Kitabı oku: «The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands», sayfa 17
“Och, don’t ye know?” said Jerry, removing his pipe for a moment, “they keeps curin’ of us as long as we’ve got any tin, an’ when that’s done they kills us off quietly. If it warn’t for the doctors we’d all live to the age of Methoosamel, excep’, of coorse, w’en we was cut off by accident or drink.”
“Well, I don’t know as to that,” said Jack Shales, in a hearty manner; “but I’m right glad to hear that Miss Durant is gettin’ a good husband, for she’s the sweetest gal in England, I think, always exceptin’ one whom I don’t mean for to name just now. Hasn’t she been a perfect angel to the poor—especially to poor old men—since she come to Ramsgate? and didn’t she, before goin’ back to Yarmouth, where she b’longs to, make a beautiful paintin’ o’ the lifeboat, and present it in a gold frame, with tears in her sweet eyes, to the coxswain o’ the boat, an’ took his big fist in her two soft little hands, an’ shook an’ squeezed it, an’ begged him to keep the pictur’ as a very slight mark of the gratitude an’ esteem of Dr Hall an’ herself—that was after they was engaged, you know? Ah! there ain’t many gals like her,” said Jack, with a sigh, “always exceptin’ one.”
“Humph!” said Dick Moy, “I wouldn’t give my old ’ooman for six dozen of ’er.”
“Just so,” observed Jerry, with a grin, “an’ I’ve no manner of doubt that Dr Hall wouldn’t give her for sixty dozen o’ your old ’ooman. It’s human natur’, lad,—that’s where it is, mates. But what has come o’ Billy Towler? Has he gone back to the what’s-’is-name—the Cavern, eh?”
“The Grotto, you mean,” said Jack Shales.
“Well, the Grotto—’tan’t much differ.”
“He’s gone back for a time,” said Dick; “but Mr Durant has prowided for him too. He has given him a berth aboord one of his East-Indiamen; so if Billy behaves hisself his fortin’s as good as made. Leastwise he has got his futt on the first round, an’ the ladder’s all clear before him.”
“By the way, what’s that I’ve heard,” said Jack Shales, “about Mr Durant findin’ out that he’d know’d Billy Towler some years ago?”
“I don’t rightly know,” replied Dick. “I’ve ’eerd it said that the old gentleman recognised him as a beggar boy ’e’d tuck a fancy to an’ putt to school long ago; but Billy didn’t like the school, it seems, an’ runn’d away—w’ich I don’t regard as wery surprisin’—an’ Mr Durant could never find out where ’e’d run to. That’s how I ’eerd the story, but wot’s true of it I dun know.”
“There goes the dinner-bell!” exclaimed Jack Shales, rising with alacrity on hearing a neighbouring clock strike noon.
Jerry rose with a sigh, and remarked, as he shook the ashes out of his pipe, and put it into his waistcoat pocket, that his appetite had quite left him; that he didn’t believe he was fit for more than two chickens at one meal, whereas he had seen the day when he would have thought nothing of a whole leg of mutton to his own cheek.
“Ah,” remarked Dick Moy, “Irish mutton, I s’pose. Well, I don’t know ’ow you feels, but I feels so hungry that I could snap at a ring-bolt; and I know of a lot o’ child’n, big an’ small, as won’t look sweet on their daddy if he keeps ’em waitin’ for dinner, so come along, mates.”
Saying this, Dick and his friends left the buoy-store, and walked smartly off to their several places of abode in the town.
In a darkened apartment of that same town sat Nora Jones, the very personification of despair, on a low stool, with her head resting on the side of a poor bed. She was alone, and perfectly silent; for some sorrows, like some thoughts, are too deep for utterance. Everything around her suggested absolute desolation. The bed was that in which not long ago she had been wont to smooth the pillow and soothe the heart of her old grandmother. It was empty now. The fire in the rusty grate had been allowed to die out, and its cold grey ashes strewed the hearth. Among them lay the fragments of a black bottle. It would be difficult to say what it was in the peculiar aspect of these fragments that rendered them so suggestive, but there was that about them which conveyed irresistibly the idea that the bottle had been dashed down there with the vehemence of uncontrollable passion. The little table which used to stand at the patient’s bedside was covered with a few crumbs and fragments of a meal that must, to judge from their state and appearance, have been eaten a considerable time ago; and the confusion of the furniture, as well as the dust that covered everything, was strangely out of keeping with the character of the poor girl, who reclined by the side of the bed, so pale and still that, but for the slight twitching movement of her clasped hands, one might have supposed she had already passed from the scene of her woe. Even the old-fashioned timepiece that hung upon a nail in the wall seemed to be smitten with the pervading spell, for its pendulum was motionless, and its feeble pulse had ceased to tick.
A soft tap at the door broke the deathlike silence. Nora looked up but did not answer, as it slowly opened, and a man entered. On seeing who it was, she uttered a low wail, and buried her face in the bed-clothes. Without speaking, or moving from her position, she held out her hand to Jim Welton, who advanced with a quick but quiet step, and, going down on his knees beside her, took the little hand in both of his. The attitude and the silence were suggestive. Without having intended it the young sailor began to pray, and in a few short broken sentences poured out his soul before God.
A flood of tears came to Nora’s relief. After a few minutes she looked up.
“Oh! thank you, thank you, Jim. I believe that in the selfishness of my grief I had forgotten God; but oh! I feel as if my heart was crushed beyond the power of recovery. She is gone” (glancing at the empty bed), “and he is gone—gone—for ever.”
Jim wished to comfort her, and tried to speak, but his voice was choked. He could only draw her to him, and laying her head on his breast, smooth her fair soft hair with his hard but gentle hand.
“Not gone for ever, dearest,” he said at length with a great effort. “It is indeed along long time, but—”
He could not go further, for it seemed to him like mockery to suggest by way of comfort that fourteen years would come to an end.
For some minutes the silence was broken only by an occasional sob from poor Nora.
“Oh! he was so different once,” she said, raising herself and looking at her lover with tearful, earnest eyes; “you have seen him at his worst, Jim. There was a time,—before he took to—”
She stopped abruptly, as if unable to find words, and pointed, with a fierce expression, that seemed strange and awful on her gentle face, to the fragments of the broken bottle on the hearth. Jim nodded. She saw that he understood, and went on in her own calm voice:—
“There was a time when he was kind and gentle and loving; when he had no drunken companions, and no mysterious goings to sea; when he was the joy as well as the support of his mother, and so fond of me—but he was always that; even after he had—”
Again Nora paused, and, drooping her head, uttered the low wail of desolation that went like cold steel to the young sailor’s heart.
“Nora,” he said earnestly, “he will get no drink where he is going. At all events he will be cured of that before he returns home.”
“Oh, I bless the Lord for that,” said Nora, with fervour. “I have thought of that before now, and I have thought, too, that there are men of God where he is going, who think of, and pray for, and strive to recover, the souls of those who—that is; but oh, Jim, Jim, it is a long, long, weary time. I feel that I shall never see my father more in this world—never, never more!”
“We cannot tell, Nora,” said Jim, with a desperate effort to appear hopeful. “I know well enough that it may seem foolish to try to comfort you with the hope of seein’ him again in this life; and yet even this may come to pass. He may escape, or he may be forgiven, and let off before the end of his time. But come, cheer up, my darling. You remember what his last request was?”
“How can you talk of such a thing at such a time?” exclaimed Nora, drawing away from him and rising.
“Be not angry, Nora,” said Jim, also rising. “I did but remind you of it for the purpose of sayin’ that as you agreed to what he wished, you have given me a sort of right or privilege, dear Nora, at least to help and look after you in your distress. Your own unselfish heart has never thought of telling me that you have neither money nor home; this poor place being yours only till term-day, which is to-morrow; but I know all this without requiring to be told, and I have come to say that there is an old woman—a sort of relation of mine—who lives in this town, and will give you board and lodging gladly till I can get arrangements made at the lighthouse for our—that is to say—till you choose, in your own good time, to let me be your rightful protector and supporter, as well as your comforter.”
“Thank you, Jim. It is like yourself to be so thoughtful. Forgive me; I judged you hastily. It is true I am poor—I have nothing in the world, but, thanks be to God, I have health. I can work; and there are some kind friends,” she added, with a sad smile, “who will throw work in my way, I know.”
“Well, we will talk about these things afterwards, Nora, but you won’t refuse to take advantage of my old friend’s offer—at least for a night or two?”
“No, I won’t refuse that, Jim; see, I am prepared to go,” she said, pointing to a wooden sea-chest which stood in the middle of the room; “my box is packed. Everything I own is in it. The furniture, clock, and bedding belong to the landlord.”
“Come then, my own poor lamb,” said the young sailor tenderly, “let us go.”
Nora rose and glanced slowly round the room. Few rooms in Ramsgate could have looked more poverty-stricken and cheerless, nevertheless, being associated in her mind with those whom she had lost, she was loath to leave it. Falling suddenly on her knees beside the bed, she kissed the old counterpane that had covered the dead form she had loved so well, and then went hastily out and leaned her head against the wall of the narrow court before the door.
Jim lifted the chest, placed it on his broad shoulders and followed her. Locking the door behind him and putting the key in his pocket, he gave his disengaged arm to Nora, and led her slowly a way.
Chapter Twenty Three.
Tells of an Unlooked-for Return, and Describes a Great Feast
If, as we have elsewhere observed in this narrative, time and tide wait for no man, it is not less true that time and tide work wonderful changes in man and his affairs and fortunes. Some of those changes we will now glance at, premising that seven years have passed away since the occurrence of the events recorded in our last chapter.
On the evening of a somewhat gloomy day in the month of sunny showers, four men of rough aspect, and clad in coarse but not disreputable garments, stopped in front of a public-house in one of the lowest localities of London, and looked about them. There was something quite peculiar in their aspect. They seemed to be filled with mingled curiosity and surprise, and looked somewhat scared, as a bird does when suddenly set free from its cage.
Two of the men were of an extremely low type of humanity—low-browed and scowling—and their language betokened that their minds were in keeping with their faces. The other two were better-looking and better-spoken, one of them having evidently been a handsome man in his day. His hair was blanched as white as snow although it still retained the curls of youth. His figure was much bent, and he appeared like one who had been smitten with premature old age.
“Well, uncommon queer changes bin goin’ on here,” said one of the men, gazing round him.
One of the others admitted that there certainly had been wonderful changes, and expressed a fear that if the change in himself was as great, his old pals wouldn’t know him.
“Hows’ever,” observed he who had spoken first, “they won’t see such a difference as they would have seen if we’d got the whole fourteen. Good luck to the ticket-of-leave system, say I.”
The others laughed at this, and one of them suggested that they should enter the public-house and have a glass of grog in memory of old times. Three of the men at once agreed to this proposal, and said that as it would not be long before they were in the stone jug again it behoved them to make the most of their freedom while it lasted. The man with white hair, however, objected, and it was not until his companions had chaffed and rallied him a good deal that he consented to enter the house, observing, as he followed them slowly, that he had not tasted a drop for seven years.
“Well, well,” replied one of the others, “it don’t matter; you’ll relish it all the more now, old feller. It’ll go down like oil, an’ call up the memory of old times—”
“The memory of old times!” cried the white-haired man, stopping short, with a sudden blaze of ferocity which amazed his companions.
He stood glaring at them for a few moments, with his hands tightly clenched; then, without uttering another word, he turned round and rushed from the house.
“Mad!” exclaimed one of the other three, looking at his companions when they had recovered from their surprise, “mad as a March hare. Hows’ever, that don’t consarn us. Come along, my hearties.—Hallo! landlord, fetch drink here—your best, and plenty of it. Now, boys, fill up and I’ll give ’ee a toast.”
Saying this the man filled his glass, the others followed his example—the toast was given and drunk—more toasts were given and drunk—the three men returned to their drink and their old ways, and haunts and comrades, as the sow returns to her wallowing in the mire.
Meanwhile the white-haired man wandered away as if he had no settled purpose. Day after day he moved on through towns and villages and fields, offering to work, but seldom being employed, begging his bread from door to door, but carefully avoiding the taverns; sleeping where he could, or where he was permitted—sometimes in the barn of a kindly farmer, sometimes under a hay-stack, not unfrequently under a hedge—until at last he found himself in the town of Ramsgate.
Here he made inquiries of various people, and immediately set forth again on his travels through the land until he reached a remote part of the coast of England, where he found his further progress checked by the sea, but, by dint of begging a free passage from fishermen here and there, he managed at last to reach one of our outlying reefs, where, on a small islet, a magnificent lighthouse reared its white and stately column, and looked abroad upon the ocean, with its glowing eye. There was a small village on the islet, in which dwelt a few families of fishermen. They were a hard-working community, and appeared to be contented and happy.
The lighthouse occupied an elevated plateau above the cliffs at the sea-ward extremity of the isle, about quarter of a mile distant from the fishing village. Thither the old man wended his way. The tower, rising high above shrubs and intervening rocks, rendered a guide unnecessary. It was a calm evening. The path, which was narrow and rugged, wound its serpentine course amid grey rocks, luxuriant brambles, grasses, and flowering shrubs. There were no trees. The want of shelter on that exposed spot rendered their growth impossible. The few that had been planted had been cut down by the nor’-west wind as with a scythe.
As he drew near to the lighthouse, the old man observed a woman sitting on a stool in front of the door, busily engaged with her needle, while three children—two girls and a boy—were romping on the grass plat beside her. The boy was just old enough to walk with the steadiness of an exceedingly drunk man, and betrayed a wonderful tendency to sit down suddenly and gaze—astonished! The girls, apparently though not really twins, were just wild enough to enjoy their brother’s tumbles, and helped him to accomplish more of them than would have resulted from his own incapacity to walk.
A magnificent black Newfoundland dog, with grey paws and a benignant countenance, couched beside the woman and watched the children at play. He frequently betrayed a desire to join them in their gambols, but either laziness or a sense of his own dignity induced him to sit still.
“Nora,” called the mother, who was a young and exceedingly beautiful mother, “Nora, come here; go tell your father that I see a stranger coming up the path. Quick, darling.”
Little Nora bounded away like a small fairy, with her fair curls streaming in the wind which her own speed created.
“Katie,” said the mother, turning to her second daughter, “don’t rumple him up quite so violently. You must remember that he is a tiny fellow yet, and can’t stand such rough treatment.”
“But he likes it, ma,” objected Katie, with a look of glee, although she obeyed the order at once. “Don’t you, Morley?”
Little Morley stopped in the middle of an ecstatic laugh, scrambled upon his fat legs and staggered towards his mother, with his fists doubled, as if to take summary vengeance on her for having stopped the fun.
“Oh, baby boy; my little Morley, what a wild fellow you are!” cried the mother, catching up her child and tossing him in the air.
The old man had approached near enough to overhear the words and recognise the face. Tears sprang to his eyes and ran down his cheeks, as he fell forward on the path with his face in the dust.
At the same moment the lighthouse-keeper issued from the door of the building. Running towards the old man, he and his wife quickly raised him and loosened his neckcloth. His face had been slightly cut by the fall. Blood and dust besmeared it and soiled his white locks.
“Poor old man!” said the keeper, as his mate, the assistant light-keeper, joined him. “Lend a hand, Billy, to carry him in. He ain’t very heavy.”
The assistant—a strapping young fellow, with a powerful, well-made frame, sparkling eyes and a handsome face, on which at that moment there was a look of intense pity—assisted his comrade to raise the old man. They carried him with tender care into the lighthouse and laid him on a couch which at that time, owing to lack of room in the building, happened to be little Nora’s bed.
For a few moments he lay apparently in a state of insensibility, while the mother of the family brought a basin of water and began carefully to remove the blood and dust which rendered his face unrecognisable. The first touch of the cold sponge caused him to open his eyes and gaze earnestly in the woman’s face—so earnestly that she was constrained to pause and return the gaze inquiringly.
“You seem to know me,” she said.
The old man made no reply, but, slowly clasping his hands and closing his eyes, exclaimed “Thank God!” fervently.
Let us glance, now, at a few more of the changes which had been wrought in the condition and circumstances of several of the actors in this tale by the wonder-working hand of time.
On another evening of another month in this same year, Mr Robert Queeker—having just completed an ode to a star which had been recently discovered by the Astronomer-Royal—walked from the door of the Fortress Hotel, Ramsgate, and, wending his way leisurely along Harbour Street, directed his steps towards Saint James’s Hall.
Seven years had wrought a great change for the better in Mr Robert Queeker. His once smooth face was decorated with a superb pair of light-brown whiskers of the stamp now styled Dundreary. His clothes fitted him well, and displayed to advantage a figure which, although short, was well made and athletic. It was evident that time had not caused his shadow to grow less. There was a jaunty, confident air about him, too, which might have been thought quite in keeping with a red coat and top-boots by his friends in Jenkinsjoy, and would have induced hospitable Mr Stoutheart to let him once more try his fortune on the back of Slapover without much anxiety as to the result; ay, even although the sweet but reckless Amy were to be his leader in the field! Nevertheless there was nothing of the coxcomb about Queeker—no self-assertion; nothing but amiableness, self-satisfaction, and enthusiasm.
Queeker smiled and hummed a tune to himself as he walked along drawing on his gloves, which were lavender kid and exceedingly tight.
“It will be a great night,” he murmured; “a grand, a glorious night.”
As there was nothing peculiarly grand in the aspect of the weather, it is to be presumed that he referred to something else, but he said nothing more at the time, although he smiled a good deal and hummed a good many snatches of popular airs as he walked along, still struggling with the refractory fingers of the lavender kid gloves.
Arrived at Saint James’s Hall, he took up a position outside the door, and remained there as if waiting for some one.
It was evident that Mr Queeker’s brief remark had reference to the proceedings that were going on at the hall, because everything in and around it, on that occasion, gave unquestionable evidence that there was to be a “great night” there. The lobby blazed with light, and resounded with voices and bustle, as people streamed in continuously. The interior of the hall itself glowed like a red-hot chamber of gold, and was tastefully decorated with flowers and flags and evergreens; while the floor of the room was covered with long tables, which groaned under the glittering accessories of an approaching feast. Fair ladies were among the assembling company, and busy gentlemen, who acted the part of stewards, hurried to and fro, giving directions and keeping order. A large portion of the company consisted of men whose hard hands, powerful frames, and bronzed faces, proclaimed them the sons of toil, and whose manly tones and holiday garments smacked of gales and salt water.
“What be goin’ on here, measter?” inquired a country fellow, nudging Mr Queeker with his elbow.
Queeker looked at his questioner in surprise, and told him that it was a supper which was about to be given to the lifeboat-men by the people of the town.
“An’ who be the lifeboat-men, measter?”
“‘Shades of the mighty dead;’ not to mention the glorious living!” exclaimed Queeker, aghast; “have you never heard of the noble fellows who man the lifeboats all round the coasts of this great country, and save hundreds of lives every year? Have you not read of their daring exploits in the newspapers? Have you never heard of the famous Ramsgate lifeboat?”
“Well, now ’ee mention it, I doos remember summat about loifboats,” replied the country fellow, after pondering a moment or two; “but, bless ’ee, I never read nothin’ about ’em, not bein’ able to read; an’ as I’ve lived all my loif fur inland, an’ on’y comed here to-day, it ain’t to be thow’t as I knows much about yer Ramsgate loifboats. Be there mony loifboat men in Ramsgate, measter?”
“My good fellow,” said Queeker, taking the man by the sleeve, and gazing at him with a look of earnest pity, “there are dozens of ’em. Splendid fellows, who have saved hundreds of men, women, and children from the raging deep; and they are all to be assembled in this hall to-night, to the number of nearly a hundred—for there are to be present not only the men who now constitute the crew of the Ramsgate boat, but all the men who have formed part of her crew in time past. Every man among them is a hero,” continued Queeker, warming as he went on, and shaking the country fellow’s arm in his earnestness, “and every man to-night will—”
He stopped short abruptly, for at that moment a carriage drove up to the door, and a gentleman jumping out assisted a lady to alight.
Without a word of explanation to the astonished country fellow, Queeker thrust him aside, dashed forward, presented himself before the lady, and, holding out his hand, exclaimed—
“How do you do, Miss Hennings? I’m so glad to have been fortunate enough to meet you.”
“Mr Quee— Queeker,” exclaimed Fanny, blushing scarlet; “I—I was not aware—so very unexpected—I thought—dear me!—but, pardon me—allow me to introduce my uncle, Mr Hemmings. Mr Queeker, uncle, whom you have often heard mamma speak about.”
Mr Hennings, a six-feet-two man, stooped to shake Queeker by the hand. An impatient cabman shouted, “Move on.” Fanny seized her uncle’s arm, and was led away. Queeker followed close, and all three were wedged together in the crowd, and swept towards the banquet-hall.
“Are you one of the stewards?” asked Fanny, during a momentary pause.
How exquisite she looks! thought Queeker, as she glanced over her shoulder at him. He felt inclined to call her an angel, or something of that sort, but restrained himself, and replied that he was not a steward, but a guest—an honoured guest—and that he would have no objection to be a dishonoured guest, if only, by being expelled from the festive board, he could manage to find an excuse to sit beside her in the ladies’ gallery.
“But that may not be,” he said, with a sigh. “I shall not be able to see you from my allotted position. Alas! we separate here—though—though—lost to sight, to memory dear!”
The latter part of this remark was said hurriedly and in desperation, in consequence of a sudden rush of the crowd, rendering abrupt separation unavoidable. But, although parted from his lady-love, and unable to gaze upon her, Queeker kept her steadily in his mind’s eye all that evening, made all his speeches to her, sang all his songs to her, and finally—but hold! we must not anticipate.
As we have said—or, rather, as we have recorded that Queeker said—all the lifeboat men of the town of Ramsgate sat down to that supper, to the number of nearly one hundred men. All sturdy men of tried courage. Some were old, with none of the fire that had nerved them to rescue lives in days gone by, save that which still gleamed in their eyes; some were young, with the glow of irrepressible enthusiasm on their smooth faces, and the intense wish to have a chance to dare and do swelling their bold hearts; others were middle-aged, iron-moulded; as able and as bold to the full as the younger men, with the coolness and self-restraint of the old ones; but all, old, middle-aged, and young, looking proud and pleased, and so gentle in their demeanour (owing, no doubt, to the presence of the fair sex), that it seemed as if a small breeze of wind would have made them all turn tail and run away,—especially if the breeze were raised by the women!
That the reception of these lion-like men (converted into lambs that night) was hearty, was evinced by the thunders of applause which greeted every reference to their brave deeds. That their reception was intensely earnest, was made plain by the scroll, emblazoned on a huge banner that spanned the upper end of the room, bearing the words. “God bless the Lifeboat Crews.”
We need not refer to the viands set forth on that great occasion. Of course they were of the best. We may just mention that they included “baccy and grog!” We merely record the fact. Whether buns and tea would have been equally effective is a question not now under consideration. We refrain from expressing an opinion on that point here.
Of course the first toast was the Queen, and as Jack always does everything heartily, it need scarcely be said that this toast was utterly divested of its usual formality of character. The chairman’s appropriate reference to her Majesty’s well-known sympathy with the distressed, especially with those who had suffered from shipwreck, intensified the enthusiasm of the loyal lifeboat-men.
A band of amateur Christy Minstrels (the “genuine original” amateur band, of course) enlivened the evening with appropriate songs, to the immense delight of all present, especially of Mr Robert Queeker, whose passionate love for music, ever since his attendance at the singing-class, long long ago, had strengthened with time to such an extent that language fails to convey any idea of it. It mattered not to Queeker whether the music were good or bad. Sufficient for him that it carried him back, with a gush, to that dear temple of music in Yarmouth where the learners were perpetually checked at critical points, and told by their callous teacher (tormentor, we had almost written) to “try it again!” and where he first beheld the perplexing and beautiful Fanny.
When the toast of the evening was given—“Success to the Ramsgate Lifeboat,”—it was, as a matter of course, received with deafening cheers and enthusiastic waving of handkerchiefs from the gallery in which the fair sex were accommodated, among which handkerchiefs Queeker, by turning his head very much round, tried to see, and believed that he saw, the precious bit of cambric wherewith Fanny Hennings was accustomed to salute her transcendental nose. The chairman spoke with enthusiasm of the noble deeds accomplished by the Ramsgate lifeboat in time past, and referred with pride, and with a touch of feeling, to the brave old coxswain, then present (loud cheers), who had been compelled, by increasing years, to resign a service which, they all knew better than he did, taxed the energies, courage, and endurance of the stoutest and youngest man among them to the uttermost. He expressed a firm belief in the courage and prowess of the coxswain who had succeeded him (renewed cheers), and felt assured that the success of the boat in time to come would at the least fully equal its successes in time past. He then referred to some of the more prominent achievements of the boat, especially to a night which all of them must remember, seven years ago, when the Ramsgate boat, with the aid of the steam-tug, was the means of saving so many lives—not to mention property—and among others the life of their brave townsman, James Welton (cheers), and a young doctor, the friend, and now the son-in-law, of one whose genial spirit and extensive charities were well known and highly appreciated—he referred to Mr George Durant (renewed cheers), whose niece at that moment graced the gallery with her presence.
