Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell (read novel full TXT) 📖
- Author: Robert Tressell
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upon it the wreath that Barrington gave him, together with the another
he had brought himself, which had a similar ribbon with the words:
`From Rushton & Co. With deep sympathy.’
Seeing that Barrington and Owen were the only occupants of the
carriage, Bill Bates and the Semidrunk came up to the door and asked
if there was any objection to their coming and as neither Owen nor
Barrington objected, they did not think it necessary to ask anyone
else’s permission, so they got in.
Meanwhile, Hunter had taken his position a few yards in front of the
hearse and the bearers each his proper position, two on each side. As
the procession turned into the main road, they saw Snatchum standing
at the corner looking very gloomy. Hunter kept his eyes fixed
straight ahead and affected not to see him, but Crass could not resist
the temptation to indulge in a jeering smile, which so enraged
Snatchum that he shouted out:
`It don’t matter! I shan’t lose much! I can use it for someone
else!’
The distance to the cemetery was about three miles, so as soon as they
got out of the busy streets of the town, Hunter called a halt, and got
up on the hearse beside the driver, Crass sat on the other side, and
two of the other bearers stood in the space behind the driver’s seat,
the fourth getting up beside the driver of the coach; and then they
proceeded at a rapid pace.
As they drew near to the cemetery they slowed down, and finally
stopped when about fifty yards from the gate. Then Hunter and the
bearers resumed their former position, mid they passed through the
open gate and up to the door of the church, where they were received
by the clerk - a man in a rusty black cassock, who stood by while they
carried the coffin in and placed it on a kind of elevated table which
revolved on a pivot. They brought it in footfirst, and as soon as
they had placed it upon the table, the clerk swung it round so as to
bring the foot of the coffin towards the door ready to be carried out
again.
There was a special pew set apart for the undertakers, and in this
Hunter and the bearers took their seats to await the arrival of the
clergyman. Barrington and the three others sat on the opposite side.
There was no altar or pulpit in this church, but a kind of reading
desk stood on a slightly raised platform at the other end of the
aisle.
After a wait of about ten minutes, the clergyman entered and, at once
proceeding to the desk, began to recite in a rapid and wholly
unintelligible manner the usual office. If it had not been for the
fact that each of his hearers had a copy of the words - for there was
a little book in each pew - none of them would have been able to
gather the sense of what the man was gabbling. Under any other
circumstances, the spectacle of a human being mouthing in this absurd
way would have compelled laughter, and so would the suggestion that
this individual really believed that he was addressing the Supreme
Being. His attitude and manner were contemptuously indifferent.
While he recited, intoned, or gabbled, the words of the office, he was
reading the certificate and some other paper the clerk had placed upon
the desk, and when he had finished reading these, his gaze wandered
abstractedly round the chapel, resting for a long time with an
expression of curiosity upon Bill Bates and the Semidrunk, who were
doing their best to follow in their books the words he was repeating.
He next turned his attention to his fingers, holding his hand away
from him nearly at arm’s length and critically examining the nails.
From time to time as this miserable mockery proceeded the clerk in the
rusty black cassock mechanically droned out a sonorous `Ah-men’, and
after the conclusion of the lesson the clergyman went out of the
church, taking a short cut through the grave-stones and monuments,
while the bearers again shouldered the coffin and followed the clerk
to the grave. When they arrived within a few yards of their
destination, they were rejoined by the clergyman, who was waiting for
them at the corner of one of the paths. He put himself at the head of
the procession with an open book in his hand, and as they walked
slowly along, he resumed his reading or repetition of the words of the
service.
He had on an old black cassock and a much soiled and slightly torn
surplice. The unseemly appearance of this dirty garment was
heightened by the circumstance that he had not taken the trouble to
adjust it properly. It hung all lop-sided, showing about six inches
more of the black cassock underneath one side than the other.
However, perhaps it is not right to criticize this person’s appearance
so severely, because the poor fellow was paid only seven-and-six for
each burial, and as this was only the fourth funeral he had officiated
at that day, probably he could not afford to wear clean linen - at any
rate, not for the funerals of the lower classes.
He continued his unintelligible jargon while they were lowering the
coffin into the grave, and those who happened to know the words of the
office by heart were, with some difficulty, able to understand what he
was saying:
`Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of His great mercy to take
unto Himself the soul of our Dear Brother here departed, we therefore
commit his body to the ground; earth to earth; ashes to ashes, dust to
dust -‘
The earth fell from the clerk’s hand and rattled on the lid of the
coffin with a mournful sound, and when the clergyman had finished
repeating the remainder of the service, he turned and walked away in
the direction of the church. Hunter and the rest of the funeral party
made their way back towards the gate of the cemetery where the hearse
and the carriage were waiting.
On their way they saw another funeral procession coming towards them.
It was a very plain-looking closed hearse with only one horse. There
was no undertaker in front and no bearers walked by the sides.
It was a pauper’s funeral.
Three men, evidently dressed in their Sunday clothes, followed behind
the hearse. As they reached the church door, four old men who were
dressed in ordinary everyday clothes, came forward and opening the
hearse took out the coffin and carried it into the church, followed by
the other three, who were evidently relatives of the deceased. The
four old men were paupers - inmates of the workhouse, who were paid
sixpence each for acting as bearers.
They were just taking out the coffin from the hearse as Hunter’s party
was passing, and most of the latter paused for a moment and watched
them carry it into the church. The roughly made coffin was of white
deal, not painted or covered in any way, and devoid of any fittings or
ornament with the exception of a square piece of zinc on the lid.
None of Rushton’s party was near enough to recognize any of the
mourners or to read what was written on the zinc, but if they had been
they would have seen, roughly painted in black letters
J.L.
Aged 67
and some of them would have recognized the three mourners who were
Jack Linden’s sons.
As for the bearers, they were all retired working men who had come
into their `titles’. One of them was old Latham, the venetian blind
maker.
The Wise men of the East
At the end of the following week there was a terrible slaughter at
Rushton’s. Barrington and all the casual hands were sacked, including
Newman, Easton and Harlow, and there was so little work that it looked
as if everyone else would have to stand off also. The summer was
practically over, so those who were stood off had but a poor chance of
getting a start anywhere else, because most other firms were
discharging hands as well.
There was only one other shop in the town that was doing anything at
all to speak of, and that was the firm of Dauber and Botchit. This
firm had come very much to the front during the summer, and had
captured several big jobs that Rushton & Co. had expected to get,
besides taking away several of the latter’s old customers.
This firm took work at almost half the price that Rushton’s could do
it for, and they had a foreman whose little finger was thicker than
Nimrod’s thigh . Some of the men who had worked for both firms during
the summer, said that after working for Dauber and Botchit, working
for Rushton seemed like having a holiday.
`There’s one bloke there,’ said Newman, in conversation with Harlow
and Easton. `There’s one bloke there wot puts up twenty-five rolls o’
paper in a day an’ trims and pastes for ‘imself; and as for the
painters, nearly everyone of ‘em gets over as much work as us three
put together, and if you’re working there you’ve got to do the same or
get the sack.’
However much truth or falsehood or exaggeration there may have been in
the stories of the sweating and driving that prevailed at Dauber and
Botchit’s, it was an indisputable fact that the other builders found it
very difficult to compete with them, and between the lot of them what
work there was to do was all finished or messed up in about a quarter
of the time that it would have taken to do it properly.
By the end of September there were great numbers of men out of
employment, and the practical persons who controlled the town were
already preparing to enact the usual farce of `Dealing’ with the
distress that was certain to ensue. The Rev. Mr Bosher talked of
reopening the Labour Yard; the secretary of the OBS appealed for more
money and castoff clothing and boots - the funds of the Society had
been depleted by the payment of his quarter’s salary. There were
rumours that the Soup Kitchen would be reopened at an early date for
the sale of `nourishment’, and charitable persons began to talk of
Rummage Sales and soup tickets.
Now and then, whenever a `job’ `came in’, a few of Rushton’s men were
able to put in a few hours’ work, but Barrington never went back. His
manner of life was the subject of much speculation on the part of his
former workmates, who were not a little puzzled by the fact that he
was much better dressed than they had ever known him to be before, and
that he was never without money. He generally had a tanner or a bob
to lend, and was always ready to stand a drink, to say nothing of what
it must have cost him for the quantities of Socialist pamphlets and
leaflets that he gave away broadcast. He lodged over at Windley, but
he used to take his meals at a little coffee tavern down town, where
he used often to invite one or two of his old mates to take dinner
with him. It sometimes happened that one of them would invite him
home of an evening, to drink a cup of tea, or to see some curiosity
that the other thought would interest him, and on these occasions - if
there were any children in the house to which they were going -
Barrington usually made a point of going into
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