LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1475, 7 November 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

OLD SIR PIERCE

[" ALL THE YKAR BOUND."]

It professed to be a Photographic Saloon and Fine Art Gallery—and that account of it was inscribed in large and small letters here and there about the b iilding over and over again, as though facts could be contradicted av.d totally routed by force of simple iteration and reiteration ; for, in truth, it was a humble affair enough. The small front-garden of a stinted suburban house, the centre of a row of like lowly &nd unpretending tenements, had been boarded over and covered in after a rude impromptu fashion, so ns to form something between a booth and a find. Little attem t

&t decoration had been made ; but. about the eiit aneo were suspended numerous specimens of inexpensive photography—the kind commonly known as "collodion on glass."

Among these were to be found, presumably as a means of bringing home to the public the skill and success of the operator, portraits of various persons easily recognisable in the district, such as the milkman, the policeman, the crossing-riweepcr, and a certain omnibus-driver of eccentric aspect But, of course, the majority of the portraits represented very undistinguished people; the artist's chief pat r ons were, as it seemed, hmnely of feature, as of occupation. Many domestic servants had Sit to him; nursjs, or young mothers, with babb s on their laps; tradesmen's boys in the habits of their trade; with a sprinkling of private soldiers in undress uniform, armed with penny canes ; nearly all somewhat blank of look aud distressed of expression : the victims of photographic art in its rudest and most ruthless form.

The neighborhood fringed London on tbe north. What had once been a country road, was gradually undergoing conversion into a town street; private houses were one after another being changed into shops. Here and there some resolute occupant had refused to yield up his garden to the purposes of trade ; and however elbowed and frowned upon by the adjoining structures, maintained his little sooty, shady enclosure, rich in vegetation of a dark brown hue, as the courtyard of a private residence. The taverns, and there were many of them, still preserved something of a rural look, as though stiil pretending to be country inns; boasting old-fashioned signboards, swinging and creaking in mid air, and rough-hewn horse troughs straddling before the doors. A. fondness for signs and signboards, indeed, characterised the locality. On all sides might be seen those trade emblems which are discarded as barbaric in the more central parts of the town ; gilded hams and flitches ; red and blue and yellow sugar-loaves ; lifesize Scotchmen, with very curly whisker?, severely taking snuff out of rams'-horns ; goldbeaters' arms and mallets; barbers' poles spirally-streaked with colour; and scarlet teapots of enormous dimensions. There was busy traffic in the roadway; up and down the middle glided unceasingly the tram-cars, to the music of clattering hoofs and. jingling bells. The wooden edifice, with its many inscriptions, in the small front garden, was but a sort of photographic show-room ; the studio was above, on the roof of the house, an apartment screened and covered in with gUss and canvas in about equal proportions. A tortuous, unsteady staircase, that creaked and crackled at every step; was the means of approach to this chamber. Ihe light was dim, the shadows perplexing, the atmosphere somewhat moist, heavy, and unpleasant; a smell of poverty, aud uncleanliness, and want of repair pervading the premised. Afier the gloom of the staircase, the glare of the studio was rather overpowering. In such wise, perhaps, was explained the fact that so many of the pho tographs represents! persons afflicted with bleared, weak, and watery eyes. 'J his upper chamber commandei a panoramic range of chimneys, and a view of the hills that border and shelter London on the north. A bright sun had been shining, and it was very hot in the studio; but it was one of those bright suns that are always attended by sharp, string east winds, livery now and then came r* whistling noise about the little room on the roof, like a burglarious signal for an attempt to break the panes of glass and buist into the premises ; and at intervals there was much roaring and rushing round the stacks of chimneys, as though efforts were being made to hurl them, bodily into the street. The photographer—hie banes, stained and soiled with nitrate of silver, black as though he had been picking walnuts or p dishing grates, proclaimed him the photographer sat alone in his Btudio, smoking a short pipe; the odour of tobacco combining curiously with the chemical smells inseparable from his pursuit. He was a shabby'ooking man, with dusty hair and rusty beard, lean aud angular of form, middleaged, wearing a faded iianmd shirt of a brickdust colour. lie was dipping smalt squares of glass in a pail of water, wiping them dry with a cloth, and then polishing them upon a ragged scrap of ditty washleather. Suddenly he suspended his labors. 'Was that a footstep?' he a--ked himself. Re paused for a few seconds and listened. '~No, only the wind shaking the back-door. A fine day like this, and not ;> soul comes near the plaoe ! I suppose they'd come in shoals if the weather were dark aud foggy, and drizzly. But no, they wouldn't It's plain to me they won't come at any price. What more can people want, I wonder ? Only sixpence, with gold frame included- ' He held out one <,f the squares of glass, breathed upon it, and polished it with his leather. ' Why, it's dirt cheap. It's too cheap, indeed, to get one's living by. But then,' he added grimly, ' I don't live by it; I only starve by it.' Angrily he threw from him the little square of glass he had been polishing. It was shivered, as it dashed upon the lloor. He shrugged his shoulders as he contemplated the fragments.

'.Not that it's any good smashing the stock-in trade,' he said. He pulled at his pipe to keep it alight. But he put it from him again, and went to the door to listen. ' I'm right this time, '.there's really someone coming upstairs.' He put on his coat, hurriedly arranged an untidy necktie, and ran his lingers comb-wise through his hair. This was a sort of rapid toilet, accomplished by way of homage to the approaching visit >r. 'That's a wretchedly crooked staircase,' he said, as he listened. ' It's no wonder that people blunder and stumble as they do. I'm always expecting those banisters to give way altogether. This way, sir. Mind the step, please. You're all right now.' But an expression of disappointment crossed bis face. His visitor looked miserably poor A man, whose shabby slouched hat half concealed a very woe begone face, pale, and pinched and worn, stood in the doorway, wrapped in a thread-bare cloak, beneath which he carried a bundle, as it seemed ; round which a Jong, caw like hand gathered, for its better protection, the foldn of thin frayed oloth. He was panting—was evidently fatigued by the assent of the creaking stairs. Presently a lit of coughing seized him, shaking him cruelly. It was some minutes before he could speak. Meantime the photographer surveyed him with a puzzled »ir, which had yet something of commiseration about it,

' You take photographs; and cheaply, very cheaply?' asked the man hoarsely. ' Very cheaply indeed.' 1 1 want a photograph taken, but ' ' :-tay. 1 tuink there's something you need still more.'

The photographer hastened to produce a bottle and a remnant of a l>af ot bread

' You're not strong, you know. One can see that with half an eye. And you're a trilla faint. You can't stand much exertion : and those stairs are trying. They've proved a little too much for you. And you need food. That's what's the matter with you.' ' It's not that,' the visitor said, waving his hand rather wildly. ' I mean—you're very kind —you mean to be kind, and I am much obliged to you. But don't speak, please, only listen. Don't think me rude — only let me pay what I've got to say and have done with it.'

• Mad,' muttered the phoiograper, resuming his seat and pipe. 'You photograph the living—can you photograph the dead?' 'Mad, without doubt,' the photographer again muttered. In another moneat he btarted to his feet. His visitor had tossed away his cloak. He was carrying in hi< arms a child of some two years, .simply robed in white—or rather, it ehould be said, the body of a child. 'Asl-ep?' asked the photographer, with yet a look upon his face that showed he knew what the answer mast be. 'Dead —stone dead!'' Tears at'earned down his face as ho said the words, his voice b-oke 'My poor litis boy ! My own little Hugh ! He was taken from me this morning—only this morning. But I knew th-. blow was coming. I've known it a long while. He died without a moan—quite

painlessly ; even with a smile upon his lips, as you see hitn now. That was his good bye to me—for he uttered no sound. He died with his hand in mine. I only knew he was dead by the little hand growing so cold so icy cold, so deadco.d.' He turned away, trying to hide a grief that indeed could not he hidden.

'One would think to loo 1 * upon him, that the poor little thing was still asleep,' said the photographer softly. 'lf I could thiuk that! But then T know —I know. He's dead, stone dead ' ' Your only child ?'

'My only child. Thank God !' Then he added, after a pause : ' .Should I not thauk <;od? Could I wish for other children, to suffer as this poor little one has suffered ? to die before my eyes as this little one has died ? to own for their father one so fallen, and wretched, and degraded as lam ? No. Will you photograph the poor little boy ?' ' If you will have it so—yes.' • The light will serve?' 'The light will serve well enough.' 'I wish to s;nd tho photograph heme.' Hebtoke into a strange laugh.' ' I call it home —though it's no home of mine now — though it can never more be home to me. Bat I mean my father's house. We quarrelled—years since. We're not likely to be friends again—or to speak to each other—or to meet face to face on this side of the grave. He would have it so, and it has been so, and will be so now, until the end. I don't know why I tell you these things. They're nothing to you. But it se ms to me that sometimes trouble acts upon men—upon far stronger men than me—like drink, and makes them giddy, and weak, and garrulous, and mad, in spiie of themselves, just as I feel now.

' I want the photograph to send home,' he resumed, after ;x pause ; ' one of tho photographs. I should say, for I must have another to kney myself. It will be little enough, but it will be something, to hug to my heart and to cover with kisses, when my poor little man is hidden away in his grave. You see, my father wanted posse?Biou of tho child. He wanted to make terms with me—he would have given much if he couid only have git the child away from mo. I was casS off; he would have nothing to say to me. But it was different with the child, he would have pet'ed and made much, of hitn—have humored and indulged hitn in every Avay, have made him his heir. Yes, and he would have taught him to hate his father. He would have parted us, ycu see; that was his < bject. But I could not have that. He was my own child. It would have been like selling him for gold. For it came to that. An allowance was to be paid to me, so long as I kept away fr.nn my child, so loug as I helped to hide from him the fact of my existence. It could not be, you fe now. It was bntfcpr for us to cling together, even thmgh we suffered together, and starved together, and it has been something very like starving together in these latter days Are you ready ? Tell ma how to place the poor child. Let the light fall on his face. You never saw prettier gold colored hair than that ? But I've heard or read some where that hair lives and grows on even after death. On tlvs pillow, with this drapery bmeath and above? Ye*. that will do. Touch him gently, please. B ;t I'm sure you haven't the heirt to deal roughly with'the poor H v tle cne. ! 'Ht;:iven forbid !'

' For he was always used to gentle treatment, poor and miserable as I've been ; and he heard o, ly words of kindness, prior child; and he never knew, perhaps, how hard, how very hard, our life was ' I tried to korp that from him. I tried so, for his Rake, to make out that things were much belter than they really were ; to persuade him to think so, at any rate.' ' His mother. Docs she know * ;

1 His mother died in giving lyini b'rth.' • Poor child ! peer child !' said the photographer, very sadly, as he brushed his hand across his eyes. ' They are both in heaven now. Is there need to pity tin m ? How happy she will be to clasp her baby to her heat, for the first time! She died, you see, before ehe had time to 1 ok upon her little one. Poor little mother! Poor tiny child. Well, well, they are together now, never to be parted a^ain.'

The photographer adjusted, his camera, ' One moment,' he said,

But he was absent some minutes. Meantime the father Hat beside the body of his child, tenderly laid upon a pi. low, with its white draperies neatly folded about it. The face seemed wasted somewhat, but wore no. look of suffering ; there was even a smile upon the pallid lips, that were as dead roseleaves. The long, dark silken lashes cast soft shadows upou the colorless cheeks. A delicately featured child, with a complexion of exquisite purity aud transparency, it seemed not dead, but rather a waxen image of sleep.

The father sat motionless, his arms resting upon his knees, his face buried iu his hands, a tangled growth of hair falling over his forehead. The photographer returned presently, bringing with him a handful of flowers. These he proceeded to strew gently about the body of the child. 4 God bless you !' said the father, with a sob. 'You're a good man. Your name's Osborne, isn't it? I saw it written up below. I sh?,n't forget it. I knew an Osborne once. Jack Osborne, his name was, down in Devonshire.' ' You knew him ?'

4 Yes. I'm speaking of years ago. Jack Osborne, the viear'a s.n, as Sfcoke Devenll, Devonshire'

To be continued.