CHAPTER 1
FEN MEN BUT FIREMEN.
“I'm small, but I am growing
As quickly as I can;
A working boy like me is bound
To make a useful man.”
“His pious course with childhood he began,
And was his Maker's sooner than his own.”
“FIRE! Fire! Fire! The dreadful word rang through the empty street, rousing the sleepers and carrying terror into the quiet parsonage of Epworth.
“Fire! Fire! Fire!" The rector thrust his head out of the window at the cry, but quickly withdrew it as he realized that his own dwelling-house was in flames.
“Susannah! " he shouted to his wife,” go you and take Emilia at once into the street; I will see to the other children.”
He rushed off as he spoke and burst in the nursery door. Little Hetty, frightened by the heat, which had aroused her, had just discovered that burning pieces of the roof were falling at her feet. She called the maid, and the girl, catching up the baby, reached the doorway as the rector rushed in.
“All right! all here!" he asked hastily.
“All here, sir," replied the girl, and the frightened company hurried downstairs into the hall.
Here they found the rest of the family completely shut in by a roaring, hissing cage of flame. The key of the door was upstairs; in a very few minutes the staircase would be on fire.
“Quick, Samuel," said Susannah Wesley to her husband, as he rushed through the blinding smoke over the creaking boards.
“The staircase will be in flames before he can return I" exclaimed the wife, anxiously. "God take care of him! Thank God, here he is!” “Stand back a moment," said Wesley, as he thrust the key into the lock and opened the door. As he did so the strong north-east wind drove in the flames, so that the fugitives were driven back.
“Through the window!" exclaimed the rector; wait not a moment, Susannah."
“I can't get through the window," exclaimed his wife. "Three times the flames have driven me back.”
“Run for it, wife, while I see to the children," exclaimed her husband. "The danger is very great.”
“God help me, then! I will," answered Susannah Wesley, and rushed into the burning furnace. Happily she sustained no serious injury, and her husband likewise escaped unhurt.
“Thank God, all safe! One, two, three! All the children safe! Yes, four, five; all here," said the father.
“John! John! where is our little John? O Samuel, is he there?”
“Who has John?" shouted the father, anxiously. "Have you, Biddy?”
“No, sir," replied the nurse; "he was asleep when we started, I just remember. In the flurry I quite forgot about him.”
“In the midst of the flames! Oh, my poor boy!" sobbed Susannah Wesley, sinking to the ground: "What shall I do?”
“I'll try to save him!" exclaimed the distressed father, and he rushed back into the house.
Three times he tried to rush towards the staircase, but was beaten back by the flames each time. Kneeling in despair upon the floor, he cried for the child whom he supposed to be dying. "O God! save the boy! Save my boy! Take him to Thyself if he must die! But, I beseech Thee, spare the child!”
His wife was getting anxious for her husband's safety, and, hearing her cries for him, Samuel Wesley stifled and smarting from the blinding smoke, came out into the yard again.
As he did so the boy appeared at the window of his own bedroom. John was standing upon a chest in the room, his head and shoulders showing clearly upon the glaring background of flame.
“Fetch a ladder! Quick! A ladder!" shouted a bystander.
“No time for that," replied another. "Here, stand against the wall; I will mount upon your shoulders, and we can perhaps reach him.”
No sooner said than attempted. But the top man slipped, and an agonized groan burst from the mother's heart. There was not a moment to be lost. The flames were raging with an awful fury; the roof would soon fall in.
“Try again," said the brave man. "Stand fast. Now then!”
“Hurray! He has got him! Thank God!" shouted the father, rushing forward to clasp his boy in his arms.
As he spoke the roof crashed in, and the tongues of flame dashed higher with more awful force.
“All gone! books, goods, money! But the children are safe!" exclaimed the rector. "Thank God they are all safe. We are rich enough, wife. Let all the things go so long as we are all spared to each other." The children were all taken to neighboring houses, and their parents found shelter among some of the people of the town.
The next day the rector, walking among' the ruins with his wife, picked up a charred fragment of paper.
“Look," he said, "a leaf of my Polyglot Bible! It cost me a large sum of money. All my books gone! Oh my books!
There is a sentence still legible," replied his wife." Read it, husband.”
“Vade, vende omnia que habes, et attolle crucem et sequere Me.”
“What's that in English?" asked his wife. "My father, though he had me taught French, did not believe in women learning Latin.”
“Wise man he was," laughed her husband, "therefore fitting father to so wise a daughter. However, co more joking. ‘Go, sell all that thou hast, and take up thy cross and follow Me.'" “We have no more than Adam and Eve when they began housekeeping, "replied his wife." Never mind, let us take up our cross.”
But the Wesleys in the Isle of Axholme that 9th of February, 1709, found that not one but many crosses had to be carried.
A year or two later the parsonage had been rebuilt; bricks took the place of wood and plaster, and a more spacious dwelling arose upon the foundations of the old parsonage.
Thither one day came a visitor from London, the brother of the rector.
Dr. Westley—for he did not drop the "t" from his name as did his brother—sat stiffly looking over the family assembled round his brother's table. Round a smaller table the little ones sat at dinner under charge of a servant. Those of the children who were able to manage a knife and fork sat with their parents. But not a child spoke; only twice during the meal did one address the other, and then in a quiet voice.
“They don't chatter; that's one good thing," observed the visitor.
“No; their mother does not permit them to do so," answered his brother. "She begins their education almost as soon as they are born, and you might never know that there were children in the house.”
“How much money hast thou put away for them?" inquired the doctor, sternly.
“Nothing, brother, nothing. Out of ₤200 a year there is little to be saved when the cost of stocking the glebe and rebuilding the house is paid for.”
“But it is every man's duty to save for his family. You ought to have done so, Samuel. It seems as if you have always been in trouble, and never will be other than penniless.”
“Perhaps not, but I shall never taunt a relative with what he could not prevent; nor shall I ever refuse to do a kindness when it is in my power," replied the rector.
“But you ought to have saved money. I regularly put so much money away," replied his brother." If I do it, who am not married, you ought to do so who are the father of so many children.”
“Your income is many times larger than mine," answered the rector." You know not what expenses I have.”
“Curtail, man, curtail," replied the other." You ought to provide for your children, and not leave them for other people to bring up.”
“Please God, I never shall. But, brother, this strip of Lincolnshire, some ten miles long and four miles broad, contains 10,000 of the wildest people you ever saw. They are lawless and addicted to evil customs, and they would not be reproved.”
“You should try to please them. If you spent some of the time you waste over your books trying to make things agreeable for the people it would be better for you. As a doctor I try to please everybody, and see where I am now.”
“I never willingly angered anyone," replied Samuel," but I have spoken out when I saw sin, for I am not here to please people, but to preach the Gospel. I dared to vote as I pleased at the election, and the people of these parts differed from me in politics. They threatened my children, telling them that they would be compelled soon to beg from door to door. Three cows, upon which we depended for food, were killed, and the men even tried to break into the house to harm us.”
“Nonsense; they would not harm you. You imagine things; you often misjudge people; you are too sensitive.”
“They hammered and drummed under the window of the room where my sick wife lay, firing off guns and making hideous noises all the night through. The din was so great that none could sleep in our house. In the morning the servant overlaid the new-born baby, and when she awoke it was dead! Then they fired my house; for I am certain that the second fire was caused by malice.”
“Have you had two fires, then? "asked the doctor." Seven years before, a spark fell upon the thatch, and a third part of the dwelling was consumed. Then, we had to rebuild, but I did not feel it so much, for so many misfortunes had come to us that I did not feel so distressed. But the gaol was the worst trouble that I had.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, before that I was burned out of house and home, my enemies had me arrested for debt. There was plenty of stock in the farm, but they stopped me coming out from a service in the church, and demanded instant payment. They hurried me off to Lincoln Castle, and did their utmost to ruin me. My wife sent me all the little jewelry she possessed, including even her wedding ring. Of course I sent it back to her, but I rejoiced in the love that spared me help out of what little she had.”
“Your friends, I suppose, helped you with the debt?”
“Yes; and many said, ' Seek another parish,' but I resolved to stay here at all cost. But we had a fearful time of persecution, until they burned our house down.”
“Well, fen men they may be, but it was a dastardly deed to set fire to a dwelling house, when the inhabitants were asleep. But I am sure you are at fault. I never get into trouble, and I never want money.”
“Perhaps not, but you are not our judge, brother," replied the rector." Rich relatives are often harsh to those who are not so favored in respect to gold, but I would not exchange my position for yours. I suppose that I require so much trouble to counterbalance the joy I have had in my family. But, brother, you cannot sit in judgment upon me, without injustice. Let us not further discuss the question.”
Before he passed to his reward, Samuel Wesley conciliated his angry parishioners, and when he at last concluded his ministry on earth, he was mourned for bitterly in the place where they had set fire to his house.