OCCUPATIONS AT BRANKLY FARM

The farmer led our two boys through a deliciously scented pine-wood at the rear of his house, to a valley which seemed to extend and widen out into a multitude of lesser valleys and clumps of woodland, where lakelets and rivulets and waterfalls glittered in the afternoon sun like shields and bands of burnished silver.

Taking a ball of twine from one of his capacious pockets, he gave it to Bobby along with a small pocket-book.

“Have you got clasp-knives?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” said both boys, at once producing instruments which were very much the worse for wear.

“Very well, now, here is the work I want you to do for me this afternoon.  D’you see the creek down in the hollow yonder ­about half a mile off?”

“Yes, yes, sir.”

“Well, go down there and cut two sticks about ten feet long each; tie strings to the small ends of them; fix hooks that you’ll find in that pocket-book to the lines.  The creek below the fall is swarming with fish; you’ll find grasshoppers and worms enough for bait if you choose to look for ’em.  Go, and see what you can do.”

A reminiscence of ancient times induced Bobby Frog to say “Walke-e-r!” to himself, but he had too much wisdom to say it aloud.  He did, however, venture modestly to remark ­

“I knows nothink about fishin’, sir.  Never cotched so much as a eel in ­”

“When I give you orders, obey them!” interrupted the farmer, in a tone and with a look that sent Bobby and Tim to the right-about double-quick.  They did not even venture to look back until they reached the pool pointed out, and when they did look back Mr Merryboy had disappeared.

“Vell, I say,” began Bobby, but Tim interrupted him with, “Now, Bob, you must git off that ‘abit you’ve got o’ puttin’ v’s for double-u’s.  Wasn’t we told by the genl’m’n that gave us a partin’ had-dress that we’d never git on in the noo world if we didn’t mind our p’s and q’s?  An’ here you are as regardless of your v’s as if they’d no connection wi’ the alphabet.”

“Pretty cove you are, to find fault wi’ me,” retorted Bob, “w’en you’re far wuss wi’ your haitches ­a-droppin’ of ’em w’en you shouldn’t ought to, an’ stickin’ of ’em in where you oughtn’t should to.  Go along an’ cut your stick, as master told you.”

The sticks were cut, pieces of string were measured off, and hooks attached thereto.  Then grasshoppers were caught, impaled, and dropped into a pool.  The immediate result was almost electrifying to lads who had never caught even a minnow before.  Bobby’s hook had barely sunk when it was seized and run away with so forcibly as to draw a tremendous “Hi! hallo!! ho!!!  I’ve got ’im!!!” from the fisher.

“Hoy! hurroo!!” responded Tim, “so’ve I!!!”

Both boys, blazing with excitement, held on.

The fish, bursting, apparently, with even greater excitement, rushed off.

“He’ll smash my stick!” cried Bob.

“The twine’s sure to go!” cried Tim.  “Hold o-o-on!”

This command was addressed to his fish, which leaped high out of the pool and went wriggling back with a heavy splash.  It did not obey the order, but the hook did, which came to the same thing.

“A ten-pounder if he’s a’ ounce,” said Tim.

“You tell that to the horse ­hi ho! stop that, will you?”

But Bobby’s fish was what himself used to be ­troublesome to deal with.  It would not “stop that.”

It kept darting from side to side and leaping out of the water until, in one of its bursts, it got entangled with Tim’s fish, and the boys were obliged to haul them both ashore together.

“Splendid!” exclaimed Bobby, as they unhooked two fine trout and laid them on a place of safety; “At ’em again!”

At them they went, and soon had two more fish, but the disturbance created by these had the effect of frightening the others.  At all events, at their third effort their patience was severely tried, for nothing came to their hooks to reward the intense gaze and the nervous readiness to act which marked each boy during the next half-hour or so.

At the end of that time there came a change in their favour, for little Martha Mild appeared on the scene.  She had been sent, she said, to work with them.

“To play with us, you mean,” suggested Tim.

“No, father said work,” the child returned simply.

“It’s jolly work, then!  But I say, old ’ooman, d’you call Mr Merryboy father?” asked Bob in surprise.

“Yes, I’ve called him father ever since I came.”

“An’ who’s your real father?”

“I have none.  Never had one.”

“An’ your mother?”

“Never had a mother either.”

“Well, you air a curiosity.”

“Hallo!  Bob, don’t forget your purliteness,” said Tim.  “Come, Mumpy; father calls you Mumpy, doesn’t he?”

“Yes.”

“Then so will I. Well, Mumpy, as I was goin’ to say, you may come an’ work with my rod if you like, an’ we’ll make a game of it.  We’ll play at work.  Let me see where shall we be?”

“In the garden of Eden,” suggested Bob.

“The very thing,” said Tim; “I’ll be Adam an’ you’ll be Eve, Mumpy.”

“Very well,” said Martha with ready assent.

She would have assented quite as readily to have personated Jezebel or the Witch of Endor.

“And I’ll be Cain,” said Bobby, moving his line in a manner that was meant to be persuasive.

“Oh!” said Martha, with much diffidence, “Cain was wicked, wasn’t he?”

“Well, my dear Eve,” said Tim, “Bobby Frog is wicked enough for half-a-dozen Cains.  In fact, you can’t cane him enough to pay him off for all his wickedness.”

“Bah! go to bed,” said Cain, still intent on his line, which seemed to quiver as if with a nibble.

As for Eve, being as innocent of pun-appreciation as her great original probably was, she looked at the two boys in pleased gravity.

“Hi!  Cain’s got another bite,” cried Adam, while Eve went into a state of gentle excitement, and fluttered near with an evidently strong desire to help in some way.

“Hallo! got ’im again!” shouted Tim, as his rod bent to the water with jerky violence; “out o’ the way, Eve, else you’ll get shoved into Gihon.”

“Euphrates, you stoopid!” said Cain, turning his Beehive training to account.  Having lost his fish, you see, he could afford to be critical while he fixed on another bait.

But Tim cared not for rivers or names just then, having hooked a “real wopper,” which gave him some trouble to land.  When landed, it proved to be the finest fish of the lot, much to Eve’s satisfaction, who sat down to watch the process when Adam renewed the bait.

Now, Bobby Frog, not having as yet been quite reformed, and, perhaps, having imbibed some of the spirit of his celebrated prototype with his name, felt a strong impulse to give Tim a gentle push behind.  For Tim sat in an irresistibly tempting position on the bank, with his little boots overhanging the dark pool from which the fish had been dragged.

“Tim,” said Bob.

“Adam, if you please ­or call me father, if you prefer it!”

“Well, then, father, since I haven’t got an Abel to kill, I’m only too ’appy to have a Adam to souse.”

Saying which, he gave him a sufficient impulse to send him off!

Eve gave vent to a treble shriek, on beholding her husband struggling in the water, and Cain himself felt somewhat alarmed at what he had done.  He quickly extended the butt of his rod to his father, and dragged him safe to land, to poor Eve’s inexpressible relief.

“What d’ee mean by that, Bob?” demanded Tim fiercely, as he sprang towards his companion.

“Cain, if you please ­or call me son, if you prefers it,” cried Bob, as he ran out of his friend’s way; “but don’t be waxy, father Adam, with your own darlin’ boy.  I couldn’t ‘elp it.  You’d ha’ done just the same to me if you’d had the chance.  Come, shake ’ands on it.”

Tim Lumpy was not the boy to cherish bad feeling.  He grinned in a ghastly manner, and shook the extended hand.

“I forgive you, Cain, but please go an’ look for Abel an’ pitch into him w’en next you git into that state o’ mind, for it’s agin common-sense, as well as history, to pitch into your old father so.”  Saying which, Tim went off to wring out his dripping garments, after which the fishing was resumed.

“Wot a remarkable difference,” said Bobby, breaking a rather long silence of expectancy, as he glanced round on the splendid landscape which was all aglow with the descending sun, “’tween these ’ere diggin’s an’ Commercial Road, or George Yard, or Ratcliff ’Ighway.  Ain’t it, Tim?”

Before Tim could reply, Mr Merryboy came forward.

“Capital!” he exclaimed, on catching sight of the fish; “well done, lads, well done.  We shall have a glorious supper to-night.  Now, Mumpy, you run home and tell mother to have the big frying-pan ready.  She’ll want your help.  Ha!” he added, turning to the boys, as Martha ran off with her wonted alacrity, “I thought you’d soon teach yourselves how to catch fish.  It’s not difficult here.  And what do you think of Martha, my boys?”

“She’s a trump!” said Bobby, with decision.

“Fust rate!” said Tim, bestowing his highest conception of praise.

“Quite true, lads; though why you should say `fust’ instead of first-rate, Tim, is more than I can understand.  However, you’ll get cured of such-like queer pronunciations in course of time.  Now, I want you to look on little Mumpy as your sister, and she’s a good deal of your sister too in reality, for she came out of that same great nest of good and bad, rich and poor ­London.  Has she told you anything about herself yet?”

“Nothin’, sir,” answered Bob, “’cept that when we axed ­asked, I mean ­I ax ­ask your parding ­she said she’d neither father nor mother.”

“Ah! poor thing; that’s too true.  Come, pick up your fish, and I’ll tell you about her as we go along.”

The boys strung their fish on a couple of branches, and followed their new master home.

“Martha came to us only last year,” said the farmer.  “She’s a little older than she looks, having been somewhat stunted in her growth, by bad treatment, I suppose, and starvation and cold in her infancy.  No one knows who was her father or mother.  She was `found’ in the streets one day, when about three years of age, by a man who took her home, and made use of her by sending her to sell matches in public-houses.  Being small, very intelligent for her years, and attractively modest, she succeeded, I suppose, in her sales, and I doubt not the man would have continued to keep her, if he had not been taken ill and carried to hospital, where he died.  Of course the man’s lodging was given up the day he left it.  As the man had been a misanthrope ­that’s a hater of everybody, lads ­nobody cared anything about him, or made inquiry after him.  The consequence was, that poor Martha was forgotten, strayed away into the streets, and got lost a second time.  She was picked up this time by a widow lady in very reduced circumstances, who questioned her closely; but all that the poor little creature knew was that she didn’t know where her home was, that she had no father or mother, and that her name was Martha.

“The widow took her home, made inquiries about her parentage in vain, and then adopted and began to train her, which accounts for her having so little of that slang and knowledge of London low life that you have so much of, you rascals!  The lady gave the child the pet surname of Mild, for it was so descriptive of her character.  But poor Martha was not destined to have this mother very long.  After a few years she died, leaving not a sixpence or a rag behind her worth having.  Thus little Mumpy was thrown a third time on the world, but God found a protector for her in a friend of the widow, who sent her to the Refuge ­the Beehive as you call it ­which has been such a blessing to you, my lads, and to so many like you, and along with her the 10 pounds required to pay her passage and outfit to Canada.  They kept her for some time and trained her, and then, knowing that I wanted a little lass here, they sent her to me, for which I thank God, for she’s a dear little child.”

The tone in which the last sentence was uttered told more than any words could have conveyed the feelings of the bluff farmer towards the little gem that had been dug out of the London mines and thus given to him.

Reader, they are prolific mines, those East-end mines of London!  If you doubt it, go, hear and see for yourself.  Perhaps it were better advice to say, go and dig, or help the miners!

Need it be said that our waifs and strays grew and flourished in that rich Canadian soil?  It need not!  One of the most curious consequences of the new connection was the powerful affection that sprang up between Bobby Frog and Mrs Merryboy, senior.  It seemed as if that jovial old lady and our London waif had fallen in love with each other at first sight.  Perhaps the fact that the lady was intensely appreciative of fun, and the young gentleman wonderfully full of the same, had something to do with it.  Whatever the cause, these two were constantly flirting with each other, and Bob often took the old lady out for little rambles in the wood behind the farm.

There was a particular spot in the woods, near a waterfall, of which this curious couple were particularly fond, and to which they frequently resorted, and there, under the pleasant shade, with the roar of the fall for a symphony, Bob poured out his hopes and fears, reminiscences and prospects into the willing ears of the little old lady, who was so very small that Bob seemed quite a big man by contrast.  He had to roar almost as loud as the cataract to make her hear, but he was well rewarded.  The old lady, it is true, did not speak much, perhaps because she understood little, but she expressed enough of sympathy, by means of nods, and winks with her brilliant black eyes, and smiles with her toothless mouth, to satisfy any boy of moderate expectations.

And Bobby was satisfied.  So, also, were the other waifs and strays, not only with old granny, but with everything in and around their home in the New World.