LIKE MOST OTHER CHILDREN, WHO SHOULD BE MY GODFATHER IS DECIDED BY
MAMMON--SO PRECOCIOUS AS TO MAKE SOME NOISE IN THE WORLD, AND BE HUNG A
FEW DAYS AFTER I WAS BORN--CUT DOWN IN TIME, AND PRODUCE A SCENE OF
BLOODSHED--MY EARLY PROPENSITIES FULLY DEVELOPED BY THE CHOICE OF MY
PROFESSION.
Those who may be pleased to honour these pages with a perusal, will not
be detained with a long introductory history of my birth, parentage, and
education. The very title implies that, at this period of my memoirs, I
was ignorant of the two first; and it will be necessary for the due
development of my narrative, that I allow them to remain in the same
state of bliss; for in the perusal of a tale, as well as in the
pilgrimage of life, ignorance of the future may truly be considered as
the greatest source of happiness.
The little that was known of me at this time I will however narrate as
concisely, and as correctly, as I am able. It was on the -- I really
forget the date, and must rise from my chair, look for a key, open a
closet, and then open an iron safe to hunt over a pile of papers--it
will detain you too long--it will be sufficient to say that it was on
_a_ night--but whether the night was dark or moonlit, or rainy or foggy,
or cloudy or fine, or starlight, I really cannot tell; but it is of no
very great consequence. Well, it was on a night about the hour--there
again I'm puzzled, it might have been ten, or eleven, or twelve, or
between any of these hours; nay, it might have been past midnight, and
far advancing to the morning, for what I know to the contrary. The
reader must excuse an infant of -- there again I am at a nonplus; but we
will assume of some days old--if, when wrapped up in flannel and in a
covered basket, and, moreover, fast asleep at the time, he does not
exactly observe the state of the weather, and the time by the church
clock. I never before was aware of the great importance of dates in
telling a story; but it is now too late to recover these facts, which
have been swept away into oblivion by the broad wing of Time. I must
therefore just tell the little I do know, trusting to the reader's good
nature, and to blanks. It is as follows:--that, at the hour -- of the
night--the state of the weather being also --:--I, an infant of a
certain age -- was suspended by somebody or somebodies -- at the knocker
of the Foundling Hospital. Having made me fast, the said somebody or
somebodies rang a peal upon the bell which made the old porter start up
in so great a hurry, that, with the back of his hand he hit his better
half a blow on the nose, occasioning a great suffusion of blood from
that organ, and a still greater pouring forth of invectives from the
organ immediately below it.
All this having been effected by the said peal on the bell, the said
somebody or somebodies did incontinently take to their heels, and
disappear long before the old porter could pull his legs through his
nether garments and obey the rude summons. At last the old man swang
open the gate and the basket swang across his nose; he went in again for
a knife and cut me down, for it was cruel to hang a baby of a few days
old; carried me into the lodge, lighted a candle, and opened the basket.
Thus did I metaphorically first come to light.
When he opened the basket I opened my eyes, and although I did not
observe it, the old woman was standing at the table in very light
attire, sponging her nose over a basin.
"Verily, a pretty babe with black eyes!" exclaimed the old man in a
tremulous voice.
"Black eyes, indeed," muttered the old woman. "I shall have two
to-morrow."
"Beautiful black eyes, indeed!" continued the old man.
"Terrible black eyes, for sartain," continued the old woman, as she
sponged away.
"Poor thing, it must be cold," murmured the old porter.
"Warrant I catch my death a-cold," muttered the wife.
"But, dear me, here's a paper!" exclaimed the old man.
"Vinegar and brown paper," echoed the old woman.
"Addressed to the governors of the hospital," continued the porter.
"Apply to the dispenser of the hospital," continued his wife.
"And sealed," said he.
"Get it healed," said she.
"The linen is good; it must be the child of no poor people. Who
knows?"--soliloquised the old man.
"My poor nose!" exclaimed the old woman.
"I must take it to the nurses, and the letter I will give to-morrow,"
said the old porter, winding up his portion of this double soliloquy,
and tottering away with the basket and your humble servant across the
court-yard.
"There, it will do now," said the old wife, wiping her face on a towel,
and regaining her bed, in which she was soon joined by her husband, and
they finished their nap without any further interruption during that
night.
The next morning I was reported and examined, and the letter addressed
to the governors was opened and read. It was laconic, but still, as
most things laconic are, very much to the point.
"This child was born in wedlock--he is to be named Japhet. When
circumstances permit, he will be reclaimed."
But there was a postscript by Abraham Newland, Esquire, promising to pay
the bearer, on demand, the sum of fifty pounds. In plainer terms, there
was a bank note to that amount inclosed in the letter. As in general
the parties who suspend children in baskets, have long before suspended
cash payments, or, at all events, forget to suspend them with the
baskets, my arrival created no little noise, to which I added my share,
until I obtained a share of the breast of a young woman, who, like
Charity, suckled two or three babies at one time.
We have preparatory schools all over the kingdom; for young gentlemen,
from three to five years of age, under ladies, and from four to seven,
under either, or both sexes, as it may happen; but the most preparatory
of all preparatory schools, is certainly the Foundling Hospital, which
takes in its pupils, if they are sent, from one to three days old, or
even hours, if the parents are in such extreme anxiety about their
education. Here it commences with their weaning, when they are
instructed in the mystery of devouring pap, next, they are taught to
walk--and as soon as they can walk--to sit still; to talk--and as soon
as they can talk--to hold their tongues; thus are they instructed and
passed on from one part of the establishment to another, until they
finally are passed out of its gates, to get on in the world, with the
advantages of some education, and the still further advantage of having
no father or mother to provide for, or relatives to pester them with
their necessities. It was so with me: I arrived at the age of fourteen,
and notwithstanding the promise contained in the letter, it appeared
that circumstances did _not_ permit of my being reclaimed. But I had a
great advantage over the other inmates of the hospital; the fifty pounds
sent with me were not added to the funds of the establishment, but
generously employed for my benefit by the governors, who were pleased
with my conduct, and thought highly of my abilities. Instead of being
bound 'prentice to a cordwainer, or some other mechanic, by the
influence of the governors, added to the fifty pounds and interest, as a
premium, I was taken by an apothecary, who engaged to bring me up to the
profession. And now, that I am out of the Foundling, we must not travel
quite so fast. The practitioner who thus took me by the hand was a Mr
Phineas Cophagus, whose house was most conveniently situated for
business, one side of the shop looking upon Smithfield Market, the other
presenting a surface of glass to the principal street leading out of the
same market. It was a _corner_ house, but not in a _corner_. On each
side of the shop were two gin establishments, and next to them were two
public-houses and then two eating-houses, frequented by graziers,
butchers, and drovers. Did the men drink so much as to quarrel in their
cups, who was so handy to plaster up the broken heads as Mr Cophagus?
Did a fat grazier eat himself into an apoplexy, how very convenient was
the ready lancet of Mr Cophagus. Did a bull gore a man, Mr Cophagus
appeared with his diachylon and lint. Did an ox frighten a lady, it was
in the back parlour of Mr Cophagus that she was recovered from her
syncope. Market-days were a sure market to my master; and if an
overdriven beast knocked down others, it only helped to set him on his
legs. Our window suffered occasionally; but whether it were broken
heads, or broken limbs, or broken windows, they were well paid for.
Everyone suffered but Mr Phineas Cophagus, who never suffered a patient
to escape him. The shop had the usual allowance of green, yellow, and
blue bottles; and in hot weather, from our vicinity, we were visited by
no small proportion of bluebottle flies. We had a white horse in one
window, and a brown horse in the other, to announce to the drovers that
we supplied horse-medicines. And we had all the patent medicines in the
known world, even to the "all-sufficient medicine for mankind" of Mr
Enouy; having which, I wondered, on my first arrival, why we troubled
ourselves about any others. The shop was large, and at the back part
there was a most capacious iron mortar, with a pestle to correspond.
The first floor was tenanted by Mr Cophagus, who was a bachelor; the
second floor was let; the others were appropriated to the housekeeper,
and to those who formed the establishment. In this well-situated
tenement, Mr Cophagus got on swimmingly. I will, therefore, for the
present, sink the shop, that my master may rise in the estimation of the
reader, when I describe his person and his qualifications.
Mr Phineas Cophagus might have been about forty-five years of age when
I first had the honour of an introduction to him in the receiving-room
of the Foundling Hospital. He was of the middle height, his face was
thin, his nose very much hooked, his eyes small and peering, with a
good-humoured twinkle in them, his mouth large, and drawn down at one
corner. He was stout in his body, and carried a considerable
protuberance before him, which he was in the habit of patting with his
left hand very complacently; but although stout in his body, his legs
were mere spindles, so that, in his appearance, he reminded you of some
bird of the crane genus. Indeed, I may say, that his whole figure gave
you just such an impression as an orange might do, had it taken to
itself a couple of pieces of tobacco pipes as vehicles of locomotion.
He was dressed in a black coat and waistcoat, white cravat and high
collar to his shirt, blue cotton net pantaloons and Hessian boots, both
fitting so tight, that it appeared as if he was proud of his spindle
shanks. His hat was broad-brimmed and low, and he carried a stout black
cane with a gold top in his right hand, almost always raising the gold
top to his nose when he spoke, just as we see doctors represented at a
consultation in the caricature prints. But if his figure was strange,
his language and manners were still more so. He spoke, as some birds
fly, in jerks, intermixing his words, for he never completed a whole
sentence, with _um_--_um_--and ending it with "so on," leaving his
hearers to supply the context from the heads of his discourse. Almost
always in motion, he generally changed his position as soon as he had
finished speaking, walking to any other part of the room, with his cane
to his nose, and his head cocked on one side, with a self-sufficient
tiptoe gait. When I was ushered into his presence, he was standing with
two of the governors. "This is the lad," said one of them, "his name is
_Japhet_."
"Japhet," replied Mr Cophagus; "um, scriptural--Shem, Ham, _um_--and so
on. Boy reads?"
"Very well, and writes a _very_ good hand. He is a very good boy, Mr
Cophagus."
"Read--write--spell--good, and so on. Bring him up--rudiments--
spatula--write labels--um--M.D. one of these days--make a man of him--
and so on," said this strange personage, walking round and round me with
his cane to his nose, and scrutinising my person with his twinkling
eyes. I was dismissed after this examination and approval, and the next
day, dressed in a plain suit of clothes, was delivered by the porter at
the shop of Mr Phineas Cophagus, who was not at home when I arrived.