In the Roaring Fifties | Page 6

power of Jim o' Mill End, that
being the name given to the boy in accordance with an awkward
provincial custom of identifying a man with his property, the situation
of his residence, or some peculiarity of manner.
On one occasion the lad fell upon a hobbledehoy who had just given a
highly diverting pantomime representing the hanging of a man, with

realistic details, and, having beaten him in fair fight, broke his
collar-bone with an atrocious fall. For this outrage Jim o' Mill End was
called upon to answer to the law, and, the answer he had to give being
considered wholly unsatisfactory, Jim was sent to gaol for a term of
days.
Chisley, if Slow to discover its mistakes, was not wholly imbecile; it
learned in time to respect the fists of Jim o' Mill End, and now hated
him quite heartily for the restraint imposed. But Jim derives little
satisfaction from his triumph; Chisley conquered him by stupid
submission. His physical superiority won him nothing but immunity
from open insult; the young men and their elders were careful to give
him no reasonable opportunity of asserting the rights of man in their
teeth with a dexterous left, and Jim was now beyond disputing with
children. The unhappy boy was not deceived by the new attitude his
neighbours had assumed towards him. He saw an increased dislike
behind the stolid, animal-like faces that met him everywhere, and felt
that silence was worse than insult, more galling than blows. He
detected jeers under the mask of dogged respect, and had passionate
impulses to beat and tear, finding himself still powerless against the
brutal injustice that had poisoned his life.
Baffled here, Jim o' Mill End turned greedily to the fount of wisdom
seeking justification for his deep contempt for his fellows,
corroboration of his opinions as to the stupidity, ignorance, and
vileness of mankind, He read greedily, finding justification everywhere.
Poets, philosophers, novelists, historians--they had all found man out,
just as he had done. Discovering an echo of his beliefs, he thrilled with
hot delight. He met allies amongst the poets, and adored them. It is
strange how sympathetic books drift to the hand of a reader possessed
with a consuming idea; how they gather around him, fall open to his
eye, and give up the thing he yearns to feed on. Without the knowledge
necessary to selection, Jim had an affinity for books of pessimistic
doctrine, and though both means and opportunities were limited, he
gathered together, in the course of two years, quite a library of precious
volumes, and he came forth from these an intellectual giant refreshed.
He saw Chisley on a plane far below him, a sink of ignorance, and

judged it like a god--or a boy. Whatever Chisley respected he found
excellent occasion to despise; whatever it revered he discovered to be
false and contemptible. His sense of superiority was magnificent; it
gave him a glorious exultation. A few hot words with the clerical
caretaker of the Chisley conscience over the question of Sabbath
observance exposed the young man--the gaol-bird--as an infidel and a
scoffer. Jim was no infidel, but communities like Chisley do not under
stand subtle distinctions in theology. Here was fresh occasion to fear
and abhor Jim o' Mill End; here was justification for many evil
prophecies.
For a time Jim revelled in his great moral superiority and dreamed
dreams. But the gnawing impatience returned--the unrest, the craving
for something he could not define, but which always merged itself into
his great grievance. He lived alone. At his work--which he obtained
readily, for he was strong and efficient, and gave double value for his
wages--he had no mates. Girls he had seen grow up from babyhood
developed into beautiful creatures, with miraculous eyes, round limbs,
and cheeks so red, so tender, that their soft ripeness haunted his dreams.
Under cover and in secret he would watch them pass or at play with a
throbbing heart and a passionate hunger for companionship, and
discover himself doing this with something of a shock, ashamed of his
interest in his enemies, resentful of all emotions that ran counter to his
cherished antipathies.
When the news of the discovery of fabulous gold deposits in far
Australia reached Chisley, Jim had thoughts of a new life in a new land:
he craved for a wide field and a wild life; nothing withheld him but
pride, the egotism that would not permit of his abandoning a struggle
even with men so contemptible as these ignorant villagers. But the
hunger for humanity filled him with visions of a new society in which
he would be one with his fellow-men, and then his enemies seemed so
pitiful that he knew himself for fool and blind to waste a care upon
them.