Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin | Page 6

old midshipman, perhaps
pleased by the good looks and the good nature of the man himself, Mrs.
Buckner turned her eyes upon Charles Jenkin. He was not only to be
the heir, however, he was to be the chief hand in a somewhat wild
scheme of family farming. Mrs. Jenkin, the mother, contributed 164
acres of land; Mrs. Buckner, 570, some at Northiam, some farther off;
Charles let one- half of Stowting to a tenant, and threw the other and
various scattered parcels into the common enterprise; so that the whole
farm amounted to near upon a thousand acres, and was scattered over
thirty miles of country. The ex-seaman of thirty-nine, on whose
wisdom and ubiquity the scheme depended, was to live in the
meanwhile without care or fear. He was to check himself in nothing;
his two extravagances, valuable horses and worthless brothers, were to

be indulged in comfort; and whether the year quite paid itself or not,
whether successive years left accumulated savings or only a growing
deficit, the fortune of the golden aunt should in the end repair all.
On this understanding Charles Jenkin transported his family to Church
House, Northiam: Charles the second, then a child of three, among the
number. Through the eyes of the boy we have glimpses of the life that
followed: of Admiral and Mrs. Buckner driving up from Windsor in a
coach and six, two post-horses and their own four; of the house full of
visitors, the great roasts at the fire, the tables in the servants' hall laid
for thirty or forty for a month together; of the daily press of neighbours,
many of whom, Frewens, Lords, Bishops, Batchellors, and Dynes, were
also kinsfolk; and the parties 'under the great spreading chestnuts of the
old fore court,' where the young people danced and made merry to the
music of the village band. Or perhaps, in the depth of winter, the father
would bid young Charles saddle his pony; they would ride the thirty
miles from Northiam to Stowting, with the snow to the pony's saddle
girths, and be received by the tenants like princes.
This life of delights, with the continual visible comings and goings of
the golden aunt, was well qualified to relax the fibre of the lads. John,
the heir, a yeoman and a fox-hunter, 'loud and notorious with his whip
and spurs,' settled down into a kind of Tony Lumpkin, waiting for the
shoes of his father and his aunt. Thomas Frewen, the youngest, is
briefly dismissed as 'a handsome beau'; but he had the merit or the good
fortune to become a doctor of medicine, so that when the crash came he
was not empty-handed for the war of life. Charles, at the day-school of
Northiam, grew so well acquainted with the rod, that his floggings
became matter of pleasantry and reached the ears of Admiral Buckner.
Hereupon that tall, rough-voiced, formidable uncle entered with the lad
into a covenant: every time that Charles was thrashed he was to pay the
Admiral a penny; everyday that he escaped, the process was to be
reversed. 'I recollect,' writes Charles, 'going crying to my mother to be
taken to the Admiral to pay my debt.' It would seem by these terms the
speculation was a losing one; yet it is probable it paid indirectly by
bringing the boy under remark. The Admiral was no enemy to dunces;
he loved courage, and Charles, while yet little more than a baby, would
ride the great horse into the pond. Presently it was decided that here
was the stuff of a fine sailor; and at an early period the name of Charles

Jenkin was entered on a ship's books.
From Northiam he was sent to another school at Boonshill, near Rye,
where the master took 'infinite delight' in strapping him. 'It keeps me
warm and makes you grow,' he used to say. And the stripes were not
altogether wasted, for the dunce, though still very 'raw,' made progress
with his studies. It was known, moreover, that he was going to sea,
always a ground of pre-eminence with schoolboys; and in his case the
glory was not altogether future, it wore a present form when he came
driving to Rye behind four horses in the same carriage with an admiral.
'I was not a little proud, you may believe,' says he.
In 1814, when he was thirteen years of age, he was carried by his father
to Chichester to the Bishop's Palace. The Bishop had heard from his
brother the Admiral that Charles was likely to do well, and had an order
from Lord Melville for the lad's admission to the Royal Naval College
at Portsmouth. Both the Bishop and the Admiral patted him on the head
and said, 'Charles will restore the old