Chapter 2
On the 2nd of September, 1865, my mother, my sister Dora, my brother Graham and I sailed for England. We duly arrived in Liverpool on September 13th and were met by a friend of my grandfather, Major Greig, who took us to his house, where we dined. I remember his children’s surprise that we were white and could speak English. The Colonies were not so well known then as now. My mother went to the Post Office as directed, and there found a letter from Mr. Darby telling her to go to Mr. G. V. Wigram’s house in London. We took the next train and arrived that evening. I have always felt that it was a special privilege to spend three weeks in the home of such a godly—I may say holy—couple as Mr. and Mrs. Wigram. Their house was a large one but the best rooms were given up to the entertainment of the Lord’s people, and they kept the rooms at the top of the house for their own use. Of their gentleness and kindness how can I speak enough? Mr. Wigram said of his wife when some three years afterwards she passed away: “She was a woman of a meek and quiet spirit, better known to heaven than on earth.” There was one daughter, but she was away from home at the time we stayed there. However, we spent happy hours playing in her old nursery. I can picture the dear old gentleman now, sitting at the breakfast table wrapped in a red eiderdown, for he was very thin and frail and the days were cold.
The day after our arrival we went to visit our grandfather (the rest of the family were away) and amused and astonished him by the amount of bread and jam we could consume. He was a tall, good looking man, grave and silent, though very kind to us, and I was always afraid of him. He used to keep bright sixpences for us and I remember his taking us all to the zoo.
After our visit with Mrs. Wigram, we went to Sheerness and spent a little while with my father’s sister, Mrs. Wilgress, and then we returned to London and my brother was sent to a lady’s school for little boys, in Croydon. I believe Croydon is now a part of London, but in those days it was a separate city and we went by train to London. We were soon settled in a small house in the outskirts of the city. In fact it was just opposite to a large cemetery, nearly empty when we first came to “Rose Villa” but much fuller before we left the following year.
It was an unusually wet winter; I do not think there was a day without rain. Accustomed to the clear cold and bright sunshine of Canada, we felt we had made a poor exchange. Before Christmas my brother was down with typhoid, of which there was quite an epidemic in the city that season. Weeks and weeks of anxiety and nursing followed. My poor mother did it all herself; trained nurses had not come to be a necessity in those long ago days. It may be imagined that the rest of the family saw little of her. Dora and I spent our days over our books and dolls. I am afraid my “lessons” did not weigh heavily upon my mind at that time, but my sister, who was a born student, faithfully brought out her books day by day and struggled with arithmetic and history and I wot not what else. It was during one of those long, sad days that a kind friend, to us almost a fairy godmother, dropped in. She was the wife of a Mr. Taylor, partner with one of my great uncles in a law firm. Mr. Taylor was a very old man by now and I do not think often went to the office in London. They had a beautiful home with large grounds, and to us it represented everything delightful and attractive. Mrs. Taylor was a very stout, kindly looking lady with white hair. I can see her before me now as she stepped out of her carriage and entered our little sitting room. My sister was busy as usual with her books. I was engaged in carrying my dolls and their belongings from one corner of the room to the other. Mrs. Taylor often laughed afterwards over my greeting. After shaking hands I said gravely, “I hope you will excuse me, but we are moving.” She brought much cheer into our home, and when my brother was better, we spent the day many times at her house, and visited every corner of her beautiful garden. When we went home in the evening Mr. Taylor always presented us each with a “magic parcel”, as he called it. It contained a few candies, a picture or a little toy and a bright threepenny piece. I for one much appreciated them.
Before that winter was over we had more sickness. My brother was still weak and white, looking as my Aunt Helen said, like “a white rabbit”, when I took ill with gastric fever, the results of which clung to me for many a day, and then my mother, worn out with nursing and anxiety, fell ill herself. She remained weak and poorly for a long time, though she never really took to her bed, and she did not recover her strength until the spring of 1867 when, accompanied by my sister and myself, she took lodgings in Margate, in the county of Kent, for six weeks or longer.
Margate is a seaside town and a great summer resort. The broad sands and fine park on the cliffs were crowded in the summer, but in the early spring days all was quiet, and the walks by the sea and into the country were very beautiful. On my brother’s recovery from his long illness he had been sent to a school in Broadstairs, also a seaside place. This school was kept by a brother in the Lord, Mr. Burbidge. The day after our arrival in Margate, one of the boys from the school came to the house where we were staying and announced in my mother’s hearing that one of the younger boys had been run over by a coal cart and nearly killed. She soon found it was my brother. The cart, fortunately empty, had gone over his head, and for years afterwards the mark of the wheel could be plainly seen on his forehead. As soon as he was able to be moved he was brought over to our lodgings, and certainly made a wonderful recovery.
We were all benefitted in health by this stay in the fresh sea air, and it was decided finally that we should leave Croydon and come to live in Margate. There was a good school there, kept by a widow and her six daughters, and to this my sister, who was now twelve years old, could go. As to my education, I do not think it troubled anyone as long as I wrote the inevitable and much hated copy each day and now and then read a little history aloud. I read everything I was allowed, and read my books over and over again, as children never do now. I think my favorite books were Mrs. Gatty’s “Parables from Nature” and the Swiss Family Robinson. We had some other books on the same line as the Swiss family: “The American Crusoes” and John Chinaman’s “The Island Home”. These my brother and I read together with great joy and many plans for future adventure. I recall my great desire in those days to be a “barbarian”, and I liked taking a chicken bone out to the hall, where I sat on the stairs and picked it, not being allowed to do so at the table. I believe Mrs. Gatty’s book, of which I never wearied, turned my mind in a direction which was of lifelong effect. Ministering Children too and the Pilgrim’s Progress I think had their part in forming my character. I never remember the time when I did not long to write. My first attempt, when I was seven was a short “treatise” on our Lord’s Resurrection. I bound it when finished in a brown paper cover and felt very proud of it. My next attempt was less ambitious, being “The Story of a Cat”. I think I must have been quick at an answer, though considered the stupid one of the family. I remember mother asking me one Sunday evening what I was doing drawing pictures on Sunday. “They are pictures of Jewish children,” was my reply. But as a rule I was quiet and kept my thoughts, of which I had many, to myself. I think this was mainly owing to being laughed at when I tried to express myself. A sensitive child feels this keenly and tries to avoid it. I missed my brother sorely when he went to school, and had many a cry in my refuge under the table. My sister and I were very fond of each other, but she was between three and four years older than I was and always taken up with her books, and when she good naturedly “played dolls” with me I felt her heart was not in it. Still, we often went out together, and always spent the time telling imaginary stories. “You tell there and I tell back” was the usual plan, as we both preferred telling to listening.
Our Aunt Helen, who lived with us during the two years spent in Croydon, was a great joy to us. She entered into our games and told us stories, and she used to keep a little book in which good and bad marks were recorded. Ten good marks brought a treat or a present, and ten bad ones earned two hours sitting still on a chair with nothing to do, a very heavy punishment to us. But the bitter winds of Margate did not suit my dear little aunt, who was exceedingly delicate, so when the move to Margate was made, she had to be left behind, much to our sorrow. We passed the summer of 1867 in Croydon, but in the autumn our furniture was stored in the coach house of our good friend Mrs. Taylor, our smaller packages were arranged, and we left Croydon forever.