Jacky

“ Jacky was a smart Yankee lad, and was always remarkable for his dislike of staying at home, and a love of lounging upon the wharves, where the sailors used to tell him stories about sea-life. Jacky was always a little fellow. The country people, who did not much like the sea, or encourage Jacky's fondness for it, used to say, that he took so much salt air and tar smoke into his lungs that it stopped his growth. The boys used to call him Little Jacket. ”

“ Mrs Brown, a woman of powerful frame and strong mind, could not turn Jacky from his purpose—it was not likely, therefore, that an amiable milk-and-water boy, in a state of exhaustion, could do it. Jacky swung the basket over his shoulder with an amount of exertion that made him stagger, and, commanding Peter to follow, marched up the hill with compressed lips and knitted brows. ”

“ Jacky fixed his eyes on the house with the stare of one who regarded it as his last and only refuge, and ran as he had never done before, roaring while he ran.
“She’s a clever callant,” observed the drover with a grim smile, as he turned to follow his cattle.
Meanwhile the Sudberry Family reached the White House in the midst of increasing rain and mists and muttering thunder. Of course Jacky’s absence was at once discovered. Of course the females screamed and the males shouted, while they turned the mail-coach entirely inside out in a vain search for the lost one. ”

“ Speak, boy, whilst yet there is time!’
‘I’ve nothing to say,’ says Jacky sulkily; he is naturally of a somewhat morose disposition, and now feels positively ill at not being able to divulge the delightful story of which these glowing cherries are the result.
‘Susan, I do believe you have at last got an admirer,’ says Carew, in the complimentary tone of the orthodox brother, who never can understand why on earth any fellow can admire his sister. ‘Come! out with it; he seems a sensible fellow, any way. ”

“ It was an epoch in the mental development of Jacky—it was a new sensation to the child. Hitherto he had known nothing but the feeling of dependence. Up to this point he had been compelled by the force of circumstances to look up to everyone—and, alas! he had done so with a very bad grace. He had never known what it was to help any one. His mother had thoroughly spoiled him. Strange infatuation in the mother! She had often blamed the boy for spoiling his toys; but she had never blamed herself for spoiling the boy. “Darling Jacky! don’t ask the child to do anything for you—he’s too young yet.” ”

“ Warner asked severely.
"Mine gibit all them things to Julia," reiterated Jacky. "She no good."
Mrs. Warner knitted her brows.
"You not telling me truth, Jacky," she said. "I send you to boss unless you do."
"Mine thinkit always tell truth," said Jacky. "That pfeller God him kill Jacky if not tell truth. Jacky very good black pfeller." He beamed on his mistress in a childlike fashion.
A tall man strode into the kitchen verandah—a stockman, so bronzed that he might almost have been taken for a native. ”

“ LITTLE Jack Horner Sat in a corner, Eating a Christmas pie; He put in his thumb, And pulled out a plum, And said, "What a good boy am I!"
HEIGH, diddle, diddle, The cat and the fiddle, The cow jumped over the moon; The little dog laughed To see such sport, And the dish ran away with the spoon.
[101]
ROBIN and Richard were two pretty men; They lay in bed till the clock struck ten; Then up starts Robin, and looks in the sky, Oh! brother Richard, the sun's very high!
SEE, saw, Margery Daw, Jacky shall have a new master; Jacky must have but a penny a day, Because he can't work any faster. ”

“ So Jacky was never asked to help any one in any way, except by Mrs Brown, who did not “ask,” but commanded, and, although she never rewarded obedience with the laurel, either literally or figuratively, she invariably punished disobedience with the palm. Little Tilly always did everything she wanted done herself; and could never do enough for Jacky, so that she afforded no opportunity for her brother to exercise amiable qualities. Thus was Jacky trained to be a selfish little imp, and to this training he superadded the natural wickedness of his own little heart. ”

“ On one occasion, and on one occasion only, Dorcas appears to have acted kindly. Two miners, who for distinction’s sake we will call Martin and Jacky, were at work in their end, and at the time busily at work “beating the borer.”
The name of Jacky was distinctly uttered between the blows. He stopped and listened—all was still. They proceed with their task: a blow on the iron rod.—“Jacky.” Another blow.—“Jacky.” They pause—all is silent. “Well, thee wert called, Jacky,” said Martin, “go and see.” ”

“ Just as they jumped up Jacky rushed in still yelling with his whole throat. 'What's the matter—what's wrong!' 'Oh I saw the divel!' 'No you didn't, you fool, 'twas something else you saw.' 'No it wasn't, 'twas the divel I saw—didn't I know him well!' 'How did you know him—did you see his horns?' 'I didn't: he had no horns—he was a mwail divel—sure that's how I knew him!' They ran out of course; but the mwail divel was gone, leaving behind him, standing up against the turf-rick, the black little Maol Kerry cow. ”

“ No, he couldn't make Jacky see this; being hot at the time Jacky could not feel the cold to come. Jacky became a hanger-on of George, and if he did little he cost little; and if a beast strayed he was invaluable, he could follow the creature for miles by a chain of physical evidence no single link of which a civilized man would have seen.
A quantity of rain having fallen and filled all the pools, George thought he would close with an offer that had been made him and swap one hundred and fifty sheep for cows and bullocks. He mentioned this intention to McLaughlan one Sunday evening. ”

“ I'm going against the whole world, Jacky.
"That's what I am, Jacky. I don't take any heed of what anyone says. I just go straight forward, I do. That's always been my way. I'm not one of your weak knock-kneed chaps. If a woman's in trouble, I don't leave her in the lurch. ”

“ I'll go. It will be better for me to go." And slipping over the ledge, he dropped down beside the unconscious boy. In another minute he was rubbing the cold hands, rousing the dormant senses. Presently Jacky spoke, and with a shout of delight the big foreman lifted the boy in his huge arms, and, struggling up the uneven ledge, he shouted, "He's all O.K., Tom—just kind of laid out, but still in the fight."
With the familiar voice in his ears, Jacky's senses returned, for, lifting his head, he cried, "Oh, Mr. Duncan, did Grey-Boy take the lantern to the danger-spot?" ”

“ For Tommy and Jacky Caffrey were twins, scarce four years old and very noisy and spoiled twins sometimes but for all that darling little fellows with bright merry faces and endearing ways about them. They were dabbling in the sand with their spades and buckets, building castles as children do, or playing with their big coloured ball, happy as the day was long. And Edy Boardman was rocking the chubby baby to and fro in the pushcar while that young gentleman fairly chuckled with delight. ”

“ As a class, the United States Jacky is more contented, perhaps, than any other man of similar conditions. Unlike the soldier, he does [197] not even have to rough it very much, for wherever he goes he takes his house with him.
Jacky sleeps in a hammock strung upon hooks to the beams of the deck above him. When he turns out, he lashes his hammock with its lashing, and stores it in the nettings,—the troughs for the purpose at the sides of the ship,—where it must stay until night. If Jack wants to sleep in the meanwhile, he chooses the softest spot he can find on a steel-clad deck ”

“ Where, in the old days, ignorance and all its accompanying evils held sway over the mind of poor Jack, and made him a prey to superstition and imagination, to-day, by dint of careful training of brain as well as body, he has become a thinking creature of power and force of mind. He knows in a general way the working of the great mechanical contrivances; and in the fights that are to come, as well as those that have been, he will show that the metal the American Jacky is made of rings true and stands well the trial by fire. ”

“ I tell you, Jacky Jingle,
I do not care a fig.
[Pg 305] "I have got a puppy-dog,
And a pussy-cat,
And I have got another thing
That's better far than that.
"For I have got a velvet purse
That holds a hundred pound,
'Twas left me by my grand-dad
Who now lies underground.
"So if your cow and pig
Is all you have in store,
You may go home and mind 'em,
For now your wooing's o'er."
Says Jacky, "You're too hasty,
I've got a horse and cart;
And I have got a better thing,—
I've got a constant heart. ”

“ The exasperating little brats of twins began to quarrel again and Jacky threw the ball out towards the sea and they both ran after it. Little monkeys common as ditchwater. Someone ought to take them and give them a good hiding for themselves to keep them in their places, the both of them. And Cissy and Edy shouted after them to come back because they were afraid the tide might come in on them and be drowned.
— Jacky! Tommy! ”

“ One day Jacky Jacky’s ship came into a little bay on the mainland for water, and then my enterprising friend, watching his opportunity, struck inland for home and liberty, accompanied by several other companions in misery. These latter the coast natives promptly speared, but Jacky Jacky escaped, thanks probably to his knowledge of the white man’s wiles. He soon reached the more friendly mountain tribes in the interior, where he was received as a man and a brother. You see, he had stolen a revolver from his late masters, and this mysterious weapon created great terror among his new friends. ”

“ After a severe cackle on both sides the voices began to calm down like water going off the boil, and presently soft low gutturals passed in pleasant modulation. Then the eldest male savage made a courteous signal to Jacky that he should sit down and gnaw. Jacky on this administered three kicks among the gins and sent them flying, then down he sat and had a gnaw at their beef—George's beef, I mean. The rage of hunger appeased, he rose, and with the male savages took the open country. ”

“ Then George showed Jacky how he had given Abner one-third of all his sheep and cattle, and Jacky two-thirds, and how McLaughlan, a just man, would see the division made. “And do leave the woods, except for a hunt now and then, Jacky; you are too good for them.” ”

“ Jacky, the ostler, is delicately chaffed as he leads out a refractory grey through the archway, and recommended to take an inside place, with various other scraps of Joe Miller left by him in the country.
As Jacky waxes wrath, a policeman approaches to receive the same fate; but the man in blue is too dignified to heed farm-yokels, and leaves them to their merriment. “Aunt Sallies” and “niggers” were unaccountably absent, but only to give the fair a more old-world look still. ”

“ Jacky yawned and threw a spear carelessly. It went close by but did not hit it.
“Didn't I tell you so?” said George. “I'd stand before him and his spears all day with nothing but a cricket-stump in my hand, and never be hit, and never brag, neither.” Jacky showed his ivories. “When I down at Sydney white man put up a little wood and a bit of white money for Jacky. Then Jacky throw straight a good deal.”
“Now hark to that! black skin or white skin 'tis all the same; we can't do our best till we are paid for it. Don't you encourage him, Tom, I won't have it.” ”

“ I remember that I got up and went out of the low window on to the porch, looking down at the quiet dun shadows and the slope of yellowed grass leading to the river, while Jacky and the boy kept up a hurly-burly conversation about soldier-crabs [Pg 3] that tore each other's legs off, and purple and pink sea-roses that ate raw meat, and sea-spiders like specks of blood in the rocks. My husband laughed once or twice, helping Jacky out with her natural history. ”

“ And the white man looked helplessly up to the black savage, who had learned to read the small type of Nature's book and he had not.
Jacky hung his head. “White fellow's eyes always shut; black fellow's always open. We pass here before and Jacky look for water—look for everything. No water here. But,” said he languidly, “Jacky will go up high tree and look a good deal.” Selecting the highest tree near he chopped a staircase and went up it almost as quickly as a bricklayer mounts a ladder with a hod. At the top he crossed his thighs over the stem, and there he sat full half an hour ”

“ When "The Man" declared that next fall Jacky was to go to school, regularly, and not according to his own sweet will, Jacky waited until he was alone with his mother to kick and scream and say he wouldn't. Lily slapped him, and said, "Mr. Curtis will give you a present if you're on time every morning!"
She told Maurice to what she had committed him: "You see, I'm bound to educate him, and make a gentleman of him, so he can have an automobile, and marry a society girl. No chippy is going to get Jacky—smoking cigarettes, and saying 'La! La!' to any man that comes along. I hate those cheap girls. ”

“ Sometimes both Jacky and the horse would go, and as a reward for his assistance old Andy would always lift the boy to the grey's back and let him ride home. Then one wet spring old Andy got rheumatism in his poor, twisted legs, and the first night he was unable to leave his shanty Jacky came whistling in at nightfall and offered to take the lantern up stream alone. Andy consented gratefully, and, with the horse at his heels, Jacky set out for the bank above the dangerous spot. ”