CHAPTER XII.
Captain Rexford had no fortune with his second wife; and their children numbered seven daughters and three sons. It was natural that the expenses of so large a family should have proved too much for a slender income in an English town where a certain style of living had been deemed a necessity. When, further, a mercantile disaster had swept away the larger part of this income, the anxious parents had felt that there was nothing left for their children but a choice between degrading dependence on the bounty of others and emigration. From the new start in life which the latter course would give they had large hopes. Accordingly, they gathered together all that they had, and, with a loan from a richer relative, purchased a house and farm in a locality where they were told their children would not wholly lack educational opportunities or society. This move of theirs was heroic, but whether wise or unwise remained to be proved by the result of indefinite years. The extent of their wealth was now this new property, an income which, in proportion to their needs, was a mere pittance, and the debt to the richer relative.
The men who came to call on their new neighbour, and congratulate him on his choice of a farm, did not know how small was the income nor how big the debt, yet even they shook their heads dubiously as they thought of their own difficulties, and remarked to each other that such a large family was certainly a great responsibility.
"I wonder," said one to another, "if Rexford had an idea in coming here that he would marry his daughters easily. It's a natural thing, you know, when one hears of the flower of British youth leaving England for the Colonies, to imagine that, in a place like this, girls would be at a premium. I did. When we came out I said to my wife that when our little girls grew up they might pick and choose for themselves from among a dozen suitors, but—well, this isn't just the locality for that, is it?"
Both men laughed a little. They knew that, however difficult it might be to find the true explanation of the fact, the fact remained that there were no young men in Chellaston, that boys who grew up there went as inevitably elsewhere to make their fortunes as they would have done from an English country town.
Among the ladies who came to see Mrs. Rexford and count her children, the feeling concerning her was more nearly allied to kindly commiseration than she would at all have liked had she known it. They said that Captain Rexford might succeed if his wife and daughters—Each would complete the conditional clause in her own way, but it was clear to the minds of all that the success of the Rexford farm would depend to a great extent upon the economy and good management practised in the house.
Now the Rexfords, man, woman, and child, had come with brave hearts, intending to work and to economise; yet they found what was actually required of them different from all that their fancy had pictured; and their courage, not being obliged to face those dangers to which they had adjusted it, and being forced to face much to which it was not adjusted, suffered shock, and took a little time to rally into moderate animation.
At the end of their weary journey they had found themselves in a large wooden house, not new by any means, or smart in any of its appointments; and, as convenience is very much a matter of custom, it appeared to them inconvenient—a house in which room was set against room without vestige of lobby or passage-way, and in which there were almost as many doors to the outside as there were windows. They had bought it and its furniture as a mere adjunct to a farm which they had chosen with more care, and when they inspected it for the first time their hearts sank somewhat within them. Captain Rexford, with impressive sadness, remarked to his wife that there was a greater lack of varnish and upholstery and of traces of the turning lathe than he could have supposed possible in—"furniture." But his wife had bustled away before he had quite finished his speech. Whatever she might feel, she at least expressed no discouragement. Torture does not draw from a brave woman expressions of dismay.
That which gave both Mrs. Rexford and Sophia much perplexity in the first day or two of the new life was that the girl Eliza seemed to them to prove wholly incompetent. She moved in a dazed and weary fashion which was quite inconsistent with the intelligence and capacity occasionally displayed in her remarks; and had they in the first three days been able to hear of another servant, Mrs. Rexford would have abruptly cancelled her agreement with Eliza. At the end of that time, however, when there came a day on which Mrs. Rexford and Sophia were both too exhausted by unpacking and housework to take their ordinary share of responsibility, Eliza suddenly seemed to awake and shake herself into thought and action. She cleared the house of the litter of packing-cases, set their contents in order, and showed her knowledge of the mysteries of the kitchen in a manner which fed the family and sent them to bed more comfortably than since their arrival. From that day Eliza became more cheerful; and she not only did her own work, but often aided others in theirs, and set the household right in all its various efforts towards becoming a model Canadian home. If the ladies had not had quite so much to learn, or if the three little children had not been quite so helpless, Eliza's work would have appeared more effective. As it was, the days passed on, and no tragedy occurred.
It was a great relief to Captain and Mrs. Rexford in those days to turn to Principal Trenholme for society and advice. He was their nearest neighbour, and had easy opportunity for being as friendly and kind as he evidently desired to be. Captain Rexford pronounced him a fine fellow and a perfect gentleman. Captain Rexford had great natural courtesy of disposition.