Illustrations of political economy, Volume 4 (of 9)

Chapter IV.

MORE NOVELTY.

At length came September, with its utter dulness in town, and its busy brightness in the country. No parliament, no ministry, no court, with whose proceedings to diversify the daily papers; but instead, a reporting of the progress of certain noble lords and patriotic gentlemen from one country seat to another, with accurate calculations of the quantity of game bagged by each. Now were expresses hurrying to and fro in search of the runaway men in power. Now were ancient ladies proudly leaning on the arms of sons, who were happy in being allowed breathing time to watch the autumn sunsets from the terraces of their stately castles. Now were the young heirs of rank and wealth initiated by playful papas into the mysteries of riding and sham shooting. Many a little lord was now mounted on his pony to adventure forth as far as the park gates, while mamma and sisters waved their handkerchiefs from afar, and careful grooms waited to lead him back safe. Many such a little rogue carried his mimic fowling-piece into the stubble, and learned not to wink or flinch when papa brought down a bird, or coaxed the gamekeeper to lend him a brace or two to carry when they should come in sight of home and the girls. Many a tenant now put himself in the way of a greeting from his landlord, resting on a stile, or pacing his way slowly through a field. Many a state secret, that the public would fain have known, was dismissed for some such freak as snatching at a high hazel twig, or leaping a gate. Many a fair family group of riders was seen threading green lanes, or cantering over downs, or appearing and disappearing in the clumpy drives of a park,—graceful boys, and high-born girls, leading their father in search of some new beauty which it turns out he discovered in like manner, when he was a pleasure-loving youth instead of a statesman. Now, in the golden noon, was the boat seen to unfurl its snowy sail, and glide in rivalship of grace with the swans which diverged on either hand to let the vessel have its way without disturbing their serenity. He who has guided, or may guide, the helm of the state, now condescends to steer a less majestic bark on a calmer element; and instead of the prayers, threats and blessings of an empire, bends his ear to the prattle of his little ones, or to the rustling of a startled deer, bounding from the thicket as the vessel nears the shore. Not now too busy to observe whether rain or sunshine be without, the recreated statesman finds in either case equal pleasure and repose. His lady’s nursery and boudoir, his sons’ classics, his daughters’ music, his library, his billiard table, and withal some peculiar and long relinquished pet pursuit, give him as much pleasure on a rainy day, as the flower-garden, the fish-pond and poultry-yard when the sky is blue overhead. He sighs over his past toils, reminds his spouse of their wedding sojourn at Chamouni, and at intervals quotes Virgil to the lad behind his chair, and whispers Pope to the little lady netting at his elbow. Statesmanship should have pleasures worthy of its toils; and so thought Letitia when her husband first mutely pointed out to her the woods of Weston.

Sweet was the leisure of the first afternoon, which gave promise of what should be done at future intervals of leisure;—intervals not likely to be too frequent to retain their charm. His lordship had brought his business and its apparatus with him; but for this day all was laid aside. Within half an hour after alighting from the carriage, and while dinner was being served up, my lord and lady were in the rosery, observing on what must have been its beauty a few weeks before, and the one pointing out and the other following with eager eyes the tracts among the hanging woods which had to be explored, the points of view which must be visited, one at sunrise, one in the glowing noon, another in the still evening. As soon as dinner was over, they were out again, that Letitia might see the ruins of the old abbey before the sunlight should have departed. Her heart melted within her when she saw the long shadows of the lofty arch extended on the velvet turf, motionless except when a bird took wing from among the ivy, and set its boughs dancing. The rooks sailed in circles above the stately ruin, and the thrush piped from the evergreen covert which shut in the retired nook in which it stood. The sun-dial also marked the silent lapse of time, although there was usually none to lay the lesson to heart.

“This is the place, love,” said lord F——.

“And you would have had me come without you,” said Letitia, after a long pause.

“We have some weeks yet, to be sure, to enjoy it. This is the last spot that looks desolate as winter comes on. No leafless trees, no strewn blossoms! The wall-flowers there on the pinnacle flourish late; and all is green and bright till the snow falls.”

“And after, surely,” said Letitia. “I should like to see icicles glistening on these arches, springing grey from the sheeted snow. I should like to see the ivy sprays bending under their white burden, or shaking it off in a shower of sparkles at the breeze’s bidding. O let us come here at Christmas!”

“If we do, you may chance to see another sight. You will see tracks of small feet in the snow, and catch some little girl, in her red cloak, stealing from the Wishing-Well.”

“The Wishing-Well! O where?”

“It springs from under an old stump behind this wall. Have you any wishes?”

“I will make some for the superstition’s sake.”

And immediately Letitia might be seen unbonneted, kneeling on the consecrated stone, and drinking the draught her husband had filled for her. Thus was she seen, as presently appeared. A voice reached them from one side, praying that her ladyship’s wishes might come to pass, be they what they might, as they must be for good and no harm to the people under her. Letitia sprang up, laughing, and her husband replaced her hat, calling to the well-wisher to show himself. He did so, not in the shape of a hardy labourer, with his farming or gardening tools on his shoulder; nor yet of a picturesque old man bending beneath his faggot. Such might better have beseemed the place: but this was a middle-aged, shrewd-looking little man, whom one would have guessed to be town-bred. He came forward, saying that he had a message for her ladyship from his wife;—my lord knew his wife.

“Not I,” said his lordship. “I did not know you had a wife.”

“May be not, my lord; but you know the woman. She that keeps the grocery shop, as you turn the corner in the village, your lordship remembers.”

“What! Nanny Sweet? So you have taken her to wife since I saw you last.”

“Yes, my lord. She has a very good business, or had before the equality folks set up a store against us. I don’t like equality, not I. But my wife sends word, my lady....”

“You do not like equality!” interrupted Letitia. “If there was equality, you know, you would not need to mind who set up a store, and what came of your wife’s grocery business.—And do not you like this place too,—these woods, and the deer, and the lake?”

White lauded the grandeur and beauty of Weston.

“Well; this place would be as much yours as ours if there was equality. You might fish on the lake, and shoot in the preserves, and....”

“And lie down to sleep in the sun here beside the well,” continued lord F——; “and all without asking anybody’s leave.”

“I thank you kindly, my lord; but I like sleeping in my bed, if I sleep at all, unless it be dozing over my pipe, while Jack is reading the news at the Duke’s Head. The only time I went fishing, I fell into the water; so you’ll not soon find me in a boat again. My wife and I like a chicken now and then, on Sundays; so a share of your poultry-yard would be welcome perhaps; and, as for the deer and game, I leave it to other folks to get out of their warm beds for the sake of it. It would not answer to me to be laid by with the rheumatism for such a cause, you see.”

“But there would be no poaching if there was equality,” said Letitia, laughing. “Cannot game be shot in the daytime?”

“By none but gentlemen, my lady, as I have always heard. However, the equality folks have no more game, as far as I know, than other people. The most they pretend to is to have plenty of butcher’s meat.—What I pretend to, and Nanny too, is to get our bread honestly; and so, my lady, she bade me tell you that she has laid in a new stock, hearing your ladyship was coming, and has lost already by its being September instead of June. Light ginghams for morning wear....”

“I thought your wife was a grocer.”

“Grocer and draper, my lady. If your ladyship should find the mornings chilly, as they will be soon, perhaps you would look at her stuffs;—a very pretty variety of browns, as you will see, my lady. And her tea and sugar is of the best; and as for her snuffs....”

“O, I must make acquaintance with her snuffs, of course. Have you a pinch about you?”

“And what is your occupation now, White?” inquired lord F——.

“The last thing I had to do, my lord, was lining your lordship’s pew at church, and covering the hassocks.”

“And what did your priest say to that?”

“Lord, sir, I cleared scores with the priest long ago; ever since I was employed to white-wash the Baptist chapel.”

“Were you once a Catholic?” inquired Letitia.

“Yes, my lady. There was carving work to do at Sir William’s chapel, and I got a good long job.”

“And were a Catholic while it lasted, and a Baptist after white-washing the meeting-house?”

“To be sure, my lady; I took a part in the week-day meetings after that.”

“Till you were employed to line my pew; and now, I dare say, you are a very good churchman?”

“I hope to be so, my lord. Your lordship may laugh, but I know what manners is. I wouldn’t be so unhandsome as to take work at one place, and attend at another.”

“So your interest has nothing at all to do with it, White; only manners. But I wonder now what you think your religion is worth, if you can change and change again as you have done?”

“Why, my lord, I think religion is a very good thing, as long as it does not come in one’s way: but one must make sacrifices to duty, as all the clergy tell us; and is it not my duty to get my living the best way I can?”

“Well, White; tell your wife I will step down to see her stock, some day soon. I do not at present take snuff; but whenever I do, I will be her customer.”

Thérèse and her mistress kept one another waiting this night. The housekeeper, who was much amused with Thérèse’s broken English and unbroken simplicity, invited her out to a turn in the shrubberies when tea was sent in, and she was sure of not being wanted for an hour or two. When they came in again, they found that their master and mistress had once more wandered forth, tempted by the rising of the clear full moon behind the woods. After sitting nearly an hour in the dressing-room, Thérèse put faith in the housekeeper’s prophecy that her master would stay abroad till after midnight, like a child as he always was, or one that lived on air, the first few days after his coming down from town. Thérèse looked out and longed for another ramble. The dressing-room lamp shed a pearly light through the room; but a golden planet hung over the opposite beechen grove: a small bright fire burned in the grate; but it was less cheering than the bracing evening air: the time-piece ticked drowsily amidst the silence; but it was less soothing than the coming and going of the night-breeze among the elms in the green walk. Thérèse could not resist. Once more she ran out, promising herself that she would be back in ten minutes,—long before her mistress should be ready for her. In an hour, startled by the striking of the village clock, she returned, and found Letitia, half undressed, still gazing from the window.

“Ah, madam!” cried Thérèse, terrified; “I am very, very wrong....”

As she hastened, with trembling hands, to throw off her cloak, and arrange the toilet-table, appealing the while to the moon and other temptations, Letitia, under a sudden impulse, ran and kissed the astonished Thérèse, crying, “O Thérèse, how happy we shall be here!” Thérèse returned the kiss again and again before she stopped to consider what she was about. As soon as Letitia could repress her inclination to laugh, she observed that they seemed all to have set aside common rules to-day, and to have their heads turned alike by coming into the country. After this, Thérèse would be in waiting at the proper hour, and she herself....

“And you, madam ...” said Thérèse, half-smiling. “You will not make me forget that there is one in this country who loves me as some love me at home; but this will redouble my respect, madam.”

“I hope it will, Thérèse; for I need to be reminded now and then.... I was not always lady F——, you know; and a moon-light night makes me forget these things sometimes. We are all equal in reality, except when ignorance, and all that comes of ignorance, separates us from one another; so there may be friendship,—there is friendship between you and me, Thérèse.”

“The knowledge which you have given me, madam, will make this friendship my secret treasure. No one will know it who cannot also be your friend.—But many ladies put confidence in their maids, and tell them such things as I have never heard from you. Mrs. Philips....”

“Mrs. Philips, I suspect, Thérèse, had much more to tell than she ever was told; at least, her secrets were of a kind that will never be known to come from me. Your confessor shall never have to warn you against me,—unless, indeed, it be my heresy. I would not spoil you, my dear; and that is the reason why I keep you so much with me. It would be hard if I did not love you and let you love me. Now go to bed; and when the sun shines, instead of the moon, we must forget all the wild things we have done this first day.”

“I shall never be fit to be a countess,” was her confession to lord F——; “I kissed my maid last night.”

“What, Philips!”

“O no, no. That would be idiotcy. Philips is at Brighton, you know, where lady Frances spoils her by a more pernicious familiarity than mine with Thérèse. But really this girl wins one’s heart as if she had been born one’s younger sister.”

“I dare say she is some countess, or countess’s daughter in disguise; or so some romantic ladies might fancy.”

“Ladies who think that nobility is only hereditary. There is disguised nobility in Thérèse; but her patent is sealed with an impress which there are few to recognize, and it is deposited where not many trouble themselves to look for it.”

“Side by side with yours, love. Happily, your nobility of that better kind needs be disguised no more than the lesser which you have acquired. This was the chief satisfaction I had in giving you the lesser.”

“We will look among the equality folks, as White calls them, for specimens of natural nobility. According to their theory, such always assumes its rank among them, does it not?”

“This is one of the professed objects of their system; but it is not fair to look for its fulfilment in such small societies as they have yet been able to form. Master minds are thinly sown.”

“There needs not equality of outward condition,” observed Letitia, “to make the best minds master minds. Those who, by virtue of a patent of mental nobility, have held sway over the national mind, have been of all ranks.”

“And will so continue to be; for, as long as men are unlike one another, there will be a distinction of ranks, though the distinction may be maintained by a better principle than heritage. Rank and wealth will, I trust, be in time distributed according to natural laws; but degrees of rank and wealth there will always be; and the advocates of a system of equality would greatly promote their cause by a frank recognition of this truth. While all evidence from which a judgment can be formed is before them, and they come to a conclusion in direct opposition to the evidence, I cannot, however much I may respect them on some accounts, think them wise and safe guides of the people. The necessity of inequality of condition may be established thus.”

“But first tell me whether their favourite principle of co-operation necessarily involves equality of condition.”

“They would tell you ‘yes.’ I say ‘no.’ They hold that competition is both the cause and effect of inequality of condition; whereas certain advocates of co-operation in another country hold, (and I think wisely,) that their principle stands a better chance where a gradation of rank and property is allowed. I so far agree with these last as to believe the time to be discernible when co-operation, in a certain sense, shall prevail,—meaning thereby, when all interests shall be harmonized instead of opposed; but that this includes equality of condition, I cannot allow, since varieties of character seem to me to forbid such equality.”

“There must be an inequality of physical and mental powers, at all events.”

“Surely; and therefore an inequality in the produce of individual labour. No one labours, or ever will labour, without a view to the fruits; and those fruits, however appropriated, are property. If a giant produces ten times as much as a dwarf, and each is allowed the same middle portion of the fruits, for his maintenance and enjoyment, is it to be supposed that the giant will trouble himself henceforth to produce more than the dwarf?”

“He will be more likely to seize some of the dwarf’s portion.”

“Certainly; and hence it is clear that the only security of society lies in awarding to all their rights, and enforcing upon all their duties; and what are rights but a man’s exclusive power over his own produce? What are his duties but allowing to others the possession of their produce?”

“You do not think then that the giant and the dwarf would be alike contented with having everything they could want or wish for administered to them in return for a certain portion of their labour. You do not look forward to the lion dandling the kid.”

“I should be afraid the lion would be dandling the kid when he ought to be out in quest of food. If there was no inducement to giants to produce more than dwarfs, there would soon be little to administer to anybody. The consumption of giants would soon have to be provided for by the labour of a community of dwarfs.”

“The giants would foresee this, and then....”

“Instead of working harder for no recompense, they would withdraw,—the mightiest first, and then the next strongest, and so on, till the weakest of the dwarfs would be left to shift for themselves as they best might.”

“And then would come the days of potatoes and wooden trenchers, of which you were speaking one day.—But this is supposing men to have the same passions and desires that they have now; whereas they are to be educated into a better state.”

“With all my heart: but the utmost that education can do is to extend man’s views, to exalt his aims, to strengthen and vivify his powers,—not to change his nature. His nature involves inequality of powers; and this decree of Providence can never be set aside, or its operation neutralized by any decree of man that the fruits of those powers shall be equally divided.”

“Certainly not; for such a decree of man involves injustice. If the giant feels it to be unjust that he must give to others the fruits of his labour, the dwarf may also complain that he enjoys no more than the giant, though he works ten times as hard.”

“The dwarf’s complaint would thus be against Providence, and the giant’s against man; but both show that equality is an arbitrary state, good neither for each nor for all. Nothing but compulsion would retain the giant in it long; and thus it is clear that, where there is liberty, there cannot be equality.”

“What becomes of the old cry of Liberty and Equality?”

“It relates, I imagine, to an equality of rights. It means an open field and fair play to every one. This kind of equality I am doing all I can in my office to procure, by doing away with the protection to some which imposes burdens upon others. By the same principle I am bound to oppose that arbitrary equality which enriches the weak with the fruits of the strongman’s labours.”

“But there is no force used. All who bind themselves to equality do it voluntarily.”

“Certainly. The only applicable force is force of argument, and the opposition I bring is an opposition of reasons. If these should not prevail, a little experience will soon finish the business. I am only sorry that any should be dazzled with a delusive prospect of ease and luxury, when their efforts should be guided in another direction for the relief of their grievous burdens. At a time when every one should be bent on regulating the labour market, providing for the utmost permanent growth of capital, and lessening the burdens of taxation, we cannot spare any from these grand objects to be urging on the increase of capital at the expense of a much greater increase of population, and amusing themselves with visions of what can never be achieved by the means they propose. Man must and will be better served as the world grows older; but it will be by giving the eternal laws of society fair play, and not by attempting to subvert them. I shall be surprised if you hear anything from our neighbours in the village which will not bear the construction I have put upon the system as laid down by its originators.”

“Suppose I make myself popular among them at once by telling them my tale of last night.”

“There is no need, my dear. I trust they do us the justice to believe that our affections graduate according to a truer scale than that of hereditary rank.”

“You have shown that they do by marrying me.”

“All people show it in the most important circumstances of their lives,—in their attachments. Alas for man, if the movements within must correspond with the outward state! Whom then would kings love?”

“And (what is more important) how should the poverty-stricken look up through the ranks above him, and say, with hope in his eye and assurance in his voice, ‘I am a brother?’ How else should the stirring thought be kept alive in him that his rights will not be for ever overlaid, his claims not be for ever incompatible with those of his brethren? Natural affinities are ever acting, even now, in opposition to circumstance. They will in time direct us to the due control of circumstance. Meanwhile, let no class imagine that any other class denies the existence of these affinities, or resists their workings.—I will go and see how they are acting in the village.—Shall I bring you some of Mrs. White’s snuff?”

“Why, thank you, I am not aware of any affinity between a rappee canister and my nostrils. But the old sexton is a snuff-taker. Call upon him by all means, and show him that you understand his likings. He will gratify some of yours, if you find him in a talkative mood.”

A tribe of little children had gathered round Mrs. White’s windows before Letitia and Thérèse arrived at the shop; the reason of which was that the grocery and drapery goods were disposed in a new style of elegance, in honour of her ladyship. Such tempting candies in the one window; such shining pins, such a rainbow box of cottons, such rolls of ribands, stuffs, calicoes, and flannels in the other! The little things could not be persuaded to move off even when White, who was on the watch, bustled about to make a clear path for the lady. There was plenty of bobbing from the girls, and pulling of forelocks from the boys; plenty of elbowing, and pushing, and signing, when it became necessary for somebody to speak in answer to her kind questions; but there was no inclination to make way. They were even rude enough to crowd about the door and peep in, while she was buying snuff and sugar-candy.

Letitia soon found that if White was shrewd in changing his occupation and profession according to circumstances, his wife was no less shrewd in understanding and conducting her own. It would be a wonder, the lady thought, if between them, they did not prove a match for their co-operative neighbours.

“I charge you the lowest, ma’am, the lowest, I assure you; and as low as is fair....”

“O, I have no doubt of it, Mrs. White. I am not going to dispute your prices, I assure you.”

“Indeed, my lady, I don’t go by the rules of the folks over the way; and why? Because they talk of charging only the interest of what their stock costs them; while I must have profit too, and that is interest twice over.”

“The other half is what you live on, Mrs. White, instead of consuming part of their stock, you know.”

“True, madam. Double interest is fair profit, as my father used to say; and he, being a schoolmaster, knew the right of such things.”

“And taught them to you, it seems. But you do not mean to say that all profit is double interest. There is your neighbour, the apothecary, he charges at a much higher rate for his medicines.”

“Aye,” said White. “His is a fine conjuring trade. He shakes up three or four things in a bottle, and what was worth twopence is directly charged two shillings.”

“But consider, John, this is not all profit. Think what he paid for his learning, and what time he gives up to his patients. He has to pay himself for all this out of his drugs.”

“Then why not call some of his gains wages at once, and charge his patients for such, instead of pretending to give his time and labour, and charging his medicines ten times dearer than he need?”

“Many wish to be allowed to do this, I understand,” said Letitia. “They dislike the temptation to cram their patients with medicine, in order to repay the expenses of their education; and they wish it to be understood, that when we pay for a blister or a powder, we pay for medical skill and aid, as well as for Spanish flies or bark. In the same way, nobody supposes that great physicians charge guineas for writing five lines of a prescription, or lawyers for reading over a sheet of parchment.”

“There is the risk in their case,” observed White, “as well as the education. For one that gets rich in their profession, there are many that make but little; and this uncertainty ought to have a large reward.”

“If it was not for such uncertainty, my lady, I could sell some of my goods cheaper. But in a place like this, I can never make sure of selling a new article, as I could in a large town; so, when I venture upon any thing new, I must charge it high to make up for my money being locked up, perhaps, and for the damage of the goods from lying by.”

“Like a hackney coachman in a town,” observed Letitia. “Coach fares are complained of, as if a driver had to charge only for driving from one point to another; but besides the interest of the money his coach and horses cost him, and the expense of repairs, he must charge the wages of the many hours and days that he and his horses are idle on the stand.”

“Well now, ma’am, there is one set of people whose gains make me more angry than almost any thing I can mention; and they are the public players and singers, and such like folks.”

White here came round the counter to his wife’s side, and kicked, and winked, and coughed, till Nanny and Thérèse were amazed, and Letitia laughed. Nanny went on,

“Lord, John, I know more about that sort of people than you think, from there being a company playing in Mr. Jarvis’s barn; and I assure you, ma’am, the satins they pretended to wear were all glazed calico; and the jewels, my lady, were all made of tinfoil. Well; they got, even in a poor place like this, ever so much more than their living could have cost them; and I have heard of some of the better sort,—London actresses and such,—making more in a night than an apothecary in a whole year. Why now, John, what should you know about it, to object in this way? I tell you....”

“I can tell you that it is true,” said Letitia; “and I can tell you the reason. Besides the uncertainty, which is much greater in those professions than in any other, there is a kind of discredit belonging to them; so that it requires a very strong inducement to tempt people of great talent to engage in them. When the time comes,—and I expect it will come,—for public singers and actors to be treated with proper respect, the best of them will not be paid extravagantly, and the inferior ones will not be half-starved, as they are now. There will be no disgrace, and less uncertainty; and payment will therefore be more equal.”

“Then perhaps scavengers will be paid no more than plough-boys; for really, it seems to me wrong that there should be any reproach against scavengers on account of their occupation. You ladyship will excuse my mentioning them before you.”

“To be sure, Mrs. White, since we both think them a respectable class, in as far as they are useful. But they are paid high, as much on account of the disagreeableness of their business as its being ill thought of. Plumbers, and gilders, and miners, and distillers are paid more than shepherds and gardeners, because their business is less healthy and agreeable than those which are carried on in the open air, and in perfect safety.”

“Well, ma’am, I suppose it is all fair and even in the end; but it seems very much like chance; for people do not stop to consider the pleasantness, or the easiness, or the constancy, or the certainty of the business of the person they are paying, or the trust they put in him. They think of no such things when they go to the play, or buy early strawberries.”

“True; there are no such nice distinctions on all occasions; nor are they necessary; but yet there is no chance in the matter. When a duke fees his physician, and his duchess pays her jeweller’s bill, the nobleman does not calculate the expense at which his physician acquired his profession, and the long time he waited for practice; nor does the lady think of the costly stock of her tradesman, and the delicate nature of his workmanship; and yet, these are the circumstances which determine the recompense of each. If it was as easy to be a physician as a plough-boy, there would be as many physicians as plough-boys; and if a diamond necklace required no more capital and skill than a bunch of asparagus, there would be as many jewellers as green-grocers; and then physicians and jewellers would be paid no more than ploughmen and green-grocers.”

“But, my lady, we do not want so many physicians as ploughmen.”

“True; and it is therefore a very happy thing that fewer can be the one than the other. If we leave the rewards of labour to take their natural course, we shall find that there always turns up a larger quantity of the sort we want most, and a lesser quantity of the sort we want least. In profits, I suppose, Mrs. White, you find less variety than in wages. It is of wages, you know, that we have been talking since we began about the apothecary.”

“Why, my lady, there is a disagreeable and an agreeable way of making profits of stock; and there is, I am sure, much more risk in some cases than others.”

“Yes; but there is no consideration of the easiness or the difficulty of selling things, or of the trust put in the seller, as there is in the manufacture of the thing sold. A smuggler, or any other kind of speculator, may make more one month, and lose more the next, than the regular trader pretends to calculate; but, I fancy, if we were able to see into the affairs of all the people in this village, or in any town, we should find less difference in what people make from an equal amount of stock, than from an equal quantity of labour. Your rule, of double interest being fair profit, shows this.”

“Certainly, my lady; or there would not be steady sellers of so many kinds of stock. People would choose the most profitable; which they might do more easily in selling goods than making them. My husband shifts his labour, as I believe he told you, from one employment to another;—(well for him that he can!) And I should shift my little capital from one kind of goods to another, if there was any real and lasting difference in the profits they would bring. But I don’t find that crockery would bring higher profits than grocery, and so I go on being a grocer; and the butcher down the street finds he makes as much of his joints as I of my stuffs, one time with another; and if he did not, I suppose his wife would turn draper.—We all find means to live; though I am sorry to say our profits are lower than they were; and if all my good father said be true, they will be lower still ten years hence.”

“Is that the sexton?” inquired Letitia, seeing an old man pass with a large key in his hand. It was, and John White must be going to see if all was right in his lordship’s pew, as the sexton was evidently about to open the church. Letitia paid for her purchases and followed, as one of her objects was to see the church as well as the sexton. Several neighbours popped into Nanny’s shop before she had cleared her counter, to hear what the lady could have been saying and doing all this while. Nanny looked rather grand and mysterious, chiefly observing upon the comfort of having got somebody into the neighbourhood that one might speak to with some chance of being understood. She was a lady of sense and learning....

“Though she did not go to school to your father, Nanny.”

“If she did not, she went to school to somebody that taught her to respect what my father taught me, neighbour; and so far, there are some folks that might take a lesson from her.”

On this, the wink went round, and the neighbours dropped off, leaving Nanny to muse on what fancy could have possessed her husband to tread on her toes and twitch her gown when she spoke of the strolling players.

The old sexton pursued his way to the church without looking behind him, though made aware by the bustle around that strangers were in his rear. It was not old Joel’s way to alter his pace or his purposes for man or woman, be they who they might. Children only had any power over him; and they only as long as they were unconscious of it.

“Is the sexton one of the equality folks?” asked Letitia of White.

“What, old Joel? Really, madam, there is no saying what he is, further than that he is discontented with everybody’s ways of thinking in turn.—Joel! Joel!” he cried, as the sexton was busied in unlocking the white gate of the churchyard, “my lady asks if you are an equality man.”

The old man muttered something unintelligible while engaged with the lock; but when he looked up and met Letitia’s eye, her countenance,—not its beauty, but the sincerity of its expression,—acted as a charm upon his reserve. They exchanged smiles, and understood one another immediately. Joel did not, like Nanny White, congratulate himself aloud on having met with a congenial companion, but he felt himself happy in having done so.

“Will you please to tell me, madam, what you are here for?”

“To see the church, and to make acquaintance with you, Joel.”

“Because you are curious about my way of thinking?”

“I have no idea what your way of thinking is; but I should certainly like to know, because it is the first thing I try to find out when I make new acquaintances.”

“Then, madam, you and I shall suit. If such is your custom, you will not do as the world for the most part does; you will not first suppose that a man must be wise for having gone through all the chances and changes that can be crowded into a long life, and then think his opinions very wicked or very foolish because they may be such as you did not look for. Why, say I, should I feel and think like you? Have you been first young and then old? Have you been looked upon as a scholar in your prime and an oddity in old age? Have you been on the other half of the world, and have you now only the sunny side of a churchyard for your range? Have you had ten children round your table, and do you now come to eat your solitary crust upon their graves? If not, why should you expect me to think like you? And how will you dare to point at me and pity me because pain and pleasure have sharpened my mind’s sight to pierce further into things than you, who, may be, see only the outsides of them, or, may be, only the mists that cover them? Follow me, madam, unless your limbs are more feeble than an old man’s, as many a fine lady’s are.”

As Joel turned to lead the way, White ventured upon a sly wink to the lady, but presently fell behind, abashed by the steady gravity with which it was met.

The church stood on a mound, and its tower, therefore, though of moderate height, rose conspicuously above the trees which belted the churchyard; and from its parapet might be obtained a glorious view of the surrounding country. Joel did not pause or speak till he had conducted Letitia and Thérèse out upon the leads.—Instead of fixing her attention on the nearer beauties of the park and village which lay stretched beneath, the uplands that rose beyond, and the towers and spires of the great city which might just be discerned on the western horizon, Letitia gazed eagerly towards the south, where a dim haze stained the blue of an autumn sky.

“It is ... is it possible? ... yes, it must be the sea!”

“What is it you see, my lady?”

“I see a faint yellow strip of beach, and an even grey line which must be the ocean. O yes! there is a sparkle, and no other light or motion can be seen so far.”

“Aye,” said Joel, laughing, “that is ever the way those pronounce who have seen little. What think you of volcano fires, my lady, quivering over two hundred miles of a midnight sea? What think you of an avalanche sparkling as it slides from the highest pinnacle of the Andes? There are things, for that matter, that you have seen. What think you of the northern lights, or of our own shining, changing moon? Is she not so far off as yonder sea?”

“I was rash in what I said, Joel. But I wish that mist was away that I might find a sail. Look, look, Thérèse! Is there anything?... Do you see any form come out from amidst the haze?”

Thérèse not having fixed her sight so long, could discern nothing; but her mistress satisfied herself that a vessel was visible, and at length, by dint of attention, could make out first the hull, then the sails, then one, then two more vessels in its train, and at last, a whole fleet.

“Why do you not insist on your servant seeing them too?” asked the old philosopher. “’Twould be just as reasonable as quarrelling, as the people do down below, about what they see with their minds’ eyes. Bring them up here. One will say that yonder haze is nothing more than a blotch upon a bright sky; another won’t trouble himself to look, but believes it is a mountain, or a city, or whatever other folks tell him it is. You, madam, see that within the mist which interests you more than the whole landscape besides; but, depend upon it, you will find plenty of people to assure you that ’tis all fancy that you perceive anything.”—Turning to Thérèse, he said, “Now you believe the lady that she sees a fleet, I dare say?”

“I do. Madame is not apt to see visions, and she ever speaks truth. Do not you believe?”

“I do. What a world of trouble it would save if we had a few people that could discern as far off, and tell what they saw as faithfully about things that will outlast the sea; or even about some notions that will pass away long before yon fleet has all been sunk, or beaten to pieces, or decayed!”

“You mean,” said Letitia, anxious to prove the old man’s scholarship, “what a pity it is that there is nobody to look out and tell us what truths there are holding their course within the mists in which our systems of religion, and politics, and science, and—above all—of society, are shrouded.”

“Yes, madam: but, after all, if there were such, would any believe them? Or, if some did and others did not, would there not follow a quarrel? Believe me, madam, (for I know every man, woman, and child, that lives beneath the roofs we are looking down upon,) there is not a spot beyond the belt of this churchyard,—bright and quiet as all looks, with not a leaf stirring in yonder woods,—there is not a spot where human beings are content with each other,—not a place above the sod where they can dwell side by side in perfect peace.—Some even quarrel about what is to become of themselves and their neighbours when they are laid under the sod. The children, indeed, tell one another such tales as it is pleasant to hear about the pretty place under ground, all cool and green and daisied, where they are to lie and sleep till all are gathered together; but as they grow up and are taken, one to Sir William’s chapel on the hill there, and another to the meeting-house in the village below, and another here....”

Letitia, perceiving that Thérèse began to look alarmed about what might be coming, interrupted Joel with the remark that it would be surprising if there were not difference of opinion on a subject so remote from human ken as the modes of future being. It was far more desirable that there should be agreement as to what should be done above ground to make life peaceful and happy; the most to be enjoyed in itself, and the fittest possible preparation for a higher and better.

“There is full as much quarrelling about this as about the other matter,” said old Joel. “There is your own mansion, madam. There, if I am rightly told, sits lord F——, sighing over the distresses of thousands, and finding fault with the management of those that have held his office before him. In yonder new farm lives a man who is annoyed by the complaints of his neighbours on account of his having undertaken the tillage of some inferior lands, owing to which, the profits of their several occupations must fall. In the old abbey farm below, there is discontent at rents being raised by the same means. In our village shop, there is jealousy of the neighbouring co-operatives; and these co-operatives themselves, congratulating one another as they do on having found out the road to prosperity, shake their heads in a very melancholy way over the impiety of holding lands, and the injustice of rewarding labour in such a faulty manner as by paying coin. There are much worse things than these. There is life lost in smuggling contests on the coast you are looking at; and life wasted and worn in ill-paid labour in the rich fields below; and life embittered by hunger and cold in yonder hovels where the jolly hunt is now sweeping by. Everybody sees all this, and everybody boasts that he could cure it. All set about it in different ways, and nothing is done.”

“I would scarcely say that nothing is done,” said Letitia. “Though labour-notes may not prove so good a circulating medium as gold and silver, it is something done for any body of men to have become practically convinced that it is labour which gives value to what we would exchange. Though it is not at all likely that property in land will be given up because the Jews, peculiar in all their institutions, held theirs under a peculiar tenure, it is something gained that common attention is turned upon the tendency of our present system of land-holding, that so the causes of the increase of this species of property may be discovered in time to remove the impediments to a just distribution. Depend upon it, something is gained by these divisions of opinion; and the more various they become, the nearer we are to a better plan of society. The more quickly opponents demolish the hinderances set up by one another, the sooner will the natural laws of distribution be left free to work.”

“Why should they not do the thing more quickly still, madam, by watching the natural course of things? There might be an old man found in every village able to tell the changes that have come to pass since his boyhood in the value of the property, and the prosperity of the people around him, and wise enough to separate what belongs to the matter from what does not. I, for my part, can prove that our people here would not have been richer if they had paid one another in labour-notes or goods, instead of coin; and that if all the people within five miles round had made an agreement fifty years ago to have everything in common, there would now have been less wealth within these bounds, and far more people to consume it,—though we have too many already.”

“Point out to me, Joel, any spot within sight where you have watched the operation of the natural laws of distribution, of which we hear so much.”

“Alas! madam, there is no such spot in this kingdom. If there were, there would be abundance and content everywhere, instead of the differences we have been talking of. What is the first of these laws? That all labour should be free and voluntary.—Well; our people are not slaves, it is true; but can labour be called voluntary as to its amount, when a man must work sixteen hours a day to get just enough to keep him from starving?”

“This comes of there being more labour than food; and this therefore cannot be remedied by equalization of property, since the rich man consumes little more food than the poor man. It can be remedied only by bringing in more corn, or by sending out a portion of our surplus labour from among us.”

“True. Well; the second law is that all the fruits of labour should be secured to the producer. This is not done; for taxation swallows up a grievous portion of what is produced.”

“But the labourer chooses to exchange part of the fruits of his labour for the sake of the protection of a government.”

“The third law,” interrupted Joel, “is that all exchanges of these fruits ought to be free and voluntary. Let our labourers give something in exchange for social protection, and welcome; but never tell me that they would willingly give as much as is now required from them in taxes, unless food was allowed so to abound as to afford a better recompense to their toil. While government checks the supply of food, the labourer cannot think the wealth he creates naturally distributed between the government and himself.”

“The co-operatives propose, I believe, to go on tilling more and more land as more food is wanted, and to give a sufficiency of its produce to every labourer.”

“Aye, madam, and many besides the co-operatives; but it would puzzle the wisest man among them to say where the sufficiency is to come from, after a time; the return from land being less and less as time passes on. Take the worst soil at present tilled....”

“Or a better soil, subtracting the rent; for the return from all land is equal when the rent is deducted.”

“Very true, madam. The produce is to be shared between the cultivator and his labourers, rent having nothing to do with the profits of the one or the wages of the other,—being the consequence entirely of the different qualities of the land. Well; let this produce be divided into wages and profits in what proportion you will, both decline as numbers increase and more food is wanted.”

“How is it then that farmers’ labourers have many things in their possession that farmers’ labourers used not to have? More shoes and stockings, and cloth coats, and other manufactured articles?”

“Because these things are more easily made, and cost less. A labourer may now have a pair of shoes for half as much corn, we will say, as he must have given for them some years ago. The same is the case with the farmer who employs him; so, though each may receive double the quantity of certain goods that they did some years ago, it does not follow that the rate of profits and wages is increased. If you reckoned the labourer’s gains in shoes, you might say that his wages are doubled; but if you reckon them in relation to the farmers’ profits, you may find them at the same time lowered; or that both wages and profits have in one sense increased; in another not. This blinds many people to the fact that wages and profits are continually declining.”

“Of course, if land produces less and less, there must be a smaller produce to divide between the capitalist and his labourers; and on the whole, they must share the decline pretty equally; since the farmer would not farm unless he could make some profit, and the labourers would not labour but for subsistence. But I am afraid this decline pulls down the profits of manufactures too; for farmers would turn manufacturers if they could make higher profits thereby; and then there would be a new demand for corn; the price would rise; farmers would return to farming, and would take in new land, the diminished produce of which would lower profits again.”

“Yes, madam: this is the way that agricultural profits determine all profits; and that all are perpetually sinking. You see labour becomes dearer when corn is; that is, the labourer must have a certain quantity of corn in return for his labour, be its price what it may; and these higher wages lessen profits again, without any advantage to the labourer.”

“Well, but the corn the farmer retains is higher in price.”

“But less in quantity, my lady; and he has the prospect of employing dearer labour for a less return.”

“It seems, then, as if wages determined profits, instead of profits determining wages. But I suppose it comes to the same thing where there are only two shares to depend on each other.”

“There are greater changes, madam, in the supply of labour than in the manner of using it; and while there are multitudes of eager, hungry labourers, they will take care that the profits of stock shall not commonly rise higher than just to make it answer to the capitalist to carry on his business.”

“But do these things actually take place? Do farmers turn manufacturers, and turn back again into farmers? and have you known any cases of their profits falling?”

“I am as sure of it, my lady, as the co-operatives themselves, whose theme it constantly is. As for farmers changing,—you must remember that almost all capitalists use borrowed capital, and that this capital floats about continually, and is taken in where it is most wanted: so that capital may be largely invested in one concern at one time, and another at another, without much visible change in the occupations of capitalists. As for the other matter,—I know a manufacturer in yon city, and the farmer in the abbey farm to have each employed ten men at 25l. wages per annum, the highest they could afford to give, they said, since they had now to pay 250l. instead of 200l., as formerly. A new man came and took new land of the old farmer’s landlord; and he had to employ eleven men to raise the same produce as the abbey farm yielded, and the price of corn rose. When the old farmer’s lease expired, he was charged 25l. more rent to make him equal with the new farmer.”

“So they paid 275l.,—one for wages only, and the other for wages and the additional rent; while the manufacturer paid only 250l.”

“Yes; but it was made up to them by the increased price of their produce; so the profits of all were still equal. When labour should become dearer in consequence of this rise of price, the profits of all three would fall together.”

“And the labourer would not be better off, after all, Joel: only the land-owner, whose rent is incessantly rising. All this is exactly what the co-operatives are complaining of, is it not?”

“Yes, madam. But how would co-operation mend the matter? However the total produce is divided, it still goes on lessening, while numbers increase. This is the point, my lady. Do away as you will with the very names of rent, profits, and wages,—throw all together in a lump into a public treasury,—and there will still be less and less return to capital, and more and more consumers to divide it. Co-operation, equalization, and all those things, cannot make all lands equally fertile, they cannot make capital grow as numbers grow; and unless they could do these things, they can make no permanent provision for unlimited numbers; they cannot prevent the decline of profits, whether those profits are taken by individuals, or thrown into the common stock.”

“But how do you answer these co-operatives, Joel, when their complaints of the distresses of our peasantry are undeniably true?”

“I answer by agreeing with them so far. Who can help it, for that matter? Where is the town in this wide kingdom where hunger does not stalk ferociously through the streets, and howl in the dark alleys? Where is the village where want does not wet the mother’s pillow with tears, and open untimely graves for the gentle and the manly? No, no! I have seen too much to deny what so many are suffering: but this only makes me the more anxious that false means of relief should not be tried. When I hear some crying out for this park of yours, my lady, to be cut up into corn-fields and potato-gardens, or for cultivation to be carried to the tops of yonder hills, or for all property to be held in common, I see that all this would only lead to tenfold misery, and I cry,—but nobody listens to an old man,—get corn whence you can get it cheapest;—send away as many of your people as you do not want to where they are wanted;—and take care so to manage matters as that you may never be overburdened with numbers again.—Often as I have said this, madam, I never before said it with so much hope of being attended to. My lord can speak so as to be heard from one end of the empire to the other, and....”

“And he likes to hear whatever is said from one end of the kingdom to the other on these matters, Joel. He would fain have a wise old man out of every town and village, as you say, to relate the changes he has seen from boyhood till now. You must come one day soon, when lord F—— is at leisure, and tell us more of what you have seen at home and abroad.”

As they descended into the church, John White was seen standing at the entrance to the gallery in a state of great impatience. He had been kicking his heels, tapping the door-posts with his rule, and amusing himself in sundry such ways for half an hour, while waiting for the party, and now hastened forward to do the honours of her pew to lady F——, pointing out the comforts and elegancies of fire-place, cushioned chairs, curtain, &c.

“Is this our seat?” said Letitia. “I do not like it at all.”

White stared in amazement. Thérèse was too busy remarking the bareness of a Protestant church to take notice of what was going on.

“It is a small, inconvenient church,” added Letitia, “and by no means made the most of. Where do the school children sit?—What! down in that narrow corner? This gallery is the proper place for them. After all your trouble, White, we must have another arrangement.”

“And where will your ladyship have all these things shifted?”

“Nowhere,” replied she, smiling. “If a fire-place is wanted here at all, it is for the half-clad, and not for those who can wrap themselves in furs; and this show of damask furniture does not beseem the place. I will speak to lord F—— about a pew for us next that of the curate’s family, and fitted up in the same way.”

“With matting underfoot, my lady, and dark green cushions, and below stairs too? Well to be sure! But your ladyship will have a curtain hung round?”

“I see no use in it. Lord F—— does not sleep at church, or wish to be supposed present when he is not.”

“And the earl, and lady Frances,” said Joel, in a whisper. “What will they think, my lady?”

“They will, as our guests, be satisfied with our accommodations, Joel. And now show me down, that I may go and arrange this with lord F——, that our pew may be ready by Sunday.”

“The old family monuments, my lady.”

“I will wait to see those till lord F—— is with me. We will call for you, the first morning he is at liberty. Meanwhile, there is much to study in the churchyard. We shall meet there sometimes, Joel.”

The lady and the old sexton did often meet there. Sometimes she went, sketch-book in hand, to sit in the porch or on the tombs; and then old Joel kept on the watch, just within sight, in hopes of being beckoned and invited to a conversation. At other times he would be there first in the performance of his duty; and the lady, warned by the passing bell, would come down and watch the process of grave-digging, gathering from him many a tale of joy and sorrow; many a touching notice of repented sin; many an animating narrative of struggling virtue. Severe as old Joel was on the follies of the present times, no one could review the past more tenderly. It was soon perceived, however, that he became less reserved in his conduct, and less severe in his judgments towards the neighbours, as his friendship with lady F—— ripened. By the time he got to call her “my dear,” he had grown so familiar with one and another as to express his admiration of her. It was a pretty sight, he observed, to see her out riding with a train of noble guests about her, and a pleasant thing to hear that she was the gayest and fairest at all the lordly festivals in the country round; but it did an old man’s heart good to have her come and watch the opening of graves, in which she never forgot that the young and graceful are often laid before the old and weary. She ever kept herself in mind of this, by coming as she did, to mourn at every funeral. It was not idle curiosity, as some people might think. There was her face to read her thoughts in; and where were thoughts ever written plainer? Let the train behind the coffin be as long as it might, there was not a face more serious, there were not any tears more ready than hers. The very children that used to be sporting upon the graves at such times, had learned to be quiet without her even holding up her finger. Who should dig his grave, the old man did not know; but he prayed his hour might come when the lady should be at the hall. She would see him laid under the sod, he was sure; and perhaps, at the moment, some things might come into her mind that they had said together at times when things are said that are worth remembering.