Comparatively few of those who nowadays run down to Southend for a breath of fresh air give a thought to the fact that the wide stretch of low country lying between the railroad and the Thames, from Pitsea to Leigh, was at one time, and that not so many centuries back, a mud flat, a continuation of the great line of sand that still, with but a short break here and there, stretches down beyond Yarmouth; still less that, were it not for the watchfulness of those who dwell upon it, it would in a short time revert to its original condition, the country lying below the level of higher water.
Along the whole face of the river run banks—the work, doubtless, of engineers brought over by Dutch William—strong, massive, and stone-faced, as they need be to withstand the rush and fret of the tide and the action of the waves when, as is often the case, the east wind knocks up ridges of short, angry water in Sea Reach. Similarly, the winding creeks are all embanked, but here dams of earth are sufficient to retain within its bounds the sluggish water as it rises and falls. Standing on any of these, the farmhouses and little homesteads lie below, their eaves for the most part level with the top of the bank, though there are a few knolls which rise above the level of the tidal water.
The most conspicuous objects are the brown sails of the barges, which seem to stand up in the midst of the brownish-green fields, the hulls being invisible. This cannot be called marsh land, for the ground is intersected by ditches, having sluices through which they discharge their water at low tide. Very fertile is the land in some[Pg 221] spots, notably in Canvey Island, where there are great stretches of wheat and broad meadows deep with rich waving grass; but there are other places where the grass is brown and coarse, showing that, though the surface may be hard and dry, water lies not far below. Here a few cattle gather a scanty living, and the little homesteads are few and far between. Most of the houses are placed near the banks of the creeks. The barges serve as their wagons, and carry their hay up to London and bring down manure and other things required, or carry coal and lime to the wharves of Pitsea.
A rare place was this in the old smuggling days, and indeed until quite lately the trade was carried on, though upon a reduced scale. Vessels drifting slowly up the river would show a light as they passed a barge at anchor or a bawley hanging to its trawl, a light would be shown in answer, and a moment later a boat would row off to the ship, and a score of tubs or a dozen bales of tobacco be quickly transferred, and before morning the contents would be stowed in underground cellars in some of the little farmhouses on the creeks, or be hidden away in the Leigh marshes.
"Will Bill be in to-night with the barge?" a child asked a woman, as he came down from the bank to a not uncomfortable-looking homestead ten yards from its foot.
"I told you that you are to call him uncle," the woman said sharply, but not unkindly. "I have told you so over and over again, child."
"I generally do now, but one forgets sometimes."
"There is never any saying"—the woman went on in reply to his question—"there is never any saying; it all depends on tide and wind. Sometimes they have to anchor and lose a tide, or maybe two. Sometimes they get a cargo directly they get into the Pool or at Rochester; sometimes they wait two or three days. They have been away four days now; they might have been here yesterday, but may not come till to-morrow. One thing is certain, whenever he do come he will want something[Pg 222] to eat, and I hope that they will bring it with them, for there is nothing here but bread and bacon."
"And do you think that I shall soon go home again, aunt?"
"There is no saying," the woman said evasively. "You are very comfortable here, aint you?"
"Oh, yes! There are the dogs and the ducks and the chickens, and uncle says that he will take me sometimes for a sail with him in the barge."
"Yes, I expect it won't be long first. You know, I used to go with him regular till, as I have told you, my little Billy fell overboard one night, and we knew nothing of it until he was gone, and I have never liked the barge since. Besides, I have plenty to do here. But I am going across to Rochester very soon. It's a good place for shopping, and I want groceries and little things for myself and more things for you. I will take you with me, but you will have to promise to be very good and careful."
"I will be careful," the child said confidently, "and you know that uncle said that when spring comes he will teach me to swim; and I shall like that, and if I tumble overboard it won't matter. He says that when I get a few years older I shall go with him regularly, and learn to steer and to manage the sails. I shall like that; but I should like to go back sometimes to see Hilda and Netta and my grandpapa."
"Well, well, my dear, we will see about it; they can't take you at present. I think that they have gone away traveling, and may not be back for a long time. And mind, you know you are not to talk about them. Just when you are here with me I don't care; but you know uncle does not like it, and if anyone asks, you must say just what he told you, that your father and mother are dead, and that Uncle Bill has took you."
"I shan't forget," the boy said. "I never do talk about it before him; it makes him angry. I don't know why, but it does."
"But he is always kind to you, Jack?"[Pg 223]
"Oh, yes, he is very kind, and he often brings me things when he comes back; he brought me my dear little kitten. Pussy, where have you hidden yourself? Puss! puss!" And in answer a little ball of white fur bounded out from behind a chair, and the child was soon engaged in a game of romps with it.
"It is a shame!" the woman said, as she watched them; "I don't mind the other things, but I never liked this. I wonder who the poor little chap is. By the way he talked when he first came, about his home and his nurse and horses and carriages, his friends must be rich people. Bill has never understood why they wanted to get rid of him; but I suppose that he was in somebody's way, and, as he never speaks of his father and mother, but only of those two girls and his grandfather, who seems to have been an invalid, I expect that he must have lost his father and mother before he can remember. Well, he will be right enough here; I should miss him dreadful if he were to go away; he seems to have taken the place of my little Billy. And Bill takes to him, too, wonderfully. He said the other day that when the boy grew up he would buy a barge, a new one of the best kind, and that some day it should be the boy's own. So he won't do so bad, after all."
A stranger would have wondered at the comfort in the interior of the little farmhouse. The land round it was very poor. Three horses—which seemed as if they had nothing to do but to nibble the coarse grass—and a couple of cows wandered about on a few acres of land, inclosed by deep water ditches; a score or two of ducks and geese paddled in the mud in the bottom of the creek at low tide, or swam about in the water when it was up; and a patch of garden ground, attended to chiefly by the woman, surrounded the cottage. But all this would have afforded a scanty living indeed, were it not that the master, Bill Nibson, was the owner of the Mary Ann barge, an old craft with a somewhat dilapidated sail, which journeyed up and down the river with more or less regularity, laden, for the most part, with manure, hay,[Pg 224] lime, bricks, or coal. This he navigated with the aid of a lad of fourteen, a waif, whose mother, a tramp, had died by the roadside one bitter cold night four years before. Bill had been summoned on the coroner's jury and had offered to take the boy.
"I can do with him on board the barge," he said; "he is only a little nipper now, but in a year or two he will be useful. The boy I have got wants to go to sea, and I shan't be sorry to get rid of him; he is getting too knowing for me altogether."
As no one else wanted the boy he was handed over to Bill, and was now a sharp lad, who, never having been instructed in the niceties of right and wrong, and being especially ignorant that there was any harm in cheating Her Majesty's Customs, was in all things a useful assistant to his master. He had, indeed, very soon imbibed the spirit, not uncommon among the dwellers on the marshes, that if managed without detection, the smuggling of tobacco and spirits was a meritorious action, advantageous to the community at large, and hurting no one except that mysterious and unknown entity, the queen's revenue. He was greatly attached to Bill, and took an occasional thrashing as a matter of course; regarding him as having saved him from the workhouse and having put him in a fair way of making a man of himself.
The next day at twelve o'clock the child, playing on the bank, ran in and reported that Joshua was coming along the bank, and in a few minutes the boy appeared.
"Morning, missis," he said. "Master sent me on to say that the barge got into the haven this morning, and that she will come on with the evening tide. He sent me on with this lump of meat, and these rokers he got from a bawley which came in just as we were getting up sail off Grain Spit. He says he has got a barrel of beer on board, that he will land as he passes. He will be along about nine o'clock. Well, Jack, how are you?"
"I am all right," the child said, "and so is Kitty. I[Pg 225] am glad that you are back. How long are you going to stay?"
"I suppose that it will take us a couple of days to unload. Master is going as usual to hire a couple of men to get the line out, so I shall be over here by breakfast. He says that I may as well do a job of digging in the garden, as he wants to get some things in before we get frosty nights. Have you any message for him, missis?"
"You can tell him he may as well get a dish of eels from one of the Dutchmen there. I suppose there is one in the haven?"
"Two of them, missis; he will be able to get them, for one of them is the Marden, and the skipper has always let master have some, though he won't sell an eel to anyone else."
"Is there any business to be done?" the woman asked significantly.
The boy nodded.
"All right; tell him that I will get the horses in."
The child was put to bed upstairs at seven o'clock, although he in vain petitioned to be allowed to stop up until the barge came along. He already knew, however, by experience, that his request was not likely to be granted, as when the barge came along after dark he was always put to bed, the woman telling him that Bill didn't like him to be up when he came in, as he wanted to have a talk with her in quiet, and to eat his supper in peace.
An hour after dark the woman went out onto the bank and listened. In a quarter of an hour she heard the rattle of a block in the distance. She went down, stirred up the fire, and put on the kettle, and in twenty minutes the barge came along. The boat, instead of towing behind as usual, was alongside.
"You take her on, Joshua," its owner said, as he quietly got into the boat; "run in where the water is deep alongside, a quarter of a mile this side Pitsea. I will come along and get on board there as soon as I have finished this job. Keep a sharp lookout on the banks; some of the coastguardsmen may be about. If they hail[Pg 226] you and ask if I am on board, say I landed as we passed here, to have a cup of tea, and that I shall not be five minutes."
Then he pushed the boat to shore. "Well, Betsy, how are you? I have got twenty kegs here, and five or six hundredweight of tobacco. I will get it up the bank, and you had better stow it away at once; I will lend you a hand as soon as it is all up."
As fast as he could carry the kegs up the banks she slipped slings round them, two at a time, hooked them to a milkmaid's yoke, and went off with them to a shed which served as a stable and cowhouse in the winter. Against this was a rick of hay. Putting the kegs down she returned for more, and by the time that they were all in the stable her husband had finished his share of the work and had carried the heavy bales of tobacco to the shed. The three horses were already there.
"Are you going to take them out at once?"
"No, not until I ............