CHAPTER IX.
In due season, Mr. Jericho—on the authority of his wife—was a pillar and an ark; a staff and a sword; a flambeau and a pair of scales; a buckler and a British lion. For, in the metaphoric mind of Mrs. Jericho all these things were contained in a member of Parliament; even as a variety of spoons may be held in a single cherry-stone.
In addition to this, Mr. Jericho, on the like conjugal assurance, found himself to his passing pleasure, one of the trees of the constitution. He wanly smiled when he learned that, with his giant arms, he was to shelter the altar and the throne. He was a little flattered in his self-love, when he heard that the weary would seek for comfort in his shadow, and the multitude feed with thankfulness upon his fruit.
As the cedar of Lebanon, without conscious effort of its own, represents the property of timber; so did Solomon Jericho represent the property of Parliament. And cedar and man—we have it upon the faith of Mrs. Jericho—are noble presences to contemplate. What—observed that intellectual woman—what would the little birds of the air, the robin-redbreasts and all the family of finches, do—were there no cedars with hospitable boughs and twigs to house and roost them? And what would become of the poor and the weak, were there no Jerichos to protect and comfort them? Mr. Jericho was, doubtless, much delighted as he pondered the question.
It must be owned that the genius of money has a liking for fair play. Now and then, it takes pleasure in equity. If, at times, it brings trouble upon men, as men are too apt in their excess of sincerity to declare,—it must be allowed that the trouble it saves them is to the full as great as the perplexity it inflicts. In the old poetic time the same fairy that would lead men astray for the sake of the mischief; would, by way of recompense, churn the butter and trim up the house, while thehousehold snored. Now, money is the prose fairy of our mechanical generation. If now and then it leads simpletons into a Fleet Ditch; on the other hand, as deftly as ever imp or brownie laboured, it works even for the slumbering. Solomon Jericho, by the labouring means of ten thousand pounds, became member for Toadsham. He ate, drank, and slept; and, without sense of the great change working in him by workman money, became a legislator. Even as the olden fairies churned butter, it may be stamping the lumps with their own elfin impress; so had ten thousand ministers silently transformed Jericho into a legislator, stamping him with M.P. There is no such Puck as the Puck of the Mint.
Solomon had paid the money for his seat; every farthing of the sum had been deposited in the hand of the Hon. Cesar Candituft, who, whilst he was ever congratulating the country upon the acquired patriotism of Jericho, could not, much as he tried, be insensible of the shrunken and still shrinking anatomy of the new legislator. “’Tis anxiety, my dear madam; no doubt, anxiety,” said Candituft, a little puzzled, to Mrs. Jericho.
“A nervous apprehensiveness,” said the wife. “He thinks too much of the responsibility. I tell him ’tis nothing; am continually assuring him that, with his property, he may expect every indulgence; nevertheless, it is plain, dear sir, that the thoughts of Parliament wear him to a shadow. But he’ll get the better of it: at least I hope—I must hope”—said the resigned woman—“that he’ll get the better of it. Without such hope, I should be forlorn indeed. For, I have other troubles, dear sir. That sweet, I mean, that foolish boy of mine”—
“A delightful study, madam; what I call a delicious study. It is so cheering, so sustaining to contemplate the generosity of youthful emotions, when the ardent heart beats towards the entire human race; that is to the whole family of man. Delightful!” and Candituft upturned his eyes.
Mrs. Jericho civilly acknowledged the general truth delivered by the philanthropist; nevertheless she felt a mother’s anxiety, amother’s grief, that her boy Basil would select from the human family one particular individual as the depositary of an affection that, for a time at least, might be expended upon the world at large. Had matters remained as they were, the union of Basil and Bessy would have been at once natural and advantageous; but that Carraways should be turned into rags at the very time that Jericho was sublimated into money, rendered the idea of such a marriage quite preposterous. It was plain that Basil as the son of the wife of a man of boundless wealth, might marry whom he would; might, improving on the manner of the sultan, throw a wedding-ring at whomsoever he pleased. Therefore, to unite himself to the child of a pauper, was to fly in the face of fortune. It was wicked, presumptuous. Mrs. Jericho was not a superstitious woman; nevertheless, she could do no otherwise than tremble to think of it.
Some six weeks had passed since the festival at Jogtrot Lodge; and Mr. and Mrs. Jericho, with the two young ladies seated in their barouche, again travelled the road. The Hon. Mr. Candituft and Sir Arthur Hodmadod, all grace and goodness, rode on either side of the carriage.
“My dear Jericho, I do think this is the most lovely country! Quite an Eden;—is it not?” asked Mrs. Jericho; and the Man made of Money looked upon God’s glorious work, as though he stared at so much whity-brown paper. “Quite a Paradise!” Jericho grunted. “Don’t you recollect these beautiful swelling fields?”
“Like a green velvet bed,” cried Hodmadod. “That is, when I say a bed, I mean to be sure a—a bed in Paradise; of course. All beds green there, Candituft? I think they’re green, eh?”
“No doubt,” said Candituft. “Green with heartsease borders.”
“You recollect these fields, eh, Solomon?” and Mrs. Jericho looked in her husband’s eyes.
“To be sure; of course; green fields. One field’s pretty well like another,” answered the listless Jericho.
“And there, upon the hill; that noble clump of oaks?” said Mrs. Jericho. “Well, I do love oaks!”
“Wonderful trees, oaks,” said Hodmadod. “Extraordinary. I tell you what happened to me.”
“Ohdo,” said Agatha, gently closing her hands in attitude of meekest entreaty.
“Only last autumn, I saw all the Channel Fleet. All with their sails set; all like so many clouds: when I say clouds, of course I mean canvas. Well, said I, this is wonderful. To think, said I—for it never struck me before—to think that all these three-deckers should come out of little acorns.” Then the baronet paused a second; then rapidly asked, “They do come out of acorns, don’t they?”
“Oh, undoubtedly,” cried Agatha, with most assuring emphasis. “Most certainly.”
Mrs. Jericho employed her thoughts solely upon the shifting beauties of the scene. “What a lovely mass of wood, is that, rising up as it were to meet us, as we mount the hill. Quite a retreat for Druids,—don’t you think so, dearest? That wood, there,” and Mrs. Jericho appealed to her husband.
“Humph!” said Jericho; “it must be damp—devilish damp. I’m very fond of woods; very; but it’s when they’re turned into comfortable houses.”
“You hav’n’t an eye for the picturesque, Mr. Jericho,” said the hasty Hodmadod.
“Sir,” cried Jericho; at the same time shutting his brow in such a deep tight fold that had a fly been at the time upon his forehead, it must have been crushed to bits in the sudden wrinkle.—“Sir!”
“When I say the picturesque, I mean you don’t like houses in trees; that is, houses in the raw material? Houses, without carpenters, you know? Theyarewithout carpenters,—eh?”
A very few weeks ago, and had Sir Arthur Hodmadod, Bart., dropt a single syllable to Jericho, he would have treasured it even as a syllable of the girl, whose biggest words were thelargest jewels. And now, in contemptuous silence, he looked upon the baronet with a grim, sharp face; keen, inexorable; the aspect of an axe. Possibly, the imaginative baronet regarded it as such; for he seemed irrepressibly to pass his hand round the back of his neck; at the same time urging on his steed, as though pricked by sudden peril.
“Why, my dear Jericho,” said Sabilla, “what a love you had for the country.”
“I’ve grown out of green food, madam; can’t abide it,” said Jericho.
“Never tell me, Solomon, I know you love it still. And how delicious, after your work in the Commons—how delicious when you can, to come to such a place as this. A place that must give you new strength, new ideas, new freshness,” said Mrs. Jericho. “Every man with such an amount of national work must be the better for the country.”
“It’s like going to grass, you know,” said Hodmadod, again dropping back.
“Quite,” said Candituft. “The country is the natural abode of man. Nothing like the fruits of rustic thought. Give me an Act of Parliament that smells of the green earth.”
“Delicious,” said Hodmadod. “An Act of Parliament that smells like a nosegay. When I say a nosegay, of course I mean, smells of the landed interest. Nothing like the country for a statute. Without the country, you know, we should have no laws against poachers. Should we?” There was no spoken answer; none: but Agatha always eloquently replied, for she always smiled.
“Certainly the loveliest village, I ever saw,” cried Mrs. Jericho as the carriage—according to orders—rolled slowly through a double line of cottages. “Delightful, is it not? The first time I saw it, I thought to myself,—well, here I could gather myself up to repose for life.”
“Like a cat on a cushion,” cried the too impulsive Hodmadod. Instantly, he felt his face shot clean through by the eye-balls of Mrs. Jericho. Whereupon, he stammered,—“When I say a caton a cushion, I mean of course a lady—a lady in her own house, you know.”
“My dear Jericho,” said the wife to the dullard made of money, “you don’t seem to recollect where you are.”
“Where?” asked Jericho, holding his cheek on edge. “Where?”
“Why, at Marigolds. Don’t you remember those cottages, where the children stood, and where”—
Jericho growled, and no more. Possibly, he had the fullest recollection of the scene; and cared not to own it. Nevertheless, the place seemed blighted, changed. The two opposite schoolrooms where infant voices would answer voices, were empty, silent. There were knots of children playing at the doorways; here and there a straggler sprawling in the road: but the room of Schoolmaster White was tongueless; alike silent, and soon to be deserted, the school of Widow Blanket. Squire Carraways, who had fed these little rills of learning, was a fountain dried up, and the rills had sunk with the source. A few of the folks of Marigolds looked from doors and peeped out at casements as the carriage ceremoniously rolled along the road; and there was an air, a look of curiosity in the people; but nothing frank, nothing hearty in their manner. The party must have felt that they entered the village as conquerors, rather than as future householders and patrons.
“Eh! Why, here we are at Jogtrot Hall,” cried Jericho as the carriage rolled through the gates and wound up the sweep.
“Dear me, how dull everything looks!” said Mrs. Jericho, as she stept from the carriage. Dull indeed. The life of the Hall was gone—it seemed only the carcase of the house. All the furniture was removed; and vacancy stared through every window.
“Well, I don’t know,” said Hodmadod a little gravely. “Seems quite the ghost of bricks and mortar. Makes one low—very low. When I say low, I mean quite a woman. No; I don’t mean that—I”—
“The emotion, my dear Sir Arthur,” said Candituft, “doeshonour to your nature. There’s hardly a piece of the house that doesn’t seem to mourn the absence of the dear people who gave it warmth and life. I’m sure the family seem to come all about me; but—there is such a chill, such a loneliness—they come like ghosts.”
“I didn’t think,” said Agatha, and two tears peeped into her eyes, “I didn’t think there could be such a—a sort of feeling in an empty house. I’m sure there’s something quite—quite religious about it.”
“Miss Pennibacker!” cried Jericho, with a reprehensive frown, “Religious! For shame!”
“It seems to me, as if dear—dear Bessy”—cried Monica—“would glide into the room every moment.”
“It is wonderful, Mr. Jericho”—said Candituft, as the party lounged on, and then paused, looking from the lawn into the dining-room—“it is wonderful, how the imagination will people space.”
Jericho rubbed his chin, and said—“Wonderful!”
“Ha, sir! what a family was here! There, sir, as perhaps you may recollect”—said Candituft,—“was the head of the table; there sat dear Mrs. Carraways; and there the master’s chair. And there Bessy’s place; she always sat beside the old man.”
“Sweet girl!”—cried Hodmadod—“clung to him like a honeysuckle; when I say a honeysuckle, I mean of course, a—a devilish affectionate thing.”
“Ha! Mr. Jericho,” said Candituft, “I have passed many delightful dinners here, sir. I spent, I think—yes, I did—I spent last Christmas here. And—pray pardon me—it is impossible to think of that room unmoved. There, sir, as I’ve said, was Mrs. Carraways; a kind, soft, beaming, hearty woman—plain to be sure, in her manners; in fact, very plain—but well meaning, poor soul! very well meaning, in spite of her bad French.—And there was Carraways himself. A good man—I’m pretty sure, a good man; though perhaps a little sanguine: at least, they accuse him of it in the City. But when people have atumble, the world always gives a good-natured reason for the slip. That, sir, I have remarked—always. There he sat, with his face lighted with the best of hearts, the best of wine, and the best of good spirits; his eyes swimming in jollity, and looking and talking as though he could have received all the brotherhood of man at his Christmas mahogany.”
“Mr. Carraways was always very kind”—observed Mrs. Jericho—“I don’t think any body can deny it.”
“And there sat Bessy”—continued Candituft, warming as he went on—“there she sat; and though not a beauty—certainly, not a beauty—still, very well she looked. And next her was—I forget his name—but he was an amazingly rich person, and a very pleasant man. And there, opposite, was an Indian friend of Carraways—a Brahmin banker or something—very curious about English Christmas, I recollect; a man of most liberal sentiments—above national prejudice. Took mince-pie and burnt brandy in a manner that quite warmed one’s heart.—Beside him I recollect was the last year’s Lady Mayoress; very fine, very interesting woman; I well remember her; she never spoke a syllable. And on that side again, was a very—very distinguished traveller. He had hunted a unicorn somewhere, and was asked to a round of dinners to tell all about the sport.—And opposite to him was the rich”—
“You’re not going to string off the whole set, are you?”—growled Jericho.
“A thousand pardons. I was carried away by the magic force of old associations. Still, I must say, it was a beautifully mixed party; that is, an equal share of wealth and wit. Poor dear Carraways! He certainly did keep up Christmas. I believe there was absolutely a plum-pudding boiled, and put out cold for the robin-redbreasts.”
“Poor little things,” cried Hodmadod, “how they’ll miss it!”
“Possibly not,” said Mrs. Jericho with a proud look. “There may be others here, Sir Arthur, equally hospitable to robins.”
“Yes, Sir Arthur,” exclaimed Agatha. “Rather than they should go without, I’d make the pudding myself.”
“Bravo! Beautiful!” cried Candituft. “Should you ever be lost in a wood, be sure of it, dear young lady—the robins will remember your goodness.”
“Faugh!” said Jericho, at the same time looking a fierce rebuke at Candituft; who with the magic of his self-possession turned the censure into a jest. “Let us go in.”
An old woman stood behind the opened door. An old, calm, sorrowful face looked timidly at the new-comers. Once or twice she sighed heavily; and then looked angrily as though, in her way, resenting the ill-manners—as they seemed to her—of the visitors.
“You needn’t follow us—we know the house well”—said Mrs. Jericho to the old dame.
“I know you do,” said the old woman. “And so being, I hope you’ll use it tenderly—poor thing.”
“Tenderly! Why”—cried Monica—“the old woman talks as if the house was alive.”
Mrs. Jericho raised her finger; forbidding any remark upon any probable meaning of such a person. And the old woman dropt herself upon a stair and, heedless of hearers—as though she eased her heart with the utterance—she answered, while the tears ran down her face—“Alive! Aye, and it be alive, more alive than some flesh and blood. Dear! dear! dear! An’ I’ve seen them folks look at the squire, as though it was bread and meat to ’em; and cosset and coax him, as if they could ha’ put their necks under his shoe-leather: and now to stand afore the Hall—in the trouble it’s in—and to grin and to make game—eh, dear! dear!—it’s like laughing in the face of a corpse.” And Widow Blanket—for it was the old village school-dame, removed from her seat of learning to dwell awhile in the Hall, before her final removal to the Poor-house—Widow Blanket sighed heavily; and as though to comfort her sorrow, seemed to fold it in her arms, and rock it to and fro.
The tread of the visitors—echoed loudly by the empty walls—sounded hollowly, heavily above. At the sound the old woman shivered a sigh, raised her eyes, and then continued to swingbackwards and forwards, as though she would hear nothing more. Will the reader—for two or three minutes—mount the staircase?
“A very noble house,” said Jericho, his eye sweeping the reception-rooms.
“And what a lovely prospect,” said Mrs. Jericho, approaching a window. “What an undulation of hill and meadow! What a prospect!”
“This, Mrs. Jericho,” said the Monied Man, “is my prospect.ThisI can make my own; this is property: in its essence, I may say, property. But where’s the property in what you call a lovely prospect; that any beggar may look at as well as I? Any vagabond tinker—or poet or any ragamuffin of that sort—may pitch his tent, and boil his kettle, and smoke his pipe, and take his pleasure of the prospect, quite as if it was his own—upon lawful parchment, his own. This, I own it—this interferes with my righteous sense of property. What belongs to a man, belongs to him. If the sun goes down upon my property, I’ve a clear title to that sunset; if the clouds over my land are remarkably fine, they are my clouds; and it’s a sort of moral larceny—though unhappily there’s no law for it—but a moral larceny it is to all intents and purposes—for any beggar at his pleasure to enjoy what is over my land; to have—as the term is—the usufruct of that sunset—of those clouds.”
Mr. Candituft pulled up to his face a look of strong conviction. “The question, my dear sir, in its whole breadth and depth, never struck me before. There is great primitive truth in what you say.”
“A law could meet it,” cried Hodmadod. “Couldn’t a law meet it? At all events, if you can’t secure the clouds and sunsets, of course the landlord has a clear right to all the thunderbolts.”
“Ass!” was at the lips of Mr. Jericho; but he swallowed the word, possibly to treasure it for another time. Stalking through the apartments, and looking about him, he flowed in speech; and Mrs. Jericho was too wise to stay the stream. “A veryfine house—very fine; but it wants a great deal—a very great deal done.”
“How fortunate, Solomon!” at length observed Mrs. Jericho. “Were it otherwise, there would be no opportunity for the development of your taste.”
After a due examination of the upper house, the party descended the stairs, Dame Blanket slowly rising from her seat to make them way. “There is one room that is locked. Have you the key?” asked Mrs. Jericho.
“That room be Miss Bessy’s,” said the old woman.
“Yes; I know it, very well. You have the key?” said the lady.
“Yes, ma’am,” answered Dame Blanket, a little creakingly.
“Give it me,” said Mrs. Jericho.
“No, ma’am,” said Dame Blanket, straightening her back.
“Were you desired to retain that key?” asked Monica sharply.
“No, I warn’t bid to keep it; but I warn’t bid to give it,” cried the Dame, her voice rising. “And as it’s as much one as t’other, I shall do one and not t’other.”
“I call that logic in petticoats,” said Candituft.
“I call it damned impertinence,” cried Jericho—“whether in petticoats or in”—
“My dear Jericho,” said his wife, with deprecating tenderness, “don’t, love.” Then, turning round to the dame, “Woman, give me the key; I tell you, I know Miss Carraways.”
“Youknow her, ma’am!” cried the dame with a doubting smile. “La, bless ’ee, ma’am, I put on her first things.” And Widow Blanket thought she had closed the conversation as with an iron spring.
“You are not aware, woman, who may become the master of this house,” said Mrs. Jericho, “you are not aware what you may want, and then”—
“La, ma’am! I’m sure to get what I want,” said the Dame smiling. “Sartin. I shall soon want nothin’ but a coffin; and folks must give me that for their own sakes.”
“What do you think of that?” asked Jericho. “’Pon my life! these people talk of coffins as if they’d a right, to ’em—as if they came into the world with a future property in coffins.”
“At your years,” said Monica, venturing a reflection, “you ought to be ashamed to talk in that, manner. Like an aged heathen—as if you’d no fear of death.”
“Fear, Miss! Oh dear! Oh dear! What a world would this be, special to folks like I,—if there was no death! What a cruel prison, Miss! And now, after what. I’ve seen, and what I’ve borne, what a comfort it is—like sabbath after work—what a comfort it is, to think of rest in the churchyard. Ay”—said the old woman, raising her shaking hand, and smiling us she scanned the gentlefolks about her—“Ay, what a comfort to think of that long, sweet Saturday-night in the grave.”
“Sheisquite a heathen,” said Hodmadod, “When I say a heathen, I mean a very strange old woman.”