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 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

Applying Mathematics
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

Applying
Mathematics
Immersion, Inference, Interpretation

Otávio Bueno and Steven French

1
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

3
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP,
United Kingdom
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of
Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries
© Otavio Bueno and Steven French 2018
The moral rights of the authors have been asserted
First Edition published in 2018
Impression: 1
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prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
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and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
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Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and
for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials
contained in any third party website referenced in this work.
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

For Patrícia, Julia, and Olivia,

minhas meninas
For Dena and Morgan
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

Preface

This book had a somewhat more prolonged gestation than most. Some of the work
on which it is based was undertaken in the mid-to-late 1990s and was shaped through
the discussions of a small reading group in the philosophy of mathematics at the
University of Leeds. And many of those discussions centred around the reaction to
Mark Steiner’s now very well-known book, The Applicability of Mathematics as a
Philosophical Problem (Steiner 1998). It seemed to us then that his analysis rendered
the applicability of mathematics mysterious, or at least, more mysterious than it
really is, and that close attention to the historical details would help to dispel that air
of mystery. It is to this claim, namely that we should look more carefully at how
mathematics has actually been applied in physics, that we returned in early 2010 in
Miami when the bones of the book were laid down. In the meantime, we had also
further developed the partial structures variant of the so-called Semantic Approach
as a philosophical device that could be deployed in the analysis of a number of issues
and views, from inter-theory and theory–data relations in general to forms of
structural empiricism and realism more specifically. Coupling that historical sensi-
tivity with the flexibility of this framework seemed to us to be an obvious way to
proceed in examining how mathematics is actually applied to science—specifically
quantum physics—in practice, rather than in the minds of philosophers.
Still, despite the clear road ahead of us, it took a further six years and an intense
few days in Leeds before we had something that we felt could be submitted to the
withering gaze of our colleagues! The book as a whole can be seen as a further
extended paean to the myriad virtues of the partial structures approach but even if
you, the reader, are sceptical about these, we hope you will find something interesting
in our historical and philosophical discussions.
It is set out as follows: Chapter 1 tackles Steiner’s claims and suggests that the
mystery that he sees in the applicability of mathematics can be dispelled by adopting
a kind of optimistic attitude with regard to the variety of mathematical structures that
are typically made available in any given context. This might suggest that applying
mathematics is simply a matter of finding a mathematical structure to fit the
phenomena in question. Nevertheless, a cautionary note can still be sounded, repre-
sented by Mark Wilson’s concern that this attitude does not in fact capture the
manner in which mathematics is applied, not least because mathematics is more
‘rigid’ than this form of optimism assumes. What has to happen for mathematics to
be brought into contact with physics is for certain ‘special circumstances’ to be in
place. We suggest a related approach that builds on the central role of idealizations in
enabling mathematics to be applied—it is via such idealizations that these circum-
stances are effectively constructed.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

viii PREFACE

Much of the rest of the book consists of a series of case studies illustrating that
approach and the manner of the construction of these special circumstances. We
think that it is important to present the details of such case studies, rather than toy
examples, in order to illustrate how mathematics was applied in the context of actual
scientific research rather than in its regimentation through textbooks. The case
studies also exemplify three different roles associated with the application of math-
ematics: a representational role, a unificatory role, and an (alleged) explanatory role.
Before we present these case studies, however, we need to set out the framework in
which these various moves and roles will be examined. Thus, in Chapter 2, we
consider, at one end of the spectrum, the structuralist account associated with Joseph
Sneed, Wolfgang Stegmüller, and others and, at the other, the models-focused
account of Ron Giere. The former, we claim, is heavy on formalism at the expense
of a consideration of practice, whereas the latter draws on a number of interesting
case studies but omits the crucial formal framework. We suggest that both these
extremes should be rejected in favour of an approach that is appropriately formal,
while retaining the ability to represent science as it is actually practised.
And such an approach of course is represented by the partial structures account
that we also present in Chapter 2. Before we do so, however, we highlight and
represent the heuristic role of surplus mathematical structure, as emphasized by
Michael Redhead. The exploitation of such structure is a crucial feature of scientific
practice that we shall return to again and again throughout the book and we maintain
that it is also nicely accommodated within the partial structures framework, extended
to include a variety of partial morphisms (such as partial isomorphism, partial
homomorphism, etc.).
In Chapter 3, we then show how this framework may be used to give an account
of how scientific models represent systems and in a way that pays due regard to the
relationship between the relevant mathematics and such models. In particular, the
open-ended nature of these developments can be accommodated within such a
framework and the use of partial homomorphisms holding between structures
allows us to capture the way in which relations may be transferred from one such
structure to another. Finally, the expansion of the framework to include partial
homomorphisms also allows us to accommodate the fact that typically not all of the
mathematics is used in a particular application, leaving surplus structure that can be
subsequently exploited.
The pay-off begins in Chapter 4, where we present the introduction of group
theory into quantum mechanics in the later 1920s and early 1930s. Here one can
make a somewhat arbitrary distinction between the ‘Weyl’ and ‘Wigner’ pro-
grammes, where the former is concerned with using group theory to set the emerging
quantum physics onto secure foundations and the latter has as its focus a more
practical use as a means of solving complex dynamical problems. Here we emphasize
that the application of the mathematics to the physics depended on certain structural
‘bridges’ within the mathematics itself and also that both this mathematics and the
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

PREFACE ix

physics were in a state of flux at the time. Given that and the fact that what we had
was a partial importation of group theory into physics, we argue that the partial
structures approach offers a suitable framework for representing these developments.
More importantly, perhaps, we show how one can resist Steiner’s claim that it is the
mathematics that is doing all the work in these cases, creating a mystery as to how it
can thus capture the physical—rather, it is only because of prior idealizing moves on
the physics side that the mathematics can be brought into play to begin with. This
will be a recurrent theme throughout our work: granted the significance of the
mathematics, the crucial work is undertaken on the empirical side of things!
This analysis is then extended in Chapter 5 to include not only the ‘top-down’
application of group theory but also the ‘bottom-up’ construction of models of the
phenomena, with London’s explanation of the superfluid behaviour of liquid helium
in terms of Bose–Einstein statistics as our case study. Thus, here we have not only the
introduction of ‘high-level’ mathematics in the form of group theory but also a degree
of modelling at the phenomenological level. We claim that in moving from top to
bottom, from the mathematics to what is observed in the laboratory, the models
involved and the relationships between them can be accommodated by the partial
structures approach, coupled with an appreciation of the heuristic moves involved in
scientific work. Furthermore, as in the previous examples, this case fits with the
‘immersion, inference, and interpretation’ account of the application of mathematics
(the inferential conception), whereby immersion of the phenomena into the relevant
mathematics allows for the drawing-down of structure and the derivation of certain
results that can then be interpreted at the phenomenological level.
In Chapter 6, we turn to a different form of application where the aim was to unify
apparently unrelated domains, such as quantum states, probability assignments, and
logical inference. Here our case study is John von Neumann’s development of an
alternative to the Hilbert space formalism that he pioneered—one that is articulated
in terms of his theory of operators and what we now call von Neumann algebras. This
allowed him to accommodate probabilities in the context of systems with infinite
degrees of freedom and here too, as well as ‘top-down’ moves from the mathematics
to the physics, we also find ‘bottom-up’ developments from empirical features, to a
particular logic and thence to mathematical structures. Through a combination of
such moves, crucially involving exploration of the structural relations that hold
between the mathematical and the physical domains, von Neumann was able to
articulate the kind of unification across such domains that represents a further
important aspect of the application of mathematics.
In Chapter 7, we move on to consider whether, in bringing the mathematics into
application in this manner, there are grounds for taking the relevant mathematical
entities to be indispensable. Our case study here is Dirac’s use of the delta function
in quantum mechanics and we point out, first, that Dirac himself was very clear about
the function’s dispensability and, second, even if certain mathematical theories
were indispensable, this wouldn’t justify the commitment to the existence of
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x PREFACE

mathematical entities. To illustrate this second point we use a further example, that
of Dirac’s prediction of the existence of antimatter via the exploitation of surplus
mathematical structure. We maintain here that the commitment to the existence of
certain objects requires the satisfaction of certain criteria of existence and it is unclear
whether mathematical entities meet these criteria. Let us be explicit: we agree that
mathematics is indispensable to science but this does not imply that we should be
committed to the existence of mathematical entities.
The putative explanatory role of mathematics is further pursued in Chapter 8,
again in the context of the so-called indispensability argument and the claim that
certain scientific features have a hybrid mathematico-physical nature. Our conclu-
sion here is that, with regard to the former, the possibility of mathematical entities
acquiring some explanatory role is not well motivated, even within the framework of
an account of explanation that might be sympathetic to such a role. Second, the
example of such a hybrid property that has been given is that of spin, but we argue
that the assertion of hybridity also lacks strong motivation and comes with associated
metaphysical costs.
In Chapter 9, we pursue these themes further by examining both the role of
idealization with specific regard to explanation, and the broad criteria of acceptability
that, we argue, any such explanatory account should meet. Our case study here is that
of the phenomenon of universality, and the role of the renormalization group, which
has been held up as another example of mathematics playing a significant explana-
tory role. Again, we press our argument that once we have a clear framework for
understanding representation, and an equally clear understanding of what is required
of any explanation, such claims simply do not hold up. Here the immersion,
inference, and interpretation framework comes to the fore once again and contrary
to Bob Batterman’s proposal we maintain that, on the one hand, this framework can
accommodate the relevant cases he presents but, on the other, the relevant mathem-
atics does not itself play an explanatory role. Nevertheless, we agree with Batterman
that his examples shed new light on the practice of science. By articulating the above
framework within the partial structures approach, we can account for the nature and
significance of the phenomena involved, and thereby offer an understanding of them
within a unitary account of scientific practice.
Our final chapter (Chapter 10) then considers two sets of criticisms of our overall
approach. The first is that there may be cases where the special circumstances
constructed via idealizations simply do not arise and thus our account cannot be
applied to them. We examine one such possible case, the discovery of the Ω- particle,
and conclude that it presents no particular obstacle to our approach. The second
concerns the role of the partial structures framework in capturing scientific practice,
and here we emphasize that we see it as a meta-level representational device that, we
argue, suits the purposes of philosophers of science when considering this practice.
In particular, when it comes to the various different aspects of the applicability of
mathematics, it does the job!
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

Contents

Acknowledgements xv
List of Illustrations xvii

1. Just How Unreasonable is the Effectiveness of Mathematics? 1

1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Mystery Mongering 2
1.3 Mathematical Optimism 10
1.4 Mathematical Opportunism 15
2. Approaching Models: Formal and Informal 24
2.1 Introduction 24
2.2 One Extreme: The Structuralists 27
2.3 The Other Extreme: Giere’s Account of Models 30
2.4 Surplus Structure 36
2.5 Partial Structures 41
2.6 Problems with Isomorphism 45
2.7 The Inferential Conception 51
2.8 Conclusion 54
3. Scientific Representation and the Application of Mathematics 55
3.1 Introduction 55
3.2 General Challenge: Reducing all Representations to the Mental 57
3.3 Specific Challenges to the Formal Account 60
3.3.1 Necessity 60
3.3.2 Sufficiency 61
3.3.3 Logic 61
3.3.4 Mechanism 62
3.3.5 Style 62
3.3.6 Misrepresentation 62
3.3.7 Ontology 63
3.4 The Formal Account Defended 63
3.4.1 Preamble: Informational vs Functional Accounts 63
3.4.2 Necessity 65
3.4.3 Logic and Sufficiency 66
3.4.4 Mechanism 67
3.4.5 Style 67
3.4.6 Misrepresentation 68
3.4.7 Ontology 70
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

xii CONTENTS

4. Applying New Mathematics: Group Theory and Quantum Mechanics 72

4.1 Introduction 72
4.2 The Historical Context 73
4.3 Applying Group Theory to Atoms 76
4.3.1 A (Very) Brief History of Quantum Statistics 76
4.3.2 The ‘Wigner Programme’ 78
4.3.3 The ‘Weyl Programme’ 82
4.4 Applying Group Theory to Nuclei 91
4.5 Conclusion 98
5. Representing Physical Phenomena: Top-Down and Bottom-Up 101
5.1 Introduction 101
5.2 From the Top: The Applicability of Mathematics 101
5.3 Bose–Einstein Statistics and Superfluidity 103
5.3.1 The Liquid Degeneracy of Helium 103
5.3.2 The Application of Bose–Einstein Statistics 104
5.4 The Autonomy of London’s Model 111
5.5 Conclusion 114
6. Unifying with Mathematics: Logic, Probability, and Quantum States 116
6.1 Introduction 116
6.2 Group Theory, Hilbert Spaces, and Quantum Mechanics 116
6.3 Logic and Empiricism 122
6.4 The 1937 Manuscript: Logics and Experience 123
6.5 The Status of Mathematics 127
7. Applying Problematic Mathematics, Interpreting Successful Structures:
From the Delta Function to the Positron 130
7.1 Introduction 130
7.2 Dirac and the Delta Function 131
7.2.1 Introducing the Delta Function 131
7.2.2 Dispensing with the Delta Function 134
7.2.3 The Status of the Delta Function 136
7.3 The Pragmatic and Heuristic Role of Mathematics in Physics 138
7.4 The Discovery of Antimatter 141
7.5 Conclusion 148
8. Explaining with Mathematics? From Cicadas to Symmetry 151
8.1 Introduction 151
8.2 The Strong Claim and Indispensability 151
8.3 The Enhanced Indispensability Argument and Explanation 159
8.3.1 Indexing and Representing 161
8.3.2 Explaining 167
8.4 The Weak Claim and the Hybridity of Spin 173
8.5 Conclusion 182
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

CONTENTS xiii

9. Explaining with Mathematics? Idealization, Universality, and the

Criteria for Explanation 183
9.1 Introduction 183
9.2 Immersion, Inference, and Partial Structures 183
9.3 Idealization and Surplus Structure 185
9.4 The Rainbow 189
9.5 Accommodating Process and Limit Operations 191
9.6 Renormalization and the Stability of Mathematical Representations 193
9.7 Structural Explanations 199
9.8 Explanation and Eliminability 203
9.9 Requirements for Explanation 206
9.10 Attempts at Explanation 209
9.11 Interpretation and Idealization 218
9.12 Conclusion: Explanation and the Inferential Conception 219
10. Conclusion: Between Lazy Optimism and Unbridled Opportunism 222
10.1 Introduction 222
10.2 The Ω- Case 223
10.3 Partial Structures as a Meta-Level Device 227

References 235
Name Index 251
Subject Index 254
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

Acknowledgements

We owe a huge debt to many people, across many years and different countries. We
won’t be able to name all of them, but we would like in particular to highlight: Jody
Azzouni, Manuel Barrantes, Mark Colyvan, Newton da Costa, Sarah Kattau, Décio
Krause, James Ladyman, Peter Lewis, Kerry McKenzie, Joseph Melia, Chris Pincock,
Juha Saatsi, Scott Shalkowski, Harvey Siegel, Amie Thomasson, Bas van Fraassen,
and Pete Vickers, among so many friends and colleagues with whom we discussed
and corresponded about the issues examined in this work. To all of them, including
those not individually named above, our sincere thanks.
For extensive comments on the manuscript, we are grateful to Manuel Barrantes
and two anonymous reviewers for Oxford University Press (OUP). Their feedback
led to substantial improvements in the final version of the work. We’d also like to
thank Peter Momtchiloff at OUP for all his tireless support and patience throughout
the long gestation of this work. It has been a pleasure to work with him and his
colleagues at OUP.
Steven would also like to thank, as always, Dena, Morgan, and The Ruffian.
Otávio would like to thank Patrícia, Julia, and Olivia for showing him the world,
and for making life such a great adventure.
On a Sunday afternoon in June 2016, as we worked together on this project in
Leeds, Olivia (Otávio’s then 9-year-old daughter) called to ask what we were up to.
We told her that we were working on the book, and she promptly asked whether it
would be the biggest book in the world. We explained to her that it wouldn’t.
Unfazed, she then proclaimed: “Okay, then make it the best one!” Clearly, it won’t
be easy to live up to her expectations. But at least we did the best we could.
A few months later, as we were putting the final touches in the work, Julia
(Otávio’s then 11-year-old daughter) browsed through the manuscript and com-
plained that the titles weren’t colourful enough. If she had her way, this book would
be called The Awesomeness of Partial Structures!
Finally, we would like to thank Cambridge University Press, Chicago University
Press, Elsevier, Oxford University Press, and Springer, for permission to reproduce
material from the following papers: Bueno, O. (1999): “Empiricism, Conservative-
ness and Quasi-Truth”, Philosophy of Science 66: S474–S485. Bueno, O. (2000):
“Empiricism, Mathematical Change and Scientific Change”, Studies in History and
Philosophy of Science 31: 269–96. Bueno, O. (2005): “Dirac and the Dispensability of
Mathematics”, Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 36: 465–90.
Bueno, O. (2016): “Belief Systems and Partial Spaces”, Foundations of Science 21:
225–36. Bueno, O. (2017): “Von Neumann, Empiricism, and the Foundations of
Quantum Mechanics”, in Aerts, D., de Ronde, C., Freytes, H., and Giuntini, R. (eds.),
Probing the Meaning and Structure of Quantum Mechanics: Superpositions, Semantics,
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

xvi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Dynamics and Identity (Singapore: World Scientific), pp. 192–230. Bueno, O., and
French, S. (1999): “Infestation or Pest Control: The Introduction of Group Theory
into Quantum Mechanics”, Manuscrito 22: 37–86. Bueno, O., and French, S. (2011):
“How Theories Represent”, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 62: 857–94.
Bueno, O., and French, S. (2012): “Can Mathematics Explain Physical Phenomena?”,
The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 63: 85–113. Bueno, O., French, S.,
and Ladyman, J. (2002): “On Representing the Relationship between the Mathemat-
ical and the Empirical”, Philosophy of Science 69: 452–73. Bueno, O., French, S., and
Ladyman, J. (2012): “Empirical Factors and Structural Transference: Returning to the
London Account”, Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 43: 95–103.
French, S. (1999): “Models and Mathematics in Physics: The Role of Group Theory”,
in Butterfield, J., and Pagonis, C. (eds.), From Physics to Philosophy (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press), pp. 187–207. French, S. (2000): “The Reasonable
Effectiveness of Mathematics: Partial Structures and the Application of Group
Theory to Physics”, Synthese 125: 103–20. French, S. (2015): “Between Weasels and
Hybrids: What Does the Applicability of Mathematics Tell Us about Ontology?”, in
Beziau, J.-Y., Krause, D., and Arenhart, J. (eds.), Conceptual Clarifications: Tributes to
Patrick Suppes (London: College Publications), pp. 63–86.
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi

List of Illustrations

1 The Inferential Conception of Applied Mathematics 53

2 The Iterated Inferential Conception of Applied Mathematics 188
OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 28/4/2018, SPi
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 18/4/2018, SPi

1
Just How Unreasonable is the
Effectiveness of Mathematics?

1.1 Introduction
Eugene Wigner’s famous description of the ‘unreasonable effectiveness’ of mathe-
matics has, explicitly or implicitly, structured much of the discussion of applicability
in recent years (Wigner 1960). Those two simple words of his phrase have laid down
the parameters of the debate: on the one hand, mathematics is clearly effective as, at
the very least, the language of science, but on the other, given the apparently stark
differences between mathematics and science,¹ this effectiveness appears unreason-
able. Put bluntly, the question is: how can something apparently so different from
science be so useful in scientific practice? This question invites comparison of the
mathematical and scientific domains, and in order to effect such a comparison
one must choose a suitable mode of representation. It further invites us to pay
close attention to the elements of practice, in order to discern the intricate workings
of the mathematical in the domain of the physical.
Of course, certain notable philosophies of mathematics do present highly articu-
lated representational frameworks. However, they fail to appropriately consider the
practice itself. Looking in the other direction, as it were, one can identify several
attempts to redress the balance, to present the nitty-gritty of both mathematical and
scientific practice. Nevertheless, admirable as these attempts might be, they are
deficient when it comes to the other side of the coin: they fail to present these details
within an appropriate mode of representation. Even worse, in one notable case, the
details are presented in a reconstruction that is so artificial as to give the most
Whiggish of historians pause. In this opening chapter, we shall argue that this
detaching of practice from the relevant history actually perpetuates the mystery of
applicability.² In subsequent chapters we shall attempt to dispel the air of mystery by
offering what we consider to be a closer reading of the historical circumstances.

¹ These differences are both epistemic, in terms of the manner in which the respective truths in
mathematics and science are established, and ontological, in terms of the apparent causal efficacy of the
relevant objects.
² This sense of mystery was perpetuated by Wigner himself, who wrote, ‘ . . . the enormous usefulness of
mathematics in the natural sciences is something bordering on the mysterious and . . . there is no rational
explanation for it’ (1960, p. 2).
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 “Losing? You don’t know creditor from debtor account. That comes
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I’ll see what I can do to get you taken up by some respectable
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and saying that there was no cock-fighting at Waterloo, because
there was; and people don’t like contradictions. When I broke open
the belfry door that the ringers might give Mr. Puddicombe a peal, I
let the world see I wasn’t going to be priest-ridden; and we are not
going to be schoolmaster-ridden neither, and told our accounts are
wrong, and that Waterloo, where the cock-fight was, is not in
England.”
 CHAPTER XI
DISCORDS

W alter Bramber left Coombe Cellars greatly discouraged. He had

unintentionally ruffled the plumes of the churchwarden by
disputing his knowledge of the situation of Waterloo, and mainly by
discovering that his affairs were in something worse than confusion,
that they wore a complexion which indicated the approach of
bankruptcy. And Pasco Pepperill was one of the magnates of the
village, and full of consciousness that he was a great man.
Bramber walked to the little village shop belonging to Whiteaway,
the second churchwarden, who was also on the committee of
management, and trustee for the school under the National Society.
Here also his reception was not cordial. It was intimated to him
that his presence in the village and tenure of the mastership of the
school would be tolerated only on condition that he supplied himself
with groceries, draperies, boots, and lollipops from Whiteaway’s
shop. He walked to his lodgings.
Such were the men with whom he was thrown. From two
instances he generalised. They were to be gained through their
interests. Unless he got one set of things at one store and another
set at another, the two mighty men who ruled Coombe-in-Teignhead
would turn their faces against him, and make his residence in the
place intolerable.
As he walked slowly along the little street, he encountered a
cluster of children, talking and romping together, composed of boys
and girls of all ages. Directly they saw him, they became silent, and
stood with eyes and mouths open contemplating him. Bramber heard
one boy whisper to the next--
 “That’s the new teacher--ain’t he a duffer?”
He nodded, and addressed a few kindly words to the children;
expressed his hope that they would soon be well acquainted and
become fast friends. To which no response was accorded. But no
sooner was he past than the whole crew burst into a loud guffaw,
which set the blood rushing into the young man’s face.
A moment later a stone was hurled, and hit him on the back. He
turned in anger, and saw the whole pack disappear behind a cottage
and down a side lane. He considered a moment whether to pursue
and capture the offender, but believing that he would have great
difficulty in discovering him, even if he caught the whole gang, he
deemed it expedient to swallow the affront.
On reaching his lodgings, Bramber unpacked his few goods; and
as he did this, his heart ached for his Hampshire home. Old
associations were connected with the trifles he took out of his box,
linked with the irrevocable past, some sad, others sunny. Then he
seated himself at his window and sank into a brown study.
Young, generous, he had come to this nook of the West full of
enthusiasm for his task, eager to advance education, to lift the
children out of the slough of ignorance and prejudice in which their
fathers and forefathers had been content to live. That his efforts
would meet with ready and enthusiastic support, would be gratefully
hailed by parents and children alike, by rich and by poor, he had not
doubted.
“There is no darkness but ignorance,” said the fool in “Twelfth
Night”; and who would not rejoice to be himself lifted out of
shadows into light, and to see his children advanced to a higher and
better walk than had been possible for himself?
But his hopes were suddenly and at once damped. He was a fish
out of water. A youth with a certain amount of culture, and with a
mind thirsting after knowledge, he was pitchforked into a village
where culture was not valued, where the only books seen were, “The
Norwood Gipsy’s Dream-Book” and “The Forty Thieves,” exposed in
the grocer’s window. He had been accustomed to associate with
friends who had an interest in history, travels, politics, scenery,
poetry, and art; and here in this backwater no one, so far as he
could see, had interest in anything save what would fill his pocket or
his paunch. Sad and temporarily discouraged, he took his violin and
began to play. This instrument was to be to him in exile companion,
friend, and confidant. Presently he heard a male voice downstairs
talking loudly to his landlady. He stayed his bow, and in another
moment a stout and florid man stumbled up the staircase.
“How do’y, schoolmaister?” said this visitor, extending a big and
moist hand. “I’m Jonas Southcott, landlord of the Lamb and Flag. As
I was passing, I heard your fiddle squeak. You’re just the chap us
wants. Peter Adams as played first fiddle at church is dead; he was
the man for you--he could turn you off a country dance, a hornpipe,
or a reel.”
“What, in church?”
“No, not exact-ly that. At our little hops at the Lamb and Flag; and
on Sunday he was wonderful at an anthem or a psalm. We want
someone who can take his place. You please to come and be
sociable when the young folks want a dance. What can you play-
-‘Moll in the Wad,’ ‘The Devil among the Tailors,’ ‘Oil of Barley,’
‘Johnny, come tie my cravat’? These were some of Peter Adams’s
tunes. And on Sunday you should have heard him in Jackson’s ‘Tee-
dum,’ or at Christmas in ‘While shepherds watched.’ It was
something worth going to church for.”
“I hardly know what to say,” gasped Walter Bramber. “I am but
newly arrived, and have not as yet shaken into my place.”
“This is practising night. The instruments will all be in my parlour
this evening at half-past six. If you like to come and be sociable, and
have a glass of spirits and water, and try your hand at Jackson’s ‘Tee-
dum,’ I reckon the orchestra will be uncommon gratified.”
“You are very good, but”--
“And when the practice is over, we’ll whip in some young folks and
have a dance, and if you’ll fiddle some of them tunes--‘Moll in the
Wad,’ or ‘The Parson among the Peas,’ or ‘The Devil among the
Tailors,’ you’ll get intimate with young and old alike. Then, also, you
can keep your eyes open, and pick out a clean, comely maiden, and
keep company with her, and walk her out on Sundays--and so look to
settling among us. You have a head-wind and a strong tide against
you. The old master was such a favourite, and so greatly respected,
that I doubt, unless you make an effort, you won’t go down here.”
“This evening you must excuse me; I’m very tired.”
“Well, this was kindly intended. I thought to put you on good
terms with the parish at once. Perhaps you’re shy of playing
Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’ till you’ve tried it over privately. I’ll see if I can
borrow you the notes. Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’”--
“I presume you mean the ‘Te Deum.’”
“We always call it ‘Tee-dum’ here, and if you give it any other
name, no one will understand you. We are English, not French or
Chinese, in Coombe-in-Teignhead.”
The landlord of the Lamb and Flag descended the stairs, and
Bramber, fearing lest he should have given offence, accompanied
him to the street door. His landlady was a widow. When Jonas
Southcott was out of the house, she beckoned to Walter Bramber,
and said--
“I be main glad you ain’t going to the practice to-night, for I have
axed Jane Cann in to tea.”
“Who is Jane Cann?”
“Her teaches sewing and the infants in the National School. I
thought you’d best become acquainted in a friendly way at the
outset. She used to keep a dame’s school herself, and a very good
school it was. But when the parson set up the new National School,
he did not want exactly to offend folk, and to take the bread out of
Jane Cann’s mouth,--you know she’s akin to me, and to several in
the place,--so he appointed her to the infants. Her’s a nice
respectable young woman, but her had a bit o’ a misfortune as a
child; falled and hurt her back, and so is rather crooked and short.
Her may be a trifle older than you, but folk do say that is always best
so; for when the wife is young”--
“Goodness preserve us! you don’t suppose I am going to marry
her because she is the sewing-mistress?”
“You might do worse. Folk are sure to talk anyhow, and it’s best to
give ’em some grounds for their talk. You see, she and you must
walk together going to school and coming away, and she lives close
by here. As I was saying, people say that when the wife is much
younger than her husband there comes a long family, and the man is
old and past work when some of the youngest are still no better than
babies.”
Bramber felt a chill down his spinal marrow, as though iced water
were trickling there.
“I speak against my own interest,” continued the widow, “but it
does seem a pity that you should not put your salaries together and
occupy one house. She gets twenty pounds a year. If you was to
marry her, you’d be twenty pounds the richer. ’Twas unfortunate,
though, about that cricket ball.”
“What about a cricket ball?”
“Why, Jane Cann was looking on at a cricket match among the
boys, and a ball came by accident and hit her on the side of her
head, so that she’s hard o’ hearing in her right ear. You’ll please to sit
by her on the left, and then she can hear well enough. Jane Cann is
my cousin, and I’d like to do her a good turn, and as she’s maybe
about seven years older than you, you need not fear a long family.”
“Preserve me!” gasped the schoolmaster.
“I’ll set you a stool on her left side, and give her a high chair, then
you’ll be about on a level with her hearing ear.”
“I--I am going out to tea,” said Bramber, snatching up his hat to fly
the cottage; but was arrested at the door by a burly farmer who
entered.
“This is Mr. Prowse of Wonnacot,” said the widow to Bramber.
Then to the farmer, “This, sir, is the new teacher, who is going to
lodge with me.”
“I’ve heard of him from Southcott,” said Prowse. “I’ve been told
you play the fiddle. Perhaps you know also how to finger the pianer.
My girls, Susanna and Eliza, are tremendously eager to learn the
pianer, and I thought that after school hours you might drop in at my
little place--Wonnacot--and give the young ladies lessons. I’d take it
as a favour, and as I am a not inconsiderable subscriber to the
National School, and”--
The widow, in a tone of admiration, threw in an aside to Bramber-
-“He subscribes half a sovereign.”
 The farmer inflated his chest, smiled, raised himself in his boots,
and, thrusting his right hand into his pocket, rattled some money. He
had heard the aside, as it was intended that he should.
“I may say,” continued Mr. Prowse, “that I am a bulwark and a
buttress of the National School, and as such I lay claim to the
services of the teacher; and if, after hours, he can hop over to my
little place and give my girls an hour three times a week, then”--he
raised his chin and smiled down on the schoolmaster--“then I shall
not begrudge my subscription.”
“It is true,” said Bramber, “that I can play a little on the piano, but-
-I am not sure that I am competent to give lessons. Moreover, I
doubt if I shall have the time at my disposal. I am still young, and
must prosecute my studies.”
“If you expect to remain here in comfort,” said the farmer testily,
“you’ll have to do what you are asked. You don’t expect me to
subscribe to the National School and get no advantage out of it?”
Thus it was--some made demands on the time, some on the
purse, and others desired to dispose of the person of the new-comer.
To escape meeting the crooked sewing-mistress, deaf of the right
ear, Walter ran into the street, and walked through the village.
A labourer came up to him.
“I want a word with you, Mr. Schoolmaister,” said he. “My boy goes
to the National School, and I gives you fair warning, if you touches
him with your hand or a stick, I’ll have the law of you.”
“But suppose he be disobedient, rude, disorderly?”
“My boy is not to be punished. He is well enough if let alone.”
“But--do you send him to school to be let alone?”
“I send him to school to be out of the way when my missus is
washing or doing needlework.”
A little farther on his way, a woman arrested Walter Bramber, and
said, “You be the new teacher, be you not? Please, I’ve five childer in
your school and three at home. Some of the scholars bain’t clean as
they should be. I can’t have my childer come home bringing with
them what they oughtn’t, and never carried to school from my
house. So will’y, now, just see to ’em every day, as they be all right,
afore you let ’em leave school, and I’ll thank’y for it kindly.”
 Presently a mason returning from his work saluted Bramber.
“Look here, schoolmaister! I want you to take special pains wi’ my
children and get ’em on like blazes. If they don’t seem to get forward
in a week or two, I shall take ’em away and send them to Mr.
Puddicombe, who is going to open a private school.”
Then another man came up, halted, and, catching hold of the
lappet of Bramber’s coat, said, “My name is Tooker. I’m not a
churchman, but I have several children at your school. I won’t have
them taught the Church Catechism. I’m a Particular Baptist, and I
won’t have no childer of mine taught to say what their godfather and
godmother promised and vowed for them--for they ain’t had no
godfathers nor godmothers, and ain’t a-going to have none. You
can’t mistake my childer. One has got a red head, another is yaller,
and the third is a sort of whitey-brown--and has sunspots, and a
mole between the shoulder-blades, and the boy never had no toe-
nails. So mind--no catechism for them.”
“And there is something,” said again another, “upon which I want
to lay down what I think. I wish you to teach readin’ and writin’ in a
rational manner.”
“I hope to do that.”
“Ah! but you’ve been too much at college, and crammed wi’ book-
larnin’. Why should you teach childer, and fret their little heads about
the H, when it’s a thing of no concern whatever. Mr. Puddicombe, he
was the reasonable man. Sez he, ‘Raisin puddin’ is good, and duffy
puddin’ wi’out raisins is good--so is it with the English language--it’s
good all round, and the H’s are just the raisins; you can put ’em in or
leave ’em out as you pleases, and stick ’em in by the scores or just a
sprinklin’, and it’s no odds--it’s good anyways.’ Them’s the principles
of spellin’ I expect my little ones to larn at your school.”
“And I hopes, Mr. Teacher,” said another sententiously, “as you’ll
never forget that it is not enough to teach the children readin’,
writing, and ’rithmetic. There is something more”--
“There is a great deal more--geography, history, the Elements”--
“There is something above all that, and you should make it the
first thing, and readin’ and the rest after.”
“What’s that?”
 “Temperance--teetotal principles.”
Bramber walked on. His discouragement was becoming greater at
every moment.
As he passed the Lamb and Flag, he was greeted by a hideous
bray of instruments both stringed and brazen. This outburst was
followed by a marvellous coruscation of instrumental music, races,
leaps, a helter-skelter of fiddles, flutes, cornets, bass-viol, now
together, more often running ahead or falling behind each other,
then one a-pickaback on the rest.
At the door of the public-house stood Mr. Jonas Southcott with his
face radiant.
“Well, Mr. Schoolmaister!” shouted he; “what do you think of this?
You’ve never heard such moosic before, I warrant. That is what I call
moosic of the spears! It’s Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum.’”
 CHAPTER XII
DAFFODILS

U nwilling to return to his lodgings, where in vain the net was spread
in his sight, Bramber walked towards Coombe Cellars. There for
sixpence he could have his tea--cockles, winkles, and presumably
bread and butter.
There also would he see that pale-faced girl with the large violet-
blue eyes, which had been fixed on him with so much sympathy.
Disappointed in proportion to the sanguineness of his expectations,
Walter felt that he needed some relief from his discouragement, a
word from some one who could understand him. On that day he had
looked straight into many eyes, into beaming eyes, into irises that
were dull with no speech in them, into stupid eyes, into boastful, into
defiant, into insolent eyes.
Those of his landlady were clear as crystal, and he could see to
their bottom; but what he saw there was but the agglomeration of
common details of everyday life--so many loaves per week, a pint of
milk, a beefsteak or mutton chop for supper, coals at so much a
bushel, so much cleaning, so much washing. As in a revolving slide
in a magic lantern, the same figures, the same trees, the same
houses, reappear in endless iteration; so would it be with the eyes of
the landlady, week by week, year by year, till those eyes closed in
death; nought else would be revealed in their shadows but loaves
and milk, and coals and washing, over and over and over again.
There are eyes that are stony and have no depth in them; such were
those of Zerah. Others have profundity, but are treacherous; such
were those of Pasco. In the two glimpses into the eyes of the pale
girl, whose name he did not know, Bramber had seen depths that
seemed unfathomable; wells which had their sources in the heart,
deeps full of mystery and promise.
The evening might have been one in summer. A light east wind
was playing; the sky was clear. The sun had been hot all day. Marsh
marigolds blazed at the water brim, reflecting their golden faces in
the tide. The orchards were sheeted with daffodils. The evening sky
was blue shot with primrose, and every hue was mirrored in the
water.
Bramber asked to have his tea out of doors on the little platform
above the water, and Mrs. Pepperill bade Kate attend on the
schoolmaster, and remain on the terrace so as to be ready to bring
him anything he required; and, in the event of his desiring company,
to be present to converse with him. She herself was engaged, and
could not give him her attention.
The evening was so warm, so balmy, that it could do the
convalescent no harm to sit outside the house. Kate took her
needlework and planted herself on the low wall above the water, one
foot in a white stocking and neat shoe touching the gravel. She was
at some distance from the schoolmaster, who opened a book and
read whilst taking his tea. He did not, apparently, require her society,
and she had no thought of forcing herself on him.
Yet, occasionally, unobserved by her, Bramber looked her way.
Behind her was an orchard-sweep golden with daffodils, and the
slant setting sun, shooting down a gap in the hills, kindled the whole
multitude of flower-heads into a blaze of wavering sunfire. Kate sat,
a dark figure against this luminous background, but her plum-
coloured kerchief, bound round her throat and tied across her breast,
was wondrous in contrast with the brilliant flowers.
Occasionally, moreover, Kate, who long looked at the flower carpet
which by its radiance threw a golden light into her face, turned her
head to see if the schoolmaster needed more milk or butter; and
then her eyes rested on the book he held with much the same greed
with which a child fastens its eyes on sweets and a miser on gold.
The setting sun had fired glass windows on the opposite side of
the estuary, and it flashed in every ripple running in from the sea.
 Kate wore a little bunch of celandines in her bosom, pinned into
the purple kerchief. The flowers were open through the warmth of
their position, and when she stooped and a streak of sunlight fell on
them and filled their cups, they sent a golden sheen over her chin.
The girl was looking dreamily with turned head at the sheet of
blazing daffodils, drinking in the beauty of the scene, and sighing,
she knew not why, when she was startled to hear a voice at her ear,
and, looking round, saw the schoolmaster.
“Are you admiring the daffodils?” he asked.
“Yes,” answered Kate, too shy, too surprised to say more.
“And I,” said he, “I also have been looking at them; and then I
turned to familiar lines in Wordsworth, the poet I am reading. Do
you know them?”
“About lent-lilies? I know nothing.”
“Listen.”
Then Bramber read--
 “I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle in the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:--
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude,
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”

Kate’s dark blue eyes were fixed with intensity on the reader’s
face. Then they became full to overflowing.
“Why,” exclaimed Bramber, “you are crying!”
“It is so true, it is so beautiful,” she said, and her voice shook; and
as she spoke the tears ran down her white cheeks. “How did he who
wrote that know about my illness, and that I was thinking about, and
troubled about, the daffodils when I was in my fever? It is all true”;
she put her hands to her bosom; “I feel it--I cannot bear it.”
Walter Bramber paused in surprise. He was himself a passionate
lover of nature, of flowers, and he was fond of the words of the poet
of nature--words that touched deep chords in his spirit. But here was
a pale, reserved girl, to whom the words of the poet appealed with
even greater force than to himself.
“Are you fond of poetry?” he asked.
She hesitated, and slightly coloured before answering.
“I do not know. Father sings a song or two. There are words, they
rhyme, and they are set to a tune, and sometimes a good tune helps
along bad words; but I never before heard words that had the music
in themselves and wanted nothing to carry them along as on the
wings of a bird. When you read that to me, it was just as though I
heard what I had felt in my heart over and over again, and had
never found how I could put it.”
“Do you know why these flowers are called daffodils?”
She turned her solemn eyes on him again.
“Because they are daffodils; why else?”
“I suppose,” said Bramber, “when the Normans came to England,
they brought these yellow flowers with them, and with the flowers
the name by which they had known them in Normandy--Fleurs
d’Avril, which means April flowers.”
“They do come in April, but also in March, and this year the
weather has been warm, and everything is advanced.”
“So,” continued Bramber, “when the English tried to pronounce the
French name, Fleurs d’Avril, they made daverils, and then slid away
into further difference, and settled down on daffodils. Do you know
about the Conquest by the Normans?”
Kate shook her head sadly.
“I know nothing--nothing at all.” Then, after a pause, she asked
timidly, “Will you be very good and kind, and repeat those verses,
and let me learn them by heart? Oh,” she gasped, and expanded,
and clasped her hands, “it would be such a joy to me! and I could
repeat them for ever and ever, and be happy.”
“I shall be delighted.”
 Kate planted herself on one of the benches by the table, leaned
her chin in her hands, and listened to each line of the poem with
concentrated attention. One or two words she did not understand,
and Bramber explained their meaning to her. When the piece had
been read over slowly, she said--
“May I try? Do you mind? I think I know it.”
Then she recited the poem with perfect accuracy.
“You are quick at learning,” said Bramber. “I hope I may find my
pupils in the National School as eager to acquire and as ready to
apprehend.”
“I never heard words like these before,” said Kate.
“May I tell you what they are like to me?”
“Certainly.”
“They are like lightning on a still night, without rain, without
thunder. The heavens are open and there is light--that is all. Is there
more in that book?”
“A great deal,” answered the young man; and, pointing to the
celandines in Kate’s bosom, said, “The poet has something to say
about these flowers.”
“What, buttercups?”
“They are not buttercups. Take them out from where they are
pinned. I will teach you a lesson--how to distinguish sorts.”
As the girl removed the bunch and placed it on the table, he said,
“Do you see the petals? The golden leaves of the flower are called
petals. They are pointed. Now, remember, a buttercup has rounded
petals.”
“You are right, and they come out later. They are more like little
drunkards.”
“Drunkards? What do you mean?”
“The large golden cups that grow by the water’s edge--these we
call drunkards, but they drink only water.”
“You mean the marsh marigold.”
“Perhaps so, but it is very different from the marigold of the
garden. The leaves”--
Bramber laughed. “Now you are going to teach me to distinguish.
You are quite right--that water-drinker is not a marigold at all. But
country people give it that name because it is the great golden
flower that blooms at or about Lady Day, and the lady is the Virgin
Mary. Now consider. The celandine has sharply-pointed petals. Do
you see the difference between them and those of the golden water-
drinker?”
“I see this clearly now.”
“He who wrote those verses about the daffodils has written three
poems on the celandine.”
“What! on these little flowers?”
Kate coloured with delight and surprise.
“Yes, and very beautiful they are. I will reserve them for another
day. You have enough to think about in the lines on the daffodils.”
“How did the man who wrote them know of my illness, and how I
dreamed and troubled about the daffodils?”
“He knew nothing of you.”
“He must have done so. He says he was lonely as a cloud, and I
am Kitty Alone.”
“Is that your name?”
“They call me so because I have no companions and no friends,
and because”--She checked herself and hung her head.
“But you have relatives.”
“Yes--my father and Aunt Zerah. But for all that I am alone. They
are grown big and old, and so of course cannot understand me--a
child. And at school I didn’t have friends. Then the man must have
been here, for he says--

‘Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle in the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay.’

There they are--‘in never-ending line.’”

 “There are daffodils elsewhere, as there are solitary spirits
elsewhere than in this little being”--and Walter lightly touched the
girl’s brow.
Both were silent for a minute. Presently Kate said, “When I was
looking at the daffodils, as the sun was on them, they blazed in at
my eyes and I was full of light, and now those beautiful words are
like the sun on the flowers that I shall carry away with me, and as I
lie in bed in the dark I shall think of them, and the golden light will
fill my room and fill my heart--

‘Flashing upon that inward eye,

Which is the bliss of solitude.’

That is true of the inward eye. You can see more with that than
with the real eye. The man was a prophet. He knew and wrote of
things that are not known or are not talked about in the world.”
“So they call you Kitty Alone. You did not give me the second
reason. What is that reason?”
The girl looked embarrassed.
“You will laugh at me.”
“Indeed I will not,” answered Bramber earnestly.
She still hesitated.
“You fear me? Surely you can trust me.”
“You are so good--indeed I can. You speak to me as does no one
else, and that is just why I do not wish to appear ridiculous in your
eyes.”
“That you never will.”
Then she said, blushing and hanging her head, “It is all along of a
song my father sings.”
“What song is that?”
“It is some silly nonsense about a frog that lived in a well--and the
burden is--‘Kitty Alone’--and then ‘Kitty Alone and I.'”
“Sing me the words.”
She did as requested.
 “The air is pleasant and very quaint. It deserves better words. Will
you remain here whilst I run for my violin?”
“Yes, unless my aunt calls me within.”
Walter Bramber hastened to his lodgings, and brought away his
cherished instrument. He made the girl sing over a few verses of the
song, and then struck in with the violin.
He speedily caught the melody, and played it, then went off into
variations, returning anon to the pleasant theme, and Kate listened
in surprise and admiration. Never before had she thought that there
was much of air, or of grace and delicacy in the tune as sung by her
father, and cast jeeringly at her in scraps by the youths of Coombe-
in-Teignhead. Zerah looked out at the door and summoned her
niece.
Kate started as from a dream.
“My bunch of flowers,” she said.
Bramber had secured the celandines.
 CHAPTER XIII
THE SPIRIT OF INQUIRY

K ate entered the house, at the summons of her aunt, and found
that John Pooke was within, standing with his hat in his hand, in
front of him, twirling it about and playing with the string that served
to contract the lining band.
“I am so glad to see that you are well, Kitty.”
Kate thanked him. She was not a little vexed at being called away
from conversation with the schoolmaster, whose talk was so unlike
that of any other man she had met. The rector she knew and loved,
but she was before him as a scholar to be instructed in spiritual
concerns, and their conversation never turned on such matters as
had been mooted between her and the schoolmaster. For a little
while she had been translated into a new sphere, and had heard
words of another order to those that had hitherto met her ears. Now
she was brought back into the world of commonplace, and could not
at once recover herself and accommodate herself to it. This made
her shy and silent. Pooke also was shy, but he was awkward to boot.
“Have you nothing to say to me, Kate?” he asked in suppliant
tone.
“Indeed, I thank you many times, Jan, for inquiring about me
when I was ill. Now, as you see, I am myself again.”
“I was the cause of your illness.”
“No indeed, no blame attaches to you. We will not talk of blame--
there is none.”
“Are you going to Ashburton Fair on Tuesday?”
“I do not know.”
 “Yes, you do,” threw in Aunt Zerah; then to John Pooke, “She is
going to the moor to her father for a change. It is her father’s wish,
so that she may be soon strong again. He will meet her at Ashburton
at the fair, if we can get her so far.”
“I am going to the fair,” said Pooke eagerly. “That is to say, sister
Sue and I be going together there. The young man to whom she is
about to be married lives at Ashburton, and will have it that she
goes. There is room for a third in our trap. I should so much like to
take you--I mean, sister Sue would wish it, if you would favour me--I
mean sister Sue.”
“Thank you again, Jan, for another kindness,” said the girl, “but I
shall be driven to Ashburton by my uncle. I really had not considered
that the fair was on Tuesday.”
“Your uncle can spare you,” thrust in Zerah; “and if Jan Pooke is so
civil as to invite you to go in his conveyance, it is only proper you
should accept.”
“But, aunt,” said Kate, slightly colouring, “my father has settled
that I am to go with Uncle Pasco, and I do not like”--
“Oh, so long as you are got to Ashburton, it doesn’t matter who
takes you,” interrupted Zerah.
“If it does not matter,” said Kate, “then let me hold to my father’s
arrangement.”
“That is not kind to me--I mean to sister Sue,” said Pooke dolefully.
“I intend no unkindness,” answered the girl, “but when my father
has made a plan, I do not like to break it even in little matters.”
The young man twirled his hat about, and pulled out the string
from the band. He paused, looked ashamed, and said, “You don’t
choose to go with me, that is the long and the short of it. Your aunt
will excuse you from going with Pasco Pepperill.”
“Do not tease me, Jan,” pleaded Kate, confused and unhappy. She
was well aware that there had been village talk about her having
been in the boat with Jan, that her aunt was desirous of thrusting
her upon him. With maidenly reserve she shrank from his proposal,
lest by riding in the trap with him some colour might be given to the
suspicions entertained in the village, and some food should be
supplied to the gossips.
 The lad went to the window, and looked out on the little platform
with moody eyes.
“Why,” said he, “there is that new schoolmaster there.” He stood
watching him. “He’s a noodle. What do’y think he is about? He has
got three or four faded buttercups, and he is putting them between
the leaves of his note-book, just as though there was something
wonderful in them; just as if they were the rarest flowers in the
world. I always thought he was a fool--now I know it.”
Kate winced.
“I say,” pursued Jan, “have you heard about him and Jackson’s
‘Tee-dum’? The landlord went to him civil-like, and invited him to join
the choir. He bragged about his violin as if he could play finer than
anyone hereabouts. But when the landlord told him our chaps could
play Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’ he ran away. I reckon Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’
is a piece to find out the corners of a man. He daren’t face it. Kitty, if
you won’t come with me to the fair, I swear I’ll offer the odd seat to
Rose Ash.”
Then he left the house.
Kate attempted to fly, for she knew what was coming, but was
arrested by her aunt, who grasped her by the shoulders.
“You little fool!” she said. “Don’t you see what may come of this if
you manage well, or let me manage for you? Jan Tottle came here
every day to inquire when you were ill, and now you let him slip
between your fingers and into the hands of that designing Rose. He
is a ball that has come to you, and you toss it to her. Don’t think she
is fool enough to toss him back to you. When she has him she will
close her fingers on him. What is going to become of you, I’d like to
know, that you should act like this? Do not reckon on anything your
father will bring you; or on your uncle either. One is helping the
other down the road to ruin, and we may all be nearer the
poorhouse than you imagine.”
She let go her hand, for Bramber came in, and asked what he had
to pay.
“Sixpence,” answered Zerah, “and what you like to the little maid. I
reckon she’ll take a ha’penny.”
 Kate’s head fell, covered with shame, and she thrust her hands
behind her back.
Walter paid Mrs. Pepperill, and said, without looking at Kate, “The
little maid and I understand each other, and the account between us
is settled.”
“Now look here,” said Zerah, allowing her niece to escape, and
laying hold of the young man, “I want a word with you, Mr.
Schoolmaster. My husband has let you go through his accounts. I
reckon he’d got that muddled himself, he didn’t know his way out,
and thought you’d have led him, as well as Jack-o’-lantern leads out
of a bog. The light is good enough, but when the mire is there, what
can the light do but show it? It can’t dry it up. If it weren’t for the
cockles and coffee as I get a few sixpences by, I reckon we’d have
been stogged (mired) long ago. But Pasco, he has the idea that he’s
a man of business and can manage a thousand affairs, and as ill-luck
will have it, that brother o’ mine feeds his fancies wi’ fresh meat.
Now I want you to tell me exactly what you found in his books.”
“I am not justified in speaking of Mr. Pepperill’s private affairs.”
“What! not to his wife?”
“Not to anyone. I was taken into confidence.”
“Bless you! he couldn’t help himself. Set a man as don’t know
nothing about machinery to manage an engine, and he’ll get it all to
pieces in no time. Pasco knows nothing about business, and there he
is trying to run coal stores, wool, timber--all kinds o’ things. I know
what it will come to, though you keep mum.”
To escape further questioning, Bramber left Coombe Cellars, and
walked towards the village.
The school was closed for a week. Some painting and plastering
had to be done in it before he could begin his duties. It was as well,
he thought; it allowed him time to find his bearings, to get to
understand something of the people amongst whom he was to be
settled, and whose children he was to instruct.
As Bramber walked in the dusk, he encountered the rector, Mr.
Fielding, who stopped him.
“Are you going indoors?” asked the parson; “or have you leisure
and inclination for a stroll?”
 “You do me an honour, sir; I shall be proud.”
“Let us walk by the water-side. This is a beautiful hour--neither
night nor day--something of one, something of the other, like life.
And who can say of the twilight in which he walks whether it will
broaden into perfect day or deepen into utter night.”
The rector took the young man’s arm.
Mr. Fielding belonged to a type that has completely disappeared;
peculiar to its time and necessarily transitory. He belonged to that
school of Churchmen which had been founded by Newman and
Keble; of men cultured, scholarly, refined in thought, steeped in
idealism, unconsciously affected, aiming at what was impossible,--at
least, fully to achieve,--and not knowing practicable methods, not
able to distinguish proportion in what they sought after, ready to
contend to death equally for trifles as for principles.
Mr. Fielding wore tall white collars and a white tie, a black dress
coat and open black waistcoat. His hat was usually at the back of his
head, and he walked with his head bent forwards and his shoulder
against the wall--a trick caught and copied from Newman, caught
when first under his influence, and now unconsciously followed.
Mr. Fielding was unmarried, a quiet, studious man, courteous to
all, understood by none.
They walked together a little way, and talked on desultory matters.
Then Walter Bramber asked the rector, “Would you mind telling me,
sir, where my predecessor got into trouble? Mr. Pepperill says it was
at Waterloo.”
“Waterloo? dear me, no; it was at Wellington.”
“I knew it could not be at Waterloo, but he insisted on it, and that
it was in England.”
“There was, you see, a connection of ideas. There is always that,
in the worst blunders. Did you correct him?”
“Yes; I said Waterloo was not in England.”
“You should have let it pass, till you knew how to enlighten him as
to where the place really was. Never show a man he is wrong till you
can show him how he can be right. Also, never let a man see you are
pulling him out of a ditch, always let him think he is scrambling out
of it himself. A man’s self-respect is his best governing motive, and
should not be wounded.”
They paced along together a little way.
“You are a young man,” said the rector, “and a young man is
sanguine.” He paused, and walked on without saying anything for a
minute, then he added, “I was sanguine once. That arises from
confidence in one’s self, and confidence in one’s cause, and
confidence in mankind. You have a noble cause--the priest and the
schoolmaster have the greatest of missions: to educate what is
highest in man, spirit and intellect. You have no reason to be shaken
by any doubt, to feel any hesitation in adhesion to the cause of
education. ‘Let there be light!’ was the first word God spake. There is
the keynote of creation, the moral law laid down for the whole
intelligent world. We walk in the twilight that we know is brightening
into day.”
He paused again; then after a dozen paces he proceeded, “You
have confidence in yourself. You have enthusiasm, you have ability,
you know what you have to teach, and you long to impart to others
what you value yourself. Is it not so?”
“It is so indeed.”
“Discouragement will come, and it is my duty to prepare you for it.
You have confidence in human nature. You think all will be as eager
to drink in instruction as you are eager to dispense it. You may be
mistaken, and will be disappointed. It has taken me some years, Mr.
Bramber, to learn a fact which I will communicate to you, as a
caution against losing heart. You will remember that when the sower
went forth to sow, though all his seed was good, yet only one-fourth
part came to anything. We must work for the work’s sake, and not
for results. In your patience possess ye your souls. That is one of the
hardest of lessons to acquire.”
“I will try not to expect too much.”
“Expect nothing. Look to the work, and the work only. One sows,
another reaps, a third grinds, a fourth bakes, but it is the fifth who
eats the loaf and tastes how good it is. Did you ever hear what Mme.
de Maintenon said of the carps, that had been transferred to the
marble basins of Marly, in which they died? ‘Ah!’ said she, ‘they are
like me, they regret their native mud.’ You will find that your pupils
do not want to be translated to purer fountains, that in them there is
a hankering after their native ignorance. That there will be little
receptiveness, no enthusiasm after the light, no hunger after the
bread of the Spirit--that is what you must be prepared to find. I have
found it so, and am now content with the smallest achievements--to
make them take a few crumbs from my palm, to accept the tiniest
ray let into their clouded minds. Be content to do your work, and do
not be asking for results. Do your duty, leave results to another day
and to the reapers. You and I are the humble sowers, enough for us
to know that, but for us, there would be no golden harvest which we
shall not see.”
The rector withdrew his hand from the arm of Bramber.
“There is a saying, ‘Except ye be as little children’--You know the
rest. What does that mean? Not the simplicity of children--simplicity
springs out of inexperience; not the innocence--which arises from
ignorance--but the inquisitiveness of the child, which is its
characteristic. The child asks questions, it wants to know everything,
often asking what it is inconvenient to answer. Mr. Bramber, unless
we have this spirit of inquiry, we cannot enter into any kingdom
above that of animal life. There is the intellectual kingdom, and
when there is eagerness to know, then there is advance into that
realm, and you will be the great prophet and mystagogue who will
lead the young of this village into that kingdom. Then, secondly,
there is the spiritual kingdom, but of that I will not now speak. I
hope you will find some pupils apt to learn, but the many will, I fear,
be listless.”
“A single swallow does not make a summer,” said the
schoolmaster; “but I have already met with one here who verily
hungers and thirsts after knowledge.”
“Ah!” Mr. Fielding looked round, and his face lightened. “You have
met--talked to Kitty.”
“Yes, sir; she is full of eagerness.”
“Oh that we had many other minds as active! Alas! alas! I fear in
that she is, as they call her, Kitty Alone.”
 CHAPTER XIV
TO THE FAIR

“H eigh! schoolmaister!” Pasco Pepperill shouted from his tax-cart

to Walter Bramber, who was walking along the road collecting
wild-flowers--the earliest of the year--that showed in a sheltered
hedge.
In the trap with Pasco was Kate.
“I say, schoolmaister,” said Pepperill, reining in his grey cob, “be
you inclined for a drive? I’m off to Ashburton Fair, where I may have
business. You have not yet seen much of our country. Jump up!
She”--he indicated Kate with a jerk of his chin--“she can squat
behind.”
The day was lovely, the prospect of a drive engaging; but Bramber
hesitated about dislodging Kate, who had, however, immediately
begun to transfer herself from the seat beside her uncle to the place
behind.
“That is not fair nor right,” said the young man. “Let her keep her
place, and let me accommodate myself in the rear.”
“Not a bit! not a bit!” exclaimed Pepperill. “I’ve asked you for
company’s sake.”
“But you have the best company in your niece.”
“She!”--Pasco uttered a contemptuous sniff,--“she is no company.
She either sits as a log or pesters one with questions. What do you
think she has just asked of me?” Imitating Kate’s voice, he said,
“Uncle, why have horses so many hairs in their ears? Why the dowse
does it matter whether horses have hair in their ears or not? Now,
schoolmaister, get up in front.”
Bramber still objected.
 “Oh, nonsense!” said Pasco; “I’m taking you up so as to be freed
from these questions. It is catechising, or nothing at all.”
Bramber looked uneasily at Kate’s face, but her countenance was
unmoved; she was accustomed to contemptuous treatment. She
raised her timid eyes to Walter, and he said hastily, with some
earnestness--
“You and I, Mr. Pepperill, form very different opinions of what
entertainment is. When I was having tea at your house, she and I
had plenty to say to each other. I found her full of interest”--
“In what?” sneered the uncle.
“Daffodils.”
“Oh, daffodils!” he laughed. “Any ass likes daffodils.”
“Pardon me,” answered Bramber warmly; “the ass and animals of
like nature reject or pass them by unnoticed.”
“Well, I care not. Get up if you are coming with me. I’ll show you a
better sight than daffodils, and something worthier of conversation.”
Pasco took up the schoolmaster, not solely for his own
entertainment, but because he was somewhat uneasy at having let
him into the secrets of his affairs. In his perplexity and inability to
balance his accounts, he had grasped at the chance offered by the
advent of Bramber; but now he feared he had been too confiding,
and that the young man might blab what he had seen. It was
requisite, or advisable, that he should disabuse his mind of any
unfavourable impression that might have been received from the
perusal of his accounts; and, like a stupid, conceited man, he
thought that he could best effect this by ostentation and
boastfulness.
In his pride, Pepperill would not admit that his circumstances were
involved, though an uneasy feeling lay as a sediment at the bottom
of his heart, assuring him that there was trouble in store.
“Why do horses have hair in their ears?” said Bramber on taking
his seat, turning to the girl in the back of the carriage. “I will tell you
why. If a cockchafer or an earwig were to get into your little pink
shell, in a minute up would go the finger in protection of the organ,
and to relieve you of the intruder. A horse cannot put up his hoof to
clear his ear, therefore he is provided with a natural strainer, which
will guard him from being irritated, and perhaps injured, by anything
penetrating where it should not.”
“Thank you,” said Kate. “There is a reason for everything.”
“You don’t happen to know anything about business?” asked
Pepperill, impatient to engross the conversation. “I mean--
commercial business.”
“My mother kept a shop--in quite a small way.”
“Ah! in quite a small way. I don’t mean anything in a small way,”
said Pasco, swelling. “I refer to buying in gross and retailing coal,
wool, hides, bark, timber. That’s my line. I do nothing myself in a
small way--still, I can understand there are people who do.”
Pasco nodded to right and left as he drove along, in return to
salutations he received from men driving cattle, from farmers
ambling on their cobs.
“You observe,” said Pepperill, “I’m pretty well known and
respected.”
Presently he drew up at a wayside inn.
“I like to step into these publics,” said he apologetically; “not that
I’m a man as takes nips--but one meets one’s fellows; it is all in the
way of business; one hears of bargains. There is more dealing done
over a tavern table than in a market-place. I’ll be with you shortly--
unless you will join me in a glass inside. Kitty will mind the cob.”
“Thank you; I will await you here, and keep Kitty company.”
“Ah, you will never be popular as was Puddicombe, unless you
take your glass!”
Then Pepperill entered the house.
Bramber turned in his seat, and met Kate’s earnest blue eyes.
There was question in them.
“Now,” said he, “I know your head is full of notes of interrogation.”
“I do not understand you.”
“Your uncle and others do not like to be questioned. I am a
schoolmaster. I delight in answering questions and communicating
information. Put to me any queries you like, and as many as you like,
and I will do my best to satisfy you.”
“Why do some stars twinkle and others do not?” asked Kate at
once. This difficulty had been troubling her mind ever since the night
in the boat.
“Planets do not twinkle.”
“What are planets?”
“Worlds on high. Stars that flash are suns that illumine worlds.
They glitter with their own light; planets shine with borrowed,
reflected light.”
“The planets are worlds?”
“Yes.”
“Very tiny ones?”
“Not at all. Some are far larger than our globe. They circle round
our sun.”
Kate looked the young man steadily in the face. The thought was
too great, too awful, to be received at once. She supposed he was
joking. But his countenance was an assurance to her that he spoke
the truth.
“Oh,” said she, with a long breath, “what it is to know!”
“There is no higher pleasure.”
“Nothing gives me greater joy than to learn.”
“But did you not get taught such simple truths as this in school?”
asked Bramber.
“Mr. Puddicombe did not tell us much,” answered Kate. “We
learned our letters and to cypher--nothing more.”
“I am glad you can read,” said Bramber.
“I can read, but I have no books. It is like having thirst and no
water. I have learned how to walk, but may not use my feet. I am
always like one who is hungry; I want to know about this, and about
that, and I get no answer. Why are there tides? Why are some
higher than others? What becomes of the stars by day?”
“The matter of the tides is beyond you. The stars are in the sky
still, but, owing to the blaze of the sun by day, you cannot discern
their lesser glories. If, however, you were at the bottom of a well,
you would be able, on looking up, to see the stars, pale, indeed, but
distinctly visible, in the heavens.”
“I should love to go down a well, and see that with my own eyes.”
“I wish--oh, I wish you were coming to school!”
Kate heaved a sigh.
 “But as you cannot come to me,” said Walter, “I shall have to come
to you.”
Kate shook her head. “That means sixpence a time in cockles and
tea. It would ruin you.”
“Well, I will lend you books.”
“Mr. Fielding once did that, but Aunt Zerah was angry, and sent
them back to the Rectory. She said that she did not want me to be a
scholar, and have all kinds of book nonsense put into my head. I was
to be a maid-of-all-work.”
Bramber did not speak. He was very sorry for the girl, craving for
knowledge, gasping for the very air in which her spirit could live--and
denied it. Then he said, pointing to the board above the inn-door--
“Do you notice the tavern sign, Kitty?”
“Yes--‘The Rising Sun.’”
“Recently repainted and gilt. Now, I will repeat to you the lines I
withheld the other day concerning the celandine; that is to say, such
as I remember:

‘I have not a doubt but he

Whosoe’er the man might be,
Who, the first, with painted rays,
(Workman worthy to be sainted,)
Set the signboard in a blaze,
When the risen sun he painted,
Took the fancy from a glance
At thy glittering countenance.’”

Then a rattle of wheels and a tramp of horse’s hoofs. A dogcart

was approaching rapidly. As it came near, the driver reined in and
drew up alongside.
Kate recognised John Pooke, with Rose Ash at his side; behind,
clinging uncomfortably to the back rail, was Susan Pooke. The young
man flourished his whip and saluted Kate joyously.
“We shall meet at the fair. I shall await you, Kitty.”
 Then he lashed the horse, and whirled away. Kate saw Rose’s face
turned towards her, wearing a dissatisfied frown.
“Who are those?” asked Walter, with a little twinge of displeasure
in his heart.
“The young man is Jan Pooke, he whose rick was burned; and
with him is Rose Ash, the prettiest girl in all Coombe. Jan’s father has
the orchard in which are the daffodils. It belonged to uncle. Uncle
had a bit of farm, but he gave it up--sold it--to devote himself more
to business. Behind, in the dogcart, is Susan Pooke. She is going to
be married at Easter to someone in Ashburton.”
Then, wiping his lips and buttoning his pockets, Pasco came from
the tavern. He mounted to his place and resumed the reins and
whip.
“Well,” said he, “got some talk out of the girl?--foolery--rank
foolery, I’ll swear. Never heard her say anything sensible; but you
and I will have a good conversation as we drive along. We will talk
about bullocks.”
 CHAPTER XV
A REASON FOR EVERYTHING

W alter Bramber sprang from his seat beside Pasco, on the latter
drawing up outside the inn at Ashburton, and ran to the back of
the tax-cart that he might assist Kate to descend. There was no step
at the back. He held up his arms to receive her; she was standing
preparing to spring.
As he looked up, he exclaimed, “They are planets!”
“What are planets?”
“Those blue orbs--their light is so still and true.”
Then he caught her as she sprang, glad to cover her confusion. A
compliment was something to which Kate was wholly unaccustomed,
and one startled and shamed her.
“Now, whither?” he asked.
“To my father.”
“But where is he?”
“I do not know.”
“Come, come!” said Pepperill, who had consigned the reins to the
ostler. “I want you, schoolmaster; I cannot let you go fairing yet. I
have business on my hands and desire your presence. Afterwards, if
you will, and when we have got rid of Kate, I’ll find you some one
more agreeable with whom you can go and see the shows.”
“But, in the meanwhile, who is to take care of her?” asked
Bramber.
“I will do that,” said John Pooke, who came up, elbowing his way
through the crowd. “Here are several of us Coombe-in-Teignhead
folk: there is sister Sue, but she is off with her sweetheart; and here
is Rose Ash, and here is Noah Flood.”
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