BOND SLAVES the Story of a Struggle
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BOND SLAVES The Story of a Struggle BY MRS. G. LINNAEUS BANKS Author of 1 God's Providence House' * The Manchester Man' ' Glory' * In His Own Hand ' etc. etc. THE DUMB STEEPLE GRIFFITH FARRAN & CO. NEWBERY HOUSE, 39 CHARING CROSS ROAD, LONDON BOND SLAVES [The Rights of Translation and of Reproduction arc Reserved.} PREFACE. |HEN, in the year 1885 or 6, I undertook to write a Luddite story at the instance of a well-known publishing firm, it was my impression that I was pretty fairly equipped for the task. Previous studies had carried me over the ground; I had a tolerably good local library; had both visited and resided in Yorkshire; was connected with the county by family ties on both sides the house; and in my early home in Manchester was not merely familiarised with rioting, but with Luddite episodes of which history has made small account, and with the persons of chief actors therein. For instance, the cap worn by the amateur Othello was embroidered for him by my own mother—then a girl in her fourteenth year—to resemble the one worn by Edmund Kean. Rioters forced themselves into the house of an aunt, pitched provisions out into the street, tore the gold rings from her ears, knocked her down, and would have trampled her to death but for the heroic bravery of a strong servant-woman, who strode across her mistress and kept the mob at bay. The husband was the aforesaid Othello, and had a post of trust and authority in a neighbouring factory. Then another sister of my mother had married a Yorkshireman from Halifax, a cousin had married a wealthy Yorkshire carrier, and another 1 a cloth merchant from Purlwell Hall, the very centre of the disaffected area. This gentleman, T. Tempest Taylor, being widowed, came to reside under our roof; and as a family connection, Mr. Joshua Ingham of Mirfield visited us occa- sionally, when the business of his bank brought him into the town. I was a little school-girl. My father was a strong politician, and any fresh grievance or outbreak among the operatives was certain to revive stories of bygone riots and outrages for animated discussion on our hearth, to all of which I listened with ears attent. But when, so much later in life, I sat down to the task I had undertaken, I found I had so wide an area to cover that I needed much more than the discursive stories told by the fireside. I had the separate counties to connect, and to make myself better acquainted with not merely bygone topography, but with old processes of manufacture in different branches and trades, such as were common before machinery set hand labour aside. Fortunately I had had opportunities for observ- ing these in many trades, both when I was young, and as I grew in years and moved from place to place. Ill health speedily set a seal on researches at the British Museum; then I ransacked old book-dealers' catalogues, made heavy purchases, and laid Yorkshire friends, and comparative strangers, under contribution. I was surprised at the generous response. Rare books came to me in piles. Plans were drawn for me of places as they were in the past, and of which nothing otherwise existed. In one instance a parish map on a roller, a map drawn in 1797, was entrusted to me. Sketches were made to illustrate personal description. Correspondents bor- rowed books for me, else unattainable, and one or two were presented to me. Among the books lent was one which I have been permitted to retain until this day, one containing the 'Proceedings at the York Special Commission, January 1813^ as reported alike for Luke Hansard (official) and for the Leeds Mercury. And, to show the interest taken over a wide area in my proposed romance of history, I may perhaps be allowed to give a list of those to whom my earnest thanks are tendered for help in one or other of these lines of research. The late Sir Edward Baines of the Leeds Mercury; Alderman Bairstow, ex-Mayor of Halifax; Mr. Bradley, stepson and successor to George Bickerdike, host of the ' Packhorse,' Huddersfield; Mr. J. Potter Briscoe, F.R.H.S., Chief Librarian of the Nottingham Public Libraries; Miss Brown, Huddersfield; Mr. W. Down- ing, Chaucer Head Library, Birmingham; the Rev. Marshall Hartley, B.A.; Mr. John Holmes, Roundhay, Leeds; Mr. William Smith, F.S.A.S., editor of Old Yorkshire \ and Mr. Woodcock, bookseller, of Huddersfield. It will be easily understood that it was not possible, with this access of material, so wide a geographical area to cover, and three separate bases of action, to confine my story within the narrow limits originally assigned to it. Overwhelmed with a mass of facts, I was compelled both to condense and to reject. Derbyshire I had to drop altogether, for there Luddism had a longer lease, under a different 4 General/ who escaped the halter until 1817. As it is, I am doubtful whether the ordinary reader will thank me for overloading my thread of fiction with so many beads of indubitable history. And to those who imagine the novelist's stock-in-trade to be merely pens, ink, paper, and imagination, I feel tempted to quote from the quaint preface Anthony-a-Wood affixed to his History of Oxford, in 1670 : 4 A painful work it is, I'll assure you, and more than difficult, wherein what toyle hath been taken, as no man thinketh, so no man believeth, but he that hath made the tryal.' ISABELLA BANKS. LONDON, 1893. CONTENTS. BOOK THE FIRST. CHAP, PAG* I. A PROPHECY, . • 9 II. THE HOME ON THE MOORSIDE, . L8 III. GOING TO MARKET, ...... 26 IV. PUT TO THE TEST, ...... 36 V. GERMS OF FATE, ...... 47 VI. JOS I AH AND HIS FRIENDS, ..... 55 VII. HAUNTED BY A PRESENTIMENT, . .65 VIII. STORMS LET LOOSE, ...... 72 IX. AN ILL WIND, ...... 80 X. IN ITS WAKE, ...... 88 XI. A LUCKLESS JOURNEY, . - 97 XII. GOOD SAMARITANS, . 107 XIII. JOHN BOOTH, . IL8 XIV. FRIENDS AND ASSOCIATES, . 126 XV. A BOLD CHAMPION, . -137 BOOK THE SECOND. I. AN IMPORTANT LETTER, . • -147 II. IN THE GRIP OF AN IRON HAND6 , . • '55 CHAP. PAGE III. THE LUDDITE OATH, . 163 IV. THE DAY AFTER, . 170 V. BRUISED SHOULDERS, . 178 VI. A SUNDAY AT SIDE-O'-BECK, . l86 VII. THE WAINWRIGHTS OF GREENFOLDS, . .195 VIII. AT A SACRIFICE, ...... 204 IX. THE FIRST BLOW, . .212 X. THE FIRST MARTYR, . .219 XT. A REED SHAKEN BY THE WIND, . .229 XII. A CRUSHING BLOW, . 239 XIII. FETTERED, ....... 249 XIV. THE MEETING AT THE * ST. CRISPIN,' . 259 XV. UNCLE TOM, . •. 27l BOOK THE THIRD. I. THE NIGHT OF THE PLAY, . .283 II. AT THE DUMB STEEPLE, . 29I III. THE ALARM BELL, . 301 IV. VICTIMS, . 310. V. A DOG'S LIFE, ...... 3l8 VI. BRAVERY AND RASHNESS, . • 327 VII. ON HIS WAY HOME, . -337 VIII. SCOT FREE, . 347 IX. DAVID'S DELIVERANCE, . 357 X. AT LAST, . • . • • 365 XI. LYDIA AND THE LUDDS, . -374 XII. THE VALUE OF THE OATH, ..... 382 XIII. THE LAST WRENCH, . 393 XIV. THE DAWN OF A NEW DAY, .... 402 BOOK THE FIRST BOND SLAVES. CHAPTER I. A PROPHECY. HEN Walter Hartland married Marian Greenwood she was one of the prettiest girls in Arnold, ay, or within the wide range of Sherwood Forest, for that ® matter. She was the only daughter of a forester or under-keeper, who, in his attachment to ancient traditions, had named his first-born son Robin, his next John, and the girl who came between the two, Marian. And had not the rough-and-ready clergyman who baptized them seconded the remonstrances of Greenwood's common-sense wife, the three children would have gone forth to bear the burden of life additionally burdened from their baptism as Robin Hood, Maid Marian, and Little John. Greenwood was a stalwart, robust man himself; Robin, also a woodsman, was fairly proportioned, with clear brown eyes and ruddy countenance; whilst Little John, whose poll and eyes bore a like tinge of chestnut, had about the same right to his prenomen as had his ancient prototype. As for Maid Marian, neither in figure nor bearing could there be any trace of the bold and buxom bride of the noted outlaw. She did not set her foot down with the resolute tread of one born to command. She had rather learned the doctrine 9 of love and obedience, words now rapidly losing their joint and sweet significance. Slight and lissom [as a willow-wand, she tripped along over the grassy ways lightly, as one who had no burden of care to carry. The c windows of her soul' were blue and clear as summer skies, set well apart under thoughtful brows, and tenderly guarded by lids with a sensitive tendency to droop, as did the pitiful corners of her mouth when the pain or suffering of others touched her heart. There were lines in her face indicative of energy as well as strong affec- tions, though the rounding fulness of youth softened any angularity that time or anxieties might develop. But the crowning glory of the village maiden was her wealth of flaxen hair that glinted in the light with just the faintest suggestion of yellow gold. Of this she was as proud as any lady in courtly circles; although she simply tied back her tresses with ribbons bought by her brother Robin or her sweetheart from travelling pedlars or at country fairs, perching above them a smaller and more coquettish cap than altogether satisfied her sober-minded mother.