as a holiday….
When I went from home, all followed me to the outer gate, and looked after me, till the carriage, or horse, was out of sight. At the time appointed for my return, all were prepared to meet me; and, if it were late at night, they sat up as long as they were able to keep their eyes open. This love of parents, and this constant pleasure at home made them not even think of seeking pleasure abroad; and they, thus, were kept from vicious playmates and early corruption.
This is the age, too, to teach children to be trustworthy, and to be merciful and humane. We lived in a garden of about two acres, partly kitchen-garden with walls, partly shrubbery and trees, and partly grass. There were the peaches, as tempting as any that ever grew, and yet as safe from fingers as if no child were ever in the garden. It was not necessary to forbid. The blackbirds, the thrushes, the white-throats, and even that very shy bird the goldfinch had their nests and bred up their young ones in great abundance, all about this little spot, constantly the play-place of six children; and one of the latter had its nest and brought up its young ones in a raspberry-bush, within two yards of a walk, and at the time that we were gathering the ripe raspberries. We give _dogs, _and justly, great credit for sagacity and memory; but the following two most curious instances, which I should not venture to state, if there were not so many witnesses to the facts, in my neighbours at Botley, as well as in my own family, will show, that birds are not, in this respect, inferior to the canine race. All country people know that the skylark is a very shy bird; that its abode is the open fields; that it settles on the ground only; that it seeks safety in the wideness of space; that it avoids enclosures, and is never seen in gardens. A part of our ground was a grass-plot of about forty rods, or a quarter of an acre, which, one year, was left to be mowed for hay. A pair of larks, coming out of the fields into the midst of a pretty populous village, chose to make their nest in the middle of this little spot and at not more than about thirty-five yards from one of the doors of the house, in which there were about twelve persons living, and six of these children, who had constant access to all parts of the ground. There we saw the cock rising up and singing, then taking his turn upon the eggs; and by and by we observed him cease to sing, and saw them both constantly engaged in bringing food to the young ones. No unintelligible hint to fathers and mothers of the human race, who have, before marriage, taken delight in music. But the time came for mowing the grass! I waited a good many days for the brood to get away, but at last I determined on the day; and if the larks were there still, to leave a patch of grass standing around them. In order not to keep them in dread longer than necessary, I brought three able mowers, who would cut the whole in about an hour; and, as the plat was nearly circular, set them to mow round, beginning at the outside. And now for sagacity indeed! The moment the men began to whet their scythes, the two old larks began to flutter over the nest, and to make a great clamour. When the men began to mow, they flew round and round, stooping so low, when near the men, as almost to touch their bodies, making a great chattering at the same time; but, before the men had got round with the second swath, they flew to the nest, and away they went, young ones and all, across the river, at the foot of the ground, and settled in the long grass in my neighbour's orchard.
The other instance relates to a house-marten. It is well known that these birds build their nests under the eaves of inhabited houses, and sometimes under those of door-porches; but we had one that built its nest in the house, and upon the top of a common door-case, the door of which opened into a room out of the main passage into the house. Perceiving that the marten had begun to build its nest here, we kept the front door open in the day-time, but were obliged to fasten it at night. It went on, had eggs, young ones, and the young ones flew. I used to open the door in the morning early, and then the birds carried on their affairs till night. The next year the marten came again, and had another brood in the same place. It found its old nest; and, having repaired it, and put it in order, went on again in the former way; and it would, I dare say, have continued to come to the end of its life, if we had remained there so long, notwithstanding there were six healthy children in the house making just as much noise as they pleased.
HIS CHILDREN
[Sidenote: William Cobbett]
We wanted no stimulants of this sort [he is referring to social dissipation, romances, and playhouses] to keep up our spirits; our various pleasing pursuits were quite sufficient for that; and the book-learning came amongst the rest of the pleasures, to which it was, in some sort, necessary. I remember that, one year, I raised a prodigious crop of fine melons, under hand-glasses; and I learned how to do it from a gardening-book; or, at least, that book was necessary to remind me of the details. Having passed part of an evening in talking to the boys about getting this crop, "Come," said I, "now let us read the book." Then the book came forth, and to work we went, following very strictly the precepts of the book. I read the thing but once, but the eldest boy read it, perhaps, twenty times over; and explained all about the matter to the others. Why, here was a motive! Then he had to tell the garden labourer what to do to the melons. Now, I will engage, that more was really learned by this single lesson, than would have been learned by spending, at this son's age, a year at school; and he happy and delighted all the while. When any dispute arose among them about hunting or shooting, or any other of their pursuits, they, by degrees, found out the way of settling it by reference to some book; and, when any difficulty occurred as to the meaning, they referred to me, who, if at home, always instantly attended to them in these matters.
They began writing by taking words out of printed books: finding out which letter was which, by asking me, or asking those who knew the letters one from the other; and, by imitating bits of my writing, it is surprising how soon they began to write a hand like mine, very small, very faint-stroked, and nearly plain as print. The first use that any of them made of the pen, was to write to me, though in the same house with them. They began doing this in mere scratches, before they knew how to make any one letter; and, as I was always folding up letters and directing them, so were they; and they were sure to receive a prompt answer, with most encouraging compliments. All the meddling and teasing of friends, and, what was more serious, the pressing prayers of their anxious mother, about sending them to school, I withstood without the slightest effect on my resolutions. As to friends, preferring my own judgment to theirs, I did not care much; but an expression of anxiety, implying a doubt of the soundness of my own judgment, coming, perhaps twenty times a day, from her whose care they were as well as mine, was not a matter to smile at, and very great trouble did it give me. My answer at last was, as to the boys, I want them to be like me; and as to the girls "in whose hands can they be so safe as in yours? Therefore my resolution is taken; go to school they shall not."
Nothing is much more annoying than the intermeddling of friends in a case like this. The wife appeals to them, and "good breeding," that is to say nonsense, is sure to put them on her side. Then they, particularly the women, when describing the surprising progress made by their own sons at school, used, if one of mine were present, to turn to him, and ask to what school he went, and what he was learning? I leave any one to judge of his opinion of her; and whether he would like her the better for that! "Bless me, so tall, and not learned anything yet!" "Oh, yes, he has," I used to say; "he has learned to ride, and hunt, and shoot, and fish, and look after cattle and sheep, and to work in the garden, and to feed his dogs, and to go from village to village in the dark." This was the way I used to manage with troublesome customers of this sort. And how glad the children used to be, when they got clear of such criticising people! And how grateful they felt to me for the protection which they saw that I gave them against that state of restraint, of which other people's boys complained! Go whither they might, they found no place so pleasant as home, and no soul that came near them affording them so many means of gratification as they received from me.