“I cannot say. My mother’s dead. As for the rest—well, it’s just this way, Old Crow, I’m a close sort o’ chap, and always were. I left home a fugitive and a vagabond, and I resolved as I’d ne’er come back till I could come as my own mayster, and that I’d ne’er tell anything about my own home and them as belonged me, till I could settle where I pleased in a home of my own. But I learnt at the diggings as it were not right to run off as I did, for the Lord sent us a faithful preacher, and he showed me my duty; and I came back with my mind made up to tell them as owned me how God had dealt with me and changed my heart. But I couldn’t find nor hear anything about ’em at the old place. They’d flitted, and nobody could tell me where. So I’d rayther say no more about ’em till I’ve tried a bit longer to find ’em out. And if I cannot light on ’em arter all, why then, I’ll start again, as if the past had never been, for it were but a dark and dismal past to me.”
Old Crow did not press Jacob with further questions, as he was evidently not disposed to be communicative on the subject of his early history, but he said,—
“Well, and suppose you take to the grinding; you can drive the cart afore ye, from town to town, and from village to village, as I’ve done myself scores and scores of times, and maybe you’ll light on them as you’re seeking. It’s strange how many an old face, as I’d never thought to see no more, has turned up as I’ve jogged along from one place to another.”
“Ah,” exclaimed Jacob, “I think as that’d just suit me! I never thought of that. I’ll take your offer then, Old Crow, and many thanks to ye, and I hope you’ll not find me a bad partner.”
So it was arranged as the old man suggested, and Jacob forthwith began to learn his new trade.
It was some weeks before he had become at all proficient in the knife-grinding and umbrella-mending arts; and many a sly laugh and joke on the part of Deborah made him at times half-inclined to give up the work; but there was a determination and dogged resolution about his character which did not let him lightly abandon anything he had once undertaken. So he persevered, much to Old Crow’s satisfaction, for he soon began to love Jacob as a son, and the other was drawn to the old man as to a father. After a while Jacob’s education in his new art was pronounced complete, not only by the old knife-grinder himself but even by Deborah, critical Deborah, who declared that his progress was astonishing.
“Why,” she said, addressing Old Crow, “when he first took to it, nothing would serve him but he must have mother’s old scissors to point; and he grund and grund till the two points turned their backs t’one on t’other, and looked different ways, as if they was weary of keeping company any longer. And when he sharped yon old carving-knife of grandfather’s, you couldn’t tell arter he’d done which side were the back and which side were the edge. But he’s a rare good hand at it now.”
And, to tell the truth, Deborah greatly prized a new pair of scissors, a present from Jacob, with the keenest of edges, the result of his first thoroughly successful grinding; indeed, it was pretty clear that the young knife-grinder was by no means an object of indifference to her. The public proclaiming of his vocation in the open streets was the most trying thing to Jacob. The very prospect of it almost made him give up. Deborah was very merry at his expense, and told him, that “if he were ashamed, she wouldn’t mind walking in front of the cart, the first day, and doing all the shouting for him.” This difficulty, however, was got over by the old man himself going with Jacob on his first few journeys, and introducing him to his customers; after which he was able to take to his new calling without much trouble. But it was quite plain that Old Crow himself was too much injured by his fall to be able to resume the knife-grinding for many months to come, even if indeed, he were ever able to take to it again. But this did not distress him, for he had learned to trace God’s hand, as the hand of a loving Father, in everything. Though old and grey-headed, he was hearty and cheerful, for his old age was like a healthy winter, “kindly, though frosty;” for “he never did apply hot and rebellious liquors to his blood.” Spite of his accident, these were happy days for him, for he had found in Jacob Poole one thoroughly like-minded. Oh, the blessings of a home, however humble, where Christ is loved, and the drink finds no entrance; for in such a home there are seen no forced spirits, no unnatural excitements! It was a touching sight when the quaint old man, having finished his tea, would bring his rocking-chair nearer to the fire, and bidding Jacob draw up closer on the other side, would tell of God’s goodness to him in times past, and of his hopes of a better and brighter home on the other side of the dark river. Deborah would often make a third, and her mother would join them too at times, and then Jacob would tell of the wonders of the deep, and of the distant colony where he had sojourned. Then the old man would lay aside the tall cap which he wore even in the house, displaying his scattered white hairs, and would open his big Bible with a smile,—
“I always smile when I open the Bible,” he said one day to Jacob, “’cos it’s like a loving letter from a far-off land. I’m not afraid of looking into’t; for, though I light on some awful verses every now and then, I know as they’re not for me. I’m not boasting. It’s all of grace; but still it’s true ‘there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus,’ and I know that through his mercy I am gradely in him.”
Then they would sing a hymn, for all had the Lancashire gift of good ear and voice, after which the old man would sink on his knees and pour out his heart in prayer. Yes, that cottage was indeed a happy home, often the very threshold of heaven; and many a time the half-drunken collier, as he sauntered by, would change the sneer that curled his lip at those strains of heartfelt praise, into the tear that melted out of a smitten and sorrowful heart, a heart that knew something of its own bitterness, for it smote him as he thought of a God despised, a soul perishing, a Bible neglected, a Saviour trampled on, and an earthly home out of which the drink had flooded every real comfort, and from which he could have no well-grounded hope of a passage to a better.