The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper | Page 3

happier sphere: the where, or the how, did not
puzzle him, any more than divers other enigmatical whys and

wherefores of his present state; he only knew this, that it would all
come right at last: and, barring sin (which he didn't comprehend),
somehow all was right at present. What if poverty pinched him? he was
a great heir still; what if oppression bruised him? it would soon be over.
He trusted to his Pilot, like the landsman in a storm; to his Father, as an
infant in the dark. For guilt, he had a Saviour, and he thought of him in
penitence; for trouble, a Guardian, and he looked to him in peace; and
as for toil, back-breaking toil, there was another Master whom he
served with spade, and mattock, and a thankful heart, while he only
seemed to be working for the landlord or his bailiff.
Such a man then had been Roger Acton from his youth up till now, or,
if sadness must be told, nearly until now; for, to speak truth, his heart at
times would fail him, and of late he had been bitter in repinings and
complaint. For a day or two, in particular, he had murmured loudly. It
was hard, very hard, that an honest, industrious man, as he was, should
so scantily pick a living out of this rich earth: after all said, let the
parson preach as he will, it's a fine thing to have money, and that his
reverence knows right well, or he wouldn't look so closely for his dues.
[N.B. Poor Mr. Evans was struggling as well as he could to bring up six
children, on a hundred and twenty pounds per annum.] Roger, too, was
getting on in years, with a blacker prospect for the future than when he
first stood behind a plough-tail. Then there were many wants
unsatisfied, which a bit of gold might buy; and his wife teased him to
be doing something better. Thus was it come at length to pass, that,
although he had endured so many years, he now got discontented at his
penury;--what human heart can blame him?--and with murmurings
came doubt; with doubt of Providence, desire of lucre; so the sunshine
of religion faded from his path;--what mortal mind can wonder?
CHAPTER II.
THE FAMILY; THE HOME; AND MORE REPININGS.
Now, if Malthus and Martineau be verily the pundits that men think
them, Roger had twice in his life done a very foolish thing: he had
sinned against society, statistics, and common sense, by a two-fold

marriage. The wife of his youth (I am afraid he married early) had once
been kitchen-maid at the Hall; but the sudden change from living
luxuriously in a great house, to the griping poverty of a cotter's hovel,
had changed, in three short years, the buxom country girl into an
emaciated shadow of her former self, and the sorrowing husband buried
her in her second child-bed. The powers of the parish clapped their
hands; political economy was glad; prudence chuckled; and a
coarse-featured farmer (he meant no ill), who occasionally had given
Roger work, heartlessly bade him be thankful that his cares were the
fewer and his incumbrance was removed; "Ay, and Heaven take the
babies also to itself," the Herodian added. But Acton's heart was broken!
scarcely could he lift up his head; and his work, though sturdy as before,
was more mechanical, less high-motived: and many a year of dreary
widowhood he mourned a loss all the greater, though any thing but
bitterer, for the infants so left motherless. To these, now grown into a
strapping youth and a bright-eyed graceful girl, had he been the
tenderest of nurses, and well supplied the place of her whom they had
lost. Neighbours would have helped him gladly--sometimes did; and
many was the hinted offer (disinterested enough, too, for in that match
penury must have been the settlement, and starvation the dower), of
giving them a mother's kindly care; but Roger could not quite so soon
forget the dead: so he would carry his darlings with him to his work,
and feed them with his own hard hands; the farmers winked at it, and
never said a word against the tiny trespassers; their wives and daughters
loved the little dears, bringing them milk and possets; and holy angels
from on high may have oft-times hovered about this rude nurse, tending
his soft innocents a-field, and have wept over the poor widower and his
orphans, tears of happy sorrow and benevolent affection. Yea, many a
good angel has shed blessings on their heads!
Within the last three years, and sixteen from the date of his first great
grief, Roger had again got married. His daughter was growing into
early womanhood, and his son gave him trouble