by Mary Howitt.
Originally published in Howitt's Journal (William Lovett) vol.2 #44 (30 Oct 1847).
Autumn.
Of the Sweet Uses of Adversity.
Summer was past; the roses, and the jasmines, and the sweet peas, were all over and gone for this year; but the poet's garden was full of flowers for all that. The dahlias were out, and the chrysanthemums and china-asters, and great big cock's-combs, like crimson madrapores, made of velvet: the leaves were changing on the trees; but apples were yet hanging golden and red upon the boughs, and looking as beautiful as flowers; and as frosts had not yet come, there were whole borders of scarlet geraniums. and verbenum, and other borders of heliotrope, which filled the air with a soft and delicious perfume.
It was real autumn; but as yet without any signs of decay; and in early morning, when the poet took his usual walks, with his children beside him, they found a thousand objects of beauty and interest to linger over. Above all things did they admire the webs of the spiders, which were at that hour hung with minute dew-drops, which as the sun shone upon them looked like so many tiny prismatic mirrors. There were yet a few butterflies and bees flying about, but the poor little butterflies seemed rather benumbed or sleepy; they flew a little way, and then settled upon something; often on the gravel walk, as if they fancied that must be a pretty variegated flower; they were evidently a little bewildered in their heads.
Every thing had undergone a change since the spring-time, when we wrote about the red peony shoots piercing the garden mould, and the lilacs and laburnums, and the crimson hawthorn in blossom; the eggs that the birds then sate on were now little living birds, that flew with great flocks of their kind into the stubble fields. The rooks had reared their young ones, and so had the blackbirds, and all for the time present were living in a land of plenty, forgetting that in the early spring the pantry-door key had been lost for a season. Every thing was changed, but most of all was there a change in the pigeon-house, where Jessy and Crow and Snowdrop and Cravates had lived "on clover," as the saying is, when all the world around them were starving. They lived then, as they did now, in the higher regions of the dove-house, and the fat little guinea-pigs, Toby and Jenny, with all their numerous family, lived below them.
When first we spoke of these pigeons, Jessy, and his handsome wife, Crow, in her blue and green shot-satin, were the lord and lady of the place, and Cravates and his wife their respectable neighbours. Jessy and Crow built their nest, and laid their eggs, and reared their broods, and all things went prosperously with them. Cravates and Snowdrop did the same, but they were unfortunate. "Cravates must be in bad circumstances," said Jessy to his wife; "he has such a down-cast look with him. He never goes strutting about on the roof in the sunshine, as I do. You may take my word for it, his banker has broke, or he has over-speculated; or he has got an execution in his house!" and with that the next time they met on the roof, Jessy swaggered up to him and shoved him aside. Jessy was tremendously proud in those days; and his wife stood by, and admired what she thought her husband's spirit; and what was still worse, their eldest brood, now a couple of flaunting pigeons, named Peeksey and Flapsey, seeing the little respect their parents had for Cravates in his trouble, never saw him out without treading on his toes, or on his tail, till it had quite a draggled and disconsolate look. Poor Cravates did not resent this ill-treatment; but when he saw them coming, tried quietly to get out of their way. Nobody pitied Cravates but the poet's children; and tears were often in their eyes, when they saw his troubles and the unkindness of his neighbours. These children were to the pigeon-house like the good angels of God to human beings. They looked on and pitied the sorrowing, and mourned over the arrogance of the proud; but morning and night they duly gave to all of their bounty—to the good and to the evil alike.
One day, while poor Cravates was in his trouble, a new pair of pigeons made their appearance in the house; they were both dressed in black velvet and white satin; she wore a black velvet dress, and white satin petticoat; he, a black velvet coat, and white satin waistcoat and breeches. They looked exactly as if they were going to court, and as if they had new dresses for every day. They were evidently in good circumstances; they were pigeons of birth and breeding, and they settled themselves down in their new home with a self-possession and propriety that was quite instructive. Jessy and Crow saw from the first moment that they must be treated with respect. The new comers were called Dico and Dixi. Jessy could see at a glance that they had ancestors, perhaps, as far back as the Norman conquest; they looked as people do who have loads of money in the bank, and who, from time immemorial, have had a fine old family seat of their own. If they had been men and women, they would have been the most noble the Marquis and Marchioness Dico and Dixi, and their children would have been earls and countesses. Jessy immediately sought to make their acquaintance, and endeavoured to enlist them in the persecution of the poor unfortunate Cravates. Dico and Dixi, however, treated Jessy with the utmost coolness; they said they did not wish for his acquaintance, and as to poor Cravates, he and his troubles were matters of no consequence to them; they knew nothing of him, either for or against; that there was a deal of trouble in the world,—there always had been, and always must be,—but they did not see what they had to do with it. They must have thought Jessy a snob and an upstart, a purse-proud fellow, and a parvenu, from the way in which they treated him. As to poor Cravates, he had too much on his own spirits to trouble himself about any of his neighbours. Jessy's wife and his eldest brood, Pecksey and Flapsey, were equally unsuccessful in making acquaintance with the grand new pigeons; they, therefore, set them down for a couple of proud aristocrats, who thought themselves too good to associate with their fellows; they were very much vexed, but they did not dare to begin any persecution; for Dico and Dixi looked like those whom it was better not to meddle with.
About this time Cravates died; and Jessy and his wife, and Pecksey and Flapsey, and the other young pigeons, had a deal to say respecting the post-mortem examination, which the poet and his children had made. Something like copper was found in his stomach. "He had taken poison," said Jessy; "no doubt, therefore, but that his circumstances were bad, and that he was on the point of bankruptcy, and had committed suicide. He even told this to Dico and Dixi; but it did not interest them at all! Never in this world was there such pride as this! Jessy thought how he should like to tread on their black velvet and white satin: but there seemed no chance of such a thing!
Cravates was dead. Pecksey and Flapsey set up housekeeping together; and the most noble the Marquis and Marchioness Dico had an heir and an heiress. Snowdrop was solitary; but neither Jessy nor Crow offered her any consolation; nay, even—I am ashamed to confess it—when they saw her come out to sit in the sunshine on the roof, they shoved her off, just as they had done poor Cravates; they strutted about, and admired one another as the sun shone on their beautiful plumage, and grew more and more self-satisfied and tyrannical every day.
But a great change was at hand. One day, a stout-built, thick-necked, positive, domineering sort of pigeon, was introduced as a resident into this little community. He was dressed in black, with a white patch under his beak. He was the famous champion, Blackbeard; not so called because his beard was black, but because he wore black and had a white beard.
Jessy, when he saw this second new arrival, of course introduced himself; but such a fellow as this Blackbeard had never been in the pigeon-house before. He did not strut about in the conceited way that Jessy and Crow did, as if they were always thinking about themselves; nor did he carry himself at all with the cool self-possession of the most noble Dico and Dixi; he was a positive, dogmatical, overbearing, unscrupulous fellow, with impudence and audacity for anything. Jessy thought at first he was just the fellow to join with him in putting down the pride of their aristocratic neighbours; but Blackbeard cared nothing for the pride and indifference and self-possession of Dico and Dixi; he did not trouble himself about them. Jessy and Crow set down Blackbeard for a low, vulgar ruffian, and they hoped Dico and Dixi would join them in putting such an insufferable fellow down. But Dico and Dixi would do nothing of the kind; and though they never had any intimacy with Blackbeard, it was not long before Jessy had the mortification of seeing that they were quite as civil to him, in their cold, proud way, as they had ever been to himself—perhaps a little more so.
In a very short time there was a regular feud between Jessy and Blackbeard. Jessy had never in his life met with his match before; and one day, when he was strutting about in the sunshine on the roof, that his wife might admire him, what should Blackbeard do but strut up to him, and try to tread on his toes. It was more than Jessy could bear. His spirit was roused, and he strutted up to him in return, meaning to shove him right off the roof; but he might as well have tried to shove off the roof itself. They fought, and each said he had won the victory. Poor Jessy! a most uncomfortable feeling rose in his mind that Blackbeard was not so easily to be conquered. He wondered that Pecksey and Flapsey, his own offspring, did not join with him, and give the fellow a regular beating; and then it came out that Blackbeard reason to suppose that she would become his wife. Here was an affair in the pigeon-house!
To Jessy it seemed as if the very world were coming to an end; there was a convulsion everywhere; nobody seemed quiet and cool but Dico and Dixi, and they did not condescend to mix themselves up in the affair. Jessy, who now began to feel the force of adverse circumstances, bethought himself of the guardian and guiding angels of the pigeon-house, and wondered they did not interfere to put things to right.
Things, however, had to get a great deal worse before they could be mended. The poet's children looked on and mourned, but the time for their interference had not yet come, Blackbeard cast off the poor solitary Snowdrop, and Flapsey and he became husband and wife. He had a prodigious notion of his own importance, and was determined to master Jessy, but he did not ask Dico and Dixi, or anybody, to help him,—he fancied he was strong enough for any-thing.
Jessy and Crow had now another young brood,—it was the fourth or the fifth they had had, for they were a most domestic couple—the very best of parents. Blackbeard turned all this into ridicule; he said that people were foolish for bothering themselves with large families; so his wife Flapsey sate on one egg, which in due time was hatched.
Poor Jessy never now went out to sun himself on the roof, or to pick tares and barley, which morning and night the poet's children scattered out of that basket which never was empty, without Blackbeard thrusting himself before him, and shoving him away, or picking up the very grains that he wanted. Again and again they fought, and now it was no uncommon thing for Blackbeard to tread upon Jessy's toes.
There were several beams which ran across the pigeon-house. Jessy had his nest over one of them, Blackbeard over anther, and the mansion of the noble Dico and Dixi was just by a third; and beside them, there were others, which, like public pleasure-grounds, had hitherto been common to every one. Now, however, Blackbeard laid claim to all; he even encroached upon the demesne of Dico and Dixi; as to Jessy, he would not suffer him to set his foot anywhere but on his own beam, whilst he himself marched about here and there, up this beam and down that, with all the daring swagger of a bravo.
Anybody who had seen Jessy now might have said that his circumstances were embarrassed, that he had been over-speculating, and that he would be a bankrupt some of these days, so careworn and dejected did he begin to look. He no longer strutted about on the roof in the sunshine; and when he saw Blackbeard approaching, he flew away. His spirit was subdued; everything seemed gloomy and discouraging. The summer was past—the long, bright and warm days, the days of his glory and self-gratulation, were over. The leaves of the sycamore were brown and curled, and every wind that blew shook hundreds of them down. The lark. the linnet, and the blackbird, that eloquent poet of spring, of gladness, and of hope, were silent; he and the rest of his fellows were out on the abundant stubbles, rejoicing in the bounty of autumn. Jessy sate alone, and to him the world seemed a dreary history of oppression and discouragement. Blackbeard, who had neither sentiment nor pity, thought only of crushing the bird that he hated; and he fell upon him on every occasion, and persecuted and tormented him. Jessy would now have given anything to be quiet; perhaps he now remembered poor Cravates with pity, and wished that he had shown him kindness and mercy. He and Crow sate together on their beam, and Blackbeard swaggered about over his broad territory; he was lord and master of the pigeon-house. He had humbled the pride of Jessy, but that did not satisfy him; and it seemed now as if he would have his life. Jessy's and Crow's feathers, plucked by Blackbeard, flew about the pigeon-house, and even in the autumn sunshine and among the falling leaves of the sycamore. It was a melancholy sight.
Poor Jessy sate on the roof of the garden-house, and long trails of the gossamer-spider's web floated around him. The garden was as still as death, excepting when the wind passed mournfully among the shivering leaves and scattered them down with every breath: or now and then when an apple fell on the grass from the old apple-tree with a dull sound, and then lay motionless. There was something mournful in the garden, and Jessy thought of his own torn and dingy plumage when he saw the seared and unsightly leaves of the trees. His pride was gone, like the pride of the year; they were both sad and dishonoured together.
With slow steps the poet walked up and down his garden. An expansive spirit of love filled his heart, which was sedate rather than gay; for he, too, was thinking on many things which were calculated to sadden.
All at once, amid the silence of the place and the melancholy of the fading and fulling leaves, a little robin redbreast began to sing. Its song was low but clear, and tender as the song of an angel. The poet heard it, and as he was a real poet, he understood every tone that it uttered. It sang of the sweet uses of adversity; how winter gives birth to spring, how death opens the portals of eternal life; how suffering and sorrow, unkindness and ingratitude, and the hardness of men's hearts, bring forth love, and pity, and forgiveness in noble and pure natures; it sang how that there is no suffering, no humiliation, no sorrow, which has not its compensation, and that in a hundred-fold degree, if we will only receive our affliction in meekness and patience and the submission of love. It spoke of angels that watch over the mourner,—that breathe into his soul consolations which cannot be spoken by words; it spoke of hope, and truth and faith; and the chorus of his song was still "the uses of adversity are sweet."
The sorrowing bird and the poet received willingly the consolatory influence. Crow joined Jessy on the roof; but there was no more strutting about, no desire to lord it over others. They sat side by side in silence, as if they were waiting for something. And they were, but they knew it not.
Justice and Mercy had in the meantime done their work in the pigeon-house. Blackbeard, the tyrant oppressor, and his weak companion, Flapsey, were gone; their fellows would see them no more, and their nestling lay beside Jessy's and Crow's in their nest. Now was an opportunity for them to return good for evil. Jessy and Crow fed the young bird as if it had been their own. The poet's children told their father, and he explained to them all that the robin had sung of the sweet uses of adversity.