Chapter Three.
“The New School.”
When the family had occupied Park House about four months, a great deal of curiosity and excitement was felt by the inhabitants of Bridgepath, the little hamlet of five hundred persons in the rear of Riverton Park, in consequence of sundry cart-loads of bricks, stone, and lime being deposited on a field which was situated a few yards from the principal beer-shop. The colonel was going to build, it seemed,—but what? Possibly a full-grown public-house. Well, that would be a very questionable improvement. Was it to be a school, or a reading-room?
There was a school already, held in the parlour of the blacksmith’s cottage, where a master attended on week-days, weather permitting, and imparted as much of the three R’s as the children, whose parents thought it worth while to send them, could be induced to acquire under the pressure of a moderate amount of persuasion and an immoderate amount of castigation.
The master came in a pony-cart from Franchope, and returned in the same the moment the afternoon school broke up, so that his scholars had ample opportunity, when he was fairly gone, to settle any little disputes which might have arisen during school hours by vigorous fights on the open green, the combatants being usually encouraged to prolong their encounters to the utmost by the cheers of the men who gathered round them out of the neighbouring beer-shops.
As for religious instruction, the master, it is true, made his scholars read a portion of the Scriptures twice a week, and learn a few verses. But they would have been almost better without this; for the hard, matter-of-fact way in which he dealt with the Holy Book and its teachings would make the children rather hate than love their Bible lesson.
And what was done for the improvement, mental or spiritual, of the grown-up people? Nothing. Neither church nor chapel existed in the place. A few old and middle-aged people walked occasionally to the nearest place of worship, some two miles off; but nine-tenths of the villagers went nowhere on a Sunday—that is to say, nowhere where they could hear anything to do them good, though they were ready enough to leave their homes on the Sabbath to congregate where they could drink and game together, and sing profane and immoral songs.
So Bridgepath was rightly called “a lost place;” and indeed it had been “lost” for so many years, that there seemed scarcely the remotest prospect of its being “found” by any one disposed to do it good. However, even in this dark spot there was a corner from which there shone a little flickering light. John Price and his family tenanted a tolerably roomy cottage at the entrance to the village, close to the horse-pond. The poor man had seen better days, having acted as steward to the young squire from the time he came into the property till he disappeared with his infant son and an old nurse who had lived for nearly two generations on the Riverton estate. Poor John had served the squire’s father also as steward, and loved the young master as if he had been his own child; and it was known that, when ruin fell on the young man, the poor steward was dragged down also to poverty, having been somehow or other involved in his employer’s ruin. But never did John Price utter a word that would throw light on this subject to anyone outside his own family. All he would let people know was, that the squire had left him his cottage rent-free for his life,—which was, indeed, all that the master had to leave his faithful servant.