Michael Goes Climbing

Two women stood talking in the sunlit streets of old flushing* three hundred

years ago.

They were talking, as their descendents

do today, of their children, of their husbands’

wages, of the price of food. Suddenly one of

them broke off and, pointing to a little boy

cried, “Ah, there goes that Michael! I can

hardly keep my hands off that little rascal!”.

“Why?” asked the other turning to look

at a lively little boy who walked past with

his hands in his pockets.

“I never saw such a spoiled, proud and

useless rascal of a boy in my life! Cried the

first. “He is never happy unless he’s making

mischief or doing something to call attention

to himself. He must always be the first. He’ll

come to a bad end, and I hope I shall live to

see it.”

The other woman thought for a while. She said, “Ah well, daring some-

times turns to courage.

He’s a bold little rascal; he’ll never make a poor, respectable citizen like

his father; he’ll go far but whether on the right road or the wrong one, who can

tell yet?”

Meanwhile the boy had passed on into the market place. He was idling

about in the sunshine on the look out for mischief. All at once he saw it calling to

him. Workmen had been salting* the church spire, and their ladders starched

invitingly from earth to steeple.

II

All children like climbing up into high places to see if the world looks any

different from an apple tree or a housetop; over and above this love of climbing

Michael had, as the woman said, an argue to think that had never been done

before. As he gazed at the spire, an idea leaped into his mind – he would the first

person in Flushing to stand on the golden ball beneath the weather-vane.

He turned his eyes around. No one was looking Michael began to climb up

the ladders. At the top of the tower there rose a slated spire, crowned by a

golden ball and weather vane. Michael at the last found himself sitting on the top

of the ball, holding on by the van. He was hot, out of breath and not a little giddy.

Presently he heard workmen moving below. He did not bend over to look,

or speak. He was not going to be pulled before Flushing had been seen him. He

died away, and Michael sat resting.

At last he felt ready to give the town a surprise. He pulled himself to his

feet, and, keeping firm hold of the weather vane, managed to stand on the top of

the ball. It was well that he had a cool head and iron nerves.

Someone must have looked at the vane by chance and seen his little figure

outlined against the blue sky and cried out .In a minute or two Michael was

delighted to see the market place full of people who had rushed out of their

shops and houses to gaze at the giddy sight. It was wonderful have all those eyes

and hearts fixed upon oneself !

III

But Michael did not intend to stay there until he was taken down, to be

handed over his father and punished before the crowd. After a little he prepared

to descend of his own free will.

He learned over the ball. The ladder had gone. The workmen had taken it

away!

A sudden feeling of sickness and giddiness came over Michael. He mas-

tered it. No doubt the people saw what had happened and would send for the

ladders.

But to wait for rescue was a poor sort of end to his mischievous adventure.

He would come down alone, even if it coast cost him his life.

The spire at the base of the ball was only half slated. And Michael saw

some hope of gaining a foothold on the old part. He put his arms round the top of

the ball and left his body swing down; he was just able to feel the first slate with

his toes. Those to d were sod with iron toecaps, for Michael was hard in his

shoes. Michael kicked with his armoured toes till the slate broke and fell in; then

he got a foothold on the wooden laths beneath. *

He rested for a minute, with aching arms and a stiff body. He could not slide

down with his arms around the ball; for the middle of the ball was much too big

for his arms. He must let go his hold on the ball, and some how grasp the spire

below. One false movement, and he would be thrown to his death on the hard

ground below.

Slowly he begins to slide his hands together at the top of the ball, and then

downwards over its sides. Every inch is packed with peril; every inch pushed

him backward toward death. It seemed to him that he would be too weak to hold

on when the time came for him to grasp the spire.

But at last the steady, deadly creeping of his figures brought him to a point

where he could bend forward. With a sudden snatch he caught the base of the

ball.

IV

The next moment he was kicking out a stairway in the old slates on the

spire, and climbing down rapidly. He reached the foot of the spire, lifted the

trapdoor* of the tower, ran down the steps, and was caught by his father in the

church.

The streets were filled with white-faced people telling each other that never

in their lives had they seen anything so dreadful as that child leaning backward

in the air.

“ I said he’d come to a bad end!” cried a woman, wiping the moisture from

her forehead with a trembling hand.

“Wait and see!” replied her neighbor.

They waited. Michael took care to maintain his reputation for mischief,

until his father lost all hope for him and sent him to sea. Suddenly he grew tiered

of the wrong road and determined to give the right one a trial. As the women had

foreseen, he marched down it with the same courage and determination.

***

One day an old woman visited her bedridden neighbor. “ Have you heard

the news?” she cried. “The English fleet has been destroyed off Chatham. What

a victory for little neighbour? Do you remembered the day be climbed the church

spire? Who could have guessed then that whole world would ring with the name

of Admiral Michael Adrianzoon de Ruyter?”

(Adapted from The Children’s Encyclopedia)

Note – During the 17th century the English and the Dutch often fought

against each other on the high seas. There were great seamen on both sides.

As the Admiral of the Dutch Navy, de Ruyter won several victories over the

English. There was great fear in London on one occasion when he sailed up

the Thames victoriously. He is considered the greatest seaman ever produced

by Holland and one forth greatest ever in the world. You may be interested to

now that as a young man de Ruyter came to India with the Dutch merchantships.

*A town in Holland

*Covering the spire with pieces of slate.

* The slates were fixed on a framework of wooden laths. When the slates were broken the

laths would appear.

*A door in the roof.