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The day at length arrived, and my father had made such preparations as he conceived were due to the polite attention and hospitality that he had received at the hands of Mr. Botham.
The cane-roots were also ploughed up in the East, whereas they were dug up with the severest exertion in the West. Many alterations," says Mr. Botham, "are to be made, and expenses and human labour lessened in the West. Having experienced the difference of labourers for profit and labourers from force, I can assert, that the savings by the former are very considerable."
Botham informed me that he wished for an alliance with the eldest daughter of his friend; and, as I think it a good match, and Salt Hill will be an excellent home for her, I will do every thing that lies in my power to promote their union."
I had also eagerly watched the countenance of the lady, to endeavour, if possible, to collect whether this Mr. Botham had made any impression upon her heart or not; and from the apathy which it manifested, I felt very little fear on his account. My father was sadly mortified at the circumstance; both at the absence of his old friend Halcomb, and his new acquaintance Botham.
In the case of the Botham children an early knowledge of good and evil was learnt from an apparently respectable nurse, who made her little charges acquainted with most of the scandals of the neighbourhood, accustomed their infant ears to oaths, and most terrible of all taught them to play whist, she herself taking dummy, and transforming the nursery tea-tray into a card-table.
When my father returned he related this circumstance to me and my sisters; and Coward overwhelmed us with his praises of Mr. Botham. My father then said that he would fix an early day, for Mr. Halcomb and his daughters to come and meet him. Coward observed that he must have a very great regard for his friend, to travel one hundred and twenty miles, merely to dine with him. "Ah!
"If that be all the objection you have," replied Botham, "we will soon settle that: I will send a steady man on to Reading with your horses, who shall get them well cleaned and fed, and after we have seen Windsor, and you have dined and taken one of the best bottles of old port my house can produce, and drank the health of my friend Halcomb, I will put the best pair of horses I have in my stables to a post chaise, in which you shall be taken to Reading in such style as will give you a specimen of the way in which we conduct posting at the London end of the Bath road.
Samuel Botham took his bride to live in the paternal home at Uttoxeter, where the preparation of the old quack doctor's herbal medicines caused her a great deal of discomfort. In the course of the next three years two daughters were born to the couple; Anna in 1797, and Mary on March 12, 1799.
Botham proved, more than thirty years ago, that two men would do more with the East Indian shovel at that sort of work in a day, than ten Negroes with the former instrument? So much for unprofitable instruments of husbandry; a few words now on unprofitable modes of employment.
For the Higginbothams an old Saxon family, as the name evidently denotes had once possessed lands in that very county; and the captain, during his visits to Hazeldean Hall, was regularly in the habit of asking to look into the County History, for the purpose of refreshing his eyes, and renovating his sense of ancestral dignity, with the following paragraph therein: To the left of the village of Dunder, and pleasantly situated in a hollow, lies Botham Hall, the residence of the ancient family of Higginbotham, as it is now commonly called.
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