The Measure of a Man

"I can take care of her myself. She has been my companion and comforter all through these past four years of sorrow. I cannot part with her, not for a day."

This controversy regarding the child was continued with unremitting force of feeling on both sides for some time, but John finally gave way to Jane's insistence, and the early days of April were spent in preparations for the journey to London and the redecoration of the home. Then one exquisite spring morning they went away in sunshine and smiles, and John returned alone to his lonely and disorderly house. The very furniture looked forlorn and unhappy. It was piled up and covered with unsightly white cloths. John hastily closed the doors of the rooms that had always been so lovely in their order and beautiful associations. He could not frame himself to work of any kind, his heart was full of regrets and forebodings. "I will go to my mother," he thought. "Until I hear they are safe in Lord Harlow's house, I can do nothing at all."

So he went up to Hatton Hall and found his mother setting her dinner-table. "Eh, but I am glad to see thee, John!" she cried joyfully. "Come thy ways in, dear lad. There's a nice roast turning over a Yorkshire pudding; thou art just in a fit time. What brought thee up the hill this morning?"

"I came to see your face and hear your voice, mother."

"Well now! I am glad and proud to hear that. How is Martha and her mother?"

"They are on their way to London."

"However could thou afford it?"

"Sometimes we spend money we cannot afford."

"To be sure we do—and are always sorry for it. Thou should have brought Martha up here and sent her mother to London by herself."

"Jane would not go without her."

"I'm astonished at thee! I am astonished at thee, John Hatton!"

"I did not want her to go. I said all I could to prevent it."

"That was not enough. Thou should not have permitted her to go."

"Jane thought the change would do her good."

"Late hours, late dinners, lights, and noise, and crowded streets, and air that hes been breathed by hundreds and thousands before it reaches the poor child, and–"

"Nay, mother, that's enough. Count up no more dangers. I am miserable as it is. How goes all with you?"

"Why, John, it goes and goes, and I hardly know where it goes or how it goes, and the mischief of it all is this—some are getting so used to the Government feeding and clothing them that they'll think it a hardship when they hev to feed and clothe themselves."

"Not they, or else they are not men of this countryside. How is Harry? I heard a queer story about him and others yesterday."

"Queer it might be, but it was queer in a good way if it is set against Harry. What did you hear?"

"That Harry had trained a quartette of singers and that they had given two concerts in Harrow-gate and three in Scarborough and Halifax, and come back with nearly five hundred pounds for the starving mill-hands in Hatton District."

"That is so—and I'm thankful to say it! People were glad to give. Many were not satisfied with buying tickets; they added a few pounds or shillings as they could spare them. Lord Thirsk went with the company as finance manager. People like a lord at the head of anything, and Thirsk is Yorkshire, well known and trusted."

"No more known and trusted than is Hatton. I think Harry might have asked me. It is a pity they did not think of this plan earlier."

"There may be time enough for the plan to wear itself out yet."

"No. We shall have peace and cotton in three months."

"However can thou say a thing like that?"

"Because I know it."

Then she looked steadily at him. He smiled confidently back, and no further doubt troubled her. "I believe thee, John," she said, "and I shall act accordingly."

"You may safely do so, mother. How is Lucy?" "Quite well, and the new baby is the finest little fellow I ever saw. Harry says they are going to call him John. Harry is very fond of thee."

"To be sure he is and I am fond of him. I wonder how they manage for cash? Do you think they need it? Have they asked you for any?"

"Not a farthing. Lucy makes the income meet the outgo. The farm feeds the family and Harry earns more than a little out of the music and song God put into him."

"A deal depends on a man's wife, mother."

"Everything depends on her. A man must ask his wife whether he is to do well with his life or make a failure of it. What wilt thou do with thyself while Jane is in London?"

"I am going to stay with you mostly, mother. There will be painters and paperers and cleaners in my home and a lot of dirt and confusion."

"Where is thy economy now, John?"

"When God turns again and blesses Hatton, He will come with both hands full. The mill is in beautiful order, ready for work at any moment. I will make clean and fair my dwelling; then a blessing may light on both places."

It was in this spirit he worked and as the days lengthened his hopes and prospects strengthened and there was soon so much to do that he could not afford the time for uncalled anxiety. He was quickly set at rest about his wife and daughter. Jane wrote that they had received a most affectionate welcome and that Martha had conquered her uncle and aunt's household.

Uncle is not happy, if Martha is out of sight [she wrote] and Aunt is always planning some new pleasure for her. And, John, Uncle is never tired of praising your pluck and humanity. He says he wishes the Almighty had given him such an opportunity; he thinks he would have done just as you have done. It was a little strange that Uncle met a great Manchester banker the other day, and while they were talking of the trouble, now so nearly over, this man said, "Gentlemen, a great many of us have done well, but there is a cotton-spinner in the Yorkshire wolds that has excelled us all—one John Hatton. He mortgaged and sold all he had and kept his looms going till the war was practically over. His people have not been idle two months. What do you think of that?"

Some man answered, he did not think it was extraordinary, for John Hatton of Hatton-Elmete was of the finest blood in England. He could not help doing the grand thing if it was there to be done. And then another man took it up and said your blood and family had nothing to do with your conduct. Many poor spinners would have done as you did, if they had been your equals in money. Then the first speaker answered, "We can do without any of your 'equality' talk, Sam Thorpe. What the cream is, the cheese is. Chut! Where's your equality now?" Uncle told me much more but that is enough of praise for you, at once. Martha and I are very happy, and if all the news we hear is true, I expect you to be living by the factory bell when we get home. Dear, good John, we love you and think of you and talk of you all the day long.

    JANE.

Jane's letters came constantly and they gave to this period of getting ready for work again a sense of great elation. If a man only passed John on the hill or in the corridors of the mill during these days, he caught spirit and energy and hope from his up-head and happy face and firm step. At the beginning of May the poor women had commenced with woeful hearts to clean their denuded houses, and make them as homelike as they could; and before May was half over, peace was won and there were hundreds of cotton ships upon the Atlantic.

John's finished goods were all now in Manchester warehouses, and Greenwood was watching the arrival of cotton and its prices in Liverpool. John had very little money—none in fact that he could use for cotton, but he confidently expected it, though ignorant of any certain cause for expectation.

As he was eating dinner with his mother one day, she said, "Whatever have you sent Greenwood to Liverpool for?"

"To buy any cotton he can."

"But you have no money."

"Simpson and Hager paid me at once for the calicoes I sent them. I shall be getting money every day now."

"Enough?"

"I shall have enough—some way or other—no fear."

"I'll tell you what, John. I can lend you twenty thousand pounds. I'll be glad to do it."

"O mother! Mother! That will be very salvation to me. How good you are! How good you are!" and there was a tone in John's voice that was perhaps entirely fresh and new. It went straight to his mother's heart, and she continued, "I'll give you a check in the morning, John. You are varry, varry welcome, my dear lad."

"How can you spare me so much?"