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diff --git a/old/vfair12h.htm b/old/vfair12h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8185c39 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/vfair12h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,39004 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<title>William Makepeace Thackeray - Vanity Fair</title> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> +<style type="text/css"> +<!-- +body {margin:10%; text-align:justify} +.smallcaps { font-variant: small-caps; } +blockquote {font-size:14pt} +P {font-size:14pt} +--> +</style> +</head> +<body> + + +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Vanity Fair, by William Makepeace Thackeray +#1 in our series by William Makepeace Thackeray + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Vanity Fair + +Author: William Makepeace Thackeray + +Release Date: July, 1996 [EBook #599] +[Date last updated: January 31, 2004] + +Edition: 12 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VANITY FAIR *** + + + + +Produced by Juli Rew, juliana@ncar.ucar.edu + + +</pre> + +<h1 align="center">Vanity Fair</h1> + +<h2 align="center">By William Makepeace Thackeray</h2> + +<h3 align="center">Before the Curtain</h3> + +<p>As the manager of the Performance sits before the +curtain on the boards and looks into the Fair, a feeling +of profound melancholy comes over him in his survey +of the bustling place. There is a great quantity of +eating and drinking, making love and jilting, laughing +and the contrary, smoking, cheating, fighting, dancing +and fiddling; there are bullies pushing about, bucks +ogling the women, knaves picking pockets, policemen +on the look-out, quacks (<i>other</i> quacks, plague +take them!) bawling in front of their booths, and yokels +looking up at the tinselled dancers and poor old rouged +tumblers, while the light-fingered folk are operating +upon their pockets behind. Yes, this is <i>Vanity Fair</i>; not a moral place certainly; nor a merry +one, though very noisy. Look at the faces of the actors +and buffoons when they come off from their business; +and Tom Fool washing the paint off his cheeks before +he sits down to dinner with his wife and the little +Jack Puddings behind the canvas. The curtain will +be up presently, and he will be turning over head and +heels, and crying, “How are you?”</p> + +<p>A man with a reflective turn of mind, walking through +an exhibition of this sort, will not be oppressed, +I take it, by his own or other people’s hilarity. +An episode of humour or kindness touches and amuses +him here and there--a pretty child looking at a gingerbread +stall; a pretty girl blushing whilst her lover talks +to her and chooses her fairing; poor Tom Fool, yonder +behind the waggon, mumbling his bone with the honest +family which lives by his tumbling; but the general +impression is one more melancholy than mirthful. +When you come home you sit down in a sober, contemplative, +not uncharitable frame of mind, and apply yourself +to your books or your business.</p> + +<p>I have no other moral than this to tag to the present +story of “Vanity Fair.” Some people consider +Fairs immoral altogether, and eschew such, with their +servants and families: very likely they are right. + But persons who think otherwise, and are of a lazy, +or a benevolent, or a sarcastic mood, may perhaps +like to step in for half an hour, and look at the +performances. There are scenes of all sorts; some +dreadful combats, some grand and lofty horse-riding, +some scenes of high life, and some of very middling +indeed; some love-making for the sentimental, and +some light comic business; the whole accompanied by +appropriate scenery and brilliantly illuminated with +the Author’s own candles.</p> + +<p>What more has the Manager of the Performance to say?--To +acknowledge the kindness with which it has been received +in all the principal towns of England through which +the Show has passed, and where it has been most favourably +noticed by the respected conductors of the public +Press, and by the Nobility and Gentry. He is proud +to think that his Puppets have given satisfaction +to the very best company in this empire. The famous +little Becky Puppet has been pronounced to be uncommonly +flexible in the joints, and lively on the wire; the +Amelia Doll, though it has had a smaller circle of +admirers, has yet been carved and dressed with the +greatest care by the artist; the Dobbin Figure, though +apparently clumsy, yet dances in a very amusing and +natural manner; the Little Boys’ Dance has been +liked by some; and please to remark the richly dressed +figure of the Wicked Nobleman, on which no expense +has been spared, and which Old Nick will fetch away +at the end of this singular performance.</p> + +<p>And with this, and a profound bow to his patrons, +the Manager retires, and the curtain rises.</p> + +<p align="right"><i>London</i>, June 28, 1848</p> + +<h3 align="center">Chapter I</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Chiswick Mall</h4> + +<p>While the present century was in its teens, and on +one sunshiny morning in June, there drove up to the +great iron gate of Miss Pinkerton’s academy +for young ladies, on Chiswick Mall, a large family +coach, with two fat horses in blazing harness, driven +by a fat coachman in a three-cornered hat and wig, +at the rate of four miles an hour. A black servant, +who reposed on the box beside the fat coachman, uncurled +his bandy legs as soon as the equipage drew up opposite +Miss Pinkerton’s shining brass plate, and as +he pulled the bell at least a score of young heads +were seen peering out of the narrow windows of the +stately old brick house. Nay, the acute observer +might have recognized the little red nose of good-natured +Miss Jemima Pinkerton herself, rising over some geranium +pots in the window of that lady’s own drawing-room.</p> + +<p>“It is Mrs. Sedley’s coach, sister,” +said Miss Jemima. “Sambo, the black servant, +has just rung the bell; and the coachman has a new +red waistcoat.”</p> + +<p>“Have you completed all the necessary preparations +incident to Miss Sedley’s departure, Miss Jemima?” +asked Miss Pinkerton herself, that majestic lady; +the Semiramis of Hammersmith, the friend of Doctor +Johnson, the correspondent of Mrs. Chapone herself.</p> + +<p>“The girls were up at four this morning, packing +her trunks, sister,” replied Miss Jemima; “we +have made her a bow-pot.”</p> + +<p>“Say a bouquet, sister Jemima, ’tis more +genteel.”</p> + +<p>“Well, a booky as big almost as a haystack; +I have put up two bottles of the gillyflower water +for Mrs. Sedley, and the receipt for making it, in +Amelia’s box.”</p> + +<p>“And I trust, Miss Jemima, you have made a copy +of Miss Sedley’s account. This is it, is it? +Very good--ninety-three pounds, four shillings. Be +kind enough to address it to John Sedley, Esquire, +and to seal this billet which I have written to his +lady.”</p> + +<p>In Miss Jemima’s eyes an autograph letter of +her sister, Miss Pinkerton, was an object of as deep +veneration as would have been a letter from a sovereign. + Only when her pupils quitted the establishment, or +when they were about to be married, and once, when +poor Miss Birch died of the scarlet fever, was Miss +Pinkerton known to write personally to the parents +of her pupils; and it was Jemima’s opinion that +if anything could console Mrs. Birch for her daughter’s +loss, it would be that pious and eloquent composition +in which Miss Pinkerton announced the event.</p> + +<p>In the present instance Miss Pinkerton’s “billet” +was to the following effect:--</p> + +<p>The Mall, Chiswick, June 15, 18</p> + +<p><i>Madam</i>,--After her six years’ residence +at the Mall, I have the honour and happiness of presenting +Miss Amelia Sedley to her parents, as a young lady +not unworthy to occupy a fitting position in their +polished and refined circle. Those virtues which +characterize the young English gentlewoman, those accomplishments +which become her birth and station, will not be found +wanting in the amiable Miss Sedley, whose <i>industry</i> +and <i>obedience</i> have endeared her to her instructors, +and whose delightful sweetness of temper has charmed +her <i>aged</i> and her <i>youthful</i> companions.</p> + +<p>In music, in dancing, in orthography, in every variety +of embroidery and needlework, she will be found to +have realized her friends’ fondest wishes. +In geography there is still much to be desired; and +a careful and undeviating use of the backboard, for +four hours daily during the next three years, is recommended +as necessary to the acquirement of that dignified +<i>deportment and carriage</i>, so requisite for +every young lady of <em>fashion</em>.</p> + +<p>In the principles of religion and morality, Miss Sedley +will be found worthy of an establishment which has +been honoured by the presence of <i>The Great Lexicographer</i>, and the patronage of the admirable +Mrs. Chapone. In leaving the Mall, Miss Amelia carries +with her the hearts of her companions, and the affectionate +regards of her mistress, who has the honour to subscribe +herself,</p> + +<p align="center">Madam,</p> + +<p>Your most obliged humble servant, + +<p align="right">B<span class="smallcaps">arbara</span> P<span class="smallcaps">inkerton</span></p> + +<p>P.S.--Miss Sharp accompanies Miss Sedley. It is particularly +requested that Miss Sharp’s stay in Russell Square +may not exceed ten days. The family of distinction +with whom she is engaged, desire to avail themselves +of her services as soon as possible.</p> + +<p>This letter completed, Miss Pinkerton proceeded to +write her own name, and Miss Sedley’s, in the +fly-leaf of a Johnson’s Dictionary-- the interesting +work which she invariably presented to her scholars, +on their departure from the Mall. On the cover was +inserted a copy of “Lines addressed to a young +lady on quitting Miss Pinkerton’s school, at +the Mall; by the late revered Doctor Samuel Johnson.” +In fact, the Lexicographer’s name was always +on the lips of this majestic woman, and a visit he +had paid to her was the cause of her reputation and +her fortune.</p> + +<p>Being commanded by her elder sister to get “the +Dictionary” from the cupboard, Miss Jemima had +extracted two copies of the book from the receptacle +in question. When Miss Pinkerton had finished the +inscription in the first, Jemima, with rather a dubious +and timid air, handed her the second.</p> + +<p>“For whom is this, Miss Jemima?” said +Miss Pinkerton, with awful coldness.</p> + +<p>“For Becky Sharp,” answered Jemima, trembling +very much, and blushing over her withered face and +neck, as she turned her back on her sister. “For +Becky Sharp: she’s going too.”</p> + +<p>“MISS JEMINA!” exclaimed Miss +Pinkerton, in the largest capitals. “Are you +in your senses? Replace the Dixonary in the closet, +and never venture to take such a liberty in future.”</p> + +<p>“Well, sister, it’s only two-and-ninepence, +and poor Becky will be miserable if she don’t +get one.”</p> + +<p>“Send Miss Sedley instantly to me,” said +Miss Pinkerton. And so venturing not to say another +word, poor Jemima trotted off, exceedingly flurried +and nervous.</p> + +<p>Miss Sedley’s papa was a merchant in London, +and a man of some wealth; whereas Miss Sharp was an +articled pupil, for whom Miss Pinkerton had done, +as she thought, quite enough, without conferring upon +her at parting the high honour of the Dixonary.</p> + +<p>Although schoolmistresses’ letters are to be +trusted no more nor less than churchyard epitaphs; +yet, as it sometimes happens that a person departs +this life who is really deserving of all the praises +the stone cutter carves over his bones; who <i>is</i> +a good Christian, a good parent, child, wife, or husband; +who actually <i>does</i> leave a disconsolate family +to mourn his loss; so in academies of the male and +female sex it occurs every now and then that the pupil +is fully worthy of the praises bestowed by the disinterested +instructor. Now, Miss Amelia Sedley was a young lady +of this singular species; and deserved not only all +that Miss Pinkerton said in her praise, but had many +charming qualities which that pompous old Minerva of +a woman could not see, from the differences of rank +and age between her pupil and herself.</p> + +<p>For she could not only sing like a lark, or a Mrs. +Billington, and dance like Hillisberg or Parisot; +and embroider beautifully; and spell as well as a +Dixonary itself; but she had such a kindly, smiling, +tender, gentle, generous heart of her own, as won the +love of everybody who came near her, from Minerva +herself down to the poor girl in the scullery, and +the one-eyed tart-woman’s daughter, who was +permitted to vend her wares once a week to the young +ladies in the Mall. She had twelve intimate and bosom +friends out of the twenty-four young ladies. Even +envious Miss Briggs never spoke ill of her; high and +mighty Miss Saltire (Lord Dexter’s granddaughter) +allowed that her figure was genteel; and as for Miss +Swartz, the rich woolly-haired mulatto from St. Kitt’s, +on the day Amelia went away, she was in such a passion +of tears that they were obliged to send for Dr. Floss, +and half tipsify her with salvolatile. Miss Pinkerton’s +attachment was, as may be supposed from the high position +and eminent virtues of that lady, calm and dignified; +but Miss Jemima had already whimpered several times +at the idea of Amelia’s departure; and, but +for fear of her sister, would have gone off in downright +hysterics, like the heiress (who paid double) of St. +Kitt’s. Such luxury of grief, however, is only +allowed to parlour-boarders. Honest Jemima had all +the bills, and the washing, and the mending, and the +puddings, and the plate and crockery, and the servants +to superintend. But why speak about her? It is probable +that we shall not hear of her again from this moment +to the end of time, and that when the great filigree +iron gates are once closed on her, she and her awful +sister will never issue therefrom into this little +world of history.</p> + +<p>But as we are to see a great deal of Amelia, there +is no harm in saying, at the outset of our acquaintance, +that she was a dear little creature; and a great mercy +it is, both in life and in novels, which (and the +latter especially) abound in villains of the most +sombre sort, that we are to have for a constant companion +so guileless and good-natured a person. As she is +not a heroine, there is no need to describe her person; +indeed I am afraid that her nose was rather short +than otherwise, and her cheeks a great deal too round +and red for a heroine; but her face blushed with rosy +health, and her lips with the freshest of smiles, +and she had a pair of eyes which sparkled with the +brightest and honestest good-humour, except indeed +when they filled with tears, and that was a great deal +too often; for the silly thing would cry over a dead +canary-bird; or over a mouse, that the cat haply had +seized upon; or over the end of a novel, were it ever +so stupid; and as for saying an unkind word to her, +were any persons hard-hearted enough to do so--why, +so much the worse for them. Even Miss Pinkerton, +that austere and godlike woman, ceased scolding her +after the first time, and though she no more comprehended +sensibility than she did Algebra, gave all masters +and teachers particular orders to treat Miss Sedley +with the utmost gentleness, as harsh treatment was +injurious to her.</p> + +<p>So that when the day of departure came, between her +two customs of laughing and crying, Miss Sedley was +greatly puzzled how to act. She was glad to go home, +and yet most woefully sad at leaving school. For +three days before, little Laura Martin, the orphan, +followed her about like a little dog. She had to make +and receive at least fourteen presents--to make fourteen +solemn promises of writing every week: “Send +my letters under cover to my grandpapa, the Earl of +Dexter,” said Miss Saltire (who, by the way, +was rather shabby). “Never mind the postage, +but write every day, you dear darling,” said +the impetuous and woolly-headed, but generous and +affectionate Miss Swartz; and the orphan little Laura +Martin (who was just in round-hand), took her friend’s +hand and said, looking up in her face wistfully, “Amelia, +when I write to you I shall call you Mamma.” +All which details, I have no doubt, <i>Jones</i>, who +reads this book at his Club, will pronounce to be +excessively foolish, trivial, twaddling, and ultra-sentimental. + Yes; I can see Jones at this minute (rather flushed +with his joint of mutton and half pint of wine), taking +out his pencil and scoring under the words “foolish, +twaddling,” &c., and adding to them his own remark +of “<i>Quite true</i>.” Well, he is +a lofty man of genius, and admires the great and heroic +in life and novels; and so had better take warning +and go elsewhere.</p> + +<p>Well, then. The flowers, and the presents, and the +trunks, and bonnet-boxes of Miss Sedley having been +arranged by Mr. Sambo in the carriage, together with +a very small and weather-beaten old cow’s-skin +trunk with Miss Sharp’s card neatly nailed upon +it, which was delivered by Sambo with a grin, and +packed by the coachman with a corresponding sneer--the +hour for parting came; and the grief of that moment +was considerably lessened by the admirable discourse +which Miss Pinkerton addressed to her pupil. Not that +the parting speech caused Amelia to philosophise, +or that it armed her in any way with a calmness, the +result of argument; but it was intolerably dull, pompous, +and tedious; and having the fear of her schoolmistress +greatly before her eyes, Miss Sedley did not venture, +in her presence, to give way to any ebullitions of +private grief. A seed-cake and a bottle of wine were +produced in the drawing-room, as on the solemn occasions +of the visits of parents, and these refreshments being +partaken of, Miss Sedley was at liberty to depart.</p> + +<p>“You’ll go in and say good-by to Miss +Pinkerton, Becky!” said Miss Jemima to a young +lady of whom nobody took any notice, and who was coming +downstairs with her own bandbox.</p> + +<p>“I suppose I must,” said Miss Sharp calmly, +and much to the wonder of Miss Jemima; and the latter +having knocked at the door, and receiving permission +to come in, Miss Sharp advanced in a very unconcerned +manner, and said in French, and with a perfect accent, +“Mademoiselle, <i>je viens vous faire mes adieux</i>.”</p> + +<p>Miss Pinkerton did not understand French; she only +directed those who did: but biting her lips and throwing +up her venerable and Roman-nosed head (on the top +of which figured a large and solemn turban), she said, +“Miss Sharp, I wish you a good morning.” +As the Hammersmith Semiramis spoke, she waved one +hand, both by way of adieu, and to give Miss Sharp +an opportunity of shaking one of the fingers of the +hand which was left out for that purpose.</p> + +<p>Miss Sharp only folded her own hands with a very frigid +smile and bow, and quite declined to accept the proffered +honour; on which Semiramis tossed up her turban more +indignantly than ever. In fact, it was a little battle +between the young lady and the old one, and the latter +was worsted. “Heaven bless you, my child,” +said she, embracing Amelia, and scowling the while +over the girl’s shoulder at Miss Sharp. “Come +away, Becky,” said Miss Jemima, pulling the young +woman away in great alarm, and the drawing-room door +closed upon them for ever.</p> + +<p>Then came the struggle and parting below. Words refuse +to tell it. All the servants were there in the hall--all +the dear friend--all the young ladies--the dancing-master +who had just arrived; and there was such a scuffling, +and hugging, and kissing, and crying, with the hysterical +YOOPS of Miss Swartz, the parlour-boarder, from her +room, as no pen can depict, and as the tender heart +would fain pass over. The embracing was over; they +parted--that is, Miss Sedley parted from her friends. + Miss Sharp had demurely entered the carriage some +minutes before. Nobody cried for leaving <i>her</i>.</p> + +<p>Sambo of the bandy legs slammed the carriage door +on his young weeping mistress. He sprang up behind +the carriage. “Stop!” cried Miss Jemima, +rushing to the gate with a parcel.</p> + +<p>“It’s some sandwiches, my dear,” +said she to Amelia. “You may be hungry, you +know; and Becky, Becky Sharp, here’s a book for +you that my sister--that is, I--Johnson’s Dixonary, +you know; you mustn’t leave us without that. + Good-by. Drive on, coachman. God bless you!”</p> + +<p>And the kind creature retreated into the garden, overcome +with emotion.</p> + +<p>But, lo! and just as the coach drove off, Miss Sharp +put her pale face out of the window and actually flung +the book back into the garden.</p> + +<p>This almost caused Jemima to faint with terror. “Well, +I never"-- said she--"what an audacious"--Emotion +prevented her from completing either sentence. The +carriage rolled away; the great gates were closed; +the bell rang for the dancing lesson. The world is +before the two young ladies; and so, farewell to Chiswick +Mall.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter II</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Miss Sharp and Miss Sedley Prepare to Open the Campaign</h4> + +<p>When Miss Sharp had performed the heroical act mentioned +in the last chapter, and had seen the Dixonary, flying +over the pavement of the little garden, fall at length +at the feet of the astonished Miss Jemima, the young +lady’s countenance, which had before worn an +almost livid look of hatred, assumed a smile that perhaps +was scarcely more agreeable, and she sank back in +the carriage in an easy frame of mind, saying--"So +much for the Dixonary; and, thank God, I’m out +of Chiswick.”</p> + +<p>Miss Sedley was almost as flurried at the act of defiance +as Miss Jemima had been; for, consider, it was but +one minute that she had left school, and the impressions +of six years are not got over in that space of time. + Nay, with some persons those awes and terrors of +youth last for ever and ever. I know, for instance, +an old gentleman of sixty-eight, who said to me one +morning at breakfast, with a very agitated countenance, +“I dreamed last night that I was flogged by +Dr. Raine.” Fancy had carried him back five-and-fifty +years in the course of that evening. Dr. Raine and +his rod were just as awful to him in his heart, then, +at sixty-eight, as they had been at thirteen. If +the Doctor, with a large birch, had appeared bodily +to him, even at the age of threescore and eight, and +had said in awful voice, “Boy, take down your +pant--”? Well, well, Miss Sedley was exceedingly +alarmed at this act of insubordination.</p> + +<p>“How could you do so, Rebecca?” at last +she said, after a pause.</p> + +<p>“Why, do you think Miss Pinkerton will come +out and order me back to the black-hole?” said +Rebecca, laughing.</p> + +<p>“No: but--”</p> + +<p>“I hate the whole house,” continued Miss +Sharp in a fury. “I hope I may never set eyes +on it again. I wish it were in the bottom of the +Thames, I do; and if Miss Pinkerton were there, I wouldn’t +pick her out, that I wouldn’t. O how I should +like to see her floating in the water yonder, turban +and all, with her train streaming after her, and her +nose like the beak of a wherry.”</p> + +<p>“Hush!” cried Miss Sedley.</p> + +<p>“Why, will the black footman tell tales?” +cried Miss Rebecca, laughing. “He may go back +and tell Miss Pinkerton that I hate her with all my +soul; and I wish he would; and I wish I had a means +of proving it, too. For two years I have only had +insults and outrage from her. I have been treated +worse than any servant in the kitchen. I have never +had a friend or a kind word, except from you. I have +been made to tend the little girls in the lower schoolroom, +and to talk French to the Misses, until I grew sick +of my mother tongue. But that talking French to Miss +Pinkerton was capital fun, wasn’t it? She doesn’t +know a word of French, and was too proud to confess +it. I believe it was that which made her part with +me; and so thank Heaven for French. Vive la France! +Vive l’Empereur! Vive Bonaparte!”</p> + +<p>“O Rebecca, Rebecca, for shame!” cried +Miss Sedley; for this was the greatest blasphemy Rebecca +had as yet uttered; and in those days, in England, +to say, “Long live Bonaparte!” was as much +as to say, “Long live Lucifer!” “How +can you--how dare you have such wicked, revengeful +thoughts?”</p> + +<p>“Revenge may be wicked, but it’s natural,” +answered Miss Rebecca. “I’m no angel.” +And, to say the truth, she certainly was not.</p> + +<p>For it may be remarked in the course of this little +conversation (which took place as the coach rolled +along lazily by the river side) that though Miss Rebecca +Sharp has twice had occasion to thank Heaven, it has +been, in the first place, for ridding her of some +person whom she hated, and secondly, for enabling her +to bring her enemies to some sort of perplexity or +confusion; neither of which are very amiable motives +for religious gratitude, or such as would be put forward +by persons of a kind and placable disposition. Miss +Rebecca was not, then, in the least kind or placable. + All the world used her ill, said this young misanthropist, +and we may be pretty certain that persons whom all +the world treats ill, deserve entirely the treatment +they get. The world is a looking-glass, and gives +back to every man the reflection of his own face. +Frown at it, and it will in turn look sourly upon +you; laugh at it and with it, and it is a jolly kind +companion; and so let all young persons take their +choice. This is certain, that if the world neglected +Miss Sharp, she never was known to have done a good +action in behalf of anybody; nor can it be expected +that twenty-four young ladies should all be as amiable +as the heroine of this work, Miss Sedley (whom we +have selected for the very reason that she was the +best-natured of all, otherwise what on earth was to +have prevented us from putting up Miss Swartz, or +Miss Crump, or Miss Hopkins, as heroine in her place!) +it could not be expected that every one should be of +the humble and gentle temper of Miss Amelia Sedley; +should take every opportunity to vanquish Rebecca’s +hard-heartedness and ill-humour; and, by a thousand +kind words and offices, overcome, for once at least, +her hostility to her kind.</p> + +<p>Miss Sharp’s father was an artist, and in that +quality had given lessons of drawing at Miss Pinkerton’s +school. He was a clever man; a pleasant companion; +a careless student; with a great propensity for running +into debt, and a partiality for the tavern. When he +was drunk, he used to beat his wife and daughter; +and the next morning, with a headache, he would rail +at the world for its neglect of his genius, and abuse, +with a good deal of cleverness, and sometimes with +perfect reason, the fools, his brother painters. As +it was with the utmost difficulty that he could keep +himself, and as he owed money for a mile round Soho, +where he lived, he thought to better his circumstances +by marrying a young woman of the French nation, who +was by profession an opera-girl. The humble calling +of her female parent Miss Sharp never alluded to, +but used to state subsequently that the Entrechats +were a noble family of Gascony, and took great pride +in her descent from them. And curious it is that +as she advanced in life this young lady’s ancestors +increased in rank and splendour.</p> + +<p>Rebecca’s mother had had some education somewhere, +and her daughter spoke French with purity and a Parisian +accent. It was in those days rather a rare accomplishment, +and led to her engagement with the orthodox Miss Pinkerton. + For her mother being dead, her father, finding himself +not likely to recover, after his third attack of delirium +tremens, wrote a manly and pathetic letter to Miss +Pinkerton, recommending the orphan child to her protection, +and so descended to the grave, after two bailiffs +had quarrelled over his corpse. Rebecca was seventeen +when she came to Chiswick, and was bound over as an +articled pupil; her duties being to talk French, as +we have seen; and her privileges to live cost free, +and, with a few guineas a year, to gather scraps of +knowledge from the professors who attended the school.</p> + +<p>She was small and slight in person; pale, sandy-haired, +and with eyes habitually cast down: when they looked +up they were very large, odd, and attractive; so attractive +that the Reverend Mr. Crisp, fresh from Oxford, and +curate to the Vicar of Chiswick, the Reverend Mr. +Flowerdew, fell in love with Miss Sharp; being shot +dead by a glance of her eyes which was fired all the +way across Chiswick Church from the school-pew to +the reading-desk. This infatuated young man used +sometimes to take tea with Miss Pinkerton, to whom +he had been presented by his mamma, and actually proposed +something like marriage in an intercepted note, which +the one-eyed apple-woman was charged to deliver. +Mrs. Crisp was summoned from Buxton, and abruptly +carried off her darling boy; but the idea, even, of +such an eagle in the Chiswick dovecot caused a great +flutter in the breast of Miss Pinkerton, who would +have sent away Miss Sharp but that she was bound to +her under a forfeit, and who never could thoroughly +believe the young lady’s protestations that she +had never exchanged a single word with Mr. Crisp, +except under her own eyes on the two occasions when +she had met him at tea.</p> + +<p>By the side of many tall and bouncing young ladies +in the establishment, Rebecca Sharp looked like a +child. But she had the dismal precocity of poverty. + Many a dun had she talked to, and turned away from +her father’s door; many a tradesman had she coaxed +and wheedled into good-humour, and into the granting +of one meal more. She sate commonly with her father, +who was very proud of her wit, and heard the talk +of many of his wild companions--often but ill-suited +for a girl to hear. But she never had been a girl, +she said; she had been a woman since she was eight +years old. Oh, why did Miss Pinkerton let such a +dangerous bird into her cage?</p> + +<p>The fact is, the old lady believed Rebecca to be the +meekest creature in the world, so admirably, on the +occasions when her father brought her to Chiswick, +used Rebecca to perform the part of the ingenue; and +only a year before the arrangement by which Rebecca +had been admitted into her house, and when Rebecca +was sixteen years old, Miss Pinkerton majestically, +and with a little speech, made her a present of a +doll--which was, by the way, the confiscated property +of Miss Swindle, discovered surreptitiously nursing +it in school-hours. How the father and daughter +laughed as they trudged home together after the evening +party (it was on the occasion of the speeches, when +all the professors were invited) and how Miss Pinkerton +would have raged had she seen the caricature of herself +which the little mimic, Rebecca, managed to make out +of her doll. Becky used to go through dialogues with +it; it formed the delight of Newman Street, Gerrard +Street, and the Artists’ quarter: and the young +painters, when they came to take their gin-and-water +with their lazy, dissolute, clever, jovial senior, +used regularly to ask Rebecca if Miss Pinkerton was +at home: she was as well known to them, poor soul! +as Mr. Lawrence or President West. Once Rebecca had +the honour to pass a few days at Chiswick; after which +she brought back Jemima, and erected another doll +as Miss Jemmy: for though that honest creature had +made and given her jelly and cake enough for three +children, and a seven-shilling piece at parting, the +girl’s sense of ridicule was far stronger than +her gratitude, and she sacrificed Miss Jemmy quite +as pitilessly as her sister.</p> + +<p>The catastrophe came, and she was brought to the Mall +as to her home. The rigid formality of the place +suffocated her: the prayers and the meals, the lessons +and the walks, which were arranged with a conventual +regularity, oppressed her almost beyond endurance; +and she looked back to the freedom and the beggary +of the old studio in Soho with so much regret, that +everybody, herself included, fancied she was consumed +with grief for her father. She had a little room +in the garret, where the maids heard her walking and +sobbing at night; but it was with rage, and not with +grief. She had not been much of a dissembler, until +now her loneliness taught her to feign. She had never +mingled in the society of women: her father, reprobate +as he was, was a man of talent; his conversation was +a thousand times more agreeable to her than the talk +of such of her own sex as she now encountered. The +pompous vanity of the old schoolmistress, the foolish +good-humour of her sister, the silly chat and scandal +of the elder girls, and the frigid correctness of +the governesses equally annoyed her; and she had no +soft maternal heart, this unlucky girl, otherwise +the prattle and talk of the younger children, with +whose care she was chiefly intrusted, might have soothed +and interested her; but she lived among them two years, +and not one was sorry that she went away. The gentle +tender-hearted Amelia Sedley was the only person to +whom she could attach herself in the least; and who +could help attaching herself to Amelia?</p> + +<p>The happiness the superior advantages of the young +women round about her, gave Rebecca inexpressible +pangs of envy. “What airs that girl gives herself, +because she is an Earl’s grand-daughter,” +she said of one. “How they cringe and bow to +that Creole, because of her hundred thousand pounds! + I am a thousand times cleverer and more charming +than that creature, for all her wealth. I am as well +bred as the Earl’s grand-daughter, for all her +fine pedigree; and yet every one passes me by here. + And yet, when I was at my father’s, did not +the men give up their gayest balls and parties in order +to pass the evening with me?” She determined +at any rate to get free from the prison in which she +found herself, and now began to act for herself, and +for the first time to make connected plans for the +future.</p> + +<p>She took advantage, therefore, of the means of study +the place offered her; and as she was already a musician +and a good linguist, she speedily went through the +little course of study which was considered necessary +for ladies in those days. Her music she practised +incessantly, and one day, when the girls were out, +and she had remained at home, she was overheard to +play a piece so well that Minerva thought, wisely, +she could spare herself the expense of a master for +the juniors, and intimated to Miss Sharp that she was +to instruct them in music for the future.</p> + +<p>The girl refused; and for the first time, and to the +astonishment of the majestic mistress of the school. + “I am here to speak French with the children,” +Rebecca said abruptly, “not to teach them music, +and save money for you. Give me money, and I will +teach them.”</p> + +<p>Minerva was obliged to yield, and, of course, disliked +her from that day. “For five-and-thirty years,” +she said, and with great justice, “I never have +seen the individual who has dared in my own house to +question my authority. I have nourished a viper in +my bosom.”</p> + +<p>“A viper--a fiddlestick,” said Miss Sharp +to the old lady, almost fainting with astonishment. + “You took me because I was useful. There is +no question of gratitude between us. I hate this place, +and want to leave it. I will do nothing here but what +I am obliged to do.”</p> + +<p>It was in vain that the old lady asked her if she +was aware she was speaking to Miss Pinkerton? Rebecca +laughed in her face, with a horrid sarcastic demoniacal +laughter, that almost sent the schoolmistress into +fits. “Give me a sum of money,” said the +girl, “and get rid of me--or, if you like better, +get me a good place as governess in a nobleman’s +family--you can do so if you please.” And in +their further disputes she always returned to this +point, “Get me a situation--we hate each other, +and I am ready to go.”</p> + +<p>Worthy Miss Pinkerton, although she had a Roman nose +and a turban, and was as tall as a grenadier, and +had been up to this time an irresistible princess, +had no will or strength like that of her little apprentice, +and in vain did battle against her, and tried to overawe +her. Attempting once to scold her in public, Rebecca +hit upon the before-mentioned plan of answering her +in French, which quite routed the old woman. In order +to maintain authority in her school, it became necessary +to remove this rebel, this monster, this serpent, +this firebrand; and hearing about this time that Sir +Pitt Crawley’s family was in want of a governess, +she actually recommended Miss Sharp for the situation, +firebrand and serpent as she was. “I cannot, +certainly,” she said, “find fault with +Miss Sharp’s conduct, except to myself; and +must allow that her talents and accomplishments are +of a high order. As far as the head goes, at least, +she does credit to the educational system pursued at +my establishment.”</p> + +<p>And so the schoolmistress reconciled the recommendation +to her conscience, and the indentures were cancelled, +and the apprentice was free. The battle here described +in a few lines, of course, lasted for some months. + And as Miss Sedley, being now in her seventeenth +year, was about to leave school, and had a friendship +for Miss Sharp ("’tis the only point in Amelia’s +behaviour,” said Minerva, “which has not +been satisfactory to her mistress"), Miss Sharp was +invited by her friend to pass a week with her at home, +before she entered upon her duties as governess in +a private family.</p> + +<p>Thus the world began for these two young ladies. +For Amelia it was quite a new, fresh, brilliant world, +with all the bloom upon it. It was not quite a new +one for Rebecca--(indeed, if the truth must be told +with respect to the Crisp affair, the tart-woman hinted +to somebody, who took an affidavit of the fact to +somebody else, that there was a great deal more than +was made public regarding Mr. Crisp and Miss Sharp, +and that his letter was in answer to another letter). + But who can tell you the real truth of the matter? +At all events, if Rebecca was not beginning the world, +she was beginning it over again.</p> + +<p>By the time the young ladies reached Kensington turnpike, +Amelia had not forgotten her companions, but had dried +her tears, and had blushed very much and been delighted +at a young officer of the Life Guards, who spied her +as he was riding by, and said, “A dem fine gal, +egad!” and before the carriage arrived in Russell +Square, a great deal of conversation had taken place +about the Drawing-room, and whether or not young ladies +wore powder as well as hoops when presented, and whether +she was to have that honour: to the Lord Mayor’s +ball she knew she was to go. And when at length home +was reached, Miss Amelia Sedley skipped out on Sambo’s +arm, as happy and as handsome a girl as any in the +whole big city of London. Both he and coachman agreed +on this point, and so did her father and mother, and +so did every one of the servants in the house, as they +stood bobbing, and curtseying, and smiling, in the +hall to welcome their young mistress.</p> + +<p>You may be sure that she showed Rebecca over every +room of the house, and everything in every one of +her drawers; and her books, and her piano, and her +dresses, and all her necklaces, brooches, laces, and +gimcracks. She insisted upon Rebecca accepting the +white cornelian and the turquoise rings, and a sweet +sprigged muslin, which was too small for her now, +though it would fit her friend to a nicety; and she +determined in her heart to ask her mother’s +permission to present her white Cashmere shawl to her +friend. Could she not spare it? and had not her brother +Joseph just brought her two from India?</p> + +<p>When Rebecca saw the two magnificent Cashmere shawls +which Joseph Sedley had brought home to his sister, +she said, with perfect truth, “that it must +be delightful to have a brother,” and easily +got the pity of the tender-hearted Amelia for being +alone in the world, an orphan without friends or kindred.</p> + +<p>“Not alone,” said Amelia; “you know, +Rebecca, I shall always be your friend, and love you +as a sister--indeed I will.”</p> + +<p>“Ah, but to have parents, as you have--kind, +rich, affectionate parents, who give you everything +you ask for; and their love, which is more precious +than all! My poor papa could give me nothing, and I +had but two frocks in all the world! And then, to have +a brother, a dear brother! Oh, how you must love him!”</p> + +<p>Amelia laughed.</p> + +<p>“What! don’t you love him? you, who say +you love everybody?”</p> + +<p>“Yes, of course, I do--only--”</p> + +<p>“Only what?”</p> + +<p>“Only Joseph doesn’t seem to care much +whether I love him or not. He gave me two fingers +to shake when he arrived after ten years’ absence! + He is very kind and good, but he scarcely ever speaks +to me; I think he loves his pipe a great deal better +than his"--but here Amelia checked herself, for why +should she speak ill of her brother? “He was +very kind to me as a child,” she added; “I +was but five years old when he went away.”</p> + +<p>“Isn’t he very rich?” said Rebecca. + “They say all Indian nabobs are enormously +rich.”</p> + +<p>“I believe he has a very large income.”</p> + +<p>“And is your sister-in-law a nice pretty woman?”</p> + +<p>“La! Joseph is not married,” said Amelia, +laughing again.</p> + +<p>Perhaps she had mentioned the fact already to Rebecca, +but that young lady did not appear to have remembered +it; indeed, vowed and protested that she expected +to see a number of Amelia’s nephews and nieces. + She was quite disappointed that Mr. Sedley was not +married; she was sure Amelia had said he was, and +she doted so on little children.</p> + +<p>“I think you must have had enough of them at +Chiswick,” said Amelia, rather wondering at +the sudden tenderness on her friend’s part; and +indeed in later days Miss Sharp would never have committed +herself so far as to advance opinions, the untruth +of which would have been so easily detected. But +we must remember that she is but nineteen as yet, +unused to the art of deceiving, poor innocent creature! +and making her own experience in her own person. +The meaning of the above series of queries, as translated +in the heart of this ingenious young woman, was simply +this: “If Mr. Joseph Sedley is rich and unmarried, +why should I not marry him? I have only a fortnight, +to be sure, but there is no harm in trying.” +And she determined within herself to make this laudable +attempt. She redoubled her caresses to Amelia; she +kissed the white cornelian necklace as she put it +on; and vowed she would never, never part with it. + When the dinner-bell rang she went downstairs with +her arm round her friend’s waist, as is the +habit of young ladies. She was so agitated at the +drawing-room door, that she could hardly find courage +to enter. “Feel my heart, how it beats, dear!” +said she to her friend.</p> + +<p>“No, it doesn’t,” said Amelia. +“Come in, don’t be frightened. Papa won’t +do you any harm.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter III</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Rebecca Is in Presence of the Enemy</h4> + +<p>A <i>very</i> stout, puffy man, in buckskins and Hessian +boots, with several immense neckcloths that rose almost +to his nose, with a red striped waistcoat and an apple +green coat with steel buttons almost as large as crown +pieces (it was the morning costume of a dandy or blood +of those days) was reading the paper by the fire when +the two girls entered, and bounced off his arm-chair, +and blushed excessively, and hid his entire face almost +in his neckcloths at this apparition.</p> + +<p>“It’s only your sister, Joseph,” +said Amelia, laughing and shaking the two fingers +which he held out. “I’ve come home <i>for good</i>, you know; and this is my friend, Miss Sharp, +whom you have heard me mention.”</p> + +<p>“No, never, upon my word,” said the head +under the neckcloth, shaking very much--"that is, +yes--what abominably cold weather, Miss"--and herewith +he fell to poking the fire with all his might, although +it was in the middle of June.</p> + +<p>“He’s very handsome,” whispered +Rebecca to Amelia, rather loud.</p> + +<p>“Do you think so?” said the latter. “I’ll +tell him.”</p> + +<p>“Darling! not for worlds,” said Miss Sharp, +starting back as timid as a fawn. She had previously +made a respectful virgin-like curtsey to the gentleman, +and her modest eyes gazed so perseveringly on the +carpet that it was a wonder how she should have found +an opportunity to see him.</p> + +<p>“Thank you for the beautiful shawls, brother,” +said Amelia to the fire poker. “Are they not +beautiful, Rebecca?”</p> + +<p>“O heavenly!” said Miss Sharp, and her +eyes went from the carpet straight to the chandelier.</p> + +<p>Joseph still continued a huge clattering at the poker +and tongs, puffing and blowing the while, and turning +as red as his yellow face would allow him. “I +can’t make you such handsome presents, Joseph,” +continued his sister, “but while I was at school, +I have embroidered for you a very beautiful pair of +braces.”</p> + +<p>“Good Gad! Amelia,” cried the brother, +in serious alarm, “what do you mean?” +and plunging with all his might at the bell-rope, that +article of furniture came away in his hand, and increased +the honest fellow’s confusion. “For heaven’s +sake see if my buggy’s at the door. I <i>can’t</i> +wait. I must go. D--that groom of mine. I must go.”</p> + +<p>At this minute the father of the family walked in, +rattling his seals like a true British merchant. +“What’s the matter, Emmy?” says +he.</p> + +<p>“Joseph wants me to see if his--his buggy is +at the door. What is a buggy, Papa?”</p> + +<p>“It is a one-horse palanquin,” said the +old gentleman, who was a wag in his way.</p> + +<p>Joseph at this burst out into a wild fit of laughter; +in which, encountering the eye of Miss Sharp, he stopped +all of a sudden, as if he had been shot.</p> + +<p>“This young lady is your friend? Miss Sharp, +I am very happy to see you. Have you and Emmy been +quarrelling already with Joseph, that he wants to +be off?”</p> + +<p>“I promised Bonamy of our service, sir,” +said Joseph, “to dine with him.”</p> + +<p>“O fie! didn’t you tell your mother you +would dine here?”</p> + +<p>“But in this dress it’s impossible.”</p> + +<p>“Look at him, isn’t he handsome enough +to dine anywhere, Miss Sharp?”</p> + +<p>On which, of course, Miss Sharp looked at her friend, +and they both set off in a fit of laughter, highly +agreeable to the old gentleman.</p> + +<p>“Did you ever see a pair of buckskins like those +at Miss Pinkerton’s?” continued he, following +up his advantage.</p> + +<p>“Gracious heavens! Father,” cried Joseph.</p> + +<p>“There now, I have hurt his feelings. Mrs. +Sedley, my dear, I have hurt your son’s feelings. + I have alluded to his buckskins. Ask Miss Sharp +if I haven’t? Come, Joseph, be friends with Miss +Sharp, and let us all go to dinner.”</p> + +<p>“There’s a pillau, Joseph, just as you +like it, and Papa has brought home the best turbot +in Billingsgate.”</p> + +<p>“Come, come, sir, walk downstairs with Miss +Sharp, and I will follow with these two young women,” +said the father, and he took an arm of wife and daughter +and walked merrily off.</p> + +<p>If Miss Rebecca Sharp had determined in her heart +upon making the conquest of this big beau, I don’t +think, ladies, we have any right to blame her; for +though the task of husband-hunting is generally, and +with becoming modesty, entrusted by young persons to +their mammas, recollect that Miss Sharp had no kind +parent to arrange these delicate matters for her, +and that if she did not get a husband for herself, +there was no one else in the wide world who would +take the trouble off her hands. What causes young +people to “come out,” but the noble ambition +of matrimony? What sends them trooping to watering-places? +What keeps them dancing till five o’clock in +the morning through a whole mortal season? What causes +them to labour at pianoforte sonatas, and to learn +four songs from a fashionable master at a guinea a +lesson, and to play the harp if they have handsome +arms and neat elbows, and to wear Lincoln Green toxophilite +hats and feathers, but that they may bring down some +“desirable” young man with those killing +bows and arrows of theirs? What causes respectable +parents to take up their carpets, set their houses +topsy-turvy, and spend a fifth of their year’s +income in ball suppers and iced champagne? Is it sheer +love of their species, and an unadulterated wish to +see young people happy and dancing? Psha! they want +to marry their daughters; and, as honest Mrs. Sedley +has, in the depths of her kind heart, already arranged +a score of little schemes for the settlement of her +Amelia, so also had our beloved but unprotected Rebecca +determined to do her very best to secure the husband, +who was even more necessary for her than for her friend. +She had a vivid imagination; she had, besides, read +the Arabian Nights and Guthrie’s Geography; +and it is a fact that while she was dressing for dinner, +and after she had asked Amelia whether her brother +was very rich, she had built for herself a most magnificent +castle in the air, of which she was mistress, with +a husband somewhere in the background (she had not +seen him as yet, and his figure would not therefore +be very distinct); she had arrayed herself in an infinity +of shawls, turbans, and diamond necklaces, and had +mounted upon an elephant to the sound of the march +in Bluebeard, in order to pay a visit of ceremony +to the Grand Mogul. Charming Alnaschar visions! it +is the happy privilege of youth to construct you, +and many a fanciful young creature besides Rebecca +Sharp has indulged in these delightful day-dreams ere +now!</p> + +<p>Joseph Sedley was twelve years older than his sister +Amelia. He was in the East India Company’s +Civil Service, and his name appeared, at the period +of which we write, in the Bengal division of the East +India Register, as collector of Boggley Wollah, an +honourable and lucrative post, as everybody knows: +in order to know to what higher posts Joseph rose +in the service, the reader is referred to the same +periodical.</p> + +<p>Boggley Wollah is situated in a fine, lonely, marshy, +jungly district, famous for snipe-shooting, and where +not unfrequently you may flush a tiger. Ramgunge, +where there is a magistrate, is only forty miles off, +and there is a cavalry station about thirty miles +farther; so Joseph wrote home to his parents, when +he took possession of his collectorship. He had lived +for about eight years of his life, quite alone, at +this charming place, scarcely seeing a Christian face +except twice a year, when the detachment arrived to +carry off the revenues which he had collected, to Calcutta.</p> + +<p>Luckily, at this time he caught a liver complaint, +for the cure of which he returned to Europe, and which +was the source of great comfort and amusement to him +in his native country. He did not live with his family +while in London, but had lodgings of his own, like +a gay young bachelor. Before he went to India he +was too young to partake of the delightful pleasures +of a man about town, and plunged into them on his +return with considerable assiduity. He drove his +horses in the Park; he dined at the fashionable taverns +(for the Oriental Club was not as yet invented); he +frequented the theatres, as the mode was in those +days, or made his appearance at the opera, laboriously +attired in tights and a cocked hat.</p> + +<p>On returning to India, and ever after, he used to +talk of the pleasure of this period of his existence +with great enthusiasm, and give you to understand +that he and Brummel were the leading bucks of the +day. But he was as lonely here as in his jungle at +Boggley Wollah. He scarcely knew a single soul in +the metropolis: and were it not for his doctor, and +the society of his blue-pill, and his liver complaint, +he must have died of loneliness. He was lazy, peevish, +and a bon-vivan; the appearance of a lady frightened +him beyond measure; hence it was but seldom that he +joined the paternal circle in Russell Square, where +there was plenty of gaiety, and where the jokes of +his good-natured old father frightened his amour-propre. + His bulk caused Joseph much anxious thought and alarm; +now and then he would make a desperate attempt to +get rid of his superabundant fat; but his indolence +and love of good living speedily got the better of +these endeavours at reform, and he found himself again +at his three meals a day. He never was well dressed; +but he took the hugest pains to adorn his big person, +and passed many hours daily in that occupation. His +valet made a fortune out of his wardrobe: his toilet-table +was covered with as many pomatums and essences as +ever were employed by an old beauty: he had tried, +in order to give himself a waist, every girth, stay, +and waistband then invented. Like most fat men, he +would have his clothes made too tight, and took care +they should be of the most brilliant colours and youthful +cut. When dressed at length, in the afternoon, he +would issue forth to take a drive with nobody in the +Park; and then would come back in order to dress again +and go and dine with nobody at the Piazza Coffee-House. +He was as vain as a girl; and perhaps his extreme +shyness was one of the results of his extreme vanity. +If Miss Rebecca can get the better of him, and at her +first entrance into life, she is a young person of +no ordinary cleverness.</p> + +<p>The first move showed considerable skill. When she +called Sedley a very handsome man, she knew that Amelia +would tell her mother, who would probably tell Joseph, +or who, at any rate, would be pleased by the compliment +paid to her son. All mothers are. If you had told +Sycorax that her son Caliban was as handsome as Apollo, +she would have been pleased, witch as she was. Perhaps, +too, Joseph Sedley would overhear the compliment--Rebecca +spoke loud enough--and he did hear, and (thinking +in his heart that he was a very fine man) the praise +thrilled through every fibre of his big body, and made +it tingle with pleasure. Then, however, came a recoil. + “Is the girl making fun of me?” he thought, +and straightway he bounced towards the bell, and was +for retreating, as we have seen, when his father’s +jokes and his mother’s entreaties caused him +to pause and stay where he was. He conducted the +young lady down to dinner in a dubious and agitated +frame of mind. “Does she really think I am handsome?” +thought he, “or is she only making game of me?” +We have talked of Joseph Sedley being as vain as a +girl. Heaven help us! the girls have only to turn +the tables, and say of one of their own sex, “She +is as vain as a man,” and they will have perfect +reason. The bearded creatures are quite as eager +for praise, quite as finikin over their toilettes, +quite as proud of their personal advantages, quite +as conscious of their powers of fascination, as any +coquette in the world.</p> + +<p>Downstairs, then, they went, Joseph very red and blushing, +Rebecca very modest, and holding her green eyes downwards. + She was dressed in white, with bare shoulders as +white as snow--the picture of youth, unprotected innocence, +and humble virgin simplicity. “I must be very +quiet,” thought Rebecca, “and very much +interested about India.”</p> + +<p>Now we have heard how Mrs. Sedley had prepared a fine +curry for her son, just as he liked it, and in the +course of dinner a portion of this dish was offered +to Rebecca. “What is it?” said she, turning +an appealing look to Mr. Joseph.</p> + +<p>“Capital,” said he. His mouth was full +of it: his face quite red with the delightful exercise +of gobbling. “Mother, it’s as good as +my own curries in India.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, I must try some, if it is an Indian dish,” +said Miss Rebecca. “I am sure everything must +be good that comes from there.”</p> + +<p>“Give Miss Sharp some curry, my dear,” +said Mr. Sedley, laughing.</p> + +<p>Rebecca had never tasted the dish before.</p> + +<p>“Do you find it as good as everything else from +India?” said Mr. Sedley.</p> + +<p>“Oh, excellent!” said Rebecca, who was +suffering tortures with the cayenne pepper.</p> + +<p>“Try a chili with it, Miss Sharp,” said +Joseph, really interested.</p> + +<p>“A chili,” said Rebecca, gasping. “Oh +yes!” She thought a chili was something cool, +as its name imported, and was served with some. “How +fresh and green they look,” she said, and put +one into her mouth. It was hotter than the curry; +flesh and blood could bear it no longer. She laid +down her fork. “Water, for Heaven’s sake, +water!” she cried. Mr. Sedley burst out laughing +(he was a coarse man, from the Stock Exchange, where +they love all sorts of practical jokes). “They +are real Indian, I assure you,” said he. “Sambo, +give Miss Sharp some water.”</p> + +<p>The paternal laugh was echoed by Joseph, who thought +the joke capital. The ladies only smiled a little. + They thought poor Rebecca suffered too much. She +would have liked to choke old Sedley, but she swallowed +her mortification as well as she had the abominable +curry before it, and as soon as she could speak, said, +with a comical, good-humoured air, “I ought to +have remembered the pepper which the Princess of Persia +puts in the cream-tarts in the Arabian Nights. Do +you put cayenne into your cream-tarts in India, sir?”</p> + +<p>Old Sedley began to laugh, and thought Rebecca was +a good-humoured girl. Joseph simply said, “Cream-tarts, +Miss? Our cream is very bad in Bengal. We generally +use goats’ milk; and, ’gad, do you know, +I’ve got to prefer it!”</p> + +<p>“You won’t like <i>everything</i> from India +now, Miss Sharp,” said the old gentleman; but +when the ladies had retired after dinner, the wily +old fellow said to his son, “Have a care, Joe; +that girl is setting her cap at you.”</p> + +<p>“Pooh! nonsense!” said Joe, highly flattered. + “I recollect, sir, there was a girl at Dumdum, +a daughter of Cutler of the Artillery, and afterwards +married to Lance, the surgeon, who made a dead set +at me in the year ’4--at me and Mulligatawney, +whom I mentioned to you before dinner--a devilish +good fellow Mulligatawney--he’s a magistrate +at Budgebudge, and sure to be in council in five years. +Well, sir, the Artillery gave a ball, and Quintin, +of the King’s 14th, said to me, ‘Sedley,’ +said he, ’I bet you thirteen to ten that Sophy +Cutler hooks either you or Mulligatawney before the +rains.’ ‘Done,’ says I; and egad, +sir--this claret’s very good. Adamson’s +or Carbonell’s?”</p> + +<p>A slight snore was the only reply: the honest stockbroker +was asleep, and so the rest of Joseph’s story +was lost for that day. But he was always exceedingly +communicative in a man’s party, and has told +this delightful tale many scores of times to his apothecary, +Dr. Gollop, when he came to inquire about the liver +and the blue-pill.</p> + +<p>Being an invalid, Joseph Sedley contented himself +with a bottle of claret besides his Madeira at dinner, +and he managed a couple of plates full of strawberries +and cream, and twenty-four little rout cakes that +were lying neglected in a plate near him, and certainly +(for novelists have the privilege of knowing everything) +he thought a great deal about the girl upstairs. +“A nice, gay, merry young creature,” thought +he to himself. “How she looked at me when I +picked up her handkerchief at dinner! She dropped +it twice. Who’s that singing in the drawing-room? +’Gad! shall I go up and see?”</p> + +<p>But his modesty came rushing upon him with uncontrollable +force. His father was asleep: his hat was in the hall: +there was a hackney-coach standing hard by in Southampton +Row. “I’ll go and see the Forty Thieves,” +said he, “and Miss Decamp’s dance”; +and he slipped away gently on the pointed toes of +his boots, and disappeared, without waking his worthy +parent.</p> + +<p>“There goes Joseph,” said Amelia, who +was looking from the open windows of the drawing-room, +while Rebecca was singing at the piano.</p> + +<p>“Miss Sharp has frightened him away,” +said Mrs. Sedley. “Poor Joe, why <i>will</i> +he be so shy?”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter IV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">The Green Silk Purse</h4> + +<p>Poor Joe’s panic lasted for two or three days; +during which he did not visit the house, nor during +that period did Miss Rebecca ever mention his name. + She was all respectful gratitude to Mrs. Sedley; +delighted beyond measure at the Bazaars; and in a whirl +of wonder at the theatre, whither the good-natured +lady took her. One day, Amelia had a headache, and +could not go upon some party of pleasure to which +the two young people were invited: nothing could induce +her friend to go without her. “What! you who +have shown the poor orphan what happiness and love +are for the first time in her life--quit <i>you</i>? + Never!” and the green eyes looked up to Heaven +and filled with tears; and Mrs. Sedley could not but +own that her daughter’s friend had a charming +kind heart of her own.</p> + +<p>As for Mr. Sedley’s jokes, Rebecca laughed at +them with a cordiality and perseverance which not +a little pleased and softened that good-natured gentleman. + Nor was it with the chiefs of the family alone that +Miss Sharp found favour. She interested Mrs. Blenkinsop +by evincing the deepest sympathy in the raspberry-jam +preserving, which operation was then going on in the +Housekeeper’s room; she persisted in calling +Sambo “Sir,” and “Mr. Sambo,” +to the delight of that attendant; and she apologised +to the lady’s maid for giving her trouble in +venturing to ring the bell, with such sweetness and +humility, that the Servants’ Hall was almost +as charmed with her as the Drawing Room.</p> + +<p>Once, in looking over some drawings which Amelia had +sent from school, Rebecca suddenly came upon one which +caused her to burst into tears and leave the room. +It was on the day when Joe Sedley made his second +appearance.</p> + +<p>Amelia hastened after her friend to know the cause +of this display of feeling, and the good-natured girl +came back without her companion, rather affected too. + “You know, her father was our drawing-master, +Mamma, at Chiswick, and used to do all the best parts +of our drawings.”</p> + +<p>“My love! I’m sure I always heard Miss +Pinkerton say that he did not touch them--he only +mounted them.” “It was called mounting, +Mamma. Rebecca remembers the drawing, and her father +working at it, and the thought of it came upon her +rather suddenly--and so, you know, she-- "</p> + +<p>“The poor child is all heart,” said Mrs. +Sedley.</p> + +<p>“I wish she could stay with us another week,” +said Amelia.</p> + +<p>“She’s devilish like Miss Cutler that +I used to meet at Dumdum, only fairer. She’s +married now to Lance, the Artillery Surgeon. Do you +know, Ma’am, that once Quintin, of the 14th, +bet me--”</p> + +<p>“O Joseph, we know that story,” said Amelia, +laughing. Never mind about telling that; but persuade +Mamma to write to Sir Something Crawley for leave +of absence for poor dear Rebecca: here she comes, +her eyes red with weeping.”</p> + +<p>“I’m better, now,” said the girl, +with the sweetest smile possible, taking good-natured +Mrs. Sedley’s extended hand and kissing it respectfully. + “How kind you all are to me! All,” she +added, with a laugh, “except you, Mr. Joseph.”</p> + +<p>“Me!” said Joseph, meditating an instant +departure “Gracious Heavens! Good Gad! Miss +Sharp!’</p> + +<p>“Yes; how could you be so cruel as to make me +eat that horrid pepper-dish at dinner, the first day +I ever saw you? You are not so good to me as dear +Amelia.”</p> + +<p>“He doesn’t know you so well,” cried +Amelia.</p> + +<p>“I defy anybody not to be good to you, my dear,” +said her mother.</p> + +<p>“The curry was capital; indeed it was,” +said Joe, quite gravely. “Perhaps there was +<i>not</i> enough citron juice in it--no, there was +<i>not</i>.”</p> + +<p>“And the chilis?”</p> + +<p>“By Jove, how they made you cry out!” +said Joe, caught by the ridicule of the circumstance, +and exploding in a fit of laughter which ended quite +suddenly, as usual.</p> + +<p>“I shall take care how I let <i>you</i> choose +for me another time,” said Rebecca, as they +went down again to dinner. “I didn’t think +men were fond of putting poor harmless girls to pain.”</p> + +<p>“By Gad, Miss Rebecca, I wouldn’t hurt +you for the world.”</p> + +<p>“No,” said she, “I <i>know</i> you +wouldn’t”; and then she gave him ever so +gentle a pressure with her little hand, and drew it +back quite frightened, and looked first for one instant +in his face, and then down at the carpet-rods; and +I am not prepared to say that Joe’s heart did +not thump at this little involuntary, timid, gentle +motion of regard on the part of the simple girl.</p> + +<p>It was an advance, and as such, perhaps, some ladies +of indisputable correctness and gentility will condemn +the action as immodest; but, you see, poor dear Rebecca +had all this work to do for herself. If a person +is too poor to keep a servant, though ever so elegant, +he must sweep his own rooms: if a dear girl has no +dear Mamma to settle matters with the young man, she +must do it for herself. And oh, what a mercy it is +that these women do not exercise their powers oftener! +We can’t resist them, if they do. Let them show +ever so little inclination, and men go down on their +knees at once: old or ugly, it is all the same. And +this I set down as a positive truth. A woman with +fair opportunities, and without an absolute hump, may +marry <i>whom she likes</i>. Only let us be +thankful that the darlings are like the beasts of +the field, and don’t know their own power. They +would overcome us entirely if they did.</p> + +<p>“Egad!” thought Joseph, entering the dining-room, +“I exactly begin to feel as I did at Dumdum +with Miss Cutler.” Many sweet little appeals, +half tender, half jocular, did Miss Sharp make to him +about the dishes at dinner; for by this time she was +on a footing of considerable familiarity with the +family, and as for the girls, they loved each other +like sisters. Young unmarried girls always do, if +they are in a house together for ten days.</p> + +<p>As if bent upon advancing Rebecca’s plans in +every way--what must Amelia do, but remind her brother +of a promise made last Easter holidays--"When I was +a girl at school,” said she, laughing--a promise +that he, Joseph, would take her to Vauxhall. “Now,” +she said, “that Rebecca is with us, will be +the very time.”</p> + +<p>“O, delightful!” said Rebecca, going to +clap her hands; but she recollected herself, and paused, +like a modest creature, as she was.</p> + +<p>“To-night is not the night,” said Joe.</p> + +<p>“Well, to-morrow.”</p> + +<p>“To-morrow your Papa and I dine out,” +said Mrs. Sedley.</p> + +<p>“You don’t suppose that I’m going, +Mrs. Sed?” said her husband, “and that +a woman of your years and size is to catch cold, in +such an abominable damp place?”</p> + +<p>’The children must have someone with them,” +cried Mrs. Sedley.</p> + +<p>“Let Joe go,” said-his father, laughing. + “He’s big enough.” At which speech +even Mr. Sambo at the sideboard burst out laughing, +and poor fat Joe felt inclined to become a parricide +almost.</p> + +<p>“Undo his stays!” continued the pitiless +old gentleman. “Fling some water in his face, +Miss Sharp, or carry him upstairs: the dear creature’s +fainting. Poor victim! carry him up; he’s as +light as a feather!”</p> + +<p>“If I stand this, sir, I’m d--!” +roared Joseph.</p> + +<p>“Order Mr. Jos’s elephant, Sambo!” +cried the father. “Send to Exeter ’Change, +Sambo”; but seeing Jos ready almost to cry with +vexation, the old joker stopped his laughter, and +said, holding out his hand to his son, “It’s +all fair on the Stock Exchange, Jos--and, Sambo, never +mind the elephant, but give me and Mr. Jos a glass +of Champagne. Boney himself hasn’t got such +in his cellar, my boy!”</p> + +<p>A goblet of Champagne restored Joseph’s equanimity, +and before the bottle was emptied, of which as an +invalid he took two-thirds, he had agreed to take +the young ladies to Vauxhall.</p> + +<p>“The girls must have a gentleman apiece,” +said the old gentleman. “Jos will be sure to +leave Emmy in the crowd, he will be so taken up with +Miss Sharp here. Send to 96, and ask George Osborne +if he’ll come.”</p> + +<p>At this, I don’t know in the least for what +reason, Mrs. Sedley looked at her husband and laughed. + Mr. Sedley’s eyes twinkled in a manner indescribably +roguish, and he looked at Amelia; and Amelia, hanging +down her head, blushed as only young ladies of seventeen +know how to blush, and as Miss Rebecca Sharp never +blushed in her life--at least not since she was eight +years old, and when she was caught stealing jam out +of a cupboard by her godmother. “Amelia had +better write a note,” said her father; “and +let George Osborne see what a beautiful handwriting +we have brought back from Miss Pinkerton’s. + Do you remember when you wrote to him to come on +Twelfth-night, Emmy, and spelt twelfth without the +f?”</p> + +<p>“That was years ago,” said Amelia.</p> + +<p>“It seems like yesterday, don’t it, John?” +said Mrs. Sedley to her husband; and that night in +a conversation which took place in a front room in +the second floor, in a sort of tent, hung round with +chintz of a rich and fantastic India pattern, and <em>double</em> +with calico of a tender rose-colour; in the interior +of which species of marquee was a featherbed, on which +were two pillows, on which were two round red faces, +one in a laced nightcap, and one in a simple cotton +one, ending in a tassel--in a <i>curtain lecture</i>, +I say, Mrs. Sedley took her husband to task for his +cruel conduct to poor Joe.</p> + +<p>“It was quite wicked of you, Mr. Sedley,” +said she, “to torment the poor boy so.”</p> + +<p>“My dear,” said the cotton-tassel in defence +of his conduct, “Jos is a great deal vainer +than you ever were in your life, and that’s +saying a good deal. Though, some thirty years ago, +in the year seventeen hundred and eighty--what was +it?--perhaps you had a right to be vain--I don’t +say no. But I’ve no patience with Jos and his +dandified modesty. It is out-Josephing Joseph, my +dear, and all the while the boy is only thinking of +himself, and what a fine fellow he is. I doubt, Ma’am, +we shall have some trouble with him yet. Here is +Emmy’s little friend making love to him as hard +as she can; that’s quite clear; and if she does +not catch him some other will. That man is destined +to be a prey to woman, as I am to go on ’Change +every day. It’s a mercy he did not bring us +over a black daughter-in-law, my dear. But, mark +my words, the first woman who fishes for him, hooks +him.”</p> + +<p>“She shall go off to-morrow, the little artful +creature,” said Mrs. Sedley, with great energy.</p> + +<p>“Why not she as well as another, Mrs. Sedley? +The girl’s a white face at any rate. I don’t +care who marries him. Let Joe please himself.”</p> + +<p>And presently the voices of the two speakers were +hushed, or were replaced by the gentle but unromantic +music of the nose; and save when the church bells +tolled the hour and the watchman called it, all was +silent at the house of John Sedley, Esquire, of Russell +Square, and the Stock Exchange.</p> + +<p>When morning came, the good-natured Mrs. Sedley no +longer thought of executing her threats with regard +to Miss Sharp; for though nothing is more keen, nor +more common, nor more justifiable, than maternal jealousy, +yet she could not bring herself to suppose that the +little, humble, grateful, gentle governess would dare +to look up to such a magnificent personage as the +Collector of Boggley Wollah. The petition, too, for +an extension of the young lady’s leave of absence +had already been despatched, and it would be difficult +to find a pretext for abruptly dismissing her.</p> + +<p>And as if all things conspired in favour of the gentle +Rebecca, the very elements (although she was not inclined +at first to acknowledge their action in her behalf) +interposed to aid her. For on the evening appointed +for the Vauxhall party, George Osborne having come +to dinner, and the elders of the house having departed, +according to invitation, to dine with Alderman Balls +at Highbury Barn, there came on such a thunder-storm +as only happens on Vauxhall nights, and as obliged +the young people, perforce, to remain at home. Mr. +Osborne did not seem in the least disappointed at +this occurrence. He and Joseph Sedley drank a fitting +quantity of port-wine, tete-a-tete, in the dining-room, +during the drinking of which Sedley told a number +of his best Indian stories; for he was extremely talkative +in man’s society; and afterwards Miss Amelia +Sedley did the honours of the drawing-room; and these +four young persons passed such a comfortable evening +together, that they declared they were rather glad +of the thunder-storm than otherwise, which had caused +them to put off their visit to Vauxhall.</p> + +<p>Osborne was Sedley’s godson, and had been one +of the family any time these three-and-twenty years. + At six weeks old, he had received from John Sedley +a present of a silver cup; at six months old, a coral +with gold whistle and bells; from his youth upwards +he was “tipped” regularly by the old gentleman +at Christmas: and on going back to school, he remembered +perfectly well being thrashed by Joseph Sedley, when +the latter was a big, swaggering hobbadyhoy, and George +an impudent urchin of ten years old. In a word, George +was as familiar with the family as such daily acts +of kindness and intercourse could make him.</p> + +<p>“Do you remember, Sedley, what a fury you were +in, when I cut off the tassels of your Hessian boots, +and how Miss--hem!--how Amelia rescued me from a beating, +by falling down on her knees and crying out to her +brother Jos, not to beat little George?”</p> + +<p>Jos remembered this remarkable circumstance perfectly +well, but vowed that he had totally forgotten it.</p> + +<p>“Well, do you remember coming down in a gig +to Dr. Swishtail’s to see me, before you went +to India, and giving me half a guinea and a pat on +the head? I always had an idea that you were at least +seven feet high, and was quite astonished at your +return from India to find you no taller than myself.”</p> + +<p>“How good of Mr. Sedley to go to your school +and give you the money!” exclaimed Rebecca, +in accents of extreme delight.</p> + +<p>“Yes, and after I had cut the tassels of his +boots too. Boys never forget those tips at school, +nor the givers.”</p> + +<p>“I delight in Hessian boots,” said Rebecca. + Jos Sedley, who admired his own legs prodigiously, +and always wore this ornamental chaussure, was extremely +pleased at this remark, though he drew his legs under +his chair as it was made.</p> + +<p>“Miss Sharp!” said George Osborne, “you +who are so clever an artist, you must make a grand +historical picture of the scene of the boots. Sedley +shall be represented in buckskins, and holding one +of the injured boots in one hand; by the other he +shall have hold of my shirt-frill. Amelia shall be +kneeling near him, with her little hands up; and the +picture shall have a grand allegorical title, as the +frontispieces have in the Medulla and the spelling-book.”</p> + +<p>“I shan’t have time to do it here,” +said Rebecca. ’I’ll do it when--when +I’m gone.” And she dropped her voice, and +looked so sad and piteous, that everybody felt how +cruel her lot was, and how sorry they would be to +part with her.</p> + +<p>“O that you could stay longer, dear Rebecca,” +said Amelia.</p> + +<p>“Why?” answered the other, still more +sadly. “That I may be only the more unhap--unwilling +to lose you?” And she turned away her head. + Amelia began to give way to that natural infirmity +of tears which, we have said, was one of the defects +of this silly little thing. George Osborne looked +at the two young women with a touched curiosity; and +Joseph Sedley heaved something very like a sigh out +of his big chest, as he cast his eyes down towards +his favourite Hessian boots.</p> + +<p>“Let us have some music, Miss Sedley--Amelia,” +said George, who felt at that moment an extraordinary, +almost irresistible impulse to seize the above-mentioned +young woman in his arms, and to kiss her in the face +of the company; and she looked at him for a moment, +and if I should say that they fell in love with each +other at that single instant of time, I should perhaps +be telling an untruth, for the fact is that these +two young people had been bred up by their parents +for this very purpose, and their banns had, as it were, +been read in their respective families any time these +ten years. They went off to the piano, which was +situated, as pianos usually are, in the back drawing-room; +and as it was rather dark, Miss Amelia, in the most +unaffected way in the world, put her hand into Mr. +Osborne’s, who, of course, could see the way +among the chairs and ottomans a great deal better +than she could. But this arrangement left Mr. Joseph +Sedley tete-a-tete with Rebecca, at the drawing-room +table, where the latter was occupied in knitting a +green silk purse.</p> + +<p>“There is no need to ask family secrets,” +said Miss Sharp. “Those two have told theirs.”</p> + +<p>“As soon as he gets his company,” said +Joseph, “I believe the affair is settled. George +Osborne is a capital fellow.”</p> + +<p>“And your sister the dearest creature in the +world,” said Rebecca. “Happy the man who +wins her!” With this, Miss Sharp gave a great +sigh.</p> + +<p>When two unmarried persons get together, and talk +upon such delicate subjects as the present, a great +deal of confidence and intimacy is presently established +between them. There is no need of giving a special +report of the conversation which now took place between +Mr. Sedley and the young lady; for the conversation, +as may be judged from the foregoing specimen, was +not especially witty or eloquent; it seldom is in +private societies, or anywhere except in very high-flown +and ingenious novels. As there was music in the next +room, the talk was carried on, of course, in a low +and becoming tone, though, for the matter of that, +the couple in the next apartment would not have been +disturbed had the talking been ever so loud, so occupied +were they with their own pursuits.</p> + +<p>Almost for the first time in his life, Mr. Sedley +found himself talking, without the least timidity +or hesitation, to a person of the other sex. Miss +Rebecca asked him a great number of questions about +India, which gave him an opportunity of narrating many +interesting anecdotes about that country and himself. + He described the balls at Government House, and the +manner in which they kept themselves cool in the hot +weather, with punkahs, tatties, and other contrivances; +and he was very witty regarding the number of Scotchmen +whom Lord Minto, the Governor-General, patronised; +and then he described a tiger-hunt; and the manner +in which the mahout of his elephant had been pulled +off his seat by one of the infuriated animals. How +delighted Miss Rebecca was at the Government balls, +and how she laughed at the stories of the Scotch aides-de-camp, +and called Mr. Sedley a sad wicked satirical creature; +and how frightened she was at the story of the elephant! +“For your mother’s sake, dear Mr. Sedley,” +she said, “for the sake of all your friends, +promise <i>never</i> to go on one of those horrid expeditions.”</p> + +<p>“Pooh, pooh, Miss Sharp,” said he, pulling +up his shirt-collars; “the danger makes the +sport only the pleasanter.” He had never been +but once at a tiger-hunt, when the accident in question +occurred, and when he was half killed--not by the +tiger, but by the fright. And as he talked on, he +grew quite bold, and actually had the audacity to +ask Miss Rebecca for whom she was knitting the green +silk purse? He was quite surprised and delighted at +his own graceful familiar manner.</p> + +<p>“For any one who wants a purse,” replied +Miss Rebecca, looking at him in the most gentle winning +way. Sedley was going to make one of the most eloquent +speeches possible, and had begun--"O Miss Sharp, how--” +when some song which was performed in the other room +came to an end, and caused him to hear his own voice +so distinctly that he stopped, blushed, and blew his +nose in great agitation.</p> + +<p>“Did you ever hear anything like your brother’s +eloquence?” whispered Mr. Osborne to Amelia. + “Why, your friend has worked miracles.”</p> + +<p>“The more the better,” said Miss Amelia; +who, like almost all women who are worth a pin, was +a match-maker in her heart, and would have been delighted +that Joseph should carry back a wife to India. She +had, too, in the course of this few days’ constant +intercourse, warmed into a most tender friendship +for Rebecca, and discovered a million of virtues and +amiable qualities in her which she had not perceived +when they were at Chiswick together. For the affection +of young ladies is of as rapid growth as Jack’s +bean-stalk, and reaches up to the sky in a night. + It is no blame to them that after marriage this Sehnsucht +nach der Liebe subsides. It is what sentimentalists, +who deal in very big words, call a yearning after +the Ideal, and simply means that women are commonly +not satisfied until they have husbands and children +on whom they may centre affections, which are spent +elsewhere, as it were, in small change.</p> + +<p>Having expended her little store of songs, or having +stayed long enough in the back drawing-room, it now +appeared proper to Miss Amelia to ask her friend to +sing. “You would not have listened to me,” +she said to Mr. Osborne (though she knew she was telling +a fib), “had you heard Rebecca first.”</p> + +<p>“I give Miss Sharp warning, though,” said +Osborne, “that, right or wrong, I consider Miss +Amelia Sedley the first singer in the world.”</p> + +<p>“You shall hear,” said Amelia; and Joseph +Sedley was actually polite enough to carry the candles +to the piano. Osborne hinted that he should like quite +as well to sit in the dark; but Miss Sedley, laughing, +declined to bear him company any farther, and the two +accordingly followed Mr. Joseph. Rebecca sang far +better than her friend (though of course Osborne was +free to keep his opinion), and exerted herself to +the utmost, and, indeed, to the wonder of Amelia, +who had never known her perform so well. She sang +a French song, which Joseph did not understand in +the least, and which George confessed he did not understand, +and then a number of those simple ballads which were +the fashion forty years ago, and in which British +tars, our King, poor Susan, blue-eyed Mary, and the +like, were the principal themes. They are not, it +is said, very brilliant, in a musical point of view, +but contain numberless good-natured, simple appeals +to the affections, which people understood better than +the milk-and-water lagrime, sospiri, and felicita +of the eternal Donizettian music with which we are +favoured now-a-days.</p> + +<p>Conversation of a sentimental sort, befitting the +subject, was carried on between the songs, to which +Sambo, after he had brought the tea, the delighted +cook, and even Mrs. Blenkinsop, the housekeeper, condescended +to listen on the landing-place.</p> + +<p>Among these ditties was one, the last of the concert, +and to the following effect:</p> + +<p>Ah! bleak and barren was the moor, Ah! loud and piercing +was the storm, The cottage roof was shelter’d +sure, The cottage hearth was bright and warm--An orphan +boy the lattice pass’d, And, as he mark’d +its cheerful glow, Felt doubly keen the midnight blast, +And doubly cold the fallen snow.</p> + +<p>They mark’d him as he onward prest, With fainting +heart and weary limb; Kind voices bade him turn and +rest, And gentle faces welcomed him. The dawn is up--the +guest is gone, The cottage hearth is blazing still; +Heaven pity all poor wanderers lone! Hark to the wind +upon the hill!</p> + +<p>It was the sentiment of the before-mentioned words, +“When I’m gone,” over again. As +she came to the last words, Miss Sharp’s “deep-toned +voice faltered.” Everybody felt the allusion +to her departure, and to her hapless orphan state. + Joseph Sedley, who was fond of music, and soft-hearted, +was in a state of ravishment during the performance +of the song, and profoundly touched at its conclusion. +If he had had the courage; if George and Miss Sedley +had remained, according to the former’s proposal, +in the farther room, Joseph Sedley’s bachelorhood +would have been at an end, and this work would never +have been written. But at the close of the ditty, +Rebecca quitted the piano, and giving her hand to +Amelia, walked away into the front drawing-room twilight; +and, at this moment, Mr. Sambo made his appearance +with a tray, containing sandwiches, jellies, and some +glittering glasses and decanters, on which Joseph Sedley’s +attention was immediately fixed. When the parents +of the house of Sedley returned from their dinner-party, +they found the young people so busy in talking, that +they had not heard the arrival of the carriage, and +Mr. Joseph was in the act of saying, “My dear +Miss Sharp, one little teaspoonful of jelly to recruit +you after your immense--your--your delightful exertions.”</p> + +<p>“Bravo, Jos!” said Mr. Sedley; on hearing +the bantering of which well-known voice, Jos instantly +relapsed into an alarmed silence, and quickly took +his departure. He did not lie awake all night thinking +whether or not he was in love with Miss Sharp; the +passion of love never interfered with the appetite +or the slumber of Mr. Joseph Sedley; but he thought +to himself how delightful it would be to hear such +songs as those after Cutcherry--what a distinguee girl +she was--how she could speak French better than the +Governor-General’s lady herself--and what a +sensation she would make at the Calcutta balls. “It’s +evident the poor devil’s in love with me,” +thought he. “She is just as rich as most of +the girls who come out to India. I might go farther, +and fare worse, egad!” And in these meditations +he fell asleep.</p> + +<p>How Miss Sharp lay awake, thinking, will he come or +not to-morrow? need not be told here. To-morrow came, +and, as sure as fate, Mr. Joseph Sedley made his appearance +before luncheon. He had never been known before to +confer such an honour on Russell Square. George Osborne +was somehow there already (sadly “putting out” +Amelia, who was writing to her twelve dearest friends +at Chiswick Mall), and Rebecca was employed upon her +yesterday’s work. As Joe’s buggy drove +up, and while, after his usual thundering knock and +pompous bustle at the door, the ex-Collector of Boggley +Wollah laboured up stairs to the drawing-room, knowing +glances were telegraphed between Osborne and Miss +Sedley, and the pair, smiling archly, looked at Rebecca, +who actually blushed as she bent her fair ringlets +over her knitting. How her heart beat as Joseph appeared-- +Joseph, puffing from the staircase in shining creaking +boots-- Joseph, in a new waistcoat, red with heat +and nervousness, and blushing behind his wadded neckcloth. + It was a nervous moment for all; and as for Amelia, +I think she was more frightened than even the people +most concerned.</p> + +<p>Sambo, who flung open the door and announced Mr. Joseph, +followed grinning, in the Collector’s rear, +and bearing two handsome nosegays of flowers, which +the monster had actually had the gallantry to purchase +in Covent Garden Market that morning--they were not +as big as the haystacks which ladies carry about with +them now-a-days, in cones of filigree paper; but the +young women were delighted with the gift, as Joseph +presented one to each, with an exceedingly solemn +bow.</p> + +<p>“Bravo, Jos!” cried Osborne.</p> + +<p>“Thank you, dear Joseph,” said Amelia, +quite ready to kiss her brother, if he were so minded. + (And I think for a kiss from such a dear creature +as Amelia, I would purchase all Mr. Lee’s conservatories +out of hand.)</p> + +<p>“O heavenly, heavenly flowers!” exclaimed +Miss Sharp, and smelt them delicately, and held them +to her bosom, and cast up her eyes to the ceiling, +in an ecstasy of admiration. Perhaps she just looked +first into the bouquet, to see whether there was a +billet-doux hidden among the flowers; but there was +no letter.</p> + +<p>“Do they talk the language of flowers at Boggley +Wollah, Sedley?” asked Osborne, laughing.</p> + +<p>“Pooh, nonsense!” replied the sentimental +youth. “Bought ’em at Nathan’s; +very glad you like ’em; and eh, Amelia, my dear, +I bought a pine-apple at the same time, which I gave +to Sambo. Let’s have it for tiffin; very cool +and nice this hot weather.” Rebecca said she +had never tasted a pine, and longed beyond everything +to taste one.</p> + +<p>So the conversation went on. I don’t know on +what pretext Osborne left the room, or why, presently, +Amelia went away, perhaps to superintend the slicing +of the pine-apple; but Jos was left alone with Rebecca, +who had resumed her work, and the green silk and the +shining needles were quivering rapidly under her white +slender fingers.</p> + +<p>“What a beautiful, BYOO-OOTIFUL song that was +you sang last night, dear Miss Sharp,” said +the Collector. “It made me cry almost; ’pon +my honour it did.”</p> + +<p>“Because you have a kind heart, Mr. Joseph; +all the Sedleys have, I think.”</p> + +<p>“It kept me awake last night, and I was trying +to hum it this morning, in bed; I was, upon my honour. + Gollop, my doctor, came in at eleven (for I’m +a sad invalid, you know, and see Gollop every day), +and, ’gad! there I was, singing away like--a +robin.”</p> + +<p>“O you droll creature! Do let me hear you sing +it.”</p> + +<p>“Me? No, you, Miss Sharp; my dear Miss Sharp, +do sing it. “Not now, Mr. Sedley,” said +Rebecca, with a sigh. “My spirits are not equal +to it; besides, I must finish the purse. Will you +help me, Mr. Sedley?” And before he had time +to ask how, Mr. Joseph Sedley, of the East India Company’s +service, was actually seated tete-a-tete with a young +lady, looking at her with a most killing expression; +his arms stretched out before her in an imploring attitude, +and his hands bound in a web of green silk, which +she was unwinding.</p> + +<p>In this romantic position Osborne and Amelia found +the interesting pair, when they entered to announce +that tiffin was ready. The skein of silk was just +wound round the card; but Mr. Jos had never spoken.</p> + +<p>“I am sure he will to-night, dear,” Amelia +said, as she pressed Rebecca’s hand; and Sedley, +too, had communed with his soul, and said to himself, +“’Gad, I’ll pop the question at Vauxhall.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter V</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Dobbin of Ours</h4> + +<p>Cuff’s fight with Dobbin, and the unexpected +issue of that contest, will long be remembered by +every man who was educated at Dr. Swishtail’s +famous school. The latter Youth (who used to be called +Heigh-ho Dobbin, Gee-ho Dobbin, and by many other names +indicative of puerile contempt) was the quietest, +the clumsiest, and, as it seemed, the dullest of all +Dr. Swishtail’s young gentlemen. His parent +was a grocer in the city: and it was bruited abroad +that he was admitted into Dr. Swishtail’s academy +upon what are called “mutual principles"--that +is to say, the expenses of his board and schooling +were defrayed by his father in goods, not money; and +he stood there--most at the bottom of the school--in +his scraggy corduroys and jacket, through the seams +of which his great big bones were bursting--as the +representative of so many pounds of tea, candles, +sugar, mottled-soap, plums (of which a very mild proportion +was supplied for the puddings of the establishment), +and other commodities. A dreadful day it was for +young Dobbin when one of the youngsters of the school, +having run into the town upon a poaching excursion +for hardbake and polonies, espied the cart of Dobbin +& Rudge, Grocers and Oilmen, Thames Street, London, +at the Doctor’s door, discharging a cargo of +the wares in which the firm dealt.</p> + +<p>Young Dobbin had no peace after that. The jokes were +frightful, and merciless against him. “Hullo, +Dobbin,” one wag would say, “here’s +good news in the paper. Sugars is ris’, my boy.” +Another would set a sum--"If a pound of mutton-candles +cost sevenpence-halfpenny, how much must Dobbin cost?” +and a roar would follow from all the circle of young +knaves, usher and all, who rightly considered that +the selling of goods by retail is a shameful and infamous +practice, meriting the contempt and scorn of all real +gentlemen.</p> + +<p>“Your father’s only a merchant, Osborne,” +Dobbin said in private to the little boy who had brought +down the storm upon him. At which the latter replied +haughtily, “My father’s a gentleman, and +keeps his carriage”; and Mr. William Dobbin +retreated to a remote outhouse in the playground, +where he passed a half-holiday in the bitterest sadness +and woe. Who amongst us is there that does not recollect +similar hours of bitter, bitter childish grief? Who +feels injustice; who shrinks before a slight; who +has a sense of wrong so acute, and so glowing a gratitude +for kindness, as a generous boy? and how many of those +gentle souls do you degrade, estrange, torture, for +the sake of a little loose arithmetic, and miserable +dog-latin?</p> + +<p>Now, William Dobbin, from an incapacity to acquire +the rudiments of the above language, as they are propounded +in that wonderful book the Eton Latin Grammar, was +compelled to remain among the very last of Doctor +Swishtail’s scholars, and was “taken down” +continually by little fellows with pink faces and +pinafores when he marched up with the lower form, +a giant amongst them, with his downcast, stupefied +look, his dog’s-eared primer, and his tight corduroys. + High and low, all made fun of him. They sewed up +those corduroys, tight as they were. They cut his +bed-strings. They upset buckets and benches, so that +he might break his shins over them, which he never +failed to do. They sent him parcels, which, when opened, +were found to contain the paternal soap and candles. + There was no little fellow but had his jeer and joke +at Dobbin; and he bore everything quite patiently, +and was entirely dumb and miserable.</p> + +<p>Cuff, on the contrary, was the great chief and dandy +of the Swishtail Seminary. He smuggled wine in. +He fought the town-boys. Ponies used to come for him +to ride home on Saturdays. He had his top-boots in +his room, in which he used to hunt in the holidays. + He had a gold repeater: and took snuff like the Doctor. + He had been to the Opera, and knew the merits of +the principal actors, preferring Mr. Kean to Mr. Kemble. + He could knock you off forty Latin verses in an hour. + He could make French poetry. What else didn’t +he know, or couldn’t he do? They said even the +Doctor himself was afraid of him.</p> + +<p>Cuff, the unquestioned king of the school, ruled over +his subjects, and bullied them, with splendid superiority. +This one blacked his shoes: that toasted his bread, +others would fag out, and give him balls at cricket +during whole summer afternoons. “Figs” +was the fellow whom he despised most, and with whom, +though always abusing him, and sneering at him, he +scarcely ever condescended to hold personal communication.</p> + +<p>One day in private, the two young gentlemen had had +a difference. Figs, alone in the schoolroom, was blundering +over a home letter; when Cuff, entering, bade him +go upon some message, of which tarts were probably +the subject.</p> + +<p>“I can’t,” says Dobbin; “I +want to finish my letter.”</p> + +<p>“You <i>can’t</i>?” says Mr. Cuff, +laying hold of that document (in which many words +were scratched out, many were mis-spelt, on which had +been spent I don’t know how much thought, and +labour, and tears; for the poor fellow was writing +to his mother, who was fond of him, although she was +a grocer’s wife, and lived in a back parlour +in Thames Street). “You <i>can’t</i>?” +says Mr. Cuff: “I should like to know why, pray? +Can’t you write to old Mother Figs to-morrow?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t call names,” Dobbin said, +getting off the bench very nervous.</p> + +<p>“Well, sir, will you go?” crowed the cock +of the school.</p> + +<p>“Put down the letter,” Dobbin replied; +“no gentleman readth letterth.”</p> + +<p>“Well, <i>now</i> will you go?” says the +other.</p> + +<p>“No, I won’t. Don’t strike, or +I’ll <em>thmash</em> you,” roars out Dobbin, springing +to a leaden inkstand, and looking so wicked, that Mr. +Cuff paused, turned down his coat sleeves again, put +his hands into his pockets, and walked away with a +sneer. But he never meddled personally with the grocer’s +boy after that; though we must do him the justice +to say he always spoke of Mr. Dobbin with con-tempt +behind his back.</p> + +<p><br></p> + +<p>Some time after this interview, it happened that Mr. +Cuff, on a sunshiny afternoon, was in the neighbourhood +of poor William Dobbin, who was lying under a tree +in the playground, spelling over a favourite copy +of the Arabian Nights which he had apart from the +rest of the school, who were pursuing their various +sports--quite lonely, and almost happy. If people +would but leave children to themselves; if teachers +would cease to bully them; if parents would not insist +upon directing their thoughts, and dominating their +feelings--those feelings and thoughts which are a mystery +to all (for how much do you and I know of each other, +of our children, of our fathers, of our neighbour, +and how far more beautiful and sacred are the thoughts +of the poor lad or girl whom you govern likely to +be, than those of the dull and world-corrupted person +who rules him?)--if, I say, parents and masters would +leave their children alone a little more, small harm +would accrue, although a less quantity of as in praesenti +might be acquired.</p> + +<p>Well, William Dobbin had for once forgotten the world, +and was away with Sindbad the Sailor in the Valley +of Diamonds, or with Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Peribanou +in that delightful cavern where the Prince found her, +and whither we should all like to make a tour; when +shrill cries, as of a little fellow weeping, woke up +his pleasant reverie; and looking up, he saw Cuff +before him, belabouring a little boy.</p> + +<p>It was the lad who had peached upon him about the +grocer’s cart; but he bore little malice, not +at least towards the young and small. “How dare +you, sir, break the bottle?” says Cuff to the +little urchin, swinging a yellow cricket-stump over +him.</p> + +<p>The boy had been instructed to get over the playground +wall (at a selected spot where the broken glass had +been removed from the top, and niches made convenient +in the brick); to run a quarter of a mile; to purchase +a pint of rum-shrub on credit; to brave all the Doctor’s +outlying spies, and to clamber back into the playground +again; during the performance of which feat, his foot +had slipt, and the bottle was broken, and the shrub +had been spilt, and his pantaloons had been damaged, +and he appeared before his employer a perfectly guilty +and trembling, though harmless, wretch.</p> + +<p>“How dare you, sir, break it?” says Cuff; +“you blundering little thief. You drank the +shrub, and now you pretend to have broken the bottle. + Hold out your hand, sir.”</p> + +<p>Down came the stump with a great heavy thump on the +child’s hand. A moan followed. Dobbin looked +up. The Fairy Peribanou had fled into the inmost cavern +with Prince Ahmed: the Roc had whisked away Sindbad +the Sailor out of the Valley of Diamonds out of sight, +far into the clouds: and there was everyday life before +honest William; and a big boy beating a little one +without cause.</p> + +<p>“Hold out your other hand, sir,” roars +Cuff to his little schoolfellow, whose face was distorted +with pain. Dobbin quivered, and gathered himself up +in his narrow old clothes.</p> + +<p>“Take that, you little devil!” cried Mr. +Cuff, and down came the wicket again on the child’s +hand.--Don’t be horrified, ladies, every boy +at a public school has done it. Your children will +so do and be done by, in all probability. Down came +the wicket again; and Dobbin started up.</p> + +<p>I can’t tell what his motive was. Torture in +a public school is as much licensed as the knout in +Russia. It would be ungentlemanlike (in a manner) +to resist it. Perhaps Dobbin’s foolish soul revolted +against that exercise of tyranny; or perhaps he had +a hankering feeling of revenge in his mind, and longed +to measure himself against that splendid bully and +tyrant, who had all the glory, pride, pomp, circumstance, +banners flying, drums beating, guards saluting, in +the place. Whatever may have been his incentive, +however, up he sprang, and screamed out, “Hold +off, Cuff; don’t bully that child any more; +or I’ll--”</p> + +<p>“Or you’ll what?” Cuff asked in +amazement at this interruption. “Hold out your +hand, you little beast.”</p> + +<p>“I’ll give you the worst thrashing you +ever had in your life,” Dobbin said, in reply +to the first part of Cuff’s sentence; and little +Osborne, gasping and in tears, looked up with wonder +and incredulity at seeing this amazing champion put +up suddenly to defend him: while Cuff’s astonishment +was scarcely less. Fancy our late monarch George +III when he heard of the revolt of the North American +colonies: fancy brazen Goliath when little David stepped +forward and claimed a meeting; and you have the feelings +of Mr. Reginald Cuff when this rencontre was proposed +to him.</p> + +<p>“After school,” says he, of course; after +a pause and a look, as much as to say, “Make +your will, and communicate your last wishes to your +friends between this time and that.”</p> + +<p>“As you please,” Dobbin said. “You +must be my bottle holder, Osborne.”</p> + +<p>“Well, if you like,” little Osborne replied; +for you see his papa kept a carriage, and he was rather +ashamed of his champion.</p> + +<p>Yes, when the hour of battle came, he was almost ashamed +to say, “Go it, Figs”; and not a single +other boy in the place uttered that cry for the first +two or three rounds of this famous combat; at the +commencement of which the scientific Cuff, with a contemptuous +smile on his face, and as light and as gay as if he +was at a ball, planted his blows upon his adversary, +and floored that unlucky champion three times running. + At each fall there was a cheer; and everybody was +anxious to have the honour of offering the conqueror +a knee.</p> + +<p>“What a licking I shall get when it’s +over,” young Osborne thought, picking up his +man. “You’d best give in,” he said +to Dobbin; “it’s only a thrashing, Figs, +and you know I’m used to it.” But Figs, +all whose limbs were in a quiver, and whose nostrils +were breathing rage, put his little bottle-holder +aside, and went in for a fourth time.</p> + +<p>As he did not in the least know how to parry the blows +that were aimed at himself, and Cuff had begun the +attack on the three preceding occasions, without ever +allowing his enemy to strike, Figs now determined +that he would commence the engagement by a charge on +his own part; and accordingly, being a left-handed +man, brought that arm into action, and hit out a couple +of times with all his might-- once at Mr. Cuff’s +left eye, and once on his beautiful Roman nose.</p> + +<p>Cuff went down this time, to the astonishment of the +assembly. “Well hit, by Jove,” says little +Osborne, with the air of a connoisseur, clapping his +man on the back. “Give it him with the left, +Figs my boy.”</p> + +<p>Figs’s left made terrific play during all the +rest of the combat. Cuff went down every time. At +the sixth round, there were almost as many fellows +shouting out, “Go it, Figs,” as there were +youths exclaiming, “Go it, Cuff.” At the +twelfth round the latter champion was all abroad, +as the saying is, and had lost all presence of mind +and power of attack or defence. Figs, on the contrary, +was as calm as a quaker. His face being quite pale, +his eyes shining open, and a great cut on his underlip +bleeding profusely, gave this young fellow a fierce +and ghastly air, which perhaps struck terror into +many spectators. Nevertheless, his intrepid adversary +prepared to close for the thirteenth time.</p> + +<p>If I had the pen of a Napier, or a Bell’s Life, +I should like to describe this combat properly. It +was the last charge of the Guard--(that is, it would +have been, only Waterloo had not yet taken place)--it +was Ney’s column breasting the hill of La Haye +Sainte, bristling with ten thousand bayonets, and +crowned with twenty eagles--it was the shout of the +beef-eating British, as leaping down the hill they +rushed to hug the enemy in the savage arms of battle-- +in other words, Cuff coming up full of pluck, but quite +reeling and groggy, the Fig-merchant put in his left +as usual on his adversary’s nose, and sent him +down for the last time.</p> + +<p>“I think that will do for him,” Figs said, +as his opponent dropped as neatly on the green as +I have seen Jack Spot’s ball plump into the +pocket at billiards; and the fact is, when time was +called, Mr. Reginald Cuff was not able, or did not +choose, to stand up again.</p> + +<p>And now all the boys set up such a shout for Figs +as would have made you think he had been their darling +champion through the whole battle; and as absolutely +brought Dr. Swishtail out of his study, curious to +know the cause of the uproar. He threatened to flog +Figs violently, of course; but Cuff, who had come +to himself by this time, and was washing his wounds, +stood up and said, “It’s my fault, sir--not +Figs’--not Dobbin’s. I was bullying a +little boy; and he served me right.” By which +magnanimous speech he not only saved his conqueror +a whipping, but got back all his ascendancy over the +boys which his defeat had nearly cost him.</p> + +<p>Young Osborne wrote home to his parents an account +of the transaction.</p> + +<p>Sugarcane House, Richmond, March, 18--</p> + +<p><i>Dear</i> Mama,--I hope you are quite well. I should +be much obliged to you to send me a cake and five +shillings. There has been a fight here between Cuff +& Dobbin. Cuff, you know, was the Cock of the School. + They fought thirteen rounds, and Dobbin Licked. So +Cuff is now Only Second Cock. The fight was about +me. Cuff was licking me for breaking a bottle of +milk, and Figs wouldn’t stand it. We call him +Figs because his father is a Grocer--Figs & Rudge, +Thames St., City--I think as he fought for me you +ought to buy your Tea & Sugar at his father’s. + Cuff goes home every Saturday, but can’t this, +because he has 2 Black Eyes. He has a white Pony to +come and fetch him, and a groom in livery on a bay +mare. I wish my Papa would let me have a Pony, and +I am</p> + +<p>Your dutiful Son, <i>George Sedley Osborne</i></p> + +<p>P.S.--Give my love to little Emmy. I am cutting +her out a Coach in cardboard. Please not a seed-cake, +but a plum-cake.</p> + +<p>In consequence of Dobbin’s victory, his character +rose prodigiously in the estimation of all his schoolfellows, +and the name of Figs, which had been a byword of reproach, +became as respectable and popular a nickname as any +other in use in the school. “After all, it’s +not his fault that his father’s a grocer,” +George Osborne said, who, though a little chap, had +a very high popularity among the Swishtail youth; +and his opinion was received with great applause. +It was voted low to sneer at Dobbin about this accident +of birth. “Old Figs” grew to be a name +of kindness and endearment; and the sneak of an usher +jeered at him no longer.</p> + +<p>And Dobbin’s spirit rose with his altered circumstances. +He made wonderful advances in scholastic learning. + The superb Cuff himself, at whose condescension Dobbin +could only blush and wonder, helped him on with his +Latin verses; “coached” him in play-hours: +carried him triumphantly out of the little-boy class +into the middle-sized form; and even there got a fair +place for him. It was discovered, that although dull +at classical learning, at mathematics he was uncommonly +quick. To the contentment of all he passed third in +algebra, and got a French prize-book at the public +Midsummer examination. You should have seen his mother’s +face when Telemaque (that delicious romance) was presented +to him by the Doctor in the face of the whole school +and the parents and company, with an inscription to +Gulielmo Dobbin. All the boys clapped hands in token +of applause and sympathy. His blushes, his stumbles, +his awkwardness, and the number of feet which he crushed +as he went back to his place, who shall describe or +calculate? Old Dobbin, his father, who now respected +him for the first time, gave him two guineas publicly; +most of which he spent in a general tuck-out for the +school: and he came back in a tail-coat after the holidays.</p> + +<p>Dobbin was much too modest a young fellow to suppose +that this happy change in all his circumstances arose +from his own generous and manly disposition: he chose, +from some perverseness, to attribute his good fortune +to the sole agency and benevolence of little George +Osborne, to whom henceforth he vowed such a love and +affection as is only felt by children--such an affection, +as we read in the charming fairy-book, uncouth Orson +had for splendid young Valentine his conqueror. He +flung himself down at little Osborne’s feet, +and loved him. Even before they were acquainted, he +had admired Osborne in secret. Now he was his valet, +his dog, his man Friday. He believed Osborne to be +the possessor of every perfection, to be the handsomest, +the bravest, the most active, the cleverest, the most +generous of created boys. He shared his money with +him: bought him uncountable presents of knives, pencil-cases, +gold seals, toffee, Little Warblers, and romantic +books, with large coloured pictures of knights and +robbers, in many of which latter you might read inscriptions +to George Sedley Osborne, Esquire, from his attached +friend William Dobbin--the which tokens of homage George +received very graciously, as became his superior merit.</p> + +<p>So that Lieutenant Osborne, when coming to Russell +Square on the day of the Vauxhall party, said to the +ladies, “Mrs. Sedley, Ma’am, I hope you +have room; I’ve asked Dobbin of ours to come +and dine here, and go with us to Vauxhall. He’s +almost as modest as Jos.”</p> + +<p>“Modesty! pooh,” said the stout gentleman, +casting a vainqueur look at Miss Sharp.</p> + +<p>“He is--but you are incomparably more graceful, +Sedley,” Osborne added, laughing. “I +met him at the Bedford, when I went to look for you; +and I told him that Miss Amelia was come home, and +that we were all bent on going out for a night’s +pleasuring; and that Mrs. Sedley had forgiven his +breaking the punch-bowl at the child’s party. +Don’t you remember the catastrophe, Ma’am, +seven years ago?”</p> + +<p>“Over Mrs. Flamingo’s crimson silk gown,” +said good-natured Mrs. Sedley. “What a gawky +it was! And his sisters are not much more graceful. + Lady Dobbin was at Highbury last night with three +of them. Such figures! my dears.”</p> + +<p>“The Alderman’s very rich, isn’t +he?” Osborne said archly. “Don’t +you think one of the daughters would be a good spec +for me, Ma’am?”</p> + +<p>“You foolish creature! Who would take you, I +should like to know, with your yellow face?”</p> + +<p>“Mine a yellow face? Stop till you see Dobbin. + Why, he had the yellow fever three times; twice at +Nassau, and once at St. Kitts.”</p> + +<p>“Well, well; yours is quite yellow enough for +us. Isn’t it, Emmy?” Mrs. Sedley said: +at which speech Miss Amelia only made a smile and +a blush; and looking at Mr. George Osborne’s +pale interesting countenance, and those beautiful +black, curling, shining whiskers, which the young +gentleman himself regarded with no ordinary complacency, +she thought in her little heart that in His Majesty’s +army, or in the wide world, there never was such a +face or such a hero. “I don’t care about +Captain Dobbin’s complexion,” she said, +“or about his awkwardness. I shall always like +him, I know,” her little reason being, that +he was the friend and champion of George.</p> + +<p>“There’s not a finer fellow in the service,” +Osborne said, “nor a better officer, though +he is not an Adonis, certainly.” And he looked +towards the glass himself with much naivete; and in +so doing, caught Miss Sharp’s eye fixed keenly +upon him, at which he blushed a little, and Rebecca +thought in her heart, “Ah, mon beau Monsieur! +I think I have <i>your</i> gauge"--the little artful +minx!</p> + +<p>That evening, when Amelia came tripping into the drawing-room +in a white muslin frock, prepared for conquest at +Vauxhall, singing like a lark, and as fresh as a rose--a +very tall ungainly gentleman, with large hands and +feet, and large ears, set off by a closely cropped +head of black hair, and in the hideous military frogged +coat and cocked hat of those times, advanced to meet +her, and made her one of the clumsiest bows that was +ever performed by a mortal.</p> + +<p>This was no other than Captain William Dobbin, of +His Majesty’s Regiment of Foot, returned from +yellow fever, in the West Indies, to which the fortune +of the service had ordered his regiment, whilst so +many of his gallant comrades were reaping glory in +the Peninsula.</p> + +<p>He had arrived with a knock so very timid and quiet +that it was inaudible to the ladies upstairs: otherwise, +you may be sure Miss Amelia would never have been +so bold as to come singing into the room. As it was, +the sweet fresh little voice went right into the Captain’s +heart, and nestled there. When she held out her hand +for him to shake, before he enveloped it in his own, +he paused, and thought--"Well, is it possible--are +you the little maid I remember in the pink frock, +such a short time ago--the night I upset the punch-bowl, +just after I was gazetted? Are you the little girl +that George Osborne said should marry him? What a +blooming young creature you seem, and what a prize +the rogue has got!” All this he thought, before +he took Amelia’s hand into his own, and as he +let his cocked hat fall.</p> + +<p>His history since he left school, until the very moment +when we have the pleasure of meeting him again, although +not fully narrated, has yet, I think, been indicated +sufficiently for an ingenious reader by the conversation +in the last page. Dobbin, the despised grocer, was +Alderman Dobbin--Alderman Dobbin was Colonel of the +City Light Horse, then burning with military ardour +to resist the French Invasion. Colonel Dobbin’s +corps, in which old Mr. Osborne himself was but an +indifferent corporal, had been reviewed by the Sovereign +and the Duke of York; and the colonel and alderman +had been knighted. His son had entered the army: +and young Osborne followed presently in the same regiment. + They had served in the West Indies and in Canada. + Their regiment had just come home, and the attachment +of Dobbin to George Osborne was as warm and generous +now as it had been when the two were schoolboys.</p> + +<p>So these worthy people sat down to dinner presently. +They talked about war and glory, and Boney and Lord +Wellington, and the last Gazette. In those famous +days every gazette had a victory in it, and the two +gallant young men longed to see their own names in +the glorious list, and cursed their unlucky fate to +belong to a regiment which had been away from the +chances of honour. Miss Sharp kindled with this exciting +talk, but Miss Sedley trembled and grew quite faint +as she heard it. Mr. Jos told several of his tiger-hunting +stories, finished the one about Miss Cutler and Lance +the surgeon; helped Rebecca to everything on the table, +and himself gobbled and drank a great deal.</p> + +<p>He sprang to open the door for the ladies, when they +retired, with the most killing grace--and coming back +to the table, filled himself bumper after bumper of +claret, which he swallowed with nervous rapidity.</p> + +<p>“He’s priming himself,” Osborne +whispered to Dobbin, and at length the hour and the +carriage arrived for Vauxhall.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter VI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Vauxhall</h4> + +<p>I know that the tune I am piping is a very mild one +(although there are some terrific chapters coming +presently), and must beg the good-natured reader +to remember that we are only discoursing at present +about a stockbroker’s family in Russell Square, +who are taking walks, or luncheon, or dinner, or talking +and making love as people do in common life, and without +a single passionate and wonderful incident to mark +the progress of their loves. The argument stands +thus--Osborne, in love with Amelia, has asked an old +friend to dinner and to Vauxhall--Jos Sedley is in +love with Rebecca. Will he marry her? That is the +great subject now in hand.</p> + +<p>We might have treated this subject in the genteel, +or in the romantic, or in the facetious manner. Suppose +we had laid the scene in Grosvenor Square, with the +very same adventures--would not some people have listened? +Suppose we had shown how Lord Joseph Sedley fell in +love, and the Marquis of Osborne became attached to +Lady Amelia, with the full consent of the Duke, her +noble father: or instead of the supremely genteel, +suppose we had resorted to the entirely low, and described +what was going on in Mr. Sedley’s kitchen--how +black Sambo was in love with the cook (as indeed he +was), and how he fought a battle with the coachman +in her behalf; how the knife-boy was caught stealing +a cold shoulder of mutton, and Miss Sedley’s +new femme de chambre refused to go to bed without a +wax candle; such incidents might be made to provoke +much delightful laughter, and be supposed to represent +scenes of “life.” Or if, on the contrary, +we had taken a fancy for the terrible, and made the +lover of the new femme de chambre a professional burglar, +who bursts into the house with his band, slaughters +black Sambo at the feet of his master, and carries +off Amelia in her night-dress, not to be let loose +again till the third volume, we should easily have +constructed a tale of thrilling interest, through +the fiery chapters of which the reader should hurry, +panting. But my readers must hope for no such romance, +only a homely story, and must be content with a chapter +about Vauxhall, which is so short that it scarce deserves +to be called a chapter at all. And yet it is a chapter, +and a very important one too. Are not there little +chapters in everybody’s life, that seem to be +nothing, and yet affect all the rest of the history?</p> + +<p>Let us then step into the coach with the Russell Square +party, and be off to the Gardens. There is barely +room between Jos and Miss Sharp, who are on the front +seat. Mr. Osborne sitting bodkin opposite, between +Captain Dobbin and Amelia.</p> + +<p>Every soul in the coach agreed that on that night +Jos would propose to make Rebecca Sharp Mrs. Sedley. + The parents at home had acquiesced in the arrangement, +though, between ourselves, old Mr. Sedley had a feeling +very much akin to contempt for his son. He said he +was vain, selfish, lazy, and effeminate. He could +not endure his airs as a man of fashion, and laughed +heartily at his pompous braggadocio stories. “I +shall leave the fellow half my property,” he +said; “and he will have, besides, plenty of his +own; but as I am perfectly sure that if you, and I, +and his sister were to die to-morrow, he would say +‘Good Gad!’ and eat his dinner just as +well as usual, I am not going to make myself anxious +about him. Let him marry whom he likes. It’s +no affair of mine.”</p> + +<p>Amelia, on the other hand, as became a young woman +of her prudence and temperament, was quite enthusiastic +for the match. Once or twice Jos had been on the +point of saying something very important to her, to +which she was most willing to lend an ear, but the +fat fellow could not be brought to unbosom himself +of his great secret, and very much to his sister’s +disappointment he only rid himself of a large sigh +and turned away.</p> + +<p>This mystery served to keep Amelia’s gentle +bosom in a perpetual flutter of excitement. If she +did not speak with Rebecca on the tender subject, +she compensated herself with long and intimate conversations +with Mrs. Blenkinsop, the housekeeper, who dropped +some hints to the lady’s-maid, who may have cursorily +mentioned the matter to the cook, who carried the +news, I have no doubt, to all the tradesmen, so that +Mr. Jos’s marriage was now talked of by a very +considerable number of persons in the Russell Square +world.</p> + +<p>It was, of course, Mrs. Sedley’s opinion that +her son would demean himself by a marriage with an +artist’s daughter. “But, lor’, +Ma’am,” ejaculated Mrs. Blenkinsop, “we +was only grocers when we married Mr. S., who was a +stock-broker’s clerk, and we hadn’t five +hundred pounds among us, and we’re rich enough +now.” And Amelia was entirely of this opinion, +to which, gradually, the good-natured Mrs. Sedley +was brought.</p> + +<p>Mr. Sedley was neutral. “Let Jos marry whom +he likes,” he said; “it’s no affair +of mine. This girl has no fortune; no more had Mrs. +Sedley. She seems good-humoured and clever, and will +keep him in order, perhaps. Better she, my dear, +than a black Mrs. Sedley, and a dozen of mahogany +grandchildren.”</p> + +<p>So that everything seemed to smile upon Rebecca’s +fortunes. She took Jos’s arm, as a matter of +course, on going to dinner; she had sate by him on +the box of his open carriage (a most tremendous “buck” +he was, as he sat there, serene, in state, driving +his greys), and though nobody said a word on the subject +of the marriage, everybody seemed to understand it. + All she wanted was the proposal, and ah! how Rebecca +now felt the want of a mother!--a dear, tender mother, +who would have managed the business in ten minutes, +and, in the course of a little delicate confidential +conversation, would have extracted the interesting +avowal from the bashful lips of the young man!</p> + +<p>Such was the state of affairs as the carriage crossed +Westminster bridge.</p> + +<p>The party was landed at the Royal Gardens in due time. +As the majestic Jos stepped out of the creaking vehicle +the crowd gave a cheer for the fat gentleman, who +blushed and looked very big and mighty, as he walked +away with Rebecca under his arm. George, of course, +took charge of Amelia. She looked as happy as a rose-tree + in sunshine.</p> + +<p>“I say, Dobbin,” says George, “just +look to the shawls and things, there’s a good +fellow.” And so while he paired off with Miss +Sedley, and Jos squeezed through the gate into the +gardens with Rebecca at his side, honest Dobbin contented +himself by giving an arm to the shawls, and by paying +at the door for the whole party.</p> + +<p>He walked very modestly behind them. He was not willing +to spoil sport. About Rebecca and Jos he did not +care a fig. But he thought Amelia worthy even of +the brilliant George Osborne, and as he saw that good-looking +couple threading the walks to the girl’s delight +and wonder, he watched her artless happiness with a +sort of fatherly pleasure. Perhaps he felt that he +would have liked to have something on his own arm +besides a shawl (the people laughed at seeing the +gawky young officer carrying this female burthen); +but William Dobbin was very little addicted to selfish +calculation at all; and so long as his friend was +enjoying himself, how should he be discontented? And +the truth is, that of all the delights of the Gardens; +of the hundred thousand extra lamps, which were always +lighted; the fiddlers in cocked hats, who played ravishing +melodies under the gilded cockle-shell in the midst +of the gardens; the singers, both of comic and sentimental +ballads, who charmed the ears there; the country dances, +formed by bouncing cockneys and cockneyesses, and +executed amidst jumping, thumping and laughter; the +signal which announced that Madame Saqui was about +to mount skyward on a slack-rope ascending to the +stars; the hermit that always sat in the illuminated +hermitage; the dark walks, so favourable to the interviews +of young lovers; the pots of stout handed about by +the people in the shabby old liveries; and the twinkling +boxes, in which the happy feasters made-believe to +eat slices of almost invisible ham--of all these things, +and of the gentle Simpson, that kind smiling idiot, +who, I daresay, presided even then over the place--Captain +William Dobbin did not take the slightest notice.</p> + +<p>He carried about Amelia’s white cashmere shawl, +and having attended under the gilt cockle-shell, while +Mrs. Salmon performed the Battle of Borodino (a savage +cantata against the Corsican upstart, who had lately +met with his Russian reverses)--Mr. Dobbin tried to +hum it as he walked away, and found he was humming--the +tune which Amelia Sedley sang on the stairs, as she +came down to dinner.</p> + +<p>He burst out laughing at himself; for the truth is, +he could sing no better than an owl.</p> + +<p>It is to be understood, as a matter of course, that +our young people, being in parties of two and two, +made the most solemn promises to keep together during +the evening, and separated in ten minutes afterwards. + Parties at Vauxhall always did separate, but ’twas +only to meet again at supper-time, when they could +talk of their mutual adventures in the interval.</p> + +<p>What were the adventures of Mr. Osborne and Miss Amelia? +That is a secret. But be sure of this--they were +perfectly happy, and correct in their behaviour; and +as they had been in the habit of being together any +time these fifteen years, their tete-a-tete offered +no particular novelty.</p> + +<p>But when Miss Rebecca Sharp and her stout companion +lost themselves in a solitary walk, in which there +were not above five score more of couples similarly +straying, they both felt that the situation was extremely +tender and critical, and now or never was the moment +Miss Sharp thought, to provoke that declaration which +was trembling on the timid lips of Mr. Sedley. They +had previously been to the panorama of Moscow, where +a rude fellow, treading on Miss Sharp’s foot, +caused her to fall back with a little shriek into the +arms of Mr. Sedley, and this little incident increased +the tenderness and confidence of that gentleman to +such a degree, that he told her several of his favourite +Indian stories over again for, at least, the sixth +time.</p> + +<p>“How I should like to see India!” said +Rebecca.</p> + +<p>“<i>Should</i> you?” said Joseph, with a +most killing tenderness; and was no doubt about to +follow up this artful interrogatory by a question +still more tender (for he puffed and panted a great +deal, and Rebecca’s hand, which was placed near +his heart, could count the feverish pulsations of +that organ), when, oh, provoking! the bell rang for +the fireworks, and, a great scuffling and running taking +place, these interesting lovers were obliged to follow +in the stream of people.</p> + +<p>Captain Dobbin had some thoughts of joining the party +at supper: as, in truth, he found the Vauxhall amusements +not particularly lively-- but he paraded twice before +the box where the now united couples were met, and +nobody took any notice of him. Covers were laid for +four. The mated pairs were prattling away quite happily, +and Dobbin knew he was as clean forgotten as if he +had never existed in this world.</p> + +<p>“I should only be de trop,” said the Captain, +looking at them rather wistfully. “I’d +best go and talk to the hermit,"--and so he strolled +off out of the hum of men, and noise, and clatter of +the banquet, into the dark walk, at the end of which +lived that well-known pasteboard Solitary. It wasn’t +very good fun for Dobbin--and, indeed, to be alone +at Vauxhall, I have found, from my own experience, +to be one of the most dismal sports ever entered into +by a bachelor.</p> + +<p>The two couples were perfectly happy then in their +box: where the most delightful and intimate conversation +took place. Jos was in his glory, ordering about +the waiters with great majesty. He made the salad; +and uncorked the Champagne; and carved the chickens; +and ate and drank the greater part of the refreshments +on the tables. Finally, he insisted upon having a +bowl of rack punch; everybody had rack punch at Vauxhall. + “Waiter, rack punch.”</p> + +<p>That bowl of rack punch was the cause of all this +history. And why not a bowl of rack punch as well +as any other cause? Was not a bowl of prussic acid +the cause of Fair Rosamond’s retiring from the +world? Was not a bowl of wine the cause of the demise +of Alexander the Great, or, at least, does not Dr. +Lempriere say so?--so did this bowl of rack punch +influence the fates of all the principal characters +in this “Novel without a Hero,” which we +are now relating. It influenced their life, although +most of them did not taste a drop of it.</p> + +<p>The young ladies did not drink it; Osborne did not +like it; and the consequence was that Jos, that fat +gourmand, drank up the whole contents of the bowl; +and the consequence of his drinking up the whole contents +of the bowl was a liveliness which at first was astonishing, +and then became almost painful; for he talked and +laughed so loud as to bring scores of listeners round +the box, much to the confusion of the innocent party +within it; and, volunteering to sing a song (which +he did in that maudlin high key peculiar to gentlemen +in an inebriated state), he almost drew away the audience +who were gathered round the musicians in the gilt scollop-shell, +and received from his hearers a great deal of applause.</p> + +<p>“Brayvo, Fat un!” said one; “Angcore, +Daniel Lambert!” said another; “What a +figure for the tight-rope!” exclaimed another +wag, to the inexpressible alarm of the ladies, and +the great anger of Mr. Osborne.</p> + +<p>“For Heaven’s sake, Jos, let us get up +and go,” cried that gentleman, and the young +women rose.</p> + +<p>“Stop, my dearest diddle-diddle-darling,” +shouted Jos, now as bold as a lion, and clasping Miss +Rebecca round the waist. Rebecca started, but she +could not get away her hand. The laughter outside +redoubled. Jos continued to drink, to make love, and +to sing; and, winking and waving his glass gracefully +to his audience, challenged all or any to come in +and take a share of his punch.</p> + +<p>Mr. Osborne was just on the point of knocking down +a gentleman in top-boots, who proposed to take advantage +of this invitation, and a commotion seemed to be inevitable, +when by the greatest good luck a gentleman of the +name of Dobbin, who had been walking about the gardens, +stepped up to the box. “Be off, you fools!” +said this gentleman--shouldering off a great number +of the crowd, who vanished presently before his cocked +hat and fierce appearance--and he entered the box +in a most agitated state.</p> + +<p>“Good Heavens! Dobbin, where have you been?” +Osborne said, seizing the white cashmere shawl from +his friend’s arm, and huddling up Amelia in +it.--"Make yourself useful, and take charge of Jos +here, whilst I take the ladies to the carriage.”</p> + +<p>Jos was for rising to interfere--but a single push +from Osborne’s finger sent him puffing back +into his seat again, and the lieutenant was enabled +to remove the ladies in safety. Jos kissed his hand +to them as they retreated, and hiccupped out “Bless +you! Bless you!” Then, seizing Captain Dobbin’s +hand, and weeping in the most pitiful way, he confided +to that gentleman the secret of his loves. He adored +that girl who had just gone out; he had broken her +heart, he knew he had, by his conduct; he would marry +her next morning at St. George’s, Hanover Square; +he’d knock up the Archbishop of Canterbury at +Lambeth: he would, by Jove! and have him in readiness; +and, acting on this hint, Captain Dobbin shrewdly +induced him to leave the gardens and hasten to Lambeth +Palace, and, when once out of the gates, easily conveyed +Mr. Jos Sedley into a hackney-coach, which deposited +him safely at his lodgings.</p> + +<p>George Osborne conducted the girls home in safety: +and when the door was closed upon them, and as he +walked across Russell Square, laughed so as to astonish +the watchman. Amelia looked very ruefully at her +friend, as they went up stairs, and kissed her, and +went to bed without any more talking.</p> + +<p>“He must propose to-morrow,” thought Rebecca. + “He called me his soul’s darling, four +times; he squeezed my hand in Amelia’s presence. + He must propose to-morrow.” And so thought Amelia, +too. And I dare say she thought of the dress she was +to wear as bridesmaid, and of the presents which she +should make to her nice little sister-in-law, and +of a subsequent ceremony in which she herself might +play a principal part, &c., and &c., and &c., and &c.</p> + +<p>Oh, ignorant young creatures! How little do you know +the effect of rack punch! What is the rack in the +punch, at night, to the rack in the head of a morning? +To this truth I can vouch as a man; there is no headache +in the world like that caused by Vauxhall punch. Through +the lapse of twenty years, I can remember the consequence +of two glasses! two wine-glasses! but two, upon the +honour of a gentleman; and Joseph Sedley, who had +a liver complaint, had swallowed at least a quart +of the abominable mixture.</p> + +<p>That next morning, which Rebecca thought was to dawn +upon her fortune, found Sedley groaning in agonies +which the pen refuses to describe. Soda-water was +not invented yet. Small beer--will it be believed!--was +the only drink with which unhappy gentlemen soothed +the fever of their previous night’s potation. + With this mild beverage before him, George Osborne +found the ex-Collector of Boggley Wollah groaning +on the sofa at his lodgings. Dobbin was already in +the room, good-naturedly tending his patient of the +night before. The two officers, looking at the prostrate +Bacchanalian, and askance at each other, exchanged +the most frightful sympathetic grins. Even Sedley’s +valet, the most solemn and correct of gentlemen, with +the muteness and gravity of an undertaker, could hardly +keep his countenance in order, as he looked at his +unfortunate master.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Sedley was uncommon wild last night, sir,” +he whispered in confidence to Osborne, as the latter +mounted the stair. “He wanted to fight the +’ackney-coachman, sir. The Capting was obliged +to bring him upstairs in his harms like a babby.” +A momentary smile flickered over Mr. Brush’s +features as he spoke; instantly, however, they relapsed +into their usual unfathomable calm, as he flung open +the drawing-room door, and announced “Mr. Hosbin.”</p> + +<p>“How are you, Sedley?” that young wag +began, after surveying his victim. “No bones +broke? There’s a hackney-coachman downstairs +with a black eye, and a tied-up head, vowing he’ll +have the law of you.”</p> + +<p>“What do you mean--law?” Sedley faintly +asked.</p> + +<p>“For thrashing him last night--didn’t +he, Dobbin? You hit out, sir, like Molyneux. The +watchman says he never saw a fellow go down so straight. + Ask Dobbin.”</p> + +<p>“You <i>did</i> have a round with the coachman,” +Captain Dobbin said, “and showed plenty of fight +too.”</p> + +<p>“And that fellow with the white coat at Vauxhall! +How Jos drove at him! How the women screamed! By Jove, +sir, it did my heart good to see you. I thought you +civilians had no pluck; but I’ll never get in +your way when you are in your cups, Jos.”</p> + +<p>“I believe I’m very terrible, when I’m +roused,” ejaculated Jos from the sofa, and made +a grimace so dreary and ludicrous, that the Captain’s +politeness could restrain him no longer, and he and +Osborne fired off a ringing volley of laughter.</p> + +<p>Osborne pursued his advantage pitilessly. He thought +Jos a milksop. He had been revolving in his mind the +marriage question pending between Jos and Rebecca, +and was not over well pleased that a member of a family +into which he, George Osborne, of the --th, was going +to marry, should make a mesalliance with a little +nobody--a little upstart governess. “You hit, +you poor old fellow!” said Osborne. “You +terrible! Why, man, you couldn’t stand--you made +everybody laugh in the Gardens, though you were crying +yourself. You were maudlin, Jos. Don’t you +remember singing a song?”</p> + +<p>“A what?” Jos asked.</p> + +<p>“A sentimental song, and calling Rosa, Rebecca, +what’s her name, Amelia’s little friend--your +dearest diddle-diddle-darling?” And this ruthless +young fellow, seizing hold of Dobbin’s hand, +acted over the scene, to the horror of the original +performer, and in spite of Dobbin’s good-natured +entreaties to him to have mercy.</p> + +<p>“Why should I spare him?” Osborne said +to his friend’s remonstrances, when they quitted +the invalid, leaving him under the hands of Doctor +Gollop. “What the deuce right has he to give +himself his patronizing airs, and make fools of us +at Vauxhall? Who’s this little schoolgirl that +is ogling and making love to him? Hang it, the family’s +low enough already, without <i>her</i>. A governess +is all very well, but I’d rather have a lady +for my sister-in-law. I’m a liberal man; but +I’ve proper pride, and know my own station: +let her know hers. And I’ll take down that great +hectoring Nabob, and prevent him from being made a +greater fool than he is. That’s why I told +him to look out, lest she brought an action against +him.”</p> + +<p>“I suppose you know best,” Dobbin said, +though rather dubiously. “You always were a +Tory, and your family’s one of the oldest in +England. But--”</p> + +<p>“Come and see the girls, and make love to Miss +Sharp yourself,” the lieutenant here interrupted +his friend; but Captain Dobbin declined to join Osborne +in his daily visit to the young ladies in Russell +Square.</p> + +<p>As George walked down Southampton Row, from Holborn, +he laughed as he saw, at the Sedley Mansion, in two +different stories two heads on the look-out.</p> + +<p>The fact is, Miss Amelia, in the drawing-room balcony, +was looking very eagerly towards the opposite side +of the Square, where Mr. Osborne dwelt, on the watch +for the lieutenant himself; and Miss Sharp, from her +little bed-room on the second floor, was in observation +until Mr. Joseph’s great form should heave in +sight.</p> + +<p>“Sister Anne is on the watch-tower,” said +he to Amelia, “but there’s nobody coming”; +and laughing and enjoying the joke hugely, he described +in the most ludicrous terms to Miss Sedley, the dismal +condition of her brother.</p> + +<p>“I think it’s very cruel of you to laugh, +George,” she said, looking particularly unhappy; +but George only laughed the more at her piteous and +discomfited mien, persisted in thinking the joke a +most diverting one, and when Miss Sharp came downstairs, +bantered her with a great deal of liveliness upon +the effect of her charms on the fat civilian.</p> + +<p>“O Miss Sharp! if you could but see him this +morning,” he said-- “moaning in his flowered +dressing-gown--writhing on his sofa; if you could +but have seen him lolling out his tongue to Gollop +the apothecary.”</p> + +<p>“See whom?” said Miss Sharp.</p> + +<p>“Whom? O whom? Captain Dobbin, of course, to +whom we were all so attentive, by the way, last night.”</p> + +<p>“We were very unkind to him,” Emmy said, +blushing very much. “I--I quite forgot him.”</p> + +<p>“Of course you did,” cried Osborne, still +on the laugh.</p> + +<p>“One can’t be <i>always</i> thinking about +Dobbin, you know, Amelia. Can one, Miss Sharp?”</p> + +<p>“Except when he overset the glass of wine at +dinner,” Miss Sharp said, with a haughty air +and a toss of the head, “I never gave the existence +of Captain Dobbin one single moment’s consideration.”</p> + +<p>“Very good, Miss Sharp, I’ll tell him,” +Osborne said; and as he spoke Miss Sharp began to +have a feeling of distrust and hatred towards this +young officer, which he was quite unconscious of having +inspired. “He is to make fun of me, is he?” +thought Rebecca. “Has he been laughing about +me to Joseph? Has he frightened him? Perhaps he won’t +come."--A film passed over her eyes, and her heart +beat quite quick.</p> + +<p>“You’re always joking,” said she, +smiling as innocently as she could. “Joke away, +Mr. George; there’s nobody to defend <i>me</i>.” +And George Osborne, as she walked away--and Amelia +looked reprovingly at him--felt some little manly +compunction for having inflicted any unnecessary unkindness +upon this helpless creature. “My dearest Amelia,” +said he, “you are too good--too kind. You don’t +know the world. I do. And your little friend Miss +Sharp must learn her station.”</p> + +<p>“Don’t you think Jos will--”</p> + +<p>“Upon my word, my dear, I don’t know. + He may, or may not. I’m not his master. I +only know he is a very foolish vain fellow, and put +my dear little girl into a very painful and awkward +position last night. My dearest diddle-diddle-darling!” +He was off laughing again, and he did it so drolly +that Emmy laughed too.</p> + +<p>All that day Jos never came. But Amelia had no fear +about this; for the little schemer had actually sent +away the page, Mr. Sambo’s aide-de-camp, to +Mr. Joseph’s lodgings, to ask for some book he +had promised, and how he was; and the reply through +Jos’s man, Mr. Brush, was, that his master was +ill in bed, and had just had the doctor with him. + He must come to-morrow, she thought, but she never +had the courage to speak a word on the subject to Rebecca; +nor did that young woman herself allude to it in any +way during the whole evening after the night at Vauxhall.</p> + +<p>The next day, however, as the two young ladies sate +on the sofa, pretending to work, or to write letters, +or to read novels, Sambo came into the room with his +usual engaging grin, with a packet under his arm, +and a note on a tray. “Note from Mr. Jos, Miss,” +says Sambo.</p> + +<p>How Amelia trembled as she opened it!</p> + +<p>So it ran:</p> + +<p>Dear Amelia,--I send you the “Orphan of the +Forest.” I was too ill to come yesterday. I +leave town to-day for Cheltenham. Pray excuse me, +if you can, to the amiable Miss Sharp, for my conduct +at Vauxhall, and entreat her to pardon and forget +every word I may have uttered when excited by that +fatal supper. As soon as I have recovered, for my +health is very much shaken, I shall go to Scotland +for some months, and am</p> + +<p>Truly yours,<br> +Jos Sedley</p> + +<p>It was the death-warrant. All was over. Amelia did +not dare to look at Rebecca’s pale face and +burning eyes, but she dropt the letter into her friend’s +lap; and got up, and went upstairs to her room, and +cried her little heart out.</p> + +<p>Blenkinsop, the housekeeper, there sought her presently +with consolation, on whose shoulder Amelia wept confidentially, +and relieved herself a good deal. “Don’t +take on, Miss. I didn’t like to tell you. +But none of us in the house have liked her except at +fust. I sor her with my own eyes reading your Ma’s +letters. Pinner says she’s always about your +trinket-box and drawers, and everybody’s drawers, +and she’s sure she’s put your white ribbing +into her box.”</p> + +<p>“I gave it her, I gave it her,” Amelia +said.</p> + +<p>But this did not alter Mrs. Blenkinsop’s opinion +of Miss Sharp. “I don’t trust them governesses, +Pinner,” she remarked to the maid. “They +give themselves the hairs and hupstarts of ladies, +and their wages is no better than you nor me.”</p> + +<p>It now became clear to every soul in the house, except +poor Amelia, that Rebecca should take her departure, +and high and low (always with the one exception) agreed +that that event should take place as speedily as possible. +Our good child ransacked all her drawers, cupboards, +reticules, and gimcrack boxes--passed in review all +her gowns, fichus, tags, bobbins, laces, silk stockings, +and fallals-- selecting this thing and that and the +other, to make a little heap for Rebecca. And going +to her Papa, that generous British merchant, who had +promised to give her as many guineas as she was years +old-- she begged the old gentleman to give the money +to dear Rebecca, who must want it, while she lacked +for nothing.</p> + +<p>She even made George Osborne contribute, and nothing +loth (for he was as free-handed a young fellow as +any in the army), he went to Bond Street, and bought +the best hat and spenser that money could buy.</p> + +<p>“That’s George’s present to you, +Rebecca, dear,” said Amelia, quite proud of +the bandbox conveying these gifts. “What a taste +he has! There’s nobody like him.”</p> + +<p>“Nobody,” Rebecca answered. “How +thankful I am to him!” She was thinking in her +heart, “It was George Osborne who prevented my +marriage."--And she loved George Osborne accordingly.</p> + +<p>She made her preparations for departure with great +equanimity; and accepted all the kind little Amelia’s +presents, after just the proper degree of hesitation +and reluctance. She vowed eternal gratitude to Mrs. +Sedley, of course; but did not intrude herself upon +that good lady too much, who was embarrassed, and evidently +wishing to avoid her. She kissed Mr. Sedley’s +hand, when he presented her with the purse; and asked +permission to consider him for the future as her kind, +kind friend and protector. Her behaviour was so affecting +that he was going to write her a cheque for twenty +pounds more; but he restrained his feelings: the carriage +was in waiting to take him to dinner, so he tripped +away with a “God bless you, my dear, always +come here when you come to town, you know.--Drive +to the Mansion House, James.”</p> + +<p>Finally came the parting with Miss Amelia, over which +picture I intend to throw a veil. But after a scene +in which one person was in earnest and the other a +perfect performer--after the tenderest caresses, the +most pathetic tears, the smelling-bottle, and some +of the very best feelings of the heart, had been called +into requisition--Rebecca and Amelia parted, the former +vowing to love her friend for ever and ever and ever.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter VII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Crawley of Queen’s Crawley</h4> + +<p>Among the most respected of the names beginning in +C which the Court-Guide contained, in the year 18--, +was that of Crawley, Sir Pitt, Baronet, Great Gaunt +Street, and Queen’s Crawley, Hants. This honourable +name had figured constantly also in the Parliamentary +list for many years, in conjunction with that of a +number of other worthy gentlemen who sat in turns +for the borough.</p> + +<p>It is related, with regard to the borough of Queen’s +Crawley, that Queen Elizabeth in one of her progresses, +stopping at Crawley to breakfast, was so delighted +with some remarkably fine Hampshire beer which was +then presented to her by the Crawley of the day (a +handsome gentleman with a trim beard and a good leg), +that she forthwith erected Crawley into a borough +to send two members to Parliament; and the place, +from the day of that illustrious visit, took the name +of Queen’s Crawley, which it holds up to the +present moment. And though, by the lapse of time, +and those mutations which age produces in empires, +cities, and boroughs, Queen’s Crawley was no +longer so populous a place as it had been in Queen +Bess’s time-- nay, was come down to that condition +of borough which used to be denominated rotten--yet, +as Sir Pitt Crawley would say with perfect justice +in his elegant way, “Rotten! be hanged--it produces +me a good fifteen hundred a year.”</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt Crawley (named after the great Commoner) +was the son of Walpole Crawley, first Baronet, of +the Tape and Sealing-Wax Office in the reign of George +II., when he was impeached for peculation, as were +a great number of other honest gentlemen of those days; +and Walpole Crawley was, as need scarcely be said, +son of John Churchill Crawley, named after the celebrated +military commander of the reign of Queen Anne. The +family tree (which hangs up at Queen’s Crawley) +furthermore mentions Charles Stuart, afterwards called +Barebones Crawley, son of the Crawley of James the +First’s time; and finally, Queen Elizabeth’s +Crawley, who is represented as the foreground of the +picture in his forked beard and armour. Out of his +waistcoat, as usual, grows a tree, on the main branches +of which the above illustrious names are inscribed. + Close by the name of Sir Pitt Crawley, Baronet (the +subject of the present memoir), are written that of +his brother, the Reverend Bute Crawley (the great Commoner +was in disgrace when the reverend gentleman was born), +rector of Crawley-cum-Snailby, and of various other +male and female members of the Crawley family.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt was first married to Grizzel, sixth daughter +of Mungo Binkie, Lord Binkie, and cousin, in consequence, +of Mr. Dundas. She brought him two sons: Pitt, named +not so much after his father as after the heaven-born +minister; and Rawdon Crawley, from the Prince of Wales’s +friend, whom his Majesty George IV forgot so completely. +Many years after her ladyship’s demise, Sir Pitt +led to the altar Rosa, daughter of Mr. G. Dawson, +of Mudbury, by whom he had two daughters, for whose +benefit Miss Rebecca Sharp was now engaged as governess. + It will be seen that the young lady was come into +a family of very genteel connexions, and was about +to move in a much more distinguished circle than that +humble one which she had just quitted in Russell Square.</p> + +<p>She had received her orders to join her pupils, in +a note which was written upon an old envelope, and +which contained the following words:</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt Crawley begs Miss Sharp and baggidge may +be hear on Tuesday, as I leaf for Queen’s Crawley +to-morrow morning ERLY.</p> + +<p>Great Gaunt Street.</p> + +<p>Rebecca had never seen a Baronet, as far as she knew, +and as soon as she had taken leave of Amelia, and +counted the guineas which good-natured Mr. Sedley +had put into a purse for her, and as soon as she had +done wiping her eyes with her handkerchief (which operation +she concluded the very moment the carriage had turned +the corner of the street), she began to depict in +her own mind what a Baronet must be. “I wonder, +does he wear a star?” thought she, “or +is it only lords that wear stars? But he will be very +handsomely dressed in a court suit, with ruffles, +and his hair a little powdered, like Mr. Wroughton +at Covent Garden. I suppose he will be awfully proud, +and that I shall be treated most contemptuously. +Still I must bear my hard lot as well as I can--at +least, I shall be amongst <i>gentlefolks</i>, and not +with vulgar city people”: and she fell to thinking +of her Russell Square friends with that very same +philosophical bitterness with which, in a certain +apologue, the fox is represented as speaking of the +grapes.</p> + +<p>Having passed through Gaunt Square into Great Gaunt +Street, the carriage at length stopped at a tall gloomy +house between two other tall gloomy houses, each with +a hatchment over the middle drawing-room window; +as is the custom of houses in Great Gaunt Street, in +which gloomy locality death seems to reign perpetual. + The shutters of the first-floor windows of Sir Pitt’s +mansion were closed--those of the dining-room were +partially open, and the blinds neatly covered up in +old newspapers.</p> + +<p>John, the groom, who had driven the carriage alone, +did not care to descend to ring the bell; and so prayed +a passing milk-boy to perform that office for him. + When the bell was rung, a head appeared between the +interstices of the dining-room shutters, and the door +was opened by a man in drab breeches and gaiters, with +a dirty old coat, a foul old neckcloth lashed round +his bristly neck, a shining bald head, a leering red +face, a pair of twinkling grey eyes, and a mouth perpetually +on the grin.</p> + +<p>“This Sir Pitt Crawley’s?” says +John, from the box.</p> + +<p>“Ees,” says the man at the door, with +a nod.</p> + +<p>“Hand down these ’ere trunks then,” +said John.</p> + +<p>“Hand ’n down yourself,” said the +porter.</p> + +<p>“Don’t you see I can’t leave my +hosses? Come, bear a hand, my fine feller, and Miss +will give you some beer,” said John, with a horse-laugh, +for he was no longer respectful to Miss Sharp, as her +connexion with the family was broken off, and as she +had given nothing to the servants on coming away.</p> + +<p>The bald-headed man, taking his hands out of his breeches +pockets, advanced on this summons, and throwing Miss +Sharp’s trunk over his shoulder, carried it +into the house.</p> + +<p>“Take this basket and shawl, if you please, +and open the door,” said Miss Sharp, and descended +from the carriage in much indignation. “I shall +write to Mr. Sedley and inform him of your conduct,” +said she to the groom.</p> + +<p>“Don’t,” replied that functionary. + “I hope you’ve forgot nothink? Miss ’Melia’s +gownds--have you got them--as the lady’s maid +was to have ’ad? I hope they’ll fit you. +Shut the door, Jim, you’ll get no good out of +’ER,” continued John, pointing with his +thumb towards Miss Sharp: “a bad lot, I tell +you, a bad lot,” and so saying, Mr. Sedley’s +groom drove away. The truth is, he was attached to +the lady’s maid in question, and indignant that +she should have been robbed of her perquisites.</p> + +<p>On entering the dining-room, by the orders of the +individual in gaiters, Rebecca found that apartment +not more cheerful than such rooms usually are, when +genteel families are out of town. The faithful chambers +seem, as it were, to mourn the absence of their masters. + The turkey carpet has rolled itself up, and retired +sulkily under the sideboard: the pictures have hidden +their faces behind old sheets of brown paper: the +ceiling lamp is muffled up in a dismal sack of brown +holland: the window-curtains have disappeared under +all sorts of shabby envelopes: the marble bust of Sir +Walpole Crawley is looking from its black corner at +the bare boards and the oiled fire-irons, and the +empty card-racks over the mantelpiece: the cellaret +has lurked away behind the carpet: the chairs are turned +up heads and tails along the walls: and in the dark +corner opposite the statue, is an old-fashioned crabbed +knife-box, locked and sitting on a dumb waiter.</p> + +<p>Two kitchen chairs, and a round table, and an attenuated +old poker and tongs were, however, gathered round +the fire-place, as was a saucepan over a feeble sputtering +fire. There was a bit of cheese and bread, and a +tin candlestick on the table, and a little black porter +in a pint-pot.</p> + +<p>“Had your dinner, I suppose? It is not too warm +for you? Like a drop of beer?”</p> + +<p>“Where is Sir Pitt Crawley?” said Miss +Sharp majestically.</p> + +<p>“He, he! I’m Sir Pitt Crawley. Reklect +you owe me a pint for bringing down your luggage. + He, he! Ask Tinker if I aynt. Mrs. Tinker, Miss +Sharp; Miss Governess, Mrs. Charwoman. Ho, ho!”</p> + +<p>The lady addressed as Mrs. Tinker at this moment made +her appearance with a pipe and a paper of tobacco, +for which she had been despatched a minute before +Miss Sharp’s arrival; and she handed the articles +over to Sir Pitt, who had taken his seat by the fire.</p> + +<p>“Where’s the farden?” said he. +“I gave you three halfpence. Where’s the +change, old Tinker?”</p> + +<p>“There!” replied Mrs. Tinker, flinging +down the coin; it’s only baronets as cares about +farthings.”</p> + +<p>“A farthing a day is seven shillings a year,” +answered the M.P.; “seven shillings a year is +the interest of seven guineas. Take care of your +farthings, old Tinker, and your guineas will come quite +nat’ral.”</p> + +<p>“You may be sure it’s Sir Pitt Crawley, +young woman,” said Mrs. Tinker, surlily; “because +he looks to his farthings. You’ll know him +better afore long.”</p> + +<p>“And like me none the worse, Miss Sharp,” +said the old gentleman, with an air almost of politeness. + “I must be just before I’m generous.”</p> + +<p>“He never gave away a farthing in his life,” +growled Tinker.</p> + +<p>“Never, and never will: it’s against my +principle. Go and get another chair from the kitchen, +Tinker, if you want to sit down; and then we’ll +have a bit of supper.”</p> + +<p>Presently the baronet plunged a fork into the saucepan +on the fire, and withdrew from the pot a piece of +tripe and an onion, which he divided into pretty equal +portions, and of which he partook with Mrs. Tinker. + “You see, Miss Sharp, when I’m not here +Tinker’s on board wages: when I’m in town +she dines with the family. Haw! haw! I’m glad +Miss Sharp’s not hungry, ain’t you, Tink?” +And they fell to upon their frugal supper.</p> + +<p>After supper Sir Pitt Crawley began to smoke his pipe; +and when it became quite dark, he lighted the rushlight +in the tin candlestick, and producing from an interminable +pocket a huge mass of papers, began reading them, +and putting them in order.</p> + +<p>“I’m here on law business, my dear, and +that’s how it happens that I shall have the +pleasure of such a pretty travelling companion to-morrow.”</p> + +<p>“He’s always at law business,” said +Mrs. Tinker, taking up the pot of porter.</p> + +<p>“Drink and drink about,” said the Baronet. + “Yes; my dear, Tinker is quite right: I’ve +lost and won more lawsuits than any man in England. + Look here at Crawley, Bart. v. Snaffle. I’ll +throw him over, or my name’s not Pitt Crawley. + Podder and another versus Crawley, Bart. Overseers +of Snaily parish against Crawley, Bart. They can’t +prove it’s common: I’ll defy ’em; +the land’s mine. It no more belongs to the parish +than it does to you or Tinker here. I’ll beat +’em, if it cost me a thousand guineas. Look over +the papers; you may if you like, my dear. Do you write +a good hand? I’ll make you useful when we’re +at Queen’s Crawley, depend on it, Miss Sharp. +Now the dowager’s dead I want some one.”</p> + +<p>“She was as bad as he,” said Tinker. +“She took the law of every one of her tradesmen; +and turned away forty-eight footmen in four year.”</p> + +<p>“She was close--very close,” said the +Baronet, simply; “but she was a valyble woman +to me, and saved me a steward."--And in this confidential +strain, and much to the amusement of the new-comer, +the conversation continued for a considerable time. + Whatever Sir Pitt Crawley’s qualities might +be, good or bad, he did not make the least disguise +of them. He talked of himself incessantly, sometimes +in the coarsest and vulgarest Hampshire accent; sometimes +adopting the tone of a man of the world. And so, +with injunctions to Miss Sharp to be ready at five +in the morning, he bade her good night. “You’ll +sleep with Tinker to-night,” he said; “it’s +a big bed, and there’s room for two. Lady Crawley +died in it. Good night.”</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt went off after this benediction, and the +solemn Tinker, rushlight in hand, led the way up the +great bleak stone stairs, past the great dreary drawing-room +doors, with the handles muffled up in paper, into +the great front bedroom, where Lady Crawley had slept +her last. The bed and chamber were so funereal and +gloomy, you might have fancied, not only that Lady +Crawley died in the room, but that her ghost inhabited +it. Rebecca sprang about the apartment, however, +with the greatest liveliness, and had peeped into the +huge wardrobes, and the closets, and the cupboards, +and tried the drawers which were locked, and examined +the dreary pictures and toilette appointments, while +the old charwoman was saying her prayers. “I +shouldn’t like to sleep in this yeer bed without +a good conscience, Miss,” said the old woman. + “There’s room for us and a half-dozen +of ghosts in it,” says Rebecca. “Tell +me all about Lady Crawley and Sir Pitt Crawley, and +everybody, my <i>dear</i> Mrs. Tinker.”</p> + +<p>But old Tinker was not to be pumped by this little +cross-questioner; and signifying to her that bed was +a place for sleeping, not conversation, set up in +her corner of the bed such a snore as only the nose +of innocence can produce. Rebecca lay awake for a +long, long time, thinking of the morrow, and of the +new world into which she was going, and of her chances +of success there. The rushlight flickered in the +basin. The mantelpiece cast up a great black shadow, +over half of a mouldy old sampler, which her defunct +ladyship had worked, no doubt, and over two little +family pictures of young lads, one in a college gown, +and the other in a red jacket like a soldier. When +she went to sleep, Rebecca chose that one to dream +about.</p> + +<p>At four o’clock, on such a roseate summer’s +morning as even made Great Gaunt Street look cheerful, +the faithful Tinker, having wakened her bedfellow, +and bid her prepare for departure, unbarred and unbolted +the great hall door (the clanging and clapping whereof +startled the sleeping echoes in the street), and taking +her way into Oxford Street, summoned a coach from +a stand there. It is needless to particularize the +number of the vehicle, or to state that the driver +was stationed thus early in the neighbourhood of Swallow +Street, in hopes that some young buck, reeling homeward +from the tavern, might need the aid of his vehicle, +and pay him with the generosity of intoxication.</p> + +<p>It is likewise needless to say that the driver, if +he had any such hopes as those above stated, was grossly +disappointed; and that the worthy Baronet whom he +drove to the City did not give him one single penny +more than his fare. It was in vain that Jehu appealed +and stormed; that he flung down Miss Sharp’s +bandboxes in the gutter at the ’Necks, and swore +he would take the law of his fare.</p> + +<p>“You’d better not,” said one of +the ostlers; “it’s Sir Pitt Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“So it is, Joe,” cried the Baronet, approvingly; +“and I’d like to see the man can do me.”</p> + +<p>“So should oi,” said Joe, grinning sulkily, +and mounting the Baronet’s baggage on the roof +of the coach.</p> + +<p>“Keep the box for me, Leader,” exclaims +the Member of Parliament to the coachman; who replied, +“Yes, Sir Pitt,” with a touch of his hat, +and rage in his soul (for he had promised the box to +a young gentleman from Cambridge, who would have given +a crown to a certainty), and Miss Sharp was accommodated +with a back seat inside the carriage, which might +be said to be carrying her into the wide world.</p> + +<p>How the young man from Cambridge sulkily put his five +great-coats in front; but was reconciled when little +Miss Sharp was made to quit the carriage, and mount +up beside him--when he covered her up in one of his +Benjamins, and became perfectly good-humoured--how +the asthmatic gentleman, the prim lady, who declared +upon her sacred honour she had never travelled in +a public carriage before (there is always such a lady +in a coach--Alas! was; for the coaches, where are +they?), and the fat widow with the brandy-bottle, took +their places inside--how the porter asked them all +for money, and got sixpence from the gentleman and +five greasy halfpence from the fat widow--and how +the carriage at length drove away--now threading the +dark lanes of Aldersgate, anon clattering by the Blue +Cupola of St. Paul’s, jingling rapidly by the +strangers’ entry of Fleet-Market, which, with +Exeter ’Change, has now departed to the world +of shadows--how they passed the White Bear in Piccadilly, +and saw the dew rising up from the market-gardens +of Knightsbridge--how Turnhamgreen, Brentwood, Bagshot, +were passed--need not be told here. But the writer +of these pages, who has pursued in former days, and +in the same bright weather, the same remarkable journey, +cannot but think of it with a sweet and tender regret. + Where is the road now, and its merry incidents of +life? Is there no Chelsea or Greenwich for the old +honest pimple-nosed coachmen? I wonder where are they, +those good fellows? Is old Weller alive or dead? and +the waiters, yea, and the inns at which they waited, +and the cold rounds of beef inside, and the stunted +ostler, with his blue nose and clinking pail, where +is he, and where is his generation? To those great +geniuses now in petticoats, who shall write novels +for the beloved reader’s children, these men +and things will be as much legend and history as Nineveh, +or Coeur de Lion, or Jack Sheppard. For them stage-coaches +will have become romances--a team of four bays as +fabulous as Bucephalus or Black Bess. Ah, how their +coats shone, as the stable-men pulled their clothes +off, and away they went--ah, how their tails shook, +as with smoking sides at the stage’s end they +demurely walked away into the inn-yard. Alas! we +shall never hear the horn sing at midnight, or see +the pike-gates fly open any more. Whither, however, +is the light four-inside Trafalgar coach carrying +us? Let us be set down at Queen’s Crawley without +further divagation, and see how Miss Rebecca Sharp +speeds there.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter VIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Private and Confidential</h4> + +<p>Miss Rebecca Sharp to Miss Amelia Sedley, Russell Square, London. +(Free.--Pitt Crawley.)</p> + + <p><i>My dearest, sweetest Amelia</i>,</p> + +<p>With what mingled joy and sorrow do I take up the +pen to write to my dearest friend! Oh, what a change +between to-day and yesterday! Now I am friendless +and alone; yesterday I was at home, in the sweet company +of a sister, whom I shall ever, ever cherish!</p> + +<p>I will not tell you in what tears and sadness I passed +the fatal night in which I separated from you. <i>You</i> +went on Tuesday to joy and happiness, with your mother +and <i>your devoted young soldier</i> +by your side; and I thought of you all night, dancing +at the Perkins’s, the prettiest, I am sure, +of all the young ladies at the Ball. I was brought +by the groom in the old carriage to Sir Pitt Crawley’s +town house, where, after John the groom had behaved +most rudely and insolently to me (alas! ’twas +safe to insult poverty and misfortune!), I was given +over to Sir P.’s care, and made to pass the +night in an old gloomy bed, and by the side of a horrid +gloomy old charwoman, who keeps the house. I did +not sleep one single wink the whole night.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt is not what we silly girls, when we used +to read Cecilia at Chiswick, imagined a baronet must +have been. Anything, indeed, less like Lord Orville +cannot be imagined. Fancy an old, stumpy, short, +vulgar, and very dirty man, in old clothes and shabby +old gaiters, who smokes a horrid pipe, and cooks his +own horrid supper in a saucepan. He speaks with a +country accent, and swore a great deal at the old +charwoman, at the hackney coachman who drove us to +the inn where the coach went from, and on which I +made the journey <i>outside for the greater part of the way</i>.</p> + +<p>I was awakened at daybreak by the charwoman, and having +arrived at the inn, was at first placed inside the +coach. But, when we got to a place called Leakington, +where the rain began to fall very heavily--will you +believe it?--I was forced to come outside; for Sir +Pitt is a proprietor of the coach, and as a passenger +came at Mudbury, who wanted an inside place, I was +obliged to go outside in the rain, where, however, +a young gentleman from Cambridge College sheltered +me very kindly in one of his several great coats.</p> + +<p>This gentleman and the guard seemed to know Sir Pitt +very well, and laughed at him a great deal. They +both agreed in calling him an old screw; which means +a very stingy, avaricious person. He never gives +any money to anybody, they said (and this meanness +I hate); and the young gentleman made me remark that +we drove very slow for the last two stages on the +road, because Sir Pitt was on the box, and because +he is proprietor of the horses for this part of the +journey. “But won’t I flog ’em +on to Squashmore, when I take the ribbons?” said +the young Cantab. “And sarve ’em right, +Master Jack,” said the guard. When I comprehended +the meaning of this phrase, and that Master Jack intended +to drive the rest of the way, and revenge himself +on Sir Pitt’s horses, of course I laughed too.</p> + +<p>A carriage and four splendid horses, covered with +armorial bearings, however, awaited us at Mudbury, +four miles from Queen’s Crawley, and we made +our entrance to the baronet’s park in state. + There is a fine avenue of a mile long leading to +the house, and the woman at the lodge-gate (over the +pillars of which are a serpent and a dove, the supporters +of the Crawley arms), made us a number of curtsies +as she flung open the old iron carved doors, which +are something like those at odious Chiswick.</p> + +<p>“There’s an avenue,” said Sir Pitt, +“a mile long. There’s six thousand pound +of timber in them there trees. Do you call that nothing?” +He pronounced avenue--EVENUE, and nothing--<i>nothink</i>, +so droll; and he had a Mr. Hodson, his hind from Mudbury, +into the carriage with him, and they talked about +distraining, and selling up, and draining and subsoiling, +and a great deal about tenants and farming--much more +than I could understand. Sam Miles had been caught +poaching, and Peter Bailey had gone to the workhouse +at last. “Serve him right,” said Sir Pitt; +“him and his family has been cheating me on +that farm these hundred and fifty years.” Some +old tenant, I suppose, who could not pay his rent. +Sir Pitt might have said “he and his family,” +to be sure; but rich baronets do not need to be careful +about grammar, as poor governesses must be.</p> + +<p>As we passed, I remarked a beautiful church-spire +rising above some old elms in the park; and before +them, in the midst of a lawn, and some outhouses, +an old red house with tall chimneys covered with ivy, +and the windows shining in the sun. “Is that +your church, sir?” I said.</p> + +<p>“Yes, hang it,” (said Sir Pitt, only he +used, dear, A <i>much</i> WICKEDER <i>word</i>); “how’s +Buty, Hodson? Buty’s my brother Bute, my dear--my +brother the parson. Buty and the Beast I call him, +ha, ha!”</p> + +<p>Hodson laughed too, and then looking more grave and +nodding his head, said, “I’m afraid he’s +better, Sir Pitt. He was out on his pony yesterday, +looking at our corn.”</p> + +<p>“Looking after his tithes, hang’un (only +he used the same wicked word). Will brandy and water +never kill him? He’s as tough as old whatdyecallum--old +Methusalem.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Hodson laughed again. “The young men is +home from college. They’ve whopped John Scroggins +till he’s well nigh dead.”</p> + +<p>“Whop my second keeper!” roared out Sir +Pitt.</p> + +<p>“He was on the parson’s ground, sir,” +replied Mr. Hodson; and Sir Pitt in a fury swore that +if he ever caught ’em poaching on his ground, +he’d transport ’em, by the lord he would. + However, he said, “I’ve sold the presentation +of the living, Hodson; none of that breed shall get +it, I war’nt”; and Mr. Hodson said he was +quite right: and I have no doubt from this that the +two brothers are at variance--as brothers often are, +and sisters too. Don’t you remember the two +Miss Scratchleys at Chiswick, how they used always +to fight and quarrel--and Mary Box, how she was always +thumping Louisa?</p> + +<p>Presently, seeing two little boys gathering sticks +in the wood, Mr. Hodson jumped out of the carriage, +at Sir Pitt’s order, and rushed upon them with +his whip. “Pitch into ’em, Hodson,” +roared the baronet; “flog their little souls +out, and bring ’em up to the house, the vagabonds; +I’ll commit ’em as sure as my name’s +Pitt.” And presently we heard Mr. Hodson’s +whip cracking on the shoulders of the poor little +blubbering wretches, and Sir Pitt, seeing that the +malefactors were in custody, drove on to the hall.</p> + +<p>All the servants were ready to meet us, and ...</p> + +<p>Here, my dear, I was interrupted last night by a dreadful +thumping at my door: and who do you think it was? +Sir Pitt Crawley in his night-cap and dressing-gown, +such a figure! As I shrank away from such a visitor, +he came forward and seized my candle. “No candles +after eleven o’clock, Miss Becky,” said +he. “Go to bed in the dark, you pretty little +hussy” (that is what he called me), “and +unless you wish me to come for the candle every night, +mind and be in bed at eleven.” And with this, +he and Mr. Horrocks the butler went off laughing. + You may be sure I shall not encourage any more of +their visits. They let loose two immense bloodhounds +at night, which all last night were yelling and howling +at the moon. “I call the dog Gorer,” +said Sir Pitt; “he’s killed a man that +dog has, and is master of a bull, and the mother I +used to call Flora; but now I calls her Aroarer, for +she’s too old to bite. Haw, haw!”</p> + +<p>Before the house of Queen’s Crawley, which is +an odious old-fashioned red brick mansion, with tall +chimneys and gables of the style of Queen Bess, there +is a terrace flanked by the family dove and serpent, +and on which the great hall-door opens. And oh, my +dear, the great hall I am sure is as big and as glum +as the great hall in the dear castle of Udolpho. +It has a large fireplace, in which we might put half +Miss Pinkerton’s school, and the grate is big +enough to roast an ox at the very least. Round the +room hang I don’t know how many generations +of Crawleys, some with beards and ruffs, some with +huge wigs and toes turned out, some dressed in long +straight stays and gowns that look as stiff as towers, +and some with long ringlets, and oh, my dear! scarcely +any stays at all. At one end of the hall is the great +staircase all in black oak, as dismal as may be, and +on either side are tall doors with stags’ heads +over them, leading to the billiard-room and the library, +and the great yellow saloon and the morning-rooms. + I think there are at least twenty bedrooms on the +first floor; one of them has the bed in which Queen +Elizabeth slept; and I have been taken by my new pupils +through all these fine apartments this morning. They +are not rendered less gloomy, I promise you, by having +the shutters always shut; and there is scarce one +of the apartments, but when the light was let into +it, I expected to see a ghost in the room. We have +a schoolroom on the second floor, with my bedroom +leading into it on one side, and that of the young +ladies on the other. Then there are Mr. Pitt’s +apartments--Mr. Crawley, he is called--the eldest son, +and Mr. Rawdon Crawley’s rooms--he is an officer +like <i>somebody</i>, and away with his regiment. There +is no want of room I assure you. You might lodge +all the people in Russell Square in the house, I think, +and have space to spare.</p> + +<p>Half an hour after our arrival, the great dinner-bell +was rung, and I came down with my two pupils (they +are very thin insignificant little chits of ten and +eight years old). I came down in your dear muslin +gown (about which that odious Mrs. Pinner was so rude, +because you gave it me); for I am to be treated as +one of the family, except on company days, when the +young ladies and I are to dine upstairs.</p> + +<p>Well, the great dinner-bell rang, and we all assembled +in the little drawing-room where my Lady Crawley sits. + She is the second Lady Crawley, and mother of the +young ladies. She was an ironmonger’s daughter, +and her marriage was thought a great match. She looks +as if she had been handsome once, and her eyes are +always weeping for the loss of her beauty. She is +pale and meagre and high-shouldered, and has not a +word to say for herself, evidently. Her stepson Mr. +Crawley, was likewise in the room. He was in full +dress, as pompous as an undertaker. He is pale, thin, +ugly, silent; he has thin legs, no chest, hay-coloured +whiskers, and straw-coloured hair. He is the very +picture of his sainted mother over the mantelpiece--Griselda +of the noble house of Binkie.</p> + +<p>“This is the new governess, Mr. Crawley,” +said Lady Crawley, coming forward and taking my hand. + “Miss Sharp.”</p> + +<p>“O!” said Mr. Crawley, and pushed his +head once forward and began again to read a great +pamphlet with which he was busy.</p> + +<p>“I hope you will be kind to my girls,” +said Lady Crawley, with her pink eyes always full +of tears.</p> + +<p>“Law, Ma, of course she will,” said the +eldest: and I saw at a glance that I need not be afraid +of <i>that</i> woman. “My lady is served,” +says the butler in black, in an immense white shirt-frill, +that looked as if it had been one of the Queen Elizabeth’s +ruffs depicted in the hall; and so, taking Mr. Crawley’s +arm, she led the way to the dining-room, whither I +followed with my little pupils in each hand.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt was already in the room with a silver jug. + He had just been to the cellar, and was in full dress +too; that is, he had taken his gaiters off, and showed +his little dumpy legs in black worsted stockings. + The sideboard was covered with glistening old plate--old +cups, both gold and silver; old salvers and cruet-stands, +like Rundell and Bridge’s shop. Everything +on the table was in silver too, and two footmen, with +red hair and canary-coloured liveries, stood on either +side of the sideboard.</p> + +<p>Mr. Crawley said a long grace, and Sir Pitt said amen, +and the great silver dish-covers were removed.</p> + +<p>“What have we for dinner, Betsy?’ said +the Baronet.</p> + +<p>“Mutton broth, I believe, Sir Pitt,” answered +Lady Crawley.</p> + +<p>“Mouton aux navets,” added the butler +gravely (pronounce, if you please, moutongonavvy); +“and the soup is potage de mouton a l’Ecossaise. + The side-dishes contain pommes de terre au naturel, +and choufleur a l’eau.”</p> + +<p>“Mutton’s mutton,” said the Baronet, +“and a devilish good thing. What <i>ship</i> was +it, Horrocks, and when did you kill?” “One +of the black-faced Scotch, Sir Pitt: we killed on +Thursday.</p> + +<p>“Who took any?”</p> + +<p>“Steel, of Mudbury, took the saddle and two +legs, Sir Pitt; but he says the last was too young +and confounded woolly, Sir Pitt.”</p> + +<p>“Will you take some potage, Miss ah--Miss Blunt? +said Mr. Crawley.</p> + +<p>“Capital Scotch broth, my dear,” said +Sir Pitt, “though they call it by a French name.”</p> + +<p>“I believe it is the custom, sir, in decent +society,” said Mr. Crawley, haughtily, “to +call the dish as I have called it”; and it was +served to us on silver soup plates by the footmen +in the canary coats, with the mouton aux navets. Then +“ale and water” were brought, and served +to us young ladies in wine-glasses. I am not a judge +of ale, but I can say with a clear conscience I prefer +water.</p> + +<p>While we were enjoying our repast, Sir Pitt took occasion +to ask what had become of the shoulders of the mutton.</p> + +<p>“I believe they were eaten in the servants’ +hall,” said my lady, humbly.</p> + +<p>“They was, my lady,” said Horrocks, “and +precious little else we get there neither.”</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt burst into a horse-laugh, and continued his +conversation with Mr. Horrocks. “That there +little black pig of the Kent sow’s breed must +be uncommon fat now.”</p> + +<p>“It’s not quite busting, Sir Pitt,” +said the butler with the gravest air, at which Sir +Pitt, and with him the young ladies, this time, began +to laugh violently.</p> + +<p>“Miss Crawley, Miss Rose Crawley,” said +Mr. Crawley, “your laughter strikes me as being +exceedingly out of place.”</p> + +<p>“Never mind, my lord,” said the Baronet, +“we’ll try the porker on Saturday. Kill +un on Saturday morning, John Horrocks. Miss Sharp +adores pork, don’t you, Miss Sharp?”</p> + +<p>And I think this is all the conversation that I remember +at dinner. When the repast was concluded a jug of +hot water was placed before Sir Pitt, with a case-bottle +containing, I believe, rum. Mr. Horrocks served myself +and my pupils with three little glasses of wine, and +a bumper was poured out for my lady. When we retired, +she took from her work-drawer an enormous interminable +piece of knitting; the young ladies began to play +at cribbage with a dirty pack of cards. We had but +one candle lighted, but it was in a magnificent old +silver candlestick, and after a very few questions +from my lady, I had my choice of amusement between +a volume of sermons, and a pamphlet on the corn-laws, +which Mr. Crawley had been reading before dinner.</p> + +<p>So we sat for an hour until steps were heard.</p> + +<p>“Put away the cards, girls,” cried my +lady, in a great tremor; “put down Mr. Crawley’s +books, Miss Sharp”; and these orders had been +scarcely obeyed, when Mr. Crawley entered the room.</p> + +<p>“We will resume yesterday’s discourse, +young ladies,” said he, “and you shall +each read a page by turns; so that Miss a--Miss Short +may have an opportunity of hearing you”; and +the poor girls began to spell a long dismal sermon +delivered at Bethesda Chapel, Liverpool, on behalf +of the mission for the Chickasaw Indians. Was it not +a charming evening?</p> + +<p>At ten the servants were told to call Sir Pitt and +the household to prayers. Sir Pitt came in first, +very much flushed, and rather unsteady in his gait; +and after him the butler, the canaries, Mr. Crawley’s +man, three other men, smelling very much of the stable, +and four women, one of whom, I remarked, was very much +overdressed, and who flung me a look of great scorn +as she plumped down on her knees.</p> + +<p>After Mr. Crawley had done haranguing and expounding, +we received our candles, and then we went to bed; +and then I was disturbed in my writing, as I have +described to my dearest sweetest Amelia.</p> + +<p>Good night. A thousand, thousand, thousand kisses!</p> + +<p>Saturday.--This morning, at five, I heard the shrieking +of the little black pig. Rose and Violet introduced +me to it yesterday; and to the stables, and to the +kennel, and to the gardener, who was picking fruit +to send to market, and from whom they begged hard a +bunch of hot-house grapes; but he said that Sir Pitt +had numbered every “Man Jack” of them, +and it would be as much as his place was worth to +give any away. The darling girls caught a colt in +a paddock, and asked me if I would ride, and began +to ride themselves, when the groom, coming with horrid +oaths, drove them away.</p> + +<p>Lady Crawley is always knitting the worsted. Sir +Pitt is always tipsy, every night; and, I believe, +sits with Horrocks, the butler. Mr. Crawley always +reads sermons in the evening, and in the morning is +locked up in his study, or else rides to Mudbury, on +county business, or to Squashmore, where he preaches, +on Wednesdays and Fridays, to the tenants there.</p> + +<p>A hundred thousand grateful loves to your dear papa +and mamma. Is your poor brother recovered of his +rack-punch? Oh, dear! Oh, dear! How men should beware +of wicked punch!</p> + +<p>Ever and ever thine own <i>Rebecca</i></p> + +<p>Everything considered, I think it is quite as well +for our dear Amelia Sedley, in Russell Square, that +Miss Sharp and she are parted. Rebecca is a droll +funny creature, to be sure; and those descriptions +of the poor lady weeping for the loss of her beauty, +and the gentleman “with hay-coloured whiskers +and straw-coloured hair,” are very smart, doubtless, +and show a great knowledge of the world. That she +might, when on her knees, have been thinking of something +better than Miss Horrocks’s ribbons, has possibly +struck both of us. But my kind reader will please +to remember that this history has “Vanity Fair” +for a title, and that Vanity Fair is a very vain, +wicked, foolish place, full of all sorts of humbugs +and falsenesses and pretensions. And while the moralist, +who is holding forth on the cover ( an accurate portrait +of your humble servant), professes to wear neither +gown nor bands, but only the very same long-eared +livery in which his congregation is arrayed: yet, look +you, one is bound to speak the truth as far as one +knows it, whether one mounts a cap and bells or a +shovel hat; and a deal of disagreeable matter must +come out in the course of such an undertaking.</p> + +<p>I have heard a brother of the story-telling trade, +at Naples, preaching to a pack of good-for-nothing +honest lazy fellows by the sea-shore, work himself +up into such a rage and passion with some of the villains +whose wicked deeds he was describing and inventing, +that the audience could not resist it; and they and +the poet together would burst out into a roar of oaths +and execrations against the fictitious monster of +the tale, so that the hat went round, and the bajocchi +tumbled into it, in the midst of a perfect storm of +sympathy.</p> + +<p>At the little Paris theatres, on the other hand, you +will not only hear the people yelling out “Ah +gredin! Ah monstre:” and cursing the tyrant +of the play from the boxes; but the actors themselves +positively refuse to play the wicked parts, such as +those of infames Anglais, brutal Cossacks, and what +not, and prefer to appear at a smaller salary, in +their real characters as loyal Frenchmen. I set the +two stories one against the other, so that you may +see that it is not from mere mercenary motives that +the present performer is desirous to show up and trounce +his villains; but because he has a sincere hatred +of them, which he cannot keep down, and which must +find a vent in suitable abuse and bad language.</p> + +<p>I warn my “kyind friends,” then, that +I am going to tell a story of harrowing villainy and +complicated--but, as I trust, intensely interesting--crime. + My rascals are no milk-and-water rascals, I promise +you. When we come to the proper places we won’t +spare fine language--No, no! But when we are going +over the quiet country we must perforce be calm. +A tempest in a slop-basin is absurd. We will reserve +that sort of thing for the mighty ocean and the lonely +midnight. The present Chapter is very mild. Others--But +we will not anticipate <i>those</i>.</p> + +<p>And, as we bring our characters forward, I will ask +leave, as a man and a brother, not only to introduce +them, but occasionally to step down from the platform, +and talk about them: if they are good and kindly, +to love them and shake them by the hand: if they are +silly, to laugh at them confidentially in the reader’s +sleeve: if they are wicked and heartless, to abuse +them in the strongest terms which politeness admits +of.</p> + +<p>Otherwise you might fancy it was I who was sneering +at the practice of devotion, which Miss Sharp finds +so ridiculous; that it was I who laughed good-humouredly +at the reeling old Silenus of a baronet-- whereas +the laughter comes from one who has no reverence except +for prosperity, and no eye for anything beyond success. +Such people there are living and flourishing in the +world--Faithless, Hopeless, Charityless: let us have +at them, dear friends, with might and main. Some there +are, and very successful too, mere quacks and fools: +and it was to combat and expose such as those, no +doubt, that Laughter was made.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter IX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Family Portraits</h4> + +<p>Sir Pitt Crawley was a philosopher with a taste for +what is called low life. His first marriage with +the daughter of the noble Binkie had been made under +the auspices of his parents; and as he often told +Lady Crawley in her lifetime she was such a confounded +quarrelsome high-bred jade that when she died he was +hanged if he would ever take another of her sort, +at her ladyship’s demise he kept his promise, +and selected for a second wife Miss Rose Dawson, daughter +of Mr. John Thomas Dawson, ironmonger, of Mudbury. +What a happy woman was Rose to be my Lady Crawley!</p> + +<p>Let us set down the items of her happiness. In the +first place, she gave up Peter Butt, a young man who +kept company with her, and in consequence of his disappointment +in love, took to smuggling, poaching, and a thousand +other bad courses. Then she quarrelled, as in duty +bound, with all the friends and intimates of her youth, +who, of course, could not be received by my Lady at +Queen’s Crawley--nor did she find in her new +rank and abode any persons who were willing to welcome +her. Who ever did? Sir Huddleston Fuddleston had three +daughters who all hoped to be Lady Crawley. Sir Giles +Wapshot’s family were insulted that one of the +Wapshot girls had not the preference in the marriage, +and the remaining baronets of the county were indignant +at their comrade’s misalliance. Never mind the +commoners, whom we will leave to grumble anonymously.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt did not care, as he said, a brass farden +for any one of them. He had his pretty Rose, and +what more need a man require than to please himself? +So he used to get drunk every night: to beat his pretty +Rose sometimes: to leave her in Hampshire when he went +to London for the parliamentary session, without a +single friend in the wide world. Even Mrs. Bute Crawley, +the Rector’s wife, refused to visit her, as +she said she would never give the pas to a tradesman’s +daughter.</p> + +<p>As the only endowments with which Nature had gifted +Lady Crawley were those of pink cheeks and a white +skin, and as she had no sort of character, nor talents, +nor opinions, nor occupations, nor amusements, nor +that vigour of soul and ferocity of temper which often +falls to the lot of entirely foolish women, her hold +upon Sir Pitt’s affections was not very great. + Her roses faded out of her cheeks, and the pretty +freshness left her figure after the birth of a couple +of children, and she became a mere machine in her husband’s +house of no more use than the late Lady Crawley’s +grand piano. Being a light-complexioned woman, she +wore light clothes, as most blondes will, and appeared, +in preference, in draggled sea-green, or slatternly +sky-blue. She worked that worsted day and night, or +other pieces like it. She had counterpanes in the +course of a few years to all the beds in Crawley. + She had a small flower-garden, for which she had +rather an affection; but beyond this no other like +or disliking. When her husband was rude to her she +was apathetic: whenever he struck her she cried. +She had not character enough to take to drinking, +and moaned about, slipshod and in curl-papers all +day. O Vanity Fair--Vanity Fair! This might have been, +but for you, a cheery lass--Peter Butt and Rose a +happy man and wife, in a snug farm, with a hearty +family; and an honest portion of pleasures, cares, +hopes and struggles--but a title and a coach and four +are toys more precious than happiness in Vanity Fair: +and if Harry the Eighth or Bluebeard were alive now, +and wanted a tenth wife, do you suppose he could not +get the prettiest girl that shall be presented this +season?</p> + +<p>The languid dulness of their mamma did not, as it +may be supposed, awaken much affection in her little +daughters, but they were very happy in the servants’ +hall and in the stables; and the Scotch gardener having +luckily a good wife and some good children, they got +a little wholesome society and instruction in his lodge, +which was the only education bestowed upon them until +Miss Sharp came.</p> + +<p>Her engagement was owing to the remonstrances of Mr. +Pitt Crawley, the only friend or protector Lady Crawley +ever had, and the only person, besides her children, +for whom she entertained a little feeble attachment. + Mr. Pitt took after the noble Binkies, from whom +he was descended, and was a very polite and proper +gentleman. When he grew to man’s estate, and +came back from Christchurch, he began to reform the +slackened discipline of the hall, in spite of his +father, who stood in awe of him. He was a man of such +rigid refinement, that he would have starved rather +than have dined without a white neckcloth. Once, +when just from college, and when Horrocks the butler +brought him a letter without placing it previously +on a tray, he gave that domestic a look, and administered +to him a speech so cutting, that Horrocks ever after +trembled before him; the whole household bowed to +him: Lady Crawley’s curl-papers came off earlier +when he was at home: Sir Pitt’s muddy gaiters +disappeared; and if that incorrigible old man still +adhered to other old habits, he never fuddled himself +with rum-and-water in his son’s presence, and +only talked to his servants in a very reserved and +polite manner; and those persons remarked that Sir +Pitt never swore at Lady Crawley while his son was +in the room.</p> + +<p>It was he who taught the butler to say, “My +lady is served,” and who insisted on handing +her ladyship in to dinner. He seldom spoke to her, +but when he did it was with the most powerful respect; +and he never let her quit the apartment without rising +in the most stately manner to open the door, and making +an elegant bow at her egress.</p> + +<p>At Eton he was called Miss Crawley; and there, I am +sorry to say, his younger brother Rawdon used to lick +him violently. But though his parts were not brilliant, +he made up for his lack of talent by meritorious industry, +and was never known, during eight years at school, +to be subject to that punishment which it is generally +thought none but a cherub can escape.</p> + +<p>At college his career was of course highly creditable. +And here he prepared himself for public life, into +which he was to be introduced by the patronage of +his grandfather, Lord Binkie, by studying the ancient +and modern orators with great assiduity, and by speaking +unceasingly at the debating societies. But though +he had a fine flux of words, and delivered his little +voice with great pomposity and pleasure to himself, +and never advanced any sentiment or opinion which +was not perfectly trite and stale, and supported by +a Latin quotation; yet he failed somehow, in spite +of a mediocrity which ought to have insured any man +a success. He did not even get the prize poem, which +all his friends said he was sure of.</p> + +<p>After leaving college he became Private Secretary +to Lord Binkie, and was then appointed Attache to +the Legation at Pumpernickel, which post he filled +with perfect honour, and brought home despatches, +consisting of Strasburg pie, to the Foreign Minister +of the day. After remaining ten years Attache (several +years after the lamented Lord Binkie’s demise), +and finding the advancement slow, he at length gave +up the diplomatic service in some disgust, and began +to turn country gentleman.</p> + +<p>He wrote a pamphlet on Malt on returning to England +(for he was an ambitious man, and always liked to +be before the public), and took a strong part in the +Negro Emancipation question. Then he became a friend +of Mr. Wilberforce’s, whose politics he admired, +and had that famous correspondence with the Reverend +Silas Hornblower, on the Ashantee Mission. He was +in London, if not for the Parliament session, at least +in May, for the religious meetings. In the country +he was a magistrate, and an active visitor and speaker +among those destitute of religious instruction. He +was said to be paying his addresses to Lady Jane Sheepshanks, +Lord Southdown’s third daughter, and whose sister, +Lady Emily, wrote those sweet tracts, “The Sailor’s +True Binnacle,” and “The Applewoman of +Finchley Common.”</p> + +<p>Miss Sharp’s accounts of his employment at Queen’s +Crawley were not caricatures. He subjected the servants +there to the devotional exercises before mentioned, +in which (and so much the better) he brought his father +to join. He patronised an Independent meeting-house +in Crawley parish, much to the indignation of his uncle +the Rector, and to the consequent delight of Sir Pitt, +who was induced to go himself once or twice, which +occasioned some violent sermons at Crawley parish +church, directed point-blank at the Baronet’s +old Gothic pew there. Honest Sir Pitt, however, did +not feel the force of these discourses, as he always +took his nap during sermon-time.</p> + +<p>Mr. Crawley was very earnest, for the good of the +nation and of the Christian world, that the old gentleman +should yield him up his place in Parliament; but this +the elder constantly refused to do. Both were of course +too prudent to give up the fifteen hundred a year +which was brought in by the second seat (at this period +filled by Mr. Quadroon, with carte blanche on the +Slave question); indeed the family estate was much +embarrassed, and the income drawn from the borough +was of great use to the house of Queen’s Crawley.</p> + +<p>It had never recovered the heavy fine imposed upon +Walpole Crawley, first baronet, for peculation in +the Tape and Sealing Wax Office. Sir Walpole was a +jolly fellow, eager to seize and to spend money (alieni +appetens, sui profusus, as Mr. Crawley would remark +with a sigh), and in his day beloved by all the county +for the constant drunkenness and hospitality which +was maintained at Queen’s Crawley. The cellars +were filled with burgundy then, the kennels with hounds, +and the stables with gallant hunters; now, such horses +as Queen’s Crawley possessed went to plough, +or ran in the Trafalgar Coach; and it was with a team +of these very horses, on an off-day, that Miss Sharp +was brought to the Hall; for boor as he was, Sir Pitt +was a stickler for his dignity while at home, and +seldom drove out but with four horses, and though +he dined off boiled mutton, had always three footmen +to serve it.</p> + +<p>If mere parsimony could have made a man rich, Sir +Pitt Crawley might have become very wealthy--if he +had been an attorney in a country town, with no capital +but his brains, it is very possible that he would +have turned them to good account, and might have achieved +for himself a very considerable influence and competency. +But he was unluckily endowed with a good name and +a large though encumbered estate, both of which went +rather to injure than to advance him. He had a taste +for law, which cost him many thousands yearly; and +being a great deal too clever to be robbed, as he +said, by any single agent, allowed his affairs to +be mismanaged by a dozen, whom he all equally mistrusted. +He was such a sharp landlord, that he could hardly +find any but bankrupt tenants; and such a close farmer, +as to grudge almost the seed to the ground, whereupon +revengeful Nature grudged him the crops which she +granted to more liberal husbandmen. He speculated +in every possible way; he worked mines; bought canal-shares; +horsed coaches; took government contracts, and was +the busiest man and magistrate of his county. As +he would not pay honest agents at his granite quarry, +he had the satisfaction of finding that four overseers +ran away, and took fortunes with them to America. + For want of proper precautions, his coal-mines filled +with water: the government flung his contract of damaged +beef upon his hands: and for his coach-horses, every +mail proprietor in the kingdom knew that he lost more +horses than any man in the country, from underfeeding +and buying cheap. In disposition he was sociable, +and far from being proud; nay, he rather preferred +the society of a farmer or a horse-dealer to that +of a gentleman, like my lord, his son: he was fond +of drink, of swearing, of joking with the farmers’ +daughters: he was never known to give away a shilling +or to do a good action, but was of a pleasant, sly, +laughing mood, and would cut his joke and drink his +glass with a tenant and sell him up the next day; +or have his laugh with the poacher he was transporting +with equal good humour. His politeness for the fair +sex has already been hinted at by Miss Rebecca Sharp--in +a word, the whole baronetage, peerage, commonage of +England, did not contain a more cunning, mean, selfish, +foolish, disreputable old man. That blood-red hand +of Sir Pitt Crawley’s would be in anybody’s +pocket except his own; and it is with grief and pain, +that, as admirers of the British aristocracy, we find +ourselves obliged to admit the existence of so many +ill qualities in a person whose name is in Debrett.</p> + +<p>One great cause why Mr. Crawley had such a hold over +the affections of his father, resulted from money +arrangements. The Baronet owed his son a sum of money +out of the jointure of his mother, which he did not +find it convenient to pay; indeed he had an almost +invincible repugnance to paying anybody, and could +only be brought by force to discharge his debts. +Miss Sharp calculated (for she became, as we shall +hear speedily, inducted into most of the secrets of +the family) that the mere payment of his creditors +cost the honourable Baronet several hundreds yearly; +but this was a delight he could not forego; he had +a savage pleasure in making the poor wretches wait, +and in shifting from court to court and from term to +term the period of satisfaction. What’s the +good of being in Parliament, he said, if you must +pay your debts? Hence, indeed, his position as a senator +was not a little useful to him.</p> + +<p>Vanity Fair--Vanity Fair! Here was a man, who could +not spell, and did not care to read--who had the habits +and the cunning of a boor: whose aim in life was pettifogging: +who never had a taste, or emotion, or enjoyment, but +what was sordid and foul; and yet he had rank, and +honours, and power, somehow: and was a dignitary of +the land, and a pillar of the state. He was high +sheriff, and rode in a golden coach. Great ministers +and statesmen courted him; and in Vanity Fair he had +a higher place than the most brilliant genius or spotless +virtue.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt had an unmarried half-sister who inherited +her mother’s large fortune, and though the Baronet +proposed to borrow this money of her on mortgage, +Miss Crawley declined the offer, and preferred the +security of the funds. She had signified, however, +her intention of leaving her inheritance between Sir +Pitt’s second son and the family at the Rectory, +and had once or twice paid the debts of Rawdon Crawley +in his career at college and in the army. Miss Crawley +was, in consequence, an object of great respect when +she came to Queen’s Crawley, for she had a balance +at her banker’s which would have made her beloved +anywhere.</p> + +<p>What a dignity it gives an old lady, that balance +at the banker’s! How tenderly we look at her +faults if she is a relative (and may every reader +have a score of such), what a kind good-natured old +creature we find her! How the junior partner of Hobbs +and Dobbs leads her smiling to the carriage with the +lozenge upon it, and the fat wheezy coachman! How, +when she comes to pay us a visit, we generally find +an opportunity to let our friends know her station +in the world! We say (and with perfect truth) I wish +I had Miss MacWhirter’s signature to a cheque +for five thousand pounds. She wouldn’t miss +it, says your wife. She is my aunt, say you, in an +easy careless way, when your friend asks if Miss MacWhirter +is any relative. Your wife is perpetually sending +her little testimonies of affection, your little girls +work endless worsted baskets, cushions, and footstools +for her. What a good fire there is in her room when +she comes to pay you a visit, although your wife laces +her stays without one! The house during her stay +assumes a festive, neat, warm, jovial, snug appearance +not visible at other seasons. You yourself, dear sir, +forget to go to sleep after dinner, and find yourself +all of a sudden (though you invariably lose) very fond +of a rubber. What good dinners you have--game every +day, Malmsey-Madeira, and no end of fish from London. + Even the servants in the kitchen share in the general +prosperity; and, somehow, during the stay of Miss +MacWhirter’s fat coachman, the beer is grown +much stronger, and the consumption of tea and sugar +in the nursery (where her maid takes her meals) is +not regarded in the least. Is it so, or is it not +so? I appeal to the middle classes. Ah, gracious +powers! I wish you would send me an old aunt--a maiden +aunt--an aunt with a lozenge on her carriage, and +a front of light coffee-coloured hair--how my children +should work workbags for her, and my Julia and I would +make her comfortable! Sweet--sweet vision! Foolish--foolish +dream!</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter X</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Miss Sharp Begins to Make Friends</h4> + +<p>And now, being received as a member of the amiable +family whose portraits we have sketched in the foregoing +pages, it became naturally Rebecca’s duty to +make herself, as she said, agreeable to her benefactors, +and to gain their confidence to the utmost of her +power. Who can but admire this quality of gratitude +in an unprotected orphan; and, if there entered some +degree of selfishness into her calculations, who can +say but that her prudence was perfectly justifiable? + “I am alone in the world,” said the friendless +girl. “I have nothing to look for but what my +own labour can bring me; and while that little pink-faced +chit Amelia, with not half my sense, has ten thousand +pounds and an establishment secure, poor Rebecca (and +my figure is far better than hers) has only herself +and her own wits to trust to. Well, let us see if +my wits cannot provide me with an honourable maintenance, +and if some day or the other I cannot show Miss Amelia +my real superiority over her. Not that I dislike poor +Amelia: who can dislike such a harmless, good-natured +creature?--only it will be a fine day when I can take +my place above her in the world, as why, indeed, should +I not?” Thus it was that our little romantic +friend formed visions of the future for herself--nor +must we be scandalised that, in all her castles in +the air, a husband was the principal inhabitant. Of +what else have young ladies to think, but husbands? +Of what else do their dear mammas think? “I +must be my own mamma,” said Rebecca; not without +a tingling consciousness of defeat, as she thought +over her little misadventure with Jos Sedley.</p> + +<p>So she wisely determined to render her position with +the Queen’s Crawley family comfortable and secure, +and to this end resolved to make friends of every +one around her who could at all interfere with her +comfort.</p> + +<p>As my Lady Crawley was not one of these personages, +and a woman, moreover, so indolent and void of character +as not to be of the least consequence in her own house, +Rebecca soon found that it was not at all necessary +to cultivate her good will--indeed, impossible to +gain it. She used to talk to her pupils about their +“poor mamma”; and, though she treated +that lady with every demonstration of cool respect, +it was to the rest of the family that she wisely directed +the chief part of her attentions.</p> + +<p>With the young people, whose applause she thoroughly +gained, her method was pretty simple. She did not +pester their young brains with too much learning, +but, on the contrary, let them have their own way +in regard to educating themselves; for what instruction +is more effectual than self-instruction? The eldest +was rather fond of books, and as there was in the +old library at Queen’s Crawley a considerable +provision of works of light literature of the last +century, both in the French and English languages (they +had been purchased by the Secretary of the Tape and +Sealing Wax Office at the period of his disgrace), +and as nobody ever troubled the book-shelves but +herself, Rebecca was enabled agreeably, and, as it +were, in playing, to impart a great deal of instruction +to Miss Rose Crawley.</p> + +<p>She and Miss Rose thus read together many delightful +French and English works, among which may be mentioned +those of the learned Dr. Smollett, of the ingenious +Mr. Henry Fielding, of the graceful and fantastic +Monsieur Crebillon the younger, whom our immortal poet +Gray so much admired, and of the universal Monsieur +de Voltaire. Once, when Mr. Crawley asked what the +young people were reading, the governess replied “Smollett.” +“Oh, Smollett,” said Mr. Crawley, quite +satisfied. “His history is more dull, but by +no means so dangerous as that of Mr. Hume. It is +history you are reading?” “Yes,” +said Miss Rose; without, however, adding that it was +the history of Mr. Humphrey Clinker. On another occasion +he was rather scandalised at finding his sister with +a book of French plays; but as the governess remarked +that it was for the purpose of acquiring the French +idiom in conversation, he was fain to be content. +Mr. Crawley, as a diplomatist, was exceedingly proud +of his own skill in speaking the French language (for +he was of the world still), and not a little pleased +with the compliments which the governess continually +paid him upon his proficiency.</p> + +<p>Miss Violet’s tastes were, on the contrary, +more rude and boisterous than those of her sister. + She knew the sequestered spots where the hens laid +their eggs. She could climb a tree to rob the nests +of the feathered songsters of their speckled spoils. + And her pleasure was to ride the young colts, and +to scour the plains like Camilla. She was the favourite +of her father and of the stablemen. She was the darling, +and withal the terror of the cook; for she discovered +the haunts of the jam-pots, and would attack them when +they were within her reach. She and her sister were +engaged in constant battles. Any of which peccadilloes, +if Miss Sharp discovered, she did not tell them to +Lady Crawley; who would have told them to the father, +or worse, to Mr. Crawley; but promised not to tell +if Miss Violet would be a good girl and love her governess.</p> + +<p>With Mr. Crawley Miss Sharp was respectful and obedient. + She used to consult him on passages of French which +she could not understand, though her mother was a +Frenchwoman, and which he would construe to her satisfaction: +and, besides giving her his aid in profane literature, +he was kind enough to select for her books of a more +serious tendency, and address to her much of his conversation. + She admired, beyond measure, his speech at the Quashimaboo-Aid +Society; took an interest in his pamphlet on malt: +was often affected, even to tears, by his discourses +of an evening, and would say--"Oh, thank you, sir,” +with a sigh, and a look up to heaven, that made him +occasionally condescend to shake hands with her. “Blood +is everything, after all,” would that aristocratic +religionist say. “How Miss Sharp is awakened +by my words, when not one of the people here is touched. + I am too fine for them--too delicate. I must familiarise +my style--but she understands it. Her mother was a +Montmorency.”</p> + +<p>Indeed it was from this famous family, as it appears, +that Miss Sharp, by the mother’s side, was descended. +Of course she did not say that her mother had been +on the stage; it would have shocked Mr. Crawley’s +religious scruples. How many noble emigres had this +horrid revolution plunged in poverty! She had several +stories about her ancestors ere she had been many +months in the house; some of which Mr. Crawley happened +to find in D’Hozier’s dictionary, which +was in the library, and which strengthened his belief +in their truth, and in the high-breeding of Rebecca. + Are we to suppose from this curiosity and prying +into dictionaries, could our heroine suppose that +Mr. Crawley was interested in her?--no, only in a +friendly way. Have we not stated that he was attached +to Lady Jane Sheepshanks?</p> + +<p>He took Rebecca to task once or twice about the propriety +of playing at backgammon with Sir Pitt, saying that +it was a godless amusement, and that she would be +much better engaged in reading “Thrump’s +Legacy,” or “The Blind Washerwoman of Moorfields,” +or any work of a more serious nature; but Miss Sharp +said her dear mother used often to play the same game +with the old Count de Trictrac and the venerable Abbe +du Cornet, and so found an excuse for this and other +worldly amusements.</p> + +<p>But it was not only by playing at backgammon with +the Baronet, that the little governess rendered herself +agreeable to her employer. She found many different +ways of being useful to him. She read over, with +indefatigable patience, all those law papers, with +which, before she came to Queen’s Crawley, he +had promised to entertain her. She volunteered to +copy many of his letters, and adroitly altered the +spelling of them so as to suit the usages of the present +day. She became interested in everything appertaining +to the estate, to the farm, the park, the garden, +and the stables; and so delightful a companion was +she, that the Baronet would seldom take his after-breakfast +walk without her (and the children of course), when +she would give her advice as to the trees which were +to be lopped in the shrubberies, the garden-beds to +be dug, the crops which were to be cut, the horses +which were to go to cart or plough. Before she had +been a year at Queen’s Crawley she had quite +won the Baronet’s confidence; and the conversation +at the dinner-table, which before used to be held +between him and Mr. Horrocks the butler, was now almost +exclusively between Sir Pitt and Miss Sharp. She was +almost mistress of the house when Mr. Crawley was absent, +but conducted herself in her new and exalted situation +with such circumspection and modesty as not to offend +the authorities of the kitchen and stable, among whom +her behaviour was always exceedingly modest and affable. + She was quite a different person from the haughty, +shy, dissatisfied little girl whom we have known previously, +and this change of temper proved great prudence, a +sincere desire of amendment, or at any rate great moral +courage on her part. Whether it was the heart which +dictated this new system of complaisance and humility +adopted by our Rebecca, is to be proved by her after-history. + A system of hypocrisy, which lasts through whole +years, is one seldom satisfactorily practised by a +person of one-and-twenty; however, our readers will +recollect, that, though young in years, our heroine +was old in life and experience, and we have written +to no purpose if they have not discovered that she +was a very clever woman.</p> + +<p>The elder and younger son of the house of Crawley +were, like the gentleman and lady in the weather-box, +never at home together--they hated each other cordially: +indeed, Rawdon Crawley, the dragoon, had a great contempt +for the establishment altogether, and seldom came +thither except when his aunt paid her annual visit.</p> + +<p>The great good quality of this old lady has been mentioned. + She possessed seventy thousand pounds, and had almost +adopted Rawdon. She disliked her elder nephew exceedingly, +and despised him as a milksop. In return he did not +hesitate to state that her soul was irretrievably +lost, and was of opinion that his brother’s chance +in the next world was not a whit better. “She +is a godless woman of the world,” would Mr. +Crawley say; “she lives with atheists and Frenchmen. + My mind shudders when I think of her awful, awful +situation, and that, near as she is to the grave, she +should be so given up to vanity, licentiousness, profaneness, +and folly.” In fact, the old lady declined altogether +to hear his hour’s lecture of an evening; and +when she came to Queen’s Crawley alone, he was +obliged to pretermit his usual devotional exercises.</p> + +<p>“Shut up your sarmons, Pitt, when Miss Crawley +comes down,” said his father; “she has +written to say that she won’t stand the preachifying.”</p> + +<p>“O, sir! consider the servants.”</p> + +<p>“The servants be hanged,” said Sir Pitt; +and his son thought even worse would happen were they +deprived of the benefit of his instruction.</p> + +<p>“Why, hang it, Pitt!” said the father +to his remonstrance. “You wouldn’t be +such a flat as to let three thousand a year go out +of the family?”</p> + +<p>“What is money compared to our souls, sir?” +continued Mr. Crawley.</p> + +<p>“You mean that the old lady won’t leave +the money to you?"--and who knows but it was Mr. Crawley’s +meaning?</p> + +<p>Old Miss Crawley was certainly one of the reprobate. +She had a snug little house in Park Lane, and, as +she ate and drank a great deal too much during the +season in London, she went to Harrowgate or Cheltenham +for the summer. She was the most hospitable and jovial +of old vestals, and had been a beauty in her day, she +said. (All old women were beauties once, we very well +know.) She was a bel esprit, and a dreadful Radical +for those days. She had been in France (where St. +Just, they say, inspired her with an unfortunate passion), +and loved, ever after, French novels, French cookery, +and French wines. She read Voltaire, and had Rousseau +by heart; talked very lightly about divorce, and most +energetically of the rights of women. She had pictures +of Mr. Fox in every room in the house: when that statesman +was in opposition, I am not sure that she had not +flung a main with him; and when he came into office, +she took great credit for bringing over to him Sir +Pitt and his colleague for Queen’s Crawley, +although Sir Pitt would have come over himself, without +any trouble on the honest lady’s part. It is +needless to say that Sir Pitt was brought to change +his views after the death of the great Whig statesman.</p> + +<p>This worthy old lady took a fancy to Rawdon Crawley +when a boy, sent him to Cambridge (in opposition to +his brother at Oxford), and, when the young man was +requested by the authorities of the first-named University +to quit after a residence of two years, she bought +him his commission in the Life Guards Green.</p> + +<p>A perfect and celebrated “blood,” or dandy +about town, was this young officer. Boxing, rat-hunting, +the fives court, and four-in-hand driving were then +the fashion of our British aristocracy; and he was +an adept in all these noble sciences. And though he +belonged to the household troops, who, as it was their +duty to rally round the Prince Regent, had not shown +their valour in foreign service yet, Rawdon Crawley +had already (apropos of play, of which he was immoderately +fond) fought three bloody duels, in which he gave ample +proofs of his contempt for death.</p> + +<p>“And for what follows after death,” would +Mr. Crawley observe, throwing his gooseberry-coloured +eyes up to the ceiling. He was always thinking of +his brother’s soul, or of the souls of those +who differed with him in opinion: it is a sort of +comfort which many of the serious give themselves.</p> + +<p>Silly, romantic Miss Crawley, far from being horrified +at the courage of her favourite, always used to pay +his debts after his duels; and would not listen to +a word that was whispered against his morality. “He +will sow his wild oats,” she would say, “and +is worth far more than that puling hypocrite of a +brother of his.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Arcadian Simplicity</h4> + +<p>Besides these honest folks at the Hall (whose simplicity +and sweet rural purity surely show the advantage of +a country life over a town one), we must introduce +the reader to their relatives and neighbours at the +Rectory, Bute Crawley and his wife.</p> + +<p>The Reverend Bute Crawley was a tall, stately, jolly, +shovel-hatted man, far more popular in his county +than the Baronet his brother. At college he pulled +stroke-oar in the Christchurch boat, and had thrashed +all the best bruisers of the “town.” He +carried his taste for boxing and athletic exercises +into private life; there was not a fight within twenty +miles at which he was not present, nor a race, nor +a coursing match, nor a regatta, nor a ball, nor an +election, nor a visitation dinner, nor indeed a good +dinner in the whole county, but he found means to +attend it. You might see his bay mare and gig-lamps +a score of miles away from his Rectory House, whenever +there was any dinner-party at Fuddleston, or at Roxby, +or at Wapshot Hall, or at the great lords of the county, +with all of whom he was intimate. He had a fine voice; +sang “A southerly wind and a cloudy sky”; +and gave the “whoop” in chorus with general +applause. He rode to hounds in a pepper-and-salt +frock, and was one of the best fishermen in the county.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crawley, the rector’s wife, was a smart +little body, who wrote this worthy divine’s +sermons. Being of a domestic turn, and keeping the +house a great deal with her daughters, she ruled absolutely +within the Rectory, wisely giving her husband full +liberty without. He was welcome to come and go, and +dine abroad as many days as his fancy dictated, for +Mrs. Crawley was a saving woman and knew the price +of port wine. Ever since Mrs. Bute carried off the +young Rector of Queen’s Crawley (she was of +a good family, daughter of the late Lieut.-Colonel +Hector McTavish, and she and her mother played for +Bute and won him at Harrowgate), she had been a prudent +and thrifty wife to him. In spite of her care, however, +he was always in debt. It took him at least ten years +to pay off his college bills contracted during his +father’s lifetime. In the year 179-, when he +was just clear of these incumbrances, he gave the odds +of 100 to 1 (in twenties) against Kangaroo, who won +the Derby. The Rector was obliged to take up the +money at a ruinous interest, and had been struggling +ever since. His sister helped him with a hundred +now and then, but of course his great hope was in her +death--when “hang it” (as he would say), +“Matilda must leave me half her money.”</p> + +<p>So that the Baronet and his brother had every reason +which two brothers possibly can have for being by +the ears. Sir Pitt had had the better of Bute in +innumerable family transactions. Young Pitt not only +did not hunt, but set up a meeting house under his +uncle’s very nose. Rawdon, it was known, was +to come in for the bulk of Miss Crawley’s property. + These money transactions--these speculations in life +and death--these silent battles for reversionary spoil--make +brothers very loving towards each other in Vanity Fair. + I, for my part, have known a five-pound note to interpose +and knock up a half century’s attachment between +two brethren; and can’t but admire, as I think +what a fine and durable thing Love is among worldly +people.</p> + +<p>It cannot be supposed that the arrival of such a personage +as Rebecca at Queen’s Crawley, and her gradual +establishment in the good graces of all people there, +could be unremarked by Mrs. Bute Crawley. Mrs. Bute, +who knew how many days the sirloin of beef lasted +at the Hall; how much linen was got ready at the great +wash; how many peaches were on the south wall; how +many doses her ladyship took when she was ill--for +such points are matters of intense interest to certain +persons in the country--Mrs. Bute, I say, could not +pass over the Hall governess without making every inquiry +respecting her history and character. There was always +the best understanding between the servants at the +Rectory and the Hall. There was always a good glass +of ale in the kitchen of the former place for the +Hall people, whose ordinary drink was very small--and, +indeed, the Rector’s lady knew exactly how much +malt went to every barrel of Hall beer--ties of relationship +existed between the Hall and Rectory domestics, as +between their masters; and through these channels +each family was perfectly well acquainted with the +doings of the other. That, by the way, may be set +down as a general remark. When you and your brother +are friends, his doings are indifferent to you. When +you have quarrelled, all his outgoings and incomings +you know, as if you were his spy.</p> + +<p>Very soon then after her arrival, Rebecca began to +take a regular place in Mrs. Crawley’s bulletin +from the Hall. It was to this effect: “The black +porker’s killed--weighed x stone--salted the +sides--pig’s pudding and leg of pork for dinner. + Mr. Cramp from Mudbury, over with Sir Pitt about +putting John Blackmore in gaol-- Mr. Pitt at meeting +(with all the names of the people who attended)- -my +lady as usual--the young ladies with the governess.”</p> + +<p>Then the report would come--the new governess be a +rare manager--Sir Pitt be very sweet on her--Mr. Crawley +too--He be reading tracts to her--"What an abandoned +wretch!” said little, eager, active, black-faced +Mrs. Bute Crawley.</p> + +<p>Finally, the reports were that the governess had “come +round” everybody, wrote Sir Pitt’s letters, +did his business, managed his accounts--had the upper +hand of the whole house, my lady, Mr. Crawley, the +girls and all--at which Mrs. Crawley declared she was +an artful hussy, and had some dreadful designs in view. + Thus the doings at the Hall were the great food for +conversation at the Rectory, and Mrs. Bute’s +bright eyes spied out everything that took place in +the enemy’s camp--everything and a great deal +besides.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bute Crawley to Miss Pinkerton, The Mall, Chiswick.</p> + +<p>Rectory, Queen’s Crawley, December--.</p> + +<p>My Dear Madam,--Although it is so many years since +I profited by your delightful and invaluable instructions, +yet I have ever retained the <i>fondest</i> and most +reverential regard for Miss Pinkerton, and <i>dear</i> +Chiswick. I hope your health is <i>good</i>. The world +and the cause of education cannot afford to lose Miss +Pinkerton for <i>many many years</i>. When +my friend, Lady Fuddleston, mentioned that her dear +girls required an instructress (I am too poor to engage +a governess for mine, but was I not educated at Chiswick?)--"Who,” +I exclaimed, “can we consult but the excellent, +the incomparable Miss Pinkerton?” In a word, +have you, dear madam, any ladies on your list, whose +services might be made available to my kind friend +and neighbour? I assure you she will take no governess +<i>but of your choosing</i>.</p> + +<p>My dear husband is pleased to say that he likes <i>everything which comes from miss Pinkerton’s school</i>. How I wish I could present him and my +beloved girls to the friend of my youth, and the <i>admired</i> +of the great lexicographer of our country! If you +ever travel into Hampshire, Mr. Crawley begs me to +say, he hopes you will adorn our <i>rural Rectory</i> +with your presence. ’Tis the humble but happy +home of</p> + +<p>Your affectionate Martha Crawley</p> + +<p>P.S. Mr. Crawley’s brother, the baronet, with +whom we are not, alas! upon those terms of UNITY in +which it <i>becomes brethren to dwell</i>, +has a governess for his little girls, who, I am told, +had the good fortune to be educated at Chiswick. +I hear various reports of her; and as I have the tenderest +interest in my dearest little nieces, whom I wish, +in spite of family differences, to see among my own +children--and as I long to be attentive to <i>any pupil of yours</i>-- do, my dear Miss Pinkerton, +tell me the history of this young lady, whom, for +<i>your sake</i>, I am most anxious to befriend.--M. +C.</p> + +<p>Miss Pinkerton to Mrs. Bute Crawley.</p> + +<p>Johnson House, Chiswick, Dec. 18--.</p> + +<p>Dear Madam,--I have the honour to acknowledge your +polite communication, to which I promptly reply. ’Tis +most gratifying to one in my most arduous position +to find that my maternal cares have elicited a responsive +affection; and to recognize in the amiable Mrs. Bute +Crawley my excellent pupil of former years, the sprightly +and accomplished Miss Martha MacTavish. I am happy +to have under my charge now the daughters of many +of those who were your contemporaries at my establishment--what +pleasure it would give me if your own beloved young +ladies had need of my instructive superintendence!</p> + +<p>Presenting my respectful compliments to Lady Fuddleston, +I have the honour (epistolarily) to introduce to her +ladyship my two friends, Miss Tuffin and Miss Hawky.</p> + +<p>Either of these young ladies is <i>perfectly</i> QUALIFIED +to instruct in Greek, Latin, and the rudiments of +Hebrew; in mathematics and history; in Spanish, French, +Italian, and geography; in music, vocal and instrumental; +in dancing, without the aid of a master; and in the +elements of natural sciences. In the use of the globes +both are proficients. In addition to these Miss Tuffin, +who is daughter of the late Reverend Thomas Tuffin +(Fellow of Corpus College, Cambridge), can instruct +in the Syriac language, and the elements of Constitutional +law. But as she is only eighteen years of age, and +of exceedingly pleasing personal appearance, perhaps +this young lady may be objectionable in Sir Huddleston +Fuddleston’s family.</p> + +<p>Miss Letitia Hawky, on the other hand, is not personally +well-favoured. She is-twenty-nine; her face is much +pitted with the small-pox. She has a halt in her +gait, red hair, and a trifling obliquity of vision. + Both ladies are endowed with <i>every moral and religious virtue</i>. Their terms, +of course, are such as their accomplishments merit. + With my most grateful respects to the Reverend Bute +Crawley, I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p>Dear Madam,</p> + +<p>Your most faithful and obedient servant, Barbara Pinkerton.</p> + +<p>P.S. The Miss Sharp, whom you mention as governess +to Sir Pitt Crawley, Bart., M.P., was a pupil of mine, +and I have nothing to say in her disfavour. Though +her appearance is disagreeable, we cannot control +the operations of nature: and though her parents were +disreputable (her father being a painter, several times +bankrupt, and her mother, as I have since learned, +with horror, a dancer at the Opera); yet her talents +are considerable, and I cannot regret that I received +her <i>out of charity</i>. My dread is, lest +the principles of the mother--who was represented +to me as a French Countess, forced to emigrate in +the late revolutionary horrors; but who, as I have +since found, was a person of the very lowest order +and morals--should at any time prove to be <i>hereditary</i> +in the unhappy young woman whom I took as <i>an</i> +OUTCAST. But her principles have hitherto been correct +(I believe), and I am sure nothing will occur to injure +them in the elegant and refined circle of the eminent +Sir Pitt Crawley.</p> + +<p>Miss Rebecca Sharp to Miss Amelia Sedley.</p> + +<p>I have not written to my beloved Amelia for these +many weeks past, for what news was there to tell of +the sayings and doings at Humdrum Hall, as I have +christened it; and what do you care whether the turnip +crop is good or bad; whether the fat pig weighed thirteen +stone or fourteen; and whether the beasts thrive well +upon mangelwurzel? Every day since I last wrote has +been like its neighbour. Before breakfast, a walk +with Sir Pitt and his spud; after breakfast studies +(such as they are) in the schoolroom; after schoolroom, +reading and writing about lawyers, leases, coal-mines, +canals, with Sir Pitt (whose secretary I am become); +after dinner, Mr. Crawley’s discourses on the +baronet’s backgammon; during both of which amusements +my lady looks on with equal placidity. She has become +rather more interesting by being ailing of late, which +has brought a new visitor to the Hall, in the person +of a young doctor. Well, my dear, young women need +never despair. The young doctor gave a certain friend +of yours to understand that, if she chose to be Mrs. +Glauber, she was welcome to ornament the surgery! I +told his impudence that the gilt pestle and mortar +was quite ornament enough; as if I was born, indeed, +to be a country surgeon’s wife! Mr. Glauber +went home seriously indisposed at his rebuff, took +a cooling draught, and is now quite cured. Sir Pitt +applauded my resolution highly; he would be sorry +to lose his little secretary, I think; and I believe +the old wretch likes me as much as it is in his nature +to like any one. Marry, indeed! and with a country +apothecary, after-- No, no, one cannot so soon forget +old associations, about which I will talk no more. + Let us return to Humdrum Hall.</p> + +<p>For some time past it is Humdrum Hall no longer. My +dear, Miss Crawley has arrived with her fat horses, +fat servants, fat spaniel-- the great rich Miss Crawley, +with seventy thousand pounds in the five per cents., +whom, or I had better say <i>which</i>, her two brothers +adore. She looks very apoplectic, the dear soul; no +wonder her brothers are anxious about her. You should +see them struggling to settle her cushions, or to +hand her coffee! “When I come into the country,” +she says (for she has a great deal of humour), “I +leave my toady, Miss Briggs, at home. My brothers +are my toadies here, my dear, and a pretty pair they +are!”</p> + +<p>When she comes into the country our hall is thrown +open, and for a month, at least, you would fancy old +Sir Walpole was come to life again. We have dinner-parties, +and drive out in the coach-and-four the footmen put +on their newest canary-coloured liveries; we drink +claret and champagne as if we were accustomed to it +every day. We have wax candles in the schoolroom, +and fires to warm ourselves with. Lady Crawley is +made to put on the brightest pea-green in her wardrobe, +and my pupils leave off their thick shoes and tight +old tartan pelisses, and wear silk stockings and muslin +frocks, as fashionable baronets’ daughters should. + Rose came in yesterday in a sad plight--the Wiltshire +sow (an enormous pet of hers) ran her down, and destroyed +a most lovely flowered lilac silk dress by dancing +over it--had this happened a week ago, Sir Pitt would +have sworn frightfully, have boxed the poor wretch’s +ears, and put her upon bread and water for a month. + All he said was, “I’ll serve you out, +Miss, when your aunt’s gone,” and laughed +off the accident as quite trivial. Let us hope his +wrath will have passed away before Miss Crawley’s +departure. I hope so, for Miss Rose’s sake, +I am sure. What a charming reconciler and peacemaker +money is!</p> + +<p>Another admirable effect of Miss Crawley and her seventy +thousand pounds is to be seen in the conduct of the +two brothers Crawley. I mean the baronet and the +rector, not <i>our</i> brothers--but the former, who +hate each other all the year round, become quite loving +at Christmas. I wrote to you last year how the abominable +horse-racing rector was in the habit of preaching +clumsy sermons at us at church, and how Sir Pitt snored +in answer. When Miss Crawley arrives there is no +such thing as quarrelling heard of--the Hall visits +the Rectory, and vice versa--the parson and the Baronet +talk about the pigs and the poachers, and the county +business, in the most affable manner, and without +quarrelling in their cups, I believe--indeed Miss +Crawley won’t hear of their quarrelling, and +vows that she will leave her money to the Shropshire +Crawleys if they offend her. If they were clever +people, those Shropshire Crawleys, they might have +it all, I think; but the Shropshire Crawley is a clergyman +like his Hampshire cousin, and mortally offended Miss +Crawley (who had fled thither in a fit of rage against +her impracticable brethren) by some strait-laced notions +of morality. He would have prayers in the house, +I believe.</p> + +<p>Our sermon books are shut up when Miss Crawley arrives, +and Mr. Pitt, whom she abominates, finds it convenient +to go to town. On the other hand, the young dandy--"blood,” +I believe, is the term-- Captain Crawley makes his +appearance, and I suppose you will like to know what +sort of a person he is.</p> + +<p>Well, he is a very large young dandy. He is six feet +high, and speaks with a great voice; and swears a +great deal; and orders about the servants, who all +adore him nevertheless; for he is very generous of +his money, and the domestics will do anything for him. +Last week the keepers almost killed a bailiff and his +man who came down from London to arrest the Captain, +and who were found lurking about the Park wall--they +beat them, ducked them, and were going to shoot them +for poachers, but the baronet interfered.</p> + +<p>The Captain has a hearty contempt for his father, +I can see, and calls him an old <i>put</i>, an old <i>Snob</i>, +an old CHAW-BACON, and numberless other pretty names. + He has a <i>dreadful reputation</i> among the ladies. +He brings his hunters home with him, lives with the +Squires of the county, asks whom he pleases to dinner, +and Sir Pitt dares not say no, for fear of offending +Miss Crawley, and missing his legacy when she dies +of her apoplexy. Shall I tell you a compliment the +Captain paid me? I must, it is so pretty. One evening +we actually had a dance; there was Sir Huddleston +Fuddleston and his family, Sir Giles Wapshot and his +young ladies, and I don’t know how many more. + Well, I heard him say--"By Jove, she’s a neat +little filly!” meaning your humble servant; +and he did me the honour to dance two country-dances +with me. He gets on pretty gaily with the young Squires, +with whom he drinks, bets, rides, and talks about +hunting and shooting; but he says the country girls +are BORES; indeed, I don’t think he is far wrong. +You should see the contempt with which they look down +on poor me! When they dance I sit and play the piano +very demurely; but the other night, coming in rather +flushed from the dining-room, and seeing me employed +in this way, he swore out loud that I was the best +dancer in the room, and took a great oath that he would +have the fiddlers from Mudbury.</p> + +<p>“I’ll go and play a country-dance,” +said Mrs. Bute Crawley, very readily (she is a little, +black-faced old woman in a turban, rather crooked, +and with very twinkling eyes); and after the Captain +and your poor little Rebecca had performed a dance +together, do you know she actually did me the honour +to compliment me upon my steps! Such a thing was never +heard of before; the proud Mrs. Bute Crawley, first +cousin to the Earl of Tiptoff, who won’t condescend +to visit Lady Crawley, except when her sister is in +the country. Poor Lady Crawley! during most part +of these gaieties, she is upstairs taking pills.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bute has all of a sudden taken a great fancy +to me. “My dear Miss Sharp,” she says, +“why not bring over your girls to the Rectory?--their +cousins will be so happy to see them.” I know +what she means. Signor Clementi did not teach us +the piano for nothing; at which price Mrs. Bute hopes +to get a professor for her children. I can see through +her schemes, as though she told them to me; but I +shall go, as I am determined to make myself agreeable--is +it not a poor governess’s duty, who has not +a friend or protector in the world? The Rector’s +wife paid me a score of compliments about the progress +my pupils made, and thought, no doubt, to touch my +heart-- poor, simple, country soul!--as if I cared +a fig about my pupils!</p> + +<p>Your India muslin and your pink silk, dearest Amelia, +are said to become me very well. They are a good +deal worn now; but, you know, we poor girls can’t +afford des fraiches toilettes. Happy, happy you! +who have but to drive to St. James’s Street, +and a dear mother who will give you any thing you +ask. Farewell, dearest girl,</p> + +<p>Your affectionate Rebecca.</p> + +<p>P.S.--I wish you could have seen the faces of the +Miss Blackbrooks (Admiral Blackbrook’s daughters, +my dear), fine young ladies, with dresses from London, +when Captain Rawdon selected poor me for a partner!</p> + +<p>When Mrs. Bute Crawley (whose artifices our ingenious +Rebecca had so soon discovered) had procured from +Miss Sharp the promise of a visit, she induced the +all-powerful Miss Crawley to make the necessary application +to Sir Pitt, and the good-natured old lady, who loved +to be gay herself, and to see every one gay and happy +round about her, was quite charmed, and ready to establish +a reconciliation and intimacy between her two brothers. +It was therefore agreed that the young people of both +families should visit each other frequently for the +future, and the friendship of course lasted as long +as the jovial old mediatrix was there to keep the +peace.</p> + +<p>“Why did you ask that scoundrel, Rawdon Crawley, +to dine?” said the Rector to his lady, as they +were walking home through the park. “I don’t +want the fellow. He looks down upon us country people +as so many blackamoors. He’s never content unless +he gets my yellow-sealed wine, which costs me ten +shillings a bottle, hang him! Besides, he’s +such an infernal character--he’s a gambler--he’s +a drunkard--he’s a profligate in every way. + He shot a man in a duel--he’s over head and +ears in debt, and he’s robbed me and mine of +the best part of Miss Crawley’s fortune. Waxy +says she has him"--here the Rector shook his fist +at the moon, with something very like an oath, and +added, in a melancholious tone, “--, down in +her will for fifty thousand; and there won’t +be above thirty to divide.”</p> + +<p>“I think she’s going,” said the +Rector’s wife. “She was very red in the +face when we left dinner. I was obliged to unlace +her.”</p> + +<p>“She drank seven glasses of champagne,” +said the reverend gentleman, in a low voice; “and +filthy champagne it is, too, that my brother poisons +us with--but you women never know what’s what.”</p> + +<p>“We know nothing,” said Mrs. Bute Crawley.</p> + +<p>“She drank cherry-brandy after dinner,” +continued his Reverence, “and took curacao with +her coffee. I wouldn’t take a glass for a five-pound +note: it kills me with heartburn. She can’t +stand it, Mrs. Crawley--she must go--flesh and blood +won’t bear it! and I lay five to two, Matilda +drops in a year.”</p> + +<p>Indulging in these solemn speculations, and thinking +about his debts, and his son Jim at College, and Frank +at Woolwich, and the four girls, who were no beauties, +poor things, and would not have a penny but what they +got from the aunt’s expected legacy, the Rector +and his lady walked on for a while.</p> + +<p>“Pitt can’t be such an infernal villain +as to sell the reversion of the living. And that +Methodist milksop of an eldest son looks to Parliament,” +continued Mr. Crawley, after a pause.</p> + +<p>“Sir Pitt Crawley will do anything,” said +the Rector’s wife. “We must get Miss +Crawley to make him promise it to James.”</p> + +<p>“Pitt will promise anything,” replied +the brother. “He promised he’d pay my +college bills, when my father died; he promised he’d +build the new wing to the Rectory; he promised he’d +let me have Jibb’s field and the Six-acre Meadow--and +much he executed his promises! And it’s to this +man’s son--this scoundrel, gambler, swindler, +murderer of a Rawdon Crawley, that Matilda leaves the +bulk of her money. I say it’s un-Christian. + By Jove, it is. The infamous dog has got every vice +except hypocrisy, and that belongs to his brother.”</p> + +<p>“Hush, my dearest love! we’re in Sir Pitt’s +grounds,” interposed his wife.</p> + +<p>“I say he has got every vice, Mrs. Crawley. + Don’t Ma’am, bully me. Didn’t he +shoot Captain Marker? Didn’t he rob young Lord +Dovedale at the Cocoa-Tree? Didn’t he cross +the fight between Bill Soames and the Cheshire Trump, +by which I lost forty pound? You know he did; and +as for the women, why, you heard that before me, in +my own magistrate’s room.”</p> + +<p>“For heaven’s sake, Mr. Crawley,” +said the lady, “spare me the details.”</p> + +<p>“And you ask this villain into your house!” +continued the exasperated Rector. “You, the +mother of a young family--the wife of a clergyman +of the Church of England. By Jove!”</p> + +<p>“Bute Crawley, you are a fool,” said the +Rector’s wife scornfully.</p> + +<p>“Well, Ma’am, fool or not--and I don’t +say, Martha, I’m so clever as you are, I never +did. But I won’t meet Rawdon Crawley, that’s +flat. I’ll go over to Huddleston, that I will, +and see his black greyhound, Mrs. Crawley; and I’ll +run Lancelot against him for fifty. By Jove, I will; +or against any dog in England. But I won’t +meet that beast Rawdon Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“Mr. Crawley, you are intoxicated, as usual,” +replied his wife. And the next morning, when the +Rector woke, and called for small beer, she put him +in mind of his promise to visit Sir Huddleston Fuddleston +on Saturday, and as he knew he should have a wet night, +it was agreed that he might gallop back again in time +for church on Sunday morning. Thus it will be seen +that the parishioners of Crawley were equally happy +in their Squire and in their Rector.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley had not long been established at the +Hall before Rebecca’s fascinations had won the +heart of that good-natured London rake, as they had +of the country innocents whom we have been describing. + Taking her accustomed drive, one day, she thought +fit to order that “that little governess” +should accompany her to Mudbury. Before they had returned +Rebecca had made a conquest of her; having made her +laugh four times, and amused her during the whole +of the little journey.</p> + +<p>“Not let Miss Sharp dine at table!” said +she to Sir Pitt, who had arranged a dinner of ceremony, +and asked all the neighbouring baronets. “My +dear creature, do you suppose I can talk about the +nursery with Lady Fuddleston, or discuss justices’ +business with that goose, old Sir Giles Wapshot? I +insist upon Miss Sharp appearing. Let Lady Crawley +remain upstairs, if there is no room. But little Miss +Sharp! Why, she’s the only person fit to talk +to in the county!”</p> + +<p>Of course, after such a peremptory order as this, +Miss Sharp, the governess, received commands to dine +with the illustrious company below stairs. And when +Sir Huddleston had, with great pomp and ceremony, +handed Miss Crawley in to dinner, and was preparing +to take his place by her side, the old lady cried +out, in a shrill voice, “Becky Sharp! Miss +Sharp! Come you and sit by me and amuse me; and let +Sir Huddleston sit by Lady Wapshot.”</p> + +<p>When the parties were over, and the carriages had +rolled away, the insatiable Miss Crawley would say, +“Come to my dressing room, Becky, and let us +abuse the company"--which, between them, this pair +of friends did perfectly. Old Sir Huddleston wheezed +a great deal at dinner; Sir Giles Wapshot had a particularly +noisy manner of imbibing his soup, and her ladyship +a wink of the left eye; all of which Becky caricatured +to admiration; as well as the particulars of the night’s +conversation; the politics; the war; the quarter-sessions; +the famous run with the H.H., and those heavy and dreary +themes, about which country gentlemen converse. As +for the Misses Wapshot’s toilettes and Lady +Fuddleston’s famous yellow hat, Miss Sharp tore +them to tatters, to the infinite amusement of her +audience.</p> + +<p>“My dear, you are a perfect trouvaille,” +Miss Crawley would say. “I wish you could come +to me in London, but I couldn’t make a butt of +you as I do of poor Briggs no, no, you little sly creature; +you are too clever--Isn’t she, Firkin?”</p> + +<p>Mrs. Firkin (who was dressing the very small remnant +of hair which remained on Miss Crawley’s pate), +flung up her head and said, “I think Miss is +very clever,” with the most killing sarcastic +air. In fact, Mrs. Firkin had that natural jealousy +which is one of the main principles of every honest +woman.</p> + +<p>After rebuffing Sir Huddleston Fuddleston, Miss Crawley +ordered that Rawdon Crawley should lead her in to +dinner every day, and that Becky should follow with +her cushion--or else she would have Becky’s +arm and Rawdon with the pillow. “We must sit +together,” she said. “We’re the +only three Christians in the county, my love"--in which +case, it must be confessed, that religion was at a +very low ebb in the county of Hants.</p> + +<p>Besides being such a fine religionist, Miss Crawley +was, as we have said, an Ultra-liberal in opinions, +and always took occasion to express these in the most +candid manner.</p> + +<p>“What is birth, my dear!” she would say +to Rebecca--"Look at my brother Pitt; look at the +Huddlestons, who have been here since Henry II; look +at poor Bute at the parsonage--is any one of them +equal to you in intelligence or breeding? Equal to +you--they are not even equal to poor dear Briggs, +my companion, or Bowls, my butler. You, my love, are +a little paragon--positively a little jewel--You have +more brains than half the shire--if merit had its reward +you ought to be a Duchess--no, there ought to be no +duchesses at all-- but you ought to have no superior, +and I consider you, my love, as my equal in every +respect; and--will you put some coals on the fire, +my dear; and will you pick this dress of mine, and +alter it, you who can do it so well?” So this +old philanthropist used to make her equal run of her +errands, execute her millinery, and read her to sleep +with French novels, every night.</p> + +<p>At this time, as some old readers may recollect, the +genteel world had been thrown into a considerable +state of excitement by two events, which, as the papers +say, might give employment to the gentlemen of the +long robe. Ensign Shafton had run away with Lady Barbara +Fitzurse, the Earl of Bruin’s daughter and heiress; +and poor Vere Vane, a gentleman who, up to forty, +had maintained a most respectable character and reared +a numerous family, suddenly and outrageously left +his home, for the sake of Mrs. Rougemont, the actress, +who was sixty-five years of age.</p> + +<p>“That was the most beautiful part of dear Lord +Nelson’s character,” Miss Crawley said. + “He went to the deuce for a woman. There must +be good in a man who will do that. I adore all impudent +matches.-- What I like best, is for a nobleman to +marry a miller’s daughter, as Lord Flowerdale +did--it makes all the women so angry--I wish some +great man would run away with you, my dear; I’m +sure you’re pretty enough.”</p> + +<p>“Two post-boys!--Oh, it would be delightful!” +Rebecca owned.</p> + +<p>“And what I like next best, is for a poor fellow +to run away with a rich girl. I have set my heart +on Rawdon running away with some one.”</p> + +<p>“A rich some one, or a poor some one?”</p> + +<p>“Why, you goose! Rawdon has not a shilling but +what I give him. He is crible de dettes--he must +repair his fortunes, and succeed in the world.”</p> + +<p>“Is he very clever?” Rebecca asked.</p> + +<p>“Clever, my love?--not an idea in the world +beyond his horses, and his regiment, and his hunting, +and his play; but he must succeed-- he’s so +delightfully wicked. Don’t you know he has hit +a man, and shot an injured father through the hat +only? He’s adored in his regiment; and all the +young men at Wattier’s and the Cocoa-Tree swear +by him.”</p> + +<p>When Miss Rebecca Sharp wrote to her beloved friend +the account of the little ball at Queen’s Crawley, +and the manner in which, for the first time, Captain +Crawley had distinguished her, she did not, strange +to relate, give an altogether accurate account of the +transaction. The Captain had distinguished her a great +number of times before. The Captain had met her in +a half-score of walks. The Captain had lighted upon +her in a half-hundred of corridors and passages. +The Captain had hung over her piano twenty times of +an evening (my Lady was now upstairs, being ill, and +nobody heeded her) as Miss Sharp sang. The Captain +had written her notes (the best that the great blundering +dragoon could devise and spell; but dulness gets on +as well as any other quality with women). But when +he put the first of the notes into the leaves of the +song she was singing, the little governess, rising +and looking him steadily in the face, took up the +triangular missive daintily, and waved it about as +if it were a cocked hat, and she, advancing to the +enemy, popped the note into the fire, and made him +a very low curtsey, and went back to her place, and +began to sing away again more merrily than ever.</p> + +<p>“What’s that?” said Miss Crawley, +interrupted in her after-dinner doze by the stoppage +of the music.</p> + +<p>“It’s a false note,” Miss Sharp +said with a laugh; and Rawdon Crawley fumed with rage +and mortification.</p> + +<p>Seeing the evident partiality of Miss Crawley for +the new governess, how good it was of Mrs. Bute Crawley +not to be jealous, and to welcome the young lady to +the Rectory, and not only her, but Rawdon Crawley, +her husband’s rival in the Old Maid’s five +per cents! They became very fond of each other’s +society, Mrs. Crawley and her nephew. He gave up +hunting; he declined entertainments at Fuddleston: +he would not dine with the mess of the depot at Mudbury: +his great pleasure was to stroll over to Crawley parsonage--whither +Miss Crawley came too; and as their mamma was ill, +why not the children with Miss Sharp? So the children +(little dears!) came with Miss Sharp; and of an evening +some of the party would walk back together. Not Miss +Crawley--she preferred her carriage--but the walk +over the Rectory fields, and in at the little park +wicket, and through the dark plantation, and up the +checkered avenue to Queen’s Crawley, was charming +in the moonlight to two such lovers of the picturesque +as the Captain and Miss Rebecca.</p> + +<p>“O those stars, those stars!” Miss Rebecca +would say, turning her twinkling green eyes up towards +them. “I feel myself almost a spirit when I +gaze upon them.”</p> + +<p>“O--ah--Gad--yes, so do I exactly, Miss Sharp,” +the other enthusiast replied. “You don’t +mind my cigar, do you, Miss Sharp?” Miss Sharp +loved the smell of a cigar out of doors beyond everything +in the world--and she just tasted one too, in the +prettiest way possible, and gave a little puff, and +a little scream, and a little giggle, and restored +the delicacy to the Captain, who twirled his moustache, +and straightway puffed it into a blaze that glowed +quite red in the dark plantation, and swore--"Jove--aw--Gad--aw--it’s +the finest segaw I ever smoked in the world aw,” +for his intellect and conversation were alike brilliant +and becoming to a heavy young dragoon.</p> + +<p>Old Sir Pitt, who was taking his pipe and beer, and +talking to John Horrocks about a “ship” +that was to be killed, espied the pair so occupied +from his study-window, and with dreadful oaths swore +that if it wasn’t for Miss Crawley, he’d +take Rawdon and bundle un out of doors, like a rogue +as he was.</p> + +<p>“He be a bad’n, sure enough,” Mr. +Horrocks remarked; “and his man Flethers is +wuss, and have made such a row in the housekeeper’s +room about the dinners and hale, as no lord would +make--but I think Miss Sharp’s a match for’n, +Sir Pitt,” he added, after a pause.</p> + +<p>And so, in truth, she was--for father and son too.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Quite a Sentimental Chapter</h4> + +<p>We must now take leave of Arcadia, and those amiable +people practising the rural virtues there, and travel +back to London, to inquire what has become of Miss +Amelia “We don’t care a fig for her,” +writes some unknown correspondent with a pretty little +handwriting and a pink seal to her note. “She +is fade and insipid,” and adds some more kind +remarks in this strain, which I should never have +repeated at all, but that they are in truth prodigiously +complimentary to the young lady whom they concern.</p> + +<p>Has the beloved reader, in his experience of society, +never heard similar remarks by good-natured female +friends; who always wonder what you <i>can</i> see in +Miss Smith that is so fascinating; or what <i>could</i> +induce Major Jones to propose for that silly insignificant +simpering Miss Thompson, who has nothing but her wax-doll +face to recommend her? What is there in a pair of +pink cheeks and blue eyes forsooth? these dear Moralists +ask, and hint wisely that the gifts of genius, the +accomplishments of the mind, the mastery of Mangnall’s +Questions, and a ladylike knowledge of botany and geology, +the knack of making poetry, the power of rattling +sonatas in the Herz-manner, and so forth, are far +more valuable endowments for a female, than those +fugitive charms which a few years will inevitably tarnish. + It is quite edifying to hear women speculate upon +the worthlessness and the duration of beauty.</p> + +<p>But though virtue is a much finer thing, and those +hapless creatures who suffer under the misfortune +of good looks ought to be continually put in mind +of the fate which awaits them; and though, very likely, +the heroic female character which ladies admire is +a more glorious and beautiful object than the kind, +fresh, smiling, artless, tender little domestic goddess, +whom men are inclined to worship--yet the latter and +inferior sort of women must have this consolation--that +the men do admire them after all; and that, in spite +of all our kind friends’ warnings and protests, +we go on in our desperate error and folly, and shall +to the end of the chapter. Indeed, for my own part, +though I have been repeatedly told by persons for +whom I have the greatest respect, that Miss Brown is +an insignificant chit, and Mrs. White has nothing +but her petit minois chiffonne, and Mrs. Black has +not a word to say for herself; yet I know that I have +had the most delightful conversations with Mrs. Black +(of course, my dear Madam, they are inviolable): I +see all the men in a cluster round Mrs. White’s +chair: all the young fellows battling to dance with +Miss Brown; and so I am tempted to think that to be +despised by her sex is a very great compliment to a +woman.</p> + +<p>The young ladies in Amelia’s society did this +for her very satisfactorily. For instance, there +was scarcely any point upon which the Misses Osborne, +George’s sisters, and the Mesdemoiselles Dobbin +agreed so well as in their estimate of her very trifling +merits: and their wonder that their brothers could +find any charms in her. “We are kind to her,” +the Misses Osborne said, a pair of fine black-browed +young ladies who had had the best of governesses, +masters, and milliners; and they treated her with such +extreme kindness and condescension, and patronised +her so insufferably, that the poor little thing was +in fact perfectly dumb in their presence, and to all +outward appearance as stupid as they thought her. +She made efforts to like them, as in duty bound, and +as sisters of her future husband. She passed “long +mornings” with them--the most dreary and serious +of forenoons. She drove out solemnly in their great +family coach with them, and Miss Wirt their governess, +that raw-boned Vestal. They took her to the ancient +concerts by way of a treat, and to the oratorio, and +to St. Paul’s to see the charity children, where +in such terror was she of her friends, she almost +did not dare be affected by the hymn the children sang. + Their house was comfortable; their papa’s table +rich and handsome; their society solemn and genteel; +their self-respect prodigious; they had the best pew +at the Foundling: all their habits were pompous and +orderly, and all their amusements intolerably dull +and decorous. After every one of her visits (and oh +how glad she was when they were over!) Miss Osborne +and Miss Maria Osborne, and Miss Wirt, the vestal governess, +asked each other with increased wonder, “What +could George find in that creature?”</p> + +<p>How is this? some carping reader exclaims. How is +it that Amelia, who had such a number of friends at +school, and was so beloved there, comes out into the +world and is spurned by her discriminating sex? My +dear sir, there were no men at Miss Pinkerton’s +establishment except the old dancing-master; and you +would not have had the girls fall out about <i>him</i>? +When George, their handsome brother, ran off directly +after breakfast, and dined from home half-a-dozen +times a week, no wonder the neglected sisters felt +a little vexation. When young Bullock (of the firm +of Hulker, Bullock & Co., Bankers, Lombard Street), +who had been making up to Miss Maria the last two +seasons, actually asked Amelia to dance the cotillon, +could you expect that the former young lady should +be pleased? And yet she said she was, like an artless +forgiving creature. “I’m so delighted +you like dear Amelia,” she said quite eagerly +to Mr. Bullock after the dance. “She’s +engaged to my brother George; there’s not much +in her, but she’s the best-natured and most +unaffected young creature: at home we’re all +so fond of her.” Dear girl! who can calculate +the depth of affection expressed in that enthusiastic +<i>so</i>?</p> + +<p>Miss Wirt and these two affectionate young women so +earnestly and frequently impressed upon George Osborne’s +mind the enormity of the sacrifice he was making, +and his romantic generosity in throwing himself away +upon Amelia, that I’m not sure but that he really +thought he was one of the most deserving characters +in the British army, and gave himself up to be loved +with a good deal of easy resignation.</p> + +<p>Somehow, although he left home every morning, as was +stated, and dined abroad six days in the week, when +his sisters believed the infatuated youth to be at +Miss Sedley’s apron-strings: he was <i>not</i> +always with Amelia, whilst the world supposed him at +her feet. Certain it is that on more occasions than +one, when Captain Dobbin called to look for his friend, +Miss Osborne (who was very attentive to the Captain, +and anxious to hear his military stories, and to know +about the health of his dear Mamma), would laughingly +point to the opposite side of the square, and say, +“Oh, you must go to the Sedleys’ to ask +for George; <i>we</i> never see him from morning till +night.” At which kind of speech the Captain would +laugh in rather an absurd constrained manner, and +turn off the conversation, like a consummate man of +the world, to some topic of general interest, such +as the Opera, the Prince’s last ball at Carlton +House, or the weather--that blessing to society.</p> + +<p>“What an innocent it is, that pet of yours,” +Miss Maria would then say to Miss Jane, upon the Captain’s +departure. “Did you see how he blushed at the +mention of poor George on duty?”</p> + +<p>“It’s a pity Frederick Bullock hadn’t +some of his modesty, Maria,” replies the elder +sister, with a toss of he head.</p> + +<p>“Modesty! Awkwardness you mean, Jane. I don’t +want Frederick to trample a hole in my muslin frock, +as Captain Dobbin did in yours at Mrs. Perkins’.”</p> + +<p>“In <i>your</i> frock, he, he! How could he? +Wasn’t he dancing with Amelia?”</p> + +<p>The fact is, when Captain Dobbin blushed so, and looked +so awkward, he remembered a circumstance of which +he did not think it was necessary to inform the young +ladies, <i>viz</i>., that he had been calling at Mr. +Sedley’s house already, on the pretence of seeing +George, of course, and George wasn’t there, +only poor little Amelia, with rather a sad wistful +face, seated near the drawing-room window, who, after +some very trifling stupid talk, ventured to ask, was +there any truth in the report that the regiment was +soon to be ordered abroad; and had Captain Dobbin +seen Mr. Osborne that day?</p> + +<p>The regiment was not ordered abroad as yet; and Captain +Dobbin had not seen George. “He was with his +sister, most likely,” the Captain said. “Should +he go and fetch the truant?” So she gave him +her hand kindly and gratefully: and he crossed the +square; and she waited and waited, but George never +came.</p> + +<p>Poor little tender heart! and so it goes on hoping +and beating, and longing and trusting. You see it +is not much of a life to describe. There is not much +of what you call incident in it. Only one feeling +all day--when will he come? only one thought to sleep +and wake upon. I believe George was playing billiards +with Captain Cannon in Swallow Street at the time +when Amelia was asking Captain Dobbin about him; for +George was a jolly sociable fellow, and excellent in +all games of skill.</p> + +<p>Once, after three days of absence, Miss Amelia put +on her bonnet, and actually invaded the Osborne house. +“What! leave our brother to come to us?” +said the young ladies. “Have you had a quarrel, +Amelia? Do tell us!” No, indeed, there had been +no quarrel. “Who could quarrel with him?” +says she, with her eyes filled with tears. She only +came over to--to see her dear friends; they had not +met for so long. And this day she was so perfectly +stupid and awkward, that the Misses Osborne and their +governess, who stared after her as she went sadly +away, wondered more than ever what George could see +in poor little Amelia.</p> + +<p>Of course they did. How was she to bare that timid +little heart for the inspection of those young ladies +with their bold black eyes? It was best that it should +shrink and hide itself. I know the Misses Osborne +were excellent critics of a Cashmere shawl, or a pink +satin slip; and when Miss Turner had hers dyed purple, +and made into a spencer; and when Miss Pickford had +her ermine tippet twisted into a muff and trimmings, +I warrant you the changes did not escape the two intelligent +young women before mentioned. But there are things, +look you, of a finer texture than fur or satin, and +all Solomon’s glories, and all the wardrobe +of the Queen of Sheba--things whereof the beauty escapes +the eyes of many connoisseurs. And there are sweet +modest little souls on which you light, fragrant and +blooming tenderly in quiet shady places; and there +are garden-ornaments, as big as brass warming-pans, +that are fit to stare the sun itself out of countenance. + Miss Sedley was not of the sunflower sort; and I +say it is out of the rules of all proportion to draw +a violet of the size of a double dahlia.</p> + +<p>No, indeed; the life of a good young girl who is in +the paternal nest as yet, can’t have many of +those thrilling incidents to which the heroine of +romance commonly lays claim. Snares or shot may take +off the old birds foraging without--hawks may be abroad, +from which they escape or by whom they suffer; but +the young ones in the nest have a pretty comfortable +unromantic sort of existence in the down and the straw, +till it comes to their turn, too, to get on the wing. +While Becky Sharp was on her own wing in the country, +hopping on all sorts of twigs, and amid a multiplicity +of traps, and pecking up her food quite harmless and +successful, Amelia lay snug in her home of Russell +Square; if she went into the world, it was under the +guidance of the elders; nor did it seem that any evil +could befall her or that opulent cheery comfortable +home in which she was affectionately sheltered. Mamma +had her morning duties, and her daily drive, and the +delightful round of visits and shopping which forms +the amusement, or the profession as you may call it, +of the rich London lady. Papa conducted his mysterious +operations in the City--a stirring place in those +days, when war was raging all over Europe, and empires +were being staked; when the “Courier” newspaper +had tens of thousands of subscribers; when one day +brought you a battle of Vittoria, another a burning +of Moscow, or a newsman’s horn blowing down +Russell Square about dinner-time, announced such a +fact as--"Battle of Leipsic--six hundred thousand +men engaged--total defeat of the French--two hundred +thousand killed.” Old Sedley once or twice came +home with a very grave face; and no wonder, when such +news as this was agitating all the hearts and all the +Stocks of Europe.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile matters went on in Russell Square, Bloomsbury, +just as if matters in Europe were not in the least +disorganised. The retreat from Leipsic made no difference +in the number of meals Mr. Sambo took in the servants’ +hall; the allies poured into France, and the dinner-bell +rang at five o’clock just as usual. I don’t +think poor Amelia cared anything about Brienne and +Montmirail, or was fairly interested in the war until +the abdication of the Emperor; when she clapped her +hands and said prayers--oh, how grateful! and flung +herself into George Osborne’s arms with all her +soul, to the astonishment of everybody who witnessed +that ebullition of sentiment. The fact is, peace was +declared, Europe was going to be at rest; the Corsican +was overthrown, and Lieutenant Osborne’s regiment +would not be ordered on service. That was the way +in which Miss Amelia reasoned. The fate of Europe +was Lieutenant George Osborne to her. His dangers +being over, she sang Te Deum. He was her Europe: +her emperor: her allied monarchs and august prince +regent. He was her sun and moon; and I believe she +thought the grand illumination and ball at the Mansion +House, given to the sovereigns, were especially in +honour of George Osborne.</p> + +<p>We have talked of shift, self, and poverty, as those +dismal instructors under whom poor Miss Becky Sharp +got her education. Now, love was Miss Amelia Sedley’s +last tutoress, and it was amazing what progress our +young lady made under that popular teacher. In the +course of fifteen or eighteen months’ daily and +constant attention to this eminent finishing governess, +what a deal of secrets Amelia learned, which Miss +Wirt and the black-eyed young ladies over the way, +which old Miss Pinkerton of Chiswick herself, had +no cognizance of! As, indeed, how should any of those +prim and reputable virgins? With Misses P. and W. +the tender passion is out of the question: I would +not dare to breathe such an idea regarding them. +Miss Maria Osborne, it is true, was “attached” +to Mr. Frederick Augustus Bullock, of the firm of +Hulker, Bullock & Bullock; but hers was a most respectable +attachment, and she would have taken Bullock Senior +just the same, her mind being fixed--as that of a +well-bred young woman should be--upon a house in Park +Lane, a country house at Wimbledon, a handsome chariot, +and two prodigious tall horses and footmen, and a +fourth of the annual profits of the eminent firm of +Hulker & Bullock, all of which advantages were represented +in the person of Frederick Augustus. Had orange blossoms +been invented then (those touching emblems of female +purity imported by us from France, where people’s +daughters are universally sold in marriage), Miss +Maria, I say, would have assumed the spotless wreath, +and stepped into the travelling carriage by the side +of gouty, old, bald-headed, bottle-nosed Bullock Senior; +and devoted her beautiful existence to his happiness +with perfect modesty--only the old gentleman was married +already; so she bestowed her young affections on the +junior partner. Sweet, blooming, orange flowers! +The other day I saw Miss Trotter (that was), arrayed +in them, trip into the travelling carriage at St. +George’s, Hanover Square, and Lord Methuselah +hobbled in after. With what an engaging modesty she +pulled down the blinds of the chariot--the dear innocent! + There were half the carriages of Vanity Fair at the +wedding.</p> + +<p>This was not the sort of love that finished Amelia’s +education; and in the course of a year turned a good +young girl into a good young woman--to be a good wife +presently, when the happy time should come. This young +person (perhaps it was very imprudent in her parents +to encourage her, and abet her in such idolatry and +silly romantic ideas) loved, with all her heart, the +young officer in His Majesty’s service with +whom we have made a brief acquaintance. She thought +about him the very first moment on waking; and his +was the very last name mentioned m her prayers. She +never had seen a man so beautiful or so clever: such +a figure on horseback: such a dancer: such a hero +in general. Talk of the Prince’s bow! what was +it to George’s? She had seen Mr. Brummell, whom +everybody praised so. Compare such a person as that +to her George! Not amongst all the beaux at the Opera +(and there were beaux in those days with actual opera +hats) was there any one to equal him. He was only +good enough to be a fairy prince; and oh, what magnanimity +to stoop to such a humble Cinderella! Miss Pinkerton +would have tried to check this blind devotion very +likely, had she been Amelia’s confidante; but +not with much success, depend upon it. It is in the +nature and instinct of some women. Some are made +to scheme, and some to love; and I wish any respected +bachelor that reads this may take the sort that best +likes him.</p> + +<p>While under this overpowering impression, Miss Amelia +neglected her twelve dear friends at Chiswick most +cruelly, as such selfish people commonly will do. + She had but this subject, of course, to think about; +and Miss Saltire was too cold for a confidante, and +she couldn’t bring her mind to tell Miss Swartz, +the woolly-haired young heiress from St. Kitt’s. + She had little Laura Martin home for the holidays; +and my belief is, she made a confidante of her, and +promised that Laura should come and live with her when +she was married, and gave Laura a great deal of information +regarding the passion of love, which must have been +singularly useful and novel to that little person. + Alas, alas! I fear poor Emmy had not a well-regulated +mind.</p> + +<p>What were her parents doing, not to keep this little +heart from beating so fast? Old Sedley did not seem +much to notice matters. He was graver of late, and +his City affairs absorbed him. Mrs. Sedley was of +so easy and uninquisitive a nature that she wasn’t +even jealous. Mr. Jos was away, being besieged by +an Irish widow at Cheltenham. Amelia had the house +to herself--ah! too much to herself sometimes--not +that she ever doubted; for, to be sure, George must +be at the Horse Guards; and he can’t always get +leave from Chatham; and he must see his friends and +sisters, and mingle in society when in town (he, such +an ornament to every society!); and when he is with +the regiment, he is too tired to write long letters. +I know where she kept that packet she had--and can +steal in and out of her chamber like Iachimo--like +Iachimo? No--that is a bad part. I will only act +Moonshine, and peep harmless into the bed where faith +and beauty and innocence lie dreaming.</p> + +<p>But if Osborne’s were short and soldierlike +letters, it must be confessed, that were Miss Sedley’s +letters to Mr. Osborne to be published, we should +have to extend this novel to such a multiplicity of +volumes as not the most sentimental reader could support; +that she not only filled sheets of large paper, but +crossed them with the most astonishing perverseness; +that she wrote whole pages out of poetry-books without +the least pity; that she underlined words and passages +with quite a frantic emphasis; and, in fine, gave +the usual tokens of her condition. She wasn’t +a heroine. Her letters were full of repetition. She +wrote rather doubtful grammar sometimes, and in her +verses took all sorts of liberties with the metre. + But oh, mesdames, if you are not allowed to touch +the heart sometimes in spite of syntax, and are not +to be loved until you all know the difference between +trimeter and tetrameter, may all Poetry go to the +deuce, and every schoolmaster perish miserably!</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Sentimental and Otherwise</h4> + +<p>I fear the gentleman to whom Miss Amelia’s letters +were addressed was rather an obdurate critic. Such +a number of notes followed Lieutenant Osborne about +the country, that he became almost ashamed of the +jokes of his mess-room companions regarding them, and +ordered his servant never to deliver them except at +his private apartment. He was seen lighting his cigar +with one, to the horror of Captain Dobbin, who, it +is my belief, would have given a bank-note for the +document.</p> + +<p>For some time George strove to keep the liaison a +secret. There was a woman in the case, that he admitted. +“And not the first either,” said Ensign +Spooney to Ensign Stubble. “That Osborne’s +a devil of a fellow. There was a judge’s daughter +at Demerara went almost mad about him; then there +was that beautiful quadroon girl, Miss Pye, at St. +Vincent’s, you know; and since he’s been +home, they say he’s a regular Don Giovanni, +by Jove.”</p> + +<p>Stubble and Spooney thought that to be a “regular +Don Giovanni, by Jove” was one of the finest +qualities a man could possess, and Osborne’s +reputation was prodigious amongst the young men of +the regiment. He was famous in field-sports, famous +at a song, famous on parade; free with his money, +which was bountifully supplied by his father. His +coats were better made than any man’s in the +regiment, and he had more of them. He was adored by +the men. He could drink more than any officer of +the whole mess, including old Heavytop, the colonel. + He could spar better than Knuckles, the private (who +would have been a corporal but for his drunkenness, +and who had been in the prize-ring); and was the best +batter and bowler, out and out, of the regimental +club. He rode his own horse, Greased Lightning, and +won the Garrison cup at Quebec races. There were +other people besides Amelia who worshipped him. Stubble +and Spooney thought him a sort of Apollo; Dobbin took +him to be an Admirable Crichton; and Mrs. Major O’Dowd +acknowledged he was an elegant young fellow, and put +her in mind of Fitzjurld Fogarty, Lord Castlefogarty’s +second son.</p> + +<p>Well, Stubble and Spooney and the rest indulged in +most romantic conjectures regarding this female correspondent +of Osborne’s-- opining that it was a Duchess +in London who was in love with him--or that it was +a General’s daughter, who was engaged to somebody +else, and madly attached to him--or that it was a +Member of Parliament’s lady, who proposed four +horses and an elopement--or that it was some other +victim of a passion delightfully exciting, romantic, +and disgraceful to all parties, on none of which conjectures +would Osborne throw the least light, leaving his young +admirers and friends to invent and arrange their whole +history.</p> + +<p>And the real state of the case would never have been +known at all in the regiment but for Captain Dobbin’s +indiscretion. The Captain was eating his breakfast +one day in the mess-room, while Cackle, the assistant-surgeon, +and the two above-named worthies were speculating +upon Osborne’s intrigue--Stubble holding out +that the lady was a Duchess about Queen Charlotte’s +court, and Cackle vowing she was an opera-singer of +the worst reputation. At this idea Dobbin became so +moved, that though his mouth was full of eggs and bread-and-butter +at the time, and though he ought not to have spoken +at all, yet he couldn’t help blurting out, “Cackle, +you’re a stupid fool. You’re always talking +nonsense and scandal. Osborne is not going to run +off with a Duchess or ruin a milliner. Miss Sedley +is one of the most charming young women that ever +lived. He’s been engaged to her ever so long; +and the man who calls her names had better not do so +in my hearing.” With which, turning exceedingly +red, Dobbin ceased speaking, and almost choked himself +with a cup of tea. The story was over the regiment +in half-an-hour; and that very evening Mrs. Major +O’Dowd wrote off to her sister Glorvina at O’Dowdstown +not to hurry from Dublin--young Osborne being prematurely +engaged already.</p> + +<p>She complimented the Lieutenant in an appropriate +speech over a glass of whisky-toddy that evening, +and he went home perfectly furious to quarrel with +Dobbin (who had declined Mrs. Major O’Dowd’s +party, and sat in his own room playing the flute, and, +I believe, writing poetry in a very melancholy manner)--to +quarrel with Dobbin for betraying his secret.</p> + +<p>“Who the deuce asked you to talk about my affairs?” +Osborne shouted indignantly. “Why the devil +is all the regiment to know that I am going to be +married? Why is that tattling old harridan, Peggy +O’Dowd, to make free with my name at her d--d +supper-table, and advertise my engagement over the +three kingdoms? After all, what right have you to +say I am engaged, or to meddle in my business at all, +Dobbin?”</p> + +<p>“It seems to me,” Captain Dobbin began.</p> + +<p>“Seems be hanged, Dobbin,” his junior +interrupted him. “I am under obligations to +you, I know it, a d--d deal too well too; but I won’t +be always sermonised by you because you’re five +years my senior. I’m hanged if I’ll stand +your airs of superiority and infernal pity and patronage. + Pity and patronage! I should like to know in what +I’m your inferior?”</p> + +<p>“Are you engaged?” Captain Dobbin interposed.</p> + +<p>“What the devil’s that to you or any one +here if I am?”</p> + +<p>“Are you ashamed of it?” Dobbin resumed.</p> + +<p>“What right have you to ask me that question, +sir? I should like to know,” George said.</p> + +<p>“Good God, you don’t mean to say you want +to break off?” asked Dobbin, starting up.</p> + +<p>“In other words, you ask me if I’m a man +of honour,” said Osborne, fiercely; “is +that what you mean? You’ve adopted such a tone +regarding me lately that I’m--if I’ll bear +it any more.”</p> + +<p>“What have I done? I’ve told you you were +neglecting a sweet girl, George. I’ve told +you that when you go to town you ought to go to her, +and not to the gambling-houses about St. James’s.”</p> + +<p>“You want your money back, I suppose,” +said George, with a sneer.</p> + +<p>“Of course I do--I always did, didn’t +I?” says Dobbin. “You speak like a generous +fellow.”</p> + +<p>“No, hang it, William, I beg your pardon"--here +George interposed in a fit of remorse; “you +have been my friend in a hundred ways, Heaven knows. + You’ve got me out of a score of scrapes. When +Crawley of the Guards won that sum of money of me +I should have been done but for you: I know I should. + But you shouldn’t deal so hardly with me; you +shouldn’t be always catechising me. I am very +fond of Amelia; I adore her, and that sort of thing. + Don’t look angry. She’s faultless; I +know she is. But you see there’s no fun in winning +a thing unless you play for it. Hang it: the regiment’s +just back from the West Indies, I must have a little +fling, and then when I’m married I’ll +reform; I will upon my honour, now. And--I say--Dob-- +don’t be angry with me, and I’ll give you +a hundred next month, when I know my father will stand +something handsome; and I’ll ask Heavytop for +leave, and I’ll go to town, and see Amelia to-morrow-- +there now, will that satisfy you?”</p> + +<p>“It is impossible to be long angry with you, +George,” said the good-natured Captain; “and +as for the money, old boy, you know if I wanted it +you’d share your last shilling with me.”</p> + +<p>“That I would, by Jove, Dobbin,” George +said, with the greatest generosity, though by the +way he never had any money to spare.</p> + +<p>“Only I wish you had sown those wild oats of +yours, George. If you could have seen poor little +Miss Emmy’s face when she asked me about you +the other day, you would have pitched those billiard-balls +to the deuce. Go and comfort her, you rascal. Go +and write her a long letter. Do something to make +her happy; a very little will.”</p> + +<p>“I believe she’s d--d fond of me,” +the Lieutenant said, with a self-satisfied air; and +went off to finish the evening with some jolly fellows +in the mess-room.</p> + +<p>Amelia meanwhile, in Russell Square, was looking at +the moon, which was shining upon that peaceful spot, +as well as upon the square of the Chatham barracks, +where Lieutenant Osborne was quartered, and thinking +to herself how her hero was employed. Perhaps he is +visiting the sentries, thought she; perhaps he is bivouacking; +perhaps he is attending the couch of a wounded comrade, +or studying the art of war up in his own desolate +chamber. And her kind thoughts sped away as if they +were angels and had wings, and flying down the river +to Chatham and Rochester, strove to peep into the barracks +where George was... . All things considered, I think +it was as well the gates were shut, and the sentry +allowed no one to pass; so that the poor little white-robed +angel could not hear the songs those young fellows +were roaring over the whisky-punch.</p> + +<p>The day after the little conversation at Chatham barracks, +young Osborne, to show that he would be as good as +his word, prepared to go to town, thereby incurring +Captain Dobbin’s applause. “I should +have liked to make her a little present,” Osborne +said to his friend in confidence, “only I am +quite out of cash until my father tips up.” +But Dobbin would not allow this good nature and generosity +to be balked, and so accommodated Mr. Osborne with +a few pound notes, which the latter took after a little +faint scruple.</p> + +<p>And I dare say he would have bought something very +handsome for Amelia; only, getting off the coach in +Fleet Street, he was attracted by a handsome shirt-pin +in a jeweller’s window, which he could not resist; +and having paid for that, had very little money to +spare for indulging in any further exercise of kindness. + Never mind: you may be sure it was not his presents +Amelia wanted. When he came to Russell Square, her +face lighted up as if he had been sunshine. The little +cares, fears, tears, timid misgivings, sleepless fancies +of I don’t know how many days and nights, were +forgotten, under one moment’s influence of that +familiar, irresistible smile. He beamed on her from +the drawing-room door-- magnificent, with ambrosial +whiskers, like a god. Sambo, whose face as he announced +Captain Osbin (having conferred a brevet rank on +that young officer) blazed with a sympathetic grin, +saw the little girl start, and flush, and jump up +from her watching-place in the window; and Sambo retreated: +and as soon as the door was shut, she went fluttering +to Lieutenant George Osborne’s heart as if it +was the only natural home for her to nestle in. Oh, +thou poor panting little soul! The very finest tree +in the whole forest, with the straightest stem, and +the strongest arms, and the thickest foliage, wherein +you choose to build and coo, may be marked, for what +you know, and may be down with a crash ere long. +What an old, old simile that is, between man and timber!</p> + +<p>In the meanwhile, George kissed her very kindly on +her forehead and glistening eyes, and was very gracious +and good; and she thought his diamond shirt-pin (which +she had not known him to wear before) the prettiest +ornament ever seen.</p> + +<p>The observant reader, who has marked our young Lieutenant’s +previous behaviour, and has preserved our report of +the brief conversation which he has just had with +Captain Dobbin, has possibly come to certain conclusions +regarding the character of Mr. Osborne. Some cynical +Frenchman has said that there are two parties to a +love-transaction: the one who loves and the other +who condescends to be so treated. Perhaps the love +is occasionally on the man’s side; perhaps on +the lady’s. Perhaps some infatuated swain has +ere this mistaken insensibility for modesty, dulness +for maiden reserve, mere vacuity for sweet bashfulness, +and a goose, in a word, for a swan. Perhaps some beloved +female subscriber has arrayed an ass in the splendour +and glory of her imagination; admired his dulness as +manly simplicity; worshipped his selfishness as manly +superiority; treated his stupidity as majestic gravity, +and used him as the brilliant fairy Titania did a +certain weaver at Athens. I think I have seen such +comedies of errors going on in the world. But this +is certain, that Amelia believed her lover to be one +of the most gallant and brilliant men in the empire: +and it is possible Lieutenant Osborne thought so too.</p> + +<p>He was a little wild: how many young men are; and +don’t girls like a rake better than a milksop? + He hadn’t sown his wild oats as yet, but he +would soon: and quit the army now that peace was proclaimed; +the Corsican monster locked up at Elba; promotion by +consequence over; and no chance left for the display +of his undoubted military talents and valour: and +his allowance, with Amelia’s settlement, would +enable them to take a snug place in the country somewhere, +in a good sporting neighbourhood; and he would hunt +a little, and farm a little; and they would be very +happy. As for remaining in the army as a married +man, that was impossible. Fancy Mrs. George Osborne +in lodgings in a county town; or, worse still, in the +East or West Indies, with a society of officers, and +patronized by Mrs. Major O’Dowd! Amelia died +with laughing at Osborne’s stories about Mrs. +Major O’Dowd. He loved her much too fondly to +subject her to that horrid woman and her vulgarities, +and the rough treatment of a soldier’s wife. + He didn’t care for himself--not he; but his +dear little girl should take the place in society +to which, as his wife, she was entitled: and to these +proposals you may be sure she acceded, as she would +to any other from the same author.</p> + +<p>Holding this kind of conversation, and building numberless +castles in the air (which Amelia adorned with all +sorts of flower-gardens, rustic walks, country churches, +Sunday schools, and the like; while George had his +mind’s eye directed to the stables, the kennel, +and the cellar), this young pair passed away a couple +of hours very pleasantly; and as the Lieutenant had +only that single day in town, and a great deal of +most important business to transact, it was proposed +that Miss Emmy should dine with her future sisters-in-law. +This invitation was accepted joyfully. He conducted +her to his sisters; where he left her talking and +prattling in a way that astonished those ladies, who +thought that George might make something of her; and +he then went off to transact his business.</p> + +<p>In a word, he went out and ate ices at a pastry-cook’s +shop in Charing Cross; tried a new coat in Pall Mall; +dropped in at the Old Slaughters’, and called +for Captain Cannon; played eleven games at billiards +with the Captain, of which he won eight, and returned +to Russell Square half an hour late for dinner, but +in very good humour.</p> + +<p>It was not so with old Mr. Osborne. When that gentleman +came from the City, and was welcomed in the drawing-room +by his daughters and the elegant Miss Wirt, they saw +at once by his face--which was puffy, solemn, and +yellow at the best of times--and by the scowl and +twitching of his black eyebrows, that the heart within +his large white waistcoat was disturbed and uneasy. + When Amelia stepped forward to salute him, which +she always did with great trembling and timidity, +he gave a surly grunt of recognition, and dropped the +little hand out of his great hirsute paw without any +attempt to hold it there. He looked round gloomily +at his eldest daughter; who, comprehending the meaning +of his look, which asked unmistakably, “Why +the devil is she here?” said at once:</p> + +<p>“George is in town, Papa; and has gone to the +Horse Guards, and will be back to dinner.”</p> + +<p>“O he is, is he? I won’t have the dinner +kept waiting for him, Jane”; with which this +worthy man lapsed into his particular chair, and then +the utter silence in his genteel, well-furnished drawing-room +was only interrupted by the alarmed ticking of the +great French clock.</p> + +<p>When that chronometer, which was surmounted by a cheerful +brass group of the sacrifice of Iphigenia, tolled +five in a heavy cathedral tone, Mr. Osborne pulled +the bell at his right hand-violently, and the butler +rushed up.</p> + +<p>“Dinner!” roared Mr. Osborne.</p> + +<p>“Mr. George isn’t come in, sir,” +interposed the man.</p> + +<p>“Damn Mr. George, sir. Am I master of the house? +<i>Dinner</i>!” Mr. Osborne scowled. Amelia trembled. + A telegraphic communication of eyes passed between +the other three ladies. The obedient bell in the +lower regions began ringing the announcement of the +meal. The tolling over, the head of the family thrust +his hands into the great tail-pockets of his great +blue coat with brass buttons, and without waiting +for a further announcement strode downstairs alone, +scowling over his shoulder at the four females.</p> + +<p>“What’s the matter now, my dear?” +asked one of the other, as they rose and tripped gingerly +behind the sire. “I suppose the funds are +falling,” whispered Miss Wirt; and so, trembling +and in silence, this hushed female company followed +their dark leader. They took their places in silence. + He growled out a blessing, which sounded as gruffly +as a curse. The great silver dish-covers were removed. +Amelia trembled in her place, for she was next to the +awful Osborne, and alone on her side of the table--the +gap being occasioned by the absence of George.</p> + +<p>“Soup?” says Mr. Osborne, clutching the +ladle, fixing his eyes on her, in a sepulchral tone; +and having helped her and the rest, did not speak +for a while.</p> + +<p>“Take Miss Sedley’s plate away,” +at last he said. “She can’t eat the soup--no +more can I. It’s beastly. Take away the soup, +Hicks, and to-morrow turn the cook out of the house, +Jane.”</p> + +<p>Having concluded his observations upon the soup, Mr. +Osborne made a few curt remarks respecting the fish, +also of a savage and satirical tendency, and cursed +Billingsgate with an emphasis quite worthy of the +place. Then he lapsed into silence, and swallowed sundry +glasses of wine, looking more and more terrible, till +a brisk knock at the door told of George’s arrival +when everybody began to rally.</p> + +<p>“He could not come before. General Daguilet +had kept him waiting at the Horse Guards. Never mind +soup or fish. Give him anything--he didn’t +care what. Capital mutton--capital everything.” +His good humour contrasted with his father’s +severity; and he rattled on unceasingly during dinner, +to the delight of all--of one especially, who need +not be mentioned.</p> + +<p>As soon as the young ladies had discussed the orange +and the glass of wine which formed the ordinary conclusion +of the dismal banquets at Mr. Osborne’s house, +the signal to make sail for the drawing-room was given, +and they all arose and departed. Amelia hoped George +would soon join them there. She began playing some +of his favourite waltzes (then newly imported) at +the great carved-legged, leather-cased grand piano +in the drawing-room overhead. This little artifice +did not bring him. He was deaf to the waltzes; they +grew fainter and fainter; the discomfited performer +left the huge instrument presently; and though her +three friends performed some of the loudest and most +brilliant new pieces of their repertoire, she did +not hear a single note, but sate thinking, and boding +evil. Old Osborne’s scowl, terrific always, +had never before looked so deadly to her. His eyes +followed her out of the room, as if she had been guilty +of something. When they brought her coffee, she started +as though it were a cup of poison which Mr. Hicks, +the butler, wished to propose to her. What mystery +was there lurking? Oh, those women! They nurse and +cuddle their presentiments, and make darlings of their +ugliest thoughts, as they do of their deformed children.</p> + +<p>The gloom on the paternal countenance had also impressed +George Osborne with anxiety. With such eyebrows, +and a look so decidedly bilious, how was he to extract +that money from the governor, of which George was +consumedly in want? He began praising his father’s +wine. That was generally a successful means of cajoling +the old gentleman.</p> + +<p>“We never got such Madeira in the West Indies, +sir, as yours. Colonel Heavytop took off three bottles +of that you sent me down, under his belt the other +day.”</p> + +<p>“Did he?” said the old gentleman. “It +stands me in eight shillings a bottle.”</p> + +<p>“Will you take six guineas a dozen for it, sir?” +said George, with a laugh. “There’s one +of the greatest men in the kingdom wants some.”</p> + +<p>“Does he?” growled the senior. “Wish +he may get it.”</p> + +<p>“When General Daguilet was at Chatham, sir, +Heavytop gave him a breakfast, and asked me for some +of the wine. The General liked it just as well--wanted +a pipe for the Commander-in-Chief. He’s his +Royal Highness’s right-hand man.”</p> + +<p>“It is devilish fine wine,” said the Eyebrows, +and they looked more good-humoured; and George was +going to take advantage of this complacency, and bring +the supply question on the mahogany, when the father, +relapsing into solemnity, though rather cordial in +manner, bade him ring the bell for claret. “And +we’ll see if that’s as good as the Madeira, +George, to which his Royal Highness is welcome, I’m +sure. And as we are drinking it, I’ll talk to +you about a matter of importance.”</p> + +<p>Amelia heard the claret bell ringing as she sat nervously +upstairs. She thought, somehow, it was a mysterious +and presentimental bell. Of the presentiments which +some people are always having, some surely must come +right.</p> + +<p>“What I want to know, George,” the old +gentleman said, after slowly smacking his first bumper--"what +I want to know is, how you and--ah--that little thing +upstairs, are carrying on?”</p> + +<p>“I think, sir, it is not hard to see,” +George said, with a self-satisfied grin. “Pretty +clear, sir.--What capital wine!”</p> + +<p>“What d’you mean, pretty clear, sir?”</p> + +<p>“Why, hang it, sir, don’t push me too +hard. I’m a modest man. I-- ah--I don’t +set up to be a lady-killer; but I do own that she’s +as devilish fond of me as she can be. Anybody can +see that with half an eye.”</p> + +<p>“And you yourself?”</p> + +<p>“Why, sir, didn’t you order me to marry +her, and ain’t I a good boy? Haven’t our +Papas settled it ever so long?”</p> + +<p>“A pretty boy, indeed. Haven’t I heard +of your doings, sir, with Lord Tarquin, Captain Crawley +of the Guards, the Honourable Mr. Deuceace and that +set. Have a care sir, have a care.”</p> + +<p>The old gentleman pronounced these aristocratic names +with the greatest gusto. Whenever he met a great +man he grovelled before him, and my-lorded him as +only a free-born Briton can do. He came home and +looked out his history in the Peerage: he introduced +his name into his daily conversation; he bragged about +his Lordship to his daughters. He fell down prostrate +and basked in him as a Neapolitan beggar does in the +sun. George was alarmed when he heard the names. + He feared his father might have been informed of certain +transactions at play. But the old moralist eased him +by saying serenely:</p> + +<p>“Well, well, young men will be young men. And +the comfort to me is, George, that living in the best +society in England, as I hope you do; as I think you +do; as my means will allow you to do--”</p> + +<p>“Thank you, sir,” says George, making +his point at once. “One can’t live with +these great folks for nothing; and my purse, sir, look +at it”; and he held up a little token which +had been netted by Amelia, and contained the very +last of Dobbin’s pound notes.</p> + +<p>“You shan’t want, sir. The British merchant’s +son shan’t want, sir. My guineas are as good +as theirs, George, my boy; and I don’t grudge +’em. Call on Mr. Chopper as you go through the +City to-morrow; he’ll have something for you. + I don’t grudge money when I know you’re +in good society, because I know that good society can +never go wrong. There’s no pride in me. I +was a humbly born man--but you have had advantages. +Make a good use of ’em. Mix with the young +nobility. There’s many of ’em who can’t +spend a dollar to your guinea, my boy. And as for +the pink bonnets (here from under the heavy eyebrows +there came a knowing and not very pleasing leer)--why +boys will be boys. Only there’s one thing I +order you to avoid, which, if you do not, I’ll +cut you off with a shilling, by Jove; and that’s +gambling.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, of course, sir,” said George.</p> + +<p>“But to return to the other business about Amelia: +why shouldn’t you marry higher than a stockbroker’s +daughter, George--that’s what I want to know?”</p> + +<p>“It’s a family business, sir,".says George, +cracking filberts. “You and Mr. Sedley made +the match a hundred years ago.”</p> + +<p>“I don’t deny it; but people’s positions +alter, sir. I don’t deny that Sedley made my +fortune, or rather put me in the way of acquiring, +by my own talents and genius, that proud position, +which, I may say, I occupy in the tallow trade and +the City of London. I’ve shown my gratitude +to Sedley; and he’s tried it of late, sir, as +my cheque-book can show. George! I tell you in confidence +I don’t like the looks of Mr. Sedley’s +affairs. My chief clerk, Mr. Chopper, does not like +the looks of ’em, and he’s an old file, +and knows ’Change as well as any man in London. + Hulker & Bullock are looking shy at him. He’s +been dabbling on his own account I fear. They say +the Jeune Amelie was his, which was taken by the Yankee +privateer Molasses. And that’s flat--unless +I see Amelia’s ten thousand down you don’t +marry her. I’ll have no lame duck’s daughter +in my family. Pass the wine, sir--or ring for coffee.”</p> + +<p>With which Mr. Osborne spread out the evening paper, +and George knew from this signal that the colloquy +was ended, and that his papa was about to take a nap.</p> + +<p>He hurried upstairs to Amelia in the highest spirits. +What was it that made him more attentive to her on +that night than he had been for a long time--more +eager to amuse her, more tender, more brilliant in +talk? Was it that his generous heart warmed to her +at the prospect of misfortune; or that the idea of +losing the dear little prize made him value it more?</p> + +<p>She lived upon the recollections of that happy evening +for many days afterwards, remembering his words; his +looks; the song he sang; his attitude, as he leant +over her or looked at her from a distance. As it +seemed to her, no night ever passed so quickly at Mr. +Osborne’s house before; and for once this young +person was almost provoked to be angry by the premature +arrival of Mr. Sambo with her shawl.</p> + +<p>George came and took a tender leave of her the next +morning; and then hurried off to the City, where he +visited Mr. Chopper, his father’s head man, +and received from that gentleman a document which +he exchanged at Hulker & Bullock’s for a whole +pocketful of money. As George entered the house, old +John Sedley was passing out of the banker’s +parlour, looking very dismal. But his godson was much +too elated to mark the worthy stockbroker’s +depression, or the dreary eyes which the kind old +gentleman cast upon him. Young Bullock did not come +grinning out of the parlour with him as had been his +wont in former years.</p> + +<p>And as the swinging doors of Hulker, Bullock & Co. +closed upon Mr. Sedley, Mr. Quill, the cashier (whose +benevolent occupation it is to hand out crisp bank-notes +from a drawer and dispense sovereigns out of a copper +shovel), winked at Mr. Driver, the clerk at the desk +on his right. Mr. Driver winked again.</p> + +<p>“No go,” Mr. D. whispered.</p> + +<p>“Not at no price,” Mr. Q. said. “Mr. +George Osborne, sir, how will you take it?” +George crammed eagerly a quantity of notes into his +pockets, and paid Dobbin fifty pounds that very evening +at mess.</p> + +<p>That very evening Amelia wrote him the tenderest of +long letters. Her heart was overflowing with tenderness, +but it still foreboded evil. What was the cause of +Mr. Osborne’s dark looks? she asked. Had any +difference arisen between him and her papa? Her poor +papa returned so melancholy from the City, that all +were alarmed about him at home--in fine, there were +four pages of loves and fears and hopes and forebodings.</p> + +<p>“Poor little Emmy--dear little Emmy. How fond +she is of me,” George said, as he perused the +missive--"and Gad, what a headache that mixed punch +has given me!” Poor little Emmy, indeed.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XIV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Miss Crawley at Home</h4> + +<p>About this time there drove up to an exceedingly snug +and well-appointed house in Park Lane, a travelling +chariot with a lozenge on the panels, a discontented +female in a green veil and crimped curls on the rumble, +and a large and confidential man on the box. It was +the equipage of our friend Miss Crawley, returning +from Hants. The carriage windows were shut; the fat +spaniel, whose head and tongue ordinarily lolled out +of one of them, reposed on the lap of the discontented +female. When the vehicle stopped, a large round bundle +of shawls was taken out of the carriage by the aid +of various domestics and a young lady who accompanied +the heap of cloaks. That bundle contained Miss Crawley, +who was conveyed upstairs forthwith, and put into +a bed and chamber warmed properly as for the reception +of an invalid. Messengers went off for her physician +and medical man. They came, consulted, prescribed, +vanished. The young companion of Miss Crawley, at +the conclusion of their interview, came in to receive +their instructions, and administered those antiphlogistic +medicines which the eminent men ordered.</p> + +<p>Captain Crawley of the Life Guards rode up from Knightsbridge +Barracks the next day; his black charger pawed the +straw before his invalid aunt’s door. He was +most affectionate in his inquiries regarding that +amiable relative. There seemed to be much source of +apprehension. He found Miss Crawley’s maid (the +discontented female) unusually sulky and despondent; +he found Miss Briggs, her dame de compagnie, in tears +alone in the drawing-room. She had hastened home, +hearing of her beloved friend’s illness. She +wished to fly to her couch, that couch which she, +Briggs, had so often smoothed in the hour of sickness. + She was denied admission to Miss Crawley’s +apartment. A stranger was administering her medicines--a +stranger from the country--an odious Miss ...--tears +choked the utterance of the dame de compagnie, and +she buried her crushed affections and her poor old +red nose in her pocket handkerchief.</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley sent up his name by the sulky femme +de chambre, and Miss Crawley’s new companion, +coming tripping down from the sick-room, put a little +hand into his as he stepped forward eagerly to meet +her, gave a glance of great scorn at the bewildered +Briggs, and beckoning the young Guardsman out of the +back drawing-room, led him downstairs into that now +desolate dining-parlour, where so many a good dinner +had been celebrated.</p> + +<p>Here these two talked for ten minutes, discussing, +no doubt, the symptoms of the old invalid above stairs; +at the end of which period the parlour bell was rung +briskly, and answered on that instant by Mr. Bowls, +Miss Crawley’s large confidential butler (who, +indeed, happened to be at the keyhole during the most +part of the interview); and the Captain coming out, +curling his mustachios, mounted the black charger +pawing among the straw, to the admiration of the little +blackguard boys collected in the street. He looked +in at the dining-room window, managing his horse, +which curvetted and capered beautifully--for one instant +the young person might be seen at the window, when +her figure vanished, and, doubtless, she went upstairs +again to resume the affecting duties of benevolence.</p> + +<p>Who could this young woman be, I wonder? That evening +a little dinner for two persons was laid in the dining-room--when +Mrs. Firkin, the lady’s maid, pushed into her +mistress’s apartment, and bustled about there +during the vacancy occasioned by the departure of +the new nurse--and the latter and Miss Briggs sat down +to the neat little meal.</p> + +<p>Briggs was so much choked by emotion that she could +hardly take a morsel of meat. The young person carved +a fowl with the utmost delicacy, and asked so distinctly +for egg-sauce, that poor Briggs, before whom that +delicious condiment was placed, started, made a great +clattering with the ladle, and once more fell back +in the most gushing hysterical state.</p> + +<p>“Had you not better give Miss Briggs a glass +of wine?” said the person to Mr. Bowls, the +large confidential man. He did so. Briggs seized +it mechanically, gasped it down convulsively, moaned +a little, and began to play with the chicken on her +plate.</p> + +<p>“I think we shall be able to help each other,” +said the person with great suavity: “and shall +have no need of Mr. Bowls’s kind services. Mr. +Bowls, if you please, we will ring when we want you.” +He went downstairs, where, by the way, he vented the +most horrid curses upon the unoffending footman, his +subordinate.</p> + +<p>“It is a pity you take on so, Miss Briggs,” +the young lady said, with a cool, slightly sarcastic, +air.</p> + +<p>“My dearest friend is so ill, and wo--o--on’t +see me,” gurgled out Briggs in an agony of renewed +grief.</p> + +<p>“She’s not very ill any more. Console +yourself, dear Miss Briggs. She has only overeaten +herself--that is all. She is greatly better. She will +soon be quite restored again. She is weak from being +cupped and from medical treatment, but she will rally +immediately. Pray console yourself, and take a little +more wine.”</p> + +<p>“But why, why won’t she see me again?” +Miss Briggs bleated out. “Oh, Matilda, Matilda, +after three-and-twenty years’ tenderness! is +this the return to your poor, poor Arabella?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t cry too much, poor Arabella,” +the other said (with ever so little of a grin); “she +only won’t see you, because she says you don’t +nurse her as well as I do. It’s no pleasure to +me to sit up all night. I wish you might do it instead.”</p> + +<p>“Have I not tended that dear couch for years?” +Arabella said, “and now--”</p> + +<p>“Now she prefers somebody else. Well, sick +people have these fancies, and must be humoured. +When she’s well I shall go.”</p> + +<p>“Never, never,” Arabella exclaimed, madly +inhaling her salts-bottle.</p> + +<p>“Never be well or never go, Miss Briggs?” +the other said, with the same provoking good-nature. + “Pooh--she will be well in a fortnight, when +I shall go back to my little pupils at Queen’s +Crawley, and to their mother, who is a great deal +more sick than our friend. You need not be jealous +about me, my dear Miss Briggs. I am a poor little +girl without any friends, or any harm in me. I don’t +want to supplant you in Miss Crawley’s good +graces. She will forget me a week after I am gone: +and her affection for you has been the work of years. + Give me a little wine if you please, my dear Miss +Briggs, and let us be friends. I’m sure I want +friends.”</p> + +<p>The placable and soft-hearted Briggs speechlessly +pushed out her hand at this appeal; but she felt the +desertion most keenly for all that, and bitterly, +bitterly moaned the fickleness of her Matilda. At +the end of half an hour, the meal over, Miss Rebecca +Sharp (for such, astonishing to state, is the name +of her who has been described ingeniously as “the +person” hitherto), went upstairs again to her +patient’s rooms, from which, with the most engaging +politeness, she eliminated poor Firkin. “Thank +you, Mrs. Firkin, that will quite do; how nicely you +make it! I will ring when anything is wanted.” +“Thank you”; and Firkin came downstairs +in a tempest of jealousy, only the more dangerous +because she was forced to confine it in her own bosom.</p> + +<p>Could it be the tempest which, as she passed the landing +of the first floor, blew open the drawing-room door? +No; it was stealthily opened by the hand of Briggs. +Briggs had been on the watch. Briggs too well heard +the creaking Firkin descend the stairs, and the clink +of the spoon and gruel-basin the neglected female carried.</p> + +<p>“Well, Firkin?” says she, as the other +entered the apartment. “Well, Jane?”</p> + +<p>“Wuss and wuss, Miss B.,” Firkin said, +wagging her head.</p> + +<p>“Is she not better then?”</p> + +<p>“She never spoke but once, and I asked her if +she felt a little more easy, and she told me to hold +my stupid tongue. Oh, Miss B., I never thought to +have seen this day!” And the water-works again +began to play.</p> + +<p>“What sort of a person is this Miss Sharp, Firkin? +I little thought, while enjoying my Christmas revels +in the elegant home of my firm friends, the Reverend +Lionel Delamere and his amiable lady, to find a stranger +had taken my place in the affections of my dearest, +my still dearest Matilda!” Miss Briggs, it +will be seen by her language, was of a literary and +sentimental turn, and had once published a volume +of poems--"Trills of the Nightingale"--by subscription.</p> + +<p>“Miss B., they are all infatyated about that +young woman,” Firkin replied. “Sir Pitt +wouldn’t have let her go, but he daredn’t +refuse Miss Crawley anything. Mrs. Bute at the Rectory +jist as bad--never happy out of her sight. The Capting +quite wild about her. Mr. Crawley mortial jealous. +Since Miss C. was took ill, she won’t have nobody +near her but Miss Sharp, I can’t tell for where +nor for why; and I think somethink has bewidged everybody.”</p> + +<p>Rebecca passed that night in constant watching upon +Miss Crawley; the next night the old lady slept so +comfortably, that Rebecca had time for several hours’ +comfortable repose herself on the sofa, at the foot +of her patroness’s bed; very soon, Miss Crawley +was so well that she sat up and laughed heartily at +a perfect imitation of Miss Briggs and her grief, +which Rebecca described to her. Briggs’ weeping +snuffle, and her manner of using the handkerchief, +were so completely rendered that Miss Crawley became +quite cheerful, to the admiration of the doctors when +they visited her, who usually found this worthy woman +of the world, when the least sickness attacked her, +under the most abject depression and terror of death.</p> + +<p>Captain Crawley came every day, and received bulletins +from Miss Rebecca respecting his aunt’s health. +This improved so rapidly, that poor Briggs was allowed +to see her patroness; and persons with tender hearts +may imagine the smothered emotions of that sentimental +female, and the affecting nature of the interview.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley liked to have Briggs in a good deal soon. + Rebecca used to mimic her to her face with the most +admirable gravity, thereby rendering the imitation +doubly piquant to her worthy patroness.</p> + +<p>The causes which had led to the deplorable illness +of Miss Crawley, and her departure from her brother’s +house in the country, were of such an unromantic nature +that they are hardly fit to be explained in this genteel +and sentimental novel. For how is it possible to +hint of a delicate female, living in good society, +that she ate and drank too much, and that a hot supper +of lobsters profusely enjoyed at the Rectory was the +reason of an indisposition which Miss Crawley herself +persisted was solely attributable to the dampness of +the weather? The attack was so sharp that Matilda--as +his Reverence expressed it--was very nearly “off +the hooks”; all the family were in a fever of +expectation regarding the will, and Rawdon Crawley +was making sure of at least forty thousand pounds +before the commencement of the London season. Mr. +Crawley sent over a choice parcel of tracts, to prepare +her for the change from Vanity Fair and Park Lane +for another world; but a good doctor from Southampton +being called in in time, vanquished the lobster which +was so nearly fatal to her, and gave her sufficient +strength to enable her to return to London. The Baronet +did not disguise his exceeding mortification at the +turn which affairs took.</p> + +<p>While everybody was attending on Miss Crawley, and +messengers every hour from the Rectory were carrying +news of her health to the affectionate folks there, +there was a lady in another part of the house, being +exceedingly ill, of whom no one took any notice at +all; and this was the lady of Crawley herself. The +good doctor shook his head after seeing her; to which +visit Sir Pitt consented, as it could be paid without +a fee; and she was left fading away in her lonely +chamber, with no more heed paid to her than to a weed +in the park.</p> + +<p>The young ladies, too, lost much of the inestimable +benefit of their governess’s instruction, So +affectionate a nurse was Miss Sharp, that Miss Crawley +would take her medicines from no other hand. Firkin +had been deposed long before her mistress’s departure +from the country. That faithful attendant found a +gloomy consolation on returning to London, in seeing +Miss Briggs suffer the same pangs of jealousy and +undergo the same faithless treatment to which she +herself had been subject.</p> + +<p>Captain Rawdon got an extension of leave on his aunt’s +illness, and remained dutifully at home. He was always +in her antechamber. (She lay sick in the state bedroom, +into which you entered by the little blue saloon.) +His father was always meeting him there; or if he came +down the corridor ever so quietly, his father’s +door was sure to open, and the hyena face of the old +gentleman to glare out. What was it set one to watch +the other so? A generous rivalry, no doubt, as to +which should be most attentive to the dear sufferer +in the state bedroom. Rebecca used to come out and +comfort both of them; or one or the other of them +rather. Both of these worthy gentlemen were most +anxious to have news of the invalid from her little +confidential messenger.</p> + +<p>At dinner--to which meal she descended for half an +hour--she kept the peace between them: after which +she disappeared for the night; when Rawdon would ride +over to the depot of the 150th at Mudbury, leaving +his papa to the society of Mr. Horrocks and his rum +and water. She passed as weary a fortnight as ever +mortal spent in Miss Crawley’s sick-room; but +her little nerves seemed to be of iron, as she was +quite unshaken by the duty and the tedium of the sick-chamber.</p> + +<p>She never told until long afterwards how painful that +duty was; how peevish a patient was the jovial old +lady; how angry; how sleepless; in what horrors of +death; during what long nights she lay moaning, and +in almost delirious agonies respecting that future +world which she quite ignored when she was in good +health.--Picture to yourself, oh fair young reader, +a worldly, selfish, graceless, thankless, religionless +old woman, writhing in pain and fear, and without her +wig. Picture her to yourself, and ere you be old, +learn to love and pray!</p> + +<p>Sharp watched this graceless bedside with indomitable +patience. Nothing escaped her; and, like a prudent +steward, she found a use for everything. She told +many a good story about Miss Crawley’s illness +in after days--stories which made the lady blush through +her artificial carnations. During the illness she +was never out of temper; always alert; she slept light, +having a perfectly clear conscience; and could take +that refreshment at almost any minute’s warning. + And so you saw very few traces of fatigue in her +appearance. Her face might be a trifle paler, and +the circles round her eyes a little blacker than usual; +but whenever she came out from the sick-room she was +always smiling, fresh, and neat, and looked as trim +in her little dressing-gown and cap, as in her smartest +evening suit.</p> + +<p>The Captain thought so, and raved about her in uncouth +convulsions. The barbed shaft of love had penetrated +his dull hide. Six weeks-- appropinquity--opportunity--had +victimised him completely. He made a confidante of +his aunt at the Rectory, of all persons in the world. + She rallied him about it; she had perceived his folly; +she warned him; she finished by owning that little +Sharp was the most clever, droll, odd, good-natured, +simple, kindly creature in England. Rawdon must not +trifle with her affections, though--dear Miss Crawley +would never pardon him for that; for she, too, was +quite overcome by the little governess, and loved Sharp +like a daughter. Rawdon must go away--go back to +his regiment and naughty London, and not play with +a poor artless girl’s feelings.</p> + +<p>Many and many a time this good-natured lady, compassionating +the forlorn life-guardsman’s condition, gave +him an opportunity of seeing Miss Sharp at the Rectory, +and of walking home with her, as we have seen. When +men of a certain sort, ladies, are in love, though +they see the hook and the string, and the whole apparatus +with which they are to be taken, they gorge the bait +nevertheless-- they must come to it--they must swallow +it--and are presently struck and landed gasping. +Rawdon saw there was a manifest intention on Mrs. +Bute’s part to captivate him with Rebecca. He +was not very wise; but he was a man about town, and +had seen several seasons. A light dawned upon his +dusky soul, as he thought, through a speech of Mrs. +Bute’s.</p> + +<p>“Mark my words, Rawdon,” she said. “You +will have Miss Sharp one day for your relation.”</p> + +<p>“What relation--my cousin, hey, Mrs. Bute? James +sweet on her, hey?” inquired the waggish officer.</p> + +<p>“More than that,” Mrs. Bute said, with +a flash from her black eyes.</p> + +<p>“Not Pitt? He sha’n’t have her. + The sneak a’n’t worthy of her. He’s +booked to Lady Jane Sheepshanks.”</p> + +<p>“You men perceive nothing. You silly, blind +creature--if anything happens to Lady Crawley, Miss +Sharp will be your mother-in-law; and that’s +what will happen.”</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley, Esquire, gave vent to a prodigious +whistle, in token of astonishment at this announcement. +He couldn’t deny it. His father’s evident +liking for Miss Sharp had not escaped him. He knew +the old gentleman’s character well; and a more +unscrupulous old-- whyou--he did not conclude the +sentence, but walked home, curling his mustachios, +and convinced he had found a clue to Mrs. Bute’s +mystery.</p> + +<p>“By Jove, it’s too bad,” thought +Rawdon, “too bad, by Jove! I do believe the +woman wants the poor girl to be ruined, in order that +she shouldn’t come into the family as Lady Crawley.”</p> + +<p>When he saw Rebecca alone, he rallied her about his +father’s attachment in his graceful way. She +flung up her head scornfully, looked him full in the +face, and said,</p> + +<p>“Well, suppose he is fond of me. I know he +is, and others too. You don’t think I am afraid +of him, Captain Crawley? You don’t suppose +I can’t defend my own honour,” said the +little woman, looking as stately as a queen.</p> + +<p>“Oh, ah, why--give you fair warning--look out, +you know--that’s all,” said the mustachio-twiddler.</p> + +<p>“You hint at something not honourable, then?” +said she, flashing out.</p> + +<p>“O Gad--really--Miss Rebecca,” the heavy +dragoon interposed.</p> + +<p>“Do you suppose I have no feeling of self-respect, +because I am poor and friendless, and because rich +people have none? Do you think, because I am a governess, +I have not as much sense, and feeling, and good breeding +as you gentlefolks in Hampshire? I’m a Montmorency. +Do you suppose a Montmorency is not as good as a Crawley?”</p> + +<p>When Miss Sharp was agitated, and alluded to her maternal +relatives, she spoke with ever so slight a foreign +accent, which gave a great charm to her clear ringing +voice. “No,” she continued, kindling as +she spoke to the Captain; “I can endure poverty, +but not shame-- neglect, but not insult; and insult +from--from you.”</p> + +<p>Her feelings gave way, and she burst into tears.</p> + +<p>“Hang it, Miss Sharp--Rebecca--by Jove--upon +my soul, I wouldn’t for a thousand pounds. +Stop, Rebecca!”</p> + +<p>She was gone. She drove out with Miss Crawley that +day. It was before the latter’s illness. At +dinner she was unusually brilliant and lively; but +she would take no notice of the hints, or the nods, +or the clumsy expostulations of the humiliated, infatuated +guardsman. Skirmishes of this sort passed perpetually +during the little campaign--tedious to relate, and +similar in result. The Crawley heavy cavalry was +maddened by defeat, and routed every day.</p> + +<p>If the Baronet of Queen’s Crawley had not had +the fear of losing his sister’s legacy before +his eyes, he never would have permitted his dear girls +to lose the educational blessings which their invaluable +governess was conferring upon them. The old house +at home seemed a desert without her, so useful and +pleasant had Rebecca made herself there. Sir Pitt’s +letters were not copied and corrected; his books not +made up; his household business and manifold schemes +neglected, now that his little secretary was away. + And it was easy to see how necessary such an amanuensis +was to him, by the tenor and spelling of the numerous +letters which he sent to her, entreating her and commanding +her to return. Almost every day brought a frank from +the Baronet, enclosing the most urgent prayers to +Becky for her return, or conveying pathetic statements +to Miss Crawley, regarding the neglected state of +his daughters’ education; of which documents +Miss Crawley took very little heed.</p> + +<p>Miss Briggs was not formally dismissed, but her place +as companion was a sinecure and a derision; and her +company was the fat spaniel in the drawing-room, or +occasionally the discontented Firkin in the housekeeper’s +closet. Nor though the old lady would by no means +hear of Rebecca’s departure, was the latter regularly +installed in office in Park Lane. Like many wealthy +people, it was Miss Crawley’s habit to accept +as much service as she could get from her inferiors; +and good-naturedly to take leave of them when she no +longer found them useful. Gratitude among certain +rich folks is scarcely natural or to be thought of. + They take needy people’s services as their +due. Nor have you, O poor parasite and humble hanger-on, +much reason to complain! Your friendship for Dives +is about as sincere as the return which it usually +gets. It is money you love, and not the man; and +were Croesus and his footman to change places you +know, you poor rogue, who would have the benefit of +your allegiance.</p> + +<p>And I am not sure that, in spite of Rebecca’s +simplicity and activity, and gentleness and untiring +good humour, the shrewd old London lady, upon whom +these treasures of friendship were lavished, had not +a lurking suspicion all the while of her affectionate +nurse and friend. It must have often crossed Miss +Crawley’s mind that nobody does anything for +nothing. If she measured her own feeling towards +the world, she must have been pretty well able to gauge +those of the world towards herself; and perhaps she +reflected that it is the ordinary lot of people to +have no friends if they themselves care for nobody.</p> + +<p>Well, meanwhile Becky was the greatest comfort and +convenience to her, and she gave her a couple of new +gowns, and an old necklace and shawl, and showed her +friendship by abusing all her intimate acquaintances +to her new confidante (than which there can’t +be a more touching proof of regard), and meditated +vaguely some great future benefit--to marry her perhaps +to Clump, the apothecary, or to settle her in some +advantageous way of life; or at any rate, to send +her back to Queen’s Crawley when she had done +with her, and the full London season had begun.</p> + +<p>When Miss Crawley was convalescent and descended to +the drawing-room, Becky sang to her, and otherwise +amused her; when she was well enough to drive out, +Becky accompanied her. And amongst the drives which +they took, whither, of all places in the world, did +Miss Crawley’s admirable good-nature and friendship +actually induce her to penetrate, but to Russell Square, +Bloomsbury, and the house of John Sedley, Esquire.</p> + +<p>Ere that event, many notes had passed, as may be imagined, +between the two dear friends. During the months of +Rebecca’s stay in Hampshire, the eternal friendship +had (must it be owned?) suffered considerable diminution, +and grown so decrepit and feeble with old age as to +threaten demise altogether. The fact is, both girls +had their own real affairs to think of: Rebecca her +advance with her employers--Amelia her own absorbing +topic. When the two girls met, and flew into each +other’s arms with that impetuosity which distinguishes +the behaviour of young ladies towards each other, +Rebecca performed her part of the embrace with the +most perfect briskness and energy. Poor little Amelia +blushed as she kissed her friend, and thought she +had been guilty of something very like coldness towards +her.</p> + +<p>Their first interview was but a very short one. Amelia +was just ready to go out for a walk. Miss Crawley +was waiting in her carriage below, her people wondering +at the locality in which they found themselves, and +gazing upon honest Sambo, the black footman of Bloomsbury, +as one of the queer natives of the place. But when +Amelia came down with her kind smiling looks (Rebecca +must introduce her to her friend, Miss Crawley was +longing to see her, and was too ill to leave her carriage)--when, +I say, Amelia came down, the Park Lane shoulder-knot +aristocracy wondered more and more that such a thing +could come out of Bloomsbury; and Miss Crawley was +fairly captivated by the sweet blushing face of the +young lady who came forward so timidly and so gracefully +to pay her respects to the protector of her friend.</p> + +<p>“What a complexion, my dear! What a sweet voice!” +Miss Crawley said, as they drove away westward after +the little interview. “My dear Sharp, your +young friend is charming. Send for her to Park Lane, +do you hear?” Miss Crawley had a good taste. + She liked natural manners--a little timidity only +set them off. She liked pretty faces near her; as +she liked pretty pictures and nice china. She talked +of Amelia with rapture half a dozen times that day. + She mentioned her to Rawdon Crawley, who came dutifully +to partake of his aunt’s chicken.</p> + +<p>Of course, on this Rebecca instantly stated that Amelia +was engaged to be married--to a Lieutenant Osborne--a +very old flame.</p> + +<p>“Is he a man in a line-regiment?” Captain +Crawley asked, remembering after an effort, as became +a guardsman, the number of the regiment, the --th.</p> + +<p>Rebecca thought that was the regiment. “The +Captain’s name,” she said, “was +Captain Dobbin.”</p> + +<p>“A lanky gawky fellow,” said Crawley, +“tumbles over everybody. I know him; and Osborne’s +a goodish-looking fellow, with large black whiskers?”</p> + +<p>“Enormous,” Miss Rebecca Sharp said, “and +enormously proud of them, I assure you.”</p> + +<p>Captain Rawdon Crawley burst into a horse-laugh by +way of reply; and being pressed by the ladies to explain, +did so when the explosion of hilarity was over. “He +fancies he can play at billiards,” said he. +“I won two hundred of him at the Cocoa-Tree. + <i>He</i> play, the young flat! He’d have played +for anything that day, but his friend Captain Dobbin +carried him off, hang him!”</p> + +<p>“Rawdon, Rawdon, don’t be so wicked,” +Miss Crawley remarked, highly pleased.</p> + +<p>“Why, ma’am, of all the young fellows +I’ve seen out of the line, I think this fellow’s +the greenest. Tarquin and Deuceace get what money +they like out of him. He’d go to the deuce to +be seen with a lord. He pays their dinners at Greenwich, +and they invite the company.”</p> + +<p>“And very pretty company too, I dare say.”</p> + +<p>“Quite right, Miss Sharp. Right, as usual, +Miss Sharp. Uncommon pretty company--haw, haw!” +and the Captain laughed more and more, thinking he +had made a good joke.</p> + +<p>“Rawdon, don’t be naughty!” his +aunt exclaimed.</p> + +<p>“Well, his father’s a City man--immensely +rich, they say. Hang those City fellows, they must +bleed; and I’ve not done with him yet, I can +tell you. Haw, haw!”</p> + +<p>“Fie, Captain Crawley; I shall warn Amelia. + A gambling husband!”</p> + +<p>“Horrid, ain’t he, hey?” the Captain +said with great solemnity; and then added, a sudden +thought having struck him: “Gad, I say, ma’am, +we’ll have him here.”</p> + +<p>“Is he a presentable sort of a person?” +the aunt inquired.</p> + +<p>“Presentable?--oh, very well. You wouldn’t +see any difference,” Captain Crawley answered. + “Do let’s have him, when you begin to +see a few people; and his whatdyecallem--his inamorato--eh, +Miss Sharp; that’s what you call it--comes. + Gad, I’ll write him a note, and have him; and +I’ll try if he can play piquet as well as billiards. +Where does he live, Miss Sharp?”</p> + +<p>Miss Sharp told Crawley the Lieutenant’s town +address; and a few days after this conversation, Lieutenant +Osborne received a letter, in Captain Rawdon’s +schoolboy hand, and enclosing a note of invitation +from Miss Crawley.</p> + +<p>Rebecca despatched also an invitation to her darling +Amelia, who, you may be sure, was ready enough to +accept it when she heard that George was to be of +the party. It was arranged that Amelia was to spend +the morning with the ladies of Park Lane, where all +were very kind to her. Rebecca patronised her with +calm superiority: she was so much the cleverer of +the two, and her friend so gentle and unassuming, +that she always yielded when anybody chose to command, +and so took Rebecca’s orders with perfect meekness +and good humour. Miss Crawley’s graciousness +was also remarkable. She continued her raptures about +little Amelia, talked about her before her face as +if she were a doll, or a servant, or a picture, and +admired her with the most benevolent wonder possible. + I admire that admiration which the genteel world +sometimes extends to the commonalty. There is no more +agreeable object in life than to see Mayfair folks +condescending. Miss Crawley’s prodigious benevolence +rather fatigued poor little Amelia, and I am not sure +that of the three ladies in Park Lane she did not +find honest Miss Briggs the most agreeable. She sympathised +with Briggs as with all neglected or gentle people: +she wasn’t what you call a woman of spirit.</p> + +<p>George came to dinner--a repast en garcon with Captain +Crawley.</p> + +<p>The great family coach of the Osbornes transported +him to Park Lane from Russell Square; where the young +ladies, who were not themselves invited, and professed +the greatest indifference at that slight, nevertheless +looked at Sir Pitt Crawley’s name in the baronetage; +and learned everything which that work had to teach +about the Crawley family and their pedigree, and the +Binkies, their relatives, &c., &c. Rawdon Crawley +received George Osborne with great frankness and graciousness: +praised his play at billiards: asked him when he would +have his revenge: was interested about Osborne’s +regiment: and would have proposed piquet to him that +very evening, but Miss Crawley absolutely forbade +any gambling in her house; so that the young Lieutenant’s +purse was not lightened by his gallant patron, for +that day at least. However, they made an engagement +for the next, somewhere: to look at a horse that Crawley +had to sell, and to try him in the Park; and to dine +together, and to pass the evening with some jolly +fellows. “That is, if you’re not on duty +to that pretty Miss Sedley,” Crawley said, with +a knowing wink. “Monstrous nice girl, ’pon +my honour, though, Osborne,” he was good enough +to add. “Lots of tin, I suppose, eh?”</p> + +<p>Osborne wasn’t on duty; he would join Crawley +with pleasure: and the latter, when they met the next +day, praised his new friend’s horsemanship--as +he might with perfect honesty--and introduced him +to three or four young men of the first fashion, whose +acquaintance immensely elated the simple young officer.</p> + +<p>“How’s little Miss Sharp, by-the-bye?” +Osborne inquired of his friend over their wine, with +a dandified air. “Good-natured little girl that. + Does she suit you well at Queen’s Crawley? Miss +Sedley liked her a good deal last year.”</p> + +<p>Captain Crawley looked savagely at the Lieutenant +out of his little blue eyes, and watched him when +he went up to resume his acquaintance with the fair +governess. Her conduct must have relieved Crawley +if there was any jealousy in the bosom of that life-guardsman.</p> + +<p>When the young men went upstairs, and after Osborne’s +introduction to Miss Crawley, he walked up to Rebecca +with a patronising, easy swagger. He was going to +be kind to her and protect her. He would even shake +hands with her, as a friend of Amelia’s; and +saying, “Ah, Miss Sharp! how-dy-doo?” +held out his left hand towards her, expecting that +she would be quite confounded at the honour.</p> + +<p>Miss Sharp put out her right forefinger, and gave +him a little nod, so cool and killing, that Rawdon +Crawley, watching the operations from the other room, +could hardly restrain his laughter as he saw the Lieutenant’s +entire discomfiture; the start he gave, the pause, +and the perfect clumsiness with which he at length +condescended to take the finger which was offered +for his embrace.</p> + +<p>“She’d beat the devil, by Jove!” +the Captain said, in a rapture; and the Lieutenant, +by way of beginning the conversation, agreeably asked +Rebecca how she liked her new place.</p> + +<p>“My place?” said Miss Sharp, coolly, “how +kind of you to remind me of it! It’s a tolerably +good place: the wages are pretty good--not so good +as Miss Wirt’s, I believe, with your sisters +in Russell Square. How are those young ladies?--not +that I ought to ask.”</p> + +<p>“Why not?” Mr. Osborne said, amazed.</p> + +<p>“Why, they never condescended to speak to me, +or to ask me into their house, whilst I was staying +with Amelia; but we poor governesses, you know, are +used to slights of this sort.”</p> + +<p>“My dear Miss Sharp!” Osborne ejaculated.</p> + +<p>“At least in some families,” Rebecca continued. + “You can’t think what a difference there +is though. We are not so wealthy in Hampshire as +you lucky folks of the City. But then I am in a gentleman’s +family--good old English stock. I suppose you know +Sir Pitt’s father refused a peerage. And you +see how I am treated. I am pretty comfortable. Indeed +it is rather a good place. But how very good of you +to inquire!”</p> + +<p>Osborne was quite savage. The little governess patronised +him and persiffled him until this young British Lion +felt quite uneasy; nor could he muster sufficient +presence of mind to find a pretext for backing out +of this most delectable conversation.</p> + +<p>“I thought you liked the City families pretty +well,” he said, haughtily.</p> + +<p>“Last year you mean, when I was fresh from that +horrid vulgar school? Of course I did. Doesn’t +every girl like to come home for the holidays? And +how was I to know any better? But oh, Mr. Osborne, +what a difference eighteen months’ experience +makes! eighteen months spent, pardon me for saying +so, with gentlemen. As for dear Amelia, she, I grant +you, is a pearl, and would be charming anywhere. +There now, I see you are beginning to be in a good +humour; but oh these queer odd City people! And Mr. +Jos--how is that wonderful Mr. Joseph?”</p> + +<p>“It seems to me you didn’t dislike that +wonderful Mr. Joseph last year,” Osborne said +kindly.</p> + +<p>“How severe of you! Well, entre nous, I didn’t +break my heart about him; yet if he had asked me to +do what you mean by your looks (and very expressive +and kind they are, too), I wouldn’t have said +no.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Osborne gave a look as much as to say, “Indeed, +how very obliging!”</p> + +<p>“What an honour to have had you for a brother-in-law, +you are thinking? To be sister-in-law to George Osborne, +Esquire, son of John Osborne, Esquire, son of--what +was your grandpapa, Mr. Osborne? Well, don’t +be angry. You can’t help your pedigree, and +I quite agree with you that I would have married Mr. +Joe Sedley; for could a poor penniless girl do better? + Now you know the whole secret. I’m frank and +open; considering all things, it was very kind of you +to allude to the circumstance--very kind and polite. + Amelia dear, Mr. Osborne and I were talking about +your poor brother Joseph. How is he?”</p> + +<p>Thus was George utterly routed. Not that Rebecca +was in the right; but she had managed most successfully +to put him in the wrong. And he now shamefully fled, +feeling, if he stayed another minute, that he would +have been made to look foolish in the presence of Amelia.</p> + +<p>Though Rebecca had had the better of him, George was +above the meanness of talebearing or revenge upon +a lady--only he could not help cleverly confiding +to Captain Crawley, next day, some notions of his +regarding Miss Rebecca--that she was a sharp one, a +dangerous one, a desperate flirt, &c.; in all of which +opinions Crawley agreed laughingly, and with every +one of which Miss Rebecca was made acquainted before +twenty-four hours were over. They added to her original +regard for Mr. Osborne. Her woman’s instinct +had told her that it was George who had interrupted +the success of her first love-passage, and she esteemed +him accordingly.</p> + +<p>“I only just warn you,” he said to Rawdon +Crawley, with a knowing look--he had bought the horse, +and lost some score of guineas after dinner, “I +just warn you--I know women, and counsel you to be +on the look-out.”</p> + +<p>“Thank you, my boy,” said Crawley, with +a look of peculiar gratitude. “You’re +wide awake, I see.” And George went off, thinking +Crawley was quite right.</p> + +<p>He told Amelia of what he had done, and how he had +counselled Rawdon Crawley--a devilish good, straightforward +fellow--to be on his guard against that little sly, +scheming Rebecca.</p> + +<p>“Against whom?” Amelia cried.</p> + +<p>“Your friend the governess.--Don’t look +so astonished.”</p> + +<p>“O George, what have you done?” Amelia +said. For her woman’s eyes, which Love had +made sharp-sighted, had in one instant discovered a +secret which was invisible to Miss Crawley, to poor +virgin Briggs, and above all, to the stupid peepers +of that young whiskered prig, Lieutenant Osborne.</p> + +<p>For as Rebecca was shawling her in an upper apartment, +where these two friends had an opportunity for a little +of that secret talking and conspiring which form the +delight of female life, Amelia, coming up to Rebecca, +and taking her two little hands in hers, said, “Rebecca, +I see it all.”</p> + +<p>Rebecca kissed her.</p> + +<p>And regarding this delightful secret, not one syllable +more was said by either of the young women. But it +was destined to come out before long.</p> + +<p>Some short period after the above events, and Miss +Rebecca Sharp still remaining at her patroness’s +house in Park Lane, one more hatchment might have +been seen in Great Gaunt Street, figuring amongst +the many which usually ornament that dismal quarter. + It was over Sir Pitt Crawley’s house; but it +did not indicate the worthy baronet’s demise. + It was a feminine hatchment, and indeed a few years +back had served as a funeral compliment to Sir Pitt’s +old mother, the late dowager Lady Crawley. Its period +of service over, the hatchment had come down from +the front of the house, and lived in retirement somewhere +in the back premises of Sir Pitt’s mansion. +It reappeared now for poor Rose Dawson. Sir Pitt was +a widower again. The arms quartered on the shield +along with his own were not, to be sure, poor Rose’s. +She had no arms. But the cherubs painted on the scutcheon +answered as well for her as for Sir Pitt’s mother, +and Resurgam was written under the coat, flanked by +the Crawley Dove and Serpent. Arms and Hatchments, +Resurgam.--Here is an opportunity for moralising!</p> + +<p>Mr. Crawley had tended that otherwise friendless bedside. + She went out of the world strengthened by such words +and comfort as he could give her. For many years +his was the only kindness she ever knew; the only +friendship that solaced in any way that feeble, lonely +soul. Her heart was dead long before her body. She +had sold it to become Sir Pitt Crawley’s wife. + Mothers and daughters are making the same bargain +every day in Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>When the demise took place, her husband was in London +attending to some of his innumerable schemes, and +busy with his endless lawyers. He had found time, +nevertheless, to call often in Park Lane, and to despatch +many notes to Rebecca, entreating her, enjoining her, +commanding her to return to her young pupils in the +country, who were now utterly without companionship +during their mother’s illness. But Miss Crawley +would not hear of her departure; for though there +was no lady of fashion in London who would desert her +friends more complacently as soon as she was tired +of their society, and though few tired of them sooner, +yet as long as her engoument lasted her attachment +was prodigious, and she clung still with the greatest +energy to Rebecca.</p> + +<p>The news of Lady Crawley’s death provoked no +more grief or comment than might have been expected +in Miss Crawley’s family circle. “I suppose +I must put off my party for the 3rd,” Miss Crawley +said; and added, after a pause, “I hope my brother +will have the decency not to marry again.” “What +a confounded rage Pitt will be in if he does,” +Rawdon remarked, with his usual regard for his elder +brother. Rebecca said nothing. She seemed by far +the gravest and most impressed of the family. She +left the room before Rawdon went away that day; but +they met by chance below, as he was going away after +taking leave, and had a parley together.</p> + +<p>On the morrow, as Rebecca was gazing from the window, +she startled Miss Crawley, who was placidly occupied +with a French novel, by crying out in an alarmed tone, +“Here’s Sir Pitt, Ma’am!” and +the Baronet’s knock followed this announcement.</p> + +<p>“My dear, I can’t see him. I won’t +see him. Tell Bowls not at home, or go downstairs +and say I’m too ill to receive any one. My +nerves really won’t bear my brother at this moment,” +cried out Miss Crawley, and resumed the novel.</p> + +<p>“She’s too ill to see you, sir,” +Rebecca said, tripping down to Sir Pitt, who was preparing +to ascend.</p> + +<p>“So much the better,” Sir Pitt answered. + “I want to see <i>you</i>, Miss Becky. Come +along a me into the parlour,” and they entered +that apartment together.</p> + +<p>“I wawnt you back at Queen’s Crawley, +Miss,” the baronet said, fixing his eyes upon +her, and taking off his black gloves and his hat with +its great crape hat-band. His eyes had such a strange +look, and fixed upon her so steadfastly, that Rebecca +Sharp began almost to tremble.</p> + +<p>“I hope to come soon,” she said in a low +voice, “as soon as Miss Crawley is better--and +return to--to the dear children.”</p> + +<p>“You’ve said so these three months, Becky,” +replied Sir Pitt, “and still you go hanging +on to my sister, who’ll fling you off like an +old shoe, when she’s wore you out. I tell you +I want you. I’m going back to the Vuneral. +Will you come back? Yes or no?”</p> + +<p>“I daren’t--I don’t think--it would +be right--to be alone--with you, sir,” Becky +said, seemingly in great agitation.</p> + +<p>“I say agin, I want you,” Sir Pitt said, +thumping the table. “I can’t git on without +you. I didn’t see what it was till you went +away. The house all goes wrong. It’s not the +same place. All my accounts has got muddled agin. +You <i>must</i> come back. Do come back. Dear Becky, +do come.”</p> + +<p>“Come--as what, sir?” Rebecca gasped out.</p> + +<p>“Come as Lady Crawley, if you like,” the +Baronet said, grasping his crape hat. “There! +will that zatusfy you? Come back and be my wife. Your +vit vor’t. Birth be hanged. You’re as +good a lady as ever I see. You’ve got more +brains in your little vinger than any baronet’s +wife in the county. Will you come? Yes or no?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, Sir Pitt!” Rebecca said, very much +moved.</p> + +<p>“Say yes, Becky,” Sir Pitt continued. + “I’m an old man, but a good’n. + I’m good for twenty years. I’ll make +you happy, zee if I don’t. You shall do what +you like; spend what you like; and ’ave it all +your own way. I’ll make you a zettlement. I’ll +do everything reglar. Look year!” and the old +man fell down on his knees and leered at her like +a satyr.</p> + +<p>Rebecca started back a picture of consternation. +In the course of this history we have never seen her +lose her presence of mind; but she did now, and wept +some of the most genuine tears that ever fell from +her eyes.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Sir Pitt!” she said. “Oh, +sir--I--I’m married <i>already</i>.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Rebecca’s Husband Appears for a Short</h4> +Time + +<p>Every reader of a sentimental turn (and we desire +no other) must have been pleased with the tableau +with which the last act of our little drama concluded; +for what can be prettier than an image of Love on +his knees before Beauty?</p> + +<p>But when Love heard that awful confession from Beauty +that she was married already, he bounced up from his +attitude of humility on the carpet, uttering exclamations +which caused poor little Beauty to be more frightened +than she was when she made her avowal. “Married; +you’re joking,” the Baronet cried, after +the first explosion of rage and wonder. “You’re +making vun of me, Becky. Who’d ever go to marry +you without a shilling to your vortune?”</p> + +<p>“Married! married!” Rebecca said, in an +agony of tears--her voice choking with emotion, her +handkerchief up to her ready eyes, fainting against +the mantelpiece a figure of woe fit to melt the most +obdurate heart. “O Sir Pitt, dear Sir Pitt, +do not think me ungrateful for all your goodness to +me. It is only your generosity that has extorted +my secret.”</p> + +<p>“Generosity be hanged!” Sir Pitt roared +out. “Who is it tu, then, you’re married? +Where was it?”</p> + +<p>“Let me come back with you to the country, sir! + Let me watch over you as faithfully as ever! Don’t, +don’t separate me from dear Queen’s Crawley!”</p> + +<p>“The feller has left you, has he?” the +Baronet said, beginning, as he fancied, to comprehend. + “Well, Becky--come back if you like. You can’t +eat your cake and have it. Any ways I made you a vair +offer. Coom back as governess--you shall have it all +your own way.” She held out one hand. She cried +fit to break her heart; her ringlets fell over her +face, and over the marble mantelpiece where she laid +it.</p> + +<p>“So the rascal ran off, eh?” Sir Pitt +said, with a hideous attempt at consolation. “Never +mind, Becky, <i>I’ll</i> take care of ’ee.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, sir! it would be the pride of my life to +go back to Queen’s Crawley, and take care of +the children, and of you as formerly, when you said +you were pleased with the services of your little Rebecca. +When I think of what you have just offered me, my heart +fills with gratitude indeed it does. I can’t +be your wife, sir; let me--let me be your daughter.” + Saying which, Rebecca went down on <i>her</i> knees +in a most tragical way, and, taking Sir Pitt’s +horny black hand between her own two (which were very +pretty and white, and as soft as satin), looked up +in his face with an expression of exquisite pathos +and confidence, when--when the door opened, and Miss +Crawley sailed in.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Firkin and Miss Briggs, who happened by chance +to be at the parlour door soon after the Baronet and +Rebecca entered the apartment, had also seen accidentally, +through the keyhole, the old gentleman prostrate before +the governess, and had heard the generous proposal +which he made her. It was scarcely out of his mouth +when Mrs. Firkin and Miss Briggs had streamed up the +stairs, had rushed into the drawing-room where Miss +Crawley was reading the French novel, and had given +that old lady the astounding intelligence that Sir +Pitt was on his knees, proposing to Miss Sharp. And +if you calculate the time for the above dialogue to +take place--the time for Briggs and Firkin to fly +to the drawing-room--the time for Miss Crawley to +be astonished, and to drop her volume of Pigault le +Brun--and the time for her to come downstairs--you +will see how exactly accurate this history is, and +how Miss Crawley must have appeared at the very instant +when Rebecca had assumed the attitude of humility.</p> + +<p>“It is the lady on the ground, and not the gentleman,” +Miss Crawley said, with a look and voice of great +scorn. “They told me that <i>you</i> were on your +knees, Sir Pitt: do kneel once more, and let me see +this pretty couple!”</p> + +<p>“I have thanked Sir Pitt Crawley, Ma’am,” +Rebecca said, rising, “and have told him that--that +I never can become Lady Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“Refused him!” Miss Crawley said, more +bewildered than ever. Briggs and Firkin at the door +opened the eyes of astonishment and the lips of wonder.</p> + +<p>“Yes--refused,” Rebecca continued, with +a sad, tearful voice.</p> + +<p>“And am I to credit my ears that you absolutely +proposed to her, Sir Pitt?” the old lady asked.</p> + +<p>“Ees,” said the Baronet, “I did.”</p> + +<p>“And she refused you as she says?”</p> + +<p>“Ees,” Sir Pitt said, his features on +a broad grin.</p> + +<p>“It does not seem to break your heart at any +rate,” Miss Crawley remarked.</p> + +<p>“Nawt a bit,” answered Sir Pitt, with +a coolness and good-humour which set Miss Crawley +almost mad with bewilderment. That an old gentleman +of station should fall on his knees to a penniless +governess, and burst out laughing because she refused +to marry him-- that a penniless governess should refuse +a Baronet with four thousand a year--these were mysteries +which Miss Crawley could never comprehend. It surpassed +any complications of intrigue in her favourite Pigault +le Brun.</p> + +<p>“I’m glad you think it good sport, brother,” +she continued, groping wildly through this amazement.</p> + +<p>“Vamous,” said Sir Pitt. “Who’d +ha’ thought it! what a sly little devil! what +a little fox it waws!” he muttered to himself, +chuckling with pleasure.</p> + +<p>“Who’d have thought what?” cries +Miss Crawley, stamping with her foot. “Pray, +Miss Sharp, are you waiting for the Prince Regent’s +divorce, that you don’t think our family good +enough for you?”</p> + +<p>“My attitude,” Rebecca said, “when +you came in, ma’am, did not look as if I despised +such an honour as this good--this noble man has deigned +to offer me. Do you think I have no heart? Have you +all loved me, and been so kind to the poor orphan--deserted--girl, +and am I to feel nothing? O my friends! O my benefactors! +may not my love, my life, my duty, try to repay the +confidence you have shown me? Do you grudge me even +gratitude, Miss Crawley? It is too much--my heart +is too full”; and she sank down in a chair so +pathetically, that most of the audience present were +perfectly melted with her sadness.</p> + +<p>“Whether you marry me or not, you’re a +good little girl, Becky, and I’m your vriend, +mind,” said Sir Pitt, and putting on his crape-bound +hat, he walked away--greatly to Rebecca’s relief; +for it was evident that her secret was unrevealed +to Miss Crawley, and she had the advantage of a brief +reprieve.</p> + +<p>Putting her handkerchief to her eyes, and nodding +away honest Briggs, who would have followed her upstairs, +she went up to her apartment; while Briggs and Miss +Crawley, in a high state of excitement, remained to +discuss the strange event, and Firkin, not less moved, +dived down into the kitchen regions, and talked of +it with all the male and female company there. And +so impressed was Mrs. Firkin with the news, that she +thought proper to write off by that very night’s +post, “with her humble duty to Mrs. Bute Crawley +and the family at the Rectory, and Sir Pitt has been +and proposed for to marry Miss Sharp, wherein she +has refused him, to the wonder of all.”</p> + +<p>The two ladies in the dining-room (where worthy Miss +Briggs was delighted to be admitted once more to confidential +conversation with her patroness) wondered to their +hearts’ content at Sir Pitt’s offer, and +Rebecca’s refusal; Briggs very acutely suggesting +that there must have been some obstacle in the shape +of a previous attachment, otherwise no young woman +in her senses would ever have refused so advantageous +a proposal.</p> + +<p>“You would have accepted it yourself, wouldn’t +you, Briggs?” Miss Crawley said, kindly.</p> + +<p>“Would it not be a privilege to be Miss Crawley’s +sister?” Briggs replied, with meek evasion.</p> + +<p>“Well, Becky would have made a good Lady Crawley, +after all,” Miss Crawley remarked (who was mollified +by the girl’s refusal, and very liberal and +generous now there was no call for her sacrifices). +“She has brains in plenty (much more wit in her +little finger than you have, my poor dear Briggs, +in all your head). Her manners are excellent, now +I have formed her. She is a Montmorency, Briggs, and +blood is something, though I despise it for my part; +and she would have held her own amongst those pompous +stupid Hampshire people much better than that unfortunate +ironmonger’s daughter.”</p> + +<p>Briggs coincided as usual, and the “previous +attachment” was then discussed in conjectures. + “You poor friendless creatures are always having +some foolish tendre,” Miss Crawley said. “You +yourself, you know, were in love with a writing-master +(don’t cry, Briggs--you’re always crying, +and it won’t bring him to life again), and I +suppose this unfortunate Becky has been silly and +sentimental too--some apothecary, or house-steward, +or painter, or young curate, or something of that +sort.”</p> + +<p>“Poor thing! poor thing!” says Briggs +(who was thinking of twenty-four years back, and +that hectic young writing-master whose lock of yellow +hair, and whose letters, beautiful in their illegibility, +she cherished in her old desk upstairs). “Poor +thing, poor thing!” says Briggs. Once more +she was a fresh-cheeked lass of eighteen; she was +at evening church, and the hectic writing-master and +she were quavering out of the same psalm-book.</p> + +<p>“After such conduct on Rebecca’s part,” +Miss Crawley said enthusiastically, “our family +should do something. Find out who is the objet, Briggs. + I’ll set him up in a shop; or order my portrait +of him, you know; or speak to my cousin, the Bishop +and I’ll doter Becky, and we’ll have a +wedding, Briggs, and you shall make the breakfast, +and be a bridesmaid.”</p> + +<p>Briggs declared that it would be delightful, and vowed +that her dear Miss Crawley was always kind and generous, +and went up to Rebecca’s bedroom to console +her and prattle about the offer, and the refusal, +and the cause thereof; and to hint at the generous +intentions of Miss Crawley, and to find out who was +the gentleman that had the mastery of Miss Sharp’s +heart.</p> + +<p>Rebecca was very kind, very affectionate and affected--responded +to Briggs’s offer of tenderness with grateful +fervour--owned there was a secret attachment--a delicious +mystery--what a pity Miss Briggs had not remained +half a minute longer at the keyhole! Rebecca might, +perhaps, have told more: but five minutes after Miss +Briggs’s arrival in Rebecca’s apartment, +Miss Crawley actually made her appearance there--an +unheard-of honour--her impatience had overcome her; +she could not wait for the tardy operations of her +ambassadress: so she came in person, and ordered Briggs +out of the room. And expressing her approval of Rebecca’s +conduct, she asked particulars of the interview, and +the previous transactions which had brought about +the astonishing offer of Sir Pitt.</p> + +<p>Rebecca said she had long had some notion of the partiality +with which Sir Pitt honoured her (for he was in the +habit of making his feelings known in a very frank +and unreserved manner) but, not to mention private +reasons with which she would not for the present trouble +Miss Crawley, Sir Pitt’s age, station, and habits +were such as to render a marriage quite impossible; +and could a woman with any feeling of self-respect +and any decency listen to proposals at such a moment, +when the funeral of the lover’s deceased wife +had not actually taken place?</p> + +<p>“Nonsense, my dear, you would never have refused +him had there not been some one else in the case,” +Miss Crawley said, coming to her point at once. “Tell +me the private reasons; what are the private reasons? + There is some one; who is it that has touched your +heart?”</p> + +<p>Rebecca cast down her eyes, and owned there was. “You +have guessed right, dear lady,” she said, with +a sweet simple faltering voice. “You wonder +at one so poor and friendless having an attachment, +don’t you? I have never heard that poverty was +any safeguard against it. I wish it were.”</p> + +<p>“My poor dear child,” cried Miss Crawley, +who was always quite ready to be sentimental, “is +our passion unrequited, then? Are we pining in secret? +Tell me all, and let me console you.”</p> + +<p>“I wish you could, dear Madam,” Rebecca +said in the same tearful tone. “Indeed, indeed, +I need it.” And she laid her head upon Miss +Crawley’s shoulder and wept there so naturally +that the old lady, surprised into sympathy, embraced +her with an almost maternal kindness, uttered many +soothing protests of regard and affection for her, +vowed that she loved her as a daughter, and would do +everything in her power to serve her. “And +now who is it, my dear? Is it that pretty Miss Sedley’s +brother? You said something about an affair with +him. I’ll ask him here, my dear. And you shall +have him: indeed you shall.”</p> + +<p>“Don’t ask me now,” Rebecca said. + “You shall know all soon. Indeed you shall. + Dear kind Miss Crawley--dear friend, may I say so?”</p> + +<p>“That you may, my child,” the old lady +replied, kissing her.</p> + +<p>“I can’t tell you now,” sobbed out +Rebecca, “I am very miserable. But O! love me +always--promise you will love me always.” And +in the midst of mutual tears--for the emotions of +the younger woman had awakened the sympathies of the +elder--this promise was solemnly given by Miss Crawley, +who left her little protege, blessing and admiring +her as a dear, artless, tender-hearted, affectionate, +incomprehensible creature.</p> + +<p>And now she was left alone to think over the sudden +and wonderful events of the day, and of what had been +and what might have been. What think you were the +private feelings of Miss, no (begging her pardon) +of Mrs. Rebecca? If, a few pages back, the present +writer claimed the privilege of peeping into Miss +Amelia Sedley’s bedroom, and understanding with +the omniscience of the novelist all the gentle pains +and passions which were tossing upon that innocent +pillow, why should he not declare himself to be Rebecca’s +confidante too, master of her secrets, and seal-keeper +of that young woman’s conscience?</p> + +<p>Well, then, in the first place, Rebecca gave way to +some very sincere and touching regrets that a piece +of marvellous good fortune should have been so near +her, and she actually obliged to decline it. In this +natural emotion every properly regulated mind will +certainly share. What good mother is there that would +not commiserate a penniless spinster, who might have +been my lady, and have shared four thousand a year? + What well-bred young person is there in all Vanity +Fair, who will not feel for a hard-working, ingenious, +meritorious girl, who gets such an honourable, advantageous, +provoking offer, just at the very moment when it is +out of her power to accept it? I am sure our friend +Becky’s disappointment deserves and will command +every sympathy.</p> + +<p>I remember one night being in the Fair myself, at +an evening party. I observed old Miss Toady there +also present, single out for her special attentions +and flattery little Mrs. Briefless, the barrister’s +wife, who is of a good family certainly, but, as we +all know, is as poor as poor can be.</p> + +<p>What, I asked in my own mind, can cause this obsequiousness +on the part of Miss Toady; has Briefless got a county +court, or has his wife had a fortune left her? Miss +Toady explained presently, with that simplicity which +distinguishes all her conduct. “You know,” +she said, “Mrs Briefless is granddaughter of +Sir John Redhand, who is so ill at Cheltenham that +he can’t last six months. Mrs. Briefless’s +papa succeeds; so you see she will be a baronet’s +daughter.” And Toady asked Briefless and his +wife to dinner the very next week.</p> + +<p>If the mere chance of becoming a baronet’s daughter +can procure a lady such homage in the world, surely, +surely we may respect the agonies of a young woman +who has lost the opportunity of becoming a baronet’s +wife. Who would have dreamed of Lady Crawley dying +so soon? She was one of those sickly women that might +have lasted these ten years--Rebecca thought to herself, +in all the woes of repentance--and I might have been +my lady! I might have led that old man whither I +would. I might have thanked Mrs. Bute for her patronage, +and Mr. Pitt for his insufferable condescension. I +would have had the town-house newly furnished and +decorated. I would have had the handsomest carriage +in London, and a box at the opera; and I would have +been presented next season. All this might have been; +and now--now all was doubt and mystery.</p> + +<p>But Rebecca was a young lady of too much resolution +and energy of character to permit herself much useless +and unseemly sorrow for the irrevocable past; so, +having devoted only the proper portion of regret to +it, she wisely turned her whole attention towards the +future, which was now vastly more important to her. + And she surveyed her position, and its hopes, doubts, +and chances.</p> + +<p>In the first place, she was <i>married</i>--that was +a great fact. Sir Pitt knew it. She was not so much +surprised into the avowal, as induced to make it by +a sudden calculation. It must have come some day: +and why not now as at a later period? He who would +have married her himself must at least be silent with +regard to her marriage. How Miss Crawley would bear +the news--was the great question. Misgivings Rebecca +had; but she remembered all Miss Crawley had said; +the old lady’s avowed contempt for birth; her +daring liberal opinions; her general romantic propensities; +her almost doting attachment to her nephew, and her +repeatedly expressed fondness for Rebecca herself. + She is so fond of him, Rebecca thought, that she +will forgive him anything: she is so used to me that +I don’t think she could be comfortable without +me: when the eclaircissement comes there will be a +scene, and hysterics, and a great quarrel, and then +a great reconciliation. At all events, what use was +there in delaying? the die was thrown, and now or +to-morrow the issue must be the same. And so, resolved +that Miss Crawley should have the news, the young +person debated in her mind as to the best means of +conveying it to her; and whether she should face the +storm that must come, or fly and avoid it until its +first fury was blown over. In this state of meditation +she wrote the following letter:</p> + +<p>Dearest Friend,</p> + +<p>The great crisis which we have debated about so often +is <i>come</i>. Half of my secret is known, and I have +thought and thought, until I am quite sure that now +is the time to reveal <i>the whole of the mystery</i>. Sir Pitt came to me this morning, and +made--what do you think?--A <i>declaration in form</i>. Think of that! Poor little me. I might +have been Lady Crawley. How pleased Mrs. Bute would +have been: and ma tante if I had taken precedence +of her! I might have been somebody’s mamma, +instead of--O, I tremble, I tremble, when I think how +soon we must tell all!</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt knows I am married, and not knowing to whom, +is not very much displeased as yet. Ma tante is <i>actually angry</i> that I should have refused him. But she +is all kindness and graciousness. She condescends +to say I would have made him a good wife; and vows +that she will be a mother to your little Rebecca. + She will be shaken when she first hears the news. + But need we fear anything beyond a momentary anger? + I think not: I <i>am sure</i> not. She dotes upon +you so (you naughty, good-for-nothing man), that she +would pardon you <i>anything</i>: and, indeed, I believe, +the next place in her heart is mine: and that she +would be miserable without me. Dearest! something +<i>tells me</i> we shall conquer. You shall leave +that odious regiment: quit gaming, racing, and <i>be</i> +A <i>good boy</i>; and we shall all live in Park +Lane, and ma tante shall leave us all her money.</p> + +<p>I shall try and walk to-morrow at 3 in the usual place. +If Miss B. accompanies me, you must come to dinner, +and bring an answer, and put it in the third volume +of Porteus’s Sermons. But, at all events, come +to your own</p> + +<p>R.</p> + +<p>To Miss Eliza Styles, At Mr. Barnet’s, Saddler, +Knightsbridge.</p> + +<p>And I trust there is no reader of this little story +who has not discernment enough to perceive that the +Miss Eliza Styles (an old schoolfellow, Rebecca said, +with whom she had resumed an active correspondence +of late, and who used to fetch these letters from the +saddler’s), wore brass spurs, and large curling +mustachios, and was indeed no other than Captain Rawdon +Crawley.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XVI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">The Letter on the Pincushion</h4> + +<p>How they were married is not of the slightest consequence +to anybody. What is to hinder a Captain who is a +major, and a young lady who is of age, from purchasing +a licence, and uniting themselves at any church in +this town? Who needs to be told, that if a woman +has a will she will assuredly find a way?--My belief +is that one day, when Miss Sharp had gone to pass +the forenoon with her dear friend Miss Amelia Sedley +in Russell Square, a lady very like her might have +been seen entering a church in the City, in company +with a gentleman with dyed mustachios, who, after a +quarter of an hour’s interval, escorted her +back to the hackney-coach in waiting, and that this +was a quiet bridal party.</p> + +<p>And who on earth, after the daily experience we have, +can question the probability of a gentleman marrying +anybody? How many of the wise and learned have married +their cooks? Did not Lord Eldon himself, the most +prudent of men, make a runaway match? Were not Achilles +and Ajax both in love with their servant maids? And +are we to expect a heavy dragoon with strong desires +and small brains, who had never controlled a passion +in his life, to become prudent all of a sudden, and +to refuse to pay any price for an indulgence to which +he had a mind? If people only made prudent marriages, +what a stop to population there would be!</p> + +<p>It seems to me, for my part, that Mr. Rawdon’s +marriage was one of the honestest actions which we +shall have to record in any portion of that gentleman’s +biography which has to do with the present history. + No one will say it is unmanly to be captivated by +a woman, or, being captivated, to marry her; and the +admiration, the delight, the passion, the wonder, +the unbounded confidence, and frantic adoration with +which, by degrees, this big warrior got to regard the +little Rebecca, were feelings which the ladies at least +will pronounce were not altogether discreditable to +him. When she sang, every note thrilled in his dull +soul, and tingled through his huge frame. When she +spoke, he brought all the force of his brains to listen +and wonder. If she was jocular, he used to revolve +her jokes in his mind, and explode over them half +an hour afterwards in the street, to the surprise +of the groom in the tilbury by his side, or the comrade +riding with him in Rotten Row. Her words were oracles +to him, her smallest actions marked by an infallible +grace and wisdom. “How she sings,--how she paints,” +thought he. “How she rode that kicking mare +at Queen’s Crawley!” And he would say +to her in confidential moments, “By Jove, Beck, +you’re fit to be Commander-in-Chief, or Archbishop +of Canterbury, by Jove.” Is his case a rare +one? and don’t we see every day in the world +many an honest Hercules at the apron-strings of Omphale, +and great whiskered Samsons prostrate in Delilah’s +lap?</p> + +<p>When, then, Becky told him that the great crisis was +near, and the time for action had arrived, Rawdon +expressed himself as ready to act under her orders, +as he would be to charge with his troop at the command +of his colonel. There was no need for him to put his +letter into the third volume of Porteus. Rebecca +easily found a means to get rid of Briggs, her companion, +and met her faithful friend in “the usual place” +on the next day. She had thought over matters at +night, and communicated to Rawdon the result of her +determinations. He agreed, of course, to everything; +was quite sure that it was all right: that what she +proposed was best; that Miss Crawley would infallibly +relent, or “come round,” as he said, after +a time. Had Rebecca’s resolutions been entirely +different, he would have followed them as implicitly. + “You have head enough for both of us, Beck,” +said he. “You’re sure to get us out of +the scrape. I never saw your equal, and I’ve +met with some clippers in my time too.” And +with this simple confession of faith, the love-stricken +dragoon left her to execute his part of the project +which she had formed for the pair.</p> + +<p>It consisted simply in the hiring of quiet lodgings +at Brompton, or in the neighbourhood of the barracks, +for Captain and Mrs. Crawley. For Rebecca had determined, +and very prudently, we think, to fly. Rawdon was only +too happy at her resolve; he had been entreating her +to take this measure any time for weeks past. He pranced +off to engage the lodgings with all the impetuosity +of love. He agreed to pay two guineas a week so readily, +that the landlady regretted she had asked him so little. +He ordered in a piano, and half a nursery-house full +of flowers: and a heap of good things. As for shawls, +kid gloves, silk stockings, gold French watches, bracelets +and perfumery, he sent them in with the profusion +of blind love and unbounded credit. And having relieved +his mind by this outpouring of generosity, he went +and dined nervously at the club, waiting until the +great moment of his life should come.</p> + +<p>The occurrences of the previous day; the admirable +conduct of Rebecca in refusing an offer so advantageous +to her, the secret unhappiness preying upon her, the +sweetness and silence with which she bore her affliction, +made Miss Crawley much more tender than usual. An +event of this nature, a marriage, or a refusal, or +a proposal, thrills through a whole household of women, +and sets all their hysterical sympathies at work. + As an observer of human nature, I regularly frequent +St. George’s, Hanover Square, during the genteel +marriage season; and though I have never seen the +bridegroom’s male friends give way to tears, +or the beadles and officiating clergy any way affected, +yet it is not at all uncommon to see women who are +not in the least concerned in the operations going +on--old ladies who are long past marrying, stout middle-aged +females with plenty of sons and daughters, let alone +pretty young creatures in pink bonnets, who are on +their promotion, and may naturally take an interest +in the ceremony--I say it is quite common to see the +women present piping, sobbing, sniffling; hiding their +little faces in their little useless pocket-handkerchiefs; +and heaving, old and young, with emotion. When my +friend, the fashionable John Pimlico, married the +lovely Lady Belgravia Green Parker, the excitement +was so general that even the little snuffy old pew-opener +who let me into the seat was in tears. And wherefore? +I inquired of my own soul: she was not going to be +married.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley and Briggs in a word, after the affair +of Sir Pitt, indulged in the utmost luxury of sentiment, +and Rebecca became an object of the most tender interest +to them. In her absence Miss Crawley solaced herself +with the most sentimental of the novels in her library. + Little Sharp, with her secret griefs, was the heroine +of the day.</p> + +<p>That night Rebecca sang more sweetly and talked more +pleasantly than she had ever been heard to do in Park +Lane. She twined herself round the heart of Miss +Crawley. She spoke lightly and laughingly of Sir Pitt’s +proposal, ridiculed it as the foolish fancy of an old +man; and her eyes filled with tears, and Briggs’s +heart with unutterable pangs of defeat, as she said +she desired no other lot than to remain for ever with +her dear benefactress. “My dear little creature,” +the old lady said, “I don’t intend to let +you stir for years, that you may depend upon it. +As for going back to that odious brother of mine after +what has passed, it is out of the question. Here +you stay with me and Briggs. Briggs wants to go to +see her relations very often. Briggs, you may go when +you like. But as for you, my dear, you must stay and +take care of the old woman.”</p> + +<p>If Rawdon Crawley had been then and there present, +instead of being at the club nervously drinking claret, +the pair might have gone down on their knees before +the old spinster, avowed all, and been forgiven in +a twinkling. But that good chance was denied to the +young couple, doubtless in order that this story might +be written, in which numbers of their wonderful adventures +are narrated-- adventures which could never have occurred +to them if they had been housed and sheltered under +the comfortable uninteresting forgiveness of Miss +Crawley.</p> + +<p>Under Mrs. Firkin’s orders, in the Park Lane +establishment, was a young woman from Hampshire, whose +business it was, among other duties, to knock at Miss +Sharp’s door with that jug of hot water which +Firkin would rather have perished than have presented +to the intruder. This girl, bred on the family estate, +had a brother in Captain Crawley’s troop, and +if the truth were known, I daresay it would come out +that she was aware of certain arrangements, which +have a great deal to do with this history. At any rate +she purchased a yellow shawl, a pair of green boots, +and a light blue hat with a red feather with three +guineas which Rebecca gave her, and as little Sharp +was by no means too liberal with her money, no doubt +it was for services rendered that Betty Martin was +so bribed.</p> + +<p>On the second day after Sir Pitt Crawley’s offer +to Miss Sharp, the sun rose as usual, and at the usual +hour Betty Martin, the upstairs maid, knocked at the +door of the governess’s bedchamber.</p> + +<p>No answer was returned, and she knocked again. Silence +was still uninterrupted; and Betty, with the hot water, +opened the door and entered the chamber.</p> + +<p>The little white dimity bed was as smooth and trim +as on the day previous, when Betty’s own hands +had helped to make it. Two little trunks were corded +in one end of the room; and on the table before the +window--on the pincushion the great fat pincushion +lined with pink inside, and twilled like a lady’s +nightcap--lay a letter. It had been reposing there +probably all night.</p> + +<p>Betty advanced towards it on tiptoe, as if she were +afraid to awake it--looked at it, and round the room, +with an air of great wonder and satisfaction; took +up the letter, and grinned intensely as she turned +it round and over, and finally carried it into Miss +Briggs’s room below.</p> + +<p>How could Betty tell that the letter was for Miss +Briggs, I should like to know? All the schooling +Betty had had was at Mrs. Bute Crawley’s Sunday +school, and she could no more read writing than Hebrew.</p> + +<p>“La, Miss Briggs,” the girl exclaimed, +“O, Miss, something must have happened--there’s +nobody in Miss Sharp’s room; the bed ain’t +been slep in, and she’ve run away, and left +this letter for you, Miss.”</p> + +<p>“<i>What</i>!” cries Briggs, dropping her +comb, the thin wisp of faded hair falling over her +shoulders; “an elopement! Miss Sharp a fugitive! +What, what is this?” and she eagerly broke the +neat seal, and, as they say, “devoured the contents” +of the letter addressed to her.</p> + +<p>Dear Miss Briggs [the refugee wrote], the kindest +heart in the world, as yours is, will pity and sympathise +with me and excuse me. With tears, and prayers, and +blessings, I leave the home where the poor orphan +has ever met with kindness and affection. Claims even +superior to those of my benefactress call me hence. + I go to my duty--to my <i>husband</i>. Yes, I am +married. My husband <i>commands</i> me to seek the +<i>humble home</i> which we call ours. Dearest +Miss Briggs, break the news as your delicate sympathy +will know how to do it--to my dear, my beloved friend +and benefactress. Tell her, ere I went, I shed tears +on her dear pillow--that pillow that I have so often +soothed in sickness--that I long <i>again</i> to watch--Oh, +with what joy shall I return to dear Park Lane! How +I tremble for the answer which is to <i>seal my fate</i>! When Sir Pitt deigned to offer me his hand, +an honour of which my beloved Miss Crawley said I +was <i>deserving</i> (my blessings go with her for judging +the poor orphan worthy to be <i>her sister</i>!) +I told Sir Pitt that I was already A <i>wife</i>. Even +he forgave me. But my courage failed me, when I should +have told him all--that I could not be his wife, for +I <i>was his daughter</i>! I am wedded to +the best and most generous of men--Miss Crawley’s +Rawdon is <i>my</i> Rawdon. At his <i>command</i> I open +my lips, and follow him to our humble home, as I would +<i>through the world</i>. O, my excellent +and kind friend, intercede with my Rawdon’s +beloved aunt for him and the poor girl to whom all +<i>his noble race</i> have shown such UNPARALLELED +<i>affection</i>. Ask Miss Crawley to receive <i>her children</i>. I can say no more, but blessings, +blessings on all in the dear house I leave, prays</p> + +<p>Your affectionate and <i>grateful</i><br> +Rebecca Crawley.<br> +Midnight.</p> + +<p>Just as Briggs had finished reading this affecting +and interesting document, which reinstated her in +her position as first confidante of Miss Crawley, +Mrs. Firkin entered the room. “Here’s +Mrs. Bute Crawley just arrived by the mail from Hampshire, +and wants some tea; will you come down and make breakfast, +Miss?”</p> + +<p>And to the surprise of Firkin, clasping her dressing-gown +around her, the wisp of hair floating dishevelled +behind her, the little curl-papers still sticking +in bunches round her forehead, Briggs sailed down +to Mrs. Bute with the letter in her hand containing +the wonderful news.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Mrs. Firkin,” gasped Betty, “sech +a business. Miss Sharp have a gone and run away with +the Capting, and they’re off to Gretney Green!” + We would devote a chapter to describe the emotions +of Mrs. Firkin, did not the passions of her mistresses +occupy our genteeler muse.</p> + +<p>When Mrs. Bute Crawley, numbed with midnight travelling, +and warming herself at the newly crackling parlour +fire, heard from Miss Briggs the intelligence of the +clandestine marriage, she declared it was quite providential +that she should have arrived at such a time to assist +poor dear Miss Crawley in supporting the shock--that +Rebecca was an artful little hussy of whom she had +always had her suspicions; and that as for Rawdon +Crawley, she never could account for his aunt’s +infatuation regarding him, and had long considered +him a profligate, lost, and abandoned being. And this +awful conduct, Mrs. Bute said, will have at least +this good effect, it will open poor dear Miss Crawley’s +eyes to the real character of this wicked man. Then +Mrs. Bute had a comfortable hot toast and tea; and +as there was a vacant room in the house now, there +was no need for her to remain at the Gloster Coffee +House where the Portsmouth mail had set her down, +and whence she ordered Mr. Bowls’s aide-de-camp +the footman to bring away her trunks.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley, be it known, did not leave her room +until near noon-- taking chocolate in bed in the morning, +while Becky Sharp read the Morning Post to her, or +otherwise amusing herself or dawdling. The conspirators +below agreed that they would spare the dear lady’s +feelings until she appeared in her drawing-room: meanwhile +it was announced to her that Mrs. Bute Crawley had +come up from Hampshire by the mail, was staying at +the Gloster, sent her love to Miss Crawley, and asked +for breakfast with Miss Briggs. The arrival of Mrs. +Bute, which would not have caused any extreme delight +at another period, was hailed with pleasure now; Miss +Crawley being pleased at the notion of a gossip with +her sister-in-law regarding the late Lady Crawley, +the funeral arrangements pending, and Sir Pitt’s +abrupt proposal to Rebecca.</p> + +<p>It was not until the old lady was fairly ensconced +in her usual arm-chair in the drawing-room, and the +preliminary embraces and inquiries had taken place +between the ladies, that the conspirators thought +it advisable to submit her to the operation. Who has +not admired the artifices and delicate approaches +with which women “prepare” their friends +for bad news? Miss Crawley’s two friends made +such an apparatus of mystery before they broke the +intelligence to her, that they worked her up to the +necessary degree of doubt and alarm.</p> + +<p>“And she refused Sir Pitt, my dear, dear Miss +Crawley, prepare yourself for it,” Mrs. Bute +said, “because--because she couldn’t help +herself.”</p> + +<p>“Of course there was a reason,” Miss Crawley +answered. “She liked somebody else. I told +Briggs so yesterday.”</p> + +<p>“LIKES somebody else!” Briggs gasped. + “O my dear friend, she is married already.”</p> + +<p>“Married already,” Mrs. Bute chimed in; +and both sate with clasped hands looking from each +other at their victim.</p> + +<p>“Send her to me, the instant she comes in. +The little sly wretch: how dared she not tell me?” +cried out Miss Crawley.</p> + +<p>“She won’t come in soon. Prepare yourself, +dear friend--she’s gone out for a long time--she’s--she’s +gone altogether.”</p> + +<p>“Gracious goodness, and who’s to make +my chocolate? Send for her and have her back; I desire +that she come back,” the old lady said.</p> + +<p>“She decamped last night, Ma’am,” +cried Mrs. Bute.</p> + +<p>“She left a letter for me,” Briggs exclaimed. + “She’s married to--”</p> + +<p>“Prepare her, for heaven’s sake. Don’t +torture her, my dear Miss Briggs.”</p> + +<p>“She’s married to whom?” cries the +spinster in a nervous fury.</p> + +<p>“To--to a relation of--”</p> + +<p>“She refused Sir Pitt,” cried the victim. + “Speak at once. Don’t drive me mad.”</p> + +<p>“O Ma’am--prepare her, Miss Briggs--she’s +married to Rawdon Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“Rawdon married Rebecca--governess--nobod--Get +out of my house, you fool, you idiot--you stupid old +Briggs how dare you? You’re in the plot--you +made him marry, thinking that I’d leave my money +from him--you did, Martha,” the poor old lady +screamed in hysteric sentences.</p> + +<p>“I, Ma’am, ask a member of this family +to marry a drawing-master’s daughter?”</p> + +<p>“Her mother was a Montmorency,” cried +out the old lady, pulling at the bell with all her +might.</p> + +<p>“Her mother was an opera girl, and she has been +on the stage or worse herself,” said Mrs. Bute.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley gave a final scream, and fell back in +a faint. They were forced to take her back to the +room which she had just quitted. One fit of hysterics +succeeded another. The doctor was sent for-- the +apothecary arrived. Mrs. Bute took up the post of nurse +by her bedside. “Her relations ought to be +round about her,” that amiable woman said.</p> + +<p>She had scarcely been carried up to her room, when +a new person arrived to whom it was also necessary +to break the news. This was Sir Pitt. “Where’s +Becky?” he said, coming in. “Where’s +her traps? She’s coming with me to Queen’s +Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“Have you not heard the astonishing intelligence +regarding her surreptitious union?” Briggs asked.</p> + +<p>“What’s that to me?” Sir Pitt asked. + “I know she’s married. That makes no +odds. Tell her to come down at once, and not keep +me.”</p> + +<p>“Are you not aware, sir,” Miss Briggs +asked, “that she has left our roof, to the dismay +of Miss Crawley, who is nearly killed by the intelligence +of Captain Rawdon’s union with her?”</p> + +<p>When Sir Pitt Crawley heard that Rebecca was married +to his son, he broke out into a fury of language, +which it would do no good to repeat in this place, +as indeed it sent poor Briggs shuddering out of the +room; and with her we will shut the door upon the figure +of the frenzied old man, wild with hatred and insane +with baffled desire.</p> + +<p>One day after he went to Queen’s Crawley, he +burst like a madman into the room she had used when +there--dashed open her boxes with his foot, and flung +about her papers, clothes, and other relics. Miss +Horrocks, the butler’s daughter, took some of +them. The children dressed themselves and acted plays +in the others. It was but a few days after the poor +mother had gone to her lonely burying-place; and +was laid, unwept and disregarded, in a vault full of +strangers.</p> + +<p>“Suppose the old lady doesn’t come to,” +Rawdon said to his little wife, as they sate together +in the snug little Brompton lodgings. She had been +trying the new piano all the morning. The new gloves +fitted her to a nicety; the new shawls became her wonderfully; +the new rings glittered on her little hands, and the +new watch ticked at her waist; “suppose she +don’t come round, eh, Becky?”</p> + +<p>“<i>I’ll</i> make your fortune,” she +said; and Delilah patted Samson’s cheek.</p> + +<p>“You can do anything,” he said, kissing +the little hand. “By Jove you can; and we’ll +drive down to the Star and Garter, and dine, by Jove.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XVII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">How Captain Dobbin Bought a Piano</h4> + +<p>If there is any exhibition in all Vanity Fair which +Satire and Sentiment can visit arm in arm together; +where you light on the strangest contrasts laughable +and tearful: where you may be gentle and pathetic, +or savage and cynical with perfect propriety: it is +at one of those public assemblies, a crowd of which +are advertised every day in the last page of the Times +newspaper, and over which the late Mr. George Robins +used to preside with so much dignity. There are very +few London people, as I fancy, who have not attended +at these meetings, and all with a taste for moralizing +must have thought, with a sensation and interest not +a little startling and queer, of the day when their +turn shall come too, and Mr. Hammerdown will sell +by the orders of Diogenes’ assignees, or will +be instructed by the executors, to offer to public +competition, the library, furniture, plate, wardrobe, +and choice cellar of wines of Epicurus deceased.</p> + +<p>Even with the most selfish disposition, the Vanity +Fairian, as he witnesses this sordid part of the obsequies +of a departed friend, can’t but feel some sympathies +and regret. My Lord Dives’s remains are in the +family vault: the statuaries are cutting an inscription +veraciously commemorating his virtues, and the sorrows +of his heir, who is disposing of his goods. What +guest at Dives’s table can pass the familiar +house without a sigh? .--the familiar house of which +the lights used to shine so cheerfully at seven o’clock, +of which the hall-doors opened so readily, of which +the obsequious servants, as you passed up the comfortable +stair, sounded your name from landing to landing, +until it reached the apartment where jolly old Dives +welcomed his friends! What a number of them he had; +and what a noble way of entertaining them. How witty +people used to be here who were morose when they got +out of the door; and how courteous and friendly men +who slandered and hated each other everywhere else! + He was pompous, but with such a cook what would one +not swallow? he was rather dull, perhaps, but would +not such wine make any conversation pleasant? We +must get some of his Burgundy at any price, the mourners +cry at his club. “I got this box at old Dives’s +sale,” Pincher says, handing it round, “one +of Louis XV’s mistresses-- pretty thing, is +it not?--sweet miniature,” and they talk of the +way in which young Dives is dissipating his fortune.</p> + +<p>How changed the house is, though! The front is patched +over with bills, setting forth the particulars of +the furniture in staring capitals. They have hung +a shred of carpet out of an upstairs window--a half +dozen of porters are lounging on the dirty steps--the +hall swarms with dingy guests of oriental countenance, +who thrust printed cards into your hand, and offer +to bid. Old women and amateurs have invaded the upper +apartments, pinching the bed-curtains, poking into +the feathers, shampooing the mattresses, and clapping +the wardrobe drawers to and fro. Enterprising young +housekeepers are measuring the looking-glasses and +hangings to see if they will suit the new menage (Snob +will brag for years that he has purchased this or +that at Dives’s sale), and Mr. Hammerdown is +sitting on the great mahogany dining-tables, in the +dining-room below, waving the ivory hammer, and employing +all the artifices of eloquence, enthusiasm, entreaty, +reason, despair; shouting to his people; satirizing +Mr. Davids for his sluggishness; inspiriting Mr. Moss +into action; imploring, commanding, bellowing, until +down comes the hammer like fate, and we pass to the +next lot. O Dives, who would ever have thought, as +we sat round the broad table sparkling with plate +and spotless linen, to have seen such a dish at the +head of it as that roaring auctioneer?</p> + +<p>It was rather late in the sale. The excellent drawing-room +furniture by the best makers; the rare and famous wines +selected, regardless of cost, and with the well-known +taste of the purchaser; the rich and complete set +of family plate had been sold on the previous days. + Certain of the best wines (which all had a great +character among amateurs in the neighbourhood) had +been purchased for his master, who knew them very +well, by the butler of our friend John Osborne, Esquire, +of Russell Square. A small portion of the most useful +articles of the plate had been bought by some young +stockbrokers from the City. And now the public being +invited to the purchase of minor objects, it happened +that the orator on the table was expatiating on the +merits of a picture, which he sought to recommend +to his audience: it was by no means so select or numerous +a company as had attended the previous days of the +auction.</p> + +<p>“No. 369,” roared Mr. Hammerdown. “Portrait +of a gentleman on an elephant. Who’ll bid for +the gentleman on the elephant? Lift up the picture, +Blowman, and let the company examine this lot.” +A long, pale, military-looking gentleman, seated demurely +at the mahogany table, could not help grinning as +this valuable lot was shown by Mr. Blowman. “Turn +the elephant to the Captain, Blowman. What shall we +say, sir, for the elephant?” but the Captain, +blushing in a very hurried and discomfited manner, +turned away his head.</p> + +<p>“Shall we say twenty guineas for this work of +art?--fifteen, five, name your own price. The gentleman +without the elephant is worth five pound.”</p> + +<p>“I wonder it ain’t come down with him,” +said a professional wag, “he’s anyhow +a precious big one”; at which (for the elephant-rider +was represented as of a very stout figure) there was +a general giggle in the room.</p> + +<p>“Don’t be trying to deprecate the value +of the lot, Mr. Moss,” Mr. Hammerdown said; +“let the company examine it as a work of art--the +attitude of the gallant animal quite according to natur’; +the gentleman in a nankeen jacket, his gun in his +hand, is going to the chase; in the distance a banyhann +tree and a pagody, most likely resemblances of some +interesting spot in our famous Eastern possessions. + How much for this lot? Come, gentlemen, don’t +keep me here all day.”</p> + +<p>Some one bid five shillings, at which the military +gentleman looked towards the quarter from which this +splendid offer had come, and there saw another officer +with a young lady on his arm, who both appeared to +be highly amused with the scene, and to whom, finally, +this lot was knocked down for half a guinea. He at +the table looked more surprised and discomposed than +ever when he spied this pair, and his head sank into +his military collar, and he turned his back upon them, +so as to avoid them altogether.</p> + +<p>Of all the other articles which Mr. Hammerdown had +the honour to offer for public competition that day +it is not our purpose to make mention, save of one +only, a little square piano, which came down from +the upper regions of the house (the state grand piano +having been disposed of previously); this the young +lady tried with a rapid and skilful hand (making the +officer blush and start again), and for it, when its +turn came, her agent began to bid.</p> + +<p>But there was an opposition here. The Hebrew aide-de-camp +in the service of the officer at the table bid against +the Hebrew gentleman employed by the elephant purchasers, +and a brisk battle ensued over this little piano, +the combatants being greatly encouraged by Mr. Hammerdown.</p> + +<p>At last, when the competition had been prolonged for +some time, the elephant captain and lady desisted +from the race; and the hammer coming down, the auctioneer +said:--"Mr. Lewis, twenty-five,” and Mr. Lewis’s +chief thus became the proprietor of the little square +piano. Having effected the purchase, he sate up as +if he was greatly relieved, and the unsuccessful competitors +catching a glimpse of him at this moment, the lady +said to her friend,</p> + +<p>“Why, Rawdon, it’s Captain Dobbin.”</p> + +<p>I suppose Becky was discontented with the new piano +her husband had hired for her, or perhaps the proprietors +of that instrument had fetched it away, declining +farther credit, or perhaps she had a particular attachment +for the one which she had just tried to purchase, +recollecting it in old days, when she used to play +upon it, in the little sitting-room of our dear Amelia +Sedley.</p> + +<p>The sale was at the old house in Russell Square, where +we passed some evenings together at the beginning +of this story. Good old John Sedley was a ruined +man. His name had been proclaimed as a defaulter +on the Stock Exchange, and his bankruptcy and commercial +extermination had followed. Mr. Osborne’s butler +came to buy some of the famous port wine to transfer +to the cellars over the way. As for one dozen well-manufactured +silver spoons and forks at per oz., and one dozen +dessert ditto ditto, there were three young stockbrokers +(Messrs. Dale, Spiggot, and Dale, of Threadneedle +Street, indeed), who, having had dealings with the +old man, and kindnesses from him in days when he was +kind to everybody with whom he dealt, sent this little +spar out of the wreck with their love to good Mrs. +Sedley; and with respect to the piano, as it had been +Amelia’s, and as she might miss it and want one +now, and as Captain William Dobbin could no more play +upon it than he could dance on the tight rope, it +is probable that he did not purchase the instrument +for his own use.</p> + +<p>In a word, it arrived that evening at a wonderful +small cottage in a street leading from the Fulham +Road--one of those streets which have the finest romantic +names--(this was called St. Adelaide Villas, Anna-Maria +Road West), where the houses look like baby-houses; +where the people, looking out of the first-floor windows, +must infallibly, as you think, sit with their feet +in the parlours; where the shrubs in the little gardens +in front bloom with a perennial display of little +children’s pinafores, little red socks, caps, +&c. (polyandria polygynia); whence you hear the sound +of jingling spinets and women singing; where little +porter pots hang on the railings sunning themselves; +whither of evenings you see City clerks padding wearily: +here it was that Mr. Clapp, the clerk of Mr. Sedley, +had his domicile, and in this asylum the good old +gentleman hid his head with his wife and daughter +when the crash came.</p> + +<p>Jos Sedley had acted as a man of his disposition would, +when the announcement of the family misfortune reached +him. He did not come to London, but he wrote to his +mother to draw upon his agents for whatever money +was wanted, so that his kind broken-spirited old parents +had no present poverty to fear. This done, Jos went +on at the boarding-house at Cheltenham pretty much +as before. He drove his curricle; he drank his claret; +he played his rubber; he told his Indian stories, +and the Irish widow consoled and flattered him as +usual. His present of money, needful as it was, made +little impression on his parents; and I have heard +Amelia say that the first day on which she saw her +father lift up his head after the failure was on the +receipt of the packet of forks and spoons with the +young stockbrokers’ love, over which he burst +out crying like a child, being greatly more affected +than even his wife, to whom the present was addressed. + Edward Dale, the junior of the house, who purchased +the spoons for the firm, was, in fact, very sweet upon +Amelia, and offered for her in spite of all. He married +Miss Louisa Cutts (daughter of Higham and Cutts, the +eminent cornfactors) with a handsome fortune in 1820; +and is now living in splendour, and with a numerous +family, at his elegant villa, Muswell Hill. But we +must not let the recollections of this good fellow +cause us to diverge from the principal history.</p> + +<p>I hope the reader has much too good an opinion of +Captain and Mrs. Crawley to suppose that they ever +would have dreamed of paying a visit to so remote +a district as Bloomsbury, if they thought the family +whom they proposed to honour with a visit were not +merely out of fashion, but out of money, and could +be serviceable to them in no possible manner. Rebecca +was entirely surprised at the sight of the comfortable +old house where she had met with no small kindness, +ransacked by brokers and bargainers, and its quiet +family treasures given up to public desecration and +plunder. A month after her flight, she had bethought +her of Amelia, and Rawdon, with a horse-laugh, had +expressed a perfect willingness to see young George +Osborne again. “He’s a very agreeable +acquaintance, Beck,” the wag added. “I’d +like to sell him another horse, Beck. I’d like +to play a few more games at billiards with him. He’d +be what I call useful just now, Mrs. C.--ha, ha!” +by which sort of speech it is not to be supposed that +Rawdon Crawley had a deliberate desire to cheat Mr. +Osborne at play, but only wished to take that fair +advantage of him which almost every sporting gentleman +in Vanity Fair considers to be his due from his neighbour.</p> + +<p>The old aunt was long in “coming-to.” +A month had elapsed. Rawdon was denied the door by +Mr. Bowls; his servants could not get a lodgment in +the house at Park Lane; his letters were sent back +unopened. Miss Crawley never stirred out--she was +unwell--and Mrs. Bute remained still and never left +her. Crawley and his wife both of them augured evil +from the continued presence of Mrs. Bute.</p> + +<p>“Gad, I begin to perceive now why she was always +bringing us together at Queen’s Crawley,” +Rawdon said.</p> + +<p>“What an artful little woman!” ejaculated +Rebecca.</p> + +<p>“Well, I don’t regret it, if you don’t,” +the Captain cried, still in an amorous rapture with +his wife, who rewarded him with a kiss by way of reply, +and was indeed not a little gratified by the generous +confidence of her husband.</p> + +<p>“If he had but a little more brains,” +she thought to herself, “I might make something +of him”; but she never let him perceive the +opinion she had of him; listened with indefatigable +complacency to his stories of the stable and the mess; +laughed at all his jokes; felt the greatest interest +in Jack Spatterdash, whose cab-horse had come down, +and Bob Martingale, who had been taken up in a gambling-house, +and Tom Cinqbars, who was going to ride the steeplechase. +When he came home she was alert and happy: when he +went out she pressed him to go: when he stayed at +home, she played and sang for him, made him good drinks, +superintended his dinner, warmed his slippers, and +steeped his soul in comfort. The best of women (I +have heard my grandmother say) are hypocrites. We +don’t know how much they hide from us: how watchful +they are when they seem most artless and confidential: +how often those frank smiles which they wear so easily, +are traps to cajole or elude or disarm--I don’t +mean in your mere coquettes, but your domestic models, +and paragons of female virtue. Who has not seen a +woman hide the dulness of a stupid husband, or coax +the fury of a savage one? We accept this amiable +slavishness, and praise a woman for it: we call this +pretty treachery truth. A good housewife is of necessity +a humbug; and Cornelia’s husband was hoodwinked, +as Potiphar was--only in a different way.</p> + +<p>By these attentions, that veteran rake, Rawdon Crawley, +found himself converted into a very happy and submissive +married man. His former haunts knew him not. They +asked about him once or twice at his clubs, but did +not miss him much: in those booths of Vanity Fair +people seldom do miss each other. His secluded wife +ever smiling and cheerful, his little comfortable +lodgings, snug meals, and homely evenings, had all +the charms of novelty and secrecy. The marriage was +not yet declared to the world, or published in the +Morning Post. All his creditors would have come rushing +on him in a body, had they known that he was united +to a woman without fortune. “My relations won’t +cry fie upon me,” Becky said, with rather a +bitter laugh; and she was quite contented to wait until +the old aunt should be reconciled, before she claimed +her place in society. So she lived at Brompton, and +meanwhile saw no one, or only those few of her husband’s +male companions who were admitted into her little +dining-room. These were all charmed with her. The +little dinners, the laughing and chatting, the music +afterwards, delighted all who participated in these +enjoyments. Major Martingale never thought about +asking to see the marriage licence, Captain Cinqbars +was perfectly enchanted with her skill in making punch. + And young Lieutenant Spatterdash (who was fond of +piquet, and whom Crawley would often invite) was +evidently and quickly smitten by Mrs. Crawley; but +her own circumspection and modesty never forsook her +for a moment, and Crawley’s reputation as a fire-eating +and jealous warrior was a further and complete defence +to his little wife.</p> + +<p>There are gentlemen of very good blood and fashion +in this city, who never have entered a lady’s +drawing-room; so that though Rawdon Crawley’s +marriage might be talked about in his county, where, +of course, Mrs. Bute had spread the news, in London +it was doubted, or not heeded, or not talked about +at all. He lived comfortably on credit. He had a +large capital of debts, which laid out judiciously, +will carry a man along for many years, and on which +certain men about town contrive to live a hundred times +better than even men with ready money can do. Indeed +who is there that walks London streets, but can point +out a half-dozen of men riding by him splendidly, +while he is on foot, courted by fashion, bowed into +their carriages by tradesmen, denying themselves nothing, +and living on who knows what? We see Jack Thriftless +prancing in the park, or darting in his brougham down +Pall Mall: we eat his dinners served on his miraculous +plate. “How did this begin,” we say, “or +where will it end?” “My dear fellow,” +I heard Jack once say, “I owe money in every +capital in Europe.” The end must come some day, +but in the meantime Jack thrives as much as ever; +people are glad enough to shake him by the hand, ignore +the little dark stories that are whispered every now +and then against him, and pronounce him a good-natured, +jovial, reckless fellow.</p> + +<p>Truth obliges us to confess that Rebecca had married +a gentleman of this order. Everything was plentiful +in his house but ready money, of which their menage +pretty early felt the want; and reading the Gazette +one day, and coming upon the announcement of “Lieutenant +G. Osborne to be Captain by purchase, vice Smith, +who exchanges,” Rawdon uttered that sentiment +regarding Amelia’s lover, which ended in the +visit to Russell Square.</p> + +<p>When Rawdon and his wife wished to communicate with +Captain Dobbin at the sale, and to know particulars +of the catastrophe which had befallen Rebecca’s +old acquaintances, the Captain had vanished; and such +information as they got was from a stray porter or +broker at the auction.</p> + +<p>“Look at them with their hooked beaks,” +Becky said, getting into the buggy, her picture under +her arm, in great glee. “They’re like +vultures after a battle.”</p> + +<p>“Don’t know. Never was in action, my +dear. Ask Martingale; he was in Spain, aide-de-camp +to General Blazes.”</p> + +<p>“He was a very kind old man, Mr. Sedley,” +Rebecca said; “I’m really sorry he’s +gone wrong.”</p> + +<p>“O stockbrokers--bankrupts--used to it, you +know,” Rawdon replied, cutting a fly off the +horse’s ear.</p> + +<p>“I wish we could have afforded some of the plate, +Rawdon,” the wife continued sentimentally. +“Five-and-twenty guineas was monstrously dear +for that little piano. We chose it at Broadwood’s +for Amelia, when she came from school. It only cost +five-and-thirty then.”</p> + +<p>“What-d’-ye-call’em--’Osborne,’ +will cry off now, I suppose, since the family is smashed. + How cut up your pretty little friend will be; hey, +Becky?”</p> + +<p>“I daresay she’ll recover it,” Becky +said with a smile--and they drove on and talked about +something else.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XVIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Who Played on the Piano Captain Dobbin Bought</h4> + +<p>Our surprised story now finds itself for a moment +among very famous events and personages, and hanging +on to the skirts of history. When the eagles of Napoleon +Bonaparte, the Corsican upstart, were flying from +Provence, where they had perched after a brief sojourn +in Elba, and from steeple to steeple until they reached +the towers of Notre Dame, I wonder whether the Imperial +birds had any eye for a little corner of the parish +of Bloomsbury, London, which you might have thought +so quiet, that even the whirring and flapping of those +mighty wings would pass unobserved there?</p> + +<p>“Napoleon has landed at Cannes.” Such +news might create a panic at Vienna, and cause Russia +to drop his cards, and take Prussia into a corner, +and Talleyrand and Metternich to wag their heads together, +while Prince Hardenberg, and even the present Marquis +of Londonderry, were puzzled; but how was this intelligence +to affect a young lady in Russell Square, before whose +door the watchman sang the hours when she was asleep: +who, if she strolled in the square, was guarded there +by the railings and the beadle: who, if she walked +ever so short a distance to buy a ribbon in Southampton +Row, was followed by Black Sambo with an enormous +cane: who was always cared for, dressed, put to bed, +and watched over by ever so many guardian angels, +with and without wages? Bon Dieu, I say, is it not +hard that the fateful rush of the great Imperial struggle +can’t take place without affecting a poor little +harmless girl of eighteen, who is occupied in billing +and cooing, or working muslin collars in Russell Square? + You too, kindly, homely flower!--is the great roaring +war tempest coming to sweep you down, here, although +cowering under the shelter of Holborn? Yes; Napoleon +is flinging his last stake, and poor little Emmy Sedley’s +happiness forms, somehow, part of it.</p> + +<p>In the first place, her father’s fortune was +swept down with that fatal news. All his speculations +had of late gone wrong with the luckless old gentleman. + Ventures had failed; merchants had broken; funds +had risen when he calculated they would fall. What +need to particularize? If success is rare and slow, +everybody knows how quick and easy ruin is. Old Sedley +had kept his own sad counsel. Everything seemed to +go on as usual in the quiet, opulent house; the good-natured +mistress pursuing, quite unsuspiciously, her bustling +idleness, and daily easy avocations; the daughter absorbed +still in one selfish, tender thought, and quite regardless +of all the world besides, when that final crash came, +under which the worthy family fell.</p> + +<p>One night Mrs. Sedley was writing cards for a party; +the Osbornes had given one, and she must not be behindhand; +John Sedley, who had come home very late from the +City, sate silent at the chimney side, while his wife +was prattling to him; Emmy had gone up to her room +ailing and low-spirited. “She’s not happy,” +the mother went on. “George Osborne neglects +her. I’ve no patience with the airs of those +people. The girls have not been in the house these +three weeks; and George has been twice in town without +coming. Edward Dale saw him at the Opera. Edward +would marry her I’m sure: and there’s +Captain Dobbin who, I think, would--only I hate all +army men. Such a dandy as George has become. With +his military airs, indeed! We must show some folks +that we’re as good as they. Only give Edward +Dale any encouragement, and you’ll see. We must +have a party, Mr. S. Why don’t you speak, John? + Shall I say Tuesday fortnight? Why don’t you +answer? Good God, John, what has happened?”</p> + +<p>John Sedley sprang up out of his chair to meet his +wife, who ran to him. He seized her in his arms, +and said with a hasty voice, “We’re ruined, +Mary. We’ve got the world to begin over again, +dear. It’s best that you should know all, and +at once.” As he spoke, he trembled in every +limb, and almost fell. He thought the news would +have overpowered his wife--his wife, to whom he had +never said a hard word. But it was he that was the +most moved, sudden as the shock was to her. When +he sank back into his seat, it was the wife that took +the office of consoler. She took his trembling hand, +and kissed it, and put it round her neck: she called +him her John--her dear John--her old man--her kind +old man; she poured out a hundred words of incoherent +love and tenderness; her faithful voice and simple +caresses wrought this sad heart up to an inexpressible +delight and anguish, and cheered and solaced his over-burdened +soul.</p> + +<p>Only once in the course of the long night as they +sate together, and poor Sedley opened his pent-up +soul, and told the story of his losses and embarrassments--the +treason of some of his oldest friends, the manly kindness +of some, from whom he never could have expected it--in +a general confession--only once did the faithful wife +give way to emotion.</p> + +<p>“My God, my God, it will break Emmy’s +heart,” she said.</p> + +<p>The father had forgotten the poor girl. She was lying, +awake and unhappy, overhead. In the midst of friends, +home, and kind parents, she was alone. To how many +people can any one tell all? Who will be open where +there is no sympathy, or has call to speak to those +who never can understand? Our gentle Amelia was thus +solitary. She had no confidante, so to speak, ever +since she had anything to confide. She could not +tell the old mother her doubts and cares; the would-be +sisters seemed every day more strange to her. And +she had misgivings and fears which she dared not acknowledge +to herself, though she was always secretly brooding +over them.</p> + +<p>Her heart tried to persist in asserting that George +Osborne was worthy and faithful to her, though she +knew otherwise. How many a thing had she said, and +got no echo from him. How many suspicions of selfishness +and indifference had she to encounter and obstinately +overcome. To whom could the poor little martyr tell +these daily struggles and tortures? Her hero himself +only half understood her. She did not dare to own +that the man she loved was her inferior; or to feel +that she had given her heart away too soon. Given +once, the pure bashful maiden was too modest, too +tender, too trustful, too weak, too much woman to +recall it. We are Turks with the affections of our +women; and have made them subscribe to our doctrine +too. We let their bodies go abroad liberally enough, +with smiles and ringlets and pink bonnets to disguise +them instead of veils and yakmaks. But their souls +must be seen by only one man, and they obey not unwillingly, +and consent to remain at home as our slaves-- ministering +to us and doing drudgery for us.</p> + +<p>So imprisoned and tortured was this gentle little +heart, when in the month of March, Anno Domini 1815, +Napoleon landed at Cannes, and Louis XVIII fled, and +all Europe was in alarm, and the funds fell, and old +John Sedley was ruined.</p> + +<p>We are not going to follow the worthy old stockbroker +through those last pangs and agonies of ruin through +which he passed before his commercial demise befell. +They declared him at the Stock Exchange; he was absent +from his house of business: his bills were protested: +his act of bankruptcy formal. The house and furniture +of Russell Square were seized and sold up, and he +and his family were thrust away, as we have seen, +to hide their heads where they might.</p> + +<p>John Sedley had not the heart to review the domestic +establishment who have appeared now and anon in our +pages and of whom he was now forced by poverty to +take leave. The wages of those worthy people were +discharged with that punctuality which men frequently +show who only owe in great sums--they were sorry to +leave good places--but they did not break their hearts +at parting from their adored master and mistress. + Amelia’s maid was profuse in condolences, but +went off quite resigned to better herself in a genteeler +quarter of the town. Black Sambo, with the infatuation +of his profession, determined on setting up a public-house. + Honest old Mrs. Blenkinsop indeed, who had seen the +birth of Jos and Amelia, and the wooing of John Sedley +and his wife, was for staying by them without wages, +having amassed a considerable sum in their service: +and she accompanied the fallen people into their new +and humble place of refuge, where she tended them +and grumbled against them for a while.</p> + +<p>Of all Sedley’s opponents in his debates with +his creditors which now ensued, and harassed the feelings +of the humiliated old gentleman so severely, that +in six weeks he oldened more than he had done for +fifteen years before--the most determined and obstinate +seemed to be John Osborne, his old friend and neighbour--John +Osborne, whom he had set up in life--who was under +a hundred obligations to him--and whose son was to +marry Sedley’s daughter. Any one of these circumstances +would account for the bitterness of Osborne’s +opposition.</p> + +<p>When one man has been under very remarkable obligations +to another, with whom he subsequently quarrels, a +common sense of decency, as it were, makes of the +former a much severer enemy than a mere stranger would +be. To account for your own hard-heartedness and ingratitude +in such a case, you are bound to prove the other party’s +crime. It is not that you are selfish, brutal, and +angry at the failure of a speculation--no, no--it +is that your partner has led you into it by the basest +treachery and with the most sinister motives. From +a mere sense of consistency, a persecutor is bound +to show that the fallen man is a villain--otherwise +he, the persecutor, is a wretch himself.</p> + +<p>And as a general rule, which may make all creditors +who are inclined to be severe pretty comfortable in +their minds, no men embarrassed are altogether honest, +very likely. They conceal something; they exaggerate +chances of good luck; hide away the real state of +affairs; say that things are flourishing when they +are hopeless, keep a smiling face (a dreary smile +it is) upon the verge of bankruptcy--are ready to +lay hold of any pretext for delay or of any money, +so as to stave off the inevitable ruin a few days longer. +“Down with such dishonesty,” says the creditor +in triumph, and reviles his sinking enemy. “You +fool, why do you catch at a straw?” calm good +sense says to the man that is drowning. “You +villain, why do you shrink from plunging into the +irretrievable Gazette?” says prosperity to the +poor devil battling in that black gulf. Who has not +remarked the readiness with which the closest of friends +and honestest of men suspect and accuse each other +of cheating when they fall out on money matters? Everybody +does it. Everybody is right, I suppose, and the world +is a rogue.</p> + +<p>Then Osborne had the intolerable sense of former benefits +to goad and irritate him: these are always a cause +of hostility aggravated. Finally, he had to break +off the match between Sedley’s daughter and +his son; and as it had gone very far indeed, and as +the poor girl’s happiness and perhaps character +were compromised, it was necessary to show the strongest +reasons for the rupture, and for John Osborne to prove +John Sedley to be a very bad character indeed.</p> + +<p>At the meetings of creditors, then, he comported himself +with a savageness and scorn towards Sedley, which +almost succeeded in breaking the heart of that ruined +bankrupt man. On George’s intercourse with +Amelia he put an instant veto--menacing the youth +with maledictions if he broke his commands, and vilipending +the poor innocent girl as the basest and most artful +of vixens. One of the great conditions of anger and +hatred is, that you must tell and believe lies against +the hated object, in order, as we said, to be consistent.</p> + +<p>When the great crash came--the announcement of ruin, +and the departure from Russell Square, and the declaration +that all was over between her and George--all over +between her and love, her and happiness, her and faith +in the world--a brutal letter from John Osborne told +her in a few curt lines that her father’s conduct +had been of such a nature that all engagements between +the families were at an end--when the final award +came, it did not shock her so much as her parents, +as her mother rather expected (for John Sedley himself +was entirely prostrate in the ruins of his own affairs +and shattered honour). Amelia took the news very +palely and calmly. It was only the confirmation of +the dark presages which had long gone before. It +was the mere reading of the sentence--of the crime +she had long ago been guilty--the crime of loving +wrongly, too violently, against reason. She told no +more of her thoughts now than she had before. She +seemed scarcely more unhappy now when convinced all +hope was over, than before when she felt but dared +not confess that it was gone. So she changed from +the large house to the small one without any mark +or difference; remained in her little room for the +most part; pined silently; and died away day by day. + I do not mean to say that all females are so. My +dear Miss Bullock, I do not think your heart would +break in this way. You are a strong-minded young +woman with proper principles. I do not venture to say +that mine would; it has suffered, and, it must be +confessed, survived. But there are some souls thus +gently constituted, thus frail, and delicate, and +tender.</p> + +<p>Whenever old John Sedley thought of the affair between +George and Amelia, or alluded to it, it was with bitterness +almost as great as Mr. Osborne himself had shown. + He cursed Osborne and his family as heartless, wicked, +and ungrateful. No power on earth, he swore, would +induce him to marry his daughter to the son of such +a villain, and he ordered Emmy to banish George from +her mind, and to return all the presents and letters +which she had ever had from him.</p> + +<p>She promised acquiescence, and tried to obey. She +put up the two or three trinkets: and, as for the +letters, she drew them out of the place where she +kept them; and read them over--as if she did not know +them by heart already: but she could not part with +them. That effort was too much for her; she placed +them back in her bosom again--as you have seen a woman +nurse a child that is dead. Young Amelia felt that +she would die or lose her senses outright, if torn +away from this last consolation. How she used to blush +and lighten up when those letters came! How she used +to trip away with a beating heart, so that she might +read unseen! If they were cold, yet how perversely +this fond little soul interpreted them into warmth. + If they were short or selfish, what excuses she found +for the writer!</p> + +<p>It was over these few worthless papers that she brooded +and brooded. She lived in her past life--every letter +seemed to recall some circumstance of it. How well +she remembered them all! His looks and tones, his +dress, what he said and how--these relics and remembrances +of dead affection were all that were left her in the +world. And the business of her life, was--to watch +the corpse of Love.</p> + +<p>To death she looked with inexpressible longing. Then, +she thought, I shall always be able to follow him. + I am not praising her conduct or setting her up as +a model for Miss Bullock to imitate. Miss B. knows +how to regulate her feelings better than this poor +little creature. Miss B. would never have committed +herself as that imprudent Amelia had done; pledged +her love irretrievably; confessed her heart away, +and got back nothing--only a brittle promise which +was snapt and worthless in a moment. A long engagement +is a partnership which one party is free to keep or +to break, but which involves all the capital of the +other.</p> + +<p>Be cautious then, young ladies; be wary how you engage. + Be shy of loving frankly; never tell all you feel, +or (a better way still), feel very little. See the +consequences of being prematurely honest and confiding, +and mistrust yourselves and everybody. Get yourselves +married as they do in France, where the lawyers are +the bridesmaids and confidantes. At any rate, never +have any feelings which may make you uncomfortable, +or make any promises which you cannot at any required +moment command and withdraw. That is the way to get +on, and be respected, and have a virtuous character +in Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>If Amelia could have heard the comments regarding +her which were made in the circle from which her father’s +ruin had just driven her, she would have seen what +her own crimes were, and how entirely her character +was jeopardised. Such criminal imprudence Mrs. Smith +never knew of; such horrid familiarities Mrs. Brown +had always condemned, and the end might be a warning +to <i>her</i> daughters. “Captain Osborne, of +course, could not marry a bankrupt’s daughter,” +the Misses Dobbin said. “It was quite enough +to have been swindled by the father. As for that +little Amelia, her folly had really passed all--”</p> + +<p>“All what?” Captain Dobbin roared out. + “Haven’t they been engaged ever since +they were children? Wasn’t it as good as a marriage? +Dare any soul on earth breathe a word against the sweetest, +the purest, the tenderest, the most angelical of young +women?”</p> + +<p>“La, William, don’t be so highty-tighty +with <i>us</i>. We’re not men. We can’t +fight you,” Miss Jane said. “We’ve +said nothing against Miss Sedley: but that her conduct +throughout was <i>most imprudent</i>, not to call +it by any worse name; and that her parents are people +who certainly merit their misfortunes.”</p> + +<p>“Hadn’t you better, now that Miss Sedley +is free, propose for her yourself, William?” +Miss Ann asked sarcastically. “It would be a +most eligible family connection. He! he!”</p> + +<p>“I marry her!” Dobbin said, blushing very +much, and talking quick. “If you are so ready, +young ladies, to chop and change, do you suppose that +she is? Laugh and sneer at that angel. She can’t +hear it; and she’s miserable and unfortunate, +and deserves to be laughed at. Go on joking, Ann. + You’re the wit of the family, and the others +like to hear it.”</p> + +<p>“I must tell you again we’re not in a +barrack, William,” Miss Ann remarked.</p> + +<p>“In a barrack, by Jove--I wish anybody in a +barrack would say what you do,” cried out this +uproused British lion. “I should like to hear +a man breathe a word against her, by Jupiter. But +men don’t talk in this way, Ann: it’s +only women, who get together and hiss, and shriek, +and cackle. There, get away--don’t begin to +cry. I only said you were a couple of geese,” +Will Dobbin said, perceiving Miss Ann’s pink +eyes were beginning to moisten as usual. “Well, +you’re not geese, you’re swans--anything +you like, only do, do leave Miss Sedley alone.”</p> + +<p>Anything like William’s infatuation about that +silly little flirting, ogling thing was never known, +the mamma and sisters agreed together in thinking: +and they trembled lest, her engagement being off with +Osborne, she should take up immediately her other admirer +and Captain. In which forebodings these worthy young +women no doubt judged according to the best of their +experience; or rather (for as yet they had had no +opportunities of marrying or of jilting) according +to their own notions of right and wrong.</p> + +<p>“It is a mercy, Mamma, that the regiment is +ordered abroad,” the girls said. “<i>This</i> +danger, at any rate, is spared our brother.”</p> + +<p>Such, indeed, was the fact; and so it is that the +French Emperor comes in to perform a part in this +domestic comedy of Vanity Fair which we are now playing, +and which would never have been enacted without the +intervention of this august mute personage. It was +he that ruined the Bourbons and Mr. John Sedley. +It was he whose arrival in his capital called up all +France in arms to defend him there; and all Europe +to oust him. While the French nation and army were +swearing fidelity round the eagles in the Champ de +Mars, four mighty European hosts were getting in motion +for the great chasse a l’aigle; and one of these +was a British army, of which two heroes of ours, Captain +Dobbin and Captain Osborne, formed a portion.</p> + +<p>The news of Napoleon’s escape and landing was +received by the gallant--th with a fiery delight and +enthusiasm, which everybody can understand who knows +that famous corps. From the colonel to the smallest +drummer in the regiment, all were filled with hope +and ambition and patriotic fury; and thanked the French +Emperor as for a personal kindness in coming to disturb +the peace of Europe. Now was the time the --th had +so long panted for, to show their comrades in arms +that they could fight as well as the Peninsular veterans, +and that all the pluck and valour of the --th had +not been killed by the West Indies and the yellow +fever. Stubble and Spooney looked to get their companies +without purchase. Before the end of the campaign (which +she resolved to share), Mrs. Major O’Dowd hoped +to write herself Mrs. Colonel O’Dowd, C.B. +Our two friends (Dobbin and Osborne) were quite as +much excited as the rest: and each in his way--Mr. +Dobbin very quietly, Mr. Osborne very loudly and energetically--was +bent upon doing his duty, and gaining his share of +honour and distinction.</p> + +<p>The agitation thrilling through the country and army +in consequence of this news was so great, that private +matters were little heeded: and hence probably George +Osborne, just gazetted to his company, busy with preparations +for the march, which must come inevitably, and panting +for further promotion--was not so much affected by +other incidents which would have interested him at +a more quiet period. He was not, it must be confessed, +very much cast down by good old Mr. Sedley’s +catastrophe. He tried his new uniform, which became +him very handsomely, on the day when the first meeting +of the creditors of the unfortunate gentleman took +place. His father told him of the wicked, rascally, +shameful conduct of the bankrupt, reminded him of +what he had said about Amelia, and that their connection +was broken off for ever; and gave him that evening +a good sum of money to pay for the new clothes and +epaulets in which he looked so well. Money was always +useful to this free-handed young fellow, and he took +it without many words. The bills were up in the Sedley +house, where he had passed so many, many happy hours. + He could see them as he walked from home that night +(to the Old Slaughters’, where he put up when +in town) shining white in the moon. That comfortable +home was shut, then, upon Amelia and her parents: +where had they taken refuge? The thought of their +ruin affected him not a little. He was very melancholy +that night in the coffee-room at the Slaughters’; +and drank a good deal, as his comrades remarked there.</p> + +<p>Dobbin came in presently, cautioned him about the +drink, which he only took, he said, because he was +deuced low; but when his friend began to put to him +clumsy inquiries, and asked him for news in a significant +manner, Osborne declined entering into conversation +with him, avowing, however, that he was devilish disturbed +and unhappy.</p> + +<p>Three days afterwards, Dobbin found Osborne in his +room at the barracks--his head on the table, a number +of papers about, the young Captain evidently in a +state of great despondency. “She--she’s +sent me back some things I gave her--some damned trinkets. + Look here!” There was a little packet directed +in the well-known hand to Captain George Osborne, +and some things lying about--a ring, a silver knife +he had bought, as a boy, for her at a fair; a gold +chain, and a locket with hair in it. “It’s +all over,” said he, with a groan of sickening +remorse. “Look, Will, you may read it if you +like.”</p> + +<p>There was a little letter of a few lines, to which +he pointed, which said:</p> + +<p>My papa has ordered me to return to you these presents, +which you made in happier days to me; and I am to +write to you for the last time. I think, I know you +feel as much as I do the blow which has come upon +us. It is I that absolve you from an engagement which +is impossible in our present misery. I am sure you +had no share in it, or in the cruel suspicions of +Mr. Osborne, which are the hardest of all our griefs +to bear. Farewell. Farewell. I pray God to strengthen +me to bear this and other calamities, and to bless +you always. A.</p> + +<p>I shall often play upon the piano--your piano. It +was like you to send it.</p> + +<p>Dobbin was very soft-hearted. The sight of women +and children in pain always used to melt him. The +idea of Amelia broken-hearted and lonely tore that +good-natured soul with anguish. And he broke out +into an emotion, which anybody who likes may consider +unmanly. He swore that Amelia was an angel, to which +Osborne said aye with all his heart. He, too, had +been reviewing the history of their lives-- and had +seen her from her childhood to her present age, so +sweet, so innocent, so charmingly simple, and artlessly +fond and tender.</p> + +<p>What a pang it was to lose all that: to have had it +and not prized it! A thousand homely scenes and recollections +crowded on him--in which he always saw her good and +beautiful. And for himself, he blushed with remorse +and shame, as the remembrance of his own selfishness +and indifference contrasted with that perfect purity. +For a while, glory, war, everything was forgotten, +and the pair of friends talked about her only.</p> + +<p>“Where are they?” Osborne asked, after +a long talk, and a long pause--and, in truth, with +no little shame at thinking that he had taken no steps +to follow her. “Where are they? There’s +no address to the note.”</p> + +<p>Dobbin knew. He had not merely sent the piano; but +had written a note to Mrs. Sedley, and asked permission +to come and see her--and he had seen her, and Amelia +too, yesterday, before he came down to Chatham; and, +what is more, he had brought that farewell letter and +packet which had so moved them.</p> + +<p>The good-natured fellow had found Mrs. Sedley only +too willing to receive him, and greatly agitated by +the arrival of the piano, which, as she conjectured, +<i>must</i> have come from George, and was a signal +of amity on his part. Captain Dobbin did not correct +this error of the worthy lady, but listened to all +her story of complaints and misfortunes with great +sympathy--condoled with her losses and privations, +and agreed in reprehending the cruel conduct of Mr. +Osborne towards his first benefactor. When she had +eased her overflowing bosom somewhat, and poured forth +many of her sorrows, he had the courage to ask actually +to see Amelia, who was above in her room as usual, +and whom her mother led trembling downstairs.</p> + +<p>Her appearance was so ghastly, and her look of despair +so pathetic, that honest William Dobbin was frightened +as he beheld it; and read the most fatal forebodings +in that pale fixed face. After sitting in his company +a minute or two, she put the packet into his hand, +and said, “Take this to Captain Osborne, if you +please, and--and I hope he’s quite well--and +it was very kind of you to come and see us--and we +like our new house very much. And I--I think I’ll +go upstairs, Mamma, for I’m not very strong.” +And with this, and a curtsey and a smile, the poor +child went her way. The mother, as she led her up, +cast back looks of anguish towards Dobbin. The good +fellow wanted no such appeal. He loved her himself +too fondly for that. Inexpressible grief, and pity, +and terror pursued him, and he came away as if he +was a criminal after seeing her.</p> + +<p>When Osborne heard that his friend had found her, +he made hot and anxious inquiries regarding the poor +child. How was she? How did she look? What did +she say? His comrade took his hand, and looked him +in the face.</p> + +<p>“George, she’s dying,” William Dobbin +said--and could speak no more.</p> + +<p>There was a buxom Irish servant-girl, who performed +all the duties of the little house where the Sedley +family had found refuge: and this girl had in vain, +on many previous days, striven to give Amelia aid +or consolation. Emmy was much too sad to answer, or +even to be aware of the attempts the other was making +in her favour.</p> + +<p>Four hours after the talk between Dobbin and Osborne, +this servant-maid came into Amelia’s room, +where she sate as usual, brooding silently over her +letters--her little treasures. The girl, smiling, +and looking arch and happy, made many trials to attract +poor Emmy’s attention, who, however, took no +heed of her.</p> + +<p>“Miss Emmy,” said the girl.</p> + +<p>“I’m coming,” Emmy said, not looking +round.</p> + +<p>“There’s a message,” the maid went +on. “There’s something-- somebody--sure, +here’s a new letter for you--don’t be reading +them old ones any more.” And she gave her a +letter, which Emmy took, and read.</p> + +<p>“I must see you,” the letter said. “Dearest +Emmy--dearest love-- dearest wife, come to me.”</p> + +<p>George and her mother were outside, waiting until +she had read the letter.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XIX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Miss Crawley at Nurse</h4> + +<p>We have seen how Mrs. Firkin, the lady’s maid, +as soon as any event of importance to the Crawley +family came to her knowledge, felt bound to communicate +it to Mrs. Bute Crawley, at the Rectory; and have +before mentioned how particularly kind and attentive +that good-natured lady was to Miss Crawley’s +confidential servant. She had been a gracious friend +to Miss Briggs, the companion, also; and had secured +the latter’s good-will by a number of those attentions +and promises, which cost so little in the making, +and are yet so valuable and agreeable to the recipient. + Indeed every good economist and manager of a household +must know how cheap and yet how amiable these professions +are, and what a flavour they give to the most homely +dish in life. Who was the blundering idiot who said +that “fine words butter no parsnips”? +Half the parsnips of society are served and rendered +palatable with no other sauce. As the immortal Alexis +Soyer can make more delicious soup for a half-penny +than an ignorant cook can concoct with pounds of vegetables +and meat, so a skilful artist will make a few simple +and pleasing phrases go farther than ever so much +substantial benefit-stock in the hands of a mere bungler. +Nay, we know that substantial benefits often sicken +some stomachs; whereas, most will digest any amount +of fine words, and be always eager for more of the +same food. Mrs. Bute had told Briggs and Firkin so +often of the depth of her affection for them; and +what she would do, if she had Miss Crawley’s +fortune, for friends so excellent and attached, that +the ladies in question had the deepest regard for +her; and felt as much gratitude and confidence as +if Mrs. Bute had loaded them with the most expensive +favours.</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley, on the other hand, like a selfish +heavy dragoon as he was, never took the least trouble +to conciliate his aunt’s aides-de-camp, showed +his contempt for the pair with entire frankness-- +made Firkin pull off his boots on one occasion--sent +her out in the rain on ignominious messages--and if +he gave her a guinea, flung it to her as if it were +a box on the ear. As his aunt, too, made a butt of +Briggs, the Captain followed the example, and levelled +his jokes at her--jokes about as delicate as a kick +from his charger. Whereas, Mrs. Bute consulted her +in matters of taste or difficulty, admired her poetry, +and by a thousand acts of kindness and politeness, +showed her appreciation of Briggs; and if she made +Firkin a twopenny-halfpenny present, accompanied it +with so many compliments, that the twopence-half-penny +was transmuted into gold in the heart of the grateful +waiting-maid, who, besides, was looking forwards quite +contentedly to some prodigious benefit which must +happen to her on the day when Mrs. Bute came into her +fortune.</p> + +<p>The different conduct of these two people is pointed +out respectfully to the attention of persons commencing +the world. Praise everybody, I say to such: never +be squeamish, but speak out your compliment both point-blank +in a man’s face, and behind his back, when you +know there is a reasonable chance of his hearing it +again. Never lose a chance of saying a kind word. + As Collingwood never saw a vacant place in his estate +but he took an acorn out of his pocket and popped +it in; so deal with your compliments through life. + An acorn costs nothing; but it may sprout into a prodigious +bit of timber.</p> + +<p>In a word, during Rawdon Crawley’s prosperity, +he was only obeyed with sulky acquiescence; when his +disgrace came, there was nobody to help or pity him. + Whereas, when Mrs. Bute took the command at Miss +Crawley’s house, the garrison there were charmed +to act under such a leader, expecting all sorts of +promotion from her promises, her generosity, and her +kind words.</p> + +<p>That he would consider himself beaten, after one defeat, +and make no attempt to regain the position he had +lost, Mrs. Bute Crawley never allowed herself to suppose. +She knew Rebecca to be too clever and spirited and +desperate a woman to submit without a struggle; and +felt that she must prepare for that combat, and be +incessantly watchful against assault; or mine, or +surprise.</p> + +<p>In the first place, though she held the town, was +she sure of the principal inhabitant? Would Miss +Crawley herself hold out; and had she not a secret +longing to welcome back the ousted adversary? The +old lady liked Rawdon, and Rebecca, who amused her. + Mrs. Bute could not disguise from herself the fact +that none of her party could so contribute to the +pleasures of the town-bred lady. “My girls’ +singing, after that little odious governess’s, +I know is unbearable,” the candid Rector’s +wife owned to herself. “She always used to +go to sleep when Martha and Louisa played their duets. +Jim’s stiff college manners and poor dear Bute’s +talk about his dogs and horses always annoyed her. + If I took her to the Rectory, she would grow angry +with us all, and fly, I know she would; and might +fall into that horrid Rawdon’s clutches again, +and be the victim of that little viper of a Sharp. + Meanwhile, it is clear to me that she is exceedingly +unwell, and cannot move for some weeks, at any rate; +during which we must think of some plan to protect +her from the arts of those unprincipled people.”</p> + +<p>In the very best-of moments, if anybody told Miss +Crawley that she was, or looked ill, the trembling +old lady sent off for her doctor; and I daresay she +was very unwell after the sudden family event, which +might serve to shake stronger nerves than hers. At +least, Mrs. Bute thought it was her duty to inform +the physician, and the apothecary, and the dame-de-compagnie, +and the domestics, that Miss Crawley was in a most +critical state, and that they were to act accordingly. + She had the street laid knee-deep with straw; and +the knocker put by with Mr. Bowls’s plate. +She insisted that the Doctor should call twice a day; +and deluged her patient with draughts every two hours. + When anybody entered the room, she uttered a shshshsh +so sibilant and ominous, that it frightened the poor +old lady in her bed, from which she could not look +without seeing Mrs. Bute’s beady eyes eagerly +fixed on her, as the latter sate steadfast in the arm-chair +by the bedside. They seemed to lighten in the dark +(for she kept the curtains closed) as she moved about +the room on velvet paws like a cat. There Miss Crawley +lay for days--ever so many days--Mr. Bute reading +books of devotion to her: for nights, long nights, +during which she had to hear the watchman sing, the +night-light sputter; visited at midnight, the last +thing, by the stealthy apothecary; and then left to +look at Mrs. Bute’s twinkling eyes, or the flicks +of yellow that the rushlight threw on the dreary darkened +ceiling. Hygeia herself would have fallen sick under +such a regimen; and how much more this poor old nervous +victim? It has been said that when she was in health +and good spirits, this venerable inhabitant of Vanity +Fair had as free notions about religion and morals +as Monsieur de Voltaire himself could desire, but +when illness overtook her, it was aggravated by the +most dreadful terrors of death, and an utter cowardice +took possession of the prostrate old sinner.</p> + +<p>Sick-bed homilies and pious reflections are, to be +sure, out of place in mere story-books, and we are +not going (after the fashion of some novelists of +the present day) to cajole the public into a sermon, +when it is only a comedy that the reader pays his money +to witness. But, without preaching, the truth may +surely be borne in mind, that the bustle, and triumph, +and laughter, and gaiety which Vanity Fair exhibits +in public, do not always pursue the performer into +private life, and that the most dreary depression of +spirits and dismal repentances sometimes overcome +him. Recollection of the best ordained banquets will +scarcely cheer sick epicures. Reminiscences of the +most becoming dresses and brilliant ball triumphs +will go very little way to console faded beauties. + Perhaps statesmen, at a particular period of existence, +are not much gratified at thinking over the most triumphant +divisions; and the success or the pleasure of yesterday +becomes of very small account when a certain (albeit +uncertain) morrow is in view, about which all of us +must some day or other be speculating. O brother wearers +of motley! Are there not moments when one grows sick +of grinning and tumbling, and the jingling of cap +and bells? This, dear friends and companions, is +my amiable object--to walk with you through the Fair, +to examine the shops and the shows there; and that +we should all come home after the flare, and the noise, +and the gaiety, and be perfectly miserable in private.</p> + +<p>“If that poor man of mine had a head on his +shoulders,” Mrs. Bute Crawley thought to herself, +“how useful he might be, under present circumstances, +to this unhappy old lady! He might make her repent +of her shocking free-thinking ways; he might urge her +to do her duty, and cast off that odious reprobate +who has disgraced himself and his family; and he might +induce her to do justice to my dear girls and the +two boys, who require and deserve, I am sure, every +assistance which their relatives can give them.”</p> + +<p>And, as the hatred of vice is always a progress towards +virtue, Mrs. Bute Crawley endeavoured to instil her +sister-in-law a proper abhorrence for all Rawdon Crawley’s +manifold sins: of which his uncle’s wife brought +forward such a catalogue as indeed would have served +to condemn a whole regiment of young officers. If +a man has committed wrong in life, I don’t know +any moralist more anxious to point his errors out +to the world than his own relations; so Mrs. Bute +showed a perfect family interest and knowledge of Rawdon’s +history. She had all the particulars of that ugly +quarrel with Captain Marker, in which Rawdon, wrong +from the beginning, ended in shooting the Captain. + She knew how the unhappy Lord Dovedale, whose mamma +had taken a house at Oxford, so that he might be educated +there, and who had never touched a card in his life +till he came to London, was perverted by Rawdon at +the Cocoa-Tree, made helplessly tipsy by this abominable +seducer and perverter of youth, and fleeced of four +thousand pounds. She described with the most vivid +minuteness the agonies of the country families whom +he had ruined-- the sons whom he had plunged into +dishonour and poverty--the daughters whom he had inveigled +into perdition. She knew the poor tradesmen who were +bankrupt by his extravagance--the mean shifts and +rogueries with which he had ministered to it--the astounding +falsehoods by which he had imposed upon the most generous +of aunts, and the ingratitude and ridicule by which +he had repaid her sacrifices. She imparted these +stories gradually to Miss Crawley; gave her the whole +benefit of them; felt it to be her bounden duty as +a Christian woman and mother of a family to do so; +had not the smallest remorse or compunction for the +victim whom her tongue was immolating; nay, very likely +thought her act was quite meritorious, and plumed +herself upon her resolute manner of performing it. + Yes, if a man’s character is to be abused, +say what you will, there’s nobody like a relation +to do the business. And one is bound to own, regarding +this unfortunate wretch of a Rawdon Crawley, that the +mere truth was enough to condemn him, and that all +inventions of scandal were quite superfluous pains +on his friends’ parts.</p> + +<p>Rebecca, too, being now a relative, came in for the +fullest share of Mrs. Bute’s kind inquiries. + This indefatigable pursuer of truth (having given +strict orders that the door was to be denied to all +emissaries or letters from Rawdon), took Miss Crawley’s +carriage, and drove to her old friend Miss Pinkerton, +at Minerva House, Chiswick Mall, to whom she announced +the dreadful intelligence of Captain Rawdon’s +seduction by Miss Sharp, and from whom she got sundry +strange particulars regarding the ex-governess’s +birth and early history. The friend of the Lexicographer +had plenty of information to give. Miss Jemima was +made to fetch the drawing-master’s receipts +and letters. This one was from a spunging-house: +that entreated an advance: another was full of gratitude +for Rebecca’s reception by the ladies of Chiswick: +and the last document from the unlucky artist’s +pen was that in which, from his dying bed, he recommended +his orphan child to Miss Pinkerton’s protection. +There were juvenile letters and petitions from Rebecca, +too, in the collection, imploring aid for her father +or declaring her own gratitude. Perhaps in Vanity +Fair there are no better satires than letters. Take +a bundle of your dear friend’s of ten years back-- +your dear friend whom you hate now. Look at a file +of your sister’s! how you clung to each other +till you quarrelled about the twenty-pound legacy! + Get down the round-hand scrawls of your son who has +half broken your heart with selfish undutifulness since; +or a parcel of your own, breathing endless ardour +and love eternal, which were sent back by your mistress +when she married the Nabob-- your mistress for whom +you now care no more than for Queen Elizabeth. Vows, +love, promises, confidences, gratitude, how queerly +they read after a while! There ought to be a law in +Vanity Fair ordering the destruction of every written +document (except receipted tradesmen’s bills) +after a certain brief and proper interval. Those +quacks and misanthropes who advertise indelible Japan +ink should be made to perish along with their wicked +discoveries. The best ink for Vanity Fair use would +be one that faded utterly in a couple of days, and +left the paper clean and blank, so that you might write +on it to somebody else.</p> + +<p>From Miss Pinkerton’s the indefatigable Mrs. +Bute followed the track of Sharp and his daughter +back to the lodgings in Greek Street, which the defunct +painter had occupied; and where portraits of the landlady +in white satin, and of the husband in brass buttons, +done by Sharp in lieu of a quarter’s rent, still +decorated the parlour walls. Mrs. Stokes was a communicative +person, and quickly told all she knew about Mr. Sharp; +how dissolute and poor he was; how good-natured and +amusing; how he was always hunted by bailiffs and duns; +how, to the landlady’s horror, though she never +could abide the woman, he did not marry his wife till +a short time before her death; and what a queer little +wild vixen his daughter was; how she kept them all +laughing with her fun and mimicry; how she used to +fetch the gin from the public-house, and was known +in all the studios in the quarter--in brief, Mrs. +Bute got such a full account of her new niece’s +parentage, education, and behaviour as would scarcely +have pleased Rebecca, had the latter known that such +inquiries were being made concerning her.</p> + +<p>Of all these industrious researches Miss Crawley had +the full benefit. Mrs. Rawdon Crawley was the daughter +of an opera-girl. She had danced herself. She had +been a model to the painters. She was brought up +as became her mother’s daughter. She drank gin +with her father, &c. &c. It was a lost woman who was +married to a lost man; and the moral to be inferred +from Mrs. Bute’s tale was, that the knavery +of the pair was irremediable, and that no properly +conducted person should ever notice them again.</p> + +<p>These were the materials which prudent Mrs. Bute gathered +together in Park Lane, the provisions and ammunition +as it were with which she fortified the house against +the siege which she knew that Rawdon and his wife +would lay to Miss Crawley.</p> + +<p>But if a fault may be found with her arrangements, +it is this, that she was too eager: she managed rather +too well; undoubtedly she made Miss Crawley more ill +than was necessary; and though the old invalid succumbed +to her authority, it was so harassing and severe, that +the victim would be inclined to escape at the very +first chance which fell in her way. Managing women, +the ornaments of their sex--women who order everything +for everybody, and know so much better than any person +concerned what is good for their neighbours, don’t +sometimes speculate upon the possibility of a domestic +revolt, or upon other extreme consequences resulting +from their overstrained authority.</p> + +<p>Thus, for instance, Mrs. Bute, with the best intentions +no doubt in the world, and wearing herself to death +as she did by foregoing sleep, dinner, fresh air, +for the sake of her invalid sister-in-law, carried +her conviction of the old lady’s illness so far +that she almost managed her into her coffin. She +pointed out her sacrifices and their results one day +to the constant apothecary, Mr. Clump.</p> + +<p>“I am sure, my dear Mr. Clump,” she said, +“no efforts of mine have been wanting to restore +our dear invalid, whom the ingratitude of her nephew +has laid on the bed of sickness. I never shrink from +personal discomfort: I never refuse to sacrifice myself.”</p> + +<p>“Your devotion, it must be confessed, is admirable,” +Mr. Clump says, with a low bow; “but--”</p> + +<p>“I have scarcely closed my eyes since my arrival: +I give up sleep, health, every comfort, to my sense +of duty. When my poor James was in the smallpox, did +I allow any hireling to nurse him? No.”</p> + +<p>“You did what became an excellent mother, my +dear Madam--the best of mothers; but--”</p> + +<p>“As the mother of a family and the wife of an +English clergyman, I humbly trust that my principles +are good,” Mrs. Bute said, with a happy solemnity +of conviction; “and, as long as Nature supports +me, never, never, Mr. Clump, will I desert the post +of duty. Others may bring that grey head with sorrow +to the bed of sickness (here Mrs. Bute, waving her +hand, pointed to one of old Miss Crawley’s coffee-coloured +fronts, which was perched on a stand in the dressing-room), +but I will never quit it. Ah, Mr. Clump! I fear, I +know, that the couch needs spiritual as well as medical +consolation.”</p> + +<p>“What I was going to observe, my dear Madam,"--here +the resolute Clump once more interposed with a bland +air--"what I was going to observe when you gave utterance +to sentiments which do you so much honour, was that +I think you alarm yourself needlessly about our kind +friend, and sacrifice your own health too prodigally +in her favour.”</p> + +<p>“I would lay down my life for my duty, or for +any member of my husband’s family,” Mrs. +Bute interposed.</p> + +<p>“Yes, Madam, if need were; but we don’t +want Mrs Bute Crawley to be a martyr,” Clump +said gallantly. “Dr Squills and myself have +both considered Miss Crawley’s case with every +anxiety and care, as you may suppose. We see her +low-spirited and nervous; family events have agitated +her.”</p> + +<p>“Her nephew will come to perdition,” Mrs. +Crawley cried.</p> + +<p>“Have agitated her: and you arrived like a guardian +angel, my dear Madam, a positive guardian angel, I +assure you, to soothe her under the pressure of calamity. +But Dr. Squills and I were thinking that our amiable +friend is not in such a state as renders confinement +to her bed necessary. She is depressed, but this +confinement perhaps adds to her depression. She should +have change, fresh air, gaiety; the most delightful +remedies in the pharmacopoeia,” Mr. Clump said, +grinning and showing his handsome teeth. “Persuade +her to rise, dear Madam; drag her from her couch and +her low spirits; insist upon her taking little drives. + They will restore the roses too to your cheeks, if +I may so speak to Mrs. Bute Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“The sight of her horrid nephew casually in +the Park, where I am told the wretch drives with the +brazen partner of his crimes,” Mrs. Bute said +(letting the cat of selfishness out of the bag of +secrecy), “would cause her such a shock, that +we should have to bring her back to bed again. She +must not go out, Mr. Clump. She shall not go out +as long as I remain to watch over her; And as for +my health, what matters it? I give it cheerfully, +sir. I sacrifice it at the altar of my duty.”</p> + +<p>“Upon my word, Madam,” Mr. Clump now said +bluntly, “I won’t answer for her life +if she remains locked up in that dark room. She is +so nervous that we may lose her any day; and if you +wish Captain Crawley to be her heir, I warn you frankly, +Madam, that you are doing your very best to serve +him.”</p> + +<p>“Gracious mercy! is her life in danger?” +Mrs. Bute cried. “Why, why, Mr. Clump, did +you not inform me sooner?”</p> + +<p>The night before, Mr. Clump and Dr. Squills had had +a consultation (over a bottle of wine at the house +of Sir Lapin Warren, whose lady was about to present +him with a thirteenth blessing), regarding Miss Crawley +and her case.</p> + +<p>“What a little harpy that woman from Hampshire +is, Clump,” Squills remarked, “that has +seized upon old Tilly Crawley. Devilish good Madeira.”</p> + +<p>“What a fool Rawdon Crawley has been,” +Clump replied, “to go and marry a governess! + There was something about the girl, too.”</p> + +<p>“Green eyes, fair skin, pretty figure, famous +frontal development,” Squills remarked. “There +is something about her; and Crawley was a fool, Squills.”</p> + +<p>“A d--- fool--always was,” the apothecary +replied.</p> + +<p>“Of course the old girl will fling him over,” +said the physician, and after a pause added, “She’ll +cut up well, I suppose.”</p> + +<p>“Cut up,” says Clump with a grin; “I +wouldn’t have her cut up for two hundred a year.”</p> + +<p>“That Hampshire woman will kill her in two months, +Clump, my boy, if she stops about her,” Dr. +Squills said. “Old woman; full feeder; nervous +subject; palpitation of the heart; pressure on the +brain; apoplexy; off she goes. Get her up, Clump; +get her out: or I wouldn’t give many weeks’ +purchase for your two hundred a year.” And it +was acting upon this hint that the worthy apothecary +spoke with so much candour to Mrs. Bute Crawley.</p> + +<p>Having the old lady under her hand: in bed: with nobody +near, Mrs. Bute had made more than one assault upon +her, to induce her to alter her will. But Miss Crawley’s +usual terrors regarding death increased greatly when +such dismal propositions were made to her, and Mrs. +Bute saw that she must get her patient into cheerful +spirits and health before she could hope to attain +the pious object which she had in view. Whither to +take her was the next puzzle. The only place where +she is not likely to meet those odious Rawdons is +at church, and that won’t amuse her, Mrs. Bute +justly felt. “We must go and visit our beautiful +suburbs of London,” she then thought. “I +hear they are the most picturesque in the world”; +and so she had a sudden interest for Hampstead, and +Hornsey, and found that Dulwich had great charms for +her, and getting her victim into her carriage, drove +her to those rustic spots, beguiling the little journeys +with conversations about Rawdon and his wife, and telling +every story to the old lady which could add to her +indignation against this pair of reprobates.</p> + +<p>Perhaps Mrs. Bute pulled the string unnecessarily +tight. For though she worked up Miss Crawley to a +proper dislike of her disobedient nephew, the invalid +had a great hatred and secret terror of her victimizer, +and panted to escape from her. After a brief space, +she rebelled against Highgate and Hornsey utterly. + She would go into the Park. Mrs. Bute knew they +would meet the abominable Rawdon there, and she was +right. One day in the ring, Rawdon’s stanhope +came in sight; Rebecca was seated by him. In the enemy’s +equipage Miss Crawley occupied her usual place, with +Mrs. Bute on her left, the poodle and Miss Briggs +on the back seat. It was a nervous moment, and Rebecca’s +heart beat quick as she recognized the carriage; and +as the two vehicles crossed each other in a line, she +clasped her hands, and looked towards the spinster +with a face of agonized attachment and devotion. Rawdon +himself trembled, and his face grew purple behind +his dyed mustachios. Only old Briggs was moved in +the other carriage, and cast her great eyes nervously +towards her old friends. Miss Crawley’s bonnet +was resolutely turned towards the Serpentine. Mrs. +Bute happened to be in ecstasies with the poodle, +and was calling him a little darling, and a sweet +little zoggy, and a pretty pet. The carriages moved +on, each in his line.</p> + +<p>“Done, by Jove,” Rawdon said to his wife.</p> + +<p>“Try once more, Rawdon,” Rebecca answered. + “Could not you lock your wheels into theirs, +dearest?”</p> + +<p>Rawdon had not the heart for that manoeuvre. When +the carriages met again, he stood up in his stanhope; +he raised his hand ready to doff his hat; he looked +with all his eyes. But this time Miss Crawley’s +face was not turned away; she and Mrs. Bute looked +him full in the face, and cut their nephew pitilessly. + He sank back in his seat with an oath, and striking +out of the ring, dashed away desperately homewards.</p> + +<p>It was a gallant and decided triumph for Mrs. Bute. +But she felt the danger of many such meetings, as +she saw the evident nervousness of Miss Crawley; and +she determined that it was most necessary for her +dear friend’s health, that they should leave +town for a while, and recommended Brighton very strongly.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Captain Dobbin Acts as the Messenger of Hymen</h4> + +<p>Without knowing how, Captain William Dobbin found +himself the great promoter, arranger, and manager +of the match between George Osborne and Amelia. But +for him it never would have taken place: he could +not but confess as much to himself, and smiled rather +bitterly as he thought that he of all men in the world +should be the person upon whom the care of this marriage +had fallen. But though indeed the conducting of this +negotiation was about as painful a task as could be +set to him, yet when he had a duty to perform, Captain +Dobbin was accustomed to go through it without many +words or much hesitation: and, having made up his +mind completely, that if Miss Sedley was balked of +her husband she would die of the disappointment, he +was determined to use all his best endeavours to keep +her alive.</p> + +<p>I forbear to enter into minute particulars of the +interview between George and Amelia, when the former +was brought back to the feet (or should we venture +to say the arms?) of his young mistress by the intervention +of his friend honest William. A much harder heart +than George’s would have melted at the sight +of that sweet face so sadly ravaged by grief and +despair, and at the simple tender accents in which +she told her little broken-hearted story: but as she +did not faint when her mother, trembling, brought +Osborne to her; and as she only gave relief to her +overcharged grief, by laying her head on her lover’s +shoulder and there weeping for a while the most tender, +copious, and refreshing tears--old Mrs. Sedley, too +greatly relieved, thought it was best to leave the +young persons to themselves; and so quitted Emmy crying +over George’s hand, and kissing it humbly, as +if he were her supreme chief and master, and as if +she were quite a guilty and unworthy person needing +every favour and grace from him.</p> + +<p>This prostration and sweet unrepining obedience exquisitely +touched and flattered George Osborne. He saw a slave +before him in that simple yielding faithful creature, +and his soul within him thrilled secretly somehow +at the knowledge of his power. He would be generous-minded, +Sultan as he was, and raise up this kneeling Esther +and make a queen of her: besides, her sadness and +beauty touched him as much as her submission, and +so he cheered her, and raised her up and forgave her, +so to speak. All her hopes and feelings, which were +dying and withering, this her sun having been removed +from her, bloomed again and at once, its light being +restored. You would scarcely have recognised the beaming +little face upon Amelia’s pillow that night +as the one that was laid there the night before, so +wan, so lifeless, so careless of all round about. +The honest Irish maid-servant, delighted with the +change, asked leave to kiss the face that had grown +all of a sudden so rosy. Amelia put her arms round +the girl’s neck and kissed her with all her heart, +like a child. She was little more. She had that +night a sweet refreshing sleep, like one--and what +a spring of inexpressible happiness as she woke in +the morning sunshine!</p> + +<p>“He will be here again to-day,” Amelia +thought. “He is the greatest and best of men.” + And the fact is, that George thought he was one of +the generousest creatures alive: and that he was making +a tremendous sacrifice in marrying this young creature.</p> + +<p>While she and Osborne were having their delightful +tete-a-tete above stairs, old Mrs. Sedley and Captain +Dobbin were conversing below upon the state of the +affairs, and the chances and future arrangements of +the young people. Mrs. Sedley having brought the +two lovers together and left them embracing each other +with all their might, like a true woman, was of opinion +that no power on earth would induce Mr. Sedley to +consent to the match between his daughter and the +son of a man who had so shamefully, wickedly, and +monstrously treated him. And she told a long story +about happier days and their earlier splendours, when +Osborne lived in a very humble way in the New Road, +and his wife was too glad to receive some of Jos’s +little baby things, with which Mrs. Sedley accommodated +her at the birth of one of Osborne’s own children. + The fiendish ingratitude of that man, she was sure, +had broken Mr. S.’s heart: and as for a marriage, +he would never, never, never, never consent.</p> + +<p>“They must run away together, Ma’am,” +Dobbin said, laughing, “and follow the example +of Captain Rawdon Crawley, and Miss Emmy’s friend +the little governess.” Was it possible? Well +she never! Mrs. Sedley was all excitement about this +news. She wished that Blenkinsop were here to hear +it: Blenkinsop always mistrusted that Miss Sharp.-- +What an escape Jos had had! and she described the already +well-known love-passages between Rebecca and the Collector +of Boggley Wollah.</p> + +<p>It was not, however, Mr. Sedley’s wrath which +Dobbin feared, so much as that of the other parent +concerned, and he owned that he had a very considerable +doubt and anxiety respecting the behaviour of the +black-browed old tyrant of a Russia merchant in Russell +Square. He has forbidden the match peremptorily, +Dobbin thought. He knew what a savage determined man +Osborne was, and how he stuck by his word. “The +only chance George has of reconcilement,” argued +his friend, “is by distinguishing himself in +the coming campaign. If he dies they both go together. + If he fails in distinction--what then? He has some +money from his mother, I have heard enough to purchase +his majority--or he must sell out and go and dig in +Canada, or rough it in a cottage in the country.” +With such a partner Dobbin thought he would not mind +Siberia--and, strange to say, this absurd and utterly +imprudent young fellow never for a moment considered +that the want of means to keep a nice carriage and +horses, and of an income which should enable its possessors +to entertain their friends genteelly, ought to operate +as bars to the union of George and Miss Sedley.</p> + +<p>It was these weighty considerations which made him +think too that the marriage should take place as quickly +as possible. Was he anxious himself, I wonder, to +have it over?--as people, when death has occurred, +like to press forward the funeral, or when a parting +is resolved upon, hasten it. It is certain that Mr. +Dobbin, having taken the matter in hand, was most +extraordinarily eager in the conduct of it. He urged +on George the necessity of immediate action: he showed +the chances of reconciliation with his father, which +a favourable mention of his name in the Gazette must +bring about. If need were he would go himself and +brave both the fathers in the business. At all events, +he besought George to go through with it before the +orders came, which everybody expected, for the departure +of the regiment from England on foreign service.</p> + +<p>Bent upon these hymeneal projects, and with the applause +and consent of Mrs. Sedley, who did not care to break +the matter personally to her husband, Mr. Dobbin went +to seek John Sedley at his house of call in the City, +the Tapioca Coffee-house, where, since his own offices +were shut up, and fate had overtaken him, the poor +broken-down old gentleman used to betake himself +daily, and write letters and receive them, and tie +them up into mysterious bundles, several of which +he carried in the flaps of his coat. I don’t +know anything more dismal than that business and bustle +and mystery of a ruined man: those letters from the +wealthy which he shows you: those worn greasy documents +promising support and offering condolence which he +places wistfully before you, and on which he builds +his hopes of restoration and future fortune. My beloved +reader has no doubt in the course of his experience +been waylaid by many such a luckless companion. He +takes you into the corner; he has his bundle of papers +out of his gaping coat pocket; and the tape off, and +the string in his mouth, and the favourite letters +selected and laid before you; and who does not know +the sad eager half-crazy look which he fixes on you +with his hopeless eyes?</p> + +<p>Changed into a man of this sort, Dobbin found the +once florid, jovial, and prosperous John Sedley. +His coat, that used to be so glossy and trim, was +white at the seams, and the buttons showed the copper. + His face had fallen in, and was unshorn; his frill +and neckcloth hung limp under his bagging waistcoat. + When he used to treat the boys in old days at a coffee-house, +he would shout and laugh louder than anybody there, +and have all the waiters skipping round him; it was +quite painful to see how humble and civil he was to +John of the Tapioca, a blear-eyed old attendant in +dingy stockings and cracked pumps, whose business +it was to serve glasses of wafers, and bumpers of +ink in pewter, and slices of paper to the frequenters +of this dreary house of entertainment, where nothing +else seemed to be consumed. As for William Dobbin, +whom he had tipped repeatedly in his youth, and who +had been the old gentleman’s butt on a thousand +occasions, old Sedley gave his hand to him in a very +hesitating humble manner now, and called him “Sir.” +A feeling of shame and remorse took possession of +William Dobbin as the broken old man so received and +addressed him, as if he himself had been somehow guilty +of the misfortunes which had brought Sedley so low.</p> + +<p>“I am very glad to see you, Captain Dobbin, +sir,” says he, after a skulking look or two +at his visitor (whose lanky figure and military appearance +caused some excitement likewise to twinkle in the blear +eyes of the waiter in the cracked dancing pumps, and +awakened the old lady in black, who dozed among the +mouldy old coffee-cups in the bar). “How is +the worthy alderman, and my lady, your excellent mother, +sir?” He looked round at the waiter as he said, +“My lady,” as much as to say, “Hark +ye, John, I have friends still, and persons of rank +and reputation, too.” “Are you come to +do anything in my way, sir? My young friends Dale +and Spiggot do all my business for me now, until my +new offices are ready; for I’m only here temporarily, +you know, Captain. What can we do for you. sir? Will +you like to take anything?”</p> + +<p>Dobbin, with a great deal of hesitation and stuttering, +protested that he was not in the least hungry or thirsty; +that he had no business to transact; that he only +came to ask if Mr. Sedley was well, and to shake hands +with an old friend; and, he added, with a desperate +perversion of truth, “My mother is very well--that +is, she’s been very unwell, and is only waiting +for the first fine day to go out and call upon Mrs. +Sedley. How is Mrs. Sedley, sir? I hope she’s +quite well.” And here he paused, reflecting +on his own consummate hypocrisy; for the day was as +fine, and the sunshine as bright as it ever is in +Coffin Court, where the Tapioca Coffee-house is situated: +and Mr. Dobbin remembered that he had seen Mrs. Sedley +himself only an hour before, having driven Osborne +down to Fulham in his gig, and left him there tete-a-tete +with Miss Amelia.</p> + +<p>“My wife will be very happy to see her ladyship,” +Sedley replied, pulling out his papers. “I’ve +a very kind letter here from your father, sir, and +beg my respectful compliments to him. Lady D. will +find us in rather a smaller house than we were accustomed +to receive our friends in; but it’s snug, and +the change of air does good to my daughter, who was +suffering in town rather--you remember little Emmy, +sir?--yes, suffering a good deal.” The old gentleman’s +eyes were wandering as he spoke, and he was thinking +of something else, as he sate thrumming on his papers +and fumbling at the worn red tape.</p> + +<p>“You’re a military man,” he went +on; “I ask you, Bill Dobbin, could any man ever +have speculated upon the return of that Corsican scoundrel +from Elba? When the allied sovereigns were here last +year, and we gave ’em that dinner in the City, +sir, and we saw the Temple of Concord, and the fireworks, +and the Chinese bridge in St. James’s Park, +could any sensible man suppose that peace wasn’t +really concluded, after we’d actually sung Te +Deum for it, sir? I ask you, William, could I suppose +that the Emperor of Austria was a damned traitor--a +traitor, and nothing more? I don’t mince words--a +double-faced infernal traitor and schemer, who meant +to have his son-in-law back all along. And I say +that the escape of Boney from Elba was a damned imposition +and plot, sir, in which half the powers of Europe +were concerned, to bring the funds down, and to ruin +this country. That’s why I’m here, William. + That’s why my name’s in the Gazette. + Why, sir?--because I trusted the Emperor of Russia +and the Prince Regent. Look here. Look at my papers. + Look what the funds were on the 1st of March--what +the French fives were when I bought for the count. + And what they’re at now. There was collusion, +sir, or that villain never would have escaped. Where +was the English Commissioner who allowed him to get +away? He ought to be shot, sir--brought to a court-martial, +and shot, by Jove.”</p> + +<p>“We’re going to hunt Boney out, sir,” +Dobbin said, rather alarmed at the fury of the old +man, the veins of whose forehead began to swell, and +who sate drumming his papers with his clenched fist. + “We are going to hunt him out, sir--the Duke’s +in Belgium already, and we expect marching orders +every day.”</p> + +<p>“Give him no quarter. Bring back the villain’s +head, sir. Shoot the coward down, sir,” Sedley +roared. “I’d enlist myself, by--; but +I’m a broken old man--ruined by that damned +scoundrel--and by a parcel of swindling thieves in +this country whom I made, sir, and who are rolling +in their carriages now,” he added, with a break +in his voice.</p> + +<p>Dobbin was not a little affected by the sight of this +once kind old friend, crazed almost with misfortune +and raving with senile anger. Pity the fallen gentleman: +you to whom money and fair repute are the chiefest +good; and so, surely, are they in Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>“Yes,” he continued, “there are +some vipers that you warm, and they sting you afterwards. + There are some beggars that you put on horseback, +and they’re the first to ride you down. You +know whom I mean, William Dobbin, my boy. I mean +a purse-proud villain in Russell Square, whom I knew +without a shilling, and whom I pray and hope to see +a beggar as he was when I befriended him.”</p> + +<p>“I have heard something of this, sir, from my +friend George,” Dobbin said, anxious to come +to his point. “The quarrel between you and +his father has cut him up a great deal, sir. Indeed, +I’m the bearer of a message from him.”</p> + +<p>“O, <i>that’s</i> your errand, is it?” +cried the old man, jumping up. “What! perhaps +he condoles with me, does he? Very kind of him, the +stiff-backed prig, with his dandified airs and West +End swagger. He’s hankering about my house, +is he still? If my son had the courage of a man, +he’d shoot him. He’s as big a villain +as his father. I won’t have his name mentioned +in my house. I curse the day that ever I let him +into it; and I’d rather see my daughter dead +at my feet than married to him.”</p> + +<p>“His father’s harshness is not George’s +fault, sir. Your daughter’s love for him is +as much your doing as his. Who are you, that you +are to play with two young people’s affections +and break their hearts at your will?”</p> + +<p>“Recollect it’s not his father that breaks +the match off,” old Sedley cried out. “It’s +I that forbid it. That family and mine are separated +for ever. I’m fallen low, but not so low as +that: no, no. And so you may tell the whole race--son, +and father and sisters, and all.”</p> + +<p>“It’s my belief, sir, that you have not +the power or the right to separate those two,” +Dobbin answered in a low voice; “and that if +you don’t give your daughter your consent it +will be her duty to marry without it. There’s +no reason she should die or live miserably because +you are wrong-headed. To my thinking, she’s +just as much married as if the banns had been read +in all the churches in London. And what better answer +can there be to Osborne’s charges against you, +as charges there are, than that his son claims to enter +your family and marry your daughter?”</p> + +<p>A light of something like satisfaction seemed to break +over old Sedley as this point was put to him: but +he still persisted that with his consent the marriage +between Amelia and George should never take place.</p> + +<p>“We must do it without,” Dobbin said, +smiling, and told Mr. Sedley, as he had told Mrs. +Sedley in the day, before, the story of Rebecca’s +elopement with Captain Crawley. It evidently amused +the old gentleman. “You’re terrible fellows, +you Captains,” said he, tying up his papers; +and his face wore something like a smile upon it, +to the astonishment of the blear-eyed waiter who now +entered, and had never seen such an expression upon +Sedley’s countenance since he had used the dismal +coffee-house.</p> + +<p>The idea of hitting his enemy Osborne such a blow +soothed, perhaps, the old gentleman: and, their colloquy +presently ending, he and Dobbin parted pretty good +friends.</p> + +<p>“My sisters say she has diamonds as big as pigeons’ +eggs,” George said, laughing. “How they +must set off her complexion! A perfect illumination +it must be when her jewels are on her neck. Her jet-black +hair is as curly as Sambo’s. I dare say she +wore a nose ring when she went to court; and with +a plume of feathers in her top-knot she would look +a perfect Belle Sauvage.”</p> + +<p>George, in conversation with Amelia, was rallying +the appearance of a young lady of whom his father +and sisters had lately made the acquaintance, and +who was an object of vast respect to the Russell Square +family. She was reported to have I don’t know +how many plantations in the West Indies; a deal of +money in the funds; and three stars to her name in +the East India stockholders’ list. She had +a mansion in Surrey, and a house in Portland Place. +The name of the rich West India heiress had been mentioned +with applause in the Morning Post. Mrs. Haggistoun, +Colonel Haggistoun’s widow, her relative, “chaperoned” +her, and kept her house. She was just from school, +where she had completed her education, and George and +his sisters had met her at an evening party at old +Hulker’s house, Devonshire Place (Hulker, Bullock, +and Co. were long the correspondents of her house +in the West Indies), and the girls had made the most +cordial advances to her, which the heiress had received +with great good humour. An orphan in her position--with +her money--so interesting! the Misses Osborne said. + They were full of their new friend when they returned +from the Hulker ball to Miss Wirt, their companion; +they had made arrangements for continually meeting, +and had the carriage and drove to see her the very +next day. Mrs. Haggistoun, Colonel Haggistoun’s +widow, a relation of Lord Binkie, and always talking +of him, struck the dear unsophisticated girls as rather +haughty, and too much inclined to talk about her great +relations: but Rhoda was everything they could wish--the +frankest, kindest, most agreeable creature--wanting +a little polish, but so good-natured. The girls Christian-named +each other at once.</p> + +<p>“You should have seen her dress for court, Emmy,” +Osborne cried, laughing. “She came to my sisters +to show it off, before she was presented in state +by my Lady Binkie, the Haggistoun’s kinswoman. +She’s related to every one, that Haggistoun. + Her diamonds blazed out like Vauxhall on the night +we were there. (Do you remember Vauxhall, Emmy, and +Jos singing to his dearest diddle diddle darling?) + Diamonds and mahogany, my dear! think what an advantageous +contrast--and the white feathers in her hair--I mean +in her wool. She had earrings like chandeliers; you +might have lighted ’em up, by Jove--and a yellow +satin train that streeled after her like the tail +of a cornet.”</p> + +<p>“How old is she?” asked Emmy, to whom +George was rattling away regarding this dark paragon, +on the morning of their reunion-- rattling away as +no other man in the world surely could.</p> + +<p>“Why the Black Princess, though she has only +just left school, must be two or three and twenty. + And you should see the hand she writes! Mrs. Colonel +Haggistoun usually writes her letters, but in a moment +of confidence, she put pen to paper for my sisters; +she spelt satin satting, and Saint James’s, +Saint Jams.”</p> + +<p>“Why, surely it must be Miss Swartz, the parlour +boarder,” Emmy said, remembering that good-natured +young mulatto girl, who had been so hysterically affected +when Amelia left Miss Pinkerton’s academy.</p> + +<p>“The very name,” George said. “Her +father was a German Jew--a slave-owner they say--connected +with the Cannibal Islands in some way or other. He +died last year, and Miss Pinkerton has finished her +education. She can play two pieces on the piano; she +knows three songs; she can write when Mrs. Haggistoun +is by to spell for her; and Jane and Maria already +have got to love her as a sister.”</p> + +<p>“I wish they would have loved me,” said +Emmy, wistfully. “They were always very cold +to me.”</p> + +<p>“My dear child, they would have loved you if +you had had two hundred thousand pounds,” George +replied. “That is the way in which they have +been brought up. Ours is a ready-money society. We +live among bankers and City big-wigs, and be hanged +to them, and every man, as he talks to you, is jingling +his guineas in his pocket. There is that jackass +Fred Bullock is going to marry Maria--there’s +Goldmore, the East India Director, there’s Dipley, +in the tallow trade--<i>our</i> trade,” George +said, with an uneasy laugh and a blush. “Curse +the whole pack of money-grubbing vulgarians! I fall +asleep at their great heavy dinners. I feel ashamed +in my father’s great stupid parties. I’ve +been accustomed to live with gentlemen, and men of +the world and fashion, Emmy, not with a parcel of turtle-fed +tradesmen. Dear little woman, you are the only person +of our set who ever looked, or thought, or spoke like +a lady: and you do it because you’re an angel +and can’t help it. Don’t remonstrate. + You are the only lady. Didn’t Miss Crawley +remark it, who has lived in the best company in Europe? + And as for Crawley, of the Life Guards, hang it, +he’s a fine fellow: and I like him for marrying +the girl he had chosen.”</p> + +<p>Amelia admired Mr. Crawley very much, too, for this; +and trusted Rebecca would be happy with him, and hoped +(with a laugh) Jos would be consoled. And so the +pair went on prattling, as in quite early days. Amelia’s +confidence being perfectly restored to her, though +she expressed a great deal of pretty jealousy about +Miss Swartz, and professed to be dreadfully frightened--like +a hypocrite as she was-- lest George should forget +her for the heiress and her money and her estates +in Saint Kitt’s. But the fact is, she was a +great deal too happy to have fears or doubts or misgivings +of any sort: and having George at her side again, +was not afraid of any heiress or beauty, or indeed +of any sort of danger.</p> + +<p>When Captain Dobbin came back in the afternoon to +these people-- which he did with a great deal of sympathy +for them--it did his heart good to see how Amelia +had grown young again--how she laughed, and chirped, +and sang familiar old songs at the piano, which were +only interrupted by the bell from without proclaiming +Mr. Sedley’s return from the City, before whom +George received a signal to retreat.</p> + +<p>Beyond the first smile of recognition--and even that +was an hypocrisy, for she thought his arrival rather +provoking--Miss Sedley did not once notice Dobbin +during his visit. But he was content, so that he +saw her happy; and thankful to have been the means +of making her so.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Quarrel About an Heiress</h4> + +<p>Love may be felt for any young lady endowed with such +qualities as Miss Swartz possessed; and a great dream +of ambition entered into old Mr. Osborne’s soul, +which she was to realize. He encouraged, with the +utmost enthusiasm and friendliness, his daughters’ +amiable attachment to the young heiress, and protested +that it gave him the sincerest pleasure as a father +to see the love of his girls so well disposed.</p> + +<p>“You won’t find,” he would say to +Miss Rhoda, “that splendour and rank to which +you are accustomed at the West End, my dear Miss, at +our humble mansion in Russell Square. My daughters +are plain, disinterested girls, but their hearts are +in the right place, and they’ve conceived an +attachment for you which does them honour--I say, +which does them honour. I’m a plain, simple, +humble British merchant--an honest one, as my respected +friends Hulker and Bullock will vouch, who were the +correspondents of your late lamented father. You’ll +find us a united, simple, happy, and I think I may +say respected, family--a plain table, a plain people, +but a warm welcome, my dear Miss Rhoda--Rhoda, let +me say, for my heart warms to you, it does really. + I’m a frank man, and I like you. A glass of +Champagne! Hicks, Champagne to Miss Swartz.”</p> + +<p>There is little doubt that old Osborne believed all +he said, and that the girls were quite earnest in +their protestations of affection for Miss Swartz. + People in Vanity Fair fasten on to rich folks quite +naturally. If the simplest people are disposed to +look not a little kindly on great Prosperity (for +I defy any member of the British public to say that +the notion of Wealth has not something awful and pleasing +to him; and you, if you are told that the man next +you at dinner has got half a million, not to look at +him with a certain interest)--if the simple look benevolently +on money, how much more do your old worldlings regard +it! Their affections rush out to meet and welcome +money. Their kind sentiments awaken spontaneously +towards the interesting possessors of it. I know +some respectable people who don’t consider themselves +at liberty to indulge in friendship for any individual +who has not a certain competency, or place in society. + They give a loose to their feelings on proper occasions. + And the proof is, that the major part of the Osborne +family, who had not, in fifteen years, been able to +get up a hearty regard for Amelia Sedley, became as +fond of Miss Swartz in the course of a single evening +as the most romantic advocate of friendship at first +sight could desire.</p> + +<p>What a match for George she’d be (the sisters +and Miss Wirt agreed), and how much better than that +insignificant little Amelia! Such a dashing young +fellow as he is, with his good looks, rank, and accomplishments, +would be the very husband for her. Visions of balls +in Portland Place, presentations at Court, and introductions +to half the peerage, filled the minds of the young +ladies; who talked of nothing but George and his grand +acquaintances to their beloved new friend.</p> + +<p>Old Osborne thought she would be a great match, too, +for his son. He should leave the army; he should go +into Parliament; he should cut a figure in the fashion +and in the state. His blood boiled with honest British +exultation, as he saw the name of Osborne ennobled +in the person of his son, and thought that he might +be the progenitor of a glorious line of baronets. + He worked in the City and on ’Change, until +he knew everything relating to the fortune of the +heiress, how her money was placed, and where her estates +lay. Young Fred Bullock, one of his chief informants, +would have liked to make a bid for her himself (it +was so the young banker expressed it), only he was +booked to Maria Osborne. But not being able to secure +her as a wife, the disinterested Fred quite approved +of her as a sister-in-law. “Let George cut +in directly and win her,” was his advice. “Strike +while the iron’s hot, you know--while she’s +fresh to the town: in a few weeks some d--- fellow +from the West End will come in with a title and a +rotten rent-roll and cut all us City men out, as Lord +Fitzrufus did last year with Miss Grogram, who was +actually engaged to Podder, of Podder & Brown’s. + The sooner it is done the better, Mr. Osborne; them’s +my sentiments,” the wag said; though, when Osborne +had left the bank parlour, Mr. Bullock remembered +Amelia, and what a pretty girl she was, and how attached +to George Osborne; and he gave up at least ten seconds +of his valuable time to regretting the misfortune +which had befallen that unlucky young woman.</p> + +<p>While thus George Osborne’s good feelings, and +his good friend and genius, Dobbin, were carrying +back the truant to Amelia’s feet, George’s +parent and sisters were arranging this splendid match +for him, which they never dreamed he would resist.</p> + +<p>When the elder Osborne gave what he called “a +hint,” there was no possibility for the most +obtuse to mistake his meaning. He called kicking +a footman downstairs a hint to the latter to leave +his service. With his usual frankness and delicacy +he told Mrs. Haggistoun that he would give her a cheque +for five thousand pounds on the day his son was married +to her ward; and called that proposal a hint, and +considered it a very dexterous piece of diplomacy. + He gave George finally such another hint regarding +the heiress; and ordered him to marry her out of hand, +as he would have ordered his butler to draw a cork, +or his clerk to write a letter.</p> + +<p>This imperative hint disturbed George a good deal. + He was in the very first enthusiasm and delight of +his second courtship of Amelia, which was inexpressibly +sweet to him. The contrast of her manners and appearance +with those of the heiress, made the idea of a union +with the latter appear doubly ludicrous and odious. + Carriages and opera-boxes, thought he; fancy being +seen in them by the side of such a mahogany charmer +as that! Add to all that the junior Osborne was quite +as obstinate as the senior: when he wanted a thing, +quite as firm in his resolution to get it; and quite +as violent when angered, as his father in his most +stern moments.</p> + +<p>On the first day when his father formally gave him +the hint that he was to place his affections at Miss +Swartz’s feet, George temporised with the old +gentleman. “You should have thought of the matter +sooner, sir,” he said. “It can’t +be done now, when we’re expecting every day +to go on foreign service. Wait till my return, if +I do return”; and then he represented, that +the time when the regiment was daily expecting to +quit England, was exceedingly ill-chosen: that the +few days or weeks during which they were still to remain +at home, must be devoted to business and not to love-making: +time enough for that when he came home with his majority; +“for, I promise you,” said he, with a +satisfied air, “that one way or other you shall +read the name of George Osborne in the Gazette.”</p> + +<p>The father’s reply to this was founded upon +the information which he had got in the City: that +the West End chaps would infallibly catch hold of +the heiress if any delay took place: that if he didn’t +marry Miss S., he might at least have an engagement +in writing, to come into effect when he returned to +England; and that a man who could get ten thousand +a year by staying at home, was a fool to risk his +life abroad.</p> + +<p>“So that you would have me shown up as a coward, +sir, and our name dishonoured for the sake of Miss +Swartz’s money,” George interposed.</p> + +<p>This remark staggered the old gentleman; but as he +had to reply to it, and as his mind was nevertheless +made up, he said, “You will dine here to-morrow, +sir, and every day Miss Swartz comes, you will be +here to pay your respects to her. If you want for +money, call upon Mr. Chopper.” Thus a new obstacle +was in George’s way, to interfere with his plans +regarding Amelia; and about which he and Dobbin had +more than one confidential consultation. His friend’s +opinion respecting the line of conduct which he ought +to pursue, we know already. And as for Osborne, when +he was once bent on a thing, a fresh obstacle or two +only rendered him the more resolute.</p> + +<p>The dark object of the conspiracy into which the chiefs +of the Osborne family had entered, was quite ignorant +of all their plans regarding her (which, strange to +say, her friend and chaperon did not divulge), and, +taking all the young ladies’ flattery for genuine +sentiment, and being, as we have before had occasion +to show, of a very warm and impetuous nature, responded +to their affection with quite a tropical ardour. +And if the truth may be told, I dare say that she +too had some selfish attraction in the Russell Square +house; and in a word, thought George Osborne a very +nice young man. His whiskers had made an impression +upon her, on the very first night she beheld them +at the ball at Messrs. Hulkers; and, as we know, she +was not the first woman who had been charmed by them. +George had an air at once swaggering and melancholy, +languid and fierce. He looked like a man who had +passions, secrets, and private harrowing griefs and +adventures. His voice was rich and deep. He would +say it was a warm evening, or ask his partner to take +an ice, with a tone as sad and confidential as if +he were breaking her mother’s death to her, +or preluding a declaration of love. He trampled over +all the young bucks of his father’s circle, and +was the hero among those third-rate men. Some few +sneered at him and hated him. Some, like Dobbin, fanatically +admired him. And his whiskers had begun to do their +work, and to curl themselves round the affections +of Miss Swartz.</p> + +<p>Whenever there was a chance of meeting him in Russell +Square, that simple and good-natured young woman was +quite in a flurry to see her dear Misses Osborne. + She went to great expenses in new gowns, and bracelets, +and bonnets, and in prodigious feathers. She adorned +her person with her utmost skill to please the Conqueror, +and exhibited all her simple accomplishments to win +his favour. The girls would ask her, with the greatest +gravity, for a little music, and she would sing her +three songs and play her two little pieces as often +as ever they asked, and with an always increasing pleasure +to herself. During these delectable entertainments, +Miss Wirt and the chaperon sate by, and conned over +the peerage, and talked about the nobility.</p> + +<p>The day after George had his hint from his father, +and a short time before the hour of dinner, he was +lolling upon a sofa in the drawing-room in a very +becoming and perfectly natural attitude of melancholy. + He had been, at his father’s request, to Mr. +Chopper in the City (the old-gentleman, though he +gave great sums to his son, would never specify any +fixed allowance for him, and rewarded him only as +he was in the humour). He had then been to pass three +hours with Amelia, his dear little Amelia, at Fulham; +and he came home to find his sisters spread in starched +muslin in the drawing-room, the dowagers cackling +in the background, and honest Swartz in her favourite +amber-coloured satin, with turquoise bracelets, countless +rings, flowers, feathers, and all sorts of tags and +gimcracks, about as elegantly decorated as a she chimney-sweep +on May-day.</p> + +<p>The girls, after vain attempts to engage him in conversation, +talked about fashions and the last drawing-room until +he was perfectly sick of their chatter. He contrasted +their behaviour with little Emmy’s--their shrill +voices with her tender ringing tones; their attitudes +and their elbows and their starch, with her humble +soft movements and modest graces. Poor Swartz was +seated in a place where Emmy had been accustomed to +sit. Her bejewelled hands lay sprawling in her amber +satin lap. Her tags and ear-rings twinkled, and her +big eyes rolled about. She was doing nothing with +perfect contentment, and thinking herself charming. + Anything so becoming as the satin the sisters had +never seen.</p> + +<p>“Dammy,” George said to a confidential +friend, “she looked like a China doll, which +has nothing to do all day but to grin and wag its +head. By Jove, Will, it was all I I could do to prevent +myself from throwing the sofa-cushion at her.” +He restrained that exhibition of sentiment, however.</p> + +<p>The sisters began to play the Battle of Prague. “Stop +that d--- thing,” George howled out in a fury +from the sofa. “It makes me mad. You play +us something, Miss Swartz, do. Sing something, anything +but the Battle of Prague.”</p> + +<p>“Shall I sing ‘Blue Eyed Mary’ or +the air from the Cabinet?” Miss Swartz asked.</p> + +<p>“That sweet thing from the Cabinet,” the +sisters said.</p> + +<p>“We’ve had that,” replied the misanthrope +on the sofa</p> + +<p>“I can sing ‘Fluvy du Tajy,’” +Swartz said, in a meek voice, “if I had the +words.” It was the last of the worthy young woman’s +collection.</p> + +<p>“O, ‘Fleuve du Tage,’” Miss +Maria cried; “we have the song,” and went +off to fetch the book in which it was.</p> + +<p>Now it happened that this song, then in the height +of the fashion, had been given to the young ladies +by a young friend of theirs, whose name was on the +title, and Miss Swartz, having concluded the ditty +with George’s applause (for he remembered that +it was a favourite of Amelia’s), was hoping +for an encore perhaps, and fiddling with the leaves +of the music, when her eye fell upon the title, and +she saw “Amelia Sedley” written in the +comer.</p> + +<p>“Lor!” cried Miss Swartz, spinning swiftly +round on the music-stool, “is it my Amelia? + Amelia that was at Miss P.’s at Hammersmith? + I know it is. It’s her. and--Tell me about +her--where is she?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t mention her,” Miss Maria +Osborne said hastily. “Her family has disgraced +itself. Her father cheated Papa, and as for her, she +is never to be mentioned <i>here</i>.” This was +Miss Maria’s return for George’s rudeness +about the Battle of Prague.</p> + +<p>“Are you a friend of Amelia’s?” +George said, bouncing up. “God bless you for +it, Miss Swartz. Don’t believe what the girls +say. <i>She’s</i> not to blame at any rate. She’s +the best--”</p> + +<p>“You know you’re not to speak about her, +George,” cried Jane. “Papa forbids it.”</p> + +<p>“Who’s to prevent me?” George cried +out. “I will speak of her. I say she’s +the best, the kindest, the gentlest, the sweetest girl +in England; and that, bankrupt or no, my sisters are +not fit to hold candles to her. If you like her, +go and see her, Miss Swartz; she wants friends now; +and I say, God bless everybody who befriends her. +Anybody who speaks kindly of her is my friend; anybody +who speaks against her is my enemy. Thank you, Miss +Swartz”; and he went up and wrung her hand.</p> + +<p>“George! George!” one of the sisters cried +imploringly.</p> + +<p>“I say,” George said fiercely, “I +thank everybody who loves Amelia Sed--” He stopped. + Old Osborne was in the room with a face livid with +rage, and eyes like hot coals.</p> + +<p>Though George had stopped in his sentence, yet, his +blood being up, he was not to be cowed by all the +generations of Osborne; rallying instantly, he replied +to the bullying look of his father, with another so +indicative of resolution and defiance that the elder +man quailed in his turn, and looked away. He felt +that the tussle was coming. “Mrs. Haggistoun, +let me take you down to dinner,” he said. “Give +your arm to Miss Swartz, George,” and they marched.</p> + +<p>“Miss Swartz, I love Amelia, and we’ve +been engaged almost all our lives,” Osborne +said to his partner; and during all the dinner, George +rattled on with a volubility which surprised himself, +and made his father doubly nervous for the fight which +was to take place as soon as the ladies were gone.</p> + +<p>The difference between the pair was, that while the +father was violent and a bully, the son had thrice +the nerve and courage of the parent, and could not +merely make an attack, but resist it; and finding +that the moment was now come when the contest between +him and his father was to be decided, he took his +dinner with perfect coolness and appetite before the +engagement began. Old Osborne, on the contrary, was +nervous, and drank much. He floundered in his conversation +with the ladies, his neighbours: George’s coolness +only rendering him more angry. It made him half mad +to see the calm way in which George, flapping his +napkin, and with a swaggering bow, opened the door +for the ladies to leave the room; and filling himself +a glass of wine, smacked it, and looked his father +full in the face, as if to say, “Gentlemen of +the Guard, fire first.” The old man also took +a supply of ammunition, but his decanter clinked against +the glass as he tried to fill it.</p> + +<p>After giving a great heave, and with a purple choking +face, he then began. “How dare you, sir, mention +that person’s name before Miss Swartz to-day, +in my drawing-room? I ask you, sir, how dare you do +it?”</p> + +<p>“Stop, sir,” says George, “don’t +say dare, sir. Dare isn’t a word to be used +to a Captain in the British Army.”</p> + +<p>“I shall say what I like to my son, sir. I +can cut him off with a shilling if I like. I can +make him a beggar if I like. I <i>will</i> say what +I like,” the elder said.</p> + +<p>“I’m a gentleman though I <i>am</i> your +son, sir,” George answered haughtily. “Any +communications which you have to make to me, or any +orders which you may please to give, I beg may be couched +in that kind of language which I am accustomed to +hear.”</p> + +<p>Whenever the lad assumed his haughty manner, it always +created either great awe or great irritation in the +parent. Old Osborne stood in secret terror of his +son as a better gentleman than himself; and perhaps +my readers may have remarked in their experience of +this Vanity Fair of ours, that there is no character +which a low-minded man so much mistrusts as that of +a gentleman.</p> + +<p>“My father didn’t give me the education +you have had, nor the advantages you have had, nor +the money you have had. If I had kept the company +<i>some folks</i> have had through <i>my means</i>, +perhaps my son wouldn’t have any reason to brag, +sir, of his <i>superiority</i> and <i>West end airs</i> (these words were uttered in the elder Osborne’s +most sarcastic tones). But it wasn’t considered +the part of a gentleman, in <i>my</i> time, for a man +to insult his father. If I’d done any such thing, +mine would have kicked me downstairs, sir.”</p> + +<p>“I never insulted you, sir. I said I begged +you to remember your son was a gentleman as well as +yourself. I know very well that you give me plenty +of money,” said George (fingering a bundle of +notes which he had got in the morning from Mr. Chopper). + “You tell it me often enough, sir. There’s +no fear of my forgetting it.”</p> + +<p>“I wish you’d remember other things as +well, sir,” the sire answered. “I wish +you’d remember that in this house--so long as +you choose to <i>honour</i> it with your <i>company</i>, +Captain--I’m the master, and that name, and +that that--that you--that I say--”</p> + +<p>“That what, sir?” George asked, with scarcely +a sneer, filling another glass of claret.</p> + +<p>“----!” burst out his father with a screaming +oath--"that the name of those Sedleys never be mentioned +here, sir--not one of the whole damned lot of ’em, +sir.”</p> + +<p>“It wasn’t I, sir, that introduced Miss +Sedley’s name. It was my sisters who spoke +ill of her to Miss Swartz; and by Jove I’ll defend +her wherever I go. Nobody shall speak lightly of that +name in my presence. Our family has done her quite +enough injury already, I think, and may leave off +reviling her now she’s down. I’ll shoot +any man but you who says a word against her.”</p> + +<p>“Go on, sir, go on,” the old gentleman +said, his eyes starting out of his head.</p> + +<p>“Go on about what, sir? about the way in which +we’ve treated that angel of a girl? Who told +me to love her? It was your doing. I might have +chosen elsewhere, and looked higher, perhaps, than +your society: but I obeyed you. And now that her +heart’s mine you give me orders to fling it +away, and punish her, kill her perhaps--for the faults +of other people. It’s a shame, by Heavens,” +said George, working himself up into passion and enthusiasm +as he proceeded, “to play at fast and loose +with a young girl’s affections--and with such +an angel as that--one so superior to the people amongst +whom she lived, that she might have excited envy, +only she was so good and gentle, that it’s a +wonder anybody dared to hate her. If I desert her, +sir, do you suppose she forgets me?”</p> + +<p>“I ain’t going to have any of this dam +sentimental nonsense and humbug here, sir,” +the father cried out. “There shall be no beggar-marriages +in my family. If you choose to fling away eight thousand +a year, which you may have for the asking, you may +do it: but by Jove you take your pack and walk out +of this house, sir. Will you do as I tell you, once +for all, sir, or will you not?”</p> + +<p>“Marry that mulatto woman?” George said, +pulling up his shirt-collars. “I don’t +like the colour, sir. Ask the black that sweeps opposite +Fleet Market, sir. I’m not going to marry a +Hottentot Venus.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Osborne pulled frantically at the cord by which +he was accustomed to summon the butler when he wanted +wine--and almost black in the face, ordered that functionary +to call a coach for Captain Osborne.</p> + +<p>“I’ve done it,” said George, coming +into the Slaughters’ an hour afterwards, looking +very pale.</p> + +<p>“What, my boy?” says Dobbin.</p> + +<p>George told what had passed between his father and +himself.</p> + +<p>“I’ll marry her to-morrow,” he said +with an oath. “I love her more every day, Dobbin.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Marriage and Part of a Honeymoon</h4> + +<p>Enemies the most obstinate and courageous can’t +hold out against starvation; so the elder Osborne +felt himself pretty easy about his adversary in the +encounter we have just described; and as soon as George’s +supplies fell short, confidently expected his unconditional +submission. It was unlucky, to be sure, that the lad +should have secured a stock of provisions on the very +day when the first encounter took place; but this +relief was only temporary, old Osborne thought, and +would but delay George’s surrender. No communication +passed between father and son for some days. The +former was sulky at this silence, but not disquieted; +for, as he said, he knew where he could put the screw +upon George, and only waited the result of that operation. + He told the sisters the upshot of the dispute between +them, but ordered them to take no notice of the matter, +and welcome George on his return as if nothing had +happened. His cover was laid as usual every day, and +perhaps the old gentleman rather anxiously expected +him; but he never came. Some one inquired at the Slaughters’ +regarding him, where it was said that he and his friend +Captain Dobbin had left town.</p> + +<p>One gusty, raw day at the end of April--the rain whipping +the pavement of that ancient street where the old +Slaughters’ Coffee-house was once situated--George +Osborne came into the coffee-room, looking very haggard +and pale; although dressed rather smartly in a blue +coat and brass buttons, and a neat buff waistcoat of +the fashion of those days. Here was his friend Captain +Dobbin, in blue and brass too, having abandoned the +military frock and French-grey trousers, which were +the usual coverings of his lanky person.</p> + +<p>Dobbin had been in the coffee-room for an hour or +more. He had tried all the papers, but could not +read them. He had looked at the clock many scores +of times; and at the street, where the rain was pattering +down, and the people as they clinked by in pattens, +left long reflections on the shining stone: he tattooed +at the table: he bit his nails most completely, and +nearly to the quick (he was accustomed to ornament +his great big hands in this way): he balanced the +tea-spoon dexterously on the milk jug: upset it, &c., +&c.; and in fact showed those signs of disquietude, +and practised those desperate attempts at amusement, +which men are accustomed to employ when very anxious, +and expectant, and perturbed in mind.</p> + +<p>Some of his comrades, gentlemen who used the room, +joked him about the splendour of his costume and his +agitation of manner. One asked him if he was going +to be married? Dobbin laughed, and said he would +send his acquaintance (Major Wagstaff of the Engineers) +a piece of cake when that event took place. At length +Captain Osborne made his appearance, very smartly +dressed, but very pale and agitated as we have said. + He wiped his pale face with a large yellow bandanna +pocket-handkerchief that was prodigiously scented. +He shook hands with Dobbin, looked at the clock, and +told John, the waiter, to bring him some curacao. + Of this cordial he swallowed off a couple of glasses +with nervous eagerness. His friend asked with some +interest about his health.</p> + +<p>“Couldn’t get a wink of sleep till daylight, +Dob,” said he. “Infernal headache and +fever. Got up at nine, and went down to the Hummums +for a bath. I say, Dob, I feel just as I did on the +morning I went out with Rocket at Quebec.”</p> + +<p>“So do I,” William responded. “I +was a deuced deal more nervous than you were that +morning. You made a famous breakfast, I remember. + Eat something now.”</p> + +<p>“You’re a good old fellow, Will. I’ll +drink your health, old boy, and farewell to--”</p> + +<p>“No, no; two glasses are enough,” Dobbin +interrupted him. “Here, take away the liqueurs, +John. Have some cayenne-pepper with your fowl. Make +haste though, for it is time we were there.”</p> + +<p>It was about half an hour from twelve when this brief +meeting and colloquy took place between the two captains. + A coach, into which Captain Osborne’s servant +put his master’s desk and dressing-case, had +been in waiting for some time; and into this the two +gentlemen hurried under an umbrella, and the valet +mounted on the box, cursing the rain and the dampness +of the coachman who was steaming beside him. “We +shall find a better trap than this at the church-door,” +says he; “that’s a comfort.” And +the carriage drove on, taking the road down Piccadilly, +where Apsley House and St. George’s Hospital +wore red jackets still; where there were oil-lamps; +where Achilles was not yet born; nor the Pimlico arch +raised; nor the hideous equestrian monster which pervades +it and the neighbourhood; and so they drove down by +Brompton to a certain chapel near the Fulham Road +there.</p> + +<p>A chariot was in waiting with four horses; likewise +a coach of the kind called glass coaches. Only a +very few idlers were collected on account of the dismal +rain.</p> + +<p>“Hang it!” said George, “I said +only a pair.”</p> + +<p>“My master would have four,” said Mr. +Joseph Sedley’s servant, who was in waiting; +and he and Mr. Osborne’s man agreed as they followed +George and William into the church, that it was a “reg’lar +shabby turn hout; and with scarce so much as a breakfast +or a wedding faviour.”</p> + +<p>“Here you are,” said our old friend, Jos +Sedley, coming forward. “You’re five minutes +late, George, my boy. What a day, eh? Demmy, it’s +like the commencement of the rainy season in Bengal. + But you’ll find my carriage is watertight. + Come along, my mother and Emmy are in the vestry.”</p> + +<p>Jos Sedley was splendid. He was fatter than ever. + His shirt collars were higher; his face was redder; +his shirt-frill flaunted gorgeously out of his variegated +waistcoat. Varnished boots were not invented as yet; +but the Hessians on his beautiful legs shone so, that +they must have been the identical pair in which the +gentleman in the old picture used to shave himself; +and on his light green coat there bloomed a fine wedding +favour, like a great white spreading magnolia.</p> + +<p>In a word, George had thrown the great cast. He was +going to be married. Hence his pallor and nervousness--his +sleepless night and agitation in the morning. I have +heard people who have gone through the same thing +own to the same emotion. After three or four ceremonies, +you get accustomed to it, no doubt; but the first dip, +everybody allows, is awful.</p> + +<p>The bride was dressed in a brown silk pelisse (as +Captain Dobbin has since informed me), and wore a +straw bonnet with a pink ribbon; over the bonnet she +had a veil of white Chantilly lace, a gift from Mr. +Joseph Sedley, her brother. Captain Dobbin himself +had asked leave to present her with a gold chain and +watch, which she sported on this occasion; and her +mother gave her her diamond brooch--almost the only +trinket which was left to the old lady. As the service +went on, Mrs. Sedley sat and whimpered a great deal +in a pew, consoled by the Irish maid-servant and Mrs. +Clapp from the lodgings. Old Sedley would not be present. + Jos acted for his father, giving away the bride, +whilst Captain Dobbin stepped up as groomsman to his +friend George.</p> + +<p>There was nobody in the church besides the officiating +persons and the small marriage party and their attendants. +The two valets sat aloof superciliously. The rain +came rattling down on the windows. In the intervals +of the service you heard it, and the sobbing of old +Mrs. Sedley in the pew. The parson’s tones echoed +sadly through the empty walls. Osborne’s “I +will” was sounded in very deep bass. Emmy’s +response came fluttering up to her lips from her heart, +but was scarcely heard by anybody except Captain Dobbin.</p> + +<p>When the service was completed, Jos Sedley came forward +and kissed his sister, the bride, for the first time +for many months--George’s look of gloom had +gone, and he seemed quite proud and radiant. “It’s +your turn, William,” says he, putting his hand +fondly upon Dobbin’s shoulder; and Dobbin went +up and touched Amelia on the cheek.</p> + +<p>Then they went into the vestry and signed the register. +“God bless you, Old Dobbin,” George said, +grasping him by the hand, with something very like +moisture glistening in his eyes. William replied +only by nodding his head. His heart was too full to +say much.</p> + +<p>“Write directly, and come down as soon as you +can, you know,” Osborne said. After Mrs. Sedley +had taken an hysterical adieu of her daughter, the +pair went off to the carriage. “Get out of the +way, you little devils,” George cried to a small +crowd of damp urchins, that were hanging about the +chapel-door. The rain drove into the bride and bridegroom’s +faces as they passed to the chariot. The postilions’ +favours draggled on their dripping jackets. The few +children made a dismal cheer, as the carriage, splashing +mud, drove away.</p> + +<p>William Dobbin stood in the church-porch, looking +at it, a queer figure. The small crew of spectators +jeered him. He was not thinking about them or their +laughter.</p> + +<p>“Come home and have some tiffin, Dobbin,” +a voice cried behind him; as a pudgy hand was laid +on his shoulder, and the honest fellow’s reverie +was interrupted. But the Captain had no heart to go +a-feasting with Jos Sedley. He put the weeping old +lady and her attendants into the carriage along with +Jos, and left them without any farther words passing. + This carriage, too, drove away, and the urchins gave +another sarcastical cheer.</p> + +<p>“Here, you little beggars,” Dobbin said, +giving some sixpences amongst them, and then went +off by himself through the rain. It was all over. + They were married, and happy, he prayed God. Never +since he was a boy had he felt so miserable and so +lonely. He longed with a heart-sick yearning for +the first few days to be over, that he might see her +again.</p> + +<p>Some ten days after the above ceremony, three young +men of our acquaintance were enjoying that beautiful +prospect of bow windows on the one side and blue sea +on the other, which Brighton affords to the traveller. +Sometimes it is towards the ocean--smiling with countless +dimples, speckled with white sails, with a hundred +bathing-machines kissing the skirt of his blue garment--that +the Londoner looks enraptured: sometimes, on the contrary, +a lover of human nature rather than of prospects of +any kind, it is towards the bow windows that he turns, +and that swarm of human life which they exhibit. +From one issue the notes of a piano, which a young +lady in ringlets practises six hours daily, to the +delight of the fellow-lodgers: at another, lovely +Polly, the nurse-maid, may be seen dandling Master +Omnium in her arms: whilst Jacob, his papa, is beheld +eating prawns, and devouring the Times for breakfast, +at the window below. Yonder are the Misses Leery, +who are looking out for the young officers of the +Heavies, who are pretty sure to be pacing the cliff; +or again it is a City man, with a nautical turn, and +a telescope, the size of a six-pounder, who has his +instrument pointed seawards, so as to command every +pleasure-boat, herring-boat, or bathing-machine that +comes to, or quits, the shore, &c., &c. But have +we any leisure for a description of Brighton?--for +Brighton, a clean Naples with genteel lazzaroni--for +Brighton, that always looks brisk, gay, and gaudy, +like a harlequin’s jacket--for Brighton, which +used to be seven hours distant from London at the time +of our story; which is now only a hundred minutes +off; and which may approach who knows how much nearer, +unless Joinville comes and untimely bombards it?</p> + +<p>“What a monstrous fine girl that is in the lodgings +over the milliner’s,” one of these three +promenaders remarked to the other; “Gad, Crawley, +did you see what a wink she gave me as I passed?”</p> + +<p>“Don’t break her heart, Jos, you rascal,” +said another. “Don’t trifle with her affections, +you Don Juan!”</p> + +<p>“Get away,” said Jos Sedley, quite pleased, +and leering up at the maid-servant in question with +a most killing ogle. Jos was even more splendid at +Brighton than he had been at his sister’s marriage. +He had brilliant under-waistcoats, any one of which +would have set up a moderate buck. He sported a military +frock-coat, ornamented with frogs, knobs, black buttons, +and meandering embroidery. He had affected a military +appearance and habits of late; and he walked with +his two friends, who were of that profession, clinking +his boot-spurs, swaggering prodigiously, and shooting +death-glances at all the servant girls who were worthy +to be slain.</p> + +<p>“What shall we do, boys, till the ladies return?” +the buck asked. The ladies were out to Rottingdean +in his carriage on a drive.</p> + +<p>“Let’s have a game at billiards,” +one of his friends said--the tall one, with lacquered +mustachios.</p> + +<p>“No, dammy; no, Captain,” Jos replied, +rather alarmed. “No billiards to-day, Crawley, +my boy; yesterday was enough.”</p> + +<p>“You play very well,” said Crawley, laughing. + “Don’t he, Osborne? How well he made +that-five stroke, eh?”</p> + +<p>“Famous,” Osborne said. “Jos is +a devil of a fellow at billiards, and at everything +else, too. I wish there were any tiger-hunting about +here! we might go and kill a few before dinner. (There +goes a fine girl! what an ankle, eh, Jos?) Tell us +that story about the tiger-hunt, and the way you did +for him in the jungle--it’s a wonderful story +that, Crawley.” Here George Osborne gave a yawn. +“It’s rather slow work,” said he, +“down here; what shall we do?”</p> + +<p>“Shall we go and look at some horses that Snaffler’s +just brought from Lewes fair?” Crawley said.</p> + +<p>“Suppose we go and have some jellies at Dutton’s,” +and the rogue Jos, willing to kill two birds with +one stone. “Devilish fine gal at Dutton’s.”</p> + +<p>“Suppose we go and see the Lightning come in, +it’s just about time?” George said. This +advice prevailing over the stables and the jelly, +they turned towards the coach-office to witness the +Lightning’s arrival.</p> + +<p>As they passed, they met the carriage--Jos Sedley’s +open carriage, with its magnificent armorial bearings--that +splendid conveyance in which he used to drive, about +at Cheltonham, majestic and solitary, with his arms +folded, and his hat cocked; or, more happy, with ladies +by his side.</p> + +<p>Two were in the carriage now: one a little person, +with light hair, and dressed in the height of the +fashion; the other in a brown silk pelisse, and a +straw bonnet with pink ribbons, with a rosy, round, +happy face, that did you good to behold. She checked +the carriage as it neared the three gentlemen, after +which exercise of authority she looked rather nervous, +and then began to blush most absurdly. “We have +had a delightful drive, George,” she said, “and--and +we’re so glad to come back; and, Joseph, don’t +let him be late.”</p> + +<p>“Don’t be leading our husbands into mischief, +Mr. Sedley, you wicked, wicked man you,” Rebecca +said, shaking at Jos a pretty little finger covered +with the neatest French kid glove. “No billiards, +no smoking, no naughtiness!”</p> + +<p>“My dear Mrs. Crawley--Ah now! upon my honour!” +was all Jos could ejaculate by way of reply; but he +managed to fall into a tolerable attitude, with his +head lying on his shoulder, grinning upwards at his +victim, with one hand at his back, which he supported +on his cane, and the other hand (the one with the +diamond ring) fumbling in his shirt-frill and among +his under-waistcoats. As the carriage drove off he +kissed the diamond hand to the fair ladies within. + He wished all Cheltenham, all Chowringhee, all Calcutta, +could see him in that position, waving his hand to +such a beauty, and in company with such a famous buck +as Rawdon Crawley of the Guards.</p> + +<p>Our young bride and bridegroom had chosen Brighton +as the place where they would pass the first few days +after their marriage; and having engaged apartments +at the Ship Inn, enjoyed themselves there in great +comfort and quietude, until Jos presently joined them. + Nor was he the only companion they found there. +As they were coming into the hotel from a sea-side +walk one afternoon, on whom should they light but +Rebecca and her husband. The recognition was immediate. + Rebecca flew into the arms of her dearest friend. +Crawley and Osborne shook hands together cordially +enough: and Becky, in the course of a very few hours, +found means to make the latter forget that little +unpleasant passage of words which had happened between +them. “Do you remember the last time we met +at Miss Crawley’s, when I was so rude to you, +dear Captain Osborne? I thought you seemed careless +about dear Amelia. It was that made me angry: and +so pert: and so unkind: and so ungrateful. Do forgive +me!” Rebecca said, and she held out her hand +with so frank and winning a grace, that Osborne could +not but take it. By humbly and frankly acknowledging +yourself to be in the wrong, there is no knowing, +my son, what good you may do. I knew once a gentleman +and very worthy practitioner in Vanity Fair, who used +to do little wrongs to his neighbours on purpose, +and in order to apologise for them in an open and +manly way afterwards--and what ensued? My friend +Crocky Doyle was liked everywhere, and deemed to be +rather impetuous--but the honestest fellow. Becky’s +humility passed for sincerity with George Osborne.</p> + +<p>These two young couples had plenty of tales to relate +to each other. The marriages of either were discussed; +and their prospects in life canvassed with the greatest +frankness and interest on both sides. George’s +marriage was to be made known to his father by his +friend Captain Dobbin; and young Osborne trembled +rather for the result of that communication. Miss +Crawley, on whom all Rawdon’s hopes depended, +still held out. Unable to make an entry into her house +in Park Lane, her affectionate nephew and niece had +followed her to Brighton, where they had emissaries +continually planted at her door.</p> + +<p>“I wish you could see some of Rawdon’s +friends who are always about our door,” Rebecca +said, laughing. “Did you ever see a dun, my +dear; or a bailiff and his man? Two of the abominable +wretches watched all last week at the greengrocer’s +opposite, and we could not get away until Sunday. + If Aunty does not relent, what shall we do?”</p> + +<p>Rawdon, with roars of laughter, related a dozen amusing +anecdotes of his duns, and Rebecca’s adroit +treatment of them. He vowed with a great oath that +there was no woman in Europe who could talk a creditor +over as she could. Almost immediately after their +marriage, her practice had begun, and her husband found +the immense value of such a wife. They had credit +in plenty, but they had bills also in abundance, and +laboured under a scarcity of ready money. Did these +debt-difficulties affect Rawdon’s good spirits? + No. Everybody in Vanity Fair must have remarked how +well those live who are comfortably and thoroughly +in debt: how they deny themselves nothing; how jolly +and easy they are in their minds. Rawdon and his +wife had the very best apartments at the inn at Brighton; +the landlord, as he brought in the first dish, bowed +before them as to his greatest customers: and Rawdon +abused the dinners and wine with an audacity which +no grandee in the land could surpass. Long custom, +a manly appearance, faultless boots and clothes, and +a happy fierceness of manner, will often help a man +as much as a great balance at the banker’s.</p> + +<p>The two wedding parties met constantly in each other’s +apartments. After two or three nights the gentlemen +of an evening had a little piquet, as their wives +sate and chatted apart. This pastime, and the arrival +of Jos Sedley, who made his appearance in his grand +open carriage, and who played a few games at billiards +with Captain Crawley, replenished Rawdon’s purse +somewhat, and gave him the benefit of that ready money +for which the greatest spirits are sometimes at a +stand-still.</p> + +<p>So the three gentlemen walked down to see the Lightning +coach come in. Punctual to the minute, the coach +crowded inside and out, the guard blowing his accustomed +tune on the horn--the Lightning came tearing down +the street, and pulled up at the coach-office.</p> + +<p>“Hullo! there’s old Dobbin,” George +cried, quite delighted to see his old friend perched +on the roof; and whose promised visit to Brighton +had been delayed until now. “How are you, old +fellow? Glad you’re come down. Emmy’ll +be delighted to see you,” Osborne said, shaking +his comrade warmly by the hand as soon as his descent +from the vehicle was effected--and then he added, in +a lower and agitated voice, “What’s the +news? Have you been in Russell Square? What does +the governor say? Tell me everything.”</p> + +<p>Dobbin looked very pale and grave. “I’ve +seen your father,” said he. “How’s +Amelia--Mrs. George? I’ll tell you all the news +presently: but I’ve brought the great news of +all: and that is--”</p> + +<p>“Out with it, old fellow,” George said.</p> + +<p>“We’re ordered to Belgium. All the army +goes--guards and all. Heavytop’s got the gout, +and is mad at not being able to move. O’Dowd +goes in command, and we embark from Chatham next week.” +This news of war could not but come with a shock upon +our lovers, and caused all these gentlemen to look +very serious.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Captain Dobbin Proceeds on His Canvass</h4> + +<p>What is the secret mesmerism which friendship possesses, +and under the operation of which a person ordinarily +sluggish, or cold, or timid, becomes wise, active, +and resolute, in another’s behalf? As Alexis, +after a few passes from Dr. Elliotson, despises pain, +reads with the back of his head, sees miles off, looks +into next week, and performs other wonders, of which, +in his own private normal condition, he is quite incapable; +so you see, in the affairs of the world and under +the magnetism of friendships, the modest man becomes +bold, the shy confident, the lazy active, or the impetuous +prudent and peaceful. What is it, on the other hand, +that makes the lawyer eschew his own cause, and call +in his learned brother as an adviser? And what causes +the doctor, when ailing, to send for his rival, and +not sit down and examine his own tongue in the chimney +Bass, or write his own prescription at his study-table? + I throw out these queries for intelligent readers +to answer, who know, at once, how credulous we are, +and how sceptical, how soft and how obstinate, how +firm for others and how diffident about ourselves: + meanwhile, it is certain that our friend William +Dobbin, who was personally of so complying a disposition +that if his parents had pressed him much, it is probable +he would have stepped down into the kitchen and married +the cook, and who, to further his own interests, would +have found the most insuperable difficulty in walking +across the street, found himself as busy and eager +in the conduct of George Osborne’s affairs, +as the most selfish tactician could be in the pursuit +of his own.</p> + +<p>Whilst our friend George and his young wife were enjoying +the first blushing days of the honeymoon at Brighton, +honest William was left as George’s plenipotentiary +in London, to transact all the business part of the +marriage. His duty it was to call upon old Sedley and +his wife, and to keep the former in good humour: to +draw Jos and his brother-in-law nearer together, so +that Jos’s position and dignity, as collector +of Boggley Wollah, might compensate for his father’s +loss of station, and tend to reconcile old Osborne +to the alliance: and finally, to communicate it to +the latter in such a way as should least irritate +the old gentleman.</p> + +<p>Now, before he faced the head of the Osborne house +with the news which it was his duty to tell, Dobbin +bethought him that it would be politic to make friends +of the rest of the family, and, if possible, have +the ladies on his side. They can’t be angry in +their hearts, thought he. No woman ever was really +angry at a romantic marriage. A little crying out, +and they must come round to their brother; when the +three of us will lay siege to old Mr. Osborne. So +this Machiavellian captain of infantry cast about +him for some happy means or stratagem by which he +could gently and gradually bring the Misses Osborne +to a knowledge of their brother’s secret.</p> + +<p>By a little inquiry regarding his mother’s engagements, +he was pretty soon able to find out by whom of her +ladyship’s friends parties were given at that +season; where he would be likely to meet Osborne’s +sisters; and, though he had that abhorrence of routs +and evening parties which many sensible men, alas! +entertain, he soon found one where the Misses Osborne +were to be present. Making his appearance at the ball, +where he danced a couple of sets with both of them, +and was prodigiously polite, he actually had the courage +to ask Miss Osborne for a few minutes’ conversation +at an early hour the next day, when he had, he said, +to communicate to her news of the very greatest interest.</p> + +<p>What was it that made her start back, and gaze upon +him for a moment, and then on the ground at her feet, +and make as if she would faint on his arm, had he +not by opportunely treading on her toes, brought the +young lady back to self-control? Why was she so violently +agitated at Dobbin’s request? This can never +be known. But when he came the next day, Maria was +not in the drawing-room with her sister, and Miss +Wirt went off for the purpose of fetching the latter, +and the Captain and Miss Osborne were left together. +They were both so silent that the ticktock of the Sacrifice +of Iphigenia clock on the mantelpiece became quite +rudely audible.</p> + +<p>“What a nice party it was last night,” +Miss Osborne at length began, encouragingly; “and--and +how you’re improved in your dancing, Captain +Dobbin. Surely somebody has taught you,” she +added, with amiable archness.</p> + +<p>“You should see me dance a reel with Mrs. Major +O’Dowd of ours; and a jig--did you ever see +a jig? But I think anybody could dance with you, +Miss Osborne, who dance so well.”</p> + +<p>“Is the Major’s lady young and beautiful, +Captain?” the fair questioner continued. “Ah, +what a terrible thing it must be to be a soldier’s +wife! I wonder they have any spirits to dance, and +in these dreadful times of war, too! O Captain Dobbin, +I tremble sometimes when I think of our dearest George, +and the dangers of the poor soldier. Are there many +married officers of the --th, Captain Dobbin?”</p> + +<p>“Upon my word, she’s playing her hand +rather too openly,” Miss Wirt thought; but this +observation is merely parenthetic, and was not heard +through the crevice of the door at which the governess +uttered it.</p> + +<p>“One of our young men is just married,” +Dobbin said, now coming to the point. “It was +a very old attachment, and the young couple are as +poor as church mice.” “O, how delightful! +O, how romantic!” Miss Osborne cried, as the +Captain said “old attachment” and “poor.” +Her sympathy encouraged him.</p> + +<p>“The finest young fellow in the regiment,” +he continued. “Not a braver or handsomer officer +in the army; and such a charming wife! How you would +like her! how you will like her when you know her, +Miss Osborne.” The young lady thought the actual +moment had arrived, and that Dobbin’s nervousness +which now came on and was visible in many twitchings +of his face, in his manner of beating the ground with +his great feet, in the rapid buttoning and unbuttoning +of his frock-coat, &c.--Miss Osborne, I say, thought +that when he had given himself a little air, he would +unbosom himself entirely, and prepared eagerly to +listen. And the clock, in the altar on which Iphigenia +was situated, beginning, after a preparatory convulsion, +to toll twelve, the mere tolling seemed as if it would +last until one--so prolonged was the knell to the anxious +spinster.</p> + +<p>“But it’s not about marriage that I came +to speak--that is that marriage--that is--no, I mean--my +dear Miss Osborne, it’s about our dear friend +George,” Dobbin said.</p> + +<p>“About George?” she said in a tone so +discomfited that Maria and Miss Wirt laughed at the +other side of the door, and even that abandoned wretch +of a Dobbin felt inclined to smile himself; for he +was not altogether unconscious of the state of affairs: + George having often bantered him gracefully and said, +“Hang it, Will, why don’t you take old +Jane? She’ll have you if you ask her. I’ll +bet you five to two she will.”</p> + +<p>“Yes, about George, then,” he continued. + “There has been a difference between him and +Mr. Osborne. And I regard him so much-- for you know +we have been like brothers--that I hope and pray the +quarrel may be settled. We must go abroad, Miss Osborne. + We may be ordered off at a day’s warning. +Who knows what may happen in the campaign? Don’t +be agitated, dear Miss Osborne; and those two at least +should part friends.”</p> + +<p>“There has been no quarrel, Captain Dobbin, +except a little usual scene with Papa,” the +lady said. “We are expecting George back daily. + What Papa wanted was only for his good. He has but +to come back, and I’m sure all will be well; +and dear Rhoda, who went away from here in sad sad +anger, I know will forgive him. Woman forgives but +too readily, Captain.”</p> + +<p>“Such an angel as <i>you</i> I am sure would,” +Mr. Dobbin said, with atrocious astuteness. “And +no man can pardon himself for giving a woman pain. + What would you feel, if a man were faithless to you?”</p> + +<p>“I should perish--I should throw myself out +of window--I should take poison--I should pine and +die. I know I should,” Miss cried, who had +nevertheless gone through one or two affairs of the +heart without any idea of suicide.</p> + +<p>“And there are others,” Dobbin continued, +“as true and as kind-hearted as yourself. +I’m not speaking about the West Indian heiress, +Miss Osborne, but about a poor girl whom George once +loved, and who was bred from her childhood to think +of nobody but him. I’ve seen her in her poverty +uncomplaining, broken-hearted, without a fault. It +is of Miss Sedley I speak. Dear Miss Osborne, can +your generous heart quarrel with your brother for +being faithful to her? Could his own conscience ever +forgive him if he deserted her? Be her friend--she +always loved you--and--and I am come here charged by +George to tell you that he holds his engagement to +her as the most sacred duty he has; and to entreat +you, at least, to be on his side.”</p> + +<p>When any strong emotion took possession of Mr. Dobbin, +and after the first word or two of hesitation, he +could speak with perfect fluency, and it was evident +that his eloquence on this occasion made some impression +upon the lady whom he addressed.</p> + +<p>“Well,” said she, “this is--most +surprising--most painful--most extraordinary--what +will Papa say?--that George should fling away such +a superb establishment as was offered to him but at +any rate he has found a very brave champion in you, +Captain Dobbin. It is of no use, however,” +she continued, after a pause; “I feel for poor +Miss Sedley, most certainly--most sincerely, you know. +We never thought the match a good one, though we were +always very kind to her here-- very. But Papa will +never consent, I am sure. And a well brought up young +woman, you know--with a well-regulated mind, must--George +must give her up, dear Captain Dobbin, indeed he must.”</p> + +<p>“Ought a man to give up the woman he loved, +just when misfortune befell her?” Dobbin said, +holding out his hand. “Dear Miss Osborne, is +this the counsel I hear from you? My dear young lady! +you must befriend her. He can’t give her up. + He must not give her up. Would a man, think you, +give <i>you</i> up if you were poor?”</p> + +<p>This adroit question touched the heart of Miss Jane +Osborne not a little. “I don’t know whether +we poor girls ought to believe what you men say, Captain,” +she said. “There is that in woman’s tenderness +which induces her to believe too easily. I’m +afraid you are cruel, cruel deceivers,"--and Dobbin +certainly thought he felt a pressure of the hand which +Miss Osborne had extended to him.</p> + +<p>He dropped it in some alarm. “Deceivers!” +said he. “No, dear Miss Osborne, all men are +not; your brother is not; George has loved Amelia +Sedley ever since they were children; no wealth would +make him marry any but her. Ought he to forsake her? + Would you counsel him to do so?”</p> + +<p>What could Miss Jane say to such a question, and with +her own peculiar views? She could not answer it, +so she parried it by saying, “Well, if you are +not a deceiver, at least you are very romantic”; +and Captain William let this observation pass without +challenge.</p> + +<p>At length when, by the help of farther polite speeches, +he deemed that Miss Osborne was sufficiently prepared +to receive the whole news, he poured it into her ear. +“George could not give up Amelia-- George was +married to her"--and then he related the circumstances +of the marriage as we know them already: how the +poor girl would have died had not her lover kept his +faith: how Old Sedley had refused all consent to +the match, and a licence had been got: and Jos Sedley +had come from Cheltenham to give away the bride: how +they had gone to Brighton in Jos’s chariot-and-four +to pass the honeymoon: and how George counted on his +dear kind sisters to befriend him with their father, +as women--so true and tender as they were--assuredly +would do. And so, asking permission (readily granted) +to see her again, and rightly conjecturing that the +news he had brought would be told in the next five +minutes to the other ladies, Captain Dobbin made his +bow and took his leave.</p> + +<p>He was scarcely out of the house, when Miss Maria +and Miss Wirt rushed in to Miss Osborne, and the whole +wonderful secret was imparted to them by that lady. + To do them justice, neither of the sisters was very +much displeased. There is something about a runaway +match with which few ladies can be seriously angry, +and Amelia rather rose in their estimation, from the +spirit which she had displayed in consenting to the +union. As they debated the story, and prattled about +it, and wondered what Papa would do and say, came +a loud knock, as of an avenging thunder-clap, at the +door, which made these conspirators start. It must +be Papa, they thought. But it was not he. It was +only Mr. Frederick Bullock, who had come from the +City according to appointment, to conduct the ladies +to a flower-show.</p> + +<p>This gentleman, as may be imagined, was not kept long +in ignorance of the secret. But his face, when he +heard it, showed an amazement which was very different +to that look of sentimental wonder which the countenances +of the sisters wore. Mr. Bullock was a man of the +world, and a junior partner of a wealthy firm. He +knew what money was, and the value of it: and a delightful +throb of expectation lighted up his little eyes, and +caused him to smile on his Maria, as he thought that +by this piece of folly of Mr. George’s she might +be worth thirty thousand pounds more than he had ever +hoped to get with her.</p> + +<p>“Gad! Jane,” said he, surveying even +the elder sister with some interest, “Eels will +be sorry he cried off. You may be a fifty thousand +pounder yet.”</p> + +<p>The sisters had never thought of the money question +up to that moment, but Fred Bullock bantered them +with graceful gaiety about it during their forenoon’s +excursion; and they had risen not a little in their +own esteem by the time when, the morning amusement +over, they drove back to dinner. And do not let my +respected reader exclaim against this selfishness +as unnatural. It was but this present morning, as +he rode on the omnibus from Richmond; while it changed +horses, this present chronicler, being on the roof, +marked three little children playing in a puddle below, +very dirty, and friendly, and happy. To these three +presently came another little one. “<i>Polly</i>,” +says she, “<i>Your sister’s got</i> +A <i>penny</i>.” At which the children got up +from the puddle instantly, and ran off to pay their +court to Peggy. And as the omnibus drove off I saw +Peggy with the infantine procession at her tail, marching +with great dignity towards the stall of a neighbouring +lollipop-woman.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXIV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Mr. Osborne Takes Down the Family Bible</h4> + +<p>So having prepared the sisters, Dobbin hastened away +to the City to perform the rest and more difficult +part of the task which he had undertaken. The idea +of facing old Osborne rendered him not a little nervous, +and more than once he thought of leaving the young +ladies to communicate the secret, which, as he was +aware, they could not long retain. But he had promised +to report to George upon the manner in which the elder +Osborne bore the intelligence; so going into the City +to the paternal counting-house in Thames Street, he +despatched thence a note to Mr. Osborne begging for +a half-hour’s conversation relative to the affairs +of his son George. Dobbin’s messenger returned +from Mr. Osborne’s house of business, with the +compliments of the latter, who would be very happy +to see the Captain immediately, and away accordingly +Dobbin went to confront him.</p> + +<p>The Captain, with a half-guilty secret to confess, +and with the prospect of a painful and stormy interview +before him, entered Mr. Osborne’s offices with +a most dismal countenance and abashed gait, and, passing +through the outer room where Mr. Chopper presided, +was greeted by that functionary from his desk with +a waggish air which farther discomfited him. Mr. +Chopper winked and nodded and pointed his pen towards +his patron’s door, and said, “You’ll +find the governor all right,” with the most +provoking good humour.</p> + +<p>Osborne rose too, and shook him heartily by the hand, +and said, “How do, my dear boy?” with +a cordiality that made poor George’s ambassador +feel doubly guilty. His hand lay as if dead in the +old gentleman’s grasp. He felt that he, Dobbin, +was more or less the cause of all that had happened. + It was he had brought back George to Amelia: it was +he had applauded, encouraged, transacted almost the +marriage which he was come to reveal to George’s +father: and the latter was receiving him with smiles +of welcome; patting him on the shoulder, and calling +him “Dobbin, my dear boy.” The envoy had +indeed good reason to hang his head.</p> + +<p>Osborne fully believed that Dobbin had come to announce +his son’s surrender. Mr. Chopper and his principal +were talking over the matter between George and his +father, at the very moment when Dobbin’s messenger +arrived. Both agreed that George was sending in his +submission. Both had been expecting it for some days--and +“Lord! Chopper, what a marriage we’ll have!” +Mr. Osborne said to his clerk, snapping his big fingers, +and jingling all the guineas and shillings in his +great pockets as he eyed his subordinate with a look +of triumph.</p> + +<p>With similar operations conducted in both pockets, +and a knowing jolly air, Osborne from his chair regarded +Dobbin seated blank and silent opposite to him. “What +a bumpkin he is for a Captain in the army,” +old Osborne thought. “I wonder George hasn’t +taught him better manners.”</p> + +<p>At last Dobbin summoned courage to begin. “Sir,” +said he, “I’ve brought you some very grave +news. I have been at the Horse Guards this morning, +and there’s no doubt that our regiment will be +ordered abroad, and on its way to Belgium before the +week is over. And you know, sir, that we shan’t +be home again before a tussle which may be fatal to +many of us.” Osborne looked grave. “My +s--, the regiment will do its duty, sir, I daresay,” +he said.</p> + +<p>“The French are very strong, sir,” Dobbin +went on. “The Russians and Austrians will be +a long time before they can bring their troops down. + We shall have the first of the fight, sir; and depend +on it Boney will take care that it shall be a hard +one.”</p> + +<p>“What are you driving at, Dobbin?” his +interlocutor said, uneasy and with a scowl. “I +suppose no Briton’s afraid of any d--- Frenchman, +hey?”</p> + +<p>“I only mean, that before we go, and considering +the great and certain risk that hangs over every one +of us--if there are any differences between you and +George--it would be as well, sir, that-- that you +should shake hands: wouldn’t it? Should anything +happen to him, I think you would never forgive yourself +if you hadn’t parted in charity.”</p> + +<p>As he said this, poor William Dobbin blushed crimson, +and felt and owned that he himself was a traitor. + But for him, perhaps, this severance need never have +taken place. Why had not George’s marriage +been delayed? What call was there to press it on so +eagerly? He felt that George would have parted from +Amelia at any rate without a mortal pang. Amelia, +too, <i>might</i> have recovered the shock of losing +him. It was his counsel had brought about this marriage, +and all that was to ensue from it. And why was it? +Because he loved her so much that he could not bear +to see her unhappy: or because his own sufferings +of suspense were so unendurable that he was glad to +crush them at once--as we hasten a funeral after a +death, or, when a separation from those we love is +imminent, cannot rest until the parting be over.</p> + +<p>“You are a good fellow, William,” said +Mr. Osborne in a softened voice; “and me and +George shouldn’t part in anger, that is true. +Look here. I’ve done for him as much as any +father ever did. He’s had three times as much +money from me, as I warrant your father ever gave +you. But I don’t brag about that. How I’ve +toiled for him, and worked and employed my talents +and energy, I won’t say. Ask Chopper. Ask +himself. Ask the City of London. Well, I propose +to him such a marriage as any nobleman in the land +might be proud of-- the only thing in life I ever +asked him--and he refuses me. Am I wrong? Is the +quarrel of <i>my</i> making? What do I seek but his +good, for which I’ve been toiling like a convict +ever since he was born? Nobody can say there’s +anything selfish in me. Let him come back. I say, +here’s my hand. I say, forget and forgive. +As for marrying now, it’s out of the question. + Let him and Miss S. make it up, and make out the +marriage afterwards, when he comes back a Colonel; +for he shall be a Colonel, by G--- he shall, if money +can do it. I’m glad you’ve brought him +round. I know it’s you, Dobbin. You’ve +took him out of many a scrape before. Let him come. + I shan’t be hard. Come along, and dine in +Russell Square to-day: both of you. The old shop, +the old hour. You’ll find a neck of venison, +and no questions asked.”</p> + +<p>This praise and confidence smote Dobbin’s heart +very keenly. Every moment the colloquy continued +in this tone, he felt more and more guilty. “Sir,” +said he, “I fear you deceive yourself. I am +sure you do. George is much too high-minded a man +ever to marry for money. A threat on your part that +you would disinherit him in case of disobedience would +only be followed by resistance on his.”</p> + +<p>“Why, hang it, man, you don’t call offering +him eight or ten thousand a year threatening him?” +Mr. Osborne said, with still provoking good humour. + “’Gad, if Miss S. will have me, I’m +her man. I ain’t particular about a shade or +so of tawny.” And the old gentleman gave his +knowing grin and coarse laugh.</p> + +<p>“You forget, sir, previous engagements into +which Captain Osborne had entered,” the ambassador +said, gravely.</p> + +<p>“What engagements? What the devil do you mean? +You don’t mean,” Mr. Osborne continued, +gathering wrath and astonishment as the thought now +first came upon him; “you don’t mean that +he’s such a d--- fool as to be still hankering +after that swindling old bankrupt’s daughter? +You’ve not come here for to make me suppose that +he wants to marry <i>her</i>? Marry <i>her</i>, that +<i>is</i> a good one. My son and heir marry a beggar’s +girl out of a gutter. D--- him, if he does, let him +buy a broom and sweep a crossing. She was always +dangling and ogling after him, I recollect now; and +I’ve no doubt she was put on by her old sharper +of a father.”</p> + +<p>“Mr. Sedley was your very good friend, sir,” +Dobbin interposed, almost pleased at finding himself +growing angry. “Time was you called him better +names than rogue and swindler. The match was of your +making. George had no right to play fast and loose--”</p> + +<p>“Fast and loose!” howled out old Osborne. + “Fast and loose! Why, hang me, those are the +very words my gentleman used himself when he gave +himself airs, last Thursday was a fortnight, and talked +about the British army to his father who made him. + What, it’s you who have been a setting of him +up--is it? and my service to you, <i>captain</i>. It’s +you who want to introduce beggars into my family. +Thank you for nothing, Captain. Marry <i>her</i> indeed--he, +he! why should he? I warrant you she’d go to +him fast enough without.”</p> + +<p>“Sir,” said Dobbin, starting up in undisguised +anger; “no man shall abuse that lady in my hearing, +and you least of all.”</p> + +<p>“O, you’re a-going to call me out, are +you? Stop, let me ring the bell for pistols for two. + Mr. George sent you here to insult his father, did +he?” Osborne said, pulling at the bell-cord.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Osborne,” said Dobbin, with a faltering +voice, “it’s you who are insulting the +best creature in the world. You had best spare her, +sir, for she’s your son’s wife.”</p> + +<p>And with this, feeling that he could say no more, +Dobbin went away, Osborne sinking back in his chair, +and looking wildly after him. A clerk came in, obedient +to the bell; and the Captain was scarcely out of the +court where Mr. Osborne’s offices were, when +Mr. Chopper the chief clerk came rushing hatless after +him.</p> + +<p>“For God’s sake, what is it?” Mr. +Chopper said, catching the Captain by the skirt. +“The governor’s in a fit. What has Mr. +George been doing?”</p> + +<p>“He married Miss Sedley five days ago,” +Dobbin replied. “I was his groomsman, Mr. Chopper, +and you must stand his friend.”</p> + +<p>The old clerk shook his head. “If that’s +your news, Captain, it’s bad. The governor +will never forgive him.”</p> + +<p>Dobbin begged Chopper to report progress to him at +the hotel where he was stopping, and walked off moodily +westwards, greatly perturbed as to the past and the +future.</p> + +<p>When the Russell Square family came to dinner that +evening, they found the father of the house seated +in his usual place, but with that air of gloom on +his face, which, whenever it appeared there, kept +the whole circle silent. The ladies, and Mr. Bullock +who dined with them, felt that the news had been communicated +to Mr. Osborne. His dark looks affected Mr. Bullock +so far as to render him still and quiet: but he was +unusually bland and attentive to Miss Maria, by whom +he sat, and to her sister presiding at the head of +the table.</p> + +<p>Miss Wirt, by consequence, was alone on her side of +the board, a gap being left between her and Miss Jane +Osborne. Now this was George’s place when he +dined at home; and his cover, as we said, was laid +for him in expectation of that truant’s return. + Nothing occurred during dinner-time except smiling +Mr. Frederick’s flagging confidential whispers, +and the clinking of plate and china, to interrupt the +silence of the repast. The servants went about stealthily +doing their duty. Mutes at funerals could not look +more glum than the domestics of Mr. Osborne The neck +of venison of which he had invited Dobbin to partake, +was carved by him in perfect silence; but his own +share went away almost untasted, though he drank much, +and the butler assiduously filled his glass.</p> + +<p>At last, just at the end of the dinner, his eyes, +which had been staring at everybody in turn, fixed +themselves for a while upon the plate laid for George. + He pointed to it presently with his left hand. His +daughters looked at him and did not comprehend, or +choose to comprehend, the signal; nor did the servants +at first understand it.</p> + +<p>“Take that plate away,” at last he said, +getting up with an oath-- and with this pushing his +chair back, he walked into his own room.</p> + +<p>Behind Mr. Osborne’s dining-room was the usual +apartment which went in his house by the name of the +study; and was sacred to the master of the house. + Hither Mr. Osborne would retire of a Sunday forenoon +when not minded to go to church; and here pass the +morning in his crimson leather chair, reading the +paper. A couple of glazed book-cases were here, +containing standard works in stout gilt bindings. +The “Annual Register,” the “Gentleman’s +Magazine,” “Blair’s Sermons,” +and “Hume and Smollett.” From year’s +end to year’s end he never took one of these +volumes from the shelf; but there was no member of +the family that would dare for his life to touch one +of the books, except upon those rare Sunday evenings +when there was no dinner-party, and when the great +scarlet Bible and Prayer-book were taken out from +the corner where they stood beside his copy of the +Peerage, and the servants being rung up to the dining +parlour, Osborne read the evening service to his family +in a loud grating pompous voice. No member of the +household, child, or domestic, ever entered that room +without a certain terror. Here he checked the housekeeper’s +accounts, and overhauled the butler’s cellar-book. +Hence he could command, across the clean gravel court-yard, +the back entrance of the stables with which one of +his bells communicated, and into this yard the coachman +issued from his premises as into a dock, and Osborne +swore at him from the study window. Four times a +year Miss Wirt entered this apartment to get her salary; +and his daughters to receive their quarterly allowance. + George as a boy had been horsewhipped in this room +many times; his mother sitting sick on the stair listening +to the cuts of the whip. The boy was scarcely ever +known to cry under the punishment; the poor woman used +to fondle and kiss him secretly, and give him money +to soothe him when he came out.</p> + +<p>There was a picture of the family over the mantelpiece, +removed thither from the front room after Mrs. Osborne’s +death--George was on a pony, the elder sister holding +him up a bunch of flowers; the younger led by her +mother’s hand; all with red cheeks and large +red mouths, simpering on each other in the approved +family-portrait manner. The mother lay underground +now, long since forgotten--the sisters and brother +had a hundred different interests of their own, and, +familiar still, were utterly estranged from each other. + Some few score of years afterwards, when all the +parties represented are grown old, what bitter satire +there is in those flaunting childish family-portraits, +with their farce of sentiment and smiling lies, and +innocence so self-conscious and self-satisfied. Osborne’s +own state portrait, with that of his great silver +inkstand and arm-chair, had taken the place of honour +in the dining-room, vacated by the family-piece.</p> + +<p>To this study old Osborne retired then, greatly to +the relief of the small party whom he left. When +the servants had withdrawn, they began to talk for +a while volubly but very low; then they went upstairs +quietly, Mr. Bullock accompanying them stealthily on +his creaking shoes. He had no heart to sit alone +drinking wine, and so close to the terrible old gentleman +in the study hard at hand.</p> + +<p>An hour at least after dark, the butler, not having +received any summons, ventured to tap at his door +and take him in wax candles and tea. The master of +the house sate in his chair, pretending to read the +paper, and when the servant, placing the lights and +refreshment on the table by him, retired, Mr. Osborne +got up and locked the door after him. This time there +was no mistaking the matter; all the household knew +that some great catastrophe was going to happen which +was likely direly to affect Master George.</p> + +<p>In the large shining mahogany escritoire Mr. Osborne +had a drawer especially devoted to his son’s +affairs and papers. Here he kept all the documents +relating to him ever since he had been a boy: here +were his prize copy-books and drawing-books, all bearing +George’s hand, and that of the master: here +were his first letters in large round-hand sending +his love to papa and mamma, and conveying his petitions +for a cake. His dear godpapa Sedley was more than +once mentioned in them. Curses quivered on old Osborne’s +livid lips, and horrid hatred and disappointment writhed +in his heart, as looking through some of these papers +he came on that name. They were all marked and docketed, +and tied with red tape. It was--"From Georgy, requesting +5s., April 23, 18--; answered, April 25"--or “Georgy +about a pony, October 13"--and so forth. In another +packet were “Dr. S.’s accounts"--"G.’s +tailor’s bills and outfits, drafts on me by G. +Osborne, jun.,” &c.--his letters from the West +Indies--his agent’s letters, and the newspapers +containing his commissions: here was a whip he had +when a boy, and in a paper a locket containing his +hair, which his mother used to wear.</p> + +<p>Turning one over after another, and musing over these +memorials, the unhappy man passed many hours. His +dearest vanities, ambitious hopes, had all been here. + What pride he had in his boy! He was the handsomest +child ever seen. Everybody said he was like a nobleman’s +son. A royal princess had remarked him, and kissed +him, and asked his name in Kew Gardens. What City +man could show such another? Could a prince have been +better cared for? Anything that money could buy had +been his son’s. He used to go down on speech-days +with four horses and new liveries, and scatter new +shillings among the boys at the school where George +was: when he went with George to the depot of his +regiment, before the boy embarked for Canada, he gave +the officers such a dinner as the Duke of York might +have sat down to. Had he ever refused a bill when +George drew one? There they were--paid without a word. + Many a general in the army couldn’t ride the +horses he had! He had the child before his eyes, on +a hundred different days when he remembered George +after dinner, when he used to come in as bold as a +lord and drink off his glass by his father’s +side, at the head of the table--on the pony at Brighton, +when he cleared the hedge and kept up with the huntsman--on +the day when he was presented to the Prince Regent +at the levee, when all Saint James’s couldn’t +produce a finer young fellow. And this, this was +the end of all!--to marry a bankrupt and fly in the +face of duty and fortune! What humiliation and fury: + what pangs of sickening rage, balked ambition and +love; what wounds of outraged vanity, tenderness even, +had this old worldling now to suffer under!</p> + +<p>Having examined these papers, and pondered over this +one and the other, in that bitterest of all helpless +woe, with which miserable men think of happy past +times--George’s father took the whole of the +documents out of the drawer in which he had kept them +so long, and locked them into a writing-box, which +he tied, and sealed with his seal. Then he opened +the book-case, and took down the great red Bible we +have spoken of a pompous book, seldom looked at, and +shining all over with gold. There was a frontispiece +to the volume, representing Abraham sacrificing Isaac. + Here, according to custom, Osborne had recorded on +the fly-leaf, and in his large clerk-like hand, the +dates of his marriage and his wife’s death, and +the births and Christian names of his children. Jane +came first, then George Sedley Osborne, then Maria +Frances, and the days of the christening of each. + Taking a pen, he carefully obliterated George’s +names from the page; and when the leaf was quite dry, +restored the volume to the place from which he had +moved it. Then he took a document out of another +drawer, where his own private papers were kept; and +having read it, crumpled it up and lighted it at one +of the candles, and saw it burn entirely away in the +grate. It was his will; which being burned, he sate +down and wrote off a letter, and rang for his servant, +whom he charged to deliver it in the morning. It was +morning already: as he went up to bed, the whole house +was alight with the sunshine; and the birds were singing +among the fresh green leaves in Russell Square.</p> + +<p>Anxious to keep all Mr. Osborne’s family and +dependants in good humour, and to make as many friends +as possible for George in his hour of adversity, William +Dobbin, who knew the effect which good dinners and +good wines have upon the soul of man, wrote off immediately +on his return to his inn the most hospitable of invitations +to Thomas Chopper, Esquire, begging that gentleman +to dine with him at the Slaughters’ next day. + The note reached Mr. Chopper before he left the City, +and the instant reply was, that “Mr. Chopper +presents his respectful compliments, and will have +the honour and pleasure of waiting on Captain D.” + The invitation and the rough draft of the answer +were shown to Mrs. Chopper and her daughters on his +return to Somers’ Town that evening, and they +talked about military gents and West End men with great +exultation as the family sate and partook of tea. + When the girls had gone to rest, Mr. and Mrs. C. +discoursed upon the strange events which were occurring +in the governor’s family. Never had the clerk +seen his principal so moved. When he went in to Mr. +Osborne, after Captain Dobbin’s departure, Mr. +Chopper found his chief black in the face, and all +but in a fit: some dreadful quarrel, he was certain, +had occurred between Mr. O. and the young Captain. + Chopper had been instructed to make out an account +of all sums paid to Captain Osborne within the last +three years. “And a precious lot of money he +has had too,” the chief clerk said, and respected +his old and young master the more, for the liberal +way in which the guineas had been flung about. The +dispute was something about Miss Sedley. Mrs. Chopper +vowed and declared she pitied that poor young lady +to lose such a handsome young fellow as the Capting. +As the daughter of an unlucky speculator, who had +paid a very shabby dividend, Mr. Chopper had no great +regard for Miss Sedley. He respected the house of +Osborne before all others in the City of London: and +his hope and wish was that Captain George should marry +a nobleman’s daughter. The clerk slept a great +deal sounder than his principal that night; and, cuddling +his children after breakfast (of which he partook with +a very hearty appetite, though his modest cup of life +was only sweetened with brown sugar), he set off in +his best Sunday suit and frilled shirt for business, +promising his admiring wife not to punish Captain +D.’s port too severely that evening.</p> + +<p>Mr. Osborne’s countenance, when he arrived in +the City at his usual time, struck those dependants +who were accustomed, for good reasons, to watch its +expression, as peculiarly ghastly and worn. At twelve +o’clock Mr. Higgs (of the firm of Higgs & Blatherwick, +solicitors, Bedford Row) called by appointment, and +was ushered into the governor’s private room, +and closeted there for more than an hour. At about +one Mr. Chopper received a note brought by Captain +Dobbin’s man, and containing an inclosure for +Mr. Osborne, which the clerk went in and delivered. + A short time afterwards Mr. Chopper and Mr. Birch, +the next clerk, were summoned, and requested to witness +a paper. “I’ve been making a new will,” +Mr. Osborne said, to which these gentlemen appended +their names accordingly. No conversation passed. + Mr. Higgs looked exceedingly grave as he came into +the outer rooms, and very hard in Mr. Chopper’s +face; but there were not any explanations. It was +remarked that Mr. Osborne was particularly quiet and +gentle all day, to the surprise of those who had augured +ill from his darkling demeanour. He called no man +names that day, and was not heard to swear once. +He left business early; and before going away, summoned +his chief clerk once more, and having given him general +instructions, asked him, after some seeming hesitation +and reluctance to speak, if he knew whether Captain +Dobbin was in town?</p> + +<p>Chopper said he believed he was. Indeed both of them +knew the fact perfectly.</p> + +<p>Osborne took a letter directed to that officer, and +giving it to the clerk, requested the latter to deliver +it into Dobbin’s own hands immediately.</p> + +<p>“And now, Chopper,” says he, taking his +hat, and with a strange look, “my mind will +be easy.” Exactly as the clock struck two (there +was no doubt an appointment between the pair) Mr. Frederick +Bullock called, and he and Mr. Osborne walked away +together.</p> + +<p>The Colonel of the --th regiment, in which Messieurs +Dobbin and Osborne had companies, was an old General +who had made his first campaign under Wolfe at Quebec, +and was long since quite too old and feeble for command; +but he took some interest in the regiment of which +he was the nominal head, and made certain of his young +officers welcome at his table, a kind of hospitality +which I believe is not now common amongst his brethren. + Captain Dobbin was an especial favourite of this +old General. Dobbin was versed in the literature +of his profession, and could talk about the great +Frederick, and the Empress Queen, and their wars, almost +as well as the General himself, who was indifferent +to the triumphs of the present day, and whose heart +was with the tacticians of fifty years back. This +officer sent a summons to Dobbin to come and breakfast +with him, on the morning when Mr. Osborne altered his +will and Mr. Chopper put on his best shirt frill, +and then informed his young favourite, a couple of +days in advance, of that which they were all expecting--a +marching order to go to Belgium. The order for the +regiment to hold itself in readiness would leave the +Horse Guards in a day or two; and as transports were +in plenty, they would get their route before the week +was over. Recruits had come in during the stay of +the regiment at Chatham; and the old General hoped +that the regiment which had helped to beat Montcalm +in Canada, and to rout Mr. Washington on Long Island, +would prove itself worthy of its historical reputation +on the oft-trodden battle-grounds of the Low Countries. + “And so, my good friend, if you have any affaire +la, said the old General, taking a pinch of snuff +with his trembling white old hand, and then pointing +to the spot of his robe de chambre under which his +heart was still feebly beating, “if you have +any Phillis to console, or to bid farewell to papa +and mamma, or any will to make, I recommend you to +set about your business without delay.” With +which the General gave his young friend a finger to +shake, and a good-natured nod of his powdered and pigtailed +head; and the door being closed upon Dobbin, sate +down to pen a poulet (he was exceedingly vain of his +French) to Mademoiselle Amenaide of His Majesty’s +Theatre.</p> + +<p>This news made Dobbin grave, and he thought of our +friends at Brighton, and then he was ashamed of himself +that Amelia was always the first thing in his thoughts +(always before anybody--before father and mother, +sisters and duty--always at waking and sleeping indeed, +and all day long); and returning to his hotel, he sent +off a brief note to Mr. Osborne acquainting him with +the information which he had received, and which might +tend farther, he hoped, to bring about a reconciliation +with George.</p> + +<p>This note, despatched by the same messenger who had +carried the invitation to Chopper on the previous +day, alarmed the worthy clerk not a little. It was +inclosed to him, and as he opened the letter he trembled +lest the dinner should be put off on which he was +calculating. His mind was inexpressibly relieved when +he found that the envelope was only a reminder for +himself. ("I shall expect you at half-past five,” +Captain Dobbin wrote.) He was very much interested +about his employer’s family; but, que voulez-vous? +a grand dinner was of more concern to him than the +affairs of any other mortal.</p> + +<p>Dobbin was quite justified in repeating the General’s +information to any officers of the regiment whom he +should see in the course of his peregrinations; accordingly +he imparted it to Ensign Stubble, whom he met at the +agent’s, and who--such was his military ardour--went +off instantly to purchase a new sword at the accoutrement-maker’s. +Here this young fellow, who, though only seventeen +years of age, and about sixty-five inches high, with +a constitution naturally rickety and much impaired +by premature brandy and water, had an undoubted courage +and a lion’s heart, poised, tried, bent, and +balanced a weapon such as he thought would do execution +amongst Frenchmen. Shouting “Ha, ha!” +and stamping his little feet with tremendous energy, +he delivered the point twice or thrice at Captain Dobbin, +who parried the thrust laughingly with his bamboo walking-stick.</p> + +<p>Mr. Stubble, as may be supposed from his size and +slenderness, was of the Light Bobs. Ensign Spooney, +on the contrary, was a tall youth, and belonged to +(Captain Dobbin’s) the Grenadier Company, and +he tried on a new bearskin cap, under which he looked +savage beyond his years. Then these two lads went +off to the Slaughters’, and having ordered a +famous dinner, sate down and wrote off letters to +the kind anxious parents at home--letters full of love +and heartiness, and pluck and bad spelling. Ah! there +were many anxious hearts beating through England at +that time; and mothers’ prayers and tears flowing +in many homesteads.</p> + +<p>Seeing young Stubble engaged in composition at one +of the coffee-room tables at the Slaughters’, +and the tears trickling down his nose on to the paper +(for the youngster was thinking of his mamma, and +that he might never see her again), Dobbin, who was +going to write off a letter to George Osborne, relented, +and locked up his desk. “Why should I?” +said he. “Let her have this night happy. I’ll +go and see my parents early in the morning, and go +down to Brighton myself to-morrow.”</p> + +<p>So he went up and laid his big hand on young Stubble’s +shoulder, and backed up that young champion, and told +him if he would leave off brandy and water he would +be a good soldier, as he always was a gentlemanly +good-hearted fellow. Young Stubble’s eyes brightened +up at this, for Dobbin was greatly respected in the +regiment, as the best officer and the cleverest man +in it.</p> + +<p>“Thank you, Dobbin,” he said, rubbing +his eyes with his knuckles, “I was just--just +telling her I would. And, O Sir, she’s so dam +kind to me.” The water pumps were at work again, +and I am not sure that the soft-hearted Captain’s +eyes did not also twinkle.</p> + +<p>The two ensigns, the Captain, and Mr. Chopper, dined +together in the same box. Chopper brought the letter +from Mr. Osborne, in which the latter briefly presented +his compliments to Captain Dobbin, and requested him +to forward the inclosed to Captain George Osborne. + Chopper knew nothing further; he described Mr. Osborne’s +appearance, it is true, and his interview with his +lawyer, wondered how the governor had sworn at nobody, +and--especially as the wine circled round--abounded +in speculations and conjectures. But these grew more +vague with every glass, and at length became perfectly +unintelligible. At a late hour Captain Dobbin put his +guest into a hackney coach, in a hiccupping state, +and swearing that he would be the kick--the kick--Captain’s +friend for ever and ever.</p> + +<p>When Captain Dobbin took leave of Miss Osborne we +have said that he asked leave to come and pay her +another visit, and the spinster expected him for some +hours the next day, when, perhaps, had he come, and +had he asked her that question which she was prepared +to answer, she would have declared herself as her +brother’s friend, and a reconciliation might +have been effected between George and his angry father. + But though she waited at home the Captain never came. +He had his own affairs to pursue; his own parents to +visit and console; and at an early hour of the day +to take his place on the Lightning coach, and go down +to his friends at Brighton. In the course of the +day Miss Osborne heard her father give orders that + that meddling scoundrel, Captain Dobbin, should never +be admitted within his doors again, and any hopes +in which she may have indulged privately were thus +abruptly brought to an end. Mr. Frederick Bullock +came, and was particularly affectionate to Maria, and +attentive to the broken-spirited old gentleman. For +though he said his mind would be easy, the means which +he had taken to secure quiet did not seem to have +succeeded as yet, and the events of the past two days +had visibly shattered him.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which All the Principal Personages Think Fit to</h4> +Leave Brighton + +<p>Conducted to the ladies, at the Ship Inn, Dobbin assumed +a jovial and rattling manner, which proved that this +young officer was becoming a more consummate hypocrite +every day of his life. He was trying to hide his +own private feelings, first upon seeing Mrs. George +Osborne in her new condition, and secondly to mask +the apprehensions he entertained as to the effect +which the dismal news brought down by him would certainly +have upon her.</p> + +<p>“It is my opinion, George,” he said, “that +the French Emperor will be upon us, horse and foot, +before three weeks are over, and will give the Duke +such a dance as shall make the Peninsula appear mere +child’s play. But you need not say that to Mrs. +Osborne, you know. There mayn’t be any fighting +on our side after all, and our business in Belgium +may turn out to be a mere military occupation. Many +persons think so; and Brussels is full of fine people +and ladies of fashion.” So it was agreed to +represent the duty of the British army in Belgium +in this harmless light to Amelia.</p> + +<p>This plot being arranged, the hypocritical Dobbin +saluted Mrs. George Osborne quite gaily, tried to +pay her one or two compliments relative to her new +position as a bride (which compliments, it must be +confessed, were exceedingly clumsy and hung fire woefully), +and then fell to talking about Brighton, and the sea-air, +and the gaieties of the place, and the beauties of +the road and the merits of the Lightning coach and +horses--all in a manner quite incomprehensible to +Amelia, and very amusing to Rebecca, who was watching +the Captain, as indeed she watched every one near whom +she came.</p> + +<p>Little Amelia, it must be owned, had rather a mean +opinion of her husband’s friend, Captain Dobbin. + He lisped--he was very plain and homely-looking: +and exceedingly awkward and ungainly. She liked him +for his attachment to her husband (to be sure there +was very little merit in that), and she thought George +was most generous and kind in extending his friendship +to his brother officer. George had mimicked Dobbin’s +lisp and queer manners many times to her, though to +do him justice, he always spoke most highly of his +friend’s good qualities. In her little day of +triumph, and not knowing him intimately as yet, she +made light of honest William--and he knew her opinions +of him quite well, and acquiesced in them very humbly. + A time came when she knew him better, and changed +her notions regarding him; but that was distant as +yet.</p> + +<p>As for Rebecca, Captain Dobbin had not been two hours +in the ladies’ company before she understood +his secret perfectly. She did not like him, and feared +him privately; nor was he very much prepossessed in +her favour. He was so honest, that her arts and cajoleries +did not affect him, and he shrank from her with instinctive +repulsion. And, as she was by no means so far superior +to her sex as to be above jealousy, she disliked him +the more for his adoration of Amelia. Nevertheless, +she was very respectful and cordial in her manner +towards him. A friend to the Osbornes! a friend to +her dearest benefactors! She vowed she should always +love him sincerely: she remembered him quite well +on the Vauxhall night, as she told Amelia archly, +and she made a little fun of him when the two ladies +went to dress for dinner. Rawdon Crawley paid scarcely +any attention to Dobbin, looking upon him as a good-natured +nincompoop and under-bred City man. Jos patronised +him with much dignity.</p> + +<p>When George and Dobbin were alone in the latter’s +room, to which George had followed him, Dobbin took +from his desk the letter which he had been charged +by Mr. Osborne to deliver to his son. “It’s +not in my father’s handwriting,” said +George, looking rather alarmed; nor was it: the letter +was from Mr. Osborne’s lawyer, and to the following +effect:</p> + +<p align="center">“Bedford +Row, May 7, 1815.</p> + +<p>“<i>Sir</i>,</p> + +<p>“I am commissioned by Mr. Osborne to inform +you, that he abides by the determination which he +before expressed to you, and that in consequence of +the marriage which you have been pleased to contract, +he ceases to consider you henceforth as a member of +his family. This determination is final and irrevocable.</p> + +<p>“Although the monies expended upon you in your +minority, and the bills which you have drawn upon +him so unsparingly of late years, far exceed in amount +the sum to which you are entitled in your own right +(being the third part of the fortune of your mother, +the late Mrs. Osborne and which reverted to you at +her decease, and to Miss Jane Osborne and Miss Maria +Frances Osborne); yet I am instructed by Mr. Osborne +to say, that he waives all claim upon your estate, +and that the sum of £2000, 4 per cent. annuities, +at the value of the day (being your one-third share +of the sum of £6000), shall be paid over to yourself +or your agents upon your receipt for the same, by</p> + +<p align="center">“Your +obedient Servt.,<br> +“S. +<i>Higgs</i>.</p> + +<p>“P.S.--Mr. Osborne desires me to say, once for +all, that he declines to receive any messages, letters, +or communications from you on this or any other subject.</p> + +<p>“A pretty way you have managed the affair,” +said George, looking savagely at William Dobbin. +“Look there, Dobbin,” and he flung over +to the latter his parent’s letter. “A beggar, +by Jove, and all in consequence of my d--d sentimentality. + Why couldn’t we have waited? A ball might have +done for me in the course of the war, and may still, +and how will Emmy be bettered by being left a beggar’s +widow? It was all your doing. You were never easy +until you had got me married and ruined. What the +deuce am I to do with two thousand pounds? Such a +sum won’t last two years. I’ve lost a +hundred and forty to Crawley at cards and billiards +since I’ve been down here. A pretty manager +of a man’s matters <i>you</i> are, forsooth.”</p> + +<p>“There’s no denying that the position +is a hard one,” Dobbin replied, after reading +over the letter with a blank countenance; “and +as you say, it is partly of my making. There are some +men who wouldn’t mind changing with you,” +he added, with a bitter smile. “How many captains +in the regiment have two thousand pounds to the fore, +think you? You must live on your pay till your father +relents, and if you die, you leave your wife a hundred +a year.”</p> + +<p>“Do you suppose a man of my habits call live +on his pay and a hundred a year?” George cried +out in great anger. “You must be a fool to +talk so, Dobbin. How the deuce am I to keep up my +position in the world upon such a pitiful pittance? + I can’t change my habits. I must have my comforts. + I wasn’t brought up on porridge, like MacWhirter, +or on potatoes, like old O’Dowd. Do you expect +my wife to take in soldiers’ washing, or ride +after the regiment in a baggage waggon?”</p> + +<p>“Well, well,” said Dobbin, still good-naturedly, +“we’ll get her a better conveyance. But +try and remember that you are only a dethroned prince +now, George, my boy; and be quiet whilst the tempest +lasts. It won’t be for long. Let your name +be mentioned in the Gazette, and I’ll engage +the old father relents towards you:”</p> + +<p>“Mentioned in the Gazette!” George answered. + “And in what part of it? Among the killed +and wounded returns, and at the top of the list, very +likely.”</p> + +<p>“Psha! It will be time enough to cry out when +we are hurt,” Dobbin said. “And if anything +happens, you know, George, I have got a little, and +I am not a marrying man, and I shall not forget my +godson in my will,” he added, with a smile. +Whereupon the dispute ended--as many scores of such +conversations between Osborne and his friend had concluded +previously--by the former declaring there was no possibility +of being angry with Dobbin long, and forgiving him +very generously after abusing him without cause.</p> + +<p>“I say, Becky,” cried Rawdon Crawley out +of his dressing-room, to his lady, who was attiring +herself for dinner in her own chamber.</p> + +<p>“What?” said Becky’s shrill voice. + She was looking over her shoulder in the glass. +She had put on the neatest and freshest white frock +imaginable, and with bare shoulders and a little necklace, +and a light blue sash, she looked the image of youthful +innocence and girlish happiness.</p> + +<p>“I say, what’ll Mrs. O. do, when O. goes +out with the regiment?” Crawley said coming +into the room, performing a duet on his head with +two huge hair-brushes, and looking out from under his +hair with admiration on his pretty little wife.</p> + +<p>“I suppose she’ll cry her eyes out,” +Becky answered. “She has been whimpering half +a dozen times, at the very notion of it, already to +me.”</p> + +<p>“<i>You</i> don’t care, I suppose?” +Rawdon said, half angry at his wife’s want of +feeling.</p> + +<p>“You wretch! don’t you know that I intend +to go with you,” Becky replied. “Besides, +you’re different. You go as General Tufto’s +aide-de-camp. We don’t belong to the line,” +Mrs. Crawley said, throwing up her head with an air +that so enchanted her husband that he stooped down +and kissed it.</p> + +<p>“Rawdon dear--don’t you think--you’d +better get that--money from Cupid, before he goes?” +Becky continued, fixing on a killing bow. She called +George Osborne, Cupid. She had flattered him about +his good looks a score of times already. She watched +over him kindly at ecarte of a night when he would +drop in to Rawdon’s quarters for a half-hour +before bed-time.</p> + +<p>She had often called him a horrid dissipated wretch, +and threatened to tell Emmy of his wicked ways and +naughty extravagant habits. She brought his cigar +and lighted it for him; she knew the effect of that +manoeuvre, having practised it in former days upon +Rawdon Crawley. He thought her gay, brisk, arch, distinguee, +delightful. In their little drives and dinners, Becky, +of course, quite outshone poor Emmy, who remained +very mute and timid while Mrs. Crawley and her husband +rattled away together, and Captain Crawley (and Jos +after he joined the young married people) gobbled in +silence.</p> + +<p>Emmy’s mind somehow misgave her about her friend. +Rebecca’s wit, spirits, and accomplishments +troubled her with a rueful disquiet. They were only +a week married, and here was George already suffering +ennui, and eager for others’ society! She trembled +for the future. How shall I be a companion for him, +she thought--so clever and so brilliant, and I such +a humble foolish creature? How noble it was of him +to marry me--to give up everything and stoop down to +me! I ought to have refused him, only I had not the +heart. I ought to have stopped at home and taken +care of poor Papa. And her neglect of her parents +(and indeed there was some foundation for this charge +which the poor child’s uneasy conscience brought +against her) was now remembered for the first time, +and caused her to blush with humiliation. Oh! thought +she, I have been very wicked and selfish-- selfish +in forgetting them in their sorrows--selfish in forcing +George to marry me. I know I’m not worthy of +him--I know he would have been happy without me--and +yet--I tried, I tried to give him up.</p> + +<p>It is hard when, before seven days of marriage are +over, such thoughts and confessions as these force +themselves on a little bride’s mind. But so +it was, and the night before Dobbin came to join these +young people--on a fine brilliant moonlight night of +May--so warm and balmy that the windows were flung +open to the balcony, from which George and Mrs. Crawley +were gazing upon the calm ocean spread shining before +them, while Rawdon and Jos were engaged at backgammon +within--Amelia couched in a great chair quite neglected, +and watching both these parties, felt a despair and +remorse such as were bitter companions for that tender +lonely soul. Scarce a week was past, and it was come +to this! The future, had she regarded it, offered +a dismal prospect; but Emmy was too shy, so to speak, +to look to that, and embark alone on that wide sea, +and unfit to navigate it without a guide and protector. + I know Miss Smith has a mean opinion of her. But +how many, my dear Madam, are endowed with your prodigious +strength of mind?</p> + +<p>“Gad, what a fine night, and how bright the +moon is!” George said, with a puff of his cigar, +which went soaring up skywards.</p> + +<p>“How delicious they smell in the open air! +I adore them. Who’d think the moon was two +hundred and thirty-six thousand eight hundred and +forty-seven miles off?” Becky added, gazing at +that orb with a smile. “Isn’t it clever +of me to remember that? Pooh! we learned it all +at Miss Pinkerton’s! How calm the sea is, and +how clear everything. I declare I can almost see +the coast of France!” and her bright green eyes +streamed out, and shot into the night as if they could +see through it.</p> + +<p>“Do you know what I intend to do one morning?” +she said; “I find I can swim beautifully, and +some day, when my Aunt Crawley’s companion--old +Briggs, you know--you remember her--that hook-nosed +woman, with the long wisps of hair--when Briggs goes +out to bathe, I intend to dive under her awning, and +insist on a reconciliation in the water. Isn’t +that a stratagem?”</p> + +<p>George burst out laughing at the idea of this aquatic +meeting. “What’s the row there, you two?” +Rawdon shouted out, rattling the box. Amelia was +making a fool of herself in an absurd hysterical manner, +and retired to her own room to whimper in private.</p> + +<p>Our history is destined in this chapter to go backwards +and forwards in a very irresolute manner seemingly, +and having conducted our story to to-morrow presently, +we shall immediately again have occasion to step back +to yesterday, so that the whole of the tale may get +a hearing. As you behold at her Majesty’s drawing-room, +the ambassadors’ and high dignitaries’ +carriages whisk off from a private door, while Captain +Jones’s ladies are waiting for their fly: as +you see in the Secretary of the Treasury’s antechamber, +a half-dozen of petitioners waiting patiently for +their audience, and called out one by one, when suddenly +an Irish member or some eminent personage enters the +apartment, and instantly walks into Mr. Under-Secretary +over the heads of all the people present: so in the +conduct of a tale, the romancer is obliged to exercise +this most partial sort of justice. Although all the +little incidents must be heard, yet they must be put +off when the great events make their appearance; and +surely such a circumstance as that which brought Dobbin +to Brighton, <i>viz</i>., the ordering out of the Guards +and the line to Belgium, and the mustering of the +allied armies in that country under the command of +his Grace the Duke of Wellington--such a dignified +circumstance as that, I say, was entitled to the pas +over all minor occurrences whereof this history is +composed mainly, and hence a little trifling disarrangement +and disorder was excusable and becoming. We have +only now advanced in time so far beyond Chapter XXII +as to have got our various characters up into their +dressing-rooms before the dinner, which took place +as usual on the day of Dobbin’s arrival.</p> + +<p>George was too humane or too much occupied with the +tie of his neckcloth to convey at once all the news +to Amelia which his comrade had brought with him from +London. He came into her room, however, holding the +attorney’s letter in his hand, and with so solemn +and important an air that his wife, always ingeniously +on the watch for calamity, thought the worst was about +to befall, and running up to her husband, besought +her dearest George to tell her everything--he was +ordered abroad; there would be a battle next week--she +knew there would.</p> + +<p>Dearest George parried the question about foreign +service, and with a melancholy shake of the head said, +“No, Emmy; it isn’t that: it’s +not myself I care about: it’s you. I have had +bad news from my father. He refuses any communication +with me; he has flung us off; and leaves us to poverty. + I can rough it well enough; but you, my dear, how +will you bear it? read here.” And he handed her +over the letter.</p> + +<p>Amelia, with a look of tender alarm in her eyes, listened +to her noble hero as he uttered the above generous +sentiments, and sitting down on the bed, read the +letter which George gave her with such a pompous martyr-like +air. Her face cleared up as she read the document, +however. The idea of sharing poverty and privation +in company with the beloved object is, as we have +before said, far from being disagreeable to a warm-hearted +woman. The notion was actually pleasant to little +Amelia. Then, as usual, she was ashamed of herself +for feeling happy at such an indecorous moment, and +checked her pleasure, saying demurely, “O, George, +how your poor heart must bleed at the idea of being +separated from your papa!”</p> + +<p>“It does,” said George, with an agonised +countenance.</p> + +<p>“But he can’t be angry with you long,” +she continued. “Nobody could, I’m sure. + He must forgive you, my dearest, kindest husband. + O, I shall never forgive myself if he does not.”</p> + +<p>“What vexes me, my poor Emmy, is not my misfortune, +but yours,” George said. “I don’t +care for a little poverty; and I think, without vanity, +I’ve talents enough to make my own way.”</p> + +<p>“That you have,” interposed his wife, +who thought that war should cease, and her husband +should be made a general instantly.</p> + +<p>“Yes, I shall make my way as well as another,” +Osborne went on; “but you, my dear girl, how +can I bear your being deprived of the comforts and +station in society which my wife had a right to expect? +My dearest girl in barracks; the wife of a soldier +in a marching regiment; subject to all sorts of annoyance +and privation! It makes me miserable.”</p> + +<p>Emmy, quite at ease, as this was her husband’s +only cause of disquiet, took his hand, and with a +radiant face and smile began to warble that stanza +from the favourite song of “Wapping Old Stairs,” +in which the heroine, after rebuking her Tom for inattention, +promises “his trousers to mend, and his grog +too to make,” if he will be constant and kind, +and not forsake her. “Besides,” she said, +after a pause, during which she looked as pretty and +happy as any young woman need, “isn’t +two thousand pounds an immense deal of money, George?”</p> + +<p>George laughed at her naivete; and finally they went +down to dinner, Amelia clinging to George’s +arm, still warbling the tune of “Wapping Old +Stairs,” and more pleased and light of mind than +she had been for some days past.</p> + +<p>Thus the repast, which at length came off, instead +of being dismal, was an exceedingly brisk and merry +one. The excitement of the campaign counteracted in +George’s mind the depression occasioned by the +disinheriting letter. Dobbin still kept up his character +of rattle. He amused the company with accounts of +the army in Belgium; where nothing but fetes and gaiety +and fashion were going on. Then, having a particular +end in view, this dexterous captain proceeded to describe +Mrs. Major O’Dowd packing her own and her Major’s +wardrobe, and how his best epaulets had been stowed +into a tea canister, whilst her own famous yellow +turban, with the bird of paradise wrapped in brown +paper, was locked up in the Major’s tin cocked-hat +case, and wondered what effect it would have at the +French king’s court at Ghent, or the great military +balls at Brussels.</p> + +<p>“Ghent! Brussels!” cried out Amelia with +a sudden shock and start. “Is the regiment ordered +away, George--is it ordered away?” A look of +terror came over the sweet smiling face, and she clung +to George as by an instinct.</p> + +<p>“Don’t be afraid, dear,” he said +good-naturedly; “it is but a twelve hours’ +passage. It won’t hurt you. You shall go, too, +Emmy.”</p> + +<p>“I intend to go,” said Becky. “I’m +on the staff. General Tufto is a great flirt of mine. + Isn’t he, Rawdon?” Rawdon laughed out +with his usual roar. William Dobbin flushed up quite +red. “She can’t go,” he said; “think +of the--of the danger,” he was going to add; +but had not all his conversation during dinner-time +tended to prove there was none? He became very confused +and silent.</p> + +<p>“I must and will go,” Amelia cried with +the greatest spirit; and George, applauding her resolution, +patted her under the chin, and asked all the persons +present if they ever saw such a termagant of a wife, +and agreed that the lady should bear him company. +“We’ll have Mrs. O’Dowd to chaperon +you,” he said. What cared she so long as her +husband was near her? Thus somehow the bitterness +of a parting was juggled away. Though war and danger +were in store, war and danger might not befall for +months to come. There was a respite at any rate, +which made the timid little Amelia almost as happy +as a full reprieve would have done, and which even +Dobbin owned in his heart was very welcome. For, +to be permitted to see her was now the greatest privilege +and hope of his life, and he thought with himself +secretly how he would watch and protect her. I wouldn’t +have let her go if I had been married to her, he thought. + But George was the master, and his friend did not +think fit to remonstrate.</p> + +<p>Putting her arm round her friend’s waist, Rebecca +at length carried Amelia off from the dinner-table +where so much business of importance had been discussed, +and left the gentlemen in a highly exhilarated state, +drinking and talking very gaily.</p> + +<p>In the course of the evening Rawdon got a little family-note +from his wife, which, although he crumpled it up and +burnt it instantly in the candle, we had the good +luck to read over Rebecca’s shoulder. “Great +news,” she wrote. “Mrs. Bute is gone. + Get the money from Cupid tonight, as he’ll +be off to-morrow most likely. Mind this.-- R.” +So when the little company was about adjourning to +coffee in the women’s apartment, Rawdon touched +Osborne on the elbow, and said gracefully, “I +say, Osborne, my boy, if quite convenient, I’ll +trouble you for that ’ere small trifle.” +It was not quite convenient, but nevertheless George +gave him a considerable present instalment in bank-notes +from his pocket-book, and a bill on his agents at +a week’s date, for the remaining sum.</p> + +<p>This matter arranged, George, and Jos, and Dobbin, +held a council of war over their cigars, and agreed +that a general move should be made for London in Jos’s +open carriage the next day. Jos, I think, would have +preferred staying until Rawdon Crawley quitted Brighton, +but Dobbin and George overruled him, and he agreed +to carry the party to town, and ordered four horses, +as became his dignity. With these they set off in +state, after breakfast, the next day. Amelia had +risen very early in the morning, and packed her little +trunks with the greatest alacrity, while Osborne lay +in bed deploring that she had not a maid to help her. + She was only too glad, however, to perform this office +for herself. A dim uneasy sentiment about Rebecca +filled her mind already; and although they kissed each +other most tenderly at parting, yet we know what jealousy +is; and Mrs. Amelia possessed that among other virtues +of her sex.</p> + +<p>Besides these characters who are coming and going +away, we must remember that there were some other +old friends of ours at Brighton; Miss Crawley, namely, +and the suite in attendance upon her. Now, although +Rebecca and her husband were but at a few stones’ +throw of the lodgings which the invalid Miss Crawley +occupied, the old lady’s door remained as pitilessly +closed to them as it had been heretofore in London. + As long as she remained by the side of her sister-in-law, +Mrs. Bute Crawley took care that her beloved Matilda +should not be agitated by a meeting with her nephew. + When the spinster took her drive, the faithful Mrs. +Bute sate beside her in the carriage. When Miss Crawley +took the air in a chair, Mrs. Bute marched on one +side of the vehicle, whilst honest Briggs occupied +the other wing. And if they met Rawdon and his wife +by chance--although the former constantly and obsequiously +took off his hat, the Miss-Crawley party passed him +by with such a frigid and killing indifference, that +Rawdon began to despair.</p> + +<p>“We might as well be in London as here,” +Captain Rawdon often said, with a downcast air.</p> + +<p>“A comfortable inn in Brighton is better than +a spunging-house in Chancery Lane,” his wife +answered, who was of a more cheerful temperament. + “Think of those two aides-de-camp of Mr. Moses, +the sheriff’s-officer, who watched our lodging +for a week. Our friends here are very stupid, but +Mr. Jos and Captain Cupid are better companions than +Mr. Moses’s men, Rawdon, my love.”</p> + +<p>“I wonder the writs haven’t followed me +down here,” Rawdon continued, still desponding.</p> + +<p>“When they do, we’ll find means to give +them the slip,” said dauntless little Becky, +and further pointed out to her husband the great comfort +and advantage of meeting Jos and Osborne, whose acquaintance +had brought to Rawdon Crawley a most timely little +supply of ready money.</p> + +<p>“It will hardly be enough to pay the inn bill,” +grumbled the Guardsman.</p> + +<p>“Why need we pay it?” said the lady, who +had an answer for everything.</p> + +<p>Through Rawdon’s valet, who still kept up a +trifling acquaintance with the male inhabitants of +Miss Crawley’s servants’ hall, and was +instructed to treat the coachman to drink whenever +they met, old Miss Crawley’s movements were +pretty well known by our young couple; and Rebecca +luckily bethought herself of being unwell, and of +calling in the same apothecary who was in attendance +upon the spinster, so that their information was on +the whole tolerably complete. Nor was Miss Briggs, +although forced to adopt a hostile attitude, secretly +inimical to Rawdon and his wife. She was naturally +of a kindly and forgiving disposition. Now that the +cause of jealousy was removed, her dislike for Rebecca +disappeared also, and she remembered the latter’s +invariable good words and good humour. And, indeed, +she and Mrs. Firkin, the lady’s-maid, and the +whole of Miss Crawley’s household, groaned under +the tyranny of the triumphant Mrs. Bute.</p> + +<p>As often will be the case, that good but imperious +woman pushed her advantages too far, and her successes +quite unmercifully. She had in the course of a few +weeks brought the invalid to such a state of helpless +docility, that the poor soul yielded herself entirely +to her sister’s orders, and did not even dare +to complain of her slavery to Briggs or Firkin. Mrs. +Bute measured out the glasses of wine which Miss Crawley +was daily allowed to take, with irresistible accuracy, +greatly to the annoyance of Firkin and the butler, +who found themselves deprived of control over even +the sherry-bottle. She apportioned the sweetbreads, +jellies, chickens; their quantity and order. Night +and noon and morning she brought the abominable drinks +ordained by the Doctor, and made her patient swallow +them with so affecting an obedience that Firkin said +“my poor Missus du take her physic like a lamb.” +She prescribed the drive in the carriage or the ride +in the chair, and, in a word, ground down the old +lady in her convalescence in such a way as only belongs +to your proper-managing, motherly moral woman. If +ever the patient faintly resisted, and pleaded for +a little bit more dinner or a little drop less medicine, +the nurse threatened her with instantaneous death, +when Miss Crawley instantly gave in. “She’s +no spirit left in her,” Firkin remarked to Briggs; +“she ain’t ave called me a fool these +three weeks.” Finally, Mrs. Bute had made up +her mind to dismiss the aforesaid honest lady’s-maid, +Mr. Bowls the large confidential man, and Briggs herself, +and to send for her daughters from the Rectory, previous +to removing the dear invalid bodily to Queen’s +Crawley, when an odious accident happened which called +her away from duties so pleasing. The Reverend Bute +Crawley, her husband, riding home one night, fell +with his horse and broke his collar-bone. Fever and +inflammatory symptoms set in, and Mrs. Bute was forced +to leave Sussex for Hampshire. As soon as ever Bute +was restored, she promised to return to her dearest +friend, and departed, leaving the strongest injunctions +with the household regarding their behaviour to their +mistress; and as soon as she got into the Southampton +coach, there was such a jubilee and sense of relief +in all Miss Crawley’s house, as the company +of persons assembled there had not experienced for +many a week before. That very day Miss Crawley left +off her afternoon dose of medicine: that afternoon +Bowls opened an independent bottle of sherry for himself +and Mrs. Firkin: that night Miss Crawley and Miss +Briggs indulged in a game of piquet instead of one +of Porteus’s sermons. It was as in the old nursery-story, +when the stick forgot to beat the dog, and the whole +course of events underwent a peaceful and happy revolution.</p> + +<p>At a very early hour in the morning, twice or thrice +a week, Miss Briggs used to betake herself to a bathing-machine, +and disport in the water in a flannel gown and an +oilskin cap. Rebecca, as we have seen, was aware +of this circumstance, and though she did not attempt +to storm Briggs as she had threatened, and actually +dive into that lady’s presence and surprise +her under the sacredness of the awning, Mrs. Rawdon +determined to attack Briggs as she came away from her +bath, refreshed and invigorated by her dip, and likely +to be in good humour.</p> + +<p>So getting up very early the next morning, Becky brought +the telescope in their sitting-room, which faced the +sea, to bear upon the bathing-machines on the beach; +saw Briggs arrive, enter her box; and put out to sea; +and was on the shore just as the nymph of whom she +came in quest stepped out of the little caravan on +to the shingles. It was a pretty picture: the beach; +the bathing-women’s faces; the long line of +rocks and building were blushing and bright in the +sunshine. Rebecca wore a kind, tender smile on her +face, and was holding out her pretty white hand as +Briggs emerged from the box. What could Briggs do +but accept the salutation?</p> + +<p>“Miss Sh--Mrs. Crawley,” she said.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crawley seized her hand, pressed it to her heart, +and with a sudden impulse, flinging her arms round +Briggs, kissed her affectionately. “Dear, dear +friend!” she said, with a touch of such natural +feeling, that Miss Briggs of course at once began to +melt, and even the bathing-woman was mollified.</p> + +<p>Rebecca found no difficulty in engaging Briggs in +a long, intimate, and delightful conversation. Everything +that had passed since the morning of Becky’s +sudden departure from Miss Crawley’s house in +Park Lane up to the present day, and Mrs. Bute’s +happy retreat, was discussed and described by Briggs. + All Miss Crawley’s symptoms, and the particulars +of her illness and medical treatment, were narrated +by the confidante with that fulness and accuracy which +women delight in. About their complaints and their +doctors do ladies ever tire of talking to each other? + Briggs did not on this occasion; nor did Rebecca +weary of listening. She was thankful, truly thankful, +that the dear kind Briggs, that the faithful, the +invaluable Firkin, had been permitted to remain with +their benefactress through her illness. Heaven bless +her! though she, Rebecca, had seemed to act undutifully +towards Miss Crawley; yet was not her fault a natural +and excusable one? Could she help giving her hand to +the man who had won her heart? Briggs, the sentimental, +could only turn up her eyes to heaven at this appeal, +and heave a sympathetic sigh, and think that she, +too, had given away her affections long years ago, +and own that Rebecca was no very great criminal.</p> + +<p>“Can I ever forget her who so befriended the +friendless orphan? No, though she has cast me off,” +the latter said, “I shall never cease to love +her, and I would devote my life to her service. As +my own benefactress, as my beloved Rawdon’s +adored relative, I love and admire Miss Crawley, dear +Miss Briggs, beyond any woman in the world, and next +to her I love all those who are faithful to her. I +would never have treated Miss Crawley’s faithful +friends as that odious designing Mrs. Bute has done. + Rawdon, who was all heart,” Rebecca continued, +“although his outward manners might seem rough +and careless, had said a hundred times, with tears +in his eyes, that he blessed Heaven for sending his +dearest Aunty two such admirable nurses as her attached +Firkin and her admirable Miss Briggs. Should the +machinations of the horrible Mrs. Bute end, as she +too much feared they would, in banishing everybody +that Miss Crawley loved from her side, and leaving +that poor lady a victim to those harpies at the Rectory, +Rebecca besought her (Miss Briggs) to remember that +her own home, humble as it was, was always open to +receive Briggs. Dear friend,” she exclaimed, +in a transport of enthusiasm, “some hearts can +never forget benefits; all women are not Bute Crawleys! +Though why should I complain of her,” Rebecca +added; “though I have been her tool and the +victim to her arts, do I not owe my dearest Rawdon +to her?” And Rebecca unfolded to Briggs all +Mrs. Bute’s conduct at Queen’s Crawley, +which, though unintelligible to her then, was clearly +enough explained by the events now--now that the attachment +had sprung up which Mrs. Bute had encouraged by a +thousand artifices--now that two innocent people had +fallen into the snares which she had laid for them, +and loved and married and been ruined through her +schemes.</p> + +<p>It was all very true. Briggs saw the stratagems as +clearly as possible. Mrs. Bute had made the match +between Rawdon and Rebecca. Yet, though the latter +was a perfectly innocent victim, Miss Briggs could +not disguise from her friend her fear that Miss Crawley’s +affections were hopelessly estranged from Rebecca, +and that the old lady would never forgive her nephew +for making so imprudent a marriage.</p> + +<p>On this point Rebecca had her own opinion, and still +kept up a good heart. If Miss Crawley did not forgive +them at present, she might at least relent on a future +day. Even now, there was only that puling, sickly +Pitt Crawley between Rawdon and a baronetcy; and should +anything happen to the former, all would be well. +At all events, to have Mrs. Bute’s designs exposed, +and herself well abused, was a satisfaction, and might +be advantageous to Rawdon’s interest; and Rebecca, +after an hour’s chat with her recovered friend, +left her with the most tender demonstrations of regard, +and quite assured that the conversation they had had +together would be reported to Miss Crawley before +many hours were over.</p> + +<p>This interview ended, it became full time for Rebecca +to return to her inn, where all the party of the previous +day were assembled at a farewell breakfast. Rebecca +took such a tender leave of Amelia as became two women +who loved each other as sisters; and having used her +handkerchief plentifully, and hung on her friend’s +neck as if they were parting for ever, and waved the +handkerchief (which was quite dry, by the way) out +of window, as the carriage drove off, she came back +to the breakfast table, and ate some prawns with a +good deal of appetite, considering her emotion; and +while she was munching these delicacies, explained +to Rawdon what had occurred in her morning walk between +herself and Briggs. Her hopes were very high: she +made her husband share them. She generally succeeded +in making her husband share all her opinions, whether +melancholy or cheerful.</p> + +<p>“You will now, if you please, my dear, sit down +at the writing-table and pen me a pretty little letter +to Miss Crawley, in which you’ll say that you +are a good boy, and that sort of thing.” So +Rawdon sate down, and wrote off, “Brighton, +Thursday,” and “My dear Aunt,” with +great rapidity: but there the gallant officer’s +imagination failed him. He mumbled the end of his +pen, and looked up in his wife’s face. She +could not help laughing at his rueful countenance, +and marching up and down the room with her hands behind +her, the little woman began to dictate a letter, which +he took down.</p> + +<p>“Before quitting the country and commencing +a campaign, which very possibly may be fatal.”</p> + +<p>“What?” said Rawdon, rather surprised, +but took the humour of the phrase, and presently wrote +it down with a grin.</p> + +<p>“Which very possibly may be fatal, I have come +hither--”</p> + +<p>“Why not say come here, Becky? Come here’s +grammar,” the dragoon interposed.</p> + +<p>“I have come hither,” Rebecca insisted, +with a stamp of her foot, “to say farewell to +my dearest and earliest friend. I beseech you before +I go, not perhaps to return, once more to let me press +the hand from which I have received nothing but kindnesses +all my life.”</p> + +<p>“Kindnesses all my life,” echoed Rawdon, +scratching down the words, and quite amazed at his +own facility of composition.</p> + +<p>“I ask nothing from you but that we should part +not in anger. I have the pride of my family on some +points, though not on all. I married a painter’s +daughter, and am not ashamed of the union.”</p> + +<p>“No, run me through the body if I am!” +Rawdon ejaculated.</p> + +<p>“You old booby,” Rebecca said, pinching +his ear and looking over to see that he made no mistakes +in spelling--"beseech is not spelt with an a, and +earliest is.” So he altered these words, bowing +to the superior knowledge of his little Missis.</p> + +<p>“I thought that you were aware of the progress +of my attachment,” Rebecca continued: “I +knew that Mrs. Bute Crawley confirmed and encouraged +it. But I make no reproaches. I married a poor woman, +and am content to abide by what I have done. Leave +your property, dear Aunt, as you will. I shall never +complain of the way in which you dispose of it. I +would have you believe that I love you for yourself, +and not for money’s sake. I want to be reconciled +to you ere I leave England. Let me, let me see you +before I go. A few weeks or months hence it may be +too late, and I cannot bear the notion of quitting +the country without a kind word of farewell from you.”</p> + +<p>“She won’t recognise my style in that,” +said Becky. “I made the sentences short and +brisk on purpose.” And this authentic missive +was despatched under cover to Miss Briggs.</p> + +<p>Old Miss Crawley laughed when Briggs, with great mystery, +handed her over this candid and simple statement. + “We may read it now Mrs. Bute is away,” +she said. “Read it to me, Briggs.”</p> + +<p>When Briggs had read the epistle out, her patroness +laughed more. “Don’t you see, you goose,” +she said to Briggs, who professed to be much touched +by the honest affection which pervaded the composition, +“don’t you see that Rawdon never wrote +a word of it. He never wrote to me without asking +for money in his life, and all his letters are full +of bad spelling, and dashes, and bad grammar. It is +that little serpent of a governess who rules him.” +They are all alike, Miss Crawley thought in her heart. + They all want me dead, and are hankering for my money.</p> + +<p>“I don’t mind seeing Rawdon,” she +added, after a pause, and in a tone of perfect indifference. + “I had just as soon shake hands with him as +not. Provided there is no scene, why shouldn’t +we meet? I don’t mind. But human patience +has its limits; and mind, my dear, I respectfully +decline to receive Mrs. Rawdon--I can’t support +that quite"--and Miss Briggs was fain to be content +with this half-message of conciliation; and thought +that the best method of bringing the old lady and +her nephew together, was to warn Rawdon to be in waiting +on the Cliff, when Miss Crawley went out for her air +in her chair. There they met. I don’t know +whether Miss Crawley had any private feeling of regard +or emotion upon seeing her old favourite; but she +held out a couple of fingers to him with as smiling +and good-humoured an air, as if they had met only the +day before. And as for Rawdon, he turned as red as +scarlet, and wrung off Briggs’s hand, so great +was his rapture and his confusion at the meeting. +Perhaps it was interest that moved him: or perhaps +affection: perhaps he was touched by the change which +the illness of the last weeks had wrought in his aunt.</p> + +<p>“The old girl has always acted like a trump +to me,” he said to his wife, as he narrated +the interview, “and I felt, you know, rather +queer, and that sort of thing. I walked by the side +of the what-dy’e-call-’em, you know, +and to her own door, where Bowls came to help her +in. And I wanted to go in very much, only--”</p> + +<p>“<i>You didn’t go in</i>, +Rawdon!” screamed his wife.</p> + +<p>“No, my dear; I’m hanged if I wasn’t +afraid when it came to the point.”</p> + +<p>“You fool! you ought to have gone in, and never +come out again,” Rebecca said.</p> + +<p>“Don’t call me names,” said the +big Guardsman, sulkily. “Perhaps I <i>was</i> +a fool, Becky, but you shouldn’t say so”; +and he gave his wife a look, such as his countenance +could wear when angered, and such as was not pleasant +to face.</p> + +<p>“Well, dearest, to-morrow you must be on the +look-out, and go and see her, mind, whether she asks +you or no,” Rebecca said, trying to soothe her +angry yoke-mate. On which he replied, that he would +do exactly as he liked, and would just thank her to +keep a civil tongue in her head--and the wounded husband +went away, and passed the forenoon at the billiard-room, +sulky, silent, and suspicious.</p> + +<p>But before the night was over he was compelled to +give in, and own, as usual, to his wife’s superior +prudence and foresight, by the most melancholy confirmation +of the presentiments which she had regarding the consequences +of the mistake which he had made. Miss Crawley must +have had some emotion upon seeing him and shaking hands +with him after so long a rupture. She mused upon +the meeting a considerable time. “Rawdon is +getting very fat and old, Briggs,” she said +to her companion. “His nose has become red, +and he is exceedingly coarse in appearance. His marriage +to that woman has hopelessly vulgarised him. Mrs. +Bute always said they drank together; and I have no +doubt they do. Yes: he smelt of gin abominably. + I remarked it. Didn’t you?”</p> + +<p>In vain Briggs interposed that Mrs. Bute spoke ill +of everybody: and, as far as a person in her humble +position could judge, was an--</p> + +<p>“An artful designing woman? Yes, so she is, +and she does speak ill of every one--but I am certain +that woman has made Rawdon drink. All those low people +do--”</p> + +<p>“He was very much affected at seeing you, ma’am,” +the companion said; “and I am sure, when you +remember that he is going to the field of danger--”</p> + +<p>“How much money has he promised you, Briggs?” +the old spinster cried out, working herself into a +nervous rage--"there now, of course you begin to cry. + I hate scenes. Why am I always to be worried? Go +and cry up in your own room, and send Firkin to me--no, +stop, sit down and blow your nose, and leave off crying, +and write a letter to Captain Crawley.” Poor +Briggs went and placed herself obediently at the writing-book. + Its leaves were blotted all over with relics of the +firm, strong, rapid handwriting of the spinster’s +late amanuensis, Mrs. Bute Crawley.</p> + +<p>“Begin ‘My dear sir,’ or ‘Dear +sir,’ that will be better, and say you are desired +by Miss Crawley--no, by Miss Crawley’s medical +man, by Mr. Creamer, to state that my health is such +that all strong emotions would be dangerous in my +present delicate condition--and that I must decline +any family discussions or interviews whatever. And +thank him for coming to Brighton, and so forth, and +beg him not to stay any longer on my account. And, +Miss Briggs, you may add that I wish him a bon voyage, +and that if he will take the trouble to call upon +my lawyer’s in Gray’s Inn Square, he will +find there a communication for him. Yes, that will +do; and that will make him leave Brighton.” +The benevolent Briggs penned this sentence with the +utmost satisfaction.</p> + +<p>“To seize upon me the very day after Mrs. Bute +was gone,” the old lady prattled on; “it +was too indecent. Briggs, my dear, write to Mrs. Crawley, +and say <i>she</i> needn’t come back. No--she +needn’t--and she shan’t--and I won’t +be a slave in my own house--and I won’t be starved +and choked with poison. They all want to kill me--all-- +all"--and with this the lonely old woman burst into +a scream of hysterical tears.</p> + +<p>The last scene of her dismal Vanity Fair comedy was +fast approaching; the tawdry lamps were going out +one by one; and the dark curtain was almost ready +to descend.</p> + +<p>That final paragraph, which referred Rawdon to Miss +Crawley’s solicitor in London, and which Briggs +had written so good-naturedly, consoled the dragoon +and his wife somewhat, after their first blank disappointment, +on reading the spinster’s refusal of a reconciliation. + And it effected the purpose for which the old lady +had caused it to be written, by making Rawdon very +eager to get to London.</p> + +<p>Out of Jos’s losings and George Osborne’s +bank-notes, he paid his bill at the inn, the landlord +whereof does not probably know to this day how doubtfully +his account once stood. For, as a general sends his +baggage to the rear before an action, Rebecca had wisely +packed up all their chief valuables and sent them +off under care of George’s servant, who went +in charge of the trunks on the coach back to London. + Rawdon and his wife returned by the same conveyance +next day.</p> + +<p>“I should have liked to see the old girl before +we went,” Rawdon said. “She looks so +cut up and altered that I’m sure she can’t +last long. I wonder what sort of a cheque I shall +have at Waxy’s. Two hundred--it can’t +be less than two hundred--hey, Becky?”</p> + +<p>In consequence of the repeated visits of the aides-de-camp +of the Sheriff of Middlesex, Rawdon and his wife did +not go back to their lodgings at Brompton, but put +up at an inn. Early the next morning, Rebecca had +an opportunity of seeing them as she skirted that suburb +on her road to old Mrs. Sedley’s house at Fulham, +whither she went to look for her dear Amelia and her +Brighton friends. They were all off to Chatham, thence +to Harwich, to take shipping for Belgium with the +regiment--kind old Mrs. Sedley very much depressed +and tearful, solitary. Returning from this visit, +Rebecca found her husband, who had been off to Gray’s +Inn, and learnt his fate. He came back furious.</p> + +<p>“By Jove, Becky,” says he, “she’s +only given me twenty pound!”</p> + +<p>Though it told against themselves, the joke was too +good, and Becky burst out laughing at Rawdon’s +discomfiture.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXVI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Between London and Chatham</h4> + +<p>On quitting Brighton, our friend George, as became +a person of rank and fashion travelling in a barouche +with four horses, drove in state to a fine hotel in +Cavendish Square, where a suite of splendid rooms, +and a table magnificently furnished with plate and +surrounded by a half-dozen of black and silent waiters, +was ready to receive the young gentleman and his bride. + George did the honours of the place with a princely +air to Jos and Dobbin; and Amelia, for the first time, +and with exceeding shyness and timidity, presided at +what George called her own table.</p> + +<p>George pooh-poohed the wine and bullied the waiters +royally, and Jos gobbled the turtle with immense satisfaction. +Dobbin helped him to it; for the lady of the house, +before whom the tureen was placed, was so ignorant +of the contents, that she was going to help Mr. Sedley +without bestowing upon him either calipash or calipee.</p> + +<p>The splendour of the entertainment, and the apartments +in which it was given, alarmed Mr. Dobbin, who remonstrated +after dinner, when Jos was asleep in the great chair. + But in vain he cried out against the enormity of +turtle and champagne that was fit for an archbishop. +“I’ve always been accustomed to travel +like a gentleman,” George said, “and, +damme, my wife shall travel like a lady. As long as +there’s a shot in the locker, she shall want +for nothing,” said the generous fellow, quite +pleased with himself for his magnificence of spirit. + Nor did Dobbin try and convince him that Amelia’s +happiness was not centred in turtle-soup.</p> + +<p>A while after dinner, Amelia timidly expressed a wish +to go and see her mamma, at Fulham: which permission +George granted her with some grumbling. And she tripped +away to her enormous bedroom, in the centre of which +stood the enormous funereal bed, “that the Emperor +Halixander’s sister slep in when the allied sufferings +was here,” and put on her little bonnet and +shawl with the utmost eagerness and pleasure. George +was still drinking claret when she returned to the +dining-room, and made no signs of moving. “Ar’n’t +you coming with me, dearest?” she asked him. + No; the “dearest” had “business” +that night. His man should get her a coach and go +with her. And the coach being at the door of the +hotel, Amelia made George a little disappointed curtsey +after looking vainly into his face once or twice, +and went sadly down the great staircase, Captain Dobbin +after, who handed her into the vehicle, and saw it +drive away to its destination. The very valet was +ashamed of mentioning the address to the hackney-coachman +before the hotel waiters, and promised to instruct +him when they got further on.</p> + +<p>Dobbin walked home to his old quarters and the Slaughters’, +thinking very likely that it would be delightful to +be in that hackney-coach, along with Mrs. Osborne. +George was evidently of quite a different taste; for +when he had taken wine enough, he went off to half-price +at the play, to see Mr. Kean perform in Shylock. Captain +Osborne was a great lover of the drama, and had himself +performed high-comedy characters with great distinction +in several garrison theatrical entertainments. Jos +slept on until long after dark, when he woke up with +a start at the motions of his servant, who was removing +and emptying the decanters on the table; and the hackney-coach +stand was again put into requisition for a carriage +to convey this stout hero to his lodgings and bed.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sedley, you may be sure, clasped her daughter +to her heart with all maternal eagerness and affection, +running out of the door as the carriage drew up before +the little garden-gate, to welcome the weeping, trembling, +young bride. Old Mr. Clapp, who was in his shirt-sleeves, +trimming the garden-plot, shrank back alarmed. The +Irish servant-lass rushed up from the kitchen and smiled +a “God bless you.” Amelia could hardly +walk along the flags and up the steps into the parlour.</p> + +<p>How the floodgates were opened, and mother and daughter +wept, when they were together embracing each other +in this sanctuary, may readily be imagined by every +reader who possesses the least sentimental turn. +When don’t ladies weep? At what occasion of +joy, sorrow, or other business of life, and, after +such an event as a marriage, mother and daughter were +surely at liberty to give way to a sensibility which +is as tender as it is refreshing. About a question +of marriage I have seen women who hate each other kiss +and cry together quite fondly. How much more do they +feel when they love! Good mothers are married over +again at their daughters’ weddings: and as for +subsequent events, who does not know how ultra-maternal +grandmothers are?--in fact a woman, until she is a +grandmother, does not often really know what to be +a mother is. Let us respect Amelia and her mamma +whispering and whimpering and laughing and crying +in the parlour and the twilight. Old Mr. Sedley did. + <i>He</i> had not divined who was in the carriage when +it drove up. He had not flown out to meet his daughter, +though he kissed her very warmly when she entered +the room (where he was occupied, as usual, with his +papers and tapes and statements of accounts), and after +sitting with the mother and daughter for a short time, +he very wisely left the little apartment in their +possession.</p> + +<p>George’s valet was looking on in a very supercilious +manner at Mr. Clapp in his shirt-sleeves, watering +his rose-bushes. He took off his hat, however, with +much condescension to Mr. Sedley, who asked news about +his son-in-law, and about Jos’s carriage, and +whether his horses had been down to Brighton, and +about that infernal traitor Bonaparty, and the war; +until the Irish maid-servant came with a plate and +a bottle of wine, from which the old gentleman insisted +upon helping the valet. He gave him a half-guinea +too, which the servant pocketed with a mixture of +wonder and contempt. “To the health of your +master and mistress, Trotter,” Mr. Sedley said, +“and here’s something to drink your health +when you get home, Trotter.”</p> + +<p>There were but nine days past since Amelia had left +that little cottage and home--and yet how far off +the time seemed since she had bidden it farewell. + What a gulf lay between her and that past life. She +could look back to it from her present standing-place, +and contemplate, almost as another being, the young +unmarried girl absorbed in her love, having no eyes +but for one special object, receiving parental affection +if not ungratefully, at least indifferently, and as +if it were her due--her whole heart and thoughts bent +on the accomplishment of one desire. The review of +those days, so lately gone yet so far away, touched +her with shame; and the aspect of the kind parents +filled her with tender remorse. Was the prize gained--the +heaven of life--and the winner still doubtful and +unsatisfied? As his hero and heroine pass the matrimonial +barrier, the novelist generally drops the curtain, +as if the drama were over then: the doubts and struggles +of life ended: as if, once landed in the marriage +country, all were green and pleasant there: and wife +and husband had nothing to do but to link each other’s +arms together, and wander gently downwards towards +old age in happy and perfect fruition. But our little +Amelia was just on the bank of her new country, and +was already looking anxiously back towards the sad +friendly figures waving farewell to her across the +stream, from the other distant shore.</p> + +<p>In honour of the young bride’s arrival, her +mother thought it necessary to prepare I don’t +know what festive entertainment, and after the first +ebullition of talk, took leave of Mrs. George Osborne +for a while, and dived down to the lower regions of +the house to a sort of kitchen-parlour (occupied by +Mr. and Mrs. Clapp, and in the evening, when her dishes +were washed and her curl-papers removed, by Miss Flannigan, +the Irish servant), there to take measures for the +preparing of a magnificent ornamented tea. All people +have their ways of expressing kindness, and it seemed +to Mrs. Sedley that a muffin and a quantity of orange +marmalade spread out in a little cut-glass saucer +would be peculiarly agreeable refreshments to Amelia +in her most interesting situation.</p> + +<p>While these delicacies were being transacted below, +Amelia, leaving the drawing-room, walked upstairs +and found herself, she scarce knew how, in the little +room which she had occupied before her marriage, and +in that very chair in which she had passed so many +bitter hours. She sank back in its arms as if it were +an old friend; and fell to thinking over the past +week, and the life beyond it. Already to be looking +sadly and vaguely back: always to be pining for something +which, when obtained, brought doubt and sadness rather +than pleasure; here was the lot of our poor little +creature and harmless lost wanderer in the great struggling +crowds of Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>Here she sate, and recalled to herself fondly that +image of George to which she had knelt before marriage. + Did she own to herself how different the real man +was from that superb young hero whom she had worshipped? + It requires many, many years--and a man must be very +bad indeed--before a woman’s pride and vanity +will let her own to such a confession. Then Rebecca’s +twinkling green eyes and baleful smile lighted upon +her, and filled her with dismay. And so she sate +for awhile indulging in her usual mood of selfish brooding, +in that very listless melancholy attitude in which +the honest maid-servant had found her, on the day +when she brought up the letter in which George renewed +his offer of marriage.</p> + +<p>She looked at the little white bed, which had been +hers a few days before, and thought she would like +to sleep in it that night, and wake, as formerly, +with her mother smiling over her in the morning: Then +she thought with terror of the great funereal damask +pavilion in the vast and dingy state bedroom, which +was awaiting her at the grand hotel in Cavendish Square. + Dear little white bed! how many a long night had +she wept on its pillow! How she had despaired and +hoped to die there; and now were not all her wishes +accomplished, and the lover of whom she had despaired +her own for ever? Kind mother! how patiently and +tenderly she had watched round that bed! She went +and knelt down by the bedside; and there this wounded +and timorous, but gentle and loving soul, sought for +consolation, where as yet, it must be owned, our little +girl had but seldom looked for it. Love had been +her faith hitherto; and the sad, bleeding disappointed +heart began to feel the want of another consoler.</p> + +<p>Have we a right to repeat or to overhear her prayers? +These, brother, are secrets, and out of the domain +of Vanity Fair, in which our story lies.</p> + +<p>But this may be said, that when the tea was finally +announced, our young lady came downstairs a great +deal more cheerful; that she did not despond, or deplore +her fate, or think about George’s coldness, +or Rebecca’s eyes, as she had been wont to do +of late. She went downstairs, and kissed her father +and mother, and talked to the old gentleman, and made +him more merry than he had been for many a day. She +sate down at the piano which Dobbin had bought for +her, and sang over all her father’s favourite +old songs. She pronounced the tea to be excellent, +and praised the exquisite taste in which the marmalade +was arranged in the saucers. And in determining to +make everybody else happy, she found herself so; and +was sound asleep in the great funereal pavilion, and +only woke up with a smile when George arrived from +the theatre.</p> + +<p>For the next day, George had more important “business” +to transact than that which took him to see Mr. Kean +in Shylock. Immediately on his arrival in London +he had written off to his father’s solicitors, +signifying his royal pleasure that an interview should +take place between them on the morrow. His hotel +bill, losses at billiards and cards to Captain Crawley +had almost drained the young man’s purse, which +wanted replenishing before he set out on his travels, +and he had no resource but to infringe upon the two +thousand pounds which the attorneys were commissioned +to pay over to him. He had a perfect belief in his +own mind that his father would relent before very +long. How could any parent be obdurate for a length +of time against such a paragon as he was? If his +mere past and personal merits did not succeed in mollifying +his father, George determined that he would distinguish +himself so prodigiously in the ensuing campaign that +the old gentleman must give in to him. And if not? +Bah! the world was before him. His luck might change +at cards, and there was a deal of spending in two +thousand pounds.</p> + +<p>So he sent off Amelia once more in a carriage to her +mamma, with strict orders and carte blanche to the +two ladies to purchase everything requisite for a +lady of Mrs. George Osborne’s fashion, who was +going on a foreign tour. They had but one day to complete +the outfit, and it may be imagined that their business +therefore occupied them pretty fully. In a carriage +once more, bustling about from milliner to linen-draper, +escorted back to the carriage by obsequious shopmen +or polite owners, Mrs. Sedley was herself again almost, +and sincerely happy for the first time since their +misfortunes. Nor was Mrs. Amelia at all above the +pleasure of shopping, and bargaining, and seeing and +buying pretty things. (Would any man, the most philosophic, +give twopence for a woman who was?) She gave herself +a little treat, obedient to her husband’s orders, +and purchased a quantity of lady’s gear, showing +a great deal of taste and elegant discernment, as +all the shopfolks said.</p> + +<p>And about the war that was ensuing, Mrs. Osborne was +not much alarmed; Bonaparty was to be crushed almost +without a struggle. Margate packets were sailing every +day, filled with men of fashion and ladies of note, +on their way to Brussels and Ghent. People were going +not so much to a war as to a fashionable tour. The +newspapers laughed the wretched upstart and swindler +to scorn. Such a Corsican wretch as that withstand +the armies of Europe and the genius of the immortal +Wellington! Amelia held him in utter contempt; for +it needs not to be said that this soft and gentle +creature took her opinions from those people who surrounded +her, such fidelity being much too humble-minded to +think for itself. Well, in a word, she and her mother +performed a great day’s shopping, and she acquitted +herself with considerable liveliness and credit on +this her first appearance in the genteel world of +London.</p> + +<p>George meanwhile, with his hat on one side, his elbows +squared, and his swaggering martial air, made for +Bedford Row, and stalked into the attorney’s +offices as if he was lord of every pale-faced clerk +who was scribbling there. He ordered somebody to inform +Mr. Higgs that Captain Osborne was waiting, in a fierce +and patronizing way, as if the pekin of an attorney, +who had thrice his brains, fifty times his money, +and a thousand times his experience, was a wretched +underling who should instantly leave all his business +in life to attend on the Captain’s pleasure. + He did not see the sneer of contempt which passed +all round the room, from the first clerk to the articled +gents, from the articled gents to the ragged writers +and white-faced runners, in clothes too tight for them, +as he sate there tapping his boot with his cane, and +thinking what a parcel of miserable poor devils these +were. The miserable poor devils knew all about his +affairs. They talked about them over their pints of +beer at their public-house clubs to other clerks of +a night. Ye gods, what do not attorneys and attorneys’ +clerks know in London! Nothing is hidden from their +inquisition, and their families mutely rule our city.</p> + +<p>Perhaps George expected, when he entered Mr. Higgs’s +apartment, to find that gentleman commissioned to +give him some message of compromise or conciliation +from his father; perhaps his haughty and cold demeanour +was adopted as a sign of his spirit and resolution: +but if so, his fierceness was met by a chilling coolness +and indifference on the attorney’s part, that +rendered swaggering absurd. He pretended to be writing +at a paper, when the Captain entered. “Pray, +sit down, sir,” said he, “and I will attend +to your little affair in a moment. Mr. Poe, get the +release papers, if you please”; and then he +fell to writing again.</p> + +<p>Poe having produced those papers, his chief calculated +the amount of two thousand pounds stock at the rate +of the day; and asked Captain Osborne whether he would +take the sum in a cheque upon the bankers, or whether +he should direct the latter to purchase stock to that +amount. “One of the late Mrs. Osborne’s +trustees is out of town,” he said indifferently, +“but my client wishes to meet your wishes, and +have done with the business as quick as possible.”</p> + +<p>“Give me a cheque, sir,” said the Captain +very surlily. “Damn the shillings and halfpence, +sir,” he added, as the lawyer was making out +the amount of the draft; and, flattering himself that +by this stroke of magnanimity he had put the old quiz +to the blush, he stalked out of the office with the +paper in his pocket.</p> + +<p>“That chap will be in gaol in two years,” +Mr. Higgs said to Mr. Poe.</p> + +<p>“Won’t O. come round, sir, don’t +you think?”</p> + +<p>“Won’t the monument come round,” +Mr. Higgs replied.</p> + +<p>“He’s going it pretty fast,” said +the clerk. “He’s only married a week, +and I saw him and some other military chaps handing +Mrs. Highflyer to her carriage after the play.” +And then another case was called, and Mr. George Osborne +thenceforth dismissed from these worthy gentlemen’s +memory.</p> + +<p>The draft was upon our friends Hulker and Bullock +of Lombard Street, to whose house, still thinking +he was doing business, George bent his way, and from +whom he received his money. Frederick Bullock, Esq., +whose yellow face was over a ledger, at which sate +a demure clerk, happened to be in the banking-room +when George entered. His yellow face turned to a more +deadly colour when he saw the Captain, and he slunk +back guiltily into the inmost parlour. George was +too busy gloating over the money (for he had never +had such a sum before), to mark the countenance or +flight of the cadaverous suitor of his sister.</p> + +<p>Fred Bullock told old Osborne of his son’s appearance +and conduct. “He came in as bold as brass,” +said Frederick. “He has drawn out every shilling. + How long will a few hundred pounds last such a chap +as that?” Osborne swore with a great oath that +he little cared when or how soon he spent it. Fred +dined every day in Russell Square now. But altogether, +George was highly pleased with his day’s business. + All his own baggage and outfit was put into a state +of speedy preparation, and he paid Amelia’s +purchases with cheques on his agents, and with the +splendour of a lord.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXVII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Amelia Joins Her Regiment</h4> + +<p>When Jos’s fine carriage drove up to the inn +door at Chatham, the first face which Amelia recognized +was the friendly countenance of Captain Dobbin, who +had been pacing the street for an hour past in expectation +of his friends’ arrival. The Captain, with shells +on his frockcoat, and a crimson sash and sabre, presented +a military appearance, which made Jos quite proud +to be able to claim such an acquaintance, and the +stout civilian hailed him with a cordiality very different +from the reception which Jos vouchsafed to his friend +in Brighton and Bond Street.</p> + +<p>Along with the Captain was Ensign Stubble; who, as +the barouche neared the inn, burst out with an exclamation +of “By Jove! what a pretty girl”; highly +applauding Osborne’s choice. Indeed, Amelia +dressed in her wedding-pelisse and pink ribbons, with +a flush in her face, occasioned by rapid travel through +the open air, looked so fresh and pretty, as fully +to justify the Ensign’s compliment. Dobbin liked +him for making it. As he stepped forward to help the +lady out of the carriage, Stubble saw what a pretty +little hand she gave him, and what a sweet pretty +little foot came tripping down the step. He blushed +profusely, and made the very best bow of which he +was capable; to which Amelia, seeing the number of +the the regiment embroidered on the Ensign’s +cap, replied with a blushing smile, and a curtsey +on her part; which finished the young Ensign on the +spot. Dobbin took most kindly to Mr. Stubble from +that day, and encouraged him to talk about Amelia +in their private walks, and at each other’s +quarters. It became the fashion, indeed, among all +the honest young fellows of the --th to adore and +admire Mrs. Osborne. Her simple artless behaviour, +and modest kindness of demeanour, won all their unsophisticated +hearts; all which simplicity and sweetness are quite +impossible to describe in print. But who has not beheld +these among women, and recognised the presence of +all sorts of qualities in them, even though they say +no more to you than that they are engaged to dance +the next quadrille, or that it is very hot weather? + George, always the champion of his regiment, rose +immensely in the opinion of the youth of the corps, +by his gallantry in marrying this portionless young +creature, and by his choice of such a pretty kind +partner.</p> + +<p>In the sitting-room which was awaiting the travellers, +Amelia, to her surprise, found a letter addressed +to Mrs. Captain Osborne. It was a triangular billet, +on pink paper, and sealed with a dove and an olive +branch, and a profusion of light blue sealing wax, +and it was written in a very large, though undecided +female hand.</p> + +<p>“It’s Peggy O’Dowd’s fist,” +said George, laughing. “I know it by the kisses +on the seal.” And in fact, it was a note from +Mrs. Major O’Dowd, requesting the pleasure of +Mrs. Osborne’s company that very evening to +a small friendly party. “You must go,” +George said. “You will make acquaintance with +the regiment there. O’Dowd goes in command +of the regiment, and Peggy goes in command.”</p> + +<p>But they had not been for many minutes in the enjoyment +of Mrs. O’Dowd’s letter, when the door +was flung open, and a stout jolly lady, in a riding-habit, +followed by a couple of officers of Ours, entered +the room.</p> + +<p>“Sure, I couldn’t stop till tay-time. + Present me, Garge, my dear fellow, to your lady. + Madam, I’m deloighted to see ye; and to present +to you me husband, Meejor O’Dowd”; and +with this, the jolly lady in the riding-habit grasped +Amelia’s hand very warmly, and the latter knew +at once that the lady was before her whom her husband +had so often laughed at. “You’ve often +heard of me from that husband of yours,” said +the lady, with great vivacity.</p> + +<p>“You’ve often heard of her,” echoed +her husband, the Major.</p> + +<p>Amelia answered, smiling, “that she had.”</p> + +<p>“And small good he’s told you of me,” +Mrs. O’Dowd replied; adding that “George +was a wicked divvle.”</p> + +<p>“That I’ll go bail for,” said the +Major, trying to look knowing, at which George laughed; +and Mrs. O’Dowd, with a tap of her whip, told +the Major to be quiet; and then requested to be presented +in form to Mrs. Captain Osborne.</p> + +<p>“This, my dear,” said George with great +gravity, “is my very good, kind, and excellent +friend, Auralia Margaretta, otherwise called Peggy.”</p> + +<p>“Faith, you’re right,” interposed +the Major.</p> + +<p>“Otherwise called Peggy, lady of Major Michael +O’Dowd, of our regiment, and daughter of Fitzjurld +Ber’sford de Burgo Malony of Glenmalony, County +Kildare.”</p> + +<p>“And Muryan Squeer, Doblin,” said the +lady with calm superiority.</p> + +<p>“And Muryan Square, sure enough,” the +Major whispered.</p> + +<p>“’Twas there ye coorted me, Meejor dear,” +the lady said; and the Major assented to this as to +every other proposition which was made generally in +company.</p> + +<p>Major O’Dowd, who had served his sovereign in +every quarter of the world, and had paid for every +step in his profession by some more than equivalent +act of daring and gallantry, was the most modest, +silent, sheep-faced and meek of little men, and as +obedient to his wife as if he had been her tay-boy. + At the mess-table he sat silently, and drank a great +deal. When full of liquor, he reeled silently home. + When he spoke, it was to agree with everybody on +every conceivable point; and he passed through life +in perfect ease and good-humour. The hottest suns +of India never heated his temper; and the Walcheren +ague never shook it. He walked up to a battery with +just as much indifference as to a dinner-table; had +dined on horse-flesh and turtle with equal relish +and appetite; and had an old mother, Mrs. O’Dowd +of O’Dowdstown indeed, whom he had never disobeyed +but when he ran away and enlisted, and when he persisted +in marrying that odious Peggy Malony.</p> + +<p>Peggy was one of five sisters, and eleven children +of the noble house of Glenmalony; but her husband, +though her own cousin, was of the mother’s side, +and so had not the inestimable advantage of being +allied to the Malonys, whom she believed to be the +most famous family in the world. Having tried nine +seasons at Dublin and two at Bath and Cheltenham, +and not finding a partner for life, Miss Malony ordered +her cousin Mick to marry her when she was about thirty-three +years of age; and the honest fellow obeying, carried +her off to the West Indies, to preside over the ladies +of the --th regiment, into which he had just exchanged.</p> + +<p>Before Mrs. O’Dowd was half an hour in Amelia’s +(or indeed in anybody else’s) company, this +amiable lady told all her birth and pedigree to her +new friend. “My dear,” said she, good-naturedly, +“it was my intention that Garge should be a brother +of my own, and my sister Glorvina would have suited +him entirely. But as bygones are bygones, and he +was engaged to yourself, why, I’m determined +to take you as a sister instead, and to look upon +you as such, and to love you as one of the family. + Faith, you’ve got such a nice good-natured +face and way widg you, that I’m sure we’ll +agree; and that you’ll be an addition to our +family anyway.”</p> + +<p>“’Deed and she will,” said O’Dowd, +with an approving air, and Amelia felt herself not +a little amused and grateful to be thus suddenly introduced +to so large a party of relations.</p> + +<p>“We’re all good fellows here,” the +Major’s lady continued. “There’s +not a regiment in the service where you’ll find +a more united society nor a more agreeable mess-room. + There’s no quarrelling, bickering, slandthering, +nor small talk amongst us. We all love each other.”</p> + +<p>“Especially Mrs. Magenis,” said George, +laughing.</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Captain Magenis and me has made up, though +her treatment of me would bring me gray hairs with +sorrow to the grave.”</p> + +<p>“And you with such a beautiful front of black, +Peggy, my dear,” the Major cried.</p> + +<p>“Hould your tongue, Mick, you booby. Them husbands +are always in the way, Mrs. Osborne, my dear; and +as for my Mick, I often tell him he should never open +his mouth but to give the word of command, or to put +meat and drink into it. I’ll tell you about +the regiment, and warn you when we’re alone. + Introduce me to your brother now; sure he’s +a mighty fine man, and reminds me of me cousin, Dan +Malony (Malony of Ballymalony, my dear, you know who +mar’ied Ophalia Scully, of Oystherstown, own +cousin to Lord Poldoody). Mr. Sedley, sir, I’m +deloighted to be made known te ye. I suppose you’ll +dine at the mess to-day. (Mind that divvle of a docther, +Mick, and whatever ye du, keep yourself sober for +me party this evening.)”</p> + +<p>“It’s the 150th gives us a farewell dinner, +my love,” interposed the Major, “but we’ll +easy get a card for Mr. Sedley.”</p> + +<p>“Run Simple (Ensign Simple, of Ours, my dear +Amelia. I forgot to introjuice him to ye). Run in +a hurry, with Mrs. Major O’Dowd’s compliments +to Colonel Tavish, and Captain Osborne has brought +his brothernlaw down, and will bring him to the 150th +mess at five o’clock sharp--when you and I, +my dear, will take a snack here, if you like.” + Before Mrs. O’Dowd’s speech was concluded, +the young Ensign was trotting downstairs on his commission.</p> + +<p>“Obedience is the soul of the army. We will +go to our duty while Mrs. O’Dowd will stay and +enlighten you, Emmy,” Captain Osborne said; +and the two gentlemen, taking each a wing of the Major, +walked out with that officer, grinning at each other +over his head.</p> + +<p>And, now having her new friend to herself, the impetuous +Mrs: O’Dowd proceeded to pour out such a quantity +of information as no poor little woman’s memory +could ever tax itself to bear. She told Amelia a +thousand particulars relative to the very numerous +family of which the amazed young lady found herself +a member. “Mrs. Heavytop, the Colonel’s +wife, died in Jamaica of the yellow faver and a broken +heart comboined, for the horrud old Colonel, with a +head as bald as a cannon-ball, was making sheep’s +eyes at a half-caste girl there. Mrs. Magenis, though +without education, was a good woman, but she had the +divvle’s tongue, and would cheat her own mother +at whist. Mrs. Captain Kirk must turn up her lobster +eyes forsooth at the idea of an honest round game +(wherein me fawther, as pious a man as ever went to +church, me uncle Dane Malony, and our cousin the Bishop, +took a hand at loo, or whist, every night of their +lives). Nayther of ‘em’s goin’ with +the regiment this time,” Mrs. O’Dowd added. + “Fanny Magenis stops with her mother, who sells +small coal and potatoes, most likely, in Islington-town, +hard by London, though she’s always bragging +of her father’s ships, and pointing them out +to us as they go up the river: and Mrs. Kirk and +her children will stop here in Bethesda Place, to be +nigh to her favourite preacher, Dr. Ramshorn. Mrs. +Bunny’s in an interesting situation--faith, +and she always is, then--and has given the Lieutenant +seven already. And Ensign Posky’s wife, who +joined two months before you, my dear, has quarl’d +with Tom Posky a score of times, till you can hear’m +all over the bar’ck (they say they’re +come to broken pleets, and Tom never accounted for +his black oi), and she’ll go back to her mother, +who keeps a ladies’ siminary at Richmond--bad +luck to her for running away from it! Where did ye +get your finishing, my dear? I had moin, and no expince +spared, at Madame Flanahan’s, at Ilyssus Grove, +Booterstown, near Dublin, wid a Marchioness to teach +us the true Parisian pronunciation, and a retired +Mejor-General of the French service to put us through +the exercise.”</p> + +<p>Of this incongruous family our astonished Amelia found +herself all of a sudden a member: with Mrs. O’Dowd +as an elder sister. She was presented to her other +female relations at tea-time, on whom, as she was +quiet, good-natured, and not too handsome, she made +rather an agreeable impression until the arrival of +the gentlemen from the mess of the 150th, who all +admired her so, that her sisters began, of course, +to find fault with her.</p> + +<p>“I hope Osborne has sown his wild oats,” +said Mrs. Magenis to Mrs. Bunny. “If a reformed +rake makes a good husband, sure it’s she will +have the fine chance with Garge,” Mrs. O’Dowd +remarked to Posky, who had lost her position as bride +in the regiment, and was quite angry with the usurper. + And as for Mrs. Kirk: that disciple of Dr. Ramshorn +put one or two leading professional questions to Amelia, +to see whether she was awakened, whether she was a +professing Christian and so forth, and finding from +the simplicity of Mrs. Osborne’s replies that +she was yet in utter darkness, put into her hands three +little penny books with pictures, <i>viz</i>., the “Howling +Wilderness,” the “Washerwoman of Wandsworth +Common,” and the “British Soldier’s +best Bayonet,” which, bent upon awakening her +before she slept, Mrs. Kirk begged Amelia to read +that night ere she went to bed.</p> + +<p>But all the men, like good fellows as they were, rallied +round their comrade’s pretty wife, and paid +her their court with soldierly gallantry. She had +a little triumph, which flushed her spirits and made +her eyes sparkle. George was proud of her popularity, +and pleased with the manner (which was very gay and +graceful, though naive and a little timid) with which +she received the gentlemen’s attentions, and +answered their compliments. And he in his uniform-- +how much handsomer he was than any man in the room! + She felt that he was affectionately watching her, +and glowed with pleasure at his kindness. “I +will make all his friends welcome,” she resolved +in her heart. “I will love all as I love him. + I will always try and be gay and good-humoured and +make his home happy.”</p> + +<p>The regiment indeed adopted her with acclamation. +The Captains approved, the Lieutenants applauded, +the Ensigns admired. Old Cutler, the Doctor, made +one or two jokes, which, being professional, need +not be repeated; and Cackle, the Assistant M.D. of +Edinburgh, condescended to examine her upon leeterature, +and tried her with his three best French quotations. + Young Stubble went about from man to man whispering, +“Jove, isn’t she a pretty gal?” +and never took his eyes off her except when the negus +came in.</p> + +<p>As for Captain Dobbin, he never so much as spoke to +her during the whole evening. But he and Captain +Porter of the l50th took home Jos to the hotel, who +was in a very maudlin state, and had told his tiger-hunt +story with great effect, both at the mess-table and +at the soiree, to Mrs. O’Dowd in her turban +and bird of paradise. Having put the Collector into +the hands of his servant, Dobbin loitered about, smoking +his cigar before the inn door. George had meanwhile +very carefully shawled his wife, and brought her away +from Mrs. O’Dowd’s after a general handshaking +from the young officers, who accompanied her to the +fly, and cheered that vehicle as it drove off. So +Amelia gave Dobbin her little hand as she got out of +the carriage, and rebuked him smilingly for not having +taken any notice of her all night.</p> + +<p>The Captain continued that deleterious amusement of +smoking, long after the inn and the street were gone +to bed. He watched the lights vanish from George’s +sitting-room windows, and shine out in the bedroom +close at hand. It was almost morning when he returned +to his own quarters. He could hear the cheering from +the ships in the river, where the transports were +already taking in their cargoes preparatory to dropping +down the Thames.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXVIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Amelia Invades the Low Countries</h4> + +<p>The regiment with its officers was to be transported +in ships provided by His Majesty’s government +for the occasion: and in two days after the festive +assembly at Mrs. O’Dowd’s apartments, in +the midst of cheering from all the East India ships +in the river, and the military on shore, the band +playing “God Save the King,” the officers +waving their hats, and the crews hurrahing gallantly, +the transports went down the river and proceeded under +convoy to Ostend. Meanwhile the gallant Jos had agreed +to escort his sister and the Major’s wife, the +bulk of whose goods and chattels, including the famous +bird of paradise and turban, were with the regimental +baggage: so that our two heroines drove pretty much +unencumbered to Ramsgate, where there were plenty +of packets plying, in one of which they had a speedy +passage to Ostend.</p> + +<p>That period of Jos’s life which now ensued was +so full of incident, that it served him for conversation +for many years after, and even the tiger-hunt story +was put aside for more stirring narratives which he +had to tell about the great campaign of Waterloo. +As soon as he had agreed to escort his sister abroad, +it was remarked that he ceased shaving his upper lip. + At Chatham he followed the parades and drills with +great assiduity. He listened with the utmost attention +to the conversation of his brother officers (as he +called them in after days sometimes), and learned +as many military names as he could. In these studies +the excellent Mrs. O’Dowd was of great assistance +to him; and on the day finally when they embarked on +board the Lovely Rose, which was to carry them to their +destination, he made his appearance in a braided frock-coat +and duck trousers, with a foraging cap ornamented +with a smart gold band. Having his carriage with +him, and informing everybody on board confidentially +that he was going to join the Duke of Wellington’s +army, folks mistook him for a great personage, a commissary-general, +or a government courier at the very least.</p> + +<p>He suffered hugely on the voyage, during which the +ladies were likewise prostrate; but Amelia was brought +to life again as the packet made Ostend, by the sight +of the transports conveying her regiment, which entered +the harbour almost at the same time with the Lovely +Rose. Jos went in a collapsed state to an inn, while +Captain Dobbin escorted the ladies, and then busied +himself in freeing Jos’s carriage and luggage +from the ship and the custom-house, for Mr. Jos was +at present without a servant, Osborne’s man and +his own pampered menial having conspired together +at Chatham, and refused point-blank to cross the water. + This revolt, which came very suddenly, and on the +last day, so alarmed Mr. Sedley, junior, that he was +on the point of giving up the expedition, but Captain +Dobbin (who made himself immensely officious in the +business, Jos said), rated him and laughed at him +soundly: the mustachios were grown in advance, and +Jos finally was persuaded to embark. In place of the +well-bred and well-fed London domestics, who could +only speak English, Dobbin procured for Jos’s +party a swarthy little Belgian servant who could speak +no language at all; but who, by his bustling behaviour, +and by invariably addressing Mr. Sedley as “My +lord,” speedily acquired that gentleman’s +favour. Times are altered at Ostend now; of the Britons +who go thither, very few look like lords, or act like +those members of our hereditary aristocracy. They +seem for the most part shabby in attire, dingy of +linen, lovers of billiards and brandy, and cigars +and greasy ordinaries.</p> + +<p>But it may be said as a rule, that every Englishman +in the Duke of Wellington’s army paid his way. + The remembrance of such a fact surely becomes a nation +of shopkeepers. It was a blessing for a commerce-loving +country to be overrun by such an army of customers: +and to have such creditable warriors to feed. And +the country which they came to protect is not military. + For a long period of history they have let other +people fight there. When the present writer went +to survey with eagle glance the field of Waterloo, +we asked the conductor of the diligence, a portly +warlike-looking veteran, whether he had been at the +battle. “Pas si bete"--such an answer and sentiment +as no Frenchman would own to--was his reply. But, +on the other hand, the postilion who drove us was +a Viscount, a son of some bankrupt Imperial General, +who accepted a pennyworth of beer on the road. The +moral is surely a good one.</p> + +<p>This flat, flourishing, easy country never could have +looked more rich and prosperous than in that opening +summer of 1815, when its green fields and quiet cities +were enlivened by multiplied red-coats: when its +wide chaussees swarmed with brilliant English equipages: +when its great canal-boats, gliding by rich pastures +and pleasant quaint old villages, by old chateaux +lying amongst old trees, were all crowded with well-to-do +English travellers: when the soldier who drank at +the village inn, not only drank, but paid his score; +and Donald, the Highlander, billeted in the Flemish +farm-house, rocked the baby’s cradle, while +Jean and Jeannette were out getting in the hay. As +our painters are bent on military subjects just now, +I throw out this as a good subject for the pencil, +to illustrate the principle of an honest English war. + All looked as brilliant and harmless as a Hyde Park +review. Meanwhile, Napoleon screened behind his curtain +of frontier-fortresses, was preparing for the outbreak +which was to drive all these orderly people into fury +and blood; and lay so many of them low.</p> + +<p>Everybody had such a perfect feeling of confidence +in the leader (for the resolute faith which the Duke +of Wellington had inspired in the whole English nation +was as intense as that more frantic enthusiasm with +which at one time the French regarded Napoleon), the +country seemed in so perfect a state of orderly defence, +and the help at hand in case of need so near and overwhelming, +that alarm was unknown, and our travellers, among +whom two were naturally of a very timid sort, were, +like all the other multiplied English tourists, entirely +at ease. The famous regiment, with so many of whose +officers we have made acquaintance, was drafted in +canal boats to Bruges and Ghent, thence to march to +Brussels. Jos accompanied the ladies in the public +boats; the which all old travellers in Flanders must +remember for the luxury and accommodation they afforded. + So prodigiously good was the eating and drinking on +board these sluggish but most comfortable vessels, +that there are legends extant of an English traveller, +who, coming to Belgium for a week, and travelling +in one of these boats, was so delighted with the fare +there that he went backwards and forwards from Ghent +to Bruges perpetually until the railroads were invented, +when he drowned himself on the last trip of the passage-boat. + Jos’s death was not to be of this sort, but +his comfort was exceeding, and Mrs. O’Dowd insisted +that he only wanted her sister Glorvina to make his +happiness complete. He sate on the roof of the cabin +all day drinking Flemish beer, shouting for Isidor, +his servant, and talking gallantly to the ladies.</p> + +<p>His courage was prodigious. “Boney attack us!” +he cried. “My dear creature, my poor Emmy, +don’t be frightened. There’s no danger. +The allies will be in Paris in two months, I tell you; +when I’ll take you to dine in the Palais Royal, +by Jove! There are three hundred thousand Rooshians, +I tell you, now entering France by Mayence and the +Rhine--three hundred thousand under Wittgenstein and +Barclay de Tolly, my poor love. You don’t know +military affairs, my dear. I do, and I tell you there’s +no infantry in France can stand against Rooshian infantry, +and no general of Boney’s that’s fit to +hold a candle to Wittgenstein. Then there are the +Austrians, they are five hundred thousand if a man, +and they are within ten marches of the frontier by +this time, under Schwartzenberg and Prince Charles. + Then there are the Prooshians under the gallant Prince +Marshal. Show me a cavalry chief like him now that +Murat is gone. Hey, Mrs. O’Dowd? Do you think +our little girl here need be afraid? Is there any +cause for fear, Isidor? Hey, sir? Get some more +beer.”</p> + +<p>Mrs. O’Dowd said that her “Glorvina was +not afraid of any man alive, let alone a Frenchman,” +and tossed off a glass of beer with a wink which expressed +her liking for the beverage.</p> + +<p>Having frequently been in presence of the enemy, or, +in other words, faced the ladies at Cheltenham and +Bath, our friend, the Collector, had lost a great +deal of his pristine timidity, and was now, especially +when fortified with liquor, as talkative as might be. + He was rather a favourite with the regiment, treating +the young officers with sumptuosity, and amusing them +by his military airs. And as there is one well-known +regiment of the army which travels with a goat heading +the column, whilst another is led by a deer, George +said with respect to his brother-in-law, that his regiment +marched with an elephant.</p> + +<p>Since Amelia’s introduction to the regiment, +George began to be rather ashamed of some of the company +to which he had been forced to present her; and determined, +as he told Dobbin (with what satisfaction to the latter +it need not be said), to exchange into some better +regiment soon, and to get his wife away from those +damned vulgar women. But this vulgarity of being ashamed +of one’s society is much more common among men +than women (except very great ladies of fashion, who, +to be sure, indulge in it); and Mrs. Amelia, a natural +and unaffected person, had none of that artificial +shamefacedness which her husband mistook for delicacy +on his own part. Thus Mrs. O’Dowd had a cock’s +plume in her hat, and a very large “repayther” +on her stomach, which she used to ring on all occasions, +narrating how it had been presented to her by her +fawther, as she stipt into the car’ge after her +mar’ge; and these ornaments, with other outward +peculiarities of the Major’s wife, gave excruciating +agonies to Captain Osborne, when his wife and the +Major’s came in contact; whereas Amelia was only +amused by the honest lady’s eccentricities, +and not in the least ashamed of her company.</p> + +<p>As they made that well-known journey, which almost +every Englishman of middle rank has travelled since, +there might have been more instructive, but few more +entertaining, companions than Mrs. Major O’Dowd. + “Talk about kenal boats; my dear! Ye should +see the kenal boats between Dublin and Ballinasloe. + It’s there the rapid travelling is; and the +beautiful cattle. Sure me fawther got a goold medal +(and his Excellency himself eat a slice of it, and +said never was finer mate in his loif) for a four-year-old +heifer, the like of which ye never saw in this country +any day.” And Jos owned with a sigh, “that +for good streaky beef, really mingled with fat and +lean, there was no country like England.”</p> + +<p>“Except Ireland, where all your best mate comes +from,” said the Major’s lady; proceeding, +as is not unusual with patriots of her nation, to +make comparisons greatly in favour of her own country. +The idea of comparing the market at Bruges with those +of Dublin, although she had suggested it herself, +caused immense scorn and derision on her part. “I’ll +thank ye tell me what they mean by that old gazabo +on the top of the market-place,” said she, in +a burst of ridicule fit to have brought the old tower +down. The place was full of English soldiery as they +passed. English bugles woke them in the morning; +at nightfall they went to bed to the note of the British +fife and drum: all the country and Europe was in arms, +and the greatest event of history pending: and honest +Peggy O’Dowd, whom it concerned as well as another, +went on prattling about Ballinafad, and the horses +in the stables at Glenmalony, and the clar’t +drunk there; and Jos Sedley interposed about curry +and rice at Dumdum; and Amelia thought about her husband, +and how best she should show her love for him; as +if these were the great topics of the world.</p> + +<p>Those who like to lay down the History-book, and to +speculate upon what <i>might</i> have happened in the +world, but for the fatal occurrence of what actually +did take place (a most puzzling, amusing, ingenious, +and profitable kind of meditation), have no doubt often +thought to themselves what a specially bad time Napoleon +took to come back from Elba, and to let loose his +eagle from Gulf San Juan to Notre Dame. The historians +on our side tell us that the armies of the allied +powers were all providentially on a war-footing, and +ready to bear down at a moment’s notice upon +the Elban Emperor. The august jobbers assembled at +Vienna, and carving out the kingdoms of Europe according +to their wisdom, had such causes of quarrel among +themselves as might have set the armies which had overcome +Napoleon to fight against each other, but for the +return of the object of unanimous hatred and fear. + This monarch had an army in full force because he +had jobbed to himself Poland, and was determined to +keep it: another had robbed half Saxony, and was +bent upon maintaining his acquisition: Italy was the +object of a third’s solicitude. Each was protesting +against the rapacity of the other; and could the Corsican +but have waited in prison until all these parties were +by the ears, he might have returned and reigned unmolested. + But what would have become of our story and all our +friends, then? If all the drops in it were dried +up, what would become of the sea?</p> + +<p>In the meanwhile the business of life and living, +and the pursuits of pleasure, especially, went on +as if no end were to be expected to them, and no enemy +in front. When our travellers arrived at Brussels, +in which their regiment was quartered, a great piece +of good fortune, as all said, they found themselves +in one of the gayest and most brilliant little capitals +in Europe, and where all the Vanity Fair booths were +laid out with the most tempting liveliness and splendour. + Gambling was here in profusion, and dancing in plenty: + feasting was there to fill with delight that great +gourmand of a Jos: there was a theatre where a miraculous +Catalani was delighting all hearers: beautiful rides, +all enlivened with martial splendour; a rare old city, +with strange costumes and wonderful architecture, +to delight the eyes of little Amelia, who had never +before seen a foreign country, and fill her with charming +surprises: so that now and for a few weeks’ space +in a fine handsome lodging, whereof the expenses were +borne by Jos and Osborne, who was flush of money and +full of kind attentions to his wife--for about a fortnight, +I say, during which her honeymoon ended, Mrs. Amelia +was as pleased and happy as any little bride out of +England.</p> + +<p>Every day during this happy time there was novelty +and amusement for all parties. There was a church +to see, or a picture-gallery--there was a ride, or +an opera. The bands of the regiments were making music +at all hours. The greatest folks of England walked +in the Park--there was a perpetual military festival. + George, taking out his wife to a new jaunt or junket +every night, was quite pleased with himself as usual, +and swore he was becoming quite a domestic character. + And a jaunt or a junket with <i>him</i>! Was it not +enough to set this little heart beating with joy? + Her letters home to her mother were filled with delight +and gratitude at this season. Her husband bade her +buy laces, millinery, jewels, and gimcracks of all +sorts. Oh, he was the kindest, best, and most generous +of men!</p> + +<p>The sight of the very great company of lords and ladies +and fashionable persons who thronged the town, and +appeared in every public place, filled George’s +truly British soul with intense delight. They flung +off that happy frigidity and insolence of demeanour +which occasionally characterises the great at home, +and appearing in numberless public places, condescended +to mingle with the rest of the company whom they met +there. One night at a party given by the general +of the division to which George’s regiment belonged, +he had the honour of dancing with Lady Blanche Thistlewood, +Lord Bareacres’ daughter; he bustled for ices +and refreshments for the two noble ladies; he pushed +and squeezed for Lady Bareacres’ carriage; he +bragged about the Countess when he got home, in a +way which his own father could not have surpassed. + He called upon the ladies the next day; he rode by +their side in the Park; he asked their party to a +great dinner at a restaurateur’s, and was quite +wild with exultation when they agreed to come. Old +Bareacres, who had not much pride and a large appetite, +would go for a dinner anywhere.</p> + +<p>“I hope there will be no women besides our own +party,” Lady Bareacres said, after reflecting +upon the invitation which had been made, and accepted +with too much precipitancy.</p> + +<p>“Gracious Heaven, Mamma--you don’t suppose +the man would bring his wife,” shrieked Lady +Blanche, who had been languishing in George’s +arms in the newly imported waltz for hours the night +before. “The men are bearable, but their women--”</p> + +<p>“Wife, just married, dev’lish pretty woman, +I hear,” the old Earl said.</p> + +<p>“Well, my dear Blanche,” said the mother, +“I suppose, as Papa wants to go, we must go; +but we needn’t know them in England, you know.” +And so, determined to cut their new acquaintance in +Bond Street, these great folks went to eat his dinner +at Brussels, and condescending to make him pay for +their pleasure, showed their dignity by making his +wife uncomfortable, and carefully excluding her from +the conversation. This is a species of dignity in +which the high-bred British female reigns supreme. + To watch the behaviour of a fine lady to other and +humbler women, is a very good sport for a philosophical +frequenter of Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>This festival, on which honest George spent a great +deal of money, was the very dismallest of all the +entertainments which Amelia had in her honeymoon. + She wrote the most piteous accounts of the feast +home to her mamma: how the Countess of Bareacres would +not answer when spoken to; how Lady Blanche stared +at her with her eye-glass; and what a rage Captain +Dobbin was in at their behaviour; and how my lord, +as they came away from the feast, asked to see the +bill, and pronounced it a d--- bad dinner, and d--- +dear. But though Amelia told all these stories, and +wrote home regarding her guests’ rudeness, and +her own discomfiture, old Mrs. Sedley was mightily +pleased nevertheless, and talked about Emmy’s +friend, the Countess of Bareacres, with such assiduity +that the news how his son was entertaining peers and +peeresses actually came to Osborne’s ears in +the City.</p> + +<p>Those who know the present Lieutenant-General Sir +George Tufto, K.C.B., and have seen him, as they may +on most days in the season, padded and in stays, strutting +down Pall Mall with a rickety swagger on his high-heeled +lacquered boots, leering under the bonnets of passers-by, +or riding a showy chestnut, and ogling broughams in +the Parks--those who know the present Sir George Tufto +would hardly recognise the daring Peninsular and Waterloo +officer. He has thick curling brown hair and black +eyebrows now, and his whiskers are of the deepest +purple. He was light-haired and bald in 1815, and +stouter in the person and in the limbs, which especially +have shrunk very much of late. When he was about +seventy years of age (he is now nearly eighty), his +hair, which was very scarce and quite white, suddenly +grew thick, and brown, and curly, and his whiskers +and eyebrows took their present colour. Ill-natured +people say that his chest is all wool, and that his +hair, because it never grows, is a wig. Tom Tufto, +with whose father he quarrelled ever so many years +ago, declares that Mademoiselle de Jaisey, of the French +theatre, pulled his grandpapa’s hair off in +the green-room; but Tom is notoriously spiteful and +jealous; and the General’s wig has nothing to +do with our story.</p> + +<p>One day, as some of our friends of the --th were sauntering +in the flower-market of Brussels, having been to see +the Hotel de Ville, which Mrs. Major O’Dowd +declared was not near so large or handsome as her +fawther’s mansion of Glenmalony, an officer of +rank, with an orderly behind him, rode up to the market, +and descending from his horse, came amongst the flowers, +and selected the very finest bouquet which money could +buy. The beautiful bundle being tied up in a paper, +the officer remounted, giving the nosegay into the +charge of his military groom, who carried it with +a grin, following his chief, who rode away in great +state and self-satisfaction.</p> + +<p>“You should see the flowers at Glenmalony,” +Mrs. O’Dowd was remarking. “Me fawther +has three Scotch garners with nine helpers. We have +an acre of hot-houses, and pines as common as pays +in the sayson. Our greeps weighs six pounds every +bunch of ’em, and upon me honour and conscience +I think our magnolias is as big as taykettles.”</p> + +<p>Dobbin, who never used to “draw out” Mrs. +O’Dowd as that wicked Osborne delighted in doing +(much to Amelia’s terror, who implored him to +spare her), fell back in the crowd, crowing and sputtering +until he reached a safe distance, when he exploded +amongst the astonished market-people with shrieks +of yelling laughter.</p> + +<p>“Hwhat’s that gawky guggling about?” +said Mrs. O’Dowd. “Is it his nose bleedn? + He always used to say ’twas his nose bleedn, +till he must have pomped all the blood out of ’um. + An’t the magnolias at Glenmalony as big as +taykettles, O’Dowd?”</p> + +<p>“’Deed then they are, and bigger, Peggy,” +the Major said. When the conversation was interrupted +in the manner stated by the arrival of the officer +who purchased the bouquet.</p> + +<p>“Devlish fine horse--who is it?” George +asked.</p> + +<p>“You should see me brother Molloy Malony’s +horse, Molasses, that won the cop at the Curragh,” +the Major’s wife was exclaiming, and was continuing +the family history, when her husband interrupted her +by saying--</p> + +<p>“It’s General Tufto, who commands the +---- cavalry division”; adding quietly, “he +and I were both shot in the same leg at Talavera.”</p> + +<p>“Where you got your step,” said George +with a laugh. “General Tufto! Then, my dear, +the Crawleys are come.”</p> + +<p>Amelia’s heart fell--she knew not why. The +sun did not seem to shine so bright. The tall old +roofs and gables looked less picturesque all of a +sudden, though it was a brilliant sunset, and one +of the brightest and most beautiful days at the end +of May.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXIX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Brussels</h4> + +<p>Mr. Jos had hired a pair of horses for his open carriage, +with which cattle, and the smart London vehicle, he +made a very tolerable figure in the drives about Brussels. +George purchased a horse for his private riding, and +he and Captain Dobbin would often accompany the carriage +in which Jos and his sister took daily excursions of +pleasure. They went out that day in the park for their +accustomed diversion, and there, sure enough, George’s +remark with regard to the arrival of Rawdon Crawley +and his wife proved to be correct. In the midst of +a little troop of horsemen, consisting of some of the +very greatest persons in Brussels, Rebecca was seen +in the prettiest and tightest of riding-habits, mounted +on a beautiful little Arab, which she rode to perfection +(having acquired the art at Queen’s Crawley, +where the Baronet, Mr. Pitt, and Rawdon himself had +given her many lessons), and by the side of the gallant +General Tufto.</p> + +<p>“Sure it’s the Juke himself,” cried +Mrs. Major O’Dowd to Jos, who began to blush +violently; “and that’s Lord Uxbridge on +the bay. How elegant he looks! Me brother, Molloy +Malony, is as like him as two pays.”</p> + +<p>Rebecca did not make for the carriage; but as soon +as she perceived her old acquaintance Amelia seated +in it, acknowledged her presence by a gracious nod +and smile, and by kissing and shaking her fingers +playfully in the direction of the vehicle. Then she +resumed her conversation with General Tufto, who asked +“who the fat officer was in the gold-laced cap?” +on which Becky replied, “that he was an officer +in the East Indian service.” But Rawdon Crawley +rode out of the ranks of his company, and came up +and shook hands heartily with Amelia, and said to +Jos, “Well, old boy, how are you?” and +stared in Mrs. O’Dowd’s face and at the +black cock’s feathers until she began to think +she had made a conquest of him.</p> + +<p>George, who had been delayed behind, rode up almost +immediately with Dobbin, and they touched their caps +to the august personages, among whom Osborne at once +perceived Mrs. Crawley. He was delighted to see Rawdon +leaning over his carriage familiarly and talking to +Amelia, and met the aide-de-camp’s cordial greeting +with more than corresponding warmth. The nods between +Rawdon and Dobbin were of the very faintest specimens +of politeness.</p> + +<p>Crawley told George where they were stopping with +General Tufto at the Hotel du Parc, and George made +his friend promise to come speedily to Osborne’s +own residence. “Sorry I hadn’t seen you +three days ago,” George said. “Had a +dinner at the Restaurateur’s--rather a nice +thing. Lord Bareacres, and the Countess, and Lady +Blanche, were good enough to dine with us--wish we’d +had you.” Having thus let his friend know his +claims to be a man of fashion, Osborne parted from +Rawdon, who followed the august squadron down an alley +into which they cantered, while George and Dobbin resumed +their places, one on each side of Amelia’s carriage.</p> + +<p>“How well the Juke looked,” Mrs. O’Dowd +remarked. “The Wellesleys and Malonys are related; +but, of course, poor I would never dream of introjuicing +myself unless his Grace thought proper to remember +our family-tie.”</p> + +<p>“He’s a great soldier,” Jos said, +much more at ease now the great man was gone. “Was +there ever a battle won like Salamanca? Hey, Dobbin? + But where was it he learnt his art? In India, my +boy! The jungle’s the school for a general, +mark me that. I knew him myself, too, Mrs. O’Dowd: + we both of us danced the same evening with Miss Cutler, +daughter of Cutler of the Artillery, and a devilish +fine girl, at Dumdum.”</p> + +<p>The apparition of the great personages held them all +in talk during the drive; and at dinner; and until +the hour came when they were all to go to the Opera.</p> + +<p>It was almost like Old England. The house was filled +with familiar British faces, and those toilettes for +which the British female has long been celebrated. + Mrs. O’Dowd’s was not the least splendid +amongst these, and she had a curl on her forehead, +and a set of Irish diamonds and Cairngorms, which +outshone all the decorations in the house, in her +notion. Her presence used to excruciate Osborne; +but go she would upon all parties of pleasure on which +she heard her young friends were bent. It never entered +into her thought but that they must be charmed with +her company.</p> + +<p>“She’s been useful to you, my dear,” +George said to his wife, whom he could leave alone +with less scruple when she had this society. “But +what a comfort it is that Rebecca’s come: you +will have her for a friend, and we may get rid now +of this damn’d Irishwoman.” To this Amelia +did not answer, yes or no: and how do we know what +her thoughts were?</p> + +<p>The coup d’oeil of the Brussels opera-house +did not strike Mrs. O’Dowd as being so fine +as the theatre in Fishamble Street, Dublin, nor was +French music at all equal, in her opinion, to the melodies +of her native country. She favoured her friends with +these and other opinions in a very loud tone of voice, +and tossed about a great clattering fan she sported, +with the most splendid complacency.</p> + +<p>“Who is that wonderful woman with Amelia, Rawdon, +love?” said a lady in an opposite box (who, +almost always civil to her husband in private, was +more fond than ever of him in company).</p> + +<p>“Don’t you see that creature with a yellow +thing in her turban, and a red satin gown, and a great +watch?”</p> + +<p>“Near the pretty little woman in white?” +asked a middle-aged gentleman seated by the querist’s +side, with orders in his button, and several under-waistcoats, +and a great, choky, white stock.</p> + +<p>“That pretty woman in white is Amelia, General: + you are remarking all the pretty women, you naughty +man.”</p> + +<p>“Only one, begad, in the world!” said +the General, delighted, and the lady gave him a tap +with a large bouquet which she had.</p> + +<p>“Bedad it’s him,” said Mrs. O’Dowd; +“and that’s the very bokay he bought in +the Marshy aux Flures!” and when Rebecca, having +caught her friend’s eye, performed the little +hand-kissing operation once more, Mrs. Major O’D., +taking the compliment to herself, returned the salute +with a gracious smile, which sent that unfortunate +Dobbin shrieking out of the box again.</p> + +<p>At the end of the act, George was out of the box in +a moment, and he was even going to pay his respects +to Rebecca in her loge. He met Crawley in the lobby, +however, where they exchanged a few sentences upon +the occurrences of the last fortnight.</p> + +<p>“You found my cheque all right at the agent’s? +George said, with a knowing air.</p> + +<p>“All right, my boy,” Rawdon answered. + “Happy to give you your revenge. Governor +come round?”</p> + +<p>“Not yet,” said George, “but he +will; and you know I’ve some private fortune +through my mother. Has Aunty relented?”</p> + +<p>“Sent me twenty pound, damned old screw. When +shall we have a meet? The General dines out on Tuesday. +Can’t you come Tuesday? I say, make Sedley +cut off his moustache. What the devil does a civilian +mean with a moustache and those infernal frogs to his +coat! By-bye. Try and come on Tuesday”; and +Rawdon was going-off with two brilliant young gentlemen +of fashion, who were, like himself, on the staff of +a general officer.</p> + +<p>George was only half pleased to be asked to dinner +on that particular day when the General was not to +dine. “I will go in and pay my respects to +your wife,” said he; at which Rawdon said, “Hm, +as you please,” looking very glum, and at which +the two young officers exchanged knowing glances. + George parted from them and strutted down the lobby +to the General’s box, the number of which he +had carefully counted.</p> + +<p>“Entrez,” said a clear little voice, and +our friend found himself in Rebecca’s presence; +who jumped up, clapped her hands together, and held +out both of them to George, so charmed was she to see +him. The General, with the orders in his button, +stared at the newcomer with a sulky scowl, as much +as to say, who the devil are you?</p> + +<p>“My dear Captain George!” cried little +Rebecca in an ecstasy. “How good of you to +come. The General and I were moping together tete-a-tete. + General, this is my Captain George of whom you heard +me talk.”</p> + +<p>“Indeed,” said the General, with a very +small bow; “of what regiment is Captain George?”</p> + +<p>George mentioned the --th: how he wished he could +have said it was a crack cavalry corps.</p> + +<p>“Come home lately from the West Indies, I believe. +Not seen much service in the late war. Quartered +here, Captain George?"--the General went on with killing +haughtiness.</p> + +<p>“Not Captain George, you stupid man; Captain +Osborne,” Rebecca said. The General all the +while was looking savagely from one to the other.</p> + +<p>“Captain Osborne, indeed! Any relation to the +L--Osbornes?”</p> + +<p>“We bear the same arms,” George said, +as indeed was the fact; Mr. Osborne having consulted +with a herald in Long Acre, and picked the L-- arms +out of the peerage, when he set up his carriage fifteen +years before. The General made no reply to this announcement; +but took up his opera-glass--the double-barrelled +lorgnon was not invented in those days--and pretended +to examine the house; but Rebecca saw that his disengaged +eye was working round in her direction, and shooting +out bloodshot glances at her and George.</p> + +<p>She redoubled in cordiality. “How is dearest +Amelia? But I needn’t ask: how pretty she looks! + And who is that nice good-natured looking creature +with her--a flame of yours? O, you wicked men! And +there is Mr. Sedley eating ice, I declare: how he seems +to enjoy it! General, why have we not had any ices?”</p> + +<p>“Shall I go and fetch you some?” said +the General, bursting with wrath.</p> + +<p>“Let <i>me</i> go, I entreat you,” George +said.</p> + +<p>“No, I will go to Amelia’s box. Dear, +sweet girl! Give me your arm, Captain George”; +and so saying, and with a nod to the General, she +tripped into the lobby. She gave George the queerest, +knowingest look, when they were together, a look which +might have been interpreted, “Don’t you +see the state of affairs, and what a fool I’m +making of him?” But he did not perceive it. + He was thinking of his own plans, and lost in pompous +admiration of his own irresistible powers of pleasing.</p> + +<p>The curses to which the General gave a low utterance, +as soon as Rebecca and her conqueror had quitted him, +were so deep, that I am sure no compositor would venture +to print them were they written down. They came from +the General’s heart; and a wonderful thing it +is to think that the human heart is capable of generating +such produce, and can throw out, as occasion demands, +such a supply of lust and fury, rage and hatred.</p> + +<p>Amelia’s gentle eyes, too, had been fixed anxiously +on the pair, whose conduct had so chafed the jealous +General; but when Rebecca entered her box, she flew +to her friend with an affectionate rapture which showed +itself, in spite of the publicity of the place; for +she embraced her dearest friend in the presence of +the whole house, at least in full view of the General’s +glass, now brought to bear upon the Osborne party. + Mrs. Rawdon saluted Jos, too, with the kindliest +greeting: she admired Mrs. O’Dowd’s large +Cairngorm brooch and superb Irish diamonds, and wouldn’t +believe that they were not from Golconda direct. She +bustled, she chattered, she turned and twisted, and +smiled upon one, and smirked on another, all in full +view of the jealous opera-glass opposite. And when +the time for the ballet came (in which there was no +dancer that went through her grimaces or performed +her comedy of action better), she skipped back to her +own box, leaning on Captain Dobbin’s arm this +time. No, she would not have George’s: he must +stay and talk to his dearest, best, little Amelia.</p> + +<p>“What a humbug that woman is!” honest +old Dobbin mumbled to George, when he came back from +Rebecca’s box, whither he had conducted her +in perfect silence, and with a countenance as glum +as an undertaker’s. “She writhes and +twists about like a snake. All the time she was here, +didn’t you see, George, how she was acting at +the General over the way?”</p> + +<p>“Humbug--acting! Hang it, she’s the nicest +little woman in England,” George replied, showing +his white teeth, and giving his ambrosial whiskers +a twirl. “You ain’t a man of the world, +Dobbin. Dammy, look at her now, she’s talked +over Tufto in no time. Look how he’s laughing! + Gad, what a shoulder she has! Emmy, why didn’t +you have a bouquet? Everybody has a bouquet.”</p> + +<p>“Faith, then, why didn’t you <i>boy</i> +one?” Mrs. O’Dowd said; and both Amelia +and William Dobbin thanked her for this timely observation. +But beyond this neither of the ladies rallied. Amelia +was overpowered by the flash and the dazzle and the +fashionable talk of her worldly rival. Even the O’Dowd +was silent and subdued after Becky’s brilliant +apparition, and scarcely said a word more about Glenmalony +all the evening.</p> + +<p>“When do you intend to give up play, George, +as you have promised me, any time these hundred years?” +Dobbin said to his friend a few days after the night +at the Opera. “When do you intend to give up +sermonising?” was the other’s reply. “What +the deuce, man, are you alarmed about? We play low; +I won last night. You don’t suppose Crawley +cheats? With fair play it comes to pretty much the +same thing at the year’s end.”</p> + +<p>“But I don’t think he could pay if he +lost,” Dobbin said; and his advice met with +the success which advice usually commands. Osborne +and Crawley were repeatedly together now. General +Tufto dined abroad almost constantly. George was always +welcome in the apartments (very close indeed to those +of the General) which the aide-de-camp and his wife +occupied in the hotel.</p> + +<p>Amelia’s manners were such when she and George +visited Crawley and his wife at these quarters, that +they had very nearly come to their first quarrel; +that is, George scolded his wife violently for her +evident unwillingness to go, and the high and mighty +manner in which she comported herself towards Mrs. +Crawley, her old friend; and Amelia did not say one +single word in reply; but with her husband’s +eye upon her, and Rebecca scanning her as she felt, +was, if possible, more bashful and awkward on the +second visit which she paid to Mrs. Rawdon, than on +her first call.</p> + +<p>Rebecca was doubly affectionate, of course, and would +not take notice, in the least, of her friend’s +coolness. “I think Emmy has become prouder +since her father’s name was in the--since Mr. +Sedley’s <i>misfortunes</i>,” Rebecca said, +softening the phrase charitably for George’s +ear.</p> + +<p>“Upon my word, I thought when we were at Brighton +she was doing me the honour to be jealous of me; and +now I suppose she is scandalised because Rawdon, and +I, and the General live together. Why, my dear creature, +how could we, with our means, live at all, but for +a friend to share expenses? And do you suppose that +Rawdon is not big enough to take care of my honour? + But I’m very much obliged to Emmy, very,” +Mrs. Rawdon said.</p> + +<p>“Pooh, jealousy!” answered George, “all +women are jealous.”</p> + +<p>“And all men too. Weren’t you jealous +of General Tufto, and the General of you, on the night +of the Opera? Why, he was ready to eat me for going +with you to visit that foolish little wife of yours; +as if I care a pin for either of you,” Crawley’s +wife said, with a pert toss of her head. “Will +you dine here? The dragon dines with the Commander-in-Chief. + Great news is stirring. They say the French have +crossed the frontier. We shall have a quiet dinner.”</p> + +<p>George accepted the invitation, although his wife +was a little ailing. They were now not quite six +weeks married. Another woman was laughing or sneering +at her expense, and he not angry. He was not even +angry with himself, this good-natured fellow. It is +a shame, he owned to himself; but hang it, if a pretty +woman <i>will</i> throw herself in your way, why, what +can a fellow do, you know? I <i>am</i> rather free +about women, he had often said, smiling and nodding +knowingly to Stubble and Spooney, and other comrades +of the mess-table; and they rather respected him +than otherwise for this prowess. Next to conquering +in war, conquering in love has been a source of pride, +time out of mind, amongst men in Vanity Fair, or how +should schoolboys brag of their amours, or Don Juan +be popular?</p> + +<p>So Mr. Osborne, having a firm conviction in his own +mind that he was a woman-killer and destined to conquer, +did not run counter to his fate, but yielded himself +up to it quite complacently. And as Emmy did not +say much or plague him with her jealousy, but merely +became unhappy and pined over it miserably in secret, +he chose to fancy that she was not suspicious of what +all his acquaintance were perfectly aware--namely, +that he was carrying on a desperate flirtation with +Mrs. Crawley. He rode with her whenever she was free. + He pretended regimental business to Amelia (by which +falsehood she was not in the least deceived), and consigning +his wife to solitude or her brother’s society, +passed his evenings in the Crawleys’ company; +losing money to the husband and flattering himself +that the wife was dying of love for him. It is very +likely that this worthy couple never absolutely conspired +and agreed together in so many words: the one to +cajole the young gentleman, whilst the other won his +money at cards: but they understood each other perfectly +well, and Rawdon let Osborne come and go with entire +good humour.</p> + +<p>George was so occupied with his new acquaintances +that he and William Dobbin were by no means so much +together as formerly. George avoided him in public +and in the regiment, and, as we see, did not like +those sermons which his senior was disposed to inflict +upon him. If some parts of his conduct made Captain +Dobbin exceedingly grave and cool; of what use was +it to tell George that, though his whiskers were large, +and his own opinion of his knowingness great, he was +as green as a schoolboy? that Rawdon was making a +victim of him as he had done of many before, and as +soon as he had used him would fling him off with scorn? + He would not listen: and so, as Dobbin, upon those +days when he visited the Osborne house, seldom had +the advantage of meeting his old friend, much painful +and unavailing talk between them was spared. Our +friend George was in the full career of the pleasures +of Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>There never was, since the days of Darius, such a +brilliant train of camp-followers as hung round the +Duke of Wellington’s army in the Low Countries, +in 1815; and led it dancing and feasting, as it were, +up to the very brink of battle. A certain ball which +a noble Duchess gave at Brussels on the 15th of June +in the above-named year is historical. All Brussels +had been in a state of excitement about it, and I +have heard from ladies who were in that town at the +period, that the talk and interest of persons of their +own sex regarding the ball was much greater even than +in respect of the enemy in their front. The struggles, +intrigues, and prayers to get tickets were such as +only English ladies will employ, in order to gain +admission to the society of the great of their own +nation.</p> + +<p>Jos and Mrs. O’Dowd, who were panting to be +asked, strove in vain to procure tickets; but others +of our friends were more lucky. For instance, through +the interest of my Lord Bareacres, and as a set-off +for the dinner at the restaurateur’s, George +got a card for Captain and Mrs. Osborne; which circumstance +greatly elated him. Dobbin, who was a friend of the +General commanding the division in which their regiment +was, came laughing one day to Mrs. Osborne, and displayed +a similar invitation, which made Jos envious, and George +wonder how the deuce he should be getting into society. + Mr. and Mrs. Rawdon, finally, were of course invited; +as became the friends of a General commanding a cavalry +brigade.</p> + +<p>On the appointed night, George, having commanded new +dresses and ornaments of all sorts for Amelia, drove +to the famous ball, where his wife did not know a +single soul. After looking about for Lady Bareacres, +who cut him, thinking the card was quite enough--and +after placing Amelia on a bench, he left her to her +own cogitations there, thinking, on his own part, +that he had behaved very handsomely in getting her +new clothes, and bringing her to the ball, where she +was free to amuse herself as she liked. Her thoughts +were not of the pleasantest, and nobody except honest +Dobbin came to disturb them.</p> + +<p>Whilst her appearance was an utter failure (as her +husband felt with a sort of rage), Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s +debut was, on the contrary, very brilliant. She arrived +very late. Her face was radiant; her dress perfection. + In the midst of the great persons assembled, and +the eye-glasses directed to her, Rebecca seemed to +be as cool and collected as when she used to marshal +Miss Pinkerton’s little girls to church. Numbers +of the men she knew already, and the dandies thronged +round her. As for the ladies, it was whispered among +them that Rawdon had run away with her from out of +a convent, and that she was a relation of the Montmorency +family. She spoke French so perfectly that there +might be some truth in this report, and it was agreed +that her manners were fine, and her air distingue. + Fifty would-be partners thronged round her at once, +and pressed to have the honour to dance with her. + But she said she was engaged, and only going to dance +very little; and made her way at once to the place +where Emmy sate quite unnoticed, and dismally unhappy. + And so, to finish the poor child at once, Mrs. Rawdon +ran and greeted affectionately her dearest Amelia, +and began forthwith to patronise her. She found fault +with her friend’s dress, and her hairdresser, +and wondered how she could be so chaussee, and vowed +that she must send her corsetiere the next morning. + She vowed that it was a delightful ball; that there +was everybody that every one knew, and only a <i>very</i> +few nobodies in the whole room. It is a fact, that +in a fortnight, and after three dinners in general +society, this young woman had got up the genteel jargon +so well, that a native could not speak it better; +and it was only from her French being so good, that +you could know she was not a born woman of fashion.</p> + +<p>George, who had left Emmy on her bench on entering +the ball-room, very soon found his way back when Rebecca +was by her dear friend’s side. Becky was just +lecturing Mrs. Osborne upon the follies which her +husband was committing. “For God’s sake, +stop him from gambling, my dear,” she said, +“or he will ruin himself. He and Rawdon are +playing at cards every night, and you know he is very +poor, and Rawdon will win every shilling from him if +he does not take care. Why don’t you prevent +him, you little careless creature? Why don’t +you come to us of an evening, instead of moping at +home with that Captain Dobbin? I dare say he is tres +aimable; but how could one love a man with feet of +such size? Your husband’s feet are darlings--Here +he comes. Where have you been, wretch? Here is Emmy +crying her eyes out for you. Are you coming to fetch +me for the quadrille?” And she left her bouquet +and shawl by Amelia’s side, and tripped off +with George to dance. Women only know how to wound +so. There is a poison on the tips of their little +shafts, which stings a thousand times more than a +man’s blunter weapon. Our poor Emmy, who had +never hated, never sneered all her life, was powerless +in the hands of her remorseless little enemy.</p> + +<p>George danced with Rebecca twice or thrice--how many +times Amelia scarcely knew. She sat quite unnoticed +in her corner, except when Rawdon came up with some +words of clumsy conversation: and later in the evening, +when Captain Dobbin made so bold as to bring her refreshments +and sit beside her. He did not like to ask her why +she was so sad; but as a pretext for the tears which +were filling in her eyes, she told him that Mrs. Crawley +had alarmed her by telling her that George would go +on playing.</p> + +<p>“It is curious, when a man is bent upon play, +by what clumsy rogues he will allow himself to be +cheated,” Dobbin said; and Emmy said, “Indeed.” +She was thinking of something else. It was not the +loss of the money that grieved her.</p> + +<p>At last George came back for Rebecca’s shawl +and flowers. She was going away. She did not even +condescend to come back and say good-bye to Amelia. + The poor girl let her husband come and go without +saying a word, and her head fell on her breast. Dobbin +had been called away, and was whispering deep in conversation +with the General of the division, his friend, and +had not seen this last parting. George went away +then with the bouquet; but when he gave it to the +owner, there lay a note, coiled like a snake among +the flowers. Rebecca’s eye caught it at once. + She had been used to deal with notes in early life. + She put out her hand and took the nosegay. He saw +by her eyes as they met, that she was aware what she +should find there. Her husband hurried her away, still +too intent upon his own thoughts, seemingly, to take +note of any marks of recognition which might pass +between his friend and his wife. These were, however, +but trifling. Rebecca gave George her hand with one +of her usual quick knowing glances, and made a curtsey +and walked away. George bowed over the hand, said +nothing in reply to a remark of Crawley’s, did +not hear it even, his brain was so throbbing with +triumph and excitement, and allowed them to go away +without a word.</p> + +<p>His wife saw the one part at least of the bouquet-scene. +It was quite natural that George should come at Rebecca’s +request to get her her scarf and flowers: it was +no more than he had done twenty times before in the +course of the last few days; but now it was too much +for her. “William,” she said, suddenly +clinging to Dobbin, who was near her, “you’ve +always been very kind to me--I’m--I’m not +well. Take me home.” She did not know she called +him by his Christian name, as George was accustomed +to do. He went away with her quickly. Her lodgings +were hard by; and they threaded through the crowd +without, where everything seemed to be more astir than +even in the ball-room within.</p> + +<p>George had been angry twice or thrice at finding his +wife up on his return from the parties which he frequented: + so she went straight to bed now; but although she +did not sleep, and although the din and clatter, and +the galloping of horsemen were incessant, she never +heard any of these noises, having quite other disturbances +to keep her awake.</p> + +<p>Osborne meanwhile, wild with elation, went off to +a play-table, and began to bet frantically. He won +repeatedly. “Everything succeeds with me to-night,” +he said. But his luck at play even did not cure him +of his restlessness, and he started up after awhile, +pocketing his winnings, and went to a buffet, where +he drank off many bumpers of wine.</p> + +<p>Here, as he was rattling away to the people around, +laughing loudly and wild with spirits, Dobbin found +him. He had been to the card-tables to look there +for his friend. Dobbin looked as pale and grave as +his comrade was flushed and jovial.</p> + +<p>“Hullo, Dob! Come and drink, old Dob! The +Duke’s wine is famous. Give me some more, you +sir”; and he held out a trembling glass for +the liquor.</p> + +<p>“Come out, George,” said Dobbin, still +gravely; “don’t drink.”</p> + +<p>“Drink! there’s nothing like it. Drink +yourself, and light up your lantern jaws, old boy. + Here’s to you.”</p> + +<p>Dobbin went up and whispered something to him, at +which George, giving a start and a wild hurray, tossed +off his glass, clapped it on the table, and walked +away speedily on his friend’s arm. “The +enemy has passed the Sambre,” William said, “and +our left is already engaged. Come away. We are to +march in three hours.”</p> + +<p>Away went George, his nerves quivering with excitement +at the news so long looked for, so sudden when it +came. What were love and intrigue now? He thought +about a thousand things but these in his rapid walk +to his quarters--his past life and future chances--the +fate which might be before him--the wife, the child +perhaps, from whom unseen he might be about to part. + Oh, how he wished that night’s work undone! + and that with a clear conscience at least he might +say farewell to the tender and guileless being by whose +love he had set such little store!</p> + +<p>He thought over his brief married life. In those +few weeks he had frightfully dissipated his little +capital. How wild and reckless he had been! Should +any mischance befall him: what was then left for +her? How unworthy he was of her. Why had he married +her? He was not fit for marriage. Why had he disobeyed +his father, who had been always so generous to him? + Hope, remorse, ambition, tenderness, and selfish +regret filled his heart. He sate down and wrote to +his father, remembering what he had said once before, +when he was engaged to fight a duel. Dawn faintly +streaked the sky as he closed this farewell letter. + He sealed it, and kissed the superscription. He thought +how he had deserted that generous father, and of the +thousand kindnesses which the stern old man had done +him.</p> + +<p>He had looked into Amelia’s bedroom when he +entered; she lay quiet, and her eyes seemed closed, +and he was glad that she was asleep. On arriving +at his quarters from the ball, he had found his regimental +servant already making preparations for his departure: + the man had understood his signal to be still, and +these arrangements were very quickly and silently +made. Should he go in and wake Amelia, he thought, +or leave a note for her brother to break the news of +departure to her? He went in to look at her once again.</p> + +<p>She had been awake when he first entered her room, +but had kept her eyes closed, so that even her wakefulness +should not seem to reproach him. But when he had +returned, so soon after herself, too, this timid little +heart had felt more at ease, and turning towards him +as he stept softly out of the room, she had fallen +into a light sleep. George came in and looked at +her again, entering still more softly. By the pale +night-lamp he could see her sweet, pale face-- the +purple eyelids were fringed and closed, and one round +arm, smooth and white, lay outside of the coverlet. + Good God! how pure she was; how gentle, how tender, +and how friendless! and he, how selfish, brutal, +and black with crime! Heart-stained, and shame-stricken, +he stood at the bed’s foot, and looked at the +sleeping girl. How dared he--who was he, to pray +for one so spotless! God bless her! God bless her! + He came to the bedside, and looked at the hand, the +little soft hand, lying asleep; and he bent over the +pillow noiselessly towards the gentle pale face.</p> + +<p>Two fair arms closed tenderly round his neck as he +stooped down. “I am awake, George,” the +poor child said, with a sob fit to break the little +heart that nestled so closely by his own. She was +awake, poor soul, and to what? At that moment a bugle +from the Place of Arms began sounding clearly, and +was taken up through the town; and amidst the drums +of the infantry, and the shrill pipes of the Scotch, +the whole city awoke.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">“The Girl I Left Behind Me”</h4> + +<p>We do not claim to rank among the military novelists. +Our place is with the non-combatants. When the decks +are cleared for action we go below and wait meekly. + We should only be in the way of the manoeuvres that +the gallant fellows are performing overhead. We shall +go no farther with the --th than to the city gate: + and leaving Major O’Dowd to his duty, come +back to the Major’s wife, and the ladies and +the baggage.</p> + +<p>Now the Major and his lady, who had not been invited +to the ball at which in our last chapter other of +our friends figured, had much more time to take their +wholesome natural rest in bed, than was accorded to +people who wished to enjoy pleasure as well as to do +duty. “It’s my belief, Peggy, my dear,” +said he, as he placidly pulled his nightcap over his +ears, “that there will be such a ball danced +in a day or two as some of ’em has never heard +the chune of”; and he was much more happy to +retire to rest after partaking of a quiet tumbler, +than to figure at any other sort of amusement. Peggy, +for her part, would have liked to have shown her turban +and bird of paradise at the ball, but for the information +which her husband had given her, and which made her +very grave.</p> + +<p>“I’d like ye wake me about half an hour +before the assembly beats,” the Major said to +his lady. “Call me at half-past one, Peggy dear, +and see me things is ready. May be I’ll not +come back to breakfast, Mrs. O’D.” With +which words, which signified his opinion that the +regiment would march the next morning, the Major ceased +talking, and fell asleep.</p> + +<p>Mrs. O’Dowd, the good housewife, arrayed in +curl papers and a camisole, felt that her duty was +to act, and not to sleep, at this juncture. “Time +enough for that,” she said, “when Mick’s +gone”; and so she packed his travelling valise +ready for the march, brushed his cloak, his cap, and +other warlike habiliments, set them out in order for +him; and stowed away in the cloak pockets a light package +of portable refreshments, and a wicker-covered flask +or pocket-pistol, containing near a pint of a remarkably +sound Cognac brandy, of which she and the Major approved +very much; and as soon as the hands of the “repayther” +pointed to half-past one, and its interior arrangements +(it had a tone quite equal to a cathaydral, its fair +owner considered) knelled forth that fatal hour, Mrs. +O’Dowd woke up her Major, and had as comfortable +a cup of coffee prepared for him as any made that +morning in Brussels. And who is there will deny that +this worthy lady’s preparations betokened affection +as much as the fits of tears and hysterics by which +more sensitive females exhibited their love, and that +their partaking of this coffee, which they drank together +while the bugles were sounding the turn-out and the +drums beating in the various quarters of the town, +was not more useful and to the purpose than the outpouring +of any mere sentiment could be? The consequence was, +that the Major appeared on parade quite trim, fresh, +and alert, his well-shaved rosy countenance, as he +sate on horseback, giving cheerfulness and confidence +to the whole corps. All the officers saluted her +when the regiment marched by the balcony on which +this brave woman stood, and waved them a cheer as +they passed; and I daresay it was not from want of +courage, but from a sense of female delicacy and propriety, +that she refrained from leading the gallant--th personally +into action.</p> + +<p>On Sundays, and at periods of a solemn nature, Mrs. +O’Dowd used to read with great gravity out of +a large volume of her uncle the Dean’s sermons. + It had been of great comfort to her on board the +transport as they were coming home, and were very nearly +wrecked, on their return from the West Indies. After +the regiment’s departure she betook herself +to this volume for meditation; perhaps she did not +understand much of what she was reading, and her thoughts +were elsewhere: but the sleep project, with poor +Mick’s nightcap there on the pillow, was quite +a vain one. So it is in the world. Jack or Donald +marches away to glory with his knapsack on his shoulder, +stepping out briskly to the tune of “The Girl +I Left Behind Me.” It is she who remains and +suffers--and has the leisure to think, and brood, +and remember.</p> + +<p>Knowing how useless regrets are, and how the indulgence +of sentiment only serves to make people more miserable, +Mrs. Rebecca wisely determined to give way to no vain +feelings of sorrow, and bore the parting from her +husband with quite a Spartan equanimity. Indeed Captain +Rawdon himself was much more affected at the leave-taking +than the resolute little woman to whom he bade farewell. + She had mastered this rude coarse nature; and he +loved and worshipped her with all his faculties of +regard and admiration. In all his life he had never +been so happy, as, during the past few months, his +wife had made him. All former delights of turf, mess, +hunting-field, and gambling-table; all previous loves +and courtships of milliners, opera-dancers, and the +like easy triumphs of the clumsy military Adonis, +were quite insipid when compared to the lawful matrimonial +pleasures which of late he had enjoyed. She had known +perpetually how to divert him; and he had found his +house and her society a thousand times more pleasant +than any place or company which he had ever frequented +from his childhood until now. And he cursed his past +follies and extravagances, and bemoaned his vast outlying +debts above all, which must remain for ever as obstacles +to prevent his wife’s advancement in the world. + He had often groaned over these in midnight conversations +with Rebecca, although as a bachelor they had never +given him any disquiet. He himself was struck with +this phenomenon. “Hang it,” he would +say (or perhaps use a still stronger expression out +of his simple vocabulary), “before I was married +I didn’t care what bills I put my name to, and +so long as Moses would wait or Levy would renew for +three months, I kept on never minding. But since +I’m married, except renewing, of course, I give +you my honour I’ve not touched a bit of stamped +paper.”</p> + +<p>Rebecca always knew how to conjure away these moods +of melancholy. “Why, my stupid love,” +she would say, “we have not done with your aunt +yet. If she fails us, isn’t there what you call +the Gazette? or, stop, when your uncle Bute’s +life drops, I have another scheme. The living has +always belonged to the younger brother, and why shouldn’t +you sell out and go into the Church?” The idea +of this conversion set Rawdon into roars of laughter: +you might have heard the explosion through the hotel +at midnight, and the haw-haws of the great dragoon’s +voice. General Tufto heard him from his quarters on +the first floor above them; and Rebecca acted the scene +with great spirit, and preached Rawdon’s first +sermon, to the immense delight of the General at breakfast.</p> + +<p>But these were mere by-gone days and talk. When the +final news arrived that the campaign was opened, and +the troops were to march, Rawdon’s gravity became +such that Becky rallied him about it in a manner which +rather hurt the feelings of the Guardsman. “You +don’t suppose I’m afraid, Becky, I should +think,” he said, with a tremor in his voice. + “But I’m a pretty good mark for a shot, +and you see if it brings me down, why I leave one +and perhaps two behind me whom I should wish to provide +for, as I brought ’em into the scrape. It is +no laughing matter that, Mrs. C., anyways.”</p> + +<p>Rebecca by a hundred caresses and kind words tried +to soothe the feelings of the wounded lover. It +was only when her vivacity and sense of humour got +the better of this sprightly creature (as they would +do under most circumstances of life indeed) that she +would break out with her satire, but she could soon +put on a demure face. “Dearest love,” +she said, “do you suppose I feel nothing?” +and hastily dashing something from her eyes, she looked +up in her husband’s face with a smile.</p> + +<p>“Look here,” said he. “If I drop, +let us see what there is for you. I have had a pretty +good run of luck here, and here’s two hundred +and thirty pounds. I have got ten Napoleons in my +pocket. That is as much as I shall want; for the +General pays everything like a prince; and if I’m +hit, why you know I cost nothing. Don’t cry, +little woman; I may live to vex you yet. Well, I shan’t +take either of my horses, but shall ride the General’s +grey charger: it’s cheaper, and I told him +mine was lame. If I’m done, those two ought +to fetch you something. Grigg offered ninety for the +mare yesterday, before this confounded news came, +and like a fool I wouldn’t let her go under +the two o’s. Bullfinch will fetch his price +any day, only you’d better sell him in this country, +because the dealers have so many bills of mine, and +so I’d rather he shouldn’t go back to +England. Your little mare the General gave you will +fetch something, and there’s no d--d livery stable +bills here as there are in London,” Rawdon added, +with a laugh. “There’s that dressing-case +cost me two hundred--that is, I owe two for it; and +the gold tops and bottles must be worth thirty or forty. + Please to put <i>that</i> up the spout, ma’am, +with my pins, and rings, and watch and chain, and +things. They cost a precious lot of money. Miss +Crawley, I know, paid a hundred down for the chain +and ticker. Gold tops and bottles, indeed! dammy, +I’m sorry I didn’t take more now. Edwards +pressed on me a silver-gilt boot-jack, and I might +have had a dressing-case fitted up with a silver warming-pan, +and a service of plate. But we must make the best +of what we’ve got, Becky, you know.”</p> + +<p>And so, making his last dispositions, Captain Crawley, +who had seldom thought about anything but himself, +until the last few months of his life, when Love had +obtained the mastery over the dragoon, went through +the various items of his little catalogue of effects, +striving to see how they might be turned into money +for his wife’s benefit, in case any accident +should befall him. He pleased himself by noting down +with a pencil, in his big schoolboy handwriting, the +various items of his portable property which might +be sold for his widow’s advantage as, for example, +“My double-barril by Manton, say 40 guineas; +my driving cloak, lined with sable fur, 50 pounds; +my duelling pistols in rosewood case (same which I +shot Captain Marker), 20 pounds; my regulation saddle-holsters +and housings; my Laurie ditto,” and so forth, +over all of which articles he made Rebecca the mistress.</p> + +<p>Faithful to his plan of economy, the Captain dressed +himself in his oldest and shabbiest uniform and epaulets, +leaving the newest behind, under his wife’s +(or it might be his widow’s) guardianship. And +this famous dandy of Windsor and Hyde Park went off +on his campaign with a kit as modest as that of a +sergeant, and with something like a prayer on his +lips for the woman he was leaving. He took her up +from the ground, and held her in his arms for a minute, +tight pressed against his strong-beating heart. His +face was purple and his eyes dim, as he put her down +and left her. He rode by his General’s side, +and smoked his cigar in silence as they hastened after +the troops of the General’s brigade, which preceded +them; and it was not until they were some miles on +their way that he left off twirling his moustache +and broke silence.</p> + +<p>And Rebecca, as we have said, wisely determined not +to give way to unavailing sentimentality on her husband’s +departure. She waved him an adieu from the window, +and stood there for a moment looking out after he +was gone. The cathedral towers and the full gables +of the quaint old houses were just beginning to blush +in the sunrise. There had been no rest for her that +night. She was still in her pretty ball-dress, her +fair hair hanging somewhat out of curl on her neck, +and the circles round her eyes dark with watching. + “What a fright I seem,” she said, examining +herself in the glass, “and how pale this pink +makes one look!” So she divested herself of +this pink raiment; in doing which a note fell out +from her corsage, which she picked up with a smile, +and locked into her dressing-box. And then she put +her bouquet of the ball into a glass of water, and +went to bed, and slept very comfortably.</p> + +<p>The town was quite quiet when she woke up at ten o’clock, +and partook of coffee, very requisite and comforting +after the exhaustion and grief of the morning’s +occurrences.</p> + +<p>This meal over, she resumed honest Rawdon’s +calculations of the night previous, and surveyed her +position. Should the worst befall, all things considered, +she was pretty well to do. There were her own trinkets +and trousseau, in addition to those which her husband +had left behind. Rawdon’s generosity, when they +were first married, has already been described and +lauded. Besides these, and the little mare, the General, +her slave and worshipper, had made her many very handsome +presents, in the shape of cashmere shawls bought at +the auction of a bankrupt French general’s lady, +and numerous tributes from the jewellers’ shops, +all of which betokened her admirer’s taste and +wealth. As for “tickers,” as poor Rawdon +called watches, her apartments were alive with their +clicking. For, happening to mention one night that +hers, which Rawdon had given to her, was of English +workmanship, and went ill, on the very next morning +there came to her a little bijou marked Leroy, with +a chain and cover charmingly set with turquoises, +and another signed Brequet, which was covered with +pearls, and yet scarcely bigger than a half-crown. + General Tufto had bought one, and Captain Osborne +had gallantly presented the other. Mrs. Osborne had +no watch, though, to do George justice, she might +have had one for the asking, and the Honourable Mrs. +Tufto in England had an old instrument of her mother’s +that might have served for the plate-warming pan which +Rawdon talked about. If Messrs. Howell and James were +to publish a list of the purchasers of all the trinkets +which they sell, how surprised would some families +be: and if all these ornaments went to gentlemen’s +lawful wives and daughters, what a profusion of jewellery +there would be exhibited in the genteelest homes of +Vanity Fair!</p> + +<p>Every calculation made of these valuables Mrs. Rebecca +found, not without a pungent feeling of triumph and +self-satisfaction, that should circumstances occur, +she might reckon on six or seven hundred pounds at +the very least, to begin the world with; and she passed +the morning disposing, ordering, looking out, and locking +up her properties in the most agreeable manner. Among +the notes in Rawdon’s pocket-book was a draft +for twenty pounds on Osborne’s banker. This +made her think about Mrs. Osborne. “I will go +and get the draft cashed,” she said, “and +pay a visit afterwards to poor little Emmy.” +If this is a novel without a hero, at least let us +lay claim to a heroine. No man in the British army +which has marched away, not the great Duke himself, +could be more cool or collected in the presence of +doubts and difficulties, than the indomitable little +aide-de-camp’s wife.</p> + +<p>And there was another of our acquaintances who was +also to be left behind, a non-combatant, and whose +emotions and behaviour we have therefore a right to +know. This was our friend the ex-collector of Boggley +Wollah, whose rest was broken, like other people’s, +by the sounding of the bugles in the early morning. + Being a great sleeper, and fond of his bed, it is +possible he would have snoozed on until his usual +hour of rising in the forenoon, in spite of all the +drums, bugles, and bagpipes in the British army, but +for an interruption, which did not come from George +Osborne, who shared Jos’s quarters with him, +and was as usual occupied too much with his own affairs +or with grief at parting with his wife, to think of +taking leave of his slumbering brother-in-law--it +was not George, we say, who interposed between Jos +Sedley and sleep, but Captain Dobbin, who came and +roused him up, insisting on shaking hands with him +before his departure.</p> + +<p>“Very kind of you,” said Jos, yawning, +and wishing the Captain at the deuce.</p> + +<p>“I--I didn’t like to go off without saying +good-bye, you know,” Dobbin said in a very incoherent +manner; “because you know some of us mayn’t +come back again, and I like to see you all well, and--and +that sort of thing, you know.”</p> + +<p>“What do you mean?” Jos asked, rubbing +his eyes. The Captain did not in the least hear him +or look at the stout gentleman in the nightcap, about +whom he professed to have such a tender interest. +The hypocrite was looking and listening with all his +might in the direction of George’s apartments, +striding about the room, upsetting the chairs, beating +the tattoo, biting his nails, and showing other signs +of great inward emotion.</p> + +<p>Jos had always had rather a mean opinion of the Captain, +and now began to think his courage was somewhat equivocal. + “What is it I can do for you, Dobbin?” +he said, in a sarcastic tone.</p> + +<p>“I tell you what you can do,” the Captain +replied, coming up to the bed; “we march in +a quarter of an hour, Sedley, and neither George nor +I may ever come back. Mind you, you are not to stir +from this town until you ascertain how things go. + You are to stay here and watch over your sister, +and comfort her, and see that no harm comes to her. + If anything happens to George, remember she has no +one but you in the world to look to. If it goes wrong +with the army, you’ll see her safe back to England; +and you will promise me on your word that you will +never desert her. I know you won’t: as far +as money goes, you were always free enough with that. + Do you want any? I mean, have you enough gold to +take you back to England in case of a misfortune?”</p> + +<p>“Sir,” said Jos, majestically, “when +I want money, I know where to ask for it. And as +for my sister, you needn’t tell me how I ought +to behave to her.”</p> + +<p>“You speak like a man of spirit, Jos,” +the other answered good-naturedly, “and I am +glad that George can leave her in such good hands. + So I may give him your word of honour, may I, that +in case of extremity you will stand by her?”</p> + +<p>“Of course, of course,” answered Mr. Jos, +whose generosity in money matters Dobbin estimated +quite correctly.</p> + +<p>“And you’ll see her safe out of Brussels +in the event of a defeat?”</p> + +<p>“A defeat! D--- it, sir, it’s impossible. + Don’t try and frighten <i>me</i>,” the +hero cried from his bed; and Dobbin’s mind was +thus perfectly set at ease now that Jos had spoken +out so resolutely respecting his conduct to his sister. + “At least,” thought the Captain, “there +will be a retreat secured for her in case the worst +should ensue.”</p> + +<p>If Captain Dobbin expected to get any personal comfort +and satisfaction from having one more view of Amelia +before the regiment marched away, his selfishness +was punished just as such odious egotism deserved +to be. The door of Jos’s bedroom opened into +the sitting-room which was common to the family party, +and opposite this door was that of Amelia’s +chamber. The bugles had wakened everybody: there +was no use in concealment now. George’s servant +was packing in this room: Osborne coming in and out +of the contiguous bedroom, flinging to the man such +articles as he thought fit to carry on the campaign. +And presently Dobbin had the opportunity which his +heart coveted, and he got sight of Amelia’s +face once more. But what a face it was! So white, +so wild and despair-stricken, that the remembrance +of it haunted him afterwards like a crime, and the +sight smote him with inexpressible pangs of longing +and pity.</p> + +<p>She was wrapped in a white morning dress, her hair +falling on her shoulders, and her large eyes fixed +and without light. By way of helping on the preparations +for the departure, and showing that she too could +be useful at a moment so critical, this poor soul had +taken up a sash of George’s from the drawers +whereon it lay, and followed him to and fro with the +sash in her hand, looking on mutely as his packing +proceeded. She came out and stood, leaning at the +wall, holding this sash against her bosom, from which +the heavy net of crimson dropped like a large stain +of blood. Our gentle-hearted Captain felt a guilty +shock as he looked at her. “Good God,” +thought he, “and is it grief like this I dared +to pry into?” And there was no help: no means +to soothe and comfort this helpless, speechless misery. + He stood for a moment and looked at her, powerless +and torn with pity, as a parent regards an infant in +pain.</p> + +<p>At last, George took Emmy’s hand, and led her +back into the bedroom, from whence he came out alone. + The parting had taken place in that moment, and he +was gone.</p> + +<p>“Thank Heaven that is over,” George thought, +bounding down the stair, his sword under his arm, +as he ran swiftly to the alarm ground, where the regiment +was mustered, and whither trooped men and officers +hurrying from their billets; his pulse was throbbing +and his cheeks flushed: the great game of war was +going to be played, and he one of the players. What +a fierce excitement of doubt, hope, and pleasure! + What tremendous hazards of loss or gain! What were +all the games of chance he had ever played compared +to this one? Into all contests requiring athletic +skill and courage, the young man, from his boyhood +upwards, had flung himself with all his might. The +champion of his school and his regiment, the bravos +of his companions had followed him everywhere; from +the boys’ cricket-match to the garrison-races, +he had won a hundred of triumphs; and wherever he +went women and men had admired and envied him. What +qualities are there for which a man gets so speedy +a return of applause, as those of bodily superiority, +activity, and valour? Time out of mind strength and +courage have been the theme of bards and romances; +and from the story of Troy down to to-day, poetry has +always chosen a soldier for a hero. I wonder is it +because men are cowards in heart that they admire +bravery so much, and place military valour so far +beyond every other quality for reward and worship?</p> + +<p>So, at the sound of that stirring call to battle, +George jumped away from the gentle arms in which he +had been dallying; not without a feeling of shame +(although his wife’s hold on him had been but +feeble), that he should have been detained there so +long. The same feeling of eagerness and excitement +was amongst all those friends of his of whom we have +had occasional glimpses, from the stout senior Major, +who led the regiment into action, to little Stubble, +the Ensign, who was to bear its colours on that day.</p> + +<p>The sun was just rising as the march began--it was +a gallant sight-- the band led the column, playing +the regimental march--then came the Major in command, +riding upon Pyramus, his stout charger--then marched +the grenadiers, their Captain at their head; in the +centre were the colours, borne by the senior and junior +Ensigns--then George came marching at the head of +his company. He looked up, and smiled at Amelia, and +passed on; and even the sound of the music died away.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Jos Sedley Takes Care of His Sister</h4> + +<p>Thus all the superior officers being summoned on duty +elsewhere, Jos Sedley was left in command of the little +colony at Brussels, with Amelia invalided, Isidor, +his Belgian servant, and the bonne, who was maid-of-all-work +for the establishment, as a garrison under him. Though +he was disturbed in spirit, and his rest destroyed +by Dobbin’s interruption and the occurrences +of the morning, Jos nevertheless remained for many +hours in bed, wakeful and rolling about there until +his usual hour of rising had arrived. The sun was +high in the heavens, and our gallant friends of the +--th miles on their march, before the civilian appeared +in his flowered dressing-gown at breakfast.</p> + +<p>About George’s absence, his brother-in-law was +very easy in mind. Perhaps Jos was rather pleased +in his heart that Osborne was gone, for during George’s +presence, the other had played but a very secondary +part in the household, and Osborne did not scruple +to show his contempt for the stout civilian. But +Emmy had always been good and attentive to him. It +was she who ministered to his comforts, who superintended +the dishes that he liked, who walked or rode with +him (as she had many, too many, opportunities of doing, +for where was George?) and who interposed her sweet +face between his anger and her husband’s scorn. + Many timid remonstrances had she uttered to George +in behalf of her brother, but the former in his trenchant +way cut these entreaties short. “I’m an +honest man,” he said, “and if I have a +feeling I show it, as an honest man will. How the +deuce, my dear, would you have me behave respectfully +to such a fool as your brother?” So Jos was +pleased with George’s absence. His plain hat, +and gloves on a sideboard, and the idea that the owner +was away, caused Jos I don’t know what secret +thrill of pleasure. “<i>He</i> won’t be +troubling me this morning,” Jos thought, “with +his dandified airs and his impudence.”</p> + +<p>“Put the Captain’s hat into the ante-room,” +he said to Isidor, the servant.</p> + +<p>“Perhaps he won’t want it again,” +replied the lackey, looking knowingly at his master. + He hated George too, whose insolence towards him +was quite of the English sort.</p> + +<p>“And ask if Madame is coming to breakfast,” +Mr. Sedley said with great majesty, ashamed to enter +with a servant upon the subject of his dislike for +George. The truth is, he had abused his brother to +the valet a score of times before.</p> + +<p>Alas! Madame could not come to breakfast, and cut +the tartines that Mr. Jos liked. Madame was a great +deal too ill, and had been in a frightful state ever +since her husband’s departure, so her bonne +said. Jos showed his sympathy by pouring her out a +large cup of tea It was his way of exhibiting kindness: + and he improved on this; he not only sent her breakfast, +but he bethought him what delicacies she would most +like for dinner.</p> + +<p>Isidor, the valet, had looked on very sulkily, while +Osborne’s servant was disposing of his master’s +baggage previous to the Captain’s departure: + for in the first place he hated Mr. Osborne, whose +conduct to him, and to all inferiors, was generally +overbearing (nor does the continental domestic like +to be treated with insolence as our own better-tempered +servants do), and secondly, he was angry that so many +valuables should be removed from under his hands, +to fall into other people’s possession when the +English discomfiture should arrive. Of this defeat +he and a vast number of other persons in Brussels +and Belgium did not make the slightest doubt. The +almost universal belief was, that the Emperor would +divide the Prussian and English armies, annihilate +one after the other, and march into Brussels before +three days were over: when all the movables of his +present masters, who would be killed, or fugitives, +or prisoners, would lawfully become the property of +Monsieur Isidor.</p> + +<p>As he helped Jos through his toilsome and complicated +daily toilette, this faithful servant would calculate +what he should do with the very articles with which +he was decorating his master’s person. He would +make a present of the silver essence-bottles and toilet +knicknacks to a young lady of whom he was fond; and +keep the English cutlery and the large ruby pin for +himself. It would look very smart upon one of the +fine frilled shirts, which, with the gold-laced cap +and the frogged frock coat, that might easily be cut +down to suit his shape, and the Captain’s gold-headed +cane, and the great double ring with the rubies, which +he would have made into a pair of beautiful earrings, +he calculated would make a perfect Adonis of himself, +and render Mademoiselle Reine an easy prey. “How +those sleeve-buttons will suit me!” thought he, +as he fixed a pair on the fat pudgy wrists of Mr. +Sedley. “I long for sleeve-buttons; and the +Captain’s boots with brass spurs, in the next +room, corbleu! what an effect they will make in the +Allee Verte!” So while Monsieur Isidor with +bodily fingers was holding on to his master’s +nose, and shaving the lower part of Jos’s face, +his imagination was rambling along the Green Avenue, +dressed out in a frogged coat and lace, and in company +with Mademoiselle Reine; he was loitering in spirit +on the banks, and examining the barges sailing slowly +under the cool shadows of the trees by the canal, +or refreshing himself with a mug of Faro at the bench +of a beer-house on the road to Laeken.</p> + +<p>But Mr. Joseph Sedley, luckily for his own peace, +no more knew what was passing in his domestic’s +mind than the respected reader, and I suspect what +John or Mary, whose wages we pay, think of ourselves. +What our servants think of us!--Did we know what our +intimates and dear relations thought of us, we should +live in a world that we should be glad to quit, and +in a frame of mind and a constant terror, that would +be perfectly unbearable. So Jos’s man was marking +his victim down, as you see one of Mr. Paynter’s +assistants in Leadenhall Street ornament an unconscious +turtle with a placard on which is written, “Soup +to-morrow.”</p> + +<p>Amelia’s attendant was much less selfishly disposed. +Few dependents could come near that kind and gentle +creature without paying their usual tribute of loyalty +and affection to her sweet and affectionate nature. + And it is a fact that Pauline, the cook, consoled +her mistress more than anybody whom she saw on this +wretched morning; for when she found how Amelia remained +for hours, silent, motionless, and haggard, by the +windows in which she had placed herself to watch the +last bayonets of the column as it marched away, the +honest girl took the lady’s hand, and said, Tenez, +Madame, est-ce qu’il n’est pas aussi +a l’armee, mon homme a moi? with which she +burst into tears, and Amelia falling into her arms, +did likewise, and so each pitied and soothed the other.</p> + +<p>Several times during the forenoon Mr. Jos’s +Isidor went from his lodgings into the town, and to +the gates of the hotels and lodging-houses round +about the Parc, where the English were congregated, +and there mingled with other valets, couriers, and +lackeys, gathered such news as was abroad, and brought +back bulletins for his master’s information. + Almost all these gentlemen were in heart partisans +of the Emperor, and had their opinions about the speedy +end of the campaign. The Emperor’s proclamation +from Avesnes had been distributed everywhere plentifully +in Brussels. “Soldiers!” it said, “this +is the anniversary of Marengo and Friedland, by which +the destinies of Europe were twice decided. Then, +as after Austerlitz, as after Wagram, we were too +generous. We believed in the oaths and promises of +princes whom we suffered to remain upon their thrones. + Let us march once more to meet them. We and they, +are we not still the same men? Soldiers! these same +Prussians who are so arrogant to-day, were three to +one against you at Jena, and six to one at Montmirail. + Those among you who were prisoners in England can +tell their comrades what frightful torments they suffered +on board the English hulks. Madmen! a moment of +prosperity has blinded them, and if they enter into +France it will be to find a grave there!” But +the partisans of the French prophesied a more speedy +extermination of the Emperor’s enemies than +this; and it was agreed on all hands that Prussians +and British would never return except as prisoners +in the rear of the conquering army.</p> + +<p>These opinions in the course of the day were brought +to operate upon Mr. Sedley. He was told that the +Duke of Wellington had gone to try and rally his army, +the advance of which had been utterly crushed the +night before.</p> + +<p>“Crushed, psha!” said Jos, whose heart +was pretty stout at breakfast-time. “The Duke +has gone to beat the Emperor as he has beaten all +his generals before.”</p> + +<p>“His papers are burned, his effects are removed, +and his quarters are being got ready for the Duke +of Dalmatia,” Jos’s informant replied. + “I had it from his own maitre d’hotel. + Milor Duc de Richemont’s people are packing +up everything. His Grace has fled already, and the +Duchess is only waiting to see the plate packed to +join the King of France at Ostend.”</p> + +<p>“The King of France is at Ghent, fellow,” +replied Jos, affecting incredulity.</p> + +<p>“He fled last night to Bruges, and embarks today +from Ostend. The Duc de Berri is taken prisoner. + Those who wish to be safe had better go soon, for +the dykes will be opened to-morrow, and who can fly +when the whole country is under water?”</p> + +<p>“Nonsense, sir, we are three to one, sir, against +any force Boney can bring into the field,” Mr. +Sedley objected; “the Austrians and the Russians +are on their march. He must, he shall be crushed,” +Jos said, slapping his hand on the table.</p> + +<p>“The Prussians were three to one at Jena, and +he took their army and kingdom in a week. They were +six to one at Montmirail, and he scattered them like +sheep. The Austrian army is coming, but with the Empress +and the King of Rome at its head; and the Russians, +bah! the Russians will withdraw. No quarter is to +be given to the English, on account of their cruelty +to our braves on board the infamous pontoons. Look +here, here it is in black and white. Here’s +the proclamation of his Majesty the Emperor and King,” +said the now declared partisan of Napoleon, and taking +the document from his pocket, Isidor sternly thrust +it into his master’s face, and already looked +upon the frogged coat and valuables as his own spoil.</p> + +<p>Jos was, if not seriously alarmed as yet, at least +considerably disturbed in mind. “Give me my +coat and cap, sir, said he, “and follow me. + I will go myself and learn the truth of these reports.” +Isidor was furious as Jos put on the braided frock. + “Milor had better not wear that military coat,” +said he; “the Frenchmen have sworn not to give +quarter to a single British soldier.”</p> + +<p>“Silence, sirrah!” said Jos, with a resolute +countenance still, and thrust his arm into the sleeve +with indomitable resolution, in the performance of +which heroic act he was found by Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, +who at this juncture came up to visit Amelia, and entered +without ringing at the antechamber door.</p> + +<p>Rebecca was dressed very neatly and smartly, as usual: +her quiet sleep after Rawdon’s departure had +refreshed her, and her pink smiling cheeks were quite +pleasant to look at, in a town and on a day when everybody +else’s countenance wore the appearance of the +deepest anxiety and gloom. She laughed at the attitude +in which Jos was discovered, and the struggles and +convulsions with which the stout gentleman thrust +himself into the braided coat.</p> + +<p>“Are you preparing to join the army, Mr. Joseph?” +she said. “Is there to be nobody left in Brussels +to protect us poor women?” Jos succeeded in +plunging into the coat, and came forward blushing and +stuttering out excuses to his fair visitor. “How +was she after the events of the morning--after the +fatigues of the ball the night before?” Monsieur +Isidor disappeared into his master’s adjacent +bedroom, bearing off the flowered dressing-gown.</p> + +<p>“How good of you to ask,” said she, pressing +one of his hands in both her own. “How cool +and collected you look when everybody else is frightened! + How is our dear little Emmy? It must have been an +awful, awful parting.”</p> + +<p>“Tremendous,” Jos said.</p> + +<p>“You men can bear anything,” replied the +lady. “Parting or danger are nothing to you. + Own now that you were going to join the army and +leave us to our fate. I know you were--something tells +me you were. I was so frightened, when the thought +came into my head (for I do sometimes think of you +when I am alone, Mr. Joseph), that I ran off immediately +to beg and entreat you not to fly from us.”</p> + +<p>This speech might be interpreted, “My dear sir, +should an accident befall the army, and a retreat +be necessary, you have a very comfortable carriage, +in which I propose to take a seat.” I don’t +know whether Jos understood the words in this sense. + But he was profoundly mortified by the lady’s +inattention to him during their stay at Brussels. + He had never been presented to any of Rawdon Crawley’s +great acquaintances: he had scarcely been invited +to Rebecca’s parties; for he was too timid to +play much, and his presence bored George and Rawdon +equally, who neither of them, perhaps, liked to have +a witness of the amusements in which the pair chose +to indulge. “Ah!” thought Jos, “now +she wants me she comes to me. When there is nobody +else in the way she can think about old Joseph Sedley!” + But besides these doubts he felt flattered at the +idea Rebecca expressed of his courage.</p> + +<p>He blushed a good deal, and put on an air of importance. +“I should like to see the action,” he +said. “Every man of any spirit would, you know. + I’ve seen a little service in India, but nothing +on this grand scale.”</p> + +<p>“You men would sacrifice anything for a pleasure,” +Rebecca answered. “Captain Crawley left me this +morning as gay as if he were going to a hunting party. + What does he care? What do any of you care for the +agonies and tortures of a poor forsaken woman? (I +wonder whether he could really have been going to +the troops, this great lazy gourmand?) Oh! dear +Mr. Sedley, I have come to you for comfort--for consolation. + I have been on my knees all the morning. I tremble +at the frightful danger into which our husbands, our +friends, our brave troops and allies, are rushing. + And I come here for shelter, and find another of +my friends--the last remaining to me--bent upon plunging +into the dreadful scene!”</p> + +<p>“My dear madam,” Jos replied, now beginning +to be quite soothed, “don’t be alarmed. + I only said I should like to go--what Briton would +not? But my duty keeps me here: I can’t leave +that poor creature in the next room.” And he +pointed with his finger to the door of the chamber +in which Amelia was.</p> + +<p>“Good noble brother!” Rebecca said, putting +her handkerchief to her eyes, and smelling the eau-de-cologne +with which it was scented. “I have done you +injustice: you have got a heart. I thought you had +not.”</p> + +<p>“O, upon my honour!” Jos said, making +a motion as if he would lay his hand upon the spot +in question. “You do me injustice, indeed you +do--my dear Mrs. Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“I do, now your heart is true to your sister. + But I remember two years ago--when it was false to +me!” Rebecca said, fixing her eyes upon him +for an instant, and then turning away into the window.</p> + +<p>Jos blushed violently. That organ which he was accused +by Rebecca of not possessing began to thump tumultuously. + He recalled the days when he had fled from her, and +the passion which had once inflamed him--the days +when he had driven her in his curricle: when she had +knit the green purse for him: when he had sate enraptured +gazing at her white arms and bright eyes.</p> + +<p>“I know you think me ungrateful,” Rebecca +continued, coming out of the window, and once more +looking at him and addressing him in a low tremulous +voice. “Your coldness, your averted looks, your +manner when we have met of late--when I came in just +now, all proved it to me. But were there no reasons +why I should avoid you? Let your own heart answer +that question. Do you think my husband was too much +inclined to welcome you? The only unkind words I have +ever had from him (I will do Captain Crawley that +justice) have been about you-- and most cruel, cruel +words they were.”</p> + +<p>“Good gracious! what have I done?” asked +Jos in a flurry of pleasure and perplexity; “what +have I done--to--to--?”</p> + +<p>“Is jealousy nothing?” said Rebecca. +“He makes me miserable about you. And whatever +it might have been once--my heart is all his. I am +innocent now. Am I not, Mr. Sedley?”</p> + +<p>All Jos’s blood tingled with delight, as he +surveyed this victim to his attractions. A few adroit +words, one or two knowing tender glances of the eyes, +and his heart was inflamed again and his doubts and +suspicions forgotten. From Solomon downwards, have +not wiser men than he been cajoled and befooled by +women? “If the worst comes to the worst,” +Becky thought, “my retreat is secure; and I have +a right-hand seat in the barouche.”</p> + +<p>There is no knowing into what declarations of love +and ardour the tumultuous passions of Mr. Joseph might +have led him, if Isidor the valet had not made his +reappearance at this minute, and begun to busy himself +about the domestic affairs. Jos, who was just going +to gasp out an avowal, choked almost with the emotion +that he was obliged to restrain. Rebecca too bethought +her that it was time she should go in and comfort +her dearest Amelia. “Au revoir,” she said, +kissing her hand to Mr. Joseph, and tapped gently at +the door of his sister’s apartment. As she +entered and closed the door on herself, he sank down +in a chair, and gazed and sighed and puffed portentously. + “That coat is very tight for Milor,” Isidor +said, still having his eye on the frogs; but his master +heard him not: his thoughts were elsewhere: now glowing, +maddening, upon the contemplation of the enchanting +Rebecca: anon shrinking guiltily before the vision +of the jealous Rawdon Crawley, with his curling, fierce +mustachios, and his terrible duelling pistols loaded +and cocked.</p> + +<p>Rebecca’s appearance struck Amelia with terror, +and made her shrink back. It recalled her to the +world and the remembrance of yesterday. In the overpowering +fears about to-morrow she had forgotten Rebecca--jealousy--everything +except that her husband was gone and was in danger. + Until this dauntless worldling came in and broke +the spell, and lifted the latch, we too have forborne +to enter into that sad chamber. How long had that +poor girl been on her knees! what hours of speechless +prayer and bitter prostration had she passed there! + The war-chroniclers who write brilliant stories of +fight and triumph scarcely tell us of these. These +are too mean parts of the pageant: and you don’t +hear widows’ cries or mothers’ sobs in +the midst of the shouts and jubilation in the great +Chorus of Victory. And yet when was the time that +such have not cried out: heart-broken, humble protestants, +unheard in the uproar of the triumph!</p> + +<p>After the first movement of terror in Amelia’s +mind--when Rebecca’s green eyes lighted upon +her, and rustling in her fresh silks and brilliant +ornaments, the latter tripped up with extended arms +to embrace her--a feeling of anger succeeded, and +from being deadly pale before, her face flushed up +red, and she returned Rebecca’s look after a +moment with a steadiness which surprised and somewhat +abashed her rival.</p> + +<p>“Dearest Amelia, you are very unwell,” +the visitor said, putting forth her hand to take Amelia’s. + “What is it? I could not rest until I knew +how you were.”</p> + +<p>Amelia drew back her hand--never since her life began +had that gentle soul refused to believe or to answer +any demonstration of good-will or affection. But +she drew back her hand, and trembled all over. “Why +are you here, Rebecca?” she said, still looking +at her solemnly with her large eyes. These glances +troubled her visitor.</p> + +<p>“She must have seen him give me the letter at +the ball,” Rebecca thought. “Don’t +be agitated, dear Amelia,” she said, looking +down. “I came but to see if I could--if you +were well.”</p> + +<p>“Are you well?” said Amelia. “I +dare say you are. You don’t love your husband. + You would not be here if you did. Tell me, Rebecca, +did I ever do you anything but kindness?”</p> + +<p>“Indeed, Amelia, no,” the other said, +still hanging down her head.</p> + +<p>“When you were quite poor, who was it that befriended +you? Was I not a sister to you? You saw us all in +happier days before he married me. I was all in all +then to him; or would he have given up his fortune, +his family, as he nobly did to make me happy? Why +did you come between my love and me? Who sent you +to separate those whom God joined, and take my darling’s +heart from me--my own husband? Do you think you could +I love him as I did? His love was everything to me. +You knew it, and wanted to rob me of it. For shame, +Rebecca; bad and wicked woman--false friend and false +wife.”</p> + +<p>“Amelia, I protest before God, I have done my +husband no wrong,” Rebecca said, turning from +her.</p> + +<p>“Have you done me no wrong, Rebecca? You did +not succeed, but you tried. Ask your heart if you +did not.”</p> + +<p>She knows nothing, Rebecca thought.</p> + +<p>“He came back to me. I knew he would. I knew +that no falsehood, no flattery, could keep him from +me long. I knew he would come. I prayed so that he +should.”</p> + +<p>The poor girl spoke these words with a spirit and +volubility which Rebecca had never before seen in +her, and before which the latter was quite dumb. +“But what have I done to you,” she continued +in a more pitiful tone, “that you should try +and take him from me? I had him but for six weeks. + You might have spared me those, Rebecca. And yet, +from the very first day of our wedding, you came and +blighted it. Now he is gone, are you come to see how +unhappy I am?” she continued. “You made +me wretched enough for the past fortnight: you might +have spared me to-day.”</p> + +<p>“I--I never came here,” interposed Rebecca, +with unlucky truth.</p> + +<p>“No. You didn’t come. You took him away. + Are you come to fetch him from me?” she continued +in a wilder tone. “He was here, but he is gone +now. There on that very sofa he sate. Don’t +touch it. We sate and talked there. I was on his +knee, and my arms were round his neck, and we said +‘Our Father.’ Yes, he was here: and they +came and took him away, but he promised me to come +back.”</p> + +<p>“He will come back, my dear,” said Rebecca, +touched in spite of herself.</p> + +<p>“Look,” said Amelia, “this is his +sash--isn’t it a pretty colour?” and she +took up the fringe and kissed it. She had tied it +round her waist at some part of the day. She had +forgotten her anger, her jealousy, the very presence +of her rival seemingly. For she walked silently and +almost with a smile on her face, towards the bed, and +began to smooth down George’s pillow.</p> + +<p>Rebecca walked, too, silently away. “How is +Amelia?” asked Jos, who still held his position +in the chair.</p> + +<p>“There should be somebody with her,” said +Rebecca. “I think she is very unwell”: + and she went away with a very grave face, refusing +Mr. Sedley’s entreaties that she would stay and +partake of the early dinner which he had ordered.</p> + +<p>Rebecca was of a good-natured and obliging disposition; +and she liked Amelia rather than otherwise. Even +her hard words, reproachful as they were, were complimentary--the +groans of a person stinging under defeat. Meeting +Mrs. O’Dowd, whom the Dean’s sermons had +by no means comforted, and who was walking very disconsolately +in the Parc, Rebecca accosted the latter, rather to +the surprise of the Major’s wife, who was not +accustomed to such marks of politeness from Mrs. Rawdon +Crawley, and informing her that poor little Mrs. Osborne +was in a desperate condition, and almost mad with grief, +sent off the good-natured Irishwoman straight to see +if she could console her young favourite.</p> + +<p>“I’ve cares of my own enough,” Mrs. +O’Dowd said, gravely, “and I thought poor +Amelia would be little wanting for company this day. +But if she’s so bad as you say, and you can’t +attend to her, who used to be so fond of her, faith +I’ll see if I can be of service. And so good +marning to ye, Madam”; with which speech and +a toss of her head, the lady of the repayther took +a farewell of Mrs. Crawley, whose company she by no +means courted.</p> + +<p>Becky watched her marching off, with a smile on her +lip. She had the keenest sense of humour, and the +Parthian look which the retreating Mrs. O’Dowd +flung over her shoulder almost upset Mrs. Crawley’s +gravity. “My service to ye, me fine Madam, and +I’m glad to see ye so cheerful,” thought +Peggy. “It’s not <i>you</i> that will cry +your eyes out with grief, anyway.” And with this +she passed on, and speedily found her way to Mrs. +Osborne’s lodgings.</p> + +<p>The poor soul was still at the bedside, where Rebecca +had left her, and stood almost crazy with grief. +The Major’s wife, a stronger-minded woman, +endeavoured her best to comfort her young friend. +“You must bear up, Amelia, dear,” she said +kindly, “for he mustn’t find you ill when +he sends for you after the victory. It’s not +you are the only woman that are in the hands of God +this day.”</p> + +<p>“I know that. I am very wicked, very weak,” +Amelia said. She knew her own weakness well enough. + The presence of the more resolute friend checked +it, however; and she was the better of this control +and company. They went on till two o’clock; +their hearts were with the column as it marched farther +and farther away. Dreadful doubt and anguish--prayers +and fears and griefs unspeakable--followed the regiment. + It was the women’s tribute to the war. It taxes +both alike, and takes the blood of the men, and the +tears of the women.</p> + +<p>At half-past two, an event occurred of daily importance +to Mr. Joseph: the dinner-hour arrived. Warriors +may fight and perish, but he must dine. He came into +Amelia’s room to see if he could coax her to +share that meal. “Try,” said he; “the +soup is very good. Do try, Emmy,” and he kissed +her hand. Except when she was married, he had not +done so much for years before. “You are very +good and kind, Joseph,” she said. “Everybody +is, but, if you please, I will stay in my room to-day.”</p> + +<p>The savour of the soup, however, was agreeable to +Mrs. O’Dowd’s nostrils: and she thought +she would bear Mr. Jos company. So the two sate down +to their meal. “God bless the meat,” said +the Major’s wife, solemnly: she was thinking +of her honest Mick, riding at the head of his regiment: + “’Tis but a bad dinner those poor boys +will get to-day,” she said, with a sigh, and +then, like a philosopher, fell to.</p> + +<p>Jos’s spirits rose with his meal. He would +drink the regiment’s health; or, indeed, take +any other excuse to indulge in a glass of champagne. + “We’ll drink to O’Dowd and the brave +--th,” said he, bowing gallantly to his guest. + “Hey, Mrs. O’Dowd? Fill Mrs. O’Dowd’s +glass, Isidor.”</p> + +<p>But all of a sudden, Isidor started, and the Major’s +wife laid down her knife and fork. The windows of +the room were open, and looked southward, and a dull +distant sound came over the sun-lighted roofs from +that direction. “What is it?” said Jos. + “Why don’t you pour, you rascal?”</p> + +<p>“Cest le feu!” said Isidor, running to +the balcony.</p> + +<p>“God defend us; it’s cannon!” Mrs. +O’Dowd cried, starting up, and followed too +to the window. A thousand pale and anxious faces might +have been seen looking from other casements. And presently +it seemed as if the whole population of the city rushed +into the streets.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Jos Takes Flight, and the War Is Brought to a Close</h4> + +<p>We of peaceful London City have never beheld--and +please God never shall witness--such a scene of hurry +and alarm, as that which Brussels presented. Crowds +rushed to the Namur gate, from which direction the +noise proceeded, and many rode along the level chaussee, +to be in advance of any intelligence from the army. + Each man asked his neighbour for news; and even great +English lords and ladies condescended to speak to +persons whom they did not know. The friends of the +French went abroad, wild with excitement, and prophesying +the triumph of their Emperor. The merchants closed +their shops, and came out to swell the general chorus +of alarm and clamour. Women rushed to the churches, +and crowded the chapels, and knelt and prayed on the +flags and steps. The dull sound of the cannon went +on rolling, rolling. Presently carriages with travellers +began to leave the town, galloping away by the Ghent +barrier. The prophecies of the French partisans began +to pass for facts. “He has cut the armies in +two,” it was said. “He is marching straight +on Brussels. He will overpower the English, and be +here to-night.” “He will overpower the +English,” shrieked Isidor to his master, “and +will be here to-night.” The man bounded in and +out from the lodgings to the street, always returning +with some fresh particulars of disaster. Jos’s +face grew paler and paler. Alarm began to take entire +possession of the stout civilian. All the champagne +he drank brought no courage to him. Before sunset +he was worked up to such a pitch of nervousness as +gratified his friend Isidor to behold, who now counted +surely upon the spoils of the owner of the laced coat.</p> + +<p>The women were away all this time. After hearing +the firing for a moment, the stout Major’s wife +bethought her of her friend in the next chamber, and +ran in to watch, and if possible to console, Amelia. + The idea that she had that helpless and gentle creature +to protect, gave additional strength to the natural +courage of the honest Irishwoman. She passed five +hours by her friend’s side, sometimes in remonstrance, +sometimes talking cheerfully, oftener in silence and +terrified mental supplication. “I never let +go her hand once,” said the stout lady afterwards, +“until after sunset, when the firing was over.” +Pauline, the bonne, was on her knees at church hard +by, praying for son homme a elle.</p> + +<p>When the noise of the cannonading was over, Mrs. O’Dowd +issued out of Amelia’s room into the parlour +adjoining, where Jos sate with two emptied flasks, +and courage entirely gone. Once or twice he had ventured +into his sister’s bedroom, looking very much +alarmed, and as if he would say something. But the +Major’s wife kept her place, and he went away +without disburthening himself of his speech. He was +ashamed to tell her that he wanted to fly.</p> + +<p>But when she made her appearance in the dining-room, +where he sate in the twilight in the cheerless company +of his empty champagne bottles, he began to open his +mind to her.</p> + +<p>“Mrs. O’Dowd,” he said, “hadn’t +you better get Amelia ready?”</p> + +<p>“Are you going to take her out for a walk?” +said the Major’s lady; “sure she’s +too weak to stir.”</p> + +<p>“I--I’ve ordered the carriage,” +he said, “and--and post-horses; Isidor is gone +for them,” Jos continued.</p> + +<p>“What do you want with driving to-night?” +answered the lady. “Isn’t she better +on her bed? I’ve just got her to lie down.”</p> + +<p>“Get her up,” said Jos; “she must +get up, I say”: and he stamped his foot energetically. + “I say the horses are ordered--yes, the horses +are ordered. It’s all over, and--”</p> + +<p>“And what?” asked Mrs. O’Dowd.</p> + +<p>“I’m off for Ghent,” Jos answered. + “Everybody is going; there’s a place +for you! We shall start in half-an-hour.”</p> + +<p>The Major’s wife looked at him with infinite +scorn. “I don’t move till O’Dowd +gives me the route,” said she. “You may +go if you like, Mr. Sedley; but, faith, Amelia and +I stop here.”</p> + +<p>“She <i>shall</i> go,” said Jos, with another +stamp of his foot. Mrs. O’Dowd put herself +with arms akimbo before the bedroom door.</p> + +<p>“Is it her mother you’re going to take +her to?” she said; “or do you want to +go to Mamma yourself, Mr. Sedley? Good marning--a +pleasant journey to ye, sir. Bon voyage, as they say, +and take my counsel, and shave off them mustachios, +or they’ll bring you into mischief.”</p> + +<p>“D--n!” yelled out Jos, wild with fear, +rage, and mortification; and Isidor came in at this +juncture, swearing in his turn. “Pas de chevaux, +sacre bleu!” hissed out the furious domestic. + All the horses were gone. Jos was not the only man +in Brussels seized with panic that day.</p> + +<p>But Jos’s fears, great and cruel as they were +already, were destined to increase to an almost frantic +pitch before the night was over. It has been mentioned +how Pauline, the bonne, had son homme a elle also +in the ranks of the army that had gone out to meet +the Emperor Napoleon. This lover was a native of +Brussels, and a Belgian hussar. The troops of his +nation signalised themselves in this war for anything +but courage, and young Van Cutsum, Pauline’s +admirer, was too good a soldier to disobey his Colonel’s +orders to run away. Whilst in garrison at Brussels +young Regulus (he had been born in the revolutionary +times) found his great comfort, and passed almost +all his leisure moments, in Pauline’s kitchen; +and it was with pockets and holsters crammed full +of good things from her larder, that he had take leave +of his weeping sweetheart, to proceed upon the campaign +a few days before.</p> + +<p>As far as his regiment was concerned, this campaign +was over now. They had formed a part of the division +under the command of his Sovereign apparent, the Prince +of Orange, and as respected length of swords and mustachios, +and the richness of uniform and equipments, Regulus +and his comrades looked to be as gallant a body of +men as ever trumpet sounded for.</p> + +<p>When Ney dashed upon the advance of the allied troops, +carrying one position after the other, until the arrival +of the great body of the British army from Brussels +changed the aspect of the combat of Quatre Bras, the +squadrons among which Regulus rode showed the greatest +activity in retreating before the French, and were +dislodged from one post and another which they occupied +with perfect alacrity on their part. Their movements +were only checked by the advance of the British in +their rear. Thus forced to halt, the enemy’s +cavalry (whose bloodthirsty obstinacy cannot be too +severely reprehended) had at length an opportunity +of coming to close quarters with the brave Belgians +before them; who preferred to encounter the British +rather than the French, and at once turning tail rode +through the English regiments that were behind them, +and scattered in all directions. The regiment in +fact did not exist any more. It was nowhere. It +had no head-quarters. Regulus found himself galloping +many miles from the field of action, entirely alone; +and whither should he fly for refuge so naturally as +to that kitchen and those faithful arms in which Pauline +had so often welcomed him?</p> + +<p>At some ten o’clock the clinking of a sabre +might have been heard up the stair of the house where +the Osbornes occupied a story in the continental fashion. + A knock might have been heard at the kitchen door; +and poor Pauline, come back from church, fainted almost +with terror as she opened it and saw before her her +haggard hussar. He looked as pale as the midnight +dragoon who came to disturb Leonora. Pauline would +have screamed, but that her cry would have called her +masters, and discovered her friend. She stifled her +scream, then, and leading her hero into the kitchen, +gave him beer, and the choice bits from the dinner, +which Jos had not had the heart to taste. The hussar +showed he was no ghost by the prodigious quantity of +flesh and beer which he devoured--and during the mouthfuls +he told his tale of disaster.</p> + +<p>His regiment had performed prodigies of courage, and +had withstood for a while the onset of the whole French +army. But they were overwhelmed at last, as was the +whole British army by this time. Ney destroyed each +regiment as it came up. The Belgians in vain interposed +to prevent the butchery of the English. The Brunswickers +were routed and had fled--their Duke was killed. It +was a general debacle. He sought to drown his sorrow +for the defeat in floods of beer.</p> + +<p>Isidor, who had come into the kitchen, heard the conversation +and rushed out to inform his master. “It is +all over,” he shrieked to Jos. “Milor +Duke is a prisoner; the Duke of Brunswick is killed; +the British army is in full flight; there is only one +man escaped, and he is in the kitchen now--come and +hear him.” So Jos tottered into that apartment +where Regulus still sate on the kitchen table, and +clung fast to his flagon of beer. In the best French +which he could muster, and which was in sooth of a +very ungrammatical sort, Jos besought the hussar to +tell his tale. The disasters deepened as Regulus +spoke. He was the only man of his regiment not slain +on the field. He had seen the Duke of Brunswick fall, +the black hussars fly, the Ecossais pounded down by +the cannon. “And the --th?” gasped Jos.</p> + +<p>“Cut in pieces,” said the hussar--upon +which Pauline cried out, “O my mistress, ma +bonne petite dame,” went off fairly into hysterics, +and filled the house with her screams.</p> + +<p>Wild with terror, Mr. Sedley knew not how or where +to seek for safety. He rushed from the kitchen back +to the sitting-room, and cast an appealing look at +Amelia’s door, which Mrs. O’Dowd had closed +and locked in his face; but he remembered how scornfully +the latter had received him, and after pausing and +listening for a brief space at the door, he left it, +and resolved to go into the street, for the first +time that day. So, seizing a candle, he looked about +for his gold-laced cap, and found it lying in its usual +place, on a console-table, in the anteroom, placed +before a mirror at which Jos used to coquet, always +giving his side-locks a twirl, and his cap the proper +cock over his eye, before he went forth to make appearance +in public. Such is the force of habit, that even in +the midst of his terror he began mechanically to twiddle +with his hair, and arrange the cock of his hat. Then +he looked amazed at the pale face in the glass before +him, and especially at his mustachios, which had attained +a rich growth in the course of near seven weeks, since +they had come into the world. They <i>will</i> mistake +me for a military man, thought he, remembering Isidor’s +warning as to the massacre with which all the defeated +British army was threatened; and staggering back to +his bedchamber, he began wildly pulling the bell which +summoned his valet.</p> + +<p>Isidor answered that summons. Jos had sunk in a chair--he +had torn off his neckcloths, and turned down his collars, +and was sitting with both his hands lifted to his +throat.</p> + +<p>“Coupez-moi, Isidor,” shouted he; “vite! + Coupez-moi!”</p> + +<p>Isidor thought for a moment he had gone mad, and that +he wished his valet to cut his throat.</p> + +<p>“Les moustaches,” gasped Joe; “les +moustaches--coupy, rasy, vite!"-- his French was of +this sort--voluble, as we have said, but not remarkable +for grammar.</p> + +<p>Isidor swept off the mustachios in no time with the +razor, and heard with inexpressible delight his master’s +orders that he should fetch a hat and a plain coat. + “Ne porty ploo--habit militair--bonn--bonny +a voo, prenny dehors"--were Jos’s words--the +coat and cap were at last his property.</p> + +<p>This gift being made, Jos selected a plain black coat +and waistcoat from his stock, and put on a large white +neckcloth, and a plain beaver. If he could have got +a shovel hat he would have worn it. As it was, you +would have fancied he was a flourishing, large parson +of the Church of England.</p> + +<p>“Venny maintenong,” he continued, “sweevy--ally--party--dong +la roo.” And so having said, he plunged swiftly +down the stairs of the house, and passed into the +street.</p> + +<p>Although Regulus had vowed that he was the only man +of his regiment or of the allied army, almost, who +had escaped being cut to pieces by Ney, it appeared +that his statement was incorrect, and that a good +number more of the supposed victims had survived the +massacre. Many scores of Regulus’s comrades +had found their way back to Brussels, and all agreeing +that they had run away--filled the whole town with +an idea of the defeat of the allies. The arrival of +the French was expected hourly; the panic continued, +and preparations for flight went on everywhere. No +horses! thought Jos, in terror. He made Isidor inquire +of scores of persons, whether they had any to lend +or sell, and his heart sank within him, at the negative +answers returned everywhere. Should he take the journey +on foot? Even fear could not render that ponderous +body so active.</p> + +<p>Almost all the hotels occupied by the English in Brussels +face the Parc, and Jos wandered irresolutely about +in this quarter, with crowds of other people, oppressed +as he was by fear and curiosity. Some families he +saw more happy than himself, having discovered a team +of horses, and rattling through the streets in retreat; +others again there were whose case was like his own, +and who could not for any bribes or entreaties procure +the necessary means of flight. Amongst these would-be +fugitives, Jos remarked the Lady Bareacres and her +daughter, who sate in their carriage in the porte-cochere +of their hotel, all their imperials packed, and the +only drawback to whose flight was the same want of +motive power which kept Jos stationary.</p> + +<p>Rebecca Crawley occupied apartments in this hotel; +and had before this period had sundry hostile meetings +with the ladies of the Bareacres family. My Lady +Bareacres cut Mrs. Crawley on the stairs when they +met by chance; and in all places where the latter’s +name was mentioned, spoke perseveringly ill of her +neighbour. The Countess was shocked at the familiarity +of General Tufto with the aide-de-camp’s wife. + The Lady Blanche avoided her as if she had been an +infectious disease. Only the Earl himself kept up +a sly occasional acquaintance with her, when out of +the jurisdiction of his ladies.</p> + +<p>Rebecca had her revenge now upon these insolent enemies. + If became known in the hotel that Captain Crawley’s +horses had been left behind, and when the panic began, +Lady Bareacres condescended to send her maid to the +Captain’s wife with her Ladyship’s compliments, +and a desire to know the price of Mrs. Crawley’s +horses. Mrs. Crawley returned a note with her compliments, +and an intimation that it was not her custom to transact +bargains with ladies’ maids.</p> + +<p>This curt reply brought the Earl in person to Becky’s +apartment; but he could get no more success than the +first ambassador. “Send a lady’s maid +to <i>me</i>!” Mrs. Crawley cried in great anger; +“why didn’t my Lady Bareacres tell me +to go and saddle the horses! Is it her Ladyship that +wants to escape, or her Ladyship’s femme de chambre?” +And this was all the answer that the Earl bore back +to his Countess.</p> + +<p>What will not necessity do? The Countess herself +actually came to wait upon Mrs. Crawley on the failure +of her second envoy. She entreated her to name her +own price; she even offered to invite Becky to Bareacres +House, if the latter would but give her the means +of returning to that residence. Mrs. Crawley sneered +at her.</p> + +<p>“I don’t want to be waited on by bailiffs +in livery,” she said; “you will never +get back though most probably--at least not you and +your diamonds together. The French will have those +They will be here in two hours, and I shall be half +way to Ghent by that time. I would not sell you my +horses, no, not for the two largest diamonds that +your Ladyship wore at the ball.” Lady Bareacres +trembled with rage and terror. The diamonds were +sewed into her habit, and secreted in my Lord’s +padding and boots. “Woman, the diamonds are at +the banker’s, and I <i>will</i> have the horses,” +she said. Rebecca laughed in her face. The infuriate +Countess went below, and sate in her carriage; her +maid, her courier, and her husband were sent once more +through the town, each to look for cattle; and woe +betide those who came last! Her Ladyship was resolved +on departing the very instant the horses arrived from +any quarter--with her husband or without him.</p> + +<p>Rebecca had the pleasure of seeing her Ladyship in +the horseless carriage, and keeping her eyes fixed +upon her, and bewailing, in the loudest tone of voice, +the Countess’s perplexities. “Not to be +able to get horses!” she said, “and to +have all those diamonds sewed into the carriage cushions! + What a prize it will be for the French when they +come!--the carriage and the diamonds, I mean; not the +lady!” She gave this information to the landlord, +to the servants, to the guests, and the innumerable +stragglers about the courtyard. Lady Bareacres could +have shot her from the carriage window.</p> + +<p>It was while enjoying the humiliation of her enemy +that Rebecca caught sight of Jos, who made towards +her directly he perceived her.</p> + +<p>That altered, frightened, fat face, told his secret +well enough. He too wanted to fly, and was on the +look-out for the means of escape. “<i>He</i> shall +buy my horses,” thought Rebecca, “and I’ll +ride the mare.”</p> + +<p>Jos walked up to his friend, and put the question +for the hundredth time during the past hour, “Did +she know where horses were to be had?”</p> + +<p>“What, <i>you</i> fly?” said Rebecca, with +a laugh. “I thought you were the champion of +all the ladies, Mr. Sedley.”</p> + +<p>“I--I’m not a military man,” gasped +he.</p> + +<p>“And Amelia?--Who is to protect that poor little +sister of yours?” asked Rebecca. “You +surely would not desert her?”</p> + +<p>“What good can I do her, suppose--suppose the +enemy arrive?” Jos answered. “They’ll +spare the women; but my man tells me that they have +taken an oath to give no quarter to the men--the dastardly +cowards.”</p> + +<p>“Horrid!” cried Rebecca, enjoying his +perplexity.</p> + +<p>“Besides, I don’t want to desert her,” +cried the brother. “She <i>shan’t</i> be +deserted. There is a seat for her in my carriage, +and one for you, dear Mrs. Crawley, if you will come; +and if we can get horses--” sighed he--</p> + +<p>“I have two to sell,” the lady said. +Jos could have flung himself into her arms at the +news. “Get the carriage, Isidor,” he cried; +“we’ve found them--we have found them.”</p> + +<p>My horses never were in harness,” added the +lady. “Bullfinch would kick the carriage to +pieces, if you put him in the traces.”</p> + +<p>“But he is quiet to ride?” asked the civilian.</p> + +<p>“As quiet as a lamb, and as fast as a hare,” +answered Rebecca.</p> + +<p>“Do you think he is up to my weight?” +Jos said. He was already on his back, in imagination, +without ever so much as a thought for poor Amelia. + What person who loved a horse-speculation could resist +such a temptation?</p> + +<p>In reply, Rebecca asked him to come into her room, +whither he followed her quite breathless to conclude +the bargain. Jos seldom spent a half-hour in his +life which cost him so much money. Rebecca, measuring +the value of the goods which she had for sale by Jos’s +eagerness to purchase, as well as by the scarcity of +the article, put upon her horses a price so prodigious +as to make even the civilian draw back. “She +would sell both or neither,” she said, resolutely. + Rawdon had ordered her not to part with them for a +price less than that which she specified. Lord Bareacres +below would give her the same money--and with all +her love and regard for the Sedley family, her dear +Mr. Joseph must conceive that poor people must live--nobody, +in a word, could be more affectionate, but more firm +about the matter of business.</p> + +<p>Jos ended by agreeing, as might be supposed of him. +The sum he had to give her was so large that he was +obliged to ask for time; so large as to be a little +fortune to Rebecca, who rapidly calculated that with +this sum, and the sale of the residue of Rawdon’s +effects, and her pension as a widow should he fall, +she would now be absolutely independent of the world, +and might look her weeds steadily in the face.</p> + +<p>Once or twice in the day she certainly had herself +thought about flying. But her reason gave her better +counsel. “Suppose the French do come,” +thought Becky, “what can they do to a poor officer’s +widow? Bah! the times of sacks and sieges are over. + We shall be let to go home quietly, or I may live +pleasantly abroad with a snug little income.”</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Jos and Isidor went off to the stables to +inspect the newly purchased cattle. Jos bade his +man saddle the horses at once. He would ride away +that very night, that very hour. And he left the +valet busy in getting the horses ready, and went homewards +himself to prepare for his departure. It must be +secret. He would go to his chamber by the back entrance. + He did not care to face Mrs. O’Dowd and Amelia, +and own to them that he was about to run.</p> + +<p>By the time Jos’s bargain with Rebecca was completed, +and his horses had been visited and examined, it was +almost morning once more. But though midnight was +long passed, there was no rest for the city; the people +were up, the lights in the houses flamed, crowds were +still about the doors, and the streets were busy. + Rumours of various natures went still from mouth +to mouth: one report averred that the Prussians had +been utterly defeated; another that it was the English +who had been attacked and conquered: a third that +the latter had held their ground. This last rumour +gradually got strength. No Frenchmen had made their +appearance. Stragglers had come in from the army +bringing reports more and more favourable: at last +an aide-de-camp actually reached Brussels with despatches +for the Commandant of the place, who placarded presently +through the town an official announcement of the success +of the allies at Quatre Bras, and the entire repulse +of the French under Ney after a six hours’ battle. + The aide-de-camp must have arrived sometime while +Jos and Rebecca were making their bargain together, +or the latter was inspecting his purchase. When he +reached his own hotel, he found a score of its numerous +inhabitants on the threshold discoursing of the news; +there was no doubt as to its truth. And he went up +to communicate it to the ladies under his charge. +He did not think it was necessary to tell them how +he had intended to take leave of them, how he had +bought horses, and what a price he had paid for them.</p> + +<p>But success or defeat was a minor matter to them, +who had only thought for the safety of those they +loved. Amelia, at the news of the victory, became +still more agitated even than before. She was for +going that moment to the army. She besought her brother +with tears to conduct her thither. Her doubts and +terrors reached their paroxysm; and the poor girl, +who for many hours had been plunged into stupor, raved +and ran hither and thither in hysteric insanity-- +a piteous sight. No man writhing in pain on the hard-fought +field fifteen miles off, where lay, after their struggles, +so many of the brave--no man suffered more keenly +than this poor harmless victim of the war. Jos could +not bear the sight of her pain. He left his sister +in the charge of her stouter female companion, and +descended once more to the threshold of the hotel, +where everybody still lingered, and talked, and waited +for more news.</p> + +<p>It grew to be broad daylight as they stood here, and +fresh news began to arrive from the war, brought by +men who had been actors in the scene. Wagons and +long country carts laden with wounded came rolling +into the town; ghastly groans came from within them, +and haggard faces looked up sadly from out of the +straw. Jos Sedley was looking at one of these carriages +with a painful curiosity--the moans of the people +within were frightful--the wearied horses could hardly +pull the cart. “Stop! stop!” a feeble +voice cried from the straw, and the carriage stopped +opposite Mr. Sedley’s hotel.</p> + +<p>“It is George, I know it is!” cried Amelia, +rushing in a moment to the balcony, with a pallid +face and loose flowing hair. It was not George, however, +but it was the next best thing: it was news of him.</p> + +<p>It was poor Tom Stubble, who had marched out of Brussels +so gallantly twenty-four hours before, bearing the +colours of the regiment, which he had defended very +gallantly upon the field. A French lancer had speared +the young ensign in the leg, who fell, still bravely +holding to his flag. At the conclusion of the engagement, +a place had been found for the poor boy in a cart, +and he had been brought back to Brussels.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Sedley, Mr. Sedley!” cried the boy, +faintly, and Jos came up almost frightened at the +appeal. He had not at first distinguished who it +was that called him.</p> + +<p>Little Tom Stubble held out his hot and feeble hand. +“I’m to be taken in here,” he said. + “Osborne--and--and Dobbin said I was; and you +are to give the man two napoleons: my mother will pay +you.” This young fellow’s thoughts, during +the long feverish hours passed in the cart, had been +wandering to his father’s parsonage which he +had quitted only a few months before, and he had sometimes +forgotten his pain in that delirium.</p> + +<p>The hotel was large, and the people kind, and all +the inmates of the cart were taken in and placed on +various couches. The young ensign was conveyed upstairs +to Osborne’s quarters. Amelia and the Major’s +wife had rushed down to him, when the latter had recognised +him from the balcony. You may fancy the feelings +of these women when they were told that the day was +over, and both their husbands were safe; in what mute +rapture Amelia fell on her good friend’s neck, +and embraced her; in what a grateful passion of prayer +she fell on her knees, and thanked the Power which +had saved her husband.</p> + +<p>Our young lady, in her fevered and nervous condition, +could have had no more salutary medicine prescribed +for her by any physician than that which chance put +in her way. She and Mrs. O’Dowd watched incessantly +by the wounded lad, whose pains were very severe, and +in the duty thus forced upon her, Amelia had not time +to brood over her personal anxieties, or to give herself +up to her own fears and forebodings after her wont. + The young patient told in his simple fashion the +events of the day, and the actions of our friends of +the gallant --th. They had suffered severely. They +had lost very many officers and men. The Major’s +horse had been shot under him as the regiment charged, +and they all thought that O’Dowd was gone, and +that Dobbin had got his majority, until on their return +from the charge to their old ground, the Major was +discovered seated on Pyramus’s carcase, refreshing +him-self from a case-bottle. It was Captain Osborne +that cut down the French lancer who had speared the +ensign. Amelia turned so pale at the notion, that Mrs. +O’Dowd stopped the young ensign in this story. + And it was Captain Dobbin who at the end of the day, +though wounded himself, took up the lad in his arms +and carried him to the surgeon, and thence to the cart +which was to bring him back to Brussels. And it was +he who promised the driver two louis if he would make +his way to Mr. Sedley’s hotel in the city; and +tell Mrs. Captain Osborne that the action was over, +and that her husband was unhurt and well.</p> + +<p>“Indeed, but he has a good heart that William +Dobbin,” Mrs. O’Dowd said, “though +he is always laughing at me.”</p> + +<p>Young Stubble vowed there was not such another officer +in the army, and never ceased his praises of the senior +captain, his modesty, his kindness, and his admirable +coolness in the field. To these parts of the conversation, +Amelia lent a very distracted attention: it was only +when George was spoken of that she listened, and when +he was not mentioned, she thought about him.</p> + +<p>In tending her patient, and in thinking of the wonderful +escapes of the day before, her second day passed away +not too slowly with Amelia. There was only one man +in the army for her: and as long as he was well, +it must be owned that its movements interested her +little. All the reports which Jos brought from the +streets fell very vaguely on her ears; though they +were sufficient to give that timorous gentleman, and +many other people then in Brussels, every disquiet. + The French had been repulsed certainly, but it was +after a severe and doubtful struggle, and with only +a division of the French army. The Emperor, with the +main body, was away at Ligny, where he had utterly +annihilated the Prussians, and was now free to bring +his whole force to bear upon the allies. The Duke of +Wellington was retreating upon the capital, and a great +battle must be fought under its walls probably, of +which the chances were more than doubtful. The Duke +of Wellington had but twenty thousand British troops +on whom he could rely, for the Germans were raw militia, +the Belgians disaffected, and with this handful his +Grace had to resist a hundred and fifty thousand men +that had broken into Belgium under Napoleon. Under +Napoleon! What warrior was there, however famous +and skilful, that could fight at odds with him?</p> + +<p>Jos thought of all these things, and trembled. So +did all the rest of Brussels--where people felt that +the fight of the day before was but the prelude to +the greater combat which was imminent. One of the +armies opposed to the Emperor was scattered to the +winds already. The few English that could be brought +to resist him would perish at their posts, and the +conqueror would pass over their bodies into the city. + Woe be to those whom he found there! Addresses were +prepared, public functionaries assembled and debated +secretly, apartments were got ready, and tricoloured +banners and triumphal emblems manufactured, to welcome +the arrival of His Majesty the Emperor and King.</p> + +<p>The emigration still continued, and wherever families +could find means of departure, they fled. When Jos, +on the afternoon of the 17th of June, went to Rebecca’s +hotel, he found that the great Bareacres’ carriage +had at length rolled away from the porte-cochere. + The Earl had procured a pair of horses somehow, in +spite of Mrs. Crawley, and was rolling on the road +to Ghent. Louis the Desired was getting ready his +portmanteau in that city, too. It seemed as if Misfortune +was never tired of worrying into motion that unwieldy +exile.</p> + +<p>Jos felt that the delay of yesterday had been only +a respite, and that his dearly bought horses must +of a surety be put into requisition. His agonies +were very severe all this day. As long as there was +an English army between Brussels and Napoleon, there +was no need of immediate flight; but he had his horses +brought from their distant stables, to the stables +in the court-yard of the hotel where he lived; so +that they might be under his own eyes, and beyond +the risk of violent abduction. Isidor watched the stable-door +constantly, and had the horses saddled, to be ready +for the start. He longed intensely for that event.</p> + +<p>After the reception of the previous day, Rebecca did +not care to come near her dear Amelia. She clipped +the bouquet which George had brought her, and gave +fresh water to the flowers, and read over the letter +which he had sent her. “Poor wretch,” +she said, twirling round the little bit of paper in +her fingers, “how I could crush her with this!--and +it is for a thing like this that she must break her +heart, forsooth--for a man who is stupid--a coxcomb--and +who does not care for her. My poor good Rawdon is +worth ten of this creature.” And then she fell +to thinking what she should do if--if anything happened +to poor good Rawdon, and what a great piece of luck +it was that he had left his horses behind.</p> + +<p>In the course of this day too, Mrs. Crawley, who saw +not without anger the Bareacres party drive off, bethought +her of the precaution which the Countess had taken, +and did a little needlework for her own advantage; +she stitched away the major part of her trinkets, +bills, and bank-notes about her person, and so prepared, +was ready for any event--to fly if she thought fit, +or to stay and welcome the conqueror, were he Englishman +or Frenchman. And I am not sure that she did not +dream that night of becoming a duchess and Madame la +Marechale, while Rawdon wrapped in his cloak, and making +his bivouac under the rain at Mount Saint John, was +thinking, with all the force of his heart, about the +little wife whom he had left behind him.</p> + +<p>The next day was a Sunday. And Mrs. Major O’Dowd +had the satisfaction of seeing both her patients refreshed +in health and spirits by some rest which they had +taken during the night. She herself had slept on +a great chair in Amelia’s room, ready to wait +upon her poor friend or the ensign, should either need +her nursing. When morning came, this robust woman +went back to the house where she and her Major had +their billet; and here performed an elaborate and +splendid toilette, befitting the day. And it is very +possible that whilst alone in that chamber, which +her husband had inhabited, and where his cap still +lay on the pillow, and his cane stood in the corner, +one prayer at least was sent up to Heaven for the welfare +of the brave soldier, Michael O’Dowd.</p> + +<p>When she returned she brought her prayer-book with +her, and her uncle the Dean’s famous book of +sermons, out of which she never failed to read every +Sabbath; not understanding all, haply, not pronouncing +many of the words aright, which were long and abstruse-- +for the Dean was a learned man, and loved long Latin +words--but with great gravity, vast emphasis, and +with tolerable correctness in the main. How often +has my Mick listened to these sermons, she thought, +and me reading in the cabin of a calm! She proposed +to resume this exercise on the present day, with Amelia +and the wounded ensign for a congregation. The same +service was read on that day in twenty thousand churches +at the same hour; and millions of British men and +women, on their knees, implored protection of the Father +of all.</p> + +<p>They did not hear the noise which disturbed our little +congregation at Brussels. Much louder than that which +had interrupted them two days previously, as Mrs. +O’Dowd was reading the service in her best voice, +the cannon of Waterloo began to roar.</p> + +<p>When Jos heard that dreadful sound, he made up his +mind that he would bear this perpetual recurrence +of terrors no longer, and would fly at once. He rushed +into the sick man’s room, where our three friends +had paused in their prayers, and further interrupted +them by a passionate appeal to Amelia.</p> + +<p>“I can’t stand it any more, Emmy,” +he said; ’I won’t stand it; and you must +come with me. I have bought a horse for you--never +mind at what price--and you must dress and come with +me, and ride behind Isidor.”</p> + +<p>“God forgive me, Mr. Sedley, but you are no +better than a coward,” Mrs. O’Dowd said, +laying down the book.</p> + +<p>“I say come, Amelia,” the civilian went +on; “never mind what she says; why are we to +stop here and be butchered by the Frenchmen?”</p> + +<p>“You forget the --th, my boy,” said the +little Stubble, the wounded hero, from his bed--"and +and you won’t leave me, will you, Mrs. O’Dowd?”</p> + +<p>“No, my dear fellow,” said she, going +up and kissing the boy. “No harm shall come +to you while I stand by. I don’t budge till I +get the word from Mick. A pretty figure I’d +be, wouldn’t I, stuck behind that chap on a +pillion?”</p> + +<p>This image caused the young patient to burst out laughing +in his bed, and even made Amelia smile. “I +don’t ask her,” Jos shouted out--"I don’t +ask that--that Irishwoman, but you Amelia; once for +all, will you come?”</p> + +<p>“Without my husband, Joseph?” Amelia said, +with a look of wonder, and gave her hand to the Major’s +wife. Jos’s patience was exhausted.</p> + +<p>“Good-bye, then,” he said, shaking his +fist in a rage, and slamming the door by which he +retreated. And this time he really gave his order +for march: and mounted in the court-yard. Mrs. O’Dowd +heard the clattering hoofs of the horses as they issued +from the gate; and looking on, made many scornful +remarks on poor Joseph as he rode down the street +with Isidor after him in the laced cap. The horses, +which had not been exercised for some days, were lively, +and sprang about the street. Jos, a clumsy and timid +horseman, did not look to advantage in the saddle. + “Look at him, Amelia dear, driving into the +parlour window. Such a bull in a china-shop I never +saw.” And presently the pair of riders disappeared +at a canter down the street leading in the direction +of the Ghent road, Mrs. O’Dowd pursuing them +with a fire of sarcasm so long as they were in sight.</p> + +<p>All that day from morning until past sunset, the cannon +never ceased to roar. It was dark when the cannonading +stopped all of a sudden.</p> + +<p>All of us have read of what occurred during that interval. + The tale is in every Englishman’s mouth; and +you and I, who were children when the great battle +was won and lost, are never tired of hearing and recounting +the history of that famous action. Its remembrance +rankles still in the bosoms of millions of the countrymen +of those brave men who lost the day. They pant for +an opportunity of revenging that humiliation; and +if a contest, ending in a victory on their part, should +ensue, elating them in their turn, and leaving its +cursed legacy of hatred and rage behind to us, there +is no end to the so-called glory and shame, and to +the alternations of successful and unsuccessful murder, +in which two high-spirited nations might engage. +Centuries hence, we Frenchmen and Englishmen might +be boasting and killing each other still, carrying +out bravely the Devil’s code of honour.</p> + +<p>All our friends took their share and fought like men +in the great field. All day long, whilst the women +were praying ten miles away, the lines of the dauntless +English infantry were receiving and repelling the +furious charges of the French horsemen. Guns which +were heard at Brussels were ploughing up their ranks, +and comrades falling, and the resolute survivors closing +in. Towards evening, the attack of the French, repeated +and resisted so bravely, slackened in its fury. They +had other foes besides the British to engage, or were +preparing for a final onset. It came at last: the +columns of the Imperial Guard marched up the hill of +Saint Jean, at length and at once to sweep the English +from the height which they had maintained all day, +and spite of all: unscared by the thunder of the +artillery, which hurled death from the English line--the +dark rolling column pressed on and up the hill. It +seemed almost to crest the eminence, when it began +to wave and falter. Then it stopped, still facing +the shot. Then at last the English troops rushed +from the post from which no enemy had been able to +dislodge them, and the Guard turned and fled.</p> + +<p>No more firing was heard at Brussels--the pursuit +rolled miles away. Darkness came down on the field +and city: and Amelia was praying for George, who +was lying on his face, dead, with a bullet through +his heart.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Miss Crawley’s Relations Are Very Anxious About Her</h4> + +<p>The kind reader must please to remember--while the +army is marching from Flanders, and, after its heroic +actions there, is advancing to take the fortifications +on the frontiers of France, previous to an occupation +of that country--that there are a number of persons +living peaceably in England who have to do with the +history at present in hand, and must come in for their +share of the chronicle. During the time of these battles +and dangers, old Miss Crawley was living at Brighton, +very moderately moved by the great events that were +going on. The great events rendered the newspapers +rather interesting, to be sure, and Briggs read out +the Gazette, in which Rawdon Crawley’s gallantry +was mentioned with honour, and his promotion was presently +recorded.</p> + +<p>“What a pity that young man has taken such an +irretrievable step in the world!” his aunt said; +“with his rank and distinction he might have +married a brewer’s daughter with a quarter of +a million--like Miss Grains; or have looked to ally +himself with the best families in England. He would +have had my money some day or other; or his children +would--for I’m not in a hurry to go, Miss Briggs, +although you may be in a hurry to be rid of me; and +instead of that, he is a doomed pauper, with a dancing-girl +for a wife.”</p> + +<p>“Will my dear Miss Crawley not cast an eye of +compassion upon the heroic soldier, whose name is +inscribed in the annals of his country’s glory?” +said Miss Briggs, who was greatly excited by the Waterloo +proceedings, and loved speaking romantically when there +was an occasion. “Has not the Captain--or the +Colonel as I may now style him--done deeds which make +the name of Crawley illustrious?”</p> + +<p>“Briggs, you are a fool,” said Miss Crawley: +“Colonel Crawley has dragged the name of Crawley +through the mud, Miss Briggs. Marry a drawing-master’s +daughter, indeed!--marry a dame de compagnie--for +she was no better, Briggs; no, she was just what you +are--only younger, and a great deal prettier and cleverer. + Were you an accomplice of that abandoned wretch, +I wonder, of whose vile arts he became a victim, and +of whom you used to be such an admirer? Yes, I daresay +you were an accomplice. But you will find yourself +disappointed in my will, I can tell you: and you will +have the goodness to write to Mr. Waxy, and say that +I desire to see him immediately.” Miss Crawley +was now in the habit of writing to Mr. Waxy her solicitor +almost every day in the week, for her arrangements +respecting her property were all revoked, and her +perplexity was great as to the future disposition of +her money.</p> + +<p>The spinster had, however, rallied considerably; as +was proved by the increased vigour and frequency of +her sarcasms upon Miss Briggs, all which attacks the +poor companion bore with meekness, with cowardice, +with a resignation that was half generous and half +hypocritical--with the slavish submission, in a word, +that women of her disposition and station are compelled +to show. Who has not seen how women bully women? + What tortures have men to endure, comparable to those +daily repeated shafts of scorn and cruelty with which +poor women are riddled by the tyrants of their sex? + Poor victims! But we are starting from our proposition, +which is, that Miss Crawley was always particularly +annoying and savage when she was rallying from illness--as +they say wounds tingle most when they are about to +heal.</p> + +<p>While thus approaching, as all hoped, to convalescence, +Miss Briggs was the only victim admitted into the +presence of the invalid; yet Miss Crawley’s +relatives afar off did not forget their beloved kinswoman, +and by a number of tokens, presents, and kind affectionate +messages, strove to keep themselves alive in her recollection.</p> + +<p>In the first place, let us mention her nephew, Rawdon +Crawley. A few weeks after the famous fight of Waterloo, +and after the Gazette had made known to her the promotion +and gallantry of that distinguished officer, the Dieppe +packet brought over to Miss Crawley at Brighton, a +box containing presents, and a dutiful letter, from +the Colonel her nephew. In the box were a pair of +French epaulets, a Cross of the Legion of Honour, and +the hilt of a sword--relics from the field of battle: + and the letter described with a good deal of humour +how the latter belonged to a commanding officer of +the Guard, who having sworn that “the Guard died, +but never surrendered,” was taken prisoner the +next minute by a private soldier, who broke the Frenchman’s +sword with the butt of his musket, when Rawdon made +himself master of the shattered weapon. As for the +cross and epaulets, they came from a Colonel of French +cavalry, who had fallen under the aide-de-camp’s +arm in the battle: and Rawdon Crawley did not know +what better to do with the spoils than to send them +to his kindest and most affectionate old friend. Should +he continue to write to her from Paris, whither the +army was marching? He might be able to give her interesting +news from that capital, and of some of Miss Crawley’s +old friends of the emigration, to whom she had shown +so much kindness during their distress.</p> + +<p>The spinster caused Briggs to write back to the Colonel +a gracious and complimentary letter, encouraging him +to continue his correspondence. His first letter +was so excessively lively and amusing that she should +look with pleasure for its successors.--"Of course, +I know,” she explained to Miss Briggs, “that +Rawdon could not write such a good letter any more +than you could, my poor Briggs, and that it is that +clever little wretch of a Rebecca, who dictates every +word to him; but that is no reason why my nephew should +not amuse me; and so I wish to let him understand that +I am in high good humour.”</p> + +<p>I wonder whether she knew that it was not only Becky +who wrote the letters, but that Mrs. Rawdon actually +took and sent home the trophies which she bought for +a few francs, from one of the innumerable pedlars +who immediately began to deal in relics of the war. + The novelist, who knows everything, knows this also. + Be this, however, as it may, Miss Crawley’s +gracious reply greatly encouraged our young friends, +Rawdon and his lady, who hoped for the best from their +aunt’s evidently pacified humour: and they took +care to entertain her with many delightful letters +from Paris, whither, as Rawdon said, they had the +good luck to go in the track of the conquering army.</p> + +<p>To the rector’s lady, who went off to tend her +husband’s broken collar-bone at the Rectory +at Queen’s Crawley, the spinster’s communications +were by no means so gracious. Mrs. Bute, that brisk, +managing, lively, imperious woman, had committed the +most fatal of all errors with regard to her sister-in-law. + She had not merely oppressed her and her household--she +had bored Miss Crawley; and if poor Miss Briggs had +been a woman of any spirit, she might have been made +happy by the commission which her principal gave her +to write a letter to Mrs. Bute Crawley, saying that +Miss Crawley’s health was greatly improved since +Mrs. Bute had left her, and begging the latter on +no account to put herself to trouble, or quit her family +for Miss Crawley’s sake. This triumph over a +lady who had been very haughty and cruel in her behaviour +to Miss Briggs, would have rejoiced most women; but +the truth is, Briggs was a woman of no spirit at all, +and the moment her enemy was discomfited, she began +to feel compassion in her favour.</p> + +<p>“How silly I was,” Mrs. Bute thought, +and with reason, “ever to hint that I was coming, +as I did, in that foolish letter when we sent Miss +Crawley the guinea-fowls. I ought to have gone without +a word to the poor dear doting old creature, and taken +her out of the hands of that ninny Briggs, and that +harpy of a femme de chambre. Oh! Bute, Bute, why +did you break your collar-bone?”</p> + +<p>Why, indeed? We have seen how Mrs. Bute, having the +game in her hands, had really played her cards too +well. She had ruled over Miss Crawley’s household +utterly and completely, to be utterly and completely +routed when a favourable opportunity for rebellion +came. She and her household, however, considered that +she had been the victim of horrible selfishness and +treason, and that her sacrifices in Miss Crawley’s +behalf had met with the most savage ingratitude. Rawdon’s +promotion, and the honourable mention made of his name +in the Gazette, filled this good Christian lady also +with alarm. Would his aunt relent towards him now +that he was a Lieutenant-Colonel and a C.B.? and would +that odious Rebecca once more get into favour? The +Rector’s wife wrote a sermon for her husband +about the vanity of military glory and the prosperity +of the wicked, which the worthy parson read in his +best voice and without understanding one syllable +of it. He had Pitt Crawley for one of his auditors--Pitt, +who had come with his two half-sisters to church, +which the old Baronet could now by no means be brought +to frequent.</p> + +<p>Since the departure of Becky Sharp, that old wretch +had given himself up entirely to his bad courses, +to the great scandal of the county and the mute horror +of his son. The ribbons in Miss Horrocks’s +cap became more splendid than ever. The polite families +fled the hall and its owner in terror. Sir Pitt went +about tippling at his tenants’ houses; and drank +rum-and-water with the farmers at Mudbury and the +neighbouring places on market-days. He drove the +family coach-and-four to Southampton with Miss Horrocks +inside: and the county people expected, every week, +as his son did in speechless agony, that his marriage +with her would be announced in the provincial paper. + It was indeed a rude burthen for Mr. Crawley to bear. + His eloquence was palsied at the missionary meetings, +and other religious assemblies in the neighbourhood, +where he had been in the habit of presiding, and of +speaking for hours; for he felt, when he rose, that +the audience said, “That is the son of the old +reprobate Sir Pitt, who is very likely drinking at +the public house at this very moment.” And once +when he was speaking of the benighted condition of +the king of Timbuctoo, and the number of his wives +who were likewise in darkness, some gipsy miscreant +from the crowd asked, “How many is there at +Queen’s Crawley, Young Squaretoes?” to +the surprise of the platform, and the ruin of Mr. Pitt’s +speech. And the two daughters of the house of Queen’s +Crawley would have been allowed to run utterly wild +(for Sir Pitt swore that no governess should ever +enter into his doors again), had not Mr. Crawley, +by threatening the old gentleman, forced the latter +to send them to school.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, as we have said, whatever individual differences +there might be between them all, Miss Crawley’s +dear nephews and nieces were unanimous in loving her +and sending her tokens of affection. Thus Mrs. Bute +sent guinea-fowls, and some remarkably fine cauliflowers, +and a pretty purse or pincushion worked by her darling +girls, who begged to keep a <i>little</i> place in the +recollection of their dear aunt, while Mr. Pitt sent +peaches and grapes and venison from the Hall. The +Southampton coach used to carry these tokens of affection +to Miss Crawley at Brighton: it used sometimes to +convey Mr. Pitt thither too: for his differences +with Sir Pitt caused Mr. Crawley to absent himself +a good deal from home now: and besides, he had an +attraction at Brighton in the person of the Lady Jane +Sheepshanks, whose engagement to Mr. Crawley has been +formerly mentioned in this history. Her Ladyship and +her sisters lived at Brighton with their mamma, the +Countess Southdown, that strong-minded woman so favourably +known in the serious world.</p> + +<p>A few words ought to be said regarding her Ladyship +and her noble family, who are bound by ties of present +and future relationship to the house of Crawley. Respecting +the chief of the Southdown family, Clement William, +fourth Earl of Southdown, little need be told, except +that his Lordship came into Parliament (as Lord Wolsey) +under the auspices of Mr. Wilberforce, and for a time +was a credit to his political sponsor, and decidedly +a serious young man. But words cannot describe the +feelings of his admirable mother, when she learned, +very shortly after her noble husband’s demise, +that her son was a member of several worldly clubs, +had lost largely at play at Wattier’s and the +Cocoa Tree; that he had raised money on post-obits, +and encumbered the family estate; that he drove four-in-hand, +and patronised the ring; and that he actually had an +opera-box, where he entertained the most dangerous +bachelor company. His name was only mentioned with +groans in the dowager’s circle.</p> + +<p>The Lady Emily was her brother’s senior by many +years; and took considerable rank in the serious world +as author of some of the delightful tracts before +mentioned, and of many hymns and spiritual pieces. + A mature spinster, and having but faint ideas of marriage, +her love for the blacks occupied almost all her feelings. + It is to her, I believe, we owe that beautiful poem.</p> + +<p>    Lead us to some sunny isle,<br> +    Yonder in the western deep;<br> +    Where the skies for ever smile,<br> +    And the blacks for ever weep, +&c.</p> + +<p>She had correspondences with clerical gentlemen in +most of our East and West India possessions; and was +secretly attached to the Reverend Silas Hornblower, +who was tattooed in the South Sea Islands.</p> + +<p>As for the Lady Jane, on whom, as it has been said, +Mr. Pitt Crawley’s affection had been placed, +she was gentle, blushing, silent, and timid. In spite +of his falling away, she wept for her brother, and +was quite ashamed of loving him still. Even yet she +used to send him little hurried smuggled notes, and +pop them into the post in private. The one dreadful +secret which weighed upon her life was, that she and +the old housekeeper had been to pay Southdown a furtive +visit at his chambers in the Albany; and found him--O +the naughty dear abandoned wretch!--smoking a cigar +with a bottle of Curacao before him. She admired +her sister, she adored her mother, she thought Mr. +Crawley the most delightful and accomplished of men, +after Southdown, that fallen angel: and her mamma +and sister, who were ladies of the most superior sort, +managed everything for her, and regarded her with +that amiable pity, of which your really superior woman +always has such a share to give away. Her mamma ordered +her dresses, her books, her bonnets, and her ideas +for her. She was made to take pony-riding, or piano-exercise, +or any other sort of bodily medicament, according +as my Lady Southdown saw meet; and her ladyship would +have kept her daughter in pinafores up to her present +age of six-and-twenty, but that they were thrown off +when Lady Jane was presented to Queen Charlotte.</p> + +<p>When these ladies first came to their house at Brighton, +it was to them alone that Mr. Crawley paid his personal +visits, contenting himself by leaving a card at his +aunt’s house, and making a modest inquiry of +Mr. Bowls or his assistant footman, with respect to +the health of the invalid. When he met Miss Briggs +coming home from the library with a cargo of novels +under her arm, Mr. Crawley blushed in a manner quite +unusual to him, as he stepped forward and shook Miss +Crawley’s companion by the hand. He introduced +Miss Briggs to the lady with whom he happened to be +walking, the Lady Jane Sheepshanks, saying, “Lady +Jane, permit me to introduce to you my aunt’s +kindest friend and most affectionate companion, Miss +Briggs, whom you know under another title, as authoress +of the delightful ’Lyrics of the Heart,’ +of which you are so fond.” Lady Jane blushed +too as she held out a kind little hand to Miss Briggs, +and said something very civil and incoherent about +mamma, and proposing to call on Miss Crawley, and +being glad to be made known to the friends and relatives +of Mr. Crawley; and with soft dove-like eyes saluted +Miss Briggs as they separated, while Pitt Crawley +treated her to a profound courtly bow, such as he +had used to H.H. the Duchess of Pumpernickel, when +he was attache at that court.</p> + +<p>The artful diplomatist and disciple of the Machiavellian +Binkie! It was he who had given Lady Jane that copy +of poor Briggs’s early poems, which he remembered +to have seen at Queen’s Crawley, with a dedication +from the poetess to his father’s late wife; and +he brought the volume with him to Brighton, reading +it in the Southampton coach and marking it with his +own pencil, before he presented it to the gentle Lady +Jane.</p> + +<p>It was he, too, who laid before Lady Southdown the +great advantages which might occur from an intimacy +between her family and Miss Crawley--advantages both +worldly and spiritual, he said: for Miss Crawley +was now quite alone; the monstrous dissipation and +alliance of his brother Rawdon had estranged her affections +from that reprobate young man; the greedy tyranny +and avarice of Mrs. Bute Crawley had caused the old +lady to revolt against the exorbitant pretensions +of that part of the family; and though he himself had +held off all his life from cultivating Miss Crawley’s +friendship, with perhaps an improper pride, he thought +now that every becoming means should be taken, both +to save her soul from perdition, and to secure her +fortune to himself as the head of the house of Crawley.</p> + +<p>The strong-minded Lady Southdown quite agreed in both +proposals of her son-in-law, and was for converting +Miss Crawley off-hand. At her own home, both at Southdown +and at Trottermore Castle, this tall and awful missionary +of the truth rode about the country in her barouche +with outriders, launched packets of tracts among the +cottagers and tenants, and would order Gaffer Jones +to be converted, as she would order Goody Hicks to +take a James’s powder, without appeal, resistance, +or benefit of clergy. My Lord Southdown, her late +husband, an epileptic and simple-minded nobleman, was +in the habit of approving of everything which his +Matilda did and thought. So that whatever changes +her own belief might undergo (and it accommodated +itself to a prodigious variety of opinion, taken from +all sorts of doctors among the Dissenters) she had +not the least scruple in ordering all her tenants +and inferiors to follow and believe after her. Thus +whether she received the Reverend Saunders McNitre, +the Scotch divine; or the Reverend Luke Waters, the +mild Wesleyan; or the Reverend Giles Jowls, the illuminated +Cobbler, who dubbed himself Reverend as Napoleon crowned +himself Emperor--the household, children, tenantry +of my Lady Southdown were expected to go down on their +knees with her Ladyship, and say Amen to the prayers +of either Doctor. During these exercises old Southdown, +on account of his invalid condition, was allowed to +sit in his own room, and have negus and the paper +read to him. Lady Jane was the old Earl’s favourite +daughter, and tended him and loved him sincerely: + as for Lady Emily, the authoress of the “Washerwoman +of Finchley Common,” her denunciations of future +punishment (at this period, for her opinions modified +afterwards) were so awful that they used to frighten +the timid old gentleman her father, and the physicians +declared his fits always occurred after one of her +Ladyship’s sermons.</p> + +<p>“I will certainly call,” said Lady Southdown +then, in reply to the exhortation of her daughter’s +pretendu, Mr. Pitt Crawley--"Who is Miss Crawley’s +medical man?”</p> + +<p>Mr. Crawley mentioned the name of Mr. Creamer.</p> + +<p>“A most dangerous and ignorant practitioner, +my dear Pitt. I have providentially been the means +of removing him from several houses: though in one +or two instances I did not arrive in time. I could +not save poor dear General Glanders, who was dying +under the hands of that ignorant man--dying. He rallied +a little under the Podgers’ pills which I administered +to him; but alas! it was too late. His death was +delightful, however; and his change was only for the +better; Creamer, my dear Pitt, must leave your aunt.”</p> + +<p>Pitt expressed his perfect acquiescence. He, too, +had been carried along by the energy of his noble +kinswoman, and future mother-in-law. He had been +made to accept Saunders McNitre, Luke Waters, Giles +Jowls, Podgers’ Pills, Rodgers’ Pills, +Pokey’s Elixir, every one of her Ladyship’s +remedies spiritual or temporal. He never left her +house without carrying respectfully away with him piles +of her quack theology and medicine. O, my dear brethren +and fellow-sojourners in Vanity Fair, which among +you does not know and suffer under such benevolent +despots? It is in vain you say to them, “Dear +Madam, I took Podgers’ specific at your orders +last year, and believe in it. Why, why am I to recant +and accept the Rodgers’ articles now?” + There is no help for it; the faithful proselytizer, +if she cannot convince by argument, bursts into tears, +and the refusant finds himself, at the end of the +contest, taking down the bolus, and saying, “Well, +well, Rodgers’ be it.”</p> + +<p>“And as for her spiritual state,” continued +the Lady, “that of course must be looked to +immediately: with Creamer about her, she may go off +any day: and in what a condition, my dear Pitt, in +what a dreadful condition! I will send the Reverend +Mr. Irons to her instantly. Jane, write a line to +the Reverend Bartholomew Irons, in the third person, +and say that I desire the pleasure of his company +this evening at tea at half-past six. He is an awakening +man; he ought to see Miss Crawley before she rests +this night. And Emily, my love, get ready a packet +of books for Miss Crawley. Put up ’A Voice +from the Flames,’ ‘A Trumpet-warning to +Jericho,’ and the ‘Fleshpots Broken; or, +the Converted Cannibal.’”</p> + +<p>“And the ‘Washerwoman of Finchley Common,’ +Mamma,” said Lady Emily. “It is as well +to begin soothingly at first.”</p> + +<p>“Stop, my dear ladies,” said Pitt, the +diplomatist. “With every deference to the opinion +of my beloved and respected Lady Southdown, I think +it would be quite unadvisable to commence so early +upon serious topics with Miss Crawley. Remember her +delicate condition, and how little, how very little +accustomed she has hitherto been to considerations +connected with her immortal welfare.”</p> + +<p>“Can we then begin too early, Pitt?” said +Lady Emily, rising with six little books already in +her hand.</p> + +<p>“If you begin abruptly, you will frighten her +altogether. I know my aunt’s worldly nature +so well as to be sure that any abrupt attempt at conversion +will be the very worst means that can be employed for +the welfare of that unfortunate lady. You will only +frighten and annoy her. She will very likely fling +the books away, and refuse all acquaintance with the +givers.”</p> + +<p>“You are as worldly as Miss Crawley, Pitt,” +said Lady Emily, tossing out of the room, her books +in her hand.</p> + +<p>“And I need not tell you, my dear Lady Southdown,” +Pitt continued, in a low voice, and without heeding +the interruption, “how fatal a little want of +gentleness and caution may be to any hopes which we +may entertain with regard to the worldly possessions +of my aunt. Remember she has seventy thousand pounds; +think of her age, and her highly nervous and delicate +condition; I know that she has destroyed the will +which was made in my brother’s (Colonel Crawley’s) +favour: it is by soothing that wounded spirit that +we must lead it into the right path, and not by frightening +it; and so I think you will agree with me that--that--’</p> + +<p>“Of course, of course,” Lady Southdown +remarked. “Jane, my love, you need not send +that note to Mr. Irons. If her health is such that +discussions fatigue her, we will wait her amendment. + I will call upon Miss Crawley tomorrow.”</p> + +<p>“And if I might suggest, my sweet lady,” +Pitt said in a bland tone, “it would be as well +not to take our precious Emily, who is too enthusiastic; +but rather that you should be accompanied by our sweet +and dear Lady Jane.”</p> + +<p>“Most certainly, Emily would ruin everything,” +Lady Southdown said; and this time agreed to forego +her usual practice, which was, as we have said, before +she bore down personally upon any individual whom +she proposed to subjugate, to fire in a quantity of +tracts upon the menaced party (as a charge of the +French was always preceded by a furious cannonade). + Lady Southdown, we say, for the sake of the invalid’s +health, or for the sake of her soul’s ultimate +welfare, or for the sake of her money, agreed to temporise.</p> + +<p>The next day, the great Southdown female family carriage, +with the Earl’s coronet and the lozenge (upon +which the three lambs trottant argent upon the field +vert of the Southdowns, were quartered with sable +on a bend or, three snuff-mulls gules, the cognizance +of the house of Binkie), drove up in state to Miss +Crawley’s door, and the tall serious footman +handed in to Mr. Bowls her Ladyship’s cards for +Miss Crawley, and one likewise for Miss Briggs. By +way of compromise, Lady Emily sent in a packet in +the evening for the latter lady, containing copies +of the “Washerwoman,” and other mild and +favourite tracts for Miss B.’s own perusal; and +a few for the servants’ hall, <i>viz</i>.: “Crumbs +from the Pantry,” “The Frying Pan and +the Fire,” and “The Livery of Sin,” +of a much stronger kind.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXIV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">James Crawley’s Pipe Is Put Out</h4> + +<p>The amiable behaviour of Mr. Crawley, and Lady Jane’s +kind reception of her, highly flattered Miss Briggs, +who was enabled to speak a good word for the latter, +after the cards of the Southdown family had been presented +to Miss Crawley. A Countess’s card left personally +too for her, Briggs, was not a little pleasing to the +poor friendless companion. “What could Lady +Southdown mean by leaving a card upon you, I wonder, +Miss Briggs?” said the republican Miss Crawley; +upon which the companion meekly said “that she +hoped there could be no harm in a lady of rank taking +notice of a poor gentlewoman,” and she put away +this card in her work-box amongst her most cherished +personal treasures. Furthermore, Miss Briggs explained +how she had met Mr. Crawley walking with his cousin +and long affianced bride the day before: and she +told how kind and gentle-looking the lady was, and +what a plain, not to say common, dress she had, all +the articles of which, from the bonnet down to the +boots, she described and estimated with female accuracy.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley allowed Briggs to prattle on without +interrupting her too much. As she got well, she was +pining for society. Mr. Creamer, her medical man, +would not hear of her returning to her old haunts +and dissipation in London. The old spinster was too +glad to find any companionship at Brighton, and not +only were the cards acknowledged the very next day, +but Pitt Crawley was graciously invited to come and +see his aunt. He came, bringing with him Lady Southdown +and her daughter. The dowager did not say a word about +the state of Miss Crawley’s soul; but talked +with much discretion about the weather: about the +war and the downfall of the monster Bonaparte: and +above all, about doctors, quacks, and the particular +merits of Dr. Podgers, whom she then patronised.</p> + +<p>During their interview Pitt Crawley made a great stroke, +and one which showed that, had his diplomatic career +not been blighted by early neglect, he might have +risen to a high rank in his profession. When the Countess +Dowager of Southdown fell foul of the Corsican upstart, +as the fashion was in those days, and showed that he +was a monster stained with every conceivable crime, +a coward and a tyrant not fit to live, one whose fall +was predicted, &c., Pitt Crawley suddenly took up +the cudgels in favour of the man of Destiny. He described +the First Consul as he saw him at Paris at the peace +of Amiens; when he, Pitt Crawley, had the gratification +of making the acquaintance of the great and good Mr. +Fox, a statesman whom, however much he might differ +with him, it was impossible not to admire fervently--a +statesman who had always had the highest opinion of +the Emperor Napoleon. And he spoke in terms of the +strongest indignation of the faithless conduct of +the allies towards this dethroned monarch, who, after +giving himself generously up to their mercy, was consigned +to an ignoble and cruel banishment, while a bigoted +Popish rabble was tyrannising over France in his stead.</p> + +<p>This orthodox horror of Romish superstition saved +Pitt Crawley in Lady Southdown’s opinion, whilst +his admiration for Fox and Napoleon raised him immeasurably +in Miss Crawley’s eyes. Her friendship with +that defunct British statesman was mentioned when we +first introduced her in this history. A true Whig, +Miss Crawley had been in opposition all through the +war, and though, to be sure, the downfall of the Emperor +did not very much agitate the old lady, or his ill-treatment +tend to shorten her life or natural rest, yet Pitt +spoke to her heart when he lauded both her idols; and +by that single speech made immense progress in her +favour.</p> + +<p>“And what do you think, my dear?” Miss +Crawley said to the young lady, for whom she had taken +a liking at first sight, as she always did for pretty +and modest young people; though it must be owned her +affections cooled as rapidly as they rose.</p> + +<p>Lady Jane blushed very much, and said “that +she did not understand politics, which she left to +wiser heads than hers; but though Mamma was, no doubt, +correct, Mr. Crawley had spoken beautifully.” +And when the ladies were retiring at the conclusion +of their visit, Miss Crawley hoped “Lady Southdown +would be so kind as to send her Lady Jane sometimes, +if she could be spared to come down and console a +poor sick lonely old woman.” This promise was +graciously accorded, and they separated upon great +terms of amity.</p> + +<p>“Don’t let Lady Southdown come again, +Pitt,” said the old lady. “She is stupid +and pompous, like all your mother’s family, whom +I never could endure. But bring that nice good-natured +little Jane as often as ever you please.” Pitt +promised that he would do so. He did not tell the +Countess of Southdown what opinion his aunt had formed +of her Ladyship, who, on the contrary, thought that +she had made a most delightful and majestic impression +on Miss Crawley.</p> + +<p>And so, nothing loth to comfort a sick lady, and perhaps +not sorry in her heart to be freed now and again from +the dreary spouting of the Reverend Bartholomew Irons, +and the serious toadies who gathered round the footstool +of the pompous Countess, her mamma, Lady Jane became +a pretty constant visitor to Miss Crawley, accompanied +her in her drives, and solaced many of her evenings. + She was so naturally good and soft, that even Firkin +was not jealous of her; and the gentle Briggs thought +her friend was less cruel to her when kind Lady Jane +was by. Towards her Ladyship Miss Crawley’s +manners were charming. The old spinster told her +a thousand anecdotes about her youth, talking to her +in a very different strain from that in which she +had been accustomed to converse with the godless little +Rebecca; for there was that in Lady Jane’s innocence +which rendered light talking impertinence before her, +and Miss Crawley was too much of a gentlewoman to +offend such purity. The young lady herself had never +received kindness except from this old spinster, and +her brother and father: and she repaid Miss Crawley’s +engoument by artless sweetness and friendship.</p> + +<p>In the autumn evenings (when Rebecca was flaunting +at Paris, the gayest among the gay conquerors there, +and our Amelia, our dear wounded Amelia, ah! where +was she?) Lady Jane would be sitting in Miss Crawley’s +drawing-room singing sweetly to her, in the twilight, +her little simple songs and hymns, while the sun was +setting and the sea was roaring on the beach. The +old spinster used to wake up when these ditties ceased, +and ask for more. As for Briggs, and the quantity +of tears of happiness which she now shed as she pretended +to knit, and looked out at the splendid ocean darkling +before the windows, and the lamps of heaven beginning +more brightly to shine-- who, I say can measure the +happiness and sensibility of Briggs?</p> + +<p>Pitt meanwhile in the dining-room, with a pamphlet +on the Corn Laws or a Missionary Register by his side, +took that kind of recreation which suits romantic +and unromantic men after dinner. He sipped Madeira: + built castles in the air: thought himself a fine +fellow: felt himself much more in love with Jane than +he had been any time these seven years, during which +their liaison had lasted without the slightest impatience +on Pitt’s part--and slept a good deal. When +the time for coffee came, Mr. Bowls used to enter in +a noisy manner, and summon Squire Pitt, who would +be found in the dark very busy with his pamphlet.</p> + +<p>“I wish, my love, I could get somebody to play +piquet with me,” Miss Crawley said one night +when this functionary made his appearance with the +candles and the coffee. “Poor Briggs can no more +play than an owl, she is so stupid” (the spinster +always took an opportunity of abusing Briggs before +the servants); “and I think I should sleep better +if I had my game.”</p> + +<p>At this Lady Jane blushed to the tips of her little +ears, and down to the ends of her pretty fingers; +and when Mr. Bowls had quitted the room, and the door +was quite shut, she said:</p> + +<p>“Miss Crawley, I can play a little. I used +to--to play a little with poor dear papa.”</p> + +<p>“Come and kiss me. Come and kiss me this instant, +you dear good little soul,” cried Miss Crawley +in an ecstasy: and in this picturesque and friendly +occupation Mr. Pitt found the old lady and the young +one, when he came upstairs with him pamphlet in his +hand. How she did blush all the evening, that poor +Lady Jane!</p> + +<p>It must not be imagined that Mr. Pitt Crawley’s +artifices escaped the attention of his dear relations +at the Rectory at Queen’s Crawley. Hampshire +and Sussex lie very close together, and Mrs. Bute +had friends in the latter county who took care to inform +her of all, and a great deal more than all, that passed +at Miss Crawley’s house at Brighton. Pitt was +there more and more. He did not come for months together +to the Hall, where his abominable old father abandoned +himself completely to rum-and-water, and the odious +society of the Horrocks family. Pitt’s success +rendered the Rector’s family furious, and Mrs. +Bute regretted more (though she confessed less) than +ever her monstrous fault in so insulting Miss Briggs, +and in being so haughty and parsimonious to Bowls +and Firkin, that she had not a single person left +in Miss Crawley’s household to give her information +of what took place there. “It was all Bute’s +collar-bone,” she persisted in saying; “if +that had not broke, I never would have left her. +I am a martyr to duty and to your odious unclerical +habit of hunting, Bute.”</p> + +<p>“Hunting; nonsense! It was you that frightened +her, Barbara,” the divine interposed. “You’re +a clever woman, but you’ve got a devil of a +temper; and you’re a screw with your money, Barbara.”</p> + +<p>“You’d have been screwed in gaol, Bute, +if I had not kept your money.”</p> + +<p>“I know I would, my dear,” said the Rector, +good-naturedly. “You <i>are</i> a clever woman, +but you manage too well, you know”: and the +pious man consoled himself with a big glass of port.</p> + +<p>“What the deuce can she find in that spooney +of a Pitt Crawley?” he continued. “The +fellow has not pluck enough to say Bo to a goose. +I remember when Rawdon, who is a man, and be hanged +to him, used to flog him round the stables as if he +was a whipping-top: and Pitt would go howling home +to his ma--ha, ha! Why, either of my boys would whop +him with one hand. Jim says he’s remembered +at Oxford as Miss Crawley still--the spooney.</p> + +<p>“I say, Barbara,” his reverence continued, +after a pause.</p> + +<p>“What?” said Barbara, who was biting her +nails, and drumming the table.</p> + +<p>“I say, why not send Jim over to Brighton to +see if he can do anything with the old lady. He’s +very near getting his degree, you know. He’s +only been plucked twice--so was I--but he’s had +the advantages of Oxford and a university education. + He knows some of the best chaps there. He pulls stroke +in the Boniface boat. He’s a handsome feller. + D--- it, ma’am, let’s put him on the old +woman, hey, and tell him to thrash Pitt if he says +anything. Ha, ha, ha!</p> + +<p>“Jim might go down and see her, certainly,” +the housewife said; adding with a sigh, “If +we could but get one of the girls into the house; +but she could never endure them, because they are not +pretty!” Those unfortunate and well-educated +women made themselves heard from the neighbouring +drawing-room, where they were thrumming away, with +hard fingers, an elaborate music-piece on the piano-forte, +as their mother spoke; and indeed, they were at music, +or at backboard, or at geography, or at history, the +whole day long. But what avail all these accomplishments, +in Vanity Fair, to girls who are short, poor, plain, +and have a bad complexion? Mrs. Bute could think +of nobody but the Curate to take one of them off her +hands; and Jim coming in from the stable at this minute, +through the parlour window, with a short pipe stuck +in his oilskin cap, he and his father fell to talking +about odds on the St. Leger, and the colloquy between +the Rector and his wife ended.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bute did not augur much good to the cause from +the sending of her son James as an ambassador, and +saw him depart in rather a despairing mood. Nor did +the young fellow himself, when told what his mission +was to be, expect much pleasure or benefit from it; +but he was consoled by the thought that possibly the +old lady would give him some handsome remembrance +of her, which would pay a few of his most pressing +bills at the commencement of the ensuing Oxford term, +and so took his place by the coach from Southampton, +and was safely landed at Brighton on the same evening? + with his portmanteau, his favourite bull-dog Towzer, +and an immense basket of farm and garden produce, +from the dear Rectory folks to the dear Miss Crawley. +Considering it was too late to disturb the invalid +lady on the first night of his arrival, he put up +at an inn, and did not wait upon Miss Crawley until +a late hour in the noon of next day.</p> + +<p>James Crawley, when his aunt had last beheld him, +was a gawky lad, at that uncomfortable age when the +voice varies between an unearthly treble and a preternatural +bass; when the face not uncommonly blooms out with +appearances for which Rowland’s Kalydor is said +to act as a cure; when boys are seen to shave furtively +with their sister’s scissors, and the sight +of other young women produces intolerable sensations +of terror in them; when the great hands and ankles +protrude a long way from garments which have grown +too tight for them; when their presence after dinner +is at once frightful to the ladies, who are whispering +in the twilight in the drawing-room, and inexpressibly +odious to the gentlemen over the mahogany, who are +restrained from freedom of intercourse and delightful +interchange of wit by the presence of that gawky innocence; +when, at the conclusion of the second glass, papa +says, “Jack, my boy, go out and see if the evening +holds up,” and the youth, willing to be free, +yet hurt at not being yet a man, quits the incomplete +banquet. James, then a hobbadehoy, was now become +a young man, having had the benefits of a university +education, and acquired the inestimable polish which +is gained by living in a fast set at a small college, +and contracting debts, and being rusticated, and being +plucked.</p> + +<p>He was a handsome lad, however, when he came to present +himself to his aunt at Brighton, and good looks were +always a title to the fickle old lady’s favour. + Nor did his blushes and awkwardness take away from +it: she was pleased with these healthy tokens of the +young gentleman’s ingenuousness.</p> + +<p>He said “he had come down for a couple of days +to see a man of his college, and--and to pay my respects +to you, Ma’am, and my father’s and mother’s, +who hope you are well.”</p> + +<p>Pitt was in the room with Miss Crawley when the lad +was announced, and looked very blank when his name +was mentioned. The old lady had plenty of humour, +and enjoyed her correct nephew’s perplexity. + She asked after all the people at the Rectory with +great interest; and said she was thinking of paying +them a visit. She praised the lad to his face, and +said he was well-grown and very much improved, and +that it was a pity his sisters had not some of his +good looks; and finding, on inquiry, that he had taken +up his quarters at an hotel, would not hear of his +stopping there, but bade Mr. Bowls send for Mr. James +Crawley’s things instantly; “and hark ye, +Bowls,” she added, with great graciousness, +“you will have the goodness to pay Mr. James’s +bill.”</p> + +<p>She flung Pitt a look of arch triumph, which caused +that diplomatist almost to choke with envy. Much +as he had ingratiated himself with his aunt, she had +never yet invited him to stay under her roof, and +here was a young whipper-snapper, who at first sight +was made welcome there.</p> + +<p>“I beg your pardon, sir,” says Bowls, +advancing with a profound bow; “what otel, sir, +shall Thomas fetch the luggage from?”</p> + +<p>“O, dam,” said young James, starting up, +as if in some alarm, “I’ll go.”</p> + +<p>“What!” said Miss Crawley.</p> + +<p>“The Tom Cribb’s Arms,” said James, +blushing deeply.</p> + +<p>Miss Crawley burst out laughing at this title. Mr. +Bowls gave one abrupt guffaw, as a confidential servant +of the family, but choked the rest of the volley; +the diplomatist only smiled.</p> + +<p>“I--I didn’t know any better,” said +James, looking down. “I’ve never been +here before; it was the coachman told me.” The +young story-teller! The fact is, that on the Southampton +coach, the day previous, James Crawley had met the +Tutbury Pet, who was coming to Brighton to make a +match with the Rottingdean Fibber; and enchanted by +the Pet’s conversation, had passed the evening +in company with that scientific man and his friends, +at the inn in question.</p> + +<p>“I--I’d best go and settle the score,” +James continued. “Couldn’t think of asking +you, Ma’am,” he added, generously.</p> + +<p>This delicacy made his aunt laugh the more.</p> + +<p>“Go and settle the bill, Bowls,” she said, +with a wave of her hand, “and bring it to me.”</p> + +<p>Poor lady, she did not know what she had done! “There--there’s +a little dawg,” said James, looking frightfully +guilty. “I’d best go for him. He bites +footmen’s calves.”</p> + +<p>All the party cried out with laughing at this description; +even Briggs and Lady Jane, who was sitting mute during +the interview between Miss Crawley and her nephew: + and Bowls, without a word, quitted the room.</p> + +<p>Still, by way of punishing her elder nephew, Miss +Crawley persisted in being gracious to the young Oxonian. +There were no limits to her kindness or her compliments +when they once began. She told Pitt he might come +to dinner, and insisted that James should accompany +her in her drive, and paraded him solemnly up and +down the cliff, on the back seat of the barouche. + During all this excursion, she condescended to say +civil things to him: she quoted Italian and French +poetry to the poor bewildered lad, and persisted that +he was a fine scholar, and was perfectly sure he would +gain a gold medal, and be a Senior Wrangler.</p> + +<p>“Haw, haw,” laughed James, encouraged +by these compliments; “Senior Wrangler, indeed; +that’s at the other shop.”</p> + +<p>“What is the other shop, my dear child?” +said the lady.</p> + +<p>“Senior Wranglers at Cambridge, not Oxford,” +said the scholar, with a knowing air; and would probably +have been more confidential, but that suddenly there +appeared on the cliff in a tax-cart, drawn by a bang-up +pony, dressed in white flannel coats, with mother-of-pearl +buttons, his friends the Tutbury Pet and the Rottingdean +Fibber, with three other gentlemen of their acquaintance, +who all saluted poor James there in the carriage as +he sate. This incident damped the ingenuous youth’s +spirits, and no word of yea or nay could he be induced +to utter during the rest of the drive.</p> + +<p>On his return he found his room prepared, and his +portmanteau ready, and might have remarked that Mr. +Bowls’s countenance, when the latter conducted +him to his apartments, wore a look of gravity, wonder, +and compassion. But the thought of Mr. Bowls did not +enter his head. He was deploring the dreadful predicament +in which he found himself, in a house full of old +women, jabbering French and Italian, and talking poetry +to him. “Reglarly up a tree, by jingo!” +exclaimed the modest boy, who could not face the gentlest +of her sex--not even Briggs--when she began to talk +to him; whereas, put him at Iffley Lock, and he could +out-slang the boldest bargeman.</p> + +<p>At dinner, James appeared choking in a white neckcloth, +and had the honour of handing my Lady Jane downstairs, +while Briggs and Mr. Crawley followed afterwards, +conducting the old lady, with her apparatus of bundles, +and shawls, and cushions. Half of Briggs’s +time at dinner was spent in superintending the invalid’s +comfort, and in cutting up chicken for her fat spaniel. + James did not talk much, but he made a point of asking +all the ladies to drink wine, and accepted Mr. Crawley’s +challenge, and consumed the greater part of a bottle +of champagne which Mr. Bowls was ordered to produce +in his honour. The ladies having withdrawn, and the +two cousins being left together, Pitt, the ex-diplomatist, +be came very communicative and friendly. He asked +after James’s career at college--what his prospects +in life were--hoped heartily he would get on; and, +in a word, was frank and amiable. James’s tongue +unloosed with the port, and he told his cousin his +life, his prospects, his debts, his troubles at the +little-go, and his rows with the proctors, filling +rapidly from the bottles before him, and flying from +Port to Madeira with joyous activity.</p> + +<p>“The chief pleasure which my aunt has,” +said Mr. Crawley, filling his glass, “is that +people should do as they like in her house. This is +Liberty Hall, James, and you can’t do Miss Crawley +a greater kindness than to do as you please, and ask +for what you will. I know you have all sneered at +me in the country for being a Tory. Miss Crawley is +liberal enough to suit any fancy. She is a Republican +in principle, and despises everything like rank or +title.”</p> + +<p>“Why are you going to marry an Earl’s +daughter?” said James.</p> + +<p>“My dear friend, remember it is not poor Lady +Jane’s fault that she is well born,” Pitt +replied, with a courtly air. “She cannot help +being a lady. Besides, I am a Tory, you know.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, as for that,” said Jim, “there’s +nothing like old blood; no, dammy, nothing like it. + I’m none of your radicals. I know what it +is to be a gentleman, dammy. See the chaps in a boat-race; +look at the fellers in a fight; aye, look at a dawg +killing rats--which is it wins? the good-blooded ones. + Get some more port, Bowls, old boy, whilst I buzz +this bottle-here. What was I asaying?”</p> + +<p>“I think you were speaking of dogs killing rats,” +Pitt remarked mildly, handing his cousin the decanter +to “buzz.”</p> + +<p>“Killing rats was I? Well, Pitt, are you a sporting +man? Do you want to see a dawg as <i>can</i> kill a +rat? If you do, come down with me to Tom Corduroy’s, +in Castle Street Mews, and I’ll show you such +a bull-terrier as--Pooh! gammon,” cried James, +bursting out laughing at his own absurdity--"<i>You</i> +don’t care about a dawg or rat; it’s all +nonsense. I’m blest if I think you know the +difference between a dog and a duck.”</p> + +<p>“No; by the way,” Pitt continued with +increased blandness, “it was about blood you +were talking, and the personal advantages which people +derive from patrician birth. Here’s the fresh +bottle.”</p> + +<p>“Blood’s the word,” said James, +gulping the ruby fluid down. “Nothing like blood, +sir, in hosses, dawgs, <i>and</i> men. Why, only last +term, just before I was rusticated, that is, I mean +just before I had the measles, ha, ha--there was me +and Ringwood of Christchurch, Bob Ringwood, Lord Cinqbars’ +son, having our beer at the Bell at Blenheim, when +the Banbury bargeman offered to fight either of us +for a bowl of punch. I couldn’t. My arm was +in a sling; couldn’t even take the drag down--a +brute of a mare of mine had fell with me only two +days before, out with the Abingdon, and I thought my +arm was broke. Well, sir, I couldn’t finish +him, but Bob had his coat off at once--he stood up +to the Banbury man for three minutes, and polished +him off in four rounds easy. Gad, how he did drop, +sir, and what was it? Blood, sir, all blood.”</p> + +<p>“You don’t drink, James,” the ex-attache +continued. “In my time at Oxford, the men passed +round the bottle a little quicker than you young fellows +seem to do.”</p> + +<p>“Come, come,” said James, putting his +hand to his nose and winking at his cousin with a +pair of vinous eyes, “no jokes, old boy; no +trying it on on me. You want to trot me out, but it’s +no go. In vino veritas, old boy. Mars, Bacchus, +Apollo virorum, hey? I wish my aunt would send down +some of this to the governor; it’s a precious +good tap.”</p> + +<p>“You had better ask her,” Machiavel continued, +“or make the best of your time now. What says +the bard? ’Nunc vino pellite curas, Cras ingens +iterabimus aequor,’” and the Bacchanalian, +quoting the above with a House of Commons air, tossed +off nearly a thimbleful of wine with an immense flourish +of his glass.</p> + +<p>At the Rectory, when the bottle of port wine was opened +after dinner, the young ladies had each a glass from +a bottle of currant wine. Mrs. Bute took one glass +of port, honest James had a couple commonly, but as +his father grew very sulky if he made further inroads +on the bottle, the good lad generally refrained from +trying for more, and subsided either into the currant +wine, or to some private gin-and-water in the stables, +which he enjoyed in the company of the coachman and +his pipe. At Oxford, the quantity of wine was unlimited, +but the quality was inferior: but when quantity and +quality united as at his aunt’s house, James +showed that he could appreciate them indeed; and hardly +needed any of his cousin’s encouragement in +draining off the second bottle supplied by Mr. Bowls.</p> + +<p>When the time for coffee came, however, and for a +return to the ladies, of whom he stood in awe, the +young gentleman’s agreeable frankness left him, +and he relapsed into his usual surly timidity; contenting +himself by saying yes and no, by scowling at Lady Jane, +and by upsetting one cup of coffee during the evening.</p> + +<p>If he did not speak he yawned in a pitiable manner, +and his presence threw a damp upon the modest proceedings +of the evening, for Miss Crawley and Lady Jane at +their piquet, and Miss Briggs at her work, felt that +his eyes were wildly fixed on them, and were uneasy +under that maudlin look.</p> + +<p>“He seems a very silent, awkward, bashful lad,” +said Miss Crawley to Mr. Pitt.</p> + +<p>“He is more communicative in men’s society +than with ladies,” Machiavel dryly replied: + perhaps rather disappointed that the port wine had +not made Jim speak more.</p> + +<p>He had spent the early part of the next morning in +writing home to his mother a most flourishing account +of his reception by Miss Crawley. But ah! he little +knew what evils the day was bringing for him, and +how short his reign of favour was destined to be. +A circumstance which Jim had forgotten--a trivial +but fatal circumstance--had taken place at the Cribb’s +Arms on the night before he had come to his aunt’s +house. It was no other than this-- Jim, who was always +of a generous disposition, and when in his cups especially +hospitable, had in the course of the night treated +the Tutbury champion and the Rottingdean man, and +their friends, twice or thrice to the refreshment +of gin-and-water--so that no less than eighteen glasses +of that fluid at eightpence per glass were charged +in Mr. James Crawley’s bill. It was not the +amount of eightpences, but the quantity of gin which +told fatally against poor James’s character, +when his aunt’s butler, Mr. Bowls, went down +at his mistress’s request to pay the young gentleman’s +bill. The landlord, fearing lest the account should +be refused altogether, swore solemnly that the young +gent had consumed personally every farthing’s +worth of the liquor: and Bowls paid the bill finally, +and showed it on his return home to Mrs. Firkin, who +was shocked at the frightful prodigality of gin; and +took the bill to Miss Briggs as accountant-general; +who thought it her duty to mention the circumstance +to her principal, Miss Crawley.</p> + +<p>Had he drunk a dozen bottles of claret, the old spinster +could have pardoned him. Mr. Fox and Mr. Sheridan +drank claret. Gentlemen drank claret. But eighteen +glasses of gin consumed among boxers in an ignoble +pot-house--it was an odious crime and not to be pardoned +readily. Everything went against the lad: he came +home perfumed from the stables, whither he had been +to pay his dog Towzer a visit--and whence he was +going to take his friend out for an airing, when he +met Miss Crawley and her wheezy Blenheim spaniel, which +Towzer would have eaten up had not the Blenheim fled +squealing to the protection of Miss Briggs, while +the atrocious master of the bull-dog stood laughing +at the horrible persecution.</p> + +<p>This day too the unlucky boy’s modesty had likewise +forsaken him. He was lively and facetious at dinner. +During the repast he levelled one or two jokes against +Pitt Crawley: he drank as much wine as upon the previous +day; and going quite unsuspiciously to the drawing-room, +began to entertain the ladies there with some choice +Oxford stories. He described the different pugilistic +qualities of Molyneux and Dutch Sam, offered playfully +to give Lady Jane the odds upon the Tutbury Pet against +the Rottingdean man, or take them, as her Ladyship +chose: and crowned the pleasantry by proposing to back +himself against his cousin Pitt Crawley, either with +or without the gloves. “And that’s a +fair offer, my buck,” he said, with a loud laugh, +slapping Pitt on the shoulder, “and my father +told me to make it too, and he’ll go halves +in the bet, ha, ha!” So saying, the engaging +youth nodded knowingly at poor Miss Briggs, and pointed +his thumb over his shoulder at Pitt Crawley in a jocular +and exulting manner.</p> + +<p>Pitt was not pleased altogether perhaps, but still +not unhappy in the main. Poor Jim had his laugh out: + and staggered across the room with his aunt’s +candle, when the old lady moved to retire, and offered +to salute her with the blandest tipsy smile: and he +took his own leave and went upstairs to his bedroom +perfectly satisfied with himself, and with a pleased +notion that his aunt’s money would be left to +him in preference to his father and all the rest of +the family.</p> + +<p>Once up in the bedroom, one would have thought he +could not make matters worse; and yet this unlucky +boy did. The moon was shining very pleasantly out +on the sea, and Jim, attracted to the window by the +romantic appearance of the ocean and the heavens, thought +he would further enjoy them while smoking. Nobody +would smell the tobacco, he thought, if he cunningly +opened the window and kept his head and pipe in the +fresh air. This he did: but being in an excited state, +poor Jim had forgotten that his door was open all +this time, so that the breeze blowing inwards and a +fine thorough draught being established, the clouds +of tobacco were carried downstairs, and arrived with +quite undiminished fragrance to Miss Crawley and Miss +Briggs.</p> + +<p>The pipe of tobacco finished the business: and the +Bute-Crawleys never knew how many thousand pounds +it cost them. Firkin rushed downstairs to Bowls who +was reading out the “Fire and the Frying Pan” +to his aide-de-camp in a loud and ghostly voice. The +dreadful secret was told to him by Firkin with so +frightened a look, that for the first moment Mr. Bowls +and his young man thought that robbers were in the +house, the legs of whom had probably been discovered +by the woman under Miss Crawley’s bed. When +made aware of the fact, however--to rush upstairs +at three steps at a time to enter the unconscious +James’s apartment, calling out, “Mr. James,” +in a voice stifled with alarm, and to cry, “For +Gawd’s sake, sir, stop that ’ere pipe,” +was the work of a minute with Mr. Bowls. “O, +Mr. James, what ’<i>ave</i> you done!” he +said in a voice of the deepest pathos, as he threw +the implement out of the window. “What ’ave +you done, sir! Missis can’t abide ’em.”</p> + +<p>“Missis needn’t smoke,” said James +with a frantic misplaced laugh, and thought the whole +matter an excellent joke. But his feelings were very +different in the morning, when Mr. Bowls’s young +man, who operated upon Mr. James’s boots, and +brought him his hot water to shave that beard which +he was so anxiously expecting, handed a note in to +Mr. James in bed, in the handwriting of Miss Briggs.</p> + +<p>“Dear sir,” it said, “Miss Crawley +has passed an exceedingly disturbed night, owing to +the shocking manner in which the house has been polluted +by tobacco; Miss Crawley bids me say she regrets that +she is too unwell to see you before you go--and above +all that she ever induced you to remove from the ale-house, +where she is sure you will be much more comfortable +during the rest of your stay at Brighton.”</p> + +<p>And herewith honest James’s career as a candidate +for his aunt’s favour ended. He had in fact, +and without knowing it, done what he menaced to do. + He had fought his cousin Pitt with the gloves.</p> + +<p>Where meanwhile was he who had been once first favourite +for this race for money? Becky and Rawdon, as we have +seen, were come together after Waterloo, and were +passing the winter of 1815 at Paris in great splendour +and gaiety. Rebecca was a good economist, and the +price poor Jos Sedley had paid for her two horses was +in itself sufficient to keep their little establishment +afloat for a year, at the least; there was no occasion +to turn into money “my pistols, the same which +I shot Captain Marker,” or the gold dressing-case, +or the cloak lined with sable. Becky had it made +into a pelisse for herself, in which she rode in the +Bois de Boulogne to the admiration of all: and you +should have seen the scene between her and her delighted +husband, whom she rejoined after the army had entered +Cambray, and when she unsewed herself, and let out +of her dress all those watches, knick-knacks, bank-notes, +cheques, and valuables, which she had secreted in the +wadding, previous to her meditated flight from Brussels! + Tufto was charmed, and Rawdon roared with delighted +laughter, and swore that she was better than any play +he ever saw, by Jove. And the way in which she jockeyed +Jos, and which she described with infinite fun, carried +up his delight to a pitch of quite insane enthusiasm. + He believed in his wife as much as the French soldiers +in Napoleon.</p> + +<p>Her success in Paris was remarkable. All the French +ladies voted her charming. She spoke their language +admirably. She adopted at once their grace, their +liveliness, their manner. Her husband was stupid +certainly--all English are stupid--and, besides, a +dull husband at Paris is always a point in a lady’s +favour. He was the heir of the rich and spirituelle +Miss Crawley, whose house had been open to so many +of the French noblesse during the emigration. They +received the colonel’s wife in their own hotels--"Why,” +wrote a great lady to Miss Crawley, who had bought +her lace and trinkets at the Duchess’s own price, +and given her many a dinner during the pinching times +after the Revolution--"Why does not our dear Miss +come to her nephew and niece, and her attached friends +in Paris? All the world raffoles of the charming Mistress +and her espiegle beauty. Yes, we see in her the grace, +the charm, the wit of our dear friend Miss Crawley! +The King took notice of her yesterday at the Tuileries, +and we are all jealous of the attention which Monsieur +pays her. If you could have seen the spite of a certain +stupid Miladi Bareacres (whose eagle-beak and toque +and feat hers may be seen peering over the heads of +all assemblies) when Madame, the Duchess of Angouleme, +the august daughter and companion of kings, desired +especially to be presented to Mrs. Crawley, as your +dear daughter and protegee, and thanked her in the +name of France, for all your benevolence towards our +unfortunates during their exile! She is of all the +societies, of all the balls--of the balls--yes--of +the dances, no; and yet how interesting and pretty +this fair creature looks surrounded by the homage +of the men, and so soon to be a mother! To hear her +speak of you, her protectress, her mother, would bring +tears to the eyes of ogres. How she loves you! how +we all love our admirable, our respectable Miss Crawley!”</p> + +<p>It is to be feared that this letter of the Parisian +great lady did not by any means advance Mrs. Becky’s +interest with her admirable, her respectable, relative. + On the contrary, the fury of the old spinster was +beyond bounds, when she found what was Rebecca’s +situation, and how audaciously she had made use of +Miss Crawley’s name, to get an entree into Parisian +society. Too much shaken in mind and body to compose +a letter in the French language in reply to that of +her correspondent, she dictated to Briggs a furious +answer in her own native tongue, repudiating Mrs. +Rawdon Crawley altogether, and warning the public +to beware of her as a most artful and dangerous person. + But as Madame the Duchess of X--had only been twenty +years in England, she did not understand a single word +of the language, and contented herself by informing +Mrs. Rawdon Crawley at their next meeting, that she +had received a charming letter from that chere Mees, +and that it was full of benevolent things for Mrs. +Crawley, who began seriously to have hopes that the +spinster would relent.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, she was the gayest and most admired of +Englishwomen: and had a little European congress +on her reception-night. Prussians and Cossacks, Spanish +and English--all the world was at Paris during this +famous winter: to have seen the stars and cordons +in Rebecca’s humble saloon would have made all +Baker Street pale with envy. Famous warriors rode +by her carriage in the Bois, or crowded her modest +little box at the Opera. Rawdon was in the highest +spirits. There were no duns in Paris as yet: there +were parties every day at Very’s or Beauvilliers’; +play was plentiful and his luck good. Tufto perhaps +was sulky. Mrs. Tufto had come over to Paris at her +own invitation, and besides this contretemps, there +were a score of generals now round Becky’s chair, +and she might take her choice of a dozen bouquets +when she went to the play. Lady Bareacres and the +chiefs of the English society, stupid and irreproachable +females, writhed with anguish at the success of the +little upstart Becky, whose poisoned jokes quivered +and rankled in their chaste breasts. But she had all +the men on her side. She fought the women with indomitable +courage, and they could not talk scandal in any tongue +but their own.</p> + +<p>So in fetes, pleasures, and prosperity, the winter +of 1815-16 passed away with Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, who +accommodated herself to polite life as if her ancestors +had been people of fashion for centuries past--and +who from her wit, talent, and energy, indeed merited +a place of honour in Vanity Fair. In the early spring +of 1816, Galignani’s Journal contained the following +announcement in an interesting corner of the paper: + “On the 26th of March--the Lady of Lieutenant-Colonel +Crawley, of the Life Guards Green--of a son and heir.”</p> + +<p>This event was copied into the London papers, out +of which Miss Briggs read the statement to Miss Crawley, +at breakfast, at Brighton. The intelligence, expected +as it might have been, caused a crisis in the affairs +of the Crawley family. The spinster’s rage +rose to its height, and sending instantly for Pitt, +her nephew, and for the Lady Southdown, from Brunswick +Square, she requested an immediate celebration of +the marriage which had been so long pending between +the two families. And she announced that it was her +intention to allow the young couple a thousand a year +during her lifetime, at the expiration of which the +bulk of her property would be settled upon her nephew +and her dear niece, Lady Jane Crawley. Waxy came down +to ratify the deeds--Lord Southdown gave away his +sister--she was married by a Bishop, and not by the +Rev. Bartholomew Irons--to the disappointment of the +irregular prelate.</p> + +<p>When they were married, Pitt would have liked to take +a hymeneal tour with his bride, as became people of +their condition. But the affection of the old lady +towards Lady Jane had grown so strong, that she fairly +owned she could not part with her favourite. Pitt +and his wife came therefore and lived with Miss Crawley: +and (greatly to the annoyance of poor Pitt, who conceived +himself a most injured character--being subject to +the humours of his aunt on one side, and of his mother-in-law +on the other) Lady Southdown, from her neighbouring +house, reigned over the whole family--Pitt, Lady Jane, +Miss Crawley, Briggs, Bowls, Firkin, and all. She +pitilessly dosed them with her tracts and her medicine, +she dismissed Creamer, she installed Rodgers, and +soon stripped Miss Crawley of even the semblance of +authority. The poor soul grew so timid that she actually +left off bullying Briggs any more, and clung to her +niece, more fond and terrified every day. Peace to +thee, kind and selfish, vain and generous old heathen!--We +shall see thee no more. Let us hope that Lady Jane +supported her kindly, and led her with gentle hand +out of the busy struggle of Vanity Fair.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Widow and Mother</h4> + +<p>The news of the great fights of Quatre Bras and Waterloo +reached England at the same time. The Gazette first +published the result of the two battles; at which +glorious intelligence all England thrilled with triumph +and fear. Particulars then followed; and after the +announcement of the victories came the list of the +wounded and the slain. Who can tell the dread with +which that catalogue was opened and read! Fancy, +at every village and homestead almost through the +three kingdoms, the great news coming of the battles +in Flanders, and the feelings of exultation and gratitude, +bereavement and sickening dismay, when the lists of +the regimental losses were gone through, and it became +known whether the dear friend and relative had escaped +or fallen. Anybody who will take the trouble of looking +back to a file of the newspapers of the time, must, +even now, feel at second-hand this breathless pause +of expectation. The lists of casualties are carried +on from day to day: you stop in the midst as in a +story which is to be continued in our next. Think +what the feelings must have been as those papers followed +each other fresh from the press; and if such an interest +could be felt in our country, and about a battle where +but twenty thousand of our people were engaged, think +of the condition of Europe for twenty years before, +where people were fighting, not by thousands, but by +millions; each one of whom as he struck his enemy wounded +horribly some other innocent heart far away.</p> + +<p>The news which that famous Gazette brought to the +Osbornes gave a dreadful shock to the family and its +chief. The girls indulged unrestrained in their grief. + The gloom-stricken old father was still more borne +down by his fate and sorrow. He strove to think that +a judgment was on the boy for his disobedience. He +dared not own that the severity of the sentence frightened +him, and that its fulfilment had come too soon upon +his curses. Sometimes a shuddering terror struck +him, as if he had been the author of the doom which +he had called down on his son. There was a chance +before of reconciliation. The boy’s wife might +have died; or he might have come back and said, Father +I have sinned. But there was no hope now. He stood +on the other side of the gulf impassable, haunting +his parent with sad eyes. He remembered them once +before so in a fever, when every one thought the lad +was dying, and he lay on his bed speechless, and gazing +with a dreadful gloom. Good God! how the father clung +to the doctor then, and with what a sickening anxiety +he followed him: what a weight of grief was off his +mind when, after the crisis of the fever, the lad +recovered, and looked at his father once more with +eyes that recognised him. But now there was no help +or cure, or chance of reconcilement: above all, there +were no humble words to soothe vanity outraged and +furious, or bring to its natural flow the poisoned, +angry blood. And it is hard to say which pang it +was that tore the proud father’s heart most keenly--that +his son should have gone out of the reach of his forgiveness, +or that the apology which his own pride expected should +have escaped him.</p> + +<p>Whatever his sensations might have been, however, +the stem old man would have no confidant. He never +mentioned his son’s name to his daughters; but +ordered the elder to place all the females of the +establishment in mourning; and desired that the male +servants should be similarly attired in deep black. + All parties and entertainments, of course, were to +be put off. No communications were made to his future +son-in-law, whose marriage-day had been fixed: but +there was enough in Mr. Osborne’s appearance +to prevent Mr. Bullock from making any inquiries, +or in any way pressing forward that ceremony. He and +the ladies whispered about it under their voices in +the drawing-room sometimes, whither the father never +came. He remained constantly in his own study; the +whole front part of the house being closed until some +time after the completion of the general mourning.</p> + +<p>About three weeks after the 18th of June, Mr. Osborne’s +acquaintance, Sir William Dobbin, called at Mr. Osborne’s +house in Russell Square, with a very pale and agitated +face, and insisted upon seeing that gentleman. Ushered +into his room, and after a few words, which neither +the speaker nor the host understood, the former produced +from an inclosure a letter sealed with a large red +seal. “My son, Major Dobbin,” the Alderman +said, with some hesitation, “despatched me a +letter by an officer of the --th, who arrived in town +to-day. My son’s letter contains one for you, +Osborne.” The Alderman placed the letter on +the table, and Osborne stared at him for a moment +or two in silence. His looks frightened the ambassador, +who after looking guiltily for a little time at the +grief-stricken man, hurried away without another word.</p> + +<p>The letter was in George’s well-known bold handwriting. +It was that one which he had written before daybreak +on the 16th of June, and just before he took leave +of Amelia. The great red seal was emblazoned with +the sham coat of arms which Osborne had assumed from +the Peerage, with “Pax in bello” for a +motto; that of the ducal house with which the vain +old man tried to fancy himself connected. The hand +that signed it would never hold pen or sword more. + The very seal that sealed it had been robbed from +George’s dead body as it lay on the field of +battle. The father knew nothing of this, but sat +and looked at the letter in terrified vacancy. He +almost fell when he went to open it.</p> + +<p>Have you ever had a difference with a dear friend? +How his letters, written in the period of love and +confidence, sicken and rebuke you! What a dreary mourning +it is to dwell upon those vehement protests of dead +affection! What lying epitaphs they make over the +corpse of love! What dark, cruel comments upon Life +and Vanities! Most of us have got or written drawers +full of them. They are closet-skeletons which we keep +and shun. Osborne trembled long before the letter from +his dead son.</p> + +<p>The poor boy’s letter did not say much. He +had been too proud to acknowledge the tenderness which +his heart felt. He only said, that on the eve of +a great battle, he wished to bid his father farewell, +and solemnly to implore his good offices for the wife--it +might be for the child--whom he left behind him. +He owned with contrition that his irregularities and +his extravagance had already wasted a large part of +his mother’s little fortune. He thanked his +father for his former generous conduct; and he promised +him that if he fell on the field or survived it, he +would act in a manner worthy of the name of George +Osborne.</p> + +<p>His English habit, pride, awkwardness perhaps, had +prevented him from saying more. His father could +not see the kiss George had placed on the superscription +of his letter. Mr. Osborne dropped it with the bitterest, +deadliest pang of balked affection and revenge. His +son was still beloved and unforgiven.</p> + +<p>About two months afterwards, however, as the young +ladies of the family went to church with their father, +they remarked how he took a different seat from that +which he usually occupied when he chose to attend +divine worship; and that from his cushion opposite, +he looked up at the wall over their heads. This caused +the young women likewise to gaze in the direction +towards which their father’s gloomy eyes pointed: + and they saw an elaborate monument upon the wall, +where Britannia was represented weeping over an urn, +and a broken sword and a couchant lion indicated that +the piece of sculpture had been erected in honour +of a deceased warrior. The sculptors of those days +had stocks of such funereal emblems in hand; as you +may see still on the walls of St. Paul’s, which +are covered with hundreds of these braggart heathen +allegories. There was a constant demand for them +during the first fifteen years of the present century.</p> + +<p>Under the memorial in question were emblazoned the +well-known and pompous Osborne arms; and the inscription +said, that the monument was “Sacred to the memory +of George Osborne, Junior, Esq., late a Captain in +his Majesty’s--th regiment of foot, who fell +on the 18th of June, 1815, aged 28 years, while fighting +for his king and country in the glorious victory of +Waterloo. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.”</p> + +<p>The sight of that stone agitated the nerves of the +sisters so much, that Miss Maria was compelled to +leave the church. The congregation made way respectfully +for those sobbing girls clothed in deep black, and +pitied the stern old father seated opposite the memorial +of the dead soldier. “Will he forgive Mrs. +George?” the girls said to themselves as soon +as their ebullition of grief was over. Much conversation +passed too among the acquaintances of the Osborne +family, who knew of the rupture between the son and +father caused by the former’s marriage, as to +the chance of a reconciliation with the young widow. +There were bets among the gentlemen both about Russell +Square and in the City.</p> + +<p>If the sisters had any anxiety regarding the possible +recognition of Amelia as a daughter of the family, +it was increased presently, and towards the end of +the autumn, by their father’s announcement that +he was going abroad. He did not say whither, but they +knew at once that his steps would be turned towards +Belgium, and were aware that George’s widow +was still in Brussels. They had pretty accurate news +indeed of poor Amelia from Lady Dobbin and her daughters. + Our honest Captain had been promoted in consequence +of the death of the second Major of the regiment on +the field; and the brave O’Dowd, who had distinguished +himself greatly here as upon all occasions where he +had a chance to show his coolness and valour, was a +Colonel and Companion of the Bath.</p> + +<p>Very many of the brave--th, who had suffered severely +upon both days of action, were still at Brussels in +the autumn, recovering of their wounds. The city +was a vast military hospital for months after the +great battles; and as men and officers began to rally +from their hurts, the gardens and places of public +resort swarmed with maimed warriors, old and young, +who, just rescued out of death, fell to gambling, +and gaiety, and love-making, as people of Vanity Fair +will do. Mr. Osborne found out some of the --th easily. + He knew their uniform quite well, and had been used +to follow all the promotions and exchanges in the +regiment, and loved to talk about it and its officers +as if he had been one of the number. On the day after +his arrival at Brussels, and as he issued from his +hotel, which faced the park, he saw a soldier in the +well-known facings, reposing on a stone bench in the +garden, and went and sate down trembling by the wounded +convalescent man.</p> + +<p>“Were you in Captain Osborne’s company?” +he said, and added, after a pause, “he was my +son, sir.”</p> + +<p>The man was not of the Captain’s company, but +he lifted up his unwounded arm and touched-his cap +sadly and respectfully to the haggard broken-spirited +gentleman who questioned him. “The whole army +didn’t contain a finer or a better officer,” +the soldier said. “The Sergeant of the Captain’s +company (Captain Raymond had it now), was in town, +though, and was just well of a shot in the shoulder. +His honour might see him if he liked, who could tell +him anything he wanted to know about--about the --th’s +actions. But his honour had seen Major Dobbin, no +doubt, the brave Captain’s great friend; and +Mrs. Osborne, who was here too, and had been very bad, +he heard everybody say. They say she was out of her +mind like for six weeks or more. But your honour +knows all about that--and asking your pardon"--the +man added.</p> + +<p>Osborne put a guinea into the soldier’s hand, +and told him he should have another if he would bring +the Sergeant to the Hotel du Parc; a promise which +very soon brought the desired officer to Mr. Osborne’s +presence. And the first soldier went away; and after +telling a comrade or two how Captain Osborne’s +father was arrived, and what a free-handed generous +gentleman he was, they went and made good cheer with +drink and feasting, as long as the guineas lasted which +had come from the proud purse of the mourning old +father.</p> + +<p>In the Sergeant’s company, who was also just +convalescent, Osborne made the journey of Waterloo +and Quatre Bras, a journey which thousands of his +countrymen were then taking. He took the Sergeant +with him in his carriage, and went through both fields +under his guidance. He saw the point of the road +where the regiment marched into action on the 16th, +and the slope down which they drove the French cavalry +who were pressing on the retreating Belgians. There +was the spot where the noble Captain cut down the French +officer who was grappling with the young Ensign for +the colours, the Colour-Sergeants having been shot +down. Along this road they retreated on the next +day, and here was the bank at which the regiment bivouacked +under the rain of the night of the seventeenth. Further +on was the position which they took and held during +the day, forming time after time to receive the charge +of the enemy’s horsemen and lying down under +the shelter of the bank from the furious French cannonade. +And it was at this declivity when at evening the whole +English line received the order to advance, as the +enemy fell back after his last charge, that the Captain, +hurraying and rushing down the hill waving his sword, +received a shot and fell dead. “It was Major +Dobbin who took back the Captain’s body to Brussels,” +the Sergeant said, in a low voice, “and had +him buried, as your honour knows.” The peasants +and relic-hunters about the place were screaming round +the pair, as the soldier told his story, offering +for sale all sorts of mementoes of the fight, crosses, +and epaulets, and shattered cuirasses, and eagles.</p> + +<p>Osborne gave a sumptuous reward to the Sergeant when +he parted with him, after having visited the scenes +of his son’s last exploits. His burial-place +he had already seen. Indeed, he had driven thither +immediately after his arrival at Brussels. George’s +body lay in the pretty burial-ground of Laeken, near +the city; in which place, having once visited it on +a party of pleasure, he had lightly expressed a wish +to have his grave made. And there the young officer +was laid by his friend, in the unconsecrated corner +of the garden, separated by a little hedge from the +temples and towers and plantations of flowers and +shrubs, under which the Roman Catholic dead repose. + It seemed a humiliation to old Osborne to think that +his son, an English gentleman, a captain in the famous +British army, should not be found worthy to lie in +ground where mere foreigners were buried. Which of +us is there can tell how much vanity lurks in our +warmest regard for others, and how selfish our love +is? Old Osborne did not speculate much upon the mingled +nature of his feelings, and how his instinct and selfishness +were combating together. He firmly believed that +everything he did was right, that he ought on all +occasions to have his own way--and like the sting of +a wasp or serpent his hatred rushed out armed and poisonous +against anything like opposition. He was proud of +his hatred as of everything else. Always to be right, +always to trample forward, and never to doubt, are +not these the great qualities with which dullness +takes the lead in the world?</p> + +<p>As after the drive to Waterloo, Mr. Osborne’s +carriage was nearing the gates of the city at sunset, +they met another open barouche, in which were a couple +of ladies and a gentleman, and by the side of which +an officer was riding. Osborne gave a start back, +and the Sergeant, seated with him, cast a look of +surprise at his neighbour, as he touched his cap to +the officer, who mechanically returned his salute. + It was Amelia, with the lame young Ensign by her side, +and opposite to her her faithful friend Mrs. O’Dowd. + It was Amelia, but how changed from the fresh and +comely girl Osborne knew. Her face was white and +thin. Her pretty brown hair was parted under a widow’s +cap--the poor child. Her eyes were fixed, and looking +nowhere. They stared blank in the face of Osborne, +as the carriages crossed each other, but she did not +know him; nor did he recognise her, until looking +up, he saw Dobbin riding by her: and then he knew +who it was. He hated her. He did not know how much +until he saw her there. When her carriage had passed +on, he turned and stared at the Sergeant, with a curse +and defiance in his eye cast at his companion, who +could not help looking at him--as much as to say “How +dare you look at me? Damn you! I do hate her. It +is she who has tumbled my hopes and all my pride down.” +“Tell the scoundrel to drive on quick,” +he shouted with an oath, to the lackey on the box. +A minute afterwards, a horse came clattering over the +pavement behind Osborne’s carriage, and Dobbin +rode up. His thoughts had been elsewhere as the carriages +passed each other, and it was not until he had ridden +some paces forward, that he remembered it was Osborne +who had just passed him. Then he turned to examine +if the sight of her father-in-law had made any impression +on Amelia, but the poor girl did not know who had +passed. Then William, who daily used to accompany +her in his drives, taking out his watch, made some +excuse about an engagement which he suddenly recollected, +and so rode off. She did not remark that either: + but sate looking before her, over the homely landscape +towards the woods in the distance, by which George +marched away.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Osborne, Mr. Osborne!” cried Dobbin, +as he rode up and held out his hand. Osborne made +no motion to take it, but shouted out once more and +with another curse to his servant to drive on.</p> + +<p>Dobbin laid his hand on the carriage side. “I +will see you, sir,” he said. “I have +a message for you.”</p> + +<p>“From that woman?” said Osborne, fiercely.</p> + +<p>“No,” replied the other, “from your +son”; at which Osborne fell back into the corner +of his carriage, and Dobbin allowing it to pass on, +rode close behind it, and so through the town until +they reached Mr. Osborne’s hotel, and without +a word. There he followed Osborne up to his apartments. + George had often been in the rooms; they were the +lodgings which the Crawleys had occupied during their +stay in Brussels.</p> + +<p>“Pray, have you any commands for me, Captain +Dobbin, or, I beg your pardon, I should say <i>major</i> +Dobbin, since better men than you are dead, and you +step into their <i>shoes</i>?” said Mr. Osborne, +in that sarcastic tone which he sometimes was pleased +to assume.</p> + +<p>“Better men <i>are</i> dead,” Dobbin replied. + “I want to speak to you about one.”</p> + +<p>“Make it short, sir,” said the other with +an oath, scowling at his visitor.</p> + +<p>“I am here as his closest friend,” the +Major resumed, “and the executor of his will. + He made it before he went into action. Are you aware +how small his means are, and of the straitened circumstances +of his widow?”</p> + +<p>“I don’t know his widow, sir,” Osborne +said. “Let her go back to her father.” +But the gentleman whom he addressed was determined +to remain in good temper, and went on without heeding +the interruption.</p> + +<p>“Do you know, sir, Mrs. Osborne’s condition? +Her life and her reason almost have been shaken by +the blow which has fallen on her. It is very doubtful +whether she will rally. There is a chance left for +her, however, and it is about this I came to speak +to you. She will be a mother soon. Will you visit +the parent’s offence upon the child’s +head? or will you forgive the child for poor George’s +sake?”</p> + +<p>Osborne broke out into a rhapsody of self-praise and +imprecations;-- by the first, excusing himself to +his own conscience for his conduct; by the second, +exaggerating the undutifulness of George. No father +in all England could have behaved more generously to +a son, who had rebelled against him wickedly. He +had died without even so much as confessing he was +wrong. Let him take the consequences of his undutifulness +and folly. As for himself, Mr. Osborne, he was a +man of his word. He had sworn never to speak to that +woman, or to recognize her as his son’s wife. + “And that’s what you may tell her,” +he concluded with an oath; “and that’s +what I will stick to to the last day of my life.”</p> + +<p>There was no hope from that quarter then. The widow +must live on her slender pittance, or on such aid +as Jos could give her. “I might tell her, and +she would not heed it,” thought Dobbin, sadly: +for the poor girl’s thoughts were not here at +all since her catastrophe, and, stupefied under the +pressure of her sorrow, good and evil were alike indifferent +to her.</p> + +<p>So, indeed, were even friendship and kindness. She +received them both uncomplainingly, and having accepted +them, relapsed into her grief.</p> + +<p>Suppose some twelve months after the above conversation +took place to have passed in the life of our poor +Amelia. She has spent the first portion of that time +in a sorrow so profound and pitiable, that we who +have been watching and describing some of the emotions +of that weak and tender heart, must draw back in the +presence of the cruel grief under which it is bleeding. + Tread silently round the hapless couch of the poor +prostrate soul. Shut gently the door of the dark chamber +wherein she suffers, as those kind people did who +nursed her through the first months of her pain, and +never left her until heaven had sent her consolation. + A day came--of almost terrified delight and wonder--when +the poor widowed girl pressed a child upon her breast--a +child, with the eyes of George who was gone--a little +boy, as beautiful as a cherub. What a miracle it was +to hear its first cry! How she laughed and wept over +it--how love, and hope, and prayer woke again in her +bosom as the baby nestled there. She was safe. The +doctors who attended her, and had feared for her life +or for her brain, had waited anxiously for this crisis +before they could pronounce that either was secure. + It was worth the long months of doubt and dread which +the persons who had constantly been with her had passed, +to see her eyes once more beaming tenderly upon them.</p> + +<p>Our friend Dobbin was one of them. It was he who +brought her back to England and to her mother’s +house; when Mrs. O’Dowd, receiving a peremptory +summons from her Colonel, had been forced to quit her +patient. To see Dobbin holding the infant, and to hear +Amelia’s laugh of triumph as she watched him, +would have done any man good who had a sense of humour. + William was the godfather of the child, and exerted +his ingenuity in the purchase of cups, spoons, pap-boats, +and corals for this little Christian.</p> + +<p>How his mother nursed him, and dressed him, and lived +upon him; how she drove away all nurses, and would +scarce allow any hand but her own to touch him; how +she considered that the greatest favour she could +confer upon his godfather, Major Dobbin, was to allow +the Major occasionally to dandle him, need not be +told here. This child was her being. Her existence +was a maternal caress. She enveloped the feeble and +unconscious creature with love and worship. It was +her life which the baby drank in from her bosom. Of +nights, and when alone, she had stealthy and intense +raptures of motherly love, such as God’s marvellous +care has awarded to the female instinct-- joys how +far higher and lower than reason--blind beautiful devotions +which only women’s hearts know. It was William +Dobbin’s task to muse upon these movements of +Amelia’s, and to watch her heart; and if his +love made him divine almost all the feelings which +agitated it, alas! he could see with a fatal perspicuity +that there was no place there for him. And so, gently, +he bore his fate, knowing it, and content to bear +it.</p> + +<p>I suppose Amelia’s father and mother saw through +the intentions of the Major, and were not ill-disposed +to encourage him; for Dobbin visited their house daily, +and stayed for hours with them, or with Amelia, or +with the honest landlord, Mr. Clapp, and his family. + He brought, on one pretext or another, presents to +everybody, and almost every day; and went, with the +landlord’s little girl, who was rather a favourite +with Amelia, by the name of Major Sugarplums. It +was this little child who commonly acted as mistress +of the ceremonies to introduce him to Mrs. Osborne. + She laughed one day when Major Sugarplums’ +cab drove up to Fulham, and he descended from it, +bringing out a wooden horse, a drum, a trumpet, and +other warlike toys, for little Georgy, who was scarcely +six months old, and for whom the articles in question +were entirely premature.</p> + +<p>The child was asleep. “Hush,” said Amelia, +annoyed, perhaps, at the creaking of the Major’s +boots; and she held out her hand; smiling because +William could not take it until he had rid himself +of his cargo of toys. “Go downstairs, little +Mary,” said he presently to the child, “I +want to speak to Mrs. Osborne.” She looked up +rather astonished, and laid down the infant on its +bed.</p> + +<p>“I am come to say good-bye, Amelia,” said +he, taking her slender little white hand gently.</p> + +<p>“Good-bye? and where are you going?” she +said, with a smile.</p> + +<p>“Send the letters to the agents,” he said; +“they will forward them; for you will write +to me, won’t you? I shall be away a long time.”</p> + +<p>“I’ll write to you about Georgy,” +she said. “Dear’ William, how good you +have been to him and to me. Look at him. Isn’t +he like an angel?”</p> + +<p>The little pink hands of the child closed mechanically +round the honest soldier’s finger, and Amelia +looked up in his face with bright maternal pleasure. + The cruellest looks could not have wounded him more +than that glance of hopeless kindness. He bent over +the child and mother. He could not speak for a moment. + And it was only with all his strength that he could +force himself to say a God bless you. “God +bless you,” said Amelia, and held up her face +and kissed him.</p> + +<p>“Hush! Don’t wake Georgy!” she +added, as William Dobbin went to the door with heavy +steps. She did not hear the noise of his cab-wheels +as he drove away: she was looking at the child, who +was laughing in his sleep.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXVI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">How to Live Well on Nothing a Year</h4> + +<p>I suppose there is no man in this Vanity Fair of ours +so little observant as not to think sometimes about +the worldly affairs of his acquaintances, or so extremely +charitable as not to wonder how his neighbour Jones, +or his neighbour Smith, can make both ends meet at +the end of the year. With the utmost regard for the +family, for instance (for I dine with them twice or +thrice in the season), I cannot but own that the appearance +of the Jenkinses in the park, in the large barouche +with the grenadier-footmen, will surprise and mystify +me to my dying day: for though I know the equipage +is only jobbed, and all the Jenkins people are on +board wages, yet those three men and the carriage +must represent an expense of six hundred a year at +the very least--and then there are the splendid dinners, +the two boys at Eton, the prize governess and masters +for the girls, the trip abroad, or to Eastbourne or +Worthing, in the autumn, the annual ball with a supper +from Gunter’s (who, by the way, supplies most +of the first-rate dinners which J. gives, as I know +very well, having been invited to one of them to fill +a vacant place, when I saw at once that these repasts +are very superior to the common run of entertainments +for which the humbler sort of J.’s acquaintances +get cards)--who, I say, with the most good-natured +feelings in the world, can help wondering how the +Jenkinses make out matters? What is Jenkins? We all +know--Commissioner of the Tape and Sealing Wax Office, +with 1200 pounds a year for a salary. Had his wife +a private fortune? Pooh!--Miss Flint--one of eleven +children of a small squire in Buckinghamshire. All +she ever gets from her family is a turkey at Christmas, +in exchange for which she has to board two or three +of her sisters in the off season, and lodge and feed +her brothers when they come to town. How does Jenkins +balance his income? I say, as every friend of his +must say, How is it that he has not been outlawed +long since, and that he ever came back (as he did +to the surprise of everybody) last year from Boulogne?</p> + +<p>“I” is here introduced to personify the +world in general--the Mrs. Grundy of each respected +reader’s private circle--every one of whom can +point to some families of his acquaintance who live +nobody knows how. Many a glass of wine have we all +of us drunk, I have very little doubt, hob-and-nobbing +with the hospitable giver and wondering how the deuce +he paid for it.</p> + +<p>Some three or four years after his stay in Paris, +when Rawdon Crawley and his wife were established +in a very small comfortable house in Curzon Street, +May Fair, there was scarcely one of the numerous friends +whom they entertained at dinner that did not ask the +above question regarding them. The novelist, it has +been said before, knows everything, and as I am in +a situation to be able to tell the public how Crawley +and his wife lived without any income, may I entreat +the public newspapers which are in the habit of extracting +portions of the various periodical works now published +not to reprint the following exact narrative and calculations--of +which I ought, as the discoverer (and at some expense, +too), to have the benefit? My son, I would say, were +I blessed with a child--you may by deep inquiry and +constant intercourse with him learn how a man lives +comfortably on nothing a year. But it is best not +to be intimate with gentlemen of this profession and +to take the calculations at second hand, as you do +logarithms, for to work them yourself, depend upon +it, will cost you something considerable.</p> + +<p>On nothing per annum then, and during a course of +some two or three years, of which we can afford to +give but a very brief history, Crawley and his wife +lived very happily and comfortably at Paris. It was +in this period that he quitted the Guards and sold +out of the army. When we find him again, his mustachios +and the title of Colonel on his card are the only +relics of his military profession.</p> + +<p>It has been mentioned that Rebecca, soon after her +arrival in Paris, took a very smart and leading position +in the society of that capital, and was welcomed at +some of the most distinguished houses of the restored +French nobility. The English men of fashion in Paris +courted her, too, to the disgust of the ladies their +wives, who could not bear the parvenue. For some +months the salons of the Faubourg St. Germain, in +which her place was secured, and the splendours of +the new Court, where she was received with much distinction, +delighted and perhaps a little intoxicated Mrs. Crawley, +who may have been disposed during this period of elation +to slight the people--honest young military men mostly--who +formed her husband’s chief society.</p> + +<p>But the Colonel yawned sadly among the Duchesses and +great ladies of the Court. The old women who played +ecarte made such a noise about a five-franc piece +that it was not worth Colonel Crawley’s while +to sit down at a card-table. The wit of their conversation +he could not appreciate, being ignorant of their language. +And what good could his wife get, he urged, by making +curtsies every night to a whole circle of Princesses? +He left Rebecca presently to frequent these parties +alone, resuming his own simple pursuits and amusements +amongst the amiable friends of his own choice.</p> + +<p>The truth is, when we say of a gentleman that he lives +elegantly on nothing a year, we use the word “nothing” +to signify something unknown; meaning, simply, that +we don’t know how the gentleman in question +defrays the expenses of his establishment. Now, our +friend the Colonel had a great aptitude for all games +of chance: and exercising himself, as he continually +did, with the cards, the dice-box, or the cue, it +is natural to suppose that he attained a much greater +skill in the use of these articles than men can possess +who only occasionally handle them. To use a cue at +billiards well is like using a pencil, or a German +flute, or a small-sword--you cannot master any one +of these implements at first, and it is only by repeated +study and perseverance, joined to a natural taste, +that a man can excel in the handling of either. Now +Crawley, from being only a brilliant amateur, had +grown to be a consummate master of billiards. Like +a great General, his genius used to rise with the +danger, and when the luck had been unfavourable to +him for a whole game, and the bets were consequently +against him, he would, with consummate skill and boldness, +make some prodigious hits which would restore the +battle, and come in a victor at the end, to the astonishment +of everybody--of everybody, that is, who was a stranger +to his play. Those who were accustomed to see it were +cautious how they staked their money against a man +of such sudden resources and brilliant and overpowering +skill.</p> + +<p>At games of cards he was equally skilful; for though +he would constantly lose money at the commencement +of an evening, playing so carelessly and making such +blunders, that newcomers were often inclined to think +meanly of his talent; yet when roused to action and +awakened to caution by repeated small losses, it was +remarked that Crawley’s play became quite different, +and that he was pretty sure of beating his enemy thoroughly +before the night was over. Indeed, very few men could +say that they ever had the better of him. His successes +were so repeated that no wonder the envious and the +vanquished spoke sometimes with bitterness regarding +them. And as the French say of the Duke of Wellington, +who never suffered a defeat, that only an astonishing +series of lucky accidents enabled him to be an invariable +winner; yet even they allow that he cheated at Waterloo, +and was enabled to win the last great trick: so it +was hinted at headquarters in England that some foul +play must have taken place in order to account for +the continuous successes of Colonel Crawley.</p> + +<p>Though Frascati’s and the Salon were open at +that time in Paris, the mania for play was so widely +spread that the public gambling-rooms did not suffice +for the general ardour, and gambling went on in private +houses as much as if there had been no public means +for gratifying the passion. At Crawley’s charming +little reunions of an evening this fatal amusement +commonly was practised--much to good-natured little +Mrs. Crawley’s annoyance. She spoke about her +husband’s passion for dice with the deepest grief; +she bewailed it to everybody who came to her house. + She besought the young fellows never, never to touch +a box; and when young Green, of the Rifles, lost a +very considerable sum of money, Rebecca passed a whole +night in tears, as the servant told the unfortunate +young gentleman, and actually went on her knees to +her husband to beseech him to remit the debt, and +burn the acknowledgement. How could he? He had lost +just as much himself to Blackstone of the Hussars, +and Count Punter of the Hanoverian Cavalry. Green +might have any decent time; but pay?--of course he +must pay; to talk of burning IOU’s was child’s +play.</p> + +<p>Other officers, chiefly young--for the young fellows +gathered round Mrs. Crawley--came from her parties +with long faces, having dropped more or less money +at her fatal card-tables. Her house began to have +an unfortunate reputation. The old hands warned the +less experienced of their danger. Colonel O’Dowd, +of the --th regiment, one of those occupying in Paris, +warned Lieutenant Spooney of that corps. A loud and +violent fracas took place between the infantry Colonel +and his lady, who were dining at the Cafe de Paris, +and Colonel and Mrs. Crawley; who were also taking +their meal there. The ladies engaged on both sides. + Mrs. O’Dowd snapped her fingers in Mrs. Crawley’s +face and called her husband “no betther than +a black-leg.” Colonel Crawley challenged Colonel +O’Dowd, C.B. The Commander-in-Chief hearing +of the dispute sent for Colonel Crawley, who was getting +ready the same pistols “which he shot Captain +Marker,” and had such a conversation with him +that no duel took place. If Rebecca had not gone +on her knees to General Tufto, Crawley would have +been sent back to England; and he did not play, except +with civilians, for some weeks after.</p> + +<p>But, in spite of Rawdon’s undoubted skill and +constant successes, it became evident to Rebecca, +considering these things, that their position was +but a precarious one, and that, even although they +paid scarcely anybody, their little capital would +end one day by dwindling into zero. “Gambling,” +she would say, “dear, is good to help your income, +but not as an income itself. Some day people may +be tired of play, and then where are we?” Rawdon +acquiesced in the justice of her opinion; and in truth +he had remarked that after a few nights of his little +suppers, &c., gentlemen were tired of play with him, +and, in spite of Rebecca’s charms, did not present +themselves very eagerly.</p> + +<p>Easy and pleasant as their life at Paris was, it was +after all only an idle dalliance and amiable trifling; +and Rebecca saw that she must push Rawdon’s +fortune in their own country. She must get him a +place or appointment at home or in the colonies, and +she determined to make a move upon England as soon +as the way could be cleared for her. As a first step +she had made Crawley sell out of the Guards and go +on half-pay. His function as aide-de-camp to General +Tufto had ceased previously. Rebecca laughed in all +companies at that officer, at his toupee (which he +mounted on coming to Paris), at his waistband, at +his false teeth, at his pretensions to be a lady-killer +above all, and his absurd vanity in fancying every +woman whom he came near was in love with him. It +was to Mrs. Brent, the beetle-browed wife of Mr. Commissary +Brent, to whom the general transferred his attentions +now--his bouquets, his dinners at the restaurateurs’, +his opera-boxes, and his knick-knacks. Poor Mrs. +Tufto was no more happy than before, and had still +to pass long evenings alone with her daughters, knowing +that her General was gone off scented and curled to +stand behind Mrs. Brent’s chair at the play. + Becky had a dozen admirers in his place, to be sure, +and could cut her rival to pieces with her wit. But, +as we have said, she. was growing tired of this idle +social life: opera-boxes and restaurateur dinners +palled upon her: nosegays could not be laid by as +a provision for future years: and she could not live +upon knick-knacks, laced handkerchiefs, and kid gloves. + She felt the frivolity of pleasure and longed for +more substantial benefits.</p> + +<p>At this juncture news arrived which was spread among +the many creditors of the Colonel at Paris, and which +caused them great satisfaction. Miss Crawley, the +rich aunt from whom he expected his immense inheritance, +was dying; the Colonel must haste to her bedside. + Mrs. Crawley and her child would remain behind until +he came to reclaim them. He departed for Calais, +and having reached that place in safety, it might +have been supposed that he went to Dover; but instead +he took the diligence to Dunkirk, and thence travelled +to Brussels, for which place he had a former predilection. +The fact is, he owed more money at London than at Paris; +and he preferred the quiet little Belgian city to +either of the more noisy capitals.</p> + +<p>Her aunt was dead. Mrs. Crawley ordered the most +intense mourning for herself and little Rawdon. The +Colonel was busy arranging the affairs of the inheritance. + They could take the premier now, instead of the little +entresol of the hotel which they occupied. Mrs. Crawley +and the landlord had a consultation about the new +hangings, an amicable wrangle about the carpets, and +a final adjustment of everything except the bill. + She went off in one of his carriages; her French +bonne with her; the child by her side; the admirable +landlord and landlady smiling farewell to her from +the gate. General Tufto was furious when he heard +she was gone, and Mrs. Brent furious with him for +being furious; Lieutenant Spooney was cut to the heart; +and the landlord got ready his best apartments previous +to the return of the fascinating little woman and her +husband. He <i>serréd</i> the trunks which she left in his +charge with the greatest care. They had been especially +recommended to him by Madame Crawley. They were not, +however, found to be particularly valuable when opened +some time after.</p> + +<p>But before she went to join her husband in the Belgic +capital, Mrs. Crawley made an expedition into England, +leaving behind her her little son upon the continent, +under the care of her French maid.</p> + +<p>The parting between Rebecca and the little Rawdon +did not cause either party much pain. She had not, +to say truth, seen much of the young gentleman since +his birth. After the amiable fashion of French mothers, +she had placed him out at nurse in a village in the +neighbourhood of Paris, where little Rawdon passed +the first months of his life, not unhappily, with +a numerous family of foster-brothers in wooden shoes. + His father would ride over many a time to see him +here, and the elder Rawdon’s paternal heart glowed +to see him rosy and dirty, shouting lustily, and happy +in the making of mud-pies under the superintendence +of the gardener’s wife, his nurse.</p> + +<p>Rebecca did not care much to go and see the son and +heir. Once he spoiled a new dove-coloured pelisse +of hers. He preferred his nurse’s caresses +to his mamma’s, and when finally he quitted that +jolly nurse and almost parent, he cried loudly for +hours. He was only consoled by his mother’s +promise that he should return to his nurse the next +day; indeed the nurse herself, who probably would +have been pained at the parting too, was told that +the child would immediately be restored to her, and +for some time awaited quite anxiously his return.</p> + +<p>In fact, our friends may be said to have been among +the first of that brood of hardy English adventurers +who have subsequently invaded the Continent and swindled +in all the capitals of Europe. The respect in those +happy days of 1817-18 was very great for the wealth +and honour of Britons. They had not then learned, +as I am told, to haggle for bargains with the pertinacity +which now distinguishes them. The great cities of +Europe had not been as yet open to the enterprise +of our rascals. And whereas there is now hardly a +town of France or Italy in which you shall not see +some noble countryman of our own, with that happy +swagger and insolence of demeanour which we carry +everywhere, swindling inn-landlords, passing fictitious +cheques upon credulous bankers, robbing coach-makers +of their carriages, goldsmiths of their trinkets, easy +travellers of their money at cards, even public libraries +of their books--thirty years ago you needed but to +be a Milor Anglais, travelling in a private carriage, +and credit was at your hand wherever you chose to +seek it, and gentlemen, instead of cheating, were +cheated. It was not for some weeks after the Crawleys’ +departure that the landlord of the hotel which they +occupied during their residence at Paris found out +the losses which he had sustained: not until Madame +Marabou, the milliner, made repeated visits with her +little bill for articles supplied to Madame Crawley; +not until Monsieur Didelot from Boule d’Or in +the Palais Royal had asked half a dozen times whether +cette charmante Miladi who had bought watches and +bracelets of him was de retour. It is a fact that +even the poor gardener’s wife, who had nursed +madame’s child, was never paid after the first +six months for that supply of the milk of human kindness +with which she had furnished the lusty and healthy +little Rawdon. No, not even the nurse was paid--the +Crawleys were in too great a hurry to remember their +trifling debt to her. As for the landlord of the +hotel, his curses against the English nation were +violent for the rest of his natural life. He asked +all travellers whether they knew a certain Colonel +Lor Crawley--avec sa femme une petite dame, tres spirituelle. + “Ah, Monsieur!” he would add--"ils m’ont +affreusement vole.” It was melancholy to hear +his accents as he spoke of that catastrophe.</p> + +<p>Rebecca’s object in her journey to London was +to effect a kind of compromise with her husband’s +numerous creditors, and by offering them a dividend +of ninepence or a shilling in the pound, to secure +a return for him into his own country. It does not +become us to trace the steps which she took in the +conduct of this most difficult negotiation; but, having +shown them to their satisfaction that the sum which +she was empowered to offer was all her husband’s +available capital, and having convinced them that +Colonel Crawley would prefer a perpetual retirement +on the Continent to a residence in this country with +his debts unsettled; having proved to them that there +was no possibility of money accruing to him from other +quarters, and no earthly chance of their getting a +larger dividend than that which she was empowered +to offer, she brought the Colonel’s creditors +unanimously to accept her proposals, and purchased +with fifteen hundred pounds of ready money more than +ten times that amount of debts.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crawley employed no lawyer in the transaction. +The matter was so simple, to have or to leave, as +she justly observed, that she made the lawyers of +the creditors themselves do the business. And Mr. +Lewis representing Mr. Davids, of Red Lion Square, +and Mr. Moss acting for Mr. Manasseh of Cursitor Street +(chief creditors of the Colonel’s), complimented +his lady upon the brilliant way in which she did business, +and declared that there was no professional man who +could beat her.</p> + +<p>Rebecca received their congratulations with perfect +modesty; ordered a bottle of sherry and a bread cake +to the little dingy lodgings where she dwelt, while +conducting the business, to treat the enemy’s +lawyers: shook hands with them at parting, in excellent +good humour, and returned straightway to the Continent, +to rejoin her husband and son and acquaint the former +with the glad news of his entire liberation. As for +the latter, he had been considerably neglected during +his mother’s absence by Mademoiselle Genevieve, +her French maid; for that young woman, contracting +an attachment for a soldier in the garrison of Calais, +forgot her charge in the society of this militaire, +and little Rawdon very narrowly escaped drowning on +Calais sands at this period, where the absent Genevieve +had left and lost him.</p> + +<p>And so, Colonel and Mrs. Crawley came to London: and +it is at their house in Curzon Street, May Fair, that +they really showed the skill which must be possessed +by those who would live on the resources above named.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXVII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">The Subject Continued</h4> + +<p>In the first place, and as a matter of the greatest +necessity, we are bound to describe how a house may +be got for nothing a year. These mansions are to be +had either unfurnished, where, if you have credit +with Messrs. Gillows or Bantings, you can get them +splendidly montees and decorated entirely according +to your own fancy; or they are to be let furnished, +a less troublesome and complicated arrangement to +most parties. It was so that Crawley and his wife +preferred to hire their house.</p> + +<p>Before Mr. Bowls came to preside over Miss Crawley’s +house and cellar in Park Lane, that lady had had for +a butler a Mr. Raggles, who was born on the family +estate of Queen’s Crawley, and indeed was a +younger son of a gardener there. By good conduct, +a handsome person and calves, and a grave demeanour, +Raggles rose from the knife-board to the footboard +of the carriage; from the footboard to the butler’s +pantry. When he had been a certain number of years +at the head of Miss Crawley’s establishment, +where he had had good wages, fat perquisites, and +plenty of opportunities of saving, he announced that +he was about to contract a matrimonial alliance with +a late cook of Miss Crawley’s, who had subsisted +in an honourable manner by the exercise of a mangle, +and the keeping of a small greengrocer’s shop +in the neighbourhood. The truth is, that the ceremony +had been clandestinely performed some years back; although +the news of Mr. Raggles’ marriage was first brought +to Miss Crawley by a little boy and girl of seven +and eight years of age, whose continual presence in +the kitchen had attracted the attention of Miss Briggs.</p> + +<p>Mr. Raggles then retired and personally undertook +the superintendence of the small shop and the greens. + He added milk and cream, eggs and country-fed pork +to his stores, contenting himself whilst other retired +butlers were vending spirits in public houses, by +dealing in the simplest country produce. And having +a good connection amongst the butlers in the neighbourhood, +and a snug back parlour where he and Mrs. Raggles +received them, his milk, cream, and eggs got to be +adopted by many of the fraternity, and his profits +increased every year. Year after year he quietly and +modestly amassed money, and when at length that snug +and complete bachelor’s residence at No. 201, +Curzon Street, May Fair, lately the residence of the +Honourable Frederick Deuceace, gone abroad, with its +rich and appropriate furniture by the first makers, +was brought to the hammer, who should go in and purchase +the lease and furniture of the house but Charles Raggles? +A part of the money he borrowed, it is true, and at +rather a high interest, from a brother butler, but +the chief part he paid down, and it was with no small +pride that Mrs. Raggles found herself sleeping in +a bed of carved mahogany, with silk curtains, with +a prodigious cheval glass opposite to her, and a wardrobe +which would contain her, and Raggles, and all the +family.</p> + +<p>Of course, they did not intend to occupy permanently +an apartment so splendid. It was in order to let +the house again that Raggles purchased it. As soon +as a tenant was found, he subsided into the greengrocer’s +shop once more; but a happy thing it was for him to +walk out of that tenement and into Curzon Street, and +there survey his house--his own house--with geraniums +in the window and a carved bronze knocker. The footman +occasionally lounging at the area railing, treated +him with respect; the cook took her green stuff at +his house and called him Mr. Landlord, and there was +not one thing the tenants did, or one dish which they +had for dinner, that Raggles might not know of, if +he liked.</p> + +<p>He was a good man; good and happy. The house brought +him in so handsome a yearly income that he was determined +to send his children to good schools, and accordingly, +regardless of expense, Charles was sent to boarding +at Dr. Swishtail’s, Sugar-cane Lodge, and little +Matilda to Miss Peckover’s, Laurentinum House, +Clapham.</p> + +<p>Raggles loved and adored the Crawley family as the +author of all his prosperity in life. He had a silhouette +of his mistress in his back shop, and a drawing of +the Porter’s Lodge at Queen’s Crawley, +done by that spinster herself in India ink--and the +only addition he made to the decorations of the Curzon +Street House was a print of Queen’s Crawley +in Hampshire, the seat of Sir Walpole Crawley, Baronet, +who was represented in a gilded car drawn by six white +horses, and passing by a lake covered with swans, +and barges containing ladies in hoops, and musicians +with flags and penwigs. Indeed Raggles thought there +was no such palace in all the world, and no such august +family.</p> + +<p>As luck would have it, Raggles’ house in Curzon +Street was to let when Rawdon and his wife returned +to London. The Colonel knew it and its owner quite +well; the latter’s connection with the Crawley +family had been kept up constantly, for Raggles helped +Mr. Bowls whenever Miss Crawley received friends. + And the old man not only let his house to the Colonel +but officiated as his butler whenever he had company; +Mrs. Raggles operating in the kitchen below and sending +up dinners of which old Miss Crawley herself might +have approved. This was the way, then, Crawley got +his house for nothing; for though Raggles had to pay +taxes and rates, and the interest of the mortgage +to the brother butler; and the insurance of his life; +and the charges for his children at school; and the +value of the meat and drink which his own family--and +for a time that of Colonel Crawley too--consumed; +and though the poor wretch was utterly ruined by the +transaction, his children being flung on the streets, +and himself driven into the Fleet Prison: yet somebody +must pay even for gentlemen who live for nothing a +year--and so it was this unlucky Raggles was made +the representative of Colonel Crawley’s defective +capital.</p> + +<p>I wonder how many families are driven to roguery and +to ruin by great practitioners in Crawlers way?--how +many great noblemen rob their petty tradesmen, condescend +to swindle their poor retainers out of wretched little +sums and cheat for a few shillings? When we read that +a noble nobleman has left for the Continent, or that +another noble nobleman has an execution in his house--and +that one or other owes six or seven millions, the +defeat seems glorious even, and we respect the victim +in the vastness of his ruin. But who pities a poor +barber who can’t get his money for powdering +the footmen’s heads; or a poor carpenter who +has ruined himself by fixing up ornaments and pavilions +for my lady’s dejeuner; or the poor devil of +a tailor whom the steward patronizes, and who has +pledged all he is worth, and more, to get the liveries +ready, which my lord has done him the honour to bespeak? +When the great house tumbles down, these miserable +wretches fall under it unnoticed: as they say in +the old legends, before a man goes to the devil himself, +he sends plenty of other souls thither.</p> + +<p>Rawdon and his wife generously gave their patronage +to all such of Miss Crawley’s tradesmen and +purveyors as chose to serve them. Some were willing +enough, especially the poor ones. It was wonderful +to see the pertinacity with which the washerwoman +from Tooting brought the cart every Saturday, and +her bills week after week. Mr. Raggles himself had +to supply the greengroceries. The bill for servants’ +porter at the Fortune of War public house is a curiosity +in the chronicles of beer. Every servant also was +owed the greater part of his wages, and thus kept +up perforce an interest in the house. Nobody in fact +was paid. Not the blacksmith who opened the lock; +nor the glazier who mended the pane; nor the jobber +who let the carriage; nor the groom who drove it; +nor the butcher who provided the leg of mutton; nor +the coals which roasted it; nor the cook who basted +it; nor the servants who ate it: and this I am given +to understand is not unfrequently the way in which +people live elegantly on nothing a year.</p> + +<p>In a little town such things cannot be done without +remark. We know there the quantity of milk our neighbour +takes and espy the joint or the fowls which are going +in for his dinner. So, probably, 200 and 202 in Curzon +Street might know what was going on in the house between +them, the servants communicating through the area-railings; +but Crawley and his wife and his friends did not know +200 and 202. When you came to 201 there was a hearty +welcome, a kind smile, a good dinner, and a jolly +shake of the hand from the host and hostess there, +just for all the world as if they had been undisputed +masters of three or four thousand a year--and so they +were, not in money, but in produce and labour--if +they did not pay for the mutton, they had it: if +they did not give bullion in exchange for their wine, +how should we know? Never was better claret at any +man’s table than at honest Rawdon’s; dinners +more gay and neatly served. His drawing-rooms were +the prettiest, little, modest salons conceivable: +they were decorated with the greatest taste, and a +thousand knick-knacks from Paris, by Rebecca: and +when she sat at her piano trilling songs with a lightsome +heart, the stranger voted himself in a little paradise +of domestic comfort and agreed that, if the husband +was rather stupid, the wife was charming, and the dinners +the pleasantest in the world.</p> + +<p>Rebecca’s wit, cleverness, and flippancy made +her speedily the vogue in London among a certain class. + You saw demure chariots at her door, out of which +stepped very great people. You beheld her carriage +in the park, surrounded by dandies of note. The little +box in the third tier of the opera was crowded with +heads constantly changing; but it must be confessed +that the ladies held aloof from her, and that their +doors were shut to our little adventurer.</p> + +<p>With regard to the world of female fashion and its +customs, the present writer of course can only speak +at second hand. A man can no more penetrate or under-stand +those mysteries than he can know what the ladies talk +about when they go upstairs after dinner. It is only +by inquiry and perseverance that one sometimes gets +hints of those secrets; and by a similar diligence +every person who treads the Pall Mall pavement and +frequents the clubs of this metropolis knows, either +through his own experience or through some acquaintance +with whom he plays at billiards or shares the joint, +something about the genteel world of London, and how, +as there are men (such as Rawdon Crawley, whose position +we mentioned before) who cut a good figure to the +eyes of the ignorant world and to the apprentices +in the park, who behold them consorting with the most +notorious dandies there, so there are ladies, who may +be called men’s women, being welcomed entirely +by all the gentlemen and cut or slighted by all their +wives. Mrs. Firebrace is of this sort; the lady with +the beautiful fair ringlets whom you see every day +in Hyde Park, surrounded by the greatest and most +famous dandies of this empire. Mrs. Rockwood is another, +whose parties are announced laboriously in the fashionable +newspapers and with whom you see that all sorts of +ambassadors and great noblemen dine; and many more +might be mentioned had they to do with the history +at present in hand. But while simple folks who are +out of the world, or country people with a taste for +the genteel, behold these ladies in their seeming +glory in public places, or envy them from afar off, +persons who are better instructed could inform them +that these envied ladies have no more chance of establishing +themselves in “society,” than the benighted +squire’s wife in Somersetshire who reads of their +doings in the Morning Post. Men living about London +are aware of these awful truths. You hear how pitilessly +many ladies of seeming rank and wealth are excluded +from this “society.” The frantic efforts +which they make to enter this circle, the meannesses +to which they submit, the insults which they undergo, +are matters of wonder to those who take human or womankind +for a study; and the pursuit of fashion under difficulties +would be a fine theme for any very great person who +had the wit, the leisure, and the knowledge of the +English language necessary for the compiling of such +a history.</p> + +<p>Now the few female acquaintances whom Mrs. Crawley +had known abroad not only declined to visit her when +she came to this side of the Channel, but cut her +severely when they met in public places. It was curious +to see how the great ladies forgot her, and no doubt +not altogether a pleasant study to Rebecca. When +Lady Bareacres met her in the waiting-room at the +opera, she gathered her daughters about her as if +they would be contaminated by a touch of Becky, and +retreating a step or two, placed herself in front of +them, and stared at her little enemy. To stare Becky +out of countenance required a severer glance than +even the frigid old Bareacres could shoot out of her +dismal eyes. When Lady de la Mole, who had ridden +a score of times by Becky’s side at Brussels, +met Mrs. Crawley’s open carriage in Hyde Park, +her Ladyship was quite blind, and could not in the +least recognize her former friend. Even Mrs. Blenkinsop, +the banker’s wife, cut her at church. Becky +went regularly to church now; it was edifying to see +her enter there with Rawdon by her side, carrying +a couple of large gilt prayer-books, and afterwards +going through the ceremony with the gravest resignation.</p> + +<p>Rawdon at first felt very acutely the slights which +were passed upon his wife, and was inclined to be +gloomy and savage. He talked of calling out the husbands +or brothers of every one of the insolent women who +did not pay a proper respect to his wife; and it was +only by the strongest commands and entreaties on her +part that he was brought into keeping a decent behaviour. + “You can’t shoot me into society,” +she said good-naturedly. “Remember, my dear, +that I was but a governess, and you, you poor silly +old man, have the worst reputation for debt, and dice, +and all sorts of wickedness. We shall get quite as +many friends as we want by and by, and in the meanwhile +you must be a good boy and obey your schoolmistress +in everything she tells you to do. When we heard +that your aunt had left almost everything to Pitt +and his wife, do you remember what a rage you were +in? You would have told all Paris, if I had not made +you keep your temper, and where would you have been +now?--in prison at <i>Ste</i>. Pelagie for debt, and +not established in London in a handsome house, with +every comfort about you--you were in such a fury you +were ready to murder your brother, you wicked Cain +you, and what good would have come of remaining angry? +All the rage in the world won’t get us your +aunt’s money; and it is much better that we +should be friends with your brother’s family +than enemies, as those foolish Butes are. When your +father dies, Queen’s Crawley will be a pleasant +house for you and me to pass the winter in. If we +are ruined, you can carve and take charge of the stable, +and I can be a governess to Lady Jane’s children. + Ruined! fiddlede-dee! I will get you a good place +before that; or Pitt and his little boy will die, +and we will be Sir Rawdon and my lady. While there +is life, there is hope, my dear, and I intend to make +a man of you yet. Who sold your horses for you? Who +paid your debts for you?” Rawdon was obliged +to confess that he owed all these benefits to his wife, +and to trust himself to her guidance for the future.</p> + +<p>Indeed, when Miss Crawley quitted the world, and that +money for which all her relatives had been fighting +so eagerly was finally left to Pitt, Bute Crawley, +who found that only five thousand pounds had been +left to him instead of the twenty upon which he calculated, +was in such a fury at his disappointment that he vented +it in savage abuse upon his nephew; and the quarrel +always rankling between them ended in an utter breach +of intercourse. Rawdon Crawley’s conduct, on +the other hand, who got but a hundred pounds, was such +as to astonish his brother and delight his sister-in-law, +who was disposed to look kindly upon all the members +of her husband’s family. He wrote to his brother +a very frank, manly, good-humoured letter from Paris. + He was aware, he said, that by his own marriage he +had forfeited his aunt’s favour; and though +he did not disguise his disappointment that she should +have been so entirely relentless towards him, he was +glad that the money was still kept in their branch +of the family, and heartily congratulated his brother +on his good fortune. He sent his affectionate remembrances +to his sister, and hoped to have her good-will for +Mrs. Rawdon; and the letter concluded with a postscript +to Pitt in the latter lady’s own handwriting. + She, too, begged to join in her husband’s congratulations. + She should ever remember Mr. Crawley’s kindness +to her in early days when she was a friendless orphan, +the instructress of his little sisters, in whose welfare +she still took the tenderest interest. She wished +him every happiness in his married life, and, asking +his permission to offer her remembrances to Lady Jane +(of whose goodness all the world informed her), she +hoped that one day she might be allowed to present +her little boy to his uncle and aunt, and begged to +bespeak for him their good-will and protection.</p> + +<p>Pitt Crawley received this communication very graciously--more +graciously than Miss Crawley had received some of Rebecca’s +previous compositions in Rawdon’s handwriting; +and as for Lady Jane, she was so charmed with the +letter that she expected her husband would instantly +divide his aunt’s legacy into two equal portions +and send off one-half to his brother at Paris.</p> + +<p>To her Ladyship’s surprise, however, Pitt declined +to accommodate his brother with a cheque for thirty +thousand pounds. But he made Rawdon a handsome offer +of his hand whenever the latter should come to England +and choose to take it; and, thanking Mrs. Crawley for +her good opinion of himself and Lady Jane, he graciously +pronounced his willingness to take any opportunity +to serve her little boy.</p> + +<p>Thus an almost reconciliation was brought about between +the brothers. When Rebecca came to town Pitt and +his wife were not in London. Many a time she drove +by the old door in Park Lane to see whether they had +taken possession of Miss Crawley’s house there. +But the new family did not make its appearance; it +was only through Raggles that she heard of their movements--how +Miss Crawley’s domestics had been dismissed +with decent gratuities, and how Mr. Pitt had only +once made his appearance in London, when he stopped +for a few days at the house, did business with his +lawyers there, and sold off all Miss Crawley’s +French novels to a bookseller out of Bond Street. + Becky had reasons of her own which caused her to long +for the arrival of her new relation. “When Lady +Jane comes,” thought she, “she shall be +my sponsor in London society; and as for the women! +bah! the women will ask me when they find the men want +to see me.”</p> + +<p>An article as necessary to a lady in this position +as her brougham or her bouquet is her companion. +I have always admired the way in which the tender +creatures, who cannot exist without sympathy, hire +an exceedingly plain friend of their own sex from whom +they are almost inseparable. The sight of that inevitable +woman in her faded gown seated behind her dear friend +in the opera-box, or occupying the back seat of the +barouche, is always a wholesome and moral one to me, +as jolly a reminder as that of the Death’s-head +which figured in the repasts of Egyptian bon-vivants, +a strange sardonic memorial of Vanity Fair. What? +even battered, brazen, beautiful, conscienceless, +heartless, Mrs. Firebrace, whose father died of her +shame: even lovely, daring Mrs. Mantrap, who will +ride at any fence which any man in England will take, +and who drives her greys in the park, while her mother +keeps a huckster’s stall in Bath still--even +those who are so bold, one might fancy they could face +anything dare not face the world without a female +friend. They must have somebody to cling to, the +affectionate creatures! And you will hardly see them +in any public place without a shabby companion in a +dyed silk, sitting somewhere in the shade close behind +them.</p> + +<p>“Rawdon,” said Becky, very late one night, +as a party of gentlemen were seated round her crackling +drawing-room fire (for the men came to her house to +finish the night; and she had ice and coffee for them, +the best in London): “I must have a sheep-dog.”</p> + +<p>“A what?” said Rawdon, looking up from +an ecarte table.</p> + +<p>“A sheep-dog!” said young Lord Southdown. + “My dear Mrs. Crawley, what a fancy! Why not +have a Danish dog? I know of one as big as a camel-leopard, +by Jove. It would almost pull your brougham. Or a +Persian greyhound, eh? (I propose, if you please); +or a little pug that would go into one of Lord Steyne’s +snuff-boxes? There’s a man at Bayswater got +one with such a nose that you might--I mark the king +and play--that you might hang your hat on it.”</p> + +<p>“I mark the trick,” Rawdon gravely said. + He attended to his game commonly and didn’t +much meddle with the conversation, except when it +was about horses and betting.</p> + +<p>“What <i>can</i> you want with a shepherd’s +dog?” the lively little Southdown continued.</p> + +<p>“I mean a <i>moral</i> shepherd’s dog,” +said Becky, laughing and looking up at Lord Steyne.</p> + +<p>“What the devil’s that?” said his +Lordship.</p> + +<p>“A dog to keep the wolves off me,” Rebecca +continued. “A companion.”</p> + +<p>“Dear little innocent lamb, you want one,” +said the marquis; and his jaw thrust out, and he began +to grin hideously, his little eyes leering towards +Rebecca.</p> + +<p>The great Lord of Steyne was standing by the fire +sipping coffee. The fire crackled and blazed pleasantly +There was a score of candles sparkling round the mantel +piece, in all sorts of quaint sconces, of gilt and +bronze and porcelain. They lighted up Rebecca’s +figure to admiration, as she sat on a sofa covered +with a pattern of gaudy flowers. She was in a pink +dress that looked as fresh as a rose; her dazzling +white arms and shoulders were half-covered with a thin +hazy scarf through which they sparkled; her hair hung +in curls round her neck; one of her little feet peeped +out from the fresh crisp folds of the silk: the prettiest +little foot in the prettiest little sandal in the +finest silk stocking in the world.</p> + +<p>The candles lighted up Lord Steyne’s shining +bald head, which was fringed with red hair. He had +thick bushy eyebrows, with little twinkling bloodshot +eyes, surrounded by a thousand wrinkles. His jaw +was underhung, and when he laughed, two white buck-teeth +protruded themselves and glistened savagely in the +midst of the grin. He had been dining with royal personages, +and wore his garter and ribbon. A short man was his +Lordship, broad-chested and bow-legged, but proud +of the fineness of his foot and ankle, and always +caressing his garter-knee.</p> + +<p>“And so the shepherd is not enough,” said +he, “to defend his lambkin?”</p> + +<p>“The shepherd is too fond of playing at cards +and going to his clubs,” answered Becky, laughing.</p> + +<p>“’Gad, what a debauched Corydon!” +said my lord--"what a mouth for a pipe!”</p> + +<p>“I take your three to two,” here said +Rawdon, at the card-table.</p> + +<p>“Hark at Meliboeus,” snarled the noble +marquis; “he’s pastorally occupied too: + he’s shearing a Southdown. What an innocent +mutton, hey? Damme, what a snowy fleece!”</p> + +<p>Rebecca’s eyes shot out gleams of scornful humour. +“My lord,” she said, “you are a +knight of the Order.” He had the collar round +his neck, indeed--a gift of the restored princes of +Spain.</p> + +<p>Lord Steyne in early life had been notorious for his +daring and his success at play. He had sat up two +days and two nights with Mr. Fox at hazard. He had +won money of the most august personages of the realm: + he had won his marquisate, it was said, at the gaming-table; +but he did not like an allusion to those bygone fredaines. + Rebecca saw the scowl gathering over his heavy brow.</p> + +<p>She rose up from her sofa and went and took his coffee +cup out of his hand with a little curtsey. “Yes,” +she said, “I must get a watchdog. But he won’t +bark at <i>you</i>. And, going into the other drawing-room, +she sat down to the piano and began to sing little +French songs in such a charming, thrilling voice that +the mollified nobleman speedily followed her into +that chamber, and might be seen nodding his head and +bowing time over her.</p> + +<p>Rawdon and his friend meanwhile played ecarte until +they had enough. The Colonel won; but, say that he +won ever so much and often, nights like these, which +occurred many times in the week--his wife having all +the talk and all the admiration, and he sitting silent +without the circle, not comprehending a word of the +jokes, the allusions, the mystical language within--must +have been rather wearisome to the ex-dragoon.</p> + +<p>“How is Mrs. Crawley’s husband?” +Lord Steyne used to say to him by way of a good day +when they met; and indeed that was now his avocation +in life. He was Colonel Crawley no more. He was Mrs. +Crawley’s husband.</p> + +<p>About the little Rawdon, if nothing has been said +all this while, it is because he is hidden upstairs +in a garret somewhere, or has crawled below into the +kitchen for companionship. His mother scarcely ever +took notice of him. He passed the days with his French +bonne as long as that domestic remained in Mr. Crawley’s +family, and when the Frenchwoman went away, the little +fellow, howling in the loneliness of the night, had +compassion taken on him by a housemaid, who took him +out of his solitary nursery into her bed in the garret +hard by and comforted him.</p> + +<p>Rebecca, my Lord Steyne, and one or two more were +in the drawing-room taking tea after the opera, when +this shouting was heard overhead. “It’s +my cherub crying for his nurse,” she said. She +did not offer to move to go and see the child. “Don’t +agitate your feelings by going to look for him,” +said Lord Steyne sardonically. “Bah!” +replied the other, with a sort of blush, “he’ll +cry himself to sleep”; and they fell to talking +about the opera.</p> + +<p>Rawdon had stolen off though, to look after his son +and heir; and came back to the company when he found +that honest Dolly was consoling the child. The Colonel’s +dressing-room was in those upper regions. He used +to see the boy there in private. They had interviews +together every morning when he shaved; Rawdon minor +sitting on a box by his father’s side and watching +the operation with never-ceasing pleasure. He and +the sire were great friends. The father would bring +him sweetmeats from the dessert and hide them in a +certain old epaulet box, where the child went to seek +them, and laughed with joy on discovering the treasure; +laughed, but not too loud: for mamma was below asleep +and must not be disturbed. She did not go to rest +till very late and seldom rose till after noon.</p> + +<p>Rawdon bought the boy plenty of picture-books and +crammed his nursery with toys. Its walls were covered +with pictures pasted up by the father’s own +hand and purchased by him for ready money. When he +was off duty with Mrs. Rawdon in the park, he would +sit up here, passing hours with the boy; who rode +on his chest, who pulled his great mustachios as if +they were driving-reins, and spent days with him in +indefatigable gambols. The room was a low room, and +once, when the child was not five years old, his father, +who was tossing him wildly up in his arms, hit the +poor little chap’s skull so violently against +the ceiling that he almost dropped the child, so terrified +was he at the disaster.</p> + +<p>Rawdon minor had made up his face for a tremendous +howl--the severity of the blow indeed authorized that +indulgence; but just as he was going to begin, the +father interposed.</p> + +<p>“For God’s sake, Rawdy, don’t wake +Mamma,” he cried. And the child, looking in +a very hard and piteous way at his father, bit his +lips, clenched his hands, and didn’t cry a bit. + Rawdon told that story at the clubs, at the mess, +to everybody in town. “By Gad, sir,” he +explained to the public in general, “what a good +plucked one that boy of mine is--what a trump he is! + I half-sent his head through the ceiling, by Gad, +and he wouldn’t cry for fear of disturbing his +mother.”</p> + +<p>Sometimes--once or twice in a week--that lady visited +the upper regions in which the child lived. She came +like a vivified figure out of the Magasin des Modes--blandly +smiling in the most beautiful new clothes and little +gloves and boots. Wonderful scarfs, laces, and jewels +glittered about her. She had always a new bonnet on, +and flowers bloomed perpetually in it, or else magnificent +curling ostrich feathers, soft and snowy as camellias. + She nodded twice or thrice patronizingly to the little +boy, who looked up from his dinner or from the pictures +of soldiers he was painting. When she left the room, +an odour of rose, or some other magical fragrance, +lingered about the nursery. She was an unearthly being +in his eyes, superior to his father--to all the world: + to be worshipped and admired at a distance. To drive +with that lady in the carriage was an awful rite: + he sat up in the back seat and did not dare to speak: + he gazed with all his eyes at the beautifully dressed +Princess opposite to him. Gentlemen on splendid prancing +horses came up and smiled and talked with her. How +her eyes beamed upon all of them! Her hand used to +quiver and wave gracefully as they passed. When he +went out with her he had his new red dress on. His +old brown holland was good enough when he stayed at +home. Sometimes, when she was away, and Dolly his +maid was making his bed, he came into his mother’s +room. It was as the abode of a fairy to him--a mystic +chamber of splendour and delights. There in the wardrobe +hung those wonderful robes--pink and blue and many-tinted. + There was the jewel-case, silver-clasped, and the +wondrous bronze hand on the dressing-table, glistening +all over with a hundred rings. There was the cheval-glass, +that miracle of art, in which he could just see his +own wondering head and the reflection of Dolly (queerly +distorted, and as if up in the ceiling), plumping and +patting the pillows of the bed. Oh, thou poor lonely +little benighted boy! Mother is the name for God in +the lips and hearts of little children; and here was +one who was worshipping a stone!</p> + +<p>Now Rawdon Crawley, rascal as the Colonel was, had +certain manly tendencies of affection in his heart +and could love a child and a woman still. For Rawdon +minor he had a great secret tenderness then, which +did not escape Rebecca, though she did not talk about +it to her husband. It did not annoy her: she was +too good-natured. It only increased her scorn for +him. He felt somehow ashamed of this paternal softness +and hid it from his wife--only indulging in it when +alone with the boy.</p> + +<p>He used to take him out of mornings when they would +go to the stables together and to the park. Little +Lord Southdown, the best-natured of men, who would +make you a present of the hat from his head, and whose +main occupation in life was to buy knick-knacks that +he might give them away afterwards, bought the little +chap a pony not much bigger than a large rat, the +donor said, and on this little black Shetland pygmy +young Rawdon’s great father was pleased to mount +the boy, and to walk by his side in the park. It pleased +him to see his old quarters, and his old fellow-guardsmen +at Knightsbridge: he had begun to think of his bachelorhood +with something like regret. The old troopers were +glad to recognize their ancient officer and dandle +the little colonel. Colonel Crawley found dining at +mess and with his brother-officers very pleasant. +“Hang it, I ain’t clever enough for her--I +know it. She won’t miss me,” he used +to say: and he was right, his wife did not miss him.</p> + +<p>Rebecca was fond of her husband. She was always perfectly +good-humoured and kind to him. She did not even +show her scorn much for him; perhaps she liked him +the better for being a fool. He was her upper servant +and maitre d’hotel. He went on her errands; +obeyed her orders without question; drove in the carriage +in the ring with her without repining; took her to +the opera-box, solaced himself at his club during +the performance, and came punctually back to fetch +her when due. He would have liked her to be a little +fonder of the boy, but even to that he reconciled +himself. “Hang it, you know she’s so +clever,” he said, “and I’m not literary +and that, you know.” For, as we have said before, +it requires no great wisdom to be able to win at cards +and billiards, and Rawdon made no pretensions to any +other sort of skill.</p> + +<p>When the companion came, his domestic duties became +very light. His wife encouraged him to dine abroad: + she would let him off duty at the opera. “Don’t +stay and stupefy yourself at home to-night, my dear,” +she would say. “Some men are coming who will +only bore you. I would not ask them, but you know +it’s for your good, and now I have a sheep-dog, +I need not be afraid to be alone.”</p> + +<p>“A sheep-dog--a companion! Becky Sharp with +a companion! Isn’t it good fun?” thought +Mrs. Crawley to herself. The notion tickled hugely +her sense of humour.</p> + +<p>One Sunday morning, as Rawdon Crawley, his little +son, and the pony were taking their accustomed walk +in the park, they passed by an old acquaintance of +the Colonel’s, Corporal Clink, of the regiment, +who was in conversation with a friend, an old gentleman, +who held a boy in his arms about the age of little +Rawdon. This other youngster had seized hold of the +Waterloo medal which the Corporal wore, and was examining +it with delight.</p> + +<p>“Good morning, your Honour,” said Clink, +in reply to the “How do, Clink?” of the +Colonel. “This ere young gentleman is about +the little Colonel’s age, sir,” continued +the corporal.</p> + +<p>“His father was a Waterloo man, too,” +said the old gentleman, who carried the boy. “Wasn’t +he, Georgy?”</p> + +<p>“Yes,” said Georgy. He and the little +chap on the pony were looking at each other with all +their might--solemnly scanning each other as children +do.</p> + +<p>“In a line regiment,” Clink said with +a patronizing air.</p> + +<p>“He was a Captain in the --th regiment,” +said the old gentleman rather pompously. “Captain +George Osborne, sir--perhaps you knew him. He died +the death of a hero, sir, fighting against the Corsican +tyrant.” Colonel Crawley blushed quite red. +“I knew him very well, sir,” he said, +“and his wife, his dear little wife, sir-- how +is she?”</p> + +<p>“She is my daughter, sir,” said the old +gentleman, putting down the boy and taking out a card +with great solemnity, which he handed to the Colonel. + On it written--</p> + +<p>“Mr. Sedley, Sole Agent for the Black Diamond +and Anti-Cinder Coal Association, Bunker’s Wharf, +Thames Street, and Anna-Maria Cottages, Fulham Road +West.”</p> + +<p>Little Georgy went up and looked at the Shetland pony.</p> + +<p>“Should you like to have a ride?” said +Rawdon minor from the saddle.</p> + +<p>“Yes,” said Georgy. The Colonel, who +had been looking at him with some interest, took up +the child and put him on the pony behind Rawdon minor.</p> + +<p>“Take hold of him, Georgy,” he said--"take +my little boy round the waist--his name is Rawdon.” +And both the children began to laugh.</p> + +<p>“You won’t see a prettier pair I think, +<i>this</i> summer’s day, sir,” said the +good-natured Corporal; and the Colonel, the Corporal, +and old Mr. Sedley with his umbrella, walked by the +side of the children.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXVIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Family in a Very Small Way</h4> + +<p>We must suppose little George Osborne has ridden from +Knightsbridge towards Fulham, and will stop and make +inquiries at that village regarding some friends whom +we have left there. How is Mrs. Amelia after the +storm of Waterloo? Is she living and thriving? What +has come of Major Dobbin, whose cab was always hankering +about her premises? And is there any news of the Collector +of Boggley Wollah? The facts concerning the latter +are briefly these:</p> + +<p>Our worthy fat friend Joseph Sedley returned to India +not long after his escape from Brussels. Either his +furlough was up, or he dreaded to meet any witnesses +of his Waterloo flight. However it might be, he went +back to his duties in Bengal very soon after Napoleon +had taken up his residence at St. Helena, where Jos +saw the ex-Emperor. To hear Mr. Sedley talk on board +ship you would have supposed that it was not the first +time he and the Corsican had met, and that the civilian +had bearded the French General at Mount St. John. + He had a thousand anecdotes about the famous battles; +he knew the position of every regiment and the loss +which each had incurred. He did not deny that he +had been concerned in those victories--that he had +been with the army and carried despatches for the +Duke of Wellington. And he described what the Duke +did and said on every conceivable moment of the day +of Waterloo, with such an accurate knowledge of his +Grace’s sentiments and proceedings that it was +clear he must have been by the conqueror’s side +throughout the day; though, as a non-combatant, his +name was not mentioned in the public documents relative +to the battle. Perhaps he actually worked himself +up to believe that he had been engaged with the army; +certain it is that he made a prodigious sensation +for some time at Calcutta, and was called Waterloo +Sedley during the whole of his subsequent stay in +Bengal.</p> + +<p>The bills which Jos had given for the purchase of +those unlucky horses were paid without question by +him and his agents. He never was heard to allude +to the bargain, and nobody knows for a certainty what +became of the horses, or how he got rid of them, or +of Isidor, his Belgian servant, who sold a grey horse, +very like the one which Jos rode, at Valenciennes +sometime during the autumn of 1815.</p> + +<p>Jos’s London agents had orders to pay one hundred +and twenty pounds yearly to his parents at Fulham. + It was the chief support of the old couple; for Mr. +Sedley’s speculations in life subsequent to his +bankruptcy did not by any means retrieve the broken +old gentleman’s fortune. He tried to be a wine-merchant, +a coal-merchant, a commission lottery agent, &c., +&c. He sent round prospectuses to his friends whenever +he took a new trade, and ordered a new brass plate +for the door, and talked pompously about making his +fortune still. But Fortune never came back to the +feeble and stricken old man. One by one his friends +dropped off, and were weary of buying dear coals and +bad wine from him; and there was only his wife in all +the world who fancied, when he tottered off to the +City of a morning, that he was still doing any business +there. At evening he crawled slowly back; and he +used to go of nights to a little club at a tavern, +where he disposed of the finances of the nation. It +was wonderful to hear him talk about millions, and +agios, and discounts, and what Rothschild was doing, +and Baring Brothers. He talked of such vast sums +that the gentlemen of the club (the apothecary, the +undertaker, the great carpenter and builder, the parish +clerk, who was allowed to come stealthily, and Mr. +Clapp, our old acquaintance,) respected the old gentleman. + “I was better off once, sir,” he did +not fail to tell everybody who “used the room.” +“My son, sir, is at this minute chief magistrate +of Ramgunge in the Presidency of Bengal, and touching +his four thousand rupees per mensem. My daughter +might be a Colonel’s lady if she liked. I might +draw upon my son, the first magistrate, sir, for two +thousand pounds to-morrow, and Alexander would cash +my bill, down sir, down on the counter, sir. But +the Sedleys were always a proud family.” You +and I, my dear reader, may drop into this condition +one day: for have not many of our friends attained +it? Our luck may fail: our powers forsake us: our +place on the boards be taken by better and younger +mimes--the chance of life roll away and leave us shattered +and stranded. Then men will walk across the road when +they meet you--or, worse still, hold you out a couple +of fingers and patronize you in a pitying way--then +you will know, as soon as your back is turned, that +your friend begins with a “Poor devil, what imprudences +he has committed, what chances that chap has thrown +away!” Well, well--a carriage and three thousand +a year is not the summit of the reward nor the end +of God’s judgment of men. If quacks prosper +as often as they go to the wall--if zanies succeed +and knaves arrive at fortune, and, vice versa, sharing +ill luck and prosperity for all the world like the +ablest and most honest amongst us--I say, brother, +the gifts and pleasures of Vanity Fair cannot be held +of any great account, and that it is probable . . + . but we are wandering out of the domain of the +story.</p> + +<p>Had Mrs. Sedley been a woman of energy, she would +have exerted it after her husband’s ruin and, +occupying a large house, would have taken in boarders. + The broken Sedley would have acted well as the boarding-house +landlady’s husband; the Munoz of private life; +the titular lord and master: the carver, house-steward, +and humble husband of the occupier of the dingy throne. + I have seen men of good brains and breeding, and +of good hopes and vigour once, who feasted squires +and kept hunters in their youth, meekly cutting up +legs of mutton for rancorous old harridans and pretending +to preside over their dreary tables--but Mrs. Sedley, +we say, had not spirit enough to bustle about for +“a few select inmates to join a cheerful musical +family,” such as one reads of in the Times. +She was content to lie on the shore where fortune +had stranded her--and you could see that the career +of this old couple was over.</p> + +<p>I don’t think they were unhappy. Perhaps they +were a little prouder in their downfall than in their +prosperity. Mrs. Sedley was always a great person +for her landlady, Mrs. Clapp, when she descended and +passed many hours with her in the basement or ornamented +kitchen. The Irish maid Betty Flanagan’s bonnets +and ribbons, her sauciness, her idleness, her reckless +prodigality of kitchen candles, her consumption of +tea and sugar, and so forth occupied and amused the +old lady almost as much as the doings of her former +household, when she had Sambo and the coachman, and +a groom, and a footboy, and a housekeeper with a regiment +of female domestics--her former household, about which +the good lady talked a hundred times a day. And besides +Betty Flanagan, Mrs. Sedley had all the maids-of-all-work +in the street to superintend. She knew how each tenant +of the cottages paid or owed his little rent. She +stepped aside when Mrs. Rougemont the actress passed +with her dubious family. She flung up her head when +Mrs. Pestler, the apothecary’s lady, drove by +in her husband’s professional one-horse chaise. + She had colloquies with the greengrocer about the +pennorth of turnips which Mr. Sedley loved; she kept +an eye upon the milkman and the baker’s boy; +and made visitations to the butcher, who sold hundreds +of oxen very likely with less ado than was made about +Mrs. Sedley’s loin of mutton: and she counted +the potatoes under the joint on Sundays, on which +days, dressed in her best, she went to church twice +and read Blair’s Sermons in the evening.</p> + +<p>On that day, for “business” prevented +him on weekdays from taking such a pleasure, it was +old Sedley’s delight to take out his little +grandson Georgy to the neighbouring parks or Kensington +Gardens, to see the soldiers or to feed the ducks. + Georgy loved the redcoats, and his grandpapa told +him how his father had been a famous soldier, and +introduced him to many sergeants and others with Waterloo +medals on their breasts, to whom the old grandfather +pompously presented the child as the son of Captain +Osborne of the --th, who died gloriously on the glorious +eighteenth. He has been known to treat some of these +non-commissioned gentlemen to a glass of porter, and, +indeed, in their first Sunday walks was disposed to +spoil little Georgy, sadly gorging the boy with apples +and parliament, to the detriment of his health--until +Amelia declared that George should never go out with +his grandpapa unless the latter promised solemnly, +and on his honour, not to give the child any cakes, +lollipops, or stall produce whatever.</p> + +<p>Between Mrs. Sedley and her daughter there was a sort +of coolness about this boy, and a secret jealousy--for +one evening in George’s very early days, Amelia, +who had been seated at work in their little parlour +scarcely remarking that the old lady had quitted the +room, ran upstairs instinctively to the nursery at +the cries of the child, who had been asleep until +that moment--and there found Mrs. Sedley in the act +of surreptitiously administering Daffy’s Elixir +to the infant. Amelia, the gentlest and sweetest +of everyday mortals, when she found this meddling +with her maternal authority, thrilled and trembled +all over with anger. Her cheeks, ordinarily pale, +now flushed up, until they were as red as they used +to be when she was a child of twelve years old. She +seized the baby out of her mother’s arms and +then grasped at the bottle, leaving the old lady gaping +at her, furious, and holding the guilty tea-spoon.</p> + +<p>Amelia flung the bottle crashing into the fire-place. +“I will <i>not</i> have baby poisoned, Mamma,” +cried Emmy, rocking the infant about violently with +both her arms round him and turning with flashing +eyes at her mother.</p> + +<p>“Poisoned, Amelia!” said the old lady; +“this language to me?”</p> + +<p>“He shall not have any medicine but that which +Mr. Pestler sends for hi n. He told me that Daffy’s +Elixir was poison.”</p> + +<p>“Very good: you think I’m a murderess +then,” replied Mrs. Sedley. “This is the +language you use to your mother. I have met with misfortunes: + I have sunk low in life: I have kept my carriage, +and now walk on foot: but I did not know I was a +murderess before, and thank you for the <i>news</i>.”</p> + +<p>“Mamma,” said the poor girl, who was always +ready for tears--"you shouldn’t be hard upon +me. I--I didn’t mean--I mean, I did not wish +to say you would to any wrong to this dear child, only--”</p> + +<p>“Oh, no, my love,--only that I was a murderess; +in which case I had better go to the Old Bailey. +Though I didn’t poison <i>you</i>, when you were +a child, but gave you the best of education and the +most expensive masters money could procure. Yes; +I’ve nursed five children and buried three; +and the one I loved the best of all, and tended through +croup, and teething, and measles, and hooping-cough, +and brought up with foreign masters, regardless of +expense, and with accomplishments at Minerva House--which +I never had when I was a girl--when I was too glad +to honour my father and mother, that I might live +long in the land, and to be useful, and not to mope +all day in my room and act the fine lady--says I’m +a murderess. Ah, Mrs. Osborne! may <i>you</i> never +nourish a viper in your bosom, that’s <i>my</i> +prayer.”</p> + +<p>“Mamma, Mamma!” cried the bewildered girl; +and the child in her arms set up a frantic chorus +of shouts. “A murderess, indeed! Go down on +your knees and pray to God to cleanse your wicked ungrateful +heart, Amelia, and may He forgive you as I do.” +And Mrs. Sedley tossed out of the room, hissing out +the word poison once more, and so ending her charitable +benediction.</p> + +<p>Till the termination of her natural life, this breach +between Mrs. Sedley and her daughter was never thoroughly +mended. The quarrel gave the elder lady numberless +advantages which she did not fail to turn to account +with female ingenuity and perseverance. For instance, +she scarcely spoke to Amelia for many weeks afterwards. +She warned the domestics not to touch the child, as +Mrs. Osborne might be offended. She asked her daughter +to see and satisfy herself that there was no poison +prepared in the little daily messes that were concocted +for Georgy. When neighbours asked after the boy’s +health, she referred them pointedly to Mrs. Osborne. + <i>She</i> never ventured to ask whether the baby was +well or not. <i>She</i> would not touch the child although +he was her grandson, and own precious darling, for +she was not <i>used</i> to children, and might kill it. + And whenever Mr. Pestler came upon his healing inquisition, +she received the doctor with such a sarcastic and +scornful demeanour, as made the surgeon declare that +not Lady Thistlewood herself, whom he had the honour +of attending professionally, could give herself greater +airs than old Mrs. Sedley, from whom he never took +a fee. And very likely Emmy was jealous too, upon +her own part, as what mother is not, of those who +would manage her children for her, or become candidates +for the first place in their affections. It is certain +that when anybody nursed the child, she was uneasy, +and that she would no more allow Mrs. Clapp or the +domestic to dress or tend him than she would have +let them wash her husband’s miniature which hung +up over her little bed--the same little bed from which +the poor girl had gone to his; and to which she retired +now for many long, silent, tearful, but happy years.</p> + +<p>In this room was all Amelia’s heart and treasure. + Here it was that she tended her boy and watched him +through the many ills of childhood, with a constant +passion of love. The elder George returned in him +somehow, only improved, and as if come back from heaven. + In a hundred little tones, looks, and movements, the +child was so like his father that the widow’s +heart thrilled as she held him to it; and he would +often ask the cause of her tears. It was because +of his likeness to his father, she did not scruple +to tell him. She talked constantly to him about this +dead father, and spoke of her love for George to the +innocent and wondering child; much more than she ever +had done to George himself, or to any confidante of +her youth. To her parents she never talked about this +matter, shrinking from baring her heart to them. +Little George very likely could understand no better +than they, but into his ears she poured her sentimental +secrets unreservedly, and into his only. The very +joy of this woman was a sort of grief, or so tender, +at least, that its expression was tears. Her sensibilities +were so weak and tremulous that perhaps they ought +not to be talked about in a book. I was told by Dr. +Pestler (now a most flourishing lady’s physician, +with a sumptuous dark green carriage, a prospect of +speedy knighthood, and a house in Manchester Square) +that her grief at weaning the child was a sight that +would have unmanned a Herod. He was very soft-hearted +many years ago, and his wife was mortally jealous +of Mrs. Amelia, then and long afterwards.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the doctor’s lady had good reason for +her jealousy: most women shared it, of those who +formed the small circle of Amelia’s acquaintance, +and were quite angry at the enthusiasm with which the +other sex regarded her. For almost all men who came +near her loved her; though no doubt they would be +at a loss to tell you why. She was not brilliant, +nor witty, nor wise over much, nor extraordinarily +handsome. But wherever she went she touched and charmed +every one of the male sex, as invariably as she awakened +the scorn and incredulity of her own sisterhood. +I think it was her weakness which was her principal +charm--a kind of sweet submission and softness, which +seemed to appeal to each man she met for his sympathy +and protection. We have seen how in the regiment, +though she spoke but to few of George’s comrades +there, all the swords of the young fellows at the +mess-table would have leapt from their scabbards to +fight round her; and so it was in the little narrow +lodging-house and circle at Fulham, she interested +and pleased everybody. If she had been Mrs. Mango +herself, of the great house of Mango, Plantain, and +Co., Crutched Friars, and the magnificent proprietress +of the Pineries, Fulham, who gave summer dejeuners +frequented by Dukes and Earls, and drove about the +parish with magnificent yellow liveries and bay horses, +such as the royal stables at Kensington themselves +could not turn out--I say had she been Mrs. Mango +herself, or her son’s wife, Lady Mary Mango +(daughter of the Earl of Castlemouldy, who condescended +to marry the head of the firm), the tradesmen of the +neighbourhood could not pay her more honour than they +invariably showed to the gentle young widow, when +she passed by their doors, or made her humble purchases +at their shops.</p> + +<p>Thus it was not only Mr. Pestler, the medical man, +but Mr. Linton the young assistant, who doctored the +servant maids and small tradesmen, and might be seen +any day reading the Times in the surgery, who openly +declared himself the slave of Mrs. Osborne. He was +a personable young gentleman, more welcome at Mrs. +Sedley’s lodgings than his principal; and if +anything went wrong with Georgy, he would drop in +twice or thrice in the day to see the little chap, +and without so much as the thought of a fee. He would +abstract lozenges, tamarinds, and other produce from +the surgery-drawers for little Georgy’s benefit, +and compounded draughts and mixtures for him of miraculous +sweetness, so that it was quite a pleasure to the +child to be ailing. He and Pestler, his chief, sat +up two whole nights by the boy in that momentous and +awful week when Georgy had the measles; and when you +would have thought, from the mother’s terror, +that there had never been measles in the world before. +Would they have done as much for other people? Did +they sit up for the folks at the Pineries, when Ralph +Plantagenet, and Gwendoline, and Guinever Mango had +the same juvenile complaint? Did they sit up for little +Mary Clapp, the landlord’s daughter, who actually +caught the disease of little Georgy? Truth compels +one to say, no. They slept quite undisturbed, at least +as far as she was concerned--pronounced hers to be +a slight case, which would almost cure itself, sent +her in a draught or two, and threw in bark when the +child rallied, with perfect indifference, and just +for form’s sake.</p> + +<p>Again, there was the little French chevalier opposite, +who gave lessons in his native tongue at various schools +in the neighbourhood, and who might be heard in his +apartment of nights playing tremulous old gavottes +and minuets on a wheezy old fiddle. Whenever this +powdered and courteous old man, who never missed a +Sunday at the convent chapel at Hammersmith, and who +was in all respects, thoughts, conduct, and bearing +utterly unlike the bearded savages of his nation, +who curse perfidious Albion, and scowl at you from +over their cigars, in the Quadrant arcades at the present +day-- whenever the old Chevalier de Talonrouge spoke +of Mistress Osborne, he would first finish his pinch +of snuff, flick away the remaining particles of dust +with a graceful wave of his hand, gather up his fingers +again into a bunch, and, bringing them up to his mouth, +blow them open with a kiss, exclaiming, Ah! la divine +creature! He vowed and protested that when Amelia +walked in the Brompton Lanes flowers grew in profusion +under her feet. He called little Georgy Cupid, and +asked him news of Venus, his mamma; and told the astonished +Betty Flanagan that she was one of the Graces, and +the favourite attendant of the Reine des Amours.</p> + +<p>Instances might be multiplied of this easily gained +and unconscious popularity. Did not Mr. Binny, the +mild and genteel curate of the district chapel, which +the family attended, call assiduously upon the widow, +dandle the little boy on his knee, and offer to teach +him Latin, to the anger of the elderly virgin, his +sister, who kept house for him? “There is nothing +in her, Beilby,” the latter lady would say. + “When she comes to tea here she does not speak +a word during the whole evening. She is but a poor +lackadaisical creature, and it is my belief has no +heart at all. It is only her pretty face which all +you gentlemen admire so. Miss Grits, who has five +thousand pounds, and expectations besides, has twice +as much character, and is a thousand times more agreeable +to my taste; and if she were good-looking I know that +you would think her perfection.”</p> + +<p>Very likely Miss Binny was right to a great extent. + It <i>is</i> the pretty face which creates sympathy +in the hearts of men, those wicked rogues. A woman +may possess the wisdom and chastity of Minerva, and +we give no heed to her, if she has a plain face. What +folly will not a pair of bright eyes make pardonable? +What dulness may not red lips and sweet accents render +pleasant? And so, with their usual sense of justice, +ladies argue that because a woman is handsome, therefore +she is a fool. O ladies, ladies! there are some of +you who are neither handsome nor wise.</p> + +<p>These are but trivial incidents to recount in the +life of our heroine. Her tale does not deal in wonders, +as the gentle reader has already no doubt perceived; +and if a journal had been kept of her proceedings +during the seven years after the birth of her son, +there would be found few incidents more remarkable +in it than that of the measles, recorded in the foregoing +page. Yes, one day, and greatly to her wonder, the +Reverend Mr. Binny, just mentioned, asked her to change +her name of Osborne for his own; when, with deep blushes +and tears in her eyes and voice, she thanked him for +his regard for her, expressed gratitude for his attentions +to her and to her poor little boy, but said that she +never, never could think of any but--but the husband +whom she had lost.</p> + +<p>On the twenty-fifth of April, and the eighteenth of +June, the days of marriage and widowhood, she kept +her room entirely, consecrating them (and we do not +know how many hours of solitary night-thought, her +little boy sleeping in his crib by her bedside) to +the memory of that departed friend. During the day +she was more active. She had to teach George to read +and to write and a little to draw. She read books, +in order that she might tell him stories from them. + As his eyes opened and his mind expanded under the +influence of the outward nature round about him, she +taught the child, to the best of her humble power, +to acknowledge the Maker of all, and every night and +every morning he and she--(in that awful and touching +communion which I think must bring a thrill to the +heart of every man who witnesses or who remembers +it)--the mother and the little boy-- prayed to Our +Father together, the mother pleading with all her +gentle heart, the child lisping after her as she spoke. + And each time they prayed to God to bless dear Papa, +as if he were alive and in the room with them. To +wash and dress this young gentleman--to take him for +a run of the mornings, before breakfast, and the retreat +of grandpapa for “business"--to make for him +the most wonderful and ingenious dresses, for which +end the thrifty widow cut up and altered every available +little bit of finery which she possessed out of her +wardrobe during her marriage--for Mrs. Osborne herself +(greatly to her mother’s vexation, who preferred +fine clothes, especially since her misfortunes) always +wore a black gown and a straw bonnet with a black +ribbon--occupied her many hours of the day. Others +she had to spare, at the service of her mother and +her old father. She had taken the pains to learn, +and used to play cribbage with this gentleman on the +nights when he did not go to his club. She sang for +him when he was so minded, and it was a good sign, +for he invariably fell into a comfortable sleep during +the music. She wrote out his numerous memorials, +letters, prospectuses, and projects. It was in her +handwriting that most of the old gentleman’s +former acquaintances were informed that he had become +an agent for the Black Diamond and Anti-Cinder Coal +Company and could supply his friends and the public +with the best coals at--s. per chaldron. All he +did was to sign the circulars with his flourish and +signature, and direct them in a shaky, clerklike hand. + One of these papers was sent to Major Dobbin,--Regt., +care of Messrs. Cox and Greenwood; but the Major +being in Madras at the time, had no particular call +for coals. He knew, though, the hand which had written +the prospectus. Good God! what would he not have given +to hold it in his own! A second prospectus came out, +informing the Major that J. Sedley and Company, having +established agencies at Oporto, Bordeaux, and St. + Mary’s, were enabled to offer to their friends +and the public generally the finest and most celebrated +growths of ports, sherries, and claret wines at reasonable +prices and under extraordinary advantages. Acting +upon this hint, Dobbin furiously canvassed the governor, +the commander-in-chief, the judges, the regiments, +and everybody whom he knew in the Presidency, and +sent home to Sedley and Co. orders for wine which +perfectly astonished Mr. Sedley and Mr. Clapp, who +was the Co. in the business. But no more orders +came after that first burst of good fortune, on which +poor old Sedley was about to build a house in the +City, a regiment of clerks, a dock to himself, and +correspondents all over the world. The old gentleman’s +former taste in wine had gone: the curses of the +mess-room assailed Major Dobbin for the vile drinks +he had been the means of introducing there; and he +bought back a great quantity of the wine and sold it +at public outcry, at an enormous loss to himself. +As for Jos, who was by this time promoted to a seat +at the Revenue Board at Calcutta, he was wild with +rage when the post brought him out a bundle of these +Bacchanalian prospectuses, with a private note from +his father, telling Jos that his senior counted upon +him in this enterprise, and had consigned a quantity +of select wines to him, as per invoice, drawing bills +upon him for the amount of the same. Jos, who would +no more have it supposed that his father, Jos Sedley’s +father, of the Board of Revenue, was a wine merchant +asking for orders, than that he was Jack Ketch, refused +the bills with scorn, wrote back contumeliously to +the old gentleman, bidding him to mind his own affairs; +and the protested paper coming back, Sedley and Co. + had to take it up, with the profits which they had +made out of the Madras venture, and with a little +portion of Emmy’s savings.</p> + +<p>Besides her pension of fifty pounds a year, there +had been five hundred pounds, as her husband’s +executor stated, left in the agent’s hands at +the time of Osborne’s demise, which sum, as +George’s guardian, Dobbin proposed to put out +at 8 per cent in an Indian house of agency. Mr. Sedley, +who thought the Major had some roguish intentions +of his own about the money, was strongly against this +plan; and he went to the agents to protest personally +against the employment of the money in question, when +he learned, to his surprise, that there had been no +such sum in their hands, that all the late Captain’s +assets did not amount to a hundred pounds, and that +the five hundred pounds in question must be a separate +sum, of which Major Dobbin knew the particulars. More +than ever convinced that there was some roguery, old +Sedley pursued the Major. As his daughter’s +nearest friend, he demanded with a high hand a statement +of the late Captain’s accounts. Dobbin’s +stammering, blushing, and awkwardness added to the +other’s convictions that he had a rogue to deal +with, and in a majestic tone he told that officer a +piece of his mind, as he called it, simply stating +his belief that the Major was unlawfully detaining +his late son-in-law’s money.</p> + +<p>Dobbin at this lost all patience, and if his accuser +had not been so old and so broken, a quarrel might +have ensued between them at the Slaughters’ +Coffee-house, in a box of which place of entertainment +the gentlemen had their colloquy. “Come upstairs, +sir,” lisped out the Major. “I insist +on your coming up the stairs, and I will show which +is the injured party, poor George or I”; and, +dragging the old gentleman up to his bedroom, he produced +from his desk Osborne’s accounts, and a bundle +of IOU’s which the latter had given, who, to +do him justice, was always ready to give an IOU. “He +paid his bills in England,” Dobbin added, “but +he had not a hundred pounds in the world when he fell. + I and one or two of his brother officers made up +the little sum, which was all that we could spare, +and you dare tell us that we are trying to cheat the +widow and the orphan.” Sedley was very contrite +and humbled, though the fact is that William Dobbin +had told a great falsehood to the old gentleman; having +himself given every shilling of the money, having buried +his friend, and paid all the fees and charges incident +upon the calamity and removal of poor Amelia.</p> + +<p>About these expenses old Osborne had never given himself +any trouble to think, nor any other relative of Amelia, +nor Amelia herself, indeed. She trusted to Major +Dobbin as an accountant, took his somewhat confused +calculations for granted, and never once suspected +how much she was in his debt.</p> + +<p>Twice or thrice in the year, according to her promise, +she wrote him letters to Madras, letters all about +little Georgy. How he treasured these papers! Whenever +Amelia wrote he answered, and not until then. But +he sent over endless remembrances of himself to his +godson and to her. He ordered and sent a box of scarfs +and a grand ivory set of chess-men from China. The +pawns were little green and white men, with real swords +and shields; the knights were on horseback, the castles +were on the backs of elephants. “Mrs. Mango’s +own set at the Pineries was not so fine,” Mr. +Pestler remarked. These chess-men were the delight +of Georgy’s life, who printed his first letter +in acknowledgement of this gift of his godpapa. He +sent over preserves and pickles, which latter the young +gentleman tried surreptitiously in the sideboard and +half-killed himself with eating. He thought it was +a judgement upon him for stealing, they were so hot. + Emmy wrote a comical little account of this mishap +to the Major: it pleased him to think that her spirits +were rallying and that she could be merry sometimes +now. He sent over a pair of shawls, a white one for +her and a black one with palm-leaves for her mother, +and a pair of red scarfs, as winter wrappers, for +old Mr. Sedley and George. The shawls were worth fifty +guineas apiece at the very least, as Mrs. Sedley knew. + She wore hers in state at church at Brompton, and +was congratulated by her female friends upon the splendid +acquisition. Emmy’s, too, became prettily her +modest black gown. “What a pity it is she won’t +think of him!” Mrs. Sedley remarked to Mrs. +Clapp and to all her friends of Brompton. “Jos +never sent us such presents, I am sure, and grudges +us everything. It is evident that the Major is over +head and ears in love with her; and yet, whenever +I so much as hint it, she turns red and begins to +cry and goes and sits upstairs with her miniature. + I’m sick of that miniature. I wish we had never +seen those odious purse-proud Osbornes.”</p> + +<p>Amidst such humble scenes and associates George’s +early youth was passed, and the boy grew up delicate, +sensitive, imperious, woman-bred--domineering the +gentle mother whom he loved with passionate affection. + He ruled all the rest of the little world round about +him. As he grew, the elders were amazed at his haughty +manner and his constant likeness to his father. He +asked questions about everything, as inquiring youth +will do. The profundity of his remarks and interrogatories +astonished his old grandfather, who perfectly bored +the club at the tavern with stories about the little +lad’s learning and genius. He suffered his grandmother +with a good-humoured indifference. The small circle +round about him believed that the equal of the boy +did not exist upon the earth. Georgy inherited his +father’s pride, and perhaps thought they were +not wrong.</p> + +<p>When he grew to be about six years old, Dobbin began +to write to him very much. The Major wanted to hear +that Georgy was going to a school and hoped he would +acquit himself with credit there: or would he have +a good tutor at home? It was time that he should begin +to learn; and his godfather and guardian hinted that +he hoped to be allowed to defray the charges of the +boy’s education, which would fall heavily upon +his mother’s straitened income. The Major, in +a word, was always thinking about Amelia and her little +boy, and by orders to his agents kept the latter provided +with picture-books, paint-boxes, desks, and all conceivable +implements of amusement and instruction. Three days +before George’s sixth birthday a gentleman in +a gig, accompanied by a servant, drove up to Mr. Sedley’s +house and asked to see Master George Osborne: it +was Mr. Woolsey, military tailor, of Conduit Street, +who came at the Major’s order to measure the +young gentleman for a suit of clothes. He had had +the honour of making for the Captain, the young gentleman’s +father. Sometimes, too, and by the Major’s desire +no doubt, his sisters, the Misses Dobbin, would call +in the family carriage to take Amelia and the little +boy to drive if they were so inclined. The patronage +and kindness of these ladies was very uncomfortable +to Amelia, but she bore it meekly enough, for her +nature was to yield; and, besides, the carriage and +its splendours gave little Georgy immense pleasure. +The ladies begged occasionally that the child might +pass a day with them, and he was always glad to go +to that fine garden-house at Denmark Hill, where they +lived, and where there were such fine grapes in the +hot-houses and peaches on the walls.</p> + +<p>One day they kindly came over to Amelia with news +which they were <i>sure</i> would delight her--something +<i>very</i> interesting about their dear William.</p> + +<p>“What was it: was he coming home?” she +asked with pleasure beaming in her eyes.</p> + +<p>“Oh, no--not the least--but they had very good +reason to believe that dear William was about to be +married--and to a relation of a very dear friend of +Amelia’s--to Miss Glorvina O’Dowd, Sir +Michael O’Dowd’s sister, who had gone +out to join Lady O’Dowd at Madras--a very beautiful +and accomplished girl, everybody said.”</p> + +<p>Amelia said “Oh!” Amelia was very <i>very</i> +happy indeed. But she supposed Glorvina could not +be like her old acquaintance, who was most kind--but--but +she was very happy indeed. And by some impulse of +which I cannot explain the meaning, she took George +in her arms and kissed him with an extraordinary tenderness. + Her eyes were quite moist when she put the child +down; and she scarcely spoke a word during the whole +of the drive--though she was so very happy indeed.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XXXIX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Cynical Chapter</h4> + +<p>Our duty now takes us back for a brief space to some +old Hampshire acquaintances of ours, whose hopes respecting +the disposal of their rich kinswoman’s property +were so woefully disappointed. After counting upon +thirty thousand pounds from his sister, it was a heavy +blow. to Bute Crawley to receive but five; out of +which sum, when he had paid his own debts and those +of Jim, his son at college, a very small fragment +remained to portion off his four plain daughters. + Mrs. Bute never knew, or at least never acknowledged, +how far her own tyrannous behaviour had tended to ruin +her husband. All that woman could do, she vowed and +protested she had done. Was it her fault if she did +not possess those sycophantic arts which her hypocritical +nephew, Pitt Crawley, practised? She wished him all +the happiness which he merited out of his ill-gotten +gains. “At least the money will remain in the +family,” she said charitably. “Pitt will +never spend it, my dear, that is quite certain; for +a greater miser does not exist in England, and he +is as odious, though in a different way, as his spendthrift +brother, the abandoned Rawdon.”</p> + +<p>So Mrs. Bute, after the first shock of rage and disappointment, +began to accommodate herself as best she could to her +altered fortunes and to save and retrench with all +her might. She instructed her daughters how to bear +poverty cheerfully, and invented a thousand notable +methods to conceal or evade it. She took them about +to balls and public places in the neighbourhood, with +praiseworthy energy; nay, she entertained her friends +in a hospitable comfortable manner at the Rectory, +and much more frequently than before dear Miss Crawley’s +legacy had fallen in. From her outward bearing nobody +would have supposed that the family had been disappointed +in their expectations, or have guessed from her frequent +appearance in public how she pinched and starved at +home. Her girls had more milliners’ furniture +than they had ever enjoyed before. They appeared +perseveringly at the Winchester and Southampton assemblies; +they penetrated to Cowes for the race-balls and regatta-gaieties +there; and their carriage, with the horses taken from +the plough, was at work perpetually, until it began +almost to be believed that the four sisters had had +fortunes left them by their aunt, whose name the family +never mentioned in public but with the most tender +gratitude and regard. I know no sort of lying which +is more frequent in Vanity Fair than this, and it may +be remarked how people who practise it take credit +to themselves for their hypocrisy, and fancy that +they are exceedingly virtuous and praiseworthy, because +they are able to deceive the world with regard to +the extent of their means.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bute certainly thought herself one of the most +virtuous women in England, and the sight of her happy +family was an edifying one to strangers. They were +so cheerful, so loving, so well-educated, so simple! + Martha painted flowers exquisitely and furnished half +the charity bazaars in the county. Emma was a regular +County Bulbul, and her verses in the Hampshire Telegraph +were the glory of its Poet’s Corner. Fanny +and Matilda sang duets together, Mamma playing the +piano, and the other two sisters sitting with their +arms round each other’s waists and listening +affectionately. Nobody saw the poor girls drumming +at the duets in private. No one saw Mamma drilling +them rigidly hour after hour. In a word, Mrs. Bute +put a good face against fortune and kept up appearances +in the most virtuous manner.</p> + +<p>Everything that a good and respectable mother could +do Mrs. Bute did. She got over yachting men from +Southampton, parsons from the Cathedral Close at Winchester, +and officers from the barracks there. She tried to +inveigle the young barristers at assizes and encouraged +Jim to bring home friends with whom he went out hunting +with the H. H. What will not a mother do for the +benefit of her beloved ones?</p> + +<p>Between such a woman and her brother-in-law, the odious +Baronet at the Hall, it is manifest that there could +be very little in common. The rupture between Bute +and his brother Sir Pitt was complete; indeed, between +Sir Pitt and the whole county, to which the old man +was a scandal. His dislike for respectable society +increased with age, and the lodge-gates had not opened +to a gentleman’s carriage-wheels since Pitt +and Lady Jane came to pay their visit of duty after +their marriage.</p> + +<p>That was an awful and unfortunate visit, never to +be thought of by the family without horror. Pitt +begged his wife, with a ghastly countenance, never +to speak of it, and it was only through Mrs. Bute +herself, who still knew everything which took place +at the Hall, that the circumstances of Sir Pitt’s +reception of his son and daughter-in-law were ever +known at all.</p> + +<p>As they drove up the avenue of the park in their neat +and well-appointed carriage, Pitt remarked with dismay +and wrath great gaps among the trees--his trees--which +the old Baronet was felling entirely without license. + The park wore an aspect of utter dreariness and ruin. + The drives were ill kept, and the neat carriage splashed +and floundered in muddy pools along the road. The +great sweep in front of the terrace and entrance stair +was black and covered with mosses; the once trim flower-beds +rank and weedy. Shutters were up along almost the +whole line of the house; the great hall-door was unbarred +after much ringing of the bell; an individual in ribbons +was seen flitting up the black oak stair, as Horrocks +at length admitted the heir of Queen’s Crawley +and his bride into the halls of their fathers. He +led the way into Sir Pitt’s “Library,” +as it was called, the fumes of tobacco growing stronger +as Pitt and Lady Jane approached that apartment, “Sir +Pitt ain’t very well,” Horrocks remarked +apologetically and hinted that his master was afflicted +with lumbago.</p> + +<p>The library looked out on the front walk and park. +Sir Pitt had opened one of the windows, and was bawling +out thence to the postilion and Pitt’s servant, +who seemed to be about to take the baggage down.</p> + +<p>“Don’t move none of them trunks,” +he cried, pointing with a pipe which he held in his +hand. “It’s only a morning visit, Tucker, +you fool. Lor, what cracks that off hoss has in his +heels! Ain’t there no one at the King’s +Head to rub ’em a little? How do, Pitt? How do, +my dear? Come to see the old man, hay? ’Gad--you’ve +a pretty face, too. You ain’t like that old +horse-godmother, your mother. Come and give old Pitt +a kiss, like a good little gal.”</p> + +<p>The embrace disconcerted the daughter-in-law somewhat, +as the caresses of the old gentleman, unshorn and +perfumed with tobacco, might well do. But she remembered +that her brother Southdown had mustachios, and smoked +cigars, and submitted to the Baronet with a tolerable +grace.</p> + +<p>“Pitt has got vat,” said the Baronet, +after this mark of affection. “Does he read +ee very long zermons, my dear? Hundredth Psalm, Evening +Hymn, hay Pitt? Go and get a glass of Malmsey and a +cake for my Lady Jane, Horrocks, you great big booby, +and don’t stand stearing there like a fat pig. + I won’t ask you to stop, my dear; you’ll +find it too stoopid, and so should I too along a Pitt. + I’m an old man now, and like my own ways, and +my pipe and backgammon of a night.”</p> + +<p>“I can play at backgammon, sir,” said +Lady Jane, laughing. “I used to play with Papa +and Miss Crawley, didn’t I, Mr. Crawley?”</p> + +<p>“Lady Jane can play, sir, at the game to which +you state that you are so partial,” Pitt said +haughtily.</p> + +<p>But she wawn’t stop for all that. Naw, naw, +goo back to Mudbury and give Mrs. Rincer a benefit; +or drive down to the Rectory and ask Buty for a dinner. + He’ll be charmed to see you, you know; he’s +so much obliged to you for gettin’ the old woman’s +money. Ha, ha! Some of it will do to patch up the +Hall when I’m gone.”</p> + +<p>“I perceive, sir,” said Pitt with a heightened +voice, “that your people will cut down the timber.”</p> + +<p>“Yees, yees, very fine weather, and seasonable +for the time of year,” Sir Pitt answered, who +had suddenly grown deaf. “But I’m gittin’ +old, Pitt, now. Law bless you, you ain’t far +from fifty yourself. But he wears well, my pretty +Lady Jane, don’t he? It’s all godliness, +sobriety, and a moral life. Look at me, I’m +not very fur from fowr-score--he, he”; and he +laughed, and took snuff, and leered at her and pinched +her hand.</p> + +<p>Pitt once more brought the conversation back to the +timber, but the Baronet was deaf again in an instant.</p> + +<p>“I’m gittin’ very old, and have +been cruel bad this year with the lumbago. I shan’t +be here now for long; but I’m glad ee’ve +come, daughter-in-law. I like your face, Lady Jane: + it’s got none of the damned high-boned Binkie +look in it; and I’ll give ee something pretty, +my dear, to go to Court in.” And he shuffled +across the room to a cupboard, from which he took +a little old case containing jewels of some value. + “Take that,” said he, “my dear; +it belonged to my mother, and afterwards to the first +Lady Binkie. Pretty pearls--never gave ’em the +ironmonger’s daughter. No, no. Take ’em +and put ’em up quick,” said he, thrusting +the case into his daughter’s hand, and clapping +the door of the cabinet to, as Horrocks entered with +a salver and refreshments.</p> + +<p>“What have you a been and given Pitt’s +wife?” said the individual in ribbons, when +Pitt and Lady Jane had taken leave of the old gentleman. + It was Miss Horrocks, the butler’s daughter--the +cause of the scandal throughout the county--the lady +who reigned now almost supreme at Queen’s Crawley.</p> + +<p>The rise and progress of those Ribbons had been marked +with dismay by the county and family. The Ribbons +opened an account at the Mudbury Branch Savings Bank; +the Ribbons drove to church, monopolising the pony-chaise, +which was for the use of the servants at the Hall. + The domestics were dismissed at her pleasure. The +Scotch gardener, who still lingered on the premises, +taking a pride in his walls and hot-houses, and indeed +making a pretty good livelihood by the garden, which +he farmed, and of which he sold the produce at Southampton, +found the Ribbons eating peaches on a sunshiny morning +at the south-wall, and had his ears boxed when he +remonstrated about this attack on his property. He +and his Scotch wife and his Scotch children, the only +respectable inhabitants of Queen’s Crawley, +were forced to migrate, with their goods and their +chattels, and left the stately comfortable gardens +to go to waste, and the flower-beds to run to seed. + Poor Lady Crawley’s rose-garden became the +dreariest wilderness. Only two or three domestics +shuddered in the bleak old servants’ hall. The +stables and offices were vacant, and shut up, and +half ruined. Sir Pitt lived in private, and boozed +nightly with Horrocks, his butler or house-steward +(as he now began to be called), and the abandoned Ribbons. +The times were very much changed since the period when +she drove to Mudbury in the spring-cart and called +the small tradesmen “Sir.” It may have +been shame, or it may have been dislike of his neighbours, +but the old Cynic of Queen’s Crawley hardly issued +from his park-gates at all now. He quarrelled with +his agents and screwed his tenants by letter. His +days were passed in conducting his own correspondence; +the lawyers and farm-bailiffs who had to do business +with him could not reach him but through the Ribbons, +who received them at the door of the housekeeper’s +room, which commanded the back entrance by which they +were admitted; and so the Baronet’s daily perplexities +increased, and his embarrassments multiplied round +him.</p> + +<p>The horror of Pitt Crawley may be imagined, as these +reports of his father’s dotage reached the most +exemplary and correct of gentlemen. He trembled daily +lest he should hear that the Ribbons was proclaimed +his second legal mother-in-law. After that first and +last visit, his father’s name was never mentioned +in Pitt’s polite and genteel establishment. + It was the skeleton in his house, and all the family +walked by it in terror and silence. The Countess +Southdown kept on dropping per coach at the lodge-gate +the most exciting tracts, tracts which ought to frighten +the hair off your head. Mrs. Bute at the parsonage +nightly looked out to see if the sky was red over +the elms behind which the Hall stood, and the mansion +was on fire. Sir G. Wapshot and Sir H. Fuddlestone, +old friends of the house, wouldn’t sit on the +bench with Sir Pitt at Quarter Sessions, and cut him +dead in the High Street of Southampton, where the +reprobate stood offering his dirty old hands to them. + Nothing had any effect upon him; he put his hands +into his pockets, and burst out laughing, as he scrambled +into his carriage and four; he used to burst out laughing +at Lady Southdown’s tracts; and he laughed at +his sons, and at the world, and at the Ribbons when +she was angry, which was not seldom.</p> + +<p>Miss Horrocks was installed as housekeeper at Queen’s +Crawley, and ruled all the domestics there with great +majesty and rigour. All the servants were instructed +to address her as “Mum,” or “Madam"-- +and there was one little maid, on her promotion, who +persisted in calling her “My Lady,” without +any rebuke on the part of the housekeeper. “There +has been better ladies, and there has been worser, +Hester,” was Miss Horrocks’ reply to this +compliment of her inferior; so she ruled, having supreme +power over all except her father, whom, however, she +treated with considerable haughtiness, warning him +not to be too familiar in his behaviour to one “as +was to be a Baronet’s lady.” Indeed, she +rehearsed that exalted part in life with great satisfaction +to herself, and to the amusement of old Sir Pitt, +who chuckled at her airs and graces, and would laugh +by the hour together at her assumptions of dignity +and imitations of genteel life. He swore it was as +good as a play to see her in the character of a fine +dame, and he made her put on one of the first Lady +Crawley’s court-dresses, swearing (entirely to +Miss Horrocks’ own concurrence) that the dress +became her prodigiously, and threatening to drive +her off that very instant to Court in a coach-and-four. + She had the ransacking of the wardrobes of the two +defunct ladies, and cut and hacked their posthumous +finery so as to suit her own tastes and figure. And +she would have liked to take possession of their jewels +and trinkets too; but the old Baronet had locked them +away in his private cabinet; nor could she coax or +wheedle him out of the keys. And it is a fact, that +some time after she left Queen’s Crawley a copy-book +belonging to this lady was discovered, which showed +that she had taken great pains in private to learn +the art of writing in general, and especially of writing +her own name as Lady Crawley, Lady Betsy Horrocks, +Lady Elizabeth Crawley, &c.</p> + +<p>Though the good people of the Parsonage never went +to the Hall and shunned the horrid old dotard its +owner, yet they kept a strict knowledge of all that +happened there, and were looking out every day for +the catastrophe for which Miss Horrocks was also eager. + But Fate intervened enviously and prevented her from +receiving the reward due to such immaculate love and +virtue.</p> + +<p>One day the Baronet surprised “her ladyship,” +as he jocularly called her, seated at that old and +tuneless piano in the drawing-room, which had scarcely +been touched since Becky Sharp played quadrilles upon +it--seated at the piano with the utmost gravity and +squalling to the best of her power in imitation of +the music which she had sometimes heard. The little +kitchen-maid on her promotion was standing at her +mistress’s side, quite delighted during the +operation, and wagging her head up and down and crying, +“Lor, Mum, ’tis bittiful"--just like a +genteel sycophant in a real drawing-room.</p> + +<p>This incident made the old Baronet roar with laughter, +as usual. He narrated the circumstance a dozen times +to Horrocks in the course of the evening, and greatly +to the discomfiture of Miss Horrocks. He thrummed +on the table as if it had been a musical instrument, +and squalled in imitation of her manner of singing. + He vowed that such a beautiful voice ought to be +cultivated and declared she ought to have singing-masters, +in which proposals she saw nothing ridiculous. He +was in great spirits that night, and drank with his +friend and butler an extraordinary quantity of rum-and-water--at +a very late hour the faithful friend and domestic +conducted his master to his bedroom.</p> + +<p>Half an hour afterwards there was a great hurry and +bustle in the house. Lights went about from window +to window in the lonely desolate old Hall, whereof +but two or three rooms were ordinarily occupied by +its owner. Presently, a boy on a pony went galloping +off to Mudbury, to the Doctor’s house there. + And in another hour (by which fact we ascertain how +carefully the excellent Mrs. Bute Crawley had always +kept up an understanding with the great house), that +lady in her clogs and calash, the Reverend Bute Crawley, +and James Crawley, her son, had walked over from the +Rectory through the park, and had entered the mansion +by the open hall-door.</p> + +<p>They passed through the hall and the small oak parlour, +on the table of which stood the three tumblers and +the empty rum-bottle which had served for Sir Pitt’s +carouse, and through that apartment into Sir Pitt’s +study, where they found Miss Horrocks, of the guilty +ribbons, with a wild air, trying at the presses and +escritoires with a bunch of keys. She dropped them +with a scream of terror, as little Mrs. Bute’s +eyes flashed out at her from under her black calash.</p> + +<p>“Look at that, James and Mr. Crawley,” +cried Mrs. Bute, pointing at the scared figure of +the black-eyed, guilty wench.</p> + +<p>“He gave ’em me; he gave ’em me!” +she cried.</p> + +<p>“Gave them you, you abandoned creature!” +screamed Mrs. Bute. “Bear witness, Mr. Crawley, +we found this good-for-nothing woman in the act of +stealing your brother’s property; and she will +be hanged, as I always said she would.”</p> + +<p>Betsy Horrocks, quite daunted, flung herself down +on her knees, bursting into tears. But those who +know a really good woman are aware that she is not +in a hurry to forgive, and that the humiliation of +an enemy is a triumph to her soul.</p> + +<p>“Ring the bell, James,” Mrs. Bute said. + “Go on ringing it till the people come.” +The three or four domestics resident in the deserted +old house came presently at that jangling and continued +summons.</p> + +<p>“Put that woman in the strong-room,” she +said. “We caught her in the act of robbing +Sir Pitt. Mr. Crawley, you’ll make out her +committal--and, Beddoes, you’ll drive her over +in the spring cart, in the morning, to Southampton +Gaol.”</p> + +<p>“My dear,” interposed the Magistrate and +Rector--"she’s only--”</p> + +<p>“Are there no handcuffs?” Mrs. Bute continued, +stamping in her clogs. “There used to be handcuffs. +Where’s the creature’s abominable father?”</p> + +<p>“He <i>did</i> give ’em me,” still +cried poor Betsy; “didn’t he, Hester? +You saw Sir Pitt--you know you did--give ’em +me, ever so long ago-- the day after Mudbury fair: + not that I want ’em. Take ’em if you +think they ain’t mine.” And here the unhappy +wretch pulled out from her pocket a large pair of +paste shoe-buckles which had excited her admiration, +and which she had just appropriated out of one of the +bookcases in the study, where they had lain.</p> + +<p>“Law, Betsy, how could you go for to tell such +a wicked story!” said Hester, the little kitchen-maid +late on her promotion--"and to Madame Crawley, so +good and kind, and his Rev’rince (with a curtsey), +and you may search all <i>my</i> boxes, Mum, I’m +sure, and here’s my keys as I’m an honest +girl, though of pore parents and workhouse bred--and +if you find so much as a beggarly bit of lace or a +silk stocking out of all the gownds as <i>you’ve</i> +had the picking of, may I never go to church agin.”</p> + +<p>“Give up your keys, you hardened hussy,” +hissed out the virtuous little lady in the calash.</p> + +<p>“And here’s a candle, Mum, and if you +please, Mum, I can show you her room, Mum, and the +press in the housekeeper’s room, Mum, where +she keeps heaps and heaps of things, Mum,” cried +out the eager little Hester with a profusion of curtseys.</p> + +<p>“Hold your tongue, if you please. I know the +room which the creature occupies perfectly well. +Mrs. Brown, have the goodness to come with me, and +Beddoes don’t you lose sight of that woman,” +said Mrs. Bute, seizing the candle. “Mr. Crawley, +you had better go upstairs and see that they are not +murdering your unfortunate brother"--and the calash, +escorted by Mrs. Brown, walked away to the apartment +which, as she said truly, she knew perfectly well.</p> + +<p>Bute went upstairs and found the Doctor from Mudbury, +with the frightened Horrocks over his master in a +chair. They were trying to bleed Sir Pitt Crawley.</p> + +<p>With the early morning an express was sent off to +Mr. Pitt Crawley by the Rector’s lady, who assumed +the command of everything, and had watched the old +Baronet through the night. He had been brought back +to a sort of life; he could not speak, but seemed to +recognize people. Mrs. Bute kept resolutely by his +bedside. She never seemed to want to sleep, that +little woman, and did not close her fiery black eyes +once, though the Doctor snored in the arm-chair. Horrocks +made some wild efforts to assert his authority and +assist his master; but Mrs. Bute called him a tipsy +old wretch and bade him never show his face again +in that house, or he should be transported like his +abominable daughter.</p> + +<p>Terrified by her manner, he slunk down to the oak +parlour where Mr. James was, who, having tried the +bottle standing there and found no liquor in it, ordered +Mr. Horrocks to get another bottle of rum, which he +fetched, with clean glasses, and to which the Rector +and his son sat down, ordering Horrocks to put down +the keys at that instant and never to show his face +again.</p> + +<p>Cowed by this behaviour, Horrocks gave up the keys, +and he and his daughter slunk off silently through +the night and gave up possession of the house of Queen’s +Crawley.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XL</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Becky Is Recognized by the Family</h4> + +<p>The heir of Crawley arrived at home, in due time, +after this catastrophe, and henceforth may be said +to have reigned in Queen’s Crawley. For though +the old Baronet survived many months, he never recovered +the use of his intellect or his speech completely, +and the government of the estate devolved upon his +elder son. In a strange condition Pitt found it. + Sir Pitt was always buying and mortgaging; he had +twenty men of business, and quarrels with each; quarrels +with all his tenants, and lawsuits with them; lawsuits +with the lawyers; lawsuits with the Mining and Dock +Companies in which he was proprietor; and with every +person with whom he had business. To unravel these +difficulties and to set the estate clear was a task +worthy of the orderly and persevering diplomatist of +Pumpernickel, and he set himself to work with prodigious +assiduity. His whole family, of course, was transported +to Queen’s Crawley, whither Lady Southdown, +of course, came too; and she set about converting the +parish under the Rector’s nose, and brought down +her irregular clergy to the dismay of the angry Mrs +Bute. Sir Pitt had concluded no bargain for the sale +of the living of Queen’s Crawley; when it should +drop, her Ladyship proposed to take the patronage into +her own hands and present a young protege to the Rectory, +on which subject the diplomatic Pitt said nothing.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bute’s intentions with regard to Miss Betsy +Horrocks were not carried into effect, and she paid +no visit to Southampton Gaol. She and her father +left the Hall when the latter took possession of the +Crawley Arms in the village, of which he had got a +lease from Sir Pitt. The ex-butler had obtained a +small freehold there likewise, which gave him a vote +for the borough. The Rector had another of these +votes, and these and four others formed the representative +body which returned the two members for Queen’s +Crawley.</p> + +<p>There was a show of courtesy kept up between the Rectory +and the Hall ladies, between the younger ones at least, +for Mrs. Bute and Lady Southdown never could meet +without battles, and gradually ceased seeing each +other. Her Ladyship kept her room when the ladies +from the Rectory visited their cousins at the Hall. + Perhaps Mr. Pitt was not very much displeased at +these occasional absences of his mamma-in-law. He +believed the Binkie family to be the greatest and +wisest and most interesting in the world, and her +Ladyship and his aunt had long held ascendency over +him; but sometimes he felt that she commanded him +too much. To be considered young was complimentary, +doubtless, but at six-and-forty to be treated as a +boy was sometimes mortifying. Lady Jane yielded up +everything, however, to her mother. She was only fond +of her children in private, and it was lucky for her +that Lady Southdown’s multifarious business, +her conferences with ministers, and her correspondence +with all the missionaries of Africa, Asia, aud Australasia, +&c., occupied the venerable Countess a great deal, +so that she had but little time to devote to her granddaughter, +the little Matilda, and her grandson, Master Pitt +Crawley. The latter was a feeble child, and it was +only by prodigious quantities of calomel that Lady +Southdown was able to keep him in life at all.</p> + +<p>As for Sir Pitt he retired into those very apartments +where Lady Crawley had been previously extinguished, +and here was tended by Miss Hester, the girl upon +her promotion, with constant care and assiduity. +What love, what fidelity, what constancy is there equal +to that of a nurse with good wages? They smooth pillows; +and make arrowroot; they get up at nights; they bear +complaints and querulousness; they see the sun shining +out of doors and don’t want to go abroad; they +sleep on arm-chairs and eat their meals in solitude; +they pass long long evenings doing nothing, watching +the embers, and the patient’s drink simmering +in the jug; they read the weekly paper the whole week +through; and Law’s Serious Call or the Whole +Duty of Man suffices them for literature for the year--and +we quarrel with them because, when their relations +come to see them once a week, a little gin is smuggled +in in their linen basket. Ladies, what man’s +love is there that would stand a year’s nursing +of the object of his affection? Whereas a nurse will +stand by you for ten pounds a quarter, and we think +her too highly paid. At least Mr. Crawley grumbled +a good deal about paying half as much to Miss Hester +for her constant attendance upon the Baronet his father.</p> + +<p>Of sunshiny days this old gentleman was taken out +in a chair on the terrace--the very chair which Miss +Crawley had had at Brighton, and which had been transported +thence with a number of Lady Southdown’s effects +to Queen’s Crawley. Lady Jane always walked +by the old man, and was an evident favourite with +him. He used to nod many times to her and smile when +she came in, and utter inarticulate deprecatory moans +when she was going away. When the door shut upon her +he would cry and sob--whereupon Hester’s face +and manner, which was always exceedingly bland and +gentle while her lady was present, would change at +once, and she would make faces at him and clench her +fist and scream out “Hold your tongue, you stoopid +old fool,” and twirl away his chair from the +fire which he loved to look at--at which he would +cry more. For this was all that was left after more +than seventy years of cunning, and struggling, and +drinking, and scheming, and sin and selfishness--a +whimpering old idiot put in and out of bed and cleaned +and fed like a baby.</p> + +<p>At last a day came when the nurse’s occupation +was over. Early one morning, as Pitt Crawley was +at his steward’s and bailiff’s books in +the study, a knock came to the door, and Hester presented +herself, dropping a curtsey, and said,</p> + +<p>“If you please, Sir Pitt, Sir Pitt died this +morning, Sir Pitt. I was a-making of his toast, Sir +Pitt, for his gruel, Sir Pitt, which he took every +morning regular at six, Sir Pitt, and--I thought I +heard a moan-like, Sir Pitt--and--and--and--” +She dropped another curtsey.</p> + +<p>What was it that made Pitt’s pale face flush +quite red? Was it because he was Sir Pitt at last, +with a seat in Parliament, and perhaps future honours +in prospect? “I’ll clear the estate now +with the ready money,” he thought and rapidly +calculated its incumbrances and the improvements which +he would make. He would not use his aunt’s +money previously lest Sir Pitt should recover and his +outlay be in vain.</p> + +<p>All the blinds were pulled down at the Hall and Rectory: +the church bell was tolled, and the chancel hung in +black; and Bute Crawley didn’t go to a coursing +meeting, but went and dined quietly at Fuddleston, +where they talked about his deceased brother and young +Sir Pitt over their port. Miss Betsy, who was by this +time married to a saddler at Mudbury, cried a good +deal. The family surgeon rode over and paid his respectful +compliments, and inquiries for the health of their +ladyships. The death was talked about at Mudbury +and at the Crawley Arms, the landlord whereof had become +reconciled with the Rector of late, who was occasionally +known to step into the parlour and taste Mr. Horrocks’ +mild beer.</p> + +<p>“Shall I write to your brother--or will you?” +asked Lady Jane of her husband, Sir Pitt.</p> + +<p>“I will write, of course,” Sir Pitt said, +“and invite him to the funeral: it will be +but becoming.”</p> + +<p>“And--and--Mrs. Rawdon,” said Lady Jane +timidly.</p> + +<p>“Jane!” said Lady Southdown, “how +can you think of such a thing?”</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Rawdon must of course be asked,” +said Sir Pitt, resolutely.</p> + +<p>“Not whilst I am in the house!” said Lady +Southdown.</p> + +<p>“Your Ladyship will be pleased to recollect +that I am the head of this family,” Sir Pitt +replied. “If you please, Lady Jane, you will +write a letter to Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, requesting her +presence upon this melancholy occasion.”</p> + +<p>“Jane, I forbid you to put pen to paper!” +cried the Countess.</p> + +<p>“I believe I am the head of this family,” +Sir Pitt repeated; “and however much I may regret +any circumstance which may lead to your Ladyship quitting +this house, must, if you please, continue to govern +it as I see fit.”</p> + +<p>Lady Southdown rose up as magnificent as Mrs. Siddons +in Lady Macbeth and ordered that horses might be put +to her carriage. If her son and daughter turned her +out of their house, she would hide her sorrows somewhere +in loneliness and pray for their conversion to better +thoughts.</p> + +<p>“We don’t turn you out of our house, Mamma,” +said the timid Lady Jane imploringly.</p> + +<p>“You invite such company to it as no Christian +lady should meet, and I will have my horses to-morrow +morning.”</p> + +<p>“Have the goodness to write, Jane, under my +dictation,” said Sir Pitt, rising and throwing +himself into an attitude of command, like the portrait +of a Gentleman in the Exhibition, “and begin. + ’Queen’s Crawley, September 14, 1822.--My +dear brother--’”</p> + +<p>Hearing these decisive and terrible words, Lady Macbeth, +who had been waiting for a sign of weakness or vacillation +on the part of her son-in-law, rose and, with a scared +look, left the library. Lady Jane looked up to her +husband as if she would fain follow and soothe her +mamma, but Pitt forbade his wife to move.</p> + +<p>“She won’t go away,” he said. “She +has let her house at Brighton and has spent her last +half-year’s dividends. A Countess living at +an inn is a ruined woman. I have been waiting long +for an opportunity--to take this--this decisive step, +my love; for, as you must perceive, it is impossible +that there should be two chiefs in a family: and now, +if you please, we will resume the dictation. ’My +dear brother, the melancholy intelligence which it +is my duty to convey to my family must have been long +anticipated by,’” &c.</p> + +<p>In a word, Pitt having come to his kingdom, and having +by good luck, or desert rather, as he considered, +assumed almost all the fortune which his other relatives +had expected, was determined to treat his family kindly +and respectably and make a house of Queen’s Crawley +once more. It pleased him to think that he should +be its chief. He proposed to use the vast influence +that his commanding talents and position must speedily +acquire for him in the county to get his brother placed +and his cousins decently provided for, and perhaps +had a little sting of repentance as he thought that +he was the proprietor of all that they had hoped for. + In the course of three or four days’ reign +his bearing was changed and his plans quite fixed: + he determined to rule justly and honestly, to depose +Lady Southdown, and to be on the friendliest possible +terms with all the relations of his blood.</p> + +<p>So he dictated a letter to his brother Rawdon--a solemn +and elaborate letter, containing the profoundest observations, +couched in the longest words, and filling with wonder +the simple little secretary, who wrote under her husband’s +order. “What an orator this will be,” +thought she, “when he enters the House of Commons” +(on which point, and on the tyranny of Lady Southdown, +Pitt had sometimes dropped hints to his wife in bed); +“how wise and good, and what a genius my husband +is! I fancied him a little cold; but how good, and +what a genius!”</p> + +<p>The fact is, Pitt Crawley had got every word of the +letter by heart and had studied it, with diplomatic +secrecy, deeply and perfectly, long before he thought +fit to communicate it to his astonished wife.</p> + +<p>This letter, with a huge black border and seal, was +accordingly despatched by Sir Pitt Crawley to his +brother the Colonel, in London. Rawdon Crawley was +but half-pleased at the receipt of it. “What’s +the use of going down to that stupid place?” +thought he. “I can’t stand being alone +with Pitt after dinner, and horses there and back +will cost us twenty pound.”</p> + +<p>He carried the letter, as he did all difficulties, +to Becky, upstairs in her bedroom--with her chocolate, +which he always made and took to her of a morning.</p> + +<p>He put the tray with the breakfast and the letter +on the dressing-table, before which Becky sat combing +her yellow hair. She took up the black-edged missive, +and having read it, she jumped up from the chair, +crying “Hurray!” and waving the note round +her head.</p> + +<p>“Hurray?” said Rawdon, wondering at the +little figure capering about in a streaming flannel +dressing-gown, with tawny locks dishevelled. “He’s +not left us anything, Becky. I had my share when I +came of age.”</p> + +<p>“You’ll never be of age, you silly old +man,” Becky replied. “Run out now to +Madam Brunoy’s, for I must have some mourning: + and get a crape on your hat, and a black waistcoat--I +don’t think you’ve got one; order it to +be brought home to-morrow, so that we may be able +to start on Thursday.”</p> + +<p>“You don’t mean to go?” Rawdon interposed.</p> + +<p>“Of course I mean to go. I mean that Lady Jane +shall present me at Court next year. I mean that +your brother shall give you a seat in Parliament, +you stupid old creature. I mean that Lord Steyne shall +have your vote and his, my dear, old silly man; and +that you shall be an Irish Secretary, or a West Indian +Governor: or a Treasurer, or a Consul, or some such +thing.”</p> + +<p>“Posting will cost a dooce of a lot of money,” +grumbled Rawdon.</p> + +<p>“We might take Southdown’s carriage, which +ought to be present at the funeral, as he is a relation +of the family: but, no--I intend that we shall go +by the coach. They’ll like it better. It seems +more humble--”</p> + +<p>“Rawdy goes, of course?” the Colonel asked.</p> + +<p>“No such thing; why pay an extra place? He’s +too big to travel bodkin between you and me. Let +him stay here in the nursery, and Briggs can make +him a black frock. Go you, and do as I bid you. And +you had best tell Sparks, your man, that old Sir Pitt +is dead and that you will come in for something considerable +when the affairs are arranged. He’ll tell this +to Raggles, who has been pressing for money, and it +will console poor Raggles.” And so Becky began +sipping her chocolate.</p> + +<p>When the faithful Lord Steyne arrived in the evening, +he found Becky and her companion, who was no other +than our friend Briggs, busy cutting, ripping, snipping, +and tearing all sorts of black stuffs available for +the melancholy occasion.</p> + +<p>“Miss Briggs and I are plunged in grief and +despondency for the death of our Papa,” Rebecca +said. “Sir Pitt Crawley is dead, my lord. +We have been tearing our hair all the morning, and +now we are tearing up our old clothes.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, Rebecca, how can you--” was all that +Briggs could say as she turned up her eyes.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Rebecca, how can you--” echoed my +Lord. “So that old scoundrel’s dead, +is he? He might have been a Peer if he had played +his cards better. Mr. Pitt had very nearly made him; +but he ratted always at the wrong time. What an old +Silenus it was!”</p> + +<p>“I might have been Silenus’s widow,” +said Rebecca. “Don’t you remember, Miss +Briggs, how you peeped in at the door and saw old Sir +Pitt on his knees to me?” Miss Briggs, our old +friend, blushed very much at this reminiscence, and +was glad when Lord Steyne ordered her to go downstairs +and make him a cup of tea.</p> + +<p>Briggs was the house-dog whom Rebecca had provided +as guardian of her innocence and reputation. Miss +Crawley had left her a little annuity. She would +have been content to remain in the Crawley family +with Lady Jane, who was good to her and to everybody; +but Lady Southdown dismissed poor Briggs as quickly +as decency permitted; and Mr. Pitt (who thought himself +much injured by the uncalled-for generosity of his +deceased relative towards a lady who had only been +Miss Crawley’s faithful retainer a score of years) +made no objection to that exercise of the dowager’s +authority. Bowls and Firkin likewise received their +legacies and their dismissals, and married and set +up a lodging-house, according to the custom of their +kind.</p> + +<p>Briggs tried to live with her relations in the country, +but found that attempt was vain after the better society +to which she had been accustomed. Briggs’s +friends, small tradesmen, in a country town, quarrelled +over Miss Briggs’s forty pounds a year as eagerly +and more openly than Miss Crawley’s kinsfolk +had for that lady’s inheritance. Briggs’s +brother, a radical hatter and grocer, called his sister +a purse-proud aristocrat, because she would not advance +a part of her capital to stock his shop; and she would +have done so most likely, but that their sister, a +dissenting shoemaker’s lady, at variance with +the hatter and grocer, who went to another chapel, +showed how their brother was on the verge of bankruptcy, +and took possession of Briggs for a while. The dissenting +shoemaker wanted Miss Briggs to send his son to college +and make a gentleman of him. Between them the two +families got a great portion of her private savings +out of her, and finally she fled to London followed +by the anathemas of both, and determined to seek for +servitude again as infinitely less onerous than liberty. + And advertising in the papers that a “Gentlewoman +of agreeable manners, and accustomed to the best society, +was anxious to,” &c., she took up her residence +with Mr. Bowls in Half Moon Street, and waited the +result of the advertisement.</p> + +<p>So it was that she fell in with Rebecca. Mrs. Rawdon’s +dashing little carriage and ponies was whirling down +the street one day, just as Miss Briggs, fatigued, +had reached Mr. Bowls’s door, after a weary +walk to the Times Office in the City to insert her +advertisement for the sixth time. Rebecca was driving, +and at once recognized the gentlewoman with agreeable +manners, and being a perfectly good-humoured woman, +as we have seen, and having a regard for Briggs, she +pulled up the ponies at the doorsteps, gave the reins +to the groom, and jumping out, had hold of both Briggs’s +hands, before she of the agreeable manners had recovered +from the shock of seeing an old friend.</p> + +<p>Briggs cried, and Becky laughed a great deal and kissed +the gentlewoman as soon as they got into the passage; +and thence into Mrs. Bowls’s front parlour, +with the red moreen curtains, and the round looking-glass, +with the chained eagle above, gazing upon the back +of the ticket in the window which announced “Apartments +to Let.”</p> + +<p>Briggs told all her history amidst those perfectly +uncalled-for sobs and ejaculations of wonder with +which women of her soft nature salute an old acquaintance, +or regard a rencontre in the street; for though people +meet other people every day, yet some there are who +insist upon discovering miracles; and women, even though +they have disliked each other, begin to cry when they +meet, deploring and remembering the time when they +last quarrelled. So, in a word, Briggs told all her +history, and Becky gave a narrative of her own life, +with her usual artlessness and candour.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bowls, late Firkin, came and listened grimly +in the passage to the hysterical sniffling and giggling +which went on in the front parlour. Becky had never +been a favourite of hers. Since the establishment +of the married couple in London they had frequented +their former friends of the house of Raggles, and did +not like the latter’s account of the Colonel’s +menage. “I wouldn’t trust him, Ragg, +my boy,” Bowls remarked; and his wife, when Mrs. +Rawdon issued from the parlour, only saluted the lady +with a very sour curtsey; and her fingers were like +so many sausages, cold and lifeless, when she held +them out in deference to Mrs. Rawdon, who persisted +in shaking hands with the retired lady’s maid. + She whirled away into Piccadilly, nodding with the +sweetest of smiles towards Miss Briggs, who hung nodding +at the window close under the advertisement-card, +and at the next moment was in the park with a half-dozen +of dandies cantering after her carriage.</p> + +<p>When she found how her friend was situated, and how +having a snug legacy from Miss Crawley, salary was +no object to our gentlewoman, Becky instantly formed +some benevolent little domestic plans concerning her. + This was just such a companion as would suit her +establishment, and she invited Briggs to come to dinner +with her that very evening, when she should see Becky’s +dear little darling Rawdon.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Bowls cautioned her lodger against venturing +into the lion’s den, “wherein you will +rue it, Miss B., mark my words, and as sure as my +name is Bowls.” And Briggs promised to be very +cautious. The upshot of which caution was that she +went to live with Mrs. Rawdon the next week, and had +lent Rawdon Crawley six hundred pounds upon annuity +before six months were over.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Becky Revisits the Halls of Her Ancestors</h4> + +<p>So the mourning being ready, and Sir Pitt Crawley +warned of their arrival, Colonel Crawley and his wife +took a couple of places in the same old High-flyer +coach by which Rebecca had travelled in the defunct +Baronet’s company, on her first journey into +the world some nine years before. How well she remembered +the Inn Yard, and the ostler to whom she refused money, +and the insinuating Cambridge lad who wrapped her +in his coat on the journey! Rawdon took his place +outside, and would have liked to drive, but his grief +forbade him. He sat by the coachman and talked about +horses and the road the whole way; and who kept the +inns, and who horsed the coach by which he had travelled +so many a time, when he and Pitt were boys going to +Eton. At Mudbury a carriage and a pair of horses received +them, with a coachman in black. “It’s +the old drag, Rawdon,” Rebecca said as they +got in. “The worms have eaten the cloth a good +deal-- there’s the stain which Sir Pitt--ha! + I see Dawson the Ironmonger has his shutters up--which +Sir Pitt made such a noise about. It was a bottle +of cherry brandy he broke which we went to fetch for +your aunt from Southampton. How time flies, to be +sure! That can’t be Polly Talboys, that bouncing +girl standing by her mother at the cottage there. + I remember her a mangy little urchin picking weeds +in the garden.”</p> + +<p>“Fine gal,” said Rawdon, returning the +salute which the cottage gave him, by two fingers +applied to his crape hatband. Becky bowed and saluted, +and recognized people here and there graciously. These +recognitions were inexpressibly pleasant to her. It +seemed as if she was not an imposter any more, and +was coming to the home of her ancestors. Rawdon was +rather abashed and cast down, on the other hand. +What recollections of boyhood and innocence might have +been flitting across his brain? What pangs of dim +remorse and doubt and shame?</p> + +<p>“Your sisters must be young women now,” +Rebecca said, thinking of those girls for the first +time perhaps since she had left them.</p> + +<p>“Don’t know, I’m shaw,” replied +the Colonel. “Hullo! here’s old Mother +Lock. How-dy-do, Mrs. Lock? Remember me, don’t +you? Master Rawdon, hey? Dammy how those old women +last; she was a hundred when I was a boy.”</p> + +<p>They were going through the lodge-gates kept by old +Mrs. Lock, whose hand Rebecca insisted upon shaking, +as she flung open the creaking old iron gate, and +the carriage passed between the two moss-grown pillars +surmounted by the dove and serpent.</p> + +<p>“The governor has cut into the timber,” +Rawdon said, looking about, and then was silent--so +was Becky. Both of them were rather agitated, and +thinking of old times. He about Eton, and his mother, +whom he remembered, a frigid demure woman, and a sister +who died, of whom he had been passionately fond; and +how he used to thrash Pitt; and about little Rawdy +at home. And Rebecca thought about her own youth +and the dark secrets of those early tainted days; and +of her entrance into life by yonder gates; and of +Miss Pinkerton, and Joe, and Amelia.</p> + +<p>The gravel walk and terrace had been scraped quite +clean. A grand painted hatchment was already over +the great entrance, and two very solemn and tall personages +in black flung open each a leaf of the door as the +carriage pulled up at the familiar steps. Rawdon turned +red, and Becky somewhat pale, as they passed through +the old hall, arm in arm. She pinched her husband’s +arm as they entered the oak parlour, where Sir Pitt +and his wife were ready to receive them. Sir Pitt +in black, Lady Jane in black, and my Lady Southdown +with a large black head-piece of bugles and feathers, +which waved on her Ladyship’s head like an undertaker’s +tray.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt had judged correctly, that she would not +quit the premises. She contented herself by preserving +a solemn and stony silence, when in company of Pitt +and his rebellious wife, and by frightening the children +in the nursery by the ghastly gloom of her demeanour. +Only a very faint bending of the head-dress and plumes +welcomed Rawdon and his wife, as those prodigals returned +to their family.</p> + +<p>To say the truth, they were not affected very much +one way or other by this coolness. Her Ladyship was +a person only of secondary consideration in their +minds just then--they were intent upon the reception +which the reigning brother and sister would afford +them.</p> + +<p>Pitt, with rather a heightened colour, went up and +shook his brother by the hand, and saluted Rebecca +with a hand-shake and a very low bow. But Lady Jane +took both the hands of her sister-in-law and kissed +her affectionately. The embrace somehow brought tears +into the eyes of the little adventuress--which ornaments, +as we know, she wore very seldom. The artless mark +of kindness and confidence touched and pleased her; +and Rawdon, encouraged by this demonstration on his +sister’s part, twirled up his mustachios and +took leave to salute Lady Jane with a kiss, which caused +her Ladyship to blush exceedingly.</p> + +<p>“Dev’lish nice little woman, Lady Jane,” +was his verdict, when he and his wife were together +again. “Pitt’s got fat, too, and is doing +the thing handsomely.” “He can afford it,” +said Rebecca and agreed in her husband’s farther +opinion “that the mother-in-law was a tremendous +old Guy--and that the sisters were rather well-looking +young women.”</p> + +<p>They, too, had been summoned from school to attend +the funeral ceremonies. It seemed Sir Pitt Crawley, +for the dignity of the house and family, had thought +right to have about the place as many persons in black +as could possibly be assembled. All the men and maids +of the house, the old women of the Alms House, whom +the elder Sir Pitt had cheated out of a great portion +of their due, the parish clerk’s family, and +the special retainers of both Hall and Rectory were +habited in sable; added to these, the undertaker’s +men, at least a score, with crapes and hatbands, and +who made goodly show when the great burying show took +place--but these are mute personages in our drama; +and having nothing to do or say, need occupy a very +little space here.</p> + +<p>With regard to her sisters-in-law Rebecca did not +attempt to forget her former position of Governess +towards them, but recalled it frankly and kindly, +and asked them about their studies with great gravity, +and told them that she had thought of them many and +many a day, and longed to know of their welfare. +In fact you would have supposed that ever since she +had left them she had not ceased to keep them uppermost +in her thoughts and to take the tenderest interest +in their welfare. So supposed Lady Crawley herself +and her young sisters.</p> + +<p>“She’s hardly changed since eight years,” +said Miss Rosalind to Miss Violet, as they were preparing +for dinner.</p> + +<p>“Those red-haired women look wonderfully well,” +replied the other.</p> + +<p>“Hers is much darker than it was; I think she +must dye it,” Miss Rosalind added. “She +is stouter, too, and altogether improved,” continued +Miss Rosalind, who was disposed to be very fat.</p> + +<p>“At least she gives herself no airs and remembers +that she was our Governess once,” Miss Violet +said, intimating that it befitted all governesses +to keep their proper place, and forgetting altogether +that she was granddaughter not only of Sir Walpole +Crawley, but of Mr. Dawson of Mudbury, and so had +a coal-scuttle in her scutcheon. There are other very +well-meaning people whom one meets every day in Vanity +Fair who are surely equally oblivious.</p> + +<p>“It can’t be true what the girls at the +Rectory said, that her mother was an opera-dancer--”</p> + +<p>“A person can’t help their birth,” +Rosalind replied with great liberality. “And +I agree with our brother, that as she is in the family, +of course we are bound to notice her. I am sure Aunt +Bute need not talk; she wants to marry Kate to young +Hooper, the wine-merchant, and absolutely asked him +to come to the Rectory for orders.”</p> + +<p>“I wonder whether Lady Southdown will go away, +she looked very glum upon Mrs. Rawdon,” the +other said.</p> + +<p>“I wish she would. I won’t read the Washerwoman +of Finchley Common,” vowed Violet; and so saying, +and avoiding a passage at the end of which a certain +coffin was placed with a couple of watchers, and lights +perpetually burning in the closed room, these young +women came down to the family dinner, for which the +bell rang as usual.</p> + +<p>But before this, Lady Jane conducted Rebecca to the +apartments prepared for her, which, with the rest +of the house, had assumed a very much improved appearance +of order and comfort during Pitt’s regency, +and here beholding that Mrs. Rawdon’s modest +little trunks had arrived, and were placed in the +bedroom and dressing-room adjoining, helped her to +take off her neat black bonnet and cloak, and asked +her sister-in-law in what more she could be useful.</p> + +<p>“What I should like best,” said Rebecca, +“would be to go to the nursery and see your +dear little children.” On which the two ladies +looked very kindly at each other and went to that apartment +hand in hand.</p> + +<p>Becky admired little Matilda, who was not quite four +years old, as the most charming little love in the +world; and the boy, a little fellow of two years--pale, +heavy-eyed, and large-headed--she pronounced to be +a perfect prodigy in point of size, intelligence, +and beauty.</p> + +<p>“I wish Mamma would not insist on giving him +so much medicine,” Lady Jane said with a sigh. + “I often think we should all be better without +it.” And then Lady Jane and her new-found friend +had one of those confidential medical conversations +about the children, which all mothers, and most women, +as I am given to understand, delight in. Fifty years +ago, and when the present writer, being an interesting +little boy, was ordered out of the room with the ladies +after dinner, I remember quite well that their talk +was chiefly about their ailments; and putting this +question directly to two or three since, I have always +got from them the acknowledgement that times are not +changed. Let my fair readers remark for themselves +this very evening when they quit the dessert-table +and assemble to celebrate the drawing-room mysteries. + Well--in half an hour Becky and Lady Jane were close +and intimate friends--and in the course of the evening +her Ladyship informed Sir Pitt that she thought her +new sister-in-law was a kind, frank, unaffected, and +affectionate young woman.</p> + +<p>And so having easily won the daughter’s good-will, +the indefatigable little woman bent herself to conciliate +the august Lady Southdown. As soon as she found her +Ladyship alone, Rebecca attacked her on the nursery +question at once and said that her own little boy was +saved, actually saved, by calomel, freely administered, +when all the physicians in Paris had given the dear +child up. And then she mentioned how often she had +heard of Lady Southdown from that excellent man the +Reverend Lawrence Grills, Minister of the chapel in +May Fair, which she frequented; and how her views were +very much changed by circumstances and misfortunes; +and how she hoped that a past life spent in worldliness +and error might not incapacitate her from more serious +thought for the future. She described how in former +days she had been indebted to Mr. Crawley for religious +instruction, touched upon the Washerwoman of Finchley +Common, which she had read with the greatest profit, +and asked about Lady Emily, its gifted author, now +Lady Emily Hornblower, at Cape Town, where her husband +had strong hopes of becoming Bishop of Caffraria.</p> + +<p>But she crowned all, and confirmed herself in Lady +Southdown’s favour, by feeling very much agitated +and unwell after the funeral and requesting her Ladyship’s +medical advice, which the Dowager not only gave, but, +wrapped up in a bed-gown and looking more like Lady +Macbeth than ever, came privately in the night to Becky’s +room with a parcel of favourite tracts, and a medicine +of her own composition, which she insisted that Mrs. +Rawdon should take.</p> + +<p>Becky first accepted the tracts and began to examine +them with great interest, engaging the Dowager in +a conversation concerning them and the welfare of +her soul, by which means she hoped that her body might +escape medication. But after the religious topics +were exhausted, Lady Macbeth would not quit Becky’s +chamber until her cup of night-drink was emptied too; +and poor Mrs. Rawdon was compelled actually to assume +a look of gratitude, and to swallow the medicine under +the unyielding old Dowager’s nose, who left her +victim finally with a benediction.</p> + +<p>It did not much comfort Mrs. Rawdon; her countenance +was very queer when Rawdon came in and heard what +had happened; and. his explosions of laughter were +as loud as usual, when Becky, with a fun which she +could not disguise, even though it was at her own expense, +described the occurrence and how she had been victimized +by Lady Southdown. Lord Steyne, and her son in London, +had many a laugh over the story when Rawdon and his +wife returned to their quarters in May Fair. Becky +acted the whole scene for them. She put on a night-cap +and gown. She preached a great sermon in the true +serious manner; she lectured on the virtue of the +medicine which she pretended to administer, with a +gravity of imitation so perfect that you would have +thought it was the Countess’s own Roman nose +through which she snuffled. “Give us Lady Southdown +and the black dose,” was a constant cry amongst +the folks in Becky’s little drawing-room in +May Fair. And for the first time in her life the Dowager +Countess of Southdown was made amusing.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt remembered the testimonies of respect and +veneration which Rebecca had paid personally to himself +in early days, and was tolerably well disposed towards +her. The marriage, ill-advised as it was, had improved +Rawdon very much--that was clear from the Colonel’s +altered habits and demeanour--and had it not been a +lucky union as regarded Pitt himself? The cunning +diplomatist smiled inwardly as he owned that he owed +his fortune to it, and acknowledged that he at least +ought not to cry out against it. His satisfaction +was not removed by Rebecca’s own statements, +behaviour, and conversation.</p> + +<p>She doubled the deference which before had charmed +him, calling out his conversational powers in such +a manner as quite to surprise Pitt himself, who, always +inclined to respect his own talents, admired them +the more when Rebecca pointed them out to him. With +her sister-in-law, Rebecca was satisfactorily able +to prove that it was Mrs. Bute Crawley who brought +about the marriage which she afterwards so calumniated; +that it was Mrs. Bute’s avarice--who hoped to +gain all Miss Crawley’s fortune and deprive Rawdon +of his aunt’s favour--which caused and invented +all the wicked reports against Rebecca. “She +succeeded in making us poor,” Rebecca said with +an air of angelical patience; “but how can I +be angry with a woman who has given me one of the +best husbands in the world? And has not her own avarice +been sufficiently punished by the ruin of her own +hopes and the loss of the property by which she set +so much store? Poor!” she cried. “Dear +Lady Jane, what care we for poverty? I am used to +it from childhood, and I am often thankful that Miss +Crawley’s money has gone to restore the splendour +of the noble old family of which I am so proud to +be a member. I am sure Sir Pitt will make a much +better use of it than Rawdon would.”</p> + +<p>All these speeches were reported to Sir Pitt by the +most faithful of wives, and increased the favourable +impression which Rebecca made; so much so that when, +on the third day after the funeral, the family party +were at dinner, Sir Pitt Crawley, carving fowls at +the head of the table, actually said to Mrs. Rawdon, +“Ahem! Rebecca, may I give you a wing?"--a +speech which made the little woman’s eyes sparkle +with pleasure.</p> + +<p>While Rebecca was prosecuting the above schemes and +hopes, and Pitt Crawley arranging the funeral ceremonial +and other matters connected with his future progress +and dignity, and Lady Jane busy with her nursery, +as far as her mother would let her, and the sun rising +and setting, and the clock-tower bell of the Hall +ringing to dinner and to prayers as usual, the body +of the late owner of Queen’s Crawley lay in +the apartment which he had occupied, watched unceasingly +by the professional attendants who were engaged for +that rite. A woman or two, and three or four undertaker’s +men, the best whom Southampton could furnish, dressed +in black, and of a proper stealthy and tragical demeanour, +had charge of the remains which they watched turn +about, having the housekeeper’s room for their +place of rendezvous when off duty, where they played +at cards in privacy and drank their beer.</p> + +<p>The members of the family and servants of the house +kept away from the gloomy spot, where the bones of +the descendant of an ancient line of knights and gentlemen +lay, awaiting their final consignment to the family +crypt. No regrets attended them, save those of the +poor woman who had hoped to be Sir Pitt’s wife +and widow and who had fled in disgrace from the Hall +over which she had so nearly been a ruler. Beyond +her and a favourite old pointer he had, and between +whom and himself an attachment subsisted during the +period of his imbecility, the old man had not a single +friend to mourn him, having indeed, during the whole +course of his life, never taken the least pains to +secure one. Could the best and kindest of us who depart +from the earth have an opportunity of revisiting it, +I suppose he or she (assuming that any Vanity Fair +feelings subsist in the sphere whither we are bound) +would have a pang of mortification at finding how +soon our survivors were consoled. And so Sir Pitt +was forgotten--like the kindest and best of us--only +a few weeks sooner.</p> + +<p>Those who will may follow his remains to the grave, +whither they were borne on the appointed day, in the +most becoming manner, the family in black coaches, +with their handkerchiefs up to their noses, ready +for the tears which did not come; the undertaker and +his gentlemen in deep tribulation; the select tenantry +mourning out of compliment to the new landlord; the +neighbouring gentry’s carriages at three miles +an hour, empty, and in profound affliction; the parson +speaking out the formula about “our dear brother +departed.” As long as we have a man’s +body, we play our Vanities upon it, surrounding it +with humbug and ceremonies, laying it in state, and +packing it up in gilt nails and velvet; and we finish +our duty by placing over it a stone, written all over +with lies. Bute’s curate, a smart young fellow +from Oxford, and Sir Pitt Crawley composed between +them an appropriate Latin epitaph for the late lamented +Baronet, and the former preached a classical sermon, +exhorting the survivors not to give way to grief and +informing them in the most respectful terms that they +also would be one day called upon to pass that gloomy +and mysterious portal which had just closed upon the +remains of their lamented brother. Then the tenantry +mounted on horseback again, or stayed and refreshed +themselves at the Crawley Arms. Then, after a lunch +in the servants’ hall at Queen’s Crawley, +the gentry’s carriages wheeled off to their different +destinations: then the undertaker’s men, taking +the ropes, palls, velvets, ostrich feathers, and other +mortuary properties, clambered up on the roof of the +hearse and rode off to Southampton. Their faces relapsed +into a natural expression as the horses, clearing +the lodge-gates, got into a brisker trot on the open +road; and squads of them might have been seen, speckling +with black the public-house entrances, with pewter-pots +flashing in the sunshine. Sir Pitt’s invalid +chair was wheeled away into a tool-house in the garden; +the old pointer used to howl sometimes at first, but +these were the only accents of grief which were heard +in the Hall of which Sir Pitt Crawley, Baronet, had +been master for some threescore years.</p> + +<p>As the birds were pretty plentiful, and partridge +shooting is as it were the duty of an English gentleman +of statesmanlike propensities, Sir Pitt Crawley, the +first shock of grief over, went out a little and partook +of that diversion in a white hat with crape round it. +The sight of those fields of stubble and turnips, now +his own, gave him many secret joys. Sometimes, and +with an exquisite humility, he took no gun, but went +out with a peaceful bamboo cane; Rawdon, his big brother, +and the keepers blazing away at his side. Pitt’s +money and acres had a great effect upon his brother. + The penniless Colonel became quite obsequious and +respectful to the head of his house, and despised +the milksop Pitt no longer. Rawdon listened with +sympathy to his senior’s prospects of planting +and draining, gave his advice about the stables and +cattle, rode over to Mudbury to look at a mare, which +he thought would carry Lady Jane, and offered to break +her, &c.: the rebellious dragoon was quite humbled +and subdued, and became a most creditable younger brother. + He had constant bulletins from Miss Briggs in London +respecting little Rawdon, who was left behind there, +who sent messages of his own. “I am very well,” +he wrote. “I hope you are very well. I hope +Mamma is very well. The pony is very well. Grey +takes me to ride in the park. I can canter. I met +the little boy who rode before. He cried when he +cantered. I do not cry.” Rawdon read these letters +to his brother and Lady Jane, who was delighted with +them. The Baronet promised to take charge of the +lad at school, and his kind-hearted wife gave Rebecca +a bank-note, begging her to buy a present with it +for her little nephew.</p> + +<p>One day followed another, and the ladies of the house +passed their life in those calm pursuits and amusements +which satisfy country ladies. Bells rang to meals +and to prayers. The young ladies took exercise on +the pianoforte every morning after breakfast, Rebecca +giving them the benefit of her instruction. Then they +put on thick shoes and walked in the park or shrubberies, +or beyond the palings into the village, descending +upon the cottages, with Lady Southdown’s medicine +and tracts for the sick people there. Lady Southdown +drove out in a pony-chaise, when Rebecca would take +her place by the Dowager’s side and listen to +her solemn talk with the utmost interest. She sang +Handel and Haydn to the family of evenings, and engaged +in a large piece of worsted work, as if she had been +born to the business and as if this kind of life was +to continue with her until she should sink to the +grave in a polite old age, leaving regrets and a great +quantity of consols behind her--as if there were not +cares and duns, schemes, shifts, and poverty waiting +outside the park gates, to pounce upon her when she +issued into the world again.</p> + +<p>“It isn’t difficult to be a country gentleman’s +wife,” Rebecca thought. “I think I could +be a good woman if I had five thousand a year. I +could dawdle about in the nursery and count the apricots +on the wall. I could water plants in a green-house +and pick off dead leaves from the geraniums. I could +ask old women about their rheumatisms and order half-a-crown’s +worth of soup for the poor. I shouldn’t miss +it much, out of five thousand a year. I could even +drive out ten miles to dine at a neighbour’s, +and dress in the fashions of the year before last. +I could go to church and keep awake in the great family +pew, or go to sleep behind the curtains, with my veil +down, if I only had practice. I could pay everybody, +if I had but the money. This is what the conjurors +here pride themselves upon doing. They look down +with pity upon us miserable sinners who have none. + They think themselves generous if they give our children +a five-pound note, and us contemptible if we are without +one.” And who knows but Rebecca was right in +her speculations--and that it was only a question +of money and fortune which made the difference between +her and an honest woman? If you take temptations into +account, who is to say that he is better than his +neighbour? A comfortable career of prosperity, if it +does not make people honest, at least keeps them so. + An alderman coming from a turtle feast will not step +out of his carnage to steal a leg of mutton; but put +him to starve, and see if he will not purloin a loaf. + Becky consoled herself by so balancing the chances +and equalizing the distribution of good and evil in +the world.</p> + +<p>The old haunts, the old fields and woods, the copses, +ponds, and gardens, the rooms of the old house where +she had spent a couple of years seven years ago, were +all carefully revisited by her. She had been young +there, or comparatively so, for she forgot the time +when she ever <i>was</i> young--but she remembered her +thoughts and feelings seven years back and contrasted +them with those which she had at present, now that +she had seen the world, and lived with great people, +and raised herself far beyond her original humble station.</p> + +<p>“I have passed beyond it, because I have brains,” +Becky thought, “and almost all the rest of the +world are fools. I could not go back and consort with +those people now, whom I used to meet in my father’s +studio. Lords come up to my door with stars and garters, +instead of poor artists with screws of tobacco in their +pockets. I have a gentleman for my husband, and an +Earl’s daughter for my sister, in the very house +where I was little better than a servant a few years +ago. But am I much better to do now in the world than +I was when I was the poor painter’s daughter +and wheedled the grocer round the corner for sugar +and tea? Suppose I had married Francis who was so +fond of me--I couldn’t have been much poorer +than I am now. Heigho! I wish I could exchange my +position in society, and all my relations for a snug +sum in the Three Per Cent. Consols”; for so +it was that Becky felt the Vanity of human affairs, +and it was in those securities that she would have +liked to cast anchor.</p> + +<p>It may, perhaps, have struck her that to have been +honest and humble, to have done her duty, and to have +marched straightforward on her way, would have brought +her as near happiness as that path by which she was +striving to attain it. But--just as the children at +Queen’s Crawley went round the room where the +body of their father lay--if ever Becky had these +thoughts, she was accustomed to walk round them and +not look in. She eluded them and despised them--or +at least she was committed to the other path from which +retreat was now impossible. And for my part I believe +that remorse is the least active of all a man’s +moral senses--the very easiest to be deadened when +wakened, and in some never wakened at all. We grieve +at being found out and at the idea of shame or punishment, +but the mere sense of wrong makes very few people +unhappy in Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>So Rebecca, during her stay at Queen’s Crawley, +made as many friends of the Mammon of Unrighteousness +as she could possibly bring under control. Lady Jane +and her husband bade her farewell with the warmest +demonstrations of good-will. They looked forward with +pleasure to the time when, the family house in Gaunt +Street being repaired and beautified, they were to +meet again in London. Lady Southdown made her up +a packet of medicine and sent a letter by her to the +Rev. Lawrence Grills, exhorting that gentleman to +save the brand who “honoured” the letter +from the burning. Pitt accompanied them with four +horses in the carriage to Mudbury, having sent on +their baggage in a cart previously, accompanied with +loads of game.</p> + +<p>“How happy you will be to see your darling little +boy again!” Lady Crawley said, taking leave +of her kinswoman.</p> + +<p>“Oh so happy!” said Rebecca, throwing +up the green eyes. She was immensely happy to be free +of the place, and yet loath to go. Queen’s Crawley +was abominably stupid, and yet the air there was somehow +purer than that which she had been accustomed to breathe. +Everybody had been dull, but had been kind in their +way. “It is all the influence of a long course +of Three Per Cents,” Becky said to herself, +and was right very likely.</p> + +<p>However, the London lamps flashed joyfully as the +stage rolled into Piccadilly, and Briggs had made +a beautiful fire in Curzon Street, and little Rawdon +was up to welcome back his papa and mamma.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Which Treats of the Osborne Family</h4> + +<p>Considerable time has elapsed since we have seen our +respectable friend, old Mr. Osborne of Russell Square. + He has not been the happiest of mortals since last +we met him. Events have occurred which have not improved +his temper, and in more in stances than one he has +not been allowed to have his own way. To be thwarted +in this reasonable desire was always very injurious +to the old gentleman; and resistance became doubly +exasperating when gout, age, loneliness, and the force +of many disappointments combined to weigh him down. + His stiff black hair began to grow quite white soon +after his son’s death; his-face grew redder; +his hands trembled more and more as he poured out +his glass of port wine. He led his clerks a dire +life in the City: his family at home were not much +happier. I doubt if Rebecca, whom we have seen piously +praying for Consols, would have exchanged her poverty +and the dare-devil excitement and chances of her life +for Osborne’s money and the humdrum gloom which +enveloped him. He had proposed for Miss Swartz, but +had been rejected scornfully by the partisans of that +lady, who married her to a young sprig of Scotch nobility. + He was a man to have married a woman out of low life +and bullied her dreadfully afterwards; but no person +presented herself suitable to his taste, and, instead, +he tyrannized over his unmarried daughter, at home. + She had a fine carriage and fine horses and sat at +the head of a table loaded with the grandest plate. + She had a cheque-book, a prize footman to follow +her when she walked, unlimited credit, and bows and +compliments from all the tradesmen, and all the appurtenances +of an heiress; but she spent a woeful time. The little +charity-girls at the Foundling, the sweeperess at +the crossing, the poorest under-kitchen-maid in the +servants’ hall, was happy compared to that unfortunate +and now middle-aged young lady.</p> + +<p>Frederick Bullock, Esq., of the house of Bullock, +Hulker, and Bullock, had married Maria Osborne, not +without a great deal of difficulty and grumbling on +Mr. Bullock’s part. George being dead and cut +out of his father’s will, Frederick insisted +that the half of the old gentleman’s property +should be settled upon his Maria, and indeed, for +a long time, refused, “to come to the scratch” +(it was Mr. Frederick’s own expression) on any +other terms. Osborne said Fred had agreed to take +his daughter with twenty thousand, and he should bind +himself to no more. “Fred might take it, and +welcome, or leave it, and go and be hanged.” +Fred, whose hopes had been raised when George had +been disinherited, thought himself infamously swindled +by the old merchant, and for some time made as if +he would break off the match altogether. Osborne withdrew +his account from Bullock and Hulker’s, went +on ’Change with a horsewhip which he swore he +would lay across the back of a certain scoundrel that +should be nameless, and demeaned himself in his usual +violent manner. Jane Osborne condoled with her sister +Maria during this family feud. “I always told +you, Maria, that it was your money he loved and not +you,” she said, soothingly.</p> + +<p>“He selected me and my money at any rate; he +didn’t choose you and yours,” replied +Maria, tossing up her head.</p> + +<p>The rapture was, however, only temporary. Fred’s +father and senior partners counselled him to take +Maria, even with the twenty thousand settled, half +down, and half at the death of Mr. Osborne, with the +chances of the further division of the property. So +he “knuckled down,” again to use his own +phrase, and sent old Hulker with peaceable overtures +to Osborne. It was his father, he said, who would +not hear of the match, and had made the difficulties; +he was most anxious to keep the engagement. The excuse +was sulkily accepted by Mr. Osborne. Hulker and Bullock +were a high family of the City aristocracy, and connected +with the “nobs” at the West End. It was +something for the old man to be able to say, “My +son, sir, of the house of Hulker, Bullock, and Co., +sir; my daughter’s cousin, Lady Mary Mango, +sir, daughter of the Right Hon. The Earl of Castlemouldy.” +In his imagination he saw his house peopled by the +“nobs.” So he forgave young Bullock and +consented that the marriage should take place.</p> + +<p>It was a grand affair--the bridegroom’s relatives +giving the breakfast, their habitations being near +St. George’s, Hanover Square, where the business +took place. The “nobs of the West End” +were invited, and many of them signed the book. Mr. +Mango and Lady Mary Mango were there, with the dear +young Gwendoline and Guinever Mango as bridesmaids; +Colonel Bludyer of the Dragoon Guards (eldest son +of the house of Bludyer Brothers, Mincing Lane), another +cousin of the bridegroom, and the Honourable Mrs. +Bludyer; the Honourable George Boulter, Lord Levant’s +son, and his lady, Miss Mango that was; Lord Viscount +Castletoddy; Honourable James McMull and Mrs. McMull +(formerly Miss Swartz); and a host of fashionables, +who have all married into Lombard Street and done +a great deal to ennoble Cornhill.</p> + +<p>The young couple had a house near Berkeley Square +and a small villa at Roehampton, among the banking +colony there. Fred was considered to have made rather +a mesalliance by the ladies of his family, whose grandfather +had been in a Charity School, and who were allied +through the husbands with some of the best blood in +England. And Maria was bound, by superior pride and +great care in the composition of her visiting-book, +to make up for the defects of birth, and felt it her +duty to see her father and sister as little as possible.</p> + +<p>That she should utterly break with the old man, who +had still so many scores of thousand pounds to give +away, is absurd to suppose. Fred Bullock would never +allow her to do that. But she was still young and +incapable of hiding her feelings; and by inviting her +papa and sister to her third-rate parties, and behaving +very coldly to them when they came, and by avoiding +Russell Square, and indiscreetly begging her father +to quit that odious vulgar place, she did more harm +than all Frederick’s diplomacy could repair, +and perilled her chance of her inheritance like a +giddy heedless creature as she was.</p> + +<p>“So Russell Square is not good enough for Mrs. +Maria, hay?” said the old gentleman, rattling +up the carriage windows as he and his daughter drove +away one night from Mrs. Frederick Bullock’s, +after dinner. “So she invites her father and +sister to a second day’s dinner (if those sides, +or ontrys, as she calls ’em, weren’t served +yesterday, I’m d--d), and to meet City folks +and littery men, and keeps the Earls and the Ladies, +and the Honourables to herself. Honourables? Damn +Honourables. I am a plain British merchant I am, +and could buy the beggarly hounds over and over. Lords, +indeed!-- why, at one of her swarreys I saw one of +’em speak to a dam fiddler--a fellar I despise. +And they won’t come to Russell Square, won’t +they? Why, I’ll lay my life I’ve got a +better glass of wine, and pay a better figure for +it, and can show a handsomer service of silver, and +can lay a better dinner on my mahogany, than ever they +see on theirs--the cringing, sneaking, stuck-up fools. + Drive on quick, James: I want to get back to Russell +Square--ha, ha!” and he sank back into the corner +with a furious laugh. With such reflections on his +own superior merit, it was the custom of the old gentleman +not unfrequently to console himself.</p> + +<p>Jane Osborne could not but concur in these opinions +respecting her sister’s conduct; and when Mrs. +Frederick’s first-born, Frederick Augustus Howard +Stanley Devereux Bullock, was born, old Osborne, who +was invited to the christening and to be godfather, +contented himself with sending the child a gold cup, +with twenty guineas inside it for the nurse. “That’s +more than any of your Lords will give, <i>I’ll</i> +warrant,” he said and refused to attend at the +ceremony.</p> + +<p>The splendour of the gift, however, caused great satisfaction +to the house of Bullock. Maria thought that her father +was very much pleased with her, and Frederick augured +the best for his little son and heir.</p> + +<p>One can fancy the pangs with which Miss Osborne in +her solitude in Russell Square read the Morning Post, +where her sister’s name occurred every now and +then, in the articles headed “Fashionable Reunions,” +and where she had an opportunity of reading a description +of Mrs. F. Bullock’s costume, when presented +at the drawing room by Lady Frederica Bullock. Jane’s +own life, as we have said, admitted of no such grandeur. + It was an awful existence. She had to get up of black +winter’s mornings to make breakfast for her scowling +old father, who would have turned the whole house +out of doors if his tea had not been ready at half-past +eight. She remained silent opposite to him, listening +to the urn hissing, and sitting in tremor while the +parent read his paper and consumed his accustomed portion +of muffins and tea. At half-past nine he rose and +went to the City, and she was almost free till dinner-time, +to make visitations in the kitchen and to scold the +servants; to drive abroad and descend upon the tradesmen, +who were prodigiously respectful; to leave her cards +and her papa’s at the great glum respectable +houses of their City friends; or to sit alone in the +large drawing-room, expecting visitors; and working +at a huge piece of worsted by the fire, on the sofa, +hard by the great Iphigenia clock, which ticked and +tolled with mournful loudness in the dreary room. + The great glass over the mantelpiece, faced by the +other great console glass at the opposite end of the +room, increased and multiplied between them the brown +Holland bag in which the chandelier hung, until you +saw these brown Holland bags fading away in endless +perspectives, and this apartment of Miss Osborne’s +seemed the centre of a system of drawing-rooms. When +she removed the cordovan leather from the grand piano +and ventured to play a few notes on it, it sounded +with a mournful sadness, startling the dismal echoes +of the house. George’s picture was gone, and +laid upstairs in a lumber-room in the garret; and +though there was a consciousness of him, and father +and daughter often instinctively knew that they were +thinking of him, no mention was ever made of the brave +and once darling son.</p> + +<p>At five o’clock Mr. Osborne came back to his +dinner, which he and his daughter took in silence +(seldom broken, except when he swore and was savage, +if the cooking was not to his liking), or which they +shared twice in a month with a party of dismal friends +of Osborne’s rank and age. Old Dr. Gulp and +his lady from Bloomsbury Square; old Mr. Frowser, +the attorney, from Bedford Row, a very great man, and +from his business, hand-in-glove with the “nobs +at the West End”; old Colonel Livermore, of +the Bombay Army, and Mrs. Livermore, from Upper Bedford +Place; old Sergeant Toffy and Mrs. Toffy; and sometimes +old Sir Thomas Coffin and Lady Coffin, from Bedford +Square. Sir Thomas was celebrated as a hanging judge, +and the particular tawny port was produced when he +dined with Mr. Osborne.</p> + +<p>These people and their like gave the pompous Russell +Square merchant pompous dinners back again. They +had solemn rubbers of whist, when they went upstairs +after drinking, and their carriages were called at +half past ten. Many rich people, whom we poor devils +are in the habit of envying, lead contentedly an existence +like that above described. Jane Osborne scarcely +ever met a man under sixty, and almost the only bachelor +who appeared in their society was Mr. Smirk, the celebrated +ladies’ doctor.</p> + +<p>I can’t say that nothing had occurred to disturb +the monotony of this awful existence: the fact is, +there had been a secret in poor Jane’s life +which had made her father more savage and morose than +even nature, pride, and over-feeding had made him. + This secret was connected with Miss Wirt, who had +a cousin an artist, Mr. Smee, very celebrated since +as a portrait-painter and R.A., but who once was glad +enough to give drawing lessons to ladies of fashion. + Mr. Smee has forgotten where Russell Square is now, +but he was glad enough to visit it in the year 1818, +when Miss Osborne had instruction from him.</p> + +<p>Smee (formerly a pupil of Sharpe of Frith Street, +a dissolute, irregular, and unsuccessful man, but +a man with great knowledge of his art) being the cousin +of Miss Wirt, we say, and introduced by her to Miss +Osborne, whose hand and heart were still free after +various incomplete love affairs, felt a great attachment +for this lady, and it is believed inspired one in +her bosom. Miss Wirt was the confidante of this intrigue. + I know not whether she used to leave the room where +the master and his pupil were painting, in order to +give them an opportunity for exchanging those vows +and sentiments which cannot be uttered advantageously +in the presence of a third party; I know not whether +she hoped that should her cousin succeed in carrying +off the rich merchant’s daughter, he would give +Miss Wirt a portion of the wealth which she had enabled +him to win-- all that is certain is that Mr. Osborne +got some hint of the transaction, came back from the +City abruptly, and entered the drawing-room with his +bamboo cane; found the painter, the pupil, and the +companion all looking exceedingly pale there; turned +the former out of doors with menaces that he would +break every bone in his skin, and half an hour afterwards +dismissed Miss Wirt likewise, kicking her trunks down +the stairs, trampling on her bandboxes, and shaking +his fist at her hackney coach as it bore her away.</p> + +<p>Jane Osborne kept her bedroom for many days. She +was not allowed to have a companion afterwards. Her +father swore to her that she should not have a shilling +of his money if she made any match without his concurrence; +and as he wanted a woman to keep his house, he did +not choose that she should marry, so that she was obliged +to give up all projects with which Cupid had any share. +During her papa’s life, then, she resigned herself +to the manner of existence here described, and was +content to be an old maid. Her sister, meanwhile, +was having children with finer names every year and +the intercourse between the two grew fainter continually. + “Jane and I do not move in the same sphere +of life,” Mrs. Bullock said. “I regard +her as a sister, of course"--which means--what does +it mean when a lady says that she regards Jane as +a sister?</p> + +<p>It has been described how the Misses Dobbin lived +with their father at a fine villa at Denmark Hill, +where there were beautiful graperies and peach-trees +which delighted little Georgy Osborne. The Misses +Dobbin, who drove often to Brompton to see our dear +Amelia, came sometimes to Russell Square too, to pay +a visit to their old acquaintance Miss Osborne. I +believe it was in consequence of the commands of their +brother the Major in India (for whom their papa had +a prodigious respect), that they paid attention to +Mrs. George; for the Major, the godfather and guardian +of Amelia’s little boy, still hoped that the +child’s grandfather might be induced to relent +towards him and acknowledge him for the sake of his +son. The Misses Dobbin kept Miss Osborne acquainted +with the state of Amelia’s affairs; how she +was living with her father and mother; how poor they +were; how they wondered what men, and such men as +their brother and dear Captain Osborne, could find +in such an insignificant little chit; how she was +still, as heretofore, a namby-pamby milk-and-water +affected creature--but how the boy was really the +noblest little boy ever seen--for the hearts of all +women warm towards young children, and the sourest +spinster is kind to them.</p> + +<p>One day, after great entreaties on the part of the +Misses Dobbin, Amelia allowed little George to go +and pass a day with them at Denmark Hill--a part of +which day she spent herself in writing to the Major +in India. She congratulated him on the happy news +which his sisters had just conveyed to her. She prayed +for his prosperity and that of the bride he had chosen. + She thanked him for a thousand thousand kind offices +and proofs of stead fast friendship to her in her +affliction. She told him the last news about little +Georgy, and how he was gone to spend that very day +with his sisters in the country. She underlined the +letter a great deal, and she signed herself affectionately +his friend, Amelia Osborne. She forgot to send any +message of kindness to Lady O’Dowd, as her wont +was--and did not mention Glorvina by name, and only +in italics, as the Major’s <i>bride</i>, for whom +she begged blessings. But the news of the marriage +removed the reserve which she had kept up towards him. + She was glad to be able to own and feel how warmly +and gratefully she regarded him--and as for the idea +of being jealous of Glorvina (Glorvina, indeed!), +Amelia would have scouted it, if an angel from heaven +had hinted it to her. That night, when Georgy came +back in the pony-carriage in which he rejoiced, and +in which he was driven by Sir Wm. Dobbin’s +old coachman, he had round his neck a fine gold chain +and watch. He said an old lady, not pretty, had given +it him, who cried and kissed him a great deal. But +he didn’t like her. He liked grapes very much. + And he only liked his mamma. Amelia shrank and started; +the timid soul felt a presentiment of terror when she +heard that the relations of the child’s father +had seen him.</p> + +<p>Miss Osborne came back to give her father his dinner. + He had made a good speculation in the City, and was +rather in a good humour that day, and chanced to remark +the agitation under which she laboured. “What’s +the matter, Miss Osborne?” he deigned to say.</p> + +<p>The woman burst into tears. “Oh, sir,” +she said, “I’ve seen little George. He +is as beautiful as an angel--and so like him!” +The old man opposite to her did not say a word, but +flushed up and began to tremble in every limb.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which the Reader Has to Double the Cape</h4> + +<p>The astonished reader must be called upon to transport +himself ten thousand miles to the military station +of Bundlegunge, in the Madras division of our Indian +empire, where our gallant old friends of the--th +regiment are quartered under the command of the brave +Colonel, Sir Michael O’Dowd. Time has dealt +kindly with that stout officer, as it does ordinarily +with men who have good stomachs and good tempers and +are not perplexed over much by fatigue of the brain. +The Colonel plays a good knife and fork at tiffin and +resumes those weapons with great success at dinner. + He smokes his hookah after both meals and puffs as +quietly while his wife scolds him as he did under +the fire of the French at Waterloo. Age and heat have +not diminished the activity or the eloquence of the +descendant of the Malonys and the Molloys. Her Ladyship, +our old acquaintance, is as much at home at Madras +as at Brussels in the cantonment as under the tents. + On the march you saw her at the head of the regiment +seated on a royal elephant, a noble sight. Mounted +on that beast, she has been into action with tigers +in the jungle, she has been received by native princes, +who have welcomed her and Glorvina into the recesses +of their zenanas and offered her shawls and jewels +which it went to her heart to refuse. The sentries +of all arms salute her wherever she makes her appearance, +and she touches her hat gravely to their salutation. + Lady O’Dowd is one of the greatest ladies in +the Presidency of Madras--her quarrel with Lady Smith, +wife of Sir Minos Smith the puisne judge, is still +remembered by some at Madras, when the Colonel’s +lady snapped her fingers in the Judge’s lady’s +face and said <i>she’d</i> never walk behind ever +a beggarly civilian. Even now, though it is five-and-twenty +years ago, people remember Lady O’Dowd performing +a jig at Government House, where she danced down two +Aides-de-Camp, a Major of Madras cavalry, and two gentlemen +of the Civil Service; and, persuaded by Major Dobbin, +C.B., second in command of the --th, to retire to +the supper-room, lassata nondum satiata recessit.</p> + +<p>Peggy O’Dowd is indeed the same as ever, kind +in act and thought; impetuous in temper; eager to +command; a tyrant over her Michael; a dragon amongst +all the ladies of the regiment; a mother to all the +young men, whom she tends in their sickness, defends +in all their scrapes, and with whom Lady Peggy is +immensely popular. But the Subalterns’ and +Captains’ ladies (the Major is unmarried) cabal +against her a good deal. They say that Glorvina gives +herself airs and that Peggy herself is ill tolerably +domineering. She interfered with a little congregation +which Mrs. Kirk had got up and laughed the young men +away from her sermons, stating that a soldier’s +wife had no business to be a parson--that Mrs. Kirk +would be much better mending her husband’s clothes; +and, if the regiment wanted sermons, that she had +the finest in the world, those of her uncle, the Dean. +She abruptly put a termination to a flirtation which +Lieutenant Stubble of the regiment had commenced with +the Surgeon’s wife, threatening to come down +upon Stubble for the money which he had borrowed from +her (for the young fellow was still of an extravagant +turn) unless he broke off at once and went to the Cape +on sick leave. On the other hand, she housed and +sheltered Mrs. Posky, who fled from her bungalow one +night, pursued by her infuriate husband, wielding +his second brandy bottle, and actually carried Posky +through the delirium tremens and broke him of the habit +of drinking, which had grown upon that officer, as +all evil habits will grow upon men. In a word, in +adversity she was the best of comforters, in good +fortune the most troublesome of friends, having a perfectly +good opinion of herself always and an indomitable resolution +to have her own way.</p> + +<p>Among other points, she had made up her mind that +Glorvina should marry our old friend Dobbin. Mrs. +O’Dowd knew the Major’s expectations and +appreciated his good qualities and the high character +which he enjoyed in his profession. Glorvina, a very +handsome, fresh-coloured, black-haired, blue-eyed young +lady, who could ride a horse, or play a sonata with +any girl out of the County Cork, seemed to be the +very person destined to insure Dobbin’s happiness--much +more than that poor good little weak-spur’ted +Amelia, about whom he used to take on so.--"Look at +Glorvina enter a room,” Mrs. O’Dowd would +say, “and compare her with that poor Mrs. Osborne, +who couldn’t say boo to a goose. She’d +be worthy of you, Major--you’re a quiet man +yourself, and want some one to talk for ye. And though +she does not come of such good blood as the Malonys + or Molloys, let me tell ye, she’s of an ancient +family that any nobleman might be proud to marry into.”</p> + +<p>But before she had come to such a resolution and determined +to subjugate Major Dobbin by her endearments, it must +be owned that Glorvina had practised them a good deal +elsewhere. She had had a season in Dublin, and who +knows how many in Cork, Killarney, and Mallow? She +had flirted with all the marriageable officers whom +the depots of her country afforded, and all the bachelor +squires who seemed eligible. She had been engaged +to be married a half-score times in Ireland, besides +the clergyman at Bath who used her so ill. She had +flirted all the way to Madras with the Captain and +chief mate of the Ramchunder East Indiaman, and had +a season at the Presidency with her brother and Mrs. +O’Dowd, who was staying there, while the Major +of the regiment was in command at the station. Everybody +admired her there; everybody danced with her; but no +one proposed who was worth the marrying--one or two +exceedingly young subalterns sighed after her, and +a beardless civilian or two, but she rejected these +as beneath her pretensions--and other and younger +virgins than Glorvina were married before her. There +are women, and handsome women too, who have this fortune +in life. They fall in love with the utmost generosity; +they ride and walk with half the Army-list, though +they draw near to forty, and yet the Misses O’Grady +are the Misses O’Grady still: Glorvina persisted +that but for Lady O’Dowd’s unlucky quarrel +with the Judge’s lady, she would have made a +good match at Madras, where old Mr. Chutney, who was +at the head of the civil service (and who afterwards +married Miss Dolby, a young lady only thirteen years +of age who had just arrived from school in Europe), +was just at the point of proposing to her.</p> + +<p>Well, although Lady O’Dowd and Glorvina quarrelled +a great number of times every day, and upon almost +every conceivable subject--indeed, if Mick O’Dowd +had not possessed the temper of an angel two such +women constantly about his ears would have driven him +out of his senses--yet they agreed between themselves +on this point, that Glorvina should marry Major Dobbin, +and were determined that the Major should have no +rest until the arrangement was brought about. Undismayed +by forty or fifty previous defeats, Glorvina laid siege +to him. She sang Irish melodies at him unceasingly. + She asked him so frequently and pathetically, Will +ye come to the bower? that it is a wonder how any +man of feeling could have resisted the invitation. + She was never tired of inquiring, if Sorrow had his +young days faded, and was ready to listen and weep +like Desdemona at the stories of his dangers and his +campaigns. It has been said that our honest and dear +old friend used to perform on the flute in private; +Glorvina insisted upon having duets with him, and Lady +O’Dowd would rise and artlessly quit the room +when the young couple were so engaged. Glorvina forced +the Major to ride with her of mornings. The whole +cantonment saw them set out and return. She was constantly +writing notes over to him at his house, borrowing his +books, and scoring with her great pencil-marks such +passages of sentiment or humour as awakened her sympathy. + She borrowed his horses, his servants, his spoons, +and palanquin--no wonder that public rumour assigned +her to him, and that the Major’s sisters in +England should fancy they were about to have a sister-in-law.</p> + +<p>Dobbin, who was thus vigorously besieged, was in the +meanwhile in a state of the most odious tranquillity. + He used to laugh when the young fellows of the regiment +joked him about Glorvina’s manifest attentions +to him. “Bah!” said he, “she is only +keeping her hand in--she practises upon me as she +does upon Mrs. Tozer’s piano, because it’s +the most handy instrument in the station. I am much +too battered and old for such a fine young lady as +Glorvina.” And so he went on riding with her, +and copying music and verses into her albums, and +playing at chess with her very submissively; for it +is with these simple amusements that some officers +in India are accustomed to while away their leisure +moments, while others of a less domestic turn hunt +hogs, and shoot snipes, or gamble and smoke cheroots, +and betake themselves to brandy-and-water. As for +Sir Michael O’Dowd, though his lady and her +sister both urged him to call upon the Major to explain +himself and not keep on torturing a poor innocent +girl in that shameful way, the old soldier refused +point-blank to have anything to do with the conspiracy. + “Faith, the Major’s big enough to choose +for himself,” Sir Michael said; “he’ll +ask ye when he wants ye”; or else he would turn +the matter off jocularly, declaring that “Dobbin +was too young to keep house, and had written home +to ask lave of his mamma.” Nay, he went farther, +and in private communications with his Major would +caution and rally him, crying, “Mind your oi, +Dob, my boy, them girls is bent on mischief--me Lady +has just got a box of gowns from Europe, and there’s +a pink satin for Glorvina, which will finish ye, Dob, +if it’s in the power of woman or satin to move +ye.”</p> + +<p>But the truth is, neither beauty nor fashion could +conquer him. Our honest friend had but one idea of +a woman in his head, and that one did not in the least +resemble Miss Glorvina O’Dowd in pink satin. + A gentle little woman in black, with large eyes and +brown hair, seldom speaking, save when spoken to, +and then in a voice not the least resembling Miss +Glorvina’s--a soft young mother tending an infant +and beckoning the Major up with a smile to look at +him--a rosy-cheeked lass coming singing into the +room in Russell Square or hanging on George Osborne’s +arm, happy and loving--there was but this image that +filled our honest Major’s mind, by day and by +night, and reigned over it always. Very likely Amelia +was not like the portrait the Major had formed of +her: there was a figure in a book of fashions which +his sisters had in England, and with which William +had made away privately, pasting it into the lid of +his desk, and fancying he saw some resemblance to +Mrs. Osborne in the print, whereas I have seen it, +and can vouch that it is but the picture of a high-waisted +gown with an impossible doll’s face simpering +over it--and, perhaps, Mr. Dobbin’s sentimental +Amelia was no more like the real one than this absurd +little print which he cherished. But what man in +love, of us, is better informed?--or is he much happier +when he sees and owns his delusion? Dobbin was under +this spell. He did not bother his friends and the +public much about his feelings, or indeed lose his +natural rest or appetite on account of them. His +head has grizzled since we saw him last, and a line +or two of silver may be seen in the soft brown hair +likewise. But his feelings are not in the least changed +or oldened, and his love remains as fresh as a man’s +recollections of boyhood are.</p> + +<p>We have said how the two Misses Dobbin and Amelia, +the Major’s correspondents in Europe, wrote +him letters from England, Mrs. Osborne congratulating +him with great candour and cordiality upon his approaching +nuptials with Miss O’Dowd. “Your sister +has just kindly visited me,” Amelia wrote in +her letter, “and informed me of an <i>interesting event</i>, upon which I beg to offer my <i>most sincere congratulations</i>. I hope the young +lady to whom I hear you are to be <i>united</i> will +in every respect prove worthy of one who is himself +all kindness and goodness. The poor widow has only +her prayers to offer and her cordial cordial wishes +for <i>your prosperity</i>! Georgy sends his love +to <i>his dear godpapa</i> and hopes that you +will not forget him. I tell him that you are about +to form <i>other ties</i>, with one who I am sure +merits <i>all your affection</i>, but that, +although such ties must of course be the strongest +and most sacred, and supersede <i>all others</i>, +yet that I am sure the widow and the child whom you +have ever protected and loved will always <i>have</i> +A <i>corner in your heart</i>” The +letter, which has been before alluded to, went on in +this strain, protesting throughout as to the extreme +satisfaction of the writer.</p> + +<p>This letter, .which arrived by the very same ship +which brought out Lady O’Dowd’s box of +millinery from London (and which you may be sure Dobbin +opened before any one of the other packets which the +mail brought him), put the receiver into such a state +of mind that Glorvina, and her pink satin, and everything +belonging to her became perfectly odious to him. +The Major cursed the talk of women, and the sex in +general. Everything annoyed him that day--the parade +was insufferably hot and wearisome. Good heavens! +was a man of intellect to waste his life, day after +day, inspecting cross-belts and putting fools through +their manoeuvres? The senseless chatter of the young +men at mess was more than ever jarring. What cared +he, a man on the high road to forty, to know how many +snipes Lieutenant Smith had shot, or what were the +performances of Ensign Brown’s mare? The jokes +about the table filled him with shame. He was too +old to listen to the banter of the assistant surgeon +and the slang of the youngsters, at which old O’Dowd, +with his bald head and red face, laughed quite easily. + The old man had listened to those jokes any time +these thirty years--Dobbin himself had been fifteen +years hearing them. And after the boisterous dulness +of the mess-table, the quarrels and scandal of the +ladies of the regiment! It was unbearable, shameful. + “O Amelia, Amelia,” he thought, “you +to whom I have been so faithful--you reproach me! + It is because you cannot feel for me that I drag +on this wearisome life. And you reward me after years +of devotion by giving me your blessing upon my marriage, +forsooth, with this flaunting Irish girl!” Sick +and sorry felt poor William; more than ever wretched +and lonely. He would like to have done with life +and its vanity altogether--so bootless and unsatisfactory +the struggle, so cheerless and dreary the prospect +seemed to him. He lay all that night sleepless, and +yearning to go home. Amelia’s letter had fallen +as a blank upon him. No fidelity, no constant truth +and passion, could move her into warmth. She would +not see that he loved her. Tossing in his bed, he +spoke out to her. “Good God, Amelia!” +he said, “don’t you know that I only love +you in the world--you, who are a stone to me--you, +whom I tended through months and months of illness +and grief, and who bade me farewell with a smile on +your face, and forgot me before the door shut between +us!” The native servants lying outside his verandas +beheld with wonder the Major, so cold and quiet ordinarily, +at present so passionately moved and cast down. Would +she have pitied him had she seen him? He read over +and over all the letters which he ever had from her--letters +of business relative to the little property which +he had made her believe her husband had left to her-- +brief notes of invitation--every scrap of writing that +she had ever sent to him--how cold, how kind, how +hopeless, how selfish they were!</p> + +<p>Had there been some kind gentle soul near at hand +who could read and appreciate this silent generous +heart, who knows but that the reign of Amelia might +have been over, and that friend William’s love +might have flowed into a kinder channel? But there +was only Glorvina of the jetty ringlets with whom +his intercourse was familiar, and this dashing young +woman was not bent upon loving the Major, but rather +on making the Major admire <i>her</i>--a most vain and +hopeless task, too, at least considering the means +that the poor girl possessed to carry it out. She +curled her hair and showed her shoulders at him, as +much as to say, did ye ever see such jet ringlets and +such a complexion? She grinned at him so that he might +see that every tooth in her head was sound--and he +never heeded all these charms. Very soon after the +arrival of the box of millinery, and perhaps indeed +in honour of it, Lady O’Dowd and the ladies of +the King’s Regiment gave a ball to the Company’s +Regiments and the civilians at the station. Glorvina +sported the killing pink frock, and the Major, who +attended the party and walked very ruefully up and +down the rooms, never so much as perceived the pink +garment. Glorvina danced past him in a fury with all +the young subalterns of the station, and the Major +was not in the least jealous of her performance, or +angry because Captain Bangles of the Cavalry handed +her to supper. It was not jealousy, or frocks, or +shoulders that could move him, and Glorvina had nothing +more.</p> + +<p>So these two were each exemplifying the Vanity of +this life, and each longing for what he or she could +not get. Glorvina cried with rage at the failure. + She had set her mind on the Major “more than +on any of the others,” she owned, sobbing. “He’ll +break my heart, he will, Peggy,” she would whimper +to her sister-in-law when they were good friends; +“sure every one of me frocks must be taken in-- +it’s such a skeleton I’m growing.” +Fat or thin, laughing or melancholy, on horseback +or the music-stool, it was all the same to the Major. + And the Colonel, puffing his pipe and listening to +these complaints, would suggest that Glory should +have some black frocks out in the next box from London, +and told a mysterious story of a lady in Ireland who +died of grief for the loss of her husband before she +got ere a one.</p> + +<p>While the Major was going on in this tantalizing way, +not proposing, and declining to fall in love, there +came another ship from Europe bringing letters on +board, and amongst them some more for the heartless +man. These were home letters bearing an earlier postmark +than that of the former packets, and as Major Dobbin +recognized among his the handwriting of his sister, +who always crossed and recrossed her letters to her +brother--gathered together all the possible bad news +which she could collect, abused him and read him lectures +with sisterly frankness, and always left him miserable +for the day after “dearest William” had +achieved the perusal of one of her epistles--the truth +must be told that dearest William did not hurry himself +to break the seal of Miss Dobbin’s letter, but +waited for a particularly favourable day and mood +for doing so. A fortnight before, moreover, he had +written to scold her for telling those absurd stories +to Mrs. Osborne, and had despatched a letter in reply +to that lady, undeceiving her with respect to the reports +concerning him and assuring her that “he had +no sort of present intention of altering his condition.”</p> + +<p>Two or three nights after the arrival of the second +package of letters, the Major had passed the evening +pretty cheerfully at Lady O’Dowd’s house, +where Glorvina thought that he listened with rather +more attention than usual to the Meeting of the Wathers, +the Minsthrel Boy, and one or two other specimens +of song with which she favoured him (the truth is, +he was no more listening to Glorvina than to the howling +of the jackals in the moonlight outside, and the delusion +was hers as usual), and having played his game at chess +with her (cribbage with the surgeon was Lady O’Dowd’s +favourite evening pastime), Major Dobbin took leave +of the Colonel’s family at his usual hour and +retired to his own house.</p> + +<p>There on his table, his sister’s letter lay +reproaching him. He took it up, ashamed rather of +his negligence regarding it, and prepared himself +for a disagreeable hour’s communing with that +crabbed-handed absent relative. . . . It may have +been an hour after the Major’s departure from +the Colonel’s house--Sir Michael was sleeping +the sleep of the just; Glorvina had arranged her black +ringlets in the innumerable little bits of paper, in +which it was her habit to confine them; Lady O’Dowd, +too, had gone to her bed in the nuptial chamber, on +the ground-floor, and had tucked her musquito curtains +round her fair form, when the guard at the gates of +the Commanding-Officer’s compound beheld Major +Dobbin, in the moonlight, rushing towards the house +with a swift step and a very agitated countenance, +and he passed the sentinel and went up to the windows +of the Colonel’s bedchamber.</p> + +<p>“O’Dowd--Colonel!” said Dobbin and +kept up a great shouting.</p> + +<p>“Heavens, Meejor!” said Glorvina of the +curl-papers, putting out her head too, from her window.</p> + +<p>“What is it, Dob, me boy?” said the Colonel, +expecting there was a fire in the station, or that +the route had come from headquarters.</p> + +<p>“I--I must have leave of absence. I must go +to England--on the most urgent private affairs,” +Dobbin said.</p> + +<p>“Good heavens, what has happened!” thought +Glorvina, trembling with all the papillotes.</p> + +<p>“I want to be off--now--to-night,” Dobbin +continued; and the Colonel getting up, came out to +parley with him.</p> + +<p>In the postscript of Miss Dobbin’s cross-letter, +the Major had just come upon a paragraph, to the following +effect:--"I drove yesterday to see your old <i>acquaintance</i>, +Mrs. Osborne. The wretched place they live at, since +they were bankrupts, you know--Mr. S., to judge from +a <i>brass plate</i> on the door of his hut (it +is little better) is a coal-merchant. The little +boy, your godson, is certainly a fine child, though +forward, and inclined to be saucy and self-willed. +But we have taken notice of him as you wish it, and +have introduced him to his aunt, Miss O., who was +rather pleased with him. Perhaps his grandpapa, not +the bankrupt one, who is almost doting, but Mr. Osborne, +of Russell Square, may be induced to relent towards +the child of your friend, <i>his</i> ERRING <i>and self</i>-<i>willed son</i>. And Amelia will not +be ill-disposed to give him up. The widow is <i>consoled</i>, +and is about to marry a reverend gentleman, the Rev. + Mr. Binny, one of the curates of Brompton. A poor +match. But Mrs. O. is getting old, and I saw a great +deal of grey in her hair--she was in very good spirits: + and your little godson overate himself at our house. +Mamma sends her love with that of your affectionate, +Ann Dobbin.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLIV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Round</h4>-about Chapter between London and Hampshire + +<p>Our old friends the Crawleys’ family house, +in Great Gaunt Street, still bore over its front the +hatchment which had been placed there as a token of +mourning for Sir Pitt Crawley’s demise, yet this +heraldic emblem was in itself a very splendid and gaudy +piece of furniture, and all the rest of the mansion +became more brilliant than it had ever been during +the late baronet’s reign. The black outer-coating +of the bricks was removed, and they appeared with a +cheerful, blushing face streaked with white: the old +bronze lions of the knocker were gilt handsomely, +the railings painted, and the dismallest house in +Great Gaunt Street became the smartest in the whole +quarter, before the green leaves in Hampshire had replaced +those yellowing ones which were on the trees in Queen’s +Crawley Avenue when old Sir Pitt Crawley passed under +them for the last time.</p> + +<p>A little woman, with a carriage to correspond, was +perpetually seen about this mansion; an elderly spinster, +accompanied by a little boy, also might be remarked +coming thither daily. It was Miss Briggs and little +Rawdon, whose business it was to see to the inward +renovation of Sir Pitt’s house, to superintend +the female band engaged in stitching the blinds and +hangings, to poke and rummage in the drawers and cupboards +crammed with the dirty relics and congregated trumperies +of a couple of generations of Lady Crawleys, and to +take inventories of the china, the glass, and other +properties in the closets and store-rooms.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Rawdon Crawley was general-in-chief over these +arrangements, with full orders from Sir Pitt to sell, +barter, confiscate, or purchase furniture, and she +enjoyed herself not a little in an occupation which +gave full scope to her taste and ingenuity. The renovation +of the house was determined upon when Sir Pitt came +to town in November to see his lawyers, and when he +passed nearly a week in Curzon Street, under the roof +of his affectionate brother and sister.</p> + +<p>He had put up at an hotel at first, but, Becky, as +soon as she heard of the Baronet’s arrival, +went off alone to greet him, and returned in an hour +to Curzon Street with Sir Pitt in the carriage by her +side. It was impossible sometimes to resist this artless +little creature’s hospitalities, so kindly were +they pressed, so frankly and amiably offered. Becky +seized Pitt’s hand in a transport of gratitude +when he agreed to come. “Thank you,” she +said, squeezing it and looking into the Baronet’s +eyes, who blushed a good deal; “how happy this +will make Rawdon!” She bustled up to Pitt’s +bedroom, leading on the servants, who were carrying +his trunks thither. She came in herself laughing, +with a coal-scuttle out of her own room.</p> + +<p>A fire was blazing already in Sir Pitt’s apartment +(it was Miss Briggs’s room, by the way, who +was sent upstairs to sleep with the maid). “I +knew I should bring you,” she said with pleasure +beaming in her glance. Indeed, she was really sincerely +happy at having him for a guest.</p> + +<p>Becky made Rawdon dine out once or twice on business, +while Pitt stayed with them, and the Baronet passed +the happy evening alone with her and Briggs. She +went downstairs to the kitchen and actually cooked +little dishes for him. “Isn’t it a good +salmi?” she said; “I made it for you. + I can make you better dishes than that, and will +when you come to see me.”</p> + +<p>“Everything you do, you do well,” said +the Baronet gallantly. “The salmi is excellent +indeed.”</p> + +<p>“A poor man’s wife,” Rebecca replied +gaily, “must make herself useful, you know”; +on which her brother-in-law vowed that “she was +fit to be the wife of an Emperor, and that to be skilful +in domestic duties was surely one of the most charming +of woman’s qualities.” And Sir Pitt thought, +with something like mortification, of Lady Jane at +home, and of a certain pie which she had insisted on +making, and serving to him at dinner--a most abominable +pie.</p> + +<p>Besides the salmi, which was made of Lord Steyne’s +pheasants from his lordship’s cottage of Stillbrook, +Becky gave her brother-in-law a bottle of white wine, +some that Rawdon had brought with him from France, +and had picked up for nothing, the little story-teller +said; whereas the liquor was, in truth, some White +Hermitage from the Marquis of Steyne’s famous +cellars, which brought fire into the Baronet’s +pallid cheeks and a glow into his feeble frame.</p> + +<p>Then when he had drunk up the bottle of petit vin +blanc, she gave him her hand, and took him up to the +drawing-room, and made him snug on the sofa by the +fire, and let him talk as she listened with the tenderest +kindly interest, sitting by him, and hemming a shirt +for her dear little boy. Whenever Mrs. Rawdon wished +to be particularly humble and virtuous, this little +shirt used to come out of her work-box. It had got +to be too small for Rawdon long before it was finished.</p> + +<p>Well, Rebecca listened to Pitt, she talked to him, +she sang to him, she coaxed him, and cuddled him, +so that he found himself more and more glad every +day to get back from the lawyer’s at Gray’s +Inn, to the blazing fire in Curzon Street--a gladness +in which the men of law likewise participated, for +Pitt’s harangues were of the longest--and so +that when he went away he felt quite a pang at departing. +How pretty she looked kissing her hand to him from +the carriage and waving her handkerchief when he had +taken his place in the mail! She put the handkerchief +to her eyes once. He pulled his sealskin cap over +his, as the coach drove away, and, sinking back, he +thought to himself how she respected him and how he +deserved it, and how Rawdon was a foolish dull fellow +who didn’t half-appreciate his wife; and how +mum and stupid his own wife was compared to that brilliant +little Becky. Becky had hinted every one of these +things herself, perhaps, but so delicately and gently +that you hardly knew when or where. And, before they +parted, it was agreed that the house in London should +be redecorated for the next season, and that the brothers’ +families should meet again in the country at Christmas.</p> + +<p>“I wish you could have got a little money out +of him,” Rawdon said to his wife moodily when +the Baronet was gone. “I should like to give +something to old Raggles, hanged if I shouldn’t. + It ain’t right, you know, that the old fellow +should be kept out of all his money. It may be inconvenient, +and he might let to somebody else besides us, you +know.”</p> + +<p>“Tell him,” said Becky, “that as +soon as Sir Pitt’s affairs are settled, everybody +will be paid, and give him a little something on account. + Here’s a cheque that Pitt left for the boy,” +and she took from her bag and gave her husband a paper +which his brother had handed over to her, on behalf +of the little son and heir of the younger branch of +the Crawleys.</p> + +<p>The truth is, she had tried personally the ground +on which her husband expressed a wish that she should +venture--tried it ever so delicately, and found it +unsafe. Even at a hint about embarrassments, Sir Pitt +Crawley was off and alarmed. And he began a long +speech, explaining how straitened he himself was in +money matters; how the tenants would not pay; how +his father’s affairs, and the expenses attendant +upon the demise of the old gentleman, had involved +him; how he wanted to pay off incumbrances; and how +the bankers and agents were overdrawn; and Pitt Crawley +ended by making a compromise with his sister-in-law +and giving her a very small sum for the benefit of +her little boy.</p> + +<p>Pitt knew how poor his brother and his brother’s +family must be. It could not have escaped the notice +of such a cool and experienced old diplomatist that +Rawdon’s family had nothing to live upon, and +that houses and carriages are not to be kept for nothing. + He knew very well that he was the proprietor or appropriator +of the money, which, according to all proper calculation, +ought to have fallen to his younger brother, and he +had, we may be sure, some secret pangs of remorse +within him, which warned him that he ought to perform +some act of justice, or, let us say, compensation, +towards these disappointed relations. A just, decent +man, not without brains, who said his prayers, and +knew his catechism, and did his duty outwardly through +life, he could not be otherwise than aware that something +was due to his brother at his hands, and that morally +he was Rawdon’s debtor.</p> + +<p>But, as one reads in the columns of the Times newspaper +every now and then, queer announcements from the Chancellor +of the Exchequer, acknowledging the receipt of 50 +pounds from A. B., or 10 pounds from W. T., as conscience-money, +on account of taxes due by the said A. B. or W. + T., which payments the penitents beg the Right Honourable +gentleman to acknowledge through the medium of the +public press--so is the Chancellor no doubt, and the +reader likewise, always perfectly sure that the above-named +A. B. and W. T. are only paying a very small instalment +of what they really owe, and that the man who sends +up a twenty-pound note has very likely hundreds or +thousands more for which he ought to account. Such, +at least, are my feelings, when I see A. B. or W. + T.’s insufficient acts of repentance. And +I have no doubt that Pitt Crawley’s contrition, +or kindness if you will, towards his younger brother, +by whom he had so much profited, was only a very small +dividend upon the capital sum in which he was indebted +to Rawdon. Not everybody is willing to pay even so +much. To part with money is a sacrifice beyond almost +all men endowed with a sense of order. There is scarcely +any man alive who does not think himself meritorious +for giving his neighbour five pounds. Thriftless +gives, not from a beneficent pleasure in giving, but +from a lazy delight in spending. He would not deny +himself one enjoyment; not his opera-stall, not his +horse, not his dinner, not even the pleasure of giving +Lazarus the five pounds. Thrifty, who is good, wise, +just, and owes no man a penny, turns from a beggar, +haggles with a hackney-coachman, or denies a poor +relation, and I doubt which is the most selfish of +the two. Money has only a different value in the +eyes of each.</p> + +<p>So, in a word, Pitt Crawley thought he would do something +for his brother, and then thought that he would think +about it some other time.</p> + +<p>And with regard to Becky, she was not a woman who +expected too much from the generosity of her neighbours, +and so was quite content with all that Pitt Crawley +had done for her. She was acknowledged by the head +of the family. If Pitt would not give her anything, +he would get something for her some day. If she got +no money from her brother-in-law, she got what was +as good as money--credit. Raggles was made rather +easy in his mind by the spectacle of the union between +the brothers, by a small payment on the spot, and by +the promise of a much larger sum speedily to be assigned +to him. And Rebecca told Miss Briggs, whose Christmas +dividend upon the little sum lent by her Becky paid +with an air of candid joy, and as if her exchequer +was brimming over with gold--Rebecca, we say, told +Miss Briggs, in strict confidence that she had conferred +with Sir Pitt, who was famous as a financier, on Briggs’s +special behalf, as to the most profitable investment +of Miss B.’s remaining capital; that Sir Pitt, +after much consideration, had thought of a most safe +and advantageous way in which Briggs could lay out +her money; that, being especially interested in her +as an attached friend of the late Miss Crawley, and +of the whole family, and that long before he left +town, he had recommended that she should be ready with +the money at a moment’s notice, so as to purchase +at the most favourable opportunity the shares which +Sir Pitt had in his eye. Poor Miss Briggs was very +grateful for this mark of Sir Pitt’s attention--it +came so unsolicited, she said, for she never should +have thought of removing the money from the funds--and +the delicacy enhanced the kindness of the office; +and she promised to see her man of business immediately +and be ready with her little cash at the proper hour.</p> + +<p>And this worthy woman was so grateful for the kindness +of Rebecca in the matter, and for that of her generous +benefactor, the Colonel, that she went out and spent +a great part of her half-year’s dividend in +the purchase of a black velvet coat for little Rawdon, +who, by the way, was grown almost too big for black +velvet now, and was of a size and age befitting him +for the assumption of the virile jacket and pantaloons.</p> + +<p>He was a fine open-faced boy, with blue eyes and waving +flaxen hair, sturdy in limb, but generous and soft +in heart, fondly attaching himself to all who were +good to him--to the pony--to Lord Southdown, who gave +him the horse (he used to blush and glow all over when +he saw that kind young nobleman)--to the groom who +had charge of the pony--to Molly, the cook, who crammed +him with ghost stories at night, and with good things +from the dinner--to Briggs, whom he plagued and laughed +at--and to his father especially, whose attachment +towards the lad was curious too to witness. Here, +as he grew to be about eight years old, his attachments +may be said to have ended. The beautiful mother-vision +had faded away after a while. During near two years +she had scarcely spoken to the child. She disliked +him. He had the measles and the hooping-cough. He +bored her. One day when he was standing at the landing-place, +having crept down from the upper regions, attracted +by the sound of his mother’s voice, who was +singing to Lord Steyne, the drawing room door opening +suddenly, discovered the little spy, who but a moment +before had been rapt in delight, and listening to the +music.</p> + +<p>His mother came out and struck him violently a couple +of boxes on the ear. He heard a laugh from the Marquis +in the inner room (who was amused by this free and +artless exhibition of Becky’s temper) and fled +down below to his friends of the kitchen, bursting +in an agony of grief.</p> + +<p>“It is not because it hurts me,” little +Rawdon gasped out--"only-- only"--sobs and tears wound +up the sentence in a storm. It was the little boy’s +heart that was bleeding. “Why mayn’t I +hear her singing? Why don’t she ever sing to +me--as she does to that baldheaded man with the large +teeth?” He gasped out at various intervals these +exclamations of rage and grief. The cook looked at +the housemaid, the housemaid looked knowingly at the +footman--the awful kitchen inquisition which sits +in judgement in every house and knows everything--sat +on Rebecca at that moment.</p> + +<p>After this incident, the mother’s dislike increased +to hatred; the consciousness that the child was in +the house was a reproach and a pain to her. His very +sight annoyed her. Fear, doubt, and resistance sprang +up, too, in the boy’s own bosom. They were +separated from that day of the boxes on the ear.</p> + +<p>Lord Steyne also heartily disliked the boy. When +they met by mischance, he made sarcastic bows or remarks +to the child, or glared at him with savage-looking +eyes. Rawdon used to stare him in the face and double +his little fists in return. He knew his enemy, and +this gentleman, of all who came to the house, was the +one who angered him most. One day the footman found +him squaring his fists at Lord Steyne’s hat +in the hall. The footman told the circumstance as +a good joke to Lord Steyne’s coachman; that officer +imparted it to Lord Steyne’s gentleman, and +to the servants’ hall in general. And very soon +afterwards, when Mrs. Rawdon Crawley made her appearance +at Gaunt House, the porter who unbarred the gates, +the servants of all uniforms in the hall, the functionaries +in white waistcoats, who bawled out from landing to +landing the names of Colonel and Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, +knew about her, or fancied they did. The man who brought +her refreshment and stood behind her chair, had talked +her character over with the large gentleman in motley-coloured +clothes at his side. Bon Dieu! it is awful, that servants’ +inquisition! You see a woman in a great party in a +splendid saloon, surrounded by faithful admirers, +distributing sparkling glances, dressed to perfection, +curled, rouged, smiling and happy--Discovery walks +respectfully up to her, in the shape of a huge powdered +man with large calves and a tray of ices--with Calumny +(which is as fatal as truth) behind him, in the shape +of the hulking fellow carrying the wafer-biscuits. + Madam, your secret will be talked over by those men +at their club at the public-house to-night. Jeames +will tell Chawles his notions about you over their +pipes and pewter beer-pots. Some people ought to +have mutes for servants in Vanity Fair--mutes who +could not write. If you are guilty, tremble. That +fellow behind your chair may be a Janissary with a +bow-string in his plush breeches pocket. If you are +not guilty, have a care of appearances, which are +as ruinous as guilt.</p> + +<p>“Was Rebecca guilty or not?” the Vehmgericht +of tho servants’ hall had pronounced against +her.</p> + +<p>And, I shame to say, she would not have got credit +had they not believed her to be guilty. It was the +sight of the Marquis of Steyne’s carriage-lamps +at her door, contemplated by Raggles, burning in the +blackness of midnight, “that kep him up,” +as he afterwards said, that even more than Rebecca’s +arts and coaxings.</p> + +<p>And so--guiltless very likely--she was writhing and +pushing onward towards what they call “a position +in society,” and the servants were pointing +at her as lost and ruined. So you see Molly, the +housemaid, of a morning, watching a spider in the doorpost +lay his thread and laboriously crawl up it, until, +tired of the sport, she raises her broom and sweeps +away the thread and the artificer.</p> + +<p>A day or two before Christmas, Becky, her husband +and her son made ready and went to pass the holidays +at the seat of their ancestors at Queen’s Crawley. + Becky would have liked to leave the little brat behind, +and would have done so but for Lady Jane’s urgent +invitations to the youngster, and the symptoms of revolt +and discontent which Rawdon manifested at her neglect +of her son. “He’s the finest boy in England,” +the father said in a tone of reproach to her, “and +you don’t seem to care for him, Becky, as much +as you do for your spaniel. He shan’t bother +you much; at home he will be away from you in the +nursery, and he shall go outside on the coach with +me.”</p> + +<p>“Where you go yourself because you want to smoke +those filthy cigars,” replied Mrs. Rawdon.</p> + +<p>“I remember when you liked ’em though,” +answered the husband.</p> + +<p>Becky laughed; she was almost always good-humoured. +“That was when I was on my promotion, Goosey,” +she said. “Take Rawdon outside with you and +give him a cigar too if you like.”</p> + +<p>Rawdon did not warm his little son for the winter’s +journey in this way, but he and Briggs wrapped up +the child in shawls and comforters, and he was hoisted +respectfully onto the roof of the coach in the dark +morning, under the lamps of the White Horse Cellar; +and with no small delight he watched the dawn rise +and made his first journey to the place which his +father still called home. It was a journey of infinite +pleasure to the boy, to whom the incidents of the +road afforded endless interest, his father answering +to him all questions connected with it and telling +him who lived in the great white house to the right, +and whom the park belonged to. His mother, inside +the vehicle, with her maid and her furs, her wrappers, +and her scent bottles, made such a to-do that you +would have thought she never had been in a stage-coach +before-- much less, that she had been turned out of +this very one to make room for a paying passenger +on a certain journey performed some half-score years +ago.</p> + +<p>It was dark again when little Rawdon was wakened up +to enter his uncle’s carriage at Mudbury, and +he sat and looked out of it wondering as the great +iron gates flew open, and at the white trunks of the +limes as they swept by, until they stopped, at length, +before the light windows of the Hall, which were blazing +and comfortable with Christmas welcome. The hall-door +was flung open--a big fire was burning in the great +old fire-place--a carpet was down over the chequered +black flags--"It’s the old Turkey one that used +to be in the Ladies’ Gallery,” thought +Rebecca, and the next instant was kissing Lady Jane.</p> + +<p>She and Sir Pitt performed the same salute with great +gravity; but Rawdon, having been smoking, hung back +rather from his sister-in-law, whose two children +came up to their cousin; and, while Matilda held out +her hand and kissed him, Pitt Binkie Southdown, the +son and heir, stood aloof rather and examined him +as a little dog does a big dog.</p> + +<p>Then the kind hostess conducted her guests to the +snug apartments blazing with cheerful fires. Then +the young ladies came and knocked at Mrs. Rawdon’s +door, under the pretence that they were desirous to +be useful, but in reality to have the pleasure of inspecting +the contents of her band and bonnet-boxes, and her +dresses which, though black, were of the newest London +fashion. And they told her how much the Hall was +changed for the better, and how old Lady Southdown +was gone, and how Pitt was taking his station in the +county, as became a Crawley in fact. Then the great +dinner-bell having rung, the family assembled at dinner, +at which meal Rawdon Junior was placed by his aunt, +the good-natured lady of the house, Sir Pitt being +uncommonly attentive to his sister-in-law at his own +right hand.</p> + +<p>Little Rawdon exhibited a fine appetite and showed +a gentlemanlike behaviour.</p> + +<p>“I like to dine here,” he said to his +aunt when he had completed his meal, at the conclusion +of which, and after a decent grace by Sir Pitt, the +younger son and heir was introduced, and was perched +on a high chair by the Baronet’s side, while +the daughter took possession of the place and the +little wine-glass prepared for her near her mother. + “I like to dine here,” said Rawdon Minor, +looking up at his relation’s kind face.</p> + +<p>“Why?” said the good Lady Jane.</p> + +<p>“I dine in the kitchen when I am at home,” +replied Rawdon Minor, “or else with Briggs.” +But Becky was so engaged with the Baronet, her host, +pouring out a flood of compliments and delights and +raptures, and admiring young Pitt Binkie, whom she +declared to be the most beautiful, intelligent, noble-looking +little creature, and so like his father, that she +did not hear the remarks of her own flesh and blood +at the other end of the broad shining table.</p> + +<p>As a guest, and it being the first night of his arrival, +Rawdon the Second was allowed to sit up until the +hour when tea being over, and a great gilt book being +laid on the table before Sir Pitt, all the domestics +of the family streamed in, and Sir Pitt read prayers. + It was the first time the poor little boy had ever +witnessed or heard of such a ceremonial.</p> + +<p>The house had been much improved even since the Baronet’s +brief reign, and was pronounced by Becky to be perfect, +charming, delightful, when she surveyed it in his +company. As for little Rawdon, who examined it with +the children for his guides, it seemed to him a perfect +palace of enchantment and wonder. There were long +galleries, and ancient state bedrooms, there were pictures +and old China, and armour. There were the rooms in +which Grandpapa died, and by which the children walked +with terrified looks. “Who was Grandpapa?” +he asked; and they told him how he used to be very +old, and used to be wheeled about in a garden-chair, +and they showed him the garden-chair one day rotting +in the out-house in which it had lain since the old +gentleman had been wheeled away yonder to the church, +of which the spire was glittering over the park elms.</p> + +<p>The brothers had good occupation for several mornings +in examining the improvements which had been effected +by Sir Pitt’s genius and economy. And as they +walked or rode, and looked at them, they could talk +without too much boring each other. And Pitt took +care to tell Rawdon what a heavy outlay of money these +improvements had occasioned, and that a man of landed +and funded property was often very hard pressed for +twenty pounds. “There is that new lodge-gate,” +said Pitt, pointing to it humbly with the bamboo cane, +“I can no more pay for it before the dividends +in January than I can fly.”</p> + +<p>“I can lend you, Pitt, till then,” Rawdon +answered rather ruefully; and they went in and looked +at the restored lodge, where the family arms were +just new scraped in stone, and where old Mrs. Lock, +for the first time these many long years, had tight +doors, sound roofs, and whole windows.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Between Hampshire and London</h4> + +<p>Sir Pitt Crawley had done more than repair fences +and restore dilapidated lodges on the Queen’s +Crawley estate. Like a wise man he had set to work +to rebuild the injured popularity of his house and +stop up the gaps and ruins in which his name had been +left by his disreputable and thriftless old predecessor. + He was elected for the borough speedily after his +father’s demise; a magistrate, a member of parliament, +a county magnate and representative of an ancient +family, he made it his duty to show himself before +the Hampshire public, subscribed handsomely to the +county charities, called assiduously upon all the +county folk, and laid himself out in a word to take +that position in Hampshire, and in the Empire afterwards, +to which he thought his prodigious talents justly +entitled him. Lady Jane was instructed to be friendly +with the Fuddlestones, and the Wapshots, and the other +famous baronets, their neighbours. Their carriages +might frequently be seen in the Queen’s Crawley +avenue now; they dined pretty frequently at the Hall +(where the cookery was so good that it was clear Lady +Jane very seldom had a hand in it), and in return +Pitt and his wife most energetically dined out in all +sorts of weather and at all sorts of distances. For +though Pitt did not care for joviality, being a frigid +man of poor hearth and appetite, yet he considered +that to be hospitable and condescending was quite +incumbent on-his station, and every time that he got +a headache from too long an after-dinner sitting, +he felt that he was a martyr to duty. He talked about +crops, corn-laws, politics, with the best country +gentlemen. He (who had been formerly inclined to be +a sad free-thinker on these points) entered into poaching +and game preserving with ardour. He didn’t +hunt; he wasn’t a hunting man; he was a man +of books and peaceful habits; but he thought that the +breed of horses must be kept up in the country, and +that the breed of foxes must therefore be looked to, +and for his part, if his friend, Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone, +liked to draw his country and meet as of old the F. + hounds used to do at Queen’s Crawley, he should +be happy to see him there, and the gentlemen of the +Fuddlestone hunt. And to Lady Southdown’s dismay +too he became more orthodox in his tendencies every +day; gave up preaching in public and attending meeting-houses; +went stoutly to church; called on the Bishop and all +the Clergy at Winchester; and made no objection when +the Venerable Archdeacon Trumper asked for a game of +whist. What pangs must have been those of Lady Southdown, +and what an utter castaway she must have thought her +son-in-law for permitting such a godless diversion! + And when, on the return of the family from an oratorio +at Winchester, the Baronet announced to the young ladies +that he should next year very probably take them to +the “county balls,” they worshipped him +for his kindness. Lady Jane was only too obedient, +and perhaps glad herself to go. The Dowager wrote +off the direst descriptions of her daughter’s +worldly behaviour to the authoress of the Washerwoman +of Finchley Common at the Cape; and her house in Brighton +being about this time unoccupied, returned to that +watering-place, her absence being not very much deplored +by her children. We may suppose, too, that Rebecca, +on paying a second visit to Queen’s Crawley, +did not feel particularly grieved at the absence of +the lady of the medicine chest; though she wrote a +Christmas letter to her Ladyship, in which she respectfully +recalled herself to Lady Southdown’s recollection, +spoke with gratitude of the delight which her Ladyship’s +conversation had given her on the former visit, dilated +on the kindness with which her Ladyship had treated +her in sickness, and declared that everything at Queen’s +Crawley reminded her of her absent friend.</p> + +<p>A great part of the altered demeanour and popularity +of Sir Pitt Crawley might have been traced to the +counsels of that astute little lady of Curzon Street. + “You remain a Baronet--you consent to be a +mere country gentleman,” she said to him, while +he had been her guest in London. “No, Sir Pitt +Crawley, I know you better. I know your talents and +your ambition. You fancy you hide them both, but +you can conceal neither from me. I showed Lord Steyne +your pamphlet on malt. He was familiar with it, and +said it was in the opinion of the whole Cabinet the +most masterly thing that had appeared on the subject. +The Ministry has its eye upon you, and I know what +you want. You want to distinguish yourself in Parliament; +every one says you are the finest speaker in England +(for your speeches at Oxford are still remembered). + You want to be Member for the County, where, with +your own vote and your borough at your back, you can +command anything. And you want to be Baron Crawley +of Queen’s Crawley, and will be before you die. + I saw it all. I could read your heart, Sir Pitt. + If I had a husband who possessed your intellect as +he does your name, I sometimes think I should not be +unworthy of him--but--but I am your kinswoman now,” +she added with a laugh. “Poor little penniless, +I have got a little interest--and who knows, perhaps +the mouse may be able to aid the lion.” Pitt +Crawley was amazed and enraptured with her speech. + “How that woman comprehends me!” he said. +“I never could get Jane to read three pages +of the malt pamphlet. She has no idea that I have +commanding talents or secret ambition. So they remember +my speaking at Oxford, do they? The rascals! Now +that I represent my borough and may sit for the county, +they begin to recollect me! Why, Lord Steyne cut me +at the levee last year; they are beginning to find +out that Pitt Crawley is some one at last. Yes, the +man was always the same whom these people neglected: + it was only the opportunity that was wanting, and +I will show them now that I can speak and act as well +as write. Achilles did not declare himself until they +gave him the sword. I hold it now, and the world +shall yet hear of Pitt Crawley.”</p> + +<p>Therefore it was that this roguish diplomatist has +grown so hospitable; that he was so civil to oratorios +and hospitals; so kind to Deans and Chapters; so generous +in giving and accepting dinners; so uncommonly gracious +to farmers on market-days; and so much interested +about county business; and that the Christmas at the +Hall was the gayest which had been known there for +many a long day.</p> + +<p>On Christmas Day a great family gathering took place. +All the Crawleys from the Rectory came to dine. Rebecca +was as frank and fond of Mrs. Bute as if the other +had never been her enemy; she was affectionately interested +in the dear girls, and surprised at the progress which +they had made in music since her time, and insisted +upon encoring one of the duets out of the great song-books +which Jim, grumbling, had been forced to bring under +his arm from the Rectory. Mrs. Bute, perforce, was +obliged to adopt a decent demeanour towards the little +adventuress--of course being free to discourse with +her daughters afterwards about the absurd respect +with which Sir Pitt treated his sister-in-law. But +Jim, who had sat next to her at dinner, declared she +was a trump, and one and all of the Rector’s +family agreed that the little Rawdon was a fine boy. +They respected a possible baronet in the boy, between +whom and the title there was only the little sickly +pale Pitt Binkie.</p> + +<p>The children were very good friends. Pitt Binkie +was too little a dog for such a big dog as Rawdon +to play with; and Matilda being only a girl, of course +not fit companion for a young gentleman who was near +eight years old, and going into jackets very soon. + He took the command of this small party at once--the +little girl and the little boy following him about +with great reverence at such times as he condescended +to sport with them. His happiness and pleasure in +the country were extreme. The kitchen garden pleased +him hugely, the flowers moderately, but the pigeons +and the poultry, and the stables when he was allowed +to visit them, were delightful objects to him. He +resisted being kissed by the Misses Crawley, but he +allowed Lady Jane sometimes to embrace him, and it +was by her side that he liked to sit when, the signal +to retire to the drawing-room being given, the ladies +left the gentlemen to their claret--by her side rather +than by his mother. For Rebecca, seeing that tenderness +was the fashion, called Rawdon to her one evening and +stooped down and kissed him in the presence of all +the ladies.</p> + +<p>He looked her full in the face after the operation, +trembling and turning very red, as his wont was when +moved. “You never kiss me at home, Mamma,” +he said, at which there was a general silence and +consternation and a by no means pleasant look in Becky’s +eyes.</p> + +<p>Rawdon was fond of his sister-in-law, for her regard +for his son. Lady Jane and Becky did not get on quite +so well at this visit as on occasion of the former +one, when the Colonel’s wife was bent upon pleasing. + Those two speeches of the child struck rather a chill. +Perhaps Sir Pitt was rather too attentive to her.</p> + +<p>But Rawdon, as became his age and size, was fonder +of the society of the men than of the women, and never +wearied of accompanying his sire to the stables, whither +the Colonel retired to smoke his cigar--Jim, the +Rector’s son, sometimes joining his cousin in +that and other amusements. He and the Baronet’s +keeper were very close friends, their mutual taste +for “dawgs” bringing them much together. +On one day, Mr. James, the Colonel, and Horn, the keeper, +went and shot pheasants, taking little Rawdon with +them. On another most blissful morning, these four +gentlemen partook of the amusement of rat-hunting +in a barn, than which sport Rawdon as yet had never +seen anything more noble. They stopped up the ends +of certain drains in the barn, into the other openings +of which ferrets were inserted, and then stood silently +aloof, with uplifted stakes in their hands, and an +anxious little terrier (Mr. James’s celebrated +“dawg” Forceps, indeed) scarcely breathing +from excitement, listening motionless on three legs, +to the faint squeaking of the rats below. Desperately +bold at last, the persecuted animals bolted above-ground--the +terrier accounted for one, the keeper for another; +Rawdon, from flurry and excitement, missed his rat, +but on the other hand he half-murdered a ferret.</p> + +<p>But the greatest day of all was that on which Sir +Huddlestone Fuddlestone’s hounds met upon the +lawn at Queen’s Crawley.</p> + +<p>That was a famous sight for little Rawdon. At half-past +ten, Tom Moody, Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone’s +huntsman, was seen trotting up the avenue, followed +by the noble pack of hounds in a compact body-- the +rear being brought up by the two whips clad in stained +scarlet frocks--light hard-featured lads on well-bred +lean horses, possessing marvellous dexterity in casting +the points of their long heavy whips at the thinnest +part of any dog’s skin who dares to straggle +from the main body, or to take the slightest notice, +or even so much as wink, at the hares and rabbits +starting under their noses.</p> + +<p>Next comes boy Jack, Tom Moody’s son, who weighs +five stone, measures eight-and-forty inches, and will +never be any bigger. He is perched on a large raw-boned +hunter, half-covered by a capacious saddle. This +animal is Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone’s favourite +horse the Nob. Other horses, ridden by other small +boys, arrive from time to time, awaiting their masters, +who will come cantering on anon.</p> + +<p>Tom Moody rides up to the door of the Hall, where +he is welcomed by the butler, who offers him drink, +which he declines. He and his pack then draw off +into a sheltered corner of the lawn, where the dogs +roll on the grass, and play or growl angrily at one +another, ever and anon breaking out into furious fight +speedily to be quelled by Tom’s voice, unmatched +at rating, or the snaky thongs of the whips.</p> + +<p>Many young gentlemen canter up on thoroughbred hacks, +spatter-dashed to the knee, and enter the house to +drink cherry-brandy and pay their respects to the +ladies, or, more modest and sportsmanlike, divest +themselves of their mud-boots, exchange their hacks +for their hunters, and warm their blood by a preliminary +gallop round the lawn. Then they collect round the +pack in the corner and talk with Tom Moody of past +sport, and the merits of Sniveller and Diamond, and +of the state of the country and of the wretched breed +of foxes.</p> + +<p>Sir Huddlestone presently appears mounted on a clever +cob and rides up to the Hall, where he enters and +does the civil thing by the ladies, after which, being +a man of few words, he proceeds to business. The +hounds are drawn up to the hall-door, and little Rawdon +descends amongst them, excited yet half-alarmed by +the caresses which they bestow upon him, at the thumps +he receives from their waving tails, and at their +canine bickerings, scarcely restrained by Tom Moody’s +tongue and lash.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, Sir Huddlestone has hoisted himself unwieldily +on the Nob: “Let’s try Sowster’s +Spinney, Tom,” says the Baronet, “Farmer +Mangle tells me there are two foxes in it.” Tom +blows his horn and trots off, followed by the pack, +by the whips, by the young gents from Winchester, +by the farmers of the neighbourhood, by the labourers +of the parish on foot, with whom the day is a great +holiday, Sir Huddlestone bringing up the rear with +Colonel Crawley, and the whole cortege disappears +down the avenue.</p> + +<p>The Reverend Bute Crawley (who has been too modest +to appear at the public meet before his nephew’s +windows), whom Tom Moody remembers forty years back +a slender divine riding the wildest horses, jumping +the widest brooks, and larking over the newest gates +in the country--his Reverence, we say, happens to +trot out from the Rectory Lane on his powerful black +horse just as Sir Huddlestone passes; he joins the +worthy Baronet. Hounds and horsemen disappear, and +little Rawdon remains on the doorsteps, wondering +and happy.</p> + +<p>During the progress of this memorable holiday, little +Rawdon, if he had got no special liking for his uncle, +always awful and cold and locked up in his study, +plunged in justice-business and surrounded by bailiffs +and farmers--has gained the good graces of his married +and maiden aunts, of the two little folks of the Hall, +and of Jim of the Rectory, whom Sir Pitt is encouraging +to pay his addresses to one of the young ladies, with +an understanding doubtless that he shall be presented +to the living when it shall be vacated by his fox-hunting +old sire. Jim has given up that sport himself and +confines himself to a little harmless duck- or snipe-shooting, +or a little quiet trifling with the rats during the +Christmas holidays, after which he will return to +the University and try and not be plucked, once more. + He has already eschewed green coats, red neckcloths, +and other worldly ornaments, and is preparing himself +for a change in his condition. In this cheap and thrifty +way Sir Pitt tries to pay off his debt to his family.</p> + +<p>Also before this merry Christmas was over, the Baronet +had screwed up courage enough to give his brother +another draft on his bankers, and for no less a sum +than a hundred pounds, an act which caused Sir Pitt +cruel pangs at first, but which made him glow afterwards +to think himself one of the most generous of men. + Rawdon and his son went away with the utmost heaviness +of heart. Becky and the ladies parted with some alacrity, +however, and our friend returned to London to commence +those avocations with which we find her occupied when +this chapter begins. Under her care the Crawley House +in Great Gaunt Street was quite rejuvenescent and +ready for the reception of Sir Pitt and his family, +when the Baronet came to London to attend his duties +in Parliament and to assume that position in the country +for which his vast genius fitted him.</p> + +<p>For the first session, this profound dissembler hid +his projects and never opened his lips but to present +a petition from Mudbury. But he attended assiduously +in his place and learned thoroughly the routine and +business of the House. At home he gave himself up +to the perusal of Blue Books, to the alarm and wonder +of Lady Jane, who thought he was killing himself by +late hours and intense application. And he made acquaintance +with the ministers, and the chiefs of his party, determining +to rank as one of them before many years were over.</p> + +<p>Lady Jane’s sweetness and kindness had inspired +Rebecca with such a contempt for her ladyship as the +little woman found no small difficulty in concealing. + That sort of goodness and simplicity which Lady Jane +possessed annoyed our friend Becky, and it was impossible +for her at times not to show, or to let the other divine, +her scorn. Her presence, too, rendered Lady Jane uneasy. + Her husband talked constantly with Becky. Signs +of intelligence seemed to pass between them, and Pitt +spoke with her on subjects on which he never thought +of discoursing with Lady Jane. The latter did not +understand them, to be sure, but it was mortifying +to remain silent; still more mortifying to know that +you had nothing to say, and hear that little audacious +Mrs. Rawdon dashing on from subject to subject, with +a word for every man, and a joke always pat; and to +sit in one’s own house alone, by the fireside, +and watching all the men round your rival.</p> + +<p>In the country, when Lady Jane was telling stories +to the children, who clustered about her knees (little +Rawdon into the bargain, who was very fond of her), +and Becky came into the room, sneering with green +scornful eyes, poor Lady Jane grew silent under those +baleful glances. Her simple little fancies shrank +away tremulously, as fairies in the story-books, before +a superior bad angel. She could not go on, although +Rebecca, with the smallest inflection of sarcasm in +her voice, besought her to continue that charming story. + And on her side gentle thoughts and simple pleasures +were odious to Mrs. Becky; they discorded with her; +she hated people for liking them; she spurned children +and children-lovers. “I have no taste for bread +and butter,” she would say, when caricaturing +Lady Jane and her ways to my Lord Steyne.</p> + +<p>“No more has a certain person for holy water,” +his lordship replied with a bow and a grin and a great +jarring laugh afterwards.</p> + +<p>So these two ladies did not see much of each other +except upon those occasions when the younger brother’s +wife, having an object to gain from the other, frequented +her. They my-loved and my-deared each other assiduously, +but kept apart generally, whereas Sir Pitt, in the +midst of his multiplied avocations, found daily time +to see his sister-in-law.</p> + +<p>On the occasion of his first Speaker’s dinner, +Sir Pitt took the opportunity of appearing before +his sister-in-law in his uniform-- that old diplomatic +suit which he had worn when attache to the Pumpernickel +legation.</p> + +<p>Becky complimented him upon that dress and admired +him almost as much as his own wife and children, to +whom he displayed himself before he set out. She +said that it was only the thoroughbred gentleman who +could wear the Court suit with advantage: it was only +your men of ancient race whom the culotte courte became. + Pitt looked down with complacency at his legs, which +had not, in truth, much more symmetry or swell than +the lean Court sword which dangled by his side--looked +down at his legs, and thought in his heart that he +was killing.</p> + +<p>When he was gone, Mrs. Becky made a caricature of +his figure, which she showed to Lord Steyne when he +arrived. His lordship carried off the sketch, delighted +with the accuracy of the resemblance. He had done +Sir Pitt Crawley the honour to meet him at Mrs. Becky’s +house and had been most gracious to the new Baronet +and member. Pitt was struck too by the deference +with which the great Peer treated his sister-in-law, +by her ease and sprightliness in the conversation, +and by the delight with which the other men of the +party listened to her talk. Lord Steyne made no doubt +but that the Baronet had only commenced his career +in public life, and expected rather anxiously to hear +him as an orator; as they were neighbours (for Great +Gaunt Street leads into Gaunt Square, whereof Gaunt +House, as everybody knows, forms one side) my lord +hoped that as soon as Lady Steyne arrived in London +she would have the honour of making the acquaintance +of Lady Crawley. He left a card upon his neighbour +in the course of a day or two, having never thought +fit to notice his predecessor, though they had lived +near each other for near a century past.</p> + +<p>In the midst of these intrigues and fine parties and +wise and brilliant personages Rawdon felt himself +more and more isolated every day. He was allowed +to go to the club more; to dine abroad with bachelor +friends; to come and go when he liked, without any +questions being asked. And he and Rawdon the younger +many a time would walk to Gaunt Street and sit with +the lady and the children there while Sir Pitt was +closeted with Rebecca, on his way to the House, or +on his return from it.</p> + +<p>The ex-Colonel would sit for hours in his brother’s +house very silent, and thinking and doing as little +as possible. He was glad to be employed of an errand; +to go and make inquiries about a horse or a servant, +or to carve the roast mutton for the dinner of the +children. He was beat and cowed into laziness and submission. +Delilah had imprisoned him and cut his hair off, too. + The bold and reckless young blood of ten-years back +was subjugated and was turned into a torpid, submissive, +middle-aged, stout gentleman.</p> + +<p>And poor Lady Jane was aware that Rebecca had captivated +her husband, although she and Mrs. Rawdon my-deared +and my-loved each other every day they met.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLVI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Struggles and Trials</h4> + +<p>Our friends at Brompton were meanwhile passing their +Christmas after their fashion and in a manner by no +means too cheerful.</p> + +<p>Out of the hundred pounds a year, which was about +the amount of her income, the Widow Osborne had been +in the habit of giving up nearly three-fourths to +her father and mother, for the expenses of herself +and her little boy. With #120 more, supplied by Jos, +this family of four people, attended by a single Irish +servant who also did for Clapp and his wife, might +manage to live in decent comfort through the year, +and hold up their heads yet, and be able to give a +friend a dish of tea still, after the storms and disappointments +of their early life. Sedley still maintained his ascendency +over the family of Mr. Clapp, his ex-clerk. Clapp +remembered the time when, sitting on the edge of the +chair, he tossed off a bumper to the health of “Mrs. +S--, Miss Emmy, and Mr. Joseph in India,” at +the merchant’s rich table in Russell Square. + Time magnified the splendour of those recollections +in the honest clerk’s bosom. Whenever he came +up from the kitchen-parlour to the drawing-room and +partook of tea or gin-and-water with Mr. Sedley, +he would say, “This was not what you was accustomed +to once, sir,” and as gravely and reverentially +drink the health of the ladies as he had done in the +days of their utmost prosperity. He thought Miss +’Melia’s playing the divinest music ever +performed, and her the finest lady. He never would +sit down before Sedley at the club even, nor would +he have that gentleman’s character abused by +any member of the society. He had seen the first +men in London shaking hands with Mr. S--; he said, +“He’d known him in times when Rothschild +might be seen on ’Change with him any day, and +he owed him personally everythink.”</p> + +<p>Clapp, with the best of characters and handwritings, +had been able very soon after his master’s disaster +to find other employment for himself. “Such +a little fish as me can swim in any bucket,” +he used to remark, and a member of the house from +which old Sedley had seceded was very glad to make +use of Mr. Clapp’s services and to reward them +with a comfortable salary. In fine, all Sedley’s +wealthy friends had dropped off one by one, and this +poor ex-dependent still remained faithfully attached +to him.</p> + +<p>Out of the small residue of her income which Amelia +kept back for herself, the widow had need of all the +thrift and care possible in order to enable her to +keep her darling boy dressed in such a manner as became +George Osborne’s son, and to defray the expenses +of the little school to which, after much misgiving +and reluctance and many secret pangs and fears on +her own part, she had been induced to send the lad. + She had sat up of nights conning lessons and spelling +over crabbed grammars and geography books in order +to teach them to Georgy. She had worked even at the +Latin accidence, fondly hoping that she might be capable +of instructing him in that language. To part with +him all day, to send him out to the mercy of a schoolmaster’s +cane and his schoolfellows’ roughness, was almost +like weaning him over again to that weak mother, so +tremulous and full of sensibility. He, for his part, +rushed off to the school with the utmost happiness. + He was longing for the change. That childish gladness +wounded his mother, who was herself so grieved to +part with him. She would rather have had him more +sorry, she thought, and then was deeply repentant +within herself for daring to be so selfish as to wish +her own son to be unhappy.</p> + +<p>Georgy made great progress in the school, which was +kept by a friend of his mother’s constant admirer, +the Rev. Mr. Binny. He brought home numberless prizes +and testimonials of ability. He told his mother countless +stories every night about his school-companions: and +what a fine fellow Lyons was, and what a sneak Sniffin +was, and how Steel’s father actually supplied +the meat for the establishment, whereas Golding’s +mother came in a carriage to fetch him every Saturday, +and how Neat had straps to his trowsers--might he have +straps?--and how Bull Major was so strong (though only +in Eutropius) that it was believed he could lick the +Usher, Mr. Ward, himself. So Amelia learned to know +every one of the boys in that school as well as Georgy +himself, and of nights she used to help him in his +exercises and puzzle her little head over his lessons +as eagerly as if she was herself going in the morning +into the presence of the master. Once, after a certain +combat with Master Smith, George came home to his +mother with a black eye, and bragged prodigiously to +his parent and his delighted old grandfather about +his valour in the fight, in which, if the truth was +known he did not behave with particular heroism, and +in which he decidedly had the worst. But Amelia has +never forgiven that Smith to this day, though he is +now a peaceful apothecary near Leicester Square.</p> + +<p>In these quiet labours and harmless cares the gentle +widow’s life was passing away, a silver hair +or two marking the progress of time on her head and +a line deepening ever so little on her fair forehead. + She used to smile at these marks of time. “What +matters it,” she asked, “For an old woman +like me?” All she hoped for was to live to see +her son great, famous, and glorious, as he deserved +to be. She kept his copy-books, his drawings, and +compositions, and showed them about in her little +circle as if they were miracles of genius. She confided +some of these specimens to Miss Dobbin, to show them +to Miss Osborne, George’s aunt, to show them +to Mr. Osborne himself--to make that old man repent +of his cruelty and ill feeling towards him who was +gone. All her husband’s faults and foibles +she had buried in the grave with him: she only remembered +the lover, who had married her at all sacrifices, the +noble husband, so brave and beautiful, in whose arms +she had hung on the morning when he had gone away +to fight, and die gloriously for his king. From heaven +the hero must be smiling down upon that paragon of +a boy whom he had left to comfort and console her. +We have seen how one of George’s grandfathers +(Mr. Osborne), in his easy chair in Russell Square, +daily grew more violent and moody, and how his daughter, +with her fine carriage, and her fine horses, and her +name on half the public charity-lists of the town, +was a lonely, miserable, persecuted old maid. She +thought again and again of the beautiful little boy, +her brother’s son, whom she had seen. She longed +to be allowed to drive in the fine carriage to the +house in which he lived, and she used to look out +day after day as she took her solitary drive in the +park, in hopes that she might see him. Her sister, +the banker’s lady, occasionally condescended +to pay her old home and companion a visit in Russell +Square. She brought a couple of sickly children attended +by a prim nurse, and in a faint genteel giggling +tone cackled to her sister about her fine acquaintance, +and how her little Frederick was the image of Lord +Claud Lollypop and her sweet Maria had been noticed +by the Baroness as they were driving in their donkey-chaise +at Roehampton. She urged her to make her papa do +something for the darlings. Frederick she had determined +should go into the Guards; and if they made an elder +son of him (and Mr. Bullock was positively ruining +and pinching himself to death to buy land), how was +the darling girl to be provided for? “I expect +<i>you</i>, dear,” Mrs. Bullock would say, “for +of course my share of our Papa’s property must +go to the head of the house, you know. Dear Rhoda +McMull will disengage the whole of the Castletoddy +property as soon as poor dear Lord Castletoddy dies, +who is quite epileptic; and little Macduff McMull +will be Viscount Castletoddy. Both the Mr. Bludyers +of Mincing Lane have settled their fortunes on Fanny +Bludyer’s little boy. My darling Frederick must +positively be an eldest son; and--and do ask Papa +to bring us back his account in Lombard Street, will +you, dear? It doesn’t look well, his going to +Stumpy and Rowdy’s.” After which kind of +speeches, in which fashion and the main chance were +blended together, and after a kiss, which was like +the contact of an oyster--Mrs. Frederick Bullock would +gather her starched nurslings and simper back into +her carriage.</p> + +<p>Every visit which this leader of ton paid to her family +was more unlucky for her. Her father paid more money +into Stumpy and Rowdy’s. Her patronage became +more and more insufferable. The poor widow in the +little cottage at Brompton, guarding her treasure +there, little knew how eagerly some people coveted +it.</p> + +<p>On that night when Jane Osborne had told her father +that she had seen his grandson, the old man had made +her no reply, but he had shown no anger--and had bade +her good-night on going himself to his room in rather +a kindly voice. And he must have meditated on what +she said and have made some inquiries of the Dobbin +family regarding her visit, for a fortnight after +it took place, he asked her where was her little French +watch and chain she used to wear?</p> + +<p>“I bought it with my money, sir,” she +said in a great fright.</p> + +<p>“Go and order another like it, or a better if +you can get it,” said the old gentleman and +lapsed again into silence.</p> + +<p>Of late the Misses Dobbin more than once repeated +their entreaties to Amelia, to allow George to visit +them. His aunt had shown her inclination; perhaps +his grandfather himself, they hinted, might be disposed +to be reconciled to him. Surely, Amelia could not +refuse such advantageous chances for the boy. Nor +could she, but she acceded to their overtures with +a very heavy and suspicious heart, was always uneasy +during the child’s absence from her, and welcomed +him back as if he was rescued out of some danger. +He brought back money and toys, at which the widow +looked with alarm and jealousy; she asked him always +if he had seen any gentleman--"Only old Sir William, +who drove him about in the four-wheeled chaise, and +Mr. Dobbin, who arrived on the beautiful bay horse +in the afternoon--in the green coat and pink neck-cloth, +with the gold-headed whip, who promised to show him +the Tower of London and take him out with the Surrey +hounds.” At last, he said, “There was an +old gentleman, with thick eyebrows, and a broad hat, +and large chain and seals.” He came one day +as the coachman was lunging Georgy round the lawn on +the gray pony. “He looked at me very much. + He shook very much. I said ‘My name is Norval’ +after dinner. My aunt began to cry. She is always +crying.” Such was George’s report on that +night.</p> + +<p>Then Amelia knew that the boy had seen his grandfather; +and looked out feverishly for a proposal which she +was sure would follow, and which came, in fact, in +a few days afterwards. Mr. Osborne formally offered +to take the boy and make him heir to the fortune which +he had intended that his father should inherit. He +would make Mrs. George Osborne an allowance, such +as to assure her a decent competency. If Mrs. George +Osborne proposed to marry again, as Mr. O. heard +was her intention, he would not withdraw that allowance. +But it must be understood that the child would live +entirely with his grandfather in Russell Square, or +at whatever other place Mr. O. should select, and +that he would be occasionally permitted to see Mrs. +George Osborne at her own residence. This message +was brought or read to her in a letter one day, when +her mother was from home and her father absent as +usual in the City.</p> + +<p>She was never seen angry but twice or thrice in her +life, and it was in one of these moods that Mr. Osborne’s +attorney had the fortune to behold her. She rose +up trembling and flushing very much as soon as, after +reading the letter, Mr. Poe handed it to her, and she +tore the paper into a hundred fragments, which she +trod on. “I marry again! I take money to part +from my child! Who dares insult me by proposing such +a thing? Tell Mr. Osborne it is a cowardly letter, +sir--a cowardly letter--I will not answer it. I wish +you good morning, sir--and she bowed me out of the +room like a tragedy Queen,” said the lawyer +who told the story.</p> + +<p>Her parents never remarked her agitation on that day, +and she never told them of the interview. They had +their own affairs to interest them, affairs which +deeply interested this innocent and unconscious lady. + The old gentleman, her father, was always dabbling +in speculation. We have seen how the wine company +and the coal company had failed him. But, prowling +about the City always eagerly and restlessly still, +he lighted upon some other scheme, of which he thought +so well that he embarked in it in spite of the remonstrances +of Mr. Clapp, to whom indeed he never dared to tell +how far he had engaged himself in it. And as it was +always Mr. Sedley’s maxim not to talk about +money matters before women, they had no inkling of +the misfortunes that were in store for them until +the unhappy old gentleman was forced to make gradual +confessions.</p> + +<p>The bills of the little household, which had been +settled weekly, first fell into arrear. The remittances +had not arrived from India, Mr. Sedley told his wife +with a disturbed face. As she had paid her bills +very regularly hitherto, one or two of the tradesmen +to whom the poor lady was obliged to go round asking +for time were very angry at a delay to which they +were perfectly used from more irregular customers. + Emmy’s contribution, paid over cheerfully without +any questions, kept the little company in half-rations +however. And the first six months passed away pretty +easily, old Sedley still keeping up with the notion +that his shares must rise and that all would be well.</p> + +<p>No sixty pounds, however, came to help the household +at the end of the half year, and it fell deeper and +deeper into trouble--Mrs. Sedley, who was growing +infirm and was much shaken, remained silent or wept +a great deal with Mrs. Clapp in the kitchen. The butcher +was particularly surly, the grocer insolent: once +or twice little Georgy had grumbled about the dinners, +and Amelia, who still would have been satisfied with +a slice of bread for her own dinner, could not but +perceive that her son was neglected and purchased little +things out of her private purse to keep the boy in +health.</p> + +<p>At last they told her, or told her such a garbled +story as people in difficulties tell. One day, her +own money having been received, and Amelia about to +pay it over, she, who had kept an account of the moneys +expended by her, proposed to keep a certain portion +back out of her dividend, having contracted engagements +for a new suit for Georgy.</p> + +<p>Then it came out that Jos’s remittances were +not paid, that the house was in difficulties, which +Amelia ought to have seen before, her mother said, +but she cared for nothing or nobody except Georgy. +At this she passed all her money across the table, +without a word, to her mother, and returned to her +room to cry her eyes out. She had a great access of +sensibility too that day, when obliged to go and countermand +the clothes, the darling clothes on which she had set +her heart for Christmas Day, and the cut and fashion +of which she had arranged in many conversations with +a small milliner, her friend.</p> + +<p>Hardest of all, she had to break the matter to Georgy, +who made a loud outcry. Everybody had new clothes +at Christmas. The others would laugh at him. He +would have new clothes. She had promised them to +him. The poor widow had only kisses to give him. +She darned the old suit in tears. She cast about +among her little ornaments to see if she could sell +anything to procure the desired novelties. There +was her India shawl that Dobbin had sent her. She +remembered in former days going with her mother to +a fine India shop on Ludgate Hill, where the ladies +had all sorts of dealings and bargains in these articles. + Her cheeks flushed and her eyes shone with pleasure +as she thought of this resource, and she kissed away +George to school in the morning, smiling brightly after +him. The boy felt that there was good news in her +look.</p> + +<p>Packing up her shawl in a handkerchief (another of +the gifts of the good Major), she hid them under her +cloak and walked flushed and eager all the way to +Ludgate Hill, tripping along by the park wall and +running over the crossings, so that many a man turned +as she hurried by him and looked after her rosy pretty +face. She calculated how she should spend the proceeds +of her shawl--how, besides the clothes, she would +buy the books that he longed for, and pay his half-year’s +schooling; and how she would buy a cloak for her father +instead of that old great-coat which he wore. She +was not mistaken as to the value of the Major’s +gift. It was a very fine and beautiful web, and the +merchant made a very good bargain when he gave her +twenty guineas for her shawl.</p> + +<p>She ran on amazed and flurried with her riches to +Darton’s shop, in St. Paul’s Churchyard, +and there purchased the Parents’ Assistant and +the Sandford and Merton Georgy longed for, and got +into the coach there with her parcel, and went home +exulting. And she pleased herself by writing in the +fly-leaf in her neatest little hand, “George +Osborne, A Christmas gift from his affectionate-mother.” +The books are extant to this day, with the fair delicate +superscription.</p> + +<p>She was going from her own room with the books in +her hand to place them on George’s table, where +he might find them on his return from school, when +in the passage, she and her mother met. The gilt +bindings of the seven handsome little volumes caught +the old lady’s eye.</p> + +<p>“What are those?” she said.</p> + +<p>“Some books for Georgy,” Amelia replied--I--I +promised them to him at Christmas.”</p> + +<p>“Books!” cried the elder lady indignantly, +“Books, when the whole house wants bread! Books, +when to keep you and your son in luxury, and your +dear father out of gaol, I’ve sold every trinket +I had, the India shawl from my back even down to the +very spoons, that our tradesmen mightn’t insult +us, and that Mr. Clapp, which indeed he is justly +entitled, being not a hard landlord, and a civil man, +and a father, might have his rent. Oh, Amelia! you +break my heart with your books and that boy of yours, +whom you are ruining, though part with him you will +not. Oh, Amelia, may God send you a more dutiful +child than I have had! There’s Jos, deserts +his father in his old age; and there’s George, +who might be provided for, and who might be rich, +going to school like a lord, with a gold watch and +chain round his neck--while my dear, dear old man +is without a sh--shilling.” Hysteric sobs and +cries ended Mrs. Sedley’s speech--it echoed +through every room in the small house, whereof the +other female inmates heard every word of the colloquy.</p> + +<p>“Oh, Mother, Mother!” cried poor Amelia +in reply. “You told me nothing--I--I promised +him the books. I--I only sold my shawl this morning. + Take the money--take everything"--and with quivering +hands she took out her silver, and her sovereigns--her +precious golden sovereigns, which she thrust into +the hands of her mother, whence they overflowed and +tumbled, rolling down the stairs.</p> + +<p>And then she went into her room, and sank down in +despair and utter misery. She saw it all now. Her +selfishness was sacrificing the boy. But for her +he might have wealth, station, education, and his +father’s place, which the elder George had forfeited +for her sake. She had but to speak the words, and +her father was restored to competency and the boy +raised to fortune. Oh, what a conviction it was to +that tender and stricken heart!</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLVII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Gaunt House</h4> + +<p>All the world knows that Lord Steyne’s town +palace stands in Gaunt Square, out of which Great +Gaunt Street leads, whither we first conducted Rebecca, +in the time of the departed Sir Pitt Crawley. Peering +over the railings and through the black trees into +the garden of the Square, you see a few miserable +governesses with wan-faced pupils wandering round +and round it, and round the dreary grass-plot in the +centre of which rises the statue of Lord Gaunt, who +fought at Minden, in a three-tailed wig, and otherwise +habited like a Roman Emperor. Gaunt House occupies +nearly a side of the Square. The remaining three sides +are composed of mansions that have passed away into +dowagerism--tall, dark houses, with window-frames +of stone, or picked out of a lighter red. Little light +seems to be behind those lean, comfortless casements +now, and hospitality to have passed away from those +doors as much as the laced lacqueys and link-boys +of old times, who used to put out their torches in +the blank iron extinguishers that still flank the +lamps over the steps. Brass plates have penetrated +into the square--Doctors, the Diddlesex Bank Western +Branch--the English and European Reunion, &c.--it has +a dreary look--nor is my Lord Steyne’s palace +less dreary. All I have ever seen of it is the vast +wall in front, with the rustic columns at the great +gate, through which an old porter peers sometimes with +a fat and gloomy red face--and over the wall the garret +and bedroom windows, and the chimneys, out of which +there seldom comes any smoke now. For the present +Lord Steyne lives at Naples, preferring the view of +the Bay and Capri and Vesuvius to the dreary aspect +of the wall in Gaunt Square.</p> + +<p>A few score yards down New Gaunt Street, and leading +into Gaunt Mews indeed, is a little modest back door, +which you would not remark from that of any of the +other stables. But many a little close carriage has +stopped at that door, as my informant (little Tom +Eaves, who knows everything, and who showed me the +place) told me. “The Prince and Perdita have +been in and out of that door, sir,” he had often +told me; “Marianne Clarke has entered it with +the Duke of--. It conducts to the famous petits +appartements of Lord Steyne-- one, sir, fitted up +all in ivory and white satin, another in ebony and +black velvet; there is a little banqueting-room taken +from Sallust’s house at Pompeii, and painted +by Cosway--a little private kitchen, in which every +saucepan was silver and all the spits were gold. +It was there that Egalite Orleans roasted partridges +on the night when he and the Marquis of Steyne won +a hundred thousand from a great personage at ombre. + Half of the money went to the French Revolution, +half to purchase Lord Gaunt’s Marquisate and +Garter--and the remainder--” but it forms no +part of our scheme to tell what became of the remainder, +for every shilling of which, and a great deal more, +little Tom Eaves, who knows everybody’s affairs, +is ready to account.</p> + +<p>Besides his town palace, the Marquis had castles and +palaces in various quarters of the three kingdoms, +whereof the descriptions may be found in the road-books--Castle +Strongbow, with its woods, on the Shannon shore; Gaunt +Castle, in Carmarthenshire, where Richard II was taken +prisoner--Gauntly Hall in Yorkshire, where I have been +informed there were two hundred silver teapots for +the breakfasts of the guests of the house, with everything +to correspond in splendour; and Stillbrook in Hampshire, +which was my lord’s farm, an humble place of +residence, of which we all remember the wonderful furniture +which was sold at my lord’s demise by a late +celebrated auctioneer.</p> + +<p>The Marchioness of Steyne was of the renowned and +ancient family of the Caerlyons, Marquises of Camelot, +who have preserved the old faith ever since the conversion +of the venerable Druid, their first ancestor, and +whose pedigree goes far beyond the date of the arrival +of King Brute in these islands. Pendragon is the title +of the eldest son of the house. The sons have been +called Arthurs, Uthers, and Caradocs, from immemorial +time. Their heads have fallen in many a loyal conspiracy. +Elizabeth chopped off the head of the Arthur of her +day, who had been Chamberlain to Philip and Mary, and +carried letters between the Queen of Scots and her +uncles the Guises. A cadet of the house was an officer +of the great Duke and distinguished in the famous +Saint Bartholomew conspiracy. During the whole of +Mary’s confinement, the house of Camelot conspired +in her behalf. It was as much injured by its charges +in fitting out an armament against the Spaniards, +during the time of the Armada, as by the fines and +confiscations levied on it by Elizabeth for harbouring +of priests, obstinate recusancy, and popish misdoings. + A recreant of James’s time was momentarily +perverted from his religion by the arguments of that +great theologian, and the fortunes of the family somewhat +restored by his timely weakness. But the Earl of Camelot, +of the reign of Charles, returned to the old creed +of his family, and they continued to fight for it, +and ruin themselves for it, as long as there was a +Stuart left to head or to instigate a rebellion.</p> + +<p>Lady Mary Caerlyon was brought up at a Parisian convent; +the Dauphiness Marie Antoinette was her godmother. + In the pride of her beauty she had been married--sold, +it was said--to Lord Gaunt, then at Paris, who won +vast sums from the lady’s brother at some of +Philip of Orleans’s banquets. The Earl of Gaunt’s +famous duel with the Count de la Marche, of the Grey +Musqueteers, was attributed by common report to the +pretensions of that officer (who had been a page, +and remained a favourite of the Queen) to the hand +of the beautiful Lady Mary Caerlyon. She was married +to Lord Gaunt while the Count lay ill of his wound, +and came to dwell at Gaunt House, and to figure for +a short time in the splendid Court of the Prince of +Wales. Fox had toasted her. Morris and Sheridan had +written songs about her. Malmesbury had made her +his best bow; Walpole had pronounced her charming; +Devonshire had been almost jealous of her; but she +was scared by the wild pleasures and gaieties of the +society into which she was flung, and after she had +borne a couple of sons, shrank away into a life of +devout seclusion. No wonder that my Lord Steyne, +who liked pleasure and cheerfulness, was not often +seen after their marriage by the side of this trembling, +silent, superstitious, unhappy lady.</p> + +<p>The before-mentioned Tom Eaves (who has no part in +this history, except that he knew all the great folks +in London, and the stories and mysteries of each family) +had further information regarding my Lady Steyne, +which may or may not be true. “The humiliations,” +Tom used to say, “which that woman has been +made to undergo, in her own house, have been frightful; +Lord Steyne has made her sit down to table with women +with whom I would rather die than allow Mrs. Eaves +to associate--with Lady Crackenbury, with Mrs. Chippenham, +with Madame de la Cruchecassee, the French secretary’s +wife (from every one of which ladies Tom Eaves--who +would have sacrificed his wife for knowing them--was +too glad to get a bow or a dinner) with the <i>reigning favourite</i> in a word. And do you suppose that +that woman, of that family, who are as proud as the +Bourbons, and to whom the Steynes are but lackeys, +mushrooms of yesterday (for after all, they are not +of the Old Gaunts, but of a minor and doubtful branch +of the house); do you suppose, I say (the reader must +bear in mind that it is always Tom Eaves who speaks) +that the Marchioness of Steyne, the haughtiest woman +in England, would bend down to her husband so submissively +if there were not some cause? Pooh! I tell you there +are secret reasons. I tell you that, in the emigration, +the Abbe de la Marche who was here and was employed +in the Quiberoon business with Puisaye and Tinteniac, +was the same Colonel of Mousquetaires Gris with whom +Steyne fought in the year ’86--that he and the +Marchioness met again--that it was after the Reverend +Colonel was shot in Brittany that Lady Steyne took +to those extreme practices of devotion which she carries +on now; for she is closeted with her director every +day--she is at service at Spanish Place, every morning, +I’ve watched her there--that is, I’ve happened +to be passing there--and depend on it, there’s +a mystery in her case. People are not so unhappy unless +they have something to repent of,” added Tom +Eaves with a knowing wag of his head; “and depend +on it, that woman would not be so submissive as she +is if the Marquis had not some sword to hold over +her.”</p> + +<p>So, if Mr. Eaves’s information be correct, it +is very likely that this lady, in her high station, +had to submit to many a private indignity and to hide +many secret griefs under a calm face. And let us, +my brethren who have not our names in the Red Book, +console ourselves by thinking comfortably how miserable +our betters may be, and that Damocles, who sits on +satin cushions and is served on gold plate, has an +awful sword hanging over his head in the shape of a +bailiff, or an hereditary disease, or a family secret, +which peeps out every now and then from the embroidered +arras in a ghastly manner, and will be sure to drop +one day or the other in the right place.</p> + +<p>In comparing, too, the poor man’s situation +with that of the great, there is (always according +to Mr. Eaves) another source of comfort for the former. + You who have little or no patrimony to bequeath or +to inherit, may be on good terms with your father or +your son, whereas the heir of a great prince, such +as my Lord Steyne, must naturally be angry at being +kept out of his kingdom, and eye the occupant of it +with no very agreeable glances. “Take it as a +rule,” this sardonic old Laves would say, “the +fathers and elder sons of all great families hate +each other. The Crown Prince is always in opposition +to the crown or hankering after it. Shakespeare knew +the world, my good sir, and when he describes Prince +Hal (from whose family the Gaunts pretend to be descended, +though they are no more related to John of Gaunt than +you are) trying on his father’s coronet, he +gives you a natural description of all heirs apparent. +If you were heir to a dukedom and a thousand pounds +a day, do you mean to say you would not wish for possession? +Pooh! And it stands to reason that every great man, +having experienced this feeling towards his father, +must be aware that his son entertains it towards himself; +and so they can’t but be suspicious and hostile.</p> + +<p>“Then again, as to the feeling of elder towards +younger sons. My dear sir, you ought to know that +every elder brother looks upon the cadets of the house +as his natural enemies, who deprive him of so much +ready money which ought to be his by right. I have +often heard George Mac Turk, Lord Bajazet’s +eldest son, say that if he had his will when he came +to the title, he would do what the sultans do, and +clear the estate by chopping off all his younger brothers’ +heads at once; and so the case is, more or less, with +them all. I tell you they are all Turks in their +hearts. Pooh! sir, they know the world.” And +here, haply, a great man coming up, Tom Eaves’s +hat would drop off his head, and he would rush forward +with a bow and a grin, which showed that he knew the +world too--in the Tomeavesian way, that is. And having +laid out every shilling of his fortune on an annuity, +Tom could afford to bear no malice to his nephews and +nieces, and to have no other feeling with regard to +his betters but a constant and generous desire to +dine with them.</p> + +<p>Between the Marchioness and the natural and tender +regard of mother for children, there was that cruel +barrier placed of difference of faith. The very love +which she might feel for her sons only served to render +the timid and pious lady more fearful and unhappy. + The gulf which separated them was fatal and impassable. + She could not stretch her weak arms across it, or +draw her children over to that side away from which +her belief told her there was no safety. During the +youth of his sons, Lord Steyne, who was a good scholar +and amateur casuist, had no better sport in the evening +after dinner in the country than in setting the boys’ +tutor, the Reverend Mr. Trail (now my Lord Bishop +of Ealing) on her ladyship’s director, Father +Mole, over their wine, and in pitting Oxford against +St. Acheul. He cried “Bravo, Latimer! Well +said, Loyola!” alternately; he promised Mole +a bishopric if he would come over, and vowed he would +use all his influence to get Trail a cardinal’s +hat if he would secede. Neither divine allowed himself +to be conquered, and though the fond mother hoped +that her youngest and favourite son would be reconciled +to her church--his mother church--a sad and awful +disappointment awaited the devout lady--a disappointment +which seemed to be a judgement upon her for the sin +of her marriage.</p> + +<p>My Lord Gaunt married, as every person who frequents +the Peerage knows, the Lady Blanche Thistlewood, a +daughter of the noble house of Bareacres, before mentioned +in this veracious history. A wing of Gaunt House +was assigned to this couple; for the head of the family +chose to govern it, and while he reigned to reign supreme; +his son and heir, however, living little at home, +disagreeing with his wife, and borrowing upon post-obits +such moneys as he required beyond the very moderate +sums which his father was disposed to allow him. The +Marquis knew every shilling of his son’s debts. +At his lamented demise, he was found himself to be +possessor of many of his heir’s bonds, purchased +for their benefit, and devised by his Lordship to +the children of his younger son.</p> + +<p>As, to my Lord Gaunt’s dismay, and the chuckling +delight of his natural enemy and father, the Lady +Gaunt had no children--the Lord George Gaunt was desired +to return from Vienna, where he was engaged in waltzing +and diplomacy, and to contract a matrimonial alliance +with the Honourable Joan, only daughter of John Johnes, +First Baron Helvellyn, and head of the firm of Jones, +Brown, and Robinson, of Threadneedle Street, Bankers; +from which union sprang several sons and daughters, +whose doings do not appertain to this story.</p> + +<p>The marriage at first was a happy and prosperous one. +My Lord George Gaunt could not only read, but write +pretty correctly. He spoke French with considerable +fluency; and was one of the finest waltzers in Europe. + With these talents, and his interest at home, there +was little doubt that his lordship would rise to the +highest dignities in his profession. The lady, his +wife, felt that courts were her sphere, and her wealth +enabled her to receive splendidly in those continental +towns whither her husband’s diplomatic duties +led him. There was talk of appointing him minister, +and bets were laid at the Travellers’ that he +would be ambassador ere long, when of a sudden, rumours +arrived of the secretary’s extraordinary behaviour. +At a grand diplomatic dinner given by his chief, he +had started up and declared that a pate de foie gras +was poisoned. He went to a ball at the hotel of the +Bavarian envoy, the Count de Springbock-Hohenlaufen, +with his head shaved and dressed as a Capuchin friar. +It was not a masked ball, as some folks wanted to persuade +you. It was something queer, people whispered. His +grandfather was so. It was in the family.</p> + +<p>His wife and family returned to this country and took +up their abode at Gaunt House. Lord George gave up +his post on the European continent, and was gazetted +to Brazil. But people knew better; he never returned +from that Brazil expedition--never died there--never +lived there--never was there at all. He was nowhere; +he was gone out altogether. “Brazil,” +said one gossip to another, with a grin-- “Brazil +is St. John’s Wood. Rio de Janeiro is a cottage +surrounded by four walls, and George Gaunt is accredited +to a keeper, who has invested him with the order of +the Strait-Waistcoat.” These are the kinds of +epitaphs which men pass over one another in Vanity +Fair.</p> + +<p>Twice or thrice in a week, in the earliest morning, +the poor mother went for her sins and saw the poor +invalid. Sometimes he laughed at her (and his laughter +was more pitiful than to hear him cry); sometimes +she found the brilliant dandy diplomatist of the Congress +of Vienna dragging about a child’s toy, or nursing +the keeper’s baby’s doll. Sometimes he +knew her and Father Mole, her director and companion; +oftener he forgot her, as he had done wife, children, +love, ambition, vanity. But he remembered his dinner-hour, +and used to cry if his wine-and-water was not strong +enough.</p> + +<p>It was the mysterious taint of the blood; the poor +mother had brought it from her own ancient race. +The evil had broken out once or twice in the father’s +family, long before Lady Steyne’s sins had begun, +or her fasts and tears and penances had been offered +in their expiation. The pride of the race was struck +down as the first-born of Pharaoh. The dark mark +of fate and doom was on the threshold-- the tall old +threshold surmounted by coronets and caned heraldry.</p> + +<p>The absent lord’s children meanwhile prattled +and grew on quite unconscious that the doom was over +them too. First they talked of their father and devised +plans against his return. Then the name of the living +dead man was less frequently in their mouth--then not +mentioned at all. But the stricken old grandmother +trembled to think that these too were the inheritors +of their father’s shame as well as of his honours, +and watched sickening for the day when the awful ancestral +curse should come down on them.</p> + +<p>This dark presentiment also haunted Lord Steyne. +He tried to lay the horrid bedside ghost in Red Seas +of wine and jollity, and lost sight of it sometimes +in the crowd and rout of his pleasures. But it always +came back to him when alone, and seemed to grow more +threatening with years. “I have taken your son,” +it said, “why not you? I may shut you up in +a prison some day like your son George. I may tap +you on the head to-morrow, and away go pleasure and +honours, feasts and beauty, friends, flatterers, French +cooks, fine horses and houses--in exchange for a prison, +a keeper, and a straw mattress like George Gaunt’s.” +And then my lord would defy the ghost which threatened +him, for he knew of a remedy by which he could baulk +his enemy.</p> + +<p>So there was splendour and wealth, but no great happiness +perchance, behind the tall caned portals of Gaunt +House with its smoky coronets and ciphers. The feasts +there were of the grandest in London, but there was +not overmuch content therewith, except among the guests +who sat at my lord’s table. Had he not been +so great a Prince very few possibly would have visited +him; but in Vanity Fair the sins of very great personages +are looked at indulgently. “Nous regardons a +deux fois” (as the French lady said) before we +condemn a person of my lord’s undoubted quality. + Some notorious carpers and squeamish moralists might +be sulky with Lord Steyne, but they were glad enough +to come when he asked them.</p> + +<p>“Lord Steyne is really too bad,” Lady +Slingstone said, “but everybody goes, and of +course I shall see that my girls come to no harm.” +“His lordship is a man to whom I owe much, everything +in life,” said the Right Reverend Doctor Trail, +thinking that the Archbishop was rather shaky, and +Mrs. Trail and the young ladies would as soon have +missed going to church as to one of his lordship’s +parties. “His morals are bad,” said little +Lord Southdown to his sister, who meekly expostulated, +having heard terrific legends from her mamma with +respect to the doings at Gaunt House; “but hang +it, he’s got the best dry Sillery in Europe!” +And as for Sir Pitt Crawley, Bart.--Sir Pitt that +pattern of decorum, Sir Pitt who had led off at missionary +meetings--he never for one moment thought of not going +too. “Where you see such persons as the Bishop +of Ealing and the Countess of Slingstone, you may be +pretty sure, Jane,” the Baronet would say, “that +we cannot be wrong. The great rank and station of +Lord Steyne put him in a position to command people +in our station in life. The Lord Lieutenant of a +County, my dear, is a respectable man. Besides, George +Gaunt and I were intimate in early life; he was my +junior when we were attaches at Pumpernickel together.”</p> + +<p>In a word everybody went to wait upon this great man--everybody +who was asked, as you the reader (do not say nay) +or I the writer hereof would go if we had an invitation.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLVIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which the Reader Is Introduced to the Very Best</h4> +of Company + +<p>At last Becky’s kindness and attention to the +chief of her husband’s family were destined +to meet with an exceeding great reward, a reward which, +though certainly somewhat unsubstantial, the little +woman coveted with greater eagerness than more positive +benefits. If she did not wish to lead a virtuous life, +at least she desired to enjoy a character for virtue, +and we know that no lady in the genteel world can +possess this desideratum, until she has put on a train +and feathers and has been presented to her Sovereign +at Court. From that august interview they come out +stamped as honest women. The Lord Chamberlain gives +them a certificate of virtue. And as dubious goods +or letters are passed through an oven at quarantine, +sprinkled with aromatic vinegar, and then pronounced +clean, many a lady, whose reputation would be doubtful +otherwise and liable to give infection, passes through +the wholesome ordeal of the Royal presence and issues +from it free from all taint.</p> + +<p>It might be very well for my Lady Bareacres, my Lady +Tufto, Mrs. Bute Crawley in the country, and other +ladies who had come into contact with Mrs. Rawdon +Crawley to cry fie at the idea of the odious little +adventuress making her curtsey before the Sovereign, +and to declare that, if dear good Queen Charlotte had +been alive, she never would have admitted such an +extremely ill-regulated personage into her chaste +drawing-room. But when we consider that it was the +First Gentleman in Europe in whose high presence Mrs. +Rawdon passed her examination, and as it were, took +her degree in reputation, it surely must be flat disloyalty +to doubt any more about her virtue. I, for my part, +look back with love and awe to that Great Character +in history. Ah, what a high and noble appreciation +of Gentlewomanhood there must have been in Vanity Fair, +when that revered and august being was invested, by +the universal acclaim of the refined and educated +portion of this empire, with the title of Premier +Gentilhomme of his Kingdom. Do you remember, dear +M--, oh friend of my youth, how one blissful night +five-and-twenty years since, the “Hypocrite” +being acted, Elliston being manager, Dowton and Liston +performers, two boys had leave from their loyal masters +to go out from Slaughter-House School where they were +educated and to appear on Drury Lane stage, amongst +a crowd which assembled there to greet the king. +<i>The king</i>? There he was. Beefeaters were +before the august box; the Marquis of Steyne (Lord + of the Powder Closet) and other great officers of +state were behind the chair on which he sat, <i>he</i> +sat--florid of face, portly of person, covered with +orders, and in a rich curling head of hair--how we +sang God save him! How the house rocked and shouted +with that magnificent music. How they cheered, and +cried, and waved handkerchiefs. Ladies wept; mothers +clasped their children; some fainted with emotion. + People were suffocated in the pit, shrieks and groans +rising up amidst the writhing and shouting mass there +of his people who were, and indeed showed themselves +almost to be, ready to die for him. Yes, we saw him. + Fate cannot deprive us of <i>that</i>. Others have +seen Napoleon. Some few still exist who have beheld +Frederick the Great, Doctor Johnson, Marie Antoinette, +&c.-- be it our reasonable boast to our children, +that we saw George the Good, the Magnificent, the +Great.</p> + +<p>Well, there came a happy day in Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s +existence when this angel was admitted into the paradise +of a Court which she coveted, her sister-in-law acting +as her godmother. On the appointed day, Sir Pitt +and his lady, in their great family carriage (just +newly built, and ready for the Baronet’s assumption +of the office of High Sheriff of his county), drove +up to the little house in Curzon Street, to the edification +of Raggles, who was watching from his greengrocer’s +shop, and saw fine plumes within, and enormous bunches +of flowers in the breasts of the new livery-coats +of the footmen.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt, in a glittering uniform, descended and went +into Curzon Street, his sword between his legs. Little +Rawdon stood with his face against the parlour window-panes, +smiling and nodding with all his might to his aunt +in the carriage within; and presently Sir Pitt issued +forth from the house again, leading forth a lady with +grand feathers, covered in a white shawl, and holding +up daintily a train of magnificent brocade. She stepped +into the vehicle as if she were a princess and accustomed +all her life to go to Court, smiling graciously on +the footman at the door and on Sir Pitt, who followed +her into the carriage.</p> + +<p>Then Rawdon followed in his old Guards’ uniform, +which had grown woefully shabby, and was much too +tight. He was to have followed the procession and +waited upon his sovereign in a cab, but that his good-natured +sister-in-law insisted that they should be a family +party. The coach was large, the ladies not very big, +they would hold their trains in their laps--finally, +the four went fraternally together, and their carriage +presently joined the line of royal equipages which +was making its way down Piccadilly and St. James’s +Street, towards the old brick palace where the Star +of Brunswick was in waiting to receive his nobles +and gentlefolks.</p> + +<p>Becky felt as if she could bless the people out of +the carriage windows, so elated was she in spirit, +and so strong a sense had she of the dignified position +which she had at last attained in life. Even our Becky +had her weaknesses, and as one often sees how men +pride themselves upon excellences which others are +slow to perceive: how, for instance, Comus firmly +believes that he is the greatest tragic actor in England; +how Brown, the famous novelist, longs to be considered, +not a man of genius, but a man of fashion; while Robinson, +the great lawyer, does not in the least care about +his reputation in Westminster Hall, but believes himself +incomparable across country and at a five-barred gate--so +to be, and to be thought, a respectable woman was +Becky’s aim in life, and she got up the genteel +with amazing assiduity, readiness, and success. We +have said, there were times when she believed herself +to be a fine lady and forgot that there was no money +in the chest at home--duns round the gate, tradesmen +to coax and wheedle--no ground to walk upon, in a +word. And as she went to Court in the carriage, the +family carriage, she adopted a demeanour so grand, +self-satisfied, deliberate, and imposing that it made +even Lady Jane laugh. She walked into the royal apartments +with a toss of the head which would have befitted +an empress, and I have no doubt had she been one, she +would have become the character perfectly.</p> + +<p>We are authorized to state that Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s +costume de cour on the occasion of her presentation +to the Sovereign was of the most elegant and brilliant +description. Some ladies we may have seen--we who +wear stars and cordons and attend the St. James’s +assemblies, or we, who, in muddy boots, dawdle up and +down Pall Mall and peep into the coaches as they drive +up with the great folks in their feathers--some ladies +of fashion, I say, we may have seen, about two o’clock +of the forenoon of a levee day, as the laced-jacketed +band of the Life Guards are blowing triumphal marches +seated on those prancing music-stools, their cream-coloured +chargers--who are by no means lovely and enticing objects +at that early period of noon. A stout countess of +sixty, decolletee, painted, wrinkled with rouge up +to her drooping eyelids, and diamonds twinkling in +her wig, is a wholesome and edifying, but not a pleasant +sight. She has the faded look of a St. James’s +Street illumination, as it may be seen of an early +morning, when half the lamps are out, and the others +are blinking wanly, as if they were about to vanish +like ghosts before the dawn. Such charms as those +of which we catch glimpses while her ladyship’s +carriage passes should appear abroad at night alone. + If even Cynthia looks haggard of an afternoon, as +we may see her sometimes in the present winter season, +with Phoebus staring her out of countenance from the +opposite side of the heavens, how much more can old +Lady Castlemouldy keep her head up when the sun is +shining full upon it through the chariot windows, +and showing all the chinks and crannies with which +time has marked her face! No. Drawing-rooms should +be announced for November, or the first foggy day, +or the elderly sultanas of our Vanity Fair should +drive up in closed litters, descend in a covered way, +and make their curtsey to the Sovereign under the +protection of lamplight.</p> + +<p>Our beloved Rebecca had no need, however, of any such +a friendly halo to set off her beauty. Her complexion +could bear any sunshine as yet, and her dress, though +if you were to see it now, any present lady of Vanity +Fair would pronounce it to be the most foolish and +preposterous attire ever worn, was as handsome in her +eyes and those of the public, some five-and-twenty +years since, as the most brilliant costume of the +most famous beauty of the present season. A score +of years hence that too, that milliner’s wonder, +will have passed into the domain of the absurd, along +with all previous vanities. But we are wandering +too much. Mrs. Rawdon’s dress was pronounced +to be charmante on the eventful day of her presentation. +Even good little Lady Jane was forced to acknowledge +this effect, as she looked at her kinswoman, and owned +sorrowfully to herself that she was quite inferior +in taste to Mrs. Becky.</p> + +<p>She did not know how much care, thought, and genius +Mrs. Rawdon had bestowed upon that garment. Rebecca +had as good taste as any milliner in Europe, and such +a clever way of doing things as Lady Jane little understood. +The latter quickly spied out the magnificence of the +brocade of Becky’s train, and the splendour of +the lace on her dress.</p> + +<p>The brocade was an old remnant, Becky said; and as +for the lace, it was a great bargain. She had had +it these hundred years.</p> + +<p>“My dear Mrs. Crawley, it must have cost a little +fortune,” Lady Jane said, looking down at her +own lace, which was not nearly so good; and then examining +the quality of the ancient brocade which formed the +material of Mrs. Rawdon’s Court dress, she felt +inclined to say that she could not afford such fine +clothing, but checked that speech, with an effort, +as one uncharitable to her kinswoman.</p> + +<p>And yet, if Lady Jane had known all, I think even +her kindly temper would have failed her. The fact +is, when she was putting Sir Pitt’s house in +order, Mrs. Rawdon had found the lace and the brocade +in old wardrobes, the property of the former ladies +of the house, and had quietly carried the goods home, +and had suited them to her own little person. Briggs +saw her take them, asked no questions, told no stories; +but I believe quite sympathised with her on this matter, +and so would many another honest woman.</p> + +<p>And the diamonds--"Where the doose did you get the +diamonds, Becky?” said her husband, admiring +some jewels which he had never seen before and which +sparkled in her ears and on her neck with brilliance +and profusion.</p> + +<p>Becky blushed a little and looked at him hard for +a moment. Pitt Crawley blushed a little too, and +looked out of window. The fact is, he had given her +a very small portion of the brilliants; a pretty diamond +clasp, which confined a pearl necklace which she wore--and +the Baronet had omitted to mention the circumstance +to his lady.</p> + +<p>Becky looked at her husband, and then at Sir Pitt, +with an air of saucy triumph--as much as to say, “Shall +I betray you?”</p> + +<p>“Guess!” she said to her husband. “Why, +you silly man,” she continued, “where +do you suppose I got them?--all except the little +clasp, which a dear friend of mine gave me long ago. + I hired them, to be sure. I hired them at Mr. Polonius’s, +in Coventry Street. You don’t suppose that all +the diamonds which go to Court belong to the wearers; +like those beautiful stones which Lady Jane has, and +which are much handsomer than any which I have, I am +certain.”</p> + +<p>“They are family jewels,” said Sir Pitt, +again looking uneasy. And in this family conversation +the carriage rolled down the street, until its cargo +was finally discharged at the gates of the palace +where the Sovereign was sitting in state.</p> + +<p>The diamonds, which had created Rawdon’s admiration, +never went back to Mr. Polonius, of Coventry Street, +and that gentleman never applied for their restoration, +but they retired into a little private repository, +in an old desk, which Amelia Sedley had given her +years and years ago, and in which Becky kept a number +of useful and, perhaps, valuable things, about which +her husband knew nothing. To know nothing, or little, +is in the nature of some husbands. To hide, in the +nature of how many women? Oh, ladies! how many of you +have surreptitious milliners’ bills? How many +of you have gowns and bracelets which you daren’t +show, or which you wear trembling?-- trembling, and +coaxing with smiles the husband by your side, who +does not know the new velvet gown from the old one, +or the new bracelet from last year’s, or has +any notion that the ragged-looking yellow lace scarf +cost forty guineas and that Madame Bobinot is writing +dunning letters every week for the money!</p> + +<p>Thus Rawdon knew nothing about the brilliant diamond +ear-rings, or the superb brilliant ornament which +decorated the fair bosom of his lady; but Lord Steyne, +who was in his place at Court, as Lord of the Powder +Closet, and one of the great dignitaries and illustrious +defences of the throne of England, and came up with +all his stars, garters, collars, and cordons, and +paid particular attention to the little woman, knew +whence the jewels came and who paid for them.</p> + +<p>As he bowed over her he smiled, and quoted the hackneyed +and beautiful lines from The Rape of the Lock about +Belinda’s diamonds, “which Jews might +kiss and infidels adore.”</p> + +<p>“But I hope your lordship is orthodox,” +said the little lady with a toss of her head. And +many ladies round about whispered and talked, and +many gentlemen nodded and whispered, as they saw what +marked attention the great nobleman was paying to +the little adventuress.</p> + +<p>What were the circumstances of the interview between +Rebecca Crawley, nee Sharp, and her Imperial Master, +it does not become such a feeble and inexperienced +pen as mine to attempt to relate. The dazzled eyes +close before that Magnificent Idea. Loyal respect +and decency tell even the imagination not to look +too keenly and audaciously about the sacred audience-chamber, +but to back away rapidly, silently, and respectfully, +making profound bows out of the August Presence.</p> + +<p>This may be said, that in all London there was no +more loyal heart than Becky’s after this interview. + The name of her king was always on her lips, and +he was proclaimed by her to be the most charming of +men. She went to Colnaghi’s and ordered the +finest portrait of him that art had produced, and +credit could supply. She chose that famous one in +which the best of monarchs is represented in a frock-coat +with a fur collar, and breeches and silk stockings, +simpering on a sofa from under his curly brown wig. + She had him painted in a brooch and wore it--indeed +she amused and somewhat pestered her acquaintance +with her perpetual talk about his urbanity and beauty. +Who knows! Perhaps the little woman thought she might +play the part of a Maintenon or a Pompadour.</p> + +<p>But the finest sport of all after her presentation +was to hear her talk virtuously. She had a few female +acquaintances, not, it must be owned, of the very +highest reputation in Vanity Fair. But being made +an honest woman of, so to speak, Becky would not consort +any longer with these dubious ones, and cut Lady Crackenbury +when the latter nodded to her from her opera-box, +and gave Mrs. Washington White the go-by in the Ring. + “One must, my dear, show one is somebody,” +she said. “One mustn’t be seen with doubtful +people. I pity Lady Crackenbury from my heart, and +Mrs. Washington White may be a very good-natured person. + <i>You</i> may go and dine with them, as you like your +rubber. But I mustn’t, and won’t; and +you will have the goodness to tell Smith to say I +am not at home when either of them calls.”</p> + +<p>The particulars of Becky’s costume were in the +newspapers--feathers, lappets, superb diamonds, and +all the rest. Lady Crackenbury read the paragraph +in bitterness of spirit and discoursed to her followers +about the airs which that woman was giving herself. + Mrs. Bute Crawley and her young ladies in the country +had a copy of the Morning Post from town, and gave +a vent to their honest indignation. “If you +had been sandy-haired, green-eyed, and a French rope-dancer’s +daughter,” Mrs. Bute said to her eldest girl +(who, on the contrary, was a very swarthy, short, +and snub-nosed young lady), “You might have +had superb diamonds forsooth, and have been presented +at Court by your cousin, the Lady Jane. But you’re +only a gentlewoman, my poor dear child. You have +only some of the best blood in England in your veins, +and good principles and piety for your portion. I, +myself, the wife of a Baronet’s younger brother, +too, never thought of such a thing as going to Court--nor +would other people, if good Queen Charlotte had been +alive.” In this way the worthy Rectoress consoled +herself, and her daughters sighed and sat over the +Peerage all night.</p> + +<p>A few days after the famous presentation, another +great and exceeding honour was vouchsafed to the virtuous +Becky. Lady Steyne’s carriage drove up to Mr. +Rawdon Crawley’s door, and the footman, instead +of driving down the front of the house, as by his +tremendous knocking he appeared to be inclined to do, +relented and only delivered in a couple of cards, +on which were engraven the names of the Marchioness +of Steyne and the Countess of Gaunt. If these bits +of pasteboard had been beautiful pictures, or had had +a hundred yards of Malines lace rolled round them, +worth twice the number of guineas, Becky could not +have regarded them with more pleasure. You may be +sure they occupied a conspicuous place in the china +bowl on the drawing-room table, where Becky kept the +cards of her visitors. Lord! lord! how poor Mrs. +Washington White’s card and Lady Crackenbury’s +card--which our little friend had been glad enough +to get a few months back, and of which the silly little +creature was rather proud once--Lord! lord! I say, +how soon at the appearance of these grand court cards, +did those poor little neglected deuces sink down to +the bottom of the pack. Steyne! Bareacres, Johnes +of Helvellyn! and Caerylon of Camelot! we may be +sure that Becky and Briggs looked out those august +names in the Peerage, and followed the noble races +up through all the ramifications of the family tree.</p> + +<p>My Lord Steyne coming to call a couple of hours afterwards, +and looking about him, and observing everything as +was his wont, found his ladies’ cards already +ranged as the trumps of Becky’s hand, and grinned, +as this old cynic always did at any naive display of +human weakness. Becky came down to him presently; +whenever the dear girl expected his lordship, her +toilette was prepared, her hair in perfect order, +her mouchoirs, aprons, scarfs, little morocco slippers, +and other female gimcracks arranged, and she seated +in some artless and agreeable posture ready to receive +him--whenever she was surprised, of course, she had +to fly to her apartment to take a rapid survey of +matters in the glass, and to trip down again to wait +upon the great peer.</p> + +<p>She found him grinning over the bowl. She was discovered, +and she blushed a little. “Thank you, Monseigneur,” +she said. “You see your ladies have been here. + How good of you! I couldn’t come before--I +was in the kitchen making a pudding.”</p> + +<p>“I know you were, I saw you through the area-railings +as I drove up,” replied the old gentleman.</p> + +<p>“You see everything,” she replied.</p> + +<p>“A few things, but not that, my pretty lady,” +he said good-naturedly. “You silly little +fibster! I heard you in the room overhead, where +I have no doubt you were putting a little rouge on-- +you must give some of yours to my Lady Gaunt, whose +complexion is quite preposterous--and I heard the +bedroom door open, and then you came downstairs.”</p> + +<p>“Is it a crime to try and look my best when +<i>you</i> come here?” answered Mrs. Rawdon plaintively, +and she rubbed her cheek with her handkerchief as +if to show there was no rouge at all, only genuine +blushes and modesty in her case. About this who can +tell? I know there is some rouge that won’t +come off on a pocket-handkerchief, and some so good +that even tears will not disturb it.</p> + +<p>“Well,” said the old gentleman, twiddling +round his wife’s card, “you are bent on +becoming a fine lady. You pester my poor old life +out to get you into the world. You won’t be +able to hold your own there, you silly little fool. + You’ve got no money.”</p> + +<p>“You will get us a place,” interposed +Becky, “as quick as possible.”</p> + +<p>“You’ve got no money, and you want to +compete with those who have. You poor little earthenware +pipkin, you want to swim down the stream along with +the great copper kettles. All women are alike. Everybody +is striving for what is not worth the having! Gad! + I dined with the King yesterday, and we had neck +of mutton and turnips. A dinner of herbs is better +than a stalled ox very often. You will go to Gaunt +House. You give an old fellow no rest until you get +there. It’s not half so nice as here. You’ll +be bored there. I am. My wife is as gay as Lady +Macbeth, and my daughters as cheerful as Regan and +Goneril. I daren’t sleep in what they call +my bedroom. The bed is like the baldaquin of St. Peter’s, +and the pictures frighten me. I have a little brass +bed in a dressing-room, and a little hair mattress +like an anchorite. I am an anchorite. Ho! ho! You’ll +be asked to dinner next week. And gare aux femmes, +look out and hold your own! How the women will bully +you!” This was a very long speech for a man +of few words like my Lord Steyne; nor was it the first +which he uttered for Becky’s benefit on that +day.</p> + +<p>Briggs looked up from the work-table at which she +was seated in the farther room and gave a deep sigh +as she heard the great Marquis speak so lightly of +her sex.</p> + +<p>“If you don’t turn off that abominable +sheep-dog,” said Lord Steyne, with a savage +look over his shoulder at her, “I will have her +poisoned.”</p> + +<p>“I always give my dog dinner from my own plate,” +said Rebecca, laughing mischievously; and having enjoyed +for some time the discomfiture of my lord, who hated +poor Briggs for interrupting his tete-a-tete with +the fair Colonel’s wife, Mrs. Rawdon at length +had pity upon her admirer, and calling to Briggs, +praised the fineness of the weather to her and bade +her to take out the child for a walk.</p> + +<p>“I can’t send her away,” Becky said +presently, after a pause, and in a very sad voice. + Her eyes filled with tears as she spoke, and she +turned away her head.</p> + +<p>“You owe her her wages, I suppose?” said +the Peer.</p> + +<p>“Worse than that,” said Becky, still casting +down her eyes; “I have ruined her.”</p> + +<p>“Ruined her? Then why don’t you turn her +out?” the gentleman asked.</p> + +<p>“Men do that,” Becky answered bitterly. + “Women are not so bad as you. Last year, when +we were reduced to our last guinea, she gave us everything. + She shall never leave me, until we are ruined utterly +ourselves, which does not seem far off, or until I +can pay her the utmost farthing.”</p> + +<p>“--it, how much is it?” said the Peer +with an oath. And Becky, reflecting on the largeness +of his means, mentioned not only the sum which she +had borrowed from Miss Briggs, but one of nearly double +the amount.</p> + +<p>This caused the Lord Steyne to break out in another +brief and energetic expression of anger, at which +Rebecca held down her head the more and cried bitterly. + “I could not help it. It was my only chance. + I dare not tell my husband. He would kill me if I +told him what I have done. I have kept it a secret +from everybody but you-- and you forced it from me. + Ah, what shall I do, Lord Steyne? for I am very, +very unhappy!”</p> + +<p>Lord Steyne made no reply except by beating the devil’s +tattoo and biting his nails. At last he clapped his +hat on his head and flung out of the room. Rebecca +did not rise from her attitude of misery until the +door slammed upon him and his carriage whirled away. + Then she rose up with the queerest expression of +victorious mischief glittering in her green eyes. + She burst out laughing once or twice to herself, +as she sat at work, and sitting down to the piano, +she rattled away a triumphant voluntary on the keys, +which made the people pause under her window to listen +to her brilliant music.</p> + +<p>That night, there came two notes from Gaunt House +for the little woman, the one containing a card of +invitation from Lord and Lady Steyne to a dinner at +Gaunt House next Friday, while the other enclosed +a slip of gray paper bearing Lord Steyne’s signature +and the address of Messrs. Jones, Brown, and Robinson, +Lombard Street.</p> + +<p>Rawdon heard Becky laughing in the night once or twice. + It was only her delight at going to Gaunt House and +facing the ladies there, she said, which amused her +so. But the truth was that she was occupied with +a great number of other thoughts. Should she pay off +old Briggs and give her her conge? Should she astonish +Raggles by settling his account? She turned over all +these thoughts on her pillow, and on the next day, +when Rawdon went out to pay his morning visit to the +Club, Mrs. Crawley (in a modest dress with a veil on) +whipped off in a hackney-coach to the City: and being +landed at Messrs. Jones and Robinson’s bank, +presented a document there to the authority at the +desk, who, in reply, asked her “How she would +take it?”</p> + +<p>She gently said “she would take a hundred and +fifty pounds in small notes and the remainder in one +note”: and passing through St. Paul’s +Churchyard stopped there and bought the handsomest +black silk gown for Briggs which money could buy; +and which, with a kiss and the kindest speeches, she +presented to the simple old spinster.</p> + +<p>Then she walked to Mr. Raggles, inquired about his +children affectionately, and gave him fifty pounds +on account. Then she went to the livery-man from +whom she jobbed her carriages and gratified him with +a similar sum. “And I hope this will be a lesson +to you, Spavin,” she said, “and that on +the next drawing-room day my brother, Sir Pitt, will +not be inconvenienced by being obliged to take four +of us in his carriage to wait upon His Majesty, because +my own carriage is not forthcoming.” It appears +there had been a difference on the last drawing-room +day. Hence the degradation which the Colonel had +almost suffered, of being obliged to enter the presence +of his Sovereign in a hack cab.</p> + +<p>These arrangements concluded, Becky paid a visit upstairs +to the before-mentioned desk, which Amelia Sedley +had given her years and years ago, and which contained +a number of useful and valuable little things--in +which private museum she placed the one note which +Messrs. Jones and Robinson’s cashier had given +her.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter XLIX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which We Enjoy Three Courses and a Dessert</h4> + +<p>When the ladies of Gaunt House were at breakfast that +morning, Lord Steyne (who took his chocolate in private +and seldom disturbed the females of his household, +or saw them except upon public days, or when they +crossed each other in the hall, or when from his pit-box +at the opera he surveyed them in their box on the grand +tier) his lordship, we say, appeared among the ladies +and the children who were assembled over the tea and +toast, and a battle royal ensued apropos of Rebecca.</p> + +<p>“My Lady Steyne,” he said, “I want +to see the list for your dinner on Friday; and I want +you, if you please, to write a card for Colonel and +Mrs. Crawley.”</p> + +<p>“Blanche writes them,” Lady Steyne said +in a flutter. “Lady Gaunt writes them.”</p> + +<p>“I will not write to that person,” Lady +Gaunt said, a tall and stately lady, who looked up +for an instant and then down again after she had spoken. + It was not good to meet Lord Steyne’s eyes for +those who had offended him.</p> + +<p>“Send the children out of the room. Go!” +said he pulling at the bell-rope. The urchins, always +frightened before him, retired: their mother would +have followed too. “Not you,” he said. + “You stop.”</p> + +<p>“My Lady Steyne,” he said, “once +more will you have the goodness to go to the desk +and write that card for your dinner on Friday?”</p> + +<p>“My Lord, I will not be present at it,” +Lady Gaunt said; “I will go home.”</p> + +<p>“I wish you would, and stay there. You will +find the bailiffs at Bareacres very pleasant company, +and I shall be freed from lending money to your relations +and from your own damned tragedy airs. Who are you +to give orders here? You have no money. You’ve +got no brains. You were here to have children, and +you have not had any. Gaunt’s tired of you, +and George’s wife is the only person in the +family who doesn’t wish you were dead. Gaunt +would marry again if you were.”</p> + +<p>“I wish I were,” her Ladyship answered +with tears and rage in her eyes.</p> + +<p>“You, forsooth, must give yourself airs of virtue, +while my wife, who is an immaculate saint, as everybody +knows, and never did wrong in her life, has no objection +to meet my young friend Mrs. Crawley. My Lady Steyne +knows that appearances are sometimes against the best +of women; that lies are often told about the most innocent +of them. Pray, madam, shall I tell you some little +anecdotes about my Lady Bareacres, your mamma?”</p> + +<p>“You may strike me if you like, sir, or hit +any cruel blow,” Lady Gaunt said. To see his +wife and daughter suffering always put his Lordship +into a good humour.</p> + +<p>“My sweet Blanche,” he said, “I +am a gentleman, and never lay my hand upon a woman, +save in the way of kindness. I only wish to correct +little faults in your character. You women are too +proud, and sadly lack humility, as Father Mole, I’m +sure, would tell my Lady Steyne if he were here. +You mustn’t give yourselves airs; you must be +meek and humble, my blessings. For all Lady Steyne +knows, this calumniated, simple, good-humoured Mrs. +Crawley is quite innocent--even more innocent than +herself. Her husband’s character is not good, +but it is as good as Bareacres’, who has played +a little and not paid a great deal, who cheated you +out of the only legacy you ever had and left you a +pauper on my hands. And Mrs. Crawley is not very +well-born, but she is not worse than Fanny’s +illustrious ancestor, the first de la Jones.”</p> + +<p>“The money which I brought into the family, +sir,” Lady George cried out--</p> + +<p>“You purchased a contingent reversion with it,” +the Marquis said darkly. “If Gaunt dies, your +husband may come to his honours; your little boys +may inherit them, and who knows what besides? In the +meanwhile, ladies, be as proud and virtuous as you +like abroad, but don’t give <i>me</i> any airs. + As for Mrs. Crawley’s character, I shan’t +demean myself or that most spotless and perfectly irreproachable +lady by even hinting that it requires a defence. You +will be pleased to receive her with the utmost cordiality, +as you will receive all persons whom I present in +this house. This house?” He broke out with +a laugh. “Who is the master of it? and what +is it? This Temple of Virtue belongs to me. And if +I invite all Newgate or all Bedlam here, by -- they +shall be welcome.”</p> + +<p>After this vigorous allocution, to one of which sort +Lord Steyne treated his “Hareem” whenever +symptoms of insubordination appeared in his household, +the crestfallen women had nothing for it but to obey. + Lady Gaunt wrote the invitation which his Lordship +required, and she and her mother-in-law drove in person, +and with bitter and humiliated hearts, to leave the +cards on Mrs. Rawdon, the reception of which caused +that innocent woman so much pleasure.</p> + +<p>There were families in London who would have sacrificed +a year’s income to receive such an honour at +the hands of those great ladies. Mrs. Frederick Bullock, +for instance, would have gone on her knees from May +Fair to Lombard Street, if Lady Steyne and Lady Gaunt +had been waiting in the City to raise her up and say, +“Come to us next Friday"--not to one of the +great crushes and grand balls of Gaunt House, whither +everybody went, but to the sacred, unapproachable, +mysterious, delicious entertainments, to be admitted +to one of which was a privilege, and an honour, and +a blessing indeed.</p> + +<p>Severe, spotless, and beautiful, Lady Gaunt held the +very highest rank in Vanity Fair. The distinguished +courtesy with which Lord Steyne treated her charmed +everybody who witnessed his behaviour, caused the +severest critics to admit how perfect a gentleman he +was, and to own that his Lordship’s heart at +least was in the right place.</p> + +<p>The ladies of Gaunt House called Lady Bareacres in +to their aid, in order to repulse the common enemy. + One of Lady Gaunt’s carriages went to Hill +Street for her Ladyship’s mother, all whose equipages +were in the hands of the bailiffs, whose very jewels +and wardrobe, it was said, had been seized by those +inexorable Israelites. Bareacres Castle was theirs, +too, with all its costly pictures, furniture, and +articles of vertu--the magnificent Vandykes; the noble +Reynolds pictures; the Lawrence portraits, tawdry and +beautiful, and, thirty years ago, deemed as precious +as works of real genius; the matchless Dancing Nymph +of Canova, for which Lady Bareacres had sat in her +youth--Lady Bareacres splendid then, and radiant in +wealth, rank, and beauty--a toothless, bald, old woman +now--a mere rag of a former robe of state. Her lord, +painted at the same time by Lawrence, as waving his +sabre in front of Bareacres Castle, and clothed in +his uniform as Colonel of the Thistlewood Yeomanry, +was a withered, old, lean man in a greatcoat and a +Brutus wig, slinking about Gray’s Inn of mornings +chiefly and dining alone at clubs. He did not like +to dine with Steyne now. They had run races of pleasure +together in youth when Bareacres was the winner. But +Steyne had more bottom than he and had lasted him out. + The Marquis was ten times a greater man now than +the young Lord Gaunt of ’85, and Bareacres nowhere +in the race--old, beaten, bankrupt, and broken down. + He had borrowed too much money of Steyne to find it +pleasant to meet his old comrade often. The latter, +whenever he wished to be merry, used jeeringly to +ask Lady Gaunt why her father had not come to see +her. “He has not been here for four months,” +Lord Steyne would say. “I can always tell by +my cheque-book afterwards, when I get a visit from +Bareacres. What a comfort it is, my ladies, I bank +with one of my sons’ fathers-in-law, and the +other banks with me!”</p> + +<p>Of the other illustrious persons whom Becky had the +honour to encounter on this her first presentation +to the grand world, it does not become the present +historian to say much. There was his Excellency the +Prince of Peterwaradin, with his Princess--a nobleman +tightly girthed, with a large military chest, on which +the plaque of his order shone magnificently, and wearing +the red collar of the Golden Fleece round his neck. + He was the owner of countless flocks. “Look +at his face. I think he must be descended from a sheep,” +Becky whispered to Lord Steyne. Indeed, his Excellency’s +countenance, long, solemn, and white, with the ornament +round his neck, bore some resemblance to that of a +venerable bell-wether.</p> + +<p>There was Mr. John Paul Jefferson Jones, titularly +attached to the American Embassy and correspondent +of the New York Demagogue, who, by way of making himself +agreeable to the company, asked Lady Steyne, during +a pause in the conversation at dinner, how his dear +friend, George Gaunt, liked the Brazils? He and George +had been most intimate at Naples and had gone up Vesuvius +together. Mr. Jones wrote a full and particular account +of the dinner, which appeared duly in the Demagogue. + He mentioned the names and titles of all the guests, +giving biographical sketches of the principal people. + He described the persons of the ladies with great +eloquence; the service of the table; the size and +costume of the servants; enumerated the dishes and +wines served; the ornaments of the sideboard; and +the probable value of the plate. Such a dinner he +calculated could not be dished up under fifteen or +eighteen dollars per head. And he was in the habit, +until very lately, of sending over proteges, with +letters of recommendation to the present Marquis of +Steyne, encouraged to do so by the intimate terms on +which he had lived with his dear friend, the late +lord. He was most indignant that a young and insignificant +aristocrat, the Earl of Southdown, should have taken +the pas of him in their procession to the dining-room. + “Just as I was stepping up to offer my hand +to a very pleasing and witty fashionable, the brilliant +and exclusive Mrs. Rawdon Crawley,"--he wrote--"the +young patrician interposed between me and the lady +and whisked my Helen off without a word of apology. +I was fain to bring up the rear with the Colonel, the +lady’s husband, a stout red-faced warrior who +distinguished himself at Waterloo, where he had better +luck than befell some of his brother redcoats at New +Orleans.”</p> + +<p>The Colonel’s countenance on coming into this +polite society wore as many blushes as the face of +a boy of sixteen assumes when he is confronted with +his sister’s schoolfellows. It has been told +before that honest Rawdon had not been much used at +any period of his life to ladies’ company. +With the men at the Club or the mess room, he was +well enough; and could ride, bet, smoke, or play at +billiards with the boldest of them. He had had his +time for female friendships too, but that was twenty +years ago, and the ladies were of the rank of those +with whom Young Marlow in the comedy is represented +as having been familiar before he became abashed in +the presence of Miss Hardcastle. The times are such +that one scarcely dares to allude to that kind of +company which thousands of our young men in Vanity +Fair are frequenting every day, which nightly fills +casinos and dancing-rooms, which is known to exist +as well as the Ring in Hyde Park or the Congregation +at St. James’s--but which the most squeamish +if not the most moral of societies is determined to +ignore. In a word, although Colonel Crawley was now +five-and-forty years of age, it had not been his lot +in life to meet with a half dozen good women, besides +his paragon of a wife. All except her and his kind +sister Lady Jane, whose gentle nature had tamed and +won him, scared the worthy Colonel, and on occasion +of his first dinner at Gaunt House he was not heard +to make a single remark except to state that the weather +was very hot. Indeed Becky would have left him at +home, but that virtue ordained that her husband should +be by her side to protect the timid and fluttering +little creature on her first appearance in polite +society.</p> + +<p>On her first appearance Lord Steyne stepped forward, +taking her hand, and greeting her with great courtesy, +and presenting her to Lady Steyne, and their ladyships, +her daughters. Their ladyships made three stately +curtsies, and the elder lady to be sure gave her hand +to the newcomer, but it was as cold and lifeless as +marble.</p> + +<p>Becky took it, however, with grateful humility, and +performing a reverence which would have done credit +to the best dancer-master, put herself at Lady Steyne’s +feet, as it were, by saying that his Lordship had +been her father’s earliest friend and patron, +and that she, Becky, had learned to honour and respect +the Steyne family from the days of her childhood. + The fact is that Lord Steyne had once purchased a +couple of pictures of the late Sharp, and the affectionate +orphan could never forget her gratitude for that favour.</p> + +<p>The Lady Bareacres then came under Becky’s cognizance--to +whom the Colonel’s lady made also a most respectful +obeisance: it was returned with severe dignity by +the exalted person in question.</p> + +<p>“I had the pleasure of making your Ladyship’s +acquaintance at Brussels, ten years ago,” Becky +said in the most winning manner. “I had the +good fortune to meet Lady Bareacres at the Duchess +of Richmond’s ball, the night before the Battle +of Waterloo. And I recollect your Ladyship, and my +Lady Blanche, your daughter, sitting in the carriage +in the porte-cochere at the Inn, waiting for horses. +I hope your Ladyship’s diamonds are safe.”</p> + +<p>Everybody’s eyes looked into their neighbour’s. + The famous diamonds had undergone a famous seizure, +it appears, about which Becky, of course, knew nothing. +Rawdon Crawley retreated with Lord Southdown into +a window, where the latter was heard to laugh immoderately, +as Rawdon told him the story of Lady Bareacres wanting +horses and “knuckling down by Jove,” to +Mrs. Crawley. “I think I needn’t be afraid +of <i>that</i> woman,” Becky thought. Indeed, +Lady Bareacres exchanged terrified and angry looks +with her daughter and retreated to a table, where +she began to look at pictures with great energy.</p> + +<p>When the Potentate from the Danube made his appearance, +the conversation was carried on in the French language, +and the Lady Bareacres and the younger ladies found, +to their farther mortification, that Mrs. Crawley +was much better acquainted with that tongue, and spoke +it with a much better accent than they. Becky had +met other Hungarian magnates with the army in France +in 1816-17. She asked after her friends with great +interest The foreign personages thought that she was +a lady of great distinction, and the Prince and the +Princess asked severally of Lord Steyne and the Marchioness, +whom they conducted to dinner, who was that petite +dame who spoke so well?</p> + +<p>Finally, the procession being formed in the order +described by the American diplomatist, they marched +into the apartment where the banquet was served, and +which, as I have promised the reader he shall enjoy +it, he shall have the liberty of ordering himself so +as to suit his fancy.</p> + +<p>But it was when the ladies were alone that Becky knew +the tug of war would come. And then indeed the little +woman found herself in such a situation as made her +acknowledge the correctness of Lord Steyne’s +caution to her to beware of the society of ladies above +her own sphere. As they say, the persons who hate +Irishmen most are Irishmen; so, assuredly, the greatest +tyrants over women are women. When poor little Becky, +alone with the ladies, went up to the fire-place +whither the great ladies had repaired, the great ladies +marched away and took possession of a table of drawings. + When Becky followed them to the table of drawings, +they dropped off one by one to the fire again. She +tried to speak to one of the children (of whom she +was commonly fond in public places), but Master George +Gaunt was called away by his mamma; and the stranger +was treated with such cruelty finally, that even Lady +Steyne herself pitied her and went up to speak to +the friendless little woman.</p> + +<p>“Lord Steyne,” said her Ladyship, as her +wan cheeks glowed with a blush, “says you sing +and play very beautifully, Mrs. Crawley--I wish you +would do me the kindness to sing to me.”</p> + +<p>“I will do anything that may give pleasure to +my Lord Steyne or to you,” said Rebecca, sincerely +grateful, and seating herself at the piano, began +to sing.</p> + +<p>She sang religious songs of Mozart, which had been +early favourites of Lady Steyne, and with such sweetness +and tenderness that the lady, lingering round the +piano, sat down by its side and listened until the +tears rolled down her eyes. It is true that the opposition +ladies at the other end of the room kept up a loud +and ceaseless buzzing and talking, but the Lady Steyne +did not hear those rumours. She was a child again--and +had wandered back through a forty years’ wilderness +to her convent garden. The chapel organ had pealed +the same tones, the organist, the sister whom she loved +best of the community, had taught them to her in those +early happy days. She was a girl once more, and the +brief period of her happiness bloomed out again for +an hour--she started when the jarring doors were flung +open, and with a loud laugh from Lord Steyne, the +men of the party entered full of gaiety.</p> + +<p>He saw at a glance what had happened in his absence, +and was grateful to his wife for once. He went and +spoke to her, and called her by her Christian name, +so as again to bring blushes to her pale face--"My +wife says you have been singing like an angel,” +he said to Becky. Now there are angels of two kinds, +and both sorts, it is said, are charming in their +way.</p> + +<p>Whatever the previous portion of the evening had been, +the rest of that night was a great triumph for Becky. + She sang her very best, and it was so good that every +one of the men came and crowded round the piano. +The women, her enemies, were left quite alone. And +Mr. Paul Jefferson Jones thought he had made a conquest +of Lady Gaunt by going up to her Ladyship and praising +her delightful friend’s first-rate singing.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter L</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Contains a Vulgar Incident</h4> + +<p>The Muse, whoever she be, who presides over this Comic +History must now descend from the genteel heights +in which she has been soaring and have the goodness +to drop down upon the lowly roof of John Sedley at +Brompton, and describe what events are taking place +there. Here, too, in this humble tenement, live care, +and distrust, and dismay. Mrs. Clapp in the kitchen +is grumbling in secret to her husband about the rent, +and urging the good fellow to rebel against his old +friend and patron and his present lodger. Mrs. Sedley +has ceased to visit her landlady in the lower regions +now, and indeed is in a position to patronize Mrs. +Clapp no longer. How can one be condescending to +a lady to whom one owes a matter of forty pounds, +and who is perpetually throwing out hints for the money? +The Irish maidservant has not altered in the least +in her kind and respectful behaviour; but Mrs. Sedley +fancies that she is growing insolent and ungrateful, +and, as the guilty thief who fears each bush an officer, +sees threatening innuendoes and hints of capture in +all the girl’s speeches and answers. Miss Clapp, +grown quite a young woman now, is declared by the +soured old lady to be an unbearable and impudent little +minx. Why Amelia can be so fond of her, or have her +in her room so much, or walk out with her so constantly, +Mrs. Sedley cannot conceive. The bitterness of poverty +has poisoned the life of the once cheerful and kindly +woman. She is thankless for Amelia’s constant +and gentle bearing towards her; carps at her for her +efforts at kindness or service; rails at her for her +silly pride in her child and her neglect of her parents. + Georgy’s house is not a very lively one since +Uncle Jos’s annuity has been withdrawn and the +little family are almost upon famine diet.</p> + +<p>Amelia thinks, and thinks, and racks her brain, to +find some means of increasing the small pittance upon +which the household is starving. Can she give lessons +in anything? paint card-racks? do fine work? She finds +that women are working hard, and better than she can, +for twopence a day. She buys a couple of begilt Bristol +boards at the Fancy Stationer’s and paints her +very best upon them-- a shepherd with a red waistcoat +on one, and a pink face smiling in the midst of a +pencil landscape--a shepherdess on the other, crossing +a little bridge, with a little dog, nicely shaded. + The man of the Fancy Repository and Brompton Emporium +of Fine Arts (of whom she bought the screens, vainly +hoping that he would repurchase them when ornamented +by her hand) can hardly hide the sneer with which he +examines these feeble works of art. He looks askance +at the lady who waits in the shop, and ties up the +cards again in their envelope of whitey-brown paper, +and hands them to the poor widow and Miss Clapp, who +had never seen such beautiful things in her life, and +had been quite confident that the man must give at +least two guineas for the screens. They try at other +shops in the interior of London, with faint sickening +hopes. “Don’t want ’em,” says +one. “Be off,” says another fiercely. + Three-and-sixpence has been spent in vain-- the screens +retire to Miss Clapp’s bedroom, who persists +in thinking them lovely.</p> + +<p>She writes out a little card in her neatest hand, +and after long thought and labour of composition, +in which the public is informed that “A Lady +who has some time at her disposal, wishes to undertake +the education of some little girls, whom she would +instruct in English, in French, in Geography, in History, +and in Music--address A. O., at Mr. Brown’s”; +and she confides the card to the gentleman of the +Fine Art Repository, who consents to allow it to lie +upon the counter, where it grows dingy and fly-blown. + Amelia passes the door wistfully many a time, in +hopes that Mr. Brown will have some news to give her, +but he never beckons her in. When she goes to make +little purchases, there is no news for her. Poor simple +lady, tender and weak--how are you to battle with +the struggling violent world?</p> + +<p>She grows daily more care-worn and sad, fixing upon +her child alarmed eyes, whereof the little boy cannot +interpret the expression. She starts up of a night +and peeps into his room stealthily, to see that he +is sleeping and not stolen away. She sleeps but little +now. A constant thought and terror is haunting her. + How she weeps and prays in the long silent nights--how +she tries to hide from herself the thought which will +return to her, that she ought to part with the boy, +that she is the only barrier between him and prosperity. + She can’t, she can’t. Not now, at least. + Some other day. Oh! it is too hard to think of and +to bear.</p> + +<p>A thought comes over her which makes her blush and +turn from herself--her parents might keep the annuity--the +curate would marry her and give a home to her and +the boy. But George’s picture and dearest memory +are there to rebuke her. Shame and love say no to +the sacrifice. She shrinks from it as from something +unholy, and such thoughts never found a resting-place +in that pure and gentle bosom.</p> + +<p>The combat, which we describe in a sentence or two, +lasted for many weeks in poor Amelia’s heart, +during which she had no confidante; indeed, she could +never have one, as she would not allow to herself +the possibility of yielding, though she was giving +way daily before the enemy with whom she had to battle. + One truth after another was marshalling itself silently +against her and keeping its ground. Poverty and misery +for all, want and degradation for her parents, injustice +to the boy--one by one the outworks of the little citadel +were taken, in which the poor soul passionately guarded +her only love and treasure.</p> + +<p>At the beginning of the struggle, she had written +off a letter of tender supplication to her brother +at Calcutta, imploring him not to withdraw the support +which he had granted to their parents and painting +in terms of artless pathos their lonely and hapless +condition. She did not know the truth of the matter. + The payment of Jos’s annuity was still regular, +but it was a money-lender in the City who was receiving +it: old Sedley had sold it for a sum of money wherewith +to prosecute his bootless schemes. Emmy was calculating +eagerly the time that would elapse before the letter +would arrive and be answered. She had written down +the date in her pocket-book of the day when she dispatched +it. To her son’s guardian, the good Major at +Madras, she had not communicated any of her griefs +and perplexities. She had not written to him since +she wrote to congratulate him on his approaching marriage. + She thought with sickening despondency, that that +friend--the only one, the one who had felt such a +regard for her--was fallen away.</p> + +<p>One day, when things had come to a very bad pass--when +the creditors were pressing, the mother in hysteric +grief, the father in more than usual gloom, the inmates +of the family avoiding each other, each secretly oppressed +with his private unhappiness and notion of wrong--the +father and daughter happened to be left alone together, +and Amelia thought to comfort her father by telling +him what she had done. She had written to Joseph--an +answer must come in three or four months. He was always +generous, though careless. He could not refuse, when +he knew how straitened were the circumstances of his +parents.</p> + +<p>Then the poor old gentleman revealed the whole truth +to her--that his son was still paying the annuity, +which his own imprudence had flung away. He had not +dared to tell it sooner. He thought Amelia’s +ghastly and terrified look, when, with a trembling, +miserable voice he made the confession, conveyed reproaches +to him for his concealment. “Ah!” said +he with quivering lips and turning away, “you +despise your old father now!”</p> + +<p>“Oh, papal it is not that,” Amelia cried +out, falling on his neck and kissing him many times. + “You are always good and kind. You did it +for the best. It is not for the money--it is--my God! +my God! have mercy upon me, and give me strength to +bear this trial”; and she kissed him again wildly +and went away.</p> + +<p>Still the father did not know what that explanation +meant, and the burst of anguish with which the poor +girl left him. It was that she was conquered. The +sentence was passed. The child must go from her--to +others--to forget her. Her heart and her treasure--her +joy, hope, love, worship--her God, almost! She must +give him up, and then--and then she would go to George, +and they would watch over the child and wait for him +until he came to them in Heaven.</p> + +<p>She put on her bonnet, scarcely knowing what she did, +and went out to walk in the lanes by which George +used to come back from school, and where she was in +the habit of going on his return to meet the boy. + It was May, a half-holiday. The leaves were all coming +out, the weather was brilliant; the boy came running +to her flushed with health, singing, his bundle of +school-books hanging by a thong. There he was. Both +her arms were round him. No, it was impossible. They +could not be going to part. “What is the matter, +Mother?” said he; “you look very pale.”</p> + +<p>“Nothing, my child,” she said and stooped +down and kissed him.</p> + +<p>That night Amelia made the boy read the story of Samuel +to her, and how Hannah, his mother, having weaned +him, brought him to Eli the High Priest to minister +before the Lord. And he read the song of gratitude +which Hannah sang, and which says, who it is who maketh +poor and maketh rich, and bringeth low and exalteth--how +the poor shall be raised up out of the dust, and how, +in his own might, no man shall be strong. Then he +read how Samuel’s mother made him a little coat +and brought it to him from year to year when she came +up to offer the yearly sacrifice. And then, in her +sweet simple way, George’s mother made commentaries +to the boy upon this affecting story. How Hannah, +though she loved her son so much, yet gave him up +because of her vow. And how she must always have thought +of him as she sat at home, far away, making the little +coat; and Samuel, she was sure, never forgot his mother; +and how happy she must have been as the time came +(and the years pass away very quick) when she should +see her boy and how good and wise he had grown. This +little sermon she spoke with a gentle solemn voice, +and dry eyes, until she came to the account of their +meeting--then the discourse broke off suddenly, the +tender heart overflowed, and taking the boy to her +breast, she rocked him in her arms and wept silently +over him in a sainted agony of tears.</p> + +<p>Her mind being made up, the widow began to take such +measures as seemed right to her for advancing the +end which she proposed. One day, Miss Osborne, in +Russell Square (Amelia had not written the name or +number of the house for ten years--her youth, her early +story came back to her as she wrote the superscription) +one day Miss Osborne got a letter from Amelia which +made her blush very much and look towards her father, +sitting glooming in his place at the other end of +the table.</p> + +<p>In simple terms, Amelia told her the reasons which +had induced her to change her mind respecting her +boy. Her father had met with fresh misfortunes which +had entirely ruined him. Her own pittance was so +small that it would barely enable her to support her +parents and would not suffice to give George the advantages +which were his due. Great as her sufferings would +be at parting with him she would, by God’s help, +endure them for the boy’s sake. She knew that +those to whom he was going would do all in their power +to make him happy. She described his disposition, +such as she fancied it--quick and impatient of control +or harshness, easily to be moved by love and kindness. + In a postscript, she stipulated that she should have +a written agreement, that she should see the child +as often as she wished--she could not part with him +under any other terms.</p> + +<p>“What? Mrs. Pride has come down, has she?” +old Osborne said, when with a tremulous eager voice +Miss Osborne read him the letter. “Reg’lar +starved out, hey? Ha, ha! I knew she would.” +He tried to keep his dignity and to read his paper +as usual--but he could not follow it. He chuckled +and swore to himself behind the sheet.</p> + +<p>At last he flung it down and, scowling at his daughter, +as his wont was, went out of the room into his study +adjoining, from whence he presently returned with +a key. He flung it to Miss Osborne.</p> + +<p>“Get the room over mine--his room that was--ready,” +he said. “Yes, sir,” his daughter replied +in a tremble. It was George’s room. It had +not been opened for more than ten years. Some of his +clothes, papers, handkerchiefs, whips and caps, fishing-rods +and sporting gear, were still there. An Army list +of 1814, with his name written on the cover; a little +dictionary he was wont to use in writing; and the +Bible his mother had given him, were on the mantelpiece, +with a pair of spurs and a dried inkstand covered +with the dust of ten years. Ah! since that ink was +wet, what days and people had passed away! The writing-book, +still on the table, was blotted with his hand.</p> + +<p>Miss Osborne was much affected when she first entered +this room with the servants under her. She sank quite +pale on the little bed. “This is blessed news, +m’am--indeed, m’am,” the housekeeper +said; “and the good old times is returning, +m’am. The dear little feller, to be sure, m’am; +how happy he will be! But some folks in May Fair, +m’am, will owe him a grudge, m’am”; +and she clicked back the bolt which held the window-sash +and let the air into the chamber.</p> + +<p>“You had better send that woman some money,” +Mr. Osborne said, before he went out. “She +shan’t want for nothing. Send her a hundred +pound.”</p> + +<p>“And I’ll go and see her to-morrow?” +Miss Osborne asked.</p> + +<p>“That’s your look out. She don’t +come in here, mind. No, by --, not for all the money +in London. But she mustn’t want now. So look +out, and get things right.” With which brief +speeches Mr. Osborne took leave of his daughter and +went on his accustomed way into the City.</p> + +<p>“Here, Papa, is some money,” Amelia said +that night, kissing the old man, her father, and putting +a bill for a hundred pounds into his hands. “And--and, +Mamma, don’t be harsh with Georgy. He--he is +not going to stop with us long.” She could say +nothing more, and walked away silently to her room. + Let us close it upon her prayers and her sorrow. + I think we had best speak little about so much love +and grief.</p> + +<p>Miss Osborne came the next day, according to the promise +contained in her note, and saw Amelia. The meeting +between them was friendly. A look and a few words +from Miss Osborne showed the poor widow that, with +regard to this woman at least, there need be no fear +lest she should take the first place in her son’s +affection. She was cold, sensible, not unkind. The +mother had not been so well pleased, perhaps, had +the rival been better looking, younger, more affectionate, +warmer-hearted. Miss Osborne, on the other hand, +thought of old times and memories and could not but +be touched with the poor mother’s pitiful situation. + She was conquered, and laying down her arms, as it +were, she humbly submitted. That day they arranged +together the preliminaries of the treaty of capitulation.</p> + +<p>George was kept from school the next day, and saw +his aunt. Amelia left them alone together and went +to her room. She was trying the separation--as that +poor gentle Lady Jane Grey felt the edge of the axe +that was to come down and sever her slender life. +Days were passed in parleys, visits, preparations. + The widow broke the matter to Georgy with great caution; +she looked to see him very much affected by the intelligence. + He was rather elated than otherwise, and the poor +woman turned sadly away. He bragged about the news +that day to the boys at school; told them how he was +going to live with his grandpapa his father’s +father, not the one who comes here sometimes; and +that he would be very rich, and have a carriage, and +a pony, and go to a much finer school, and when he +was rich he would buy Leader’s pencil-case and +pay the tart-woman. The boy was the image of his +father, as his fond mother thought.</p> + +<p>Indeed I have no heart, on account of our dear Amelia’s +sake, to go through the story of George’s last +days at home.</p> + +<p>At last the day came, the carriage drove up, the little +humble packets containing tokens of love and remembrance +were ready and disposed in the hall long since--George +was in his new suit, for which the tailor had come +previously to measure him. He had sprung up with +the sun and put on the new clothes, his mother hearing +him from the room close by, in which she had been +lying, in speechless grief and watching. Days before +she had been making preparations for the end, purchasing +little stores for the boy’s use, marking his +books and linen, talking with him and preparing him +for the change-- fondly fancying that he needed preparation.</p> + +<p>So that he had change, what cared he? He was longing +for it. By a thousand eager declarations as to what +he would do, when he went to live with his grandfather, +he had shown the poor widow how little the idea of +parting had cast him down. “He would come and +see his mamma often on the pony,” he said. +“He would come and fetch her in the carriage; +they would drive in the park, and she should have +everything she wanted.” The poor mother was fain +to content herself with these selfish demonstrations +of attachment, and tried to convince herself how sincerely +her son loved her. He must love her. All children +were so: a little anxious for novelty, and--no, not +selfish, but self-willed. Her child must have his +enjoyments and ambition in the world. She herself, +by her own selfishness and imprudent love for him +had denied him his just rights and pleasures hitherto.</p> + +<p>I know few things more affecting than that timorous +debasement and self-humiliation of a woman. How she +owns that it is she and not the man who is guilty; +how she takes all the faults on her side; how she +courts in a manner punishment for the wrongs which +she has not committed and persists in shielding the +real culprit! It is those who injure women who get +the most kindness from them--they are born timid and +tyrants and maltreat those who are humblest before +them.</p> + +<p>So poor Amelia had been getting ready in silent misery +for her son’s departure, and had passed many +and many a long solitary hour in making preparations +for the end. George stood by his mother, watching +her arrangements without the least concern. Tears +had fallen into his boxes; passages had been scored +in his favourite books; old toys, relics, treasures +had been hoarded away for him, and packed with strange +neatness and care--and of all these things the boy +took no note. The child goes away smiling as the mother +breaks her heart. By heavens it is pitiful, the bootless +love of women for children in Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>A few days are past, and the great event of Amelia’s +life is consummated. No angel has intervened. The +child is sacrificed and offered up to fate, and the +widow is quite alone.</p> + +<p>The boy comes to see her often, to be sure. He rides +on a pony with a coachman behind him, to the delight +of his old grandfather, Sedley, who walks proudly +down the lane by his side. She sees him, but he is +not her boy any more. Why, he rides to see the boys +at the little school, too, and to show off before +them his new wealth and splendour. In two days he +has adopted a slightly imperious air and patronizing +manner. He was born to command, his mother thinks, +as his father was before him.</p> + +<p>It is fine weather now. Of evenings on the days when +he does not come, she takes a long walk into London--yes, +as far as Russell Square, and rests on the stone by +the railing of the garden opposite Mr. Osborne’s +house. It is so pleasant and cool. She can look up +and see the drawing-room windows illuminated, and, +at about nine o’clock, the chamber in the upper +story where Georgy sleeps. She knows--he has told +her. She prays there as the light goes out, prays +with an humble heart, and walks home shrinking and +silent. She is very tired when she comes home. Perhaps +she will sleep the better for that long weary walk, +and she may dream about Georgy.</p> + +<p>One Sunday she happened to be walking in Russell Square, +at some distance from Mr. Osborne’s house (she +could see it from a distance though) when all the +bells of Sabbath were ringing, and George and his +aunt came out to go to church; a little sweep asked +for charity, and the footman, who carried the books, +tried to drive him away; but Georgy stopped and gave +him money. May God’s blessing be on the boy! + Emmy ran round the square and, coming up to the sweep, +gave him her mite too. All the bells of Sabbath were +ringing, and she followed them until she came to the +Foundling Church, into which she went. There she +sat in a place whence she could see the head of the +boy under his father’s tombstone. Many hundred +fresh children’s voices rose up there and sang +hymns to the Father Beneficent, and little George’s +soul thrilled with delight at the burst of glorious +psalmody. His mother could not see him for awhile, +through the mist that dimmed her eyes.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which a Charade Is Acted Which May or May Not Puzzle</h4> +the Reader + +<p>After Becky’s appearance at my Lord Steyne’s +private and select parties, the claims of that estimable +woman as regards fashion were settled, and some of +the very greatest and tallest doors in the metropolis +were speedily opened to her--doors so great and tall +that the beloved reader and writer hereof may hope +in vain to enter at them. Dear brethren, let us tremble +before those august portals. I fancy them guarded +by grooms of the chamber with flaming silver forks +with which they prong all those who have not the right +of the entree. They say the honest newspaper-fellow +who sits in the hall and takes down the names of the +great ones who are admitted to the feasts dies after +a little time. He can’t survive the glare of +fashion long. It scorches him up, as the presence +of Jupiter in full dress wasted that poor imprudent +Semele--a giddy moth of a creature who ruined herself +by venturing out of her natural atmosphere. Her myth +ought to be taken to heart amongst the Tyburnians, +the Belgravians--her story, and perhaps Becky’s +too. Ah, ladies!--ask the Reverend Mr. Thurifer if +Belgravia is not a sounding brass and Tyburnia a tinkling +cymbal. These are vanities. Even these will pass +away. And some day or other (but it will be after +our time, thank goodness) Hyde Park Gardens will be +no better known than the celebrated horticultural +outskirts of Babylon, and Belgrave Square will be +as desolate as Baker Street, or Tadmor in the wilderness.</p> + +<p>Ladies, are you aware that the great Pitt lived in +Baker Street? What would not your grandmothers have +given to be asked to Lady Hester’s parties in +that now decayed mansion? I have dined in it-- moi +qui vous parle, I peopled the chamber with ghosts of +the mighty dead. As we sat soberly drinking claret +there with men of to-day, the spirits of the departed +came in and took their places round the darksome board. + The pilot who weathered the storm tossed off great +bumpers of spiritual port; the shade of Dundas did +not leave the ghost of a heeltap. Addington sat bowing +and smirking in a ghastly manner, and would not be +behindhand when the noiseless bottle went round; Scott, +from under bushy eyebrows, winked at the apparition +of a beeswing; Wilberforce’s eyes went up to +the ceiling, so that he did not seem to know how his +glass went up full to his mouth and came down empty; +up to the ceiling which was above us only yesterday, +and which the great of the past days have all looked +at. They let the house as a furnished lodging now. + Yes, Lady Hester once lived in Baker Street, and +lies asleep in the wilderness. Eothen saw her there--not +in Baker Street, but in the other solitude.</p> + +<p>It is all vanity to be sure, but who will not own +to liking a little of it? I should like to know what +well-constituted mind, merely because it is transitory, +dislikes roast beef? That is a vanity, but may every +man who reads this have a wholesome portion of it through +life, I beg: aye, though my readers were five hundred +thousand. Sit down, gentlemen, and fall to, with a +good hearty appetite; the fat, the lean, the gravy, +the horse-radish as you like it--don’t spare +it. Another glass of wine, Jones, my boy--a little +bit of the Sunday side. Yes, let us eat our fill +of the vain thing and be thankful therefor. And let +us make the best of Becky’s aristocratic pleasures +likewise--for these too, like all other mortal delights, +were but transitory.</p> + +<p>The upshot of her visit to Lord Steyne was that His +Highness the Prince of Peterwaradin took occasion +to renew his acquaintance with Colonel Crawley, when +they met on the next day at the Club, and to compliment +Mrs. Crawley in the Ring of Hyde Park with a profound +salute of the hat. She and her husband were invited +immediately to one of the Prince’s small parties +at Levant House, then occupied by His Highness during +the temporary absence from England of its noble proprietor. + She sang after dinner to a very little comite. The +Marquis of Steyne was present, paternally superintending +the progress of his pupil.</p> + +<p>At Levant House Becky met one of the finest gentlemen +and greatest ministers that Europe has produced--the +Duc de la Jabotiere, then Ambassador from the Most +Christian King, and subsequently Minister to that +monarch. I declare I swell with pride as these august +names are transcribed by my pen, and I think in what +brilliant company my dear Becky is moving. She became +a constant guest at the French Embassy, where no party +was considered to be complete without the presence +of the charming Madame Ravdonn Cravley. Messieurs +de Truffigny (of the Perigord family) and Champignac, +both attaches of the Embassy, were straightway smitten +by the charms of the fair Colonel’s wife, and +both declared, according to the wont of their nation +(for who ever yet met a Frenchman, come out of England, +that has not left half a dozen families miserable, +and brought away as many hearts in his pocket-book?), +both, I say, declared that they were au mieux with +the charming Madame Ravdonn.</p> + +<p>But I doubt the correctness of the assertion. Champignac +was very fond of ecarte, and made many parties with +the Colonel of evenings, while Becky was singing to +Lord Steyne in the other room; and as for Truffigny, +it is a well-known fact that he dared not go to the +Travellers’, where he owed money to the waiters, +and if he had not had the Embassy as a dining-place, +the worthy young gentleman must have starved. I doubt, +I say, that Becky would have selected either of these +young men as a person on whom she would bestow her +special regard. They ran of her messages, purchased +her gloves and flowers, went in debt for opera-boxes +for her, and made themselves amiable in a thousand +ways. And they talked English with adorable simplicity, +and to the constant amusement of Becky and my Lord +Steyne, she would mimic one or other to his face, +and compliment him on his advance in the English language +with a gravity which never failed to tickle the Marquis, +her sardonic old patron. Truffigny gave Briggs a shawl +by way of winning over Becky’s confidante, and +asked her to take charge of a letter which the simple +spinster handed over in public to the person to whom +it was addressed, and the composition of which amused +everybody who read it greatly. Lord Steyne read it, +everybody but honest Rawdon, to whom it was not necessary +to tell everything that passed in the little house +in May Fair.</p> + +<p>Here, before long, Becky received not only “the +best” foreigners (as the phrase is in our noble +and admirable society slang), but some of the best +English people too. I don’t mean the most virtuous, +or indeed the least virtuous, or the cleverest, or +the stupidest, or the richest, or the best born, but +“the best,"--in a word, people about whom there +is no question--such as the great Lady Fitz-Willis, +that Patron Saint of Almack’s, the great Lady +Slowbore, the great Lady Grizzel Macbeth (she was +Lady G. Glowry, daughter of Lord Grey of Glowry), +and the like. When the Countess of Fitz-Willis (her +Ladyship is of the Kingstreet family, see Debrett and +Burke) takes up a person, he or she is safe. There +is no question about them any more. Not that my Lady +Fitz-Willis is any better than anybody else, being, +on the contrary, a faded person, fifty-seven years +of age, and neither handsome, nor wealthy, nor entertaining; +but it is agreed on all sides that she is of the “best +people.” Those who go to her are of the best: + and from an old grudge probably to Lady Steyne (for +whose coronet her ladyship, then the youthful Georgina +Frederica, daughter of the Prince of Wales’s +favourite, the Earl of Portansherry, had once tried), +this great and famous leader of the fashion chose +to acknowledge Mrs. Rawdon Crawley; made her a most +marked curtsey at the assembly over which she presided; +and not only encouraged her son, St. Kitts (his lordship +got his place through Lord Steyne’s interest), +to frequent Mrs. Crawley’s house, but asked +her to her own mansion and spoke to her twice in the +most public and condescending manner during dinner. + The important fact was known all over London that +night. People who had been crying fie about Mrs. +Crawley were silent. Wenham, the wit and lawyer, Lord +Steyne’s right-hand man, went about everywhere +praising her: some who had hesitated, came forward +at once and welcomed her; little Tom Toady, who had +warned Southdown about visiting such an abandoned woman, +now besought to be introduced to her. In a word, +she was admitted to be among the “best” +people. Ah, my beloved readers and brethren, do not +envy poor Becky prematurely--glory like this is said +to be fugitive. It is currently reported that even +in the very inmost circles, they are no happier than +the poor wanderers outside the zone; and Becky, who +penetrated into the very centre of fashion and saw +the great George IV face to face, has owned since that +there too was Vanity.</p> + +<p>We must be brief in descanting upon this part of her +career. As I cannot describe the mysteries of freemasonry, +although I have a shrewd idea that it is a humbug, +so an uninitiated man cannot take upon himself to +portray the great world accurately, and had best keep +his opinions to himself, whatever they are.</p> + +<p>Becky has often spoken in subsequent years of this +season of her life, when she moved among the very +greatest circles of the London fashion. Her success +excited, elated, and then bored her. At first no +occupation was more pleasant than to invent and procure +(the latter a work of no small trouble and ingenuity, +by the way, in a person of Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s +very narrow means)--to procure, we say, the prettiest +new dresses and ornaments; to drive to fine dinner +parties, where she was welcomed by great people; and +from the fine dinner parties to fine assemblies, whither +the same people came with whom she had been dining, +whom she had met the night before, and would see on +the morrow--the young men faultlessly appointed, handsomely +cravatted, with the neatest glossy boots and white +gloves--the elders portly, brass-buttoned, noble-looking, +polite, and prosy--the young ladies blonde, timid, +and in pink--the mothers grand, beautiful, sumptuous, +solemn, and in diamonds. They talked in English, +not in bad French, as they do in the novels. They +talked about each others’ houses, and characters, +and families--just as the Joneses do about the Smiths. + Becky’s former acquaintances hated and envied +her; the poor woman herself was yawning in spirit. +“I wish I were out of it,” she said to +herself. “I would rather be a parson’s +wife and teach a Sunday school than this; or a sergeant’s +lady and ride in the regimental waggon; or, oh, how +much gayer it would be to wear spangles and trousers +and dance before a booth at a fair.”</p> + +<p>“You would do it very well,” said Lord +Steyne, laughing. She used to tell the great man her +ennuis and perplexities in her artless way-- they +amused him.</p> + +<p>“Rawdon would make a very good Ecuyer--Master +of the Ceremonies-- what do you call him--the man +in the large boots and the uniform, who goes round +the ring cracking the whip? He is large, heavy, and +of a military figure. I recollect,” Becky continued +pensively, “my father took me to see a show +at Brookgreen Fair when I was a child, and when we +came home, I made myself a pair of stilts and danced +in the studio to the wonder of all the pupils.”</p> + +<p>“I should have liked to see it,” said +Lord Steyne.</p> + +<p>“I should like to do it now,” Becky continued. + “How Lady Blinkey would open her eyes, and +Lady Grizzel Macbeth would stare! Hush! silence! +there is Pasta beginning to sing.” Becky always +made a point of being conspicuously polite to the +professional ladies and gentlemen who attended at +these aristocratic parties--of following them into +the corners where they sat in silence, and shaking +hands with them, and smiling in the view of all persons. + She was an artist herself, as she said very truly; +there was a frankness and humility in the manner in +which she acknowledged her origin, which provoked, +or disarmed, or amused lookers-on, as the case might +be. “How cool that woman is,” said one; +“what airs of independence she assumes, where +she ought to sit still and be thankful if anybody +speaks to her!” “What an honest and good-natured +soul she is!” said another. “What an artful +little minx” said a third. They were all right +very likely, but Becky went her own way, and so fascinated +the professional personages that they would leave +off their sore throats in order to sing at her parties +and give her lessons for nothing.</p> + +<p>Yes, she gave parties in the little house in Curzon +Street. Many scores of carriages, with blazing lamps, +blocked up the street, to the disgust of No. 100, +who could not rest for the thunder of the knocking, +and of 102, who could not sleep for envy. The gigantic +footmen who accompanied the vehicles were too big to +be contained in Becky’s little hall, and were +billeted off in the neighbouring public-houses, whence, +when they were wanted, call-boys summoned them from +their beer. Scores of the great dandies of London squeezed +and trod on each other on the little stairs, laughing +to find themselves there; and many spotless and severe +ladies of ton were seated in the little drawing-room, +listening to the professional singers, who were singing +according to their wont, and as if they wished to +blow the windows down. And the day after, there appeared +among the fashionable reunions in the Morning Post +a paragraph to the following effect:</p> + +<p>“Yesterday, Colonel and Mrs. Crawley entertained +a select party at dinner at their house in May Fair. + Their Excellencies the Prince and Princess of Peterwaradin, +H. E. Papoosh Pasha, the Turkish Ambassador (attended +by Kibob Bey, dragoman of the mission), the Marquess +of Steyne, Earl of Southdown, Sir Pitt and Lady Jane +Crawley, Mr. Wagg, &c. After dinner Mrs. Crawley had +an assembly which was attended by the Duchess (Dowager) +of Stilton, Duc de la Gruyere, Marchioness of Cheshire, +Marchese Alessandro Strachino, Comte de Brie, Baron +Schapzuger, Chevalier Tosti, Countess of Slingstone, +and Lady F. Macadam, Major-General and Lady G. Macbeth, +and (2) Miss Macbeths; Viscount Paddington, Sir Horace +Fogey, Hon. Sands Bedwin, Bobachy Bahawder,” +and an &c., which the reader may fill at his pleasure +through a dozen close lines of small type.</p> + +<p>And in her commerce with the great our dear friend +showed the same frankness which distinguished her +transactions with the lowly in station. On one occasion, +when out at a very fine house, Rebecca was (perhaps +rather ostentatiously) holding a conversation in the +French language with a celebrated tenor singer of that +nation, while the Lady Grizzel Macbeth looked over +her shoulder scowling at the pair.</p> + +<p>“How very well you speak French,” Lady +Grizzel said, who herself spoke the tongue in an Edinburgh +accent most remarkable to hear.</p> + +<p>“I ought to know it,” Becky modestly said, +casting down her eyes. “I taught it in a school, +and my mother was a Frenchwoman.”</p> + +<p>Lady Grizzel was won by her humility and was mollified +towards the little woman. She deplored the fatal +levelling tendencies of the age, which admitted persons +of all classes into the society of their superiors, +but her ladyship owned that this one at least was well +behaved and never forgot her place in life. She was +a very good woman: good to the poor; stupid, blameless, +unsuspicious. It is not her ladyship’s fault +that she fancies herself better than you and me. +The skirts of her ancestors’ garments have been +kissed for centuries; it is a thousand years, they +say, since the tartans of the head of the family were +embraced by the defunct Duncan’s lords and councillors, +when the great ancestor of the House became King of +Scotland.</p> + +<p>Lady Steyne, after the music scene, succumbed before +Becky, and perhaps was not disinclined to her. The +younger ladies of the house of Gaunt were also compelled +into submission. Once or twice they set people at +her, but they failed. The brilliant Lady Stunnington +tried a passage of arms with her, but was routed with +great slaughter by the intrepid little Becky. When +attacked sometimes, Becky had a knack of adopting +a demure ingenue air, under which she was most dangerous. + She said the wickedest things with the most simple +unaffected air when in this mood, and would take care +artlessly to apologize for her blunders, so that all +the world should know that she had made them.</p> + +<p>Mr. Wagg, the celebrated wit, and a led captain and +trencher-man of my Lord Steyne, was caused by the +ladies to charge her; and the worthy fellow, leering +at his patronesses and giving them a wink, as much +as to say, “Now look out for sport,” one +evening began an assault upon Becky, who was unsuspiciously +eating her dinner. The little woman, attacked on a +sudden, but never without arms, lighted up in an instant, +parried and riposted with a home-thrust, which made +Wagg’s face tingle with shame; then she returned +to her soup with the most perfect calm and a quiet +smile on her face. Wagg’s great patron, who +gave him dinners and lent him a little money sometimes, +and whose election, newspaper, and other jobs Wagg +did, gave the luckless fellow such a savage glance +with the eyes as almost made him sink under the table +and burst into tears. He looked piteously at my lord, +who never spoke to him during dinner, and at the ladies, +who disowned him. At last Becky herself took compassion +upon him and tried to engage him in talk. He was not +asked to dinner again for six weeks; and Fiche, my +lord’s confidential man, to whom Wagg naturally +paid a good deal of court, was instructed to tell +him that if he ever dared to say a rude thing to Mrs. +Crawley again, or make her the butt of his stupid jokes, +Milor would put every one of his notes of hand into +his lawyer’s hands and sell him up without mercy. + Wagg wept before Fiche and implored his dear friend +to intercede for him. He wrote a poem in favour of +Mrs. R. C., which appeared in the very next number +of the Harum-scarum Magazine, which he conducted. + He implored her good-will at parties where he met +her. He cringed and coaxed Rawdon at the club. He +was allowed to come back to Gaunt House after a while. +Becky was always good to him, always amused, never +angry.</p> + +<p>His lordship’s vizier and chief confidential +servant (with a seat in parliament and at the dinner +table), Mr. Wenham, was much more prudent in his behaviour +and opinions than Mr. Wagg. However much he might +be disposed to hate all parvenus (Mr. Wenham himself +was a staunch old True Blue Tory, and his father a +small coal-merchant in the north of England), this +aide-de-camp of the Marquis never showed any sort +of hostility to the new favourite, but pursued her +with stealthy kindnesses and a sly and deferential +politeness which somehow made Becky more uneasy than +other people’s overt hostilities.</p> + +<p>How the Crawleys got the money which was spent upon +the entertainments with which they treated the polite +world was a mystery which gave rise to some conversation +at the time, and probably added zest to these little +festivities. Some persons averred that Sir Pitt Crawley +gave his brother a handsome allowance; if he did, +Becky’s power over the Baronet must have been +extraordinary indeed, and his character greatly changed +in his advanced age. Other parties hinted that it +was Becky’s habit to levy contributions on all +her husband’s friends: going to this one in +tears with an account that there was an execution in +the house; falling on her knees to that one and declaring +that the whole family must go to gaol or commit suicide +unless such and such a bill could be paid. Lord Southdown, +it was said, had been induced to give many hundreds +through these pathetic representations. Young Feltham, +of the --th Dragoons (and son of the firm of Tiler +and Feltham, hatters and army accoutrement makers), +and whom the Crawleys introduced into fashionable +life, was also cited as one of Becky’s victims +in the pecuniary way. People declared that she got +money from various simply disposed persons, under +pretence of getting them confidential appointments +under Government. Who knows what stories were or were +not told of our dear and innocent friend? Certain it +is that if she had had all the money which she was +said to have begged or borrowed or stolen, she might +have capitalized and been honest for life, whereas,--but +this is advancing matters.</p> + +<p>The truth is, that by economy and good management--by +a sparing use of ready money and by paying scarcely +anybody--people can manage, for a time at least, to +make a great show with very little means: and it is +our belief that Becky’s much-talked-of parties, +which were not, after all was said, very numerous, +cost this lady very little more than the wax candles +which lighted the walls. Stillbrook and Queen’s +Crawley supplied her with game and fruit in abundance. + Lord Steyne’s cellars were at her disposal, +and that excellent nobleman’s famous cooks presided +over her little kitchen, or sent by my lord’s +order the rarest delicacies from their own. I protest +it is quite shameful in the world to abuse a simple +creature, as people of her time abuse Becky, and I +warn the public against believing one-tenth of the +stories against her. If every person is to be banished +from society who runs into debt and cannot pay--if +we are to be peering into everybody’s private +life, speculating upon their income, and cutting them +if we don’t approve of their expenditure--why, +what a howling wilderness and intolerable dwelling +Vanity Fair would be! Every man’s hand would +be against his neighbour in this case, my dear sir, +and the benefits of civilization would be done away +with. We should be quarrelling, abusing, avoiding +one another. Our houses would become caverns, and +we should go in rags because we cared for nobody. + Rents would go down. Parties wouldn’t be given +any more. All the tradesmen of the town would be bankrupt. + Wine, wax-lights, comestibles, rouge, crinoline-petticoats, +diamonds, wigs, Louis-Quatorze gimcracks, and old +china, park hacks, and splendid high-stepping carriage +horses--all the delights of life, I say,--would go +to the deuce, if people did but act upon their silly +principles and avoid those whom they dislike and abuse. + Whereas, by a little charity and mutual forbearance, +things are made to go on pleasantly enough: we may +abuse a man as much as we like, and call him the greatest +rascal unhanged--but do we wish to hang him therefore? +No. We shake hands when we meet. If his cook is good +we forgive him and go and dine with him, and we expect +he will do the same by us. Thus trade flourishes--civilization +advances; peace is kept; new dresses are wanted for +new assemblies every week; and the last year’s +vintage of Lafitte will remunerate the honest proprietor +who reared it.</p> + +<p>At the time whereof we are writing, though the Great +George was on the throne and ladies wore gigots and +large combs like tortoise-shell shovels in their +hair, instead of the simple sleeves and lovely wreaths +which are actually in fashion, the manners of the +very polite world were not, I take it, essentially +different from those of the present day: and their +amusements pretty similar. To us, from the outside, +gazing over the policeman’s shoulders at the +bewildering beauties as they pass into Court or ball, +they may seem beings of unearthly splendour and in +the enjoyment of an exquisite happiness by us unattainable. +It is to console some of these dissatisfied beings +that we are narrating our dear Becky’s struggles, +and triumphs, and disappointments, of all of which, +indeed, as is the case with all persons of merit, she +had her share.</p> + +<p>At this time the amiable amusement of acting charades +had come among us from France, and was considerably +in vogue in this country, enabling the many ladies +amongst us who had beauty to display their charms, +and the fewer number who had cleverness to exhibit +their wit. My Lord Steyne was incited by Becky, who +perhaps believed herself endowed with both the above +qualifications, to give an entertainment at Gaunt +House, which should include some of these little dramas--and +we must take leave to introduce the reader to this +brilliant reunion, and, with a melancholy welcome too, +for it will be among the very last of the fashionable +entertainments to which it will be our fortune to +conduct him.</p> + +<p>A portion of that splendid room, the picture gallery +of Gaunt House, was arranged as the charade theatre. + It had been so used when George III was king; and +a picture of the Marquis of Gaunt is still extant, +with his hair in powder and a pink ribbon, in a Roman +shape, as it was called, enacting the part of Cato +in Mr. Addison’s tragedy of that name, performed +before their Royal Highnesses the Prince of Wales, +the Bishop of Osnaburgh, and Prince William Henry, +then children like the actor. One or two of the old +properties were drawn out of the garrets, where they +had lain ever since, and furbished up anew for the +present festivities.</p> + +<p>Young Bedwin Sands, then an elegant dandy and Eastern +traveller, was manager of the revels. An Eastern +traveller was somebody in those days, and the adventurous +Bedwin, who had published his quarto and passed some +months under the tents in the desert, was a personage +of no small importance. In his volume there were +several pictures of Sands in various oriental costumes; +and he travelled about with a black attendant of most +unprepossessing appearance, just like another Brian +de Bois Guilbert. Bedwin, his costumes, and black +man, were hailed at Gaunt House as very valuable acquisitions.</p> + +<p>He led off the first charade. A Turkish officer with +an immense plume of feathers (the Janizaries were +supposed to be still in existence, and the tarboosh +had not as yet displaced the ancient and majestic +head-dress of the true believers) was seen couched +on a divan, and making believe to puff at a narghile, +in which, however, for the sake of the ladies, only +a fragrant pastille was allowed to smoke. The Turkish +dignitary yawns and expresses signs of weariness and +idleness. He claps his hands and Mesrour the Nubian +appears, with bare arms, bangles, yataghans, and every +Eastern ornament-- gaunt, tall, and hideous. He makes +a salaam before my lord the Aga.</p> + +<p>A thrill of terror and delight runs through the assembly. +The ladies whisper to one another. The black slave +was given to Bedwin Sands by an Egyptian pasha in +exchange for three dozen of Maraschino. He has sewn +up ever so many odalisques in sacks and tilted them +into the Nile.</p> + +<p>“Bid the slave-merchant enter,” says the +Turkish voluptuary with a wave of his hand. Mesrour +conducts the slave-merchant into my lord’s presence; +he brings a veiled female with him. He removes the +veil. A thrill of applause bursts through the house. + It is Mrs. Winkworth (she was a Miss Absolom) with +the beautiful eyes and hair. She is in a gorgeous +oriental costume; the black braided locks are twined +with innumerable jewels; her dress is covered over +with gold piastres. The odious Mahometan expresses +himself charmed by her beauty. She falls down on +her knees and entreats him to restore her to the mountains +where she was born, and where her Circassian lover +is still deploring the absence of his Zuleikah. No +entreaties will move the obdurate Hassan. He laughs +at the notion of the Circassian bridegroom. Zuleikah +covers her face with her hands and drops down in an +attitude of the most beautiful despair. There seems +to be no hope for her, when--when the Kislar Aga appears.</p> + +<p>The Kislar Aga brings a letter from the Sultan. Hassan +receives and places on his head the dread firman. + A ghastly terror seizes him, while on the Negro’s +face (it is Mesrour again in another costume) appears +a ghastly joy. “Mercy! mercy!” cries +the Pasha: while the Kislar Aga, grinning horribly, +pulls out--a bow-string.</p> + +<p>The curtain draws just as he is going to use that +awful weapon. Hassan from within bawls out, “First +two syllables"--and Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, who is going +to act in the charade, comes forward and compliments +Mrs. Winkworth on the admirable taste and beauty of +her costume.</p> + +<p>The second part of the charade takes place. It is +still an Eastern scene. Hassan, in another dress, +is in an attitude by Zuleikah, who is perfectly reconciled +to him. The Kislar Aga has become a peaceful black +slave. It is sunrise on the desert, and the Turks +turn their heads eastwards and bow to the sand. As +there are no dromedaries at hand, the band facetiously +plays “The Camels are coming.” An enormous +Egyptian head figures in the scene. It is a musical +one-- and, to the surprise of the oriental travellers, +sings a comic song, composed by Mr. Wagg. The Eastern +voyagers go off dancing, like Papageno and the Moorish +King in The Magic Flute. “Last two syllables,” +roars the head.</p> + +<p>The last act opens. It is a Grecian tent this time. + A tall and stalwart man reposes on a couch there. + Above him hang his helmet and shield. There is no +need for them now. Ilium is down. Iphigenia is slain. + Cassandra is a prisoner in his outer halls. The king +of men (it is Colonel Crawley, who, indeed, has no +notion about the sack of Ilium or the conquest of +Cassandra), the anax andron is asleep in his chamber +at Argos. A lamp casts the broad shadow of the sleeping +warrior flickering on the wall--the sword and shield +of Troy glitter in its light. The band plays the awful +music of Don Juan, before the statue enters.</p> + +<p>Aegisthus steals in pale and on tiptoe. What is that +ghastly face looking out balefully after him from +behind the arras? He raises his dagger to strike the +sleeper, who turns in his bed, and opens his broad +chest as if for the blow. He cannot strike the noble +slumbering chieftain. Clytemnestra glides swiftly into +the room like an apparition--her arms are bare and +white--her tawny hair floats down her shoulders--her +face is deadly pale--and her eyes are lighted up with +a smile so ghastly that people quake as they look at +her.</p> + +<p>A tremor ran through the room. “Good God!” +somebody said, “it’s Mrs. Rawdon Crawley.”</p> + +<p>Scornfully she snatches the dagger out of Aegisthus’s +hand and advances to the bed. You see it shining +over her head in the glimmer of the lamp, and--and +the lamp goes out, with a groan, and all is dark.</p> + +<p>The darkness and the scene frightened people. Rebecca +performed her part so well, and with such ghastly +truth, that the spectators were all dumb, until, with +a burst, all the lamps of the hall blazed out again, +when everybody began to shout applause. “Brava! + brava!” old Steyne’s strident voice was +heard roaring over all the rest. “By--, she’d +do it too,” he said between his teeth. The performers +were called by the whole house, which sounded with +cries of “Manager! Clytemnestra!” Agamemnon +could not be got to show in his classical tunic, but +stood in the background with Aegisthus and others of +the performers of the little play. Mr. Bedwin Sands +led on Zuleikah and Clytemnestra. A great personage +insisted on being presented to the charming Clytemnestra. + “Heigh ha? Run him through the body. Marry +somebody else, hay?” was the apposite remark +made by His Royal Highness.</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Rawdon Crawley was quite killing in the +part,” said Lord Steyne. Becky laughed, gay +and saucy looking, and swept the prettiest little +curtsey ever seen.</p> + +<p>Servants brought in salvers covered with numerous +cool dainties, and the performers disappeared to get +ready for the second charade-tableau.</p> + +<p>The three syllables of this charade were to be depicted +in pantomime, and the performance took place in the +following wise:</p> + +<p>First syllable. Colonel Rawdon Crawley, C.B., with +a slouched hat and a staff, a great-coat, and a lantern +borrowed from the stables, passed across the stage +bawling out, as if warning the inhabitants of the +hour. In the lower window are seen two bagmen playing +apparently at the game of cribbage, over which they +yawn much. To them enters one looking like Boots (the +Honourable G. Ringwood), which character the young +gentleman performed to perfection, and divests them +of their lower coverings; and presently Chambermaid +(the Right Honourable Lord Southdown) with two candlesticks, +and a warming-pan. She ascends to the upper apartment +and warms the bed. She uses the warming-pan as a weapon +wherewith she wards off the attention of the bagmen. +She exits. They put on their night-caps and pull +down the blinds. Boots comes out and closes the shutters +of the ground-floor chamber. You hear him bolting +and chaining the door within. All the lights go out. + The music plays Dormez, dormez, chers Amours. A +voice from behind the curtain says, “First syllable.”</p> + +<p>Second syllable. The lamps are lighted up all of +a sudden. The music plays the old air from John of +Paris, Ah quel plaisir d’etre en voyage. It +is the same scene. Between the first and second floors +of the house represented, you behold a sign on which +the Steyne arms are painted. All the bells are ringing +all over the house. In the lower apartment you see +a man with a long slip of paper presenting it to another, +who shakes his fists, threatens and vows that it is +monstrous. “Ostler, bring round my gig,” +cries another at the door. He chucks Chambermaid +(the Right Honourable Lord Southdown) under the chin; +she seems to deplore his absence, as Calypso did that +of that other eminent traveller Ulysses. Boots (the +Honourable G. Ringwood) passes with a wooden box, +containing silver flagons, and cries “Pots” +with such exquisite humour and naturalness that the +whole house rings with applause, and a bouquet is thrown +to him. Crack, crack, crack, go the whips. Landlord, +chambermaid, waiter rush to the door, but just as +some distinguished guest is arriving, the curtains +close, and the invisible theatrical manager cries +out “Second syllable.”</p> + +<p>“I think it must be ‘Hotel,’” +says Captain Grigg of the Life Guards; there is a +general laugh at the Captain’s cleverness. He +is not very far from the mark.</p> + +<p>While the third syllable is in preparation, the band +begins a nautical medley--"All in the Downs,” +“Cease Rude Boreas,” “Rule Britannia,” +“In the Bay of Biscay O!"--some maritime event +is about to take place. A ben is heard ringing as +the curtain draws aside. “Now, gents, for the +shore!” a voice exclaims. People take leave +of each other. They point anxiously as if towards +the clouds, which are represented by a dark curtain, +and they nod their heads in fear. Lady Squeams (the +Right Honourable Lord Southdown), her lap-dog, her +bags, reticules, and husband sit down, and cling hold +of some ropes. It is evidently a ship.</p> + +<p>The Captain (Colonel Crawley, C.B.), with a cocked +hat and a telescope, comes in, holding his hat on +his head, and looks out; his coat tails fly about +as if in the wind. When he leaves go of his hat to +use his telescope, his hat flies off, with immense +applause. It is blowing fresh. The music rises and +whistles louder and louder; the mariners go across +the stage staggering, as if the ship was in severe +motion. The Steward (the Honourable G. Ringwood) +passes reeling by, holding six basins. He puts one +rapidly by Lord Squeams--Lady Squeams, giving a pinch +to her dog, which begins to howl piteously, puts her +pocket-handkerchief to her face, and rushes away as +for the cabin. The music rises up to the wildest pitch +of stormy excitement, and the third syllable is concluded.</p> + +<p>There was a little ballet, “Le Rossignol,” +in which Montessu and Noblet used to be famous in +those days, and which Mr. Wagg transferred to the +English stage as an opera, putting his verse, of which +he was a skilful writer, to the pretty airs of the +ballet. It was dressed in old French costume, and +little Lord Southdown now appeared admirably attired +in the disguise of an old woman hobbling about the +stage with a faultless crooked stick.</p> + +<p>Trills of melody were heard behind the scenes, and +gurgling from a sweet pasteboard cottage covered with +roses and trellis work. “Philomele, Philomele,” +cries the old woman, and Philomele comes out.</p> + +<p>More applause--it is Mrs. Rawdon Crawley in powder +and patches, the most ravissante little Marquise in +the world.</p> + +<p>She comes in laughing, humming, and frisks about the +stage with all the innocence of theatrical youth--she +makes a curtsey. Mamma says “Why, child, you +are always laughing and singing,” and away she +goes, with--</p> + +<p align="center"><em>The Rose Upon My Balcony</em></p> + +<p>The rose upon my balcony the morning air perfuming +Was leafless all the winter time and pining for the +spring; You ask me why her breath is sweet and why +her cheek is blooming, It is because the sun is +out and birds begin to sing.</p> + +<p>The nightingale, whose melody is through the greenwood + ringing, Was silent when the boughs were bare and +winds were blowing keen: And if, Mamma, you ask +of me the reason of his singing, It is because the +sun is out and all the leaves are green.</p> + +<p>Thus each performs his part, Mamma, the birds have +found their voices, The blowing rose a flush, Mamma, +her bonny cheek to dye; And there’s sunshine +in my heart, Mamma, which wakens and rejoices, And +so I sing and blush, Mamma, and that’s the reason +why.</p> + +<p>During the intervals of the stanzas of this ditty, +the good-natured personage addressed as Mamma by the +singer, and whose large whiskers appeared under her +cap, seemed very anxious to exhibit her maternal affection +by embracing the innocent creature who performed the +daughter’s part. Every caress was received with +loud acclamations of laughter by the sympathizing +audience. At its conclusion (while the music was performing +a symphony as if ever so many birds were warbling) +the whole house was unanimous for an encore: and applause +and bouquets without end were showered upon the Nightingale +of the evening. Lord Steyne’s voice of applause +was loudest of all. Becky, the nightingale, took the +flowers which he threw to her and pressed them to +her heart with the air of a consummate comedian. Lord +Steyne was frantic with delight. His guests’ +enthusiasm harmonized with his own. Where was the +beautiful black-eyed Houri whose appearance in the +first charade had caused such delight? She was twice +as handsome as Becky, but the brilliancy of the latter +had quite eclipsed her. All voices were for her. + Stephens, Caradori, Ronzi de Begnis, people compared +her to one or the other, and agreed with good reason, +very likely, that had she been an actress none on +the stage could have surpassed her. She had reached +her culmination: her voice rose trilling and bright +over the storm of applause, and soared as high and +joyful as her triumph. There was a ball after the +dramatic entertainments, and everybody pressed round +Becky as the great point of attraction of the evening. + The Royal Personage declared with an oath that she +was perfection, and engaged her again and again in +conversation. Little Becky’s soul swelled with +pride and delight at these honours; she saw fortune, +fame, fashion before her. Lord Steyne was her slave, +followed her everywhere, and scarcely spoke to any +one in the room beside, and paid her the most marked +compliments and attention. She still appeared in her +Marquise costume and danced a minuet with Monsieur +de Truffigny, Monsieur Le Duc de la Jabotiere’s +attache; and the Duke, who had all the traditions +of the ancient court, pronounced that Madame Crawley +was worthy to have been a pupil of Vestris, or to have +figured at Versailles. Only a feeling of dignity, +the gout, and the strongest sense of duty and personal +sacrifice prevented his Excellency from dancing with +her himself, and he declared in public that a lady +who could talk and dance like Mrs. Rawdon was fit +to be ambassadress at any court in Europe. He was +only consoled when he heard that she was half a Frenchwoman +by birth. “None but a compatriot,” his +Excellency declared, “could have performed that +majestic dance in such a way.”</p> + +<p>Then she figured in a waltz with Monsieur de Klingenspohr, +the Prince of Peterwaradin’s cousin and attache. + The delighted Prince, having less retenue than his +French diplomatic colleague, insisted upon taking +a turn with the charming creature, and twirled round +the ball-room with her, scattering the diamonds out +of his boot-tassels and hussar jacket until his Highness +was fairly out of breath. Papoosh Pasha himself would +have liked to dance with her if that amusement had +been the custom of his country. The company made a +circle round her and applauded as wildly as if she +had been a Noblet or a Taglioni. Everybody was in +ecstacy; and Becky too, you may be sure. She passed +by Lady Stunnington with a look of scorn. She patronized +Lady Gaunt and her astonished and mortified sister-in-law--she +ecrased all rival charmers. As for poor Mrs. Winkworth, +and her long hair and great eyes, which had made such +an effect at the commencement of the evening--where +was she now? Nowhere in the race. She might tear +her long hair and cry her great eyes out, but there +was not a person to heed or to deplore the discomfiture.</p> + +<p>The greatest triumph of all was at supper time. She +was placed at the grand exclusive table with his Royal +Highness the exalted personage before mentioned, and +the rest of the great guests. She was served on gold +plate. She might have had pearls melted into her +champagne if she liked--another Cleopatra--and the +potentate of Peterwaradin would have given half the +brilliants off his jacket for a kind glance from +those dazzling eyes. Jabotiere wrote home about her +to his government. The ladies at the other tables, +who supped off mere silver and marked Lord Steyne’s +constant attention to her, vowed it was a monstrous +infatuation, a gross insult to ladies of rank. If +sarcasm could have killed, Lady Stunnington would have +slain her on the spot.</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley was scared at these triumphs. They +seemed to separate his wife farther than ever from +him somehow. He thought with a feeling very like +pain how immeasurably she was his superior.</p> + +<p>When the hour of departure came, a crowd of young +men followed her to her carriage, for which the people +without bawled, the cry being caught up by the link-men +who were stationed outside the tall gates of Gaunt +House, congratulating each person who issued from the +gate and hoping his Lordship had enjoyed this noble +party.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s carriage, coming up to +the gate after due shouting, rattled into the illuminated +court-yard and drove up to the covered way. Rawdon +put his wife into the carriage, which drove off. +Mr. Wenham had proposed to him to walk home, and offered +the Colonel the refreshment of a cigar.</p> + +<p>They lighted their cigars by the lamp of one of the +many link-boys outside, and Rawdon walked on with +his friend Wenham. Two persons separated from the +crowd and followed the two gentlemen; and when they +had walked down Gaunt Square a few score of paces, +one of the men came up and, touching Rawdon on the +shoulder, said, “Beg your pardon, Colonel, I +vish to speak to you most particular.” This +gentleman’s acquaintance gave a loud whistle +as the latter spoke, at which signal a cab came clattering +up from those stationed at the gate of Gaunt House--and +the aide-de-camp ran round and placed himself in front +of Colonel Crawley.</p> + +<p>That gallant officer at once knew what had befallen +him. He was in the hands of the bailiffs. He started +back, falling against the man who had first touched +him.</p> + +<p>“We’re three on us--it’s no use +bolting,” the man behind said.</p> + +<p>“It’s you, Moss, is it?” said the +Colonel, who appeared to know his interlocutor. “How +much is it?”</p> + +<p>“Only a small thing,” whispered Mr. Moss, +of Cursitor Street, Chancery Lane, and assistant officer +to the Sheriff of Middlesex-- “One hundred and +sixty-six, six and eight-pence, at the suit of Mr. +Nathan.”</p> + +<p>“Lend me a hundred, Wenham, for God’s +sake,” poor Rawdon said--"I’ve got seventy +at home.”</p> + +<p>“I’ve not got ten pounds in the world,” +said poor Mr. Wenham--"Good night, my dear fellow.”</p> + +<p>“Good night,” said Rawdon ruefully. And +Wenham walked away--and Rawdon Crawley finished his +cigar as the cab drove under Temple Bar.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Lord Steyne Shows Himself in a Most Amiable Light</h4> + +<p>When Lord Steyne was benevolently disposed, he did +nothing by halves, and his kindness towards the Crawley +family did the greatest honour to his benevolent discrimination. + His lordship extended his good-will to little Rawdon: + he pointed out to the boy’s parents the necessity +of sending him to a public school, that he was of an +age now when emulation, the first principles of the +Latin language, pugilistic exercises, and the society +of his fellow-boys would be of the greatest benefit +to the boy. His father objected that he was not rich +enough to send the child to a good public school; his +mother that Briggs was a capital mistress for him, +and had brought him on (as indeed was the fact) famously +in English, the Latin rudiments, and in general learning: + but all these objections disappeared before the generous +perseverance of the Marquis of Steyne. His lordship +was one of the governors of that famous old collegiate +institution called the Whitefriars. It had been a +Cistercian Convent in old days, when the Smithfield, +which is contiguous to it, was a tournament ground. + Obstinate heretics used to be brought thither convenient +for burning hard by. Henry VIII, the Defender of +the Faith, seized upon the monastery and its possessions +and hanged and tortured some of the monks who could +not accommodate themselves to the pace of his reform. + Finally, a great merchant bought the house and land +adjoining, in which, and with the help of other wealthy +endowments of land and money, he established a famous +foundation hospital for old men and children. An extern +school grew round the old almost monastic foundation, +which subsists still with its middle-age costume and +usages--and all Cistercians pray that it may long +flourish.</p> + +<p>Of this famous house, some of the greatest noblemen, +prelates, and dignitaries in England are governors: + and as the boys are very comfortably lodged, fed, +and educated, and subsequently inducted to good scholarships +at the University and livings in the Church, many +little gentlemen are devoted to the ecclesiastical +profession from their tenderest years, and there is +considerable emulation to procure nominations for +the foundation. It was originally intended for the +sons of poor and deserving clerics and laics, but many +of the noble governors of the Institution, with an +enlarged and rather capricious benevolence, selected +all sorts of objects for their bounty. To get an education +for nothing, and a future livelihood and profession +assured, was so excellent a scheme that some of the +richest people did not disdain it; and not only great +men’s relations, but great men themselves, sent +their sons to profit by the chance--Right Rev. prelates +sent their own kinsmen or the sons of their clergy, +while, on the other hand, some great noblemen did +not disdain to patronize the children of their confidential +servants--so that a lad entering this establishment +had every variety of youthful society wherewith to +mingle.</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley, though the only book which he studied +was the Racing Calendar, and though his chief recollections +of polite learning were connected with the floggings +which he received at Eton in his early youth, had +that decent and honest reverence for classical learning +which all English gentlemen feel, and was glad to think +that his son was to have a provision for life, perhaps, +and a certain opportunity of becoming a scholar. +And although his boy was his chief solace and companion, +and endeared to him by a thousand small ties, about +which he did not care to speak to his wife, who had +all along shown the utmost indifference to their son, +yet Rawdon agreed at once to part with him and to +give up his own greatest comfort and benefit for the +sake of the welfare of the little lad. He did not +know how fond he was of the child until it became +necessary to let him go away. When he was gone, he +felt more sad and downcast than he cared to own--far +sadder than the boy himself, who was happy enough to +enter a new career and find companions of his own age. + Becky burst out laughing once or twice when the Colonel, +in his clumsy, incoherent way, tried to express his +sentimental sorrows at the boy’s departure. + The poor fellow felt that his dearest pleasure and +closest friend was taken from him. He looked often +and wistfully at the little vacant bed in his dressing-room, +where the child used to sleep. He missed him sadly +of mornings and tried in vain to walk in the park +without him. He did not know how solitary he was until +little Rawdon was gone. He liked the people who were +fond of him, and would go and sit for long hours with +his good-natured sister Lady Jane, and talk to her +about the virtues, and good looks, and hundred good +qualities of the child.</p> + +<p>Young Rawdon’s aunt, we have said, was very +fond of him, as was her little girl, who wept copiously +when the time for her cousin’s departure came. + The elder Rawdon was thankful for the fondness of +mother and daughter. The very best and honestest feelings +of the man came out in these artless outpourings of +paternal feeling in which he indulged in their presence, +and encouraged by their sympathy. He secured not +only Lady Jane’s kindness, but her sincere regard, +by the feelings which he manifested, and which he could +not show to his own wife. The two kinswomen met as +seldom as possible. Becky laughed bitterly at Jane’s +feelings and softness; the other’s kindly and +gentle nature could not but revolt at her sister’s +callous behaviour.</p> + +<p>It estranged Rawdon from his wife more than he knew +or acknowledged to himself. She did not care for +the estrangement. Indeed, she did not miss him or +anybody. She looked upon him as her errand-man and +humble slave. He might be ever so depressed or sulky, +and she did not mark his demeanour, or only treated +it with a sneer. She was busy thinking about her +position, or her pleasures, or her advancement in +society; she ought to have held a great place in it, +that is certain.</p> + +<p>It was honest Briggs who made up the little kit for +the boy which he was to take to school. Molly, the +housemaid, blubbered in the passage when he went away--Molly +kind and faithful in spite of a long arrear of unpaid +wages. Mrs. Becky could not let her husband have +the carriage to take the boy to school. Take the horses +into the City!--such a thing was never heard of. +Let a cab be brought. She did not offer to kiss him +when he went, nor did the child propose to embrace +her; but gave a kiss to old Briggs (whom, in general, +he was very shy of caressing), and consoled her by +pointing out that he was to come home on Saturdays, +when she would have the benefit of seeing him. As +the cab rolled towards the City, Becky’s carriage +rattled off to the park. She was chattering and laughing +with a score of young dandies by the Serpentine as +the father and son entered at the old gates of the +school--where Rawdon left the child and came away +with a sadder purer feeling in his heart than perhaps +that poor battered fellow had ever known since he himself +came out of the nursery.</p> + +<p>He walked all the way home very dismally, and dined +alone with Briggs. He was very kind to her and grateful +for her love and watchfulness over the boy. His conscience +smote him that he had borrowed Briggs’s money +and aided in deceiving her. They talked about little +Rawdon a long time, for Becky only came home to dress +and go out to dinner--and then he went off uneasily +to drink tea with Lady Jane, and tell her of what +had happened, and how little Rawdon went off like +a trump, and how he was to wear a gown and little +knee-breeches, and how young Blackball, Jack Blackball’s +son, of the old regiment, had taken him in charge +and promised to be kind to him.</p> + +<p>In the course of a week, young Blackball had constituted +little Rawdon his fag, shoe-black, and breakfast toaster; +initiated him into the mysteries of the Latin Grammar; +and thrashed him three or four times, but not severely. + The little chap’s good-natured honest face +won his way for him. He only got that degree of beating +which was, no doubt, good for him; and as for blacking +shoes, toasting bread, and fagging in general, were +these offices not deemed to be necessary parts of +every young English gentleman’s education?</p> + +<p>Our business does not lie with the second generation +and Master Rawdon’s life at school, otherwise +the present tale might be carried to any indefinite +length. The Colonel went to see his son a short time +afterwards and found the lad sufficiently well and +happy, grinning and laughing in his little black gown +and little breeches.</p> + +<p>His father sagaciously tipped Blackball, his master, +a sovereign, and secured that young gentleman’s +good-will towards his fag. As a protege of the great +Lord Steyne, the nephew of a County member, and son +of a Colonel and C.B., whose name appeared in some +of the most fashionable parties in the Morning Post, +perhaps the school authorities were disposed not to +look unkindly on the child. He had plenty of pocket-money, +which he spent in treating his comrades royally to +raspberry tarts, and he was often allowed to come home +on Saturdays to his father, who always made a jubilee +of that day. When free, Rawdon would take him to the +play, or send him thither with the footman; and on +Sundays he went to church with Briggs and Lady Jane +and his cousins. Rawdon marvelled over his stories +about school, and fights, and fagging. Before long, +he knew the names of all the masters and the principal +boys as well as little Rawdon himself. He invited +little Rawdon’s crony from school, and made +both the children sick with pastry, and oysters, and +porter after the play. He tried to look knowing over +the Latin grammar when little Rawdon showed him what +part of that work he was “in.” “Stick +to it, my boy,” he said to him with much gravity, +“there’s nothing like a good classical +education! Nothing!”</p> + +<p>Becky’s contempt for her husband grew greater +every day. “Do what you like--dine where you +please--go and have ginger-beer and sawdust at Astley’s, +or psalm-singing with Lady Jane--only don’t expect +me to busy myself with the boy. I have your interests +to attend to, as you can’t attend to them yourself. + I should like to know where you would have been now, +and in what sort of a position in society, if I had +not looked after you.” Indeed, nobody wanted +poor old Rawdon at the parties whither Becky used +to go. She was often asked without him now. She +talked about great people as if she had the fee-simple +of May Fair, and when the Court went into mourning, +she always wore black.</p> + +<p>Little Rawdon being disposed of, Lord Steyne, who +took such a parental interest in the affairs of this +amiable poor family, thought that their expenses might +be very advantageously curtailed by the departure +of Miss Briggs, and that Becky was quite clever enough +to take the management of her own house. It has been +narrated in a former chapter how the benevolent nobleman +had given his protegee money to pay off her little +debt to Miss Briggs, who however still remained behind +with her friends; whence my lord came to the painful +conclusion that Mrs. Crawley had made some other use +of the money confided to her than that for which her +generous patron had given the loan. However, Lord +Steyne was not so rude as to impart his suspicions +upon this head to Mrs. Becky, whose feelings might +be hurt by any controversy on the money-question, and +who might have a thousand painful reasons for disposing +otherwise of his lordship’s generous loan. +But he determined to satisfy himself of the real state +of the case, and instituted the necessary inquiries +in a most cautious and delicate manner.</p> + +<p>In the first place he took an early opportunity of +pumping Miss Briggs. That was not a difficult operation. +A very little encouragement would set that worthy +woman to talk volubly and pour out all within her. + And one day when Mrs. Rawdon had gone out to drive +(as Mr. Fiche, his lordship’s confidential servant, +easily learned at the livery stables where the Crawleys +kept their carriage and horses, or rather, where the +livery-man kept a carriage and horses for Mr. and +Mrs. Crawley)--my lord dropped in upon the Curzon +Street house--asked Briggs for a cup of coffee--told +her that he had good accounts of the little boy at +school--and in five minutes found out from her that +Mrs. Rawdon had given her nothing except a black silk +gown, for which Miss Briggs was immensely grateful.</p> + +<p>He laughed within himself at this artless story. +For the truth is, our dear friend Rebecca had given +him a most circumstantial narration of Briggs’s +delight at receiving her money--eleven hundred and +twenty-five pounds--and in what securities she had +invested it; and what a pang Becky herself felt in +being obliged to pay away such a delightful sum of +money. “Who knows,” the dear woman may +have thought within herself, “perhaps he may +give me a little more?” My lord, however, made +no such proposal to the little schemer--very likely +thinking that he had been sufficiently generous already.</p> + +<p>He had the curiosity, then, to ask Miss Briggs about +the state of her private affairs--and she told his +lordship candidly what her position was--how Miss +Crawley had left her a legacy--how her relatives had +had part of it--how Colonel Crawley had put out another +portion, for which she had the best security and interest-- +and how Mr. and Mrs. Rawdon had kindly busied themselves +with Sir Pitt, who was to dispose of the remainder +most advantageously for her, when he had time. My +lord asked how much the Colonel had already invested +for her, and Miss Briggs at once and truly told him +that the sum was six hundred and odd pounds.</p> + +<p>But as soon as she had told her story, the voluble +Briggs repented of her frankness and besought my lord +not to tell Mr. Crawley of the confessions which she +had made. “The Colonel was so kind--Mr. Crawley +might be offended and pay back the money, for which +she could get no such good interest anywhere else.” +Lord Steyne, laughing, promised he never would divulge +their conversation, and when he and Miss Briggs parted +he laughed still more.</p> + +<p>“What an accomplished little devil it is!” +thought he. “What a splendid actress and manager! + She had almost got a second supply out of me the +other day; with her coaxing ways. She beats all the +women I have ever seen in the course of all my well-spent +life. They are babies compared to her. I am a greenhorn +myself, and a fool in her hands--an old fool. She +is unsurpassable in lies.” His lordship’s +admiration for Becky rose immeasurably at this proof +of her cleverness. Getting the money was nothing--but +getting double the sum she wanted, and paying nobody--it +was a magnificent stroke. And Crawley, my lord thought--Crawley +is not such a fool as he looks and seems. He has +managed the matter cleverly enough on his side. Nobody +would ever have supposed from his face and demeanour +that he knew anything about this money business; and +yet he put her up to it, and has spent the money, +no doubt. In this opinion my lord, we know, was mistaken, +but it influenced a good deal his behaviour towards +Colonel Crawley, whom he began to treat with even less +than that semblance of respect which he had formerly +shown towards that gentleman. It never entered into +the head of Mrs. Crawley’s patron that the little +lady might be making a purse for herself; and, perhaps, +if the truth must be told, he judged of Colonel Crawley +by his experience of other husbands, whom he had known +in the course of the long and well-spent life which +had made him acquainted with a great deal of the weakness +of mankind. My lord had bought so many men during +his life that he was surely to be pardoned for supposing +that he had found the price of this one.</p> + +<p>He taxed Becky upon the point on the very first occasion +when he met her alone, and he complimented her, good-humouredly, +on her cleverness in getting more than the money which +she required. Becky was only a little taken aback. + It was not the habit of this dear creature to tell +falsehoods, except when necessity compelled, but in +these great emergencies it was her practice to lie +very freely; and in an instant she was ready with +another neat plausible circumstantial story which +she administered to her patron. The previous statement +which she had made to him was a falsehood--a wicked +falsehood--she owned it. But who had made her tell +it? “Ah, my Lord,” she said, “you +don’t know all I have to suffer and bear in +silence; you see me gay and happy before you--you little +know what I have to endure when there is no protector +near me. It was my husband, by threats and the most +savage treatment, forced me to ask for that sum about +which I deceived you. It was he who, foreseeing that +questions might be asked regarding the disposal of +the money, forced me to account for it as I did. +He took the money. He told me he had paid Miss Briggs; +I did not want, I did not dare to doubt him. Pardon +the wrong which a desperate man is forced to commit, +and pity a miserable, miserable woman.” She +burst into tears as she spoke. Persecuted virtue +never looked more bewitchingly wretched.</p> + +<p>They had a long conversation, driving round and round +the Regent’s Park in Mrs. Crawley’s carriage +together, a conversation of which it is not necessary +to repeat the details, but the upshot of it was that, +when Becky came home, she flew to her dear Briggs with +a smiling face and announced that she had some very +good news for her. Lord Steyne had acted in the noblest +and most generous manner. He was always thinking +how and when he could do good. Now that little Rawdon +was gone to school, a dear companion and friend was +no longer necessary to her. She was grieved beyond +measure to part with Briggs, but her means required +that she should practise every retrenchment, and her +sorrow was mitigated by the idea that her dear Briggs +would be far better provided for by her generous patron +than in her humble home. Mrs. Pilkington, the housekeeper +at Gauntly Hall, was growing exceedingly old, feeble, +and rheumatic: she was not equal to the work of superintending +that vast mansion, and must be on the look out for +a successor. It was a splendid position. The family +did not go to Gauntly once in two years. At other +times the housekeeper was the mistress of the magnificent +mansion--had four covers daily for her table; was +visited by the clergy and the most respectable people +of the county--was the lady of Gauntly, in fact; and +the two last housekeepers before Mrs. Pilkington had +married rectors of Gauntly--but Mrs. P. could not, +being the aunt of the present Rector. The place was +not to be hers yet, but she might go down on a visit +to Mrs. Pilkington and see whether she would like +to succeed her.</p> + +<p>What words can paint the ecstatic gratitude of Briggs! +All she stipulated for was that little Rawdon should +be allowed to come down and see her at the Hall. +Becky promised this--anything. She ran up to her +husband when he came home and told him the joyful news. +Rawdon was glad, deuced glad; the weight was off his +conscience about poor Briggs’s money. She was +provided for, at any rate, but-- but his mind was +disquiet. He did not seem to be all right, somehow. + He told little Southdown what Lord Steyne had done, +and the young man eyed Crawley with an air which surprised +the latter.</p> + +<p>He told Lady Jane of this second proof of Steyne’s +bounty, and she, too, looked odd and alarmed; so did +Sir Pitt. “She is too clever and--and gay to +be allowed to go from party to party without a companion,” +both said. “You must go with her, Rawdon, wherever +she goes, and you must have somebody with her--one +of the girls from Queen’s Crawley, perhaps, +though they were rather giddy guardians for her.”</p> + +<p>Somebody Becky should have. But in the meantime it +was clear that honest Briggs must not lose her chance +of settlement for life, and so she and her bags were +packed, and she set off on her journey. And so two +of Rawdon’s out-sentinels were in the hands of +the enemy.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt went and expostulated with his sister-in-law +upon the subject of the dismissal of Briggs and other +matters of delicate family interest. In vain she +pointed out to him how necessary was the protection +of Lord Steyne for her poor husband; how cruel it +would be on their part to deprive Briggs of the position +offered to her. Cajolements, coaxings, smiles, tears +could not satisfy Sir Pitt, and he had something very +like a quarrel with his once admired Becky. He spoke +of the honour of the family, the unsullied reputation +of the Crawleys; expressed himself in indignant tones +about her receiving those young Frenchmen--those wild +young men of fashion, my Lord Steyne himself, whose +carriage was always at her door, who passed hours +daily in her company, and whose constant presence +made the world talk about her. As the head of the +house he implored her to be more prudent. Society +was already speaking lightly of her. Lord Steyne, +though a nobleman of the greatest station and talents, +was a man whose attentions would compromise any woman; +he besought, he implored, he commanded his sister-in-law +to be watchful in her intercourse with that nobleman.</p> + +<p>Becky promised anything and everything Pitt wanted; +but Lord Steyne came to her house as often as ever, +and Sir Pitt’s anger increased. I wonder was +Lady Jane angry or pleased that her husband at last +found fault with his favourite Rebecca? Lord Steyne’s +visits continuing, his own ceased, and his wife was +for refusing all further intercourse with that nobleman +and declining the invitation to the charade-night +which the marchioness sent to her; but Sir Pitt thought +it was necessary to accept it, as his Royal Highness +would be there.</p> + +<p>Although he went to the party in question, Sir Pitt +quitted it very early, and his wife, too, was very +glad to come away. Becky hardly so much as spoke +to him or noticed her sister-in-law. Pitt Crawley +declared her behaviour was monstrously indecorous, +reprobated in strong terms the habit of play-acting +and fancy dressing as highly unbecoming a British +female, and after the charades were over, took his +brother Rawdon severely to task for appearing himself +and allowing his wife to join in such improper exhibitions.</p> + +<p>Rawdon said she should not join in any more such amusements--but +indeed, and perhaps from hints from his elder brother +and sister, he had already become a very watchful +and exemplary domestic character. He left off his +clubs and billiards. He never left home. He took +Becky out to drive; he went laboriously with her to +all her parties. Whenever my Lord Steyne called, he +was sure to find the Colonel. And when Becky proposed +to go out without her husband, or received invitations +for herself, he peremptorily ordered her to refuse +them: and there was that in the gentleman’s +manner which enforced obedience. Little Becky, to +do her justice, was charmed with Rawdon’s gallantry. + If he was surly, she never was. Whether friends were +present or absent, she had always a kind smile for +him and was attentive to his pleasure and comfort. + It was the early days of their marriage over again: + the same good humour, prevenances, merriment, and +artless confidence and regard. “How much pleasanter +it is,” she would say, “to have you by +my side in the carriage than that foolish old Briggs! + Let us always go on so, dear Rawdon. How nice it +would be, and how happy we should always be, if we +had but the money!” He fell asleep after dinner +in his chair; he did not see the face opposite to +him, haggard, weary, and terrible; it lighted up with +fresh candid smiles when he woke. It kissed him gaily. + He wondered that he had ever had suspicions. No, +he never had suspicions; all those dumb doubts and +surly misgivings which had been gathering on his mind +were mere idle jealousies. She was fond of him; she +always had been. As for her shining in society, it +was no fault of hers; she was formed to shine there. +Was there any woman who could talk, or sing, or do +anything like her? If she would but like the boy! +Rawdon thought. But the mother and son never could +be brought together.</p> + +<p>And it was while Rawdon’s mind was agitated +with these doubts and perplexities that the incident +occurred which was mentioned in the last chapter, +and the unfortunate Colonel found himself a prisoner +away from home.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Rescue and a Catastrophe</h4> + +<p>Friend Rawdon drove on then to Mr. Moss’s mansion +in Cursitor Street, and was duly inducted into that +dismal place of hospitality. Morning was breaking +over the cheerful house-tops of Chancery Lane as the +rattling cab woke up the echoes there. A little pink-eyed +Jew-boy, with a head as ruddy as the rising morn, let +the party into the house, and Rawdon was welcomed +to the ground-floor apartments by Mr. Moss, his travelling +companion and host, who cheerfully asked him if he +would like a glass of something warm after his drive.</p> + +<p>The Colonel was not so depressed as some mortals would +be, who, quitting a palace and a placens uxor, find +themselves barred into a spunging-house; for, if the +truth must be told, he had been a lodger at Mr. Moss’s +establishment once or twice before. We have not thought +it necessary in the previous course of this narrative +to mention these trivial little domestic incidents: + but the reader may be assured that they can’t +unfrequently occur in the life of a man who lives +on nothing a year.</p> + +<p>Upon his first visit to Mr. Moss, the Colonel, then +a bachelor, had been liberated by the generosity +of his aunt; on the second mishap, little Becky, with +the greatest spirit and kindness, had borrowed a sum +of money from Lord Southdown and had coaxed her husband’s +creditor (who was her shawl, velvet-gown, lace pocket-handkerchief, +trinket, and gim-crack purveyor, indeed) to take a +portion of the sum claimed and Rawdon’s promissory +note for the remainder: so on both these occasions +the capture and release had been conducted with the +utmost gallantry on all sides, and Moss and the Colonel +were therefore on the very best of terms.</p> + +<p>“You’ll find your old bed, Colonel, and +everything comfortable,” that gentleman said, +“as I may honestly say. You may be pretty sure +its kep aired, and by the best of company, too. It +was slep in the night afore last by the Honorable +Capting Famish, of the Fiftieth Dragoons, whose Mar +took him out, after a fortnight, jest to punish him, +she said. But, Law bless you, I promise you, he punished +my champagne, and had a party ere every night--reglar +tip-top swells, down from the clubs and the West End--Capting +Ragg, the Honorable Deuceace, who lives in the Temple, +and some fellers as knows a good glass of wine, I +warrant you. I’ve got a Doctor of Diwinity +upstairs, five gents in the coffee-room, and Mrs. Moss +has a tably-dy-hoty at half-past five, and a little +cards or music afterwards, when we shall be most happy +to see you.”</p> + +<p>“I’ll ring when I want anything,” +said Rawdon and went quietly to his bedroom. He was +an old soldier, we have said, and not to be disturbed +by any little shocks of fate. A weaker man would have +sent off a letter to his wife on the instant of his +capture. “But what is the use of disturbing +her night’s rest?” thought Rawdon. “She +won’t know whether I am in my room or not. It +will be time enough to write to her when she has had +her sleep out, and I have had mine. It’s only +a hundred-and-seventy, and the deuce is in it if we +can’t raise that.” And so, thinking about +little Rawdon (whom he would not have know that he +was in such a queer place), the Colonel turned into +the bed lately occupied by Captain Famish and fell +asleep. It was ten o’clock when he woke up, +and the ruddy-headed youth brought him, with conscious +pride, a fine silver dressing-case, wherewith he might +perform the operation of shaving. Indeed Mr. Moss’s +house, though somewhat dirty, was splendid throughout. + There were dirty trays, and wine-coolers en permanence +on the sideboard, huge dirty gilt cornices, with dingy +yellow satin hangings to the barred windows which +looked into Cursitor Street-- vast and dirty gilt +picture frames surrounding pieces sporting and sacred, +all of which works were by the greatest masters--and +fetched the greatest prices, too, in the bill transactions, +in the course of which they were sold and bought over +and over again. The Colonel’s breakfast was +served to him in the same dingy and gorgeous plated +ware. Miss Moss, a dark-eyed maid in curl-papers, +appeared with the teapot, and, smiling, asked the +Colonel how he had slep? And she brought him in the +Morning Post, with the names of all the great people +who had figured at Lord Steyne’s entertainment +the night before. It contained a brilliant account +of the festivities and of the beautiful and accomplished +Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s admirable personifications.</p> + +<p>After a lively chat with this lady (who sat on the +edge of the breakfast table in an easy attitude displaying +the drapery of her stocking and an ex-white satin +shoe, which was down at heel), Colonel Crawley called +for pens and ink, and paper, and being asked how many +sheets, chose one which was brought to him between +Miss Moss’s own finger and thumb. Many a sheet +had that dark-eyed damsel brought in; many a poor +fellow had scrawled and blotted hurried lines of entreaty +and paced up and down that awful room until his messenger +brought back the reply. Poor men always use messengers +instead of the post. Who has not had their letters, +with the wafers wet, and the announcement that a person +is waiting in the hall?</p> + +<p>Now on the score of his application, Rawdon had not +many misgivings.</p> + +<p><i>Dear Becky</i>, (Rawdon wrote)</p> + +<p>I <i>hope you slept well</i>. Don’t +be <i>frightened</i> if I don’t bring you in your +COFFY. Last night as I was coming home smoaking, I +met with an ACCADENT. I was NABBED by Moss of Cursitor +Street--from whose <i>gilt and splendid</i> +PARLER I write this--the same that had me this time +two years. Miss Moss brought in my tea--she is grown +very <i>fat</i>, and, as usual, had her STOCKENS <i>down at heal</i>.</p> + +<p>It’s Nathan’s business--a hundred-and-fifty--with +costs, hundred-and-seventy. Please send me my desk +and some CLOTHS--I’m in pumps and a white tye +(something like Miss M’s stockings)--I’ve +seventy in it. And as soon as you get this, Drive +to Nathan’s--offer him seventy-five down, and +<i>ask him to renew</i>--say I’ll +take wine--we may as well have some dinner sherry; +but not PICTURS, they’re too dear.</p> + +<p>If he won’t stand it. Take my ticker and such +of your things as you can <i>spare</i>, and send them +to Balls--we must, of coarse, have the sum to-night. + It won’t do to let it stand over, as to-morrow’s +Sunday; the beds here are not very <i>clean</i>, and +there may be other things out against me--I’m +glad it an’t Rawdon’s Saturday for coming +home. God bless you.</p> + +<p>Yours in haste, R. C. P.S. Make haste and come.</p> + +<p>This letter, sealed with a wafer, was dispatched by +one of the messengers who are always hanging about +Mr. Moss’s establishment, and Rawdon, having +seen him depart, went out in the court-yard and smoked +his cigar with a tolerably easy mind--in spite of the +bars overhead--for Mr. Moss’s court-yard is +railed in like a cage, lest the gentlemen who are +boarding with him should take a fancy to escape from +his hospitality.</p> + +<p>Three hours, he calculated, would be the utmost time +required, before Becky should arrive and open his +prison doors, and he passed these pretty cheerfully +in smoking, in reading the paper, and in the coffee-room +with an acquaintance, Captain Walker, who happened +to be there, and with whom he cut for sixpences for +some hours, with pretty equal luck on either side.</p> + +<p>But the day passed away and no messenger returned--no +Becky. Mr. Moss’s tably-dy-hoty was served +at the appointed hour of half-past five, when such +of the gentlemen lodging in the house as could afford +to pay for the banquet came and partook of it in the +splendid front parlour before described, and with +which Mr. Crawley’s temporary lodging communicated, +when Miss M. (Miss Hem, as her papa called her) appeared +without the curl-papers of the morning, and Mrs. Hem +did the honours of a prime boiled leg of mutton and +turnips, of which the Colonel ate with a very faint +appetite. Asked whether he would “stand” +a bottle of champagne for the company, he consented, +and the ladies drank to his ’ealth, and Mr. Moss, +in the most polite manner, “looked towards him.”</p> + +<p>In the midst of this repast, however, the doorbell +was heard--young Moss of the ruddy hair rose up with +the keys and answered the summons, and coming back, +told the Colonel that the messenger had returned with +a bag, a desk and a letter, which he gave him. “No +ceramony, Colonel, I beg,” said Mrs. Moss with +a wave of her hand, and he opened the letter rather +tremulously. It was a beautiful letter, highly scented, +on a pink paper, and with a light green seal.</p> + +<p><i>Mon pauvre cher petit</i>, (Mrs. Crawley +wrote)</p> + +<p>I could not sleep <i>one wink</i> for thinking +of what had become of my odious old monstre, and only +got to rest in the morning after sending for Mr. Blench +(for I was in a fever), who gave me a composing draught +and left orders with Finette that I should be disturbed +<i>on no account</i>. So that my poor old +man’s messenger, who had bien mauvaise mine +Finette says, and sentoit le Genievre, remained in +the hall for some hours waiting my bell. You may fancy +my state when I read your poor dear old ill-spelt letter.</p> + +<p>Ill as I was, I instantly called for the carriage, +and as soon as I was dressed (though I couldn’t +drink a drop of chocolate--I assure you I couldn’t +without my monstre to bring it to me), I drove ventre +a terre to Nathan’s. I saw him--I wept--I cried--I +fell at his odious knees. Nothing would mollify the +horrid man. He would have all the money, he said, +or keep my poor monstre in prison. I drove home with +the intention of paying that triste visite chez mon +oncle (when every trinket I have should be at your +disposal though they would not fetch a hundred pounds, +for some, you know, are with ce cher oncle already), +and found Milor there with the Bulgarian old sheep-faced +monster, who had come to compliment me upon last night’s +performances. Paddington came in, too, drawling and +lisping and twiddling his hair; so did Champignac, +and his chef--everybody with foison of compliments +and pretty speeches--plaguing poor me, who longed +to be rid of them, and was thinking every moment of +the time of mon pauvre prisonnier.</p> + +<p>When they were gone, I went down on my knees to Milor; +told him we were going to pawn everything, and begged +and prayed him to give me two hundred pounds. He pish’d +and psha’d in a fury--told me not to be such +a fool as to pawn--and said he would see whether he +could lend me the money. At last he went away, promising +that he would send it me in the morning: when I will +bring it to my poor old monster with a kiss fro his +affectionate</p> + +<p>Becky</p> + +<p>I am writing in bed. Oh I have such a headache and +such a heartache!</p> + +<p>When Rawdon read over this letter, he turned so red +and looked so savage that the company at the table +d’hote easily perceived that bad news had reached +him. All his suspicions, which he had been trying +to banish, returned upon him. She could not even go +out and sell her trinkets to free him. She could +laugh and talk about compliments paid to her, whilst +he was in prison. Who had put him there? Wenham had +walked with him. Was there.... He could hardly bear +to think of what he suspected. Leaving the room hurriedly, +he ran into his own--opened his desk, wrote two hurried +lines, which he directed to Sir Pitt or Lady Crawley, +and bade the messenger carry them at once to Gaunt +Street, bidding him to take a cab, and promising him +a guinea if he was back in an hour.</p> + +<p>In the note he besought his dear brother and sister, +for the sake of God, for the sake of his dear child +and his honour, to come to him and relieve him from +his difficulty. He was in prison, he wanted a hundred +pounds to set him free--he entreated them to come to +him.</p> + +<p>He went back to the dining-room after dispatching +his messenger and called for more wine. He laughed +and talked with a strange boisterousness, as the people +thought. Sometimes he laughed madly at his own fears +and went on drinking for an hour, listening all the +while for the carriage which was to bring his fate +back.</p> + +<p>At the expiration of that time, wheels were heard +whirling up to the gate--the young janitor went out +with his gate-keys. It was a lady whom he let in +at the bailiff’s door.</p> + +<p>“Colonel Crawley,” she said, trembling +very much. He, with a knowing look, locked the outer +door upon her--then unlocked and opened the inner +one, and calling out, “Colonel, you’re +wanted,” led her into the back parlour, which +he occupied.</p> + +<p>Rawdon came in from the dining-parlour where all those +people were carousing, into his back room; a flare +of coarse light following him into the apartment where +the lady stood, still very nervous.</p> + +<p>“It is I, Rawdon,” she said in a timid +voice, which she strove to render cheerful. “It +is Jane.” Rawdon was quite overcome by that +kind voice and presence. He ran up to her--caught +her in his arms-- gasped out some inarticulate words +of thanks and fairly sobbed on her shoulder. She +did not know the cause of his emotion.</p> + +<p>The bills of Mr. Moss were quickly settled, perhaps +to the disappointment of that gentleman, who had counted +on having the Colonel as his guest over Sunday at +least; and Jane, with beaming smiles and happiness +in her eyes, carried away Rawdon from the bailiff’s +house, and they went homewards in the cab in which +she had hastened to his release. “Pitt was +gone to a parliamentary dinner,” she said, “when +Rawdon’s note came, and so, dear Rawdon, I--I +came myself”; and she put her kind hand in his. + Perhaps it was well for Rawdon Crawley that Pitt +was away at that dinner. Rawdon thanked his sister +a hundred times, and with an ardour of gratitude which +touched and almost alarmed that soft-hearted woman. +“Oh,” said he, in his rude, artless way, +“you--you don’t know how I’m changed +since I’ve known you, and--and little Rawdy. + I--I’d like to change somehow. You see I want--I +want--to be--” He did not finish the sentence, +but she could interpret it. And that night after he +left her, and as she sat by her own little boy’s +bed, she prayed humbly for that poor way-worn sinner.</p> + +<p>Rawdon left her and walked home rapidly. It was nine +o’clock at night. He ran across the streets +and the great squares of Vanity Fair, and at length +came up breathless opposite his own house. He started +back and fell against the railings, trembling as he +looked up. The drawing-room windows were blazing +with light. She had said that she was in bed and +ill. He stood there for some time, the light from +the rooms on his pale face.</p> + +<p>He took out his door-key and let himself into the +house. He could hear laughter in the upper rooms. + He was in the ball-dress in which he had been captured +the night before. He went silently up the stairs, +leaning against the banisters at the stair-head. Nobody +was stirring in the house besides--all the servants +had been sent away. Rawdon heard laughter within--laughter +and singing. Becky was singing a snatch of the song +of the night before; a hoarse voice shouted “Brava! + Brava!"--it was Lord Steyne’s.</p> + +<p>Rawdon opened the door and went in. A little table +with a dinner was laid out--and wine and plate. Steyne +was hanging over the sofa on which Becky sat. The +wretched woman was in a brilliant full toilette, her +arms and all her fingers sparkling with bracelets and +rings, and the brilliants on her breast which Steyne +had given her. He had her hand in his, and was bowing +over it to kiss it, when Becky started up with a faint +scream as she caught sight of Rawdon’s white +face. At the next instant she tried a smile, a horrid +smile, as if to welcome her husband; and Steyne rose +up, grinding his teeth, pale, and with fury in his +looks.</p> + +<p>He, too, attempted a laugh--and came forward holding +out his hand. “What, come back! How d’ye +do, Crawley?” he said, the nerves of his mouth +twitching as he tried to grin at the intruder.</p> + +<p>There was that in Rawdon’s face which caused +Becky to fling herself before him. “I am innocent, +Rawdon,” she said; “before God, I am innocent.” +She clung hold of his coat, of his hands; her own were +all covered with serpents, and rings, and baubles. + “I am innocent. Say I am innocent,” she +said to Lord Steyne.</p> + +<p>He thought a trap had been laid for him, and was as +furious with the wife as with the husband. “You +innocent! Damn you,” he screamed out. “You +innocent! Why every trinket you have on your body +is paid for by me. I have given you thousands of pounds, +which this fellow has spent and for which he has sold +you. Innocent, by --! You’re as innocent as +your mother, the ballet-girl, and your husband the +bully. Don’t think to frighten me as you have +done others. Make way, sir, and let me pass”; +and Lord Steyne seized up his hat, and, with flame +in his eyes, and looking his enemy fiercely in the +face, marched upon him, never for a moment doubting +that the other would give way.</p> + +<p>But Rawdon Crawley springing out, seized him by the +neckcloth, until Steyne, almost strangled, writhed +and bent under his arm. “You lie, you dog!” +said Rawdon. “You lie, you coward and villain!” +And he struck the Peer twice over the face with his +open hand and flung him bleeding to the ground. It +was all done before Rebecca could interpose. She +stood there trembling before him. She admired her +husband, strong, brave, and victorious.</p> + +<p>“Come here,” he said. She came up at +once.</p> + +<p>“Take off those things.” She began, trembling, +pulling the jewels from her arms, and the rings from +her shaking fingers, and held them all in a heap, +quivering and looking up at him. “Throw them +down,” he said, and she dropped them. He tore +the diamond ornament out of her breast and flung it +at Lord Steyne. It cut him on his bald forehead. + Steyne wore the scar to his dying day.</p> + +<p>“Come upstairs,” Rawdon said to his wife. + “Don’t kill me, Rawdon,” she said. + He laughed savagely. “I want to see if that +man lies about the money as he has about me. Has +he given you any?”</p> + +<p>“No,” said Rebecca, “that is--”</p> + +<p>“Give me your keys,” Rawdon answered, +and they went out together.</p> + +<p>Rebecca gave him all the keys but one, and she was +in hopes that he would not have remarked the absence +of that. It belonged to the little desk which Amelia +had given her in early days, and which she kept in +a secret place. But Rawdon flung open boxes and wardrobes, +throwing the multifarious trumpery of their contents +here and there, and at last he found the desk. The +woman was forced to open it. It contained papers, +love-letters many years old--all sorts of small trinkets +and woman’s memoranda. And it contained a pocket-book +with bank-notes. Some of these were dated ten years +back, too, and one was quite a fresh one--a note for +a thousand pounds which Lord Steyne had given her.</p> + +<p>“Did he give you this?” Rawdon said.</p> + +<p>“Yes,” Rebecca answered.</p> + +<p>“I’ll send it to him to-day,” Rawdon +said (for day had dawned again, and many hours had +passed in this search), “and I will pay Briggs, +who was kind to the boy, and some of the debts. You +will let me know where I shall send the rest to you. + You might have spared me a hundred pounds, Becky, +out of all this--I have always shared with you.”</p> + +<p>“I am innocent,” said Becky. And he left +her without another word.</p> + +<p>What were her thoughts when he left her? She remained +for hours after he was gone, the sunshine pouring +into the room, and Rebecca sitting alone on the bed’s +edge. The drawers were all opened and their contents +scattered about--dresses and feathers, scarfs and +trinkets, a heap of tumbled vanities lying in a wreck. + Her hair was falling over her shoulders; her gown +was torn where Rawdon had wrenched the brilliants +out of it. She heard him go downstairs a few minutes +after he left her, and the door slamming and closing +on him. She knew he would never come back. He was +gone forever. Would he kill himself?--she thought--not +until after he had met Lord Steyne. She thought of +her long past life, and all the dismal incidents of +it. Ah, how dreary it seemed, how miserable, lonely +and profitless! Should she take laudanum, and end +it, to have done with all hopes, schemes, debts, and +triumphs? The French maid found her in this position--sitting +in the midst of her miserable ruins with clasped hands +and dry eyes. The woman was her accomplice and in +Steyne’s pay. “Mon Dieu, madame, what +has happened?” she asked.</p> + +<p>What had happened? Was she guilty or not? She said +not, but who could tell what was truth which came +from those lips, or if that corrupt heart was in this +case pure?</p> + +<p>All her lies and her schemes, an her selfishness and +her wiles, all her wit and genius had come to this +bankruptcy. The woman closed the curtains and, with +some entreaty and show of kindness, persuaded her +mistress to lie down on the bed. Then she went below +and gathered up the trinkets which had been lying +on the floor since Rebecca dropped them there at her +husband’s orders, and Lord Steyne went away.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LIV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Sunday After the Battle</h4> + +<p>The mansion of Sir Pitt Crawley, in Great Gaunt Street, +was just beginning to dress itself for the day, as +Rawdon, in his evening costume, which he had now worn +two days, passed by the scared female who was scouring +the steps and entered into his brother’s study. +Lady Jane, in her morning-gown, was up and above stairs +in the nursery superintending the toilettes of her +children and listening to the morning prayers which +the little creatures performed at her knee. Every +morning she and they performed this duty privately, +and before the public ceremonial at which Sir Pitt +presided and at which all the people of the household +were expected to assemble. Rawdon sat down in the +study before the Baronet’s table, set out with +the orderly blue books and the letters, the neatly +docketed bills and symmetrical pamphlets, the locked +account-books, desks, and dispatch boxes, the Bible, +the Quarterly Review, and the Court Guide, which all +stood as if on parade awaiting the inspection of their +chief.</p> + +<p>A book of family sermons, one of which Sir Pitt was +in the habit of administering to his family on Sunday +mornings, lay ready on the study table, and awaiting +his judicious selection. And by the sermon-book was +the Observer newspaper, damp and neatly folded, and +for Sir Pitt’s own private use. His gentleman +alone took the opportunity of perusing the newspaper +before he laid it by his master’s desk. Before +he had brought it into the study that morning, he +had read in the journal a flaming account of “Festivities +at Gaunt House,” with the names of all the distinguished +personages invited by tho Marquis of Steyne to meet +his Royal Highness. Having made comments upon this +entertainment to the housekeeper and her niece as +they were taking early tea and hot buttered toast +in the former lady’s apartment, and wondered +how the Rawding Crawleys could git on, the valet had +damped and folded the paper once more, so that it +looked quite fresh and innocent against the arrival +of the master of the house.</p> + +<p>Poor Rawdon took up the paper and began to try and +read it until his brother should arrive. But the +print fell blank upon his eyes, and he did not know +in the least what he was reading. The Government +news and appointments (which Sir Pitt as a public man +was bound to peruse, otherwise he would by no means +permit the introduction of Sunday papers into his +household), the theatrical criticisms, the fight for +a hundred pounds a side between the Barking Butcher +and the Tutbury Pet, the Gaunt House chronicle itself, +which contained a most complimentary though guarded +account of the famous charades of which Mrs. Becky +had been the heroine--all these passed as in a haze +before Rawdon, as he sat waiting the arrival of the +chief of the family.</p> + +<p>Punctually, as the shrill-toned bell of the black +marble study clock began to chime nine, Sir Pitt made +his appearance, fresh, neat, smugly shaved, with a +waxy clean face, and stiff shirt collar, his scanty +hair combed and oiled, trimming his nails as he descended +the stairs majestically, in a starched cravat and +a grey flannel dressing-gown--a real old English gentleman, +in a word--a model of neatness and every propriety. + He started when he saw poor Rawdon in his study in +tumbled clothes, with blood-shot eyes, and his hair +over his face. He thought his brother was not sober, +and had been out all night on some orgy. “Good +gracious, Rawdon,” he said, with a blank face, +“what brings you here at this time of the morning? +Why ain’t you at home?”</p> + +<p>“Home,” said Rawdon with a wild laugh. + “Don’t be frightened, Pitt. I’m +not drunk. Shut the door; I want to speak to you.”</p> + +<p>Pitt closed the door and came up to the table, where +he sat down in the other arm-chair--that one placed +for the reception of the steward, agent, or confidential +visitor who came to transact business with the Baronet--and +trimmed his nails more vehemently than ever.</p> + +<p>“Pitt, it’s all over with me,” the +Colonel said after a pause. “I’m done.”</p> + +<p>“I always said it would come to this,” +the Baronet cried peevishly, and beating a tune with +his clean-trimmed nails. “I warned you a thousand +times. I can’t help you any more. Every shilling +of my money is tied up. Even the hundred pounds that +Jane took you last night were promised to my lawyer +to-morrow morning, and the want of it will put me +to great inconvenience. I don’t mean to say that +I won’t assist you ultimately. But as for paying +your creditors in full, I might as well hope to pay +the National Debt. It is madness, sheer madness, +to think of such a thing. You must come to a compromise. + It’s a painful thing for the family, but everybody +does it. There was George Kitely, Lord Ragland’s +son, went through the Court last week, and was what +they call whitewashed, I believe. Lord Ragland would +not pay a shilling for him, and--”</p> + +<p>“It’s not money I want,” Rawdon +broke in. “I’m not come to you about +myself. Never mind what happens to me "</p> + +<p>“What is the matter, then?” said Pitt, +somewhat relieved.</p> + +<p>“It’s the boy,” said Rawdon in a +husky voice. “I want you to promise me that +you will take charge of him when I’m gone. That +dear good wife of yours has always been good to him; +and he’s fonder of her than he is of his . +. .--Damn it. Look here, Pitt--you know that I was +to have had Miss Crawley’s money. I wasn’t +brought up like a younger brother, but was always +encouraged to be extravagant and kep idle. But for +this I might have been quite a different man. I didn’t +do my duty with the regiment so bad. You know how +I was thrown over about the money, and who got it.”</p> + +<p>“After the sacrifices I have made, and the manner +in which I have stood by you, I think this sort of +reproach is useless,” Sir Pitt said. “Your +marriage was your own doing, not mine.”</p> + +<p>“That’s over now,” said Rawdon. + “That’s over now.” And the words +were wrenched from him with a groan, which made his +brother start.</p> + +<p>“Good God! is she dead?” Sir Pitt said +with a voice of genuine alarm and commiseration.</p> + +<p>“I wish I was,” Rawdon replied. “If +it wasn’t for little Rawdon I’d have cut +my throat this morning--and that damned villain’s +too.”</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt instantly guessed the truth and surmised +that Lord Steyne was the person whose life Rawdon +wished to take. The Colonel told his senior briefly, +and in broken accents, the circumstances of the case. + “It was a regular plan between that scoundrel +and her,” he said. “The bailiffs were +put upon me; I was taken as I was going out of his +house; when I wrote to her for money, she said she +was ill in bed and put me off to another day. And +when I got home I found her in diamonds and sitting +with that villain alone.” He then went on to +describe hurriedly the personal conflict with Lord +Steyne. To an affair of that nature, of course, he +said, there was but one issue, and after his conference +with his brother, he was going away to make the necessary +arrangements for the meeting which must ensue. “And +as it may end fatally with me,” Rawdon said with +a broken voice, “and as the boy has no mother, +I must leave him to you and Jane, Pitt--only it will +be a comfort to me if you will promise me to be his +friend.”</p> + +<p>The elder brother was much affected, and shook Rawdon’s +hand with a cordiality seldom exhibited by him. Rawdon +passed his hand over his shaggy eyebrows. “Thank +you, brother,” said he. “I know I can +trust your word.”</p> + +<p>“I will, upon my honour,” the Baronet +said. And thus, and almost mutely, this bargain was +struck between them.</p> + +<p>Then Rawdon took out of his pocket the little pocket-book +which he had discovered in Becky’s desk, and +from which he drew a bundle of the notes which it +contained. “Here’s six hundred,” +he said--"you didn’t know I was so rich. I +want you to give the money to Briggs, who lent it +to us--and who was kind to the boy--and I’ve +always felt ashamed of having taken the poor old woman’s +money. And here’s some more--I’ve only +kept back a few pounds--which Becky may as well have, +to get on with.” As he spoke he took hold of +the other notes to give to his brother, but his hands +shook, and he was so agitated that the pocket-book +fell from him, and out of it the thousand-pound note +which had been the last of the unlucky Becky’s +winnings.</p> + +<p>Pitt stooped and picked them up, amazed at so much +wealth. “Not that,” Rawdon said. “I +hope to put a bullet into the man whom that belongs +to.” He had thought to himself, it would be a +fine revenge to wrap a ball in the note and kill Steyne +with it.</p> + +<p>After this colloquy the brothers once more shook hands +and parted. Lady Jane had heard of the Colonel’s +arrival, and was waiting for her husband in the adjoining +dining-room, with female instinct, auguring evil. + The door of the dining-room happened to be left open, +and the lady of course was issuing from it as the two +brothers passed out of the study. She held out her +hand to Rawdon and said she was glad he was come to +breakfast, though she could perceive, by his haggard +unshorn face and the dark looks of her husband, that +there was very little question of breakfast between +them. Rawdon muttered some excuses about an engagement, +squeezing hard the timid little hand which his sister-in-law +reached out to him. Her imploring eyes could read +nothing but calamity in his face, but he went away +without another word. Nor did Sir Pitt vouchsafe her +any explanation. The children came up to salute him, +and he kissed them in his usual frigid manner. The +mother took both of them close to herself, and held +a hand of each of them as they knelt down to prayers, +which Sir Pitt read to them, and to the servants in +their Sunday suits or liveries, ranged upon chairs +on the other side of the hissing tea-urn. Breakfast +was so late that day, in consequence of the delays +which had occurred, that the church-bells began to +ring whilst they were sitting over their meal; and +Lady Jane was too ill, she said, to go to church, +though her thoughts had been entirely astray during +the period of family devotion.</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley meanwhile hurried on from Great Gaunt +Street, and knocking at the great bronze Medusa’s +head which stands on the portal of Gaunt House, brought +out the purple Silenus in a red and silver waistcoat +who acts as porter of that palace. The man was scared +also by the Colonel’s dishevelled appearance, +and barred the way as if afraid that the other was +going to force it. But Colonel Crawley only took +out a card and enjoined him particularly to send it +in to Lord Steyne, and to mark the address written +on it, and say that Colonel Crawley would be all day +after one o’clock at the Regent Club in St. + James’s Street--not at home. The fat red-faced +man looked after him with astonishment as he strode +away; so did the people in their Sunday clothes who +were out so early; the charity-boys with shining +faces, the greengrocer lolling at his door, and the +publican shutting his shutters in the sunshine, against +service commenced. The people joked at the cab-stand +about his appearance, as he took a carriage there, +and told the driver to drive him to Knightsbridge +Barracks.</p> + +<p>All the bells were jangling and tolling as he reached +that place. He might have seen his old acquaintance +Amelia on her way from Brompton to Russell Square, +had he been looking out. Troops of schools were on +their march to church, the shiny pavement and outsides +of coaches in the suburbs were thronged with people +out upon their Sunday pleasure; but the Colonel was +much too busy to take any heed of these phenomena, +and, arriving at Knightsbridge, speedily made his +way up to the room of his old friend and comrade Captain +Macmurdo, who Crawley found, to his satisfaction, was +in barracks.</p> + +<p>Captain Macmurdo, a veteran officer and Waterloo man, +greatly liked by his regiment, in which want of money +alone prevented him from attaining the highest ranks, +was enjoying the forenoon calmly in bed. He had been +at a fast supper-party, given the night before by +Captain the Honourable George Cinqbars, at his house +in Brompton Square, to several young men of the regiment, +and a number of ladies of the corps de ballet, and +old Mac, who was at home with people of all ages and +ranks, and consorted with generals, dog-fanciers, +opera-dancers, bruisers, and every kind of person, +in a word, was resting himself after the night’s +labours, and, not being on duty, was in bed.</p> + +<p>His room was hung round with boxing, sporting, and +dancing pictures, presented to him by comrades as +they retired from the regiment, and married and settled +into quiet life. And as he was now nearly fifty years +of age, twenty-four of which he had passed in the corps, +he had a singular museum. He was one of the best +shots in England, and, for a heavy man, one of the +best riders; indeed, he and Crawley had been rivals +when the latter was in the Army. To be brief, Mr. +Macmurdo was lying in bed, reading in Bell’s +Life an account of that very fight between the Tutbury +Pet and the Barking Butcher, which has been before +mentioned--a venerable bristly warrior, with a little +close-shaved grey head, with a silk nightcap, a red +face and nose, and a great dyed moustache.</p> + +<p>When Rawdon told the Captain he wanted a friend, the +latter knew perfectly well on what duty of friendship +he was called to act, and indeed had conducted scores +of affairs for his acquaintances with the greatest +prudence and skill. His Royal Highness the late lamented +Commander-in-Chief had had the greatest regard for +Macmurdo on this account, and he was the common refuge +of gentlemen in trouble.</p> + +<p>“What’s the row about, Crawley, my boy?” +said the old warrior. “No more gambling business, +hay, like that when we shot Captain Marker?”</p> + +<p>“It’s about--about my wife,” Crawley +answered, casting down his eyes and turning very red.</p> + +<p>The other gave a whistle. “I always said she’d +throw you over,” he began--indeed there were +bets in the regiment and at the clubs regarding the +probable fate of Colonel Crawley, so lightly was his +wife’s character esteemed by his comrades and +the world; but seeing the savage look with which Rawdon +answered the expression of this opinion, Macmurdo +did not think fit to enlarge upon it further.</p> + +<p>“Is there no way out of it, old boy?” +the Captain continued in a grave tone. “Is +it only suspicion, you know, or--or what is it? Any +letters? Can’t you keep it quiet? Best not make +any noise about a thing of that sort if you can help +it.” “Think of his only finding her out +now,” the Captain thought to himself, and remembered +a hundred particular conversations at the mess-table, +in which Mrs. Crawley’s reputation had been +torn to shreds.</p> + +<p>“There’s no way but one out of it,” +Rawdon replied--"and there’s only a way out +of it for one of us, Mac--do you understand? I was +put out of the way--arrested--I found ’em alone +together. I told him he was a liar and a coward, +and knocked him down and thrashed him.”</p> + +<p>“Serve him right,” Macmurdo said. “Who +is it?”</p> + +<p>Rawdon answered it was Lord Steyne.</p> + +<p>“The deuce! a Marquis! they said he--that +is, they said you--”</p> + +<p>“What the devil do you mean?” roared out +Rawdon; “do you mean that you ever heard a fellow +doubt about my wife and didn’t tell me, Mac?”</p> + +<p>“The world’s very censorious, old boy,” +the other replied. “What the deuce was the +good of my telling you what any tom-fools talked about?”</p> + +<p>“It was damned unfriendly, Mac,” said +Rawdon, quite overcome; and, covering his face with +his hands, he gave way to an emotion, the sight of +which caused the tough old campaigner opposite him +to wince with sympathy. “Hold up, old boy,” +he said; “great man or not, we’ll put +a bullet in him, damn him. As for women, they’re +all so.”</p> + +<p>“You don’t know how fond I was of that +one,” Rawdon said, half-inarticulately. “Damme, +I followed her like a footman. I gave up everything +I had to her. I’m a beggar because I would marry +her. By Jove, sir, I’ve pawned my own watch +in order to get her anything she fancied; and she +she’s been making a purse for herself all the +time, and grudged me a hundred pound to get me out +of quod.” He then fiercely and incoherently, +and with an agitation under which his counsellor had +never before seen him labour, told Macmurdo the circumstances +of the story. His adviser caught at some stray hints +in it. “She may be innocent, after all,” +he said. “She says so. Steyne has been a hundred +times alone with her in the house before.”</p> + +<p>“It may be so,” Rawdon answered sadly, +“but this don’t look very innocent”: + and he showed the Captain the thousand-pound note +which he had found in Becky’s pocket-book. +“This is what he gave her, Mac, and she kep +it unknown to me; and with this money in the house, +she refused to stand by me when I was locked up.” +The Captain could not but own that the secreting of +the money had a very ugly look.</p> + +<p>Whilst they were engaged in their conference, Rawdon +dispatched Captain Macmurdo’s servant to Curzon +Street, with an order to the domestic there to give +up a bag of clothes of which the Colonel had great +need. And during the man’s absence, and with +great labour and a Johnson’s Dictionary, which +stood them in much stead, Rawdon and his second composed +a letter, which the latter was to send to Lord Steyne. + Captain Macmurdo had the honour of waiting upon the +Marquis of Steyne, on the part of Colonel Rawdon Crawley, +and begged to intimate that he was empowered by the +Colonel to make any arrangements for the meeting which, +he had no doubt, it was his Lordship’s intention +to demand, and which the circumstances of the morning +had rendered inevitable. Captain Macmurdo begged Lord +Steyne, in the most polite manner, to appoint a friend, +with whom he (Captain M.M.) might communicate, and +desired that the meeting might take place with as +little delay as possible.</p> + +<p>In a postscript the Captain stated that he had in +his possession a bank-note for a large amount, which +Colonel Crawley had reason to suppose was the property +of the Marquis of Steyne. And he was anxious, on +the Colonel’s behalf, to give up the note to +its owner.</p> + +<p>By the time this note was composed, the Captain’s +servant returned from his mission to Colonel Crawley’s +house in Curzon Street, but without the carpet-bag +and portmanteau, for which he had been sent, and with +a very puzzled and odd face.</p> + +<p>“They won’t give ’em up,” +said the man; “there’s a regular shinty +in the house, and everything at sixes and sevens. + The landlord’s come in and took possession. + The servants was a drinkin’ up in the drawingroom. + They said--they said you had gone off with the plate, +Colonel"--the man added after a pause--"One of the +servants is off already. And Simpson, the man as +was very noisy and drunk indeed, says nothing shall +go out of the house until his wages is paid up.”</p> + +<p>The account of this little revolution in May Fair +astonished and gave a little gaiety to an otherwise +very triste conversation. The two officers laughed +at Rawdon’s discomfiture.</p> + +<p>“I’m glad the little ’un isn’t +at home,” Rawdon said, biting his nails. “You +remember him, Mac, don’t you, in the Riding School? +How he sat the kicker to be sure! didn’t he?”</p> + +<p>“That he did, old boy,” said the good-natured +Captain.</p> + +<p>Little Rawdon was then sitting, one of fifty gown +boys, in the Chapel of Whitefriars School, thinking, +not about the sermon, but about going home next Saturday, +when his father would certainly tip him and perhaps +would take him to the play.</p> + +<p>“He’s a regular trump, that boy,” +the father went on, still musing about his son. “I +say, Mac, if anything goes wrong--if I drop--I should +like you to--to go and see him, you know, and say that +I was very fond of him, and that. And--dash it--old +chap, give him these gold sleeve-buttons: it’s +all I’ve got.” He covered his face with +his black hands, over which the tears rolled and made +furrows of white. Mr. Macmurdo had also occasion +to take off his silk night-cap and rub it across +his eyes.</p> + +<p>“Go down and order some breakfast,” he +said to his man in a loud cheerful voice. “What’ll +you have, Crawley? Some devilled kidneys and a herring--let’s +say. And, Clay, lay out some dressing things for +the Colonel: we were always pretty much of a size, +Rawdon, my boy, and neither of us ride so light as +we did when we first entered the corps.” With +which, and leaving the Colonel to dress himself, Macmurdo +turned round towards the wall, and resumed the perusal +of Bell’s Life, until such time as his friend’s +toilette was complete and he was at liberty to commence +his own.</p> + +<p>This, as he was about to meet a lord, Captain Macmurdo +performed with particular care. He waxed his mustachios +into a state of brilliant polish and put on a tight +cravat and a trim buff waistcoat, so that all the +young officers in the mess-room, whither Crawley had +preceded his friend, complimented Mac on his appearance +at breakfast and asked if he was going to be married +that Sunday.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which the Same Subject is Pursued</h4> + +<p>Becky did not rally from the state of stupor and confusion +in which the events of the previous night had plunged +her intrepid spirit until the bells of the Curzon +Street Chapels were ringing for afternoon service, +and rising from her bed she began to ply her own bell, +in order to summon the French maid who had left her +some hours before.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Rawdon Crawley rang many times in vain; and though, +on the last occasion, she rang with such vehemence +as to pull down the bell-rope, Mademoiselle Fifine +did not make her appearance--no, not though her mistress, +in a great pet, and with the bell-rope in her hand, +came out to the landing-place with her hair over her +shoulders and screamed out repeatedly for her attendant.</p> + +<p>The truth is, she had quitted the premises for many +hours, and upon that permission which is called French +leave among us After picking up the trinkets in the +drawing-room, Mademoiselle had ascended to her own +apartments, packed and corded her own boxes there, +tripped out and called a cab for herself, brought +down her trunks with her own hand, and without ever +so much as asking the aid of any of the other servants, +who would probably have refused it, as they hated +her cordially, and without wishing any one of them +good-bye, had made her exit from Curzon Street.</p> + +<p>The game, in her opinion, was over in that little +domestic establishment. Fifine went off in a cab, +as we have known more exalted persons of her nation +to do under similar circumstances: but, more provident +or lucky than these, she secured not only her own +property, but some of her mistress’s (if indeed +that lady could be said to have any property at all)--and +not only carried off the trinkets before alluded to, +and some favourite dresses on which she had long kept +her eye, but four richly gilt Louis Quatorze candlesticks, +six gilt albums, keepsakes, and Books of Beauty, a +gold enamelled snuff-box which had once belonged to +Madame du Barri, and the sweetest little inkstand +and mother-of-pearl blotting book, which Becky used +when she composed her charming little pink notes, +had vanished from the premises in Curzon Street together +with Mademoiselle Fifine, and all the silver laid +on the table for the little festin which Rawdon interrupted. + The plated ware Mademoiselle left behind her was +too cumbrous, probably for which reason, no doubt, +she also left the fire irons, the chimney-glasses, +and the rosewood cottage piano.</p> + +<p>A lady very like her subsequently kept a milliner’s +shop in the Rue du Helder at Paris, where she lived +with great credit and enjoyed the patronage of my +Lord Steyne. This person always spoke of England +as of the most treacherous country in the world, and +stated to her young pupils that she had been affreusement +vole by natives of that island. It was no doubt compassion +for her misfortunes which induced the Marquis of Steyne +to be so very kind to Madame de Saint-Amaranthe. +May she flourish as she deserves--she appears no more +in our quarter of Vanity Fair.</p> + +<p>Hearing a buzz and a stir below, and indignant at +the impudence of those servants who would not answer +her summons, Mrs. Crawley flung her morning robe round +her and descended majestically to the drawing-room, +whence the noise proceeded.</p> + +<p>The cook was there with blackened face, seated on +the beautiful chintz sofa by the side of Mrs. Raggles, +to whom she was administering Maraschino. The page +with the sugar-loaf buttons, who carried about Becky’s +pink notes, and jumped about her little carriage with +such alacrity, was now engaged putting his fingers +into a cream dish; the footman was talking to Raggles, +who had a face full of perplexity and woe--and yet, +though the door was open, and Becky had been screaming +a half-dozen of times a few feet off, not one of her +attendants had obeyed her call. “Have a little +drop, do’ee now, Mrs. Raggles,” the cook +was saying as Becky entered, the white cashmere dressing-gown +flouncing around her.</p> + +<p>“Simpson! Trotter!” the mistress of the +house cried in great wrath. “How dare you +stay here when you heard me call? How dare you sit +down in my presence? Where’s my maid?” +The page withdrew his fingers from his mouth with +a momentary terror, but the cook took off a glass +of Maraschino, of which Mrs. Raggles had had enough, +staring at Becky over the little gilt glass as she +drained its contents. The liquor appeared to give +the odious rebel courage.</p> + +<p>“<i>Your</i> sofy, indeed!” Mrs. Cook said. + “I’m a settin’ on Mrs. Raggles’s +sofy. Don’t you stir, Mrs. Raggles, Mum. I’m +a settin’ on Mr. and Mrs. Raggles’s sofy, +which they bought with honest money, and very dear +it cost ‘em, too. And I’m thinkin’ +if I set here until I’m paid my wages, I shall +set a precious long time, Mrs. Raggles; and set I +will, too--ha! ha!” and with this she filled +herself another glass of the liquor and drank it with +a more hideously satirical air.</p> + +<p>“Trotter! Simpson! turn that drunken wretch +out,” screamed Mrs. Crawley.</p> + +<p>“I shawn’t,” said Trotter the footman; +“turn out yourself. Pay our selleries, and +turn me out too. <i>We’ll</i> go fast enough.”</p> + +<p>“Are you all here to insult me?” cried +Becky in a fury; “when Colonel Crawley comes +home I’ll--”</p> + +<p>At this the servants burst into a horse haw-haw, in +which, however, Raggles, who still kept a most melancholy +countenance, did not join. “He ain’t a +coming back,” Mr. Trotter resumed. “He +sent for his things, and I wouldn’t let ’em +go, although Mr. Raggles would; and I don’t +b’lieve he’s no more a Colonel than I am. + He’s hoff, and I suppose you’re a goin’ +after him. You’re no better than swindlers, +both on you. Don’t be a bullyin’ <i>me</i>. + I won’t stand it. Pay us our selleries, I +say. Pay us our selleries.” It was evident, +from Mr. Trotter’s flushed countenance and defective +intonation, that he, too, had had recourse to vinous +stimulus.</p> + +<p>“Mr. Raggles,” said Becky in a passion +of vexation, “you will not surely let me be +insulted by that drunken man?” “Hold your +noise, Trotter; do now,” said Simpson the page. + He was affected by his mistress’s deplorable +situation, and succeeded in preventing an outrageous +denial of the epithet “drunken” on the +footman’s part.</p> + +<p>“Oh, M’am,” said Raggles, “I +never thought to live to see this year day: I’ve +known the Crawley family ever since I was born. I +lived butler with Miss Crawley for thirty years; and +I little thought one of that family was a goin’ +to ruing me--yes, ruing me"--said the poor fellow +with tears in his eyes. “Har you a goin’ +to pay me? You’ve lived in this ’ouse +four year. You’ve ’ad my substance: my +plate and linning. You ho me a milk and butter bill +of two ’undred pound, you must ’ave noo +laid heggs for your homlets, and cream for your spanil +dog.”</p> + +<p>“She didn’t care what her own flesh and +blood had,” interposed the cook. “Many’s +the time, he’d have starved but for me.”</p> + +<p>“He’s a charaty-boy now, Cooky,” +said Mr. Trotter, with a drunken “ha! ha!"--and +honest Raggles continued, in a lamentable tone, an +enumeration of his griefs. All he said was true. +Becky and her husband had ruined him. He had bills +coming due next week and no means to meet them. He +would be sold up and turned out of his shop and his +house, because he had trusted to the Crawley family. + His tears and lamentations made Becky more peevish +than ever.</p> + +<p>“You all seem to be against me,” she said +bitterly. “What do you want? I can’t pay +you on Sunday. Come back to-morrow and I’ll +pay you everything. I thought Colonel Crawley had +settled with you. He will to-morrow. I declare to +you upon my honour that he left home this morning +with fifteen hundred pounds in his pocket-book. He +has left me nothing. Apply to him. Give me a bonnet +and shawl and let me go out and find him. There was +a difference between us this morning. You all seem +to know it. I promise you upon my word that you shall +all be paid. He has got a good appointment. Let me +go out and find him.”</p> + +<p>This audacious statement caused Raggles and the other +personages present to look at one another with a wild +surprise, and with it Rebecca left them. She went +upstairs and dressed herself this time without the +aid of her French maid. She went into Rawdon’s +room, and there saw that a trunk and bag were packed +ready for removal, with a pencil direction that they +should be given when called for; then she went into +the Frenchwoman’s garret; everything was clean, +and all the drawers emptied there. She bethought herself +of the trinkets which had been left on the ground +and felt certain that the woman had fled. “Good +Heavens! was ever such ill luck as mine?” she +said; “to be so near, and to lose all. Is it +all too late?” No; there was one chance more.</p> + +<p>She dressed herself and went away unmolested this +time, but alone. It was four o’clock. She went +swiftly down the streets (she had no money to pay +for a carriage), and never stopped until she came to +Sir Pitt Crawley’s door, in Great Gaunt Street. + Where was Lady Jane Crawley? She was at church. +Becky was not sorry. Sir Pitt was in his study, and +had given orders not to be disturbed--she must see +him--she slipped by the sentinel in livery at once, +and was in Sir Pitt’s room before the astonished +Baronet had even laid down the paper.</p> + +<p>He turned red and started back from her with a look +of great alarm and horror.</p> + +<p>“Do not look so,” she said. “I +am not guilty, Pitt, dear Pitt; you were my friend +once. Before God, I am not guilty. I seem so. Everything +is against me. And oh! at such a moment! just when +all my hopes were about to be realized: just when +happiness was in store for us.”</p> + +<p>“Is this true, what I see in the paper then?” +Sir Pitt said--a paragraph in which had greatly surprised +him.</p> + +<p>“It is true. Lord Steyne told me on Friday +night, the night of that fatal ball. He has been +promised an appointment any time these six months. + Mr. Martyr, the Colonial Secretary, told him yesterday +that it was made out. That unlucky arrest ensued; +that horrible meeting. I was only guilty of too much +devotedness to Rawdon’s service. I have received +Lord Steyne alone a hundred times before. I confess +I had money of which Rawdon knew nothing. Don’t +you know how careless he is of it, and could I dare +to confide it to him?” And so she went on with +a perfectly connected story, which she poured into +the ears of her perplexed kinsman.</p> + +<p>It was to the following effect. Becky owned, and +with prefect frankness, but deep contrition, that +having remarked Lord Steyne’s partiality for +her (at the mention of which Pitt blushed), and being +secure of her own virtue, she had determined to turn +the great peer’s attachment to the advantage +of herself and her family. “I looked for a +peerage for you, Pitt,” she said (the brother-in-law +again turned red). “We have talked about it. + Your genius and Lord Steyne’s interest made +it more than probable, had not this dreadful calamity +come to put an end to all our hopes. But, first, I +own that it was my object to rescue my dear husband--him +whom I love in spite of all his ill usage and suspicions +of me--to remove him from the poverty and ruin which +was impending over us. I saw Lord Steyne’s +partiality for me,” she said, casting down her +eyes. “I own that I did everything in my power +to make myself pleasing to him, and as far as an honest +woman may, to secure his--his esteem. It was only +on Friday morning that the news arrived of the death +of the Governor of Coventry Island, and my Lord instantly +secured the appointment for my dear husband. It was +intended as a surprise for him--he was to see it in +the papers to-day. Even after that horrid arrest +took place (the expenses of which Lord Steyne generously +said he would settle, so that I was in a manner prevented +from coming to my husband’s assistance), my +Lord was laughing with me, and saying that my dearest +Rawdon would be consoled when he read of his appointment +in the paper, in that shocking spun--bailiff’s +house. And then--then he came home. His suspicions +were excited,--the dreadful scene took place between +my Lord and my cruel, cruel Rawdon--and, O my God, +what will happen next? Pitt, dear Pitt! pity me, +and reconcile us!” And as she spoke she flung +herself down on her knees, and bursting into tears, +seized hold of Pitt’s hand, which she kissed +passionately.</p> + +<p>It was in this very attitude that Lady Jane, who, +returning from church, ran to her husband’s +room directly she heard Mrs. Rawdon Crawley was closeted +there, found the Baronet and his sister-in-law.</p> + +<p>“I am surprised that woman has the audacity +to enter this house,” Lady Jane said, trembling +in every limb and turning quite pale. (Her Ladyship +had sent out her maid directly after breakfast, who +had communicated with Raggles and Rawdon Crawley’s +household, who had told her all, and a great deal +more than they knew, of that story, and many others +besides). “How dare Mrs. Crawley to enter the +house of--of an honest family?”</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt started back, amazed at his wife’s +display of vigour. Becky still kept her kneeling posture +and clung to Sir Pitt’s hand.</p> + +<p>“Tell her that she does not know all: Tell +her that I am innocent, dear Pitt,” she whimpered +out.</p> + +<p>“Upon-my word, my love, I think you do Mrs. +Crawley injustice,” Sir Pitt said; at which +speech Rebecca was vastly relieved. “Indeed +I believe her to be--”</p> + +<p>“To be what?” cried out Lady Jane, her +clear voice thrilling and, her heart beating violently +as she spoke. “To be a wicked woman--a heartless +mother, a false wife? She never loved her dear little +boy, who used to fly here and tell me of her cruelty +to him. She never came into a family but she strove +to bring misery with her and to weaken the most sacred +affections with her wicked flattery and falsehoods. + She has deceived her husband, as she has deceived +everybody; her soul is black with vanity, worldliness, +and all sorts of crime. I tremble when I touch her. + I keep my children out of her sight.</p> + +<p>“Lady Jane!” cried Sir Pitt, starting +up, “this is really language-- " “I have +been a true and faithful wife to you, Sir Pitt,” +Lady Jane continued, intrepidly; “I have kept +my marriage vow as I made it to God and have been +obedient and gentle as a wife should. But righteous +obedience has its limits, and I declare that I will +not bear that--that woman again under my roof; if +she enters it, I and my children will leave it. She +is not worthy to sit down with Christian people. +You--you must choose, sir, between her and me”; +and with this my Lady swept out of the room, fluttering +with her own audacity, and leaving Rebecca and Sir +Pitt not a little astonished at it.</p> + +<p>As for Becky, she was not hurt; nay, she was pleased. +“It was the diamond-clasp you gave me,” +she said to Sir Pitt, reaching him out her hand; and +before she left him (for which event you may be sure +my Lady Jane was looking out from her dressing-room +window in the upper story) the Baronet had promised +to go and seek out his brother, and endeavour to bring +about a reconciliation.</p> + +<p>Rawdon found some of the young fellows of the regiment +seated in the mess-room at breakfast, and was induced +without much difficulty to partake of that meal, and +of the devilled legs of fowls and soda-water with +which these young gentlemen fortified themselves. +Then they had a conversation befitting the day and +their time of life: about the next pigeon-match at +Battersea, with relative bets upon Ross and Osbaldiston; +about Mademoiselle Ariane of the French Opera, and +who had left her, and how she was consoled by Panther +Carr; and about the fight between the Butcher and +the Pet, and the probabilities that it was a cross. + Young Tandyman, a hero of seventeen, laboriously +endeavouring to get up a pair of mustachios, had seen +the fight, and spoke in the most scientific manner +about the battle and the condition of the men. It +was he who had driven the Butcher on to the ground +in his drag and passed the whole of the previous night +with him. Had there not been foul play he must have +won it. All the old files of the Ring were in it; +and Tandyman wouldn’t pay; no, dammy, he wouldn’t +pay. It was but a year since the young Cornet, now +so knowing a hand in Cribb’s parlour, had a +still lingering liking for toffy, and used to be birched +at Eton.</p> + +<p>So they went on talking about dancers, fights, drinking, +demireps, until Macmurdo came down and joined the +boys and the conversation. He did not appear to think +that any especial reverence was due to their boyhood; +the old fellow cut in with stories, to the full as +choice as any the youngest rake present had to tell--nor +did his own grey hairs nor their smooth faces detain +him. Old Mac was famous for his good stories. He +was not exactly a lady’s man; that is, men asked +him to dine rather at the houses of their mistresses +than of their mothers. There can scarcely be a life +lower, perhaps, than his, but he was quite contented +with it, such as it was, and led it in perfect good +nature, simplicity, and modesty of demeanour.</p> + +<p>By the time Mac had finished a copious breakfast, +most of the others had concluded their meal. Young +Lord Varinas was smoking an immense Meerschaum pipe, +while Captain Hugues was employed with a cigar: that +violent little devil Tandyman, with his little bull-terrier +between his legs, was tossing for shillings with all +his might (that fellow was always at some game or +other) against Captain Deuceace; and Mac and Rawdon +walked off to the Club, neither, of course, having +given any hint of the business which was occupying +their minds. Both, on the other hand, had joined +pretty gaily in the conversation, for why should they +interrupt it? Feasting, drinking, ribaldry, laughter, +go on alongside of all sorts of other occupations +in Vanity Fair--the crowds were pouring out of church +as Rawdon and his friend passed down St. James’s +Street and entered into their Club.</p> + +<p>The old bucks and habitues, who ordinarily stand gaping +and grinning out of the great front window of the +Club, had not arrived at their posts as yet--the newspaper-room +was almost empty. One man was present whom Rawdon +did not know; another to whom he owed a little score +for whist, and whom, in consequence, he did not care +to meet; a third was reading the Royalist (a periodical +famous for its scandal and its attachment to Church +and King) Sunday paper at the table, and looking up +at Crawley with some interest, said, “Crawley, +I congratulate you.”</p> + +<p>“What do you mean?” said the Colonel.</p> + +<p>“It’s in the Observer and the Royalist +too,” said Mr. Smith.</p> + +<p>“What?” Rawdon cried, turning very red. + He thought that the affair with Lord Steyne was already +in the public prints. Smith looked up wondering and +smiling at the agitation which the Colonel exhibited +as he took up the paper and, trembling, began to read.</p> + +<p>Mr. Smith and Mr. Brown (the gentleman with .whom +Rawdon had the outstanding whist account) had been +talking about the Colonel just before he came in.</p> + +<p>“It is come just in the nick of time,” +said Smith. “I suppose Crawley had not a shilling +in the world.”</p> + +<p>“It’s a wind that blows everybody good,” +Mr. Brown said. “He can’t go away without +paying me a pony he owes me.”</p> + +<p>“What’s the salary?” asked Smith.</p> + +<p>“Two or three thousand,” answered the +other. “But the climate’s so infernal, +they don’t enjoy it long. Liverseege died after +eighteen months of it, and the man before went off +in six weeks, I hear.”</p> + +<p>“Some people say his brother is a very clever +man. I always found him a d--- bore,” Smith +ejaculated. “He must have good interest, though. + He must have got the Colonel the place.”</p> + +<p>“He!” said Brown. with a sneer. “Pooh. + It was Lord Steyne got it.</p> + +<p>“How do you mean?”</p> + +<p>“A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband,” +answered the other enigmatically, and went to read +his papers.</p> + +<p>Rawdon, for his part, read in the Royalist the following +astonishing paragraph:</p> + +<p><i>Governorship of Coventry island</i>.--H.M.S. +Yellowjack, Commander Jaunders, has brought letters +and papers from Coventry Island. H. E. Sir Thomas +Liverseege had fallen a victim to the prevailing fever +at Swampton. His loss is deeply felt in the flourishing +colony. We hear that the Governorship has been offered +to Colonel Rawdon Crawley, C.B., a distinguished Waterloo +officer. We need not only men of acknowledged bravery, +but men of administrative talents to superintend the +affairs of our colonies, and we have no doubt that +the gentleman selected by the Colonial Office to fill +the lamented vacancy which has occurred at Coventry +Island is admirably calculated for the post which +he is about to occupy.”</p> + +<p>“Coventry Island! Where was it? Who had appointed +him to the government? You must take me out as your +secretary, old boy,” Captain Macmurdo said laughing; +and as Crawley and his friend sat wondering and perplexed +over the announcement, the Club waiter brought in +to the Colonel a card on which the name of Mr. Wenham +was engraved, who begged to see Colonel Crawley.</p> + +<p>The Colonel and his aide-de-camp went out to meet +the gentleman, rightly conjecturing that he was an +emissary of Lord Steyne. “How d’ye do, +Crawley? I am glad to see you,” said Mr. Wenham +with a bland smile, and grasping Crawley’s hand +with great cordiality.</p> + +<p>“You come, I suppose, from--”</p> + +<p>“Exactly,” said Mr. Wenham.</p> + +<p>“Then this is my friend Captain Macmurdo, of +the Life Guards Green.”</p> + +<p>“Delighted to know Captain Macmurdo, I’m +sure,” Mr. Wenham said and tendered another +smile and shake of the hand to the second, as he had +done to the principal. Mac put out one finger, armed +with a buckskin glove, and made a very frigid bow +to Mr. Wenham over his tight cravat. He was, perhaps, +discontented at being put in communication with a +pekin, and thought that Lord Steyne should have sent +him a Colonel at the very least.</p> + +<p>“As Macmurdo acts for me, and knows what I mean,” +Crawley said, “I had better retire and leave +you together.”</p> + +<p>“Of course,” said Macmurdo.</p> + +<p>“By no means, my dear Colonel,” Mr. Wenham +said; “the interview which I had the honour +of requesting was with you personally, though the +company of Captain Macmurdo cannot fail to be also +most pleasing. In fact, Captain, I hope that our +conversation will lead to none but the most agreeable +results, very different from those which my friend +Colonel Crawley appears to anticipate.”</p> + +<p>“Humph!” said Captain Macmurdo. Be hanged +to these civilians, he thought to himself, they are +always for arranging and speechifying. Mr. Wenham +took a chair which was not offered to him--took a paper +from his pocket, and resumed--</p> + +<p>“You have seen this gratifying announcement +in the papers this morning, Colonel? Government has +secured a most valuable servant, and you, if you +accept office, as I presume you will, an excellent +appointment. Three thousand a year, delightful climate, +excellent government-house, all your own way in the +Colony, and a certain promotion. I congratulate you +with all my heart. I presume you know, gentlemen, +to whom my friend is indebted for this piece of patronage?”</p> + +<p>“Hanged if I know,” the Captain said; +his principal turned very red.</p> + +<p>“To one of the most generous and kindest men +in the world, as he is one of the greatest--to my +excellent friend, the Marquis of Steyne.”</p> + +<p>“I’ll see him d--- before I take his place,” +growled out Rawdon.</p> + +<p>“You are irritated against my noble friend,” +Mr. Wenham calmly resumed; “and now, in the +name of common sense and justice, tell me why?”</p> + +<p>“<i>Why</i>?” cried Rawdon in surprise.</p> + +<p>“Why? Dammy!” said the Captain, ringing +his stick on the ground.</p> + +<p>“Dammy, indeed,” said Mr. Wenham with +the most agreeable smile; “still, look at the +matter as a man of the world--as an honest man-- and +see if you have not been in the wrong. You come home +from a journey, and find--what?--my Lord Steyne supping +at your house in Curzon Street with Mrs. Crawley. + Is the circumstance strange or novel? Has he not +been a hundred times before in the same position? +Upon my honour and word as a gentleman"--Mr. Wenham +here put his hand on his waistcoat with a parliamentary +air--"I declare I think that your suspicions are monstrous +and utterly unfounded, and that they injure an honourable +gentleman who has proved his good-will towards you +by a thousand benefactions--and a most spotless and +innocent lady.”</p> + +<p>“You don’t mean to say that--that Crawley’s +mistaken?” said Mr. Macmurdo.</p> + +<p>“I believe that Mrs. Crawley is as innocent +as my wife, Mrs. Wenham,” Mr. Wenham said with +great energy. “I believe that, misled by an +infernal jealousy, my friend here strikes a blow against +not only an infirm and old man of high station, his +constant friend and benefactor, but against his wife, +his own dearest honour, his son’s future reputation, +and his own prospects in life.”</p> + +<p>“I will tell you what happened,” Mr. Wenham +continued with great solemnity; “I was sent +for this morning by my Lord Steyne, and found him +in a pitiable state, as, I need hardly inform Colonel +Crawley, any man of age and infirmity would be after +a personal conflict with a man of your strength. +I say to your face; it was a cruel advantage you took +of that strength, Colonel Crawley. It was not only +the body of my noble and excellent friend which was +wounded-- his heart, sir, was bleeding. A man whom +he had loaded with benefits and regarded with affection +had subjected him to the foulest indignity. What +was this very appointment, which appears in the journals +of to-day, but a proof of his kindness to you? When +I saw his Lordship this morning I found him in a state +pitiable indeed to see, and as anxious as you are +to revenge the outrage committed upon him, by blood. + You know he has given his proofs, I presume, Colonel +Crawley?”</p> + +<p>“He has plenty of pluck,” said the Colonel. + “Nobody ever said he hadn’t.”</p> + +<p>“His first order to me was to write a letter +of challenge, and to carry it to Colonel Crawley. + One or other of us,” he said, “must not +survive the outrage of last night.”</p> + +<p>Crawley nodded. “You’re coming to the +point, Wenham,” he said.</p> + +<p>“I tried my utmost to calm Lord Steyne. Good +God! sir,” I said, “how I regret that +Mrs. Wenham and myself had not accepted Mrs. Crawley’s +invitation to sup with her!”</p> + +<p>“She asked you to sup with her?” Captain +Macmurdo said.</p> + +<p>“After the opera. Here’s the note of +invitation--stop--no, this is another paper--I thought +I had h, but it’s of no consequence, and I pledge +you my word to the fact. If we had come--and it was +only one of Mrs. Wenham’s headaches which prevented +us--she suffers under them a good deal, especially +in the spring--if we had come, and you had returned +home, there would have been no quarrel, no insult, +no suspicion--and so it is positively because my poor +wife has a headache that you are to bring death down +upon two men of honour and plunge two of the most +excellent and ancient families in the kingdom into +disgrace and sorrow.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Macmurdo looked at his principal with the air +of a man profoundly puzzled, and Rawdon felt with +a kind of rage that his prey was escaping him. He +did not believe a word of the story, and yet, how +discredit or disprove it?</p> + +<p>Mr. Wenham continued with the same fluent oratory, +which in his place in Parliament he had so often practised--"I +sat for an hour or more by Lord Steyne’s bedside, +beseeching, imploring Lord Steyne to forego his intention +of demanding a meeting. I pointed out to him that +the circumstances were after all suspicious--they were +suspicious. I acknowledge it--any man in your position +might have been taken in--I said that a man furious +with jealousy is to all intents and purposes a madman, +and should be as such regarded--that a duel between +you must lead to the disgrace of all parties concerned--that +a man of his Lordship’s exalted station had no +right in these days, when the most atrocious revolutionary +principles, and the most dangerous levelling doctrines +are preached among the vulgar, to create a public +scandal; and that, however innocent, the common people +would insist that he was guilty. In fine, I implored +him not to send the challenge.”</p> + +<p>“I don’t believe one word of the whole +story,” said Rawdon, grinding his teeth. “I +believe it a d--- lie, and that you’re in it, +Mr. Wenham. If the challenge don’t come from +him, by Jove it shall come from me.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Wenham turned deadly pale at this savage interruption +of the Colonel and looked towards the door.</p> + +<p>But he found a champion in Captain Macmurdo. That +gentleman rose up with an oath and rebuked Rawdon +for his language. “You put the affair into +my hands, and you shall act as I think fit, by Jove, +and not as you do. You have no right to insult Mr. +Wenham with this sort of language; and dammy, Mr. +Wenham, you deserve an apology. And as for a challenge +to Lord Steyne, you may get somebody else to carry +it, I won’t. If my lord, after being thrashed, +chooses to sit still, dammy let him. And as for the +affair with--with Mrs. Crawley, my belief is, there’s +nothing proved at all: that your wife’s innocent, +as innocent as Mr. Wenham says she is; and at any rate +that you would be a d--fool not to take the place and +hold your tongue.”</p> + +<p>“Captain Macmurdo, you speak like a man of sense,” +Mr. Wenham cried out, immensely relieved--"I forget +any words that Colonel Crawley has used in the irritation +of the moment.”</p> + +<p>“I thought you would,” Rawdon said with +a sneer.</p> + +<p>“Shut your mouth, you old stoopid,” the +Captain said good-naturedly. “Mr. Wenham ain’t +a fighting man; and quite right, too.”</p> + +<p>“This matter, in my belief,” the Steyne +emissary cried, “ought to be buried in the most +profound oblivion. A word concerning it should never +pass these doors. I speak in the interest of my friend, +as well as of Colonel Crawley, who persists in considering +me his enemy.”</p> + +<p>“I suppose Lord Steyne won’t talk about +it very much,” said Captain Macmurdo; “and +I don’t see why our side should. The affair +ain’t a very pretty one, any way you take it, +and the less said about it the better. It’s +you are thrashed, and not us; and if you are satisfied, +why, I think, we should be.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Wenham took his hat, upon this, and Captain Macmurdo +following him to the door, shut it upon himself and +Lord Steyne’s agent, leaving Rawdon chafing +within. When the two were on the other side, Macmurdo +looked hard at the other ambassador and with an expression +of anything but respect on his round jolly face.</p> + +<p>“You don’t stick at a trifle, Mr. Wenham,” +he said.</p> + +<p>“You flatter me, Captain Macmurdo,” answered +the other with a smile. “Upon my honour and +conscience now, Mrs. Crawley did ask us to sup after +the opera.”</p> + +<p>“Of course; and Mrs. Wenham had one of her head-aches. + I say, I’ve got a thousand-pound note here, +which I will give you if you will give me a receipt, +please; and I will put the note up in an envelope +for Lord Steyne. My man shan’t fight him. But +we had rather not take his money.”</p> + +<p>“It was all a mistake--all a mistake, my dear +sir,” the other said with the utmost innocence +of manner; and was bowed down the Club steps by Captain +Macmurdo, just as Sir Pitt Crawley ascended them. +There was a slight acquaintance between these two gentlemen, +and the Captain, going back with the Baronet to the +room where the latter’s brother was, told Sir +Pitt, in confidence, that he had made the affair all +right between Lord Steyne and the Colonel.</p> + +<p>Sir Pitt was well pleased, of course, at this intelligence, +and congratulated his brother warmly upon the peaceful +issue of the affair, making appropriate moral remarks +upon the evils of duelling and the unsatisfactory +nature of that sort of settlement of disputes.</p> + +<p>And after this preface, he tried with all his eloquence +to effect a reconciliation between Rawdon and his +wife. He recapitulated the statements which Becky +had made, pointed out the probabilities of their truth, +and asserted his own firm belief in her innocence.</p> + +<p>But Rawdon would not hear of it. “She has kep +money concealed from me these ten years,” he +said “She swore, last night only, she had none +from Steyne. She knew it was all up, directly I found +it. If she’s not guilty, Pitt, she’s +as bad as guilty, and I’ll never see her again--never.” +His head sank down on his chest as he spoke the words, +and he looked quite broken and sad.</p> + +<p>“Poor old boy,” Macmurdo said, shaking +his head.</p> + +<p>Rawdon Crawley resisted for some time the idea of +taking the place which had been procured for him by +so odious a patron, and was also for removing the +boy from the school where Lord Steyne’s interest +had placed him. He was induced, however, to acquiesce +in these benefits by the entreaties of his brother +and Macmurdo, but mainly by the latter, pointing out +to him what a fury Steyne would be in to think that +his enemy’s fortune was made through his means.</p> + +<p>When the Marquis of Steyne came abroad after his accident, +the Colonial Secretary bowed up to him and congratulated +himself and the Service upon having made so excellent +an appointment. These congratulations were received +with a degree of gratitude which may be imagined on +the part of Lord Steyne.</p> + +<p>The secret of the rencontre between him and Colonel +Crawley was buried in the profoundest oblivion, as +Wenham said; that is, by the seconds and the principals. +But before that evening was over it was talked of +at fifty dinner-tables in Vanity Fair. Little Cackleby +himself went to seven evening parties and told the +story with comments and emendations at each place. + How Mrs. Washington White revelled in it! The Bishopess +of Ealing was shocked beyond expression; the Bishop +went and wrote his name down in the visiting-book +at Gaunt House that very day. Little Southdown was +sorry; so you may be sure was his sister Lady Jane, +very sorry. Lady Southdown wrote it off to her other +daughter at the Cape of Good Hope. It was town-talk +for at least three days, and was only kept out of +the newspapers by the exertions of Mr. Wagg, acting +upon a hint from Mr. Wenham.</p> + +<p>The bailiffs and brokers seized upon poor Raggles +in Curzon Street, and the late fair tenant of that +poor little mansion was in the meanwhile--where? Who +cared! Who asked after a day or two? Was she guilty +or not? We all know how charitable the world is, and +how the verdict of Vanity Fair goes when there is +a doubt. Some people said she had gone to Naples +in pursuit of Lord Steyne, whilst others averred that +his Lordship quitted that city and fled to Palermo +on hearing of Becky’s arrival; some said she +was living in Bierstadt, and had become a dame d’honneur +to the Queen of Bulgaria; some that she was at Boulogne; +and others, at a boarding-house at Cheltenham.</p> + +<p>Rawdon made her a tolerable annuity, and we may be +sure that she was a woman who could make a little +money go a great way, as the saying is. He would +have paid his debts on leaving England, could he have +got any Insurance Office to take his life, but the +climate of Coventry Island was so bad that he could +borrow no money on the strength of his salary. He +remitted, however, to his brother punctually, and +wrote to his little boy regularly every mail. He +kept Macmurdo in cigars and sent over quantities of +shells, cayenne pepper, hot pickles, guava jelly, +and colonial produce to Lady Jane. He sent his brother +home the Swamp Town Gazette, in which the new Governor +was praised with immense enthusiasm; whereas the Swamp +Town Sentinel, whose wife was not asked to Government +House, declared that his Excellency was a tyrant, +compared to whom Nero was an enlightened philanthropist. + Little Rawdon used to like to get the papers and +read about his Excellency.</p> + +<p>His mother never made any movement to see the child. +He went home to his aunt for Sundays and holidays; +he soon knew every bird’s nest about Queen’s +Crawley, and rode out with Sir Huddlestone’s +hounds, which he admired so on his first well-remembered +visit to Hampshire.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LVI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Georgy is Made a Gentleman</h4> + +<p>Georgy Osborne was now fairly established in his grandfather’s +mansion in Russell Square, occupant of his father’s +room in the house and heir apparent of all the splendours +there. The good looks, gallant bearing, and gentlemanlike +appearance of the boy won the grandsire’s heart +for him. Mr. Osborne was as proud of him as ever +he had been of the elder George.</p> + +<p>The child had many more luxuries and indulgences than +had been awarded his father. Osborne’s commerce +had prospered greatly of late years. His wealth and +importance in the City had very much increased. He +had been glad enough in former days to put the elder +George to a good private school; and a commission in +the army for his son had been a source of no small +pride to him; for little George and his future prospects +the old man looked much higher. He would make a gentleman +of the little chap, was Mr. Osborne’s constant +saying regarding little Georgy. He saw him in his +mind’s eye, a collegian, a Parliament man, a +Baronet, perhaps. The old man thought he would die +contented if he could see his grandson in a fair way +to such honours. He would have none but a tip-top +college man to educate him--none of your quacks and +pretenders--no, no. A few years before, he used to +be savage, and inveigh against all parsons, scholars, +and the like declaring that they were a pack of humbugs, +and quacks that weren’t fit to get their living +but by grinding Latin and Greek, and a set of supercilious +dogs that pretended to look down upon British merchants +and gentlemen, who could buy up half a hundred of +’em. He would mourn now, in a very solemn manner, +that his own education had been neglected, and repeatedly +point out, in pompous orations to Georgy, the necessity +and excellence of classical acquirements.</p> + +<p>When they met at dinner the grandsire used to ask +the lad what he had been reading during the day, and +was greatly interested at the report the boy gave +of his own studies, pretending to understand little +George when he spoke regarding them. He made a hundred +blunders and showed his ignorance many a time. It +did not increase the respect which the child had for +his senior. A quick brain and a better education elsewhere +showed the boy very soon that his grandsire was a +dullard, and he began accordingly to command him and +to look down upon him; for his previous education, +humble and contracted as it had been, had made a much +better gentleman of Georgy than any plans of his grandfather +could make him. He had been brought up by a kind, +weak, and tender woman, who had no pride about anything +but about him, and whose heart was so pure and whose +bearing was so meek and humble that she could not but +needs be a true lady. She busied herself in gentle +offices and quiet duties; if she never said brilliant +things, she never spoke or thought unkind ones; guileless +and artless, loving and pure, indeed how could our +poor little Amelia be other than a real gentlewoman!</p> + +<p>Young Georgy lorded over this soft and yielding nature; +and the contrast of its simplicity and delicacy with +the coarse pomposity of the dull old man with whom +he next came in contact made him lord over the latter +too. If he had been a Prince Royal he could not have +been better brought up to think well of himself.</p> + +<p>Whilst his mother was yearning after him at home, +and I do believe every hour of the day, and during +most hours of the sad lonely nights, thinking of him, +this young gentleman had a number of pleasures and +consolations administered to him, which made him for +his part bear the separation from Amelia very easily. + Little boys who cry when they are going to school +cry because they are going to a very uncomfortable +place. It is only a few who weep from sheer affection. + When you think that the eyes of your childhood dried +at the sight of a piece of gingerbread, and that a +plum cake was a compensation for the agony of parting +with your mamma and sisters, oh my friend and brother, +you need not be too confident of your own fine feelings.</p> + +<p>Well, then, Master George Osborne had every comfort +and luxury that a wealthy and lavish old grandfather +thought fit to provide. The coachman was instructed +to purchase for him the handsomest pony which could +be bought for money, and on this George was taught +to ride, first at a riding-school, whence, after having +performed satisfactorily without stirrups, and over +the leaping-bar, he was conducted through the New +Road to Regent’s Park, and then to Hyde Park, +where he rode in state with Martin the coachman behind +him. Old Osborne, who took matters more easily in +the City now, where he left his affairs to his junior +partners, would often ride out with Miss O. in the +same fashionable direction. As little Georgy came +cantering up with his dandified air and his heels down, +his grandfather would nudge the lad’s aunt and +say, “Look, Miss O.” And he would laugh, +and his face would grow red with pleasure, as he nodded +out of the window to the boy, as the groom saluted +the carriage, and the footman saluted Master George. + Here too his aunt, Mrs. Frederick Bullock (whose +chariot might daily be seen in the Ring, with bullocks +or emblazoned on the panels and harness, and three +pasty-faced little Bullocks, covered with cockades +and feathers, staring from the windows) Mrs. Frederick +Bullock, I say, flung glances of the bitterest hatred +at the little upstart as he rode by with his hand +on his side and his hat on one ear, as proud as a +lord.</p> + +<p>Though he was scarcely eleven years of age, Master +George wore straps and the most beautiful little boots +like a man. He had gilt spurs, and a gold-headed +whip, and a fine pin in his handkerchief, and the +neatest little kid gloves which Lamb’s Conduit +Street could furnish. His mother had given him a couple +of neckcloths, and carefully hemmed and made some +little shirts for him; but when her Eli came to see +the widow, they were replaced by much finer linen. +He had little jewelled buttons in the lawn shirt fronts. + Her humble presents had been put aside--I believe +Miss Osborne had given them to the coachman’s +boy. Amelia tried to think she was pleased at the +change. Indeed, she was happy and charmed to see the +boy looking so beautiful.</p> + +<p>She had had a little black profile of him done for +a shilling, and this was hung up by the side of another +portrait over her bed. One day the boy came on his +accustomed visit, galloping down the little street +at Brompton, and bringing, as usual, all the inhabitants +to the windows to admire his splendour, and with great +eagerness and a look of triumph in his face, he pulled +a case out of his great-coat--it was a natty white +great-coat, with a cape and a velvet collar-- pulled +out a red morocco case, which he gave her.</p> + +<p>“I bought it with my own money, Mamma,” +he said. “I thought you’d like it.”</p> + +<p>Amelia opened the case, and giving a little cry of +delighted affection, seized the boy and embraced him +a hundred times. It was a miniature-of himself, very +prettily done (though not half handsome enough, we +may be sure, the widow thought). His grandfather had +wished to have a picture of him by an artist whose +works, exhibited in a shop-window, in Southampton +Row, had caught the old gentleman’s eye; and +George, who had plenty of money, bethought him of asking +the painter how much a copy of the little portrait +would cost, saying that he would pay for it out of +his own money and that he wanted to give it to his +mother. The pleased painter executed it for a small +price, and old Osborne himself, when he heard of the +incident, growled out his satisfaction and gave the +boy twice as many sovereigns as he paid for the miniature.</p> + +<p>But what was the grandfather’s pleasure compared +to Amelia’s ecstacy? That proof of the boy’s +affection charmed her so that she thought no child +in the world was like hers for goodness. For long +weeks after, the thought of his love made her happy. + She slept better with the picture under her pillow, +and how many many times did she kiss it and weep and +pray over it! A small kindness from those she loved +made that timid heart grateful. Since her parting +with George she had had no such joy and consolation.</p> + +<p>At his new home Master George ruled like a lord; at +dinner he invited the ladies to drink wine with the +utmost coolness, and took off his champagne in a way +which charmed his old grandfather. “Look at +him,” the old man would say, nudging his neighbour +with a delighted purple face, “did you ever +see such a chap? Lord, Lord! he’ll be ordering +a dressing-case next, and razors to shave with; I’m +blessed if he won’t.”</p> + +<p>The antics of the lad did not, however, delight Mr. +Osborne’s friends so much as they pleased the +old gentleman. It gave Mr. Justice Coffin no pleasure +to hear Georgy cut into the conversation and spoil +his stories. Colonel Fogey was not interested in seeing +the little boy half tipsy. Mr. Sergeant Toffy’s +lady felt no particular gratitude, when, with a twist +of his elbow, he tilted a glass of port-wine over +her yellow satin and laughed at the disaster; nor +was she better pleased, although old Osborne was highly +delighted, when Georgy “whopped” her third +boy (a young gentleman a year older than Georgy, and +by chance home for the holidays from Dr. Tickleus’s +at Ealing School) in Russell Square. George’s +grandfather gave the boy a couple of sovereigns for +that feat and promised to reward him further for every +boy above his own size and age whom he whopped in +a similar manner. It is difficult to say what good +the old man saw in these combats; he had a vague notion +that quarrelling made boys hardy, and that tyranny +was a useful accomplishment for them to learn. English +youth have been so educated time out of mind, and +we have hundreds of thousands of apologists and admirers +of injustice, misery, and brutality, as perpetrated +among children. Flushed with praise and victory over +Master Toffy, George wished naturally to pursue his +conquests further, and one day as he was strutting +about in prodigiously dandified new clothes, near +St. Pancras, and a young baker’s boy made sarcastic +comments upon his appearance, the youthful patrician +pulled off his dandy jacket with great spirit, and +giving it in charge to the friend who accompanied +him (Master Todd, of Great Coram Street, Russell Square, +son of the junior partner of the house of Osborne +and Co.), George tried to whop the little baker. But +the chances of war were unfavourable this time, and +the little baker whopped Georgy, who came home with +a rueful black eye and all his fine shirt frill dabbled +with the claret drawn from his own little nose. He +told his grandfather that he had been in combat with +a giant, and frightened his poor mother at Brompton +with long, and by no means authentic, accounts of +the battle.</p> + +<p>This young Todd, of Coram Street, Russell Square, +was Master George’s great friend and admirer. + They both had a taste for painting theatrical characters; +for hardbake and raspberry tarts; for sliding and +skating in the Regent’s Park and the Serpentine, +when the weather permitted; for going to the play, +whither they were often conducted, by Mr. Osborne’s +orders, by Rowson, Master George’s appointed +body-servant, with whom they sat in great comfort in +the pit.</p> + +<p>In the company of this gentleman they visited all +the principal theatres of the metropolis; knew the +names of all the actors from Drury Lane to Sadler’s +Wells; and performed, indeed, many of the plays to +the Todd family and their youthful friends, with West’s +famous characters, on their pasteboard theatre. Rowson, +the footman, who was of a generous disposition, would +not unfrequently, when in cash, treat his young master +to oysters after the play, and to a glass of rum-shrub +for a night-cap. We may be pretty certain that Mr. +Rowson profited in his turn by his young master’s +liberality and gratitude for the pleasures to which +the footman inducted him.</p> + +<p>A famous tailor from the West End of the town--Mr. +Osborne would have none of your City or Holborn bunglers, +he said, for the boy (though a City tailor was good +enough for <i>him</i>)--was summoned to ornament little +George’s person, and was told to spare no expense +in so doing. So, Mr. Woolsey, of Conduit Street, +gave a loose to his imagination and sent the child +home fancy trousers, fancy waistcoats, and fancy jackets +enough to furnish a school of little dandies. Georgy +had little white waistcoats for evening parties, and +little cut velvet waistcoats for dinners, and a dear +little darling shawl dressing-gown, for all the world +like a little man. He dressed for dinner every day, +“like a regular West End swell,” as his +grandfather remarked; one of the domestics was affected +to his special service, attended him at his toilette, +answered his bell, and brought him his letters always +on a silver tray.</p> + +<p>Georgy, after breakfast, would sit in the arm-chair +in the dining-room and read the Morning Post, just +like a grown-up man. “How he <i>du</i> dam and +swear,” the servants would cry, delighted at +his precocity. Those who remembered the Captain his +father, declared Master George was his Pa, every inch +of him. He made the house lively by his activity, +his imperiousness, his scolding, and his good-nature.</p> + +<p>George’s education was confided to a neighbouring +scholar and private pedagogue who “prepared +young noblemen and gentlemen for the Universities, +the senate, and the learned professions: whose system +did not embrace the degrading corporal severities still +practised at the ancient places of education, and +in whose family the pupils would find the elegances +of refined society and the confidence and affection +of a home.” It was in this way that the Reverend +Lawrence Veal of Hart Street, Bloomsbury, and domestic +Chaplain to the Earl of Bareacres, strove with Mrs. +Veal his wife to entice pupils.</p> + +<p>By thus advertising and pushing sedulously, the domestic +Chaplain and his Lady generally succeeded in having +one or two scholars by them--who paid a high figure +and were thought to be in uncommonly comfortable quarters. + There was a large West Indian, whom nobody came to +see, with a mahogany complexion, a woolly head, and +an exceedingly dandyfied appearance; there was another +hulking boy of three-and-twenty whose education had +been neglected and whom Mr. and Mrs. Veal were to +introduce into the polite world; there were two sons +of Colonel Bangles of the East India Company’s +Service: these four sat down to dinner at Mrs. Veal’s +genteel board, when Georgy was introduced to her establishment.</p> + +<p>Georgy was, like some dozen other pupils, only a day +boy; he arrived in the morning under the guardianship +of his friend Mr. Rowson, and if it was fine, would +ride away in the afternoon on his pony, followed by +the groom. The wealth of his grandfather was reported +in the school to be prodigious. The Rev. Mr. Veal +used to compliment Georgy upon it personally, warning +him that he was destined for a high station; that +it became him to prepare, by sedulity and docility +in youth, for the lofty duties to which he would be +called in mature age; that obedience in the child was +the best preparation for command in the man; and that +he therefore begged George would not bring toffee +into the school and ruin the health of the Masters +Bangles, who had everything they wanted at the elegant +and abundant table of Mrs. Veal.</p> + +<p>With respect to learning, “the Curriculum,” +as Mr. Veal loved to call it, was of prodigious extent, +and the young gentlemen in Hart Street might learn +a something of every known science. The Rev. Mr. +Veal had an orrery, an electrifying machine, a turning +lathe, a theatre (in the wash-house), a chemical apparatus, +and what he called a select library of all the works +of the best authors of ancient and modern times and +languages. He took the boys to the British Museum +and descanted upon the antiquities and the specimens +of natural history there, so that audiences would gather +round him as he spoke, and all Bloomsbury highly admired +him as a prodigiously well-informed man. And whenever +he spoke (which he did almost always), he took care +to produce the very finest and longest words of which +the vocabulary gave him the use, rightly judging that +it was as cheap to employ a handsome, large, and sonorous +epithet, as to use a little stingy one.</p> + +<p>Thus he would say to George in school, “I observed +on my return home from taking the indulgence of an +evening’s scientific conversation with my excellent +friend Doctor Bulders--a true archaeologian, gentlemen, +a true archaeologian--that the windows of your venerated +grandfather’s almost princely mansion in Russell +Square were illuminated as if for the purposes of +festivity. Am I right in my conjecture that Mr. Osborne +entertained a society of chosen spirits round his +sumptuous board last night?”</p> + +<p>Little Georgy, who had considerable humour, and used +to mimic Mr. Veal to his face with great spirit and +dexterity, would reply that Mr. V. was quite correct +in his surmise.</p> + +<p>“Then those friends who had the honour of partaking +of Mr. Osborne’s hospitality, gentlemen, had +no reason, I will lay any wager, to complain of their +repast. I myself have been more than once so favoured. + (By the way, Master Osborne, you came a little late +this morning, and have been a defaulter in this respect +more than once.) I myself, I say, gentlemen, humble +as I am, have been found not unworthy to share Mr. +Osborne’s elegant hospitality. And though I +have feasted with the great and noble of the world--for +I presume that I may call my excellent friend and +patron, the Right Honourable George Earl of Bareacres, +one of the number--yet I assure you that the board +of the British merchant was to the full as richly served, +and his reception as gratifying and noble. Mr. Bluck, +sir, we will resume, if you please, that passage of +Eutropis, which was interrupted by the late arrival +of Master Osborne.”</p> + +<p>To this great man George’s education was for +some time entrusted. Amelia was bewildered by his +phrases, but thought him a prodigy of learning. That +poor widow made friends of Mrs. Veal, for reasons of +her own. She liked to be in the house and see Georgy +coming to school there. She liked to be asked to +Mrs. Veal’s conversazioni, which took place +once a month (as you were informed on pink cards, +with AOHNH engraved on them), and where the professor +welcomed his pupils and their friends to weak tea +and scientific conversation. Poor little Amelia never +missed one of these entertainments and thought them +delicious so long as she might have Georgy sitting +by her. And she would walk from Brompton in any weather, +and embrace Mrs. Veal with tearful gratitude for the +delightful evening she had passed, when, the company +having retired and Georgy gone off with Mr. Rowson, +his attendant, poor Mrs. Osborne put on her cloaks +and her shawls preparatory to walking home.</p> + +<p>As for the learning which Georgy imbibed under this +valuable master of a hundred sciences, to judge from +the weekly reports which the lad took home to his +grandfather, his progress was remarkable. The names +of a score or more of desirable branches of knowledge +were printed in a table, and the pupil’s progress +in each was marked by the professor. In Greek Georgy +was pronounced aristos, in Latin optimus, in French +tres bien, and so forth; and everybody had prizes +for everything at the end of the year. Even Mr. Swartz, +the wooly-headed young gentleman, and half-brother +to the Honourable Mrs. Mac Mull, and Mr. Bluck, the +neglected young pupil of three-and-twenty from the +agricultural district, and that idle young scapegrace +of a Master Todd before mentioned, received little +eighteen-penny books, with “Athene” engraved +on them, and a pompous Latin inscription from the +professor to his young friends.</p> + +<p>The family of this Master Todd were hangers-on of +the house of Osborne. The old gentleman had advanced +Todd from being a clerk to be a junior partner in +his establishment.</p> + +<p>Mr. Osborne was the godfather of young Master Todd +(who in subsequent life wrote Mr. Osborne Todd on +his cards and became a man of decided fashion), while +Miss Osborne had accompanied Miss Maria Todd to the +font, and gave her protegee a prayer-book, a collection +of tracts, a volume of very low church poetry, or some +such memento of her goodness every year. Miss O. + drove the Todds out in her carriage now and then; +when they were ill, her footman, in large plush smalls +and waistcoat, brought jellies and delicacies from +Russell Square to Coram Street. Coram Street trembled +and looked up to Russell Square indeed, and Mrs. Todd, +who had a pretty hand at cutting out paper trimmings +for haunches of mutton, and could make flowers, ducks, +&c., out of turnips and carrots in a very creditable +manner, would go to “the Square,” as it +was called, and assist in the preparations incident +to a great dinner, without even so much as thinking +of sitting down to the banquet. If any guest failed +at the eleventh hour, Todd was asked to dine. Mrs. +Todd and Maria came across in the evening, slipped +in with a muffled knock, and were in the drawing-room +by the time Miss Osborne and the ladies under her +convoy reached that apartment--and ready to fire off +duets and sing until the gentlemen came up. Poor +Maria Todd; poor young lady! How she had to work +and thrum at these duets and sonatas in the Street, +before they appeared in public in the Square!</p> + +<p>Thus it seemed to be decreed by fate that Georgy was +to domineer over everybody with whom he came in contact, +and that friends, relatives, and domestics were all +to bow the knee before the little fellow. It must +be owned that he accommodated himself very willingly +to this arrangement. Most people do so. And Georgy +liked to play the part of master and perhaps had a +natural aptitude for it.</p> + +<p>In Russell Square everybody was afraid of Mr. Osborne, +and Mr. Osborne was afraid of Georgy. The boy’s +dashing manners, and offhand rattle about books and +learning, his likeness to his father (dead unreconciled +in Brussels yonder) awed the old gentleman and gave +the young boy the mastery. The old man would start +at some hereditary feature or tone unconsciously used +by the little lad, and fancy that George’s father +was again before him. He tried by indulgence to the +grandson to make up for harshness to the elder George. + People were surprised at his gentleness to the boy. + He growled and swore at Miss Osborne as usual, and +would smile when George came down late for breakfast.</p> + +<p>Miss Osborne, George’s aunt, was a faded old +spinster, broken down by more than forty years of +dulness and coarse usage. It was easy for a lad of +spirit to master her. And whenever George wanted anything +from her, from the jam-pots in her cupboards to the +cracked and dry old colours in her paint-box (the +old paint-box which she had had when she was a pupil +of Mr. Smee and was still almost young and blooming), +Georgy took possession of the object of his desire, +which obtained, he took no further notice of his aunt.</p> + +<p>For his friends and cronies, he had a pompous old +schoolmaster, who flattered him, and a toady, his +senior, whom he could thrash. It was dear Mrs. Todd’s +delight to leave him with her youngest daughter, Rosa +Jemima, a darling child of eight years old. The little +pair looked so well together, she would say (but not +to the folks in “the Square,” we may be +sure) “who knows what might happen? Don’t +they make a pretty little couple?” the fond mother +thought.</p> + +<p>The broken-spirited, old, maternal grandfather was +likewise subject to the little tyrant. He could not +help respecting a lad who had such fine clothes and +rode with a groom behind him. Georgy, on his side, +was in the constant habit of hearing coarse abuse and +vulgar satire levelled at John Sedley by his pitiless +old enemy, Mr. Osborne. Osborne used to call the +other the old pauper, the old coal-man, the old bankrupt, +and by many other such names of brutal contumely. + How was little George to respect a man so prostrate? +A few months after he was with his paternal grandfather, +Mrs. Sedley died. There had been little love between +her and the child. He did not care to show much grief. + He came down to visit his mother in a fine new suit +of mourning, and was very angry that he could not go +to a play upon which he had set his heart.</p> + +<p>The illness of that old lady had been the occupation +and perhaps the safeguard of Amelia. What do men +know about women’s martyrdoms? We should go +mad had we to endure the hundredth part of those daily +pains which are meekly borne by many women. Ceaseless +slavery meeting with no reward; constant gentleness +and kindness met by cruelty as constant; love, labour, +patience, watchfulness, without even so much as the +acknowledgement of a good word; all this, how many +of them have to bear in quiet, and appear abroad with +cheerful faces as if they felt nothing. Tender slaves +that they are, they must needs be hypocrites and weak.</p> + +<p>From her chair Amelia’s mother had taken to +her bed, which she had never left, and from which +Mrs. Osborne herself was never absent except when +she ran to see George. The old lady grudged her even +those rare visits; she, who had been a kind, smiling, +good-natured mother once, in the days of her prosperity, +but whom poverty and infirmities had broken down. + Her illness or estrangement did not affect Amelia. + They rather enabled her to support the other calamity +under which she was suffering, and from the thoughts +of which she was kept by the ceaseless calls of the +invalid. Amelia bore her harshness quite gently; +smoothed the uneasy pillow; was always ready with +a soft answer to the watchful, querulous voice; soothed +the sufferer with words of hope, such as her pious +simple heart could best feel and utter, and closed +the eyes that had once looked so tenderly upon her.</p> + +<p>Then all her time and tenderness were devoted to the +consolation and comfort of the bereaved old father, +who was stunned by the blow which had befallen him, +and stood utterly alone in the world. His wife, his +honour, his fortune, everything he loved best had fallen +away from him. There was only Amelia to stand by and +support with her gentle arms the tottering, heart-broken +old man. We are not going to write the history: it +would be too dreary and stupid. I can see Vanity +Fair yawning over it d’avance.</p> + +<p>One day as the young gentlemen were assembled in the +study at the Rev. Mr. Veal’s, and the domestic +chaplain to the Right Honourable the Earl of Bareacres +was spouting away as usual, a smart carriage drove +up to the door decorated with the statue of Athene, +and two gentlemen stepped out. The young Masters +Bangles rushed to the window with a vague notion that +their father might have arrived from Bombay. The +great hulking scholar of three-and-twenty, who was +crying secretly over a passage of Eutropius, flattened +his neglected nose against the panes and looked at +the drag, as the laquais de place sprang from the +box and let out the persons in the carriage.</p> + +<p>“It’s a fat one and a thin one,” +Mr. Bluck said as a thundering knock came to the door.</p> + +<p>Everybody was interested, from the domestic chaplain +himself, who hoped he saw the fathers of some future +pupils, down to Master Georgy, glad of any pretext +for laying his book down.</p> + +<p>The boy in the shabby livery with the faded copper +buttons, who always thrust himself into the tight +coat to open the door, came into the study and said, +“Two gentlemen want to see Master Osborne.” +The professor had had a trifling altercation in the +morning with that young gentleman, owing to a difference +about the introduction of crackers in school-time; +but his face resumed its habitual expression of bland +courtesy as he said, “Master Osborne, I give +you full permission to go and see your carriage friends--to +whom I beg you to convey the respectful compliments +of myself and Mrs. Veal.”</p> + +<p>Georgy went into the reception-room and saw two strangers, +whom he looked at with his head up, in his usual haughty +manner. One was fat, with mustachios, and the other +was lean and long, in a blue frock-coat, with a brown +face and a grizzled head.</p> + +<p>“My God, how like he is!” said the long +gentleman with a start. “Can you guess who we +are, George?”</p> + +<p>The boy’s face flushed up, as it did usually +when he was moved, and his eyes brightened. “I +don’t know the other,” he said, “but +I should think you must be Major Dobbin.”</p> + +<p>Indeed it was our old friend. His voice trembled +with pleasure as he greeted the boy, and taking both +the other’s hands in his own, drew the lad to +him.</p> + +<p>“Your mother has talked to you about me--has +she?” he said.</p> + +<p>“That she has,” Georgy answered, “hundreds +and hundreds of times.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LVII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Eothen</h4> + +<p>It was one of the many causes for personal pride with +which old Osborne chose to recreate himself that Sedley, +his ancient rival, enemy, and benefactor, was in his +last days so utterly defeated and humiliated as to +be forced to accept pecuniary obligations at the hands +of the man who had most injured and insulted him. +The successful man of the world cursed the old pauper +and relieved him from time to time. As he furnished +George with money for his mother, he gave the boy +to understand by hints, delivered in his brutal, coarse +way, that George’s maternal grandfather was but +a wretched old bankrupt and dependant, and that John +Sedley might thank the man to whom he already owed +ever so much money for the aid which his generosity +now chose to administer. George carried the pompous +supplies to his mother and the shattered old widower +whom it was now the main business of her life to tend +and comfort. The little fellow patronized the feeble +and disappointed old man.</p> + +<p>It may have shown a want of “proper pride” +in Amelia that she chose to accept these money benefits +at the hands of her father’s enemy. But proper +pride and this poor lady had never had much acquaintance +together. A disposition naturally simple and demanding +protection; a long course of poverty and humility, +of daily privations, and hard words, of kind offices +and no returns, had been her lot ever since womanhood +almost, or since her luckless marriage with George +Osborne. You who see your betters bearing up under +this shame every day, meekly suffering under the slights +of fortune, gentle and unpitied, poor, and rather +despised for their poverty, do you ever step down +from your prosperity and wash the feet of these poor +wearied beggars? The very thought of them is odious +and low. “There must be classes--there must +be rich and poor,” Dives says, smacking his +claret (it is well if he even sends the broken meat +out to Lazarus sitting under the window). Very true; +but think how mysterious and often unaccountable it +is--that lottery of life which gives to this man the +purple and fine linen and sends to the other rags +for garments and dogs for comforters.</p> + +<p>So I must own that, without much repining, on the +contrary with something akin to gratitude, Amelia +took the crumbs that her father-in-law let drop now +and then, and with them fed her own parent. Directly +she understood it to be her duty, it was this young +woman’s nature (ladies, she is but thirty still, +and we choose to call her a young woman even at that +age) it was, I say, her nature to sacrifice herself +and to fling all that she had at the feet of the beloved +object. During what long thankless nights had she +worked out her fingers for little Georgy whilst at +home with her; what buffets, scorns, privations, poverties +had she endured for father and mother! And in the +midst of all these solitary resignations and unseen +sacrifices, she did not respect herself any more than +the world respected her, but I believe thought in +her heart that she was a poor-spirited, despicable +little creature, whose luck in life was only too good +for her merits. O you poor women! O you poor secret +martyrs and victims, whose life is a torture, who are +stretched on racks in your bedrooms, and who lay your +heads down on the block daily at the drawing-room +table; every man who watches your pains, or peers +into those dark places where the torture is administered +to you, must pity you--and--and thank God that he +has a beard. I recollect seeing, years ago, at the +prisons for idiots and madmen at Bicetre, near Paris, +a poor wretch bent down under the bondage of his imprisonment +and his personal infirmity, to whom one of our party +gave a halfpenny worth of snuff in a cornet or “screw” +of paper. The kindness was too much for the poor +epileptic creature. He cried in an anguish of delight +and gratitude: if anybody gave you and me a thousand +a year, or saved our lives, we could not be so affected. + And so, if you properly tyrannize over a woman, you +will find a h’p’orth of kindness act upon +her and bring tears into her eyes, as though you were +an angel benefiting her.</p> + +<p>Some such boons as these were the best which Fortune +allotted to poor little Amelia. Her life, begun not +unprosperously, had come down to this--to a mean prison +and a long, ignoble bondage. Little George visited +her captivity sometimes and consoled it with feeble +gleams of encouragement. Russell Square was the boundary +of her prison: she might walk thither occasionally, +but was always back to sleep in her cell at night; +to perform cheerless duties; to watch by thankless +sick-beds; to suffer the harassment and tyranny of +querulous disappointed old age. How many thousands +of people are there, women for the most part, who +are doomed to endure this long slavery?--who are hospital +nurses without wages--sisters of Charity, if you like, +without the romance and the sentiment of sacrifice--who +strive, fast, watch, and suffer, unpitied, and fade +away ignobly and unknown.</p> + +<p>The hidden and awful Wisdom which apportions the destinies +of mankind is pleased so to humiliate and cast down +the tender, good, and wise, and to set up the selfish, +the foolish, or the wicked. Oh, be humble, my brother, +in your prosperity! Be gentle with those who are +less lucky, if not more deserving. Think, what right +have you to be scornful, whose virtue is a deficiency +of temptation, whose success may be a chance, whose +rank may be an ancestor’s accident, whose prosperity +is very likely a satire.</p> + +<p>They buried Amelia’s mother in the churchyard +at Brompton, upon just such a rainy, dark day as Amelia +recollected when first she had been there to marry +George. Her little boy sat by her side in pompous new +sables. She remembered the old pew-woman and clerk. + Her thoughts were away in other times as the parson +read. But that she held George’s hand in her +own, perhaps she would have liked to change places +with.... Then, as usual, she felt ashamed of her selfish +thoughts and prayed inwardly to be strengthened to +do her duty.</p> + +<p>So she determined with all her might and strength +to try and make her old father happy. She slaved, +toiled, patched, and mended, sang and played backgammon, +read out the newspaper, cooked dishes, for old Sedley, +walked him out sedulously into Kensington Gardens or +the Brompton Lanes, listened to his stories with untiring +smiles and affectionate hypocrisy, or sat musing by +his side and communing with her own thoughts and reminiscences, +as the old man, feeble and querulous, sunned himself +on the garden benches and prattled about his wrongs +or his sorrows. What sad, unsatisfactory thoughts +those of the widow were! The children running up +and down the slopes and broad paths in the gardens +reminded her of George, who was taken from her; the +first George was taken from her; her selfish, guilty +love, in both instances, had been rebuked and bitterly +chastised. She strove to think it was right that she +should be so punished. She was such a miserable wicked +sinner. She was quite alone in the world.</p> + +<p>I know that the account of this kind of solitary imprisonment +is insufferably tedious, unless there is some cheerful +or humorous incident to enliven it--a tender gaoler, +for instance, or a waggish commandant of the fortress, +or a mouse to come out and play about Latude’s +beard and whiskers, or a subterranean passage under +the castle, dug by Trenck with his nails and a toothpick: + the historian has no such enlivening incident to +relate in the narrative of Amelia’s captivity. + Fancy her, if you please, during this period, very +sad, but always ready to smile when spoken to; in a +very mean, poor, not to say vulgar position of life; +singing songs, making puddings, playing cards, mending +stockings, for her old father’s benefit. So, +never mind, whether she be a heroine or no; or you +and I, however old, scolding, and bankrupt--may we +have in our last days a kind soft shoulder on which +to lean and a gentle hand to soothe our gouty old +pillows.</p> + +<p>Old Sedley grew very fond of his daughter after his +wife’s death, and Amelia had her consolation +in doing her duty by the old man.</p> + +<p>But we are not going to leave these two people long +in such a low and ungenteel station of life. Better +days, as far as worldly prosperity went, were in store +for both. Perhaps the ingenious reader has guessed +who was the stout gentleman who called upon Georgy +at his school in company with our old friend Major +Dobbin. It was another old acquaintance returned to +England, and at a time when his presence was likely +to be of great comfort to his relatives there.</p> + +<p>Major Dobbin having easily succeeded in getting leave +from his good-natured commandant to proceed to Madras, +and thence probably to Europe, on urgent private affairs, +never ceased travelling night and day until he reached +his journey’s end, and had directed his march +with such celerity that he arrived at Madras in a high +fever. His servants who accompanied him brought him +to the house of the friend with whom he had resolved +to stay until his departure for Europe in a state +of delirium; and it was thought for many, many days +that he would never travel farther than the burying-ground +of the church of St. George’s, where the troops +should fire a salvo over his grave, and where many +a gallant officer lies far away from his home.</p> + +<p>Here, as the poor fellow lay tossing in his fever, +the people who watched him might have heard him raving +about Amelia. The idea that he should never see her +again depressed him in his lucid hours. He thought +his last day was come, and he made his solemn preparations +for departure, setting his affairs in this world in +order and leaving the little property of which he +was possessed to those whom he most desired to benefit. + The friend in whose house he was located witnessed +his testament. He desired to be buried with a little +brown hair-chain which he wore round his neck and which, +if the truth must be known, he had got from Amelia’s +maid at Brussels, when the young widow’s hair +was cut off, during the fever which prostrated her +after the death of George Osborne on the plateau at +Mount St. John.</p> + +<p>He recovered, rallied, relapsed again, having undergone +such a process of blood-letting and calomel as showed +the strength of his original constitution. He was +almost a skeleton when they put him on board the Ramchunder +East Indiaman, Captain Bragg, from Calcutta, touching +at Madras, and so weak and prostrate that his friend +who had tended him through his illness prophesied +that the honest Major would never survive the voyage, +and that he would pass some morning, shrouded in flag +and hammock, over the ship’s side, and carrying +down to the sea with him the relic that he wore at +his heart. But whether it was the sea air, or the +hope which sprung up in him afresh, from the day that +the ship spread her canvas and stood out of the roads +towards home, our friend began to amend, and he was +quite well (though as gaunt as a greyhound) before +they reached the Cape. “Kirk will be disappointed +of his majority this time,” he said with a smile; +“he will expect to find himself gazetted by the +time the regiment reaches home.” For it must +be premised that while the Major was lying ill at +Madras, having made such prodigious haste to go thither, +the gallant--th, which had passed many years abroad, +which after its return from the West Indies had been +baulked of its stay at home by the Waterloo campaign, +and had been ordered from Flanders to India, had received +orders home; and the Major might have accompanied +his comrades, had he chosen to wait for their arrival +at Madras.</p> + +<p>Perhaps he was not inclined to put himself in his +exhausted state again under the guardianship of Glorvina. +“I think Miss O’Dowd would have done for +me,” he said laughingly to a fellow-passenger, +“if we had had her on board, and when she had +sunk me, she would have fallen upon you, depend upon +it, and carried you in as a prize to Southampton, +Jos, my boy.”</p> + +<p>For indeed it was no other than our stout friend who +was also a passenger on board the Ramchunder. He +had passed ten years in Bengal. Constant dinners, +tiffins, pale ale and claret, the prodigious labour +of cutcherry, and the refreshment of brandy-pawnee +which he was forced to take there, had their effect +upon Waterloo Sedley. A voyage to Europe was pronounced +necessary for him--and having served his full time +in India and had fine appointments which had enabled +him to lay by a considerable sum of money, he was free +to come home and stay with a good pension, or to return +and resume that rank in the service to which his seniority +and his vast talents entitled him.</p> + +<p>He was rather thinner than when we last saw him, but +had gained in majesty and solemnity of demeanour. +He had resumed the mustachios to which his services +at Waterloo entitled him, and swaggered about on deck +in a magnificent velvet cap with a gold band and a +profuse ornamentation of pins and jewellery about +his person. He took breakfast in his cabin and dressed +as solemnly to appear on the quarter-deck as if he +were going to turn out for Bond Street, or the Course +at Calcutta. He brought a native servant with him, +who was his valet and pipe-bearer and who wore the +Sedley crest in silver on his turban. That oriental +menial had a wretched life under the tyranny of Jos +Sedley. Jos was as vain of his person as a woman, +and took as long a time at his toilette as any fading +beauty. The youngsters among the passengers, Young +Chaffers of the 150th, and poor little Ricketts, coming +home after his third fever, used to draw out Sedley +at the cuddy-table and make him tell prodigious stories +about himself and his exploits against tigers and Napoleon. +He was great when he visited the Emperor’s tomb +at Longwood, when to these gentlemen and the young +officers of the ship, Major Dobbin not being by, he +described the whole battle of Waterloo and all but +announced that Napoleon never would have gone to Saint +Helena at all but for him, Jos Sedley.</p> + +<p>After leaving St. Helena he became very generous, +disposing of a great quantity of ship stores, claret, +preserved meats, and great casks packed with soda-water, +brought out for his private delectation. There were +no ladies on board; the Major gave the pas of precedency +to the civilian, so that he was the first dignitary +at table, and treated by Captain Bragg and the officers +of the Ramchunder with the respect which his rank +warranted. He disappeared rather in a panic during +a two-days’ gale, in which he had the portholes +of his cabin battened down, and remained in his cot +reading the Washerwoman of Finchley Common, left on +board the Ramchunder by the Right Honourable the Lady +Emily Hornblower, wife of the Rev. Silas Hornblower, +when on their passage out to the Cape, where the Reverend +gentleman was a missionary; but, for common reading, +he had brought a stock of novels and plays which he +lent to the rest of the ship, and rendered himself +agreeable to all by his kindness and condescension.</p> + +<p>Many and many a night as the ship was cutting through +the roaring dark sea, the moon and stars shining overhead +and the bell singing out the watch, Mr. Sedley and +the Major would sit on the quarter-deck of the vessel +talking about home, as the Major smoked his cheroot +and the civilian puffed at the hookah which his servant +prepared for him.</p> + +<p>In these conversations it was wonderful with what +perseverance and ingenuity Major Dobbin would manage +to bring the talk round to the subject of Amelia and +her little boy. Jos, a little testy about his father’s +misfortunes and unceremonious applications to him, +was soothed down by the Major, who pointed out the +elder’s ill fortunes and old age. He would +not perhaps like to live with the old couple, whose +ways and hours might not agree with those of a younger +man, accustomed to different society (Jos bowed at +this compliment); but, the Major pointed out, how +advantageous it would be for Jos Sedley to have a +house of his own in London, and not a mere bachelor’s +establishment as before; how his sister Amelia would +be the very person to preside over it; how elegant, +how gentle she was, and of what refined good manners. + He recounted stories of the success which Mrs. George +Osborne had had in former days at Brussels, and in +London, where she was much admired by people of very +great fashion; and he then hinted how becoming it +would be for Jos to send Georgy to a good school and +make a man of him, for his mother and her parents +would be sure to spoil him. In a word, this artful +Major made the civilian promise to take charge of +Amelia and her unprotected child. He did not know +as yet what events had happened in the little Sedley +family, and how death had removed the mother, and +riches had carried off George from Amelia. But the +fact is that every day and always, this love-smitten +and middle-aged gentleman was thinking about Mrs. +Osborne, and his whole heart was bent upon doing her +good. He coaxed, wheedled, cajoled, and complimented +Jos Sedley with a perseverance and cordiality of which +he was not aware himself, very likely; but some men +who have unmarried sisters or daughters even, may +remember how uncommonly agreeable gentlemen are to +the male relations when they are courting the females; +and perhaps this rogue of a Dobbin was urged by a +similar hypocrisy.</p> + +<p>The truth is, when Major Dobbin came on board the +Ramchumder, very sick, and for the three days she +lay in the Madras Roads, he did not begin to rally, +nor did even the appearance and recognition of his +old acquaintance, Mr. Sedley, on board much cheer him, +until after a conversation which they had one day, +as the Major was laid languidly on the deck. He said +then he thought he was doomed; he had left a little +something to his godson in his will, and he trusted +Mrs. Osborne would remember him kindly and be happy +in the marriage she was about to make. “Married? +not the least,” Jos answered; “he had +heard from her: she made no mention of the marriage, +and by the way, it was curious, she wrote to say that +Major Dobbin was going to be married, and hoped that +<i>he</i> would be happy.” What were the dates +of Sedley’s letters from Europe? The civilian +fetched them. They were two months later than the +Major’s; and the ship’s surgeon congratulated +himself upon the treatment adopted by him towards his +new patient, who had been consigned to shipboard by +the Madras practitioner with very small hopes indeed; +for, from that day, the very day that he changed the +draught, Major Dobbin began to mend. And thus it was +that deserving officer, Captain Kirk, was disappointed +of his majority.</p> + +<p>After they passed St. Helena, Major Dobbin’s +gaiety and strength was such as to astonish all his +fellow passengers. He larked with the midshipmen, +played single-stick with the mates, ran up the shrouds +like a boy, sang a comic song one night to the amusement +of the whole party assembled over their grog after +supper, and rendered himself so gay, lively, and amiable +that even Captain Bragg, who thought there was nothing +in his passenger, and considered he was a poor-spirited +feller at first, was constrained to own that the Major +was a reserved but well-informed and meritorious officer. + “He ain’t got distangy manners, dammy,” +Bragg observed to his first mate; “he wouldn’t +do at Government House, Roper, where his Lordship and +Lady William was as kind to me, and shook hands with +me before the whole company, and asking me at dinner +to take beer with him, before the Commander-in-Chief +himself; he ain’t got manners, but there’s +something about him--” And thus Captain Bragg +showed that he possessed discrimination as a man, +as well as ability as a commander.</p> + +<p>But a calm taking place when the Ramchunder was within +ten days’ sail of England, Dobbin became so +impatient and ill-humoured as to surprise those comrades +who had before admired his vivacity and good temper. +He did not recover until the breeze sprang up again, +and was in a highly excited state when the pilot came +on board. Good God, how his heart beat as the two +friendly spires of Southampton came in sight.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LVIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Our Friend the Major</h4> + +<p>Our Major had rendered himself so popular on board +the Ramchunder that when he and Mr. Sedley descended +into the welcome shore-boat which was to take them +from the ship, the whole crew, men and officers, the +great Captain Bragg himself leading off, gave three +cheers for Major Dobbin, who blushed very much and +ducked his head in token of thanks. Jos, who very +likely thought the cheers were for himself, took off +his gold-laced cap and waved it majestically to his +friends, and they were pulled to shore and landed with +great dignity at the pier, whence they proceeded to +the Royal George Hotel.</p> + +<p>Although the sight of that magnificent round of beef, +and the silver tankard suggestive of real British +home-brewed ale and porter, which perennially greet +the eyes of the traveller returning from foreign parts +who enters the coffee-room of the George, are so invigorating +and delightful that a man entering such a comfortable +snug homely English inn might well like to stop some +days there, yet Dobbin began to talk about a post-chaise +instantly, and was no sooner at Southampton than he +wished to be on the road to London. Jos, however, +would not hear of moving that evening. Why was he +to pass a night in a post-chaise instead of a great +large undulating downy feather-bed which was there +ready to replace the horrid little narrow crib in +which the portly Bengal gentleman had been confined +during the voyage? He could not think of moving till +his baggage was cleared, or of travelling until he +could do so with his chillum. So the Major was forced +to wait over that night, and dispatched a letter to +his family announcing his arrival, entreating from +Jos a promise to write to his own friends. Jos promised, +but didn’t keep his promise. The Captain, the +surgeon, and one or two passengers came and dined +with our two gentlemen at the inn, Jos exerting himself +in a sumptuous way in ordering the dinner and promising +to go to town the next day with the Major. The landlord +said it did his eyes good to see Mr. Sedley take off +his first pint of porter. If I had time and dared +to enter into digressions, I would write a chapter +about that first pint of porter drunk upon English +ground. Ah, how good it is! It is worth-while to +leave home for a year, just to enjoy that one draught.</p> + +<p>Major Dobbin made his appearance the next morning +very neatly shaved and dressed, according to his wont. +Indeed, it was so early in the morning that nobody +was up in the house except that wonderful Boots of +an inn who never seems to want sleep; and the Major +could hear the snores of the various inmates of the +house roaring through the corridors as he creaked +about in those dim passages. Then the sleepless Boots +went shirking round from door to door, gathering up +at each the Bluchers, Wellingtons, Oxonians, which +stood outside. Then Jos’s native servant arose +and began to get ready his master’s ponderous +dressing apparatus and prepare his hookah; then the +maidservants got up, and meeting the dark man in the +passages, shrieked, and mistook him for the devil. + He and Dobbin stumbled over their pails in the passages +as they were scouring the decks of the Royal George. + When the first unshorn waiter appeared and unbarred +the door of the inn, the Major thought that the time +for departure was arrived, and ordered a post-chaise +to be fetched instantly, that they might set off.</p> + +<p>He then directed his steps to Mr. Sedley’s room +and opened the curtains of the great large family +bed wherein Mr. Jos was snoring. “Come, up! + Sedley,” the Major said, “it’s time +to be off; the chaise will be at the door in half +an hour.”</p> + +<p>Jos growled from under the counterpane to know what +the time was; but when he at last extorted from the +blushing Major (who never told fibs, however they +might be to his advantage) what was the real hour +of the morning, he broke out into a volley of bad language, +which we will not repeat here, but by which he gave +Dobbin to understand that he would jeopardy his soul +if he got up at that moment, that the Major might +go and be hanged, that he would not travel with Dobbin, +and that it was most unkind and ungentlemanlike to +disturb a man out of his sleep in that way; on which +the discomfited Major was obliged to retreat, leaving +Jos to resume his interrupted slumbers.</p> + +<p>The chaise came up presently, and the Major would +wait no longer.</p> + +<p>If he had been an English nobleman travelling on a +pleasure tour, or a newspaper courier bearing dispatches +(government messages are generally carried much more +quietly), he could not have travelled more quickly. + The post-boys wondered at the fees he flung amongst +them. How happy and green the country looked as the +chaise whirled rapidly from mile-stone to mile-stone, +through neat country towns where landlords came out +to welcome him with smiles and bows; by pretty roadside +inns, where the signs hung on the elms, and horses +and waggoners were drinking under the chequered shadow +of the trees; by old halls and parks; rustic hamlets +clustered round ancient grey churches--and through +the charming friendly English landscape. Is there +any in the world like it? To a traveller returning +home it looks so kind--it seems to shake hands with +you as you pass through it. Well, Major Dobbin passed +through all this from Southampton to London, and without +noting much beyond the milestones along the road. + You see he was so eager to see his parents at Camberwell.</p> + +<p>He grudged the time lost between Piccadilly and his +old haunt at the Slaughters’, whither he drove +faithfully. Long years had passed since he saw it +last, since he and George, as young men, had enjoyed +many a feast, and held many a revel there. He had +now passed into the stage of old-fellow-hood. His +hair was grizzled, and many a passion and feeling +of his youth had grown grey in that interval. There, +however, stood the old waiter at the door, in the same +greasy black suit, with the same double chin and flaccid +face, with the same huge bunch of seals at his fob, +rattling his money in his pockets as before, and receiving +the Major as if he had gone away only a week ago. + “Put the Major’s things in twenty-three, +that’s his room,” John said, exhibiting +not the least surprise. “Roast fowl for your +dinner, I suppose. You ain’t got married? They +said you was married--the Scotch surgeon of yours +was here. No, it was Captain Humby of the thirty-third, +as was quartered with the --th in Injee. Like any +warm water? What do you come in a chay for--ain’t +the coach good enough?” And with this, the faithful +waiter, who knew and remembered every officer who +used the house, and with whom ten years were but as +yesterday, led the way up to Dobbin’s old room, +where stood the great moreen bed, and the shabby carpet, +a thought more dingy, and all the old black furniture +covered with faded chintz, just as the Major recollected +them in his youth.</p> + +<p>He remembered George pacing up and down the room, +and biting his nails, and swearing that the Governor +must come round, and that if he didn’t, he didn’t +care a straw, on the day before he was married. He +could fancy him walking in, banging the door of Dobbin’s +room, and his own hard by--</p> + +<p>“You ain’t got young,” John said, +calmly surveying his friend of former days.</p> + +<p>Dobbin laughed. “Ten years and a fever don’t +make a man young, John,” he said. “It +is you that are always young--no, you are always old.”</p> + +<p>“What became of Captain Osborne’s widow?” +John said. “Fine young fellow that. Lord, +how he used to spend his money. He never came back +after that day he was marched from here. He owes me +three pound at this minute. Look here, I have it +in my book. ’April 10, 1815, Captain Osborne: + ‘3 pounds.’ I wonder whether his father +would pay me,” and so saying, John of the Slaughters’ +pulled out the very morocco pocket-book in which he +had noted his loan to the Captain, upon a greasy faded +page still extant, with many other scrawled memoranda +regarding the bygone frequenters of the house.</p> + +<p>Having inducted his customer into the room, John retired +with perfect calmness; and Major Dobbin, not without +a blush and a grin at his own absurdity, chose out +of his kit the very smartest and most becoming civil +costume he possessed, and laughed at his own tanned +face and grey hair, as he surveyed them in the dreary +little toilet-glass on the dressing-table.</p> + +<p>“I’m glad old John didn’t forget +me,” he thought. “She’ll know me, +too, I hope.” And he sallied out of the inn, +bending his steps once more in the direction of Brompton.</p> + +<p>Every minute incident of his last meeting with Amelia +was present to the constant man’s mind as he +walked towards her house. The arch and the Achilles +statue were up since he had last been in Piccadilly; +a hundred changes had occurred which his eye and mind +vaguely noted. He began to tremble as he walked up +the lane from Brompton, that well-remembered lane +leading to the street where she lived. Was she going +to be married or not? If he were to meet her with +the little boy--Good God, what should he do? He saw +a woman coming to him with a child of five years old--was +that she? He began to shake at the mere possibility. + When he came up to the row of houses, at last, where +she lived, and to the gate, he caught hold of it and +paused. He might have heard the thumping of his own +heart. “May God Almighty bless her, whatever +has happened,” he thought to himself. “Psha! + she may be gone from here,” he said and went +in through the gate.</p> + +<p>The window of the parlour which she used to occupy +was open, and there were no inmates in the room. +The Major thought he recognized the piano, though, +with the picture over it, as it used to be in former +days, and his perturbations were renewed. Mr. Clapp’s +brass plate was still on the door, at the knocker +of which Dobbin performed a summons.</p> + +<p>A buxom-looking lass of sixteen, with bright eyes +and purple cheeks, came to answer the knock and looked +hard at the Major as he leant back against the little +porch.</p> + +<p>He was as pale as a ghost and could hardly falter +out the words-- “Does Mrs. Osborne live here?”</p> + +<p>She looked him hard in the face for a moment--and +then turning white too--said, “Lord bless me--it’s +Major Dobbin.” She held out both her hands shaking--"Don’t +you remember me?” she said. “I used to +call you Major Sugarplums.” On which, and I +believe it was for the first time that he ever so +conducted himself in his life, the Major took the +girl in his arms and kissed her. She began to laugh +and cry hysterically, and calling out “Ma, Pa!” +with all her voice, brought up those worthy people, +who had already been surveying the Major from the +casement of the ornamental kitchen, and were astonished +to find their daughter in the little passage in the +embrace of a great tall man in a blue frock-coat and +white duck trousers.</p> + +<p>“I’m an old friend,” he said--not +without blushing though. “Don’t you remember +me, Mrs. Clapp, and those good cakes you used to make +for tea? Don’t you recollect me, Clapp? I’m +George’s godfather, and just come back from +India.” A great shaking of hands ensued--Mrs. +Clapp was greatly affected and delighted; she called +upon heaven to interpose a vast many times in that +passage.</p> + +<p>The landlord and landlady of the house led the worthy +Major into the Sedleys’ room (whereof he remembered +every single article of furniture, from the old brass +ornamented piano, once a natty little instrument, +Stothard maker, to the screens and the alabaster miniature +tombstone, in the midst of which ticked Mr. Sedley’s +gold watch), and there, as he sat down in the lodger’s +vacant arm-chair, the father, the mother, and the +daughter, with a thousand ejaculatory breaks in the +narrative, informed Major Dobbin of what we know already, +but of particulars in Amelia’s history of which +he was not aware--namely of Mrs. Sedley’s death, +of George’s reconcilement with his grandfather +Osborne, of the way in which the widow took on at +leaving him, and of other particulars of her life. +Twice or thrice he was going to ask about the marriage +question, but his heart failed him. He did not care +to lay it bare to these people. Finally, he was informed +that Mrs. O. was gone to walk with her pa in Kensington +Gardens, whither she always went with the old gentleman +(who was very weak and peevish now, and led her a sad +life, though she behaved to him like an angel, to be +sure), of a fine afternoon, after dinner.</p> + +<p>“I’m very much pressed for time,” +the Major said, “and have business to-night +of importance. I should like to see Mrs. Osborne tho’. +Suppose Miss Polly would come with me and show me the +way?”</p> + +<p>Miss Polly was charmed and astonished at this proposal. + She knew the way. She would show Major Dobbin. +She had often been with Mr. Sedley when Mrs. O. was +gone--was gone Russell Square way--and knew the bench +where he liked to sit. She bounced away to her apartment +and appeared presently in her best bonnet and her mamma’s +yellow shawl and large pebble brooch, of which she +assumed the loan in order to make herself a worthy +companion for the Major.</p> + +<p>That officer, then, in his blue frock-coat and buckskin +gloves, gave the young lady his arm, and they walked +away very gaily. He was glad to have a friend at +hand for the scene which he dreaded somehow. He asked +a thousand more questions from his companion about +Amelia: his kind heart grieved to think that she should +have had to part with her son. How did she bear it? +Did she see him often? Was Mr. Sedley pretty comfortable +now in a worldly point of view? Polly answered all +these questions of Major Sugarplums to the very best +of her power.</p> + +<p>And in the midst of their walk an incident occurred +which, though very simple in its nature, was productive +of the greatest delight to Major Dobbin. A pale young +man with feeble whiskers and a stiff white neckcloth +came walking down the lane, en sandwich--having a +lady, that is, on each arm. One was a tall and commanding +middle-aged female, with features and a complexion +similar to those of the clergyman of the Church of +England by whose side she marched, and the other a +stunted little woman with a dark face, ornamented by +a fine new bonnet and white ribbons, and in a smart +pelisse, with a rich gold watch in the midst of her +person. The gentleman, pinioned as he was by these +two ladies, carried further a parasol, shawl, and +basket, so that his arms were entirely engaged, and +of course he was unable to touch his hat in acknowledgement +of the curtsey with which Miss Mary Clapp greeted +him.</p> + +<p>He merely bowed his head in reply to her salutation, +which the two ladies returned with a patronizing air, +and at the same time looking severely at the individual +in the blue coat and bamboo cane who accompanied Miss +Polly.</p> + +<p>“Who’s that?” asked the Major, amused +by the group, and after he had made way for the three +to pass up the lane. Mary looked at him rather roguishly.</p> + +<p>“That is our curate, the Reverend Mr. Binny +(a twitch from Major Dobbin), and his sister Miss +B. Lord bless us, how she did use to worret us at +Sunday-school; and the other lady, the little one with +a cast in her eye and the handsome watch, is Mrs. Binny--Miss +Grits that was; her pa was a grocer, and kept the +Little Original Gold Tea Pot in Kensington Gravel +Pits. They were married last month, and are just +come back from Margate. She’s five thousand +pound to her fortune; but her and Miss B., who made +the match, have quarrelled already.”</p> + +<p>If the Major had twitched before, he started now, +and slapped the bamboo on the ground with an emphasis +which made Miss Clapp cry, “Law,” and +laugh too. He stood for a moment, silent, with open +mouth, looking after the retreating young couple, while +Miss Mary told their history; but he did not hear +beyond the announcement of the reverend gentleman’s +marriage; his head was swimming with felicity. After +this rencontre he began to walk double quick towards +the place of his destination--and yet they were too +soon (for he was in a great tremor at the idea of +a meeting for which he had been longing any time these +ten years)--through the Brompton lanes, and entering +at the little old portal in Kensington Garden wall.</p> + +<p>“There they are,” said Miss Polly, and +she felt him again start back on her arm. She was +a confidante at once of the whole business. She knew +the story as well as if she had read it in one of her +favourite novel-books--Fatherless Fanny, or the Scottish +Chiefs.</p> + +<p>“Suppose you were to run on and tell her,” +the Major said. Polly ran forward, her yellow shawl +streaming in the breeze.</p> + +<p>Old Sedley was seated on a bench, his handkerchief +placed over his knees, prattling away, according to +his wont, with some old story about old times to which +Amelia had listened and awarded a patient smile many +a time before. She could of late think of her own +affairs, and smile or make other marks of recognition +of her father’s stories, scarcely hearing a +word of the old man’s tales. As Mary came bouncing +along, and Amelia caught sight of her, she started +up from her bench. Her first thought was that something +had happened to Georgy, but the sight of the messenger’s +eager and happy face dissipated that fear in the timorous +mother’s bosom.</p> + +<p>“News! News!” cried the emissary of Major +Dobbin. “He’s come! He’s come!”</p> + +<p>“Who is come?” said Emmy, still thinking +of her son.</p> + +<p>“Look there,” answered Miss Clapp, turning +round and pointing; in which direction Amelia looking, +saw Dobbin’s lean figure and long shadow stalking +across the grass. Amelia started in her turn, blushed +up, and, of course, began to cry. At all this simple +little creature’s fetes, the grandes eaux were +accustomed to play. He looked at her--oh, how fondly--as +she came running towards him, her hands before her, +ready to give them to him. She wasn’t changed. +She was a little pale, a little stouter in figure. + Her eyes were the same, the kind trustful eyes. +There were scarce three lines of silver in her soft +brown hair. She gave him both her hands as she looked +up flushing and smiling through her tears into his +honest homely face. He took the two little hands +between his two and held them there. He was speechless +for a moment. Why did he not take her in his arms +and swear that he would never leave her? She must +have yielded: she could not but have obeyed him.</p> + +<p>“I--I’ve another arrival to announce,” +he said after a pause.</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Dobbin?” Amelia said, making a movement +back--why didn’t he speak?</p> + +<p>“No,” he said, letting her hands go: +“Who has told you those lies? I mean, your brother +Jos came in the same ship with me, and is come home +to make you all happy.”</p> + +<p>“Papa, Papa!” Emmy cried out, “here +are news! My brother is in England. He is come to +take care of you. Here is Major Dobbin.”</p> + +<p>Mr. Sedley started up, shaking a great deal and gathering +up his thoughts. Then he stepped forward and made +an old-fashioned bow to the Major, whom he called +Mr. Dobbin, and hoped his worthy father, Sir William, +was quite well. He proposed to call upon Sir William, +who had done him the honour of a visit a short time +ago. Sir William had not called upon the old gentleman +for eight years--it was that visit he was thinking +of returning.</p> + +<p>“He is very much shaken,” Emmy whispered +as Dobbin went up and cordially shook hands with the +old man.</p> + +<p>Although he had such particular business in London +that evening, the Major consented to forego it upon +Mr. Sedley’s invitation to him to come home +and partake of tea. Amelia put her arm under that +of her young friend with the yellow shawl and headed +the party on their return homewards, so that Mr. Sedley +fell to Dobbin’s share. The old man walked very +slowly and told a number of ancient histories about +himself and his poor Bessy, his former prosperity, +and his bankruptcy. His thoughts, as is usual with +failing old men, were quite in former times. The present, +with the exception of the one catastrophe which he +felt, he knew little about. The Major was glad to +let him talk on. His eyes were fixed upon the figure +in front of him--the dear little figure always present +to his imagination and in his prayers, and visiting +his dreams wakeful or slumbering.</p> + +<p>Amelia was very happy, smiling, and active all that +evening, performing her duties as hostess of the little +entertainment with the utmost grace and propriety, +as Dobbin thought. His eyes followed her about as +they sat in the twilight. How many a time had he +longed for that moment and thought of her far away +under hot winds and in weary marches, gentle and happy, +kindly ministering to the wants of old age, and decorating +poverty with sweet submission-- as he saw her now. + I do not say that his taste was the highest, or that +it is the duty of great intellects to be content with +a bread-and-butter paradise, such as sufficed our +simple old friend; but his desires were of this sort, +whether for good or bad, and, with Amelia to help +him, he was as ready to drink as many cups of tea as +Doctor Johnson.</p> + +<p>Amelia seeing this propensity, laughingly encouraged +it and looked exceedingly roguish as she administered +to him cup after cup. It is true she did not know +that the Major had had no dinner and that the cloth +was laid for him at the Slaughters’, and a plate +laid thereon to mark that the table was retained, +in that very box in which the Major and George had +sat many a time carousing, when she was a child just +come home from Miss Pinkerton’s school.</p> + +<p>The first thing Mrs. Osborne showed the Major was +Georgy’s miniature, for which she ran upstairs +on her arrival at home. It was not half handsome +enough of course for the boy, but wasn’t it +noble of him to think of bringing it to his mother? +Whilst her papa was awake she did not talk much about +Georgy. To hear about Mr. Osborne and Russell Square +was not agreeable to the old man, who very likely +was unconscious that he had been living for some months +past mainly on the bounty of his richer rival, and +lost his temper if allusion was made to the other.</p> + +<p>Dobbin told him all, and a little more perhaps than +all, that had happened on board the Ramchunder, and +exaggerated Jos’s benevolent dispositions towards +his father and resolution to make him comfortable +in his old days. The truth is that during the voyage +the Major had impressed this duty most strongly upon +his fellow-passenger and extorted promises from him +that he would take charge of his sister and her child. + He soothed Jos’s irritation with regard to +the bills which the old gentleman had drawn upon him, +gave a laughing account of his own sufferings on the +same score and of the famous consignment of wine with +which the old man had favoured him, and brought Mr. +Jos, who was by no means an ill-natured person when +well-pleased and moderately flattered, to a very good +state of feeling regarding his relatives in Europe.</p> + +<p>And in fine I am ashamed to say that the Major stretched +the truth so far as to tell old Mr. Sedley that it +was mainly a desire to see his parent which brought +Jos once more to Europe.</p> + +<p>At his accustomed hour Mr. Sedley began to doze in +his chair, and then it was Amelia’s opportunity +to commence her conversation, which she did with great +eagerness--it related exclusively to Georgy. She +did not talk at all about her own sufferings at breaking +from him, for indeed, this worthy woman, though she +was half-killed by the separation from the child, +yet thought it was very wicked in her to repine at +losing him; but everything concerning him, his virtues, +talents, and prospects, she poured out. She described +his angelic beauty; narrated a hundred instances of +his generosity and greatness of mind whilst living +with her; how a Royal Duchess had stopped and admired +him in Kensington Gardens; how splendidly he was cared +for now, and how he had a groom and a pony; what quickness +and cleverness he had, and what a prodigiously well-read +and delightful person the Reverend Lawrence Veal was, +George’s master. “He knows <i>everything</i>,” +Amelia said. “He has the most delightful parties. + You who are so learned yourself, and have read so +much, and are so clever and accomplished--don’t +shake your head and say no--<i>he</i> always used to +say you were--you will be charmed with Mr. Veal’s +parties. The last Tuesday in every month. He says +there is no place in the bar or the senate that Georgy +may not aspire to. Look here,” and she went +to the piano-drawer and drew out a theme of Georgy’s +composition. This great effort of genius, which is +still in the possession of George’s mother, +is as follows:</p> + +<p>On Selfishness--Of all the vices which degrade the +human character, Selfishness is the most odious and +contemptible. An undue love of Self leads to the +most monstrous crimes and occasions the greatest misfortunes +both in States and Families. As a selfish man will +impoverish his family and often bring them to ruin, +so a selfish king brings ruin on his people and often +plunges them into war.</p> + +<p>Example: The selfishness of Achilles, as remarked +by the poet Homer, occasioned a thousand woes to the +Greeks--muri Achaiois alge etheke--(Hom. Il. A. 2). +The selfishness of the late Napoleon Bonaparte occasioned +innumerable wars in Europe and caused him to perish, +himself, in a miserable island--that of Saint Helena +in the Atlantic Ocean.</p> + +<p>We see by these examples that we are not to consult +our own interest and ambition, but that we are to +consider the interests of others as well as our own.</p> + +<p>George S. Osborne Athene House, 24 April, 1827</p> + +<p>“Think of him writing such a hand, and quoting +Greek too, at his age,” the delighted mother +said. “Oh, William,” she added, holding +out her hand to the Major, “what a treasure Heaven +has given me in that boy! He is the comfort of my +life--and he is the image of--of him that’s +gone!”</p> + +<p>“Ought I to be angry with her for being faithful +to him?” William thought. “Ought I to +be jealous of my friend in the grave, or hurt that +such a heart as Amelia’s can love only once and +for ever? Oh, George, George, how little you knew +the prize you had, though.” This sentiment +passed rapidly through William’s mind as he was +holding Amelia’s hand, whilst the handkerchief +was veiling her eyes.</p> + +<p>“Dear friend,” she said, pressing the +hand which held hers, “how good, how kind you +always have been to me! See! Papa is stirring. You +will go and see Georgy tomorrow, won’t you?”</p> + +<p>“Not to-morrow,” said poor old Dobbin. + “I have business.” He did not like to +own that he had not as yet been to his parents’ +and his dear sister Anne--a remissness for which I +am sure every well-regulated person will blame the +Major. And presently he took his leave, leaving his +address behind him for Jos, against the latter’s +arrival. And so the first day was over, and he had +seen her.</p> + +<p>When he got back to the Slaughters’, the roast +fowl was of course cold, in which condition he ate +it for supper. And knowing what early hours his family +kept, and that it would be needless to disturb their +slumbers at so late an hour, it is on record, that +Major Dobbin treated himself to half-price at the Haymarket +Theatre that evening, where let us hope he enjoyed +himself.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LIX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">The Old Piano</h4> + +<p>The Major’s visit left old John Sedley in a +great state of agitation and excitement. His daughter +could not induce him to settle down to his customary +occupations or amusements that night. He passed the +evening fumbling amongst his boxes and desks, untying +his papers with trembling hands, and sorting and arranging +them against Jos’s arrival. He had them in +the greatest order--his tapes and his files, his receipts, +and his letters with lawyers and correspondents; the +documents relative to the wine project (which failed +from a most unaccountable accident, after commencing +with the most splendid prospects), the coal project +(which only a want of capital prevented from becoming +the most successful scheme ever put before the public), +the patent saw-mills and sawdust consolidation project, +&c., &c. All night, until a very late hour, he passed +in the preparation of these documents, trembling about +from one room to another, with a quivering candle +and shaky hands. Here’s the wine papers, here’s +the sawdust, here’s the coals; here’s my +letters to Calcutta and Madras, and replies from Major +Dobbin, C.B., and Mr. Joseph Sedley to the same. +“He shall find no irregularity about <i>me</i>, +Emmy,” the old gentleman said.</p> + +<p>Emmy smiled. “I don’t think Jos will +care about seeing those papers, Papa,” she said.</p> + +<p>“You don’t know anything about business, +my dear,” answered the sire, shaking his head +with an important air. And it must be confessed that +on this point Emmy was very ignorant, and that is a +pity some people are so knowing. All these twopenny +documents arranged on a side table, old Sedley covered +them carefully over with a clean bandanna handkerchief +(one out of Major Dobbin’s lot) and enjoined +the maid and landlady of the house, in the most solemn +way, not to disturb those papers, which were arranged +for the arrival of Mr. Joseph Sedley the next morning, +“Mr. Joseph Sedley of the Honourable East India +Company’s Bengal Civil Service.”</p> + +<p>Amelia found him up very early the next morning, more +eager, more hectic, and more shaky than ever. “I +didn’t sleep much, Emmy, my dear,” he +said. “I was thinking of my poor Bessy. I wish +she was alive, to ride in Jos’s carriage once +again. She kept her own and became it very well.” +And his eyes filled with tears, which trickled down +his furrowed old face. Amelia wiped them away, and +smilingly kissed him, and tied the old man’s +neckcloth in a smart bow, and put his brooch into +his best shirt frill, in which, in his Sunday suit +of mourning, he sat from six o’clock in the morning +awaiting the arrival of his son.</p> + +<p>However, when the postman made his appearance, the +little party were put out of suspense by the receipt +of a letter from Jos to his sister, who announced +that he felt a little fatigued after his voyage, and +should not be able to move on that day, but that he +would leave Southampton early the next morning and +be with his father and mother at evening. Amelia, +as she read out the letter to her father, paused over +the latter word; her brother, it was clear, did not +know what had happened in the family. Nor could he, +for the fact is that, though the Major rightly suspected +that his travelling companion never would be got into +motion in so short a space as twenty-four hours, and +would find some excuse for delaying, yet Dobbin had +not written to Jos to inform him of the calamity which +had befallen the Sedley family, being occupied in talking +with Amelia until long after post-hour.</p> + +<p>There are some splendid tailors’ shops in the +High Street of Southampton, in the fine plate-glass +windows of which hang gorgeous waistcoats of all sorts, +of silk and velvet, and gold and crimson, and pictures +of the last new fashions, in which those wonderful +gentlemen with quizzing glasses, and holding on to +little boys with the exceeding large eyes and curly +hair, ogle ladies in riding habits prancing by the +Statue of Achilles at Apsley House. Jos, although +provided with some of the most splendid vests that +Calcutta could furnish, thought he could not go to +town until he was supplied with one or two of these +garments, and selected a crimson satin, embroidered +with gold butterflies, and a black and red velvet tartan +with white stripes and a rolling collar, with which, +and a rich blue satin stock and a gold pin, consisting +of a five-barred gate with a horseman in pink enamel +jumping over it, he thought he might make his entry +into London with some dignity. For Jos’s former +shyness and blundering blushing timidity had given +way to a more candid and courageous self-assertion +of his worth. “I don’t care about owning +it,” Waterloo Sedley would say to his friends, +“I am a dressy man”; and though rather +uneasy if the ladies looked at him at the Government +House balls, and though he blushed and turned away +alarmed under their glances, it was chiefly from a +dread lest they should make love to him that he avoided +them, being averse to marriage altogether. But there +was no such swell in Calcutta as Waterloo Sedley, +I have heard say, and he had the handsomest turn-out, +gave the best bachelor dinners, and had the finest +plate in the whole place.</p> + +<p>To make these waistcoats for a man of his size and +dignity took at least a day, part of which he employed +in hiring a servant to wait upon him and his native +and in instructing the agent who cleared his baggage, +his boxes, his books, which he never read, his chests +of mangoes, chutney, and curry-powders, his shawls +for presents to people whom he didn’t know as +yet, and the rest of his Persicos apparatus.</p> + +<p>At length, he drove leisurely to London on the third +day and in the new waistcoat, the native, with chattering +teeth, shuddering in a shawl on the box by the side +of the new European servant; Jos puffing his pipe +at intervals within and looking so majestic that the +little boys cried Hooray, and many people thought he +must be a Governor-General. <i>He</i>, I promise, did +not decline the obsequious invitation of the landlords +to alight and refresh himself in the neat country +towns. Having partaken of a copious breakfast, with +fish, and rice, and hard eggs, at Southampton, he had +so far rallied at Winchester as to think a glass of +sherry necessary. At Alton he stepped out of the +carriage at his servant’s request and imbibed +some of the ale for which the place is famous. At +Farnham he stopped to view the Bishop’s Castle +and to partake of a light dinner of stewed eels, veal +cutlets, and French beans, with a bottle of claret. + He was cold over Bagshot Heath, where the native chattered +more and more, and Jos Sahib took some brandy-and-water; +in fact, when he drove into town he was as full of +wine, beer, meat, pickles, cherry-brandy, and tobacco +as the steward’s cabin of a steam-packet. It +was evening when his carriage thundered up to the little +door in Brompton, whither the affectionate fellow +drove first, and before hieing to the apartments secured +for him by Mr. Dobbin at the Slaughters’.</p> + +<p>All the faces in the street were in the windows; the +little maidservant flew to the wicket-gate; the Mesdames +Clapp looked out from the casement of the ornamented +kitchen; Emmy, in a great flutter, was in the passage +among the hats and coats; and old Sedley in the parlour +inside, shaking all over. Jos descended from the +post-chaise and down the creaking swaying steps in +awful state, supported by the new valet from Southampton +and the shuddering native, whose brown face was now +livid with cold and of the colour of a turkey’s +gizzard. He created an immense sensation in the passage +presently, where Mrs. and Miss Clapp, coming perhaps +to listen at the parlour door, found Loll Jewab shaking +upon the hall-bench under the coats, moaning in a +strange piteous way, and showing his yellow eyeballs +and white teeth.</p> + +<p>For, you see, we have adroitly shut the door upon +the meeting between Jos and the old father and the +poor little gentle sister inside. The old man was +very much affected; so, of course, was his daughter; +nor was Jos without feeling. In that long absence +of ten years, the most selfish will think about home +and early ties. Distance sanctifies both. Long brooding +over those lost pleasures exaggerates their charm +and sweetness. Jos was unaffectedly glad to see and +shake the hand of his father, between whom and himself +there had been a coolness--glad to see his little +sister, whom he remembered so pretty and smiling, +and pained at the alteration which time, grief, and +misfortune had made in the shattered old man. Emmy +had come out to the door in her black clothes and whispered +to him of her mother’s death, and not to speak +of it to their father. There was no need of this caution, +for the elder Sedley himself began immediately to +speak of the event, and prattled about it, and wept +over it plenteously. It shocked the Indian not a little +and made him think of himself less than the poor fellow +was accustomed to do.</p> + +<p>The result of the interview must have been very satisfactory, +for when Jos had reascended his post-chaise and had +driven away to his hotel, Emmy embraced her father +tenderly, appealing to him with an air of triumph, +and asking the old man whether she did not always +say that her brother had a good heart?</p> + +<p>Indeed, Joseph Sedley, affected by the humble position +in which he found his relations, and in the expansiveness +and overflowing of heart occasioned by the first meeting, +declared that they should never suffer want or discomfort +any more, that he was at home for some time at any +rate, during which his house and everything he had +should be theirs: and that Amelia would look very +pretty at the head of his table--until she would accept +one of her own.</p> + +<p>She shook her head sadly and had, as usual, recourse +to the waterworks. She knew what he meant. She and +her young confidante, Miss Mary, had talked over the +matter most fully, the very night of the Major’s +visit, beyond which time the impetuous Polly could +not refrain from talking of the discovery which she +had made, and describing the start and tremor of joy +by which Major Dobbin betrayed himself when Mr. Binny +passed with his bride and the Major learned that he +had no longer a rival to fear. “Didn’t +you see how he shook all over when you asked if he +was married and he said, ’Who told you those +lies?’ Oh, M’am,” Polly said, “he +never kept his eyes off you, and I’m sure he’s +grown grey athinking of you.”</p> + +<p>But Amelia, looking up at her bed, over which hung +the portraits of her husband and son, told her young +protegee never, never, to speak on that subject again; +that Major Dobbin had been her husband’s dearest +friend and her own and George’s most kind and +affectionate guardian; that she loved him as a brother--but +that a woman who had been married to such an angel +as that, and she pointed to the wall, could never +think of any other union. Poor Polly sighed: she +thought what she should do if young Mr. Tomkins, at +the surgery, who always looked at her so at church, +and who, by those mere aggressive glances had put +her timorous little heart into such a flutter that +she was ready to surrender at once,--what she should +do if he were to die? She knew he was consumptive, +his cheeks were so red and he was so uncommon thin +in the waist.</p> + +<p>Not that Emmy, being made aware of the honest Major’s +passion, rebuffed him in any way, or felt displeased +with him. Such an attachment from so true and loyal +a gentleman could make no woman angry. Desdemona was +not angry with Cassio, though there is very little +doubt she saw the Lieutenant’s partiality for +her (and I for my part believe that many more things +took place in that sad affair than the worthy Moorish +officer ever knew of); why, Miranda was even very +kind to Caliban, and we may be pretty sure for the +same reason. Not that she would encourage him in the +least--the poor uncouth monster--of course not. No +more would Emmy by any means encourage her admirer, +the Major. She would give him that friendly regard, +which so much excellence and fidelity merited; she +would treat him with perfect cordiality and frankness +until he made his proposals, and <i>then</i> it would +be time enough for her to speak and to put an end +to hopes which never could be realized.</p> + +<p>She slept, therefore, very soundly that evening, after +the conversation with Miss Polly, and was more than +ordinarily happy, in spite of Jos’s delaying. + “I am glad he is not going to marry that Miss +O’Dowd,” she thought. “Colonel O’Dowd +never could have a sister fit for such an accomplished +man as Major William.” Who was there amongst +her little circle who would make him a good wife? Not +Miss Binny, she was too old and ill-tempered; Miss +Osborne? too old too. Little Polly was too young. +Mrs. Osborne could not find anybody to suit the Major +before she went to sleep.</p> + +<p>The same morning brought Major Dobbin a letter to +the Slaughters’ Coffee-house from his friend +at Southampton, begging dear Dob to excuse Jos for +being in a rage when awakened the day before (he had +a confounded headache, and was just in his first sleep), +and entreating Dob to engage comfortable rooms at +the Slaughters’ for Mr. Sedley and his servants. + The Major had become necessary to Jos during the +voyage. He was attached to him, and hung upon him. + The other passengers were away to London. Young Ricketts +and little Chaffers went away on the coach that day--Ricketts +on the box, and taking the reins from Botley; the +Doctor was off to his family at Portsea; Bragg gone +to town to his co-partners; and the first mate busy +in the unloading of the Ramchunder. Mr. Joe was very +lonely at Southampton, and got the landlord of the +George to take a glass of wine with him that day, +at the very hour at which Major Dobbin was seated +at the table of his father, Sir William, where his +sister found out (for it was impossible for the Major +to tell fibs) that he had been to see Mrs. George +Osborne.</p> + +<p>Jos was so comfortably situated in St. Martin’s +Lane, he could enjoy his hookah there with such perfect +ease, and could swagger down to the theatres, when +minded, so agreeably, that, perhaps, he would have +remained altogether at the Slaughters’ had not +his friend, the Major, been at his elbow. That gentleman +would not let the Bengalee rest until he had executed +his promise of having a home for Amelia and his father. + Jos was a soft fellow in anybody’s hands, Dobbin +most active in anybody’s concerns but his own; +the civilian was, therefore, an easy victim to the +guileless arts of this good-natured diplomatist and +was ready to do, to purchase, hire, or relinquish +whatever his friend thought fit. Loll Jewab, of whom +the boys about St. Martin’s Lane used to make +cruel fun whenever he showed his dusky countenance +in the street, was sent back to Calcutta in the Lady +Kicklebury East Indiaman, in which Sir William Dobbin +had a share, having previously taught Jos’s European +the art of preparing curries, pilaus, and pipes. It +was a matter of great delight and occupation to Jos +to superintend the building of a smart chariot which +he and the Major ordered in the neighbouring Long +Acre: and a pair of handsome horses were jobbed, with +which Jos drove about in state in the park, or to +call upon his Indian friends. Amelia was not seldom +by his side on these excursions, when also Major Dobbin +would be seen in the back seat of the carriage. At +other times old Sedley and his daughter took advantage +of it, and Miss Clapp, who frequently accompanied her +friend, had great pleasure in being recognized as +she sat in the carriage, dressed in the famous yellow +shawl, by the young gentleman at the surgery, whose +face might commonly be seen over the window-blinds +as she passed.</p> + +<p>Shortly after Jos’s first appearance at Brompton, +a dismal scene, indeed, took place at that humble +cottage at which the Sedleys had passed the last ten +years of their life. Jos’s carriage (the temporary +one, not the chariot under construction) arrived one +day and carried off old Sedley and his daughter--to +return no more. The tears that were shed by the landlady +and the landlady’s daughter at that event were +as genuine tears of sorrow as any that have been outpoured +in the course of this history. In their long acquaintanceship +and intimacy they could not recall a harsh word that +had been uttered by Amelia She had been all sweetness +and kindness, always thankful, always gentle, even +when Mrs. Clapp lost her own temper and pressed for +the rent. When the kind creature was going away for +good and all, the landlady reproached herself bitterly +for ever having used a rough expression to her--how +she wept, as they stuck up with wafers on the window, +a paper notifying that the little rooms so long occupied +were to let! They never would have such lodgers again, +that was quite clear. After-life proved the truth +of this melancholy prophecy, and Mrs. Clapp revenged +herself for the deterioration of mankind by levying +the most savage contributions upon the tea-caddies +and legs of mutton of her locataires. Most of them +scolded and grumbled; some of them did not pay; none +of them stayed. The landlady might well regret those +old, old friends, who had left her.</p> + +<p>As for Miss Mary, her sorrow at Amelia’s departure +was such as I shall not attempt to depict. From childhood +upwards she had been with her daily and had attached +herself so passionately to that dear good lady that +when the grand barouche came to carry her off into +splendour, she fainted in the arms of her friend, who +was indeed scarcely less affected than the good-natured +girl. Amelia loved her like a daughter. During eleven +years the girl had been her constant friend and associate. + The separation was a very painful one indeed to her. + But it was of course arranged that Mary was to come +and stay often at the grand new house whither Mrs. +Osborne was going, and where Mary was sure she would +never be so happy as she had been in their humble +cot, as Miss Clapp called it, in the language of the +novels which she loved.</p> + +<p>Let us hope she was wrong in her judgement. Poor +Emmy’s days of happiness had been very few in +that humble cot. A gloomy Fate had oppressed her +there. She never liked to come back to the house +after she had left it, or to face the landlady who +had tyrannized over her when ill-humoured and unpaid, +or when pleased had treated her with a coarse familiarity +scarcely less odious. Her servility and fulsome compliments +when Emmy was in prosperity were not more to that +lady’s liking. She cast about notes of admiration +all over the new house, extolling every article of +furniture or ornament; she fingered Mrs. Osborne’s +dresses and calculated their price. Nothing could +be too good for that sweet lady, she vowed and protested. + But in the vulgar sycophant who now paid court to +her, Emmy always remembered the coarse tyrant who +had made her miserable many a time, to whom she had +been forced to put up petitions for time, when the +rent was overdue; who cried out at her extravagance +if she bought delicacies for her ailing mother or +father; who had seen her humble and trampled upon +her.</p> + +<p>Nobody ever heard of these griefs, which had been +part of our poor little woman’s lot in life. + She kept them secret from her father, whose improvidence +was the cause of much of her misery. She had to bear +all the blame of his misdoings, and indeed was so utterly +gentle and humble as to be made by nature for a victim.</p> + +<p>I hope she is not to suffer much more of that hard +usage. And, as in all griefs there is said to be +some consolation, I may mention that poor Mary, when +left at her friend’s departure in a hysterical +condition, was placed under the medical treatment of +the young fellow from the surgery, under whose care +she rallied after a short period. Emmy, when she +went away from Brompton, endowed Mary with every article +of furniture that the house contained, only taking +away her pictures (the two pictures over the bed) and +her piano-- that little old piano which had now passed +into a plaintive jingling old age, but which she loved +for reasons of her own. She was a child when first +she played on it, and her parents gave it her. It +had been given to her again since, as the reader may +remember, when her father’s house was gone to +ruin and the instrument was recovered out of the wreck.</p> + +<p>Major Dobbin was exceedingly pleased when, as he was +superintending the arrangements of Jos’s new +house--which the Major insisted should be very handsome +and comfortable--the cart arrived from Brompton, bringing +the trunks and bandboxes of the emigrants from that +village, and with them the old piano. Amelia would +have it up in her sitting-room, a neat little apartment +on the second floor, adjoining her father’s +chamber, and where the old gentleman sat commonly +of evenings.</p> + +<p>When the men appeared then bearing this old music-box, +and Amelia gave orders that it should be placed in +the chamber aforesaid, Dobbin was quite elated. “I’m +glad you’ve kept it,” he said in a very +sentimental manner. “I was afraid you didn’t +care about it.”</p> + +<p>“I value it more than anything I have in the +world,” said Amelia.</p> + +<p>“Do you, Amelia?” cried the Major. The +fact was, as he had bought it himself, though he never +said anything about it, it never entered into his +head to suppose that Emmy should think anybody else +was the purchaser, and as a matter of course he fancied +that she knew the gift came from him. “Do you, +Amelia?” he said; and the question, the great +question of all, was trembling on his lips, when Emmy +replied--</p> + +<p>“Can I do otherwise?--did not he give it me?”</p> + +<p>“I did not know,” said poor old Dob, and +his countenance fell.</p> + +<p>Emmy did not note the circumstance at the time, nor +take immediate heed of the very dismal expression +which honest Dobbin’s countenance assumed, but +she thought of it afterwards. And then it struck her, +with inexpressible pain and mortification too, that +it was William who was the giver of the piano, and +not George, as she had fancied. It was not George’s +gift; the only one which she had received from her +lover, as she thought--the thing she had cherished +beyond all others--her dearest relic and prize. She +had spoken to it about George; played his favourite +airs upon it; sat for long evening hours, touching, +to the best of her simple art, melancholy harmonies +on the keys, and weeping over them in silence. It was +not George’s relic. It was valueless now. +The next time that old Sedley asked her to play, she +said it was shockingly out of tune, that she had a +headache, that she couldn’t play.</p> + +<p>Then, according to her custom, she rebuked herself +for her pettishness and ingratitude and determined +to make a reparation to honest William for the slight +she had not expressed to him, but had felt for his +piano. A few days afterwards, as they were seated in +the drawing-room, where Jos had fallen asleep with +great comfort after dinner, Amelia said with rather +a faltering voice to Major Dobbin--</p> + +<p>“I have to beg your pardon for something.”</p> + +<p>“About what?” said he.</p> + +<p>“About--about that little square piano. I never +thanked you for it when you gave it me, many, many +years ago, before I was married. I thought somebody +else had given it. Thank you, William.” She +held out her hand, but the poor little woman’s +heart was bleeding; and as for her eyes, of course +they were at their work.</p> + +<p>But William could hold no more. “Amelia, Amelia,” +he said, “I did buy it for you. I loved you +then as I do now. I must tell you. I think I loved +you from the first minute that I saw you, when George +brought me to your house, to show me the Amelia whom +he was engaged to. You were but a girl, in white, +with large ringlets; you came down singing--do you +remember?--and we went to Vauxhall. Since then I +have thought of but one woman in the world, and that +was you. I think there is no hour in the day has +passed for twelve years that I haven’t thought +of you. I came to tell you this before I went to +India, but you did not care, and I hadn’t the +heart to speak. You did not care whether I stayed +or went.”</p> + +<p>“I was very ungrateful,” Amelia said.</p> + +<p>“No, only indifferent,” Dobbin continued +desperately. “I have nothing to make a woman +to be otherwise. I know what you are feeling now. + You are hurt in your heart at the discovery about +the piano, and that it came from me and not from George. + I forgot, or I should never have spoken of it so. + It is for me to ask your pardon for being a fool +for a moment, and thinking that years of constancy +and devotion might have pleaded with you.”</p> + +<p>“It is you who are cruel now,” Amelia +said with some spirit. “George is my husband, +here and in heaven. How could I love any other but +him? I am his now as when you first saw me, dear William. +It was he who told me how good and generous you were, +and who taught me to love you as a brother. Have +you not been everything to me and my boy? Our dearest, +truest, kindest friend and protector? Had you come +a few months sooner perhaps you might have spared me +that--that dreadful parting. Oh, it nearly killed +me, William--but you didn’t come, though I wished +and prayed for you to come, and they took him too +away from me. Isn’t he a noble boy, William? +Be his friend still and mine"--and here her voice +broke, and she hid her face on his shoulder.</p> + +<p>The Major folded his arms round her, holding her to +him as if she was a child, and kissed her head. “I +will not change, dear Amelia,” he said. “I +ask for no more than your love. I think I would not +have it otherwise. Only let me stay near you and see +you often.”</p> + +<p>“Yes, often,” Amelia said. And so William +was at liberty to look and long--as the poor boy at +school who has no money may sigh after the contents +of the tart-woman’s tray.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LX</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Returns to the Genteel World</h4> + +<p>Good fortune now begins to smile upon Amelia. We +are glad to get her out of that low sphere in which +she has been creeping hitherto and introduce her into +a polite circle--not so grand and refined as that +in which our other female friend, Mrs. Becky, has appeared, +but still having no small pretensions to gentility +and fashion. Jos’s friends were all from the +three presidencies, and his new house was in the comfortable +Anglo-Indian district of which Moira Place is the +centre. Minto Square, Great Clive Street, Warren Street, +Hastings Street, Ochterlony Place, Plassy Square, +Assaye Terrace ("gardens” was a felicitous word +not applied to stucco houses with asphalt terraces +in front, so early as 1827)--who does not know these +respectable abodes of the retired Indian aristocracy, +and the quarter which Mr. Wenham calls the Black Hole, +in a word? Jos’s position in life was not grand +enough to entitle him to a house in Moira Place, where +none can live but retired Members of Council, and +partners of Indian firms (who break, after having settled +a hundred thousand pounds on their wives, and retire +into comparative penury to a country place and four +thousand a year); he engaged a comfortable house of +a second- or third-rate order in Gillespie Street, +purchasing the carpets, costly mirrors, and handsome +and appropriate planned furniture by Seddons from +the assignees of Mr. Scape, lately admitted partner +into the great Calcutta House of Fogle, Fake, and +Cracksman, in which poor Scape had embarked seventy +thousand pounds, the earnings of a long and honourable +life, taking Fake’s place, who retired to a +princely park in Sussex (the Fogles have been long +out of the firm, and Sir Horace Fogle is about to be +raised to the peerage as Baron Bandanna)--admitted, +I say, partner into the great agency house of Fogle +and Fake two years before it failed for a million +and plunged half the Indian public into misery and +ruin.</p> + +<p>Scape, ruined, honest, and broken-hearted at sixty-five +years of age, went out to Calcutta to wind up the +affairs of the house. Walter Scape was withdrawn from +Eton and put into a merchant’s house. Florence +Scape, Fanny Scape, and their mother faded away to +Boulogne, and will be heard of no more. To be brief, +Jos stepped in and bought their carpets and sideboards +and admired himself in the mirrors which had reflected +their kind handsome faces. The Scape tradesmen, all +honourably paid, left their cards, and were eager to +supply the new household. The large men in white waistcoats +who waited at Scape’s dinners, greengrocers, +bank-porters, and milkmen in their private capacity, +left their addresses and ingratiated themselves with +the butler. Mr. Chummy, the chimney-purifier, who +had swept the last three families, tried to coax the +butler and the boy under him, whose duty it was to +go out covered with buttons and with stripes down +his trousers, for the protection of Mrs. Amelia whenever +she chose to walk abroad.</p> + +<p>It was a modest establishment. The butler was Jos’s +valet also, and never was more drunk than a butler +in a small family should be who has a proper regard +for his master’s wine. Emmy was supplied with +a maid, grown on Sir William Dobbin’s suburban +estate; a good girl, whose kindness and humility disarmed +Mrs. Osborne, who was at first terrified at the idea +of having a servant to wait upon herself, who did +not in the least know how to use one, and who always +spoke to domestics with the most reverential politeness. + But this maid was very useful in the family, in dexterously +tending old Mr. Sedley, who kept almost entirely to +his own quarter of the house and never mixed in any +of the gay doings which took place there.</p> + +<p>Numbers of people came to see Mrs. Osborne. Lady +Dobbin and daughters were delighted at her change +of fortune, and waited upon her. Miss Osborne from +Russell Square came in her grand chariot with the +flaming hammer-cloth emblazoned with the Leeds arms. + Jos was reported to be immensely rich. Old Osborne +had no objection that Georgy should inherit his uncle’s +property as well as his own. “Damn it, we will +make a man of the feller,” he said; “and +I’ll see him in Parliament before I die. You +may go and see his mother, Miss O., though I’ll +never set eyes on her”: and Miss Osborne came. +Emmy, you may be sure, was very glad to see her, and +so be brought nearer to George. That young fellow +was allowed to come much more frequently than before +to visit his mother. He dined once or twice a week +in Gillespie Street and bullied the servants and his +relations there, just as he did in Russell Square.</p> + +<p>He was always respectful to Major Dobbin, however, +and more modest in his demeanour when that gentleman +was present. He was a clever lad and afraid of the +Major. George could not help admiring his friend’s +simplicity, his good humour, his various learning quietly +imparted, his general love of truth and justice. He +had met no such man as yet in the course of his experience, +and he had an instinctive liking for a gentleman. + He hung fondly by his godfather’s side, and +it was his delight to walk in the parks and hear Dobbin +talk. William told George about his father, about +India and Waterloo, about everything but himself. + When George was more than usually pert and conceited, +the Major made jokes at him, which Mrs. Osborne thought +very cruel. One day, taking him to the play, and +the boy declining to go into the pit because it was +vulgar, the Major took him to the boxes, left him +there, and went down himself to the pit. He had not +been seated there very long before he felt an arm +thrust under his and a dandy little hand in a kid glove +squeezing his arm. George had seen the absurdity of +his ways and come down from the upper region. A tender +laugh of benevolence lighted up old Dobbin’s +face and eyes as he looked at the repentant little +prodigal. He loved the boy, as he did everything that +belonged to Amelia. How charmed she was when she heard +of this instance of George’s goodness! Her +eyes looked more kindly on Dobbin than they ever had +done. She blushed, he thought, after looking at him +so.</p> + +<p>Georgy never tired of his praises of the Major to +his mother. “I like him, Mamma, because he +knows such lots of things; and he ain’t like +old Veal, who is always bragging and using such long +words, don’t you know? The chaps call him ‘Longtail’ +at school. I gave him the name; ain’t it capital? +But Dob reads Latin like English, and French and that; +and when we go out together he tells me stories about +my Papa, and never about himself; though I heard Colonel +Buckler, at Grandpapa’s, say that he was one +of the bravest officers in the army, and had distinguished +himself ever so much. Grandpapa was quite surprised, +and said, ’<i>that</i> feller! Why, I didn’t +think he could say Bo to a goose’--but I know +he could, couldn’t he, Mamma?”</p> + +<p>Emmy laughed: she thought it was very likely the +Major could do thus much.</p> + +<p>If there was a sincere liking between George and the +Major, it must be confessed that between the boy and +his uncle no great love existed. George had got a +way of blowing out his cheeks, and putting his hands +in his waistcoat pockets, and saying, “God bless +my soul, you don’t say so,” so exactly +after the fashion of old Jos that it was impossible +to refrain from laughter. The servants would explode +at dinner if the lad, asking for something which wasn’t +at table, put on that countenance and used that favourite +phrase. Even Dobbin would shoot out a sudden peal +at the boy’s mimicry. If George did not mimic +his uncle to his face, it was only by Dobbin’s +rebukes and Amelia’s terrified entreaties that +the little scapegrace was induced to desist. And +the worthy civilian being haunted by a dim consciousness +that the lad thought him an ass, and was inclined +to turn him into ridicule, used to be extremely timorous +and, of course, doubly pompous and dignified in the +presence of Master Georgy. When it was announced +that the young gentleman was expected in Gillespie +Street to dine with his mother, Mr. Jos commonly found +that he had an engagement at the Club. Perhaps nobody +was much grieved at his absence. On those days Mr. +Sedley would commonly be induced to come out from +his place of refuge in the upper stories, and there +would be a small family party, whereof Major Dobbin +pretty generally formed one. He was the ami de la +maison--old Sedley’s friend, Emmy’s friend, +Georgy’s friend, Jos’s counsel and adviser. +“He might almost as well be at Madras for anything +<i>we</i> see of him,” Miss Ann Dobbin remarked +at Camberwell. Ah! Miss Ann, did it not strike you +that it was not <i>you</i> whom the Major wanted to marry?</p> + +<p>Joseph Sedley then led a life of dignified otiosity +such as became a person of his eminence. His very +first point, of course, was to become a member of +the Oriental Club, where he spent his mornings in +the company of his brother Indians, where he dined, +or whence he brought home men to dine.</p> + +<p>Amelia had to receive and entertain these gentlemen +and their ladies. From these she heard how soon Smith +would be in Council; how many lacs Jones had brought +home with him, how Thomson’s House in London +had refused the bills drawn by Thomson, Kibobjee, and +Co., the Bombay House, and how it was thought the +Calcutta House must go too; how very imprudent, to +say the least of it, Mrs. Brown’s conduct (wife +of Brown of the Ahmednuggur Irregulars) had been with +young Swankey of the Body Guard, sitting up with him +on deck until all hours, and losing themselves as +they were riding out at the Cape; how Mrs. Hardyman +had had out her thirteen sisters, daughters of a country +curate, the Rev: Felix Rabbits, and married eleven +of them, seven high up in the service; how Hornby +was wild because his wife would stay in Europe, and +Trotter was appointed Collector at Ummerapoora. This +and similar talk took place at the grand dinners all +round. They had the same conversation; the same silver +dishes; the same saddles of mutton, boiled turkeys, +and entrees. Politics set in a short time after dessert, +when the ladies retired upstairs and talked about +their complaints and their children.</p> + +<p>Mutato nomine, it is all the same. Don’t the +barristers’ wives talk about Circuit? Don’t +the soldiers’ ladies gossip about the Regiment? +Don’t the clergymen’s ladies discourse +about Sunday-schools and who takes whose duty? Don’t +the very greatest ladies of all talk about that small +clique of persons to whom they belong? And why should +our Indian friends not have their own conversation?--only +I admit it is slow for the laymen whose fate it sometimes +is to sit by and listen.</p> + +<p>Before long Emmy had a visiting-book, and was driving +about regularly in a carriage, calling upon Lady Bludyer +(wife of Major-General Sir Roger Bludyer, K.C.B., +Bengal Army); Lady Huff, wife of Sir G. Huff, Bombay +ditto; Mrs. Pice, the Lady of Pice the Director, &c. + We are not long in using ourselves to changes in +life. That carriage came round to Gillespie Street +every day; that buttony boy sprang up and down from +the box with Emmy’s and Jos’s visiting-cards; +at stated hours Emmy and the carriage went for Jos +to the Club and took him an airing; or, putting old +Sedley into the vehicle, she drove the old man round +the Regent’s Park. The lady’s maid and +the chariot, the visiting-book and the buttony page, +became soon as familiar to Amelia as the humble routine +of Brompton. She accommodated herself to one as to +the other. If Fate had ordained that she should be +a Duchess, she would even have done that duty too. + She was voted, in Jos’s female society, rather +a pleasing young person--not much in her, but pleasing, +and that sort of thing.</p> + +<p>The men, as usual, liked her artless kindness and +simple refined demeanour. The gallant young Indian +dandies at home on furlough-- immense dandies these--chained +and moustached--driving in tearing cabs, the pillars +of the theatres, living at West End hotels-- nevertheless +admired Mrs. Osborne, liked to bow to her carriage +in the park, and to be admitted to have the honour +of paying her a morning visit. Swankey of the Body +Guard himself, that dangerous youth, and the greatest +buck of all the Indian army now on leave, was one +day discovered by Major Dobbin tete-a-tete with Amelia, +and describing the sport of pig-sticking to her with +great humour and eloquence; and he spoke afterwards +of a d--d king’s officer that’s always +hanging about the house--a long, thin, queer-looking, +oldish fellow--a dry fellow though, that took the +shine out of a man in the talking line.</p> + +<p>Had the Major possessed a little more personal vanity +he would have been jealous of so dangerous a young +buck as that fascinating Bengal Captain. But Dobbin +was of too simple and generous a nature to have any +doubts about Amelia. He was glad that the young men +should pay her respect, and that others should admire +her. Ever since her womanhood almost, had she not +been persecuted and undervalued? It pleased him to +see how kindness bought out her good qualities and +how her spirits gently rose with her prosperity. Any +person who appreciated her paid a compliment to the +Major’s good judgement-- that is, if a man may +be said to have good judgement who is under the influence +of Love’s delusion.</p> + +<p>After Jos went to Court, which we may be sure he did +as a loyal subject of his Sovereign (showing himself +in his full court suit at the Club, whither Dobbin +came to fetch him in a very shabby old uniform) he +who had always been a staunch Loyalist and admirer +of George IV, became such a tremendous Tory and pillar +of the State that he was for having Amelia to go to +a Drawing-room, too. He somehow had worked himself +up to believe that he was implicated in the maintenance +of the public welfare and that the Sovereign would +not be happy unless Jos Sedley and his family appeared +to rally round him at St. James’s.</p> + +<p>Emmy laughed. “Shall I wear the family diamonds, +Jos?” she said.</p> + +<p>“I wish you would let me buy you some,” +thought the Major. “I should like to see any +that were too good for you.”</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which Two Lights are Put Out</h4> + +<p>There came a day when the round of decorous pleasures +and solemn gaieties in which Mr. Jos Sedley’s +family indulged was interrupted by an event which +happens in most houses. As you ascend the staircase +of your house from the drawing towards the bedroom +floors, you may have remarked a little arch in the +wall right before you, which at once gives light to +the stair which leads from the second story to the +third (where the nursery and servants’ chambers +commonly are) and serves for another purpose of utility, +of which the undertaker’s men can give you a +notion. They rest the coffins upon that arch, or +pass them through it so as not to disturb in any unseemly +manner the cold tenant slumbering within the black +ark.</p> + +<p>That second-floor arch in a London house, looking +up and down the well of the staircase and commanding +the main thoroughfare by which the inhabitants are +passing; by which cook lurks down before daylight +to scour her pots and pans in the kitchen; by which +young master stealthily ascends, having left his boots +in the hall, and let himself in after dawn from a +jolly night at the Club; down which miss comes rustling +in fresh ribbons and spreading muslins, brilliant +and beautiful, and prepared for conquest and the ball; +or Master Tommy slides, preferring the banisters for +a mode of conveyance, and disdaining danger and the +stair; down which the mother is fondly carried smiling +in her strong husband’s arms, as he steps steadily +step by step, and followed by the monthly nurse, on +the day when the medical man has pronounced that the +charming patient may go downstairs; up which John +lurks to bed, yawning, with a sputtering tallow candle, +and to gather up before sunrise the boots which are +awaiting him in the passages--that stair, up or down +which babies are carried, old people are helped, guests +are marshalled to the ball, the parson walks to the +christening, the doctor to the sick-room, and the +undertaker’s men to the upper floor--what a +memento of Life, Death, and Vanity it is--that arch +and stair--if you choose to consider it, and sit on +the landing, looking up and down the well! The doctor +will come up to us too for the last time there, my +friend in motley. The nurse will look in at the curtains, +and you take no notice--and then she will fling open +the windows for a little and let in the air. Then +they will pull down all the front blinds of the house +and live in the back rooms-- then they will send for +the lawyer and other men in black, &c. Your comedy +and mine will have been played then, and we shall be +removed, oh, how far, from the trumpets, and the shouting, +and the posture-making. If we are gentlefolks they +will put hatchments over our late domicile, with gilt +cherubim, and mottoes stating that there is “Quiet +in Heaven.” Your son will new furnish the house, +or perhaps let it, and go into a more modern quarter; +your name will be among the “Members Deceased” +in the lists of your clubs next year. However much +you may be mourned, your widow will like to have her +weeds neatly made--the cook will send or come up to +ask about dinner--the survivor will soon bear to look +at your picture over the mantelpiece, which will presently +be deposed from the place of honour, to make way for +the portrait of the son who reigns.</p> + +<p>Which of the dead are most tenderly and passionately +deplored? Those who love the survivors the least, +I believe. The death of a child occasions a passion +of grief and frantic tears, such as your end, brother +reader, will never inspire. The death of an infant +which scarce knew you, which a week’s absence +from you would have caused to forget you, will strike +you down more than the loss of your closest friend, +or your first-born son--a man grown like yourself, +with children of his own. We may be harsh and stern +with Judah and Simeon--our love and pity gush out +for Benjamin, the little one. And if you are old, +as some reader of this may be or shall be old and +rich, or old and poor--you may one day be thinking +for yourself--"These people are very good round about +me, but they won’t grieve too much when I am +gone. I am very rich, and they want my inheritance--or +very poor, and they are tired of supporting me.”</p> + +<p>The period of mourning for Mrs. Sedley’s death +was only just concluded, and Jos scarcely had had +time to cast off his black and appear in the splendid +waistcoats which he loved, when it became evident +to those about Mr. Sedley that another event was at +hand, and that the old man was about to go seek for +his wife in the dark land whither she had preceded +him. “The state of my father’s health,” +Jos Sedley solemnly remarked at the Club, “prevents +me from giving any <i>large</i> parties this season: + but if you will come in quietly at half-past six, +Chutney, my boy, and fake a homely dinner with one +or two of the old set--I shall be always glad to see +you.” So Jos and his acquaintances dined and +drank their claret among themselves in silence, whilst +the sands of life were running out in the old man’s +glass upstairs. The velvet-footed butler brought them +their wine, and they composed themselves to a rubber +after dinner, at which Major Dobbin would sometimes +come and take a hand; and Mrs. Osborne would occasionally +descend, when her patient above was settled for the +night, and had commenced one of those lightly troubled +slumbers which visit the pillow of old age.</p> + +<p>The old man clung to his daughter during this sickness. + He would take his broths and medicines from scarcely +any other hand. To tend him became almost the sole +business of her life. Her bed was placed close by +the door which opened into his chamber, and she was +alive at the slightest noise or disturbance from the +couch of the querulous invalid. Though, to do him +justice, he lay awake many an hour, silent and without +stirring, unwilling to awaken his kind and vigilant +nurse.</p> + +<p>He loved his daughter with more fondness now, perhaps, +than ever he had done since the days of her childhood. + In the discharge of gentle offices and kind filial +duties, this simple creature shone most especially. + “She walks into the room as silently as a sunbeam,” +Mr. Dobbin thought as he saw her passing in and out +from her father’s room, a cheerful sweetness +lighting up her face as she moved to and fro, graceful +and noiseless. When women are brooding over their +children, or busied in a sick-room, who has not seen +in their faces those sweet angelic beams of love and +pity?</p> + +<p>A secret feud of some years’ standing was thus +healed, and with a tacit reconciliation. In these +last hours, and touched by her love and goodness, +the old man forgot all his grief against her, and +wrongs which he and his wife had many a long night +debated: how she had given up everything for her +boy; how she was careless of her parents in their +old age and misfortune, and only thought of the child; +how absurdly and foolishly, impiously indeed, she took +on when George was removed from her. Old Sedley forgot +these charges as he was making up his last account, +and did justice to the gentle and uncomplaining little +martyr. One night when she stole into his room, she +found him awake, when the broken old man made his +confession. “Oh, Emmy, I’ve been thinking +we were very unkind and unjust to you,” he said +and put out his cold and feeble hand to her. She knelt +down and prayed by his bedside, as he did too, having +still hold of her hand. When our turn comes, friend, +may we have such company in our prayers!</p> + +<p>Perhaps as he was lying awake then, his life may have +passed before him--his early hopeful struggles, his +manly successes and prosperity, his downfall in his +declining years, and his present helpless condition--no +chance of revenge against Fortune, which had had the +better of him--neither name nor money to bequeath--a +spent-out, bootless life of defeat and disappointment, +and the end here! Which, I wonder, brother reader, +is the better lot, to die prosperous and famous, or +poor and disappointed? To have, and to be forced to +yield; or to sink out of life, having played and lost +the game? That must be a strange feeling, when a day +of our life comes and we say, “To-morrow, success +or failure won’t matter much, and the sun will +rise, and all the myriads of mankind go to their work +or their pleasure as usual, but I shall be out of the +turmoil.”</p> + +<p>So there came one morning and sunrise when all the +world got up and set about its various works and pleasures, +with the exception of old John Sedley, who was not +to fight with fortune, or to hope or scheme any more, +but to go and take up a quiet and utterly unknown +residence in a churchyard at Brompton by the side of +his old wife.</p> + +<p>Major Dobbin, Jos, and Georgy followed his remains +to the grave, in a black cloth coach. Jos came on +purpose from the Star and Garter at Richmond, whither +he retreated after the deplorable event. He did not +care to remain in the house, with the--under the circumstances, +you understand. But Emmy stayed and did her duty as +usual. She was bowed down by no especial grief, and +rather solemn than sorrowful. She prayed that her +own end might be as calm and painless, and thought +with trust and reverence of the words which she had +heard from her father during his illness, indicative +of his faith, his resignation, and his future hope.</p> + +<p>Yes, I think that will be the better ending of the +two, after all. Suppose you are particularly rich +and well-to-do and say on that last day, “I +am very rich; I am tolerably well known; I have lived +all my life in the best society, and thank Heaven, +come of a most respectable family. I have served +my King and country with honour. I was in Parliament +for several years, where, I may say, my speeches were +listened to and pretty well received. I don’t +owe any man a shilling: on the contrary, I lent my +old college friend, Jack Lazarus, fifty pounds, for +which my executors will not press him. I leave my +daughters with ten thousand pounds apiece--very good +portions for girls; I bequeath my plate and furniture, +my house in Baker Street, with a handsome jointure, +to my widow for her life; and my landed property, +besides money in the funds, and my cellar of well-selected +wine in Baker Street, to my son. I leave twenty pound +a year to my valet; and I defy any man after I have +gone to find anything against my character.” +Or suppose, on the other hand, your swan sings quite +a different sort of dirge and you say, “I am +a poor blighted, disappointed old fellow, and have +made an utter failure through life. I was not endowed +either with brains or with good fortune, and confess +that I have committed a hundred mistakes and blunders. +I own to having forgotten my duty many a time. I can’t +pay what I owe. On my last bed I lie utterly helpless +and humble, and I pray forgiveness for my weakness +and throw myself, with a contrite heart, at the feet +of the Divine Mercy.” Which of these two speeches, +think you, would be the best oration for your own funeral? +Old Sedley made the last; and in that humble frame +of mind, and holding by the hand of his daughter, +life and disappointment and vanity sank away from +under him.</p> + +<p>“You see,” said old Osborne to George, +“what comes of merit, and industry, and judicious +speculations, and that. Look at me and my banker’s +account. Look at your poor Grandfather Sedley and +his failure. And yet he was a better man than I was, +this day twenty years--a better man, I should say, +by ten thousand pound.”</p> + +<p>Beyond these people and Mr. Clapp’s family, +who came over from Brompton to pay a visit of condolence, +not a single soul alive ever cared a penny piece about +old John Sedley, or remembered the existence of such +a person.</p> + +<p>When old Osborne first heard from his friend Colonel +Buckler (as little Georgy had already informed us) +how distinguished an officer Major Dobbin was, he +exhibited a great deal of scornful incredulity and +expressed his surprise how ever such a feller as that +should possess either brains or reputation. But he +heard of the Major’s fame from various members +of his society. Sir William Dobbin had a great opinion +of his son and narrated many stories illustrative of +the Major’s learning, valour, and estimation +in the world’s opinion. Finally, his name appeared +in the lists of one or two great parties of the nobility, +and this circumstance had a prodigious effect upon +the old aristocrat of Russell Square.</p> + +<p>The Major’s position, as guardian to Georgy, +whose possession had been ceded to his grandfather, +rendered some meetings between the two gentlemen inevitable; +and it was in one of these that old Osborne, a keen +man of business, looking into the Major’s accounts +with his ward and the boy’s mother, got a hint, +which staggered him very much, and at once pained +and pleased him, that it was out of William Dobbin’s +own pocket that a part of the fund had been supplied +upon which the poor widow and the child had subsisted.</p> + +<p>When pressed upon the point, Dobbin, who could not +tell lies, blushed and stammered a good deal and finally +confessed. “The marriage,” he said (at +which his interlocutor’s face grew dark) “was +very much my doing. I thought my poor friend had gone +so far that retreat from his engagement would have +been dishonour to him and death to Mrs. Osborne, and +I could do no less, when she was left without resources, +than give what money I could spare to maintain her.”</p> + +<p>“Major D.,” Mr. Osborne said, looking +hard at him and turning very red too--"you did me +a great injury; but give me leave to tell you, sir, +you are an honest feller. There’s my hand, sir, +though I little thought that my flesh and blood was +living on you--” and the pair shook hands, with +great confusion on Major Dobbin’s part, thus +found out in his act of charitable hypocrisy.</p> + +<p>He strove to soften the old man and reconcile him +towards his son’s memory. “He was such +a noble fellow,” he said, “that all of +us loved him, and would have done anything for him. + I, as a young man in those days, was flattered beyond +measure by his preference for me, and was more pleased +to be seen in his company than in that of the Commander-in-Chief. + I never saw his equal for pluck and daring and all +the qualities of a soldier”; and Dobbin told +the old father as many stories as he could remember +regarding the gallantry and achievements of his son. + “And Georgy is so like him,” the Major +added.</p> + +<p>“He’s so like him that he makes me tremble +sometimes,” the grandfather said.</p> + +<p>On one or two evenings the Major came to dine with +Mr. Osborne (it was during the time of the sickness +of Mr. Sedley), and as the two sat together in the +evening after dinner, all their talk was about the +departed hero. The father boasted about him according +to his wont, glorifying himself in recounting his +son’s feats and gallantry, but his mood was +at any rate better and more charitable than that in +which he had been disposed until now to regard the +poor fellow; and the Christian heart of the kind Major +was pleased at these symptoms of returning peace and +good-will. On the second evening old Osborne called +Dobbin William, just as he used to do at the time +when Dobbin and George were boys together, and the +honest gentleman was pleased by that mark of reconciliation.</p> + +<p>On the next day at breakfast, when Miss Osborne, with +the asperity of her age and character, ventured to +make some remark reflecting slightingly upon the Major’s +appearance or behaviour--the master of the house interrupted +her. “You’d have been glad enough to git +him for yourself, Miss O. But them grapes are sour. + Ha! ha! Major William is a fine feller.”</p> + +<p>“That he is, Grandpapa,” said Georgy approvingly; +and going up close to the old gentleman, he took a +hold of his large grey whiskers, and laughed in his +face good-humouredly, and kissed him. And he told +the story at night to his mother, who fully agreed +with the boy. “Indeed he is,” she said. + “Your dear father always said so. He is one +of the best and most upright of men.” Dobbin +happened to drop in very soon after this conversation, +which made Amelia blush perhaps, and the young scapegrace +increased the confusion by telling Dobbin the other +part of the story. “I say, Dob,” he said, +“there’s such an uncommon nice girl wants +to marry you. She’s plenty of tin; she wears +a front; and she scolds the servants from morning till +night.” “Who is it?” asked Dobbin. + “It’s Aunt O.,” the boy answered. +“Grandpapa said so. And I say, Dob, how prime +it would be to have you for my uncle.” Old Sedley’s +quavering voice from the next room at this moment +weakly called for Amelia, and the laughing ended.</p> + +<p>That old Osborne’s mind was changing was pretty +clear. He asked George about his uncle sometimes, +and laughed at the boy’s imitation of the way +in which Jos said “God-bless-my-soul” and +gobbled his soup. Then he said, “It’s +not respectful, sir, of you younkers to be imitating +of your relations. Miss O., when you go out adriving +to-day, leave my card upon Mr. Sedley, do you hear? +There’s no quarrel betwigst me and him anyhow.”</p> + +<p>The card was returned, and Jos and the Major were +asked to dinner-- to a dinner the most splendid and +stupid that perhaps ever Mr. Osborne gave; every inch +of the family plate was exhibited, and the best company +was asked. Mr. Sedley took down Miss O. to dinner, +and she was very gracious to him; whereas she hardly +spoke to the Major, who sat apart from her, and by +the side of Mr. Osborne, very timid. Jos said, with +great solemnity, it was the best turtle soup he had +ever tasted in his life, and asked Mr. Osborne where +he got his Madeira.</p> + +<p>“It is some of Sedley’s wine,” whispered +the butler to his master. “I’ve had it +a long time, and paid a good figure for it, too,” +Mr. Osborne said aloud to his guest, and then whispered +to his right-hand neighbour how he had got it “at +the old chap’s sale.”</p> + +<p>More than once he asked the Major about--about Mrs. +George Osborne-- a theme on which the Major could +be very eloquent when he chose. He told Mr. Osborne +of her sufferings--of her passionate attachment to +her husband, whose memory she worshipped still--of +the tender and dutiful manner in which she had supported +her parents, and given up her boy, when it seemed +to her her duty to do so. “You don’t know +what she endured, sir,” said honest Dobbin with +a tremor in his voice, “and I hope and trust +you will be reconciled to her. If she took your son +away from you, she gave hers to you; and however much +you loved your George, depend on it, she loved hers +ten times more.”</p> + +<p>“By God, you are a good feller, sir,” +was all Mr. Osborne said. It had never struck him +that the widow would feel any pain at parting from +the boy, or that his having a fine fortune could grieve +her. A reconciliation was announced as speedy and +inevitable, and Amelia’s heart already began +to beat at the notion of the awful meeting with George’s +father.</p> + +<p>It was never, however, destined to take place. Old +Sedley’s lingering illness and death supervened, +after which a meeting was for some time impossible. + That catastrophe and other events may have worked +upon Mr. Osborne. He was much shaken of late, and +aged, and his mind was working inwardly. He had sent +for his lawyers, and probably changed something in +his will. The medical man who looked in pronounced +him shaky, agitated, and talked of a little blood and +the seaside; but he took neither of these remedies.</p> + +<p>One day when he should have come down to breakfast, +his servant missing him, went into his dressing-room +and found him lying at the foot of the dressing-table +in a fit. Miss Osborne was apprised; the doctors +were sent for; Georgy stopped away from school; the +bleeders and cuppers came. Osborne partially regained +cognizance, but never could speak again, though he +tried dreadfully once or twice, and in four days he +died. The doctors went down, and the undertaker’s +men went up the stairs, and all the shutters were +shut towards the garden in Russell Square. Bullock +rushed from the City in a hurry. “How much money +had he left to that boy? Not half, surely? Surely +share and share alike between the three?” It +was an agitating moment.</p> + +<p>What was it that poor old man tried once or twice +in vain to say? I hope it was that he wanted to see +Amelia and be reconciled before he left the world +to one dear and faithful wife of his son: it was +most likely that, for his will showed that the hatred +which he had so long cherished had gone out of his +heart.</p> + +<p>They found in the pocket of his dressing-gown the +letter with the great red seal which George had written +him from Waterloo. He had looked at the other papers +too, relative to his son, for the key of the box in +which he kept them was also in his pocket, and it was +found the seals and envelopes had been broken--very +likely on the night before the seizure--when the butler +had taken him tea into his study, and found him reading +in the great red family Bible.</p> + +<p>When the will was opened, it was found that half the +property was left to George, and the remainder between +the two sisters. Mr. Bullock to continue, for their +joint benefit, the affairs of the commercial house, +or to go out, as he thought fit. An annuity of five +hundred pounds, chargeable on George’s property, +was left to his mother, “the widow of my beloved +son, George Osborne,” who was to resume the +guardianship of the boy.</p> + +<p>“Major William Dobbin, my beloved son’s +friend,” was appointed executor; “and +as out of his kindness and bounty, and with his own +private funds, he maintained my grandson and my son’s +widow, when they were otherwise without means of support” +(the testator went on to say) “I hereby thank +him heartily for his love and regard for them, and +beseech him to accept such a sum as may be sufficient +to purchase his commission as a Lieutenant-Colonel, +or to be disposed of in any way he may think fit.”</p> + +<p>When Amelia heard that her father-in-law was reconciled +to her, her heart melted, and she was grateful for +the fortune left to her. But when she heard how Georgy +was restored to her, and knew how and by whom, and +how it was William’s bounty that supported her +in poverty, how it was William who gave her her husband +and her son--oh, then she sank on her knees, and prayed +for blessings on that constant and kind heart; she +bowed down and humbled herself, and kissed the feet, +as it were, of that beautiful and generous affection.</p> + +<p>And gratitude was all that she had to pay back for +such admirable devotion and benefits--only gratitude! + If she thought of any other return, the image of +George stood up out of the grave and said, “You +are mine, and mine only, now and forever.”</p> + +<p>William knew her feelings: had he not passed his +whole life in divining them?</p> + +<p>When the nature of Mr. Osborne’s will became +known to the world, it was edifying to remark how +Mrs. George Osborne rose in the estimation of the +people forming her circle of acquaintance. The servants +of Jos’s establishment, who used to question +her humble orders and say they would “ask Master” +whether or not they could obey, never thought now +of that sort of appeal. The cook forgot to sneer +at her shabby old gowns (which, indeed, were quite +eclipsed by that lady’s finery when she was +dressed to go to church of a Sunday evening), the +others no longer grumbled at the sound of her bell, +or delayed to answer that summons. The coachman, +who grumbled that his ’osses should be brought +out and his carriage made into an hospital for that +old feller and Mrs. O., drove her with the utmost alacrity +now, and trembling lest he should be superseded by +Mr. Osborne’s coachman, asked “what them +there Russell Square coachmen knew about town, and +whether they was fit to sit on a box before a lady?” +Jos’s friends, male and female, suddenly became +interested about Emmy, and cards of condolence multiplied +on her hall table. Jos himself, who had looked on +her as a good-natured harmless pauper, to whom it was +his duty to give victuals and shelter, paid her and +the rich little boy, his nephew, the greatest respect--was +anxious that she should have change and amusement +after her troubles and trials, “poor dear girl"--and +began to appear at the breakfast-table, and most particularly +to ask how she would like to dispose of the day.</p> + +<p>In her capacity of guardian to Georgy, she, with the +consent of the Major, her fellow-trustee, begged Miss +Osborne to live in the Russell Square house as long +as ever she chose to dwell there; but that lady, with +thanks, declared that she never could think of remaining +alone in that melancholy mansion, and departed in deep +mourning to Cheltenham, with a couple of her old domestics. +The rest were liberally paid and dismissed, the faithful +old butler, whom Mrs. Osborne proposed to retain, +resigning and preferring to invest his savings in +a public-house, where, let us hope, he was not unprosperous. +Miss Osborne not choosing to live in Russell Square, +Mrs. Osborne also, after consultation, declined to +occupy the gloomy old mansion there. The house was +dismantled; the rich furniture and effects, the awful +chandeliers and dreary blank mirrors packed away and +hidden, the rich rosewood drawing-room suite was muffled +in straw, the carpets were rolled up and corded, the +small select library of well-bound books was stowed +into two wine-chests, and the whole paraphernalia +rolled away in several enormous vans to the Pantechnicon, +where they were to lie until Georgy’s majority. + And the great heavy dark plate-chests went off to +Messrs. Stumpy and Rowdy, to lie in the cellars of +those eminent bankers until the same period should +arrive.</p> + +<p>One day Emmy, with George in her hand and clad in +deep sables, went to visit the deserted mansion which +she had not entered since she was a girl. The place +in front was littered with straw where the vans had +been laden and rolled off. They went into the great +blank rooms, the walls of which bore the marks where +the pictures and mirrors had hung. Then they went +up the great blank stone staircases into the upper +rooms, into that where grandpapa died, as George said +in a whisper, and then higher still into George’s +own room. The boy was still clinging by her side, +but she thought of another besides him. She knew +that it had been his father’s room as well as +his own.</p> + +<p>She went up to one of the open windows (one of those +at which she used to gaze with a sick heart when the +child was first taken from her), and thence as she +looked out she could see, over the trees of Russell +Square, the old house in which she herself was born, +and where she had passed so many happy days of sacred +youth. They all came back to her, the pleasant holidays, +the kind faces, the careless, joyful past times, and +the long pains and trials that had since cast her +down. She thought of these and of the man who had +been her constant protector, her good genius, her sole +benefactor, her tender and generous friend.</p> + +<p>“Look here, Mother,” said Georgy, “here’s +a G.O. scratched on the glass with a diamond, I never +saw it before, I never did it.”</p> + +<p>“It was your father’s room long before +you were born, George,” she said, and she blushed +as she kissed the boy.</p> + +<p>She was very silent as they drove back to Richmond, +where they had taken a temporary house: where the +smiling lawyers used to come bustling over to see +her (and we may be sure noted the visit in the bill): + and where of course there was a room for Major Dobbin +too, who rode over frequently, having much business +to transact on behalf of his little ward.</p> + +<p>Georgy at this time was removed from Mr. Veal’s +on an unlimited holiday, and that gentleman was engaged +to prepare an inscription for a fine marble slab, +to be placed up in the Foundling under the monument +of Captain George Osborne.</p> + +<p>The female Bullock, aunt of Georgy, although despoiled +by that little monster of one-half of the sum which +she expected from her father, nevertheless showed +her charitableness of spirit by being reconciled to +the mother and the boy. Roehampton is not far from +Richmond, and one day the chariot, with the golden +bullocks emblazoned on the panels, and the flaccid +children within, drove to Amelia’s house at +Richmond; and the Bullock family made an irruption +into the garden, where Amelia was reading a book, Jos +was in an arbour placidly dipping strawberries into +wine, and the Major in one of his Indian jackets was +giving a back to Georgy, who chose to jump over him. + He went over his head and bounded into the little +advance of Bullocks, with immense black bows in their +hats, and huge black sashes, accompanying their mourning +mamma.</p> + +<p>“He is just of the age for Rosa,” the +fond parent thought, and glanced towards that dear +child, an unwholesome little miss of seven years of +age.</p> + +<p>“Rosa, go and kiss your dear cousin,” +Mrs. Frederick said. “Don’t you know +me, George? I am your aunt.”</p> + +<p>“I know you well enough,” George said; +“but I don’t like kissing, please”; +and he retreated from the obedient caresses of his +cousin.</p> + +<p>“Take me to your dear mamma, you droll child,” +Mrs. Frederick said, and those ladies accordingly +met, after an absence of more than fifteen years. + During Emmy’s cares and poverty the other had +never once thought about coming to see her, but now +that she was decently prosperous in the world, her +sister-in-law came to her as a matter of course.</p> + +<p>So did numbers more. Our old friend, Miss Swartz, +and her husband came thundering over from Hampton +Court, with flaming yellow liveries, and was as impetuously +fond of Amelia as ever. Miss Swartz would have liked +her always if she could have seen her. One must do +her that justice. But, que voulez vous?--in this vast +town one has not the time to go and seek one’s +friends; if they drop out of the rank they disappear, +and we march on without them. Who is ever missed +in Vanity Fair?</p> + +<p>But so, in a word, and before the period of grief +for Mr. Osborne’s death had subsided, Emmy found +herself in the centre of a very genteel circle indeed, +the members of which could not conceive that anybody +belonging to it was not very lucky. There was scarce +one of the ladies that hadn’t a relation a Peer, +though the husband might be a drysalter in the City. + Some of the ladies were very blue and well informed, +reading Mrs. Somerville and frequenting the Royal +Institution; others were severe and Evangelical, and +held by Exeter Hall. Emmy, it must be owned, found +herself entirely at a loss in the midst of their clavers, +and suffered woefully on the one or two occasions +on which she was compelled to accept Mrs. Frederick +Bullock’s hospitalities. That lady persisted +in patronizing her and determined most graciously +to form her. She found Amelia’s milliners for +her and regulated her household and her manners. She +drove over constantly from Roehampton and entertained +her friend with faint fashionable fiddle-faddle and +feeble Court slip-slop. Jos liked to hear it, but +the Major used to go off growling at the appearance +of this woman, with her twopenny gentility. He went +to sleep under Frederick Bullock’s bald head, +after dinner, at one of the banker’s best parties +(Fred was still anxious that the balance of the Osborne +property should be transferred from Stumpy and Rowdy’s +to them), and whilst Amelia, who did not know Latin, +or who wrote the last crack article in the Edinburgh, +and did not in the least deplore, or otherwise, Mr. +Peel’s late extraordinary tergiversation on +the fatal Catholic Relief Bill, sat dumb amongst the +ladies in the grand drawing-room, looking out upon +velvet lawns, trim gravel walks, and glistening hot-houses.</p> + +<p>“She seems good-natured but insipid,” +said Mrs. Rowdy; “that Major seems to be particularly +epris.”</p> + +<p>“She wants ton sadly,” said Mrs. Hollyock. + “My dear creature, you never will be able to +form her.”</p> + +<p>“She is dreadfully ignorant or indifferent,” +said Mrs. Glowry with a voice as if from the grave, +and a sad shake of the head and turban. “I asked +her if she thought that it was in 1836, according to +Mr. Jowls, or in 1839, according to Mr. Wapshot, that +the Pope was to fall: and she said--’Poor Pope! + I hope not--What has he done?’”</p> + +<p>“She is my brother’s widow, my dear friends,” +Mrs. Frederick replied, “and as such I think +we’re all bound to give her every attention +and instruction on entering into the world. You may +fancy there can be no <i>mercenary</i> motives in those +whose <i>disappointments</i> are well known.”</p> + +<p>“That poor dear Mrs. Bullock,” said Rowdy +to Hollyock, as they drove away together--"she is +always scheming and managing. She wants Mrs. Osborne’s +account to be taken from our house to hers--and the +way in which she coaxes that boy and makes him sit +by that blear-eyed little Rosa is perfectly ridiculous.”</p> + +<p>“I wish Glowry was choked with her Man of Sin +and her Battle of Armageddon,” cried the other, +and the carriage rolled away over Putney Bridge.</p> + +<p>But this sort of society was too cruelly genteel for +Emmy, and all jumped for joy when a foreign tour was +proposed.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Am Rhein</h4> + +<p>The above everyday events had occurred, and a few +weeks had passed, when on one fine morning, Parliament +being over, the summer advanced, and all the good +company in London about to quit that city for their +annual tour in search of pleasure or health, the Batavier +steamboat left the Tower-stairs laden with a goodly +company of English fugitives. The quarter-deck awnings +were up, and the benches and gangways crowded with +scores of rosy children, bustling nursemaids; ladies +in the prettiest pink bonnets and summer dresses; +gentlemen in travelling caps and linen-jackets, whose +mustachios had just begun to sprout for the ensuing +tour; and stout trim old veterans with starched neckcloths +and neat-brushed hats, such as have invaded Europe +any time since the conclusion of the war, and carry +the national Goddem into every city of the Continent. + The congregation of hat-boxes, and Bramah desks, +and dressing-cases was prodigious. There were jaunty +young Cambridge-men travelling with their tutor, and +going for a reading excursion to Nonnenwerth or Konigswinter; +there were Irish gentlemen, with the most dashing +whiskers and jewellery, talking about horses incessantly, +and prodigiously polite to the young ladies on board, +whom, on the contrary, the Cambridge lads and their +pale-faced tutor avoided with maiden coyness; there +were old Pall Mall loungers bound for Ems and Wiesbaden +and a course of waters to clear off the dinners of +the season, and a little roulette and trente-et-quarante +to keep the excitement going; there was old Methuselah, +who had married his young wife, with Captain Papillon +of the Guards holding her parasol and guide-books; +there was young May who was carrying off his bride +on a pleasure tour (Mrs. Winter that was, and who had +been at school with May’s grandmother); there +was Sir John and my Lady with a dozen children, and +corresponding nursemaids; and the great grandee Bareacres +family that sat by themselves near the wheel, stared +at everybody, and spoke to no one. Their carriages, +emblazoned with coronets and heaped with shining imperials, +were on the foredeck, locked in with a dozen more +such vehicles: it was difficult to pass in and out +amongst them; and the poor inmates of the fore-cabin +had scarcely any space for locomotion. These consisted +of a few magnificently attired gentlemen from Houndsditch, +who brought their own provisions, and could have bought +half the gay people in the grand saloon; a few honest +fellows with mustachios and portfolios, who set to +sketching before they had been half an hour on board; +one or two French femmes de chambre who began to be +dreadfully ill by the time the boat had passed Greenwich; +a groom or two who lounged in the neighbourhood of +the horse-boxes under their charge, or leaned over +the side by the paddle-wheels, and talked about who +was good for the Leger, and what they stood to win +or lose for the Goodwood cup.</p> + +<p>All the couriers, when they had done plunging about +the ship and had settled their various masters in +the cabins or on the deck, congregated together and +began to chatter and smoke; the Hebrew gentlemen joining +them and looking at the carriages. There was Sir +John’s great carriage that would hold thirteen +people; my Lord Methuselah’s carriage, my Lord +Bareacres’ chariot, britzska, and fourgon, that +anybody might pay for who liked. It was a wonder how +my Lord got the ready money to pay for the expenses +of the journey. The Hebrew gentlemen knew how he got +it. They knew what money his Lordship had in his +pocket at that instant, and what interest he paid +for it, and who gave it him. Finally there was a very +neat, handsome travelling carriage, about which the +gentlemen speculated.</p> + +<p>“A qui cette voiture la?” said one gentleman-courier +with a large morocco money-bag and ear-rings to another +with ear-rings and a large morocco money-bag.</p> + +<p>“C’est a Kirsch je bense--je l’ai +vu toute a l’heure--qui brenoit des sangviches +dans la voiture,” said the courier in a fine +German French.</p> + +<p>Kirsch emerging presently from the neighbourhood of +the hold, where he had been bellowing instructions +intermingled with polyglot oaths to the ship’s +men engaged in secreting the passengers’ luggage, +came to give an account of himself to his brother +interpreters. He informed them that the carriage +belonged to a Nabob from Calcutta and Jamaica enormously +rich, and with whom he was engaged to travel; and +at this moment a young gentleman who had been warned +off the bridge between the paddle-boxes, and who had +dropped thence on to the roof of Lord Methuselah’s +carriage, from which he made his way over other carriages +and imperials until he had clambered on to his own, +descended thence and through the window into the body +of the carriage, to the applause of the couriers looking +on.</p> + +<p>“Nous allons avoir une belle traversee, Monsieur +George,” said the courier with a grin, as he +lifted his gold-laced cap.</p> + +<p>“D--- your French,” said the young gentleman, +“where’s the biscuits, ay?” Whereupon +Kirsch answered him in the English language or in +such an imitation of it as he could command--for though +he was familiar with all languages, Mr. Kirsch was +not acquainted with a single one, and spoke all with +indifferent volubility and incorrectness.</p> + +<p>The imperious young gentleman who gobbled the biscuits +(and indeed it was time to refresh himself, for he +had breakfasted at Richmond full three hours before) +was our young friend George Osborne. Uncle Jos and +his mamma were on the quarter-deck with a gentleman +of whom they used to see a good deal, and the four +were about to make a summer tour.</p> + +<p>Jos was seated at that moment on deck under the awning, +and pretty nearly opposite to the Earl of Bareacres +and his family, whose proceedings absorbed the Bengalee +almost entirely. Both the noble couple looked rather +younger than in the eventful year ’15, when Jos +remembered to have seen them at Brussels (indeed, he +always gave out in India that he was intimately acquainted +with them). Lady Bareacres’ hair, which was +then dark, was now a beautiful golden auburn, whereas +Lord Bareacres’ whiskers, formerly red, were +at present of a rich black with purple and green reflections +in the light. But changed as they were, the movements +of the noble pair occupied Jos’s mind entirely. + The presence of a Lord fascinated him, and he could +look at nothing else.</p> + +<p>“Those people seem to interest you a good deal,” +said Dobbin, laughing and watching him. Amelia too +laughed. She was in a straw bonnet with black ribbons, +and otherwise dressed in mourning, but the little +bustle and holiday of the journey pleased and excited +her, and she looked particularly happy.</p> + +<p>“What a heavenly day!” Emmy said and added, +with great originality, “I hope we shall have +a calm passage.”</p> + +<p>Jos waved his hand, scornfully glancing at the same +time under his eyelids at the great folks opposite. + “If you had made the voyages we have,” +he said, “you wouldn’t much care about +the weather.” But nevertheless, traveller as +he was, he passed the night direfully sick in his +carriage, where his courier tended him with brandy-and-water +and every luxury.</p> + +<p>In due time this happy party landed at the quays of +Rotterdam, whence they were transported by another +steamer to the city of Cologne. Here the carriage +and the family took to the shore, and Jos was not +a little gratified to see his arrival announced in +the Cologne newspapers as “Herr Graf Lord von +Sedley nebst Begleitung aus London.” He had +his court dress with him; he had insisted that Dobbin +should bring his regimental paraphernalia; he announced +that it was his intention to be presented at some +foreign courts, and pay his respects to the Sovereigns +of the countries which he honoured with a visit.</p> + +<p>Wherever the party stopped, and an opportunity was +offered, Mr. Jos left his own card and the Major’s +upon “Our Minister.” It was with great +difficulty that he could be restrained from putting +on his cocked hat and tights to wait upon the English +consul at the Free City of Judenstadt, when that hospitable +functionary asked our travellers to dinner. He kept +a journal of his voyage and noted elaborately the +defects or excellences of the various inns at which +he put up, and of the wines and dishes of which he +partook.</p> + +<p>As for Emmy, she was very happy and pleased. Dobbin +used to carry about for her her stool and sketch-book, +and admired the drawings of the good-natured little +artist as they never had been admired before. She +sat upon steamers’ decks and drew crags and castles, +or she mounted upon donkeys and ascended to ancient +robber-towers, attended by her two aides-de-camp, +Georgy and Dobbin. She laughed, and the Major did +too, at his droll figure on donkey-back, with his +long legs touching the ground. He was the interpreter +for the party; having a good military knowledge of +the German language, and he and the delighted George +fought the campaigns of the Rhine and the Palatinate. + In the course of a few weeks, and by assiduously +conversing with Herr Kirsch on the box of the carriage, +Georgy made prodigious advance in the knowledge of +High Dutch, and could talk to hotel waiters and postilions +in a way that charmed his mother and amused his guardian.</p> + +<p>Mr. Jos did not much engage in the afternoon excursions +of his fellow-travellers. He slept a good deal after +dinner, or basked in the arbours of the pleasant inn-gardens. + Pleasant Rhine gardens! Fair scenes of peace and +sunshine--noble purple mountains, whose crests are +reflected in the magnificent stream--who has ever seen +you that has not a grateful memory of those scenes +of friendly repose and beauty? To lay down the pen +and even to think of that beautiful Rhineland makes +one happy. At this time of summer evening, the cows +are trooping down from the hills, lowing and with +their bells tinkling, to the old town, with its old +moats, and gates, and spires, and chestnut-trees, +with long blue shadows stretching over the grass; +the sky and the river below flame in-crimson and +gold; and the moon is already out, looking pale towards +the sunset. The sun sinks behind the great castle-crested +mountains, the night falls suddenly, the river grows +darker and darker, lights quiver in it from the windows +in the old ramparts, and twinkle peacefully in the +villages under the hills on the opposite shore.</p> + +<p>So Jos used to go to sleep a good deal with his bandanna +over his face and be very comfortable, and read all +the English news, and every word of Galignani’s +admirable newspaper (may the blessings of all Englishmen +who have ever been abroad rest on the founders and +proprietors of that piratical print! ) and whether +he woke or slept, his friends did not very much miss +him. Yes, they were very happy. They went to the +opera often of evenings--to those snug, unassuming, +dear old operas in the German towns, where the noblesse +sits and cries, and knits stockings on the one side, +over against the bourgeoisie on the other; and His +Transparency the Duke and his Transparent family, +all very fat and good-natured, come and occupy the +great box in the middle; and the pit is full of the +most elegant slim-waisted officers with straw-coloured +mustachios, and twopence a day on full pay. Here it +was that Emmy found her delight, and was introduced +for the first time to the wonders of Mozart and Cimarosa. +The Major’s musical taste has been before alluded +to, and his performances on the flute commended. But +perhaps the chief pleasure he had in these operas +was in watching Emmy’s rapture while listening +to them. A new world of love and beauty broke upon +her when she was introduced to those divine compositions; +this lady had the keenest and finest sensibility, +and how could she be indifferent when she heard Mozart? +The tender parts of “Don Juan” awakened +in her raptures so exquisite that she would ask herself +when she went to say her prayers of a night whether +it was not wicked to feel so much delight as that +with which “Vedrai Carino” and “Batti +Batti” filled her gentle little bosom? But the +Major, whom she consulted upon this head, as her theological +adviser (and who himself had a pious and reverent +soul), said that for his part, every beauty of art +or nature made him thankful as well as happy, and that +the pleasure to be had in listening to fine music, +as in looking at the stars in the sky, or at a beautiful +landscape or picture, was a benefit for which we might +thank Heaven as sincerely as for any other worldly +blessing. And in reply to some faint objections of +Mrs. Amelia’s (taken from certain theological +works like the Washerwoman of Finchley Common and +others of that school, with which Mrs. Osborne had +been furnished during her life at Brompton) he told +her an Eastern fable of the Owl who thought that the +sunshine was unbearable for the eyes and that the +Nightingale was a most overrated bird. “It +is one’s nature to sing and the other’s +to hoot,” he said, laughing, “and with +such a sweet voice as you have yourself, you must +belong to the Bulbul faction.”</p> + +<p>I like to dwell upon this period of her life and to +think that she was cheerful and happy. You see, she +has not had too much of that sort of existence as +yet, and has not fallen in the way of means to educate +her tastes or her intelligence. She has been domineered +over hitherto by vulgar intellects. It is the lot +of many a woman. And as every one of the dear sex +is the rival of the rest of her kind, timidity passes +for folly in their charitable judgments; and gentleness +for dulness; and silence--which is but timid denial +of the unwelcome assertion of ruling folks, and tacit +protestantism-- above all, finds no mercy at the hands +of the female Inquisition. Thus, my dear and civilized +reader, if you and I were to find ourselves this evening +in a society of greengrocers, let us say, it is probable +that our conversation would not be brilliant; if, on +the other hand, a greengrocer should find himself +at your refined and polite tea-table, where everybody +was saying witty things, and everybody of fashion +and repute tearing her friends to pieces in the most +delightful manner, it is possible that the stranger +would not be very talkative and by no means interesting +or interested.</p> + +<p>And it must be remembered that this poor lady had +never met a gentleman in her life until this present +moment. Perhaps these are rarer personages than some +of us think for. Which of us can point out many such +in his circle--men whose aims are generous, whose +truth is constant, and not only constant in its kind +but elevated in its degree; whose want of meanness +makes them simple; who can look the world honestly +in the face with an equal manly sympathy for the great +and the small? We all know a hundred whose coats are +very well made, and a score who have excellent manners, +and one or two happy beings who are what they call +in the inner circles, and have shot into the very +centre and bull’s-eye of the fashion; but of +gentlemen how many? Let us take a little scrap of +paper and each make out his list.</p> + +<p>My friend the Major I write, without any doubt, in +mine. He had very long legs, a yellow face, and a +slight lisp, which at first was rather ridiculous. + But his thoughts were just, his brains were fairly +good, his life was honest and pure, and his heart warm +and humble. He certainly had very large hands and +feet, which the two George Osbornes used to caricature +and laugh at; and their jeers and laughter perhaps +led poor little Emmy astray as to his worth. But +have we not all been misled about our heroes and changed +our opinions a hundred times? Emmy, in this happy +time, found that hers underwent a very great change +in respect of the merits of the Major.</p> + +<p>Perhaps it was the happiest time of both their lives, +indeed, if they did but know it--and who does? Which +of us can point out and say that was the culmination--that +was the summit of human joy? But at all events, this +couple were very decently contented, and enjoyed as +pleasant a summer tour as any pair that left England +that year. Georgy was always present at the play, +but it was the Major who put Emmy’s shawl on +after the entertainment; and in the walks and excursions +the young lad would be on ahead, and up a tower-stair +or a tree, whilst the soberer couple were below, the +Major smoking his cigar with great placidity and constancy, +whilst Emmy sketched the site or the ruin. It was +on this very tour that I, the present writer of a +history of which every word is true, had the pleasure +to see them first and to make their acquaintance.</p> + +<p>It was at the little comfortable Ducal town of Pumpernickel +(that very place where Sir Pitt Crawley had been so +distinguished as an attache; but that was in early +early days, and before the news of the Battle of Austerlitz +sent all the English diplomatists in Germany to the +right about) that I first saw Colonel Dobbin and his +party. They had arrived with the carriage and courier +at the Erbprinz Hotel, the best of the town, and the +whole party dined at the table d’hote. Everybody +remarked the majesty of Jos and the knowing way in +which he sipped, or rather sucked, the Johannisberger, +which he ordered for dinner. The little boy, too, +we observed, had a famous appetite, and consumed schinken, +and braten, and kartoffeln, and cranberry jam, and +salad, and pudding, and roast fowls, and sweetmeats, +with a gallantry that did honour to his nation. After +about fifteen dishes, he concluded the repast with +dessert, some of which he even carried out of doors, +for some young gentlemen at table, amused with his +coolness and gallant free-and-easy manner, induced +him to pocket a handful of macaroons, which he discussed +on his way to the theatre, whither everybody went in +the cheery social little German place. The lady in +black, the boy’s mamma, laughed and blushed, +and looked exceedingly pleased and shy as the dinner +went on, and at the various feats and instances of +espieglerie on the part of her son. The Colonel--for +so he became very soon afterwards--I remember joked +the boy with a great deal of grave fun, pointing out +dishes which he hadn’t tried, and entreating +him not to baulk his appetite, but to have a second +supply of this or that.</p> + +<p>It was what they call a gast-rolle night at the Royal +Grand Ducal Pumpernickelisch Hof--or Court theatre--and +Madame Schroeder Devrient, then in the bloom of her +beauty and genius, performed the part of the heroine +in the wonderful opera of Fidelio. From our places +in the stalls we could see our four friends of the +table d’hote in the loge which Schwendler of +the Erbprinz kept for his best guests, and I could +not help remarking the effect which the magnificent +actress and music produced upon Mrs. Osborne, for so +we heard the stout gentleman in the mustachios call +her. During the astonishing Chorus of the Prisoners, +over which the delightful voice of the actress rose +and soared in the most ravishing harmony, the English +lady’s face wore such an expression of wonder +and delight that it struck even little Fipps, the +blase attache, who drawled out, as he fixed his glass +upon her, “Gayd, it really does one good to +see a woman caypable of that stayt of excaytement.” +And in the Prison Scene, where Fidelio, rushing to +her husband, cries, “Nichts, nichts, mein Florestan,” +she fairly lost herself and covered her face with +her handkerchief. Every woman in the house was snivelling +at the time, but I suppose it was because it was predestined +that I was to write this particular lady’s memoirs +that I remarked her.</p> + +<p>The next day they gave another piece of Beethoven, +Die Schlacht bei Vittoria. Malbrook is introduced +at the beginning of the performance, as indicative +of the brisk advance of the French army. Then come +drums, trumpets, thunders of artillery, and groans +of the dying, and at last, in a grand triumphal swell, +“God Save the King” is performed.</p> + +<p>There may have been a score of Englishmen in the house, +but at the burst of that beloved and well-known music, +every one of them, we young fellows in the stalls, +Sir John and Lady Bullminster (who had taken a house +at Pumpernickel for the education of their nine children), +the fat gentleman with the mustachios, the long Major +in white duck trousers, and the lady with the little +boy upon whom he was so sweet, even Kirsch, the courier +in the gallery, stood bolt upright in their places +and proclaimed themselves to be members of the dear +old British nation. As for Tapeworm, the Charge d’Affaires, +he rose up in his box and bowed and simpered, as if +he would represent the whole empire. Tapeworm was +nephew and heir of old Marshal Tiptoff, who has been +introduced in this story as General Tiptoff, just +before Waterloo, who was Colonel of the --th regiment +in which Major Dobbin served, and who died in this +year full of honours, and of an aspic of plovers’ +eggs; when the regiment was graciously given by his +Majesty to Colonel Sir Michael O’Dowd, K.C.B. + who had commanded it in many glorious fields.</p> + +<p>Tapeworm must have met with Colonel Dobbin at the +house of the Colonel’s Colonel, the Marshal, +for he recognized him on this night at the theatre, +and with the utmost condescension, his Majesty’s +minister came over from his own box and publicly shook +hands with his new-found friend.</p> + +<p>“Look at that infernal sly-boots of a Tapeworm,” +Fipps whispered, examining his chief from the stalls. +“Wherever there’s a pretty woman he always +twists himself in.” And I wonder what were diplomatists +made for but for that?</p> + +<p>“Have I the honour of addressing myself to Mrs. +Dobbin?” asked the Secretary with a most insinuating +grin.</p> + +<p>Georgy burst out laughing and said, “By Jove, +that was a good ’un.” Emmy and the Major +blushed: we saw them from the stalls.</p> + +<p>“This lady is Mrs. George Osborne,” said +the Major, “and this is her brother, Mr. Sedley, +a distinguished officer of the Bengal Civil Service: + permit me to introduce him to your lordship.”</p> + +<p>My lord nearly sent Jos off his legs with the most +fascinating smile. “Are you going to stop in +Pumpernickel?” he said. “It is a dull +place, but we want some nice people, and we would try +and make it <i>so</i> agreeable to you. Mr.--Ahum--Mrs.--Oho. + I shall do myself the honour of calling upon you +to-morrow at your inn.” And he went away with +a Parthian grin and glance which he thought must finish +Mrs. Osborne completely.</p> + +<p>The performance over, the young fellows lounged about +the lobbies, and we saw the society take its departure. +The Duchess Dowager went off in her jingling old coach, +attended by two faithful and withered old maids of +honour, and a little snuffy spindle-shanked gentleman +in waiting, in a brown jasey and a green coat covered +with orders-- of which the star and the grand yellow +cordon of the order of St. Michael of Pumpernickel +were most conspicuous. The drums rolled, the guards +saluted, and the old carriage drove away.</p> + +<p>Then came his Transparency the Duke and Transparent +family, with his great officers of state and household. + He bowed serenely to everybody. And amid the saluting +of the guards and the flaring of the torches of the +running footmen, clad in scarlet, the Transparent +carriages drove away to the old Ducal schloss, with +its towers and pinacles standing on the schlossberg. + Everybody in Pumpernickel knew everybody. No sooner +was a foreigner seen there than the Minister of Foreign +Affairs, or some other great or small officer of state, +went round to the Erbprinz and found out the name of +the new arrival.</p> + +<p>We watched them, too, out of the theatre. Tapeworm +had just walked off, enveloped in his cloak, with +which his gigantic chasseur was always in attendance, +and looking as much as possible like Don Juan. The +Prime Minister’s lady had just squeezed herself +into her sedan, and her daughter, the charming Ida, +had put on her calash and clogs; when the English +party came out, the boy yawning drearily, the Major +taking great pains in keeping the shawl over Mrs. Osborne’s +head, and Mr. Sedley looking grand, with a crush opera-hat +on one side of his head and his hand in the stomach +of a voluminous white waistcoat. We took off our +hats to our acquaintances of the table d’hote, +and the lady, in return, presented us with a little +smile and a curtsey, for which everybody might be +thankful.</p> + +<p>The carriage from the inn, under the superintendence +of the bustling Mr. Kirsch, was in waiting to convey +the party; but the fat man said he would walk and +smoke his cigar on his way homewards, so the other +three, with nods and smiles to us, went without Mr. +Sedley, Kirsch, with the cigar case, following in +his master’s wake.</p> + +<p>We all walked together and talked to the stout gentleman +about the agremens of the place. It was very agreeable +for the English. There were shooting-parties and battues; +there was a plenty of balls and entertainments at +the hospitable Court; the society was generally good; +the theatre excellent; and the living cheap.</p> + +<p>“And our Minister seems a most delightful and +affable person,” our new friend said. “With +such a representative, and--and a good medical man, +I can fancy the place to be most eligible. Good-night, +gentlemen.” And Jos creaked up the stairs to +bedward, followed by Kirsch with a flambeau. We rather +hoped that nice-looking woman would be induced to +stay some time in the town.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXIII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">In Which We Meet an Old Acquaintance</h4> + +<p>Such polite behaviour as that of Lord Tapeworm did +not fail to have the most favourable effect upon Mr. +Sedley’s mind, and the very next morning, at +breakfast, he pronounced his opinion that Pumpernickel +was the pleasantest little place of any which he had +visited on their tour. Jos’s motives and artifices +were not very difficult of comprehension, and Dobbin +laughed in his sleeve, like a hypocrite as he was, +when he found, by the knowing air of the civilian and +the offhand manner in which the latter talked about +Tapeworm Castle and the other members of the family, +that Jos had been up already in the morning, consulting +his travelling Peerage. Yes, he had seen the Right +Honourable the Earl of Bagwig, his lordship’s +father; he was sure he had, he had met him at--at +the Levee--didn’t Dob remember? and when the +Diplomatist called on the party, faithful to his promise, +Jos received him with such a salute and honours as +were seldom accorded to the little Envoy. He winked +at Kirsch on his Excellency’s arrival, and that +emissary, instructed before-hand, went out and superintended +an entertainment of cold meats, jellies, and other +delicacies, brought in upon trays, and of which Mr. +Jos absolutely insisted that his noble guest should +partake.</p> + +<p>Tapeworm, so long as he could have an opportunity +of admiring the bright eyes of Mrs. Osborne (whose +freshness of complexion bore daylight remarkably well) +was not ill pleased to accept any invitation to stay +in Mr. Sedley’s lodgings; he put one or two +dexterous questions to him about India and the dancing-girls +there; asked Amelia about that beautiful boy who had +been with her; and complimented the astonished little +woman upon the prodigious sensation which she had +made in the house; and tried to fascinate Dobbin by +talking of the late war and the exploits of the Pumpernickel +contingent under the command of the Hereditary Prince, +now Duke of Pumpernickel.</p> + +<p>Lord Tapeworm inherited no little portion of the family +gallantry, and it was his happy belief that almost +every woman upon whom he himself cast friendly eyes +was in love with him. He left Emmy under the persuasion +that she was slain by his wit and attractions and +went home to his lodgings to write a pretty little +note to her. She was not fascinated, only puzzled, +by his grinning, his simpering, his scented cambric +handkerchief, and his high-heeled lacquered boots. + She did not understand one-half the compliments which +he paid; she had never, in her small experience of +mankind, met a professional ladies’ man as yet, +and looked upon my lord as something curious rather +than pleasant; and if she did not admire, certainly +wondered at him. Jos, on the contrary, was delighted. +“How very affable his Lordship is,” he +said; “How very kind of his Lordship to say +he would send his medical man! Kirsch, you will carry +our cards to the Count de Schlusselback directly; the +Major and I will have the greatest pleasure in paying +our respects at Court as soon as possible. Put out +my uniform, Kirsch--both our uniforms. It is a mark +of politeness which every English gentleman ought +to show to the countries which he visits to pay his +respects to the sovereigns of those countries as to +the representatives of his own.”</p> + +<p>When Tapeworm’s doctor came, Doctor von Glauber, +Body Physician to H.S.H. the Duke, he speedily convinced +Jos that the Pumpernickel mineral springs and the +Doctor’s particular treatment would infallibly +restore the Bengalee to youth and slimness. “Dere +came here last year,” he said, “Sheneral +Bulkeley, an English Sheneral, tvice so pic as you, +sir. I sent him back qvite tin after tree months, +and he danced vid Baroness Glauber at the end of two.”</p> + +<p>Jos’s mind was made up; the springs, the Doctor, +the Court, and the Charge d’Affaires convinced +him, and he proposed to spend the autumn in these +delightful quarters. And punctual to his word, on +the next day the Charge d’Affaires presented +Jos and the Major to Victor Aurelius XVII, being conducted +to their audience with that sovereign by the Count +de Schlusselback, Marshal of the Court.</p> + +<p>They were straightway invited to dinner at Court, +and their intention of staying in the town being announced, +the politest ladies of the whole town instantly called +upon Mrs. Osborne; and as not one of these, however +poor they might be, was under the rank of a Baroness, +Jos’s delight was beyond expression. He wrote +off to Chutney at the Club to say that the Service +was highly appreciated in Germany, that he was going +to show his friend, the Count de Schlusselback, how +to stick a pig in the Indian fashion, and that his +august friends, the Duke and Duchess, were everything +that was kind and civil.</p> + +<p>Emmy, too, was presented to the august family, and +as mourning is not admitted in Court on certain days, +she appeared in a pink crape dress with a diamond +ornament in the corsage, presented to her by her brother, +and she looked so pretty in this costume that the Duke +and Court (putting out of the question the Major, who +had scarcely ever seen her before in an evening dress, +and vowed that she did not look five-and-twenty) all +admired her excessively.</p> + +<p>In this dress she walked a Polonaise with Major Dobbin +at a Court ball, in which easy dance Mr. Jos had the +honour of leading out the Countess of Schlusselback, +an old lady with a hump back, but with sixteen good +quarters of nobility and related to half the royal +houses of Germany.</p> + +<p>Pumpernickel stands in the midst of a happy valley +through which sparkles--to mingle with the Rhine somewhere, +but I have not the map at hand to say exactly at what +point--the fertilizing stream of the Pump. In some +places the river is big enough to support a ferry-boat, +in others to turn a mill; in Pumpernickel itself, the +last Transparency but three, the great and renowned +Victor Aurelius XIV built a magnificent bridge, on +which his own statue rises, surrounded by water-nymphs +and emblems of victory, peace, and plenty; he has +his foot on the neck of a prostrate Turk--history +says he engaged and ran a Janissary through the body +at the relief of Vienna by Sobieski--but, quite undisturbed +by the agonies of that prostrate Mahometan, who writhes +at his feet in the most ghastly manner, the Prince +smiles blandly and points with his truncheon in the +direction of the Aurelius Platz, where he began to +erect a new palace that would have been the wonder +of his age had the great-souled Prince but had funds +to complete it. But the completion of Monplaisir +(Monblaisir the honest German folks call it) was stopped +for lack of ready money, and it and its park and garden +are now in rather a faded condition, and not more +than ten times big enough to accommodate the Court +of the reigning Sovereign.</p> + +<p>The gardens were arranged to emulate those of Versailles, +and amidst the terraces and groves there are some +huge allegorical waterworks still, which spout and +froth stupendously upon fete-days, and frighten one +with their enormous aquatic insurrections. There is +the Trophonius’ cave in which, by some artifice, +the leaden Tritons are made not only to spout water, +but to play the most dreadful groans out of their +lead conchs--there is the nymphbath and the Niagara +cataract, which the people of the neighbourhood admire +beyond expression, when they come to the yearly fair +at the opening of the Chamber, or to the fetes with +which the happy little nation still celebrates the +birthdays and marriage-days of its princely governors.</p> + +<p>Then from all the towns of the Duchy, which stretches +for nearly ten mile--from Bolkum, which lies on its +western frontier bidding defiance to Prussia, from +Grogwitz, where the Prince has a hunting-lodge, and +where his dominions are separated by the Pump River +from those of the neighbouring Prince of Potzenthal; +from all the little villages, which besides these +three great cities, dot over the happy principality--from +the farms and the mills along the Pump come troops +of people in red petticoats and velvet head-dresses, +or with three-cornered hats and pipes in their mouths, +who flock to the Residenz and share in the pleasures +of the fair and the festivities there. Then the theatre +is open for nothing, then the waters of Monblaisir +begin to play (it is lucky that there is company to +behold them, for one would be afraid to see them alone)--then +there come mountebanks and riding troops (the way +in which his Transparency was fascinated by one of +the horse-riders is well known, and it is believed +that La Petite Vivandiere, as she was called, was +a spy in the French interest), and the delighted people +are permitted to march through room after room of the +Grand Ducal palace and admire the slippery floor, +the rich hangings, and the spittoons at the doors +of all the innumerable chambers. There is one Pavilion +at Monblaisir which Aurelius Victor XV had arranged--a +great Prince but too fond of pleasure--and which I +am told is a perfect wonder of licentious elegance. +It is painted with the story of Bacchus and Ariadne, +and the table works in and out of the room by means +of a windlass, so that the company was served without +any intervention of domestics. But the place was +shut up by Barbara, Aurelius XV’s widow, a severe +and devout Princess of the House of Bolkum and Regent +of the Duchy during her son’s glorious minority, +and after the death of her husband, cut off in the +pride of his pleasures.</p> + +<p>The theatre of Pumpernickel is known and famous in +that quarter of Germany. It languished a little when +the present Duke in his youth insisted upon having +his own operas played there, and it is said one day, +in a fury, from his place in the orchestra, when he +attended a rehearsal, broke a bassoon on the head +of the Chapel Master, who was conducting, and led +too slow; and during which time the Duchess Sophia +wrote domestic comedies, which must have been very +dreary to witness. But the Prince executes his music +in private now, and the Duchess only gives away her +plays to the foreigners of distinction who visit her +kind little Court.</p> + +<p>It is conducted with no small comfort and splendour. +When there are balls, though there may be four hundred +people at supper, there is a servant in scarlet and +lace to attend upon every four, and every one is served +on silver. There are festivals and entertainments +going continually on, and the Duke has his chamberlains +and equerries, and the Duchess her mistress of the +wardrobe and ladies of honour, just like any other +and more potent potentates.</p> + +<p>The Constitution is or was a moderate despotism, tempered +by a Chamber that might or might not be elected. +I never certainly could hear of its sitting in my +time at Pumpernickel. The Prime Minister had lodgings +in a second floor, and the Foreign Secretary occupied +the comfortable lodgings over Zwieback’s Conditorey. + The army consisted of a magnificent band that also +did duty on the stage, where it was quite pleasant +to see the worthy fellows marching in Turkish dresses +with rouge on and wooden scimitars, or as Roman warriors +with ophicleides and trombones--to see them again, +I say, at night, after one had listened to them all +the morning in the Aurelius Platz, where they performed +opposite the cafe where we breakfasted. Besides the +band, there was a rich and numerous staff of officers, +and, I believe, a few men. Besides the regular sentries, +three or four men, habited as hussars, used to do duty +at the Palace, but I never saw them on horseback, +and au fait, what was the use of cavalry in a time +of profound peace?--and whither the deuce should the +hussars ride?</p> + +<p>Everybody--everybody that was noble of course, for +as for the bourgeois we could not quite be expected +to take notice of <i>them</i>-- visited his neighbour. + H. E. Madame de Burst received once a week, H. E. +Madame de Schnurrbart had her night--the theatre was +open twice a week, the Court graciously received once, +so that a man’s life might in fact be a perfect +round of pleasure in the unpretending Pumpernickel +way.</p> + +<p>That there were feuds in the place, no one can deny. +Politics ran very high at Pumpernickel, and parties +were very bitter. There was the Strumpff faction +and the Lederlung party, the one supported by our +envoy and the other by the French Charge d’Affaires, +M. de Macabau. Indeed it sufficed for our Minister +to stand up for Madame Strumpff, who was clearly the +greater singer of the two, and had three more notes +in her voice than Madame Lederlung her rival--it sufficed, +I say, for our Minister to advance any opinion to have +it instantly contradicted by the French diplomatist.</p> + +<p>Everybody in the town was ranged in one or other of +these factions. The Lederlung was a prettyish little +creature certainly, and her voice (what there was +of it) was very sweet, and there is no doubt that +the Strumpff was not in her first youth and beauty, +and certainly too stout; when she came on in the last +scene of the Sonnambula, for instance, in her night-chemise +with a lamp in her hand, and had to go out of the +window, and pass over the plank of the mill, it was +all she could do to squeeze out of the window, and +the plank used to bend and creak again under her weight--but +how she poured out the finale of the opera! and with +what a burst of feeling she rushed into Elvino’s +arms--almost fit to smother him! Whereas the little +Lederlung--but a truce to this gossip--the fact is +that these two women were the two flags of the French +and the English party at Pumpernickel, and the society +was divided in its allegiance to those two great nations.</p> + +<p>We had on our side the Home Minister, the Master of +the Horse, the Duke’s Private Secretary, and +the Prince’s Tutor; whereas of the French party +were the Foreign Minister, the Commander-in-Chief’s +Lady, who had served under Napoleon, and the Hof-Marschall +and his wife, who was glad enough to get the fashions +from Pans, and always had them and her caps by M. +de Macabau’s courier. The Secretary of his +Chancery was little Grignac, a young fellow, as malicious +as Satan, and who made caricatures of Tapeworm in +all the-albums of the place.</p> + +<p>Their headquarters and table d’hote were established +at the Pariser Hof, the other inn of the town; and +though, of course, these gentlemen were obliged to +be civil in public, yet they cut at each other with +epigrams that were as sharp as razors, as I have seen +a couple of wrestlers in Devonshire, lashing at each +other’s shins and never showing their agony +upon a muscle of their faces. Neither Tapeworm nor +Macabau ever sent home a dispatch to his government +without a most savage series of attacks upon his rival. + For instance, on our side we would write, “The +interests of Great Britain in this place, and throughout +the whole of Germany, are perilled by the continuance +in office of the present French envoy; this man is +of a character so infamous that he will stick at no +falsehood, or hesitate at no crime, to attain his ends. + He poisons the mind of the Court against the English +minister, represents the conduct of Great Britain +in the most odious and atrocious light, and is unhappily +backed by a minister whose ignorance and necessities +are as notorious as his influence is fatal.” +On their side they would say, “M. de Tapeworm +continues his system of stupid insular arrogance and +vulgar falsehood against the greatest nation in the +world. Yesterday he was heard to speak lightly of +Her Royal Highness Madame the Duchess of Berri; on +a former occasion he insulted the heroic Duke of Angouleme +and dared to insinuate that H.R.H. the Duke of Orleans +was conspiring against the august throne of the lilies. + His gold is prodigated in every direction which his +stupid menaces fail to frighten. By one and the other, +he has won over creatures of the Court here--and, +in fine, Pumpernickel will not be quiet, Germany tranquil, +France respected, or Europe content until this poisonous +viper be crushed under heel”: and so on. When +one side or the other had written any particularly +spicy dispatch, news of it was sure to slip out.</p> + +<p>Before the winter was far advanced, it is actually +on record that Emmy took a night and received company +with great propriety and modesty. She had a French +master, who complimented her upon the purity of her +accent and her facility of learning; the fact is she +had learned long ago and grounded herself subsequently +in the grammar so as to be able to teach it to George; +and Madam Strumpff came to give her lessons in singing, +which she performed so well and with such a true voice +that the Major’s windows, who had lodgings opposite +under the Prime Minister, were always open to hear +the lesson. Some of the German ladies, who are very +sentimental and simple in their tastes, fell in love +with her and began to call her du at once. These +are trivial details, but they relate to happy times. + The Major made himself George’s tutor and read +Caesar and mathematics with him, and they had a German +master and rode out of evenings by the side of Emmy’s +carriage--she was always too timid, and made a dreadful +outcry at the slightest disturbance on horse-back. + So she drove about with one of her dear German friends, +and Jos asleep on the back-seat of the barouche.</p> + +<p>He was becoming very sweet upon the Grafinn Fanny +de Butterbrod, a very gentle tender-hearted and unassuming +young creature, a Canoness and Countess in her own +right, but with scarcely ten pounds per year to her +fortune, and Fanny for her part declared that to be +Amelia’s sister was the greatest delight that +Heaven could bestow on her, and Jos might have put +a Countess’s shield and coronet by the side of +his own arms on his carriage and forks; when--when +events occurred, and those grand fetes given upon +the marriage of the Hereditary Prince of Pumpernickel +with the lovely Princess Amelia of Humbourg-Schlippenschloppen +took place.</p> + +<p>At this festival the magnificence displayed was such +as had not been known in the little German place since +the days of the prodigal Victor XIV. All the neighbouring +Princes, Princesses, and Grandees were invited to +the feast. Beds rose to half a crown per night in +Pumpernickel, and the Army was exhausted in providing +guards of honour for the Highnesses, Serenities, and +Excellencies who arrived from all quarters. The Princess +was married by proxy, at her father’s residence, +by the Count de Schlusselback. Snuff-boxes were given +away in profusion (as we learned from the Court jeweller, +who sold and afterwards bought them again), and bushels +of the Order of Saint Michael of Pumpernickel were +sent to the nobles of the Court, while hampers of +the cordons and decorations of the Wheel of St. Catherine +of Schlippenschloppen were brought to ours. The French +envoy got both. “He is covered with ribbons +like a prize cart-horse,” Tapeworm said, who +was not allowed by the rules of his service to take +any decorations: “Let him have the cordons; +but with whom is the victory?” The fact is, +it was a triumph of British diplomacy, the French +party having proposed and tried their utmost to carry +a marriage with a Princess of the House of Potztausend-Donnerwetter, +whom, as a matter of course, we opposed.</p> + +<p>Everybody was asked to the fetes of the marriage. +Garlands and triumphal arches were hung across the +road to welcome the young bride. The great Saint +Michael’s Fountain ran with uncommonly sour +wine, while that in the Artillery Place frothed with +beer. The great waters played; and poles were put +up in the park and gardens for the happy peasantry, +which they might climb at their leisure, carrying +off watches, silver forks, prize sausages hung with +pink ribbon, &c., at the top. Georgy got one, wrenching +it off, having swarmed up the pole to the delight +of the spectators, and sliding down with the rapidity +of a fall of water. But it was for the glory’s +sake merely. The boy gave the sausage to a peasant, +who had very nearly seized it, and stood at the foot +of the mast, blubbering, because he was unsuccessful.</p> + +<p>At the French Chancellerie they had six more lampions +in their illumination than ours had; but our transparency, +which represented the young Couple advancing and Discord +flying away, with the most ludicrous likeness to the +French Ambassador, beat the French picture hollow; +and I have no doubt got Tapeworm the advancement and +the Cross of the Bath which he subsequently attained.</p> + +<p>Crowds of foreigners arrived for the fetes, and of +English, of course. Besides the Court balls, public +balls were given at the Town Hall and the Redoute, +and in the former place there was a room for trente-et-quarante +and roulette established, for the week of the festivities +only, and by one of the great German companies from +Ems or Aix-la-Chapelle. The officers or inhabitants +of the town were not allowed to play at these games, +but strangers, peasants, ladies were admitted, and +any one who chose to lose or win money.</p> + +<p>That little scapegrace Georgy Osborne amongst others, +whose pockets were always full of dollars and whose +relations were away at the grand festival of the Court, +came to the Stadthaus Ball in company of his uncle’s +courier, Mr. Kirsch, and having only peeped into a +play-room at Baden-Baden when he hung on Dobbin’s +arm, and where, of course, he was not permitted to +gamble, came eagerly to this part of the entertainment +and hankered round the tables where the croupiers +and the punters were at work. Women were playing; +they were masked, some of them; this license was allowed +in these wild times of carnival.</p> + +<p>A woman with light hair, in a low dress by no means +so fresh as it had been, and with a black mask on, +through the eyelets of which her eyes twinkled strangely, +was seated at one of the roulette-tables with a card +and a pin and a couple of florins before her. As the +croupier called out the colour and number, she pricked +on the card with great care and regularity, and only +ventured her money on the colours after the red or +black had come up a certain number of times. It was +strange to look at her.</p> + +<p>But in spite of her care and assiduity she guessed +wrong and the last two florins followed each other +under the croupier’s rake, as he cried out with +his inexorable voice the winning colour and number. + She gave a sigh, a shrug with her shoulders, which +were already too much out of her gown, and dashing +the pin through the card on to the table, sat thrumming +it for a while. Then she looked round her and saw +Georgy’s honest face staring at the scene. The +little scamp! What business had he to be there?</p> + +<p>When she saw the boy, at whose face she looked hard +through her shining eyes and mask, she said, “Monsieur +n’est pas joueur?”</p> + +<p>“Non, Madame,” said the boy; but she must +have known, from his accent, of what country he was, +for she answered him with a slight foreign tone. +“You have nevare played--will you do me a littl’ +favor?”</p> + +<p>“What is it?” said Georgy, blushing again. + Mr. Kirsch was at work for his part at the rouge +et noir and did not see his young master.</p> + +<p>“Play this for me, if you please; put it on +any number, any number.” And she took from her +bosom a purse, and out of it a gold piece, the only +coin there, and she put it into George’s hand. + The boy laughed and did as he was bid.</p> + +<p>The number came up sure enough. There is a power +that arranges that, they say, for beginners.</p> + +<p>“Thank you,” said she, pulling the money +towards her, “thank you. What is your name?”</p> + +<p>“My name’s Osborne,” said Georgy, +and was fingering in his own pockets for dollars, +and just about to make a trial, when the Major, in +his uniform, and Jos, en Marquis, from the Court ball, +made their appearance. Other people, finding the +entertainment stupid and preferring the fun at the +Stadthaus, had quitted the Palace ball earlier; but +it is probable the Major and Jos had gone home and +found the boy’s absence, for the former instantly +went up to him and, taking him by the shoulder, pulled +him briskly back from the place of temptation. Then, +looking round the room, he saw Kirsch employed as +we have said, and going up to him, asked how he dared +to bring Mr. George to such a place.</p> + +<p>“Laissez-moi tranquille,” said Mr. Kirsch, +very much excited by play and wine. “ll faut +s’amuser, parbleu. Je ne suis pas au service +de Monsieur.”</p> + +<p>Seeing his condition the Major did not choose to argue +with the man, but contented himself with drawing away +George and asking Jos if he would come away. He was +standing close by the lady in the mask, who was playing +with pretty good luck now, and looking on much interested +at the game.</p> + +<p>“Hadn’t you better come, Jos,” the +Major said, “with George and me?”</p> + +<p>“I’ll stop and go home with that rascal, +Kirsch,” Jos said; and for the same reason of +modesty, which he thought ought to be preserved before +the boy, Dobbin did not care to remonstrate with Jos, +but left him and walked home with Georgy.</p> + +<p>“Did you play?” asked the Major when they +were out and on their way home.</p> + +<p>The boy said “No.”</p> + +<p>“Give me your word of honour as a gentleman +that you never will.”</p> + +<p>“Why?” said the boy; “it seems very +good fun.” And, in a very eloquent and impressive +manner, the Major showed him why he shouldn’t, +and would have enforced his precepts by the example +of Georgy’s own father, had he liked to say +anything that should reflect on the other’s +memory. When he had housed him, he went to bed and +saw his light, in the little room outside of Amelia’s, +presently disappear. Amelia’s followed half +an hour afterwards. I don’t know what made +the Major note it so accurately.</p> + +<p>Jos, however, remained behind over the play-table; +he was no gambler, but not averse to the little excitement +of the sport now and then, and he had some Napoleons +chinking in the embroidered pockets of his court waistcoat. + He put down one over the fair shoulder of the little +gambler before him, and they won. She made a little +movement to make room for him by her side, and just +took the skirt of her gown from a vacant chair there.</p> + +<p>“Come and give me good luck,” she said, +still in a foreign accent, quite different from that +frank and perfectly English “Thank you,” +with which she had saluted Georgy’s coup in her +favour. The portly gentleman, looking round to see +that nobody of rank observed him, sat down; he muttered--"Ah, +really, well now, God bless my soul. I’m very +fortunate; I’m sure to give you good fortune,” +and other words of compliment and confusion. “Do +you play much?” the foreign mask said.</p> + +<p>“I put a Nap or two down,” said Jos with +a superb air, flinging down a gold piece.</p> + +<p>“Yes; ay nap after dinner,” said the mask +archly. But Jos looking frightened, she continued, +in her pretty French accent, “You do not play +to win. No more do I. I play to forget, but I cannot. + I cannot forget old times, monsieur. Your little +nephew is the image of his father; and you--you are +not changed--but yes, you are. Everybody changes, +everybody forgets; nobody has any heart.”</p> + +<p>“Good God, who is it?” asked Jos in a +flutter.</p> + +<p>“Can’t you guess, Joseph Sedley?” +said the little woman in a sad voice, and undoing +her mask, she looked at him. “You have forgotten +me.”</p> + +<p>“Good heavens! Mrs. Crawley!” gasped +out Jos.</p> + +<p>“Rebecca,” said the other, putting her +hand on his; but she followed the game still, all +the time she was looking at him.</p> + +<p>“I am stopping at the Elephant,” she continued. + “Ask for Madame de Raudon. I saw my dear Amelia +to-day; how pretty she looked, and how happy! So +do you! Everybody but me, who am wretched, Joseph +Sedley.” And she put her money over from the +red to the black, as if by a chance movement of her +hand, and while she was wiping her eyes with a pocket-handkerchief +fringed with torn lace.</p> + +<p>The red came up again, and she lost the whole of that +stake. “Come away,” she said. “Come +with me a little--we are old friends, are we not, +dear Mr. Sedley?”</p> + +<p>And Mr. Kirsch having lost all his money by this time, +followed his master out into the moonlight, where +the illuminations were winking out and the transparency +over our mission was scarcely visible.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXIV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">A Vagabond Chapter</h4> + +<p>We must pass over a part of Mrs. Rebecca Crawley’s +biography with that lightness and delicacy which the +world demands--the moral world, that has, perhaps, +no particular objection to vice, but an insuperable +repugnance to hearing vice called by its proper name. +There are things we do and know perfectly well in Vanity +Fair, though we never speak of them: as the Ahrimanians +worship the devil, but don’t mention him: and +a polite public will no more bear to read an authentic +description of vice than a truly refined English or +American female will permit the word breeches to be +pronounced in her chaste hearing. And yet, madam, +both are walking the world before our faces every +day, without much shocking us. If you were to blush +every time they went by, what complexions you would +have! It is only when their naughty names are called +out that your modesty has any occasion to show alarm +or sense of outrage, and it has been the wish of the +present writer, all through this story, deferentially +to submit to the fashion at present prevailing, and +only to hint at the existence of wickedness in a light, +easy, and agreeable manner, so that nobody’s +fine feelings may be offended. I defy any one to +say that our Becky, who has certainly some vices, +has not been presented to the public in a perfectly +genteel and inoffensive manner. In describing this +Siren, singing and smiling, coaxing and cajoling, +the author, with modest pride, asks his readers all +round, has he once forgotten the laws of politeness, +and showed the monster’s hideous tail above +water? No! Those who like may peep down under waves +that are pretty transparent and see it writhing and +twirling, diabolically hideous and slimy, flapping +amongst bones, or curling round corpses; but above +the waterline, I ask, has not everything been proper, +agreeable, and decorous, and has any the most squeamish +immoralist in Vanity Fair a right to cry fie? When, +however, the Siren disappears and dives below, down +among the dead men, the water of course grows turbid +over her, and it is labour lost to look into it ever +so curiously. They look pretty enough when they sit +upon a rock, twanging their harps and combing their +hair, and sing, and beckon to you to come and hold +the looking-glass; but when they sink into their native +element, depend on it, those mermaids are about no +good, and we had best not examine the fiendish marine +cannibals, revelling and feasting on their wretched +pickled victims. And so, when Becky is out of the +way, be sure that she is not particularly well employed, +and that the less that is said about her doings is +in fact the better.</p> + +<p>If we were to give a full account of her proceedings +during a couple of years that followed after the Curzon +Street catastrophe, there might be some reason for +people to say this book was improper. The actions +of very vain, heartless, pleasure-seeking people are +very often improper (as are many of yours, my friend +with the grave face and spotless reputation--but that +is merely by the way); and what are those of a woman +without faith--or love--or character? And I am inclined +to think that there was a period in Mrs Becky’s +life when she was seized, not by remorse, but by a +kind of despair, and absolutely neglected her person +and did not even care for her reputation.</p> + +<p>This abattement and degradation did not take place +all at once; it was brought about by degrees, after +her calamity, and after many struggles to keep up--as +a man who goes overboard hangs on to a spar whilst +any hope is left, and then flings it away and goes +down, when he finds that struggling is in vain.</p> + +<p>She lingered about London whilst her husband was making +preparations for his departure to his seat of government, +and it is believed made more than one attempt to see +her brother-in-law, Sir Pitt Crawley, and to work +upon his feelings, which she had almost enlisted in +her favour. As Sir Pitt and Mr. Wenham were walking +down to the House of Commons, the latter spied Mrs. +Rawdon in a black veil, and lurking near the palace +of the legislature. She sneaked away when her eyes +met those of Wenham, and indeed never succeeded in +her designs upon the Baronet.</p> + +<p>Probably Lady Jane interposed. I have heard that +she quite astonished her husband by the spirit which +she exhibited in this quarrel, and her determination +to disown Mrs. Becky. Of her own movement, she invited +Rawdon to come and stop in Gaunt Street until his +departure for Coventry Island, knowing that with him +for a guard Mrs. Becky would not try to force her +door; and she looked curiously at the superscriptions +of all the letters which arrived for Sir Pitt, lest +he and his sister-in-law should be corresponding. +Not but that Rebecca could have written had she a +mind, but she did not try to see or to write to Pitt +at his own house, and after one or two attempts consented +to his demand that the correspondence regarding her +conjugal differences should be carried on by lawyers +only.</p> + +<p>The fact was that Pitt’s mind had been poisoned +against her. A short time after Lord Steyne’s +accident Wenham had been with the Baronet and given +him such a biography of Mrs. Becky as had astonished +the member for Queen’s Crawley. He knew everything +regarding her: who her father was; in what year her +mother danced at the opera; what had been her previous +history; and what her conduct during her married life--as +I have no doubt that the greater part of the story +was false and dictated by interested malevolence, it +shall not be repeated here. But Becky was left with +a sad sad reputation in the esteem of a country gentleman +and relative who had been once rather partial to her.</p> + +<p>The revenues of the Governor of Coventry Island are +not large. A part of them were set aside by his Excellency +for the payment of certain outstanding debts and liabilities, +the charges incident on his high situation required +considerable expense; finally, it was found that he +could not spare to his wife more than three hundred +pounds a year, which he proposed to pay to her on an +undertaking that she would never trouble him. Otherwise, +scandal, separation, Doctors’ Commons would +ensue. But it was Mr. Wenham’s business, Lord +Steyne’s business, Rawdon’s, everybody’s--to +get her out of the country, and hush up a most disagreeable +affair.</p> + +<p>She was probably so much occupied in arranging these +affairs of business with her husband’s lawyers +that she forgot to take any step whatever about her +son, the little Rawdon, and did not even once propose +to go and see him. That young gentleman was consigned +to the entire guardianship of his aunt and uncle, +the former of whom had always possessed a great share +of the child’s affection. His mamma wrote him +a neat letter from Boulogne, when she quitted England, +in which she requested him to mind his book, and said +she was going to take a Continental tour, during which +she would have the pleasure of writing to him again. + But she never did for a year afterwards, and not, +indeed, until Sir Pitt’s only boy, always sickly, +died of hooping-cough and measles--then Rawdon’s +mamma wrote the most affectionate composition to her +darling son, who was made heir of Queen’s Crawley +by this accident, and drawn more closely than ever +to the kind lady, whose tender heart had already adopted +him. Rawdon Crawley, then grown a tall, fine lad, +blushed when he got the letter. “Oh, Aunt Jane, +you are my mother!” he said; “and not--and +not that one.” But he wrote back a kind and respectful +letter to Mrs. Rebecca, then living at a boarding-house +at Florence. But we are advancing matters.</p> + +<p>Our darling Becky’s first flight was not very +far. She perched upon the French coast at Boulogne, +that refuge of so much exiled English innocence, and +there lived in rather a genteel, widowed manner, with +a femme de chambre and a couple of rooms, at an hotel. + She dined at the table d’hote, where people +thought her very pleasant, and where she entertained +her neighbours by stories of her brother, Sir Pitt, +and her great London acquaintance, talking that easy, +fashionable slip-slop which has so much effect upon +certain folks of small breeding. She passed with +many of them for a person of importance; she gave +little tea-parties in her private room and shared in +the innocent amusements of the place in sea-bathing, +and in jaunts in open carriages, in strolls on the +sands, and in visits to the play. Mrs. Burjoice, the +printer’s lady, who was boarding with her family +at the hotel for the summer, and to whom her Burjoice +came of a Saturday and Sunday, voted her charming, +until that little rogue of a Burjoice began to pay +her too much attention. But there was nothing in +the story, only that Becky was always affable, easy, +and good-natured--and with men especially.</p> + +<p>Numbers of people were going abroad as usual at the +end of the season, and Becky had plenty of opportunities +of finding out by the behaviour of her acquaintances +of the great London world the opinion of “society” +as regarded her conduct. One day it was Lady Partlet +and her daughters whom Becky confronted as she was +walking modestly on Boulogne pier, the cliffs of Albion +shining in the distance across the deep blue sea. + Lady Partlet marshalled all her daughters round her +with a sweep of her parasol and retreated from the +pier, darting savage glances at poor little Becky +who stood alone there.</p> + +<p>On another day the packet came in. It had been blowing +fresh, and it always suited Becky’s humour to +see the droll woe-begone faces of the people as they +emerged from the boat. Lady Slingstone happened to +be on board this day. Her ladyship had been exceedingly +ill in her carriage, and was greatly exhausted and +scarcely fit to walk up the plank from the ship to +the pier. But all her energies rallied the instant +she saw Becky smiling roguishly under a pink bonnet, +and giving her a glance of scorn such as would have +shrivelled up most women, she walked into the Custom +House quite unsupported. Becky only laughed: but +I don’t think she liked it. She felt she was +alone, quite alone, and the far-off shining cliffs +of England were impassable to her.</p> + +<p>The behaviour of the men had undergone too I don’t +know what change. Grinstone showed his teeth and laughed +in her face with a familiarity that was not pleasant. +Little Bob Suckling, who was cap in hand to her three +months before, and would walk a mile in the rain to +see for her carriage in the line at Gaunt House, was +talking to Fitzoof of the Guards (Lord Heehaw’s +son) one day upon the jetty, as Becky took her walk +there. Little Bobby nodded to her over his shoulder, +without moving his hat, and continued his conversation +with the heir of Heehaw. Tom Raikes tried to walk +into her sitting-room at the inn with a cigar in +his mouth, but she closed the door upon him, and would +have locked it, only that his fingers were inside. + She began to feel that she was very lonely indeed. + “If <i>he’d</i> been here,” she said, +“those cowards would never have dared to insult +me.” She thought about “him” with +great sadness and perhaps longing--about his honest, +stupid, constant kindness and fidelity; his never-ceasing +obedience; his good humour; his bravery and courage. + Very likely she cried, for she was particularly lively, +and had put on a little extra rouge, when she came +down to dinner.</p> + +<p>She rouged regularly now; and--and her maid got Cognac +for her besides that which was charged in the hotel +bill.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the insults of the men were not, however, +so intolerable to her as the sympathy of certain women. +Mrs. Crackenbury and Mrs. Washington White passed +through Boulogne on their way to Switzerland. The +party were protected by Colonel Horner, young Beaumoris, +and of course old Crackenbury, and Mrs. White’s +little girl. <i>They</i> did not avoid her. They giggled, +cackled, tattled, condoled, consoled, and patronized +her until they drove her almost wild with rage. To +be patronized by <i>them</i>! she thought, as they went +away simpering after kissing her. And she heard Beaumoris’s +laugh ringing on the stair and knew quite well how +to interpret his hilarity.</p> + +<p>It was after this visit that Becky, who had paid her +weekly bills, Becky who had made herself agreeable +to everybody in the house, who smiled at the landlady, +called the waiters “monsieur,” and paid +the chambermaids in politeness and apologies, what +far more than compensated for a little niggardliness +in point of money (of which Becky never was free), +that Becky, we say, received a notice to quit from +the landlord, who had been told by some one that she +was quite an unfit person to have at his hotel, where +English ladies would not sit down with her. And she +was forced to fly into lodgings of which the dulness +and solitude were most wearisome to her.</p> + +<p>Still she held up, in spite of these rebuffs, and +tried to make a character for herself and conquer +scandal. She went to church very regularly and sang +louder than anybody there. She took up the cause +of the widows of the shipwrecked fishermen, and gave +work and drawings for the Quashyboo Mission; she subscribed +to the Assembly and <i>wouldn’t</i> waltz. In +a word, she did everything that was respectable, and +that is why we dwell upon this part of her career +with more fondness than upon subsequent parts of her +history, which are not so pleasant. She saw people +avoiding her, and still laboriously smiled upon them; +you never could suppose from her countenance what +pangs of humiliation she might be enduring inwardly.</p> + +<p>Her history was after all a mystery. Parties were +divided about her. Some people who took the trouble +to busy themselves in the matter said that she was +the criminal, whilst others vowed that she was as +innocent as a lamb and that her odious husband was +in fault. She won over a good many by bursting into +tears about her boy and exhibiting the most frantic +grief when his name was mentioned, or she saw anybody +like him. She gained good Mrs. Alderney’s heart +in that way, who was rather the Queen of British Boulogne +and gave the most dinners and balls of all the residents +there, by weeping when Master Alderney came from Dr. +Swishtail’s academy to pass his holidays with +his mother. “He and her Rawdon were of the same +age, and so like,” Becky said in a voice choking +with agony; whereas there was five years’ difference +between the boys’ ages, and no more likeness +between them than between my respected reader and his +humble servant. Wenham, when he was going abroad, +on his way to Kissingen to join Lord Steyne, enlightened +Mrs. Alderney on this point and told her how he was +much more able to describe little Rawdon than his +mamma, who notoriously hated him and never saw him; +how he was thirteen years old, while little Alderney +was but nine, fair, while the other darling was dark--in +a word, caused the lady in question to repent of her +good humour.</p> + +<p>Whenever Becky made a little circle for herself with +incredible toils and labour, somebody came and swept +it down rudely, and she had all her work to begin +over again. It was very hard; very hard; lonely and +disheartening.</p> + +<p>There was Mrs. Newbright, who took her up for some +time, attracted by the sweetness of her singing at +church and by her proper views upon serious subjects, +concerning which in former days, at Queen’s +Crawley, Mrs. Becky had had a good deal of instruction. + Well, she not only took tracts, but she read them. + She worked flannel petticoats for the Quashyboos--cotton +night-caps for the Cocoanut Indians--painted handscreens +for the conversion of the Pope and the Jews--sat under +Mr. Rowls on Wednesdays, Mr. Huggleton on Thursdays, +attended two Sunday services at church, besides Mr. +Bawler, the Darbyite, in the evening, and all in vain. + Mrs. Newbright had occasion to correspond with the +Countess of Southdown about the Warmingpan Fund for +the Fiji Islanders (for the management of which admirable +charity both these ladies formed part of a female +committee), and having mentioned her “sweet friend,” +Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, the Dowager Countess wrote back +such a letter regarding Becky, with such particulars, +hints, facts, falsehoods, and general comminations, +that intimacy between Mrs. Newbright and Mrs. Crawley +ceased forthwith, and all the serious world of Tours, +where this misfortune took place, immediately parted +company with the reprobate. Those who know the English +Colonies abroad know that we carry with us us our +pride, pills, prejudices, Harvey-sauces, cayenne-peppers, +and other Lares, making a little Britain wherever +we settle down.</p> + +<p>From one colony to another Becky fled uneasily. From +Boulogne to Dieppe, from Dieppe to Caen, from Caen +to Tours--trying with all her might to be respectable, +and alas! always found out some day or other and +pecked out of the cage by the real daws.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Hook Eagles took her up at one of these places--a +woman without a blemish in her character and a house +in Portman Square. She was staying at the hotel at +Dieppe, whither Becky fled, and they made each other’s +acquaintance first at sea, where they were swimming +together, and subsequently at the table d’hote +of the hotel. Mrs Eagles had heard--who indeed had +not?--some of the scandal of the Steyne affair; but +after a conversation with Becky, she pronounced that +Mrs. Crawley was an angel, her husband a ruffian, Lord +Steyne an unprincipled wretch, as everybody knew, +and the whole case against Mrs. Crawley an infamous +and wicked conspiracy of that rascal Wenham. “If +you were a man of any spirit, Mr. Eagles, you would +box the wretch’s ears the next time you see him +at the Club,” she said to her husband. But +Eagles was only a quiet old gentleman, husband to +Mrs. Eagles, with a taste for geology, and not tall +enough to reach anybody’s ears.</p> + +<p>The Eagles then patronized Mrs. Rawdon, took her to +live with her at her own house at Paris, quarrelled +with the ambassador’s wife because she would +not receive her protegee, and did all that lay in +woman’s power to keep Becky straight in the paths +of virtue and good repute.</p> + +<p>Becky was very respectable and orderly at first, but +the life of humdrum virtue grew utterly tedious to +her before long. It was the same routine every day, +the same dulness and comfort, the same drive over +the same stupid Bois de Boulogne, the same company +of an evening, the same Blair’s Sermon of a +Sunday night--the same opera always being acted over +and over again; Becky was dying of weariness, when, +luckily for her, young Mr. Eagles came from Cambridge, +and his mother, seeing the impression which her little +friend made upon him, straightway gave Becky warning.</p> + +<p>Then she tried keeping house with a female friend; +then the double menage began to quarrel and get into +debt. Then she determined upon a boarding-house existence +and lived for some time at that famous mansion kept +by Madame de Saint Amour, in the Rue Royale, at Paris, +where she began exercising her graces and fascinations +upon the shabby dandies and fly-blown beauties who +frequented her landlady’s salons. Becky loved +society and, indeed, could no more exist without it +than an opium-eater without his dram, and she was happy +enough at the period of her boarding-house life. “The +women here are as amusing as those in May Fair,” +she told an old London friend who met her, “only, +their dresses are not quite so fresh. The men wear +cleaned gloves, and are sad rogues, certainly, but +they are not worse than Jack This and Tom That. The +mistress of the house is a little vulgar, but I don’t +think she is so vulgar as Lady --” and here +she named the name of a great leader of fashion that +I would die rather than reveal. In fact, when you +saw Madame de Saint Amour’s rooms lighted up +of a night, men with plaques and cordons at the ecarte +tables, and the women at a little distance, you might +fancy yourself for a while in good society, and that +Madame was a real Countess. Many people did so fancy, +and Becky was for a while one of the most dashing +ladies of the Countess’s salons.</p> + +<p>But it is probable that her old creditors of 1815 +found her out and caused her to leave Paris, for the +poor little woman was forced to fly from the city +rather suddenly, and went thence to Brussels.</p> + +<p>How well she remembered the place! She grinned as +she looked up at the little entresol which she had +occupied, and thought of the Bareacres family, bawling +for horses and flight, as their carriage stood in +the porte-cochere of the hotel. She went to Waterloo +and to Laeken, where George Osborne’s monument +much struck her. She made a little sketch of it. + “That poor Cupid!” she said; “how +dreadfully he was in love with me, and what a fool +he was! I wonder whether little Emmy is alive. It +was a good little creature; and that fat brother of +hers. I have his funny fat picture still among my +papers. They were kind simple people.”</p> + +<p>At Brussels Becky arrived, recommended by Madame de +Saint Amour to her friend, Madame la Comtesse de Borodino, +widow of Napoleon’s General, the famous Count +de Borodino, who was left with no resource by the +deceased hero but that of a table d’hote and +an ecarte table. Second-rate dandies and roues, widow-ladies +who always have a lawsuit, and very simple English +folks, who fancy they see “Continental society” +at these houses, put down their money, or ate their +meals, at Madame de Borodino’s tables. The gallant +young fellows treated the company round to champagne +at the table d’hote, rode out with the women, +or hired horses on country excursions, clubbed money +to take boxes at the play or the opera, betted over +the fair shoulders of the ladies at the ecarte tables, +and wrote home to their parents in Devonshire about +their felicitous introduction to foreign society.</p> + +<p>Here, as at Paris, Becky was a boarding-house queen, +and ruled in select pensions. She never refused the +champagne, or the bouquets, or the drives into the +country, or the private boxes; but what she preferred +was the ecarte at night,--and she played audaciously. +First she played only for a little, then for five-franc +pieces, then for Napoleons, then for notes: then +she would not be able to pay her month’s pension: + then she borrowed from the young gentlemen: then +she got into cash again and bullied Madame de Borodino, +whom she had coaxed and wheedled before: then she +was playing for ten sous at a time, and in a dire +state of poverty: then her quarter’s allowance +would come in, and she would pay off Madame de Borodino’s +score and would once more take the cards against Monsieur +de Rossignol, or the Chevalier de Raff.</p> + +<p>When Becky left Brussels, the sad truth is that she +owed three months’ pension to Madame de Borodino, +of which fact, and of the gambling, and of the drinking, +and of the going down on her knees to the Reverend +Mr. Muff, Ministre Anglican, and borrowing money of +him, and of her coaxing and flirting with Milor Noodle, +son of Sir Noodle, pupil of the Rev. Mr. Muff, whom +she used to take into her private room, and of whom +she won large sums at ecarte--of which fact, I say, +and of a hundred of her other knaveries, the Countess +de Borodino informs every English person who stops +at her establishment, and announces that Madame Rawdon +was no better than a vipere.</p> + +<p>So our little wanderer went about setting up her tent +in various cities of Europe, as restless as Ulysses +or Bampfylde Moore Carew. Her taste for disrespectability +grew more and more remarkable. She became a perfect +Bohemian ere long, herding with people whom it would +make your hair stand on end to meet.</p> + +<p>There is no town of any mark in Europe but it has +its little colony of English raffs--men whose names +Mr. Hemp the officer reads out periodically at the +Sheriffs’ Court--young gentlemen of very good +family often, only that the latter disowns them; frequenters +of billiard-rooms and estaminets, patrons of foreign +races and gaming-tables. They people the debtors’ +prisons--they drink and swagger-- they fight and brawl--they +run away without paying--they have duels with French +and German officers--they cheat Mr. Spooney at ecarte-- +they get the money and drive off to Baden in magnificent +britzkas-- they try their infallible martingale and +lurk about the tables with empty pockets, shabby bullies, +penniless bucks, until they can swindle a Jew banker +with a sham bill of exchange, or find another Mr. +Spooney to rob. The alternations of splendour and misery +which these people undergo are very queer to view. + Their life must be one of great excitement. Becky--must +it be owned?--took to this life, and took to it not +unkindly. She went about from town to town among +these Bohemians. The lucky Mrs. Rawdon was known at +every play-table in Germany. She and Madame de Cruchecassee +kept house at Florence together. It is said she was +ordered out of Munich, and my friend Mr. Frederick +Pigeon avers that it was at her house at Lausanne +that he was hocussed at supper and lost eight hundred +pounds to Major Loder and the Honourable Mr. Deuceace. + We are bound, you see, to give some account of Becky’s +biography, but of this part, the less, perhaps, that +is said the better.</p> + +<p>They say that, when Mrs. Crawley was particularly +down on her luck, she gave concerts and lessons in +music here and there. There was a Madame de Raudon, +who certainly had a matinee musicale at Wildbad, accompanied +by Herr Spoff, premier pianist to the Hospodar of +Wallachia, and my little friend Mr. Eaves, who knew +everybody and had travelled everywhere, always used +to declare that he was at Strasburg in the year 1830, +when a certain Madame Rebecque made her appearance +in the opera of the Dame Blanche, giving occasion to +a furious row in the theatre there. She was hissed +off the stage by the audience, partly from her own +incompetency, but chiefly from the ill-advised sympathy +of some persons in the parquet, (where the officers +of the garrison had their admissions); and Eaves was +certain that the unfortunate debutante in question +was no other than Mrs. Rawdon Crawley.</p> + +<p>She was, in fact, no better than a vagabond upon this +earth. When she got her money she gambled; when she +had gambled it she was put to shifts to live; who +knows how or by what means she succeeded? It is said +that she was once seen at St. Petersburg, but was +summarily dismissed from that capital by the police, +so that there cannot be any possibility of truth in +the report that she was a Russian spy at Toplitz and +Vienna afterwards. I have even been informed that +at Paris she discovered a relation of her own, no +less a person than her maternal grandmother, who was +not by any means a Montmorenci, but a hideous old +box-opener at a theatre on the Boulevards. The meeting +between them, of which other persons, as it is hinted +elsewhere, seem to have been acquainted, must have +been a very affecting interview. The present historian +can give no certain details regarding the event.</p> + +<p>It happened at Rome once that Mrs. de Rawdon’s +half-year’s salary had just been paid into the +principal banker’s there, and, as everybody +who had a balance of above five hundred scudi was invited +to the balls which this prince of merchants gave during +the winter, Becky had the honour of a card, and appeared +at one of the Prince and Princess Polonia’s +splendid evening entertainments. The Princess was +of the family of Pompili, lineally descended from the +second king of Rome, and Egeria of the house of Olympus, +while the Prince’s grandfather, Alessandro Polonia, +sold wash-balls, essences, tobacco, and pocket-handkerchiefs, +ran errands for gentlemen, and lent money in a small +way. All the great company in Rome thronged to his +saloons--Princes, Dukes, Ambassadors, artists, fiddlers, +monsignori, young bears with their leaders--every +rank and condition of man. His halls blazed with light +and magnificence; were resplendent with gilt frames +(containing pictures), and dubious antiques; and the +enormous gilt crown and arms of the princely owner, +a gold mushroom on a crimson field (the colour of +the pocket-handkerchiefs which he sold), and the silver +fountain of the Pompili family shone all over the +roof, doors, and panels of the house, and over the +grand velvet baldaquins prepared to receive Popes +and Emperors.</p> + +<p>So Becky, who had arrived in the diligence from Florence, +and was lodged at an inn in a very modest way, got +a card for Prince Polonia’s entertainment, and +her maid dressed her with unusual care, and she went +to this fine ball leaning on the arm of Major Loder, +with whom she happened to be travelling at the time--(the +same man who shot Prince Ravoli at Naples the next +year, and was caned by Sir John Buckskin for carrying +four kings in his hat besides those which he used +in playing at ecarte )--and this pair went into the +rooms together, and Becky saw a number of old faces +which she remembered in happier days, when she was +not innocent, but not found out. Major Loder knew +a great number of foreigners, keen-looking whiskered +men with dirty striped ribbons in their buttonholes, +and a very small display of linen; but his own countrymen, +it might be remarked, eschewed the Major. Becky, +too, knew some ladies here and there--French widows, +dubious Italian countesses, whose husbands had treated +them ill--faugh--what shall we say, we who have moved +among some of the finest company of Vanity Fair, of +this refuse and sediment of rascals? If we play, let +it be with clean cards, and not with this dirty pack. + But every man who has formed one of the innumerable +army of travellers has seen these marauding irregulars +hanging on, like Nym and Pistol, to the main force, +wearing the king’s colours and boasting of his +commission, but pillaging for themselves, and occasionally +gibbeted by the roadside.</p> + +<p>Well, she was hanging on the arm of Major Loder, and +they went through the rooms together, and drank a +great quantity of champagne at the buffet, where the +people, and especially the Major’s irregular +corps, struggled furiously for refreshments, of which +when the pair had had enough, they pushed on until +they reached the Duchess’s own pink velvet saloon, +at the end of the suite of apartments (where the statue +of the Venus is, and the great Venice looking-glasses, +framed in silver), and where the princely family were +entertaining their most distinguished guests at a round +table at supper. It was just such a little select +banquet as that of which Becky recollected that she +had partaken at Lord Steyne’s--and there he +sat at Polonia’s table, and she saw him. The +scar cut by the diamond on his white, bald, shining +forehead made a burning red mark; his red whiskers +were dyed of a purple hue, which made his pale face +look still paler. He wore his collar and orders, his +blue ribbon and garter. He was a greater Prince than +any there, though there was a reigning Duke and a +Royal Highness, with their princesses, and near his +Lordship was seated the beautiful Countess of Belladonna, +nee de Glandier, whose husband (the Count Paolo della +Belladonna), so well known for his brilliant entomological +collections, had been long absent on a mission to the +Emperor of Morocco.</p> + +<p>When Becky beheld that familiar and illustrious face, +how vulgar all of a sudden did Major Loder appear +to her, and how that odious Captain Rook did smell +of tobacco! In one instant she reassumed her fine-ladyship +and tried to look and feel as if she were in May Fair +once more. “That woman looks stupid and ill-humoured,” +she thought; “I am sure she can’t amuse +him. No, he must be bored by her--he never was by +me.” A hundred such touching hopes, fears, and +memories palpitated in her little heart, as she looked +with her brightest eyes (the rouge which she wore +up to her eyelids made them twinkle) towards the great +nobleman. Of a Star and Garter night Lord Steyne +used also to put on his grandest manner and to look +and speak like a great prince, as he was. Becky admired +him smiling sumptuously, easy, lofty, and stately. + Ah, bon Dieu, what a pleasant companion he was, what +a brilliant wit, what a rich fund of talk, what a grand +manner!--and she had exchanged this for Major Loder, +reeking of cigars and brandy-and-water, and Captain +Rook with his horsejockey jokes and prize-ring slang, +and their like. “I wonder whether he will know +me,” she thought. Lord Steyne was talking and +laughing with a great and illustrious lady at his +side, when he looked up and saw Becky.</p> + +<p>She was all over in a flutter as their eyes met, and +she put on the very best smile she could muster, and +dropped him a little, timid, imploring curtsey. He +stared aghast at her for a minute, as Macbeth might +on beholding Banquo’s sudden appearance at his +ball-supper, and remained looking at her with open +mouth, when that horrid Major Loder pulled her away.</p> + +<p>“Come away into the supper-room, Mrs. R.,” +was that gentleman’s remark: “seeing +these nobs grubbing away has made me peckish too. +Let’s go and try the old governor’s champagne.” +Becky thought the Major had had a great deal too much +already.</p> + +<p>The day after she went to walk on the Pincian Hill--the +Hyde Park of the Roman idlers--possibly in hopes to +have another sight of Lord Steyne. But she met another +acquaintance there: it was Mr. Fiche, his lordship’s +confidential man, who came up nodding to her rather +familiarly and putting a finger to his hat. “I +knew that Madame was here,” he said; “I +followed her from her hotel. I have some advice to +give Madame.”</p> + +<p>“From the Marquis of Steyne?” Becky asked, +resuming as much of her dignity as she could muster, +and not a little agitated by hope and expectation.</p> + +<p>“No,” said the valet; “it is from +me. Rome is very unwholesome.”</p> + +<p>“Not at this season, Monsieur Fiche--not till +after Easter.”</p> + +<p>“I tell Madame it is unwholesome now. There +is always malaria for some people. That cursed marsh +wind kills many at all seasons. Look, Madame Crawley, +you were always bon enfant, and I have an interest +in you, parole d’honneur. Be warned. Go away +from Rome, I tell you--or you will be ill and die.”</p> + +<p>Becky laughed, though in rage and fury. “What! +assassinate poor little me?” she said. “How +romantic! Does my lord carry bravos for couriers, +and stilettos in the fourgons? Bah! I will stay, if +but to plague him. I have those who will defend me +whilst I am here.”</p> + +<p>It was Monsieur Fiche’s turn to laugh now. +“Defend you,” he said, “and who? +The Major, the Captain, any one of those gambling men +whom Madame sees would take her life for a hundred +louis. We know things about Major Loder (he is no +more a Major than I am my Lord the Marquis) which +would send him to the galleys or worse. We know everything +and have friends everywhere. We know whom you saw at +Paris, and what relations you found there. Yes, Madame +may stare, but we do. How was it that no minister +on the Continent would receive Madame? She has offended +somebody: who never forgives-- whose rage redoubled +when he saw you. He was like a madman last night +when he came home. Madame de Belladonna made him a +scene about you and fired off in one of her furies.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, it was Madame de Belladonna, was it?” +Becky said, relieved a little, for the information +she had just got had scared her.</p> + +<p>“No--she does not matter--she is always jealous. + I tell you it was Monseigneur. You did wrong to +show yourself to him. And if you stay here you will +repent it. Mark my words. Go. Here is my lord’s +carriage"--and seizing Becky’s arm, he rushed +down an alley of the garden as Lord Steyne’s +barouche, blazing with heraldic devices, came whirling +along the avenue, borne by the almost priceless horses, +and bearing Madame de Belladonna lolling on the cushions, +dark, sulky, and blooming, a King Charles in her lap, +a white parasol swaying over her head, and old Steyne +stretched at her side with a livid face and ghastly +eyes. Hate, or anger, or desire caused them to brighten +now and then still, but ordinarily, they gave no light, +and seemed tired of looking out on a world of which +almost all the pleasure and all the best beauty had +palled upon the worn-out wicked old man.</p> + +<p>“Monseigneur has never recovered the shock of +that night, never,” Monsieur Fiche whispered +to Mrs. Crawley as the carriage flashed by, and she +peeped out at it from behind the shrubs that hid her. + “That was a consolation at any rate,” +Becky thought.</p> + +<p>Whether my lord really had murderous intentions towards +Mrs. Becky as Monsieur Fiche said (since Monseigneur’s +death he has returned to his native country, where +he lives much respected, and has purchased from his +Prince the title of Baron Ficci), and the factotum +objected to have to do with assassination; or whether +he simply had a commission to frighten Mrs. Crawley +out of a city where his Lordship proposed to pass +the winter, and the sight of her would be eminently +disagreeable to the great nobleman, is a point which +has never been ascertained: but the threat had its +effect upon the little woman, and she sought no more +to intrude herself upon the presence of her old patron.</p> + +<p>Everybody knows the melancholy end of that nobleman, +which befell at Naples two months after the French +Revolution of 1830; when the Most Honourable George +Gustavus, Marquis of Steyne, Earl of Gaunt and of +Gaunt Castle, in the Peerage of Ireland, Viscount Hellborough, +Baron Pitchley and Grillsby, a Knight of the Most +Noble Order of the Garter, of the Golden Fleece of +Spain, of the Russian Order of Saint Nicholas of the +First Class, of the Turkish Order of the Crescent, +First Lord of the Powder Closet and Groom of the Back +Stairs, Colonel of the Gaunt or Regent’s Own +Regiment of Militia, a Trustee of the British Museum, +an Elder Brother of the Trinity House, a Governor +of the White Friars, and D.C.L.--died after a series +of fits brought on, as the papers said, by the shock +occasioned to his lordship’s sensibilities by +the downfall of the ancient French monarchy.</p> + +<p>An eloquent catalogue appeared in a weekly print, +describing his virtues, his magnificence, his talents, +and his good actions. His sensibility, his attachment +to the illustrious House of Bourbon, with which he +claimed an alliance, were such that he could not survive +the misfortunes of his august kinsmen. His body was +buried at Naples, and his heart--that heart which +always beat with every generous and noble emotion +was brought back to Castle Gaunt in a silver urn. + “In him,” Mr. Wagg said, “the poor +and the Fine Arts have lost a beneficent patron, society +one of its most brilliant ornaments, and England one +of her loftiest patriots and statesmen,” &c., +&c.</p> + +<p>His will was a good deal disputed, and an attempt +was made to force from Madame de Belladonna the celebrated +jewel called the “Jew’s-eye” diamond, +which his lordship always wore on his forefinger, and +which it was said that she removed from it after his +lamented demise. But his confidential friend and attendant, +Monsieur Fiche proved that the ring had been presented +to the said Madame de Belladonna two days before the +Marquis’s death, as were the bank-notes, jewels, +Neapolitan and French bonds, &c., found in his lordship’s +secretaire and claimed by his heirs from that injured +woman.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXV</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Full of Business and Pleasure</h4> + +<p>The day after the meeting at the play-table, Jos had +himself arrayed with unusual care and splendour, and +without thinking it necessary to say a word to any +member of his family regarding the occurrences of +the previous night, or asking for their company in +his walk, he sallied forth at an early hour, and was +presently seen making inquiries at the door of the +Elephant Hotel. In consequence of the fetes the house +was full of company, the tables in the street were +already surrounded by persons smoking and drinking +the national small-beer, the public rooms were in +a cloud of smoke, and Mr. Jos having, in his pompous +way, and with his clumsy German, made inquiries for +the person of whom he was in search, was directed to +the very top of the house, above the first-floor rooms +where some travelling pedlars had lived, and were +exhibiting their jewellery and brocades; above the +second-floor apartments occupied by the etat major +of the gambling firm; above the third-floor rooms, +tenanted by the band of renowned Bohemian vaulters +and tumblers; and so on to the little cabins of the +roof, where, among students, bagmen, small tradesmen, +and country-folks come in for the festival, Becky had +found a little nest--as dirty a little refuge as ever +beauty lay hid in.</p> + +<p>Becky liked the life. She was at home with everybody +in the place, pedlars, punters, tumblers, students +and all. She was of a wild, roving nature, inherited +from father and mother, who were both Bohemians, by +taste and circumstance; if a lord was not by, she +would talk to his courier with the greatest pleasure; +the din, the stir, the drink, the smoke, the tattle +of the Hebrew pedlars, the solemn, braggart ways of +the poor tumblers, the sournois talk of the gambling-table +officials, the songs and swagger of the students, and +the general buzz and hum of the place had pleased and +tickled the little woman, even when her luck was down +and she had not wherewithal to pay her bill. How +pleasant was all the bustle to her now that her purse +was full of the money which little Georgy had won +for her the night before!</p> + +<p>As Jos came creaking and puffing up the final stairs, +and was speechless when he got to the landing, and +began to wipe his face and then to look for No. 92, +the room where he was directed to seek for the person +he wanted, the door of the opposite chamber, No. 90, +was open, and a student, in jack-boots and a dirty +schlafrock, was lying on the bed smoking a long pipe; +whilst another student in long yellow hair and a braided +coat, exceeding smart and dirty too, was actually +on his knees at No. 92, bawling through the keyhole +supplications to the person within.</p> + +<p>“Go away,” said a well-known voice, which +made Jos thrill, “I expect somebody; I expect +my grandpapa. He mustn’t see you there.”</p> + +<p>“Angel Englanderinn!” bellowed the kneeling +student with the whity-brown ringlets and the large +finger-ring, “do take compassion upon us. Make +an appointment. Dine with me and Fritz at the inn in +the park. We will have roast pheasants and porter, +plum-pudding and French wine. We shall die if you +don’t.”</p> + +<p>“That we will,” said the young nobleman +on the bed; and this colloquy Jos overheard, though +he did not comprehend it, for the reason that he had +never studied the language in which it was carried +on.</p> + +<p>“Newmero kattervang dooze, si vous plait,” +Jos said in his grandest manner, when he was able +to speak.</p> + +<p>“Quater fang tooce!” said the student, +starting up, and he bounced into his own room, where +he locked the door, and where Jos heard him laughing +with his comrade on the bed.</p> + +<p>The gentleman from Bengal was standing, disconcerted +by this incident, when the door of the 92 opened of +itself and Becky’s little head peeped out full +of archness and mischief. She lighted on Jos. “It’s +you,” she said, coming out. “How I have +been waiting for you! Stop! not yet--in one minute +you shall come in.” In that instant she put +a rouge-pot, a brandy bottle, and a plate of broken +meat into the bed, gave one smooth to her hair, and +finally let in her visitor.</p> + +<p>She had, by way of morning robe, a pink domino, a +trifle faded and soiled, and marked here and there +with pomaturn; but her arms shone out from the loose +sleeves of the dress very white and fair, and it was +tied round her little waist so as not ill to set off +the trim little figure of the wearer. She led Jos +by the hand into her garret. “Come in,” +she said. “Come and talk to me. Sit yonder +on the chair”; and she gave the civilian’s +hand a little squeeze and laughingly placed him upon +it. As for herself, she placed herself on the bed--not +on the bottle and plate, you may be sure--on which +Jos might have reposed, had he chosen that seat; and +so there she sat and talked with her old admirer. + “How little years have changed you,” +she said with a look of tender interest. “I +should have known you anywhere. What a comfort it +is amongst strangers to see once more the frank honest +face of an old friend!”</p> + +<p>The frank honest face, to tell the truth, at this +moment bore any expression but one of openness and +honesty: it was, on the contrary, much perturbed +and puzzled in look. Jos was surveying the queer +little apartment in which he found his old flame. +One of her gowns hung over the bed, another depending +from a hook of the door; her bonnet obscured half +the looking-glass, on which, too, lay the prettiest +little pair of bronze boots; a French novel was on +the table by the bedside, with a candle, not of wax. + Becky thought of popping that into the bed too, but +she only put in the little paper night-cap with which +she had put the candle out on going to sleep.</p> + +<p>“I should have known you anywhere,” she +continued; “a woman never forgets some things. + And you were the first man I ever--I ever saw.”</p> + +<p>“Was I really?” said Jos. “God +bless my soul, you--you don’t say so.”</p> + +<p>“When I came with your sister from Chiswick, +I was scarcely more than a child,” Becky said. + “How is that, dear love? Oh, her husband was +a sad wicked man, and of course it was of me that the +poor dear was jealous. As if I cared about him, heigho! + when there was somebody--but no--don’t let +us talk of old times”; and she passed her handkerchief +with the tattered lace across her eyelids.</p> + +<p>“Is not this a strange place,” she continued, +“for a woman, who has lived in a very different +world too, to be found in? I have had so many griefs +and wrongs, Joseph Sedley; I have been made to suffer +so cruelly that I am almost made mad sometimes. I +can’t stay still in any place, but wander about +always restless and unhappy. All my friends have been +false to me--all. There is no such thing as an honest +man in the world. I was the truest wife that ever +lived, though I married my husband out of pique, because +somebody else--but never mind that. I was true, and +he trampled upon me and deserted me. I was the fondest +mother. I had but one child, one darling, one hope, +one joy, which I held to my heart with a mother’s +affection, which was my life, my prayer, my--my blessing; +and they-- they tore it from me--tore it from me”; +and she put her hand to her heart with a passionate +gesture of despair, burying her face for a moment +on the bed.</p> + +<p>The brandy-bottle inside clinked up against the plate +which held the cold sausage. Both were moved, no +doubt, by the exhibition of so much grief. Max and +Fritz were at the door, listening with wonder to Mrs. +Becky’s sobs and cries. Jos, too, was a good +deal frightened and affected at seeing his old flame +in this condition. And she began, forthwith, to tell +her story--a tale so neat, simple, and artless that +it was quite evident from hearing her that if ever +there was a white-robed angel escaped from heaven to +be subject to the infernal machinations and villainy +of fiends here below, that spotless being--that miserable +unsullied martyr, was present on the bed before Jos--on +the bed, sitting on the brandy-bottle.</p> + +<p>They had a very long, amicable, and confidential talk +there, in the course of which Jos Sedley was somehow +made aware (but in a manner that did not in the least +scare or offend him) that Becky’s heart had +first learned to beat at his enchanting presence; that +George Osborne had certainly paid an unjustifiable +court to <i>her</i>, which might account for Amelia’s +jealousy and their little rupture; but that Becky +never gave the least encouragement to the unfortunate +officer, and that she had never ceased to think about +Jos from the very first day she had seen him, though, +of course, her duties as a married woman were paramount--duties +which she had always preserved, and would, to her +dying day, or until the proverbially bad climate in +which Colonel Crawley was living should release her +from a yoke which his cruelty had rendered odious +to her.</p> + +<p>Jos went away, convinced that she was the most virtuous, +as she was one of the most fascinating of women, and +revolving in his mind all sorts of benevolent schemes +for her welfare. Her persecutions ought to be ended: +she ought to return to the society of which she was +an ornament. He would see what ought to be done. + She must quit that place and take a quiet lodging. + Amelia must come and see her and befriend her. He +would go and settle about it, and consult with the +Major. She wept tears of heart-felt gratitude as she +parted from him, and pressed his hand as the gallant +stout gentleman stooped down to kiss hers.</p> + +<p>So Becky bowed Jos out of her little garret with as +much grace as if it was a palace of which she did +the honours; and that heavy gentleman having disappeared +down the stairs, Max and Fritz came out of their hole, +pipe in mouth, and she amused herself by mimicking +Jos to them as she munched her cold bread and sausage +and took draughts of her favourite brandy-and-water.</p> + +<p>Jos walked over to Dobbin’s lodgings with great +solemnity and there imparted to him the affecting +history with which he had just been made acquainted, +without, however, mentioning the play business of +the night before. And the two gentlemen were laying +their heads together and consulting as to the best +means of being useful to Mrs. Becky, while she was +finishing her interrupted dejeuner a la fourchette.</p> + +<p>How was it that she had come to that little town? +How was it that she had no friends and was wandering +about alone? Little boys at school are taught in their +earliest Latin book that the path of Avernus is very +easy of descent. Let us skip over the interval in +the history of her downward progress. She was not +worse now than she had been in the days of her prosperity--only +a little down on her luck.</p> + +<p>As for Mrs. Amelia, she was a woman of such a soft +and foolish disposition that when she heard of anybody +unhappy, her heart straightway melted towards the +sufferer; and as she had never thought or done anything +mortally guilty herself, she had not that abhorrence +for wickedness which distinguishes moralists much more +knowing. If she spoiled everybody who came near her +with kindness and compliments--if she begged pardon +of all her servants for troubling them to answer the +bell--if she apologized to a shopboy who showed her +a piece of silk, or made a curtsey to a street-sweeper +with a complimentary remark upon the elegant state +of his crossing--and she was almost capable of every +one of these follies-- the notion that an old acquaintance +was miserable was sure to soften her heart; nor would +she hear of anybody’s being deservedly unhappy. +A world under such legislation as hers would not be +a very orderly place of abode; but there are not many +women, at least not of the rulers, who are of her +sort. This lady, I believe, would have abolished +all gaols, punishments, handcuffs, whippings, poverty, +sickness, hunger, in the world, and was such a mean-spirited +creature that--we are obliged to confess it--she could +even forget a mortal injury.</p> + +<p>When the Major heard from Jos of the sentimental adventure +which had just befallen the latter, he was not, it +must be owned, nearly as much interested as the gentleman +from Bengal. On the contrary, his excitement was +quite the reverse from a pleasurable one; he made use +of a brief but improper expression regarding a poor +woman in distress, saying, in fact, “The little +minx, has she come to light again?” He never +had had the slightest liking for her, but had heartily +mistrusted her from the very first moment when her +green eyes had looked at, and turned away from, his +own.</p> + +<p>“That little devil brings mischief wherever +she goes,” the Major said disrespectfully. +“Who knows what sort of life she has been leading? +And what business has she here abroad and alone? Don’t +tell me about persecutors and enemies; an honest woman +always has friends and never is separated from her +family. Why has she left her husband? He may have +been disreputable and wicked, as you say. He always +was. I remember the confounded blackleg and the way +in which he used to cheat and hoodwink poor George. + Wasn’t there a scandal about their separation? +I think I heard something,” cried out Major +Dobbin, who did not care much about gossip, and whom +Jos tried in vain to convince that Mrs. Becky was +in all respects a most injured and virtuous female.</p> + +<p>“Well, well; let’s ask Mrs. George,” +said that arch-diplomatist of a Major. “Only +let us go and consult her. I suppose you will allow +that she is a good judge at any rate, and knows what +is right in such matters.”</p> + +<p>“Hm! Emmy is very well,” said Jos, who +did not happen to be in love with his sister.</p> + +<p>“Very well? By Gad, sir, she’s the finest +lady I ever met in my life,” bounced out the +Major. “I say at once, let us go and ask her +if this woman ought to be visited or not--I will be +content with her verdict.” Now this odious, +artful rogue of a Major was thinking in his own mind +that he was sure of his case. Emmy, he remembered, +was at one time cruelly and deservedly jealous of +Rebecca, never mentioned her name but with a shrinking +and terror--a jealous woman never forgives, thought +Dobbin: and so the pair went across the street to +Mrs. George’s house, where she was contentedly +warbling at a music lesson with Madame Strumpff.</p> + +<p>When that lady took her leave, Jos opened the business +with his usual pomp of words. “Amelia, my dear,” +said he, “I have just had the most extraordinary--yes--God +bless my soul! the most extraordinary adventure--an +old friend--yes, a most interesting old friend of +yours, and I may say in old times, has just arrived +here, and I should like you to see her.”</p> + +<p>“Her!” said Amelia, “who is it? +Major Dobbin, if you please not to break my scissors.” +The Major was twirling them round by the little chain +from which they sometimes hung to their lady’s +waist, and was thereby endangering his own eye.</p> + +<p>It is a woman whom I dislike very much,” said +the Major, doggedly, “and whom you have no cause +to love.”</p> + +<p>“It is Rebecca, I’m sure it is Rebecca,” +Amelia said, blushing and being very much agitated.</p> + +<p>“You are right; you always are,” Dobbin +answered. Brussels, Waterloo, old, old times, griefs, +pangs, remembrances, rushed back into Amelia’s +gentle heart and caused a cruel agitation there.</p> + +<p>“Don’t let me see her,” Emmy continued. + “I couldn’t see her.”</p> + +<p>“I told you so,” Dobbin said to Jos.</p> + +<p>“She is very unhappy, and--and that sort of +thing,” Jos urged. “She is very poor +and unprotected, and has been ill--exceedingly ill--and +that scoundrel of a husband has deserted her.”</p> + +<p>“Ah!” said Amelia</p> + +<p>“She hasn’t a friend in the world,” +Jos went on, not undexterously, “and she said +she thought she might trust in you. She’s so +miserable, Emmy. She has been almost mad with grief. + Her story quite affected me--’pon my word and +honour, it did--never was such a cruel persecution +borne so angelically, I may say. Her family has been +most cruel to her.”</p> + +<p>“Poor creature!” Amelia said.</p> + +<p>“And if she can get no friend, she says she +thinks she’ll die,” Jos proceeded in a +low tremulous voice. “God bless my soul! do +you know that she tried to kill herself? She carries +laudanum with her-- I saw the bottle in her room--such +a miserable little room--at a third-rate house, the +Elephant, up in the roof at the top of all. I went +there.”</p> + +<p>This did not seem to affect Emmy. She even smiled +a little. Perhaps she figured Jos to herself panting +up the stair.</p> + +<p>“She’s beside herself with grief,” +he resumed. “The agonies that woman has endured +are quite frightful to hear of. She had a little +boy, of the same age as Georgy.”</p> + +<p>“Yes, yes, I think I remember,” Emmy remarked. +“Well?”</p> + +<p>“The most beautiful child ever seen,” +Jos said, who was very fat, and easily moved, and +had been touched by the story Becky told; “a +perfect angel, who adored his mother. The ruffians +tore him shrieking out of her arms, and have never +allowed him to see her.”</p> + +<p>“Dear Joseph,” Emmy cried out, starting +up at once, “let us go and see her this minute.” +And she ran into her adjoining bedchamber, tied on +her bonnet in a flutter, came out with her shawl on +her arm, and ordered Dobbin to follow.</p> + +<p>He went and put her shawl--it was a white cashmere, +consigned to her by the Major himself from India--over +her shoulders. He saw there was nothing for it but +to obey, and she put her hand into his arm, and they +went away.</p> + +<p>“It is number 92, up four pair of stairs,” +Jos said, perhaps not very willing to ascend the steps +again; but he placed himself in the window of his +drawing-room, which commands the place on which the +Elephant stands, and saw the pair marching through +the market.</p> + +<p>It was as well that Becky saw them too from her garret, +for she and the two students were chattering and laughing +there; they had been joking about the appearance of +Becky’s grandpapa--whose arrival and departure +they had witnessed--but she had time to dismiss them, +and have her little room clear before the landlord +of the Elephant, who knew that Mrs. Osborne was a +great favourite at the Serene Court, and respected +her accordingly, led the way up the stairs to the roof +story, encouraging Miladi and the Herr Major as they +achieved the ascent.</p> + +<p>“Gracious lady, gracious lady!” said the +landlord, knocking at Becky’s door; he had called +her Madame the day before, and was by no means courteous +to her.</p> + +<p>“Who is it?” Becky said, putting out her +head, and she gave a little scream. There stood Emmy +in a tremble, and Dobbin, the tall Major, with his +cane.</p> + +<p>He stood still watching, and very much interested +at the scene; but Emmy sprang forward with open arms +towards Rebecca, and forgave her at that moment, and +embraced her and kissed her with all her heart. Ah, +poor wretch, when was your lip pressed before by such +pure kisses?</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXVI</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Amantium Irae</h4> + +<p>Frankness and kindness like Amelia’s were likely +to touch even such a hardened little reprobate as +Becky. She returned Emmy’s caresses and kind +speeches with something very like gratitude, and an +emotion which, if it was not lasting, for a moment +was almost genuine. That was a lucky stroke of hers +about the child “torn from her arms shrieking.” +It was by that harrowing misfortune that Becky had +won her friend back, and it was one of the very first +points, we may be certain, upon which our poor simple +little Emmy began to talk to her new-found acquaintance.</p> + +<p>“And so they took your darling child from you?” +our simpleton cried out. “Oh, Rebecca, my poor +dear suffering friend, I know what it is to lose a +boy, and to feel for those who have lost one. But +please Heaven yours will be restored to you, as a +merciful merciful Providence has brought me back mine.”</p> + +<p>“The child, my child? Oh, yes, my agonies were +frightful,” Becky owned, not perhaps without +a twinge of conscience. It jarred upon her to be obliged +to commence instantly to tell lies in reply to so +much confidence and simplicity. But that is the misfortune +of beginning with this kind of forgery. When one +fib becomes due as it were, you must forge another +to take up the old acceptance; and so the stock of +your lies in circulation inevitably multiplies, and +the danger of detection increases every day.</p> + +<p>“My agonies,” Becky continued, “were +terrible (I hope she won’t sit down on the bottle) +when they took him away from me; I thought I should +die; but I fortunately had a brain fever, during which +my doctor gave me up, and--and I recovered, and--and +here I am, poor and friendless.”</p> + +<p>“How old is he?” Emmy asked.</p> + +<p>“Eleven,” said Becky.</p> + +<p>“Eleven!” cried the other. “Why, +he was born the same year with Georgy, who is--”</p> + +<p>“I know, I know,” Becky cried out, who +had in fact quite forgotten all about little Rawdon’s +age. “Grief has made me forget so many things, +dearest Amelia. I am very much changed: half-wild +sometimes. He was eleven when they took him away from +me. Bless his sweet face; I have never seen it again.”</p> + +<p>“Was he fair or dark?” went on that absurd +little Emmy. “Show me his hair.”</p> + +<p>Becky almost laughed at her simplicity. “Not +to-day, love--some other time, when my trunks arrive +from Leipzig, whence I came to this place--and a little +drawing of him, which I made in happy days.”</p> + +<p>“Poor Becky, poor Becky!” said Emmy. +“How thankful, how thankful I ought to be”; +(though I doubt whether that practice of piety inculcated +upon us by our womankind in early youth, namely, to +be thankful because we are better off than somebody +else, be a very rational religious exercise) and then +she began to think, as usual, how her son was the +handsomest, the best, and the cleverest boy in the +whole world.</p> + +<p>“You will see my Georgy,” was the best +thing Emmy could think of to console Becky. If anything +could make her comfortable that would.</p> + +<p>And so the two women continued talking for an hour +or more, during which Becky had the opportunity of +giving her new friend a full and complete version +of her private history. She showed how her marriage +with Rawdon Crawley had always been viewed by the family +with feelings of the utmost hostility; how her sister-in-law +(an artful woman) had poisoned her husband’s +mind against her; how he had formed odious connections, +which had estranged his affections from her: how +she had borne everything--poverty, neglect, coldness +from the being whom she most loved--and all for the +sake of her child; how, finally, and by the most flagrant +outrage, she had been driven into demanding a separation +from her husband, when the wretch did not scruple +to ask that she should sacrifice her own fair fame +so that he might procure advancement through the means +of a very great and powerful but unprincipled man--the +Marquis of Steyne, indeed. The atrocious monster!</p> + +<p>This part of her eventful history Becky gave with +the utmost feminine delicacy and the most indignant +virtue. Forced to fly her husband’s roof by +this insult, the coward had pursued his revenge by +taking her child from her. And thus Becky said she +was a wanderer, poor, unprotected, friendless, and +wretched.</p> + +<p>Emmy received this story, which was told at some length, +as those persons who are acquainted with her character +may imagine that she would. She quivered with indignation +at the account of the conduct of the miserable Rawdon +and the unprincipled Steyne. Her eyes made notes +of admiration for every one of the sentences in which +Becky described the persecutions of her aristocratic +relatives and the falling away of her husband. (Becky +did not abuse him. She spoke rather in sorrow than +in anger. She had loved him only too fondly: and +was he not the father of her boy?) And as for the separation +scene from the child, while Becky was reciting it, +Emmy retired altogether behind her pocket-handkerchief, +so that the consummate little tragedian must have +been charmed to see the effect which her performance +produced on her audience.</p> + +<p>Whilst the ladies were carrying on their conversation, +Amelia’s constant escort, the Major (who, of +course, did not wish to interrupt their conference, +and found himself rather tired of creaking about the +narrow stair passage of which the roof brushed the +nap from his hat) descended to the ground-floor of +the house and into the great room common to all the +frequenters of the Elephant, out of which the stair +led. This apartment is always in a fume of smoke +and liberally sprinkled with beer. On a dirty table +stand scores of corresponding brass candlesticks with +tallow candles for the lodgers, whose keys hang up +in rows over the candles. Emmy had passed blushing +through the room anon, where all sorts of people were +collected; Tyrolese glove-sellers and Danubian linen-merchants, +with their packs; students recruiting themselves with +butterbrods and meat; idlers, playing cards or dominoes +on the sloppy, beery tables; tumblers refreshing during +the cessation of their performances--in a word, all +the fumum and strepitus of a German inn in fair time. + The waiter brought the Major a mug of beer, as a +matter of course, and he took out a cigar and amused +himself with that pernicious vegetable and a newspaper +until his charge should come down to claim him.</p> + +<p>Max and Fritz came presently downstairs, their caps +on one side, their spurs jingling, their pipes splendid +with coats of arms and full-blown tassels, and they +hung up the key of No. 90 on the board and called +for the ration of butterbrod and beer. The pair sat +down by the Major and fell into a conversation of +which he could not help hearing somewhat. It was +mainly about “Fuchs” and “Philister,” +and duels and drinking-bouts at the neighbouring University +of Schoppenhausen, from which renowned seat of learning +they had just come in the Eilwagen, with Becky, as +it appeared, by their side, and in order to be present +at the bridal fetes at Pumpernickel.</p> + +<p>“The title Englanderinn seems to be en bays +de gonnoisance,” said Max, who knew the French +language, to Fritz, his comrade. “After the +fat grandfather went away, there came a pretty little +compatriot. I heard them chattering and whimpering +together in the little woman’s chamber.”</p> + +<p>“We must take the tickets for her concert,” +Fritz said. “Hast thou any money, Max?”</p> + +<p>“Bah,” said the other, “the concert +is a concert in nubibus. Hans said that she advertised +one at Leipzig, and the Burschen took many tickets. + But she went off without singing. She said in the +coach yesterday that her pianist had fallen ill at +Dresden. She cannot sing, it is my belief: her voice +is as cracked as thine, O thou beer-soaking Renowner!”</p> + +<p>“It is cracked; I hear her trying out of her +window a schrecklich. English ballad, called ‘De +Rose upon de Balgony.’”</p> + +<p>“Saufen and singen go not together,” observed +Fritz with the red nose, who evidently preferred the +former amusement. “No, thou shalt take none +of her tickets. She won money at the trente and quarante +last night. I saw her: she made a little English +boy play for her. We will spend thy money there or +at the theatre, or we will treat her to French wine +or Cognac in the Aurelius Garden, but the tickets +we will not buy. What sayest thou? Yet, another mug +of beer?” and one and another successively having +buried their blond whiskers in the mawkish draught, +curled them and swaggered off into the fair.</p> + +<p>The Major, who had seen the key of No. 90 put up on +its hook and had heard the conversation of the two +young University bloods, was not at a loss to understand +that their talk related to Becky. “The little +devil is at her old tricks,” he thought, and +he smiled as he recalled old days, when he had witnessed +the desperate flirtation with Jos and the ludicrous +end of that adventure. He and George had often laughed +over it subsequently, and until a few weeks after +George’s marriage, when he also was caught in +the little Circe’s toils, and had an understanding +with her which his comrade certainly suspected, but +preferred to ignore. William was too much hurt or +ashamed to ask to fathom that disgraceful mystery, +although once, and evidently with remorse on his mind, +George had alluded to it. It was on the morning of +Waterloo, as the young men stood together in front +of their line, surveying the black masses of Frenchmen +who crowned the opposite heights, and as the rain +was coming down, “I have been mixing in a foolish +intrigue with a woman,” George said. “I +am glad we were marched away. If I drop, I hope Emmy +will never know of that business. I wish to God it +had never been begun!” And William was pleased +to think, and had more than once soothed poor George’s +widow with the narrative, that Osborne, after quitting +his wife, and after the action of Quatre Bras, on +the first day, spoke gravely and affectionately to +his comrade of his father and his wife. On these +facts, too, William had insisted very strongly in +his conversations with the elder Osborne, and had thus +been the means of reconciling the old gentleman to +his son’s memory, just at the close of the elder +man’s life.</p> + +<p>“And so this devil is still going on with her +intrigues,” thought William. “I wish +she were a hundred miles from here. She brings mischief +wherever she goes.” And he was pursuing these +forebodings and this uncomfortable train of thought, +with his head between his hands, and the Pumpernickel +Gazette of last week unread under his nose, when somebody +tapped his shoulder with a parasol, and he looked +up and saw Mrs. Amelia.</p> + +<p>This woman had a way of tyrannizing over Major Dobbin +(for the weakest of all people will domineer over +somebody), and she ordered him about, and patted him, +and made him fetch and carry just as if he was a great +Newfoundland dog. He liked, so to speak, to jump +into the water if she said “High, Dobbin!” +and to trot behind her with her reticule in his mouth. + This history has been written to very little purpose +if the reader has not perceived that the Major was +a spooney.</p> + +<p>“Why did you not wait for me, sir, to escort +me downstairs?” she said, giving a little toss +of her head and a most sarcastic curtsey.</p> + +<p>“I couldn’t stand up in the passage,” +he answered with a comical deprecatory look; and, +delighted to give her his arm and to take her out +of the horrid smoky place, he would have walked off +without even so much as remembering the waiter, had +not the young fellow run after him and stopped him +on the threshold of the Elephant to make him pay for +the beer which he had not consumed. Emmy laughed: + she called him a naughty man, who wanted to run away +in debt, and, in fact, made some jokes suitable to +the occasion and the small-beer. She was in high spirits +and good humour, and tripped across the market-place +very briskly. She wanted to see Jos that instant. + The Major laughed at the impetuous affection Mrs. +Amelia exhibited; for, in truth, it was not very often +that she wanted her brother “that instant.” + They found the civilian in his saloon on the first-floor; +he had been pacing the room, and biting his nails, +and looking over the market-place towards the Elephant +a hundred times at least during the past hour whilst +Emmy was closeted with her friend in the garret and +the Major was beating the tattoo on the sloppy tables +of the public room below, and he was, on his side +too, very anxious to see Mrs. Osborne.</p> + +<p>“Well?” said he.</p> + +<p>“The poor dear creature, how she has suffered!” +Emmy said.</p> + +<p>“God bless my soul, yes,” Jos said, wagging +his head, so that his cheeks quivered like jellies.</p> + +<p>“She may have Payne’s room, who can go +upstairs,” Emmy continued. Payne was a staid +English maid and personal attendant upon Mrs. Osborne, +to whom the courier, as in duty bound, paid court, +and whom Georgy used to “lark” dreadfully +with accounts of German robbers and ghosts. She passed +her time chiefly in grumbling, in ordering about her +mistress, and in stating her intention to return the +next morning to her native village of Clapham. “She +may have Payne’s room,” Emmy said.</p> + +<p>“Why, you don’t mean to say you are going +to have that woman into the house?” bounced +out the Major, jumping up.</p> + +<p>“Of course we are,” said Amelia in the +most innocent way in the world. “Don’t +be angry and break the furniture, Major Dobbin. Of +course we are going to have her here.”</p> + +<p>“Of course, my dear,” Jos said.</p> + +<p>“The poor creature, after all her sufferings,” +Emmy continued; “her horrid banker broken and +run away; her husband--wicked wretch-- having deserted +her and taken her child away from her” (here +she doubled her two little fists and held them in +a most menacing attitude before her, so that the Major +was charmed to see such a dauntless virago) “the +poor dear thing! quite alone and absolutely forced +to give lessons in singing to get her bread--and not +have her here!”</p> + +<p>“Take lessons, my dear Mrs. George,” cried +the Major, “but don’t have her in the +house. I implore you don’t.”</p> + +<p>“Pooh,” said Jos.</p> + +<p>“You who are always good and kind--always used +to be at any rate-- I’m astonished at you, Major +William,” Amelia cried. “Why, what is +the moment to help her but when she is so miserable? +Now is the time to be of service to her. The oldest +friend I ever had, and not--”</p> + +<p>“She was not always your friend, Amelia,” +the Major said, for he was quite angry. This allusion +was too much for Emmy, who, looking the Major almost +fiercely in the face, said, “For shame, Major +Dobbin!” and after having fired this shot, she +walked out of the room with a most majestic air and +shut her own door briskly on herself and her outraged +dignity.</p> + +<p>“To allude to <i>that</i>!” she said, when +the door was closed. “Oh, it was cruel of him +to remind me of it,” and she looked up at George’s +picture, which hung there as usual, with the portrait +of the boy underneath. “It was cruel of him. + If I had forgiven it, ought he to have spoken? No. + And it is from his own lips that I know how wicked +and groundless my jealousy was; and that you were pure--oh, +yes, you were pure, my saint in heaven!”</p> + +<p>She paced the room, trembling and indignant. She +went and leaned on the chest of drawers over which +the picture hung, and gazed and gazed at it. Its +eyes seemed to look down on her with a reproach that +deepened as she looked. The early dear, dear memories +of that brief prime of love rushed back upon her. + The wound which years had scarcely cicatrized bled +afresh, and oh, how bitterly! She could not bear +the reproaches of the husband there before her. It +couldn’t be. Never, never.</p> + +<p>Poor Dobbin; poor old William! That unlucky word +had undone the work of many a year--the long laborious +edifice of a life of love and constancy--raised too +upon what secret and hidden foundations, wherein lay +buried passions, uncounted struggles, unknown sacrifices--a +little word was spoken, and down fell the fair palace +of hope--one word, and away flew the bird which he +had been trying all his life to lure!</p> + +<p>William, though he saw by Amelia’s looks that +a great crisis had come, nevertheless continued to +implore Sedley, in the most energetic terms, to beware +of Rebecca; and he eagerly, almost frantically, adjured +Jos not to receive her. He besought Mr. Sedley to +inquire at least regarding her; told him how he had +heard that she was in the company of gamblers and +people of ill repute; pointed out what evil she had +done in former days, how she and Crawley had misled +poor George into ruin, how she was now parted from +her husband, by her own confession, and, perhaps, +for good reason. What a dangerous companion she would +be for his sister, who knew nothing of the affairs +of the world! William implored Jos, with all the +eloquence which he could bring to bear, and a great +deal more energy than this quiet gentleman was ordinarily +in the habit of showing, to keep Rebecca out of his +household.</p> + +<p>Had he been less violent, or more dexterous, he might +have succeeded in his supplications to Jos; but the +civilian was not a little jealous of the airs of superiority +which the Major constantly exhibited towards him, +as he fancied (indeed, he had imparted his opinions +to Mr. Kirsch, the courier, whose bills Major Dobbin +checked on this journey, and who sided with his master), +and he began a blustering speech about his competency +to defend his own honour, his desire not to have his +affairs meddled with, his intention, in fine, to rebel +against the Major, when the colloquy-- rather a long +and stormy one--was put an end to in the simplest way +possible, namely, by the arrival of Mrs. Becky, with +a porter from the Elephant Hotel in charge of her +very meagre baggage.</p> + +<p>She greeted her host with affectionate respect and +made a shrinking, but amicable salutation to Major +Dobbin, who, as her instinct assured her at once, +was her enemy, and had been speaking against her; +and the bustle and clatter consequent upon her arrival +brought Amelia out of her room. Emmy went up and +embraced her guest with the greatest warmth, and took +no notice of the Major, except to fling him an angry +look--the most unjust and scornful glance that had +perhaps ever appeared in that poor little woman’s +face since she was born. But she had private reasons +of her own, and was bent upon being angry with him. + And Dobbin, indignant at the injustice, not at the +defeat, went off, making her a bow quite as haughty +as the killing curtsey with which the little woman +chose to bid him farewell.</p> + +<p>He being gone, Emmy was particularly lively and affectionate +to Rebecca, and bustled about the apartments and installed +her guest in her room with an eagerness and activity +seldom exhibited by our placid little friend. But +when an act of injustice is to be done, especially +by weak people, it is best that it should be done +quickly, and Emmy thought she was displaying a great +deal of firmness and proper feeling and veneration +for the late Captain Osborne in her present behaviour.</p> + +<p>Georgy came in from the fetes for dinner-time and +found four covers laid as usual; but one of the places +was occupied by a lady, instead of by Major Dobbin. +“Hullo! where’s Dob?” the young +gentleman asked with his usual simplicity of language. + “Major Dobbin is dining out, I suppose,” +his mother said, and, drawing the boy to her, kissed +him a great deal, and put his hair off his forehead, +and introduced him to Mrs. Crawley. “This is +my boy, Rebecca,” Mrs. Osborne said--as much +as to say--can the world produce anything like that? +Becky looked at him with rapture and pressed his hand +fondly. “Dear boy!” she said--"he is just +like my--” Emotion choked her further utterance, +but Amelia understood, as well as if she had spoken, +that Becky was thinking of her own blessed child. + However, the company of her friend consoled Mrs. +Crawley, and she ate a very good dinner.</p> + +<p>During the repast, she had occasion to speak several +times, when Georgy eyed her and listened to her. +At the desert Emmy was gone out to superintend further +domestic arrangements; Jos was in his great chair +dozing over Galignani; Georgy and the new arrival sat +close to each other--he had continued to look at her +knowingly more than once, and at last he laid down +the nutcrackers.</p> + +<p>“I say,” said Georgy.</p> + +<p>“What do you say?” Becky said, laughing.</p> + +<p>“You’re the lady I saw in the mask at +the Rouge et Noir.”</p> + +<p>“Hush! you little sly creature,” Becky +said, taking up his hand and kissing it. “Your +uncle was there too, and Mamma mustn’t know.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, no--not by no means,” answered the +little fellow.</p> + +<p>“You see we are quite good friends already,” +Becky said to Emmy, who now re-entered; and it must +be owned that Mrs. Osborne had introduced a most judicious +and amiable companion into her house.</p> + +<p>William, in a state of great indignation, though still +unaware of all the treason that was in store for him, +walked about the town wildly until he fell upon the +Secretary of Legation, Tapeworm, who invited him to +dinner. As they were discussing that meal, he took +occasion to ask the Secretary whether he knew anything +about a certain Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, who had, he believed, +made some noise in London; and then Tapeworm, who +of course knew all the London gossip, and was besides +a relative of Lady Gaunt, poured out into the astonished +Major’s ears such a history about Becky and her +husband as astonished the querist, and supplied all +the points of this narrative, for it was at that very +table years ago that the present writer had the pleasure +of hearing the tale. Tufto, Steyne, the Crawleys, +and their history--everything connected with Becky +and her previous life passed under the record of the +bitter diplomatist. He knew everything and a great +deal besides, about all the world--in a word, he made +the most astounding revelations to the simple-hearted +Major. When Dobbin said that Mrs. Osborne and Mr. +Sedley had taken her into their house, Tapeworm burst +into a peal of laughter which shocked the Major, and +asked if they had not better send into the prison +and take in one or two of the gentlemen in shaved +heads and yellow jackets who swept the streets of +Pumpernickel, chained in pairs, to board and lodge, +and act as tutor to that little scapegrace Georgy.</p> + +<p>This information astonished and horrified the Major +not a little. It had been agreed in the morning (before +meeting with Rebecca) that Amelia should go to the +Court ball that night. There would be the place where +he should tell her. The Major went home, and dressed +himself in his uniform, and repaired to Court, in hopes +to see Mrs. Osborne. She never came. When he returned +to his lodgings all the lights in the Sedley tenement +were put out. He could not see her till the morning. + I don’t know what sort of a night’s rest +he had with this frightful secret in bed with him.</p> + +<p>At the earliest convenient hour in the morning he +sent his servant across the way with a note, saying +that he wished very particularly to speak with her. + A message came back to say that Mrs. Osborne was +exceedingly unwell and was keeping her room.</p> + +<p>She, too, had been awake all that night. She had +been thinking of a thing which had agitated her mind +a hundred times before. A hundred times on the point +of yielding, she had shrunk back from a sacrifice +which she felt was too much for her. She couldn’t, +in spite of his love and constancy and her own acknowledged +regard, respect, and gratitude. What are benefits, +what is constancy, or merit? One curl of a girl’s +ringlet, one hair of a whisker, will turn the scale +against them all in a minute. They did not weigh with +Emmy more than with other women. She had tried them; +wanted to make them pass; could not; and the pitiless +little woman had found a pretext, and determined to +be free.</p> + +<p>When at length, in the afternoon, the Major gained +admission to Amelia, instead of the cordial and affectionate +greeting, to which he had been accustomed now for +many a long day, he received the salutation of a curtsey, +and of a little gloved hand, retracted the moment +after it was accorded to him.</p> + +<p>Rebecca, too, was in the room, and advanced to meet +him with a smile and an extended hand. Dobbin drew +back rather confusedly, “I--I beg your pardon, +m’am,” he said; “but I am bound to +tell you that it is not as your friend that I am come +here now.”</p> + +<p>“Pooh! damn; don’t let us have this sort +of thing!” Jos cried out, alarmed, and anxious +to get rid of a scene.</p> + +<p>“I wonder what Major Dobbin has to say against +Rebecca?” Amelia said in a low, clear voice +with a slight quiver in it, and a very determined +look about the eyes.</p> + +<p>“I will not have this sort of thing in my house,” +Jos again interposed. “I say I will not have +it; and Dobbin, I beg, sir, you’ll stop it.” +And he looked round, trembling and turning very red, +and gave a great puff, and made for his door.</p> + +<p>“Dear friend!” Rebecca said with angelic +sweetness, “do hear what Major Dobbin has to +say against me.”</p> + +<p>“I will not hear it, I say,” squeaked +out Jos at the top of his voice, and, gathering up +his dressing-gown, he was gone.</p> + +<p>“We are only two women,” Amelia said. + “You can speak now, sir.”</p> + +<p>“This manner towards me is one which scarcely +becomes you, Amelia,” the Major answered haughtily; +“nor I believe am I guilty of habitual harshness +to women. It is not a pleasure to me to do the duty +which I am come to do.”</p> + +<p>“Pray proceed with it quickly, if you please, +Major Dobbin,” said Amelia, who was more and +more in a pet. The expression of Dobbin’s face, +as she spoke in this imperious manner, was not pleasant.</p> + +<p>“I came to say--and as you stay, Mrs. Crawley, +I must say it in your presence--that I think you--you +ought not to form a member of the family of my friends. + A lady who is separated from her husband, who travels +not under her own name, who frequents public gaming-tables-- +"</p> + +<p>“It was to the ball I went,” cried out +Becky.</p> + +<p>“-- is not a fit companion for Mrs. Osborne +and her son,” Dobbin went on: “and I +may add that there are people here who know you, and +who profess to know that regarding your conduct about +which I don’t even wish to speak before--before +Mrs. Osborne.”</p> + +<p>“Yours is a very modest and convenient sort +of calumny, Major Dobbin,” Rebecca said. “You +leave me under the weight of an accusation which, +after all, is unsaid. What is it? Is it unfaithfulness +to my husband? I scorn it and defy anybody to prove +it--I defy you, I say. My honour is as untouched as +that of the bitterest enemy who ever maligned me. + Is it of being poor, forsaken, wretched, that you +accuse me? Yes, I am guilty of those faults, and punished +for them every day. Let me go, Emmy. It is only +to suppose that I have not met you, and I am no worse +to-day than I was yesterday. It is only to suppose +that the night is over and the poor wanderer is on +her way. Don’t you remember the song we used +to sing in old, dear old days? I have been wandering +ever since then--a poor castaway, scorned for being +miserable, and insulted because I am alone. Let me +go: my stay here interferes with the plans of this +gentleman.”</p> + +<p>“Indeed it does, madam,” said the Major. + “If I have any authority in this house--”</p> + +<p>“Authority, none!” broke out Amelia “Rebecca, +you stay with me. I won’t desert you because +you have been persecuted, or insult you because--because +Major Dobbin chooses to do so. Come away, dear.” +And the two women made towards the door.</p> + +<p>William opened it. As they were going out, however, +he took Amelia’s hand and said--"Will you stay +a moment and speak to me?”</p> + +<p>“He wishes to speak to you away from me,” +said Becky, looking like a martyr. Amelia gripped +her hand in reply.</p> + +<p>“Upon my honour it is not about you that I am +going to speak,” Dobbin said. “Come back, +Amelia,” and she came. Dobbin bowed to Mrs. +Crawley, as he shut the door upon her. Amelia looked +at him, leaning against the glass: her face and her +lips were quite white.</p> + +<p>“I was confused when I spoke just now,” +the Major said after a pause, “and I misused +the word authority.”</p> + +<p>“You did,” said Amelia with her teeth +chattering.</p> + +<p>“At least I have claims to be heard,” +Dobbin continued.</p> + +<p>“It is generous to remind me of our obligations +to you,” the woman answered.</p> + +<p>“The claims I mean are those left me by George’s +father,” William said.</p> + +<p>“Yes, and you insulted his memory. You did +yesterday. You know you did. And I will never forgive +you. Never!” said Amelia. She shot out each +little sentence in a tremor of anger and emotion.</p> + +<p>“You don’t mean that, Amelia?” William +said sadly. “You don’t mean that these +words, uttered in a hurried moment, are to weigh against +a whole life’s devotion? I think that George’s +memory has not been injured by the way in which I +have dealt with it, and if we are come to bandying +reproaches, I at least merit none from his widow and +the mother of his son. Reflect, afterwards when--when +you are at leisure, and your conscience will withdraw +this accusation. It does even now.” Amelia +held down her head.</p> + +<p>“It is not that speech of yesterday,” +he continued, “which moves you. That is but +the pretext, Amelia, or I have loved you and watched +you for fifteen years in vain. Have I not learned in +that time to read all your feelings and look into +your thoughts? I know what your heart is capable of: + it can cling faithfully to a recollection and cherish +a fancy, but it can’t feel such an attachment +as mine deserves to mate with, and such as I would +have won from a woman more generous than you. No, +you are not worthy of the love which I have devoted +to you. I knew all along that the prize I had set +my life on was not worth the winning; that I was a +fool, with fond fancies, too, bartering away my all +of truth and ardour against your little feeble remnant +of love. I will bargain no more: I withdraw. I +find no fault with you. You are very good-natured, +and have done your best, but you couldn’t--you +couldn’t reach up to the height of the attachment +which I bore you, and which a loftier soul than yours +might have been proud to share. Good-bye, Amelia! +I have watched your struggle. Let it end. We are +both weary of it.”</p> + +<p>Amelia stood scared and silent as William thus suddenly +broke the chain by which she held him and declared +his independence and superiority. He had placed himself +at her feet so long that the poor little woman had +been accustomed to trample upon him. She didn’t +wish to marry him, but she wished to keep him. She +wished to give him nothing, but that he should give +her all. It is a bargain not unfrequently levied +in love.</p> + +<p>William’s sally had quite broken and cast her +down. <i>Her</i> assault was long since over and beaten +back.</p> + +<p>“Am I to understand then, that you are going--away, +William?” she said.</p> + +<p>He gave a sad laugh. “I went once before,” +he said, “and came back after twelve years. + We were young then, Amelia. Good-bye. I have spent +enough of my life at this play.”</p> + +<p>Whilst they had been talking, the door into Mrs. Osborne’s +room had opened ever so little; indeed, Becky had +kept a hold of the handle and had turned it on the +instant when Dobbin quitted it, and she heard every +word of the conversation that had passed between these +two. “What a noble heart that man has,” +she thought, “and how shamefully that woman +plays with it!” She admired Dobbin; she bore +him no rancour for the part he had taken against her. + It was an open move in the game, and played fairly. + “Ah!” she thought, “if I could +have had such a husband as that--a man with a heart +and brains too! I would not have minded his large +feet”; and running into her room, she absolutely +bethought herself of something, and wrote him a note, +beseeching him to stop for a few days--not to think +of going-- and that she could serve him with A.</p> + +<p>The parting was over. Once more poor William walked +to the door and was gone; and the little widow, the +author of all this work, had her will, and had won +her victory, and was left to enjoy it as she best +might. Let the ladies envy her triumph.</p> + +<p>At the romantic hour of dinner, Mr. Georgy made his +appearance and again remarked the absence of “Old +Dob.” The meal was eaten in silence by the party. + Jos’s appetite not being diminished, but Emmy +taking nothing at all.</p> + +<p>After the meal, Georgy was lolling in the cushions +of the old window, a large window, with three sides +of glass abutting from the gable, and commanding on +one side the market-place, where the Elephant is, +his mother being busy hard by, when he remarked symptoms +of movement at the Major’s house on the other +side of the street.</p> + +<p>“Hullo!” said he, “there’s +Dob’s trap--they are bringing it out of the +court-yard.” The “trap” in question +was a carriage which the Major had bought for six +pounds sterling, and about which they used to rally +him a good deal.</p> + +<p>Emmy gave a little start, but said nothing.</p> + +<p>“Hullo!” Georgy continued, “there’s +Francis coming out with the portmanteaus, and Kunz, +the one-eyed postilion, coming down the market with +three schimmels. Look at his boots and yellow jacket-- +ain’t he a rum one? Why--they’re putting +the horses to Dob’s carriage. Is he going anywhere?”</p> + +<p>“Yes,” said Emmy, “he is going on +a journey.”</p> + +<p>“Going on a journey; and when is he coming back?”</p> + +<p>“He is--not coming back,” answered Emmy.</p> + +<p>“Not coming back!” cried out Georgy, jumping +up. “Stay here, sir,” roared out Jos. + “Stay, Georgy,” said his mother with a +very sad face. The boy stopped, kicked about the +room, jumped up and down from the window-seat with +his knees, and showed every symptom of uneasiness +and curiosity.</p> + +<p>The horses were put to. The baggage was strapped +on. Francis came out with his master’s sword, +cane, and umbrella tied up together, and laid them +in the well, and his desk and old tin cocked-hat case, +which he placed under the seat. Francis brought out +the stained old blue cloak lined with red camlet, +which had wrapped the owner up any time these fifteen +years, and had manchen Sturm erlebt, as a favourite +song of those days said. It had been new for the campaign +of Waterloo and had covered George and William after +the night of Quatre Bras.</p> + +<p>Old Burcke, the landlord of the lodgings, came out, +then Francis, with more packages--final packages--then +Major William--Burcke wanted to kiss him. The Major +was adored by all people with whom he had to do. +It was with difficulty he could escape from this demonstration +of attachment.</p> + +<p>“By Jove, I will go!” screamed out George. + “Give him this,” said Becky, quite interested, +and put a paper into the boy’s hand. He had +rushed down the stairs and flung across the street +in a minute-- the yellow postilion was cracking his +whip gently.</p> + +<p>William had got into the carriage, released from the +embraces of his landlord. George bounded in afterwards, +and flung his arms round the Major’s neck (as +they saw from the window), and began asking him multiplied +questions. Then he felt in his waistcoat pocket and +gave him a note. William seized at it rather eagerly, +he opened it trembling, but instantly his countenance +changed, and he tore the paper in two and dropped +it out of the carriage. He kissed Georgy on the head, +and the boy got out, doubling his fists into his eyes, +and with the aid of Francis. He lingered with his +hand on the panel. Fort, Schwager! The yellow postilion +cracked his whip prodigiously, up sprang Francis to +the box, away went the schimmels, and Dobbin with +his head on his breast. He never looked up as they +passed under Amelia’s window, and Georgy, left +alone in the street, burst out crying in the face +of all the crowd.</p> + +<p>Emmy’s maid heard him howling again during the +night and brought him some preserved apricots to console +him. She mingled her lamentations with his. All +the poor, all the humble, all honest folks, all good +men who knew him, loved that kind-hearted and simple +gentleman.</p> + +<p>As for Emmy, had she not done her duty? She had her +picture of George for a consolation.</p> + + + + + +<h3 align="center">Chapter LXVII</h3> + +<h4 align="center">Which Contains Births, Marriages, and Deaths</h4> + +<p>Whatever Becky’s private plan might be by which +Dobbin’s true love was to be crowned with success, +the little woman thought that the secret might keep, +and indeed, being by no means so much interested about +anybody’s welfare as about her own, she had a +great number of things pertaining to herself to consider, +and which concerned her a great deal more than Major +Dobbin’s happiness in this life.</p> + +<p>She found herself suddenly and unexpectedly in snug +comfortable quarters, surrounded by friends, kindness, +and good-natured simple people such as she had not +met with for many a long day; and, wanderer as she +was by force and inclination, there were moments when +rest was pleasant to her. As the most hardened Arab +that ever careered across the desert over the hump +of a dromedary likes to repose sometimes under the +date-trees by the water, or to come into the cities, +walk into the bazaars, refresh himself in the baths, +and say his prayers in the mosques, before he goes +out again marauding, so Jos’s tents and pilau +were pleasant to this little Ishmaelite. She picketed +her steed, hung up her weapons, and warmed herself +comfortably by his fire. The halt in that roving, +restless life was inexpressibly soothing and pleasant +to her.</p> + +<p>So, pleased herself, she tried with all her might +to please everybody; and we know that she was eminent +and successful as a practitioner in the art of giving +pleasure. As for Jos, even in that little interview +in the garret at the Elephant Inn, she had found means +to win back a great deal of his good-will. In the +course of a week, the civilian was her sworn slave +and frantic admirer. He didn’t go to sleep +after dinner, as his custom was in the much less lively +society of Amelia. He drove out with Becky in his +open carriage. He asked little parties and invented +festivities to do her honour.</p> + +<p>Tapeworm, the Charge d’Affaires, who had abused +her so cruelly, came to dine with Jos, and then came +every day to pay his respects to Becky. Poor Emmy, +who was never very talkative, and more glum and silent +than ever after Dobbin’s departure, was quite +forgotten when this superior genius made her appearance. + The French Minister was as much charmed with her +as his English rival. The German ladies, never particularly +squeamish as regards morals, especially in English +people, were delighted with the cleverness and wit +of Mrs. Osborne’s charming friend, and though +she did not ask to go to Court, yet the most august +and Transparent Personages there heard of her fascinations +and were quite curious to know her. When it became +known that she was noble, of an ancient English family, +that her husband was a Colonel of the Guard, Excellenz +and Governor of an island, only separated from his +lady by one of those trifling differences which are +of little account in a country where Werther is still +read and the Wahlverwandtschaften of Goethe is considered +an edifying moral book, nobody thought of refusing +to receive her in the very highest society of the +little Duchy; and the ladies were even more ready +to call her du and to swear eternal friendship for +her than they had been to bestow the same inestimable +benefits upon Amelia. Love and Liberty are interpreted +by those simple Germans in a way which honest folks +in Yorkshire and Somersetshire little understand, +and a lady might, in some philosophic and civilized +towns, be divorced ever so many times from her respective +husbands and keep her character in society. Jos’s +house never was so pleasant since he had a house of +his own as Rebecca caused it to be. She sang, she +played, she laughed, she talked in two or three languages, +she brought everybody to the house, and she made Jos +believe that it was his own great social talents and +wit which gathered the society of the place round +about him.</p> + +<p>As for Emmy, who found herself not in the least mistress +of her own house, except when the bills were to be +paid, Becky soon discovered the way to soothe and +please her. She talked to her perpetually about Major +Dobbin sent about his business, and made no scruple +of declaring her admiration for that excellent, high-minded +gentleman, and of telling Emmy that she had behaved +most cruelly regarding him. Emmy defended her conduct +and showed that it was dictated only by the purest +religious principles; that a woman once, &c., and to +such an angel as him whom she had had the good fortune +to marry, was married forever; but she had no objection +to hear the Major praised as much as ever Becky chose +to praise him, and indeed, brought the conversation +round to the Dobbin subject a score of times every +day.</p> + +<p>Means were easily found to win the favour of Georgy +and the servants. Amelia’s maid, it has been +said, was heart and soul in favour of the generous +Major. Having at first disliked Becky for being the +means of dismissing him from the presence of her mistress, +she was reconciled to Mrs. Crawley subsequently, because +the latter became William’s most ardent admirer +and champion. And in those nightly conclaves in which +the two ladies indulged after their parties, and +while Miss Payne was “brushing their ’airs,” +as she called the yellow locks of the one and the +soft brown tresses of the other, this girl always +put in her word for that dear good gentleman Major +Dobbin. Her advocacy did not make Amelia angry any +more than Rebecca’s admiration of him. She +made George write to him constantly and persisted +in sending Mamma’s kind love in a postscript. + And as she looked at her husband’s portrait +of nights, it no longer reproached her--perhaps she +reproached it, now William was gone.</p> + +<p>Emmy was not very happy after her heroic sacrifice. +She was very distraite, nervous, silent, and ill to +please. The family had never known her so peevish. + She grew pale and ill. She used to try to sing certain +songs ("Einsam bin ich nicht alleine,” was one +of them, that tender love-song of Weber’s which +in old-fashioned days, young ladies, and when you +were scarcely born, showed that those who lived before +you knew too how to love and to sing) certain songs, +I say, to which the Major was partial; and as she +warbled them in the twilight in the drawing-room, +she would break off in the midst of the song, and +walk into her neighbouring apartment, and there, no +doubt, take refuge in the miniature of her husband.</p> + +<p>Some books still subsisted, after Dobbin’s departure, +with his name written in them; a German dictionary, +for instance, with “William Dobbin,--th Reg.,” +in the fly-leaf; a guide-book with his initials; and +one or two other volumes which belonged to the Major. + Emmy cleared these away and put them on the drawers, +where she placed her work-box, her desk, her Bible, +and prayer-book, under the pictures of the two Georges. + And the Major, on going away, having left his gloves +behind him, it is a fact that Georgy, rummaging his +mother’s desk some time afterwards, found the +gloves neatly folded up and put away in what they +call the secret-drawers of the desk.</p> + +<p>Not caring for society, and moping there a great deal, +Emmy’s chief pleasure in the summer evenings +was to take long walks with Georgy (during which Rebecca +was left to the society of Mr. Joseph), and then the +mother and son used to talk about the Major in a way +which even made the boy smile. She told him that +she thought Major William was the best man in all +the world--the gentlest and the kindest, the bravest +and the humblest. Over and over again she told him +how they owed everything which they possessed in the +world to that kind friend’s benevolent care +of them; how he had befriended them all through their +poverty and misfortunes; watched over them when nobody +cared for them; how all his comrades admired him though +he never spoke of his own gallant actions; how Georgy’s +father trusted him beyond all other men, and had been +constantly befriended by the good William. “Why, +when your papa was a little boy,” she said, +“he often told me that it was William who defended +him against a tyrant at the school where they were; +and their friendship never ceased from that day until +the last, when your dear father fell.”</p> + +<p>“Did Dobbin kill the man who killed Papa?” +Georgy said. “I’m sure he did, or he +would if he could have caught him, wouldn’t he, +Mother? When I’m in the Army, won’t I hate +the French?--that’s all.”</p> + +<p>In such colloquies the mother and the child passed +a great deal of their time together. The artless +woman had made a confidant of the boy. He was as +much William’s friend as everybody else who knew +him well.</p> + +<p>By the way, Mrs. Becky, not to be behind hand in sentiment, +had got a miniature too hanging up in her room, to +the surprise and amusement of most people, and the +delight of the original, who was no other than our +friend Jos. On her first coming to favour the Sedleys +with a visit, the little woman, who had arrived with +a remarkably small shabby kit, was perhaps ashamed +of the meanness of her trunks and bandboxes, and often +spoke with great respect about her baggage left behind +at Leipzig, which she must have from that city. When +a traveller talks to you perpetually about the splendour +of his luggage, which he does not happen to have with +him, my son, beware of that traveller! He is, ten +to one, an impostor.</p> + +<p>Neither Jos nor Emmy knew this important maxim. It +seemed to them of no consequence whether Becky had +a quantity of very fine clothes in invisible trunks; +but as her present supply was exceedingly shabby, +Emmy supplied her out of her own stores, or took her +to the best milliner in the town and there fitted +her out. It was no more torn collars now, I promise +you, and faded silks trailing off at the shoulder. + Becky changed her habits with her situation in life--the +rouge-pot was suspended--another excitement to which +she had accustomed herself was also put aside, or +at least only indulged in in privacy, as when she +was prevailed on by Jos of a summer evening, Emmy +and the boy being absent on their walks, to take a +little spirit-and-water. But if she did not indulge--the +courier did: that rascal Kirsch could not be kept +from the bottle, nor could he tell how much he took +when he applied to it. He was sometimes surprised +himself at the way in which Mr. Sedley’s Cognac +diminished. Well, well, this is a painful subject. + Becky did not very likely indulge so much as she +used before she entered a decorous family.</p> + +<p>At last the much-bragged-about boxes arrived from +Leipzig; three of them not by any means large or splendid; +nor did Becky appear to take out any sort of dresses +or ornaments from the boxes when they did arrive. + But out of one, which contained a mass of her papers +(it was that very box which Rawdon Crawley had ransacked +in his furious hunt for Becky’s concealed money), +she took a picture with great glee, which she pinned +up in her room, and to which she introduced Jos. +It was the portrait of a gentleman in pencil, his +face having the advantage of being painted up in pink. + He was riding on an elephant away from some cocoa-nut +trees and a pagoda: it was an Eastern scene.</p> + +<p>“God bless my soul, it is my portrait,” +Jos cried out. It was he indeed, blooming in youth +and beauty, in a nankeen jacket of the cut of 1804. + It was the old picture that used to hang up in Russell +Square.</p> + +<p>“I bought it,” said Becky in a voice trembling +with emotion; “I went to see if I could be of +any use to my kind friends. I have never parted with +that picture--I never will.”</p> + +<p>“Won’t you?” Jos cried with a look +of unutterable rapture and satisfaction. “Did +you really now value it for my sake?”</p> + +<p>“You know I did, well enough,” said Becky; +“but why speak--why think--why look back! It +is too late now!”</p> + +<p>That evening’s conversation was delicious for +Jos. Emmy only came in to go to bed very tired and +unwell. Jos and his fair guest had a charming tete-a-tete, +and his sister could hear, as she lay awake in her +adjoining chamber, Rebecca singing over to Jos the +old songs of 1815. He did not sleep, for a wonder, +that night, any more than Amelia.</p> + +<p>It was June, and, by consequence, high season in London; +Jos, who read the incomparable Galignani (the exile’s +best friend) through every day, used to favour the +ladies with extracts from his paper during their breakfast. + Every week in this paper there is a full account +of military movements, in which Jos, as a man who had +seen service, was especially interested. On one occasion +he read out-- “Arrival of the --th regiment. + Gravesend, June 20.--The Ramchunder, East Indiaman, +came into the river this morning, having on board 14 +officers, and 132 rank and file of this gallant corps. + They have been absent from England fourteen years, +having been embarked the year after Waterloo, in which +glorious conflict they took an active part, and having +subsequently distinguished themselves in the Burmese +war. The veteran colonel, Sir Michael O’Dowd, +K.C.B., with his lady and sister, landed here yesterday, +with Captains Posky, Stubble, Macraw, Malony; Lieutenants +Smith, Jones, Thompson, F. Thomson; Ensigns Hicks +and Grady; the band on the pier playing the national +anthem, and the crowd loudly cheering the gallant veterans +as they went into Wayte’s hotel, where a sumptuous +banquet was provided for the defenders of Old England. + During the repast, which we need not say was served +up in Wayte’s best style, the cheering continued +so enthusiastically that Lady O’Dowd and the +Colonel came forward to the balcony and drank the +healths of their fellow-countrymen in a bumper of +Wayte’s best claret.”</p> + +<p>On a second occasion Jos read a brief announcement--Major +Dobbin had joined the --th regiment at Chatham; and +subsequently he promulgated accounts of the presentations +at the Drawing-room of Colonel Sir Michael O’Dowd, +K.C.B., Lady O’Dowd (by Mrs. Malloy Malony of +Ballymalony), and Miss Glorvina O’Dowd (by Lady +O’Dowd). Almost directly after this, Dobbin’s +name appeared among the Lieutenant-Colonels: for +old Marshal Tiptoff had died during the passage of +the --th from Madras, and the Sovereign was pleased +to advance Colonel Sir Michael O’Dowd to the +rank of Major-General on his return to England, with +an intimation that he should be Colonel of the distinguished +regiment which he had so long commanded.</p> + +<p>Amelia had been made aware of some of these movements. + The correspondence between George and his guardian +had not ceased by any means: William had even written +once or twice to her since his departure, but in a +manner so unconstrainedly cold that the poor woman +felt now in her turn that she had lost her power over +him and that, as he had said, he was free. He had +left her, and she was wretched. The memory of his +almost countless services, and lofty and affectionate +regard, now presented itself to her and rebuked her +day and night. She brooded over those recollections +according to her wont, saw the purity and beauty of +the affection with which she had trifled, and reproached +herself for having flung away such a treasure.</p> + +<p>It was gone indeed. William had spent it all out. + He loved her no more, he thought, as he had loved +her. He never could again. That sort of regard, which +he had proffered to her for so many faithful years, +can’t be flung down and shattered and mended +so as to show no scars. The little heedless tyrant +had so destroyed it. No, William thought again and +again, “It was myself I deluded and persisted +in cajoling; had she been worthy of the love I gave +her, she would have returned it long ago. It was +a fond mistake. Isn’t the whole course of life +made up of such? And suppose I had won her, should +I not have been disenchanted the day after my victory? +Why pine, or be ashamed of my defeat?” The more +he thought of this long passage of his life, the more +clearly he saw his deception. “I’ll go +into harness again,” he said, “and do +my duty in that state of life in which it has pleased +Heaven to place me. I will see that the buttons of +the recruits are properly bright and that the sergeants +make no mistakes in their accounts. I will dine at +mess and listen to the Scotch surgeon telling his +stories. When I am old and broken, I will go on half-pay, +and my old sisters shall scold me. I have geliebt +und gelebet, as the girl in ‘Wallenstein’ +says. I am done. Pay the bills and get me a cigar: + find out what there is at the play to-night, Francis; +to-morrow we cross by the Batavier.” He made +the above speech, whereof Francis only heard the last +two lines, pacing up and down the Boompjes at Rotterdam. +The Batavier was lying in the basin. He could see +the place on the quarter-deck where he and Emmy had +sat on the happy voyage out. What had that little +Mrs. Crawley to say to him? Psha; to-morrow we will +put to sea, and return to England, home, and duty!</p> + +<p>After June all the little Court Society of Pumpernickel +used to separate, according to the German plan, and +make for a hundred watering-places, where they drank +at the wells, rode upon donkeys, gambled at the redoutes +if they had money and a mind, rushed with hundreds +of their kind to gourmandise at the tables d’hote, +and idled away the summer. The English diplomatists +went off to Teoplitz and Kissingen, their French rivals +shut up their chancellerie and whisked away to their +darling Boulevard de Gand. The Transparent reigning +family took too to the waters, or retired to their +hunting lodges. Everybody went away having any pretensions +to politeness, and of course, with them, Doctor von +Glauber, the Court Doctor, and his Baroness. The +seasons for the baths were the most productive periods +of the Doctor’s practice--he united business +with pleasure, and his chief place of resort was Ostend, +which is much frequented by Germans, and where the +Doctor treated himself and his spouse to what he called +a “dib” in the sea.</p> + +<p>His interesting patient, Jos, was a regular milch-cow +to the Doctor, and he easily persuaded the civilian, +both for his own health’s sake and that of his +charming sister, which was really very much shattered, +to pass the summer at that hideous seaport town. Emmy +did not care where she went much. Georgy jumped at +the idea of a move. As for Becky, she came as a matter +of course in the fourth place inside of the fine barouche +Mr. Jos had bought, the two domestics being on the +box in front. She might have some misgivings about +the friends whom she should meet at Ostend, and who +might be likely to tell ugly stories--but bah! she +was strong enough to hold her own. She had cast such +an anchor in Jos now as would require a strong storm +to shake. That incident of the picture had finished +him. Becky took down her elephant and put it into +the little box which she had had from Amelia ever +so many years ago. Emmy also came off with her Lares--her +two pictures--and the party, finally, were, lodged +in an exceedingly dear and uncomfortable house at +Ostend.</p> + +<p>There Amelia began to take baths and get what good +she could from them, and though scores of people of +Becky’s acquaintance passed her and cut her, +yet Mrs. Osborne, who walked about with her, and who +knew nobody, was not aware of the treatment experienced +by the friend whom she had chosen so judiciously as +a companion; indeed, Becky never thought fit to tell +her what was passing under her innocent eyes.</p> + +<p>Some of Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s acquaintances, +however, acknowledged her readily enough,--perhaps +more readily than she would have desired. Among those +were Major Loder (unattached), and Captain Rook (late +of the Rifles), who might be seen any day on the Dike, +smoking and staring at the women, and who speedily +got an introduction to the hospitable board and select +circle of Mr. Joseph Sedley. In fact they would take +no denial; they burst into the house whether Becky +was at home or not, walked into Mrs. Osborne’s +drawing-room, which they perfumed with their coats +and mustachios, called Jos “Old buck,” +and invaded his dinner-table, and laughed and drank +for long hours there.</p> + +<p>“What can they mean?” asked Georgy, who +did not like these gentlemen. “I heard the +Major say to Mrs. Crawley yesterday, ’No, no, +Becky, you shan’t keep the old buck to yourself. + We must have the bones in, or, dammy, I’ll +split.’ What could the Major mean, Mamma?”</p> + +<p>“Major! don’t call him Major!” +Emmy said. “I’m sure I can’t tell +what he meant.” His presence and that of his +friend inspired the little lady with intolerable terror +and aversion. They paid her tipsy compliments; they +leered at her over the dinner-table. And the Captain +made her advances that filled her with sickening dismay, +nor would she ever see him unless she had George by +her side.</p> + +<p>Rebecca, to do her justice, never would let either +of these men remain alone with Amelia; the Major was +disengaged too, and swore he would be the winner of +her. A couple of ruffians were fighting for this innocent +creature, gambling for her at her own table, and though +she was not aware of the rascals’ designs upon +her, yet she felt a horror and uneasiness in their +presence and longed to fly.</p> + +<p>She besought, she entreated Jos to go. Not he. He +was slow of movement, tied to his Doctor, and perhaps +to some other leading-strings. At least Becky was +not anxious to go to England.</p> + +<p>At last she took a great resolution--made the great +plunge. She wrote off a letter to a friend whom she +had on the other side of the water, a letter about +which she did not speak a word to anybody, which she +carried herself to the post under her shawl; nor was +any remark made about it, only that she looked very +much flushed and agitated when Georgy met her, and +she kissed him, and hung over him a great deal that +night. She did not come out of her room after her +return from her walk. Becky thought it was Major Loder +and the Captain who frightened her.</p> + +<p>“She mustn’t stop here,” Becky reasoned +with herself. “She must go away, the silly little +fool. She is still whimpering after that gaby of +a husband--dead (and served right!) these fifteen years. +She shan’t marry either of these men. It’s +too bad of Loder. No; she shall marry the bamboo +cane, I’ll settle it this very night.”</p> + +<p>So Becky took a cup of tea to Amelia in her private +apartment and found that lady in the company of her +miniatures, and in a most melancholy and nervous condition. + She laid down the cup of tea.</p> + +<p>“Thank you,” said Amelia.</p> + +<p>“Listen to me, Amelia,” said Becky, marching +up and down the room before the other and surveying +her with a sort of contemptuous kindness. “I +want to talk to you. You must go away from here and +from the impertinences of these men. I won’t +have you harassed by them: and they will insult you +if you stay. I tell you they are rascals: men fit +to send to the hulks. Never mind how I know them. +I know everybody. Jos can’t protect you; he +is too weak and wants a protector himself. You are +no more fit to live in the world than a baby in arms. + You must marry, or you and your precious boy will +go to ruin. You must have a husband, you fool; and +one of the best gentlemen I ever saw has offered you +a hundred times, and you have rejected him, you silly, +heartless, ungrateful little creature!”</p> + +<p>“I tried--I tried my best, indeed I did, Rebecca,” +said Amelia deprecatingly, “but I couldn’t +forget--”; and she finished the sentence by +looking up at the portrait.</p> + +<p>“Couldn’t forget <i>him</i>!” cried +out Becky, “that selfish humbug, that low-bred +cockney dandy, that padded booby, who had neither wit, +nor manners, nor heart, and was no more to be compared +to your friend with the bamboo cane than you are to +Queen Elizabeth. Why, the man was weary of you, and +would have jilted you, but that Dobbin forced him +to keep his word. He owned it to me. He never cared +for you. He used to sneer about you to me, time after +time, and made love to me the week after he married +you.”</p> + +<p>“It’s false! It’s false! Rebecca,” +cried out Amelia, starting up.</p> + +<p>“Look there, you fool,” Becky said, still +with provoking good humour, and taking a little paper +out of her belt, she opened it and flung it into Emmy’s +lap. “You know his handwriting. He wrote that +to me--wanted me to run away with him--gave it me under +your nose, the day before he was shot--and served +him right!” Becky repeated.</p> + +<p>Emmy did not hear her; she was looking at the letter. +It was that which George had put into the bouquet +and given to Becky on the night of the Duchess of +Richmond’s ball. It was as she said: the foolish +young man had asked her to fly.</p> + +<p>Emmy’s head sank down, and for almost the last +time in which she shall be called upon to weep in +this history, she commenced that work. Her head fell +to her bosom, and her hands went up to her eyes; and +there for a while, she gave way to her emotions, as +Becky stood on and regarded her. Who shall analyse +those tears and say whether they were sweet or bitter? +Was she most grieved because the idol of her life +was tumbled down and shivered at her feet, or indignant +that her love had been so despised, or glad because +the barrier was removed which modesty had placed between +her and a new, a real affection? “There is nothing +to forbid me now,” she thought. “I may +love him with all my heart now. Oh, I will, I will, +if he will but let me and forgive me.” I believe +it was this feeling rushed over all the others which +agitated that gentle little bosom.</p> + +<p>Indeed, she did not cry so much as Becky expected--the +other soothed and kissed her--a rare mark of sympathy +with Mrs. Becky. She treated Emmy like a child and +patted her head. “And now let us get pen and +ink and write to him to come this minute,” she +said.</p> + +<p>“I--I wrote to him this morning,” Emmy +said, blushing exceedingly. Becky screamed with laughter--"Un +biglietto,” she sang out with Rosina, “eccolo +qua!"--the whole house echoed with her shrill singing.</p> + +<p>Two mornings after this little scene, although the +day was rainy and gusty, and Amelia had had an exceedingly +wakeful night, listening to the wind roaring, and +pitying all travellers by land and by water, yet she +got up early and insisted upon taking a walk on the +Dike with Georgy; and there she paced as the rain +beat into her face, and she looked out westward across +the dark sea line and over the swollen billows which +came tumbling and frothing to the shore. Neither spoke +much, except now and then, when the boy said a few +words to his timid companion, indicative of sympathy +and protection.</p> + +<p>“I hope he won’t cross in such weather,” +Emmy said.</p> + +<p>“I bet ten to one he does,” the boy answered. + “Look, Mother, there’s the smoke of the +steamer.” It was that signal, sure enough.</p> + +<p>But though the steamer was under way, he might not +be on board; he might not have got the letter; he +might not choose to come. A hundred fears poured +one over the other into the little heart, as fast +as the waves on to the Dike.</p> + +<p>The boat followed the smoke into sight. Georgy had +a dandy telescope and got the vessel under view in +the most skilful manner. And he made appropriate nautical +comments upon the manner of the approach of the steamer +as she came nearer and nearer, dipping and rising +in the water. The signal of an English steamer in +sight went fluttering up to the mast on the pier. + I daresay Mrs. Amelia’s heart was in a similar +flutter.</p> + +<p>Emmy tried to look through the telescope over George’s +shoulder, but she could make nothing of it. She only +saw a black eclipse bobbing up and down before her +eyes.</p> + +<p>George took the glass again and raked the vessel. +“How she does pitch!” he said. “There +goes a wave slap over her bows. There’s only +two people on deck besides the steersman. There’s +a man lying down, and a--chap in a--cloak with a--Hooray!--it’s +Dob, by Jingo!” He clapped to the telescope +and flung his arms round his mother. As for that +lady, let us say what she did in the words of a favourite +poet--"Dakruoen gelasasa.” She was sure it was +William. It could be no other. What she had said +about hoping that he would not come was all hypocrisy. + Of course he would come; what could he do else but +come? She knew he would come.</p> + +<p>The ship came swiftly nearer and nearer. As they +went in to meet her at the landing-place at the quay, +Emmy’s knees trembled so that she scarcely could +run. She would have liked to kneel down and say her +prayers of thanks there. Oh, she thought, she would +be all her life saying them!</p> + +<p>It was such a bad day that as the vessel came alongside +of the quay there were no idlers abroad, scarcely +even a commissioner on the look out for the few passengers +in the steamer. That young scapegrace George had +fled too, and as the gentleman in the old cloak lined +with red stuff stepped on to the shore, there was +scarcely any one present to see what took place, which +was briefly this:</p> + +<p>A lady in a dripping white bonnet and shawl, with +her two little hands out before her, went up to him, +and in the next minute she had altogether disappeared +under the folds of the old cloak, and was kissing +one of his hands with all her might; whilst the other, +I suppose, was engaged in holding her to his heart +(which her head just about reached) and in preventing +her from tumbling down. She was murmuring something +about--forgive--dear William--dear, dear, dearest +friend--kiss, kiss, kiss, and so forth--and in fact +went on under the cloak in an absurd manner.</p> + +<p>When Emmy emerged from it, she still kept tight hold +of one of William’s hands, and looked up in +his face. It was full of sadness and tender love +and pity. She understood its reproach and hung down +her head.</p> + +<p>“It was time you sent for me, dear Amelia,” +he said.</p> + +<p>“You will never go again, William?”</p> + +<p>“No, never,” he answered, and pressed +the dear little soul once more to his heart.</p> + +<p>As they issued out of the custom-house precincts, +Georgy broke out on them, with his telescope up to +his eye, and a loud laugh of welcome; he danced round +the couple and performed many facetious antics as +he led them up to the house. Jos wasn’t up yet; +Becky not visible (though she looked at them through +the blinds). Georgy ran off to see about breakfast. + Emmy, whose shawl and bonnet were off in the passage +in the hands of Mrs. Payne, now went to undo the clasp +of William’s cloak, and--we will, if you please, +go with George, and look after breakfast for the Colonel. + The vessel is in port. He has got the prize he has +been trying for all his life. The bird has come in +at last. There it is with its head on his shoulder, +billing and cooing close up to his heart, with soft +outstretched fluttering wings. This is what he has +asked for every day and hour for eighteen years. +This is what he pined after. Here it is--the summit, +the end--the last page of the third volume. Good-bye, +Colonel--God bless you, honest William!--Farewell, +dear Amelia--Grow green again, tender little parasite, +round the rugged old oak to which you cling!</p> + +<p>Perhaps it was compunction towards the kind and simple +creature, who had been the first in life to defend +her, perhaps it was a dislike to all such sentimental +scenes--but Rebecca, satisfied with her part in the +transaction, never presented herself before Colonel +Dobbin and the lady whom he married. “Particular +business,” she said, took her to Bruges, whither +she went, and only Georgy and his uncle were present +at the marriage ceremony. When it was over, and Georgy +had rejoined his parents, Mrs. Becky returned (just +for a few days) to comfort the solitary bachelor, +Joseph Sedley. He preferred a continental life, he +said, and declined to join in housekeeping with his +sister and her husband.</p> + +<p>Emmy was very glad in her heart to think that she +had written to her husband before she read or knew +of that letter of George’s. “I knew it +all along,” William said; “but could I +use that weapon against the poor fellow’s memory? +It was that which made me suffer so when you--”</p> + +<p>“Never speak of that day again,” Emmy +cried out, so contrite and humble that William turned +off the conversation by his account of Glorvina and +dear old Peggy O’Dowd, with whom he was sitting +when the letter of recall reached him. “If +you hadn’t sent for me,” he added with +a laugh, “who knows what Glorvina’s name +might be now?”</p> + +<p>At present it is Glorvina Posky (now Mrs. Major Posky); +she took him on the death of his first wife, having +resolved never to marry out of the regiment. Lady +O’Dowd is also so attached to it that, she says, +if anything were to happen to Mick, bedad she’d +come back and marry some of ’em. But the Major-General +is quite well and lives in great splendour at O’Dowdstown, +with a pack of beagles, and (with the exception of +perhaps their neighbour, Hoggarty of Castle Hoggarty) +he is the first man of his county. Her Ladyship still +dances jigs, and insisted on standing up with the Master +of the Horse at the Lord Lieutenant’s last ball. + Both she and Glorvina declared that Dobbin had used +the latter SHEAMFULLY, but Posky falling in, Glorvina +was consoled, and a beautiful turban from Paris appeased +the wrath of Lady O’Dowd.</p> + +<p>When Colonel Dobbin quitted the service, which he +did immediately after his marriage, he rented a pretty +little country place in Hampshire, not far from Queen’s +Crawley, where, after the passing of the Reform Bill, +Sir Pitt and his family constantly resided now. All +idea of a Peerage was out of the question, the Baronet’s +two seats in Parliament being lost. He was both out +of pocket and out of spirits by that catastrophe, +failed in his health, and prophesied the speedy ruin +of the Empire.</p> + +<p>Lady Jane and Mrs. Dobbin became great friends--there +was a perpetual crossing of pony-chaises between the +Hall and the Evergreens, the Colonel’s place +(rented of his friend Major Ponto, who was abroad +with his family). Her Ladyship was godmother to Mrs. +Dobbin’s child, which bore her name, and was +christened by the Rev. James Crawley, who succeeded +his father in the living: and a pretty close friendship +subsisted between the two lads, George and Rawdon, +who hunted and shot together in the vacations, were +both entered of the same college at Cambridge, and +quarrelled with each other about Lady Jane’s +daughter, with whom they were both, of course, in love. +A match between George and that young lady was long +a favourite scheme of both the matrons, though I have +heard that Miss Crawley herself inclined towards her +cousin.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Rawdon Crawley’s name was never mentioned +by either family. There were reasons why all should +be silent regarding her. For wherever Mr. Joseph +Sedley went, she travelled likewise, and that infatuated +man seemed to be entirely her slave. The Colonel’s +lawyers informed him that his brother-in-law had effected +a heavy insurance upon his life, whence it was probable +that he had been raising money to discharge debts. + He procured prolonged leave of absence from the East +India House, and indeed, his infirmities were daily +increasing.</p> + +<p>On hearing the news about the insurance, Amelia, in +a good deal of alarm, entreated her husband to go +to Brussels, where Jos then was, and inquire into +the state of his affairs. The Colonel quitted home +with reluctance (for he was deeply immersed in his +History of the Punjaub which still occupies him, and +much alarmed about his little daughter, whom he idolizes, +and who was just recovering from the chicken-pox) +and went to Brussels and found Jos living at one of +the enormous hotels in that city. Mrs. Crawley, who +had her carriage, gave entertainments, and lived in +a very genteel manner, occupied another suite of apartments +in the same hotel.</p> + +<p>The Colonel, of course, did not desire to see that +lady, or even think proper to notify his arrival at +Brussels, except privately to Jos by a message through +his valet. Jos begged the Colonel to come and see +him that night, when Mrs. Crawley would be at a soiree, +and when they could meet alone. He found his brother-in-law +in a condition of pitiable infirmity--and dreadfully +afraid of Rebecca, though eager in his praises of +her. She tended him through a series of unheard-of +illnesses with a fidelity most admirable. She had +been a daughter to him. “But--but--oh, for God’s +sake, do come and live near me, and--and--see me sometimes,” +whimpered out the unfortunate man.</p> + +<p>The Colonel’s brow darkened at this. “We +can’t, Jos,” he said. “Considering +the circumstances, Amelia can’t visit you.”</p> + +<p>“I swear to you--I swear to you on the Bible,” +gasped out Joseph, wanting to kiss the book, “that +she is as innocent as a child, as spotless as your +own wife.”</p> + +<p>“It may be so,” said the Colonel gloomily, +“but Emmy can’t come to you. Be a man, +Jos: break off this disreputable connection. Come +home to your family. We hear your affairs are involved.”</p> + +<p>“Involved!” cried Jos. “Who has +told such calumnies? All my money is placed out most +advantageously. Mrs. Crawley--that is--I mean-- it +is laid out to the best interest.”</p> + +<p>“You are not in debt, then? Why did you insure +your life?”</p> + +<p>“I thought--a little present to her--in case +anything happened; and you know my health is so delicate--common +gratitude you know--and I intend to leave all my money +to you--and I can spare it out of my income, indeed +I can,” cried out William’s weak brother-in-law.</p> + +<p>The Colonel besought Jos to fly at once--to go back +to India, whither Mrs. Crawley could not follow him; +to do anything to break off a connection which might +have the most fatal consequences to him.</p> + +<p>Jos clasped his hands and cried, “He would go +back to India. He would do anything, only he must +have time: they mustn’t say anything to Mrs. +Crawley--she’d--she’d kill me if she knew +it. You don’t know what a terrible woman she +is,” the poor wretch said.</p> + +<p>“Then, why not come away with me?” said +Dobbin in reply; but Jos had not the courage. “He +would see Dobbin again in the morning; he must on +no account say that he had been there. He must go +now. Becky might come in.” And Dobbin quitted +him, full of forebodings.</p> + +<p>He never saw Jos more. Three months afterwards Joseph +Sedley died at Aix-la-Chapelle. It was found that +all his property had been muddled away in speculations, +and was represented by valueless shares in different +bubble companies. All his available assets were the +two thousand pounds for which his life was insured, +and which were left equally between his beloved “sister +Amelia, wife of, &c., and his friend and invaluable +attendant during sickness, Rebecca, wife of Lieutenant-Colonel +Rawdon Crawley, C.B.,” who was appointed administratrix.</p> + +<p>The solicitor of the insurance company swore it was +the blackest case that ever had come before him, talked +of sending a commission to Aix to examine into the +death, and the Company refused payment of the policy. + But Mrs., or Lady Crawley, as she styled herself, +came to town at once (attended with her solicitors, +Messrs. Burke, Thurtell, and Hayes, of Thavies Inn) +and dared the Company to refuse the payment. They +invited examination, they declared that she was the +object of an infamous conspiracy, which had been pursuing +her all through life, and triumphed finally. The +money was paid, and her character established, but +Colonel Dobbin sent back his share of the legacy to +the insurance office and rigidly declined to hold any +communication with Rebecca.</p> + +<p>She never was Lady Crawley, though she continued so +to call herself. His Excellency Colonel Rawdon Crawley +died of yellow fever at Coventry Island, most deeply +beloved and deplored, and six weeks before the demise +of his brother, Sir Pitt. The estate consequently +devolved upon the present Sir Rawdon Crawley, Bart.</p> + +<p>He, too, has declined to see his mother, to whom he +makes a liberal allowance, and who, besides, appears +to be very wealthy. The Baronet lives entirely at +Queen’s Crawley, with Lady Jane and her daughter, +whilst Rebecca, Lady Crawley, chiefly hangs about Bath +and Cheltenham, where a very strong party of excellent +people consider her to be a most injured woman. She +has her enemies. Who has not? Her life is her answer +to them. She busies herself in works of piety. She +goes to church, and never without a footman. Her name +is in all the Charity Lists. The destitute orange-girl, +the neglected washerwoman, the distressed muffin-man +find in her a fast and generous friend. She is always +having stalls at Fancy Fairs for the benefit of these +hapless beings. Emmy, her children, and the Colonel, +coming to London some time back, found themselves suddenly +before her at one of these fairs. She cast down her +eyes demurely and smiled as they started away from +her; Emmy scurrying off on the arm of George (now +grown a dashing young gentleman) and the Colonel seizing +up his little Janey, of whom he is fonder than of anything +in the world--fonder even than of his History of the +Punjaub.</p> + +<p>“Fonder than he is of me,” Emmy thinks +with a sigh But he never said a word to Amelia that +was not kind and gentle, or thought of a want of hers +that he did not try to gratify.</p> + +<p>Ah! Vanitas Vanitatum! which of us is happy in this +world? Which of us has his desire? or, having it, +is satisfied?--come, children, let us shut up the +box and the puppets, for our play is played out.</p> + +<hr width="75%" size="1" /> + +<pre> + +End of Project Gutenberg's Vanity Fair, by William Makepeace Thackeray + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VANITY FAIR *** + +This file should be named vfair12.txt or vfair12.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, vfair11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, vfair10a.txt + +Produced by Juli Rew, juliana@ncar.ucar.edu + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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