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diff --git a/old/smlgg10.txt b/old/smlgg10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b20ef6b --- /dev/null +++ b/old/smlgg10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2499 @@ +Project Gutenberg Etext of Somebody's Luggage by Charles Dickens +#41 in our series by Charles Dickens + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +This etext was prepared from the 1894 Chapman and Hall "Christmas Stories" +edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +SOMEBODY'S LUGGAGE + + + + +CHAPTER I--HIS LEAVING IT TILL CALLED FOR + + + +The writer of these humble lines being a Waiter, and having come of +a family of Waiters, and owning at the present time five brothers +who are all Waiters, and likewise an only sister who is a Waitress, +would wish to offer a few words respecting his calling; first having +the pleasure of hereby in a friendly manner offering the Dedication +of the same unto JOSEPH, much respected Head Waiter at the Slamjam +Coffee-house, London, E.C., than which a individual more eminently +deserving of the name of man, or a more amenable honour to his own +head and heart, whether considered in the light of a Waiter or +regarded as a human being, do not exist. + +In case confusion should arise in the public mind (which it is open +to confusion on many subjects) respecting what is meant or implied +by the term Waiter, the present humble lines would wish to offer an +explanation. It may not be generally known that the person as goes +out to wait is NOT a Waiter. It may not be generally known that the +hand as is called in extra, at the Freemasons' Tavern, or the +London, or the Albion, or otherwise, is NOT a Waiter. Such hands +may be took on for Public Dinners by the bushel (and you may know +them by their breathing with difficulty when in attendance, and +taking away the bottle ere yet it is half out); but such are NOT +Waiters. For you cannot lay down the tailoring, or the shoemaking, +or the brokering, or the green-grocering, or the pictorial- +periodicalling, or the second-hand wardrobe, or the small fancy +businesses,--you cannot lay down those lines of life at your will +and pleasure by the half-day or evening, and take up Waitering. You +may suppose you can, but you cannot; or you may go so far as to say +you do, but you do not. Nor yet can you lay down the gentleman's- +service when stimulated by prolonged incompatibility on the part of +Cooks (and here it may be remarked that Cooking and Incompatibility +will be mostly found united), and take up Waitering. It has been +ascertained that what a gentleman will sit meek under, at home, he +will not bear out of doors, at the Slamjam or any similar +establishment. Then, what is the inference to be drawn respecting +true Waitering? You must be bred to it. You must be born to it. + +Would you know how born to it, Fair Reader,--if of the adorable +female sex? Then learn from the biographical experience of one that +is a Waiter in the sixty-first year of his age. + +You were conveyed,--ere yet your dawning powers were otherwise +developed than to harbour vacancy in your inside,--you were +conveyed, by surreptitious means, into a pantry adjoining the +Admiral Nelson, Civic and General Dining-Rooms, there to receive by +stealth that healthful sustenance which is the pride and boast of +the British female constitution. Your mother was married to your +father (himself a distant Waiter) in the profoundest secrecy; for a +Waitress known to be married would ruin the best of businesses,--it +is the same as on the stage. Hence your being smuggled into the +pantry, and that--to add to the infliction--by an unwilling +grandmother. Under the combined influence of the smells of roast +and boiled, and soup, and gas, and malt liquors, you partook of your +earliest nourishment; your unwilling grandmother sitting prepared to +catch you when your mother was called and dropped you; your +grandmother's shawl ever ready to stifle your natural complainings; +your innocent mind surrounded by uncongenial cruets, dirty plates, +dish-covers, and cold gravy; your mother calling down the pipe for +veals and porks, instead of soothing you with nursery rhymes. Under +these untoward circumstances you were early weaned. Your unwilling +grandmother, ever growing more unwilling as your food assimilated +less, then contracted habits of shaking you till your system +curdled, and your food would not assimilate at all. At length she +was no longer spared, and could have been thankfully spared much +sooner. When your brothers began to appear in succession, your +mother retired, left off her smart dressing (she had previously been +a smart dresser), and her dark ringlets (which had previously been +flowing), and haunted your father late of nights, lying in wait for +him, through all weathers, up the shabby court which led to the back +door of the Royal Old Dust-Bin (said to have been so named by George +the Fourth), where your father was Head. But the Dust-Bin was going +down then, and your father took but little,--excepting from a liquid +point of view. Your mother's object in those visits was of a house- +keeping character, and you was set on to whistle your father out. +Sometimes he came out, but generally not. Come or not come, +however, all that part of his existence which was unconnected with +open Waitering was kept a close secret, and was acknowledged by your +mother to be a close secret, and you and your mother flitted about +the court, close secrets both of you, and would scarcely have +confessed under torture that you know your father, or that your +father had any name than Dick (which wasn't his name, though he was +never known by any other), or that he had kith or kin or chick or +child. Perhaps the attraction of this mystery, combined with your +father's having a damp compartment, to himself, behind a leaky +cistern, at the Dust-Bin,--a sort of a cellar compartment, with a +sink in it, and a smell, and a plate-rack, and a bottle-rack, and +three windows that didn't match each other or anything else, and no +daylight,--caused your young mind to feel convinced that you must +grow up to be a Waiter too; but you did feel convinced of it, and so +did all your brothers, down to your sister. Every one of you felt +convinced that you was born to the Waitering. At this stage of your +career, what was your feelings one day when your father came home to +your mother in open broad daylight,--of itself an act of Madness on +the part of a Waiter,--and took to his bed (leastwise, your mother +and family's bed), with the statement that his eyes were devilled +kidneys. Physicians being in vain, your father expired, after +repeating at intervals for a day and a night, when gleams of reason +and old business fitfully illuminated his being, "Two and two is +five. And three is sixpence." Interred in the parochial department +of the neighbouring churchyard, and accompanied to the grave by as +many Waiters of long standing as could spare the morning time from +their soiled glasses (namely, one), your bereaved form was attired +in a white neckankecher, and you was took on from motives of +benevolence at The George and Gridiron, theatrical and supper. +Here, supporting nature on what you found in the plates (which was +as it happened, and but too often thoughtlessly, immersed in +mustard), and on what you found in the glasses (which rarely went +beyond driblets and lemon), by night you dropped asleep standing, +till you was cuffed awake, and by day was set to polishing every +individual article in the coffee-room. Your couch being sawdust; +your counterpane being ashes of cigars. Here, frequently hiding a +heavy heart under the smart tie of your white neckankecher (or +correctly speaking lower down and more to the left), you picked up +the rudiments of knowledge from an extra, by the name of Bishops, +and by calling plate-washer, and gradually elevating your mind with +chalk on the back of the corner-box partition, until such time as +you used the inkstand when it was out of hand, attained to manhood, +and to be the Waiter that you find yourself. + +I could wish here to offer a few respectful words on behalf of the +calling so long the calling of myself and family, and the public +interest in which is but too often very limited. We are not +generally understood. No, we are not. Allowance enough is not made +for us. For, say that we ever show a little drooping listlessness +of spirits, or what might be termed indifference or apathy. Put it +to yourself what would your own state of mind be, if you was one of +an enormous family every member of which except you was always +greedy, and in a hurry. Put it to yourself that you was regularly +replete with animal food at the slack hours of one in the day and +again at nine p.m., and that the repleter you was, the more +voracious all your fellow-creatures came in. Put it to yourself +that it was your business, when your digestion was well on, to take +a personal interest and sympathy in a hundred gentlemen fresh and +fresh (say, for the sake of argument, only a hundred), whose +imaginations was given up to grease and fat and gravy and melted +butter, and abandoned to questioning you about cuts of this, and +dishes of that,--each of 'em going on as if him and you and the bill +of fare was alone in the world. Then look what you are expected to +know. You are never out, but they seem to think you regularly +attend everywhere. "What's this, Christopher, that I hear about the +smashed Excursion Train? How are they doing at the Italian Opera, +Christopher?" "Christopher, what are the real particulars of this +business at the Yorkshire Bank?" Similarly a ministry gives me more +trouble than it gives the Queen. As to Lord Palmerston, the +constant and wearing connection into which I have been brought with +his lordship during the last few years is deserving of a pension. +Then look at the Hypocrites we are made, and the lies (white, I +hope) that are forced upon us! Why must a sedentary-pursuited +Waiter be considered to be a judge of horseflesh, and to have a most +tremendous interest in horse-training and racing? Yet it would be +half our little incomes out of our pockets if we didn't take on to +have those sporting tastes. It is the same (inconceivable why!) +with Farming. Shooting, equally so. I am sure that so regular as +the months of August, September, and October come round, I am +ashamed of myself in my own private bosom for the way in which I +make believe to care whether or not the grouse is strong on the wing +(much their wings, or drumsticks either, signifies to me, +uncooked!), and whether the partridges is plentiful among the +turnips, and whether the pheasants is shy or bold, or anything else +you please to mention. Yet you may see me, or any other Waiter of +my standing, holding on by the back of the box, and leaning over a +gentleman with his purse out and his bill before him, discussing +these points in a confidential tone of voice, as if my happiness in +life entirely depended on 'em. + +I have mentioned our little incomes. Look at the most unreasonable +point of all, and the point on which the greatest injustice is done +us! Whether it is owing to our always carrying so much change in +our right-hand trousers-pocket, and so many halfpence in our coat- +tails, or whether it is human nature (which I were loth to believe), +what is meant by the everlasting fable that Head Waiters is rich? +How did that fable get into circulation? Who first put it about, +and what are the facts to establish the unblushing statement? Come +forth, thou slanderer, and refer the public to the Waiter's will in +Doctors' Commons supporting thy malignant hiss! Yet this is so +commonly dwelt upon--especially by the screws who give Waiters the +least--that denial is vain; and we are obliged, for our credit's +sake, to carry our heads as if we were going into a business, when +of the two we are much more likely to go into a union. There was +formerly a screw as frequented the Slamjam ere yet the present +writer had quitted that establishment on a question of tea-ing his +assistant staff out of his own pocket, which screw carried the taunt +to its bitterest height. Never soaring above threepence, and as +often as not grovelling on the earth a penny lower, he yet +represented the present writer as a large holder of Consols, a +lender of money on mortgage, a Capitalist. He has been overheard to +dilate to other customers on the allegation that the present writer +put out thousands of pounds at interest in Distilleries and +Breweries. "Well, Christopher," he would say (having grovelled his +lowest on the earth, half a moment before), "looking out for a House +to open, eh? Can't find a business to be disposed of on a scale as +is up to your resources, humph?" To such a dizzy precipice of +falsehood has this misrepresentation taken wing, that the well-known +and highly-respected OLD CHARLES, long eminent at the West Country +Hotel, and by some considered the Father of the Waitering, found +himself under the obligation to fall into it through so many years +that his own wife (for he had an unbeknown old lady in that capacity +towards himself) believed it! And what was the consequence? When +he was borne to his grave on the shoulders of six picked Waiters, +with six more for change, six more acting as pall-bearers, all +keeping step in a pouring shower without a dry eye visible, and a +concourse only inferior to Royalty, his pantry and lodgings was +equally ransacked high and low for property, and none was found! +How could it be found, when, beyond his last monthly collection of +walking-sticks, umbrellas, and pocket-handkerchiefs (which happened +to have been not yet disposed of, though he had ever been through +life punctual in clearing off his collections by the month), there +was no property existing? Such, however, is the force of this +universal libel, that the widow of Old Charles, at the present hour +an inmate of the Almshouses of the Cork-Cutters' Company, in Blue +Anchor Road (identified sitting at the door of one of 'em, in a +clean cap and a Windsor arm-chair, only last Monday), expects John's +hoarded wealth to be found hourly! Nay, ere yet he had succumbed to +the grisly dart, and when his portrait was painted in oils life- +size, by subscription of the frequenters of the West Country, to +hang over the coffee-room chimney-piece, there were not wanting +those who contended that what is termed the accessories of such a +portrait ought to be the Bank of England out of window, and a +strong-box on the table. And but for better-regulated minds +contending for a bottle and screw and the attitude of drawing,--and +carrying their point,--it would have been so handed down to +posterity. + +I am now brought to the title of the present remarks. Having, I +hope without offence to any quarter, offered such observations as I +felt it my duty to offer, in a free country which has ever dominated +the seas, on the general subject, I will now proceed to wait on the +particular question. + +At a momentous period of my life, when I was off, so far as +concerned notice given, with a House that shall be nameless,--for +the question on which I took my departing stand was a fixed charge +for waiters, and no House as commits itself to that eminently Un- +English act of more than foolishness and baseness shall be +advertised by me,--I repeat, at a momentous crisis, when I was off +with a House too mean for mention, and not yet on with that to which +I have ever since had the honour of being attached in the capacity +of Head, {1} I was casting about what to do next. Then it were that +proposals were made to me on behalf of my present establishment. +Stipulations were necessary on my part, emendations were necessary +on my part: in the end, ratifications ensued on both sides, and I +entered on a new career. + +We are a bed business, and a coffee-room business. We are not a +general dining business, nor do we wish it. In consequence, when +diners drop in, we know what to give 'em as will keep 'em away +another time. We are a Private Room or Family business also; but +Coffee-room principal. Me and the Directory and the Writing +Materials and cetrer occupy a place to ourselves--a place fended of +up a step or two at the end of the Coffee-room, in what I call the +good old-fashioned style. The good old-fashioned style is, that +whatever you want, down to a wafer, you must be olely and solely +dependent on the Head Waiter for. You must put yourself a new-born +Child into his hands. There is no other way in which a business +untinged with Continental Vice can be conducted. (It were bootless +to add, that if languages is required to be jabbered and English is +not good enough, both families and gentlemen had better go somewhere +else.) + +When I began to settle down in this right-principled and well- +conducted House, I noticed, under the bed in No. 24 B (which it is +up a angle off the staircase, and usually put off upon the lowly- +minded), a heap of things in a corner. I asked our Head Chambermaid +in the course of the day, + +"What are them things in 24 B?" + +To which she answered with a careless air, "Somebody's Luggage." + +Regarding her with a eye not free from severity, I says, "Whose +Luggage?" + +Evading my eye, she replied, + +"Lor! How should I know!" + +- Being, it may be right to mention, a female of some pertness, +though acquainted with her business. + +A Head Waiter must be either Head or Tail. He must be at one +extremity or the other of the social scale. He cannot be at the +waist of it, or anywhere else but the extremities. It is for him to +decide which of the extremities. + +On the eventful occasion under consideration, I give Mrs. Pratchett +so distinctly to understand my decision, that I broke her spirit as +towards myself, then and there, and for good. Let not inconsistency +be suspected on account of my mentioning Mrs. Pratchett as "Mrs.," +and having formerly remarked that a waitress must not be married. +Readers are respectfully requested to notice that Mrs. Pratchett was +not a waitress, but a chambermaid. Now a chambermaid MAY be +married; if Head, generally is married,--or says so. It comes to +the same thing as expressing what is customary. (N.B. Mr. Pratchett +is in Australia, and his address there is "the Bush.") + +Having took Mrs. Pratchett down as many pegs as was essential to the +future happiness of all parties, I requested her to explain herself. + +"For instance," I says, to give her a little encouragement, "who is +Somebody?" + +"I give you my sacred honour, Mr. Christopher," answers Pratchett, +"that I haven't the faintest notion." + +But for the manner in which she settled her cap-strings, I should +have doubted this; but in respect of positiveness it was hardly to +be discriminated from an affidavit. + +"Then you never saw him?" I followed her up with. + +"Nor yet," said Mrs. Pratchett, shutting her eyes and making as if +she had just took a pill of unusual circumference,--which gave a +remarkable force to her denial,--"nor yet any servant in this house. +All have been changed, Mr. Christopher, within five year, and +Somebody left his Luggage here before then." + +Inquiry of Miss Martin yielded (in the language of the Bard of A.1.) +"confirmation strong." So it had really and truly happened. Miss +Martin is the young lady at the bar as makes out our bills; and +though higher than I could wish considering her station, is +perfectly well-behaved. + +Farther investigations led to the disclosure that there was a bill +against this Luggage to the amount of two sixteen six. The Luggage +had been lying under the bedstead of 24 B over six year. The +bedstead is a four-poster, with a deal of old hanging and valance, +and is, as I once said, probably connected with more than 24 Bs,-- +which I remember my hearers was pleased to laugh at, at the time. + +I don't know why,--when DO we know why?--but this Luggage laid heavy +on my mind. I fell a wondering about Somebody, and what he had got +and been up to. I couldn't satisfy my thoughts why he should leave +so much Luggage against so small a bill. For I had the Luggage out +within a day or two and turned it over, and the following were the +items:- A black portmanteau, a black bag, a desk, a dressing-case, a +brown-paper parcel, a hat-box, and an umbrella strapped to a +walking-stick. It was all very dusty and fluey. I had our porter +up to get under the bed and fetch it out; and though he habitually +wallows in dust,--swims in it from morning to night, and wears a +close-fitting waistcoat with black calimanco sleeves for the +purpose,--it made him sneeze again, and his throat was that hot with +it that it was obliged to be cooled with a drink of Allsopp's draft. + +The Luggage so got the better of me, that instead of having it put +back when it was well dusted and washed with a wet cloth,--previous +to which it was so covered with feathers that you might have thought +it was turning into poultry, and would by-and-by begin to Lay,--I +say, instead of having it put back, I had it carried into one of my +places down-stairs. There from time to time I stared at it and +stared at it, till it seemed to grow big and grow little, and come +forward at me and retreat again, and go through all manner of +performances resembling intoxication. When this had lasted weeks,-- +I may say months, and not be far out,--I one day thought of asking +Miss Martin for the particulars of the Two sixteen six total. She +was so obliging as to extract it from the books,--it dating before +her time,--and here follows a true copy: + +Coffee-Room. +1856. No. 4. Pounds s. d. +Feb. 2d, Pen and Paper 0 0 6 + Port Negus 0 2 0 + Ditto 0 2 0 + Pen and paper 0 0 6 + Tumbler broken 0 2 6 + Brandy 0 2 0 + Pen and paper 0 0 6 + Anchovy toast 0 2 6 + Pen and paper 0 0 6 + Bed 0 3 0 +Feb. 3d, Pen and paper 0 0 6 + Breakfast 0 2 6 + Broiled ham 0 2 0 + Eggs 0 1 0 + Watercresses 0 1 0 + Shrimps 0 1 0 + Pen and paper 0 0 6 + Blotting-paper 0 0 6 + Messenger to Paternoster + Row and back 0 1 6 + Again, when No Answer 0 1 6 + Brandy 2s., Devilled + Pork chop 2s. 0 4 0 + Pens and paper 0 1 0 + Messenger to Albemarle + Street and back 0 1 0 + Again (detained), when + No Answer 0 1 6 + Salt-cellar broken 0 3 6 + Large Liquour-glass + Orange Brandy 0 1 6 + Dinner, Soup, Fish, + Joint, and bird 0 7 6 + Bottle old East India + Brown 0 8 0 + Pen and paper 0 0 6 + 2 16 6 + +Mem.: January 1st, 1857. He went out after dinner, directing +luggage to be ready when he called for it. Never called. + + +So far from throwing a light upon the subject, this bill appeared to +me, if I may so express my doubts, to involve it in a yet more lurid +halo. Speculating it over with the Mistress, she informed me that +the luggage had been advertised in the Master's time as being to be +sold after such and such a day to pay expenses, but no farther steps +had been taken. (I may here remark, that the Mistress is a widow in +her fourth year. The Master was possessed of one of those +unfortunate constitutions in which Spirits turns to Water, and rises +in the ill-starred Victim.) + +My speculating it over, not then only, but repeatedly, sometimes +with the Mistress, sometimes with one, sometimes with another, led +up to the Mistress's saying to me,--whether at first in joke or in +earnest, or half joke and half earnest, it matters not: + +"Christopher, I am going to make you a handsome offer." + +(If this should meet her eye,--a lovely blue,--may she not take it +ill my mentioning that if I had been eight or ten year younger, I +would have done as much by her! That is, I would have made her a +offer. It is for others than me to denominate it a handsome one.) + +"Christopher, I am going to make you a handsome offer." + +"Put a name to it, ma'am." + +"Look here, Christopher. Run over the articles of Somebody's +Luggage. You've got it all by heart, I know." + +"A black portmanteau, ma'am, a black bag, a desk, a dressing-case, a +brown-paper parcel, a hat-box, and an umbrella strapped to a +walking-stick." + +"All just as they were left. Nothing opened, nothing tampered +with." + +"You are right, ma'am. All locked but the brown-paper parcel, and +that sealed." + +The Mistress was leaning on Miss Martin's desk at the bar-window, +and she taps the open book that lays upon the desk,--she has a +pretty-made hand to be sure,--and bobs her head over it and laughs. + +"Come," says she, "Christopher. Pay me Somebody's bill, and you +shall have Somebody's Luggage." + +I rather took to the idea from the first moment; but, + +"It mayn't be worth the money," I objected, seeming to hold back. + +"That's a Lottery," says the Mistress, folding her arms upon the +book,--it ain't her hands alone that's pretty made, the observation +extends right up her arms. "Won't you venture two pound sixteen +shillings and sixpence in the Lottery? Why, there's no blanks!" +says the Mistress; laughing and bobbing her head again, "you MUST +win. If you lose, you must win! All prizes in this Lottery! Draw +a blank, and remember, Gentlemen-Sportsmen, you'll still be entitled +to a black portmanteau, a black bag, a desk, a dressing-case, a +sheet of brown paper, a hat-box, and an umbrella strapped to a +walking-stick!" + +To make short of it, Miss Martin come round me, and Mrs. Pratchett +come round me, and the Mistress she was completely round me already, +and all the women in the house come round me, and if it had been +Sixteen two instead of Two sixteen, I should have thought myself +well out of it. For what can you do when they do come round you? + +So I paid the money--down--and such a laughing as there was among +'em! But I turned the tables on 'em regularly, when I said: + +"My family-name is Blue-Beard. I'm going to open Somebody's Luggage +all alone in the Secret Chamber, and not a female eye catches sight +of the contents!" + +Whether I thought proper to have the firmness to keep to this, don't +signify, or whether any female eye, and if any, how many, was really +present when the opening of the Luggage came off. Somebody's +Luggage is the question at present: Nobody's eyes, nor yet noses. + +What I still look at most, in connection with that Luggage, is the +extraordinary quantity of writing-paper, and all written on! And +not our paper neither,--not the paper charged in the bill, for we +know our paper,--so he must have been always at it. And he had +crumpled up this writing of his, everywhere, in every part and +parcel of his luggage. There was writing in his dressing-case, +writing in his boots, writing among his shaving-tackle, writing in +his hat-box, writing folded away down among the very whalebones of +his umbrella. + +His clothes wasn't bad, what there was of 'em. His dressing-case +was poor,--not a particle of silver stopper,--bottle apertures with +nothing in 'em, like empty little dog-kennels,--and a most searching +description of tooth-powder diffusing itself around, as under a +deluded mistake that all the chinks in the fittings was divisions in +teeth. His clothes I parted with, well enough, to a second-hand +dealer not far from St. Clement's Danes, in the Strand,--him as the +officers in the Army mostly dispose of their uniforms to, when hard +pressed with debts of honour, if I may judge from their coats and +epaulets diversifying the window with their backs towards the +public. The same party bought in one lot the portmanteau, the bag, +the desk, the dressing-case, the hat-box, the umbrella, strap, and +walking-stick. On my remarking that I should have thought those +articles not quite in his line, he said: "No more ith a man'th +grandmother, Mithter Chrithtopher; but if any man will bring hith +grandmother here, and offer her at a fair trifle below what the'll +feth with good luck when the'th thcoured and turned--I'll buy her!" + +These transactions brought me home, and, indeed, more than home, for +they left a goodish profit on the original investment. And now +there remained the writings; and the writings I particular wish to +bring under the candid attention of the reader. + +I wish to do so without postponement, for this reason. That is to +say, namely, viz. i.e., as follows, thus:- Before I proceed to +recount the mental sufferings of which I became the prey in +consequence of the writings, and before following up that harrowing +tale with a statement of the wonderful and impressive catastrophe, +as thrilling in its nature as unlooked for in any other capacity, +which crowned the ole and filled the cup of unexpectedness to +overflowing, the writings themselves ought to stand forth to view. +Therefore it is that they now come next. One word to introduce +them, and I lay down my pen (I hope, my unassuming pen) until I take +it up to trace the gloomy sequel of a mind with something on it. + +He was a smeary writer, and wrote a dreadful bad hand. Utterly +regardless of ink, he lavished it on every undeserving object--on +his clothes, his desk, his hat, the handle of his tooth-brush, his +umbrella. Ink was found freely on the coffee-room carpet by No. 4 +table, and two blots was on his restless couch. A reference to the +document I have given entire will show that on the morning of the +third of February, eighteen fifty-six, he procured his no less than +fifth pen and paper. To whatever deplorable act of ungovernable +composition he immolated those materials obtained from the bar, +there is no doubt that the fatal deed was committed in bed, and that +it left its evidences but too plainly, long afterwards, upon the +pillow-case. + +He had put no Heading to any of his writings. Alas! Was he likely +to have a Heading without a Head, and where was HIS Head when he +took such things into it? In some cases, such as his Boots, he +would appear to have hid the writings; thereby involving his style +in greater obscurity. But his Boots was at least pairs,--and no two +of his writings can put in any claim to be so regarded. Here +follows (not to give more specimens) what was found in + + + +CHAPTER II--HIS BOOTS + + + +"Eh! well then, Monsieur Mutuel! What do I know, what can I say? I +assure you that he calls himself Monsieur The Englishman." + +"Pardon. But I think it is impossible," said Monsieur Mutuel,--a +spectacled, snuffy, stooping old gentleman in carpet shoes and a +cloth cap with a peaked shade, a loose blue frock-coat reaching to +his heels, a large limp white shirt-frill, and cravat to +correspond,--that is to say, white was the natural colour of his +linen on Sundays, but it toned down with the week. + +"It is," repeated Monsieur Mutuel, his amiable old walnut-shell +countenance very walnut-shelly indeed as he smiled and blinked in +the bright morning sunlight,--"it is, my cherished Madame Bouclet, I +think, impossible!" + +"Hey!" (with a little vexed cry and a great many tosses of her +head.) "But it is not impossible that you are a Pig!" retorted +Madame Bouclet, a compact little woman of thirty-five or so. "See +then,--look there,--read! 'On the second floor Monsieur L'Anglais.' +Is it not so?" + +"It is so," said Monsieur Mutuel. + +"Good. Continue your morning walk. Get out!" Madame Bouclet +dismissed him with a lively snap of her fingers. + +The morning walk of Monsieur Mutuel was in the brightest patch that +the sun made in the Grande Place of a dull old fortified French +town. The manner of his morning walk was with his hands crossed +behind him; an umbrella, in figure the express image of himself, +always in one hand; a snuffbox in the other. Thus, with the +shuffling gait of the Elephant (who really does deal with the very +worst trousers-maker employed by the Zoological world, and who +appeared to have recommended him to Monsieur Mutuel), the old +gentleman sunned himself daily when sun was to be had--of course, at +the same time sunning a red ribbon at his button-hole; for was he +not an ancient Frenchman? + +Being told by one of the angelic sex to continue his morning walk +and get out, Monsieur Mutuel laughed a walnut-shell laugh, pulled +off his cap at arm's length with the hand that contained his +snuffbox, kept it off for a considerable period after he had parted +from Madame Bouclet, and continued his morning walk and got out, +like a man of gallantry as he was. + +The documentary evidence to which Madame Bouclet had referred +Monsieur Mutuel was the list of her lodgers, sweetly written forth +by her own Nephew and Bookkeeper, who held the pen of an Angel, and +posted up at the side of her gateway, for the information of the +Police: "Au second, M. L'Anglais, Proprietaire." On the second +floor, Mr. The Englishman, man of property. So it stood; nothing +could be plainer. + +Madame Bouclet now traced the line with her forefinger, as it were +to confirm and settle herself in her parting snap at Monsieur +Mutuel, and so placing her right hand on her hip with a defiant air, +as if nothing should ever tempt her to unsnap that snap, strolled +out into the Place to glance up at the windows of Mr. The +Englishman. That worthy happening to be looking out of window at +the moment, Madame Bouclet gave him a graceful salutation with her +head, looked to the right and looked to the left to account to him +for her being there, considered for a moment, like one who accounted +to herself for somebody she had expected not being there, and +reentered her own gateway. Madame Bouclet let all her house giving +on the Place in furnished flats or floors, and lived up the yard +behind in company with Monsieur Bouclet her husband (great at +billiards), an inherited brewing business, several fowls, two carts, +a nephew, a little dog in a big kennel, a grape-vine, a counting- +house, four horses, a married sister (with a share in the brewing +business), the husband and two children of the married sister, a +parrot, a drum (performed on by the little boy of the married +sister), two billeted soldiers, a quantity of pigeons, a fife +(played by the nephew in a ravishing manner), several domestics and +supernumeraries, a perpetual flavour of coffee and soup, a terrific +range of artificial rocks and wooden precipices at least four feet +high, a small fountain, and half-a-dozen large sunflowers. + +Now the Englishman, in taking his Appartement,--or, as one might say +on our side of the Channel, his set of chambers,--had given his +name, correct to the letter, LANGLEY. But as he had a British way +of not opening his mouth very wide on foreign soil, except at meals, +the Brewery had been able to make nothing of it but L'Anglais. So +Mr. The Englishman he had become and he remained. + +"Never saw such a people!" muttered Mr. The Englishman, as he now +looked out of window. "Never did, in my life!" + +This was true enough, for he had never before been out of his own +country,--a right little island, a tight little island, a bright +little island, a show-fight little island, and full of merit of all +sorts; but not the whole round world. + +"These chaps," said Mr. The Englishman to himself, as his eye rolled +over the Place, sprinkled with military here and there, "are no more +like soldiers--" Nothing being sufficiently strong for the end of +his sentence, he left it unended. + +This again (from the point of view of his experience) was strictly +correct; for though there was a great agglomeration of soldiers in +the town and neighbouring country, you might have held a grand +Review and Field-day of them every one, and looked in vain among +them all for a soldier choking behind his foolish stock, or a +soldier lamed by his ill-fitting shoes, or a soldier deprived of the +use of his limbs by straps and buttons, or a soldier elaborately +forced to be self-helpless in all the small affairs of life. A +swarm of brisk, bright, active, bustling, handy, odd, skirmishing +fellows, able to turn cleverly at anything, from a siege to soup, +from great guns to needles and thread, from the broadsword exercise +to slicing an onion, from making war to making omelets, was all you +would have found. + +What a swarm! From the Great Place under the eye of Mr. The +Englishman, where a few awkward squads from the last conscription +were doing the goose-step--some members of those squads still as to +their bodies, in the chrysalis peasant-state of Blouse, and only +military butterflies as to their regimentally-clothed legs--from the +Great Place, away outside the fortifications, and away for miles +along the dusty roads, soldiers swarmed. All day long, upon the +grass-grown ramparts of the town, practising soldiers trumpeted and +bugled; all day long, down in angles of dry trenches, practising +soldiers drummed and drummed. Every forenoon, soldiers burst out of +the great barracks into the sandy gymnasium-ground hard by, and flew +over the wooden horse, and hung on to flying ropes, and dangled +upside-down between parallel bars, and shot themselves off wooden +platforms,--splashes, sparks, coruscations, showers of soldiers. At +every corner of the town-wall, every guard-house, every gateway, +every sentry-box, every drawbridge, every reedy ditch, and rushy +dike, soldiers, soldiers, soldiers. And the town being pretty well +all wall, guard-house, gateway, sentry-box, drawbridge, reedy ditch, +and rushy dike, the town was pretty well all soldiers. + +What would the sleepy old town have been without the soldiers, +seeing that even with them it had so overslept itself as to have +slept its echoes hoarse, its defensive bars and locks and bolts and +chains all rusty, and its ditches stagnant! From the days when +VAUBAN engineered it to that perplexing extent that to look at it +was like being knocked on the head with it, the stranger becoming +stunned and stertorous under the shock of its incomprehensibility,-- +from the days when VAUBAN made it the express incorporation of every +substantive and adjective in the art of military engineering, and +not only twisted you into it and twisted you out of it, to the +right, to the left, opposite, under here, over there, in the dark, +in the dirt, by the gateway, archway, covered way, dry way, wet way, +fosse, portcullis, drawbridge, sluice, squat tower, pierced wall, +and heavy battery, but likewise took a fortifying dive under the +neighbouring country, and came to the surface three or four miles +off, blowing out incomprehensible mounds and batteries among the +quiet crops of chicory and beet-root,--from those days to these the +town had been asleep, and dust and rust and must had settled on its +drowsy Arsenals and Magazines, and grass had grown up in its silent +streets. + +On market-days alone, its Great Place suddenly leaped out of bed. +On market-days, some friendly enchanter struck his staff upon the +stones of the Great Place, and instantly arose the liveliest booths +and stalls, and sittings and standings, and a pleasant hum of +chaffering and huckstering from many hundreds of tongues, and a +pleasant, though peculiar, blending of colours,--white caps, blue +blouses, and green vegetables,--and at last the Knight destined for +the adventure seemed to have come in earnest, and all the Vaubanois +sprang up awake. And now, by long, low-lying avenues of trees, +jolting in white-hooded donkey-cart, and on donkey-back, and in +tumbril and wagon, and cart and cabriolet, and afoot with barrow and +burden,--and along the dikes and ditches and canals, in little peak- +prowed country boats,--came peasant-men and women in flocks and +crowds, bringing articles for sale. And here you had boots and +shoes, and sweetmeats and stuffs to wear, and here (in the cool +shade of the Town-hall) you had milk and cream and butter and +cheese, and here you had fruits and onions and carrots, and all +things needful for your soup, and here you had poultry and flowers +and protesting pigs, and here new shovels, axes, spades, and bill- +hooks for your farming work, and here huge mounds of bread, and here +your unground grain in sacks, and here your children's dolls, and +here the cake-seller, announcing his wares by beat and roll of drum. +And hark! fanfaronade of trumpets, and here into the Great Place, +resplendent in an open carriage, with four gorgeously-attired +servitors up behind, playing horns, drums, and cymbals, rolled "the +Daughter of a Physician" in massive golden chains and ear-rings, and +blue-feathered hat, shaded from the admiring sun by two immense +umbrellas of artificial roses, to dispense (from motives of +philanthropy) that small and pleasant dose which had cured so many +thousands! Toothache, earache, headache, heartache, stomach-ache, +debility, nervousness, fits, fainting, fever, ague, all equally +cured by the small and pleasant dose of the great Physician's great +daughter! The process was this,--she, the Daughter of a Physician, +proprietress of the superb equipage you now admired with its +confirmatory blasts of trumpet, drum, and cymbal, told you so: On +the first day after taking the small and pleasant dose, you would +feel no particular influence beyond a most harmonious sensation of +indescribable and irresistible joy; on the second day you would be +so astonishingly better that you would think yourself changed into +somebody else; on the third day you would be entirely free from +disorder, whatever its nature and however long you had had it, and +would seek out the Physician's Daughter to throw yourself at her +feet, kiss the hem of her garment, and buy as many more of the small +and pleasant doses as by the sale of all your few effects you could +obtain; but she would be inaccessible,--gone for herbs to the +Pyramids of Egypt,--and you would be (though cured) reduced to +despair! Thus would the Physician's Daughter drive her trade (and +briskly too), and thus would the buying and selling and mingling of +tongues and colours continue, until the changing sunlight, leaving +the Physician's Daughter in the shadow of high roofs, admonished her +to jolt out westward, with a departing effect of gleam and glitter +on the splendid equipage and brazen blast. And now the enchanter +struck his staff upon the stones of the Great Place once more, and +down went the booths, the sittings and standings, and vanished the +merchandise, and with it the barrows, donkeys, donkey-carts, and +tumbrils, and all other things on wheels and feet, except the slow +scavengers with unwieldy carts and meagre horses clearing up the +rubbish, assisted by the sleek town pigeons, better plumped out than +on non-market days. While there was yet an hour or two to wane +before the autumn sunset, the loiterer outside town-gate and +drawbridge, and postern and double-ditch, would see the last white- +hooded cart lessening in the avenue of lengthening shadows of trees, +or the last country boat, paddled by the last market-woman on her +way home, showing black upon the reddening, long, low, narrow dike +between him and the mill; and as the paddle-parted scum and weed +closed over the boat's track, he might be comfortably sure that its +sluggish rest would be troubled no more until next market-day. + +As it was not one of the Great Place's days for getting out of bed, +when Mr. The Englishman looked down at the young soldiers practising +the goose-step there, his mind was left at liberty to take a +military turn. + +"These fellows are billeted everywhere about," said he; "and to see +them lighting the people's fires, boiling the people's pots, minding +the people's babies, rocking the people's cradles, washing the +people's greens, and making themselves generally useful, in every +sort of unmilitary way, is most ridiculous! Never saw such a set of +fellows,--never did in my life!" + +All perfectly true again. Was there not Private Valentine in that +very house, acting as sole housemaid, valet, cook, steward, and +nurse, in the family of his captain, Monsieur le Capitaine de la +Cour,--cleaning the floors, making the beds, doing the marketing, +dressing the captain, dressing the dinners, dressing the salads, and +dressing the baby, all with equal readiness? Or, to put him aside, +he being in loyal attendance on his Chief, was there not Private +Hyppolite, billeted at the Perfumer's two hundred yards off, who, +when not on duty, volunteered to keep shop while the fair +Perfumeress stepped out to speak to a neighbour or so, and +laughingly sold soap with his war-sword girded on him? Was there +not Emile, billeted at the Clock-maker's, perpetually turning to of +an evening, with his coat off, winding up the stock? Was there not +Eugene, billeted at the Tinman's, cultivating, pipe in mouth, a +garden four feet square, for the Tinman, in the little court, behind +the shop, and extorting the fruits of the earth from the same, on +his knees, with the sweat of his brow? Not to multiply examples, +was there not Baptiste, billeted on the poor Water-carrier, at that +very instant sitting on the pavement in the sunlight, with his +martial legs asunder, and one of the Water-carrier's spare pails +between them, which (to the delight and glory of the heart of the +Water-carrier coming across the Place from the fountain, yoked and +burdened) he was painting bright-green outside and bright-red +within? Or, to go no farther than the Barber's at the very next +door, was there not Corporal Theophile - + +"No," said Mr. The Englishman, glancing down at the Barber's, "he is +not there at present. There's the child, though." + +A mere mite of a girl stood on the steps of the Barber's shop, +looking across the Place. A mere baby, one might call her, dressed +in the close white linen cap which small French country children +wear (like the children in Dutch pictures), and in a frock of +homespun blue, that had no shape except where it was tied round her +little fat throat. So that, being naturally short and round all +over, she looked, behind, as if she had been cut off at her natural +waist, and had had her head neatly fitted on it. + +"There's the child, though." + +To judge from the way in which the dimpled hand was rubbing the +eyes, the eyes had been closed in a nap, and were newly opened. But +they seemed to be looking so intently across the Place, that the +Englishman looked in the same direction. + +"O!" said he presently. "I thought as much. The Corporal's there." + +The Corporal, a smart figure of a man of thirty, perhaps a thought +under the middle size, but very neatly made,--a sunburnt Corporal +with a brown peaked beard,--faced about at the moment, addressing +voluble words of instruction to the squad in hand. Nothing was +amiss or awry about the Corporal. A lithe and nimble Corporal, +quite complete, from the sparkling dark eyes under his knowing +uniform cap to his sparkling white gaiters. The very image and +presentment of a Corporal of his country's army, in the line of his +shoulders, the line of his waist, the broadest line of his Bloomer +trousers, and their narrowest line at the calf of his leg. + +Mr. The Englishman looked on, and the child looked on, and the +Corporal looked on (but the last-named at his men), until the drill +ended a few minutes afterwards, and the military sprinkling dried up +directly, and was gone. Then said Mr. The Englishman to himself, +"Look here! By George!" And the Corporal, dancing towards the +Barber's with his arms wide open, caught up the child, held her over +his head in a flying attitude, caught her down again, kissed her, +and made off with her into the Barber's house. + +Now Mr. The Englishman had had a quarrel with his erring and +disobedient and disowned daughter, and there was a child in that +case too. Had not his daughter been a child, and had she not taken +angel-flights above his head as this child had flown above the +Corporal's? + +"He's a "--National Participled--"fool!" said the Englishman, and +shut his window. + +But the windows of the house of Memory, and the windows of the house +of Mercy, are not so easily closed as windows of glass and wood. +They fly open unexpectedly; they rattle in the night; they must be +nailed up. Mr. The Englishman had tried nailing them, but had not +driven the nails quite home. So he passed but a disturbed evening +and a worse night. + +By nature a good-tempered man? No; very little gentleness, +confounding the quality with weakness. Fierce and wrathful when +crossed? Very, and stupendously unreasonable. Moody? Exceedingly +so. Vindictive? Well; he had had scowling thoughts that he would +formally curse his daughter, as he had seen it done on the stage. +But remembering that the real Heaven is some paces removed from the +mock one in the great chandelier of the Theatre, he had given that +up. + +And he had come abroad to be rid of his repudiated daughter for the +rest of his life. And here he was. + +At bottom, it was for this reason, more than for any other, that Mr. +The Englishman took it extremely ill that Corporal Theophile should +be so devoted to little Bebelle, the child at the Barber's shop. In +an unlucky moment he had chanced to say to himself, "Why, confound +the fellow, he is not her father!" There was a sharp sting in the +speech which ran into him suddenly, and put him in a worse mood. So +he had National Participled the unconscious Corporal with most +hearty emphasis, and had made up his mind to think no more about +such a mountebank. + +But it came to pass that the Corporal was not to be dismissed. If +he had known the most delicate fibres of the Englishman's mind, +instead of knowing nothing on earth about him, and if he had been +the most obstinate Corporal in the Grand Army of France, instead of +being the most obliging, he could not have planted himself with more +determined immovability plump in the midst of all the Englishman's +thoughts. Not only so, but he seemed to be always in his view. Mr. +The Englishman had but to look out of window, to look upon the +Corporal with little Bebelle. He had but to go for a walk, and +there was the Corporal walking with Bebelle. He had but to come +home again, disgusted, and the Corporal and Bebelle were at home +before him. If he looked out at his back windows early in the +morning, the Corporal was in the Barber's back yard, washing and +dressing and brushing Bebelle. If he took refuge at his front +windows, the Corporal brought his breakfast out into the Place, and +shared it there with Bebelle. Always Corporal and always Bebelle. +Never Corporal without Bebelle. Never Bebelle without Corporal. + +Mr. The Englishman was not particularly strong in the French +language as a means of oral communication, though he read it very +well. It is with languages as with people,--when you only know them +by sight, you are apt to mistake them; you must be on speaking terms +before you can be said to have established an acquaintance. + +For this reason, Mr. The Englishman had to gird up his loins +considerably before he could bring himself to the point of +exchanging ideas with Madame Bouclet on the subject of this Corporal +and this Bebelle. But Madame Bouclet looking in apologetically one +morning to remark, that, O Heaven! she was in a state of desolation +because the lamp-maker had not sent home that lamp confided to him +to repair, but that truly he was a lamp-maker against whom the whole +world shrieked out, Mr. The Englishman seized the occasion. + +"Madame, that baby--" + +"Pardon, monsieur. That lamp." + +"No, no, that little girl." + +"But, pardon!" said Madame Bonclet, angling for a clew, "one cannot +light a little girl, or send her to be repaired?" + +"The little girl--at the house of the barber." + +"Ah-h-h!" cried Madame Bouclet, suddenly catching the idea with her +delicate little line and rod. "Little Bebelle? Yes, yes, yes! And +her friend the Corporal? Yes, yes, yes, yes! So genteel of him,-- +is it not?" + +"He is not -?" + +"Not at all; not at all! He is not one of her relations. Not at +all!" + +"Why, then, he--" + +"Perfectly!" cried Madame Bouclet, "you are right, monsieur. It is +so genteel of him. The less relation, the more genteel. As you +say." + +"Is she -?" + +"The child of the barber?" Madame Bouclet whisked up her skilful +little line and rod again. "Not at all, not at all! She is the +child of--in a word, of no one." + +"The wife of the barber, then -?" + +"Indubitably. As you say. The wife of the barber receives a small +stipend to take care of her. So much by the month. Eh, then! It +is without doubt very little, for we are all poor here." + +"You are not poor, madame." + +"As to my lodgers," replied Madame Bouclet, with a smiling and a +gracious bend of her head, "no. As to all things else, so-so." + +"You flatter me, madame." + +"Monsieur, it is you who flatter me in living here." + +Certain fishy gasps on Mr. The Englishman's part, denoting that he +was about to resume his subject under difficulties, Madame Bouclet +observed him closely, and whisked up her delicate line and rod again +with triumphant success. + +"O no, monsieur, certainly not. The wife of the barber is not cruel +to the poor child, but she is careless. Her health is delicate, and +she sits all day, looking out at window. Consequently, when the +Corporal first came, the poor little Bebelle was much neglected." + +"It is a curious--" began Mr. The Englishman. + +"Name? That Bebelle? Again you are right, monsieur. But it is a +playful name for Gabrielle." + +"And so the child is a mere fancy of the Corporal's?" said Mr. The +Englishman, in a gruffly disparaging tone of voice. + +"Eh, well!" returned Madame Bouclet, with a pleading shrug: "one +must love something. Human nature is weak." + +("Devilish weak," muttered the Englishman, in his own language.) + +"And the Corporal," pursued Madame Bouclet, "being billeted at the +barber's,--where he will probably remain a long time, for he is +attached to the General,--and finding the poor unowned child in need +of being loved, and finding himself in need of loving,--why, there +you have it all, you see!" + +Mr. The Englishman accepted this interpretation of the matter with +an indifferent grace, and observed to himself, in an injured manner, +when he was again alone: "I shouldn't mind it so much, if these +people were not such a"--National Participled--"sentimental people!" + +There was a Cemetery outside the town, and it happened ill for the +reputation of the Vaubanois, in this sentimental connection, that he +took a walk there that same afternoon. To be sure there were some +wonderful things in it (from the Englishman's point of view), and of +a certainty in all Britain you would have found nothing like it. +Not to mention the fanciful flourishes of hearts and crosses in wood +and iron, that were planted all over the place, making it look very +like a Firework-ground, where a most splendid pyrotechnic display +might be expected after dark, there were so many wreaths upon the +graves, embroidered, as it might be, "To my mother," "To my +daughter," "To my father," "To my brother," "To my sister," "To my +friend," and those many wreaths were in so many stages of +elaboration and decay, from the wreath of yesterday, all fresh +colour and bright beads, to the wreath of last year, a poor +mouldering wisp of straw! There were so many little gardens and +grottos made upon graves, in so many tastes, with plants and shells +and plaster figures and porcelain pitchers, and so many odds and +ends! There were so many tributes of remembrance hanging up, not to +be discriminated by the closest inspection from little round +waiters, whereon were depicted in glowing lines either a lady or a +gentleman with a white pocket-handkerchief out of all proportion, +leaning, in a state of the most faultless mourning and most profound +affliction, on the most architectural and gorgeous urn! There were +so many surviving wives who had put their names on the tombs of +their deceased husbands, with a blank for the date of their own +departure from this weary world; and there were so many surviving +husbands who had rendered the same homage to their deceased wives; +and out of the number there must have been so many who had long ago +married again! In fine, there was so much in the place that would +have seemed more frippery to a stranger, save for the consideration +that the lightest paper flower that lay upon the poorest heap of +earth was never touched by a rude hand, but perished there, a sacred +thing! + +"Nothing of the solemnity of Death here," Mr. The Englishman had +been going to say, when this last consideration touched him with a +mild appeal, and on the whole he walked out without saying it. "But +these people are," he insisted, by way of compensation, when he was +well outside the gate, "they are so"--Participled--"sentimental!" + +His way back lay by the military gymnasium-ground. And there he +passed the Corporal glibly instructing young soldiers how to swing +themselves over rapid and deep watercourses on their way to Glory, +by means of a rope, and himself deftly plunging off a platform, and +flying a hundred feet or two, as an encouragement to them to begin. +And there he also passed, perched on a crowning eminence (probably +the Corporal's careful hands), the small Bebelle, with her round +eyes wide open, surveying the proceeding like a wondering sort of +blue and white bird. + +"If that child was to die," this was his reflection as he turned his +back and went his way,--"and it would almost serve the fellow right +for making such a fool of himself,--I suppose we should have him +sticking up a wreath and a waiter in that fantastic burying-ground." + +Nevertheless, after another early morning or two of looking out of +window, he strolled down into the Place, when the Corporal and +Bebelle were walking there, and touching his hat to the Corporal (an +immense achievement), wished him Good-day. + +"Good-day, monsieur." + +"This is a rather pretty child you have here," said Mr. The +Englishman, taking her chin in his hand, and looking down into her +astonished blue eyes. + +"Monsieur, she is a very pretty child," returned the Corporal, with +a stress on his polite correction of the phrase. + +"And good?" said the Englishman. + +"And very good. Poor little thing!" + +"Hah!" The Englishman stooped down and patted her cheek, not +without awkwardness, as if he were going too far in his +conciliation. "And what is this medal round your neck, my little +one?" + +Bebelle having no other reply on her lips than her chubby right +fist, the Corporal offered his services as interpreter. + +"Monsieur demands, what is this, Bebelle?" + +"It is the Holy Virgin," said Bebelle. + +"And who gave it you?" asked the Englishman. + +"Theophile." + +"And who is Theophile?" + +Bebelle broke into a laugh, laughed merrily and heartily, clapped +her chubby hands, and beat her little feet on the stone pavement of +the Place. + +"He doesn't know Theophile! Why, he doesn't know any one! He +doesn't know anything!" Then, sensible of a small solecism in her +manners, Bebelle twisted her right hand in a leg of the Corporal's +Bloomer trousers, and, laying her cheek against the place, kissed +it. + +"Monsieur Theophile, I believe?" said the Englishman to the +Corporal. + +"It is I, monsieur." + +"Permit me." Mr. The Englishman shook him heartily by the hand and +turned away. But he took it mighty ill that old Monsieur Mutuel in +his patch of sunlight, upon whom he came as he turned, should pull +off his cap to him with a look of pleased approval. And he +muttered, in his own tongue, as he returned the salutation, "Well, +walnut-shell! And what business is it of YOURS?" + +Mr. The Englishman went on for many weeks passing but disturbed +evenings and worse nights, and constantly experiencing that those +aforesaid windows in the houses of Memory and Mercy rattled after +dark, and that he had very imperfectly nailed them up. Likewise, he +went on for many weeks daily improving the acquaintance of the +Corporal and Bebelle. That is to say, he took Bebelle by the chin, +and the Corporal by the hand, and offered Bebelle sous and the +Corporal cigars, and even got the length of changing pipes with the +Corporal and kissing Bebelle. But he did it all in a shamefaced +way, and always took it extremely ill that Monsieur Mutuel in his +patch of sunlight should note what he did. Whenever that seemed to +be the case, he always growled in his own tongue, "There you are +again, walnut-shell! What business is it of yours?" + +In a word, it had become the occupation of Mr. The Englishman's life +to look after the Corporal and little Bebelle, and to resent old +Monsieur Mutuel's looking after HIM. An occupation only varied by a +fire in the town one windy night, and much passing of water-buckets +from hand to hand (in which the Englishman rendered good service), +and much beating of drums,--when all of a sudden the Corporal +disappeared. + +Next, all of a sudden, Bebelle disappeared. + +She had been visible a few days later than the Corporal,--sadly +deteriorated as to washing and brushing,--but she had not spoken +when addressed by Mr. The Englishman, and had looked scared and had +run away. And now it would seem that she had run away for good. +And there lay the Great Place under the windows, bare and barren. + +In his shamefaced and constrained way, Mr. The Englishman asked no +question of any one, but watched from his front windows and watched +from his back windows, and lingered about the Place, and peeped in +at the Barber's shop, and did all this and much more with a +whistling and tune-humming pretence of not missing anything, until +one afternoon when Monsieur Mutuel's patch of sunlight was in +shadow, and when, according to all rule and precedent, he had no +right whatever to bring his red ribbon out of doors, behold here he +was, advancing with his cap already in his hand twelve paces off! + +Mr. The Englishman had got as far into his usual objurgation as, +"What bu-si- " when he checked himself. + +"Ah, it is sad, it is sad! Helas, it is unhappy, it is sad!" Thus +old Monsieur Mutuel, shaking his gray head. + +"What busin- at least, I would say, what do you mean, Monsieur +Mutuel?" + +"Our Corporal. Helas, our dear Corporal!" + +"What has happened to him?" + +"You have not heard?" + +"No." + +"At the fire. But he was so brave, so ready. Ah, too brave, too +ready!" + +"May the Devil carry you away!" the Englishman broke in impatiently; +"I beg your pardon,--I mean me,--I am not accustomed to speak +French,--go on, will you?" + +"And a falling beam--" + +"Good God!" exclaimed the Englishman. "It was a private soldier who +was killed?" + +"No. A Corporal, the same Corporal, our dear Corporal. Beloved by +all his comrades. The funeral ceremony was touching,--penetrating. +Monsieur The Englishman, your eyes fill with tears." + +"What bu-si- " + +"Monsieur The Englishman, I honour those emotions. I salute you +with profound respect. I will not obtrude myself upon your noble +heart." + +Monsieur Mutuel,--a gentleman in every thread of his cloudy linen, +under whose wrinkled hand every grain in the quarter of an ounce of +poor snuff in his poor little tin box became a gentleman's +property,--Monsieur Mutuel passed on, with his cap in his hand. + +"I little thought," said the Englishman, after walking for several +minutes, and more than once blowing his nose, "when I was looking +round that cemetery--I'll go there!" + +Straight he went there, and when he came within the gate he paused, +considering whether he should ask at the lodge for some direction to +the grave. But he was less than ever in a mood for asking +questions, and he thought, "I shall see something on it to know it +by." + +In search of the Corporal's grave he went softly on, up this walk +and down that, peering in, among the crosses and hearts and columns +and obelisks and tombstones, for a recently disturbed spot. It +troubled him now to think how many dead there were in the cemetery,- +-he had not thought them a tenth part so numerous before,--and after +he had walked and sought for some time, he said to himself, as he +struck down a new vista of tombs, "I might suppose that every one +was dead but I." + +Not every one. A live child was lying on the ground asleep. Truly +he had found something on the Corporal's grave to know it by, and +the something was Bebelle. + +With such a loving will had the dead soldier's comrades worked at +his resting-place, that it was already a neat garden. On the green +turf of the garden Bebelle lay sleeping, with her cheek touching it. +A plain, unpainted little wooden Cross was planted in the turf, and +her short arm embraced this little Cross, as it had many a time +embraced the Corporal's neck. They had put a tiny flag (the flag of +France) at his head, and a laurel garland. + +Mr. The Englishman took off his hat, and stood for a while silent. +Then, covering his head again, he bent down on one knee, and softly +roused the child. + +"Bebelle! My little one!" + +Opening her eyes, on which the tears were still wet, Bebelle was at +first frightened; but seeing who it was, she suffered him to take +her in his arms, looking steadfastly at him. + +"You must not lie here, my little one. You must come with me." + +"No, no. I can't leave Theophile. I want the good dear Theophile." + +"We will go and seek him, Bebelle. We will go and look for him in +England. We will go and look for him at my daughter's, Bebelle." + +"Shall we find him there?" + +"We shall find the best part of him there. Come with me, poor +forlorn little one. Heaven is my witness," said the Englishman, in +a low voice, as, before he rose, he touched the turf above the +gentle Corporal's breast, "that I thankfully accept this trust!" + +It was a long way for the child to have come unaided. She was soon +asleep again, with her embrace transferred to the Englishman's neck. +He looked at her worn shoes, and her galled feet, and her tired +face, and believed that she had come there every day. + +He was leaving the grave with the slumbering Bebelle in his arms, +when he stopped, looked wistfully down at it, and looked wistfully +at the other graves around. "It is the innocent custom of the +people," said Mr. The Englishman, with hesitation. "I think I +should like to do it. No one sees." + +Careful not to wake Bebelle as he went, he repaired to the lodge +where such little tokens of remembrance were sold, and bought two +wreaths. One, blue and white and glistening silver, "To my friend;" +one of a soberer red and black and yellow, "To my friend." With +these he went back to the grave, and so down on one knee again. +Touching the child's lips with the brighter wreath, he guided her +hand to hang it on the Cross; then hung his own wreath there. After +all, the wreaths were not far out of keeping with the little garden. +To my friend. To my friend. + +Mr. The Englishman took it very ill when he looked round a street +corner into the Great Place, carrying Bebelle in his arms, that old +Mutuel should be there airing his red ribbon. He took a world of +pains to dodge the worthy Mutuel, and devoted a surprising amount of +time and trouble to skulking into his own lodging like a man pursued +by Justice. Safely arrived there at last, he made Bebelle's toilet +with as accurate a remembrance as he could bring to bear upon that +work of the way in which he had often seen the poor Corporal make +it, and having given her to eat and drink, laid her down on his own +bed. Then he slipped out into the barber's shop, and after a brief +interview with the barber's wife, and a brief recourse to his purse +and card-case, came back again with the whole of Bebelle's personal +property in such a very little bundle that it was quite lost under +his arm. + +As it was irreconcilable with his whole course and character that he +should carry Bebelle off in state, or receive any compliments or +congratulations on that feat, he devoted the next day to getting his +two portmanteaus out of the house by artfulness and stealth, and to +comporting himself in every particular as if he were going to run +away,--except, indeed, that he paid his few debts in the town, and +prepared a letter to leave for Madame Bouclet, enclosing a +sufficient sum of money in lieu of notice. A railway train would +come through at midnight, and by that train he would take away +Bebelle to look for Theophile in England and at his forgiven +daughter's. + +At midnight, on a moonlight night, Mr. The Englishman came creeping +forth like a harmless assassin, with Bebelle on his breast instead +of a dagger. Quiet the Great Place, and quiet the never-stirring +streets; closed the cafes; huddled together motionless their +billiard-balls; drowsy the guard or sentinel on duty here and there; +lulled for the time, by sleep, even the insatiate appetite of the +Office of Town-dues. + +Mr. The Englishman left the Place behind, and left the streets +behind, and left the civilian-inhabited town behind, and descended +down among the military works of Vauban, hemming all in. As the +shadow of the first heavy arch and postern fell upon him and was +left behind, as the shadow of the second heavy arch and postern fell +upon him and was left behind, as his hollow tramp over the first +drawbridge was succeeded by a gentler sound, as his hollow tramp +over the second drawbridge was succeeded by a gentler sound, as he +overcame the stagnant ditches one by one, and passed out where the +flowing waters were and where the moonlight, so the dark shades and +the hollow sounds and the unwholesomely locked currents of his soul +were vanquished and set free. See to it, Vaubans of your own +hearts, who gird them in with triple walls and ditches, and with +bolt and chain and bar and lifted bridge,--raze those +fortifications, and lay them level with the all-absorbing dust, +before the night cometh when no hand can work! + +All went prosperously, and he got into an empty carriage in the +train, where he could lay Bebelle on the seat over against him, as +on a couch, and cover her from head to foot with his mantle. He had +just drawn himself up from perfecting this arrangement, and had just +leaned back in his own seat contemplating it with great +satisfaction, when he became aware of a curious appearance at the +open carriage window,--a ghostly little tin box floating up in the +moon-light, and hovering there. + +He leaned forward, and put out his head. Down among the rails and +wheels and ashes, Monsieur Mutuel, red ribbon and all! + +"Excuse me, Monsieur The Englishman," said Monsieur Mutuel, holding +up his box at arm's length, the carriage being so high and he so +low; "but I shall reverence the little box for ever, if your so +generous hand will take a pinch from it at parting." + +Mr. The Englishman reached out of the window before complying, and-- +without asking the old fellow what business it was of his--shook +hands and said, "Adieu! God bless you!" + +"And, Mr. The Englishman, God bless YOU!" cried Madame Bouclet, who +was also there among the rails and wheels and ashes. "And God will +bless you in the happiness of the protected child now with you. And +God will bless you in your own child at home. And God will bless +you in your own remembrances. And this from me!" + +He had barely time to catch a bouquet from her hand, when the train +was flying through the night. Round the paper that enfolded it was +bravely written (doubtless by the nephew who held the pen of an +Angel), "Homage to the friend of the friendless." + +"Not bad people, Bebelle!" said Mr. The Englishman, softly drawing +the mantle a little from her sleeping face, that he might kiss it, +"though they are so--" + +Too "sentimental" himself at the moment to be able to get out that +word, he added nothing but a sob, and travelled for some miles, +through the moonlight, with his hand before his eyes. + + + +CHAPTER III--HIS BROWN-PAPER PARCEL + + + +My works are well known. I am a young man in the Art line. You +have seen my works many a time, though it's fifty thousand to one if +you have seen me. You say you don't want to see me? You say your +interest is in my works, and not in me? Don't be too sure about +that. Stop a bit. + +Let us have it down in black and white at the first go off, so that +there may be no unpleasantness or wrangling afterwards. And this is +looked over by a friend of mine, a ticket writer, that is up to +literature. I am a young man in the Art line--in the Fine-Art line. +You have seen my works over and over again, and you have been +curious about me, and you think you have seen me. Now, as a safe +rule, you never have seen me, and you never do see me, and you never +will see me. I think that's plainly put--and it's what knocks me +over. + +If there's a blighted public character going, I am the party. + +It has been remarked by a certain (or an uncertain,) philosopher, +that the world knows nothing of its greatest men. He might have put +it plainer if he had thrown his eye in my direction. He might have +put it, that while the world knows something of them that apparently +go in and win, it knows nothing of them that really go in and don't +win. There it is again in another form--and that's what knocks me +over. + +Not that it's only myself that suffers from injustice, but that I am +more alive to my own injuries than to any other man's. Being, as I +have mentioned, in the Fine-Art line, and not the Philanthropic +line, I openly admit it. As to company in injury, I have company +enough. Who are you passing every day at your Competitive +Excruciations? The fortunate candidates whose heads and livers you +have turned upside down for life? Not you. You are really passing +the Crammers and Coaches. If your principle is right, why don't you +turn out to-morrow morning with the keys of your cities on velvet +cushions, your musicians playing, and your flags flying, and read +addresses to the Crammers and Coaches on your bended knees, +beseeching them to come out and govern you? Then, again, as to your +public business of all sorts, your Financial statements and your +Budgets; the Public knows much, truly, about the real doers of all +that! Your Nobles and Right Honourables are first-rate men? Yes, +and so is a goose a first-rate bird. But I'll tell you this about +the goose;--you'll find his natural flavour disappointing, without +stuffing. + +Perhaps I am soured by not being popular? But suppose I AM popular. +Suppose my works never fail to attract. Suppose that, whether they +are exhibited by natural light or by artificial, they invariably +draw the public. Then no doubt they are preserved in some +Collection? No, they are not; they are not preserved in any +Collection. Copyright? No, nor yet copyright. Anyhow they must be +somewhere? Wrong again, for they are often nowhere. + +Says you, "At all events, you are in a moody state of mind, my +friend." My answer is, I have described myself as a public +character with a blight upon him--which fully accounts for the +curdling of the milk in THAT cocoa-nut. + +Those that are acquainted with London are aware of a locality on the +Surrey side of the river Thames, called the Obelisk, or, more +generally, the Obstacle. Those that are not acquainted with London +will also be aware of it, now that I have named it. My lodging is +not far from that locality. I am a young man of that easy +disposition, that I lie abed till it's absolutely necessary to get +up and earn something, and then I lie abed again till I have spent +it. + +It was on an occasion when I had had to turn to with a view to +victuals, that I found myself walking along the Waterloo Road, one +evening after dark, accompanied by an acquaintance and fellow-lodger +in the gas-fitting way of life. He is very good company, having +worked at the theatres, and, indeed, he has a theatrical turn +himself, and wishes to be brought out in the character of Othello; +but whether on account of his regular work always blacking his face +and hands more or less, I cannot say. + +"Tom," he says, "what a mystery hangs over you!" + +"Yes, Mr. Click"--the rest of the house generally give him his name, +as being first, front, carpeted all over, his own furniture, and if +not mahogany, an out-and-out imitation--"yes, Mr. Click, a mystery +does hang over me." + +"Makes you low, you see, don't it?" says he, eyeing me sideways. + +"Why, yes, Mr. Click, there are circumstances connected with it that +have," I yielded to a sigh, "a lowering effect." + +"Gives you a touch of the misanthrope too, don't it?" says he. +"Well, I'll tell you what. If I was you, I'd shake it of." + +"If I was you, I would, Mr. Click; but, if you was me, you +wouldn't." + +"Ah!" says he, "there's something in that." + +When we had walked a little further, he took it up again by touching +me on the chest. + +"You see, Tom, it seems to me as if, in the words of the poet who +wrote the domestic drama of The Stranger, you had a silent sorrow +there." + +"I have, Mr. Click." + +"I hope, Tom," lowering his voice in a friendly way, "it isn't +coining, or smashing?" + +"No, Mr. Click. Don't be uneasy." + +"Nor yet forg- " Mr. Click checked himself, and added, +"counterfeiting anything, for instance?" + +"No, Mr. Click. I am lawfully in the Art line--Fine-Art line--but I +can say no more." + +"Ah! Under a species of star? A kind of malignant spell? A sort +of a gloomy destiny? A cankerworm pegging away at your vitals in +secret, as well as I make it out?" said Mr. Click, eyeing me with +some admiration. + +I told Mr. Click that was about it, if we came to particulars; and I +thought he appeared rather proud of me. + +Our conversation had brought us to a crowd of people, the greater +part struggling for a front place from which to see something on the +pavement, which proved to be various designs executed in coloured +chalks on the pavement stones, lighted by two candles stuck in mud +sconces. The subjects consisted of a fine fresh salmon's head and +shoulders, supposed to have been recently sent home from the +fishmonger's; a moonlight night at sea (in a circle); dead game; +scroll-work; the head of a hoary hermit engaged in devout +contemplation; the head of a pointer smoking a pipe; and a cherubim, +his flesh creased as in infancy, going on a horizontal errand +against the wind. All these subjects appeared to me to be +exquisitely done. + +On his knees on one side of this gallery, a shabby person of modest +appearance who shivered dreadfully (though it wasn't at all cold), +was engaged in blowing the chalk-dust off the moon, toning the +outline of the back of the hermit's head with a bit of leather, and +fattening the down-stroke of a letter or two in the writing. I have +forgotten to mention that writing formed a part of the composition, +and that it also--as it appeared to me--was exquisitely done. It +ran as follows, in fine round characters: "An honest man is the +noblest work of God. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0. Pounds s. d. Employment +in an office is humbly requested. Honour the Queen. Hunger is a 0 +9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 sharp thorn. Chip chop, cherry chop, fol de rol +de ri do. Astronomy and mathematics. I do this to support my +family." + +Murmurs of admiration at the exceeding beauty of this performance +went about among the crowd. The artist, having finished his +touching (and having spoilt those places), took his seat on the +pavement, with his knees crouched up very nigh his chin; and +halfpence began to rattle in. + +"A pity to see a man of that talent brought so low; ain't it?" said +one of the crowd to me. + +"What he might have done in the coach-painting, or house- +decorating!" said another man, who took up the first speaker because +I did not. + +"Why, he writes--alone--like the Lord Chancellor!" said another man. + +"Better," said another. "I know his writing. He couldn't support +his family this way." + +Then, a woman noticed the natural fluffiness of the hermit's hair, +and another woman, her friend, mentioned of the salmon's gills that +you could almost see him gasp. Then, an elderly country gentleman +stepped forward and asked the modest man how he executed his work? +And the modest man took some scraps of brown paper with colours in +'em out of his pockets, and showed them. Then a fair-complexioned +donkey, with sandy hair and spectacles, asked if the hermit was a +portrait? To which the modest man, casting a sorrowful glance upon +it, replied that it was, to a certain extent, a recollection of his +father. This caused a boy to yelp out, "Is the Pinter a smoking the +pipe your mother?" who was immediately shoved out of view by a +sympathetic carpenter with his basket of tools at his back. + +At every fresh question or remark the crowd leaned forward more +eagerly, and dropped the halfpence more freely, and the modest man +gathered them up more meekly. At last, another elderly gentleman +came to the front, and gave the artist his card, to come to his +office to-morrow, and get some copying to do. The card was +accompanied by sixpence, and the artist was profoundly grateful, +and, before he put the card in his hat, read it several times by the +light of his candles to fix the address well in his mind, in case he +should lose it. The crowd was deeply interested by this last +incident, and a man in the second row with a gruff voice growled to +the artist, "You've got a chance in life now, ain't you?" The +artist answered (sniffing in a very low-spirited way, however), "I'm +thankful to hope so." Upon which there was a general chorus of "You +are all right," and the halfpence slackened very decidedly. + +I felt myself pulled away by the arm, and Mr. Click and I stood +alone at the corner of the next crossing. + +"Why, Tom," said Mr. Click, "what a horrid expression of face you've +got!" + +"Have I?" says I. + +"Have you?" says Mr. Click. "Why, you looked as if you would have +his blood." + +"Whose blood?" + +"The artist's." + +"The artist's?" I repeated. And I laughed, frantically, wildly, +gloomily, incoherently, disagreeably. I am sensible that I did. I +know I did. + +Mr. Click stared at me in a scared sort of a way, but said nothing +until we had walked a street's length. He then stopped short, and +said, with excitement on the part of his forefinger: + +"Thomas, I find it necessary to be plain with you. I don't like the +envious man. I have identified the cankerworm that's pegging away +at YOUR vitals, and it's envy, Thomas." + +"Is it?" says I. + +"Yes, it is," says be. "Thomas, beware of envy. It is the green- +eyed monster which never did and never will improve each shining +hour, but quite the reverse. I dread the envious man, Thomas. I +confess that I am afraid of the envious man, when he is so envious +as you are. Whilst you contemplated the works of a gifted rival, +and whilst you heard that rival's praises, and especially whilst you +met his humble glance as he put that card away, your countenance was +so malevolent as to be terrific. Thomas, I have heard of the envy +of them that follows the Fine-Art line, but I never believed it +could be what yours is. I wish you well, but I take my leave of +you. And if you should ever got into trouble through knifeing--or +say, garotting--a brother artist, as I believe you will, don't call +me to character, Thomas, or I shall be forced to injure your case." + +Mr. Click parted from me with those words, and we broke off our +acquaintance. + +I became enamoured. Her name was Henrietta. Contending with my +easy disposition, I frequently got up to go after her. She also +dwelt in the neighbourhood of the Obstacle, and I did fondly hope +that no other would interpose in the way of our union. + +To say that Henrietta was volatile is but to say that she was woman. +To say that she was in the bonnet-trimming is feebly to express the +taste which reigned predominant in her own. + +She consented to walk with me. Let me do her the justice to say +that she did so upon trial. "I am not," said Henrietta, "as yet +prepared to regard you, Thomas, in any other light than as a friend; +but as a friend I am willing to walk with you, on the understanding +that softer sentiments may flow." + +We walked. + +Under the influence of Henrietta's beguilements, I now got out of +bed daily. I pursued my calling with an industry before unknown, +and it cannot fail to have been observed at that period, by those +most familiar with the streets of London, that there was a larger +supply. But hold! The time is not yet come! + +One evening in October I was walking with Henrietta, enjoying the +cool breezes wafted over Vauxhall Bridge. After several slow turns, +Henrietta gaped frequently (so inseparable from woman is the love of +excitement), and said, "Let's go home by Grosvenor Place, +Piccadilly, and Waterloo"--localities, I may state for the +information of the stranger and the foreigner, well known in London, +and the last a Bridge. + +"No. Not by Piccadilly, Henrietta," said I. + +"And why not Piccadilly, for goodness' sake?" said Henrietta. + +Could I tell her? Could I confess to the gloomy presentiment that +overshadowed me? Could I make myself intelligible to her? No. + +"I don't like Piccadilly, Henrietta." + +"But I do," said she. "It's dark now, and the long rows of lamps in +Piccadilly after dark are beautiful. I WILL go to Piccadilly!" + +Of course we went. It was a pleasant night, and there were numbers +of people in the streets. It was a brisk night, but not too cold, +and not damp. Let me darkly observe, it was the best of all nights- +-FOR THE PURPOSE. + +As we passed the garden wall of the Royal Palace, going up Grosvenor +Place, Henrietta murmured: + +"I wish I was a Queen!" + +"Why so, Henrietta?" + +"I would make YOU Something," said she, and crossed her two hands on +my arm, and turned away her head. + +Judging from this that the softer sentiments alluded to above had +begun to flow, I adapted my conduct to that belief. Thus happily we +passed on into the detested thoroughfare of Piccadilly. On the +right of that thoroughfare is a row of trees, the railing of the +Green Park, and a fine broad eligible piece of pavement. + +"Oh my!" cried Henrietta presently. "There's been an accident!" + +I looked to the left, and said, "Where, Henrietta?" + +"Not there, stupid!" said she. "Over by the Park railings. Where +the crowd is. Oh no, it's not an accident, it's something else to +look at! What's them lights?" + +She referred to two lights twinkling low amongst the legs of the +assemblage: two candles on the pavement. + +"Oh, do come along!" cried Henrietta, skipping across the road with +me. I hung back, but in vain. "Do let's look!" + +Again, designs upon the pavement. Centre compartment, Mount +Vesuvius going it (in a circle), supported by four oval +compartments, severally representing a ship in heavy weather, a +shoulder of mutton attended by two cucumbers, a golden harvest with +distant cottage of proprietor, and a knife and fork after nature; +above the centre compartment a bunch of grapes, and over the whole a +rainbow. The whole, as it appeared to me, exquisitely done. + +The person in attendance on these works of art was in all respects, +shabbiness excepted, unlike the former personage. His whole +appearance and manner denoted briskness. Though threadbare, he +expressed to the crowd that poverty had not subdued his spirit, or +tinged with any sense of shame this honest effort to turn his +talents to some account. The writing which formed a part of his +composition was conceived in a similarly cheerful tone. It breathed +the following sentiments: "The writer is poor, but not despondent. +To a British 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 Public he Pounds S. d. appeals. +Honour to our brave Army! And also 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 to our +gallant Navy. BRITONS STRIKE the A B C D E F G writer in common +chalks would be grateful for any suitable employment HOME! HURRAH!" +The whole of this writing appeared to me to be exquisitely done. + +But this man, in one respect like the last, though seemingly hard at +it with a great show of brown paper and rubbers, was only really +fattening the down-stroke of a letter here and there, or blowing the +loose chalk off the rainbow, or toning the outside edge of the +shoulder of mutton. Though he did this with the greatest +confidence, he did it (as it struck me) in so ignorant a manner, and +so spoilt everything he touched, that when he began upon the purple +smoke from the chimney of the distant cottage of the proprietor of +the golden harvest (which smoke was beautifully soft), I found +myself saying aloud, without considering of it: + +"Let that alone, will you?" + +"Halloa!" said the man next me in the crowd, jerking me roughly from +him with his elbow, "why didn't you send a telegram? If we had +known you was coming, we'd have provided something better for you. +You understand the man's work better than he does himself, don't +you? Have you made your will? You're too clever to live long." + +"Don't be hard upon the gentleman, sir," said the person in +attendance on the works of art, with a twinkle in his eye as he +looked at me; "he may chance to be an artist himself. If so, sir, +he will have a fellow-feeling with me, sir, when I"--he adapted his +action to his words as he went on, and gave a smart slap of his +hands between each touch, working himself all the time about and +about the composition--"when I lighten the bloom of my grapes--shade +off the orange in my rainbow--dot the i of my Britons--throw a +yellow light into my cow-cum-BER--insinuate another morsel of fat +into my shoulder of mutton--dart another zigzag flash of lightning +at my ship in distress!" + +He seemed to do this so neatly, and was so nimble about it, that the +halfpence came flying in. + +"Thanks, generous public, thanks!" said the professor. "You will +stimulate me to further exertions. My name will be found in the +list of British Painters yet. I shall do better than this, with +encouragement. I shall indeed." + +"You never can do better than that bunch of grapes," said Henrietta. +"Oh, Thomas, them grapes!" + +"Not better than THAT, lady? I hope for the time when I shall paint +anything but your own bright eyes and lips equal to life." + +"(Thomas, did you ever?) But it must take a long time, sir," said +Henrietta, blushing, "to paint equal to that." + +"I was prenticed to it, miss," said the young man, smartly touching +up the composition--"prenticed to it in the caves of Spain and +Portingale, ever so long and two year over." + +There was a laugh from the crowd; and a new man who had worked +himself in next me, said, "He's a smart chap, too; ain't he?" + +"And what a eye!" exclaimed Henrietta softly. + +"Ah! He need have a eye," said the man. + +"Ah! He just need," was murmured among the crowd. + +"He couldn't come that 'ere burning mountain without a eye," said +the man. He had got himself accepted as an authority, somehow, and +everybody looked at his finger as it pointed out Vesuvius. "To come +that effect in a general illumination would require a eye; but to +come it with two dips--why, it's enough to blind him!" + +That impostor, pretending not to have heard what was said, now +winked to any extent with both eyes at once, as if the strain upon +his sight was too much, and threw back his long hair--it was very +long--as if to cool his fevered brow. I was watching him doing it, +when Henrietta suddenly whispered, "Oh, Thomas, how horrid you +look!" and pulled me out by the arm. + +Remembering Mr. Click's words, I was confused when I retorted, "What +do you mean by horrid?" + +"Oh gracious! Why, you looked," said Henrietta, "as if you would +have his blood." + +I was going to answer, "So I would, for twopence--from his nose," +when I checked myself and remained silent. + +We returned home in silence. Every step of the way, the softer +sentiments that had flowed, ebbed twenty mile an hour. Adapting my +conduct to the ebbing, as I had done to the flowing, I let my arm +drop limp, so as she could scarcely keep hold of it, and I wished +her such a cold good-night at parting, that I keep within the bounds +of truth when I characterise it as a Rasper. + +In the course of the next day I received the following document: + + +"Henrietta informs Thomas that my eyes are open to you. I must ever +wish you well, but walking and us is separated by an unfarmable +abyss. One so malignant to superiority--Oh that look at him!--can +never never conduct + +HENRIETTA + +P.S.--To the altar." + + +Yielding to the easiness of my disposition, I went to bed for a +week, after receiving this letter. During the whole of such time, +London was bereft of the usual fruits of my labour. When I resumed +it, I found that Henrietta was married to the artist of Piccadilly. + +Did I say to the artist? What fell words were those, expressive of +what a galling hollowness, of what a bitter mockery! I--I--I--am +the artist. I was the real artist of Piccadilly, I was the real +artist of the Waterloo Road, I am the only artist of all those +pavement-subjects which daily and nightly arouse your admiration. I +do 'em, and I let 'em out. The man you behold with the papers of +chalks and the rubbers, touching up the down-strokes of the writing +and shading off the salmon, the man you give the credit to, the man +you give the money to, hires--yes! and I live to tell it!--hires +those works of art of me, and brings nothing to 'em but the candles. + +Such is genius in a commercial country. I am not up to the +shivering, I am not up to the liveliness, I am not up to the +wanting-employment-in-an-office move; I am only up to originating +and executing the work. In consequence of which you never see me; +you think you see me when you see somebody else, and that somebody +else is a mere Commercial character. The one seen by self and Mr. +Click in the Waterloo Road can only write a single word, and that I +taught him, and it's MULTIPLICATION--which you may see him execute +upside down, because he can't do it the natural way. The one seen +by self and Henrietta by the Green Park railings can just smear into +existence the two ends of a rainbow, with his cuff and a rubber--if +very hard put upon making a show--but he could no more come the arch +of the rainbow, to save his life, than he could come the moon-light, +fish, volcano, shipwreck, mutton, hermit, or any of my most +celebrated effects. + +To conclude as I began: if there's a blighted public character +going, I am the party. And often as you have seen, do see, and will +see, my Works, it's fifty thousand to one if you'll ever see me, +unless, when the candles are burnt down and the Commercial character +is gone, you should happen to notice a neglected young man +perseveringly rubbing out the last traces of the pictures, so that +nobody can renew the same. That's me. + + + +CHAPTER IV--HIS WONDERFUL END + + + +It will have been, ere now, perceived that I sold the foregoing +writings. From the fact of their being printed in these pages, the +inference will, ere now, have been drawn by the reader (may I add, +the gentle reader?) that I sold them to One who never yet--{2} + +Having parted with the writings on most satisfactory terms,--for, in +opening negotiations with the present Journal, was I not placing +myself in the hands of One of whom it may be said, in the words of +Another, {2,}--resumed my usual functions. But I too soon +discovered that peace of mind had fled from a brow which, up to that +time, Time had merely took the hair off, leaving an unruffled +expanse within. + +It were superfluous to veil it,--the brow to which I allude is my +own. + +Yes, over that brow uneasiness gathered like the sable wing of the +fabled bird, as--as no doubt will be easily identified by all right- +minded individuals. If not, I am unable, on the spur of the moment, +to enter into particulars of him. The reflection that the writings +must now inevitably get into print, and that He might yet live and +meet with them, sat like the Hag of Night upon my jaded form. The +elasticity of my spirits departed. Fruitless was the Bottle, +whether Wine or Medicine. I had recourse to both, and the effect of +both upon my system was witheringly lowering. + +In this state of depression, into which I subsided when I first +began to revolve what could I ever say if He--the unknown--was to +appear in the Coffee-room and demand reparation, I one forenoon in +this last November received a turn that appeared to be given me by +the finger of Fate and Conscience, hand in hand. I was alone in the +Coffee-room, and had just poked the fire into a blaze, and was +standing with my back to it, trying whether heat would penetrate +with soothing influence to the Voice within, when a young man in a +cap, of an intelligent countenance, though requiring his hair cut, +stood before me. + +"Mr. Christopher, the Head Waiter?" + +"The same." + +The young man shook his hair out of his vision,--which it impeded,-- +to a packet from his breast, and handing it over to me, said, with +his eye (or did I dream?) fixed with a lambent meaning on me, "THE +PROOFS." + +Although I smelt my coat-tails singeing at the fire, I had not the +power to withdraw them. The young man put the packet in my +faltering grasp, and repeated,--let me do him the justice to add, +with civility: + +"THE PROOFS. A. Y. R." + +With those words he departed. + +A. Y. R.? And You Remember. Was that his meaning? At Your Risk. +Were the letters short for THAT reminder? Anticipate Your +Retribution. Did they stand for THAT warning? Out-dacious Youth +Repent? But no; for that, a O was happily wanting, and the vowel +here was a A. + +I opened the packet, and found that its contents were the foregoing +writings printed just as the reader (may I add the discerning +reader?) peruses them. In vain was the reassuring whisper,--A.Y.R., +All the Year Round,--it could not cancel the Proofs. Too +appropriate name. The Proofs of my having sold the Writings. + +My wretchedness daily increased. I had not thought of the risk I +ran, and the defying publicity I put my head into, until all was +done, and all was in print. Give up the money to be off the bargain +and prevent the publication, I could not. My family was down in the +world, Christmas was coming on, a brother in the hospital and a +sister in the rheumatics could not be entirely neglected. And it +was not only ins in the family that had told on the resources of one +unaided Waitering; outs were not wanting. A brother out of a +situation, and another brother out of money to meet an acceptance, +and another brother out of his mind, and another brother out at New +York (not the same, though it might appear so), had really and truly +brought me to a stand till I could turn myself round. I got worse +and worse in my meditations, constantly reflecting "The Proofs," and +reflecting that when Christmas drew nearer, and the Proofs were +published, there could be no safety from hour to hour but that He +might confront me in the Coffee-room, and in the face of day and his +country demand his rights. + +The impressive and unlooked-for catastrophe towards which I dimly +pointed the reader (shall I add, the highly intellectual reader?) in +my first remarks now rapidly approaches. + +It was November still, but the last echoes of the Guy Foxes had long +ceased to reverberate. We was slack,--several joints under our +average mark, and wine, of course, proportionate. So slack had we +become at last, that Beds Nos. 26, 27, 28, and 31, having took their +six o'clock dinners, and dozed over their respective pints, had +drove away in their respective Hansoms for their respective Night +Mail-trains and left us empty. + +I had took the evening paper to No. 6 table,--which is warm and most +to be preferred,--and, lost in the all-absorbing topics of the day, +had dropped into a slumber. I was recalled to consciousness by the +well-known intimation, "Waiter!" and replying, "Sir!" found a +gentleman standing at No. 4 table. The reader (shall I add, the +observant reader?) will please to notice the locality of the +gentleman,--AT NO. 4 TABLE. + +He had one of the newfangled uncollapsable bags in his hand (which I +am against, for I don't see why you shouldn't collapse, while you +are about it, as your fathers collapsed before you), and he said: + +"I want to dine, waiter. I shall sleep here to-night." + +"Very good, sir. What will you take for dinner, sir?" + +"Soup, bit of codfish, oyster sauce, and the joint." + +"Thank you, sir." + +I rang the chambermaid's bell; and Mrs. Pratchett marched in, +according to custom, demurely carrying a lighted flat candle before +her, as if she was one of a long public procession, all the other +members of which was invisible. + +In the meanwhile the gentleman had gone up to the mantelpiece, right +in front of the fire, and had laid his forehead against the +mantelpiece (which it is a low one, and brought him into the +attitude of leap-frog), and had heaved a tremenjous sigh. His hair +was long and lightish; and when he laid his forehead against the +mantelpiece, his hair all fell in a dusty fluff together over his +eyes; and when he now turned round and lifted up his head again, it +all fell in a dusty fluff together over his ears. This give him a +wild appearance, similar to a blasted heath. + +"O! The chambermaid. Ah!" He was turning something in his mind. +"To be sure. Yes. I won't go up-stairs now, if you will take my +bag. It will be enough for the present to know my number.--Can you +give me 24 B?" + +(O Conscience, what a Adder art thou!) + +Mrs. Pratchett allotted him the room, and took his bag to it. He +then went back before the fire, and fell a biting his nails. + +"Waiter!" biting between the words, "give me," bite, "pen and paper; +and in five minutes," bite, "let me have, if you please," bite, "a", +bite, "Messenger." + +Unmindful of his waning soup, he wrote and sent off six notes before +he touched his dinner. Three were City; three West-End. The City +letters were to Cornhill, Ludgate-hill, and Farringdon Street. The +West-End letters were to Great Marlborough Street, New Burlington +Street, and Piccadilly. Everybody was systematically denied at +every one of the six places, and there was not a vestige of any +answer. Our light porter whispered to me, when he came back with +that report, "All Booksellers." + +But before then he had cleared off his dinner, and his bottle of +wine. He now--mark the concurrence with the document formerly given +in full!--knocked a plate of biscuits off the table with his +agitated elber (but without breakage), and demanded boiling brandy- +and-water. + +Now fully convinced that it was Himself, I perspired with the utmost +freedom. When he became flushed with the heated stimulant referred +to, he again demanded pen and paper, and passed the succeeding two +hours in producing a manuscript which he put in the fire when +completed. He then went up to bed, attended by Mrs. Pratchett. +Mrs. Pratchett (who was aware of my emotions) told me, on coming +down, that she had noticed his eye rolling into every corner of the +passages and staircase, as if in search of his Luggage, and that, +looking back as she shut the door of 24 B, she perceived him with +his coat already thrown off immersing himself bodily under the +bedstead, like a chimley-sweep before the application of machinery. + +The next day--I forbear the horrors of that night--was a very foggy +day in our part of London, insomuch that it was necessary to light +the Coffee-room gas. We was still alone, and no feverish words of +mine can do justice to the fitfulness of his appearance as he sat at +No. 4 table, increased by there being something wrong with the +meter. + +Having again ordered his dinner, he went out, and was out for the +best part of two hours. Inquiring on his return whether any of the +answers had arrived, and receiving an unqualified negative, his +instant call was for mulligatawny, the cayenne pepper, and orange +brandy. + +Feeling that the mortal struggle was now at hand, I also felt that I +must be equal to him, and with that view resolved that whatever he +took I would take. Behind my partition, but keeping my eye on him +over the curtain, I therefore operated on Mulligatawny, Cayenne +Pepper, and Orange Brandy. And at a later period of the day, when +he again said, "Orange Brandy," I said so too, in a lower tone, to +George, my Second Lieutenant (my First was absent on leave), who +acts between me and the bar. + +Throughout that awful day he walked about the Coffee-room +continually. Often he came close up to my partition, and then his +eye rolled within, too evidently in search of any signs of his +Luggage. Half-past six came, and I laid his cloth. He ordered a +bottle of old Brown. I likewise ordered a bottle of old Brown. He +drank his. I drank mine (as nearly as my duties would permit) glass +for glass against his. He topped with coffee and a small glass. I +topped with coffee and a small glass. He dozed. I dozed. At last, +"Waiter!"--and he ordered his bill. The moment was now at hand when +we two must be locked in the deadly grapple. + +Swift as the arrow from the bow, I had formed my resolution; in +other words, I had hammered it out between nine and nine. It was, +that I would be the first to open up the subject with a full +acknowledgment, and would offer any gradual settlement within my +power. He paid his bill (doing what was right by attendance) with +his eye rolling about him to the last for any tokens of his Luggage. +One only time our gaze then met, with the lustrous fixedness (I +believe I am correct in imputing that character to it?) of the well- +known Basilisk. The decisive moment had arrived. + +With a tolerable steady hand, though with humility, I laid The +Proofs before him. + +"Gracious Heavens!" he cries out, leaping up, and catching hold of +his hair. "What's this? Print!" + +"Sir," I replied, in a calming voice, and bending forward, "I humbly +acknowledge to being the unfortunate cause of it. But I hope, sir, +that when you have heard the circumstances explained, and the +innocence of my intentions--" + +To my amazement, I was stopped short by his catching me in both his +arms, and pressing me to his breast-bone; where I must confess to my +face (and particular, nose) having undergone some temporary vexation +from his wearing his coat buttoned high up, and his buttons being +uncommon hard. + +"Ha, ha, ha!" he cries, releasing me with a wild laugh, and grasping +my hand. "What is your name, my Benefactor?" + +"My name, sir" (I was crumpled, and puzzled to make him out), "is +Christopher; and I hope, sir, that, as such, when you've heard my +ex- " + +"In print!" he exclaims again, dashing the proofs over and over as +if he was bathing in them.--"In print!! O Christopher! +Philanthropist! Nothing can recompense you,--but what sum of money +would be acceptable to you?" + +I had drawn a step back from him, or I should have suffered from his +buttons again. + +"Sir, I assure you, I have been already well paid, and--" + +"No, no, Christopher! Don't talk like that! What sum of money +would be acceptable to you, Christopher? Would you find twenty +pounds acceptable, Christopher?" + +However great my surprise, I naturally found words to say, "Sir, I +am not aware that the man was ever yet born without more than the +average amount of water on the brain as would not find twenty pounds +acceptable. But--extremely obliged to you, sir, I'm sure;" for he +had tumbled it out of his purse and crammed it in my hand in two +bank-notes; "but I could wish to know, sir, if not intruding, how I +have merited this liberality?" + +"Know then, my Christopher," he says, "that from boyhood's hour I +have unremittingly and unavailingly endeavoured to get into print. +Know, Christopher, that all the Booksellers alive--and several dead- +-have refused to put me into print. Know, Christopher, that I have +written unprinted Reams. But they shall be read to you, my friend +and brother. You sometimes have a holiday?" + +Seeing the great danger I was in, I had the presence of mind to +answer, "Never!" To make it more final, I added, "Never! Not from +the cradle to the grave." + +"Well," says he, thinking no more about that, and chuckling at his +proofs again. "But I am in print! The first flight of ambition +emanating from my father's lowly cot is realised at length! The +golden bow"--he was getting on,--"struck by the magic hand, has +emitted a complete and perfect sound! When did this happen, my +Christopher?" + +"Which happen, sir?" + +"This," he held it out at arms length to admire it,--"this Per- +rint." + +When I had given him my detailed account of it, he grasped me by the +hand again, and said: + +"Dear Christopher, it should be gratifying to you to know that you +are an instrument in the hands of Destiny. Because you ARE." + +A passing Something of a melancholy cast put it into my head to +shake it, and to say, "Perhaps we all are." + +"I don't mean that," he answered; "I don't take that wide range; I +confine myself to the special case. Observe me well, my +Christopher! Hopeless of getting rid, through any effort of my own, +of any of the manuscripts among my Luggage,--all of which, send them +where I would, were always coming back to me,--it is now some seven +years since I left that Luggage here, on the desperate chance, +either that the too, too faithful manuscripts would come back to me +no more, or that some one less accursed than I might give them to +the world. You follow me, my Christopher?" + +"Pretty well, sir." I followed him so far as to judge that he had a +weak head, and that the Orange, the Boiling, and Old Brown combined +was beginning to tell. (The Old Brown, being heady, is best adapted +to seasoned cases.) + +"Years elapsed, and those compositions slumbered in dust. At +length, Destiny, choosing her agent from all mankind, sent You here, +Christopher, and lo! the Casket was burst asunder, and the Giant was +free!" + +He made hay of his hair after he said this, and he stood a-tiptoe. + +"But," he reminded himself in a state of excitement, "we must sit up +all night, my Christopher. I must correct these Proofs for the +press. Fill all the inkstands, and bring me several new pens." + +He smeared himself and he smeared the Proofs, the night through, to +that degree that when Sol gave him warning to depart (in a four- +wheeler), few could have said which was them, and which was him, and +which was blots. His last instructions was, that I should instantly +run and take his corrections to the office of the present Journal. +I did so. They most likely will not appear in print, for I noticed +a message being brought round from Beauford Printing House, while I +was a throwing this concluding statement on paper, that the ole +resources of that establishment was unable to make out what they +meant. Upon which a certain gentleman in company, as I will not +more particularly name,--but of whom it will be sufficient to +remark, standing on the broad basis of a wave-girt isle, that +whether we regard him in the light of,--{3} laughed, and put the +corrections in the fire. + + + +Footnotes: + +{1} Its name and address at length, with other full particulars, +all editorially struck out. + +{2} The remainder of this complimentary sentence editorially struck +out. + +{3} The remainder of this complimentary parenthesis editorially +struck out. + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Somebody's Luggage by Charles Dickens + diff --git a/old/smlgg10.zip b/old/smlgg10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..863d10c --- /dev/null +++ b/old/smlgg10.zip |