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International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, by Various

V >> Various >> International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1,




Mr. Spires, who sat near his counting-house window at his books, was
struck with the bold and handsome bearing of the boy, and said to a
clerk:

"What boy is that?"

"It is Jenny Deg's," was the answer.

"Ha! that boy! Zounds! how boys do grow! Why that's the child that Jenny
Deg was carrying when she came to Stockington: and what a strong,
handsome, bright-looking fellow he is now!"

As the boy was returning, Mr. Spires called him to the counting-house
door, and put some questions to him as to what he was doing and learning,
and so on.

Simon, taking off his cap with much respect, answered in such a clear and
Modest way, and with a voice that had so much feeling and natural music
in it, that the worthy manufacturer was greatly taken with him.

"That's no Deg," said he, when he again entered the counting-house, "not
a bit of it. He's all Goodrick, or whatever his mother's name was, every
inch of him."

The consequence of that interview was, that Simon Deg was very soon after
Perched on a stool in Mr. Spires's counting-house, where he continued
till he was twenty-two. Mr. Spires had no son, only a single daughter;
and such were Simon Deg's talents, attention to business, and genial
disposition, that at that age Mr. Spires gave him a share in the concern.
He was himself now getting less fond of exertion than he had been, and
placed the most implicit reliance on Simon's judgment and general
management. Yet no two men could be more unlike in their opinions beyond
the circle of trade. Mr. Spires was a staunch tory of the staunch old
school. He was for Church and King, and for things remaining forever as
they had been. Simon, on the other hand, had liberal and reforming
notions. He was for the improvement of the people, and their admission to
many privileges. Mr. Spires was therefore liked by the leading men of the
place, and disliked by the people. Simon's estimation was precisely in
the opposite direction. But this did not disturb their friendship; it
required another disturbing cause--and that came.

Simon Deg and the daughter of Mr. Spires grew attached to each other; and
as the father had thought Simon worthy of becoming a partner in the
business, neither of the young people deemed that he would object to a
partnership of a more domestic description. But here they made a
tremendous mistake. No sooner was such a proposal hinted at, than Mr.
Spires burst forth with the fury of all the winds from the bag of
Ulysses.

"What! a Deg aspire to the hand of the sole heiress of the enormously
opulent Spires?"

The very thought almost cut the proud manufacturer off with an apoplexy.
The hosts of a thousand paupers rose up before him, and he was black in
the face. It was only by a prompt and bold application of leeches and
lancet that the life of the great man was saved. But there was an end of
all further friendship between himself and the expectant Simon. He
insisted that he should withdraw from the concern, and it was done.
Simon, who felt his own dignity deeply wounded too, for dignity he had,
though the last of a long line of paupers--his own dignity, not his
ancestors'--took silently, yet not unrespectfully, his share--a good,
round sum, and entered another house of business.

For several years there appeared to be a feud and a bitterness between
the former friends; yet it showed itself in no other manner than by a
careful avoidance of each other. The continental war came to an end; the
manufacturing distress increased exceedingly. There came troublous times,
and a fierce warfare of politics. Great Stockington was torn asunder by
rival parties. On one side stood preeminent, Mr. Spires; on the other
towered conspicuously, Simon Deg. Simon was grown rich, and extremely
popular. He was on all occasions the advocate of the people. He said that
he had sprung from, and was one of them. He had bought a large tract of
land on one side of the town; and intensely fond of the country and
flowers himself, he had divided this into gardens, built little
summer-houses in them, and let them to the artisans. In his factory he
had introduced order, cleanliness, and ventilation. He had set up a
school for the children in the evenings, with a reading-room and
conversation-room for the work-people, and encouraged them to bring their
families there, and enjoy music, books, and lectures. Accordingly, he was
the idol of the people, and the horror of the old school of
manufacturers.

"A pretty upstart and demagogue I've nurtured," said Mr. Spires often, to
his wife and daughter, who only sighed, and were silent.

Then came a furious election. The town, for a fortnight, more resembled
the worst corner of Tartarus than a Christian borough. Drunkenness,
riot, pumping on one another, spencering one another, all sorts of
violence and abuse ruled and raged till the blood of all Stockington was
at boiling heat. In the midst of the tempest were everywhere seen, ranged
on the opposite sides, Mr. Spires, now old and immensely corpulent, and
Simon Deg, active, buoyant, zealous, and popular beyond measure. But
popular though he was, the other and old tory side still triumphed. The
people were exasperated to madness; and when the chairing of the
successful candidate commenced, there was a terrific attack made on the
procession by the defeated party. Down went the chair, and the new
member, glad to escape into an inn, saw his friends mercilessly assailed
by the populace. There was a tremendous tempest of sticks, brickbats,
paving-stones, and rotten eggs. In the midst of all this, Simon Deg and a
number of his friends, standing at the upper window of an hotel, saw Mr.
Spires knocked down and trampled on by the crowd. In an instant, and
before his friends had missed him from amongst them, Simon Deg was seen
darting through the raging mass, cleaving his way with a surprising
vigor, and gesticulating, and no doubt shouting vehemently to the
rioters, though his voice was lost in the din. In the next moment his hat
was knocked off, and himself appeared in imminent danger: but, another
moment, and there was a pause, and a group of people were bearing
somebody from the frantic mob into a neighboring shop. It was Simon Deg,
assisting in the rescue of his old friend and benefactor, Mr. Spires.

Mr. Spires was a good deal bruised, and wonderfully confounded and
bewildered by his fall. His clothes were one mass of mud, and his face
was bleeding copiously; but when he had had a good draught of water,
and his face washed, and had time to recover himself, it was found that
he had received no serious injury.

"They had like to have done for me, though," said he.

"Yes, and who saved you?" asked a gentleman.

"Ay, who was it? who was it?" asked the really warm-hearted manufacturer;
"let me know? I owe him my life."

"There he is!" said several gentlemen, at the same instant, pushing
forward Simon Deg.

"What, Simon!" said Mr. Spires, starting to his feet. "Was it thee, my
boy?" He did more, he stretched out his hand; the young man clasped it
eagerly, and the two stood silent, and with a heart-felt emotion, which
blended all the past into forgetfulness, and the future into a union more
sacred than esteem.

A week hence, and Simon Deg was the son-in-law of Mr. Spires. Though Mr.
Spires had misunderstood Simon, and Simon had borne the aspect of
opposition to his old friend, in defense of conscientious principle,
the wife and daughter of the manufacturer had always understood him, and
secretly looked forward to some day of recognition and reunion.

Simon Deg was now the richest man in Stockington. His mother was still
living to enjoy his elevation. She had been his excellent and wise
housekeeper, and she continued to occupy that post still.

Twenty-five years afterward, when the worthy old Spires was dead, and
Simon Deg had himself two sons attained to manhood; when he had five
times been mayor of Stockington, and had been knighted on the
presentation of a loyal address; still his mother was living to see it;
and William Watson, the shoemaker, was acting as a sort of orderly at Sir
Simon's chief manufactory. He occupied the lodge, and walked about, and
saw that all was safe, and moving on as it should do.

It was amazing how the most plebeian name of Simon Deg had slid, under
the hands of the heralds, into the really aristocratical one of Sir Simon
Degge. They had traced him up a collateral kinship, spite of his own
consciousness, to a baronet of the same name of the county of Stafford,
and had given him a coat of arms that was really astonishing.

It was some years before this, that Sir Roger Rockville had breathed his
last. His title and estate had fallen into litigation. Owing to two
generations having passed without any issue of the Rockville family
except the one son and heir, the claims, though numerous, were so mingled
with obscuring circumstance, and so equally balanced, that the lawyers
raised quibbles and difficulties enough to keep the property in Chancery,
till they had not only consumed all the ready money and rental, but had
made frightful inroads into the estate itself. To save the remnant, the
contending parties came to a compromise. A neighboring squire, whose
grandfather had married a Rockville, was allowed to secure the title, on
condition that the rest carried off the residuum of the estate. The woods
and lands of Rockville were announced for sale!

It was at this juncture that old William Watson reminded Sir Simon Degge
of a conversation in the great grove of Rockville, which they had held at
the time that Sir Roger was endeavoring to drive the people thence.

"What a divine pleasure might this man enjoy," said Simon Deg to his
humble friend, "if he had a heart capable of letting others enjoy
themselves."

"But we talk without the estate," said William Watson; "what might we do
if we were tried with it?"

Sir Simon was silent for a moment; then observed that there was sound
philosophy in William Watson's remark. He said no more, but went away;
and the next day announced to the astonished old man that he had
purchased the groves and the whole ancient estate of Rockville!

Sir Simon Degge, the last of a long line of paupers, was become the
possessor of the noble estate of Sir Roger Rockville, of Rockville,
the last of a long line of aristocrats!

The following summer, when the hay was lying in fragrant cocks in the
great meadows of Rockville, and on the little islands in the river, Sir
Simon Degge, Baronet, of Rockville--for such was now his title-through
the suggestion of a great lawyer, formerly Recorder of the Borough of
Stockington, to the crown--held a grand fete on the occasion of his
coming to reside at Rockville Hall, henceforth the family seat of the
Degges. His house and gardens had all been restored to the most
consummate order. For years Sir Simon had been a great purchaser of works
of art and literature, paintings, statuary, books, and articles of
antiquity, including rich armor and precious works in ivory and gold.

First and foremost he gave a great banquet to his wealthy friends, and no
man with a million and a half is without them--and in abundance. In the
second place, he gave a substantial dinner to all his tenantry, from the
wealthy farmer of five hundred acres to the tenant of a cottage. On this
occasion he said, "Game is a subject of great heart-burning and of great
injustice to the country. It was the bane of my predecessors: let us take
care it is not ours. Let every man kill the game on the land that he
rents--then he will not destroy it utterly, nor allow it to grow into a
nuisance. I am fond of a gun myself, but I trust to find enough for my
propensity to the chase in my own fields and woods--if I occasionally
extend my pursuit across the lands of my tenants, it shall not be to
carry off the first fruits of their feeding, and I shall still hold the
enjoyment as a favor."

We need not say that this speech was applauded most vociferously.
Thirdly, and lastly, he gave a grand entertainment to all his work
people, both of the town and the country. His house and gardens were
thrown open to the inspection of the whole assembled company. The
delighted crowd admired immensely the pictures and the pleasant gardens.
On the lawn, lying between the great grove and the hall, an enormous tent
was pitched, or rather a vast canvas canopy erected, open on all sides,
in which was laid a charming banquet; a military band from Stockington
barracks playing during the time. Here Sir Simon made a speech as
rapturously received as that to the farmers. It was to the effect, that
all the old privileges of wandering in the grove, and angling, and
boating on the river were restored. The inn was already rebuilt in a
handsome Elizabethan style, larger than before, and to prevent it ever
becoming a fane of intemperance, he had there posted as landlord, he
hoped for many years to come, his old friend and benefactor, William
Watson. William Watson should protect the inn from riot, and they
themselves the groves and river banks from injury.

Long and loud were the applauses which this announcement occasioned. The
young people turned out upon the green for a dance, and in the evening,
after an excellent tea, the whole company descended the river to
Stockington in boats and barges decorated with boughs and flowers, and
singing a song made by William Watson for the occasion, called "The
Health of Sir Simon, last and first of his Line!"

Years have rolled on. The groves and river banks and islands of Rockville
are still greatly frequented, but are never known to be injured: poachers
are never known there, for four reasons. First, nobody would like to
annoy the good Sir Simon; secondly, game is not very numerous there;
thirdly, there is no fun in killing it, where there is no resistance; and
fourthly, it is vastly more abundant in other proprietors' demesnes, and
it is fun to kill it there, where it is jealously watched, and there is a
chance of a good spree with the keepers.

And with what different feelings does the good Sir Simon look down from
his lofty eyrie, over the princely expanse of meadows, and over the
glittering river, and over the stately woods to where Great Stockington
still stretches farther and farther its red brick walls, its red-tiled
roofs, and its tall smoke-vomiting chimneys. There he sees no haunts of
crowded enemies to himself or any man. No upstarts, nor envious
opponents, but a past family of human beings, all toiling for the good of
their families and their country. All advancing, some faster, some
slower, to a better education, a better social condition, a better
conception of the principles of art and commerce, and a clearer
recognition of their rights and duties, and a more cheering faith
in the upward tendency of humanity.

Looking on this interesting scene from his distant and quiet home, Sir
Simon sees what blessings flow--and how deeply he feels them in his own
case--from a free circulation, not only of trade, but of human relations.
How this corrects the mischiefs, moral and physical, of false systems and
rusty prejudices;--and he ponders on schemes of no ordinary beauty and
beneficence yet to reach his beloved town through them. He sees lecture
halls and academies, means of sanitary purification, and delicious
recreation, in which baths, wash-houses, and airy homes figure largely;
while public walks extend all round the great industrial hive, including
wood, hills, meadow and river in their circuit of many miles. There he
lived and labored; there live and labor his sons; and there he trusts his
family will continue to live and labor to all future generations: never
retiring to the fatal indolence of wealth, but aiding onward its active
and ever-expanding beneficence.

Long may the good Sir Simon live and labor to realize these views. But
already in a green corner of the pleasant churchyard of Rockville may be
read this inscription on a marble headstone:--"Sacred to the memory of
Jane Deg, the mother of Sir Simon Degge, Bart., of Rockville. This stone
is erected in honor of the best of Mothers by the most grateful of sons."

* * * * *

[From Fraser's Magazine.]

THE SPOTTED BOWER-BIRD.

FROM LEAVES FROM THE NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST.


Elegant and ingenious as are the structures and collections of the satin
bower-bird, the species of the allied genus _Chlamydera_ display still
greater architectural abilities, and more extensive, collective, and
decorative powers.

The spotted bower-bird[A] is an inhabitant of the interior. Its probable
range, in Mr. Gould's opinion, is widely extended over the central
portions of the Australian continent; but the only parts in which he
observed it, or from which he procured specimens, were the districts
immediately to the north of the colony of New South Wales. During his
journey into the interior he saw it in tolerable abundance at Brezi, on
the river Mokai, to the northward of the Liverpool plains; and it was
also equally numerous in all the low scrubby ranges in the neighborhood
of the Namoi, as well as in the open brushes that intersect the plains on
its borders. Mr. Gould is gifted with the eye of an observer; but from
the extreme shyness of its disposition, it generally escapes the
attention of ordinary travelers, and it seldom allows itself to be
approached near enough for the spectator to discern its colors. Its
'harsh, grating, scolding note,' betrays its haunts to the intruder; but,
when disturbed, it seeks the tops of the highest trees, and, generally,
flies off to another locality.


[Footnote A: _Chlamydera maculala_.--GOULD.]


Mr. Gould obtained his specimens most readily by watching at the
water-holes where they come to drink; and on one occasion, near the
termination of a long drought, he was guided by a native to a deep basin
in a rock where water, the produce of many antecedent months, still
remained. Numbers of the spotted bower-birds, honeysuckers, and parrots,
sought this welcome reservoir, which had seldom, if ever before,
reflected a white face. Mr. Gould's presence was regarded with suspicion
by the winged frequenters of this attractive spot; but while he remained
lying on the ground perfectly motionless, though close to the water,
their wants overpowered their misgivings, and they would dash down past
him and eagerly take their fill, although an enormous black snake was
lying coiled upon a piece of wood near the edge of the pool. At this
interesting post Mr. Gould remained for three days. The spotted
bower-birds were the most numerous of the thirsty assemblage there
congregated, and the most shy, and yet he had the satisfaction of
frequently seeing six or eight of them displaying their beautiful necks
as they were perched within a few feet of him. He states that the scanty
supply of water remaining in the cavity must soon have been exhausted by
the thousands of birds that daily resorted to it, if the rains which had
so long been suspended had not descended in torrents.

Mr. Gould discovered several of the bowers of this species during his
journey to the interior, the tiniest of which, now in the National
Museum, he brought to England. He found the situations of these runs or
bowers to be much varied. Sometimes he discovered them on the plains
studded with Myalls (_Acacia pendula,_) and sometimes in the brushes with
which the lower hills were clothed. He describes them as considerably
longer, and more avenue-like, than those of the satin bower-bird,
extending in many instances to three feet in length. Outwardly they were
built with twigs, and beautifully lined with tall grasses, so disposed
that their upper ends nearly met. The decorations were very profuse,
consisting of bivalve shells, skulls of small animals, and other bones.

Evident and beautiful indications of design (continues Mr. Gould) are
manifest throughout the whole of the bower and decorations formed by this
species, particularly in the manner in which the stones are placed within
the bower, apparently to keep the grasses with which it is lined fixed
firmly in their places, these stones diverge from the mouth of the run on
each side so as to form little paths, while the immense collection of
decorative materials, bones, shells, &c., are placed in a heap before the
entrance of the avenue, this arrangement being the same at both ends. In
some of the larger bowers, which had evidently been resorted to for many
years, I have seen nearly half a bushel of bones, shells, &c., at each of
the entrances. In some instances, small bowers, composed almost entirely
of grasses, apparently the commencement of a new place of rendezvous,
were observable. I frequently found these structures at a considerable
distance from the rivers, from the borders of which they could alone have
procured the shells, and small, round pebbly stones; their collection and
transportation must, therefore, be a task of great labor and difficulty.
As these birds feed almost entirely upon seeds and fruits, the shells and
bones cannot have been collected for any other purpose than ornament;
besides, it is only those which have been bleached perfectly white in the
sun, or such as have been roasted by the natives, and by this means
whitened, that attract their attention. I fully ascertained that these
runs, like those of the satin bower-bird, formed the rendezvous of many
individuals; for, after secreting myself for a short space of time near
one of them, I killed two males which I had previously seen running
through the avenue.

The plumage of this species is remarkable. A rich brown pervades the
crown of the head, the ear-coverts and the throat, each feather being
bordered by a narrow black line; and, on the crown, the feathers are
small and tipped with silver gray. The back of the neck is crossed by a
beautiful, broad, light, rosy pink band of elongated feathers, so as to
form a sort of occipital crest. The wings, tail, and upper surface, are
deep brown, every feather of the back, rump, scapularies, and
secondaries, having a large round spot of full buff at the tip. Primaries
slightly tipped with white. All the tail-feathers with buffy white
terminations. Under parts grayish white. Flank-feathers zigzagged with
faint transverse light brown lines. Bill and feet dusky brown. At the
corner of the mouth the bare, thick, fleshy, prominent skin, is of a
pinky flesh colour, and the irides are dark brown.

The rosy frill adorns the adults of both sexes: but the young male and
female of the years have it not.

Another species, the great bower-bird,[B] was probably the architect of
the bowers found by Captain Grey during his Australian rambles, and which
interested him greatly in consequence of the doubts entertained by him
whether they were the works of a bird or of a quadruped,--the inclination
of his mind being that their construction was due to the four-footed
animal. They were formed of dead grass and parts of bushes, sunk a slight
depth into two parallel furrows, in sandy soil, and were nicely arched
above; they were always full of broken sea-shells, large heaps of which
also protruded from the extremity of the bower. In one of these bowers,
the most remote from the sea of those discovered by Captain Grey, was a
heap of the stones of some fruit that evidently had been rolled therein.
He never saw any animal in or near these bowers; but the abundant
droppings of a small species of kangaroo close to them, induced him to
suppose them to be the work of some quadruped.


[Footnote B: _Chlamydora nuchalis_.]


Here, then, we have a race of birds whose ingenuity is not merely
directed to the usual; ends of existence, self-preservation, and the
continuation of the species, but to the elegancies and amusements of
life. Their bowers are their ball and assembly rooms; and we are very
much mistaken if they are not, like places of meeting,

For whispering lovers made.

The male satin bower-bird, in the garden at the Regent's Park, is
indefatigable in his assiduity toward the female; and his winning
ways to coax her into the bower conjure up the notion that the soul of
some Damon in the course of his transmigration, has found its way into
his elegant form. He picks up a brilliant feather, flits about with it
before her, and when he has caught her eye adds it to the decorations.

Haste, my Nanette, my lovely maid,
Haste to the bower thy swain has made.

No enchanted prince could act the deferential lover with more delicate or
graceful attention. Poor fellow, the pert, intruding sparrows plague him
abominably; and really it becomes almost an affair of police that some
measures should be adopted for their exclusion. He is subject to fits,
too, and suddenly, without the least apparent warning, falls senseless,
like an epileptic patient; but presently recovers, and busies himself
about the bower. When he has induced the female to enter it, he seems
greatly pleased; alters the disposition of a feather or a shell, as if
hoping that the change may meet her approbation; and looks at her as she
sits coyly under the overarching twigs, and then at the little
arrangement which he has made, and then at her again, till one could
almost fancy that one hears him breathe a sigh. He is still in his
transition dress, and has not yet donned his full Venetian suit of black.

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