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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 02:15:50 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 02:15:50 -0700 |
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diff --git a/25129-h/25129-h.htm b/25129-h/25129-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c47f56f --- /dev/null +++ b/25129-h/25129-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6234 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"> + +<html lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1"> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Baboo Jabberjee, B.A., by F. Anstey. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em;} + + p.chaphead {width: 45%; font-style: italic;} + p.firstword {text-indent: 0 ! important; } + p.firstword:first-letter {font-size: 250%; + float: left; + line-height: 95%; + padding-right: 4px;} + p.clearpara {clear: left; clear: right;} + + h1 {text-align: center; + margin-bottom: .85em; + line-height: 1.3em; + letter-spacing: 2px;} + + h2, h3, h4 {text-align: center; + margin-top: .5em; + margin-bottom: .85em; + line-height: 1.3em;} + + h5, h6 {text-align: center; + margin-top: .95em; + margin-bottom: .25em; + line-height: 1.3em;} + + h2.roman {float: right; width: 50%;} + + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both;} + + hr.pg { width: 90%; + height: 2px; + margin-top: 25px; + margin-bottom: 25px;} + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + td.text {vertical-align: top; + text-align: left;} + + td.pg {vertical-align: bottom; + text-align: right;} + + a:hover {color:#F00; + background-color: inherit;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; left: 92%; + font-size: 13px; text-indent: 0em; color: #ababab; + background-color: inherit; font-weight: normal; + font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; + text-decoration: none;} /* page numbers */ + + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + + .txtright {text-align: right;} + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps; font-style: normal;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold; font-size: smaller;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: small;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: baseline; position: relative; bottom: 0.4em; + font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i6 {display: block; margin-left: 6em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i8 {display: block; margin-left: 8em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Baboo Jabberjee, B.A., by F. Anstey + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. + +Author: F. Anstey + +Release Date: April 22, 2008 [EBook #25129] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BABOO JABBERJEE, B.A. *** + + + + +Produced by David Clarke, Carolyn Bottomley and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figcenter"><a name='Frontispiece'></a> +<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="493" height="700" alt="Unaccustomed to dark-complexioned gentlemen."></div> + +<hr class="pg"> + +<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/tp.jpg" width="397" height="700" alt="Title Page"></div> + +<h3>THE WAYFARER'S LIBRARY</h3> + +<h1>BABOO JABBERJEE, B.A.</h1> + +<h2>F. Anstey</h2> + +<h3>J. M. DENT & SONS, Ltd.</h3> + +<h4>LONDON</h4> + +<hr class="pg"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i"></a></span> + +<h3>CONTENTS</h3> + +<table summary="Contents" width="65%" cellpadding="1"> + <tr> + <td class="txt"> </td> + <td class="pg"><small>PAGE</small></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>I</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee apologises for the unambitious scope of +his work; sundry confidences, criticisms, and complaints.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#I">1</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>II</h5><i>Some account of Mr Jabberjee's experiences at +the Westminster Play.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#II">9</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>III</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee gives his views concerning the Laureateship.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#III">18</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>IV</h5><i>Containing Mr Jabberjee's Impressions at The Old Masters.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#IV">24</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>V</h5><i>In which Mr Jabberjee expresses his Opinions on Bicycling as a Pastime.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#V">33</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>VI</h5><i>Dealing with his Adventures at Olympia.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#VI">42</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>VII</h5><i>How Mr Jabberjee risked a Sprat to capture something very like a Whale.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#VII">50</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>VIII</h5><i>How Mr Jabberjee delivered an Oration at a Ladies' Debating Club.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#VIII">60</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii"></a></span> + <h5>IX</h5><i>How he saw the practice of the University Crews, and what he thought of it.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#IX">69</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>X</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee is taken to see a Glove-Fight.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#X">75</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XI</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee finds himself in a position of extreme delicacy.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XI">80</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XII</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee is taken by surprise.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XII">88</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XIII</h5><i>Drawbacks and advantages of being engaged. Some Meditations +in a Music-hall, together with notes of certain things that Mr Jabberjee failed to understand.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XIII">96</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XIV</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee's fellow-student. What's in a Title? An +invitation to a Wedding. Mr J. as a wedding guest, with what he thought of the ceremony, and how he distinguished +himself on the occasion.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XIV">105</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XV</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee is asked out to dinner. Unreasonable behaviour +of his betrothed. His doubts concerning the social advantages of a Boarding Establishment, with some scathing +remarks upon ambitious pretenders. He goes out to dinner, and meets a person of some importance.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XV">114</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XVI</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee makes a pilgrimage to the Shrine of Shakespeare.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XVI">125</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii"></a></span> + <h5>XVII</h5><i>Containing some intimate confidences from Mr Jabberjee, with the explanation +of such apparent indiscretion.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XVII">135</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XVIII</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee is a little over-ingenious in his excuses.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XVIII">138</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XIX</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee tries a fresh tack. His visit to the India +Office and sympathetic reception.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XIX">146</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XX</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee distinguishes himself in the Bar Examination, +but is less successful in other respects. He writes another extremely ingenious epistle, from which he +anticipates the happiest results.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XX">155</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXI</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee halloos before he is quite out of the Wood.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXI">164</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXII</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee places himself in the hands of a +solicitor—with certain reservations.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXII">173</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXIII</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee delivers his Statement of Defence, and makes +his preparations for the North. He allows his patriotic sentiments to get the better of him in a momentary +outburst of disloyalty—to which no serious importance need be attached.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXIII">182</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXIV</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee relates his experiences upon the Moors.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXIV">190</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXV</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee concludes the thrilling account of his +experiences on a Scotch Moor, greatly to his own glorification.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXV">199</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv"></a></span> + <h5>XXVI</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee expresses some audaciously sceptical opinions. +How he secured his first Salmon, with the manner in which he presented it to his divinity.</i> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXVI">207</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXVII</h5><i>Mr Jabberjee is unavoidably compelled to return to town, +thereby affording his Solicitor the inestimable benefit of his personal assistance. An apparent attempt to pack the Jury.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXVII">216</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXVIII</h5><i>Mankletow</i> v. <i>Jabberjee. Notes taken by Mr Jabberjee +in Court during the proceedings.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXVIII">225</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXIX</h5><i>Further proceedings in the Case of Mankletow </i>v.<i> +Jabberjee. Mr Jabberjee's Opening for the Defence.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXIX">235</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXX</h5><i>Mankletow </i>v.<i> Jabberjee (part heard). Mr Jabberjee +finds cross-examination much less formidable than he had anticipated.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXX">245</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXXI</h5><i>Mankletow </i>v.<i> Jabberjee (continued). The Defendant +brings his Speech to a somewhat unexpected conclusion, and Mr Witherington, Q.C., addresses the Jury in reply.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXXI">255</a></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><h5>XXXII</h5><i>Containing the conclusion of the whole matter, and (which +many Readers will receive in a spirit of chastened resignation) Mr Jabberjee's final farewell.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#XXXII">265</a></td> </tr> +</table> + +<hr class="pg"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v"></a></span> + +<h3>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h3> + +<table summary="List of Illustrations" width="65%" cellpadding="1"> + <tr> + <td class="txt"> </td> + <td class="pg"><small>PAGE</small></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Unaccustomed to dark-complexioned gentlemen."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#Frontispiece"><i>Frontispiece</i></a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>Baboo Hurry Bungsho Jabberjee, B.A.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#pviii">viii</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Let out! Let out!!"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p5">5</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"A golden-headed umbrella, fresh as a rose."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p15">15</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Miss Jessimina Mankletow."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p25">25</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"I instantaneously endured the total upset!"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p37">37</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"With a large, stout constable."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p47">47</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Was accosted by a polite, agreeable stranger."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p51">51</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"A weedy, tall male gentleman."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p61">61</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"A beaming simper of indescribable suavity."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p81">81</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"I became once more the silent tomb."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p91">91</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"In garbage of unparagoned shabbiness."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p99">99</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"The spectators saluted me with shouts of joy as the returned Shahzadar."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p107">107</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Some haughty masculine might insult her under my very nose."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p115">115</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"It was here," I said, reverently, "that the swan of Avon was hatched!"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p129">129</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Ascended his bicycle with a waggish winkle in his eye."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p141">141</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Pitch it strong, my respectable Sir!"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p151">151</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Huzza! Tol-de-rol-loll!"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p157">157</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"A royal command from the Queen-Empress."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p169">169</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Would be greatly improved by the simple addition of some knee-caps."</i> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi"></a></span></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p179">179</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"I am addressed by an underbred street-urchin as a 'Blooming Blacky!'"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p187">187</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Of incredible bashfulness and bucolical appearance."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p191">191</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"I presented my trophy and treasure-trove to the fairylike Miss Wee-Wee."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p203">203</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Whether he had wha-haed wi' hon'ble Wallace?"</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p209">209</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>Baboo Chuckerbutty Ram.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p219">219</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Fresh as a daisy, and fine as a carrot fresh scraped."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p227">227</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>Mr Justice Honeygall.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p237">237</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>Witherington, Q.C.</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p247">247</a><br><br></td> </tr> + <tr> + <td class="txt"><i>"Jabberjee's face gradually lengthens."</i></td> + <td class="pg"><a href="#p261">261</a><br><br></td> </tr> +</table> + +<hr style="width: 50%;"> + +<p class="center">The text and illustrations of this book are reproduced by kind +permission of the Proprietors of <i>Punch</i>.</p><br><br> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='pviii'></a> +<img src="images/pviii.jpg" width="384" height="700" alt="Baboo Hurry Bungsho Jabberjee, B.A."> +</div> + +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix"></a></span> +<h2><a name="INTRODUCTORY_LETTER_FROM_BABOO_JABBERJEE" id="INTRODUCTORY_LETTER_FROM_BABOO_JABBERJEE"></a>INTRODUCTORY LETTER FROM BABOO JABBERJEE.</h2> + + +<p class="center"><i>To the Hon'ble —— Punch.</i></p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Venerable and Ludicrous Sir.</span>—Permit me most respectfully to bring +beneath your notice a proposal which I serenely anticipate will turn up +trumps under the fructifying sunshine of your esteemed approbation.</p> + +<p>Sir, I am an able B.A. of a respectable Indian University, now in this +country for purposes of being crammed through Inns of Court and Law +Exam., and rendering myself a completely fledged Pleader or Barrister in +the Native Bar of the High Court.</p> + +<p>Since my sojourn here, I have accomplished the laborious perusal of your +transcendent and tip-top periodical, and, hoity toity! I am like a duck +in thunder with admiring wonderment at the drollishness and jocosity +with which your paper is ready to burst in its pictorial department. +But, alack! when I turn my critical attention to the literary contents, +I am met with a lamentable deficiency and no great shakes, for I note +there the fly in the ointment and <i>hiatus valde deflendus</i>—to wit the utter +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x"></a></span> absenteeism of a correct and classical style in English +composition.</p> + +<p>To the highly educated native gentleman who searches your printed +articles, hoping fondly to find himself in a well of English pure and +undefiled, it proves merely to fish in the air. Conceive, Sir, the +disgustful result to one saturated to the skin of his teeth in best +English masterpieces of immaculate and moderately good prose extracts +and dramatic passages, published with notes for the use of the native +student, at weltering in a hotchpot and hurley-burley of arbitrarily +distorted and very vulgarised cockneydoms and purely London +provincialities, which must be of necessity to him as casting pearls +before a swine!</p> + +<p>And I have the honour to inform you of a number of cultivated lively +young native B.A.'s, both here and in my country, who are quite capable +to appreciate really fine writing and sonoriferous periods if published +in your paper, and which would infallibly result in a feather in your +cap and bring increase of grit to the mill.</p> + +<p>If, Honoured Sir, you feel disposed to bolster yourself up with the wet +blanket of a <i>non possumus</i>, and reply to me that your existing +quill-drivers are too fat-witted and shallow-pated for the production of +more pretentiously polished lucubrations—aye, not even if they burn the +night-light oil and hear the chimes at midnight! I will not be +hoodwinked by the superficiality +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi"></a></span> of your <i>cui bono</i>, and shall make you +the answer that I am willing <i>for an exceedingly paltry honorarium</i> to +rush into the Gordian knot and write you the most superior essays on +every conceivable and inconceivable subject under the sun, as per +enclosed samples which I forward respectfully for your delightful and +golden opinions, guaranteeing faithfully that all of your readers in +every hemisphere and postal district will fall in love with such a new +departure and fresh tack.</p> + +<p>The specimens I send are <i>not my best</i>, only very ordinary and humdrum +affairs—but <i>ex pede Herculem!</i> Hon'ble Sir, and you will see how +transcendentally superior are even such poor effusions compared to the +fiddle-faddle and gim-crack style of article with which you are being +fobbed off by puzzle-headed and self-opiniated nincompoops.</p> + +<p>I can also turn out rhymed poetry after models of Poets <span class="smcap">Tennyson</span>, +<span class="smcap">Cowper</span>, Mrs <span class="smcap">Hemans</span>, <span class="smcap">Southey</span>, & Co., +<i>done to a tittle</i>, so as not to be +detected, even by the cynosure, as mere spurious imitation, but in every +respect up to the mark and the real Simon Pure.</p> + +<p>Therefore, Hon'ble Sir, do not hesitate to strike while the iron is +incandescent and bleed freely, even if it should be necessary, prior to +engaging your humble petitioner's services, to turn out one or more of +your present contributioners crop and heels, and lay them on the shelf +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii"></a></span> +of their own incompetencies. Remember that the slightest act of volition +on your part can exalt my pecuniary status to the skies, as well as +confer distinguished and unparagoned ennoblement upon your <i>cacoëthes +scribendi</i>.</p> + +<p>I remain, respected Sir, Your most obsequious Servant,</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p class="txtright"><span class="smcap">Hurry Bungsho Jabberjee</span>, B.A.</p></div> + +<p>P.S. and N.B.—Being so unacquainted with the limner's art, I cannot <i>at +present</i> undertake the etching of caricatures <i>et hoc genus omne</i>. +However, if such is your will, Hon'ble Sir, I will take the cow by the +horns, after preliminary course of instruction at Government Art School, +all expenses, &c., to be defrayed on the nail out of your purse of +Fortunatus, seeing that your esteemed correspondent is so hard up +between two stools that he is reduced to a choice of Hodson's Horse!</p><p class="txtright">H. B. J.</p><br><br><br> + +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span> + +<div class="figcenter"><a name='banner'></a> +<img src="images/banner.jpg" width="400" height="71" alt="banner"> +</div> + +<h2 class="roman"><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee apologises for the unambitious scope of his work; sundry +confidences, criticisms and complaints.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">When</span> I first received intimation from the supernal and spanking hand of +Hon'ble <i>Mr Punch</i>, that he smiled with fatherly benignity at my humble +request that he should offer myself as a regular poorly-paid +contributor, I blessed my stars and was as if to jump over the moon for +jubilation and sprightfulness.</p> + +<p>But, heigh-ho! <i>surgit amari aliquid</i>, and his condescending patronage +was dolefully alloyed with the inevitable dash of bitters which, as Poet +<span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span> remarks, withers the galled jade until it winces. For with an +iron heel has Hon'ble <i>Mr P.</i> declined sundry essays of enormous length +and importance, composed in Addisonian, Johnsonian, and Gibbonian +phraseology on assorted topics, such as "Love," "Civilisation," +"Matrimony," "Superstition," "Is Courage a Virtue, or <i>Vice Versâ</i>?" and +has recommended me instead to devote my pen to quite ephemeral and +fugacious topics, and merely commit to paper such reflections, critical +opinions, and experiences as may turn up in the potluck of my daily +career.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2"></a></span></p> + +<p>What wonder that on reading such a <i>sine quâ non</i> and ultimatum my <i>vox +faucibus hæsit</i> and stuck in my gizzard with bashful sheepishness, for +how to convulse the Thames and set it on fire and all agog with +amazement at the humdrum incidents of so very ordinary an existence as +mine, which is spent in the diligent study of Roman, Common, +International, and Canonical Law from morn to dewy eve in the +lecture-hall or the library of my inn, and, as soon as the shades of +night are falling fast, in returning to my domicilium at Ladbroke Grove +with the undeviating punctuality of a tick?</p> + +<p>However, being above all things desirous not to let slip the golden +opportunity and pocket the root of all evil, I decided to let my +diffidence go to the wall and boldly record every jot and tittle, +however humdrum, with the critical reflections and censorious +observations arising therefrom, remembering that, though the fabulous +and mountain-engendered mouse was no doubt at the time considered but a +fiasco and flash in the pan by its maternal progenitor, nevertheless +that same identical mouse rendered yeomanry services at a subsequent +period to the lion involved in the compromising intricacies of a +landing-net!</p> + +<p>Benevolent reader, <i>de te fabula narratur</i>. Perchance the mousey +bantlings of my insignificant brain may nibble away the cords of +prejudice and exclusiveness now encircling many +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3"></a></span> highly respectable +British lions. Be not angry with me therefore, if in the character of a +damned but good-natured friend, I venture on occasions to "hint dislike +and hesitate disgust."</p> + +<p>The majestic and magnificent matron, under whose aegis I reside for rs. +20 per week, is of lofty lineage, though fallen from that high estate +into the peck of troubles, and compelled (owing to severely social +disposition) to receive a number of small and select boarders.</p> + +<p>Like <i>Jepthah</i>, in the play of <i>Hamlet</i>, she has one fair daughter and +no more, a bewitching and well-proportioned damsel, as fine as a +fivepence or a May-day queen. Notwithstanding this, when I summon up my +courage to address her, she receives my laborious politeness with a +cachinnation like that of a Cheshire cheese, which strikes me all of a +heap. Her female parent excuses to me such flabbergasting demeanour on +the plea that her daughter is afflicted with great shyness and maidenly +modesty, but, on perceiving that she can be skittish and genial in the +company of other masculines, I am forced to attribute her +contumeliousness to the circumstance that I am a native gentleman of a +dark complexion.</p> + +<p>In addition, I have the honour to inform you of further specimens of +this inurbanity and bearishness from officials who are perfect strangers +to the writer. Each morning I journey through the subterranean bowels of the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4"></a></span> earth to the Temple, +and on a recent occasion, when I was +descending the stairs in haste to pop into the train, lo and behold, +just as I reached the gate, it was shut in my nose by the churlishness +of the jack-in-office!</p> + +<p>At which, stung to the quick at so unprovoked and unpremeditated an +affront, I accosted him severely through the bars of the wicket, +demanding sarcastically, "Is <i>this</i> your boasted British Jurisprudence?"</p> + +<p>The savage heart of the Collector was moved by my expostulation, and he +consented to open the gate, and imprint a perforated hole on my ticket; +but, alack! his repentance was a day after the fair, for the train had +already taken its hook into the Cimmerian gloom of a tunnel! When the +next train arrived, I, waiting prudently until it was quiescent, stepped +into a compartment, wherein I was dismayed and terrified to find myself +alone with an individual and two lively young terriers, which barked +minaciously at my legs.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p5'></a> +<img src="images/p5.jpg" width="437" height="700" alt="Let out! Let out!!"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"LET OUT! LET OUT!!"</span></p></div> + +<p>But I, with much presence of mind, protruded my head from the window, +vociferating to those upon the platform, "Let out! Let out!! Fighting +dogs are here!!!"</p> + +<p>And they met my appeal with unmannerly jeerings, until the controller of +the train, seeing that I was firm in upholding my dignity of British +subject, and claiming my just rights, unfastened the door and permitted +me to escape;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7"></a></span> but, +while I was yet in search of a compartment where +no canine elements were in the manger, the train was once more in +motion, and I, being no daredevil to take such leap into the dark, was a +second time left behind, and a loser of two trains. Moreover, though I +have written a humbly indignant petition to the Hon'ble Directors of the +Company pointing out loss of time and inconvenience through incivility, +and asking them for small pecuniary compensation, they have assumed the +rhinoceros hide, and nilled my request with dry eyes.</p> + +<p>But I shall next make the further complaint that, even when making every +effort to do the civil, the result is apt to kill with kindness; and—as +King <span class="smcap">Charles the First</span>, when they were shuffling off his mortal coil, +politely apologised for the unconscionable long time that his head took +to decapitate—so I, too, must draw attention to the fact that the +duration of formal ceremonious visits, is far too protracted and long +drawn out.</p> + +<p><i>Crede experto.</i> A certain young English gentleman, dwelling in the +Temple, whose acquaintance I have formed, earnestly requested that I +should do him the honour of a visit; and recently, wishing to be hail +fellow well met, I presented myself before him about 9.30 <span class="smcap">a.m.</span></p> + +<p>He greeted me with effusion, shaking me warmly by the hand, and begging +me to be seated, and making many inquiries, whether I +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8"></a></span> preferred India +to England, and what progress I was making in my studies, &c., and so +forth, all of which I answered faithfully, to the best of my abilities.</p> + +<p>After that he addressed me by fits and starts and <i>longo intervallo</i>, +yet displaying so manifest and absorbent a delight in my society that he +could not bring himself to terminate the audience, while I was to +conceal my immense wearisomeness and the ardent desire I had conceived +to leave him.</p> + +<p>And thus he detained me there hour after hour, until five minutes past +one <span class="smcap">p.m.</span>, when he recollected, with many professions of chagrin, that he +had an appointment to take his tiffin, and dismissed me, inviting me +cordially to come again.</p> + +<p>If, however, it is expected of me that I can devote three hours and a +half to ceremonial civilities, I must respectfully answer with a <i>Nolo +episcopari</i>, for my time is more precious than rubies, and so I will beg +not only Mr <span class="smcap">Melladew</span>, Esq., Barrister-at-law, but all other Anglo-Saxon +friends and their families, to accept this as a <i>verbum sap.</i> and wink +to a blind horse.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> + +<h2 class="roman"><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Some account of Mr Jabberjee's experiences at the Westminster Play.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Being</span> forearmed by editorial beneficence with ticket of admission to +theatrical entertainment by adolescent students at Westminster College, +I presented myself at the scene of acting in a state of liveliest and +frolicsome anticipation on a certain Wednesday evening in the month of +December last, about 7.20 <span class="smcap">p.m.</span></p> + +<p>At the summit of the stairs I was received by a posse of polite and +stalwart striplings in white kids, who, after abstracting large circular +orifice from my credentials, ordered me to ascend to a lofty gallery, +where, on arriving, I found every chair pre-occupied, and moreover was +restricted to a prospect of the backs of numerous juvenile heads, while +expected to remain the livelong evening on the tiptoe of expectation and +Shank's mare!</p> + +<p>This for a while I endured submissively from native timidity and +retirement, until my bosom boiled over at the sense of "<i>Civis Romanus +sum</i>," and, descending to the barrier, I harangued the wicket-keeper +with great length and fervid eloquence, informing him that I was graduate of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10"></a></span> high-class Native University after passing most tedious and +difficult exams with fugitive colours and that it was injurious and +deleterious to my "<i>mens sana in corpore sano</i>" to remain on legs for +some hours beholding what I practically found to be invisible.</p> + +<p>But, though he turned an indulgent ear to my quandary, he professed his +inability to help me over my "<i>pons asinorum</i>," until I ventured to play +the ticklish card and inform him that I was a distinguished +representative of Hon'ble <i>Punch</i>, who was paternally anxious for me to +be awarded a seat on the lap of luxury.</p> + +<p>Then he unbended, and admitted me to the body of the auditorium, where I +was conducted to a coign of vantage in near proximity to members of the +fair sex and galaxy of beauty.</p> + +<p>Thus, by dint of nude gumption, I was in the bed of clover and seventh +heaven, and more so when, on inquiry from a bystander, I understood that +the performance was taken from Mr <span class="smcap">Terriss's</span> Adelphi Theatre, which I had +heard was conspicuous for excellence in fierce combats, blood-curdling +duels, and scenes in court. And I narrated to him how I too, when a +callow and unfledged hobbardyhoy, had engaged in theatrical +entertainments, and played such parts in native dramas as heroic +giant-killers and tiger slayers, in which I was an "<i>au fait</i>" and +"<i>facile princeps</i>," also in select scenes +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11"></a></span> from <span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> play of +<i>Macbeth</i> in English and being correctly attired as a Scotch.</p> + +<p>But presently I discovered that the play was quite another sort of +Adelphi, being a jocose comedy by a notorious ancient author of the name +of <span class="smcap">Terence</span>, and written entirely in Latin, which a contiguous damsel +expressed a fear lest she should find it incomprehensible and obscure. I +hastened to reassure her by explaining that, having been turned out as a +certificated B.A. by Indian College, I had acquired perfect familiarity +and nodding acquaintance with the early Roman and Latin tongues, and +offering my services as interpreter of "<i>quicquid agunt homines</i>," and +the entire "<i>farrago libelli</i>," which rendered her red as a turkeycock +with delight and gratitude. When the performance commenced with a scenic +representation of the Roman Acropolis, and a venerable elderly man +soliloquising lengthily to himself, and then carrying on a protracted +logomachy with another greybeard—although I understood sundry +colloquial idioms and phrases such as "<i>uxorem duxit</i>," "<i>carum mihi</i>," +"<i>quid agis?</i>" "<i>cur amat?</i>" and the like, all of which I assiduously +translated <i>vivâ voce</i>—I could not succeed in learning the reason why +they were having such a snip-snap, until the interval, when the lady +informed me herself that it was because one of them had carried off a +nautch-girl belonging to the other's son—which caused me to marvel +greatly at her erudition.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12"></a></span></p> + +<p>I looked that, in the next portion of the performance, I might behold +the nautch-girl, and witness her forcible rescue—or at least some +saltatory exhibition; but, alack! she remained <i>sotto voce</i> and +hermetically sealed; and though other characters, in addition to the +elderly gentlemen, appeared, they were all exclusively masculine in +gender, and there was nothing done but to converse by twos and threes. +When the third portion opened with a long-desiderated peep of +petticoats, I told my neighbour confidently that now at last we were to +see this dancing girl and the abduction; but she replied that it was not +so, for these females were merely the mother of the wife of another of +the youths and her attendant ayah. And even this precious pair, after +weeping and wringing their hands for a while, vanished, not to appear +again.</p> + +<p>Now as the entertainment proceeded, I fell into the dumps with +increasing abashment and mortification to see everyone around me, ay, +even the women and the tenderest juveniles! clap the hands and laugh in +their sleeves with merriment at quirks and gleeks in which—in spite of +all my classical proficiency—I could not discover <i>le mot pour rire</i> or +crack so much as the cream of a jest, but must sit there melancholy as a +gib cat or smile at the wrong end of mouth.</p> + +<p>For, indeed, I began to fear that I had been fobbed off with the +smattered education of a painted sepulchre, that I should fail so dolorously +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13"></a></span> to comprehend what was plain as a turnpike-staff to the +veriest British babe and suckling!</p> + +<p>However, on observing more closely, I discovered that most of the +grown-up adults present had books containing the translation of all the +witticisms, which they secretly perused, and that the feminality were +also provided with pink leaflets on which the dark outline of the plot +was perspicuously inscribed.</p> + +<p>Moreover, on casting my eyes up to the gallery, I perceived that there +were overseers there armed with long canes, and that the small youths +did not indulge in plaudations and hilarity except when threatened by +these.</p> + +<p>And thereupon I took heart, seeing that the proceedings were clearly +veiled in an obsolete and cryptic language, and it was simply matter of +rite and custom to applaud at fixed intervals, so I did at Rome as the +Romans did, and was laughter holding both his sides as often as I beheld +the canes in a state of agitation.</p> + +<p>I am not unaware that it is to bring a coal from Newcastle to pronounce +any critical opinion upon the ludibrious qualities of so antiquated a +comedy as this, but, while I am wishful to make every allowance for its +having been composed in a period of prehistoric barbarity, I would still +hazard the criticism that it does not excite the simpering guffaw with +the frequency of such modern standard works as <i>exempli gratiâ</i>, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14"></a></span> +<i>Miss Brown</i>, or <i>The Aunt of Charley</i>, to either of which I would award the +palm for pure whimsicality and gawkiness.</p> + +<p>Candour compels me to admit, however, that the conclusion of the +Adelphi, in which a certain magician summoned a black-robed, +steeple-hatted demon from the nether world, who, after commanding a +minion to give a pickle-back to sundry grotesque personages, did +castigate their ulterior portions severely with a large switch, was a +striking amelioration and betterment upon the preceding scenes, and +evinced that <span class="smcap">Terence</span> possessed no deficiency of up-to-date facetiousness +and genuine humour; though I could not but reflect—"<i>O, si sic omnia!</i>" +and lament that he should have hidden his <i>vis comica</i> for so long under +the stifling disguise of a <i>serviette</i>.</p> + +<p>I am a beggar at describing the hurly-burly and most admired disorder +amidst which I performed the descent of the staircase in a savage +perspiration, my elbows and heels unmercifully jostled by a dense, +unruly horde, and going with nose in pocket, from trepidation due to +national cowardice, while the seething mob clamoured and contended for +overcoats and hats around very exiguous aperture, through which +bewildered custodians handed out bundles of sticks and umbrellas, in +vain hope to appease such impatience. Nor did I succeed to the recovery +of my hat and paraphernalia until after twenty-four and a half minutes +(Greenwich time), and with the labours of Hercules for the golden +fleece!</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p15'></a> +<img src="images/p15.jpg" width="423" height="700" alt="A golden-headed umbrella, fresh as a rose."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"A GOLDEN-HEADED UMBRELLA, FRESH AS A ROSE."</span></p></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17"></a></span> +For which I was minded at first to address a sharp remonstrance and +claim for indemnity to some pundit in authority; but perceiving that by +such fishing in troubled waters I was the gainer of a golden-headed +umbrella, fresh as a rose, I decided to accept the olive branch and bury +the bone of contention.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee gives his views concerning the Laureateship.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">It</span> is "<i>selon les règles</i>" and <i>rerum naturâ</i> that the <span class="smcap">Queen's</span> Most +Excellent Majesty, being constitutionally partial to poetry, should +desire to have constant private supply from respectable tip-top genius, +to be kept snug on Royal premises and ready at momentary notice to +oblige with song or dirge, according as High Jinks or Dolorousness are +the Court orders of the day.</p> + +<p>But how far more satisfactory if Right Hon'ble Marquis <span class="smcap">Salisbury</span>, +instead of arbitrarily decorating some already notorious bard with this +"<i>cordon bleu</i>" and thus gilding a lily, should throw the office open to +competition by public exam, and, after carefully weighing such +considerations as the applicant's <i>res angusta domi</i>, the fluency of his +imagination, his nationality, and so on—should award the itching palm +of Fame to the poet who succeeded best in tickling his fancy!</p> + +<p>Had some such method been adopted, the whole Indian Empire might to-day +have been pleased as <i>Punch</i> by the selection of a Hindoo gentleman to +do the job—for I should infallibly +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19"></a></span> have entered myself for the +running. Unfortunately such unparalleled opportunity of throwing soup to +Cerberus, and exhibiting colour-blindness, has been given the slip, +though the door is perhaps still open (even at past eleven o'clock <span class="smcap">p.m.</span>) +for retracing the false step and web of Penelope.</p> + +<p>For I would respectfully submit to Her Imperial Majesty that, in her +duplicate capacity of Queen of England and Empress of India, she has +urgent necessity for a Court Poet for each department, who would be +<i>Arcades ambo</i> and two of a trade, and share the duties with their +proportionate pickings.</p> + +<p>Or, if she would be unwilling to pay the piper to such a tune, I alone +would work the oracle in both Indian and Anglo-Saxon departments, and +waive the annual tub of sherry for equivalent in cash down.</p> + +<p>And, if I may make the suggestion, I would strongly advise that this +question of my joint (or several) appointment should be severely taken +up by London Press as matter of simple justice to India. This is without +prejudice to the already appointed Laureate as a swan and singing bird +of the first water. All I desire is that the Public should know of +another—and, perchance, even rarer—avis, who is <i>nigroque simillima +cygno</i>, and could be obtained dog cheap for a mere song or a drug in the +marketplace, if only there is made a National Appeal +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20"></a></span> to the Sovereign +that he should be promoted to such a sinecure and <i>ære perennius</i>.</p> + +<p>As a specimen of the authenticity of my divine flatulence, please find +inclosed herewith copy of complimentary verses, written by myself on +hearing of Poet <span class="smcap">Austin's</span> selection. Indulgence is kindly requested for +very hasty composition, and circumstance of being greatly harrowed and +impeded at time of writing by an excruciating full sized boil on back of +neck, infuriated by collar of shirt, poulticings, and so forth.</p><br> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Congratulatory Ode</span><br> +<br> +<i>To Hon'ble Poet-Laureate Alfred Austin, Esq.</i></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hail! you full-blown tulip!<br></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! when the wheezing zephyr brought glad news<br></span> +<span class="i0">Of your judicious appointment, no hearts who did peruse,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Such a long-desiderated slice of good luck were sorry at,<br></span> +<span class="i0">To a most prolific and polacious Poet-Laureate!<br></span> +<span class="i0">For no <i>poeta nascitur</i> who is fitter<br></span> +<span class="i0">To greet Royal progeny with melodious twitter.<br></span> +<span class="i2">Seated on the resplendent cloud of official Elysium,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Far away, far away from fuliginous busy hum<br></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21"></a></span> +<span class="i2">You are now perched with phenomenal velocity<br></span> +<span class="i2">On vertiginous pinnacle of poetic pomposity!<br></span> +<span class="i0">Yet deign to cock thy indulgent eye at the petition<br></span> +<span class="i0">Of one consumed by corresponding ambition,<br></span> +<span class="i0">And lend the helping hand to lift, pulley-hauley,<br></span> +<span class="i0">To Parnassian Peak this poor perspiring Bengali!<br></span> +<span class="i2">Whose <i>ars poetica</i> (as per sample lyric)<br></span> +<span class="i2">Is fully competent to turn out panegyric.<br></span> +<span class="i0">What if some time to come, perhaps not distant,<br></span> +<span class="i0">You were in urgent need of Deputy-Assistant!<br></span> +<span class="i0">For two Princesses might be confined simultaneously—<br></span> +<span class="i0">Then, how to homage the pair extemporaneously?<br></span> +<span class="i0">Or with Nuptial Ode, lack-a-daisy! What a fix<br></span> +<span class="i0">If with Influenza raging like cat on hot bricks!<br></span> +<span class="i2">In such a wrong box you will please remember yours truly,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Who can do the needful satisfactorily and duly,<br></span> +<span class="i2">By an <i>epithalamium</i> (or what not) to inflame your credit<br></span> +<span class="i2">With every coronated head that will have read it!<br></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22"></a></span> +<span class="i2">And the <i>quid pro quo</i>, magnificent and grand Sir!<br></span> +<span class="i2">Would be at the rate of four annas for every stanza,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Now, thou who scale sidereal paths afar dost,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Deign from thy brilliant boots to cast the superfluous star-dust<br></span> +<span class="i2">Upon<br></span> +<span class="i4">The head of him<br></span> +<span class="i6">Whose fate depends<br></span> +<span class="i8">On Thee!<br></span> +</div></div> +(<i>Signed</i>) <span class="smcap">Baboo Hurry Bungsho Jabberjee.</span><br> + +<p>The above was forwarded (<i>post-paid</i>) to Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Austin's</span> official +address at Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey (opposite the Royal +Aquarium), but—hoity-toity and <i>mirabile dictu!</i>—no answer has yet +been vouchsafed to yours truly save the cold shoulder of contemptuous +inattention!</p> + +<p>What a pity! Well-a-day, that we should find such passions of envy and +jealousy in bosom of a distinguished poet, whose lucubrated productions +may (for all that is known to the present writer) be no great shakes +after all, and mere food for powder!</p> + +<p>The British public is an ardent lover of the scintillating jewellery of +fair play, and so I confidently submit my claims and poetical +compositions to be arbitrated by the unanimous voice of all who +understand such articles.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23"></a></span></p> + +<p>Let us remember that it is never too late to pull down the fallen idol +out of the gilded shrine in which it has established itself with the +egotistical isolation of a dog with the mange!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Containing Mr Jabberjee's Impressions at The Old Masters.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">I have</span> the honour to report that the phantom of delight has recently +recommenced to dance before me.</p> + +<p>Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina Mankletow</span>, the perfumed, moony-faced daughter of the +gracious and eagle-eyed goddess who presides over the select boarding +establishment in which I am resident member, has of late emerged from +the shell of superciliousness, and brought the beaming eye of +encouragement to bear upon my diffidence and humility.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p25'></a> +<img src="images/p25.jpg" width="465" height="700" alt="Miss Jessimina Mankletow."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"MISS JESSIMINA MANKLETOW."</span></p></div> + +<p>This I partly attribute to general impression—which I do not condescend +to deny—that, at home, I occupy the social status of a Rajah, or some +analogous kind of big native pot.</p> + +<p>So, on a recent Saturday afternoon, she invited me to escort her and a +similar young virginal lady friend, by name Miss <span class="smcap">Priscilla Primmett</span>, to +Burlington House, Piccadilly, and, as <i>Prince Hamlet</i> appositely +remarks, "Look here upon this picture and on this." Which I joyfully +accepted, being head-over-heels in love with Art, and the possessor of +two magnificent coloured photo-lithographs, representing +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27"></a></span> a +steeplechase in the act of jumping a trench, and a water-nymph in the +very <i>décolleté</i> undress of "<i>puris naturalibus</i>," weltering on a rushy +bed.</p> + +<p>We proceeded thither upon the giddy summit of a Royal Oak omnibus, and +on arriving in the vestibulum, were peremptorily commanded to undergo +total abstinence from our umbrellas.</p> + +<p>Being accompanied by the span-new silken affair with the golden head, +which, as I have narrated <i>supra</i>, I was so lucky to obtain +promiscuously after witnessing the Adelphi of the Westminster college +boys, I naturally protested vehemently against such arbitrary and +tyrannical regulations, urging the risk of my unprotected umbrella being +feloniously abducted during unavoidable absence by some unprincipled and +illegitimate claimant.</p> + +<p>But, alack! I was confronted with the official ultimatum and <i>sine quâ +non</i>, and have subsequently learnt that the cause of this self-denying +ordinance is due to the uncontrollable enthusiasm of British Public for +works of art, which leads them to signify approbation by puncturing +innumerable orifices by dint of sticks or umbrellas in the process of +pointing out tit-bits of painting, and on account of the detrimental +influence on the marketable value of pictures thus distinguished by the +plerophory of the <i>Vox Populi</i>.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, my heart was oppressed with +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28"></a></span> many misgivings at having to +hand over three hostage umbrellas—one being masculine and two feminine +gender—and receiving nothing in exchange but a wooden medallion of no +intrinsic worth, bearing the utterly disproportionate number of over one +thousand! Next, after, at Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> bidding, having purchased a +sixpenny index, we ascended the staircase, and on shelling out three +shillings cash payment, were consecutively squeezed through a restricted +wicket as if needles going through the eye of a camel.</p> + +<p>I will vouchsafe to aver that my interior sensations on penetrating the +first gallery were those of acute and indignant disappointment, for will +it be credited that a working majority of the exhibits were second, or +even third and fourth-hand mechanisms of an unparagoned dingitude, and +fit only for the lumbering room?</p> + +<p>Perhaps I shall be told that this wintry exhibition is a mere stopgap +and makeshift, until a fresh supply of bright new paintings can be +procured, and that it is <i>ultra vires</i> to obtain such for love or money +before the merry month of May.</p> + +<p>Still I must persist in denouncing the penny wisdom and pound foolery of +the Academicals in foisting off upon the public such ancient and +fish-like articles that have long ceased to be <i>bon ton</i> and in the +fashion, since it is undeniable that many are over fifty years, and some +several centuries behind the times!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29"></a></span></p> + +<p>It is to be hoped that these parsimonious Misters will soon recognise +that it is not possible for modern up-to-date Art to be florescent under +this retrograde and fossilized system, and be warned that such +untradesmanlike goings-on will deservedly forfeit the confidence and +patronage of their most fastidious customers.</p> + +<p>Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> remarked more than once that such and such a picture was +not in <i>her</i> taste and she would never have chosen it personally, while +Miss <span class="smcap">Primmett</span> declared that she would not have had her likeness taken by +Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Josh Gainsboro</span>, or +Misters <span class="smcap">Velasky</span> and <span class="smcap">Vandick</span>, not even if +they implored her on their bended marrowbones, and that, as for a +certain individual effeminately named <span class="smcap">Etty</span>, it was a wonderment to her +how respectable people could stand in front of such brazen performances! +These remarks are trivial, perhaps, but even straws will serve as cocks +of the weather on occasions, and, moreover, I shall certify that the +most general tone was of a critical and disapproving severity, and it +was quite evident that the greater portion of the spectators could have +done the job better themselves.</p> + +<p>A certain Mister <span class="smcap">Turner</span> came in for +the <span class="smcap">Benjamin's</span> mess of obloquy, +having represented Pluto, the god of wealth, in the act of carrying off +a female Proserpine, but the figures so Lilliputian, and in such a +disproportionate expansion +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30"></a></span> of confused sceneries, that the elopement +produced but a very paltry impression. The slipshod carelessness of this +painter may be realised from the fact that in a composition styled +"<i>Blue Lights to Warn Steamboats off Shoal Water</i>," the blue lights are +conspicuous by their total absence, and the mistiness of the +atmospherical conditions renders it difficult to distinguish either the +steamers or the shoals with even tolerable accuracy!</p> + +<p>In the ulterior room were sundry productions from Umbrian and Milanese +and other schools, such being presumptively the teaching establishments +over which Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Reynolds</span> and <span class="smcap">Turner</span> and +<span class="smcap">Greuzy</span> and Co. predominated +as Old Masters. But surely it is unfair, and like seething a kid in the +maternal nutriment, to class such crude and hobbardyhoy performances +with works by more senile hands!</p> + +<p>Here I observed a painting to illustrate scenes in the life of an +important celebrity, who was childishly represented many times over +having separate adventures in the space of a few square feet, and of a +Brobdingnacian bulkiness compared to his perspective surroundings.</p> + +<p>Had this been the work of an Indian artist, native gentlemen out there +would simply have smiled pitiably at such ignorance, and given him the +gentle admonishment that he was only to make a fool of himself for his +pains. There was also a picture of a Diptych, in two portions, with a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31"></a></span> +background of gilt, but the figure of the Diptych himself very poorly +represented as an anatomy.</p> + +<p>Where all is so so-so, and below par, it is perhaps invidious to single +out any for hon'ble mention; but loyalty as a British subject obliges me +to speak favourably of a concern lent by Her Majesty the <span class="smcap">Queen</span>, and +representing a bombastical youth engaged in a snip-snap with a meek and +inoffensive schoolfellow, who supports himself on one leg, and is +occupied in sheltering his nose behind his arm, until his widowed and +aged mother can arrive to rescue her beloved offspring from his grave +crisis.</p> + +<p>This at least can be commended as being true to nature, as I can attest +from personal experience of similar boyish loggerheads, although, owing +to preserving my <i>sang froid</i>, I was generally able to remove myself +with phenomenal rapidity from vicinity of shocking kicks by my truculent +assailant.</p> + +<p>Let me not omit to mention a painting of "<i>Polichinelle</i>" by a Gallic +artist, which Miss <span class="smcap">Primmett</span> said was the French equivalent to <i>Punch</i>. +At which, speaking loudly for instruction of bystanders, I assured them, +as one familiarly connected with Hon'ble <i>Punch</i>, who regarded me as a +son, such a portrait was the very antipode to his majestic lineaments, +nor was it reasonable to suppose that he would allow his counterfeit +presentment to be depicted in the undignified garbage of a buffoon! +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32"></a></span></p> + +<p>I trust that I may be gratefully remembered by my Liege Lord, and that +he will be gracious enough to entertain me favourably with something in +the shape of prize or bonus in reward for such open testimony as the +above.</p> + +<p>I have only to add that the custodian preserved the inviolability of our +umbrellas with honorable fidelity, and that we moistened the drooping +clay of our internal tenements at an Aërated Tea Company with a +profusion of confectionaries, for which my fair friends with amiable +blandness permitted me the privilege of forking out.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">In which Mr Jabberjee expresses his Opinions on Bicycling as a Pastime.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">In</span> consequence of the increasing demands of the incomparable Miss +<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> upon the dancing attendance of your humble servant, I am +lately become as idle as a newly painted ship, and have not drunk in the +legal wisdom of the learned <i>Moonshees</i> who lecture in the hall of my +Inn of Court, or opened the ponderous treatise of Hon'ble Justice +<span class="smcap">Blackstone</span> or <span class="smcap">Addison</span> on <i>Torts</i>, for many a blank day.</p> + +<p>Still, as Philosopher <span class="smcap">Plato</span> observed, "<i>Nihil humani alienum a me +puto</i>," and my time has not been actually squandered in the theft of +Procrastination, but rather employed in the proper study of Mankind, and +acquiring a more complete knowingness in <i>Ars Vivendi</i>.</p> + +<p>So I think it worth to direct public attention to the dangers of a +practice which threatens to develop into an epidemical kind of plague, +and carry the deteriorating trails of a serpent over our household +families, unless promptly scotched by benevolent firmness of a paternal +Government.</p> + +<p>Need I explain I am alluding to the nowaday +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34"></a></span> passion for propelling +oneself at a severe speed by dint of unstable and most precarious +machinery? It is now the exception which breaks the rule to take the air +in the streets without being startled by the unseemly spectacles of +go-ahead citizens straddled upon such revolutionary contrivances, +threading their way with breakneck velocity under the very noses of +omnibus and other horses, and ringing the shrill welkin of a +tintinnabulating gong!</p> + +<p>Nay, even after the Curfew has taken its toll from the knell of parting +day, and darkness reigns supreme, they will urge on their wild career, +illuminated by the dim religious light of a small oil lamp!</p> + +<p>I possess no knack of medical knowledge, but I boldly state my opinion +that such daredevilry must necessarily inflict a deleterious result to +the nervous organisms of these riders; and, who knows, of their +posterity?</p> + +<p>For no one can expect to have hairbreadth escapes from the running +gauntlet continuously, without suffering a shattering internal panic, +while catastrophes of fatal injury to life and limb have become <i>de +rigueur</i>.</p> + +<p><i>Experto crede</i>—for I can support my <i>obiter dictum</i> by the crushing +weight of personal experience. A few mornings since I had the honour to +escort Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina Mankletow</span> and a middle-aged select female boarder +into the interior of Hyde Park. The day was fine, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35"></a></span> though frigid, and I +was wearing my fur-lined overcoat, with boots of patent Japan leather, +and a Bombay gold-embroidered cap, so that I was a mould of form and the +howling nob.</p> + +<p>Picture my amazement when, as I promenaded the path beside the waters of +the Serpentine lake, I beheld a wheeled cavalcade of every conceivable +age, sex, and appearance; senile gaffers and baby buntings; +multitudinous women, some plump as a duckling, others thin as a +paper-thread; aye, and even priests in sanctimonious black and +milk-white cravats, rolling swiftly upon two wheels, and all agog to +dash through thick and thin!</p> + +<p>On seeing which, the matured lady boarder did exclaim upon the +difficulties of the performance, and the vast crowd that had collected +to view such a <i>tour de force</i>, but I, perceiving that those seated upon +the machines used no exorbitant exertions, and, indeed, appeared to be +wholly engrossed in social intercourse, responded that no skill was +required to circulate these bicycles, which, owing to being surrounded +with air-cushions, would proceed <i>proprio motu</i> and without meandering.</p> + +<p>Thereupon Miss <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> expressed an ardent desire to behold myself +upon one of these same machines, and—as we were now close to the effigy +of Hon'ble Duke of <span class="smcap">Wellington</span> disguised as an Achilles, near +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36"></a></span> which were +certain <i>bunniahs</i> trafficking with bicycles—I, wishing to pleasure my +fair companion, approached one of these contractors and bargained with +him for the sole user of his vehicle for the space of one calendar hour, +to which he consented at the <i>honorarium</i> of one rupee four annas.</p> + +<p>But, on receiving the bicycle from his hands, I at once perceived myself +under a total impossibility of achieving its ascent—for no sooner had I +protruded one leg over the saddle than the foremost wheel averted +itself, and the entire machine bit the dust, which afforded lively and +infinite entertainment to my feminine companions.</p> + +<p>I, however, reproached the <i>bunniah</i> for furnishing a worn-out effete +affair that was not in working order or a going concern, but he, by +assuring me that it was all right, cajoled me into trying once more.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p37'></a> +<img src="images/p37.jpg" width="580" height="700" alt="I instantaneously endured the total upset!"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"I INSTANTANEOUSLY ENDURED THE TOTAL UPSET!"</span></p></div> + +<p>So, divesting myself of my fur-lined overcoat, which I commanded a +hobbardyhoy of the sweeper class to hold, I again mounted upon the +saddle, while the proprietor of the machine sustained it in a position +of rectitude, and then, supporting me by the superfluity of my +pantaloons, he propelled me from the rear, counselling me to press my +feet vigorously upon the paddles. But it all proved as the labour of +Sisyphus, for the seat was of sadly insufficient dimensions and +adamantine hardihood, and whenever the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39"></a></span> bicycle-man released his hold, +I instantaneously endured the total upset!</p> + +<p>Then again I reproved him for his <i>Punica fides</i>, informing him that I +required a machine that would run with smooth progressiveness, precisely +similar to those I beheld in motion around me. To which he replied that +I must not expect to be able to ride <i>impromptu</i> as well as individuals +who had only mastered the accomplishment by long continuity of practice +and industry.</p> + +<p>"Oh, man of wily tongue!" I addressed him. "Not thus will you bamboozle +my supposed simplicity! For if the art were indeed so difficult as you +pretend, how should it be acquired by so many timid and delicate +feminines and mere nurselings? This machine of yours is nothing but an +obsolete <i>hors de combat</i> with which it is not humanly possible to work +the oracle!"</p> + +<p>At which, waxing with indignation, he leaped upon it, and to my +surprise, did easily propel it in whatsoever direction he pleased, and +its motive power appeared to be similar in every respect to the rest; +so, beguiled by his representations that, under his instructions, I +should speedily become a <i>chef-d'œuvre</i>, I once more suffered myself +to mount the machine; but whether from superabundant energy of my +foot-paddling, or the alarming fact that we were upon the descent of a +precipitous slope, I was +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40"></a></span> soon horrified at finding that my instructor +was stripped out, and I abandoned to the lurch of my Caudine fork!</p> + +<p>Oh, my goodness! My heart turns to water at the nude recollection of +such an unparalleled predicament, for the now unrestrained bicycle +<i>vires acquirit eundo</i>, and in seven-league boots! While I, wet as a +clout with anxiety and perspiration, did grasp the handles like the +horns of a dilemma, calling out in agonised accents to the +bystanders,—"Help! I am running away with myself! Half a rupee for my +life-preserver!"</p> + +<p>But they were all as if to burst with laughter, and none had the +ordinary heroism to intervene, and I with ever increasing rapidity was +borne helplessly down the declivity towards the gates of Hyde Park +Corner, when, by the benevolence of Providence, the anterior wheel ran +under a railing, and I flew off like a tangent into the comparative +security of a mud-barrow!</p> + +<p>On my return and solicitous inquiry for my fur-lined overcoat, I had the +further shock to discover that it was <i>solvitur ambulando</i>!</p> + +<p>After such a shuddering experience and narrow squeak of my safety, I +confidently appeal to the authorities to extinguish this highly +dangerous and foolhardy sort of so-called amusement, or at the very +least to issue paternal orders that, in future, no one shall be +permitted to ride upon any bicycle possessing +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41"></a></span>less than three wheels, +or guilty of a greater celerity than three (or four) miles per hour.</p> + +<p>The fair Miss <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> amended this proposal by suggesting that the +Public should be restricted at once to perambulators; but this is, +perhaps, <i>majori cautelâ</i>, and an instance of the over-solicitude of the +female intellect, for it is not feasible to treat an adult, who has +assumed the <i>toga virilis</i> and tall hat, as if he was still mewling and +puking in a tucker and bib.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Dealing with his Adventures at Olympia.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">The</span> dialoquial form is now become an indispensible <i>factotum</i> in +periodical literature, and so, like a <i>brebis de Panurge</i>, I shall +follow the fashion occasionally,—though with rather more obedience to a +literary elegant style of phraseology than my predecessors in <i>Punch</i> +have thought worth to practise.</p> + +<p>Time: the other morning. Scene: the breakfast table at Porticobello +House, Ladbroke Grove. Myself and other select boarders engaged in +masticating fowl eggs with their concomitant bacon, while intelligently +discussing topical subjects (for we carry out the poetical recipe of +"Plain thinking and high living").</p> + +<p><i>Miss Jessimina</i> (<i>at the table-head</i>). The papers seem eloquent in +laudation of the Sporting and Military Show at Olympia. How I should +like to go if I had anyone to take me!</p> + +<p><i>Mr Wylie</i> (<i>stingily</i>). And I would be enraptured at so tip-top an +opportunity, but for circumstance of being stonily broken.</p> + +<p class="txtright">[<i>Helps himself to the surviving fowl egg.</i></p> + +<p><i>Mr Cossetter</i> (<i>in sepulchral tone</i>). Alack! +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43"></a></span> that doctorial +prescriptions do nill for me such nocturnal jinks; otherwise——</p> + +<p class="txtright">[<i>He treats himself to a digestible pill.</i></p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>taking a leap into the darkness and deadly breaches</i>). Since +other gentlemen are not more obsequious in gallantry, I hereby tender +myself for honour of accompanyist and <i>vade mecum</i>.</p> + +<p><i>Miss Jess.</i> (<i>lowering the silken curtains of her almond-like orbs</i>). +Oh, really, <span class="smcap">Prince</span>! So <i>very</i> unexpected! I must obtain the expert +opinion of my Mamma.</p> + +<p>Mistress <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> did approve the jaunt on condition of our being +saddled by a select lady boarder of the name of <span class="smcap">Spink</span> as a <i>tertium +quid</i> to play at propriety; at which I was internally disgusted, fearing +she would play the old gooseberry with our <i>tête-à-tête</i>.</p> + +<p>Having arrived at Olympia, we perambulated the bazaar prior to the +commencement of the shows, and here (after parting with rs. 8 for three +seats on the balcony) I did bleed more freely still, for Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> +expressed a passionate longing to possess my profile, snipped out of +paper by the scissors of a Silhouette, for which I mulcted one shilling +sterling.</p> + +<p>And, after all, although it proved the <i>alter ego</i> and speaking likeness +of my embossed Bombay cap and golden spectacles, she found the fault +that it rendered my complexion of a too excessive murksomeness; not +reflecting (with feminine +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44"></a></span> imperceptivity) that, the material being +black as a Stygian, this criticism applied to the portraitures of all +alike!</p> + +<p>Farther on I presented her and the female gooseberry with a +pocket-handkerchief a-piece, interwoven by a mechanism with their +baptismal appellation (another rupee!).</p> + +<p>Then we arrived at a cage containing an automatic Devil revealing the +future for a penny in the slit, and Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> worked the oracle +with a coin advanced by myself, and the demon, after flashing his optics +and consulting sundry playing-cards, did presently produce a small paper +which she opened eagerly.</p> + +<p><i>Miss Jess.</i> (<i>after perusal</i>). Only fancy! It says I'm "to marry a dark +man, and go for a long journey, and be very rich." What ridiculous +nonsense! do you not think so, <span class="smcap">Prince</span>?</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>with a tender sauciness</i>). Poet <span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span> asserts there are +more things in Heaven and earth than the Horatian philosophy. I am not a +superstitious—and yet this mechanical demon may have seen correctly +through the brick wall of Futurity. Have you not a worshipful adorer who +might be described as dark, and to whose native land it is a long +journey?</p> + +<p><i>Miss Jess.</i> (<i>with the complexion of a tomato</i>). It's time we took our +seats for the performance. And you are not to be a silly!</p> + +<p>It is notorious that the English female +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45"></a></span> vocabulary contains no more +caressing and flattering epithet than this of "a silly," so that I +repaired to my seat immoderately encouraged by such gracious +appreciation.</p> + +<p>Of the show, I can testify that it was truly magnificent, though the +introductory portion was somewhat spoilt by the too great prevalence of +the bicycle, which is daily increasing its ubiquity, nor do I see the +rationality of engaging a <i>sais</i> in topped boots to attend upon each +machine, under the transparent pretentiousness of its belonging to the +equine genus, since it can never become the similitude of a horse in +mettlesome vivacity.</p> + +<p>My companions marvelled greatly at the severe curvature of the +extremities of the cycle-track, which were shaped like the interior of a +huge bowl, and while I was demonstrating to them how, from scientific +considerations and owing to the centrifugal forces of gravitation, it +was not possible for any rider to become a loser of his equilibrium—lo +and behold! two of the competitors made the <i>facilis descensus</i>, and +were intermingled in the weltering hotchpot of a calamity.</p> + +<p>But on being disentangled they did limp away, and it is allowable to +hope that they suffered no serious dismantling of their vital organs. +Still, I cannot approve of these bicycle contentions, which are +veritable provocative flights at the providential features. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46"></a></span></p> + +<p>After the termination I conducted my <i>protégées</i> to the Palmarium, where +we sat under a shrub imbibing lemon crushes, brought by a neat-handed +Phyllis in the uniform of a house-maid intermixed with a hospital nurse.</p> + +<p>Here occurred a most discomposing <i>contretemps</i>, for presently Miss +<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> uttered the complaint that two strangers were regarding +herself and Miss <span class="smcap">Spink</span> with the brazen eyes of a sheep, and even making +personal comments on my nationality, which rendered me like toad under a +harrow with burning indignation.</p> + +<p>At length, being utterly beside myself with rage, I summoned one of the +Phyllises and requested her to take steps to abate the nuisance, being +met with a smiling "<i>Nolo Episcopari</i>." So, entreating my companions not +to give way to panic and leave their cause in my hands, I went in search +of a policeman.</p> + +<p>Unfortunately some time flew before I could find one at liberty to +understand my crucial position, nor could I obtain from him a legal +opinion as to whether I could administer a cuff or a slap in the ear to +my insulters without incurring risk of retaliation in kind.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p47'></a> +<img src="images/p47.jpg" width="505" height="700" alt="With a large, stout constable."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"WITH A LARGE, STOUT CONSTABLE."</span></p></div> + +<p>And, on returning to the spot with a large, stout constable, I had the +mortification to discover that the two impolite strangers had departed, +and that Misses <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> and <span class="smcap">Spink</span> were similarly imperceptible.</p> + +<p>However, after prolonged search and mental +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49"></a></span> anxiety, I returned alone, +and was rewarded by finding my fair friends arrived in safety; and +hearing that the two strangers had explained, in the gentlemanly terms +of an apology, that they had mistaken them for acquaintances.</p> + +<p>Consequently I am thankful that I did not execute my design of assault +and battery, more especially as I am the happy receiver of many handsome +compliments on all sides upon the tactfulness and <i>savoir faire</i> with +which I extricated myself from my shocking fix.</p> + +<p>At which my countenance beams with the shiny resplendency of +self-satisfaction.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">How Mr Jabberjee risked a Sprat to capture something very like a Whale.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">I am</span> this week to narrate an unprecedented stroke of bad luck occurring +to the present writer. The incipience of the affair was the addressing +of a humble petition to the indulgent ear of Hon'ble <i>Punch</i>, calling +attention to the great copiousness of my literary out-put, and the +ardent longing I experienced to behold the colour of money on account. +On which, by returning post, my parched soul was reinvigorated by the +refreshing draught of a <i>draft</i> (if I may be permitted the rather +facetious <i>jeu de mots</i>) payable to my order.</p> + +<p>So uplifted by pride at finding the insignificant crumbs I had cast upon +the journalistic waters return to me after numerous days in the improved +form of loaves and fishes, I wended my footsteps to the bank on which my +cheque was drafted, and requested the bankers behind the counter to +honour it with the equivalent in filthy lucres, which they did with +obsequious alacrity.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p51'></a> +<img src="images/p51.jpg" width="575" height="700" alt="Was accosted by a polite, agreeable stranger."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"WAS ACCOSTED BY A POLITE, AGREEABLE STRANGER."</span></p></div> + +<p>After closely inspecting the notes to satisfy myself that I had not been +imposed upon by meretricious counterfeits, I emerged with a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53"></a></span> beaming +and joyful countenance, stowing the needful away carefully in an +interior pocket, and, on descending the bank step, was accosted by a +polite, agreeable stranger, who, begging my pardon with profusion, +inquired whether he had not had the honour of voyaging from India with +me in the—the—for his life he could not recall the name of the +ship—he should forget his own name presently!</p> + +<p>"Indeed," I answered him, "I cannot remember having the felicity of an +encounter with you upon the <i>Kaisar-i-Hind</i>."</p> + +<p>The Stranger: "To be sure; that <i>was</i> the name! A truly magnificent +vessel! I forget names—but faces, never! And yours I remember from the +striking resemblance to my dear friend, the Maharajah of Bahanapúr—you +know him?—a very elegant young, handsome chap. A splendid <i>Shikarri</i>! I +was often on the verge of asking if you were related; but being then but +a second-class passenger, and under an impecunious cloud, did not dare +to take the liberty. Now, being on the bed of clover owing to decease of +wealthy uncle, I can address you without the mortifying fear of +misconstruction."</p> + +<p>So, in return, I, without absolutely claiming consanguinity with the +Maharajah (of whom, indeed, I had never heard), did inform him that I, +too, was munching the slice of luck, having just drawn the princely +instalment of a salary +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54"></a></span> for jots and tittles contributed to periodical +<i>Punch</i>. Whereat he warmly congratulated me, expressing high +appreciation of my articles and abilities, but exclaiming at the +miserable paucity of my <i>honorarium</i>, saying he was thick as a thief +with the Editor, and would leave no stone unturned to procure me a +greater adequacy of remuneration for writings that were dirt cheap at a +Jew's eye.</p> + +<p>And presently he invited me to accompany him to a respectable sort of +tavern, and solicited the honour of my having a "peg" at his expense; to +which I, perceiving him to be a good-natured, simple fellow, inflated by +sudden prosperity, consented, accepting, contrary to my normal habitude, +his offer of a brandy panee, or an old Tom.</p> + +<p>While we were discoursing of India (concerning which I found that, like +most globular trotters, he had not been long enough in the country to be +accurately informed), enters a third party, who, it so happened, was an +early acquaintance of my companion, though separated by the old lang +sign of a longinquity. What followed I shall render in a dialogue form.</p> + +<p>The Third party: Why, <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>, you have a prosperous appearance, +<span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>. When last met, you suffered from the impecuniosity of a +churched mouse. Have you made your fortune, <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>?</p> + +<p><i>Mr Tomkins.</i> I am too easy a goer, and there +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55"></a></span> are too many rogues in +the world, that I should ever make my own fortune, <span class="smcap">Johnson</span>! Happily for +me, an opulent and ancient avuncular relative has lately departed to +reside with the morning stars, and left me wealth outside the dream of +an avaricious!</p> + +<p><i>Mr Johnson</i> (<i>enviously</i>). God bless my soul! Some folks have the good +luck. (<i>To me, whispering.</i>) A poor ninny-hammer sort of chap, he will +soon throw it away on drakes and ducks! (<i>Aloud, to</i> Mr <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>.) +Splendid! I congratulate you sincerely.</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> (<i>in a tone of dolesomeness</i>). The heart knoweth where the shoe +pinches it, <span class="smcap">Johnson</span>. My lot is not a rose-bed. For my antique and +eccentric relative must needs insert a testamentary condition commanding +me to forfeit the inheritance, unless, within three calendered months +from his last obsequies, I shall have distributed ten thousand pounds +amongst young deserving foreigners. To-morrow time is up, and I have +still a thousand pounds to give away! But how to discover genuine young +deserving foreigners in so short a space? Truly, I go in fear of losing +the whole!</p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> Let me act as your <i>budli</i> in this and distribute the remaining +thousand.</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> From what I remember of you as a youth, I cannot wholly rely on +your discretion. Rather would I place my confidence in this gentleman. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56"></a></span></p> + +<p class="txtright">[<i>Indicating myself, who turned orange with pleasure.</i></p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> Indeed? And how know you that he may not adhere to the entire +thousand?</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> And if he does, it is no matter, if he is a genuine deserving. I +can give the whole to him if I am so minded, and he need not give away a +penny of it unless inclined.</p> + +<p class="txtright">[<i>At which I was fit to dance with delight.</i></p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> I deny that you possess the power, seeing that he is a British +subject, and as such cannot be styled a "foreigner."</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> There you have mooted a knotty point indeed. Alas, that we have +no forensic big-wig here to decide it!</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>modestly</i>). As a native poor student of English law, I +venture to think that, by dint of my legal attainments, I shall be +enabled to crack the Gordian nut. I am distinctly of opinion that an +individual born of dusky parents in a tropical climate <i>is</i> a foreigner, +in the eye of British prejudice, and within the meaning of the testator. +[<i>And here I maintained my assertion by a logomachy of such brilliancy +and erudition that I completely convinced the minds of both auditors.</i></p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> (<i>grumblingly, to</i> Mr <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>). Assuming he is correct, why +favour <i>him</i> more than <i>me</i>?</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> Because instinct informs me that a gentleman with such a face as +his—however +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57"></a></span> dusky—may be trusted, and with the untold gold!</p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> (<i>jealously</i>). And I am not to be trusted! If you were to hand +me your <i>portemonnaie</i> now, full of notes and gold, and let me walk into +the street with it, do you doubt that I should return? Speak, <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>!</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> Assuredly not; but so, too, would this gentleman. (<i>To me, as +</i>Mr <span class="smcap">Johnson</span><i> sneered a doubt</i>.) Here, you, Sir, take this <i>portemonnaie</i> +out into the street for five minutes or so, I trust to your honour to +return it intact. (<i>After I had emerged triumphantly from this severe +ordeal of my</i> bonâ fide.) Aha, <span class="smcap">Johnson</span>! am I the judge of men or not?</p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> (<i>still seeking, as I could see, to undermine me in his friend's +favour</i>). Pish! Who would steal a paltry £50 and lose £1000? If I had so +much to give away, I should wish to be sure that the party I was about +to endow had corresponding confidence in <i>me</i>. Now, though I have always +considered you as a dull, I know you to be strictly honest, and would +trust you with all I possess. In proof of which, take these two golden +sovereigns and few shillings outside. Stay away as long as you desire. +You will return, I know you well!</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>penetrating this shallow artifice, and hoisting the +engine-driver on his own petard</i>). Who would not risk a paltry £2 to +gain £1000? Oh, a magnificent confidence, truly! +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58"></a></span></p> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> (<i>to me</i>). Have you the ordinary manly pluck to act likewise? If +you are expecting him to trust you with the pot of money, he has a right +to expect to be trusted in return. That is logic!</p> + +<p><i>Mr T.</i> (<i>mildly</i>). No, <span class="smcap">Johnson</span>, you are too +hasty, <span class="smcap">Johnson</span>. The cases +are different. I can understand the gentleman's very natural hesitation. +I do not ask him to show his confidence in me—enough that I feel I can +trust <i>him</i>. If he doubts my honesty, I shall think no worse of him; +whichever way I decide eventually.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>[<i>Here, terrified lest by hesitation I had wounded him at +his quick, and lest, after all, he should decide to entrust +the thousand pounds to </i>Mr <span class="smcap">Johnson</span>, <i>I hastily produced all +the specie and bullion I had upon me, including a valuable +large golden chronometer and chain of best English make, and +besought him to go into the outer air for a while with them, +which, after repeated refusals, he at last consented to do, +leaving </i>Myself<i> and </i>Mr <span class="smcap">Johnson</span><i> to wait</i>.</p></div> + +<p><i>Mr J.</i> (<i>after tedious lapse of ten minutes</i>). Strange! I expected him +back before this. But he is an absent-minded, chuckle-headed chap. Very +likely he is staring at a downfallen horse and has forgotten this +affair. I had better go in search of him. What? you will +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59"></a></span> come, too. +Capital! Then if you go to the right, and I to the left, we cannot miss +him!</p> + +<p>But, alack! we did; and, in a short time, both Misters were invisible to +the nude eye, nor have I heard from them since. Certain of my +fellow-boarders, on hearing the matter, declared that I had been diddled +by a bamboozle-trick; but it is egregiously absurd that my puissance in +knowledge of the world should have been so much at fault; and, moreover, +why should one who had succeeded to vast riches seek to rob me of my +paltry possessions? It is much more probable that they are still +diligently seeking for me, having omitted, owing to hurry of moment, to +ascertain my name and address; and I hereby request Mr <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span>, on +reading this, to forward the thousand pounds (or so much thereof as in +his munificent generosity he may deem sufficient) to me at Porticobello +House, Ladbroke Grove, W., or care of his friend, the Editor of <i>Punch</i>, +by whom it will (I am sure) be honourably handed over intact.</p> + +<p>Nor need Mr <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span> fear my reproaches for his dilatoriness, for there +is a somewhat musty proverb that "Procrastination is preferable to +Neverness."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">How Mr Jabberjee delivered an Oration at a Ladies' Debating Club.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Miss Spink</span> (whom I have mentioned <i>supra</i> as a feminine inmate of +Porticobello House) is <i>in additum</i> a member of a Debating Female +Society, which assembles once a week in various private Westbourne Grove +parlours, for argumentative intercourse.</p> + +<p>So, she expressing an anxious desire that I should attend one of these +conclaves, I consented, on ascertaining that I should be afforded the +opportunity of parading the gab with which I have been gifted in an +extemporised allocution.</p> + +<p>On the appointed evening I directed my steps, under the guidance of the +said Miss <span class="smcap">Spink</span>, to a certain imposing stucco residence hard by, wherein +were an assortment of female women conversing with vivacious garrulity, +in a delicious atmosphere of tea, coffee, and buttered bread.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p61'></a> +<img src="images/p61.jpg" width="328" height="700" alt="A weedy, tall male gentleman."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"A WEEDY, TALL MALE GENTLEMAN."</span></p></div> + +<p>After having partaken freely of these comestibles, we made the +adjournment to a luxuriously upholstered parlour, circled with +plush-seated chairs and adorned with countless mirrors, and there we +began to beg the question at issue, to-whit, "<i>To what extent has Ibsen (if </i> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63"></a></span><i>any) contributed +towards the cause of Female Emancipation?</i>" +which was opened by a weedy, tall male gentleman, with a lofty and a +shining forehead, and round, owlish spectacle-glasses. He read a very +voluminous paper, from which I learnt that <span class="smcap">Ibsen</span> was the writer of +innumerable new-fangled dramas of very problematical intentions, +exposing the hollow conventionalisms of all established social usages, +especially in the matrimonial department.</p> + +<p>When he had ceased there was a universal and unanimous silence, due to +uncontrollable female bashfulness, for the duration of several minutes, +until the chairwoman exhorted someone to have the courage of her +opinions. And the ice being once fractured, one Amurath succeeded +another in disjointed commentaries, plucking crows in the teeth of the +assertions of the Hon'ble Opener and of their precursors, and resumed +their seats with abrupt precipitancy, stating that they had no further +remarks to make.</p> + +<p>Then ensued another interim of golden "Silence and slow Time," as Poet +<span class="smcap">Keats</span> says, which was as if to become Sempiternity, had not I, rushing +in where the angels were in fear of slipping up, caught the Speaker in +the eye, and tipped the wink of my <i>cacoëthes loquendi</i>.</p> + +<p>To prevent disappointment, I shall report my harangue with verbose +accuracy.</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>assuming a perpendicular attitude, </i> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64"></a></span><i>inserting one hand among +my vest buttons, and waving the other with a graceful affability</i>). +"<span class="smcap">Hon'ble Miss Chairwoman, Madams, Misses, and Hon'ble Mister Opener</span>, the +humble individual now palpitating on his limbs before you is a denizen +from a land whose benighted, ignorant inhabitants are accustomed to +treat the females of their species as small fry and fiddle faddle. Yes, +Madams and Misses, in India the woman is forbidden to eat except in the +severest solitude, and after her lord and master has surfeited his pangs +of hunger; she may not make the briefest outdoor excursion without +permission, and then solely in a covered <i>palkee</i>, or the hermetically +sealed interior of a blinded carriage. (<i>Cries of 'Shame.'</i>) In the +Zenana, she is restricted to the occupation of puerile gossipings, or +listening to apocryphal fairy tales of so scandalising an impropriety +that I shrink to pollute my ears by the repetition even of the tit-bits. +(<i>Subdued groans.</i>)</p> + +<p>"Such being the case, you can imagine the astonishment and gratification +I have experienced here this evening at the intelligence and forwardness +manifested by so many effeminate intellects. (<i>A flattered rustle and +prolonged simpering.</i>)</p> + +<p>"The late respectable Dr <span class="smcap">Ben Johnson</span>, gifted author of <i>Boswell's +Biography</i> (<i>applause</i>), once rather humorously remarked, on witnessing +a nautch performed by canine quadrupeds, that—although +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65"></a></span>their +choreographical abilities were of but a mediocre nature—the wonderment +was that they should be capable at all to execute such a hind-legged +feat and <i>tour de force</i>.</p> + +<p>"Similarly, it is to me a gaping marvel that womanish tongues should +hold forth upon subjects which are naturally far outside the radius of +their comprehensions.</p> + +<p>"The subject for our discursiveness to-night is, '<i>To what extent has +Ibsen contributed to the Cause (if any) of Female Emancipation?</i>' and +being a total ignoramus up to date of the sheer existence of said +hon'ble gentleman, I shall abstain from scratching my head over so +Sphinxian a conundrum, and confine myself to knuckling to the obiter +diction of sundry lady speakers.</p> + +<p>"There was a stout full-blown matron, with grey curl-shavings and a +bonnet and plumage, who declaimed her opinionated conviction that it was +degrading and <i>infra dig.</i> for any woman to be treated as a doll. +(<i>Hear, hear.</i>) Well, I would hatch the questionable egg of a doubt +whether any rationalistic masculine could regard the speaker herself in +a dollish aspect, and will assure her that in my fatherland every +cultivated native gentleman would approach her with the cold shoulder of +apprehensive respectfulness. (<i>The bonneted matron becomes ruddier than +the cherry with complacency, and fans herself vigorously.</i>) +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66"></a></span></p> + +<p>"Next I shall deal with the tall, meagre female near the fire-hearth, in +abbreviated hair and a nose-pinch, who set up the claim that her sex +were in all essentials the equals, if not the superiors, of man. Now, +without any gairish of words, I will proceed baldly to enumerate various +important physical differentiations which—— (<i>Intervention by Hon'ble +Chairwoman, reminding me that these were not in disputation.</i>) I bow to +correction, and kiss the rod by summing up the gist of my argument, +viz., that it is nonsensical idiotcy to suppose that a woman can be the +equivalent of a man either in intellectual gripe, in bodily +robustiousness, or in physical courage. Of the last, I shall afford an +unanswerable proof from my own person. It is notorious, <i>urbi et orbi</i>, +that every feminine person will flee in panicstricken dismay from the +approach of the smallest mouse.</p> + +<p>"I am a Bengali, and, as such, profusely endowed with the fugacious +instinct, and yet, shall I quake in appalling consternation if a mouse +is to invade my vicinity?</p> + +<p>"Certainly I shall not; and why? Because, though not racially a +temerarious, I nevertheless appertain to the masculine sex, and +consequentially my heart is not capable of contracting at the mere +aspect of a rodent. This is not to blow the triumphant trumpet of sexual +superiority, but to prove a simple undenied fact by dint of an <i>a +fortiori</i>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67"></a></span></p> + +<p>"Having pulverised my pinched-nose predecessor, I pass on to a speaker +of a very very opposite personality—the well-proportioned, beauteous +maiden with azure starry eyes, gilded hair, and teeth like the seeds of +a pomegranate (oh, <i>si sic omnes!</i>), who vaunted, in the musical accents +of a cuckoo, her right to work out her own life, independently of +masculine companionship or assistance, and declared that the saccharine +element of courtship and connubiality was but the exploded mask of man's +tyrannical selfishness.</p> + +<p>"Had such shocking sentiments been aired by some of the other lady +orators in this room, I must facetiously have recalled them to a certain +fabular fox which criticised the unattainable grapes as too immature to +merit mastication; but the particular speaker cannot justly be said to +be on all fours with such an animal. Understand, please, I am no +prejudiced, narrow-minded chap. I would freely and generously permit +plainfaced, antiquated, unmarriageable madams and misses to undertake +the manufacture of their own careers <i>ad nauseam</i>; but when I behold a +maiden of such excessive pulchritude—— (<i>Second intervention by +Hon'ble Chairwoman desiring me to abstain from personal references.</i>) I +assure the Hon'ble Miss <span class="smcap">Chairwoman</span> that I was not alluding to herself, +but since she has spoken in my wheel with such severity, I will conclude +with my peroration on the subject for debate, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68"></a></span> namely, the theatrical +dramas of Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Ibsen</span>. When, Madams and Misses, I make the odious +comparison of these works, with which I am completely unacquainted, to +the productions of Poet <span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span>, where I may boast the familiarity +that is a breeder of contempt, I find that, in <i>Hamlet's</i> own words, it +is the 'Criterion of a Satire,' and I shall assert the unalterable <i>a +priori</i> of my belief that the melodious Swan of Stony Stratford, whether +judged by his longitude, his versical blankness, or the profoundly of +his attainments in Chronology, Theology, Phrenology, Palmistry, +Metallurgy, Zoography, Nosology, Chiropody, or the Musical Glasses, has +outnumbered every subsequent contemporary and succumbed them all!"</p> + +<p>With this, I sat down, leaving my audience as <i>sotto voce</i> as fishes +with admiration and amazement at the facundity of my eloquence, and +should indubitably have been the recipient of innumerable felicitations +but for the fact that Miss <span class="smcap">Spink</span>, suddenly experiencing sensations of +insalubriousness, requested me, without delay, to conduct her from the +assemblage.</p> + +<p>I would willingly make a repetition of my visit and rhetorical triumphs, +only Miss <span class="smcap">Spink</span> informs me that she has recently terminated her +membership with the above society.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">How he saw the practice of the University Crews, and what he thought of it.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">The</span> notorious Intercollegian Boat-race of this <i>anno Domini</i> will be +obsolete and <i>ex post facto</i> by the time of publication of the present +instalment of jots and tittles, still I am sufficiently presumptive to +think that the cogitations and personal experiences of a cultivated, +thoughtful native gentleman on this cœrulean topic may not be found +so stale and dry as the remainder of a biscuit.</p> + +<p>First I will make a clean bosom with the confession that, though +ardently desirous to witness such a Titianic struggle for the <i>cordon +bleu</i> of old Father Antic the Thames, I was not the actual spectator of +the affair, being previously contracted to escort Miss <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> (whose +wishfulness is equivalent to legislation) to a theatrical matutinal +performance, which she would in nowise consent to renounce, alleging +that she had already seen the Boat-race to the verge of satiety, and +that the spectacle was instantaneous and paltry.</p> + +<p>However, on acquainting my kind and patronising father, Hon'ble <i>Punch</i>, +of my disappointment, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70"></a></span> he did +benevolently propose, as a <i>pis aller</i> and +blind bargain, a voyage in the steam launch-boat of the official +coachman of one of the crews so that I might ascertain how the trick was +done.</p> + +<p>And at 10 <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> on the day of assignation I presented myself at the +riparian premises of a certain Boating Society, and, on exhibiting my +letter of credit to the Mentor or Corypheus aforesaid, was received <i>à +bras ouverts</i> and with an urbane offhandedness.</p> + +<p>After I had hung fire and cooled my heels on the banks for a while, I +was instructed to enter a skiff, which conveyed me and others to a +steamship of very meagre dimensions, whereupon owing to the heel of one +of my Japan leather shoes becoming implicated in the wire railing that +circumvented the desk, I was embarked in a horizontal attitude, and +severely deteriorated the tall chimneypot hat which I had assumed to do +credit to the hon'ble periodical I represented. (<i>Nota bene.</i> Hatmaker's +bill for renovating same, 2 rupees 8 annas—which those to whom it is of +concern will please attend to and refund.)</p> + +<p>On recovery of my head-gear and equanimity, I stationed myself in close +proximity to the officiating coach for purpose of being on the threshold +of inquiries, and proceeded to pop numerous questions to my neighbours. +I ascertained, among other things, that the vessels are +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71"></a></span> called +"eights," owing to their containing nine passengers; that the ninth is +called the "cock," and is a mere supernumerary or understudent, in case +any member of the crew should be overcome by sickishness during the +contest and desire to discontinue.</p> + +<p>It appears that the race is of religious and ceremonious origin, for +only "good men" are permitted to compete, and none who is a wine +drunkard, a gluttonous, or addicted to any form of tobacco. Moreover, +they are to observe a strict fast and abstinence for many weeks previous +to the ordeal. The most prominent ecclesiastics and Judges of the +Supreme Courts are usually chosen from this class of individuals, which +is a further proof of the sanctimoniousness attached to the competition.</p> + +<p>Consequently I was the more surprised at the disrespectful +superciliousness of their <i>Fidus Achates</i> or dry nurse, who, stretching +himself upon his stomach in the prow, did shout counsels of perfection +at his receding pupils.</p> + +<p>Such criticisms as I overheard, seemed to me of a very puerile and +captious description, and some of an opprobrious personality, <i>e.g.</i>, as +when a certain oarman was taunted with being short—as though he were +capable of adding the cubic inch to his stature!</p> + +<p>Another I heard advised to keep his visual organs in the interior of the +boat, though, being +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72"></a></span> ordinary optics and not at all of a vitreous +composition, they could not be removable by volition. Again, a third was +reproached because of the lateness with which he had made his beginning; +but, as it was not asserted that he was inferior to the rest, the +tardiness of his initiation was surely rather honourable than +disgraceful!</p> + +<p>I observed that said trainer did stickle almost prudishly for propriety, +being greatly shocked at the levity with which the rowers were attired +and entreating them to keep their buttons well up, though indeed I could +discern none, nor was there much which was humanly possible to be +buttoned.</p> + +<p>For myself, I must make the humble complaint that the Hon'ble Coach was +defective in courteous attention to my inquisitiveness, which he totally +ignored. For I could not prevail upon him to explain what thing it was +that he directed the oarmen to "wait for," to "spring at from a +stretcher," and "catch at the beginning;" nor why they were forbidden to +row with their hands, not being quadrumanous, and able to employ their +feet in such a manner; nor whether when he commanded them to "get in at +once," he intended them to leap into the waters or to return to the +landing-place, nor why they did neither of these things; nor why he +should express satisfaction that a certain rower had got rid of a lofty +feather, which <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73"></a></span> would +indubitably have added to the showiness of his appearance.</p> + +<p>Again, hearing him anxiously inquire the time after a stoppage, I was +proceeding to explain how gladly I would have given him such +information, but for the unavoidable absence of my golden chronometer, owing +to the failure of Misters <span class="smcap">Tomkins</span> and <span class="smcap">Johnson</span> to restore the same, +whereupon he treated me in such a "please-go-away-and-die" sort of style +that I subsided with utmost alacrity.</p> + +<p>On the return voyage the Collegiate eight was challenged to a spurting +match by a scratched crew, which appeared to me to be the superior in +velocity, though it seemed it was then too late to make the happy +exchange.</p> + +<p>When the practice was at an end and the Blues in a state of quiescence, +I intimated my desire to harangue them and express my wonderment and +admiration at beholding them content to suffer such hardships and perils +and faultfinding without expostulation or excuses for their +shortcomings, and all for no pecuniary recompense, but the evasive +reward of a <i>nominis umbra</i>. And I would have reminded them of the +extended popularity of their performance, and that it was an unfairness +to muzzle the ox that treadeth upon one's corn, appealing to them to +stand up for their rights, and refuse to compete +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74"></a></span>except for the +honorarium of a <i>quid pro quo</i>.</p> + +<p>But the official instructor, seeing me about to climb upon the poop, to +deliver my oration, entreated me with so much earnestness to desist that +I became immediately aphonous.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee is taken to see a Glove-Fight.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">A young</span> sprightly Londoner acquaintance of mine, who is a member of a +Sportish Club where exhibitions of fisticuffs are periodically given, +did generously invite me on a recent Monday evening to be the +eye-witness of this gladiatorial spectacle.</p> + +<p>And, though not constitutionally bellicose, I eagerly accepted his +invitation on being assured that I should not be requisitioned to take +part personally in such pugilistic exercises, and should observe same +from a safe distance and coign of vantage, for I am sufficiently a lover +of sportfulness to appreciate highly the sight of courage and science in +third parties.</p> + +<p>So he conducted me to the Club-house, and by the open sesame of a ticket +enabled me to penetrate the barrier, after which I followed his wake +downstairs, through rooms full of smoking and conversing sportlovers +mostly in festal attire, to a long and lofty hall with balconies and a +stage at the further end with foliage painted in imitation of a forest, +which was tenanted by press reporters.</p> + +<p>The centre of the hall was monopolised by a white square platform +confined by a circumambience +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76"></a></span> of rope, which I was informed was the +veritable theatre of war and cockpit.</p> + +<p>Presently two hobbardyhoys made the ascent of this platform with their +attendant myrmidons, and did proceed to remove their trouserings and +coats until they were in the state of nature with the exception of a +loincloth, whereupon the President or Master of the Ceremonies +introduced them and their respective partisans by name to the +assemblage, stating their precise ponderability, and that these juvenile +antagonists were fraternally related by ties of brotherhood.</p> + +<p>At which I was revolted, for it is against nature and <i>contra bonos +mores</i> that relations should be egged on into family jars, nor can such +proceedings tend to promote the happiness and domesticity of their home +circle. However, on such occasion when the youths were in danger of +inflicting corporal injuries upon each other, the President called out +"Time" in such reproving tones that they hung their heads in +shamefulness and desisted. And at length they were persuaded into a +pacification, and made the <i>amende honorable</i> by shaking each other by +the hand, whereat I was rejoiced, for, as Poet <span class="smcap">Watt</span> says, "Birds which +are in little nests should refrain from falling out."</p> + +<p>The victory was adjudged to the elder brother—in obedience, I suppose, +to the rule of Primogeniture, for he did not succeed in reducing his +opponent to a <i>hors de combat</i>. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77"></a></span></p> + +<p>Next came a more bustling encounter between Misters <span class="smcap">Bill Husband</span> and +<span class="smcap">Mysterious Smith</span>, which was protracted to the duration of eight rounds. +I was largely under the impression that Mister <span class="smcap">Husband</span> was to win, owing +to the acclamations he received, and the excessive agility with which he +removed his head from vicinity of the blows of Mister <span class="smcap">Mysterious Smith</span>.</p> + +<p>It was truly magnificent to see how they did embrace each other by the +neck, and the wonderment and suspicion in their glances when one +discovered that he was resting his chin upon the padded hand of his +adversary, and from time to time the Hon'ble Chairman was heard ordering +them to "break away," and "not to hold," or requesting us to refrain +from any remarks. And at intervals they retired to sit upon chairs in +opposing corners, where they rinsed their mouths, and were severely +fanned by their bearers, who agitated a large towel after the manner of +a punkah. But, in the end, it was Mysterious Mister <span class="smcap">Smith</span> who hit the +right nail on the head, and was declared the conquering hero, though +once more I was incapacitated to discover in what precise respects he +was the <i>facile princeps</i>.</p> + +<p>Around the hall there were placards announcing that smoking was +respectfully prohibited, and the President did repeatedly entreat +members of the audience to refrain from blowing a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78"></a></span> cloud, assuring them +that the perfume of tobacco was noxious and disgustful to the +combatants, and threatening to mention disobedient tobacconists by name.</p> + +<p>Whereupon most did desist; but some, secreting their cigars in the +hollow of their hands, took whiffs by stealth, and blushed to find it +<a name="flame">flame</a>; while others, who were such grandees and big pots that their own +convenience was the first and foremost desideratum, continued to smoke +with lordliness and indifference.</p> + +<p>And I am an approver of such conduct—for it is unreasonable that a +well-bred, genteel sort of individual should make the total sacrifice of +a cigar, for which he has perhaps paid as much as two or even four +annas, out of consideration for insignificant common chaps hired to +engage in snipsnaps for his entertainment.</p> + +<p>The last competition was to be the <i>bonne bouche</i> and <i>pièce de +résistance</i> of the evening, consisting of a rumpus in twenty rounds +between Misters <span class="smcap">Tom Tracy</span> of Australia, and <span class="smcap">Tommy Williams</span>, +from the same hemisphere, at which I was on the tiptoe of expectation.</p> + +<p>But, although they commenced with dancing activity, one of the <span class="smcap">Toms</span> in +the very first round sparred the other under the chin with such +superabundant energy that he immediately became a recumbent for a +lengthy period, and, on being elevated to a chair, only recaptured +sufficient consciousness to abandon the sponge. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79"></a></span></p> + +<p>And then, to my chapfallen disappointment, the Chairman announced that +he was very sorry and could not help it, but that was the concluding box +of the evening.</p> + +<p>I will reluctantly confess that, on the whole, I found the proceedings +lacking in sensationality, since they were of very limited duration, and +totally devoid of bloodshed, or any danger to the life and limb of the +performers. For it is not reasonably possible for a combatant to make a +palpable hit when his hands are, as it were, muzzled, being cabined, +cribbed, and confined in padded soft gloves. I am not a squeamish in +such cases, and I must respectfully submit that the Cause of True Sport +can only be hampered by such nursery and puerile restrictions, for none +can expect to compound an omelette without the fracture of eggs.</p> + +<p>Upon remarking as above to my young lively friend, he assured me that +even a gloved hand was competent to produce facial disfigurement and tap +the vital fluid, and offered to demonstrate the truth of his statement +if I would be the partaker with him in a glove-box.</p> + +<p>But, though doubting the authenticity of his assertions, I thought it +prudential to decline the proof of the pudding, and so took a +precipitate leave of him with profuse thanks for his unparagoned +kindness, and many promises to put on the gloves with him at the first +convenient opportunity.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee finds himself in a position of extreme delicacy.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">It</span> is an indubitable fact that the discovery of steam is the most +marvellous invention of the century. For had it been predicted +beforehand that innumerable millions of human beings would be +transported with security at a headlong speed for hundreds of miles +along a ferruginous track, the most temporary deviation from which would +produce the inevitable cataclysm and no end of a smash, the working +majority would have expressed their candid opinion of such rhodomontade +by cocking the contemptuous snook of incredulity.</p> + +<p>And yet it is now the highly accomplished fact and matter of course!</p> + +<p>Still, I shall venture to express the opinion that the pleasurability of +such railway journeys is largely dependent upon the person who may be +our travelling companion, and that some of the companies are not quite +careful enough in the exclusion of undesirable fellow-passengers. In +proof of which I now beg to submit an exemplary instance from personal +experience.</p> + +<p>I was recently the payer of a ceremonial visit to a friend of my +boyhood, namely, <span class="smcap">Baboo Chuckerbutty Ram</span>, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83"></a></span> +with whom, finding him at +home in his lodgings in a distant suburb, I did hold politely +affectionate intercourse for the space of two hours, and then departed, +as I had come, by train, and the sole occupant of a second-class dual +compartment divided by a low partition.</p> + +<p>At the next station the adjoining compartment was suddenly invaded by a +portly female of the matronly type, with a rubicund countenance and a +bonnet in a dismantled and lopsided condition, who was bundled through +the doorway by the impetuosity of a porter, and occupied a seat in +immediate opposition to myself.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p81'></a> +<img src="images/p81.jpg" width="439" height="700" alt="A beaming simper of indescribable suavity."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"A BEAMING SIMPER OF INDESCRIBABLE SUAVITY."</span></p></div> + +<p>When the train resumed its motion, I observed that she was contemplating +me with a beaming simper of indescribable suavity, and though she was of +an unornamental exterior and many years my superior, I constrained +myself from motives of merest politeness to do some simperings in +return, since only a churlish would grudge such an economical and +inexpensive civility.</p> + +<p>But whether she was of an unusually ardent temperament, or whether, +against my volition, I had invested my simper with an irresistible +winsomeness, I cannot tell; but she fell to making nods and becks and +wreathed smiles which reduced me to crimsoned sheepishness, and the +necessity of looking earnestly out of window at vacancy.</p> + +<p>At this she entreated me passionately not to +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84"></a></span> be unkind, inviting me to +cross to the next compartment and seat myself by her side; but I did +nill this invitation politely, urging that Company's bye-laws +countermanded the placing of boots upon the seat-cushions, and my utter +inability to pose as a <i>Romeo</i> to scale the barrier.</p> + +<p>Whereupon to my lively horror and amazement, she did exclaim, "Then I +will come to <i>you</i>, darling!" and commenced to scramble precipitately +towards me over the partition!</p> + +<p>At which I was in the blue funk, perceiving the <i>arcanum</i> of her design +to embrace me, and resolved to leave no stone unturned for the +preservation of my bacon. So, at the moment she made the entrance into +my compartment, I did simultaneously hop the twig into the next, and she +followed in pursuit, and I once more achieved the return with +inconceivable agility.</p> + +<p>Then, as we were both, like <i>Hamlet</i>, fat and short of breath, I +addressed her gaspingly across the barrier, assuring her that it was as +if to milk the ram to set her bonnet at a poor young native chap who +regarded her with nothing but platonical esteem, and advising her to sit +down for the recovery of her wind.</p> + +<p>But alack! this speech only operated to inspire her with <i>spretæ injuria +formæ</i>, and flourishing a large stalwart umbrella, she exclaimed that +she would teach me how to insult a lady. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85"></a></span></p> + +<p>After that she came floundering once again over the partition, and +guarding my loins, I leapt into the next compartment, seeing the affair +had become a <i>sauve qui peut</i>, and devil take the hindmost: and at the +nick of time, when she was about to descend like a wolf on a fold, I +most fortunately perceived a bell-handle provided for such pressing +emergencies and rung it with such unparalleled energy, that the train +immediately became stationary.</p> + +<p>Then, as my female persecutress alighted on the floor of the compartment +in the limp condition of a collapse, I stepped across to my original +seat, and endeavoured to look as if with withers unwrung. Presently the +Guard appeared, and what followed I can best render in the dramatical +form of a dialogue:—</p> + +<p><i>The Guard</i> (<i>addressing the </i>Elderly Female, <i>who is sitting smiling with +vacuity beneath the bell-pull</i>). So it is you who have sounded the +alarm! What is it all about?</p> + +<p><i>The Elderly Female</i> (<i>with warm indignation</i>). Me? I never did! I am +too much of the lady. It was that young coloured gentleman in the next +compartment.</p> + +<p class="txtright">[<i>At which the tip of my nose goes down with apprehensiveness</i>.</p> + +<p><i>The Guard.</i> Indeed! A likely story! How could the gentleman ring this +bell from where he is?</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>with mental presence</i>). Well said, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86"></a></span> Mister <span class="smcap">Guard</span>! +The thing is not humanly possible. <i>Rem acu tetigisti!</i></p> + +<p><i>The Guard.</i> I do not understand Indian, Sir. If you have anything to +say about this affair, you had better say it.</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>combining discretion with magnanimousness</i>). As a chivalrous, +I must decline to bring any accusation against a member of the weaker +sex, and my tongue is hermetically sealed.</p> + +<p><i>The Eld. F.</i> It was <i>him</i> who rang the alarm, and not me. He was in +this compartment, and I in that.</p> + +<p><i>The Guard.</i> What? have you been playing at Hide-and-seek together, +then? But if your story is watertight, he must have rung the bell in a +state of abject bodily terror, owing to your chivying him about!</p> + +<p><i>The Eld. F.</i> It is false! I have been well educated, and belong to an +excellent family. I merely wanted to kiss him.</p> + +<p><i>The Guard.</i> I see what is your complaint. You have been imbibing the +drop too much and will hear of this from the Company. I must trouble +you, Mam, for your correct name and address.</p> + +<p><i>Myself</i> (<i>after he had obtained this and was departing</i>). Mister Guard, +I do most earnestly entreat you not to abandon me to the tender mercies +of this feminine. I am not a proficient in physical courage, and have no +desire to test +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87"></a></span> the +correctness of Poet <span class="smcap">Pope's</span> assertion, that Hell does +not possess the fury of a scorned woman. I request to be conducted into +a better-populated compartment.</p> + +<p><i>The Guard</i> (<i>with complimentary jocosity</i>). Ah, such young good-looking +chaps as you ought to go about in a veil. Come with me, and I'll put you +into a smoker-carriage. You won't be run after there!</p> + +<p>So the incident was closed, and I did greatly compliment myself upon the +sagacity and coolness of head with which I extricated myself from my +pretty kettle of fish. For to have denounced myself as the real alarmist +would have rendered the affair more, rather than less, discreditable to +my feminine companion, and I should have been arraigned before the +solemn bar of a police-court magistrate, who might even have made a Star +Chamber matter of the incident.</p> + +<p>All is well that is well over, but when you have been once bitten, you +become doubly bashful. Consequently, this humble self will take care +that he does not on any subsequent occasion travel alone in a railway +compartment with a female woman.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee is taken by surprise.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Diligent</span> perusers of my lucubrations to <i>Punch</i> will remember that I +have devoted sundry jots and tittles to the subject of Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina +Mankletow</span>, and already may have concluded that I was long since up to +the hilt in the tender passion. In this deduction, however, they would +have manufactured a stentorian cry from an extreme paucity of wool; the +actual fact being that, although percipient of the well-proportionate +symmetry of her person and the ladylike liveliness of her deportment, I +did never regard her except with eyes of strictly platonic philandering +and calf love.</p> + +<p>It is true that, at certain seasons, the ostentatious favours she would +squander upon other young masculine boarders in my presence did reduce +me to the doleful dump of despair, so that even the birds and beasts of +forest shed tears at my misery, and frequently at meal-times I have +sought to move her to compassion by neighing like horse, or by the +incessant rolling of my visual organs; though she did only attribute +such <i>ad misericordiam</i> appeals to the excessive gravity of the cheese, +or the immaturity of the rhubarb pie.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89"></a></span></p> + +<p>But I was then a labourer under the impression that I was the odd man +out of her affections, and it is well known that, to a sensitive, it is +intolerable to feel that oneself is not the object of adoration, even to +one to whom we may entertain but a mediocre attraction.</p> + +<p>On a recent evening we had a <i>tête-à-tête</i> which culminated in the utter +surprise. It was the occasion of our hebdomadal dancing-party at +Porticobello House, and I had solicited her to become a copartner with +this unassuming self in the maziness of a waltz; but, not being the +carpet-knight, and consequently treading the measure with too great +frequency upon the toes of my fair auxiliary, she suggested a temporary +withdrawal from circulation.</p> + +<p>To which I assenting, she conducted me to a landing whereon was a small +glazed apartment, screened by hangings and furnished with a profusion of +unproductive pots, which is styled the conservatory, and here we did sit +upon two wicker-worked chairs, and for a while were mutually <i>sotto +voce</i>.</p> + +<p>Presently I, remarking with corner of eye the sumptuousness of her +appearance, and the supercilious indifference of her demeanour, which +made it seem totally improbable that she should ever, like <i>Desdemona</i>, +seriously incline to treat me as an <i>Othello</i>, commenced to heave the +sighs of a fire-stove, causing Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> to accuse me of desiring +myself in India.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90"></a></span></p> + +<p>I denied this with native hyperbolism, saying that I was content to +remain in <i>statu quo</i> until the doom cracked, and that the conservatory +was for me the equivalent of Paradise.</p> + +<p>She replied that its similitude to Paradise would be more startling if a +larger proportion of the pots had contained plants, and if such plants +as there were had not fallen into such a lean and slippered stage of +decrepitude, adding that she did perpetually urge her mamma to incur the +expense of some geranium-blooms and a few fairy-lamps, but she had +refused to run for such adornments.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p91'></a> +<img src="images/p91.jpg" width="518" height="700" alt="I became once more the silent tomb."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"I BECAME ONCE MORE THE SILENT TOMB."</span></p></div> + +<p>And I, with spontaneous gallantry, retorted that she was justified in +such parsimony, since her daughter's eyes supplied such fairy +illumination, and upon her cheeks was a bloom brighter than many +geraniums. But this compliment she unhappily mistook as an insinuation +that her complexion was of meretricious composition, and seeing that I +had put my foot into a <i>cul-de-sac</i>, I became once more the silent tomb, +and exhaled sighs at intervals.</p> + +<p>Presently she declared once more that she saw, from the dullness of my +expression, that I was longing for the luxurious magnificence of my +Indian palace.</p> + +<p>Now my domestic abode, though a respectable spacious sort of residence, +and containing my father, mother, married brothers, &c., together with a +few antique unmarried aunts, is not at all +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93"></a></span> of a palatial +architecture; but it is a bad bird that blackens his own nest, and so I +merely answered that I was now so saturated with Western civilisation, +that I had lost all taste for Oriental splendours.</p> + +<p>Next she inquired whether I did not miss the tiger-shooting and +pig-sticking; and I replied (with veraciousness, since I am not the <i>au +fait</i> in such sports) that I could not deny a liability to miss both +tigers and pigs, and, indeed, all animals that were <i>feræ naturæ</i>, and +she condemned the hazardousness of these jungle sports, and wished me to +promise that I would abstain from them on my return to India.</p> + +<p>To this I replied that before I agreed to such a self-denying ordinance, +I desired to be more convinced of the sincerity of her interest in the +preservation of my humble existence.</p> + +<p>Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> asked what had she done that I should be in dubitation as +to her <i>bona fides</i>?</p> + +<p>Then I did meekly remind her of her flirtatious preferences for the +young beef-witted London chaps, and her incertitude and disdainful +capriciousness towards myself, who was not a beetlehead or an obtuse, +but a cultivated native gentleman with high-class university degree, and +an oratorical flow of language which was infallibly to land me upon the +pinnacle of some tip-top judicial preferment in the Calcutta High Court +of Justice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94"></a></span></p> + +<p>She made the excuse that she was compelled by financial reasons to be +pleasant to the male boarders, and that I could not expect any marked +favouritism so long as I kept my tongue concealed inside my damask cheek +like a worm in bud.</p> + +<p>Upon which, transported by uncontrollable emotion, I ventured to embrace +her, assuring her that she was the cynosure of my neighbouring eyes, and +supplied the vacuum and long-felt want of my soul, and while occupied in +imprinting a chaste salute upon her rosebud lips—who'd have thought it! +her severe matronly parent popped in through the curtains and, surveying +me with a cold and basilican eye, did demand my intentions.</p> + +<p>Nor can I tell what I should have responded, seeing that I had acted +from momentary impulsiveness and feminine encouragement, had not Miss +<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>, with ready-made female wit, answered for me that it was all +right, and that we were the engaged couple.</p> + +<p>But her mother expressed an ardent desire to hear my <i>vivâ voce</i> +corroboration of this statement, informing me that she was but a poor +weak widow-woman, but that, if it should appear that I was merely the +giddy trifler of her daughter's young, artless affections, it would be +her dolesome duty to summon instantaneously every male able-bodied +inmate of her establishment, and request them to inflict deserved +corporal chastisement upon my person!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95"></a></span></p> + +<p>So, although still of a twitter with amazement at Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> +announcement, I considered it the better part of valour to corroborate +it with promptitude, rather than incur the shocking punches and kicks of +numerous athletic young commercials; and, upon hearing the piece of good +news, Mrs <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> exploded into lachrymation, saying that she was +divested of narrow-minded racial colour prejudices, and had from the +first regarded me as a beloved son.</p> + +<p>Then, blessing me, and calling me her Boy, she clasped me against her +bosom, where, owing to the exuberant redundancy of her ornamental +jetwork, my nose and chin received severe laceration and disfigurement, +which I endured courageously, without a whimper.</p> + +<p>When I have grown more accustomed to being the lucky dog, I shall +commence cockahooping, and become merry as a grig. At the present moment +I am only capable of wonderment at the unpremeditated rapidity with +which such solemn concerns as betrothals are knocked off in this +country.</p> + +<p>But if, as <i>Macbeth</i> says, such jobs are to be done at all, then it is +well they were done quickly.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Drawbacks and advantages of being engaged. Some Meditations in a Music-hall, together +with notes of certain things that Mr Jabberjee failed to understand.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">My</span> preceding article announced the important intelligence of my +betrothal, in which I was then too much the neophyte to express any very +opinionated judgment as to the pros or cons of my approaching +<i>benediction</i> as a <i>Benedick</i> (if I may be allowed a somewhat humorous +pun).</p> + +<p><i>L'appétit vient en mangeant</i>, and I am blessing my stars more fervidly +every day for the lucky windfall which has bolted upon me from the blue.</p> + +<p>All the select boarders were speedily informed of my engagement, and the +males though profuse in their congratulations, did manifest their +green-eyed monster by sundry veiled chucklings and rib-pokings, while +the ladies—especially Miss <span class="smcap">Spink</span>—are become less pressing in their +attentions, and address me as "Prince" with increased frequency, and in +a tone of tittering acidulation.</p> + +<p>This, however, is attributable to natural disappointment; +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97"></a></span>for it was +notorious that all of them, even the least prepossessing, were on the +tiptoe of languishing expectancy that I should cast my handkerchief in +one of their directions. But the feminine nature is not capable of +sustaining the good-fortune of another member of their sex with +good-humoured complacency!</p> + +<p>On the other hand, I enjoy many privileges and bonuses. I am permitted +to enter Mrs <span class="smcap">Mankletow's</span> private parlour <i>ad libitum</i>, and there +converse with my beloved, calling her "<span class="smcap">Jessie</span>," and even embrace her in +moderation. I may also embrace her Mother, and address her as "Mamma," +which affords me raptures of a less tumultuous kind.</p> + +<p>Moreover now, when I conduct my <i>inamorata</i> to an entertainment, it is +no longer <i>de rigueur</i> for any third party to impersonate a gooseberry!</p> + +<p>The mention of entertainments reminds me that, a few evenings ago, I +escorted her to a music-hall, wherein, although I had previously +believed myself a past master in the shibboleth of London Cockneyisms +and technical terminology, I heard and saw much which was <i>au bout de +mon Latin</i>, and the head impossible to be made out of the tail.</p> + +<p><i>E.g.</i>, there were two young lady-performers alleged by the programme to +be "Serios and Bone Soloists," whereas they were the reverse of +lugubrious; nor were their physiognomies fleshless or osseous; but, on +the contrary, so shapely +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98"></a></span> and +well-favoured that <span class="smcap">Jessie</span> did remonstrate +with me upon the perseverance with which I gazed at them.</p> + +<p>And I could not at all find anyone to explain to me the difference +between a "<i>Comedian</i>" and a "<i>Comic</i>"; or a "<i>Comedian and Patterer</i>" +and an "<i>Eccentric Comedian</i>"; or a "<i>Society Belle</i>" and a "<i>Burlesque +Artiste</i>"; or, again, "<i>A Sketch Artiste</i>" and a "<i>Speciality Dancer</i>." +For to me they seemed precisely similar. There were "<i>four Charming +Lyric Sisters</i>," who performed a dance in long expansive skirts, and in +conclusion did all turn heels-over-head in simultaneity; but this, it +seems, was—contrary to my own expectancy—<i>not</i> to dance a speciality. +Speaking for my humble part, I am respectfully of opinion that lovely +woman loses in queenly dignity by the abrupt execution of a somersault; +however, the feat did indubitably excite vociferous applause from the +spectators.</p> + +<p>Further there appeared a couple of Duettists in ordinary evening +habiliments, who sang in unison with egregious melodiousness. One was +plump as a partridge; the other thin as a weasel; and they related how +they were both the adorers of a certain lovely damsel called "<span class="smcap">Sally</span>," +who was the darling of their co-operative hearts, and resided in their +Alley. And of all the days in the week they loved Sunday, because then +they were dressed in all their best, and went for a walk with <span class="smcap">Sally</span>. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101"></a></span></p> + +<p>I should have thought that it was not humanly feasible for <span class="smcap">Sally</span> to +continue such periodical promenades without exhibiting some preferential +kind of choice, either for the partridge or the weasel, and that such a +triangular courtship and triple alliance would infallibly terminate in +the apple of discord, but <span class="smcap">Jessie</span> did assure me that it was quite usual +and the correct cheese for a girl to have more than one beau upon her +string.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p99'></a> +<img src="images/p99.jpg" width="412" height="700" alt="In garbage of unparagoned shabbiness."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"IN GARBAGE OF UNPARAGONED SHABBINESS."</span></p></div> + +<p>I made the further observation that the Comedians and Comics must be +reduced to extreme pauperism, since they presented themselves before a +well-dressed, respectable audience in garbage of unparagoned shabbiness, +and with hair of unbrushed wildness, and needing immediate tonsure.</p> + +<p>One songster did offer some excuse for the poverty of his appearance, +telling us his hard case, how that he was occupied in declaring his +passion to a beauteous damsel, when she was "all over him in a minute," +and, while he was making love to the pretty stars above, she cleared out +all his pockets in a minute! At which many laughed; but, though Jove is +said to regard lovers' perjuries with cachinnation, I could not help +feeling the most pitiable sympathy for such a disappointing conclusion +to a love affair, seeing that it is impossible for the comeliest nymph +who returns her admirer's devotion by stealing his purse, and similar trash, to remain +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102"></a></span> posed any longer upon the towering pedestal +of an ideal. Upon making this remark to <span class="smcap">Jessie</span>, however, she uttered the +repartee that I was the silly noodle; though she is, I am sure, +notwithstanding her attachment to gewgaws, not capable of descending +personally to such light-fingered tactics.</p> + +<p>I was additionally bewildered by a chorus chanted by one of the Society +Belles, which I took down <i>verbatim</i>, in the hope of a solution. It was +as follows: "For I like a good liar, indeed I do! Provided he comes out +with something new! But why did he tell me that story with whiskers on, +why, why, why?"</p> + +<p>Now to me it is wholly incomprehensible that the female intelligence +should admire mendacity in the opposite sex on the sole conditions that +the said liar should present himself in some novel article of attire, +and, previously to relating his untruth, remove from his cheeks any +hirsute appendages. One of the boarders whom I consulted on the subject +attempted to persuade me that it was the <i>story</i> that had the whiskers; +but it is nonsensical to suppose that a purely abstract affair like an +untruth could be furnished with capillary growth, which belongs to the +concrete department.</p> + +<p>There was a lady described as an "incomparable Comedienne," who was the +victim of unexampled bad luck. For she had purchased a camera (which she +exhibited to the assembly), +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103"></a></span> and with this she had gone about +photographing landscapes and other sceneries. But, lack-a-daisy! no +sooner were they printed than the pictures were discovered to be +irretrievably spoilt by objects in the foreground of such doubtful +propriety that they were not exactly fit to place among her brick-backs, +so she was compelled to keep them in a drawer among her knick-nacks!</p> + +<p>I should have liked her to inform us where such a faulty mechanism was +procured, and why she did not exchange it for one of superior +competency.</p> + +<p>She was succeeded on the stage by a little girl with a hoop, who bore a +striking resemblance to her predecessor, and was probably her infantile +daughter. This child was evidently of a greatly inquisitive disposition, +and asked many questions of her progenitors which they were unable to +answer, bidding her not to bother, and to go away and play.</p> + +<p>Then she asked a juvenile boy (who remained invisible), called "<span class="smcap">Johnny +Jones</span>," and informed us that "she knew now." But I was still in the +total darkness as to the answers, which even <span class="smcap">Jessie</span> declared that she +was "<i>Davus non Œdipus</i>," and not able to provide with the correct +solutions.</p> + +<p>Upon the whole, I am of opinion that music-halls are more fertile in +mental puzzlement and social problems, and more difficult of +comprehension, than theatrical entertainments. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104"></a></span></p> + +<p>This is, no doubt, why the spectators are allowed to consume liquors and +sandwiches throughout the performance, since it is well known that the +brain cannot carry on its <i>modus operandi</i> with efficiency if the +stomach is in the beggarly array of an empty box!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee's fellow-student. What's in a Title? An invitation to a Wedding. Mr J. as +a wedding guest, with what he thought of the ceremony, and how he distinguished himself +on the occasion.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">There</span> is a certain English young fellow-student of mine—to wit and +<i>videlicet</i>, <span class="smcap">Howard Allbutt-Innett</span>, Esquire, with whom I have succeeded +in scratching an acquaintance at sundry Law Lectures, and in the Library +of my Inn of Court—a most amiable tip-top young chap, who is "the +moulded glass of fashionable form," and cap-in-hand with innumerable +aristocratic nobs.</p> + +<p>Seeing that I had (at an earlier period) been a more diligent attendant +and note-taker of lectures than himself, he did pay me the transcendent +compliment of borrowing the loan of my note-book, which, to my grateful +astonishment, he condescended to bring back personally to Porticobello +House, saying that he had found my notes magnificent, and totally +incomprehensible to his more limited intellect!</p> + +<p>In <i>additum</i>, he graciously accepted my invitation +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106"></a></span> to ascend to the +drawing-room, where I introduced him freely to several select lady +boarders as my <i>alter ego</i> and <i>Fidus Achates</i>.</p> + +<p>On taking his leave, he expressed some marvelling that I should have +concealed my superior rank under the reticence of a napkin, having +observed that I was addressed as "Prince" by more than one of the +softer-sexed boarders.</p> + +<p>I replied that I attached no valid importance to the <i>nominis umbra</i> of +such a barren title, and that the contents of what there is nothing in +must necessarily be naught.</p> + +<p>He answered me warmly that he entirely joined issue with me in such an +opinion, and that he was often affected to sickishness by the snobbery +of mundane society, adding that he hoped I would give him the look up at +his paternal mansion in Prince's Square, Bayswater, shortly, since his +people would be overjoyed at making my acquaintance, which both +enraptured and surprised me, for hitherto he had ridden the high and +rough-shoed horse, and employed me to suck my brains as a cat's foot.</p> + +<p>And odzookers! before many days I was the recipient of a silver-lettered +missive, stating that Mr and Mrs <span class="smcap">Leofric Allbutt-Innett</span> did request the +honour of Prince <span class="smcap">Jabberjee's</span> company at the marriage of their daughter, +<span class="smcap">Clorinda Isabel</span>, with Mr <span class="smcap">Overton Wood +beigh-Smart</span>,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109"></a></span> at a certain sacred +Bayswater edifice.</p> + +<p>This I eagerly accepted, perceiving that my friend must have eulogised +to his parents my legal accomplishments and forensic acumen.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p107'></a> +<img src="images/p107.jpg" width="457" height="700" alt="The spectators saluted me with shouts of joy as the returned Shahzadar."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"THE SPECTATORS SALUTED ME WITH SHOUTS OF JOY AS THE RETURNED SHAHZADAR."</span></p></div> + +<p>When I did, in all my best, obey, alighting at the church in my embossed +cap, shawl neckcloth, a pair of yellow glove-kids, and patented Japan +shoes, the spectators saluted me with shouts of joy as the returned +<span class="smcap">Shahzadar</span>, which caused me to bow profusely, while the driver of the +hansom petitioned an additional sixpence.</p> + +<p>The interior of the church was dim and crowded with feminines, and I +could only hear flutters and rustlings, together with a subdued mumble +at the remoter end—which I ascertained to be the ceremony. Then +followed the long stop and awkward pause, accompanied on the organ, and +at length all the company stood on seats and the tiptoe of expectation, +as the bridal procession moved slowly down the central passage amidst +the congratulations of their friends and nearest relations.</p> + +<p>Not being desirous to hide under a bushel, I did press myself forward, +and addressing a lady whom I took to be the bride, I felicitated her +loudly, wishing that she might never become a widow, or use vermilion on +her grey head, and that she might wear the iron bangle, and get seven +male children.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110"></a></span></p> + +<p>Unhappily the serene ray of my goodwill was born to blush unseen in the +dark unfathomed cave of a desert ear, for the actual recipient of my +compliments was an unmarried spinster relative, who had already passed +the years of discretion.</p> + +<p>Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> welcomed me with cordial effusiveness, insisting that +I should honour them by visiting their residence, and critically +inspecting the nuptial gifts, to which I consented.</p> + +<p>On my arrival, I held a lengthy colloquy with the happy bridegroom, from +whom I was anxious to obtain particulars of English marriage customs, +such as whether he would be required to spend the evening in having his +ears pulled, and other facetious banterings by his mother-in-law and +sisters-in-law, as in India.</p> + +<p>But he seemed oppressed by so severe a bashfulness that I could extract +no information from him, and presently the father of the bride came up +and conducted me into an apartment wherein was a kind of bazaar, or +exhibition of clocks and lamps and stationery cases and knives and forks +and other trinkets and gewgaws, none of which appeared to me at all +different from similar objects in shop windows.</p> + +<p>However, the greatest admiration and wonderment were expressed by all +who entered, and I found that the host was under grave apprehensiveness +that the presents might be looted +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111"></a></span> by the more unscrupulous of the +guests, for he pointed out to me a sharp-eyed, shy gentleman in a +corner, who, he informed me, was a disguised police-officer. This, at +first, I was loth to believe, but was assured that it was a necessary +precaution.</p> + +<p>Still, I will presume to point out that the simulation by a policeman of +the ordinary character of a friend of the family and fellow-rejoicer, is +a rather reprehensible trap to catch a sleeping weasel, since those +whose honesty is not invariably above par may be lulled into the false +security by his civilian get-up. And I did assure him, privately, that +it was totally unnecessary to keep an eye on myself, who was a native +University man with no necessity or natural taste for peculation, but +that I would infallibly inform him if I should succeed at detecting any +attempted dishonesty.</p> + +<p>Later I was ushered into the refreshment-room, and partook of a pink +ice, with champagne-wine and strawberries, after which I entreated leave +of Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> to deliver a nuptial oration. And she, overjoyed +at my happy thought, did loudly request silence for Prince <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, +who was to utter a few very brief utterances.</p> + +<p>So as they became all ears, I addressed them, describing how, in my +native country, at such a bridal feast and blow-out, it was customary +for the bridegroom's mother to eat a sevenfold +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112"></a></span> repast, for fear of a +subsequently empty stomach; but the bride's mother, on the contrary, +will touch nothing, feeling that the more she fasts then, the more +provender will fall to her later on. And I facetiously added that, on +the present occasion, I had the certainty that both the mothers might +indulge their appetites <i>ad libitum</i>.</p> + +<p>Next I recounted how, during a former boyish wedding of my own, my +wife's mother after, as was befitting, setting a conical tinselled cap +upon my head, and placing ten rings of twigs upon my ten fingers, and +binding my hands with a weaver's shuttle, did say, "I have bound thee, +and bought thee with cowries, and put a shuttle between thy fingers; now +bleat then like a lamb." Whereupon I, being of a jokish disposition, +did, unexpectedly and contrary to usage, cry "Baa" loudly, causing my +mother-in-law to fear that I was a dull—until that night in the Zenana +she had the great happiness to overhear me outwitting all the females +present by the sprightliness of my badinage.</p> + +<p>And I was proceeding, amidst vociferous cachinnation, to enumerate some +of my most lively sallies, when the bride's father did take me by the +arm, and drawing me aside, inform me that the young couple were just +about to start for their wedding journey, and that I was urgently +required to see them depart.</p> + +<p>I observed that here, as with us, it is <i>de règle</i> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113"></a></span> to scatter rice upon +the head of the bridegroom—but neither treacle nor spices. Moreover, +this complimentary shower is extended to the bride and the +carriage-horses, and hurled with athletic vigorousness, while it is a +point of honour to knock off the coachman's hat with a female satin +slipper.</p> + +<p>I was disappointed to see that both the happy pair had cast aside their +gorgeous wedding garments, and put on quite ordinary and everyday +attire, which, if not due to excessive parsimoniousness, must originate +in a shamefaced desire to conceal their state of connubiality though it +might be reasonably anticipated that they should rather be anxious to +manifest their triumphant good-luck <i>pro bono publico</i>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee is asked out to dinner. Unreasonable behaviour of his betrothed. His +doubts concerning the social advantages of a Boarding Establishment, with some scathing +remarks upon ambitious pretenders. He goes out to dinner, and meets a person of some importance.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">The</span> pleasing impression produced by this humble self upon both Mister +and Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> at the wedding of their eldest daughter became +speedily prolific of golden fruit in the request of the honour of my +company for dinner at 8.15 <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> on a subsequent evening.</p> + +<p>Incidentally recounting this prime compliment to my lovely <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>, I +was astounded that she did not share my jubilations, but was, on the +contrary, the sore subject at not being included in such invitation, +which, as I explained, was totally irrational, seeing that the inviters +remained unaware of her nude existence. She, however, maintained that I +ought to have mentioned that I was an affianced, and have refused to sit +at any banquet at which she was +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117"></a></span> fobbed off with a cold shoulder. This +again was absurd, since the moiety of a loaf is preferable to total +deprivation of the staff of life, and moreover, in my country, it is +customary for the husband-elect to take his meals apart from his bride +that is to be; nor does she ever touch food until he has previously +assuaged his pangs of hunger. Notwithstanding, she would not be pacified +until I had bestowed upon her a gold and turquoise ring of best English +workmanship, as an olive-branch and calumet of peace.</p> + +<p>But, outside Porticobello House, I have been close as wax on the subject +of my flowery chains, and it was especially inconceivable that I should +inform my friend <span class="smcap">Howard</span> of same, since he has frequently bantered me in +wonderment that a respectable Oriental magnate should reside in such a +very ordinary and third-rate boarding establishment, where it was an +impossibility to gain any real familiarity with smart and refined +English society.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p115'></a> +<img src="images/p115.jpg" width="548" height="700" alt="Some haughty masculine might insult her under my very nose."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"SOME HAUGHTY MASCULINE MIGHT INSULT HER UNDER MY VERY NOSE."</span></p></div> + +<p>And who knows that if I should introduce Miss <span class="smcap">Jessie</span> into company of a +superior caste, some haughty masculine might insult her under my very +nose; and lack-a-daisy! where would she find a protector?</p> + +<p>I am certainly oppressed by an increasing dubiety whether Mrs <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> +is verily such an upper crustacean and <i>habituée</i> of the <i>beau monde</i> as +she did represent herself to be. It is well-nigh incomprehensible that any individual +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118"></a></span>should seek to appear of a higher social +status than Nature has provided; but my youthful acquaintance, <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span>, Jun., +Esq., informs me that this is a common failing among the English +classes, who fondly imagine that nothing is needed to render a frog the +exact equivalent to an ox except an increased quantity of air, +forgetting that if a frog is abnormally inflated, it is apt to provide +the rather ludicrous catastrophe of exploding from excessive +swellishness!</p> + +<p>However <i>revenons à nos moutons</i>—<i>id est</i>, the dinner party.</p> + +<p>I intended to be the early bird at Prince's Square, but, owing to a +rarity among the hansom cabs, did not arrive until most of the guests +were already assembled, being welcomed with effusive hospitality by the +household god and goddess, Mr and Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span>, who begged leave +to present to me all the most distinguished of their friends.</p> + +<p>Then—<i>pop</i>, and <i>à l'improviste</i>—the door was thrown open, and a +butler announced <i>ore rotundo</i>, Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd Cummerbund</span>, whom, in the +wink of an eye, I recognised as an ex-Justice of the very court in +Calcutta in which my male progenitor practises as a mook-tear, or +attorney, and who, moreover, was familiar with myself almost <i>ab ovo</i>, +having been more than once humbly presented to his notice by my said +father, with a request for his patronising +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119"></a></span> opinion of my abilities, and +the feasibility of my education at a London Inn of Court!</p> + +<p>Oh, my gracious! I was as if to sink through the carpet, and sought to +draw in my horns of dilemma behind a column, when, to my uncontrollable +dismay, my hostess led him towards me, with the remark that he was +probably already acquainted in India with His Highness Prince <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>.</p> + +<p>The Hon'ble Retired Judge at this did merely smile indulgently, +observing that India was a country of considerable extensiveness, and +inquiring of me in my own tongue where my <i>raj</i> was situated, and the +strength of my army, though with a scintillation in his visual organs +that told me he knew me perfectly well.</p> + +<p>And I, realising that honesty was my best policy of insurance from his +displeasure, did throw myself frankly on the mercy of the Court, +protesting volubly in native language that I was an industrious poor +Bengali boy, and had always regarded him as my beloved father; that I +was not to blame because certain foolish, ignorant persons imagined me +to be some species of Rajah; and earnestly representing to him that our +kind mutual hostess would be woefully distressed by any disclosures. +"Let your Hon'ble Ludship," I said, "only remain hermetically sealed, +and preserve this as a trade secret, and my sisters, sisters-in-law, and aunts +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120"></a></span> shall +always chant hymns on the Ganges for your Honour's felicities!"</p> + +<p>His Honour, laughing good-naturedly, did tell me that if I liked to +assume the plumes of a daw, it was no affair of his, and kindly promised +to respect my confidences—at which I was greatly relieved. Indeed, +throughout the evening, nothing could exceed his affability, for, being +seated on the other side of the hostess, opposite myself, he showed me +the greatest honour and deference, frequently requesting my views on +such subjects as Increased Representation of the People of India, the +National Congress, and so forth; upon which, being now perfectly +reassured and at my ease, I discoursed with facundity, and did loudly +extol the intellectual capacity of the Bengalis, as evinced by +marvellous success in passing most difficult exams., and denouncing it +as a crying injustice and beastly shame that fullest political powers +should not be conceded to them, and that they should not be eligible for +all civil appointments <i>pari passu</i>, or even in priority to Englishmen.</p> + +<p>Wherein his Honour did warmly agree, assuring me with fatherly +benignancy of the pleasure with which he would hear of my appointment to +be Head of a District somewhere on the Punjab frontier, and mentioning +how a certain native Bengali gentleman of his acquaintance, +Deputy-Commissioner <span class="smcap">Grish Chunder Dé</span>, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121"></a></span> Esq., M.A., had distinguished +himself splendidly (according to the printed testimony of Hon'ble +<span class="smcap">Kipling</span>) in such a post of danger.</p> + +<p>I replied, that I was not passionately in love with personal danger, and +that in my case <i>cedant arma togæ</i>, and my tongue was mightier than my +sword, but that there was no doubt that we Bengalis were intellectually +competent to govern the whole country, provided only that we were backed +up from behind by a large English military force to uphold our +authority, as otherwise we should soon be the pretty pickles, owing to +brutal violence from Sikhs, Rajputs, Marathas, and similar uncivilised +coarse races.</p> + +<p>And Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd</span> expressed his lively satisfaction that I appreciated +some of the advantages of the British occupation.</p> + +<p>Thus, through my presence of mind in boldly grappling with the nettle, I +turned what might have been a disaster into a conspicuous triumph, for +all the company, seeing the favour I was in with such a big wig as +Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>, listened to me with spell-bound enchantment, +especially my friend <span class="smcap">Howard's</span> sprightly young sister, a damsel of +distinguished personal attractiveness, who was seated on my other side. +Her birth-name is <span class="smcap">Louisa-Gwendolen</span>; but her family and intimates, so she +did inform me, call her "<span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>."</p> + +<p>Of the dinner itself I can speak highly, as +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122"></a></span> being inexpressibly +superior, both in stylishness of service and for the quality of the +food, etc., to any meals hitherto furnished by Mrs <span class="smcap">Mankletow's</span> mahogany +board. Nevertheless, I wondered to find the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innetts</span> behind the +times in one respect, viz., the lighting, which was with old-fashioned +candles and semi-obscured lamps, instead of the more modern and +infinitely more brilliant illumination of gas! Here, at least, though in +other particulars of very mediocre elegance, I must pronounce +Porticobello House the more up to date.</p> + +<p>In taking leave, I did thank Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd Cummerbund</span> profusely +for so discreetly retaining its feline contents within the generous bag +of his mouth, whereat he clapped my back very cordially, advising me to +abstain for the future from a super-abundance of frills, since the +character of a diligent legal native student was a precious lily that +needed no princely gilding, and adding that he was indebted to me for a +most entertaining and mirthful evening. This I do not understand, as I +had not uttered any of the facetious puns and conceits wherewith it is +my <i>wont</i>—when I <i>will</i><a name='FNanchor_1'></a><a href='#Footnote_1' class='fnanchor'>[1]</a>—to set the table in a simper.</p> + +<p>But possibly I may have spoken rather humorously unawares, and it is proverbial that +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123"></a></span> these exalted +legal luminaries are pleased with a rattle and tickled by a straw.</p> + +<p>On my return I did omit to mention Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> to <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>; +but, after all, <i>cui bono</i>?</p><br><br> + +<div class='footnote'><p><a name='Footnote_1'></a><a href='#FNanchor_1'><span class="label">[1]</span></a> +This is a fairly sample specimen, though I have frequently surpassed +it in waggish drollery.—<i>H. B. J.</i></p></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> + +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XVI" id="XVI"></a>XVI</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee makes a pilgrimage to the Shrine of Shakespeare.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">I have</span> frequently spoken in the flattering terms of a eulogium +concerning my extreme partiality for the writings of Hon'ble <span class="smcap">William +Shakspeare</span>. It has been remarked, with some correctness, that he did not +exist for an age, but all the time; and though it is the open question +whether he did not derive all his ideas from previous writers, and even +whether he wrote so much as a single line of the plays which are +attributed to his inspired nib, he is one of the institutions of the +country, and it is the correct thing for every orthodox British subject +to admire and understand him even when most incomprehensible.</p> + +<p>Consequently I did cock-a-hoop for joy on receiving an invitation from +my friend <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span>, Jun., Esq., on behalf of his parents, that I +should accompany them on an excursion by rail to Stratford-upon-Avon, +where the said poet had his domicile of origin.</p> + +<p>And so great was my enthusiasm that, during the journey, I declaimed, +<i>ore rotundo</i>, certain select passages from his works which I had +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126"></a></span> +committed to memory during the salad days of my schoolboyishness, and +with such effect that Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee Allbutt-Innett</span> (who is excessively +emotional) was compelled, at times, to veil her countenance in the +recesses of a pocket-handkerchief.</p> + +<p>Having at length arrived at that hallowed and sacred spot, the very name +of which sends a sweet and responsive thrill through every educated +bosom, our first proceeding was to partake of a copious cold tiffin.</p> + +<p>This repast we ordered at an old-fashioned hostelry, whose doorway was +decorated by a counterfeit presentment of the Bard, and I observed that +similar effigies were placed above several of the shops as I walked +along the streets. These images somewhat resemble those erected to +Buddha in certain parts of India, being similarly bald, but +terminating—not in crossed legs, but a cushion with tassels. However, I +was not able to discover that it is the custom for even the most +ignorant inhabitants to do anything in the nature of poojah before these +figures any longer, though probably usual enough before <span class="smcap">Cromwell</span>, with +the iron sides, ordered all such baubles to be removed. In a hole of the +upper wall of the Town Hall there is a life-size statuary of <span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span>, +with legs complete, showing that he was not actually deficient in such +extremities and a mere gifted Torso: and it +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127"></a></span> is presumable that the +reason why only his upper portions are generally represented is, that +marble in these parts is too precious a commodity to be wasted on mere +superfluities.</p> + +<p>We visited the church, and saw his tomb, and there again was the +superior half of him occupied with writing verses on a cushion in a +mural niche, supported by pillars. Upon a slab below is inscribed a +verse requesting that his dust should not be digged, and cursing him who +should interfere with his bones, but in so mediocre a style, and of such +indifferent orthography, that it is considered by some to be a sort of +spurious cryptogram composed by Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Bacon</span>.</p> + +<p>On such a <i>vexata quæstio</i> I am not to give a decided opinion, though +the verse, as a literary composition, is hardly up to the level of +<i>Hamlet</i>, and it would perhaps have been preferable if the poet, instead +of attempting an impromptu, had looked out some suitable quotation from +his earlier works. For, when an author is occupied in shuffling off his +mortal coil, it is unreasonable to expect him to produce poetry that is +up to the mark.</p> + +<p>When I advanced this excuse aloud in the church, a party of Americans +within hearing exclaimed, indignantly, that such irreverent levity was a +scandal in a spot which was the Mecca of the entire civilised universe.</p> + +<p>Whereupon I did protest earnestly that I +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128"></a></span> meant no irreverence, being +<i>nulli secundus</i> in respect for the <i>Genius Loci</i>, only, as a critic of +English Literature, I could not help regretting that a poet gifted with +every requisite for producing a satisfactory epitaph had produced a +doggerel which was undeniably below his usual par.</p> + +<p>This rendered them of an increased ferocity, until Mr <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> +good naturedly took them into a corner and whispered that I was a very +wealthy young Indian Prince, of great scholastic attainments, but +oppressed by an uncontrollable <i>naïveté</i>, after which they all came and +shook me by the hand, saying they were very proud to have met me.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p129'></a> +<img src="images/p129.jpg" width="438" height="700" alt="'It was here,' I said, reverently, 'that the swan of Avon was hatched!'"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"IT WAS HERE," I SAID, REVERENTLY, "THAT THE SWAN OF AVON WAS HATCHED!"</span></p></div> + +<p>Afterwards we proceeded to the Birthplace, where a very gentlewomanly +female exhibited the apartment in which the Infant Bard first saw the +light. Alack! there was but little light to behold, being a shockingly +low and dingy room, meagrely furnished with two chairs and a table, on +which was another of the busts. As I came in, I uttered a remark which I +had prepared for the occasion. "It was here," I said, reverently, "here +that the Swan of Avon was hatched!" At which Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> was again +overcome by emotion.</p> + +<p>The room was greatly in the necessity of whitewash, being black with +smoke and signatures in lead pencil. Even the window-panes were +scratched all over by diamonds, on seeing +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131"></a></span> which, and being also the +possessor of a diamond and gold ring, I was about to inscribe my own +name, but was prevented by the lady custodian.</p> + +<p>I indignantly and eloquently protested that if Hon'ble Sirs, <span class="smcap">Walter +Scott</span>, Lord <span class="smcap">Byron</span>, <span class="smcap">Isaac +Walton</span>, <span class="smcap">Washington Irving</span> and Co. were +permitted to deface the glass thus, surely I, who was a graduate of +Calcutta University, and a valuable contributor to London <i>Punch</i>, was +equally entitled, since what was sauce for a goose was sauce for a +gander, and Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> urged that I was a distinguished +Shakspearian student and Indian prince, but the custodian responded that +she couldn't help that, for it was <i>ultra vires</i>, nevertheless.</p> + +<p>However, while she was engaged in pointing out the spot where somebody's +signature had been before it was peeled away, I, snatching the +opportunity behind her back, did triumphantly inscribe my autograph on +the bust's nose.</p> + +<p>In the back-room they showed us where <span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> father stapled his +wool, which caused Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> to remark that she had always +understood that the poet was of quite humble origin, and that, for her +part, she thought it was all the more creditable to him to have done +what he did do.</p> + +<p>We also inspected the Museum, and were shown <span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> jug, a rather +ordinary concern; the identical dial which one of the clowns in his +plays drew out of a poke, and a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132"></a></span> ring with W. S. engraved on it, found +in the churchyard some years ago, and, no doubt, dropped there by the +poet himself, while absorbed in the composition of his famous and +world-renowned elegy.</p> + +<p>There were several portraits of him also, all utterly unlike one +another, or only agreeing in one respect, namely, their total +dissimilarity from the bust.</p> + +<p>We likewise saw the very desk <span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span> used, after creeping +unwillingly to school with a shining face like a snail's. I was pained +to see evidence of the mischievousness of the juvenile genius, for it +was slashed and hacked to such a doleful degree as to be totally +incapacitated for scholastic use!</p> + +<p>I myself was sprightly in my youth, but never, I am proud to say, to the +extent of wilfully damaging my master's furniture! Before leaving, we +walked to visit the residence of <span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> wife, which turned out to +be a very humble thatched-roof affair, such as is commonly occupied by +peasants.</p> + +<p>But, as Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> said, it is a sad fact that distinguished +literary characters often make most imprudent marriages. Which put me in +a wonderment whether she had heard anything about myself and Miss +<span class="smcap">Mankletow</span>.</p> + +<p>At one of the bazaars I purchased a beautiful Shakspearian souvenir, in +the form of a coloured porcelain model of +<span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> birthplace, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133"></a></span> +which can be rendered transparent and luminous by the insertion of a night-light.</p> + +<p>This I had intended humbly to offer for the gracious acceptance of Miss +<span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, but having thrust it into a coat-tail pocket, I unfortunately +sat upon it in the train as we were returning.</p> + +<p>So I presented it as a token of remembrance to <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>, who was +transported with delight at the gift, which she said could be easily +rendered the <i>statu quo</i> by dint of a little diamond cement.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XVII" id="XVII"></a>XVII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Containing some intimate confidences from Mr Jabberjee, with the explanation +of such apparent indiscretion.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Since</span> writing my latest contribution I have folded up my tent like an +Arab, and silently stolen away from Porticobello House, this independent +hook being taken under the ostensible and colourable pretext of a +medical opinion that the climate of Bayswater was operating injuriously +upon my internal arrangements, but the real <i>causa causans</i> and <i>dessous +des cartes</i> being a growing disinclination for the society of select +male and female boarders.</p> + +<p>Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> was naturally bathed in tears at the announcement of my +approaching departure, although I fondly sought to console her by +assurances that my residence in Highbury, Islington, though beyond the +radius and of inaccessible remoteness from Ladbroke Grove, should not +obliterate her brilliant image from the cracked looking-glass of my +heart, and that I would write to her with weekly regularity, and revisit +the glimpses of her moony presence at the first convenient opportunity.</p> + +<p>I do correspond with effusiveness and punctuality +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136"></a></span> through the obliging +medium of a young intimate Indian acquaintance of mine, who does +actually reside at Highbury, and has kindly undertaken to forward my +<i>billets doux</i>.</p> + +<p>This stratagem is necessitated by the circumstance that (as a matter of +fact) I am dwelling under a rose at Hereford Road, Westbourne Grove, +which is in convenient proximity to Prince's Square and the stately home +of the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> family, with whom I am now promoted to become the +tame cat.</p> + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="frontis" id="frontis"></a> +<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="493" height="700" alt="Unaccustomed to dark-complexioned gentlemen."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"UNACCUSTOMED TO DARK-COMPLEXIONED GENTLEMEN."</span></p></div> + +<p>In Hereford Road I occupy garishly genteel first-floor front and back +apartments at rupees fifteen per week and the Lady of the Land has +entreated me to kindly excuse the waiting-maid for jumping with +diffidence whenever I pop upon her unpremeditatedly on the stairs, being +a nervous girl and unaccustomed to dark-complexioned gentlemen—though +her own countenance, from superabundance of blacking and smuts, being of +a far superior nigritude, it is I myself who should be more justified in +jumping.</p> + +<p>However, she is already becoming the <i>habituée</i>, and seldom drops the +crockery-ware now—except when I simper with too beaming a +condescension.</p> + +<p>Certain of my readers will perhaps hold up the hands of amazement at my +imprudence in disclosing my whereabouts, and other private concerns, in +the publicity of a popular periodical—but there is method in such madness; they +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137"></a></span> do not +take in <i>Punch</i> at Porticobello House, considering +that one penny (or even the moiety of that sum) is more correct value +for funny and comical illustrated journalism, while the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innetts</span>, +although they see <i>Punch</i> weekly do not peruse the literary contents, +especially in the season, when, as Mrs A.-I. frequently remarks, they +are in such a constant whirl of social dissipation that they have +absolutely no time for serious reading.</p> + +<p>At first I was severely mortified that—so far as my acquaintances were +concerned—these tittlings and jottings should be thus written with +water, but I have since made the discovery that my cloud of +disappointment is internally lined with precious silver.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XVIII" id="XVIII"></a>XVIII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee is a little over-ingenious in his excuses.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Since</span> shaking the dust off my feet at Porticobello House, I have not +succeeded to pluck the courage for a personal interview with Miss +<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>, and my correspondence, duly forwarded per Mr <span class="smcap">Bhoobone Lall +Jalpanybhoy</span>, of Highbury, has consisted mainly of abject excuses for +non-attendance on plea of over-study for Bar Exam, and total incapacity +to journey due to excessive disorderliness in stomach department.</p> + +<p>This, unhappily, at length inspired her with the harrowing dread that I +was on the point of being launched into the throes of eternity, if not +already as dead as Death's door-nail, and so, with feminine want of +reflection, she performed a hurried pilgrimage to Highbury.</p> + +<p>Now, whether on account of the beetleheadedness of a domestic, or Baboo +<span class="smcap">Jalpanybhoy's</span> incompetency in the art of equivocation, I am not to +say—but the sequel of her inquiries was the unshakable conviction that +I had not struck root in the habitation from which my letters were +ostensibly addressed.</p> + +<p>And in a subsequently forwarded letter she did reproach me pathetically with my duplicity, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139"></a></span> and accused me of being a +fickle—by which I was so unspeakably cut up that I abstained from the condescension of a +rejoinder.</p> + +<p>Next I became the involuntary recipient of another letter in more +intemperate style, menacing me that with a hook or a crook, she would +dislodge me from the loophole in which I was snugly established, and +that several able-bodied boarders were the hue of a full cry in pursuit.</p> + +<p>Since Hereford Road is in dangerous proximity to Ladbroke Grove, I was +sitting tight in my apartments on receipt of this grave intelligence, +with funk in my heart, and the Unknown hovering above me, when my young +friend <span class="smcap">Howard Allbutt-Innett</span>, Esq., arrived with his bicycle, like a god +on a machine, and perceiving the viridity of my countenance, inquired +sympathetically what was up.</p> + +<p>At first, being mindful of the excessive liveliness with which he had +bantered my residence in a boarding-house of such mediocre pretensions, +I was naturally disinclined to reveal that I was in the plight of troth +with the proprietress's daughter; but eventually I overcame my coyness, +and uncovered the pretty kettle of fish of my <i>infandum dolorem</i>, and my +ardent longing to hit upon some plan to extricate myself from the +suffocating coils of such a Laocoon.</p> + +<p>"My dear old chap," he said kindly, after I had unfolded the last link +of my tale of woe, "I will put you up in a dodge that will perform the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140"></a></span> +trick. Don't see the young woman, or she will get round you with half a +jiffy. Write to her that you are not worthy of a rap, and no more a +Prince than I am!"</p> + +<p>Hearing his last words, I started, and did, like the ghost of <i>Hamlet</i>, +Senior, "jump at this dead hour," being convinced that young <span class="smcap">Howard</span> had +found out (perhaps from Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>) that my title was a bogus, +and anticipating that, if he divulged the skeleton of my bare cupboard +to his highly genteel parents, I should infallibly experience the +crushing mortification of a chuck out.</p> + +<p>However, I hid the fox that was nibbling my vitals by inquiring, in a +rather natural accent, what he meant by such a suggestion.</p> + +<p>"Are you such an innocent, simple old Johnny, Prince," he said, with +reassuring <i>bonhomie</i>, "as not to catch the idea? Do you not know that +European feminines in all ranks of society—alack, even in our own!—are +immoderately attracted by anyone possessed of riches and a title—or of +either of the two? As an <i>au faït</i> in the female temperament, I shall +wager that it is nine out of ten that if you spoof this mercenary young +minx into believing that you are merely a native impecunious nonentity, +and not to be shot at with powder, she will instantaneously drop +pursuing such a hot potato."</p> + +<p>To this speech (reported <i>verbatim</i> to best of my ability) I did shake +my head sorrowfully, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143"></a></span> and +reply that I greatly feared that <span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> +devotion to this unlucky self was too severe to be diverted, or even +checked, like a cow that is infuriated or <i>non compos mentis</i>, by the +mere relinquishment of such tinsel and gewgaw wraps as a title or +worldly belongings, having frequently (and that, too, <i>prior</i> to our +engagement) protested her preference for very dark-complexioned +individuals, and her vehement curiosity to behold India.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p141'></a> +<img src="images/p141.jpg" width="570" height="700" alt="Ascended his bicycle with a waggish winkle in his eye."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"ASCENDED HIS BICYCLE WITH A WAGGISH WINKLE IN HIS EYE."</span></p></div> + +<p>But he, as he ascended his bicycle with a waggish winkle in his eye, +repeated that I might try it on at all events.</p> + +<p>Still, I could not induce myself to adopt his spoofish strategy, for I +reflected that, though it might convince her that I was unmarriageable, +it would only increase her fury and the vengeance of her champion +boarders. So at length I composed a moving epistle, as follows:—</p> + +<p class="center"> +<span class="smcap">Incomparable—though lack-a-daisy!<br> +inaccessible—Jessimina!</span><br> +</p> + +<p>Poet <span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span> has shrewdly observed that "a true lover never did run a +straight course," and the sincerity of present writer's affection is +incontestably proved by his apparent crookedness of running, and keeping +dark outside the illuminating rays of thy moon-like countenance. The +cause is the unforeseen cataclysm of a decree from my family astrologer +or <i>dowyboghee</i>, whom I have anxiously consulted upon our joint +matrimonial prospects. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144"></a></span>[<span class="smcap">Mem. to the + Readers.</span>—<i>This was what young +</i><span class="smcap">Howard</span><i> would term</i> "the bit of spoof." <i>I am no ninny-hammer to consult an +exploded astrologer!</i>] <i>Miserabile dictu!</i> the venerable and senile +pundit reports that such an alliance would infallibly plunge us into the +peck of troubles, since the sign of your natal month is the meek and +innocent Lamb—while mine is the more ferocious Lion!</p> + +<p>A very slight familiarity with Natural History, &c., will show you the +utter incompatibility of temper between such an uncongenial couple of +animals, and the correctness of said astrologer's prediction that it +must infallibly be the Lamb who would be whiphanded in the unequal +conflict.</p> + +<p>In consequence, though I am beating the floor with my head as I write, +and moistening the carpet with the copiousness of my lachrymations, I +must bid you the final and irrevocable adieu and <i>au revoir</i>, since I am +unwilling to act as a selfish. Think of me as "a prince out of thy +star," to quote the reference of <span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> character, <i>Polonius</i>, to +<i>Hamlet</i>, under precisely similar circumstances. You will please forget +me <i>instanter</i>, and accept this as my last solemn so-long, which I utter +on the threshold of preparation for the stern and dreaded ordeal of Bar +Exam. In frantic haste,</p> + +<p>Your ever faithful and broken-hearted Baboo,</p> + +<p class="txtright"><span class="smcap">Hurry.</span></p> + +<p>P.S.—<i>No answer required.</i> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145"></a></span></p> + +<p>But after an interval of a very few posts, in spite of my strict +injunctions to contrary, I got the answer that she was deeply moved by +my self-sacrifice, and had never loved me more. Having been brought up +in a Christian disbelief of all astronomy, she was not in fear of my +"doweybogey" or any other native bogies, and nothing should part us, if +she could help it. She added, that I had been seen about Westbourne +Grove recently.</p> + +<p>On receipt of this touching and beautiful communication I was again in +the stampede of panic, and realised that I must have immediate resort to +some stronger description of "Spoof."</p> + +<p>It is calamitous that I cannot find a card up my sleeve with the single +exception of my young friend <span class="smcap">Howard's</span> dodge, which I fear will prove too +filamentous.</p> + +<p>However, a faint heart never got rid of a fair lady!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XIX" id="XIX"></a>XIX</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee tries a fresh tack. His visit to the India Office and sympathetic reception.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">In</span> my last I had the honour to report the total non-success of my +endeavour to nill my betrothal on plea of astrological objections, and +how I was consequentially up the tree of embarrassment.</p> + +<p>I have since resolved that honesty is my best politics, and have +confessed to Miss <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> in a well-expressed curt letter that I am +only the possessor of a courtesy title, and, so far from rolling on the +rosy bed of unlimited rhino, am out of elbows, and dependent upon +parental remittances for pin-money.</p> + +<p>For corroboration of said statements I begged to refer her politely to +my benevolent friend and patron, Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>, Nevern Square, +South Kensington; to whom I simultaneously wrote a private and +confidential note, instructing him that if any young female person was +to inquire particulars of my birth, origin, &c., he was to tell the +truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, especially making it +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147"></a></span> +clear that I was neither a tip-top Rajah, nor a Leviathan of filthy +lucre.</p> + +<p>The rest (up to present date) is silence; but I have confident hopes +that the manly, straightforward stratagem suggested by my friend, young +<span class="smcap">Howard</span>, will accomplish the job, and procure me the happy release.</p> + +<p>I am now to pass to a different subject—to wit, a visit I paid some +time since to the India Office. The why of the wherefore was that, in +conversation with the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innetts</span>, I had boasted freely of the +credit I was in with certain high grade India Official nobs, who could +refuse me nothing.</p> + +<p>Which was hitherto the positive fact, since I had never requested any +favour at their hands.</p> + +<p>But Mrs <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> stated that she had heard that the +reception-soirées at said India Office were extremely enjoyable and +classy, and inquired whether I possessed sufficient influence to obtain +for her tickets of admission to one of these select entertainments.</p> + +<p>Naturally I had to reply that I could indubitably do the trick, and +would at once proceed to the India Office and interview one of the +senior clerks who regarded me as his brother.</p> + +<p>So, after procuring a <i>Whitaker Almanack</i>, and hunting up the name of +one of the most senior, I cabbed to Whitehall. Inside the entrance I +found an attendant sitting at a table absorbed in reading, who rose and inquired my +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148"></a></span> business, and +upon my statement that I desired to see Mr +<span class="smcap">Breakwater</span>, Esq., on urgent business, courteously directed me up a +marble staircase, at the top of which was a second attendant, also +engaged in brown study—for the attendants appear to be laudably +addicted to the cultivation of their minds.</p> + +<p>He informed me that I should find Mr <span class="smcap">Breakwater's</span> room down a certain +corridor, and proceeding thither, I stopped a clerk who was hurrying +along with his hands full of documents, and represented that I had come +for an immediate interview with Mr <span class="smcap">Breakwater</span> on highly important +matters.</p> + +<p>He demanded incredulously whether Mr <span class="smcap">Breakwater</span> expected me.</p> + +<p>This elevated my monkey, and I retorted, haughtily, that I was the bosom +friend of said Mr B., who would be overjoyed to receive me, and, +following him into a room, I peremptorily demanded that he should inform +his master without fail that Baboo <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span> was there.</p> + +<p>Whereupon, with the nonchalance of a Jack in an office, he rang a bell +and desired an attendant to usher me to the waiting-room.</p> + +<p>There, in a large gloomy apartment, surrounded by portraits of English +and Native big pots, I did sit patiently sucking the golden nob of my +umbrella for a quarter of an hour, until the attendant returned, saying, +that Mr <span class="smcap">Breakwater</span> could see me now, and presently showed +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149"></a></span> me into the +aforesaid private room, where, behind a large table covered with wicker +baskets containing dockets and memoranda, <i>et hoc genus omne</i>, sat the +very gentleman whom I had recently taken for his own underling!</p> + +<p>Formerly I should have proffered abject excuses, but I am now +sufficiently up in British observances to know that the only necessary +is a frank and breezy apology.</p> + +<p>So, disguising my bashful confusion, I said, "I am awfully sorry that I +took you, my dear old chap, for a common ordinary fellow; but remember +the proverb, that 'appearances are deceitful,' and do not reveal a thin +skin about a rather natural mistake."</p> + +<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Breakwater</span> courteously entreated me not to mention the affair, but to +state my business briefly. Accordingly I related how I was a native +Bengalee student, at present moving Heaven and Earth to pass Bar Exam, +and my intimate connection with the distinguished Bayswater family of +the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innetts</span>, who were consumed with longing for free tickets to +an official <i>soirée</i>. I then described the transcendent charms of Miss +<span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, and my own ardent desire to obtain her grateful recognition by +procuring the open sesame for self and friends. Furthermore, I pointed +out that, as an official in the India Office, he was <i>in loco parentis</i> +to myself, and bound to indulge all my reasonable requests, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150"></a></span> and I +assured him that if he exhibited generosity on this occasion, the entire +<span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> family, self included, would ever pray on the crooked +hinges of knees for his temporal and spiritual welfare.</p> + +<p>He heard me benignantly, but said he regretted that it was not in his +power to oblige me.</p> + +<p>"You are not to suppose," I said, "that I am a native <span class="smcap">Tom-dick</span> or + <span class="smcap">Harry</span>. +I am a B.A. of Calcutta University, and candidate for call to Bar. <i>In +additum</i>, I am the literary celebrity, being especially retained to jot +and tittle for the periodical of <i>Punch</i>."</p> + +<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Breakwater</span> assured me earnestly that he fully appreciated my many +distinguished claims, but that he was under an impossibility of granting +my petition for an invite to the annual summer <i>soirée</i>, owing to the +fact that aforesaid festivity was already the <i>fait accompli</i>.</p> + +<p>"How is that?" I exclaimed. "Have I not read in the daily press of a +grand <i>durbar</i> to be given shortly in honour of Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Hung Chang</span>?"</p> + +<p>"But that is at the Foreign Office," he objected; "we have no connection +with such a concern."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p151'></a> +<img src="images/p151.jpg" width="408" height="700" alt="Pitch it strong, my respectable Sir!"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"PITCH IT STRONG, MY RESPECTABLE SIR!"</span></p></div> + +<p>"The Foreign Office would be better than nullity," I said. "I will tell +you what to do. Write me a letter to show to the head of the Foreign +Office. You can state that you have +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153"></a></span> known me intimately for a long +time, and that I am deserving of patronage. Hint, for instance, that it +is impolitic to show favouritism to one Oriental (such as a Chinese) +rather than another, and that you will regard any kindness done to me as +the personal favour to yourself. Pitch it strong, my respectable Sir!"</p> + +<p>He, however, protested that any recommendation from him would be a +<i>brutum fulmen</i>.</p> + +<p>"You are too modest, honoured Sir!" I told him, seeing that flattery was +requisite; "but I am not the ignoramus of how highly your character and +virtues are esteemed, and I can assure you that you are not so +contemptible a nonentity as you imagine. Listen to me; I am now to go to +the Foreign Office, and shall there assume the liberty of mentioning +your distinguished name as a referee."</p> + +<p>With benevolent blandness he accorded me full permission to go where I +liked, and say anything I chose, recommending me warmly to depart +immediately.</p> + +<p>Seeing him so well-disposed, I ventured, on taking my leave, to pat his +shoulder in friendly facetiousness, and to say, "It is all right, old +boy. Remember, I have complete <i>bonâ fides</i> in your ability to work the +oracle for me successfully." Which rendered him <i>sotto voce</i> with +gratification.</p> + +<p>But alack! at the Foreign Office, after stating my business and sitting like Patience on a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154"></a></span> Monument +for two immortal hours, I was officially +informed that the Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs was +not in, and that all the Private and Under Secretaries were equally +invisible.</p> + +<p>This, I must respectfully submit, is not exactly the correct style to +conduct a first-class Empire!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XX" id="XX"></a>XX</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee distinguishes himself in the Bar Examination, but is less successful in other +respects. He writes another extremely ingenious epistle, from which he anticipates the happiest results.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">I am</span> happy to announce that I have passed the <i>pons asinorum</i> of Bar +Exam with facility of a needle penetrating the camel's eye. <i>Tant +mieux!</i> Huzza! Tol-de-rol-loll!!!</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p157'></a> +<img src="images/p157.jpg" width="526" height="700" alt="Huzza! Tol-de-rol-loll!"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"HUZZA! TOL-DE-ROL-LOLL!"</span></p></div> + +<p>My dilatoriness in publishing this joyful intelligence is due to fact +that I have only recently received official information of my triumph, +which my family are now engaged in celebrating at Calcutta with pæans of +transport, illuminations, fireworks, an English brass band, and +delicacies supplied (on contract system) from Great Eastern Hotel.</p> + +<p>And yet so great was my humility that, when I entered Lincoln's Inn Hall +one Monday shortly before 10 <span class="smcap">a.m.</span>, and received pens, some foolscaps, +and a printed exam paper on the Law of Real and Personal Property and +Conveyancing, I was at first as melancholy as a gib cat, and like to eat +my head with despair!</p> + +<p>So much so that I began my answers by +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156"></a></span> pathetically imploring my +indulgent father examiner to show me his bowels of compassion, on ground +that I was an unfortunate Bengalee chap, afflicted by narrow +circumstances and a raging tooth, and that my entire earthly felicity +depended upon my being favoured with qualifying marks.</p> + +<p>However, on perusal of the paper, I found that, owing to diligent cram +and native aptitude for nice sharp quillets of the law, I could floor it +upon my <i>caput</i>, being at home with every description of mortgage, and +having such things as reversions and contingent remainders at the +extremities of my finger-ends.</p> + +<p>In the afternoon I was again examined in Law and Equity, answering +nearly every question with great copiousness and best style of +composition, quoting freely from Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Snell</span> and <span class="smcap">Underhill</span> to +back my opinion. Unhappily, I lost some of my precious time because, finding +that I was required by the paper to "discuss" a certain statement, I +left my seat in search of some pundit with whom I might carry on such a +logomachy. And even now I fail to see how one individual can discuss a +question in pen and ink, any more than a single hand is capable of +making a clap. Which I gave as my reason for not attempting the +impossible.</p> + +<p>The ordeal endured for four days. In the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159"></a></span> Roman Law department, I was +on the spot with <i>Stillicidium</i> and similar servitudes, and in Criminal +Law I did vastly distinguish myself by polishing off an intricate legal +problem about Misters A., B. and C., and certain bicycles, though, as I +stated in a <i>postscriptum</i>, not being the practical cyclist, I could not +be at all responsible for the accuracy of my solution, and hinted that +it was somewhat <i>infra dig.</i> for such solemn dry-as-dusts as the Council +of Legal Education to take any notice at all of these fashionable but +flimsy mechanisms.</p> + +<p>When called up for <i>vivâ voce</i> purposes, I dumb-foundered my examiner by +the readiness and volubility of my responses, to such an extent that, +after asking one question only, he intimated his complete satisfaction, +and I divined by his smiles that he was secretly determined to work the +oracle in my favour.</p> + +<p>And so I arrived at the pretty Pass by dint of flourishing my trumpet. +But, heigho! some fly or other is the indispensable adjunct of every pot +of ointment, and while I was still jumping for joy at having passed the +steep barrier of such a Rubicon, there came a letter from Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> +which constrained me to cachinnate upon the wrong side of nose!</p> + +<p>It appeared that, pursuant of my request, she had been to call upon +Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd</span>, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160"></a></span> who had duly informed her +that I was not the genuine Rajah or any kind of real Prince, nor yet a Crœsus with +unlimited cash.</p> + +<p>Here, if Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span> had stopped, or represented me as a +worthless riddance of bad rubbish, all would have been well; but most +unhappily he did exceed his instructions, and added that I was of +respectable, well-to-do parentage, and very industrious young chap with +first-class abilities, and likely to obtain lucrative practice at native +Bar.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> wrote that she hoped she was not so mercenary as to be +attracted by mere rank, and that it was enough for her that I was in the +position to maintain her as a lady, so she would continue to hold me to +my promise of marriage, and if I still declined to perform, she would be +reluctantly compelled to place the matter in hands of lawyer.</p> + +<p>On seeing that my second attempt to spoof was similarly the utter +failure, I became like pig in poke with perplexity, until I was suddenly +inspired by the ebullient flash of a happy idea, and taking up my +<i>penna</i>, inscribed the following epistle:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p class="center"><span class="smcap">Magnanimous and Ever Adorable Jessimina!</span></p></div> + +<p>I am immensely tickled with flattered complacency at your indomitable +desire to become +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161"></a></span> the +bride of such a man of straw as this undeserving +self, and will no longer offer any factious opposition to your wishes.</p> + +<p>But in the intoxicating ardour of my billing and cooing I may have +omitted to mention that, when I have led you to the Hymeneal altar, you +will not be alone in your glory. As a Koolin Brahmin, I am, by laws of +my country, entitled to about thirty or forty spouses, though, owing to +natural timidity and economical reasons, I have not hitherto availed +myself of said privilege.</p> + +<p>However, when that I was a little tiny boy, I was compelled by family +pressure to contract matrimony with an equally juvenile female of eight, +and, though circumstances have prevented the second ceremony being +celebrated on arriving at the more mature age of discretion, such infant +marriage is notwithstanding the binding affair.</p> + +<p>What of it? Your overwhelming affection will render you totally +indifferent to the unpleasant side of your position as a <i>sateen</i> or +rival wife, though it is the antipode of the bed of roses, especially +under internecine feuds and perpetual snipsnaps with sundry aunts and +sisters-in-law of mine of rather nagging idiosyncracies. But ignorance +of language will probably blind your sensitive ears to the sneering and +ill-natured tone of their remarks.</p> + +<p>I can only say that I am quite ready (if you +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162"></a></span> insist upon it) to fulfil +my contract to best ability, and undertake the heavy burden which +Providence has, very injudiciously, saddled upon my feeble back. Mr +<span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span>, of 15 Jubilee Terrace, Clapham, was present at my +first wedding, and will doubtless certify to same on application.</p> + +<p>Ever yours faithfully and devotedly,</p> +<p class="txtright">H. B. J.</p> + +<p>In writing the above, I was well aware that there is a strong prejudice +in the mind of European feminines in favour of monogamy, and my letter +(as will be seen by the intelligent reader) was rather cleverly composed +so as to shift the burden of breach of contract from my shoulders to +hers.</p> + +<p>So that I rubbed my hands with gleeful jubilation on receiving her reply +that she was astounded with wonderment at the sublimity of my cheek in +supposing that she would play the subordinate fiddle to any native wife, +and that she had communicated with <span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span>, Esq., and if my +statement <i>re</i> infant marriage (which at present she suspected to be a +mere spoof) proved correct, she would certainly decline my insulting +offer.</p> + +<p>Now as it is the undeniable fact that I was wedded when a mere juvenile, +I shall save my brush from this near shave—provided that Mr +<span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span> has received my tip in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163"></a></span> time and does not, like Hon'ble +<span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>, go beyond his instructions.</p> + +<p>But this is not reasonably probable, Baboo <span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span> being a +tolerably discreet, subtle chap.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXI" id="XXI"></a>XXI</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee halloos before he is quite out of the Wood.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Being</span> (to my best of belief) satisfactorily off with the old love, I +naturally became as playful as a kitten or gay as a grig. For the most +superficial observer, and with the half of a naked optic, could easily +discern the immeasurable superiority of Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> to <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> in all +the refinements and delicacies of a real English lady, and although, up +to present date, the timidity of girlishness has restrained Miss +<span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> from reciprocating my increasing spooniness, her parents +and brother are of an overwhelming cordiality, and repeatedly mention +their ardent hope that I may become their guest up in the hills some +time this autumn.</p> + +<p>So that Hope is already recommencing to hop jauntily about the secret +chamber of my heart.</p> + +<p>For, seeing the magnanimous contempt for the snobbishness of chasing a +tuft that actuates their bosoms, I am no longer apprehensive that their +affection for this present writer will be at all impaired by the +revelation that he is merely a member of nature's nobility. Rather the +contrary.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165"></a></span></p> + +<p>As Poet <span class="smcap">Burns</span> remarks with great truthfulness, "<i>Rank is but a penny +stamp and a Man is a Man and all that.</i>" Nevertheless, for the present, +I am resolved to remain mum as a mouse.</p> + +<p>Since I am now in their pockets for a perpetuity, I was privileged on a +recent evening to escort the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> ladies to the Empire of +India Exhibition, upon which I shall now pronounce the opinion of an +expert, though space forbids me to describe its multitudinous marvels, +save with the brevity of a soul of wit.</p> + +<p>In the Cinghalese Palace we beheld a highly pious <i>Yogi</i> from Ceylon, +who had trained himself to perform his devotions with one of his legs +embracing his neck, or walking upon the caps of his knees with his toes +inserted into his waistband. But I am not convinced that such a style of +prayer-making is at all superior in reverence to more ordinary +attitudes, especially when exhibited publicly for an <i>honorarium</i>.</p> + +<p>I feel proud to narrate that, at Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee's</span> urgent entreaties, I +subdued my native funkiness so far as to make the revolution of the +Gigantic Wheel, in spite of grave apprehensions that it would prove but +a house of cards, or suddenly become totally immobile—though to pass +interminable hours at a lofty attitude with such a lively companion +might, on secondary thoughts, have possessed pleasing saccharine +compensations. Nevertheless, I was relieved when we descended without having +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166"></a></span> hitched anywhere, and I +did most firmly decline to fly in the +face of Providence for five shillings in the basket of a captive +balloon.</p> + +<p>The Indian street is constructed with cleverness, but gives a very, very +inadequate idea of the principal Calcutta thoroughfares; moreover, to +cultivated Indian intellects, the fuss made by English ladies over +native artisans and mechanics of rather so-so abilities and appearance +seems a little ludicrous!</p> + +<p>After dining, we witnessed the Historical Spectacle of India in the +Empress Theatre, and Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> made the criticism that the fall of +Somnath was accomplished with a too great facility, since its so-called +defenders did lie down with perfect tameness and counterfeit death +immediately the army of Sultan <span class="smcap">Mahmud</span> galloped their horses through the +gateway.</p> + +<p>But this appeared to me rather a typical and prudent exercise of their +discretion.</p> + +<p>It seems—though (in spite of extensive historical researches) I was in +previous ignorance of the fact—that Sultan <span class="smcap">Mahmud</span>, the Great Mogul +<span class="smcap">Akbar</span>, and <span class="smcap">Sivaji</span>, the Mahratta Chief, were each taken +in tow and personally conducted by a trio of Divine Guides, respectively named +Love, Mercy and Wisdom, who came forward whenever nothing of consequence +was transpiring, and sang with the melodiousness of Paradisiacal fowls.</p> + +<p>As for the representation of the Hindu Paradise, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167"></a></span> I shall confess to +some disappointment, seeing that it was exclusively reserved to military +masculines—the more highly educated civilian class of Baboos being left +out of the cold altogether! Nor am I in love with a future state in +which there is so much dancing up and down lofty flights of stairs with +terpsichorean energy, and manœuvring in companies and circles with +members of the softer sex. As a philosophical conception of disembodied +existence, it is undeniably deficient in repose, though perhaps good +enough for ordinary fighting chaps!</p> + +<p>I spent a rapturous and ripping evening, however, greatly owing to the +condescension of Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, who exhibited such entertainment at my +comments that I left under the confident persuasion that I was +infallibly to be the favoured swain.</p> + +<p>On returning to Hereford Road, I found a last letter from <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>, +beseeching me, for the sake of "Old Langsyne," to meet her on the +following evening at Westbourne Park Station, and mentioning that +certain events had occurred to change her views, and she was now only +desirous for an amicable arrangement.</p> + +<p>Accordingly, perceiving that I had no longer any reason to dread such an +encounter, and not wishing her to peak and pine through my unkindness, I +wrote at once accepting the <i>rendezvous</i>.</p> + +<p>When I duly turned up, lo and behold! I +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168"></a></span> found she was escorted, not +only by her eagle-eyed mother (<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> herself inherits, in <i>Hamlet's</i> +immortal phraseology, "an eye like Ma's, to threaten or command"), but +also by a juvenile individual with a black neck-tie and Hebrew profile, +whom she formerly introduced to me as Mr <span class="smcap">Solomons</span>.</p> + +<p>Though a little hurt by this proof of the rapidity of feminine +fickleness, I began to congratulate her effusively on having obtained +such an excellent substitute for my worthless self, and to wish the +happy couple all earthly felicities, when she explained that he was not +a <i>fiancé</i>, but merely a sort of friend, and Mrs <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> severely +added that they had come to know whether I still declined to fulfil my +legal contract.</p> + +<p>Naturally I made the answer that I had recently offered to fulfil same +to best ability, but that, my offer having been declined with +contumeliousness, the affair was now on its end.</p> + +<p>Here <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> said that she had of course refused to marry a man who +declared that he was already the owner of a dusky spouse, but that, on +inquiries from Mr <span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span>, she had made the discovery that my +said infant wife had popped off with some juvenile complaint or other +three or four years ago.</p> + +<p>At this I was rendered completely flabaghast—for, although the +allegation was undeniably correct, I had confidently hoped that my friend +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171"></a></span> <span class="smcap">Ram</span> was +unaware of the fact, or would at least have the +ordinary mother-wit to refrain from blurting it out! "<i>Et tu, Brute!</i>" +But I must make the dismal confession that my friends are mostly a very +fat-witted sort of fellows.</p> + +<p><i>Que faire?</i>—except to explain that my melancholy bereavement must have +entirely slipped off my memory, and that in any case it had no logical +connection with the matter in hand.</p> + +<p>Then Mrs <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> inquired, would I, or would I not, marry her illused +child? and stated that all she wished for was a plain answer.</p> + +<p>I replied that it was a very natural and moderate desire, and I was +prepared to gratify it at once by the plain answer of—<i>Not on any +account.</i></p> + +<p>Whereupon Mr <span class="smcap">Solomons</span> stepped forward and politely handed me a folded +paper, and, observing that he thought there was no need to protract the +interview, he lifted his hat and went off with the ladies, leaving +myself upon a bench endeavouring to get the sense of the official +document into my baffled and bewildered nob.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p169'></a> +<img src="images/p169.jpg" width="468" height="700" alt="A royal command from the Queen-Empress."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"A ROYAL COMMAND FROM THE QUEEN-EMPRESS."</span></p></div> + +<p>Eventually, I gathered that it was a Royal command from the +Queen-Empress, backed by the Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, that +I was to enter my appearance in an action at the suit of <span class="smcap">Jemima +Mankletow</span> for a claim of damages for having breached my promise to +marry!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172"></a></span></p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;'> + +<p>No matter! Pugh! Fiddle-de-dee! Never mind! Who cares?</p> + +<p>Having successfully passed Exam, and been called to the Bar, I am now an +<i>amicus curiæ</i>, and the friend in Court.</p> + +<p>I shall enter my appearance in the forensic costume of wig and gown.</p> + +<p>What will be the price of the plaintiff's pleadings <i>then</i>, Madams?</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXII" id="XXII"></a>XXII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee places himself in the hands of a solicitor—with certain reservations.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">I concluded</span> my foregoing instalment, narrating my service of a writ for +breaching a promise of marriage, with a spirited outburst of +<i>insouciance</i> and devilmaycarefulness.</p> + +<p>But such courage of a Dutch evaporated deplorably on closer perusal of +the said writ, which contained the peremptory mandate that I was to +enter my appearance within the incredibly short notice of eight days, or +the judgment would be given in my absence!</p> + +<p>Now it was totally out of the question that I was to prepare a long +complicated defence, and have the requisite witnesses, and also perfect +myself in the customs and etiquettes of Common Law Procedure, all in +such a ridiculously brief period; and yet, if I remained <i>perdu</i> with a +hidden head, I could not hope for even the minimum of justice, since, +heigh-ho! <i>les absents ont toujours tort</i>. So that I shed blistering and +scalding tears like a spanked child, to find myself confronting such a +devil of a deep sea, and my day was dismal and my night a nonentity, +until, by a great piece of potluck, on going up +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174"></a></span> the next morning to the +library of my Inn, I espied my young friend <span class="smcap">Howard</span> in the compound, +busily employed in a lawn tennis game.</p> + +<p>Having partially poured the cat from my bag already into his sympathetic +and receptive bosom, I decided to confide to him my hard case in its +entirety, and so made him a secret sign that I desired some private +confabulations at his earliest conveniency, which he observing, after +the termination of the match, came towards the remote bench whereon I +was forlornly moping, and sat down kindly by my side.</p> + +<p>This young <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span>, I am to mention here, had only just missed +succeeding in the passing of Bar Exam owing to the inveterate malignancy +of his stars and lack of a more industrial temperament; but from the +coolness of his cheek, and complete man-of-the-worldliness, is a most +judicious and tip-top adviser to friends in tight places.</p> + +<p><i>Experto crede</i>, for, when he had heard the latest particulars of my +shocking <i>imbroglio</i>, he promptly gave me the excellent advice that I +was to consult a solicitor; strongly recommending a Mr <span class="smcap">Sidney Smartle</span>, +who was a former schoolmate of his own, and a good thundering chap, and +who (he thought) was not so overburdened as yet by legal business that +he could not find time for working the oracle on my behalf.</p> + +<p>"And look here, <span class="smcap">Jab</span>," he added (he has sometimes +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175"></a></span> the extreme +condescension to address me as an abbreviation), "I'll trot you up to +him at once—and I say, A 1 idea! tell him you mean to be your own +counsel, and do all the speechifying yourself. Native prince, in +brand-new wig and gown, defending himself single-handed from wiles of +artful adventuress—why, you'll knock the jury as if with old boots!"</p> + +<p>"Alack," said I, sorrowfully; "though I am quite competent to become the +stump orator at shortest notice, I do not see how I can enter my first +appearance until I have carefully instructed Misters <span class="smcap">Ram</span> and <span class="smcap">Jalpanybhoy</span> +in the evidence they are to give and leave untold, &c., and a week is +too scanty and fugitive a period for such preparations!"</p> + +<p>"Nonsense and stuff!" he replies, "you will have a lot more than that, +since the week only applies to entering an appearance—which is a mere +farcical formality that old <span class="smcap">Sid</span> can perform in your place on his head." +At which I was greatly relieved.</p> + +<p>But on arrival at Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle's</span> office in Chancery Lane, we were +disappointed to be informed, by a small, juvenile clerk, that he was +absent at Wimbledon on urgent professional affairs, and his return was +the unknown quantity. However, after waiting till close upon the hour of +tiffin, he unexpectedly turned up in a suit of knickerbockers, carrying +a long, narrow bag full of metal-headed rods, and although rather adolescent +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176"></a></span>than senile +in physical appearance I was vastly impressed by the offhanded cocksurety of his manner.</p> + +<p>My friend <span class="smcap">Howard</span> introduced me, and exhibited my doleful predicament in +the shell of a nut, whereupon Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle</span> jauntily pronounced it to be +the common garden breach of promise, but that we had better all repair +to the First Avenue Hotel and lunch, and talk the affair over +afterwards.</p> + +<p>Which we did in the smoking-room after lunch, with coffee, liqueurs, and +cigars, &c., for which I had to pay, as a Tommy Dod, and the odd man out +of pocket.</p> + +<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle</span>, after listening attentively to my narrative, said that I +certainly seemed to him to have let myself into the deuced cavity of a +hole by so publicly proclaiming my engagement, but that my status as an +oriental foreigner, and the fact I had asserted—viz., that my promise +was extorted from me by compulsion and sheer physical funkiness—might +pull me through, unless the plaintiff were of superlative loveliness +(which, fortunately, is by no means the case).</p> + +<p>He added, that we had better engage <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., as he was +notoriously the crossest examiner at the Common Bar.</p> + +<p>But to this I opposed the <i>sine quâ non</i> that I am to have the sole +control of my case in court, and reap the undivided <i>kudos</i>, assuring +him that I should be able to cross-examine all witnesses +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177"></a></span> until they +could not stand on one leg. From some private motives of his own, he +sought to overcome my determination, hinting that, as my calling and +election to the Bar were not yet an ancient history, I might not possess +sufficient experience; and moreover that, by appearing in barristerial +garbage, I should infallibly forfeit the indulgence shown by a judge to +ordinary litigants; to which I responded by pointing out that I was a +typical Indian in the matter of legal subtlety and ready-made wit, and +that, if not capable of conducting my <i>own</i> case, how, then, could I be +fit to undertake a logomachy for any third parties? finally, that it is +proverbially unnecessary to keep a dog when you are equally proficient +in the practice of barking yourself.</p> + +<p>Whereupon, silenced by my <i>a fortiori</i> and <i>reductio ad absurdum</i>, he +gave way, saying that it was my own affair, and, anyhow, there would be +plenty of time to consider such a matter, since the plaintiff might not +choose to do anything further till after the Long Vacation, and we could +easily postpone the hearing of the action until the Midsummer of next +year.</p> + +<p>I, however, earnestly protested that I did not wish so procrastinated a +delay, as I desired to make my forensic <i>début</i> at the earliest possible +moment, and urged him to leave no stone unturned to get the job finished +by November at least, suggesting that if we could ascertain +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178"></a></span> the name +and address of the judge who was to try the case, I might call upon him, +and, in a private and confidential interview, ascertain the extent of +his disposition in my favour, and the length of his foot.</p> + +<p>To which Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle</span> replied that he could not recommend any such +tactics, as I should certainly ascertain the dimensions of the judicial +foot in a literal and painful manner.</p> + +<p>Now I must conclude with a livelier piece of intelligence: I am now in +receipt of the wished-for invitation to visit the <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span> family +at the elegant mansion (or—to speak Scottishly—"manse") they have +hired for a few weeks in the savage and romantic mountains of Ayrshire, +N.B.</p> + +<p>Mrs A.-I. wrote that there is no shooting attached to the manse, but +several aristocratic friends of theirs own moors in the vicinity, and +will inevitably invite them and their visitors to sport with them, so +that, as she believed I was the keen sportsman, I had better bring my +gun.</p> + +<p>Alack! I am not the happy possessor of any lethal weapon, but, having +since this invitation practised diligently upon tin moving beasts, +bottles, and eggs rendered incredibly lively by a jet of steam, I am at +last an <i>au fait</i> with a crackshot, and no end of a Nimrod.</p> + +<p>I do not think I shall purchase a gun, for there is a young English +acquaintance of mine who is the Devil's Own Volunteer, and who will +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181"></a></span> +no doubt have the good nature to lend me his rifle for a week or two.</p> + +<p>As to costume, my tailor assures me that it is totally unnecessary to +assume the national raiment of a Scotch, unless I am prepared to stalk +after a stag. But why should I be deterred by any cowardly fear from +pursuing so constitutionally timid a quadruped? I have therefore +commissioned him to manufacture me a petticoat kilt, with a chequered +tartan, and other accessories, for when we are going to Rome, it is the +mark of politeness to dress in the Romish style.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p179'></a> +<img src="images/p179.jpg" width="379" height="700" alt="Would be greatly improved by the simple addition of some knee-caps."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"WOULD BE GREATLY IMPROVED BY THE SIMPLE ADDITION OF SOME KNEE-CAPS."</span></p></div> + +<p>The Caledonian costume is indubitably becoming; but would, I venture +humbly to think, be greatly improved by the simple addition of some +knee-caps.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXIII" id="XXIII"></a>XXIII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee delivers his Statement of Defence, and makes his preparations for the North. +He allows his patriotic sentiments to get the better of him in a momentary outburst of disloyalty—to +which no serious importance need be attached.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">My</span> fair plaintiff has not suffered the grass of inaction to grow upon +her feet, having already issued her Statement of Claim, by which she +alleges that I proposed marriage on a certain date, and did +subsequently, on divers occasions, treat her, in the presence of sundry +witnesses, as an affianced, after which I mizzled into obscurity, and on +various pretexts did decline, and do still decline, to fulfil my nuptial +contract, by which conduct the plaintiff, being grievously afflicted in +mind, body, and estate, claims damages to the doleful tune of £1000.</p> + +<p>(N.B.—I have thought it advisable here and there to translate the legal +phraseology into more comprehensible verbiage.)</p> + +<p>Now such a claim is to milk a ram, or <i>prendre la lune avec les dents</i>, +seeing that I am not a proprietor of even one thousand rupees. Nevertheless +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183"></a></span>(as +I have informed Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle</span>), my progenitor, the +Mooktear, will bleed to any reasonable extent of costs out of pocket.</p> + +<p>I have held frequent and lengthy interviews with the said <span class="smcap">Smartle</span>, Esq., +who is of incredible despatch and celerity—though I sometimes regret +that I did not procure a solicitor of a more senile and sympathetic +disposition.</p> + +<p>Assuredly had I done so, such an one would not, after perusing my +Statement of Defence—a most magnificently voluminous document of over +fifty folios, crammed and stuffed with satirical hits and sideblows, and +pathetic appeals for the Bench's indulgence, and replete with familiar +quotations from best classical and continental authors—such an one, I +say, would not have split his sides with disrespectful chucklings, +thrown my composition into a wasted paper receptacle, and proceeded to +knock off a meagre substitute of his own, containing a very few dry bald +paragraphs, in the inadequately brief space of under the hour.</p> + +<p>Such, however, was Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle's</span> course; and the sole consolation is +that, owing to his unprofessional precipitation, the action was set down +for trial previously to the commencement of the Long Vacation, and my +case may come on some time next Term, and I be put out of my misery at +the close of the year.</p> + +<p>My aforesaid legal adviser, finding that I adhered with the tenacity of +bird-slime to my +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184"></a></span> determination to conduct my case +in person, did hint in no ambiguous language, that it might perhaps be even better for me to +do the guy next November to my native land, and snip my fingers then +from a safe distance at the plaintiff.</p> + +<p>But it is not my practice to exhibit a white feather (except when +prostrated by severe bodily panics), and I am consumed by an ardent +impatience to air my fluencies and legal learnedness before the +publicity of a London Law Court.</p> + +<p>Now, begone dull care! for I am to dismiss all litigious thoughts till +October or November next, and become a <i>Dolce far niente</i>, chasing the +deer with my heart in the Highlands.</p> + +<p>My volunteering acquaintance, by the way, has declined to lend me his +rifle, on the transparent pretence that it was contrary to regulations, +and that it was not the <i>bon ton</i> to pursue grouse-birds and the like +with so war-like a weapon.</p> + +<p>So, on young <span class="smcap">Howard's</span> advice, I made the purchase from a pawnbroker of a +lethal instrument, provided with a duplicate bore, so that, should a +bird happen by any chance to escape my first barrel, the second will +infallibly make him bite the dust.</p> + +<p>I have also purchased some cartridges of a very pleasing colour, a +hunting knife, and a shot belt and pouch, and if I can only procure some +inexpensive kind of sporting hound from the Dogs' +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185"></a></span> Home, I shall be +forewarned and forearmed <i>cap à pie</i> for the perils and pleasures of the +chase.</p> + +<p>Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> did earnestly advise me, inasmuch as I was about to go +amongst the savage hill tribes of canny Scotians, to previously make +myself acquainted with their idioms, &c., for which purpose she lent me +some romances written entirely in Caledonian dialects, also the +compositions of Hon. Poet <span class="smcap">Burns</span>.</p> + +<p>But hoity-toity! after much diligent perusal, I arrived at the +conclusion that such works were sealed books to the most intelligent +foreigner, unless he is furnished with a good Scotch grammar and +dictionary.</p> + +<p>And <i>mirabile dictu!</i> though I have made diligent inquiries of various +London booksellers, I have found it utterly impossible to obtain such +works in England—a haughty and arrogantly dispositioned country, more +inclined to teach than to learn!</p> + +<p>How many of your boasted British Cabinet, supposed to rule our countless +millions of so-called Indian subjects, would be capable to sit down and +read and translate—<i>correctly</i>—a single sentence from the Mahábhárat +in the original?</p> + +<p>Not more, I shrewdly suspect, than half a dozen at most!</p> + +<p>So it is not to be expected that any more interest would be displayed in +the language and literature of a country like Scotland, which is +notoriously wild and barren and less densely +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186"></a></span> populated and productive +than the most ordinary districts of Bengal.</p> + +<p>Oh, you pusillanimous Highland chiefs and other misters! how long will +you tamely submit to such offhanded treatment? Will the day never come +when, with whirling sporrans and flashing pibrochs you will rise against +the alien oppressor, and demand Home Rule, together with the total +abolition of present disdainful British <i>insouciance</i>?</p> + +<p>When that day dawns—if ever—please note this piece of private +intelligence from an authorised source: <i>Young Bengal will be with you +in your struggle for Autonomy.</i> If not in body, assuredly in spirit. +Possibly in <i>both</i>.</p> + +<p>I say no more, in case I should be accused of trying to stir up +seditious feelings; but, as a patriotic Baboo gentleman, my blood will +boil occasionally at instances of stuck-up English self-sufficiency, and +the worm in the bud, if nipped too severely, may blossom into a rather +formidable serpent!</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p187'></a> +<img src="images/p187.jpg" width="514" height="700" alt="I am addressed by an underbred street-urchin as a 'Blooming Blacky!'"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"I AM ADDRESSED BY AN UNDERBRED STREET-URCHIN AS A 'BLOOMING BLACKY!'"</span></p></div> + +<p>As, for instance, when, in the course of an inoffensive promenade, I am +addressed by an underbred street-urchin as a "blooming blacky," and +cannot induce a policeman to compel my aggressor to furnish me with his +name and address or that of his parents, or even to offer the most +ordinary apology.</p> + +<p>Enough of these rather bitter reflections, however. I omitted to mention +that I am also the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189"></a></span> proprietor (at the same +pawnbroker's where I bought my breeches-loader gun) of a very fine second-hand salmon-rod, a +great bargain and immense value, with which I hope to be able to catch a +great quantity of fishes.</p> + +<p>For there is, according to young <span class="smcap">Howard</span>, good fishing in a burn +adjoining the Manse, so I shall follow King Solomon's injunctions, and +not spare the rod and spoil the salmons, though if I should happen to +"spoil" my rod, the salmons would inevitably in consequence be "spared."</p> + +<p>This is a sample of the kind of verbal pleasantries in which, when in +exhilarated high spirits, I sometimes facetiously indulge.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXIV" id="XXIV"></a>XXIV</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee relates his experiences upon the Moors.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">I am</span> now an acclimatised denizen of Caledonia stern and wild; which, +however, turns out to be milder and tamer than depicted by the jaundiced +hand of national jealousy.</p> + +<p>For, since my arrival at this hamlet of Kilpaitrick, N.B., I have not +once beheld any species of savage hill-man; moreover, the adult +inhabitants are clothed with irreproachable decency, and, if the +juveniles run about with denuded feet and heads, where is the shocking +scandal?</p> + +<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span>, sen., did me the honour to appear in person upon the +Kilpaitrick platform, and welcome me with outspread arms to his +temporary hearth and home, but I shall have the candour of confessing my +disappointment with the size and appearance of the same. It appears that +a "Manse" is not at all a palatial edifice, furnished with a plethora of +marble halls and vassals and serfs, &c., but simply the very so-so and +two-storied abode of some local priest!</p> + +<p>My gracious hostess was to tender profuse apologies for its homeliness, +on the plea that it is refreshing at times to lay aside ceremonial +magnificence and unbend in rural simplicity, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193"></a></span> though it is not humanly +possible to unbend oneself upon the thorny bosoms of chairs and couches +severely upholstered with the prickling hairs of an extinct horse.</p> + +<p>Still, as I assured Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, she is the happy owner of a magical +knack to transform, by her sheer apparition, the humblest hovel into the +first-class family residence with every modern improvement.</p> + +<p>With the said Miss I continue on terms of hand and gloveship, with +mutual harmless jokes, which would perhaps be as caviare on toast to a +general, though I shall venture to recount some examples.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p191'></a> +<img src="images/p191.jpg" width="371" height="700" alt="Of incredible bashfulness and bucolical appearance."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"OF INCREDIBLE BASHFULNESS AND BUCOLICAL APPEARANCE."</span></p></div> + +<p>A certain local young laird, of incredible bashfulness and bucolical +appearance, is a frequent visitor at the manse, and the fervent admirer +of Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, who cannot endure the tedium of his society, and is +constantly endeavouring to escape therefrom.</p> + +<p>Now his name is Mr <span class="smcap">Crum</span>, and I have frequently entertained her in +private by play upon the word, alluding to him as "Mister <span class="smcap">Crust</span>," +"Mister <span class="smcap">Oatcake</span>," or "the Scotch Bun," and the like; but he informed me +that he preferred to be addressed as "Balbannock," and upon my inquiring +his reasons for selecting such an alias, he answered that it was because +he inhabited a house of that name.</p> + +<p>Whereupon I facetiously requested that he would address myself in future as "Mister +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194"></a></span> Seventy-nine, Hereford +Road, Bayswater," which stroke of wit +occasioned inextinguishable merriment from Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, though it did +not excite from the aforesaid laird so much as the smallest simper!</p> + +<p>From an ingrained love of teasing, and also the natural desire to +stimulate her appreciation of my superior fertility in small talk and +<i>l'art de plaire</i>, I do often slyly contrive to inflict his sole society +upon her—to the huge entertainment of her father and mother, who carry +on the joke by assisting my manœuvrings; but, although it affords me +a flattering gratification to be plaintively upbraided by Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> +for my cruel desertion, I am resolved not to persist in such heartless +pranks beyond her natural endurance.</p> + +<p>Shortly after my arrival I heard from my host that he was the recipient of an invitation +from a Mister <span class="smcap">Bagshot</span>, Q.C., that he and his son <span class="smcap">Howard</span> +would accompany him to a shooting expedition upon some adjacent moors, +and that, being now immoderately plump, and past his prime as a potshot, +he had requested leave to nominate myself as his <i>budli</i> or substitute, +explaining that I was a young Indian prince of great prowess at every +kind of big games.</p> + +<p>Accordingly, to my great delight, it was arranged that I should take his +place.</p> + +<p>My young friend <span class="smcap">Howard</span>, beholding me appear at the breakfast-table arrayed in my +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195"></a></span> short kilt and superincumbent +belly-purse with tassels, did entreat me to change myself into ordinary knickerbockers, lest I +should catch death with a cold.</p> + +<p>But I declined, disdaining such dangers, and assuring him that I did not +at all dislike the excessive ventilation of my knees.</p> + +<p>We drove to Mr <span class="smcap">Bagshot's</span> residence, Rowans Castle, in a hired machine, +and found the gentlemen-shooters gathered outside the portico. Amongst +the party I was pleased to observe Hon'ble Justice <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>, who, when +we were all ascended into the waggonette-break, did rally me very +good-humouredly upon some mixed bag of elephants and tigers he had heard +(or so he said) I had accomplished in some up-country jungle.</p> + +<p>At first, knowing that this was the utter impossibility, I perspired +with terror that he was making me the fool, but apparently he was +himself under a misunderstanding, for when we had left the vehicle and +were preparing to advance, he paid me the distinguished compliment of +entreating that I might be awarded the command of one extremity of the +line, while he himself was to preside over the opposite end!</p> + +<p>And thus we commenced to climb a steep hill, thickly covered with a very +pricklesome heather, and black slimy bogs, wherein the varnish of my +patent-leather shoes did soon +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196"></a></span> become totally dimmed. So, being gravely +incommoded by the shortness of my wind, I entrusted my musket to an +under-keeper, begging him to inform me of the early approach of any stag +or deer.</p> + +<p>However, we saw nothing to shoot at except various sorts of wild +poultry, and when some of these flew up immediately in front of me, I +was too late, owing to the carriage of my gun by an underling, to do +more than fire off a couple of barrels as a declaration of hostility.</p> + +<p>But profiting by this lesson in being <i>semper paratus</i>, I refused to +part again with my deadly instrument, and stumbled manfully onwards with +finger upon the triggers, letting them fly instantaneously at the first +appearance of any animals <i>feræ naturæ</i>.</p> + +<p>It is not customary, I was assured, to slay the wild sheep in these +districts, though horned, and of an excessively ferocious appearance, +and even when firing my bullets at birds, I was subjected to continual +reproofs from some officious keeper or other.</p> + +<p>For example, I was not to shoot into a flock of partridges, for the +superstitious reason, forsooth! that it was still the month of August, +which is supposed to be unlucky!</p> + +<p>Again, I was rebuked for burning powder at a grey hen, because it is the +wife of a black-cock, which may be shot with impunity. Although a highly +chivalrous chap in questions +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197"></a></span> of the fairer sex, I am yet to see why it +is allowable to render the female bird a bereaved widow, but totally +forbidden to make the male a widower! Or why it is permissible to slay a +minute bird such as a snipe, while a titlark is on no account to be +touched.</p> + +<p>Being eventually exasperated by these unreasonable faultfindings, seeing +that I had merely emptied my gun-barrels without actually destroying any +of these sacred volatiles, I addressed the keeper in the withering tones +of a sarcasm: "Mister Keeper," I said, "as I am not the ornithologist or +soothsayer to distinguish infallibly every species of bird by instinct +when flying with incredible velocity, would it not be better that I +should discharge no shots in future?"</p> + +<p>To which, abashed by my severity, he replied that he could not just say +that it would make any considerable difference whether I fired at all or +none.</p> + +<p>My fellow-shooters, however, could not refrain from shouting with +irrepressible admiration at the intrepidity with which, forestalling the +fleetest dogs, I did rush forward to pick up the fallen grouse-birds, +and repeatedly exhorted me to take greater care for my own safety.</p> + +<p>I cannot say that they exhibited equivalent courageousness, seeing that, +so often as I raised my gun to fire, they flung themselves upon their +stomachs in the heather until I had finished, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198"></a></span> upon which I rallied them +mercilessly upon their timidity, assuring them repeatedly that they had +nothing to fear.</p> + +<p>Yet English and Scotch alike accuse us Bengalees of being subject to +excessive funkiness. What about the Pot and the Kettle, Misters?</p> + +<p>I am to reserve the conclusion of my shooting experiences until a future +occasion.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXV" id="XXV"></a>XXV</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee concludes the thrilling account of his experiences on a Scotch moor, +greatly to his own glorification.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Now</span> to resume the rather arbitrarily truncated account of my gunnery on +Scottish moors.</p> + +<p>Before luncheon I ventured to remonstrate earnestly with my entertainer, +Mr <span class="smcap">Bagshot</span>, Q.C., concerning the extreme severity with which he +chastised a juvenile sporting hound of his for such trivial offences as +running after some rabbit, or picking up slaughtered volatiles without +receiving the <i>mot d'ordre</i>!</p> + +<p>"Listen, honourable Sir," I entreated him, "to the voice of Reason! It +is the second nature of all such canines to pursue vermins, nor are they +at all capable of comprehending the Why and Wherefore of a shocking +flagellation. If it is your wish that this hound should play the part of +a Tantalus, forbidden even to touch the <i>bonne-bouches</i> with his +watering mouth, surely it is possible to restrain him by a more humane +method than Brute Force!"</p> + +<p>At this mild reproof Mister <span class="smcap">Bagshot</span> became utterly rubescent, murmuring +excuses which I +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200"></a></span> did not catch; and I, perceiving +that this object lesson of kindness to animals from an Oriental had strongly affected all +the shooters, patted the hound on the forehead, consoling him with some +chocolate I carried in my cartridge sack.</p> + +<p>We picnicked our lunch under a stone wall, and I, becoming an hilarious, +rallied my companions unmercifully upon the solemnity with which they +had marched in cautious silence, and with stern countenances as to +attack some formidable foe—and all to slaughter sundry braces of +inoffensive grouse-birds—truly an heroical sort of undertaking!</p> + +<p>To which Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span> replied, with his utterance impeded by cold +pie, that I might congratulate myself on having kept my own hands +unstained by any grouse's gore.</p> + +<p>"True, Mister Ex-Judge," I retorted, "but as you have already testified" +(here I hoisted his own petard at him rather ingeniously), "I am more an +<i>au fait</i> in the extermination of elephants <i>et hoc genus omne</i>, and +have hitherto reserved my powder and shot for a stag or some similar +monarch of the glen. However, after lunch let us see whether I am not +competent to kill, or at least maim, one of these same grouse-fowls, +<i>faute de mieux</i>!"</p> + +<p>A repartee which excited uproarious laughter (at Hon'ble C.'s expense) +from all the present company.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201"></a></span></p> + +<p>Subsequently, we were posted in a row of small fortresses constructed of +turfs, to await what is termed a "Drive," <i>i.e.</i>, until some flock of +grouse-birds, exasperated to fury by the cries and blows of certain +individuals called "beaters," should attack our positions.</p> + +<p>Hearing that the grouses on this moor were of an excessive wildness, I +was at first apprehensive that one might fly at my nose or eyes while I +was busied in defending myself against its fellows, but the keeper who +was with me assured me that such was seldom their custom.</p> + +<p>And, indeed, such as came in my direction flew with wings so accelerated +by panic that they were invisible before I could even select one as my +target, so I was reduced to fire with considerable random. Presently the +beaters approached, carrying flags of truce, and we sallied out of our +forts to pick up the slain and wounded. After diligent search, I had the +happiness to discover a grouse-bird, stone dead, in the heather, and, +capering with triumph, called to the keeper to come and see the spoil.</p> + +<p>On his arrival, however, he said that he could not just think it would +be my bird, as he had not noticed any fall in that direction. But after +I had presented him with a piece of silver, he did agree that if I chose +to claim the bird as mine, it was not his place to contradict me, and so in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202"></a></span> great +glee I exhibited my prize to the others, appealing to the +keeper (who basely remained <i>sotto voce</i>) for confirmation.</p> + +<p>"A devilish clean shot, Prince!" Sir <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span> graciously remarked; +"why, the bird is stiff and cold already!"</p> + +<p>Whereupon I was cordially congratulated, and awarded the tail feathers +to decorate my "tommy-shanty," and during the next driving, having now +acquired the knack, I rendered several more denizens of the air the +<i>hors de combats</i>, though—either on account of their great ingenuity in +running out of the radius, or creeping into holes, etc., or else the +stupidity of the retrieving dogs—their corpses remained irrecoverable.</p> + +<p>On taking my leave, I expressed unbounded satisfaction with such sport +as I had had, and my fixed intention to assist on some similar +shooting-expedition, and Mr <span class="smcap">Bagshot</span> kindly promised to let me know if he +should again have vacancy for an additional gun.</p> + +<p>I regret to say that young <span class="smcap">Howard</span>, who, having only laid low a couple of +black cocks and a blue hare, was immoderately jealous of my superior +skilfulness, did seek to depreciate it by insinuating that my grouse was +one which, having been seriously wounded by other hands some days +previously, had come up to the hills to shuffle off its mortal coil in +seclusion, arguing +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205"></a></span> thus from its total absence of heat and +suppleness.</p> + +<p>This is the merest quibble, and to travel out of the record, since, of +course, if a bird is at all of a venerable age, it becomes stiff and +deficient in vital warmth long before it is popped off! Moreover, if the +grouse were not legitimately my property, why, forsooth, should I be +permitted to carry it home?</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p203'></a> +<img src="images/p203.jpg" width="468" height="700" alt="I presented my trophy and treasure-trove to the fairylike Miss Wee-Wee."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"I PRESENTED MY TROPHY AND TREASURE-TROVE TO THE FAIRYLIKE MISS WEE-WEE."</span></p></div> + +<p>I presented my trophy and treasure-trove to the fairylike Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span>, +who was so overwhelmed by the compliment that she entreated for it to be +cooked and eaten <i>instanter</i>.</p> + +<p>As soon as I have recovered a missing link of my fishing-rod (which it +seems has been overlooked by Mister Pawnbroker), and when I have +procured some suitable bait, &c., it is my intention to catch a fine +salmon out of the burn for my enchanting divinity, and, as I place the +fish in her lily-like hands, to strike iron while it is hot and make her +the formal proposal of matrimony.</p> + +<p>Mister <span class="smcap">Crum</span>, hearing of my piscatorial ambitions, has, with almost +incredible simplicity, offered to lend me his salmon rod, with a volume +of flies, little suspecting that he will be assisting me to catch two +fish upon one hook! I am immensely tickled by such a tip-top joke, and +can scarcely refrain from imparting it to Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> herself, though I +shall wait until I have first secured the salmon. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206"></a></span></p> + +<p>I had some valuable remarks upon Scottish idioms and linguistic +peculiarities, &c., but these, of course, are to be suppressed <i>sine +die</i>—unless I am to be permitted to overflow into a special +supplement.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXVI" id="XXVI"></a>XXVI</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee expresses some audaciously sceptical opinions. How he secured +his first Salmon, with the manner in which he presented it to his divinity.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">Owing</span> mainly to lack of opportunity, invitations, <i>et cætera</i>, I have +not resumed the offensive against members of the grouse department, but +have rather occupied myself in laborious study of Caledonian dialects, +as exemplified in sundry local works of poetical and prose fiction, +until I should be competent to converse with the <i>aborigines</i> in their +own tongue.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p209'></a> +<img src="images/p209.jpg" width="430" height="700" alt="Whether he had wha-haed wi' hon'ble Wallace?"> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"WHETHER HE HAD WHA-HAED WI' HON'BLE WALLACE?"</span></p></div> + +<p>Then (having now the diction of Poet <span class="smcap">Burns</span> in my fingers' ends) I did +genially accost the first native I met in the street of Kilpaitrick, +complimenting him upon his honest, sonsie face, and enquiring whether he +had wha-haed wi' Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Wallace</span>, and was to bruise the Peckomaut, or +ca' the knowes to the yowes. But, from the intemperance of his reply, I +divined that he was totally without comprehension of my meaning!</p> + +<p>Next I addressed him by turns in the phraseologies of Misters <span class="smcap">Black</span>, +<span class="smcap">Barrie</span>, and <span class="smcap">Crockett</span>, Esquires, interlarding my speech with +"whatefers," +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208"></a></span> and +"hechs," and "ou-ays," and "dod-mons," and "loshes," +and "tods," <i>ad libitum</i>, to which after listening with the most earnest +attention, he returned the answer that he was not acquainted with any +Oriental language.</p> + +<p>Nor could I by any argument convince this beetle-head that I was simply +speaking the barbarous accents of his native land!</p> + +<p>Since which, after some similar experiments upon various peasants, &c., +I have made a rather peculiar discovery.</p> + +<p>There is no longer any such article as a separate Scottish language, +and, indeed, I am in some dubitation whether it ever existed at all, and +is not rather the waggish invention of certain audacious Scottishers, +who have taken advantage of the insular ignorance and credulity of the +British public to palm off upon it several highly fictitious kinds of +unintelligible gibberish!</p> + +<p>Nay, I will even go farther and express a grave suspicion whether the +Scotland of these bookish romances is not the daring imposture of a <i>ben +trovato</i>. For, after a prolonged residence of over a fortnight, I have +never seen anything approaching a mountain pass, nor a dizzy crag, +surmounted by an eagle, nor any stag drinking itself full at eve among +the shady trunks of a deer-forest! I have never met a single mountaineer +in feminine bonnet and plumes and short petticoats, and pipes inserted +in a bag. Nor do the inhabitants dance in the street upon +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211"></a></span> crossed +sword-blades—this is purely a London practice. Nor have I seen any +Caledonian snuffing his nostrils with tobacco from the discarded horn of +some ram.</p> + +<p>Finding that my short kilt is no longer the mould of national form, I +have now altogether abandoned it, while retaining the fox-tailed +belly-purse on account of its convenience and handsome appearance.</p> + +<p>Now let me proceed to narrate how I became the captor of a large-sized +salmon.</p> + +<p>Having accepted the loan of Mister <span class="smcap">Crum's</span> fishing-wand, and attached to +my line certain large flies, composed of black hairs, red worsted, and +gilded thread, which it seems the salmons prefer even to worms, I +sallied forth along the riparian bank of a river, and proceeded to whip +the stream with the severity of Emperor <span class="smcap">Xerxes</span> when engaged in +flagellating the ocean.</p> + +<p>But waesucks! (to employ the perhaps spurious verbiage of aforesaid Poet +<span class="smcap">Burns</span>) my line, owing to superabundant longitude, did promptly become a +labyrinth of Gordian knots, and the flies (which are named <i>Zulus</i>) +attached their barbs to my cap and adjacent bushes with well-nigh +inextricable tenacity, until at length I had the bright idea to +abbreviate the line, so that I could dangle my bait a foot or two above +the surface of the water—where a salmon could easily obtain it by +simply turning a somersault.</p> + +<p>However, after sitting patiently for an hour, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212"></a></span> as if on a monument, I +could not succeed in catching the eye of any passing fish, and so, +severely disheartened by my ill-luck, I was strolling on, shouldering my +rod, when—odzooks! whom should I encounter but Mister <span class="smcap">Bagshot</span> and a +party of friends, who were watching his keepers capture salmons from a +boat by means of a large net, a far more practical and effectual method +than the cumbersome and unreliable device of a meretricious fly with a +very visible hook!</p> + +<p>And, just as I approached, the net was drawn towards the bank, and +proved to contain three very large lively fishes lashing their tails +with ungovernable fury at such detention!</p> + +<p>Whereupon I made the humble petition to Mister <span class="smcap">Bagshot</span> that, since he +was now the favourite of Fortune, he was to remember him to whom she had +denied her simpers, and bestow upon me the most mediocre of the salmons, +since I was desirous to make a polite offering to the amiable daughter +of my host and hostess.</p> + +<p>And with munificent generosity he presented me with the largest of the +trio, which, with great jubilation, I endeavoured to carry off under my +arm, though severely baffled by the extreme slipperiness with which +(even after its decease) it repeatedly wallowed in dust, until someone, +perceiving my fix, good-naturedly instructed me how to carry it by +perforating its head with a piece of string. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213"></a></span></p> + +<p>I found Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> in a secluded garden seat at the back of the Manse, +incommoded, as usual, by the society of Mister <span class="smcap">Crum</span>. "Sir," I said, +addressing him politely (for I was extremely anxious for his departure, +since I could not well present my salmon to Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> and request the +<i>quid-pro-quo</i> of her affection in his presence), "accept my gratitude +for the usufruct of your rod, which has produced magnificent fruit. You +will find the instrument leaning against the palings of the front +garden." And with this I made secret signals to Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> that she +was to dismiss him; but she remained bashful, and he seemed totally +unaware that he was the drug of the market!</p> + +<p>At last, weary of concealing my captured salmon any longer behind the +small of my back, I was about to inform Mister <span class="smcap">Crum</span> that he had Miss +<span class="smcap">Louisa's</span> permission to absent himself, when she broke the silence by +informing me that, as the old familiar friend of both parties, I was to +be the first to hear a piece of news—to wit, that <span class="smcap">Donald</span> (Mister C.'s +baptismal appellation) and she were just become the engaged couple!</p> + +<p>I was so overcome by grief and indignation at her perfidious duplicity +(since she had frequently encouraged me in my mockeries of her admirer's +uncouthness and rusticity), that I stuck in the throat, and then flung +the salmon violently across a boundary hedge into a yard of poultry. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214"></a></span></p> + +<p>"Madam," I said, "that fish was to have been laid at your feet as the +visible pledge of my devotion. You have not only lost the gift of a +splendid salmon, but have thrown away the heart of a well-educated +native B.A. and Member of the Bar! And you have gained—hoity toity! +What? Why, a Scotch Bun!"</p> + +<p>But almost immediately I was taken by violent remorse for my +presumption, and shed the tears of contrition, entreating +forgiveness—nay, more, I scrambled through a hole in a very thorny +hedge, and, recovering the salmon (which had not had time to become very +severely henpecked), I begged them to accept it between them as a token +of my esteem and good wishes, which they joyfully consented to do. I had +expected that my worthy host and hostess would have shared my astounded +disappointment on hearing of their daughter's engagement; but, on the +contrary, they received the news with smiling complacency.</p> + +<p>It appears that Mister <span class="smcap">Crum</span>, though endowed with a somewhat sheepish and +bucolical exterior, is of tip-top Scottish caste and lineage, and the +landed proprietor.</p> + +<p>I am not to deny the attractiveness of such qualities, though I had +hitherto been under the Fool's Paradise of an impression that they would +have infinitely preferred this humble self as a son-in-law.</p> + +<p>However, I am now emerging from my doleful +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215"></a></span> dumps, with the reflection +that, after all, it is contrary to common-sense to drain the cup of +misery to the dregs for so totally inadequate a cause as the ficklety of +any feminine!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXVII" id="XXVII"></a>XXVII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mr Jabberjee is unavoidably compelled to return to town, thereby affording +his Solicitor the inestimable benefit of his personal assistance. An apparent attempt to pack the Jury.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">The</span> Public will be astounded at the news (which came with the perfect +novelty of a surprise upon this insignificant self) that I have ceased +to be the cherished guest beneath the hired Scottish roof of Mister +<span class="smcap">Leofric Allbutt-Innett</span> and his bucksome lady.</p> + +<p>It fell out after this fashion.</p> + +<p>One fine September morning, when I was accoutring myself in order to go +out and hunt the robert (N.B. a genuine local Scotticism for individuals +belonging to the rabbit genius), there came to me my young friend +<span class="smcap">Howard</span>, who was to teach my young idea how to shoot, in great gloom, +asking me if it would take me a prolonged period to pack up my +<i>impedimenta</i>.</p> + +<p>I replied that I could do the trick instantaneously, inquiring the +reason for his question.</p> + +<p>"Because," said he, "if I were you, I should have a wire requiring me to +come up to London at once."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217"></a></span></p> + +<p>"From my solicitor?" I inquired. "Is he then desirous of consulting with +me?"</p> + +<p>My friend answered me that it was the one object of his present +existence.</p> + +<p>"In that case," said I, rather spiritedly, "let him come up here, since +I am not a mountain that I should obey the becking call of any Mahomet. +Moreover, I am impatient to achieve the destruction of some Scottish +roberts."</p> + +<p>"If you will take my advice," he said, "you will grant them a reprieve, +and make a scarcity of yourself. There is a train for Glasgow which you +can just catch. I wouldn't distress the Mater and Governor by any +farewells, you know."</p> + +<p>"But," I objected, "I am not even in receipt of any telegram. Nor can I +possibly omit the etiquette of a ceremonious leave-taking with your +honourable parents."</p> + +<p>"Just as you please," replied he. "Just now the Governor and Mater are +in the front sitting-room, engaged in perusing the back numbers of your +precious 'Jossers and Tidlers' or whatever you call 'em, which have been +thoughtfully forwarded by a relative. I don't think I'd disturb them."</p> + +<p>"Are they so hugely interested in the performances of my unassuming +<i>penna</i>?" I cried, with the gratified simpering of a flattered.</p> + +<p>"It looked like it when I left the room," said he; "the Mater was very near rolling on the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218"></a></span> oilcloth, and +the Governor dancing and foaming from +his mouth. What an awfully old ass you have been, <span class="smcap">Jab</span>, to go and blurt +out everything in print—about your breach of promise case, and getting +to know us, and—worst of all—being merely a bogey prince. Naturally, +we don't care about being made to look fools. The dear old Mater, you +know, is one of those simple, trusting natures that, if they once +discover they have been taken in by a sham title, why, they kick up the +row of a deuce! And, as for the Governor, he's the sort of old retiring +chap that has a downright loathing of publicity, when it makes him +ridiculous. If he came across you just now, there's really no saying +what he mightn't do. He's such a devilishly hot-tempered old boy!"</p> + +<p>I did not comprehend the reasons for such exuberant anger, but, of +course, young <span class="smcap">Howard</span> insisted so urgently on physical dangers to myself +if I delayed, that I hastened stealthily to my room by a backstair, and +flinging my <i>paraphernalia</i> with incredible despatch into a portmanteau, +was so fortunate as to convey it out of the house without attracting the +invidious attention of my host and hostess, who were probably still +occupied in foaming and rolling upon the carpet like angry waves of the +sea.</p> + +<p>Young <span class="smcap">Howard</span> accompanied me to the station, though blaming me as the +cause of his embroilment with his progenitors, who, it seems, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221"></a></span> had +insisted—quite unjustly—that he must have known from the first that my +nobility was merely a brevet rank; and Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee</span> bade me farewell +with a soft and perfectly ladylike cordiality, being too grieved by my +departure to make any allusion to the head and front of my offending.</p> + +<p>Now I am once more in London, paying daily visits of several hours to +the office of my solicitor, in order to assist him in the preparation of +my brief.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p219'></a> +<img src="images/p219.jpg" width="386" height="700" alt="Baboo Chuckerbutty Ram."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"BABOO CHUCKERBUTTY RAM."</span></p></div> + +<p>The other day, Baboo <span class="smcap">Jalpanybhoy</span> and Baboo <span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span> +attended for the purpose of arranging their evidence, when I regret to say the former +made a rather paltry exhibition of himself, being declared by Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle</span> +himself to be totally incompetent to prove anything whatever material to +the case, and I am therefore resolved to refuse him admission to the +witness-box.</p> + +<p>I am more hopeful of Mr <span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span>, who, I think, after diligent +coaching from myself, may be induced to restrain his natural garrulity, +and speak no more than is set down for him, which is simply that I have +already, in his presence, contracted matrimony with a juvenile native, +and that the laws of my country entitle me to marry several more.</p> + +<p>This is in support of one of my most subtle pleadings of defence, to +wit, that I have already offered to marry the plaintiff according to my +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222"></a></span> +country's laws, but that she did definitely decline such a marriage as +polygamous (which it is indubitably liable to become at any moment), +consequently, that my said contract is nilled by mutual consent.</p> + +<p>Mr <span class="smcap">Smartle</span> was of the opinion that the plaintiff's solicitors would move +to strike out such a pleading as bad in law, since it is no defence to +an action for breach of promise that the defendant is already the +Benedick. Fortunately they have omitted to do this, and I anticipate +exciting excessive admiration in Court by the ingenuity of my arguments +from Analogy, Common Sense, Roman Law, &c.</p> + +<p>My said solicitor has also communicated with Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd +Cummerbund</span>, to inquire if he would consent to appear as a witness to my +dependent filial condition, and entire lack of the sinews of war; which, +with fatherly kindness, he has agreed to do, and, as he rather +humorously puts it, convince the jury that I am the good riddance of bad +rubbish.</p> + +<p>Now the decks are cleaned for action, and all is ready for the forensic +logomachy as soon as it may please Providence and some associate in the +Queen's Bench Division to place the suit of <i>Mankletow </i>v.<i> Jabberjee</i> in +the list of causes for the day.</p> + +<p>My solicitor's advice, which I shall very probably adopt, is to keep as +close as possible +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223"></a></span>to the issues, and more especially +to the point that, if I gave any promise to marry at all, it was extorted from me by +threats of bodily violence which reduced me to a blue funkiness.</p> + +<p>Also he recommends that I am not to attempt any golden-mouthed +eloquence, thereby making the lamentable exhibit of a most stupendous +ignorance of human nature!</p> + +<p>For what can melt the stony hearts of men, causing them to bellow like +an ox and become tender as chickens, or what can rouse them to +Indignation, Approval, Contempt, Wonderment, and every other known +sentiment as required, so effectively as the trumpeting tongue of +oratorical eloquence!</p> + +<p>All I can aver is that, if I am not to be permitted to draw the +glittering sword of my tongue from the scabbard of my mouth, I shall +infallibly, in sheer sickishness at such short-sighted folly, throw up +my brief!</p> + +<p>I must not omit to say that if any of my fellow-colleagues on this +periodical (of course including Hon'ble Editor) should be anxious to +become eye-witnesses of my forensic <i>début</i>, I shall be overjoyed to +procure their admission and will instruct the Usher that they are to be +awarded the seats of honour. Perhaps it might even be feasible for two +or three of them to obtain appointments as jurymen. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224"></a></span></p> + +<p>If so, let them not turn the deaf ear to the gentle wheezings of their +<i>esprit de corps</i>, but remember that it is not the custom for one eagle +to peck another in his optics.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXVIII" id="XXVIII"></a>XXVIII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mankletow <span class="smcap">v.</span> Jabberjee. Notes taken by Mr Jabberjee in Court during the proceedings.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><p class="center"><i>Queen's Bench Court, No. ——,</i> <span class="smcap">10.20 a.m.</span></p> + +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> eventful morn of my trial for Breach of Promise has at length +arrived, and I am resolved to jot down on the exterior of my brief such +tittles as take place. I have taken my seat in Court on one of the +benches reserved for long-robed juniors; in my immediate rear being my +solicitor, <span class="smcap">Sidney Smartle</span>, Esq., who will officiate as my Remembrancer +and Friend in Need.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p227'></a> +<img src="images/p227.jpg" width="353" height="700" alt="Fresh as a daisy, and fine as a carrot fresh scraped."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"FRESH AS A DAISY, AND FINE AS A CARROT FRESH SCRAPED."</span></p></div> + +<p>In the Great Hall below I had the pleasure to encounter Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> +and that worthy Madam her Mamma, being prepared to greet them with +effusive kindness, and assure them I was only a hostile in my +professional capacity. Whether they were struck with awe by the +unaccustomed majesty of my appearance in brand-new wig, bands, &c., in +which I am fresh as a daisy, and fine as a carrot fresh scraped, or +whether they simply did not recognise me in the disguisement of such +toggeries, I am not to decide—but they passed by without responding +visibly to my salutations.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226"></a></span></p> + +<p><span class="smcap">10.25.</span>—A stout, large Q.C., with luxuriant cheek-whiskers has just +entered the row in front. Mister <span class="smcap">Smartle</span> whispers to me that this is +<span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, whom I refused to engage, and who is now in opposition.</p> + +<p>I have taken the undue liberty to pluck him by the sleeve and introduce +myself in straightforward English style to his honourable notice, +acquainting him that his unfortunate client had a very flimsy case, and +was not deserving of success, while myself was a meritorious Native +Neophyte, whose entire fortune was impaled on a stake, and urging him +not to show too windy a temper to such a shorn lamb as his petitioner.</p> + +<p>However, he has declined rather peremptorily to lend me his ears, nor +can I induce his learned junior, who is my next neighbour, to show me +any fraternal kindness. My said solicitor is highly indignant at my +treatment, and warns me in an undertone that I am not to make any +further overtures to such stuck-up individuals.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">10.30.</span>—Hon'ble Mister Justice <span class="smcap">Honeygall</span> enters in highly dignified +fashion. He is of a bland, benignant, and intensely clean aspect, which +uplifts my downfallen heart, for it is obvious, from his benevolent and +smiling bow to myself that he already feels a paternal interest in my +achieving the conquest of my spurs.</p> + +<p>The jury are taking the oath. Whether any of my co-contributors to +<i>Punch</i> are among them I cannot discover, since they do not vouchsafe +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229"></a></span> +to encourage me by the freemasonry of even a surreptitious simper. But +this is perhaps occasioned by over prudence.</p> + +<p>The learned junior on my right has risen, and in shockingly bald and +barren verbiage has stated the issues which are to be tried, and, being +evidently no Heaven-born orator, sits abruptly down, completely +gravelled for lack of a more copious vocabulary. A poor tongue-tied +devil of a chap whom I regard with pity!</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., is addressing the jury. He is not a tongue-tied, but +he speaks in a colloquial, commonplace sort of fashion which does not +shed a very brilliant lustre upon boasted British advocacy.</p> + +<p>Though of an unromantic obesity, it appears from the excessive eulogies +he lavishes upon <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> that he is already the tangled fly in the web +of her feminine enchantments. What a pity that such a prominent +barrister should be so unskilled in seeing through such a millstone as +the female heart!</p> + +<p>He is persisting in making most incorrect and uncomplimentary allusions +to my undeserving self, which it is impossible that I am to suffer +without rising to repudiate with voluble indignation! However, though he +makes bitter complaints of my interruptions, he does me the honour to +refer to me as his friend, for which I thank him with a gratified +fervour, assuring him that I reciprocate his esteem. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230"></a></span></p> + +<p>Hon'ble Judge has just tendered me the kindly and golden advice that, +unless I sit down and remain hermetically sealed, the case will +infallibly continue for ever and anon, and that I am not to advance my +interests by disregarding the customary etiquettes of the Bar.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">11.5.</span>—<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> is giving her testimony. Indubitably she has greatly +improved in her physical appearance since I was a resident of +Porticobello House, and her habiliments are as fashionably ladylike (if +not more so) than Miss <span class="smcap">Wee-Wee's</span> own! Alack! that she should relate her +story with so many departures from ordinary veracity. Her pulchritude +and well-assumed timidity have captivated even the senile Judge, for, +after I have risen and vehemently contradicted her in various +unimportant details, he has actually barked at me that, unless I wait +until it is my turn to cross-examine he will take some very severe +measure with me at the rising of the Court! A pretty specimen of +judicial impartiality!</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">1.30 p.m.</span>—The Court has risen for lunch at the conclusion of a rather +severe cross-examination by myself of the fair plaintiff, and, not being +oppressed by pangs of hunger, I have leisure to record the +result—which, owing to the partisanship of Hon'ble Bench, the +disgracefully complicated state of the laws of Evidence, and Miss +<span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> ingenuity in returning entirely wrong answers to my +searching interrogatories, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231"></a></span> did not attain to the sanguine level of my +expectations.</p> + +<p>For instance, when I asked her whether it was not the fact that I was +notoriously deficient in physical courageousness, she made the +unexpected reply that she had not observed it, and that I had frequently +described to her my daring achievements in sticking wild pigs and +shooting man-eating tigers.</p> + +<p>Also she entirely refused to admit that the turquoise and gold ring I +had given her was not in token of our betrothal, but merely to +compensate her for not being invited as well as myself to a certain +fashionable dinner-party; and the Judge (interrupting in the most +unwarrantable manner) said that, as he did not understand that I +seriously denied the existence of an engagement to marry, he was unable +to perceive the bearings of my query.</p> + +<p>Again, I reminded her of her mention of the gift of a china model of +Poet <span class="smcap">Shakspeare's</span> birthplace, and required her—on her oath—to answer +whether it had not been originally intended for another lady, and +whether, having accidentally seated myself upon it, I had not decided to +bestow the <i>disjecta membra</i> upon herself instead.</p> + +<p>To which she replied, with artfully simulated emotion, that all she knew +was that I had assured her at the time that the said piece of china had +been expressly purchased for herself as a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232"></a></span> souvenir of my ardent +affection, and she had accepted it as such, and carefully restored it +with some patent cement.</p> + +<p>Before this the Judge had asked me how I could expect the plaintiff to +know what was passing in the tortuous recesses of my own mind, and +informed her that she need not answer such a ridiculous question unless +she pleased. But she did please, and her answer was received with +applause, which, however, the Bench perceiving, though tardily, that I +was entitled to some protection, did declare in angry tones that it was +on no account to be permitted.</p> + +<p>Next I inquired whether it was not true that she was of a flirtatious +disposition, and addicted to laugh and talk vivaciously with the +gentlemen-boarders, and whether I had not earnestly remonstrated with +her upon such conduct. Here <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., bounded on to his feet, +and protested that I was not entitled to put this question now, since I +had not dared to allege in my letters or pleadings that I had breached +my promise owing to any misconduct of plaintiff. But, instead of +submitting to such objection, <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> answered in mellifluous accents +that she had never manifested more than ordinary civility towards any +gentleman-boarder, but that I had displayed passionate jealousy of them +all prior to my engagement—though never since, because she had never +afforded the slightest excuse for remonstrances. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233"></a></span></p> + +<p>Whereupon she was again flooded with tears, which stirred my heart with +tender commiseration; for her maidenly distress did only increase her +charms to infinity. And the Judge, feeling fatherly sympathy for myself, +observed very kindly that I had got my answer, which he hoped might do +me much good. For which good wish I thanked him gratefully; and the +Court was again dissolved in senseless cachinnations!</p> + +<p>Next I cross-questioned her as to her refusal of my offer to marry on +the ground that I was already the husband of one infant wife, and +whether it was not the fact. She responded that I had referred her to Mr +<span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span> for corroboration of my story, and that he had informed +her that my said wife was a <i>post mortem</i>.</p> + +<p>Here I cleverly took the legal objection that what Mr <span class="smcap">Ram</span> said was not +evidence, and warned her to be careful, while the Hon'ble Judge partly +upheld my contention, remarking that it was evidence that a conversation +was held, but not of the truth of the facts stated in such conversation, +thereby showing clearly that he did not credit her story.</p> + +<p>Upon the whole, I am confident that I have at least silenced the guns of +<span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., for upon the conclusion of my cross-examination, he +admitted that he had no further questions to ask the plaintiff. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234"></a></span></p> + +<p>My solicitor says I shall have to buck myself up if I am to reduce the +damages to any reasonable amount, and that he had been desirous from the +first to brief <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>. But this is to croak like a raven, for the +cross-examining is, after all, of very minor importance compared to the +Gift of the Gab—in which I am notoriously <i>nulli secundus</i>.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">2.15 p.m.</span>—The Court has returned. <span class="smcap">Witherington's</span> Junior +has called <span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> mother, whom I shall presently have the bounden but rather +painful duty to cross-examine sharply.</p> + +<p>Already I experience serious sinkings in stomach department. <i>Sursum +corda!</i> I must buck it up.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXIX" id="XXIX"></a>XXIX</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Further proceedings in the Case of Mankletow <span class="smcap">v.</span> Jabberjee. Mr Jabberjee's +Opening for the Defence.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><p class="center"> +<i>Queen's Bench Court, No. ——,</i> <span class="smcap">2.40 p.m.</span> +</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">I have</span> just resumed my seat after a rather searching examination of +Madam <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span>, as will appear from the notes of her evidence kindly +taken by my solicitor:—</p><br> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">My Solicitor's said Notes.</span></p> + +<p>Mrs <span class="smcap">Martha Mankletow</span> (<i>formidable old party—all bugles and bombazine</i>). +Would certainly describe her establishment as 'select'; all of her male +boarders perfect gentlemen—except defendant. Was never anxious to +secure him for her daughter—on the contrary, would have much preferred +her son-in-law white. Gave her consent because of the passionate +attachment he professed for plaintiff. Nothing to her whether he was of +princely rank or not. He appeared to be very well able to support her +daughter, which was the chief thing. Had never threatened defendant with +personal chastisement from other boarders if he denied any engagement. +Did say that if he meant nothing serious +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236"></a></span> after all the marked +attentions he had paid the plaintiff, he deserved to be cut dead by all +the gentlemen in the house. Insisted on the engagement being made public +at once; thought it her bounden duty to do so. Did not know whether +defendant was married already, or how many wives he was entitled to in +his own country—he had taken good care not to say anything about all +that when he proposed. Did not consider him a desirable match, and never +had done, but thought he ought to be made to pay heavily for his +heartless behaviour to her poor unprotected child, who would never get +over the slight of being jilted by a black man....</p> + +<p>Here I sat down, amidst suppressed murmurs from the Court of indignation +and sympathy at such gross unmannerly insults to a highly educated +Indian University man and qualified native barrister.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">3.15.</span>—More witnesses for plaintiff, viz., Miss <span class="smcap">Spink</span> and sundry select +boarders, who have testified to my courtship and the notoriety of my +engagement. Seeing that they were predetermined not to answer favourably +to myself, I tore a leaf out of Mister <span class="smcap">Witherington's</span> book, and said +that I had no questions to ask.... The plaintiff's junior has just sat +down, with the announcement that that is his case. I am now to turn the +tables by dint of rhetorical loquacity. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239"></a></span></p> + +<p>The annexed report, though sadly meagre and doing very scanty justice to +the occasion, is furnished by my friend young <span class="smcap">Howard</span>, who was present in +Court at the time....</p> + +<p><i>Jab.</i> (<i>in a kind of sing-song</i>). May it please your venerable lordship +and respectable gentlemen of the jury, I am in the very similar +predicament of another celebrated native gentleman and well-known +character in the dramatic works of your immortal <i>littérateur</i> Poet +<span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span>. I allude to <span class="smcap">Othello</span> on the occasion of his +pleading before the Duke and other potent, grave, and reverent signiors of Venice, in a +speech which I shall commence by quoting in full——</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p237'></a> +<img src="images/p237.jpg" width="600" height="590" alt="Mr Justice Honeygall."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"MR JUSTICE HONEYGALL."</span></p></div> + +<p><i>Mr Justice Honeygall.</i> One moment, Mr <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, I am always reluctant +to interfere with Counsel, but it may save my time and that of the jury +if I remind you that the illustration you propose to give us is hardly +as happy as it might be. The head and front of <span class="smcap">Othello's</span> offending, +unless I am mistaken, was that he had married the lady of his +affections, whereas in <i>your</i> case——</p> + +<p><i>Jab.</i> (<i>plaintively</i>). Your lordship, it is not humanly possible that I +can exhibit even ordinary eloquence if I am to be interrupted by +far-fetched and frivolous objections. The story of <span class="smcap">Othello</span>——</p> + +<p><i>Mr Justice H.</i> What the jury want to hear is not <span class="smcap">Othello's</span> story, but +yours, Sir, and your +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240"></a></span> proper course is to go into the +witness-box at once, and give your version of the facts as simply and straightforwardly +as you can. When you have given your own evidence and called any +witnesses you may wish to call, you will have an opportunity of +addressing the jury, and exhibiting the eloquence on which you +apparently place so much reliance.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>[<i>Here poor old </i><span class="smcap">Jab</span><i> bundles off to the witness-box, and +takes some outlandish oath or other with immense gusto, +after which he starts telling the Jury a long rambling +rigmarole, and is awfully riled when the old Judge pulls him +up, which he does about every other minute. This is the sort +of thing that goes on:—</i></p></div> + +<p><i>Jab.</i> At this, Misters of the Jury, I, being but a pusillanimous and no +Leviathan of valour——</p> + +<p><i>The Judge.</i> Not so fast, Sir, not so fast. Follow my pen. I've not got +down half what you said before that. (<i>Reads laboriously from his +notes.</i>) "In panicstricken apprehension of being severely assaulted <i>à +posteriori</i>." Who do you say threatened to assault you in that +manner—the plaintiff's mother?</p> + +<p><i>Jab.</i> I have already had the honour to inform your lordship that I was +utterly intimidated by the savage threats of the plaintiff's mother +that,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241"></a></span> unless I consented to become the betrothed, she would summon +certain able-bodied athletic boarders to batter and kick my unprotected +person, and consequently, not being a Leviathan——</p> + +<p><i>The Judge.</i> No one has ever suggested that you are an animal of that +description, Sir. Have the goodness to keep to the point. (<i>Reads as he +writes.</i>) "I was so intimidated by threats of plaintiff's mother that +she would have me severely kicked by third parties if I refused, that I +consented to become engaged to plaintiff." Is <i>that</i> what you say?</p> + +<p><i>Jab.</i> (<i>beaming</i>). Your lordship's acute intellect has comprehended my +<i>pons asinorum</i> with great intelligence.</p> + +<p><i>The Judge</i> (<i>looking at him under his spectacles</i>). Umph! Well, go on. +What next?</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>[<i>So old </i><span class="smcap">Jab</span><i> goes on gassing away, +at such a deuce of a rate +that the Judge gives up all idea of taking notes, and sits +staring at </i><span class="smcap">Jab</span><i> in resigned disgust</i>. (<i>It was spell-bound +attentiveness.</i>—H. B. J.) +<span class="smcap">Jab <i>will</i></span> <i>spout and</i> <span class="smcap"><i>won't</i></span> <i>keep to +the point; but, all the same, I fancy, somehow, he's getting +round the Jury. He's such a jolly innocent kind of old ass, +and they like him because he's no end of sport. The +plaintiff's a devilish fine girl, and gave her evidence +uncommonly well; but, unless </i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242"></a></span> +<span class="smcap">Witherington</span><i> turns up again, I +believe old </i><span class="smcap">Jab</span><i> will romp in a winner, after all! I haven't +taken down anything else, except his wind-up, when of course +he managed to get in a speech.</i></p></div> + +<p><i>Jab.</i> Believe me, gentlemen of the jury, this is simply the barefaced +attempt to bleed and mulct a poor impecunious Indian. For it is +incredible that any English female, of genteel upbringings and the +lovely and beauteous appearance which you have all beheld in this box, +it is incredible, I say, that she should seriously desire to become a +mere unconsidered unit in a bevy of Indian brides! How is she possibly +to endure a domestic existence exposed to the slings and arrows of a +perpetual gorilla warfare from various native aunts and sisters-in-law, +or how is she to reconcile her dainty and fastidious stomach, after the +luscious and appetising fare of a Bayswater boarding-house, to simple, +unostentatious, and frequently repulsive Indian eatables? No, Misters of +the jury, as warm-hearted noble-minded English gentlemen, you will never +condemn an unfortunate and industrious native graduate and barrister to +make a cripple of his career, and burden his friends and his families +with such a bone of contention as a European better half, who will +infallibly plunge him into the pretty pickle of innumerable family jars! +I shall now vacate the witness-box in favour of my +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243"></a></span> intimate friend and +fatherly benefactor, Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd Cummerbund</span>, who will tell +you——</p> + +<p><i>The Judge</i> (<i>rising</i>). Before we have the pleasure of seeing Sir +<span class="smcap">Chetwynd</span> here, Mr <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, there +is a little formality you appear to +have overlooked. The plaintiff's counsel will probably wish before you +leave the box to put a few questions to you in cross-examination, and +that must stand over till to-morrow. (<i>At this, old Jab's jaw falls +several holes.</i>)</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Note by Mr Jabberjee.</span>—<i>Hereford Road, Bayswater.</i>—I am excessively +gratified by the result of my first day's trial, being already the +established favourite and chartered libertine of the whole Court, who +split their sides at my slightest utterances. So I am no longer +immeasurably alarmed by the prospect of being crossly +examined—especially since <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., has abandoned his brief +in despair to a tongue-tied junior, who is incompetent to exclaim Bo! to +a goose. Indeed, I have some thoughts of declining haughtily to be +interrogated by a mere underling.</p> + +<p>The only fly in the ointment of my success is the utter indifference of +<span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> to my aforesaid triumphs. At the termination of the hearing +to-day, I beheld her so deeply engrossed in smiling and cordial converse +with the smartly-attired curly-headed young solicitor who is +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244"></a></span> acting on +her behalf that she was totally unconscious of my vicinity!</p> + +<p>Alackaday! <i>varium et mutabile semper fœmina!</i></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXX" id="XXX"></a>XXX</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mankletow <span class="smcap">v.</span> Jabberjee (part heard.) Mr Jabberjee finds cross-examination +much less formidable than he had anticipated.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">It</span> is now the second day of my celebrated case, which is such a +transcendental success that already the Court is tight as a drum, while +a vast disappointed crowd is barricading imploringly at the doors!</p> + +<p>I was about to harangue these unfortunates, assuring them I was not +responsible for their exclusion, and promising to exert my utmost +influence with the Hon'ble Judge that they were all to be admitted.</p> + +<p>But my solicitor, seizing me by the forearm, hurried me through the +entrance with the friendly recommendation that I was not to be the +bally-fool.</p> + +<p>In the trough I perceive <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> seated, in a hat even more +resplendently becoming than her yesterday head-dress, and I am not a +little puffed with pride to be proceeded against by a plaintiff of such +a stylish and elegant appearance.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p247'></a> +<img src="images/p247.jpg" width="494" height="700" alt="Witherington, Q.C."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"WITHERINGTON, Q.C."</span></p></div> + +<p><span class="smcap">10.25 a.m.</span>—After all, <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., has +paid me the marked compliment of turning +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246"></a></span> up to personally conduct my cross-examination. At +which <span class="smcap">Smartle</span>, Esq., becomes lugubrious, averring that he is capable of +turning my inside out in no time unless I am preciously careful. But, +knowing that such inhuman barbarities are not feasible in civilised +regions, I enter the box with a serene and smiling countenance....</p> + +<p><i>Later.</i>—I am unspeakably delighted with the urbanity (on the whole) +with which I have been cross-examined. For, to my wonderment, +<span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., commenced with displaying a respectful and +sympathetic interest in my career, &c., which rendered me completely at +my ease, and though on occasions he did suddenly manifest inquisitorial +severity, I soon discovered that his anger was mere wind from a tea-pot, +and that he was in secret highly gratified by the nature of my replies. +And for the most part he had the great condescension to treat me with a +kind and facetious familiarity.</p> + +<p>I had privately commissioned a shorthanded acquaintance of mine with +instructions to take down nothing but my answers, but with inconceivable +doltishness he has done the exact converse, and transcribed merely the +utterances of Mister <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>! However, as I do not accurately +recall my responses, I am to insert the report here <i>pro tanto</i>, +trusting to the ingenuity of the public to read between the lines.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249"></a></span></p><br> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Here Follows the Report.</span></p> + +<p><i>Mr Witherington, Q.C.</i> Well, Mr <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, so it seems that it is all a +mistake about your being a Prince, eh?... And, however such an idea may +have originated, <i>you</i> never represented yourself as a Rajah, or +anything of the kind?... I was sure you would say so. You have such a +high regard for truth, and such a deep sense of the obligation of an +oath, that you are incapable of a deliberate falsehood at any time—may +I take that for granted?... Very glad to hear it. And of course, Mr +<span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, it was no fault of yours if people chose to assume, from a +certain magnificence in your appearance and way of living and so on, +that you must be of high rank in your own country?... But, though you +don't set up to be a Prince, you are, I believe, a recent acquisition to +the honourable profession of which we are both members?... And also a +journalist of some distinction, are you not?... Indeed? I congratulate +you—a highly respectable periodical. And no doubt the proprietors have +shown a proper appreciation of the value of your services, in a +pecuniary sense?... Really? You are indeed to be envied, Mr <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>! +Not many young barristers can rely upon making such an income by their +pen while they are waiting for the briefs to come in. May I ask if you +intend to practise +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250"></a></span> in +this country?... The Calcutta Bar, eh? Then I +suppose you can count upon influence out there?... Your father a +<i>Mooktear</i>, is he? I'm afraid I don't know what that is exactly.... A +solicitor? <i>Now</i> I understand. So he will give you cases—in which I am +sure you will distinguish yourself. But you'll have to work hard, won't +you?... I thought so. No more pig-sticking or tiger-shooting, eh?... +That's a drawback, isn't it? You're passionately devoted to +tiger-shooting, aren't you? Unless I'm mistaken, you first won the +plaintiff's admiration by the vivid manner in which you described your +"moving accidents by flood and field"—another parallel between you and +<span class="smcap">Othello</span>, eh? Well, tell me, I'm no sportsman myself—but it's rather a +thrilling moment, isn't it, when a tiger is trying to climb up your +elephant, and get inside the—what do you call it—howlah?—oh, +<i>howdah</i>, to be sure; thank you, very much.... So I should have +imagined. Still, I suppose, when you're used to it, even that wouldn't +shake your nerve to any appreciable extent. You would bowl over your +tiger at close quarters without turning a hair, would you not?... Just +so. A great gift, presence of mind. And pig-sticking, now—isn't a boar +rather an awkward customer to tackle?... "You never found him so"? But +suppose you miss him with your spear, and he charges your horse?... Ah, you're a +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251"></a></span> mighty +hunter, Mr <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, I perceive! Ever shoot any +elephants?... <i>No</i> elephants? That's a pleasure to come, then. Now, +about your relations with the plaintiff prior to your engagement—you +were a good deal in her company, weren't you?... Well, you constantly +escorted her to various places of amusement, come?... Yes, yes; I am +quite aware a <i>chaperon</i> was always present. We are both agreed that my +client has acted throughout with the most scrupulous propriety—but you +liked being in her society, didn't you?... Exactly so, and, at that time +at all events, you admired her extremely?... "Merely as a friend," eh? +no idea of proposing? Well, just tell us once more how it was you came +to engage yourself.... You were afraid your landlady would summon a +boarder and ask him to give you a kicking?... And the prospect of being +kicked terrified you to such an extent that you were willing to promise +anything—is <i>that</i> your story?... But you are a man of iron nerve, you +know, you've just been giving us a description of your performances in +the jungle. How did you come to be so alarmed by a boarder, when the +attack of the fiercest tiger or wild boar never made you turn a hair?... +But that is what you gave us to understand just now, wasn't it?... Then +do you tell his lordship and the jury now that, as a matter of fact, you +never shot a solitary tiger or speared a single boar in your +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252"></a></span> life? Why +didn't you say so at once, Sir.... Do you consider a misrepresentation +of that kind a mere trifle?... In spite of the fact that you have +solemnly sworn to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the +truth?... Very well, Sir, I will take your answer. Now, just look at +this letter of yours. (Your lordship has a copy of the +correspondence.... Yes, it is all admitted, my lord.) I'll read it to +you. (<i>Reads it.</i>) Now, Sir, is it the fact that you ever actually +consulted the gentleman who enjoys the distinction of being astrologer +to your family upon your marriage with the plaintiff? Be careful what +you say.... And did he ever forbid you to contract such an alliance?... +Then was there a word of truth in all that?... I thought as much. Let me +read you another letter. (<i>He reads.</i>) Here, you see, you make quite +another excuse. You are already married, and can only offer the +plaintiff the position of a rival wife, or "<i>sateen</i>," as you call it. +Have you ever contracted an infant marriage in India?... Oh, that <i>is</i> +true, is it? But why, when you were paying these attentions to the +plaintiff, did it never occur to you to mention the fact that you were a +married man?... "You don't know?" May it not have been because you were +a widower? Was your infant wife alive or dead when you wrote this +letter?... Then why did you write of her as if she were alive?... I +quite believe <i>that</i>—but why +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253"></a></span> were you so anxious to break it off just +then?... Well, when you were cross-examining the plaintiff you asked her +about a certain china ornament you had given her, which seems to have +been originally intended for another young lady. We needn't mention her +name here—but you made her acquaintance some time after your +engagement, didn't you?... And since you left Porticobello House, you +have seen a good deal of her, eh?... You were a great admirer of hers, +weren't you?... I'm not asking you whether she is engaged to a Scotch +gentleman at the present moment—I'm putting it to you that, at the time +you were writing these letters to the plaintiff, you had already formed +the conclusion that this other young lady was more deserving of the +honour of being the second Mrs <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>.... I am not suggesting that +you could help it—but wasn't it so?... Very well—that is all I have to +ask you Mr <span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>. You can go....</p> + +<p>I must not omit to record that my replies and the reading of my letters +did excite frequent and vociferous merriment, and in other respects I +have testified so exhaustively that my solicitor informs me it is not +worth a candle to call any further witnesses—especially as Hon'ble +<span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span> has intimated that he prefers to blow unseen, and as for +Baboo <span class="smcap">Chuckerbutty Ram</span>, he, it seems, has of course been seized by such +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254"></a></span> +violent indisposition that he was compelled to leave the Court.</p> + +<p>So I am now to deliver one more brief oration, which will infallibly +secure me the plerophory of the jury and exalt my head to the skies as +Cock of the Roost.</p> + +<p>Only I regret that <span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> visage is now completely invisible to me, +being obscured by the dimensions of her hat, also that she should carry +on such protracted confabulations with her curly-headed professional +adviser—which is surely lacking in most ordinary respect for myself and +Hon'ble Justice <span class="smcap">Honeygall</span>!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXXI" id="XXXI"></a>XXXI</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Mankletow <span class="smcap">v.</span> Jabberjee (continued). The Defendant brings his Speech to a somewhat +unexpected conclusion, and Mr Witherington, Q.C., addresses the Jury in reply.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><span class="smcap">My</span> aforesaid shorthanded acquaintance has very fortunately preserved the +literal transcript of my concluding oration, which will afford a feeble +idea of the grandiloquence of my loquacity.—H. B. J.</p> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Verbatim Report</span> (<i>unofficial</i>).</p> + +<p><i>Baboo Jab.</i> May it please your mighty honour and great notorious +gentlemen on the jury, it must present a strange and funny appearance to +behold a young Indian B.A., provided with a big education and the <i>locus +standi</i> of barrister-at-law, crawling humbly towards your footstools as +a suppliant, and already I perceive from your benevolent and smirking +visages that your hearts are favourably inclined towards your +unfortunate son, and that you are too deeply imbued with serpentine +wisdom to be at all bamfoozled by the <i>ad captandum</i> charms of feminine +cajoleries. Indeed, I am a poor penniless chap, if not almost completely +dead for want of funds, and if I had +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256"></a></span> only been able to call my revered +and fatherly benefactor, Hon'ble Sir <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>, he would infallibly +have testified—</p> + +<p><i>The Judge.</i> As you did not think proper—no doubt for excellent +reasons—to put Sir <span class="smcap">Chetwynd</span> in the box when you could have done so, Mr +<span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, I shall most certainly not allow you to make any comments now +upon the evidence he might or might not have given.</p> + +<p><i>Baboo J.</i> I beg to knuckle very submissively to your lordship's +argument. The fact is, that the said Sir <span class="smcap">Cummerbund</span>, on hearing my +answers when I was acting in the capacity of a harrowed toad under my +friend <span class="smcap">Witherington's</span> cross-examination, very handsomely stated that I +had left nothing for him to say, and begged modestly that he might be +excused. But indeed, Misters, I occupy but a very beggarly apartment in +this Fools' Hotel of a world, and it is the moral impossibility for me +to pay any damages whatever! Moreover, it is a well-authenticated fact +that I am a shocking coward, and was induced to become affianced by +haunting apprehensions of receiving a succession of severe kicks. For +how, being suddenly put to my choice between being barbarously kicked +and punched or acquiring a spruce and blooming bride, could I hesitate +for a moment to accept the lesser of two evils? Nevertheless, I did +remain uninterruptedly devoted to the plaintiff for many weeks—until I +encountered a still +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257"></a></span> younger +and more bewitching lady, who became the +Polar Star to my compass-like heart. But, lack-a-daisy, Sirs! though I +left no stones unturned to be off with my Old Love, I did not get on +very fortunately with the New, seeing that she preferred an affluent +young Scotch, whereby I am reduced to shedding tears in silence and +solicitude between two stools! (<i>Roars of laughter.</i>) Misters, like the +frog that was being lapidated by thoughtless juveniles, I reply:—"for +you it may be facetious; but to myself it is a devilishly serious +affair!" For, after beholding the plaintiff here and discovering that +she had advanced rather than retrograded in physical attractiveness, I +made cordial approaches to her, but she passed me by with a +superciliously exalted nose! Gentlemen, it is a terrific piece of humbug +for her to allege that her heart has been infernally lacerated by my +unfaithfulness, when, at this very moment, instead of lending her ears +to my brief and rambling oration, she is entirely engrossed in +flirtatious converse with her curlypated juvenile solicitor! +(<i>Sensation.</i>)</p> + +<p><i>Witherington, Q.C.</i> (<i>rising</i>). My lord, I really must protest. There +is absolutely <i>no</i> justification for the defendant's outrageous +insinuation. I am informed by Miss <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> that she simply asked the +gentleman sitting next to her whether he had seen her smelling-salts!</p> + +<p><i>The Judge.</i> I fail to see, Mr +<span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span>, what +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258"></a></span> advantage you can hope +to gain by these highly irregular digressions. The plaintiff is under my +immediate observation, and I have seen nothing in her conduct during the +trial of which you have the smallest right to complain.</p> + +<p><i>Bab. J.</i> I am highly satisfied by your lordship's <i>obiter dictum</i>. Not +being in such a coign of vantage as your honour's excellency, I was +misled by the propinquity of heads viewed from the rear. Now, before +again becoming a sedentary, I am to propose a decisive test of +plaintiff's <i>bona fides</i> in desiring my insignificant self as a spouse. +Herewith I beg humbly to have the honour of renewing my formal proposal +of marriage, and moreover will pledge myself in most solemn and +business-like style never on any account, whether so permitted by laws +of country or <i>vice versâ</i>, to take to myself a single additional native +wife in her lifetime. This handsome offer is genuine and without +prejudice, and I will take leave to remind plaintiff, in the terms of a +rather musty adage, that she is not too closely to inspect the mouth of +such a gifted horse as myself. (<i>Great laughter, and some sensation in +Court as </i><span class="smcap">Jabberjee</span><i> sits down</i>.)</p> + +<p><i>Witherington, Q.C.</i> Your lordship will see that this—ah—rather +unforeseen development renders it necessary that I should ascertain the +plaintiff's views before proceeding to reply. (<i>The Judge nods: +breathless excitement in Court while the</i> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259"></a></span><i>plaintiff's solicitor carries +on an animated conversation with </i>Mr W.<i> in undertones.</i>)</p> + +<p><i>Witherington</i> (<i>rising once more</i>). Gentlemen, I have, as it was my +duty to do, consulted the plaintiff respecting the unusual course which +the defendant has thought proper to take. Her answer to his proposal is +the answer which I am sure you will feel is the only possible one in the +circumstances. (<span class="smcap">Jab.</span> <i>beams</i>.) The plaintiff, gentlemen, has undergone +the severest ordeal a young woman of delicacy and refinement can be +called upon to endure (<i>"Hear, hear!" from </i><span class="smcap">Jab.</span>), and out of that +ordeal I think you will all agree she has come absolutely unscathed.</p> + +<p>I need hardly say that she is incapable now of harbouring any unworthy +sentiments of rancour or revenge. (<span class="smcap">Jab.</span> <i>beams more effulgently still</i>.)</p> + +<p><i>But</i>, gentlemen, there are some injuries which, as you know, a woman +may find herself able to excuse, to palliate, even to condone; but which +she feels nevertheless must operate as an insuperable and impassable +barrier between herself and the individual who could be capable of them! +(<span class="smcap">Jab.'s</span> <i>smile becomes a trifle less assured</i>.)</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261"></a></span></p> +<div class="figcenter"><a name='p261'></a> +<img src="images/p261.jpg" width="454" height="700" alt="Jabberjee's face gradually lengthens."> +<p class="center"> +<span class="caption">"JABBERJEE'S FACE GRADUALLY LENGTHENS."</span></p></div> + +<p>After the disgraceful and unmanly attempts the defendant has made to +evade his obligations; his disingenuous defences; his insulting +innuendoes; after the deplorable exhibition he has made of himself in +that box; and especially after the sombre picture he himself has painted +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260"></a></span> of +the domestic future he has to offer; after all this, I ask +you, gentlemen, is it likely, is it possible, is it even conceivable +that the plaintiff can retain any respect or affection for him, or have +sufficient courage and confidence to entrust her happiness to such +hands? (<span class="smcap">Jab.'s</span> <i>face gradually lengthens</i>.)</p> + +<p>Once, it is true, under the glamour of her own girlish illusions, she +was ready to expatriate herself, to endure an alien existence, and +strange manners and customs for his beloved sake; but now, now that her +ideal is shattered, her dream dispelled,—now, it is too late! +Gentlemen, my client's answer is—and it is one which will only command +your increased respect:—"No. He has broken my heart, undermined my +belief in human nature, cast a blight upon my existence. (Miss M. <i>sobs +audibly, here, and </i><span class="smcap">Jab.</span><i> is visibly affected.</i>) Much as I should like to +recover my old belief in him, much as it would be to my worldly +advantage to marry a wealthy Bengali barrister with talents and +influence which are certain to lead to rapid promotion in his native +land (<span class="smcap">Jab.</span> <i>bows, and then shakes his head in protest</i>), he has made me +suffer too much, I cannot accept him now!"</p> + +<p>(<i>The learned Counsel then dealt exhaustively with various portions of +the case, and concluded thus.</i>) Well, gentlemen, I shall not have to +trouble you with many further remarks, but I will just say this before I +sit down:—The +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263"></a></span> defendant +amongst innumerable other ingenious excuses, +has pleaded for your indulgence on the score of poverty. He has the +brazen effrontery to plead poverty, forsooth! after complacently +admitting, in that box, that he is earning at this very moment an income +by his pen alone that might be envied by many a hardworking English +journalist! I do not say this by way of making any reflection upon the +defendant; on the contrary, gentlemen, I consider it does credit to his +ability and enterprise. (<span class="smcap">Jab.</span> <i>bows again</i>.) But at the same time it +disposes effectually of his allegation that he is without means, and +indeed, leaving his literary gains entirely out of the question, it must +have been obvious from what you have heard and seen of his manner of +living in this country that he is amply provided with pecuniary +resources. Bearing this in mind, gentlemen, I ask you to mark your sense +of his heartless treatment of the plaintiff, and the mental and social +injury she has suffered on his account, by awarding her substantial +damages; not, I need scarcely say, in any spirit of vindictiveness, but +as some compensation (however inadequate) for all she has gone through, +and also as a warning to other ingratiating but unprincipled Orientals +that they cannot expect to trifle with the artless affection of our +generous, warmhearted English maidens without paying—aye, and paying +dearly, too! for the amusement. (<i>He sits down amidst applause.</i>) +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264"></a></span></p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Note by Mr Jabberjee.</span>—Hon'ble Judge is to sum up after lunch. I am +highly pained and disappointed that my friend <span class="smcap">Witherington</span> should have +shown himself a perfidious, and have taken the liberty as he quitted the +Court to murmur the plaintive remonstrance of "<i>Et tu, Brute!</i>" into the +cavity of his left ear.</p> + +<p>My solicitor, <span class="smcap">Sidney Smartle</span>, is of the opinion that my case is looking +"a bit rocky," but that much will depend upon how the Judge sums up. +What a pity that, owing to judicial red-tapery, I am prohibited from +popping in upon him at lunch and importuning him to pronounce a decree +in my favour!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> +<h2 class="roman"><a name="XXXII" id="XXXII"></a>XXXII</h2> + +<p class="chaphead">Containing the conclusion of the whole matter, and (which many Readers will +receive in a spirit of chastened resignation) Mr Jabberjee's final farewell.</p> + +<p class="clearpara"><p class="center"> +<i>Queen's Bench Court, No. ——,</i> <span class="smcap">2 p.m.</span></p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Hon'ble Justice Honeygall</span> is now summing-up, in such very nice, chatty, +confidential style that it is impossible to hear one half of his +observations, while the remainder is totally inaudible.... Nevertheless, +I already gather that he regards the affair with the restricted +narrowminded view that it is simply the question of damages.... He +appears to be now discussing whether my testimony that I am of such +excessive natural funkiness as to be intimidated by a few threats into +my matrimonial engagement is humanly credible.... I cannot at all +comprehend why, at his frequent references to my alleged +tiger-slaughters—which, with shrewd commonsense sapience, he seems to +consider mere ideally fabricated fibs and fanciful yarns—the whole +Court should be so convulsed with unmeaning merriment, nor why so stern +a Judge does not make any attempt to check such disorderly +interruptions....<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266"></a></span></p> + +<p>So far as my imperfect hearing can ascertain, he has been instructing +the jury that they may utterly dismiss from their minds my highly +ingenious plea of inability to offer any other kind of matrimony than a +polygamous union—surely, a very, very slipshod off-hand method of +disposing of such a nice sharp quillet of the Law!... He is talking to +them about my means, and has thrown out a rather apt suggestion that I +may have been led by sheer vaingloriousness and Oriental love of +hyperbole into exaggerating my resources.... However, he "sees no reason +to doubt my competence to pay a reasonable amount of damages"—an +opinion with which I am not so pleased. "If the jury think me a gay sort +of Hindoo deceiver, who has heartlessly trifled with the affections of a +simple, unsuspecting English girl, that will lead them to award +substantial damages. If, on the other hand, they consider myself an +inexperienced Oriental ninnyhammer of a fellow, who has been entrapped +into an engagement by an ambitious, artful young woman—why, that may +incline them to inflict a merely nominal penalty." (But why, I should +like to know, does a Judge, who is infinitely more capable than a dozen +doltish juryman to express a decided opinion, thus put on the +double-faced mask of ambiguity, and run with the hare and halloo with +the hounds, like +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267"></a></span>some +Lukeworm from Laodicea?) ... Now he is mentioning +"certain circumstances, which he is bound to tell the jury have made a +strong impression on his own mind." ... Alack, that, owing to the +incorrigible mumbling of his diction, I cannot succeed in ascertaining +what these said circumstances are!... He has begun (I think) to +discourse concerning my latest offer of marriage in open Court. What a +pity that hon'ble judges should not study to acquire at least ordinary +proficiency in such a simple affair as Elocution!</p> + +<p>"It may strike you, gentlemen, that if the plaintiff had any genuine +affection for the defendant, or any actual intention of linking her lot +with his, she would——" (the rest is a severe mumble!) "Or again, you +may take into consideration——" (but precisely <i>what</i> they are to take +is, to myself, a dumb show!). "Still, after making every possible +allowance for the idealising effects of the tender passion upon the +female judgment, I confess I find it a little difficult to persuade +myself that——" (Again I am not in at the finish—but, from the +bristling and tossing of <span class="smcap">Jessimina's</span> hat-plumes, I am in great hopes +that it contained something complimentary to myself.) ... He has just +concluded with the observation that, "after what they have seen and +heard of the defendant during the proceedings, the jury should find +little difficulty in arriving at a fairly accurate estimate of the loss +which a young lady of British birth and bringing-up +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268"></a></span>would sustain by +her failure to secure such a husband."</p> + +<p>From the last it is clear that his hon'ble lordship meant that, in +secret, he has the highest opinion of my merits, though he entirely +overlooked the obvious fact that he would have better carried out his +benevolent and patronising intentions towards me by affecting (just now) +to consider me only a worthless poor chap. But even the most +subtly-trained European intellects are curiously backward in such +elementary chicaneries!</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">3 p.m.</span>—The jury are assembling their heads. They seem generally +agreed—except a couple of stout ones who are lolling back and listening +with mulish simpers. If I were certain that they were fellow-colleagues +from <i>Punch</i>, I would encourage them by secret signs to persevere—but +who knows that they may not be partisans of the plaintiff? If so, they +deserve to be condignly punished for such obstinate dull-headedness.... +The foreman has asked that they may retire, whereupon Justice <span class="smcap">Honeygall</span> +answers them, "certainly," and retires his own person +contemporaneously....</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">3.15 p.m.</span>—The jury are still absentees. In reply to my questions, my +solicitor says that, as far as he can see, the damages can't be under +£250, and may amount to a cold "Thou" (or thousand)! Adding that, if I +had only let him brief <span class="smcap">Witherington</span>, Q.C., I might have got off +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269"></a></span> with +£50, or even what is nominally called a farthing. But I say to him, in +such a case how could I possibly have acquired any forensic distinction? +To which he has no reply ready.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">3.30.</span>—The jury are still delayed by the two stouts. I have just +attempted to chat over the affair with <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span> and +Madame <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span>, +and ascertain whether the former will not accept myself at the eleventh +hour as payment in full of all damages, costs, &c. Mrs M. replies that +the jurymen are notoriously in favour of her daughter, and that she +would as soon see her in gates of grave as the bride of a black man. On +closer approach to <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>, I have made the rather disenchanting +discovery that she has rendered her nose lilac from too much superfluity +of face-powder. Perhaps, after all, the damages may not be so very.... +The jury are coming back. Hon'ble Judge is fetched hurriedly.... Mister +Associate asks: "Have you agreed upon your verdict?" Answered that they +have. "Do they find for plaintiff or defendant?" "For plaintiff." And +the damages? "<i>Twenty-five Thou!!!</i>" My stars! O Gemini! Who'd have +thought it? My Progenitor will never pay the piper for such an +atrociously cacophonous tune.... I am a done-for!</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">3.35 p.m.</span>—All right. I was deceived by aural +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270"></a></span> incorrectness. It is not +twenty-five <i>thou.</i>—but twenty-five <i>pounds</i>!</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">3.45 p.m.</span>—Hiphussar! Cockadoodledoo! A mere bite from a flea!... The +plaintiff has fallen into hystericals from disappointed +avariciousness.... There is some idle talk about costs following the +event, and certifying for a special jury—a luxury for which it seems I +am not to fork out. The case is over.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;'> + +<p>Outside in the corridor and hall I was the cynosure of neighbouring +eyes, and vociferously applauded as a "good old nigger," and told that +"now they <i>shouldn't</i> be long," though for what else they were waiting I +could not learn. Madame <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> did overtake me near the doors and +invite me to tea and talk in a coffee and bun emporium, hinting that she +had recently misunderstood the state of her daughter's heart, and that +she had in reality been ardently desirous from the first to accept my +offer. To which I replied that the gates of grave were now hermetically +closed, and that the plaintiff, like the fabulous canine, had thrown +away the meaty bone of a first-class opportunity in exchange for the +rather flimsy and shadowy form of a twenty-five pound note. But, as a +chivalrous, I refrained from saying that I had been thus totally put off +by an over-powdered nose.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271"></a></span></p> + +<p>Then I proceeded, amidst cheering populaces, up Chancery Lane to a +certain Bar, wherein young <span class="smcap">Howard</span> regaled myself and solicitor very +handsomely upon anchovy sandwiches and champagne-wine, after which I +returned to Hereford Road full of ovation and cheerfulness.</p> + +<p>It is practically certain that my sire, the Mooktear, will cockahoop +with paternal pride on hearing by telegram of my moral victory, and +celebrate same with fireworks and festivities, besides sending ample +remittances for all costs out of pocket, &c.</p> + +<p>So I am now to return shortly to Calcutta, when my time will be too +exclusively taken up with forensic triumphs for any further jotting or +tittling for <i>Punch</i>, or similar periodicals.</p> + +<p>After all, for a fellow who is able to enchant multitudes, and persuade +their intellects and reasoning faculties by dint of golden verbolatory +of diction, mere sedentary journalism is a very mediocre and poorly-paid +pursuit!</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding my cessation as a contributor, I shall, on arriving in +India, infallibly recommend <i>Punch</i> to all my innumerable aunts, +families, and friends, as a highly respectable periodical—provided that +the munificent and free-hearted generosity of those Hon'ble Misters, the +Editor and Proprietors, shall account me worthy to draw a monthly +retiring pension for my distinguished services. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272"></a></span></p> + +<p>And, with prostrated respects to my honoured readers and their +respective relatives, I have the honour to remain, ever and anon,</p> + +<p class="txtright">Their Excellencies most grateful, humble, and obedient servant,<br> +H. B. J.</p><br><br><br> + +<h4>THE END</h4> +<br><br><br> +<h6>THE TEMPLE PRESS, PRINTERS, LETCHWORTH</h6> +<hr class="pg"> +<p class="center">Transcriber's Notes:</p> + +<p>Table of Contents corrections (page iv):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">XXIX: opening changed to Opening to match text:</span><br> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;"><i>Further proceedings in the Case of Mankletow </i>v.<i> Jabberjee. +Mr Jabberjee's Opening for the Defence.</i></span><br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">XXXII: readers changed to Readers to match text:</span><br> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;"><i>Containing the conclusion of the whole matter, and (which many Readers +will receive in a spirit of chastened resignation) Mr Jabberjee's final farewell.</i></span></p> + +<p>Illustration captions changed in List of Illustrations (pages v-vi):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"<i>Let out! let out!!</i>" changed to "<i>Let out! Let out!!</i>" to reflect text.</span><br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"<i>Huzza! tol-de-rol-loll!</i>" changed to "<i>Huzza! Tol-de-rol-loll!</i>" to reflect text.</span><br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"<i>I presented my trophy and treasure-trove to the fairy-like Miss Wee-wee.</i>" changed +to "<i>I presented my trophy and treasure-trove to the fairylike Miss Wee-Wee.</i>" to reflect text.</span></p> + +<p>Chapter I, punctuation (page 1):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Changed : to ; to match Table of Contents: "Mr Jabberjee apologises for +the unambitious scope of his work;"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter IV, capitalization (page 30):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">CO. changed to Co. for consistency: "Hon'ble <span class="smcap">Reynolds</span> and +<span class="smcap">Turner</span> and <span class="smcap">Greuzy</span> and Co. +predominated as Old Masters."</span></p> + +<p>Chapter V, spelling (page 33):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Jessiminia to Jessimina: "In consequence of the increasing demands of the +incomparable Miss <span class="smcap">Jessimina</span>"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter VI, spelling (page 46):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mankeltow to Mankletow: "and that Misses <span class="smcap">Mankletow</span> and +<span class="smcap">Spink</span> were similarly imperceptible."</span></p> + +<p>Chapter X, spelling (page 75):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Jaberjee to Jabberjee: "Mr Jabberjee is taken to see a Glove-Fight."</span><br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><a href="#flame">fame to flame</a>: "some, secreting their cigars in the hollow +of their hands, took whiffs by stealth, and blushed to find it flame;"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter XIII, spelling (page 96):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">bethrothal to betrothal: "My preceding article announced the +important intelligence of my betrothal"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter XV, spelling (page 117):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">turqoise to turquoise: "Notwithstanding, she would not be pacified until I had +bestowed upon her a gold and turquoise ring of best English workmanship,"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter XVI, spelling (page 125):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Allbutt-Innet changed to Allbutt-Innett: "Consequently I did cock-a-hoop for +joy on receiving an invitation from my friend <span class="smcap">Allbutt-Innett</span>,"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter XVII, illustration:<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><a href="#frontis">frontispiece</a> has been reproduced and inserted at appropriate place in text.</span></p> + +<p>Chapter XIX, illustration caption (page 151):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">period changed to exclamation point to reflect text: "Pitch it strong, my respectable Sir!"</span></p> + +<p>Chapter XXVIII, subheading punctuation (page 225):<br> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"No. ——." changed to "No. ——," for consistency in text.</span></p> +<br> +<p class="center">End of Transcriber's Notes.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Baboo Jabberjee, B.A., by F. 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