Mr Harding was afraid; he was afraid that he was being led to do that which was not his duty: he was not, however, strong enough to resist, so he got up and followed his son-in-law.
The old men were assembled in groups in the quadrangle — eleven of them at least, for poor old Johnny Bell was bed-ridden, and couldn’t come; he had, however, put his mark to the petition, as one of Handy’s earliest followers. ’Tis true he could not move from the bed where he lay; ’tis true he had no friend on earth, but those whom the hospital contained; and of those the warden and his daughter were the most constant and most appreciated; ’tis true that everything was administered to him which his failing body could require, or which his faint appetite could enjoy; but still his dull eye had glistened for a moment at the idea of possessing a hundred pounds a year ‘to his own cheek,’ as Abel Handy had eloquently expressed it; and poor old Johnny Bell had greedily put his mark to the petition.
When the two clergymen appeared, they all uncovered their heads. Handy was slow to do it, and hesitated; but the black coat and waistcoat of which he had spoken so irreverently in Skulpit’s room, had its effect even on him, and he too doffed his hat. Bunce, advancing before the others, bowed lowly to the archdeacon, and with affectionate reverence expressed his wish, that the warden and Miss Eleanor were quite well; ‘and the doctor’s lady,’ he added, turning to the archdeacon, ‘and the children at Plumstead, and my lord’; and having made his speech, he also retired among the others, and took his place with the rest upon the stone benches.
As the archdeacon stood up to make his speech, erect in the middle of that little square, he looked like an ecclesiastical statue placed there, as a fitting impersonation of the church militant here on earth; his shovel hat, large, new, and well- pronounced, a churchman’s hat in every inch, declared the profession as plainly as does the Quaker’s broad brim; his heavy eyebrows, large open eyes, and full mouth and chin expressed the solidity of his order; the broad chest, amply covered with fine cloth, told how well to do was its estate; one hand ensconced within his pocket, evinced the practical hold which our mother church keeps on her temporal possessions; and the other, loose for action, was ready to fight if need be in her defence; and, below these, the decorous breeches, and neat black gaiters showing so admirably that well-turned leg, betokened the decency, the outward beauty and grace of our church establishment.
‘Now, my men,’ he began, when he had settled himself well in his position, ‘I want to say a few words to you. Your good friend, the warden here, and myself, and my lord the bishop, on whose behalf I wish to speak to you, would all be very sorry, very sorry indeed, that you should have any just ground of complaint. Any just ground of complaint on your part would be removed at once by the warden, or by his lordship, or by me on his behalf, without the necessity of any petition on your part.’ Here the orator stopped for a moment, expecting that some little murmurs of applause would show that the weakest of the men were beginning to give way; but no such murmurs came. Bunce, himself, even sat with closed lips, mute and unsatisfactory. ‘Without the necessity of any petition at all,’ he repeated. ‘I’m told you have addressed a petition to my lord.’ He paused for a reply from the men, and after a while, Handy plucked up courage and said, ‘Yes, we has.’
‘ You have addressed a petition to my lord, in which, as I am informed, you express an opinion that you do not receive from Hiram’s estate all that is your due.’ Here most of the men expressed their assent. ‘Now what is it you ask for? What is it you want that you hav’n’t got here? What is it —’
‘A hundred a year,’ muttered old Moody, with a voice as if it came out of the ground.
‘A hundred a year!’ ejaculated the archdeacon militant, defying the impudence of these claimants with one hand stretched out and closed, while with the other he tightly grasped, and secured within his breeches pocket, that symbol of the church’s wealth which his own loose half-crowns not unaptly represented. ‘A hundred a year! Why, my men, you must be mad; and you talk about John Hiram’s will! When John Hiram built a hospital for worn-out old men, worn-out old labouring men, infirm old men past their work, cripples, blind, bed-ridden, and such like, do you think he meant to make gentlemen of them? Do you think John Hiram intended to give a hundred a year to old single men, who earned perhaps two shillings or half-a-crown a day for themselves and families in the best of their time? No, my men, I’ll tell you what John Hiram meant: he meant that twelve poor old worn-out labourers, men who could no longer support themselves, who had no friends to support them, who must starve and perish miserably if not protected by the hand of charity; he meant that twelve such men as these should come in here in their poverty and wretchedness, and find within these walls shelter and food before their death, and a little leisure to make their peace with God. That was what John Hiram meant: you have not read John Hiram’s will, and I doubt whether those wicked men who are advising you have done so. I have; I know what his will was; and I tell you that that was his will, and that that was his intention.’
Not a sound came from the eleven bedesmen, as they sat listening to what, according to the archdeacon, was their intended estate. They grimly stared upon his burly figure, but did not then express, by word or sign, the anger and disgust to which such language was sure to give rise.
‘Now let me ask you,’ he continued: ‘do you think you are worse off than John Hiram intended to make you? Have you not shelter, and food, and leisure? Have you not much more? Have you not every indulgence which you are capable of enjoying? Have you not twice better food, twice a better bed, ten times more money in your pocket than you were ever able to earn for yourselves before you were lucky enough to get into this place? And now you send a petition to the bishop, asking for a hundred pounds a year! I tell you what, my friends; you are deluded, and made fools of by wicked men who are acting for their own ends. You will never get a hundred pence a year more than what you have now: it is very possible that you may get less; it is very possible that my lord the bishop, and your warden, may make changes —’
‘No, no, no,’ interrupted Mr Harding, who had been listening with indescribable misery to the tirade of his son-in-law; ‘no, my friends. I want no changes — at least no changes that shall make you worse off than you now are, as long as you and I live together.’
‘God bless you, Mr Harding,’ said Bunce; and ‘God bless you, Mr Harding, God bless you, sir: we know you was always our friend,’ was exclaimed by enough of the men to make it appear that the sentiment was general.
The archdeacon had been interrupted in his speech before he had quite finished it; but he felt that he could not recommence with dignity after this little ebullition, and he led the way back into the garden, followed by his father-in-law.
‘Well,’ said he, as soon as he found himself within the cool retreat of the warden’s garden; ‘I think I spoke to them plainly.’ And he wiped the perspiration from his brow; for making a speech under a broiling mid-day sun in summer, in a full suit of thick black cloth, is warm work.
‘Yes, you were plain enough,’ replied the warden, in a tone which did not express approbation.
‘And that’s everything,’ said the other, who was clearly well satisfied with himself; ‘that’s everything: with those sort of people one must be plain, or one will not be understood. Now, I think they did understand me — I think they knew what I meant.’
The warden agreed. He certainly thought they had understood to the full what had been said to them.
‘They know pretty well what they have to expect from us; they know how we shall meet any refractory spirit on their part; they know that we are not afraid of them. And now I’ll just step into Chadwick’s, and tell him what I’ve done; and then I’ll go up to the palace, and answer this petition of theirs.’
The warden’s mind was very full — full nearly to overcharging itself; and had it done so — had he allowed himself to speak the thoughts which were working within him, he would indeed have astonished the archdeacon by the reprobation he would have expressed as to the proceeding of which he had been so unwilling a witness.