Frank Oldfield Part 4

Its sign, however, had long since disappeared; and it was now in the hands of the rector, its princ.i.p.al apartment having been transformed into a reading-room, and place for holding meetings. And how was this brought about? Simply thus. When Bernard Oliphant first came to Waterland, he found the "Oldfield Arms" doing a most excellent business; so far as _that_ can be an excellent business which builds the prosperity of one upon the ruin of hundreds. People grumbled at the lowness of wages; wives were unable to procure money from their husbands for decent dress; children were half-starved and two-thirds naked; disease and dirt found a home almost everywhere; boys and girls grew up in ignorance, for their parents could not afford to send them to school; the men had no tidy clothes in which to appear at church. Yet, somehow or other, the "Oldfield Arms" was never short of customers; and customers, too, who paid, and paid well, sooner or later, for what they consumed. So the rector went among the people, and told them plainly of the sin of drunkenness, and pointed out the misery it brought, as their own eyes could see. They confessed the truth--such as he could manage to get hold of--and drank on as before. He was getting heart-sick and miserable. Preach as he might--and he did preach the truth with all faithfulness and love--the notices of ale, porter, and spirits, set up in flaming colours in the windows and on the walls of the "Oldfield Arms," preached far more persuasively in the cause of intemperance.

One day he came upon a knot of men standing just at the entrance of the yard that led to the tap-room. They were none of them exactly drunk; and certainly none were exactly sober. There were some among them whom he never saw at church, and never found at home. He was grieved to see these men in high discussion and dispute, when they ought to have been busily engaged in some lawful calling. He stopped, and taking one of them aside whose home was specially miserable, he said,--

"James, I'm grieved to see you here, when I know how sadly your poor wife and children are in need of food and clothing."

The man looked half angry, half ashamed, but hung down his head, and made no reply. The rest were moving off.

"Nay, my friends," said the rector, kindly, "don't go. I just want a word with you all. I want to say a few words of love and warning to you, as your clergyman. G.o.d has sent me here to teach and guide you; and oh, do listen to me now."

They all stood still, and looked at him respectfully. He went on:--

"Don't you see that drinking habits are bringing misery into the homes of the people in our parish--ay, into your own homes? You must see it.

You must see how drunkenness stores up misery for you here and hereafter. What will become of you when you die, if you go on as you are doing now? What will become of your families? What will--"

At this moment there was a loud shout of "Hoy! hoy!" from the lips of a carter who was coming with a brewer's dray out of the inn-yard. The man had just been depositing several full casks, and was now returning with the empty ones. He did not see the rector at first; but when the group made way for him, and his eyes fell on Mr Oliphant, he touched his hat as he was pa.s.sing, and said,--

"I beg pardon, sir; I did not know as you was there." Then suddenly pulling up his horse, he added-- "Oh, if you please, sir, master bid me say he's very sorry he hasn't any of the ale you've been drinking ready just now, but he hopes you'll let me leave this barrel of stout, it's in prime order, he says."

"Very well," replied Mr Oliphant; "you may leave it."

Then he turned again to the men: they were moving off. He would have taken up his earnest appeal where he left it; but somehow or other he felt a difficulty in speaking, and the deep attention was evidently gone from his hearers. He hesitated. They were already dispersing: should he call them back? He felt as if he could not. He turned sadly towards home, deeply vexed and chafed in his spirit. He blamed the ill-timed interruption of the carter; and yet he felt that there was something else lurking in the background with which he felt dissatisfied-- something which wanted dragging out into the light.

"And yet it's so foolis.h.!.+" he said to himself, as he walked slowly up the street. "My drinking in moderation has nothing in common with their drinking immoderately. Why should my use of intoxicating liquors fetter me in dissuading these poor creatures from their abuse? They ought to see the difference." Then a voice, deeper in the heart, whispered-- "They ought; but they do not, and their souls are peris.h.i.+ng. They are your people: you must deal with them as they are, not as they ought to be."

That night the rector's sleep was very troubled.

It was about a week later that he was again near the "Oldfield Arms,"

when a spruce-looking man--his wine-merchant's agent--came out of the inn door, and walked up the street. Two men were standing with their backs to the rector just outside the yard. He was about to pa.s.s on; when he heard one say,--

"What a sight of wine some of them parsons drink! Yon fine gent couldn't afford all them gold chains and pins if it warn't for the parsons."

"Ay," said the other, "it's the parsons as knows good wine from bad. I heerd yon chap say only this morning: 'Our very best customers is the clergy.'"

"Well," rejoined the other, "I shouldn't mind if they'd only leave us poor fellows alone, and let us get drunk when we've a mind. But it do seem a little hard that _they_ may get drunk on their wine, but we mustn't get drunk on our beer."

"Oh, but you know, Bill," said the other, "this here's the difference.

When they get drunk, it's genteel drunk, and there's no sin in that; but when we poor fellows get drunk, it's wulgar drunk, and that's awful wicked."

Bernard Oliphant was deeply pained; he shrank within himself.

"It's a cruel libel and a coa.r.s.e slander," he muttered, and hastened on his way. "Am _I_ answerable," he asked himself, "for the abuse which others may make of what I take moderately and innocently? Absurd! And yet it's a pity, a grievous pity, that it should be possible for such poor ignorant creatures to speak thus of any of our holy calling, and so to justify themselves in sin."

Yes, he felt it to be so, and it preyed upon his mind more and more. He mentioned what he had heard to his wife.

"Dear Bernard," she replied, "I have thought a great deal lately on this subject, especially since you told me about your speaking to those men when you were interrupted by the drayman. I have prayed that you and I might be directed aright; and we _shall_ be. But do not let us be hasty. It does seem as though we were being called on to give up, for the sake of others, what does us personally no harm. But perhaps we may be wrong in this view. A great many excellent Christians, and ministers too, are moderate drinkers, and never exceed; and we must not be carried away by a mistaken enthusiasm to brand their use of fermented drinks as sinful because such frightful evils are daily resulting from immoderate drinking. We must think and pray, and our path will be made plain; and we must be prepared to walk in it, cost what it may."

"Yes," said her husband; "I am getting more and more convinced that there is something exceptional in this matter--that we cannot deal with this sin of drunkenness as we deal with other sins. But we will wait a little longer for guidance; yet not too long, for souls are peris.h.i.+ng, and ruin is thickening all round us."

They had not to wait long; their path was soon made clear.

It was on a bitter and cheerless November evening that Mr Oliphant was returning to the rectory from a distant part of his parish. He was warmly clad; but the keen wind, which drove a p.r.i.c.kly deluge of fine hail into his face, seemed to make its way through every covering into his very bones. He was hurrying on, thankful that home was so near, when he suddenly stumbled upon something in the path which he had not noticed, being half blinded by the frozen sleet. With difficulty he saved himself from falling over this obstacle, which looked in the feeble moonlight like a bundle of ragged clothes. Then he stooped down to examine it more closely, and was horrified at hearing a low moan, which showed that it was a living creature that lay on the path. It was plainly, in fact, some poor, half-frozen fellow-man, who lay coiled together there, peris.h.i.+ng of cold in that bitter night. The rector tried to raise the poor wretch from the ground, but the body hung like a dead weight upon him.

"Come," he said, "my poor fellow; come, try and rouse yourself and get up. You'll die if you lie here."

The miserable bundle of humanity partly uncoiled itself, and made an effort to rise, but sunk back again. Mr Oliphant shouted for help.

The shout seemed partly to revive the prostrate creature, and he half raised himself.

"Come," said the rector again,-- "come, lean on my arm, and try and get up. You'll die of cold if you stay here."

"Die!" said a thick, unearthly voice from out of that half-frozen ma.s.s of flesh and blood. "In Adam all die."

"Who and what are you?" cried the rector, in extreme astonishment and distress.

"What am I? Ah, what am I?" was the bewildered, scarce audible reply.

By this time help had arrived. Two men came up, and a.s.sisted Mr Oliphant to raise the poor man, and support him to the "Oldfield Arms,"

where he was immediately put to bed; one of the men being sent off by the rector to fetch the nearest medical man, while he himself gave orders that everything should be done to restore the unhappy sufferer to warmth and consciousness.

"Please, Mrs Barnes," said he to the landlady, "be so good as to send up to the rectory, and let me know, when the doctor comes, if he says that there is any danger. If his report is favourable, I will leave a night's rest to do its work, and will look in again early to-morrow.

And pray let the poor man have everything that he needs, and send up to the rectory if you are short of anything."

"Thank you, sir," said Mrs Barnes. "I will see that he is properly looked to."

The rector then went home, and in another hour received a message from the inn that the doctor had been, and that there was no danger of any immediately fatal result; that he would call again on his patient the following morning, and should be glad to meet the rector at the inn.

Accordingly, the following day at the appointed hour Bernard and the doctor went up together into the sick man's room. As they opened the door they were astonished to hear the patient declaiming in a loud voice,--

"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us."

Bernard's heart grew sick. Could it be? Could this miserable creature be one of his own profession? Were these words the ramblings of one who had been used to officiate as a Church minister? And, if so, what could have brought him to such a state of utter dest.i.tution? The doctor seemed to read his thoughts, and shook his head sadly. Then, putting his mouth to his ear, he said,--

"It's the drink; the smell of spirits is still strong on him."

"Poor wretched creature!" said Mr Oliphant. "Can it be that the love of drink has brought a man of position and education to such a state as this? What can be done for him?"

"Not much at present," was the reply, "beyond keeping him quiet, and nursing him well till the fever has run its course. And one thing is clear--we must keep all intoxicants from him. They are downright poison to a man of his const.i.tution; and should he get hold of any spirits before his health is thoroughly established again, I would not answer for his life."

The rector called Mrs Barnes, and told her what the doctor had said, adding,--

"You must find a trustworthy nurse for him--one who will strictly attend to the doctor's orders."

The landlady promised she would do so; and the rector left the sick- chamber with a sorrowful look and troubled heart.

In ten days' time the patient was well enough to sit up in bed and converse with Mr Oliphant.

"My poor friend," said the rector, "I grieve to see you in your present state, especially as I cannot but perceive that you have seen better days, and moved among people of education. However, there is great cause to thank G.o.d that he has so far spared your life."

A deep flush overspread the sick man's face as he replied,--