Erema; Or, My Father's Sin

by R. D. Blackmore

That ancient church, with its red-tiled spire, stands well up in the good old town, at the head of a street whose principal object now certainly is to lead to it. Three hundred years ago that street had business of its own to think of, and was brave perhaps with fine men and maids at the time of the Spanish Armada. Its only bravery now was the good old church, and some queer gables, and a crypt (which was true to itself by being buried up to the spandrels), and one or two corners where saints used to stand, until they were pelted out of them, and where fisher-like men, in the lodging season, stand selling fish caught at Billingsgate. But to Bruntsea itself the great glory of that street was rather of hope than of memory. Bailiff Hopkins had taken out three latticed windows, and put in one grand one of plate-glass, with “finishing” blinds all varnished. And even on a Sunday morning Bruntsea wanted to know what ever the bailiff was at behind them. Some said that he did all his pickling on a Sunday; and by putting up “spectacle glass” he had challenged the oldest inhabitant to come and try his focus.

Despite all the rattle and roar of the wind, we went on in church as usual. The vicar had a stout young curate from Durham, who could outshout any tempest, with a good stone wall between them; and the Bruntsea folk were of thicker constitution than to care an old hat for the weather. Whatever was “sent by the Lord” they took with a grumble, but no excitement. The clock in front of the gallery told the time of the day as five minutes to twelve, when the vicar, a pleasant old-fashioned man, pronounced his text, which he always did thrice over to make us sure of it. And then he hitched up his old black gown, and directed his gaze at the lord of the manor, to impress the whole church with authority. Major Hockin acknowledged in a proper manner this courtesy of the minister by rubbing up his crest, and looking even more wide-awake than usual; whereas Aunt Mary, whose kind heart longed to see her own son in that pulpit, calmly settled back her shoulders, and arranged her head and eyes so well as to seem at a distance in rapt attention, while having a nice little dream of her own. But suddenly all was broken up. The sexton (whose license as warden of the church, and even whose duty it was to hear the sermon only fitfully, from the tower arch, where he watched the boys, and sniffed the bakehouse of his own dinner)—to the consternation of every body, this faithful man ran up the nave, with his hands above his head, and shouted,

“All Brownzee be awash, awash”—sounding it so as to rhyme with “lash”—“the zea, the zea be all over us!”

The clergyman in the pulpit turned and looked through a window behind him, while all the congregation rose.

“It is too true,” the preacher cried; “the sea is in over the bank, my friends. Every man must rush to his own home. The blessing of the Lord be on you through His fearful visitation!”

He had no time to say more; and we thought it very brave of him to say that, for his own house was in the lower village, and there he had a wife and children sick. In half a minute the church was empty, and the street below it full of people, striving and struggling against the blast, and breasting it at an incline like swimmers, but beaten back ever and anon and hurled against one another, with tattered umbrellas, hats gone, and bonnets hanging. And among them, like gulls before the wind, blew dollops of spray and chunks of froth, with every now and then a slate or pantile.

All this was so bad that scarcely any body found power to speak, or think, or see. The Major did his very best to lead us, but could by no means manage it. And I screamed into his soundest ear to pull Aunt Mary into some dry house—for she could not face such buffeting—and to let me fare for myself as I might. So we left Mrs. Hockin in the bailiff's house, though she wanted sadly to come with us, and on we went to behold the worst. And thus, by running the byes of the wind, and craftily hugging the corners, we got to the foot of the street at last, and then could go no further.

For here was the very sea itself, with furious billows panting. Before us rolled and ran a fearful surf of crested whiteness, torn by the screeching squalls, and tossed in clashing tufts and pinnacles. And into these came, sweeping over the shattered chine of shingle, gigantic surges from the outer deep, towering as they crossed the bar, and combing against the sky-line, then rushing onward, and driving the huddle of the ponded waves before them.

The tide was yet rising, and at every blow the wreck and the havoc grew worse and worse. That long sweep of brick-work, the “Grand Promenade,” bowed and bulged, with wall and window knuckled in and out, like wattles; the “Sea Parade” was a parade of sea; and a bathing-machine wheels upward lay, like a wrecked Noah's Ark, on the top of the “Saline-Silico-Calcareous Baths.”

The Major stood by me, while all his constructions “went by the board,” as they say at sea; and verily every thing was at sea. I grieved for him so that it was not the spray alone that put salt drops on my cheeks. And I could not bear to turn and look at his good old weather-beaten face. But he was not the man to brood upon his woes in silence. He might have used nicer language, perhaps, but his inner sense was manful.