"Is that the way you use me?" said she.—I believe I had rather pushed her away; buthowcould I help it?—"Is that the way you welcome me home, whither I have come,—leaving kinsfolk and friends,—to nurse you? Barbarous man, you hate me! yes, and besides having no longer any love for me, you have not even the slightest regard for my feelings. But don't think, Mr. Higginson, that I will be treated so any longer; you may break my heart,—your poor Margaret's heart,—if you will, but—but—" And here the affectionate creature was so overcome that she could not utter another word, but sat down wringing her hands and weeping as if I had broken her heart, and she had not crushed my foot! But, as far as my experience enables me to form any opinion on such a subject, I must say, that wives have an extraordinary knack at turning the tables on their husbands.
"For Heaven's sake, madam," said I, "don't set me distracted;"—the pain and her absurd reproaches together made me both frantic and ferocious—"don't make me believe that Adam's wife was made out of the bone of a gouty leg, instead of a good sound rib."
"What do you mean by that, sir?" said Mrs. Higginson.
"Only," said I, gritting my teeth, "that I have some thoughts she must have been a piece of the sorest bone in his body."
My wife marched up to the bed, and looked me in the face. My wrath went out like a gas-light before a black frost; my agonies again disappeared. There was no standing that look, unless one could stand the look of a Jersey black-snake, famous beyond all other snakes for its powers of fascination. And, talking of snakes, I must add, that, while my wife gave me that look, I felt as if one, just turned out of winter-quarters, horribly cold and creepy, were slipping down my back. She looked at me with mingled anger and disdain.
"How often have I told you, Mr. Higginson," she said, "never to attempt to be witty, since you only expose your folly—I won't use any harder word. And whatever you do, sir," she added, beginning to cry again, "don't make a jest of your wife, sir. You're always doing it, sir; you're always making me appear ridiculous to your friends and to myself; you treat me as if I were a fool—you—"
"Madam," said I, endeavouring to appease her a little, for I was quite overcome by her violence, "remember that I have the gout, and am suffering the—"
"Yes!" she cried; "and you are determined that everybody else shall suffer as well as yourself, and me in particular. Oh, Mr. Higginson! how can you use me so? I'll never speak to you another word!"
And down she sat again, weeping and wringing her hands harder than ever, and moping and whining the Lord knows how long.
"Sheppard Lee! Sheppard Lee!" I muttered (but I took good care not to mutter aloud), "you were not the most miserable dog in the world by a great deal. A gouty constitution and a perverse wife are—oh! pangs and purgatory!"
I hoped my consort, being so greatly incensed, would take herself out of the room, when I determined, though it should cost me a howl for every step, to get up and lock the door on her, come of it what might; but she was not of that mind. She maintained her seat, sobbing and sighing, and, by taking off her hat and flinging it pettishly into a corner, made it manifest that she had determined to nurse me in earnest, though in a way entirely of her own. Happily, the paroxysm of suffering, which was at its height when she entered, soon subsided; and being left greatly exhausted, and her sobs having somewhat of a soporific quality, I managed, notwithstanding my mental disquiet, to fall fast asleep; whereby I got rid for a time of an evil in many respects equal to the gout itself.
Two days after I was able to leave my bed, though not to walk: had I been, I am strongly of opinion I should have walked out of my house— out of the city of Philadelphia—and perhaps out of the United States of America—nay, and upon a pinch, out of the world itself, to get rid of my beloved wife. Who would have believed in our village, that John H. Higginson, who seemed to have nothing in the world to do but to slaughter woodcocks, beat his dog Ponto, and ride about in a fine new barouche with a pair of horses that cost a thousand dollars; who had a dwelling-house in Chestnut-street, a brewery in the Northern Liberties, with an ale-butt as big as the basin of the Mediterranean, a goodly store of real estate in town and country, bank-stock and coal-mines, and a thousand other of the good things of the world—who, I say, would have believed that this same John H. Higginson was decidedly the most miserable dog in the whole universe? It was truth, every word of it; and before I was six days old in my new body, I wished—no, not that the devil had me—but I was more than willing he should have the better half of me. I had the gout, my wife was a shrew, and I was—a henpecked husband.
Yes! the reader may stare, and bless his stars—the manly John H. Higginson, who seemed to have no earthly care or trouble, and who was so little deficient in spirit that he could quarrel with a Jersey farmer while trespassing on his grounds, shoot his bull-dog, and take aim at his negro, had long since succumbed to the superior spirit, and acknowledged the irresponsible supremacy of his wife; in the field, and at a distance from his house, he was a man of spirit and figure, but at home the most submissive of the henpecked. Resistance against a petticoat government is, as all know, the most hopeless of resistance: a single man has often subverted a monarchy, and overturned a republic; but history has not yet recorded an instance of successful rebellion on the part of a married man against the tyranny of a wife. The tongue of woman is the only true sceptre; for, unlike other emblems of authority, it is both the instrument of power and the axe of execution. John H. Higginson attempted no resistance against the rule of his wife; the few explosions of impatience of which he was now and then guilty, were punished with a rigour that awed him into discretion. On this subject I feel myself eloquent, and I could expatiate on it by the hour. But I am writing not so much the history of my reflections as of my adventures; and I must hasten on with my story.
No one but a henpecked husband who may happen to be shut up in prison with his wife, can appreciate the horror of the situation in which I now found myself placed. The gout prevented my escaping, even for a moment, from the sway of my spouse; she truly had me tied to her apron-string, and, as I may say, by a cord that went round my sore foot. I was a martyr to two of the greatest ills that ever afflicted a son of Adam; and the two together were not to be borne. Either, if alone, I might perhaps have tolerated, in consideration of the many good things that marked my lot. I might have endured the gout, if I had had a wife who, instead of scolding at me, would have suffered me, as a good wife should, to do all the scolding myself; or I might even have submitted to the tyranny of my Margaret, had I been able to beat a retreat when I grew tired of it. But my wife and the gout together were not to be borne by any human being: they set me, after a while, quite distracted.
What pleasure had I in being the rich John H. Higginson? It was in vain that my brother-in-law, Tim (who, it appears, was the junior partner and factotum in the brewery, as well as manager-general of my affairs), bragged to me of the astonishing rise in my property, and declared I was already worth a hundred thousand dollars; in the midst of my exultation I heard my wife's voice on the stairs, and my joy oozed out of the hair of my head. I could only look at Tim and groan, and Tim did the same; for, poor fellow, though only her brother, he was as much henpecked as myself. "Never mind," said Tim, consolatorily; "your foot will be well by-and-by, and then we shall have a jolly time together." But my comforter took great care on such occasions to sneak out of the house in good time, and so leave me to bear the evil by myself.
In the course of two weeks, or thereabouts, my foot had so far recovered that I was able to put it on the ground, and hobble about a little with a crutch; but I had lost all hope of ever being able to resume my exercises in the field. I was therefore reduced to despair; and my wife becoming more intolerable every day, I began to be so weary of existence, that I was once or twice on the point of making away with myself.
She was, in truth, the nonpareil of women and of scolders. I have called her a shrew; but it must not be supposed she was of that species to which men give the name of Tartar. She was none of your fierce, pepper-tempered creatures, who wrangle in a loud voice over the whole house, and sometimes take broomsticks to the servants. Such viragoes are in a measure sufferable, for they are sometimes in a good-humour. My Margaret was of the family ofCroakers, as they are called; that is, of a lugubrious, grumbling complexion, always sad and whining, full of suspicions and reproaches, now in tears, now in hysterics, always in an ill-humour, and so keeping every one about her in a state of misery. I never knew a servant, male or female, old or young, black or white, to remain in the house two weeks at a time, except a poor little negress that had been bound to me—that is, my prototype—under indentures; and she, after running away a dozen times, began to mope, and pine, and look so sorrowful, that, out of pity, I sent her home to her mother. As for myself, being incapable of flying, and exposed all day long to her lectures and reproaches, I became melancholy and desperate, wished myself Sheppard Lee again, with the constable and sheriff both after me, and, twice or thrice, as I have hinted before, resolved to put an end to my life.
One day, while I was reading the papers, I fell upon the account of a man who had hanged himself. "He was in good circumstances," said the journal, "and had a wife and three children. No reason has been assigned or suspected for his rash act."
"No doubt his wife was a shrew!" said I to myself, "and there was no way of getting rid of her; and so it was the wisest thing the poor man could do."
I thought over this occurrence so long, that it produced a great effect upon my mind; and my wife leaving me one day more incensed and desperate than ever, I snatched up a bit of cord that lay in my way, and resolved to strangle myself forthwith. I should have hanged myself over the chamber door, but was in dread I might slip down to the floor, and hurt my foot; and thinking it more genteel to die in my bed, I made the cord into a noose, or ring, through which, having placed it about my neck, I clapped a silver candlestick, by means of which I thought I might twist the cord tight enough to strangle me. And so I might, had I possessed the nerve; but in truth, I no sooner found my breath a little obstructed, than I became alarmed with the idea of apoplexy, which was always frightful to me, and so gave over my purpose.
On another occasion I sent to an apothecary whom I knew, for a vial of prussic acid, which takes life so expeditiously, that, as I supposed, one could have no time to be in pain. But that I might know in what manner it operated, I gave a quantity to a neighbour's cat, which had found her way into my chamber, and made friends with me during my confinement; and the creature was thrown into such horrible convulsions, and set up such a diabolical yell, that although she was stone-dead in less than half a minute, I was convinced this was the most uncomfortable way of dying that could be hit on.
I had then some thoughts of drowning myself, and only hesitated whether I should try the experiment in the bath-tub, or wait until I could bear a ride over the paving-stones to the river. As to cutting my throat, or blowing my brains out, I had never the slightest idea of trying either; for in respect to the former, besides that it makes such a horrible puddle of blood about one's body, it causes one to look as vulgar and low-lived as a slaughtered bullock; and as for the latter, I was so familiar with fire-arms, that I knew them to be weapons one cannot trifle with.
But fortune, that had served me such a scurvy trick in saddling me with gout and a scolding wife, along with the wealth of John H. Higginson, willed that I should employ none of these deadly expedients against my life, but get rid of my distresses in a manner much more remarkable and novel.
It was three full weeks before I left my chamber; and during the last days of that confinement, the only amusement I had consisted in looking from the window, after properly poising my leg on a soft cushion, upon what passed in the streets; and this, as the reader may suppose, I only enjoyed when my wife left off tormenting me for a moment, to go down stairs and torment the servants.
This was poor pastime for one of my habits and turn of mind; but my wife had made me contemplative; and had it not been for the perpetual dread of her return that I was under, I think I might have extracted some diversion from what I saw in the streets. But being in constant fear and vexation, I looked on with a spirit too morose and cynical for my own enjoyment.
Day after day, between the hours of five and six in the afternoon, I observed Mr. Cutclose, the tailor, descend from his marble steps, and climb upon the back of a horse, to take the evening air. He rode like one who had taken his chief lessons on the shop-board; and I often wondered he did not draw up his legs, and sit on the saddle hunker-fashion at once; but what particularly struck me was the compliment he paid himself of wearing his own coats, cut American-fashion about the arm-holes, and so keeping himself in purgatory all day long. He used to give parties every fortnight, and invite all the dandies whom he had down in his tick-book; by which means his entertainments were rendered highly genteel and fashionable.
Next door to Mr. Cutclose lived the great lawyer of our square, the celebrated Coke Butterside, Esq. I could see him sally out every morning with his green bag, which he carried in his own hands, either because he intended to be a candidate at the next Congressional election, and would seem democratic, or because he was afraid, if he intrusted it to another, the devil might snap it up as his own property. He had a lordly, self-satisfied air about him, as if he felt the full merit of his vocation, and prided himself upon having more men by the ears than any other in the whole city. His bow was exceedingly condescending, and his look protecting.
Nearer at hand was the dwelling of the old note-shaver—old Goldfist, as they called him, though his true name was Skinner. He was horribly rich, and such a miserly, insatiable old hunks, that although he had ostensibly retired from business (he was originally a pawn-broker) for some six or seven years, he still kept up his trade in a certain way, that was not so reputable as gainful, and of which I shall have occasion to say something by-and-by. He was said to be a good friend of such desperate young gentlemen as moved in high life, and had passable expectations from rich uncles and parents, but he was said to hold his friendship at very extortionate prices. How such a skinflint as he ever came to live in a good house and in a fashionable quarter, was a question not easy to solve. But according to Tim my brother-in-law's story, he came for economy, having got the house of a demolished aristocrat who had fallen into his clutches, and found it in so dilapidated a condition that he chose to live in it himself rather than submit to the expense of preparing it for a tenant. It brought him, moreover, nearer to his customers; and perhaps the old curmudgeon, who had a daughter and a brace of hopeful sons, had a hope of thus getting them into society.
But one who lives at Heaven's gate does not live in Heaven, as the saying is. Old Goldfist kept neither horses nor carriages, nor did he give parties: I doubt whether he ever asked anybody to dine with him in his life; and as for his boys and his girl, all of whom were grown up, he kept them in such a mean condition that they were not company for genteel people. Everybody despised them, especially Cutclose the tailor, who turned up his nose at them, and called themrooterers, which, I am told (for I never troubled myself to study the modern languages, there being so many of them), is a French word signifyinglow people.[1]
This old money-maker, who had a stoop in the shoulders, used to parade the street up and down before his own door every sunshiny day, in a thread-bare brown coat, to which he sometimes added a blue spencer roundabout, a silver-headed stick in one hand, and a yellow handkerchief in the other. The latter he was wont every two or three minutes to clap to his nose, producing thereby an explosion, which, notwithstanding the muffler over his nostrils, was prodigiously strong and sonorous; and once, to my knowledge, it frightened a young lady into the gutter.
I could say a great deal more of this old gentle man, whom everybody despised, but whom every man took off his hat to, on account of his wealth; but I shall have occasion to speak of him hereafter.
As for the rest of my neighbours, I do not think them worthy of notice. I might, indeed, except Mr. Periwinkle Smith, my opposite neighbour, spoken of before, whom I knew to belong to that order of aristocracy which is emphatically termed chip-chop, and who was of such pure blood that it had known no mechanical taint for three different generations, the nearest approach to such disgrace being found in a family of ragamuffins, who claimed to be Mr. Smith's relations, merely because they were descended from his grandfather, but who were very properly discountenanced by him.
This old gentleman had a daughter who seemed to be universally admired, judging from the numbers of visiters of both sexes who besieged her father's door every morning. To do her justice, I must say she was very handsome; but she had the additional merit of being an only child, and therefore an heiress, as was supposed. I thought so myself, until Tim, who knew something of everybody's affairs, assured me that her father's estate was eaten up by mortgages, that he was poor as a rat, and would die insolvent.
Among the many young gentlemen who paid court to the fair Miss Smith, I noticed one, who, besides being more assiduous in his attentions, seemed also to enjoy a greater share of her regard than others. He was a young fellow of uncommonly genteel figure; that is, he was long and lank, somewhat narrow in the shoulders, but clean-limbed, and straight as an arrow. He had a long face and hollow cheeks; but what his jaws lacked in flesh was made up to them in beard, his whiskers, which were coal-black, being as exuberant as if made by a brush-maker, and stretching from his temples to the point of his chin, and so enveloping his whole face. He had besides a pair of peaked mustaches, that would have done honour to the Grand Seignior; and, with a turban and caftan on, he might have paid his respects to the alumni of any college in the land, without even the necessity of speaking bad Latin.[2]He dressed well, walked with a step as easy and majestical as a stork or an ostrich, and was evidently a favourite with the ladies.
His name, Tim told me, was I. D.—that is to say, Isaac Dulmer—Dawkins; though, in consideration of the rusticalness of the first member of the triad, and from regard to his feelings, which were outraged by its pronunciation, his friends had universally agreed to suppress it; and, in consequence, he was called I. Dulmer Dawkins, Esquire, that title being added, because it is the only one an American gentleman not in office, or the militia, can claim. He was, as Timothy assured me, a dandy of the true style, being a born scion of the chip-chop order, and, as such, admitted to all its honours and immunities, though without the support of any living relations in society, or, as his ill luck would have it, of connexions either. He was said to possess some little property in town, and, what was still better, to be the heir of a rich uncle without children, whom he expected to die within a reasonable period. As for his town property, my brother Tim doubted its existence altogether, and would perhaps have been as skeptical in regard to the uncle, had he not known that an uncle did really exist, and a rich one too, for he was largely concerned in the distilling and lumbering business on the Susquehanna.
I am particular in making the reader acquainted with Mr. I. Dulmer Dawkins, inasmuch as it was my fortune, after a time, to fall into a connexion with him myself—as intimate as it was unexpected.
When I first saw him, I accounted him an ugly and uncouth personage, and I regarded him with contempt and dislike. I had acquired, along with other peculiarities of John H. Higginson, a hearty hatred for all people who considered themselves better than myself; for, rich and respectable as I was, I soon perceived that I was considered a very low, vulgar personage by the true chip-chop aristocracy, and I longed greatly at times, as I looked out of the window upon them, to take some of them by the ears, and settle the matter of superiority between us in that way.
But as for Mr. Dulmer Dawkins, I soon began to experience an interest in him, which was indeed of a somewhat envious complexion. I frequently saw him dancing along at the side of the fair Miss Smith; and he seemed so exceedingly happy and content, and she cast upon him so many approving glances, that I could not help contrasting his condition with mine. There he strutted in the open street, young, active, and hale, as ignorant of disease as of care, and here sat I, in a sick chamber, imprisoned with the gout. There he moved at the side of a young and elegant woman, who eyed him with admiration, doubtless, also, with regard, and who had such native amiableness and cheerfulness imprinted together on her countenance, that it was plain she must prove a blessing, rather than a curse, to him who should be so happy as to wed her; while I, miserable I! was tied to such a wife as I could scarce have the cruelty to wish bestowed upon my worst enemy, contracted to an ague, married, as I may say, to a toothache. I should have been glad to exchange conditions with Mr. Dulmer Dawkins—ay, by my honour! if there was ever honour in man—or with anybody else.
From Tim's account it seemed that my young gentleman had a longer face than head; in other words, that nature had endowed him more bountifully with beard than brains: and, in truth, I judged, by the way he showed his teeth and rolled his eyes at the fair Miss Smith, and a thousand other little grimaces and affectations I was witness to, that he was neither more wise nor brilliant than the others of his tribe. But what of that? Wisdom and care go hand in hand, and wit makes us uncomfortable: fools are the only happy people. So I used to think, while I looked on Mr. I. D. Dawkins and the fair Miss Smith.
But it is an ill way to pass time, peeping into millstones, or reading men's history out of their faces. Dulmer Dawkins had his cares, as well as another. I suddenly missed him from the street; the fair Miss Smith made her promenades, attended by other admirers, and for three whole days Mr. Dawkins was invisible. On the fourth he reappeared: I saw him as he came up the street, escorting another belle, entirely unknown to me, but of a dashing appearance. As he passed Mr. Periwinkle Smith's house, the fair Miss Smith issued from the door. Mr. Dawkins made her a low and most elegant bow, his companion waved her fan, and they passed on, looking unutterable things at one another. The fair Miss Smith seemed confounded; a flush appeared on her face, and then vanished; she looked after her admirer, and then, with her attendants, two young coxcombs who were with her, descended the steps, and walked down the street. I saw her once turn her head half round as if to look again after Dulmer; but her curiosity, anger, sorrow, or whatever feeling it was prompted the movement, was restrained, and she strode off at an unusually rapid and unfashionable gait. "So, so! my turtles have been quarrelling," I said to myself; "and the fair Miss Smith is just a Jezebel, like the rest of her confounded sex!"—It never occurred to me to think a quarrel arising between two persons of different sexes could be caused by any thing but the unreasonable behaviour of the lady.
It was two weeks before I saw Dulmer Dawkins again, and then I beheld him under a new aspect.
[1]Perhapsroturiers. Rooterers is, however, good America French —Printer's Devil.
[1]Perhapsroturiers. Rooterers is, however, good America French —Printer's Devil.
[2]Here Sheppard Lee seems to have had in his eye a very ingenious loafer of Pearl Slip, or thereabouts who, some years since, was seized with the whim of travelling, and bamboozling the politic, especially the learned part thereof. By the aid of little dog-Latin, horribly anglicized in idiom and pronunciation, a stock of Gothamic impudence, and features truly Yankee and vernacular, he convinced the cognoscenti of one or more learned institutions that he was a highly unlucky son of a Turk, born all the way off at Damascus.
[2]Here Sheppard Lee seems to have had in his eye a very ingenious loafer of Pearl Slip, or thereabouts who, some years since, was seized with the whim of travelling, and bamboozling the politic, especially the learned part thereof. By the aid of little dog-Latin, horribly anglicized in idiom and pronunciation, a stock of Gothamic impudence, and features truly Yankee and vernacular, he convinced the cognoscenti of one or more learned institutions that he was a highly unlucky son of a Turk, born all the way off at Damascus.
It may be supposed, since I was able to amuse my mind with such observations, that they detracted from the miseries of my condition, or at least assuaged in some measure my pangs. But as well might one believe that the condemned malefactor, who looks out from his cart on the volunteer companies escorting him to the gallows, and admires the splendid incoherence of their trappings—their infantry coats and horsemen's hats, their republican faces and imperial colours—feels thereby less dissatisfaction with his shroud and coffin, and the rope coiled so inelegantly round his neck. My observations were made only at intervals that were both brief and rare. My wife was the most attentive creature that ever set a husband distracted; and under the plea of nursing me, gave me so much of her company, that I was gradually driven to desperation. In course of time I was happily able to get into my barouche, and thus, for a short hour or two, escape my tormentor. Had that period been deferred a week later, I should certainly have taken an ounce of arsenic that I found lying in a closet, though I knew it was awful bad stuff to swallow.
As soon as I found myself once more at liberty, I began to con over a project I had formed of deserting my dear Margaret altogether; and this I resolved to put into execution the moment my foot should be well enough for travelling. But, oh horror! just as the doctor pronounced me cured, I was seized with a second paroxysm, and beheld nothing before me but eternal captivity and unmitigated wife!
This attack was brought on by the mere triumph of restoration. The afternoon before, I drove out upon the Schuylkill, with Tim and another friend; and several other jolly dogs meeting us, we stopped together at a well-known house of entertainment on the banks of that river, and resolved to enjoy ourselves. I declare in all sincerity that I was very moderate both in eating and drinking; but having sat at the table until after nightfall, and being well content to tarry longer, I made a sudden and rash resolution not to return that night at all, nor upon the following day either, if I could avoid it. But as it was necessary to account for my absence to my wife, I instructed Tim to tell her I had contracted a sudden fit of podagra, which made it proper I should not expose myself to the night-air. With this fib in his mouth, Tim, who considered the whole thing a capital joke, as indeed he did every other of my devising, returned to the city, whither he was followed by the others before midnight.
Now whether it was that the immoderate satisfaction I indulged in, at enjoying even a few hours of quiet, was an excess capable of bringing on a paroxysm of gout,—whether it was the unwholesome night-air of the Schuylkill, so famous for its agues and bilious fevers, or whether indeed it was not the lie I had invented, which was punished upon me in the reality of the affliction I had assumed,—it is certain that I woke up the next morning in quite a feverish condition, and with all the symptoms of returning podagra, though I did not immediately suspect it. It was not until towards nightfall that I understood my situation.
In the meanwhile Tim had returned, and again driven back to town without me, to assure my affectionate spouse, that, being entirely recovered, I thought it best to defer my return until the evening; at which time I proposed to be sick again, so as to excuse my remaining from home a second night. In this way I designed to put off my return from night till morning, and from morning till night, as long as I could.
Feeling a little better about dinner-time, I indulged in a hearty meal, and then lay down. But I had not slept many hours before I dreamed the devil was tugging at my foot with a pair of red-hot tongs; and starting up in anguish, I perceived clearly enough that my malady had returned.
"Miserable wretch that I am!" I cried; "why was I not content to be Sheppard Lee? Was poverty worse than the gout? was debt equal in torment to a scolding wife? What a fool I was to change my condition.—Would that I was now a dog!"
I hobbled down to the porch of the inn, not without pain, for my foot was awfully tender, and began to picture to myself the misery that was inevitably prepared for me. The thought of living a month longer in the same house with my wife, entirely at her mercy, drove me to despair; in the midst of which, being roused by the sound of approaching wheels, I looked up, and beheld my wife herself, advancing as fast as my elegant bays could bear her, to pay me a visit. I knew her by her white feathers, and my brother Tim was sitting at her side.
At this sight my philosophy forsook me altogether; I fell into a phrensy, and disregarding the condition of my foot, or rather sharpened and confirmed in my purpose by the pangs it gave me, I rushed down to the river-side towards a spot where I knew there was deep water, resolved to throw myself in without a moment's delay; and this without considering that, as it was hot weather, I should spoil the water drunk by my fellow-citizens. This was an objection that partly occurred to me before, when debating the subject of drowning; and I think it so serious a one, that I would recommend to the councils of Philadelphia to appoint a bailiff, whose express duty should be to prevent people drowning themselves in the basin; and the same person might have an eye to the drowned cats, dogs, pigs, calves, dead fish, and swimming boys, that somewhat detract from the agreeableness of the water.
I reached the place just as the barouche drew up at the door, and hopping forward, I began to slip off my coat and waistcoat, and draw out my watch and pocketbook, though for what purpose, I am sure I cannot say. But what was my surprise to perceive myself forestalled in my intentions by another person, who stood upon the very rock from which I designed to throw myself, and was evidently preparing to exercise justice upon himself in the same summary way. He was a tall, lank personage, of highly genteel figure and habit; but his back being towards me, I could not see his face.
I had scarce laid eyes upon him before, with a very violent motion of his arm, he cast his hat into the stream, and immediately afterward his neck-cloth; then slapping his hands together like one who is about rushing into a fight, and rushing into it with resolution, he exclaimed, "The devil take all women and tailors!" and leaped into the river, which instantly closed over his head.
I was so petrified at his rashness that I forgot my own, and stood staring on the water, as it came rushing in agitated ripples to the shore, lost in such confusion and horror, that for a space of a minute or more I neither moved hand nor foot. The water, which, previous to the plunge, had been as smooth as a mirror, was fast regaining its tranquillity, when, on a sudden, a great bubbling began to appear a few yards below the rock, and I saw the top of a man's head come to the surface, and immediately after sink again.
At that sight, my presence of mind was restored; and being much concerned that a young fellow, as he appeared to be, should perish so miserably, I rushed into the river, and being a good diver, had but little trouble to fish him up, and drag him to the shore. But I pulled him out a moment too late; he was as dead as a herring, or appeared to be; for his countenance was distorted, and blue as an in digo-bag, and his mouth full of foam; a circumstance which I regretted the more, as I no sooner looked him in the face than I recognised the features of my friend, if I may so call him, Mr. I. Dulmer Dawkins.
As I was dragging the body to the shore, a carriage came rattling along the road, which is there so near to the river that those who were in it could easily perceive the act in which I was engaged, and they stopped it to give me assistance. It was at that very moment that I discovered who it was I was carrying; and I was so much surprised at the discovery, that I cried out in a loud voice, "I. D. Dawkins, by the Lord!"
There was immediately a great screaming in the carriage, and out rushed my aristocratical neighbour, Mr. Periwinkle Smith, with two young ladies, one of whom was his daughter; and such an uproar and lamentation as they made about me, were perhaps never before made by so small a number of genteel people, on any occasion. I was particularly affected by the expressions of the fair Miss Smith, who seemed overcome by grief; and, as I did not doubt she had an affection for the young fellow, I wondered what folly could have driven him into this act of suicide.
But my wonder was not very long-lived; the cries of the two ladies had reached the inn, and drawn every soul therein to the scene of disaster. They came running towards us, and I saw that my wife was among them.
I could maintain my equanimity no longer: in the bitterness of my heart I muttered, almost aloud, and as sincerely as I ever muttered any thing in my life, "I would I were this addle-pate Dawkins, were it only to be lying as much like a drowned rat as he!"
I had not well grumbled the last word, before a sudden fire flashed before my eyes, a loud noise like the roar of falling water passed through my head, and I lost all sensation and consciousness.
When I recovered my wits, I thought I had got into the place which is never mentioned among polite people, except at church. I perceived a horrible smell of gin, whiskey, hartshorn, tobacco-smoke, and spirits of camphire, as if these made up the constituents of the atmosphere of darkness; and I saw, though very obscurely, for the light was dim, and there seemed to be films over my eyes, a number of figures that moved to and fro, uttering discordant noises. One of them, it seems, and I took it for granted he was the chief devil, stood by me, pressing my ribs with a fist that felt marvellously heavy, while with the other he maintained a grasp upon my nose, to which ever and anon he gave a considerable tweak; while another, little less dreadful, stood at his side, armed with some singular weapon, shaped much like a common fire-bellows, the nozle of which he held at but a little distance from my own. There were four others of them, each of whom had me by a leg or arm, pulling and slapping with much zeal, and, as I supposed, preparing me for a gridiron; while divers others flitted about, as I mentioned before, talking with voices that appeared to me louder than thunder.
Such were the observations which I made, vaguely and confusedly (for there was a great stupor over most of my senses), and which led me to suspect I was in the place of torment; in which suspicion I was confirmed by a thousand pangs I felt all over my body, so strange, racking, and horrible, that unless one were to have the toothache, gout, earache, gravel, rheumatism, headache, a stumped toe, and locked jaw all together, it would be impossible to form any just conception of the nature and variety of my torments. I had, I verily believed, the paddle-wheel of a steamboat in my head, which was revolving full thirty times a minute, with a hideous crashing and clamour, and churning my brains to atoms; and, by the same rule, I conceived there was an iron-foundry in my lungs and heart, every cell and cavity of which was full of hot castings.
But it would require a greater space than the subject is worthy of, to describe the agonies I endured in those moments of torture; and they were, perhaps, the more poignant, since I could neither move a muscle, nor vent my distresses in a single cry,—which I was the more inclined to do from conceiving myself in the kingdom of darkness.
When I opened my eyes, I heard him who had me by the nose yell out something to the others; upon which there was a great stir and outcry among them, and I distinctly heard one say, after a great oath, "We'll do well enough without a doctor."
"What!" said I to myself, "have they doctors here too? Do they follow their patients?"
"But," continued the same voice, "we'll never finish the job till we roll him over a barrel. He'll never show game till the water's out of him."
These words, it may be supposed, were sufficient to give my mind the right cue, and relieve me of all apprehensions in relation to death and condemnation. On the contrary, they confirmed me the more strongly in my conceit. How there should be water in me I knew not; but my idea was, the inhuman imps wished to roll it out of me, only to make me burn the better. Fortunately for me, another voice made answer, and opposed the atrocious proposal.
"No rolling on barrels," it said, "nor hanging up by the heels"—(hanging up by the heels! thought I)—"it is against the rules of the Humane Society; and here they are."
"The Humane Society!" thought I; "is there a Humane Society among the devils?"
"The rule is," the second voice went on, "as soon as the body shows signs of life, snaps its eyes, and breathes, to pour a little brandy and water down."
"Brandy and water!" said the first voice, evidently in a passion; "and I wonder if that a'n't against the rules of the Temperance Society? Better give the man so much burning brimstone?"
"The Temperance Society?" thought I.—I might have brought myself to believe they had a Temperance Society, as well as a Humane one, in the lower regions, had it not been for the violent ardour of him who pronounced its name. I knew by his rage and fury he could belong to no Temperance Society but in the United States of America; and the inference was therefore plain, that instead of being in the other world, I was in the United States of America myself.
But before I could infer myself into this happy belief, I was confused by a hot argument that grew up between the advocates of the two societies, who waxed quarrelsome, until there was a sudden cry, "The doctor has come!" which pacified them in a moment, and satisfied me I was neither dead nor buried.
The doctor stalked up to me; I thought I knew his features and voice, but my sight and hearing were still confused. I have no doubt he treated mesecundum artem; but in about five minutes I was as dead as ever.
However, it was not my fate to die in good earnest. By-and-by I opened my eyes, feeling in very passable health, though somewhat weak and dejected.
The devils, or my late attendants, whoever they were, had all vanished, and with them noise, darkness, and the various ill odours that had afflicted my nostrils. I was lying in a very good bed, and chamber with curtained windows, the curtains being closed, to keep out the sunshine that was playing on them; and at my side there sat in an arm-chair a young gentleman of a buckish appearance, sound asleep. The creaking of the bed, as I rose on my elbow, roused him; he started, rubbed his eyes, and, looking me in the face, burst into a hearty laugh.
"Bravo!" he cried; "I told old Boneset so! I could watch as comfortably as ever a child's nurse of Messina. I thought I should have the child wake me with crying! I vow to gad, I've been snoozing all night. And so you've opened your peepers like an honest man at last, Dawky!—Pray, what the devil made you drown yourself?"
And here the young gentleman, seizing me by the hand, fell a laughing again, and that with more zest than before.
"Sah!" said I, looking at him with both surprise and confusion; for, though his voice and face seemed familiar to me, I could not for the life of me say who he was. "Sa—ah, really I—ah—" and here I stopped; for, first, I knew not what to say, and secondly, my bewildered looks set him into such a roar of merriment, that there was no saying a word to him.
"Come, you dog," said he, with a grin here and a roar there, "don't be comical just after coming out of the grave. A man just fished out of a river, and rescued from death after a hard fight between the doctor and the devil, should be serious and ecclesiastical, solemn of visage, and sanctified of conversation. No joking, you dog; but get up, Absalomize, and talk. No joking, I say; no joking with Jack Tickle."
As he spoke he seized me by the shoulder, and dragged me half out of bed.
"Ged and demmee!" said I, "remember my foot!" For my toe catching in the bed-cord, I suddenly recollected the gouty member.
"I will," said he, with another roar; "for, the Lord knows, 'tis the best part of you. Spoil Dawky's foot, and ruin him with women and shoe-makers for ever! The one ceases to adore, and the other trusts no longer."
"But I mean the gout," said I.
"The fiddlestick and fiddle!" said he: "whoever heard of a poor dandy, living on tick, having the gout? Up, Dawky, my dog, and tell me what set you to drowning? If 'twas about Betty Small, 'twas a small matter. What! drown for being jilted! If 'twas about the tailor's bill, 'twas still more ridiculous. I say, Dawky, my fellow,whatmade you drown yourself?"
"Drown myself!" said I; but I said it with a stare. The odd behaviour and expressions of the young gentleman, who called himself Jack Tickle (a name that I never remembered to have heard before in my life, although his countenance was certainly highly familiar), and certain queer associations his appearance gave birth to; the singularity of my feelings; and, more than all, the appearance of my foot and leg (the former of which, instead of being tumid and red with gout, was white, and of elegant shape, while the latter, which but the day before had a calf to compare with any old Quaker's in Arch-street, was now as lank as a sword-blade); I say, these circumstances had the effect to increase my confusion to that degree, that I felt like one who is asleep and knows it—provided one ever did or can feel so.
In the midst of all I suddenly cast my eyes upon a goodly large looking-glass that hung against the wall, and saw my reflection therein. It was the image of Mr. I. Dulmer Dawkins! his exact representation, perfect in beard and visage, save that the former was in great disorder, and the latter somewhat white, and equally perfect in figure, as far as I could compare a man in buff and linen to one in the full panoply of the tailor.
"My ged!" said I, "I am transformed again!"
And with that I made a hop up to the glass to look at myself closer. There was no mistaking the matter, even if the looking-glass had. I looked at my legs, and I gave a tweak at my mustaches. My shoulders were elegantly narrow, and my foot as sound as a savage's. I jumped up, cut a pigeon-wing, and then, descending, attempted a ballet-dancer's pirouette; after which I looked again into the glass. I was a young man of twenty-five, and the most elegant fellow I ever laid eyes on!
I ran to Jack, and hugged him round the neck, crying, "Lard, Jack, you rogue, I'm the most comical creature that ever lived!"
"Ay," said he, smothering with laughter and my embraces together; "but what made you drown yourself?"
I recollected all about it, and suddenly felt astonished. I remembered how I had jumped into the water, and how I had fished myself out, as dead as a poker; that is, how Mr. Higginson had fished me, or rather how I had fished Mr. Dawkins. I remembered how I, John Hazlewood Higginson, had wished to be Mr. I. Dulmer Dawkins, and now I was Mr. I. Dulmer Dawkins himself, and nobody but he. I sat down on the bedside, marvelling how such a thing could be; and the wonder of it was indeed amazing. That my spirit should creep into a man's body, though strange enough, was not so prodigiously surprising; but that my spirit and body together (for I did not know it had been otherwise disposed of), especially so corpulent a one as John H. Higginson's, should get into one—that was truly marvellous.
But my study was brought to an end by Tickle suddenly exclaiming, with a voice of concern, "Curse him! gad, poor fellow, I believe he has washed his wits out! He has gone mad!"
"No more than you have," said I, shaking him by the hand; "but you must allow it is a most extraordinary affair."
"'Pon honour, yes," said he, laughing as hard as ever; "but what made you throw yourself into the river?"
"Why," said I, in a hurry, "to save Dawkins."
"To save Dawkins!!!" said he, looking at me as one would look at a shoemaker who brings a pair of shoes home the day he has promised them.
"That is," said I, "to save Higginson."
"To save Higginson!!!" he cried, with such a roar of laughter as made my teeth rattle; "why there were twenty people saw Higginson dragyouout! I say, Dawky, no lillibullering—what did you jump into the river for?"
"I jumped," said I, quite in a quandary, "after my hat."
At this answer my friend Jack Tickle threw himself upon the bed, where he rolled over and over, until his coat was covered with down and feathers, which cooled his transports a little.
"I see," said he, "I see! It was the last of the family; for hatters' tick was exhausted! Right, Dawky; in such straits of credit, I think I should have jumped after mine! Who would not fight, roast, or drown, for his hat, when it was the last decent one he ever expected to have on his head? I am gladthiswas the cause: it makes me think better of you. I thought, like the rest, it was on account of your disappointment from the adorable Betty—"
"The devil take Betty!" said I, but without well knowing why.
"Hehas!" cried Jack, uproariously; "at least apoordevil has. She has thrown away her seventy thousand upon a fellow no more to be compared with you than a tame goose with a wild one: and instead of spending it like a man, the rascal will buy stocks, and save it. I say, Dawky, you must have been surprised at her conduct—as we all were;—really, we thought you had her; and there was no one more certain than the fair Miss Smith."
"The devil take the fair Miss Smith!" said I.
"He will," said Tickle, shaking his head and laughing; "or, ifhedon't, I don't know who will; for it is a clear matter—dad's done up entirely, and they say the sheriff is already making an inventory of his chattels. A great pity, Dawky; for, if she had but money, Miss Smith would be certainly an angel incarnate—a nymph, a houri—the finest woman in town. I say, Dawky, I think she almost had you!"
There were many things in the conversation of my friend Tickle which I did not exactly comprehend, though I had a vague, confused appreciation of all, and afterward understood him well enough. The fact is, I was in the same difficulty which had beset me when scarce warm in the body of Mr. Higginson, that is, a confusion of characters, propensities, and associations, only that the last were imperfect, as if my memory had suddenly given way; and besides, the difficulty was in both cases increased by the feeling of amazement with which, for several hours, when properly conscious of it, I pondered over the marvel of my transformation. How such a thing could happen, or had happened, I knew no more than the man in the moon: it was a new thing in the history of man, and there was nothing in philosophy (at least, such philosophy as I had at that time) to explain it. I had certainly done nothing, on my part, in either case, to effect a change, save merely wishing it; and it seemed to me that I possessed a power, never before known to a human being, of transferring my spirit from body to body, whenever I willed, at least, under certain circumstances. But on this subject I will have more to say hereafter.
Happen how and by what means it might, it was certain a transferhadtaken place; and that I was no longer the poor miserable John H. Higginson, with the gout and a scolding wife; the conception and full consciousness of which were so rapturous, that I suddenly bounded on my feet, and danced about like a madman, now running to the glass to admire my youthful and elegant appearance, and now flinging my arms round the neck of my friend, and hugging him twenty times over.
The conversation that passed between us was exceedingly joyous and varied; though, as I said before, I had but an imperfect understanding of many things Tickle said; for which reason I will record no more of his expressions, lest they should confuse the reader's mind, as they did mine. Some things, however, I gathered from him in relation to my catastrophe and resuscitation which are proper to be told.
It seems that when I—that is, John H. Higginson—wished I were, or might be, the defunct, Dulmer Dawkins, I fell down under a sudden stroke of apoplexy, which was supposed to be caused by my exertions to rescue the unfortunate beau; and, indeed, I saw in the first newspaper I looked into, upon getting to Philadelphia afterward, a long account of my demise, with a highly eulogistic and affecting account of my heroism in sacrificing my life for another's; for, as the paragraph stated, I was of a full and plethoric habit, strongly inclined to apoplexy, of which I was aware myself, as well as of the danger of over exertion; and therefore my act was the more truly heroic. The paper was of a highly democratic character, and the notice was closed by a ferocious warning to the young bug of aristocracy (meaning the elegant and fashionable. I. Dulmer Dawkins), "to remember, when wasting his trivial existence in that heartless society, whose pleasures were obtained at the expense of their worthier, though poorer fellow-creatures, that the preservation of it had cost the nation one of its most excellent citizens, and the world a virtuous man and pure patriot:"—by which I understood that John H. Higginson was of the democratic party; although that was a circumstance of which the gout and my wife had kept me ignorant, as long as I lived in his body.
As for me—that is, I. D. Dawkins—being lugged into the tavern, along with my late tenement, the body of John H. Higginson, I was fallen foul of by all hands; and what with tweaking my nose, beating my arms, scorching my legs with hot bricks, flaying me with salt, whiskey, spirits, and such things, and filling my lungs with dust and ashes from an old fire-bellows, I was brought to life again, greatly to the triumph of my tormentors, before the appearance of a physician; who, however, subsequently assured me they had revived me with such effect as to give him double trouble to keep me in the land of the living afterward; for it seems, after being more dead than alive all that night, I had remained in a kind of stupor all the following day, from which I awoke on the second morning, well enough, as the doctor prognosticated I would be, but only after I had remained more than thirty-six hours in a state of insensibility.
As for my body—that is, Higginson's—it had the honour, after being cogitated over by the coroner, of riding home in my splendid barouche, with the thousand-dollar hourses; but whether my wife went with it or not, I never cared to inquire. It was enough she was gone; and oh, rapture of raptures! gone for ever.
My friend Tickle illuminated me as to other matters, especially in relation to the fair Miss Smith; with whom, it seems (and I recollected all about it when he had set my new associations properly to work), I had been quite particular, until he himself discovered the insolvency of her father's estate; when (and this I began to recollect in the same manner) I instantly turned my attentions upon another—the fair Miss Small—who jilted me. These things, I say, I soon began to recall to mind, as well as many other incidents in the past life of I. Dulmer Dawkins; and, indeed, in the course of a few days, I was as much at home in his body, and among his affairs, as he had ever been himself. But of this anon. I learned that Mr. Periwinkle Smith, after seeing me lodged in the tavern, had driven off to town to engage medical assistance; and this he did so effectually, that I had no less than seven doctors at one time to send me their bills; which was a very foolish thing of them.
Of these things, I say, I discoursed with my friend Jack Tickle, whose conversation, together with the happy consciousness I had of my transformation, infused inexpressible vivacity into my spirits. I was marvellously pleased at the idea of being a fine young fellow, with the freedom of chip-chop society; and I was impatient to return to the city to enjoy my happiness.
"Bravo!" said Jack; "we'll walk in together. But do you know, Dawky," he went on, nodding and winking, "that this is a cursed no-credit place, and that the man below betrayed a certain vulgar anxiety about scot and lot, and the extra expenses you had put him to? What do you say about paying?"
"Really," said I, clapping my hands into my pockets, "I have forgotten my pocketbook!"
"To be sure you have," said Tickle, laughing; "but why need you tell me so? I am no shop-keeper."
"I mean," said I, in alarm, "demmee, that I have lost it, and with that hundred-dollar bill my brother Tim—"
"Your brother Tim!" said Tickle; "who's he?"
I was struck all aback. I remembered that I was I. D. Dawkins.
Tickle perceived my confusion, and enjoyed it, attributing it to another cause.
"Right!" said he, grinning with delight; "but don't make any pretence with me. I didn't expect you to have any money; and, the Lord be thanked, I have. I'll square your account, my dear fellow, and help you to a pigeon besides."
With these words, and many others not needful to be mentioned, he led the way down stairs, where he became astonishingly grave and dignified—a peculiarity I found myself falling into—slapped his ratan against his legs, called for "his friend Dawkins's bill," and paid it—that is, I suppose he did, for I stalked out upon the porch, as if I considered such vulgar matters beneath my notice.
Here, being soon joined by Tickle, and the day proving uncommonly fine, we set out on foot towards the city; and I was conducted by my friend to the door of my own lodgings.
"In and mount," said Tickle: "I see Jem Puddle in the street yonder, and I have an idea I can borrow fifty dollars of him. I will drop round on you by-and-by."
So saying, Tickle started off and left me at the door of my lodgings. I had a sort of confused recollection of the place, though I had never seen it before in my life;—the dingy bricks and weather-stained marble, the rickety old iron railing on the steps, and the ugly, worn-out brass plate, with the "J. SNIGGLES" engraved thereon, rose on my memory like old acquaintances who had grown out of it. The house might have been a fashionable one in its day; nay, for the matter of that, it was not so humble in appearance but that a gentleman might have lived in it, if too poor to inhabit a better; and though out of the world, being in a street called Eighth, it was within hail of Chestnut: nevertheless, it was but a poor place compared with my late dwelling,myhouse, in Chestnut; the recollection of which, together with the reflection that I entered this only as a lodger, somewhat abated the transport of my joy. "Ah!" thought I, "what a pity, in giving up John H. Higginson's gout and wife, I had also to give up his house and money!" But the recollection of the two first-named possessions was fresh upon me, and I ceased to murmur.
I ascended the steps and rang the bell, somewhat faintly, I must acknowledge; for though I had my friend Tickle's assurance, and a confused consciousness of my own, that I was at the right place, there was a certain strangeness in it, naturally arising from my situation, that made me hesitate. The door, however, opened, and the reception that followed convinced me I was not intruding where I was not known.
The door was opened by a bouncing Irish wench, of some twenty-five years or thereabouts, with hair as yellow as a broom-whisk, and shoulders twice as broad as my own; besides which, she was not handsome; she had staring gray eyes, brick-coloured cheeks, a nose that looked up at her forehead, and a mouth not so ugly as spacious.
I was about to pass by this fair apparition with no further notice than a nod, which I made somewhat instinctively; but I was not fated to get off so easily. No sooner did she lay eyes upon me than she set up a squeak, "Oh, hubbuboo! and is ityou, Misther Dawkins, dear?" and threw her great beef-steak arms round my neck.
An embrace from a creature of her attractions I could have easily dispensed with; yet I might have been affected by her joy at seeing me return alive from the bottom of the river, it was so truly natural and exuberant, had she not been in a great hurry to qualify it. "Oh, murder, dear!" she cried, "and I'm glad; for they said, bad luck till'em, the vagabones! you was drownded, dear, and was after chating me out iv my money for the washin' and mindin'!"
"The washing and mending?" thought I. "Do I patronise such a tasty body as this? and do I owe her money?"
But while I muttered thus within, the girl, giving me another hug that I thought would have made my shoulders change place with one another, roared out, in continuation,—
"Och, throth, but the man must drown dape that chates Nora Magee of her own! Musha, hinny darlint, jist pit yer finger into yer pocket and pull me out the tin dollars and seventy cents that you owe me."
"Certainly, Nora," said I; "and Succuba let me go. But, ged now, Nora," I cried, for well I knew my pockets were as empty as the promises I intended to make her, and I was driven by a sort of instinct upon the proper course for pacifying the harpy,—a course, I suppose, that I,—that is, my prototype, the true Dawkins,—had often practised before;—I say, "Nora, don't talk of dollars and cents; for I intend to pay you in eagles and half-eagles some of these days, when my uncle comes; and besides, Nora, you jade you, I intend to give you a buss into the bargain, as, ged, I believe I willnow."
And with that I returned the compliment she had paid me, took the great creature by the neck, and (yea, faith, and I presume I should have done the same thing with my tailor, if he could have been managed the same way) absolutely kissed her.
"Och! blessings on yer pritty face!" said she, looking pleased and disappointed together, but wiping her mouth as if to prepare for a second salute, "and that's the way you bamboozles me wid your uncles and your thricks upon a poor cratur's modesty! But, oh, Misther Dawkins, dear, ye'r lookin' sick and pokey; and so I'll not be after throubling you; and I hopes your uncle will be soon in Phillydelphy; for there's our ould Sniggles, the hungry ould nagur (that I should be saying so of the master o' the house, that gives me a dollar a week and a new bonnet at Christmas!) he's been rampin', and roarin', and swearin' like a Turk, my heavy hathred on him, he'll be havin' you up before the constables and squires for the dirty rint-money, the ould divil! that you owe him."
"The rent-money?" thought I; and I began to have a sort of feeling about me, I do not know what, but it was not agreeable. I clapped my hand into my pocket; there was a pocketbook there, but I had examined it before, and there was nothing in it. My mind began to misgive me a little; it was apparent the worthy I. D. Dawkins had not yielded me his body without leaving me some of his debts to pay: and as to what means of discharging them he might have bequeathed, I was yet in the dark.
I ascended to my rooms, of which I discovered I had a brace; but I was in some dudgeon to find them in the third story. "Very odd," said I to myself, "that I should be a fashionable man and a dandy, and live in a third story!" My instincts had gone nigh, as I climbed the stairs, to carry me into a chamber on the first floor; but, "Arrah, now, hinny," said Nora, "you'd be after forgetting you agreed to give up the best chambers till yer uncle comes to town—bad luck to him for keeping me so long out iv my tin dollars!"
"This uncle of mine," thought I, "will settle all pothers." But who he was, or what sort of claim I had upon him, I knew no more than the man in the moon. My associations acted but slowly and imperfectly, and when I strove to look back upon the past history of my new body, I felt like a man who has clapped upon his nose his grandmother's spectacles, through which he can behold objects indeed, but all so confused, distorted, and mystified, that they serve only to bewilder his vision. Thus I beheld, when I made the effort, a jumble of events and persons crowded together on my memory, but without being able to seize upon any one and examine it to my satisfaction. I had an uncle, it seemed, but I could not recall any thing like a recollection of having ever seen him. "But time," thought I, "will set these things right."
My chambers were but meanly furnished, and this—But it needs not I should acquaint the reader with the divers proofs that rose every moment to convince me Mr. I. D. Dawkins, though a dandy, was not a rich one. Before I had rummaged an hour among his chattels, I discovered enough to set me into a cold shiver, and almost make me repent having taken possession of his body. I found lying upon his table no less than thirty-seven folded papers—the tribute doubtless of the two days of his absence—of which, eight were either billetsdoux or mere cards of invitation to ladies' parties, and twenty-nine were letters from tailors, shoemakers, &c., all of them requesting payment of money owed, and most of them as ferocious in spirit as they were original in style and grammar. In an old trunk, which I ransacked, as well as every chest of drawers and closet in the rooms (the keys were ready at hand in my pocket), I discovered a bushel or two of bills—I suppose there may have been a thousand of them, for they were of all dates—not one of which had a receipt to it.
But, to make amends for this evil, I found Mr. I. D. Dawkins's wardrobe in pretty good condition, except in the article of shirts; of which I discovered but six, and those none of the best. However, there were three dozen good dickeys, and a great abundance of loose collars and wristbands; with which, I perceived, I might do without shirts altogether.
But what gave me most pleasure, and indeed quite consoled me under the feelings of disappointment and doubt that had begun to rise, was a marvellous great quantity of love-letters, locks of hair, finger-rings, odd gloves, &c., that I found scattered about; each, as was apparent, the tribute or spoil of some admiring fair. "Aha!" said I, "I am a devil of a fellow among the girls: who can resist me?" The idea of being a favourite among the women, and the prospect I had of shooting conquests among them, right and left, were infinitely agreeable. "Ged and demmee," said I, "I will look about me now, and fix for life. I will pick out the finest creature I can find who has a fortune, and marry her; and then, I say, demm all tailors and other people. I will marry a wife, eged!"
It was doubly remarkable I should make such a resolution, having had but lately such a lesson of the joys of matrimony. But I found myself fast growing another man. I still retained a lively recollection of Mrs. Higginson, but fancy pictured an angel in the anticipated Mrs. Dawkins. Dim visions—which seemed to be made up as much of crude recollections as of half-formed anticipations—dim visions of lovely eyes and noses floated over my brain; I sank into a soft, elysium-like revery; when I suddenly heard a voice, somewhat tremulous and feeble, but rude as the screech of a strawberry-woman in spring, saying,
"Sir, I say, sir, Mr. Dawkins, I shall trouble you, I say, for the amount of that 'ere small account."
The accents were more horrible to my soul than the grating of a dentist's file upon the tenderest of grinders. I looked up from my feet, which I had been admiring, and beheld a visage somewhat iracund and savage, but so vulgar and plebeian in all its lineaments, that my fear was changed into contempt.
"And I say, sare! whoever you ah," said I, looking the fellow to the soul, "what do you want he-ah? who ah you?"
At these questions the man looked petrified; he opened his mouth till I thought his under jaw would drop off, and stared at me in dumb amazement. I had some hopes he was about to fall down in a fit. I am not naturally of a bloodthirsty turn; but I knew he was a dun, and such persons one always wishes the devil would snatch up. But he recovered his tongue, and, to do him justice, I must confess he used it with a spirit I did not look for in such a mean, shrivelled-up body as he had.
"Don't go for to insult me," said the Goth, gritting his teeth, and spluttering his words through them as through a watering-pot; "I'll let you know who I am. I'll have my money, or I'll have the worth on it out on you; for I won't be cheated no more for nothing. And as for what I'm doing here, I'll let you know as how I'm master in my own house; and, as Mrs. Sniggles says—"
"Sniggles!" said I, recollecting that the rascal was my landlord and creditor. I started up, and seizing the enraged little man by the hand, I begged his pardon.
"Really, my dear soul," said I, "I was in a brown study, and I didn't know you. Pray how d'ye do? how is Mrs. Sniggles? You must know I have hardly yet got over my unfortunate fall into the water. Really, sah, I was almost drowned, and I had the misfortune to lose my pocketbook."
"None on your gammon on me!" said Mr. Sniggles, looking as intrepid as ever; "for I don't believe none on it; and I don't believe you're no gentleman neither, or you wouldn't keep me out of my money. You see, Mr. Dawkins, do you see, you've had my rooms five months, and I ha'n't seen the colour on your money over once; it's all promise and no pay. And so, as I was saying, I won't be diddled no longer, or I'll see the end of it; for, as Mrs. Sniggles says, we can't afford to be diddled for nothing."
"Come, Sniggles," said I, "don't be in a passion; I'll pay you. What's the amount?"
"Seventeen weeks on the second story, seven dollars a week—monstrous cheap at that, considerin' there's breakfast in—one hundred and nineteen dollars—and taking off the ten dollars you paid me, as per account, one hundred and nine dollars; four weeks on the third story, at five dollars and a half (and good rooms too), twenty-two dollars; and adding the ten dollars I paid the shoe-maker, and the five dollars sixty cents I loaned you to pay the fine at the mayor's office, for smashing the lamp, makes jest a hundred and forty-one dollars sixty cents, no halves nor quarters, precise; and the sooner you shows me the money the better."
"A confounded long bill that, Sniggles," said I; "but I don't dispute it; and the moment my uncle comes to town—"
The mean, avaricious fellow had begun to look happy, as he conned over the hateful particulars of his account, which he held in his hand; but no sooner had the words "my uncle" left my lips, than he began to jump up and down, pulling his hair, gritting his teeth, and shaking his fists like a mad-man; and to my astonishment the contemptible fellow waxed profane, and actually cursed me and my uncle too. His oaths, as may be supposed, only made him appear more low-lived and vulgar than before; for cursing and swearing are the hardest things to dogenteellythat I know: there are but few persons in the world who can produce an oath with any thing like elegance; it is the truest criterion of gentility, and in consequence I would recommend no person to attempt one who is not confident of his high breeding.
My landlord, Mr. Sniggles, fell to cursing and swearing, and insulted me very grossly; first, by affecting to believe that no such person as my uncle existed; secondly, by threatening to turn me out of his house; and thirdly, by assuring me he would have his account in an attorney's hands before I was an hour older. It was in vain I exhorted him to moderate his passion, and strove to wheedle him into a better humour; I had forgotten (or rather I did not yet know) the true secret of his character, which was cowardice, by addressing my arguments to which I might have readily brought him to reason. But, in truth, I was frightened myself; how I was to pay a bill of a hundred and forty-one dollars sixty cents was a thing only to be guessed at; and the prospect of taking up my lodgings in the debtors' apartments up Arch-street, was as vinegar and wormwood to my imagination.
The more I strove to sooth the wrath of Mr. Sniggles, the more ferocious he became; until at last he did nothing but dance round and round me, like a little dog barking at a big one that is tied to a post, crying out all the time, frantic with despair and fury, "Pay me what you owe me! pay this here bill here! pay me my money, or I'll have you in jail!" with other expressions equally foolish and insulting.
In the midst of my troubles, up comes my friend Tickle and pops into the room. He gave a stare at Sniggles, and next a grin; and then, just as I was looking to be laughed at, he made a spring and caught me round the neck, crying, with uncommon exultation and eagerness,—
"I congratulate you, Dawkins, you dog! and, mind, you must lend me five hundred dollars tomorrow!"
Before I could answer a word to this surprising address, he turned upon Sniggles, and, looking black as a thunder-cloud, cried,—