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DICKENS MISCELLANY
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Sunday Under Three Heads

by

Charles Dickens

DEDICATION
To The Right Reverend
THE BISHOP OF LONDON

MY LORD,

You were among the first, some years ago, to expatiate on the
vicious addiction of the lower classes of society to Sunday
excursions; and were thus instrumental in calling forth occasional
demonstrations of those extreme opinions on the subject, which are
very generally received with derision, if not with contempt.

Your elevated station, my Lord, affords you countless opportunities
of increasing the comforts and pleasures of the humbler classes of
society - not by the expenditure of the smallest portion of your
princely income, but by merely sanctioning with the influence of
your example, their harmless pastimes, and innocent recreations.

That your Lordship would ever have contemplated Sunday recreations
with so much horror, if you had been at all acquainted with the
wants and necessities of the people who indulged in them, I cannot
imagine possible. That a Prelate of your elevated rank has the
faintest conception of the extent of those wants, and the nature of
those necessities, I do not believe.

For these reasons, I venture to address this little Pamphlet to
your Lordship's consideration. I am quite conscious that the
outlines I have drawn, afford but a very imperfect description of
the feelings they are intended to illustrate; but I claim for them
one merit - their truth and freedom from exaggeration. I may have
fallen short of the mark, but I have never overshot it: and while
I have pointed out what appears to me, to be injustice on the part
of others, I hope I have carefully abstained from committing it
myself.

I am,
My Lord,
Your Lordship's most obedient,
Humble Servant,
TIMOTHY SPARKS.
JUNE, 1836.

CHAPTER I - AS IT IS

There are few things from which I derive greater pleasure, than
walking through some of the principal streets of London on a fine
Sunday, in summer, and watching the cheerful faces of the lively
groups with which they are thronged. There is something, to my
eyes at least, exceedingly pleasing in the general desire evinced
by the humbler classes of society, to appear neat and clean on this
their only holiday. There are many grave old persons, I know, who
shake their heads with an air of profound wisdom, and tell you that
poor people dress too well now-a-days; that when they were
children, folks knew their stations in life better; that you may
depend upon it, no good will come of this sort of thing in the end,
- and so forth: but I fancy I can discern in the fine bonnet of
the working-man's wife, or the feather-bedizened hat of his child,
no inconsiderable evidence of good feeling on the part of the man
himself, and an affectionate desire to expend the few shillings he
can spare from his week's wages, in improving the appearance and
adding to the happiness of those who are nearest and dearest to
him. This may be a very heinous and unbecoming degree of vanity,
perhaps, and the money might possibly be applied to better uses; it
must not be forgotten, however, that it might very easily be
devoted to worse: and if two or three faces can be rendered happy
and contented, by a trifling improvement of outward appearance, I
cannot help thinking that the object is very cheaply purchased,
even at the expense of a smart gown, or a gaudy riband. There is a
great deal of very unnecessary cant about the over-dressing of the
common people. There is not a manufacturer or tradesman in
existence, who would not employ a man who takes a reasonable degree
of pride in the appearance of himself and those about him, in
preference to a sullen, slovenly fellow, who works doggedly on,
regardless of his own clothing and that of his wife and children,
and seeming to take pleasure or pride in nothing.

The pampered aristocrat, whose life is one continued round of
licentious pleasures and sensual gratifications; or the gloomy
enthusiast, who detests the cheerful amusements he can never enjoy,
and envies the healthy feelings he can never know, and who would
put down the one and suppress the other, until he made the minds of
his fellow-beings as besotted and distorted as his own; - neither
of these men can by possibility form an adequate notion of what
Sunday really is to those whose lives are spent in sedentary or
laborious occupations, and who are accustomed to look forward to it
through their whole existence, as their only day of rest from toil,
and innocent enjoyment.

The sun that rises over the quiet streets of London on a bright
Sunday morning, shines till his setting, on gay and happy faces.
Here and there, so early as six o'clock, a young man and woman in
their best attire, may be seen hurrying along on their way to the
house of some acquaintance, who is included in their scheme of
pleasure for the day; from whence, after stopping to take "a bit of
breakfast," they sally forth, accompanied by several old people,
and a whole crowd of young ones, bearing large hand-baskets full of
provisions, and Belcher handkerchiefs done up in bundles, with the
neck of a bottle sticking out at the top, and closely-packed apples
bulging out at the sides, - and away they hurry along the streets
leading to the steam-packet wharfs, which are already plentifully
sprinkled with parties bound for the same destination. Their good
humour and delight know no bounds - for it is a delightful morning,
all blue over head, and nothing like a cloud in the whole sky; and
even the air of the river at London Bridge is something to them,
shut up as they have been, all the week, in close streets and
heated rooms. There are dozens of steamers to all sorts of places
- Gravesend, Greenwich, and Richmond; and such numbers of people,
that when you have once sat down on the deck, it is all but a moral
impossibility to get up again - to say nothing of walking about,
which is entirely out of the question. Away they go, joking and
laughing, and eating and drinking, and admiring everything they
see, and pleased with everything they hear, to climb Windmill Hill,
and catch a glimpse of the rich corn-fields and beautiful orchards
of Kent; or to stroll among the fine old trees of Greenwich Park,
and survey the wonders of Shooter's Hill and Lady James's Folly; or
to glide past the beautiful meadows of Twickenham and Richmond, and
to gaze with a delight which only people like them can know, on
every lovely object in the fair prospect around. Boat follows
boat, and coach succeeds coach, for the next three hours; but all
are filled, and all with the same kind of people - neat and clean,
cheerful and contented.

They reach their places of destination, and the taverns are
crowded; but there is no drunkenness or brawling, for the class of
men who commit the enormity of making Sunday excursions, take their
families with them: and this in itself would be a check upon them,
even if they were inclined to dissipation, which they really are
not. Boisterous their mirth may be, for they have all the
excitement of feeling that fresh air and green fields can impart to
the dwellers in crowded cities, but it is innocent and harmless.
The glass is circulated, and the joke goes round; but the one is
free from excess, and the other from offence; and nothing but good
humour and hilarity prevail.

In streets like Holborn and Tottenham Court Road, which form the
central market of a large neighbourhood, inhabited by a vast number
of mechanics and poor people, a few shops are open at an early hour
of the morning; and a very poor man, with a thin and sickly woman
by his side, may be seen with their little basket in hand,
purchasing the scanty quantity of necessaries they can afford,
which the time at which the man receives his wages, or his having a
good deal of work to do, or the woman's having been out charing
till a late hour, prevented their procuring over-night. The
coffee-shops too, at which clerks and young men employed in
counting-houses can procure their breakfasts, are also open. This
class comprises, in a place like London, an enormous number of
people, whose limited means prevent their engaging for their
lodgings any other apartment than a bedroom, and who have
consequently no alternative but to take their breakfasts at a
coffee-shop, or go without it altogether. All these places,
however, are quickly closed; and by the time the church bells begin
to ring, all appearance of traffic has ceased. And then, what are
the signs of immorality that meet the eye? Churches are well
filled, and Dissenters' chapels are crowded to suffocation. There
is no preaching to empty benches, while the drunken and dissolute
populace run riot in the streets.

Here is a fashionable church, where the service commences at a late
hour, for the accommodation of such members of the congregation -
and they are not a few - as may happen to have lingered at the
Opera far into the morning of the Sabbath; an excellent contrivance
for poising the balance between God and Mammon, and illustrating
the ease with which a man's duties to both, may be accommodated and
adjusted. How the carriages rattle up, and deposit their richly-
dressed burdens beneath the lofty portico! The powdered footmen
glide along the aisle, place the richly-bound prayer-books on the
pew desks, slam the doors, and hurry away, leaving the fashionable
members of the congregation to inspect each other through their
glasses, and to dazzle and glitter in the eyes of the few shabby
people in the free seats. The organ peals forth, the hired singers
commence a short hymn, and the congregation condescendingly rise,
stare about them, and converse in whispers. The clergyman enters
the reading-desk, - a young man of noble family and elegant
demeanour, notorious at Cambridge for his knowledge of horse-flesh
and dancers, and celebrated at Eton for his hopeless stupidity.
The service commences. Mark the soft voice in which he reads, and
the impressive manner in which he applies his white hand, studded
with brilliants, to his perfumed hair. Observe the graceful
emphasis with which he offers up the prayers for the King, the
Royal Family, and all the Nobility; and the nonchalance with which
he hurries over the more uncomfortable portions of the service, the
seventh commandment for instance, with a studied regard for the
taste and feeling of his auditors, only to be equalled by that
displayed by the sleek divine who succeeds him, who murmurs, in a
voice kept down by rich feeding, most comfortable doctrines for
exactly twelve minutes, and then arrives at the anxiously expected
'Now to God,' which is the signal for the dismissal of the
congregation. The organ is again heard; those who have been asleep
wake up, and those who have kept awake, smile and seem greatly
relieved; bows and congratulations are exchanged, the livery
servants are all bustle and commotion, bang go the steps, up jump
the footmen, and off rattle the carriages: the inmates discoursing
on the dresses of the congregation, and congratulating themselves
on having set so excellent an example to the community in general,
and Sunday-pleasurers in particular.

Enter a less orthodox place of religious worship, and observe the
contrast. A small close chapel with a white-washed wall, and plain
deal pews and pulpit, contains a closely-packed congregation, as
different in dress, as they are opposed in manner, to that we have
just quitted. The hymn is sung - not by paid singers, but by the
whole assembly at the loudest pitch of their voices, unaccompanied
by any musical instrument, the words being given out, two lines at
a time, by the clerk. There is something in the sonorous quavering
of the harsh voices, in the lank and hollow faces of the men, and
the sour solemnity of the women, which bespeaks this a strong-hold
of intolerant zeal and ignorant enthusiasm. The preacher enters
the pulpit. He is a coarse, hard-faced man of forbidding aspect,
clad in rusty black, and bearing in his hand a small plain Bible
from which he selects some passage for his text, while the hymn is
concluding. The congregation fall upon their knees, and are hushed
into profound stillness as he delivers an extempore prayer, in
which he calls upon the Sacred Founder of the Christian faith to
bless his ministry, in terms of disgusting and impious familiarity
not to be described. He begins his oration in a drawling tone, and
his hearers listen with silent attention. He grows warmer as he
proceeds with his subject, and his gesticulation becomes
proportionately violent. He clenches his fists, beats the book
upon the desk before him, and swings his arms wildly about his
head. The congregation murmur their acquiescence in his doctrines:
and a short groan, occasionally bears testimony to the moving
nature of his eloquence. Encouraged by these symptoms of approval,
and working himself up to a pitch of enthusiasm amounting almost to
frenzy, he denounces sabbath-breakers with the direst vengeance of
offended Heaven. He stretches his body half out of the pulpit,
thrusts forth his arms with frantic gestures, and blasphemously
calls upon The Deity to visit with eternal torments, those who turn
aside from the word, as interpreted and preached by - himself. A
low moaning is heard, the women rock their bodies to and fro, and
wring their hands; the preacher's fervour increases, the
perspiration starts upon his brow, his face is flushed, and he
clenches his hands convulsively, as he draws a hideous and
appalling picture of the horrors preparing for the wicked in a
future state. A great excitement is visible among his hearers, a
scream is heard, and some young girl falls senseless on the floor.
There is a momentary rustle, but it is only for a moment - all eyes
are turned towards the preacher. He pauses, passes his
handkerchief across his face, and looks complacently round. His
voice resumes its natural tone, as with mock humility he offers up
a thanksgiving for having been successful in his efforts, and
having been permitted to rescue one sinner from the path of evil.
He sinks back into his seat, exhausted with the violence of his
ravings; the girl is removed, a hymn is sung, a petition for some
measure for securing the better observance of the Sabbath, which
has been prepared by the good man, is read; and his worshipping
admirers struggle who shall be the first to sign it.

But the morning service has concluded, and the streets are again
crowded with people. Long rows of cleanly-dressed charity
children, preceded by a portly beadle and a withered schoolmaster,
are returning to their welcome dinner; and it is evident, from the
number of men with beer-trays who are running from house to house,
that no inconsiderable portion of the population are about to take
theirs at this early hour. The bakers' shops in the humbler
suburbs especially, are filled with men, women, and children, each
anxiously waiting for the Sunday dinner. Look at the group of
children who surround that working man who has just emerged from
the baker's shop at the corner of the street, with the reeking
dish, in which a diminutive joint of mutton simmers above a vast
heap of half-browned potatoes. How the young rogues clap their
hands, and dance round their father, for very joy at the prospect
of the feast: and how anxiously the youngest and chubbiest of the
lot, lingers on tiptoe by his side, trying to get a peep into the
interior of the dish. They turn up the street, and the chubby-
faced boy trots on as fast as his little legs will carry him, to
herald the approach of the dinner to 'Mother' who is standing with
a baby in her arms on the doorstep, and who seems almost as pleased
with the whole scene as the children themselves; whereupon 'baby'
not precisely understanding the importance of the business in hand,
but clearly perceiving that it is something unusually lively, kicks
and crows most lustily, to the unspeakable delight of all the
children and both the parents: and the dinner is borne into the
house amidst a shouting of small voices, and jumping of fat legs,
which would fill Sir Andrew Agnew with astonishment; as well it
might, seeing that Baronets, generally speaking, eat pretty
comfortable dinners all the week through, and cannot be expected to
understand what people feel, who only have a meat dinner on one day
out of every seven.

The bakings being all duly consigned to their respective owners,
and the beer-man having gone his rounds, the church bells ring for
afternoon service, the shops are again closed, and the streets are
more than ever thronged with people; some who have not been to
church in the morning, going to it now; others who have been to
church, going out for a walk; and others - let us admit the full
measure of their guilt - going for a walk, who have not been to
church at all. I am afraid the smart servant of all work, who has
been loitering at the corner of the square for the last ten
minutes, is one of the latter class. She is evidently waiting for
somebody, and though she may have made up her mind to go to church
with him one of these mornings, I don't think they have any such
intention on this particular afternoon. Here he is, at last. The
white trousers, blue coat, and yellow waistcoat - and more
especially that cock of the hat - indicate, as surely as inanimate
objects can, that Chalk Farm and not the parish church, is their
destination. The girl colours up, and puts out her hand with a
very awkward affectation of indifference. He gives it a gallant
squeeze, and away they walk, arm in arm, the girl just looking back
towards her 'place' with an air of conscious self-importance, and
nodding to her fellow-servant who has gone up to the two-pair-of-
stairs window, to take a full view of 'Mary's young man,' which
being communicated to William, he takes off his hat to the fellow-
servant: a proceeding which affords unmitigated satisfaction to
all parties, and impels the fellow-servant to inform Miss Emily
confidentially, in the course of the evening, 'that the young man
as Mary keeps company with, is one of the most genteelest young men
as ever she see.'

The two young people who have just crossed the road, and are
following this happy couple down the street, are a fair specimen of
another class of Sunday - pleasurers. There is a dapper smartness,
struggling through very limited means, about the young man, which
induces one to set him down at once as a junior clerk to a
tradesman or attorney. The girl no one could possibly mistake.
You may tell a young woman in the employment of a large dress-
maker, at any time, by a certain neatness of cheap finery and
humble following of fashion, which pervade her whole attire; but
unfortunately there are other tokens not to be misunderstood - the
pale face with its hectic bloom, the slight distortion of form
which no artifice of dress can wholly conceal, the unhealthy stoop,
and the short cough - the effects of hard work and close
application to a sedentary employment, upon a tender frame. They
turn towards the fields. The girl's countenance brightens, and an
unwonted glow rises in her face. They are going to Hampstead or
Highgate, to spend their holiday afternoon in some place where they
can see the sky, the fields, and trees, and breathe for an hour or
two the pure air, which so seldom plays upon that poor girl's form,
or exhilarates her spirits.

I would to God, that the iron-hearted man who would deprive such
people as these of their only pleasures, could feel the sinking of
heart and soul, the wasting exhaustion of mind and body, the utter
prostration of present strength and future hope, attendant upon
that incessant toil which lasts from day to day, and from month to
month; that toil which is too often protracted until the silence of
midnight, and resumed with the first stir of morning. How
marvellously would his ardent zeal for other men's souls, diminish
after a short probation, and how enlightened and comprehensive
would his views of the real object and meaning of the institution
of the Sabbath become!

The afternoon is far advanced - the parks and public drives are
crowded. Carriages, gigs, phaetons, stanhopes, and vehicles of
every description, glide smoothly on. The promenades are filled
with loungers on foot, and the road is thronged with loungers on
horseback. Persons of every class are crowded together, here, in
one dense mass. The plebeian, who takes his pleasure on no day but
Sunday, jostles the patrician, who takes his, from year's end to
year's end. You look in vain for any outward signs of profligacy
or debauchery. You see nothing before you but a vast number of
people, the denizens of a large and crowded city, in the needful
and rational enjoyment of air and exercise.

It grows dusk. The roads leading from the different places of
suburban resort, are crowded with people on their return home, and
the sound of merry voices rings through the gradually darkening
fields. The evening is hot and sultry. The rich man throws open
the sashes of his spacious dining-room, and quaffs his iced wine in
splendid luxury. The poor man, who has no room to take his meals
in, but the close apartment to which he and his family have been
confined throughout the week, sits in the tea-garden of some famous
tavern, and drinks his beer in content and comfort. The fields and
roads are gradually deserted, the crowd once more pour into the
streets, and disperse to their several homes; and by midnight all
is silent and quiet, save where a few stragglers linger beneath the
window of some great man's house, to listen to the strains of music
from within: or stop to gaze upon the splendid carriages which are
waiting to convey the guests from the dinner-party of an Earl.

There is a darker side to this picture, on which, so far from its
being any part of my purpose to conceal it, I wish to lay
particular stress. In some parts of London, and in many of the
manufacturing towns of England, drunkenness and profligacy in their
most disgusting forms, exhibit in the open streets on Sunday, a sad
and a degrading spectacle. We need go no farther than St. Giles's,
or Drury Lane, for sights and scenes of a most repulsive nature.
Women with scarcely the articles of apparel which common decency
requires, with forms bloated by disease, and faces rendered hideous
by habitual drunkenness - men reeling and staggering along -
children in rags and filth - whole streets of squalid and miserable
appearance, whose inhabitants are lounging in the public road,
fighting, screaming, and swearing - these are the common objects
which present themselves in, these are the well-known
characteristics of, that portion of London to which I have just
referred.

And why is it, that all well-disposed persons are shocked, and
public decency scandalised, by such exhibitions?

These people are poor - that is notorious. It may be said that
they spend in liquor, money with which they might purchase
necessaries, and there is no denying the fact; but let it be
remembered that even if they applied every farthing of their
earnings in the best possible way, they would still be very - very
poor. Their dwellings are necessarily uncomfortable, and to a
certain degree unhealthy. Cleanliness might do much, but they are
too crowded together, the streets are too narrow, and the rooms too
small, to admit of their ever being rendered desirable habitations.
They work very hard all the week. We know that the effect of
prolonged and arduous labour, is to produce, when a period of rest
does arrive, a sensation of lassitude which it requires the
application of some stimulus to overcome. What stimulus have they?
Sunday comes, and with it a cessation of labour. How are they to
employ the day, or what inducement have they to employ it, in
recruiting their stock of health? They see little parties, on
pleasure excursions, passing through the streets; but they cannot
imitate their example, for they have not the means. They may walk,
to be sure, but it is exactly the inducement to walk that they
require. If every one of these men knew, that by taking the
trouble to walk two or three miles he would be enabled to share in
a good game of cricket, or some athletic sport, I very much
question whether any of them would remain at home.

But you hold out no inducement, you offer no relief from
listlessness, you provide nothing to amuse his mind, you afford him
no means of exercising his body. Unwashed and unshaven, he
saunters moodily about, weary and dejected. In lieu of the
wholesome stimulus he might derive from nature, you drive him to
the pernicious excitement to be gained from art. He flies to the
gin-shop as his only resource; and when, reduced to a worse level
than the lowest brute in the scale of creation, he lies wallowing
in the kennel, your saintly lawgivers lift up their hands to
heaven, and exclaim for a law which shall convert the day intended
for rest and cheerfulness, into one of universal gloom, bigotry,
and persecution.

CHAPTER II - AS SABBATH BILLS WOULD MAKE IT

The provisions of the bill introduced into the House of Commons by
Sir Andrew Agnew, and thrown out by that House on the motion for
the second reading, on the 18th of May in the present year, by a
majority of 32, may very fairly be taken as a test of the length to
which the fanatics, of which the honourable Baronet is the
distinguished leader, are prepared to go. No test can be fairer;
because while on the one hand this measure may be supposed to
exhibit all that improvement which mature reflection and long
deliberation may have suggested, so on the other it may very
reasonably be inferred, that if it be quite as severe in its
provisions, and to the full as partial in its operation, as those
which have preceded it and experienced a similar fate, the disease
under which the honourable Baronet and his friends labour, is
perfectly hopeless, and beyond the reach of cure.

The proposed enactments of the bill are briefly these:- All work is
prohibited on the Lord's day, under heavy penalties, increasing
with every repetition of the offence. There are penalties for
keeping shops open - penalties for drunkenness - penalties for
keeping open houses of entertainment - penalties for being present
at any public meeting or assembly - penalties for letting
carriages, and penalties for hiring them - penalties for travelling
in steam-boats, and penalties for taking passengers - penalties on
vessels commencing their voyage on Sunday - penalties on the owners
of cattle who suffer them to be driven on the Lord's day -
penalties on constables who refuse to act, and penalties for
resisting them when they do. In addition to these trifles, the
constables are invested with arbitrary, vexatious, and most
extensive powers; and all this in a bill which sets out with a
hypocritical and canting declaration that 'nothing is more
acceptable to God than the TRUE AND SINCERE worship of Him
according to His holy will, and that it is the bounden duty of
Parliament to promote the observance of the Lord's day, by
protecting every class of society against being required to
sacrifice their comfort, health, religious privileges, and
conscience, for the convenience, enjoyment, or supposed advantage
of any other class on the Lord's day'! The idea of making a man
truly moral through the ministry of constables, and sincerely
religious under the influence of penalties, is worthy of the mind
which could form such a mass of monstrous absurdity as this bill is
composed of.

The House of Commons threw the measure out certainly, and by so
doing retrieved the disgrace - so far as it could be retrieved - of
placing among the printed papers of Parliament, such an egregious
specimen of legislative folly; but there was a degree of delicacy
and forbearance about the debate that took place, which I cannot
help thinking as unnecessary and uncalled for, as it is unusual in
Parliamentary discussions. If it had been the first time of Sir
Andrew Agnew's attempting to palm such a measure upon the country,
we might well understand, and duly appreciate, the delicate and
compassionate feeling due to the supposed weakness and imbecility
of the man, which prevented his proposition being exposed in its
true colours, and induced this Hon. Member to bear testimony to his
excellent motives, and that Noble Lord to regret that he could not
- although he had tried to do so - adopt any portion of the bill.
But when these attempts have been repeated, again and again; when
Sir Andrew Agnew has renewed them session after session, and when
it has become palpably evident to the whole House that

His impudence of proof in every trial,
Kens no polite, and heeds no plain denial -

it really becomes high time to speak of him and his legislation, as
they appear to deserve, without that gloss of politeness, which is
all very well in an ordinary case, but rather out of place when the
liberties and comforts of a whole people are at stake.

In the first place, it is by no means the worst characteristic of
this bill, that it is a bill of blunders: it is, from beginning to
end, a piece of deliberate cruelty, and crafty injustice. If the
rich composed the whole population of this country, not a single
comfort of one single man would be affected by it. It is directed
exclusively, and without the exception of a solitary instance,
against the amusements and recreations of the poor. This was the
bait held out by the Hon. Baronet to a body of men, who cannot be
supposed to have any very strong sympathies in common with the
poor, because they cannot understand their sufferings or their
struggles. This is the bait, which will in time prevail, unless
public attention is awakened, and public feeling exerted, to
prevent it.

Take the very first clause, the provision that no man shall be
allowed to work on Sunday - 'That no person, upon the Lord's day,
shall do, or hire, or employ any person to do any manner of labour,
or any work of his or her ordinary calling.'  What class of persons
does this affect? The rich man? No. Menial servants, both male
and female, are specially exempted from the operation of the bill.
'Menial servants' are among the poor people. The bill has no
regard for them. The Baronet's dinner must be cooked on Sunday,
the Bishop's horses must be groomed, and the Peer's carriage must
be driven. So the menial servants are put utterly beyond the pale
of grace; - unless indeed, they are to go to heaven through the
sanctity of their masters, and possibly they might think even that,
rather an uncertain passport.

There is a penalty for keeping open, houses of entertainment. Now,
suppose the bill had passed, and that half-a-dozen adventurous
licensed victuallers, relying upon the excitement of public feeling
on the subject, and the consequent difficulty of conviction (this
is by no means an improbable supposition), had determined to keep
their houses and gardens open, through the whole Sunday afternoon,
in defiance of the law. Every act of hiring or working, every act
of buying or selling, or delivering, or causing anything to be
bought or sold, is specifically made a separate offence - mark the
effect. A party, a man and his wife and children, enter a tea-
garden, and the informer stations himself in the next box, from
whence he can see and hear everything that passes. 'Waiter!' says
the father. 'Yes. Sir.'  'Pint of the best ale!'  'Yes, Sir.'
Away runs the waiter to the bar, and gets the ale from the
landlord. Out comes the informer's note-book - penalty on the
father for hiring, on the waiter for delivering, and on the
landlord for selling, on the Lord's day. But it does not stop
here. The waiter delivers the ale, and darts off, little
suspecting the penalties in store for him. 'Hollo,' cries the
father, 'waiter!'  'Yes, Sir.'  'Just get this little boy a
biscuit, will you?'  'Yes, Sir.'  Off runs the waiter again, and
down goes another case of hiring, another case of delivering, and
another case of selling; and so it would go on AD INFINITUM, the
sum and substance of the matter being, that every time a man or
woman cried 'Waiter!' on Sunday, he or she would be fined not less
than forty shillings, nor more than a hundred; and every time a
waiter replied, 'Yes, Sir,' he and his master would be fined in the
same amount: with the addition of a new sort of window duty on the
landlord, to wit, a tax of twenty shillings an hour for every hour
beyond the first one, during which he should have his shutters down
on the Sabbath.

With one exception, there are perhaps no clauses in the whole bill,
so strongly illustrative of its partial operation, and the
intention of its framer, as those which relate to travelling on
Sunday. Penalties of ten, twenty, and thirty pounds, are
mercilessly imposed upon coach proprietors who shall run their
coaches on the Sabbath; one, two, and ten pounds upon those who
hire, or let to hire, horses and carriages upon the Lord's day, but
not one syllable about those who have no necessity to hire, because
they have carriages and horses of their own; not one word of a
penalty on liveried coachmen and footmen. The whole of the saintly
venom is directed against the hired cabriolet, the humble fly, or
the rumbling hackney-coach, which enables a man of the poorer class
to escape for a few hours from the smoke and dirt, in the midst of
which he has been confined throughout the week: while the
escutcheoned carriage and the dashing cab, may whirl their wealthy
owners to Sunday feasts and private oratorios, setting constables,
informers, and penalties, at defiance. Again, in the description
of the places of public resort which it is rendered criminal to
attend on Sunday, there are no words comprising a very fashionable
promenade. Public discussions, public debates, public lectures and
speeches, are cautiously guarded against; for it is by their means
that the people become enlightened enough to deride the last
efforts of bigotry and superstition. There is a stringent
provision for punishing the poor man who spends an hour in a news-
room, but there is nothing to prevent the rich one from lounging
away the day in the Zoological Gardens.

There is, in four words, a mock proviso, which affects to forbid
travelling 'with any animal' on the Lord's day. This, however, is
revoked, as relates to the rich man, by a subsequent provision. We
have then a penalty of not less than fifty, nor more than one
hundred pounds, upon any person participating in the control, or
having the command of any vessel which shall commence her voyage on
the Lord's day, should the wind prove favourable. The next time
this bill is brought forward (which will no doubt be at an early
period of the next session of Parliament) perhaps it will be better
to amend this clause by declaring, that from and after the passing
of the act, it shall be deemed unlawful for the wind to blow at all
upon the Sabbath. It would remove a great deal of temptation from
the owners and captains of vessels.

The reader is now in possession of the principal enacting clauses
of Sir Andrew Agnew's bill, with the exception of one, for
preventing the killing or taking of 'FISH, OR OTHER WILD ANIMALS,'
and the ordinary provisions which are inserted for form's sake in
all acts of Parliament. I now beg his attention to the clauses of
exemption.

They are two in number. The first exempts menial servants from any
rest, and all poor men from any recreation: outlaws a milkman
after nine o'clock in the morning, and makes eating-houses lawful
for only two hours in the afternoon; permits a medical man to use
his carriage on Sunday, and declares that a clergyman may either
use his own, or hire one.

The second is artful, cunning, and designing; shielding the rich
man from the possibility of being entrapped, and affecting at the
same time, to have a tender and scrupulous regard, for the
interests of the whole community. It declares, 'that nothing in
this act contained, shall extend to works of piety, charity, or
necessity.'

What is meant by the word 'necessity' in this clause? Simply this
- that the rich man shall be at liberty to make use of all the
splendid luxuries he has collected around him, on any day in the
week, because habit and custom have rendered them 'necessary' to
his easy existence; but that the poor man who saves his money to
provide some little pleasure for himself and family at lengthened
intervals, shall not be permitted to enjoy it. It is not
'necessary' to him:- Heaven knows, he very often goes long enough
without it. This is the plain English of the clause. The carriage
and pair of horses, the coachman, the footman, the helper, and the
groom, are 'necessary' on Sundays, as on other days, to the bishop
and the nobleman; but the hackney-coach, the hired gig, or the
taxed cart, cannot possibly be 'necessary' to the working-man on
Sunday, for he has it not at other times. The sumptuous dinner and
the rich wines, are 'necessaries' to a great man in his own
mansion: but the pint of beer and the plate of meat, degrade the
national character in an eating-house.

Such is the bill for promoting the true and sincere worship of God
according to his Holy Will, and for protecting every class of
society against being required to sacrifice their health and
comfort on the Sabbath. Instances in which its operation would be
as unjust as it would be absurd, might be multiplied to an endless
amount; but it is sufficient to place its leading provisions before
the reader. In doing so, I have purposely abstained from drawing
upon the imagination for possible cases; the provisions to which I
have referred, stand in so many words upon the bill as printed by
order of the House of Commons; and they can neither be disowned,
nor explained away.

Let us suppose such a bill as this, to have actually passed both
branches of the legislature; to have received the royal assent; and
to have come into operation. Imagine its effect in a great city
like London.

Sunday comes, and brings with it a day of general gloom and
austerity. The man who has been toiling hard all the week, has
been looking towards the Sabbath, not as to a day of rest from
labour, and healthy recreation, but as one of grievous tyranny and
grinding oppression. The day which his Maker intended as a
blessing, man has converted into a curse. Instead of being hailed
by him as his period of relaxation, he finds it remarkable only as
depriving him of every comfort and enjoyment. He has many children
about him, all sent into the world at an early age, to struggle for
a livelihood; one is kept in a warehouse all day, with an interval
of rest too short to enable him to reach home, another walks four
or five miles to his employment at the docks, a third earns a few
shillings weekly, as an errand boy, or office messenger; and the
employment of the man himself, detains him at some distance from
his home from morning till night. Sunday is the only day on which
they could all meet together, and enjoy a homely meal in social
comfort; and now they sit down to a cold and cheerless dinner: the
pious guardians of the man's salvation having, in their regard for
the welfare of his precious soul, shut up the bakers' shops. The
fire blazes high in the kitchen chimney of these well-fed
hypocrites, and the rich steams of the savoury dinner scent the
air. What care they to be told that this class of men have neither
a place to cook in - nor means to bear the expense, if they had?

Look into your churches - diminished congregations, and scanty
attendance. People have grown sullen and obstinate, and are
becoming disgusted with the faith which condemns them to such a day
as this, once in every seven. And as you cannot make people
religious by Act of Parliament, or force them to church by
constables, they display their feeling by staying away.

Turn into the streets, and mark the rigid gloom that reigns over
everything around. The roads are empty, the fields are deserted,
the houses of entertainment are closed. Groups of filthy and
discontented-looking men, are idling about at the street corners,
or sleeping in the sun; but there are no decently-dressed people of
the poorer class, passing to and fro. Where should they walk to?
It would take them an hour, at least, to get into the fields, and
when they reached them, they could procure neither bite nor sup,
without the informer and the penalty. Now and then, a carriage
rolls smoothly on, or a well-mounted horseman, followed by a
liveried attendant, canters by; but with these exceptions, all is
as melancholy and quiet as if a pestilence had fallen on the city.

Bend your steps through the narrow and thickly-inhabited streets,
and observe the sallow faces of the men and women who are lounging
at the doors, or lolling from the windows. Regard well the
closeness of these crowded rooms, and the noisome exhalations that
rise from the drains and kennels; and then laud the triumph of
religion and morality, which condemns people to drag their lives
out in such stews as these, and makes it criminal for them to eat
or drink in the fresh air, or under the clear sky. Here and there,
from some half-opened window, the loud shout of drunken revelry
strikes upon the ear, and the noise of oaths and quarrelling - the
effect of the close and heated atmosphere - is heard on all sides.
See how the men all rush to join the crowd that are making their
way down the street, and how loud the execrations of the mob become
as they draw nearer. They have assembled round a little knot of
constables, who have seized the stock-in-trade, heinously exposed
on Sunday, of some miserable walking-stick seller, who follows
clamouring for his property. The dispute grows warmer and fiercer,
until at last some of the more furious among the crowd, rush
forward to restore the goods to their owner. A general conflict
takes place; the sticks of the constables are exercised in all
directions; fresh assistance is procured; and half a dozen of the
assailants are conveyed to the station-house, struggling, bleeding,
and cursing. The case is taken to the police-office on the
following morning; and after a frightful amount of perjury on both
sides, the men are sent to prison for resisting the officers, their
families to the workhouse to keep them from starving: and there
they both remain for a month afterwards, glorious trophies of the
sanctified enforcement of the Christian Sabbath. Add to such
scenes as these, the profligacy, idleness, drunkenness, and vice,
that will be committed to an extent which no man can foresee, on
Monday, as an atonement for the restraint of the preceding day; and
you have a very faint and imperfect picture of the religious
effects of this Sunday legislation, supposing it could ever be
forced upon the people.

But let those who advocate the cause of fanaticism, reflect well
upon the probable issue of their endeavours. They may by
perseverance, succeed with Parliament. Let them ponder on the
probability of succeeding with the people. You may deny the
concession of a political question for a time, and a nation will
bear it patiently. Strike home to the comforts of every man's
fireside - tamper with every man's freedom and liberty - and one
month, one week, may rouse a feeling abroad, which a king would
gladly yield his crown to quell, and a peer would resign his
coronet to allay.

It is the custom to affect a deference for the motives of those who
advocate these measures, and a respect for the feelings by which
they are actuated. They do not deserve it. If they legislate in
ignorance, they are criminal and dishonest; if they do so with
their eyes open, they commit wilful injustice; in either case, they
bring religion into contempt. But they do NOT legislate in
ignorance. Public prints, and public men, have pointed out to them
again and again, the consequences of their proceedings. If they
persist in thrusting themselves forward, let those consequences
rest upon their own heads, and let them be content to stand upon
their own merits.

It may be asked, what motives can actuate a man who has so little
regard for the comfort of his fellow-beings, so little respect for
their wants and necessities, and so distorted a notion of the
beneficence of his Creator. I reply, an envious, heartless, ill-
conditioned dislike to seeing those whom fortune has placed below
him, cheerful and happy - an intolerant confidence in his own high
worthiness before God, and a lofty impression of the demerits of
others - pride, selfish pride, as inconsistent with the spirit of
Christianity itself, as opposed to the example of its Founder upon
earth.

To these may be added another class of men - the stern and gloomy
enthusiasts, who would make earth a hell, and religion a torment:
men who, having wasted the earlier part of their lives in
dissipation and depravity, find themselves when scarcely past its
meridian, steeped to the neck in vice, and shunned like a loathsome
disease. Abandoned by the world, having nothing to fall back upon,
nothing to remember but time mis-spent, and energies misdirected,
they turn their eyes and not their thoughts to Heaven, and delude
themselves into the impious belief, that in denouncing the
lightness of heart of which they cannot partake, and the rational
pleasures from which they never derived enjoyment, they are more
than remedying the sins of their old career, and - like the
founders of monasteries and builders of churches, in ruder days -
establishing a good set claim upon their Maker.

CHAPTER III - AS IT MIGHT BE MADE

The supporters of Sabbath Bills, and more especially the extreme
class of Dissenters, lay great stress upon the declarations
occasionally made by criminals from the condemned cell or the
scaffold, that to Sabbath-breaking they attribute their first
deviation from the path of rectitude; and they point to these
statements, as an incontestable proof of the evil consequences
which await a departure from that strict and rigid observance of
the Sabbath, which they uphold. I cannot help thinking that in
this, as in almost every other respect connected with the subject,
there is a considerable degree of cant, and a very great deal of
wilful blindness. If a man be viciously disposed - and with very
few exceptions, not a man dies by the executioner's hands, who has
not been in one way or other a most abandoned and profligate
character for many years - if a man be viciously disposed, there is
no doubt that he will turn his Sunday to bad account, that he will
take advantage of it, to dissipate with other bad characters as
vile as himself; and that in this way, he may trace his first
yielding to temptation, possibly his first commission of crime, to
an infringement of the Sabbath. But this would be an argument
against any holiday at all. If his holiday had been Wednesday
instead of Sunday, and he had devoted it to the same improper uses,
it would have been productive of the same results. It is too much
to judge of the character of a whole people, by the confessions of
the very worst members of society. It is not fair, to cry down
things which are harmless in themselves, because evil-disposed men
may turn them to bad account. Who ever thought of deprecating the
teaching poor people to write, because some porter in a warehouse
had committed forgery? Or into what man's head did it ever enter,
to prevent the crowding of churches, because it afforded a
temptation for the picking of pockets?

When the Book of Sports, for allowing the peasantry of England to
divert themselves with certain games in the open air, on Sundays,
after evening service, was published by Charles the First, it is
needless to say the English people were comparatively rude and
uncivilised. And yet it is extraordinary to how few excesses it
gave rise, even in that day, when men's minds were not enlightened,
or their passions moderated, by the influence of education and
refinement. That some excesses were committed through its means,
in the remoter parts of the country, and that it was discontinued
in those places, in consequence, cannot be denied: but generally
speaking, there is no proof whatever on record, of its having had
any tendency to increase crime, or to lower the character of the
people.

The Puritans of that time, were as much opposed to harmless
recreations and healthful amusements as those of the present day,
and it is amusing to observe that each in their generation, advance
precisely the same description of arguments. In the British
Museum, there is a curious pamphlet got up by the Agnews of
Charles's time, entitled 'A Divine Tragedie lately acted, or a
Collection of sundry memorable examples of God's Judgements upon
Sabbath Breakers, and other like Libertines in their unlawful
Sports, happening within the realme of England, in the compass only
of two yeares last past, since the Booke (of Sports) was published,
worthy to be knowne and considered of all men, especially such who
are guilty of the sinne, or archpatrons thereof.'  This amusing
document, contains some fifty or sixty veritable accounts of balls
of fire that fell into churchyards and upset the sporters, and
sporters that quarrelled, and upset one another, and so forth: and
among them is one anecdote containing an example of a rather
different kind, which I cannot resist the temptation of quoting, as
strongly illustrative of the fact, that this blinking of the
question has not even the recommendation of novelty.

'A woman about Northampton, the same day that she heard the booke
for sports read, went immediately, and having 3. pence in her
purse, hired a fellow to goe to the next towne to fetch a
Minstrell, who coming, she with others fell a dauncing, which
continued within night; at which time shee was got with child,
which at the birth shee murthering, was detected and apprehended,
and being converted before the justice, shee confessed it, and
withal told the occasion of it, saying it was her falling to sport
on the Sabbath, upon the reading of the Booke, so as for this
treble sinfull act, her presumptuous profaning of the Sabbath, wh.
brought her adultory and that murther. Shee was according to the
Law both of God and man, put to death. Much sinne and misery
followeth upon Sabbath-breaking.'

It is needless to say, that if the young lady near Northampton had
'fallen to sport' of such a dangerous description, on any other day
but Sunday, the first result would probably have been the same: it
never having been distinctly shown that Sunday is more favourable
to the propagation of the human race than any other day in the
week. The second result - the murder of the child - does not speak
very highly for the amiability of her natural disposition; and the
whole story, supposing it to have had any foundation at all, is
about as much chargeable upon the Book of Sports, as upon the Book
of Kings. Such 'sports' have taken place in Dissenting Chapels
before now; but religion has never been blamed in consequence; nor
has it been proposed to shut up the chapels on that account.

The question, then, very fairly arises, whether we have any reason
to suppose that allowing games in the open air on Sundays, or even
providing the means of amusement for the humbler classes of society
on that day, would be hurtful and injurious to the character and
morals of the people.

I was travelling in the west of England a summer or two back, and
was induced by the beauty of the scenery, and the seclusion of the
spot, to remain for the night in a small village, distant about
seventy miles from London. The next morning was Sunday; and I
walked out, towards the church. Groups of people - the whole
population of the little hamlet apparently - were hastening in the
same direction. Cheerful and good-humoured congratulations were
heard on all sides, as neighbours overtook each other, and walked
on in company. Occasionally I passed an aged couple, whose married
daughter and her husband were loitering by the side of the old
people, accommodating their rate of walking to their feeble pace,
while a little knot of children hurried on before; stout young
labourers in clean round frocks; and buxom girls with healthy,
laughing faces, were plentifully sprinkled about in couples, and
the whole scene was one of quiet and tranquil contentment,
irresistibly captivating. The morning was bright and pleasant, the
hedges were green and blooming, and a thousand delicious scents
were wafted on the air, from the wild flowers which blossomed on
either side of the footpath. The little church was one of those
venerable simple buildings which abound in the English counties;
half overgrown with moss and ivy, and standing in the centre of a
little plot of ground, which, but for the green mounds with which
it was studded, might have passed for a lovely meadow. I fancied
that the old clanking bell which was now summoning the congregation
together, would seem less terrible when it rung out the knell of a
departed soul, than I had ever deemed possible before - that the
sound would tell only of a welcome to calmness and rest, amidst the
most peaceful and tranquil scene in nature.

I followed into the church - a low-roofed building with small
arched windows, through which the sun's rays streamed upon a plain
tablet on the opposite wall, which had once recorded names, now as
undistinguishable on its worn surface, as were the bones beneath,
from the dust into which they had resolved. The impressive service
of the Church of England was spoken - not merely READ - by a grey-
headed minister, and the responses delivered by his auditors, with
an air of sincere devotion as far removed from affectation or
display, as from coldness or indifference. The psalms were
accompanied by a few instrumental performers, who were stationed in
a small gallery extending across the church at the lower end, over
the door: and the voices were led by the clerk, who, it was
evident, derived no slight pride and gratification from this
portion of the service. The discourse was plain, unpretending, and
well adapted to the comprehension of the hearers. At the
conclusion of the service, the villagers waited in the churchyard,
to salute the clergyman as he passed; and two or three, I observed,
stepped aside, as if communicating some little difficulty, and
asking his advice. This, to guess from the homely bows, and other
rustic expressions of gratitude, the old gentleman readily
conceded. He seemed intimately acquainted with the circumstances
of all his parishioners; for I heard him inquire after one man's
youngest child, another man's wife, and so forth; and that he was
fond of his joke, I discovered from overhearing him ask a stout,
fresh-coloured young fellow, with a very pretty bashful-looking
girl on his arm, 'when those banns were to be put up?' - an inquiry
which made the young fellow more fresh-coloured, and the girl more
bashful, and which, strange to say, caused a great many other girls
who were standing round, to colour up also, and look anywhere but
in the faces of their male companions.

As I approached this spot in the evening about half an hour before
sunset, I was surprised to hear the hum of voices, and occasionally
a shout of merriment from the meadow beyond the churchyard; which I
found, when I reached the stile, to be occasioned by a very
animated game of cricket, in which the boys and young men of the
place were engaged, while the females and old people were scattered
about: some seated on the grass watching the progress of the game,
and others sauntering about in groups of two or three, gathering
little nosegays of wild roses and hedge flowers. I could not but
take notice of one old man in particular, with a bright-eyed grand-
daughter by his side, who was giving a sunburnt young fellow some
instructions in the game, which he received with an air of profound
deference, but with an occasional glance at the girl, which induced
me to think that his attention was rather distracted from the old
gentleman's narration of the fruits of his experience. When it was
his turn at the wicket, too, there was a glance towards the pair
every now and then, which the old grandfather very complacently
considered as an appeal to his judgment of a particular hit, but
which a certain blush in the girl's face, and a downcast look of
the bright eye, led me to believe was intended for somebody else
than the old man, - and understood by somebody else, too, or I am
much mistaken.

I was in the very height of the pleasure which the contemplation of
this scene afforded me, when I saw the old clergyman making his way
towards us. I trembled for an angry interruption to the sport, and
was almost on the point of crying out, to warn the cricketers of
his approach; he was so close upon me, however, that I could do
nothing but remain still, and anticipate the reproof that was
preparing. What was my agreeable surprise to see the old gentleman
standing at the stile, with his hands in his pockets, surveying the
whole scene with evident satisfaction! And how dull I must have
been, not to have known till my friend the grandfather (who, by-
the-bye, said he had been a wonderful cricketer in his time) told
me, that it was the clergyman himself who had established the whole
thing: that it was his field they played in; and that it was he
who had purchased stumps, bats, ball, and all!

It is such scenes as this, I would see near London, on a Sunday
evening. It is such men as this, who would do more in one year to
make people properly religious, cheerful, and contented, than all
the legislation of a century could ever accomplish.

It will be said - it has been very often - that it would be matter
of perfect impossibility to make amusements and exercises succeed
in large towns, which may be very well adapted to a country
population. Here, again, we are called upon to yield to bare
assertions on matters of belief and opinion, as if they were
established and undoubted facts. That there is a wide difference
between the two cases, no one will be prepared to dispute; that the
difference is such as to prevent the application of the same
principle to both, no reasonable man, I think, will be disposed to
maintain. The great majority of the people who make holiday on
Sunday now, are industrious, orderly, and well-behaved persons. It
is not unreasonable to suppose that they would be no more inclined
to an abuse of pleasures provided for them, than they are to an
abuse of the pleasures they provide for themselves; and if any
people, for want of something better to do, resort to criminal
practices on the Sabbath as at present observed, no better remedy
for the evil can be imagined, than giving them the opportunity of
doing something which will amuse them, and hurt nobody else.

The propriety of opening the British Museum to respectable people
on Sunday, has lately been the subject of some discussion. I think
it would puzzle the most austere of the Sunday legislators to
assign any valid reason for opposing so sensible a proposition.
The Museum contains rich specimens from all the vast museums and
repositories of Nature, and rare and curious fragments of the
mighty works of art, in bygone ages: all calculated to awaken
contemplation and inquiry, and to tend to the enlightenment and
improvement of the people. But attendants would be necessary, and
a few men would be employed upon the Sabbath. They certainly
would; but how many? Why, if the British Museum, and the National
Gallery, and the Gallery of Practical Science, and every other
exhibition in London, from which knowledge is to be derived and
information gained, were to be thrown open on a Sunday afternoon,
not fifty people would be required to preside over the whole: and
it would take treble the number to enforce a Sabbath bill in any
three populous parishes.

I should like to see some large field, or open piece of ground, in
every outskirt of London, exhibiting each Sunday evening on a
larger scale, the scene of the little country meadow. I should
like to see the time arrive, when a man's attendance to his
religious duties might be left to that religious feeling which most
men possess in a greater or less degree, but which was never forced
into the breast of any man by menace or restraint. I should like
to see the time when Sunday might be looked forward to, as a
recognised day of relaxation and enjoyment, and when every man
might feel, what few men do now, that religion is not incompatible
with rational pleasure and needful recreation.

How different a picture would the streets and public places then
present! The museums, and repositories of scientific and useful
inventions, would be crowded with ingenious mechanics and
industrious artisans, all anxious for information, and all unable
to procure it at any other time. The spacious saloons would be
swarming with practical men: humble in appearance, but destined,
perhaps, to become the greatest inventors and philosophers of their
age. The labourers who now lounge away the day in idleness and
intoxication, would be seen hurrying along, with cheerful faces and
clean attire, not to the close and smoky atmosphere of the public-
house but to the fresh and airy fields. Fancy the pleasant scene.
Throngs of people, pouring out from the lanes and alleys of the
metropolis, to various places of common resort at some short
distance from the town, to join in the refreshing sports and
exercises of the day - the children gambolling in crowds upon the
grass, the mothers looking on, and enjoying themselves the little
game they seem only to direct; other parties strolling along some
pleasant walks, or reposing in the shade of the stately trees;
others again intent upon their different amusements. Nothing
should be heard on all sides, but the sharp stroke of the bat as it
sent the ball skimming along the ground, the clear ring of the
quoit, as it struck upon the iron peg: the noisy murmur of many
voices, and the loud shout of mirth and delight, which would awaken
the echoes far and wide, till the fields rung with it. The day
would pass away, in a series of enjoyments which would awaken no
painful reflections when night arrived; for they would be
calculated to bring with them, only health and contentment. The
young would lose that dread of religion, which the sour austerity
of its professors too often inculcates in youthful bosoms; and the
old would find less difficulty in persuading them to respect its
observances. The drunken and dissipated, deprived of any excuse
for their misconduct, would no longer excite pity but disgust.
Above all, the more ignorant and humble class of men, who now
partake of many of the bitters of life, and taste but few of its
sweets, would naturally feel attachment and respect for that code
of morality, which, regarding the many hardships of their station,
strove to alleviate its rigours, and endeavoured to soften its
asperity.

This is what Sunday might be made, and what it might be made
without impiety or profanation. The wise and beneficent Creator
who places men upon earth, requires that they shall perform the
duties of that station of life to which they are called, and He can
never intend that the more a man strives to discharge those duties,
the more he shall be debarred from happiness and enjoyment. Let
those who have six days in the week for all the world's pleasures,
appropriate the seventh to fasting and gloom, either for their own
sins or those of other people, if they like to bewail them; but let
those who employ their six days in a worthier manner, devote their
seventh to a different purpose. Let divines set the example of
true morality: preach it to their flocks in the morning, and
dismiss them to enjoy true rest in the afternoon; and let them
select for their text, and let Sunday legislators take for their
motto, the words which fell from the lips of that Master, whose
precepts they misconstrue, and whose lessons they pervert - 'The
Sabbath was made for man, and not man to serve the Sabbath.'

THE END.

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DICKENS MISCELLANY
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The Village Coquettes ? by Charles Dickens (1836)

Foreword
 
�g�cwhen about a year before his death, Frederick Locker asked him [Dickens] whether 
he possessed a copy of the Coquettes, he replied: �eNo; and if I knew it was in my house, 
and if I could not get rid of it in any other way, I would burn the wing of the house where 
it was!�f�h

 

? J.W.T. Ley, ed., in Forster, Life of Charles Dickens, 83.94

 

            The story of the Village Coquettes really begins with the story of Charles 
Dickens�fs older sister, Fanny Dickens. Fanny was the family�fs first star. The oldest child, 
she was closely associated with the Royal Academy of Music; she had been one of the 
first students admitted, she had worked there as a sub-professor and a piano tutor as 
well, and she had recently returned to the Academy to study singing a second time 
(until June 1834). No longer a student, Fanny still continued to sing at Academy 
concerts, as an Associate Honorary Member, and frequently received good reviews in the 
newspapers.

            At the school, and at those concerts, one of Fanny�fs fellow students and 
concert performers was John Pyke Hullah, an aspiring composer. It was through Fanny 
that Hullah met the family�fs second rising star?Charles Dickens. The second child was 
already beginning to gain some fame, as the author of a popular series of �hSketches by 
Boz�h. We can�ft be sure when, but perhaps in late December 1835, Dickens and Hullah 
began to consider working on a light opera together. Hullah had an idea for an Italian 
piece called �gThe Gondolier�h, but Dickens instead preferred �gthe increased ease and 
effect with which we could both work on an English Drama where the characters would 
act and talk like people we see and hear of every day�h (Pilgrim 1:113). This was the 
Drama which was to become The Village Coquettes. 

            Dickens was just finishing up the writing of Coquettes�fs first act, when the 
play had a bit of great good luck. George Hogarth, Dickens�fs soon-to-be father-in-law, 
was sometimes acting as Dickens�fs literary agent, and Hogarth had had a meeting with 
John Braham (15 Jan 1836). John Braham was the most popular light-opera tenor of 
the day, and, more significantly, he had recently become a theatre producer also. 

            The meeting was to have great consequences. Dickens, still working as a 
Morning Chronicle reporter, had just that same day written a glowing theatre review of 
Braham�fs singing, and Hogarth pointed the notice out to Braham. The theatre manager 
was so touched at Dickens�fs �gbeautiful compliments�h (Pilgrim 1:118), that he agreed to 
consider The Village Coquettes for production. Dickens rushed to complete the opera�fs 
libretto, and no more than fifteen days later, Braham had accepted it, �gwith the most 
flattering encomiums�h (Pilgrim 1:122). Two months before he began Pickwick?one 
week before his first book was published?still age 23?Charles Dickens had placed his 
first play. 

            Dickens and Hullah went through one round of revisions for the opera, and 
at Braham�fs request Dickens added the character Martin Stokes, �ga low comedy part�h 
without singing (Pilgrim 1:151). The role was a vehicle for J.P. Harley, a star whom 
Braham had just lured away from the Drury Lane Theatre and signed. Harley was to 
become good friends with Dickens, and the published play was dedicated to him. Harley, 
Braham, and his wife, were all wildly enthusiastic about Coquettes?more so, even, 
than Dickens and Hullah?and were positive it would be a hit. Manager Braham went 
so far as to take the lead part for himself.

            Although The Village Coquettes was written first, scheduling concerns 
were such that a second play by Dickens was first performed. The Strange Gentleman 
had opened the theatre�fs season with a hit, and had a successful first run of 50 
performances. Adapted from one of the Sketches by Boz, it was the type of material the 
public expected from Dickens. On its final night, Tuesday 6 Dec 1836, Gentleman 
shared the bill with the premiere of The Village Coquettes. A historical romance, 
deliberately written in the style of the minor popular plays of the time, Coquettes did 
not catch the public�fs fancy. Reviews were mostly negative, and complained that the 
opera was derivative, and not appropriate for nor worthy of Boz�fs talents (see Dexter for 
more). One detailed review is included in full, below, after the text of the play. 

            Thus Coquettes had only a limited success, and closed its first run after 
seventeen performances (24 Dec 1836). Revived the following year, it was still staged 
occasionally, but Braham was soon begging Dickens to give away plenty of free passes, 
to fill empty seats in a drafty house. On April 7, Boz asked to have his name removed 
from the playbills. Coquettes finally finished with a total of 27 performances (17 May 
1837). 

            The story does have a happy ending, though. For the last few performances 
of Coquettes, the lead role of Squire Norton was taken over by Henry Burnett, who was, 
like Fanny and Hullah, a star of the Royal Academy concerts. Henry Burnett and Fanny 
Dickens had known each other many years, and became engaged at just about this time. 
They were soon married (13 Sep 1837). 

            Some final details of the opera should be noted. Dickens�fs libretto was 
published by Bentley (22 Dec 1836), as a two-shilling pamphlet, too late for the opera�fs 
premiere. Many years later, Bentley in was serious financial difficulties, and offered 
Dickens his remaining supply of 355 Coquettes. Dickens wrote �gI am not particularly 
proud of the performance to which your obliging note refers, and shall be sufficiently 
contented to pay the deficit for the privilege of possessing myself of the copies on hand�h 
(Pilgrim 7:672). Dickens wrote Bentley a cheque for ?9.9.0 for the backstock, and 
presumably disposed of it (see epigraph). 

            The music fared even worse. Many of Hullah�fs songs for the opera were 
published individually, and these still exist, though they are not included here. However, 
the concerted score, the music as a whole, was lost, notably the overture and the 
incidental music. The circumstances are not clear, but it may have happened during a 
residential fire in Edinburgh (27 Dec 1836), which destroyed a large collection of 
theatrical music, belonging to the Theatre Royal�fs librarian. Forty-five families were left 
homeless (Hill, 194). Years later, a Sir Frederick Bridge attempted to reconstruct the 
lost music. His version of the Coquettes was played on a small stage in London (1924), 
but Sir Frederick never saw it. He died a few months before opening night. Bridge was 
followed by Edward J. Chadfield, who did a more thorough job of researching and 
reconstruction. The Chadfield version was also given a small production in London, the 
first time without incident (1937). But when the play was revived, the playwright 
expired (1956). 

            Dickens was to write one more piece for the St. James�fs Theatre,  Is She 
His Wife?, a one act farce. The details of that production will be given with the text of 
the play.
 

THE VILLAGE COQUETTES

A COMIC OPERA

IN TWO ACTS

(Music by John Hullah)

[Libretto by Charles Dickens - 1836]

 

 

DEDICATION
To J. P. HARLEY, ESQ.

MY DEAR SIR,

            My dramatic bantlings are no sooner born, than you father them. You have 
made my �eStrange Gentleman�f exclusively your own; you have adopted Martin Stokes 
with equal readiness; and you still profess your willingness to do the same kind office 
for all future scions of the same stock.

            I dedicate to you the first play I ever published; and you made for the me 
the first play I ever produced:?the balance is in your favour, and I am afraid it will 
remain so.

            That you may long contribute to the amusement of the public, and long be 
spared to shed a lustre, by the honour and integrity of your public life, on the profession 
which for many years you have done so much to uphold, is the sincere and earnest wish 
of, my dear Sir,

                                                                        Yours 
most faithfully, 

                                                                                    
CHARLES DICKENS.

December 15th, 1836.

 

 

PREFACE

 

�eEITHER the Honourable Gentleman is in the right, or he is not,�f is a phrase in very 
common use within the walls of Parliament. This drama may have a plot, or it may not; 
and the songs may be poetry, or they may not; and the whole affair, from beginning to 
end, may be great nonsense, or it may not, just as the honourable gentleman or lady 
who reads it may happen to think. So, retaining his own private and particular opinion 
upon the subject (an opinion which he formed upwards of a year ago, when he wrote the 
piece), the Author leaves every such gentleman or lady, to form his or hers, as he or she 
may think proper, without saying one word to influence or conciliate them.

            All he wishes to say is this;?That he hopes MR. BRAHAM, and all the 
performers who assisted in the representation of this opera, will accept his warmest 
thanks for the interest they evinced in it, from its very first rehearsal, and for their 
zealous efforts in his behalf?efforts which have crowned it with a degree of success far 
exceeding his most sanguine anticipations; and of which no form of words could speak 
his acknowledgment.

            It is needless to add that the libretto of an opera must be, to a certain 
extent, a mere vehicle for the music; and that it is scarcely fair or reasonable to judge it 
by those strict rules of criticism which would be justly applicable to a five-act tragedy, or 
a finished comedy. 

 

DRAMATIS PERSON?

AT ST. JAMES�fS THEATRE, DECEMBER 6, 1836

 

SQUIRE NORTON
 MR. BRAHAM.
 
THE HON. SPARKINS FLAM (his friend)
 MR. M. BARNETT.
 
OLD BENSON (a small farmer)
 MR. STRICKLAND.
 
MR. MARTIN STOKES (a very small farmer with a very large circle of particular 
friends)
 MR. HARLEY.
 
GEORGE EDMUNDS (betrothed to Lucy)
 MR. BENNETT.
 
YOUNG BENSON
 MR. J. PARRY.
 
JOHN MADDOX (attached to Rose)
 MR. GARDNER.
 
LUCY BENSON
 MISS RAINFORTH.
 
ROSE (her cousin)
 MISS J. SMITH.
 

 

Time occupied in Representation.?Two hours and a half.

 

PERIOD.?THE AUTUMN of 1729.

 

SCENE.?AN ENGLISH VILLAGE.

 

The Passages [ruled out] were omitted in the representation.

 

 

THE VILLAGE COQUETTES

ACT I

 

SCENE I.?A Rick-yard, with a cart laden with corn-sheaves. JOHN MADDOX, and 
labourers, unloading it. Implements of husbandry, etc., lie scattered about. A gate on 
one side. JOHN MADDOX is in the cart, and dismounts at the conclusion of the Chorus. 

 

Round.

 

Hail to the merry Autumn days, when yellow cornfields shine, 

Far brighter than the costly cup that holds the monarch�fs wine! 

Hail to the merry harvest time, the gayest of the year, 

The time of rich and bounteous crops, rejoicing, and good cheer! 

 

�fTis pleasant on a fine Spring morn to see the buds expand, 

�fTis pleasant in the Summer time to view the teeming land; 

�fTis pleasant on a Winter�fs night to crouch around the blaze,?

But what are joys like these, my boys, to Autumn�fs merry days! 

 

Then hail to merry Autumn days, when yellow corn-fields shine, 

Far brighter than the costly cup that holds the monarch�fs wine! 

And hail to merry harvest time, the gayest of the year, 

The time of rich and bounteous crops, rejoicing, and good cheer! 

 

JOHN. Well done, my lads; a good day�fs work, and a warm one. Here, Tom (to Villager), 
run into the house, and ask Miss Rose to send out some beer for the men, and a jug for 
Master Maddox; and d�fye hear, Tom, tell Miss Rose it�fs a fine evening, and that if she�fll 
step out herself, it�fll do her good, and do me good into the bargain. (Exit Villager.) That�fs 
right, my lads, stow these sheaves away, before the sun goes down. Let�fs begin fresh in 
the morning, without any leavings of to-day. By this time to-morrow the last load will 
have been carried, and then for our Harvest-Home! 

VILLAGERS. Hurrah! Hurrah! 

(First four lines of Round repeated.)

 

Enter MARTIN STOKES.

 

MARTIN. Very good! very good, indeed!?always sing while you work?capital custom! I 
always do when I work, and I never work at all when I can help it;?another capital 
custom. John, old fellow, how are you??give us your hand,?hearty squeeze,?good 
shake,?capital custom number three. Fine dry weather for the harvest, John. Talking 
of that, I�fm dry too: you always give away plenty of beer, here;?capital custom number 
four. Trouble you for the loan of that can, John. 

JOHN (taking it from the cart). Here�fs the can, but as to there being anything good in it 
it�fs as dry as the weather, and as empty as you. Hoo! hoo! (laughing boisterously, is 
suddenly checked by a look from MARTIN). 

MARTIN. Hallo, John, hallo! I have often told you before, Mr. Maddox, that I don�ft 
consider you in a situation of life which entitles you to make jokes, far less to laugh 
at �fem. If you must make a joke, do it solemnly, and respectfully. If I laugh, that�fs quite 
enough, and it must be far more gratifying to your feelings than any contortions of that 
enormous mouth of yours. 

JOHN. Well, perhaps, as you say, I ought n�ft to make jokes till I arrive, like you, at the 
dignity of a small piece of ground and a cottage; but I must laugh at a joke, sometimes. 

MARTIN. Must, must you!?Rather presuming fellow, this Maddox. (Aside.) 

JOHN. Why, when you make one of them rum jokes of yours,?�fcod, I must laugh then! 

MARTIN. Oh! ah! you may laugh then, John; always laugh at my jokes,?capital custom 
number five; no harm in that, because you can�ft help it, you know.?Knowing fellow, 
though. (Aside.) 

JOHN. Remember that joke about the old cow, as you made five years ago??�fcod, that 
was a joke! Hoo! hoo! hoo!?I never shall forget that joke. I never see a cow, to this day, 
without laughing. 

MARTIN. Ha! ha! ha! very good, very good!?Devilish clever fellow this! (Aside.) Well, 
Jack, you behave yourself well, all the evening, and perhaps I may make that joke again 
before the day�fs out. 

JOHN. Thank �fee, that�fs very kind. 

MARTIN. Don�ft mention it, don�ft mention it; but I say, John, I called to speak to you 
about more important matters.?Something wrong here, an�ft there? (Mysteriously.) 

JOHN. Wrong! you�fre always fancying something wrong. 

MARTIN. Fancying,?come, I like that. I say, why don�ft you keep your harvest-home at 
home, to-morrow night? Why are we all to go up to the Squire�fs, as if we couldn�ft be 
merry in Benson�fs barn? And why is the Squire always coming down here, looking after 
some people, and cutting out other people??an�ft that wrong? Where�fs George 
Edmunds?old Benson�fs so fond of, and that Lucy was fond of too, once upon a 
time,?eh? An�ft that wrong? Where�fs your sweetheart, Rose??An�ft her walkings, and 
gigglings, and whisperings, and simperings, with the Squire�fs friend, Mr. Sparkins Flam, 
the talk of the whole place? Nothing wrong there,?eh? (MADDOX goes up.) Had him 
there; I knew there was something wrong. I�fll keep a sharp eye upon these doings, for I 
don�ft like these new-fangled customs. It was all very well in the old time, to see the 
Squire�fs father come riding among the people on his bay cob, nodding to the common 
folks, shaking hands with me, and all that sort of thing; but when you change the old 
country-gentleman into a dashing fop from London, and the steady old steward into Mr. 
Sparkins Flam, the case is very different. We shall see,?but if I might tell Miss Lucy 
Benson a bit of my mind, I should say, �eStick to an independent young fellow, like George 
Edmunds, and depend upon it you will be happier than you would with all the show and 
glitter of a squire�fs lady.�f And I should say to Rose, very solemn, �eRose?�f

 

ROSE enters unperceived, with beer.

 

       �eRose?�f

ROSE (starting). Lord bless us! What a hollow voice!?Why, it�fs Mr. Stokes!?What on 
earth is the matter with him? 

MARTIN (not seeing her). Rose,?if you would be happy and contented, if you would 
escape destruction, shield yourself from dangerous peril, and save yourself from horrid 
ruin!? 

ROSE. What dreadful words!? 

MARTIN. You will at once, and without delay, bestow your hand on John Maddox; or if 
you would aspire to a higher rank in life, and a loftier station in society, you will 
cultivate the affections of Mr. Stokes,?Mr. Martin Stokes,?a young gentleman of great 
mental attractions, and very considerable personal charms; leaving the false and fatal 
Flam to the ignominious fate which? 

ROSE. Why, Mr. Stokes.? 

MARTIN. Ignominious fate which? 

ROSE. Dear, he must be in a fit! Mr. Stokes! 

MARTIN. Eh??Ah! Miss Rose,?It�fs you, is it? 

ROSE. Me! Yes, and here have I been waiting all this time, while you were talking 
nonsense to yourself. Here, I have brought you some beer. 

MARTIN. Oh! Miss Rose, if you go on in this way, you�fll bring us to our bier, instead of 
bringing our beer to us. (Looking round.) You may laugh, if you want to, very much, 
John. 

JOHN. Hoo! hoo! hoo! 

ROSE. Be quiet, oaf! And pray, sir (to MARTIN), to what may your most humorous 
observation refer? 

MARTIN. Why, my dear Miss Rose, you know my way,?always friendly,?always 
thinking of the welfare of those I like best, and very seldom receiving any gratitude in 
return. 

ROSE. I know you very seldom deserve any. 

MARTIN. Ah! that�fs exactly my meaning; that�fs the way, you see. The moment I begin to 
throw out a hint to one of my dear friends, out comes some unkind and rude remark. 
But I bear it all for their sakes. I won�ft allow you to raise my ill nature,?you shan�ft stop 
me. I was going to say, don�ft you think?now don�ft you think?that you?don�ft be 
angry?make rather?don�ft colour up,?rather too free with Mr. Sparkins Flam? 

ROSE. I make free with Mr. Sparkins Flam! Why you odious, insolent creature! 

MARTIN. Ah, of course?always the way?I told you so?I knew you�fd say that. 

ROSE. And you, John, you mean-spirited scarecrow; will you stand there, and see me 
insulted by an officious, impertinent? 

MARTIN. Go on, go on! (A gun fired.) Hallo! (Looking off.) Here they are, the Squire and 
Mr. Sparkins Flam. 

ROSE (hastily adjusting her dress). My goodness! Mr. Spar?run, John, run, there�fs a 
dear! 

JOHN (not moving). Very dear, I dare say. 

ROSE. Run, and tell my uncle and Lucy, that Mr. Spar?I mean that the Squire�fs 
coming. 

JOHN. I wouldn�ft ha�f gone anyhow; but nobody need go now, for here they are. Now, I�fm 
extinguished for the rest of the day. 

 

Enter through the gate SQUIRE NORTON and MR. SPARKINS FLAM, dressed for 
sporting, with guns, etc., and two Gamekeepers. On the other side, old BENSON and 
LUCY. MARTIN, during the whole scene, thrusts himself in the SQUIRE�fS way, to be 
taken notice of. 

 

SQUIRE (to Gamekeeper, and putting down his gun). Take the birds into the house. 
Benson, we have had a good day�fs sport, but a tiring one; and as the load is heavy for my 
fellows, you�fll let our game remain where it is. I could not offer it to a better friend. 

BENSON. Your honour�fs very good, but? 

SQUIRE. Nay, you make a merit of receiving the smallest favour. 

BENSON. Not a merit of receiving, nor a boast of refusing it; but a man in humble 
station should be cautious how he receives favours from those above him, which he 
never asks, and can never return. I have had too many such favours forced upon me by 
your honour, lately, and would rather not increase the number. 

SQUIRE. But such a trifle? 

BENSON. A trifle from an equal, but a condescension from a superior. Let your men 
carry your birds up to the Hall, sir, or, if they are tired, mine shall do it for them, and 
welcome. (Retires up.) 

FLAM (aside). Swine and independence! Leather breeches and liberty! 

SQUIRE. At least I may be permitted to leave a few brace, as a present to the ladies. 
Lucy, I hope, will not object. (Crosses to her.) 

LUCY. I feel much flattered by your honour�fs politeness?and?and?and? 

ROSE. My cousin means to say, sir, that we�fre very much obliged to your honour and Mr. 
Flam for your politeness, and that we are very willing to accept of anything, your 
honour. 

FLAM (aside). Condescending little savage! 

SQUIRE. You have spoken very well, both for yourself and your cousin. Flam, this is 
Rose?the pretty little Rose, you know. 

FLAM. Know! can I ever forget the charming Rose?the beautiful?the?the?(aside) 
the Cabbage Rose! 

SQUIRE (aside). Keep that girl engaged, while I talk to the other one. 

ROSE. Oh, Mr. Flam! 

FLAM. Oh, Miss Rose! (He salutes her.) 

BENSON. Your honour will not object to taste our ale, after your day�fs sport. The 
afternoon is fresh and cool, and �ftwill be pleasant here in the air. Here, Ben, Thomas, 
bring mugs here?quick?quick?and a seat for his honour. 

[Exeunt BENSON, MADDOX, etc.

SQUIRE. It will be delightful?won�ft it, Flam? 

FLAM. Inexpressibly charming! (Aside.) An amateur tea-garden. (He retires a little up 
with ROSE?she coquetting.) 

SQUIRE (to LUCY.) And in such society, how much the pleasure will be enhanced! 

LUCY. Your honour knows I ought not to listen to you?George Edmunds would? 

SQUIRE. Edmunds! a rustic!?you cannot love that Edmunds, Lucy. Forget 
him?remember your own worth. 

LUCY. I wish I could, sir. My heart will tell me though, weak and silly as I am, that I 
cannot better show the consciousness of my own worth, than by remaining true to my 
first and early love. Your honour rouses my foolish pride; but real true love is not to be 
forgotten easily. 

 

Song.?LUCY.

 

                      Love is not a feeling to pass away, 

                      Like the balmy breath of a summer day; 

                      It is not?it cannot be?laid aside; 

                      It is not a thing to forget or hide. 

                      It clings to the heart, ah, woe is me! 

                      As the ivy clings to the old oak tree. 

 

                      Love is not a passion of earthly mould, 

                      As a thirst for honour, or fame, or gold: 

                      For when all these wishes have died away, 

                      The deep strong love of a brighter day, 

                      Though nourish�fd in secret, consumes the more, 

                      As the slow rust eats to the iron�fs core. 

 

Re-enter OLD BENSON, JOHN MADDOX, and Villagers, with jugs, seats, etc.; 
SQUIRE NORTON seats himself next LUCY, and ROSE contrives to sit next MR. 
SPARKINS FLAM, which MARTIN and MADDOX in vain endeavour to prevent. 

 

SQUIRE. Flam, you know these honest people? all tenants of my own. 

FLAM. Oh, yes, I know �fem?pleasant fellows!?This?this is?what�fs his name? 

BENSON. Martin, sir,?Martin Stokes. 

MARTIN (starting forward). A?a?Mr. Stokes at your service, sir,?how do you do, sir? 
(shaking FLAM by the hand, while speaking). I hope you are quite well, sir; I am 
delighted to see you looking so well, sir. I hope your majestic father, and your 
fashionable mother, are in the enjoyment of good health, sir. I should have spoken to you 
before, sir, only you have been so very much engaged, that I couldn�ft succeed in catching 
your honourable eye;?very happy to see you, sir. 

FLAM. Ah. Pleasant fellow, this Martin!?agreeable manners,?no reserve about him. 

MARTIN. Sir, you do me a great deal of honour. Mr. Norton, sir, I have the honour of 
drinking your remarkably good health,?I admire you, sir. 

SQUIRE (laughing). Sir, I feel highly gratified, I�fm sure. 

MARTIN (aside). He�fs gratified!?I flatter myself I have produced a slight impression 
here. (Drinks.) 

FLAM (turns round, sees MADDOX). Ah, Ox! 

JOHN. Ox! Who do you call Ox? Maddox is my name. 

FLAM. Oh, mad Ox! true; I forgot the lunacy:?your health, mad Ox. 

SQUIRE (rising and coming forward). Come, Flam, another glass. Here, friends, is 
success to our Harvest-Home! 

MARTIN. Hear, hear! a most appropriate toast, most eloquently given,?a charming 
sentiment, delightfully expressed. Gentlemen (to Villagers), allow me to have the 
pleasure of proposing Mr. Norton, if you please. Take your time from me. (He gives the 
time, and they all cheer.) Mr. Norton, sir, I beg to call upon you for a song. 

 

Song.?SQUIRE NORTON.

 

          That very wise head, old ?sop, said, 

                 The bow should be sometimes loose; 

          Keep it tight for ever, the string you sever:? 

                 Let�fs turn his old moral to use. 

          The world forget, and let us yet, 

                 The glass our spirits buoying, 

          Revel to-night in those moments bright

                 Which make life worth enjoying. 

          The cares of the day, old moralists say, 

                 Are quite enough to perplex one; 

          Then drive to-day�fs sorrow away till to-morrow, 

                 And then put it off till the next one.

                      Chorus.?The cares of the day, etc. 

 

          Some plodding old crones, the heartless drones! 

                 Appeal to my cool reflection, 

          And ask me whether such nights can ever 

                 Charm sober recollection. 

          Yes, yes! I cry, I�fll grieve and die, 

                 When those I love forsake me; 

          But while friends so dear surround me here,

                 Let Care, if he can, o�fertake me. 

                      Chorus.?The cares of the day, etc. 

 

(During the Chorus, SQUIRE NORTON and FLAM resume their guns, and go up the 
stage, followed by the various characters. The Chorus concludes as the Scene closes.) 

 

SCENE II.?An open spot near the village, with stile and pathway leading to the church, 
which is seen in the distance. 

 

GEORGE EDMUNDS enters, with a stick in his hand.

 

EDMUNDS. How thickly the fallen leaves lie scattered at the feet of that old row of 
elm-trees! When I first met Lucy on this spot, it was a fine spring day, and those same 
leaves were trembling in the sunshine, as green and bright as if their beauty would last 
for ever. What a contrast they present now, and how true an emblem of my own lost 
happiness! 

 

Song.?GEORGE EDMUNDS.

 

Autumn leaves, autumn leaves, lie strewn around me here; 

Autumn leaves, autumn leaves, how sad, how cold, how drear! 

          How like the hopes of childhood�fs day, 

                 Thick clustering on the bough! 

          How like those hopes is their decay,? 

                 How faded are they now! 

Autumn leaves, autumn leaves, lie strewn around me here; 

Autumn leaves, autumn leaves, how sad, how cold, how drear! 

 

Wither�fd leaves, wither�fd leaves, that fly before the gale; 

Wither�fd leaves, wither�fd leaves, ye tell a mournful tale, 

       Of love once true, and friends once kind, 

          And happy moments fled: 

       Dispersed by every breath of wind, 

          Forgotten, changed, or dead! 

Autumn leaves, autumn leaves, lie strewn around me here; 

Autumn leaves, autumn leaves, how sad, how cold, how drear! 

 

       An hour past the old time, and still no Lucy! �fTis useless lingering here: I�fll wait 
no longer. A female crossing the meadow!?�fTis Rose, the bearer of a letter or a message 
perhaps. 

 

Enter ROSE. (She avoids him.)

 

       No! Then I will see Lucy at once, without a moment�fs delay. (Going.) 

ROSE. No, no, you can�ft. (Aside.) There�fll certainly be bloodshed! I am quite certain Mr. 
Flam will kill him. He offered me, with the most insinuating speeches, to cut John�fs 
throat at a moment�fs notice: and when the Squire complimented him on being a good 
shot, he said he should like to �ebag�f the whole male population of the village. (To him.) 
You can�ft see her. 

EDMUNDS. Not see her, and she at home! Were you instructed to say this, Rose? 

ROSE. I say it, because I know you can�ft see her. She is not well; and?and? 

EDMUNDS. And Mr. Norton is there, you would say. 

ROSE. Mr. Norton! 

EDMUNDS. Yes, Mr. Norton. Was he not there last evening? Was he not there the 
evening before? Is he not there at this moment? 

 

Enter JOHN MADDOX.

 

JOHN. There at this moment??of course he is. 

ROSE. (aside). John here! 

JOHN. Of course he is; of course he was there last night; and of course he was there the 
evening before. He�fs always there, and so is his bosom friend and confidential demon, 
Mr. Sparkins Flam. Oh! George, we�fre injured men, both of us. 

EDMUNDS. Heartless girl! (Retires up.) 

JOHN (to ROSE). Faithless person!

ROSE. Don�ft call me a person. 

JOHN. You are a person, perjured, treacherous, and deceiving! Oh! George, if you had 
seen what I have seen to-day. Soft whisperings and loving smiles, gentle looks and 
encouraging sighs,?such looks and sighs as used once upon a time to be bestowed on us, 
George! If you had seen the Squire making up to Lucy, and Rose making up to 
Flam:?but I am very glad you did not see it, George, very. It would have broken your 
heart, as it has broken mine! Oh, Rose! could you break my heart? 

ROSE. I could break your head with the greatest pleasure, you mischief-making booby; 
and if you don�ft make haste to wherever you�fre going, somebody that I know of will 
certainly do so, very quickly. 

JOHN. Will he, will he??your friend, Mr. Flam, I suppose! Let him?that�fs all; let him! 
(Retires up.) 

ROSE. Oh! I�fll let him: you needn�ft be afraid of my interfering. Dear, dear, I wish Mr. 
Flam would come, for I will own, notwithstanding what graver people may say, that I 
enjoy a little flirtation as much as any one. 

 

Song.?ROSE.

 

                      Some folks who have grown old and sour, 

                      Say love does nothing but annoy. 

                      The fact is, they have had their hour, 

                      So envy what they can�ft enjoy. 

                      I like the glance?I like the sigh? 

                      That does of ardent passion tell! 

                      If some folks were as young as I, 

                      I�fm sure they�fd like it quite as well. 

                      Old maiden aunts so hate the men, 

                      So well know how wives are harried, 

                      It makes them sad?not jealous?when 

                      They see their poor dear nieces married. 

                      All men are fair and false, they know, 

                      And with deep sighs they assail �fem, 

                      It�fs so long since they tried men, though, 

                      I rather think their memories fail �fem. 

 

       ?Here comes Mr. Flam. You�fd better go, John. I know you�fll be murdered. 

JOHN. Here I shall stop; let him touch me, and he shall feel the weight of my 
indignation. 

 

Enter FLAM.

 

FLAM. Ah, my charmer! Punctual to my time, you see, my sweet little Damask Rose! 

JOHN (coming down). A great deal more like a monthly one,?constantly changing, and 
gone the moment you wear it. 

ROSE. Impertinent creature! 

FLAM. Who is this poetical cauliflower? 

JOHN. Don�ft pretend not to know me. You know who I am, well enough. 

FLAM. As I live, it�fs the Ox!?retire, Ox, to your pasture, and don�ft rudely disturb the 
cooing of the doves. Go and graze, Ox! 

JOHN. Suppose I choose to remain here, what then? 

FLAM. Why then you must be driven off, mad Ox. (To ROSE.) Who is that other 
grasshopper? 

ROSE. Hush, hush! for Heaven�fs sake don�ft let him hear you! It�fs young Edmunds. 

FLAM. Young Edmunds? And who the devil is young Edmunds? For beyond the natural 
inference that young Edmunds is the son of old Edmunds, curse me if the fame of young 
Edmunds has ever reached my ears. 

ROSE (in a low tone). It�fs Lucy�fs former lover, whom she has given up for the squire. 

FLAM. The rejected cultivator? 

ROSE. The same. 

FLAM. Ah! I guessed as much from his earthy appearance. But, my darling Rose, I must 
speak with you,?I must?(putting his arm round her waist, sees JOHN). Good-bye, Ox! 

JOHN. Good-bye! 

FLAM. Pleasant walk to you, Ox! 

JOHN. (not moving). Thank �fee;?same to you! 

FLAM. That other clodpole must not stay here either. 

ROSE. Yes, yes! he neither sees nor hears us. Pray let him remain. 

FLAM (to JOHN). You understand, Ox, that it is my wish that you forthwith retire and 
graze,?or in other words, that you at once, and without delay, betake yourself to the 
farm, or the devil, or any other place where you are in your element, and won�ft be in the 
way. 

JOHN. Oh yes, I understand that. 

FLAM. Very well; then the sooner you create a scarcity of such animals in this market, 
the better. Now, my dear Rose (puts his arm round her waist again). Are you gone, Ox? 

JOHN. No. 

FLAM. Are you going? 

JOHN. By no means. 

FLAM. This insolence is not to be borne. 

ROSE. Oh, pray don�ft hurt him,?pray don�ft. Go away, you stupid creature, if you don�ft 
want to be ruined. 

JOHN. That�fs just the very advice I would give you, Rose; do you go away, if you don�ft 
want to be ruined. As for me, this is a public place, and here I�fll remain just as long as I 
think proper. 

FLAM (quitting ROSE, and advancing towards him). You will? 

JOHN. I will. 

ROSE. Oh, dear, dear! I knew he�fd be murdered all along. I was quite certain of it. 

JOHN. Don�ft frown and scowl at me,?it won�ft do,?it only makes me smile; and when 
you talk of insolence and put my blood up, I tell you at once, that I am not to be bullied. 

FLAM. Bullied? 

JOHN. Ay, bullied was the word,?bullied by a coward, if you like that better. 

FLAM. Coward! (Seizes his gun by the barrel, and aims a blow at him, with the 
butt-end; EDMUNDS rushes forward, and strikes it up with his stick.) 

EDMUNDS. Hold your hand, sir,?hold your hand, or I�fll fell you to the ground. Maddox, 
leave this place directly: take the opposite path, and I�fll follow you. (Exit MADDOX.) As 
for you, sir, who by the way of vindicating yourself from the charge of cowardice, raise 
your gun against an unarmed man, tell your protector, the Squire, from me, that he and 
his companions might content themselves with turning the heads of our farmers�f 
daughters, and endeavouring to corrupt their hearts, without wantonly insulting the 
men they have most injured. Let this be a lesson to you, sir,?although you were armed, 
you would have had the worst of a scuffle, and you may not have the benefit of a third 
person�fs interference at so critical a moment, another time;?remember this warning, 
sir, and benefit by it. 

[Exit.

FLAM (aside). If Norton does not take a dear revenge for this insult, I have lost my 
influence with him. Bully! coward! They shall rue it. 

ROSE (with her apron to her eyes). Oh, Mr. Flam! I can�ft bear to think that you should 
have suffered all this, on my account. 

FLAM (aside). On her account!?a little vanity! (To her.) Suffered! Why, my dear, it was 
the drollest and most humorous affair that ever happened. Here stand I,?the 
Honourable Sparkins Flam,?on this second day of September, one thousand seven 
hundred and twenty-nine; and positively and solemnly declare that all the coffee-houses, 
play-houses, faro-tables, brag-tables, assemblies, drums and routs of a whole season put 
together, could not furnish such a splendid piece of exquisite drollery. The idea is 
admirable. My affecting to quarrel with a ploughman, and submitting to be lectured by 
another caterpillar, whom I suffer to burst into a butterfly importance! 

ROSE. Then you were not really quarrelling? 

FLAM. Bless you, no! I was only acting. 

ROSE. Lor�f! how well you do act, to be sure. 

FLAM. Come, let us retire into the house, or after this joke we shall be the gaze of all 
the animated potatoes that are planted in this hole of a village. Why do you hesitate, 
Damask? 

ROSE. Why, I have just been thinking that if you go to all these coffee-houses, and 
play-houses, and fairs, and brags, and keep playing drums, and routing people about, 
you�fll forget me, when you go back to London. 

FLAM (aside). More than probable. (To her.) Never fear; you will be generally known as 
Rose the lovely, and I shall be universally denominated Flam the constant. 

 

Duet.?ROSE and SPARKINS FLAM.

 

FLAM.
 �fTis true I�fm caress�fd by the witty,
 
 
  
 The envy of all the fine beaux, 
 
 
 The pet of the court and the city, 
 
 
  
 But still I�fm the lover of Rose. 
 
 
  
  
 
ROSE.
 Country sweethearts, oh, how I despise! 
 
 
  
 And oh! how delighted I am 
 
 
 To think that I shine in the eyes 
 
 
  
 Of the elegant?sweet?Mr. Flam. 
 
 
  
  
 
FLAM. Allow me (offers to kiss her).
 
ROSE.
 Pray don�ft be so bold, sir. (Kisses her.) 
 
FLAM.
  
 What sweets on that honey�fd lip hang! 
 
ROSE.
 Your presumption, I know, I should scold, sir, 
 
 
  
 But I really can�ft scold Mr. Flam.
 
 
  
  
 
BOTH.
 Then let us be happy together, 
 
 
  
 Content with the world as it goes, 
 
 
 An unchangeable couple for ever, 
 
 
  
 Mr. Flam and his beautiful Rose. 
 

[Exeunt.

 

SCENE III.?The Farmer�fs Kitchen. A table and chairs.

 

Enter OLD BENSON and MARTIN.

 

BENSON. Well, Stokes. Now you have the opportunity you have desired, and we are 
alone, I am ready to listen to the information which you wished to communicate to my 
private ear. 

MARTIN. Exactly;?you said information, I think? 

BENSON. You said information, or I have forgotten. 

MARTIN. Just so, exactly; I said information. I did say information, why should I deny 
it? 

BENSON. I see no necessity for your doing so, certainly. Pray go on. 

MARTIN. Why, you see, my dear Mr. Benson, the fact is?won�ft you be seated? Pray sit 
down (brings forward two chairs;?they sit). There, now,?let me see,?where was I? 

BENSON. You were going to begin, I think. 

MARTIN. Oh,?ah!?so I was;?I hadn�ft begun, had I? 

BENSON. No, no! Pray begin again, if you had. 

MARTIN. Well, then, what I have got to say is not so much information, as a kind of 
advice, or suggestion, or hint, or something of that kind; and it relates to?eh??(looking 
very mysterious.) 

BENSON. What? 

MARTIN. Yes (nodding). Don�ft you think there�fs something wrong there? 

BENSON. Where? 

MARTIN. In that quarter. 

BENSON. In what quarter? Speak more plainly, sir. 

MARTIN. You know what a friendly feeling I entertain to your family. You know what a 
very particular friend of mine you are. You know how anxious I always am to prevent 
anything going wrong. 

BENSON. Well! (abruptly). 

MARTIN. Yes, I see you�fre very sensible of it, but I�fll take it for granted: you needn�ft 
bounce and fizz about, in that way, because it makes one nervous. Don�ft you think, now, 
don�ft you think, that ill-natured people may say;?don�ft be angry, you know, because if I 
wasn�ft a very particular friend of the family, I wouldn�ft mention the subject on any 
account;?don�ft you think that ill-natured people may say there�fs something wrong in 
the frequency of the Squire�fs visits here? 

BENSON (starting up furiously). What! 

MARTIN (aside). Here he goes again! 

BENSON. Who dares suspect my child? 

MARTIN. Ah, to be sure, that�fs exactly what I say. Who dares? Damme, I should like to 
see �fem! 

BENSON. Is it you? 

MARTIN. I! Bless you, no, not for the world! I!?Come, that�fs a good one. I only say what 
other people say, you know; that�fs all. 

BENSON. And what are these tales, that idle busy fools prate of with delight, among 
themselves, caring not whose ears they reach, so long as they are kept from the old man, 
whose blindness?the blindness of a fond and doting father?is subject for their rude 
and brutal jeering. What are they? 

MARTIN. Dear me, Mr. Benson, you keep me in a state of perpetual excitement. 

BENSON. Tell me, without equivocation, what do they say? 

MARTIN. Why, they say they think it?not exactly wrong, perhaps; don�ft fly out, 
now?but among those remarkable coincidences which do occur sometimes, that 
whenever you go out of your house, the Squire and his friend should come into it; that 
Miss Lucy and Miss Rose, in the long walks they take every day, should be met and 
walked home with by the same gentlemen; that long after you have gone to bed at night, 
the Squire and Mr. Sparkins Flam should still be seen hovering about the lane and 
meadow; and that one of the lattice windows should be always open, at that hour. 

BENSON. This is all? 

MARTIN. Ye?yes?yes, that�fs all. 

BENSON. Nothing beside? 

MARTIN. Eh? 

BENSON. Nothing beside? 

MARTIN. Why, there is something else, but I know you�fll begin to bounce about again, if 
I tell it you. 

BENSON. No, no! let me hear it all. 

MARTIN. Why, then, they do say that the Squire has been heard to boast that he had 
practised on Lucy�fs mind?that when he bid her, she would leave her father and her 
home, and follow him over the world. 

BENSON. They lie! Her breast is pure and innocent! Her soul is free from guilt; her 
mind from blemish. They lie! I�fll not believe it. Are they mad? Do they think that I stand 
tamely by, and look upon my child�fs disgrace? Heaven! do they know of what a father�fs 
heart is made? 

MARTIN. My dear Mr. Benson, if you? 

BENSON. This coarse and brutal boast shall be disowned. (Going; MARTIN stops him.) 

MARTIN. My dear Mr. Benson, you know it may not have been made after all,?my 
dear sir,? 

BENSON (struggling). Unhand me, Martin! Made, or not made, it has gone abroad, 
fixing an infamous notoriety on me and mine. I�fll hear its truth or falsehood from 
himself. (Breaks from him and exit.) 

MARTIN (solus). There�fll be something decidedly wrong here presently. Hallo! here�fs 
another very particular friend in a fume. 

 

Enter YOUNG BENSON hastily.

 

MARTIN. Ah! my dear fellow, how? 

YOUNG BENSON. Where is Lucy? 

MARTIN. I don�ft know, unless she has walked out with the Squire. 

YOUNG BENSON. The Squire! 

MARTIN. To be sure; she very often walks out with the Squire. Very pleasant recreation 
walking out with the Squire;?capital custom, an�ft it? 

YOUNG BENSON. Where�fs my father? 

MARTIN. Why, upon my word, I am unable to satisfy your curiosity in that particular 
either. All I know of him is that he whisked out of this room in a rather boisterous and 
turbulent manner for an individual at his time of life, some few seconds before you 
whisked in. But what�fs the matter??you seem excited. Nothing wrong, is there? 

YOUNG BENSON (aside). This treatment of Edmunds, and Lucy�fs altered behaviour to 
him, confirm my worst fears. Where is Mr. Norton? 

MARTIN (calling off). Ah! to be sure,?where is Mr. Norton? 

 

Enter SQUIRE.

 

SQUIRE. Mr. Norton is here. Who wishes to see him? 

MARTIN. To be sure, sir. Mr. Norton is here: who wishes to see him? 

YOUNG BENSON. I do. 

MARTIN. I don�ft. Old fellow, good-bye! Mr. Norton, good evening! (Aside.) There�fll be 
something wrong here, in a minute. 

[Exit. 

SQUIRE. Well, young man?

YOUNG BENSON. If you contemplate treachery here, Mr. Norton, look to yourself. My 
father is an old man; the chief prop of his declining years is his child,?my sister. For 
your actions here, sir, you shall render a dear account to me. 

SQUIRE. To you, peasant! 

YOUNG BENSON. To me, sir. One other scene like that enacted by your creature, at 
your command, to-night, may terminate more seriously to him. For your behaviour here 
you are responsible to me. 

SQUIRE. Indeed! Anything more, sir? 

YOUNG BENSON. Simply this:?after injuring the old man beyond reparation, and 
embittering the last moments of his life, you may possibly attempt to shield yourself 
under the paltry excuse, that, as a gentleman, you cannot descend to take the 
consequences from my hand. You shall take them from me, sir, if I strike you to the 
earth first. 

[Exit.

SQUIRE. Fiery and valorous, indeed! As the suspicions of the family are aroused, no 
time is to be lost: the girl must be carried off to-night, if possible. With Flam�fs assistance 
and management, she may be speedily removed from within the reach of these rustic 
sparks. In my cooler moments, the reflection of the misery I may inflict upon the old 
man makes my conduct appear base and dishonourable, even to myself. Pshaw! 
hundreds have done the same thing before me, who have been lauded and blazoned 
forth as men of honour. Honour in such cases,?an idle tale!?a by-word! Honour! There 
is much to be gleaned from old tales; and the legend of the child and the old man speaks 
but too truly. 

 

Song.?SQUIRE NORTON.

 

                      The child and the old man sat alone 

                             In the quiet peaceful shade

                      Of the old green boughs, that had richly grown 

                             In the deep thick forest glade. 

                      It was a soft and pleasant sound, 

                             That rustling of the oak; 

                      And the gentle breeze play�fd lightly round, 

                             As thus the fair boy spoke:? 

 

                      �eDear father, what can honour be, 

                             Of which I hear men rave? 

                      Field, cell and cloister, land and sea, 

                             The tempest and the grave:? 

                      It lives in all, �ftis sought in each, 

                             �fTis never heard or seen: 

                      Now tell me, father, I beseech, 

                             What can this honour mean?�f

 

                      �eIt is a name,?a name, my child,? 

                             It lived in other days, 

                      When men were rude, their passions wild, 

                             Their sport, thick battle-frays. 

                      When in armour bright, the warrior bold, 

                             Knelt to his lady�fs eyes: 

                      Beneath the abbey-pavement old 

                             That warrior�fs dust now lies. 

 

                      �eThe iron hearts of that old day 

                             Have moulder�fd in the grave; 

                      And chivalry has pass�fd away, 

                             With knights so true and brave;

                      The honour, which to them was life, 

                             Throbs in no bosom now; 

                      It only gilds the gambler�fs strife, 

                             Or decks the worthless vow.�f* 

 

Enter LUCY.

 

SQUIRE. Lucy, dear Lucy. 

LUCY. Let me entreat you not to stay here, sir! you will be exposed to nothing but insult 
and attack. Edmunds and my brother have both returned, irritated at something that 
has passed with my cousin Rose:?for my sake,?for my sake, Mr. Norton, spare me the 
pain of witnessing what will ensue, if they find you here. You little know what I have 
borne already. 

SQUIRE. For your sake, Lucy, I would do much; but why should I leave you to encounter 
the passion and ill-will, from which you would have me fly? 

LUCY. Oh, I can bear it, sir; I deserve it but too well. 

SQUIRE. Deserve it!?you do yourself an injustice, Lucy. No; rather let me remove you 
from a house where you will suffer nothing but persecution, and confer upon you a title 
which the proudest lady in the land might wear. Here?here, on my knees (he bends on 
his knee, and seizes her hand.) 

 

Enter FLAM.

 

SQUIRE (rising). Flam here!

FLAM (aside). Upon my word!?I thought we had been getting on pretty well in the 
open air, but they�fre beating us hollow here, under cover.

SQUIRE. Lucy, but one word, and I understand your decision.

LUCY. I?I?cannot subdue the feelings of uneasiness and distrust which the great 
difference between your honour�fs rank and mine awakens in my mind.

SQUIRE. Difference! Hundreds of such cases happen every day!

LUCY. Indeed!

SQUIRE. Oh, �ftis a matter of general notoriety,?isn�ft it, Flam?

FLAM. No doubt of it. (Aside.) Don�ft exactly know yet what they are talking about, 
though.

SQUIRE. A relation of my own, a man of exalted rank, courted a girl far his inferior in 
station but only beneath him in that respect. In all others she was on a footing of 
equality with himself, if not far above him.

LUCY. And were they married?

FLAM (aside). Rather an important circumstance in the case. I do remember that.

SQUIRE. They were,?after a time, when the resentment of his friends, occasioned by 
his forming such an attachment, had subsided, and he was able to acknowledge her, 
without involving the ruin of both.

LUCY. They were married privately at first, then?

FLAM (aside). I must put in a word here. Oh, yes, it was all comfortably arranged to 
everybody�fs satisfaction,?wasn�ft it, Norton?

SQUIRE. Certainly. And a happy couple they were, weren�ft they, Flam?

FLAM. Happiest of the happy. As happy as (aside)?a separation could make them.

SQUIRE. Hundreds of great people have formed similar attachments,?haven�ft they, 
Flam?

FLAM. Undoubtedly. There was the Right Honourable Augustus Frederick Charles 
Thomson Camharado, and the German Baron Hyfenstyfenlooberhausen, and they were 
both married?(aside) to somebody else, first. Not to mention Damask and I, who are 
models of constancy. By the bye, I have lost sight of her, and I am interrupting you. 
(Aside to SQUIRE, as he goes out.) I came to tell you that she is ripe for an elopement, if 
you urge her strongly. Edmunds has been reproaching her to my knowledge. She�fll 
consent while her passion lasts. 

[Exit

SQUIRE. Lucy, I wait your answer. One word from you, and a few hours will place you 
far beyond the reach of those who would fetter your choice and control your inclinations. 
You hesitate. Come, decide. The Squire�fs lady, or the wife of Edmunds! 

 

Duet.?LUCY and SQUIRE NORTON.

 

SQUIRE.
 In rich and lofty station shine,
 
 
  
 Before his jealous eyes:
 
 
 In golden splendour, lady mine,
 
 
  
 This peasant youth despise.
 
 
  
  
 
LUCY (apart: the SQUIRE regarding her attentively).
 
 
 Oh! It would be revenge indeed
 
 
  
 With scorn his glance to meet.
 
 
 I, I, his humble pleading heed!
 
 
  
 I�fd spurn him from my feet.
 
 
  
  
 
SQUIRE.
 With love and rage her bosom�fs torn,
 
 
  
 And rash the choice will be;
 
LUCY.
 With love and rage my bosom�fs torn,
 
 
  
 And rash the choice will be.
 
 
  
  
 
SQUIRE.
 From hence she quickly must be borne,
 
 
  
 Her home, her home, she�fll flee.
 
LUCY.
 Oh! long shall I have cause to mourn
 
 
  
 My home, my home, for thee!
 

 

Enter OLD BENSON.

 

BENSON. What do I see! The Squire and Lucy. 

SQUIRE. Listen. A chaise and four fleet horses, under the direction of a trusty friend of 
mine, will be in waiting on the high road, at the corner of the Elm-Tree avenue, to-night, 
at ten o�fclock. They shall bear you whither we can be safe, and in secret, by the first 
light of morning. 

LUCY. His cruel harshness;?it would be revenge, indeed. But my father?my poor old 
father! 

SQUIRE. Your father is prejudiced in Edmund�fs favour; and so long as he thinks there is 
any chance of your being his, he will oppose your holding communication with me. 
Situated as you are now, you only stand in the way of his wealth and advancement. 
Once fly with me, and in four and twenty hours you will be his pride, his boast, his 
support. 

 

OLD BENSON coming forward.

 

BENSON. It is a lie, a base lie!?(LUCY shrieks and throws herself at his feet.) My 
pride! my boast! She would be my disgrace, my shame: an outcast from her father�fs roof, 
and from the world. Support!?Support me with the gold coined in her infamy and guilt! 
Heaven help me! Have I cherished her for this! 

LUCY (clinging to him). Father!?dear, dear, father! 

SQUIRE. Hear me speak, Benson. Be calm. 

BENSON. Calm!?Do you know that from infancy I have almost worshipped her, 
fancying that I saw in her young mind the virtues of a mother, to whom the anguish of 
this one hour would have been worse than death! Calm!?Do you know that I have a 
heart and soul within me; or do you believe that because I am of lower station, I am a 
being of a different order from yourself, and that Nature has denied me thought and 
feeling! Calm! Man, do you know that I am this girl�fs father? 

SQUIRE. Benson, if you will not hear me, at least do not, by hastily exposing this 
matter, deprive me of the inclination of making you some reparation. 

BENSON. Reparation! You need be thankful, sir, for the grasp she has upon my arm. 
Money! If she were dying for want, and the smallest coin from you could restore her to 
life and health, sooner than she should take it from your hand, I would cast her from a 
sick bed to perish on the road-side. 

SQUIRE. Benson, a word. 

BENSON. Do not, I caution you; do not talk to me, sir. I am an old man, but I do not 
know what passion may make me do. 

SQUIRE. These are high words, Benson. A farmer! 

BENSON. Yes, sir; a farmer, one of the men on whom you, and such as you, depend for 
the money they squander in profligacy and idleness. A farmer, sir! I care not for your 
long pedigree of ancestors,?my forefathers made them all. Here, neighbours, friends! 
(ROSE, MADDOX, STOKES, Villagers, etc., crowd on the stage.) Hear this, hear this! 
your landlord, a high-born gentleman, entering the houses of your humble farmers, and 
tempting their daughters to destruction! 

 

Enter YOUNG BENSON and GEORGE EDMUNDS.

 

YOUNG BENSON. What�fs that I hear? (rushing towards the SQUIRE, STOKES 
interposes). 

MARTIN. Hallo, hallo! Take hold of the other one, John. (MADDOX and he remove 
them to opposite sides of the stage.) Hold him tight, John, hold him tight. Stand still, 
there�fs a good fellow. Keep back, Squire. Knew there�fd be something wrong,?ready to 
come in at the nick of time,?capital custom. 

 

FLAM enters and stands next the SQUIRE.

 

SQUIRE. Exposed, baited! Benson, are you mad? Within the last few hours my friend 
here has been attacked and insulted on the very land you hold, by a person in your 
employ and young Edmunds there. I, too, have been threatened and insulted in the 
presence of my tenantry and workmen. Take care you do not drive me to extremities. 
Remember?the lease of this farm for seventy years, which your father took of mine, 
expires to-morrow; and that I have the power to refuse its renewal. Again I ask you, are 
you mad? 

BENSON. Quit my house, villain! 

SQUIRE. Villain! quit my house, then. This farm is mine: and you and yours shall 
depart from under its roof, before the sun has set to-morrow. (BENSON sinks into a 
chair in centre, and covers his face with his hands.) 

 

Sestet and Chorus.

LUCY?ROSE?EDMUNDS?SQUIRE NORTON?FLAM?

YOUNG BENSON?and Chorus.

 

YOUNG BENSON. Turn him from the farm! From his home will you cast 

                             The old man who has till�fd it for years? 

                      Every tree, every flower, is link�fd with the past, 

                             And a friend of his childhood appears.

                      Turn him from the farm! O�fer its grassy hill-side, 

                             A gay boy he once loved to range; 

                      His boyhood has fled, and its dear friends are dead, 

                             But these meadows have never known change. 

 

EDMUNDS.     Oppressor, hear me. 

LUCY.                                                 On my knees I implore

SQUIRE.                 I command it, and you will obey.

ROSE.             Rise, dear Lucy, rise; you shall not kneel before 

                              The tyrant who drives us away. 

SQUIRE.          Your sorrows are useless, your prayers are in vain;

                              I command it and you will begone.

                      I�fll hear no more. 

EDMUNDS.                                         No, they shall not beg again, 

                      Of a man whom I view with deep scorn. 

FLAM. Do not yield. 

YOUNG BENSON.
 Leave the farm!
 
SQUIRE.
 
LUCY.
 
ROSE.
 

EDMUNDS.                                         Your power I despise. 

SQUIRE. And your threats, boy, I disregard too. 

FLAM. Do not yield. 

YOUNG BENSON.
 Leave the farm!
 
SQUIRE.
 
LUCY.
 
ROSE.
 

ROSE.                                                 If he leaves it, he dies. 

EDMUNDS. This base act, proud man, you shall rue. 

YOUNG BENSON. Turn him from the farm! From his home will you cast

                             The old man who has till�fd it for years?

                      Every tree, every flower, is linked with the past, 

                             And a friend of his childhood appears! 

SQUIRE. Yes, yes, leave the farm! From his home I will cast, 

                             The old man who has till�fd it for years; 

                      Though each tree and flower is link�fd with the past, 

                             And a friend of his childhood appears. 

 

Chorus.

 

                      He has turn�fd from his farm, from his home he has cast

                             The old man who has till�fd it for years; 

                      Though each tree and flower is link�fd with the past, 

                             And a friend of his childhood appears. 

 

END OF THE FIRST ACT

 

ACT II.

 

SCENE I.?An Apartment in the Hall. A breakfast-table, with urn and tea-service. A 
Livery Servant arranging it. FLAM in a morning gown and slippers, reclining on the 
sofa.

 

FLAM. Is the Squire out of bed yet? 

SERVANT. Yes, sir, he will be down directly. 

FLAM. Any letters from London? 

SERVANT. One for your honour, that the man brought over from the market-town, this 
morning. 

FLAM. Give it me, blockhead! (Servant gives it, and exit.) Never like the look of a great 
official-folded letter, with a large seal, it�fs always an unpleasant one. Talk of discovering 
a man�fs character from his handwriting!?I�fll back myself against any odds to form a 
very close guess at the contents of a letter from the form into which it is folded. This, 
now, I should say, is a decidedly hostile fold. Let us see?�eKing�fs Bench 
Walk?September 1st, 1729. Sir, I am instructed by my client, Mr. Edward Montague, to 
apply to you?(the old story?for the immediate payment, I suppose?what�fs this?)?to 
apply to you for the instant restitution of the sum of two hundred and fifty pounds, his 
son lost to you at play; and to acquaint you, that unless it is immediately forwarded to 
my office, as above, the circumstances of the transaction will be made known; and the 
unfair and fraudulent means by which you deprived the young man of his money, 
publicly advertised.?I am, Sir, your obedient Servant, John Ellis.�f The devil! who would 
believe now, that such a trifling circumstance as the mere insinuation of a small piece of 
gold into the corner of two dice would influence a man�fs destiny! What�fs to be done? If, 
by some dexterous stroke, I could manage to curry favour with Norton, and procure 
some handsome present in return for services rendered,?for �ework and labour done and 
performed,�f as my obedient servant, John Ellis, would say, I might keep my head above 
water yet. I have it! He shall have a joyful surprise. I�fll carry this girl off for him, and he 
shall know nothing of the enterprise until it is completed, or at least till she is fairly off. 
I have been well rewarded for similar services before, and may securely calculate on his 
gratitude in the present instance. He is here. (Puts up the letter.) 

 

Enter SQUIRE NORTON.

 

SQUIRE (seating himself at table). Has any application for permission to remain on the 
farm been made from Benson, this morning, Flam? 

FLAM. None. 

SQUIRE. I am very sorry for it, although I admire the old man�fs independent spirit. I 
am very sorry for it. Wrong as I know I have been, I would rather that the first 
concession came from him. 

FLAM. Concession! 

SQUIRE. The more I reflect upon the occurrences of yesterday, Flam, the more I regret 
that, under the influence of momentary passion and excitement, I should have used so 
uncalled-for a threat against my father�fs oldest tenant. It is an act of baseness to which 
I look back with abhorrence. 

FLAM (aside). What weathercock morality is this! 

SQUIRE. It was unnecessary violence. 

FLAM. Unnecessary! Oh, certainly; no doubt you could have attained your object 
without it, and can still. There is no occasion to punish the old man. 

SQUIRE. Nor will I. He shall not leave the farm, if I myself implore, and beg him to 
remain. 

 

Enter Servant.

 

SERVANT. Two young women to speak with your honour. 

 

Enter LUCY and ROSE.

 

SQUIRE. Lucy! 

FLAM (aside). She must be carried off to-night, or she certainly will save me the trouble, 
and I shall lose the money. 

LUCY. Your honour may be well surprised to see me here, after the events of yesterday. 
It has cost me no trifling struggle to take this step, but I hope my better feelings have at 
length prevailed, and conquered my pride and weakness. I wish to speak to your honour, 
with nobody by. 

FLAM (aside). Nobody by! I rather suspect I�fm not particularly wanted here. (To them.) 
Pray allow us to retire for a few moments. Rose, my dear. 

ROSE. Well! 

FLAM. Come along. 

LUCY. Rose will remain here, I brought her for that purpose. 

FLAM. Bless me! that�fs very odd. As you please, of course, but I really think you�fll find 
her very much in the way. (Aside.) Acting propriety! So much the better for my purpose; 
a little coyness will enhance the value of the prize.

[Exit FLAM.

LUCY. Mr. Norton, I come here to throw myself upon your honourable feelings, as a man 
and as a gentleman. Oh, sir! now that my eyes are opened to the misery into which I 
have plunged myself, by my own ingratitude and treachery, do not?do not add to it the 
reflection that I have driven my father in his old age from the house where he was born, 
and in which he hoped to have died. 

SQUIRE. Be calm, Lucy; your father shall continue to hold the farm; the lease shall be 
renewed. 

LUCY. I have more to say to your honour still, and what I have to add may even induce 
your honour to retract the promise you have just now made me. 

SQUIRE. Lucy! what can you mean? 

LUCY. Oh, sir! call me coquette, faithless, treacherous, deceitful, what you will; I 
deserve it all;?but believe me, I speak the truth when I make the humiliating avowal. A 
weak, despicable vanity induced me to listen with a ready ear to your honour�fs 
addresses, and to cast away the best and noblest heart that ever woman won. 

SQUIRE. Lucy, �ftwas but last night you told me that your love for Edmunds had 
vanished into air; that you hated and despised him. 

LUCY. I know it, sir, too well. He laid bare my own guilt, and showed me the ruin which 
impended over me. He spoke the truth. Your honour more than confirmed him. 

SQUIRE (after a pause). Even the avowal you have just made, unexpected as it is, shall 
not disturb my resolution. Your father shall not leave the farm. 

 

Quartet.

 

LUCY?ROSE?SQUIRE NORTON, and afterwards YOUNG 

BENSON.

 

          SQUIRE. Hear me, when I swear that the farm is your own 

                 Through all changes Fortune may make; 

          The base charge of falsehood I never have known; 

                 This promise I never will break. 

ROSE and LUCY. Hear him, when he swears that the farm is our own 

                 Through all changes Fortune may make; 

          The base charge of falsehood he never has known; 

                 This promise he never will break. 

 

Enter YOUNG BENSON.

 

YOUNG BENSON. My sister here! Lucy! begone, I command. 

SQUIRE. To your home I restore you again. 

YOUNG BENSON. No boon I�fll accept from that treacherous hand 

                  As the price of my sister�fs fair fame. 

SQUIRE. To your home! 

YOUNG BENSON (to LUCY.)    Hence away! 

LUCY.                                                             Brother dear, I 
obey. 

SQUIRE. I restore. 

YOUNG BENSON.                    Hence away! 

YOUNG BENSON, ROSE and LUCY.                  Let us leave. 

LUCY. He swears it, dear brother. 

SQUIRE.                                                          I swear it. 

YOUNG BENSON.                                                                    
Away! 

SQUIRE. I swear it. 

YOUNG BENSON.        You swear to deceive. 

SQUIRE. Hear me, when I swear that the farm is your own 

          Through all changes Fortune may make. 

LUCY and ROSE. Hear him when he swears that the farm is our own.

          Through all changes Fortune may make. 

YOUNG BENSON. Hear him swear, hear him swear, that the farm is our own 

          Through all changes Fortune may make. 

SQUIRE. The base charge of falsehood I never have known, 

          This promise I never will break. 

LUCY and ROSE. The base charge of falsehood he never has known, 

                                  This promise he never will break. 

YOUNG BENSON. The base charge of falsehood he often has known

                                  This promise he surely will break. 

[Exeunt omnes.

 

Re-enter FLAM, in a walking-dress.

 

FLAM. The coast is clear at last. What on earth the conversation can have been, at 
which Rose was wanted, and I was not, I confess my inability to comprehend; but away 
with speculation, and now to business.?(Rings.)

 

Enter Servant.

 

       Pen and ink. 

SERVANT. Yes, sir. 

[Exit Servant.

FLAM (solus). Nearly all the tenantry will be assembled here at the ball to-night; and if 
the father of this rustic Dulcinea is reinstated in his farm, he and his people will no 
doubt be among the number. It will be easy enough to entice the girl into the garden, 
through the window opening on the lawn; a chaise can be waiting in the quiet lane at 
the side, and some trusty fellow can slip a hasty note into Norton�fs hands informing him 
of the flight, and naming the place at which he can join us. (Re-enter Servant with pen, 
ink, taper and two sheets of notepaper; he places them on the table and exit.) I may as 
well reply to my friend Mr. John Ellis�fs obliging favour now, too, by promising that the 
money shall be forwarded in the course of three days�f post. (Takes the letter from his 
pocket, and lays it on the table.) Lie you there. First, for Norton�fs note.?�eDear 
Norton,?knowing your wishes?seized the girl?no blame attach to you. Join us as soon 
as people have dispersed in search of her in all directions but the right one,?fifteen 
miles off.�f (Folds it ready for an envelope and lays it by the side of the other letter.) Now 
for John Ellis. Why, what does the rascal mean by bringing but two sheets of paper? No 
matter: that affair will keep cool till to-morrow, when I have less business on my hands, 
and more money in my pockets, I hope. (Crumples the letter he has just written, hastily 
up, thrusts it into his pocket, and folds the wrong one in the envelope. As he is sealing it 

 

Enter MARTIN, very cautiously.

 

MARTIN (peeping). There he is, hatching some mysterious and diabolical plot. If I can 
only get to the bottom of these dreadful designs, I shall immortalise myself. What a 
lucky dog I am, to be such a successful gleaner of news, and such a confidential person 
into the bargain, as to be the first to hear that he wanted some trustworthy person. All 
comes of talking to everybody I meet, and drawing out everything they hear. Capital 
custom! He don�ft see me. Hem! (Coughs very loud, and when FLAM looks round, nods 
familiarly.) How are you again? 

FLAM. How am I again! Who the devil are you??and what do you want here? 

MARTIN. Hush! 

FLAM. Eh? 

MARTIN. Hush! I�fm the man. 

FLAM. The man! 

MARTIN. Yes, the man that you asked the ostler at the George to recommend you; the 
trustworthy man that knows all the by-roads well, and can keep a secret; the man that 
you wanted to lend you a hand in a job that? 

FLAM. Hush, hush! 

MARTIN. Oh! you�fre beginning to hush now, are you? 

FLAM. Haven�ft I seen your face before? 

MARTIN. To be sure you have. You recollect admiring my manners at Benson�fs 
yesterday. You must remember Mr. Martin Stokes. You can�ft have forgotten him?not 
possible! 

FLAM (aside). A friend of Benson!?a dangerous rencontre. Another moment, and our 
conversation might have taken an awkward turn. (To him.) So you are Stokes, eh? 
Benson�fs friend Stokes? 

MARTIN. To be sure. Ha, ha! I knew you couldn�ft have forgotten me. Pleasant Stokes 
they call me, clever Stokes sometimes;?but that�fs flattery. 

FLAM. No, surely. 

MARTIN. Yes, �fpon my life! it is. Can�ft bear flattery,?don�ft like it at all. 

FLAM. Well, Mr. Stokes? 

MARTIN (aside). Now for the secret. 

FLAM. I am very sorry you have had the trouble of coming up here, Mr. Stokes, because 
I have changed my plan, and shall not require your valuable services. (Goes up to the 
table.) 

MARTIN (aside). Something wrong here: try him again. You�fre sure you don�ft want me? 

FLAM. Quite. 

MARTIN. That�fs unlucky, because, as I have quarrelled with Benson? 

FLAM. Quarrelled with Benson! 

MARTIN. What! didn�ft you know that? 

FLAM. Never heard of it. Now I think of it, Mr. Stokes, I shall want your assistance. 
Pray, sit down, Mr. Stokes. 

MARTIN. With pleasure. (They sit.) I say, I thought you wanted me. 

FLAM. Ah! you�fre a sharp fellow. 

MARTIN. You don�ft mean that? 

FLAM. I do, indeed. 

MARTIN (aside). You would, if you knew all. 

FLAM (aside). Conceited hound! 

MARTIN (aside). Poor devil! 

FLAM. Mr. Stokes, I needn�ft impress upon a gentleman of your intelligence, the 
necessity of secrecy in this matter. 

MARTIN. Of course not: see all?say nothing. Capital custom:?(aside) not mine though. 
Go on. 

FLAM. You wouldn�ft mind playing Benson a trick,?just a harmless trick?

MARTIN. Certainly not. Go on.

FLAM. I�fll trust you.

MARTIN. So you may. Go on.

FLAM. A chaise and four will be waiting to-night, at ten o�fclock precisely, at the little 
gate that opens from the garden into the lane. 

MARTIN. No: will it though? Go on.

FLAM. Don�ft interrupt me, Stokes. Into that chaise you must assist me in forcing as 
quickly as possible and without noise? 

MARTIN. Yes. Go on.

FLAM. Whom do you think?

MARTIN. Don�ft know.

FLAM. Can�ft you guess whom? 

MARTIN. No. 

FLAM. Try. 

MARTIN. Eh! what!?Miss? 

FLAM. Hush, hush! You understand me, I see. Not another word; not another syllable. 

MARTIN. But do you really mean to run away with? 

FLAM (stopping his mouth). You understand me;?that�fs quite sufficient. 

MARTIN (aside). He�fs going to run away with Rose. Why if I hadn�ft found this out, John 
Maddox,?one of my most particular friends,?would have gone stark, staring, raving 
mad with grief. (To him.) But what will become of Miss Lucy, when she has lost Rose? 

FLAM. No matter. We cannot take them both, without the certainty of an immediate 
discovery. Meet me at the corner of the avenue, before the ball commences, and I will 
communicate any further instructions I may have to give you. Meanwhile take this 
(gives him money) as an earnest of what you shall receive when the girl is secured. 
Remember, silence and secrecy. 

MARTIN. Silence and secrecy, (exit FLAM)?confidence and two guineas. I am perfectly 
bewildered with this tremendous secret. What shall I do? Where shall I go??To my 
particular friend, old Benson, or young Benson, or George Edmunds? or?no; I�fll go and 
paralyse my particular friend, John Maddox. Not a moment is to be lost. I am all in a 
flutter. Run away with Rose! I suppose he�fll run away with Lucy next. I shouldn�ft 
wonder. Run away with Rose! I never did?

[Exit hastily.

SCENE II.?An open spot in the Village.

 

Enter SQUIRE NORTON.

 

SQUIRE. My mind is made up. This girl has opened her whole heart to me; and it would 
be worse than villainy to pursue her further. I will seek out Benson and Edmunds, and 
endeavour to repair the mischief my folly has occasioned. I have sought happiness in the 
dissipation of crowded cities, in vain. A country life offers health and cheerfulness; and a 
country life shall henceforth be mine, in all seasons. 

 

Song.?SQUIRE NORTON.

 

          There�fs a charm in Spring, when everything 

                 Is bursting from the ground; 

          When pleasant showers bring forth the flowers, 

                 And all is life around. 

 

          In summer day, the fragrant hay 

                 Most sweetly scents the breeze; 

          And all is still, save murmuring rill, 

                 Or sound of humming bees. 

 

          Old Autumn come, with trusty gun 

                 In quest of birds we roam: 

          Unerring aim, we mark the game, 

                 And proudly bear it home. 

 

          A winter�fs night has its delight, 

                 Well warm�fd to bed we go; 

          A winter�fs day, we�fre blithe and gay, 

                 Snipe-shooting in the snow. 

 

          A country life without the strife 

                 And noisy din of town, 

          Is all I need, I take no heed

                 Of splendour or renown. 

 

          And when I die, oh, let me lie 

                 Where trees above me wave; 

          Let wild plants bloom, around my tomb, 

                 My quiet country grave! 

[Exit.

 

SCENE III.?The Rick-yard. Same as ACT I. SCENE I.

 

EDMUNDS and MADDOX meeting.

 

JOHN. Ah, George! Why this is kind to come down to the old farm to-day, and take one 
peep at us, before we leave it for ever. I suppose it�fs fancy, now, George, but to my 
thinking I never saw the hedges look so fresh, the fields so rich, or the old house so 
pretty and comfortable, as they do this morning. It�fs fancy that, George,?an�ft it? 

EDMUNDS. It�fs a place you may well be fond of, and attached to, for it�fs the prettiest 
spot in all the country round. 

JOHN. Ah! you always enter into my feelings; and speaking of that, I want to ask your 
advice about Rose. I meant to come up to you to-day, on purpose. Do you think she is 
fond of me, George? 

EDMUNDS (smiling). What do you think? She has not shown any desperate warmth of 
affection, of late, has she? 

JOHN. No?no, she certainly has not, but she used to once, and the girl has got a good 
heart after all; and she came crying to me, this morning, in the little paddock, and 
somehow or other, my heart melted towards her; and?and?there�fs something very 
pleasant about her manner,?isn�ft there, George? 

EDMUNDS. No doubt of it, as other people besides ourselves would appear to think. 

JOHN. You mean Mr. Flam? (EDMUNDS nods assent.) Ah! it�fs a bad business, 
altogether; but still there are some excuses to be made for a young country girl, who has 
never seen a town gentleman before, and can�ft be expected to know as well as you and I, 
George, what the real worth of one is. However that may be, Rose came into the little 
paddock this morning, as I was standing there, looking at the young colts, and thinking 
of all our misfortunes; and first of all she walked by me, and then she stopped at a little 
distance, and then she walked back, and stopped again; and I heard her sobbing as if 
her heart would burst: and then she came a little nearer, and at last she laid her hand 
upon my arm, and looked up in my face: and the tears started into my eyes, George, and 
I couldn�ft bear it any longer, for I thought of the many pleasant days we had been happy 
together, and it hurt me to think that she should ever have done anything to make her 
afraid of me, or me unkind to her. 

EDMUNDS. You�fre a good fellow, John, an excellent fellow. Take her; I believe her to 
have an excellent disposition, though it is a little disguised by girlish levity 
sometimes;?you may safely take her,?if she had far less good feeling than she actually 
possesses, she could never abuse your kind and affectionate nature. 

JOHN. Is that your advice? give me your hand, George (they shake hands), I will take 
her. You shall dance at our wedding, and I don�ft quite despair yet of dancing at yours, at 
the same time. 

EDMUNDS. At mine! Where is the old man? I came here to offer him the little cottage 
in the village, which belongs to me. There is no tenant in it now: it has a pretty garden, 
of which I know he is fond, and it may serve his turn till he has had time to look about 
him. 

JOHN. He is somewhere about the farm; walk with me across the yard, and perhaps we 
may meet him?this way. 

[Exeunt.

 

Enter YOUNG BENSON.

 

YOUNG BENSON. The worst portion of the poor old man�fs hard trial is past. I have 
lingered with him in every field on the land, and wandered through every room in the 
old house. I can neither blame his grief, nor console him in his affliction, for the farm 
has been the happy scene of my birth and boyhood; and I feel, in looking on it, for the 
last time, as if I were leaving the dearest friends of my youth, for ever. 

 

Song.?YOUNG BENSON.

 

                      My fair home is no longer mine; 

                             From its roof-tree I�fm driven away,

                      Alas! who will tend the old vine, 

                             Which I planted in infancy�fs day! 

                      The garden, the beautiful flowers, 

                             The oak with its branches on high, 

                      Dear friends of my happiest hours, 

                             Among ye, I long hoped to die. 

                      The briar, the moss, and the bramble, 

                             Along the green paths will run wild: 

                      The paths where I once used to ramble, 

                             An innocent, light-hearted child. 

 

At the conclusion of the song enter to the symphony OLD 

BENSON, with LUCY and ROSE.

 

YOUNG BENSON (advancing to meet him). Come, father, come! 

OLD BENSON. I am ready, boy. We have but to walk a few steps, and the pang of 
leaving is over. Come, Rose, bring on that unhappy girl; come! 

 

As they are going, enter the SQUIRE, who meets them.

 

SQUIRE. I am in time. 

BENSON (to YOUNG BENSON, who is advancing). Harry, stand back. Mr. Norton, if by 
this visit you intend to mock the misery you have inflicted here, it is a heartless insult 
that might have been spared. 

SQUIRE. You do me an injustice, Benson. I come here,?not to insult your grief, but to 
entreat, implore you, to remain. The lease of this farm shall be renewed;?I beseech you 
to remain here. 

BENSON. It is not the quitting even the home of my infancy, which most men love, that 
bows my spirit down to-day. Here, in this old house, for near two hundred years, my 
ancestors have lived and died, and left their names behind them free from spot or 
blemish. I am the first to cross its threshold with the brand of infamy upon me. Would to 
God I had been borne from its porch a senseless corpse many weary years ago, so that I 
had been spared this hard calamity! You have moved an old man�fs weakness, but not 
with your revenge, sir. You implore me to remain here. I spurn your offer. Here! A father 
yielding to the destroyer of his child�fs good name and honour! Say no more, sir. Let me 
pass. 

 

Enter, behind, STOKES and EDMUNDS.

 

SQUIRE. Benson, you are guilty of the foulest injustice, not to me, but to your daughter. 
After her fearless confession to me this morning of her love for Edmunds, and her 
abhorrence of my professions, I honour her too much to injure her, or you. 

LUCY. Dear father, it is true indeed. The noble behaviour of his honour to me, this 
morning, I can never forget, or be too grateful for. 

BENSON. Thank God! thank God! I can look upon her once again. My child! my own 
child! (he embraces her with great emotion.) I have done your honour wrong, and I hope 
you�fll forgive me. (They shake hands.) 

MARTIN (running forward). So have I! so have I! I have done his honour wrong, and I 
hope he�fll forgive me too. You don�ft leave the farm, then? Hurrah! (A man carrying a pail, 
some harness, etc., crosses the stage.) Hallo, young fellow! go back, go back! don�ft take 
another thing away, and bring back all you have carried off; they are going to stop in the 
farm. Hallo! you fellows! (Calling off.) Leave the barn alone, and put everything in its 
place. They are going to stop in the farm. 

[Exit bawling.

BENSON (seeing EDMUNDS). What! George here, and turning away from his old 
friend, too, without a look of congratulation or a shake of the hand, just at the time, 
when of all others, he had the best right to expect it! For shame, George, for shame! 

EDMUNDS. My errand here is rendered useless. By accident, and not intentionally, I 
partly overheard just now the nature of the avowal made by your daughter to Mr. 
Norton this morning. 

BENSON. You believe it, George. You cannot doubt its truth. 

EDMUNDS. I do believe it. But I have been hurt, slighted, set aside for another. My 
honest love has been despised; my affection has been remembered, only to be tried 
almost beyond endurance. Lucy, all this from you I freely forgive. Be what you have 
been once, and what you may so well become again. Be the high-souled woman; not the 
light and thoughtless trifler that disgraces the name. Let me see you this, and you are 
mine again. Let me see you what you have been of late, and I never can be yours! 

BENSON. Lead her in, Rose. Come, dear, come! (The BENSONS and ROSE lead her 
slowly away.) 

EDMUNDS. Mr. Norton, if this altered conduct be sincere, it deserves a much better 
return than my poor thanks can ever be to you. If it be feigned, to serve some purposes 
of your own, the consequences will be upon your head. 

SQUIRE. And I shall be prepared to meet them. 

 

Duet.?SQUIRE NORTON and EDMUNDS.

 

SQUIRE.          Listen, though I do not fear you, 

                      Listen to me, ere we part. 

 

EDMUNDS.     List to you! Yes, I will hear you. 

 

SQUIRE.          Yours alone is Lucy�fs heart, 

                      I swear it, by that Heaven above me. 

 

EDMUNDS.     What! can I believe my ears! 

                      Could I hope that she still loves me! 

 

SQUIRE.          Banish all these doubts and fears, 

                      If a love were e�fer worth gaining, 

                      If love were ever fond and true, 

                      No disguise or passion feigning, 

                      Such is her young love for you. 

 

                      Listen, though I do not fear you, 

                      Listen to me ere we part. 

 

EDMUNDS.     List to you! yes, I will hear you, 

                      Mine alone is her young heart. 

[Exeunt severally.

 

SCENE IV.?The avenue leading to the Hall, by moonlight. 

The house in the distance, gaily illuminated.

 

Enter FLAM and MARTIN.

 

FLAM. You have got the letter I gave you for the Squire? 

MARTIN. All right. Here it is. 

FLAM. The moment you see me leave the room, slip it into the Squire�fs hand; you can 
easily do so, without being recognised, in the confusion of the dance, and then follow me. 
You perfectly understand your instructions? 

MARTIN. Oh, yes,?I understand them well enough. 

FLAM. There�fs nothing more, then, that you want to know? 

MARTIN. No, nothing,?oh, yes there is. I want to know whether?whether? 

FLAM. Well, go on. 

MARTIN. Whether you could conveniently manage to let me have another couple of 
guineas, before you go away in the chaise. Payment beforehand,?capital custom. And if 
you don�ft, perhaps I may not get them at all, you know: (aside) seeing that I don�ft intend 
to go at all, I think it�fs very likely. 

FLAM. You�fre a remarkably pleasant fellow, Stokes, in general 
conversation,?very,?but when you descend into particularities, you become 
excessively prosy. On some points,?money-matters for instance,?you have a very 
grasping imagination, and seem disposed to dilate upon them at too great a length. You 
must cure yourself of this habit,?you must indeed. Good-bye, Stokes; you shall have the 
two guineas doubled when the journey is completed. Remember,?ten o�fclock. 

[Exit FLAM.

MARTIN. I shan�ft forget ten o�fclock, depend upon it. Now to burst upon my particular 
friend, Mr. John Maddox, with the awful disclosure. He must pass this way on his road 
to the Hall. Here they come,?don�ft see him though. (Groups of male and female 
Villagers in cloaks, etc., cross the stage on their way to the Hall.) 

MARTIN. How are you, Tom? How do, Will? 

VILLAGERS. How do, Mas�fr Stokes? 

MARTIN (shaking hands with them). How do, Susan? Mind, Cary, you�fre my first 
partner. Always kiss your first partner,?capital custom. (Kisses her.) Good-bye! See you 
up at the Hall. 

VILLAGERS. Ay, ay, Mas�fr Stokes.

[Exeunt Villagers.

MARTIN. Not among them. (More Villagers cross.) Nor them. Here he comes:?Rose 
with him too,?innocent little victim, little thinking of the atrocious designs that are 
going on against her! 

 

Enter MADDOX and ROSE, arm-in-arm.

 

JOHN. Ha, ha, ha! that was a good �fun,?wasn�ft it? Ah! Martin, I wish I�fd seen you a 
minute ago. I made such a joke! How you would ha�f laughed! 

MARTIN (mysteriously beckoning MADDOX away from ROSE, and whispering). I want 
to speak to you. 

JOHN (whispering). What about? 

ROSE. Lor�f! don�ft stand whispering there, John. If you have anything to say, Mr. Stokes, 
say it before me. 

JOHN (taking her arm). Ah! say it before her! Don�ft mind her, Martin; she�fs to be my 
wife, you know, and we�fre to be on the mutual-confidence principle; an�ft we,?Rose? 

ROSE. To be sure. Why don�ft you speak, Mr. Stokes? I suppose it�fs the old 
story,?something wrong. 

MARTIN. Something wrong! I rather think there is; and you little know what it is, or 
you wouldn�ft look so merry. What I have got to say?don�ft be frightened, Miss 
Rose,?relates to?don�ft alarm yourself, Master Maddox. 

JOHN. I an�ft alarming myself; you�fre alarming me. Go on! 

ROSE. Go on!?can�ft you?

MARTIN. Relates to Mr. Flam. 

JOHN (dropping ROSE�fS arm). Mr. Flam! 

MARTIN. Hush!?and Miss Rose. 

ROSE. Me! Me and Mr. Flam! 

MARTIN. Mr. Flam intends at ten o�fclock, this very night,?don�ft be frightened, 
Miss,?by force, in secret, and in a chaise and four, too,?to carry off, against her will, 
and elope with, Miss Rose. 

ROSE. Me! Oh! (Screams, and falls into the arms of MADDOX.) 

JOHN. Rub her hands, Martin, she�fs going off in a fit. 

MARTIN. Never mind; she�fd better go off in a fit than a chaise. 

ROSE (recovering). Oh, John! don�ft let me go. 

JOHN. Let you go!?not if I set the whole Hall on fire. 

ROSE. Hold me fast, John. 

JOHN. I�fll hold you fast enough, depend upon it. 

ROSE. Come on the other side of me, Mr. Stokes: take my arm; hold me tight, Mr. 
Stokes. 

MARTIN. Don�ft be frightened, I�fll take care of you. (Takes her arm.) 

ROSE. Oh! Mr. Stokes. 

MARTIN. Oh, indeed! Nothing wrong,?eh? 

ROSE. Oh! Mr. Stokes,?pray forgive my having doubted that there was?Oh! what a 
dreadful thing! What is to be done with me? 

MARTIN. Upon my word, I don�ft know. I think we had better shut her up in some place 
under ground,?hadn�ft we, John??or, stay,?suppose we borrow the keys of the family 
vault, and lock her up there, for an hour or two. 

JOHN. Capital! 

ROSE. Lor�f! surely you may find out some more agreeable place than that, John. 

MARTIN. I have it.?I�fm to carry her off. 

BOTH. You! 

MARTIN. Me,?don�ft be afraid of me:?all my management. You dance with her all the 
evening, and I�fll keep close to you. If anybody tries to get her away, you knock him 
down,?and I�fll help you. 

JOHN. That�fs the plan;?come along. 

ROSE. Oh, I am so frightened! Hold me fast, Mr. Stokes,?Don�ft let me go, John! 

[Exeunt, talking.

 

Enter LUCY.

 

LUCY. Light-hearted revellers! how I envy them! How painful is my situation,?obliged 
with a sad heart to attend a festivity, from which the only person I would care to meet 
will, I know, be absent. But I will not complain. He shall see that I can become worthy of 
him, once again. I have lingered here so long, watching the soft shades of evening as 
they closed around me, that I cannot bear the thought of exchanging this beautiful 
scene for the noise and glare of a crowded room.

 

Song.?LUCY.

 

                             How beautiful at even-tide 

                      To see the twilight shadows pale, 

                             Steal o�fer the landscape, far and wide, 

                      O�fer stream and meadow, mound and dale. 

                             How soft is Nature�fs calm repose 

                      When evening skies their cool dews weep: 

                             The gentlest wind more gently blows, 

                      As if to soothe her in her sleep! 

                                     The gay morn breaks, 

                                            Mists roll away, 

                                     All Nature awakes 

                                            To glorious day. 

                                     In my breast alone 

                                            Dark shadows remain; 

                                     The peace it has known 

                                            It can never regain. 

 

SCENE THE LAST.?A spacious ball-room, brilliantly illuminated. A window at the end, 
through which is seen a moonlit landscape. A large concourse of country people, 
discovered.?The SQUIRE,?FLAM,?the BENSONS,?LUCY,?ROSE,?MARTIN, 
and MADDOX.

 

SQUIRE. Welcome, friends, welcome all! Come, choose your partners, and begin the 
dance. 

FLAM (to LUCY) Your hand, for the dance? 

LUCY. Pray excuse me, sir; I am not well. My head is oppressed and giddy. I would 
rather sit by the window which looks into the garden, and feel the cool evening air. (She 
goes up. He follows her.) 

JOHN (aside). Stand by me, Martin. He�fs gone to order the chaise, perhaps. 

ROSE. Oh! pray don�ft let me be taken away, Mr. Stokes. 

MARTIN. Don�ft be frightened,?don�ft be frightened. Mr. Flam is gone. I�fll give the 
Squire the note in a minute. 

SQUIRE. Now,?begin the dance. 

 

A Country Dance.

 

(MARTIN and MADDOX, in their endeavours to keep close to ROSE, occasion great 
confusion. As the SQUIRE is looking at some particular couple in the dance, MARTIN 
steals behind him, thrusts the letter in his hands, and resumes his place. The SQUIRE 
looks round as if to discover the person who has delivered it; but being unsuccessful, 
puts it up, and retires among the crowd of dancers. Suddenly a violent scream is heard, 
and the dance abruptly ceases. Great confusion. MARTIN and MADDOX hold Rose 
firmly.)

 

SQUIRE. What has happened? Whence did that scream proceed? 

SEVERAL VOICES. From the garden!?from the garden! 

EDMUNDS (without). Raise him, and bring him here. Lucy,?dear Lucy! 

BENSON. Lucy! My child! (Runs up the stage, and exit into garden.) 

MARTIN. His child! Damme! they can�ft get this one, so they�fre going to run away with 
the other. Here�fs some mistake here. Let me go, Rose. Come along, John. Make way 
there,?make way! 

(As they run towards the window, EDMUNDS appears at it, without a hat, and his 
dress disordered, with LUCY in his arms. He delivers her to her father and ROSE.) 

ROSE. Lucy,?dear Lucy,?look up! 

BENSON. Is she hurt, George??is the poor child injured? 

EDMUNDS. No, it is nothing but terror; she will be better instantly. See! she is 
recovering now. (LUCY gradually recovers, as FLAM, his clothes torn, and face 
disfigured, is led in by MADDOX and MARTIN.) 

BENSON. Mr. Norton, this is an act of perjury and baseness, of which another instant 
would have witnessed the completion. 

SQUIRE (to FLAM). Rascal! this is your deed. 

FLAM (aside to NORTON). That�fs right, Norton, keep it up. 

SQUIRE. Do not address me with your odious familiarity, scoundrel! 

FLAM. You don�ft really mean to give me up? 

SQUIRE. I renounce you from this instant. 

FLAM. You do??then take the consequences. 

SQUIRE. Benson,?Edmunds,?friends,?I declare to you most solemnly that I had 
neither hand nor part in this disgraceful outrage. It has been perpetrated without my 
knowledge, wholly by that scoundrel. 

FLAM. �fTis false; it was done with his consent. He has in his pocket, at this moment, a 
letter from me, acquainting him with my intention. 

ALL. A letter! 

SQUIRE. A letter was put into my hands five minutes since; but it acquainted me, not 
with this fellow�fs intention, but with his real dishonourable and disgraceful character, to 
which I had hitherto been a stranger. (To FLAM.) Do you know that handwriting, sir? 
(Showing him the letter.) 

FLAM. Ellis�fs letter! (searching his pockets, and producing the other). I must,?ass that 
I was!?I did?enclose the wrong one. 

SQUIRE. You will quit my house this instant; its roof shall not shelter you another 
night. Take that with you, sir, and begone. (Throws him a purse.) 

FLAM (taking it up). Ah! I suppose you think this munificent, now?eh? I could have 
made twice as much of you in London, Norton, I could indeed, to say nothing of my 
exhibiting myself for a whole week to these clods of earth, which would have been cheap, 
dirt-cheap, at double the money. Bye-bye, Norton! Farewell, grubs! 

[Exit.

SQUIRE. Edmunds, you have rescued your future wife from brutal violence; you will 
not leave her exposed to similar attempts in future? 

EDMUNDS. Even if I would, I feel, now that I have preserved her, that I could not. 

SQUIRE. Then take her, and with her the old farm, which from henceforth is your own. 
You will not turn the old man out, I suppose? 

EDMUNDS (shaking BENSON by the hand). I don�ft think we are very likely to quarrel 
on that score; and most gratefully do we acknowledge your honour�fs kindness. Maddox! 

JOHN. Hallo! 

EDMUNDS. I shall not want that cottage and garden we were speaking of, this morning, 
now. Let me imitate a good example, and bestow it on your wife, as her marriage 
portion. 

ROSE. Oh, delightful! Say certainly, John,?can�ft you?

JOHN. Thank �fee, George, thank �fee! I say, Martin, I have arrived at the dignity of a 
cottage and a piece of ground, at last. 

MARTIN. Yes, you may henceforth consider yourself on a level with me. 

SQUIRE. Resume the dance. 

MARTIN. I beg your pardon. One word. (Whispers the SQUIRE.) 

SQUIRE. I hope not. Recollect, you have been mistaken before, to-day. You had better 
inquire. 

MARTIN. I will. (To the audience.) My very particular friend, if he will allow me to call 
him so,? 

SQUIRE. Oh, certainly. 

MARTIN. My very particular friend, Mr. Norton, wishes me to ask my other particular 
friends here, whether there�fs?anything wrong? We are delighted to hear your 
approving opinion in the old way. You can�ft do better. It�fs a capital custom. 

 

Dance and Finale.?Chorus.

 

                      Join the dance, with step as light 

                      As every heart should be to-night; 

                      Music, shake the lofty dome, 

                      In honour of our Harvest Home. 

 

                      Join the dance, and banish care, 

                      All are young, and gay, and fair; 

                      Even age has youthful grown, 

                      In honour of our Harvest Home. 

 

                      Join the dance, bright faces beam, 

                      Sweet lips smile, and dark eyes gleam; 

                      All these charms have hither come, 

                      In honour of our Harvest Home. 

 

                      Join the dance, with step as light, 

                      As every heart should be to-night; 

                      Music, shake the lofty dome, 

                      In honour of our Harvest Home. 

 

Quintet.

 

LUCY?ROSE?EDMUNDS?The SQUIRE?YOUNG BENSON.

                                         No light bound 

                                  Of stag or timid hare, 

                                         O�fer the ground 

                                  Where startled herds repair, 

                                         Do we prize 

                                  So high, or hold so dear, 

                                         As the eyes 

                                  That light our pleasures here. 

 

                                         No cool breeze 

                                  That gently plays by night, 

                                         O�fer calm seas, 

                                  Whose waters glisten bright; 

                                         No soft moan 

                                  That sighs across the lea, 

                                         Harvest Home, 

                                  Is half so sweet as thee! 

 

Chorus.

 

Hail to the merry autumn days, when yellow cornfields shine, 

Far brighter than the costly cup that holds the monarch�fs wine! 

Hail to the merry harvest time, the gayest of the year, 

The time of rich and bounteous crops, rejoicing, and good cheer. 

Hail! Hail! Hail!

 

__________

 

* In John Hullah�fs music to this song, the last two lines are printed as follows:?

�eThe name adorns the gambler�fs strife,
 
 
 Or gilds the worthless vow.�f?ED. [Matz]
 

 

Afterword
 
            At the beginning of December, in time for opening night, and before 
Bentley had published the libretto, Dickens and Hullah themselves had published a 
twopenny book of songs from Coquettes, for sale in the St. James�fs Theatre. Dickens 
sent a few of these pamphlets along to theatre critics, along with their �gorders�h, free 
passes, and the invitations to the premiere. One such note went to editor of the weekly 
Examiner, and was passed along to its drama critic (Pilgrim 1:205). The Examiner critic 
attended the first night, and?not mollified by the small gift?wrote a withering 
denunciation of the opera, thunderously imprecating against its every aspect. Dickens 
wrote to composer Hullah, �gHave you seen the Examiner? It is rather depreciatory of 
the Opera, but like all their inveterate critiques against Braham, so well done that I 
cannot help laughing at it, for the life and soul of me�h (Pilgrim 1:210). A short time later, 
at one of author Ainsworth�fs Sunday literary parties, Dickens was to see the funny and 
inveterate critic in person. From the tone of his reviews, a reader might expect to see a 
crotchety and bitter septuagenarian, but in fact the theatre reviewer was Dickens�fs own 
age (24). The Examiner critic who Dickens met was?as you may have guessed?John 
Forster, and the two men would go on to have one of the greatest of all literary 
friendships. Forster was Dickens�fs closest friend for the remainder of his life, the 
executor of his estate, and his first major biographer. Presented below, in its entirety, is 
the review of Village Coquettes (from the Examiner, 11 Dec 1836, 791?92), as written by 
Boz�fs Boswell, John Forster.
 

 

THEATRICAL EXAMINER
???

ST. JAMES�fS THEATRE

[anonymous Village Coquettes review by John Forster]

 

            An opera, or, as they call it at this house, an operatic burletta, in two acts, 
entitled the Village Coquettes?�gthe drama�h and the �gwords of the song�h by Boz; the 
�gmusic by John Hullah�h?was produced on Tuesday evening. This piece is a compound of 
Gerald Burgoyne�fs Lord of the Manor, and of Jerrold�fs Rent-day, but very far inferior to 
either. The scene is laid in a country village in England, in the year 1729, and the 
costume of that day is attempted. The plot and dialogue are totally unworthy of Boz.

            One Squire Norton (Mr Braham), a wealthy man,?a compound of the 
Truemore and Sir John Contrast of Burgoyne, with a considerable spice of Bickerstaff�fs 
Hawthorn added,?has picked up a fashionable swindler, the Honourable Sparkins 
Flam (Mr Barnett),?an imitation of Burgoyne�fs Young Contrast,?and these two 
gentlemen amuse themselves with paying some compliments to a couple of country 
lasses, Lucy Benson and Rose (Miss Rainforth and Miss Smith),?whereupon these 
ladies, dismissing a couple of country lovers, George Edmunds and John Maddox 
(Messrs Bennett and Gardner), and being taken by the glitter of greatness in a most 
womanly and natural manner, prefer the men clad in purple and fine linen to the tillers 
of the earth. A busy-body, one Mr Martin Stokes (Harley), now acquaints old Farmer 
Benson (Strickland) that these young ladies have moonlight assignations with our two 
patricians. The old farmer falls into a fury; the bumpkin lovers and a virtuous brother 
join him; and all straightway utter certain admitted and well worn sentiments which 
are sure to touch the springs of feeling in all those who are not absolutely sick of the old 
clap-trap, and taken ill whenever they hear it. These sentiments are to be met with in 
Burgoyne�fs opera of the Lord of the Manor, and are pretty strongly iterated in Jerrold�fs 
Rent-day. After all this takes place, and when the usual epithets (which poor men in a 
passion, on the stage, always apply to rich ones, when the rich meddle too nearly with 
their domestic arrangements) have been let off, Mr Braham (the squire) incontinently 
resolves to turn the old farmer out of his holding, because he will not consent to the ruin 
of his daughter, and he also scolds a little upon the occasion; a finale thereupon is sung 
to the first act, and a tableau formed after the manner of the ejectment in the Rent-day. 

            In the second act the squire begins to think he has not behaved �gexactly 
right,�h and the two young ladies presenting themselves at his house, to tell him that he 
is an inhuman monster for turning out Farmer Benson, and that they never really 
preferred him or his friend Flam to their two barn-door lovers, he very generously 
permits them to stay in the farm, father and brother, and lovers and all. He then 
marches off and tells the farmer his resolution, and gives a ball to celebrate the event. 
From this ball his friend, the Honourable Sparkins Flam, contrives to steal the squire�fs 
former innamorato for him, but without his knowledge. This causes Flam to be knocked 
down, and be brought back a prisoner. The squire turns his friend out of his house, 
swearing he had no hand in it, and the ball goes on. 

            Not to speak of the lack of originality which this piece presents, it has also 
the demerit of having the incidents, such as they are, most clumsily hung together. The 
ejectment scene and tableau ? la Rent Day, for instance, concludes one act in which the 
landlord is irritated to the highest degree. The next act commences at once with the 
same gentleman remorseful, and in this mood the two coquettes are introduced to pay 
him a visit?repentant as a pair of Magdalens, the only non-repentant among them 
being the squire�fs partner, Mr Flam, and him they turn out of the room. Now instead of 
converting the inflammatory landlord by their prayers or reasoning powers, the ladies 
at once proceed to acquaint him that nothing but the fine attitudes of himself and friend 
had gained their affections, so he had better let their relation stay in the farm; and they 
add that they had discovered that their quondam village lovers were much better men 
than the squire and his friend. This address, so likely to soothe the irritation of a 
gentleman in the squire�fs circumstances, and so extremely judicious, causes the squire 
to swear that they shall remain in the farm. Mr Flam, of course, is in disgrace with the 
ladies, and the squire intimates to him that they must now be let alone. After this, and 
during the ball which the squire gives to celebrate his repentance, Miss Lucy, the 
squire�fs choice, makes the audience to understand that she is miserable, and that the 
late events have incapacitated her for dancing, her young man not having quite got over 
her turning him off;?she therefore takes the immoral Mr Flam�fs arm, and strolls into 
the garden, the said Flam having a carriage ready to carry her off for the squire. Now as 
the squire is repentant, the lady repentant, and Flam out of favour with both, this is all 
vastly mysterious; however, at the fall of the curtain, Mr Harley came forward, and 
asked the audience �gif it were all right?�h They made a great din?we presume in 
acquiescence?and he then proceeded to beg favour for the piece, in that whining, half 
apologetic, all-familiar strain, now so very common on our stage. He desired the 
audience to applaud. They applauded. To repeat the same. They repeated it; and a 
disgusting farce was kept up between the favourite actor and his patrons, which we can 
hardly think will bear repetition, unless the house is on all occasions filled with orders.

            When the curtain fell, Braham brought out Miss Rainforth, she pulled on 
Miss Smith, Bennet and Strickland followed, Barnett and all the rest paraded 
themselves,?and then the audience screamed for Boz! Now we have a great respect and 
liking for Boz; the Pickwick Papers have made him, as our readers are very well aware, 
an especial favourite with us; and we have no idea of his being exhibited gratis. Bad as 
the opera is, however, we feel assured that if Mr Braham will make arrangements to 
parade the real living Boz every night after that opera, he will insure for it a certain 
attraction. Boz appeared, and bowed and smiled and disappeared, and left the audience 
in perfect consternation that he neither resembled the portraits of Pickwick, Snodgrass, 
Winkle, nor Tupman. Some critics in the gallery were said to have expected Samuel 
Weller. The disappointment was deeply and generally felt. We think, however, that Mr 
Braham has still a right to exhibit a large wood-cut of Pickwick on his bills, with an 
intimation that Boz will be shown nightly after the opera. It would be no very 
exaggerated theatrical puff according to the present system.

            We have now to say a word of the music, and we are compelled to state that 
its utter insignificance makes our task a brief one. The only song which we think to 
have any merit is that commencing �gAutumn leaves.�h It is introduced by rather a pretty 
obligato passage on the horn. This song was sung very neatly by Mr Bennet. The finale 
to the first act is not remarkable, but yet not devoid of merit. There is in the finale to the 
first act a short quintette which is very well harmonized. The instrumentation 
throughout the opera is not appropriate; but the band of this theatre is so inefficient, 
that it can hardly do justice to any music. In this band there is a little boy who beats the 
drums, but never tunes them. He should be whipt.

            The costume is absolutely disfiguring. Mr Braham himself is inducted into 
the strangest red velvet coat we can remember to have seen, surmounted by a 
hunting-cap, and underwritten by a pair of long gaiters. Signor somebody, who exhibits 
wax figures, and rejoices in mounted men who ride in procession through the streets, 
might study Mr Braham�fs costume with advantage for his cavalry. 

            Miss Rainforth had not one note of music in which she could use her 
talents with any effect. This young lady (evidently brought before the public of the 
metropolis, as is too frequently the case, without having had any previous practice in 
the country) labours under the disadvantage of being completely a novice in the 
business of the stage. However, to our thinking, she evinces promise of becoming a fair 
actress in serious characters; and, as far as the part allowed, she manifested evidently a 
very proper conception of it; but, alas! she was dressed more like Deborah Woodcock 
than any other person we know of. Miss Smith acted the part of Rose. We have already 
given it as our opinion that this young lady should never sing except with her sister. Of 
Mr Strickland�fs ill-used farmer we are happy to speak favourably, and Mr Parry was as 
effective in the virtuous brother as the part would allow. Harley made as much of a Paul 
Pry kind of character as possible. Mr Barnett made a miserable business of a fop; his 
acting was harsh, overstrained, and unnatural.

            Mr Hullah is, we understand, a young gentleman of the Royal Academy. 
We think he has completely mistaken the genre of English music. We must conceive it to 
be an error to set English words to music after the manner of any foreign school. We 
think that words so set never can be effective. Barnett has set English words for the 
drama with more success than any composer of the present day except Weber; and the 
manner in which that great composer treated Oberon proves that the English lyrical 
drama is capable of a distinctive school.

            We hear that an opera composed by Barnett is about to appear at 
Drury-lane. The composer will there meet with a band capable of giving any music 
effect, and we shall be most happy to see our national opera vindicated.

THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

The Strange Gentleman ? by Charles Dickens (1836)

Foreword
 
The farce [The Strange Gentleman] I also did as a sort of practical joke, for Harley, whom I have known a long time. It was funny?adapted from one of the published sketches called the �gGreat Winglebury Duel,�h and was published by Chapman and Hall. But I have no copy of it now, nor should I think they have. But both these things were done without the least consideration or regard to reputation. | I wouldn't repeat them for a thousand pounds apiece, and devoutly wish them to be forgotten.

 

? Letters of Charles Dickens (the Pilgrim Edition), 3:598 [13 Nov 1843].

 

            It�fs not that bad. 

            Dickensians will probably never forget The Strange Gentleman, and indeed Dickensians will probably never forget any of Dickens�fs work. In that respect we are an elephantine lot. Those of us who admire Dickens�fs work, admire it a lot, and we are sometimes in the paradoxical position of having to disregard one of the author�fs wishes, with regrets, in order to read a little more of the work we admire so much. With this apologia is here presented Dickens�fs first-produced play. 

            First a little background on the creation of The Strange Gentleman. As Dickens notes above, the play was based on �gThe Great Winglebury Duel�h, one of the Sketches by Boz. Dickens wrote �gDuel�h in October 1835, and expected it to go into the Monthly Magazine for December. Instead, it appeared as one of the three previously-unpublished stories included when the Sketches were first collected in book form (First Series, 8 Feb 1836). 

            In the meantime, something important had happened. George Hogarth, Dickens�fs soon-to-be father-in-law, had made an important connection for Dickens, and had interested a theatrical producer in the author�fs unfinished first play?The Village Coquettes. Dickens quickly completed Coquettes, around the end of January, and apparently continued right on to Strange Gentleman. By 18 Feb he was offering Gentleman to his Pickwick publishers, Chapman and Hall, and the script was likely finished by that time. Chapman and Hall eventually published the playbook, without music, in Dec 1836 or Jan 1837.Dickens accepted ?30 for the play�fs acting copyright from producer Braham (25 Aug 1836).  

            The Village Coquettes had been intended for the first production, but it was not ready in time, and The Strange Gentleman was substituted instead. Dickens was proud of the play, and very involved with it; he wrote �gI have been superintending its preparation, morning, noon, and night�h (Pilgrim, 1:177?78). Gentleman premiered on the opening night of the St. James�fs Theatre�fs second season (Thu 29 Sep 1836). It finished its first run with its fiftieth performance (Tue 6 Dec), sharing the Bill with the delayed debut of Coquettes. Thus Boz had two pieces running, in the same house, on the same night, at least for that one night. A great success, Gentleman continued to appear occasionally; it made its 58th appearance as part of a benefit for stage-manager Harley (Mon 13 Mar 1837). It soon opened in the Park Theatre in New York (15 Sep 1837), at the Chestnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia (29 Jan 1838), and was revived at the Olympic on Broadway (16 Dec 1839).  

            At noted above, despite his early enthusiasm for the piece, Dickens was later to disavow the play, and (by 1843) did not wish to see it performed again. After his death, an attempt was made to revive the play, at the Charing Cross Theatre (1873), but this was soon halted by legal action from Dickens�fs sister-in-law Georgina Hogarth, and from his executor John Forster?in life his closest friend. Forster wrote to a solicitor �gI know that he [Dickens] more than once refused to let it be acted�h (Adrian, 160). Since then, the play has been staged a few times by branches of the Dickens Fellowship (California, 1926; Toronto, 1930; St. Pancras, 1933?), local companies (Portsmouth and Cantonbury, 1970), a Dickens Festival (Staten Island, 1983), London�fs Birkbeck College (1984), and more. The Strange Gentleman was also translated into Spanish, and El extra?o caballero was staged at the Victoria Hall Theatre, in Montevideo, Uruguay (9 May 1946), to good reviews. Dickensians are keenly interested in the author�fs apprentice work, and invariably understanding of any youthful missteps. 

            The original cast of The Strange Gentleman, as first produced (1836), contained some notable characters. The title role was played by John Pritt Harley, who became a friend to Dickens for many years. The Village Coquettes was dedicated to Harley, and he was to be a guest at Dickens�fs celebration dinners for Nicholas Nickleby (5 Oct 1839) and Master Humphrey�fs Clock (20 Oct 1840). The role of Julia Dobbs was played by Madame Sala, and it was through her that Dickens met her little boy, George Augustus Sala. The same boy, as an adult, would become a major contributor to Dickens�fs weekly Household Words (Sala wrote two sections of the �gSeven Poor Travellers�h). The sister characters in the play, Mary and Fanny Wilson, were played by real sisters, Julia and Kitty Smith; since the Wilson girls do not appear in the original sketch, the characters appear to have been added to the burletta to accommodate the Smith girls. Dickens himself is said to have once stood in as understudy for the role of Charles Tomkins.

            Some topical allusions in the Gentleman may require explanation. 1) The lead actor, Harley, had, in real life, left Drury Lane Theatre, one of (note) the Theatres Royal. Dickens felt that the royal theatres were producing too many �ghorse spectacles�h, showy, noisy, productions, with live horses on stage. Harley had then signed on with the St. James�fs Theatre (15 May 1836), where Gentleman was playing. This underlies the jokes below about the (again) Royal Hotel, its noise and its horses, and also the quiet St. James�fs Hotel, where Harley�fs character stays. 2) As you�fll read below, the Strange Gentleman gives an anonymous note to the hotel shoeshine man to deliver?and the �gBoots�h archly believes that, because anonymous, this is a �gSwing�h note. �gCaptain Swing�h was a pseudonym widely used by rebellious farm workers (1830 onwards), when protesting, or rioting, against poverty and the onset of farm machinery. Often they torched haystacks. One gentleman farmer received this grim Captain Swing note: �gthis is to inform you what you have to undergo Gentelmen if providing you Dont pull down your messhines and rise the poor mens wages the maried men give tow and six pence a day a day the single tow shilings or we will burn down your barns and you in them this is the last notis�h. Another: �gRevenge for thee is on the wing | from thy Determined | Capt Swing�h. Dickens doesn�ft make any particularly clever joke about Swing, either in Gentleman, or later in Pickwick, where he makes a similar reference. Apparently just the mention of the taboo name was enough to raise a nervous giggle. 

            Now well armed, readers are ready to approach the play proper. It is a play about confusion, and it can be confusing; you may have to read it twice. It should reward the effort. What follows below represents the first time one of Dickens�fs works was dramatized, ever, as adapted by the author, himself, and is now presented here, for the first time on the open Internet, ever. 

            It�fs not that bad.
 

 

THE STRANGE GENTLEMAN

A COMIC BURLETTA

IN TWO ACTS

[by Charles Dickens ? 1836]

 

CAST OF THE CHARACTERS

AT ST. JAMES�fS THEATRE, September 29, 1836

 

MR. OWEN OVERTON (Mayor of a small

 town on the road to Gretna, and

 useful at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MR. HOLLINGSWORTH.
 
JOHN JOHNSON (detained at the St.

 James�fs Arms)
 MR. SIDNEY.
 
THE STRANGE GENTLEMAN (just arrived at the St. James�fs Arms) 
 MR. HARLEY.
 
CHARLES TOMKINS (incognito at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MR. FORESTER.
 
TOM SPARKS (a one-eyed �eBoots�f at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MR. GARDNER.
 
JOHN
 }
 Waiters at the 

St. James�fs Arms
 {
 MR. WILLIAMSON.
 
TOM
 MR. MAY.
 
WILL
 MR. COULSON.
 
JULIA DOBBS (looking for a husband at St. James�fs Arms)
 MADAME SALA.
 
FANNY WILSON (with an appointment at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MISS SMITH.
 
MARY WILSON (her sister, awkwardly situated at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MISS JULIA SMITH.
 
MRS. NOAKES (the Landlady at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MRS. W. PENSON.
 
CHAMBERMAID (at the St. James�fs Arms)
 MISS STUART.
 

 

Miss Smith and Miss Julia Smith will sing the duet of

�eI know a Bank,�f in �eThe Strange Gentleman.�f

 

COSTUME

 

MR. OWEN OVERTON.?Black smalls, and high black boots. A blue body coat, rather long in the waist, with yellow buttons, buttoned close up to the chin. A white stock; ditto gloves. A broad-brimmed low-crowned white hat.

 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN.?A light blue plaid French-cut trousers and vest. A brown cloth frock coat, with full skirts, scarcely covering the hips. A light blue kerchief, and eccentric low-crowned broad-brimmed white hat. Boots. 

 

JOHN JOHNSON.?White fashionable trousers, boots, light vest, frock coat, black hat, gloves, etc.

 

CHARLES TOMKINS.?Shepherd�fs plaid French-cut trousers; boots; mohair fashionable frock coat, buttoned up; black hat, gloves, etc.

 

TOM SPARKS.?Leather smalls; striped stockings, and lace-up half boots, red vest, and a Holland stable jacket; coloured kerchief, and red wig.

 

THE WAITERS.?All in black trousers, black stockings and shoes, white vests, striped jackets, and white kerchiefs. 

 

MARY WILSON.?Fashionable walking dress, white silk stockings; shoes and gloves.

 

FANNY WILSON.?Precisely the same as Mary.

 

JULIA DOBBS.?A handsome white travelling dress, cashmere shawl, white silk stockings; shoes and gloves. A bonnet to correspond.

 

MRS. NOAKES.?A chintz gown, rather of a dark pattern, French apron, and handsome cap. 

 

SCENE.?A SMALL TOWN, ON THE ROAD TO GRETNA.

 

TIME.?PART OF A DAY AND NIGHT.

 

Time in acting.?One hour and twenty minutes.

 

THE STRANGE GENTLEMAN

 

ACT I

 

SCENE I.?A Room at the St. James�fs Arms; Door in Centre, with a Bolt on it. A Table with Cover, and two Chairs, R. H. 

 

Enter MRS. NOAKES, C. DOOR.

 

MRS. NOAKES. Bless us, what a coachful! Four inside?twelve out; and the guard blowing the key-bugle in the fore-boot, for fear the informers should see that they have got one over the number. Post-chaise and a gig besides.?We shall be filled to the very attics. Now, look alive, there?bustle about.

 

Enter FIRST WAITER, running, C. DOOR.

 

       Now, John. 

FIRST WAITER (coming down L. H.). Single lady, inside the stage, wants a private room, ma�fam. 

MRS. NOAKES (R. H.). Much luggage?

FIRST WAITER. Four trunks, two bonnet-boxes, six brown-paper parcels, and a basket. 

MRS. NOAKES. Give her a private room, directly. No. 1, on the first floor.

FIRST WAITER. Yes, ma�fam.

[Exit FIRST WAITER, running, C. DOOR.

 

Enter SECOND WAITER, running, C. DOOR.

 

       Now, Tom. 

SECOND WAITER (coming down R. H.). Two young ladies and one gentleman, in a post-chaise, want a private sitting room d�frectly, ma�fam.

MRS. NOAKES. Brother and sisters, Tom?

SECOND WAITER. Ladies are something alike, ma�fam. Gentleman like neither of �fem.

MRS. NOAKES. Husband and wife and wife�fs sister, perhaps. Eh, Tom?

SECOND WAITER. Can�ft be husband and wife, ma�fam, because I saw the gentleman kiss one of the ladies.

MRS. NOAKES. Kissing one of the ladies! Put them in the small sitting-room behind the bar, Tom, that I may have an eye on them through the little window, and see that nothing improper goes forward. 

SECOND WAITER. Yes, ma�fam. (Going.)

MRS. NOAKES. And Tom! (Crossing to L. H.)

SECOND WAITER. (coming down R. H.). Yes, ma�fam.

MRS. NOAKES. Tell Cook to put together all the bones and pieces that were left on the plates at the great dinner yesterday, and make some nice soup to feed the stage-coach passengers with.

SECOND WAITER. Very well, ma�fam.

[Exit SECOND WAITER, C. DOOR.

 

Enter THIRD WAITER, running, C. DOOR.

 

       Now, Will.

THIRD WAITER (coming down L. H.). A strange gentleman in a gig, ma�fam, wants a private sitting-room.

MRS. NOAKES. Much luggage, Will?

THIRD WAITER. One portmanteau, and a great-coat. 

MRS. NOAKES. Oh! nonsense!?Tell him to go into the commercial room. 

THIRD WAITER. I told him so, ma�fam, but the Strange Gentleman says he will have a private apartment, and that it�fs as much as his life is worth, to sit in a public room.

MRS. NOAKES. As much as his life is worth?

THIRD WAITER. Yes, ma�fam.?Gentleman says he doesn�ft care if it�fs a dark closet; but a private room of some kind he must and will have.

MRS. NOAKES. Very odd.?Did you ever see him before, Will?

THIRD WAITER. No, ma�fam; he�fs quite a stranger here.?He�fs a wonderful man to talk, ma�fam?keeps on like a steam engine. Here he is, ma�fam.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (without). Now don�ft tell me, because that�fs all gammon and nonsense; and gammoned I never was, and never will be, by any waiter that ever drew the breath of life, or a cork.?And just have the goodness to leave my portmanteau alone, because I can carry it very well myself; and show me a private room without further delay; for a private room I must and will have.?Damme, do you think I�fm going to be murdered!?

 

Enter the three Waiters, C. DOOR?they form down L. H., the STRANGE GENTLEMAN following, carrying his portmanteau and great-coat. 

 

There?this room will do capitally well. Quite the thing,?just the fit.?How are you, ma�fam? I suppose you are the landlady of this place? Just order those very attentive young fellows out, will you, and I�fll order dinner.

MRS. NOAKES (to Waiters). You may leave the room.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Hear that??You may leave the room. Make yourselves scarce. Evaporate?disappear?come. 

[Exeunt Waiters, C. DOOR.

       That�fs right. And now, madam, while we�fre talking over this important matter of dinner, I�fll just secure us effectually against further intrusion. (Bolts the door.)

MRS. NOAKES. Lor, sir! Bolting the door, and me in the room!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Don�ft be afraid?I won�ft hurt you. I have no designs against you, my dear ma�fam: but I must be private. (Sits on the portmanteau, R. H.)

MRS. NOAKES. Well, sir?I have no objection to break through our rules for once; but it is not our way, when we�fre full, to give private rooms to solitary gentlemen, who come in a gig, and bring only one portmanteau. You�fre quite a stranger here, sir. If I�fm not mistaken, it�fs your first appearance in this house.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You�fre right, ma�fam. It is my first, my very first?but not my last, I can tell you. 

MRS. NOAKES. No?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No (looking round him). I like the look of this place. Snug and comfortable?neat and lively. You�fll very often find me at the St. James�fs Arms, I can tell you, ma�fam. 

MRS. NOAKES (aside). A civil gentleman. Are you a stranger in this town, sir?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Stranger! Bless you, no. I have been here for many years past, in the season. 

MRS. NOAKES. Indeed!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Oh, yes. Put up at the Royal Hotel regularly for a long time; but I was obliged to leave it at last. 

MRS. NOAKES. I have heard a good many complaints of it. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. O! terrible! such a noisy house.

MRS. NOAKES. Ah!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Shocking! Din, din, din?Drum, drum, drum, all night. Nothing but noise, glare, and nonsense. I bore it a long time for old acquaintance sake; but what do you think they did at last, ma�fam?

MRS. NOAKES. I can�ft guess.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Turned the fine Old Assembly Room into a stable, and took to keeping horses. I tried that too, but I found I couldn�ft stand it; so I came away, ma�fam, and?and?here I am. (Rises). 

MRS. NOAKES. And I�fll be bound to say, sir, that you will have no cause to complain of the exchange. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I�fm sure not, ma�fam; I know it?I feel it, already. 

MRS. NOAKES. About dinner, sir; what would you like to take?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Let me see; will you be good enough to suggest something, ma�fam?

MRS. NOAKES. Why, a broiled fowl and mushrooms is a very nice dish.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You are right, ma�fam; a broiled fowl and mushrooms form a very delightful and harmless amusement, either for one or two persons. Broiled fowl and mushrooms let it be, ma�fam. 

MRS. NOAKES. In about an hour, I suppose, sir?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. For the second time, ma�fam, you have anticipated my feelings.

MRS. NOAKES. You�fll want a bed to-night, I suppose, sir; perhaps you�fd like to see it? Step this way, sir, and?(going L. H.).

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No, no, never mind. (Aside.) This is a plot to get me out of the room. She�fs bribed by somebody who wants to identify me. I must be careful; I am exposed to nothing but artifice and stratagem. Never mind, ma�fam, never mind.

MRS. NOAKES. If you�fll give me your portmanteau, sir, the Boots will carry it into the next room for you.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside.) Here�fs diabolical ingenuity; she thinks it�fs got the name upon it. (To her.) I�fm very much obliged to the Boots for his disinterested attention, ma�fam, but with your kind permission this portmanteau will remain just exactly where it is; consequently, ma�fam, (with great warmth,) if the aforesaid Boots wishes to succeed in removing this portmanteau, he must previously remove me, ma�fam, me; and it will take a pair of very stout Boots to do that, ma�fam, I promise you. 

MRS. NOAKES. Dear me, sir, you needn�ft fear for your portmanteau in this house; I dare say nobody wants it. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I hope not, ma�fam, because in that case nobody will be disappointed. (Aside.) How she fixes her old eyes on me!

MRS. NOAKES (aside). I never saw such an extraordinary person in all my life. What can he be? (Looks at him very hard.)

[Exit MRS. NOAKES, C. DOOR.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. She�fs gone at last! Now let me commune with my own dreadful thoughts, and reflect on the best means of escaping from my horrible position. (Takes a letter from his pocket.) Here�fs an illegal death-warrant; a pressing invitation to be slaughtered; a polite request just to step out and be killed, thrust into my hand by some disguised assassin in a dirty black calico jacket, the very instant I got out of the gig at the door. I know the hand; there�fs a ferocious recklessness in the cross to this �eT,�f and a baleful malignity in the dot of that �eI,�f which warns me that it comes from my desperate rival. (Opens it, and reads.) �eMr. Horatio Tinkles�f?that�fs him?�epresents his compliments to his enemy�f?that�fs me?�eand requests the pleasure of his company to-morrow morning, under the clump of trees, on Corpse Common,�f?Corpse Common!?�eto which any of the town�fs people will direct him, and where he hopes to have the satisfaction of giving him his gruel.�f?Giving him his gruel! Ironical cut-throat!?�eHis punctuality will be esteemed a personal favour, as it will save Mr. Tinkles the trouble and inconvenience of calling with a horsewhip in his pocket. Mr. Tinkles has ordered breakfast at the Royal for one. It is paid for. The individual who returns alive can eat it. Pistols?half-past five?precisely.�f?Bloodthirsty miscreant! The individual who returns alive! I have seen him hit the painted man at the shooting-gallery regularly every time in his centre shirt plait, except when he varied the entertainments, by lodging the ball playfully in his left eye. Breakfast! I shall want nothing beyond the gruel. What�fs to be done? Escape! I can�ft escape; concealment�fs of no use, he knows I am here. He has dodged me all the way from London, and will dodge me all the way to the residence of Miss Emily Brown, whom my respected, but swine-headed parents have picked out for my future wife. A pretty figure I should cut before the old people, whom I have never beheld more than once in my life, and Miss Emily Brown, whom I have never seen at all, if I went down there, pursued by this Salamander, who, I suppose, is her accepted lover! What is to be done? I can�ft go back again; father would be furious. What can be done? nothing! (Sinks into a chair.) I must undergo this fiery ordeal, and submit to be packed up, and carried back to my weeping parents, like an unfortunate buck, with a flat piece of lead in my head, and a brief epitaph on my breast, �eKilled on Wednesday morning.�f No, I won�ft (starting up, and walking about). I won�ft submit to it; I�fll accept the challenge, but first I�fll write an anonymous letter to the local authorities, giving them information of this intended duel, and desiring them to place me under immediate restraint. That�fs feasible; on further consideration, it�fs capital. My character will be saved?I shall be bound over?he�fll be bound over?I shall resume my journey?reach the house?marry the girl?pocket the fortune, and laugh at him. No time to be lost; it shall be done forthwith. (Goes to the table and writes.) There; the challenge accepted, with a bold defiance, that�fll look very brave when it comes to be printed. Now for the other. (Writes.) �eTo the Mayor?Sir?A strange Gentleman at the St. James�fs Arms, whose name is unknown to the writer of this communication, is bent upon committing a rash and sanguinary act, at an early hour tomorrow morning. As you value human life, secure the amiable youth, without delay. Think, I implore you, sir, think what would be the feelings of those to whom he is nearest and dearest, if any mischance befall the interesting young man. Do not neglect this solemn warning; the number of his room is seventeen.�f There?(folding it up). Now if I can find any one who will deliver it secretly.? 

 

TOM SPARKS, with a pair of boots in his hand, peeps in at the C. D.

 

TOM. Are these here your�fn?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No.

TOM. Oh! (going back). 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Hallo! stop, are you the Boots?

TOM (still at the door). I�fm the head o�f that branch o�f the establishment. There�fs another man under me, as brushes the dirt off, and puts the blacking on. The fancy work�fs my department; I do the polishing, nothing else.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You are the upper Boots, then?

TOM. Yes, I�fm the reg�flar; t�fother one�fs only the deputy; top boots and half boots, I calls us.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You�fre a sharp fellow.

TOM. Ah! I�fd better cut then (going). 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Don�ft hurry, Boots?don�ft hurry; I want you. (Rises, and comes forward, R. H.)

TOM (coming forward, L. H.). Well!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Can?can?you be secret, Boots?

TOM. That depends entirely on accompanying circumstances;?see the point?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I think I comprehend your meaning, Boots, You insinuate that you could be secret (putting his hand in his pocket) if you had?five shillings for instance?isn�ft that it, Boots?

TOM. That�fs the line o�f argument I should take up; but that an�ft exactly my meaning.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No! 

TOM. No. A secret�fs a thing as is always a rising to one�fs lips. It requires an astonishing weight to keep one on �fem down. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Ah!

TOM. Yes; I don�ft think I could keep one snug?reg�flar snug, you know?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Yes, regularly snug, of course.

TOM. ?If it had a less weight a-top on it, than ten shillins.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You don�ft think three half-crowns would do it?

TOM. It might, I won�ft say it wouldn�ft, but I couldn�ft warrant it. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You could the other!

TOM. Yes.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Then there it is. (Gives him four half-crowns.) You see these letters?

TOM. Yes, I can manage that without my spectacles. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Well; that�fs to be left at the Royal Hotel. This, this, is an anonymous one; and I want it to be delivered at the Mayor�fs house, without his knowing from whom it came, or seeing who delivered it.

TOM (taking the letters). I say?you�fre a rum �fun, you are.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Think so! Ha, ha! so are you. 

TOM. Ay, but you�fre a rummer one than me.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No, no, that�fs your modesty. 

TOM. No it an�ft. I say, how vell you did them last hay-stacks. How do you contrive that ere now, if it�fs a fair question. Is it done with a pipe, or do you use them Lucifer boxes?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Pipe?Lucifer boxes?hay-stacks! Why, what do you mean?

TOM (looking cautiously round). I know your name, old �fun.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You know my name! (Aside.) Now how the devil has he got hold of that, I wonder!

TOM. Yes, I know it. It begins with a �eS.�f

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Begins with an S!

TOM. And ends with a �eG,�f (winking). We�fve all heard talk of Swing down here. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Heard talk of Swing! Here�fs a situation! Damme, d�fye think I�fm a walking carbois of vitriol, and burn everything I touch??Will you go upon the errand you�fre paid for?

TOM. Oh, I�fm going?I�fm going. It�fs nothing to me, you know; I don�ft care. I�fll only just give these boots to the deputy, to take them to whoever they belong to, and then I�fll pitch this here letter in at the Mayor�fs office-window, in no time.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Will you be off?

TOM. Oh, I�fm going, I�fm going. Close, you knows, close!

[Exit TOM, C. DOOR.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. In five minutes more the letter will be delivered; in another half hour, if the Mayor does his duty, I shall be in custody, and secure from the vengeance of this infuriated monster. I wonder whether they�fll take me away? Egad! I may as well be provided with a clean shirt and a nightcap in case. Let�fs see, she said the next room was my bedroom, and as I have accepted the challenge, I may venture so far now. (Shouldering the portmanteau.) What a capital notion it is; there�fll be all the correspondence in large letters, in the county paper, and my name figuring away in roman capitals, with a long story, how I was such a desperate dragon, and so bent upon fighting, that it took four constables to carry me to the Mayor, and one boy to carry my hat. It�fs a capital plan?must be done?the only way I have of escaping unpursued from this place, unless I could put myself in the General Post, and direct myself to a friend in town. And then it�fs a chance whether they�fd take me in, being so much over weight. 

[Exit STRANGE GENTLEMAN, with portmanteau, L. H. 

 

MRS. NOAKES, peeping in C. DOOR, then entering.

 

MRS. NOAKES. This is the room, ladies, but the gentleman has stepped out somewhere, he won�ft be long, I dare say. Pray come in, Miss.

 

Enter MARY and FANNY WILSON, C. DOOR.

 

MARY (C.). This is the Strange Gentleman�fs apartment, is it?

MRS. NOAKES (R.). Yes, Miss; shall I see if I can find him, ladies, and tell him you are here?

MARY. No; we should prefer waiting till he returns, if you please.

MRS. NOAKES. Very well, ma�fam. He�fll be back directly, I dare say; for it�fs very near his dinner time.

[Exit MRS. NOAKES, C. DOOR.

MARY. Come, Fanny, dear; don�ft give way to these feelings of depression. Take pattern by me?I feel the absurdity of our situation acutely; but you see that I keep up, nevertheless.

FANNY. It is easy for you to do so. Your situation is neither so embarrassing, nor so painful a one as mine. 

MARY. Well, my dear, it may not be, certainly; but the circumstances which render it less so are, I own, somewhat incomprehensible to me. My harebrained, mad-cap swain, John Johnson, implores me to leave my guardian�fs house, and accompany him on an expedition to Gretna Green. I with immense reluctance, and after considerable pressing? 

FANNY. Yield a very willing consent.

MARY. Well, we won�ft quarrel about terms; at all events I do consent. He bears me off, and when we get exactly half-way, discovers that his money is all gone, and that we must stop at this Inn, until he can procure a remittance from London, by post. I think, my dear, you�fll own that this is rather an embarrassing position.

FANNY. Compare it with mine. Taking advantage of your flight, I send express to my admirer, Charles Tomkins, to say that I have accompanied you; first, because I should have been miserable if left behind with a peevish old man alone; secondly, because I thought it proper that your sister should accompany you?

MARY. And, thirdly, because you knew that he would immediately comply with this indirect assent to his entreaties of three months�f duration, and follow you without delay, on the same errand. Eh, my dear?

FANNY. It by no means follows that such was my intention, or that I knew he would pursue such a course, but supposing he has done so; supposing this Strange Gentleman should be himself? 

MARY. Supposing!?Why, you know it is. You told him not to disclose his name, on any account; and the Strange Gentleman is not a very common travelling name, I should imagine; besides the hasty note, in which he said he should join you here. 

FANNY. Well, granted that it is he. In what a situation am I placed. You tell me, for the first time, that my violent intended must on no account be beheld by your violent intended, just now, because of some old quarrel between them, of long standing, which has never been adjusted to this day. What an appearance this will have! How am I to explain it, or relate your present situation? I should sink into the earth with shame and confusion. 

MARY. Leave it to me. It arises from my heedlessness. I will take it all upon myself and see him alone. But tell me, my dear?as you got up this love affair with so much secrecy and expedition during the four months you spent at Aunt Martha�fs, I have never yet seen Mr. Tomkins, you know. Is he so very handsome? 

FANNY. See him, and judge for yourself. 

MARY. Well, I will; and you may retire, till I have paved the way for your appearance. But just assist me first, dear, in making a little noise to attract his attention, if he really be in the next room, or I may wait here all day.

 

DUET?At end of which exit FANNY, C. DOOR. MARY retires up R. H.

 

Enter STRANGE GENTLEMAN, L. H.

 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. There; now with a clean shirt in one pocket and a night-cap in the other, I�fm ready to be carried magnanimously to my dungeon in the cause of love.

MARY (aside). He says, he�fs ready to be carried magnanimously to a dungeon in the cause of love. I thought it was Mr. Tomkins! Hem! (Coming down L. H.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (seeing her). Hallo! Who�fs this! Not a disguised peace officer in petticoats. Beg your pardon, ma�fam. (Advancing towards her.) What?did?you? 

MARY. Oh, Sir; I feel the delicacy of my situation.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). Feels the delicacy of her situation; Lord bless us, what�fs the matter! Permit me to offer you a seat, ma�fam, if you�fre in a delicate situation. (He places chairs; they sit.)

MARY. You are very good, Sir. You are surprised to see me here, Sir?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No, no, at least not very; rather, perhaps?rather. (Aside.) Never was more astonished in all my life!

MARY (aside). His politeness, and the extraordinary tale I have to tell him, overpower me. I must summon up courage. Hem!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Hem!

MARY. Sir!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Ma�fam!

MARY. You have arrived at this house in pursuit of a young lady, if I mistake not?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You are quite right, ma�fam. (Aside.) Mysterious female!

MARY. If you are the gentleman I�fm in search of, you wrote a hasty note a short time since, stating that you would be found here this afternoon.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (drawing back his chair). I?I?wrote a note, ma�fam!

MARY. You need keep nothing secret from me, Sir. I know all.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). That villain, Boots, has betrayed me! Know all, ma�fam?

MARY. Everything.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). It must be so. She�fs a constable�fs wife.

MARY. You are the writer of that letter, Sir? I think I am not mistaken.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You are not, ma�fam; I confess I did write it. What was I to do, ma�fam? Consider the situation in which I was placed. 

MARY. In your situation, you had, as it appears to me, only one course to pursue.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You mean the course I adopted?

MARY. Undoubtedly.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I am very happy to hear you say so, though of course I should like it to be kept a secret.

MARY. Oh, of course.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (drawing his chair close to her, and speaking very softly). Will you allow me to ask you, whether the constables are downstairs?

MARY (surprised). The constables!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Because if I am to be apprehended, I should like to have it over. I am quite ready, if it must be done. 

MARY. No legal interference has been attempted. There is nothing to prevent your continuing your journey to-night. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. But will not the other party follow?

MARY (looking down). The other party, I am compelled to inform you, is detained here by?by want of funds. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (starting up). Detained here by want of funds! Hurrah! Hurrah! I have caged him at last. I�fm revenged for all his blustering and bullying. This is a glorious triumph, ha, ha, ha! I have nailed him?nailed him to the spot!

MARY (rising indignantly). This exulting over a fallen foe, Sir, is mean and pitiful. In my presence, too, it is an additional insult. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Insult! I wouldn�ft insult you for the world, after the joyful intelligence you have brought me?I could hug you in my arms!?One kiss, my little constable�fs deputy. (Seizing her). 

MARY (struggling with him). Help! help!

 

Enter JOHN JOHNSON, C. DOOR.

 

JOHN. What the devil do I see! (Seizes STRANGE GENTLEMAN by the collar.)

MARY (L. H.). John, and Mr. Tomkins, met together! They�fll kill each other.?Here, help! help!

[Exit MARY, running, C. DOOR.

JOHN (shaking him). What do you mean by that, scoundrel?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Come, none of your nonsense?there�fs no harm done.

JOHN. No harm done.?How dare you offer to salute that lady?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. What did you send her here for?

JOHN. I send her here!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Yes, you; you gave her instructions, I suppose. (Aside.) Her husband, the constable, evidently. 

JOHN. That lady, Sir, is attached to me. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Well, I know she is; and a very useful little person she must be, to be attached to anybody,?it�fs a pity she can�ft be legally sworn in.

JOHN. Legally sworn in! Sir, that is an insolent reflection upon the temporary embarrassment which prevents our taking the marriage vows. How dare you to insinuate? 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Pooh! pooh!?don�ft talk about daring to insinuate; it doesn�ft become a man in your station of life? 

JOHN. My station of life!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. But as you have managed this matter very quietly, and say you�fre in temporary embarrassment?here?here�fs five shillings for you. (Offers it.) 

JOHN. Five shillings! (Raises his cane.) 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (flourishing a chair). Keep off, sir!

 

Enter MARY, TOM SPARKS, and two Waiters.

 

MARY. Separate them, or there�fll be murder! (TOM clasps STRANGE GENTLEMAN round the waist?the Waiters seize JOHN JOHNSON). 

TOM. Come, none o�f that �fere, Mr. S. We don�ft let private rooms for such games as these.?If you want to try it on wery partickler, we don�ft mind making a ring for you in the yard, but you mustn�ft do it here.

JOHN. Let me get at him. Let me go; waiters?Mary, don�ft hold me. I insist on your letting me go. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Hold him fast.?Call yourself a peace officer, you prize-fighter!

JOHN (struggling). Let me go, I say!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Hold him fast! Hold him fast!

[TOM takes STRANGE GENTLEMAN off, R. H. 

Waiters take JOHN off, L. H. MARY following.

 

SCENE II.?Another Room in the Inn.

 

Enter JULIA DOBBS and OVERTON, L. H.

 

JULIA. You seem surprised, Overton.

OVERTON. Surprised, Miss Dobbs! Well I may be, when, after seeing nothing of you for three years and more, you come down here without any previous notice, for the express purpose of running away?positively running away, with a young man. I am astonished, Miss Dobbs!

JULIA. You would have had better reason to be astonished if I had come down here with any notion of positively running away with an old one, Overton.

OVERTON. Old or young, it would matter little to me, if you had not conceived the preposterous idea of entangling me?me, an attorney, and mayor of the town, in so ridiculous a scheme.?Miss Dobbs, I can�ft do it.?I really cannot consent to mix myself up with such an affair.

JULIA. Very well, Overton, very well. You recollect that in the lifetime of that poor old dear, Mr. Woolley, who?

OVERTON.?Who would have married you, if he hadn�ft died; and who, as it was, left you his property, free from all incumbrances, the incumbrance of himself, as a husband, not being among the least. 

JULIA. Well, you may recollect, that in the poor old dear�fs lifetime, sundry advances of money were made to you, at my persuasion, which still remain unpaid. Oblige me by forwarding them to my agent in the course of the week, and I free you from any interference in this little matter. (Crosses to L. H. and is going.)

OVERTON. Stay, Miss Dobbs, stay. As you say, we are old acquaintances, and there certainly were some small sums of money, which?which?

JULIA. Which certainly are still outstanding.

OVERTON. Just so, just so; and which, perhaps, you would be likely to forget, if you had a husband?eh, Miss Dobbs, eh?

JULIA. I have little doubt that I should. If I gained one through your assistance, indeed?I can safely say I should forget all about them. 

OVERTON. My dear Miss Dobbs, we perfectly understand each other.?Pray proceed.

JULIA. Well?dear Lord Peter?

OVERTON. That�fs the young man you�fre going to run away with, I presume?

JULIA. That�fs the young nobleman who�fs going to run away with me, Mr. Overton.

OVERTON. Yes, just so.?I beg your pardon?pray go on.

JULIA. Dear Lord Peter is young and wild, and the fact is, his friends do not consider him very sagacious or strong-minded. To prevent their interference, our marriage is to be a secret one. In fact, he is stopping now at a friend�fs hunting seat in the neighbourhood; he is to join me here; and we are to be married at Gretna.

OVERTON. Just so.?A matter, as it seems to me, which you can conclude without any interference.

JULIA. Wait an instant. To avoid suspicion, and prevent our being recognised and followed, I settled with him that you should give out in this house that he was a lunatic, and that I?his aunt?was going to convey him in a chaise, to-night, to a private asylum at Berwick. I have ordered the chaise at half-past one in the morning. You can see him, and make our final arrangements. It will avert all suspicion, if I have no communication with him, till we start. You can say to the people of the house that the sight of me makes him furious.

OVERTON. Where shall I find him??Is he here?

JULIA. You know best.

OVERTON. I!

JULIA. I desired him, immediately on his arrival, to write you some mysterious nonsense, acquainting you with the number of his room.

OVERTON (producing a letter). Dear me, he has arrived, Miss Dobbs.

JULIA. No!

OVERTON. Yes?see here?a most mysterious and extraordinary composition, which was thrown in at my office window this morning, and which I could make neither head nor tail of. Is that his handwriting? (Giving her the letter.) 

JULIA (taking letter). I never saw it more than once, but I know he writes very large and straggling.?(Looks at letter.) Ha, ha, ha! This is capital, isn�ft it?

OVERTON. Excellent!?Ha, ha, ha!?So mysterious!

JULIA. Ha, ha, ha!?So very good?�eRash act.�f

OVERTON. Yes. Ha, ha!

JULIA. �eInteresting young man.�f

OVERTON. Yes.?Very good.

JULIA. �eAmiable youth!�f

OVERTON. Capital!

JULIA. �eSolemn warning!�f

OVERTON. Yes.?That�fs the best of all. (They both laugh.)

JULIA. Number seventeen, he says. See him at once, that�fs a good creature. (Returning the letter.)

OVERTON (taking letter). I will. (He crosses to L. H. and rings a bell.)

 

Enter WAITER, L. H.

 

       Who is there in number seventeen, waiter?

WAITER. Number seventeen, sir??Oh!?the strange gentleman, sir.

OVERTON. Show me the room. 

[Exit WAITER, L. H.

       (Looking at JULIA, and pointing to the letter.) �eThe Strange Gentleman.�f?Ha, ha, ha! Very good?very good indeed.?Excellent notion! (They both laugh.)

[Exeunt severally.

 

SCENE III.?Same as the first.?A small table, with wine, dessert, and lights on it, R. H. of C. DOOR; two chairs.

 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN discovered seated at table.

 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. �eThe other party is detained here, by want of funds.�f Ha, ha, ha! I can finish my wine at my leisure, order my gig when I please, and drive on to Brown�fs in perfect security. I�fll drink the other party�fs good health, and long may he be detained here. (Fills a glass.) Ha, ha, ha! The other party; and long may he?(A knock at C. DOOR.) Hallo! I hope this isn�ft the other party. Talk of the?(A knock at C. DOOR.) Well?(setting down his glass)?this is the most extraordinary private room that was ever invented. I am continually disturbed by unaccountable knockings. (A gentle tap at C. DOOR.) There�fs another; that was a gentle rap?a persuasive tap?like a friend�fs fore-finger on one�fs coat-sleeve. It can�ft be Tinkles with the gruel.?Come in.

 

OVERTON peeping in at C. DOOR.

 

OVERTON. Are you alone, my Lord?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (amazed). Eh!

OVERTON. Are you alone, my Lord?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. My Lord!

OVERTON (stepping in, and closing the door). You are right, sir, we cannot be too cautious, for we do not know who may be within hearing. You are very right, sir. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (rising from table, and coming forward, R. H.). It strikes me, sir, that you are very wrong.

OVERTON. Very good, very good; I like this caution; it shows me you are wide awake.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Wide awake!?damme, I begin to think I am fast asleep, and have been for the last two hours.

OVERTON (whispering). I?am?the mayor. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (in the same tone). Oh!

OVERTON. This is your letter? (Shows it; STRANGE GENTLEMAN nods assent solemnly.) It will be necessary for you to leave here to-night, at half-past one o�fclock, in a postchaise and four; and the higher you bribe the postboys to drive at their utmost speed, the better.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You don�ft say so? 

OVERTON. I do indeed. You are not safe from pursuit here. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Bless my soul, can such dreadful things happen in a civilised community, Mr. Mayor?

OVERTON. It certainly does at first sight appear rather a hard case that people cannot marry whom they please, without being hunted down in this way. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. To be sure. To be hunted down, and killed, as if one was game, you know.

OVERTON. Certainly, and you an�ft game, you know.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Of course not. But can�ft you prevent it? can�ft you save me by the interposition of your power? 

OVERTON. My power can do nothing in such a case.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Can�ft it, though?

OVERTON. Nothing whatever.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I never heard of such dreadful revenge, never! Mr. Mayor, I am a victim, I am the unhappy victim of parental obstinacy. 

OVERTON. Oh, no; don�ft say that. You may escape yet. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (grasping his hand). Do you think I may? Do you think I may, Mr. Mayor?

OVERTON. Certainly! certainly! I have little doubt of it, if you manage properly. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I thought I was managing properly. I understood the other party was detained here, by want of funds.

OVERTON. Want of funds!?There�fs no want of funds in that quarter, I can tell you.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. An�ft there, though?

OVERTON. Bless you, no. Three thousand a year!?But who told you there was a want of funds?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Why, she did.

OVERTON. She! you have seen her then? She told me you had not. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Nonsense; don�ft believe her. She was in this very room half an hour ago. 

OVERTON. Then I must have misunderstood her, and you must have misunderstood her too.?But to return to business. Don�ft you think it would keep up appearances if I had you put under some restraint.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I think it would. I am very much obliged to you. (Aside.) This regard for my character in an utter stranger, and in a Mayor too, is quite affecting.

OVERTON. I�fll send somebody up, to mount guard over you. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Thank �fee, my dear friend, thank �fee.

OVERTON. And if you make a little resistance, when we take you upstairs to your bedroom, or away in the chaise, it will be keeping up the character, you know.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. To be sure.?So it will.?I�fll do it.

OVERTON. Very well, then. I shall see your Lordship again by and by.?For the present, my Lord, good evening. (Going.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Lord!?Lordship!?Mr. Mayor!

OVERTON. Eh??Oh!?I see. (Comes forward.) Practising the lunatic, my Lord. Ah, very good?very vacant look indeed.?Admirable, my Lord, admirable!?I say, my Lord?(pointing to letter)?�eAmiable youth!�f?�eInteresting young man.�f?�eStrange Gentleman.�f?Eh? Ha, ha, ha! Knowing trick indeed, my Lord, very!

[Exit OVERTON, C. D.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. That mayor is either in the very last stage of mystified intoxication, or in the most hopeless state of incurable insanity.?I have no doubt of it. A little touched here (tapping his forehead). Never mind, he is sufficiently sane to understand my business at all events. (Goes to table and takes a glass.) Poor fellow!?I�fll drink his health, and speedy recovery. (A knock at C. DOOR.) It is a most extraordinary thing, now, that every time I propose a toast to myself, some confounded fellow raps at that door, as if he were receiving it with the utmost enthusiasm. Private room!?I might as well be sitting behind the little shutter of a Two-penny Post Office, where all the letters put in were to be post-paid. (A knock at C. DOOR.) Perhaps it�fs the guard! I shall feel a great deal safer if it is. Come in. (He has brought a chair forward, and sits L. H.)

 

Enter TOM SPARKS, C. DOOR, very slowly, with an enormous stick. He closes the door, and, after looking at the STRANGE GENTLEMAN very steadily, brings a chair down L. H., and sits opposite him.

 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Are you sent by the mayor of this place, to mount guard over me?

TOM. Yes, yes.?It�fs all right.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). It�fs all right?I�fm safe. (To TOM, with affected indignation.) Now mind, I have been insulted by receiving this challenge, and I want to fight the man who gave it me. I protest against being kept here. I denounce this treatment as an outrage. 

TOM. Ay, ay. Anything you please?poor creature; don�ft put yourself in a passion. It�fll only make you worse. (Whistles.) 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. This is most extraordinary behaviour. I don�ft understand it.?What d�f ye mean by behaving in this manner? (Rising.)

TOM (aside). He�fs getting wiolent. I must frighten him with a steady look.?I say, young fellow, do you see this here eye? (Staring at him, and pointing at his own eye.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). Do I see his eye!?What can he mean by glaring upon me, with that large round optic!?Ha! a terrible light flashes upon me.?He thought I was �eSwing�f this morning. It was an insane delusion.?That eye is an insane eye.?He�fs a madman!

TOM. Madman! Damme, I think he is a madman with a vengeance

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. He acknowledges it. He is sensible of his misfortune!?Go away?leave the room instantly, and tell them to send somebody else.?Go away!

TOM. Oh, you unhappy lunatic!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. What a dreadful situation!?I shall be attacked, strangled, smothered, and mangled, by a madman! Where�fs the bell?

TOM (advancing and brandishing his stick). Leave that �fere bell alone?leave that �fere bell alone?and come here!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Certainly, Mr. Boots, certainly.?He�fs going to strangle me. (Going towards table.) Let me pour you out a glass of wine, Mr. Boots?pray do! (Aside.) If he said �eYes,�f I�fd throw the decanter at his temple.

TOM. None o�f your nonsense.?Sit down there. (Forces him into a chair, L. H.) I�fll sit here. (Opposite him, R. H.) Look me full in the face, and I won�ft hurt you. Move hand, foot, or eye, and you�fll never want to move either of �fem again.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I�fm paralysed with terror.

TOM. Ha! (raising his stick in a threatening attitude.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. I�fm dumb, Mr. Boots?dumb, sir. 

They sit gazing intently on each other; TOM with the

stick raised, as the Act Drop slowly descends.

 

END OF ACT FIRST

 

FIRST ACT FIFTY MINUTES

 

ACT II

 

SCENE I.?The same as SCENE III, ACT I.

 

TOM SPARKS discovered in the same attitude watching the STRANGE GENTLEMAN, who has fallen asleep with his head over the back of his Chair.

TOM. He�fs asleep; poor unhappy wretch! How very mad he looks with his mouth wide open and his eyes shut! (STRANGE GENTLEMAN snores.) Ah! there�fs a wacant snore; no meaning in it at all. I cou�fd ha�f told he was out of his senses from the very tone of it. (He snores again.) That�fs a wery insane snore. I should say he was melancholy mad from the sound of it.

 

Enter, through C. DOOR, OVERTON, MRS. NOAKES, a Chambermaid, and two Waiters; MRS. NOAKES with a warming-pan, the Maid with a light. STRANGE GENTLEMAN starts up, greatly exhausted.

 

TOM (starting up in C.). Hallo!?Hallo! keep quiet, young fellow. Keep quiet!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (L. H.). Out of the way, you savage maniac. Mr. Mayor (crossing to him, R. H.), the person you sent to keep guard over me is a madman, sir. What do you mean by shutting me up with a madman??what do you mean, sir, I ask?

OVERTON, R. H. C. (aside to STRANGE GENTLEMAN). Bravo! bravo! very good indeed?excellent! 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Excellent, sir!?It�fs horrible!?The bare recollection of what I have endured, makes me shudder, down to my very toe-nails.

MRS. NOAKES (R. H.). Poor dear!?Mad people always think other people mad. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Poor dear! Ma�fam! What the devil do you mean by �ePoor dear?�f How dare you have a madman here, ma�fam, to assault and terrify the visitors to your establishment?

MRS. NOAKES. Ah! terrify indeed! I�fll never have another, to please anybody, you may depend on that, Mr. Overton. (To STRANGE GENTLEMAN.) There, there.?Don�ft exert yourself, there�fs a dear.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (C.). Exert myself!?Damme! it�fs a mercy I have any life left to exert myself with. It�fs a special miracle, ma�fam, that my existence has not long ago fallen a sacrifice to that sanguinary monster in the leather smalls.

OVERTON, R. C. (aside to STRANGE GENTLEMAN). I never saw any passion more real in my life. Keep it up, it�fs an admirable joke.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Joke!?joke!?Peril a precious life, and call it a joke,?you, a man with a sleek head and a broad-brimmed hat, who ought to know better, calling it a joke.?Are you mad too, sir,?are you mad? (Confronting OVERTON.)

TOM, L. H. (very loud). Keep your hands off. Would you murder the wery mayor, himself, you mis-rable being?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Mr. Mayor, I call upon you to issue your warrant for the instant confinement of that one-eyed Orson in some place of security.

OVERTON (aside, advancing a little). He reminds me that he had better be removed to his bedroom. He is right.?Waiters, carry the gentleman upstairs.?Boots, you will continue to watch him in his bedroom.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. He continue!?What, am I to be boxed up again with this infuriated animal, and killed off, when he has done playing with me??I won�ft go?I won�ft go?help there, help! (The Waiters cross from R. H. to behind him.) 

 

Enter JOHN JOHNSON hastily, C. DOOR.

 

JOHN (coming forward L. H.). What on earth is the meaning of this dreadful outcry, which disturbs the whole house?

MRS. NOAKES. Don�ft be alarmed, sir, I beg.?They�fre only going to carry an unfortunate gentleman, as is out of his senses, to his bedroom. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN, C. (to JOHN). Constable?constable?do your duty?apprehend these persons?every one of them. Do you hear, officer, do you hear??(The Waiters seize him by the arms.)?Here?here?you see this. You�fve seen the assault committed. Take them into custody?off with them. 

MRS. NOAKES. Poor creature!?He thinks you are a constable, sir.

JOHN. Unfortunate man! It is the second time to-day that he has been the victim of this strange delusion.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (breaking from Waiters and going to JOHN L. H.) Unfortunate man!?What, do you think I am mad?

JOHN. Poor fellow! His hopeless condition is pitiable indeed. (Goes up.) 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (returning to C.). They�fre all mad!?Every one of �fem!

MRS. NOAKES. Come now, come to bed?there�fs a dear young man, do.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Who are you, you shameless old ghost, standing there before company, with a large warming-pan, and asking me to come to bed??Are you mad?

MRS. NOAKES. Oh! he�fs getting shocking now. Take him away.?Take him away.

OVERTON. Ah, you had better remove him to his bedroom at once. (The Waiters take him up by the feet and shoulders.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Mind, if I survive this, I�fll bring an action of false imprisonment against every one of you. Mark my words?especially against that villainous old mayor.?Mind, I�fll do it! (They bear him off, struggling and talking?the others crowding round, and assisting.)

OVERTON (following). How well he does it!

[Exeunt L. H. 1st E.

Enter a Waiter, showing in CHARLES TOMKINS in a

travelling coat, C. DOOR.

 

WAITER (L. H.). This room is disengaged now, sir. There was a gentleman in it, but he has just left it. 

CHARLES. Very well, this will do. I may want a bed here to-night, perhaps, waiter. 

WAITER. Yes, sir.?Shall I take your card to the bar, sir?

CHARLES. My card!?No, never mind.

WAITER. No name, sir?

CHARLES. No?it doesn�ft matter.

WAITER (aside, as going out). Another Strange Gentleman!

[Exit Waiter, C. DOOR.

CHARLES. Ah!?(Takes off coat.)?The sun and dust on this long ride have been almost suffocating. I wonder whether Fanny has arrived? If she has?the sooner we start forward on our journey further North the better. Let me see; she would be accompanied by her sister, she said in her note?and they would both be on the look-out for me. Then the best thing I can do is to ask no questions, for the present at all events, and to be on the look-out for them. (Looking towards C. DOOR.) Why here she comes, walking slowly down the long passage, straight towards this room?she can�ft have seen me yet.?Poor girl, how melancholy she looks! I�fll keep in the background for an instant, and give her a joyful surprise (He goes up R. H.)

 

Enter FANNY, C. DOOR.

 

FANNY (L. H.). Was ever unhappy girl placed in so dreadful a situation! Friendless, and almost alone, in a strange place?my dear, dear Charles a victim to an attack of mental derangement, and I unable to avow my interest in him, or express my anxious sympathy and solicitude for his sufferings! I cannot bear this dreadful torture of agonising suspense. I must and will see him, let the cost be what it may. (She is going L. H.)

CHARLES (coming forward R. H.). Hist! Fanny!

FANNY (starting and repressing a scream). Ch?Charles?here in this room!

CHARLES. Bodily present, my dear, in this very room. My darling Fanny, let me strain you to my bosom. (Advancing.) 

FANNY (shrinking back). N?n?no, dearest Charles, no, not now.?(Aside.)?How flushed he is!

CHARLES. No!?Fanny, this cold reception is a very different one to what I looked forward to meeting with, from you.

FANNY (advancing, and offering the tip of her finger). N?n?no?not cold, Charles; not cold. I do not mean it to be so, indeed.?How is your head, now, dear?

CHARLES. How is my head! After days and weeks of suspense and anxiety, when half our dangerous journey is gained, and I meet you here, to bear you whither you can be made mine for life, you greet me with the tip of your longest finger, and inquire after my head,?Fanny, what can you mean?

FANNY. You?you have startled me rather, Charles.?I thought you had gone to bed.

CHARLES. Gone to bed!?Why I have but this moment arrived.

FANNY (aside). Poor, poor Charles!

CHARLES. Miss Wilson, what am I to?

FANNY. No, no; pray, pray, do not suffer yourself to be excited?

CHARLES. Suffer myself to be excited!?Can I possibly avoid it? can I do aught but wonder at this extraordinary and sudden change in your whole demeanour??Excited! But five minutes since, I arrived here, brimful of the hope and expectation which had buoyed up my spirits during my long journey. I find you cold, reserved, and embarrassed?everything but what I expected to find you?and then you tell me not to be excited.

FANNY (aside). He is wandering again. The fever is evidently upon him.

CHARLES. This altered manner and ill-disguised confusion all convince me of what you would fain conceal. Miss Wilson, you repent of your former determination, and love another!

FANNY. Poor fellow!

CHARLES. Poor fellow!?What, am I pitied?

FANNY. Oh, Charles, do not give way to this. Consider how much depends upon your being composed. 

CHARLES. I see how much depends upon my being composed, ma�fam?well, very well.?A husband depends upon it, ma�fam. Your new lover is in this house, and if he overhears my reproaches he will become suspicious of the woman who has jilted another, and may jilt him. That�fs it, madam?a great deal depends, as you say, upon my being composed.?A great deal, ma�fam.

FANNY. Alas! these are indeed the ravings of frenzy.

CHARLES. Upon my word, ma�fam, you must form a very modest estimate of your own power, if you imagine that disappointment has impaired my senses. Ha, ha, ha!?I am delighted. I am delighted to have escaped you, ma�fam. I am glad, ma�fam?damn�fd glad! (Kicks a chair over.) 

FANNY (aside). I must call for assistance. He grows more incoherent and furious every instant. 

CHARLES. I leave you ma�fam.?I am unwilling to interrupt the tender t?te-?-t?te with the other gentleman, to which you are, no doubt, anxiously looking forward.?To you I have no more to say. To him I must beg to offer a few rather unexpected congratulations on his approaching marriage.

[Exit CHARLES hastily, C. DOOR. 

FANNY. Alas! it is but too true. His senses have entirely left him.

[Exit L. H.

 

SCENE SECOND AND LAST.?A Gallery in the Inn, leading to the Bedrooms. Four Doors in the Flat, and one at each of the upper Entrances, numbered from 20 to 25, beginning at the R. H. A pair of boots at the door of 23. 

 

Enter Chambermaid with two lights; and CHARLES TOMKINS,
R. H. 1st E.

 

MAID. This is your room, sir, No. 21. (Opening the door.)

CHARLES. Very well. Call me at seven in the morning.

MAID. Yes, sir. (Gives him a light, and

[Exit Chambermaid, R. H. 1st E.

CHARLES. And at nine, if I can previously obtain a few words of explanation with this unknown rival, I will just return to the place from whence I came, in the same coach that brought me down here. I wonder who he is and where he sleeps. (Looking round.) I have a lurking suspicion of those boots. (Pointing to No. 23.) They are an ill-looking, underhanded sort of pair, and an undefinable instinct tells me that they have clothed the feet of the rascal I am in search of. Besides myself, the owner of those ugly articles is the only person who has yet come up to bed. I will keep my eyes open for half an hour or so; and my ears too. 

[Exit CHARLES into No. 21.

 

Enter R. H. 1st E. MRS. NOAKES with two lights,

followed by MARY and FANNY.

 

MRS. NOAKES. Take care of the last step, ladies. This way, ma�fam, if you please. No. 20 is your room, ladies: nice large double-bedded room, with coals and a rushlight.

FANNY, R. H. (aside to MARY). I must ask which is his room. I cannot rest unless I know he has at length sunk into the slumber he so much needs. (Crosses to MRS. NOAKES, who is L. H.) Which is the room in which the Strange Gentleman sleeps?

MRS. NOAKES. No. 23, ma�fam. There�fs his boots outside the door. Don�ft be frightened of him, ladies. He�fs very quiet now, and our Boots is a watching him. 

FANNY. Oh, no?we are not afraid of him. (Aside.) Poor Charles!

MRS. NOAKES (going to door No. 20, which is 3rd E. R. H.). This way, if you please; you�fll find everything very comfortable, and there�fs a bell-rope at the head of the bed, if you want anything in the morning. Good night, ladies. 

As MARY and FANNY pass MRS. NOAKES, FANNY takes a light.

[Exeunt FANNY and MARY into No. 20.

MRS. NOAKES (tapping at No. 23). Tom?Tom? 

 

Enter TOM from No. 23.

 

TOM (coming forward, L. H.). Is that you, missis?

MRS. NOAKES (R. H.). Yes.?How�fs the Strange Gentleman, Tom?

TOM. He was very boisterous half an hour ago, but I punched his head a little, and now he�fs uncommon comfortable. He�fs fallen asleep, but his snores is still wery incoherent. 

MRS. NOAKES. Mind you take care of him, Tom. They�fll take him away in half an hour�fs time. It�fs very nearly one o�fclock now.

TOM. I�fll pay ev�fry possible attention to him. If he offers to call out, I shall whop him again. 

[Exit TOM into No. 23.

MRS. NOAKES (looking off R. H.). This way, ma�fam, if you please. Up these stairs. 

 

Enter JULIA DOBBS with a light, R. H. 1st E.

 

JULIA. Which did you say was the room in which I could arrange my dress for travelling? 

MRS. NOAKES. No. 22, ma�fam; the next room to your nephew�fs. Poor dear?he�fs fallen asleep, ma�fam, and I dare say you�fll be able to take him away very quietly by and by.

JULIA (aside). Not so quietly as you imagine, if he plays his part half as well as Overton reports he does. (To MRS. NOAKES.) Thank you.?For the present, good night. 

[Exit JULIA into No. 22.

MRS. NOAKES. Wish you good night, ma�fam. There.?Now I think I may go downstairs again, and see if Mr. Overton wants any more negus. Why who�fs this? (Looking off R. H.) Oh, I forgot?No. 24 an�ft a-bed yet.?It�fs him. 

 

Enter JOHN JOHNSON with a light, R. H. 1st E.

 

MRS. NOAKES. No. 24, sir, if you please. 

JOHN. Yes, yes, I know. The same room I slept in last night. (Crossing L. H.)

MRS. NOAKES. Yes, sir.?Wish you good night, sir.

[Exit MRS. NOAKES, R. H. 1st E. 

JOHN. Good night, ma�fam. The same room I slept in last night, indeed, and the same room I may sleep in to-morrow night, and the next night, and the night after that, and just as many more nights as I can get credit here, unless this remittance arrives. I could raise the money to prosecute my journey without difficulty were I on the spot; but my confounded thoughtless liberality to the post-boys has left me absolutely penniless. Well, we shall see what tomorrow brings forth. (He goes into No. 24, but immediately returns and places his boots outside his room door, leaving it ajar.)

[Exit JOHN into No. 24.

 

CHARLES peeping from No. 21, and putting out his boots.

 

CHARLES. There�fs another pair of boots. Now I wonder which of these two fellows is the man. I can�ft help thinking it�fs No. 23.?Hallo! (He goes in and closes his door.)

 

The door of No. 20 opens; FANNY comes out with a light in

a night shade. No. 23 opens. She retires into No. 20.

 

Enter TOM SPARKS, with a stable lantern from No. 23.

 

TOM (closing the door gently). Fast asleep still. I may as vell go my rounds, and glean for the deputy. (Pulls out a piece of chalk from his pocket, and takes up boots from No. 23.) Twenty-three. It�fs difficult to tell what a fellow is ven he han�ft got his senses, but I think this here twenty-three�fs a timorous faint-hearted genus. (Examines the boots.) You want new soleing, No. 23. (Goes to No. 24, takes up boots and looks at them.) Hallo! here�fs a bust: and there�fs been a piece put on in the corner.?I must let my missis know. The bill�fs always doubtful ven there�fs any mending. (Goes to No. 21, takes up boots.) French calf Vellingtons.?All�fs right here. These here French calves always come it strong?light vines, and all that �eere. (Looking round.) Werry happy to see there an�ft no high-lows?they never drinks nothing but gin-and-vater. Them and the cloth boots is the vurst customers an inn has.?The cloth boots is always obstemious, only drinks sherry vine and vater, and never eats no suppers. (He chalks the No. of the room on each pair of boots as he takes them up.) Lucky for you, my French calves, that you an�ft done with the patent polish, or you�fd ha�f been witrioled in no time. I don�ft like to put oil o�f witriol on a well-made pair of boots; ben ven they�fre rubbed vith that �fere polish, it must be done, or the profession�fs ruined.

[Exit TOM with boots, R. H. 1st E.

 

Enter FANNY from No. 20, with light as before.

 

FANNY. I tremble at the idea of going into his room, but surely at a moment like this, when he is left to be attended by rude and uninterested strangers, the strict rules of propriety which regulate our ordinary proceedings may be dispensed with. I will but satisfy myself that he sleeps, and has those comforts which his melancholy situation demands, and return immediately. (Goes to No. 23, and knocks.)

 

CHARLES TOMKINS peeping from No. 21.

 

CHARLES. I�fll swear I heard a knock.?A woman! Fanny Wilson?and at that door at this hour of the night!

 

FANNY comes forward.

 

       Why what an ass I must have been ever to have loved that girl. It is No 23, though.?I�fll throttle him presently. The next room-door open?I�fll watch there. (He crosses to No. 24, and goes in.)

 

FANNY returns to No. 23, and knocks?the door opens and the STRANGE GENTLEMAN appears, night-cap on his head and a light in his hand.?FANNY screams and runs back into No. 20. 

 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (coming forward). Well, of all the wonderful and extraordinary houses that ever did exist, this particular tenement is the most extraordinary. I�fve got rid of the madman at last?and it�fs almost time for that vile old mayor to remove me. But where??I�fm lost, bewildered, confused, and actually begin to think I am mad. Half these things I�fve seen to-day must be visions of fancy?they never could have really happened. No, no, I�fm clearly mad!?I�fve not the least doubt of it now. I�fve caught it from that horrid Boots. He has inoculated the whole establishment. We�fre all mad together.?(Looking off R. H.) Lights coming upstairs!?Some more lunatics.

[Exit STRANGE GENTLEMAN in No. 23.

 

Enter R. H. 1st E. OVERTON with a cloak, MRS. NOAKES, TOM SPARKS with lantern, and three Waiters with lights. The Waiters range up R. H. side. TOM is in R. H. corner and MRS. NOAKES next to him.

 

OVERTON. Remain there till I call for your assistance. (Goes up to No. 23 and knocks.)

 

Enter STRANGE GENTLEMAN from No. 23.

 

       Now, the chaise is ready.?Muffle yourself up in this cloak. (Puts it on the STRANGE GENTLEMAN.?They come forward.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (L. H.). Yes.

OVERTON (C.). Make a little noise when we take you away, you know.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Yes?yes.?I say, what a queer room this is of mine. Somebody has been tapping at the wall for the last half hour, like a whole forest of woodpeckers. 

OVERTON. Don�ft you know who that was?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No.

OVERTON. The other party.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (alarmed). The other party!

OVERTON. To be sure.?The other party is going with you.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Going with me!?In the same chaise!

OVERTON. Of course.?Hush! (Goes to No. 22. Knocks.)

 

Enter JULIA DOBBS from No. 22, wrapped up in a large cloak.

 

       Look here! (Bringing her forward. JULIA is next to MRS. NOAKES.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (starting into L. H. CORNER). I won�ft go?I won�ft go. This is a plot?a conspiracy. I won�ft go, I tell you. I shall be assassinated.?I shall be murdered!

 

FANNY and MARY appear at No. 20, JOHNSON and TOMKINS at 24.

 

JOHN (at the door). I told you he was mad.

CHARLES (at the door). I see?I see?poor fellow!

JULIA (crossing to STRANGE GENTLEMAN and taking his arm). Come, dear, come.

MRS. NOAKES. Yes, do go, there�fs a good soul. Go with your affectionate aunt.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (breaking from her). My affectionate aunt!

 

JULIA returns to her former position.

 

TOM. He don�ft deserve no affection. I niver see such an unfectionate fellow to his relations.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (L. H.). Take that wretch away, and smother him between two feather beds. Take him away, and make a sandwich of him directly. 

JULIA (to OVERTON, who is in C.). What voice was that??It was not Lord Peter�fs. (Throwing off her cloak.)

OVERTON. Nonsense?nonsense.?Look at him. (Pulls cloak off STRANGE GENTLEMAN.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (turning round). A woman!

JULIA. A stranger!

OVERTON. A stranger! What, an�ft he your husband that is to?your mad nephew, I mean?

JULIA. No!

ALL. No!

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. No!?no, I�fll be damned if I am. I an�ft anybody�fs nephew.?My aunt�fs dead, and I never had an uncle.

MRS. NOAKES. And an�ft he mad, ma�fam?

JULIA. No.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Oh, I�fm not mad.?I was mistaken just now.

OVERTON. And isn�ft he going away with you?

JULIA. No.

MARY (coming forward R. H., next to MRS. NOAKES). And isn�ft his name Tomkins?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (very loud.) No.

 

(All these questions and answers should be very rapid. JOHNSON and TOMKINS advance to the ladies, and they all retire up.)

 

MRS. NOAKES. What is his name? (Producing a letter.) It an�ft Mr. Walker Trott, is it? (She advances a little towards him.)

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Something so remarkably like it, ma�fam, that, with your permission, I�fll open that epistle. (Taking letter.)

 

All go up, but JULIA and STRANGE GENTLEMAN.

 

       (Opening letter.) Tinkles�fs hand. (Reads.) �eThe challenge was a ruse. By this time I shall have been united at Gretna Green to the charming Emily Brown.�f?Then, through a horror of duels, I have lost a wife!

JULIA (R. H. with her handkerchief to her eyes). And through Lord Peter�fs negligence, I have lost a husband! 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Eh! (Regards her for a moment, then beckons OVERTON, who comes forward, L. H.) I say, didn�ft you say something about three thousand a year this morning?

OVERTON. I did.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You alluded to that party? (Nodding towards JULIA.)

OVERTON. I did. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Hem! (Puts OVERTON back). Permit me, ma�fam (going to her), to sympathise most respectfully with your deep distress.

JULIA. Oh, sir! your kindness penetrates to my very heart.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). Penetrates to her heart!?It�fs taking the right direction.?If I understand your sorrowing murmur, ma�fam, you contemplated taking a destined husband away with you, in the chaise at the door?

JULIA. Oh! sir,?spare my feelings?I did.?The horses were ordered and paid for; and everything was ready. (Weeps.) 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN (aside). She weeps.?Expensive thing, posting, ma�fam.

JULIA. Very, sir.

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Eighteen-pence a mile, ma�fam, not including the boys.

JULIA. Yes, sir. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. You�fve lost a husband, ma�fam?I have lost a wife.?Marriages are made above?I�fm quite certain ours is booked.?Pity to have all this expense for nothing?let�fs go together.

JULIA (drying her eyes).The suddenness of this proposal, sir?

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Requires a sudden answer, ma�fam.?You don�ft say no?you mean yes. Permit me to?(kisses her).?All right! Old one (to OVERTON, who comes down L. H.), I�fve done it.?Mrs. Noakes (she comes down R. H.), don�ft countermand the chaise.?We�fre off directly. 

CHARLES (who with FANNY comes down L. H. C.). So are we.

JOHN (who with MARY come down R. H. C.). So are we, thanks to a negotiated loan, and an explanation as hasty as the quarrel that gave rise to it. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. Three post-chaises and four, on to Gretna, directly. 

[Exeunt Waiters, R. H. 1st E.

       I say?we�fll stop here as we come back?

JOHN and CHARLES. Certainly. 

STRANGE GENTLEMAN. But before I go, as I fear I have given a great deal of trouble here to-night?permit me to inquire whether you will view my mistakes and perils with an indulgent eye, and consent to receive �eThe Strange Gentleman�f again to-morrow.

 

JOHN. JULIA. STRANGE GENTLEMAN.
 
 
  
  
 MARY.
 FANNY.
  
  
  
 
 
  
 MRS. NOAKES.
 CHARLES.
  
  
 
 
 TOM.
 OVERTON.
  
 
R. H.
 L. H.
 

 

 

CURTAIN.

 

THE END

 

SECOND ACT THIRTY MINUTES.

 

Afterword
 
            Did you notice that Julia mentioned �gLord Peter�fs negligence�h? What was that all about? According to the �gGreat Winglebury Duel�h: �gLord Peter, who had been detained beyond his time by drinking champagne and riding a steeplechase, went back to the Honourable Augustus Flair�fs, and drank more champagne, and rode another steeplechase, and was thrown and killed.�h Dickens neglected to explain this, at least in the published version of the play. 

            Reviews for The Strange Gentleman were appreciative but mixed. The News and Sunday Herald reported: �gThe well-earned reputation of Mr. Charles Dickens as a sort of literary Hogarth, induced us to regard the first dramatic production of �eBoz�f with more than ordinary interest, and we are truly happy to record the triumphant success of The Strange Gentleman as pleasant and really humorous a piece as could be well desired. A wide field is open, and Mr. Dickens will be alike regardless of his own interest and the public�fs gratification if he neglect to maintain that position to which his maiden effort so justly entitles him. Harley was the strange gentleman, and he bustled through his work as if he knew and felt that he had something better to deal with than some of the comic abortions which have been recently consigned to his charge.�h The Champion wrote that the play �gwas lively, certainly; but the humour throughout was not worthy the great reputation he [Dickens] had acquired. It was commonplace and Joe Millerish.�h From the Satirist: �gThere is certainly no want of point or cleverness in the piece, yet strange to say it did not as a whole, �etell�f with the audience. It is in truth clogged with matter which may be very good, and probably is so, in the very sketch, on which the drama is founded, but which somehow destroys the effect in many instances, of the dialogue. The position of the parties assembled at The St. James�fs Arms, is astonishingly improbable; the situations are too forced, the perplexities too prolonged, to keep up a genuine interest among an audience. �eBoz,�f alias Mr. C. Dickens, describes what he has seen or imagined with graphic power, and his excellence lies in dwelling on these minute points which escape common observers; but as a dramatist, he lacks the faculty of seizing on the points, and only those, which are really of interest in representation.�h (See Dexter for more.)

            Dickens was to have two more plays produced at the St. James�fs Theatre: The Village Coquettes and Is She His Wife?. Neither was so successful as The Strange Gentleman. The story of those productions will be found with the texts of those plays.


THE END.


**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

Is She His Wife? ? by Charles Dickens (1837)

Foreword

 Charles Dickens and Catherine Hogarth had been married on the 2nd of April, 1836, and had spent a one-week honeymoon at the cottage of a Mrs. Nash, in Chalk, near Gravesend. Dickens was still working as a Parliamentary reporter, and he could only take a short time away from work, while the Houses were in Easter recess. 

            Ten months later, the couple was to return to the same cottage, this time for an entire month (Feb 1837). Things had changed. Two days before the marriage, the first number of Pickwick Papers had appeared, and in the time intervening, Dickens had quit his day job as a reporter, and had become one of the most popular writers in London. He was so busy, in fact, that when he went on this second honeymoon, he had to take some work along him, finish it off the first night (Sat 4 Feb), and send it back to London by priority mail. 

            What was this work? The actor J.P. Harley had wanted another play from Dickens, to follow the success of The Strange Gentleman. Dickens wrote Harley: �gI have by me a little piece in one act called �eCross Purposes�f, which I wrote long before I was Boz. It would admit of the introduction of any Music; and if you think there is anything in it, it is at your service.�h (Pilgrim 1:226). Dickens had first used the name �gBoz�h for part two of �gThe Boarding-House�h (Aug 1834), so, if he was being literal, the play was over two years old. 

            In Pickwick Papers, and in Nicholas Nickleby, several not-too-relevant short stories are dropped into the novels, and it�fs sometimes thought that these were older pieces pulled in to help with deadline problems. The case of �gCross Purposes�h, presented below as Is She His Wife?, is the only time we know for certain that Dickens pulled such old material �gout of the trunk�h, and used work from the days before his success, to help meet the sudden demand for his writing. Such a practice would help to explain Dickens�fs phenomenal burst of productivity and activity at this time. 

            The storyline of Is She His Wife? involves a couple, married six months, with the husband restless, snappish, and bored from staying in the country, and both of the pair unhappy. Given the circumstances under which the play was revised, the storyline must, inevitably, raise eyebrows. But the piece is not autobiographical. The bulk of it had been written long before the Dickens marriage, and the revisions made in the honeymoon cottage, done for Harley, must have served to create or modify the role of his character, Felix Tapkins. The piece is too good-natured and frivolous to reflect any marital discord.

            Charles and Caroline probably returned from Chalk in time to see the premiere of the short play. Is She His Wife? opened on Monday, March 6th, 1837; by April 25th it was on its nineteenth performance. It appeared on and off through the end of the season (31 May). A thirty-minute farce like this serves mainly as an extra attraction to supplement longer and more substantial dramas; we would not expect it to draw much in the way of crowds or attention. The name of Boz did not appear on the playbills until one week after the farce premiered, and without knowing that Dickens was involved, few papers bothered to review such a short slight piece. The Sunday Times called it �ga trifle, but a pleasant one, containing sufficient incident to interest the audience while it lasts�h. The Morning Chronicle, Dickens�fs old employer, wrote: �gThe few meagre incidents had not even the merit of novelty to recommend them, and the dialogue was singularly pointless with the exception of a few puns of venerable antiquity�c.It was well received, but whether the audience of another night will be so indulgent, is doubtful�h (both quoted in Dexter). Wife has been revived, as a lunch-time pub production in London (1971), and by the Broadstairs Dickens Players (1975?), the latter winning local awards. 

            Is She His Wife? is Dickens�fs most risqu? work. It features such racy material as extra-marital flirting, flippant jokes about adultery, and even a woman displaying her shapely ankle. The Times wrote that: �gThe plot bordered on the dangerous, but it was so dexterously and delicately managed that its success was decided. We have rarely seen Harley to such advantage�h (quoted in Dexter, 254). Like all plays at this time, it was registered with the Lord Chamberlain for licensing, as required by law; but nothing was censored. Similarly, no deletions are indicated in the published copy. The Village Coquettes had undergone �gchoppings and changings�h (Pilgrim 1:246), in its passages about seduction, gambling, and subversion; but Is She His Wife? appears to have escaped unscathed. 

            In the past, Is She His Wife? has sometimes been of more interest to book collectors than to playgoers. A version of the comedy was published about the time of its production, but only one copy was ever known to exist?perhaps some kind of print test. The single copy was in the possession of James Ripley Osgood, one of Dickens�fs American publishers, when it was lost in a fire in Boston (1879). Luckily it had already been reprinted (1872?, 1877); these are among the rarest of Dickens early editions.

            We are fortunate that the text of this play has survived. It would have been a shame to lose it. Deliberately loud and hammy, Is She His Wife? is a marvellous opportunity for actors to act daft, overact, and chew up the carpet. It follows the conventions of many theatre farces of the time, and strings together a series of contrived coincidences and implausible misunderstandings. Audiences liked and expected such things. Like all three of the St. James�fs Theatre plays, the best part is the �glow comic�h character?in this case, Felix Tapkins, a good example of one of Dickens�fs eternal optimists. To Boz�fs new fans, Felix Tapkins in Wife, and Martin Stokes in Coquettes?both played by Harley?would have seemed like the most �gDickensian�h characters in those plays.

            Just a few annotations should be noted, and then we can let anxious readers proceed to Dickens. �gHumane man-traps�h are mentioned; these were intended to be just what they sound like; groundskeepers would sometimes set these out to prevent poaching. The Felix Tapkins character makes his entrance singing �gA hunting we will go�h; this is the second verse of the song from Henry Fielding�fs ballad opera, �gDon Quixote�h; another case of Dickens alluding to two of his favourites, Cervantes and Fielding. Readers can understand the rest by themselves, with some application, so put all distractions aside, turn off your cell phones, and let the curtain rise.
 

 

IS SHE HIS WIFE?

OR, SOMETHING SINGULAR!

A COMIC BURLETTA

IN ONE ACT

[by Charles Dickens ? 1837]

 

DRAMATIS PERSON?

AT ST. JAMES�fS THEATRE, MARCH 6, 1837

 

ALFRED LOVETOWN, ESQ.
 MR. FORESTER.
 
MR. PETER LIMBURY
 MR. GARDNER.
 
FELIX TAPKINS, ESQ. (formerly of the India House, Leadenhall Street, and Prospect Place, Poplar; but now of the Rustic Lodge, near Reading)
 MR. HARLEY.
 
JOHN (servant to Lovetown)
 [name not given]
 
MRS. LOVETOWN
 MISS ALLISON.
 
MRS. PETER LIMBURY
 MADAME SALA.
 

 

IS SHE HIS WIFE?

OR, SOMETHING SINGULAR!

 

SCENE I.?A Room opening into a Garden. A Table laid for Breakfast; Chairs, etc. MR. and MRS. LOVETOWN, C., discovered at Breakfast, R. H. The former in a dressing-gown and slippers, reading a newspaper. A Screen on one side.

 

LOVETOWN (L. H. of table, yawning). Another cup of tea, my dear,?O Lord! 

MRS. LOVETOWN (R. H. of table). I wish, Alfred, you would endeavour to assume a more cheerful appearance in your wife�fs society. If you are perpetually yawning and complaining of ennui a few months after marriage, what am I to suppose you�fll become in a few years? It really is very odd of you. 

LOVETOWN. Not at all odd, my dear, not the least in the world; it would be a great deal more odd if I were not. The fact is, my love, I�fm tired of the country; green fields, and blooming hedges, and feathered songsters, are fine things to talk about and read about and write about; but I candidly confess that I prefer paved streets, area railings and dustman�fs bells, after all. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. How often have you told me that, blessed with my love, you could live contented and happy in a desert? 

LOVETOWN (reading). �eArtful impostor!�f 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Have you not over and over again said that fortune and personal attractions were secondary considerations with you? That you loved me for those virtues which, while they gave additional lustre to public life, would adorn and sweeten retirement? 

LOVETOWN (reading). �eSoothing syrup!�f

MRS. LOVETOWN. You complain of the tedious sameness of a country life. Was it not you yourself who first proposed our residing permanently in the country? Did you not say that I should then have an ample sphere in which to exercise those charitable feelings which I have so often evinced, by selling at those benevolent fancy fairs? 

LOVETOWN (reading). �eHumane man-traps!�f

MRS. LOVETOWN. He pays no attention to me,?Alfred dear,? 

LOVETOWN (stamping his foot). Yes, my life. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Have you heard what I have just been saying, dear? 

LOVETOWN. Yes, love. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. And what can you say in reply? 

LOVETOWN. Why, really, my dear, you�fve said it so often before in the course of the last six weeks, that I think it quite unnecessary to say anything more about it. (Reads.) �eThe learned judge delivered a brief but impressive summary of the unhappy man�fs trial.�f

MRS. LOVETOWN (aside). I could bear anything but this neglect. He evidently does not care for me. 

LOVETOWN (aside). I could put up with anything rather than these constant altercations and little petty quarrels. I repeat, my dear, that I am very dull in this out-of-the-way villa?confoundedly dull, horridly dull. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. And I repeat that if you took any pleasure in your wife�fs society, or felt for her as you once professed to feel, you would have no cause to make such a complaint. 

LOVETOWN. If I did not know you to be one of the sweetest creatures in existence, my dear, I should be strongly disposed to say that you were a very close imitation of an aggravating female. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. That�fs very curious, my dear, for I declare that if I hadn�ft known you to be such an exquisite, good-tempered, attentive husband, I should have mistaken you for a very great brute. 

LOVETOWN. My dear, you�fre offensive. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. My love, you�fre intolerable. (They turn their chairs back to back.) 

 

MR. FELIX TAPKINS sings without.

 

                        �eThe wife around her husband throws 

                               Her arms to make him stay; 

                        �gMy dear, it rains, it hails, it blows, 

                               And you cannot hunt to-day.�h

                        But a hunting we will go, 

                               And a hunting we will go,?wo?wo?wo! 

                        And a hunting we will go.�f 

 

MRS. LOVETOWN. There�fs that dear, good-natured creature, Mr. Tapkins,?do you ever hear him complain of the tediousness of a country life? Light-hearted creature,?his lively disposition and rich flow of spirits are wonderful, even to me. (Rising.) 

LOVETOWN. They need not be matter of astonishment to anybody, my dear,?he�fs a bachelor. 

 

MR. FELIX TAPKINS appears at window, L. H.

 

TAPKINS. Ha, ha! How are you both??Here�fs a morning! Bless my heart alive, what a morning! I�fve been gardening ever since five o�fclock, and the flowers have been actually growing before my very eyes. The London Pride is sweeping everything before it, and the stalks are half as high again as they were yesterday. They�fre all run up like so many tailors�f bills, after that heavy dew of last night broke down half my rosebuds with the weight of its own moisture,?something like a dew that!?reg�flar doo, eh??come, that�fs not so bad for a before-dinner one. 

LOVETOWN. Ah, you happy dog, Felix! 

TAPKINS. Happy! of course I am,?Felix by name, Felix by nature,?what the deuce should I be unhappy for, or anybody be unhappy for? What�fs the use of it, that�fs the point.

MRS. LOVETOWN. Have you finished your improvements yet, Mr. Tapkins? 

TAPKINS. At Rustic Lodge? (She nods assent.) Bless your heart and soul! you never saw such a place,?cardboard chimneys, Grecian balconies,?Gothic parapets, thatched roof. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Indeed! 

TAPKINS. Lord bless you, yes,?green verandah, with ivy twining round the pillars. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. How very rural! 

TAPKINS. Rural, my dear Mrs. Lovetown! delightful! The French windows, too! Such an improvement! 

MRS. LOVETOWN. I should think they were! 

TAPKINS. Yes, I should think they were. Why, on a fine summer�fs evening the frogs hop off the grass-plot into the very sitting-room. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Dear me! 

TAPKINS. Bless you, yes! Something like the country,?quite a little Eden. Why, when I�fm smoking under the verandah, after a shower of rain, the black beetles fall into my brandy-and-water. 

MR. and MRS. LOVETOWN. No!?Ha! ha! ha! 

TAPKINS. Yes. And I take �fem out again with the teaspoon, and lay bets with myself which of them will run away the quickest. Ha! ha! ha! (They all laugh.) Then the stable, too. Why, in Rustic Lodge the stables are close to the dining-room window. 

LOVETOWN. No! 

TAPKINS. Yes. The horse can�ft cough but I hear him. There�fs compactness. Nothing like the cottage style of architecture for comfort, my boy. By the bye, I have left the new horse at your garden-gate this moment. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. The new horse! 

TAPKINS. The new horse! Splendid fellow,?such action! Puts out its feet like a rocking-horse, and carries its tail like a hat-peg. Come and see him. 

LOVETOWN (laughing). I can�ft deny you anything. 

TAPKINS. No, that�fs what they all say, especially the?eh! (Nodding and winking.) 

LOVETOWN. Ha! ha! ha! 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Ha! ha! ha! I�fm afraid you�fre a very bad man, Mr. Tapkins; I�fm afraid you�fre a shocking man, Mr. Tapkins. 

TAPKINS. Think so? No, I don�ft know,?not worse than other people similarly situated. Bachelors, my dear Mrs. Lovetown, bachelors?eh! old fellow? (Winking to LOVETOWN.) 

LOVETOWN. Certainly, certainly. 

TAPKINS. We know?eh? (They all laugh.) By the bye, talking of bachelors puts me in mind of Rustic Lodge, and talking of Rustic Lodge puts me in mind of what I came here for. You must come and see me this afternoon. Little Peter Limbury and his wife are coming. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. I detest that man. 

LOVETOWN. The wife is supportable, my dear. 

TAPKINS. To be sure, so she is. You�fll come, and that�fs enough. Now come and see the horse. 

LOVETOWN. Give me three minutes to put on my coat and boots, and I�fll join you. I won�ft be three minutes. 

[Exit LOVETOWN, R. H. 

TAPKINS. Look sharp, look sharp!?Mrs. Lovetown, will you excuse me one moment? (Crosses to L.; calling off.) Jim,?these fellows never know how to manage horses,?walk him gently up and down,?throw the stirrups over the saddle to show the people that his master�fs coming, and if anybody asks what that fine animal�fs pedigree is, and who he belongs to, say he�fs the property of Mr. Felix Tapkins of Rustic Lodge, near Reading, and that he�fs the celebrated horse who ought to have won the Newmarket Cup last year, only he didn�ft. 

[Exit TAPKINS. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. My mind is made up,?I can bear Alfred�fs coldness and insensibility no longer, and come what may I will endeavour to remove it. From the knowledge I have of his disposition I am convinced that the only mode of doing so will be by rousing his jealousy and wounding his vanity. This thoughtless creature will be a very good instrument for my scheme. He plumes himself on his gallantry, has no very small share of vanity, and is easily led. I see him crossing the garden. (She brings a chair hastily forward and sits R. H.) 

 

Enter FELIX TAPKINS, L. H. window.

 

TAPKINS (singing). �eMy dear, it rains, it hails, it blows,?�f

MRS. LOVETOWN (tragically). Would that I had never beheld him! 

TAPKINS (aside). Hallo! She�fs talking about her husband. I knew by their manner there had been a quarrel, when I came in this morning. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. So fascinating, and yet so insensible to the tenderest of passions as not to see how devotedly I love him. 

TAPKINS (aside). I thought so. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. That he should still remain unmarried is to me extraordinary. 

TAPKINS. Um! 

MRS. LOVETOWN. He ought to have married long since. 

TAPKINS (aside). Eh! Why, they aren�ft married!?�eought to have married long since.�f? I rather think he ought. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. And, though I am the wife of another,? 

TAPKINS (aside). Wife of another! 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Still, I grieve to say that I cannot be blind to his extraordinary merits. 

TAPKINS. Why, he�fs run away with somebody else�fs wife! The villain!?I must let her know I�fm in the room, or there�fs no telling what I may hear next. (Coughs.) 

MRS. LOVETOWN (starting up in affected confusion). Mr. Tapkins! (They sit.) Bring your chair nearer. I fear, Mr. Tapkins, that I have been unconsciously giving utterance to what was passing in my mind. I trust you have not overheard my confession of the weakness of my heart. 

TAPKINS. No?no?not more than a word or two. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. That agitated manner convinces me that you have heard more than you are willing to confess. Then why?why should I seek to conceal from you?that though I esteem my husband, I?I?love?another? 

TAPKINS. I heard you mention that little circumstance. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Oh! (Sighs.) 

TAPKINS (aside). What the deuce is she Oh-ing at? She looks at me as if I were Lovetown himself. 

MRS. LOVETOWN (putting her hand on his shoulder with a languishing air). Does my selection meet with your approbation? 

TAPKINS (slowly). It doesn�ft. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. No! 

TAPKINS. Decidedly not. (Aside.) I�fll cut that Lovetown out, and offer myself. Hem! Mrs. Lovetown. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Yes, Mr. Tapkins. 

TAPKINS. I know an individual? 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Ah! an individual! 

TAPKINS. An individual,?I may, perhaps, venture to say an estimable individual,?who for the last three months has been constantly in your society, who never yet had courage to disclose his passion, but who burns to throw himself at your feet. Oh! (Aside.) I�fll try an Oh or two now,?Oh! (Sighs.) That�fs a capital Oh! 

MRS. LOVETOWN (aside). He must have misunderstood me before, for he is evidently speaking of himself. Is the gentleman you speak of handsome, Mr. Tapkins? 

TAPKINS. He is generally considered remarkably so. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Is he tall? 

TAPKINS. About the height of the Apollo Belvidere. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Is he stout? 

TAPKINS. Of nearly the same dimensions as the gentleman I have just named. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. His figure is? 

TAPKINS. Quite a model. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. And he is? 

TAPKINS. Myself. (Throws himself on his knees and seizes her hand.) 

 

Enter LOVETOWN, R. H.

 

Tapkins immediately pretends to be diligently looking 
for something on the floor.

 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Pray don�ft trouble yourself. I�fll find it. Dear me! how could I lose it? 

LOVETOWN. What have you lost, love? I should almost imagine that you had lost yourself, and that our friend Mr. Tapkins here had just found you. 

TAPKINS (aside). Ah! you always will have your joke,?funny dog! funny dog! Bless your heart and soul, there�fs that immortal horse standing outside all this time! He�fll catch his death of cold! Come and see him at once,?come?come. 

LOVETOWN. No. I can�ft see him to-day. I had forgotten. I�fve letters to write,?business to transact,?I�fm engaged. 

TAPKINS (to MRS. LOVETOWN). Oh! if he�fs engaged, you know, we�fd better not interrupt him. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Oh! certainly! Not by any means. 

TAPKINS (taking her arm). Good-bye, old fellow. 

LOVETOWN (seating himself at table). Oh!?good-bye. 

TAPKINS (going). Take care of yourself. I�fll take care of Mrs. L. 

[Exit TAPKINS and MRS. LOVETOWN, C. 

LOVETOWN. What the deuce does that fellow mean by laying such emphasis on Mrs. L.? What�fs my wife to him, or he to my wife? Very extraordinary! I can hardly believe that even if he had the treachery to make any advances, she would encourage such a preposterous intrigue. (Walks to and fro.) She spoke in his praise at breakfast-time, though,?and they have gone away together to see that confounded horse. But stop, I must keep a sharp eye upon them this afternoon, without appearing to do so. I would not appear unnecessarily suspicious for the world. Dissembling in such a case, though, is difficult?very difficult. 

 

Enter a Servant, L. H.

 

SERVANT. Mr. and Mrs. Peter Limbury. 

LOVETOWN. Desire them to walk in. 

[Exit Servant, L. H. 

       A lucky visit! it furnishes me with a hint. This Mrs. Limbury is a vain, conceited woman, ready to receive the attentions of anybody who feigns admiration for her, partly to gratify herself, and partly to annoy the jealous little husband whom she keeps under such strict control. If I pay particular attention to her, I shall lull my wife and that scoundrel Tapkins into a false security, and have better opportunities of observation. They are here. 

 

Enter MR. and MRS. LIMBURY, L. H.

 

LOVETOWN. My dear Mrs. Limbury. (Crosses to C.) 

LIMBURY. Eh? 

LOVETOWN (not regarding him). How charming?how delightful? how divine you look to-day. 

LIMBURY (aside). Dear Mrs. Limbury,?charming,?divine and beautiful look to-day! They are smiling at each other,?he squeezes her hand. I see how it is. I always thought he paid her too much attention. 

LOVETOWN. Sit down,?sit down. 

 

(LOVETOWN places the chairs so as to sit between them, which 

LIMBURY in vain endeavours to prevent.)

 

MRS. LIMBURY. Peter and I called as we passed in our little pony-chaise, to inquire whether we should have the pleasure of seeing you at Tapkins�fs this afternoon. 

LOVETOWN. Is it possible you can ask such a question? Do you think I could stay away? 

MRS. LIMBURY. Dear Mr. Lovetown! (Aside.) How polite,?he�fs quite struck with me. 

LIMBURY (aside). Wretched miscreant! a regular assignation before my very face. 

LOVETOWN (to MRS. LIMBURY). Do you know I entertained some apprehensions?some dreadful fears?that you might not be there. 

LIMBURY. Fears that we mightn�ft be there? Of course we shall be there. 

MRS. LIMBURY. Now don�ft talk, Peter. 

LOVETOWN. I thought it just possible, you know, that you might not be agreeable? 

MRS. LIMBURY. O, Peter is always agreeable to anything that is agreeable to me. Aren�ft you, Peter? 

LIMBURY. Yes, dearest. (Aside.) Agreeable to anything that�fs agreeable to her! O Lor�f! 

MRS. LIMBURY. By the bye, Mr. Lovetown, how do you like this bonnet? 

LOVETOWN. O, beautiful! 

LIMBURY (aside). I must change the subject. Do you know, Mr. Lovetown, I have often thought, and it has frequently occurred to me?when? 

MRS. LIMBURY. Now don�ft talk, Peter. (To LOVETOWN.) The colour is so bright, is it not? 

LOVETOWN. It might appear so elsewhere, but the brightness of those eyes casts it quite into shade. 

MRS. LIMBURY. I know you are a connoisseur in ladies�f dresses; how do you like those shoes? 

LIMBURY (aside). Her shoes! What will she ask his opinion of next? 

LOVETOWN. O, like the bonnet, you deprive them of their fair chance of admiration. That small and elegant foot engrosses all the attention which the shoes might otherwise attract. That taper ankle, too?

LIMBURY (aside). Her taper ankle! My bosom swells with the rage of an ogre. Mr. Lovetown,?I? 

MRS. LIMBURY. Now, pray do not talk so, Limbury. You�fve put Mr. Lovetown out as it is. 

LIMBURY (aside). Put him out! I wish I could put him out, Mrs. Limbury. I must. 

 

Enter SERVANT, hastily.

 

SERVANT. I beg your pardon, sir, but the bay pony has got his hind leg over the traces, and he�fs kicking the chaise to pieces! 

LIMBURY. Kicking the new chaise to pieces! 

LOVETOWN. Kicking the new chaise to pieces! The bay pony! Limbury, my dear fellow, fly to the spot! (Pushing him out.) 

LIMBURY. But, Mr. Lovetown, I? 

MRS. LIMBURY. Oh! he�fll kick somebody�fs brains out, if Peter don�ft go to him. 

LIMBURY. But perhaps he�fll kick my brains out if I do go to him. 

LOVETOWN. Never mind, don�ft lose an instant,?not a moment. (Pushes him out, both talking together.) 

[Exit LIMBURY. 

       (Aside.) Now for it,?here�fs my wife. Dearest Mrs. Limbury?(Kneels by her chair, and seizes her hand.) 

 

Enter MRS. LOVETOWN, C.

 

MRS. LOVETOWN (aside). Can I believe my eyes? (Retires behind the screen.) 

MRS. LIMBURY. Mr. Lovetown! 

LOVETOWN. Nay. Allow me in one hurried interview, which I have sought in vain for weeks,?for months,?to say how devotedly, how ardently I love you. Suffer me to retain this hand in mine. Give me one ray of hope. 

MRS. LIMBURY. Rise, I entreat you,?we shall be discovered. 

LOVETOWN. Nay, I will not rise till you promise me that you will take an opportunity of detaching yourself from the rest of the company and meeting me alone in Tapkins�fs grounds this evening. I shall have no eyes, no ears for any one but yourself. 

MRS. LIMBURY. Well,?well,?I will?I do? 

LOVETOWN. Then I am blest indeed! 

MRS. LIMBURY. I am so agitated. If Peter or Mrs. Lovetown?were to find me thus?I should betray all. I�fll teach my husband to be jealous! (Crosses to L. H.) Let us walk round the garden. 

LOVETOWN. With pleasure,?take my arm. Divine creature! (Aside.) I�fm sure she is behind the screen. I saw her peeking. Come. 

[Exit LOVETOWN and MRS. LIMBURY, L. H. 

MRS. LOVETOWN (coming forward). Faithless man! His coldness and neglect are now too well explained. O Alfred! Alfred! how little did I think when I married you, six short months since, that I should be exposed to so much wretchedness! I begin to tremble at my own imprudence, and the situation in which it may place me; but it is now too late to recede. I must be firm. This day will either bring my project to the explanation I so much desire, or convince me of what I too much fear,?my husband�fs aversion. Can this woman�fs husband suspect their intimacy? If so, he may be able to prevent this assignation taking place. I will seek him instantly. If I can but meet him at once, he may prevent her going at all. 

[Exit MRS. LOVETOWN, R. H. 

 

Enter TAPKINS, L. H. window.

 

TAPKINS. This, certainly, is a most extraordinary affair. Not her partiality for me?that�fs natural enough,?but the confession I overheard about her marriage to another. I have been thinking that, after such a discovery, it would be highly improper to allow Limbury and his wife to meet her without warning him of the fact. The best way will be to make him acquainted with the real state of the case. Then he must see the propriety of not bringing his wife to my house to-night. Ah! here he is. I�fll make the awful disclosure at once, and petrify him. 

 

Enter LIMBURY, L. H. window.

 

LIMBURY. That damned little bay pony is as bad as my wife. There�fs no curbing either of them; and as soon as I have got the traces of the one all right, I lose all traces of the other. 

TAPKINS (R.). Peter! 

LIMBURY (L.). Ah! Tapkins! 

TAPKINS. Hush! Hush! (Looking cautiously round.) If you have a moment to spare, I�fve got something of great importance to communicate. 

LIMBURY. Something of great importance, Mr. Tapkins! (Aside.) What can he mean? Can it relate to Mrs. Limbury? The thought is dreadful. You horrify me! 

TAPKINS. You�fll be more horrified presently. What I am about to tell you concerns yourself and your honour very materially; and I beg you to understand that I communicate it?in the strictest confidence. 

LIMBURY. Myself and my honour! I shall dissolve into nothing with horrible anticipations! 

TAPKINS (in a low tone). Have you ever observed anything remarkable about Lovetown�fs manner? 

LIMBURY. Anything remarkable? 

TAPKINS. Ay,?anything very odd, and rather unpleasant?

LIMBURY. Decidedly! No longer than half an hour ago,?in this very room, I observed something in his manner particularly odd and exceedingly unpleasant. 

TAPKINS. To your feelings as a husband? 

LIMBURY. Yes, my friend, yes, yes;?you know it all, I see! 

TAPKINS. What! Do you know it? 

LIMBURY. I�fm afraid I do; but go on?go on. 

TAPKINS (aside). How the deuce can he know anything about it? Well, this oddness arises from the peculiar nature of his connexion with? You look very pale. 

LIMBURY. No, no,?go on,?�econnexion with?�f

TAPKINS. A certain lady,?you know whom I mean. 

LIMBURY. I do, I do! (Aside.) Disgrace and confusion! I�fll kill her with a look! I�fll wither her with scornful indignation! Mrs. Limbury!?viper! 

TAPKINS (whispering with caution). They?aren�ft?married. 

LIMBURY. They aren�ft married! Who aren�ft? 

TAPKINS. Those two, to be sure! 

LIMBURY. Those two! What two? 

TAPKINS. Why, them. And the worst of it is she�fs?she�fs married to somebody else. 

LIMBURY. Well, of course I know that. 

TAPKINS. You know it? 

LIMBURY. Of course I do. Why, how you talk! Isn�ft she my wife? 

TAPKINS. Your wife! Wretched bigamist! Mrs. Lovetown your wife? 

LIMBURY. Mrs. Lovetown! What! Have you been talking of Mrs. Lovetown all this time? My dear friend! (Embraces him.) The revulsion of feeling is almost insupportable. I thought you were talking about Mrs. Limbury. 

TAPKINS. No! 

LIMBURY. Yes. Ha! ha! But I say, what a dreadful fellow this is?another man�fs wife! Gad, I think he wants to run away with every man�fs wife he sees. And Mrs. Lovetown, too?horrid! 

TAPKINS. Shocking! 

LIMBURY. I say, I oughtn�ft to allow Mrs. Limbury to associate with her, ought I? 

TAPKINS. Precisely my idea. You had better induce your wife to stay away from my house to-night. 

LIMBURY. I�fm afraid I can�ft do that. 

TAPKINS. What, has she any particular objection to staying away? 

LIMBURY. She has a very strange inclination to go, and �ftis much the same; however, I�fll make the best arrangement I can! 

TAPKINS. Well, so be it. Of course I shall see you? 

LIMBURY. Of course. 

TAPKINS. Mind the secret,?close?close?you know, as a Cabinet Minister answering a question. 

LIMBURY. You may rely upon me. 

[Exit LIMBURY, L. H., TAPKINS, R. H. 

 

SCENE II.?A Conservatory on one side. A Summer-house on the other.

 

Enter LOVETOWN at L. H.

 

LOVETOWN. So far so good. My wife has not dropped the slightest hint of having overheard the conversation between me and Mrs. Limbury; but she cannot conceal the impression it has made upon her mind, or the jealousy it has evidently excited in her breast. This is just as I wished. I made Mr. Peter Limbury�fs amiable helpmate promise to meet me here. I know that refuge for destitute reptiles (pointing to summer-house) is Tapkins�fs favorite haunt, and if he has any assignation with my wife I have no doubt he will lead her to this place. A woman�fs coming down the walk. Mrs. Limbury, I suppose,?no, my wife, by all that�fs actionable. I must conceal myself here, even at the risk of a shower of black beetles, or a marching regiment of frogs. (Goes into conservatory, L. H.) 

 

Enter MRS. LOVETOWN from top, L. H.

 

MRS. LOVETOWN. I cannot have been mistaken. I am certain I saw Alfred here; he must have secreted himself somewhere to avoid me. Can his assignation with Mrs. Limbury have been discovered? Mr. Limbury�fs behaviour to me just now was strange in the extreme; and after a variety of incoherent expressions he begged me to meet him here, on a subject, as he said, of great delicacy and importance to myself. Alas! I fear that my husband�fs neglect and unkindness are but too well known. The injured little man approaches. I summon all my fortitude to bear the disclosure. 

 

Enter MR. LIMBURY at top, L. H.

 

LIMBURY (aside). Now as I could not prevail on Mrs. Limbury to stay away, the only distressing alternative I have is to inform Mrs. Lovetown that I know her history, and to put it to her good feeling whether she hadn�ft better go. 

LOVETOWN (peeping). Limbury! what the deuce can that little wretch want here? 

LIMBURY. I took the liberty, Mrs. Lovetown, of begging you to meet me in this retired spot, because the esteem I still entertain for you, and my regard for your feelings, induce me to prefer a private to a public disclosure. 

LOVETOWN (peeping). �ePublic disclosure!�f what on earth is he talking about? I wish he�fd speak a little louder. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. I am sensible of your kindness, Mr. Limbury, and believe me most grateful for it. I am fully prepared to hear what you have to say. 

LIMBURY. It is hardly necessary for me, I presume, to say, Mrs. Lovetown, that I have accidentally discovered the whole secret. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. The whole secret, sir? 

LOVETOWN (peeping). Whole secret! What secret? 

LIMBURY. The whole secret, ma�fam, of this disgraceful?I must call it disgraceful?and most abominable intrigue. 

MRS. LOVETOWN (aside). My worst fears are realised,?my husband�fs neglect is occasioned by his love for another. 

LOVETOWN (peeping). Abominable intrigue! My first suspicions are too well founded. He reproaches my wife with her infidelity, and she cannot deny it,?that villain Tapkins! 

MRS. LOVETOWN (weeping). Cruel?cruel?Alfred! 

LIMBURY. You may well call him cruel, unfortunate woman. His usage of you is indefensible, unmanly, scandalous. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. It is. It is, indeed. 

LIMBURY. It�fs very painful for me to express myself in such plain terms, Mrs. Lovetown; but allow me to say, as delicately as possible, that you should not endeavour to appear in society under such unusual and distressing circumstances. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Not appear in society! Why should I quit it? 

LOVETOWN (peeping). Shameful woman! 

LIMBURY. Is it possible you can ask such a question? 

MRS. LOVETOWN. What should I do? Where can I go? 

LIMBURY. Gain permission to return once again to your husband�fs roof. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. My husband�fs roof? 

LIMBURY. Yes, the roof of your husband, your wretched, unfortunate husband! 

MRS. LOVETOWN. Never! 

LIMBURY (aside). She�fs thoroughly hardened, steeped in vice beyond redemption. Mrs. Lovetown, as you reject my well-intentioned advice in this extraordinary manner, I am reduced to the painful necessity of expressing my hope that you will,?now pray don�ft think me unkind,?that you will never attempt to meet Mrs. Limbury more. 

MRS. LOVETOWN. What! Can you suppose I am so utterly dead to every sense of feeling and propriety as to meet that person,?the destroyer of my peace and happiness,?the wretch who has ruined my hopes and blighted my prospects for ever? Ask your own heart, sir,?appeal to your own feelings. You are naturally indignant at her conduct. You would hold no further communication with her. Can you suppose, then, I would deign to do so? The mere supposition is an insult! 

[Exit MRS. LOVETOWN hastily at top, L. H. 

LIMBURY. What can all this mean? I am lost in a maze of astonishment, petrified at the boldness with which she braves it out. Eh! it�fs breaking upon me by degrees. I see it. What did she say? �eDestroyer of peace and happiness,?person?ruined hopes and blighted prospects?her.�f I see it all. That atrocious Lovetown, that Don Juan multiplied by twenty, that unprecedented libertine, has seduced Mrs. Limbury from her allegiance to her lawful lord and master. He first of all runs away with the wife of another man, and he is no sooner tired of her, than he runs away with another wife of another man. I thirst for his destruction. I?(LOVETOWN rushes from the conservatory and embraces LIMBURY, who disengages himself.) Murderer of domestic happiness! behold hold your victim! 

LOVETOWN. Alas! you speak but too truly. (Covering his face with his hands.) I am the victim. 

LIMBURY. I speak but too truly!?He avows his own criminality. I shall throttle him. I know I shall. I feel it. 

 

Enter MRS. LIMBURY at back, L. H.

 

MRS. LIMBURY (aside). My husband here! (Goes into conservatory.) 

 

Enter TAPKINS at back, L. H.

 

TAPKINS (aside). Not here, and her husband with Limbury. I�fll reconnoitre. (Goes into summer-house, R. H.) 

LIMBURY. Lovetown, have you the boldness to look an honest man in the face? 

LOVETOWN. O, spare me! I feel the situation in which I am placed acutely, deeply. Feel for me when I say that from that conservatory I overheard the greater part of what passed between you and Mrs. Lovetown. 

LIMBURY. You did? 

LOVETOWN. Need I say how highly I approve both of the language you used, and the advice you gave her? 

LIMBURY. What! you want to get rid of her, do you? 

LOVETOWN. Can you doubt it? 

TAPKINS (peeping). Hallo! he wants to get rid of her. Queer! 

LOVETOWN. Situated as I am, you know, I have no other resource, after what has passed. I must part from her. 

MRS. LIMBURY (peeping). What can he mean? 

LIMBURY (aside). I should certainly throttle him, were it not that the coolness with which he refers to the dreadful event paralyses me. Mr. Lovetown, look at me! Sir, consider the feelings of an indignant husband, sir! 

LOVETOWN. Oh, I thank you for those words. Those strong expressions prove the unaffected interest you take in the matter. 

LIMBURY. Unaffected interest! I shall go raving mad with passion and fury! Villain! Monster! To embrace the opportunity afforded him of being on a footing of friendship. 

LOVETOWN. To take a mean advantage of his being a single man. 

LIMBURY. To tamper with the sacred engagements of a married woman. 

LOVETOWN. To place a married man in a disgraceful and humiliating situation. 

LIMBURY. Scoundrel! Do you mock me to my face? 

LOVETOWN. Mock you. What d�f ye mean? Who the devil are you talking about? 

LIMBURY. Talking about?you! 

LOVETOWN. Me! 

LIMBURY. Designing miscreant! Of whom do you speak? 

LOVETOWN. Of whom should I speak but that scoundrel Tapkins? 

TAPKINS (coming forward, R.). Me! What the devil do you mean by that? 

LOVETOWN. Ha! (Rushing at him, is held back by LIMBURY.) 

LIMBURY (to TAPKINS). Avoid him. Get out of his sight. He�fs raving mad with conscious villainy. 

TAPKINS. What are you all playing at I spy I over my two acres of infant hay for? 

LOVETOWN (to TAPKINS). How dare you tamper with the affections of Mrs. Lovetown? 

TAPKINS. O, is that all? Ha! ha! (Crosses to C.) 

LOVETOWN. All! 

TAPKINS. Come, come, none of your nonsense. 

LOVETOWN. Nonsense! Designate the best feelings of our nature nonsense! 

TAPKINS. Pooh! pooh! Here, I know all about it. 

LOVETOWN (angrily). And so do I, sir! And so do I. 

TAPKINS. Of course you do. And you�fve managed very well to keep it quiet so long. But you�fre a deep fellow, by Jove! you�fre a deep fellow! 

LOVETOWN. Now, mind! I restrain myself sufficiently to ask you once again before I knock you down, by what right dare you tamper with the affections of Mrs. Lovetown? 

TAPKINS. Right! O, if you come to strict right, you know, nobody has a right but her husband. 

LOVETOWN. And who is her husband? Who is her husband? 

TAPKINS. Ah! to be sure, that�fs the question. Nobody that I know. I hope?poor fellow? 

LOVETOWN. I�fll bear these insults no longer! (Rushes towards TAPKINS. LIMBURY interposes. LOVETOWN crosses to R. H. A scream is heard from the conservatory?a pause.) 

TAPKINS. Something singular among the plants! (He goes into the conservatory and returns with MRS. LIMBURY.) A flower that wouldn�ft come out of its own accord. I was obliged to force it. Tolerably full blown now, at all events. 

LIMBURY. My wife! Traitoress! (Crosses to L. H.) Fly from my presence! Quit my sight! 

Return to the conservatory with that demon in a frock-coat! 

 

Enter MRS. LOVETOWN at top, L. H. and comes down C.

 

TAPKINS. Hallo! Somebody else! 

LOVETOWN (aside). My wife here! 

MRS. LOVETOWN (to LIMBURY). I owe you some return for the commiseration you expressed just now for my wretched situation. The best, the only one I can make you is, to entreat you to refrain from committing any rash act, however excited you may be, and to control the feelings of an injured husband. 

TAPKINS. Injured husband! Decidedly singular! 

LOVETOWN. The allusion of that lady I confess my utter inability to understand. Mr. Limbury, to you an explanation is due, and I make it more cheerfully, as my abstaining from doing so might involve the character of your wife. Stung by the attentions which I found Mrs. Lovetown had received from a scoundrel present,? 

TAPKINS (aside). That�fs me. 

LOVETOWN. I?partly to obtain opportunities of watching her closely, under an assumed mask of levity and carelessness, and partly in the hope of awaking once again any dormant feelings of affection that might still slumber in her breast, affected a passion for your wife which I never felt, and to which she never really responded. The second part of my project, I regret to say, has failed. The first has succeeded but too well. 

LIMBURY. Can I believe my ears? But how came Mrs. Peter Limbury to receive those attentions? 

MRS. LIMBURY. Why, not because I liked them, of course, but to assist Mr. Lovetown in his project, and to teach you the misery of those jealous fears. Come here, you stupid little jealous, insinuating darling. (They retire up L. H., she coaxing him.)

TAPKINS (aside). It strikes me very forcibly that I have made a slight mistake here, which is something particularly singular. (Turns up R. H.)

MRS. LOVETOWN. Alfred, hear me! I am as innocent as yourself. Your fancied neglect and coldness hurt my weak vanity, and roused some foolish feelings of angry pride. In a moment of irritation I resorted to some such retaliation as you have yourself described. That I did so from motives as guiltless as your own I call Heaven to witness. That I repent my fault I solemnly assure you. 

LOVETOWN. Is this possible? 

TAPKINS. Very possible indeed! Believe your wife�fs assurance and my corroboration. Here, give and take is all fair, you know. Give me your hand and take your wife�fs. Here, Mr. and Mrs. L. (To LIMBURY.) Double L,?I call them. (To LOVETOWN.) Small italic and Roman capital. (To MR. and MRS. LIMBURY, who come forward.) Here, it�fs all arranged. The key to the whole matter is that I�fve been mistaken, which is something singular. If I have made another mistake in calculating on your kind and lenient reception of our last half-hour�fs misunderstanding (to the audience), I shall have done something more singular still. Do you forbid me committing any more mistakes, or may I announce my intention of doing something singular again? 

 

 

Afterword
 
            Felix Tapkins�fs closing address to the audience simply asks whether or not the crowd approved of the performance. Theatre managers would continue or terminate a play�fs run, based on such applause or hisses. 

            We must end now on an unhappy note. The most noted performance of Is She His Wife??the evening of 6 May, 1837?is known for the saddest of reasons, and for one of the great tragedies in Dickens�fs life. The story of how Dickens lost his beloved sister-in-law is well known to all Dickensians. Henry Burnett, an actor at the St. James�fs Theatre, and Dickens�fs future brother-in-law, played in another piece that same evening. Many years later, he remembered seeing Dickens and his family in the audience: �gAs to Mary Hogarth, I can see her sweet face looking over the Box upon the Stage of the St. James�fs Theatre as it appeared the night she died�cDickens had a box on the night and with him were his Father, Mother, Wife and Mary Hogarth. My future Wife [Fanny Dickens] was nervous and could not go. There was some excitement, of course, for the House was very full. Mary was to sleep at her sister�fs house in Doughty Street. On her way back she fell ill?was carried in from the coach, and it was not long before her head was gently laid back on the pillow?a very spirit of sweetness?in her last sleep. The shadow from her grave darkened the sensitive life of Dickens for a long time, for he had the warmest brotherly love for her unaffected simplicity and the sweetness of her character and her beauty.�h (Carlton, 71). Mary died in Dickens�fs arms the following afternoon (7 May 1837). She was only seventeen. When Dickens returned to the St. James Theatre, later the same year (12 Dec 1837), he asked for different seating: �glet us have either a pit or proscenium box on the same side as that in which we used to sit; but not a box on the same tier, or opposite. Old recollections make us shun our old haunts, or the sight of them.�h (Pilgrim 1:343). 

            Dickens was never to write another play for the St. James Theatre. His first novel Pickwick was already a roaring hit, and was to be one of the most popular novels of the century. But his plays had met with only limited success, and even that was due in part to the fame of Harley and of Pickwick. Coquettes had been a critical failure and a disappointment. Dickens took the natural route and pursued the novels. There exists one further letter from Dickens on the subject, in which he offers to write a two-act piece for the St. James?for one-hundred and fifty pounds. It was five times what he had received for The Strange Gentleman (Pilgrim 1:254). Nothing came of it. Dickens had become too popular and too expensive an author to continue as a playwright. 

THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

Public LIfe Of Mr. Tulrumble--Once Mayor Of Mudfog

Mudfog is a pleasant town--a remarkably pleasant town--situated in
a charming hollow by the side of a river, from which river, Mudfog
derives an agreeable scent of pitch, tar, coals, and rope-yarn, a
roving population in oilskin hats, a pretty steady influx of
drunken bargemen, and a great many other maritime advantages.
There is a good deal of water about Mudfog, and yet it is not
exactly the sort of town for a watering-place, either. Water is a
perverse sort of element at the best of times, and in Mudfog it is
particularly so. In winter, it comes oozing down the streets and
tumbling over the fields,--nay, rushes into the very cellars and
kitchens of the houses, with a lavish prodigality that might well
be dispensed with; but in the hot summer weather it WILL dry up,
and turn green: and, although green is a very good colour in its
way, especially in grass, still it certainly is not becoming to
water; and it cannot be denied that the beauty of Mudfog is rather
impaired, even by this trifling circumstance. Mudfog is a healthy
place--very healthy;--damp, perhaps, but none the worse for that.
It's quite a mistake to suppose that damp is unwholesome: plants
thrive best in damp situations, and why shouldn't men? The
inhabitants of Mudfog are unanimous in asserting that there exists
not a finer race of people on the face of the earth; here we have
an indisputable and veracious contradiction of the vulgar error at
once. So, admitting Mudfog to be damp, we distinctly state that it
is salubrious.

The town of Mudfog is extremely picturesque. Limehouse and
Ratcliff Highway are both something like it, but they give you a
very faint idea of Mudfog. There are a great many more public-
houses in Mudfog--more than in Ratcliff Highway and Limehouse put
together. The public buildings, too, are very imposing. We
consider the town-hall one of the finest specimens of shed
architecture, extant: it is a combination of the pig-sty and tea-
garden-box orders; and the simplicity of its design is of
surpassing beauty. The idea of placing a large window on one side
of the door, and a small one on the other, is particularly happy.
There is a fine old Doric beauty, too, about the padlock and
scraper, which is strictly in keeping with the general effect.

In this room do the mayor and corporation of Mudfog assemble
together in solemn council for the public weal. Seated on the
massive wooden benches, which, with the table in the centre, form
the only furniture of the whitewashed apartment, the sage men of
Mudfog spend hour after hour in grave deliberation. Here they
settle at what hour of the night the public-houses shall be closed,
at what hour of the morning they shall be permitted to open, how
soon it shall be lawful for people to eat their dinner on church-
days, and other great political questions; and sometimes, long
after silence has fallen on the town, and the distant lights from
the shops and houses have ceased to twinkle, like far-off stars, to
the sight of the boatmen on the river, the illumination in the two
unequal-sized windows of the town-hall, warns the inhabitants of
Mudfog that its little body of legislators, like a larger and
better-known body of the same genus, a great deal more noisy, and
not a whit more profound, are patriotically dozing away in company,
far into the night, for their country's good.

Among this knot of sage and learned men, no one was so eminently
distinguished, during many years, for the quiet modesty of his
appearance and demeanour, as Nicholas Tulrumble, the well-known
coal-dealer. However exciting the subject of discussion, however
animated the tone of the debate, or however warm the personalities
exchanged, (and even in Mudfog we get personal sometimes,) Nicholas
Tulrumble was always the same. To say truth, Nicholas, being an
industrious man, and always up betimes, was apt to fall asleep when
a debate began, and to remain asleep till it was over, when he
would wake up very much refreshed, and give his vote with the
greatest complacency. The fact was, that Nicholas Tulrumble,
knowing that everybody there had made up his mind beforehand,
considered the talking as just a long botheration about nothing at
all; and to the present hour it remains a question, whether, on
this point at all events, Nicholas Tulrumble was not pretty near
right.

Time, which strews a man's head with silver, sometimes fills his
pockets with gold. As he gradually performed one good office for
Nicholas Tulrumble, he was obliging enough, not to omit the other.
Nicholas began life in a wooden tenement of four feet square, with
a capital of two and ninepence, and a stock in trade of three
bushels and a-half of coals, exclusive of the large lump which
hung, by way of sign-board, outside. Then he enlarged the shed,
and kept a truck; then he left the shed, and the truck too, and
started a donkey and a Mrs. Tulrumble; then he moved again and set
up a cart; the cart was soon afterwards exchanged for a waggon; and
so he went on like his great predecessor Whittington--only without
a cat for a partner--increasing in wealth and fame, until at last
he gave up business altogether, and retired with Mrs. Tulrumble and
family to Mudfog Hall, which he had himself erected, on something
which he attempted to delude himself into the belief was a hill,
about a quarter of a mile distant from the town of Mudfog.

About this time, it began to be murmured in Mudfog that Nicholas
Tulrumble was growing vain and haughty; that prosperity and success
had corrupted the simplicity of his manners, and tainted the
natural goodness of his heart; in short, that he was setting up for
a public character, and a great gentleman, and affected to look
down upon his old companions with compassion and contempt. Whether
these reports were at the time well-founded, or not, certain it is
that Mrs. Tulrumble very shortly afterwards started a four-wheel
chaise, driven by a tall postilion in a yellow cap,--that Mr.
Tulrumble junior took to smoking cigars, and calling the footman a
'feller,'--and that Mr. Tulrumble from that time forth, was no more
seen in his old seat in the chimney-corner of the Lighterman's Arms
at night. This looked bad; but, more than this, it began to be
observed that Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble attended the corporation
meetings more frequently than heretofore; and he no longer went to
sleep as he had done for so many years, but propped his eyelids
open with his two forefingers; that he read the newspapers by
himself at home; and that he was in the habit of indulging abroad
in distant and mysterious allusions to 'masses of people,' and 'the
property of the country,' and 'productive power,' and 'the monied
interest:' all of which denoted and proved that Nicholas Tulrumble
was either mad, or worse; and it puzzled the good people of Mudfog
amazingly.

At length, about the middle of the month of October, Mr. Tulrumble
and family went up to London; the middle of October being, as Mrs.
Tulrumble informed her acquaintance in Mudfog, the very height of
the fashionable season.

Somehow or other, just about this time, despite the health-
preserving air of Mudfog, the Mayor died. It was a most
extraordinary circumstance; he had lived in Mudfog for eighty-five
years. The corporation didn't understand it at all; indeed it was
with great difficulty that one old gentleman, who was a great
stickler for forms, was dissuaded from proposing a vote of censure
on such unaccountable conduct. Strange as it was, however, die he
did, without taking the slightest notice of the corporation; and
the corporation were imperatively called upon to elect his
successor. So, they met for the purpose; and being very full of
Nicholas Tulrumble just then, and Nicholas Tulrumble being a very
important man, they elected him, and wrote off to London by the
very next post to acquaint Nicholas Tulrumble with his new
elevation.

Now, it being November time, and Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble being in
the capital, it fell out that he was present at the Lord Mayor's
show and dinner, at sight of the glory and splendour whereof, he,
Mr. Tulrumble, was greatly mortified, inasmuch as the reflection
would force itself on his mind, that, had he been born in London
instead of in Mudfog, he might have been a Lord Mayor too, and have
patronized the judges, and been affable to the Lord Chancellor, and
friendly with the Premier, and coldly condescending to the
Secretary to the Treasury, and have dined with a flag behind his
back, and done a great many other acts and deeds which unto Lord
Mayors of London peculiarly appertain. The more he thought of the
Lord Mayor, the more enviable a personage he seemed. To be a King
was all very well; but what was the King to the Lord Mayor! When
the King made a speech, everybody knew it was somebody else's
writing; whereas here was the Lord Mayor, talking away for half an
hour-all out of his own head--amidst the enthusiastic applause of
the whole company, while it was notorious that the King might talk
to his parliament till he was black in the face without getting so
much as a single cheer. As all these reflections passed through
the mind of Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble, the Lord Mayor of London
appeared to him the greatest sovereign on the face of the earth,
beating the Emperor of Russia all to nothing, and leaving the Great
Mogul immeasurably behind.

Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble was pondering over these things, and
inwardly cursing the fate which had pitched his coal-shed in
Mudfog, when the letter of the corporation was put into his hand.
A crimson flush mantled over his face as he read it, for visions of
brightness were already dancing before his imagination.

'My dear,' said Mr. Tulrumble to his wife, 'they have elected me,
Mayor of Mudfog.'

'Lor-a-mussy!' said Mrs. Tulrumble: 'why what's become of old
Sniggs?'

'The late Mr. Sniggs, Mrs. Tulrumble,' said Mr. Tulrumble sharply,
for he by no means approved of the notion of unceremoniously
designating a gentleman who filled the high office of Mayor, as
'Old Sniggs,'--'The late Mr. Sniggs, Mrs. Tulrumble, is dead.'

The communication was very unexpected; but Mrs. Tulrumble only
ejaculated 'Lor-a-mussy!' once again, as if a Mayor were a mere
ordinary Christian, at which Mr. Tulrumble frowned gloomily.

'What a pity 'tan't in London, ain't it?' said Mrs. Tulrumble,
after a short pause; 'what a pity 'tan't in London, where you might
have had a show.'

'I MIGHT have a show in Mudfog, if I thought proper, I apprehend,'
said Mr. Tulrumble mysteriously.

'Lor! so you might, I declare,' replied Mrs. Tulrumble.

'And a good one too,' said Mr. Tulrumble.

'Delightful!' exclaimed Mrs. Tulrumble.

'One which would rather astonish the ignorant people down there,'
said Mr. Tulrumble.

'It would kill them with envy,' said Mrs. Tulrumble.

So it was agreed that his Majesty's lieges in Mudfog should be
astonished with splendour, and slaughtered with envy, and that such
a show should take place as had never been seen in that town, or in
any other town before,--no, not even in London itself.

On the very next day after the receipt of the letter, down came the
tall postilion in a post-chaise,--not upon one of the horses, but
inside--actually inside the chaise,--and, driving up to the very
door of the town-hall, where the corporation were assembled,
delivered a letter, written by the Lord knows who, and signed by
Nicholas Tulrumble, in which Nicholas said, all through four sides
of closely-written, gilt-edged, hot-pressed, Bath post letter
paper, that he responded to the call of his fellow-townsmen with
feelings of heartfelt delight; that he accepted the arduous office
which their confidence had imposed upon him; that they would never
find him shrinking from the discharge of his duty; that he would
endeavour to execute his functions with all that dignity which
their magnitude and importance demanded; and a great deal more to
the same effect. But even this was not all. The tall postilion
produced from his right-hand top-boot, a damp copy of that
afternoon's number of the county paper; and there, in large type,
running the whole length of the very first column, was a long
address from Nicholas Tulrumble to the inhabitants of Mudfog, in
which he said that he cheerfully complied with their requisition,
and, in short, as if to prevent any mistake about the matter, told
them over again what a grand fellow he meant to be, in very much
the same terms as those in which he had already told them all about
the matter in his letter.

The corporation stared at one another very hard at all this, and
then looked as if for explanation to the tall postilion, but as the
tall postilion was intently contemplating the gold tassel on the
top of his yellow cap, and could have afforded no explanation
whatever, even if his thoughts had been entirely disengaged, they
contented themselves with coughing very dubiously, and looking very
grave. The tall postilion then delivered another letter, in which
Nicholas Tulrumble informed the corporation, that he intended
repairing to the town-hall, in grand state and gorgeous procession,
on the Monday afternoon next ensuing. At this the corporation
looked still more solemn; but, as the epistle wound up with a
formal invitation to the whole body to dine with the Mayor on that
day, at Mudfog Hall, Mudfog Hill, Mudfog, they began to see the fun
of the thing directly, and sent back their compliments, and they'd
be sure to come.

Now there happened to be in Mudfog, as somehow or other there does
happen to be, in almost every town in the British dominions, and
perhaps in foreign dominions too--we think it very likely, but,
being no great traveller, cannot distinctly say--there happened to
be, in Mudfog, a merry-tempered, pleasant-faced, good-for-nothing
sort of vagabond, with an invincible dislike to manual labour, and
an unconquerable attachment to strong beer and spirits, whom
everybody knew, and nobody, except his wife, took the trouble to
quarrel with, who inherited from his ancestors the appellation of
Edward Twigger, and rejoiced in the sobriquet of Bottle-nosed Ned.
He was drunk upon the average once a day, and penitent upon an
equally fair calculation once a month; and when he was penitent, he
was invariably in the very last stage of maudlin intoxication. He
was a ragged, roving, roaring kind of fellow, with a burly form, a
sharp wit, and a ready head, and could turn his hand to anything
when he chose to do it. He was by no means opposed to hard labour
on principle, for he would work away at a cricket-match by the day
together,--running, and catching, and batting, and bowling, and
revelling in toil which would exhaust a galley-slave. He would
have been invaluable to a fire-office; never was a man with such a
natural taste for pumping engines, running up ladders, and throwing
furniture out of two-pair-of-stairs' windows: nor was this the
only element in which he was at home; he was a humane society in
himself, a portable drag, an animated life-preserver, and had saved
more people, in his time, from drowning, than the Plymouth life-
boat, or Captain Manby's apparatus. With all these qualifications,
notwithstanding his dissipation, Bottle-nosed Ned was a general
favourite; and the authorities of Mudfog, remembering his numerous
services to the population, allowed him in return to get drunk in
his own way, without the fear of stocks, fine, or imprisonment. He
had a general licence, and he showed his sense of the compliment by
making the most of it.

We have been thus particular in describing the character and
avocations of Bottle-nosed Ned, because it enables us to introduce
a fact politely, without hauling it into the reader's presence with
indecent haste by the head and shoulders, and brings us very
naturally to relate, that on the very same evening on which Mr.
Nicholas Tulrumble and family returned to Mudfog, Mr. Tulrumble's
new secretary, just imported from London, with a pale face and
light whiskers, thrust his head down to the very bottom of his
neckcloth-tie, in at the tap-room door of the Lighterman's Arms,
and inquiring whether one Ned Twigger was luxuriating within,
announced himself as the bearer of a message from Nicholas
Tulrumble, Esquire, requiring Mr. Twigger's immediate attendance at
the hall, on private and particular business. It being by no means
Mr. Twigger's interest to affront the Mayor, he rose from the
fireplace with a slight sigh, and followed the light-whiskered
secretary through the dirt and wet of Mudfog streets, up to Mudfog
Hall, without further ado.

Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble was seated in a small cavern with a
skylight, which he called his library, sketching out a plan of the
procession on a large sheet of paper; and into the cavern the
secretary ushered Ned Twigger.

'Well, Twigger!' said Nicholas Tulrumble, condescendingly.

There was a time when Twigger would have replied, 'Well, Nick!' but
that was in the days of the truck, and a couple of years before the
donkey; so, he only bowed.

'I want you to go into training, Twigger,' said Mr. Tulrumble.

'What for, sir?' inquired Ned, with a stare.

'Hush, hush, Twigger!' said the Mayor. 'Shut the door, Mr.
Jennings. Look here, Twigger.'

As the Mayor said this, he unlocked a high closet, and disclosed a
complete suit of brass armour, of gigantic dimensions.

'I want you to wear this next Monday, Twigger,' said the Mayor.

'Bless your heart and soul, sir!' replied Ned, 'you might as well
ask me to wear a seventy-four pounder, or a cast-iron boiler.'

'Nonsense, Twigger, nonsense!' said the Mayor.

'I couldn't stand under it, sir,' said Twigger; 'it would make
mashed potatoes of me, if I attempted it.'

'Pooh, pooh, Twigger!' returned the Mayor. 'I tell you I have seen
it done with my own eyes, in London, and the man wasn't half such a
man as you are, either.'

'I should as soon have thought of a man's wearing the case of an
eight-day clock to save his linen,' said Twigger, casting a look of
apprehension at the brass suit.

'It's the easiest thing in the world,' rejoined the Mayor.

'It's nothing,' said Mr. Jennings.

'When you're used to it,' added Ned.

'You do it by degrees,' said the Mayor. 'You would begin with one
piece to-morrow, and two the next day, and so on, till you had got
it all on. Mr. Jennings, give Twigger a glass of rum. Just try
the breast-plate, Twigger. Stay; take another glass of rum first.
Help me to lift it, Mr. Jennings. Stand firm, Twigger! There!--it
isn't half as heavy as it looks, is it?'

Twigger was a good strong, stout fellow; so, after a great deal of
staggering, he managed to keep himself up, under the breastplate,
and even contrived, with the aid of another glass of rum, to walk
about in it, and the gauntlets into the bargain. He made a trial
of the helmet, but was not equally successful, inasmuch as he
tipped over instantly,--an accident which Mr. Tulrumble clearly
demonstrated to be occasioned by his not having a counteracting
weight of brass on his legs.

'Now, wear that with grace and propriety on Monday next,' said
Tulrumble, 'and I'll make your fortune.'

'I'll try what I can do, sir,' said Twigger.

'It must be kept a profound secret,' said Tulrumble.

'Of course, sir,' replied Twigger.

'And you must be sober,' said Tulrumble; 'perfectly sober.' Mr.
Twigger at once solemnly pledged himself to be as sober as a judge,
and Nicholas Tulrumble was satisfied, although, had we been
Nicholas, we should certainly have exacted some promise of a more
specific nature; inasmuch as, having attended the Mudfog assizes in
the evening more than once, we can solemnly testify to having seen
judges with very strong symptoms of dinner under their wigs.
However, that's neither here nor there.

The next day, and the day following, and the day after that, Ned
Twigger was securely locked up in the small cavern with the sky-
light, hard at work at the armour. With every additional piece he
could manage to stand upright in, he had an additional glass of
rum; and at last, after many partial suffocations, he contrived to
get on the whole suit, and to stagger up and down the room in it,
like an intoxicated effigy from Westminster Abbey.

Never was man so delighted as Nicholas Tulrumble; never was woman
so charmed as Nicholas Tulrumble's wife. Here was a sight for the
common people of Mudfog! A live man in brass armour! Why, they
would go wild with wonder!

The day--THE Monday--arrived.

If the morning had been made to order, it couldn't have been better
adapted to the purpose. They never showed a better fog in London
on Lord Mayor's day, than enwrapped the town of Mudfog on that
eventful occasion. It had risen slowly and surely from the green
and stagnant water with the first light of morning, until it
reached a little above the lamp-post tops; and there it had
stopped, with a sleepy, sluggish obstinacy, which bade defiance to
the sun, who had got up very blood-shot about the eyes, as if he
had been at a drinking-party over-night, and was doing his day's
work with the worst possible grace. The thick damp mist hung over
the town like a huge gauze curtain. All was dim and dismal. The
church steeples had bidden a temporary adieu to the world below;
and every object of lesser importance--houses, barns, hedges,
trees, and barges--had all taken the veil.

The church-clock struck one. A cracked trumpet from the front
garden of Mudfog Hall produced a feeble flourish, as if some
asthmatic person had coughed into it accidentally; the gate flew
open, and out came a gentleman, on a moist-sugar coloured charger,
intended to represent a herald, but bearing a much stronger
resemblance to a court-card on horseback. This was one of the
Circus people, who always came down to Mudfog at that time of the
year, and who had been engaged by Nicholas Tulrumble expressly for
the occasion. There was the horse, whisking his tail about,
balancing himself on his hind-legs, and flourishing away with his
fore-feet, in a manner which would have gone to the hearts and
souls of any reasonable crowd. But a Mudfog crowd never was a
reasonable one, and in all probability never will be. Instead of
scattering the very fog with their shouts, as they ought most
indubitably to have done, and were fully intended to do, by
Nicholas Tulrumble, they no sooner recognized the herald, than they
began to growl forth the most unqualified disapprobation at the
bare notion of his riding like any other man. If he had come out
on his head indeed, or jumping through a hoop, or flying through a
red-hot drum, or even standing on one leg with his other foot in
his mouth, they might have had something to say to him; but for a
professional gentleman to sit astride in the saddle, with his feet
in the stirrups, was rather too good a joke. So, the herald was a
decided failure, and the crowd hooted with great energy, as he
pranced ingloriously away.

On the procession came. We are afraid to say how many
supernumeraries there were, in striped shirts and black velvet
caps, to imitate the London watermen, or how many base imitations
of running-footmen, or how many banners, which, owing to the
heaviness of the atmosphere, could by no means be prevailed on to
display their inscriptions: still less do we feel disposed to
relate how the men who played the wind instruments, looking up into
the sky (we mean the fog) with musical fervour, walked through
pools of water and hillocks of mud, till they covered the powdered
heads of the running-footmen aforesaid with splashes, that looked
curious, but not ornamental; or how the barrel-organ performer put
on the wrong stop, and played one tune while the band played
another; or how the horses, being used to the arena, and not to the
streets, would stand still and dance, instead of going on and
prancing;--all of which are matters which might be dilated upon to
great advantage, but which we have not the least intention of
dilating upon, notwithstanding.

Oh! it was a grand and beautiful sight to behold a corporation in
glass coaches, provided at the sole cost and charge of Nicholas
Tulrumble, coming rolling along, like a funeral out of mourning,
and to watch the attempts the corporation made to look great and
solemn, when Nicholas Tulrumble himself, in the four-wheel chaise,
with the tall postilion, rolled out after them, with Mr. Jennings
on one side to look like a chaplain, and a supernumerary on the
other, with an old life-guardsman's sabre, to imitate the sword-
bearer; and to see the tears rolling down the faces of the mob as
they screamed with merriment. This was beautiful! and so was the
appearance of Mrs. Tulrumble and son, as they bowed with grave
dignity out of their coach-window to all the dirty faces that were
laughing around them: but it is not even with this that we have to
do, but with the sudden stopping of the procession at another blast
of the trumpet, whereat, and whereupon, a profound silence ensued,
and all eyes were turned towards Mudfog Hall, in the confident
anticipation of some new wonder.

'They won't laugh now, Mr. Jennings,' said Nicholas Tulrumble.

'I think not, sir,' said Mr. Jennings.

'See how eager they look,' said Nicholas Tulrumble. 'Aha! the
laugh will be on our side now; eh, Mr. Jennings?'

'No doubt of that, sir,' replied Mr. Jennings; and Nicholas
Tulrumble, in a state of pleasurable excitement, stood up in the
four-wheel chaise, and telegraphed gratification to the Mayoress
behind.

While all this was going forward, Ned Twigger had descended into
the kitchen of Mudfog Hall for the purpose of indulging the
servants with a private view of the curiosity that was to burst
upon the town; and, somehow or other, the footman was so
companionable, and the housemaid so kind, and the cook so friendly,
that he could not resist the offer of the first-mentioned to sit
down and take something--just to drink success to master in.

So, down Ned Twigger sat himself in his brass livery on the top of
the kitchen-table; and in a mug of something strong, paid for by
the unconscious Nicholas Tulrumble, and provided by the
companionable footman, drank success to the Mayor and his
procession; and, as Ned laid by his helmet to imbibe the something
strong, the companionable footman put it on his own head, to the
immeasurable and unrecordable delight of the cook and housemaid.
The companionable footman was very facetious to Ned, and Ned was
very gallant to the cook and housemaid by turns. They were all
very cosy and comfortable; and the something strong went briskly
round.

At last Ned Twigger was loudly called for, by the procession
people: and, having had his helmet fixed on, in a very complicated
manner, by the companionable footman, and the kind housemaid, and
the friendly cook, he walked gravely forth, and appeared before the
multitude.

The crowd roared--it was not with wonder, it was not with surprise;
it was most decidedly and unquestionably with laughter.

'What!' said Mr. Tulrumble, starting up in the four-wheel chaise.
'Laughing? If they laugh at a man in real brass armour, they'd
laugh when their own fathers were dying. Why doesn't he go into
his place, Mr. Jennings? What's he rolling down towards us for? he
has no business here!'

'I am afraid, sir--' faltered Mr. Jennings.

'Afraid of what, sir?' said Nicholas Tulrumble, looking up into the
secretary's face.

'I am afraid he's drunk, sir,' replied Mr. Jennings.

Nicholas Tulrumble took one look at the extraordinary figure that
was bearing down upon them; and then, clasping his secretary by the
arm, uttered an audible groan in anguish of spirit.

It is a melancholy fact that Mr. Twigger having full licence to
demand a single glass of rum on the putting on of every piece of
the armour, got, by some means or other, rather out of his
calculation in the hurry and confusion of preparation, and drank
about four glasses to a piece instead of one, not to mention the
something strong which went on the top of it. Whether the brass
armour checked the natural flow of perspiration, and thus prevented
the spirit from evaporating, we are not scientific enough to know;
but, whatever the cause was, Mr. Twigger no sooner found himself
outside the gate of Mudfog Hall, than he also found himself in a
very considerable state of intoxication; and hence his
extraordinary style of progressing. This was bad enough, but, as
if fate and fortune had conspired against Nicholas Tulrumble, Mr.
Twigger, not having been penitent for a good calendar month, took
it into his head to be most especially and particularly
sentimental, just when his repentance could have been most
conveniently dispensed with. Immense tears were rolling down his
cheeks, and he was vainly endeavouring to conceal his grief by
applying to his eyes a blue cotton pocket-handkerchief with white
spots,--an article not strictly in keeping with a suit of armour
some three hundred years old, or thereabouts.

'Twigger, you villain!' said Nicholas Tulrumble, quite forgetting
his dignity, 'go back.'

'Never,' said Ned. 'I'm a miserable wretch. I'll never leave
you.'

The by-standers of course received this declaration with
acclamations of 'That's right, Ned; don't!'

'I don't intend it,' said Ned, with all the obstinacy of a very
tipsy man. 'I'm very unhappy. I'm the wretched father of an
unfortunate family; but I am very faithful, sir. I'll never leave
you.' Having reiterated this obliging promise, Ned proceeded in
broken words to harangue the crowd upon the number of years he had
lived in Mudfog, the excessive respectability of his character, and
other topics of the like nature.

'Here! will anybody lead him away?' said Nicholas: 'if they'll
call on me afterwards, I'll reward them well.'

Two or three men stepped forward, with the view of bearing Ned off,
when the secretary interposed.

'Take care! take care!' said Mr. Jennings. 'I beg your pardon,
sir; but they'd better not go too near him, because, if he falls
over, he'll certainly crush somebody.'

At this hint the crowd retired on all sides to a very respectful
distance, and left Ned, like the Duke of Devonshire, in a little
circle of his own.

'But, Mr. Jennings,' said Nicholas Tulrumble, 'he'll be
suffocated.'

'I'm very sorry for it, sir,' replied Mr. Jennings; 'but nobody can
get that armour off, without his own assistance. I'm quite certain
of it from the way he put it on.'

Here Ned wept dolefully, and shook his helmeted head, in a manner
that might have touched a heart of stone; but the crowd had not
hearts of stone, and they laughed heartily.

'Dear me, Mr. Jennings,' said Nicholas, turning pale at the
possibility of Ned's being smothered in his antique costume--'Dear
me, Mr. Jennings, can nothing be done with him?'

'Nothing at all,' replied Ned, 'nothing at all. Gentlemen, I'm an
unhappy wretch. I'm a body, gentlemen, in a brass coffin.' At
this poetical idea of his own conjuring up, Ned cried so much that
the people began to get sympathetic, and to ask what Nicholas
Tulrumble meant by putting a man into such a machine as that; and
one individual in a hairy waistcoat like the top of a trunk, who
had previously expressed his opinion that if Ned hadn't been a poor
man, Nicholas wouldn't have dared do it, hinted at the propriety of
breaking the four-wheel chaise, or Nicholas's head, or both, which
last compound proposition the crowd seemed to consider a very good
notion.

It was not acted upon, however, for it had hardly been broached,
when Ned Twigger's wife made her appearance abruptly in the little
circle before noticed, and Ned no sooner caught a glimpse of her
face and form, than from the mere force of habit he set off towards
his home just as fast as his legs could carry him; and that was not
very quick in the present instance either, for, however ready they
might have been to carry HIM, they couldn't get on very well under
the brass armour. So, Mrs. Twigger had plenty of time to denounce
Nicholas Tulrumble to his face: to express her opinion that he was
a decided monster; and to intimate that, if her ill-used husband
sustained any personal damage from the brass armour, she would have
the law of Nicholas Tulrumble for manslaughter. When she had said
all this with due vehemence, she posted after Ned, who was dragging
himself along as best he could, and deploring his unhappiness in
most dismal tones.

What a wailing and screaming Ned's children raised when he got home
at last! Mrs. Twigger tried to undo the armour, first in one
place, and then in another, but she couldn't manage it; so she
tumbled Ned into bed, helmet, armour, gauntlets, and all. Such a
creaking as the bedstead made, under Ned's weight in his new suit!
It didn't break down though; and there Ned lay, like the anonymous
vessel in the Bay of Biscay, till next day, drinking barley-water,
and looking miserable: and every time he groaned, his good lady
said it served him right, which was all the consolation Ned Twigger
got.

Nicholas Tulrumble and the gorgeous procession went on together to
the town-hall, amid the hisses and groans of all the spectators,
who had suddenly taken it into their heads to consider poor Ned a
martyr. Nicholas was formally installed in his new office, in
acknowledgment of which ceremony he delivered himself of a speech,
composed by the secretary, which was very long, and no doubt very
good, only the noise of the people outside prevented anybody from
hearing it, but Nicholas Tulrumble himself. After which, the
procession got back to Mudfog Hall any how it could; and Nicholas
and the corporation sat down to dinner.

But the dinner was flat, and Nicholas was disappointed. They were
such dull sleepy old fellows, that corporation. Nicholas made
quite as long speeches as the Lord Mayor of London had done, nay,
he said the very same things that the Lord Mayor of London had
said, and the deuce a cheer the corporation gave him. There was
only one man in the party who was thoroughly awake; and he was
insolent, and called him Nick. Nick! What would be the
consequence, thought Nicholas, of anybody presuming to call the
Lord Mayor of London 'Nick!' He should like to know what the
sword-bearer would say to that; or the recorder, or the toast-
master, or any other of the great officers of the city. They'd
nick him.

But these were not the worst of Nicholas Tulrumble's doings. If
they had been, he might have remained a Mayor to this day, and have
talked till he lost his voice. He contracted a relish for
statistics, and got philosophical; and the statistics and the
philosophy together, led him into an act which increased his
unpopularity and hastened his downfall.

At the very end of the Mudfog High-street, and abutting on the
river-side, stands the Jolly Boatmen, an old-fashioned low-roofed,
bay-windowed house, with a bar, kitchen, and tap-room all in one,
and a large fireplace with a kettle to correspond, round which the
working men have congregated time out of mind on a winter's night,
refreshed by draughts of good strong beer, and cheered by the
sounds of a fiddle and tambourine: the Jolly Boatmen having been
duly licensed by the Mayor and corporation, to scrape the fiddle
and thumb the tambourine from time, whereof the memory of the
oldest inhabitants goeth not to the contrary. Now Nicholas
Tulrumble had been reading pamphlets on crime, and parliamentary
reports,--or had made the secretary read them to him, which is the
same thing in effect,--and he at once perceived that this fiddle
and tambourine must have done more to demoralize Mudfog, than any
other operating causes that ingenuity could imagine. So he read up
for the subject, and determined to come out on the corporation with
a burst, the very next time the licence was applied for.

The licensing day came, and the red-faced landlord of the Jolly
Boatmen walked into the town-hall, looking as jolly as need be,
having actually put on an extra fiddle for that night, to
commemorate the anniversary of the Jolly Boatmen's music licence.
It was applied for in due form, and was just about to be granted as
a matter of course, when up rose Nicholas Tulrumble, and drowned
the astonished corporation in a torrent of eloquence. He descanted
in glowing terms upon the increasing depravity of his native town
of Mudfog, and the excesses committed by its population. Then, he
related how shocked he had been, to see barrels of beer sliding
down into the cellar of the Jolly Boatmen week after week; and how
he had sat at a window opposite the Jolly Boatmen for two days
together, to count the people who went in for beer between the
hours of twelve and one o'clock alone--which, by-the-bye, was the
time at which the great majority of the Mudfog people dined. Then,
he went on to state, how the number of people who came out with
beer-jugs, averaged twenty-one in five minutes, which, being
multiplied by twelve, gave two hundred and fifty-two people with
beer-jugs in an hour, and multiplied again by fifteen (the number
of hours during which the house was open daily) yielded three
thousand seven hundred and eighty people with beer-jugs per day, or
twenty-six thousand four hundred and sixty people with beer-jugs,
per week. Then he proceeded to show that a tambourine and moral
degradation were synonymous terms, and a fiddle and vicious
propensities wholly inseparable. All these arguments he
strengthened and demonstrated by frequent references to a large
book with a blue cover, and sundry quotations from the Middlesex
magistrates; and in the end, the corporation, who were posed with
the figures, and sleepy with the speech, and sadly in want of
dinner into the bargain, yielded the palm to Nicholas Tulrumble,
and refused the music licence to the Jolly Boatmen.

But although Nicholas triumphed, his triumph was short. He carried
on the war against beer-jugs and fiddles, forgetting the time when
he was glad to drink out of the one, and to dance to the other,
till the people hated, and his old friends shunned him. He grew
tired of the lonely magnificence of Mudfog Hall, and his heart
yearned towards the Lighterman's Arms. He wished he had never set
up as a public man, and sighed for the good old times of the coal-
shop, and the chimney corner.

At length old Nicholas, being thoroughly miserable, took heart of
grace, paid the secretary a quarter's wages in advance, and packed
him off to London by the next coach. Having taken this step, he
put his hat on his head, and his pride in his pocket, and walked
down to the old room at the Lighterman's Arms. There were only two
of the old fellows there, and they looked coldly on Nicholas as he
proffered his hand.

'Are you going to put down pipes, Mr. Tulrumble?' said one.

'Or trace the progress of crime to 'bacca?' growled another.

'Neither,' replied Nicholas Tulrumble, shaking hands with them
both, whether they would or not. 'I've come down to say that I'm
very sorry for having made a fool of myself, and that I hope you'll
give me up the old chair, again.'

The old fellows opened their eyes, and three or four more old
fellows opened the door, to whom Nicholas, with tears in his eyes,
thrust out his hand too, and told the same story. They raised a
shout of joy, that made the bells in the ancient church-tower
vibrate again, and wheeling the old chair into the warm corner,
thrust old Nicholas down into it, and ordered in the very largest-
sized bowl of hot punch, with an unlimited number of pipes,
directly.

The next day, the Jolly Boatmen got the licence, and the next
night, old Nicholas and Ned Twigger's wife led off a dance to the
music of the fiddle and tambourine, the tone of which seemed
mightily improved by a little rest, for they never had played so
merrily before. Ned Twigger was in the very height of his glory,
and he danced hornpipes, and balanced chairs on his chin, and
straws on his nose, till the whole company, including the
corporation, were in raptures of admiration at the brilliancy of
his acquirements.

Mr. Tulrumble, junior, couldn't make up his mind to be anything but
magnificent, so he went up to London and drew bills on his father;
and when he had overdrawn, and got into debt, he grew penitent, and
came home again.

As to old Nicholas, he kept his word, and having had six weeks of
public life, never tried it any more. He went to sleep in the
town-hall at the very next meeting; and, in full proof of his
sincerity, has requested us to write this faithful narrative. We
wish it could have the effect of reminding the Tulrumbles of
another sphere, that puffed-up conceit is not dignity, and that
snarling at the little pleasures they were once glad to enjoy,
because they would rather forget the times when they were of lower
station, renders them objects of contempt and ridicule.

This is the first time we have published any of our gleanings from
this particular source. Perhaps, at some future period, we may
venture to open the chronicles of Mudfog.

THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

The Pantomime Of Life

Before we plunge headlong into this paper, let us at once confess
to a fondness for pantomimes--to a gentle sympathy with clowns and
pantaloons--to an unqualified admiration of harlequins and
columbines--to a chaste delight in every action of their brief
existence, varied and many-coloured as those actions are, and
inconsistent though they occasionally be with those rigid and
formal rules of propriety which regulate the proceedings of meaner
and less comprehensive minds. We revel in pantomimes--not because
they dazzle one's eyes with tinsel and gold leaf; not because they
present to us, once again, the well-beloved chalked faces, and
goggle eyes of our childhood; not even because, like Christmas-day,
and Twelfth-night, and Shrove-Tuesday, and one's own birthday, they
come to us but once a year;--our attachment is founded on a graver
and a very different reason. A pantomime is to us, a mirror of
life; nay, more, we maintain that it is so to audiences generally,
although they are not aware of it, and that this very circumstance
is the secret cause of their amusement and delight.

Let us take a slight example. The scene is a street: an elderly
gentleman, with a large face and strongly marked features, appears.
His countenance beams with a sunny smile, and a perpetual dimple is
on his broad, red cheek. He is evidently an opulent elderly
gentleman, comfortable in circumstances, and well-to-do in the
world. He is not unmindful of the adornment of his person, for he
is richly, not to say gaudily, dressed; and that he indulges to a
reasonable extent in the pleasures of the table may be inferred
from the joyous and oily manner in which he rubs his stomach, by
way of informing the audience that he is going home to dinner. In
the fulness of his heart, in the fancied security of wealth, in the
possession and enjoyment of all the good things of life, the
elderly gentleman suddenly loses his footing, and stumbles. How
the audience roar! He is set upon by a noisy and officious crowd,
who buffet and cuff him unmercifully. They scream with delight!
Every time the elderly gentleman struggles to get up, his
relentless persecutors knock him down again. The spectators are
convulsed with merriment! And when at last the elderly gentleman
does get up, and staggers away, despoiled of hat, wig, and
clothing, himself battered to pieces, and his watch and money gone,
they are exhausted with laughter, and express their merriment and
admiration in rounds of applause.

Is this like life? Change the scene to any real street;--to the
Stock Exchange, or the City banker's; the merchant's counting-
house, or even the tradesman's shop. See any one of these men
fall,--the more suddenly, and the nearer the zenith of his pride
and riches, the better. What a wild hallo is raised over his
prostrate carcase by the shouting mob; how they whoop and yell as
he lies humbled beneath them! Mark how eagerly they set upon him
when he is down; and how they mock and deride him as he slinks
away. Why, it is the pantomime to the very letter.

Of all the pantomimic dramatis personae, we consider the pantaloon
the most worthless and debauched. Independent of the dislike one
naturally feels at seeing a gentleman of his years engaged in
pursuits highly unbecoming his gravity and time of life, we cannot
conceal from ourselves the fact that he is a treacherous, worldly-
minded old villain, constantly enticing his younger companion, the
clown, into acts of fraud or petty larceny, and generally standing
aside to watch the result of the enterprise. If it be successful,
he never forgets to return for his share of the spoil; but if it
turn out a failure, he generally retires with remarkable caution
and expedition, and keeps carefully aloof until the affair has
blown over. His amorous propensities, too, are eminently
disagreeable; and his mode of addressing ladies in the open street
at noon-day is down-right improper, being usually neither more nor
less than a perceptible tickling of the aforesaid ladies in the
waist, after committing which, he starts back, manifestly ashamed
(as well he may be) of his own indecorum and temerity; continuing,
nevertheless, to ogle and beckon to them from a distance in a very
unpleasant and immoral manner.

Is there any man who cannot count a dozen pantaloons in his own
social circle? Is there any man who has not seen them swarming at
the west end of the town on a sunshiny day or a summer's evening,
going through the last-named pantomimic feats with as much
liquorish energy, and as total an absence of reserve, as if they
were on the very stage itself? We can tell upon our fingers a
dozen pantaloons of our acquaintance at this moment--capital
pantaloons, who have been performing all kinds of strange freaks,
to the great amusement of their friends and acquaintance, for years
past; and who to this day are making such comical and ineffectual
attempts to be young and dissolute, that all beholders are like to
die with laughter.

Take that old gentleman who has just emerged from the Cafe de
l'Europe in the Haymarket, where he has been dining at the expense
of the young man upon town with whom he shakes hands as they part
at the door of the tavern. The affected warmth of that shake of
the hand, the courteous nod, the obvious recollection of the
dinner, the savoury flavour of which still hangs upon his lips, are
all characteristics of his great prototype. He hobbles away
humming an opera tune, and twirling his cane to and fro, with
affected carelessness. Suddenly he stops--'tis at the milliner's
window. He peeps through one of the large panes of glass; and, his
view of the ladies within being obstructed by the India shawls,
directs his attentions to the young girl with the band-box in her
hand, who is gazing in at the window also. See! he draws beside
her. He coughs; she turns away from him. He draws near her again;
she disregards him. He gleefully chucks her under the chin, and,
retreating a few steps, nods and beckons with fantastic grimaces,
while the girl bestows a contemptuous and supercilious look upon
his wrinkled visage. She turns away with a flounce, and the old
gentleman trots after her with a toothless chuckle. The pantaloon
to the life!

But the close resemblance which the clowns of the stage bear to
those of every-day life is perfectly extraordinary. Some people
talk with a sigh of the decline of pantomime, and murmur in low and
dismal tones the name of Grimaldi. We mean no disparagement to the
worthy and excellent old man when we say that this is downright
nonsense. Clowns that beat Grimaldi all to nothing turn up every
day, and nobody patronizes them--more's the pity!

'I know who you mean,' says some dirty-faced patron of Mr.
Osbaldistone's, laying down the Miscellany when he has got thus
far, and bestowing upon vacancy a most knowing glance; 'you mean C.
J. Smith as did Guy Fawkes, and George Barnwell at the Garden.'
The dirty-faced gentleman has hardly uttered the words, when he is
interrupted by a young gentleman in no shirt-collar and a Petersham
coat. 'No, no,' says the young gentleman; 'he means Brown, King,
and Gibson, at the 'Delphi.' Now, with great deference both to the
first-named gentleman with the dirty face, and the last-named
gentleman in the non-existing shirt-collar, we do NOT mean either
the performer who so grotesquely burlesqued the Popish conspirator,
or the three unchangeables who have been dancing the same dance
under different imposing titles, and doing the same thing under
various high-sounding names for some five or six years last past.
We have no sooner made this avowal, than the public, who have
hitherto been silent witnesses of the dispute, inquire what on
earth it is we DO mean; and, with becoming respect, we proceed to
tell them.

It is very well known to all playgoers and pantomime-seers, that
the scenes in which a theatrical clown is at the very height of his
glory are those which are described in the play-bills as
'Cheesemonger's shop and Crockery warehouse,' or 'Tailor's shop,
and Mrs. Queertable's boarding-house,' or places bearing some such
title, where the great fun of the thing consists in the hero's
taking lodgings which he has not the slightest intention of paying
for, or obtaining goods under false pretences, or abstracting the
stock-in-trade of the respectable shopkeeper next door, or robbing
warehouse porters as they pass under his window, or, to shorten the
catalogue, in his swindling everybody he possibly can, it only
remaining to be observed that, the more extensive the swindling is,
and the more barefaced the impudence of the swindler, the greater
the rapture and ecstasy of the audience. Now it is a most
remarkable fact that precisely this sort of thing occurs in real
life day after day, and nobody sees the humour of it. Let us
illustrate our position by detailing the plot of this portion of
the pantomime--not of the theatre, but of life.

The Honourable Captain Fitz-Whisker Fiercy, attended by his livery
servant Do'em--a most respectable servant to look at, who has grown
grey in the service of the captain's family--views, treats for, and
ultimately obtains possession of, the unfurnished house, such a
number, such a street. All the tradesmen in the neighbourhood are
in agonies of competition for the captain's custom; the captain is
a good-natured, kind-hearted, easy man, and, to avoid being the
cause of disappointment to any, he most handsomely gives orders to
all. Hampers of wine, baskets of provisions, cart-loads of
furniture, boxes of jewellery, supplies of luxuries of the
costliest description, flock to the house of the Honourable Captain
Fitz-Whisker Fiercy, where they are received with the utmost
readiness by the highly respectable Do'em; while the captain
himself struts and swaggers about with that compound air of
conscious superiority and general blood-thirstiness which a
military captain should always, and does most times, wear, to the
admiration and terror of plebeian men. But the tradesmen's backs
are no sooner turned, than the captain, with all the eccentricity
of a mighty mind, and assisted by the faithful Do'em, whose devoted
fidelity is not the least touching part of his character, disposes
of everything to great advantage; for, although the articles fetch
small sums, still they are sold considerably above cost price, the
cost to the captain having been nothing at all. After various
manoeuvres, the imposture is discovered, Fitz-Fiercy and Do'em are
recognized as confederates, and the police office to which they are
both taken is thronged with their dupes.

Who can fail to recognize in this, the exact counterpart of the
best portion of a theatrical pantomime--Fitz-Whisker Fiercy by the
clown; Do'em by the pantaloon; and supernumeraries by the
tradesmen? The best of the joke, too, is, that the very coal-
merchant who is loudest in his complaints against the person who
defrauded him, is the identical man who sat in the centre of the
very front row of the pit last night and laughed the most
boisterously at this very same thing,--and not so well done either.
Talk of Grimaldi, we say again! Did Grimaldi, in his best days,
ever do anything in this way equal to Da Costa?

The mention of this latter justly celebrated clown reminds us of
his last piece of humour, the fraudulently obtaining certain
stamped acceptances from a young gentleman in the army. We had
scarcely laid down our pen to contemplate for a few moments this
admirable actor's performance of that exquisite practical joke,
than a new branch of our subject flashed suddenly upon us. So we
take it up again at once.

All people who have been behind the scenes, and most people who
have been before them, know, that in the representation of a
pantomime, a good many men are sent upon the stage for the express
purpose of being cheated, or knocked down, or both. Now, down to a
moment ago, we had never been able to understand for what possible
purpose a great number of odd, lazy, large-headed men, whom one is
in the habit of meeting here, and there, and everywhere, could ever
have been created. We see it all, now. They are the
supernumeraries in the pantomime of life; the men who have been
thrust into it, with no other view than to be constantly tumbling
over each other, and running their heads against all sorts of
strange things. We sat opposite to one of these men at a supper-
table, only last week. Now we think of it, he was exactly like the
gentlemen with the pasteboard heads and faces, who do the
corresponding business in the theatrical pantomimes; there was the
same broad stolid simper--the same dull leaden eye--the same
unmeaning, vacant stare; and whatever was said, or whatever was
done, he always came in at precisely the wrong place, or jostled
against something that he had not the slightest business with. We
looked at the man across the table again and again; and could not
satisfy ourselves what race of beings to class him with. How very
odd that this never occurred to us before!

We will frankly own that we have been much troubled with the
harlequin. We see harlequins of so many kinds in the real living
pantomime, that we hardly know which to select as the proper fellow
of him of the theatres. At one time we were disposed to think that
the harlequin was neither more nor less than a young man of family
and independent property, who had run away with an opera-dancer,
and was fooling his life and his means away in light and trivial
amusements. On reflection, however, we remembered that harlequins
are occasionally guilty of witty, and even clever acts, and we are
rather disposed to acquit our young men of family and independent
property, generally speaking, of any such misdemeanours. On a more
mature consideration of the subject, we have arrived at the
conclusion that the harlequins of life are just ordinary men, to be
found in no particular walk or degree, on whom a certain station,
or particular conjunction of circumstances, confers the magic wand.
And this brings us to a few words on the pantomime of public and
political life, which we shall say at once, and then conclude--
merely premising in this place that we decline any reference
whatever to the columbine, being in no wise satisfied of the nature
of her connection with her parti-coloured lover, and not feeling by
any means clear that we should be justified in introducing her to
the virtuous and respectable ladies who peruse our lucubrations.

We take it that the commencement of a Session of Parliament is
neither more nor less than the drawing up of the curtain for a
grand comic pantomime, and that his Majesty's most gracious speech
on the opening thereof may be not inaptly compared to the clown's
opening speech of 'Here we are!' 'My lords and gentlemen, here we
are!' appears, to our mind at least, to be a very good abstract of
the point and meaning of the propitiatory address of the ministry.
When we remember how frequently this speech is made, immediately
after THE CHANGE too, the parallel is quite perfect, and still more
singular.

Perhaps the cast of our political pantomime never was richer than
at this day. We are particularly strong in clowns. At no former
time, we should say, have we had such astonishing tumblers, or
performers so ready to go through the whole of their feats for the
amusement of an admiring throng. Their extreme readiness to
exhibit, indeed, has given rise to some ill-natured reflections; it
having been objected that by exhibiting gratuitously through the
country when the theatre is closed, they reduce themselves to the
level of mountebanks, and thereby tend to degrade the
respectability of the profession. Certainly Grimaldi never did
this sort of thing; and though Brown, King, and Gibson have gone to
the Surrey in vacation time, and Mr. C. J. Smith has ruralised at
Sadler's Wells, we find no theatrical precedent for a general
tumbling through the country, except in the gentleman, name
unknown, who threw summersets on behalf of the late Mr. Richardson,
and who is no authority either, because he had never been on the
regular boards.

But, laying aside this question, which after all is a mere matter
of taste, we may reflect with pride and gratification of heart on
the proficiency of our clowns as exhibited in the season. Night
after night will they twist and tumble about, till two, three, and
four o'clock in the morning; playing the strangest antics, and
giving each other the funniest slaps on the face that can possibly
be imagined, without evincing the smallest tokens of fatigue. The
strange noises, the confusion, the shouting and roaring, amid which
all this is done, too, would put to shame the most turbulent
sixpenny gallery that ever yelled through a boxing-night.

It is especially curious to behold one of these clowns compelled to
go through the most surprising contortions by the irresistible
influence of the wand of office, which his leader or harlequin
holds above his head. Acted upon by this wonderful charm he will
become perfectly motionless, moving neither hand, foot, nor finger,
and will even lose the faculty of speech at an instant's notice; or
on the other hand, he will become all life and animation if
required, pouring forth a torrent of words without sense or
meaning, throwing himself into the wildest and most fantastic
contortions, and even grovelling on the earth and licking up the
dust. These exhibitions are more curious than pleasing; indeed,
they are rather disgusting than otherwise, except to the admirers
of such things, with whom we confess we have no fellow-feeling.

Strange tricks--very strange tricks--are also performed by the
harlequin who holds for the time being the magic wand which we have
just mentioned. The mere waving it before a man's eyes will
dispossess his brains of all the notions previously stored there,
and fill it with an entirely new set of ideas; one gentle tap on
the back will alter the colour of a man's coat completely; and
there are some expert performers, who, having this wand held first
on one side and then on the other, will change from side to side,
turning their coats at every evolution, with so much rapidity and
dexterity, that the quickest eye can scarcely detect their motions.
Occasionally, the genius who confers the wand, wrests it from the
hand of the temporary possessor, and consigns it to some new
performer; on which occasions all the characters change sides, and
then the race and the hard knocks begin anew.

We might have extended this chapter to a much greater length--we
might have carried the comparison into the liberal professions--we
might have shown, as was in fact our original purpose, that each is
in itself a little pantomime with scenes and characters of its own,
complete; but, as we fear we have been quite lengthy enough
already, we shall leave this chapter just where it is. A
gentleman, not altogether unknown as a dramatic poet, wrote thus a
year or two ago -


'All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:'


and we, tracking out his footsteps at the scarcely-worth-mentioning
little distance of a few millions of leagues behind, venture to
add, by way of new reading, that he meant a Pantomime, and that we
are all actors in The Pantomime of Life.

THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

MUDFOG AND OTHER SKETCHES

I.    PUBLIC LIFE OF MR. TULRUMBLE - ONCE MAYOR OF MUDFOG
II.  FULL REPORT OF THE FIRST MEETING OF THE MUDFOG ASSOCIATION
      FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF EVERYTHING
III.  FULL REPORT OF THE SECOND MEETING OF THE MUDFOG 
ASSOCIATION
      FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF EVERYTHING
IV.  THE PANTOMIME OF LIFE
V.    SOME PARTICULARS CONCERNING A LION
VI.  MR. ROBERT BOLTON:  THE �eGENTLEMAN CONNECTED WITH THE 
PRESS�f
VII.  FAMILIAR EPISTLE FROM A PARENT TO A CHILD AGED TWO YEARS AND 
TWO MONTHS


PUBLIC LIFE OF MR. TULRUMBLE?ONCE MAYOR OF MUDFOG



Mudfog is a pleasant town?a remarkably pleasant town?situated in a charming 
hollow by the side of a river, from which river, Mudfog derives an agreeable scent of 
pitch, tar, coals, and rope-yarn, a roving population in oilskin hats, a pretty steady 
influx of drunken bargemen, and a great many other maritime advantages.  There is a 
good deal of water about Mudfog, and yet it is not exactly the sort of town for a 
watering-place, either.  Water is a perverse sort of element at the best of times, and in 
Mudfog it is particularly so.  In winter, it comes oozing down the streets and tumbling 
over the fields,?nay, rushes into the very cellars and kitchens of the houses, with a 
lavish prodigality that might well be dispensed with; but in the hot summer weather it 
will dry up, and turn green: and, although green is a very good colour in its way, 
especially in grass, still it certainly is not becoming to water; and it cannot be denied 
that the beauty of Mudfog is rather impaired, even by this trifling circumstance.  
Mudfog is a healthy place?very healthy;?damp, perhaps, but none the worse for that.  
It�fs quite a mistake to suppose that damp is unwholesome: plants thrive best in damp 
situations, and why shouldn�ft men?  The inhabitants of Mudfog are unanimous in 
asserting that there exists not a finer race of people on the face of the earth; here we 
have an indisputable and veracious contradiction of the vulgar error at once.  So, 
admitting Mudfog to be damp, we distinctly state that it is salubrious.

The town of Mudfog is extremely picturesque.  Limehouse and Ratcliff Highway are 
both something like it, but they give you a very faint idea of Mudfog.  There are a great 
many more public-houses in Mudfog?more than in Ratcliff Highway and Limehouse 
put together.  The public buildings, too, are very imposing.  We consider the town-hall 
one of the finest specimens of shed architecture, extant: it is a combination of the pig-sty 
and tea-garden-box orders; and the simplicity of its design is of surpassing beauty.  The 
idea of placing a large window on one side of the door, and a small one on the other, is 
particularly happy.  There is a fine old Doric beauty, too, about the padlock and scraper, 
which is strictly in keeping with the general effect.

In this room do the mayor and corporation of Mudfog assemble together in solemn 
council for the public weal.  Seated on the massive wooden benches, which, with the 
table in the centre, form the only furniture of the whitewashed apartment, the sage men 
of Mudfog spend hour after hour in grave deliberation.  Here they settle at what hour 
of the night the public-houses shall be closed, at what hour of the morning they shall be 
permitted to open, how soon it shall be lawful for people to eat their dinner on 
church-days, and other great political questions; and sometimes, long after silence has 
fallen on the town, and the distant lights from the shops and houses have ceased to 
twinkle, like far-off stars, to the sight of the boatmen on the river, the illumination in 
the two unequal-sized windows of the town-hall, warns the inhabitants of Mudfog that 
its little body of legislators, like a larger and better-known body of the same genus, a 
great deal more noisy, and not a whit more profound, are patriotically dozing away in 
company, far into the night, for their country�fs good.

Among this knot of sage and learned men, no one was so eminently distinguished, 
during many years, for the quiet modesty of his appearance and demeanour, as Nicholas 
Tulrumble, the well-known coal-dealer.  However exciting the subject of discussion, 
however animated the tone of the debate, or however warm the personalities exchanged, 
(and even in Mudfog we get personal sometimes,) Nicholas Tulrumble was always the 
same.  To say truth, Nicholas, being an industrious man, and always up betimes, was 
apt to fall asleep when a debate began, and to remain asleep till it was over, when he 
would wake up very much refreshed, and give his vote with the greatest complacency.  
The fact was, that Nicholas Tulrumble, knowing that everybody there had made up his 
mind beforehand, considered the talking as just a long botheration about nothing at all; 
and to the present hour it remains a question, whether, on this point at all events, 
Nicholas Tulrumble was not pretty near right.

Time, which strews a man�fs head with silver, sometimes fills his pockets with gold.  As 
he gradually performed one good office for Nicholas Tulrumble, he was obliging enough, 
not to omit the other.  Nicholas began life in a wooden tenement of four feet square, 
with a capital of two and ninepence, and a stock in trade of three bushels and a-half of 
coals, exclusive of the large lump which hung, by way of sign-board, outside.  Then he 
enlarged the shed, and kept a truck; then he left the shed, and the truck too, and started 
a donkey and a Mrs. Tulrumble; then he moved again and set up a cart; the cart was 
soon afterwards exchanged for a waggon; and so he went on like his great predecessor 
Whittington?only without a cat for a partner?increasing in wealth and fame, until at 
last he gave up business altogether, and retired with Mrs. Tulrumble and family to 
Mudfog Hall, which he had himself erected, on something which he attempted to delude 
himself into the belief was a hill, about a quarter of a mile distant from the town of 
Mudfog.

About this time, it began to be murmured in Mudfog that Nicholas Tulrumble was 
growing vain and haughty; that prosperity and success had corrupted the simplicity of 
his manners, and tainted the natural goodness of his heart; in short, that he was setting 
up for a public character, and a great gentleman, and affected to look down upon his old 
companions with compassion and contempt.  Whether these reports were at the time 
well-founded, or not, certain it is that Mrs. Tulrumble very shortly afterwards started a 
four-wheel chaise, driven by a tall postilion in a yellow cap,?that Mr. Tulrumble junior 
took to smoking cigars, and calling the footman a �efeller,�f?and that Mr. Tulrumble from 
that time forth, was no more seen in his old seat in the chimney-corner of the 
Lighterman�fs Arms at night.  This looked bad; but, more than this, it began to be 
observed that Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble attended the corporation meetings more 
frequently than heretofore; and he no longer went to sleep as he had done for so many 
years, but propped his eyelids open with his two forefingers; that he read the 
newspapers by himself at home; and that he was in the habit of indulging abroad in 
distant and mysterious allusions to �emasses of people,�f and �ethe property of the country,�f 
and �eproductive power,�f and �ethe monied interest:�f all of which denoted and proved that 
Nicholas Tulrumble was either mad, or worse; and it puzzled the good people of Mudfog 
amazingly.

At length, about the middle of the month of October, Mr. Tulrumble and family went up 
to London; the middle of October being, as Mrs. Tulrumble informed her acquaintance 
in Mudfog, the very height of the fashionable season.

Somehow or other, just about this time, despite the health-preserving air of Mudfog, the 
Mayor died.  It was a most extraordinary circumstance; he had lived in Mudfog for 
eighty-five years.  The corporation didn�ft understand it at all; indeed it was with great 
difficulty that one old gentleman, who was a great stickler for forms, was dissuaded 
from proposing a vote of censure on such unaccountable conduct.  Strange as it was, 
however, die he did, without taking the slightest notice of the corporation; and the 
corporation were imperatively called upon to elect his successor.  So, they met for the 
purpose; and being very full of Nicholas Tulrumble just then, and Nicholas Tulrumble 
being a very important man, they elected him, and wrote off to London by the very next 
post to acquaint Nicholas Tulrumble with his new elevation.

Now, it being November time, and Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble being in the capital, it fell 
out that he was present at the Lord Mayor�fs show and dinner, at sight of the glory and 
splendour whereof, he, Mr. Tulrumble, was greatly mortified, inasmuch as the reflection 
would force itself on his mind, that, had he been born in London instead of in Mudfog, 
he might have been a Lord Mayor too, and have patronized the judges, and been affable 
to the Lord Chancellor, and friendly with the Premier, and coldly condescending to the 
Secretary to the Treasury, and have dined with a flag behind his back, and done a great 
many other acts and deeds which unto Lord Mayors of London peculiarly appertain.  
The more he thought of the Lord Mayor, the more enviable a personage he seemed.  To 
be a King was all very well; but what was the King to the Lord Mayor!  When the King 
made a speech, everybody knew it was somebody else�fs writing; whereas here was the 
Lord Mayor, talking away for half an hour-all out of his own head?amidst the 
enthusiastic applause of the whole company, while it was notorious that the King might 
talk to his parliament till he was black in the face without getting so much as a single 
cheer.  As all these reflections passed through the mind of Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble, the 
Lord Mayor of London appeared to him the greatest sovereign on the face of the earth, 
beating the Emperor of Russia all to nothing, and leaving the Great Mogul 
immeasurably behind.

Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble was pondering over these things, and inwardly cursing the fate 
which had pitched his coal-shed in Mudfog, when the letter of the corporation was put 
into his hand.  A crimson flush mantled over his face as he read it, for visions of 
brightness were already dancing before his imagination.

�eMy dear,�f said Mr. Tulrumble to his wife, �ethey have elected me, Mayor of Mudfog.�f

�eLor-a-mussy!�f said Mrs. Tulrumble: �ewhy what�fs become of old Sniggs?�f

�eThe late Mr. Sniggs, Mrs. Tulrumble,�f said Mr. Tulrumble sharply, for he by no means 
approved of the notion of unceremoniously designating a gentleman who filled the high 
office of Mayor, as �eOld Sniggs,�f?�eThe late Mr. Sniggs, Mrs. Tulrumble, is dead.�f

The communication was very unexpected; but Mrs. Tulrumble only ejaculated 
�eLor-a-mussy!�f once again, as if a Mayor were a mere ordinary Christian, at which Mr. 
Tulrumble frowned gloomily.

�eWhat a pity �ftan�ft in London, ain�ft it?�f said Mrs. Tulrumble, after a short pause; �ewhat 
a pity �ftan�ft in London, where you might have had a show.�f

�eI might have a show in Mudfog, if I thought proper, I apprehend,�f said Mr. Tulrumble 
mysteriously.

�eLor! so you might, I declare,�f replied Mrs. Tulrumble.

�eAnd a good one too,�f said Mr. Tulrumble.

�eDelightful!�f exclaimed Mrs. Tulrumble.

�eOne which would rather astonish the ignorant people down there,�f said Mr. 
Tulrumble.

�eIt would kill them with envy,�f said Mrs. Tulrumble.

So it was agreed that his Majesty�fs lieges in Mudfog should be astonished with 
splendour, and slaughtered with envy, and that such a show should take place as had 
never been seen in that town, or in any other town before,?no, not even in London 
itself.

On the very next day after the receipt of the letter, down came the tall postilion in a 
post-chaise,?not upon one of the horses, but inside?actually inside the chaise,?and, 
driving up to the very door of the town-hall, where the corporation were assembled, 
delivered a letter, written by the Lord knows who, and signed by Nicholas Tulrumble, in 
which Nicholas said, all through four sides of closely-written, gilt-edged, hot-pressed, 
Bath post letter paper, that he responded to the call of his fellow-townsmen with 
feelings of heartfelt delight; that he accepted the arduous office which their confidence 
had imposed upon him; that they would never find him shrinking from the discharge of 
his duty; that he would endeavour to execute his functions with all that dignity which 
their magnitude and importance demanded; and a great deal more to the same effect.  
But even this was not all.  The tall postilion produced from his right-hand top-boot, a 
damp copy of that afternoon�fs number of the county paper; and there, in large type, 
running the whole length of the very first column, was a long address from Nicholas 
Tulrumble to the inhabitants of Mudfog, in which he said that he cheerfully complied 
with their requisition, and, in short, as if to prevent any mistake about the matter, told 
them over again what a grand fellow he meant to be, in very much the same terms as 
those in which he had already told them all about the matter in his letter.

The corporation stared at one another very hard at all this, and then looked as if for 
explanation to the tall postilion, but as the tall postilion was intently contemplating the 
gold tassel on the top of his yellow cap, and could have afforded no explanation whatever, 
even if his thoughts had been entirely disengaged, they contented themselves with 
coughing very dubiously, and looking very grave.  The tall postilion then delivered 
another letter, in which Nicholas Tulrumble informed the corporation, that he intended 
repairing to the town-hall, in grand state and gorgeous procession, on the Monday 
afternoon next ensuing.  At this the corporation looked still more solemn; but, as the 
epistle wound up with a formal invitation to the whole body to dine with the Mayor on 
that day, at Mudfog Hall, Mudfog Hill, Mudfog, they began to see the fun of the thing 
directly, and sent back their compliments, and they�fd be sure to come.

Now there happened to be in Mudfog, as somehow or other there does happen to be, in 
almost every town in the British dominions, and perhaps in foreign dominions too?we 
think it very likely, but, being no great traveller, cannot distinctly say?there happened 
to be, in Mudfog, a merry-tempered, pleasant-faced, good-for-nothing sort of vagabond, 
with an invincible dislike to manual labour, and an unconquerable attachment to strong 
beer and spirits, whom everybody knew, and nobody, except his wife, took the trouble to 
quarrel with, who inherited from his ancestors the appellation of Edward Twigger, and 
rejoiced in the sobriquet of Bottle-nosed Ned.  He was drunk upon the average once a 
day, and penitent upon an equally fair calculation once a month; and when he was 
penitent, he was invariably in the very last stage of maudlin intoxication.  He was a 
ragged, roving, roaring kind of fellow, with a burly form, a sharp wit, and a ready head, 
and could turn his hand to anything when he chose to do it.  He was by no means 
opposed to hard labour on principle, for he would work away at a cricket-match by the 
day together,?running, and catching, and batting, and bowling, and revelling in toil 
which would exhaust a galley-slave.  He would have been invaluable to a fire-office; 
never was a man with such a natural taste for pumping engines, running up ladders, 
and throwing furniture out of two-pair-of-stairs�f windows: nor was this the only element 
in which he was at home; he was a humane society in himself, a portable drag, an 
animated life-preserver, and had saved more people, in his time, from drowning, than 
the Plymouth life-boat, or Captain Manby�fs apparatus.  With all these qualifications, 
notwithstanding his dissipation, Bottle-nosed Ned was a general favourite; and the 
authorities of Mudfog, remembering his numerous services to the population, allowed 
him in return to get drunk in his own way, without the fear of stocks, fine, or 
imprisonment.  He had a general licence, and he showed his sense of the compliment 
by making the most of it.

We have been thus particular in describing the character and avocations of Bottle-nosed 
Ned, because it enables us to introduce a fact politely, without hauling it into the 
reader�fs presence with indecent haste by the head and shoulders, and brings us very 
naturally to relate, that on the very same evening on which Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble and 
family returned to Mudfog, Mr. Tulrumble�fs new secretary, just imported from London, 
with a pale face and light whiskers, thrust his head down to the very bottom of his 
neckcloth-tie, in at the tap-room door of the Lighterman�fs Arms, and inquiring whether 
one Ned Twigger was luxuriating within, announced himself as the bearer of a message 
from Nicholas Tulrumble, Esquire, requiring Mr. Twigger�fs immediate attendance at 
the hall, on private and particular business.  It being by no means Mr. Twigger�fs 
interest to affront the Mayor, he rose from the fireplace with a slight sigh, and followed 
the light-whiskered secretary through the dirt and wet of Mudfog streets, up to Mudfog 
Hall, without further ado.

Mr. Nicholas Tulrumble was seated in a small cavern with a skylight, which he called 
his library, sketching out a plan of the procession on a large sheet of paper; and into the 
cavern the secretary ushered Ned Twigger.

�eWell, Twigger!�f said Nicholas Tulrumble, condescendingly.

There was a time when Twigger would have replied, �eWell, Nick!�f but that was in the 
days of the truck, and a couple of years before the donkey; so, he only bowed.

�eI want you to go into training, Twigger,�f said Mr. Tulrumble.

�eWhat for, sir?�f inquired Ned, with a stare.

�eHush, hush, Twigger!�f said the Mayor.  �eShut the door, Mr. Jennings.  Look here, 
Twigger.�f

As the Mayor said this, he unlocked a high closet, and disclosed a complete suit of brass 
armour, of gigantic dimensions.

�eI want you to wear this next Monday, Twigger,�f said the Mayor.

�eBless your heart and soul, sir!�f replied Ned, �eyou might as well ask me to wear a 
seventy-four pounder, or a cast-iron boiler.�f

�eNonsense, Twigger, nonsense!�f said the Mayor.

�eI couldn�ft stand under it, sir,�f said Twigger; �eit would make mashed potatoes of me, if I 
attempted it.�f

�ePooh, pooh, Twigger!�f returned the Mayor.  �eI tell you I have seen it done with my own 
eyes, in London, and the man wasn�ft half such a man as you are, either.�f

�eI should as soon have thought of a man�fs wearing the case of an eight-day clock to 
save his linen,�f said Twigger, casting a look of apprehension at the brass suit.

�eIt�fs the easiest thing in the world,�f rejoined the Mayor.

�eIt�fs nothing,�f said Mr. Jennings.

�eWhen you�fre used to it,�f added Ned.

�eYou do it by degrees,�f said the Mayor.  �eYou would begin with one piece to-morrow, 
and two the next day, and so on, till you had got it all on.  Mr. Jennings, give Twigger a 
glass of rum.  Just try the breast-plate, Twigger.  Stay; take another glass of rum first.  
Help me to lift it, Mr. Jennings.  Stand firm, Twigger!  There!?it isn�ft half as heavy as 
it looks, is it?�f

Twigger was a good strong, stout fellow; so, after a great deal of staggering, he managed 
to keep himself up, under the breastplate, and even contrived, with the aid of another 
glass of rum, to walk about in it, and the gauntlets into the bargain.  He made a trial of 
the helmet, but was not equally successful, inasmuch as he tipped over instantly,?an 
accident which Mr. Tulrumble clearly demonstrated to be occasioned by his not having a 
counteracting weight of brass on his legs.

�eNow, wear that with grace and propriety on Monday next,�f said Tulrumble, �eand I�fll 
make your fortune.�f

�eI�fll try what I can do, sir,�f said Twigger.

�eIt must be kept a profound secret,�f said Tulrumble.

�eOf course, sir,�f replied Twigger.

�eAnd you must be sober,�f said Tulrumble; �eperfectly sober.�f  Mr. Twigger at once 
solemnly pledged himself to be as sober as a judge, and Nicholas Tulrumble was 
satisfied, although, had we been Nicholas, we should certainly have exacted some 
promise of a more specific nature; inasmuch as, having attended the Mudfog assizes in 
the evening more than once, we can solemnly testify to having seen judges with very 
strong symptoms of dinner under their wigs.  However, that�fs neither here nor there.

The next day, and the day following, and the day after that, Ned Twigger was securely 
locked up in the small cavern with the sky-light, hard at work at the armour.  With 
every additional piece he could manage to stand upright in, he had an additional glass 
of rum; and at last, after many partial suffocations, he contrived to get on the whole suit, 
and to stagger up and down the room in it, like an intoxicated effigy from Westminster 
Abbey.

Never was man so delighted as Nicholas Tulrumble; never was woman so charmed as 
Nicholas Tulrumble�fs wife.  Here was a sight for the common people of Mudfog!  A live 
man in brass armour!  Why, they would go wild with wonder!

The day?the Monday?arrived.

If the morning had been made to order, it couldn�ft have been better adapted to the 
purpose.  They never showed a better fog in London on Lord Mayor�fs day, than 
enwrapped the town of Mudfog on that eventful occasion.  It had risen slowly and 
surely from the green and stagnant water with the first light of morning, until it 
reached a little above the lamp-post tops; and there it had stopped, with a sleepy, 
sluggish obstinacy, which bade defiance to the sun, who had got up very blood-shot 
about the eyes, as if he had been at a drinking-party over-night, and was doing his day�fs 
work with the worst possible grace.  The thick damp mist hung over the town like a 
huge gauze curtain.  All was dim and dismal.  The church steeples had bidden a 
temporary adieu to the world below; and every object of lesser importance?houses, 
barns, hedges, trees, and barges?had all taken the veil.

The church-clock struck one.  A cracked trumpet from the front garden of Mudfog Hall 
produced a feeble flourish, as if some asthmatic person had coughed into it accidentally; 
the gate flew open, and out came a gentleman, on a moist-sugar coloured charger, 
intended to represent a herald, but bearing a much stronger resemblance to a 
court-card on horseback.  This was one of the Circus people, who always came down to 
Mudfog at that time of the year, and who had been engaged by Nicholas Tulrumble 
expressly for the occasion.  There was the horse, whisking his tail about, balancing 
himself on his hind-legs, and flourishing away with his fore-feet, in a manner which 
would have gone to the hearts and souls of any reasonable crowd.  But a Mudfog crowd 
never was a reasonable one, and in all probability never will be.  Instead of scattering 
the very fog with their shouts, as they ought most indubitably to have done, and were 
fully intended to do, by Nicholas Tulrumble, they no sooner recognized the herald, than 
they began to growl forth the most unqualified disapprobation at the bare notion of his 
riding like any other man.  If he had come out on his head indeed, or jumping through 
a hoop, or flying through a red-hot drum, or even standing on one leg with his other foot 
in his mouth, they might have had something to say to him; but for a professional 
gentleman to sit astride in the saddle, with his feet in the stirrups, was rather too good 
a joke.  So, the herald was a decided failure, and the crowd hooted with great energy, as 
he pranced ingloriously away.

On the procession came.  We are afraid to say how many supernumeraries there were, 
in striped shirts and black velvet caps, to imitate the London watermen, or how many 
base imitations of running-footmen, or how many banners, which, owing to the 
heaviness of the atmosphere, could by no means be prevailed on to display their 
inscriptions: still less do we feel disposed to relate how the men who played the wind 
instruments, looking up into the sky (we mean the fog) with musical fervour, walked 
through pools of water and hillocks of mud, till they covered the powdered heads of the 
running-footmen aforesaid with splashes, that looked curious, but not ornamental; or 
how the barrel-organ performer put on the wrong stop, and played one tune while the 
band played another; or how the horses, being used to the arena, and not to the streets, 
would stand still and dance, instead of going on and prancing;?all of which are matters 
which might be dilated upon to great advantage, but which we have not the least 
intention of dilating upon, notwithstanding.

Oh! it was a grand and beautiful sight to behold a corporation in glass coaches, provided 
at the sole cost and charge of Nicholas Tulrumble, coming rolling along, like a funeral 
out of mourning, and to watch the attempts the corporation made to look great and 
solemn, when Nicholas Tulrumble himself, in the four-wheel chaise, with the tall 
postilion, rolled out after them, with Mr. Jennings on one side to look like a chaplain, 
and a supernumerary on the other, with an old life-guardsman�fs sabre, to imitate the 
sword-bearer; and to see the tears rolling down the faces of the mob as they screamed 
with merriment.  This was beautiful! and so was the appearance of Mrs. Tulrumble 
and son, as they bowed with grave dignity out of their coach-window to all the dirty 
faces that were laughing around them: but it is not even with this that we have to do, 
but with the sudden stopping of the procession at another blast of the trumpet, whereat, 
and whereupon, a profound silence ensued, and all eyes were turned towards Mudfog 
Hall, in the confident anticipation of some new wonder.

�eThey won�ft laugh now, Mr. Jennings,�f said Nicholas Tulrumble.

�eI think not, sir,�f said Mr. Jennings.

�eSee how eager they look,�f said Nicholas Tulrumble.  �eAha! the laugh will be on our 
side now; eh, Mr. Jennings?�f

�eNo doubt of that, sir,�f replied Mr. Jennings; and Nicholas Tulrumble, in a state of 
pleasurable excitement, stood up in the four-wheel chaise, and telegraphed gratification 
to the Mayoress behind.

While all this was going forward, Ned Twigger had descended into the kitchen of 
Mudfog Hall for the purpose of indulging the servants with a private view of the 
curiosity that was to burst upon the town; and, somehow or other, the footman was so 
companionable, and the housemaid so kind, and the cook so friendly, that he could not 
resist the offer of the first-mentioned to sit down and take something?just to drink 
success to master in.

So, down Ned Twigger sat himself in his brass livery on the top of the kitchen-table; and 
in a mug of something strong, paid for by the unconscious Nicholas Tulrumble, and 
provided by the companionable footman, drank success to the Mayor and his procession; 
and, as Ned laid by his helmet to imbibe the something strong, the companionable 
footman put it on his own head, to the immeasurable and unrecordable delight of the 
cook and housemaid.  The companionable footman was very facetious to Ned, and Ned 
was very gallant to the cook and housemaid by turns.  They were all very cosy and 
comfortable; and the something strong went briskly round.

At last Ned Twigger was loudly called for, by the procession people: and, having had his 
helmet fixed on, in a very complicated manner, by the companionable footman, and the 
kind housemaid, and the friendly cook, he walked gravely forth, and appeared before 
the multitude.

The crowd roared?it was not with wonder, it was not with surprise; it was most 
decidedly and unquestionably with laughter.

�eWhat!�f said Mr. Tulrumble, starting up in the four-wheel chaise.  �eLaughing?  If they 
laugh at a man in real brass armour, they�fd laugh when their own fathers were dying.  
Why doesn�ft he go into his place, Mr. Jennings?  What�fs he rolling down towards us for? 
he has no business here!�f

�eI am afraid, sir?�f faltered Mr. Jennings.

�eAfraid of what, sir?�f said Nicholas Tulrumble, looking up into the secretary�fs face.

�eI am afraid he�fs drunk, sir,�f replied Mr. Jennings.

Nicholas Tulrumble took one look at the extraordinary figure that was bearing down 
upon them; and then, clasping his secretary by the arm, uttered an audible groan in 
anguish of spirit.

It is a melancholy fact that Mr. Twigger having full licence to demand a single glass of 
rum on the putting on of every piece of the armour, got, by some means or other, rather 
out of his calculation in the hurry and confusion of preparation, and drank about four 
glasses to a piece instead of one, not to mention the something strong which went on the 
top of it.  Whether the brass armour checked the natural flow of perspiration, and thus 
prevented the spirit from evaporating, we are not scientific enough to know; but, 
whatever the cause was, Mr. Twigger no sooner found himself outside the gate of 
Mudfog Hall, than he also found himself in a very considerable state of intoxication; and 
hence his extraordinary style of progressing.  This was bad enough, but, as if fate and 
fortune had conspired against Nicholas Tulrumble, Mr. Twigger, not having been 
penitent for a good calendar month, took it into his head to be most especially and 
particularly sentimental, just when his repentance could have been most conveniently 
dispensed with.  Immense tears were rolling down his cheeks, and he was vainly 
endeavouring to conceal his grief by applying to his eyes a blue cotton 
pocket-handkerchief with white spots,?an article not strictly in keeping with a suit of 
armour some three hundred years old, or thereabouts.

�eTwigger, you villain!�f said Nicholas Tulrumble, quite forgetting his dignity, �ego back.�f

�eNever,�f said Ned.  �eI�fm a miserable wretch.  I�fll never leave you.�f

The by-standers of course received this declaration with acclamations of �eThat�fs right, 
Ned; don�ft!�f

�eI don�ft intend it,�f said Ned, with all the obstinacy of a very tipsy man.  �eI�fm very 
unhappy.  I�fm the wretched father of an unfortunate family; but I am very faithful, sir.  
I�fll never leave you.�f  Having reiterated this obliging promise, Ned proceeded in broken 
words to harangue the crowd upon the number of years he had lived in Mudfog, the 
excessive respectability of his character, and other topics of the like nature.

�eHere! will anybody lead him away?�f said Nicholas: �eif they�fll call on me afterwards, I�fll 
reward them well.�f

Two or three men stepped forward, with the view of bearing Ned off, when the secretary 
interposed.

�eTake care! take care!�f said Mr. Jennings.  �eI beg your pardon, sir; but they�fd better not 
go too near him, because, if he falls over, he�fll certainly crush somebody.�f

At this hint the crowd retired on all sides to a very respectful distance, and left Ned, like 
the Duke of Devonshire, in a little circle of his own.

�eBut, Mr. Jennings,�f said Nicholas Tulrumble, �ehe�fll be suffocated.�f

�eI�fm very sorry for it, sir,�f replied Mr. Jennings; �ebut nobody can get that armour off, 
without his own assistance.  I�fm quite certain of it from the way he put it on.�f

Here Ned wept dolefully, and shook his helmeted head, in a manner that might have 
touched a heart of stone; but the crowd had not hearts of stone, and they laughed 
heartily.

�eDear me, Mr. Jennings,�f said Nicholas, turning pale at the possibility of Ned�fs being 
smothered in his antique costume?�eDear me, Mr. Jennings, can nothing be done with 
him?�f

�eNothing at all,�f replied Ned, �enothing at all.  Gentlemen, I�fm an unhappy wretch.  
I�fm a body, gentlemen, in a brass coffin.�f  At this poetical idea of his own conjuring up, 
Ned cried so much that the people began to get sympathetic, and to ask what Nicholas 
Tulrumble meant by putting a man into such a machine as that; and one individual in a 
hairy waistcoat like the top of a trunk, who had previously expressed his opinion that if 
Ned hadn�ft been a poor man, Nicholas wouldn�ft have dared do it, hinted at the propriety 
of breaking the four-wheel chaise, or Nicholas�fs head, or both, which last compound 
proposition the crowd seemed to consider a very good notion.

It was not acted upon, however, for it had hardly been broached, when Ned Twigger�fs 
wife made her appearance abruptly in the little circle before noticed, and Ned no sooner 
caught a glimpse of her face and form, than from the mere force of habit he set off 
towards his home just as fast as his legs could carry him; and that was not very quick in 
the present instance either, for, however ready they might have been to carry him, they 
couldn�ft get on very well under the brass armour.  So, Mrs. Twigger had plenty of time 
to denounce Nicholas Tulrumble to his face: to express her opinion that he was a decided 
monster; and to intimate that, if her ill-used husband sustained any personal damage 
from the brass armour, she would have the law of Nicholas Tulrumble for manslaughter.  
When she had said all this with due vehemence, she posted after Ned, who was 
dragging himself along as best he could, and deploring his unhappiness in most dismal 
tones.

What a wailing and screaming Ned�fs children raised when he got home at last!  Mrs. 
Twigger tried to undo the armour, first in one place, and then in another, but she 
couldn�ft manage it; so she tumbled Ned into bed, helmet, armour, gauntlets, and all.  
Such a creaking as the bedstead made, under Ned�fs weight in his new suit!  It didn�ft 
break down though; and there Ned lay, like the anonymous vessel in the Bay of Biscay, 
till next day, drinking barley-water, and looking miserable: and every time he groaned, 
his good lady said it served him right, which was all the consolation Ned Twigger got.

Nicholas Tulrumble and the gorgeous procession went on together to the town-hall, 
amid the hisses and groans of all the spectators, who had suddenly taken it into their 
heads to consider poor Ned a martyr.  Nicholas was formally installed in his new office, 
in acknowledgment of which ceremony he delivered himself of a speech, composed by 
the secretary, which was very long, and no doubt very good, only the noise of the people 
outside prevented anybody from hearing it, but Nicholas Tulrumble himself.  After 
which, the procession got back to Mudfog Hall any how it could; and Nicholas and the 
corporation sat down to dinner.

But the dinner was flat, and Nicholas was disappointed.  They were such dull sleepy 
old fellows, that corporation.  Nicholas made quite as long speeches as the Lord Mayor 
of London had done, nay, he said the very same things that the Lord Mayor of London 
had said, and the deuce a cheer the corporation gave him.  There was only one man in 
the party who was thoroughly awake; and he was insolent, and called him Nick.  Nick!  
What would be the consequence, thought Nicholas, of anybody presuming to call the 
Lord Mayor of London �eNick!�f  He should like to know what the sword-bearer would say 
to that; or the recorder, or the toast-master, or any other of the great officers of the city.  
They�fd nick him.

But these were not the worst of Nicholas Tulrumble�fs doings.  If they had been, he 
might have remained a Mayor to this day, and have talked till he lost his voice.  He 
contracted a relish for statistics, and got philosophical; and the statistics and the 
philosophy together, led him into an act which increased his unpopularity and hastened 
his downfall.

At the very end of the Mudfog High-street, and abutting on the river-side, stands the 
Jolly Boatmen, an old-fashioned low-roofed, bay-windowed house, with a bar, kitchen, 
and tap-room all in one, and a large fireplace with a kettle to correspond, round which 
the working men have congregated time out of mind on a winter�fs night, refreshed by 
draughts of good strong beer, and cheered by the sounds of a fiddle and tambourine: the 
Jolly Boatmen having been duly licensed by the Mayor and corporation, to scrape the 
fiddle and thumb the tambourine from time, whereof the memory of the oldest 
inhabitants goeth not to the contrary.  Now Nicholas Tulrumble had been reading 
pamphlets on crime, and parliamentary reports,?or had made the secretary read them 
to him, which is the same thing in effect,?and he at once perceived that this fiddle and 
tambourine must have done more to demoralize Mudfog, than any other operating 
causes that ingenuity could imagine.  So he read up for the subject, and determined to 
come out on the corporation with a burst, the very next time the licence was applied for.

The licensing day came, and the red-faced landlord of the Jolly Boatmen walked into the 
town-hall, looking as jolly as need be, having actually put on an extra fiddle for that 
night, to commemorate the anniversary of the Jolly Boatmen�fs music licence.  It was 
applied for in due form, and was just about to be granted as a matter of course, when up 
rose Nicholas Tulrumble, and drowned the astonished corporation in a torrent of 
eloquence.  He descanted in glowing terms upon the increasing depravity of his native 
town of Mudfog, and the excesses committed by its population.  Then, he related how 
shocked he had been, to see barrels of beer sliding down into the cellar of the Jolly 
Boatmen week after week; and how he had sat at a window opposite the Jolly Boatmen 
for two days together, to count the people who went in for beer between the hours of 
twelve and one o�fclock alone?which, by-the-bye, was the time at which the great 
majority of the Mudfog people dined.  Then, he went on to state, how the number of 
people who came out with beer-jugs, averaged twenty-one in five minutes, which, being 
multiplied by twelve, gave two hundred and fifty-two people with beer-jugs in an hour, 
and multiplied again by fifteen (the number of hours during which the house was open 
daily) yielded three thousand seven hundred and eighty people with beer-jugs per day, 
or twenty-six thousand four hundred and sixty people with beer-jugs, per week.  Then 
he proceeded to show that a tambourine and moral degradation were synonymous terms, 
and a fiddle and vicious propensities wholly inseparable.  All these arguments he 
strengthened and demonstrated by frequent references to a large book with a blue cover, 
and sundry quotations from the Middlesex magistrates; and in the end, the corporation, 
who were posed with the figures, and sleepy with the speech, and sadly in want of 
dinner into the bargain, yielded the palm to Nicholas Tulrumble, and refused the music 
licence to the Jolly Boatmen.

But although Nicholas triumphed, his triumph was short.  He carried on the war 
against beer-jugs and fiddles, forgetting the time when he was glad to drink out of the 
one, and to dance to the other, till the people hated, and his old friends shunned him.  
He grew tired of the lonely magnificence of Mudfog Hall, and his heart yearned towards 
the Lighterman�fs Arms.  He wished he had never set up as a public man, and sighed for 
the good old times of the coal-shop, and the chimney corner.

At length old Nicholas, being thoroughly miserable, took heart of grace, paid the 
secretary a quarter�fs wages in advance, and packed him off to London by the next coach.  
Having taken this step, he put his hat on his head, and his pride in his pocket, and 
walked down to the old room at the Lighterman�fs Arms.  There were only two of the old 
fellows there, and they looked coldly on Nicholas as he proffered his hand.

�eAre you going to put down pipes, Mr. Tulrumble?�f said one.

�eOr trace the progress of crime to �ebacca?�f growled another.

�eNeither,�f replied Nicholas Tulrumble, shaking hands with them both, whether they 
would or not.  �eI�fve come down to say that I�fm very sorry for having made a fool of 
myself, and that I hope you�fll give me up the old chair, again.�f

The old fellows opened their eyes, and three or four more old fellows opened the door, to 
whom Nicholas, with tears in his eyes, thrust out his hand too, and told the same story.  
They raised a shout of joy, that made the bells in the ancient church-tower vibrate again, 
and wheeling the old chair into the warm corner, thrust old Nicholas down into it, and 
ordered in the very largest-sized bowl of hot punch, with an unlimited number of pipes, 
directly.

The next day, the Jolly Boatmen got the licence, and the next night, old Nicholas and 
Ned Twigger�fs wife led off a dance to the music of the fiddle and tambourine, the tone of 
which seemed mightily improved by a little rest, for they never had played so merrily 
before.  Ned Twigger was in the very height of his glory, and he danced hornpipes, and 
balanced chairs on his chin, and straws on his nose, till the whole company, including 
the corporation, were in raptures of admiration at the brilliancy of his acquirements.

Mr. Tulrumble, junior, couldn�ft make up his mind to be anything but magnificent, so he 
went up to London and drew bills on his father; and when he had overdrawn, and got 
into debt, he grew penitent, and came home again.

As to old Nicholas, he kept his word, and having had six weeks of public life, never tried 
it any more.  He went to sleep in the town-hall at the very next meeting; and, in full 
proof of his sincerity, has requested us to write this faithful narrative.  We wish it could 
have the effect of reminding the Tulrumbles of another sphere, that puffed-up conceit is 
not dignity, and that snarling at the little pleasures they were once glad to enjoy, 
because they would rather forget the times when they were of lower station, renders 
them objects of contempt and ridicule.

This is the first time we have published any of our gleanings from this particular source.  
Perhaps, at some future period, we may venture to open the chronicles of Mudfog.




FULL REPORT OF THE FIRST MEETING OF THE MUDFOG ASSOCIATION FOR 
THE ADVANCEMENT OF EVERYTHING



We have made the most unparalleled and extraordinary exertions to place before our 
readers a complete and accurate account of the proceedings at the late grand meeting of 
the Mudfog Association, holden in the town of Mudfog; it affords us great happiness to 
lay the result before them, in the shape of various communications received from our 
able, talented, and graphic correspondent, expressly sent down for the purpose, who has 
immortalized us, himself, Mudfog, and the association, all at one and the same time.  
We have been, indeed, for some days unable to determine who will transmit the greatest 
name to posterity; ourselves, who sent our correspondent down; our correspondent, who 
wrote an account of the matter; or the association, who gave our correspondent 
something to write about.  We rather incline to the opinion that we are the greatest 
man of the party, inasmuch as the notion of an exclusive and authentic report originated 
with us; this may be prejudice: it may arise from a prepossession on our part in our own 
favour.  Be it so.  We have no doubt that every gentleman concerned in this mighty 
assemblage is troubled with the same complaint in a greater or less degree; and it is a 
consolation to us to know that we have at least this feeling in common with the great 
scientific stars, the brilliant and extraordinary luminaries, whose speculations we 
record.

We give our correspondent�fs letters in the order in which they reached us.  Any attempt 
at amalgamating them into one beautiful whole, would only destroy that glowing tone, 
that dash of wildness, and rich vein of picturesque interest, which pervade them 
throughout.

�eMudfog, Monday night, seven o�fclock.

�eWe are in a state of great excitement here.  Nothing is spoken of, but the 
approaching meeting of the association.  The inn-doors are thronged with waiters 
anxiously looking for the expected arrivals; and the numerous bills which are wafered 
up in the windows of private houses, intimating that there are beds to let within, give 
the streets a very animated and cheerful appearance, the wafers being of a great variety 
of colours, and the monotony of printed inscriptions being relieved by every possible size 
and style of hand-writing.  It is confidently rumoured that Professors Snore, Doze, and 
Wheezy have engaged three beds and a sitting-room at the Pig and Tinder-box.  I give 
you the rumour as it has reached me; but I cannot, as yet, vouch for its accuracy.  The 
moment I have been enabled to obtain any certain information upon this interesting 
point, you may depend upon receiving it.�f

�eHalf-past seven.

I have just returned from a personal interview with the landlord of the Pig and 
Tinder-box.  He speaks confidently of the probability of Professors Snore, Doze, and 
Wheezy taking up their residence at his house during the sitting of the association, but 
denies that the beds have been yet engaged; in which representation he is confirmed by 
the chambermaid?a girl of artless manners, and interesting appearance.  The boots 
denies that it is at all likely that Professors Snore, Doze, and Wheezy will put up here; 
but I have reason to believe that this man has been suborned by the proprietor of the 
Original Pig, which is the opposition hotel.  Amidst such conflicting testimony it is 
difficult to arrive at the real truth; but you may depend upon receiving authentic 
information upon this point the moment the fact is ascertained.  The excitement still 
continues.  A boy fell through the window of the pastrycook�fs shop at the corner of the 
High-street about half an hour ago, which has occasioned much confusion.  The general 
impression is, that it was an accident.  Pray heaven it may prove so!�f

�eTuesday, noon.

�eAt an early hour this morning the bells of all the churches struck seven o�fclock; the 
effect of which, in the present lively state of the town, was extremely singular.  While I 
was at breakfast, a yellow gig, drawn by a dark grey horse, with a patch of white over 
his right eyelid, proceeded at a rapid pace in the direction of the Original Pig stables; it 
is currently reported that this gentleman has arrived here for the purpose of attending 
the association, and, from what I have heard, I consider it extremely probable, although 
nothing decisive is yet known regarding him.  You may conceive the anxiety with which 
we are all looking forward to the arrival of the four o�fclock coach this afternoon.

�eNotwithstanding the excited state of the populace, no outrage has yet been committed, 
owing to the admirable discipline and discretion of the police, who are nowhere to be 
seen.  A barrel-organ is playing opposite my window, and groups of people, offering fish 
and vegetables for sale, parade the streets.  With these exceptions everything is quiet, 
and I trust will continue so.�f

�eFive o�fclock.

�eIt is now ascertained, beyond all doubt, that Professors Snore, Doze, and Wheezy will 
not repair to the Pig and Tinder-box, but have actually engaged apartments at the 
Original Pig.  This intelligence is exclusive; and I leave you and your readers to draw 
their own inferences from it.  Why Professor Wheezy, of all people in the world, should 
repair to the Original Pig in preference to the Pig and Tinder-box, it is not easy to 
conceive.  The professor is a man who should be above all such petty feelings.  Some 
people here openly impute treachery, and a distinct breach of faith to Professors Snore 
and Doze; while others, again, are disposed to acquit them of any culpability in the 
transaction, and to insinuate that the blame rests solely with Professor Wheezy.  I own 
that I incline to the latter opinion; and although it gives me great pain to speak in terms 
of censure or disapprobation of a man of such transcendent genius and acquirements, 
still I am bound to say that, if my suspicions be well founded, and if all the reports 
which have reached my ears be true, I really do not well know what to make of the 
matter.

�eMr. Slug, so celebrated for his statistical researches, arrived this afternoon by the four 
o�fclock stage.  His complexion is a dark purple, and he has a habit of sighing constantly.  
He looked extremely well, and appeared in high health and spirits.  Mr. Woodensconce 
also came down in the same conveyance.  The distinguished gentleman was fast asleep 
on his arrival, and I am informed by the guard that he had been so the whole way.  He 
was, no doubt, preparing for his approaching fatigues; but what gigantic visions must 
those be that flit through the brain of such a man when his body is in a state of 
torpidity!

�eThe influx of visitors increases every moment.  I am told (I know not how truly) that 
two post-chaises have arrived at the Original Pig within the last half-hour, and I myself 
observed a wheelbarrow, containing three carpet bags and a bundle, entering the yard of 
the Pig and Tinder-box no longer ago than five minutes since.  The people are still 
quietly pursuing their ordinary occupations; but there is a wildness in their eyes, and 
an unwonted rigidity in the muscles of their countenances, which shows to the 
observant spectator that their expectations are strained to the very utmost pitch.  I 
fear, unless some very extraordinary arrivals take place to-night, that consequences 
may arise from this popular ferment, which every man of sense and feeling would 
deplore.�f

�eTwenty minutes past six.

�eI have just heard that the boy who fell through the pastrycook�fs window last night has 
died of the fright.  He was suddenly called upon to pay three and sixpence for the 
damage done, and his constitution, it seems, was not strong enough to bear up against 
the shock.  The inquest, it is said, will be held to-morrow.�f

�eThree-quarters part seven.

�eProfessors Muff and Nogo have just driven up to the hotel door; they at once ordered 
dinner with great condescension.  We are all very much delighted with the urbanity of 
their manners, and the ease with which they adapt themselves to the forms and 
ceremonies of ordinary life.  Immediately on their arrival they sent for the head waiter, 
and privately requested him to purchase a live dog,?as cheap a one as he could meet 
with,?and to send him up after dinner, with a pie-board, a knife and fork, and a clean 
plate.  It is conjectured that some experiments will be tried upon the dog to-night; if 
any particulars should transpire, I will forward them by express.�f

�eHalf-past eight.

�eThe animal has been procured.  He is a pug-dog, of rather intelligent appearance, in 
good condition, and with very short legs.  He has been tied to a curtain-peg in a dark 
room, and is howling dreadfully.�f

�eTen minutes to nine.

�eThe dog has just been rung for.  With an instinct which would appear almost the 
result of reason, the sagacious animal seized the waiter by the calf of the leg when he 
approached to take him, and made a desperate, though ineffectual resistance.  I have 
not been able to procure admission to the apartment occupied by the scientific 
gentlemen; but, judging from the sounds which reached my ears when I stood upon the 
landing-place outside the door, just now, I should be disposed to say that the dog had 
retreated growling beneath some article of furniture, and was keeping the professors at 
bay.  This conjecture is confirmed by the testimony of the ostler, who, after peeping 
through the keyhole, assures me that he distinctly saw Professor Nogo on his knees, 
holding forth a small bottle of prussic acid, to which the animal, who was crouched 
beneath an arm-chair, obstinately declined to smell.  You cannot imagine the feverish 
state of irritation we are in, lest the interests of science should be sacrificed to the 
prejudices of a brute creature, who is not endowed with sufficient sense to foresee the 
incalculable benefits which the whole human race may derive from so very slight a 
concession on his part.�f

�eNine o�fclock.

�eThe dog�fs tail and ears have been sent down-stairs to be washed; from which 
circumstance we infer that the animal is no more.  His forelegs have been delivered to 
the boots to be brushed, which strengthens the supposition.�f

�eHalf after ten.

�eMy feelings are so overpowered by what has taken place in the course of the last hour 
and a half, that I have scarcely strength to detail the rapid succession of events which 
have quite bewildered all those who are cognizant of their occurrence.  It appears that 
the pug-dog mentioned in my last was surreptitiously obtained,?stolen, in fact,?by 
some person attached to the stable department, from an unmarried lady resident in this 
town.  Frantic on discovering the loss of her favourite, the lady rushed distractedly into 
the street, calling in the most heart-rending and pathetic manner upon the passengers 
to restore her, her Augustus,?for so the deceased was named, in affectionate 
remembrance of a former lover of his mistress, to whom he bore a striking personal 
resemblance, which renders the circumstances additionally affecting.  I am not yet in a 
condition to inform you what circumstance induced the bereaved lady to direct her steps 
to the hotel which had witnessed the last struggles of her prot?g?.  I can only state that 
she arrived there, at the very instant when his detached members were passing through 
the passage on a small tray.  Her shrieks still reverberate in my ears!  I grieve to say 
that the expressive features of Professor Muff were much scratched and lacerated by 
the injured lady; and that Professor Nogo, besides sustaining several severe bites, has 
lost some handfuls of hair from the same cause.  It must be some consolation to these 
gentlemen to know that their ardent attachment to scientific pursuits has alone 
occasioned these unpleasant consequences; for which the sympathy of a grateful country 
will sufficiently reward them.  The unfortunate lady remains at the Pig and Tinder-box, 
and up to this time is reported in a very precarious state.

�eI need scarcely tell you that this unlooked-for catastrophe has cast a damp and gloom 
upon us in the midst of our exhilaration; natural in any case, but greatly enhanced in 
this, by the amiable qualities of the deceased animal, who appears to have been much 
and deservedly respected by the whole of his acquaintance.�f

�eTwelve o�fclock.

�eI take the last opportunity before sealing my parcel to inform you that the boy who 
fell through the pastrycook�fs window is not dead, as was universally believed, but alive 
and well.  The report appears to have had its origin in his mysterious disappearance.  
He was found half an hour since on the premises of a sweet-stuff maker, where a raffle 
had been announced for a second-hand seal-skin cap and a tambourine; and where?a 
sufficient number of members not having been obtained at first?he had patiently 
waited until the list was completed.  This fortunate discovery has in some degree 
restored our gaiety and cheerfulness.  It is proposed to get up a subscription for him 
without delay.

�eEverybody is nervously anxious to see what to-morrow will bring forth.  If any one 
should arrive in the course of the night, I have left strict directions to be called 
immediately.  I should have sat up, indeed, but the agitating events of this day have 
been too much for me.

�eNo news yet of either of the Professors Snore, Doze, or Wheezy.  It is very strange!�f

�eWednesday afternoon.

�eAll is now over; and, upon one point at least, I am at length enabled to set the minds 
of your readers at rest.  The three professors arrived at ten minutes after two o�fclock, 
and, instead of taking up their quarters at the Original Pig, as it was universally 
understood in the course of yesterday that they would assuredly have done, drove 
straight to the Pig and Tinder-box, where they threw off the mask at once, and openly 
announced their intention of remaining.  Professor Wheezy may reconcile this very 
extraordinary conduct with his notions of fair and equitable dealing, but I would 
recommend Professor Wheezy to be cautious how he presumes too far upon his 
well-earned reputation.  How such a man as Professor Snore, or, which is still more 
extraordinary, such an individual as Professor Doze, can quietly allow himself to be 
mixed up with such proceedings as these, you will naturally inquire.  Upon this head, 
rumour is silent; I have my speculations, but forbear to give utterance to them just now.�f

�eFour o�fclock.

�eThe town is filling fast; eighteenpence has been offered for a bed and refused.  
Several gentlemen were under the necessity last night of sleeping in the brick fields, 
and on the steps of doors, for which they were taken before the magistrates in a body 
this morning, and committed to prison as vagrants for various terms.  One of these 
persons I understand to be a highly-respectable tinker, of great practical skill, who had 
forwarded a paper to the President of Section D. Mechanical Science, on the 
construction of pipkins with copper bottoms and safety-values, of which report speaks 
highly.  The incarceration of this gentleman is greatly to be regretted, as his absence 
will preclude any discussion on the subject.

�eThe bills are being taken down in all directions, and lodgings are being secured on 
almost any terms.  I have heard of fifteen shillings a week for two rooms, exclusive of 
coals and attendance, but I can scarcely believe it.  The excitement is dreadful.  I was 
informed this morning that the civil authorities, apprehensive of some outbreak of 
popular feeling, had commanded a recruiting sergeant and two corporals to be under 
arms; and that, with the view of not irritating the people unnecessarily by their 
presence, they had been requested to take up their position before daybreak in a 
turnpike, distant about a quarter of a mile from the town.  The vigour and promptness 
of these measures cannot be too highly extolled.

�eIntelligence has just been brought me, that an elderly female, in a state of inebriety, 
has declared in the open street her intention to �gdo�h for Mr. Slug.  Some statistical 
returns compiled by that gentleman, relative to the consumption of raw spirituous 
liquors in this place, are supposed to be the cause of the wretch�fs animosity.  It is added 
that this declaration was loudly cheered by a crowd of persons who had assembled on 
the spot; and that one man had the boldness to designate Mr. Slug aloud by the 
opprobrious epithet of �gStick-in-the-mud!�h  It is earnestly to be hoped that now, when 
the moment has arrived for their interference, the magistrates will not shrink from the 
exercise of that power which is vested in them by the constitution of our common 
country.�f

�eHalf-past ten.

�eThe disturbance, I am happy to inform you, has been completely quelled, and the 
ringleader taken into custody.  She had a pail of cold water thrown over her, previous to 
being locked up, and expresses great contrition and uneasiness.  We are all in a fever of 
anticipation about to-morrow; but, now that we are within a few hours of the meeting of 
the association, and at last enjoy the proud consciousness of having its illustrious 
members amongst us, I trust and hope everything may go off peaceably.  I shall send 
you a full report of to-morrow�fs proceedings by the night coach.�f

�eEleven o�fclock.

�eI open my letter to say that nothing whatever has occurred since I folded it up.�f

�eThursday.

�eThe sun rose this morning at the usual hour.  I did not observe anything particular 
in the aspect of the glorious planet, except that he appeared to me (it might have been a 
delusion of my heightened fancy) to shine with more than common brilliancy, and to 
shed a refulgent lustre upon the town, such as I had never observed before.  This is the 
more extraordinary, as the sky was perfectly cloudless, and the atmosphere peculiarly 
fine.  At half-past nine o�fclock the general committee assembled, with the last year�fs 
president in the chair.  The report of the council was read; and one passage, which 
stated that the council had corresponded with no less than three thousand five hundred 
and seventy-one persons, (all of whom paid their own postage,) on no fewer than seven 
thousand two hundred and forty-three topics, was received with a degree of enthusiasm 
which no efforts could suppress.  The various committees and sections having been 
appointed, and the more formal business transacted, the great proceedings of the 
meeting commenced at eleven o�fclock precisely.  I had the happiness of occupying a 
most eligible position at that time, in



�eSECTION A.?ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY.
GREAT ROOM, PIG AND TINDER-BOX.



President?Professor Snore.  Vice-Presidents?Professors Doze and Wheezy.

�eThe scene at this moment was particularly striking.  The sun streamed through the 
windows of the apartments, and tinted the whole scene with its brilliant rays, bringing 
out in strong relief the noble visages of the professors and scientific gentlemen, who, 
some with bald heads, some with red heads, some with brown heads, some with grey 
heads, some with black heads, some with block heads, presented a coup d�foeil which no 
eye-witness will readily forget.  In front of these gentlemen were papers and inkstands; 
and round the room, on elevated benches extending as far as the forms could reach, 
were assembled a brilliant concourse of those lovely and elegant women for which 
Mudfog is justly acknowledged to be without a rival in the whole world.  The contrast 
between their fair faces and the dark coats and trousers of the scientific gentlemen I 
shall never cease to remember while Memory holds her seat.

�eTime having been allowed for a slight confusion, occasioned by the falling down of the 
greater part of the platforms, to subside, the president called on one of the secretaries to 
read a communication entitled, �gSome remarks on the industrious fleas, with 
considerations on the importance of establishing infant-schools among that numerous 
class of society; of directing their industry to useful and practical ends; and of applying 
the surplus fruits thereof, towards providing for them a comfortable and respectable 
maintenance in their old age.�h

�eThe author stated, that, having long turned his attention to the moral and social 
condition of these interesting animals, he had been induced to visit an exhibition in 
Regent-street, London, commonly known by the designation of �gThe Industrious Fleas.�h  
He had there seen many fleas, occupied certainly in various pursuits and avocations, 
but occupied, he was bound to add, in a manner which no man of well-regulated mind 
could fail to regard with sorrow and regret.  One flea, reduced to the level of a beast of 
burden, was drawing about a miniature gig, containing a particularly small effigy of His 
Grace the Duke of Wellington; while another was staggering beneath the weight of a 
golden model of his great adversary Napoleon Bonaparte.  Some, brought up as 
mountebanks and ballet-dancers, were performing a figure-dance (he regretted to 
observe, that, of the fleas so employed, several were females); others were in training, in 
a small card-board box, for pedestrians,?mere sporting characters?and two were 
actually engaged in the cold-blooded and barbarous occupation of duelling; a pursuit 
from which humanity recoiled with horror and disgust.  He suggested that measures 
should be immediately taken to employ the labour of these fleas as part and parcel of 
the productive power of the country, which might easily be done by the establishment 
among them of infant schools and houses of industry, in which a system of virtuous 
education, based upon sound principles, should be observed, and moral precepts strictly 
inculcated.  He proposed that every flea who presumed to exhibit, for hire, music, or 
dancing, or any species of theatrical entertainment, without a licence, should be 
considered a vagabond, and treated accordingly; in which respect he only placed him 
upon a level with the rest of mankind.  He would further suggest that their labour 
should be placed under the control and regulation of the state, who should set apart 
from the profits, a fund for the support of superannuated or disabled fleas, their widows 
and orphans.  With this view, he proposed that liberal premiums should be offered for 
the three best designs for a general almshouse; from which?as insect architecture was 
well known to be in a very advanced and perfect state?we might possibly derive many 
valuable hints for the improvement of our metropolitan universities, national galleries, 
and other public edifices.

�eTHE PRESIDENT wished to be informed how the ingenious gentleman proposed to 
open a communication with fleas generally, in the first instance, so that they might be 
thoroughly imbued with a sense of the advantages they must necessarily derive from 
changing their mode of life, and applying themselves to honest labour.  This appeared 
to him, the only difficulty.

�eTHE AUTHOR submitted that this difficulty was easily overcome, or rather that 
there was no difficulty at all in the case.  Obviously the course to be pursued, if Her 
Majesty�fs government could be prevailed upon to take up the plan, would be, to secure 
at a remunerative salary the individual to whom he had alluded as presiding over the 
exhibition in Regent-street at the period of his visit.  That gentleman would at once be 
able to put himself in communication with the mass of the fleas, and to instruct them in 
pursuance of some general plan of education, to be sanctioned by Parliament, until such 
time as the more intelligent among them were advanced enough to officiate as teachers 
to the rest.

�eThe President and several members of the section highly complimented the author of 
the paper last read, on his most ingenious and important treatise.  It was determined 
that the subject should be recommended to the immediate consideration of the council. 


�eMR. WIGSBY produced a cauliflower somewhat larger than a chaise-umbrella, which 
had been raised by no other artificial means than the simple application of highly 
carbonated soda-water as manure.  He explained that by scooping out the head, which 
would afford a new and delicious species of nourishment for the poor, a parachute, in 
principle something similar to that constructed by M. Garnerin, was at once obtained; 
the stalk of course being kept downwards.  He added that he was perfectly willing to 
make a descent from a height of not less than three miles and a quarter; and had in fact 
already proposed the same to the proprietors of Vauxhall Gardens, who in the 
handsomest manner at once consented to his wishes, and appointed an early day next 
summer for the undertaking; merely stipulating that the rim of the cauliflower should 
be previously broken in three or four places to ensure the safety of the descent.

�eTHE PRESIDENT congratulated the public on the grand gala in store for them, and 
warmly eulogised the proprietors of the establishment alluded to, for their love of 
science, and regard for the safety of human life, both of which did them the highest 
honour.

�eA Member wished to know how many thousand additional lamps the royal property 
would be illuminated with, on the night after the descent.

�eMR. WIGSBY replied that the point was not yet finally decided; but he believed it was 
proposed, over and above the ordinary illuminations, to exhibit in various devices eight 
millions and a-half of additional lamps.

�eThe Member expressed himself much gratified with this announcement.

�eMR. BLUNDERUM delighted the section with a most interesting and valuable paper 
�gon the last moments of the learned pig,�h which produced a very strong impression on 
the assembly, the account being compiled from the personal recollections of his favourite 
attendant.  The account stated in the most emphatic terms that the animal�fs name was 
not Toby, but Solomon; and distinctly proved that he could have no near relatives in the 
profession, as many designing persons had falsely stated, inasmuch as his father, 
mother, brothers and sisters, had all fallen victims to the butcher at different times.  
An uncle of his indeed, had with very great labour been traced to a sty in Somers Town; 
but as he was in a very infirm state at the time, being afflicted with measles, and 
shortly afterwards disappeared, there appeared too much reason to conjecture that he 
had been converted into sausages.  The disorder of the learned pig was originally a 
severe cold, which, being aggravated by excessive trough indulgence, finally settled 
upon the lungs, and terminated in a general decay of the constitution.  A melancholy 
instance of a presentiment entertained by the animal of his approaching dissolution, 
was recorded.  After gratifying a numerous and fashionable company with his 
performances, in which no falling off whatever was visible, he fixed his eyes on the 
biographer, and, turning to the watch which lay on the floor, and on which he was 
accustomed to point out the hour, deliberately passed his snout twice round the dial.  
In precisely four-and-twenty hours from that time he had ceased to exist!

�ePROFESSOR WHEEZY inquired whether, previous to his demise, the animal had 
expressed, by signs or otherwise, any wishes regarding the disposal of his little property.

�eMR. BLUNDERUM replied, that, when the biographer took up the pack of cards at 
the conclusion of the performance, the animal grunted several times in a significant 
manner, and nodding his head as he was accustomed to do, when gratified.  From these 
gestures it was understood that he wished the attendant to keep the cards, which he 
had ever since done.  He had not expressed any wish relative to his watch, which had 
accordingly been pawned by the same individual.

�eTHE PRESIDENT wished to know whether any Member of the section had ever seen 
or conversed with the pig-faced lady, who was reported to have worn a black velvet 
mask, and to have taken her meals from a golden trough.

�eAfter some hesitation a Member replied that the pig-faced lady was his mother-in-law, 
and that he trusted the President would not violate the sanctity of private life.

�eTHE PRESIDENT begged pardon.  He had considered the pig-faced lady a public 
character.  Would the honourable member object to state, with a view to the 
advancement of science, whether she was in any way connected with the learned pig?

�eThe Member replied in the same low tone, that, as the question appeared to involve a 
suspicion that the learned pig might be his half-brother, he must decline answering it.



�eSECTION B.?ANATOMY AND MEDICINE.
COACH-HOUSE, PIG AND TINDER-BOX.



President?Dr. Toorell.  Vice-Presidents?Professors Muff and Nogo.

DR. KUTANKUMAGEN (of Moscow) read to the section a report of a case which had 
occurred within his own practice, strikingly illustrative of the power of medicine, as 
exemplified in his successful treatment of a virulent disorder.  He had been called in to 
visit the patient on the 1st of April, 1837.  He was then labouring under symptoms 
peculiarly alarming to any medical man.  His frame was stout and muscular, his step 
firm and elastic, his cheeks plump and red, his voice loud, his appetite good, his pulse 
full and round.  He was in the constant habit of eating three meals per diem, and of 
drinking at least one bottle of wine, and one glass of spirituous liquors diluted with 
water, in the course of the four-and-twenty hours.  He laughed constantly, and in so 
hearty a manner that it was terrible to hear him.  By dint of powerful medicine, low 
diet, and bleeding, the symptoms in the course of three days perceptibly decreased.  A 
rigid perseverance in the same course of treatment for only one week, accompanied with 
small doses of water-gruel, weak broth, and barley-water, led to their entire 
disappearance.  In the course of a month he was sufficiently recovered to be carried 
down-stairs by two nurses, and to enjoy an airing in a close carriage, supported by soft 
pillows.  At the present moment he was restored so far as to walk about, with the slight 
assistance of a crutch and a boy.  It would perhaps be gratifying to the section to learn 
that he ate little, drank little, slept little, and was never heard to laugh by any accident 
whatever.

�eDR. W. R. FEE, in complimenting the honourable member upon the triumphant cure 
he had effected, begged to ask whether the patient still bled freely?

�eDR. KUTANKUMAGEN replied in the affirmative.

�eDR. W. R. FEE.?And you found that he bled freely during the whole course of the 
disorder?

�eDR. KUTANKUMAGEN.?Oh dear, yes; most freely.

�eDR. NEESHAWTS supposed, that if the patient had not submitted to be bled with 
great readiness and perseverance, so extraordinary a cure could never, in fact, have 
been accomplished.  Dr. Kutankumagen rejoined, certainly not.

�eMR. KNIGHT BELL (M.R.C.S.) exhibited a wax preparation of the interior of a 
gentleman who in early life had inadvertently swallowed a door-key.  It was a curious 
fact that a medical student of dissipated habits, being present at the post mortem 
examination, found means to escape unobserved from the room, with that portion of the 
coats of the stomach upon which an exact model of the instrument was distinctly 
impressed, with which he hastened to a locksmith of doubtful character, who made a 
new key from the pattern so shown to him.  With this key the medical student entered 
the house of the deceased gentleman, and committed a burglary to a large amount, for 
which he was subsequently tried and executed.

�eTHE PRESIDENT wished to know what became of the original key after the lapse of 
years.  Mr. Knight Bell replied that the gentleman was always much accustomed to 
punch, and it was supposed the acid had gradually devoured it.

�eDR. NEESHAWTS and several of the members were of opinion that the key must 
have lain very cold and heavy upon the gentleman�fs stomach.

�eMR. KNIGHT BELL believed it did at first.  It was worthy of remark, perhaps, that 
for some years the gentleman was troubled with a night-mare, under the influence of 
which he always imagined himself a wine-cellar door.

�ePROFESSOR MUFF related a very extraordinary and convincing proof of the 
wonderful efficacy of the system of infinitesimal doses, which the section were doubtless 
aware was based upon the theory that the very minutest amount of any given drug, 
properly dispersed through the human frame, would be productive of precisely the same 
result as a very large dose administered in the usual manner.  Thus, the fortieth part 
of a grain of calomel was supposed to be equal to a five-grain calomel pill, and so on in 
proportion throughout the whole range of medicine.  He had tried the experiment in a 
curious manner upon a publican who had been brought into the hospital with a broken 
head, and was cured upon the infinitesimal system in the incredibly short space of three 
months.  This man was a hard drinker.  He (Professor Muff) had dispersed three 
drops of rum through a bucket of water, and requested the man to drink the whole.  
What was the result?  Before he had drunk a quart, he was in a state of beastly 
intoxication; and five other men were made dead drunk with the remainder.

�eTHE PRESIDENT wished to know whether an infinitesimal dose of soda-water would 
have recovered them?  Professor Muff replied that the twenty-fifth part of a 
teaspoonful, properly administered to each patient, would have sobered him 
immediately.  The President remarked that this was a most important discovery, and 
he hoped the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen would patronize it immediately.

�eA Member begged to be informed whether it would be possible to administer?say, the 
twentieth part of a grain of bread and cheese to all grown-up paupers, and the fortieth 
part to children, with the same satisfying effect as their present allowance.

�ePROFESSOR MUFF was willing to stake his professional reputation on the perfect 
adequacy of such a quantity of food to the support of human life?in workhouses; the 
addition of the fifteenth part of a grain of pudding twice a week would render it a high 
diet.

�ePROFESSOR NOGO called the attention of the section to a very extraordinary case of 
animal magnetism.  A private watchman, being merely looked at by the operator from 
the opposite side of a wide street, was at once observed to be in a very drowsy and 
languid state.  He was followed to his box, and being once slightly rubbed on the palms 
of the hands, fell into a sound sleep, in which he continued without intermission for ten 
hours.




�eSECTION C.?STATISTICS.
HAY-LOFT, ORIGINAL PIG.

President?Mr. Woodensconce.  Vice-Presidents?Mr. Ledbrain and Mr. Timbered.

�eMR. SLUG stated to the section the result of some calculations he had made with 
great difficulty and labour, regarding the state of infant education among the middle 
classes of London.  He found that, within a circle of three miles from the Elephant and 
Castle, the following were the names and numbers of children�fs books principally in 
circulation:-



�eJack the Giant-killer           7,943
Ditto and Bean-stalk             8,621
Ditto and Eleven Brothers        2,845
Ditto and Jill                   1,998
Total                           21,407

�eHe found that the proportion of Robinson Crusoes to Philip Quarlls was as four and a 
half to one; and that the preponderance of Valentine and Orsons over Goody Two 
Shoeses was as three and an eighth of the former to half a one of the latter; a 
comparison of Seven Champions with Simple Simons gave the same result.  The 
ignorance that prevailed, was lamentable.  One child, on being asked whether he 
would rather be Saint George of England or a respectable tallow-chandler, instantly 
replied, �gTaint George of Ingling.�h  Another, a little boy of eight years old, was found to 
be firmly impressed with a belief in the existence of dragons, and openly stated that it 
was his intention when he grew up, to rush forth sword in hand for the deliverance of 
captive princesses, and the promiscuous slaughter of giants.  Not one child among the 
number interrogated had ever heard of Mungo Park,?some inquiring whether he was 
at all connected with the black man that swept the crossing; and others whether he was 
in any way related to the Regent�fs Park.  They had not the slightest conception of the 
commonest principles of mathematics, and considered Sindbad the Sailor the most 
enterprising voyager that the world had ever produced.

�eA Member strongly deprecating the use of all the other books mentioned, suggested 
that Jack and Jill might perhaps be exempted from the general censure, inasmuch as 
the hero and heroine, in the very outset of the tale, were depicted as going up a hill to 
fetch a pail of water, which was a laborious and useful occupation,?supposing the 
family linen was being washed, for instance.

�eMR. SLUG feared that the moral effect of this passage was more than 
counterbalanced by another in a subsequent part of the poem, in which very gross 
allusion was made to the mode in which the heroine was personally chastised by her 
mother



�g�eFor laughing at Jack�fs disaster;�h



besides, the whole work had this one great fault, it was not true.

�eTHE PRESIDENT complimented the honourable member on the excellent distinction 
he had drawn.  Several other Members, too, dwelt upon the immense and urgent 
necessity of storing the minds of children with nothing but facts and figures; which 
process the President very forcibly remarked, had made them (the section) the men they 
were.

�eMR. SLUG then stated some curious calculations respecting the dogs�f-meat barrows 
of London.  He found that the total number of small carts and barrows engaged in 
dispensing provision to the cats and dogs of the metropolis was, one thousand seven 
hundred and forty-three.  The average number of skewers delivered daily with the 
provender, by each dogs�f-meat cart or barrow, was thirty-six.  Now, multiplying the 
number of skewers so delivered by the number of barrows, a total of sixty-two thousand 
seven hundred and forty-eight skewers daily would be obtained.  Allowing that, of 
these sixty-two thousand seven hundred and forty-eight skewers, the odd two thousand 
seven hundred and forty-eight were accidentally devoured with the meat, by the most 
voracious of the animals supplied, it followed that sixty thousand skewers per day, or 
the enormous number of twenty-one millions nine hundred thousand skewers annually, 
were wasted in the kennels and dustholes of London; which, if collected and warehoused, 
would in ten years�f time afford a mass of timber more than sufficient for the 
construction of a first-rate vessel of war for the use of her Majesty�fs navy, to be called 
�gThe Royal Skewer,�h and to become under that name the terror of all the enemies of this 
island.

�eMR. X. LEDBRAIN read a very ingenious communication, from which it appeared 
that the total number of legs belonging to the manufacturing population of one great 
town in Yorkshire was, in round numbers, forty thousand, while the total number of 
chair and stool legs in their houses was only thirty thousand, which, upon the very 
favourable average of three legs to a seat, yielded only ten thousand seats in all.  From 
this calculation it would appear,?not taking wooden or cork legs into the account, but 
allowing two legs to every person,?that ten thousand individuals (one-half of the whole 
population) were either destitute of any rest for their legs at all, or passed the whole of 
their leisure time in sitting upon boxes.



�eSECTION D.?MECHANICAL SCIENCE.
COACH-HOUSE, ORIGINAL PIG.



President?Mr. Carter.  Vice-Presidents?Mr. Truck and Mr. Waghorn.

�ePROFESSOR QUEERSPECK exhibited an elegant model of a portable railway, 
neatly mounted in a green case, for the waistcoat pocket.  By attaching this beautiful 
instrument to his boots, any Bank or public-office clerk could transport himself from his 
place of residence to his place of business, at the easy rate of sixty-five miles an hour, 
which, to gentlemen of sedentary pursuits, would be an incalculable advantage.

�eTHE PRESIDENT was desirous of knowing whether it was necessary to have a level 
surface on which the gentleman was to run.

�ePROFESSOR QUEERSPECK explained that City gentlemen would run in trains, 
being handcuffed together to prevent confusion or unpleasantness.  For instance, 
trains would start every morning at eight, nine, and ten o�fclock, from Camden Town, 
Islington, Camberwell, Hackney, and various other places in which City gentlemen are 
accustomed to reside.  It would be necessary to have a level, but he had provided for 
this difficulty by proposing that the best line that the circumstances would admit of, 
should be taken through the sewers which undermine the streets of the metropolis, and 
which, well lighted by jets from the gas pipes which run immediately above them, would 
form a pleasant and commodious arcade, especially in winter-time, when the 
inconvenient custom of carrying umbrellas, now so general, could be wholly dispensed 
with.  In reply to another question, Professor Queerspeck stated that no substitute for 
the purposes to which these arcades were at present devoted had yet occurred to him, 
but that he hoped no fanciful objection on this head would be allowed to interfere with 
so great an undertaking.

�eMR. JOBBA produced a forcing-machine on a novel plan, for bringing joint-stock 
railway shares prematurely to a premium.  The instrument was in the form of an 
elegant gilt weather-glass, of most dazzling appearance, and was worked behind, by 
strings, after the manner of a pantomime trick, the strings being always pulled by the 
directors of the company to which the machine belonged.  The quicksilver was so 
ingeniously placed, that when the acting directors held shares in their pockets, figures 
denoting very small expenses and very large returns appeared upon the glass; but the 
moment the directors parted with these pieces of paper, the estimate of needful 
expenditure suddenly increased itself to an immense extent, while the statements of 
certain profits became reduced in the same proportion.  Mr. Jobba stated that the 
machine had been in constant requisition for some months past, and he had never once 
known it to fail.

�eA Member expressed his opinion that it was extremely neat and pretty.  He wished to 
know whether it was not liable to accidental derangement?  Mr. Jobba said that the 
whole machine was undoubtedly liable to be blown up, but that was the only objection to 
it.

�ePROFESSOR NOGO arrived from the anatomical section to exhibit a model of a 
safety fire-escape, which could be fixed at any time, in less than half an hour, and by 
means of which, the youngest or most infirm persons (successfully resisting the progress 
of the flames until it was quite ready) could be preserved if they merely balanced 
themselves for a few minutes on the sill of their bedroom window, and got into the 
escape without falling into the street.  The Professor stated that the number of boys 
who had been rescued in the daytime by this machine from houses which were not on 
fire, was almost incredible.  Not a conflagration had occurred in the whole of London 
for many months past to which the escape had not been carried on the very next day, 
and put in action before a concourse of persons.

�eTHE PRESIDENT inquired whether there was not some difficulty in ascertaining 
which was the top of the machine, and which the bottom, in cases of pressing 
emergency.

�ePROFESSOR NOGO explained that of course it could not be expected to act quite as 
well when there was a fire, as when there was not a fire; but in the former case he 
thought it would be of equal service whether the top were up or down.�f



With the last section our correspondent concludes his most able and faithful Report, 
which will never cease to reflect credit upon him for his scientific attainments, and upon 
us for our enterprising spirit.  It is needless to take a review of the subjects which have 
been discussed; of the mode in which they have been examined; of the great truths 
which they have elicited.  They are now before the world, and we leave them to read, to 
consider, and to profit.

The place of meeting for next year has undergone discussion, and has at length been 
decided, regard being had to, and evidence being taken upon, the goodness of its wines, 
the supply of its markets, the hospitality of its inhabitants, and the quality of its hotels.  
We hope at this next meeting our correspondent may again be present, and that we may 
be once more the means of placing his communications before the world.  Until that 
period we have been prevailed upon to allow this number of our Miscellany to be 
retailed to the public, or wholesaled to the trade, without any advance upon our usual 
price.

We have only to add, that the committees are now broken up, and that Mudfog is once 
again restored to its accustomed tranquillity,?that Professors and Members have had 
balls, and soir?es, and suppers, and great mutual complimentations, and have at length 
dispersed to their several homes,?whither all good wishes and joys attend them, until 
next year!

Signed BOZ.




FULL REPORT OF THE SECOND MEETING OF THE MUDFOG ASSOCIATION 
FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF EVERYTHING



In October last, we did ourselves the immortal credit of recording, at an enormous 
expense, and by dint of exertions unnpralleled in the history of periodical publication, 
the proceedings of the Mudfog Association for the Advancement of Everything, which in 
that month held its first great half-yearly meeting, to the wonder and delight of the 
whole empire.  We announced at the conclusion of that extraordinary and most 
remarkable Report, that when the Second Meeting of the Society should take place, we 
should be found again at our post, renewing our gigantic and spirited endeavours, and 
once more making the world ring with the accuracy, authenticity, immeasurable 
superiority, and intense remarkability of our account of its proceedings.  In redemption 
of this pledge, we caused to be despatched per steam to Oldcastle (at which place this 
second meeting of the Society was held on the 20th instant), the same 
superhumanly-endowed gentleman who furnished the former report, and who,?gifted 
by nature with transcendent abilities, and furnished by us with a body of assistants 
scarcely inferior to himself,?has forwarded a series of letters, which, for faithfulness of 
description, power of language, fervour of thought, happiness of expression, and 
importance of subject-matter, have no equal in the epistolary literature of any age or 
country.  We give this gentleman�fs correspondence entire, and in the order in which it 
reached our office.

�eSaloon of Steamer, Thursday night, half-past eight.

�eWhen I left New Burlington Street this evening in the hackney cabriolet, number four 
thousand two hundred and eighty-five, I experienced sensations as novel as they were 
oppressive.  A sense of the importance of the task I had undertaken, a consciousness 
that I was leaving London, and, stranger still, going somewhere else, a feeling of 
loneliness and a sensation of jolting, quite bewildered my thoughts, and for a time 
rendered me even insensible to the presence of my carpet-bag and hat-box.  I shall ever 
feel grateful to the driver of a Blackwall omnibus who, by thrusting the pole of his 
vehicle through the small door of the cabriolet, awakened me from a tumult of 
imaginings that are wholly indescribable.  But of such materials is our imperfect 
nature composed!

�eI am happy to say that I am the first passenger on board, and shall thus be enabled to 
give you an account of all that happens in the order of its occurrence.  The chimney is 
smoking a good deal, and so are the crew; and the captain, I am informed, is very drunk 
in a little house upon deck, something like a black turnpike.  I should infer from all I 
hear that he has got the steam up.

�eYou will readily guess with what feelings I have just made the discovery that my 
berth is in the same closet with those engaged by Professor Woodensconce, Mr. Slug, 
and Professor Grime.  Professor Woodensconce has taken the shelf above me, and Mr. 
Slug and Professor Grime the two shelves opposite.  Their luggage has already arrived.  
On Mr. Slug�fs bed is a long tin tube of about three inches in diameter, carefully closed at 
both ends.  What can this contain?  Some powerful instrument of a new construction, 
doubtless.�f

�eTen minutes past nine.

�eNobody has yet arrived, nor has anything fresh come in my way except several joints 
of beef and mutton, from which I conclude that a good plain dinner has been provided 
for to-morrow.  There is a singular smell below, which gave me some uneasiness at 
first; but as the steward says it is always there, and never goes away, I am quite 
comfortable again.  I learn from this man that the different sections will be distributed 
at the Black Boy and Stomach-ache, and the Boot-jack and Countenance.  If this 
intelligence be true (and I have no reason to doubt it), your readers will draw such 
conclusions as their different opinions may suggest.

�eI write down these remarks as they occur to me, or as the facts come to my knowledge, 
in order that my first impressions may lose nothing of their original vividness.  I shall 
despatch them in small packets as opportunities arise.�f

�eHalf past nine.

�eSome dark object has just appeared upon the wharf.  I think it is a travelling 
carriage.�f

�eA quarter to ten.

�eNo, it isn�ft.�f

�eHalf-past ten.

The passengers are pouring in every instant.  Four omnibuses full have just arrived 
upon the wharf, and all is bustle and activity.  The noise and confusion are very great.  
Cloths are laid in the cabins, and the steward is placing blue plates?full of knobs of 
cheese at equal distances down the centre of the tables.  He drops a great many knobs; 
but, being used to it, picks them up again with great dexterity, and, after wiping them 
on his sleeve, throws them back into the plates.  He is a young man of exceedingly 
prepossessing appearance?either dirty or a mulatto, but I think the former.

�eAn interesting old gentleman, who came to the wharf in an omnibus, has just 
quarrelled violently with the porters, and is staggering towards the vessel with a large 
trunk in his arms.  I trust and hope that he may reach it in safety; but the board he has 
to cross is narrow and slippery.  Was that a splash?  Gracious powers!

�eI have just returned from the deck.  The trunk is standing upon the extreme brink of 
the wharf, but the old gentleman is nowhere to be seen.  The watchman is not sure 
whether he went down or not, but promises to drag for him the first thing to-morrow 
morning.  May his humane efforts prove successful!

�eProfessor Nogo has this moment arrived with his nightcap on under his hat.  He has 
ordered a glass of cold brandy and water, with a hard biscuit and a basin, and has gone 
straight to bed.  What can this mean?

�eThe three other scientific gentlemen to whom I have already alluded have come on 
board, and have all tried their beds, with the exception of Professor Woodensconce, who 
sleeps in one of the top ones, and can�ft get into it.  Mr. Slug, who sleeps in the other top 
one, is unable to get out of his, and is to have his supper handed up by a boy.  I have 
had the honour to introduce myself to these gentlemen, and we have amicably arranged 
the order in which we shall retire to rest; which it is necessary to agree upon, because, 
although the cabin is very comfortable, there is not room for more than one gentleman 
to be out of bed at a time, and even he must take his boots off in the passage.

�eAs I anticipated, the knobs of cheese were provided for the passengers�f supper, and 
are now in course of consumption.  Your readers will be surprised to hear that 
Professor Woodensconce has abstained from cheese for eight years, although he takes 
butter in considerable quantities.  Professor Grime having lost several teeth, is unable, 
I observe, to eat his crusts without previously soaking them in his bottled porter.  How 
interesting are these peculiarities!�f

�eHalf-past eleven.

�eProfessors Woodensconce and Grime, with a degree of good humour that delights us 
all, have just arranged to toss for a bottle of mulled port.  There has been some 
discussion whether the payment should be decided by the first toss or the best out of 
three.  Eventually the latter course has been determined on.  Deeply do I wish that 
both gentlemen could win; but that being impossible, I own that my personal 
aspirations (I speak as an individual, and do not compromise either you or your readers 
by this expression of feeling) are with Professor Woodensconce.  I have backed that 
gentleman to the amount of eighteenpence.�f

�eTwenty minutes to twelve.

�eProfessor Grime has inadvertently tossed his half-crown out of one of the 
cabin-windows, and it has been arranged that the steward shall toss for him.  Bets are 
offered on any side to any amount, but there are no takers.

�eProfessor Woodensconce has just called �gwoman;�h but the coin having lodged in a 
beam, is a long time coming down again.  The interest and suspense of this one 
moment are beyond anything that can be imagined.�f

�eTwelve o�fclock.

�eThe mulled port is smoking on the table before me, and Professor Grime has won.  
Tossing is a game of chance; but on every ground, whether of public or private character, 
intellectual endowments, or scientific attainments, I cannot help expressing my opinion 
that Professor Woodensconce ought to have come off victorious.  There is an exultation 
about Professor Grime incompatible, I fear, with true greatness.�f

�eA quarter past twelve.

�eProfessor Grime continues to exult, and to boast of his victory in no very measured 
terms, observing that he always does win, and that he knew it would be a �ghead�h 
beforehand, with many other remarks of a similar nature.  Surely this gentleman is 
not so lost to every feeling of decency and propriety as not to feel and know the 
superiority of Professor Woodensconce?  Is Professor Grime insane? or does he wish to 
be reminded in plain language of his true position in society, and the precise level of his 
acquirements and abilities?  Professor Grime will do well to look to this.�f

�eOne o�fclock.

�eI am writing in bed.  The small cabin is illuminated by the feeble light of a flickering 
lamp suspended from the ceiling; Professor Grime is lying on the opposite shelf on the 
broad of his back, with his mouth wide open.  The scene is indescribably solemn.  The 
rippling of the tide, the noise of the sailors�f feet overhead, the gruff voices on the river, 
the dogs on the shore, the snoring of the passengers, and a constant creaking of every 
plank in the vessel, are the only sounds that meet the ear.  With these exceptions, all is 
profound silence.

�eMy curiosity has been within the last moment very much excited.  Mr. Slug, who lies 
above Professor Grime, has cautiously withdrawn the curtains of his berth, and, after 
looking anxiously out, as if to satisfy himself that his companions are asleep, has taken 
up the tin tube of which I have before spoken, and is regarding it with great interest.  
What rare mechanical combination can be contained in that mysterious case?  It is 
evidently a profound secret to all.�f

�eA quarter past one.

�eThe behaviour of Mr. Slug grows more and more mysterious.  He has unscrewed the 
top of the tube, and now renews his observations upon his companions, evidently to 
make sure that he is wholly unobserved.  He is clearly on the eve of some great 
experiment.  Pray heaven that it be not a dangerous one; but the interests of science 
must be promoted, and I am prepared for the worst.�f

�eFive minutes later.

�eHe has produced a large pair of scissors, and drawn a roll of some substance, not 
unlike parchment in appearance, from the tin case.  The experiment is about to begin.  
I must strain my eyes to the utmost, in the attempt to follow its minutest operation.�f

�eTwenty minutes before two.

�eI have at length been enabled to ascertain that the tin tube contains a few yards of 
some celebrated plaster, recommended?as I discover on regarding the label attentively 
through my eye-glass?as a preservative against sea-sickness.  Mr. Slug has cut it up 
into small portions, and is now sticking it over himself in every direction.�f

�eThree o�fclock.

�ePrecisely a quarter of an hour ago we weighed anchor, and the machinery was 
suddenly put in motion with a noise so appalling, that Professor Woodensconce (who 
had ascended to his berth by means of a platform of carpet-bags arranged by himself on 
geometrical principals) darted from his shelf head foremost, and, gaining his feet with 
all the rapidity of extreme terror, ran wildly into the ladies�f cabin, under the impression 
that we were sinking, and uttering loud cries for aid.  I am assured that the scene 
which ensued baffles all description.  There were one hundred and forty-seven ladies in 
their respective berths at the time.

�eMr. Slug has remarked, as an additional instance of the extreme ingenuity of the 
steam-engine as applied to purposes of navigation, that in whatever part of the vessel a 
passenger�fs berth may be situated, the machinery always appears to be exactly under 
his pillow.  He intends stating this very beautiful, though simple discovery, to the 
association.�f

�eHalf-past ten.

�eWe are still in smooth water; that is to say, in as smooth water as a steam-vessel ever 
can be, for, as Professor Woodensconce (who has just woke up) learnedly remarks, 
another great point of ingenuity about a steamer is, that it always carries a little storm 
with it.  You can scarcely conceive how exciting the jerking pulsation of the ship 
becomes.  It is a matter of positive difficulty to get to sleep.�f

�eFriday afternoon, six o�fclock.

�eI regret to inform you that Mr. Slug�fs plaster has proved of no avail.  He is in great 
agony, but has applied several large, additional pieces notwithstanding.  How affecting 
is this extreme devotion to science and pursuit of knowledge under the most trying 
circumstances!

�eWe were extremely happy this morning, and the breakfast was one of the most 
animated description.  Nothing unpleasant occurred until noon, with the exception of 
Doctor Foxey�fs brown silk umbrella and white hat becoming entangled in the machinery 
while he was explaining to a knot of ladies the construction of the steam-engine.  I fear 
the gravy soup for lunch was injudicious.  We lost a great many passengers almost 
immediately afterwards.�f

�eHalf-past six.

�eI am again in bed.  Anything so heart-rending as Mr. Slug�fs sufferings it has never 
yet been my lot to witness.�f

�eSeven o�fclock.

�eA messenger has just come down for a clean pocket-handkerchief from Professor 
Woodensconce�fs bag, that unfortunate gentleman being quite unable to leave the deck, 
and imploring constantly to be thrown overboard.  From this man I understand that 
Professor Nogo, though in a state of utter exhaustion, clings feebly to the hard biscuit 
and cold brandy and water, under the impression that they will yet restore him.  Such 
is the triumph of mind over matter.

�eProfessor Grime is in bed, to all appearance quite well; but he will eat, and it is 
disagreeable to see him.  Has this gentleman no sympathy with the sufferings of his 
fellow-creatures?  If he has, on what principle can he call for mutton-chops?and 
smile?�f

�eBlack Boy and Stomach-ache, Oldcastle, Saturday noon.

�eYou will be happy to learn that I have at length arrived here in safety.  The town is 
excessively crowded, and all the private lodgings and hotels are filled with savans of 
both sexes.  The tremendous assemblage of intellect that one encounters in every 
street is in the last degree overwhelming.

�eNotwithstanding the throng of people here, I have been fortunate enough to meet 
with very comfortable accommodation on very reasonable terms, having secured a sofa 
in the first-floor passage at one guinea per night, which includes permission to take my 
meals in the bar, on condition that I walk about the streets at all other times, to make 
room for other gentlemen similarly situated.  I have been over the outhouses intended 
to be devoted to the reception of the various sections, both here and at the Boot-jack and 
Countenance, and am much delighted with the arrangements.  Nothing can exceed the 
fresh appearance of the saw-dust with which the floors are sprinkled.  The forms are of 
unplaned deal, and the general effect, as you can well imagine, is extremely beautiful.�f

�eHalf-past nine.

�eThe number and rapidity of the arrivals are quite bewildering.  Within the last ten 
minutes a stage-coach has driven up to the door, filled inside and out with distinguished 
characters, comprising Mr. Muddlebranes, Mr. Drawley, Professor Muff, Mr. X. Misty, 
Mr. X. X. Misty, Mr. Purblind, Professor Rummun, The Honourable and Reverend Mr. 
Long Eers, Professor John Ketch, Sir William Joltered, Doctor Buffer, Mr. Smith (of 
London), Mr. Brown (of Edinburgh), Sir Hookham Snivey, and Professor Pumpkinskull.  
The ten last-named gentlemen were wet through, and looked extremely intelligent.�f

�eSunday, two o�fclock, p.m.

�eThe Honourable and Reverend Mr. Long Eers, accompanied by Sir William Joltered, 
walked and drove this morning.  They accomplished the former feat in boots, and the 
latter in a hired fly.  This has naturally given rise to much discussion.

�eI have just learnt that an interview has taken place at the Boot-jack and Countenance 
between Sowster, the active and intelligent beadle of this place, and Professor 
Pumpkinskull, who, as your readers are doubtless aware, is an influential member of 
the council.  I forbear to communicate any of the rumours to which this very 
extraordinary proceeding has given rise until I have seen Sowster, and endeavoured to 
ascertain the truth from him.�f

�eHalf-past six.

�eI engaged a donkey-chaise shortly after writing the above, and proceeded at a brisk 
trot in the direction of Sowster�fs residence, passing through a beautiful expanse of 
country, with red brick buildings on either side, and stopping in the marketplace to 
observe the spot where Mr. Kwakley�fs hat was blown off yesterday.  It is an uneven 
piece of paving, but has certainly no appearance which would lead one to suppose that 
any such event had recently occurred there.  From this point I proceeded?passing the 
gas-works and tallow-melter�fs?to a lane which had been pointed out to me as the 
beadle�fs place of residence; and before I had driven a dozen yards further, I had the good 
fortune to meet Sowster himself advancing towards me.

�eSowster is a fat man, with a more enlarged development of that peculiar conformation 
of countenance which is vulgarly termed a double chin than I remember to have ever 
seen before.  He has also a very red nose, which he attributes to a habit of early 
rising?so red, indeed, that but for this explanation I should have supposed it to proceed 
from occasional inebriety.  He informed me that he did not feel himself at liberty to 
relate what had passed between himself and Professor Pumpkinskull, but had no 
objection to state that it was connected with a matter of police regulation, and added 
with peculiar significance �gNever wos sitch times!�h

�eYou will easily believe that this intelligence gave me considerable surprise, not wholly 
unmixed with anxiety, and that I lost no time in waiting on Professor Pumpkinskull, 
and stating the object of my visit.  After a few moments�f reflection, the Professor, who, I 
am bound to say, behaved with the utmost politeness, openly avowed (I mark the 
passage in italics) that he had requested Sowster to attend on the Monday morning at 
the Boot-jack and Countenance, to keep off the boys; and that he had further desired 
that the under-beadle might be stationed, with the same object, at the Black Boy and 
Stomach-ache!

�eNow I leave this unconstitutional proceeding to your comments and the consideration 
of your readers.  I have yet to learn that a beadle, without the precincts of a church, 
churchyard, or work-house, and acting otherwise than under the express orders of 
churchwardens and overseers in council assembled, to enforce the law against people 
who come upon the parish, and other offenders, has any lawful authority whatever over 
the rising youth of this country.  I have yet to learn that a beadle can be called out by 
any civilian to exercise a domination and despotism over the boys of Britain.  I have yet 
to learn that a beadle will be permitted by the commissioners of poor law regulation to 
wear out the soles and heels of his boots in illegal interference with the liberties of 
people not proved poor or otherwise criminal.  I have yet to learn that a beadle has 
power to stop up the Queen�fs highway at his will and pleasure, or that the whole width 
of the street is not free and open to any man, boy, or woman in existence, up to the very 
walls of the houses?ay, be they Black Boys and Stomach-aches, or Boot-jacks and 
Countenances, I care not.�f

�eNine o�fclock.

�eI have procured a local artist to make a faithful sketch of the tyrant Sowster, which, 
as he has acquired this infamous celebrity, you will no doubt wish to have engraved for 
the purpose of presenting a copy with every copy of your next number.  I enclose it.

[Picture which cannot be reproduced]

The under-beadle has consented to write his life, but it is to be strictly anonymous.

�eThe accompanying likeness is of course from the life, and complete in every respect.  
Even if I had been totally ignorant of the man�fs real character, and it had been placed 
before me without remark, I should have shuddered involuntarily.  There is an intense 
malignity of expression in the features, and a baleful ferocity of purpose in the ruffian�fs 
eye, which appals and sickens.  His whole air is rampant with cruelty, nor is the 
stomach less characteristic of his demoniac propensities.�f

�eMonday.

�eThe great day has at length arrived.  I have neither eyes, nor ears, nor pens, nor ink, 
nor paper, for anything but the wonderful proceedings that have astounded my senses.  
Let me collect my energies and proceed to the account.



�eSECTION A.?ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY.
FRONT PARLOUR, BLACK BOY AND STOMACH-ACHE.



President?Sir William Joltered.  Vice-Presidents?Mr. Muddlebranes and Mr. 
Drawley.

�eMR. X. X. MISTY communicated some remarks on the disappearance of 
dancing-bears from the streets of London, with observations on the exhibition of 
monkeys as connected with barrel-organs.  The writer had observed, with feelings of 
the utmost pain and regret, that some years ago a sudden and unaccountable change in 
the public taste took place with reference to itinerant bears, who, being 
discountenanced by the populace, gradually fell off one by one from the streets of the 
metropolis, until not one remained to create a taste for natural history in the breasts of 
the poor and uninstructed.  One bear, indeed,?a brown and ragged animal,?had 
lingered about the haunts of his former triumphs, with a worn and dejected visage and 
feeble limbs, and had essayed to wield his quarter-staff for the amusement of the 
multitude; but hunger, and an utter want of any due recompense for his abilities, had at 
length driven him from the field, and it was only too probable that he had fallen a 
sacrifice to the rising taste for grease.  He regretted to add that a similar, and no less 
lamentable, change had taken place with reference to monkeys.  These delightful 
animals had formerly been almost as plentiful as the organs on the tops of which they 
were accustomed to sit; the proportion in the year 1829 (it appeared by the 
parliamentary return) being as one monkey to three organs.  Owing, however, to an 
altered taste in musical instruments, and the substitution, in a great measure, of 
narrow boxes of music for organs, which left the monkeys nothing to sit upon, this 
source of public amusement was wholly dried up.  Considering it a matter of the 
deepest importance, in connection with national education, that the people should not 
lose such opportunities of making themselves acquainted with the manners and 
customs of two most interesting species of animals, the author submitted that some 
measures should be immediately taken for the restoration of these pleasing and truly 
intellectual amusements.

�eTHE PRESIDENT inquired by what means the honourable member proposed to 
attain this most desirable end?

�eTHE AUTHOR submitted that it could be most fully and satisfactorily accomplished, 
if Her Majesty�fs Government would cause to be brought over to England, and 
maintained at the public expense, and for the public amusement, such a number of 
bears as would enable every quarter of the town to be visited?say at least by three 
bears a week.  No difficulty whatever need be experienced in providing a fitting place 
for the reception of these animals, as a commodious bear-garden could be erected in the 
immediate neighbourhood of both Houses of Parliament; obviously the most proper and 
eligible spot for such an establishment.

�ePROFESSOR MULL doubted very much whether any correct ideas of natural history 
were propagated by the means to which the honourable member had so ably adverted.  
On the contrary, he believed that they had been the means of diffusing very incorrect 
and imperfect notions on the subject.  He spoke from personal observation and 
personal experience, when he said that many children of great abilities had been 
induced to believe, from what they had observed in the streets, at and before the period 
to which the honourable gentleman had referred, that all monkeys were born in red 
coats and spangles, and that their hats and feathers also came by nature.  He wished 
to know distinctly whether the honourable gentleman attributed the want of 
encouragement the bears had met with to the decline of public taste in that respect, or 
to a want of ability on the part of the bears themselves?

�eMR. X. X. MISTY replied, that he could not bring himself to believe but that there 
must be a great deal of floating talent among the bears and monkeys generally; which, 
in the absence of any proper encouragement, was dispersed in other directions.

�ePROFESSOR PUMPKINSKULL wished to take that opportunity of calling the 
attention of the section to a most important and serious point.  The author of the 
treatise just read had alluded to the prevalent taste for bears�f-grease as a means of 
promoting the growth of hair, which undoubtedly was diffused to a very great and (as it 
appeared to him) very alarming extent.  No gentleman attending that section could fail 
to be aware of the fact that the youth of the present age evinced, by their behaviour in 
the streets, and at all places of public resort, a considerable lack of that gallantry and 
gentlemanly feeling which, in more ignorant times, had been thought becoming.  He 
wished to know whether it were possible that a constant outward application of 
bears�f-grease by the young gentlemen about town had imperceptibly infused into those 
unhappy persons something of the nature and quality of the bear.  He shuddered as he 
threw out the remark; but if this theory, on inquiry, should prove to be well founded, it 
would at once explain a great deal of unpleasant eccentricity of behaviour, which, 
without some such discovery, was wholly unaccountable.

�eTHE PRESIDENT highly complimented the learned gentleman on his most valuable 
suggestion, which produced the greatest effect upon the assembly; and remarked that 
only a week previous he had seen some young gentlemen at a theatre eyeing a box of 
ladies with a fierce intensity, which nothing but the influence of some brutish appetite 
could possibly explain.  It was dreadful to reflect that our youth were so rapidly 
verging into a generation of bears.

�eAfter a scene of scientific enthusiasm it was resolved that this important question 
should be immediately submitted to the consideration of the council.

�eTHE PRESIDENT wished to know whether any gentleman could inform the section 
what had become of the dancing-dogs?

�eA MEMBER replied, after some hesitation, that on the day after three glee-singers 
had been committed to prison as criminals by a late most zealous police-magistrate of 
the metropolis, the dogs had abandoned their professional duties, and dispersed 
themselves in different quarters of the town to gain a livelihood by less dangerous 
means.  He was given to understand that since that period they had supported 
themselves by lying in wait for and robbing blind men�fs poodles.

�eMR. FLUMMERY exhibited a twig, claiming to be a veritable branch of that noble 
tree known to naturalists as the SHAKSPEARE, which has taken root in every land and 
climate, and gathered under the shade of its broad green boughs the great family of 
mankind.  The learned gentleman remarked that the twig had been undoubtedly called 
by other names in its time; but that it had been pointed out to him by an old lady in 
Warwickshire, where the great tree had grown, as a shoot of the genuine 
SHAKSPEARE, by which name he begged to introduce it to his countrymen.

�eTHE PRESIDENT wished to know what botanical definition the honourable 
gentleman could afford of the curiosity.

�eMR. FLUMMERY expressed his opinion that it was A DECIDED PLANT.



�eSECTION B.?DISPLAY OF MODELS AND MECHANICAL SCIENCE.
LARGE ROOM, BOOT-JACK AND COUNTENANCE.



President?Mr. Mallett.  Vice-Presidents?Messrs. Leaver and Scroo.

�eMR. CRINKLES exhibited a most beautiful and delicate machine, of little larger size 
than an ordinary snuff-box, manufactured entirely by himself, and composed 
exclusively of steel, by the aid of which more pockets could be picked in one hour than by 
the present slow and tedious process in four-and-twenty.  The inventor remarked that 
it had been put into active operation in Fleet Street, the Strand, and other 
thoroughfares, and had never been once known to fail.

�eAfter some slight delay, occasioned by the various members of the section buttoning 
their pockets,

�eTHE PRESIDENT narrowly inspected the invention, and declared that he had never 
seen a machine of more beautiful or exquisite construction.  Would the inventor be 
good enough to inform the section whether he had taken any and what means for 
bringing it into general operation?

�eMR. CRINKLES stated that, after encountering some preliminary difficulties, he had 
succeeded in putting himself in communication with Mr. Fogle Hunter, and other 
gentlemen connected with the swell mob, who had awarded the invention the very 
highest and most unqualified approbation.  He regretted to say, however, that these 
distinguished practitioners, in common with a gentleman of the name of Gimlet-eyed 
Tommy, and other members of a secondary grade of the profession whom he was 
understood to represent, entertained an insuperable objection to its being brought into 
general use, on the ground that it would have the inevitable effect of almost entirely 
superseding manual labour, and throwing a great number of highly-deserving persons 
out of employment.

�eTHE PRESIDENT hoped that no such fanciful objections would be allowed to stand in 
the way of such a great public improvement.

�eMR. CRINKLES hoped so too; but he feared that if the gentlemen of the swell mob 
persevered in their objection, nothing could be done.

�ePROFESSOR GRIME suggested, that surely, in that case, Her Majesty�fs Government 
might be prevailed upon to take it up.

�eMR. CRINKLES said, that if the objection were found to be insuperable he should 
apply to Parliament, which he thought could not fail to recognise the utility of the 
invention.

�eTHE PRESIDENT observed that, up to this time Parliament had certainly got on very 
well without it; but, as they did their business on a very large scale, he had no doubt 
they would gladly adopt the improvement.  His only fear was that the machine might 
be worn out by constant working.

�eMR. COPPERNOSE called the attention of the section to a proposition of great 
magnitude and interest, illustrated by a vast number of models, and stated with much 
clearness and perspicuity in a treatise entitled �gPractical Suggestions on the necessity 
of providing some harmless and wholesome relaxation for the young noblemen of 
England.�h  His proposition was, that a space of ground of not less than ten miles in 
length and four in breadth should be purchased by a new company, to be incorporated 
by Act of Parliament, and inclosed by a brick wall of not less than twelve feet in height.  
He proposed that it should be laid out with highway roads, turnpikes, bridges, 
miniature villages, and every object that could conduce to the comfort and glory of 
Four-in-hand Clubs, so that they might be fairly presumed to require no drive beyond it.  
This delightful retreat would be fitted up with most commodious and extensive stables, 
for the convenience of such of the nobility and gentry as had a taste for ostlering, and 
with houses of entertainment furnished in the most expensive and handsome style.  It 
would be further provided with whole streets of door-knockers and bell-handles of extra 
size, so constructed that they could be easily wrenched off at night, and regularly 
screwed on again, by attendants provided for the purpose, every day.  There would also 
be gas lamps of real glass, which could be broken at a comparatively small expense per 
dozen, and a broad and handsome foot pavement for gentlemen to drive their cabriolets 
upon when they were humorously disposed?for the full enjoyment of which feat live 
pedestrians would be procured from the workhouse at a very small charge per head.  
The place being inclosed, and carefully screened from the intrusion of the public, there 
would be no objection to gentlemen laying aside any article of their costume that was 
considered to interfere with a pleasant frolic, or, indeed, to their walking about without 
any costume at all, if they liked that better.  In short, every facility of enjoyment would 
be afforded that the most gentlemanly person could possibly desire.  But as even these 
advantages would be incomplete unless there were some means provided of enabling 
the nobility and gentry to display their prowess when they sallied forth after dinner, 
and as some inconvenience might be experienced in the event of their being reduced to 
the necessity of pummelling each other, the inventor had turned his attention to the 
construction of an entirely new police force, composed exclusively of automaton figures, 
which, with the assistance of the ingenious Signor Gagliardi, of Windmill-street, in the 
Haymarket, he had succeeded in making with such nicety, that a policeman, cab-driver, 
or old woman, made upon the principle of the models exhibited, would walk about until 
knocked down like any real man; nay, more, if set upon and beaten by six or eight 
noblemen or gentlemen, after it was down, the figure would utter divers groans, 
mingled with entreaties for mercy, thus rendering the illusion complete, and the 
enjoyment perfect.  But the invention did not stop even here; for station-houses would 
be built, containing good beds for noblemen and gentlemen during the night, and in the 
morning they would repair to a commodious police office, where a pantomimic 
investigation would take place before the automaton magistrates,?quite equal to 
life,?who would fine them in so many counters, with which they would be previously 
provided for the purpose.  This office would be furnished with an inclined plane, for the 
convenience of any nobleman or gentleman who might wish to bring in his horse as a 
witness; and the prisoners would be at perfect liberty, as they were now, to interrupt the 
complainants as much as they pleased, and to make any remarks that they thought 
proper.  The charge for these amusements would amount to very little more than they 
already cost, and the inventor submitted that the public would be much benefited and 
comforted by the proposed arrangement.

�ePROFESSOR NOGO wished to be informed what amount of automaton police force it 
was proposed to raise in the first instance.

�eMR. COPPERNOSE replied, that it was proposed to begin with seven divisions of 
police of a score each, lettered from A to G inclusive.  It was proposed that not more 
than half this number should be placed on active duty, and that the remainder should be 
kept on shelves in the police office ready to be called out at a moment�fs notice.

�eTHE PRESIDENT, awarding the utmost merit to the ingenious gentleman who had 
originated the idea, doubted whether the automaton police would quite answer the 
purpose.  He feared that noblemen and gentlemen would perhaps require the 
excitement of thrashing living subjects.

�eMR. COPPERNOSE submitted, that as the usual odds in such cases were ten 
noblemen or gentlemen to one policeman or cab-driver, it could make very little 
difference in point of excitement whether the policeman or cab-driver were a man or a 
block.  The great advantage would be, that a policeman�fs limbs might be all knocked off, 
and yet he would be in a condition to do duty next day.  He might even give his 
evidence next morning with his head in his hand, and give it equally well.

�ePROFESSOR MUFF.?Will you allow me to ask you, sir, of what materials it is 
intended that the magistrates�f heads shall be composed?

�eMR. COPPERNOSE.?The magistrates will have wooden heads of course, and they 
will be made of the toughest and thickest materials that can possibly be obtained.

�ePROFESSOR MUFF.?I am quite satisfied.  This is a great invention.

�ePROFESSOR NOGO.?I see but one objection to it.  It appears to me that the 
magistrates ought to talk.

�eMR. COPPERNOSE no sooner heard this suggestion than he touched a small spring 
in each of the two models of magistrates which were placed upon the table; one of the 
figures immediately began to exclaim with great volubility that he was sorry to see 
gentlemen in such a situation, and the other to express a fear that the policeman was 
intoxicated.

�eThe section, as with one accord, declared with a shout of applause that the invention 
was complete; and the President, much excited, retired with Mr. Coppernose to lay it 
before the council.  On his return,

�eMR. TICKLE displayed his newly-invented spectacles, which enabled the wearer to 
discern, in very bright colours, objects at a great distance, and rendered him wholly 
blind to those immediately before him.  It was, he said, a most valuable and useful 
invention, based strictly upon the principle of the human eye.

�eTHE PRESIDENT required some information upon this point.  He had yet to learn 
that the human eye was remarkable for the peculiarities of which the honourable 
gentleman had spoken.

�eMR. TICKLE was rather astonished to hear this, when the President could not fail to 
be aware that a large number of most excellent persons and great statesmen could see, 
with the naked eye, most marvellous horrors on West India plantations, while they 
could discern nothing whatever in the interior of Manchester cotton mills.  He must 
know, too, with what quickness of perception most people could discover their 
neighbour�fs faults, and how very blind they were to their own.  If the President differed 
from the great majority of men in this respect, his eye was a defective one, and it was to 
assist his vision that these glasses were made.

�eMR. BLANK exhibited a model of a fashionable annual, composed of copper-plates, 
gold leaf, and silk boards, and worked entirely by milk and water.

�eMR. PROSEE, after examining the machine, declared it to be so ingeniously 
composed, that he was wholly unable to discover how it went on at all.

�eMR. BLANK.?Nobody can, and that is the beauty of it.



�eSECTION C.?ANATOMY AND MEDICINE.
BAR ROOM, BLACK BOY AND STOMACH-ACHE.



President?Dr. Soemup.  Vice-Presidents?Messrs. Pessell and Mortair.

�eDR. GRUMMIDGE stated to the section a most interesting case of monomania, and 
described the course of treatment he had pursued with perfect success.  The patient 
was a married lady in the middle rank of life, who, having seen another lady at an 
evening party in a full suit of pearls, was suddenly seized with a desire to possess a 
similar equipment, although her husband�fs finances were by no means equal to the 
necessary outlay.  Finding her wish ungratified, she fell sick, and the symptoms soon 
became so alarming, that he (Dr. Grummidge) was called in.  At this period the 
prominent tokens of the disorder were sullenness, a total indisposition to perform 
domestic duties, great peevishness, and extreme languor, except when pearls were 
mentioned, at which times the pulse quickened, the eyes grew brighter, the pupils 
dilated, and the patient, after various incoherent exclamations, burst into a passion of 
tears, and exclaimed that nobody cared for her, and that she wished herself dead.  
Finding that the patient�fs appetite was affected in the presence of company, he began by 
ordering a total abstinence from all stimulants, and forbidding any sustenance but 
weak gruel; he then took twenty ounces of blood, applied a blister under each ear, one 
upon the chest, and another on the back; having done which, and administered five 
grains of calomel, he left the patient to her repose.  The next day she was somewhat 
low, but decidedly better, and all appearances of irritation were removed.  The next day 
she improved still further, and on the next again.  On the fourth there was some 
appearance of a return of the old symptoms, which no sooner developed themselves, 
than he administered another dose of calomel, and left strict orders that, unless a 
decidedly favourable change occurred within two hours, the patient�fs head should be 
immediately shaved to the very last curl.  From that moment she began to mend, and, 
in less than four-and-twenty hours was perfectly restored.  She did not now betray the 
least emotion at the sight or mention of pearls or any other ornaments.  She was 
cheerful and good-humoured, and a most beneficial change had been effected in her 
whole temperament and condition.

�eMR. PIPKIN (M.R.C.S.) read a short but most interesting communication in which he 
sought to prove the complete belief of Sir William Courtenay, otherwise Thorn, recently 
shot at Canterbury, in the Homoeopathic system.  The section would bear in mind that 
one of the Homoeopathic doctrines was, that infinitesimal doses of any medicine which 
would occasion the disease under which the patient laboured, supposing him to be in a 
healthy state, would cure it.  Now, it was a remarkable circumstance?proved in the 
evidence?that the deceased Thorn employed a woman to follow him about all day with 
a pail of water, assuring her that one drop (a purely homoeopathic remedy, the section 
would observe), placed upon his tongue, after death, would restore him.  What was the 
obvious inference?  That Thorn, who was marching and countermarching in osier beds, 
and other swampy places, was impressed with a presentiment that he should be 
drowned; in which case, had his instructions been complied with, he could not fail to 
have been brought to life again instantly by his own prescription.  As it was, if this 
woman, or any other person, had administered an infinitesimal dose of lead and 
gunpowder immediately after he fell, he would have recovered forthwith.  But 
unhappily the woman concerned did not possess the power of reasoning by analogy, or 
carrying out a principle, and thus the unfortunate gentleman had been sacrificed to the 
ignorance of the peasantry.



�eSECTION D.?STATISTICS.
OUT-HOUSE, BLACK BOY AND STOMACH-ACHE.

President?Mr. Slug.  Vice-Presidents?Messrs. Noakes and Styles.

�eMR. KWAKLEY stated the result of some most ingenious statistical inquiries relative 
to the difference between the value of the qualification of several members of 
Parliament as published to the world, and its real nature and amount.  After 
reminding the section that every member of Parliament for a town or borough was 
supposed to possess a clear freehold estate of three hundred pounds per annum, the 
honourable gentleman excited great amusement and laughter by stating the exact 
amount of freehold property possessed by a column of legislators, in which he had 
included himself.  It appeared from this table, that the amount of such income 
possessed by each was 0 pounds, 0 shillings, and 0 pence, yielding an average of the 
same. (Great laughter.)  It was pretty well known that there were accommodating 
gentlemen in the habit of furnishing new members with temporary qualifications, to the 
ownership of which they swore solemnly?of course as a mere matter of form.  He 
argued from these data that it was wholly unnecessary for members of Parliament to 
possess any property at all, especially as when they had none the public could get them 
so much cheaper.



�eSUPPLEMENTARY SECTION, E.?UMBUGOLOGY AND DITCHWATERISICS.



President?Mr. Grub.  Vice Presidents?Messrs. Dull and Dummy.

�eA paper was read by the secretary descriptive of a bay pony with one eye, which had 
been seen by the author standing in a butcher�fs cart at the corner of Newgate Market.  
The communication described the author of the paper as having, in the prosecution of a 
mercantile pursuit, betaken himself one Saturday morning last summer from Somers 
Town to Cheapside; in the course of which expedition he had beheld the extraordinary 
appearance above described.  The pony had one distinct eye, and it had been pointed 
out to him by his friend Captain Blunderbore, of the Horse Marines, who assisted the 
author in his search, that whenever he winked this eye he whisked his tail (possibly to 
drive the flies off), but that he always winked and whisked at the same time.  The 
animal was lean, spavined, and tottering; and the author proposed to constitute it of the 
family of Fitfordogsmeataurious.  It certainly did occur to him that there was no case 
on record of a pony with one clearly-defined and distinct organ of vision, winking and 
whisking at the same moment.

�eMR. Q. J. SNUFFLETOFFLE had heard of a pony winking his eye, and likewise of a 
pony whisking his tail, but whether they were two ponies or the same pony he could not 
undertake positively to say.  At all events, he was acquainted with no authenticated 
instance of a simultaneous winking and whisking, and he really could not but doubt the 
existence of such a marvellous pony in opposition to all those natural laws by which 
ponies were governed.  Referring, however, to the mere question of his one organ of 
vision, might he suggest the possibility of this pony having been literally half asleep at 
the time he was seen, and having closed only one eye.

�eTHE PRESIDENT observed that, whether the pony was half asleep or fast asleep, 
there could be no doubt that the association was wide awake, and therefore that they 
had better get the business over, and go to dinner.  He had certainly never seen 
anything analogous to this pony, but he was not prepared to doubt its existence; for he 
had seen many queerer ponies in his time, though he did not pretend to have seen any 
more remarkable donkeys than the other gentlemen around him.

�ePROFESSOR JOHN KETCH was then called upon to exhibit the skull of the late Mr. 
Greenacre, which he produced from a blue bag, remarking, on being invited to make any 
observations that occurred to him, �gthat he�fd pound it as that �fere �fspectable section had 
never seed a more gamerer cove nor he vos.�h

�eA most animated discussion upon this interesting relic ensued; and, some difference 
of opinion arising respecting the real character of the deceased gentleman, Mr. Blubb 
delivered a lecture upon the cranium before him, clearly showing that Mr. Greenacre 
possessed the organ of destructiveness to a most unusual extent, with a most 
remarkable development of the organ of carveativeness.  Sir Hookham Snivey was 
proceeding to combat this opinion, when Professor Ketch suddenly interrupted the 
proceedings by exclaiming, with great excitement of manner, �gWalker!�h

�eTHE PRESIDENT begged to call the learned gentleman to order.

�ePROFESSOR KETCH.?�gOrder be blowed! you�fve got the wrong un, I tell you.  It 
ain�ft no �fed at all; it�fs a coker-nut as my brother-in-law has been a-carvin�f, to hornament 
his new baked tatur-stall wots a-comin�f down �fere vile the �fsociation�fs in the town.  
Hand over, vill you?�h

�eWith these words, Professor Ketch hastily repossessed himself of the cocoa-nut, and 
drew forth the skull, in mistake for which he had exhibited it.  A most interesting 
conversation ensued; but as there appeared some doubt ultimately whether the skull 
was Mr. Greenacre�fs, or a hospital patient�fs, or a pauper�fs, or a man�fs, or a woman�fs, or a 
monkey�fs, no particular result was obtained.�f



�eI cannot,�f says our talented correspondent in conclusion, �eI cannot close my account of 
these gigantic researches and sublime and noble triumphs without repeating a bon mot 
of Professor Woodensconce�fs, which shows how the greatest minds may occasionally 
unbend when truth can be presented to listening ears, clothed in an attractive and 
playful form.  I was standing by, when, after a week of feasting and feeding, that 
learned gentleman, accompanied by the whole body of wonderful men, entered the hall 
yesterday, where a sumptuous dinner was prepared; where the richest wines sparkled 
on the board, and fat bucks?propitiatory sacrifices to learning?sent forth their 
savoury odours.  �gAh!�h said Professor Woodensconce, rubbing his hands, �gthis is what 
we meet for; this is what inspires us; this is what keeps us together, and beckons us 
onward; this is the spread of science, and a glorious spread it is.�h�f





THE PANTOMIME OF LIFE




Before we plunge headlong into this paper, let us at once confess to a fondness for 
pantomimes?to a gentle sympathy with clowns and pantaloons?to an unqualified 
admiration of harlequins and columbines?to a chaste delight in every action of their 
brief existence, varied and many-coloured as those actions are, and inconsistent though 
they occasionally be with those rigid and formal rules of propriety which regulate the 
proceedings of meaner and less comprehensive minds.  We revel in pantomimes?not 
because they dazzle one�fs eyes with tinsel and gold leaf; not because they present to us, 
once again, the well-beloved chalked faces, and goggle eyes of our childhood; not even 
because, like Christmas-day, and Twelfth-night, and Shrove-Tuesday, and one�fs own 
birthday, they come to us but once a year;?our attachment is founded on a graver and a 
very different reason.  A pantomime is to us, a mirror of life; nay, more, we maintain 
that it is so to audiences generally, although they are not aware of it, and that this very 
circumstance is the secret cause of their amusement and delight.

Let us take a slight example.  The scene is a street: an elderly gentleman, with a large 
face and strongly marked features, appears.  His countenance beams with a sunny 
smile, and a perpetual dimple is on his broad, red cheek.  He is evidently an opulent 
elderly gentleman, comfortable in circumstances, and well-to-do in the world.  He is 
not unmindful of the adornment of his person, for he is richly, not to say gaudily, 
dressed; and that he indulges to a reasonable extent in the pleasures of the table may be 
inferred from the joyous and oily manner in which he rubs his stomach, by way of 
informing the audience that he is going home to dinner.  In the fulness of his heart, in 
the fancied security of wealth, in the possession and enjoyment of all the good things of 
life, the elderly gentleman suddenly loses his footing, and stumbles.  How the audience 
roar!  He is set upon by a noisy and officious crowd, who buffet and cuff him 
unmercifully.  They scream with delight!  Every time the elderly gentleman struggles 
to get up, his relentless persecutors knock him down again.  The spectators are 
convulsed with merriment!  And when at last the elderly gentleman does get up, and 
staggers away, despoiled of hat, wig, and clothing, himself battered to pieces, and his 
watch and money gone, they are exhausted with laughter, and express their merriment 
and admiration in rounds of applause.

Is this like life?  Change the scene to any real street;?to the Stock Exchange, or the 
City banker�fs; the merchant�fs counting-house, or even the tradesman�fs shop.  See any 
one of these men fall,?the more suddenly, and the nearer the zenith of his pride and 
riches, the better.  What a wild hallo is raised over his prostrate carcase by the 
shouting mob; how they whoop and yell as he lies humbled beneath them!  Mark how 
eagerly they set upon him when he is down; and how they mock and deride him as he 
slinks away.  Why, it is the pantomime to the very letter.

Of all the pantomimic dramatis personae, we consider the pantaloon the most worthless 
and debauched.  Independent of the dislike one naturally feels at seeing a gentleman of 
his years engaged in pursuits highly unbecoming his gravity and time of life, we cannot 
conceal from ourselves the fact that he is a treacherous, worldly-minded old villain, 
constantly enticing his younger companion, the clown, into acts of fraud or petty larceny, 
and generally standing aside to watch the result of the enterprise.  If it be successful, 
he never forgets to return for his share of the spoil; but if it turn out a failure, he 
generally retires with remarkable caution and expedition, and keeps carefully aloof 
until the affair has blown over.  His amorous propensities, too, are eminently 
disagreeable; and his mode of addressing ladies in the open street at noon-day is 
down-right improper, being usually neither more nor less than a perceptible tickling of 
the aforesaid ladies in the waist, after committing which, he starts back, manifestly 
ashamed (as well he may be) of his own indecorum and temerity; continuing, 
nevertheless, to ogle and beckon to them from a distance in a very unpleasant and 
immoral manner.

Is there any man who cannot count a dozen pantaloons in his own social circle?  Is 
there any man who has not seen them swarming at the west end of the town on a 
sunshiny day or a summer�fs evening, going through the last-named pantomimic feats 
with as much liquorish energy, and as total an absence of reserve, as if they were on the 
very stage itself?  We can tell upon our fingers a dozen pantaloons of our acquaintance 
at this moment?capital pantaloons, who have been performing all kinds of strange 
freaks, to the great amusement of their friends and acquaintance, for years past; and 
who to this day are making such comical and ineffectual attempts to be young and 
dissolute, that all beholders are like to die with laughter.

Take that old gentleman who has just emerged from the Caf? de l�fEurope in the 
Haymarket, where he has been dining at the expense of the young man upon town with 
whom he shakes hands as they part at the door of the tavern.  The affected warmth of 
that shake of the hand, the courteous nod, the obvious recollection of the dinner, the 
savoury flavour of which still hangs upon his lips, are all characteristics of his great 
prototype.  He hobbles away humming an opera tune, and twirling his cane to and fro, 
with affected carelessness.  Suddenly he stops?�ftis at the milliner�fs window.  He 
peeps through one of the large panes of glass; and, his view of the ladies within being 
obstructed by the India shawls, directs his attentions to the young girl with the 
band-box in her hand, who is gazing in at the window also.  See! he draws beside her.  
He coughs; she turns away from him.  He draws near her again; she disregards him.  
He gleefully chucks her under the chin, and, retreating a few steps, nods and beckons 
with fantastic grimaces, while the girl bestows a contemptuous and supercilious look 
upon his wrinkled visage.  She turns away with a flounce, and the old gentleman trots 
after her with a toothless chuckle. The pantaloon to the life!

 But the close resemblance which the clowns of the stage bear to those of every-day life 
is perfectly extraordinary.  Some people talk with a sigh of the decline of pantomime, 
and murmur in low and dismal tones the name of Grimaldi.  We mean no 
disparagement to the worthy and excellent old man when we say that this is downright 
nonsense.  Clowns that beat Grimaldi all to nothing turn up every day, and nobody 
patronizes them?more�fs the pity!

�eI know who you mean,�f says some dirty-faced patron of Mr. Osbaldistone�fs, laying 
down the Miscellany when he has got thus far, and bestowing upon vacancy a most 
knowing glance; �eyou mean C. J. Smith as did Guy Fawkes, and George Barnwell at the 
Garden.�f  The dirty-faced gentleman has hardly uttered the words, when he is 
interrupted by a young gentleman in no shirt-collar and a Petersham coat.  �eNo, no,�f 
says the young gentleman; �ehe means Brown, King, and Gibson, at the �eDelphi.�f  Now, 
with great deference both to the first-named gentleman with the dirty face, and the 
last-named gentleman in the non-existing shirt-collar, we do not mean either the 
performer who so grotesquely burlesqued the Popish conspirator, or the three 
unchangeables who have been dancing the same dance under different imposing titles, 
and doing the same thing under various high-sounding names for some five or six years 
last past.  We have no sooner made this avowal, than the public, who have hitherto 
been silent witnesses of the dispute, inquire what on earth it is we do mean; and, with 
becoming respect, we proceed to tell them.

It is very well known to all playgoers and pantomime-seers, that the scenes in which a 
theatrical clown is at the very height of his glory are those which are described in the 
play-bills as �eCheesemonger�fs shop and Crockery warehouse,�f or �eTailor�fs shop, and Mrs. 
Queertable�fs boarding-house,�f or places bearing some such title, where the great fun of 
the thing consists in the hero�fs taking lodgings which he has not the slightest intention 
of paying for, or obtaining goods under false pretences, or abstracting the stock-in-trade 
of the respectable shopkeeper next door, or robbing warehouse porters as they pass 
under his window, or, to shorten the catalogue, in his swindling everybody he possibly 
can, it only remaining to be observed that, the more extensive the swindling is, and the 
more barefaced the impudence of the swindler, the greater the rapture and ecstasy of 
the audience.  Now it is a most remarkable fact that precisely this sort of thing occurs 
in real life day after day, and nobody sees the humour of it.  Let us illustrate our 
position by detailing the plot of this portion of the pantomime?not of the theatre, but of 
life.

The Honourable Captain Fitz-Whisker Fiercy, attended by his livery servant Do�fem?a 
most respectable servant to look at, who has grown grey in the service of the captain�fs 
family?views, treats for, and ultimately obtains possession of, the unfurnished house, 
such a number, such a street.  All the tradesmen in the neighbourhood are in agonies of 
competition for the captain�fs custom; the captain is a good-natured, kind-hearted, easy 
man, and, to avoid being the cause of disappointment to any, he most handsomely gives 
orders to all.  Hampers of wine, baskets of provisions, cart-loads of furniture, boxes of 
jewellery, supplies of luxuries of the costliest description, flock to the house of the 
Honourable Captain Fitz-Whisker Fiercy, where they are received with the utmost 
readiness by the highly respectable Do�fem; while the captain himself struts and 
swaggers about with that compound air of conscious superiority and general 
blood-thirstiness which a military captain should always, and does most times, wear, to 
the admiration and terror of plebeian men.  But the tradesmen�fs backs are no sooner 
turned, than the captain, with all the eccentricity of a mighty mind, and assisted by the 
faithful Do�fem, whose devoted fidelity is not the least touching part of his character, 
disposes of everything to great advantage; for, although the articles fetch small sums, 
still they are sold considerably above cost price, the cost to the captain having been 
nothing at all.  After various manoeuvres, the imposture is discovered, Fitz-Fiercy and 
Do�fem are recognized as confederates, and the police office to which they are both taken 
is thronged with their dupes.

Who can fail to recognize in this, the exact counterpart of the best portion of a theatrical 
pantomime?Fitz-Whisker Fiercy by the clown; Do�fem by the pantaloon; and 
supernumeraries by the tradesmen?  The best of the joke, too, is, that the very 
coal-merchant who is loudest in his complaints against the person who defrauded him, 
is the identical man who sat in the centre of the very front row of the pit last night and 
laughed the most boisterously at this very same thing,?and not so well done either.  
Talk of Grimaldi, we say again!  Did Grimaldi, in his best days, ever do anything in 
this way equal to Da Costa?

The mention of this latter justly celebrated clown reminds us of his last piece of humour, 
the fraudulently obtaining certain stamped acceptances from a young gentleman in the 
army.  We had scarcely laid down our pen to contemplate for a few moments this 
admirable actor�fs performance of that exquisite practical joke, than a new branch of our 
subject flashed suddenly upon us.  So we take it up again at once.

All people who have been behind the scenes, and most people who have been before 
them, know, that in the representation of a pantomime, a good many men are sent upon 
the stage for the express purpose of being cheated, or knocked down, or both.  Now, 
down to a moment ago, we had never been able to understand for what possible purpose 
a great number of odd, lazy, large-headed men, whom one is in the habit of meeting here, 
and there, and everywhere, could ever have been created.  We see it all, now.  They 
are the supernumeraries in the pantomime of life; the men who have been thrust into it, 
with no other view than to be constantly tumbling over each other, and running their 
heads against all sorts of strange things.  We sat opposite to one of these men at a 
supper-table, only last week.  Now we think of it, he was exactly like the gentlemen 
with the pasteboard heads and faces, who do the corresponding business in the 
theatrical pantomimes; there was the same broad stolid simper?the same dull leaden 
eye?the same unmeaning, vacant stare; and whatever was said, or whatever was done, 
he always came in at precisely the wrong place, or jostled against something that he had 
not the slightest business with.  We looked at the man across the table again and 
again; and could not satisfy ourselves what race of beings to class him with.  How very 
odd that this never occurred to us before!

We will frankly own that we have been much troubled with the harlequin.  We see 
harlequins of so many kinds in the real living pantomime, that we hardly know which to 
select as the proper fellow of him of the theatres.  At one time we were disposed to 
think that the harlequin was neither more nor less than a young man of family and 
independent property, who had run away with an opera-dancer, and was fooling his life 
and his means away in light and trivial amusements.  On reflection, however, we 
remembered that harlequins are occasionally guilty of witty, and even clever acts, and 
we are rather disposed to acquit our young men of family and independent property, 
generally speaking, of any such misdemeanours.  On a more mature consideration of 
the subject, we have arrived at the conclusion that the harlequins of life are just 
ordinary men, to be found in no particular walk or degree, on whom a certain station, or 
particular conjunction of circumstances, confers the magic wand.  And this brings us to 
a few words on the pantomime of public and political life, which we shall say at once, 
and then conclude?merely premising in this place that we decline any reference 
whatever to the columbine, being in no wise satisfied of the nature of her connection 
with her parti-coloured lover, and not feeling by any means clear that we should be 
justified in introducing her to the virtuous and respectable ladies who peruse our 
lucubrations.

We take it that the commencement of a Session of Parliament is neither more nor less 
than the drawing up of the curtain for a grand comic pantomime, and that his Majesty�fs 
most gracious speech on the opening thereof may be not inaptly compared to the clown�f
s opening speech of �eHere we are!�f  �eMy lords and gentlemen, here we are!�f appears, to 
our mind at least, to be a very good abstract of the point and meaning of the propitiatory 
address of the ministry.  When we remember how frequently this speech is made, 
immediately after the change too, the parallel is quite perfect, and still more singular.

Perhaps the cast of our political pantomime never was richer than at this day.  We are 
particularly strong in clowns.  At no former time, we should say, have we had such 
astonishing tumblers, or performers so ready to go through the whole of their feats for 
the amusement of an admiring throng.  Their extreme readiness to exhibit, indeed, has 
given rise to some ill-natured reflections; it having been objected that by exhibiting 
gratuitously through the country when the theatre is closed, they reduce themselves to 
the level of mountebanks, and thereby tend to degrade the respectability of the 
profession.  Certainly Grimaldi never did this sort of thing; and though Brown, King, 
and Gibson have gone to the Surrey in vacation time, and Mr. C. J. Smith has ruralised 
at Sadler�fs Wells, we find no theatrical precedent for a general tumbling through the 
country, except in the gentleman, name unknown, who threw summersets on behalf of 
the late Mr. Richardson, and who is no authority either, because he had never been on 
the regular boards.

But, laying aside this question, which after all is a mere matter of taste, we may reflect 
with pride and gratification of heart on the proficiency of our clowns as exhibited in the 
season.  Night after night will they twist and tumble about, till two, three, and four 
o�fclock in the morning; playing the strangest antics, and giving each other the funniest 
slaps on the face that can possibly be imagined, without evincing the smallest tokens of 
fatigue.  The strange noises, the confusion, the shouting and roaring, amid which all 
this is done, too, would put to shame the most turbulent sixpenny gallery that ever 
yelled through a boxing-night.

It is especially curious to behold one of these clowns compelled to go through the most 
surprising contortions by the irresistible influence of the wand of office, which his leader 
or harlequin holds above his head.  Acted upon by this wonderful charm he will become 
perfectly motionless, moving neither hand, foot, nor finger, and will even lose the faculty 
of speech at an instant�fs notice; or on the other hand, he will become all life and 
animation if required, pouring forth a torrent of words without sense or meaning, 
throwing himself into the wildest and most fantastic contortions, and even grovelling on 
the earth and licking up the dust.  These exhibitions are more curious than pleasing; 
indeed, they are rather disgusting than otherwise, except to the admirers of such things, 
with whom we confess we have no fellow-feeling.

Strange tricks?very strange tricks?are also performed by the harlequin who holds for 
the time being the magic wand which we have just mentioned.  The mere waving it 
before a man�fs eyes will dispossess his brains of all the notions previously stored there, 
and fill it with an entirely new set of ideas; one gentle tap on the back will alter the 
colour of a man�fs coat completely; and there are some expert performers, who, having 
this wand held first on one side and then on the other, will change from side to side, 
turning their coats at every evolution, with so much rapidity and dexterity, that the 
quickest eye can scarcely detect their motions.  Occasionally, the genius who confers 
the wand, wrests it from the hand of the temporary possessor, and consigns it to some 
new performer; on which occasions all the characters change sides, and then the race 
and the hard knocks begin anew.

We might have extended this chapter to a much greater length?we might have carried 
the comparison into the liberal professions?we might have shown, as was in fact our 
original purpose, that each is in itself a little pantomime with scenes and characters of 
its own, complete; but, as we fear we have been quite lengthy enough already, we shall 
leave this chapter just where it is.  A gentleman, not altogether unknown as a dramatic 
poet, wrote thus a year or two ago -



�eAll the world�fs a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:�f



and we, tracking out his footsteps at the scarcely-worth-mentioning little distance of a 
few millions of leagues behind, venture to add, by way of new reading, that he meant a 
Pantomime, and that we are all actors in The Pantomime of Life.




SOME PARTICULARS CONCERNING A LION



We have a great respect for lions in the abstract.  In common with most other people, 
we have heard and read of many instances of their bravery and generosity.  We have 
duly admired that heroic self-denial and charming philanthropy which prompts them 
never to eat people except when they are hungry, and we have been deeply impressed 
with a becoming sense of the politeness they are said to display towards unmarried 
ladies of a certain state.  All natural histories teem with anecdotes illustrative of their 
excellent qualities; and one old spelling-book in particular recounts a touching instance 
of an old lion, of high moral dignity and stern principle, who felt it his imperative duty 
to devour a young man who had contracted a habit of swearing, as a striking example to 
the rising generation.

All this is extremely pleasant to reflect upon, and, indeed, says a very great deal in 
favour of lions as a mass.  We are bound to state, however, that such individual lions as 
we have happened to fall in with have not put forth any very striking characteristics, 
and have not acted up to the chivalrous character assigned them by their chroniclers.  
We never saw a lion in what is called his natural state, certainly; that is to say, we have 
never met a lion out walking in a forest, or crouching in his lair under a tropical sun, 
waiting till his dinner should happen to come by, hot from the baker�fs.  But we have 
seen some under the influence of captivity, and the pressure of misfortune; and we must 
say that they appeared to us very apathetic, heavy-headed fellows.

The lion at the Zoological Gardens, for instance.  He is all very well; he has an 
undeniable mane, and looks very fierce; but, Lord bless us! what of that?  The lions of 
the fashionable world look just as ferocious, and are the most harmless creatures 
breathing.  A box-lobby lion or a Regent-street animal will put on a most terrible aspect, 
and roar, fearfully, if you affront him; but he will never bite, and, if you offer to attack 
him manfully, will fairly turn tail and sneak off.  Doubtless these creatures roam about 
sometimes in herds, and, if they meet any especially meek-looking and 
peaceably-disposed fellow, will endeavour to frighten him; but the faintest show of a 
vigorous resistance is sufficient to scare them even then.  These are pleasant 
characteristics, whereas we make it matter of distinct charge against the Zoological lion 
and his brethren at the fairs, that they are sleepy, dreamy, sluggish quadrupeds.

We do not remember to have ever seen one of them perfectly awake, except at 
feeding-time.  In every respect we uphold the biped lions against their four-footed 
namesakes, and we boldly challenge controversy upon the subject.

With these opinions it may be easily imagined that our curiosity and interest were very 
much excited the other day, when a lady of our acquaintance called on us and resolutely 
declined to accept our refusal of her invitation to an evening party; �efor,�f said she, �eI have 
got a lion coming.�f  We at once retracted our plea of a prior engagement, and became as 
anxious to go, as we had previously been to stay away.

We went early, and posted ourselves in an eligible part of the drawing-room, from 
whence we could hope to obtain a full view of the interesting animal.  Two or three 
hours passed, the quadrilles began, the room filled; but no lion appeared.  The lady of 
the house became inconsolable,?for it is one of the peculiar privileges of these lions to 
make solemn appointments and never keep them,?when all of a sudden there came a 
tremendous double rap at the street-door, and the master of the house, after gliding out 
(unobserved as he flattered himself) to peep over the banisters, came into the room, 
rubbing his hands together with great glee, and cried out in a very important voice, �eMy 
dear, Mr.?(naming the lion) has this moment arrived.�f

Upon this, all eyes were turned towards the door, and we observed several young ladies, 
who had been laughing and conversing previously with great gaiety and good humour, 
grow extremely quiet and sentimental; while some young gentlemen, who had been 
cutting great figures in the facetious and small-talk way, suddenly sank very obviously 
in the estimation of the company, and were looked upon with great coldness and 
indifference.  Even the young man who had been ordered from the music shop to play 
the pianoforte was visibly affected, and struck several false notes in the excess of his 
excitement.

All this time there was a great talking outside, more than once accompanied by a loud 
laugh, and a cry of �eOh! capital! excellent!�f from which we inferred that the lion was 
jocose, and that these exclamations were occasioned by the transports of his keeper and 
our host.  Nor were we deceived; for when the lion at last appeared, we overheard his 
keeper, who was a little prim man, whisper to several gentlemen of his acquaintance, 
with uplifted hands, and every expression of half-suppressed admiration, 
that?(naming the lion again) was in such cue to-night!

The lion was a literary one.  Of course, there were a vast number of people present who 
had admired his roarings, and were anxious to be introduced to him; and very pleasant 
it was to see them brought up for the purpose, and to observe the patient dignity with 
which he received all their patting and caressing.  This brought forcibly to our mind 
what we had so often witnessed at country fairs, where the other lions are compelled to 
go through as many forms of courtesy as they chance to be acquainted with, just as often 
as admiring parties happen to drop in upon them.

While the lion was exhibiting in this way, his keeper was not idle, for he mingled among 
the crowd, and spread his praises most industriously.  To one gentleman he whispered 
some very choice thing that the noble animal had said in the very act of coming 
up-stairs, which, of course, rendered the mental effort still more astonishing; to another 
he murmured a hasty account of a grand dinner that had taken place the day before, 
where twenty-seven gentlemen had got up all at once to demand an extra cheer for the 
lion; and to the ladies he made sundry promises of interceding to procure the majestic 
brute�fs sign-manual for their albums.  Then, there were little private consultations in 
different corners, relative to the personal appearance and stature of the lion; whether 
he was shorter than they had expected to see him, or taller, or thinner, or fatter, or 
younger, or older; whether he was like his portrait, or unlike it; and whether the 
particular shade of his eyes was black, or blue, or hazel, or green, or yellow, or mixture.  
At all these consultations the keeper assisted; and, in short, the lion was the sole and 
single subject of discussion till they sat him down to whist, and then the people relapsed 
into their old topics of conversation?themselves and each other.

We must confess that we looked forward with no slight impatience to the announcement 
of supper; for if you wish to see a tame lion under particularly favourable circumstances, 
feeding-time is the period of all others to pitch upon.  We were therefore very much 
delighted to observe a sensation among the guests, which we well knew how to interpret, 
and immediately afterwards to behold the lion escorting the lady of the house 
down-stairs.  We offered our arm to an elderly female of our acquaintance, who?dear 
old soul!?is the very best person that ever lived, to lead down to any meal; for, be the 
room ever so small, or the party ever so large, she is sure, by some intuitive perception 
of the eligible, to push and pull herself and conductor close to the best dishes on the 
table;?we say we offered our arm to this elderly female, and, descending the stairs 
shortly after the lion, were fortunate enough to obtain a seat nearly opposite him.

Of course the keeper was there already.  He had planted himself at precisely that 
distance from his charge which afforded him a decent pretext for raising his voice, when 
he addressed him, to so loud a key, as could not fail to attract the attention of the whole 
company, and immediately began to apply himself seriously to the task of bringing the 
lion out, and putting him through the whole of his manoeuvres.  Such flashes of wit as 
he elicited from the lion!  First of all, they began to make puns upon a salt-cellar, and 
then upon the breast of a fowl, and then upon the trifle; but the best jokes of all were 
decidedly on the lobster salad, upon which latter subject the lion came out most 
vigorously, and, in the opinion of the most competent authorities, quite outshone 
himself.  This is a very excellent mode of shining in society, and is founded, we humbly 
conceive, upon the classic model of the dialogues between Mr. Punch and his friend the 
proprietor, wherein the latter takes all the up-hill work, and is content to pioneer to the 
jokes and repartees of Mr. P. himself, who never fails to gain great credit and excite 
much laughter thereby.  Whatever it be founded on, however, we recommend it to all 
lions, present and to come; for in this instance it succeeded to admiration, and perfectly 
dazzled the whole body of hearers.

When the salt-cellar, and the fowl�fs breast, and the trifle, and the lobster salad were all 
exhausted, and could not afford standing-room for another solitary witticism, the 
keeper performed that very dangerous feat which is still done with some of the caravan 
lions, although in one instance it terminated fatally, of putting his head in the animal�fs 
mouth, and placing himself entirely at its mercy.  Boswell frequently presents a 
melancholy instance of the lamentable results of this achievement, and other keepers 
and jackals have been terribly lacerated for their daring.  It is due to our lion to state, 
that he condescended to be trifled with, in the most gentle manner, and finally went 
home with the showman in a hack cab: perfectly peaceable, but slightly fuddled.

Being in a contemplative mood, we were led to make some reflections upon the 
character and conduct of this genus of lions as we walked homewards, and we were not 
long in arriving at the conclusion that our former impression in their favour was very 
much strengthened and confirmed by what we had recently seen.  While the other lions 
receive company and compliments in a sullen, moody, not to say snarling manner, these 
appear flattered by the attentions that are paid them; while those conceal themselves to 
the utmost of their power from the vulgar gaze, these court the popular eye, and, unlike 
their brethren, whom nothing short of compulsion will move to exertion, are ever ready 
to display their acquirements to the wondering throng.  We have known bears of 
undoubted ability who, when the expectations of a large audience have been wound up 
to the utmost pitch, have peremptorily refused to dance; well-taught monkeys, who 
have unaccountably objected to exhibit on the slack wire; and elephants of unquestioned 
genius, who have suddenly declined to turn the barrel-organ; but we never once knew or 
heard of a biped lion, literary or otherwise,?and we state it as a fact which is highly 
creditable to the whole species,?who, occasion offering, did not seize with avidity on 
any opportunity which was afforded him, of performing to his heart�fs content on the 
first violin.




MR. ROBERT BOLTON: THE �eGENTLEMAN CONNECTED WITH THE PRESS�f



In the parlour of the Green Dragon, a public-house in the immediate neighbourhood of 
Westminster Bridge, everybody talks politics, every evening, the great political 
authority being Mr. Robert Bolton, an individual who defines himself as �ea gentleman 
connected with the press,�f which is a definition of peculiar indefiniteness.  Mr. Robert 
Bolton�fs regular circle of admirers and listeners are an undertaker, a greengrocer, a 
hairdresser, a baker, a large stomach surmounted by a man�fs head, and placed on the 
top of two particularly short legs, and a thin man in black, name, profession, and 
pursuit unknown, who always sits in the same position, always displays the same long, 
vacant face, and never opens his lips, surrounded as he is by most enthusiastic 
conversation, except to puff forth a volume of tobacco smoke, or give vent to a very 
snappy, loud, and shrill hem!  The conversation sometimes turns upon literature, Mr. 
Bolton being a literary character, and always upon such news of the day as is 
exclusively possessed by that talented individual.  I found myself (of course, 
accidentally) in the Green Dragon the other evening, and, being somewhat amused by 
the following conversation, preserved it.

�eCan you lend me a ten-pound note till Christmas?�f inquired the hairdresser of the 
stomach.

�eWhere�fs your security, Mr. Clip?�f

�eMy stock in trade,?there�fs enough of it, I�fm thinking, Mr. Thicknesse.  Some fifty 
wigs, two poles, half-a-dozen head blocks, and a dead Bruin.�f

�eNo, I won�ft, then,�f growled out Thicknesse.  �eI lends nothing on the security of the 
whigs or the Poles either.  As for whigs, they�fre cheats; as for the Poles, they�fve got no 
cash.  I never have nothing to do with blockheads, unless I can�ft awoid it (ironically), 
and a dead bear�fs about as much use to me as I could be to a dead bear.�f

�eWell, then,�f urged the other, �ethere�fs a book as belonged to Pope, Byron�fs Poems, 
valued at forty pounds, because it�fs got Pope�fs identical scratch on the back; what do you 
think of that for security?�f

�eWell, to be sure!�f cried the baker.  �eBut how d�fye mean, Mr. Clip?�f

�eMean! why, that it�fs got the hottergruff of Pope.



�gSteal not this book, for fear of hangman�fs rope;
For it belongs to Alexander Pope.�h



All that�fs written on the inside of the binding of the book; so, as my son says, we�fre 
bound to believe it.�f

�eWell, sir,�f observed the undertaker, deferentially, and in a half-whisper, leaning over 
the table, and knocking over the hairdresser�fs grog as he spoke, �ethat argument�fs very 
easy upset.�f

�ePerhaps, sir,�f said Clip, a little flurried, �eyou�fll pay for the first upset afore you thinks 
of another.�f

�eNow,�f said the undertaker, bowing amicably to the hairdresser, �eI think, I says I 
think?you�fll excuse me, Mr. Clip, I think, you see, that won�ft go down with the present 
company?unfortunately, my master had the honour of making the coffin of that ere 
Lord�fs housemaid, not no more nor twenty year ago.  Don�ft think I�fm proud on it, 
gentlemen; others might be; but I hate rank of any sort.  I�fve no more respect for a 
Lord�fs footman than I have for any respectable tradesman in this room.  I may say no 
more nor I have for Mr. Clip! (bowing).  Therefore, that ere Lord must have been born 
long after Pope died.  And it�fs a logical interference to defer, that they neither of them 
lived at the same time.  So what I mean is this here, that Pope never had no book, 
never seed, felt, never smelt no book (triumphantly) as belonged to that ere Lord.  And, 
gentlemen, when I consider how patiently you have �feared the ideas what I have 
expressed, I feel bound, as the best way to reward you for the kindness you have 
exhibited, to sit down without saying anything more?partickler as I perceive a 
worthier visitor nor myself is just entered.  I am not in the habit of paying compliments, 
gentlemen; when I do, therefore, I hope I strikes with double force.�f

�eAh, Mr. Murgatroyd! what�fs all this about striking with double force?�f said the object 
of the above remark, as he entered.  �eI never excuse a man�fs getting into a rage during 
winter, even when he�fs seated so close to the fire as you are.  It is very injudicious to 
put yourself into such a perspiration.  What is the cause of this extreme physical and 
mental excitement, sir?�f

Such was the very philosophical address of Mr. Robert Bolton, a shorthand-writer, as he 
termed himself?a bit of equivoque passing current among his fraternity, which must 
give the uninitiated a vast idea of the establishment of the ministerial organ, while to 
the initiated it signifies that no one paper can lay claim to the enjoyment of their 
services.  Mr. Bolton was a young man, with a somewhat sickly and very dissipated 
expression of countenance.  His habiliments were composed of an exquisite union of 
gentility, slovenliness, assumption, simplicity, newness, and old age.  Half of him was 
dressed for the winter, the other half for the summer.  His hat was of the newest cut, 
the D�fOrsay; his trousers had been white, but the inroads of mud and ink, etc., had 
given them a pie-bald appearance; round his throat he wore a very high black cravat, of 
the most tyrannical stiffness; while his tout ensemble was hidden beneath the 
enormous folds of an old brown poodle-collared great-coat, which was closely buttoned 
up to the aforesaid cravat.  His fingers peeped through the ends of his black kid gloves, 
and two of the toes of each foot took a similar view of society through the extremities of 
his high-lows.  Sacred to the bare walls of his garret be the mysteries of his interior 
dress!  He was a short, spare man, of a somewhat inferior deportment.  Everybody 
seemed influenced by his entry into the room, and his salutation of each member 
partook of the patronizing.  The hairdresser made way for him between himself and 
the stomach.  A minute afterwards he had taken possession of his pint and pipe.  A 
pause in the conversation took place.  Everybody was waiting, anxious for his first 
observation.

�eHorrid murder in Westminster this morning,�f observed Mr. Bolton.

Everybody changed their positions.  All eyes were fixed upon the man of paragraphs.

�eA baker murdered his son by boiling him in a copper,�f said Mr. Bolton.

�eGood heavens!�f exclaimed everybody, in simultaneous horror.

�eBoiled him, gentlemen!�f added Mr. Bolton, with the most effective emphasis; �eboiled 
him!�f

�eAnd the particulars, Mr. B.,�f inquired the hairdresser, �ethe particulars?�f

Mr. Bolton took a very long draught of porter, and some two or three dozen whiffs of 
tobacco, doubtless to instil into the commercial capacities of the company the 
superiority of a gentlemen connected with the press, and then said -

�eThe man was a baker, gentlemen.�f  (Every one looked at the baker present, who 
stared at Bolton.)  �eHis victim, being his son, also was necessarily the son of a baker.  
The wretched murderer had a wife, whom he was frequently in the habit, while in an 
intoxicated state, of kicking, pummelling, flinging mugs at, knocking down, and 
half-killing while in bed, by inserting in her mouth a considerable portion of a sheet or 
blanket.�f

The speaker took another draught, everybody looked at everybody else, and exclaimed, 
�eHorrid!�f

�eIt appears in evidence, gentlemen,�f continued Mr. Bolton, �ethat, on the evening of 
yesterday, Sawyer the baker came home in a reprehensible state of beer.  Mrs. S., 
connubially considerate, carried him in that condition up-stairs into his chamber, and 
consigned him to their mutual couch.  In a minute or two she lay sleeping beside the 
man whom the morrow�fs dawn beheld a murderer!�f  (Entire silence informed the 
reporter that his picture had attained the awful effect he desired.)  �eThe son came home 
about an hour afterwards, opened the door, and went up to bed.  Scarcely (gentlemen, 
conceive his feelings of alarm), scarcely had he taken off his indescribables, when 
shrieks (to his experienced ear maternal shrieks) scared the silence of surrounding 
night.  He put his indescribables on again, and ran down-stairs.  He opened the door 
of the parental bed-chamber.  His father was dancing upon his mother.  What must 
have been his feelings!  In the agony of the minute he rushed at his male parent as he 
was about to plunge a knife into the side of his female.  The mother shrieked.  The 
father caught the son (who had wrested the knife from the paternal grasp) up in his 
arms, carried him down-stairs, shoved him into a copper of boiling water among some 
linen, closed the lid, and jumped upon the top of it, in which position he was found with 
a ferocious countenance by the mother, who arrived in the melancholy wash-house just 
as he had so settled himself.

�e�gWhere�fs my boy?�h shrieked the mother.

�e�gIn that copper, boiling,�h coolly replied the benign father.

�eStruck by the awful intelligence, the mother rushed from the house, and alarmed the 
neighbourhood.  The police entered a minute afterwards.  The father, having bolted 
the wash-house door, had bolted himself.  They dragged the lifeless body of the boiled 
baker from the cauldron, and, with a promptitude commendable in men of their station, 
they immediately carried it to the station-house.  Subsequently, the baker was 
apprehended while seated on the top of a lamp-post in Parliament Street, lighting his 
pipe.�f

The whole horrible ideality of the Mysteries of Udolpho, condensed into the pithy effect 
of a ten-line paragraph, could not possibly have so affected the narrator�fs auditory.  
Silence, the purest and most noble of all kinds of applause, bore ample testimony to the 
barbarity of the baker, as well as to Bolton�fs knack of narration; and it was only broken 
after some minutes had elapsed by interjectional expressions of the intense indignation 
of every man present.  The baker wondered how a British baker could so disgrace 
himself and the highly honourable calling to which he belonged; and the others indulged 
in a variety of wonderments connected with the subject; among which not the least 
wonderment was that which was awakened by the genius and information of Mr. Robert 
Bolton, who, after a glowing eulogium on himself, and his unspeakable influence with 
the daily press, was proceeding, with a most solemn countenance, to hear the pros and 
cons of the Pope autograph question, when I took up my hat, and left.




FAMILIAR EPISTLE FROM A PARENT TO A CHILD AGED TWO YEARS AND TWO 
MONTHS



MY CHILD,

To recount with what trouble I have brought you up?with what an anxious eye I have 
regarded your progress,?how late and how often I have sat up at night working for 
you,?and how many thousand letters I have received from, and written to your various 
relations and friends, many of whom have been of a querulous and irritable turn,?to 
dwell on the anxiety and tenderness with which I have (as far as I possessed the power) 
inspected and chosen your food; rejecting the indigestible and heavy matter which some 
injudicious but well-meaning old ladies would have had you swallow, and retaining only 
those light and pleasant articles which I deemed calculated to keep you free from all 
gross humours, and to render you an agreeable child, and one who might be popular 
with society in general,?to dilate on the steadiness with which I have prevented your 
annoying any company by talking politics?always assuring you that you would thank 
me for it yourself some day when you grew older,?to expatiate, in short, upon my own 
assiduity as a parent, is beside my present purpose, though I cannot but contemplate 
your fair appearance?your robust health, and unimpeded circulation (which I take to 
be the great secret of your good looks) without the liveliest satisfaction and delight.

It is a trite observation, and one which, young as you are, I have no doubt you have often 
heard repeated, that we have fallen upon strange times, and live in days of constant 
shiftings and changes.  I had a melancholy instance of this only a week or two since.  I 
was returning from Manchester to London by the Mail Train, when I suddenly fell into 
another train?a mixed train?of reflection, occasioned by the dejected and disconsolate 
demeanour of the Post-Office Guard.  We were stopping at some station where they 
take in water, when he dismounted slowly from the little box in which he sits in ghastly 
mockery of his old condition with pistol and blunderbuss beside him, ready to shoot the 
first highwayman (or railwayman) who shall attempt to stop the horses, which now 
travel (when they travel at all) inside and in a portable stable invented for the 
purpose,?he dismounted, I say, slowly and sadly, from his post, and looking mournfully 
about him as if in dismal recollection of the old roadside public-house the blazing 
fire?the glass of foaming ale?the buxom handmaid and admiring hangers-on of 
tap-room and stable, all honoured by his notice; and, retiring a little apart, stood 
leaning against a signal-post, surveying the engine with a look of combined affliction 
and disgust which no words can describe.  His scarlet coat and golden lace were 
tarnished with ignoble smoke; flakes of soot had fallen on his bright green shawl?his 
pride in days of yore?the steam condensed in the tunnel from which we had just 
emerged, shone upon his hat like rain.  His eye betokened that he was thinking of the 
coachman; and as it wandered to his own seat and his own fast-fading garb, it was plain 
to see that he felt his office and himself had alike no business there, and were nothing 
but an elaborate practical joke.

As we whirled away, I was led insensibly into an anticipation of those days to come, 
when mail-coach guards shall no longer be judges of horse-flesh?when a mail-coach 
guard shall never even have seen a horse?when stations shall have superseded stables, 
and corn shall have given place to coke.  �eIn those dawning times,�f thought I, 
�eexhibition-rooms shall teem with portraits of Her Majesty�fs favourite engine, with 
boilers after Nature by future Landseers.  Some Amburgh, yet unborn, shall break wild 
horses by his magic power; and in the dress of a mail-coach guard exhibit his TRAINED 
ANIMALS in a mock mail-coach.  Then, shall wondering crowds observe how that, 
with the exception of his whip, it is all his eye; and crowned heads shall see them fed on 
oats, and stand alone unmoved and undismayed, while counters flee affrighted when 
the coursers neigh!�f

Such, my child, were the reflections from which I was only awakened then, as I am now, 
by the necessity of attending to matters of present though minor importance.  I offer no 
apology to you for the digression, for it brings me very naturally to the subject of change, 
which is the very subject of which I desire to treat.

In fact, my child, you have changed hands.  Henceforth I resign you to the 
guardianship and protection of one of my most intimate and valued friends, Mr. 
Ainsworth, with whom, and with you, my best wishes and warmest feelings will ever 
remain.  I reap no gain or profit by parting from you, nor will any conveyance of your 
property be required, for, in this respect, you have always been literally �eBentley�fs�f 
Miscellany, and never mine.

Unlike the driver of the old Manchester mail, I regard this altered state of things with 
feelings of unmingled pleasure and satisfaction.

Unlike the guard of the new Manchester mail, your guard is at home in his new place, 
and has roystering highwaymen and gallant desperadoes ever within call.  And if I 
might compare you, my child, to an engine; (not a Tory engine, nor a Whig engine, but a 
brisk and rapid locomotive;) your friends and patrons to passengers; and he who now 
stands towards you in loco parentis as the skilful engineer and supervisor of the whole, I 
would humbly crave leave to postpone the departure of the train on its new and 
auspicious course for one brief instant, while, with hat in hand, I approach side by side 
with the friend who travelled with me on the old road, and presume to solicit favour and 
kindness in behalf of him and his new charge, both for their sakes and that of the old 
coachman,

Boz.

THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

The Lamplighter

Charles Dickens

"I f you talk of Murphy and Francis Moore, gentlemen,�f said the lamplighter who was in the chair, �eI 
mean to say that neither of �eem ever had any more to do with the stars than Tom Grig had.�f

�eAnd what had HE to do with �eem?�f asked the lamplighter who officiated as vice.

�eNothing at all,�f replied the other; �ejust exactly nothing at all.�f

�eDo you mean to say you don�ft believe in Murphy, then?�f demanded the lamplighter who had opened 
the discussion.

�eI mean to say I believe in Tom Grig,�f replied the chairman. �eWhether I believe in Murphy, or not, is 
a matter between me and my conscience; and whether Murphy believes in himself, or not, is a matter 
between him and his conscience. Gentlemen, I drink your healths.�f

The lamplighter who did the company this honour, was seated in the chimney-corner of a certain 
tavern, which has been, time out of mind, the Lamplighters�f House of Call. He sat in the midst of a 
circle of lamplighters, and was the cacique, or chief of the tribe.

If any of our readers have had the good fortune to behold a lamplighter�fs funeral, they will not be 
surprised to learn that lamplighters are a strange and primitive people; that they rigidly adhere to old 
ceremonies and customs which have been handed down among them from father to son since the 
first public lamp was lighted out of doors; that they intermarry, and betroth their children in infancy; 
that they enter into no plots or conspiracies (for who ever heard of a traitorous lamplighter?); that 
they commit no crimes against the laws of their country (there being no instance of a murderous or 
burglarious lamplighter); that they are, in short, notwithstanding their apparently volatile and restless 
character, a highly moral and reflective people: having among themselves as many traditional 
observances as the Jews, and being, as a body, if not as old as the hills, at least as old as the streets. It 
is an article of their creed that the first faint glimmering of true civilisation shone in the first 
street-light maintained at the public expense. They trace their existence and high position in the 
public esteem, in a direct line to the heathen mythology; and hold that the history of Prometheus 
himself is but a pleasant fable, whereof the true hero is a lamplighter.

�eGentlemen,�f said the lamplighter in the chair, �eI drink your healths.�f

�eAnd perhaps, Sir,�f said the vice, holding up his glass, and rising a little way off his seat and sitting 
down again, in token that he recognised and returned the compliment, �eperhaps you will add to that 
condescension by telling us who Tom Grig was, and how he came to be connected in your mind with 
Francis Moore, Physician.�f

�eHear, hear, hear!�f cried the lamplighters generally.

�eTom Grig, gentlemen,�f said the chairman, �ewas one of us; and it happened to him, as it don�ft often 
happen to a public character in our line, that he had his what-you-may-call-it cast.�f

�eHis head?�f said the vice.

�eNo,�f replied the chairman, �enot his head.�f

�eHis face, perhaps?�f said the vice. �eNo, not his face.�f �eHis legs?�f �eNo, not his legs.�f Nor yet his arms, 
nor his hands, nor his feet, nor his chest, all of which were severally suggested.

�eHis nativity, perhaps?�f

�eThat�fs it,�f said the chairman, awakening from his thoughtful attitude at the suggestion. �eHis nativity. 
That�fs what Tom had cast, gentlemen.�f

�eIn plaster?�f asked the vice.

�eI don�ft rightly know how it�fs done,�f returned the chairman. �eBut I suppose it was.�f

And there he stopped as if that were all he had to say; whereupon there arose a murmur among the 
company, which at length resolved itself into a request, conveyed through the vice, that he would go 
on. This being exactly what the chairman wanted, he mused for a little time, performed that 
agreeable ceremony which is popularly termed wetting one�fs whistle, and went on thus:

�eTom Grig, gentlemen, was, as I have said, one of us; and I may go further, and say he was an 
ornament to us, and such a one as only the good old times of oil and cotton could have produced. 
Tom�fs family, gentlemen, were all lamplighters.�f

�eNot the ladies, I hope?�f asked the vice.

�eThey had talent enough for it, Sir,�f rejoined the chairman, �eand would have been, but for the 
prejudices of society. Let women have their rights, Sir, and the females of Tom�fs family would have 
been every one of �eem in office. But that emancipation hasn�ft come yet, and hadn�ft then, and 
consequently they confined themselves to the bosoms of their families, cooked the dinners, mended 
the clothes, minded the children, comforted their husbands, and attended to the house-keeping 
generally. It�fs a hard thing upon the women, gentlemen, that they are limited to such a sphere of 
action as this; very hard.

�eI happen to know all about Tom, gentlemen, from the circumstance of his uncle by his mother�fs side, 
having been my particular friend. His (that�fs Tom�fs uncle�fs) fate was a melancholy one. Gas was the 
death of him. When it was first talked of, he laughed. He wasn�ft angry; he laughed at the credulity of 
human nature. "They might as well talk," he says, "of laying on an everlasting succession of 
glow-worms;" and then he laughed again, partly at his joke, and partly at poor humanity.

�eIn course of time, however, the thing got ground, the experiment was made, and they lighted up Pall 
Mall. Tom�fs uncle went to see it. I�fve heard that he fell off his ladder fourteen times that night, from 
weakness, and that he would certainly have gone on falling till he killed himself, if his last tumble 
hadn�ft been into a wheelbarrow which was going his way, and humanely took him home. "I foresee 
in this," says Tom�fs uncle faintly, and taking to his bed as he spoke - "I foresee in this," he says, "the 
breaking up of our profession. There�fs no more going the rounds to trim by daylight, no more 
dribbling down of the oil on the hats and bonnets of ladies and gentlemen when one feels in spirits. 
Any low fellow can light a gas-lamp. And it�fs all up." In this state of mind, he petitioned the 
government for - I want a word again, gentlemen what do you call that which they give to people 
when it�fs found out, at last, that they�fve never been of any use, and have been paid too much for 
doing nothing?�f

�eCompensation?�f suggested the vice.

�eThat�fs it,�f said the chairman. �eCompensation. They didn�ft give it him, though, and then he got very 
fond of his country all at once, and went about saying that gas was a death-blow to his native land, 
and that it was a plot of the radicals to ruin the country and destroy the oil and cotton trade for ever, 
and that the whales would go and kill themselves privately, out of sheer spite and vexation at not 
being caught. At last he got right-down cracked; called his tobacco-pipe a gas-pipe; thought his tears 
were lampoil; and went on with all manner of nonsense of that sort, till one night he hung himself on 
a lamp-iron in Saint Martin�fs Lane, and there was an end of HIM.

�eTom loved him, gentlemen, but he survived it. He shed a tear over his grave, got very drunk, spoke 
a funeral oration that night in the watch-house, and was fined five shillings for it, in the morning. 
Some men are none the worse for this sort of thing. Tom was one of �eem. He went that very 
afternoon on a new beat: as clear in his head, and as free from fever as Father Mathew himself.

�eTom�fs new beat, gentlemen, was - I can�ft exactly say where, for that he�fd never tell; but I know it 
was in a quiet part of town, where there were some queer old houses. I have always had it in my 
head that it must have been somewhere near Canonbury Tower in Islington, but that�fs a matter of 
opinion. Wherever it was, he went upon it, with a bran-new ladder, a white hat, a brown holland 
jacket and trousers, a blue neck-kerchief, and a sprig of fullblown double wall-flower in his 
button-hole. Tom was always genteel in his appearance, and I have heard from the best judges, that if 
he had left his ladder at home that afternoon, you might have took him for a lord.

�eHe was always merry, was Tom, and such a singer, that if there was any encouragement for native 
talent, he�fd have been at the opera. He was on his ladder, lighting his first lamp, and singing to 
himself in a manner more easily to be conceived than described, when he hears the clock strike five, 
and suddenly sees an old gentleman with a telescope in his hand, throw up a window and look at him 
very hard.

�eTom didn�ft know what could be passing in this old gentleman�fs mind. He thought it likely enough 
that he might be saying within himself, "Here�fs a new lamplighter - a good-looking young fellow 
shall I stand something to drink?" Thinking this possible, he keeps quite still, pretending to be very 
particular about the wick, and looks at the old gentleman sideways, seeming to take no notice of him.

�eGentlemen, he was one of the strangest and most mysterious-looking files that ever Tom clapped his 
eyes on. He was dressed all slovenly and untidy, in a great gown of a kind of bed-furniture pattern, 
with a cap of the same on his head; and a long old flapped waistcoat; with no braces, no strings, very 
few buttons - in short, with hardly any of those artificial contrivances that hold society together. Tom 
knew by these signs, and by his not being shaved, and by his not being over-clean, and by a sort of 
wisdom not quite awake, in his face, that he was a scientific old gentleman. He often told me that if 
he could have conceived the possibility of the whole Royal Society being boiled down into one man, 
he should have said the old gentleman�fs body was that Body.

�eThe old gentleman claps the telescope to his eye, looks all round, sees nobody else in sight, stares at 
Tom again, and cries out very loud:

�e"Hal-loa!"

�e"Halloa, Sir," says Tom from the ladder; "and halloa again, if you come to that."

�e"Here�fs an extraordinary fulfilment," says the old gentleman, "of a prediction of the planets."

�e"Is there?" says Tom. "I�fm very glad to hear it."

�e"Young man," says the old gentleman, "you don�ft know me."

�e"Sir," says Tom, "I have not that honour; but I shall be happy to drink your health, notwithstanding."

�e"I read," cries the old gentleman, without taking any notice of this politeness on Tom�fs part - "I read 
what�fs going to happen, in the stars."

�eTom thanked him for the information, and begged to know if anything particular was going to 
happen in the stars, in the course of a week or so; but the old gentleman, correcting him, explained 
that he read in the stars what was going to happen on dry land, and that he was acquainted with all 
the celestial bodies.

�e"I hope they�fre all well, Sir," says Tom, - "everybody."

�e"Hush!" cries the old gentleman. "I have consulted the book of Fate with rare and wonderful 
success. I am versed in the great sciences of astrology and astronomy. In my house here, I have 
every description of apparatus for observing the course and motion of the planets. Six months ago, I 
derived from this source, the knowledge that precisely as the clock struck five this afternoon a 
stranger would present himself - the destined husband of my young and lovely niece - in reality of 
illustrious and high descent, but whose birth would be enveloped in uncertainty and mystery. Don�ft 
tell me yours isn�ft," says the old gentleman, who was in such a hurry to speak that he couldn�ft get 
the words out fast enough, "for I know better."

�eGentlemen, Tom was so astonished when he heard him say this, that he could hardly keep his 
footing on the ladder, and found it necessary to hold on by the lamp-post. There WAS a mystery 
about his birth. His mother had always admitted it. Tom had never known who was his father, and 
some people had gone so far as to say that even SHE was in doubt.

�eWhile he was in this state of amazement, the old gentleman leaves the window, bursts out of the 
house-door, shakes the ladder, and Tom, like a ripe pumpkin, comes sliding down into his arms.

�e"Let me embrace you," he says, folding his arms about him, and nearly lighting up his old 
bed-furniture gown at Tom�fs link. "You�fre a man of noble aspect. Everything combines to prove the 
accuracy of my observations. You have had mysterious promptings within you," he says; "I know 
you have had whisperings of greatness, eh?" he says.

�e"I think I have," says Tom - Tom was one of those who can persuade themselves to anything they 
like - "I�fve often thought I wasn�ft the small beer I was taken for."

�e"You were right," cries the old gentleman, hugging him again. "Come in. My niece awaits us."

�e"Is the young lady tolerable good-looking, Sir?" says Tom, hanging fire rather, as he thought of her 
playing the piano, and knowing French, and being up to all manner of accomplishments.

�e"She�fs beautiful!" cries the old gentleman, who was in such a terrible bustle that he was all in a 
perspiration. "She has a graceful carriage, an exquisite shape, a sweet voice, a countenance beaming 
with animation and expression; and the eye," he says, rubbing his hands, "of a startled fawn."

�eTom supposed this might mean, what was called among his circle of acquaintance, "a game eye;" 
and, with a view to this defect, inquired whether the young lady had any cash.

�e"She has five thousand pounds," cries the old gentleman. "But what of that? what of that? A word in 
your ear. I�fm in search of the philosopher�fs stone. I have very nearly found it - not quite. It turns 
everything to gold; that�fs its property."

�eTom naturally thought it must have a deal of property; and said that when the old gentleman did get 
it, he hoped he�fd be careful to keep it in the family.

�e"Certainly," he says, "of course. Five thousand pounds! What�fs five thousand pounds to us? What�fs 
five million?" he says. "What�fs five thousand million? Money will be nothing to us. We shall never 
be able to spend it fast enough."

�e"We�fll try what we can do, Sir," says Tom.

�e"We will," says the old gentleman. "Your name?"

�e"Grig," says Tom.

�eThe old gentleman embraced him again, very tight; and without speaking another word, dragged 
him into the house in such an excited manner, that it was as much as Tom could do to take his link 
and ladder with him, and put them down in the passage.

�eGentlemen, if Tom hadn�ft been always remarkable for his love of truth, I think you would still have 
believed him when he said that all this was like a dream. There is no better way for a man to find out 
whether he is really asleep or awake, than calling for something to eat. If he�fs in a dream, gentlemen, 
he�fll find something wanting in flavour, depend upon it.

�eTom explained his doubts to the old gentleman, and said that if there was any cold meat in the house, 
it would ease his mind very much to test himself at once. The old gentleman ordered up a venison 
pie, a small ham, and a bottle of very old Madeira. At the first mouthful of pie and the first glass of 
wine, Tom smacks his lips and cries out, "I�fm awake - wide awake;" and to prove that he was so, 
gentlemen, he made an end of �eem both.

�eWhen Tom had finished his meal (which he never spoke of afterwards without tears in his eyes), the 
old gentleman hugs him again, and says, "Noble stranger! let us visit my young and lovely niece." 
Tom, who was a little elevated with the wine, replies, "The noble stranger is agreeable!" At which 
words the old gentleman took him by the hand, and led him to the parlour; crying as he opened the 
door, "Here is Mr. Grig, the favourite of the planets!"

�eI will not attempt a description of female beauty, gentlemen, for every one of us has a model of his 
own that suits his own taste best. In this parlour that I�fm speaking of, there were two young ladies; 
and if every gentleman present, will imagine two models of his own in their places, and will be kind 
enough to polish �eem up to the very highest pitch of perfection, he will then have a faint conception 
of their uncommon radiance.

�eBesides these two young ladies, there was their waiting-woman, that under any other circumstances 
Tom would have looked upon as a Venus; and besides her, there was a tall, thin, dismal-faced young 
gentleman, half man and half boy, dressed in a childish suit of clothes very much too short in the 
legs and arms; and looking, according to Tom�fs comparison, like one of the wax juveniles from a 
tailor�fs door, grown up and run to seed. Now, this youngster stamped his foot upon the ground and 
looked very fierce at Tom, and Tom looked fierce at him - for to tell the truth, gentlemen, Tom more 
than half suspected that when they entered the room he was kissing one of the young ladies; and for 
anything Tom knew, you observe, it might be HIS young lady - which was not pleasant.

�e"Sir," says Tom, "before we proceed any further, will you have the goodness to inform me who this 
young Salamander" - Tom called him that for aggravation, you perceive, gentlemen - "who this 
young Salamander may be?"

�e"That, Mr. Grig," says the old gentleman, "is my little boy. He was christened Galileo Isaac Newton 
Flamstead. Don�ft mind him. He�fs a mere child."

�e"And a very fine child too," says Tom - still aggravating, you�fll observe - "of his age, and as good as 
fine, I have no doubt. How do you do, my man?" with which kind and patronising expressions, Tom 
reached up to pat him on the head, and quoted two lines about little boys, from Doctor Watts�fs 
Hymns, which he had learnt at a Sunday School.

�eIt was very easy to see, gentlemen, by this youngster�fs frowning and by the waiting-maid�fs tossing 
her head and turning up her nose, and by the young ladies turning their backs and talking together at 
the other end of the room, that nobody but the old gentleman took very kindly to the noble stranger. 
Indeed, Tom plainly heard the waiting-woman say of her master, that so far from being able to read 
the stars as he pretended, she didn�ft believe he knew his letters in �eem, or at best that he had got 
further than words in one syllable; but Tom, not minding this (for he was in spirits after the Madeira), 
looks with an agreeable air towards the young ladies, and, kissing his hand to both, says to the old 
gentleman, "Which is which?"

�e"This," says the old gentleman, leading out the handsomest, if one of �eem could possibly be said to 
be handsomer than the other "this is my niece, Miss Fanny Barker."

�e"If you�fll permit me, Miss," says Tom, "being a noble stranger and a favourite of the planets, I will 
conduct myself as such." With these words, he kisses the young lady in a very affable way, turns to 
the old gentleman, slaps him on the back, and says, "When�fs it to come off, my buck?"

�eThe young lady coloured so deep, and her lip trembled so much, gentlemen, that Tom really thought 
she was going to cry. But she kept her feelings down, and turning to the old gentleman, says, "Dear 
uncle, though you have the absolute disposal of my hand and fortune, and though you mean well in 
disposing of �eem thus, I ask you whether you don�ft think this is a mistake? Don�ft you think, dear 
uncle," she says, "that the stars must be in error? Is it not possible that the comet may have put �eem 
out?"

�e"The stars," says the old gentleman, "couldn�ft make a mistake if they tried. Emma," he says to the 
other young lady.

�e"Yes, papa," says she.

�e"The same day that makes your cousin Mrs. Grig will unite you to the gifted Mooney. No 
remonstrance - no tears. Now, Mr. Grig, let me conduct you to that hallowed ground, that 
philosophical retreat, where my friend and partner, the gifted Mooney of whom I have just now 
spoken, is even now pursuing those discoveries which shall enrich us with the precious metal, and 
make us masters of the world. Come, Mr. Grig," he says.

�e"With all my heart, Sir," replies Tom; "and luck to the gifted Mooney, say I - not so much on his 
account as for our worthy selves!" With this sentiment, Tom kissed his hand to the ladies again, and 
followed him out; having the gratification to perceive, as he looked back, that they were all hanging 
on by the arms and legs of Galileo Isaac Newton Flamstead, to prevent him from following the noble 
stranger, and tearing him to pieces.

�eGentlemen, Tom�fs father-in-law that was to be, took him by the hand, and having lighted a little 
lamp, led him across a paved court-yard at the back of the house, into a very large, dark, gloomy 
room: filled with all manner of bottles, globes, books, telescopes, crocodiles, alligators, and other 
scientific instruments of every kind. In the centre of this room was a stove or furnace, with what 
Tom called a pot, but which in my opinion was a crucible, in full boil. In one corner was a sort of 
ladder leading through the roof; and up this ladder the old gentleman pointed, as he said in a 
whisper:

�e"The observatory. Mr. Mooney is even now watching for the precise time at which we are to come 
into all the riches of the earth. It will be necessary for he and I, alone in that silent place, to cast your 
nativity before the hour arrives. Put the day and minute of your birth on this piece of paper, and 
leave the rest to me."

�e"You don�ft mean to say," says Tom, doing as he was told and giving him back the paper, "that I�fm to 
wait here long, do you? It�fs a precious dismal place."

�e"Hush!" says the old gentleman. "It�fs hallowed ground. Farewell!" �e"Stop a minute," says Tom. 
"What a hurry you�fre in! What�fs in that large bottle yonder?"

�e"It�fs a child with three heads," says the old gentleman; "and everything else in proportion."

�e"Why don�ft you throw him away?" says Tom. "What do you keep such unpleasant things here for?"

�e"Throw him away!" cries the old gentleman. "We use him constantly in astrology. He�fs a charm."

�e"I shouldn�ft have thought it," says Tom, "from his appearance. MUST you go, I say?"

�eThe old gentleman makes him no answer, but climbs up the ladder in a greater bustle than ever. Tom 
looked after his legs till there was nothing of him left, and then sat down to wait; feeling (so he used 
to say) as comfortable as if he was going to be made a freemason, and they were heating the pokers.

�eTom waited so long, gentlemen, that he began to think it must be getting on for midnight at least, 
and felt more dismal and lonely than ever he had done in all his life. He tried every means of whiling 
away the time, but it never had seemed to move so slow. First, he took a nearer view of the child 
with three heads, and thought what a comfort it must have been to his parents. Then he looked up a 
long telescope which was pointed out of the window, but saw nothing particular, in consequence of 
the stopper being on at the other end. Then he came to a skeleton in a glass case, labelled, "Skeleton 
of a Gentleman - prepared by Mr. Mooney," which made him hope that Mr. Mooney might not be in 
the habit of preparing gentlemen that way without their own consent. A hundred times, at least, he 
looked into the pot where they were boiling the philosopher�fs stone down to the proper consistency, 
and wondered whether it was nearly done. "When it is," thinks Tom, "I�fll send out for six-penn�forth 
of sprats, and turn �eem into gold fish for a first experiment." Besides which, he made up his mind, 
gentlemen, to have a country-house and a park; and to plant a bit of it with a double row of 
gas-lamps a mile long, and go out every night with a French-polished mahogany ladder, and two 
servants in livery behind him, to light �eem for his own pleasure.

�eAt length and at last, the old gentleman�fs legs appeared upon the steps leading through the roof, and 
he came slowly down: bringing along with him, the gifted Mooney. This Mooney, gentlemen, was 
even more scientific in appearance than his friend; and had, as Tom often declared upon his word 
and honour, the dirtiest face we can possibly know of, in this imperfect state of existence.

�eGentlemen, you are all aware that if a scientific man isn�ft absent in his mind, he�fs of no good at all. 
Mr. Mooney was so absent, that when the old gentleman said to him, "Shake hands with Mr. Grig," 
he put out his leg. "Here�fs a mind, Mr. Grig!" cries the old gentleman in a rapture. "Here�fs 
philosophy! Here�fs rumination! Don�ft disturb him," he says, "for this is amazing!"

�eTom had no wish to disturb him, having nothing particular to say; but he was so uncommonly 
amazing, that the old gentleman got impatient, and determined to give him an electric shock to bring 
him to - "for you must know, Mr. Grig," he says, "that we always keep a strongly charged battery, 
ready for that purpose." These means being resorted to, gentlemen, the gifted Mooney revived with a 
loud roar, and he no sooner came to himself than both he and the old gentleman looked at Tom with 
compassion, and shed tears abundantly.

�e"My dear friend," says the old gentleman to the Gifted, "prepare him."

�e"I say," cries Tom, falling back, "none of that, you know. No preparing by Mr. Mooney if you 
please."

�e"Alas!" replies the old gentleman, "you don�ft understand us. My friend, inform him of his fate. - I 
can�ft."

�eThe Gifted mustered up his voice, after many efforts, and informed Tom that his nativity had been 
carefully cast, and he would expire at exactly thirty-five minutes, twenty-seven seconds, and 
fivesixths of a second past nine o�fclock, a.m., on that day two months.

�eGentlemen, I leave you to judge what were Tom�fs feelings at this announcement, on the eve of 
matrimony and endless riches. "I think," he says in a trembling voice, "there must be a mistake in the 
working of that sum. Will you do me the favour to cast it up again?" - "There is no mistake," replies 
the old gentleman, "it is confirmed by Francis Moore, Physician. Here is the prediction for 
to-morrow two months." And he showed him the page, where sure enough were these words - "The 
decease of a great person may be looked for, about this time."

�e"Which," says the old gentleman, "is clearly you, Mr. Grig."

�e"Too clearly," cries Tom, sinking into a chair, and giving one hand to the old gentleman, and one to 
the Gifted. "The orb of day has set on Thomas Grig for ever!"

�eAt this affecting remark, the Gifted shed tears again, and the other two mingled their tears with his, 
in a kind - if I may use the expression - of Mooney and Co.�fs entire. But the old gentleman 
recovering first, observed that this was only a reason for hastening the marriage, in order that Tom�fs 
distinguished race might be transmitted to posterity; and requesting the Gifted to console Mr. Grig 
during his temporary absence, he withdrew to settle the preliminaries with his niece immediately.

�eAnd now, gentlemen, a very extraordinary and remarkable occurrence took place; for as Tom sat in 
a melancholy way in one chair, and the Gifted sat in a melancholy way in another, a couple of doors 
were thrown violently open, the two young ladies rushed in, and one knelt down in a loving attitude 
at Tom�fs feet, and the other at the Gifted�fs. So far, perhaps, as Tom was concerned - as he used to say 
- you will say there was nothing strange in this: but you will be of a different opinion when you 
understand that Tom�fs young lady was kneeling to the Gifted, and the Gifted�fs young lady was 
kneeling to Tom.

�e"Halloa! stop a minute!" cries Tom; "here�fs a mistake. I need condoling with by sympathising 
woman, under my afflicting circumstances; but we�fre out in the figure. Change partners, Mooney."

�e"Monster!" cries Tom�fs young lady, clinging to the Gifted.

�e"Miss!" says Tom. "Is THAT your manners?"

�e"I abjure thee!" cries Tom�fs young lady. "I renounce thee. I never will be thine. Thou," she says to 
the Gifted, "art the object of my first and all-engrossing passion. Wrapt in thy sublime visions, thou 
hast not perceived my love; but, driven to despair, I now shake off the woman and avow it. Oh, cruel, 
cruel man!" With which reproach she laid her head upon the Gifted�fs breast, and put her arms about 
him in the tenderest manner possible, gentlemen.

�e"And I," says the other young lady, in a sort of ecstasy, that made Tom start - "I hereby abjure my 
chosen husband too. Hear me, Goblin!" - this was to the Gifted - "Hear me! I hold thee in the deepest 
detestation. The maddening interview of this one night has filled my soul with love - but not for thee. 
It is for thee, for thee, young man," she cries to Tom. "As Monk Lewis finely observes, Thomas, 
Thomas, I am thine, Thomas, Thomas, thou art mine: thine for ever, mine for ever!" with which 
words, she became very tender likewise.

�eTom and the Gifted, gentlemen, as you may believe, looked at each other in a very awkward manner, 
and with thoughts not at all complimentary to the two young ladies. As to the Gifted, I have heard 
Tom say often, that he was certain he was in a fit, and had it inwardly.

�e"Speak to me! Oh, speak to me!" cries Tom�fs young lady to the Gifted.

�e"I don�ft want to speak to anybody," he says, finding his voice at last, and trying to push her away. "I 
think I had better go. I�fm - I�fm frightened," he says, looking about as if he had lost something.

�e"Not one look of love!" she cries. "Hear me while I declare - "

�e"I don�ft know how to look a look of love," he says, all in a maze. "Don�ft declare anything. I don�ft 
want to hear anybody."

�e"That�fs right!" cries the old gentleman (who it seems had been listening). "That�fs right! Don�ft hear 
her. Emma shall marry you to-morrow, my friend, whether she likes it or not, and SHE shall marry 
Mr. Grig."

�eGentlemen, these words were no sooner out of his mouth than Galileo Isaac Newton Flamstead 
(who it seems had been listening too) darts in, and spinning round and round, like a young giant�fs 
top, cries, "Let her. Let her. I�fm fierce; I�fm furious. I give her leave. I�fll never marry anybody after 
this - never. It isn�ft safe. She is the falsest of the false," he cries, tearing his hair and gnashing his 
teeth; "and I�fll live and die a bachelor!"

�e"The little boy," observed the Gifted gravely, "albeit of tender years, has spoken wisdom. I have 
been led to the contemplation of woman-kind, and will not adventure on the troubled waters of 
matrimony."

�e"What!" says the old gentleman, "not marry my daughter! Won�ft you, Mooney? Not if I make her? 
Won�ft you? Won�ft you?"

�e"No," says Mooney, "I won�ft. And if anybody asks me any more, I�fll run away, and never come 
back again."

�e"Mr. Grig," says the old gentleman, "the stars must be obeyed. You have not changed your mind 
because of a little girlish folly eh, Mr. Grig?"

�eTom, gentlemen, had had his eyes about him, and was pretty sure that all this was a device and trick 
of the waiting-maid, to put him off his inclination. He had seen her hiding and skipping about the 
two doors, and had observed that a very little whispering from her pacified the Salamander directly. 
"So," thinks Tom, "this is a plot - but it won�ft fit."

�e"Eh, Mr. Grig?" says the old gentleman.

�e"Why, Sir," says Tom, pointing to the crucible, "if the soup�fs nearly ready - "

�e"Another hour beholds the consummation of our labours," returned the old gentleman.

�e"Very good," says Tom, with a mournful air. "It�fs only for two months, but I may as well be the 
richest man in the world even for that time. I�fm not particular, I�fll take her, Sir. I�fll take her."

�eThe old gentleman was in a rapture to find Tom still in the same mind, and drawing the young lady 
towards him by little and little, was joining their hands by main force, when all of a sudden, 
gentlemen, the crucible blows up, with a great crash; everybody screams; the room is filled with 
smoke; and Tom, not knowing what may happen next, throws himself into a Fancy attitude, and says, 
"Come on, if you�fre a man!" without addressing himself to anybody in particular.

�e"The labours of fifteen years!" says the old gentleman, clasping his hands and looking down upon 
the Gifted, who was saving the pieces, "are destroyed in an instant!" - And I am told, gentlemen, 
by-the-bye, that this same philosopher�fs stone would have been discovered a hundred times at least, 
to speak within bounds, if it wasn�ft for the one unfortunate circumstance that the apparatus always 
blows up, when it�fs on the very point of succeeding.

�eTom turns pale when he hears the old gentleman expressing himself to this unpleasant effect, and 
stammers out that if it�fs quite agreeable to all parties, he would like to know exactly what has 
happened, and what change has really taken place in the prospects of that company.

�e"We have failed for the present, Mr. Grig," says the old gentleman, wiping his forehead. "And I 
regret it the more, because I have in fact invested my niece�fs five thousand pounds in this glorious 
speculation. But don�ft be cast down," he says, anxiously - "in another fifteen years, Mr. Grig - "

"Oh!" cries Tom, letting the young lady�fs hand fall. "Were the stars very positive about this union, 
Sir?"

�e"They were," says the old gentleman.

�e"I�fm sorry to hear it," Tom makes answer, "for it�fs no go, Sir."

�e"No what!" cries the old gentleman.

�e"Go, Sir," says Tom, fiercely. "I forbid the banns." And with these words - which are the very words 
he used - he sat himself down in a chair, and, laying his head upon the table, thought with a secret 
grief of what was to come to pass on that day two months.

�eTom always said, gentlemen, that that waiting-maid was the artfullest minx he had ever seen; and he 
left it in writing in this country when he went to colonize abroad, that he was certain in his own mind 
she and the Salamander had blown up the philosopher�fs stone on purpose, and to cut him out of his 
property. I believe Tom was in the right, gentlemen; but whether or no, she comes forward at this 
point, and says, "May I speak, Sir?" and the old gentleman answering, "Yes, you may," she goes on 
to say that "the stars are no doubt quite right in every respect, but Tom is not the man." And she says, 
"Don�ft you remember, Sir, that when the clock struck five this afternoon, you gave Master Galileo a 
rap on the head with your telescope, and told him to get out of the way?" "Yes, I do," says the old 
gentleman. "Then," says the waitingmaid, "I say he�fs the man, and the prophecy is fulfilled." The old 
gentleman staggers at this, as if somebody had hit him a blow on the chest, and cries, "He! why he�fs 
a boy!" Upon that, gentlemen, the Salamander cries out that he�fll be twenty-one next Lady-day; and 
complains that his father has always been so busy with the sun round which the earth revolves, that 
he has never taken any notice of the son that revolves round him; and that he hasn�ft had a new suit of 
clothes since he was fourteen; and that he wasn�ft even taken out of nankeen frocks and trousers till 
he was quite unpleasant in �eem; and touches on a good many more family matters to the same 
purpose. To make short of a long story, gentlemen, they all talk together, and cry together, and 
remind the old gentleman that as to the noble family, his own grandfather would have been lord 
mayor if he hadn�ft died at a dinner the year before; and they show him by all kinds of arguments that 
if the cousins are married, the prediction comes true every way. At last, the old gentleman being 
quite convinced, gives in; and joins their hands; and leaves his daughter to marry anybody she likes; 
and they are all well pleased; and the Gifted as well as any of them.

�eIn the middle of this little family party, gentlemen, sits Tom all the while, as miserable as you like. 
But, when everything else is arranged, the old gentleman�fs daughter says, that their strange conduct 
was a little device of the waiting-maid�fs to disgust the lovers he had chosen for �eem, and will he 
forgive her? and if he will, perhaps he might even find her a husband - and when she says that, she 
looks uncommon hard at Tom. Then the waiting-maid says that, oh dear! she couldn�ft abear Mr. Grig 
should think she wanted him to marry her; and that she had even gone so far as to refuse the last 
lamplighter, who was now a literary character (having set up as a bill-sticker); and that she hoped Mr. 
Grig would not suppose she was on her last legs by any means, for the baker was very strong in his 
attentions at that moment, and as to the butcher, he was frantic. And I don�ft know how much more 
she might have said, gentlemen (for, as you know, this kind of young women are rare ones to talk), if 
the old gentleman hadn�ft cut in suddenly, and asked Tom if he�fd have her, with ten pounds to 
recompense him for his loss of time and disappointment, and as a kind of bribe to keep the story 
secret.

�e"It don�ft much matter, Sir," says Tom, "I ain�ft long for this world. Eight weeks of marriage, 
especially with this young woman, might reconcile me to my fate. I think," he says, "I could go off 
easy after that." With which he embraces her with a very dismal face, and groans in a way that might 
move a heart of stone - even of philosopher�fs stone.

�e"Egad," says the old gentleman, "that reminds me - this bustle put it out of my head - there was a 
figure wrong. He�fll live to a green old age - eighty-seven at least!"

�e"How much, Sir?" cries Tom.

�e"Eighty-seven!" says the old gentleman.

�eWithout another word, Tom flings himself on the old gentleman�fs neck; throws up his hat; cuts a 
caper; defies the waiting-maid; and refers her to the butcher.

�e"You won�ft marry her!" says the old gentleman, angrily.

�e"And live after it!" says Tom. "I�fd sooner marry a mermaid with a small-tooth comb and 
looking-glass."

�e"Then take the consequences," says the other.

�eWith those words - I beg your kind attention here, gentlemen, for it�fs worth your notice - the old 
gentleman wetted the forefinger of his right hand in some of the liquor from the crucible that was 
spilt on the floor, and drew a small triangle on Tom�fs forehead. The room swam before his eyes, and 
he found himself in the watchhouse.�f

�eFound himself WHERE?�f cried the vice, on behalf of the company generally.

�eIn the watch-house,�f said the chairman. �eIt was late at night, and he found himself in the very 
watch-house from which he had been let out that morning.�f

�eDid he go home?�f asked the vice.

�eThe watch-house people rather objected to that,�f said the chairman; �eso he stopped there that night, 
and went before the magistrate in the morning. "Why, you�fre here again, are you?" says the 
magistrate, adding insult to injury; "we�fll trouble you for five shillings more, if you can conveniently 
spare the money." Tom told him he had been enchanted, but it was of no use. He told the contractors 
the same, but they wouldn�ft believe him. It was very hard upon him, gentlemen, as he often said, for 
was it likely he�fd go and invent such a tale? They shook their heads and told him he�fd say anything 
but his prayers - as indeed he would; there�fs no doubt about that. It was the only imputation on his 
moral character that ever I heard of.�f


THE END.

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Mr. Robert Bolton: The 'Gentleman Connected With The Press'

Charles Dickens

In the parlour of the Green Dragon, a public-house in the immediate
neighbourhood of Westminster Bridge, everybody talks politics,
every evening, the great political authority being Mr. Robert
Bolton, an individual who defines himself as 'a gentleman connected
with the press,' which is a definition of peculiar indefiniteness.
Mr. Robert Bolton's regular circle of admirers and listeners are an
undertaker, a greengrocer, a hairdresser, a baker, a large stomach
surmounted by a man's head, and placed on the top of two
particularly short legs, and a thin man in black, name, profession,
and pursuit unknown, who always sits in the same position, always
displays the same long, vacant face, and never opens his lips,
surrounded as he is by most enthusiastic conversation, except to
puff forth a volume of tobacco smoke, or give vent to a very
snappy, loud, and shrill HEM! The conversation sometimes turns
upon literature, Mr. Bolton being a literary character, and always
upon such news of the day as is exclusively possessed by that
talented individual. I found myself (of course, accidentally) in
the Green Dragon the other evening, and, being somewhat amused by
the following conversation, preserved it.

'Can you lend me a ten-pound note till Christmas?' inquired the
hairdresser of the stomach.

'Where's your security, Mr. Clip?'

'My stock in trade,--there's enough of it, I'm thinking, Mr.
Thicknesse. Some fifty wigs, two poles, half-a-dozen head blocks,
and a dead Bruin.'

'No, I won't, then,' growled out Thicknesse. 'I lends nothing on
the security of the whigs or the Poles either. As for whigs,
they're cheats; as for the Poles, they've got no cash. I never
have nothing to do with blockheads, unless I can't awoid it
(ironically), and a dead bear's about as much use to me as I could
be to a dead bear.'

'Well, then,' urged the other, 'there's a book as belonged to Pope,
Byron's Poems, valued at forty pounds, because it's got Pope's
identical scratch on the back; what do you think of that for
security?'

'Well, to be sure!' cried the baker. 'But how d'ye mean, Mr.
Clip?'

'Mean! why, that it's got the HOTTERGRUFF of Pope.


"Steal not this book, for fear of hangman's rope;
For it belongs to Alexander Pope."


All that's written on the inside of the binding of the book; so, as
my son says, we're BOUND to believe it.'

'Well, sir,' observed the undertaker, deferentially, and in a half-
whisper, leaning over the table, and knocking over the
hairdresser's grog as he spoke, 'that argument's very easy upset.'

'Perhaps, sir,' said Clip, a little flurried, 'you'll pay for the
first upset afore you thinks of another.'

'Now,' said the undertaker, bowing amicably to the hairdresser, 'I
THINK, I says I THINK--you'll excuse me, Mr. Clip, I THINK, you
see, that won't go down with the present company--unfortunately, my
master had the honour of making the coffin of that ere Lord's
housemaid, not no more nor twenty year ago. Don't think I'm proud
on it, gentlemen; others might be; but I hate rank of any sort.
I've no more respect for a Lord's footman than I have for any
respectable tradesman in this room. I may say no more nor I have
for Mr. Clip! (bowing). Therefore, that ere Lord must have been
born long after Pope died. And it's a logical interference to
defer, that they neither of them lived at the same time. So what I
mean is this here, that Pope never had no book, never seed, felt,
never smelt no book (triumphantly) as belonged to that ere Lord.
And, gentlemen, when I consider how patiently you have 'eared the
ideas what I have expressed, I feel bound, as the best way to
reward you for the kindness you have exhibited, to sit down without
saying anything more--partickler as I perceive a worthier visitor
nor myself is just entered. I am not in the habit of paying
compliments, gentlemen; when I do, therefore, I hope I strikes with
double force.'

'Ah, Mr. Murgatroyd! what's all this about striking with double
force?' said the object of the above remark, as he entered. 'I
never excuse a man's getting into a rage during winter, even when
he's seated so close to the fire as you are. It is very
injudicious to put yourself into such a perspiration. What is the
cause of this extreme physical and mental excitement, sir?'

Such was the very philosophical address of Mr. Robert Bolton, a
shorthand-writer, as he termed himself--a bit of equivoque passing
current among his fraternity, which must give the uninitiated a
vast idea of the establishment of the ministerial organ, while to
the initiated it signifies that no one paper can lay claim to the
enjoyment of their services. Mr. Bolton was a young man, with a
somewhat sickly and very dissipated expression of countenance. His
habiliments were composed of an exquisite union of gentility,
slovenliness, assumption, simplicity, NEWNESS, and old age. Half
of him was dressed for the winter, the other half for the summer.
His hat was of the newest cut, the D'Orsay; his trousers had been
white, but the inroads of mud and ink, etc., had given them a pie-
bald appearance; round his throat he wore a very high black cravat,
of the most tyrannical stiffness; while his tout ensemble was
hidden beneath the enormous folds of an old brown poodle-collared
great-coat, which was closely buttoned up to the aforesaid cravat.
His fingers peeped through the ends of his black kid gloves, and
two of the toes of each foot took a similar view of society through
the extremities of his high-lows. Sacred to the bare walls of his
garret be the mysteries of his interior dress! He was a short,
spare man, of a somewhat inferior deportment. Everybody seemed
influenced by his entry into the room, and his salutation of each
member partook of the patronizing. The hairdresser made way for
him between himself and the stomach. A minute afterwards he had
taken possession of his pint and pipe. A pause in the conversation
took place. Everybody was waiting, anxious for his first
observation.

'Horrid murder in Westminster this morning,' observed Mr. Bolton.

Everybody changed their positions. All eyes were fixed upon the
man of paragraphs.

'A baker murdered his son by boiling him in a copper,' said Mr.
Bolton.

'Good heavens!' exclaimed everybody, in simultaneous horror.

'Boiled him, gentlemen!' added Mr. Bolton, with the most effective
emphasis; 'BOILED him!'

'And the particulars, Mr. B.,' inquired the hairdresser, 'the
particulars?'

Mr. Bolton took a very long draught of porter, and some two or
three dozen whiffs of tobacco, doubtless to instil into the
commercial capacities of the company the superiority of a gentlemen
connected with the press, and then said -

'The man was a baker, gentlemen.' (Every one looked at the baker
present, who stared at Bolton.) 'His victim, being his son, also
was necessarily the son of a baker. The wretched murderer had a
wife, whom he was frequently in the habit, while in an intoxicated
state, of kicking, pummelling, flinging mugs at, knocking down, and
half-killing while in bed, by inserting in her mouth a considerable
portion of a sheet or blanket.'

The speaker took another draught, everybody looked at everybody
else, and exclaimed, 'Horrid!'

'It appears in evidence, gentlemen,' continued Mr. Bolton, 'that,
on the evening of yesterday, Sawyer the baker came home in a
reprehensible state of beer. Mrs. S., connubially considerate,
carried him in that condition up-stairs into his chamber, and
consigned him to their mutual couch. In a minute or two she lay
sleeping beside the man whom the morrow's dawn beheld a murderer!'
(Entire silence informed the reporter that his picture had attained
the awful effect he desired.) 'The son came home about an hour
afterwards, opened the door, and went up to bed. Scarcely
(gentlemen, conceive his feelings of alarm), scarcely had he taken
off his indescribables, when shrieks (to his experienced ear
MATERNAL shrieks) scared the silence of surrounding night. He put
his indescribables on again, and ran down-stairs. He opened the
door of the parental bed-chamber. His father was dancing upon his
mother. What must have been his feelings! In the agony of the
minute he rushed at his male parent as he was about to plunge a
knife into the side of his female. The mother shrieked. The
father caught the son (who had wrested the knife from the paternal
grasp) up in his arms, carried him down-stairs, shoved him into a
copper of boiling water among some linen, closed the lid, and
jumped upon the top of it, in which position he was found with a
ferocious countenance by the mother, who arrived in the melancholy
wash-house just as he had so settled himself.

'"Where's my boy?" shrieked the mother.

'"In that copper, boiling," coolly replied the benign father.

'Struck by the awful intelligence, the mother rushed from the
house, and alarmed the neighbourhood. The police entered a minute
afterwards. The father, having bolted the wash-house door, had
bolted himself. They dragged the lifeless body of the boiled baker
from the cauldron, and, with a promptitude commendable in men of
their station, they immediately carried it to the station-house.
Subsequently, the baker was apprehended while seated on the top of
a lamp-post in Parliament Street, lighting his pipe.'

The whole horrible ideality of the Mysteries of Udolpho, condensed
into the pithy effect of a ten-line paragraph, could not possibly
have so affected the narrator's auditory. Silence, the purest and
most noble of all kinds of applause, bore ample testimony to the
barbarity of the baker, as well as to Bolton's knack of narration;
and it was only broken after some minutes had elapsed by
interjectional expressions of the intense indignation of every man
present. The baker wondered how a British baker could so disgrace
himself and the highly honourable calling to which he belonged; and
the others indulged in a variety of wonderments connected with the
subject; among which not the least wonderment was that which was
awakened by the genius and information of Mr. Robert Bolton, who,
after a glowing eulogium on himself, and his unspeakable influence
with the daily press, was proceeding, with a most solemn
countenance, to hear the pros and cons of the Pope autograph
question, when I took up my hat, and left.

THE END.

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DICKENS MISCELLANY
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Sketches of Young Couples

Charles Dickens

AN URGENT REMONSTRANCE, &c

TO THE GENTLEMEN OF ENGLAND,

(BEING BACHELORS OR WIDOWERS,)

THE REMONSTRANCE OF THEIR FAITHFUL FELLOW-SUBJECT,

SHEWETH,-

THAT Her Most Gracious Majesty, Victoria, by the Grace of God of
the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Queen, Defender of
the Faith, did, on the 23rd day of November last past, declare and
pronounce to Her Most Honourable Privy Council, Her Majesty's Most
Gracious intention of entering into the bonds of wedlock.

THAT Her Most Gracious Majesty, in so making known Her Most
Gracious intention to Her Most Honourable Privy Council as
aforesaid, did use and employ the words--'It is my intention to
ally myself in marriage with Prince Albert of Saxe Coburg and
Gotha.'

THAT the present is Bissextile, or Leap Year, in which it is held
and considered lawful for any lady to offer and submit proposals of
marriage to any gentleman, and to enforce and insist upon
acceptance of the same, under pain of a certain fine or penalty; to
wit, one silk or satin dress of the first quality, to be chosen by
the lady and paid (or owed) for, by the gentleman.

THAT these and other the horrors and dangers with which the said
Bissextile, or Leap Year, threatens the gentlemen of England on
every occasion of its periodical return, have been greatly
aggravated and augmented by the terms of Her Majesty's said Most
Gracious communication, which have filled the heads of divers young
ladies in this Realm with certain new ideas destructive to the
peace of mankind, that never entered their imagination before.

THAT a case has occurred in Camberwell, in which a young lady
informed her Papa that 'she intended to ally herself in marriage'
with Mr. Smith of Stepney; and that another, and a very distressing
case, has occurred at Tottenham, in which a young lady not only
stated her intention of allying herself in marriage with her cousin
John, but, taking violent possession of her said cousin, actually
married him.

THAT similar outrages are of constant occurrence, not only in the
capital and its neighbourhood, but throughout the kingdom, and that
unless the excited female populace be speedily checked and
restrained in their lawless proceedings, most deplorable results
must ensue therefrom; among which may be anticipated a most
alarming increase in the population of the country, with which no
efforts of the agricultural or manufacturing interest can possibly
keep pace.

THAT there is strong reason to suspect the existence of a most
extensive plot, conspiracy, or design, secretly contrived by vast
numbers of single ladies in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland, and now extending its ramifications in every quarter of
the land; the object and intent of which plainly appears to be the
holding and solemnising of an enormous and unprecedented number of
marriages, on the day on which the nuptials of Her said Most
Gracious Majesty are performed.

THAT such plot, conspiracy, or design, strongly savours of Popery,
as tending to the discomfiture of the Clergy of the Established
Church, by entailing upon them great mental and physical
exhaustion; and that such Popish plots are fomented and encouraged
by Her Majesty's Ministers, which clearly appears--not only from
Her Majesty's principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
traitorously getting married while holding office under the Crown;
but from Mr. O'Connell having been heard to declare and avow that,
if he had a daughter to marry, she should be married on the same
day as Her said Most Gracious Majesty.

THAT such arch plots, conspiracies, and designs, besides being
fraught with danger to the Established Church, and (consequently)
to the State, cannot fail to bring ruin and bankruptcy upon a large
class of Her Majesty's subjects; as a great and sudden increase in
the number of married men occasioning the comparative desertion
(for a time) of Taverns, Hotels, Billiard-rooms, and Gaming-Houses,
will deprive the Proprietors of their accustomed profits and
returns. And in further proof of the depth and baseness of such
designs, it may be here observed, that all proprietors of Taverns,
Hotels, Billiard-rooms, and Gaming-Houses, are (especially the
last) solemnly devoted to the Protestant religion.

FOR all these reasons, and many others of no less gravity and
import, an urgent appeal is made to the gentlemen of England (being
bachelors or widowers) to take immediate steps for convening a
Public meeting; To consider of the best and surest means of
averting the dangers with which they are threatened by the
recurrence of Bissextile, or Leap Year, and the additional
sensation created among single ladies by the terms of Her Majesty's
Most Gracious Declaration; To take measures, without delay, for
resisting the said single Ladies, and counteracting their evil
designs; And to pray Her Majesty to dismiss her present Ministers,
and to summon to her Councils those distinguished Gentlemen in
various Honourable Professions who, by insulting on all occasions
the only Lady in England who can be insulted with safety, have
given a sufficient guarantee to Her Majesty's Loving Subjects that
they, at least, are qualified to make war with women, and are
already expert in the use of those weapons which are common to the
lowest and most abandoned of the sex.


THE YOUNG COUPLE


There is to be a wedding this morning at the corner house in the
terrace. The pastry-cook's people have been there half-a-dozen
times already; all day yesterday there was a great stir and bustle,
and they were up this morning as soon as it was light. Miss Emma
Fielding is going to be married to young Mr. Harvey.

Heaven alone can tell in what bright colours this marriage is
painted upon the mind of the little housemaid at number six, who
has hardly slept a wink all night with thinking of it, and now
stands on the unswept door-steps leaning upon her broom, and
looking wistfully towards the enchanted house. Nothing short of
omniscience can divine what visions of the baker, or the green-
grocer, or the smart and most insinuating butterman, are flitting
across her mind--what thoughts of how she would dress on such an
occasion, if she were a lady--of how she would dress, if she were
only a bride--of how cook would dress, being bridesmaid, conjointly
with her sister 'in place' at Fulham, and how the clergyman,
deeming them so many ladies, would be quite humbled and respectful.
What day-dreams of hope and happiness--of life being one perpetual
holiday, with no master and no mistress to grant or withhold it--of
every Sunday being a Sunday out--of pure freedom as to curls and
ringlets, and no obligation to hide fine heads of hair in caps--
what pictures of happiness, vast and immense to her, but utterly
ridiculous to us, bewilder the brain of the little housemaid at
number six, all called into existence by the wedding at the corner!

We smile at such things, and so we should, though perhaps for a
better reason than commonly presents itself. It should be pleasant
to us to know that there are notions of happiness so moderate and
limited, since upon those who entertain them, happiness and
lightness of heart are very easily bestowed.

But the little housemaid is awakened from her reverie, for forth
from the door of the magical corner house there runs towards her,
all fluttering in smart new dress and streaming ribands, her friend
Jane Adams, who comes all out of breath to redeem a solemn promise
of taking her in, under cover of the confusion, to see the
breakfast table spread forth in state, and--sight of sights!--her
young mistress ready dressed for church.

And there, in good truth, when they have stolen up-stairs on tip-
toe and edged themselves in at the chamber-door--there is Miss Emma
'looking like the sweetest picter,' in a white chip bonnet and
orange flowers, and all other elegancies becoming a bride, (with
the make, shape, and quality of every article of which the girl is
perfectly familiar in one moment, and never forgets to her dying
day)--and there is Miss Emma's mamma in tears, and Miss Emma's papa
comforting her, and saying how that of course she has been long
looking forward to this, and how happy she ought to be--and there
too is Miss Emma's sister with her arms round her neck, and the
other bridesmaid all smiles and tears, quieting the children, who
would cry more but that they are so finely dressed, and yet sob for
fear sister Emma should be taken away--and it is all so affecting,
that the two servant-girls cry more than anybody; and Jane Adams,
sitting down upon the stairs, when they have crept away, declares
that her legs tremble so that she don't know what to do, and that
she will say for Miss Emma, that she never had a hasty word from
her, and that she does hope and pray she may be happy.

But Jane soon comes round again, and then surely there never was
anything like the breakfast table, glittering with plate and china,
and set out with flowers and sweets, and long-necked bottles, in
the most sumptuous and dazzling manner. In the centre, too, is the
mighty charm, the cake, glistening with frosted sugar, and
garnished beautifully. They agree that there ought to be a little
Cupid under one of the barley-sugar temples, or at least two hearts
and an arrow; but, with this exception, there is nothing to wish
for, and a table could not be handsomer. As they arrive at this
conclusion, who should come in but Mr. John! to whom Jane says that
its only Anne from number six; and John says HE knows, for he's
often winked his eye down the area, which causes Anne to blush and
look confused. She is going away, indeed; when Mr. John will have
it that she must drink a glass of wine, and he says never mind it's
being early in the morning, it won't hurt her: so they shut the
door and pour out the wine; and Anne drinking lane's health, and
adding, 'and here's wishing you yours, Mr. John,' drinks it in a
great many sips,--Mr. John all the time making jokes appropriate to
the occasion. At last Mr. John, who has waxed bolder by degrees,
pleads the usage at weddings, and claims the privilege of a kiss,
which he obtains after a great scuffle; and footsteps being now
heard on the stairs, they disperse suddenly.

By this time a carriage has driven up to convey the bride to
church, and Anne of number six prolonging the process of 'cleaning
her door,' has the satisfaction of beholding the bride and
bridesmaids, and the papa and mamma, hurry into the same and drive
rapidly off. Nor is this all, for soon other carriages begin to
arrive with a posse of company all beautifully dressed, at whom she
could stand and gaze for ever; but having something else to do, is
compelled to take one last long look and shut the street-door.

And now the company have gone down to breakfast, and tears have
given place to smiles, for all the corks are out of the long-necked
bottles, and their contents are disappearing rapidly. Miss Emma's
papa is at the top of the table; Miss Emma's mamma at the bottom;
and beside the latter are Miss Emma herself and her husband,--
admitted on all hands to be the handsomest and most interesting
young couple ever known. All down both sides of the table, too,
are various young ladies, beautiful to see, and various young
gentlemen who seem to think so; and there, in a post of honour, is
an unmarried aunt of Miss Emma's, reported to possess unheard-of
riches, and to have expressed vast testamentary intentions
respecting her favourite niece and new nephew. This lady has been
very liberal and generous already, as the jewels worn by the bride
abundantly testify, but that is nothing to what she means to do, or
even to what she has done, for she put herself in close
communication with the dressmaker three months ago, and prepared a
wardrobe (with some articles worked by her own hands) fit for a
Princess. People may call her an old maid, and so she may be, but
she is neither cross nor ugly for all that; on the contrary, she is
very cheerful and pleasant-looking, and very kind and tender-
hearted: which is no matter of surprise except to those who yield
to popular prejudices without thinking why, and will never grow
wiser and never know better.

Of all the company though, none are more pleasant to behold or
better pleased with themselves than two young children, who, in
honour of the day, have seats among the guests. Of these, one is a
little fellow of six or eight years old, brother to the bride,--and
the other a girl of the same age, or something younger, whom he
calls 'his wife.' The real bride and bridegroom are not more
devoted than they: he all love and attention, and she all blushes
and fondness, toying with a little bouquet which he gave her this
morning, and placing the scattered rose-leaves in her bosom with
nature's own coquettishness. They have dreamt of each other in
their quiet dreams, these children, and their little hearts have
been nearly broken when the absent one has been dispraised in jest.
When will there come in after-life a passion so earnest, generous,
and true as theirs; what, even in its gentlest realities, can have
the grace and charm that hover round such fairy lovers!

By this time the merriment and happiness of the feast have gained
their height; certain ominous looks begin to be exchanged between
the bridesmaids, and somehow it gets whispered about that the
carriage which is to take the young couple into the country has
arrived. Such members of the party as are most disposed to prolong
its enjoyments, affect to consider this a false alarm, but it turns
out too true, being speedily confirmed, first by the retirement of
the bride and a select file of intimates who are to prepare her for
the journey, and secondly by the withdrawal of the ladies
generally. To this there ensues a particularly awkward pause, in
which everybody essays to be facetious, and nobody succeeds; at
length the bridegroom makes a mysterious disappearance in obedience
to some equally mysterious signal; and the table is deserted.

Now, for at least six weeks last past it has been solemnly devised
and settled that the young couple should go away in secret; but
they no sooner appear without the door than the drawing-room
windows are blocked up with ladies waving their handkerchiefs and
kissing their hands, and the dining-room panes with gentlemen's
faces beaming farewell in every queer variety of its expression.
The hall and steps are crowded with servants in white favours,
mixed up with particular friends and relations who have darted out
to say good-bye; and foremost in the group are the tiny lovers arm
in arm, thinking, with fluttering hearts, what happiness it would
be to dash away together in that gallant coach, and never part
again.

The bride has barely time for one hurried glance at her old home,
when the steps rattle, the door slams, the horses clatter on the
pavement, and they have left it far away.

A knot of women servants still remain clustered in the hall,
whispering among themselves, and there of course is Anne from
number six, who has made another escape on some plea or other, and
been an admiring witness of the departure. There are two points on
which Anne expatiates over and over again, without the smallest
appearance of fatigue or intending to leave off; one is, that she
'never see in all her life such a--oh such a angel of a gentleman
as Mr. Harvey'--and the other, that she 'can't tell how it is, but
it don't seem a bit like a work-a-day, or a Sunday neither--it's
all so unsettled and unregular.'


THE FORMAL COUPLE


The formal couple are the most prim, cold, immovable, and
unsatisfactory people on the face of the earth. Their faces,
voices, dress, house, furniture, walk, and manner, are all the
essence of formality, unrelieved by one redeeming touch of
frankness, heartiness, or nature.

Everything with the formal couple resolves itself into a matter of
form. They don't call upon you on your account, but their own; not
to see how you are, but to show how they are: it is not a ceremony
to do honour to you, but to themselves,--not due to your position,
but to theirs. If one of a friend's children die, the formal
couple are as sure and punctual in sending to the house as the
undertaker; if a friend's family be increased, the monthly nurse is
not more attentive than they. The formal couple, in fact, joyfully
seize all occasions of testifying their good-breeding and precise
observance of the little usages of society; and for you, who are
the means to this end, they care as much as a man does for the
tailor who has enabled him to cut a figure, or a woman for the
milliner who has assisted her to a conquest.

Having an extensive connexion among that kind of people who make
acquaintances and eschew friends, the formal gentleman attends from
time to time a great many funerals, to which he is formally
invited, and to which he formally goes, as returning a call for the
last time. Here his deportment is of the most faultless
description; he knows the exact pitch of voice it is proper to
assume, the sombre look he ought to wear, the melancholy tread
which should be his gait for the day. He is perfectly acquainted
with all the dreary courtesies to be observed in a mourning-coach;
knows when to sigh, and when to hide his nose in the white
handkerchief; and looks into the grave and shakes his head when the
ceremony is concluded, with the sad formality of a mute.

'What kind of funeral was it?' says the formal lady, when he
returns home. 'Oh!' replies the formal gentleman, 'there never was
such a gross and disgusting impropriety; there were no feathers.'
'No feathers!' cries the lady, as if on wings of black feathers
dead people fly to Heaven, and, lacking them, they must of
necessity go elsewhere. Her husband shakes his head; and further
adds, that they had seed-cake instead of plum-cake, and that it was
all white wine. 'All white wine!' exclaims his wife. 'Nothing but
sherry and madeira,' says the husband. 'What! no port?' 'Not a
drop.' No port, no plums, and no feathers! 'You will recollect,
my dear,' says the formal lady, in a voice of stately reproof,
'that when we first met this poor man who is now dead and gone, and
he took that very strange course of addressing me at dinner without
being previously introduced, I ventured to express my opinion that
the family were quite ignorant of etiquette, and very imperfectly
acquainted with the decencies of life. You have now had a good
opportunity of judging for yourself, and all I have to say is, that
I trust you will never go to a funeral THERE again.' 'My dear,'
replies the formal gentleman, 'I never will.' So the informal
deceased is cut in his grave; and the formal couple, when they tell
the story of the funeral, shake their heads, and wonder what some
people's feelings ARE made of, and what their notions of propriety
CAN be!

If the formal couple have a family (which they sometimes have),
they are not children, but little, pale, sour, sharp-nosed men and
women; and so exquisitely brought up, that they might be very old
dwarfs for anything that appeareth to the contrary. Indeed, they
are so acquainted with forms and conventionalities, and conduct
themselves with such strict decorum, that to see the little girl
break a looking-glass in some wild outbreak, or the little boy kick
his parents, would be to any visitor an unspeakable relief and
consolation.

The formal couple are always sticklers for what is rigidly proper,
and have a great readiness in detecting hidden impropriety of
speech or thought, which by less scrupulous people would be wholly
unsuspected. Thus, if they pay a visit to the theatre, they sit
all night in a perfect agony lest anything improper or immoral
should proceed from the stage; and if anything should happen to be
said which admits of a double construction, they never fail to take
it up directly, and to express by their looks the great outrage
which their feelings have sustained. Perhaps this is their chief
reason for absenting themselves almost entirely from places of
public amusement. They go sometimes to the Exhibition of the Royal
Academy;--but that is often more shocking than the stage itself,
and the formal lady thinks that it really is high time Mr. Etty was
prosecuted and made a public example of.

We made one at a christening party not long since, where there were
amongst the guests a formal couple, who suffered the acutest
torture from certain jokes, incidental to such an occasion, cut--
and very likely dried also--by one of the godfathers; a red-faced
elderly gentleman, who, being highly popular with the rest of the
company, had it all his own way, and was in great spirits. It was
at supper-time that this gentleman came out in full force. We--
being of a grave and quiet demeanour--had been chosen to escort the
formal lady down-stairs, and, sitting beside her, had a favourable
opportunity of observing her emotions.

We have a shrewd suspicion that, in the very beginning, and in the
first blush--literally the first blush--of the matter, the formal
lady had not felt quite certain whether the being present at such a
ceremony, and encouraging, as it were, the public exhibition of a
baby, was not an act involving some degree of indelicacy and
impropriety; but certain we are that when that baby's health was
drunk, and allusions were made, by a grey-headed gentleman
proposing it, to the time when he had dandled in his arms the young
Christian's mother,--certain we are that then the formal lady took
the alarm, and recoiled from the old gentleman as from a hoary
profligate. Still she bore it; she fanned herself with an
indignant air, but still she bore it. A comic song was sung,
involving a confession from some imaginary gentleman that he had
kissed a female, and yet the formal lady bore it. But when at
last, the health of the godfather before-mentioned being drunk, the
godfather rose to return thanks, and in the course of his
observations darkly hinted at babies yet unborn, and even
contemplated the possibility of the subject of that festival having
brothers and sisters, the formal lady could endure no more, but,
bowing slightly round, and sweeping haughtily past the offender,
left the room in tears, under the protection of the formal
gentleman.


THE LOVING COUPLE


There cannot be a better practical illustration of the wise saw and
ancient instance, that there may be too much of a good thing, than
is presented by a loving couple. Undoubtedly it is meet and proper
that two persons joined together in holy matrimony should be
loving, and unquestionably it is pleasant to know and see that they
are so; but there is a time for all things, and the couple who
happen to be always in a loving state before company, are well-nigh
intolerable.

And in taking up this position we would have it distinctly
understood that we do not seek alone the sympathy of bachelors, in
whose objection to loving couples we recognise interested motives
and personal considerations. We grant that to that unfortunate
class of society there may be something very irritating,
tantalising, and provoking, in being compelled to witness those
gentle endearments and chaste interchanges which to loving couples
are quite the ordinary business of life. But while we recognise
the natural character of the prejudice to which these unhappy men
are subject, we can neither receive their biassed evidence, nor
address ourself to their inflamed and angered minds. Dispassionate
experience is our only guide; and in these moral essays we seek no
less to reform hymeneal offenders than to hold out a timely warning
to all rising couples, and even to those who have not yet set forth
upon their pilgrimage towards the matrimonial market.

Let all couples, present or to come, therefore profit by the
example of Mr. and Mrs. Leaver, themselves a loving couple in the
first degree.

Mr. and Mrs. Leaver are pronounced by Mrs. Starling, a widow lady
who lost her husband when she was young, and lost herself about the
same-time--for by her own count she has never since grown five
years older--to be a perfect model of wedded felicity. 'You would
suppose,' says the romantic lady, 'that they were lovers only just
now engaged. Never was such happiness! They are so tender, so
affectionate, so attached to each other, so enamoured, that
positively nothing can be more charming!'

'Augusta, my soul,' says Mr. Leaver. 'Augustus, my life,' replies
Mrs. Leaver. 'Sing some little ballad, darling,' quoth Mr. Leaver.
'I couldn't, indeed, dearest,' returns Mrs. Leaver. 'Do, my dove,'
says Mr. Leaver. 'I couldn't possibly, my love,' replies Mrs.
Leaver; 'and it's very naughty of you to ask me.' 'Naughty,
darling!' cries Mr. Leaver. 'Yes, very naughty, and very cruel,'
returns Mrs. Leaver, 'for you know I have a sore throat, and that
to sing would give me great pain. You're a monster, and I hate
you. Go away!' Mrs. Leaver has said 'go away,' because Mr. Leaver
has tapped her under the chin: Mr. Leaver not doing as he is bid,
but on the contrary, sitting down beside her, Mrs. Leaver slaps Mr.
Leaver; and Mr. Leaver in return slaps Mrs. Leaver, and it being
now time for all persons present to look the other way, they look
the other way, and hear a still small sound as of kissing, at which
Mrs. Starling is thoroughly enraptured, and whispers her neighbour
that if all married couples were like that, what a heaven this
earth would be!

The loving couple are at home when this occurs, and maybe only
three or four friends are present, but, unaccustomed to reserve
upon this interesting point, they are pretty much the same abroad.
Indeed upon some occasions, such as a pic-nic or a water-party,
their lovingness is even more developed, as we had an opportunity
last summer of observing in person.

There was a great water-party made up to go to Twickenham and dine,
and afterwards dance in an empty villa by the river-side, hired
expressly for the purpose. Mr. and Mrs. Leaver were of the
company; and it was our fortune to have a seat in the same boat,
which was an eight-oared galley, manned by amateurs, with a blue
striped awning of the same pattern as their Guernsey shirts, and a
dingy red flag of the same shade as the whiskers of the stroke oar.
A coxswain being appointed, and all other matters adjusted, the
eight gentlemen threw themselves into strong paroxysms, and pulled
up with the tide, stimulated by the compassionate remarks of the
ladies, who one and all exclaimed, that it seemed an immense
exertion--as indeed it did. At first we raced the other boat,
which came alongside in gallant style; but this being found an
unpleasant amusement, as giving rise to a great quantity of
splashing, and rendering the cold pies and other viands very moist,
it was unanimously voted down, and we were suffered to shoot a-
head, while the second boat followed ingloriously in our wake.

It was at this time that we first recognised Mr. Leaver. There
were two firemen-watermen in the boat, lying by until somebody was
exhausted; and one of them, who had taken upon himself the
direction of affairs, was heard to cry in a gruff voice, 'Pull
away, number two--give it her, number two--take a longer reach,
number two--now, number two, sir, think you're winning a boat.'
The greater part of the company had no doubt begun to wonder which
of the striped Guernseys it might be that stood in need of such
encouragement, when a stifled shriek from Mrs. Leaver confirmed the
doubtful and informed the ignorant; and Mr. Leaver, still further
disguised in a straw hat and no neckcloth, was observed to be in a
fearful perspiration, and failing visibly. Nor was the general
consternation diminished at this instant by the same gentleman (in
the performance of an accidental aquatic feat, termed 'catching a
crab') plunging suddenly backward, and displaying nothing of
himself to the company, but two violently struggling legs. Mrs.
Leaver shrieked again several times, and cried piteously--'Is he
dead? Tell me the worst. Is he dead?'

Now, a moment's reflection might have convinced the loving wife,
that unless her husband were endowed with some most surprising
powers of muscular action, he never could be dead while he kicked
so hard; but still Mrs. Leaver cried, 'Is he dead? is he dead?' and
still everybody else cried--'No, no, no,' until such time as Mr.
Leaver was replaced in a sitting posture, and his oar (which had
been going through all kinds of wrong-headed performances on its
own account) was once more put in his hand, by the exertions of the
two firemen-watermen. Mr. Leaver then exclaimed, 'Augustus, my
child, come to me;' and Mr. Leaver said, 'Augusta, my love, compose
yourself, I am not injured.' But Mrs. Leaver cried again more
piteously than before, 'Augustus, my child, come to me;' and now
the company generally, who seemed to be apprehensive that if Mr.
Leaver remained where he was, he might contribute more than his
proper share towards the drowning of the party, disinterestedly
took part with Mrs. Leaver, and said he really ought to go, and
that he was not strong enough for such violent exercise, and ought
never to have undertaken it. Reluctantly, Mr. Leaver went, and
laid himself down at Mrs. Leaver's feet, and Mrs. Leaver stooping
over him, said, 'Oh Augustus, how could you terrify me so?' and Mr.
Leaver said, 'Augusta, my sweet, I never meant to terrify you;' and
Mrs. Leaver said, 'You are faint, my dear;' and Mr. Leaver said, 'I
am rather so, my love;' and they were very loving indeed under Mrs.
Leaver's veil, until at length Mr. Leaver came forth again, and
pleasantly asked if he had not heard something said about bottled
stout and sandwiches.

Mrs. Starling, who was one of the party, was perfectly delighted
with this scene, and frequently murmured half-aside, 'What a loving
couple you are!' or 'How delightful it is to see man and wife so
happy together!' To us she was quite poetical, (for we are a kind
of cousins,) observing that hearts beating in unison like that made
life a paradise of sweets; and that when kindred creatures were
drawn together by sympathies so fine and delicate, what more than
mortal happiness did not our souls partake! To all this we
answered 'Certainly,' or 'Very true,' or merely sighed, as the case
might be. At every new act of the loving couple, the widow's
admiration broke out afresh; and when Mrs. Leaver would not permit
Mr. Leaver to keep his hat off, lest the sun should strike to his
head, and give him a brain fever, Mrs. Starling actually shed
tears, and said it reminded her of Adam and Eve.

The loving couple were thus loving all the way to Twickenham, but
when we arrived there (by which time the amateur crew looked very
thirsty and vicious) they were more playful than ever, for Mrs.
Leaver threw stones at Mr. Leaver, and Mr. Leaver ran after Mrs.
Leaver on the grass, in a most innocent and enchanting manner. At
dinner, too, Mr. Leaver WOULD steal Mrs. Leaver's tongue, and Mrs.
Leaver WOULD retaliate upon Mr. Leaver's fowl; and when Mrs. Leaver
was going to take some lobster salad, Mr. Leaver wouldn't let her
have any, saying that it made her ill, and she was always sorry for
it afterwards, which afforded Mrs. Leaver an opportunity of
pretending to be cross, and showing many other prettinesses. But
this was merely the smiling surface of their loves, not the mighty
depths of the stream, down to which the company, to say the truth,
dived rather unexpectedly, from the following accident. It chanced
that Mr. Leaver took upon himself to propose the bachelors who had
first originated the notion of that entertainment, in doing which,
he affected to regret that he was no longer of their body himself,
and pretended grievously to lament his fallen state. This Mrs.
Leaver's feelings could not brook, even in jest, and consequently,
exclaiming aloud, 'He loves me not, he loves me not!' she fell in a
very pitiable state into the arms of Mrs. Starling, and, directly
becoming insensible, was conveyed by that lady and her husband into
another room. Presently Mr. Leaver came running back to know if
there was a medical gentleman in company, and as there was, (in
what company is there not?) both Mr. Leaver and the medical
gentleman hurried away together.

The medical gentleman was the first who returned, and among his
intimate friends he was observed to laugh and wink, and look as
unmedical as might be; but when Mr. Leaver came back he was very
solemn, and in answer to all inquiries, shook his head, and
remarked that Augusta was far too sensitive to be trifled with--an
opinion which the widow subsequently confirmed. Finding that she
was in no imminent peril, however, the rest of the party betook
themselves to dancing on the green, and very merry and happy they
were, and a vast quantity of flirtation there was; the last
circumstance being no doubt attributable, partly to the fineness of
the weather, and partly to the locality, which is well known to be
favourable to all harmless recreations.

In the bustle of the scene, Mr. and Mrs. Leaver stole down to the
boat, and disposed themselves under the awning, Mrs. Leaver
reclining her head upon Mr. Leaver's shoulder, and Mr. Leaver
grasping her hand with great fervour, and looking in her face from
time to time with a melancholy and sympathetic aspect. The widow
sat apart, feigning to be occupied with a book, but stealthily
observing them from behind her fan; and the two firemen-watermen,
smoking their pipes on the bank hard by, nudged each other, and
grinned in enjoyment of the joke. Very few of the party missed the
loving couple; and the few who did, heartily congratulated each
other on their disappearance.


THE CONTRADICTORY COUPLE


One would suppose that two people who are to pass their whole lives
together, and must necessarily be very often alone with each other,
could find little pleasure in mutual contradiction; and yet what is
more common than a contradictory couple?

The contradictory couple agree in nothing but contradiction. They
return home from Mrs. Bluebottle's dinner-party, each in an
opposite corner of the coach, and do not exchange a syllable until
they have been seated for at least twenty minutes by the fireside
at home, when the gentleman, raising his eyes from the stove, all
at once breaks silence:

'What a very extraordinary thing it is,' says he, 'that you WILL
contradict, Charlotte!' '_I_ contradict!' cries the lady, 'but
that's just like you.' 'What's like me?' says the gentleman
sharply. 'Saying that I contradict you,' replies the lady. 'Do
you mean to say that you do NOT contradict me?' retorts the
gentleman; 'do you mean to say that you have not been contradicting
me the whole of this day?' 'Do you mean to tell me now, that you
have not? I mean to tell you nothing of the kind,' replies the
lady quietly; 'when you are wrong, of course I shall contradict
you.'

During this dialogue the gentleman has been taking his brandy-and-
water on one side of the fire, and the lady, with her dressing-case
on the table, has been curling her hair on the other. She now lets
down her back hair, and proceeds to brush it; preserving at the
same time an air of conscious rectitude and suffering virtue, which
is intended to exasperate the gentleman--and does so.

'I do believe,' he says, taking the spoon out of his glass, and
tossing it on the table, 'that of all the obstinate, positive,
wrong-headed creatures that were ever born, you are the most so,
Charlotte.' 'Certainly, certainly, have it your own way, pray.
You see how much _I_ contradict you,' rejoins the lady. 'Of
course, you didn't contradict me at dinner-time--oh no, not you!'
says the gentleman. 'Yes, I did,' says the lady. 'Oh, you did,'
cries the gentleman 'you admit that?' 'If you call that
contradiction, I do,' the lady answers; 'and I say again, Edward,
that when I know you are wrong, I will contradict you. I am not
your slave.' 'Not my slave!' repeats the gentleman bitterly; 'and
you still mean to say that in the Blackburns' new house there are
not more than fourteen doors, including the door of the wine-
cellar!' 'I mean to say,' retorts the lady, beating time with her
hair-brush on the palm of her hand, 'that in that house there are
fourteen doors and no more.' 'Well then--' cries the gentleman,
rising in despair, and pacing the room with rapid strides. 'By G-,
this is enough to destroy a man's intellect, and drive him mad!'

By and by the gentleman comes-to a little, and passing his hand
gloomily across his forehead, reseats himself in his former chair.
There is a long silence, and this time the lady begins. 'I
appealed to Mr. Jenkins, who sat next to me on the sofa in the
drawing-room during tea--' 'Morgan, you mean,' interrupts the
gentleman. 'I do not mean anything of the kind,' answers the lady.
'Now, by all that is aggravating and impossible to bear,' cries the
gentleman, clenching his hands and looking upwards in agony, 'she
is going to insist upon it that Morgan is Jenkins!' 'Do you take
me for a perfect fool?' exclaims the lady; 'do you suppose I don't
know the one from the other? Do you suppose I don't know that the
man in the blue coat was Mr. Jenkins?' 'Jenkins in a blue coat!'
cries the gentleman with a groan; 'Jenkins in a blue coat! a man
who would suffer death rather than wear anything but brown!' 'Do
you dare to charge me with telling an untruth?' demands the lady,
bursting into tears. 'I charge you, ma'am,' retorts the gentleman,
starting up, 'with being a monster of contradiction, a monster of
aggravation, a--a--a--Jenkins in a blue coat!--what have I done
that I should be doomed to hear such statements!'

Expressing himself with great scorn and anguish, the gentleman
takes up his candle and stalks off to bed, where feigning to be
fast asleep when the lady comes up-stairs drowned in tears,
murmuring lamentations over her hard fate and indistinct intentions
of consulting her brothers, he undergoes the secret torture of
hearing her exclaim between whiles, 'I know there are only fourteen
doors in the house, I know it was Mr. Jenkins, I know he had a blue
coat on, and I would say it as positively as I do now, if they were
the last words I had to speak!'

If the contradictory couple are blessed with children, they are not
the less contradictory on that account. Master James and Miss
Charlotte present themselves after dinner, and being in perfect
good humour, and finding their parents in the same amiable state,
augur from these appearances half a glass of wine a-piece and other
extraordinary indulgences. But unfortunately Master James, growing
talkative upon such prospects, asks his mamma how tall Mrs. Parsons
is, and whether she is not six feet high; to which his mamma
replies, 'Yes, she should think she was, for Mrs. Parsons is a very
tall lady indeed; quite a giantess.' 'For Heaven's sake,
Charlotte,' cries her husband, 'do not tell the child such
preposterous nonsense. Six feet high!' 'Well,' replies the lady,
'surely I may be permitted to have an opinion; my opinion is, that
she is six feet high--at least six feet.' 'Now you know,
Charlotte,' retorts the gentleman sternly, 'that that is NOT your
opinion--that you have no such idea--and that you only say this for
the sake of contradiction.' 'You are exceedingly polite,' his wife
replies; 'to be wrong about such a paltry question as anybody's
height, would be no great crime; but I say again, that I believe
Mrs. Parsons to be six feet--more than six feet; nay, I believe you
know her to be full six feet, and only say she is not, because I
say she is.' This taunt disposes the gentleman to become violent,
but he cheeks himself, and is content to mutter, in a haughty tone,
'Six feet--ha! ha! Mrs. Parsons six feet!' and the lady answers,
'Yes, six feet. I am sure I am glad you are amused, and I'll say
it again--six feet.' Thus the subject gradually drops off, and the
contradiction begins to be forgotten, when Master James, with some
undefined notion of making himself agreeable, and putting things to
rights again, unfortunately asks his mamma what the moon's made of;
which gives her occasion to say that he had better not ask her, for
she is always wrong and never can be right; that he only exposes
her to contradiction by asking any question of her; and that he had
better ask his papa, who is infallible, and never can be wrong.
Papa, smarting under this attack, gives a terrible pull at the
bell, and says, that if the conversation is to proceed in this way,
the children had better be removed. Removed they are, after a few
tears and many struggles; and Pa having looked at Ma sideways for a
minute or two, with a baleful eye, draws his pocket-handkerchief
over his face, and composes himself for his after-dinner nap.

The friends of the contradictory couple often deplore their
frequent disputes, though they rather make light of them at the
same time: observing, that there is no doubt they are very much
attached to each other, and that they never quarrel except about
trifles. But neither the friends of the contradictory couple, nor
the contradictory couple themselves, reflect, that as the most
stupendous objects in nature are but vast collections of minute
particles, so the slightest and least considered trifles make up
the sum of human happiness or misery.


THE COUPLE WHO DOTE UPON THEIR CHILDREN


The couple who dote upon their children have usually a great many
of them: six or eight at least. The children are either the
healthiest in all the world, or the most unfortunate in existence.
In either case, they are equally the theme of their doting parents,
and equally a source of mental anguish and irritation to their
doting parents' friends.

The couple who dote upon their children recognise no dates but
those connected with their births, accidents, illnesses, or
remarkable deeds. They keep a mental almanack with a vast number
of Innocents'-days, all in red letters. They recollect the last
coronation, because on that day little Tom fell down the kitchen
stairs; the anniversary of the Gunpowder Plot, because it was on
the fifth of November that Ned asked whether wooden legs were made
in heaven and cocked hats grew in gardens. Mrs. Whiffler will
never cease to recollect the last day of the old year as long as
she lives, for it was on that day that the baby had the four red
spots on its nose which they took for measles: nor Christmas-day,
for twenty-one days after Christmas-day the twins were born; nor
Good Friday, for it was on a Good Friday that she was frightened by
the donkey-cart when she was in the family way with Georgiana. The
movable feasts have no motion for Mr. and Mrs. Whiffler, but remain
pinned down tight and fast to the shoulders of some small child,
from whom they can never be separated any more. Time was made,
according to their creed, not for slaves but for girls and boys;
the restless sands in his glass are but little children at play.

As we have already intimated, the children of this couple can know
no medium. They are either prodigies of good health or prodigies
of bad health; whatever they are, they must be prodigies. Mr.
Whiffler must have to describe at his office such excruciating
agonies constantly undergone by his eldest boy, as nobody else's
eldest boy ever underwent; or he must be able to declare that there
never was a child endowed with such amazing health, such an
indomitable constitution, and such a cast-iron frame, as his child.
His children must be, in some respect or other, above and beyond
the children of all other people. To such an extent is this
feeling pushed, that we were once slightly acquainted with a lady
and gentleman who carried their heads so high and became so proud
after their youngest child fell out of a two-pair-of-stairs window
without hurting himself much, that the greater part of their
friends were obliged to forego their acquaintance. But perhaps
this may be an extreme case, and one not justly entitled to be
considered as a precedent of general application.

If a friend happen to dine in a friendly way with one of these
couples who dote upon their children, it is nearly impossible for
him to divert the conversation from their favourite topic.
Everything reminds Mr. Whiffler of Ned, or Mrs. Whiffler of Mary
Anne, or of the time before Ned was born, or the time before Mary
Anne was thought of. The slightest remark, however harmless in
itself, will awaken slumbering recollections of the twins. It is
impossible to steer clear of them. They will come uppermost, let
the poor man do what he may. Ned has been known to be lost sight
of for half an hour, Dick has been forgotten, the name of Mary Anne
has not been mentioned, but the twins will out. Nothing can keep
down the twins.

'It's a very extraordinary thing, Saunders,' says Mr. Whiffler to
the visitor, 'but--you have seen our little babies, the--the--
twins?' The friend's heart sinks within him as he answers, 'Oh,
yes--often.' 'Your talking of the Pyramids,' says Mr. Whiffler,
quite as a matter of course, 'reminds me of the twins. It's a very
extraordinary thing about those babies--what colour should you say
their eyes were?' 'Upon my word,' the friend stammers, 'I hardly
know how to answer'--the fact being, that except as the friend does
not remember to have heard of any departure from the ordinary
course of nature in the instance of these twins, they might have no
eyes at all for aught he has observed to the contrary. 'You
wouldn't say they were red, I suppose?' says Mr. Whiffler. The
friend hesitates, and rather thinks they are; but inferring from
the expression of Mr. Whiffler's face that red is not the colour,
smiles with some confidence, and says, 'No, no! very different from
that.' 'What should you say to blue?' says Mr. Whiffler. The
friend glances at him, and observing a different expression in his
face, ventures to say, 'I should say they WERE blue--a decided
blue.' 'To be sure!' cries Mr. Whiffler, triumphantly, 'I knew you
would! But what should you say if I was to tell you that the boy's
eyes are blue and the girl's hazel, eh?' 'Impossible!' exclaims
the friend, not at all knowing why it should be impossible. 'A
fact, notwithstanding,' cries Mr. Whiffler; 'and let me tell you,
Saunders, THAT'S not a common thing in twins, or a circumstance
that'll happen every day.'

In this dialogue Mrs. Whiffler, as being deeply responsible for the
twins, their charms and singularities, has taken no share; but she
now relates, in broken English, a witticism of little Dick's
bearing upon the subject just discussed, which delights Mr.
Whiffler beyond measure, and causes him to declare that he would
have sworn that was Dick's if he had heard it anywhere. Then he
requests that Mrs. Whiffler will tell Saunders what Tom said about
mad bulls; and Mrs. Whiffler relating the anecdote, a discussion
ensues upon the different character of Tom's wit and Dick's wit,
from which it appears that Dick's humour is of a lively turn, while
Tom's style is the dry and caustic. This discussion being
enlivened by various illustrations, lasts a long time, and is only
stopped by Mrs. Whiffler instructing the footman to ring the
nursery bell, as the children were promised that they should come
down and taste the pudding.

The friend turns pale when this order is given, and paler still
when it is followed up by a great pattering on the staircase, (not
unlike the sound of rain upon a skylight,) a violent bursting open
of the dining-room door, and the tumultuous appearance of six small
children, closely succeeded by a strong nursery-maid with a twin in
each arm. As the whole eight are screaming, shouting, or kicking--
some influenced by a ravenous appetite, some by a horror of the
stranger, and some by a conflict of the two feelings--a pretty long
space elapses before all their heads can be ranged round the table
and anything like order restored; in bringing about which happy
state of things both the nurse and footman are severely scratched.
At length Mrs. Whiffler is heard to say, 'Mr. Saunders, shall I
give you some pudding?' A breathless silence ensues, and sixteen
small eyes are fixed upon the guest in expectation of his reply. A
wild shout of joy proclaims that he has said 'No, thank you.'
Spoons are waved in the air, legs appear above the table-cloth in
uncontrollable ecstasy, and eighty short fingers dabble in damson
syrup.

While the pudding is being disposed of, Mr. and Mrs. Whiffler look
on with beaming countenances, and Mr. Whiffler nudging his friend
Saunders, begs him to take notice of Tom's eyes, or Dick's chin, or
Ned's nose, or Mary Anne's hair, or Emily's figure, or little Bob's
calves, or Fanny's mouth, or Carry's head, as the case may be.
Whatever the attention of Mr. Saunders is called to, Mr. Saunders
admires of course; though he is rather confused about the sex of
the youngest branches and looks at the wrong children, turning to a
girl when Mr. Whiffler directs his attention to a boy, and falling
into raptures with a boy when he ought to be enchanted with a girl.
Then the dessert comes, and there is a vast deal of scrambling
after fruit, and sudden spirting forth of juice out of tight
oranges into infant eyes, and much screeching and wailing in
consequence. At length it becomes time for Mrs. Whiffler to
retire, and all the children are by force of arms compelled to kiss
and love Mr. Saunders before going up-stairs, except Tom, who,
lying on his back in the hall, proclaims that Mr. Saunders 'is a
naughty beast;' and Dick, who having drunk his father's wine when
he was looking another way, is found to be intoxicated and is
carried out, very limp and helpless.

Mr. Whiffler and his friend are left alone together, but Mr.
Whiffler's thoughts are still with his family, if his family are
not with him. 'Saunders,' says he, after a short silence, 'if you
please, we'll drink Mrs. Whiffler and the children.' Mr. Saunders
feels this to be a reproach against himself for not proposing the
same sentiment, and drinks it in some confusion. 'Ah!' Mr.
Whiffler sighs, 'these children, Saunders, make one quite an old
man.' Mr. Saunders thinks that if they were his, they would make
him a very old man; but he says nothing. 'And yet,' pursues Mr.
Whiffler, 'what can equal domestic happiness? what can equal the
engaging ways of children! Saunders, why don't you get married?'
Now, this is an embarrassing question, because Mr. Saunders has
been thinking that if he had at any time entertained matrimonial
designs, the revelation of that day would surely have routed them
for ever. 'I am glad, however,' says Mr. Whiffler, 'that you ARE a
bachelor,--glad on one account, Saunders; a selfish one, I admit.
Will you do Mrs. Whiffler and myself a favour?' Mr. Saunders is
surprised--evidently surprised; but he replies, 'with the greatest
pleasure.' 'Then, will you, Saunders,' says Mr. Whiffler, in an
impressive manner, 'will you cement and consolidate our friendship
by coming into the family (so to speak) as a godfather?' 'I shall
be proud and delighted,' replies Mr. Saunders: 'which of the
children is it? really, I thought they were all christened; or--'
'Saunders,' Mr. Whiffler interposes, 'they ARE all christened; you
are right. The fact is, that Mrs. Whiffler is--in short, we expect
another.' 'Not a ninth!' cries the friend, all aghast at the idea.
'Yes, Saunders,' rejoins Mr. Whiffler, solemnly, 'a ninth. Did we
drink Mrs. Whiffler's health? Let us drink it again, Saunders, and
wish her well over it!'

Doctor Johnson used to tell a story of a man who had but one idea,
which was a wrong one. The couple who dote upon their children are
in the same predicament: at home or abroad, at all times, and in
all places, their thoughts are bound up in this one subject, and
have no sphere beyond. They relate the clever things their
offspring say or do, and weary every company with their prolixity
and absurdity. Mr. Whiffler takes a friend by the button at a
street corner on a windy day to tell him a bon mot of his youngest
boy's; and Mrs. Whiffler, calling to see a sick acquaintance,
entertains her with a cheerful account of all her own past
sufferings and present expectations. In such cases the sins of the
fathers indeed descend upon the children; for people soon come to
regard them as predestined little bores. The couple who dote upon
their children cannot be said to be actuated by a general love for
these engaging little people (which would be a great excuse); for
they are apt to underrate and entertain a jealousy of any children
but their own. If they examined their own hearts, they would,
perhaps, find at the bottom of all this, more self-love and egotism
than they think of. Self-love and egotism are bad qualities, of
which the unrestrained exhibition, though it may be sometimes
amusing, never fails to be wearisome and unpleasant. Couples who
dote upon their children, therefore, are best avoided.


THE COOL COUPLE


There is an old-fashioned weather-glass representing a house with
two doorways, in one of which is the figure of a gentleman, in the
other the figure of a lady. When the weather is to be fine the
lady comes out and the gentleman goes in; when wet, the gentleman
comes out and the lady goes in. They never seek each other's
society, are never elevated and depressed by the same cause, and
have nothing in common. They are the model of a cool couple,
except that there is something of politeness and consideration
about the behaviour of the gentleman in the weather-glass, in
which, neither of the cool couple can be said to participate.

The cool couple are seldom alone together, and when they are,
nothing can exceed their apathy and dulness: the gentleman being
for the most part drowsy, and the lady silent. If they enter into
conversation, it is usually of an ironical or recriminatory nature.
Thus, when the gentleman has indulged in a very long yawn and
settled himself more snugly in his easy-chair, the lady will
perhaps remark, 'Well, I am sure, Charles! I hope you're
comfortable.' To which the gentleman replies, 'Oh yes, he's quite
comfortable quite.' 'There are not many married men, I hope,'
returns the lady, 'who seek comfort in such selfish gratifications
as you do.' 'Nor many wives who seek comfort in such selfish
gratifications as YOU do, I hope,' retorts the gentleman. 'Whose
fault is that?' demands the lady. The gentleman becoming more
sleepy, returns no answer. 'Whose fault is that?' the lady
repeats. The gentleman still returning no answer, she goes on to
say that she believes there never was in all this world anybody so
attached to her home, so thoroughly domestic, so unwilling to seek
a moment's gratification or pleasure beyond her own fireside as
she. God knows that before she was married she never thought or
dreamt of such a thing; and she remembers that her poor papa used
to say again and again, almost every day of his life, 'Oh, my dear
Louisa, if you only marry a man who understands you, and takes the
trouble to consider your happiness and accommodate himself a very
little to your disposition, what a treasure he will find in you!'
She supposes her papa knew what her disposition was--he had known
her long enough--he ought to have been acquainted with it, but what
can she do? If her home is always dull and lonely, and her husband
is always absent and finds no pleasure in her society, she is
naturally sometimes driven (seldom enough, she is sure) to seek a
little recreation elsewhere; she is not expected to pine and mope
to death, she hopes. 'Then come, Louisa,' says the gentleman,
waking up as suddenly as he fell asleep, 'stop at home this
evening, and so will I.' 'I should be sorry to suppose, Charles,
that you took a pleasure in aggravating me,' replies the lady; 'but
you know as well as I do that I am particularly engaged to Mrs.
Mortimer, and that it would be an act of the grossest rudeness and
ill-breeding, after accepting a seat in her box and preventing her
from inviting anybody else, not to go.' 'Ah! there it is!' says
the gentleman, shrugging his shoulders, 'I knew that perfectly
well. I knew you couldn't devote an evening to your own home. Now
all I have to say, Louisa, is this--recollect that _I_ was quite
willing to stay at home, and that it's no fault of MINE we are not
oftener together.'

With that the gentleman goes away to keep an old appointment at his
club, and the lady hurries off to dress for Mrs. Mortimer's; and
neither thinks of the other until by some odd chance they find
themselves alone again.

But it must not be supposed that the cool couple are habitually a
quarrelsome one. Quite the contrary. These differences are only
occasions for a little self-excuse,--nothing more. In general they
are as easy and careless, and dispute as seldom, as any common
acquaintances may; for it is neither worth their while to put each
other out of the way, nor to ruffle themselves.

When they meet in society, the cool couple are the best-bred people
in existence. The lady is seated in a corner among a little knot
of lady friends, one of whom exclaims, 'Why, I vow and declare
there is your husband, my dear!' 'Whose?--mine?' she says,
carelessly. 'Ay, yours, and coming this way too.' 'How very odd!'
says the lady, in a languid tone, 'I thought he had been at Dover.'
The gentleman coming up, and speaking to all the other ladies and
nodding slightly to his wife, it turns out that he has been at
Dover, and has just now returned. 'What a strange creature you
are!' cries his wife; 'and what on earth brought you here, I
wonder?' 'I came to look after you, OF COURSE,' rejoins her
husband. This is so pleasant a jest that the lady is mightily
amused, as are all the other ladies similarly situated who are
within hearing; and while they are enjoying it to the full, the
gentleman nods again, turns upon his heel, and saunters away.

There are times, however, when his company is not so agreeable,
though equally unexpected; such as when the lady has invited one or
two particular friends to tea and scandal, and he happens to come
home in the very midst of their diversion. It is a hundred chances
to one that he remains in the house half an hour, but the lady is
rather disturbed by the intrusion, notwithstanding, and reasons
within herself,--'I am sure I never interfere with him, and why
should he interfere with me? It can scarcely be accidental; it
never happens that I have a particular reason for not wishing him
to come home, but he always comes. It's very provoking and
tiresome; and I am sure when he leaves me so much alone for his own
pleasure, the least he could do would be to do as much for mine.'
Observing what passes in her mind, the gentleman, who has come home
for his own accommodation, makes a merit of it with himself;
arrives at the conclusion that it is the very last place in which
he can hope to be comfortable; and determines, as he takes up his
hat and cane, never to be so virtuous again.

Thus a great many cool couples go on until they are cold couples,
and the grave has closed over their folly and indifference. Loss
of name, station, character, life itself, has ensued from causes as
slight as these, before now; and when gossips tell such tales, and
aggravate their deformities, they elevate their hands and eyebrows,
and call each other to witness what a cool couple Mr. and Mrs. So-
and-so always were, even in the best of times.


THE PLAUSIBLE COUPLE


The plausible couple have many titles. They are 'a delightful
couple,' an 'affectionate couple,' 'a most agreeable couple, 'a
good-hearted couple,' and 'the best-natured couple in existence.'
The truth is, that the plausible couple are people of the world;
and either the way of pleasing the world has grown much easier than
it was in the days of the old man and his ass, or the old man was
but a bad hand at it, and knew very little of the trade.

'But is it really possible to please the world!' says some doubting
reader. It is indeed. Nay, it is not only very possible, but very
easy. The ways are crooked, and sometimes foul and low. What
then? A man need but crawl upon his hands and knees, know when to
close his eyes and when his ears, when to stoop and when to stand
upright; and if by the world is meant that atom of it in which he
moves himself, he shall please it, never fear.

Now, it will be readily seen, that if a plausible man or woman have
an easy means of pleasing the world by an adaptation of self to all
its twistings and twinings, a plausible man AND woman, or, in other
words, a plausible couple, playing into each other's hands, and
acting in concert, have a manifest advantage. Hence it is that
plausible couples scarcely ever fail of success on a pretty large
scale; and hence it is that if the reader, laying down this
unwieldy volume at the next full stop, will have the goodness to
review his or her circle of acquaintance, and to search
particularly for some man and wife with a large connexion and a
good name, not easily referable to their abilities or their wealth,
he or she (that is, the male or female reader) will certainly find
that gentleman or lady, on a very short reflection, to be a
plausible couple.

The plausible couple are the most ecstatic people living: the most
sensitive people--to merit--on the face of the earth. Nothing
clever or virtuous escapes them. They have microscopic eyes for
such endowments, and can find them anywhere. The plausible couple
never fawn--oh no! They don't even scruple to tell their friends
of their faults. One is too generous, another too candid; a third
has a tendency to think all people like himself, and to regard
mankind as a company of angels; a fourth is kind-hearted to a
fault. 'We never flatter, my dear Mrs. Jackson,' say the plausible
couple; 'we speak our minds. Neither you nor Mr. Jackson have
faults enough. It may sound strangely, but it is true. You have
not faults enough. You know our way,--we must speak out, and
always do. Quarrel with us for saying so, if you will; but we
repeat it,--you have not faults enough!'

The plausible couple are no less plausible to each other than to
third parties. They are always loving and harmonious. The
plausible gentleman calls his wife 'darling,' and the plausible
lady addresses him as 'dearest.' If it be Mr. and Mrs. Bobtail
Widger, Mrs. Widger is 'Lavinia, darling,' and Mr. Widger is
'Bobtail, dearest.' Speaking of each other, they observe the same
tender form. Mrs. Widger relates what 'Bobtail' said, and Mr.
Widger recounts what 'darling' thought and did.

If you sit next to the plausible lady at a dinner-table, she takes
the earliest opportunity of expressing her belief that you are
acquainted with the Clickits; she is sure she has heard the
Clickits speak of you--she must not tell you in what terms, or you
will take her for a flatterer. You admit a knowledge of the
Clickits; the plausible lady immediately launches out in their
praise. She quite loves the Clickits. Were there ever such true-
hearted, hospitable, excellent people--such a gentle, interesting
little woman as Mrs. Clickit, or such a frank, unaffected creature
as Mr. Clickit? were there ever two people, in short, so little
spoiled by the world as they are? 'As who, darling?' cries Mr.
Widger, from the opposite side of the table. 'The Clickits,
dearest,' replies Mrs. Widger. 'Indeed you are right, darling,'
Mr. Widger rejoins; 'the Clickits are a very high-minded, worthy,
estimable couple.' Mrs. Widger remarking that Bobtail always grows
quite eloquent upon this subject, Mr. Widger admits that he feels
very strongly whenever such people as the Clickits and some other
friends of his (here he glances at the host and hostess) are
mentioned; for they are an honour to human nature, and do one good
to think of. 'YOU know the Clickits, Mrs. Jackson?' he says,
addressing the lady of the house. 'No, indeed; we have not that
pleasure,' she replies. 'You astonish me!' exclaims Mr. Widger:
'not know the Clickits! why, you are the very people of all others
who ought to be their bosom friends. You are kindred beings; you
are one and the same thing:- not know the Clickits! Now WILL you
know the Clickits? Will you make a point of knowing them? Will
you meet them in a friendly way at our house one evening, and be
acquainted with them?' Mrs. Jackson will be quite delighted;
nothing would give her more pleasure. 'Then, Lavinia, my darling,'
says Mr. Widger, 'mind you don't lose sight of that; now, pray take
care that Mr. and Mrs. Jackson know the Clickits without loss of
time. Such people ought not to be strangers to each other.' Mrs.
Widger books both families as the centre of attraction for her next
party; and Mr. Widger, going on to expatiate upon the virtues of
the Clickits, adds to their other moral qualities, that they keep
one of the neatest phaetons in town, and have two thousand a year.

As the plausible couple never laud the merits of any absent person,
without dexterously contriving that their praises shall reflect
upon somebody who is present, so they never depreciate anything or
anybody, without turning their depreciation to the same account.
Their friend, Mr. Slummery, say they, is unquestionably a clever
painter, and would no doubt be very popular, and sell his pictures
at a very high price, if that cruel Mr. Fithers had not forestalled
him in his department of art, and made it thoroughly and completely
his own;--Fithers, it is to be observed, being present and within
hearing, and Slummery elsewhere. Is Mrs. Tabblewick really as
beautiful as people say? Why, there indeed you ask them a very
puzzling question, because there is no doubt that she is a very
charming woman, and they have long known her intimately. She is no
doubt beautiful, very beautiful; they once thought her the most
beautiful woman ever seen; still if you press them for an honest
answer, they are bound to say that this was before they had ever
seen our lovely friend on the sofa, (the sofa is hard by, and our
lovely friend can't help hearing the whispers in which this is
said;) since that time, perhaps, they have been hardly fair judges;
Mrs. Tabblewick is no doubt extremely handsome,--very like our
friend, in fact, in the form of the features,--but in point of
expression, and soul, and figure, and air altogether--oh dear!

But while the plausible couple depreciate, they are still careful
to preserve their character for amiability and kind feeling; indeed
the depreciation itself is often made to grow out of their
excessive sympathy and good will. The plausible lady calls on a
lady who dotes upon her children, and is sitting with a little girl
upon her knee, enraptured by her artless replies, and protesting
that there is nothing she delights in so much as conversing with
these fairies; when the other lady inquires if she has seen young
Mrs. Finching lately, and whether the baby has turned out a finer
one than it promised to be. 'Oh dear!' cries the plausible lady,
'you cannot think how often Bobtail and I have talked about poor
Mrs. Finching--she is such a dear soul, and was so anxious that the
baby should be a fine child--and very naturally, because she was
very much here at one time, and there is, you know, a natural
emulation among mothers--that it is impossible to tell you how much
we have felt for her.' 'Is it weak or plain, or what?' inquires
the other. 'Weak or plain, my love,' returns the plausible lady,
'it's a fright--a perfect little fright; you never saw such a
miserable creature in all your days. Positively you must not let
her see one of these beautiful dears again, or you'll break her
heart, you will indeed.--Heaven bless this child, see how she is
looking in my face! can you conceive anything prettier than that?
If poor Mrs. Finching could only hope--but that's impossible--and
the gifts of Providence, you know--What DID I do with my pocket-
handkerchief!'

What prompts the mother, who dotes upon her children, to comment to
her lord that evening on the plausible lady's engaging qualities
and feeling heart, and what is it that procures Mr. and Mrs.
Bobtail Widger an immediate invitation to dinner?


THE NICE LITTLE COUPLE


A custom once prevailed in old-fashioned circles, that when a lady
or gentleman was unable to sing a song, he or she should enliven
the company with a story. As we find ourself in the predicament of
not being able to describe (to our own satisfaction) nice little
couples in the abstract, we purpose telling in this place a little
story about a nice little couple of our acquaintance.

Mr. and Mrs. Chirrup are the nice little couple in question. Mr.
Chirrup has the smartness, and something of the brisk, quick manner
of a small bird. Mrs. Chirrup is the prettiest of all little
women, and has the prettiest little figure conceivable. She has
the neatest little foot, and the softest little voice, and the
pleasantest little smile, and the tidiest little curls, and the
brightest little eyes, and the quietest little manner, and is, in
short, altogether one of the most engaging of all little women,
dead or alive. She is a condensation of all the domestic virtues,-
-a pocket edition of the young man's best companion,--a little
woman at a very high pressure, with an amazing quantity of goodness
and usefulness in an exceedingly small space. Little as she is,
Mrs. Chirrup might furnish forth matter for the moral equipment of
a score of housewives, six feet high in their stockings--if, in the
presence of ladies, we may be allowed the expression--and of
corresponding robustness.

Nobody knows all this better than Mr. Chirrup, though he rather
takes on that he don't. Accordingly he is very proud of his
better-half, and evidently considers himself, as all other people
consider him, rather fortunate in having her to wife. We say
evidently, because Mr. Chirrup is a warm-hearted little fellow; and
if you catch his eye when he has been slyly glancing at Mrs.
Chirrup in company, there is a certain complacent twinkle in it,
accompanied, perhaps, by a half-expressed toss of the head, which
as clearly indicates what has been passing in his mind as if he had
put it into words, and shouted it out through a speaking-trumpet.
Moreover, Mr. Chirrup has a particularly mild and bird-like manner
of calling Mrs. Chirrup 'my dear;' and--for he is of a jocose turn-
-of cutting little witticisms upon her, and making her the subject
of various harmless pleasantries, which nobody enjoys more
thoroughly than Mrs. Chirrup herself. Mr. Chirrup, too, now and
then affects to deplore his bachelor-days, and to bemoan (with a
marvellously contented and smirking face) the loss of his freedom,
and the sorrow of his heart at having been taken captive by Mrs.
Chirrup--all of which circumstances combine to show the secret
triumph and satisfaction of Mr. Chirrup's soul.

We have already had occasion to observe that Mrs. Chirrup is an
incomparable housewife. In all the arts of domestic arrangement
and management, in all the mysteries of confectionery-making,
pickling, and preserving, never was such a thorough adept as that
nice little body. She is, besides, a cunning worker in muslin and
fine linen, and a special hand at marketing to the very best
advantage. But if there be one branch of housekeeping in which she
excels to an utterly unparalleled and unprecedented extent, it is
in the important one of carving. A roast goose is universally
allowed to be the great stumbling-block in the way of young
aspirants to perfection in this department of science; many
promising carvers, beginning with legs of mutton, and preserving a
good reputation through fillets of veal, sirloins of beef, quarters
of lamb, fowls, and even ducks, have sunk before a roast goose, and
lost caste and character for ever. To Mrs. Chirrup the resolving a
goose into its smallest component parts is a pleasant pastime--a
practical joke--a thing to be done in a minute or so, without the
smallest interruption to the conversation of the time. No handing
the dish over to an unfortunate man upon her right or left, no wild
sharpening of the knife, no hacking and sawing at an unruly joint,
no noise, no splash, no heat, no leaving off in despair; all is
confidence and cheerfulness. The dish is set upon the table, the
cover is removed; for an instant, and only an instant, you observe
that Mrs. Chirrup's attention is distracted; she smiles, but
heareth not. You proceed with your story; meanwhile the glittering
knife is slowly upraised, both Mrs. Chirrup's wrists are slightly
but not ungracefully agitated, she compresses her lips for an
instant, then breaks into a smile, and all is over. The legs of
the bird slide gently down into a pool of gravy, the wings seem to
melt from the body, the breast separates into a row of juicy
slices, the smaller and more complicated parts of his anatomy are
perfectly developed, a cavern of stuffing is revealed, and the
goose is gone!

To dine with Mr. and Mrs. Chirrup is one of the pleasantest things
in the world. Mr. Chirrup has a bachelor friend, who lived with
him in his own days of single blessedness, and to whom he is
mightily attached. Contrary to the usual custom, this bachelor
friend is no less a friend of Mrs. Chirrup's, and, consequently,
whenever you dine with Mr. and Mrs. Chirrup, you meet the bachelor
friend. It would put any reasonably-conditioned mortal into good-
humour to observe the entire unanimity which subsists between these
three; but there is a quiet welcome dimpling in Mrs. Chirrup's
face, a bustling hospitality oozing as it were out of the
waistcoat-pockets of Mr. Chirrup, and a patronising enjoyment of
their cordiality and satisfaction on the part of the bachelor
friend, which is quite delightful. On these occasions Mr. Chirrup
usually takes an opportunity of rallying the friend on being
single, and the friend retorts on Mr. Chirrup for being married, at
which moments some single young ladies present are like to die of
laughter; and we have more than once observed them bestow looks
upon the friend, which convinces us that his position is by no
means a safe one, as, indeed, we hold no bachelor's to be who
visits married friends and cracks jokes on wedlock, for certain it
is that such men walk among traps and nets and pitfalls
innumerable, and often find themselves down upon their knees at the
altar rails, taking M. or N. for their wedded wives, before they
know anything about the matter.

However, this is no business of Mr. Chirrup's, who talks, and
laughs, and drinks his wine, and laughs again, and talks more,
until it is time to repair to the drawing-room, where, coffee
served and over, Mrs. Chirrup prepares for a round game, by sorting
the nicest possible little fish into the nicest possible little
pools, and calling Mr. Chirrup to assist her, which Mr. Chirrup
does. As they stand side by side, you find that Mr. Chirrup is the
least possible shadow of a shade taller than Mrs. Chirrup, and that
they are the neatest and best-matched little couple that can be,
which the chances are ten to one against your observing with such
effect at any other time, unless you see them in the street arm-in-
arm, or meet them some rainy day trotting along under a very small
umbrella. The round game (at which Mr. Chirrup is the merriest of
the party) being done and over, in course of time a nice little
tray appears, on which is a nice little supper; and when that is
finished likewise, and you have said 'Good night,' you find
yourself repeating a dozen times, as you ride home, that there
never was such a nice little couple as Mr. and Mrs. Chirrup.

Whether it is that pleasant qualities, being packed more closely in
small bodies than in large, come more readily to hand than when
they are diffused over a wider space, and have to be gathered
together for use, we don't know, but as a general rule,--
strengthened like all other rules by its exceptions,--we hold that
little people are sprightly and good-natured. The more sprightly
and good-natured people we have, the better; therefore, let us wish
well to all nice little couples, and hope that they may increase
and multiply.


THE EGOTISTICAL COUPLE


Egotism in couples is of two kinds.--It is our purpose to show this
by two examples.

The egotistical couple may be young, old, middle-aged, well to do,
or ill to do; they may have a small family, a large family, or no
family at all. There is no outward sign by which an egotistical
couple may be known and avoided. They come upon you unawares;
there is no guarding against them. No man can of himself be
forewarned or forearmed against an egotistical couple.

The egotistical couple have undergone every calamity, and
experienced every pleasurable and painful sensation of which our
nature is susceptible. You cannot by possibility tell the
egotistical couple anything they don't know, or describe to them
anything they have not felt. They have been everything but dead.
Sometimes we are tempted to wish they had been even that, but only
in our uncharitable moments, which are few and far between.

We happened the other day, in the course of a morning call, to
encounter an egotistical couple, nor were we suffered to remain
long in ignorance of the fact, for our very first inquiry of the
lady of the house brought them into active and vigorous operation.
The inquiry was of course touching the lady's health, and the
answer happened to be, that she had not been very well. 'Oh, my
dear!' said the egotistical lady, 'don't talk of not being well.
We have been in SUCH a state since we saw you last!'--The lady of
the house happening to remark that her lord had not been well
either, the egotistical gentleman struck in: 'Never let Briggs
complain of not being well--never let Briggs complain, my dear Mrs.
Briggs, after what I have undergone within these six weeks. He
doesn't know what it is to be ill, he hasn't the least idea of it;
not the faintest conception.'--'My dear,' interposed his wife
smiling, 'you talk as if it were almost a crime in Mr. Briggs not
to have been as ill as we have been, instead of feeling thankful to
Providence that both he and our dear Mrs. Briggs are in such
blissful ignorance of real suffering.'--'My love,' returned the
egotistical gentleman, in a low and pious voice, 'you mistake me;--
I feel grateful--very grateful. I trust our friends may never
purchase their experience as dearly as we have bought ours; I hope
they never may!'

Having put down Mrs. Briggs upon this theme, and settled the
question thus, the egotistical gentleman turned to us, and, after a
few preliminary remarks, all tending towards and leading up to the
point he had in his mind, inquired if we happened to be acquainted
with the Dowager Lady Snorflerer. On our replying in the negative,
he presumed we had often met Lord Slang, or beyond all doubt, that
we were on intimate terms with Sir Chipkins Glogwog. Finding that
we were equally unable to lay claim to either of these
distinctions, he expressed great astonishment, and turning to his
wife with a retrospective smile, inquired who it was that had told
that capital story about the mashed potatoes. 'Who, my dear?'
returned the egotistical lady, 'why Sir Chipkins, of course; how
can you ask! Don't you remember his applying it to our cook, and
saying that you and I were so like the Prince and Princess, that he
could almost have sworn we were they?' 'To be sure, I remember
that,' said the egotistical gentleman, 'but are you quite certain
that didn't apply to the other anecdote about the Emperor of
Austria and the pump?' 'Upon my word then, I think it did,'
replied his wife. 'To be sure it did,' said the egotistical
gentleman, 'it was Slang's story, I remember now, perfectly.'
However, it turned out, a few seconds afterwards, that the
egotistical gentleman's memory was rather treacherous, as he began
to have a misgiving that the story had been told by the Dowager
Lady Snorflerer the very last time they dined there; but there
appearing, on further consideration, strong circumstantial evidence
tending to show that this couldn't be, inasmuch as the Dowager Lady
Snorflerer had been, on the occasion in question, wholly engrossed
by the egotistical lady, the egotistical gentleman recanted this
opinion; and after laying the story at the doors of a great many
great people, happily left it at last with the Duke of Scuttlewig:-
observing that it was not extraordinary he had forgotten his Grace
hitherto, as it often happened that the names of those with whom we
were upon the most familiar footing were the very last to present
themselves to our thoughts.

It not only appeared that the egotistical couple knew everybody,
but that scarcely any event of importance or notoriety had occurred
for many years with which they had not been in some way or other
connected. Thus we learned that when the well-known attempt upon
the life of George the Third was made by Hatfield in Drury Lane
theatre, the egotistical gentleman's grandfather sat upon his right
hand and was the first man who collared him; and that the
egotistical lady's aunt, sitting within a few boxes of the royal
party, was the only person in the audience who heard his Majesty
exclaim, 'Charlotte, Charlotte, don't be frightened, don't be
frightened; they're letting off squibs, they're letting off
squibs.' When the fire broke out, which ended in the destruction
of the two Houses of Parliament, the egotistical couple, being at
the time at a drawing-room window on Blackheath, then and there
simultaneously exclaimed, to the astonishment of a whole party--
'It's the House of Lords!' Nor was this a solitary instance of
their peculiar discernment, for chancing to be (as by a comparison
of dates and circumstances they afterwards found) in the same
omnibus with Mr. Greenacre, when he carried his victim's head about
town in a blue bag, they both remarked a singular twitching in the
muscles of his countenance; and walking down Fish Street Hill, a
few weeks since, the egotistical gentleman said to his lady--
slightly casting up his eyes to the top of the Monument--'There's a
boy up there, my dear, reading a Bible. It's very strange. I
don't like it.--In five seconds afterwards, Sir,' says the
egotistical gentleman, bringing his hands together with one violent
clap--'the lad was over!'

Diversifying these topics by the introduction of many others of the
same kind, and entertaining us between whiles with a minute account
of what weather and diet agreed with them, and what weather and
diet disagreed with them, and at what time they usually got up, and
at what time went to bed, with many other particulars of their
domestic economy too numerous to mention; the egotistical couple at
length took their leave, and afforded us an opportunity of doing
the same.

Mr. and Mrs. Sliverstone are an egotistical couple of another
class, for all the lady's egotism is about her husband, and all the
gentleman's about his wife. For example:- Mr. Sliverstone is a
clerical gentleman, and occasionally writes sermons, as clerical
gentlemen do. If you happen to obtain admission at the street-door
while he is so engaged, Mrs. Sliverstone appears on tip-toe, and
speaking in a solemn whisper, as if there were at least three or
four particular friends up-stairs, all upon the point of death,
implores you to be very silent, for Mr. Sliverstone is composing,
and she need not say how very important it is that he should not be
disturbed. Unwilling to interrupt anything so serious, you hasten
to withdraw, with many apologies; but this Mrs. Sliverstone will by
no means allow, observing, that she knows you would like to see
him, as it is very natural you should, and that she is determined
to make a trial for you, as you are a great favourite. So you are
led up-stairs--still on tip-toe--to the door of a little back room,
in which, as the lady informs you in a whisper, Mr. Sliverstone
always writes. No answer being returned to a couple of soft taps,
the lady opens the door, and there, sure enough, is Mr.
Sliverstone, with dishevelled hair, powdering away with pen, ink,
and paper, at a rate which, if he has any power of sustaining it,
would settle the longest sermon in no time. At first he is too
much absorbed to be roused by this intrusion; but presently looking
up, says faintly, 'Ah!' and pointing to his desk with a weary and
languid smile, extends his hand, and hopes you'll forgive him.
Then Mrs. Sliverstone sits down beside him, and taking his hand in
hers, tells you how that Mr. Sliverstone has been shut up there
ever since nine o'clock in the morning, (it is by this time twelve
at noon,) and how she knows it cannot be good for his health, and
is very uneasy about it. Unto this Mr. Sliverstone replies firmly,
that 'It must be done;' which agonizes Mrs. Sliverstone still more,
and she goes on to tell you that such were Mr. Sliverstone's
labours last week--what with the buryings, marryings, churchings,
christenings, and all together,--that when he was going up the
pulpit stairs on Sunday evening, he was obliged to hold on by the
rails, or he would certainly have fallen over into his own pew.
Mr. Sliverstone, who has been listening and smiling meekly, says,
'Not quite so bad as that, not quite so bad!' he admits though, on
cross-examination, that he WAS very near falling upon the verger
who was following him up to bolt the door; but adds, that it was
his duty as a Christian to fall upon him, if need were, and that
he, Mr. Sliverstone, and (possibly the verger too) ought to glory
in it.

This sentiment communicates new impulse to Mrs. Sliverstone, who
launches into new praises of Mr. Sliverstone's worth and
excellence, to which he listens in the same meek silence, save when
he puts in a word of self-denial relative to some question of fact,
as--'Not seventy-two christenings that week, my dear. Only
seventy-one, only seventy-one.' At length his lady has quite
concluded, and then he says, Why should he repine, why should he
give way, why should he suffer his heart to sink within him? Is it
he alone who toils and suffers? What has she gone through, he
should like to know? What does she go through every day for him
and for society?

With such an exordium Mr. Sliverstone launches out into glowing
praises of the conduct of Mrs. Sliverstone in the production of
eight young children, and the subsequent rearing and fostering of
the same; and thus the husband magnifies the wife, and the wife the
husband.

This would be well enough if Mr. and Mrs. Sliverstone kept it to
themselves, or even to themselves and a friend or two; but they do
not. The more hearers they have, the more egotistical the couple
become, and the more anxious they are to make believers in their
merits. Perhaps this is the worst kind of egotism. It has not
even the poor excuse of being spontaneous, but is the result of a
deliberate system and malice aforethought. Mere empty-headed
conceit excites our pity, but ostentatious hypocrisy awakens our
disgust.


THE COUPLE WHO CODDLE THEMSELVES


Mrs. Merrywinkle's maiden name was Chopper. She was the only child
of Mr. and Mrs. Chopper. Her father died when she was, as the
play-books express it, 'yet an infant;' and so old Mrs. Chopper,
when her daughter married, made the house of her son-in-law her
home from that time henceforth, and set up her staff of rest with
Mr. and Mrs. Merrywinkle.

Mr. and Mrs. Merrywinkle are a couple who coddle themselves; and
the venerable Mrs. Chopper is an aider and abettor in the same.

Mr. Merrywinkle is a rather lean and long-necked gentleman, middle-
aged and middle-sized, and usually troubled with a cold in the
head. Mrs. Merrywinkle is a delicate-looking lady, with very light
hair, and is exceedingly subject to the same unpleasant disorder.
The venerable Mrs. Chopper--who is strictly entitled to the
appellation, her daughter not being very young, otherwise than by
courtesy, at the time of her marriage, which was some years ago--is
a mysterious old lady who lurks behind a pair of spectacles, and is
afflicted with a chronic disease, respecting which she has taken a
vast deal of medical advice, and referred to a vast number of
medical books, without meeting any definition of symptoms that at
all suits her, or enables her to say, 'That's my complaint.'
Indeed, the absence of authentic information upon the subject of
this complaint would seem to be Mrs. Chopper's greatest ill, as in
all other respects she is an uncommonly hale and hearty
gentlewoman.

Both Mr. and Mrs. Chopper wear an extraordinary quantity of
flannel, and have a habit of putting their feet in hot water to an
unnatural extent. They likewise indulge in chamomile tea and such-
like compounds, and rub themselves on the slightest provocation
with camphorated spirits and other lotions applicable to mumps,
sore-throat, rheumatism, or lumbago.

Mr. Merrywinkle's leaving home to go to business on a damp or wet
morning is a very elaborate affair. He puts on wash-leather socks
over his stockings, and India-rubber shoes above his boots, and
wears under his waistcoat a cuirass of hare-skin. Besides these
precautions, he winds a thick shawl round his throat, and blocks up
his mouth with a large silk handkerchief. Thus accoutred, and
furnished besides with a great-coat and umbrella, he braves the
dangers of the streets; travelling in severe weather at a gentle
trot, the better to preserve the circulation, and bringing his
mouth to the surface to take breath, but very seldom, and with the
utmost caution. His office-door opened, he shoots past his clerk
at the same pace, and diving into his own private room, closes the
door, examines the window-fastenings, and gradually unrobes
himself: hanging his pocket-handkerchief on the fender to air, and
determining to write to the newspapers about the fog, which, he
says, 'has really got to that pitch that it is quite unbearable.'

In this last opinion Mrs. Merrywinkle and her respected mother
fully concur; for though not present, their thoughts and tongues
are occupied with the same subject, which is their constant theme
all day. If anybody happens to call, Mrs. Merrywinkle opines that
they must assuredly be mad, and her first salutation is, 'Why, what
in the name of goodness can bring you out in such weather? You
know you MUST catch your death.' This assurance is corroborated by
Mrs. Chopper, who adds, in further confirmation, a dismal legend
concerning an individual of her acquaintance who, making a call
under precisely parallel circumstances, and being then in the best
health and spirits, expired in forty-eight hours afterwards, of a
complication of inflammatory disorders. The visitor, rendered not
altogether comfortable perhaps by this and other precedents,
inquires very affectionately after Mr. Merrywinkle, but by so doing
brings about no change of the subject; for Mr. Merrywinkle's name
is inseparably connected with his complaints, and his complaints
are inseparably connected with Mrs. Merrywinkle's; and when these
are done with, Mrs. Chopper, who has been biding her time, cuts in
with the chronic disorder--a subject upon which the amiable old
lady never leaves off speaking until she is left alone, and very
often not then.

But Mr. Merrywinkle comes home to dinner. He is received by Mrs.
Merrywinkle and Mrs. Chopper, who, on his remarking that he thinks
his feet are damp, turn pale as ashes and drag him up-stairs,
imploring him to have them rubbed directly with a dry coarse towel.
Rubbed they are, one by Mrs. Merrywinkle and one by Mrs. Chopper,
until the friction causes Mr. Merrywinkle to make horrible faces,
and look as if he had been smelling very powerful onions; when they
desist, and the patient, provided for his better security with
thick worsted stockings and list slippers, is borne down-stairs to
dinner. Now, the dinner is always a good one, the appetites of the
diners being delicate, and requiring a little of what Mrs.
Merrywinkle calls 'tittivation;' the secret of which is understood
to lie in good cookery and tasteful spices, and which process is so
successfully performed in the present instance, that both Mr. and
Mrs. Merrywinkle eat a remarkably good dinner, and even the
afflicted Mrs. Chopper wields her knife and fork with much of the
spirit and elasticity of youth. But Mr. Merrywinkle, in his desire
to gratify his appetite, is not unmindful of his health, for he has
a bottle of carbonate of soda with which to qualify his porter, and
a little pair of scales in which to weigh it out. Neither in his
anxiety to take care of his body is he unmindful of the welfare of
his immortal part, as he always prays that for what he is going to
receive he may be made truly thankful; and in order that he may be
as thankful as possible, eats and drinks to the utmost.

Either from eating and drinking so much, or from being the victim
of this constitutional infirmity, among others, Mr. Merrywinkle,
after two or three glasses of wine, falls fast asleep; and he has
scarcely closed his eyes, when Mrs. Merrywinkle and Mrs. Chopper
fall asleep likewise. It is on awakening at tea-time that their
most alarming symptoms prevail; for then Mr. Merrywinkle feels as
if his temples were tightly bound round with the chain of the
street-door, and Mrs. Merrywinkle as if she had made a hearty
dinner of half-hundredweights, and Mrs. Chopper as if cold water
were running down her back, and oyster-knives with sharp points
were plunging of their own accord into her ribs. Symptoms like
these are enough to make people peevish, and no wonder that they
remain so until supper-time, doing little more than doze and
complain, unless Mr. Merrywinkle calls out very loudly to a servant
'to keep that draught out,' or rushes into the passage to flourish
his fist in the countenance of the twopenny-postman, for daring to
give such a knock as he had just performed at the door of a private
gentleman with nerves.

Supper, coming after dinner, should consist of some gentle
provocative; and therefore the tittivating art is again in
requisition, and again--done honour to by Mr. and Mrs. Merrywinkle,
still comforted and abetted by Mrs. Chopper. After supper, it is
ten to one but the last-named old lady becomes worse, and is led
off to bed with the chronic complaint in full vigour. Mr. and Mrs.
Merrywinkle, having administered to her a warm cordial, which is
something of the strongest, then repair to their own room, where
Mr. Merrywinkle, with his legs and feet in hot water, superintends
the mulling of some wine which he is to drink at the very moment he
plunges into bed, while Mrs. Merrywinkle, in garments whose nature
is unknown to and unimagined by all but married men, takes four
small pills with a spasmodic look between each, and finally comes
to something hot and fragrant out of another little saucepan, which
serves as her composing-draught for the night.

There is another kind of couple who coddle themselves, and who do
so at a cheaper rate and on more spare diet, because they are
niggardly and parsimonious; for which reason they are kind enough
to coddle their visitors too. It is unnecessary to describe them,
for our readers may rest assured of the accuracy of these general
principles:- that all couples who coddle themselves are selfish and
slothful,--that they charge upon every wind that blows, every rain
that falls, and every vapour that hangs in the air, the evils which
arise from their own imprudence or the gloom which is engendered in
their own tempers,--and that all men and women, in couples or
otherwise, who fall into exclusive habits of self-indulgence, and
forget their natural sympathy and close connexion with everybody
and everything in the world around them, not only neglect the first
duty of life, but, by a happy retributive justice, deprive
themselves of its truest and best enjoyment.


THE OLD COUPLE


They are grandfather and grandmother to a dozen grown people and
have great-grandchildren besides; their bodies are bent, their hair
is grey, their step tottering and infirm. Is this the lightsome
pair whose wedding was so merry, and have the young couple indeed
grown old so soon!

It seems but yesterday--and yet what a host of cares and griefs are
crowded into the intervening time which, reckoned by them,
lengthens out into a century! How many new associations have
wreathed themselves about their hearts since then! The old time is
gone, and a new time has come for others--not for them. They are
but the rusting link that feebly joins the two, and is silently
loosening its hold and dropping asunder.

It seems but yesterday--and yet three of their children have sunk
into the grave, and the tree that shades it has grown quite old.
One was an infant--they wept for him; the next a girl, a slight
young thing too delicate for earth--her loss was hard indeed to
bear. The third, a man. That was the worst of all, but even that
grief is softened now.

It seems but yesterday--and yet how the gay and laughing faces of
that bright morning have changed and vanished from above ground!
Faint likenesses of some remain about them yet, but they are very
faint and scarcely to be traced. The rest are only seen in dreams,
and even they are unlike what they were, in eyes so old and dim.

One or two dresses from the bridal wardrobe are yet preserved.
They are of a quaint and antique fashion, and seldom seen except in
pictures. White has turned yellow, and brighter hues have faded.
Do you wonder, child? The wrinkled face was once as smooth as
yours, the eyes as bright, the shrivelled skin as fair and
delicate. It is the work of hands that have been dust these many
years.

Where are the fairy lovers of that happy day whose annual return
comes upon the old man and his wife, like the echo of some village
bell which has long been silent? Let yonder peevish bachelor,
racked by rheumatic pains, and quarrelling with the world, let him
answer to the question. He recollects something of a favourite
playmate; her name was Lucy--so they tell him. He is not sure
whether she was married, or went abroad, or died. It is a long
while ago, and he don't remember.

Is nothing as it used to be; does no one feel, or think, or act, as
in days of yore? Yes. There is an aged woman who once lived
servant with the old lady's father, and is sheltered in an alms-
house not far off. She is still attached to the family, and loves
them all; she nursed the children in her lap, and tended in their
sickness those who are no more. Her old mistress has still
something of youth in her eyes; the young ladies are like what she
was but not quite so handsome, nor are the gentlemen as stately as
Mr. Harvey used to be. She has seen a great deal of trouble; her
husband and her son died long ago; but she has got over that, and
is happy now--quite happy.

If ever her attachment to her old protectors were disturbed by
fresher cares and hopes, it has long since resumed its former
current. It has filled the void in the poor creature's heart, and
replaced the love of kindred. Death has not left her alone, and
this, with a roof above her head, and a warm hearth to sit by,
makes her cheerful and contented. Does she remember the marriage
of great-grandmamma? Ay, that she does, as well--as if it was only
yesterday. You wouldn't think it to look at her now, and perhaps
she ought not to say so of herself, but she was as smart a young
girl then as you'd wish to see. She recollects she took a friend
of hers up-stairs to see Miss Emma dressed for church; her name
was--ah! she forgets the name, but she remembers that she was a
very pretty girl, and that she married not long afterwards, and
lived--it has quite passed out of her mind where she lived, but she
knows she had a bad husband who used her ill, and that she died in
Lambeth work-house. Dear, dear, in Lambeth workhouse!

And the old couple--have they no comfort or enjoyment of existence?
See them among their grandchildren and great-grandchildren; how
garrulous they are, how they compare one with another, and insist
on likenesses which no one else can see; how gently the old lady
lectures the girls on points of breeding and decorum, and points
the moral by anecdotes of herself in her young days--how the old
gentleman chuckles over boyish feats and roguish tricks, and tells
long stories of a 'barring-out' achieved at the school he went to:
which was very wrong, he tells the boys, and never to be imitated
of course, but which he cannot help letting them know was very
pleasant too--especially when he kissed the master's niece. This
last, however, is a point on which the old lady is very tender, for
she considers it a shocking and indelicate thing to talk about, and
always says so whenever it is mentioned, never failing to observe
that he ought to be very penitent for having been so sinful. So
the old gentleman gets no further, and what the schoolmaster's
niece said afterwards (which he is always going to tell) is lost to
posterity.

The old gentleman is eighty years old, to-day--'Eighty years old,
Crofts, and never had a headache,' he tells the barber who shaves
him (the barber being a young fellow, and very subject to that
complaint). 'That's a great age, Crofts,' says the old gentleman.
'I don't think it's sich a wery great age, Sir,' replied the
barber. 'Crofts,' rejoins the old gentleman, 'you're talking
nonsense to me. Eighty not a great age?' 'It's a wery great age,
Sir, for a gentleman to be as healthy and active as you are,'
returns the barber; 'but my grandfather, Sir, he was ninety-four.'
'You don't mean that, Crofts?' says the old gentleman. 'I do
indeed, Sir,' retorts the barber, 'and as wiggerous as Julius
Caesar, my grandfather was.' The old gentleman muses a little
time, and then says, 'What did he die of, Crofts?' 'He died
accidentally, Sir,' returns the barber; 'he didn't mean to do it.
He always would go a running about the streets--walking never
satisfied HIS spirit--and he run against a post and died of a hurt
in his chest.' The old gentleman says no more until the shaving is
concluded, and then he gives Crofts half-a-crown to drink his
health. He is a little doubtful of the barber's veracity
afterwards, and telling the anecdote to the old lady, affects to
make very light of it--though to be sure (he adds) there was old
Parr, and in some parts of England, ninety-five or so is a common
age, quite a common age.

This morning the old couple are cheerful but serious, recalling old
times as well as they can remember them, and dwelling upon many
passages in their past lives which the day brings to mind. The old
lady reads aloud, in a tremulous voice, out of a great Bible, and
the old gentleman with his hand to his ear, listens with profound
respect. When the book is closed, they sit silent for a short
space, and afterwards resume their conversation, with a reference
perhaps to their dead children, as a subject not unsuited to that
they have just left. By degrees they are led to consider which of
those who survive are the most like those dearly-remembered
objects, and so they fall into a less solemn strain, and become
cheerful again.

How many people in all, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and one
or two intimate friends of the family, dine together to-day at the
eldest son's to congratulate the old couple, and wish them many
happy returns, is a calculation beyond our powers; but this we
know, that the old couple no sooner present themselves, very
sprucely and carefully attired, than there is a violent shouting
and rushing forward of the younger branches with all manner of
presents, such as pocket-books, pencil-cases, pen-wipers, watch-
papers, pin-cushions, sleeve-buckles, worked-slippers, watch-
guards, and even a nutmeg-grater: the latter article being
presented by a very chubby and very little boy, who exhibits it in
great triumph as an extraordinary variety. The old couple's
emotion at these tokens of remembrance occasions quite a pathetic
scene, of which the chief ingredients are a vast quantity of
kissing and hugging, and repeated wipings of small eyes and noses
with small square pocket-handkerchiefs, which don't come at all
easily out of small pockets. Even the peevish bachelor is moved,
and he says, as he presents the old gentleman with a queer sort of
antique ring from his own finger, that he'll be de'ed if he doesn't
think he looks younger than he did ten years ago.

But the great time is after dinner, when the dessert and wine are
on the table, which is pushed back to make plenty of room, and they
are all gathered in a large circle round the fire, for it is then--
the glasses being filled, and everybody ready to drink the toast--
that two great-grandchildren rush out at a given signal, and
presently return, dragging in old Jane Adams leaning upon her
crutched stick, and trembling with age and pleasure. Who so
popular as poor old Jane, nurse and story-teller in ordinary to two
generations; and who so happy as she, striving to bend her stiff
limbs into a curtsey, while tears of pleasure steal down her
withered cheeks!

The old couple sit side by side, and the old time seems like
yesterday indeed. Looking back upon the path they have travelled,
its dust and ashes disappear; the flowers that withered long ago,
show brightly again upon its borders, and they grow young once more
in the youth of those about them.


CONCLUSION


We have taken for the subjects of the foregoing moral essays,
twelve samples of married couples, carefully selected from a large
stock on hand, open to the inspection of all comers. These samples
are intended for the benefit of the rising generation of both
sexes, and, for their more easy and pleasant information, have been
separately ticketed and labelled in the manner they have seen.

We have purposely excluded from consideration the couple in which
the lady reigns paramount and supreme, holding such cases to be of
a very unnatural kind, and like hideous births and other monstrous
deformities, only to be discreetly and sparingly exhibited.

And here our self-imposed task would have ended, but that to those
young ladies and gentlemen who are yet revolving singly round the
church, awaiting the advent of that time when the mysterious laws
of attraction shall draw them towards it in couples, we are
desirous of addressing a few last words.

Before marriage and afterwards, let them learn to centre all their
hopes of real and lasting happiness in their own fireside; let them
cherish the faith that in home, and all the English virtues which
the love of home engenders, lies the only true source of domestic
felicity; let them believe that round the household gods,
contentment and tranquillity cluster in their gentlest and most
graceful forms; and that many weary hunters of happiness through
the noisy world, have learnt this truth too late, and found a
cheerful spirit and a quiet mind only at home at last.

How much may depend on the education of daughters and the conduct
of mothers; how much of the brightest part of our old national
character may be perpetuated by their wisdom or frittered away by
their folly--how much of it may have been lost already, and how
much more in danger of vanishing every day--are questions too
weighty for discussion here, but well deserving a little serious
consideration from all young couples nevertheless.

To that one young couple on whose bright destiny the thoughts of
nations are fixed, may the youth of England look, and not in vain,
for an example. From that one young couple, blessed and favoured
as they are, may they learn that even the glare and glitter of a
court, the splendour of a palace, and the pomp and glory of a
throne, yield in their power of conferring happiness, to domestic
worth and virtue. From that one young couple may they learn that
the crown of a great empire, costly and jewelled though it be,
gives place in the estimation of a Queen to the plain gold ring
that links her woman's nature to that of tens of thousands of her
humble subjects, and guards in her woman's heart one secret store
of tenderness, whose proudest boast shall be that it knows no
Royalty save Nature's own, and no pride of birth but being the
child of heaven!

So shall the highest young couple in the land for once hear the
truth, when men throw up their caps, and cry with loving shouts -


GOD BLESS THEM.


THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

AN APPEAL TO FALLEN WOMEN 
Charles Dickens
  
(Dickens wrote this leaflet in 1849 for distribution among women taken into police 
custody, in the hope of directing them to a Home at Shepherd's Bush established by his 
friend Angela Burdett Coutts.) 
  
You will see, on beginning to read this letter, that it is not addressed to you by name. 
But I address it to a woman--a very young woman still--who was born to be happy and 
has lived miserably; who has no prospect before her but sorrow, or behind her but a 
wasted youth; who, if she has ever been a mother, has felt shame instead of pride in her 
own unhappy child. 
  
You are such a person, or this letter would not be put into your hands. If you have ever 
wished (I know you must have done so some time) for a chance of rising out of your sad 
life, and having friends, a quiet home, means of being useful to yourself and others, 
peace of mind, self-respect, everything you have lost, pray read it attentively and reflect 
upon it afterwards. 
  
I am going to offer you, not the chance but the certainty of all these blessings, if you 
will exert yourself to deserve them. And do not think that I write to you as if I felt 
myself very much above you, or wished to hurt your feelings by reminding you of the 
situation in which you are placed. God forbid! I mean nothing but kindness to you, and I 
write as if you were my sister. 
  
Think for a moment what your present situation is. Think how impossible it is that it 
ever can be better if you continue to live as you have lived, and how certain it is that it 
must be worse. You know what the streets are; you know how cruel the companions 
that you find there are; you know the vices practised there, and to what wretched 
consequences they bring you, even while you are young. Shunned by decent people, 
marked out from all other kinds of women as you walk along, avoided by the very 
children, hunted by the police, imprisoned, and only set free to be imprisoned over and 
over again--reading this very letter in a common jail you have already dismal 
experience of the truth. 
  
But to grow old in such a way of life, and among such company--to escape an early 
death from terrible disease, or your own maddened hand, and arrive at old age in such a 
course--will be an aggravation of every misery that you know now, which words cannot 
describe. Imagine for yourself the bed on which you, then an object terrible to look at, 
will lie down to die. Imagine all the long, long years of shame, want, crime, and ruin 
that will arise before you. And by that dreadful day, and by the judgment that will 
follow it, and by the recollection that you are certain to have then, when it is too late, of 
the offer that is made to you now, when it is NOT too late, I implore you to think of it 
and weigh it well. 
  
There is a lady in this town who from the windows of her house has seen such as you 
going past at night, and has felt her heart bleed at the sight. She is what is called a great 
lady, but she has looked after you with compassion as being of her own sex and nature, 
and the thought of such fallen women has troubled her in her bed. 
  
She has resolved to open at her own expense a place of refuge near London for a small 
number of females, who without such help are lost for ever, and to make a HOME for 
them. In this home they will be taught all household work that would be useful to them 
in a home of their own and enable them to make it comfortable and happy. In this home, 
which stands in a pleasant country lane and where each may have her little 
flower-garden if she pleases, they will be treated with the greatest kindness: will lead an 
active, cheerful, healthy life: will learn many things it is profitable and good to know, 
and being entirely removed from all who have any knowledge of their past career will 
begin life afresh and be able to win a good name and character. 
  
And because it is not the lady's wish that these young women should be shut out from 
the world after they have repented and learned to do their duty there, and because it is 
her wish and object that they may be restored to society--a comfort to themselves and 
it--they will be supplied with every means, when some time shall have elapsed and their 
conduct shall have fully proved their earnestness and reformation, to go abroad, where 
in a distant country they may become the faithful wives of honest men, and live and die 
in peace. 
  
I have been told that those who see you daily in this place believe that there are virtuous 
inclinations lingering within you, and that you may be reclaimed. I offer the Home I 
have described in these few words, to you. 
  
But, consider well before you accept it. As you are to pass from the gate of this Prison 
to a perfectly new life, where all the means of happiness, from which you are now shut 
out, are opened brightly to you, so remember on the other hand that you must have the 
strength to leave behind you all old habits. You must resolve to set a watch upon 
yourself, and to be firm in your control over yourself, and to restrain yourself; to be 
gentle, patient, persevering, and good tempered. Above all things, to be truthful in every 
word you speak. Do this, and all the rest is easy. But you must solemnly remember that 
if you enter this Home without such constant resolutions, you will occupy, unworthily 
and uselessly, the place of some other unhappy girl, now wandering and lost; and that 
her ruin, no less than your own, will be upon your head, before Almighty God, who 
knows the secrets of our breasts; and Christ, who died upon the Cross to save us. 
  
In case there should be anything you wish to know, or any question you would like to 
ask about this Home, you have only to say so, and every information shall be given to 
you. Whether you accept or reject it, think of it. If you awake in the silence and solitude 
of the night, think of it then. If any remembrance ever comes into your mind of any time 
when you were innocent and very different, think of it then. If you should be softened 
by a moment's recollection of any tenderness or affection you have ever felt, or that has 
ever been shown to you, or of any kind word that has ever been spoken to you, think of 
it then. If ever your poor heart is moved to feel truly, what you might have been, and 
what you are, oh think of it then, and consider what you may yet become. 
  
Believe me that I am indeed, 
  
YOUR FRIEND

THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

THE LIFE OF OUR LORD

CHARLES DICKENS

FOREWORD TO THE FIRST EDITION
By Lady Dickens 

``This book, the last work of Charles Dickens to be published, has an individual interest 
and purpose that separate it completely from everything else that Dickens wrote. 

Quite apart from its Divine Subject, the manuscript is peculiarly personal to the novelist, 
and is not so much a revelation of his mind as a tribute to his heart and humanity, and 
also, of course, his deep devotion to Our Lord. 

It was written in 1849, twenty-one years before his death, expressly for his children. 

The simple manuscript is entirely handwritten and is in no sense a fair copy but a 
spontaneous draft. In order to preserve its personality, the manuscript has been followed 
faithfully in every detail. This accounts for the varying use of capital letters, and other 
peculiarities. 

Charles Dickens frequently told his children the Gospel Story, and made mention of the 
Divine Example in his letters to them. 

This life of Our Lord was written without thought of publication, in order that his 
family might have a permanent record of their father's thoughts. 

After his death, this manuscript remained in the possession of his sister-in law, Miss 
Georgina Hogarth. 

On her death in 1917 it came into the possession of Sir Henry Fielding Dickens. 

Charles Dickens had made it clear that he had written The Life of Our Lord in a form 
which he thought best suited to his children, and not for publication. His son, Sir Henry, 
was averse to publishing the work in his own lifetime, but saw no reason why 
publication should be withheld after his death. 

Sir Henry's will provided that, if the majority of his family were in favour of publication, 
The Life of Our Lord should be given to the world. It was first published, in serial form, 
in March 1934. `` 

Marie Dickens 

April 1934 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE FIRST
My dear children, I am very anxious that you should know something about the History 
of Jesus Christ. For everybody ought to know about Him. No one ever lived, who was 
so good, so kind, so gentle, and so sorry for all people who did wrong, or were in 
anyway ill or miserable, as he was. And as he is now in Heaven, where we hope to go, 
and all to meet each other after we are dead, and there be happy always together, you 
never can think what a good place Heaven, is without knowing who he was and what he 
did.  


He was born, a long long time ago - nearly Two Thousand years ago - at a place called 
Bethlehem. His father and mother lived in a city called Nazareth, but they were forced, 
by business to travel to Bethlehem. His father's name was Joseph, and his mother's 
name was Mary. 

And the town being very full of people, also brought there by business, there was no 
room for Joseph and Mary in the Inn or any house; so they went into a Stable to lodge, 
and in this stable Jesus Christ was born. There was no cradle or anything of that kind 
there, so Mary laid her pretty little boy in what is called the Manger, which is the place 
the horses eat out of. And there he fell asleep. 

While he was asleep, some Shepherds who were watching Sheep in the Fields, saw an 
Angel from God, all light and beautiful, come moving over the grass towards Them. At 
first they were afraid and fell down and hid their faces. But it said ``There is a child 
born to-day in the city of Bethlehem near here, who will grow up to be so good that God 
will love him as his own son; and he will teach men to love one another, and not to 
quarrel and hurt one another; and his name will be Jesus Christ; and people will put that 
name in their prayers, because they will know God loves it, and will know that they 
should love it too.'' And then the Angel told the Shepherds to go to that Stable, and look 
at that little child in the Manger. Which they did; and they kneeled down by it in its 
sleep, and said ``God bless this child!'' 

Now the great place of all that country was Jerusalem - just as London is the great place 
in England - and at Jerusalem the King lived, whose name was King Herod. Some wise 
men came one day, from a country a long way off in the East, and said to the King `` 
We have seen a Star in the Sky, which teaches us to know that a child is born in 
Bethlehem who will live to be a man whom all people will love.'' When King Herod 
heard this, he was jealous, for he was a wicked man. But he pretended not to be, and 
said to the wise men, ``Whereabouts is this child?'' And the wise men said ``We don't 
know. But we think the Star will shew us; for the Star has been moving on before us, all 
the way here, and is now standing still in the sky.'' Then Herod asked them to see if the 
Star would shew them where the child lived, and ordered them, if they found the child, 
to come back to him. So they went out, and the Star went on, over their heads a little 
way before them, until it stopped over the house where the child was. This was very 
wonderful, but God ordered it to be so. 

When the Star stopped, the wise men went in, and saw the child with Mary his Mother. 
They loved him very much, and gave him some presents. Then they went away. But 
they did not go back to King Herod; for they thought he was jealous, though he had not 
said so. So they went away, by night, back into their own country. And an Angel came, 
and told Joseph and Mary to take the child into a Country called Egypt, or Herod would 
kill him. So they escaped too, in the night - the father, the mother, and the child - and 
arrived there, safely. 

But when this cruel Herod found that the wise men did not come back to him, and that 
he could not, therefore, find out where this child, Jesus Christ, lived, he called his 
soldiers and captains to him, and told them to go and Kill all the children in his 
dominions that were not more than two years old. The wicked men did so. The mothers 
of the children ran up and down the streets with them in their arms trying to save them, 
and hide them in caves and cellars, but it was of no use. The soldiers with their swords 
killed all the children they could find. This dreadful murder was called the Murder of 
the Innocents. Because the little children were so innocent. 

King Herod hoped that Jesus Christ was one of them. But He was not, as you know, for 
He had escaped safely into Egypt. And he lived there, with his father and mother, until 
Bad King Herod died. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE SECOND
When King Herod was dead, an angel came to Joseph again, and said he might now go 
to Jerusalem, and not be afraid for the child's sake. So Joseph and Mary, and her Son 
Jesus Christ (who are commonly called The Holy Family) travelled towards Jerusalem; 
but hearing on the way that King Herod's son was the new King, and fearing that he, too, 
might want to hurt the child, they turned out of the way, and went to live in Nazareth. 
They lived there, until Jesus Christ was twelve years old. 

Then Joseph and Mary went to Jerusalem to attend a Religious Feast which used to be 
held in those days, in the Temple of Jerusalem, which was a great church or Cathedral; 
and they took Jesus Christ with them. And when the Feast was over, they travelled away 
from Jerusalem, back towards their own home in Nazareth, wit a great many of their 
friends and neighbours. For people used, then, to travel a great many together, for fear 
of robbers; the roads not being so safe and well guarded as they are now, and travelling 
being much more difficult altogether, than it now is. 

They travelled on. For a whole day, and never knew that Jesus Christ was not with 
them; for the company being so large, they thought he was somewhere among the 
people, thought they did not see Him. But finding that he was not there, and fearing that 
he was lost, they turned back to Jerusalem in great anxiety to look for him. They found 
him, sitting in the temple, talking about the goodness of God, and how we should all 
pay to him, with some learned men who were called Doctors. They were not what you 
understand by the word ``doctors'' now; they did not attend sick people; they were 
scholars and clever men. And Jesus Christ shewed such knowledge in what said to them, 
and in the questions he asked them that they were all astonished. 

He went, with Joseph and Mary, home to Nazareth, when they found him, and lived 
there until he was thirty or thirty-five years old. 

At the time there was a very good man indeed, named John, who was the son of a 
woman named Elizabeth - the cousin of Mary. And people being wicked, and violent, 
and killing each other, and not minding their duty towards God, John (to teach them 
better) went about the country, preaching to them, and entreating them to be better men 
and women. And because he loved them more than himself, and didn't mind himself 
when he was doing them good, he was poorly dressed in the skin of a camel, and ate 
little but some insects called locusts, which he found as he travelled: and wild honey, 
which the bees left in the Hollow Trees. 

You never saw a locust, because they belong to that country near Jerusalem, which is a 
great way off. So do camels, but I think you have seen a camel? At all events they are 
brought over here, sometimes; and if you would like to see one, I will shew you one. 

There was a River, not very far from Jerusalem, called the River Jordan; and in this 
water, John baptized those people who would come to him, and promise to be better. A 
great many people went to him in crowds. Jesus Christ went too. But when John saw 
him, John said, ``Why should I baptize you, who are so much better than!'' Jesus Christ 
made answer, ``Suffer it to be so now.'' So John baptized him. And when he was 
baptized, the sky opened, and a beautiful bird like a dove came flying down, and the 
voice of God, speaking up in Heaven, was heard to say ``This is my beloved Son, in 
whom I am well pleased!'' 

Jesus Christ then went into a wild and lovely country called the Wilderness, and stayed 
there forty days and forty nights, praying that he night be of use to men and women, and 
teach them to be better, so that after their deaths, they might be happy in Heaven. 

When he came out of the Wilderness, he began to cure sick people by only laying his 
hand upon them; for God had given him power to heal the sick, and to give sight to the 
blind, and to do many wonderful and solemn things of which I shall tell you more bye 
and bye, and which are called ``The Miracles'' of Christ. I wish you would remember 
that word, because I shall use it again, and I should like you to know that it means 
something which is very wonderful and which could not be done without God's leave 
and assistance. 

The first miracle which Jesus Christ did, was at a place called Cana, where he went to a 
Marriage-Feast with Mary his Mother. There was not wine; and Mary told him so. 
There were only six stone water-pots filled with water. But Jesus turned this water into 
wine, by only lifting up his hand; and all who were there, drank of it. 

For God had given Jesus Christ the power to do such wonders; and he did them, that 
people might know he was not a common man, and might believe what he taught them, 
and also believe that God had sent him. And many people, hearing this, and hearing that 
he cured the sick, did begin to believe in him; and great crowds followed him in the 
streets and on the roads, wherever he went. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE THIRD
That there might be some good men to go about with Him, teaching the people, Jesus 
Christ chose Twelve poor men to be his companions. These twelve are called The 
apostles or Disciples, and he chose them from among Poor Men, in order that the Poor 
might know - always after that; in all years to come - that Heaven was made for them as 
well as for the rich, and that God makes no difference between those who wear good 
clothes and those who go barefoot and in rags. The most miserable, the most ugly, 
deformed, wretched creatures that live, will be bright Angels in Heaven if they are good 
here on earth. Never forget this, when you are grown up. Never be proud or unkind, my 
dears, to any poor man, woman, or child. If they are bad, think that they would have 
been better, if they had had kind friends, and good homes, and had been better taught. 
So, always try to make them better by kind persuading words; and always try to teach 
them and relieve them if you can. And when people speak ill of the Poor and Miserable, 
think how Jesus Christ went among them and taught them, and thought them worthy of 
his care. And always pity them yourselves, and think as well of them as you can. 

The names of the Twelve apostles were, Simon Peter, Andrew, James the son of 
Zebedee, John, Philip, Bartholomew, Thomas, Matthew, James the son Alphaeus, 
Labbaeus, Simon, and Judas Iscariot. This man afterwards betrayed Jesus Christ, as you 
will hear bye and bye. 

The first four of these, were poor fishermen, who were sitting in their boats by the 
seaside, mending their nets, when Christ passed by. He stopped, and went into Simon 
Peter's boat, and asked him if he had caught many fish. Peter said No; though they had 
worked all night with their nets, they had caught nothing. Christ said, ``let down the net 
again.'' They did so; and it was immediately so full of fish, that it required the strength 
of many men (who came and helped them) to lift it out of the water, and even then it 
was very hard to do. This was another of the miracles of Jesus Christ. 

Jesus then said, ``Come with me.'' And they followed him directly. 

And from that time the Twelve disciples or apostles were always with him. 

As great crowds of people followed him, and wished to be taught, he went up into a 
Mountain and there preached to them, and gave them, from his own lips, the words of 
that Prayer, beginning ``Our father which art in Heaven,'' that you say every night. It is 
called The Lord's Prayer, because it was first said by Jesus Christ, and because he 
commanded his disciples to pray in those words. 

When he was come down from the Mountain, there came to him a man with a dreadful 
disease called the leprosy. It was common in those times, and those who were ill with it, 
were called lepers. This Leper fell at the feet of Jesus Christ, and said ``Lord! If thou 
wilt, thou cans't make me well!'' Jesus, always full of compassion, stretched out his 
hand, and said ``I will! Be thou well!'' And his disease went away, immediately, and he 
was cured. 

Being followed, wherever he went, by great crowds of people, Jesus went, with his 
disciples, into a house, to rest. While he was sitting inside, some men brought upon a 
bed, a man who was very ill of what is called the Palsy, so that he trembled all over 
from head to foot, and could neither stand, nor move. But the crowd being all about the 
door and windows, and they not being able to get near Jesus Christ, these men climbed 
up to the roof of the house, which was a low one; and through the tiling at the top, let 
down the bed, with the sick man upon it, into the room where Jesus sat. When he saw 
him, Jesus, full of pity, said ``Arise! Take up thy bed, and go to thine own home!'' And 
the man rose up and went away quite well; blessing him, and thanking God. 

There was a Centurion too, or officer over the Soldiers, who came to him, and said, 
``Lord! My servant lies at home in my house, very ill.'' - Jesus Christ made answer, ``I 
will come and cure him.'' But the Centurion said ``Lord! I am not worthy that Thou 
shoulds't come to my house. Say the word only, and I know he will be cured.'' Then 
Jesus Christ, glad that the Centurion believed in him so truly said ``Be it so!'' And the 
servant became well, from that moment. 

But of all the people who came to him, none were so full of grief and distress, as one 
man who was a Ruler or Magistrate over many people, and he wrung his hands, and 
cried, and said ``Oh Lord, my daughter - my beautiful, good, innocent little girl, is 
dead!'' Oh come to her, come to her, and lay Thy blessed hand upon her, and I know she 
will revive, and come to life again, and make me and her mother happy. Oh Lord we 
love her so, we love her so! And she is dead!`` 

Jesus Christ went out with him, and so did his disciples and went to his house, where 
the friends and neighbours were crying in the room where the poor dead little girl lay, 
and where there was soft music playing; as there used to be, in those days, when people 
died. Jesus Christ, looking on her, sorrowfully, said - to comfort her poor parents - ``She 
is not dead. She is asleep.'' Then he commanded the room to be cleared of the people 
that were in it, and going to the dead child, took her by the hand, and she rose up, quite 
well, as if she had only been asleep. Oh what a sight it must have been to see her parents 
clasp her in their arms, and kiss her, and thank God, and Jesus Christ his son, for such 
great Mercy! 

But he was always merciful and tender. And because he did such Good, and taught 
people how to love God and how to hope to go to Heaven after death, he was called Our 
Saviour. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE FOURTH
There were in that, country where Our Saviour performed his Miracles, certain people 
who were called Pharisees. They were very proud, and believed that no people were 
good but themselves; and they were all afraid of Jesus Christ, because he taught the 
people better. So were the Jews, in general. Most of the Inhabitants of that country, 
were Jews. 

Our Saviour, walking once in the fields with his disciples on a Sunday (which the Jews 
called, and still call, the Sabbath) they gathered some ears of the corn that was growing 
there, to eat. This, the Pharisees said, was wrong; and in the same way, when our 
Saviour went into one of their churches - they were called Synagogues - and looked 
compassionately on a poor man who had his hand all withered and wasted away, these 
Pharisees said ``Is it right to cure people on a Sunday?'' Our Saviour answered them by 
saying, ``If any of you had a sheep and it fell into a pit, would you not take it out, even 
though it happened on a Sunday? And how much better is a man than a sheep!'' Then he 
said to the poor man, ``Stretch out thine hand!'' And it was cured immediately, and was 
smooth and useful like the other. So Jesus Christ told them ``You may always do good, 
no matter what the day is.'' 

There was a city called Nain into which Our Saviour went soon after this, followed by 
great numbers of people, and especially by those who had sick relations, or friends, or 
children. For they brought sick people out into the streets and roads through which he 
passed, and cried out to him to touch them, and when he did, they became well. Going 
on, in the midst of this crowd, and near the Gate of the city, He met a funeral. It was the 
funeral of a young man, who was carried on what is called a Bier, which was open, as 
the custom was in that country, and is now in many parts of Italy. His poor mother 
followed the bier, and wept very much, for she had no other child. When Our Saviour 
saw her, he was touched to the heart to see her so sorry and said ``Weep not!'' Then, the 
bearers of the bier standing still, he walked up to it and touched it with his hand, and 
said ``Young Man! Arise.'' The dead man, coming to life again at the sound of The 
Saviour's Voice, rose up and began to speak. And Jesus Christ leaving him with his 
mother - Ah how happy they both were! - went away. 

By this time the crowd was so very great that Jesus Christ went down to the waterside, 
to go in a boat, to a more retired place. And in the boat, He fell asleep, while his 
Disciples were sitting on the deck. While he was still sleeping a violent storm arose, so 
that the waves washed over the boat, and the howling wind so rocked and shook it, that 
they thought it would sink. In their fright the disciples awoke Our Saviour, and said 
``Lord! Save us, or we are lost!'' He stood up, and raising his arm, said to the rolling Sea 
and to the whistling wind, ``Peace! Be still!'' And immediately it was calm and pleasant 
weather, and the boat went safely on, through the smooth waters. 

When they came to the other side of the waters they had to pass a wild and lonely 
burying-ground that was outside the City to which they were going. All 
burying-grounds were outside cities in those times. In this place there was a dreadful 
madman who lived among the tombs, and houled all day and night, so that it made 
travellers afraid, to hear him. 

They had tried to chain him, but he broke his chains, he was so strong; and he would 
throw himself on the sharp stones, and cut himself in the most dreadful manner; crying 
and houling all the while; 

When this wretched man saw Jesus Christ a long way off, he cried out ``It is the son of 
God! Oh son of God, do not torment me!'' Jesus, coming near him, perceived that he 
was torn by an Evil Spirit, and cast the madness out of him, and into a herd of swine (or 
pigs) who were feeding close by, and who directly ran headlong down a steep place 
leading to the sea and were dashed to pieces. 

Now Herod, the son of that cruel King who murdered the Innocents, reigning over the 
people there, and hearing that Jesus Christ was doing these wonders, and was giving 
sight to the blind and causing the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak, and the lame to 
walk, and that he was followed by multitudes and multitudes of people - Herod, hearing 
this, said ``This man is a companion and friend of John the Baptist.'' John was the good 
man, you recollect, who wore a garment made of camel's hair, and ate wild honey. 
Herod had taken him Prisoner, because he taught and preached to the people; and had 
him then, locked up, in the prisons of his Palace. 

While Herod was in this angry humour with John, his birthday came; and his daughter, 
Herodias, who was a fine dancer, danced before him, to please him. She pleased him so 
much that he swore on oath he would give her whatever she would ask him for. ``Then'', 
said she, ``father, give me the head of John the Baptist in a charger.'' For she hated John, 
and was a wicked, cruel woman. 

The King was sorry, for though he had John prisoner, he did not wish to kill him, but 
having sworn that he would give her what she asked for, he sent some soldiers down 
into the Prison, with directions to cut off the head of John the Baptist, and give it to 
Herodias. This they did, and took it to her, as she had said, in a charger, which was a 
kind of dish. When Jesus Christ heard from the apostles of this cruel deed, he left that 
city, and went with them (after they had privately buried John's body in the night) to 
another place. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE FIFTH
One of the Pharisees begged Our Saviour to go into his house, and eat with him. And 
while our Saviour sat eating at the table, there crept into the room a woman of that city 
who had led a bad and sinful life, and was ashamed that the Son of God should see her; 
and yet she trusted so much to his goodness, and his compassion for all who, having 
done wrong were truly sorry for it in their hearts, that, by little and little she went 
behind the seat on which he sat, and dropped down at his feet, and wetted them with her 
sorrowful tears, then she kissed them and dried them on her long hair, and rubbed them 
with some sweet-smelling ointment she had brought with her in a box. Her name was 
Mary Magdalene. 

When the Pharisee saw that Jesus permitted this woman to touch Him, he said within 
himself that Jesus did not know how wicked she had been. But Jesus Christ, who knew 
his thoughts, said to him ``Simon'' - for that was his name - ``if a man had debtors, one 
of whom owed him five hundred pence, and one of whom owed him only fifty pence, 
and he forgave them, both, their debts, which of those two debtors do you think would 
love him most?'' Simon answered ``I suppose that one whom he forgave most.'' Jesus 
told him he was right, and said ``As God forgives this woman so much sin, she will love 
Him, I hope, the more.'' And he said to her, ``God forgives you!'' The company who 
were present wondered that Jesus Christ had power to forgive sins, but God had given it 
to Him. And the woman thanking Him for all his mercy, went away. 

We learn from this, this we must always forgive those who have done us any harm, 
when they come to us and say they are truly sorry for it. Even if they do not come and 
say so, we must still forgive them, and never hate them or be unkind to them, if we 
would hope that God will forgive us. 

After this, there was a great feast of the Jews, and Jesus Christ went to Jerusalem. There 
was, near the sheep market in that place, a pool, or pond, called Bethesda, having five 
gate to it; and at the time of the year when that feast took place great numbers of sick 
people and cripples went to this pool to bathe in it; believing that an Angel came and 
stirred the water, and that whoever went in first after the Angel had done so, was cured 
of any illness he or she had, whatever it might be. Among these poor persons, was one 
man who had been ill, thirty eight years; and he told Jesus Christ (who took pity on him 
when he saw him lying on his bed alone, with no one to help him) that he never could 
be dipped in the pool, because he was so weak and ill that he could not move to get 
there. Out Saviour said to him, ``take up thy bed and go away.'' And he went away, 
quite well. 

Many Jews saw this; and when they saw it, they hated Jesus Christ the more; knowing 
that the people, being taught and cured by him, would not believe their Priests, who told 
the people what was not true , and deceived them. So they said to one another that Jesus 
Christ should be killed, because he cured people on the Sabbath Day (which was against 
their strict law) and because he called himself the Son of God. And they tried to raise 
enemies against him, and to get the crowd in the streets to murder Him. 

But the crowd followed Him wherever he went, blessing him, and praying to be taught 
and cured; for they knew He did nothing but Good. Jesus going with his disciples over a 
sea, called the Sea of Tiberia and sitting with them on a hill-side, saw great numbers of 
these poor people waiting below, and said to ht apostle Philip. ``Where shall we buy 
bread, that they may eat and be refreshed, after their long journey?'' Philip answered, 
``Lord, two hundred penny-worthy of bread would not be enough for so many people, 
and we have none.'' ``We have only'', said another apostle - Andrew, Simon, Peter’s 
brother - ``five small barley loaves, and two little fish, belonging to a lad who is among 
us. What are they, among so many!'' Jesus Christ said, ``Let them all sit down!'' The did; 
there being a great deal of grass in that place. When they were all seated, Jesus took the 
bread, and looked up to Heaven, and blessed it, and broke it, and handed it in pieces to 
the apostles, who handing it to the people. And of those five little loaves, and two fish, 
five thousand men, besides women, and children, ate, and had enough; and when they 
were all satisfied, there were gathered up twelve baskets full of what was left. This was 
another of the Miracles of Jesus Christ. 

Our Saviour then sent his disciples away in a boat, across the water, and said he would 
follow them presently, when he had dismissed the people. The people being one, he 
remained by himself to pray; so that the night came on, and the disciples were still 
rowing on the water in their boat, wondering when Christ would come. Late in the night, 
when the wind was against them and the waves were running high, they saw Him 
coming walking towards them on the water, as if it were dry land. When they saw this, 
they were terrified, and cried out, but Jesus said, ``It is I, Be not afraid!'' Peter taking 
courage, said, ``Lord, if it be thou, tell me to come to thee upon the water.'' Jesus Christ 
said, ``Come!'' Peter then walked towards Him, but seeing the angry waves, and hearing 
the wind roar, he was frightened and began to sink, and would have done so, but that 
Jesus took him by the hand, and let him into the boat. Then, in a moment, the wind went 
down; and the Disciples said to one another, ``It is true! He is the Son of God!'' 

Jesus did many more miracles after this happened and cured the sick in great numbers; 
making the lame walk, and the dumb speak, and the blind see. And being again 
surrounded by a great crowd who were faint and hungry, and had been with him for 
three days eating little, he took from his disciples seven loaves and a few fish, and again 
divided them among the people who were four thousand in number. They all ate, and 
had enough; of what was left, there were gathered up seven baskets full. 

He now divided the disciples, and sent them into many towns and villages, teaching the 
people, and giving them power to cure, in the name of God, all those were ill. And at 
this time He began to tell them (for he knew what would happen) that he must one day 
go back to Jerusalem where he would suffer a great deal, and where he would certainly 
be put to Death. But he said to them that on the third day after he was dead, he would 
rise from the grave, and ascend to Heaven, where he would sit at the right hand of God, 
beseeching God’s pardon to sinners. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE SIXTH
Six days after the last Miracle of the loaves and fish, Jesus Christ went up into a high 
Mountain, with only three of the Disciples - Peter, James, and John. And while he was 
speaking to them there, suddenly His face began to shine as if it were the Sun, and the 
robes he wore, which were white, glistened and shone like sparkling silver, and he stood 
before them like an angel. A bright cloud overshadowed them at the same time; and a 
voice, speaking from the cloud, was heard to say ``This is my beloved Son in whom I 
am well pleased. Hear ye him!'' At which the three disciples fell on their knees and 
covered their faces; being afraid. 

This is called the Transfiguration of our Saviour. 

When they were come down from this mountain, and were among the people again, a 
man knelt at the feet of Jesus Christ, and said, ``Lord have mercy on my son, for he is 
mad and cannot help himself, and sometimes falls into the fire, and sometimes into the 
water, and covers himself with scars and sores. Some of Thy Disciples have tried to 
cure him, but could not.'' Our Saviour cured the child immediately; and turning to 

his disciples told them they had not been able to cure him themselves, because they did 
not believe in Him so truly as he had hoped. 

The Disciples asked him, ``Master, who is greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven?'' Jesus 
called a little child to him, and took him in his arms, and stood him among them, and 
answered, ``a child like this. I say unto you that none but those who are as humble as 
little children shall enter into Heaven. Whosoever shall receive one such little child in 
my name receiveth me. But whosoever hurts one of them, it were better for him that he 
had a millstone tied about his neck, and were drowned in the depths of the sea. The 
angels are all children.'' Our Saviour loved the child, and loved all children. Yes, and all 
the world. No one ever loved all people so well and so truly as He did. 

Peter asked Him, ``Lord, How often shall I forgive any one who offends me? Seven 
times?'' Our Saviour answered ``Seventy time seven times, and more than that. For how 
can you hope that God will forgive you, when you do wrong, unless you forgive all 
other people!'' 

And he told his disciples this Story - He said, there was once a Servant who owed his 
master a great deal of money, and could not pay it, at which the Master, being very 
angry, was going to have this servant sold for a Slave. But the servant kneeling down 
and begging his Master's pardon with great sorrow, the Master forgave him. Now this 
same servant had a fellow-servant who owed him a hundred pence, and instead of being 
kind and forgiving to this poor man, as his Master had been to him, he put him in prison 
for the debt. His master hearing of it, went to him, and said ``oh wicked Servant, I 
forgave you. Why did you not forgive your fellow servant!'' And because he had not 
done so, his Master turned him away with great misery. ``So,'' said Our Saviour; ``how 
can you expect God to forgive you, if you do not forgive others!'' This is the meaning of 
that part of the Lord's prayer, where we say ``as we forgive us our trespasses'' - that 
word means faults - ``as we forgive them that trespass against us.'' 

And he told them another story, and said ``There was a certain Farmer once, who had a 
vineyard and he went out early in the morning and agreed with some labourers to work 
there all day, for a Penny. And bye and bye, when it was later, he went out again and 
engaged some more labourers on the same terms; and bye and bye went out again; and 
so on, several times, until the afternoon. When the day was over, and they all came to be 
paid, those who had worked since morning complained that those who had not begun to 
work until late in the day had the same money as themselves, and they said it was not 
fair. But the Master, said, ''Friend, I agreed with you for a Penny; and is it less money to 
you, because I give the same money to another man?`` 

Our Saviour meant to teach them by this, that people who have done good all their lives 
long, will go to Heaven after they are dead. But that people who have been wicked, 
because of their being miserable, or not having parents and friends to take care of them 
when young, and who are truly sorry for it, however late in their lives, and pray God to 
forgive them, will be forgiven and will go to Heaven too. He taught His disciples in 
these stories, because he knew the people liked to hear them, and would remember what 
He said better, if he said it in that way. They are called Parables - 

THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR 

and I wish you to remember that word, as I shall soon have some more of these Parables 
to tell you about. 

The people listened to all that our Saviour said, but were not agreed among themselves 
about Him. The Pharisees and Jews had spoken to some of them against Him, and some 
of them were inclined to do Him harm and even to murder Him. But they were afraid, as 
yet, to do Him any harm, because of His goodness, and His looking so divine and grand 
- although he was very simply dressed; almost like the poor people - that they could 
hardly bear to meet his eyes. 

One morning, He was sitting in a place called the Mount of Olives, teaching the people 
who were all clustered round Him, listening and learning attentively, when a great noise 
was heard, and a crowd of Pharisees, and some other people like them, called Scribes, 
came running in, with great cries and shouts, dragging among them a woman who had 
done wrong, and they all cried out together, ``Master! Look at this woman. The law 
says she shall be pelted with stones until she is dead. But what say you? what say you?'' 

Jesus looked upon the noisy crowd attentively, and knew that they had come to make 
him say the law was wrong and cruel; and that if He said so, they would make it a 
charge against Him and would kill him. They were ashamed and afraid as He looked 
into their faces, but they still cried out, ``Come! What say you Master? what say you?'' 

Jesus stooped down, and wrote with his finger in the sand on the ground, ``He that is 
without sin among you, let him throw the first stone at her.'' As they read this looking 
over one another's shoulders, and as He repeated the words to them, they went away, 
one by one, ashamed, until not a man of all the noisy crowd was left there; and Jesus 
Christ, and the woman, hiding her face in her hands, alone remained. 

Then said Jesus Christ, ``Woman, where are thine accusers? Hath no man condemned 
Thee?'' She answered, trembling, ``No Lord!'' Then said our Saviour, ``Neither do I 
condemn Thee. Go! and sin no more!'' 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE SEVENTH
As Our Saviour sat teaching the people and answering their questions, a certian Lawyer 
stood up, and said ``Master what shall I do, that I may live again in happiness after I am 
dead?'' Jesus said to him ``The first of all the commandments is, the Lord our God is 
one Lord: and Thou shalt love the Lord Thy God with all Thy heart, and with all Thy 
mind, and with all thy Strength. And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy 
neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater then these.'' 

Then the Lawyer said ``But who is my neighbour? Tell me that I may know.'' Jesus 
answered in this Parable: 

``There was once a traveller,'' he said, ``journeying from Jerusalem to Jericho, who fell 
among Thieves; and they robbed him of his clothes, and wounded him, and went away, 
leaving him half dead upon the road. A Priest, happening to pass that way, while the 
poor man lay there, saw him, but took no notice, and passed by, on the other side. 
Another man, a Levite, came that way, and also saw him; but he only looked at him for 
a moment, and then passed by, also. But a certain Samaritan who came travelling along 
that road, no sooner saw him than he had compassion on him, and dressed his wounds 
with oil and wine, and set him on the beast he rode himself, and took him to an Inn, and 
next morning took out of his pocket Two pence and gave them to the Landlord, saying 
''take care of him and whatever you may spend beyond this, in doing so, I will repay 
you when I come here again.`` - Now which of these three men'', said our Saviour to the 
Lawyer, ``do you think should be called the neighbour of him who fell among the 
Thieves?'' The Lawyer said, ``The man who shewed compassion on him.'' ``True,'' 
replied our Saviour. ``Go Thou and do likewise! Be compassionate to all men. For all 
men are your neighbours and brothers.'' 

And he told them this Parable, of which the meaning is, that we are never to be proud, 
or think ourselves very good, before God, but are always to be humble. He said, ``when 
you are invited to a Feast or Wedding, do not sit down in the best place, lest some more 
honored man should come, and claim that seat. But sit down in the lowest place, and a 
better will be offered you if you deserve it. For whosoever exalteth himself shall be 
abased, and whosoever humbleth himself shall be exalted.'' 

He also told them this Parable: ``There was a certain man who prepared a great supper, 
and invited many people, and sent his Servant round to them when supper was ready to 
tell them they were waited for. Upon this, they made excuses. One said he had bought a 
piece of ground and must go to look at it. Another that he had bought five yoke of Oxen, 
and must go to try them. Another, that he was newly married, and could not come. 
When the Master of the house heard this, he was angry, and told the servant to go into 
the streets, and into the high roads, and among the hedges, and invite the poor, the lame, 
the maimed, and the blind to supper instead.'' 

The meaning of Our Saviour in telling them this Parable, was, that those who are too 
busy with their own profits and pleasures, to think of God and doing good, will not find 
such favor with him as the sick and miserable. 

It happened that our Saviour, being in the city of Jericho, saw, looking down upon him 
over the heads of the crowd, from a tree into which he had climbed for that purpose, a 
man named Zacchaeus, who was regarded as a common kind of man, and a Sinner, but 
to whom Jesus Christ called out, as He passed along, that He would come and eat with 
him in his house that day. Those proud men, the Pharisees and Scribes, hearing this, 
muttered among themselves, and said ``he eats with Sinners.'' In answer to them, Jesus 
related this Parable, which is usually called THE PARABLE OF THE PRODIGAL 
SON. 

``There was once a Man,'' he told them, ``who had two sons: and the younger of them 
said one day, ''Father, give me my share of your riches now, and let me do with it what I 
please? The father granting his request, he travelled away with his money into a distant 
country, and soon spent it in riotous living. 

When he had spent all, there came a time, through all that country, of great public 
distress and famine, when there was no bread, and when the corn, and the grass, and all 
the things that grow in the ground were all dried up and blighted. The Prodigal Son fell 
into such distress and hunger, that he hired himself out as a servant to feed swine in the 
fields. And he would have been glad to eat, even the poor coarse husks that the swine 
were fed with, but his Master gave him none. In this distress, he said to himself ``How 
many of my father's servants have bread enough, and to spare, while I perish with 
hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father! I have sinned 
against Heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called Thy Son!'' 

And so he travelled back again, in great pain and sorrow and difficulty, to his father's 
house. When he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and knew him in the midst 
of all his rags and misery, and ran towards him, and wept, and fell upon his neck, and 
kissed him. And he told his servants to clothe his poor repentant Son in the best robes, 
and to make a great feast to celebrate his return. Which was done; and they began to be 
merry. 

But the eldest Son, who had been in the field and knew nothing of his brother's return, 
coming to the house and hearing the music and Dancing, called to one of the Servants, 
and asked him what it meant. To this the Servant made answer that his brother had 
come home, and that his father was joyful because of his return. At this, the elder 
brother was angry and would not go into the house; so the father, hearing of it, came out 
to persuade him. 

``Father'', said the elder brother, ``you do not treat me justly, to shew so much joy for 
my younger brother's return. For these many years I have remained with you constantly, 
and have been true to you, yet you have never made a feast for me. But when my 
younger brother returns, who has been prodigal, and riotous, and spent his money in 
many bad ways, you are full of delight, and the whole house makes merry!'' - ``Son'' 
returned the father, ``you have always been with me, and all I have is yours. But we 
thought your brother dead, and he is alive. He was lost, and he is found; and it is natural 
and right that we should be merry for his unexpected return to his old home.'' 

By this, our Saviour meant to teach, that those who have done wrong and forgotten God, 
are always welcome to him and will always receive his mercy, if they will only return to 
Him in sorrow for the sin of which they have been guilty. 

Now the Pharisees received these lessons from our Saviour, scornfully; for they were 
rich, and covetous, and thought themselves superior to all mankind. As a warning to 
them, Christ related this Parable: - OF DIVES AND LAZARUS. 

``There was a certain man who was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared 
sumptuously every day. And there was a certain beggar, named Lazarus, who was laid 
at his gate, full of sores and desiring to be fed with crumbs which fell from the rich 
man's table. Moreover, the dogs came and licked his sores. 

``And it came to pass that the Beggar died, and was carried by the angels into 
Abraham's bosom - Abraham had been a very good man who lived many years before 
that time, and was then in Heaven. The rich man also died, and was buried. And in Hell, 
he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus. And he 
cried and said, ''Father Abraham have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip 
the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame. But 
Abraham said, Son, remember that in thy life time thou receivedst good things, and 
likewise Lazarus evil things. But now, he is comforted, and thou art tormented! 

And among other Parables, Christ said to these same Pharisees, because of their pride, 
That two men once went up into the Temple, to pray; of whom, one was a Pharisee, and 
one a Publican. The Pharisee said, ``God I thank Thee, that I am not unjust as other men 
are, or bad as this Publican is! The Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up his eyes 
to Heaven, but struck his breast, and only said, ''God be merciful to me, a Sinner!`` And 
God, - our Saviour told them - would be merciful to that man rather than the other, and 
would be better pleased with his prayer, because he made it with a humble and lowly 
heart. 

The Pharisees were so angry at being taught these things, that they employed some spies 
to ask Our Saviour questions, and try to entrap Him into saying something which was 
against the Law. The Emperor of that country, who was called Caesar, having 
commanded tribute-money to be regularly paid to him by the people, and being cruel 
against any one who disputed his right to it, these spies thought they might, perhaps, 
induce our Saviour to say it was an unjust payment, and so to bring himself under the 
Emperor's displeasure. Therefore, pretending to be very humble, they came to Him and 
said, ``Master you teach the word of God rightly, and do not respect persons on account 
of their wealth or high station. Tell us, is it lawful that we should pay tribute to Caesar?'' 

Christ, who knew their thoughts, replied, ``Why do you ask ? Shew me a penny.'' They 
did so. ``Whose image, and whose name, is this upon it?'' he asked them. They said 
``Caesar's''. ``Then,'' said He, ``Render unto Caesar, the things that are Caesar's.''  


So they left him; very much enraged and disappointed that they could not entrap Him. 
But our Saviour knew their hearts and thoughts, as well as He knew that other men were 
conspiring against him, and that he would soon be put to Death. 

As he was teaching them thus, he sat near the Public Treasury, where people as they 
passed along the street, were accustomed to drop money into a box for the poor; and 
many rich persons, passing while Jesus sat there, had put in a great deal of money. At 
last there came a poor Widow who dropped in two mites, each half a farthing in value, 
and then went quietly away. Jesus, seeing her do this as he rose to leave the place, called 
his disciples about him, and said to them that that poor widow had been more truly 
charitable than all the rest who had given money that day; for the others were rich and 
would never miss what they had given, but she was very poor, and had given those two 
mites which might have bought her bread to eat. 

Let us never forget what the poor widow did, when we think we are charitable. 



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CHAPTER THE EIGHTH
There was a certain man named Lazarus of Bethany, who was taken very ill; and as he 
was the Brother of that Mary who had anointed Christ with ointment, and wiped his feet 
with her hair, She and her sister Martha sent to him in great trouble, saying, Lord, 
Lazarus whom you love is sick, and like to die. 

Jesus did not go to them for two days after receiving this message; but when that time 
was past, he said to his Disciples, ``Lazarus is dead. Let us go to Bethny.'' When they 
arrived there (it was a place very near to Jerusalem) they found, as Jesus had foretold, 
that Lazarus was dead, and had been dead and buried, four days. 

When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she rose up from among the people who had 
come to condole with her on her poor brother's death, and ran to meet him: leaving her 
sister Mary weeping, in the house. When Martha saw Him she burst into tears, and said 
``Oh Lord if Thou hads't been here, my brother would not have died.'' - ``Thy brother 
shall rise again '', returned Our Saviour. ``I know he will, and I believe he will, Lord, at 
the Resurrection on the Last Day '', said Martha. 

Jesus said to her, ``I am the Resurrection and the Life. Dost thou believe this? She 
answered '' Yes Lord``; and running back to her sister Mary, told her that Christ was 
come. Mary hearing this, ran out, followed by all those who had been grieving with her 
in the house, and coming to the place where he was, fell down at his feet upon the 
ground and wept; and so did all the rest. Jesus was so full of compassion for their 
sorrow, that He wept too, as he said, ''where have you laid him?`` - They said, ''Lord, 
come and see!`` 

He was buried in a cave; and there was a great stone laid upon it. When they all came to 
the Grave, Jesus ordered the stone to be rolled away, which was done. Then, after 
casting up his eyes, and thanking God, he said, in a loud and solemn voice, ``Lazarus, 
come forth!'' and the dead man, Lazarus, restored to life, came out among the people, 
and went home with his sisters. At this sight, so awful and affecting, many of the people 
there, believed that Christ was indeed the Son of God; come to instruct and save 
mankind. 

But others ran to tell the Pharisees; and from that day the Pharisees resolved among 
themselves - to prevent more people from believing in him, that Jesus should be killed. 
And they agreed among themselves - meeting in the Temple for that purpose - that if he 
came into Jerusalem before the Feast of the Passover, which was then approaching, he 
should be seized. 

It was six days before the Passover, when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead; and, at 
night, when they all sat at supper together, with Lazarus among them, Mary rose up, and 
took a pound of ointment (which was very precious and costly, and was called ointment 
of Spikenard) and anointed the feet of Jesus Christ with it, and, once again, wiped them 
on her hair; and the whole house was filled with the pleasant smell of the ointment. 
Judas Iscariot, one of the Disciples, pretended to be angry at this, and said that the 
ointment might have been sold for Three Hundred Pence, and the money given to the 
poor. But he only said so, in reality, because he carried the Purse, and was (unknown to 
the rest, at that time) a Thief, and wished to get all the money he could. He now began 
to plot for betraying Christ into the hands of the chief Priests. 

The Feast of the Passover now drawing very near, Jesus Christ, with his disciples, 
moved forward towards Jerusalem. When they were come near to that city, He pointed 
to a village and told two of his disciples to go there, and they would find an ass, with a 
colt, tied to a tree, which they were to bring to Him. Finding these animals exactly as 
Jesus had described, they brought them away, and Jesus, riding on the ass, entered 
Jerusalem. An immense crowd of people collected round him as he went along, and 
throwing their robes on the ground, and cutting down green branches from the trees, and 
spreading them in His path, they shouted, and cried ``Hosanna to the Son of David!'' 
(David had been a great King there) `` He comes in the name of the Lord! This is Jesus, 
the Prophet of Nazareth!'' And when Jesus went into the Temple, and cast out the tables 
of the money- changers who wrongfully sat there, together with people who sold Doves; 
saying `` My father's house is a house of prayer, but ye have made it a den of Thieves!'' 
- and when the people and children cried in the Temple ``This is Jesus the Prophet of 
Nazareth,'' and would not be silenced - and when the blind and lame came flocking 
there in crowds, and were healed by his hand - the chief Priests and Scribes, and 
Pharisees were filled with fear and hatred of Him. But Jesus continued to heal the sick, 
and to do good, and went and lodged at Bethany; a place that was very near the City of 
Jerusalem, but not within the walls. 

One night, at that place, he rose from Supper at which he was seated with his Disciples, 
and taking a cloth and a basin of water, washed their feet. Simon Peter, one of the 
Disciples, would have prevented Him from washing his feet: but our Saviour told Him 
that He did this, in order that they, remembering it, might be always kind and gentle to 
one another, and might know no pride or ill-will among themselves. 

Then, he became sad, and grieved, and looking round on the Disciples said, ``There is 
one here, who will betray me.'' They cried out, one after another, ``Is it I, Lord! - ''Is it 
I!`` But he only answered, ''It is one of the Twelve that dippeth with me in the dish.`` 
One of the disciples, whom Jesus loved, happening to be leaning on His Breast at that 
moment listening to his words, Simon Peter beckoned to him that he should ask the 
name of this false man. Jesus answered '' It is he to whom I shall give a sop when I have 
dipped it in the dish`` and when he had dipped it, He gave it to Judas Iscariot, saying 
''What thou doest, do quickly.`` Which the other disciples did not understand, but which 
Judas knew to mean that Christ had read his bad thoughts. 

So Judas, taking the sop, went out immediately. It was night, and he went straight to the 
chief Priests and said ``what will you give me, if I deliver him to you?'' They agreed to 
give him thirty pieces of Silver; and for this, he undertook soon to betray into their 
hands, his Lord and Master Jesus Christ. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE NINTH
The feast of the Passover being now almost come, Jesus said to two of his disciples, 
Peter and John, ``Go into the city of Jerusalem, and you will meet a man carrying a 
pitcher of water. Follow him home, and say to him, ''the Master says where is the 
guest-chamber, where he can eat the Passover with his Disciples.`` And he will shew 
you a large upper room, furnished. There, make ready the supper.'' 

The two disciples found that it happened as Jesus had said; and having met the man 
with the pitcher of water, and having followed him home, and having been shewn the 
room, they prepared the supper, and Jesus and the other ten apostles came at the usual 
time, and they all sat down to partake of it together. 

It is always called The Last Supper, because this was the last time that Our Saviour ate 
and drank with his Disciples. 

And he took bread from the table, and blessed it, and broke it, and gave it to them; and 
drank, and gave it to them, saying ``Do this in remembrance of Me!'' And when they 
had finished supper, and had sung a hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives. 

There, Jesus told them that he would be seized that night, and that they would all leave 
him alone and would think only of their own safety. Peter said, earnestly, he never 
would, for one. ``Before the cock crows,'' returned Our Saviour, ``you will deny me 
thrice.'' But Peter answered ``No Lord. Though I should die with Thee, I will never deny 
Thee'' And all the other Disciples said the same. 

Jesus then led the way over a brook, called Cedron, into a garden that was called 
Gethsemane; and walked with three of the disciples into a retired part of the garden. 
Then he left them as he had left the other, together; saying ``Wait here, and watch!'' �E
and went away and prayed by Himself, while they, being weary, fell asleep. 

And Christ suffered great sorrow and distress of mind, in his prayers in that garden, 
because of the wickness of the men of Jerusalem who were going to kill Him; and He 
shed tears before God, and was in deep and strong affliction. 

When His prayers were finished, and He was comforted, He returned to the Disciples, 
and said ``Rise! Let us be going! He is close at hand, who will betray me!'' 

Now, Judas knew that garden well, for Our Saviour had often walked there, with his 
Disciples; and, almost at the moment when Our Saviour said these words, he came there, 
accompanied by a strong guard of men and officers, which had been sent by the chief 
Priests and Pharisees. It being dark, they carried lanterns and torches. They were armed 
with swords and staves too; for they did not know but that the people would rise and 
defend Jesus Christ; and this had made them afraid to seize Him boldly in the day, when 
he sat teaching the people. 

As the leader of this guard had never seen Jesus Christ and did not know him from the 
apostles, Judas had said to them, `` The man whom I kiss, will be he.'' As he advanced 
to give this wicked kiss, Jesus said to the soldiers ``Whom do ye seek?''- `` Jesus of 
Nazareth,'' they answered. ``Then,'' said Our Saviour, ``I am He.'' Which Judas 
confirmed, by saying ``Hail Master!'' and kissing Him. Whereupon Jesus said, ``Judas, 
Thou betrayest me with a kiss!'' 

The guard then ran forward to seize Him. No one offered to protect Him, except Peter, 
who, having a sword, drew it, and cut off the right ear of the High Priest's Servant, who 
was one of them, and whose name was Malchus. But Jesus made him sheath his sword, 
and gave himself up. Then, all the disciples forsook Him, and fled; and there remained 
not one- not one- to bear Him company. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE TENTH
After a short time, Peter and another Disciple took heart, and secretly followed the 
guard to the house of Caiaphas the High Priest, whither Jesus was taken, and where the 
Scribes and others were assembled to question Him. Peter stood at the door, but the 
other disciple, who was known to the High Priest, went in, and presently returning, 
asked the woman, who kept the door, to admit Peter too. She, looking at him said, ``Are 
you not one of the Disciples?'' He said, ``I am not.'' So she let him in; and he stood 
before a fire that was there, warming himself, among the servants and officers who were 
crowded round it. For it was very cold. 

Some of these men asked him the same question as the woman had done, and said, 
``Are you not one of the disciples?'' He again denied it, and said, ``I am not.'' One of 
them, who was related to that man whose ear Peter had cut off with his sword, said `` 
Did I not see you in the garden with him?'' Peter again denied it with an oath, and said, 
``I do not know the man.'' Immediately the cock crew, and Jesus turning round, looked 
stedfastly at Peter. Then Peter remembered what He had said - that before the cock crew, 
he would deny Him thrice - and went out, and wept bitterly. 

Among other questions that were put to Jesus, the High Priest asked Him what He had 
taught the people. To which He answered that He had taught them in the open day, and 
in the open streets, and that the priests should ask the people what they had learned of 
Him. One of the officers struck Jesus with his hand for this reply; and two false 
witnesses coming in, said they had heard Him say that He could destroy the Temple of 
God and build it again in three days. Jesus answered little; but the Scribes and Priests 
agreed that He was guilty of blasphemy, and should be put to death; and they spat upon, 
and beat him. 

When Judas Iscariot saw that His Master was indeed condemned, he was so full of 
horror for what he had done, that he took the Thirty Pieces of Silver back to the chief 
Priests, and said ``I have betrayed innocent blood! I cannot keep it!'' with those words, 
he threw the money down upon the floor, and rushing away, wild with despair, hanged 
himself. The rope, being weak, broke with the weight of his body, and it fell down on 
the ground, after Death, all bruised and burst, - a dreadful sight to see! The chief Priests, 
not knowing what else to do with the Thirty Pieces of Silver, bought a burying-place for 
strangers with it, the proper name of which was The Potters' Field. But the people called 
it The Field of Blood ever afterwards. 

Jesus was taken from the High Priests' to the Judgment Hall where Pontius Pilate, the 
Governor, sat, to administer Justice. Pilate (who was not a Jew) said to Him ``your own 
Nation, the Jews, and your own Priests have delivered you to me ''your own Nation, the 
Jews, and your own Priests have delivered you to me. What have you done?`` Finding 
that He had done no harm, Pilate went out and told the Jews so; but they said ''He has 
been teaching the People what is not true and what is wrong; and he began to do so, 
long ago, in Galilee.`` As Herod had the right to punish people who offended against the 
law in Galilee, Pilate said, ''I find no wrong in him. Let him be taken before Herod!`` 

They carried Him accordingly before Herod, where he sat surrounded by his stern 
soldiers and men in armour. And these laughed at, Jesus, and dressed him, in mockery, 
in a fine robe, and sent him back to Pilate. And Pilate called the Priests and People 
together again, and said ``I find no wrong in this man; neither does Herod. He has done 
nothing to deserve death.'' But they cried out, ``He has, he has! Yes, yes! Let him be 
killed!'' 

Pilate was troubled in his mind to hear them so clamorous against Jesus Christ. His wife, 
too, had dreamed all night about it, and sent to him upon the Judgment Seat saying 
``Have nothing to do with that just man!'' As it was the custom of the feast of the 
Passover to give some prisoner his liberty, Pilate endeavoured to persuade the people to 
ask for the release of Jesus. But they said (being very ignorant and passionate, and being 
told to do so, by the Priests) ``No, no, we will not have him released. Release Barabbas, 
and let this man be crucified!'' 

Barabbas was a wicked criminal, in jail for his crimes, and in danger of being put to 
death. 

Pilate, finding the people so determined against Jesus, delivered him to the soldiers to 
be scourged - that is beaten. They plaited a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and 
dressed Him in a purple robe, and spat upon him, and struck him with their hands, and 
said ``Hail, King of the Jews!'' - remembering that the crowd had called him the Son of 
David when he entered into Jerusalem. And they ill-used him in many cruel ways; but 
Jesus bore it patiently, and only said ``Father! Forgive them! They know not what they 
do!'' 

Once more, Pilate brought Him out before the people, dressed in the purple robe and 
crown of thorns, and said `` Behold the man!'' They cried out, savagely, ``Crucify him! 
Crucify him!'' So did the chief Priests and officers. ``Take him and crucify him 
yourselves,'' said Pilate. ``I find no fault in him.'' But they cried out, ``He called himself 
the Son of the God; and that, by the Jewish Law is Death! And he called himself King 
of the Jews; and that is against the Roman Law, for we have no King but Caesar, who is 
the Roman Emperor. If you let him go, you are not Caesar's friend. Crucify him! 
Crucify him!'' 

When Pilate saw that he could not prevail with them, however hard he tried, he called 
for water, and washing his hands before the crowd, said, ``I am innocent of the blood of 
this just person.'' Then he delivered Him to them to be crucified; and they, shouting and 
gathering round Him, and treating him (who still prayed for them to God) with cruelty 
and insult, took Him away. 



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH
That you may know what the People meant when they said ``Crucify him!'' I must tell 
you that in those times, which were very cruel times indeed (let us thank God and Jesus 
Christ that they are past!) it was the custom to kill people who were sentenced to Death, 
by nailing them alive on a great wooden Cross, planted upright in the ground, and 
leaving them there, exposed to the Sun and Wind, and day and night, until they died of 
pain and thirst. It was the custom too, to make them walk to the place of execution, 
carrying the cross-piece of wood to which their hands were to be afterwards nailed; that 
their shame and suffering might be the greater. 

Bearing his Cross, upon his shoulder, like the commonest and most wicked criminal, 
our blessed Saviour, Jesus Christ, surrounded by the persecuting crowd, went out of 
Jerusalem to a place called in the Hebrew language, Golgotha; that is, the place of a 
scull. And being come to a hill called Mount Calvary, they hammered cruel nails 
through his hands and feet and nailed him on the Cross, between two other crosses on 
each of which, a common thief was nailed in agony. Over His head, they fastened this 
writing ``Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews'' - in three languages; in Hebrew, in 
Greek, and in Latin. 

Meantime, a guard of four soldiers, sitting on the ground, divided His clothes (which 
they had taken off) into four parcels for themselves, and cast lots for His coat, and sat 
there, gambling and talking, while He suffered. They offered him vinegar to drink, 
mixed with gall; and wine, mixed with myrrh, but he took none. And the wicked people 
who passed that way, mocked him, and said ``If Thou be the Son of God, come down 
from the cross.'' The Chief Priests also mocked Him, and said ``He came to save Sinners. 
Let him save himself!'' One of the Thieves too, railed at him, in his torture, and said, ‘I
f Thou be Christ, save thyself, and us.`` But the other Thief, who was penitent, said '' 
Lord! Remember me when Thou comest into Thy Kingdom!`` And Jesus answered, '' 
Today, thou shalt be with me in Paradise.`` 

None were there, to take pity on Him, but one disciple and four women. God blessed 
those women for their true and tender hearts! They were, the mother of Jesus, his 
mother’s sister, Mary, the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene who had twice 
dried his feet upon her hair. The disciple was he whom Jesus loved - John, who had 
leaned upon his breast and asked Him which was the Betrayer. When Jesus saw them 
standing at the foot of the Cross, He said to His mother that John would be her son, to 
comfort her when He was dead; and from that hour John was as a son to her, and loved 
her. 

At about the sixth hour, a deep and terrible darkness came over all the land, and lasted 
until the ninth hour, when Jesus cried out, with a loud voice, ``My God, My God, why 
has Thou forsaken me!'' The soldiers, hearing him, dipped a sponge in some vinegar, 
that was standing there, and fastening it to long reed, put it up to His Mouth. When He 
had received it, He said ``It is finished!'' - And crying ``Father! Into thy hands I 
commend my Spirit!'' - died. 

Then, there was a dreadful earthquake; and the Great wall of the Temple, cracked; and 
the rocks were rent asunder. The guard, terrified at these sights, said to each other, 
``Surely this was the Son of God!'' - and the People who had been watching the cross 
from a distance (among whom were many women) smote upon their breasts, and went 
fearfully and sadly, home. 

The next day, being the Sabbath, the Jews were anxious that the Bodies should be taken 
down at once, and made that request to Pilate. Therefore some soldiers came, and broke 
the legs of the two criminals to kill them; but coming to Jesus, and finding Him already 
dead, they only pierced his side with a spear. From the wound, there came out, blood 
and water. 

There was a good man named Joseph of Arimathea - a Jewish City - who believed in 
Christ, and going to Pilate privately (for fear of the Jews) begged that he might have the 
body. Pilate consenting, he and one Nicodemus, rolled it in linen and spices - it was the 
custom of the Jews to prepare bodies for burial in that way - and buried it in a new tomb 
or sepulchre, which had been cut out of a rock in a garden near to the place of 
Crucifixion, and where no one had ever yet been buried. They then rolled a great stone 
to the mouth of the sepulchre, and left Mary Magdalene, and the other Mary, sitting 
there, watching it. 

The Chief Priests and Pharisees remembering that Jesus Christ had said to his disciples 
that He would rise from the grave on the third day after His death, went to Pilate and 
prayed that the Sepulchre might be well taken care off until that day, lest the disciples 
should steal the Body, and afterwards say to the people that Christ was risen from the 
dead. Pilate agreeing to this, a guard of soldiers was set over it constantly, and the stone 
was sealed up besides. And so it remained, watched and sealed, until the third day; 
which was the first day of the week. 

When that morning began to dawn, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, and some 
other women, came to the Sepulchre, with some more spices which they had prepared. 
As they were saying to each other, ``How shall we roll away the stone?'' the earth 
trembled and shook, and an angel, descending from Heaven, rolled it back, and then sat 
resting on it. His countenance was like lightning, and his garments were white as snow; 
and at sight of him, the men of the guard fainted away with fear, as if they were dead. 

Mary Magdalene saw the stone rolled away, and waiting to see no more, ran to Peter 
and John who were coming towards the place, and said ``They have taken away the 
Lord and we know not where they have laid him!'' They immediately ran to the Tomb, 
but John, being the faster of the two, outran the other, and got there first. He stooped 
down, and looked in, and saw the linen cloths in which the body had been wrapped, 
lying there; but he did not go in. When Peter came up, he went in, and saw the linen 
clothes lying in one place, and a napkin that had been bound about the head, in another. 
John also went in then, and saw the same things. Then they went home, to tell the rest. 

But Mary Magdalene remained outside the sepulcher, weeping. After a little time, she 
stooped down, and looked in, and saw Two angels, clothed in white, sitting where the 
body of Christ had lain. These said to her, ``Woman, why weepest Thou?'' She 
answered, ``Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have 
laid him.'' As she gave his answer, she turned round, and saw Jesus standing behind her, 
but did not Then know Him. ``Woman,'' said He, ``Why weepest Thou? what seekest 
thou?'' She, supposing Him to be the gardener, replied, ``Sir! If thou hast borne my Lord 
hence, tell me where Thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.'' Jesus pronounced 
her name, ``Mary.'' Then she knew him, and, starting, exclaimed ``Master!'' - ``Touch 
me not,'' said Christ; ``for I am not yet ascended to my father; but go to my disciples, 
and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and to 
your God!'' 

Accordingly, Mary Magdalene went and told the Disciples that she had seen Christ, and 
what He had said to her; and with them she found the other women whom she had left 
at the Sepulchre when she had gone to call those two disciples Peter and John. These 
women told her and the rest, that they had seen at the Tomb, two men in shining 
garments, at sight of whom they had been afraid, and had bent down, but who had told 
them that the Lord was risen; and also that as they came to tell this, they had seen Christ, 
on the way, and had held him by the feet, and worshipped Him. But these accounts 
seemed to the apostles at that time, as idle tales, and they did not believe them. 

The soldiers of the guard too, when they recovered from their fainted-fit, and went to 
the Chief Priests to tell them what they had seen, were silenced with large sums of 
money, and were told by them to say that the Disciples had stolen the Body away while 
they were asleep. 

But it happened that on that same day, Simon and Cleopas - Simon one of the twelve 
Apostles, and Cleopas one of the followers of Christ were walking to a village called 
Emmaus, at some little distance from Jerusalem, and were talking, by the way, upon the 
death and resurrection of Christ, when they were joined by a stranger, who explained 
the Scriptures to them, and told them a great deal about God, so that they wondered at 
his knowledge. As the night was fast coming on when they reached the village, they 
asked this stranger to stay with them, which he consented to do. When they all three sat 
down to supper, 

he took some bread, and blessed it, and broke it as Christ had done at the Last Supper. 
Looking on him in wonder they found that his face was changed before them, and that it 
was Christ himself; and as they looked on him, he disappeared. 

They instantly rose up, and returned to Jerusalem, and finding the disciples sitting 
together, told them what they had seen. While they were speaking, Jesus suddenly stood 
in the midst of all the company, and said ``Peace be unto ye!'' Seeing that they were 
greatly frightened, he shewed them his hands and feet, and invited them to touch Him; 
and, to encourage them and give them time to recover themselves, he ate a piece of 
broiled fish and a piece of honeycomb before them all. 

But Thomas, one of the Twelve Apostles, was not there, at that time; and when the rest 
said to him afterwards, ``we have seen the Lord!'' he answered ``Except I shall see in his 
hands the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe!'' At that 
moment, though the doors were all shut, Jesus again appeared, standing among them, 
and said ``Peace be unto you!'' Then He said to Thomas, ``Reach hither thy finger, and 
behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side; and be no 
faithless, but believing.'' And Thomas answered, and said to him, `` My Lord and my 
God!'' Then said Jesus, ``Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou has believed. 
Blessed are they that have not seen me, and yet have believed.'' 

After that time, Jesus Christ was seen by five hundred of his followers at once, and He 
remained with others of them forty days, teaching them, and instructing them to go forth 
into the world, and preach His gospel and religion; not minding what wicked men might 
do to them. And conducting his disciples at last, out of Jerusalem as far as Bethany, he 
blessed them, and ascended in a cloud to Heaven, and took His place at the right hand of 
God. And while they gazed into the bright blue sky where He had vanished, two white- 
robed angels appeared among them, and told them that as they had seen Christ ascend to 
Heaven, so He would, one day, come descending from it, to judge the World. 

When Christ was seen no more, the Apostles began to teach the People as He had 
commanded them. And having chosen a new apostle, named Matthias, to replace the 
Wicked Judas, they wandered into all countries, telling the People of Christ’s Life and 
Death - and of the Crucifixion and Resurrection - and of the Lessons he had taught - and 
baptizing them in Christ’s name. And through the power He had given them they 
healed the sick, and gave sight to the Blind, and speech to the Dumb, and Hearing to the 
Deaf, as he had done. And Peter being thrown into Prison, was delivered from it, in the 
dead of night, by an Angel: and once, his words before God caused a man named 
Ananias, and his wife Sapphira, who had told a lie, to be struck down dead, upon the 
Earth. 

Wherever they went, they were persecuted and cruelly treated; and one man named Saul 
who had held the clothes of some barbarous persons who pelted one of the Christians 
named Stephen, to death with stones, was always active in doing them harm. But God 
turned Saul’s heart afterwards; for as he was travelling to Damascus to find out some 
Christians who were there, and drag them to prison, there shone about him a great light 
from Heaven; a voice cried, ``Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me!'' and he was struck 
down from his horse, by an invisible hand, in sight of all the guards and soldiers who 
were riding with him. When they raised him, they found that he was blind; and so he 
remained for three days, neither eating nor drinking, until one of the Christians (sent to 
him by an angel for that purpose) restored his sight in the name of Jesus Christ. After 
which, he became a Christians, and preached, and taught, and believed, with the 
apostles, and did great service. 

They took the name of Christians from Our Saviour Christ, and carried Crosses as their 
sign, because upon a Cross He had suffered Death. The religions that were then in the 
World were false and brutal, and encouraged men to violence. Beasts, and even men, 
were killed in the churches, in the belief that the smell of their blood was pleasant to the 
Gods - there were supposed to be a great many Gods - and many most cruel and 
disgusting ceremonies prevailed. Yet, for all this, and though the christian Religion was 
such a true, and kind, and good one, the Priests of the old Religions long persuaded the 
people to do all possible hurt to the christians; and christians were hanged, beheaded, 
burnt, buried alive, and devoured in Theatres by Wild Beasts for the public amusement, 
during many years. Nothing would silence them, or terrify them though; for they knew 
that if they did their duty, they would go to Heaven. So thousands upon thousands of 
christians sprung up and taught the people and were cruelly killed, and were succeeded 
by other Christians, until the Religion gradually became the great religion of the world. 

Remember! - It is christianity TO DO GOOD always - even to those who do evil to us. 
It is christianity to love our neighbour as ourself, and to do to all men as we would have 
them Do to us. It is christianity to be gentle, merciful, and forgiving, and to keep those 
qualities quiet in our own hearts, and never make a boast of them, or of our prayers or 
of our love of God, but always to shew that we love Him by humbly trying to do right in 
everything. If we do this, and remember the life and lessons of Our Lord Jesus Christ, 
and try to act up to them, we may confidently hope that God will forgive us our sins and 
mistakes, and enable us to live and die in Peace.


THE END.


**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

THE LAZY TOUR OF TWO IDLE APPRENTICES

CHARLES DICKENS

CHAPTER I



In the autumn month of September, eighteen hundred and fifty-seven, wherein these 
presents bear date, two idle apprentices, exhausted by the long, hot summer, and the 
long, hot work it had brought with it, ran away from their employer.  They were bound 
to a highly meritorious lady (named Literature), of fair credit and repute, though, it must 
be acknowledged, not quite so highly esteemed in the City as she might be.  This is the 
more remarkable, as there is nothing against the respectable lady in that quarter, but 
quite the contrary; her family having rendered eminent service to many famous citizens 
of London.  It may be sufficient to name Sir William Walworth, Lord Mayor under 
King Richard II., at the time of Wat Tyler�fs insurrection, and Sir Richard Whittington: 
which latter distinguished man and magistrate was doubtless indebted to the lady�fs 
family for the gift of his celebrated cat.  There is also strong reason to suppose that 
they rang the Highgate bells for him with their own hands.

The misguided young men who thus shirked their duty to the mistress from whom they 
had received many favours, were actuated by the low idea of making a perfectly idle trip, 
in any direction.  They had no intention of going anywhere in particular; they wanted 
to see nothing, they wanted to know nothing, they wanted to learn nothing, they wanted 
to do nothing.  They wanted only to be idle.  They took to themselves (after 
HOGARTH), the names of Mr. Thomas Idle and Mr. Francis Goodchild; but there was 
not a moral pin to choose between them, and they were both idle in the last degree.

Between Francis and Thomas, however, there was this difference of character: 
Goodchild was laboriously idle, and would take upon himself any amount of pains and 
labour to assure himself that he was idle; in short, had no better idea of idleness than 
that it was useless industry.  Thomas Idle, on the other hand, was an idler of the 
unmixed Irish or Neapolitan type; a passive idler, a born-and-bred idler, a consistent 
idler, who practised what he would have preached if he had not been too idle to preach; 
a one entire and perfect chrysolite of idleness.

The two idle apprentices found themselves, within a few hours of their escape, walking 
down into the North of England, that is to say, Thomas was lying in a meadow, looking 
at the railway trains as they passed over a distant viaduct?which was his idea of 
walking down into the North; while Francis was walking a mile due South against 
time?which was his idea of walking down into the North.  In the meantime the day 
waned, and the milestones remained unconquered.

�eTom,�f said Goodchild, �ethe sun is getting low.  Up, and let us go forward!�f

�eNay,�f quoth Thomas Idle, �eI have not done with Annie Laurie yet.�f  And he 
proceeded with that idle but popular ballad, to the effect that for the bonnie young 
person of that name he would �elay him doon and dee�f?equivalent, in prose, to lay him 
down and die.

�eWhat an ass that fellow was!�f cried Goodchild, with the bitter emphasis of contempt.

�eWhich fellow?�f asked Thomas Idle.

�eThe fellow in your song.  Lay him doon and dee!  Finely he�fd show off before the 
girl by doing that.  A sniveller!  Why couldn�ft he get up, and punch somebody�fs 
head!�f

�eWhose?�f asked Thomas Idle.

�eAnybody�fs.  Everybody�fs would be better than nobody�fs!  If I fell into that state of 
mind about a girl, do you think I�fd lay me doon and dee?  No, sir,�f proceeded 
Goodchild, with a disparaging assumption of the Scottish accent, �eI�fd get me oop and 
peetch into somebody.  Wouldn�ft you?�f

�eI wouldn�ft have anything to do with her,�f yawned Thomas Idle.  �eWhy should I take 
the trouble?�f

�eIt�fs no trouble, Tom, to fall in love,�f said Goodchild, shaking his head.

�eIt�fs trouble enough to fall out of it, once you�fre in it,�f retorted Tom.  �eSo I keep out of 
it altogether.  It would be better for you, if you did the same.�f

Mr. Goodchild, who is always in love with somebody, and not unfrequently with 
several objects at once, made no reply.  He heaved a sigh of the kind which is termed 
by the lower orders �ea bellowser,�f and then, heaving Mr. Idle on his feet (who was not 
half so heavy as the sigh), urged him northward.

These two had sent their personal baggage on by train: only retaining each a knapsack.  
Idle now applied himself to constantly regretting the train, to tracking it through the 
intricacies of Bradshaw�fs Guide, and finding out where it is now?and where now?and 
where now?and to asking what was the use of walking, when you could ride at such a 
pace as that.  Was it to see the country?  If that was the object, look at it out of the 
carriage windows.  There was a great deal more of it to be seen there than here.  
Besides, who wanted to see the country?  Nobody.  And again, whoever did walk?  
Nobody.  Fellows set off to walk, but they never did it.  They came back and said 
they did, but they didn�ft.  Then why should he walk?  He wouldn�ft walk.  He swore 
it by this milestone!

It was the fifth from London, so far had they penetrated into the North.  Submitting to 
the powerful chain of argument, Goodchild proposed a return to the Metropolis, and a 
falling back upon Euston Square Terminus.  Thomas assented with alacrity, and so 
they walked down into the North by the next morning�fs express, and carried their 
knapsacks in the luggage-van.

It was like all other expresses, as every express is and must be.  It bore through the 
harvest country a smell like a large washing-day, and a sharp issue of steam as from a 
huge brazen tea-urn.  The greatest power in nature and art combined, it yet glided over 
dangerous heights in the sight of people looking up from fields and roads, as smoothly 
and unreally as a light miniature plaything.  Now, the engine shrieked in hysterics of 
such intensity, that it seemed desirable that the men who had her in charge should hold 
her feet, slap her hands, and bring her to; now, burrowed into tunnels with a stubborn 
and undemonstrative energy so confusing that the train seemed to be flying back into 
leagues of darkness.  Here, were station after station, swallowed up by the express 
without stopping; here, stations where it fired itself in like a volley of cannon-balls, 
swooped away four country-people with nosegays, and three men of business with 
portmanteaus, and fired itself off again, bang, bang, bang!  At long intervals were 
uncomfortable refreshment-rooms, made more uncomfortable by the scorn of Beauty 
towards Beast, the public (but to whom she never relented, as Beauty did in the story, 
towards the other Beast), and where sensitive stomachs were fed, with a contemptuous 
sharpness occasioning indigestion.  Here, again, were stations with nothing going but a 
bell, and wonderful wooden razors set aloft on great posts, shaving the air.  In these 
fields, the horses, sheep, and cattle were well used to the thundering meteor, and didn�ft 
mind; in those, they were all set scampering together, and a herd of pigs scoured after 
them.  The pastoral country darkened, became coaly, became smoky, became infernal, 
got better, got worse, improved again, grew rugged, turned romantic; was a wood, a 
stream, a chain of hills, a gorge, a moor, a cathedral town, a fortified place, a waste.  
Now, miserable black dwellings, a black canal, and sick black towers of chimneys; now, 
a trim garden, where the flowers were bright and fair; now, a wilderness of hideous 
altars all a-blaze; now, the water meadows with their fairy rings; now, the mangy patch 
of unlet building ground outside the stagnant town, with the larger ring where the Circus 
was last week.  The temperature changed, the dialect changed, the people changed, 
faces got sharper, manner got shorter, eyes got shrewder and harder; yet all so quickly, 
that the spruce guard in the London uniform and silver lace, had not yet rumpled his 
shirt-collar, delivered half the dispatches in his shiny little pouch, or read his 
newspaper.

Carlisle!  Idle and Goodchild had got to Carlisle.  It looked congenially and 
delightfully idle.  Something in the way of public amusement had happened last month, 
and something else was going to happen before Christmas; and, in the meantime there 
was a lecture on India for those who liked it?which Idle and Goodchild did not.  
Likewise, by those who liked them, there were impressions to be bought of all the vapid 
prints, going and gone, and of nearly all the vapid books.  For those who wanted to put 
anything in missionary boxes, here were the boxes.  For those who wanted the 
Reverend Mr. Podgers (artist�fs proofs, thirty shillings), here was Mr. Podgers to any 
amount.  Not less gracious and abundant, Mr. Codgers also of the vineyard, but 
opposed to Mr. Podgers, brotherly tooth and nail.  Here, were guide-books to the 
neighbouring antiquities, and eke the Lake country, in several dry and husky sorts; here, 
many physically and morally impossible heads of both sexes, for young ladies to copy, 
in the exercise of the art of drawing; here, further, a large impression of MR. 
SPURGEON, solid as to the flesh, not to say even something gross.  The working 
young men of Carlisle were drawn up, with their hands in their pockets, across the 
pavements, four and six abreast, and appeared (much to the satisfaction of Mr. Idle) to 
have nothing else to do.  The working and growing young women of Carlisle, from the 
age of twelve upwards, promenaded the streets in the cool of the evening, and rallied the 
said young men.  Sometimes the young men rallied the young women, as in the case of 
a group gathered round an accordion-player, from among whom a young man advanced 
behind a young woman for whom he appeared to have a tenderness, and hinted to her 
that he was there and playful, by giving her (he wore clogs) a kick.

On market morning, Carlisle woke up amazingly, and became (to the two Idle 
Apprentices) disagreeably and reproachfully busy.  There were its cattle market, its 
sheep market, and its pig market down by the river, with raw-boned and shock-headed 
Rob Roys hiding their Lowland dresses beneath heavy plaids, prowling in and out 
among the animals, and flavouring the air with fumes of whiskey.  There was its corn 
market down the main street, with hum of chaffering over open sacks.  There was its 
general market in the street too, with heather brooms on which the purple flower still 
flourished, and heather baskets primitive and fresh to behold.  With women trying on 
clogs and caps at open stalls, and �eBible stalls�f adjoining.  With �eDoctor Mantle�fs 
Dispensary for the cure of all Human Maladies and no charge for advice,�f and with 
Doctor Mantle�fs �eLaboratory of Medical, Chemical, and Botanical Science�f?both 
healing institutions established on one pair of trestles, one board, and one sun-blind.  
With the renowned phrenologist from London, begging to be favoured (at sixpence 
each) with the company of clients of both sexes, to whom, on examination of their 
heads, he would make revelations �eenabling him or her to know themselves.�f  Through 
all these bargains and blessings, the recruiting-sergeant watchfully elbowed his way, a 
thread of War in the peaceful skein.  Likewise on the walls were printed hints that the 
Oxford Blues might not be indisposed to hear of a few fine active young men; and that 
whereas the standard of that distinguished corps is full six feet, �egrowing lads of five 
feet eleven�f need not absolutely despair of being accepted.

Scenting the morning air more pleasantly than the buried majesty of Denmark did, 
Messrs. Idle and Goodchild rode away from Carlisle at eight o�fclock one forenoon, 
bound for the village of Hesket, Newmarket, some fourteen miles distant.  Goodchild 
(who had already begun to doubt whether he was idle: as his way always is when he has 
nothing to do) had read of a certain black old Cumberland hill or mountain, called 
Carrock, or Carrock Fell; and had arrived at the conclusion that it would be the 
culminating triumph of Idleness to ascend the same.  Thomas Idle, dwelling on the 
pains inseparable from that achievement, had expressed the strongest doubts of the 
expediency, and even of the sanity, of the enterprise; but Goodchild had carried his 
point, and they rode away.

Up hill and down hill, and twisting to the right, and twisting to the left, and with old 
Skiddaw (who has vaunted himself a great deal more than his merits deserve; but that is 
rather the way of the Lake country), dodging the apprentices in a picturesque and 
pleasant manner.  Good, weather-proof, warm, pleasant houses, well white-limed, 
scantily dotting the road.  Clean children coming out to look, carrying other clean 
children as big as themselves.  Harvest still lying out and much rained upon; here and 
there, harvest still unreaped.  Well-cultivated gardens attached to the cottages, with 
plenty of produce forced out of their hard soil.  Lonely nooks, and wild; but people can 
be born, and married, and buried in such nooks, and can live and love, and be loved, 
there as elsewhere, thank God! (Mr. Goodchild�fs remark.)  By-and-by, the village.  
Black, coarse-stoned, rough-windowed houses; some with outer staircases, like Swiss 
houses; a sinuous and stony gutter winding up hill and round the corner, by way of 
street.  All the children running out directly.  Women pausing in washing, to peep 
from doorways and very little windows.  Such were the observations of Messrs. Idle 
and Goodchild, as their conveyance stopped at the village shoemaker�fs.  Old Carrock 
gloomed down upon it all in a very ill-tempered state; and rain was beginning.

The village shoemaker declined to have anything to do with Carrock.  No visitors went 
up Carrock.  No visitors came there at all.  Aa�f the world ganged awa�f yon.  The 
driver appealed to the Innkeeper.  The Innkeeper had two men working in the fields, 
and one of them should be called in, to go up Carrock as guide.  Messrs. Idle and 
Goodchild, highly approving, entered the Innkeeper�fs house, to drink whiskey and eat 
oatcake.

The Innkeeper was not idle enough?was not idle at all, which was a great fault in 
him?but was a fine specimen of a north-country man, or any kind of man.  He had a 
ruddy cheek, a bright eye, a well-knit frame, an immense hand, a cheery, outspeaking 
voice, and a straight, bright, broad look.  He had a drawing-room, too, upstairs, which 
was worth a visit to the Cumberland Fells.  (This was Mr. Francis Goodchild�fs opinion, 
in which Mr. Thomas Idle did not concur.)

The ceiling of this drawing-room was so crossed and recrossed by beams of unequal 
lengths, radiating from a centre, in a corner, that it looked like a broken star-fish.  The 
room was comfortably and solidly furnished with good mahogany and horsehair.  It 
had a snug fireside, and a couple of well-curtained windows, looking out upon the wild 
country behind the house.  What it most developed was, an unexpected taste for little 
ornaments and nick-nacks, of which it contained a most surprising number.  They were 
not very various, consisting in great part of waxen babies with their limbs more or less 
mutilated, appealing on one leg to the parental affections from under little cupping 
glasses; but, Uncle Tom was there, in crockery, receiving theological instructions from 
Miss Eva, who grew out of his side like a wen, in an exceedingly rough state of profile 
propagandism.  Engravings of Mr. Hunt�fs country boy, before and after his pie, were 
on the wall, divided by a highly-coloured nautical piece, the subject of which had all her 
colours (and more) flying, and was making great way through a sea of a regular pattern, 
like a lady�fs collar.  A benevolent, elderly gentleman of the last century, with a 
powdered head, kept guard, in oil and varnish, over a most perplexing piece of furniture 
on a table; in appearance between a driving seat and an angular knife-box, but, when 
opened, a musical instrument of tinkling wires, exactly like David�fs harp packed for 
travelling.  Everything became a nick-nack in this curious room.  The copper 
tea-kettle, burnished up to the highest point of glory, took his station on a stand of his 
own at the greatest possible distance from the fireplace, and said: �eBy your leave, not a 
kettle, but a bijou.�f  The Staffordshire-ware butter-dish with the cover on, got upon a 
little round occasional table in a window, with a worked top, and announced itself to the 
two chairs accidentally placed there, as an aid to polite conversation, a graceful trifle in 
china to be chatted over by callers, as they airily trifled away the visiting moments of a 
butterfly existence, in that rugged old village on the Cumberland Fells.  The very 
footstool could not keep the floor, but got upon a sofa, and there-from proclaimed itself, 
in high relief of white and liver-coloured wool, a favourite spaniel coiled up for repose.  
Though, truly, in spite of its bright glass eyes, the spaniel was the least successful 
assumption in the collection: being perfectly flat, and dismally suggestive of a recent 
mistake in sitting down on the part of some corpulent member of the family.

There were books, too, in this room; books on the table, books on the chimney-piece, 
books in an open press in the corner.  Fielding was there, and Smollett was there, and 
Steele and Addison were there, in dispersed volumes; and there were tales of those who 
go down to the sea in ships, for windy nights; and there was really a choice of good 
books for rainy days or fine.  It was so very pleasant to see these things in such a 
lonesome by-place?so very agreeable to find these evidences of a taste, however 
homely, that went beyond the beautiful cleanliness and trimness of the house?so 
fanciful to imagine what a wonder a room must be to the little children born in the 
gloomy village?what grand impressions of it those of them who became wanderers 
over the earth would carry away; and how, at distant ends of the world, some old 
voyagers would die, cherishing the belief that the finest apartment known to men was 
once in the Hesket-Newmarket Inn, in rare old Cumberland?it was such a charmingly 
lazy pursuit to entertain these rambling thoughts over the choice oatcake and the genial 
whiskey, that Mr. Idle and Mr. Goodchild never asked themselves how it came to pass 
that the men in the fields were never heard of more, how the stalwart landlord replaced 
them without explanation, how his dog-cart came to be waiting at the door, and how 
everything was arranged without the least arrangement for climbing to old Carrock�fs 
shoulders, and standing on his head.

Without a word of inquiry, therefore, the Two Idle Apprentices drifted out resignedly 
into a fine, soft, close, drowsy, penetrating rain; got into the landlord�fs light dog-cart, 
and rattled off through the village for the foot of Carrock.  The journey at the outset 
was not remarkable.  The Cumberland road went up and down like all other roads; the 
Cumberland curs burst out from backs of cottages and barked like other curs, and the 
Cumberland peasantry stared after the dog-cart amazedly, as long as it was in sight, like 
the rest of their race.  The approach to the foot of the mountain resembled the 
approaches to the feet of most other mountains all over the world.  The cultivation 
gradually ceased, the trees grew gradually rare, the road became gradually rougher, and 
the sides of the mountain looked gradually more and more lofty, and more and more 
difficult to get up.  The dog-cart was left at a lonely farm-house.  The landlord 
borrowed a large umbrella, and, assuming in an instant the character of the most 
cheerful and adventurous of guides, led the way to the ascent.  Mr. Goodchild looked 
eagerly at the top of the mountain, and, feeling apparently that he was now going to be 
very lazy indeed, shone all over wonderfully to the eye, under the influence of the 
contentment within and the moisture without.  Only in the bosom of Mr. Thomas Idle 
did Despondency now hold her gloomy state.  He kept it a secret; but he would have 
given a very handsome sum, when the ascent began, to have been back again at the inn.  
The sides of Carrock looked fearfully steep, and the top of Carrock was hidden in mist.  
The rain was falling faster and faster.  The knees of Mr. Idle?always weak on 
walking excursions?shivered and shook with fear and damp.  The wet was already 
penetrating through the young man�fs outer coat to a brand-new shooting-jacket, for 
which he had reluctantly paid the large sum of two guineas on leaving town; he had no 
stimulating refreshment about him but a small packet of clammy gingerbread nuts; he 
had nobody to give him an arm, nobody to push him gently behind, nobody to pull him 
up tenderly in front, nobody to speak to who really felt the difficulties of the ascent, the 
dampness of the rain, the denseness of the mist, and the unutterable folly of climbing, 
undriven, up any steep place in the world, when there is level ground within reach to 
walk on instead.  Was it for this that Thomas had left London?  London, where there 
are nice short walks in level public gardens, with benches of repose set up at convenient 
distances for weary travellers?London, where rugged stone is humanely pounded into 
little lumps for the road, and intelligently shaped into smooth slabs for the pavement!  
No! it was not for the laborious ascent of the crags of Carrock that Idle had left his 
native city, and travelled to Cumberland.  Never did he feel more disastrously 
convinced that he had committed a very grave error in judgment than when he found 
himself standing in the rain at the bottom of a steep mountain, and knew that the 
responsibility rested on his weak shoulders of actually getting to the top of it.

The honest landlord went first, the beaming Goodchild followed, the mournful Idle 
brought up the rear.  From time to time, the two foremost members of the expedition 
changed places in the order of march; but the rearguard never altered his position.  Up 
the mountain or down the mountain, in the water or out of it, over the rocks, through the 
bogs, skirting the heather, Mr. Thomas Idle was always the last, and was always the 
man who had to be looked after and waited for.  At first the ascent was delusively easy, 
the sides of the mountain sloped gradually, and the material of which they were 
composed was a soft spongy turf, very tender and pleasant to walk upon.  After a 
hundred yards or so, however, the verdant scene and the easy slope disappeared, and the 
rocks began.  Not noble, massive rocks, standing upright, keeping a certain regularity 
in their positions, and possessing, now and then, flat tops to sit upon, but little irritating, 
comfortless rocks, littered about anyhow, by Nature; treacherous, disheartening rocks of 
all sorts of small shapes and small sizes, bruisers of tender toes and trippers-up of 
wavering feet.  When these impediments were passed, heather and slough followed.  
Here the steepness of the ascent was slightly mitigated; and here the exploring party of 
three turned round to look at the view below them.  The scene of the moorland and the 
fields was like a feeble water-colour drawing half sponged out.  The mist was 
darkening, the rain was thickening, the trees were dotted about like spots of faint 
shadow, the division-lines which mapped out the fields were all getting blurred together, 
and the lonely farm-house where the dog-cart had been left, loomed spectral in the grey 
light like the last human dwelling at the end of the habitable world.  Was this a sight 
worth climbing to see?  Surely?surely not!

Up again?for the top of Carrock is not reached yet.  The land-lord, just as 
good-tempered and obliging as he was at the bottom of the mountain.  Mr. Goodchild 
brighter in the eyes and rosier in the face than ever; full of cheerful remarks and apt 
quotations; and walking with a springiness of step wonderful to behold.  Mr. Idle, 
farther and farther in the rear, with the water squeaking in the toes of his boots, with his 
two-guinea shooting-jacket clinging damply to his aching sides, with his overcoat so 
full of rain, and standing out so pyramidically stiff, in consequence, from his shoulders 
downwards, that he felt as if he was walking in a gigantic extinguisher?the despairing 
spirit within him representing but too aptly the candle that had just been put out.  Up 
and up and up again, till a ridge is reached and the outer edge of the mist on the summit 
of Carrock is darkly and drizzingly near.  Is this the top?  No, nothing like the top.  
It is an aggravating peculiarity of all mountains, that, although they have only one top 
when they are seen (as they ought always to be seen) from below, they turn out to have 
a perfect eruption of false tops whenever the traveller is sufficiently ill-advised to go out 
of his way for the purpose of ascending them.  Carrock is but a trumpery little 
mountain of fifteen hundred feet, and it presumes to have false tops, and even precipices, 
as if it were Mont Blanc.  No matter; Goodchild enjoys it, and will go on; and Idle, 
who is afraid of being left behind by himself, must follow.  On entering the edge of the 
mist, the landlord stops, and says he hopes that it will not get any thicker.  It is twenty 
years since he last ascended Carrock, and it is barely possible, if the mist increases, that 
the party may be lost on the mountain.  Goodchild hears this dreadful intimation, and 
is not in the least impressed by it.  He marches for the top that is never to be found, as 
if he was the Wandering Jew, bound to go on for ever, in defiance of everything.  The 
landlord faithfully accompanies him.  The two, to the dim eye of Idle, far below, look 
in the exaggerative mist, like a pair of friendly giants, mounting the steps of some 
invisible castle together.  Up and up, and then down a little, and then up, and then 
along a strip of level ground, and then up again.  The wind, a wind unknown in the 
happy valley, blows keen and strong; the rain-mist gets impenetrable; a dreary little 
cairn of stones appears.  The landlord adds one to the heap, first walking all round the 
cairn as if he were about to perform an incantation, then dropping the stone on to the top 
of the heap with the gesture of a magician adding an ingredient to a cauldron in full 
bubble.  Goodchild sits down by the cairn as if it was his study-table at home; Idle, 
drenched and panting, stands up with his back to the wind, ascertains distinctly that this 
is the top at last, looks round with all the little curiosity that is left in him, and gets, in 
return, a magnificent view of?Nothing!

The effect of this sublime spectacle on the minds of the exploring party is a little injured 
by the nature of the direct conclusion to which the sight of it points?the said 
conclusion being that the mountain mist has actually gathered round them, as the 
landlord feared it would.  It now becomes imperatively necessary to settle the exact 
situation of the farm-house in the valley at which the dog-cart has been left, before the 
travellers attempt to descend.  While the landlord is endeavouring to make this 
discovery in his own way, Mr. Goodchild plunges his hand under his wet coat, draws 
out a little red morocco-case, opens it, and displays to the view of his companions a neat 
pocket-compass.  The north is found, the point at which the farm-house is situated is 
settled, and the descent begins.  After a little downward walking, Idle (behind as usual) 
sees his fellow-travellers turn aside sharply?tries to follow them?loses them in the 
mist?is shouted after, waited for, recovered?and then finds that a halt has been 
ordered, partly on his account, partly for the purpose of again consulting the compass.

The point in debate is settled as before between Goodchild and the landlord, and the 
expedition moves on, not down the mountain, but marching straight forward round the 
slope of it.  The difficulty of following this new route is acutely felt by Thomas Idle.  
He finds the hardship of walking at all greatly increased by the fatigue of moving his 
feet straight forward along the side of a slope, when their natural tendency, at every step, 
is to turn off at a right angle, and go straight down the declivity.  Let the reader 
imagine himself to be walking along the roof of a barn, instead of up or down it, and he 
will have an exact idea of the pedestrian difficulty in which the travellers had now 
involved themselves.  In ten minutes more Idle was lost in the distance again, was 
shouted for, waited for, recovered as before; found Goodchild repeating his observation 
of the compass, and remonstrated warmly against the sideway route that his companions 
persisted in following.  It appeared to the uninstructed mind of Thomas that when three 
men want to get to the bottom of a mountain, their business is to walk down it; and he 
put this view of the case, not only with emphasis, but even with some irritability.  He 
was answered from the scientific eminence of the compass on which his companions 
were mounted, that there was a frightful chasm somewhere near the foot of Carrock, 
called The Black Arches, into which the travellers were sure to march in the mist, if 
they risked continuing the descent from the place where they had now halted.  Idle 
received this answer with the silent respect which was due to the commanders of the 
expedition, and followed along the roof of the barn, or rather the side of the mountain, 
reflecting upon the assurance which he received on starting again, that the object of the 
party was only to gain �ea certain point,�f and, this haven attained, to continue the descent 
afterwards until the foot of Carrock was reached.  Though quite unexceptionable as an 
abstract form of expression, the phrase �ea certain point�f has the disadvantage of 
sounding rather vaguely when it is pronounced on unknown ground, under a canopy of 
mist much thicker than a London fog.  Nevertheless, after the compass, this phrase was 
all the clue the party had to hold by, and Idle clung to the extreme end of it as hopefully 
as he could.

More sideway walking, thicker and thicker mist, all sorts of points reached except the 
�ecertain point;�f third loss of Idle, third shouts for him, third recovery of him, third 
consultation of compass.  Mr. Goodchild draws it tenderly from his pocket, and 
prepares to adjust it on a stone.  Something falls on the turf?it is the glass.  
Something else drops immediately after?it is the needle.  The compass is broken, and 
the exploring party is lost!

It is the practice of the English portion of the human race to receive all great disasters in 
dead silence.  Mr. Goodchild restored the useless compass to his pocket without saying 
a word, Mr. Idle looked at the landlord, and the landlord looked at Mr. Idle.  There was 
nothing for it now but to go on blindfold, and trust to the chapter of chances.  
Accordingly, the lost travellers moved forward, still walking round the slope of the 
mountain, still desperately resolved to avoid the Black Arches, and to succeed in 
reaching the �ecertain point.�f

A quarter of an hour brought them to the brink of a ravine, at the bottom of which there 
flowed a muddy little stream.  Here another halt was called, and another consultation 
took place.  The landlord, still clinging pertinaciously to the idea of reaching the 
�epoint,�f voted for crossing the ravine, and going on round the slope of the mountain.  
Mr. Goodchild, to the great relief of his fellow-traveller, took another view of the case, 
and backed Mr. Idle�fs proposal to descend Carrock at once, at any hazard?the rather as 
the running stream was a sure guide to follow from the mountain to the valley.  
Accordingly, the party descended to the rugged and stony banks of the stream; and here 
again Thomas lost ground sadly, and fell far behind his travelling companions.  Not 
much more than six weeks had elapsed since he had sprained one of his ankles, and he 
began to feel this same ankle getting rather weak when he found himself among the 
stones that were strewn about the running water.  Goodchild and the landlord were 
getting farther and farther ahead of him.  He saw them cross the stream and disappear 
round a projection on its banks.  He heard them shout the moment after as a signal that 
they had halted and were waiting for him.  Answering the shout, he mended his pace, 
crossed the stream where they had crossed it, and was within one step of the opposite 
bank, when his foot slipped on a wet stone, his weak ankle gave a twist outwards, a hot, 
rending, tearing pain ran through it at the same moment, and down fell the idlest of the 
Two Idle Apprentices, crippled in an instant.

The situation was now, in plain terms, one of absolute danger.  There lay Mr. Idle 
writhing with pain, there was the mist as thick as ever, there was the landlord as 
completely lost as the strangers whom he was conducting, and there was the compass 
broken in Goodchild�fs pocket.  To leave the wretched Thomas on unknown ground 
was plainly impossible; and to get him to walk with a badly sprained ankle seemed 
equally out of the question.  However, Goodchild (brought back by his cry for help) 
bandaged the ankle with a pocket-handkerchief, and assisted by the landlord, raised the 
crippled Apprentice to his legs, offered him a shoulder to lean on, and exhorted him for 
the sake of the whole party to try if he could walk.  Thomas, assisted by the shoulder 
on one side, and a stick on the other, did try, with what pain and difficulty those only 
can imagine who have sprained an ankle and have had to tread on it afterwards.  At a 
pace adapted to the feeble hobbling of a newly-lamed man, the lost party moved on, 
perfectly ignorant whether they were on the right side of the mountain or the wrong, and 
equally uncertain how long Idle would be able to contend with the pain in his ankle, 
before he gave in altogether and fell down again, unable to stir another step.

Slowly and more slowly, as the clog of crippled Thomas weighed heavily and more 
heavily on the march of the expedition, the lost travellers followed the windings of the 
stream, till they came to a faintly-marked cart-track, branching off nearly at right angles, 
to the left.  After a little consultation it was resolved to follow this dim vestige of a 
road in the hope that it might lead to some farm or cottage, at which Idle could be left in 
safety.  It was now getting on towards the afternoon, and it was fast becoming more 
than doubtful whether the party, delayed in their progress as they now were, might not 
be overtaken by the darkness before the right route was found, and be condemned to 
pass the night on the mountain, without bit or drop to comfort them, in their wet clothes.

The cart-track grew fainter and fainter, until it was washed out altogether by another 
little stream, dark, turbulent, and rapid.  The landlord suggested, judging by the colour 
of the water, that it must be flowing from one of the lead mines in the neighbourhood of 
Carrock; and the travellers accordingly kept by the stream for a little while, in the hope 
of possibly wandering towards help in that way.  After walking forward about two 
hundred yards, they came upon a mine indeed, but a mine, exhausted and abandoned; a 
dismal, ruinous place, with nothing but the wreck of its works and buildings left to 
speak for it.  Here, there were a few sheep feeding.  The landlord looked at them 
earnestly, thought he recognised the marks on them?then thought he did not?finally 
gave up the sheep in despair?and walked on just as ignorant of the whereabouts of the 
party as ever.

The march in the dark, literally as well as metaphorically in the dark, had now been 
continued for three-quarters of an hour from the time when the crippled Apprentice had 
met with his accident.  Mr. Idle, with all the will to conquer the pain in his ankle, and 
to hobble on, found the power rapidly failing him, and felt that another ten minutes at 
most would find him at the end of his last physical resources.  He had just made up his 
mind on this point, and was about to communicate the dismal result of his reflections to 
his companions, when the mist suddenly brightened, and begun to lift straight ahead.  
In another minute, the landlord, who was in advance, proclaimed that he saw a tree.  
Before long, other trees appeared?then a cottage?then a house beyond the cottage, 
and a familiar line of road rising behind it.  Last of all, Carrock itself loomed darkly 
into view, far away to the right hand.  The party had not only got down the mountain 
without knowing how, but had wandered away from it in the mist, without knowing 
why?away, far down on the very moor by which they had approached the base of 
Carrock that morning.

The happy lifting of the mist, and the still happier discovery that the travellers had 
groped their way, though by a very roundabout direction, to within a mile or so of the 
part of the valley in which the farm-house was situated, restored Mr. Idle�fs sinking 
spirits and reanimated his failing strength.  While the landlord ran off to get the 
dog-cart, Thomas was assisted by Goodchild to the cottage which had been the first 
building seen when the darkness brightened, and was propped up against the garden 
wall, like an artist�fs lay figure waiting to be forwarded, until the dog-cart should arrive 
from the farm-house below.  In due time?and a very long time it seemed to Mr. 
Idle?the rattle of wheels was heard, and the crippled Apprentice was lifted into the seat.  
As the dog-cart was driven back to the inn, the landlord related an anecdote which he 
had just heard at the farm-house, of an unhappy man who had been lost, like his two 
guests and himself, on Carrock; who had passed the night there alone; who had been 
found the next morning, �escared and starved;�f and who never went out afterwards, 
except on his way to the grave.  Mr. Idle heard this sad story, and derived at least one 
useful impression from it.  Bad as the pain in his ankle was, he contrived to bear it 
patiently, for he felt grateful that a worse accident had not befallen him in the wilds of 
Carrock.




CHAPTER II



The dog-cart, with Mr. Thomas Idle and his ankle on the hanging seat behind, Mr. 
Francis Goodchild and the Innkeeper in front, and the rain in spouts and splashes 
everywhere, made the best of its way back to the little inn; the broken moor country 
looking like miles upon miles of Pre-Adamite sop, or the ruins of some enormous jorum 
of antediluvian toast-and-water.  The trees dripped; the eaves of the scattered cottages 
dripped; the barren stone walls dividing the land, dripped; the yelping dogs dripped; 
carts and waggons under ill-roofed penthouses, dripped; melancholy cocks and hens 
perching on their shafts, or seeking shelter underneath them, dripped; Mr. Goodchild 
dripped; Thomas Idle dripped; the Inn-keeper dripped; the mare dripped; the vast 
curtains of mist and cloud passed before the shadowy forms of the hills, streamed water 
as they were drawn across the landscape.  Down such steep pitches that the mare 
seemed to be trotting on her head, and up such steep pitches that she seemed to have a 
supplementary leg in her tail, the dog-cart jolted and tilted back to the village.  It was 
too wet for the women to look out, it was too wet even for the children to look out; all 
the doors and windows were closed, and the only sign of life or motion was in the 
rain-punctured puddles.

Whiskey and oil to Thomas Idle�fs ankle, and whiskey without oil to Francis 
Goodchild�fs stomach, produced an agreeable change in the systems of both; soothing 
Mr. Idle�fs pain, which was sharp before, and sweetening Mr. Goodchild�fs temper, 
which was sweet before.  Portmanteaus being then opened and clothes changed, Mr. 
Goodchild, through having no change of outer garments but broadcloth and velvet, 
suddenly became a magnificent portent in the Innkeeper�fs house, a shining frontispiece 
to the fashions for the month, and a frightful anomaly in the Cumberland village.

Greatly ashamed of his splendid appearance, the conscious Goodchild quenched it as 
much as possible, in the shadow of Thomas Idle�fs ankle, and in a corner of the little 
covered carriage that started with them for Wigton?a most desirable carriage for any 
country, except for its having a flat roof and no sides; which caused the plumps of rain 
accumulating on the roof to play vigorous games of bagatelle into the interior all the 
way, and to score immensely.  It was comfortable to see how the people coming back 
in open carts from Wigton market made no more of the rain than if it were sunshine; 
how the Wigton policeman taking a country walk of half-a-dozen miles (apparently for 
pleasure), in resplendent uniform, accepted saturation as his normal state; how clerks 
and schoolmasters in black, loitered along the road without umbrellas, getting varnished 
at every step; how the Cumberland girls, coming out to look after the Cumberland cows, 
shook the rain from their eyelashes and laughed it away; and how the rain continued to 
fall upon all, as it only does fall in hill countries.

Wigton market was over, and its bare booths were smoking with rain all down the street.  
Mr. Thomas Idle, melodramatically carried to the inn�fs first floor, and laid upon three 
chairs (he should have had the sofa, if there had been one), Mr. Goodchild went to the 
window to take an observation of Wigton, and report what he saw to his disabled 
companion.

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �eWhat do you see from the 
turret?�f

�eI see,�f said Brother Francis, �ewhat I hope and believe to be one of the most dismal 
places ever seen by eyes.  I see the houses with their roofs of dull black, their stained 
fronts, and their dark-rimmed windows, looking as if they were all in mourning.  As 
every little puff of wind comes down the street, I see a perfect train of rain let off along 
the wooden stalls in the market-place and exploded against me.  I see a very big gas 
lamp in the centre which I know, by a secret instinct, will not be lighted to-night.  I see 
a pump, with a trivet underneath its spout whereon to stand the vessels that are brought 
to be filled with water.  I see a man come to pump, and he pumps very hard, but no 
water follows, and he strolls empty away.�f

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �ewhat more do you see from the 
turret, besides the man and the pump, and the trivet and the houses all in mourning and 
the rain?�f

�eI see,�f said Brother Francis, �eone, two, three, four, five, linen-drapers�f shops in front of 
me.  I see a linen-draper�fs shop next door to the right?and there are five more 
linen-drapers�f shops down the corner to the left.  Eleven homicidal linen-drapers�f 
shops within a short stone�fs throw, each with its hands at the throats of all the rest!  
Over the small first-floor of one of these linen-drapers�f shops appears the wonderful 
inscription, BANK.�f

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �ewhat more do you see from the 
turret, besides the eleven homicidal linen-drapers�f shops, and the wonderful inscription, 
�gBank,�h?on the small first-floor, and the man and the pump and the trivet and the 
houses all in mourning and the rain?�f

�eI see,�f said Brother Francis, �ethe depository for Christian Knowledge, and through the 
dark vapour I think I again make out Mr. Spurgeon looming heavily.  Her Majesty the 
Queen, God bless her, printed in colours, I am sure I see.  I see the Illustrated London 
News of several years ago, and I see a sweetmeat shop?which the proprietor calls a 
�gSalt Warehouse�h?with one small female child in a cotton bonnet looking in on tip-toe, 
oblivious of rain.  And I see a watchmaker�fs with only three great pale watches of a 
dull metal hanging in his window, each in a separate pane.�f

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �ewhat more do you see of Wigton, 
besides these objects, and the man and the pump and the trivet and the houses all in 
mourning and the rain?�f

�eI see nothing more,�f said Brother Francis, �eand there is nothing more to see, except the 
curlpaper bill of the theatre, which was opened and shut last week (the manager�fs 
family played all the parts), and the short, square, chinky omnibus that goes to the 
railway, and leads too rattling a life over the stones to hold together long.  O yes!  
Now, I see two men with their hands in their pockets and their backs towards me.�f

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �ewhat do you make out from the 
turret, of the expression of the two men with their hands in their pockets and their backs 
towards you?�f

�eThey are mysterious men,�f said Brother Francis, �ewith inscrutable backs.  They keep 
their backs towards me with persistency.  If one turns an inch in any direction, the 
other turns an inch in the same direction, and no more.  They turn very stiffly, on a 
very little pivot, in the middle of the market-place.  Their appearance is partly of a 
mining, partly of a ploughing, partly of a stable, character.  They are looking at 
nothing?very hard.  Their backs are slouched, and their legs are curved with much 
standing about.  Their pockets are loose and dog�fs-eared, on account of their hands 
being always in them.  They stand to be rained upon, without any movement of 
impatience or dissatisfaction, and they keep so close together that an elbow of each 
jostles an elbow of the other, but they never speak.  They spit at times, but speak not.  
I see it growing darker and darker, and still I see them, sole visible population of the 
place, standing to be rained upon with their backs towards me, and looking at nothing 
very hard.�f

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �ebefore you draw down the blind 
of the turret and come in to have your head scorched by the hot gas, see if you can, and 
impart to me, something of the expression of those two amazing men.�f

�eThe murky shadows,�f said Francis Goodchild, �eare gathering fast; and the wings of 
evening, and the wings of coal, are folding over Wigton.  Still, they look at nothing 
very hard, with their backs towards me.  Ah!  Now, they turn, and I see?�f

�eBrother Francis, brother Francis,�f cried Thomas Idle, �etell me quickly what you see of 
the two men of Wigton!�f

�eI see,�f said Francis Goodchild, �ethat they have no expression at all.  And now the 
town goes to sleep, undazzled by the large unlighted lamp in the market-place; and let 
no man wake it.�f

At the close of the next day�fs journey, Mr. Thomas Idle�fs ankle became much swollen 
and inflamed.  There are reasons which will presently explain themselves for not 
publicly indicating the exact direction in which that journey lay, or the place in which it 
ended.  It was a long day�fs shaking of Thomas Idle over the rough roads, and a long 
day�fs getting out and going on before the horses, and fagging up hills, and scouring 
down hills, on the part of Mr. Goodchild, who in the fatigues of such labours 
congratulated himself on attaining a high point of idleness.  It was at a little town, still 
in Cumberland, that they halted for the night?a very little town, with the purple and 
brown moor close upon its one street; a curious little ancient market-cross set up in the 
midst of it; and the town itself looking much as if it were a collection of great stones 
piled on end by the Druids long ago, which a few recluse people had since hollowed out 
for habitations.

�eIs there a doctor here?�f asked Mr. Goodchild, on his knee, of the motherly landlady of 
the little Inn: stopping in his examination of Mr. Idle�fs ankle, with the aid of a candle.

�eEy, my word!�f said the landlady, glancing doubtfully at the ankle for herself; �ethere�fs 
Doctor Speddie.�f

�eIs he a good Doctor?�f

�eEy!�f said the landlady, �eI ca�f him so.  A�f cooms efther nae doctor that I ken.  Mair 
nor which, a�fs just THE doctor heer.�f

�eDo you think he is at home?�f

Her reply was, �eGang awa�f, Jock, and bring him.�f

Jock, a white-headed boy, who, under pretence of stirring up some bay salt in a basin of 
water for the laving of this unfortunate ankle, had greatly enjoyed himself for the last 
ten minutes in splashing the carpet, set off promptly.  A very few minutes had elapsed 
when he showed the Doctor in, by tumbling against the door before him and bursting it 
open with his head.

�eGently, Jock, gently,�f said the Doctor as he advanced with a quiet step.  �eGentlemen, 
a good evening.  I am sorry that my presence is required here.  A slight accident, I 
hope?  A slip and a fall?  Yes, yes, yes.  Carrock, indeed?  Hah!  Does that pain 
you, sir?  No doubt, it does.  It is the great connecting ligament here, you see, that has 
been badly strained.  Time and rest, sir!  They are often the recipe in greater cases,�f 
with a slight sigh, �eand often the recipe in small.  I can send a lotion to relieve you, but 
we must leave the cure to time and rest.�f

This he said, holding Idle�fs foot on his knee between his two hands, as he sat over 
against him.  He had touched it tenderly and skilfully in explanation of what he said, 
and, when his careful examination was completed, softly returned it to its former 
horizontal position on a chair.

He spoke with a little irresolution whenever he began, but afterwards fluently.  He was 
a tall, thin, large-boned, old gentleman, with an appearance at first sight of being 
hard-featured; but, at a second glance, the mild expression of his face and some 
particular touches of sweetness and patience about his mouth, corrected this impression 
and assigned his long professional rides, by day and night, in the bleak hill-weather, as 
the true cause of that appearance.  He stooped very little, though past seventy and very 
grey.  His dress was more like that of a clergyman than a country doctor, being a plain 
black suit, and a plain white neck-kerchief tied behind like a band.  His black was the 
worse for wear, and there were darns in his coat, and his linen was a little frayed at the 
hems and edges.  He might have been poor?it was likely enough in that 
out-of-the-way spot?or he might have been a little self-forgetful and eccentric.  Any 
one could have seen directly, that he had neither wife nor child at home.  He had a 
scholarly air with him, and that kind of considerate humanity towards others which 
claimed a gentle consideration for himself.  Mr. Goodchild made this study of him 
while he was examining the limb, and as he laid it down.  Mr. Goodchild wishes to add 
that he considers it a very good likeness.

It came out in the course of a little conversation, that Doctor Speddie was acquainted 
with some friends of Thomas Idle�fs, and had, when a young man, passed some years in 
Thomas Idle�fs birthplace on the other side of England.  Certain idle labours, the fruit 
of Mr. Goodchild�fs apprenticeship, also happened to be well known to him.  The lazy 
travellers were thus placed on a more intimate footing with the Doctor than the casual 
circumstances of the meeting would of themselves have established; and when Doctor 
Speddie rose to go home, remarking that he would send his assistant with the lotion, 
Francis Goodchild said that was unnecessary, for, by the Doctor�fs leave, he would 
accompany him, and bring it back.  (Having done nothing to fatigue himself for a full 
quarter of an hour, Francis began to fear that he was not in a state of idleness.)

Doctor Speddie politely assented to the proposition of Francis Goodchild, �eas it would 
give him the pleasure of enjoying a few more minutes of Mr. Goodchild�fs society than 
he could otherwise have hoped for,�f and they went out together into the village street.  
The rain had nearly ceased, the clouds had broken before a cool wind from the 
north-east, and stars were shining from the peaceful heights beyond them.

Doctor Speddie�fs house was the last house in the place.  Beyond it, lay the moor, all 
dark and lonesome.  The wind moaned in a low, dull, shivering manner round the little 
garden, like a houseless creature that knew the winter was coming.  It was exceedingly 
wild and solitary.  �eRoses,�f said the Doctor, when Goodchild touched some wet leaves 
overhanging the stone porch; �ebut they get cut to pieces.�f

The Doctor opened the door with a key he carried, and led the way into a low but pretty 
ample hall with rooms on either side.  The door of one of these stood open, and the 
Doctor entered it, with a word of welcome to his guest.  It, too, was a low room, half 
surgery and half parlour, with shelves of books and bottles against the walls, which 
were of a very dark hue.  There was a fire in the grate, the night being damp and chill.  
Leaning against the chimney-piece looking down into it, stood the Doctor�fs Assistant.

A man of a most remarkable appearance.  Much older than Mr. Goodchild had 
expected, for he was at least two-and-fifty; but, that was nothing.  What was startling 
in him was his remarkable paleness.  His large black eyes, his sunken cheeks, his long 
and heavy iron-grey hair, his wasted hands, and even the attenuation of his figure, were 
at first forgotten in his extraordinary pallor.  There was no vestige of colour in the man.  
When he turned his face, Francis Goodchild started as if a stone figure had looked 
round at him.

�eMr. Lorn,�f said the Doctor.  �eMr. Goodchild.�f

The Assistant, in a distraught way?as if he had forgotten something?as if he had 
forgotten everything, even to his own name and himself?acknowledged the visitor�fs 
presence, and stepped further back into the shadow of the wall behind him.  But, he 
was so pale that his face stood out in relief again the dark wall, and really could not be 
hidden so.

�eMr. Goodchild�fs friend has met with accident, Lorn,�f said Doctor Speddie.  �eWe want 
the lotion for a bad sprain.�f

A pause.

�eMy dear fellow, you are more than usually absent to-night.  The lotion for a bad 
sprain.�f

�eAh! yes!  Directly.�f

He was evidently relieved to turn away, and to take his white face and his wild eyes to a 
table in a recess among the bottles.  But, though he stood there, compounding the 
lotion with his back towards them, Goodchild could not, for many moments, withdraw 
his gaze from the man.  When he at length did so, he found the Doctor observing him, 
with some trouble in his face.  �eHe is absent,�f explained the Doctor, in a low voice.  
�eAlways absent.  Very absent.�f

�eIs he ill?�f

�eNo, not ill.�f

�eUnhappy?�f

�eI have my suspicions that he was,�f assented the Doctor, �eonce.�f

Francis Goodchild could not but observe that the Doctor accompanied these words with 
a benignant and protecting glance at their subject, in which there was much of the 
expression with which an attached father might have looked at a heavily afflicted son.  
Yet, that they were not father and son must have been plain to most eyes.  The 
Assistant, on the other hand, turning presently to ask the Doctor some question, looked 
at him with a wan smile as if he were his whole reliance and sustainment in life.

It was in vain for the Doctor in his easy-chair, to try to lead the mind of Mr. Goodchild 
in the opposite easy-chair, away from what was before him.  Let Mr. Goodchild do 
what he would to follow the Doctor, his eyes and thoughts reverted to the Assistant.  
The Doctor soon perceived it, and, after falling silent, and musing in a little perplexity, 
said:

�eLorn!�f

�eMy dear Doctor.�f

�eWould you go to the Inn, and apply that lotion?  You will show the best way of 
applying it, far better than Mr. Goodchild can.�f

�eWith pleasure.�f

The Assistant took his hat, and passed like a shadow to the door.

�eLorn!�f said the Doctor, calling after him.

He returned.

�eMr. Goodchild will keep me company till you come home.  Don�ft hurry.  Excuse 
my calling you back.�f

�eIt is not,�f said the Assistant, with his former smile, �ethe first time you have called me 
back, dear Doctor.�f  With those words he went away.

�eMr. Goodchild,�f said Doctor Speddie, in a low voice, and with his former troubled 
expression of face, �eI have seen that your attention has been concentrated on my friend.�f

�eHe fascinates me.  I must apologise to you, but he has quite bewildered and mastered 
me.�f

�eI find that a lonely existence and a long secret,�f said the Doctor, drawing his chair a 
little nearer to Mr. Goodchild�fs, �ebecome in the course of time very heavy.  I will tell 
you something.  You may make what use you will of it, under fictitious names.  I 
know I may trust you.  I am the more inclined to confidence to-night, through having 
been unexpectedly led back, by the current of our conversation at the Inn, to scenes in 
my early life.  Will you please to draw a little nearer?�f

Mr. Goodchild drew a little nearer, and the Doctor went on thus: speaking, for the most 
part, in so cautious a voice, that the wind, though it was far from high, occasionally got 
the better of him.

When this present nineteenth century was younger by a good many years than it is now, 
a certain friend of mine, named Arthur Holliday, happened to arrive in the town of 
Doncaster, exactly in the middle of a race-week, or, in other words, in the middle of the 
month of September.  He was one of those reckless, rattle-pated, open-hearted, and 
open-mouthed young gentlemen, who possess the gift of familiarity in its highest 
perfection, and who scramble carelessly along the journey of life making friends, as the 
phrase is, wherever they go.  His father was a rich manufacturer, and had bought 
landed property enough in one of the midland counties to make all the born squires in 
his neighbourhood thoroughly envious of him.  Arthur was his only son, possessor in 
prospect of the great estate and the great business after his father�fs death; well supplied 
with money, and not too rigidly looked after, during his father�fs lifetime.  Report, or 
scandal, whichever you please, said that the old gentleman had been rather wild in his 
youthful days, and that, unlike most parents, he was not disposed to be violently 
indignant when he found that his son took after him.  This may be true or not.  I 
myself only knew the elder Mr. Holliday when he was getting on in years; and then he 
was as quiet and as respectable a gentleman as ever I met with.

Well, one September, as I told you, young Arthur comes to Doncaster, having decided 
all of a sudden, in his harebrained way, that he would go to the races.  He did not reach 
the town till towards the close of the evening, and he went at once to see about his 
dinner and bed at the principal hotel.  Dinner they were ready enough to give him; but 
as for a bed, they laughed when he mentioned it.  In the race-week at Doncaster, it is 
no uncommon thing for visitors who have not bespoken apartments, to pass the night in 
their carriages at the inn doors.  As for the lower sort of strangers, I myself have often 
seen them, at that full time, sleeping out on the doorsteps for want of a covered place to 
creep under.  Rich as he was, Arthur�fs chance of getting a night�fs lodging (seeing that 
he had not written beforehand to secure one) was more than doubtful.  He tried the 
second hotel, and the third hotel, and two of the inferior inns after that; and was met 
everywhere by the same form of answer.  No accommodation for the night of any sort 
was left.  All the bright golden sovereigns in his pocket would not buy him a bed at 
Doncaster in the race-week.

To a young fellow of Arthur�fs temperament, the novelty of being turned away into the 
street, like a penniless vagabond, at every house where he asked for a lodging, presented 
itself in the light of a new and highly amusing piece of experience.  He went on, with 
his carpet-bag in his hand, applying for a bed at every place of entertainment for 
travellers that he could find in Doncaster, until he wandered into the outskirts of the 
town.  By this time, the last glimmer of twilight had faded out, the moon was rising 
dimly in a mist, the wind was getting cold, the clouds were gathering heavily, and there 
was every prospect that it was soon going to rain.

The look of the night had rather a lowering effect on young Holliday�fs good spirits.  
He began to contemplate the houseless situation in which he was placed, from the 
serious rather than the humorous point of view; and he looked about him, for another 
public-house to inquire at, with something very like downright anxiety in his mind on 
the subject of a lodging for the night.  The suburban part of the town towards which he 
had now strayed was hardly lighted at all, and he could see nothing of the houses as he 
passed them, except that they got progressively smaller and dirtier, the farther he went.  
Down the winding road before him shone the dull gleam of an oil lamp, the one faint, 
lonely light that struggled ineffectually with the foggy darkness all round him.  He 
resolved to go on as far as this lamp, and then, if it showed him nothing in the shape of 
an Inn, to return to the central part of the town and to try if he could not at least secure a 
chair to sit down on, through the night, at one of the principal Hotels.

As he got near the lamp, he heard voices; and, walking close under it, found that it 
lighted the entrance to a narrow court, on the wall of which was painted a long hand in 
faded flesh-colour, pointing with a lean forefinger, to this inscription:-



THE TWO ROBINS.



Arthur turned into the court without hesitation, to see what The Two Robins could do 
for him.  Four or five men were standing together round the door of the house which 
was at the bottom of the court, facing the entrance from the street.  The men were all 
listening to one other man, better dressed than the rest, who was telling his audience 
something, in a low voice, in which they were apparently very much interested.

On entering the passage, Arthur was passed by a stranger with a knapsack in his hand, 
who was evidently leaving the house.

�eNo,�f said the traveller with the knapsack, turning round and addressing himself 
cheerfully to a fat, sly-looking, bald-headed man, with a dirty white apron on, who had 
followed him down the passage.  �eNo, Mr. landlord, I am not easily scared by trifles; 
but, I don�ft mind confessing that I can�ft quite stand that.�f

It occurred to young Holliday, the moment he heard these words, that the stranger had 
been asked an exorbitant price for a bed at The Two Robins; and that he was unable or 
unwilling to pay it.  The moment his back was turned, Arthur, comfortably conscious 
of his own well-filled pockets, addressed himself in a great hurry, for fear any other 
benighted traveller should slip in and forestall him, to the sly-looking landlord with the 
dirty apron and the bald head.

�eIf you have got a bed to let,�f he said, �eand if that gentleman who has just gone out 
won�ft pay your price for it, I will.�f

The sly landlord looked hard at Arthur.

�eWill you, sir?�f he asked, in a meditative, doubtful way.

�eName your price,�f said young Holliday, thinking that the landlord�fs hesitation sprang 
from some boorish distrust of him.  �eName your price, and I�fll give you the money at 
once if you like?�f

�eAre you game for five shillings?�f inquired the landlord, rubbing his stubbly double 
chin, and looking up thoughtfully at the ceiling above him.

Arthur nearly laughed in the man�fs face; but thinking it prudent to control himself, 
offered the five shillings as seriously as he could.  The sly landlord held out his hand, 
then suddenly drew it back again.

�eYou�fre acting all fair and above-board by me,�f he said: �eand, before I take your money, 
I�fll do the same by you.  Look here, this is how it stands.  You can have a bed all to 
yourself for five shillings; but you can�ft have more than a half-share of the room it 
stands in.  Do you see what I mean, young gentleman?�f

�eOf course I do,�f returned Arthur, a little irritably.  �eYou mean that it is a 
double-bedded room, and that one of the beds is occupied?�f

The landlord nodded his head, and rubbed his double chin harder than ever.  Arthur 
hesitated, and mechanically moved back a step or two towards the door.  The idea of 
sleeping in the same room with a total stranger, did not present an attractive prospect to 
him.  He felt more than half inclined to drop his five shillings into his pocket, and to 
go out into the street once more.

�eIs it yes, or no?�f asked the landlord.  �eSettle it as quick as you can, because there�fs 
lots of people wanting a bed at Doncaster to-night, besides you.�f

Arthur looked towards the court, and heard the rain falling heavily in the street outside.  
He thought he would ask a question or two before he rashly decided on leaving the 
shelter of The Two Robins.

�eWhat sort of a man is it who has got the other bed?�f he inquired.  �eIs he a gentleman?  
I mean, is he a quiet, well-behaved person?�f

�eThe quietest man I ever came across,�f said the landlord, rubbing his fat hands stealthily 
one over the other.  �eAs sober as a judge, and as regular as clock-work in his habits.  
It hasn�ft struck nine, not ten minutes ago, and he�fs in his bed already.  I don�ft know 
whether that comes up to your notion of a quiet man: it goes a long way ahead of mine, 
I can tell you.�f

�eIs he asleep, do you think?�f asked Arthur.

�eI know he�fs asleep,�f returned the landlord.  �eAnd what�fs more, he�fs gone off so fast, 
that I�fll warrant you don�ft wake him.  This way, sir,�f said the landlord, speaking over 
young Holliday�fs shoulder, as if he was addressing some new guest who was 
approaching the house.

�eHere you are,�f said Arthur, determined to be beforehand with the stranger, whoever he 
might be.  �eI�fll take the bed.�f  And he handed the five shillings to the landlord, who 
nodded, dropped the money carelessly into his waistcoat-pocket, and lighted the candle.

�eCome up and see the room,�f said the host of The Two Robins, leading the way to the 
staircase quite briskly, considering how fat he was.

They mounted to the second-floor of the house.  The landlord half opened a door, 
fronting the landing, then stopped, and turned round to Arthur.

�eIt�fs a fair bargain, mind, on my side as well as on yours,�f he said.  �eYou give me five 
shillings, I give you in return a clean, comfortable bed; and I warrant, beforehand, that 
you won�ft be interfered with, or annoyed in any way, by the man who sleeps in the 
same room as you.�f  Saying those words, he looked hard, for a moment, in young 
Holliday�fs face, and then led the way into the room.

It was larger and cleaner than Arthur had expected it would be.  The two beds stood 
parallel with each other?a space of about six feet intervening between them.  They 
were both of the same medium size, and both had the same plain white curtains, made 
to draw, if necessary, all round them.  The occupied bed was the bed nearest the 
window.  The curtains were all drawn round this, except the half curtain at the bottom, 
on the side of the bed farthest from the window.  Arthur saw the feet of the sleeping 
man raising the scanty clothes into a sharp little eminence, as if he was lying flat on his 
back.  He took the candle, and advanced softly to draw the curtain?stopped half-way, 
and listened for a moment?then turned to the landlord.

�eHe�fs a very quiet sleeper,�f said Arthur.

�eYes,�f said the landlord, �every quiet.�f

Young Holliday advanced with the candle, and looked in at the man cautiously.

�eHow pale he is!�f said Arthur.

�eYes,�f returned the landlord, �epale enough, isn�ft he?�f

Arthur looked closer at the man.  The bedclothes were drawn up to his chin, and they 
lay perfectly still over the region of his chest.  Surprised and vaguely startled, as he 
noticed this, Arthur stooped down closer over the stranger; looked at his ashy, parted 
lips; listened breathlessly for an instant; looked again at the strangely still face, and the 
motionless lips and chest; and turned round suddenly on the landlord, with his own 
cheeks as pale for the moment as the hollow cheeks of the man on the bed. 


�eCome here,�f he whispered, under his breath.  �eCome here, for God�fs sake!  The 
man�fs not asleep?he is dead!�f

�eYou have found that out sooner than I thought you would,�f said the landlord, 
composedly.  �eYes, he�fs dead, sure enough.  He died at five o�fclock to-day.�f

�eHow did he die?  Who is he?�f asked Arthur, staggered, for a moment, by the 
audacious coolness of the answer.

�eAs to who is he,�f rejoined the landlord, �eI know no more about him than you do.  
There are his books and letters and things, all sealed up in that brown-paper parcel, for 
the Coroner�fs inquest to open to-morrow or next day.  He�fs been here a week, paying 
his way fairly enough, and stopping in-doors, for the most part, as if he was ailing.  My 
girl brought him up his tea at five to-day; and as he was pouring of it out, he fell down 
in a faint, or a fit, or a compound of both, for anything I know.  We could not bring 
him to?and I said he was dead.  And the doctor couldn�ft bring him to?and the doctor 
said he was dead.  And there he is.  And the Coroner�fs inquest�fs coming as soon as it 
can.  And that�fs as much as I know about it.�f

Arthur held the candle close to the man�fs lips.  The flame still burnt straight up, as 
steadily as before.  There was a moment of silence; and the rain pattered drearily 
through it against the panes of the window.

�eIf you haven�ft got nothing more to say to me,�f continued the landlord, �eI suppose I 
may go.  You don�ft expect your five shillings back, do you?  There�fs the bed I 
promised you, clean and comfortable.  There�fs the man I warranted not to disturb you, 
quiet in this world for ever.  If you�fre frightened to stop alone with him, that�fs not my 
look out.  I�fve kept my part of the bargain, and I mean to keep the money.  I�fm not 
Yorkshire, myself, young gentleman; but I�fve lived long enough in these parts to have 
my wits sharpened; and I shouldn�ft wonder if you found out the way to brighten up 
yours, next time you come amongst us.�f  With these words, the landlord turned 
towards the door, and laughed to himself softly, in high satisfaction at his own 
sharpness.

Startled and shocked as he was, Arthur had by this time sufficiently recovered himself 
to feel indignant at the trick that had been played on him, and at the insolent manner in 
which the landlord exulted in it.

�eDon�ft laugh,�f he said sharply, �etill you are quite sure you have got the laugh against me.  
You shan�ft have the five shillings for nothing, my man.  I�fll keep the bed.�f

�eWill you?�f said the landlord.  �eThen I wish you a goodnight�fs rest.�f  With that brief 
farewell, he went out, and shut the door after him.

A good night�fs rest!  The words had hardly been spoken, the door had hardly been 
closed, before Arthur half-repented the hasty words that had just escaped him.  Though 
not naturally over-sensitive, and not wanting in courage of the moral as well as the 
physical sort, the presence of the dead man had an instantaneously chilling effect on his 
mind when he found himself alone in the room?alone, and bound by his own rash 
words to stay there till the next morning.  An older man would have thought nothing of 
those words, and would have acted, without reference to them, as his calmer sense 
suggested.  But Arthur was too young to treat the ridicule, even of his inferiors, with 
contempt?too young not to fear the momentary humiliation of falsifying his own 
foolish boast, more than he feared the trial of watching out the long night in the same 
chamber with the dead.

�eIt is but a few hours,�f he thought to himself, �eand I can get away the first thing in the 
morning.�f

He was looking towards the occupied bed as that idea passed through his mind, and the 
sharp, angular eminence made in the clothes by the dead man�fs upturned feet again 
caught his eye.  He advanced and drew the curtains, purposely abstaining, as he did so, 
from looking at the face of the corpse, lest he might unnerve himself at the outset by 
fastening some ghastly impression of it on his mind.  He drew the curtain very gently, 
and sighed involuntarily as he closed it.  �ePoor fellow,�f he said, almost as sadly as if he 
had known the man.  �eAh, poor fellow!�f

He went next to the window.  The night was black, and he could see nothing from it.  
The rain still pattered heavily against the glass.  He inferred, from hearing it, that the 
window was at the back of the house; remembering that the front was sheltered from the 
weather by the court and the buildings over it.

While he was still standing at the window?for even the dreary rain was a relief, 
because of the sound it made; a relief, also, because it moved, and had some faint 
suggestion, in consequence, of life and companionship in it?while he was standing at 
the window, and looking vacantly into the black darkness outside, he heard a distant 
church-clock strike ten.  Only ten!  How was he to pass the time till the house was 
astir the next morning?

Under any other circumstances, he would have gone down to the public-house parlour, 
would have called for his grog, and would have laughed and talked with the company 
assembled as familiarly as if he had known them all his life.  But the very thought of 
whiling away the time in this manner was distasteful to him.  The new situation in 
which he was placed seemed to have altered him to himself already.  Thus far, his life 
had been the common, trifling, prosaic, surface-life of a prosperous young man, with no 
troubles to conquer, and no trials to face.  He had lost no relation whom he loved, no 
friend whom he treasured.  Till this night, what share he had of the immortal 
inheritance that is divided amongst us all, had laid dormant within him.  Till this night, 
Death and he had not once met, even in thought.

He took a few turns up and down the room?then stopped.  The noise made by his 
boots on the poorly carpeted floor, jarred on his ear.  He hesitated a little, and ended by 
taking the boots off, and walking backwards and forwards noiselessly.  All desire to 
sleep or to rest had left him.  The bare thought of lying down on the unoccupied bed 
instantly drew the picture on his mind of a dreadful mimicry of the position of the dead 
man.  Who was he?  What was the story of his past life?  Poor he must have been, or 
he would not have stopped at such a place as The Two Robins Inn?and weakened, 
probably, by long illness, or he could hardly have died in the manner in which the 
landlord had described.  Poor, ill, lonely,?dead in a strange place; dead, with nobody 
but a stranger to pity him.  A sad story: truly, on the mere face of it, a very sad story.

While these thoughts were passing through his mind, he had stopped insensibly at the 
window, close to which stood the foot of the bed with the closed curtains.  At first he 
looked at it absently; then he became conscious that his eyes were fixed on it; and then, 
a perverse desire took possession of him to do the very thing which he had resolved not 
to do, up to this time?to look at the dead man.

He stretched out his hand towards the curtains; but checked himself in the very act of 
undrawing them, turned his back sharply on the bed, and walked towards the 
chimney-piece, to see what things were placed on it, and to try if he could keep the dead 
man out of his mind in that way.

There was a pewter inkstand on the chimney-piece, with some mildewed remains of ink 
in the bottle.  There were two coarse china ornaments of the commonest kind; and 
there was a square of embossed card, dirty and fly-blown, with a collection of wretched 
riddles printed on it, in all sorts of zig-zag directions, and in variously coloured inks.  
He took the card, and went away, to read it, to the table on which the candle was placed; 
sitting down, with his back resolutely turned to the curtained bed.

He read the first riddle, the second, the third, all in one corner of the card?then turned 
it round impatiently to look at another.  Before he could begin reading the riddles 
printed here, the sound of the church-clock stopped him.  Eleven.  He had got through 
an hour of the time, in the room with the dead man.

Once more he looked at the card.  It was not easy to make out the letters printed on it, 
in consequence of the dimness of the light which the landlord had left him?a common 
tallow candle, furnished with a pair of heavy old-fashioned steel snuffers.  Up to this 
time, his mind had been too much occupied to think of the light.  He had left the wick 
of the candle unsnuffed, till it had risen higher than the flame, and had burnt into an odd 
pent-house shape at the top, from which morsels of the charred cotton fell off, from time 
to time, in little flakes.  He took up the snuffers now, and trimmed the wick.  The 
light brightened directly, and the room became less dismal.

Again he turned to the riddles; reading them doggedly and resolutely, now in one corner 
of the card, now in another.  All his efforts, however, could not fix his attention on 
them.  He pursued his occupation mechanically, deriving no sort of impression from 
what he was reading.  It was as if a shadow from the curtained bed had got between his 
mind and the gaily printed letters?a shadow that nothing could dispel.  At last, he 
gave up the struggle, and threw the card from him impatiently, and took to walking 
softly up and down the room again.

The dead man, the dead man, the hidden dead man on the bed!  There was the one 
persistent idea still haunting him.  Hidden?  Was it only the body being there, or was 
it the body being there, concealed, that was preying on his mind?  He stopped at the 
window, with that doubt in him; once more listening to the pattering rain, once more 
looking out into the black darkness.

Still the dead man!  The darkness forced his mind back upon itself, and set his memory 
at work, reviving, with a painfully-vivid distinctness the momentary impression it had 
received from the first sight of the corpse.  Before long the face seemed to be hovering 
out in the middle of the darkness, confronting him through the window, with the 
paleness whiter, with the dreadful dull line of light between the imperfectly-closed 
eyelids broader than he had seen it?with the parted lips slowly dropping farther and 
farther away from each other?with the features growing larger and moving closer, till 
they seemed to fill the window and to silence the rain, and to shut out the night.

The sound of a voice, shouting below-stairs, woke him suddenly from the dream of his 
own distempered fancy.  He recognised it as the voice of the landlord.  �eShut up at 
twelve, Ben,�f he heard it say.  �eI�fm off to bed.�f

He wiped away the damp that had gathered on his forehead, reasoned with himself for a 
little while, and resolved to shake his mind free of the ghastly counterfeit which still 
clung to it, by forcing himself to confront, if it was only for a moment, the solemn 
reality.  Without allowing himself an instant to hesitate, he parted the curtains at the 
foot of the bed, and looked through.

There was a sad, peaceful, white face, with the awful mystery of stillness on it, laid back 
upon the pillow.  No stir, no change there!  He only looked at it for a moment before 
he closed the curtains again?but that moment steadied him, calmed him, restored 
him?mind and body?to himself.

He returned to his old occupation of walking up and down the room; persevering in it, 
this time, till the clock struck again.  Twelve.

As the sound of the clock-bell died away, it was succeeded by the confused noise, 
down-stairs, of the drinkers in the tap-room leaving the house.  The next sound, after 
an interval of silence, was caused by the barring of the door, and the closing of the 
shutters, at the back of the Inn.  Then the silence followed again, and was disturbed no 
more.

He was alone now?absolutely, utterly, alone with the dead man, till the next morning.

The wick of the candle wanted trimming again.  He took up the snuffers?but paused 
suddenly on the very point of using them, and looked attentively at the candle?then 
back, over his shoulder, at the curtained bed?then again at the candle.  It had been 
lighted, for the first time, to show him the way up-stairs, and three parts of it, at least, 
were already consumed.  In another hour it would be burnt out.  In another 
hour?unless he called at once to the man who had shut up the Inn, for a fresh 
candle?he would be left in the dark.

Strongly as his mind had been affected since he had entered his room, his unreasonable 
dread of encountering ridicule, and of exposing his courage to suspicion, had not 
altogether lost its influence over him, even yet.  He lingered irresolutely by the table, 
waiting till he could prevail on himself to open the door, and call, from the landing, to 
the man who had shut up the Inn.  In his present hesitating frame of mind, it was a kind 
of relief to gain a few moments only by engaging in the trifling occupation of snuffing 
the candle.  His hand trembled a little, and the snuffers were heavy and awkward to use.  
When he closed them on the wick, he closed them a hair�fs breadth too low.  In an 
instant the candle was out, and the room was plunged in pitch darkness.

The one impression which the absence of light immediately produced on his mind, was 
distrust of the curtained bed?distrust which shaped itself into no distinct idea, but 
which was powerful enough in its very vagueness, to bind him down to his chair, to 
make his heart beat fast, and to set him listening intently.  No sound stirred in the room 
but the familiar sound of the rain against the window, louder and sharper now than he 
had heard it yet.

Still the vague distrust, the inexpressible dread possessed him, and kept him to his chair.  
He had put his carpet-bag on the table, when he first entered the room; and he now took 
the key from his pocket, reached out his hand softly, opened the bag, and groped in it 
for his travelling writing-case, in which he knew that there was a small store of matches.  
When he had got one of the matches, he waited before he struck it on the coarse wooden 
table, and listened intently again, without knowing why.  Still there was no sound in 
the room but the steady, ceaseless, rattling sound of the rain.

He lighted the candle again, without another moment of delay and, on the instant of its 
burning up, the first object in the room that his eyes sought for was the curtained bed.

Just before the light had been put out, he had looked in that direction, and had seen no 
change, no disarrangement of any sort, in the folds of the closely-drawn curtains.

When he looked at the bed, now, he saw, hanging over the side of it, a long white hand.

It lay perfectly motionless, midway on the side of the bed, where the curtain at the head 
and the curtain at the foot met.  Nothing more was visible.  The clinging curtains hid 
everything but the long white hand.

He stood looking at it unable to stir, unable to call out; feeling nothing, knowing 
nothing, every faculty he possessed gathered up and lost in the one seeing faculty.  
How long that first panic held him he never could tell afterwards.  It might have been 
only for a moment; it might have been for many minutes together.  How he got to the 
bed?whether he ran to it headlong, or whether he approached it slowly?how he 
wrought himself up to unclose the curtains and look in, he never has remembered, and 
never will remember to his dying day.  It is enough that he did go to the bed, and that 
he did look inside the curtains.

The man had moved.  One of his arms was outside the clothes; his face was turned a 
little on the pillow; his eyelids were wide open.  Changed as to position, and as to one 
of the features, the face was, otherwise, fearfully and wonderfully unaltered.  The dead 
paleness and the dead quiet were on it still

One glance showed Arthur this?one glance, before he flew breathlessly to the door, 
and alarmed the house.

The man whom the landlord called �eBen,�f was the first to appear on the stairs.  In three 
words, Arthur told him what had happened, and sent him for the nearest doctor.

I, who tell you this story, was then staying with a medical friend of mine, in practice at 
Doncaster, taking care of his patients for him, during his absence in London; and I, for 
the time being, was the nearest doctor.  They had sent for me from the Inn, when the 
stranger was taken ill in the afternoon; but I was not at home, and medical assistance 
was sought for elsewhere.  When the man from The Two Robins rang the night-bell, I 
was just thinking of going to bed.  Naturally enough, I did not believe a word of his 
story about �ea dead man who had come to life again.�f  However, I put on my hat, 
armed myself with one or two bottles of restorative medicine, and ran to the Inn, 
expecting to find nothing more remarkable, when I got there, than a patient in a fit.

My surprise at finding that the man had spoken the literal truth was almost, if not quite, 
equalled by my astonishment at finding myself face to face with Arthur Holliday as 
soon as I entered the bedroom.  It was no time then for giving or seeking explanations.  
We just shook hands amazedly; and then I ordered everybody but Arthur out of the 
room, and hurried to the man on the bed.

The kitchen fire had not been long out.  There was plenty of hot water in the boiler, 
and plenty of flannel to be had.  With these, with my medicines, and with such help as 
Arthur could render under my direction, I dragged the man, literally, out of the jaws of 
death.  In less than an hour from the time when I had been called in, he was alive and 
talking in the bed on which he had been laid out to wait for the Coroner�fs inquest.

You will naturally ask me, what had been the matter with him; and I might treat you, in 
reply, to a long theory, plentifully sprinkled with, what the children call, hard words.  I 
prefer telling you that, in this case, cause and effect could not be satisfactorily joined 
together by any theory whatever.  There are mysteries in life, and the condition of it, 
which human science has not fathomed yet; and I candidly confess to you, that, in 
bringing that man back to existence, I was, morally speaking, groping haphazard in the 
dark.  I know (from the testimony of the doctor who attended him in the afternoon) 
that the vital machinery, so far as its action is appreciable by our senses, had, in this 
case, unquestionably stopped; and I am equally certain (seeing that I recovered him) that 
the vital principle was not extinct.  When I add, that he had suffered from a long and 
complicated illness, and that his whole nervous system was utterly deranged, I have told 
you all I really know of the physical condition of my dead-alive patient at The Two 
Robins Inn.

When he �ecame to,�f as the phrase goes, he was a startling object to look at, with his 
colourless face, his sunken cheeks, his wild black eyes, and his long black hair.  The 
first question he asked me about himself, when he could speak, made me suspect that I 
had been called in to a man in my own profession.  I mentioned to him my surmise; 
and he told me that I was right.

He said he had come last from Paris, where he had been attached to a hospital.  That he 
had lately returned to England, on his way to Edinburgh, to continue his studies; that he 
had been taken ill on the journey; and that he had stopped to rest and recover himself at 
Doncaster.  He did not add a word about his name, or who he was: and, of course, I did 
not question him on the subject.  All I inquired, when he ceased speaking, was what 
branch of the profession he intended to follow.

�eAny branch,�f he said, bitterly, �ewhich will put bread into the mouth of a poor man.�f

At this, Arthur, who had been hitherto watching him in silent curiosity, burst out 
impetuously in his usual good-humoured way:-

�eMy dear fellow!�f (everybody was �emy dear fellow�f with Arthur) �enow you have come 
to life again, don�ft begin by being down-hearted about your prospects.  I�fll answer for 
it, I can help you to some capital thing in the medical line?or, if I can�ft, I know my 
father can.�f

The medical student looked at him steadily.

�eThank you,�f he said, coldly.  Then added, �eMay I ask who your father is?�f

�eHe�fs well enough known all about this part of the country,�f replied Arthur.  �eHe is a 
great manufacturer, and his name is Holliday.�f

My hand was on the man�fs wrist during this brief conversation.  The instant the name 
of Holliday was pronounced I felt the pulse under my fingers flutter, stop, go on 
suddenly with a bound, and beat afterwards, for a minute or two, at the fever rate.

�eHow did you come here?�f asked the stranger, quickly, excitably, passionately almost.

Arthur related briefly what had happened from the time of his first taking the bed at the 
inn.

�eI am indebted to Mr. Holliday�fs son then for the help that has saved my life,�f said the 
medical student, speaking to himself, with a singular sarcasm in his voice.  �eCome 
here!�f

He held out, as he spoke, his long, white, bony, right hand.

�eWith all my heart,�f said Arthur, taking the hand-cordially.  �eI may confess it now,�f he 
continued, laughing.  �eUpon my honour, you almost frightened me out of my wits.�f

The stranger did not seem to listen.  His wild black eyes were fixed with a look of 
eager interest on Arthur�fs face, and his long bony fingers kept tight hold of Arthur�fs 
hand.  Young Holliday, on his side, returned the gaze, amazed and puzzled by the 
medical student�fs odd language and manners.  The two faces were close together; I 
looked at them; and, to my amazement, I was suddenly impressed by the sense of a 
likeness between them?not in features, or complexion, but solely in expression.  It 
must have been a strong likeness, or I should certainly not have found it out, for I am 
naturally slow at detecting resemblances between faces.

�eYou have saved my life,�f said the strange man, still looking hard in Arthur�fs face, still 
holding tightly by his hand.  �eIf you had been my own brother, you could not have 
done more for me than that.�f

He laid a singularly strong emphasis on those three words �emy own brother,�f and a 
change passed over his face as he pronounced them,?a change that no language of 
mine is competent to describe.

�eI hope I have not done being of service to you yet,�f said Arthur.  �eI�fll speak to my 
father, as soon as I get home.�f

�eYou seem to be fond and proud of your father,�f said the medical student.  �eI suppose, 
in return, he is fond and proud of you?�f

�eOf course, he is!�f answered Arthur, laughing.  �eIs there anything wonderful in that?  
Isn�ft your father fond?�f

The stranger suddenly dropped young Holliday�fs hand, and turned his face away.

�eI beg your pardon,�f said Arthur.  �eI hope I have not unintentionally pained you.  I 
hope you have not lost your father.�f

�eI can�ft well lose what I have never had,�f retorted the medical student, with a harsh, 
mocking laugh.

�eWhat you have never had!�f

The strange man suddenly caught Arthur�fs hand again, suddenly looked once more hard 
in his face.

�eYes,�f he said, with a repetition of the bitter laugh.  �eYou have brought a poor devil 
back into the world, who has no business there.  Do I astonish you?  Well!  I have a 
fancy of my own for telling you what men in my situation generally keep a secret.  I 
have no name and no father.  The merciful law of Society tells me I am Nobody�fs Son!  
Ask your father if he will be my father too, and help me on in life with the family 
name.�f

Arthur looked at me, more puzzled than ever.  I signed to him to say nothing, and then 
laid my fingers again on the man�fs wrist.  No!  In spite of the extraordinary speech 
that he had just made, he was not, as I had been disposed to suspect, beginning to get 
light-headed.  His pulse, by this time, had fallen back to a quiet, slow beat, and his skin 
was moist and cool.  Not a symptom of fever or agitation about him.

Finding that neither of us answered him, he turned to me, and began talking of the 
extraordinary nature of his case, and asking my advice about the future course of 
medical treatment to which he ought to subject himself.  I said the matter required 
careful thinking over, and suggested that I should submit certain prescriptions to him 
the next morning.  He told me to write them at once, as he would, most likely, be 
leaving Doncaster, in the morning, before I was up.  It was quite useless to represent to 
him the folly and danger of such a proceeding as this.  He heard me politely and 
patiently, but held to his resolution, without offering any reasons or any explanations, 
and repeated to me, that if I wished to give him a chance of seeing my prescription, I 
must write it at once.  Hearing this, Arthur volunteered the loan of a travelling 
writing-case, which, he said, he had with him; and, bringing it to the bed, shook the 
note-paper out of the pocket of the case forthwith in his usual careless way.  With the 
paper, there fell out on the counterpane of the bed a small packet of sticking-plaster, and 
a little water-colour drawing of a landscape.

The medical student took up the drawing and looked at it.  His eye fell on some initials 
neatly written, in cypher, in one corner.  He started and trembled; his pale face grew 
whiter than ever; his wild black eyes turned on Arthur, and looked through and through 
him.

�eA pretty drawing,�f he said in a remarkably quiet tone of voice.

�eAh! and done by such a pretty girl,�f said Arthur.  �eOh, such a pretty girl!  I wish it 
was not a landscape?I wish it was a portrait of her!�f

�eYou admire her very much?�f

Arthur, half in jest, half in earnest, kissed his hand for answer.

�eLove at first sight!�f he said, putting the drawing away again.  �eBut the course of it 
doesn�ft run smooth.  It�fs the old story.  She�fs monopolised as usual.  Trammelled by 
a rash engagement to some poor man who is never likely to get money enough to marry 
her.  It was lucky I heard of it in time, or I should certainly have risked a declaration 
when she gave me that drawing.  Here, doctor!  Here is pen, ink, and paper all ready 
for you.�f

�eWhen she gave you that drawing?  Gave it.  Gave it.�f  He repeated the words 
slowly to himself, and suddenly closed his eyes.  A momentary distortion passed 
across his face, and I saw one of his hands clutch up the bedclothes and squeeze them 
hard.  I thought he was going to be ill again, and begged that there might be no more 
talking.  He opened his eyes when I spoke, fixed them once more searchingly on 
Arthur, and said, slowly and distinctly, �eYou like her, and she likes you.  The poor man 
may die out of your way.  Who can tell that she may not give you herself as well as her 
drawing, after all?�f

Before young Holliday could answer, he turned to me, and said in a whisper, �eNow for 
the prescription.�f  From that time, though he spoke to Arthur again, he never looked at 
him more.

When I had written the prescription, he examined it, approved of it, and then astonished 
us both by abruptly wishing us good night.  I offered to sit up with him, and he shook 
his head.  Arthur offered to sit up with him, and he said, shortly, with his face turned 
away, �eNo.�f  I insisted on having somebody left to watch him.  He gave way when he 
found I was determined, and said he would accept the services of the waiter at the Inn.

�eThank you, both,�f he said, as we rose to go.  �eI have one last favour to ask?not of 
you, doctor, for I leave you to exercise your professional discretion?but of Mr. 
Holliday.�f  His eyes, while he spoke, still rested steadily on me, and never once turned 
towards Arthur.  �eI beg that Mr. Holliday will not mention to any one?least of all to 
his father?the events that have occurred, and the words that have passed, in this room.  
I entreat him to bury me in his memory, as, but for him, I might have been buried in my 
grave.  I cannot give my reasons for making this strange request.  I can only implore 
him to grant it.�f

His voice faltered for the first time, and he hid his face on the pillow.  Arthur, 
completely bewildered, gave the required pledge.  I took young Holliday away with 
me, immediately afterwards, to the house of my friend; determining to go back to the 
Inn, and to see the medical student again before he had left in the morning.

I returned to the Inn at eight o�fclock, purposely abstaining from waking Arthur, who 
was sleeping off the past night�fs excitement on one of my friend�fs sofas.  A suspicion 
had occurred to me as soon as I was alone in my bedroom, which made me resolve that 
Holliday and the stranger whose life he had saved should not meet again, if I could 
prevent it.  I have already alluded to certain reports, or scandals, which I knew of, 
relating to the early life of Arthur�fs father.  While I was thinking, in my bed, of what 
had passed at the Inn?of the change in the student�fs pulse when he heard the name of 
Holliday; of the resemblance of expression that I had discovered between his face and 
Arthur�fs; of the emphasis he had laid on those three words, �emy own brother;�f and of his 
incomprehensible acknowledgment of his own illegitimacy?while I was thinking of 
these things, the reports I have mentioned suddenly flew into my mind, and linked 
themselves fast to the chain of my previous reflections.  Something within me 
whispered, �eIt is best that those two young men should not meet again.�f  I felt it before 
I slept; I felt it when I woke; and I went, as I told you, alone to the Inn the next 
morning.

I had missed my only opportunity of seeing my nameless patient again.  He had been 
gone nearly an hour when I inquired for him.



I have now told you everything that I know for certain, in relation to the man whom I 
brought back to life in the double-bedded room of the Inn at Doncaster.  What I have 
next to add is matter for inference and surmise, and is not, strictly speaking, matter of 
fact.

I have to tell you, first, that the medical student turned out to be strangely and 
unaccountably right in assuming it as more than probable that Arthur Holliday would 
marry the young lady who had given him the water-colour drawing of the landscape.  
That marriage took place a little more than a year after the events occurred which I have 
just been relating.  The young couple came to live in the neighbourhood in which I was 
then established in practice.  I was present at the wedding, and was rather surprised to 
find that Arthur was singularly reserved with me, both before and after his marriage, on 
the subject of the young lady�fs prior engagement.  He only referred to it once, when 
we were alone, merely telling me, on that occasion, that his wife had done all that 
honour and duty required of her in the matter, and that the engagement had been broken 
off with the full approval of her parents.  I never heard more from him than this.  For 
three years he and his wife lived together happily.  At the expiration of that time, the 
symptoms of a serious illness first declared themselves in Mrs. Arthur Holliday.  It 
turned out to be a long, lingering, hopeless malady.  I attended her throughout.  We 
had been great friends when she was well, and we became more attached to each other 
than ever when she was ill.  I had many long and interesting conversations with her in 
the intervals when she suffered least.  The result of one of these conversations I may 
briefly relate, leaving you to draw any inferences from it that you please.

The interview to which I refer, occurred shortly before her death.  I called one evening, 
as usual, and found her alone, with a look in her eyes which told me that she had been 
crying.  She only informed me at first, that she had been depressed in spirits; but, by 
little and little, she became more communicative, and confessed to me that she had been 
looking over some old letters, which had been addressed to her, before she had seen 
Arthur, by a man to whom she had been engaged to be married.  I asked her how the 
engagement came to be broken off.  She replied that it had not been broken off, but 
that it had died out in a very mysterious way.  The person to whom she was 
engaged?her first love, she called him?was very poor, and there was no immediate 
prospect of their being married.  He followed my profession, and went abroad to study.  
They had corresponded regularly, until the time when, as she believed, he had returned 
to England.  From that period she heard no more of him.  He was of a fretful, 
sensitive temperament; and she feared that she might have inadvertently done or said 
something that offended him.  However that might be, he had never written to her 
again; and, after waiting a year, she had married Arthur.  I asked when the first 
estrangement had begun, and found that the time at which she ceased to hear anything 
of her first lover exactly corresponded with the time at which I had been called in to my 
mysterious patient at The Two Robins Inn.

A fortnight after that conversation, she died.  In course of time, Arthur married again.  
Of late years, he has lived principally in London, and I have seen little or nothing of 
him.

I have many years to pass over before I can approach to anything like a conclusion of 
this fragmentary narrative.  And even when that later period is reached, the little that I 
have to say will not occupy your attention for more than a few minutes.  Between six 
and seven years ago, the gentleman to whom I introduced you in this room, came to me, 
with good professional recommendations, to fill the position of my assistant.  We met, 
not like strangers, but like friends?the only difference between us being, that I was 
very much surprised to see him, and that he did not appear to be at all surprised to see 
me.  If he was my son or my brother, I believe he could not be fonder of me than he is; 
but he has never volunteered any confidences since he has been here, on the subject of 
his past life.  I saw something that was familiar to me in his face when we first met; 
and yet it was also something that suggested the idea of change.  I had a notion once 
that my patient at the Inn might be a natural son of Mr. Holliday�fs; I had another idea 
that he might also have been the man who was engaged to Arthur�fs first wife; and I 
have a third idea, still clinging to me, that Mr. Lorn is the only man in England who 
could really enlighten me, if he chose, on both those doubtful points.  His hair is not 
black, now, and his eyes are dimmer than the piercing eyes that I remember, but, for all 
that, he is very like the nameless medical student of my young days?very like him.  
And, sometimes, when I come home late at night, and find him asleep, and wake him, 
he looks, in coming to, wonderfully like the stranger at Doncaster, as he raised himself 
in the bed on that memorable night!

The Doctor paused.  Mr. Goodchild, who had been following every word that fell from 
his lips up to this time, leaned forward eagerly to ask a question.  Before he could say 
a word, the latch of the door was raised, without any warning sound of footsteps in the 
passage outside.  A long, white, bony hand appeared through the opening, gently 
pushing the door, which was prevented from working freely on its hinges by a fold in 
the carpet under it.

�eThat hand!  Look at that hand, Doctor!�f said Mr. Goodchild, touching him.

At the same moment, the Doctor looked at Mr. Goodchild, and whispered to him, 
significantly:

�eHush! he has come back.�f




CHAPTER III



The Cumberland Doctor�fs mention of Doncaster Races, inspired Mr. Francis Goodchild 
with the idea of going down to Doncaster to see the races.  Doncaster being a good 
way off, and quite out of the way of the Idle Apprentices (if anything could be out of 
their way, who had no way), it necessarily followed that Francis perceived Doncaster in 
the race-week to be, of all possible idleness, the particular idleness that would 
completely satisfy him.

Thomas, with an enforced idleness grafted on the natural and voluntary power of his 
disposition, was not of this mind; objecting that a man compelled to lie on his back on a 
floor, a sofa, a table, a line of chairs, or anything he could get to lie upon, was not in 
racing condition, and that he desired nothing better than to lie where he was, enjoying 
himself in looking at the flies on the ceiling.  But, Francis Goodchild, who had been 
walking round his companion in a circuit of twelve miles for two days, and had begun 
to doubt whether it was reserved for him ever to be idle in his life, not only 
overpowered this objection, but even converted Thomas Idle to a scheme he formed 
(another idle inspiration), of conveying the said Thomas to the sea-coast, and putting his 
injured leg under a stream of salt-water.

Plunging into this happy conception headforemost, Mr. Goodchild immediately referred 
to the county-map, and ardently discovered that the most delicious piece of sea-coast to 
be found within the limits of England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, the Isle of Man, and the 
Channel Islands, all summed up together, was Allonby on the coast of Cumberland.  
There was the coast of Scotland opposite to Allonby, said Mr. Goodchild with 
enthusiasm; there was a fine Scottish mountain on that Scottish coast; there were 
Scottish lights to be seen shining across the glorious Channel, and at Allonby itself there 
was every idle luxury (no doubt) that a watering-place could offer to the heart of idle 
man.  Moreover, said Mr. Goodchild, with his finger on the map, this exquisite retreat 
was approached by a coach-road, from a railway-station called Aspatria?a name, in a 
manner, suggestive of the departed glories of Greece, associated with one of the most 
engaging and most famous of Greek women.  On this point, Mr. Goodchild continued 
at intervals to breathe a vein of classic fancy and eloquence exceedingly irksome to Mr. 
Idle, until it appeared that the honest English pronunciation of that Cumberland country 
shortened Aspatria into �eSpatter.�f  After this supplementary discovery, Mr. Goodchild 
said no more about it.

By way of Spatter, the crippled Idle was carried, hoisted, pushed, poked, and packed, 
into and out of carriages, into and out of beds, into and out of tavern resting-places, until 
he was brought at length within sniff of the sea.  And now, behold the apprentices 
gallantly riding into Allonby in a one-horse fly, bent upon staying in that peaceful 
marine valley until the turbulent Doncaster time shall come round upon the wheel, in its 
turn among what are in sporting registers called the �eFixtures�f for the month.

�eDo you see Allonby!�f asked Thomas Idle.

�eI don�ft see it yet,�f said Francis, looking out of window.

�eIt must be there,�f said Thomas Idle.

�eI don�ft see it,�f returned Francis.

�eIt must be there,�f repeated Thomas Idle, fretfully.

�eLord bless me!�f exclaimed Francis, drawing in his head, �eI suppose this is it!�f

�eA watering-place,�f retorted Thomas Idle, with the pardonable sharpness of an invalid, 
�ecan�ft be five gentlemen in straw hats, on a form on one side of a door, and four ladies 
in hats and falls, on a form on another side of a door, and three geese in a dirty little 
brook before them, and a boy�fs legs hanging over a bridge (with a boy�fs body I suppose 
on the other side of the parapet), and a donkey running away.  What are you talking 
about?�f

�eAllonby, gentlemen,�f said the most comfortable of landladies as she opened one door 
of the carriage; �eAllonby, gentlemen,�f said the most attentive of landlords, as he opened 
the other.

Thomas Idle yielded his arm to the ready Goodchild, and descended from the vehicle.  
Thomas, now just able to grope his way along, in a doubled-up condition, with the aid 
of two thick sticks, was no bad embodiment of Commodore Trunnion, or of one of 
those many gallant Admirals of the stage, who have all ample fortunes, gout, thick 
sticks, tempers, wards, and nephews.  With this distinguished naval appearance upon 
him, Thomas made a crab-like progress up a clean little bulk-headed staircase, into a 
clean little bulk-headed room, where he slowly deposited himself on a sofa, with a stick 
on either hand of him, looking exceedingly grim.

�eFrancis,�f said Thomas Idle, �ewhat do you think of this place?�f

�eI think,�f returned Mr. Goodchild, in a glowing way, �eit is everything we expected.�f

�eHah!�f said Thomas Idle.

�eThere is the sea,�f cried Mr. Goodchild, pointing out of window; �eand here,�f pointing to 
the lunch on the table, �eare shrimps.  Let us?�f here Mr. Goodchild looked out of 
window, as if in search of something, and looked in again,?�elet us eat �fem.�f

The shrimps eaten and the dinner ordered, Mr. Goodchild went out to survey the 
watering-place.  As Chorus of the Drama, without whom Thomas could make nothing 
of the scenery, he by-and-by returned, to have the following report screwed out of him.

In brief, it was the most delightful place ever seen.

�eBut,�f Thomas Idle asked, �ewhere is it?�f

�eIt�fs what you may call generally up and down the beach, here and there,�f said Mr. 
Goodchild, with a twist of his hand.

�eProceed,�f said Thomas Idle.

It was, Mr. Goodchild went on to say, in cross-examination, what you might call a 
primitive place.  Large?  No, it was not large.  Who ever expected it would be large?  
Shape?  What a question to ask!  No shape.  What sort of a street?  Why, no street.  
Shops?  Yes, of course (quite indignant).  How many?  Who ever went into a place 
to count the shops?  Ever so many.  Six?  Perhaps.  A library?  Why, of course 
(indignant again).  Good collection of books?  Most likely?couldn�ft say?had seen 
nothing in it but a pair of scales.  Any reading-room?  Of course, there was a 
reading-room.  Where?  Where! why, over there.  Where was over there?  Why, 
there!  Let Mr. Idle carry his eye to that bit of waste ground above high-water mark, 
where the rank grass and loose stones were most in a litter; and he would see a sort of 
long, ruinous brick loft, next door to a ruinous brick out-house, which loft had a ladder 
outside, to get up by.  That was the reading-room, and if Mr. Idle didn�ft like the idea of 
a weaver�fs shuttle throbbing under a reading-room, that was his look out.  He was not 
to dictate, Mr. Goodchild supposed (indignant again), to the company.

�eBy-the-by,�f Thomas Idle observed; �ethe company?�f

Well! (Mr. Goodchild went on to report) very nice company.  Where were they?  
Why, there they were.  Mr. Idle could see the tops of their hats, he supposed.  What?  
Those nine straw hats again, five gentlemen�fs and four ladies�f?  Yes, to be sure.  Mr. 
Goodchild hoped the company were not to be expected to wear helmets, to please Mr. 
Idle.

Beginning to recover his temper at about this point, Mr. Goodchild voluntarily reported 
that if you wanted to be primitive, you could be primitive here, and that if you wanted to 
be idle, you could be idle here.  In the course of some days, he added, that there were 
three fishing-boats, but no rigging, and that there were plenty of fishermen who never 
fished.  That they got their living entirely by looking at the ocean.  What nourishment 
they looked out of it to support their strength, he couldn�ft say; but, he supposed it was 
some sort of Iodine.  The place was full of their children, who were always upside 
down on the public buildings (two small bridges over the brook), and always hurting 
themselves or one another, so that their wailings made more continual noise in the air 
than could have been got in a busy place.  The houses people lodged in, were nowhere 
in particular, and were in capital accordance with the beach; being all more or less 
cracked and damaged as its shells were, and all empty?as its shells were.  Among 
them, was an edifice of destitute appearance, with a number of wall-eyed windows in it, 
looking desperately out to Scotland as if for help, which said it was a Bazaar (and it 
ought to know), and where you might buy anything you wanted?supposing what you 
wanted, was a little camp-stool or a child�fs wheelbarrow.  The brook crawled or 
stopped between the houses and the sea, and the donkey was always running away, and 
when he got into the brook he was pelted out with stones, which never hit him, and 
which always hit some of the children who were upside down on the public buildings, 
and made their lamentations louder.  This donkey was the public excitement of 
Allonby, and was probably supported at the public expense.

The foregoing descriptions, delivered in separate items, on separate days of adventurous 
discovery, Mr. Goodchild severally wound up, by looking out of window, looking in 
again, and saying, �eBut there is the sea, and here are the shrimps?let us eat �fem.�f

There were fine sunsets at Allonby when the low flat beach, with its pools of water and 
its dry patches, changed into long bars of silver and gold in various states of burnishing, 
and there were fine views?on fine days?of the Scottish coast.  But, when it rained at 
Allonby, Allonby thrown back upon its ragged self, became a kind of place which the 
donkey seemed to have found out, and to have his highly sagacious reasons for wishing 
to bolt from.  Thomas Idle observed, too, that Mr. Goodchild, with a noble show of 
disinterestedness, became every day more ready to walk to Maryport and back, for 
letters; and suspicions began to harbour in the mind of Thomas, that his friend deceived 
him, and that Maryport was a preferable place.

Therefore, Thomas said to Francis on a day when they had looked at the sea and eaten 
the shrimps, �eMy mind misgives me, Goodchild, that you go to Maryport, like the boy 
in the story-book, to ask it to be idle with you.�f

�eJudge, then,�f returned Francis, adopting the style of the story-book, �ewith what success.  
I go to a region which is a bit of water-side Bristol, with a slice of Wapping, a seasoning 
of Wolverhampton, and a garnish of Portsmouth, and I say, �gWill you come and be idle 
with me?�h  And it answers, �gNo; for I am a great deal too vaporous, and a great deal 
too rusty, and a great deal too muddy, and a great deal too dirty altogether; and I have 
ships to load, and pitch and tar to boil, and iron to hammer, and steam to get up, and 
smoke to make, and stone to quarry, and fifty other disagreeable things to do, and I 
can�ft be idle with you.�h  Then I go into jagged up-hill and down-hill streets, where I 
am in the pastrycook�fs shop at one moment, and next moment in savage fastnesses of 
moor and morass, beyond the confines of civilisation, and I say to those murky and 
black-dusty streets, �gWill you come and be idle with me?�h  To which they reply, �gNo, 
we can�ft, indeed, for we haven�ft the spirits, and we are startled by the echo of your feet 
on the sharp pavement, and we have so many goods in our shop-windows which nobody 
wants, and we have so much to do for a limited public which never comes to us to be 
done for, that we are altogether out of sorts and can�ft enjoy ourselves with any one.�h  
So I go to the Post-office, and knock at the shutter, and I say to the Post-master, �gWill 
you come and be idle with me?�h  To which he rejoins, �gNo, I really can�ft, for I live, as 
you may see, in such a very little Post-office, and pass my life behind such a very little 
shutter, that my hand, when I put it out, is as the hand of a giant crammed through the 
window of a dwarf�fs house at a fair, and I am a mere Post-office anchorite in a cell 
much too small for him, and I can�ft get out, and I can�ft get in, and I have no space to be 
idle in, even if I would.�h  So, the boy,�f said Mr. Goodchild, concluding the tale, 
�ecomes back with the letters after all, and lives happy never afterwards.�f

But it may, not unreasonably, be asked?while Francis Goodchild was wandering hither 
and thither, storing his mind with perpetual observation of men and things, and 
sincerely believing himself to be the laziest creature in existence all the time?how did 
Thomas Idle, crippled and confined to the house, contrive to get through the hours of 
the day?

Prone on the sofa, Thomas made no attempt to get through the hours, but passively 
allowed the hours to get through him.  Where other men in his situation would have 
read books and improved their minds, Thomas slept and rested his body.  Where other 
men would have pondered anxiously over their future prospects, Thomas dreamed lazily 
of his past life.  The one solitary thing he did, which most other people would have 
done in his place, was to resolve on making certain alterations and improvements in his 
mode of existence, as soon as the effects of the misfortune that had overtaken him had 
all passed away.  Remembering that the current of his life had hitherto oozed along in 
one smooth stream of laziness, occasionally troubled on the surface by a slight passing 
ripple of industry, his present ideas on the subject of self-reform, inclined him?not as 
the reader may be disposed to imagine, to project schemes for a new existence of 
enterprise and exertion?but, on the contrary, to resolve that he would never, if he could 
possibly help it, be active or industrious again, throughout the whole of his future 
career.

It is due to Mr. Idle to relate that his mind sauntered towards this peculiar conclusion on 
distinct and logically-producible grounds.  After reviewing, quite at his ease, and with 
many needful intervals of repose, the generally-placid spectacle of his past existence, he 
arrived at the discovery that all the great disasters which had tried his patience and 
equanimity in early life, had been caused by his having allowed himself to be deluded 
into imitating some pernicious example of activity and industry that had been set him by 
others.  The trials to which he here alludes were three in number, and may be thus 
reckoned up: First, the disaster of being an unpopular and a thrashed boy at school; 
secondly, the disaster of falling seriously ill; thirdly, the disaster of becoming 
acquainted with a great bore.

The first disaster occurred after Thomas had been an idle and a popular boy at school, 
for some happy years.  One Christmas-time, he was stimulated by the evil example of 
a companion, whom he had always trusted and liked, to be untrue to himself, and to try 
for a prize at the ensuing half-yearly examination.  He did try, and he got a prize?how, 
he did not distinctly know at the moment, and cannot remember now.  No sooner, 
however, had the book?Moral Hints to the Young on the Value of Time?been placed 
in his hands, than the first troubles of his life began.  The idle boys deserted him, as a 
traitor to their cause.  The industrious boys avoided him, as a dangerous interloper; one 
of their number, who had always won the prize on previous occasions, expressing just 
resentment at the invasion of his privileges by calling Thomas into the play-ground, and 
then and there administering to him the first sound and genuine thrashing that he had 
ever received in his life.  Unpopular from that moment, as a beaten boy, who belonged 
to no side and was rejected by all parties, young Idle soon lost caste with his masters, as 
he had previously lost caste with his schoolfellows.  He had forfeited the comfortable 
reputation of being the one lazy member of the youthful community whom it was quite 
hopeless to punish.  Never again did he hear the headmaster say reproachfully to an 
industrious boy who had committed a fault, �eI might have expected this in Thomas Idle, 
but it is inexcusable, sir, in you, who know better.�f  Never more, after winning that 
fatal prize, did he escape the retributive imposition, or the avenging birch.  From that 
time, the masters made him work, and the boys would not let him play.  From that time 
his social position steadily declined, and his life at school became a perpetual burden to 
him.

So, again, with the second disaster.  While Thomas was lazy, he was a model of health.  
His first attempt at active exertion and his first suffering from severe illness are 
connected together by the intimate relations of cause and effect.  Shortly after leaving 
school, he accompanied a party of friends to a cricket-field, in his natural and 
appropriate character of spectator only.  On the ground it was discovered that the 
players fell short of the required number, and facile Thomas was persuaded to assist in 
making up the complement.  At a certain appointed time, he was roused from peaceful 
slumber in a dry ditch, and placed before three wickets with a bat in his hand.  
Opposite to him, behind three more wickets, stood one of his bosom friends, filling the 
situation (as he was informed) of bowler.  No words can describe Mr. Idle�fs horror and 
amazement, when he saw this young man?on ordinary occasions, the meekest and 
mildest of human beings?suddenly contract his eye-brows, compress his lips, assume 
the aspect of an infuriated savage, run back a few steps, then run forward, and, without 
the slightest previous provocation, hurl a detestably hard ball with all his might straight 
at Thomas�fs legs.  Stimulated to preternatural activity of body and sharpness of eye by 
the instinct of self-preservation, Mr. Idle contrived, by jumping deftly aside at the right 
moment, and by using his bat (ridiculously narrow as it was for the purpose) as a shield, 
to preserve his life and limbs from the dastardly attack that had been made on both, to 
leave the full force of the deadly missile to strike his wicket instead of his leg; and to 
end the innings, so far as his side was concerned, by being immediately bowled out.  
Grateful for his escape, he was about to return to the dry ditch, when he was 
peremptorily stopped, and told that the other side was �egoing in,�f and that he was 
expected to �efield.�f  His conception of the whole art and mystery of �efielding,�f may be 
summed up in the three words of serious advice which he privately administered to 
himself on that trying occasion?avoid the ball.  Fortified by this sound and salutary 
principle, he took his own course, impervious alike to ridicule and abuse.  Whenever 
the ball came near him, he thought of his shins, and got out of the way immediately.  
�eCatch it!�f  �eStop it!�f  �ePitch it up!�f were cries that passed by him like the idle wind 
that he regarded not.  He ducked under it, he jumped over it, he whisked himself away 
from it on either side.  Never once, through the whole innings did he and the ball come 
together on anything approaching to intimate terms.  The unnatural activity of body 
which was necessarily called forth for the accomplishment of this result threw Thomas 
Idle, for the first time in his life, into a perspiration.  The perspiration, in consequence 
of his want of practice in the management of that particular result of bodily activity, was 
suddenly checked; the inevitable chill succeeded; and that, in its turn, was followed by a 
fever.  For the first time since his birth, Mr. Idle found himself confined to his bed for 
many weeks together, wasted and worn by a long illness, of which his own disastrous 
muscular exertion had been the sole first cause.

The third occasion on which Thomas found reason to reproach himself bitterly for the 
mistake of having attempted to be industrious, was connected with his choice of a 
calling in life.  Having no interest in the Church, he appropriately selected the next 
best profession for a lazy man in England?the Bar.  Although the Benchers of the 
Inns of Court have lately abandoned their good old principles, and oblige their students 
to make some show of studying, in Mr. Idle�fs time no such innovation as this existed.  
Young men who aspired to the honourable title of barrister were, very properly, not 
asked to learn anything of the law, but were merely required to eat a certain number of 
dinners at the table of their Hall, and to pay a certain sum of money; and were called to 
the Bar as soon as they could prove that they had sufficiently complied with these 
extremely sensible regulations.  Never did Thomas move more harmoniously in 
concert with his elders and betters than when he was qualifying himself for admission 
among the barristers of his native country.  Never did he feel more deeply what real 
laziness was in all the serene majesty of its nature, than on the memorable day when he 
was called to the Bar, after having carefully abstained from opening his law-books 
during his period of probation, except to fall asleep over them.  How he could ever 
again have become industrious, even for the shortest period, after that great reward 
conferred upon his idleness, quite passes his comprehension.  The kind Benchers did 
everything they could to show him the folly of exerting himself.  They wrote out his 
probationary exercise for him, and never expected him even to take the trouble of 
reading it through when it was written.  They invited him, with seven other choice 
spirits as lazy as himself, to come and be called to the Bar, while they were sitting over 
their wine and fruit after dinner.  They put his oaths of allegiance, and his dreadful 
official denunciations of the Pope and the Pretender, so gently into his mouth, that he 
hardly knew how the words got there.  They wheeled all their chairs softly round from 
the table, and sat surveying the young barristers with their backs to their bottles, rather 
than stand up, or adjourn to hear the exercises read.  And when Mr. Idle and the seven 
unlabouring neophytes, ranged in order, as a class, with their backs considerately placed 
against a screen, had begun, in rotation, to read the exercises which they had not written, 
even then, each Bencher, true to the great lazy principle of the whole proceeding, 
stopped each neophyte before he had stammered through his first line, and bowed to 
him, and told him politely that he was a barrister from that moment.  This was all the 
ceremony.  It was followed by a social supper, and by the presentation, in accordance 
with ancient custom, of a pound of sweetmeats and a bottle of Madeira, offered in the 
way of needful refreshment, by each grateful neophyte to each beneficent Bencher.  It 
may seem inconceivable that Thomas should ever have forgotten the great do-nothing 
principle instilled by such a ceremony as this; but it is, nevertheless, true, that certain 
designing students of industrious habits found him out, took advantage of his easy 
humour, persuaded him that it was discreditable to be a barrister and to know nothing 
whatever about the law, and lured him, by the force of their own evil example, into a 
conveyancer�fs chambers, to make up for lost time, and to qualify himself for practice at 
the Bar.  After a fortnight of self-delusion, the curtain fell from his eyes; he resumed 
his natural character, and shut up his books.  But the retribution which had hitherto 
always followed his little casual errors of industry followed them still.  He could get 
away from the conveyancer�fs chambers, but he could not get away from one of the 
pupils, who had taken a fancy to him,?a tall, serious, raw-boned, hard-working, 
disputatious pupil, with ideas of his own about reforming the Law of Real Property, 
who has been the scourge of Mr. Idle�fs existence ever since the fatal day when he fell 
into the mistake of attempting to study the law.  Before that time his friends were all 
sociable idlers like himself.  Since that time the burden of bearing with a hard-working 
young man has become part of his lot in life.  Go where he will now, he can never feel 
certain that the raw-boned pupil is not affectionately waiting for him round a corner, to 
tell him a little more about the Law of Real Property.  Suffer as he may under the 
infliction, he can never complain, for he must always remember, with unavailing regret, 
that he has his own thoughtless industry to thank for first exposing him to the great 
social calamity of knowing a bore.

These events of his past life, with the significant results that they brought about, pass 
drowsily through Thomas Idle�fs memory, while he lies alone on the sofa at Allonby and 
elsewhere, dreaming away the time which his fellow-apprentice gets through so actively 
out of doors.  Remembering the lesson of laziness which his past disasters teach, and 
bearing in mind also the fact that he is crippled in one leg because he exerted himself to 
go up a mountain, when he ought to have known that his proper course of conduct was 
to stop at the bottom of it, he holds now, and will for the future firmly continue to hold, 
by his new resolution never to be industrious again, on any pretence whatever, for the 
rest of his life.  The physical results of his accident have been related in a previous 
chapter.  The moral results now stand on record; and, with the enumeration of these, 
that part of the present narrative which is occupied by the Episode of The Sprained 
Ankle may now perhaps be considered, in all its aspects, as finished and complete.

�eHow do you propose that we get through this present afternoon and evening?�f 
demanded Thomas Idle, after two or three hours of the foregoing reflections at Allonby.

Mr. Goodchild faltered, looked out of window, looked in again, and said, as he had so 
often said before, �eThere is the sea, and here are the shrimps;?let us eat �fem�f!�f

But, the wise donkey was at that moment in the act of bolting: not with the irresolution 
of his previous efforts which had been wanting in sustained force of character, but with 
real vigour of purpose: shaking the dust off his mane and hind-feet at Allonby, and 
tearing away from it, as if he had nobly made up his mind that he never would be taken 
alive.  At sight of this inspiring spectacle, which was visible from his sofa, Thomas 
Idle stretched his neck and dwelt upon it rapturously.

�eFrancis Goodchild,�f he then said, turning to his companion with a solemn air, �ethis is a 
delightful little Inn, excellently kept by the most comfortable of landladies and the most 
attentive of landlords, but?the donkey�fs right!�f

The words, �eThere is the sea, and here are the?�f again trembled on the lips of 
Goodchild, unaccompanied however by any sound.

�eLet us instantly pack the portmanteaus,�f said Thomas Idle, �epay the bill, and order a fly 
out, with instructions to the driver to follow the donkey!�f

Mr. Goodchild, who had only wanted encouragement to disclose the real state of his 
feelings, and who had been pining beneath his weary secret, now burst into tears, and 
confessed that he thought another day in the place would be the death of him.

So, the two idle apprentices followed the donkey until the night was far advanced.  
Whether he was recaptured by the town-council, or is bolting at this hour through the 
United Kingdom, they know not.  They hope he may be still bolting; if so, their best 
wishes are with him.

It entered Mr. Idle�fs head, on the borders of Cumberland, that there could be no idler 
place to stay at, except by snatches of a few minutes each, than a railway station.  �eAn 
intermediate station on a line?a junction?anything of that sort,�f Thomas suggested.  
Mr. Goodchild approved of the idea as eccentric, and they journeyed on and on, until 
they came to such a station where there was an Inn.

�eHere,�f said Thomas, �ewe may be luxuriously lazy; other people will travel for us, as it 
were, and we shall laugh at their folly.�f

It was a Junction-Station, where the wooden razors before mentioned shaved the air 
very often, and where the sharp electric-telegraph bell was in a very restless condition.  
All manner of cross-lines of rails came zig-zagging into it, like a Congress of iron 
vipers; and, a little way out of it, a pointsman in an elevated signal-box was constantly 
going through the motions of drawing immense quantities of beer at a public-house bar.  
In one direction, confused perspectives of embankments and arches were to be seen 
from the platform; in the other, the rails soon disentangled themselves into two tracks 
and shot away under a bridge, and curved round a corner.  Sidings were there, in which 
empty luggage-vans and cattle-boxes often butted against each other as if they couldn�ft 
agree; and warehouses were there, in which great quantities of goods seemed to have 
taken the veil (of the consistency of tarpaulin), and to have retired from the world 
without any hope of getting back to it.  Refreshment-rooms were there; one, for the 
hungry and thirsty Iron Locomotives where their coke and water were ready, and of 
good quality, for they were dangerous to play tricks with; the other, for the hungry and 
thirsty human Locomotives, who might take what they could get, and whose chief 
consolation was provided in the form of three terrific urns or vases of white metal, 
containing nothing, each forming a breastwork for a defiant and apparently 
much-injured woman.

Established at this Station, Mr. Thomas Idle and Mr. Francis Goodchild resolved to 
enjoy it.  But, its contrasts were very violent, and there was also an infection in it.

First, as to its contrasts.  They were only two, but they were Lethargy and Madness.  
The Station was either totally unconscious, or wildly raving.  By day, in its 
unconscious state, it looked as if no life could come to it,?as if it were all rust, dust, 
and ashes?as if the last train for ever, had gone without issuing any 
Return-Tickets?as if the last Engine had uttered its last shriek and burst.  One 
awkward shave of the air from the wooden razor, and everything changed.  Tight 
office-doors flew open, panels yielded, books, newspapers, travelling-caps and 
wrappers broke out of brick walls, money chinked, conveyances oppressed by 
nightmares of luggage came careering into the yard, porters started up from secret 
places, ditto the much-injured women, the shining bell, who lived in a little tray on stilts 
by himself, flew into a man�fs hand and clamoured violently.  The pointsman aloft in 
the signal-box made the motions of drawing, with some difficulty, hogsheads of beer.  
Down Train!  More bear!  Up Train!  More beer.  Cross junction Train!  More 
beer!  Cattle Train!  More beer.  Goods Train!  Simmering, whistling, trembling, 
rumbling, thundering.  Trains on the whole confusion of intersecting rails, crossing one 
another, bumping one another, hissing one another, backing to go forward, tearing into 
distance to come close.  People frantic.  Exiles seeking restoration to their native 
carriages, and banished to remoter climes.  More beer and more bell.  Then, in a 
minute, the Station relapsed into stupor as the stoker of the Cattle Train, the last to 
depart, went gliding out of it, wiping the long nose of his oil-can with a dirty 
pocket-handkerchief.

By night, in its unconscious state, the Station was not so much as visible.  Something 
in the air, like an enterprising chemist�fs established in business on one of the boughs of 
Jack�fs beanstalk, was all that could be discerned of it under the stars.  In a moment it 
would break out, a constellation of gas.  In another moment, twenty rival chemists, on 
twenty rival beanstalks, came into existence.  Then, the Furies would be seen, waving 
their lurid torches up and down the confused perspectives of embankments and 
arches?would be heard, too, wailing and shrieking.  Then, the Station would be full 
of palpitating trains, as in the day; with the heightening difference that they were not so 
clearly seen as in the day, whereas the Station walls, starting forward under the gas, like 
a hippopotamus�fs eyes, dazzled the human locomotives with the sauce-bottle, the cheap 
music, the bedstead, the distorted range of buildings where the patent safes are made, 
the gentleman in the rain with the registered umbrella, the lady returning from the ball 
with the registered respirator, and all their other embellishments.  And now, the human 
locomotives, creased as to their countenances and purblind as to their eyes, would 
swarm forth in a heap, addressing themselves to the mysterious urns and the 
much-injured women; while the iron locomotives, dripping fire and water, shed their 
steam about plentifully, making the dull oxen in their cages, with heads depressed, and 
foam hanging from their mouths as their red looks glanced fearfully at the surrounding 
terrors, seem as though they had been drinking at half-frozen waters and were hung with 
icicles.  Through the same steam would be caught glimpses of their fellow-travellers, 
the sheep, getting their white kid faces together, away from the bars, and stuffing the 
interstices with trembling wool.  Also, down among the wheels, of the man with the 
sledge-hammer, ringing the axles of the fast night-train; against whom the oxen have a 
misgiving that he is the man with the pole-axe who is to come by-and-by, and so the 
nearest of them try to get back, and get a purchase for a thrust at him through the bars.  
Suddenly, the bell would ring, the steam would stop with one hiss and a yell, the 
chemists on the beanstalks would be busy, the avenging Furies would bestir themselves, 
the fast night-train would melt from eye and ear, the other trains going their ways more 
slowly would be heard faintly rattling in the distance like old-fashioned watches 
running down, the sauce-bottle and cheap music retired from view, even the bedstead 
went to bed, and there was no such visible thing as the Station to vex the cool wind in 
its blowing, or perhaps the autumn lightning, as it found out the iron rails.

The infection of the Station was this:- When it was in its raving state, the Apprentices 
found it impossible to be there, without labouring under the delusion that they were in a 
hurry.  To Mr. Goodchild, whose ideas of idleness were so imperfect, this was no 
unpleasant hallucination, and accordingly that gentleman went through great exertions 
in yielding to it, and running up and down the platform, jostling everybody, under the 
impression that he had a highly important mission somewhere, and had not a moment to 
lose.  But, to Thomas Idle, this contagion was so very unacceptable an incident of the 
situation, that he struck on the fourth day, and requested to be moved.

�eThis place fills me with a dreadful sensation,�f said Thomas, �eof having something to 
do.  Remove me, Francis.�f

�eWhere would you like to go next?�f was the question of the ever-engaging Goodchild.

�eI have heard there is a good old Inn at Lancaster, established in a fine old house: an Inn 
where they give you Bride-cake every day after dinner,�f said Thomas Idle.  �eLet us eat 
Bride-cake without the trouble of being married, or of knowing anybody in that 
ridiculous dilemma.�f

Mr. Goodchild, with a lover�fs sigh, assented.  They departed from the Station in a 
violent hurry (for which, it is unnecessary to observe, there was not the least occasion), 
and were delivered at the fine old house at Lancaster, on the same night.

It is Mr. Goodchild�fs opinion, that if a visitor on his arrival at Lancaster could be 
accommodated with a pole which would push the opposite side of the street some yards 
farther off, it would be better for all parties.  Protesting against being required to live 
in a trench, and obliged to speculate all day upon what the people can possibly be doing 
within a mysterious opposite window, which is a shop-window to look at, but not a 
shop-window in respect of its offering nothing for sale and declining to give any 
account whatever of itself, Mr. Goodchild concedes Lancaster to be a pleasant place.  
A place dropped in the midst of a charming landscape, a place with a fine ancient 
fragment of castle, a place of lovely walks, a place possessing staid old houses richly 
fitted with old Honduras mahogany, which has grown so dark with time that it seems to 
have got something of a retrospective mirror-quality into itself, and to show the visitor, 
in the depth of its grain, through all its polish, the hue of the wretched slaves who 
groaned long ago under old Lancaster merchants.  And Mr. Goodchild adds that the 
stones of Lancaster do sometimes whisper, even yet, of rich men passed away?upon 
whose great prosperity some of these old doorways frowned sullen in the brightest 
weather?that their slave-gain turned to curses, as the Arabian Wizard�fs money turned 
to leaves, and that no good ever came of it, even unto the third and fourth generations, 
until it was wasted and gone.

It was a gallant sight to behold, the Sunday procession of the Lancaster elders to 
Church?all in black, and looking fearfully like a funeral without the Body?under the 
escort of Three Beadles.

�eThink,�f said Francis, as he stood at the Inn window, admiring, �eof being taken to the 
sacred edifice by three Beadles!  I have, in my early time, been taken out of it by one 
Beadle; but, to be taken into it by three, O Thomas, is a distinction I shall never enjoy!�f




CHAPTER IV



When Mr. Goodchild had looked out of the Lancaster Inn window for two hours on end, 
with great perseverance, he begun to entertain a misgiving that he was growing 
industrious.  He therefore set himself next, to explore the country from the tops of all 
the steep hills in the neighbourhood.

He came back at dinner-time, red and glowing, to tell Thomas Idle what he had seen.  
Thomas, on his back reading, listened with great composure, and asked him whether he 
really had gone up those hills, and bothered himself with those views, and walked all 
those miles?

�eBecause I want to know,�f added Thomas, �ewhat you would say of it, if you were 
obliged to do it?�f

�eIt would be different, then,�f said Francis.  �eIt would be work, then; now, it�fs play.�f

�ePlay!�f replied Thomas Idle, utterly repudiating the reply.  �ePlay!  Here is a man goes 
systematically tearing himself to pieces, and putting himself through an incessant course 
of training, as if he were always under articles to fight a match for the champion�fs belt, 
and he calls it Play!  Play!�f exclaimed Thomas Idle, scornfully contemplating his one 
boot in the air.  �eYou can�ft play.  You don�ft know what it is.  You make work of 
everything.�f

The bright Goodchild amiably smiled.

�eSo you do,�f said Thomas.  �eI mean it.  To me you are an absolutely terrible fellow.  
You do nothing like another man.  Where another fellow would fall into a footbath of 
action or emotion, you fall into a mine.  Where any other fellow would be a painted 
butterfly, you are a fiery dragon.  Where another man would stake a sixpence, you 
stake your existence.  If you were to go up in a balloon, you would make for Heaven; 
and if you were to dive into the depths of the earth, nothing short of the other place 
would content you.  What a fellow you are, Francis!�f  The cheerful Goodchild 
laughed.

�eIt�fs all very well to laugh, but I wonder you don�ft feel it to be serious,�f said Idle.  �eA 
man who can do nothing by halves appears to me to be a fearful man.�f

�eTom, Tom,�f returned Goodchild, �eif I can do nothing by halves, and be nothing by 
halves, it�fs pretty clear that you must take me as a whole, and make the best of me.�f

With this philosophical rejoinder, the airy Goodchild clapped Mr. Idle on the shoulder 
in a final manner, and they sat down to dinner.

�eBy-the-by,�f said Goodchild, �eI have been over a lunatic asylum too, since I have been 
out.�f

�eHe has been,�f exclaimed Thomas Idle, casting up his eyes, �eover a lunatic asylum!  
Not content with being as great an Ass as Captain Barclay in the pedestrian way, he 
makes a Lunacy Commissioner of himself?for nothing!�f

�eAn immense place,�f said Goodchild, �eadmirable offices, very good arrangements, very 
good attendants; altogether a remarkable place.�f

�eAnd what did you see there?�f asked Mr. Idle, adapting Hamlet�fs advice to the occasion, 
and assuming the virtue of interest, though he had it not.

�eThe usual thing,�f said Francis Goodchild, with a sigh.  �eLong groves of blighted 
men-and-women-trees; interminable avenues of hopeless faces; numbers, without the 
slightest power of really combining for any earthly purpose; a society of human 
creatures who have nothing in common but that they have all lost the power of being 
humanly social with one another.�f

�eTake a glass of wine with me,�f said Thomas Idle, �eand let us be social.�f

�eIn one gallery, Tom,�f pursued Francis Goodchild, �ewhich looked to me about the 
length of the Long Walk at Windsor, more or less?�f

�eProbably less,�f observed Thomas Idle.

�eIn one gallery, which was otherwise clear of patients (for they were all out), there was 
a poor little dark-chinned, meagre man, with a perplexed brow and a pensive face, 
stooping low over the matting on the floor, and picking out with his thumb and 
forefinger the course of its fibres.  The afternoon sun was slanting in at the large 
end-window, and there were cross patches of light and shade all down the vista, made 
by the unseen windows and the open doors of the little sleeping-cells on either side.  In 
about the centre of the perspective, under an arch, regardless of the pleasant weather, 
regardless of the solitude, regardless of approaching footsteps, was the poor little 
dark-chinned, meagre man, poring over the matting.  �gWhat are you doing there?�h said 
my conductor, when we came to him.  He looked up, and pointed to the matting.  �gI 
wouldn�ft do that, I think,�h said my conductor, kindly; �gif I were you, I would go and 
read, or I would lie down if I felt tired; but I wouldn�ft do that.�h  The patient considered 
a moment, and vacantly answered, �gNo, sir, I won�ft; I�fll?I�fll go and read,�h and so he 
lamely shuffled away into one of the little rooms.  I turned my head before we had 
gone many paces.  He had already come out again, and was again poring over the 
matting, and tracking out its fibres with his thumb and forefinger.  I stopped to look at 
him, and it came into my mind, that probably the course of those fibres as they plaited 
in and out, over and under, was the only course of things in the whole wide world that it 
was left to him to understand?that his darkening intellect had narrowed down to the 
small cleft of light which showed him, �gThis piece was twisted this way, went in here, 
passed under, came out there, was carried on away here to the right where I now put my 
finger on it, and in this progress of events, the thing was made and came to be here.�h  
Then, I wondered whether he looked into the matting, next, to see if it could show him 
anything of the process through which he came to be there, so strangely poring over it.  
Then, I thought how all of us, GOD help us! in our different ways are poring over our 
bits of matting, blindly enough, and what confusions and mysteries we make in the 
pattern.  I had a sadder fellow-feeling with the little dark-chinned, meagre man, by that 
time, and I came away.�f

Mr. Idle diverting the conversation to grouse, custards, and bride-cake, Mr. Goodchild 
followed in the same direction.  The bride-cake was as bilious and indigestible as if a 
real Bride had cut it, and the dinner it completed was an admirable performance. 


The house was a genuine old house of a very quaint description, teeming with old 
carvings, and beams, and panels, and having an excellent old staircase, with a gallery or 
upper staircase, cut off from it by a curious fence-work of old oak, or of the old 
Honduras Mahogany wood.  It was, and is, and will be, for many a long year to come, 
a remarkably picturesque house; and a certain grave mystery lurking in the depth of the 
old mahogany panels, as if they were so many deep pools of dark water?such, indeed, 
as they had been much among when they were trees?gave it a very mysterious 
character after nightfall.

When Mr. Goodchild and Mr. Idle had first alighted at the door, and stepped into the 
sombre, handsome old hall, they had been received by half-a-dozen noiseless old men in 
black, all dressed exactly alike, who glided up the stairs with the obliging landlord and 
waiter?but without appearing to get into their way, or to mind whether they did or 
no?and who had filed off to the right and left on the old staircase, as the guests entered 
their sitting-room.  It was then broad, bright day.  But, Mr. Goodchild had said, when 
their door was shut, �eWho on earth are those old men?�f  And afterwards, both on going 
out and coming in, he had noticed that there were no old men to be seen.

Neither, had the old men, or any one of the old men, reappeared since.  The two 
friends had passed a night in the house, but had seen nothing more of the old men.  Mr. 
Goodchild, in rambling about it, had looked along passages, and glanced in at doorways, 
but had encountered no old men; neither did it appear that any old men were, by any 
member of the establishment, missed or expected.

Another odd circumstance impressed itself on their attention.  It was, that the door of 
their sitting-room was never left untouched for a quarter of an hour.  It was opened 
with hesitation, opened with confidence, opened a little way, opened a good 
way,?always clapped-to again without a word of explanation.  They were reading, 
they were writing, they were eating, they were drinking, they were talking, they were 
dozing; the door was always opened at an unexpected moment, and they looked towards 
it, and it was clapped-to again, and nobody was to be seen.  When this had happened 
fifty times or so, Mr. Goodchild had said to his companion, jestingly: �eI begin to think, 
Tom, there was something wrong with those six old men.�f

Night had come again, and they had been writing for two or three hours: writing, in 
short, a portion of the lazy notes from which these lazy sheets are taken.  They had left 
off writing, and glasses were on the table between them.  The house was closed and 
quiet.  Around the head of Thomas Idle, as he lay upon his sofa, hovered light wreaths 
of fragrant smoke.  The temples of Francis Goodchild, as he leaned back in his chair, 
with his two hands clasped behind his head, and his legs crossed, were similarly 
decorated.

They had been discussing several idle subjects of speculation, not omitting the strange 
old men, and were still so occupied, when Mr. Goodchild abruptly changed his attitude 
to wind up his watch.  They were just becoming drowsy enough to be stopped in their 
talk by any such slight check.  Thomas Idle, who was speaking at the moment, paused 
and said, �eHow goes it?�f

�eOne,�f said Goodchild.

As if he had ordered One old man, and the order were promptly executed (truly, all 
orders were so, in that excellent hotel), the door opened, and One old man stood there.

He did not come in, but stood with the door in his hand.

�eOne of the six, Tom, at last!�f said Mr. Goodchild, in a surprised whisper.?�eSir, your 
pleasure?�f

�eSir, your pleasure?�f said the One old man.

�eI didn�ft ring.�f

�eThe bell did,�f said the One old man.

He said BELL, in a deep, strong way, that would have expressed the church Bell.

�eI had the pleasure, I believe, of seeing you, yesterday?�f said Goodchild.

�eI cannot undertake to say for certain,�f was the grim reply of the One old man.

�eI think you saw me?  Did you not?�f

�eSaw you?�f said the old man.  �eO yes, I saw you.  But, I see many who never see me.�f

A chilled, slow, earthy, fixed old man.  A cadaverous old man of measured speech.  
An old man who seemed as unable to wink, as if his eyelids had been nailed to his 
forehead.  An old man whose eyes?two spots of fire?had no more motion than if 
they had been connected with the back of his skull by screws driven through it, and 
rivetted and bolted outside, among his grey hair.

The night had turned so cold, to Mr. Goodchild�fs sensations, that he shivered.  He 
remarked lightly, and half apologetically, �eI think somebody is walking over my grave.�f

�eNo,�f said the weird old man, �ethere is no one there.�f

Mr. Goodchild looked at Idle, but Idle lay with his head enwreathed in smoke.

�eNo one there?�f said Goodchild.

�eThere is no one at your grave, I assure you,�f said the old man.

He had come in and shut the door, and he now sat down.  He did not bend himself to 
sit, as other people do, but seemed to sink bolt upright, as if in water, until the chair 
stopped him.

�eMy friend, Mr. Idle,�f said Goodchild, extremely anxious to introduce a third person 
into the conversation.

�eI am,�f said the old man, without looking at him, �eat Mr. Idle�fs service.�f

�eIf you are an old inhabitant of this place,�f Francis Goodchild resumed.

�eYes.�f

�ePerhaps you can decide a point my friend and I were in doubt upon, this morning.  
They hang condemned criminals at the Castle, I believe?�f

�eI believe so,�f said the old man.

�eAre their faces turned towards that noble prospect?�f

�eYour face is turned,�f replied the old man, �eto the Castle wall.  When you are tied up, 
you see its stones expanding and contracting violently, and a similar expansion and 
contraction seem to take place in your own head and breast.  Then, there is a rush of 
fire and an earthquake, and the Castle springs into the air, and you tumble down a 
precipice.�f

His cravat appeared to trouble him.  He put his hand to his throat, and moved his neck 
from side to side.  He was an old man of a swollen character of face, and his nose was 
immoveably hitched up on one side, as if by a little hook inserted in that nostril.  Mr. 
Goodchild felt exceedingly uncomfortable, and began to think the night was hot, and 
not cold.

�eA strong description, sir,�f he observed.

�eA strong sensation,�f the old man rejoined.

Again, Mr. Goodchild looked to Mr. Thomas Idle; but Thomas lay on his back with his 
face attentively turned towards the One old man, and made no sign.  At this time Mr. 
Goodchild believed that he saw threads of fire stretch from the old man�fs eyes to his 
own, and there attach themselves.  (Mr.  Goodchild writes the present account of his 
experience, and, with the utmost solemnity, protests that he had the strongest sensation 
upon him of being forced to look at the old man along those two fiery films, from that 
moment.)

�eI must tell it to you,�f said the old man, with a ghastly and a stony stare.

�eWhat?�f asked Francis Goodchild.

�eYou know where it took place.  Yonder!�f

Whether he pointed to the room above, or to the room below, or to any room in that old 
house, or to a room in some other old house in that old town, Mr. Goodchild was not, 
nor is, nor ever can be, sure.  He was confused by the circumstance that the right 
forefinger of the One old man seemed to dip itself in one of the threads of fire, light 
itself, and make a fiery start in the air, as it pointed somewhere.  Having pointed 
somewhere, it went out.

�eYou know she was a Bride,�f said the old man.

�eI know they still send up Bride-cake,�f Mr. Goodchild faltered.  �eThis is a very 
oppressive air.�f

�eShe was a Bride,�f said the old man.  �eShe was a fair, flaxen-haired, large-eyed girl, 
who had no character, no purpose.  A weak, credulous, incapable, helpless nothing.  
Not like her mother.  No, no.  It was her father whose character she reflected.

�eHer mother had taken care to secure everything to herself, for her own life, when the 
father of this girl (a child at that time) died?of sheer helplessness; no other 
disorder?and then He renewed the acquaintance that had once subsisted between the 
mother and Him.  He had been put aside for the flaxen-haired, large-eyed man (or 
nonentity) with Money.  He could overlook that for Money.  He wanted 
compensation in Money.

�eSo, he returned to the side of that woman the mother, made love to her again, danced 
attendance on her, and submitted himself to her whims.  She wreaked upon him every 
whim she had, or could invent.  He bore it.  And the more he bore, the more he 
wanted compensation in Money, and the more he was resolved to have it.

�eBut, lo!  Before he got it, she cheated him.  In one of her imperious states, she froze, 
and never thawed again.  She put her hands to her head one night, uttered a cry, 
stiffened, lay in that attitude certain hours, and died.  And he had got no compensation 
from her in Money, yet.  Blight and Murrain on her!  Not a penny.

�eHe had hated her throughout that second pursuit, and had longed for retaliation on her.  
He now counterfeited her signature to an instrument, leaving all she had to leave, to her 
daughter?ten years old then?to whom the property passed absolutely, and appointing 
himself the daughter�fs Guardian.  When He slid it under the pillow of the bed on 
which she lay, He bent down in the deaf ear of Death, and whispered: �gMistress Pride, I 
have determined a long time that, dead or alive, you must make me compensation in 
Money.�f

�eSo, now there were only two left.  Which two were, He, and the fair flaxen-haired, 
large-eyed foolish daughter, who afterwards became the Bride.

�eHe put her to school.  In a secret, dark, oppressive, ancient house, he put her to school 
with a watchful and unscrupulous woman.  �gMy worthy lady,�h he said, �ghere is a mind 
to be formed; will you help me to form it?�h  She accepted the trust.  For which she, 
too, wanted compensation in Money, and had it.

�eThe girl was formed in the fear of him, and in the conviction, that there was no escape 
from him.  She was taught, from the first, to regard him as her future husband?the 
man who must marry her?the destiny that overshadowed her?the appointed certainty 
that could never be evaded.  The poor fool was soft white wax in their hands, and took 
the impression that they put upon her.  It hardened with time.  It became a part of 
herself.  Inseparable from herself, and only to be torn away from her, by tearing life 
away from her.

�eEleven years she had lived in the dark house and its gloomy garden.  He was jealous 
of the very light and air getting to her, and they kept her close.  He stopped the wide 
chimneys, shaded the little windows, left the strong-stemmed ivy to wander where it 
would over the house-front, the moss to accumulate on the untrimmed fruit-trees in the 
red-walled garden, the weeds to over-run its green and yellow walks.  He surrounded 
her with images of sorrow and desolation.  He caused her to be filled with fears of the 
place and of the stories that were told of it, and then on pretext of correcting them, to be 
left in it in solitude, or made to shrink about it in the dark.  When her mind was most 
depressed and fullest of terrors, then, he would come out of one of the hiding-places 
from which he overlooked her, and present himself as her sole resource.

�eThus, by being from her childhood the one embodiment her life presented to her of 
power to coerce and power to relieve, power to bind and power to loose, the ascendency 
over her weakness was secured.  She was twenty-one years and twenty-one days old, 
when he brought her home to the gloomy house, his half-witted, frightened, and 
submissive Bride of three weeks.

�eHe had dismissed the governess by that time?what he had left to do, he could best do 
alone?and they came back, upon a rain night, to the scene of her long preparation.  
She turned to him upon the threshold, as the rain was dripping from the porch, and said:

�e�gO sir, it is the Death-watch ticking for me!�h

�e�gWell!�h he answered.  �gAnd if it were?�h

�e�gO sir!�h she returned to him, �glook kindly on me, and be merciful to me!  I beg your 
pardon.  I will do anything you wish, if you will only forgive me!�h

�eThat had become the poor fool�fs constant song: �gI beg your pardon,�h and �gForgive 
me!�h

�eShe was not worth hating; he felt nothing but contempt for her.  But, she had long 
been in the way, and he had long been weary, and the work was near its end, and had to 
be worked out.

�e�gYou fool,�h he said.  �gGo up the stairs!�h

�eShe obeyed very quickly, murmuring, �gI will do anything you wish!�h  When he came 
into the Bride�fs Chamber, having been a little retarded by the heavy fastenings of the 
great door (for they were alone in the house, and he had arranged that the people who 
attended on them should come and go in the day), he found her withdrawn to the 
furthest corner, and there standing pressed against the paneling as if she would have 
shrunk through it: her flaxen hair all wild about her face, and her large eyes staring at 
him in vague terror.

�e�gWhat are you afraid of?  Come and sit down by me.�h

�e�gI will do anything you wish.  I beg your pardon, sir.  Forgive me!�h  Her 
monotonous tune as usual.

�e�gEllen, here is a writing that you must write out to-morrow, in your own hand.  You 
may as well be seen by others, busily engaged upon it.  When you have written it all 
fairly, and corrected all mistakes, call in any two people there may be about the house, 
and sign your name to it before them.  Then, put it in your bosom to keep it safe, and 
when I sit here again to-morrow night, give it to me.�h

�e�gI will do it all, with the greatest care.  I will do anything you wish.�h

�e�gDon�ft shake and tremble, then.�h

�e�gI will try my utmost not to do it?if you will only forgive me!�h

�eNext day, she sat down at her desk, and did as she had been told.  He often passed in 
and out of the room, to observe her, and always saw her slowly and laboriously writing: 
repeating to herself the words she copied, in appearance quite mechanically, and 
without caring or endeavouring to comprehend them, so that she did her task.  He saw 
her follow the directions she had received, in all particulars; and at night, when they 
were alone again in the same Bride�fs Chamber, and he drew his chair to the hearth, she 
timidly approached him from her distant seat, took the paper from her bosom, and gave 
it into his hand.

�eIt secured all her possessions to him, in the event of her death.  He put her before him, 
face to face, that he might look at her steadily; and he asked her, in so many plain words, 
neither fewer nor more, did she know that?

�eThere were spots of ink upon the bosom of her white dress, and they made her face 
look whiter and her eyes look larger as she nodded her head.  There were spots of ink 
upon the hand with which she stood before him, nervously plaiting and folding her 
white skirts.

�eHe took her by the arm, and looked her, yet more closely and steadily, in the face.  
�gNow, die!  I have done with you.�h

�eShe shrunk, and uttered a low, suppressed cry.

�e�gI am not going to kill you.  I will not endanger my life for yours.  Die!�h

�eHe sat before her in the gloomy Bride�fs Chamber, day after day, night after night, 
looking the word at her when he did not utter it.  As often as her large unmeaning eyes 
were raised from the hands in which she rocked her head, to the stern figure, sitting with 
crossed arms and knitted forehead, in the chair, they read in it, �gDie!�h  When she 
dropped asleep in exhaustion, she was called back to shuddering consciousness, by the 
whisper, �gDie!�h  When she fell upon her old entreaty to be pardoned, she was 
answered �gDie!�h  When she had out-watched and out-suffered the long night, and the 
rising sun flamed into the sombre room, she heard it hailed with, �gAnother day and not 
dead??Die!�h

�eShut up in the deserted mansion, aloof from all mankind, and engaged alone in such a 
struggle without any respite, it came to this?that either he must die, or she.  He knew 
it very well, and concentrated his strength against her feebleness.  Hours upon hours he 
held her by the arm when her arm was black where he held it, and bade her Die!

�eIt was done, upon a windy morning, before sunrise.  He computed the time to be 
half-past four; but, his forgotten watch had run down, and he could not be sure.  She 
had broken away from him in the night, with loud and sudden cries?the first of that 
kind to which she had given vent?and he had had to put his hands over her mouth.  
Since then, she had been quiet in the corner of the paneling where she had sunk down; 
and he had left her, and had gone back with his folded arms and his knitted forehead to 
his chair.

�ePaler in the pale light, more colourless than ever in the leaden dawn, he saw her 
coming, trailing herself along the floor towards him?a white wreck of hair, and dress, 
and wild eyes, pushing itself on by an irresolute and bending hand.

�e�gO, forgive me!  I will do anything.  O, sir, pray tell me I may live!�h

�e�gDie!�h

�e�gAre you so resolved?  Is there no hope for me?�h

�e�gDie!�h

�eHer large eyes strained themselves with wonder and fear; wonder and fear changed to 
reproach; reproach to blank nothing.  It was done.  He was not at first so sure it was 
done, but that the morning sun was hanging jewels in her hair?he saw the diamond, 
emerald, and ruby, glittering among it in little points, as he stood looking down at 
her?when he lifted her and laid her on her bed.

�eShe was soon laid in the ground.  And now they were all gone, and he had 
compensated himself well.

�eHe had a mind to travel.  Not that he meant to waste his Money, for he was a 
pinching man and liked his Money dearly (liked nothing else, indeed), but, that he had 
grown tired of the desolate house and wished to turn his back upon it and have done 
with it.  But, the house was worth Money, and Money must not be thrown away.  He 
determined to sell it before he went.  That it might look the less wretched and bring a 
better price, he hired some labourers to work in the overgrown garden; to cut out the 
dead wood, trim the ivy that drooped in heavy masses over the windows and gables, and 
clear the walks in which the weeds were growing mid-leg high.

�eHe worked, himself, along with them.  He worked later than they did, and, one 
evening at dusk, was left working alone, with his bill-hook in his hand.  One autumn 
evening, when the Bride was five weeks dead.

�e�gIt grows too dark to work longer,�h he said to himself, �gI must give over for the night.�h

�eHe detested the house, and was loath to enter it.  He looked at the dark porch waiting 
for him like a tomb, and felt that it was an accursed house.  Near to the porch, and near 
to where he stood, was a tree whose branches waved before the old bay-window of the 
Bride�fs Chamber, where it had been done.  The tree swung suddenly, and made him 
start.  It swung again, although the night was still.  Looking up into it, he saw a figure 
among the branches.

�eIt was the figure of a young man.  The face looked down, as his looked up; the 
branches cracked and swayed; the figure rapidly descended, and slid upon its feet before 
him.  A slender youth of about her age, with long light brown hair.

�e�gWhat thief are you?�h he said, seizing the youth by the collar.

�eThe young man, in shaking himself free, swung him a blow with his arm across the 
face and throat.  They closed, but the young man got from him and stepped back, 
crying, with great eagerness and horror, �gDon�ft touch me!  I would as lieve be touched 
by the Devil!�h

�eHe stood still, with his bill-hook in his hand, looking at the young man.  For, the 
young man�fs look was the counterpart of her last look, and he had not expected ever to 
see that again.

�e�gI am no thief.  Even if I were, I would not have a coin of your wealth, if it would 
buy me the Indies.  You murderer!�h

�e�gWhat!�h

�e�gI climbed it,�h said the young man, pointing up into the tree, �gfor the first time, nigh 
four years ago.  I climbed it, to look at her.  I saw her.  I spoke to her.  I have 
climbed it, many a time, to watch and listen for her.  I was a boy, hidden among its 
leaves, when from that bay-window she gave me this!�h

�eHe showed a tress of flaxen hair, tied with a mourning ribbon.

�e�gHer life,�h said the young man, �gwas a life of mourning.  She gave me this, as a token 
of it, and a sign that she was dead to every one but you.  If I had been older, if I had 
seen her sooner, I might have saved her from you.  But, she was fast in the web when I 
first climbed the tree, and what could I do then to break it!�h

�eIn saying those words, he burst into a fit of sobbing and crying: weakly at first, then 
passionately.

�e�gMurderer!  I climbed the tree on the night when you brought her back.  I heard her, 
from the tree, speak of the Death-watch at the door.  I was three times in the tree while 
you were shut up with her, slowly killing her.  I saw her, from the tree, lie dead upon 
her bed.  I have watched you, from the tree, for proofs and traces of your guilt.  The 
manner of it, is a mystery to me yet, but I will pursue you until you have rendered up 
your life to the hangman.  You shall never, until then, be rid of me.  I loved her!  I 
can know no relenting towards you.  Murderer, I loved her!�h

�eThe youth was bare-headed, his hat having fluttered away in his descent from the tree.  
He moved towards the gate.  He had to pass?Him?to get to it.  There was breadth 
for two old-fashioned carriages abreast; and the youth�fs abhorrence, openly expressed in 
every feature of his face and limb of his body, and very hard to bear, had verge enough 
to keep itself at a distance in.  He (by which I mean the other) had not stirred hand or 
foot, since he had stood still to look at the boy.  He faced round, now, to follow him 
with his eyes.  As the back of the bare light-brown head was turned to him, he saw a 
red curve stretch from his hand to it.  He knew, before he threw the bill-hook, where it 
had alighted?I say, had alighted, and not, would alight; for, to his clear perception the 
thing was done before he did it.  It cleft the head, and it remained there, and the boy 
lay on his face.

�eHe buried the body in the night, at the foot of the tree.  As soon as it was light in the 
morning, he worked at turning up all the ground near the tree, and hacking and hewing 
at the neighbouring bushes and undergrowth.  When the labourers came, there was 
nothing suspicious, and nothing suspected.

�eBut, he had, in a moment, defeated all his precautions, and destroyed the triumph of 
the scheme he had so long concerted, and so successfully worked out.  He had got rid 
of the Bride, and had acquired her fortune without endangering his life; but now, for a 
death by which he had gained nothing, he had evermore to live with a rope around his 
neck.

�eBeyond this, he was chained to the house of gloom and horror, which he could not 
endure.  Being afraid to sell it or to quit it, lest discovery should be made, he was 
forced to live in it.  He hired two old people, man and wife, for his servants; and dwelt 
in it, and dreaded it.  His great difficulty, for a long time, was the garden.  Whether he 
should keep it trim, whether he should suffer it to fall into its former state of neglect, 
what would be the least likely way of attracting attention to it?

�eHe took the middle course of gardening, himself, in his evening leisure, and of then 
calling the old serving-man to help him; but, of never letting him work there alone.  
And he made himself an arbour over against the tree, where he could sit and see that it 
was safe.

�eAs the seasons changed, and the tree changed, his mind perceived dangers that were 
always changing.  In the leafy time, he perceived that the upper boughs were growing 
into the form of the young man?that they made the shape of him exactly, sitting in a 
forked branch swinging in the wind.  In the time of the falling leaves, he perceived that 
they came down from the tree, forming tell-tale letters on the path, or that they had a 
tendency to heap themselves into a churchyard mound above the grave.  In the winter, 
when the tree was bare, he perceived that the boughs swung at him the ghost of the 
blow the young man had given, and that they threatened him openly.  In the spring, 
when the sap was mounting in the trunk, he asked himself, were the dried-up particles 
of blood mounting with it: to make out more obviously this year than last, the 
leaf-screened figure of the young man, swinging in the wind?

�eHowever, he turned his Money over and over, and still over.  He was in the dark trade, 
the gold-dust trade, and most secret trades that yielded great returns.  In ten years, he 
had turned his Money over, so many times, that the traders and shippers who had 
dealings with him, absolutely did not lie?for once?when they declared that he had 
increased his fortune, Twelve Hundred Per Cent.

�eHe possessed his riches one hundred years ago, when people could be lost easily.  He 
had heard who the youth was, from hearing of the search that was made after him; but, 
it died away, and the youth was forgotten.

�eThe annual round of changes in the tree had been repeated ten times since the night of 
the burial at its foot, when there was a great thunder-storm over this place.  It broke at 
midnight, and roared until morning.  The first intelligence he heard from his old 
serving-man that morning, was, that the tree had been struck by Lightning.

�eIt had been riven down the stem, in a very surprising manner, and the stem lay in two 
blighted shafts: one resting against the house, and one against a portion of the old red 
garden-wall in which its fall had made a gap.  The fissure went down the tree to a little 
above the earth, and there stopped.  There was great curiosity to see the tree, and, with 
most of his former fears revived, he sat in his arbour?grown quite an old 
man?watching the people who came to see it.

�eThey quickly began to come, in such dangerous numbers, that he closed his 
garden-gate and refused to admit any more.  But, there were certain men of science 
who travelled from a distance to examine the tree, and, in an evil hour, he let them 
in!?Blight and Murrain on them, let them in!

�eThey wanted to dig up the ruin by the roots, and closely examine it, and the earth about 
it.  Never, while he lived!  They offered money for it.  They!  Men of science, 
whom he could have bought by the gross, with a scratch of his pen!  He showed them 
the garden-gate again, and locked and barred it.

�eBut they were bent on doing what they wanted to do, and they bribed the old 
serving-man?a thankless wretch who regularly complained when he received his 
wages, of being underpaid?and they stole into the garden by night with their lanterns, 
picks, and shovels, and fell to at the tree.  He was lying in a turret-room on the other 
side of the house (the Bride�fs Chamber had been unoccupied ever since), but he soon 
dreamed of picks and shovels, and got up.

�eHe came to an upper window on that side, whence he could see their lanterns, and 
them, and the loose earth in a heap which he had himself disturbed and put back, when 
it was last turned to the air.  It was found!  They had that minute lighted on it.  They 
were all bending over it.  One of them said, �gThe skull is fractured;�h and another, �gSee 
here the bones;�h and another, �gSee here the clothes;�h and then the first struck in again, 
and said, �gA rusty bill-hook!�h

�eHe became sensible, next day, that he was already put under a strict watch, and that he 
could go nowhere without being followed.  Before a week was out, he was taken and 
laid in hold.  The circumstances were gradually pieced together against him, with a 
desperate malignity, and an appalling ingenuity.  But, see the justice of men, and how 
it was extended to him!  He was further accused of having poisoned that girl in the 
Bride�fs Chamber.  He, who had carefully and expressly avoided imperilling a hair of 
his head for her, and who had seen her die of her own incapacity!

�eThere was doubt for which of the two murders he should be first tried; but, the real one 
was chosen, and he was found Guilty, and cast for death.  Bloodthirsty wretches!  
They would have made him Guilty of anything, so set they were upon having his life. 


�eHis money could do nothing to save him, and he was hanged.  I am He, and I was 
hanged at Lancaster Castle with my face to the wall, a hundred years ago!�f



At this terrific announcement, Mr. Goodchild tried to rise and cry out.  But, the two 
fiery lines extending from the old man�fs eyes to his own, kept him down, and he could 
not utter a sound.  His sense of hearing, however, was acute, and he could hear the 
clock strike Two.  No sooner had he heard the clock strike Two, than he saw before 
him Two old men!

TWO.

The eyes of each, connected with his eyes by two films of fire: each, exactly like the 
other: each, addressing him at precisely one and the same instant: each, gnashing the 
same teeth in the same head, with the same twitched nostril above them, and the same 
suffused expression around it.  Two old men.  Differing in nothing, equally distinct to 
the sight, the copy no fainter than the original, the second as real as the first.

�eAt what time,�f said the Two old men, �edid you arrive at the door below?�f

�eAt Six.�f

�eAnd there were Six old men upon the stairs!�f

Mr. Goodchild having wiped the perspiration from his brow, or tried to do it, the Two 
old men proceeded in one voice, and in the singular number:

�eI had been anatomised, but had not yet had my skeleton put together and re-hung on an 
iron hook, when it began to be whispered that the Bride�fs Chamber was haunted.  It 
was haunted, and I was there.

�eWe were there.  She and I were there.  I, in the chair upon the hearth; she, a white 
wreck again, trailing itself towards me on the floor.  But, I was the speaker no more, 
and the one word that she said to me from midnight until dawn was, �eLive!�f

�eThe youth was there, likewise.  In the tree outside the window.  Coming and going 
in the moonlight, as the tree bent and gave.  He has, ever since, been there, peeping in 
at me in my torment; revealing to me by snatches, in the pale lights and slatey shadows 
where he comes and goes, bare-headed?a bill-hook, standing edgewise in his hair.

�eIn the Bride�fs Chamber, every night from midnight until dawn?one month in the year 
excepted, as I am going to tell you?he hides in the tree, and she comes towards me on 
the floor; always approaching; never coming nearer; always visible as if by moon-light, 
whether the moon shines or no; always saying, from mid-night until dawn, her one word, 
�gLive!�h

�eBut, in the month wherein I was forced out of this life?this present month of thirty 
days?the Bride�fs Chamber is empty and quiet.  Not so my old dungeon.  Not so the 
rooms where I was restless and afraid, ten years.  Both are fitfully haunted then.  At 
One in the morning.  I am what you saw me when the clock struck that hour?One old 
man.  At Two in the morning, I am Two old men.  At Three, I am Three.  By 
Twelve at noon, I am Twelve old men, One for every hundred per cent. of old gain.  
Every one of the Twelve, with Twelve times my old power of suffering and agony.  
From that hour until Twelve at night, I, Twelve old men in anguish and fearful 
foreboding, wait for the coming of the executioner.  At Twelve at night, I, Twelve old 
men turned off, swing invisible outside Lancaster Castle, with Twelve faces to the wall!

�eWhen the Bride�fs Chamber was first haunted, it was known to me that this punishment 
would never cease, until I could make its nature, and my story, known to two living men 
together.  I waited for the coming of two living men together into the Bride�fs Chamber, 
years upon years.  It was infused into my knowledge (of the means I am ignorant) that 
if two living men, with their eyes open, could be in the Bride�fs Chamber at One in the 
morning, they would see me sitting in my chair.

�eAt length, the whispers that the room was spiritually troubled, brought two men to try 
the adventure.  I was scarcely struck upon the hearth at midnight (I come there as if the 
Lightning blasted me into being), when I heard them ascending the stairs.  Next, I saw 
them enter.  One of them was a bold, gay, active man, in the prime of life, some five 
and forty years of age; the other, a dozen years younger.  They brought provisions with 
them in a basket, and bottles.  A young woman accompanied them, with wood and 
coals for the lighting of the fire.  When she had lighted it, the bold, gay, active man 
accompanied her along the gallery outside the room, to see her safely down the staircase, 
and came back laughing.

�eHe locked the door, examined the chamber, put out the contents of the basket on the 
table before the fire?little recking of me, in my appointed station on the hearth, close 
to him?and filled the glasses, and ate and drank.  His companion did the same, and 
was as cheerful and confident as he: though he was the leader.  When they had supped, 
they laid pistols on the table, turned to the fire, and began to smoke their pipes of 
foreign make.

�eThey had travelled together, and had been much together, and had an abundance of 
subjects in common.  In the midst of their talking and laughing, the younger man made 
a reference to the leader�fs being always ready for any adventure; that one, or any other.  
He replied in these words:

�e�gNot quite so, Dick; if I am afraid of nothing else, I am afraid of myself.�h

�eHis companion seeming to grow a little dull, asked him, in what sense?  How?

�e�gWhy, thus,�h he returned.  �gHere is a Ghost to be disproved.  Well!  I cannot 
answer for what my fancy might do if I were alone here, or what tricks my senses might 
play with me if they had me to themselves.  But, in company with another man, and 
especially with Dick, I would consent to outface all the Ghosts that were ever of in the 
universe.�h

�e�gI had not the vanity to suppose that I was of so much importance to-night,�h said the 
other.

�e�gOf so much,�h rejoined the leader, more seriously than he had spoken yet, �gthat I 
would, for the reason I have given, on no account have undertaken to pass the night here 
alone.�h

�eIt was within a few minutes of One.  The head of the younger man had drooped when 
he made his last remark, and it drooped lower now.

�e�gKeep awake, Dick!�h said the leader, gaily.  �gThe small hours are the worst.�h

�eHe tried, but his head drooped again.

�e�gDick!�h urged the leader.  �gKeep awake!�h

�e�gI can�ft,�h he indistinctly muttered.  �gI don�ft know what strange influence is stealing 
over me.  I can�ft.�h

�eHis companion looked at him with a sudden horror, and I, in my different way, felt a 
new horror also; for, it was on the stroke of One, and I felt that the second watcher was 
yielding to me, and that the curse was upon me that I must send him to sleep.

�e�gGet up and walk, Dick!�h cried the leader.  �gTry!�h

�eIt was in vain to go behind the slumber�fs chair and shake him.  One o�fclock sounded, 
and I was present to the elder man, and he stood transfixed before me.

�eTo him alone, I was obliged to relate my story, without hope of benefit.  To him 
alone, I was an awful phantom making a quite useless confession.  I foresee it will ever 
be the same.  The two living men together will never come to release me.  When I 
appear, the senses of one of the two will be locked in sleep; he will neither see nor hear 
me; my communication will ever be made to a solitary listener, and will ever be 
unserviceable.  Woe!  Woe!  Woe!�f

As the Two old men, with these words, wrung their hands, it shot into Mr. Goodchild�fs 
mind that he was in the terrible situation of being virtually alone with the spectre, and 
that Mr. Idle�fs immoveability was explained by his having been charmed asleep at One 
o�fclock.  In the terror of this sudden discovery which produced an indescribable dread, 
he struggled so hard to get free from the four fiery threads, that he snapped them, after 
he had pulled them out to a great width.  Being then out of bonds, he caught up Mr. 
Idle from the sofa and rushed down-stairs with him.



�eWhat are you about, Francis?�f demanded Mr. Idle.  �eMy bedroom is not down here.  
What the deuce are you carrying me at all for?  I can walk with a stick now.  I don�ft 
want to be carried.  Put me down.�f

Mr. Goodchild put him down in the old hall, and looked about him wildly.

�eWhat are you doing?  Idiotically plunging at your own sex, and rescuing them or 
perishing in the attempt?�f asked Mr. Idle, in a highly petulant state.

�eThe One old man!�f cried Mr. Goodchild, distractedly,?�eand the Two old men!�f

Mr. Idle deigned no other reply than �eThe One old woman, I think you mean,�f as he 
began hobbling his way back up the staircase, with the assistance of its broad 
balustrade.

�eI assure you, Tom,�f began Mr. Goodchild, attending at his side, �ethat since you fell 
asleep?�f

�eCome, I like that!�f said Thomas Idle, �eI haven�ft closed an eye!�f

With the peculiar sensitiveness on the subject of the disgraceful action of going to sleep 
out of bed, which is the lot of all mankind, Mr. Idle persisted in this declaration.  The 
same peculiar sensitiveness impelled Mr. Goodchild, on being taxed with the same 
crime, to repudiate it with honourable resentment.  The settlement of the question of 
The One old man and The Two old men was thus presently complicated, and soon made 
quite impracticable.  Mr. Idle said it was all Bride-cake, and fragments, newly 
arranged, of things seen and thought about in the day.  Mr. Goodchild said how could 
that be, when he hadn�ft been asleep, and what right could Mr. Idle have to say so, who 
had been asleep?  Mr. Idle said he had never been asleep, and never did go to sleep, 
and that Mr. Goodchild, as a general rule, was always asleep.  They consequently 
parted for the rest of the night, at their bedroom doors, a little ruffled.  Mr. 
Goodchild�fs last words were, that he had had, in that real and tangible old sitting-room 
of that real and tangible old Inn (he supposed Mr. Idle denied its existence?), every 
sensation and experience, the present record of which is now within a line or two of 
completion; and that he would write it out and print it every word.  Mr. Idle returned 
that he might if he liked?and he did like, and has now done it.




CHAPTER V



Two of the many passengers by a certain late Sunday evening train, Mr. Thomas Idle 
and Mr. Francis Goodchild, yielded up their tickets at a little rotten platform (converted 
into artificial touchwood by smoke and ashes), deep in the manufacturing bosom of 
Yorkshire.  A mysterious bosom it appeared, upon a damp, dark, Sunday night, dashed 
through in the train to the music of the whirling wheels, the panting of the engine, and 
the part-singing of hundreds of third-class excursionists, whose vocal efforts �ebobbed 
arayound�f from sacred to profane, from hymns, to our transatlantic sisters the Yankee 
Gal and Mairy Anne, in a remarkable way.  There seemed to have been some large 
vocal gathering near to every lonely station on the line.  No town was visible, no 
village was visible, no light was visible; but, a multitude got out singing, and a 
multitude got in singing, and the second multitude took up the hymns, and adopted our 
transatlantic sisters, and sang of their own egregious wickedness, and of their bobbing 
arayound, and of how the ship it was ready and the wind it was fair, and they were 
bayound for the sea, Mairy Anne, until they in their turn became a getting-out multitude, 
and were replaced by another getting-in multitude, who did the same.  And at every 
station, the getting-in multitude, with an artistic reference to the completeness of their 
chorus, incessantly cried, as with one voice while scuffling into the carriages, �eWe mun 
aa�f gang toogither!�f

The singing and the multitudes had trailed off as the lonely places were left and the 
great towns were neared, and the way had lain as silently as a train�fs way ever can, over 
the vague black streets of the great gulfs of towns, and among their branchless woods of 
vague black chimneys.  These towns looked, in the cinderous wet, as though they had 
one and all been on fire and were just put out?a dreary and quenched panorama, many 
miles long.

Thus, Thomas and Francis got to Leeds; of which enterprising and important 
commercial centre it may be observed with delicacy, that you must either like it very 
much or not at all.  Next day, the first of the Race-Week, they took train to Doncaster.

And instantly the character, both of travellers and of luggage, entirely changed, and no 
other business than race-business any longer existed on the face of the earth.  The talk 
was all of horses and �eJohn Scott.�f  Guards whispered behind their hands to 
station-masters, of horses and John Scott.  Men in cut-away coats and speckled cravats 
fastened with peculiar pins, and with the large bones of their legs developed under tight 
trousers, so that they should look as much as possible like horses�f legs, paced up and 
down by twos at junction-stations, speaking low and moodily of horses and John Scott.  
The young clergyman in the black strait-waistcoat, who occupied the middle seat of the 
carriage, expounded in his peculiar pulpit-accent to the young and lovely Reverend Mrs. 
Crinoline, who occupied the opposite middle-seat, a few passages of rumour relative to 
�eOartheth, my love, and Mithter John Eth-COTT.�f  A bandy vagabond, with a head 
like a Dutch cheese, in a fustian stable-suit, attending on a horse-box and going about 
the platforms with a halter hanging round his neck like a Calais burgher of the ancient 
period much degenerated, was courted by the best society, by reason of what he had to 
hint, when not engaged in eating straw, concerning �et�fharses and Joon Scott.�f  The 
engine-driver himself, as he applied one eye to his large stationary double-eye-glass on 
the engine, seemed to keep the other open, sideways, upon horses and John Scott.

Breaks and barriers at Doncaster Station to keep the crowd off; temporary wooden 
avenues of ingress and egress, to help the crowd on.  Forty extra porters sent down for 
this present blessed Race-Week, and all of them making up their betting-books in the 
lamp-room or somewhere else, and none of them to come and touch the luggage.  
Travellers disgorged into an open space, a howling wilderness of idle men.  All work 
but race-work at a stand-still; all men at a stand-still.  �eEy my word!  Deant ask noon 
o�f us to help wi�f t�fluggage.  Bock your opinion loike a mon.  Coom!  Dang it, coom, 
t�fharses and Joon Scott!�f  In the midst of the idle men, all the fly horses and omnibus 
horses of Doncaster and parts adjacent, rampant, rearing, backing, plunging, 
shying?apparently the result of their hearing of nothing but their own order and John 
Scott.

Grand Dramatic Company from London for the Race-Week.  Poses Plastiques in the 
Grand Assembly Room up the Stable-Yard at seven and nine each evening, for the 
Race-Week.  Grand Alliance Circus in the field beyond the bridge, for the Race-Week.  
Grand Exhibition of Aztec Lilliputians, important to all who want to be horrified cheap, 
for the Race-Week.  Lodgings, grand and not grand, but all at grand prices, ranging 
from ten pounds to twenty, for the Grand Race-Week!

Rendered giddy enough by these things, Messieurs Idle and Goodchild repaired to the 
quarters they had secured beforehand, and Mr. Goodchild looked down from the 
window into the surging street.

�eBy Heaven, Tom!�f cried he, after contemplating it, �eI am in the Lunatic Asylum again, 
and these are all mad people under the charge of a body of designing keepers!�f

All through the Race-Week, Mr. Goodchild never divested himself of this idea.  Every 
day he looked out of window, with something of the dread of Lemuel Gulliver looking 
down at men after he returned home from the horse-country; and every day he saw the 
Lunatics, horse-mad, betting-mad, drunken-mad, vice-mad, and the designing Keepers 
always after them.  The idea pervaded, like the second colour in shot-silk, the whole of 
Mr. Goodchild�fs impressions.  They were much as follows:

Monday, mid-day.  Races not to begin until to-morrow, but all the mob-Lunatics out, 
crowding the pavements of the one main street of pretty and pleasant Doncaster, 
crowding the road, particularly crowding the outside of the Betting Rooms, whooping 
and shouting loudly after all passing vehicles.  Frightened lunatic horses occasionally 
running away, with infinite clatter.  All degrees of men, from peers to paupers, betting 
incessantly.  Keepers very watchful, and taking all good chances.  An awful family 
likeness among the Keepers, to Mr. Palmer and Mr. Thurtell.  With some knowledge 
of expression and some acquaintance with heads (thus writes Mr. Goodchild), I never 
have seen anywhere, so many repetitions of one class of countenance and one character 
of head (both evil) as in this street at this time.  Cunning, covetousness, secrecy, cold 
calculation, hard callousness and dire insensibility, are the uniform Keeper 
characteristics.  Mr. Palmer passes me five times in five minutes, and, so I go down the 
street, the back of Mr. Thurtell�fs skull is always going on before me.

Monday evening.  Town lighted up; more Lunatics out than ever; a complete choke 
and stoppage of the thoroughfare outside the Betting Rooms.  Keepers, having dined, 
pervade the Betting Rooms, and sharply snap at the moneyed Lunatics.  Some Keepers 
flushed with drink, and some not, but all close and calculating.  A vague echoing roar 
of �et�fharses�f and �et�fraces�f always rising in the air, until midnight, at about which period 
it dies away in occasional drunken songs and straggling yells.  But, all night, some 
unmannerly drinking-house in the neighbourhood opens its mouth at intervals and spits 
out a man too drunk to be retained: who thereupon makes what uproarious protest may 
be left in him, and either falls asleep where he tumbles, or is carried off in custody.

Tuesday morning, at daybreak.  A sudden rising, as it were out of the earth, of all the 
obscene creatures, who sell �ecorrect cards of the races.�f  They may have been coiled in 
corners, or sleeping on door-steps, and, having all passed the night under the same set of 
circumstances, may all want to circulate their blood at the same time; but, however that 
may be, they spring into existence all at once and together, as though a new Cadmus 
had sown a race-horse�fs teeth.  There is nobody up, to buy the cards; but, the cards are 
madly cried.  There is no patronage to quarrel for; but, they madly quarrel and fight.  
Conspicuous among these hyaenas, as breakfast-time discloses, is a fearful creature in 
the general semblance of a man: shaken off his next-to-no legs by drink and devilry, 
bare-headed and bare-footed, with a great shock of hair like a horrible broom, and 
nothing on him but a ragged pair of trousers and a pink glazed-calico coat?made on 
him?so very tight that it is as evident that he could never take it off, as that he never 
does.  This hideous apparition, inconceivably drunk, has a terrible power of making a 
gong-like imitation of the braying of an ass: which feat requires that he should lay his 
right jaw in his begrimed right paw, double himself up, and shake his bray out of 
himself, with much staggering on his next-to-no legs, and much twirling of his horrible 
broom, as if it were a mop.  From the present minute, when he comes in sight holding 
up his cards to the windows, and hoarsely proposing purchase to My Lord, Your 
Excellency, Colonel, the Noble Captain, and Your Honourable Worship?from the 
present minute until the Grand Race-Week is finished, at all hours of the morning, 
evening, day, and night, shall the town reverberate, at capricious intervals, to the brays 
of this frightful animal the Gong-donkey.

No very great racing to-day, so no very great amount of vehicles: though there is a good 
sprinkling, too: from farmers�f carts and gigs, to carriages with post-horses and to 
fours-in-hand, mostly coming by the road from York, and passing on straight through 
the main street to the Course.  A walk in the wrong direction may be a better thing for 
Mr. Goodchild to-day than the Course, so he walks in the wrong direction.  Everybody 
gone to the races.  Only children in the street.  Grand Alliance Circus deserted; not 
one Star-Rider left; omnibus which forms the Pay-Place, having on separate panels Pay 
here for the Boxes, Pay here for the Pit, Pay here for the Gallery, hove down in a corner 
and locked up; nobody near the tent but the man on his knees on the grass, who is 
making the paper balloons for the Star young gentlemen to jump through to-night.  A 
pleasant road, pleasantly wooded.  No labourers working in the fields; all gone 
�et�fraces.�f  The few late wenders of their way �et�fraces,�f who are yet left driving on the 
road, stare in amazement at the recluse who is not going �et�fraces.�f  Roadside innkeeper 
has gone �et�fraces.�f  Turnpike-man has gone �et�fraces.�f  His thrifty wife, washing 
clothes at the toll-house door, is going �et�fraces�f to-morrow.  Perhaps there may be no 
one left to take the toll to-morrow; who knows?  Though assuredly that would be 
neither turnpike-like nor Yorkshire-like.  The very wind and dust seem to be hurrying 
�et�fraces,�f as they briskly pass the only wayfarer on the road.  In the distance, the 
Railway Engine, waiting at the town-end, shrieks despairingly.  Nothing but the 
difficulty of getting off the Line, restrains that Engine from going �et�fraces,�f too, it is 
very clear.

At night, more Lunatics out than last night?and more Keepers.  The latter very active 
at the Betting Rooms, the street in front of which is now impassable.  Mr. Palmer as 
before.  Mr. Thurtell as before.  Roar and uproar as before.  Gradual subsidence as 
before.  Unmannerly drinking-house expectorates as before.  Drunken 
negro-melodists, Gong-donkey, and correct cards, in the night.

On Wednesday morning, the morning of the great St. Leger, it becomes apparent that 
there has been a great influx since yesterday, both of Lunatics and Keepers.  The 
families of the tradesmen over the way are no longer within human ken; their places 
know them no more; ten, fifteen, and twenty guinea-lodgers fill them.  At the 
pastry-cook�fs second-floor window, a Keeper is brushing Mr. Thurtell�fs hair?thinking 
it his own.  In the wax-chandler�fs attic, another Keeper is putting on Mr. Palmer�fs 
braces.  In the gunsmith�fs nursery, a Lunatic is shaving himself.  In the serious 
stationer�fs best sitting-room, three Lunatics are taking a combination-breakfast, praising 
the (cook�fs) devil, and drinking neat brandy in an atmosphere of last midnight�fs cigars.  
No family sanctuary is free from our Angelic messengers?we put up at the 
Angel?who in the guise of extra waiters for the grand Race-Week, rattle in and out of 
the most secret chambers of everybody�fs house, with dishes and tin covers, decanters, 
soda-water bottles, and glasses.  An hour later.  Down the street and up the street, as 
far as eyes can see and a good deal farther, there is a dense crowd; outside the Betting 
Rooms it is like a great struggle at a theatre door?in the days of theatres; or at the 
vestibule of the Spurgeon temple?in the days of Spurgeon.  An hour later.  Fusing 
into this crowd, and somehow getting through it, are all kinds of conveyances, and all 
kinds of foot-passengers; carts, with brick-makers and brick-makeresses jolting up and 
down on planks; drags, with the needful grooms behind, sitting cross-armed in the 
needful manner, and slanting themselves backward from the soles of their boots at the 
needful angle; postboys, in the shining hats and smart jackets of the olden time, when 
stokers were not; beautiful Yorkshire horses, gallantly driven by their own breeders and 
masters.  Under every pole, and every shaft, and every horse, and every wheel as it 
would seem, the Gong-donkey?metallically braying, when not struggling for life, or 
whipped out of the way.

By one o�fclock, all this stir has gone out of the streets, and there is no one left in them 
but Francis Goodchild.  Francis Goodchild will not be left in them long; for, he too is 
on his way, �et�fraces.�f

A most beautiful sight, Francis Goodchild finds �et�fraces�f to be, when he has left fair 
Doncaster behind him, and comes out on the free course, with its agreeable prospect, its 
quaint Red House oddly changing and turning as Francis turns, its green grass, and fresh 
heath.  A free course and an easy one, where Francis can roll smoothly where he will, 
and can choose between the start, or the coming-in, or the turn behind the brow of the 
hill, or any out-of-the-way point where he lists to see the throbbing horses straining 
every nerve, and making the sympathetic earth throb as they come by.  Francis much 
delights to be, not in the Grand Stand, but where he can see it, rising against the sky 
with its vast tiers of little white dots of faces, and its last high rows and corners of 
people, looking like pins stuck into an enormous pincushion?not quite so 
symmetrically as his orderly eye could wish, when people change or go away.  When 
the race is nearly run out, it is as good as the race to him to see the flutter among the 
pins, and the change in them from dark to light, as hats are taken off and waved.  Not 
less full of interest, the loud anticipation of the winner�fs name, the swelling, and the 
final, roar; then, the quick dropping of all the pins out of their places, the revelation of 
the shape of the bare pincushion, and the closing-in of the whole host of Lunatics and 
Keepers, in the rear of the three horses with bright-coloured riders, who have not yet 
quite subdued their gallop though the contest is over.

Mr. Goodchild would appear to have been by no means free from lunacy himself at 
�et�fraces,�f though not of the prevalent kind.  He is suspected by Mr. Idle to have fallen 
into a dreadful state concerning a pair of little lilac gloves and a little bonnet that he saw 
there.  Mr. Idle asserts, that he did afterwards repeat at the Angel, with an appearance 
of being lunatically seized, some rhapsody to the following effect: �eO little lilac gloves!  
And O winning little bonnet, making in conjunction with her golden hair quite a Glory 
in the sunlight round the pretty head, why anything in the world but you and me!  Why 
may not this day�fs running-of horses, to all the rest: of precious sands of life to me?be 
prolonged through an everlasting autumn-sunshine, without a sunset!  Slave of the 
Lamp, or Ring, strike me yonder gallant equestrian Clerk of the Course, in the scarlet 
coat, motionless on the green grass for ages!  Friendly Devil on Two Sticks, for ten 
times ten thousands years, keep Blink-Bonny jibbing at the post, and let us have no 
start!  Arab drums, powerful of old to summon Genii in the desert, sound of yourselves 
and raise a troop for me in the desert of my heart, which shall so enchant this dusty 
barouche (with a conspicuous excise-plate, resembling the Collector�fs door-plate at a 
turnpike), that I, within it, loving the little lilac gloves, the winning little bonnet, and the 
dear unknown-wearer with the golden hair, may wait by her side for ever, to see a Great 
St. Leger that shall never be run!�f

Thursday morning.  After a tremendous night of crowding, shouting, drinking-house 
expectoration, Gong-donkey, and correct cards.  Symptoms of yesterday�fs gains in the 
way of drink, and of yesterday�fs losses in the way of money, abundant.  Money-losses 
very great.  As usual, nobody seems to have won; but, large losses and many losers are 
unquestionable facts.  Both Lunatics and Keepers, in general very low.  Several of 
both kinds look in at the chemist�fs while Mr. Goodchild is making a purchase there, to 
be �epicked up.�f  One red-eyed Lunatic, flushed, faded, and disordered, enters 
hurriedly and cries savagely, �eHond us a gloss of sal volatile in wather, or soom 
dommed thing o�f thot sart!�f  Faces at the Betting Rooms very long, and a tendency to 
bite nails observable.  Keepers likewise given this morning to standing about solitary, 
with their hands in their pockets, looking down at their boots as they fit them into cracks 
of the pavement, and then looking up whistling and walking away.  Grand Alliance 
Circus out, in procession; buxom lady-member of Grand Alliance, in crimson 
riding-habit, fresher to look at, even in her paint under the day sky, than the cheeks of 
Lunatics or Keepers.  Spanish Cavalier appears to have lost yesterday, and jingles his 
bossed bridle with disgust, as if he were paying.  Reaction also apparent at the 
Guildhall opposite, whence certain pickpockets come out handcuffed together, with that 
peculiar walk which is never seen under any other circumstances?a walk expressive of 
going to jail, game, but still of jails being in bad taste and arbitrary, and how would you 
like it if it was you instead of me, as it ought to be!  Mid-day.  Town filled as 
yesterday, but not so full; and emptied as yesterday, but not so empty.  In the evening, 
Angel ordinary where every Lunatic and Keeper has his modest daily meal of turtle, 
venison, and wine, not so crowded as yesterday, and not so noisy.  At night, the theatre.  
More abstracted faces in it than one ever sees at public assemblies; such faces wearing 
an expression which strongly reminds Mr. Goodchild of the boys at school who were 
�egoing up next,�f with their arithmetic or mathematics.  These boys are, no doubt, going 
up to-morrow with their sums and figures.  Mr. Palmer and Mr. Thurtell in the boxes O. 
P.  Mr. Thurtell and Mr. Palmer in the boxes P. S.  The firm of Thurtell, Palmer, and 
Thurtell, in the boxes Centre.  A most odious tendency observable in these 
distinguished gentlemen to put vile constructions on sufficiently innocent phrases in the 
play, and then to applaud them in a Satyr-like manner.  Behind Mr. Goodchild, with a 
party of other Lunatics and one Keeper, the express incarnation of the thing called a 
�egent.�f  A gentleman born; a gent manufactured.  A something with a scarf round its 
neck, and a slipshod speech issuing from behind the scarf; more depraved, more foolish, 
more ignorant, more unable to believe in any noble or good thing of any kind, than the 
stupidest Bosjesman.  The thing is but a boy in years, and is addled with drink.  To do 
its company justice, even its company is ashamed of it, as it drawls its slang criticisms 
on the representation, and inflames Mr. Goodchild with a burning ardour to fling it into 
the pit.  Its remarks are so horrible, that Mr. Goodchild, for the moment, even doubts 
whether that is a wholesome Art, which sets women apart on a high floor before such a 
thing as this, though as good as its own sisters, or its own mother?whom Heaven 
forgive for bringing it into the world!  But, the consideration that a low nature must 
make a low world of its own to live in, whatever the real materials, or it could no more 
exist than any of us could without the sense of touch, brings Mr. Goodchild to reason: 
the rather, because the thing soon drops its downy chin upon its scarf, and slobbers itself 
asleep.

Friday Morning.  Early fights.  Gong-donkey, and correct cards.  Again, a great set 
towards the races, though not so great a set as on Wednesday.  Much packing going on 
too, upstairs at the gun-smith�fs, the wax-chandler�fs, and the serious stationer�fs; for there 
will be a heavy drift of Lunatics and Keepers to London by the afternoon train.  The 
course as pretty as ever; the great pincushion as like a pincushion, but not nearly so full 
of pins; whole rows of pins wanting.  On the great event of the day, both Lunatics and 
Keepers become inspired with rage; and there is a violent scuffling, and a rushing at the 
losing jockey, and an emergence of the said jockey from a swaying and menacing 
crowd, protected by friends, and looking the worse for wear; which is a rough 
proceeding, though animating to see from a pleasant distance.  After the great event, 
rills begin to flow from the pincushion towards the railroad; the rills swell into rivers; 
the rivers soon unite into a lake.  The lake floats Mr. Goodchild into Doncaster, past 
the Itinerant personage in black, by the way-side telling him from the vantage ground of 
a legibly printed placard on a pole that for all these things the Lord will bring him to 
judgment.  No turtle and venison ordinary this evening; that is all over.  No Betting at 
the rooms; nothing there but the plants in pots, which have, all the week, been stood 
about the entry to give it an innocent appearance, and which have sorely sickened by 
this time.

Saturday.  Mr. Idle wishes to know at breakfast, what were those dreadful groanings in 
his bedroom doorway in the night?  Mr. Goodchild answers, Nightmare.  Mr. Idle 
repels the calumny, and calls the waiter.  The Angel is very sorry?had intended to 
explain; but you see, gentlemen, there was a gentleman dined down-stairs with two 
more, and he had lost a deal of money, and he would drink a deal of wine, and in the 
night he �etook the horrors,�f and got up; and as his friends could do nothing with him he 
laid himself down and groaned at Mr. Idle�fs door.  �eAnd he DID groan there,�f Mr. Idle 
says; �eand you will please to imagine me inside, �gtaking the horrors�h too!�f



So far, the picture of Doncaster on the occasion of its great sporting anniversary, offers 
probably a general representation of the social condition of the town, in the past as well 
as in the present time.  The sole local phenomenon of the current year, which may be 
considered as entirely unprecedented in its way, and which certainly claims, on that 
account, some slight share of notice, consists in the actual existence of one remarkable 
individual, who is sojourning in Doncaster, and who, neither directly nor indirectly, has 
anything at all to do, in any capacity whatever, with the racing amusements of the week.  
Ranging throughout the entire crowd that fills the town, and including the inhabitants as 
well as the visitors, nobody is to be found altogether disconnected with the business of 
the day, excepting this one unparalleled man.  He does not bet on the races, like the 
sporting men.  He does not assist the races, like the jockeys, starters, judges, and 
grooms.  He does not look on at the races, like Mr. Goodchild and his 
fellow-spectators.  He does not profit by the races, like the hotel-keepers and the 
tradespeople.  He does not minister to the necessities of the races, like the 
booth-keepers, the postilions, the waiters, and the hawkers of Lists.  He does not assist 
the attractions of the races, like the actors at the theatre, the riders at the circus, or the 
posturers at the Poses Plastiques.  Absolutely and literally, he is the only individual in 
Doncaster who stands by the brink of the full-flowing race-stream, and is not swept 
away by it in common with all the rest of his species.  Who is this modern hermit, this 
recluse of the St. Leger-week, this inscrutably ungregarious being, who lives apart from 
the amusements and activities of his fellow-creatures?  Surely, there is little difficulty 
in guessing that clearest and easiest of all riddles.  Who could he be, but Mr. Thomas 
Idle?

Thomas had suffered himself to be taken to Doncaster, just as he would have suffered 
himself to be taken to any other place in the habitable globe which would guarantee him 
the temporary possession of a comfortable sofa to rest his ankle on.  Once established 
at the hotel, with his leg on one cushion and his back against another, he formally 
declined taking the slightest interest in any circumstance whatever connected with the 
races, or with the people who were assembled to see them.  Francis Goodchild, 
anxious that the hours should pass by his crippled travelling-companion as lightly as 
possible, suggested that his sofa should be moved to the window, and that he should 
amuse himself by looking out at the moving panorama of humanity, which the view 
from it of the principal street presented.  Thomas, however, steadily declined profiting 
by the suggestion.

�eThe farther I am from the window,�f he said, �ethe better, Brother Francis, I shall be 
pleased.  I have nothing in common with the one prevalent idea of all those people 
who are passing in the street.  Why should I care to look at them?�f

�eI hope I have nothing in common with the prevalent idea of a great many of them, 
either,�f answered Goodchild, thinking of the sporting gentlemen whom he had met in 
the course of his wanderings about Doncaster.  �eBut, surely, among all the people who 
are walking by the house, at this very moment, you may find?�f

�eNot one living creature,�f interposed Thomas, �ewho is not, in one way or another, 
interested in horses, and who is not, in a greater or less degree, an admirer of them.  
Now, I hold opinions in reference to these particular members of the quadruped creation, 
which may lay claim (as I believe) to the disastrous distinction of being unpartaken by 
any other human being, civilised or savage, over the whole surface of the earth.  
Taking the horse as an animal in the abstract, Francis, I cordially despise him from 
every point of view.�f

�eThomas,�f said Goodchild, �econfinement to the house has begun to affect your biliary 
secretions.  I shall go to the chemist�fs and get you some physic.�f

�eI object,�f continued Thomas, quietly possessing himself of his friend�fs hat, which 
stood on a table near him,?�eI object, first, to the personal appearance of the horse.  I 
protest against the conventional idea of beauty, as attached to that animal.  I think his 
nose too long, his forehead too low, and his legs (except in the case of the cart-horse) 
ridiculously thin by comparison with the size of his body.  Again, considering how big 
an animal he is, I object to the contemptible delicacy of his constitution.  Is he not the 
sickliest creature in creation?  Does any child catch cold as easily as a horse?  Does 
he not sprain his fetlock, for all his appearance of superior strength, as easily as I 
sprained my ankle!  Furthermore, to take him from another point of view, what a 
helpless wretch he is!  No fine lady requires more constant waiting-on than a horse.  
Other animals can make their own toilette: he must have a groom.  You will tell me 
that this is because we want to make his coat artificially glossy.  Glossy!  Come home 
with me, and see my cat,?my clever cat, who can groom herself!  Look at your own 
dog! see how the intelligent creature curry-combs himself with his own honest teeth!  
Then, again, what a fool the horse is, what a poor, nervous fool!  He will start at a 
piece of white paper in the road as if it was a lion.  His one idea, when he hears a noise 
that he is not accustomed to, is to run away from it.  What do you say to those two 
common instances of the sense and courage of this absurdly overpraised animal?  I 
might multiply them to two hundred, if I chose to exert my mind and waste my breath, 
which I never do.  I prefer coming at once to my last charge against the horse, which is 
the most serious of all, because it affects his moral character.  I accuse him boldly, in 
his capacity of servant to man, of slyness and treachery.  I brand him publicly, no 
matter how mild he may look about the eyes, or how sleek he may be about the coat, as 
a systematic betrayer, whenever he can get the chance, of the confidence reposed in him.  
What do you mean by laughing and shaking your head at me?�f

�eOh, Thomas, Thomas!�f said Goodchild.  �eYou had better give me my hat; you had 
better let me get you that physic.�f

�eI will let you get anything you like, including a composing draught for yourself,�f said 
Thomas, irritably alluding to his fellow-apprentice�fs inexhaustible activity, �eif you will 
only sit quiet for five minutes longer, and hear me out.  I say again the horse is a 
betrayer of the confidence reposed in him; and that opinion, let me add, is drawn from 
my own personal experience, and is not based on any fanciful theory whatever.  You 
shall have two instances, two overwhelming instances.  Let me start the first of these 
by asking, what is the distinguishing quality which the Shetland Pony has arrogated to 
himself, and is still perpetually trumpeting through the world by means of popular 
report and books on Natural History?  I see the answer in your face: it is the quality of 
being Sure-Footed.  He professes to have other virtues, such as hardiness and strength, 
which you may discover on trial; but the one thing which he insists on your believing, 
when you get on his back, is that he may be safely depended on not to tumble down 
with you.  Very good.  Some years ago, I was in Shetland with a party of friends.  
They insisted on taking me with them to the top of a precipice that overhung the sea.  
It was a great distance off, but they all determined to walk to it except me.  I was wiser 
then than I was with you at Carrock, and I determined to be carried to the precipice.  
There was no carriage-road in the island, and nobody offered (in consequence, as I 
suppose, of the imperfectly-civilised state of the country) to bring me a sedan-chair, 
which is naturally what I should have liked best.  A Shetland pony was produced 
instead.  I remembered my Natural History, I recalled popular report, and I got on the 
little beast�fs back, as any other man would have done in my position, placing implicit 
confidence in the sureness of his feet.  And how did he repay that confidence?  
Brother Francis, carry your mind on from morning to noon.  Picture to yourself a 
howling wilderness of grass and bog, bounded by low stony hills.  Pick out one 
particular spot in that imaginary scene, and sketch me in it, with outstretched arms, 
curved back, and heels in the air, plunging headforemost into a black patch of water and 
mud.  Place just behind me the legs, the body, and the head of a sure-footed Shetland 
pony, all stretched flat on the ground, and you will have produced an accurate 
representation of a very lamentable fact.  And the moral device, Francis, of this picture 
will be to testify that when gentlemen put confidence in the legs of Shetland ponies, 
they will find to their cost that they are leaning on nothing but broken reeds.  There is 
my first instance?and what have you got to say to that?�f

�eNothing, but that I want my hat,�f answered Goodchild, starting up and walking 
restlessly about the room.

�eYou shall have it in a minute,�f rejoined Thomas.  �eMy second instance�f?(Goodchild 
groaned, and sat down again)?�eMy second instance is more appropriate to the present 
time and place, for it refers to a race-horse.  Two years ago an excellent friend of mine, 
who was desirous of prevailing on me to take regular exercise, and who was well 
enough acquainted with the weakness of my legs to expect no very active compliance 
with his wishes on their part, offered to make me a present of one of his horses.  
Hearing that the animal in question had started in life on the turf, I declined accepting 
the gift with many thanks; adding, by way of explanation, that I looked on a race-horse 
as a kind of embodied hurricane, upon which no sane man of my character and habits 
could be expected to seat himself.  My friend replied that, however appropriate my 
metaphor might be as applied to race-horses in general, it was singularly unsuitable as 
applied to the particular horse which he proposed to give me.  From a foal upwards 
this remarkable animal had been the idlest and most sluggish of his race.  Whatever 
capacities for speed he might possess he had kept so strictly to himself, that no amount 
of training had ever brought them out.  He had been found hopelessly slow as a racer, 
and hopelessly lazy as a hunter, and was fit for nothing but a quiet, easy life of it with 
an old gentleman or an invalid.  When I heard this account of the horse, I don�ft mind 
confessing that my heart warmed to him.  Visions of Thomas Idle ambling serenely on 
the back of a steed as lazy as himself, presenting to a restless world the soothing and 
composite spectacle of a kind of sluggardly Centaur, too peaceable in his habits to alarm 
anybody, swam attractively before my eyes.  I went to look at the horse in the stable.  
Nice fellow! he was fast asleep with a kitten on his back.  I saw him taken out for an 
airing by the groom.  If he had had trousers on his legs I should not have known them 
from my own, so deliberately were they lifted up, so gently were they put down, so 
slowly did they get over the ground.  From that moment I gratefully accepted my 
friend�fs offer.  I went home; the horse followed me?by a slow train.  Oh, Francis, 
how devoutly I believed in that horse I how carefully I looked after all his little 
comforts!  I had never gone the length of hiring a man-servant to wait on myself; but I 
went to the expense of hiring one to wait upon him.  If I thought a little of myself 
when I bought the softest saddle that could be had for money, I thought also of my 
horse.  When the man at the shop afterwards offered me spurs and a whip, I turned 
from him with horror.  When I sallied out for my first ride, I went purposely unarmed 
with the means of hurrying my steed.  He proceeded at his own pace every step of the 
way; and when he stopped, at last, and blew out both his sides with a heavy sigh, and 
turned his sleepy head and looked behind him, I took him home again, as I might take 
home an artless child who said to me, �gIf you please, sir, I am tired.�h  For a week this 
complete harmony between me and my horse lasted undisturbed.  At the end of that 
time, when he had made quite sure of my friendly confidence in his laziness, when he 
had thoroughly acquainted himself with all the little weaknesses of my seat (and their 
name is Legion), the smouldering treachery and ingratitude of the equine nature blazed 
out in an instant.  Without the slightest provocation from me, with nothing passing him 
at the time but a pony-chaise driven by an old lady, he started in one instant from a state 
of sluggish depression to a state of frantic high spirits.  He kicked, he plunged, he 
shied, he pranced, he capered fearfully.  I sat on him as long as I could, and when I 
could sit no longer, I fell off.  No, Francis! this is not a circumstance to be laughed at, 
but to be wept over.  What would be said of a Man who had requited my kindness in 
that way?  Range over all the rest of the animal creation, and where will you find me 
an instance of treachery so black as this?  The cow that kicks down the milking-pail 
may have some reason for it; she may think herself taxed too heavily to contribute to the 
dilution of human tea and the greasing of human bread.  The tiger who springs out on 
me unawares has the excuse of being hungry at the time, to say nothing of the further 
justification of being a total stranger to me.  The very flea who surprises me in my 
sleep may defend his act of assassination on the ground that I, in my turn, am always 
ready to murder him when I am awake.  I defy the whole body of Natural Historians to 
move me, logically, off the ground that I have taken in regard to the horse.  Receive 
back your hat, Brother Francis, and go to the chemist�fs, if you please; for I have now 
done.  Ask me to take anything you like, except an interest in the Doncaster races.  
Ask me to look at anything you like, except an assemblage of people all animated by 
feelings of a friendly and admiring nature towards the horse.  You are a remarkably 
well-informed man, and you have heard of hermits.  Look upon me as a member of 
that ancient fraternity, and you will sensibly add to the many obligations which Thomas 
Idle is proud to owe to Francis Goodchild.�f

Here, fatigued by the effort of excessive talking, disputatious Thomas waved one hand 
languidly, laid his head back on the sofa-pillow, and calmly closed his eyes.

At a later period, Mr. Goodchild assailed his travelling companion boldly from the 
impregnable fortress of common sense.  But Thomas, though tamed in body by drastic 
discipline, was still as mentally unapproachable as ever on the subject of his favourite 
delusion.



The view from the window after Saturday�fs breakfast is altogether changed.  The 
tradesmen�fs families have all come back again.  The serious stationer�fs young woman 
of all work is shaking a duster out of the window of the combination breakfast-room; a 
child is playing with a doll, where Mr. Thurtell�fs hair was brushed; a sanitary scrubbing 
is in progress on the spot where Mr. Palmer�fs braces were put on.  No signs of the 
Races are in the streets, but the tramps and the tumble-down-carts and trucks laden with 
drinking-forms and tables and remnants of booths, that are making their way out of the 
town as fast as they can.  The Angel, which has been cleared for action all the week, 
already begins restoring every neat and comfortable article of furniture to its own neat 
and comfortable place.  The Angel�fs daughters (pleasanter angels Mr. Idle and Mr. 
Goodchild never saw, nor more quietly expert in their business, nor more superior to the 
common vice of being above it), have a little time to rest, and to air their cheerful faces 
among the flowers in the yard.  It is market-day.  The market looks unusually natural, 
comfortable, and wholesome; the market-people too.  The town seems quite restored, 
when, hark! a metallic bray?The Gong-donkey!

The wretched animal has not cleared off with the rest, but is here, under the window.  
How much more inconceivably drunk now, how much more begrimed of paw, how 
much more tight of calico hide, how much more stained and daubed and dirty and 
dunghilly, from his horrible broom to his tender toes, who shall say!  He cannot even 
shake the bray out of himself now, without laying his cheek so near to the mud of the 
street, that he pitches over after delivering it.  Now, prone in the mud, and now 
backing himself up against shop-windows, the owners of which come out in terror to 
remove him; now, in the drinking-shop, and now in the tobacconist�fs, where he goes to 
buy tobacco, and makes his way into the parlour, and where he gets a cigar, which in 
half-a-minute he forgets to smoke; now dancing, now dozing, now cursing, and now 
complimenting My Lord, the Colonel, the Noble Captain, and Your Honourable 
Worship, the Gong-donkey kicks up his heels, occasionally braying, until suddenly, he 
beholds the dearest friend he has in the world coming down the street.

The dearest friend the Gong-donkey has in the world, is a sort of Jackall, in a dull, 
mangy, black hide, of such small pieces that it looks as if it were made of blacking 
bottles turned inside out and cobbled together.  The dearest friend in the world 
(inconceivably drunk too) advances at the Gong-donkey, with a hand on each thigh, in a 
series of humorous springs and stops, wagging his head as he comes.  The 
Gong-donkey regarding him with attention and with the warmest affection, suddenly 
perceives that he is the greatest enemy he has in the world, and hits him hard in the 
countenance.  The astonished Jackall closes with the Donkey, and they roll over and 
over in the mud, pummelling one another.  A Police Inspector, supernaturally endowed 
with patience, who has long been looking on from the Guildhall-steps, says, to a 
myrmidon, �eLock �fem up!  Bring �fem in!�f

Appropriate finish to the Grand Race-Week.  The Gong-donkey, captive and last trace 
of it, conveyed into limbo, where they cannot do better than keep him until next 
Race-Week.  The Jackall is wanted too, and is much looked for, over the way and up 
and down.  But, having had the good fortune to be undermost at the time of the capture, 
he has vanished into air.

On Saturday afternoon, Mr. Goodchild walks out and looks at the Course.  It is quite 
deserted; heaps of broken crockery and bottles are raised to its memory; and correct 
cards and other fragments of paper are blowing about it, as the regulation little 
paper-books, carried by the French soldiers in their breasts, were seen, soon after the 
battle was fought, blowing idly about the plains of Waterloo.

Where will these present idle leaves be blown by the idle winds, and where will the last 
of them be one day lost and forgotten?  An idle question, and an idle thought.; and 
with it Mr. Idle fitly makes his bow, and Mr. Goodchild his, and thus ends the Lazy 
Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.


THE END.


**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

Hunted Down

Charles Dickens

I.

Most of us see some romances in life. In my capacity as Chief Manager of a Life 
Assurance Office, I think I have within the last thirty years seen more romances than the 
generality of men, however unpromising the opportunity may, at first sight, seem.

As I have retired, and live at my ease, I possess the means that I used to want, of 
considering what I have seen, at leisure. My experiences have a more remarkable aspect, 
so reviewed, than they had when they were in progress. I have come home from the 
Play now, and can recall the scenes of the Drama upon which the curtain has fallen, free 
from the glare, bewilderment, and bustle of the Theatre.

Let me recall one of these Romances of the real world.

There is nothing truer than physiognomy, taken in connection with manner. The art of 
reading that book of which Eternal Wisdom obliges every human creature to present his 
or her own page with the individual character written on it, is a difficult one, perhaps, 
and is little studied. It may require some natural aptitude, and it must require (for 
everything does) some patience and some pains. That these are not usually given to it, 
? that numbers of people accept a few stock commonplace expressions of the face as 
the whole list of characteristics, and neither seek nor know the refinements that are 
truest, ? that You, for instance, give a great deal of time and attention to the reading of 
music, Greek, Latin, French, Italian, Hebrew, if you please, and do not qualify yourself 
to read the face of the master or mistress looking over your shoulder teaching it to you, 
? I assume to be five hundred times more probable than improbable. Perhaps a little 
self-sufficiency may be at the bottom of this; facial expression requires no study from 
you, you think; it comes by nature to you to know enough about it, and you are not to be 
taken in.

I confess, for my part, that I HAVE been taken in, over and over again. I have been 
taken in by acquaintances, and I have been taken in (of course) by friends; far oftener by 
friends than by any other class of persons. How came I to be so deceived? Had I quite 
misread their faces?

No. Believe me, my first impression of those people, founded on face and manner alone, 
was invariably true. My mistake was in suffering them to come nearer to me and 
explain themselves away.



II.

The partition which separated my own office from our general outer office in the City 
was of thick plate-glass. I could see through it what passed in the outer office, without 
hearing a word. I had it put up in place of a wall that had been there for years, ? ever 
since the house was built. It is no matter whether I did or did not make the change in 
order that I might derive my first impression of strangers, who came to us on business, 
from their faces alone, without being influenced by anything they said. Enough to 
mention that I turned my glass partition to that account, and that a Life Assurance 
Office is at all times exposed to be practised upon by the most crafty and cruel of the 
human race.

It was through my glass partition that I first saw the gentleman whose story I am going 
to tell.

He had come in without my observing it, and had put his hat and umbrella on the broad 
counter, and was bending over it to take some papers from one of the clerks. He was 
about forty or so, dark, exceedingly well dressed in black, ? being in mourning, ? and 
the hand he extended with a polite air, had a particularly well-fitting black-kid glove 
upon it. His hair, which was elaborately brushed and oiled, was parted straight up the 
middle; and he presented this parting to the clerk, exactly (to my thinking) as if he had 
said, in so many words: �eYou must take me, if you please, my friend, just as I show 
myself. Come straight up here, follow the gravel path, keep off the grass, I allow no 
trespassing.�f

I conceived a very great aversion to that man the moment I thus saw him.

He had asked for some of our printed forms, and the clerk was giving them to him and 
explaining them. An obliged and agreeable smile was on his face, and his eyes met 
those of the clerk with a sprightly look. (I have known a vast quantity of nonsense 
talked about bad men not looking you in the face. Don�ft trust that conventional idea. 
Dishonesty will stare honesty out of countenance, any day in the week, if there is 
anything to be got by it.)

I saw, in the corner of his eyelash, that he became aware of my looking at him. 
Immediately he turned the parting in his hair toward the glass partition, as if he said to 
me with a sweet smile, �eStraight up here, if you please. Off the grass!�f

In a few moments he had put on his hat and taken up his umbrella, and was gone.

I beckoned the clerk into my room, and asked, �eWho was that?�f

He had the gentleman�fs card in his hand. �eMr. Julius Slinkton, Middle Temple.�f

�eA barrister, Mr. Adams?�f

�eI think not, sir.�f

�eI should have thought him a clergyman, but for his having no Reverend here,�f said I.

�eProbably, from his appearance,�f Mr. Adams replied, �ehe is reading for orders.�f

I should mention that he wore a dainty white cravat, and dainty linen altogether.

�eWhat did he want, Mr. Adams?�f

�eMerely a form of proposal, sir, and form of reference.�f

�eRecommended here? Did he say?�f

�eYes, he said he was recommended here by a friend of yours. He noticed you, but said 
that as he had not the pleasure of your personal acquaintance he would not trouble you.�f

�eDid he know my name?�f

�eO yes, sir! He said, �gThere IS Mr. Sampson, I see!�h�f

�eA well-spoken gentleman, apparently?�f

�eRemarkably so, sir.�f

�eInsinuating manners, apparently?�f

�eVery much so, indeed, sir.�f

�eHah!�f said I. �eI want nothing at present, Mr. Adams.�f

Within a fortnight of that day I went to dine with a friend of mine, a merchant, a man of 
taste, who buys pictures and books, and the first man I saw among the company was Mr. 
Julius Slinkton. There he was, standing before the fire, with good large eyes and an 
open expression of face; but still (I thought) requiring everybody to come at him by the 
prepared way he offered, and by no other.

I noticed him ask my friend to introduce him to Mr. Sampson, and my friend did so. Mr. 
Slinkton was very happy to see me. Not too happy; there was no over-doing of the 
matter; happy in a thoroughly well-bred, perfectly unmeaning way.

�eI thought you had met,�f our host observed.

�eNo,�f said Mr. Slinkton. �eI did look in at Mr. Sampson�fs office, on your 
recommendation; but I really did not feel justified in troubling Mr. Sampson himself, on 
a point in the everyday, routine of an ordinary clerk.�f

I said I should have been glad to show him any attention on our friend�fs introduction.

�eI am sure of that,�f said he, �eand am much obliged. At another time, perhaps, I may be 
less delicate. Only, however, if I have real business; for I know, Mr. Sampson, how 
precious business time is, and what a vast number of impertinent people there are in the 
world.�f

I acknowledged his consideration with a slight bow. �eYou were thinking,�f said I, �eof 
effecting a policy on your life.�f

�eO dear no! I am afraid I am not so prudent as you pay me the compliment of supposing 
me to be, Mr. Sampson. I merely inquired for a friend. But you know what friends are in 
such matters. Nothing may ever come of it. I have the greatest reluctance to trouble men 
of business with inquiries for friends, knowing the probabilities to be a thousand to one 
that the friends will never follow them up. People are so fickle, so selfish, so 
inconsiderate. Don�ft you, in your business, find them so every day, Mr. Sampson?�f

I was going to give a qualified answer; but he turned his smooth, white parting on me 
with its �eStraight up here, if you please!�f and I answered �eYes.�f

�eI hear, Mr. Sampson,�f he resumed presently, for our friend had a new cook, and dinner 
was not so punctual as usual, �ethat your profession has recently suffered a great loss.�f

�eIn money?�f said I.

He laughed at my ready association of loss with money, and replied, �eNo, in talent and 
vigour.�f

Not at once following out his allusion, I considered for a moment. �eHAS it sustained a 
loss of that kind?�f said I. �eI was not aware of it.�f

�eUnderstand me, Mr. Sampson. I don�ft imagine that you have retired. It is not so bad as 
that. But Mr. Meltham ? �f

�eO, to be sure!�f said I. �eYes! Mr. Meltham, the young actuary of the �gInestimable.�h�f

�eJust so,�f he returned in a consoling way.

�eHe is a great loss. He was at once the most profound, the most original, and the most 
energetic man I have ever known connected with Life Assurance.�f

I spoke strongly; for I had a high esteem and admiration for Meltham; and my 
gentleman had indefinitely conveyed to me some suspicion that he wanted to sneer at 
him. He recalled me to my guard by presenting that trim pathway up his head, with its 
internal �eNot on the grass, if you please ? the gravel.�f

�eYou knew him, Mr. Slinkton.�f

�eOnly by reputation. To have known him as an acquaintance or as a friend, is an honour 
I should have sought if he had remained in society, though I might never have had the 
good fortune to attain it, being a man of far inferior mark. He was scarcely above thirty, 
I suppose?�f

�eAbout thirty.�f

�eAh!�f he sighed in his former consoling way. �eWhat creatures we are! To break up, Mr. 
Sampson, and become incapable of business at that time of life! ? Any reason assigned 
for the melancholy fact?�f

(�eHumph!�f thought I, as I looked at him. �eBut I WON�fT go up the track, and I WILL go 
on the grass.�f)

�eWhat reason have you heard assigned, Mr. Slinkton?�f I asked, point-blank.

�eMost likely a false one. You know what Rumour is, Mr. Sampson. I never repeat what 
I hear; it is the only way of paring the nails and shaving the head of Rumour. But when 
YOU ask me what reason I have heard assigned for Mr. Meltham�fs passing away from 
among men, it is another thing. I am not gratifying idle gossip then. I was told, Mr. 
Sampson, that Mr. Meltham had relinquished all his avocations and all his prospects, 
because he was, in fact, broken-hearted. A disappointed attachment I heard, ? though it 
hardly seems probable, in the case of a man so distinguished and so attractive.�f

�eAttractions and distinctions are no armour against death,�f said I.

�eO, she died? Pray pardon me. I did not hear that. That, indeed, makes it very, very sad. 
Poor Mr. Meltham! She died? Ah, dear me! Lamentable, lamentable!�f

I still thought his pity was not quite genuine, and I still suspected an unaccountable 
sneer under all this, until he said, as we were parted, like the other knots of talkers, by 
the announcement of dinner:

�eMr. Sampson, you are surprised to see me so moved on behalf of a man whom I have 
never known. I am not so disinterested as you may suppose. I have suffered, and 
recently too, from death myself. I have lost one of two charming nieces, who were my 
constant companions. She died young ? barely three-and-twenty; and even her 
remaining sister is far from strong. The world is a grave!�f

He said this with deep feeling, and I felt reproached for the coldness of my manner. 
Coldness and distrust had been engendered in me, I knew, by my bad experiences; they 
were not natural to me; and I often thought how much I had lost in life, losing 
trustfulness, and how little I had gained, gaining hard caution. This state of mind being 
habitual to me, I troubled myself more about this conversation than I might have 
troubled myself about a greater matter. I listened to his talk at dinner, and observed how 
readily other men responded to it, and with what a graceful instinct he adapted his 
subjects to the knowledge and habits of those he talked with. As, in talking with me, he 
had easily started the subject I might be supposed to understand best, and to be the most 
interested in, so, in talking with others, he guided himself by the same rule. The 
company was of a varied character; but he was not at fault, that I could discover, with 
any member of it. He knew just as much of each man�fs pursuit as made him agreeable 
to that man in reference to it, and just as little as made it natural in him to seek modestly 
for information when the theme was broached.

As he talked and talked ? but really not too much, for the rest of us seemed to force it 
upon him ? I became quite angry with myself. I took his face to pieces in my mind, 
like a watch, and examined it in detail. I could not say much against any of his features 
separately; I could say even less against them when they were put together. �eThen is it 
not monstrous,�f I asked myself, �ethat because a man happens to part his hair straight up 
the middle of his head, I should permit myself to suspect, and even to detest him?�f

(I may stop to remark that this was no proof of my sense. An observer of men who finds 
himself steadily repelled by some apparently trifling thing in a stranger is right to give it 
great weight. It may be the clue to the whole mystery. A hair or two will show where a 
lion is hidden. A very little key will open a very heavy door.)

I took my part in the conversation with him after a time, and we got on remarkably well. 
In the drawing-room I asked the host how long he had known Mr. Slinkton. He 
answered, not many months; he had met him at the house of a celebrated painter then 
present, who had known him well when he was travelling with his nieces in Italy for 
their health. His plans in life being broken by the death of one of them, he was reading 
with the intention of going back to college as a matter of form, taking his degree, and 
going into orders. I could not but argue with myself that here was the true explanation 
of his interest in poor Meltham, and that I had been almost brutal in my distrust on that 
simple head.




III.

On the very next day but one I was sitting behind my glass partition, as before, when he 
came into the outer office, as before. The moment I saw him again without hearing him, 
I hated him worse than ever.

It was only for a moment that I had this opportunity; for he waved his tight-fitting black 
glove the instant I looked at him, and came straight in.

�eMr. Sampson, good-day! I presume, you see, upon your kind permission to intrude 
upon you. I don�ft keep my word in being justified by business, for my business here ? 
if I may so abuse the word ? is of the slightest nature.�f

I asked, was it anything I could assist him in?

�eI thank you, no. I merely called to inquire outside whether my dilatory friend had been 
so false to himself as to be practical and sensible. But, of course, he has done nothing. I 
gave him your papers with my own hand, and he was hot upon the intention, but of 
course he has done nothing. Apart from the general human disinclination to do anything 
that ought to be done, I dare say there is a specially about assuring one�fs life. You find 
it like will-making. People are so superstitious, and take it for granted they will die soon 
afterwards.�f

�eUp here, if you please; straight up here, Mr. Sampson. Neither to the right nor to the 
left.�f I almost fancied I could hear him breathe the words as he sat smiling at me, with 
that intolerable parting exactly opposite the bridge of my nose.

�eThere is such a feeling sometimes, no doubt,�f I replied; �ebut I don�ft think it obtains to 
any great extent.�f

�eWell,�f said he, with a shrug and a smile, �eI wish some good angel would influence my 
friend in the right direction. I rashly promised his mother and sister in Norfolk to see it 
done, and he promised them that he would do it. But I suppose he never will.�f 


He spoke for a minute or two on indifferent topics, and went away.

I had scarcely unlocked the drawers of my writing-table next morning, when he 
reappeared. I noticed that he came straight to the door in the glass partition, and did not 
pause a single moment outside.

�eCan you spare me two minutes, my dear Mr. Sampson?�f

�eBy all means.�f

�eMuch obliged,�f laying his hat and umbrella on the table; �eI came early, not to interrupt 
you. The fact is, I am taken by surprise in reference to this proposal my friend has 
made.�f

�eHas he made one?�f said I.

�eYe-es,�f he answered, deliberately looking at me; and then a bright idea seemed to 
strike him ? �eor he only tells me he has. Perhaps that may be a new way of evading the 
matter. By Jupiter, I never thought of that!�f

Mr. Adams was opening the morning�fs letters in the outer office. �eWhat is the name, Mr. 
Slinkton?�f I asked.

�eBeckwith.�f

I looked out at the door and requested Mr. Adams, if there were a proposal in that name, 
to bring it in. He had already laid it out of his hand on the counter. It was easily selected 
from the rest, and he gave it me. Alfred Beckwith. Proposal to effect a policy with us 
for two thousand pounds. Dated yesterday.

�eFrom the Middle Temple, I see, Mr. Slinkton.�f

�eYes. He lives on the same staircase with me; his door is opposite. I never thought he 
would make me his reference though.�f

�eIt seems natural enough that he should.�f

�eQuite so, Mr. Sampson; but I never thought of it. Let me see.�f He took the printed 
paper from his pocket. �eHow am I to answer all these questions?�f

�eAccording to the truth, of course,�f said I.

�eO, of course!�f he answered, looking up from the paper with a smile; �eI meant they were 
so many. But you do right to be particular. It stands to reason that you must be 
particular. Will you allow me to use your pen and ink?�f

�eCertainly.�f

�eAnd your desk?�f

�eCertainly.�f

He had been hovering about between his hat and his umbrella for a place to write on. He 
now sat down in my chair, at my blotting-paper and inkstand, with the long walk up his 
head in accurate perspective before me, as I stood with my back to the fire.

Before answering each question he ran over it aloud, and discussed it. How long had he 
known Mr. Alfred Beckwith? That he had to calculate by years upon his fingers. What 
were his habits? No difficulty about them; temperate in the last degree, and took a little 
too much exercise, if anything. All the answers were satisfactory. When he had written 
them all, he looked them over, and finally signed them in a very pretty hand. He 
supposed he had now done with the business. I told him he was not likely to be troubled 
any farther. Should he leave the papers there? If he pleased. Much obliged. 
Good-morning.

I had had one other visitor before him; not at the office, but at my own house. That 
visitor had come to my bedside when it was not yet daylight, and had been seen by no 
one else but by my faithful confidential servant.

A second reference paper (for we required always two) was sent down into Norfolk, and 
was duly received back by post. This, likewise, was satisfactorily answered in every 
respect. Our forms were all complied with; we accepted the proposal, and the premium 
for one year was paid.



IV.

For six or seven months I saw no more of Mr. Slinkton. He called once at my house, but 
I was not at home; and he once asked me to dine with him in the Temple, but I was 
engaged. His friend�fs assurance was effected in March. Late in September or early in 
October I was down at Scarborough for a breath of sea-air, where I met him on the 
beach. It was a hot evening; he came toward me with his hat in his hand; and there was 
the walk I had felt so strongly disinclined to take in perfect order again, exactly in front 
of the bridge of my nose.

He was not alone, but had a young lady on his arm.

She was dressed in mourning, and I looked at her with great interest. She had the 
appearance of being extremely delicate, and her face was remarkably pale and 
melancholy; but she was very pretty. He introduced her as his niece, Miss Niner.

�eAre you strolling, Mr. Sampson? Is it possible you can be idle?�f

It WAS possible, and I WAS strolling.

�eShall we stroll together?�f

�eWith pleasure.�f

The young lady walked between us, and we walked on the cool sea sand, in the 
direction of Filey.

�eThere have been wheels here,�f said Mr. Slinkton. �eAnd now I look again, the wheels of 
a hand-carriage! Margaret, my love, your shadow without doubt!�f

�eMiss Niner�fs shadow?�f I repeated, looking down at it on the sand.

�eNot that one,�f Mr. Slinkton returned, laughing. �eMargaret, my dear, tell Mr. Sampson.�f

�eIndeed,�f said the young lady, turning to me, �ethere is nothing to tell ? except that I 
constantly see the same invalid old gentleman at all times, wherever I go. I have 
mentioned it to my uncle, and he calls the gentleman my shadow.�f

�eDoes he live in Scarborough?�f I asked.

�eHe is staying here.�f

�eDo you live in Scarborough?�f

�eNo, I am staying here. My uncle has placed me with a family here, for my health.�f

�eAnd your shadow?�f said I, smiling.

�eMy shadow,�f she answered, smiling too, �eis ? like myself ? not very robust, I fear; 
for I lose my shadow sometimes, as my shadow loses me at other times. We both seem 
liable to confinement to the house. I have not seen my shadow for days and days; but it 
does oddly happen, occasionally, that wherever I go, for many days together, this 
gentleman goes. We have come together in the most unfrequented nooks on this shore.�f

�eIs this he?�f said I, pointing before us.

The wheels had swept down to the water�fs edge, and described a great loop on the sand 
in turning. Bringing the loop back towards us, and spinning it out as it came, was a 
hand-carriage, drawn by a man.

�eYes,�f said Miss Niner, �ethis really is my shadow, uncle.�f

As the carriage approached us and we approached the carriage, I saw within it an old 
man, whose head was sunk on his breast, and who was enveloped in a variety of 
wrappers. He was drawn by a very quiet but very keen-looking man, with iron-gray hair, 
who was slightly lame. They had passed us, when the carriage stopped, and the old 
gentleman within, putting out his arm, called to me by my name. I went back, and was 
absent from Mr. Slinkton and his niece for about five minutes.

When I rejoined them, Mr. Slinkton was the first to speak. Indeed, he said to me in a 
raised voice before I came up with him:

�eIt is well you have not been longer, or my niece might have died of curiosity to know 
who her shadow is, Mr. Sampson.�f

�eAn old East India Director,�f said I. �eAn intimate friend of our friend�fs, at whose house 
I first had the pleasure of meeting you. A certain Major Banks. You have heard of him?�f

�eNever.�f

�eVery rich, Miss Niner; but very old, and very crippled. An amiable man, sensible ? 
much interested in you. He has just been expatiating on the affection that he has 
observed to exist between you and your uncle.�f

Mr. Slinkton was holding his hat again, and he passed his hand up the straight walk, as 
if he himself went up it serenely, after me.

�eMr. Sampson,�f he said, tenderly pressing his niece�fs arm in his, �eour affection was 
always a strong one, for we have had but few near ties. We have still fewer now. We 
have associations to bring us together, that are not of this world, Margaret.�f

�eDear uncle!�f murmured the young lady, and turned her face aside to hide her tears.

�eMy niece and I have such remembrances and regrets in common, Mr. Sampson,�f he 
feelingly pursued, �ethat it would be strange indeed if the relations between us were cold 
or indifferent. If I remember a conversation we once had together, you will understand 
the reference I make. Cheer up, dear Margaret. Don�ft droop, don�ft droop. My Margaret! 
I cannot bear to see you droop!�f

The poor young lady was very much affected, but controlled herself. His feelings, too, 
were very acute. In a word, he found himself under such great need of a restorative, that 
he presently went away, to take a bath of sea-water, leaving the young lady and me 
sitting by a point of rock, and probably presuming ? but that you will say was a 
pardonable indulgence in a luxury ? that she would praise him with all her heart.

She did, poor thing! With all her confiding heart, she praised him to me, for his care of 
her dead sister, and for his untiring devotion in her last illness. The sister had wasted 
away very slowly, and wild and terrible fantasies had come over her toward the end, but 
he had never been impatient with her, or at a loss; had always been gentle, watchful, and 
self-possessed. The sister had known him, as she had known him, to be the best of men, 
the kindest of men, and yet a man of such admirable strength of character, as to be a 
very tower for the support of their weak natures while their poor lives endured.

�eI shall leave him, Mr. Sampson, very soon,�f said the young lady; �eI know my life is 
drawing to an end; and when I am gone, I hope he will marry and be happy. I am sure 
he has lived single so long, only for my sake, and for my poor, poor sister�fs.�f

The little hand-carriage had made another great loop on the damp sand, and was coming 
back again, gradually spinning out a slim figure of eight, half a mile long.

�eYoung lady,�f said I, looking around, laying my hand upon her arm, and speaking in a 
low voice, �etime presses. You hear the gentle murmur of that sea?�f

She looked at me with the utmost wonder and alarm, saying, �eYes!�f

�eAnd you know what a voice is in it when the storm comes?�f

�eYes!�f

�eYou see how quiet and peaceful it lies before us, and you know what an awful sight of 
power without pity it might be, this very night!�f

�eYes!�f

�eBut if you had never heard or seen it, or heard of it in its cruelty, could you believe that 
it beats every inanimate thing in its way to pieces, without mercy, and destroys life 
without remorse?�f

�eYou terrify me, sir, by these questions!�f

�eTo save you, young lady, to save you! For God�fs sake, collect your strength and 
collect your firmness! If you were here alone, and hemmed in by the rising tide on the 
flow to fifty feet above your head, you could not be in greater danger than the danger 
you are now to be saved from.�f

The figure on the sand was spun out, and straggled off into a crooked little jerk that 
ended at the cliff very near us.

�eAs I am, before Heaven and the Judge of all mankind, your friend, and your dead 
sister�fs friend, I solemnly entreat you, Miss Niner, without one moment�fs loss of time, 
to come to this gentleman with me!�f

If the little carriage had been less near to us, I doubt if I could have got her away; but it 
was so near that we were there before she had recovered the hurry of being urged from 
the rock. I did not remain there with her two minutes. Certainly within five, I had the 
inexpressible satisfaction of seeing her ? from the point we had sat on, and to which I 
had returned ? half supported and half carried up some rude steps notched in the cliff, 
by the figure of an active man. With that figure beside her, I knew she was safe 
anywhere.

I sat alone on the rock, awaiting Mr. Slinkton�fs return. The twilight was deepening and 
the shadows were heavy, when he came round the point, with his hat hanging at his 
button-hole, smoothing his wet hair with one of his hands, and picking out the old path 
with the other and a pocket-comb.

�eMy niece not here, Mr. Sampson?�f he said, looking about.

�eMiss Niner seemed to feel a chill in the air after the sun was down, and has gone 
home.�f

He looked surprised, as though she were not accustomed to do anything without him; 
even to originate so slight a proceeding.

�eI persuaded Miss Niner,�f I explained.

�eAh!�f said he. �eShe is easily persuaded ? for her good. Thank you, Mr. Sampson; she 
is better within doors. The bathing-place was farther than I thought, to say the truth.�f

�eMiss Niner is very delicate,�f I observed.

He shook his head and drew a deep sigh. �eVery, very, very. You may recollect my 
saying so. The time that has since intervened has not strengthened her. The gloomy 
shadow that fell upon her sister so early in life seems, in my anxious eyes, to gather 
over her, ever darker, ever darker. Dear Margaret, dear Margaret! But we must hope.�f

The hand-carriage was spinning away before us at a most indecorous pace for an invalid 
vehicle, and was making most irregular curves upon the sand. Mr. Slinkton, noticing it 
after he had put his handkerchief to his eyes, said;

�eIf I may judge from appearances, your friend will be upset, Mr. Sampson.�f

�eIt looks probable, certainly,�f said I.

�eThe servant must be drunk.�f

�eThe servants of old gentlemen will get drunk sometimes,�f said I.

�eThe major draws very light, Mr. Sampson.�f

�eThe major does draw light,�f said I.

By this time the carriage, much to my relief, was lost in the darkness. We walked on for 
a little, side by side over the sand, in silence. After a short while he said, in a voice still 
affected by the emotion that his niece�fs state of health had awakened in him,

�eDo you stay here long, Mr. Sampson?�f

�eWhy, no. I am going away to-night.�f

�eSo soon? But business always holds you in request. Men like Mr. Sampson are too 
important to others, to be spared to their own need of relaxation and enjoyment.�f

�eI don�ft know about that,�f said I. �eHowever, I am going back.�f

�eTo London?�f

�eTo London.�f

�eI shall be there too, soon after you.�f

I knew that as well as he did. But I did not tell him so. Any more than I told him what 
defensive weapon my right hand rested on in my pocket, as I walked by his side. Any 
more than I told him why I did not walk on the sea side of him with the night closing in.

We left the beach, and our ways diverged. We exchanged goodnight, and had parted 
indeed, when he said, returning,

�eMr. Sampson, MAY I ask? Poor Meltham, whom we spoke of, ? dead yet?�f

�eNot when I last heard of him; but too broken a man to live long, and hopelessly lost to 
his old calling.�f

�eDear, dear, dear!�f said he, with great feeling. �eSad, sad, sad! The world is a grave!�f 
And so went his way.

It was not his fault if the world were not a grave; but I did not call that observation after 
him, any more than I had mentioned those other things just now enumerated. He went 
his way, and I went mine with all expedition. This happened, as I have said, either at the 
end of September or beginning of October. The next time I saw him, and the last time, 
was late in November.



V.

I had a very particular engagement to breakfast in the Temple. It was a bitter 
north-easterly morning, and the sleet and slush lay inches deep in the streets. I could get 
no conveyance, and was soon wet to the knees; but I should have been true to that 
appointment, though I had to wade to it up to my neck in the same impediments.

The appointment took me to some chambers in the Temple. They were at the top of a 
lonely corner house overlooking the river. The name, MR. ALFRED BECKWITH, was 
painted on the outer door. On the door opposite, on the same landing, the name MR. 
JULIUS SLINKTON. The doors of both sets of chambers stood open, so that anything 
said aloud in one set could be heard in the other.

I had never been in those chambers before. They were dismal, close, unwholesome, and 
oppressive; the furniture, originally good, and not yet old, was faded and dirty, ? the 
rooms were in great disorder; there was a strong prevailing smell of opium, brandy, and 
tobacco; the grate and fire-irons were splashed all over with unsightly blotches of rust; 
and on a sofa by the fire, in the room where breakfast had been prepared, lay the host, 
Mr. Beckwith, a man with all the appearances of the worst kind of drunkard, very far 
advanced upon his shameful way to death.

�eSlinkton is not come yet,�f said this creature, staggering up when I went in; �eI�fll call 
him. ? Halloa! Julius Caesar! Come and drink!�f As he hoarsely roared this out, he beat 
the poker and tongs together in a mad way, as if that were his usual manner of 
summoning his associate.

The voice of Mr. Slinkton was heard through the clatter from the opposite side of the 
staircase, and he came in. He had not expected the pleasure of meeting me. I have seen 
several artful men brought to a stand, but I never saw a man so aghast as he was when 
his eyes rested on mine.

�eJulius Caesar,�f cried Beckwith, staggering between us, �eMist�f Sampson! Mist�f 
Sampson, Julius Caesar! Julius, Mist�f Sampson, is the friend of my soul. Julius keeps 
me plied with liquor, morning, noon, and night. Julius is a real benefactor. Julius threw 
the tea and coffee out of window when I used to have any. Julius empties all the 
water-jugs of their contents, and fills �eem with spirits. Julius winds me up and keeps me 
going. ? Boil the brandy, Julius!�f

There was a rusty and furred saucepan in the ashes, ? the ashes looked like the 
accumulation of weeks, ? and Beckwith, rolling and staggering between us as if he 
were going to plunge headlong into the fire, got the saucepan out, and tried to force it 
into Slinkton�fs hand.

�eBoil the brandy, Julius Caesar! Come! Do your usual office. Boil the brandy!�f

He became so fierce in his gesticulations with the saucepan, that I expected to see him 
lay open Slinkton�fs head with it. I therefore put out my hand to check him. He reeled 
back to the sofa, and sat there panting, shaking, and red-eyed, in his rags of 
dressing-gown, looking at us both. I noticed then that there was nothing to drink on the 
table but brandy, and nothing to eat but salted herrings, and a hot, sickly, 
highly-peppered stew.

�eAt all events, Mr. Sampson,�f said Slinkton, offering me the smooth gravel path for the 
last time, �eI thank you for interfering between me and this unfortunate man�fs violence. 
However you came here, Mr. Sampson, or with whatever motive you came here, at least 
I thank you for that.�f

�eBoil the brandy,�f muttered Beckwith.

Without gratifying his desire to know how I came there, I said, quietly, �eHow is your 
niece, Mr. Slinkton?�f

He looked hard at me, and I looked hard at him.

�eI am sorry to say, Mr. Sampson, that my niece has proved treacherous and ungrateful 
to her best friend. She left me without a word of notice or explanation. She was misled, 
no doubt, by some designing rascal. Perhaps you may have heard of it.�f

�eI did hear that she was misled by a designing rascal. In fact, I have proof of it.�f

�eAre you sure of that?�f said he.

�eQuite.�f

�eBoil the brandy,�f muttered Beckwith. �eCompany to breakfast, Julius Caesar. Do your 
usual office, ? provide the usual breakfast, dinner, tea, and supper. Boil the brandy!�f

The eyes of Slinkton looked from him to me, and he said, after a moment�fs 
consideration,

�eMr. Sampson, you are a man of the world, and so am I. I will be plain with you.�f

�eO no, you won�ft,�f said I, shaking my head.

�eI tell you, sir, I will be plain with you.�f

�eAnd I tell you you will not,�f said I. �eI know all about you. YOU plain with any one? 
Nonsense, nonsense!�f

�eI plainly tell you, Mr. Sampson,�f he went on, with a manner almost composed, �ethat I 
understand your object. You want to save your funds, and escape from your liabilities; 
these are old tricks of trade with you Office-gentlemen. But you will not do it, sir; you 
will not succeed. You have not an easy adversary to play against, when you play against 
me. We shall have to inquire, in due time, when and how Mr. Beckwith fell into his 
present habits. With that remark, sir, I put this poor creature, and his incoherent 
wanderings of speech, aside, and wish you a good morning and a better case next time.�f

While he was saying this, Beckwith had filled a half-pint glass with brandy. At this 
moment, he threw the brandy at his face, and threw the glass after it. Slinkton put his 
hands up, half blinded with the spirit, and cut with the glass across the forehead. At the 
sound of the breakage, a fourth person came into the room, closed the door, and stood at 
it; he was a very quiet but very keen-looking man, with iron-gray hair, and slightly 
lame.

Slinkton pulled out his handkerchief, assuaged the pain in his smarting eyes, and 
dabbled the blood on his forehead. He was a long time about it, and I saw that in the 
doing of it, a tremendous change came over him, occasioned by the change in Beckwith, 
? who ceased to pant and tremble, sat upright, and never took his eyes off him. I never 
in my life saw a face in which abhorrence and determination were so forcibly painted as 
in Beckwith�fs then.

�eLook at me, you villain,�f said Beckwith, �eand see me as I really am. I took these rooms, 
to make them a trap for you. I came into them as a drunkard, to bait the trap for you. 
You fell into the trap, and you will never leave it alive. On the morning when you last 
went to Mr. Sampson�fs office, I had seen him first. Your plot has been known to both of 
us, all along, and you have been counter-plotted all along. What? Having been cajoled 
into putting that prize of two thousand pounds in your power, I was to be done to death 
with brandy, and, brandy not proving quick enough, with something quicker? Have I 
never seen you, when you thought my senses gone, pouring from your little bottle into 
my glass? Why, you Murderer and Forger, alone here with you in the dead of night, as I 
have so often been, I have had my hand upon the trigger of a pistol, twenty times, to 
blow your brains out!�f

This sudden starting up of the thing that he had supposed to be his imbecile victim into 
a determined man, with a settled resolution to hunt him down and be the death of him, 
mercilessly expressed from head to foot, was, in the first shock, too much for him. 
Without any figure of speech, he staggered under it. But there is no greater mistake than 
to suppose that a man who is a calculating criminal, is, in any phase of his guilt, 
otherwise than true to himself, and perfectly consistent with his whole character. Such a 
man commits murder, and murder is the natural culmination of his course; such a man 
has to outface murder, and will do it with hardihood and effrontery. It is a sort of 
fashion to express surprise that any notorious criminal, having such crime upon his 
conscience, can so brave it out. Do you think that if he had it on his conscience at all, or 
had a conscience to have it upon, he would ever have committed the crime?

Perfectly consistent with himself, as I believe all such monsters to be, this Slinkton 
recovered himself, and showed a defiance that was sufficiently cold and quiet. He was 
white, he was haggard, he was changed; but only as a sharper who had played for a 
great stake and had been outwitted and had lost the game.

�eListen to me, you villain,�f said Beckwith, �eand let every word you hear me say be a 
stab in your wicked heart. When I took these rooms, to throw myself in your way and 
lead you on to the scheme that I knew my appearance and supposed character and habits 
would suggest to such a devil, how did I know that? Because you were no stranger to 
me. I knew you well. And I knew you to be the cruel wretch who, for so much money, 
had killed one innocent girl while she trusted him implicitly, and who was by inches 
killing another.�f

Slinkton took out a snuff-box, took a pinch of snuff, and laughed.

�eBut see here,�f said Beckwith, never looking away, never raising his voice, never 
relaxing his face, never unclenching his hand. �eSee what a dull wolf you have been, 
after all! The infatuated drunkard who never drank a fiftieth part of the liquor you plied 
him with, but poured it away, here, there, everywhere ? almost before your eyes; who 
bought over the fellow you set to watch him and to ply him, by outbidding you in his 
bribe, before he had been at his work three days ? with whom you have observed no 
caution, yet who was so bent on ridding the earth of you as a wild beast, that he would 
have defeated you if you had been ever so prudent ? that drunkard whom you have, 
many a time, left on the floor of this room, and who has even let you go out of it, alive 
and undeceived, when you have turned him over with your foot ? has, almost as often, 
on the same night, within an hour, within a few minutes, watched you awake, had his 
hand at your pillow when you were asleep, turned over your papers, taken samples from 
your bottles and packets of powder, changed their contents, rifled every secret of your 
life!�f

He had had another pinch of snuff in his hand, but had gradually let it drop from 
between his fingers to the floor; where he now smoothed it out with his foot, looking 
down at it the while.

�eThat drunkard,�f said Beckwith, �ewho had free access to your rooms at all times, that he 
might drink the strong drinks that you left in his way and be the sooner ended, holding 
no more terms with you than he would hold with a tiger, has had his master-key for all 
your locks, his test for all your poisons, his clue to your cipher-writing. He can tell you, 
as well as you can tell him, how long it took to complete that deed, what doses there 
were, what intervals, what signs of gradual decay upon mind and body; what 
distempered fancies were produced, what observable changes, what physical pain. He 
can tell you, as well as you can tell him, that all this was recorded day by day, as a 
lesson of experience for future service. He can tell you, better than you can tell him, 
where that journal is at this moment.�f

Slinkton stopped the action of his foot, and looked at Beckwith.

�eNo,�f said the latter, as if answering a question from him. �eNot in the drawer of the 
writing-desk that opens with a spring; it is not there, and it never will be there again.�f

�eThen you are a thief!�f said Slinkton.

Without any change whatever in the inflexible purpose, which it was quite terrific even 
to me to contemplate, and from the power of which I had always felt convinced it was 
impossible for this wretch to escape, Beckwith returned,

�eAnd I am your niece�fs shadow, too.�f

With an imprecation Slinkton put his hand to his head, tore out some hair, and flung it 
to the ground. It was the end of the smooth walk; he destroyed it in the action, and it 
will soon be seen that his use for it was past.

Beckwith went on: �eWhenever you left here, I left here. Although I understood that you 
found it necessary to pause in the completion of that purpose, to avert suspicion, still I 
watched you close, with the poor confiding girl. When I had the diary, and could read it 
word by word, ? it was only about the night before your last visit to Scarborough, ? 
you remember the night? you slept with a small flat vial tied to your wrist, ? I sent to 
Mr. Sampson, who was kept out of view. This is Mr. Sampson�fs trusty servant standing 
by the door. We three saved your niece among us.�f

Slinkton looked at us all, took an uncertain step or two from the place where he had 
stood, returned to it, and glanced about him in a very curious way, ? as one of the 
meaner reptiles might, looking for a hole to hide in. I noticed at the same time, that a 
singular change took place in the figure of the man, ? as if it collapsed within his 
clothes, and they consequently became ill-shapen and ill-fitting.

�eYou shall know,�f said Beckwith, �efor I hope the knowledge will be bitter and terrible 
to you, why you have been pursued by one man, and why, when the whole interest that 
Mr. Sampson represents would have expended any money in hunting you down, you 
have been tracked to death at a single individual�fs charge. I hear you have had the name 
of Meltham on your lips sometimes?�f

I saw, in addition to those other changes, a sudden stoppage come upon his breathing.

�eWhen you sent the sweet girl whom you murdered (you know with what artfully 
made-out surroundings and probabilities you sent her) to Meltham�fs office, before 
taking her abroad to originate the transaction that doomed her to the grave, it fell to 
Meltham�fs lot to see her and to speak with her. It did not fall to his lot to save her, 
though I know he would freely give his own life to have done it. He admired her; ? I 
would say he loved her deeply, if I thought it possible that you could understand the 
word. When she was sacrificed, he was thoroughly assured of your guilt. Having lost 
her, he had but one object left in life, and that was to avenge her and destroy you.�f

I saw the villain�fs nostrils rise and fall convulsively; but I saw no moving at his mouth.

�eThat man Meltham,�f Beckwith steadily pursued, �ewas as absolutely certain that you 
could never elude him in this world, if he devoted himself to your destruction with his 
utmost fidelity and earnestness, and if he divided the sacred duty with no other duty in 
life, as he was certain that in achieving it he would be a poor instrument in the hands of 
Providence, and would do well before Heaven in striking you out from among living 
men. I am that man, and I thank God that I have done my work!�f

If Slinkton had been running for his life from swift-footed savages, a dozen miles, he 
could not have shown more emphatic signs of being oppressed at heart and labouring 
for breath, than he showed now, when he looked at the pursuer who had so relentlessly 
hunted him down.

�eYou never saw me under my right name before; you see me under my right name now. 
You shall see me once again in the body, when you are tried for your life. You shall see 
me once again in the spirit, when the cord is round your neck, and the crowd are crying 
against you!�f

When Meltham had spoken these last words, the miscreant suddenly turned away his 
face, and seemed to strike his mouth with his open hand. At the same instant, the room 
was filled with a new and powerful odour, and, almost at the same instant, he broke into 
a crooked run, leap, start, ? I have no name for the spasm, ? and fell, with a dull 
weight that shook the heavy old doors and windows in their frames.

That was the fitting end of him.

When we saw that he was dead, we drew away from the room, and Meltham, giving me 
his hand, said, with a weary air,

�eI have no more work on earth, my friend. But I shall see her again elsewhere.�f

It was in vain that I tried to rally him. He might have saved her, he said; he had not 
saved her, and he reproached himself; he had lost her, and he was broken-hearted.

�eThe purpose that sustained me is over, Sampson, and there is nothing now to hold me 
to life. I am not fit for life; I am weak and spiritless; I have no hope and no object; my 
day is done.�f

In truth, I could hardly have believed that the broken man who then spoke to me was the 
man who had so strongly and so differently impressed me when his purpose was before 
him. I used such entreaties with him, as I could; but he still said, and always said, in a 
patient, undemonstrative way, ? nothing could avail him, ? he was broken-hearted.

He died early in the next spring. He was buried by the side of the poor young lady for 
whom he had cherished those tender and unhappy regrets; and he left all he had to her 
sister. She lived to be a happy wife and mother; she married my sister�fs son, who 
succeeded poor Meltham; she is living now, and her children ride about the garden on 
my walking-stick when I go to see her.



THE END.

**********************************************
DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

Holiday Romance

Charles Dickens

Part I.
INTRODUCTORY ROMANCE PROM THE PEN OF
WILLIAM TINKLING, ESQUIRE. (Aged eight.)

 THIS beginning-part is not made out of anybody's head, you know. It's real. You must 
believe this beginning-part more than what comes after, else you won't understand how 
what comes after came to be written. You must believe it all; but you must believe this 
most, please. I am the editor of it. Bob Redforth (he's my cousin, and shaking the table 
on purpose) wanted to be the editor of it; but I said he shouldn't because he couldn't. HE 
has no idea of being an editor. 

    Nettie Ashford is my bride. We were married in the right-hand closet in the corner 
of the dancing-school, where first we met, with a ring (a green one) from 
Wilkingwater's toy-shop. I owed for it out of my pocket-money. When the rapturous 
ceremony was over, we all four went up the lane and let off a cannon (brought loaded in 
Bob Redforth's waistcoat-pocket) to announce our nuptials. It flew right up when it 
went off, and turned over. Next day, Lieut.-Col. Robin Redforth was united, with 
similar ceremonies, to Alice Rainbird. This time the cannon burst with a most terrific 
explosion, and made a puppy bark. 

    My peerless bride was, at the period of which we now treat, in captivity at Miss 
Grimmer's. Drowvey and Grimmer is the partnership, and opinion is divided which is 
the greatest beast. The lovely bride of the colonel was also immured in the dungeons of 
the same establishment. A vow was entered into, between the colonel and myself, that 
we would cut them out on the following Wednesday when walking two and two. 

    Under the desperate circumstances of the case, the active brain of the colonel, 
combining with his lawless pursuit (he is a pirate), suggested an attack with fireworks. 
This, however, from motives of humanity, was abandoned as too expensive. 

    Lightly armed with a paper-knife buttoned up under his jacket, and waving the 
dreaded black flag at the end of a cane, the colonel took command of me at two P.M. on 
the eventful and appointed day. He had drawn out the plan of attack on a piece of paper, 
which was rolled up round a hoop-stick. He showed it to me. My position and my 
full-length portrait (but my real ears don't stick out horizontal) was behind a corner 
lamp-post, with written orders to remain there till I should see Miss Drowvey fall. The 
Drowvey who was to fall was the one in spectacles, not the one with the large lavender 
bonnet. At that signal I was to rush forth, seize my bride, and fight my way to the lane. 
There a junction would be effected between myself and the colonel; and putting our 
brides behind us, between ourselves and the palings, we were to conquer or die. 

    The enemy appeared,-approached. Waving his black flag, the colonel attacked. 
Confusion ensued. Anxiously I awaited my signal; but my signal came not. So far from 
falling, the hated Drowvey in spectacles appeared to me to have muffled the colonel's 
head in his outlawed banner, and to be pitching into him with a parasol. The one in the 
lavender bonnet also performed prodigies of valour with her fists on his back. Seeing 
that all was for the moment lost, I fought my desperate way hand to hand to the lane. 
Through taking the back road, I was so fortunate as to meet nobody, and arrived there 
uninterrupted. 

    It seemed an age ere the colonel joined me. He had been to the jobbing tailor's to 
be sewn up in several places, and attributed our defeat to the refusal of the detested 
Drowvey to fall. Finding her so obstinate, he had said to her, 'Die, recreant!' but had 
found her no more open to reason on that point than the other. 

    My blooming bride appeared, accompanied by the colonel's bride, at the 
dancing-school next day. What? Was her face averted from me? Hah? Even so. With a 
look of scorn, she put into my hand a bit of paper, and took another partner. On the 
paper was pencilled, 'Heavens! Can I write the word? Is my husband a cow?' 

    In the first bewilderment of my heated brain, I tried to think what slanderer could 
have traced my family to the ignoble animal mentioned above. Vain were my 
endeavours. At the end of that dance I whispered the colonel to come into the 
cloak-room, and I showed him the note. 

    'There is a syllable wanting,' said he, with a gloomy brow. 

    'Hah! What syllable?' was my inquiry. 

    'She asks, can she write the word? And no; you see she couldn't,' said the colonel, 
pointing out the passage. 

    'And the word was?' said I. 

    'Cow-cow-coward,' hissed the pirate-colonel in my ear, and gave me back the note. 

    Feeling that I must for ever tread the earth a branded boy,-person I mean,-or that I 
must clear up my honour, I demanded to be tried by a court-martial. The colonel 
admitted my right to be tried. Some difficulty was found in composing the court, on 
account of the Emperor of France's aunt refusing to let him come out. He was to be the 
president. Ere yet we had appointed a substitute, he made his escape over the back-wall, 
and stood among us, a free monarch. 

    The court was held on the grass by the pond. I recognised, in a certain admiral 
among my judges, my deadliest foe. A cocoa-nut had given rise to language that I could 
not brook; but confiding in my innocence, and also in the knowledge that the President 
of the United States (who sat next him) owed me a knife, I braced myself for the ordeal. 

    It was a solemn spectacle, that court. Two executioners with pinafores reversed led 
me in. Under the shade of an umbrella I perceived my bride, supported by the bride of 
the pirate-colonel. The president, having reproved a little female ensign for tittering, on 
a matter of life or death, called upon me to plead, 'Coward or no coward, guilty or not 
guilty?' I pleaded in a firm tone, 'No coward and not guilty.' (The little female ensign 
being again reproved by the president for misconduct, mutinied, left the court, and 
threw stones.) 

    My implacable enemy, the admiral, conducted the case against me. The colonel's 
bride was called to prove that I had remained behind the corner lamp-post during the 
engagement. I might have been spared the anguish of my own bride's being also made a 
witness to the same point, but the admiral knew where to wound me. Be still, my soul, 
no matter. The colonel was then brought forward with his evidence. 

    It was for this point that I had saved myself up, as the turning-point of my case. 
Shaking myself free of my guards,-who had no business to hold me, the stupids, unless I 
was found guilty,-I asked the colonel what he considered the first duty of a soldier? Ere 
he could reply, the President of the United States rose and informed the court, that my 
foe, the admiral, had suggested 'Bravery,' and that prompting a witness wasn't fair. The 
president of the court immediately ordered the admiral's mouth to be filled with leaves, 
and tied up with string. I had the satisfaction of seeing the sentence carried into effect 
before the proceedings went further. 

    I then took a paper from my trousers-pocket, and asked, 'What do you consider, 
Col. Redford, the first duty of a soldier? Is it obedience?' 

    'It is,' said the colonel. 

    'Is that paper-please to look at it-in your hand?' 

    'It is,' said the colonel. 

    'Is it a military sketch?' 

    'It is,' said the colonel. 

    'Of an engagement?' 

    'Quite so,' said the colonel. 

    'Of the late engagement?' 

    'Of the late engagement.' 

    'Please to describe it, and then hand it to the president of the court.' 

    From that triumphant moment my sufferings and my dangers were at an end. The 
court rose up and jumped, on discovering that I had strictly obeyed orders. My foe, the 
admiral, who though muzzled was malignant yet, contrived to suggest that I was 
dishonoured by having quitted the field. But the colonel himself had done as much, and 
gave his opinion, upon his word and honour as a pirate, that when all was lost the field 
might be quitted without disgrace. I was going to be found 'No coward and not guilty,' 
and my blooming bride was going to be publicly restored to my arms in a procession, 
when an unlooked-for event disturbed the general rejoicing. This was no other than the 
Emperor of France's aunt catching hold of his hair. The proceedings abruptly terminated, 
and the court tumultuously dissolved. 

    It was when the shades of the next evening but one were beginning to fall, ere yet 
the silver beams of Luna touched the earth, that four forms might have been descried 
slowly advancing towards the weeping willow on the borders of the pond, the now 
deserted scene of the day before yesterday's agonies and triumphs. On a nearer approach, 
and by a practised eye, these might have been identified as the forms of the 
pirate-colonel with his bride, and of the day before yesterday's gallant prisoner with his 
bride. 

    On the beauteous faces of the Nymphs dejection sat enthroned. All four reclined 
under the willow for some minutes without speaking, till at length the bride of the 
colonel poutingly observed, 'It's of no use pretending any more, and we had better give 
it up.' 

    'Hah!' exclaimed the pirate. 'Pretending?' 

    'Don't go on like that; you worry me,' returned his bride. 

    The lovely bride of Tinkling echoed the incredible declaration. The two warriors 
exchanged stony glances. 

    'If,' said the bride of the pirate-colonel, 'grown-up people WON'T do what they 
ought to do, and WILL put us out, what comes of our pretending?' 

    'We only get into scrapes,' said the bride of Tinkling. 

    'You know very well,' pursued the colonel's bride, 'that Miss Drowvey wouldn't fall. 
You complained of it yourself. And you know how disgracefully the court-martial 
ended. As to our marriage; would my people acknowledge it at home?' 

    'Or would my people acknowledge ours?' said the bride of Tinkling. 

    Again the two warriors exchanged stony glances. 

    'If you knocked at the door and claimed me, after you were told to go away,' said 
the colonel's bride, 'you would only have your hair pulled, or your ears, or your nose.' 

    'If you persisted in ringing at the bell and claiming me,' said the bride of Tinkling 
to that gentleman, 'you would have things dropped on your head from the window over 
the handle, or you would be played upon by the garden-engine.' 

    'And at your own homes,' resumed the bride of the colonel, 'it would be just as bad. 
You would be sent to bed, or something equally undignified. Again, how would you 
support us?' 

    The pirate-colonel replied in a courageous voice, 'By rapine!' But his bride retorted, 
'Suppose the grown-up people wouldn't be rapined?' 'Then,' said the colonel, 'they 
should pay the penalty in blood.'-'But suppose they should object,' retorted his bride, 
'and wouldn't pay the penalty in blood or anything else?' 

    A mournful silence ensued. 

    'Then do you no longer love me, Alice?' asked the colonel. 

    'Redforth! I am ever thine,' returned his bride. 

    'Then do you no longer love me, Nettie?' asked the present writer. 

    'Tinkling! I am ever thine,' returned my bride. 

    We all four embraced. Let me not be misunderstood by the giddy. The colonel 
embraced his own bride, and I embraced mine. But two times two make four. 

    'Nettie and I,' said Alice mournfully, 'have been considering our position. The 
grown-up people are too strong for us. They make us ridiculous. Besides, they have 
changed the times. William Tinkling's baby brother was christened yesterday. What 
took place? Was any king present? Answer, William.' 

    I said No, unless disguised as Great-uncle Chopper. 

    'Any queen?' 

    There had been no queen that I knew of at our house. There might have been one in 
the kitchen: but I didn't think so, or the servants would have mentioned it. 

    'Any fairies?' 

    None that were visible. 

    'We had an idea among us, I think,' said Alice, with a melancholy smile, 'we four, 
that Miss Grimmer would prove to be the wicked fairy, and would come in at the 
christening with her crutch-stick, and give the child a bad gift. Was there anything of 
that sort? Answer, William.' 

    I said that ma had said afterwards (and so she had), that Great-uncle Chopper's gift 
was a shabby one; but she hadn't said a bad one. She had called it shabby, electrotyped, 
second-hand, and below his income. 

    'It must be the grown-up people who have changed all this,' said Alice. 'We 
couldn't have changed it, if we had been so inclined, and we never should have been. Or 
perhaps Miss Grimmer is a wicked fairy after all, and won't act up to it because the 
grown-up people have persuaded her not to. Either way, they would make us ridiculous 
if we told them what we expected.' 

    'Tyrants!' muttered the pirate-colonel. 

    'Nay, my Redforth,' said Alice, 'say not so. Call not names, my Redforth, or they 
will apply to pa.' 

    'Let 'em,' said the colonel. 'I do not care. Who's he?' 

    Tinkling here undertook the perilous task of remonstrating with his lawless friend, 
who consented to withdraw the moody expressions above quoted. 

    'What remains for us to do?' Alice went on in her mild, wise way. 'We must 
educate, we must pretend in a new manner, we must wait.' 

    The colonel clenched his teeth,-four out in front, and a piece of another, and he had 
been twice dragged to the door of a dentist-despot, but had escaped from his guards. 
'How educate? How pretend in a new manner? How wait?' 

    'Educate the grown-up people,' replied Alice. 'We part to-night. Yes, Redforth,'-for 
the colonel tucked up his cuffs,-'part to-night! Let us in these next holidays, now going 
to begin, throw our thoughts into something educational for the grown-up people, 
hinting to them how things ought to be. Let us veil our meaning under a mask of 
romance; you, I, and Nettie. William Tinkling being the plainest and quickest writer, 
shall copy out. Is it agreed?' 

    The colonel answered sulkily, 'I don't mind.' He then asked, 'How about 
pretending?' 

    'We will pretend,' said Alice, 'that we are children; not that we are those grown-up 
people who won't help us out as they ought, and who understand us so badly.' 

    The colonel, still much dissatisfied, growled, 'How about waiting?' 

    'We will wait,' answered little Alice, taking Nettie's hand in hers, and looking up to 
the sky, 'we will wait-ever constant and true-till the times have got so changed as that 
everything helps us out, and nothing makes us ridiculous, and the fairies have come 
back. We will wait-ever constant and true-till we are eighty, ninety, or one hundred. 
And then the fairies will send us children, and we will help them out, poor pretty little 
creatures, if they pretend ever so much.' 

    'So we will, dear,' said Nettie Ashford, taking her round the waist with both arms 
and kissing her. 'And now if my husband will go and buy some cherries for us, I have 
got some money.' 

    In the friendliest manner I invited the colonel to go with me; but he so far forgot 
himself as to acknowledge the invitation by kicking out behind, and then lying down on 
his stomach on the grass, pulling it up and chewing it. When I came back, however, 
Alice had nearly brought him out of his vexation, and was soothing him by telling him 
how soon we should all be ninety. 

    As we sat under the willow-tree and ate the cherries (fair, for Alice shared them 
out), we played at being ninety. Nettie complained that she had a bone in her old back, 
and it made her hobble; and Alice sang a song in an old woman's way, but it was very 
pretty, and we were all merry. At least, I don't know about merry exactly, but all 
comfortable. 

    There was a most tremendous lot of cherries; and Alice always had with her some 
neat little bag or box or case, to hold things. In it that night was a tiny wine-glass. So 
Alice and Nettie said they would make some cherry-wine to drink our love at parting. 

    Each of us had a glassful, and it was delicious; and each of us drank the toast, 'Our 
love at parting.' The colonel drank his wine last; and it got into my head directly that it 
got into his directly. Anyhow, his eyes rolled immediately after he had turned the glass 
upside down; and he took me on one side and proposed in a hoarse whisper, that we 
should 'Cut 'em out still.' 

    'How did he mean?' I asked my lawless friend. 

    'Cut our brides out,' said the colonel, 'and then cut our way, without going down a 
single turning, bang to the Spanish main!' 

    We might have tried it, though I didn't think it would answer; only we looked 
round and saw that there was nothing but moon-light under the willow-tree, and that our 
pretty, pretty wives were gone. We burst out crying. The colonel gave in second, and 
came to first; but he gave in strong. 

    We were ashamed of our red eyes, and hung about for half-an-hour to whiten them. 
Likewise a piece of chalk round the rims, I doing the colonel's, and he mine, but 
afterwards found in the bedroom looking-glass not natural, besides inflammation. Our 
conversation turned on being ninety. The colonel told me he had a pair of boots that 
wanted soling and heeling; but he thought it hardly worth while to mention it to his 
father, as he himself should so soon be ninety, when he thought shoes would be more 
convenient. The colonel also told me, with his hand upon his hip, that he felt himself 
already getting on in life, and turning rheumatic. And I told him the same. And when 
they said at our house at supper (they are always bothering about something) that I 
stooped, I felt so glad! 

    This is the end of the beginning-part that you were to believe most. 


PART II.
ROMANCE. FROM THE PEN OF MISS ALICE
RAINBIRD (Aged seven.)


THERE was once a king, and he had a queen; and he was the manliest of his sex, and 
she was the loveliest of hers. The king was, in his private profession, under government. 
The queen's father had been a medical man out of town. 

    They had nineteen children, and were always having more. Seventeen of these 
children took care of the baby; and Alicia, the eldest, took care of them all. Their ages 
varied from seven years to seven months. 

    Let us now resume our story. 

    One day the king was going to the office, when he stopped at the fishmonger's to 
buy a pound and a half of salmon not too near the tail, which the queen (who was a 
careful housekeeper) had requested him to send home. Mr. Pickles, the fishmonger, said, 
'Certainly, sir; is there any other article? Good-morning.' 

    The king went on towards the office in a melancholy mood; for quarter-day was 
such a long way off, and several of the dear children were growing out of their clothes. 
He had not proceeded far, when Mr. Pickles's errand-boy came running after him, and 
said, 'Sir, you didn't notice the old lady in our shop.' 

    'What old lady?' inquired the king. 'I saw none.' 

    Now the king had not seen any old lady, because this old lady had been invisible to 
him, though visible to Mr. Pickles's boy. Probably because he messed and splashed the 
water about to that degree, and flopped the pairs of soles down in that violent manner, 
that, if she had not been visible to him, he would have spoilt her clothes. 

    Just then the old lady came trotting up. She was dressed in shot-silk of the richest 
quality, smelling of dried lavender. 

    'King Watkins the First, I believe?' said the old lady. 

    'Watkins,' replied the king, 'is my name.' 

    'Papa, if I am not mistaken, of the beautiful Princess Alicia?' said the old lady. 

    'And of eighteen other darlings,' replied the king. 

    'Listen. You are going to the office,' said the old lady. 

    It instantly flashed upon the king that she must be a fairy, or how could she know 
that? 

    'You are right,' said the old lady, answering his thoughts. 'I am the good Fairy 
Grandmarina. Attend! When you return home to dinner, politely invite the Princess 
Alicia to have some of the salmon you bought just now.' 

    'It may disagree with her,' said the king. 

    The old lady became so very angry at this absurd idea, that the king was quite 
alarmed, and humbly begged her pardon. 

    'We hear a great deal too much about this thing disagreeing, and that thing 
disagreeing,' said the old lady, with the greatest contempt it was possible to express. 
'Don't be greedy. I think you want it all yourself.' 

    The king hung his head under this reproof, and said he wouldn't talk about things 
disagreeing any more. 

    'Be good, then,' said the Fairy Grandmarina, 'and don't. When the beautiful 
Princess Alicia consents to partake of the salmon,-as I think she will,-you will find she 
will leave a fish-bone on her plate. Tell her to dry it, and to rub it, and to polish it till it 
shines like mother-of-pearl, and to take care of it as a present from me.' 

    'Is that all?' asked the king. 

    'Don't be impatient, sir,' returned the Fairy Grandmarina, scolding him severely. 
'Don't catch people short, before they have done speaking. Just the way with you 
grown-up persons. You are always doing it.' 

    The king again hung his head, and said he wouldn't do so any more. 

    'Be good, then,' said the Fairy Grandmarina, 'and don't! Tell the Princess Alicia, 
with my love, that the fish-bone is a magic present which can only be used once; but 
that it will bring her, that once, whatever she wishes for, PROVIDED SHE WISHES 
FOR IT AT THE RIGHT TIME. That is the message. Take care of it.' 

    The king was beginning, 'Might I ask the reason?' when the fairy became 
absolutely furious. 

    'Will you be good, sir?' she exclaimed, stamping her foot on the ground. 'The 
reason for this, and the reason for that, indeed! You are always wanting the reason. No 
reason. There! Hoity toity me! I am sick of your grown-up reasons.' 

    The king was extremely frightened by the old lady's flying into such a passion, and 
said he was very sorry to have offended her, and he wouldn't ask for reasons any more. 

    'Be good, then,' said the old lady, 'and don't!' 

    With those words, Grandmarina vanished, and the king went on and on and on, till 
he came to the office. There he wrote and wrote and wrote, till it was time to go home 
again. Then he politely invited the Princess Alicia, as the fairy had directed him, to 
partake of the salmon. And when she had enjoyed it very much, he saw the fish-bone on 
her plate, as the fairy had told him he would, and he delivered the fairy's message, and 
the Princess Alicia took care to dry the bone, and to rub it, and to polish it, till it shone 
like mother-of-pearl. 

    And so, when the queen was going to get up in the morning, she said, 'O, dear me, 
dear me; my head, my head!' and then she fainted away. 

    The Princess Alicia, who happened to be looking in at the chamber-door, asking 
about breakfast, was very much alarmed when she saw her royal mamma in this state, 
and she rang the bell for Peggy, which was the name of the lord chamberlain. But 
remembering where the smelling-bottle was, she climbed on a chair and got it; and after 
that she climbed on another chair by the bedside, and held the smelling-bottle to the 
queen's nose; and after that she jumped down and got some water; and after that she 
jumped up again and wetted the queen's forehead; and, in short, when the lord 
chamberlain came in, that dear old woman said to the little princess, 'What a trot you 
are! I couldn't have done it better myself!' 

    But that was not the worst of the good queen's illness. O, no! She was very ill 
indeed, for a long time. The Princess Alicia kept the seventeen young princes and 
princesses quiet, and dressed and undressed and danced the baby, and made the kettle 
boil, and heated the soup, and swept the hearth, and poured out the medicine, and 
nursed the queen, and did all that ever she could, and was as busy, busy, busy as busy 
could be; for there were not many servants at that palace for three reasons: because the 
king was short of money, because a rise in his office never seemed to come, and 
because quarter-day was so far off that it looked almost as far off and as little as one of 
the stars. 

    But on the morning when the queen fainted away, where was the magic fish-bone? 
Why, there it was in the Princess Alicia's pocket! She had almost taken it out to bring 
the queen to life again, when she put it back, and looked for the smelling-bottle. 

    After the queen had come out of her swoon that morning, and was dozing, the 
Princess Alicia hurried up-stairs to tell a most particular secret to a most particularly 
confidential friend of hers, who was a duchess. People did suppose her to be a doll; but 
she was really a duchess, though nobody knew it except the princess. 

    This most particular secret was the secret about the magic fish-bone, the history of 
which was well known to the duchess, because the princess told her everything. The 
princess kneeled down by the bed on which the duchess was lying, full-dressed and 
wide awake, and whispered the secret to her. The duchess smiled and nodded. People 
might have supposed that she never smiled and nodded; but she often did, though 
nobody knew it except the princess. 

    Then the Princess Alicia hurried down-stairs again, to keep watch in the queen's 
room. She often kept watch by herself in the queen's room; but every evening, while the 
illness lasted, she sat there watching with the king. And every evening the king sat 
looking at her with a cross look, wondering why she never brought out the magic 
fish-bone. As often as she noticed this, she ran up-stairs, whispered the secret to the 
duchess over again, and said to the duchess besides, 'They think we children never have 
a reason or a meaning!' And the duchess, though the most fashionable duchess that ever 
was heard of, winked her eye. 

    'Alicia,' said the king, one evening, when she wished him good-night. 

    'Yes, papa.' 

    'What is become of the magic fish-bone?' 

    'In my pocket, papa!' 

    'I thought you had lost it?' 

    'O, no, papa!' 

    'Or forgotten it?' 

    'No, indeed, papa.' 

    And so another time the dreadful little snapping pug-dog, next door, made a rush at 
one of the young princes as he stood on the steps coming home from school, and 
terrified him out of his wits; and he put his hand through a pane of glass, and bled, bled, 
bled. When the seventeen other young princes and princesses saw him bleed, bleed, 
bleed, they were terrified out of their wits too, and screamed themselves black in their 
seventeen faces all at once. But the Princess Alicia put her hands over all their 
seventeen mouths, one after another, and persuaded them to be quiet because of the sick 
queen. And then she put the wounded prince's hand in a basin of fresh cold water, while 
they stared with their twice seventeen are thirty-four, put down four and carry three, 
eyes, and then she looked in the hand for bits of glass, and there were fortunately no bits 
of glass there. And then she said to two chubby-legged princes, who were sturdy though 
small, 'Bring me in the royal rag-bag: I must snip and stitch and cut and contrive.' So 
these two young princes tugged at the royal rag-bag, and lugged it in; and the Princess 
Alicia sat down on the floor, with a large pair of scissors and a needle and thread, and 
snipped and stitched and cut and contrived, and made a bandage, and put it on, and it 
fitted beautifully; and so when it was all done, she saw the king her papa looking on by 
the door. 

    'Alicia.' 

    'Yes, papa.' 

    'What have you been doing?' 

    'Snipping, stitching, cutting, and contriving, papa.' 

    'Where is the magic fish-bone?' 

    'In my pocket, papa.' 

    'I thought you had lost it?' 

    'O, no, papa.' 

    'Or forgotten it?' 

    'No, indeed, papa.' 

    After that, she ran up-stairs to the duchess, and told her what had passed, and told 
her the secret over again; and the duchess shook her flaxen curls, and laughed with her 
rosy lips. 

    Well! and so another time the baby fell under the grate. The seventeen young 
princes and princesses were used to it; for they were almost always falling under the 
grate or down the stairs; but the baby was not used to it yet, and it gave him a swelled 
face and a black eye. The way the poor little darling came to tumble was, that he was 
out of the Princess Alicia's lap just as she was sitting, in a great coarse apron that quite 
smothered her, in front of the kitchen-fire, beginning to peel the turnips for the broth for 
dinner; and the way she came to be doing that was, that the king's cook had run away 
that morning with her own true love, who was a very tall but very tipsy soldier. Then 
the seventeen young princes and princesses, who cried at everything that happened, 
cried and roared. But the Princess Alicia (who couldn't help crying a little herself) 
quietly called to them to be still, on account of not throwing back the queen up-stairs, 
who was fast getting well, and said, 'Hold your tongues, you wicked little monkeys, 
every one of you, while I examine baby!' Then she examined baby, and found that he 
hadn't broken anything; and she held cold iron to his poor dear eye, and smoothed his 
poor dear face, and he presently fell asleep in her arms. Then she said to the seventeen 
princes and princesses, 'I am afraid to let him down yet, lest he should wake and feel 
pain; be good, and you shall all be cooks.' They jumped for joy when they heard that, 
and began making themselves cooks' caps out of old newspapers. So to one she gave the 
salt-box, and to one she gave the barley, and to one she gave the herbs, and to one she 
gave the turnips, and to one she gave the carrots, and to one she gave the onions, and to 
one she gave the spice-box, till they were all cooks, and all running about at work, she 
sitting in the middle, smothered in the great coarse apron, nursing baby. By and by the 
broth was done; and the baby woke up, smiling, like an angel, and was trusted to the 
sedatest princess to hold, while the other princes and princesses were squeezed into a 
far-off corner to look at the Princess Alicia turning out the saucepanful of broth, for fear 
(as they were always getting into trouble) they should get splashed and scalded. When 
the broth came tumbling out, steaming beautifully, and smelling like a nosegay good to 
eat, they clapped their hands. That made the baby clap his hands; and that, and his 
looking as if he had a comic toothache, made all the princes and princesses laugh. So 
the Princess Alicia said, 'Laugh and be good; and after dinner we will make him a nest 
on the floor in a corner, and he shall sit in his nest and see a dance of eighteen cooks.' 
That delighted the young princes and princesses, and they ate up all the broth, and 
washed up all the plates and dishes, and cleared away, and pushed the table into a 
corner; and then they in their cooks' caps, and the Princess Alicia in the smothering 
coarse apron that belonged to the cook that had run away with her own true love that 
was the very tall but very tipsy soldier, danced a dance of eighteen cooks before the 
angelic baby, who forgot his swelled face and his black eye, and crowed with joy. 

    And so then, once more the Princess Alicia saw King Watkins the First, her father, 
standing in the doorway looking on, and he said, 'What have you been doing, Alicia?' 

    'Cooking and contriving, papa.' 

    'What else have you been doing, Alicia?' 

    'Keeping the children light-hearted, papa.' 

    'Where is the magic fish-bone, Alicia? 

    'In my pocket, papa.' 

    'I thought you had lost it?' 

    'O, no, papa!' 

    'Or forgotten it?' 

    'No, indeed, papa.' 

    The king then sighed so heavily, and seemed so low-spirited, and sat down so 
miserably, leaning his head upon his hand, and his elbow upon the kitchen-table pushed 
away in the corner, that the seventeen princes and princesses crept softly out of the 
kitchen, and left him alone with the Princess Alicia and the angelic baby. 

    'What is the matter, papa?' 

    'I am dreadfully poor, my child.' 

    'Have you no money at all, papa?' 

    'None, my child.' 

    'Is there no way of getting any, papa?' 

    'No way,' said the king. 'I have tried very hard, and I have tried all ways.' 

    When she heard those last words, the Princess Alicia began to put her hand into the 
pocket where she kept the magic fish-bone. 

    'Papa,' said she, 'when we have tried very hard, and tried all ways, we must have 
done our very, very best?' 

    'No doubt, Alicia.' 

    'When we have done our very, very best, papa, and that is not enough, then I think 
the right time must have come for asking help of others.' This was the very secret 
connected with the magic fish-bone, which she had found out for herself from the good 
Fairy Grandmarina's words, and which she had so often whispered to her beautiful and 
fashionable friend, the duchess. 

    So she took out of her pocket the magic fish-bone, that had been dried and rubbed 
and polished till it shone like mother-of-pearl; and she gave it one little kiss, and wished 
it was quarter-day. And immediately it was quarter-day; and the king's quarter's salary 
came rattling down the chimney, and bounced into the middle of the floor. 

    But this was not half of what happened,-no, not a quarter; for immediately 
afterwards the good Fairy Grandmarina came riding in, in a carriage and four 
(peacocks), with Mr. Pickles's boy up behind, dressed in silver and gold, with a 
cocked-hat, powdered-hair, pink silk stockings, a jewelled cane, and a nosegay. Down 
jumped Mr. Pickles's boy, with his cocked-hat in his hand, and wonderfully polite 
(being entirely changed by enchantment), and handed Grandmarina out; and there she 
stood, in her rich shot-silk smelling of dried lavender, fanning herself with a sparkling 
fan. 

    'Alicia, my dear,' said this charming old fairy, 'how do you do? I hope I see you 
pretty well? Give me a kiss.' 

    The Princess Alicia embraced her; and then Grandmarina turned to the king, and 
said rather sharply, 'Are you good?' The king said he hoped so. 

    'I suppose you know the reason now, why my god-daughter here,' kissing the 
princess again, 'did not apply to the fish-bone sooner?' said the fairy. 

    The king made a shy bow. 

    'Ah! but you didn't then?' said the fairy. 

    The king made a shyer bow. 

    'Any more reasons to ask for?' said the fairy. 

    The king said, No, and he was very sorry. 

    'Be good, then,' said the fairy, 'and live happy ever afterwards.' 

    Then Grandmarina waved her fan, and the queen came in most splendidly dressed; 
and the seventeen young princes and princesses, no longer grown out of their clothes, 
came in, newly fitted out from top to toe, with tucks in everything to admit of its being 
let out. After that, the fairy tapped the Princess Alicia with her fan; and the smothering 
coarse apron flew away, and she appeared exquisitely dressed, like a little bride, with a 
wreath of orange-flowers and a silver veil. After that, the kitchen dresser changed of 
itself into a wardrobe, made of beautiful woods and gold and looking glass, which was 
full of dresses of all sorts, all for her and all exactly fitting her. After that, the angelic 
baby came in, running alone, with his face and eye not a bit the worse, but much the 
better. Then Grandmarina begged to be introduced to the duchess; and, when the 
duchess was brought down, many compliments passed between them. 

    A little whispering took place between the fairy and the duchess; and then the fairy 
said out loud, 'Yes, I thought she would have told you.' Grandmarina then turned to the 
king and queen, and said, 'We are going in search of Prince Certainpersonio. The 
pleasure of your company is requested at church in half an hour precisely.' So she and 
the Princess Alicia got into the carriage; and Mr. Pickles's boy handed in the duchess, 
who sat by herself on the opposite seat; and then Mr. Pickles's boy put up the steps and 
got up behind, and the peacocks flew away with their tails behind. 

    Prince Certainpersonio was sitting by himself, eating barley-sugar, and waiting to 
be ninety. When he saw the peacocks, followed by the carriage, coming in at the 
window it immediately occurred to him that something uncommon was going to 
happen. 

    'Prince,' said Grandmarina, 'I bring you your bride.' The moment the fairy said 
those words, Prince Certainpersonio's face left off being sticky, and his jacket and 
corduroys changed to peach-bloom velvet, and his hair curled, and a cap and feather 
flew in like a bird and settled on his head. He got into the carriage by the fairy's 
invitation; and there he renewed his acquaintance with the duchess, whom he had seen 
before. 

    In the church were the prince's relations and friends, and the Princess Alicia's 
relations and friends, and the seventeen princes and princesses, and the baby, and a 
crowd of the neighbours. The marriage was beautiful beyond expression. The duchess 
was bridesmaid, and beheld the ceremony from the pulpit, where she was supported by 
the cushion of the desk. 

    Grandmarina gave a magnificent wedding-feast afterwards, in which there was 
everything and more to eat, and everything and more to drink. The wedding-cake was 
delicately ornamented with white satin ribbons, frosted silver, and white lilies, and was 
forty-two yards round. 

    When Grandmarina had drunk her love to the young couple, and Prince 
Certainpersonio had made a speech, and everybody had cried, Hip, hip, hip, hurrah! 
Grandmarina announced to the king and queen that in future there would be eight 
quarter-days in every year, except in leap-year, when there would be ten. She then 
turned to Certainpersonio and Alicia, and said, 'My dears, you will have thirty-five 
children, and they will all be good and beautiful. Seventeen of your children will be 
boys, and eighteen will be girls. The hair of the whole of your children will curl 
naturally. They will never have the measles, and will have recovered from the 
whooping-cough before being born.' 

    On hearing such good news, everybody cried out 'Hip, hip, hip, hurrah!' again. 

    'It only remains,' said Grandmarina in conclusion, 'to make an end of the 
fish-bone.' 

    So she took it from the hand of the Princess Alicia, and it instantly flew down the 
throat of the dreadful little snapping pug-dog, next door, and choked him, and he 
expired in convulsions. 


PART III.
ROMANCE. FROM THE PEN OF LIEUTENANT-
COLONEL ROBIN REDFORTH (Aged nine.)




    THE subject of our present narrative would appear to have devoted himself to the 
pirate profession at a comparatively early age. We find him in command of a splendid 
schooner of one hundred guns loaded to the muzzle, ere yet he had had a party in 
honour of his tenth birthday. 

    It seems that our hero, considering himself spited by a Latin-grammar master, 
demanded the satisfaction due from one man of honour to another.-Not getting it, he 
privately withdrew his haughty spirit from such low company, bought a second-hand 
pocket-pistol, folded up some sandwiches in a paper bag, made a bottle of Spanish 
liquorice-water, and entered on a career of valour. 

    It were tedious to follow Boldheart (for such was his name) through the 
commencing stages of his story. Suffice it, that we find him bearing the rank of Capt. 
Boldheart, reclining in full uniform on a crimson hearth-rug spread out upon the 
quarter-deck of his schooner 'The Beauty,' in the China seas. It was a lovely evening; 
and, as his crew lay grouped about him, he favoured them with the following melody: 

O landsmen are folly!
O pirates are jolly!
O diddleum Dolly,
Di!
Chorus.-Heave yo. 
    The soothing effect of these animated sounds floating over the waters, as the 
common sailors united their rough voices to take up the rich tones of Boldheart, may be 
more easily conceived than described. 

    It was under these circumstances that the look-out at the masthead gave the word, 
'Whales!' 

    All was now activity. 

    'Where away?' cried Capt. Boldheart, starting up. 

    'On the larboard bow, sir,' replied the fellow at the masthead, touching his hat. For 
such was the height of discipline on board of 'The Beauty,' that, even at that height, he 
was obliged to mind it, or be shot through the head. 

    'This adventure belongs to me,' said Boldheart. 'Boy, my harpoon. Let no man 
follow;' and leaping alone into his boat, the captain rowed with admirable dexterity in 
the direction of the monster. 

    All was now excitement. 

    'He nears him!' said an elderly seaman, following the captain through his spy-glass. 

    'He strikes him!' said another seaman, a mere stripling, but also with a spy-glass. 

    'He tows him towards us!' said another seaman, a man in the full vigour of life, but 
also with a spy-glass. 

    In fact, the captain was seen approaching, with the huge bulk following. We will 
not dwell on the deafening cries of 'Boldheart! Boldheart!' with which he was received, 
when, carelessly leaping on the quarter-deck, he presented his prize to his men. They 
afterwards made two thousand four hundred and seventeen pound ten and sixpence by 
it. 

    Ordering the sail to be braced up, the captain now stood W.N.W. 'The Beauty' flew 
rather than floated over the dark blue waters. Nothing particular occurred for a fortnight, 
except taking, with considerable slaughter, four Spanish galleons, and a snow from 
South America, all richly laden. Inaction began to tell upon the spirits of the men. Capt. 
Boldheart called all hands aft, and said, 'My lads, I hear there are discontented ones 
among ye. Let any such stand forth.' 

    After some murmuring, in which the expressions, 'Ay, ay, sir!' 'Union Jack,' 
'Avast,' 'Starboard,' 'Port,' 'Bowsprit,' and similar indications of a mutinous undercurrent, 
though subdued, were audible, Bill Boozey, captain of the foretop, came out from the 
rest. His form was that of a giant, but he quailed under the captain's eye. 

    'What are your wrongs?' said the captain. 

    'Why, d'ye see, Capt. Boldheart,' replied the towering manner, 'I've sailed, man and 
boy, for many a year, but I never yet know'd the milk served out for the ship's 
company's teas to be so sour as 'tis aboard this craft.' 

    At this moment the thrilling cry, 'Man overboard!' announced to the astonished 
crew that Boozey, in stepping back, as the captain (in mere thoughtfulness) laid his 
hand upon the faithful pocket-pistol which he wore in his belt, had lost his balance, and 
was struggling with the foaming tide. 

    All was now stupefaction. 

    But with Capt. Boldheart, to throw off his uniform coat, regardless of the various 
rich orders with which it was decorated, and to plunge into the sea after the drowning 
giant, was the work of a moment. Maddening was the excitement when boats were 
lowered; intense the joy when the captain was seen holding up the drowning man with 
his teeth; deafening the cheering when both were restored to the main deck of 'The 
Beauty.' And, from the instant of his changing his wet clothes for dry ones, Capt. 
Boldheart had no such devoted though humble friend as William Boozey. 

    Boldheart now pointed to the horizon, and called the attention of his crew to the 
taper spars of a ship lying snug in harbour under the guns of a fort. 

    'She shall be ours at sunrise,' said he. 'Serve out a double allowance of grog, and 
prepare for action.' 

    All was now preparation. 

    When morning dawned, after a sleepless night, it was seen that the stranger was 
crowding on all sail to come out of the harbour and offer battle. As the two ships came 
nearer to each other, the stranger fired a gun and hoisted Roman colours. Boldheart then 
perceived her to be the Latin-grammar master's bark. Such indeed she was, and had 
been tacking about the world in unavailing pursuit, from the time of his first taking to a 
roving life. 

    Boldheart now addressed his men, promising to blow them up if he should feel 
convinced that their reputation required it, and giving orders that the Latin-grammar 
master should be taken alive. He then dismissed them to their quarters, and the fight 
began with a broadside from 'The Beauty.' She then veered around, and poured in 
another. 'The Scorpion' (so was the bark of the Latin-grammar master appropriately 
called) was not slow to return her fire; and a terrific cannonading ensued, in which the 
guns of 'The Beauty' did tremendous execution. 

    The Latin-grammar master was seen upon the poop, in the midst of the smoke and 
fire, encouraging his men. To do him justice, he was no craven, though his white hat, 
his short gray trousers, and his long snuff-coloured surtout reaching to his heels (the 
self-same coat in which he had spited Boldheart), contrasted most unfavourably with the 
brilliant uniform of the latter. At this moment, Boldheart, seizing a pike and putting 
himself at the head of his men, gave the word to board. 

    A desperate conflict ensued in the hammock-nettings,-or somewhere in about that 
direction,-until the Latin-grammar master, having all his masts gone, his hull and 
rigging shot through, and seeing Boldheart slashing a path towards him, hauled down 
his flag himself, gave up his sword to Boldheart, and asked for quarter. Scarce had he 
been put into the captain's boat, ere 'The Scorpion' went down with all on board. 

    On Capt. Boldheart's now assembling his men, a circumstance occurred. He found 
it necessary with one blow of his cutlass to kill the cook, who, having lost his brother in 
the late action, was making at the Latin-grammar master in an infuriated state, intent on 
his destruction with a carving-knife. 

    Capt. Boldheart then turned to the Latin-grammar master, severely reproaching 
him with his perfidy, and put it to his crew what they considered that a master who 
spited a boy deserved. 

    They answered with one voice, 'Death.' 

    'It may be so,' said the captain; 'but it shall never be said that Boldheart stained his 
hour of triumph with the blood of his enemy. Prepare the cutter.' 

    The cutter was immediately prepared. 

    'Without taking your life,' said the captain, 'I must yet for ever deprive you of the 
power of spiting other boys. I shall turn you adrift in this boat. You will find in her two 
oars, a compass, a bottle of rum, a small cask of water, a piece of pork, a bag of biscuit, 
and my Latin grammar. Go! and spite the natives, if you can find any.' 

    Deeply conscious of this bitter sarcasm, the unhappy wretch was put into the cutter, 
and was soon left far behind. He made no effort to row, but was seen lying on his back 
with his legs up, when last made out by the ship's telescopes. 

    A stiff breeze now beginning to blow, Capt. Boldheart gave orders to keep her 
S.S.W., easing her a little during the night by falling off a point or two W. by W., or 
even by W.S., if she complained much. He then retired for the night, having in truth 
much need of repose. In addition to the fatigues he had undergone, this brave officer 
had received sixteen wounds in the engagement, but had not mentioned it. 

    In the morning a white squall came on, and was succeeded by other squalls of 
various colours. It thundered and lightened heavily for six weeks. Hurricanes then set in 
for two months. Waterspouts and tornadoes followed. The oldest sailor on board-and he 
was a very old one-had never seen such weather. 'The Beauty' lost all idea where she 
was, and the carpenter reported six feet two of water in the hold. Everybody fell 
senseless at the pumps every day. 

    Provisions now ran very low. Our hero put the crew on short allowance, and put 
himself on shorter allowance than any man in the ship. But his spirit kept him fat. In this 
extremity, the gratitude of Boozey, the captain of the foretop, whom our readers may 
remember, was truly affecting. The loving though lowly William repeatedly requested 
to be killed, and preserved for the captain's table. 

    We now approach a change of affairs. One day during a gleam of sunshine, and 
when the weather had moderated, the man at the masthead-too weak now to touch his 
hat, besides its having been blown away-called out, 

    'Savages!' 

    All was now expectation. 

    Presently fifteen hundred canoes, each paddled by twenty savages, were seen 
advancing in excellent order. They were of a light green colour (the savages were), and 
sang, with great energy, the following strain: 

Choo a choo a choo tooth.
Muntch, muntch. Nycey!
Choo a choo a choo tooth.
Muntch, muntch. Nycey! 
    As the shades of night were by this time closing in, these expressions were 
supposed to embody this simple people's views of the evening hymn. But it too soon 
appeared that the song was a translation of 'For what we are going to receive,' &c. 

    The chief, imposingly decorated with feathers of lively colours, and having the 
majestic appearance of a fighting parrot, no sooner understood (he understood English 
perfectly) that the ship was 'The Beauty,' Capt. Boldheart, than he fell upon his face on 
the deck, and could not be persuaded to rise until the captain had lifted him up, and told 
him he wouldn't hurt him. All the rest of the savages also fell on their faces with marks 
of terror, and had also to be lifted up one by one. Thus the fame of the great Boldheart 
had gone before him, even among these children of Nature. 

    Turtles and oysters were now produced in astonishing numbers; and on these and 
yams the people made a hearty meal. After dinner the chief told Capt. Boldheart that 
there was better feeding up at the village, and that he would be glad to take him and his 
officers there. Apprehensive of treachery, Boldheart ordered his boat's crew to attend 
him completely armed. And well were it for other commanders if their precautions-but 
let us not anticipate. 

    When the canoes arrived at the beach, the darkness of the night was illumined by 
the light of an immense fire. Ordering his boat's crew (with the intrepid though illiterate 
William at their head) to keep close and be upon their guard, Boldheart bravely went on, 
arm in arm with the chief. 

    But how to depict the captain's surprise when he found a ring of savages singing in 
chorus that barbarous translation of 'For what we are going to receive,' &c., which has 
been given above, and dancing hand in hand round the Latin-grammar master, in a 
hamper with his head shaved, while two savages floured him, before putting him to the 
fire to be cooked! 

    Boldheart now took counsel with his officers on the course to be adopted. In the 
mean time, the miserable captive never ceased begging pardon and imploring to be 
delivered. On the generous Boldheart's proposal, it was at length resolved that he should 
not be cooked, but should be allowed to remain raw, on two conditions, namely: 

    1. That he should never, under any circumstances, presume to teach any boy 
anything any more. 

    2. That, if taken back to England, he should pass his life in travelling to find out 
boys who wanted their exercises done, and should do their exercises for those boys for 
nothing, and never say a word about it. 

    Drawing the sword from its sheath, Boldheart swore him to these conditions on its 
shining blade. The prisoner wept bitterly, and appeared acutely to feel the errors of his 
past career. 

    The captain then ordered his boat's crew to make ready for a volley, and after firing 
to re-load quickly. 'And expect a score or two on ye to go head over heels,' murmured 
William Boozey; 'for I'm a-looking at ye.' With those words, the derisive though deadly 
William took a good aim. 

    'Fire!' 

    The ringing voice of Boldheart was lost in the report of the guns and the screeching 
of the savages. Volley after volley awakened the numerous echoes. Hundreds of savages 
were killed, hundreds wounded, and thousands ran howling into the woods. The 
Latin-grammar master had a spare night-cap lent him, and a long-tail coat, which he 
wore hind side before. He presented a ludicrous though pitiable appearance, and serve 
him right. 

    We now find Capt. Boldheart, with this rescued wretch on board, standing off for 
other islands. At one of these, not a cannibal island, but a pork and vegetable one, he 
married (only in fun on his part) the king's daughter. Here he rested some time, 
receiving from the natives great quantities of precious stones, gold dust, elephants' teeth, 
and sandal wood, and getting very rich. This, too, though he almost every day made 
presents of enormous value to his men. 

    The ship being at length as full as she could hold of all sorts of valuable things, 
Boldheart gave orders to weigh the anchor, and turn 'The Beauty's' head towards 
England. These orders were obeyed with three cheers; and ere the sun went down full 
many a hornpipe had been danced on deck by the uncouth though agile William. 

    We next find Capt. Boldheart about three leagues off Madeira, surveying through 
his spy-glass a stranger of suspicious appearance making sail towards him. On his firing 
a gun ahead of her to bring her to, she ran up a flag, which he instantly recognised as the 
flag from the mast in the back-garden at home. 

    Inferring from this, that his father had put to sea to seek his long-lost son, the 
captain sent his own boat on board the stranger to inquire if this was so, and, if so, 
whether his father's intentions were strictly honourable. The boat came back with a 
present of greens and fresh meat, and reported that the stranger was 'The Family,' of 
twelve hundred tons, and had not only the captain's father on board, but also his mother, 
with the majority of his aunts and uncles, and all his cousins. It was further reported to 
Boldheart that the whole of these relations had expressed themselves in a becoming 
manner, and were anxious to embrace him and thank him for the glorious credit he had 
done them. Boldheart at once invited them to breakfast next morning on board 'The 
Beauty,' and gave orders for a brilliant ball that should last all day. 

    It was in the course of the night that the captain discovered the hopelessness of 
reclaiming the Latin-grammar master. That thankless traitor was found out, as the two 
ships lay near each other, communicating with 'The Family' by signals, and offering to 
give up Boldheart. He was hanged at the yard-arm the first thing in the morning, after 
having it impressively pointed out to him by Boldheart that this was what spiters came 
to. 

    The meeting between the captain and his parents was attended with tears. His 
uncles and aunts would have attended their meeting with tears too, but he wasn't going 
to stand that. His cousins were very much astonished by the size of his ship and the 
discipline of his men, and were greatly overcome by the splendour of his uniform. He 
kindly conducted them round the vessel, and pointed out everything worthy of notice. 
He also fired his hundred guns, and found it amusing to witness their alarm. 

    The entertainment surpassed everything ever seen on board ship, and lasted from 
ten in the morning until seven the next morning. Only one disagreeable incident 
occurred. Capt. Boldheart found himself obliged to put his cousin Tom in irons, for 
being disrespectful. On the boy's promising amendment, however, he was humanely 
released after a few hours' close confinement. 

    Boldheart now took his mother down into the great cabin, and asked after the 
young lady with whom, it was well known to the world, he was in love. His mother 
replied that the object of his affections was then at school at Margate, for the benefit of 
sea-bathing (it was the month of September), but that she feared the young lady's friends 
were still opposed to the union. Boldheart at once resolved, if necessary, to bombard the 
town. 

    Taking the command of his ship with this intention, and putting all but fighting 
men on board 'The Family,' with orders to that vessel to keep in company, Boldheart 
soon anchored in Margate Roads. Here he went ashore well-armed, and attended by his 
boat's crew (at their head the faithful though ferocious William), and demanded to see 
the mayor, who came out of his office. 

    'Dost know the name of yon ship, mayor?' asked Boldheart fiercely. 

    'No,' said the mayor, rubbing his eyes, which he could scarce believe, when he saw 
the goodly vessel riding at anchor. 

    'She is named "The Beauty,"' said the captain. 

    'Hah!' exclaimed the mayor, with a start. 'And you, then, are Capt. Boldheart?' 

    'The same.' 

    A pause ensued. The mayor trembled. 

    'Now, mayor,' said the captain, 'choose! Help me to my bride, or be bombarded.' 

    The mayor begged for two hours' grace, in which to make inquiries respecting the 
young lady. Boldheart accorded him but one; and during that one placed William 
Boozey sentry over him, with a drawn sword, and instructions to accompany him 
wherever he went, and to run him through the body if he showed a sign of playing false. 

    At the end of the hour the mayor re-appeared more dead than alive, closely waited 
on by Boozey more alive than dead. 

    'Captain,' said the mayor, 'I have ascertained that the young lady is going to bathe. 
Even now she waits her turn for a machine. The tide is low, though rising. I, in one of 
our town-boats, shall not be suspected. When she comes forth in her bathing-dress into 
the shallow water from behind the hood of the machine, my boat shall intercept her and 
prevent her return. Do you the rest.' 

    'Mayor,' returned Capt. Boldheart, 'thou hast saved thy town.' 

    The captain then signalled his boat to take him off, and, steering her himself, 
ordered her crew to row towards the bathing-ground, and there to rest upon their oars. 
All happened as had been arranged. His lovely bride came forth, the mayor glided in 
behind her, she became confused, and had floated out of her depth, when, with one 
skilful touch of the rudder and one quivering stroke from the boat's crew, her adoring 
Boldheart held her in his strong arms. There her shrieks of terror were changed to cries 
of joy. 

    Before 'The Beauty' could get under way, the hoisting of all the flags in the town 
and harbour, and the ringing of all the bells, announced to the brave Boldheart that he 
had nothing to fear. He therefore determined to be married on the spot, and signalled for 
a clergyman and clerk, who came off promptly in a sailing-boat named 'The Skylark.' 
Another great entertainment was then given on board 'The Beauty,' in the midst of 
which the mayor was called out by a messenger. He returned with the news that 
government had sent down to know whether Capt. Boldheart, in acknowledgment of the 
great services he had done his country by being a pirate, would consent to be made a 
lieutenant-colonel. For himself he would have spurned the worthless boon; but his bride 
wished it, and he consented. 

    Only one thing further happened before the good ship 'Family' was dismissed, with 
rich presents to all on board. It is painful to record (but such is human nature in some 
cousins) that Capt. Boldheart's unmannerly Cousin Tom was actually tied up to receive 
three dozen with a rope's end 'for cheekiness and making game,' when Capt. Boldheart's 
lady begged for him, and he was spared. 'The Beauty' then refitted, and the captain and 
his bride departed for the Indian Ocean to enjoy themselves for evermore. 


PART IV.
ROMANCE. FROM THE PEN OF MISS NETTIE
ASHFORD (Aged half-past six.)

 THERE is a country, which I will show you when I get into maps, where the children 
have everything their own way. It is a most delightful country to live in. The grown-up 
people are obliged to obey the children, and are never allowed to sit up to supper, except 
on their birthdays. The children order them to make jam and jelly and marmalade, and 
tarts and pies and puddings, and all manner of pastry. If they say they won't, they are 
put in the corner till they do. They are sometimes allowed to have some; but when they 
have some, they generally have powders given them afterwards. 

    One of the inhabitants of this country, a truly sweet young creature of the name of 
Mrs. Orange, had the misfortune to be sadly plagued by her numerous family. Her 
parents required a great deal of looking after, and they had connections and companions 
who were scarcely ever out of mischief. So Mrs. Orange said to herself, 'I really cannot 
be troubled with these torments any longer: I must put them all to school.' 

    Mrs. Orange took off her pinafore, and dressed herself very nicely, and took up her 
baby, and went out to call upon another lady of the name of Mrs. Lemon, who kept a 
preparatory establishment. Mrs. Orange stood upon the scraper to pull at the bell, and 
give a ring-ting-ting. 

    Mrs. Lemon's neat little housemaid, pulling up her socks as she came along the 
passage, answered the ring-ting-ting. 

    'Good-morning,' said Mrs. Orange. 'Fine day. How do you do? Mrs. Lemon at 
home!' 

    'Yes, ma'am.' 

    'Will you say Mrs. Orange and baby?' 

    'Yes, ma'am. Walk in.' 

    Mrs. Orange's baby was a very fine one, and real wax all over. Mrs. Lemon's baby 
was leather and bran. However, when Mrs. Lemon came into the drawing-room with her 
baby in her arms, Mrs. Orange said politely, 'Good-morning. Fine day. How do you do? 
And how is little Tootleumboots?' 

    'Well, she is but poorly. Cutting her teeth, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 

    'O, indeed, ma'am!' said Mrs. Orange. 'No fits, I hope?' 

    'No, ma'am.' 

    'How many teeth has she, ma'am?' 

    'Five, ma'am.' 

    'My Emilia, ma'am, has eight,' said Mrs. Orange. 'Shall we lay them on the 
mantelpiece side by side, while we converse?' 

    'By all means, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 'Hem!' 

    'The first question is, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange, 'I don't bore you?' 

    'Not in the least, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 'Far from it, I assure you.' 

    'Then pray have you,' said Mrs. Orange,-'have you any vacancies?' 

    'Yes, ma'am. How many might you require?' 

    'Why, the truth is, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange, 'I have come to the conclusion that 
my children,'-O, I forgot to say that they call the grown-up people children in that 
country!-'that my children are getting positively too much for me. Let me see. Two 
parents, two intimate friends of theirs, one godfather, two godmothers, and an aunt. 
Have you as many as eight vacancies?' 

    'I have just eight, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 

    'Most fortunate! Terms moderate, I think?' 

    'Very moderate, ma'am.' 

    'Diet good, I believe?' 

    'Excellent, ma'am.' 

    'Unlimited?' 

    'Unlimited.' 

    'Most satisfactory! Corporal punishment dispensed with?' 

    'Why, we do occasionally shake,' said Mrs. Lemon, 'and we have slapped. But only 
in extreme cases.' 

    'Could I, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange,-'could I see the establishment?' 

    'With the greatest of pleasure, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 

    Mrs. Lemon took Mrs. Orange into the schoolroom, where there were a number of 
pupils. 'Stand up, children,' said Mrs. Lemon; and they all stood up. 

    Mrs. Orange whispered to Mrs. Lemon, 'There is a pale, bald child, with red 
whiskers, in disgrace. Might I ask what he has done?' 

    'Come here, White,' said Mrs. Lemon, 'and tell this lady what you have been 
doing.' 

    'Betting on horses,' said White sulkily. 

    'Are you sorry for it, you naughty child?' said Mrs. Lemon. 

    'No,' said White. 'Sorry to lose, but shouldn't be sorry to win.' 

    'There's a vicious boy for you, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 'Go along with you, sir. 
This is Brown, Mrs. Orange. O, a sad case, Brown's! Never knows when he has had 
enough. Greedy. How is your gout, sir?' 

    'Bad,' said Brown. 

    'What else can you expect?' said Mrs. Lemon. 'Your stomach is the size of two. Go 
and take exercise directly. Mrs. Black, come here to me. Now, here is a child, Mrs. 
Orange, ma'am, who is always at play. She can't be kept at home a single day together; 
always gadding about and spoiling her clothes. Play, play, play, play, from morning to 
night, and to morning again. How can she expect to improve?' 

    'Don't expect to improve,' sulked Mrs. Black. 'Don't want to.' 

    'There is a specimen of her temper, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 'To see her when she 
is tearing about, neglecting everything else, you would suppose her to be at least 
good-humoured. But bless you! ma'am, she is as pert and flouncing a minx as ever you 
met with in all your days!' 

    'You must have a great deal of trouble with them, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange. 

    'Ah, I have, indeed, ma'am!' said Mrs. Lemon. 'What with their tempers, what with 
their quarrels, what with their never knowing what's good for them, and what with their 
always wanting to domineer, deliver me from these unreasonable children!' 

    'Well, I wish you good-morning, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange. 

    'Well, I wish you good-morning, ma'am,' said Mrs. Lemon. 

    So Mrs. Orange took up her baby and went home, and told the family that plagued 
her so that they were all going to be sent to school. They said they didn't want to go to 
school; but she packed up their boxes, and packed them off. 

    'O dear me, dear me! Rest and be thankful!' said Mrs. Orange, throwing herself 
back in her little arm-chair. 'Those troublesome troubles are got rid of, please the pigs!' 

    Just then another lady, named Mrs. Alicumpaine, came calling at the street-door 
with a ring-ting-ting. 

    'My dear Mrs. Alicumpaine,' said Mrs. Orange, 'how do you do? Pray stay to 
dinner. We have but a simple joint of sweet-stuff, followed by a plain dish of bread and 
treacle; but, if you will take us as you find us, it will be so kind!' 

    'Don't mention it,' said Mrs. Alicumpaine. 'I shall be too glad. But what do you 
think I have come for, ma'am? Guess, ma'am.' 

    'I really cannot guess, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange. 

    'Why, I am going to have a small juvenile party to-night,' said Mrs. Alicumpaine; 
'and if you and Mr. Orange and baby would but join us, we should be complete.' 

    'More than charmed, I am sure!' said Mrs. Orange. 

    'So kind of you!' said Mrs. Alicumpaine. 'But I hope the children won't bore you?' 

    'Dear things! Not at all,' said Mrs. Orange. 'I dote upon them.' 

    Mr. Orange here came home from the city; and he came, too, with a ring-ting-ting. 

    'James love,' said Mrs. Orange, 'you look tired. What has been doing in the city 
to-day?' 

    'Trap, bat, and ball, my dear,' said Mr. Orange, 'and it knocks a man up.' 

    'That dreadfully anxious city, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange to Mrs. Alicumpaine; 'so 
wearing, is it not?' 

    'O, so trying!' said Mrs. Alicumpaine. 'John has lately been speculating in the 
peg-top ring; and I often say to him at night, "John, is the result worth the wear and 
tear?"' 

    Dinner was ready by this time: so they sat down to dinner; and while Mr. Orange 
carved the joint of sweet-stuff, he said, 'It's a poor heart that never rejoices. Jane, go 
down to the cellar, and fetch a bottle of the Upest ginger-beer.' 

    At tea-time, Mr. and Mrs. Orange, and baby, and Mrs. Alicumpaine went off to 
Mrs. Alicumpaine's house. The children had not come yet; but the ball-room was ready 
for them, decorated with paper flowers. 

    'How very sweet!' said Mrs. Orange. 'The dear things! How pleased they will be!' 

    'I don't care for children myself,' said Mr. Orange, gaping. 

    'Not for girls?' said Mrs. Alicumpaine. 'Come! you care for girls?' 

    Mr. Orange shook his head, and gaped again. 'Frivolous and vain, ma'am.' 

    'My dear James,' cried Mrs. Orange, who had been peeping about, 'do look here. 
Here's the supper for the darlings, ready laid in the room behind the folding-doors. 
Here's their little pickled salmon, I do declare! And here's their little salad, and their 
little roast beef and fowls, and their little pastry, and their wee, wee, wee champagne!' 

    'Yes, I thought it best, ma'am,' said Mrs. Alicumpaine, 'that they should have their 
supper by themselves. Our table is in the corner here, where the gentlemen can have 
their wineglass of negus, and their egg-sandwich, and their quiet game at 
beggar-my-neighbour, and look on. As for us, ma'am, we shall have quite enough to do 
to manage the company.' 

    'O, indeed, you may say so! Quite enough, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange. 

    The company began to come. The first of them was a stout boy, with a white 
top-knot and spectacles. The housemaid brought him in and said, 'Compliments, and at 
what time was he to be fetched!' Mrs. Alicumpaine said, 'Not a moment later than ten. 
How do you do, sir? Go and sit down.' Then a number of other children came; boys by 
themselves, and girls by themselves, and boys and girls together. They didn't behave at 
all well. Some of them looked through quizzing-glasses at others, and said, 'Who are 
those? Don't know them.' Some of them looked through quizzing-glasses at others, and 
said, 'How do?' Some of them had cups of tea or coffee handed to them by others, and 
said, 'Thanks; much!' A good many boys stood about, and felt their shirt-collars. Four 
tiresome fat boys would stand in the doorway, and talk about the newspapers, till Mrs. 
Alicumpaine went to them and said, 'My dears, I really cannot allow you to prevent 
people from coming in. I shall be truly sorry to do it; but, if you put yourself in 
everybody's way, I must positively send you home.' One boy, with a beard and a large 
white waistcoat, who stood straddling on the hearth-rug warming his coat-tails, was sent 
home. 'Highly incorrect, my dear,' said Mrs. Alicumpaine, handing him out of the room, 
'and I cannot permit it.' 

    There was a children's band,-harp, cornet, and piano,-and Mrs. Alicumpaine and 
Mrs. Orange bustled among the children to persuade them to take partners and dance. 
But they were so obstinate! For quite a long time they would not be persuaded to take 
partners and dance. Most of the boys said, 'Thanks; much! But not at present.' And most 
of the rest of the boys said, 'Thanks; much! But never do.' 

    'O, these children are very wearing!' said Mrs. Alicumpaine to Mrs. Orange. 

    'Dear things! I dote upon them; but they ARE wearing,' said Mrs. Orange to Mrs. 
Alicumpaine. 

    At last they did begin in a slow and melancholy way to slide about to the music; 
though even then they wouldn't mind what they were told, but would have this partner, 
and wouldn't have that partner, and showed temper about it. And they wouldn't 
smile,-no, not on any account they wouldn't; but, when the music stopped, went round 
and round the room in dismal twos, as if everybody else was dead. 

    'O, it's very hard indeed to get these vexing children to be entertained!' said Mrs. 
Alicumpaine to Mrs. Orange. 

    'I dote upon the darlings; but it is hard,' said Mrs. Orange to Mrs. Alicumpaine. 

    They were trying children, that's the truth. First, they wouldn't sing when they were 
asked; and then, when everybody fully believed they wouldn't, they would. 'If you serve 
us so any more, my love,' said Mrs. Alicumpaine to a tall child, with a good deal of 
white back, in mauve silk trimmed with lace, 'it will be my painful privilege to offer you 
a bed, and to send you to it immediately.' 

    The girls were so ridiculously dressed, too, that they were in rags before supper. 
How could the boys help treading on their trains? And yet when their trains were 
trodden on, they often showed temper again, and looked as black, they did! However, 
they all seemed to be pleased when Mrs. Alicumpaine said, 'Supper is ready, children!' 
And they went crowding and pushing in, as if they had had dry bread for dinner. 

    'How are the children getting on?' said Mr. Orange to Mrs. Orange, when Mrs. 
Orange came to look after baby. Mrs. Orange had left baby on a shelf near Mr. Orange 
while he played at beggar-my-neighbour, and had asked him to keep his eye upon her 
now and then. 

    'Most charmingly, my dear!' said Mrs. Orange. 'So droll to see their little flirtations 
and jealousies! Do come and look!' 

    'Much obliged to you, my dear,' said Mr. Orange; 'but I don't care about children 
myself.' 

    So Mrs. Orange, having seen that baby was safe, went back without Mr. Orange to 
the room where the children were having supper. 

    'What are they doing now?' said Mrs. Orange to Mrs. Alicumpaine. 

    'They are making speeches, and playing at parliament,' said Mrs. Alicumpaine to 
Mrs. Orange. 

    On hearing this, Mrs. Orange set off once more back again to Mr. Orange, and said, 
'James dear, do come. The children are playing at parliament.' 

    'Thank you, my dear,' said Mr. Orange, 'but I don't care about parliament myself.' 

    So Mrs. Orange went once again without Mr. Orange to the room where the 
children were having supper, to see them playing at parliament. And she found some of 
the boys crying, 'Hear, hear, hear!' while other boys cried 'No, no!' and others, 
'Question!' 'Spoke!' and all sorts of nonsense that ever you heard. Then one of those 
tiresome fat boys who had stopped the doorway told them he was on his legs (as if they 
couldn't see that he wasn't on his head, or on his anything else) to explain, and that, with 
the permission of his honourable friend, if he would allow him to call him so (another 
tiresome boy bowed), he would proceed to explain. Then he went on for a long time in a 
sing-song (whatever he meant), did this troublesome fat boy, about that he held in his 
hand a glass; and about that he had come down to that house that night to discharge 
what he would call a public duty; and about that, on the present occasion, he would lay 
his hand (his other hand) upon his heart, and would tell honourable gentlemen that he 
was about to open the door to general approval. Then he opened the door by saying, 'To 
our hostess!' and everybody else said 'To our hostess!' and then there were cheers. Then 
another tiresome boy started up in sing-song, and then half a dozen noisy and 
nonsensical boys at once. But at last Mrs. Alicumpaine said, 'I cannot have this din. 
Now, children, you have played at parliament very nicely; but parliament gets tiresome 
after a little while, and it's time you left off, for you will soon be fetched.' 

    After another dance (with more tearing to rags than before supper), they began to 
be fetched; and you will be very glad to be told that the tiresome fat boy who had been 
on his legs was walked off first without any ceremony. When they were all gone, poor 
Mrs. Alicumpaine dropped upon a sofa, and said to Mrs. Orange, 'These children will be 
the death of me at last, ma'am,-they will indeed!' 

    'I quite adore them, ma'am,' said Mrs. Orange; 'but they DO want variety.' 

    Mr. Orange got his hat, and Mrs. Orange got her bonnet and her baby, and they set 
out to walk home. They had to pass Mrs. Lemon's preparatory establishment on their 
way. 

    'I wonder, James dear,' said Mrs. Orange, looking up at the window, 'whether the 
precious children are asleep!' 

    'I don't care much whether they are or not, myself,' said Mr. Orange. 

    'James dear!' 

    'You dote upon them, you know,' said Mr. Orange. 'That's another thing.' 

    'I do,' said Mrs. Orange rapturously. 'O, I DO!' 

    'I don't,' said Mr. Orange. 

    'But I was thinking, James love,' said Mrs. Orange, pressing his arm, 'whether our 
dear, good, kind Mrs. Lemon would like them to stay the holidays with her.' 

    'If she was paid for it, I daresay she would,' said Mr. Orange. 

    'I adore them, James,' said Mrs. Orange, 'but SUPPOSE we pay her, then!' 

    This was what brought that country to such perfection, and made it such a 
delightful place to live in. The grown-up people (that would be in other countries) soon 
left off being allowed any holidays after Mr. and Mrs. Orange tried the experiment; and 
the children (that would be in other countries) kept them at school as long as ever they 
lived, and made them do whatever they were told. 


THE END.


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DICKENS MISCELLANY
**********************************************

GEORGE SILVERMAN'S EXPLANATION

CHARLES DICKENS


FIRST CHAPTER



IT happened in this wise -

But, sitting with my pen in my hand looking at those words again,
without descrying any hint in them of the words that should follow,
it comes into my mind that they have an abrupt appearance.  They
may serve, however, if I let them remain, to suggest how very
difficult I find it to begin to explain my explanation.  An uncouth
phrase: and yet I do not see my way to a better.



SECOND CHAPTER



IT happened in THIS wise -

But, looking at those words, and comparing them with my former
opening, I find they are the self-same words repeated.  This is the
more surprising to me, because I employ them in quite a new
connection.  For indeed I declare that my intention was to discard
the commencement I first had in my thoughts, and to give the
preference to another of an entirely different nature, dating my
explanation from an anterior period of my life.  I will make a
third trial, without erasing this second failure, protesting that
it is not my design to conceal any of my infirmities, whether they
be of head or heart.



THIRD CHAPTER



NOT as yet directly aiming at how it came to pass, I will come upon
it by degrees.  The natural manner, after all, for God knows that
is how it came upon me.

My parents were in a miserable condition of life, and my infant
home was a cellar in Preston.  I recollect the sound of father's
Lancashire clogs on the street pavement above, as being different
in my young hearing from the sound of all other clogs; and I
recollect, that, when mother came down the cellar-steps, I used
tremblingly to speculate on her feet having a good or an ill-
tempered look, - on her knees, - on her waist, - until finally her
face came into view, and settled the question.  From this it will
be seen that I was timid, and that the cellar-steps were steep, and
that the doorway was very low.

Mother had the gripe and clutch of poverty upon her face, upon her
figure, and not least of all upon her voice.  Her sharp and high-
pitched words were squeezed out of her, as by the compression of
bony fingers on a leathern bag; and she had a way of rolling her
eyes about and about the cellar, as she scolded, that was gaunt and
hungry.  Father, with his shoulders rounded, would sit quiet on a
three-legged stool, looking at the empty grate, until she would
pluck the stool from under him, and bid him go bring some money
home.  Then he would dismally ascend the steps; and I, holding my
ragged shirt and trousers together with a hand (my only braces),
would feint and dodge from mother's pursuing grasp at my hair.

A worldly little devil was mother's usual name for me.  Whether I
cried for that I was in the dark, or for that it was cold, or for
that I was hungry, or whether I squeezed myself into a warm corner
when there was a fire, or ate voraciously when there was food, she
would still say, 'O, you worldly little devil!'  And the sting of
it was, that I quite well knew myself to be a worldly little devil.
Worldly as to wanting to be housed and warmed, worldly as to
wanting to be fed, worldly as to the greed with which I inwardly
compared how much I got of those good things with how much father
and mother got, when, rarely, those good things were going.

Sometimes they both went away seeking work; and then I would be
locked up in the cellar for a day or two at a time.  I was at my
worldliest then.  Left alone, I yielded myself up to a worldly
yearning for enough of anything (except misery), and for the death
of mother's father, who was a machine-maker at Birmingham, and on
whose decease, I had heard mother say, she would come into a whole
courtful of houses 'if she had her rights.'  Worldly little devil,
I would stand about, musingly fitting my cold bare feet into
cracked bricks and crevices of the damp cellar-floor, - walking
over my grandfather's body, so to speak, into the courtful of
houses, and selling them for meat and drink, and clothes to wear.

At last a change came down into our cellar.  The universal change
came down even as low as that, - so will it mount to any height on
which a human creature can perch, - and brought other changes with
it.

We had a heap of I don't know what foul litter in the darkest
corner, which we called 'the bed.'  For three days mother lay upon
it without getting up, and then began at times to laugh.  If I had
ever heard her laugh before, it had been so seldom that the strange
sound frightened me.  It frightened father too; and we took it by
turns to give her water.  Then she began to move her head from side
to side, and sing.  After that, she getting no better, father fell
a-laughing and a-singing; and then there was only I to give them
both water, and they both died.



FOURTH CHAPTER



WHEN I was lifted out of the cellar by two men, of whom one came
peeping down alone first, and ran away and brought the other, I
could hardly bear the light of the street.  I was sitting in the
road-way, blinking at it, and at a ring of people collected around
me, but not close to me, when, true to my character of worldly
little devil, I broke silence by saying, 'I am hungry and thirsty!'

'Does he know they are dead?' asked one of another.

'Do you know your father and mother are both dead of fever?' asked
a third of me severely.

'I don't know what it is to be dead.  I supposed it meant that,
when the cup rattled against their teeth, and the water spilt over
them.  I am hungry and thirsty.'  That was all I had to say about
it.

The ring of people widened outward from the inner side as I looked
around me; and I smelt vinegar, and what I know to be camphor,
thrown in towards where I sat.  Presently some one put a great
vessel of smoking vinegar on the ground near me; and then they all
looked at me in silent horror as I ate and drank of what was
brought for me.  I knew at the time they had a horror of me, but I
couldn't help it.

I was still eating and drinking, and a murmur of discussion had
begun to arise respecting what was to be done with me next, when I
heard a cracked voice somewhere in the ring say, 'My name is
Hawkyard, Mr. Verity Hawkyard, of West Bromwich.'  Then the ring
split in one place; and a yellow-faced, peak-nosed gentleman, clad
all in iron-gray to his gaiters, pressed forward with a policeman
and another official of some sort.  He came forward close to the
vessel of smoking vinegar; from which he sprinkled himself
carefully, and me copiously.

'He had a grandfather at Birmingham, this young boy, who is just
dead too,' said Mr. Hawkyard.

I turned my eyes upon the speaker, and said in a ravening manner,
'Where's his houses?'

'Hah!  Horrible worldliness on the edge of the grave,' said Mr.
Hawkyard, casting more of the vinegar over me, as if to get my
devil out of me.  'I have undertaken a slight - a very slight -
trust in behalf of this boy; quite a voluntary trust: a matter of
mere honour, if not of mere sentiment: still I have taken it upon
myself, and it shall be (O, yes, it shall be!) discharged.'

The bystanders seemed to form an opinion of this gentleman much
more favourable than their opinion of me.

'He shall be taught,' said Mr. Hawkyard, '(O, yes, he shall be
taught!) but what is to be done with him for the present?  He may
be infected.  He may disseminate infection.'  The ring widened
considerably.  'What is to be done with him?'

He held some talk with the two officials.  I could distinguish no
word save 'Farm-house.'  There was another sound several times
repeated, which was wholly meaningless in my ears then, but which I
knew afterwards to be 'Hoghton Towers.'

'Yes,' said Mr. Hawkyard.  'I think that sounds promising; I think
that sounds hopeful.  And he can be put by himself in a ward, for a
night or two, you say?'

It seemed to be the police-officer who had said so; for it was he
who replied, Yes!  It was he, too, who finally took me by the arm,
and walked me before him through the streets, into a whitewashed
room in a bare building, where I had a chair to sit in, a table to
sit at, an iron bedstead and good mattress to lie upon, and a rug
and blanket to cover me.  Where I had enough to eat too, and was
shown how to clean the tin porringer in which it was conveyed to
me, until it was as good as a looking-glass.  Here, likewise, I was
put in a bath, and had new clothes brought to me; and my old rags
were burnt, and I was camphored and vinegared and disinfected in a
variety of ways.

When all this was done, - I don't know in how many days or how few,
but it matters not, - Mr. Hawkyard stepped in at the door,
remaining close to it, and said, 'Go and stand against the opposite
wall, George Silverman.  As far off as you can.  That'll do.  How
do you feel?'

I told him that I didn't feel cold, and didn't feel hungry, and
didn't feel thirsty.  That was the whole round of human feelings,
as far as I knew, except the pain of being beaten.

'Well,' said he, 'you are going, George, to a healthy farm-house to
be purified.  Keep in the air there as much as you can.  Live an
out-of-door life there, until you are fetched away.  You had better
not say much - in fact, you had better be very careful not to say
anything - about what your parents died of, or they might not like
to take you in.  Behave well, and I'll put you to school; O, yes!
I'll put you to school, though I'm not obligated to do it.  I am a
servant of the Lord, George; and I have been a good servant to him,
I have, these five-and-thirty years.  The Lord has had a good
servant in me, and he knows it.'

What I then supposed him to mean by this, I cannot imagine.  As
little do I know when I began to comprehend that he was a prominent
member of some obscure denomination or congregation, every member
of which held forth to the rest when so inclined, and among whom he
was called Brother Hawkyard.  It was enough for me to know, on that
day in the ward, that the farmer's cart was waiting for me at the
street corner.  I was not slow to get into it; for it was the first
ride I ever had in my life.

It made me sleepy, and I slept.  First, I stared at Preston streets
as long as they lasted; and, meanwhile, I may have had some small
dumb wondering within me whereabouts our cellar was; but I doubt
it.  Such a worldly little devil was I, that I took no thought who
would bury father and mother, or where they would be buried, or
when.  The question whether the eating and drinking by day, and the
covering by night, would be as good at the farm-house as at the
ward superseded those questions.

The jolting of the cart on a loose stony road awoke me; and I found
that we were mounting a steep hill, where the road was a rutty by-
road through a field.  And so, by fragments of an ancient terrace,
and by some rugged outbuildings that had once been fortified, and
passing under a ruined gateway we came to the old farm-house in the
thick stone wall outside the old quadrangle of Hoghton Towers:
which I looked at like a stupid savage, seeing no specially in,
seeing no antiquity in; assuming all farm-houses to resemble it;
assigning the decay I noticed to the one potent cause of all ruin
that I knew, - poverty; eyeing the pigeons in their flights, the
cattle in their stalls, the ducks in the pond, and the fowls
pecking about the yard, with a hungry hope that plenty of them
might be killed for dinner while I stayed there; wondering whether
the scrubbed dairy vessels, drying in the sunlight, could be goodly
porringers out of which the master ate his belly-filling food, and
which he polished when he had done, according to my ward
experience; shrinkingly doubtful whether the shadows, passing over
that airy height on the bright spring day, were not something in
the nature of frowns, - sordid, afraid, unadmiring, - a small brute
to shudder at.

To that time I had never had the faintest impression of duty.  I
had had no knowledge whatever that there was anything lovely in
this life.  When I had occasionally slunk up the cellar-steps into
the street, and glared in at shop-windows, I had done so with no
higher feelings than we may suppose to animate a mangy young dog or
wolf-cub.  It is equally the fact that I had never been alone, in
the sense of holding unselfish converse with myself.  I had been
solitary often enough, but nothing better.

Such was my condition when I sat down to my dinner that day, in the
kitchen of the old farm-house.  Such was my condition when I lay on
my bed in the old farm-house that night, stretched out opposite the
narrow mullioned window, in the cold light of the moon, like a
young vampire.



FIFTH CHAPTER



WHAT do I know of Hoghton Towers?  Very little; for I have been
gratefully unwilling to disturb my first impressions.  A house,
centuries old, on high ground a mile or so removed from the road
between Preston and Blackburn, where the first James of England, in
his hurry to make money by making baronets, perhaps made some of
those remunerative dignitaries.  A house, centuries old, deserted
and falling to pieces, its woods and gardens long since grass-land
or ploughed up, the Rivers Ribble and Darwen glancing below it, and
a vague haze of smoke, against which not even the supernatural
prescience of the first Stuart could foresee a counter-blast,
hinting at steam-power, powerful in two distances.

What did I know then of Hoghton Towers?  When I first peeped in at
the gate of the lifeless quadrangle, and started from the
mouldering statue becoming visible to me like its guardian ghost;
when I stole round by the back of the farm-house, and got in among
the ancient rooms, many of them with their floors and ceilings
falling, the beams and rafters hanging dangerously down, the
plaster dropping as I trod, the oaken panels stripped away, the
windows half walled up, half broken; when I discovered a gallery
commanding the old kitchen, and looked down between balustrades
upon a massive old table and benches, fearing to see I know not
what dead-alive creatures come in and seat themselves, and look up
with I know not what dreadful eyes, or lack of eyes, at me; when
all over the house I was awed by gaps and chinks where the sky
stared sorrowfully at me, where the birds passed, and the ivy
rustled, and the stains of winter weather blotched the rotten
floors; when down at the bottom of dark pits of staircase, into
which the stairs had sunk, green leaves trembled, butterflies
fluttered, and bees hummed in and out through the broken door-ways;
when encircling the whole ruin were sweet scents, and sights of
fresh green growth, and ever-renewing life, that I had never
dreamed of, - I say, when I passed into such clouded perception of
these things as my dark soul could compass, what did I know then of
Hoghton Towers?

I have written that the sky stared sorrowfully at me.  Therein have
I anticipated the answer.  I knew that all these things looked
sorrowfully at me; that they seemed to sigh or whisper, not without
pity for me, 'Alas! poor worldly little devil!'

There were two or three rats at the bottom of one of the smaller
pits of broken staircase when I craned over and looked in.  They
were scuffling for some prey that was there; and, when they started
and hid themselves close together in the dark, I thought of the old
life (it had grown old already) in the cellar.

How not to be this worldly little devil? how not to have a
repugnance towards myself as I had towards the rats?  I hid in a
corner of one of the smaller chambers, frightened at myself, and
crying (it was the first time I had ever cried for any cause not
purely physical), and I tried to think about it.  One of the farm-
ploughs came into my range of view just then; and it seemed to help
me as it went on with its two horses up and down the field so
peacefully and quietly.

There was a girl of about my own age in the farm-house family, and
she sat opposite to me at the narrow table at meal-times.  It had
come into my mind, at our first dinner, that she might take the
fever from me.  The thought had not disquieted me then.  I had only
speculated how she would look under the altered circumstances, and
whether she would die.  But it came into my mind now, that I might
try to prevent her taking the fever by keeping away from her.  I
knew I should have but scrambling board if I did; so much the less
worldly and less devilish the deed would be, I thought.

From that hour, I withdrew myself at early morning into secret
corners of the ruined house, and remained hidden there until she
went to bed.  At first, when meals were ready, I used to hear them
calling me; and then my resolution weakened.  But I strengthened it
again by going farther off into the ruin, and getting out of
hearing.  I often watched for her at the dim windows; and, when I
saw that she was fresh and rosy, felt much happier.

Out of this holding her in my thoughts, to the humanising of
myself, I suppose some childish love arose within me.  I felt, in
some sort, dignified by the pride of protecting her, - by the pride
of making the sacrifice for her.  As my heart swelled with that new
feeling, it insensibly softened about mother and father.  It seemed
to have been frozen before, and now to be thawed.  The old ruin and
all the lovely things that haunted it were not sorrowful for me
only, but sorrowful for mother and father as well.  Therefore did I
cry again, and often too.

The farm-house family conceived me to be of a morose temper, and
were very short with me; though they never stinted me in such
broken fare as was to be got out of regular hours.  One night when
I lifted the kitchen latch at my usual time, Sylvia (that was her
pretty name) had but just gone out of the room.  Seeing her
ascending the opposite stairs, I stood still at the door.  She had
heard the clink of the latch, and looked round.

'George,' she called to me in a pleased voice, 'to-morrow is my
birthday; and we are to have a fiddler, and there's a party of boys
and girls coming in a cart, and we shall dance.  I invite you.  Be
sociable for once, George.'

'I am very sorry, miss,' I answered; 'but I - but, no; I can't
come.'

'You are a disagreeable, ill-humoured lad,' she returned
disdainfully; 'and I ought not to have asked you.  I shall never
speak to you again.'

As I stood with my eyes fixed on the fire, after she was gone, I
felt that the farmer bent his brows upon me.

'Eh, lad!' said he; 'Sylvy's right.  You're as moody and broody a
lad as never I set eyes on yet.'

I tried to assure him that I meant no harm; but he only said
coldly, 'Maybe not, maybe not!  There, get thy supper, get thy
supper; and then thou canst sulk to thy heart's content again.'

Ah! if they could have seen me next day, in the ruin, watching for
the arrival of the cart full of merry young guests; if they could
have seen me at night, gliding out from behind the ghostly statue,
listening to the music and the fall of dancing feet, and watching
the lighted farm-house windows from the quadrangle when all the
ruin was dark; if they could have read my heart, as I crept up to
bed by the back way, comforting myself with the reflection, 'They
will take no hurt from me,' - they would not have thought mine a
morose or an unsocial nature.

It was in these ways that I began to form a shy disposition; to be
of a timidly silent character under misconstruction; to have an
inexpressible, perhaps a morbid, dread of ever being sordid or
worldly.  It was in these ways that my nature came to shape itself
to such a mould, even before it was affected by the influences of
the studious and retired life of a poor scholar.



SIXTH CHAPTER



BROTHER HAWKYARD (as he insisted on my calling him) put me to
school, and told me to work my way.  'You are all right, George,'
he said.  'I have been the best servant the Lord has had in his
service for this five-and-thirty year (O, I have!); and he knows
the value of such a servant as I have been to him (O, yes, he
does!); and he'll prosper your schooling as a part of my reward.
That's what HE'll do, George.  He'll do it for me.'

From the first I could not like this familiar knowledge of the ways
of the sublime, inscrutable Almighty, on Brother Hawkyard's part.
As I grew a little wiser, and still a little wiser, I liked it less
and less.  His manner, too, of confirming himself in a parenthesis,
- as if, knowing himself, he doubted his own word, - I found
distasteful.  I cannot tell how much these dislikes cost me; for I
had a dread that they were worldly.

As time went on, I became a Foundation-boy on a good foundation,
and I cost Brother Hawkyard nothing.  When I had worked my way so
far, I worked yet harder, in the hope of ultimately getting a
presentation to college and a fellowship.  My health has never been
strong (some vapour from the Preston cellar cleaves to me, I
think); and what with much work and some weakness, I came again to
be regarded - that is, by my fellow-students - as unsocial.

All through my time as a foundation-boy, I was within a few miles
of Brother Hawkyard's congregation; and whenever I was what we
called a leave-boy on a Sunday, I went over there at his desire.
Before the knowledge became forced upon me that outside their place
of meeting these brothers and sisters were no better than the rest
of the human family, but on the whole were, to put the case mildly,
as bad as most, in respect of giving short weight in their shops,
and not speaking the truth, - I say, before this knowledge became
forced upon me, their prolix addresses, their inordinate conceit,
their daring ignorance, their investment of the Supreme Ruler of
heaven and earth with their own miserable meannesses and
littlenesses, greatly shocked me.  Still, as their term for the
frame of mind that could not perceive them to be in an exalted
state of grace was the 'worldly' state, I did for a time suffer
tortures under my inquiries of myself whether that young worldly-
devilish spirit of mine could secretly be lingering at the bottom
of my non-appreciation.

Brother Hawkyard was the popular expounder in this assembly, and
generally occupied the platform (there was a little platform with a
table on it, in lieu of a pulpit) first, on a Sunday afternoon.  He
was by trade a drysalter.  Brother Gimblet, an elderly man with a
crabbed face, a large dog's-eared shirt-collar, and a spotted blue
neckerchief reaching up behind to the crown of his head, was also a
drysalter and an expounder.  Brother Gimblet professed the greatest
admiration for Brother Hawkyard, but (I had thought more than once)
bore him a jealous grudge.

Let whosoever may peruse these lines kindly take the pains here to
read twice my solemn pledge, that what I write of the language and
customs of the congregation in question I write scrupulously,
literally, exactly, from the life and the truth.

On the first Sunday after I had won what I had so long tried for,
and when it was certain that I was going up to college, Brother
Hawkyard concluded a long exhortation thus:

'Well, my friends and fellow-sinners, now I told you when I began,
that I didn't know a word of what I was going to say to you (and
no, I did not!), but that it was all one to me, because I knew the
Lord would put into my mouth the words I wanted.'

('That's it!' from Brother Gimblet.)

'And he did put into my mouth the words I wanted.'

('So he did!' from Brother Gimblet.)

'And why?'

('Ah, let's have that!' from Brother Gimblet.)

'Because I have been his faithful servant for five-and-thirty
years, and because he knows it.  For five-and-thirty years!  And he
knows it, mind you!  I got those words that I wanted on account of
my wages.  I got 'em from the Lord, my fellow-sinners.  Down! I
said, "Here's a heap of wages due; let us have something down, on
account."  And I got it down, and I paid it over to you; and you
won't wrap it up in a napkin, nor yet in a towel, nor yet
pocketankercher, but you'll put it out at good interest.  Very
well.  Now, my brothers and sisters and fellow-sinners, I am going
to conclude with a question, and I'll make it so plain (with the
help of the Lord, after five-and-thirty years, I should rather
hope!) as that the Devil shall not be able to confuse it in your
heads, - which he would be overjoyed to do.'

('Just his way.  Crafty old blackguard!' from Brother Gimblet.)

'And the question is this, Are the angels learned?'

('Not they.  Not a bit on it!' from Brother Gimblet, with the
greatest confidence.)

'Not they.  And where's the proof? sent ready-made by the hand of
the Lord.  Why, there's one among us here now, that has got all the
learning that can be crammed into him.  I got him all the learning
that could be crammed into him.  His grandfather' (this I had never
heard before) 'was a brother of ours.  He was Brother Parksop.
That's what he was.  Parksop; Brother Parksop.  His worldly name
was Parksop, and he was a brother of this brotherhood.  Then wasn't
he Brother Parksop?'

('Must be.  Couldn't help hisself!' from Brother Gimblet.)

'Well, he left that one now here present among us to the care of a
brother-sinner of his (and that brother-sinner, mind you, was a
sinner of a bigger size in his time than any of you; praise the
Lord!), Brother Hawkyard.  Me.  I got him without fee or reward, -
without a morsel of myrrh, or frankincense, nor yet amber, letting
alone the honeycomb, - all the learning that could be crammed into
him.  Has it brought him into our temple, in the spirit?  No.  Have
we had any ignorant brothers and sisters that didn't know round O
from crooked S, come in among us meanwhile?  Many.  Then the angels
are NOT learned; then they don't so much as know their alphabet.
And now, my friends and fellow-sinners, having brought it to that,
perhaps some brother present - perhaps you, Brother Gimblet - will
pray a bit for us?'

Brother Gimblet undertook the sacred function, after having drawn
his sleeve across his mouth, and muttered, 'Well!  I don't know as
I see my way to hitting any of you quite in the right place
neither.'  He said this with a dark smile, and then began to
bellow.  What we were specially to be preserved from, according to
his solicitations, was, despoilment of the orphan, suppression of
testamentary intentions on the part of a father or (say)
grandfather, appropriation of the orphan's house-property, feigning
to give in charity to the wronged one from whom we withheld his
due; and that class of sins.  He ended with the petition, 'Give us
peace!' which, speaking for myself, was very much needed after
twenty minutes of his bellowing.

Even though I had not seen him when he rose from his knees,
steaming with perspiration, glance at Brother Hawkyard, and even
though I had not heard Brother Hawkyard's tone of congratulating
him on the vigour with which he had roared, I should have detected
a malicious application in this prayer.  Unformed suspicions to a
similar effect had sometimes passed through my mind in my earlier
school-days, and had always caused me great distress; for they were
worldly in their nature, and wide, very wide, of the spirit that
had drawn me from Sylvia.  They were sordid suspicions, without a
shadow of proof.  They were worthy to have originated in the
unwholesome cellar.  They were not only without proof, but against
proof; for was I not myself a living proof of what Brother Hawkyard
had done? and without him, how should I ever have seen the sky look
sorrowfully down upon that wretched boy at Hoghton Towers?

Although the dread of a relapse into a stage of savage selfishness
was less strong upon me as I approached manhood, and could act in
an increased degree for myself, yet I was always on my guard
against any tendency to such relapse.  After getting these
suspicions under my feet, I had been troubled by not being able to
like Brother Hawkyard's manner, or his professed religion.  So it
came about, that, as I walked back that Sunday evening, I thought
it would be an act of reparation for any such injury my struggling
thoughts had unwillingly done him, if I wrote, and placed in his
hands, before going to college, a full acknowledgment of his
goodness to me, and an ample tribute of thanks.  It might serve as
an implied vindication of him against any dark scandal from a rival
brother and expounder, or from any other quarter.

Accordingly, I wrote the document with much care.  I may add with
much feeling too; for it affected me as I went on.  Having no set
studies to pursue, in the brief interval between leaving the
Foundation and going to Cambridge, I determined to walk out to his
place of business, and give it into his own hands.

It was a winter afternoon, when I tapped at the door of his little
counting-house, which was at the farther end of his long, low shop.
As I did so (having entered by the back yard, where casks and boxes
were taken in, and where there was the inscription, 'Private way to
the counting-house'), a shopman called to me from the counter that
he was engaged.

'Brother Gimblet' (said the shopman, who was one of the
brotherhood) 'is with him.'

I thought this all the better for my purpose, and made bold to tap
again.  They were talking in a low tone, and money was passing; for
I heard it being counted out.

'Who is it?' asked Brother Hawkyard, sharply.

'George Silverman,' I answered, holding the door open.  'May I come
in?'

Both brothers seemed so astounded to see me that I felt shyer than
usual.  But they looked quite cadaverous in the early gaslight, and
perhaps that accidental circumstance exaggerated the expression of
their faces.

'What is the matter?' asked Brother Hawkyard.

'Ay! what is the matter?' asked Brother Gimblet.

'Nothing at all,' I said, diffidently producing my document: 'I am
only the bearer of a letter from myself.'

'From yourself, George?' cried Brother Hawkyard.

'And to you,' said I.

'And to me, George?'

He turned paler, and opened it hurriedly; but looking over it, and
seeing generally what it was, became less hurried, recovered his
colour, and said, 'Praise the Lord!'

'That's it!' cried Brother Gimblet.  'Well put!  Amen.'

Brother Hawkyard then said, in a livelier strain, 'You must know,
George, that Brother Gimblet and I are going to make our two
businesses one.  We are going into partnership.  We are settling it
now.  Brother Gimblet is to take one clear half of the profits (O,
yes! he shall have it; he shall have it to the last farthing).'

'D.V.!' said Brother Gimblet, with his right fist firmly clinched
on his right leg.

'There is no objection,' pursued Brother Hawkyard, 'to my reading
this aloud, George?'

As it was what I expressly desired should be done, after
yesterday's prayer, I more than readily begged him to read it
aloud.  He did so; and Brother Gimblet listened with a crabbed
smile.

'It was in a good hour that I came here,' he said, wrinkling up his
eyes.  'It was in a good hour, likewise, that I was moved yesterday
to depict for the terror of evil-doers a character the direct
opposite of Brother Hawkyard's.  But it was the Lord that done it:
I felt him at it while I was perspiring.'

After that it was proposed by both of them that I should attend the
congregation once more before my final departure.  What my shy
reserve would undergo, from being expressly preached at and prayed
at, I knew beforehand.  But I reflected that it would be for the
last time, and that it might add to the weight of my letter.  It
was well known to the brothers and sisters that there was no place
taken for me in THEIR paradise; and if I showed this last token of
deference to Brother Hawkyard, notoriously in despite of my own
sinful inclinations, it might go some little way in aid of my
statement that he had been good to me, and that I was grateful to
him.  Merely stipulating, therefore, that no express endeavour
should be made for my conversion, - which would involve the rolling
of several brothers and sisters on the floor, declaring that they
felt all their sins in a heap on their left side, weighing so many
pounds avoirdupois, as I knew from what I had seen of those
repulsive mysteries, - I promised.

Since the reading of my letter, Brother Gimblet had been at
intervals wiping one eye with an end of his spotted blue
neckerchief, and grinning to himself.  It was, however, a habit
that brother had, to grin in an ugly manner even when expounding.
I call to mind a delighted snarl with which he used to detail from
the platform the torments reserved for the wicked (meaning all
human creation except the brotherhood), as being remarkably
hideous.

I left the two to settle their articles of partnership, and count
money; and I never saw them again but on the following Sunday.
Brother Hawkyard died within two or three years, leaving all he
possessed to Brother Gimblet, in virtue of a will dated (as I have
been told) that very day.

Now I was so far at rest with myself, when Sunday came, knowing
that I had conquered my own mistrust, and righted Brother Hawkyard
in the jaundiced vision of a rival, that I went, even to that
coarse chapel, in a less sensitive state than usual.  How could I
foresee that the delicate, perhaps the diseased, corner of my mind,
where I winced and shrunk when it was touched, or was even
approached, would be handled as the theme of the whole proceedings?

On this occasion it was assigned to Brother Hawkyard to pray, and
to Brother Gimblet to preach.  The prayer was to open the
ceremonies; the discourse was to come next.  Brothers Hawkyard and
Gimblet were both on the platform; Brother Hawkyard on his knees at
the table, unmusically ready to pray; Brother Gimblet sitting
against the wall, grinningly ready to preach.

'Let us offer up the sacrifice of prayer, my brothers and sisters
and fellow-sinners.'  Yes; but it was I who was the sacrifice.  It
was our poor, sinful, worldly-minded brother here present who was
wrestled for.  The now-opening career of this our unawakened
brother might lead to his becoming a minister of what was called
'the church.'  That was what HE looked to.  The church.  Not the
chapel, Lord.  The church.  No rectors, no vicars, no archdeacons,
no bishops, no archbishops, in the chapel, but, O Lord! many such
in the church.  Protect our sinful brother from his love of lucre.
Cleanse from our unawakened brother's breast his sin of worldly-
mindedness.  The prayer said infinitely more in words, but nothing
more to any intelligible effect.

Then Brother Gimblet came forward, and took (as I knew he would)
the text, 'My kingdom is not of this world.'  Ah! but whose was, my
fellow-sinners?  Whose?  Why, our brother's here present was.  The
only kingdom he had an idea of was of this world.  ('That's it!'
from several of the congregation.)  What did the woman do when she
lost the piece of money?  Went and looked for it.  What should our
brother do when he lost his way?  ('Go and look for it,' from a
sister.)  Go and look for it, true.  But must he look for it in the
right direction, or in the wrong?  ('In the right,' from a
brother.)  There spake the prophets!  He must look for it in the
right direction, or he couldn't find it.  But he had turned his
back upon the right direction, and he wouldn't find it.  Now, my
fellow-sinners, to show you the difference betwixt worldly-
mindedness and unworldly-mindedness, betwixt kingdoms not of this
world and kingdoms OF this world, here was a letter wrote by even
our worldly-minded brother unto Brother Hawkyard.  Judge, from
hearing of it read, whether Brother Hawkyard was the faithful
steward that the Lord had in his mind only t'other day, when, in
this very place, he drew you the picter of the unfaithful one; for
it was him that done it, not me.  Don't doubt that!

Brother Gimblet then groaned and bellowed his way through my
composition, and subsequently through an hour.  The service closed
with a hymn, in which the brothers unanimously roared, and the
sisters unanimously shrieked at me, That I by wiles of worldly gain
was mocked, and they on waters of sweet love were rocked; that I
with mammon struggled in the dark, while they were floating in a
second ark.

I went out from all this with an aching heart and a weary spirit:
not because I was quite so weak as to consider these narrow
creatures interpreters of the Divine Majesty and Wisdom, but
because I was weak enough to feel as though it were my hard fortune
to be misrepresented and misunderstood, when I most tried to subdue
any risings of mere worldliness within me, and when I most hoped
that, by dint of trying earnestly, I had succeeded.



SEVENTH CHAPTER



MY timidity and my obscurity occasioned me to live a secluded life
at college, and to be little known.  No relative ever came to visit
me, for I had no relative.  No intimate friends broke in upon my
studies, for I made no intimate friends.  I supported myself on my
scholarship, and read much.  My college time was otherwise not so
very different from my time at Hoghton Towers.

Knowing myself to be unfit for the noisier stir of social
existence, but believing myself qualified to do my duty in a
moderate, though earnest way, if I could obtain some small
preferment in the Church, I applied my mind to the clerical
profession.  In due sequence I took orders, was ordained, and began
to look about me for employment.  I must observe that I had taken a
good degree, that I had succeeded in winning a good fellowship, and
that my means were ample for my retired way of life.  By this time
I had read with several young men; and the occupation increased my
income, while it was highly interesting to me.  I once accidentally
overheard our greatest don say, to my boundless joy, 'That he heard
it reported of Silverman that his gift of quiet explanation, his
patience, his amiable temper, and his conscientiousness made him
the best of coaches.'  May my 'gift of quiet explanation' come more
seasonably and powerfully to my aid in this present explanation
than I think it will!

It may be in a certain degree owing to the situation of my college-
rooms (in a corner where the daylight was sobered), but it is in a
much larger degree referable to the state of my own mind, that I
seem to myself, on looking back to this time of my life, to have
been always in the peaceful shade.  I can see others in the
sunlight; I can see our boats' crews and our athletic young men on
the glistening water, or speckled with the moving lights of sunlit
leaves; but I myself am always in the shadow looking on.  Not
unsympathetically, - God forbid! - but looking on alone, much as I
looked at Sylvia from the shadows of the ruined house, or looked at
the red gleam shining through the farmer's windows, and listened to
the fall of dancing feet, when all the ruin was dark that night in
the quadrangle.

I now come to the reason of my quoting that laudation of myself
above given.  Without such reason, to repeat it would have been
mere boastfulness.

Among those who had read with me was Mr. Fareway, second son of
Lady Fareway, widow of Sir Gaston Fareway, baronet.  This young
gentleman's abilities were much above the average; but he came of a
rich family, and was idle and luxurious.  He presented himself to
me too late, and afterwards came to me too irregularly, to admit of
my being of much service to him.  In the end, I considered it my
duty to dissuade him from going up for an examination which he
could never pass; and he left college without a degree.  After his
departure, Lady Fareway wrote to me, representing the justice of my
returning half my fee, as I had been of so little use to her son.
Within my knowledge a similar demand had not been made in any other
case; and I most freely admit that the justice of it had not
occurred to me until it was pointed out.  But I at once perceived
it, yielded to it, and returned the money -

Mr. Fareway had been gone two years or more, and I had forgotten
him, when he one day walked into my rooms as I was sitting at my
books.

Said he, after the usual salutations had passed, 'Mr. Silverman, my
mother is in town here, at the hotel, and wishes me to present you
to her.'

I was not comfortable with strangers, and I dare say I betrayed
that I was a little nervous or unwilling.  'For,' said he, without
my having spoken, 'I think the interview may tend to the
advancement of your prospects.'

It put me to the blush to think that I should be tempted by a
worldly reason, and I rose immediately.

Said Mr. Fareway, as we went along, 'Are you a good hand at
business?'

'I think not,' said I.

Said Mr. Fareway then, 'My mother is.'

'Truly?' said I.

'Yes: my mother is what is usually called a managing woman.
Doesn't make a bad thing, for instance, even out of the spendthrift
habits of my eldest brother abroad.  In short, a managing woman.
This is in confidence.'

He had never spoken to me in confidence, and I was surprised by his
doing so.  I said I should respect his confidence, of course, and
said no more on the delicate subject.  We had but a little way to
walk, and I was soon in his mother's company.  He presented me,
shook hands with me, and left us two (as he said) to business.

I saw in my Lady Fareway a handsome, well-preserved lady of
somewhat large stature, with a steady glare in her great round dark
eyes that embarrassed me.

Said my lady, 'I have heard from my son, Mr. Silverman, that you
would be glad of some preferment in the church.'  I gave my lady to
understand that was so.

'I don't know whether you are aware,' my lady proceeded, 'that we
have a presentation to a living?  I say WE have; but, in point of
fact, I have.'

I gave my lady to understand that I had not been aware of this.

Said my lady, 'So it is: indeed I have two presentations, - one to
two hundred a year, one to six.  Both livings are in our county, -
North Devonshire, - as you probably know.  The first is vacant.
Would you like it?'

What with my lady's eyes, and what with the suddenness of this
proposed gift, I was much confused.

'I am sorry it is not the larger presentation,' said my lady,
rather coldly; 'though I will not, Mr. Silverman, pay you the bad
compliment of supposing that YOU are, because that would be
mercenary, - and mercenary I am persuaded you are not.'

Said I, with my utmost earnestness, 'Thank you, Lady Fareway, thank
you, thank you!  I should be deeply hurt if I thought I bore the
character.'

'Naturally,' said my lady.  'Always detestable, but particularly in
a clergyman.  You have not said whether you will like the living?'

With apologies for my remissness or indistinctness, I assured my
lady that I accepted it most readily and gratefully.  I added that
I hoped she would not estimate my appreciation of the generosity of
her choice by my flow of words; for I was not a ready man in that
respect when taken by surprise or touched at heart.

'The affair is concluded,' said my lady; 'concluded.  You will find
the duties very light, Mr. Silverman.  Charming house; charming
little garden, orchard, and all that.  You will be able to take
pupils.  By the bye!  No: I will return to the word afterwards.
What was I going to mention, when it put me out?'

My lady stared at me, as if I knew.  And I didn't know.  And that
perplexed me afresh.

Said my lady, after some consideration, 'O, of course, how very
dull of me!  The last incumbent, - least mercenary man I ever saw,
- in consideration of the duties being so light and the house so
delicious, couldn't rest, he said, unless I permitted him to help
me with my correspondence, accounts, and various little things of
that kind; nothing in themselves, but which it worries a lady to
cope with.  Would Mr. Silverman also like to -?  Or shall I -?'

I hastened to say that my poor help would be always at her
ladyship's service.

'I am absolutely blessed,' said my lady, casting up her eyes (and
so taking them off me for one moment), 'in having to do with
gentlemen who cannot endure an approach to the idea of being
mercenary!'  She shivered at the word.  'And now as to the pupil.'

'The -?' I was quite at a loss.

'Mr. Silverman, you have no idea what she is.  She is,' said my
lady, laying her touch upon my coat-sleeve, 'I do verily believe,
the most extraordinary girl in this world.  Already knows more
Greek and Latin than Lady Jane Grey.  And taught herself!  Has not
yet, remember, derived a moment's advantage from Mr. Silverman's
classical acquirements.  To say nothing of mathematics, which she
is bent upon becoming versed in, and in which (as I hear from my
son and others) Mr. Silverman's reputation is so deservedly high!'

Under my lady's eyes I must have lost the clue, I felt persuaded;
and yet I did not know where I could have dropped it.

'Adelina,' said my lady, 'is my only daughter.  If I did not feel
quite convinced that I am not blinded by a mother's partiality;
unless I was absolutely sure that when you know her, Mr. Silverman,
you will esteem it a high and unusual privilege to direct her
studies, - I should introduce a mercenary element into this
conversation, and ask you on what terms - '

I entreated my lady to go no further.  My lady saw that I was
troubled, and did me the honour to comply with my request.



EIGHTH CHAPTER



EVERYTHING in mental acquisition that her brother might have been,
if he would, and everything in all gracious charms and admirable
qualities that no one but herself could be, - this was Adelina.

I will not expatiate upon her beauty; I will not expatiate upon her
intelligence, her quickness of perception, her powers of memory,
her sweet consideration, from the first moment, for the slow-paced
tutor who ministered to her wonderful gifts.  I was thirty then; I
am over sixty now: she is ever present to me in these hours as she
was in those, bright and beautiful and young, wise and fanciful and
good.

When I discovered that I loved her, how can I say?  In the first
day? in the first week? in the first month?  Impossible to trace.
If I be (as I am) unable to represent to myself any previous period
of my life as quite separable from her attracting power, how can I
answer for this one detail?

Whensoever I made the discovery, it laid a heavy burden on me.  And
yet, comparing it with the far heavier burden that I afterwards
took up, it does not seem to me now to have been very hard to bear.
In the knowledge that I did love her, and that I should love her
while my life lasted, and that I was ever to hide my secret deep in
my own breast, and she was never to find it, there was a kind of
sustaining joy or pride, or comfort, mingled with my pain.

But later on, - say, a year later on, - when I made another
discovery, then indeed my suffering and my struggle were strong.
That other discovery was -

These words will never see the light, if ever, until my heart is
dust; until her bright spirit has returned to the regions of which,
when imprisoned here, it surely retained some unusual glimpse of
remembrance; until all the pulses that ever beat around us shall
have long been quiet; until all the fruits of all the tiny
victories and defeats achieved in our little breasts shall have
withered away.  That discovery was that she loved me.

She may have enhanced my knowledge, and loved me for that; she may
have over-valued my discharge of duty to her, and loved me for
that; she may have refined upon a playful compassion which she
would sometimes show for what she called my want of wisdom,
according to the light of the world's dark lanterns, and loved me
for that; she may - she must - have confused the borrowed light of
what I had only learned, with its brightness in its pure, original
rays; but she loved me at that time, and she made me know it.

Pride of family and pride of wealth put me as far off from her in
my lady's eyes as if I had been some domesticated creature of
another kind.  But they could not put me farther from her than I
put myself when I set my merits against hers.  More than that.
They could not put me, by millions of fathoms, half so low beneath
her as I put myself when in imagination I took advantage of her
noble trustfulness, took the fortune that I knew she must possess
in her own right, and left her to find herself, in the zenith of
her beauty and genius, bound to poor rusty, plodding me.

No!  Worldliness should not enter here at any cost.  If I had tried
to keep it out of other ground, how much harder was I bound to try
to keep it out from this sacred place!

But there was something daring in her broad, generous character,
that demanded at so delicate a crisis to be delicately and
patiently addressed.  And many and many a bitter night (O, I found
I could cry for reasons not purely physical, at this pass of my
life!) I took my course.

My lady had, in our first interview, unconsciously overstated the
accommodation of my pretty house.  There was room in it for only
one pupil.  He was a young gentleman near coming of age, very well
connected, but what is called a poor relation.  His parents were
dead.  The charges of his living and reading with me were defrayed
by an uncle; and he and I were to do our utmost together for three
years towards qualifying him to make his way.  At this time he had
entered into his second year with me.  He was well-looking, clever,
energetic, enthusiastic; bold; in the best sense of the term, a
thorough young Anglo-Saxon.

I resolved to bring these two together.



NINTH CHAPTER



SAID I, one night, when I had conquered myself, 'Mr. Granville,' -
Mr. Granville Wharton his name was, - 'I doubt if you have ever yet
so much as seen Miss Fareway.'

'Well, sir,' returned he, laughing, 'you see her so much yourself,
that you hardly leave another fellow a chance of seeing her.'

'I am her tutor, you know,' said I.

And there the subject dropped for that time.  But I so contrived as
that they should come together shortly afterwards.  I had
previously so contrived as to keep them asunder; for while I loved
her, - I mean before I had determined on my sacrifice, - a lurking
jealousy of Mr. Granville lay within my unworthy breast.

It was quite an ordinary interview in the Fareway Park but they
talked easily together for some time: like takes to like, and they
had many points of resemblance.  Said Mr. Granville to me, when he
and I sat at our supper that night, 'Miss Fareway is remarkably
beautiful, sir, remarkably engaging.  Don't you think so?'  'I
think so,' said I.  And I stole a glance at him, and saw that he
had reddened and was thoughtful.  I remember it most vividly,
because the mixed feeling of grave pleasure and acute pain that the
slight circumstance caused me was the first of a long, long series
of such mixed impressions under which my hair turned slowly gray.

I had not much need to feign to be subdued; but I counterfeited to
be older than I was in all respects (Heaven knows! my heart being
all too young the while), and feigned to be more of a recluse and
bookworm than I had really become, and gradually set up more and
more of a fatherly manner towards Adelina.  Likewise I made my
tuition less imaginative than before; separated myself from my
poets and philosophers; was careful to present them in their own
light, and me, their lowly servant, in my own shade.  Moreover, in
the matter of apparel I was equally mindful; not that I had ever
been dapper that way; but that I was slovenly now.

As I depressed myself with one hand, so did I labour to raise Mr.
Granville with the other; directing his attention to such subjects
as I too well knew interested her, and fashioning him (do not
deride or misconstrue the expression, unknown reader of this
writing; for I have suffered!) into a greater resemblance to myself
in my solitary one strong aspect.  And gradually, gradually, as I
saw him take more and more to these thrown-out lures of mine, then
did I come to know better and better that love was drawing him on,
and was drawing her from me.

So passed more than another year; every day a year in its number of
my mixed impressions of grave pleasure and acute pain; and then
these two, being of age and free to act legally for themselves,
came before me hand in hand (my hair being now quite white), and
entreated me that I would unite them together.  'And indeed, dear
tutor,' said Adelina, 'it is but consistent in you that you should
do this thing for us, seeing that we should never have spoken
together that first time but for you, and that but for you we could
never have met so often afterwards.'  The whole of which was
literally true; for I had availed myself of my many business
attendances on, and conferences with, my lady, to take Mr.
Granville to the house, and leave him in the outer room with
Adelina.

I knew that my lady would object to such a marriage for her
daughter, or to any marriage that was other than an exchange of her
for stipulated lands, goods, and moneys.  But looking on the two,
and seeing with full eyes that they were both young and beautiful;
and knowing that they were alike in the tastes and acquirements
that will outlive youth and beauty; and considering that Adelina
had a fortune now, in her own keeping; and considering further that
Mr. Granville, though for the present poor, was of a good family
that had never lived in a cellar in Preston; and believing that
their love would endure, neither having any great discrepancy to
find out in the other, - I told them of my readiness to do this
thing which Adelina asked of her dear tutor, and to send them
forth, husband and wife, into the shining world with golden gates
that awaited them.

It was on a summer morning that I rose before the sun to compose
myself for the crowning of my work with this end; and my dwelling
being near to the sea, I walked down to the rocks on the shore, in
order that I might behold the sun in his majesty.

The tranquillity upon the deep, and on the firmament, the orderly
withdrawal of the stars, the calm promise of coming day, the rosy
suffusion of the sky and waters, the ineffable splendour that then
burst forth, attuned my mind afresh after the discords of the
night.  Methought that all I looked on said to me, and that all I
heard in the sea and in the air said to me, 'Be comforted, mortal,
that thy life is so short.  Our preparation for what is to follow
has endured, and shall endure, for unimaginable ages.'

I married them.  I knew that my hand was cold when I placed it on
their hands clasped together; but the words with which I had to
accompany the action I could say without faltering, and I was at
peace.

They being well away from my house and from the place after our
simple breakfast, the time was come when I must do what I had
pledged myself to them that I would do, - break the intelligence to
my lady.

I went up to the house, and found my lady in her ordinary business-
room.  She happened to have an unusual amount of commissions to
intrust to me that day; and she had filled my hands with papers
before I could originate a word.

'My lady,' I then began, as I stood beside her table.

'Why, what's the matter?' she said quickly, looking up.

'Not much, I would fain hope, after you shall have prepared
yourself, and considered a little.'

'Prepared myself; and considered a little!  You appear to have
prepared YOURSELF but indifferently, anyhow, Mr. Silverman.'  This
mighty scornfully, as I experienced my usual embarrassment under
her stare.

Said I, in self-extenuation once for all, 'Lady Fareway, I have but
to say for myself that I have tried to do my duty.'

'For yourself?' repeated my lady.  'Then there are others
concerned, I see.  Who are they?'

I was about to answer, when she made towards the bell with a dart
that stopped me, and said, 'Why, where is Adelina?'

'Forbear! be calm, my lady.  I married her this morning to Mr.
Granville Wharton.'

She set her lips, looked more intently at me than ever, raised her
right hand, and smote me hard upon the cheek.

'Give me back those papers! give me back those papers!'  She tore
them out of my hands, and tossed them on her table.  Then seating
herself defiantly in her great chair, and folding her arms, she
stabbed me to the heart with the unlooked-for reproach, 'You
worldly wretch!'

'Worldly?' I cried.  'Worldly?'

'This, if you please,' - she went on with supreme scorn, pointing
me out as if there were some one there to see, - 'this, if you
please, is the disinterested scholar, with not a design beyond his
books!  This, if you please, is the simple creature whom any one
could overreach in a bargain!  This, if you please, is Mr.
Silverman!  Not of this world; not he!  He has too much simplicity
for this world's cunning.  He has too much singleness of purpose to
be a match for this world's double-dealing.  What did he give you
for it?'

'For what?  And who?'

'How much,' she asked, bending forward in her great chair, and
insultingly tapping the fingers of her right hand on the palm of
her left, - 'how much does Mr. Granville Wharton pay you for
getting him Adelina's money?  What is the amount of your percentage
upon Adelina's fortune?  What were the terms of the agreement that
you proposed to this boy when you, the Rev. George Silverman,
licensed to marry, engaged to put him in possession of this girl?
You made good terms for yourself, whatever they were.  He would
stand a poor chance against your keenness.'

Bewildered, horrified, stunned by this cruel perversion, I could
not speak.  But I trust that I looked innocent, being so.

'Listen to me, shrewd hypocrite,' said my lady, whose anger
increased as she gave it utterance; 'attend to my words, you
cunning schemer, who have carried this plot through with such a
practised double face that I have never suspected you.  I had my
projects for my daughter; projects for family connection; projects
for fortune.  You have thwarted them, and overreached me; but I am
not one to be thwarted and overreached without retaliation.  Do you
mean to hold this living another month?'

'Do you deem it possible, Lady Fareway, that I can hold it another
hour, under your injurious words?'

'Is it resigned, then?'

'It was mentally resigned, my lady, some minutes ago.'

Don't equivocate, sir.  IS it resigned?'

'Unconditionally and entirely; and I would that I had never, never
come near it!'

'A cordial response from me to THAT wish, Mr. Silverman!  But take
this with you, sir.  If you had not resigned it, I would have had
you deprived of it.  And though you have resigned it, you will not
get quit of me as easily as you think for.  I will pursue you with
this story.  I will make this nefarious conspiracy of yours, for
money, known.  You have made money by it, but you have at the same
time made an enemy by it.  YOU will take good care that the money
sticks to you; I will take good care that the enemy sticks to you.'

Then said I finally, 'Lady Fareway, I think my heart is broken.
Until I came into this room just now, the possibility of such mean
wickedness as you have imputed to me never dawned upon my thoughts.
Your suspicions - '

'Suspicions!  Pah!' said she indignantly.  'Certainties.'

'Your certainties, my lady, as you call them, your suspicions as I
call them, are cruel, unjust, wholly devoid of foundation in fact.
I can declare no more; except that I have not acted for my own
profit or my own pleasure.  I have not in this proceeding
considered myself.  Once again, I think my heart is broken.  If I
have unwittingly done any wrong with a righteous motive, that is
some penalty to pay.'

She received this with another and more indignant 'Pah!' and I made
my way out of her room (I think I felt my way out with my hands,
although my eyes were open), almost suspecting that my voice had a
repulsive sound, and that I was a repulsive object.

There was a great stir made, the bishop was appealed to, I received
a severe reprimand, and narrowly escaped suspension.  For years a
cloud hung over me, and my name was tarnished.

But my heart did not break, if a broken heart involves death; for I
lived through it.

They stood by me, Adelina and her husband, through it all.  Those
who had known me at college, and even most of those who had only
known me there by reputation, stood by me too.  Little by little,
the belief widened that I was not capable of what was laid to my
charge.  At length I was presented to a college-living in a
sequestered place, and there I now pen my explanation.  I pen it at
my open window in the summer-time, before me, lying in the
churchyard, equal resting-place for sound hearts, wounded hearts,
and broken hearts.  I pen it for the relief of my own mind, not
foreseeing whether or no it will ever have a reader.


THE END.


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