Theatre Production - The Cricket on the Hearth

"Oh, goodness, John!" said Mrs. Peerybingle. "What a state you’re in with the weather!"

He was something the worse for it, undeniably. The thick mist hung in clots upon his eyelashes like candied thaw; and between the fog and fire together, there were rainbows in his very whiskers.

"Why, you see, Dot," John made answer, slowly, as he unrolled a shawl from about his throat, and warmed his hands," it - it an't exactly summer weather. So, no wonder."

"I wish you wouldn’t call me Dot, John. I don’t like it," said Mrs. Peerybingle, pouting in a way that clearly showed she did like it, very much.

"Why what else are you?" returned John, looking down upon her with a smile, and giving her waist as light a squeeze as his huge hand and arm could give.

"A dot and" - here he glanced at the baby - "a dot and carry - I won’t say it for fear I should spoil it; but I was very near a joke. I don’t know as ever I was nearer."

It was pleasant to see him, with his tender awkwardness, endeavouring to adapt his rude support to her slight need, and make his burly middle-age a leaning-staff not inappropriate to her blooming youth. It was pleasant to observe how Tilly Slowboy, waiting in the background for the Baby, took special cognisance - though in her earliest teens - of this grouping; and stood with her mouth and eyes wide open, and her head thrust forward, taking it in as if it were air. Nor was it less agreeable to observe how John the Carrier, reference being made by Dot to the aforesaid Baby, checked his hand when on the point of touching the infant, as if he thought he might crack it; and bending down, surveyed it from a safe distance with a kind of puzzled pride, such as an amiable mastitf might be supposed to show, if he found himself one day the father of a young canary.

PRESS REVIEW

(London Weekly News [London, UK] - 6th December, 1903)
GARRICK THEATRE

Mr. J. L. Toole, from whom, through Mr. Arthur Bourohier, the audience on Tuesday received a Christmas greeting, was so long identified with the aged toymaker of The Cricket on the Hearth (one of his most popular impersonations) that, a performance in which Caleb Plummer is not accorded the former prominence may somewhat surprise the devotees of Dickens. The present revival, however, is designed for the holiday season, and the beauties of simple faith and of pure home life are dwelt upon not only by some of the characters in the original story, but by fairies who were brought into the stage action many years ago by the late Mr. Dion Boucicault.

A combination of elfin spectacle and of domestic drama is not advantageous to Caleb, though it may serve for a Christmas play. The Cricket assumes human form, and is the emissary of the good fairy Home. With these is a troop of elves in glistening white, who engage in orthodox gambols and dances in and near honest John Peerybingle's cottage when opportunity offers. Other seasonable accessories are a snowfall, snowballing by boys, and the vigorous old-fashioned dance," Sir Roger de Coverley."

Thanks in great measure to the sound acting of Mr. J.H. Barnes, the part of Peerybingle holds its own as regards dramatic interest. It is a manly, earnest, and sympathetic embodiment. Mr. Bourchier is successful in depicting the helplessness and timidity of poor Caleb, and Miss Lizzie Webster's comicality as Tilly Slowboy occasionally borders on the grotesque. The lively Cricket, as represented by the intelligent Miss Empsie Bowman, is always welcome. Miss Jessie Bateman plays Dot, and Miss Violet Vanbrugh represents Caleb's blind daughter Bertha, to whom the old toymaker appeals for forgiveness when she discovers that his boasted condition of comfort was a deception. Mr.Frank Mills is the returned sailor Edward, and Mr. Jerrold Robertshaw the churlish Tackleton. All work hard, particularly during the Christmas eve festivity in caleb's humble abode.

"It an’t right for him to turn ’em up in that way!" said the astonished Carrier, "is it? See how he’s winking with both of ’em at once! and look at his mouth! why he’s gasping like a gold and silver fish!"

"You don’t deserve to be a father, you don’t," said Dot, with all the dignity of an experienced matron. "But how should you know what little complaints children are troubled with, John! You wouldn’t so much as know their names, you stupid fellow." And when she had turned the Baby over on her left arm, and had slapped its back as a restorative, she pinched her husband’s ear, laughing.

"No," said John, pulling off his outer coat. "It’s very true, Dot. I don’t know much about it. I only know that I’ve been fighting pretty stiffly with the wind to-night. It’s been blowing north-east, straight into the cart, the whole way home."

"Poor old man, so it has!" cried Mrs. Peerybingle, instantly becoming very active. "Only let me make the tea first, John; and then I'll help you with the parcels, like a busy bee. ‘How doth the little’ - and all the rest of it, you know, John. Did you ever learn ‘how doth the little,’ when you went to school, John?"

"Not to quite know it," John returned. "I was very near it once. But I should only have spoilt it, I daresay."

"Ha, ha!" laughed Dot. She had the blithest little laugh you ever heard. "What a dear old darling of a dunce you are, John, to be sure!"

Not at all disputing this position, John went out to see that the boy with the lantern, which had been dancing to and fro before the door and window, like a Will-0’-the-Wisp, took due care of the horse.

To have seen little Mrs. Peerybingle come back with her husband; tugging at the clothes-basket, and making the most strenuous exertions to do nothing at all (for he carried it), would have amused you, almost as much as it amused him. It may have entertained the Cricket, too, for anything I know; but certainly it now began to chirp again vehemently.

"Heyday!" said John, in his slow way. "lt’s merrier than ever, to-night, I think."

"And it’s sure to bring us good fortune, John! It always has done so. To have a Cricket on the Hearth is the luckiest thing in all the world!"

John looked at her as if he had very nearly got the thought into his head, that she was his Cricket in chief, and he quite agreed with her. But it was probably one of his narrow escapes, for he said nothing.#

"Now a man would never have thought of it! whereas, it’s my belief that if you was to pack wedding-cake up in a tea chest, or a turn-up bedstead, or a pickled salmon keg, or any unlikely thing, a woman would be sure to find it out directly. Yes; I called for it at a pastry-cook’s."

"And it weighs I don’tknow what - whole hundredweights!" cried Dot, making a great demonstration of trying to lift it.

"You never mean to say," pursued Dot, sitting on the floor and shaking her head at him, "that it’s Gruff and Tackleton, the toymaker!"

John nodded. Mrs. Peerybingle nodded also, fifty times at least. Not in assent; in dumb and pitying amazement; screwing up her lips, the while, with all their little force (they were never made for screwing up; I am clear of that), and looking the good Carrier through and through in her abstraction.

Miss Slowboy, in the meantime, who had a mechanical power of reproducing scraps of current conversation for the delectation of the Baby, with all the sense struck out of them, and all the Nouns changed into the Plural number, inquired aloud of that young creature, Was it Gruffs and Tackletons the toy-makers then, and Would it call at Pastry-cooks for weddingcakes, and Did its mothers know the boxes when its fathers brought them homes; and so on.

"And that is really to come about!" said Dot. "Why, she and I were girls at school together, John."

He might have been thinking of her, or nearly thinking of her perhaps, as she was in that same school-time. He looked upon her with a thoughtful pleasure, but he made no answer.

"And he’s as old. As unlike her! - Why, how many years older than you is Gruff and Tackleton, John?"

"How many more cups of tea shall I drink to-night at one sitting, than Gruff and Tackleton ever took in four, I wonder!" replied John, good-humouredly, as he drew a chair to the round table and began at the cold ham. "As to eating, I eat but little; but that little I enjoy, Dot."

"So these are all the parcels, are they, John?" she said, breaking a long silence, which the honest Carrier had devoted to the practical illustration of one part of his favourite sentiment - certainly enjoying what he ate, if it couldn’t be admitted that he ate but little. "So these are all the parcels, are they, John?"

"That’s aIl," said John. "Why - no - I -" laying down his knife and fork, and taking a long breath. "I declare - I’ve clean forgotten the old gentleman!"

"In the cart," said John. "He was asleep, among the straw, the last time I saw him. I’ve very nearly remembered him twice, since I came in; but he went out of my head again. Halloa! Yahip there! rouse up! That’s my hearty!"

John said these latter words outside the door, whither he had hurried with the candle in his hand.

The Stranger, who had long, white hair, good features - singularly bold and well defined for an old man - and dark, bright, penetrating eyes, looked round with a smile, and saluted the Carrier’s wife by gravely inclining his head. His garb was very quaint and old - a long, long way behind the times. Its hue was brown, all over. In his hand he held a great brown club, or walking-stick; and striking this upon the floor, it fell asunder, and became a chair, on which he sat down, quite composedly.

"There!" said the Carrier, turning to his wife;" that’s the way I found him, sitting by the roadside, upright as a milestone, and almost as deaf."

"In the open air," replied the Carrier, "just at dusk. ‘Carriage Paid,’ he said, and gave me eighteen pence. Then he got in. And there he is."

"If you please, I was to be left till called for," said the Stranger, mildly. "Don't mind me."

With that, he took a pair of spectacles from one of his large pockets, and a hook from another; and leisurely began to read. Making no more of Boxer than if he had been a house lamb! The Carrier and his wife exchanged a look of perplexity. The Stranger raised his head; and glancing from the latter to the former, said:-

"Indeed!" observed the Stranger. "Surely? Very young!" He quietly turned over, and resumed his reading. But, before he could have read two lines, he again interrupted himself, to say:-

John gave him a gigantic nod; equivalent to an answer in the affirmative delivered through a speaking trumpet.

Mrs. Peerybingle instantly struck in. "Two months and three da-ays! Vaccinated just six weeks ago-o! Took very fine-ly! Considered, by the doctor, a remarkably beautiful chi-ild! Equal to the general run of children at five months o-old! Takes notice, in a way quite won-der-ful! May seem impossible to you, but feels his legs already!"

Here the breathless little mother, who had been shrieking these short sentences into the old man’s ear, until her pretty face was crimsoned, held up the Baby before him as a stubborn and triumphant fact; while Tilly Slowboy, with a melodious cry of Ketcher, Ketcher - which sounded like some unknown words adapted to a popular Sneeze - performed some cow-like gambols round that all-unconscions Innocent.

"Hark! He’s called for, sure enough," said john. "There’s somebody at the door. Open it, Tilly."

Before she could reach it, however, it was opened from without; being a primitive sort of door, with a latch, that anyone could lift if he chose - and a good many people did choose, I can tell you, for all kinds of neighbours liked to have a cheerful word or two with the Carrier, though he was no great talker for the matter of that. Being opened, it gave admission to a little meagre, thoughtful, dingy-faced man, who seemed to have made himself a great coat from the sack-cloth covering of some old box; for when he turned to shut the door, and keep the weather out, he disclosed upon the back of that garment, the inscription G & T in large black capitals. Also the word GLASS in bold characters.

"Good evening, John!" said the little man. "Good evening, Mum! Good evening, Tilly! Good evening, Unbeknown! How’s Baby, Mum? Boxer's pretty well, I hope?"

"All thriving, Caleb," replied Dot. "I am sure you need only look at the dear child, for one, to know that."

"And I’m sure I need only look at you for another," said Caleb, He didn't look at her, though; for he had a wandering and thoughtful eye which seemed to be always projecting itself into some other time and place, no matter what he said; a description which will equally apply to his voice.

"Or at John for another" said Caleb. "Or at Tilly, as far as that goes. Or certainly at Boxer."

"Why, pretty well, John," he returned, with the distraught air of a man who was casting about for the Philosopher’s stone, at least. "Pretty much so. There’s rather a run on Noah’s Arks at present. I could have wished to improve upon the Family, but I don’t see how it’s to be done at the price. It will be a satisfaction to one’s mind, to make it clearer which was Shems and Hams, and which was wives. Flies ain’t on that scale neither, as compared with elephants, you know! Ah! well! Have you got anything in the parcel line for me, john?"

The Carrier put his hand into a pocket of the coat he had taken off; and brought out carefully preserved in moss and paper, a tiny flower-pot.

"There it is!" he said, adjusting it with great care. "Not so much as a leaf damaged. Full of buds!"

"Never mind that. lt would be cheap to me, whatever it cost," returned the little man. "Anything else, John?"

"‘For Caleb Plummer,’" said the little man, spelling out the direction. "‘With Cash.' With Cash, John? I don’t think it’s for me."

"Oh! To be sure!" said Caleb. "It’s all right. With care! Yes, yes; that’s mine. It rnight have been with cash, indeed, if my dear Boy in the Golden South Americas had lived, John. You loved him like a son; didn’t you? You needn’t say you did. I know, of course. ‘Caleb Plummer. With care' Yes, yes, it’s all right. It’s a box of dolls’ eyes for my daughter's work. I wish it was her own sight in a box, John."

"Thankee," said the little man. "You speak very hearty. To think that she should never see the Dolls; and them a-staring at her, so bold, all day long! That’s where it cuts. What’s the damage, John?"

"Well! it’s like you to say so," observed the little man. "It’s your kind way. Let me see. I think that’s all."

"Something for our Governor, eh?" said Caleb, after pondering a little while. "To be sure. That’s what I came for; but my head’s so running on them Arks and things l He hasn’t been here, has he?"

"He’s coming round, though," said Caleb; "for he told me to keep on the near side of the road going home, and it was ten to one he’d take, me up. I had better go. By-the-bye, you couldn’t have the goodness to let me pinch Boxer’s tail, Mum, for half a moment, could you?"

"Oh, never mind, Mum," said the little man. "He mightn’t like it, perhaps. Therels a small order just come in, for barking dogs; and I should wish to go as close to Natur’ as I could, for sixpence. That’s all. Never mind, Mum."

He didn’t look much like a Bridegroom as he stood in the Carrier’s kitchen, with a twist in his dry face, and a screw in his body, and his hat jerked over the bridge of his nose, and his hand stuck down into the bottoms of his pockets, and his whole sarcastic, ill-conditioned self peering out of one little corner of one little eye, like the concentrated essence of any number of ravens; but a Bridegroom he designed to be.

"In three days’ time - next Thursday - the last day of the iirst month in the year; that’s my wedding day," said Tackleton.

Did I mention that he had always one eye wide open and one eye nearly shut; and that the one eye nearly shut was always the expressive eye? I don’t think I did.

The indignation of Dot at this presumptuous assertion is not to be described. What next? His imagination would compass the possibility of just such another Baby, perhaps. The man was mad.

"I have the humour," said Tackleton: holding up the Fingers of his left hand and tapping the forefinger, to imply 'there I am, Tackleton to wit;' "I have the humour, Sir, to marry a young wife and a pretty wife:" here he rapped his little finger, to express the Bride; not sparingly, but sharply; with a sense of power. "I’m able to gratify that humour and I do. It’s my whim. But - now look there." He pointed to where Dot was sitting, thoughtfully, before the fire; leaning her dimpled chin upon her hand, and watching the bright blaze. The Carrier looked at her, and then at him, and then at her, and then at him again,

"She honours and obeys, no doubt, you know," said Tackleton; "and that, I am not a man of sentiment, is quite enough for me. But do you think there’s anything more in it?"

"I think," observed the Carrier, "that I should chuck any man out of window who said there wasn’t."

"Exactly so," returned the other with an unusual alacrity of assent, "To be sure! boubtless you would. Of course. l’m certain of it. Good night. Pleasant dreams!"

The good Carrier was puzzled, and made uncomfortable and uncertain, in spite of liimself. He couldn’t help showing it, in his manner.

"Good night, my dear friend!" said Tackleton, compassionately, "I’m off. We’re exactly alike, in reality, I see. You won’t give us to-morrow evening? Well? Next day you go out visiting, I know. I’ll meet you there, and bring my wife that is to be. It’ll do her good. You’re agreeable? Thankee. What’s that?"

It was a loud cry from the Carrier’s wife; a loud, sharp, sudden cry that made the room ring, like a glass vessel. She had risen from her seat, and stood like one transfixed by terror and surprise. The Stranger had advanced towards the fire to warm himself, and stood within a short stride of her chair. But quite still.

"Dot!" cried the Carrier. "Mary! Darling! what’s the matter?" They were all about her in a moment. Caleb, who had been dozing on the cake-box, in the first imperfect recovery of his suspended presence of mind, seized Miss Slowboy by the hair of her head; but immediately apologized.

"Mary!" exclaimed the Carrier, supporting her in his arms. "Are you ill! What is it? Tell me, dear!"

She only answered by beating her hands together and falling into a fit of wild laughter. Then, sinking from his grasp upon the ground, she covered her face with her apron and wept bitterly. And then she laughed again; and then she cried again; and then she said how cold it was, and suffered him to lead her to the fire, where she sat down as before. The old man standing, as before, quite still.

"I’m better, John," she said. "I’m quite well now - I - John!" But john was on the other side of her. Why turn her face towards the strange old gentleman, as if addressing him? Was her brain wandering?

"Only a fancy, John, dear - a kind of shock - a something coming suddenly before my eyes - I don’t know what it was. lt’s quite gone; quite gone"

"I’m glad it’s gone," muttered Tackleton, turning the expressive eye all round the room. "I wonder where it’s gone, and what it was. Humph! Caleb, come here! Who’s that with the grey hair?"

"I don't know, Sir," returned Caleb in a whisper. "Never see him before in all my life. A beautiful figure for a nutcracker; quite a new model. With a screw-jaw opening down into his waistcoat, he’d be lovely."

"Or for a firebox, either," observed Caleb, in deep contemplation; "what a model! Unscrew his head to put the matches in; turn him heels up’ards for the light; and what a firebox for a gentleman’s mantelshelf just as he stands!"

"Not half ugly enough!" said Tackleton. "Nothing in him at all. Come! Bring that box! All right now, I hope?"

"Oh, quite gone! Quite gone!" said the little woman, waving him hurriedly away. "Good night!"

"Good night," said Tackleton. "Good night, John Peerybingle! Take care how you carry that box, Caleb. Let it fall, and I’ll murder you! Dark as pitch, and weather worse than ever, eh? Good night!"

So, with another sharp look round the room, he went out at the door; followed by Caleb with the wedding-cake on his head. The Carrier had been so much astounded by his little wife, and so busily engaged in soothing and tending her, that he had scarcely been conscious of the Stranger’s presence until now, when he again stood there, their only guest.

"He don’t belong to them, you see," said John. "I must give him a hint to go."

"I beg your pardon, friend," said the old gentleman, advancing to him: "the more so, as I fear your wife has not been well: but the Attendant whom my infirmity," he touched his ears and shook his head, "renders almost indispensable, not having arrived, I fear there must be some mistake. The bad night which made the shelter of your comfortable cart (may I never have a worse!) so acceptable, is still as bad as ever. Would you, in your kindness, suffer me to rent a bed here?"

"Oh!" said the Carrier, surprised by the rapidity of this consent. "Well! I don’t object, but still I’m not quite sure that..."

"I know he is, but - Yes, Sir, certainly. Yes! certainly! I’ll make him up a bed directly, John."

As she hurried off to do it, the flutter of her spirits, and the agitation of her manner, were so strange, that the Carrier stood looking after her, quite confounded.

"Did its mothers make it up a beds, then!" cried Miss Slowboy to the Baby; "and did its hair grow brown and curly, when its caps was lifted off and frighten it, a precious Pets, a sitting by the fires!"

The Blind Girl never knew that ceilings were discoloured; walls blotched, and bare of plaster here and there; high crevices unstopped, and widening every day; beams mouldering and tending downward. The Blind Girl never knew that iron was rusting, wood rotting, paper peeling off; the very size and shape, and true proportion of the dwelling, withering away. The Blind Girl never knew that ugly shapes of delf and earthenware were on the board; that sorrow and faint-heartedness were in the house; that Caleb’s scanty hairs were turning greyer and more grey before her sightless face. The Blind Girl never knew they had a master, cold, exacting, and uninterested; never knew that Tackleton was Tackleton, in short; but lived in the belief of an eccentric humorist who loved to have his jest with them; and while he was the Guardian Angel of their lives, disdained to hear one word of thankfulness.

"So you were out in the rain last night, father, in your beautiful new great-coat," said Caleb’s daughter.

"In my beautiful new great-coat," answered Caleb, glancing towards a clothes-line in the room, on which the sack-cloth garment previously described was carefully hung up to dry.

"And of such a tailor, too," said Caleb. "Quite a fashionable tailor. It’s too good for me."

The Blind Girl rested from her work, and laughed with delight. "Too good father! What can be too good for you?"

"I’m half-ashamed to wear it, though," said Caleb, watching the effect of what he said, upon her brightening face "upon my word. When I hear the boysland people say behind me, ‘Halloa! here’s a swell!’ I don’t know which way to look. And when the beggar wouldn’t go away last night; and, when I said I was a very common man, said, ‘No, your honour! Bless your honour don’t say that!’ I was quite ashamed. I really felt as if I hadn’t a right to wear it."

"I see you, father," she said, clasping her hands, "as plainly, as if I had the eyes I never want when you are with me. A blue coat -"

"Yes, yes! Bright blue!" exclaimed the girl, turning up her radiant face; "the colour I can just remember in the blessed sky! You told me it was blue before! A bright blue coat;"

"Yes! loose to the figure!" cried the Blind Girl, laughing heartily" and in it you, dear father, with your merry eye, your smiling face, your free step and your dark hair: looking so young and handsome,"

How different the picture in her mind, from Caleb, as he sat observing her! She had spoken of his free step. She was right in that. For years and years, he never once had crossed that threshold at his own slow pace, but with a footfall counterfeited for her ear; and never had he, when his heart was heaviest, forgotten the light tread that was to render hers so cheerful and courageous.

Caleb sat next his daughter; Dot and her old schoolfellow were side by side; the good Carrier took care of the bottom of the table. Miss Slowboy was isolated, for the time being, from every article of furniture but the chair she sat on, that she might have nothing else to knock the baby’s head against.

"Ah, May!" said Dot. "Dear, dear, what changes! To talk of those merry school-days makes one young again."

"Look at my sober, plodding husband there," returned Dot. "He adds twenty years to my age at least. Don’t you, John?"

"How many you'll add to May’s, I am sure I don’t know," said Dot, laughing. "But she can’t be much less than a hundred years of age on her next birthday."

"Ha, ha!" laughed Tackleton. Hollow as a drum, that laugh, though. And he looked as if he could have twisted Dot’s neck - comfortably.

"Dear, dear!" said Dot. " Only to remember how we used to talk, at School, about the husbands we would choose. I don’t know how young and how handsome, and how gay, and how lively mine was not to be! and as to May’s! - Ah, dear! I don’t know whether to laugh or cry, when I think what silly girls we were."

May seemed to know which to do; for the colour dashed into her face, and tears stood in her eyes.

"Even the very persons themselves - real live young men - were fixed on sometimes," said Dot. "We little thought how things would come about. I never fixed on John, I’m sure; I never so much as thought of him. And if I had told you you were ever to be married to Mr. Tackleton, why, you’d have slapped me. Wouldn’t you, May?"

Though May didn't say yes, she certainly didn’t say no, or express no, by any means. Tackleton laughed - quite shouted, he laughed so loud. John Peerybingle laughed too, in his ordinary good-natured and contented manner; but his was a mere whisper of a laugh to Tackleton's.

"You couldn’t help yourselves, for all that. You couldn’t resist us, you see," said Tackleton. "Here we are! here we are! Where are your gay young bridegrooms now?"

"Some of them are dead," said Dot; "and some of them forgotten. Some of them, if they could stand among us at this moment, would not believe we were the same creatures; would not believe that what they saw and heard was real, and we could forget them so. No! they would not believe one word of it!"

She had spoken with such earnestness and fire, that she stood in need of some recalling to herself without doubt. Her husband’s check was very gentle, for he merely interfered, as he supposed, to shield old Tackleton; but it proved effectual, for she stopped, and said no more. There was an uncommon agitation even in her silence, which the wary Tackleton, who had brought his half-shut eye to bear upon her, noted closely; and remembered to some purpose too, as you will see.

There was that in his pale face which made the other rise immediately, and ask him, in a hurry, what the matter was.

"Hush! John Peerybingle," said Tackleton. "I am sorry for this. I am indeed. I have been afraid of it. l have suspected it from the first."

The Carrier accompanied him without another word. They went across a yard, where the stars were shining, and by a little side door, into Tackleton’s own counting-house, where there was a glass window commanding the ware-room, which was closed for the night. There was no light in the countinghouse itself, but there were lamps in the long, narrow ware-room, and consequently the window was bright.

"A moment," said Tackleton. "Can you bear to look through that window, do you think?"

"A moment more," said Tackleton. "Don’t commit any violence. It’s of no use. lt’s dangerous, too. You’re a strong-made man, and you might do Murder before you know it."

The Carrier looked him in the face, and recoiled a step, as if he had been struck. In one stride he was at the window, and he saw - O Shadow on the Hearth! O truthful Cricket! O perfidious Wife! - He saw her with the old man; old no longer, but erect and gallant; bearing in his hand the false white hair that had won his way into their desolate and miserable home. He saw her listening to him, as he bent his head to whisper in her ear; and suffering him to clasp her round the waist, as they moved slowly down the dim wooden gallery towards the door by which they had entered it. He saw them stop, and saw her turn - to have the face, the face he loved so, so presented to his view! - and saw her, with her own hands, adjust the Lie upon his head, laughing, as she did it, at his unsuspicious nature! He clenched his strong right hand at first, as if it would have beaten down a lion. But opening it immediately again, he spread it out before the eyes of Tackleton (for he was tender of her even then), and so, as they passed out, fell down upon a desk, and was as weak as an infant.

The Carrier set his grip upon the collar of the Toy Merchant, and shook him like a reed.

"Listen to me!" he said, "and take care that you hear me right. Listen to me. Do I speak plainly?"

"I sat upon that hearth, last night, all night!" exclaimed the Carrier. "On the spot where she has often sat beside me, with her sweet face looking into mine. I called up her whole life, day by day; I had her dear self, in its every passage, in review before me. And upon my soul she is innocent, if there is one to judge the innocent and guilty!"

"Passion and distrust have left me!" said the Carrier; "and nothing but my grief remains. In an unhappy moment some old lover, better suited to her tastes and years than I; forsaken, perhaps, for me, against her will; returned. In an unhappy moment: taken by surprise, and wanting time to think of what she did: she made herself a party to his treachery by concealing it. Last night she saw him in the interview we witnessed. It was wrong. But otherwise than this, she is innocent if there is Truth on earth!"

"So, let her go!" pursued the Carrier. "Go, with my blessing for the many happy hours she had given me, and my forgiveness for any pang she has caused me. Let her go, and have the peace of mind I wish her! She’ll never hate me. She’ll learn to like me better, when I’m not a drag upon her, and she wears the chain I have riveted, more likely. This is the day on which I took her, with so little thought for her enjoyment, from her home. To-day she shall return to it; and I will trouble her no more. Her father and mother will be here to-day - we had made a little plan for keeping it together - and they shall take her home. I can trust her, there, or anywhere. She leaves me without blame, and she will live so, I am sure. lf I should die - I may perhaps while she is still young; I have lost some courage in a few hours - she’ll find that l remembered her, and loved her to the last! This is the end of what you showed me. Now, it’s over!"

"Bertha, my dear!" said Caleb, "I have something on my mind I want to tell you while we three are alone. Hear me kindly! I have a confession to make to you, my Darling."

"I have wandered from the Truth and lost myself, my child," said Caleb, with a pitiable expression in his bewildered face. "I have wandered from the Truth, intending to be kind to you, and have been cruel."

"He accuses himself too strongly, Bertha," said Dot. "You’ll say so presently. You’ll be the first to tell him so."

"Not meaning it, my child," said Caleb. "But I have been, though I never suspected it, till yesterday. My dear Blind Daughter, hear me and forgive me! The world you live in, heart of mine, doesn’t exist as I have represented it. The eyes you have trusted in have been false to you."

She turned her wonder-stricken face towards him still; but drew back, and clung closer to her friend.

"Your road in life was rough, my poor one," said Caleb, "and I meant to smooth it for you. I have altered objects, changed the characters of people, invented many things that never have been, to make you happier. I have had concealments from you, put deceptions on you, God forgive me! and surrounded you with fancies."

"But living people are not fancies?" she said, hurriedly, and turning very pale, and still retiring from him. "You can't change them."

"I have done so, Bertha," pleaded Caleb. "There is one person that you know, my Dove -"

"Oh, father! why do you say I know?" she answered, in a tone of keen reproach. "What and whom do I know - I, who have no leader - I, so miserably blind?"

In the anguish of her heart, she stretched out her hands, as if she were groping her way; then spread them, in a manner most forlorn and sad, upon her face.

"The marriage that takes place to-day," said Caleb, "is with a stern, sordid, grinding man. A hard master to you and me, my dear, for many years. Ugly in his looks, and in his nature. Cold and callous always. Unlike what I have painted him to you in everything, my child. In everything."

"Oh, why," cried the Blind Girl, tortured, as it seemed, almost beyond endurance, "why did you ever do this! Why did you ever fill my heart so full, and then come in like death, and tear away the objects of my love! Oh, Heaven, how blind I am! How helpless and alone!"

Her afflicted father hung his head, and offered no reply but in his penitence and sorrow...

"It is a poor place, Bertha; very poor and bare indeed. The house will scarcely keep out wind and rain another winter. It is as roughly shielded from the weather, Bertha," Dot continued in a low, clear voice, "as your poor father in his sackcloth coat."

The Blind Girl, greatly agitated, rose, and led the Carrier’s little wife aside.

"Those presents that I took such care of; that came almost at my wish, and were so dearly welcome to me," she said, trembling; "where did they come from? Did you send them?"

Dot saw she knew, already; and was silent. The Blind Girl spread her hands before her face again. But in quite another manner now.

"Dear Mary, a moment. One moment! More this way. Speak softly to me. You are true, I know. You’d not deceive me now; would you?"

"No, I am sure you would not. You have too much pity for me. Mary, look across the room to where we were just now; to where my father is - my father, so compassionate and loving to me - and tell me what you see."

"I see," said Dot, who understood her well, "an old man sitting in a chair, and leaning sorrowfully on the back, with his face resting on his hand. As if his child should comfort him, Bertha."

"He is an old man, worn with care and work. He is a spare, dejected, thoughtful, grey-haired man. I see him now, despondent and bowed down, and striving against nothing. But, Bertha, I have seen him many times before; and striving hard in many ways for one great sacred object. And I honour his grey head and bless him!"

The Blind Girl broke away from her; and throwing herself upon her knees before him, took the grey head to her breast. "It is my sight restored. It is my sight!" she cried. "I have been blind, and now my eyes are open. I never knew him! To think I might have died, and never truly seen the father who has been so loving to me!"

"There is not a gallant figure on this earth," exclaimed the Blind Girl, holding him in her embrace, "that I would love so dearly, and would cherish so devotedly, as this! The greyer, and more worn, the dearer, father! Never let them say I am blind again. There’s not a furrow in his face, there’s not a hair upon his head, that shall be forgotten in my prayers and thanks to Heaven!"

"And in my Blindness I believed him," said the girl, caressing him with tears of exquisite affection, "to be so different! And having him beside me, day by day, so mindful of me always, never dreamed of this!"

"The fresh, smart father in the blue coat, Bertha," said poor Caleb. "He’s gone!"

"Nothing is gone," she answered. "Dearest father, no! Everything is here in you. The father that I loved so well; the father that I never loved enough, and never knew; the Benefactor whom I first began to reverence and love, because he had such sympathy for me; all are here in you. Nothing is dead to me. The Soul of all that was most dear to me is here - here, with the worn face, and the grey head. And I am NOT blind, father, any longer!"

"Do you recollect the voice, dear Caleb? Did you ever hear the like of it before?" cried Dot.

"He is alive!" shrieked Dot, removing her hands from his eyes, and clapping them in ecstasy; "look at him! See where he stands before you, healthy and strong! Your own dear son! Your own dear living, loving brother, Bertha!"

All honour to the little creature for her transports! All honour to her tears and laughter, when the three were locked in one another’s arms! All honour to the heartiness with which she met the sunburnt Sailor-fellow, with his dark streaming hair, half way, and never turned her rosy little mouth aside, but suffered him to kiss it, freely, and to press her to his bounding heart!

The Carrier, entering, started back: and well he might, to find himself in such good company.

"Look, John!" said Caleb, exultingly, "look here! My own boy from the Golden South Americas! My own son! Him that you fitted out, and sent away yourself; him that you were always such a friend to!"

The Carrier advanced to seize him by the hand; but, recoiling, as some feature in his face awakened a remembrance of the Deaf Man in the Cart, said - ‘"Edward! Was it you?"

"Now tell him all!" cried Dot. "Tell him all, Edward; and don’t spare me, for nothing shall make me spare myself in his eyes, ever again."

"And could you steal, disguised, into the house of your old friend?" rejoined the Carrier. "There was a frank boy once - how many years is it, Caleb, since we heard that he was dead, and had it proved, we thought? - who never would have done that."

"There was a generous friend of mine, once, more a father to me than a friend," said Edward, "who never would have judged me, or any other man, unheard. You were he. So I am certain you will hear me now."

The Carrier, with a troubled glance at Dot, who still kept far away from him, replied, "Well! that`s but fair. I will."

"You must know that when I left here, a boy," said Edward, "I was in love and mylove was returned. She was a very young girl, who perhaps (you may tell me) didn’t know her own mind. But I knew mine; and I had a passion for her."

"Indeed I had," returned the other. " And she returned it. I have ever since believed she did; and now I am sure she did."

But now the sound of wheels was heard again outside the door: and somebody exclaimed that Gruff and Tackleton was coming back. Speedily that worthy gentleman appeared, looking warm and flustered.

"Why, what the Devil’s this, John Peerybingle?" said Tackleton. "There’s some mistake. I appointed Mrs. Tackleton to meet me at the church; and I’ll swear I passed her on the road, on her way here. Oh! here she is! I beg your pardon, Sir; I haven’t the pleasure of knowing you; but if you can do me the favour to spare this young lady, she has rather a particular engagement this morning."

"I mean that, as I can make allowance for your being vexed," returned the other, with a smile, "I am as deaf to harsh discourse this morning as I was to all discourse last night."

"I am sorry, Sir," said Edward, holding out May’s left hand, and especially the third finger, "that the young lady can’t accompany you to church; but as she has been there once, this morning, perhaps you’ll excuse her."

Tackleton looked hard at the third finger; and took a little piece of silver-paper, apparently containing a ring, from his waistcoat pocket.

"Miss Slowboy," said Tackleton. "Will you have the kindness to throw that in the fire?"

"It was a previous engagement, quite an old engagement, that prevented my wife from keeping her appointment with you, I assure you," said Edward.

"Mr. Tackleton will do me the justice to acknowledge that I revealed it to him faithfully; and that I told him, many times, I never could forget it," said May, blushing.

Oh, certainly!" said Tackleton. "Oh, to be sure. Oh, it’s all right. It’s quite correct. Mrs. Edward Plummer, I infer?"

"Ah! I shouldn't have known you, Sir," said Tackleton: scrutinizing his face narrowly, and making a low bow.

"Mrs. Peerybingle," said Tackleton, turning suddenly to where she stood with her husband, "I am sorry. You haven’t done me a very great kindness, but upon my life I am sorry. You are better than I thought you. John Peerybingle, I am sorry. You understand me; that’s enough. It’s quite correct, ladies and gentlemen all, and perfectly satisfactory. Good morning!"