Collingwood

“ With the same dauntless courage with which he had faced existence he now accepted the knowledge that this day—the thought of which had sustained him through loneliness and battle and tempest—was to prove the day of his death. History indeed presents few events of an irony more profound. At sunset on March 6th, Collingwood set sail for England; at sunset on the 7th, he lay dead, and that fortitude with which he met a fate, the harshness of which must have cruelly enhanced his bodily anguish, presents to all time a sublime ending to a sublime career. ”

“ Think of the job that is in front of you! Just one more: something for old time's sake. Aren't you unhappy? Who cares, anyhow?”
Collingwood, desperately pressed, went over to the window. The sky was now filled with sparkling stars. Stars and clover blossoms, clean things. He looked up at the stars, then down at the clover which he held in his hand. ”

“ Collingwood answered to this name in Yokohama. He stepped into the private office. The consul was writing. When he had finished his letter and signed it, he looked up.
“So it's you, Mr. Randolph?” he said ironically, “I suppose you've been all the way to America and back since I last saw you.”
“I spent that money on a carouse,” replied Collingwood simply. “I wound up in Singapore.”
“You're frank about it, anyhow. Well, I can do nothing more for you. The ring you left as security isn't worth a hundred dollars. ”

“ The result of the battle of Trafalgar, and the expense at which it was purchased, are well known. On the death of Nelson, Collingwood assumed the supreme command; and by his skill and judgment greatly contributed to the preservation of the British ships, as well as of those which were captured from the enemy. He was raised to the peerage as Baron Collingwood of Coldburne and Heathpool, and received the thanks of both Houses of Parliament, with a pension of £2000 per annum. ”

“ He married Arabella, daughter of General John Calcraft of Cholderton, Hants., on the 9th of Sept., 1820, and left one son and two daughters. By Royal License he had assumed the name and arms of Collingwood in 1816, pursuant to the will of his great uncle, the Edward Collingwood mentioned above, who left him the Collingwood estates. On the death of his only son Edward, in 1868, the elder daughter Arabel, married to the Rev. Robert Gordon Calthrop, became possessed of the estates, and by Royal License dated April 3rd, 1868, they assumed the surname and arms of Collingwood only. ”

“ The sleeping echoes, for ages undisturbed in that lonely room, awoke, surprised and resentful, for they flung back the challenge hollowly. “I will!” said Collingwood again, bringing his fist down upon the trunk fiercely. Then he bowed his head on his arms and sobbed: “I will, I will, I will!”
By and by he got upon his feet, heavily. He drew the chair up to the table and contemplated the flag-pin and the clover. America! He was going to take this half-wrecked body and make it straight and strong again, then he was going to give it.
“All right, old girl,” he whispered; “I'm coming. ”

“ If Yale could hold her own till near the end Collingwood hoped to win by a spurt. Outside of Merriwell, he felt that the crew was in perfect condition. [Pg 210] He was sure the men were superior to those in the Harvard boat.
Harvard begins to gain. That strong, steady stroke is telling. It looks as if the crimson lads were going to pull away from the blue with ease.
Collingwood does not allow himself to get excited in the least. He keeps his men steadily at work, husbanding their strength as far as possible. ”

“ Mac was to go to Manila with the Collingwoods, started to say something, bestowed upon the lady an unfriendly glance, and somewhat pointedly asked Mrs. Collingwood if she was going to join the bridge game after dinner. [263]
Charlotte smiled across the table at her husband. “Not unless I’m actually needed,” she replied.
“You hate it so badly, you’ll have to be excused,” Collingwood said. “Better let Kingsnorth take you for a stroll. You need exercise and his temper needs sweetening. He has been in a devilish mood all day.” ”

“ FROM MRS. SOMERVILLE TO W. GREIG, ESQ.
Collingwood, 1st January, 1848.
... You can more easily conceive than I can describe the great kindness and affection which we have received from both Sir John and Lady Herschel; I feel [Pg 290] a pride and pleasure beyond what I can express in having such friends. Collingwood is a house by itself in the world, there certainly is nothing like it for all that is great and good. The charm of the conversation is only equalled by its variety—every subject Sir John touches turns to doubly refined gold ”

“ Collingwood travels about a great deal—always has done,—and he first met Peggy when she was a flapper of fifteen at old Grainger's place near Chantilly—old Grainger used to run horses a lot in France.
"Collingwood has always been an extraordinary sort of chap; he was then, it appears. Like any other young man of great wealth, he found everything done for him, anything he liked ready to his hand, and simply let himself go. When Peggy's father died, Colling was going it hell-for-leather—just about as fast as they're made. ”

“ Then he gave a rather searching glance at Pauline. "But surely M. Collingwood knows the Continent?" he asked.
The maid gave an almost imperceptible start, and went up to the fireplace, where she began to pull about the flowers in one of the vases. "Oh yes, I think so," she answered, in a voice which strove to appear quite indifferent to the question.
"Well, I can tell you," the waiter went on—"I can tell you that M. Collingwood knows the Continent as well as a Cook's agent. He's always travelling about. You can see his name in the Riviera lists, in the Paris Daily Mail or the New York Herald. ”

“ Collingwood turned his hand over this way and that, speculatively. “It is not very clean.”
The girl laughed happily. The tears in her eyes twinkled for a moment, trembled and went back. “I shall be very proud to shake your hand.” With her small white hand in his grimy, calloused one, she added: “One's country; to love it and to die for it if need be!” ”

“ After all, a rich wife isn't a despicable thing, nowadays. You've seen this young lady?"
"I've been there once," asserted Collingwood.
"Go again—before you leave," counselled Eldrick. "You're just the right man. Listen to the counsels of the wise! And while you're in India, think well over my other advice. I tell you there's a career for you, here in the North, that you'd never get in town."
Collingwood left him and went out—to find a motorcar and drive off to Normandale Grange, not because Eldrick had advised him to go, but because of his promise to Harper and Nesta Mallathorpe. ”

“ If Collingwood did not have all the requisites of a woman’s ideal of her husband, he had at least three-fourths of them; and Mrs. Collingwood was enough of a philosopher (little as she liked being told so) not to cavil at the missing quarter when they were hurrying away from the conditions that made that quarter vital.
The coastguard steamer skirted the coast of Mindoro and then turned her nose westward. The next day, she crept up under the pinnacled heights of Peñon de Coron in a jade-green sea, and entered the channel between Coron and Bushuanga. ”

“ Collingwood experienced much kind treatment from the kinsman under whose protection he embarked on his career of duty and renown. He afterward confessed the obligations he owed to Admiral Braithwaite in the acquirement of professional knowledge. But the sage, meditative, and energetic seaman, was far from trusting to the aid or inspiration of others in his triumphant struggle. He thought earnestly, and labored diligently, for himself. He steadily practiced that self-culture which he ever strongly and perseveringly recommended to others. ”

“ Collingwood’s dog, Bounce, was on board the Royal Sovereign at Trafalgar, tied up out of the way below, in comparative safety, on the orlop deck. According to Collingwood himself, Bounce did not like cannon firing. Wrote Collingwood about him, before the battle: “Bounce is my only pet now, and he is indeed a good fellow; he sleeps by the side of my cot, whenever I lie in one, until near the time of tacking, and then marches off, to be out of the hearing of the guns, for he is not reconciled to them [263] yet.” ”

“ The passengers were all seated in the cars, the locomotive had its steam up, when a telegram came to say that there could be no train before four o’clock.
Collingwood is a collection of unpainted houses built in the sand, most dreary and uninviting in its aspect. Norman and his mother, and Alfred Scarborough, walked through its streets. The stores are shaded by evergreens, stuck in the ground, to afford a temporary shade. ”

“ Collingwood thanked him and went off. He had travelled down from London by the earliest morning train, and leaving his portmanteau at the hotel of the Barford terminus, had gone straight to Eldrick & Pascoe's office; accordingly this was his first visit to the shop in Quagg Alley. But he knew the shop and its surroundings well enough, though he had not been in Barford for some time; he also knew Antony Bartle's old housekeeper, Mrs. Clough, a rough and ready Yorkshirewoman, who had looked after the old man as long as he, Collingwood, could remember. ”

“ Yellow men and brown men and white men swarmed hither and thither and yon. The roar of the furnaces and ventilators, the never-ending slither of the coal, the shouts, the dust, the thud-thud of the engines, the greasy sheet-iron flooring, the insupportable heat—through it all Collingwood plodded on He was lifting himself by his boot-straps. There was one ceaseless thought: to make his body straight and strong, and then to give it to his country. ”

“ Collingwood seemed a travesty upon the once easy courtesy of the well-born Briton. As for Charlotte, she stiffened perceptibly. Try as she would, she could not overcome her proud resentment at being expected to associate with John Kingsnorth.
“Any special plans for to-day, Mrs. Collingwood?” Kingsnorth demanded as they sat down to breakfast.
“There never are any, I believe. I am going to make a lemon pie under the direct supervision of Mrs. Maclaughlin. My husband has impressed it upon me that I can never fulfil his ideal of a cook till I can make such lemon pies as Mrs. Maclaughlin does.” ”

“ ON DITS FROM YORKSHIRE, LONDON AND RAMSGATE Three years before his death, in the midst of the stress and labour which was undermining his bodily strength, Collingwood had written with regard to this same wearing anxiety—"My astonishment is to find that in England this does not seem to enter into the minds of the people, or at least not to interrupt their gaieties. England on the verge of ruin requires the care of all; but when that all is divided and contending for power, then it is that the foundation shakes." ”

“ Nelson, with the instinct of genius, intended the Fleet to anchor, turning the very dangers of the shoals of Trafalgar into a security. Collingwood, simply a naval machine, and never having been his own master all his life, and not92 being a genius, thought a shoal was a thing to be avoided, and, consequently, wrecked the ships unfitted to cope with a gale, and so to weather these shoals! Collingwood ought to have had the moon given him for his crest, for all his glory was reflected from Nelson, the sun of glory! Collingwood was an old woman!
History is a record of exploded ideas. ”

“ My name,” raising my hat and bowing, “is Harry Collingwood, and I am the owner of the small craft now hanging on astern. This,” indicating Bob, who took off his hat and made a most elaborate “scrape,” “is my friend and well-tried shipmate, Robert Trunnion, who, with myself, will do all we can to make you comfortable on board the cutter, and will stand by you to the death if need be, until we have placed you in perfect safety.” ”

“ Collingwood," said Nesta.
Collingwood went away with that last intimation warm in his memory. He had an idea that the girl meant what she said—and for a moment he was sorry that he was going to India. He might have settled down at Barford there and then, and—but at that he laughed at himself.
"A young woman with several thousands a year of her own!" he said. "Of course, she'll marry some big pot in the county. They feel a little lonely, those two, just now, because everything's new to them, and they're new to their changed circumstances. ”

“ A relationship, similar to that which influenced the fortunes of his mighty compeer, seems to have guided Collingwood in his selection of a career. Captain Braithwaite, who afterward rose to the rank of admiral, had married the boy’s aunt. That officer then commanded the “Shannon,” and it was resolved to place the young aspirant under his care and protection. A touching and interesting glimpse of his earliest experience on board is afforded as he sat on the deck, sad at heart, and with tears in his eyes, which flowed more rapidly as he gazed through them at the shore. ”

“ The only personal description of Collingwood’s [261] appearance in existence is from the pen of a young officer (Midshipman Crawford, of the Royal George) who had an audience of him, to present a letter of introduction, in October, 1806, just a year after Trafalgar:
“Being provided with a letter of recommendation to Lord Collingwood, the Commander-in-Chief, I took an early opportunity to wait upon his Lordship.... ”

“ Returning to Liverpool he became senior physician of the Northern Hospital and took a leading part in the intellectual life of the city. In 1876-7 he travelled in Palestine and Egypt. Collingwood was through life a prominent member of the New Church (Swedenborgian) . ”