THE WATER-BABIES
A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby
BY CHARLES KINGSLEY
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR BY
WARWICK GOBLE
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
1922
_First Published 1863_
_Edition with 32 Illustrations in Colour by Warwick Goble, Crown
4to, 1909_
_With 16 Illustrations in Colour by Warwick Goble, Demy 8vo, October
1910_
_Reprinted November 1910, 1912_
_With 16 Illustrations in Colour by Warwick Goble, Medium 8vo, 1922_
PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN
TO
MY YOUNGEST SON
GRENVILLE ARTHUR
AND
TO ALL OTHER GOOD LITTLE BOYS
COME READ ME MY RIDDLE, EACH GOOD LITTLE MAN;
IF YOU CANNOT READ IT, NO GROWN-UP FOLK CAN.
ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING PAGE
The thing whirred up into the air, and hung poised on its
wings, . . . a dragon fly, ... the king of all the
flies.--p. 74 _Frontispiece_
In rushed a stout old nurse from the next room 20
Play by me, bathe in me, mother and child 32
A quiet, silent, rich, happy place 35
She was the Queen of them all 44
From which great trout rushed out on Tom 88
He watched the moonlight on the rippling river 101
Tom had never seen a lobster before 113
The fairies came flying in at the window and brought her
such a pretty pair of wings 126
A real live water-baby, sitting on the white sand 146
Tom found that the isle stood all on pillars, and that its
roots were full of caves 151
He crept away among the rocks, and got to the cabinet, and
behold! it was open 172
There he saw the last of the Gairfowl, standing up on the
Allalonestone, all alone 201
The most beautiful bird of paradise 210
"That's Mother Carey" 219
Pandora and her box 224
"I heard a thousand blended notes,
While in a grove I sate reclined;
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.
"To her fair works did Nature link
The human soul that through me ran;
And much it grieved my heart to think,
What man has made of man."
WORDSWORTH.
CHAPTER I
ONCE upon a time there was a little chimney-sweep, and his name was Tom.
That is a short name, and you have heard it before, so you will not have
much trouble in remembering it. He lived in a great town in the North
country, where there were plenty of chimneys to sweep, and plenty of
money for Tom to earn and his master to spend. He could not read nor
write, and did not care to do either; and he never washed himself, for
there was no water up the court where he lived. He had never been taught
to say his prayers. He never had heard of God, or of Christ, except in
words which you never have heard, and which it would have been well if
he had never heard. He cried half his time, and laughed the other half.
He cried when he had to climb the dark flues, rubbing his poor knees and
elbows raw; and when the soot got into his eyes, which it did every day
in the week; and when his master beat him, which he did every day in the
week; and when he had not enough to eat, which happened every day in the
week likewise. And he laughed the other half of the day, when he was
tossing halfpennies with the other boys, or playing leap-frog over the
posts, or bowling stones at the horses' legs as they trotted by, which
last was excellent fun, when there was a wall at hand behind which to
hide. As for chimney-sweeping, and being hungry, and being beaten, he
took all that for the way of the world, like the rain and snow and
thunder, and stood manfully with his back to it till it was over, as his
old donkey did to a hail-storm; and then shook his ears and was as jolly
as ever; and thought of the fine times coming, when he would be a man,
and a master sweep, and sit in the public-house with a quart of beer and
a long pipe, and play cards for silver money, and wear velveteens and
ankle-jacks, and keep a white bull-dog with one grey ear, and carry her
puppies in his pocket, just like a man. And he would have apprentices,
one, two, three, if he could. How he would bully them, and knock them
about, just as his master did to him; and make them carry home the soot
sacks, while he rode before them on his donkey, with a pipe in his mouth
and a flower in his button-hole, like a king at the head of his army.
Yes, there were good times coming; and, when his master let him have a
pull at the leavings of his beer, Tom was the jolliest boy in the whole
town.
One day a smart little groom rode into the court where Tom lived. Tom
was just hiding behind a wall, to heave half a brick at his horse's
legs, as is the custom of that country when they welcome strangers; but
the groom saw him, and halloed to him to know where Mr. Grimes, the
chimney-sweep, lived. Now, Mr. Grimes was Tom's own master, and Tom was
a good man of business, and always civil to customers, so he put the
half-brick down quietly behind the wall, and proceeded to take orders.
Mr. Grimes was to come up next morning to Sir John Harthover's, at the
Place, for his old chimney-sweep was gone to prison, and the chimneys
wanted sweeping. And so he rode away, not giving Tom time to ask what
the sweep had gone to prison for, which was a matter of interest to Tom,
as he had been in prison once or twice himself. Moreover, the groom
looked so very neat and clean, with his drab gaiters, drab breeches,
drab jacket, snow-white tie with a smart pin in it, and clean round
ruddy face, that Tom was offended and disgusted at his appearance, and
considered him a stuck-up fellow, who gave himself airs because he wore
smart clothes, and other people paid for them; and went behind the wall
to fetch the half-brick after all; but did not, remembering that he had
come in the way of business, and was, as it were, under a flag of truce.
His master was so delighted at his new customer that he knocked Tom down
out of hand, and drank more beer that night than he usually did in two,
in order to be sure of getting up in time next morning; for the more a
man's head aches when he wakes, the more glad he is to turn out, and
have a breath of fresh air. And, when he did get up at four the next
morning, he knocked Tom down again, in order to teach him (as young
gentlemen used to be taught at public schools) that he must be an extra
good boy that day, as they were going to a very great house, and might
make a very good thing of it, if they could but give satisfaction.
And Tom thought so likewise, and, indeed, would have done and behaved
his best, even without being knocked down. For, of all places upon
earth, Harthover Place (which he had never seen) was the most wonderful,
and, of all men on earth, Sir John (whom he had seen, having been sent
to gaol by him twice) was the most awful.
Harthover Place was really a grand place, even for the rich North
country; with a house so large that in the frame-breaking riots, which
Tom could just remember, the Duke of Wellington, and ten thousand
soldiers to match, were easily housed therein; at least, so Tom
believed; with a park full of deer, which Tom believed to be monsters
who were in the habit of eating children; with miles of game-preserves,
in which Mr. Grimes and the collier lads poached at times, on which
occasions Tom saw pheasants, and wondered what they tasted like; with a
noble salmon-river, in which Mr. Grimes and his friends would have liked
to poach; but then they must have got into cold water, and that they did
not like at all. In short, Harthover was a grand place, and Sir John a
grand old man, whom even Mr. Grimes respected; for not only could he
send Mr. Grimes to prison when he deserved it, as he did once or twice
a week; not only did he own all the land about for miles; not only was
he a jolly, honest, sensible squire, as ever kept a pack of hounds, who
would do what he thought right by his neighbours, as well as get what he
thought right for himself; but, what was more, he weighed full fifteen
stone, was nobody knew how many inches round the chest, and could have
thrashed Mr. Grimes himself in fair fight, which very few folk round
there could do, and which, my dear little boy, would not have been right
for him to do, as a great many things are not which one both can do, and
would like very much to do. So Mr. Grimes touched his hat to him when he
rode through the town, and called him a "buirdly awd chap," and his
young ladies "gradely lasses," which are two high compliments in the
North country; and thought that that made up for his poaching Sir John's
pheasants; whereby you may perceive that Mr. Grimes had not been to a
properly-inspected Government National School.
Now, I dare say, you never got up at three o'clock on a midsummer
morning. Some people get up then because they want to catch salmon; and
some because they want to climb Alps; and a great many more because they
must, like Tom. But, I assure you, that three o'clock on a midsummer
morning is the pleasantest time of all the twenty-four hours, and all
the three hundred and sixty-five days; and why every one does not get up
then, I never could tell, save that they are all determined to spoil
their nerves and their complexions by doing all night what they might
just as well do all day. But Tom, instead of going out to dinner at
half-past eight at night, and to a ball at ten, and finishing off
somewhere between twelve and four, went to bed at seven, when his master
went to the public-house, and slept like a dead pig; for which reason he
was as piert as a game-cock (who always gets up early to wake the maids),
and just ready to get up when the fine gentlemen and ladies were just
ready to go to bed.
So he and his master set out; Grimes rode the donkey in front, and Tom
and the brushes walked behind; out of the court, and up the street, past
the closed window-shutters, and the winking weary policemen, and the
roofs all shining grey in the grey dawn.
They passed through the pitmen's village, all shut up and silent now,
and through the turnpike; and then they were out in the real country,
and plodding along the black dusty road, between black slag walls, with
no sound but the groaning and thumping of the pit-engine in the next
field. But soon the road grew white, and the walls likewise; and at the
wall's foot grew long grass and gay flowers, all drenched with dew; and
instead of the groaning of the pit-engine, they heard the skylark saying
his matins high up in the air, and the pit-bird warbling in the sedges,
as he had warbled all night long.
All else was silent. For old Mrs. Earth was still fast asleep; and, like
many pretty people, she looked still prettier asleep than awake. The
great elm-trees in the gold-green meadows were fast asleep above, and
the cows fast asleep beneath them; nay, the few clouds which were about
were fast asleep likewise, and so tired that they had lain down on the