The Sexton's Hero

identity of the person who had outwitted him, I thought it a
pity not to give him a clew. He is well acquainted with my
MS., and I just copied into the middle of the blank sheet the
words:---

""---------Un dessein si funeste,
S'il n'est digne d'Atree, est digne de Thyeste."

They are to be found in Brebillion's "Atree.":

THE afternoon sun shed down his glorious rays on the
grassy churchyard, making the shadow, cast by the old
yew-tree under which we sat, seem deeper and deeper by
contrast. The everlasting hum of myriads of summer
insects made luxurious lullaby.
Of the view that lay beneath our gaze, I cannot speak
adequately. The foreground was the grey-stone wall of the
Vicarage garden; rich in the colouring made by innumerable
lichens, ferns, ivy of most tender green and most delicate
tracery, and the vivid scarlet of the crane's bill, which found
a home in every nook and crevice---and at the summit of
that old wall flaunted some unpruned tendrils of the vine, and
long flower-laden branches of the climbing rose-tree, trained
against the grey, and the blue dazzle of Morecambe Bay, as it
sparkled between us and the more distant view.
For a while we were silent, living in sight and murmuring
sound. The Jeremy took up our conversation where,
suddenly feeling weariness, as we saw that deep green
shadowy resting-place, we had ceased speaking a quarter of
an hour before.
It is one of the luxuries of holiday-time that thoughts are not
rudely shaken from us by outward violence of hurry and buy
impatience, but fall maturely from our lips in the sunny
leisure of our days. The stock may be bad, but the fruit is
ripe.
'How would you then define a hero? ' I asked.
85

There was a long pause, and I had almost forgotten my
question in watching a cloud-shadow floating over the
far-away hills, when Jeremy made answer--
' My idea of a hero is one who acts up to the highest idea of
duty he has been able to for, no matter at what sacrifice. I
think that by this definition we may include all phases of
character, even to the heroes of old, whose sole (and to us,
low) idea of duty consisted in personal prowess.'
' Then you would even admit the military heroes? ' asked I.
' I would; with a certain kind of pity for the circumstances
which had given them no higher ideas of duty. Still if they
sacrificed self to do what they sincerely believe to be right, I
do not think I could deny them the title of hero.'
' A poor, unchristian heroism, whose manifestation consists
in injury to others ! ' I said.
We were both startled by a third voice.
If I might make so bold, sir ' --and then the speaker stopped.
It was the Sexton, whom, when we first arrived, we had
noticed, as an accessory to the scene, but who we had
forgotten, as much as though he were as inanimate as one of
the moss-covered headstones.
' If I might be so bold,' said he again, waiting leave to
speak. Jeremy bowed in deference to his white, uncovered
head. And so encouraged, he went on.
' What that gentleman ' (alluding to my last speech) ' has just
now said, brings to my mind one who is dead and gone this
many a year ago. I, may be, have not rightly understood
your meaning, gentlemen, but as far as I could gather it, I

think you'd both have given in to thinking poor Gilbert
Dawson a hero. At any rate.' said he, heaving a long,
quivering sigh, 'I have reason to think him so.'
' Will you take a seat, sir, and tell us about him ? ' said
Jeremy, standing up until the old man was seated. I confess
I felt impatient at the interruption.
' It will be forty-five year come Martinamas,' said the
Sexton, sitting down on a grassy mound at our feet, ' since
I finished my 'prenticeship, and settled down at Lindel. You
can see Lindal, sir, at evening and mornings across the bay ;
a little to the right of Grange ; at least, I used to see it, many
a time and of, afore my sight grew so dark : and I have
spent many a quarter of an hour a-gazing at it far away, and
thinking of the days I lived there, till the tears came so thick
to my eyes, I could gaze no longer. I shall never look upon
it again, either far or near, but you may see it, both ways,
and a terrible bonny spot it is. In my young days, when I
went to settle there, it was full of as wild a set of young
fellows as ever were clapped eyes on ; all for fighting,
poaching, quarrelling and suchlike work. I were startled
myself when I first found what a set I were among, but
soon I began to fall into their ways, and I ended by being as
rough a chap as any on 'em. I'd been there a matter of two
year, and were reckoned by most the cock of the village,
when Gilbert Dawson, as I was speaking of came to Lindal.
He were about as strapping a chap as I was (I used to be six
feet high, though now I'm so shrunk and doubled up), and,
as we were like in the same trade (both used to prepare

' Well ! I began to look out to pick a quarrel with him, for
my blood was up to fight him. If I beat him (and I were a
rare boxer in those days), I thought Letty would cool
towards him. So one evening at quoits (I'm sure I don't
know how or why, but large doings grow out of small
words) I fell out with him, and challenged him to fight. I
could see he were very wroth by his colour coming and
going--and, as I said before, he were a fine active young
fellow. But all at once he drew in, and said he would not
fight. Such a yell as the Lindal lads, who were watching us
set up ! I hear it yet. I could na' help but feel sorry for him,
to be so scorned, and I thought he'd not rightly taken my
meaning, and I'd give him another chance ; so I said it again,
and dared him, as plain as words could speak, to fight out
the quarrel. He told me then, he had no quarrel against me ;
that he might have said something to put me up ; he did not
know that he had, but that if he had, he asked pardon 'but
that he would not fight no-how.
' I was so full of scorn at his cowardliness, that I was vexed
I'd given him the second chance, and I joined in the yell that
was set up, twice as bad as before. He stood it out, his teeth
set, and looking very white, and when we were silent for
want of breath, he said out loud, but in a hoarse voice, quite
different from his own--
' "I cannot fight, because I think it is wrong to quarrel and
use violence. "

osiers and wood for the Liverpool coopers, who get a great
deal of stuff from the copses round the bay sir), we were
thrown together, and took mightily to each other. I put my
best leg foremost to be equal with Gilbert, for I'd had some
schooling, though since I'd been at Lindal I'd lost a good part
of what I'd learnt ; and I kept my rough ways out of sight
for a time, I felt so ashamed of his getting to know them.
But that did not last long. I began to think he fancied a girl I
dearly loved, but who had always held off from me. Eh !
but she was a pretty one in those days ; There's none like
her, now. I think I see her going along the road with her
dancing tread, and shaking back her long yellow curls, to
give me or any other you fellow a saucy word ; no wonder
Gilbert was taken with her, for all he was grave, and she so
merry and light. But I began to think she liked him again ;
and then my blood was all afire. I got to hate him for
everything he did. Aforetime I had stood by, admiring to see
him, how he leapt, and what a quoiter and cricketer he was.
And now I ground my teeth with hatred whene'er he did a
thing which caught Letty's eye. I could read it in her look
that she liked him, for all she held herself just as high with
him as with all the rest. Lord God forgive me ! how I hated
that man. '
He spoke as if the hatred were a thing of yesterday, so clear
withing his memory were shown the actions and feelings of
his youth. And then he dropped his voice and said--

' Then he turned to go away ' I were so beside myself
with scorn and hate, that I called out--
' " Tell truth, lad, at least ' if thou dare not fight, dunnot go
and tell a lie about it. Mother's moppet is afraid of a black
eye, pretty dear. It shannot be hurt, but it munnot tell lies. "
' Well, they laughed, but I could not laugh. It seemed such a
thing for a stout young chap to be a coward, and afraid !
' Before the sun had set, it was talked of all over Lindal, how
I had challenged Gilbert to fight, and how he'd denied me '
and the folks stood at their doors, and looked at him going
up the hill to his home, as if he'd been a monkey or a
foriegner--but no one wished him good e'en. Such a thing
as refusing to fight had never been heard of afore at Lindal.
Next day, however, they had found voice. The men
muttered the word " coward " in his hearing, and kept aloof ;
the women tittered as he passed, and the little impudent lads
and lasses shouted out, " How long is it sin' thou turned
Quaker ? " "Good-bye, Jonathon Broad-brim" and suchlike
jests.
' That evening I met him, with Letty by his side, coming up
from the shore. She was almost crying as I came upon
them at the turn of the lane ; and looking up in his face, as if
begging him something. And so she was, she told me after.
For she did really like him ; and could not abide to hear him
scorned by every one for being a coward; and she, coy as
she was, all but told him that very night that she loved him,
and begged him not to disgrace himself, but fight me as I'd

dared him to. When he still stuck to it he could not, for that
it was wrong, she was so vexed and mad-like at the way
she'd spoken, and the feelings she'd let out to coax him, that
she said more stinging things about his being a coward than
all the rest put together (according to what she told me, sir,
afterwards), and ended by saying she'd never speak to him
again, as long as she lived ; she did once again though--her
blessing was the last human speech that reached his ear in his
wild death-struggle.
' But much happened afore that time. From the day I met
them walking, Letty turned towards me ; I could see a part
of it was to spite Gilbert, for she'd be twice as kind when he
was near, or likely to hear of it ; but by and by she got to like
me for my own sake, and it was all settled for our marriage.
Gilbert kept aloof from every one, and fell into a sad, careless
way. His very gait was changed ; his step used to be brisk
and sounding, and now his foot lingered heavily on the
ground. I used to try and daunt him with my eye, but he
would always meet my look in a steady quiet way, for all so
much about him was altered ; the lads would not play with
him ; and as soon as he found he was to be slighted by them
whenever he came to quoiting or cricket, he just left off
coming.
' The old clerk was the only one he kept company with ' or
perhaps, rightly to speak, the only one who would keep
company with him. They got so thick at last, that old Jonas
would say, Gilbert had gospel on his side, and did not more

than gospel told him to do ; but we none of us gave much
credit to what he said, more by token our vicar had a
brother, a colonel in the army; and as we threeped it many a
time to Jonas, would he set himself up to know the gospel
better than the vicar ? that would be putting the cart afore
the horse, like the French radicals. And if the vicar had
thought quarrelling and fighting wicked, and again the Bible,
would he have made so much work about all the victories,
that were as plenty as blackberries at that time of day, and
kept the little bell of Lindal church for ever ringing; or would
he have thought so much of " my brother the colonel," as he
was always talking on ?
' After I was married to Letty I left off hating Gilbert. I even
kind of pitied him--he was so scorned and slighted; and for
all he'd a bold look about him, as if he were not ashamed, he
seemed pining and shrunk. It's a wearying thing to be kept
at arm's length by one's kind ; and so Gilbert found it, poor
fellow. The little children took to him, though ; they'd be
round about him like a swarm of bees--them as was too you
to know what a coward was, and only felt that he was ever
ready to love and to help them, and was never loud or cross,
however naughty they might be. After a while we had our
little one, too ; such a blessed darling she was, and dearly did
we love her ; Letty in especial, who seemed to get all the
thought I used to think sometimes she wanted, after she had
her baby to care for.

' All my kin lived on this side of the bay, up above Kellet.
Jane (that's her that lies buried near yon white rose-tree) was
to be married, and naught would serve her but that Letty and
I must come to the wedding ; for all my sisters loved Letty,
she had such winning ways with her. Letty did not like to
leave her baby, nor yet did I want her to take it : so, after a
talk, we fixed to leave it with Letty's mother for the
afternoon. I could see her heart ached a bit, for she'd never
left it till then, and she seemed to fear all manner of evil,
even to the French coming and taking it away. Well ! we
borrowed a shandry, and harnessed my old grey mare, as I
used in th' car, and set off as grand as King George across
the sands about three o'clock, for you see it were high-water
about twelve, and we'd to go and come back same tide, as
Letty could not leave her baby for long. It were a merry
afternoon, were that ; last time I ever saw Letty laugh
heartily ' and, for that matter, last time I ever laughed
downright hearty myself. The latest crossing-time fell about
nin o'clock, and we were late at starting. Clocks were
wrong ; and we'd a piece of work chasing a pig father had
given Letty to take home ; we bagged him at last, and he
screeched and screeched in the back part o' th' shandry, and
we laughed and they laughed ' and in the midst of all the
merriment the sun set, and that sobered us a bit, for then we
knew what time it was. I whipped the old mare, but she
was a deal beener than she was in the morning, and would

neither go quick up nor down the brows, and they're not a
few 'twixt Kellet and the shore. On the sands it were worse.
They were very heavy, for the fresh had come down after
the rains we'd had. Lord ! how I did whip the poor mare, to
make the most of the red light as yet lasted. You, maybe,
don't know the sands, gentlemen. From Bolton side, where
we started from, it is better than six mile to Cart Lane, and
two channels to cross, let alone holes and quicksands. At
the second channel from us the guide waits, all during
crossing-time from sunrise to sunset ' but for the three
hours on each side high-water he's not there, in course. He
stays after sunset if he's forspoken, not else. So now you
know where we were that awful night. For we'd crossed the
first channel about two mile, and it were growing darker and
darker above and around us, all but one red line of light
above the hills around us, all but one red line of light above
the hills, around us, all but one red line of light above the
hills, when we came to a hollow (for all the sands look so
flat, there's many a hollow in them where you lose all sight
of the shore). We were longer than we should ha' been in
crossing the hollow, the sand was so quick ; and when we
came up again, there, again the blackness, was the white line
of the rushing tide coming up the bay ! It looked not a mile
from us ; and when the wind blows up the bay it comes
swifter than a galloping horse. "Lord help us ! " said I ; and
then I were sorry I'd spoken, to frighten Letty ' but then

the sea-birds were skiling, and the pig shreiking ; I never
caught it ; it was miles away, at any rate. ' Just as I'd gotten
my knife out, another sound was close upon us, blending
with the gurgle of the near waters, and the roar of the distant
(not so distant though) ; we could hardly see, but we
thought we saw something black against the deep lead
colour of wave, and mist and sky. It neared and neared :
with slow, steady motion, it came across the channel right to
where we were.
' Oh, God ! it was Gilbert Dawson on his strong bay horse.
' Few words did we speak, and little time had we to say
them in. I had no knowledge at that moment of past or
future--only of one present thought--how to save Letty, and
if I could, myself. I only remembered afterwards that
Gilbert said he had been guided by an animal's shriek of
terror ; I only heard, when all was over that he had been
uneasy about our return, because of the depth of fresh, and
had borrowed a pillion, and saddled his horse early in the
evening and ridden tow to Cart Lane to watch for us. If all
had gone well, we should ne'er have heard of it. As it was,
old Jonas told it, the tears dew-dropping from his withered
cheeks.
' We fastened his horse to the shandry. We lifted Letty to
the pillion. The waters rose every instant with sullen sound.
They were all but in the shandry. Letty clung to the pillion
handles, but drooped her head as if she had yet no hope of
life. Swifter than thought ( and yet he might have had time
for thought and for temptation, sir--if he had ridden off with
Letty, he would have been saved, not me). Gilbert was in

God can work through many a scornful thing, if need be.
' By this time the mare was all in a lather, and trembling and
panting, as if in mortal fright ' for though we were on the
last bank afore the second channel, the water was gathering
up her legs ; and she so tired out ! When we cam close to
the channel she stood still, and not all we came close to the
channel she stood still, and not all my flogging could get her
to stir ; she fairly groaned aloud, and shook in a terrible
quaking way. Till now Letty had not spoken ; only held my
coat tightly. I heard her say something, and bent down my
head.
' "I think, John--I think--I shall never see baby again ! "
' And then she sent up such a cry--so loud, and shrill, and
pitiful ! It fairly maddened me. I pulled out my knife to
spur on the old mare, that it might end one way or the other,
for the water was stealing sullenly up to the very axle-tree,
let alone the white waves that knew no mercy in their steady
advance. That one quarter of an hour, sir, seemed as long
as all my life since. Thoughts, and fancies, and dreams and
memory ran into each other. The mist, the heavy mist, that
was like a ghastly curtain, cutting us in for death, seemed to
bring with it the scents of the flowers that grew around our
own threshold ; it might be, for it was falling on them like
blessed dew, though to us it was a shroud. Letty told me
after, she heard her baby crying for her, above the gurgling
of the rising waters, as plain as ever she heard anything ; but

the shandry by my side.
' "Quick !" said he, clear and firm. " You must ride before
her, and keep her up. The horse can swim. By God's
mercy I will follow. I can cut the traces, and if the mare is
not hampered with the shandry, she'll carry me safely
through. At any rate, you are a husband and a father. No
one cares for me." '
' Do not hate me gentlemen. I often wish that night was a
dream. It has haunted my sleep ever since like a dream, and
yet it was no dream. I took his place on the saddle, and put
Letty's arms around me, and felt her head rest on my
shoulder. I trust in God I spoke some word of thanks ; but
I can't remember. I only recollect Letty raising her head,
and calling out--
' "God bless you, Gilbert Dawson, for saving my baby from
being an orphan this night. " And then she fell against me, as
if unconscious.'
' I bore her through ; or, rather the strong horse swam
bravely through the gathering waves. We were dripping wet
when we reached the banks in-shore ; but we could have but
one thought--where was Gilbert ? Thick mists and heaving
waters compassed us round. Where was he ? We shouted.
Letty, faint as she was, raised her voice and shouted clear
and shrill. No answer came, the sea boomed on with
ceaseless sullen beat. I rode to the guide's house. He was
a-bed, and would not get up, though I offered him more than
I was worth. Perhaps he knew it, the cursed old villain ! At
any rate, I'd have paid it if I'd toiled my life long. He said I
might take his horn and welcome. I did, and blew such a

blast though the still, black night, the echoes came back
upon the heavy air : but no human voice or sound was
heard--that wild blast could not awaken the dead !
' I took Letty home to her baby, over whom she wept the
livelong night. I rode back to the shore about Cart Lane ;
and to and fro, with weary March, did I pace along the brink
of the waters, now and then shouting out into the silence a
vain cry for Gilbert. The waters went back and left no
trace. Two days afterwards he was washed ashore near
Flukeborough. The shandry and pooor old mare were found
half-buried in a heap of sand by Arnside Knott. As far as we
could guess, he had dropped his knife while trying to cut the
traces and so had lost all chance of life. Any rate, the knife
was found in a cleft of the shaft.
' His friends came over from Garstang to his funeral. I
wanted to go chief mourner, but it was not my right, and I
might not ; though I've never done mourning him to this
day. When his sister packed up his things, I begged hard for
something that had been his. She would give me none of his
clothes (she was a right-down having woman), as she had
boys of her own, who might grow up into them. But she
threw me his Bible, as she said they'd gotten one already,
and his were but a poor used-up thing. It was his, and so I
cared for it. It were a black leather one, with pockets at the
sides, old fashioned-wise ; and in one were a bunch of wild
flowers, Letty said she could almost be sure were some she
had once given him.
' There were many a text in the Gospel, marked broad

with his carpenter's pencil, which more than bore him out
in his refusal to fight. Of a surety, sir, there's call enough
for bravery in the service of God, and to show love to
man, without quarrelling and fighting.
' Thank you, gentlemen, for listening to me. Your words
called up the thoughts of him, and my heart was fill to
speaking. But I must make up ; I've to dig a grave for a
little child, who is to be buried to-morrow morning, just
when his playmates are trooping off to school.'
' But tell us of Letty ; is she yet alive ? ' asked Jeremy.
The old man shook his head, and struggled against a
choking sigh. After a minute's pause he said--
' She died in less than two year at after that night. She was
never like the same again. She would sit thinking, on
Gilbert, I guessed ; but I could not blame her. We had a
boy, and we named it Gilbert Dawson Knipe ; he that's a
stoker on the London railway. Our girl was carried off in
teething ; and Letty just quietly drooped, and died in less
than six week. They were buried here ; so I came to be
near them, and away from Lindal, a place I could never
abide after Letty was gone.'
He turned to his work, and we, having rested sufficiently,
rose up, and came away.