She was in the act of turning the pic-nic biscuits into the canister, when the heavy tread of Farmer Coggan's hob-nailed shoes announced his approach through the back kitchen. Mrs. Coggan was quite excited by the visit and by her own talking, and she exclaimed, as her husband entered the room, "Deary me, I wish you could have come in a bit quicker; we've had the nicest and pleasantest gentleman here that I've made acquaintance with for many a long day-he's just gone." "Just gone!" repeated the farmer, not very well pleased. "If he was in such a terrible hurry like, it wasn't worth while to call I home from t'other side of the farm. If he had business why couldn't he wait? He might a' judged that a man wi' work to do isn't found like a fire-shovel always standing in the chimney corner. What did he say he wanted ?" that nothing would do but he must have her photograph card." The farmer opened his eyes wider than ever, and stuck his hands deeper into his pockets. "I tell you what, wife, you've been humbugged. I thought so when I see'd you with your Sunday cap stuck on, on a washing day. But I'll tell you my mind-Mary has grown up as comely a girl as need be, and as good a girl, though I says it; but I won't have any gentlemen from London or elsewhere coming here a courting of her, or philandering with you, as have no acquaintance with us. I know what you're going to say, wife, but I don't care. I tell you, again, I don't care a brass farthing about her grandfather. I don't see what his genteelity would sell for, and he left nothing else behind him." Mrs. Coggan flopped into a chair, and took to crying, but her husband was too angry to notice her tears. "I say again," he added, "that Mary Coggan is a farmer's daughter, and nothing more, spite of all her forefathers or foremothers, who might all have been parsons, for aught I care; and the closer she keeps herself to herself, in her own situation, the better. I don't think all the world of your genteel folks, when they are out at elbows." The farmer turned on his heel, satisfied with "No, he didn't-did he, Mary? You see it his victory over that skeleton of gentility-his was all of a hurry, like, at last." "Well, I never!" ejaculated the farmer, putting both his hands in his pockets, and looking at his wife and daughter as if they had been natural curiosities. "Do you mean to tell I, that this gentleman, or this what's-aname from London, has been in the house for the best part of two hours, and that he never as much as dropped a hint of his business, or gave out whether he'd call again, or left a word or a sign of what he was, or who he was!" 'Oh, yes, he told us his name," interrupted Mrs. Coggan. "He is one Mr. Chubb, from London. That's his name, for certain." "A queer fish, I should say, into the bargain," sneered the farmer. "I believe he's a forgery. Who ever heard of anybody of the name of Chubb?" "It's a fish name, to be sure," answered Mrs. Coggan; "but people are called after all sorts-the tax-gatherer's name is Pike. But let me tell you, Mr. Chubb is quite a gentleman, and I think I ought to know a gentleman when I meet one, seeing what my own father was. And speaking of my family, he was most kind in asking about everything as concerned us, and was so taken up with Mary, wife's father, once perpetual curate in a lonely parish on the Mendip, but dead and buried these forty years. Farmer Coggan had reached the door, when he faced suddenly round again, nearly upsetting his wife, who was close behind with the tea-tray in her hands. "I have it all of a heap," he cried, as if a new light had struck him. "This here Mr. Chubb is a lawyer, I'll be bound, and he's come to fish out something about Edward's trust-money and Roger's mortgage. Did the man say anything about my nephew?” "We spoke of him, and of the worry you had had along of his property; but nothing particular wasn't said by either party," answered Mrs. Coggan, in a wonderfully subdued tone, for she thought within herself whether she had not been a little too communicative to the stranger. "Dang me, if I don't think mischief 'ill come out of this here visit and your talking." "I'm sure I said but very little-I never do," responded Mrs. Coggan. "You talk but very little? Why, wife, your tongue goes like a threshing machine with the steam up. I know the lawyer would get all the information he wanted out of you, as sure as my name's Thomas Coggan. We shall have brook were regarded as almost oracular; and trouble along of this visit." never did deputation of bankers wait upon the "Law bless you, maister, he wasn't that Government, never was meeting held to debate sort of man." "What sort of man?" retorted the farmer. "Why, Mr. Chubb wasn't the sort of man to work folks mischief behind their backs." "Rotten potatoes and toadstools," ejaculated Coggan; "you don't know nothing. I thought I should have some worry, for I saw the new moon through the window-pane last night." With this he stalked off, for the cows had to be changed after milking; and if he did not see to the men, "they would most like be standing wi' their hands in their pockets," a thing not suffered by Farmer Coggan, who knew better than most people that" the master's eye makes the grass grow." CORNELIA A. H. CROSSE. MY CHRISTMAS-DAY AT THE BANK. F EW London banks stood higher, in the year 183-, than the old house in which I was at that time junior cashier. It is true that, by comparison with the largest banks, the transactions of Sir Richard Swinbrook, Bart., Neville, and Co. (I love to give the full style), were modest enough in extent; but no firm was more respected for soundness and uprightness than the one I have mentioned. Such strictness did they exercise in all their relations, that I have heard of cases in which the mere fact of having an account with them was of more value to a young merchant than any single connection besides. Was any change in the law or practice of banking discussed, no opinion was received with greater attention than that of this solid compact firm. The utterances in the House of Sir Richard Swin on an important commercial point, but at the head of the list of weighty names figured that of one of the partners of Swinbrook, Neville, and Co. The position held by the firm was due to a long course of unvarying integrity and capacity. The house had been in existence when bankers were "goldsmiths," who kept "running cashes," and, hat in hand, obsequiously followed the merchants on 'Change, begging for their custom. In those old times there had swung over the house in Lombard Street the sign of the "Golden Lion," the tradition of which still lingered in the bank at the time of which I write, and whose very image, indeed, was to be seen on certain papers, printed with queer plates, offering religious fac-similes of the "Golden Lion" of bygone days. It had lived through hard times, the old house; and many traditions were current of how in some awful crisis, when nearly all the other banks had had to shut their doors, the "Golden Lion" still hung above open portals. Often and often, in many a terrible time, when men ran wildly about with stories of foreign invasion or universal bankruptcy, had the partners stood behind the counter, ready with courteous words and smiles, and, better still, with piled-up bags of gold and bundles of crisp notes full in view, to stem the mad rush of panic-stricken depositors. The Sir Richard Swinbrook of my day was the descendant of the Swinbrooks who had founded the bank, and great grandson of the banker who had been made baronet during his mayoralty, at a time when great traders did not hold aloof from civic honours. Of this Swinbrook, the first baronet, I need say no more. Those who would learn his virtues as a man, a citizen, and a banker, are referred to his monument in the church of the united parishes of St. Spurcus-the-Martyr with St. Austin Stockishaw. The Fame, attributed to Roubiliac, tells how he performed his duties as alderman of the Ward of Portsoken, how he achieved his baronetcy, and indeed furnishes ample materials for a eulogy of the periwigged banker, who, with a fat smile, complacently listens to his own praises. The other name in the firm was comparatively new; but the introducer of it was a figure that always interested me, as being descended from a French Huguenot refugee, Simon de Neuville. This Simon de Neuville had one grief. His eldest son had renounced the Protestant religion for the sake of succeeding to his father's property. This was Simon's great grief. In the bitterness of his anger he forswore his native land, and never after his flight, but on one occasion, as it was thought, did his eldest son's name pass his lips. His wife, a tender. delicate creature, pined in this foggy climate, so different from the warm sunny land she had left. She would have died, and, what is more, she did die, rather than murmur; and none but those who knew how tenderly Simon, stern to all else, loved his wife, could have divined the bitter agony Iwith which he must have reflected that his exile was costing him the life of her who, through all his trials, had clung to him with unchanged affection. Even she had never dared to speak of the recreant; but when the last scene of all came, and the bright loving face was wan and dull, and the gentle voice had sunk to a whisper almost, she and Simon had their first and last difference. All others sent away, they two remained together. What passed could only be guessed; but Simon's heavy tread was long heard in the sick room, quick and agitated as none had ever heard it before, and when he left his wife, the poor soul, radiant with a last joy, had scarce strength left to murmur her thanks to Him who had watched over them in their grievous exile, and had given her power to extort the pardon of the first-born, for whom her mother's heart still yearned. From that time to her death, which happened after a few days, during which her husband did not quit her, she could only thank him by looks, and by the faint pressure of her thin white hand. At times she seemed to listen eagerly, as if for some expected sound, the joy of which would render death easy. Did she think perhaps that the disobedient son would hasten to throw himself at his father's feet? Was her disappointment the grief that wrung her heart in the last agony? He was beyond the reach of his father's pardon! Stung by self-reproach or by the taunts of others, he had tried to justify his abandonment of his family by the show of a proselyte's zeal, and had volunteered, under Montrevel, for the infamous crusade against the Camisards. Some weeks before his mother's death he had fallen in the Cevennes. After the death of his wife Simon gave up his house in Spital Square. His bitterness against his native land increased. He now dropped the de from his name; the loose orthography of his day did the rest, and from de Neuville the name grew to be the one so long known in Lombard Street. Simon's stern character, uncontrolled any longer by the gentle being to whom it had bowed, became gloomy and morose; and to those who knew his history there was something too sad to be grotesque in his never-ceasing efforts to forget, at an advanced age, the very accent of his mother-tongue. How I have lingered over the traditions of the old house! Ah, well! you won't find its name in the "Directory" now. Swinbrook and Neville couldn't stop payment; but they are gone. What boots it to know whether they "amalgamated," or were taken over" by a joint-stock bank? I was only head-clerk in the bank. Had I been a partner I would have shut the doors after paying every one, and so have kept sacred the grand traditions of the old house. I'm an old fool, I know; but when I was asked to go into the new concern I said, "No; I'd been brought up in Swinbrook's, and wouldn't give it up. If it gave me up I couldn't help it; but I was too old-fashioned to change." It's only some ten years ago; but Swinbrook's then was just what it had been all along. We still burnt candles, although now and then young fellows did snigger; and down in the strong room were kept religiously the old exchequer tallies that I myself had taken to the West-End in a hackney coach many a time. I began by mentioning the year 183-. Well, it was in that year that the old house, where ever so many generations of Swinbrooks had done business, became clearly too old to last out another. It had never been anything more than an old shop and back parlour, with the wall between knocked out; but, for all that, its queer old look as I recollect it pleases me more than the "mahogany halls," with their sun-burners, encaustic tiles, and all that rubbish that I see about Lombard Street now. However, it was almost tumbling about our ears at last; so it was decided to pull it down and rebuild it. The head-clerk moved out, and a place was found where we could carry on business during the rebuilding. It was in a narrow lane, lying a little way off Lombard Street, and was altogether in as quaint, quiet a neighbourhood as you could find anywhere, let alone in the heart of a great city. It was some fifty yards up the lane from the main street on either side, and stood back from the roadway a little, with its own particular row of posts in front of it. The house had been a good bit altered since it was built; but from the style of the architecture, I have no doubt it was some great merchant's house, at a time when merchants still lived in the City. There remained the broad staircase, with its dark oak wainscoating and carved balustrade, wide landings and broad burly-looking doors, surmounted by carvings in the manner of Grinling Gibbons. The staircase was lighted from above by a large lantern, springing from a small cupola, on which I recollected to have seen sprawling gods that might have been Thornhill's. They were painted over now, as being unbusiness-like. long room, temporarily fitted up with counters and partitions, one of which last cut off a portion of the space, and formed a room for the "partners." The portion thus cut off must have been originally a court-yard, or perhaps an outhouse, projecting beyond the main body of the house. It did not reach higher than the ground-floor, and was almost entirely covered by a skylight. Besides the front entrance to the bank (that in the lane), there was a second one from the court, and this latter was always used after the putting up of the shutters, which, in fact, were so disposed that, once up, all communication with the lane was cut off. There were two doors to this entrance: an outer one, leading from the court to the staircase which gave access to the offices above; and a second inner opening from this staircase into the bank. The safe was of course kept in the division of the bank set aside for the principals. These explanations are tedious enough, I know; but I could not without them tell my story so as to be understood. A little paved court, arched over at the entrance, ran at one side of the house, and led, on the right, to some half dozen houses, similar in character to ours, and on the left to a church, with its churchyard, through which there was a flagged pathway up to the door; an entrance little used, as the few church-goers of the neigh-one, bourhood went in mostly by the front door in the main street. It was one of the churches built after the Great Fire by Sir Christopher Wren, who in this case, hampered by the smallness of the means at his disposal, and not, I suppose, having yet discovered the secret of building cheaply exquisite churches, like that in Walbrook, had just shown a touch of his genius in the tower and spire, and had left the rest mostly to the bricklayer. The interior had little to recommend it beyond the quaintness that age and a bygone style gave to the heavy black oak fittings. Nevertheless, I used to go in sometimes of a quiet sunny Sunday morning, and, lulled by the monotonous drone of the rubicund parson, dream of the time when the daughters of the merchant who had lived in the big house-that was his monument, perhaps, with the swollen cherubs-lovely and brilliant, in powder, patches, and hoops, would rustle into the church, and, to the great scandal of old City dames, sing the psalms of Hopkins, with flourishes learnt at the Opera from the newest male soprano. It was in the pew affected to the use of the inhabitants of the big house their house-that I was sitting; not one of your wretched little modern pews, but a good-sized place, with seats round three sides of it, and room for your legs in the middle; walled in so high by carved oak that you could not see the verger as he passed, but only the gilt mace which progressed solemnly along the horizon. We rented only the ground and first-floors of the house. The rest was let out in offices, except the topmost story, in which lived a housekeeper. The ground-floor only was used as the public part of the bank. It was one From the nature of the building, and the fact that no one belonging to us lived on the premises, it was thought unsafe that the bank should ever be left unguarded, and some time before we moved into the new place an extra messenger had been engaged, whose duty it was to watch the premises all night, from the closing to the re-opening of the bank, his wakefulness being tested by a "tell-tale." Some little while after we had moved in he complained, as well he might, of having to be on duty from Saturday evening to Monday morning; and it was then arranged that some of the clerks should take it in turns to guard the bank on Sundays. I own that I was not very well pleased to find myself on the list of those who were to be mewed up in the closed bank periodically for some seven or eight hours; but there was no help for it. Our staff (never very large) had a short while before been reduced by the discharge of a clerk immediately above me in the bank, for dishonesty, which I had been mainly instrumental in exposing. Unwillingly enough; for though for some time past there had been between Langton and myself a coolness, the result of his own courses, which were such that I was more shocked than surprised on accidentally discovering his frauds, yet I could not forget that we had been friends, and that as my senior he had smoothed down several difficulties in my first years at the bank. So much did I feel this that I refused the promotion which was the result of his dismissal; nor did I give way, save at the request of the principals, who, on their side, at my prayer agreed to abandon Langton's prosecution. This concession was granted only at the last hour. Langton was already in custody, and was on the point of being brought before a magistrate, when I hastened to tell him that the firm would not appear against him. Little as I had expected in the way of thanks, I was inexpressibly shocked by his rage on seeing me. Argument would have been in vain. I left him with the sad conviction that the clemency of the firm had been thrown away, and with the knowledge that one whom I had called my friend had become a bitter enemy. The re "Very good, Cole; then don't stop a minute longer; for I shan't give you any grace.” "I'll be here punctually at five. You can This had taken place at the beginning of depend on me. When I shut the inner door, November, and just after our move. sir, you will please put up the bar. I'll shut duction in our numbers caused by Langton's the outer one after me. The housekeeper and dismissal had not been made up; and although family are all out for the day; but I've seen I was promoted to a post which would other- that you've got everything. You'll have the wise have exempted me from the duties of house all to yourself." "housekeeper," my advance was too recent for me to be greatly hurt when the head-clerk requested me to take my share in the new arrangements. I was, however, annoyed to find that my first turn would fall on Christmas-day, which was to rank in this respect with the Sundays. "What a shame!" said Julia, when, on the morning of Christmas-day, I stood muffled up and ready to start. "Oh, dont go!" "I must, love," I said, as I pushed back from her forehead the clusters of bright sunny hair. "Don't be silly, child," I added, as I kissed a foolish little tear from her cheek. "You know we don't dine till six on account of Uncle John. I shall leave the City at five; half an hour's walk home; half an hour's chat with him--I suppose he's sure to come, by-theby?" "Of course he will. Oh, that horrid bank! You make me quite angry; and the first Christmas-day since our marriage, too!" "So much the better. I shall be quiet. Do you smoke, Cole ?" "As you offer me a cigar, sir, I'll keep it, with your permission; but I never smoke till night." "I do," I said, as I stooped to the blazing fire. "Would you like the fire lit in the partners' room?" asked Cole. "No," I said; "it's too cold in there, with the skylight. Good morning, Cole," I said, as I let him out. "You'll be punctual?" "As the clock, sir," he answered. And having watched him down the paved court into the lane, I shut the outer door, locked and barred the inner one, and then stretched myself before the fire on a couple of chairs. So I lay reading, till all over the City broke out the chimes, and close by, the little cracked bell of the almost deserted church rang out for half an hour its warning to a few worshippers that the hour of service had come. I tried to picture to myself the people whose footsteps I heard now and then along the court. Now it was an old infirm step that tottered by, nearing the grave every hour; and then I heard, mingled with other steps, the pattering of a child's feet and the merry little voice ringing through the cold air. After a while they all ceased. The tinkling bell stopped, and then, softened by distance, came the peals of the rich old organ. How strange it seemed to me to be there alone; and to walk up and down the partners' room, as I did, profaning with the smoke of my cigar those hallowed precincts! |