Keighley

“ In fact, nothing can be more opposed than the state of society, the modes of thinking, the standards of reference on all points of morality, manners, and even politics and religion, in such a new manufacturing place as Keighley in the north, and any stately, sleepy, picturesque cathedral town in the south. ”

“ It was Jonas Moore and Joe Town who induced him to give a public lecture on his travels. An elaborate bill was prepared, “almost as big as a house side,” informing the burgesses of Keighley that Mr James Leach would give “three nights’ lectures in the Temperance Hall, on his life and travels in London during his six weeks’ commission from the Local Board of Health.” A few frequenters of the barber’s shop in the Market-place suggested that Mr (now Sir) Isaac Holden should be asked to take the chair. Mr Holden was accordingly communicated with, and came down to Keighley in his carriage ”

“ The next four years are spent at Keighley, Bradford, and Leeds in Yorkshire. When at Keighley he “travelled” [66] for a time with Wesley, and had an opportunity of observing the way in which that sainted man wholly devoted his gifts, his time, and his money to the service of God and his fellow-men. Wesley’s stipend from the Society in London was £30 a year, but the sale of books, the generosity of the friends at Bristol, and occasional preaching fees and sundry legacies, brought his yearly income up to £1000 or £1200 ”

“ Behind him Keighley said:
“Between the boys o’ the soap-works fightin’ the boys o’ the brew’ry, an’ Chief Dolger scrappin’ with Depaty Hencks, there ain’t much left o’ Nohunk.”
Noonan did not reply.
Keighley took a turn around the deck. When he came back to the stern, he said: “Them days is past fer us, Tim. We don’t wear red shirts nowadays. We don’t elect our Chief. We [Pg 183] get a day’s pay fer a day’s work. An’ we got no use fer politics.” ”

“ Now do not imagine for a moment that Giles Clumps is the p. 129only “So be I” in Keighley, for the whole town is full of “So be I’s,” and it is a well-known fact that if six long yellow chimneys were to turn blue to-morrow, there wouldn’t be a Liberal in six hours in the city of “So be I’s,” with the exception of the old veteran Squire Leach. ”

“ The governor of the asylum asked me who the old gentleman was, and I told him he was “James Leach, Esquire, a Guardian, from Keighley.” “He’s a funny fellow,” said the governor, “I couldn’t tell whether he was coming in as a patient or not.” By way of re-assurance I told the governor that Mr Leach had had a stroke, which rather accounted for his “acting funny.” The other members of the deputation had now arrived, and the whole were shown into a private room. There the Guardians sat as a Board, with Mr Middlebrook as chairman, and the thirty-six lunatics from the Keighley Union were brought in. ”

“ Many are the happy hours we have spent together on the stage. His letter says he is in California, where he is occupying a good situation as registrar of a town of about 10,000 inhabitants. He says he has left off acting and wishes to know if I have done the same; and he also inquires after many of his old Keighley friends. This sentence leads me to refer to a few more of my own friends in the days of yore. There is the Rev William Thawbrey, a Wesleyan Methodist minister at Keighley, who subsequently took up work in the mission field in South Africa. ”

“ The acting-chief left [Pg 142] his nozzle and went forward dazedly.
“All right, chief!” Keighley called to him. “We got her beat.”
Moran sat down weakly on the bulwarks and wiped his face. “Gee!” he said. “I’m done out. Phew!”
He sat there, unnoticed, until the last flicker of the blaze had been stamped out; then, knowing that the shore companies would be waiting his orders to return to their houses, he went to Keighley. “All right, captain,” he said gruffly. “The men ashore can finish this. Let me off here, and go back to your quarters.”
Keighley nodded. “All right, boys,” he cried. ”

“ Keighley admitted, unabashed. “But he’s left off makin trouble.”
“Now listen to me, Dan,” Borden broke out. “I’ve come back to the department and I’m counting up my friends. Those that ain’t with me are against me. That’s the way I look at it.... You know as well as I do [Pg 242] that if I don’t pound these men, they’ll think I’m afraid of them—and they’ll get to work and knife me.”
“Well—that’s true, too,” Keighley reflected. He glanced up at the Jersey shore and down at the deck again. “I wish yuh’d leave them be, though, chief. I got the best crew in the department, now.” ”

“ Good father and true-hearted shepherd,
Who knew both the poor and their ways.
SOME LAUGHABLE STORIES
In this, the last chapter, I should like to give a few anecdotes concerning an eccentric character who was pretty well known in the Keighley district, although he was a native of Flintergill, a village near Kendal. This individual was known as “Kendal,” “Flintergill Billy,” “Three bease an’ a Cow” &c. He was a warpdresser by trade, and for a time worked along with me at Messrs Butterfield Bros.’ Prospect Mill. ”

“ Acting-Chief Moran would be lenient with a “Jigger.”
“Yuh’ve been havin’ things pretty much yer own way around here,” Keighley said. “This’s where yuh take a drop. The Commissioner’s out, see? He quit this afternoon. Youse fullahs ’er goin’ to do what I say after this. If yuh go up to Headquarters, yuh don’t come back. Moran won’t save yuh. He’s got all he can do to save his own neck, now.”
“Shine” looked at the captain, and recognized that his game was up. “’Twasn’t my fault,” he said. “It was Doherty’s.” ”

“ Then what the hell’re yuh botherin’ me about it fer? I got enough to do t’ atten’ to my own bus’ness without pokin’ any nose into newspaper muddles. You atten’ to yer toutin’ an’ I’ll atten’ to my fires.”
“All right, captain,” the reporter called after him as he went out. “I’ll get that story yet.”
(And he got it, too. This is it!)
[Pg 151] XIV DURING that same day, Keighley received various hints, from various go-betweens, that the men in power were prepared to forgive and forget if he would take the first opportunity to “make himself solid” and come into the fold. ”

“ The dress of the Ceylonese women is really pretty: a skirt closely fitting the figure, and a tight jacket over the shoulders—all of fine, pure white cotton cloth or muslin and quite plain, with neither frill, tuck, flounce, nor anything of the kind. Necklaces and ear-rings are worn, but I am glad to say the nose in Ceylon seems to be preserved from the indignity of rings. The men's dress is rather scanty, their weakness being a large tortoise-shell comb, which every one wears; it reaches from ear to ear, and the hair is combed straight back and confined by it. ”

“ Good-morning, sir.”
Murray stood for a moment looking after the tall retreating figure of the old parson, and then turned to Gervase with a smile. “That smacks too much of dissent for the Governor ́s nose, Mr. Orme. There ́s a great heart in yon cassock but half of him is only a parson, after all. He would have us drilled from the pulpit steps, and no man may march but to the tune of the prayer-book. A very good tune too, but every man can ́t step to the time. But I wonder how it has gone with your old captain--I wouldn ́t lose Macpherson for a regiment.” ”

“ And now here I am, in daily charge of the mail-bags between Monistrol and Montserrat. A humble office you will say, but not ignoble. After the free life of Ceylon, with all its magnificent scenery, I felt it impossible to live shut up in a town, and especially requested this post might be given me. In the midst of this wild grandeur, which really somehow reminds me of parts of Ceylon, I am happy and contented. Bricks and mortar are my abomination; they weigh upon one's soul and crush out one's vital power. I love to breathe the morning air with the lark. ”

“ How different from Ceylon! There is a certain severity about India, both climate and people. The dry soil, the burning sun (for though so much farther north the sun has a more wicked quality about it here) , are matched by a certain aridity and tension in the people. Ceylon is idyllic, romantic—the plentiful foliage and shade everywhere, the easy-going nature of the Cinghalese themselves, the absence of caste—even the English are softened towards such willing subjects. ”

“ The ancient history of Ceylon is involved in much obscurity, but nevertheless we have sufficient data in the existing traces of its former population to form our opinions of the position and power which Ceylon occupied in the Eastern Hemisphere when England was in a state of barbarism. The wonderful remains of ancient cities, tanks and water-courses throughout the island all prove that the now desolate regions were tenanted by a multitude—not of savages, but of a race long since passed away, full of industry and intelligence. ”

“ A forest-covered country, peopled by a fierce race of savages clad in skins, bowing before druidical idolatry, paddling along our shores in frames of wickerwork and hide.
The ancient deities of Ceylon are in the same spots, unchanged; the stones of the Druids stand unmoved; but what has become of the nations? Those of the East have faded away and their strength has perished. Their ships are crumbled; the rude canoe glides over their waves; the spices grow wild in their jungles; and, unshorn and unclad, the inhabitants wander on the face of the land. ”

“ But strange indeed, where every thing seems strange, is the arrangement of this Ceylonese territory and people. Take a peach: what you call the flesh of the peach, the substance which you eat, is massed orbicularly around a central stone—often as large as a pretty large strawberry. Now in Ceylon, the central district, answering to this peach-stone, constitutes a fierce little Liliputian kingdom, quite independent, through many centuries, of the lazy belt, the peach-flesh, which swathes and enfolds it, and perfectly distinct by the character and origin of its population. ”

“ In the Ceylon legend all turns upon the inexhaustible series of ages which this pillar guarantees. But, as one inexhaustible is quite enough for one race of men, and you are sure of more by ineffable excess than you can use in any private consumption of your own, you become generous; 'and between friends,' you say, in accepting my apologies for the doubtful error as to the four cubits, 'what signifies an infinity more or less?'
For the Ceylonese legend is this, that once in every hundred years an angel visits this granite pillar. ”

“ A Ceylon night after a heavy shower of rain is a brilliant sight, when the whole atmosphere is teeming with moving lights bright as the stars themselves, waving around the tree-tops in fiery circles, now threading like distant lamps through the intricate branches and lighting up the dark recesses of the foliage, then rushing like a shower of sparks around the glittering boughs. ”

“ BROADBENT [modestly remonstrating] . Oh come! come!
KEEGAN. Yes, I assure you. You are an extremely interesting man. [He goes out] .
BROADBENT [enthusiastically] . What a nice chap! What an intelligent, interesting fellow! By the way, I'd better have a wash. [He takes up his coat and cap, and leaves the room through the inner door] .
Nora returns to her chair and shuts up the backgammon board. AUNT JUDY. Keegan's very queer to-day. He has his mad fit on him.
CORNELIUS [worried and bitter] . I wouldn't say but he's right after all. It's a contrairy world. ”

“ Kandy is termed by the Cingalese "Newera," as it was the capital of Ceylon and the residence of the king.
However wild the country may be, and in many portions unvisited by Europeans, still every high mountain and every little plain in this wilderness of forest is not only known to the natives of the adjacent low country, but has its separate designation. There is no feature of the country without its name, although the immense tracts of mountain are totally uninhabited, and the nearest villages are some ten or twelve miles distant, between two and three thousand feet below. ”

“ The scientific researches of all kinds, which have in modern days been instituted in Ceylon, have been attended with the most important results, bearing upon its history and its various tribes, as well as on its natural wealth; and the masterly and marvellous work Sir Emerson Tennent lately published on the isle of Ceylon, seems intended to compensate for many instances of neglect which Ceylon and its inhabitants have experienced from the English since they seized on it. ”

“ We took a stroll there this afternoon, and found it delightful; every few hundred yards there are seats where you may sit and look at the scenery, and from some of the points you can look for miles over the lovely valleys and the hills covered with trees clear up to their summits.
"Kandy is the capital of Ceylon, and it is to this fact that it owes the great number of charming walks and drives; nearly every road and path bears the name of Lady Somebody or other, and there are so many of them that the list becomes tiresome after a while. ”

“ Richard Keigwin was the third son of Richard Keigwin, of Penzance, and of his wife Margaret, daughter of Nicholas Godolphin, of Trewarveneth. The family was ancient and honourable. His great-grandfather, Jenkin Keigwin, had been killed by the Spaniards in 1595. Richard entered the Royal Navy, became a captain and then colonel of Marines, and was appointed Governor of S. Helena, then a possession of the East India Company, by grant of Charles II. After that he was transferred to Bombay, and had the commandantship there. ”

“ We who sail under the Jolly Roger cannot afford to be scrupulous. You are sly, wench, damnably sly, but you will not overreach me. Nay, you shall have a doubloon or two for yourself and a bundle of silks from our next venture. I am grown stiff with this long lying ashore, and am well wearied for a breath of the Spanish Main.
“‘For the guns are all ready and the decks are all clear
And the prize is awaiting the bold Buccaneer! ́” Dorothy rose and wrung her hands with a gesture of despair. Gervase could see that the wild words of the old man had touched her beyond description. ”