Fothergill

“ Fothergill's success in his profession was rapid and assured, especially after the publication of his ‘Account of the Sore Throat,’ which greatly advanced his reputation, and before many years he had one of the largest and most lucrative practices in the city. But outside professional pursuits he took a keen and persistent interest in science and philanthropy, and holding no public appointments was able to give to these objects all his spare time. His chief scientific interest was in botany, especially in the collection and cultivation of rare plants. ”

“ FOTHERGILL, JOHN (1712–1780) , English physician, was born of a Quaker family on the 8th of March 1712 at Carr End in Yorkshire. He took the degree of M.D. at Edinburgh in 1736, and after visiting the continent of Europe he in 1740 settled in London, where he gained an extensive practice. In the epidemics of influenza in 1775 and 1776 he is said to have had sixty patients daily. In his leisure he made a study of conchology and botany; and at Upton, near Stratford, he had an extensive botanical garden where he grew many rare plants obtained from various parts of the world. ”

“ Sometimes, at the abundant ‘spreads’ on the Thorsgarth or Red Gables boards, his sallow young face would take a faint glow, his deep-set black eyes would grow wistfully misty, but never a word betrayed the bareness of the board at home, nor the fact that his father might even then be asking a blessing upon a bowl of oatmeal-porridge, sole reward of a hard day’s work. For the living of Bradstane, although ancient, was not rich, and the parish priest’s own stipend was not a fat one. Judge, therefore, how exceeding short the curate must have come! ”

“ Then came the path on which Miss Wynter was walking, and beyond that a glade, sloping steeply down to where Tees flowed by in one of his many curves.
Gilbert saw a dark, close cap of velvet, and a pale face which drooped somewhat beneath it, a long, fur-bordered mantle tightly clipped around the wearer’s form, the bottom of a crimson kilting peeped beneath it, and a pair of small, well-shod feet. Her back was turned to him, and he stopped and looked over the palings till she turned, lifted her head, and saw him. She gave a little start. ”

“ Fothergill, being three years older, was less exhausted; but he knew that he, too, could not support his sufferings for many days longer. Their bodies were covered with sores, and try as they would they were able to catch only a few minutes' sleep at a time, so much did the bamboo bars hurt their wasted limbs.
They seldom exchanged a word during the daytime, suffering in silence the persecutions to which they were exposed; but at night they talked about their homes and friends in England, and their comrades on board ship, seldom saying a word as to their present position. ”

“ While Joseph Banks was gone to fetch the papers, I intimated to Dr. Fothergill, that, the shells and other curiosities not having been returned me according to promise, it was proper to take notice of it now, and that, unless they were re-turned, I would not sign the receipt. But to this intimation Dr. Fothergill hastily replied, "No, no ; thou seest he is now in a passion, and it will be improper to " speak of them;" adding, that he placed so much confidence in Joseph Banks’s integrity, that he would answer for the return of at least the greatest part of them. ”

“ Sara looked after him dreamily. ‘What does he mean?’ she speculated. ‘But I know. He finds a change in me; and I am changed, even to myself. Sometimes I think the old spirit has completely left me, and yet how can that be? It will all come right again, I suppose. But I wish—I wish it might be soon.’
She sighed as she put down her palette, and sat down before her easel in the chair which Wilhelmi had lately occupied, and, amid the profound stillness of the quiet afternoon, let her thoughts wander off there where now they were for ever straying. ”

“ He assisted the production of important scientific works, such as those of Drury and Edwards, and he incurred the whole expense of printing a new translation of the Bible by Anthony Purver, a quaker. Fothergill took no part in current politics; but when troubles began to arise between England and the North American colonies, he made patriotic efforts to produce a better state of feeling. ”

“ Miss Fothergill's novels largely depict life on the moorland, in the factories of Lancashire and Yorkshire; but she combined with the fruits of her observation of the places where her life was mainly spent, enthusiastic descriptions of the influence of music. 'Cotton mills and music, manufacturing England and Germany' were the chief subjects of her pen (Novel Review, May 1892, p. 155) . Her plots were rather less satisfactorily devised than her studies of character, which were usually subtly and powerfully portrayed. ”

“ Avice Wellfield, beside her, looked like an inhabitant of another world. It was the first time she had been out anywhere since her father’s death; and her plain black frock and white crêpe ruffles at neck and wrists formed a pointed contrast to Luise’s flashing colours and glittering rings and chains and bangles. Avice had plaited her hair up into a coronet, which gave her an older, staider look. The girl was fulfilling, more and more every day, Sara’s prophecy to her brother, that she would one day be beautiful. ”

“ But so few persons visit Caldron Snout, so few tourists or picnickers care to be at the trouble of penetrating to it, that no road has got beaten out. Nature seems to sit enthroned in undesecrated queenliness in the fastnesses around the cataract.
It was a day that Michael and Eleanor never forgot. The children, literally frantic with the novelty and the wildness of the thing, and with the exhilarating moorland air, tore about in all directions—over heather and thyme, bluebells and boulders. ”

“ Our forefathers, speaking of a man’s death, said “he changed his life.” This is how Fothergill changed his life and died to Bloomsbury. One morning he made his way to the Whitechapel Road, and there he bought a barrow. The Whitechapel barrows are of all sizes, from the barrow wheeled about by a boy with half a dozen heads of cabbages to barrows drawn by a tall pony, such as on Sundays take the members of a club to Epping Forest. They are all precisely the same in plan and construction, only in the larger sizes the handles develop or evolve into shafts ”

“ That is when a rose is more beautiful than at any other time. It is just like you,’ he added, drawing it from the jar, and shaking the water from it. ‘And now, Sara, what of the future?’ he added, drawing her to him. ‘Why do you always look at me as if you were half-afraid of me?’ he added, gazing down into her fascinated eyes. ‘Avice never does. Yours is not “perfect love” if it has not cast out fear.’
‘Avice—you will never have the same rights over Avice that you have already over me,’ she replied, tremulously.
Jerome smiled. The sensation he felt was not one of displeasure. ”

“ I sometimes walk down to it, to look at it, and think what a folly it was. “Langstroth’s 41Folly,” it ought to be called. Townend Mills is the name it actually bears. There it is!’ as the moon shone out brightly for a few minutes, and showed the dark mass of the factories rising almost directly in front of them.
‘You’re a queer one!’ said Otho, not without a kind of admiration in his tones. ‘Where’s the sense of fretting yourself by coming and looking at it? It’s like trying to heal a raw by scraping.’
‘Your simile would be just, if I did irritate myself,’ replied Gilbert, gently. ”

“ It was afternoon of the following day. Sara was much in the same state–no stronger, no weaker. She saw, with something like apathy, how Wilhelmi, his wife, and Luise came into her room together, spoke to her, and seated themselves side by side.
She had a faint remembrance that Rudolf had said something about witnesses; she was not quite sure what it all meant, but no doubt it was right. Falkenberg was there too, seated beside her, and, in an unconscious appeal to his protecting power, she had moved her hand into his, and then lay back in her chair, silent and indifferent. ”

“ Eleanor liked it. She liked the windows looking into the broad open street. Such a prospect seemed to bring her nearer to humanity, and to the wholesome everyday life of her fellow-creatures. The recollection of Thorsgarth, rising stately from its basement of velvet sward, rendered dark by the towering trees which surrounded it,—of the terraces sloping to the river; the flights of steps, the discoloured marble fauns and nymphs—this recollection came over her, and made her feel dreary. She felt as if she had lived in it all for years, and had no joy in any one of them. ”

“ I fancy Gilbert was a bit taken with you, Eleanor. He was mighty particular about his message.’
‘You fancy very uncalled-for things.’
‘Hey, but I wouldn’t mind having him for a brother-in-law,’ persisted Otho; but he was too careless even to look at her as he aired his views. ‘A first-rate fellow is Gilbert, and he has rid me of those blessed factories, and stumped up like a man. ”

“ Avice laughed and said: ‘It would have to be a very clever governess, Jerome.’
‘But not old and ugly, or I could not possibly learn from her; and yet, if she were young and handsome, I might fall in love with her. Upon my word, I think I should like to have a governess, Avice. Shall we see about it?’
‘How ridiculous you are! Since I have had you, I don’t care so much about a governess. How horribly frightened of you I was, before I saw you. Papa used to pinch my ear sometimes when he wanted to tease me, and say, “I wonder what Hieronymus will say when he first sees you—little interloper!” ”

“ A dreary blank seemed to open before her mind’s eye, and still she sat motionless, staring into the fire.
‘Michael is my lover—he does love me, too. He is the only friend I have, for no one is fond of me. If they were kind to me, and really cared for me, I would not take their Otho Askam away from them. I wonder if they know what he is, this creature that they make such a fuss about! Perhaps there would be no fuss if he were dancing attendance on any one but me—fuss, of course there would be no fuss. Gilbert and I know what he is. He has not been able to conceal his miserableness from us. ”

“ Yet it was with strange feelings that she found herself again here, on a bleak, sad December afternoon. There was no snow, but the temperature had been falling all day; a bitter east wind was blowing; a sullen, leaden sky, against which the body of the cathedral and the rugged shape of the old Heidenthurm showed out black and mournful. The hills looked dark and sad; the aspect of the whole fair land was changed.
It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when they arrived. Sara, very weary, stayed in her room to rest. ”

“ For I ask myself, Cui bono?”
“Like me,” I could not help saying.
He added:
“Fräulein May, the nearest feeling I have had to happiness has been the knowing you. Do you know that you are a person who makes joy?”
“No, indeed I did not.”
“It is true, though. I should like, if you do not mind—if you can say it truly—to hear from your lips that you look upon me as your friend.”
“Indeed, Herr von Francius, I feel you my very best friend, and I would not lose your regard for anything,” I was able to assure him. ”

“ Shall I go straight to Elberthal and send a drosky here for you, or will you try to walk home?”
“Oh, I will walk. I am sure it would be the best—if—do you think it would?”
“Do you feel equal to it? is the question,” he answered, and I was surprised to see that though I was looking hard at him he did not look at me, but only into the glass he held.
“Yes,” said I. “And they say that people who have been nearly drowned should always walk; it does them good.”
“In that case then,” said he, repressing a smile, “I should say it would be better for you to try. ”

“ I will not deprecate such generosity. I take you at your word. Teach her only to be a little like yourself, and I shall find her perfect.’
‘You will bring her to me to-morrow morning, will you not, before you go away? [180] What a joy it will be to have her! I know I shall love her, and I think I can make her love me; and it will bind your thoughts the faster to Elberthal,’ she added, looking at him with a tender smile.
Jerome took one of her hands, and sat with it in his, as Sara closed her eyes, and leaned back in her chair, wearied with the excess of emotion she had gone through. ”

“ He does nothing but what is good and right,” said I.
“Oh, of course! But I can’t tell the reason. I think and think about it.” He put his hand wearily to his head. “They never speak of him. Once I said something about him. It was at a great dinner they had. Aunt Hildegarde turned quite pale, and Uncle Bruno called me to him and said—no one heard it but me, you know—‘Never let me hear that name again!’ and his eyes looked so fierce. I’m tired of this place,” he added, mournfully. [Pg 333] “I want to be at Elberthal again—at the Wehrhahn, with my father and Friedhelm and Karl Linders. ”

“ Friedhelm went off, shrugging his dear old shoulders, and I at last turned up, mooning at the Kölner Bahnof. Well—you know the rest. Nay, do not turn so angrily away. Try to forgive a fallen man one little indiscretion. When I saw you I can not tell what feeling stole warm and invigorating into my heart; it was something quite new—something I had never felt before: it was so sweet that I could not part with it. Fräulein May, I have lived that afternoon over again many and many a time. ”

“ His very first words only heightened her uneasiness.
‘I hope you did not think me too officious in sending for the violets,’ he said in a low voice.
Magdalen lowered her paper, and gave him a look, which he received and returned; and, with a dark expression on her face, she resumed her ostensible occupation. Perhaps Gilbert knew all about what had passed, and was mocking her futile efforts to appear unconcerned. Magdalen had always felt that Gilbert’s sin and hers had had such very unequally meted rewards. ”