University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.
ARTHUR BLAGUE GETS HIS HAND IN, AND THE PROPRIETOR
MEETS WITH AN UNEXPECTED REVOLUTION.

Arthur still had writing to do in finishing up his
father's accounts, and a few weeks were passed in this
employment before he was ready to begin work at the
Run. In the meantime, he had visited Ruggles, and
entered into a formal engagement with him.

On a frosty morning toward the last of October, he
rose before daylight, quietly crept down stairs, made a
fire in the kitchen, and cooked for himself a simple
breakfast. He found his dinner already snugly packed
in a little basket—the timely work of his mother on the
previous evening. The daylight had just begun to tinge
the sky, as he stepped forth from his home, and only
here and there in the village rose the smoke from the
early kindled fires. The Run was a mile from the village,
and only farms and farm-houses lay between. He
supposed he should be early at the mill, so, though the
air was brisk, he loitered thoughtfully along the uneven
highway, recalling the past and revolving the
future. Unmindful of the passage of time, he found

himself suddenly within sight of the tall chimney of the
mill. The buildings were still buried in the valley.

For the first time since he had fully decided on this
step of life, his heart sank within him. He shrank from
the eyes that would be fixed upon him, the sneers that
would reach his ear, and the subjection of his will to
that of a man whom, in his inmost soul, he abhorred.
At length, he discarded these details; and a dull undercurrent
of dread took their place, while he endeavored
to engage his mind with the most insignificant observations
and incidents. There was a long golden cloud in
the east, which only lacked a fin of being a model salmon.
He walked under a maple whose foliage frost had
changed to amber, and dropped ankle-deep upon the
ground, and wondered what he should do with those
leaves if they were all golden eagles. He picked up an
apple in the street, tossed it into the air, caught it in his
hand, bit into it, and then threw it at a cat sneaking under
a fence.

Lingering in this aimless kind of way, and pausing
to hear any sound that struck his ear, he was still a
hundred rods from the mill when the sun rose, fresh
and bright, above the eastern hills. The tall chimney
was vomiting forth thick masses of black smoke, the
hum of machinery with the pulsating din of many looms
filled the air, and a few minutes' walk brought him to
the brow of the hill, at the foot of which lay the factory
and the little hamlet of Hucklebury Run.

Young men and young women, and boys and girls,
were pouring out of the door of the large boarding-house,
and crowding into the mill. Arthur waited until
all had disappeared within the black door, and then

boldly pushed down the hill. As he entered the yard,
he became conscious of many eyes at the windows.
Dirty-looking wenches, with arms bare to the elbows,
were tittering behind the dirtier glass. Frowzy-headed
men passed him in the yard, and gave him an offensively
familiar greeting. What struck the young man with
peculiar force was the perversive spirit of old Ruggles
in all these people. They acted like him, they looked
like him, they all seemed to have sold themselves to
him. He understood old Ruggles' remark now—“We
are all alike down to the Run.”

Uncertain where to look for his employer, he approached
the door, and hailed a boy—barefoot, and with
no clothes upon him but shirt and trousers—and inquired
if he knew where Mr. Ruggles was.

“He ain't very fur off,” replied the boy with a grin,
and in an undertone that showed that he was afraid to
speak louder.

“I wish to see him,” said Arthur.

“Stand right where you be then,” said the boy.
“That's the quickest way. You can't find him afollerin'
him; he's too fast for that. Old Gabriel will blow his
horn afore you've stood here five minutes,” and the little
wretch looked around him carefully and cunningly,
to see if he were overheard.

Arthur understood and smiled at the allusion of the
boy to his employer's nasal note, and felt that possibly
it might announce the day of doom to him.

The boy cocked his eye suddenly, shrugged his
shoulders, and was out of sight in an instant. He had
detected the signs of the old man's coming, and was
hardly in the mill before that individual ran down the

stairs at the foot of which Arthur stood, taking three
steps at a leap, and blowing his nose at the landing.

“On hand, eh?” was his greeting of the new operative.

“On hand,” was the response.

“Little late this morning, but never mind—it's the
first day, and we won't be particular to start with.”

“Late!” exclaimed Arthur in astonishment, “why,
I saw the hands just go in.”

“Oh! yes, they've jest had their breakfast. They
work an hour before breakfast, by candle-light, you
know.” The old man grinned as he said this, and
looked at Arthur curiously, to see how he took it.

“Do you expect me to be here an hour before breakfast
every morning?” inquired the young man.

“Well,” replied old Ruggles, “we'll be as easy
with you as we can, you know, but we can't show many
favors. I'm here an hour before breakfast myself.
That's the way we get our living, and we all fare alike
down here to the Run. I work jest as hard as my
hands, and my hands are jest as good as I am.”

This, by the way, was the method by which the
low-bred proprietor of Hucklebury Run settled all the
complaints of those in his employ. They worked no
more hours and no harder than he; they fared as well
as he. That was true, and if a workman were not content
with that, he had the alternative of leaving, provided
he could raise money enough to get away.

Arthur was not to be frightened away from the Run
without a trial; so he said: “Mr. Ruggles, I am ready
for work, and will conform myself to your rules so far
as I can.”

“Well, I really haven't any thing for you to do in
the mill this morning,” responded Ruggles, scratching his
head. “Let's see—let's see. What do you say to going
out into the pasture and mowing bushes with Cheek?”

“That's what you call the foot of the ladder, I suppose,”
said Arthur, with poorly disguised contempt.

“Very well,” said old Ruggles. “Stay here, and
do my work, and I'll mow bushes. I had rather be
out of doors than in.”

This of course settled the matter. The practicability
of Arthur's stepping into the shoes of the manager of the
mill, and sending that gentleman out to clean up a
shrubby pasture with Cheek, one of his hopeful operatives,
was entirely evident to the young man, but he
was too polite to avail himself of the offer. So he said:
“Set me to work where you will, and let me have a
place in the mill as soon as you can.”

The old man took down a bush-hook that hung upon
a post near the mill, and then called Cheek, who straightway
appeared from the basement, coming up the stairs
through a cloud of steam that issued from the passage.

“Cheek, you're to mow bushes in the mountain-pasture
with this new hand to-day. Show him how it's
done, and do a better day's work than you did the last
time you were up there, or I'll show you how it's done.
Do you hear?”

Cheek heard, nodded his head a great number of
times, took off a very dirty striped apron, rolled down
a very dirty pair of shirt-sleeves, put on an old cloth cap
with the visor turned up, took down another bush-hook,
and said, “Come on.”

The young men were of about equal age, though

Arthur was much the taller of the two. Old Ruggles
stood and watched them as they passed out of sight,
with a grin of satisfaction, then blew his nose and
plunged into the mill.

As soon as they were out of sight and hearing of the
master, Cheek exclaimed: “I vow, Blague, you're the
last feller I ever expected to see in this hole.”

“This is the last hole I ever expected to be in,” responded
Arthur; adding, “how did you know my name
was Blague?”

“Oh! I've heard all about you. The old man has
been bragging that he'd got hold of one of the Crampton
aristocracy, and was going to put him through a course
of sprouts.”

“Those that grow in the pasture are the first of the
course, I suppose,” said Arthur drily.

Cheek laughed, and said that was good. Then he
threw down his bush-hook, and cried, “Halt! Now,
Blague,” said he, coming up and laying a hand on each
of Arthur's shoulders, “don't you remember me?”

“I think I've seen you before, but I cannot tell when
nor where. Possibly I have seen you in my father's
store.”

“Not often, but you knew me when I was a shaver,”
(by which term Cheek meant a very small boy,) “and
I knew you when you was a shaver. You remember
old Bob Lampson—drunken old coot—he was my
father. I'm Tom Lampson, and you gave me a pair of
shoes once. Do you twig now?”

“Oh! yes, I remember you. What do they call you
Cheek for?”

“Look here,” said Tom Lampson; and lifting his

long hair with one hand, and pulling down his shirt-collar
very low with the other, he displayed a cheek
very black with gunpowder. “I got blowed up one
Fourth of July, and did this; and ever since, the boys
have called me Cheek. I don't mind it now. I vow I
b'lieve I like it better. They never call me Tom Lampson
now, but I think of old Bob Lampson—old scamp—
my father, you know.”

“Don't talk so about your father,” said Arthur.
“I don't like to hear you.”

Cheek shrugged his shoulders, as if the unpleasant
memory of his father had got under his jacket. “I
guess,” said he, “you don't remember him very well.
If he had tanned you, and swore your head off, and
abused your mother till he used her up, you wouldn't
like him any better than I do—old—well, never
mind!”

At a motion from Arthur, Cheek resumed his implement,
and both moved on toward the pasture. Arthur
comprehended the character of Cheek very readily.
He was a good-natured fellow, whom no amount of bad
treatment could thoroughly demoralize. He was garalous
and shallow, but he had a kind heart and a degree
of genuine sensibility. He had always remembered
Arthur Blague with affectionate respect. This morning
he pitied him, because he saw that his mind was
troubled, and knew there was sufficient reason for it.
He wondered what he could do to make him feel better.

“Blague,” said Cheek, (and when he called him
Blague, instead of Arthur, he intended it as the more
respectful and pleasant style of address,) “Blague,
you'll find that you and I ain't exactly like the rest of

'em, and now I want always to be your friend, and you
shall always be my friend.”

“Certainly, Cheek, we shall always be friends, of
course,” responded Arthur with a smile.

“Well, I mean,” said Cheek earnestly, “that I will
always stick to you, and you shall always stick to me.
Give us your hand on that,” and Cheek seized Arthur's
outstretched hand, and shook it violently. The act
seemed to give his affectionate nature a great deal of
satisfaction, and he burst tunefully into “Away with
melancholy,” the name of that somber passion sounding
very much in Arthur's ears like “melon-colie.”

When the song had subsided, Cheek turned to Arthur,
and said: “What do you s'pose is the reason
you're so much bigger than I am?”

Arthur replied: “I'm sure I don't know.”

“It's because,” said Cheek, “that you've always had
enough to eat, and I haven't. I haven't seen what you've
got there, of course, (looking at Arthur's dinner-basket,
and alluding to its contents,) but I'll bet a goose I haven't
seen so much good, wholesome victuals in three months
as you've got in your basket there. I am always hungry
—hungry from one year's end to the other. I'm hungry
now—hungry enough to eat a jackass, and chase the
driver a mile.”

Arthur laughed long and loud, which pleased Cheek
very much. So he repeated the statement, that Arthur
might get more satisfaction from it, if possible, and then
added that it was “a true fact, and no mistake.”

“You ought to see the boarders skin that table
once,” continued Cheek, “regular grab game. Every
thing comes on together, and the pie goes first. Sometimes

we put it into our pockets, so's to be sure of it,
and eat it when we get ready. You might carry one
of them boarding-house pies in your pocket for a year
without hurting the pocket any, or the pie either, any
more than if it was a whetstone. But you ought to see
the old man when he comes in to weigh the victuals, to
see if he isn't feeding us too much.”

“But he doesn't do that?” said Arthur incredulously.

“Don't he, though! I've seen him weigh every
mouthful that went on to the table, and sit and look at
us, and figure with his little black pencil all dinner-time.
Then's the time we put in. Didn't I have a time with
him one day? I vow, wasn't that a time!”

Cheek shrugged his shoulders again, as if another very
unpleasant memory had got under his jacket.

“Tell me about it,” said Arthur.

“It was when I first went there,” said Cheek. “I
shouldn't dare to do it now. We all get afraid of the
old man after we've been with him a while. You see
he came in one day, and we all heard a jingle, and knew
the steelyards were round. So we all dipped in strong,
and said nothing. I saw what they were up to, so I
stuck my fork into a chunk of corned beef as big as
your two fists. The old man was mad enough, I tell
you. `Cheek,' says he, `you're a pig, to take such a
piece of beef as that.' Says I, `Not as you knows of.'
Says he, `You're a pig.' Says I, `I ain't a pig;' and I
took up the chunk of meat on my fork, and held it where
all the boarders could see it, and says I, `Do you s'pose
a pig would eat such a piece of meat as that? Smell
of it, Mr. Ruggles!' Everybody at the table looked
scared, but I hadn't learned him then. He came

straight towards me, and I held out the piece for him
to smell of, and just as he got his nose to it I gave it a
little dab, and he jumped as if something had hit him.
I s'pose it was a little hot. Wasn't he mad? He knocked
my fork out of my hand, and then he kicked me clear
into the yard. I think I've got a little place somewhere
on me now that has been numb ever since;” and Cheek
felt around upon his back to see if he could find it.

“Here's the place,” said Cheek at last; and lifting
some clumsy bars, he turned Arthur into the field of his
day's labor—a barren, rambling pasture, more friendly,
apparently, to the growth of scrub-oaks and blackberry
bushes than to grass. Arthur soon got the swing of
the hook, and laid about him right lustily.

“You'll get sick of it before night,” said Cheek, “if
that's the way you pitch in.” Cheek then illustrated
the manner in which he proposed to perform the labor
of the day.

“I shall work faithfully, Cheek,” replied Arthur;
“you will do as you choose, of course.”

“Well, you're right, I s'pose,” said Cheek, “but I
can tell you one thing—the more you do for old Ruggles,
the more you may do. We old hands all understand
it.”

Arthur had worked half an hour vigorously, when
his hands began to feel sore, and, drawing on a pair of
gloves for their protection, he proceeded. Straightening
up, at length, for a little rest, he turned to Cheek, and
inquired what he meant by saying that everybody became
afraid of the old man after living with him a while.

“Why, you see, he haunts us,” replied Cheek, leaning
upon his hook. “He's always 'round. If three

heads get together in the mill, off goes his nose right
over their shoulders. If anybody laughs, off goes his
nose again. He's always within ten feet of everybody,
and—I don't know, we kind o' dread him, and then we
get to hating him, and somehow we all settle down at
last into being afraid of him. There's Big Joslyn—
strong enough to lick a regiment of him—he'll swing a
hundred-and-sixty-spindled jack like a feather, but he's
as afraid of old Ruggles as if he was a tiger. The old
man will abuse him up hill and down, and he'll stand
and take it as meek as Moses. Somehow or other he
gets 'em all.”

“What do you mean by gets 'em all?”

“Well, take Big Joslyn now. He's got a wife and
children, and he doesn't get wages enough for 'em all to
live on, so the old man lets him get in debt, and he
never lets him get out of debt. There isn't a hand in
the mill who isn't in debt in the same way; and when
the old fellow gets a chap there, it's all day with him.
He never expects to leave Hucklebury Run, unless he
cuts stick, or goes out on wheels in a black box that
smells of vinegar. Them that have families can't
peep, you see, and the old man makes 'em take things
out of the store, and pays 'em in all sorts of ways.”

“Out of what store?” inquired Arthur, very glad
indeed to be placed on his guard.

“Oh! he's got a store up in the mill, and you ought
to see it. You see he sells some of his nigger-cloth for
goods, so as to accommodate his hands, he says. I
bought this old cap there, when it was new,” (Cheek
touched it with his finger) “and it smelt so strong of
codfish that it kept my mouth watering for a month.

You see every thing goes in together, and the thing that
smells the strongest gets the lead. If you've a mind to
try it,” pursued Cheek, anxious to impress the truth of
his assertions upon Arthur, and handing his cap toward
him, “I shouldn't wonder if you could find a little codfish
about that now.”

Arthur laughed, and told him he would take his
word for it.

“I tell you,” said Cheek, recalling the hopeless condition
of Big Joslyn, “that when a feller gets tied to a
wife, and has a lot of little chickadees around him,
there's no help for him if he once gets into old Ruggles's
hands.”

“How do the girls get along with him?” inquired
Arthur.

“Well, they wilt to it,” replied Cheek. “I know
every girl in the mill, and they get along a mighty
sight better'n the men. Some of 'em will put on their
sun-bonnets and cry all day. There are girls there that
have regular crying days. I always know when there's
a shower coming. A girl sits down to the table in the
morning with the corners of her mouth drawn down,
eats just a bite of breakfast, then on goes the sun-bonnet,
and just as soon as she gets her looms running,
and all ready for it, she begins to cry, and cries till the
mill stops. I used to kind o' pity them at first, but
I've got used to it now, and don't mind it so much.”

“What do they cry for?” inquired Arthur.

“Oh! I don't know. I don't s'pose they do. They
feel bad promisc'usly, I reckon, and don't know what
else to do. They all come out bright enough next day,
if nobody says any thing to 'em. It's a kind of a

fashion at the Run for girls to have crying days. All of
'em cry, but them that have long hair.”

“Long hair!” exclaimed Arthur with a smile,
“what has long hair to do with it?”

“Well, they all have to get something to take up
their minds, you know—kind of amuse them, you
know,” pursued Cheek, in explanation. “If a girl has
long hair, she takes in a comb regular when she goes to
work, and her hair isn't done up all day. She gets her
looms going, and then she draws her comb down
through her hair, and keeps doing so till there's a
bobbin out. Oh! I tell you, combs and sun-bonnets are
thick some days; but they work first-rate when they
cry, for they're always mum then. When old Ruggles
comes in and sees the sun-bonnets thick, he knows it's
all right for one day, so he just blows his nose and
leaves 'em.”

At this instant the young men were interrupted, by
the accustomed note of warning, that their employer
was with them. They had not seen where he came
from, and did not know how long he had been near them.

“How are you getting along?” said old Ruggles.
“You find Cheek very good company, don't you, Arthur?”

Cheek had no sooner become aware of his master's
presence than he began to lay about him with great
diligence. Arthur understood the taunt, but replied
quietly, that Cheek seemed to be a very good fellow,
indeed.

Old Ruggles, accustomed to no replies from his
workmen, looked up and down Arthur's cool front in
astonishment. There was no servile fear in that eye,

no nervous apprehension. Failing to look him into
activity, he broke into a low, sneering laugh, and said,
“Well, that is very fine!”

“You seem amused,” said Arthur.

“Amused!” exclaimed Ruggles. “Cheek, look
here!”

Cheek feared a scene, and came up trembling and
afraid.

“Cheek, here's something you never see afore in
your life. It's worth looking at. Here's a young man
at work for me in gloves!”

Arthur's face burnt for a moment with intense
anger, for the words were said in the most insulting
way possible. Then he recalled his good resolutions,
and checked the hasty response that sprang to his
lips.

“My hands are not used to this work,” said he, “and
they are already blistered. I shall wear gloves as long
as they do not interfere with my work.” Having said
this, he coolly turned his back on his employer, and
resumed his labor.

Old Ruggles did not know what to say. In his establishment
dependence always walked hand in hand
with servility. Somehow, the spirit of the young man
must be broken, but he could not decide how to undertake
the task.

He watched Arthur for a few minutes in silence;
then he stepped up, and taking his bush-hook out of his
hands, he worked actively a while, and handed the implement
back to him with an air that said, “You have
done nothing to-day; work as I do.”

Arthur smiled, and said: “You mow bushes very

well, Mr. Ruggles. You must have had a good deal of
practice.”

The old man replied not a word, but went off, muttering
something about “upstarts.” As soon as he was
out of sight and hearing, Cheek dropped his hook,
mounted on a stump, slapped his hands upon his thighs
half a dozen times, and crowed like a cock. Then he
threw his old cap into the air, and caught it, and then
he came up to Arthur, and said: “I vow, Blague, give
us your hand. You are a trump. There ain't another
man at the Run that would dare to do it; but he's after
you now. He won't stop until he's got you under his
thumb.”

“Cheek,” said Arthur coolly, “I shall do for Mr.
Ruggles just as well as I can, and I shall never be afraid
of him.”

That was a tedious day for Arthur Blague. Long
before night he was tired and sore; but he labored on
faithfully until after sunset; and then, in company with
Cheek, walked back to the mill. The old man was
away, and, without waiting for dismissal, he walked
home. He was glad that the evening covered him from
observation, for he was sad, and almost disheartened.
His mother greeted him on his return with a very
feeble attempt to smile; but her eyelids were red with
weeping. She sat and watched him as he devoured his
supper, and wondered at his overflow of spirits. Whatever
might be his hardships, he was determined that his
mother should know nothing of them; and as she
obeyed his wishes, and refrained from asking him any
questions, he got along very easily with her.

He went to bed early, and the next morning breakfasted

and was off before his mother awoke. He found
old Ruggles ready for him—waiting to set him to work
in the mill. He could not help noticing a marked
change in the expression of the faces which greeted him
on all sides. The truth was, that Cheek had been full of
Blague all night. The scene between Ruggles and Arthur
in the pasture had been described in Cheek's best
style, with all the exaggerations that were necessary to
make an impression. The men had all got hold of it,
and talked it over. The girls had heard the story, and
rehearsed it to one another until they had become surcharged
with admiration of the young man. There
were none but kind eyes that greeted him among the
operatives that morning. All wondered what Ruggles
would do to tame him. Cheek's opinion was, that
Blague would whip the old man in less than five minutes,
if it ever came to that.

“How are your hands this morning?” inquired
Ruggles, as Arthur presented himself before him.

“They are very sore, sir,” replied the young man.

“That's too bad, ain't it?” said the master, “because
I was going to set you to dyeing, and it might
make 'em smart some. Besides, it ain't work where
you can wear gloves very well.”

“I beg you not to consult the condition of my
hands at all,” replied Arthur.

“Oh! very well! You can go down stairs, and
Cheek will show you what to do.”

Arthur went down through the same column of
steam out of which Cheek issued the previous morning,
and found that young man in a very lively state of
mind, and up to his elbows in a dyeing vat. The atmosphere

was hot, heavy, almost stifling. The room
was full of the noise of heavy gearing, and the constant
plash of water in the near wheel-pit. Objects a few
feet distant could not be seen in consequence of the
steam that rolled out of the vats.

Cheek explained to Arthur the nature of his labor,
and set him to work. The moment his hands were
bathed in the poisonous liquid they became as painful as
if they had been bathed in fire. This was what he anticipated,
and he was prepared to endure it. By degrees,
however, sensibility was benumbed, and he worked on
with tolerable comfort. He was disturbed by the frequent
visits of the master, who would stand by him
sometimes for several minutes, and tell him how well
he took hold of business. “When I want to take the
starch out of a man, I always put him in here,” said old
Ruggles with a grin.

Arthur took no notice of these taunts, but kept on
with his work, until the bell rang. The ponderous
wheel in the pit stood still, and the snarling, grinding
din of the gearing was hushed. The world never
seemed so still to Arthur as it did then. The noise
of the ever-revolving machinery had seemed to crowd
out of his consciousness all the rest of the universe;
and when it stopped, it seemed as if the world had
ceased to move. Putting on his coat, and taking his
dinner-basket in his hand, he ascended the stairs, and
sought a quiet place in the mill where he could eat his
lunch undisturbed. This he had hardly succeeded in
doing, when old Ruggles, making a rapid passage
through the mill, discovered him. “I've been looking
for you, sir,” said the master.

“Well, sir,” responded Arthur, rising and brushing
the crumbs from his lap, “you have found me, and I
am at your service.”

The old man had really begun to feel very uncomfortably
about Arthur. He saw that the young man
was determined to do his duty, and to serve him faithfully.
He had become indistinctly conscious that there
was nothing in Ruggles, the master, to inspire fear in
Arthur, the hired workman. He had found a character
which he could not overtop nor undermine; and he
knew, too, that he was an object of contempt to a
young man whose heart was pure and true. He had
begun to find that his attempts to wound the young
man's feelings reacted unpleasantly upon himself. He
was the man whose pride was wounded, and not Arthur.

Therefore, when Arthur rose so readily, and so respectfully,
and told him he was at his service, the old
man hesitated, and became half-ashamed of a trick that
he had planned for Arthur's humiliation. Then he
stammered and lied. He thought, he said, that perhaps
Arthur would like a little relief from his confinement in
the basement, and he wanted to have him take his horse
and go to the village for him. His object was simply
to have him shown up to the village of Crampton as
the servant—the errand-boy—of old Ruggles of Hucklebury
Run. Arthur told him he would go very willingly,
(and thereby was guilty of a lie, with such a
blending of all the colors of the spectrum of truth in it,
that it was white,) and inquired what his errand was.

At this moment the bell for the recommencement
of work sounded, and the men and women came pouring
into the mill. Seeing the old man and Arthur in

conversation, they paused, as if anxious to overhear
what was passing between them.

“You will go first,” said the master, in a loud and
insolently dictatorial tone, “to the post-office, and get
the newspapers, and then down to old Leach's, and get a
barrel of soap.”

Arthur smiled.

“Well, sir, what are you laughing about?” inquired
the old man savagely.

“I was only thinking,” replied Arthur, “what a
suggestive combination newspapers and soap were.”

The very dirty audience tittered, and the dirty proprietor
looked daggers.

“Do you mean to say that we need newspapers and
soap here, sir? Do you mean to insult me and my
hands?” and the proprietor grew white with anger.

“I never insulted anybody in my life, Mr. Ruggles.
As for the soap and the newspapers, I think the combination
an excellent one anywhere, and I suppose you
need the articles here, or you wouldn't send for
them.”

The old man turned angrily round upon the gaping
operatives, and said: “Go to your work; don't you
know the bell has stopped ringing?”

They went off smiling, and exchanging significant
looks with each other. Arthur looked out of the window,
and seeing the horse and the accustomed truck-wagon
waiting for him, he took out his gloves, drew
them on over his stained hands, and asked his employer
if the soap and the newspapers were all. The old man
could hardly speak for anger, and the state of his mind
was not improved at all by the success that Arthur had

achieved in covering with gloves the mark of servitude
which the dye had left upon his fingers.

“Nothing else,” said the old man, answering Arthur's
question snappishly. “Get what I tell you, and
be quick about it.”

Arthur left the mill, and as he stepped into the
wagon was greeted by a voice coming out through the
steam that poured from the basement window, with
something that sounded like, “Hit 'im ag'in, Blague—I'll
hold your moccasins.”

Arthur drove off toward the town, feeling, on the
whole, very pleasantly. He comprehended perfectly
the trick of his employer, but the two days of his experience
at the Run had given him strength. He had
not been humiliated. He had not been crushed. On
the contrary, he had risen to the point of laboring where
God and duty had placed him, without being ashamed
of it. He became conscious of a new power in life, and
a new power over his destiny. Instead, therefore, of
riding through the village of Crampton with a sense of
shame and mortified vanity, he rode as self-respectfully and
as confidently as if he had been a king. He greeted the old
acquaintances whom he met with his accustomed freedom
and cordiality, and was greeted in the old hearty way by
all. There were some silly people who thought it must
be very “trying” to Arthur, “brought up as he had
been;” but all the sensible people said that Arthur
Blague was a brave, good fellow, and was sure to
“work his way in the world.”

Arthur visited the post-office and got his newspapers,
and then he went to the soap establishment of old
Leach, and procured the soap, and turned his horse

toward Hucklebury Run. He caught a glimpse of his
astonished mother as he drove by his home, and kissed
his hand to her merrily, when she, poor woman! sank
into a chair as despairingly as if she had seen him in his
coffin.

Returning to the mill, he delivered his package to
the master without a word, helped to unload the soap,
and then went down to his work again among the
vats.

Old Ruggles was very busy that afternoon. He
was angry, irritable, baffled. Every thing went wrong.
First he was in the weaving-room, then in the spinning-room,
then in the carding-room. He went up stairs
three steps at a time; he plunged down stairs three
steps at a time; and blew his resonant nose at every
landing. If he saw two men or two women talking together,
he was at their side in an instant. If he caught
a boy out of his place, he led him back by the ear.
There was not a sun-bonnet nor a comb in use that afternoon,
for the girls, illustrative of the ingenious theory
of Cheek, had found something “to take up their minds.”
He was particularly attentive to the dyeing-room, so
that Arthur and Cheek contented themselves with monosyllables,
and only spoke when necessary.

The day wore on slowly, and it had become almost
late enough for lighting the lamps. Still the old man
was omnipresent. Arthur worked diligently, and his
thoughts were as busy as the feet and eyes of his employer.
The ceaseless noise in his ears wearied him.
The constant plash of water in the wheel-pit, the grinding,
metallic ring of the gearing, the prevalent sense of
motion everywhere—the buzz, the whirr, the clashing

overhead, the stifling atmosphere which enveloped him,
all tended to oppress him with sensations and emotions
utterly strange.

In an instant, every sound was swept from his consciousness
by a cry so sharp—so full of fear and agony
—that his heart stood still. The steam was around
him and he could see nothing, but he notices that Cheek
escaped past him like lightning, and rushed up stairs.
In a moment more, the gate of the water-wheel closed
with a sudden plunge, and the mill stood still. Another
moment, and a dozen men came down stairs with lamps
in their hands, and the first one, walking a few steps
into the darkness, exclaimed, “It's old Ruggles himself!”

Arthur approached the group as they held their
lamps over the prostrate form of the master of Hucklebury
Run.

“He's been round that shaft, the Lord knows how
many times,” exclaimed Big Joslyn, casting his eyes
upwards.

Not another word was spoken for a minute. All
seemed to be stupefied. Arthur had stood back from
them, waiting to see what steps they would take, and
feeling himself quite too young to assume responsibility
among his seniors; but they seemed so thoroughly paralyzed,
and so incapable of doing any thing without
direction, that he pushed through the group, and, kneeling
by the old man's side, placed his fingers upon his
pulse. The prostrate master presented a sickening aspect.
His face was bruised and bleeding, his clothes
were nearly torn from his body, his whole frame seemed
to be a mass of bruises, and one leg was broken, and
fairly doubled upon itself.

“He is not dead,” said Arthur; and a gasp and a
moan attested the truth of the announcement. “Now,
lift him up carefully, carry him to his house, and take
care of him till I send the doctor.”

The young man waited only long enough to be sure
that the master would be carefully looked after, and then
he put on his coat, and taking his basket in his hand,
ran every step of the mile that lay between the Run
and the house of Dr. Gilbert. He found the doctor at
home, delivered his errand, watched the little gig as it
reeled off toward the mill at the highest speed the little
black pony could command, and then, tired and sore,
and shocked and sad, entered his own dwelling.