As we came to this verse, I chanced to look up from my book towards the swarm of black-coated pensioners: and amongst them—amongst them—sate Thomas Newcome.
His dear old head was bent down over his prayer-book—there was no mistaking him. He wore the black gown of the pensioners of the Hospital of Grey Friars. His order of the Bath was on his breast. He stood there amongst the poor brethren, uttering the responses to the psalm. The steps of this good man had been ordered him hither by Heaven’s decree: to this almshouse! Here it was ordained that a life all love, and kindness, and honour, should end! I heard no more of prayers, and psalms, and sermon, after that. How dared I to be in a place of mark, and he, he yonder among the poor? Oh, pardon, you noble soul! I ask forgiveness of you for being of a world that has so treated you—you my better, you the honest, and gentle, and good! I thought the service would never end, or the organist’s voluntaries, or the preacher’s homily.
The organ played us out of chapel at length, and I waited in the ante-chapel until the pensioners took their turn to quit it. My dear, dear old friend! I ran to him with a warmth and eagerness of recognition which no doubt showed themselves in my face and accents, as my heart was moved at the sight of him. His own face flushed up when he saw me, and his hand shook in mine. “I have found a home, Arthur,” said he. “Don’t you remember before I went to India, when we came to see the old Grey Friars, and visited Captain Scarsdale in his room?—a poor brother like me—an old Peninsular man. Scarsdale is gone now, sir, and is where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest; and I thought then, when we saw him,—here would be a place for an old fellow when his career was over, to hang his sword up; to humble his soul, and to wait thankfully for the end. Arthur. My good friend, Lord H., who is a Cistercian like ourselves, and has just been appointed a governor, gave me his first nomination. Don’t be agitated, Arthur my boy, I am very happy. I have good quarters, good food, good light and fire, and good friends; blessed be God! my dear kind young friend—my boy’s friend; you have always been so, sir; and I take it uncommonly kind of you, and I thank God for you, sir. Why, sir, I am as happy as the day is long.” He uttered words to this effect as he walked through the courts of the building towards his room, which in truth I found neat and comfortable, with a brisk fire crackling on the hearth; a little tea-table laid out, a Bible and spectacles by the side of it, and over the mantelpiece a drawing of his grandson by Clive.
“You may come and see me here, sir, whenever you like, and so may your dear wife and little ones, tell Laura, with my love;—but you must not stay now. You must go back to your dinner.” In vain I pleaded that I had no stomach for it. He gave me a look, which seemed to say he desired to be alone, and I had to respect that order and leave him.
Of course I came to him on the very next day; though not with my wife and children, who were in truth absent in the country at Rosebury, where they were to pass the Christmas holidays; and where, this school-dinner over, I was to join them. On my second visit to Grey Friars my good friend entered more at length into the reasons why he had assumed the Poor Brother’s gown; and I cannot say but that I acquiesced in his reasons, and admired that noble humility and contentedness of which he gave me an example.
“That which had caused him most grief and pain,” he said, “in the issue of that unfortunate bank, was the thought that poor friends of his had been induced by his representations to invest their little capital in that speculation. Good Miss Honeyman, for instance, meaning no harm, and in all respects a most honest and kindly-disposed old lady, had nevertheless alluded more than once to the fact that her money had been thrown away; and these allusions, sir, made her hospitality somewhat hard to bear,” said the Colonel. “At home—at poor Clivey’s, I mean—it was even worse,” he continued; “Mrs. Mackenzie for months past, by her complaints, and—and her conduct, has made my son and me so miserable—that flight before her, and into any refuge, was the best course. She too does not mean ill, Pen. Do not waste any of your oaths upon that poor woman,” he added, holding up his finger, and smiling sadly. “She thinks I deceived her, though Heaven knows it was myself I deceived. She has great influence over Rosa. Very few persons can resist that violent and headstrong woman, sir. I could not bear her reproaches, or my poor sick daughter, whom her mother leads almost entirely now, and it was with all this grief on my mind, that, as I was walking one day upon Brighton cliff, I met my schoolfellow, my Lord H——, who has ever been a good friend of mine—and who told me how he had just been appointed a governor of Grey Friars. He asked me to dine with him on the next day, and would take no refusal. He knew of my pecuniary misfortunes, of course—and showed himself most noble and liberal in his offers of help. I was very much touched by his goodness, Pen,—and made a clean breast of it to his lordship; who at first would not hear of my coming to this place—and offered me out of the purse of an old brother-schoolfellow and an old brother soldier as much—as much as should last me my time. Wasn’t it noble of him, Arthur? God bless him! There are good men in the world, sir, there are true friends, as I have found in these later days. Do you know, sir”—here the old man’s eyes twinkled,—“that Fred Bayham fixed up that bookcase yonder—and brought me my little boy’s picture to hang up? Boy and Clive will come and see me soon.”
“Do you mean they do not come?” I cried.
“They don’t know I am here, sir,” said the Colonel, with a sweet, kind smile. “They think I am visiting his lordship in Scotland. Ah! they are good people! When we had had a talk downstairs over our bottle of claret—where my old commander-in-chief would not hear of my plan—we went upstairs to her ladyship, who saw that her husband was disturbed, and asked the reason. I dare say it was the good claret that made me speak, sir; for I told her that I and her husband had had a dispute and that I would take her ladyship for umpire. And then I told her the story over, that I had paid away every rupee to the creditors, and mortgaged my pensions and retiring allowances for the same end, that I was a burden upon Clivey, who had enough, poor boy, to keep his own family, and his wife’s mother, whom my imprudence had impoverished,—that here was an honourable asylum which my friend could procure for me, and was not that better than to drain his purse? She was very much moved, sir—she is a very kind lady, though she passed for being very proud and haughty in India—so wrongly are people judged. And Lord H. said, in his rough way, ‘that, by Jove, if Tom Newcome took a thing into his obstinate old head no one could drive it out.’ And so,” said the Colonel, with his sad smile, “I had my own way. Lady H. was good enough to come and see me the very next day—and do you know, Pen, she invited me to go and live with them for the rest of my life—made me the most generous, the most delicate offers. But I knew I was right, and held my own. I am too old to work, Arthur: and better here whilst I am to stay, than elsewhere. Look! all this furniture came from H. House—and that wardrobe is full of linen, which she sent me. She has been twice to see me, and every officer in this hospital is as courteous to me as if I had my fine house.”
I thought of the psalm we had heard on the previous evening, and turned to it in the opened Bible, and pointed to the verse, “Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the Lord upholdeth him.” Thomas Newcome seeing my occupation, laid a kind, trembling hand on my shoulder; and then, putting on his glasses, with a smile bent over the volume. And who that saw him then, and knew him and loved him as I did—who would not have humbled his own heart, and breathed his inward prayer, confessing and adoring the Divine Will, which ordains these trials, these triumphs, these humiliations, these blest griefs, this crowning Love?
I had the happiness of bringing Clive and his little boy to Thomas Newcome that evening; and heard the child’s cry of recognition and surprise, and the old man calling the boy’s name, as I closed the door upon that meeting; and by the night’s mail I went down to Newcome, to the friends with whom my own family was already staying.