Jan of the Windmill: A Story of the Plains

by Juliana Horatia Ewing

The other three were the parish doctor, Squire Ammaby, and the schoolmaster.

On the very first rumor of the epidemic, Lady Louisa had carried off Amabel, and had gone with Lady Craikshaw to Brighton. Both the ladies were indignant with the Squire’s obstinate resolve to remain amongst his tenants. In her alarm, Lady Louisa implored him to sell the property and buy one in Ireland, which was Lady Craikshaw’s native country; and the list she contrived to run up of the drawbacks to the Ammaby estate would have driven a temper less stolid than her husband’s to distraction.

When the fever broke out among the children, the schools were closed, and Master Swift devoted his whole time to laboring with the parson, the doctor, and the Squire.

No part of the Rector’s devotion won more affectionate gratitude from his people than a single act of thoughtfulness, by which he preserved a record of the graves of their dead. He had held firmly on to a decent and reverent burial, and, foreseeing that the poor survivors would be quite unable to afford gravestones, he kept a strict list of the dead, and where they were buried, which was afterwards transferred to one large monument, which was bought by subscription. He cut the village off from all communication with the outer world, to prevent a spread of the disease; but he sent accounts of the calamity to the public papers, which brought abundant help in money for the needs of the parish. And in these matters the schoolmaster was his right-hand man.

The disease was most eccentric in its path. Having scourged one side only of the main street, it burst out with virulence in detached houses at a distance. Then it returned to the village, and after lulls and outbreaks it ceased as suddenly as it began.

It was about midway in its career that it fell with all its wrath upon Master Lake’s windmill.

The mill stood in a healthy position, but the dwelling room was ill-ventilated, and there were defective sanitary arrangements, which Master Swift had anxiously pointed out to the miller. The plague had begun in the village, and the schoolmaster trembled for Jan. But Master Lake was not to be interfered with, and, when the schoolmaster spoke of poison, thought himself witty as he replied,—

“It be a uncommon slow pison then, Master Swift.”

It must also be allowed that such epidemics, once started, do havoc in apparently clean houses and amongst well-fed people.

It was a little foster-sister of Jan’s who sickened first. She died within two days. Her burial was hasty enough, but Mrs. Lake had no time to fret about that, for a second child was ill. Like many another householder, the poor windmiller was now ready enough to look to his drains, and so forth; but it may be doubted if the general stirring up of dirty places at this moment did not do as much harm as good. It was hot,—terribly hot. Day after day passed without a breeze to cool the burning skins of the sick, and yet it was not sunshiny. People did say that the pestilence hung like a murky vapor above the district, and hid the sun.