1927 - Saunders, A. Tales of a Pioneer - I. PARENTS, p 3-9

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TALES OF A PIONEER

CHAPTER I

PARENTS

AS the traveller descends from the bleak Salisbury plain into the village of West Lavington, he passes, at some distance on his right hand, a little lake called Knowland's Pond. From this lake a little stream takes its course, in a westerly direction, to the Avon at Bath and the Severn at Bristol, turning a number of useful little mills in the first part of its course.

At the time I was born, and I don't know how long before, the first mill on this stream, which was very near to the lake, was called Garratt's Mill; the third, about a mile down the stream, was called Saunders' Mill. At Garratt's Mill was born my paternal grandmother, Sarah Garratt; at Saunders Mill, my paternal grandfather, James Saunders.

My father, Amram Edwards Saunders, was born on the 3rd of November, 1779, at what was then known as Saunders' Mill (in Lavington, Wiltshire), but has since been named by himself "Russell Mill" in admiration of the conduct of Lord John Russell when passing the Reform Bill of 1832. As Amram was for some years the only son of his mother, he was much indulged by her, and being so early put forward as the business man of the family, owing to his father's death when he was only eleven years old, he was greatly petted by his mother and his five sisters, so that his high combative spirit probably never knew what it was to be much under control.

On his father's death, Amram seems to have taken his place almost at once, as he was soon found to be absolutely steady and trustworthy. Thus, at the age of eleven years, he regularly attended Devizes Market, and seems to have gone with all the steady perseverance of manhood into both the commercial and the manufacturing part of the business.

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His personal appearance when much past the prime of life, is well represented in an oil painting by Darby. He was five feet, ten and a half inches, in height, with erect carriage and a very broad chest. His forehead was high, he had a florid complexion and a beautifully clear skin. His walk was quite a military one. Energy and determination were stamped on every movement. A friend, who knew him well, used to say that he walked as if nothing could turn him aside, and so as to give the impression that a castle must come down if it came in his way. His strength and resolution were so evident that no one seemed inclined to test or to question them.

On the lst of August, 1808, he was married to Mary Box, and, in her, found one of the best wives that was ever bestowed on man. Father loved her as he never loved anyone else, his home was no home to him without her, he appreciated and valued all her excellencies, she was the one person whom he believed to be faultless, his fiery spirit recoiled abashed before her supreme gentleness; but he could never estimate the immeasurable distance between her susceptibilities and his own, between the strongest of men and the most refined and sensitive of women.

Whatever fondness father may have felt for his children, it was most effectually concealed from them, and his affection for anyone was never of a demonstrative character. He used to talk of us as prodigies of awkwardness and stupidity, though he evidently did not like or expect anyone to agree with him in that opinion. His threatenings were frequent and by no means mild, though generally given in stereotyped language which we of course soon learned by heart and knew what was coming. It might be supposed that such conduct taught us to pay little attention to his words, and even to venture some disobedience, but it was not so. There was something in the appearance, manners, and actions of father that made no human being disposed to trifle with him.

In matters of conscience, his ideas and practice were exceedingly liberal, and he would carefully avoid coercion or interference without sincere convictions.

His punctuality and regularity were something almost incredible, and clocks might safely be corrected by his movements. On every alternate Monday, he

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started, at exactly half past eight, for what we called his Bristol journey, including Trowbridge, Bradford, Bath, and Bristol. Each of his customers could tell, within a few minutes, the time he would be at his door. One of his Bath customers used to say to his wife, "Here is Mr Saunders coming, see if our clock is right."

At the Devizes Market on Thursday, exactly at noon, he commenced to examine each sack of wheat in the Market, and generally made a bid for every good sample, which was hardly ever taken at the time. I have been with him, sometimes, when it was of the greatest consequence that we should have a large quantity of wheat, and, at twenty minutes before the close of the Market, I have thought that he was not to get a single sack. But, at a quarter to two, he would take out his pocket-book and turn his back to the Market Cross, and farmer after farmer would come up and accept his offer, most of them saying they had many times been offered the same price by other millers but had given him the preference.

To his servants he was just and generous as far as his deliberate conduct went, though he often spoke to them provokingly and unadvisedly. Yet his old servants never left him, and he succeeded beyond most employers in making them act and feel as if they were dealing with their own property--a feeling that greatly adds to the happiness and interest of both employers and employed. In planning out his horse work, he would often say, "If John will let me have a horse," or of the garden, "I think James might let us have some new potatoes now." Such language was not without its good effect, although John and James, and all around him, knew that their master's plans must and would be carried out.

As a public man father was far more faultless than in domestic life. Irritable as he was over trifles, impatient of the smallest delay, and complaining of the most insignificant inconvenience or loss, he met great dangers, losses or injuries with magnanimity and wonderful imperturbability. In all avoidable, unnecessary dangers, he displayed a vigilance that might give the idea of positive timidity; but, in great demands for necessary moral or physical courage, he was so well known to be never wanting that everyone expected him to go to the front as a matter of course. The greater the danger, the more certainly could his temper, coolness

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and clear judgment be relied upon. He often incurred great trouble, expense, and odium to see justice done to his poor neighbours, and never counted any cost or consequence in resisting any act of oppression on himself or others.

Soon after 1820, he commenced an agitation against the numerous turnpike gates that were so thickly studded around his neighbourhood, though only kept up to pay the interest on an old standing debt. After years of active effort, he was successful. The gates were pulled down and burned in a bonfire on Lavington Hill on February 8th, 1825. The inhabitants of Lavington and its vicinity were so gratified with the result of my father's exertions that they soon afterwards presented him with a silver dessert-service, bearing the following inscription:

Some time after his death, the Rev. R. Brindley, Rath, thus wrote of my father--

My mother, the youngest daughter and youngest child but one in a family of seven, was born at Hilcott, in Wiltshire, on the 13th August, 1788. Her father, John Box, was a farmer. He died when my mother was about sixteen years old. He was a warm-hearted, genial man, jovial and hospitable to a fault, so that his wife had to keep the purse and to see that the rent and all other liabilities were punctually paid, which she never failed to do.

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At the earnest request of her brother William, my mother was sent, when fourteen years of age, to a boarding school at Melksham for fifteen months. There she made a most conscientious use of every hour, and acquired such a thorough knowledge of English grammar that, even seventy years afterwards, she was regarded by her children and friends as the highest authority they could consult on that subject.

When still in her early teens, she felt impelled to join a small and despised band of dissenters, and her religious views were long the subject of no small ridicule in a family where wit was not a scarce article. Her eldest brother John once said to her, in the presence of the whole family, "Now, Mary, I will have nothing to do with that Methodistical cant." Her unguarded reply was, "Then, John, you will have nothing to do with Heaven." The tall, intellectual man waved his strong hand toward the earnest child, and said, "There sits my judge." This unwonted piece of presumption on her part and its severe rebuke were never forgotten by her.

I have been told by her seniors and contemporaries that my mother was a beautiful young woman, with gentle blue eyes, a very fair complexion, a pretty expressive colour that came and went, and dark hair which curled on the top of her head and hung down behind in the fashion of those days. When I knew her, she never had much colour, and I have no wish to paint her, as I should be sorry indeed to exchange my recollection of that pale, spiritual face for that of any mere beauty. Such a character must always have been accompanied by a pleasing countenance, and, in very old age, every one spoke of her as beautiful. She looked small and fragile by the side of her big husband, and at no time of her life did she ever carry a pound of surplus flesh.

Few brides have ever come to a prettier spot than the Russell Mill valley, with its home, mill, garden, and shrubberies, and many an old playmate envied the lot of little Mary Box. But there was less exultation than apprehension in the heart of my mother as she succeeded, twelve days before she had completed her 20th year, to the duties of the notable old housekeeper that her husband's mother was so well known to be. She knew that she had married the favourite son, and that it would not be easy to come up to her mother-in-law's idea of how his house ought to be kept.

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But even the experienced mother's jealous love could find no fault with the young wife, and, indeed, so fond did she become of her daughter-in-law that, when her end was drawing near, she asked and obtained permission to spend her last days in her home and under her care. That such a mother-in-law was sometimes a trying guest may be inferred from one of her last acts which showed the ruling passion strong in death. Mother's brother, Dr. William Box, had told his sister that his patient could not live many days longer. My mother was not satisfied with the dying woman's religious state, and, after spending a short time on her knees, she thought she had summoned up enough courage to talk to her on the great change that so soon awaited her. For this purpose, she drew a chair to her bedside, and, with serious face, was about to sit down without even her busy needle in her hand, when the object of her solicitude said, "You need not sit idle, Mary, there are stockings to mend in that drawer."

I question if one of mother's ten children ever deliberately disobeyed her; but of course we often did so through forgetfulness or carelessness, and then came the inevitable punishment which no excuse, or pleading, or interference from anyone, could set aside. For, unlike father, mother never threatened punishments that she had no intention of inflicting. I remember, one summer evening, being met at the back door, where I had evidently been waited for. After dusting my shoes, shaking my pinafore, and hanging up my cap, I was taken gently by the hand and led to the clock;. Then, in the kindest tone and manner, the clear, firm voice said, "Alfred, I have told you that you must always be in by a quarter to eight. You see it is now five minutes past eight. Go to bed, and you must not leave your room till two o'clock to-morrow afternoon." That was one of her shortest sentences, and they were always understood to include bread and water fare. How merciful those thoughtfully given, deliberate, never retracted sentences were.

Mother's reputation as a mistress gave her a wide choice in the selection of her servants, and of these servants I never heard her speak an unkind word. Their reputation was their only wealth and was a sacred thing in her estimation. She expected no miracles from them, but she made it pleasant and easy for them to do their

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best, and they did it with wonderful regularity. She knew intimately the family history of each one of them, and, though her sympathies with the poor were very wide, she always felt that her old servants had the first claim upon her.

To the day of my dear mother's death, in her 87th year, she kept her mental faculties and her loving unselfishness and consideration for every one about her absolutely unimpaired, and every one of her children had reason to say of her, in the words of Whittier,

For one of the mottoes on her funeral card my brother William chose the words, --