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And in truth Jack Matterby was a very pitiable object, at least according to the report of shop-mirrors, which told him that his face was discoloured and bloody, his coat indescribably dirty and ragged, besides being out of harmony with his trousers, and that his person generally was bedaubed with mud.
It is a curious and interesting fact that Christmas-tide seemed to have a peculiar influence on the prospects of our hero Jack Matterby, all through his life. All the chief events of his career, somehow, happened on or about Christmas Day. Jack was born, to begin with, on a Christmas morning.
In an uncommonly thick fog, on a day in December of the following year, Mrs Matterby hurried along Fleet Street in the direction of the city, leading Jack by the hand. Both were very wet, very cold, ravenously hungry, and rather poorly clad. It was evident that things had not prospered with the widow.
Time passed, and Jack Matterby became a trusted servant and a thorough farmer. He also became a big, dashing, and earnest boy. More time passed, and Jack became a handsome young man, the bosom friend of his employer.
A third time he leaped into the rushing flood, and this time was successful. Soon he stood panting on the deck of the stranded vessel, almost unable to stand, and well he knew that there was not a moment to lose, for the ship was going to pieces! Jack Matterby, however, knew well what to do.
She had been bed-ridden for many years because of what her son called rum-matticks and her grandson styled rum-ticks. The name of Natty's little sister was Nellie; that of his grandmother, Nell old Nell, as people affectionately called her. Now it may perhaps surprise the reader to be told that Jack Matterby, at the age of nine years, was deeply in love.
Mrs Matterby had no friends to whom she could go in London; but she could paint and draw and sing, and was fairly educated. She would teach. In the meantime she had a little money to start with. Entertaining a suspicion that it might be considered a wildish scheme by her friends and neighbours, she resolved to say nothing about her plans to any one, save that she was going to London for a time.
When they spoke with gravity, old Nell shook her tremulous head, and put on a look of alarmingly solemn sympathy. On the present occasion, however, the antique old thing seemed to have been affected with some absolutely new, and evidently quaint, ideas, for she laughed frequently and immoderately, especially when she gazed hard at Jack Matterby after having looked long at Nellie Grove!
"I daresay it is a puzzler," replied Mrs Matterby, with a laugh, "but be off with your basket and message, my son; some day you shall understand it better." Pondering deeply on this "puzzler," the boy went off on his mission, trudging through the deep snow which whitened the earth and brightened that Christmas morning.
If you carry on as you've begun, you'll make your mark somewhere in this world." "Alas!" remarked poor Mrs Matterby, "he has made his mark already everywhere, and that a little too freely!" Nevertheless she was proud of her boy, and sought to subdue his spirit by teaching him lessons of self-denial and love out of the Word of God.
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