The Rocket: The Story of the Stephensons, Father and Son Read online

  CHAPTER II.

  MENDING AND MAKING—LITTLE BOB.

  George was now twenty—sober, faithful, and expert. Finding a littlespare time on his hands, he took to cobbling to increase his gains, andfrom this source contrived to save his first guinea. To this greaterdiligence he was urged by his love for Fanny Henderson, a finesweet-tempered girl, whom he shortly married, and began housekeeping inthe upper room of a small cottage in Wellington, six miles fromNewcastle. Happy were they in each other, and in their simple,industrious, and frugal habits; and when a little son was born to them,George, who loved birds, rabbits, and dogs so well, welcomed with allthe tenderness of a father's heart the little Bobby.

  Robert he was named, after the old fireman his grandfather.

  Accidents, they say, will happen in the best-regulated families. Fanny'sfamily was not an exception. One day the cottage chimney got on fire,and the neighbours, with friendly zeal, not only poured water enoughdown the chimney to put out a much bigger and more alarming fire, butenough to deluge the poor little home of the brakeman with soot andwater, making a pitiful sight to the young husband when he reached it.His eight-day clock, the choicest bit of furniture the young couple had,was completely smothered by ashes. What was to be done? Sending it to aclock-maker for repairs was quite out of the question—it would cost toomuch.

  "I'll try my own hand on it," said George. After righting everythingelse, he attacked the clock, took it to pieces, carefully cleaned it,put it together, set it, and it _ticked_—ticking on as faithfully andsoberly as ever! The astonished neighbours sent him their clocks, andGeorge became one of the most famous clock doctors thereabouts.

  The young man's reputation for business soon won him a situation inKillingworth—the best and largest colliery in the region. But hisbrightened worldly prospects were soon clouded by a dark sorrow—thedeath of his young wife, after three happy years of married life. PoorGeorge felt it deeply, which was perhaps one reason for accepting asituation in Scotland, hoping in a change of scene to change themournful current of his thoughts.

  MENDING THE CLOCK.]

  Leaving his little boy in kind hands, he set off to the north with hispack on his back, afoot and alone, for Montrose—a long journey in thosedays. Good wages he received, and good friends he no doubt made, foreverybody loved his honest and generous character; yet by the end of theyear he yearned to get back to the friends and scenes of his early days.It was not home in Scotland; for it is only home where the heart is.With his savings in his pocket—twenty-eight pounds—back he trudged toKillingworth; and not before his friendly presence was greatly needed tocomfort his aged parents, plunged in debt and affliction. By a terribleaccident his father had lost his eyesight. No longer able to work, andreceiving little or no help from his other children, who were barelyable to maintain themselves, the old couple had a hard battle with life.But George is back again; all will be righted. He paid off their debts,and removed them to comfortable lodgings beside his own. He has father,mother, and Bobby to look after, and is thankful and happy in doing it.

  Those were dark days, however, for the working-men of England. War wasdraining the country of men and money. Taxes were high, wages low, breadscarce, and able-bodied men were liable at any time to be impressed forthe army or naval service. George himself was drawn; and go he must, orfind a substitute. He found one, but it cost all he had to hire him.

  Poor George was in straits. His spirits were much damped by the prospectof things around and before him. All business was in a discouragingcondition. Some of his friends were about to emigrate to America, and heat one time nearly concluded to join them. It was a sore trial to theyoung man. He loved his English home; and bitter tears did he in secretshed as he visited old haunts—the fields and lanes and scenes of hisboyhood—feeling and fearing that all too soon the wide Atlantic mightroll between him and them. But the necessary funds for such anenterprise were not forthcoming. George gave it up, therefore, and wentto work for what wages the times would allow. Better times would come.

  The thing nearest his heart was to afford his little son an education.Keenly alive to his own early deficiencies and disadvantages, hedetermined to make them up in Robert. Every spare moment was of two-foldvalue to him, and all the work he could pick up he cheerfully did.Besides tinkering old clocks and cobbling old shoes, he took to cuttingout the pitmen's clothes. Never was there such a fit, for George actedfully up to the principle that everything which was worth doing wasworth doing well.

  Busy as were his hands, his mind was no less busy, catching up and usingevery scrap of knowledge which came in his way. And it was a perpetualsurprise to his fellow-workmen to see what a knack he had at betteringthings. Everything improved in his hands. There was always progress onhis track.

  A new pit was opened at one of the collieries. Streams of water rushedin, which the most vigorous strokes of the pump could not lower. On theengine went pumping, pumping, pumping for a year, and the watercontinued to flow in, until it was nearly concluded to give up the pitas a failure. George's curiosity and interest were much excited, andalways, on seeing the men, he asked how matters were coming on.

  "Drowned out, drowned out," was the one and the same answer.

  Over he went to the poor pit, as often as he could, to see for himself;and over he turned in his mind again and again the whys and whereforesof the failure.

  "Weel, George," said his friend Kit one day, "what do you mak' o' her?Do you think you could doctor her?"

  "Man," answered George, "in a week's time I could send you to thebottom."

  The regular engineers were in high dudgeon with the forth-puttingbrakeman. What right had he to know how to cure an evil that had baffledthem? His words, however, were reported at head-quarters; and thecontractor was not long in hastening over to see if he could make hiswords good.

  "Well, George," he said, "they tell me you think you can put that engineto rights."

  "Yes, sir," replied the young man modestly; "I think I can."

  As matters could be no worse, Mr. Dodds was ready to let him try; andGeorge agreed, on condition that he should choose his own men to helphim. The old hands were highly indignant, but there was no help for it.So they were ordered off, and George with his gang went on.

  The engine was taken to pieces, examined, righted, and put togetheragain. It was set to work. Did it go? Many a looker-on shook his headdoubtfully, and prophesied in his inmost heart, "_No_ go." It pumped andpumped. The obstinate water found it had an antagonist that could masterit. In less than two days it disappeared from the pit, and workmen weresent to the bottom. Who could gainsay George's skill?

  Mr. Dodds, of course, was delighted. Over and above his wages he put aten-pound note into the young man's hand, and engaged him to superintendhis works for the future.

  A profitable job was this.

  The fame of this engineering exploit spread far and wide. As an enginedoctor he took the lead, and many a wheezy old thing was brought him tocure. Envious engineers tried to put him down. But real merit cannot beput down. It is stern stuff.

  George's cottage showed the bent of his tastes. It was like an oldcuriosity shop, full of models of engines, complete or in parts, hangingand standing round; for busy as he had need to be—eking out his means byengineering, by clocks, and by coats—the construction and improvement ofmachinery for the collieries was his hobby.

  Likeness of taste drew a young farmer often to the cottage—JohnWigham—who spent most of his evenings in George's society. John had asmattering of chemistry and philosophy, and a superior knowledge ofmathematics, which made him a desirable companion. George put himselfunder his tuition, and again took to "figuring." Tasks set him in theevening were worked out among the rough toils of the day. And so muchhonest purpose did not fail to secure progress. Drawing was another newline of effort. Sheets of plans and sections gave his rude desk the airof mind-work somewhere. Thus their winter evenings passed away.

  Bobby
was growing up in a little thought-world by himself; for he couldnot fail to be interested in all that interested his father—that fatheralways making his son the companion of his studies, and earlyintroducing him into the curious and cunning power of machinery.

  Ah, that was a proud day when little Bob was old enough, and knewenough, to be sent to the academy at Newcastle. He was thirteen. Hisfather's means had happily been increased. The old engine-wright of thecolliery having died, George Stephenson was promoted to the post, on thesalary of a hundred pounds a year. This was in 1812.

  The new office relieving him from incessant hard work, and the necessityof earning a shilling by extra labours, he had more time for study andfor verifying his plans of practical improvement; and the consequencewas very considerable improvement in the machinery of the colliery towhich he was attached.

  Meanwhile Robert's education went on apace. The boy was hungry forknowledge, not only for himself, but to satisfy the voracious appetiteof his father, and the no less keen one of John Wigham.

  Robert joined a literary and philosophical society at Newcastle, whosefine library opened a rich storehouse of material. Here the boy spentmost of his time out of school, storing his mind with principles, facts,and illustrations, to carry home on Saturday afternoon. Books also. The"Edinburgh Encyclopædia" was at his command. A volume of that at thecottage unfolded a world of wonders. But the library had some books toochoice to be trusted away. How was Robert to get the gist of these home?His father had often said that a "good drawing and a well-executed planwould always explain itself;" and many a time he had placed a roughsketch of machinery before his son, and told him to describe it. Robert,therefore, when he could do no better, put his drilling to the test, andcopied diagrams and drew pictures, thus taking many an important andperhaps rare specimen of machinery and science to Killingworth, for hisfather's benefit.

  We can well imagine Saturday afternoon was as much a holiday to fatheras to son. Robert's coming was hailed with delight. John did not lag farbehind. Some of the neighbours dropped in to listen to discussions whichmade the little room a spot of lively interest and earnest toil. Awide-awake mind allows nothing stagnant around it.

  THE SUN-DIAL.]

  Among the borrowed books of the day was Ferguson's "Astronomy," whichput father and son to calculating and constructing a sun-dial for thelatitude of Killingworth. It was wrought in stone, and fixed over thecottage door; and there it is still, with its date, August 11, 1816—ayear or two before Robert left school—a fair specimen of the drift ofhis boyish tastes.