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No sooner did I perceive it motionless than I repented of having killed a creature unconscious of the mischief it had done. Was this worthy of the professor of philosophy, the adorer of the gentle Amelia? But thus to eat up my rose-tree, my only hope to get admittance to her! When I thought on its annihilation, I could not consider myself so culpable. However, the night darkened; I heard the old servant crossing the lower passage, and I called her. ‘Catherine,’ said I, ‘bring your light, there is mischief here; you left the stable doon open (that of the court was also unclosed), one of your sheep has been browsing on my rose-trees, and I have punished it.’
“She soon came with a lanthorn in her hand. It is not one of our sheep,’ said she; ‘I have just come from them; the stable gate is shut, and they are all within. O, blessed saints! blessed saints! What do I see’—exclaimed she, when near, ‘it is the pet sheep of our neighbour Mademoiselle de Belmont. Poor Robin! what bad luck brought you here! O! how sorry she will be.’ I nearly dropped down beside Robin.
“‘Of Mademoiselle Amelia!’ said I in a trembling voice; ‘has she actually a sheep?’ ‘O! good Lord! no; she has none at this moment—but that which lies there, with its four legs up in the air: she loved it as herself; see the collar that she worked for it with her own hands.’ I bent to look at it. It was of red leather, ornamented with little bells, and she had embroidered on it, in gold thread—‘Robin belongs to Amelia de Belmont; she loves him, and begs that he may be restored to her.’ ‘What will she think of the barbarian who killed him in a fit of passion—the vice that she most detests; she is right, it has been fatal to her; yet if he should be only stunned by a blow; Catherine, run, ask for some aether, orEau de Vie, or hartshorn,—run, Catherine, run!’
“Catherine set off; I tried to make it open its mouth,—my rose-bud was still between its hermetically-sealed teeth; perhaps the collar pressed it: in fact the throat was swelled. I got it off with difficulty; something fell from it at my feet, which I mechanically took up and put into my pocket without looking at, so much was I absorbed in anxiety for the resuscitation. I rubbed him with all my strength; I grew more and more impatient for the return of Catherine. She came with a small new phial in her hand, calling out in her usual manner, ‘Here, sir, here’s the medicine. I never opened my mouth about it to Mademoiselle Amelia; I pity her enough without that.’
“‘What is all this Catherine? where have you seen Mademoiselle Amelia? and what is her affliction, if she does not know of her favourite’s death?’ ‘O, sir, this is a terrible day for the poor young lady. She was at the end of the street searching for a ring which she had lost; and it was no trifle, but the ring that her dead father had got as a present from the Emperor, and worth, they say, more ducats than I have hairs on my head. Her mother lent it to her to day for the party; she has lost it, she knows neither how nor where, and never missed it till she drew off her glove at supper. And, poor soul! the glove was on again in a minute, for fear it should be seen that the ring was wanting, and she slipped out to search for it along the street, but has found nothing.’
“It struck me that the substance that had fallen from the sheep’s collar had the form of a ring—could it possibly be!—I looked at it; and judge of my joy!—it was Madame de Belmont’s ring, and really very beautiful and costly. A secret presentiment whispered to me that this was a better means of presentation than the rose-tree. I pressed the precious ring to my heart, and to my lips; assured myself that the sheep was really dead; and leaving him stretched near the devastated rose-trees, I ran into the street, dismissed those who were seeking in vain, and stationed myself at my door to await the return of my neighbours. I saw from a distance the flambeau that preceded them, quickly distinguished their voices, and comprehended by them, that Amelia had confessed her misfortune. The mother scolded bitterly; the daughter wept, and said, ‘Perhaps it may be found.’ ‘O yes, perhaps,’—replied the mother with irritation, ‘it is too rich a prize to him that finds it; the emperor gave it to your deceased father, on the field, when he saved his life; he set more value on it than on all he possessed besides, and now you have thus flung it away; but the fault is mine for having trusted you with it. For some time back you have seemed quite bewildered.’ I heard all this as I followed at some paces behind them; they reached home; and I had the cruelty to prolong, for some moments more, Amelia’s mortification.—I intended that the treasure should procure me the entrée of their dwelling, and I waited till they had got up stairs. I then had myself announced as the bearer of good news; I was introduced, and respectfully presented the ring to Madame de Belmont: and how delighted seemed Amelia! and how beautifully she brightened in her joy, not alone that the ring was found, but that I was the finder. She cast herself on her mother’s bosom, and turning on me her eyes, humid with tears, though beaming with pleasure, she clasped her hands, exclaiming, ‘O, sir, what obligation, what gratitude do we owe to you!’
“‘Ah, Mademoiselle!’ returned I, ‘you know not to whom you address the term gratitude.’ ‘To one who has conferred on me a great pleasure,’ said she.’ ‘To one who has caused you a serious pain—to the killer of Robin.’
“‘You, sir?—I cannot credit it—why should you do so? you are not so cruel.’
“‘No, but I am so unfortunate. It was in opening his collar, which I have also brought to you, that your ring fell on the ground—you promised a great recompence to him who should find it. I dare to solicit that recompence; grant me my pardon for Robin’s death.’
“‘And I, sir, I thank you for it,’ exclaimed the mother. ‘I never could endure that animal; it took up Amelia’s entire time, and wearied me out of all patience with its bleating. If you had not killed it, Heaven knows where it might have carried my diamond. But how did it get entangled in the collar? Amelia, pray explain all this.’
“Amelia’s heart was agitated; she was as much grieved that it was I who had killed Robin, as that he was dead.—‘Poor Robin,’ said she, drying a tear, ‘he was rather too fond of running out; before leaving home, I had put on his collar that he might not be lost—he had always been brought back to me. The ring must have slipped under his collar. I hastily drew on my glove, and never missed it till I was at supper.
“‘What good luck it was that he went straight to this gentleman’s,’ observed the mother.
“‘Yes—for you,’ said Amelia; ‘he was cruelly received—was it such a crime, sir, to enter your door?’
“‘It was night,’ I replied; ‘I could not distinguish the collar, and I learned, when too late, that the animal belonged to you.’ “‘Thank Heaven, then, you did not know it!’ cried the mother, or where would have been my ring?’
“‘It is necessary at least,’ said Amelia, with emotion, ‘that I should know how my favourite could have so cruelly chagrined you.’
“‘O Mademoiselle, he had devoured my hope, my happiness, a superb rose-tree about to blow, that I had been long watching, and intended to present to—to—a person on New-Year’s-Day.’ Amelia smiled, blushed, extended her lovely hand towards me, and murmured,—‘All is pardoned.’ ‘If it had eaten up a rose-tree about to blow,’ cried Madame de Belmont, ‘it deserved a thousand deaths. I would give twenty sheep for a rose-tree in blow.’ ‘And I am much mistaken,’ said Amelia, with the sweetestnaïveté, ‘if this very rose-tree was not intended for you.’ ‘For me! you have lost your senses child; I have not the honour of knowing the gentleman.’ ‘But he knows your fondness for roses; I mentioned it one day before him, the only time I ever met him, at Madame de S.‘s. Is it not true, sir, that my unfortunate favourite had eaten up my mother’s rose-tree?’ I acknowledged it, and I related the course of education of my fifty rose-trees.
“Madame de Belmont laughed heartily, and said, ‘she owed me a double obligation.’ Mademoiselle Amelia has given me my recompence for the diamond,’ said I to her;—‘I claim yours also, madame.’ ‘Ask, sir—’ ‘Permission to pay my respects sometimes to you!’ ‘Granted,’ replied she, gaily. I kissed her hand respectfully, that of her daughter tenderly, and withdrew. But I returned the next day—and every day—I was received with a kindness that each visit increased,—I was looked on as one of the family. It was I who now gave my arm to Madame de Belmont to conduct her to the evening parties; she presented me as her friend, and they were no longer dull to her daughter. New-Year’s-Day arrived. I had gone the evening before to a sheepfold in the vicinity to purchase a lamb similar to that I had killed. I collected from the different hot-houses all the flowering rose-trees I could find; the finest of them was for Madame de Belmont; and the roses of the others were wreathed in a garland round the fleecy neck of the lamb. In the evening I went to my neighbours, with my presents. ‘Robin and the rose-tree are restored to life,’ said I, in offering my homage, which was received with sensibility and gratefulness. ‘I also should like to give you a New-Year’s-gift,’ said Madame de Belmont to me, ‘if I but knew what you would best like.’ ‘What I best like—ah! if I only dared to tell you.’ ‘If it should chance now to be my daughter—.’ I fell at her feet, and so did Amelia. ‘Well,’ said the kind parent, ‘there then is your New-Year’s-gift ready found; Amelia gives you her heart, and I give you her hand.’ She took the rose wreath from off the lamb, and twined it round our united hands. ‘And my Amelia,’ continued the old professor, as he finished his anecdote, passing an arm round his companion as she sat beside him, ‘My Amelia is still to my eyes as beautiful, and to my heart as dear, as on the day when our hands were bound together with a chain of flowers.’”
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Mr. Job Spimkins, grocer and vestryman of Crutched-Friars, was a stout, easy, good-natured, middle-aged gentleman, who—to adopt a mercantile phrase—was “well to do in the world,” and had long borne an exemplary character throughout his ward for sobriety, punctuality, civility, and all those homely but well-wearing qualities which we are apt to associate with trade. Punctuality, however, was the one leading feature of his mind, which he carried to so extravagant a height, that having formed a scale of moral duties, he had placed it in the very front rank, side by side with honesty—or the art of driving a good bargain—and just two above temperance, soberness and chastity. Even in his social hours, this peculiar trait of character decided his predilections; for, notwithstanding he was much given to keeping up feasts and holidays, and had a high respect for Michaelmas-Day, Christmas-Day, Twelfth-Day, New-Year’s-Day, &c., yet he always expressed an indifferent opinion of Easter, because, like an Irishman’s pay-day, it was seldom or never punctual. Next to this engrossing hobby was our citizen’s abhorrence of poetry, an abhorrence which he extended with considerate impartiality to every branch of literature.
But Dr. Franklin’s works formed an exception. He pronounced his commercial maxims to be thechefs-d’oeuvreof genius, and used to set them as large text-copies for his son, when he and the school-bill came home together for the holidays from Dr. Thickskull’s academy at Camberwell. But poetry—our prosaic citizen could not for the life of him abide it. The only good thing, he used to say, he ever, yet saw inverse, was the Rule of Three; and the onlyrhymesthat had the slightest reason to recommend them, were “Thirty days hath September.”
To these opinions Mrs. Spimkins, like a dutiful wife, never failed to respond, “Amen.” In person, this good lady was short and stoutly timbered, with a face on which lay the full sunshine of prosperity, in one broad, unvaried grin. Three children were her’s: three “dear, delightful children,” as their grandmother by the father’s side never failed to declare, when punctually, every New-Year’s-Day, she presented them each with a five-shilling-piece, wrapt up in gilt-edged note-paper. Thomas, the eldest, was a slim, sickly youth; easy, conceited, and eighteen: Martha, the second, was a maiden of more sensibility than beauty: while Sophy, the youngest and sprightliest, to a considerable portion of the maternal simper and the paternal circumference, added a fine expanse of foot, which spreading out semi-circularly, like a lady’s fan, at the toes, gave a peculiar weight and safety to her tread.
The habits of this amiable family were to the full as unassuming as their manners. They dined at one o’clock, with the exception of Sundays, when the discussion of roast, or boiled, was, for fashion’s sake, adjourned to five; took tea at six; supped at nine; and retired to rest at ten. The Sabbath, however, was a day not less of fashion than of luxury. The young folks—Thomas, especially, who was growing, and wanted nourishment—were then indulged with two glasses of port wine after dinner; and, at tea-time, were made happy in the privilege of a “blow out” with one or more friendly neighbours. Once every year they went half-price to the Christmas pantomimes, a memorable epoch, which never failed to deprive them of sleep, and disorganize their nervous system for at least a fortnight beforehand. Such were the habits of the Spimkins’ family, a family rich, respectable, and orderly, until the March of Mind, which our modern philosophers are striving so hard to expedite, reduced them from wealth to poverty; and, from having been the pride, compelled them to become the pity of Crutched-Friars.
Every one must remember the strange, bewildering enthusiasm excited by Sir Walter Scott’s first appearance as a novelist. All the world was Scott-struck. His songs were set to music; fair hands painted fire-screens from his incidents; playwrights dramatized his heroes; and even the great Mr. Alderman Dobbs himself was so enraptured with his descriptions of Highland scenery, that he actually took an inside place in the Inverness mail, in order, as he shrewdly remarked, “to judge for himself with his own eyes”—a feat which he would infallibly have accomplished, but for two reasons; first, that the coach passed the most picturesque part of the Highlands in the night-time; secondly that the worthy alderman himself fell fast asleep during the best part of his journey. He returned home, however, as might have been expected, in ecstacies.
Among the number of those who caught this poetic influenza in its most alarming form, were the two Misses Spinks, daughters of Mr. Common-Council Spinks, once a mighty man on’ Change, but who had lately retired from business to enjoy life, alternately at his town house in Crutched-Friars, and his charming summer villa at Newington Butts, near the Montpellier Tea Gardens. As these young ladies lived next door to Mr. Spimkins, and cultivated the gentilities of society—a little neutralized, perhaps, by the circumstance of their indulging in certain pleonastic peculiarities of aspiration, by virtue of which the substantive “air” would be accommodated with anh, and the adverb “very” be transformed into awherry—it may reasonably be inferred that they were much looked up to by their neighbours. The Misses Spimkins, in particular, took pattern by them in all things. They were the standards by which, in secret, they regulated their demeanor—the mirror in which they longed to see themselves at full-length reflected.
Things were in this state, when one morning Miss Spinks, a young lady of a grave and intellectual cast of mind, with a face broad at the forehead and peaked at the chin, like a kite, called at the Spimkinses for the purpose of inquiring the character of a servant maid. The Spimkinses were delighted by such condescension. Miss Spinks was such a charming young woman! such a dear creature!—so well-bred, so well-dressed, and, above all, so well-informed! Such, for at least a month afterwards, was the hourly topic of conversation at the grocer’s table: it came up with the breakfast tray, it helped to digest the dinner, it served as a night-cap after supper, until at length old Spimkins, in consideration of his neighbour’s importance, was prevailed on to depart so far from his homely notions of household economy, as to allow his wife and children to return Miss Spinks’ visit. In due time, both parties, as a matter of course, became intimate; but as literature was all the rage at the common councilman’s, the Misses Spimkins were for a time at fault, until a seasonable supply of novels, procured secretly from a fashionable publisher in the Minories, enabled them to converse on a more equal footing.
It was just about this period, that the Third Series of the Tales of My Landlord appeared. The Spinkses, who had heard from Alderman Dobbs that the descriptions were “uncommon like natur,” of course read it; so of necessity did the Spimkinses; and, as Miss Spinks kept an album, it came to pass that she one day commissioned Thomas Spimkins to copy into it a few of the most notable passages. On what slight circumstances do the leading events of life depend! The youth, delighted with his task, ventured, after concluding it, to interpolate some stanzas of his own; Miss Spinks inquired who was the author; when Tom, blushing, likeMrs. Malaprop, “confessed the soft impeachment,” was instantly pronounced a genius, and as such introduced by the Spinkses to all their high acquaintances.
Genius! What a fatal talisman exists in that portentous word! How many industrious families has it led astray! How much common-sense has it shipwrecked! How many prospects, once bright and imposing, has it utterly, incurably blighted!
Astonished at her son’s promise, dazzled by the hopes of his preferment, all Mrs. Spimkins’s usual good sense forsook her. The wisdom of the world was lost in the feelings of the mother. She gave play at once to the most ambitious expectations, and resolved henceforth not to let an hour escape without striving to inoculate her husband. With this view, she called every possible resource to her aid. She appealed to his affection as a father, to his pride as a man; she pointed out the injustice, not to say the inhumanity, of thwarting the genius of Thomas; she talked of his wealth, his deserts, his dignities; and, finally, by some miracle, for which I have never yet been able to account, persuaded the old gentleman to relax so liberally in his anti-poetic notions, as to despatch Thomas to Oxford, where he would infallibly have gained the prize poem, had it not, by some unaccountable mistake, been transferred to another.
It is from this period that the historian of the Spimkinses must date their decline and fall. Thomas returned home in due time from the university, a finished genius, but as poor as such geniuses are apt to be; while his father, who now began to repent having sent him there, proposed buying him a share in a grocer’s shop at Whitechapel. But the gifted youth disdained such base employment. He had a soul above figs! What! Thomas Spimkins, Esq., of Brazen Nose, author of a poem which was within an inch of gaining the Chancellor’s prize, stand behind the counter in a white apron, answering the demands of some uneducated customer for “a quarter of a pound of moist sugar, and change for sixpence!” Impossible! the idea was revolting to humanity!
Nevertheless, something must be done: one cannot live upon gentility, even though certificated at Oxford. Old Spimkins was precisely of this way of thinking; so, as a next resource, proposed articling his son to an attorney. But here again a difficulty presented itself. The business of a solicitor requires, it is well known, the impudence of a Yorkshire postboy, whereas Thomas was diffidence itself. Law, then, was out of the question; the church presented equal impediments; the navy, though respectable, was inappropriate; the army ruinously expensive. In this exigence, nothing remained but literature; to which, after many an urgent, impassioned, but fruitless remonstrance from his father, the young man finally resolved to addict himself. Meanwhile, his kind patrons, the Spinkses, thinking, naturally enough, that genius should vegetate among congenial scenery, took him on a visit to their villa at Newington Butts, where, in a romantic summer-house, built up of red bricks and oyster-shells, he gave vent to some of the sweetest stanzas imaginable. One of these, inspired by that poetic ceremony, the Lord Mayor’s Show, fell accidentally into the hands of his lordship himself, who pronounced the author to be “a clever fellow, and one as knew what’s what.” This opinion, delivered in public by so great a judge, soon made the round of Crutched-Friars; so that, whenever Thomas chanced to make his appearance in public, the very shop-boys would whisper admiringly after him, “I say, Jack, there goes a poet!”
Behold, then, our sensitive minstrel, the pride of his neighbourhood, the “young Astyanax” of his family! As such, it became him to affect eccentricity. Accordingly, he grew “melancholy and gentleman-like,” eschewed his cravat, and even advised his father to addict himself to Scott and Byron. But the old gentleman winced exceedingly at this proposal. Recollections of a poetic apprentice he once had, who had for some months carried on a very irregular flirtation with the till, came thronging fast upon his mind, and spurred him at once to a refusal. But what can resist the eternal solicitations of the shrewder sex? By day his daughter, by night his wife, kept teazing him into gradual compliance with their wishes. First he was prevailed on to dine at five, instead of two o’clock; secondly, to listen to his daughter’s execution of “Oh! ‘tis love, ‘tis love!” sung with a twist of the mouth peculiarly provocative of that passion; and lastly (the severest cut of all), to giveconversazionesto his son’s literary acquaintances.
At these parties, a strange and talented group never failed to present themselves. All were men of genius, but exhibited, in their respective persons, proofs of the amazing rancour that subsists between genius and gentility. Among them was a lively Irishman, named O’Blarney, a reporter for the daily press, with sandy hair, a nose that turned up like a fish-hook, and a mouth which, from its extensive dimensions, afforded the most copious facilities for grinning. This promising young Papist, whose estates unfortunately lay in the most Protestant part of Ireland, was the very gem of Mr. Spimkins’ parties; and as he mixed much in fashionable society, and could beat even a negro in dancing, his presence never failed to create a lively sensation at Crutched-Friars. Another of the old gentleman’s guests was a rising versifier of twenty-two, whose appearance would have been sentiment itself, had not a pair of dingy whiskers, which grew back towards his ears, as if enamoured of the latter’s unusual length, given him a slight touch of the grotesque. As it was, his fine, open, full-blown face, resembled a cherub on a country tomb-stone. It would be injustice to acknowledged ability were I here to omit the mention of another poet, whose genius taking an uxorious turn, exploded in admiring apostrophes to his wife. This bard displayed infinite sweetness of versification—as the extracts from the different reviews, inserted, accidentally, at the end of his volume—assured him. There were no intemperate sallies, no startling originality, no audacious imagery in his rhymes; all was sweetly and agreeably uniform, like the features on a barber’s block. Such, with the addition of three historians from St. Mary Axe, two political economists from Long Acre, a pastoral writer from Wapping, and an essayist from Houndsditch, were theliteratiwhose dazzling abilities illumined the fortunate neighbourhood of Crutched-Friars. Old Spimkins, meanwhile, to whom the whole scene was a novelty that well nigh took away his breath, kept moving backwards and forwards among his guests, oscillating in spirits, between a sigh and a smile; at one moment looking grave and dignified, like the Scotch Highlander at a tobacconist’s; at another, simpering sweetly and benignly, and perpetrating, whenever he ventured on a remark, the strangest possible blunders. The three French consuls he invariably mistook for the three per cent, consols; quoted Moore’s Almanack in illustration of Moore’s Melodies; inquired whether those two great poets, Hogg and Bacon, were not of the same family; and, when asked his opinion of Crabbe, gave a decided preference to lobster.
This sort of work had continued for the best part of a year, during which time the good-natured old grocer had been subjected to every species of expence and annoyance; when one morning, towards the close of October, news arrived that a literary gentleman, for whom his son had persuaded him to become bail to a pretty considerable amount, had presented him in return, with what is termed leg-bail—a species of gratitude whereby the locomotive powers are exercised at the expense of principle. The same post brought a letter from Miss Spinks at Newington, with the intelligence that Sophy—the sprightly Sophy Spimkins—who had been on a visit there for some days, had just set out with O’Blarney, on a hasty visit of inspection to the latter’s estates at Monaghan. This letter enclosed another from the fair fugitive herself, in which she implored her father’s forgiveness for the “rash step” she had taken; but assured him that immediately on her arrival at the old family castle, she should become Mrs. O’Blarney, and return home the very instant that her husband had secured his election for the county. The epistle concluded with affectionate remembrances to the family circle, and a hope that, when things were a little in order, her eldest sister would be prevailed upon to accompany her back to Monaghan.
This intelligence, notwithstanding his son’s very sanguine anticipations on the subject, annoyed poor Mr. Spimkins exceedingly; while, as if to fill up the measure of his tribulation, his former acquaintance at Crutched-Friars, finding that, for months past, he had shewn evident symptoms of a wish to cut them, began in self-defence, to set up reports injurious to his reputation. Rumours so circulated soon obtained belief. First one customer dropped off—then a second—then a third—then a fourth, fifth, and sixth—until at length the whole neighbourhood set it down, confidently down in their minds, that the Spimkinses were a losing family. Even the parish-clerk himself, a person of considerable local authority, was heard to observe that they were getting too clever for business—an opinion which, pronounced gravely and oracularly by a gentleman in a double chin, produced an instantaneous effect.
But where all this time were the Spinkses? Where were they whose patronage should have shielded, and whose kindness should have cherished, the unfortunate but still interesting Spimkinses? Alas! they had set out, only a few weeks before, for the Holy Land, with the avowed intention of taking furnished lodgings for at least six months at Jerusalem.
As if this, of itself, were not sufficiently vexatious, Miss Spimkins took it into her head to espouse a gentleman for the very last thing a lady usually thinks of looking for in a husband—his intellect. The origin of her amour is curious. She had read in the Gentleman’s Magazine, the “Confessions of a Wanderer,” who had been shipwrecked on the Thames, at night-fall, off Chelsea Reach; which Confessions were penned in so poetic a spirit, and described so feelingly the horrors of the catastrophe, the hoarse dash of the waves—the howling of the winds—and the subsequent encounter of the vessel against the fourth arch of Battersea bridge, that the susceptible Miss Spimkins was on thorns till she became acquainted with the author. This, by her brother’s intervention, was soon brought about; an invitation to dinner confirmed the intimacy; the lady, likeDesdemona, loved the Wanderer “for the perils he had passed;” and he, likeOthello, “loved her that she did pity them.” It has been well said, one marriage makes many: scarcely had his sister embraced the nuptial state, when Thomas handed to the same altar a widow lady, whom he had accidentally met at Margate, and had mistaken for a person of quality, but who had since turned out to be the leading tragic actress of Sadler’s Wells, at a rising salary of eighteen shillings per week, exclusive of benefits. It is but justice to add, that if this young lady brought her husband no fortune, she brought him, what to a sensitive mind is infinitely preferable, two fine boys, one of whom was breeched, the other yet in petticoats.
Such accumulated incidents—calamities he ungratefully called them—occurring to old Spimkins at a period when the mind, having lost the first elasticity of youth, is not yet mellowed down into the philosophy of age, but stands, restless and unsettled, between the two, in a sort of crepuscular condition, heaped “sackcloth and ashes on his head.” He neglected his ledger, he neglected his house, he neglected himself, and, worst of all, he neglected his customers. In fact, for months together, he did nothing but sigh and swear. His family, even in this exigency, could render him not the slightest assistance. His daughter, who still lived with him, had, by a diligent cultivation of the intellect, long since forgotten the household duties of a wife; her husband, as the old man used often to remark, “was of no more use than a cargo of damaged coffee;” and even Thomas—the inspired Thomas himself—had dwindled down into a mere mortal, and now dwelt in aerial seclusion up two pair of stairs at Pentonville. Thus widowed in his age—for his wife, I should observe, had, three months since, transferred herself from his to Abraham’s bosom—the disconsolate grocer abruptly sold his business, pensioned off his daughter and her “Wanderer,” and retired alone, on a small annuity, to a back street in Islington—a memorable illustration of’ the March of Mind and its very peculiar concomitants.
Here it was that I first became acquainted with him, and gleaned the particulars of the history I have just ventured to sketch. Our intimacy continued upwards of a year, during which period I will do my old friend the justice to say, that I heard the anecdote of the poetic apprentice who had robbed him, at least a dozen times. Now and then, when I ventured to express my astonishment that a tradesman of his good sense, who held such proper notions on the score of poetry and punctuality, should have so far forgotten himself as to have encouraged the one, and abandoned the other, to his own manifest ruin, the venerable sage would answer, “True Sir, but it was all my wife’s doing. She kept perpetually telling me that the Spinkses—who, one would have thought must have been good judges, for they were capital customers, and always paid their way—had pronounced my son to be a genius, and that it was a shame to thwart his abilities; so I was over-persuaded, you see, to send him to college, when, had he but stuck to business, who knows but he might have become a common-councilman; or, perhaps, even in time a sheriff! But there’s no doing any thing with poets. I remember an apprentice of mine, once—— But I see you’re affected!”—and here the old man would pause, shake the ashes from his pipe, and then revert to some less ungracious topic. It was on one of these occasions, when, having concluded a longer story than usual, he had stopped to take his customary allowance of breath, that on waking from a nap which his affecting anecdotes rarely failed to bring on, I found him stretched in an apoplectic fit upon the floor. With some difficulty he was brought to his senses; but, a relapse occurring in a few days, it became but too evident that, like the late John Wesley, he had had a call—that, in short, his closing hour was come. I was with him in his last extremity, and have every reason to be satisfied with the Christian character of his exit. He swore most incredibly at all poets; left Thomas his blessing and six half-crowns; his daughter a MS. Essay, by the political economist of Houndsditch; and then, with a convulsive jerk of his left leg, which lamed the bed-post for life, set out on his travels to eternity, with the story of the apprentice on his lips.
Of his three children, Thomas is the sole survivor. The “Wanderer’s” wife was taken off, about a fortnight since, by dyspepsia, the consequence of inordinate indulgence in tripe and toast-and-water; while her sprightly sister, Sophy, threw herself headlong into a mill-pond at Holyhead (having previously tied down her petticoats at the ankles), on being informed by O’Blarney, in one of those confidential moments which brandy-and-water seldom fails to elicit, that he was already the devoted husband of three wives and a proportionate abundance of pledges, and had quitted London, not so much with a view to visit any Irish estates—which, as a matter of course, existed only in his fancy—as to obviate the personal inconveniences likely to arise from the circumstance of his having, in a moment of forgetfulness, appropriated to his own use the purse and pocket-book of one of his most intimate and valued acquaintances. The poor girl’s body was fished up, a few days afterwards, by a Welsh clergyman, who was trolling in spectacles for pike: and a coroner’s inquest having been summoned, the evidence of O’Blarney was taken, from which it clearly appeared that the deceased was at times insane, and, only two hours before her death, had made three attempts to swallow a salt-cellar. The young Irishman deposed to these and other facts with so much feeling, earnestness, and simplicity, that the coroner complimented him highly on his humanity; and an account of the inquest having been furnished by himself for theNorth Wales Chronicle, it soon afterwards made the round of the London newspapers, under the title of “Distressing Suicide.”
Of poor Thomas, my account, I grieve to say, must be equally disheartening. An epic poem, on which he had been some months engaged, having not only failed, but even contributed to introduce its publisher to ready-furnished lodgings in the Fleet, he is now driven to the necessity of jobbing for minor periodicals, thereby adding one more to the already swollen catalogue of those who, mistaking theignis fatuusof vanity for the sober radiance of intellect, start off prematurely on the voyage of life, without pilot to steer, compass to direct, or ballast to steady their course.
When I called on the young man, a few mornings since, I was much struck with his more than usually picturesque condition. Being always fond of air, he had hired a back attic, overlooking two charming gardens filled with clothes’-lines, and commanding a distant view of some brick-fields, a pig, and an Irish hodman from Carrickfergus. His wife was seated at the fire, watching a leg of mutton as it pirouetted before the grate, at the end of a bit of whipcord: Fernando, her eldest boy, was riding with manifest ecstacy on the back of an old chair: and her two other darling babes, Alphonso and Eleonora, were fast asleep, on a turn-up bedstead, in an adjoining room. Close by Thomas, who was busy writing reviews at a deal table with three legs, was an elderly cotton shirt, hanging to dry on a small wooden horse, quite a pony in its dimensions; and at the further end of the room, near the door, stood a pot of half-and-half, a pen’orth of pickled cabbage in a tea-cup, a twopenny French roll, a black horn dinner knife, and a fork with two prongs, both of which were broken. On observing these evident symptoms of domestic conviviality, I abruptly hastened my departure; but, on my return home by way of Crutched-Friars, could not refrain from stopping an instant in order to survey my old friend’s establishment. It was in the most deplorable condition possible. The voice of its till was mute; the very fixtures themselves were removed; and advertisements, three deep, specifying in large red characters the virtues of Daffy’s Elixir, were posted up, on door, wall, and window-shutter. Altogether, the scene was of the most affecting character, and forcibly impressed on my mind the calamities attendant on what Shakspeare calls “ill-judged ambition.”
116m
At the foot of the long range of the Mendip hills, standeth a village, which, for obvious reasons, we shall conceal the precise locality of, by bestowing thereon, the appellation of Stockwell. The principal trade of the Stockwellites is in coals, which certain of the industrious operative natives sedulously employ themselves in extracting from our mother earth, while others are engaged in conveying the “black diamonds,” to various adjacent towns, in carts of sundry shapes and dimensions. The horses engaged in this traffic are of the Rosinante species, and, too often, literally raw-boned.
Stockwell, moreover, hath its inn, or public house, a place of no small importance, having for its sign a swinging creaking board whereon is emblazoned the effigy of a roaring, red, and rampant lion.—High towering above the said lion are the branches of a solitary elm, the foot of which is encircled by a seat, especially convenient for those guests whose taste it is to “blow a cloud” in the open air; and it is of two individuals, who were much given thereon to enjoy their “otium cum dignitate,” that we are about to speak.
George Syms had long enjoyed a monopoly in the shoemaking and cobbling line (though latterly two oppositionists had started against him), and Peter Brown was a man well to do in the world, being “the man wot” shod the raw-boned horses before-mentioned, “him and his father, and grandfather,” as the parish-clerk said, “for time immemorial.” These two worthies were regaling themselves, as was their wonted custom, each with his pint, upon a small table, which was placed for their accommodation, when an elderly stranger, of a shabby genteel appearance, approached the Lion, and inquired the road to an adjoining village.—“You are late, Sir,” said George Syms. “Yes,” replied the stranger, “I am;” and he threw himself on the bench, and took off his hat, and began to call about him, notwithstanding his shabby appearance, with the air of one who has money in his pocket to pay his way. “Three make good company,” observed Peter Brown. “Ay, ay,” said the stranger. “Holloa, there! bring me another pint! This walk has made me confoundedly thirsty. You may as well make it a pot—and be quick!”
Messrs. Brown and Syms were greatly pleased with this additional guest at their symposium; and the trio sat and talked of the wind, and the weather, and the roads, and the coal trade, and drank and smoked to their hearts’ content, till time began to hang heavy, and then the stranger asked the two friends, if ever they played at tee-to-tum. “Play at what?” asked Peter Brown. “Play at what?” inquired George Syms. “At tee-to-tum,” replied the stranger, gravely taking a pair of spectacles from one pocket of his waistcoat, and the machine in question from the other. “It is an excellent game, I assure you. Rare sport, my masters!” and he forthwith began to spin his teetotum upon the table, to the no small diversion of George Syms and Peter Brown, who opined that the potent ale of the ramping Red Lion had done its office.—“Only see how the little fellow runs about!” cried the stranger, in apparent ecstacy. “Holloa, there! Bring a lantern! There he goes, round and round—and now he’s asleep—and now he begins to reel—wiggle-waggle—-down he tumbles! What colour, for a shilling?”—“I don’t understand the game,” said Peter Brown. “Nor I, neither,” quoth George Syms: “but it seems easy enough to learn”—“Oh, ho!” said the stranger; “you think so, do you? But, let me tell you that there’s a great deal more in it than you imagine. There he is, you see, with as many sides as a modern politician, and as many colours as an Algerine.—Come, let us have a game! This is the way!” and he again sat the teetotum in motion, and capered about in exceeding glee. “He, he, he!” uttered George Syms; and “Ha, ha, ha!” exclaimed Peter Brown; and, being wonderfully tickled with the oddity of the thing, they were easily persuaded by the stranger just to take a game together for five minutes, while he stood by as umpire, with a stopwatch in his hand.
When precisely five minutes had elapsed, although it was Peter Brown’s spin, and the teetotum was yet going its rounds, and George Syms had called out yellow, he demurely took it from the table and put it in his pocket, and then, returning his watch to his fob, walked away into the Red Lion, without as much as saying good-night. The two friends looked at each other in surprise, and then indulged in a very loud and hearty fit of laughter; and then paid their reckoning, and went away exceedingly merry, which they would not have been, had they understood properly what they had been doing.
In the meanwhile, the stranger had entered the house; and he found it not very difficult to persuade them likewise to take a game at teetotum for five minutes, which he terminated in the same unceremonious way as that under the tree, and then desired to be shown the room wherein he was to sleep. Mrs. Philpot immediately, contrary to her usual custom, jumped up with great alacrity, lighted a candle, and conducted her guest to his apartment; while Sally, contrary toherusual custom, reclined herself in her mistress’s great arm-chair, yawned three or four times, and then exclaimed, “Heigho! it’s getting very late! I wish my husband would come home!” Now as we are not fond of useless mysteries, we think proper to tell the reader, that the teetotum in question had the peculiar property of causing those who played therewith to lose all remembrance of their former character, and to adopt that of their antagonists in the game. During the process of spinning, the personal identity of the two players was completely changed. Now, on the evening of this memorable day, Jacob Philpot, the landlord of the rampant Red Lion, had spent a few convivial hours with mine host of the Blue Boar, a house on the road-side, about two miles from Stockwell; and the two publicans had discussed the ale, grog, and tobacco, in the manner customary with Britons, whose insignia are roaring, rampant red lions, green dragons, blue boars, &c. Therefore, when Jacob came home, he began to call about him, with the air of one who purposeth that his arrival shall be no secret; and very agreeably surprised was he when Mrs. Philpot ran out from the house, and assisted him to dismount, for Jacob was somewhat rotund; and yet more did he marvel, when, instead of haranguing him in a loud voice (as she had whilom done on similar occasions, greatly to his discomfiture), she good-humouredly said that she would lead his nag to the stable, and then go and call Philip the ostler. “Humph!” said the host of the Lion, leaning with his back against the door-post, “after a calm comes a storm. She’ll make up for this presently, I’ll warrant.” But Mrs. Philpot put up the horse, and called Philip, and then returned in peace and quietness, and attempted to pass into the house, without uttering a word to her lord and master.
“What’s the matter with you, my dear?” asked Jacob Philpot; “a’nt you well?”—“Yes, Sir,” replied Mrs. Philpot, “very well, I thank you.—But pray take away your leg, and let me go into the house.”—“But didn’t you think I was very late?” asked Jacob. “Oh! I don’t know,” replied Mrs. Philpot; “when gentlemen get together, they don’t think how time goes.” Poor Jacob was quite delighted, and, as it was dusk, and by no means, as he conceived, a scandalous proceeding, he forthwith put one arm round Mrs. Philpot’s neck, and stole a kiss, whereat she said, “Oh dear me! how could you think of doing such a thing?” and immediately squeezed herself past him, and ran into the house, where Sally sat, in the armchair before mentioned, with a handkerchief over her head, pretending to be asleep.
“Come, my dear,” said Jacob to his wife, “I’m glad to see you in such good humour. You shall make me a glass of rum and water, and take some of it yourself.” He then good-humouredly told her to go to bed, and he would follow her presently, as soon as he had looked after his horse, and pulled off his boots. This proposition was no sooner made, than the good man’s ears were suddenly grasped from behind, and his head was shaken and twisted about, as though it had been the purport of the assailant to wrench it from his shoulders. Mrs. Philpot instantly made her escape from the kitchen, leaving her spouse in the hands of the enraged Sally, who, under the influence of the teetotum delusion, was firmly persuaded that she was justly inflicting wholesome discipline upon her husband, whom she had, as she conceived, caught in the act of making love to the maid. Sally was active and strong, and Jacob Philpot was, as before hinted, somewhat obese, and, withal, not in excellent “wind;” consequently it was some time ere he could disengage himself; and then he stood panting and blowing, and utterly lost in astonishment, while Sally saluted him with divers appellations, which it would not be seemly here to set down.
When Jacob did find his tongue, however, he answered her much in the same style; and added, that he had a great mind to lay a stick about her back. “What,” strike a woman! “Eh—would you, you coward?”—and immediately she darted forward, and, as she termed it, put her mark upon him with her nails, whereby his rubicund countenance was greatly disfigured, and his patience entirely exhausted: but Sally was too nimble, and made her escape up stairs. So the landlord of the Red Lion, having got rid of the two mad or drunken women, very philosophically resolved to sit down for half an hour by himself, to think oyer the business, while he took his “night cap.” He had scarcely brewed the ingredients, when he was roused by a rap at the window; and, in answer to his inquiry of “Who’s there?” he recognised the voice of his neighbour, George Syms, and, of course, immediately admitted him; for George was a good customer, and, consequently, welcome at all hours. “My good friend,” said Syms, “I dare say you are surprised to see me here at this time of night; but I can’t get into my own house. My wife is drunk, I believe.”—“And so is mine,” quoth the landlord; “so sit you down and make yourself comfortable. Hang me if I think I’ll go to bed to night!”—“No more will I,” said Syms; “I’ve got a job to do early in the morning, and then I shall be ready for it.” So the two friends sat down, and had scarcely begun to enjoy themselves, when another rap was heard at the window, and mine host recognised the voice of Peter Brown, who came with the same complaint against his wife, and was easily persuaded to join the party, each declaring that the women must have contrived to meet, during their absence from home, and all got fuddled together. Matters went on pleasantly enough for some time, while they continued to rail against the women; but, when that subject was exhausted, George Syms, the shoe-maker, began to talk about shoeing horses; and Peter Brown, the Blacksmith, averred that he could make a pair of jockey boots with any man for fifty miles round. The host of the rampant Red Lion considered these things at first as a sort of joke, which he had no doubt, from such good customers, was exceedingly good, though he could not exactly comprehend it. But when Peter Brown answered to the name of George Syms, and George Syms responded to that of Peter Brown, he was somewhat more bewildered, and could not help thinking that his guests had drunk quite enough. He, however, satisfied himself with the reflection that that was no business of his, and that “a man must live by his trade.” With the exception of these apparent occasional cross purposes, conversation went on as well as could be expected under existing circumstances, and the three unfortunate husbands sat and talked, and drank, and smoked, till tired nature cried, “hold, enough!”
Leaving them to their slumbers, we must now say a word or two about the teetotum, the properties of which were to change people’s characters, spinning the mind of one man or woman into the body of another. The duration of the delusion, caused by this droll game of the old gentleman’s, depended upon the length of time spent in the diversion; and five minutes was the specific period for causing it to last till the next sun-rise or sun-setafterthe change had been effected. Therefore, when the morning came, Mrs. Philpot and Sally, and Peter Brown and George Syms, all came to their senses. The two latter went quietly home with aching heads and very confused recollections of the preceding evening; and shortly after their departure Mrs. Philpot awoke in great astonishment at finding herself in the garret; and Sally was equally surprised and much alarmed, at finding herself in her mistress’s room, from which she hastened in quick time, leaving all things in due order.
The elderly stranger made his appearance soon after, and appeared to have brushed up his shabby genteel clothes, for he really looked much more respectable than on the preceding evening. He ordered his breakfast, and sat down thereto very quietly, and asked for the newspaper, and pulled out his spectacles, and began to con the politics of the day much at his ease, no one having the least suspicion that he and his teetotum had been the cause of all the uproar at the Red Lion. In due time the landlord made his appearance, with sundry marks of violence upon his jolly countenance, and, after due obeisance made to his respectable-looking guest, took the liberty of telling his spouse that he should insist upon her sending Sally away, for he had never been so mauled since he was born; but Mrs. Philpot told him that he ought to be ashamed of himself, and she was very glad the girl had spirit enough to protect herself, and that she wouldn’t part with her on any account. She then referred to what had passed in the back kitchen, taking to herself the credit of having inflicted that punishment which had been administered by the hands of Sally.
Jacob Philpot was now more than ever convinced that his wife had been paying her respects to a huge stone bottle of rum which stood in the closet; and he “made bold” to tell her his thoughts, whereat Mrs. Philpot thought fit to put herself into a tremendous passion, although she could not help fearing that, perhaps, she might have taken a drop too much of something, for she was unable, in any other manner, to account for having slept in the garret.
The elderly stranger now took upon himself to recommend mutual forgiveness, and stated that it was really quite pardonable for any one to take a little too much of such very excellent ale as that at the Red Lion. “For my own part,” said he, “I don’t know whether I didn’t get a trifle beyond the mark myself last night. But I hope, madam, I did not annoy you.”
“Oh dear, no, not at all, Sir,” replied Mrs. Philpot, whose good-humour was restored at this compliment, paid to the good cheer of the Lion, “you were exceeding pleasant, I assure you, just enough to make you funny; we had a hearty laugh about the teetotum, you know.”—“Ah!” said the stranger, “I guess how it was then. I always introduce the teetotum when I want to be merry.”
Jacob Philpot expressed a wish to understand the game, and after spinning it two or three times, proposed to take his chance, for five minutes, with the stranger; but the latter, laughing heartily, would by no means agree with the proposition, and declared that it would be downright cheating, as he was an overmatch for any beginner. “However,” he continued, “as soon as any of your neighbours come in, I’ll put you in the way of it, and we’ll have some of your ale, now, just to pass the time. It will do neither of us any harm after last night’s affair, and I want to have some talk with you about the coal trade.”
They accordingly sat down together, and the stranger displayed considerable knowledge in the science of mining; and Jacob was so much delighted with his companion, that an hour or two slipped away, as he said, “in no” and then there was heard the sound of a horse’s feet at the door, and a somewhat authoratative hillo!
“It is our parson,” said Jacob, starting up, and he ran to the door to enquire what might be his reverence’s pleasure. “Good morning,” said the Reverend Mr. Stanhope. “I’m going over to dine with our club at the Old Boar, and I want you just to cast your eye on those fellows in my home close; you can see them out of your parlour window.”—“Yes, to be sure, Sir,” replied Jacob “Hem!” quoth Mr. Stanhope, “have you any body indoors?”—“Yes, Sir, we have,” replied Jacob, “a strange gentleman, who seems to know a pretty deal about mining and them sort of things. I think he’s some great person in disguise, he seems regularly edicated, up to every thing.”—“Eh, ah! a great person in disguise!” exclaimed Mr. Stanhope; “I’ll just step in a minute. It seems as if there was a shower coming over, and I’m in no hurry, and it is not worth while to get wet through for the sake of a few minutes.” So he alighted from his horse, soliloquizing to himself. “Perhaps the Lord Chancellor! Who knows? However, I shall take care to show my principles;” and straightway he went into the house, and was most respectfully saluted by the elderly stranger; and they entered into a conversation upon the standing English topics of weather, wind, crops, and the coal trade; and Mr. Stanhope contrived to introduce therein sundry unkind things against the Pope and all his followers; and avowed himself a staunch “church and king” man, and spake enthusiastically of our “glorious constitution,” and lauded divers individuals then in power, but more particularly those who studied the true interests of the church, by seeking out and preferring men of merit and talent to fill vacant benefices. The stranger thereat smiled significantly, as though he could, if he felt disposed, say something to the purpose; and Mr. Stanhope felt more inclined than ever to think the landlord might have conjectured very near the truth, and consequently, redoubled his efforts to make the agreeable, professing his regret at being obliged to dine out that day, &c. The stranger politely thanked him for his polite consideration, and stated that he was never at a loss for employment, and that he was then rambling, for a few days, to relax his mind from the fatigues of an overwhelming mass of important business, to which his duty compelled him to attend early and late. “Perhaps,” he continued, “you will smile when I tell you that I am now engaged in a series of experiments relative to the power of the centrifugal force, and its capacity of overcoming various degrees of friction.” (Here he produced the teetotum.) “You perceive the different surfaces of the under edge of this little thing. The outside, you see, is all of ivory, but indented in various ways; and yet I have not been able to decide whether the roughest or smoothest more frequently arrest its motions. The colours, of course, are merely indications. Here is my register, and he produced a book, wherein divers mathematical abstruse calculations were apparent.
“I always prefer other people to spin it, as then I obtain a variety of impelling power. Perhaps you will do me the favour just to twirl it round a few times alternately with the landlord? Two make a fairer experiment than one. Just for five minutes. I’ll not trouble you a moment longer, I promise you.”—“Hem!” thought Mr. Stanhope—