I SHA’N’T SAY ANYTHING AT ALL ABOUT WHAT’S COMING IN THE PRESENT
CHAPTER. ALL I KNOW IS, THAT IT NEARLY DROVE ME STARK STARING MAD,
AND OFTEN AND OFTEN I HAVE IN MY AGONY OF MIND BEEN FORCED TO
EXCLAIM, IN THE WORDS OF THAT SWEET SINGER, MR. BRAHAM, AS FOLLOWS:--
“Oh! (goodness gracious me) I can bear my fate no longer,
E’en hope (’pon my word) is banish’d from my soul!”
_Recitative to that beautiful ballad of_ “THROUGH THE FORESTS,
THROUGH THE MEADOWS,” _in “Der Freischutz,” and which, indeed, I
once had the music of, for that charming girl, Miss Emily B-yl-s,
was kind enough to copy it out for me, but where it’s gone to now,
goodness only knows; most likely some of my beauties of servants
have taken it to light the fire, or put the candles up with, or
something equally pretty. All I know is, it isn’t to be found in my
Canterbury, and it can’t have walked out of the house by itself,
that’s clear._
Before taking up the thread of my story from where I dropped it last
month, I should like the gentle reader to know what a dreadful fidget
Mr. Sk--n--st--n is. Though it is but right to add, that I have
comparatively little or nothing to say against my beloved Edward in
other respects. But even if I had been blessed with an angel for a
husband, and he had unfortunately been a knag, still, I do verily
believe that I should have found my lot just as hard to bear with as I
do at present. For if there is one thing more trying than another to
one’s good temper, or more calculated to rumple the natural smoothness
of one’s amiable disposition, and to put one out of sorts with the whole
world, and everybody in it, it is to have a man always at one, worry
worry, fidget fidget, knag knag, from the first thing when he gets up in
the morning, to the last thing when he goes to bed at night. Really any
unprejudiced person like myself would believe that Mr. Sk--n--st--n was
never happy unless he was trying to see how miserable he could make me;
for literally and truly, without exaggeration, the man’s chief
enjoyment seemed to lie in finding fault with, first this thing, then
that thing, and then the other. I declare it’s my firm opinion to this
very day, that he used to think of nothing else all the way home, but
what he could make a noise about directly he set foot in the house. Only
just let him be able to write his trumpery name in the dust on the hall
chairs, or let the cloth not be laid for dinner ready to receive my
fine, greedy gentleman, or let me be in my morning wrapper, and not
dressed to the very moment that he knocked at the door (of course it was
no matter to _him_ how much I had been slaving all through the hot day,
just to make him comfortable, oh, no, of course it wasn’t!)--or even if
he couldn’t find fault with any of these, only just let the forks be a
little dirty between the prongs, or the soup be cold, or a little
twopenny-halfpenny caterpillar be in the greens, and then, oh dear me,
_there_ were fine nuts indeed for my lord to crack--he never knew such a
house--he didn’t--like a pigstye--of course it _always_ was--be better
treated at a common tavern, he would (then why didn’t he go there, I
should like to know, instead of coming home always grumbling away, like
an old Smellfungus as he is). Then of a morning, too, he had no sooner
swallowed his breakfast, than he must go dancing down stairs, and stand
fiddling for half an hour in the cellar, pretending to be getting his
filthy wine out, though of course I knew what my gentleman was after, as
well as he himself did, for up stairs he’d trot, with a face as long as
my arm, with a whole pack of trumpery complaints, and, as pleased as
Punch with the mare’s-nests that my Mr. Clever thought he had
discovered. Then out they would come, one after another--first, why
weren’t the blacking brushes in their proper place, instead of on the
kitchen dresser?--or else, hadn’t he told me over and over again, that
he wouldn’t have the servants’ candlesticks put into the fire?--or, why
were the cinders all about the passage?--or else, he declared the stones
were as black as his hat, and had never been cleaned for a
twelvemonth,--in fact, the whole place was a perfect disgrace to me, and
positively, he would go on fidgeting and knagging about this, that, and
the other, until I lost all patience with him, and told him as plainly
as I could, “that he had no business at all down in the kitchen, poking
his nose into what didn’t concern him, and that all I wished to goodness
gracious was, that the cook would pin a dishclout to his coat tails, and
then, nothing would give me greater pleasure than to let him go down to
the court at Westminster with it dangling at his heels, if it was only
that the Lord Chief Justice of England might see what a mollycoddle and
poking meddling thing he was”--and the beauty of it was, that I used to
put him in such a passion by telling him that there was a party I knew,
who was not a hundred miles from where I was standing, and who was one
of the greatest fidgets that I ever came near, and saying in my most
tantalising way, “Well, I wouldn’t be a fidget, no, not if anybody was
to make me a present of all the gold in the mines of Peru that very
moment.”
Methinks that ever and anon I hear the courteous reader exclaiming,
“But, my dear Mrs. Sk--n--st--n, this really has nothing at all to do
with the subject of your story.” You are right, courteous reader, no
more it has; but the truth is, I feel slightly indisposed this morning;
in fact, I may say I have not felt myself for this last day or two--I
think it is nothing more than a slight attack of the bile after all, and
my fair readers will, I’m sure, agree with me, that when one is bilious,
there is nothing does one so much good as to be able to speak one’s
mind, without any restraint or the fear of ever being taken to task for
it. So, as there is no earthly chance of Mr. Sk--n--st--n’s ever meeting
with these few candid remarks, why I’m only too glad to have the
opportunity of letting my lady readers know what I really think of my
pretty gentleman. However, I will try and rally myself, and coax my
wandering thoughts back to my subject, though I’m afraid it will be a
difficult task for me to accomplish in my present state of feeling, for
I’ve a number of little white stars floating about before my eyes, and
my right temple is throbbing and aching as if some imp, out of mere
mischief, was thumping away at it with a sledge hammer, and I have a
shooting pain just between my shoulders as though some one had got a
penknife and was digging it into me every other moment. Our medical
adviser says I have gone out and caught that nasty influenza which has
been flying about our neighbourhood of late; but don’t tell me! I know
it’s nothing of the kind, and only my old friend the bile that’s come
back again to worry my very life out, and it’s my firm opinion that our
medical adviser knows nothing at all about it.
Well, as I was saying, that beauty of a husband of mine is such a
fidget, and must always be meddling with what he knows nothing at all
about, that I declare all the time I was nursing he wouldn’t let me
taste even a little pickle. And of course in a family you can’t be
having a hot joint every day of the week, and I wouldn’t give a pin for
my dinner when it’s cold meat, and you can’t touch even so much as a
gherkin, or a walnut, or a simple mouthful of red cabbage, to give it a
relish. When the rhubarb was coming in, too, really it was quite
heart-rending. I declare, he wouldn’t let me eat a spoonful of it,
though I had gone to the expense of two shillings, like a silly, to buy
as beautiful a bundle as I think I ever set eyes on in all my life, and
which positively quite made my mouth water when I saw it at the
greengrocer’s, it looked such a picture. And the worst of it all was, I
had fixed my mind on it so, (for, to tell the truth, it’s a favourite
dish of mine,) that I only eat half a dinner, so as to be able to do
justice to the lovely large tart I had made. But Mr. Edward _must_ know
such a deal about what was good and what was bad for me, that _of
course_ he would have it that I should go making the child ill, even if
I took as much of the fruit as would lie upon a sixpence, only just as a
taste, though I told him that I had bought it principally in the light
of medicine, as I had heard mother say over and over again that it was a
fine thing to sweeten the blood at the change of the year. But, oh dear
me, no! of course my Mr. Wiseacre knew a great deal better than people
who had lived twice as long and seen twice as much of the world as he
had, and wouldn’t let me have even a thimble full, just to see if it had
turned out as well as I had expected (drat him!) saying, “I ought to be
as well aware as he was, that such things were not fit for me while I
was nursing.” Ought I, indeed!--though, if it comes to that, what on
earth can _he_ know about nursing--a molly-coddle! (Augh! I do detest
molly-coddles, and all I can say is, you wont catch me marrying one
again in a hurry.)
So as I had got a nurse, and she was coming in shortly, and as my poor
little dear pet must be weaned some time or other, I thought it would be
better to get that troublesome job over before the new maid entered my
service. For I do think it is a perfect cruelty to break a poor thing’s
rest every night, for a week at least, with the care of a dear little
infant, that of course she doesn’t care a fig about. Besides, I didn’t
like to entrust the arduous duty of weaning to a stranger, and my own
ever dear mother had made me promise that I would let her have the
pleasure of weaning my little chicken. So I thought it would be better,
under the circumstances, to make friends with her again, and just get
her to take charge of my beautiful little ducks-o’-diamonds for a week
or so, especially, too, as Easter Sunday was just coming round; and
since I have always made it a religious duty to have a nice little
quarter of lamb and a delicious gooseberry pudding with the wood in it,
on that day, I felt convinced I should never forgive myself if I wasn’t
able to touch a mouthful of the pudding, through Mr. Edward’s taking a
mean advantage of my nursing, as I well knew he would only be too glad
to do. Besides, to tell the truth, if there’s one thing that I’m more
partial to than another, it is to gooseberries with the wood in them,
for I do think that, with an egg beaten up in them, just to take the
roughness off, you have such an exquisite flavour of the tree in the
fruit, that really I should like any lady reader of mine who may be
unacquainted with that delicacy of the season, just to try it, (though I
can hardly bring myself to believe, that out of the thirty-nine thousand
readers I have every month, there can be one among the number who has
been wicked heathen enough to have allowed every Easter Sunday of her
life to have gone by, without having so much as once partaken of a
gooseberry pudding with the wood in it--if so, I blush for her.) Oh!
with plenty of sugar, it is delicious; indeed, I may say, heavenly.
While upon this topic, I think it is but right to add, that I have
always, ever since I was a child, made it a solemn duty to observe, with
the greatest strictness, all the feasts which have been ordained by our
venerable mother church. Thank goodness, I can lay my head on my pillow
at night and safely say, that I have never allowed a single year to
pass over my head without partaking with great devotion and extreme
relish of the plum-pudding and mince-pie of Christmas, the pancake of
Shrove Tuesday (by the bye, with a spoonful of gin, it eats just like
ratafia, I can assure you) and the divine gooseberry tart of Easter
Sunday; though, with all my enthusiasm, I regret to state, I can’t say
as much for that filthy salt cod of Ash Wednesday. I cannot let the
subject drop here, without adding, that it has cut me to the heart to
see a nasty barbarous innovating spirit growing up among us of late,
which threatens to destroy all the sacred institutions of our country,
and to roll the plum-pudding of our forefathers in the dust. Nor can I,
before quitting the theme, help giving this solemn warning to the wives
and mothers of England, “Hold fast to your pancakes, or they will be
snatched from you before many Shrove Tuesdays are over your heads, as
sure as my name is Sk--n--st--n.” If the ruthless despoilers must pull
down something, why let them tear our salt fish from us; but in the name
of all that is great and good, let them spare us the agony of seeing the
gooseberry pudding of our best affections trampled under foot.
However, I must leave my gooseberry pudding for awhile, and return to
that sentimental novel-reading creature of a Betsy, of whom I spoke in
my last chapter. There was a nice bit of goods for a well regulated
establishment like mine! How people can ever bring their minds to give
characters to such idle, good-for-nothing affected toads, is a mystery
to me, and from the character I had with her, I’m sure I expected that
she would have proved nothing less than the treasure I had been on the
constant look out for ever since I was married. Lord-a’-mercy upon the
woman, I don’t suppose there ever was (or ever will be again, let us
hope) another creature like her. I declare, unless you kept her right
under your nose all day long, there was no getting her to do a single
thing properly; for positively she was so wrapt up in her romances, that
directly my eye was off her, she was sure to pull the “HEADS OF THE
HEADLESS” out of her pocket, or else spread out “MARIANNE THE CHILD OF
CHARITY,” right before her on the kitchen dresser, and no matter what
she was at, there she would go rubbing and reading and snivelling away,
paying a great deal more attention to her trumpery pennyworth of
“soul-stirring interest,” than to my work. I’m sure that to have made
her perfectly happy, all she wanted was to have been allowed to scrub
down the stairs, with a reading-desk set up before her, or else to stick
some highly exciting nautico-domestic rubbish at the top of her broom,
and read while she swept--in the same way as the military bands stick
their music on their hautboys and things, so that they may play while
they march.
For, upon my word, often and often have I, after ringing two or three
times for the sentimental cat, gone down in the kitchen, and found her
with a snuff to the candle as big as a toad-stool, and all of a tremble
like an Italian greyhound, over the “CASTLE FIEND, or _the Fate of the
Loved and the Lost, and the Ten Mysteries_,” or some other
powerfully-written nonsense; and if in my vexation I snatched it from
her hand, I was sure to find that, instead of minding the needle-work I
had given her, she had been wasting the whole of her evening with such
stuff as this:
“Hush! some one comes,” said the Baron Mavaracordo to Canoni--a man
of strange aspect and apparel--as they were seated in a richly
decorated room in Strademoor Castle.
“My lord,” said a man-at-arms, “there come three travellers through
the storm, and demand admittance to the castle.”
“Do they proclaim their calling and degree?”
“They do not; but in the name of hospitality as wanderers, they
demand admittance. One is a female, but they are well mounted; and
one looks warlike, although clad not in the garments of a knight.”
(Clad not! Pretty talk that for a common soldier--of the dark ages,
too.)
“Admit them; and, with all imaginable speed, show them to the
painted closet. I will see them there.”
When the man-at-arms had left to perform his errand, the baron
turned to his companion, and said,--
“It is they.”[B]
It is they!--_is it_ they indeed? There’s soul-stirring interest for
you, all about your grand Baron Mavaracordo’s, who can’t speak even good
grammar, and Italian gentlemen of astrological skill, who declare, that
“if by the occult sciences that are familiar to them they can only find
the knave who threw this here, he should suffer such pangs he dreams
not of.”[C]
And, bless your heart, she hadn’t been in the house a week or so before,
I declare to goodness, I don’t think there was a saucepan in the place
that hadn’t its bottom burnt out; for there she would let, no matter
what it was, boil and boil away till there wasn’t a drop of water left;
for what did _she_ care about the fish or the potatoes so long as she
could have a quiet half-hour’s cry over the “BLACK PIRATE,” or else be
finding out what became of “MARY, THE PRIMROSE GIRL,” instead of looking
after my greens. It’s a perfect miracle to me, too, that we were not all
of us burnt in our beds; for when she found that I was one too many for
her, and kept throwing her “HEIRESSES OF SACKVILLE” and her “CHILDREN OF
TWO FATHERS” behind the fire as fast as she got them, then she must
needs go reading in her room half the night through, and smuggling
either “THE GIPSY BOY,” or else “THE MANIAC FATHER, _or the Victim of
Seduction_,” up to-bed with her of a night, robbing herself of her
proper rest and me of my candles; and even when I took care to see that
she had only an end just long enough to light her into bed, why then,
drat her impudence, if the nasty toad didn’t burn all the kitchen stuff
she could lay her hands upon in the butter-boat, with an old lamp wick
stuck up in the middle.
How on earth the horrid silly could ever have managed to pay for all the
works she took in out of the wages I allowed her, and what in the name
of goodness she could ever have thought was to become of her in her old
age, it would, I’m sure, take a much wiser head than mine to say; for
independently of being a constant subscriber from the commencement to
most of the penny novels, I declare nothing would please her stuck-up
literary ladyship but she must needs take in a newspaper of her own
every week, and be a constant reader of the “Penny Sunday Times,” though
what to gracious she could have seen in the thing, I can’t make out.
Positively, it used to make me shudder all over, and the blood run quite
cold down my back, to see the large, staring, frightful engraving that
there was always in the middle of its front page. For as true as each
Saturday came round, there was sure to be some great brute of a man, in
a Spanish hat and a large black cloak all flying about, striking some
very grand theatrical attitude, and flourishing over his head a big
carving-knife, to which three or four heavy notes of admiration were
hanging, while a poor defenceless woman lay at his feet, with her throat
cut as wide open as a cheese, and weltering in a pool of ink; and the
beauty of it was, the thing always had some grand title, like “THE EARL
IN HIS JEALOUS RAGE SLAYING THE LADY ISOLINE.”
Any one would naturally have fancied that the Penny Sunday Times and the
novels at the same price would have been quite enough to have satisfied
my lady’s love of the horrible; but, Lord bless you, no! I declare,
there wasn’t a single murder or last dying speech and confession cried
out in the streets, but she must rush up, all haste, to the door just to
have another pen’orth of horrors; and then she would sit herself down,
and never let the bit of paper go out of her hand until she had got the
whole of the affecting copy of verses at the end of it by heart, and
there I should have her marching about the house for weeks afterwards
chanting some such nonsense as the following:--
“Biddle and Sheriff is our sad names,
And do confess we were much to blame,
On the 28th of September last,
We well remember, alas! alas!
The very thoughts causes us to rue,
In Eighteen hundred and forty-two.”
I declare to goodness, there was no keeping the woman away from the door
as soon as she heard those husky vagabonds in the street, shouting away
at the top of their cracked post-horn voices, all at once, “The full,
true, and particular account” of some cock-and-a-bull-story or other;
and whether it was the “as-sas-si-nation of Lew-is Philip, the King of
the French,” (I’m sure those screaming scoundrels used to assassinate
that poor, dear old man at least two or three times a month in our
neighbourhood all the winter through,) or whether it was the “full
disclosures of an elopement of a certain pretty milliner, not a hundred
miles from these parts, with a well-known sporting nobleman, together
with authentic copies of all the love-letters found in a silver
cigar-case, which was picked up this morning by a respectable butcher in
High-street,” or indeed no matter what it was, my Miss Betsy was sure to
invest a penny in the rubbish, although directly I told her to let me
see the nonsense that she had been stupid enough to go wasting her money
about, of course, I used to find that it had nothing at all to do with
what the fellows had been crying, and was merely some trumped-up
rigmarole story, that would have done just as well for York as it did
for Camden Town--a pack of wicked scoundrels coming up, three at a time,
at the dusk of evening, alarming a quiet neighbourhood, and frightening
one out of one’s wits by bawling their wicked stories out all of a
sudden right under one’s window, and robbing the poor maids, who are
sure to buy their rubbish, and imposing upon the mistresses, who are
certain to read it.
As for the “new and popular songs,” too, it’s impossible to say how many
miles of ballads that Betsy must have bought in her time, at three yards
for a halfpenny. Positively, if the drawers in the dresser were not
crammed with her “CHERRY RIPES,” and her “MISTLETOE BOUGHS,” and her
“OLD ARM CHAIRS,” and her “CORK LEGS,” and a pack of other stuff, as
full as they could hold, with the stupid engravings at the top of some
of them, that had nothing at all to do with the song, for I declare if
there wasn’t a ship in full sail put as an illustration to “AWAY, AWAY,
TO THE MOUNTAIN’S BROW!” and a trumpery shepherdess, playing on a pipe
to two grubby little lambs, as the picture of “WANTED! A GOVERNESS!”
However, to come back to my gooseberry pudding and my weaning. Well,
thanks to that dear good mother of mine, I got the weaning all over so
nicely the reader can’t tell, though, I’m sorry to say that, thanks to
that beauty of a Betsy of mine, the gooseberry pudding with the wood in
it, that I had set my heart upon having so, wasn’t fit to have been set
before a pig, let alone a respectable married female like myself--Augh!
I declare I’ve got the taste of it in my mouth to this very day.
Well, as I was saying, I went by myself round to dear, dear mother’s,
(who, whatever her faults may be, still I must say has always been a
good mother to me,) and after we had had a nice long cry together, and
both of us agreed that it was all owing to Mr. Sk--n--st--n’s
continually trying, all he could, to set me against my own dear parents,
as he was, we kissed each other and made friends again; for, as my
darling mother very truly said, I had always been her own dear, good
girl, and, she would add, whatever might come of it, (though, far be it
from her to make words between man and wife,) that I was a _great_ deal
too good for that sour, good-for-nothing husband of mine, who, she
couldn’t help saying, was no gentleman. Then the dear, foolish old soul
_would_ make me step into the beautiful little back parlour and take a
mouthful of luncheon. And then, I declare, she _must_ go having up,
expressly for me, the beautiful cold, baked rice-pudding that she’d had
for dinner only the day before, and which, if it is well browned, and
has got plenty of custard, and a stick or two of cinnamon in it, is to
my mind as nice a thing as one can put one’s lips to. Nor, was this all.
Really she seemed as if she couldn’t make enough of me, for, do what I
would, I could not prevent the affectionate silly from opening a fresh
bottle of her lovely, best green-ginger wine on the joyful occasion, for
the more I told her that I dare not touch a drop of it for the life of
me, the more determined she seemed to be to open it.
Oh! upon my word, I don’t think I ever passed such a pleasant afternoon
as that was. I declare, as I sat there, looking out of that lovely
little window, and seeing that superb Regent’s Canal winding along like
a live eel, with father’s majestic barge dancing on its surface, and his
gallant heaver fast asleep in the stern, while here and there a child of
charity might be seen fishing on the banks, it seemed to me as if, with
a slight stretch of the imagination, you might have fancied yourself to
have been far away in beautiful Venice, and the swarthy bargeman the
sun-burnt gondolier of that romantic clime, while with a little extra
play of fancy one might easily have twisted the charity boys seeking the
finny tribe into the yellow-legged kingfishers, which I have heard
papa’s old friend, Mr. Glasscock, (who keeps a large Italian warehouse
in the neighbourhood, and consequently ought to know something about the
country,) over and over again say, delight to haunt the Venetian
shores.
Oh! it was so beautiful to sit there, eating that heavenly cold baked
rice-pudding till I was afraid I should make myself ill, and hearing
dear mother call me everything that was good, and Mr. Sk--n--st--n
everything that was bad. “Ah! my dear sweet Caroline,” she said, with
much feeling and great truth, “how you can ever have brought yourself to
put up with the brutal treatment of that disgraceful tyrant of a husband
of yours,--of whose conduct I must beg of you, my darling, not to ask me
to express any opinion,--is more than I should like to take upon myself
to state. All I can say is, my love, that if you had not been a perfect
angel, you would have packed up your things, and left the ungrateful
monster long ago. But I can see what he is after, my dear; he wont rest
easy until he has fidgetted you into an early grave; for I see as
plainly as plainly can be, that you are fast giving way under it, and
that your appetite is not half as good as it used to be, and that unless
you take as much strengthening food as you possibly can, the wretch will
break your heart chip by chip before he has done with you. However, it
is no business of mine, and Heaven forbid that I should say a word about
it! Only I wish to goodness gracious, with all my heart and soul, that
it had pleased Providence to have allowed your father to have blessed
you with a big brother, and then Mr. Sk--n--st--n would never have dared
to have treated you in the way he does. But, as I said before, it is a
subject which it pains me much to touch upon, so I shall let it drop,
merely observing, that if your respected father had the spirit of a
tadpole in him, he could never sit quietly smoking his pipe of an
evening down at that filthy wharf as he does, while he knows, as well as
I do, that a big-whiskered fellow is puzzling his wits to find out the
quickest way of driving his own innocent, gentle little lamb of a
Caroline into a premature coffin. But I have done with the painful
theme, my pet; so let me give you a little more ginger, and we will
change the conversation to a more lively theme, if you please.
By-the-bye, will you, on your return home, remember to mention to that
disgraceful husband of yours, that your dear father is now selling the
very best screened Wall’s-end coals as low as twenty-one shillings a
ton.”
Well, as I said before, I got the weaning over beautifully. Poor dear
mother was delighted at having the job, though father--just like all the
selfish men--was quite of a different way of thinking. Of course I kept
away from the dear little pet for more than a whole week, though I’m
sure I needn’t tell my fair readers that it was a hard, very hard
struggle for me to do so, as I made certain that the darling was
fretting its poor little life out for want of it. However, when I went
to fetch the dear, mother told me that it had been as good as gold all
the time, and had never cried once for it; for bless the little chick’s
heart, it’s got its own mother’s sweet temper--so it has.
And upon my word, I had only just got my new nurse in, and my little
toodle-loodle-lumpties (if I may be allowed so strong an expression) was
only just beginning to take its food nicely, when, lo and behold, if
that Easter Sunday didn’t pop round upon me! I never knew such a price
as gooseberries were--three-and-sixpence for a little tiddy basketful,
scarcely enough for one person; and Edward is such a pig at pastry,
especially if it’s short crust; though I take good care always to make
it flakey. However, it was a solemn feast; and if they had been twenty
shillings a quart, I should have felt it my bounden duty to have given
as much for them.
On the Saturday before Easter Sunday, I saw a little boy come to the
door; and as Miss Betsy was up-stairs, busy with the beds, I went and
opened it, when, bless us and save us, if it wasn’t a little dirty-faced
monkey who had brought round her ladyship’s papers for the week from her
twopenny-halfpenny newsvender. Oh, yes! there they were--“Penny Sunday
Times,” as usual, with another horrible engraving; and the fifteenth
part of “EMILY FITZORMOND, _or the Deserted One_;” together with the
commencement of “ELA THE OUTCAST, _or the Gipsy Girl of Rosemary Dell_;”
with the first number of which Nos. 2, 3, and 4, were given gratis. Like
a good-natured silly as I was, I went, letting her have the
highly-exciting rubbish, instead of tearing it all up, as I ought to
have done; and nicely I bit my fingers for my folly, for, just as I
might have expected, there she was, all the next day, so interested with
that stupid outcast of an Ela, that she couldn’t get my lamb down before
the fire until it was so late, that when it came to table it was only
just warmed through, and every one knows how nice underdone lamb is.
However, said I to myself, thank goodness, there’s a good large pudding
coming, or else I don’t know what I should do. But, Lord-a-mercy me!
when that came up, I thought I should have died of disgust and vexation,
for, drat the novel-reading blockhead, if she hadn’t been so taken up
with the fate of that bothering fal-lal gipsy-girl of Rosemary Dell,
indeed, that I declare, if she didn’t go beating up a nasty, filthy, bad
French egg, in my beautiful expensive little green gooseberries, with
the wood in them. As she had spoilt the lamb for me, of course I had
made little or no dinner, and, let alone my being as hungry as a hunter,
I was positively dying to taste my favourite pudding for the first time
that year, so that it wasn’t until I had put a large dessert-spoonful
into my mouth, that I found out what the minx had been doing. And then,
Uch! oh la! of all the messes, I thought I should have fainted! Taken
the roughness off, indeed--ay, that she had, with a vengeance. Upon my
word I was so vexed, I could have set down and had a good cry, I could;
but as it was, I merely said to the jade,--“I’ll make you pay soundly
for this, you may depend upon it, Miss Betsy; for if I don’t have
another gooseberry pudding out of your next quarter, my name isn’t what
it is; and I can tell you this, my fine lady, that if you don’t mind
your P’s and Q’s, you’ll find that those trumpery soul-thrilling novels
of yours will bring you to a bad end some of these fine mornings, take
my word for it.”
Oh! if I’d had my wits about me, and only been able to see my true
interests, I should have had none of the stupid scruples of conscience
that I had, and have got rid of the girl on the spot--only, thanks to
Mr. Edward, he must have it that I was only happy when I was changing,
when he knows that all I pray for is that I could get hold of some good,
honest, hard-working maid, that would live and die in my service. As for
Miss Betsy, she was quite a hopeless job. Upon my word she was so wrapt
up in her works of fiction, that really she would believe any trumpery
cock-and-a-bull story that was told her. There really was no trusting
her out of my sight, and that’s the truth. Once I went out just to get
a mouthful of fresh air in the Park, and on my return found that the
hall had been stripped, and the gold watch of Edward’s poor dear first
wife, which he had given me before we were married, had been carried off
the mantelpiece by a fellow, whom she would have was the clergyman of
the parish, and who, she said, requested to be allowed to write a letter
to me about the Easter offering. If, too, by any accident I let the key
of the area-gate out of my possession for more than a minute, she was
certain to have down in the kitchen the first gipsy woman, with her
trumpery box of sewing cottons to sell, that she could lay hold of, just
to tell her rubbishing fortune, and who, after stuffing her head that
she saw by the lines in her great ugly, coarse hand, that she was to
marry a certain black-eyed young baker, and was to have her nine
children and a shay-cart, and promising her, moreover, a large fortune
into the bargain, would be certain to wind up by walking off with my
silver spoons. The beauty of it was, too, that when I used to rate the
romantic idiot soundly for her disgusting simplicity, telling her that
she ought to be whipped at the cart’s tail for encouraging a pack of
thieves in the way she did, upon my word if she wouldn’t, with all the
coolness in the world, go off lamenting the degraded state of the
robbers of the present day, saying that they were not half the fine set
of people that they used to be in “the good old times and days of yore;”
and then she’d actually have the impudence to look me in the face, and
ask me if I knew anything about the great Jack Sheppard, declaring that
he was the robber for her money, for he never shed blood but once; and
whatever his faults might have been, the book that had been written upon
him said very beautifully that he never told a lie.
This was the secret of it all. Of course, with the high-flown notions
she had got of robbers, and brigands, and pirates, and a pack of other
pickpockets, out of her weekly pennyworths of romantic rodomontades; and
believing that the vagabonds possessed every virtue under the sun, with
merely the slight drawback of occasionally wanting either your money or
your life, she was a common victim to every villain that chose to impose
upon her. I declare she got me into one scrape by her credulity that
nearly proved the death of me, (though it wasn’t the one that I spoke of
last month, and for which I sent her away.)
You see, summer was just coming on, and the fine weather had set in; so
I went to work, looking up my light dresses; and it’s very lucky I did
so, for there was scarcely any of them that were fit to put on. They
were all as yellow as marigolds; so I packed them off to the wash, every
one excepting a very nice clear muslin, which really was so slightly
discoloured, that it seemed to me worse than a sin to go giving a matter
of eightpence to have it washed, when with a nice dark shawl it would
look nearly clean, and do very well for a walk round the park some fine
day at the end of the week. When I saw my beautiful Swiss cambric again,
with its sweet pretty little, bright-red flower upon it, and its rich
skirt and four rows of deep flounces, I couldn’t for the life of me help
saying to myself, “Oh, you are a perfect love, I declare! and when
you’re nicely clear-starched you’ll look superb, with my pink drawn silk
bonnet and green shot-silk scarf, next Sunday at church.” And the more I
looked at it, the more it struck me that I might just as well coax my
own dear Edward, the first evening he was in one of his merry humours,
to consent to have a one-horse fly for half the day; and then after
church we could go round and make a number of calls that I was
positively dying to rub off, and afterwards take a drive round Hyde
Park, and wind up with a promenade in Kensington Gardens. Nothing on
earth would have given me greater pleasure than to have taken my darling
good mother with me, as I knew it would do her so much good; but then
she always _will_ dress so funny, and I felt convinced that, as matters
stood, it would not be safe to trust the dear old soul with Edward a
whole afternoon in a shut-up fly, or they would be certain to get to
high words again, and then I should never forgive myself.
Well, on the Monday, off I packed my dresses, with the dirty linen, to
the wash, and gave the woman a whole string of directions as to how I
wanted them done. When the Saturday came, I declare it was such a fine
warm day, that I slipped on the clear muslin that I had kept back, and
went out in the afternoon to pay the last week’s bills; and while I was
in the neighbourhood, I thought I might just as well run round to Mrs.
L--ckl--y’s, and ask that sweet woman to take a walk down Oxford-street
with me and look at the shops; for, to tell the truth, I felt that I
wanted a mouthful of fresh air. So off Mrs. L--ckl--y and I set
together; and though there was not so much as a goat’s hair or a mare’s
tail to be seen in the sky when we started, of course, as usual, we had
no sooner set foot in Regent-street than it began to spit a bit.
However, as we thought it would not last, and we didn’t see the fun of
spoiling our bonnets, why we both of us agreed that it would be best to
step into Hodge and Lowman’s, and just look at a few things that we
didn’t want, until it had given over. But, oh dear, no! nothing of the
kind; for though we must have stopped there, I should say, a good
half-hour, pulling the things over, and having first this dress out of
the window, and then that, until we put the poor man to such trouble,
that Mrs. L--ckl--y whispered to me that she really thought that she
must buy a yard or two of sarsnet ribbon, just for the look of the
thing; it really seemed as if the fates had conspired against my clear
muslin, for, upon my word, it only kept getting worse and worse, and
came down at last in such straight lines, that it really looked as if it
was raining iron wires. So, as it was getting close to dinner time, and
I thought Edward would be coming home and fidgetting again about the
place for want of his dinner, I told Mrs. L--ckl--y, that, since a cab
up to her house, in Albany-street, would come to the same money as the
bus, why it would be much better to take one, instead of having a parcel
of wet umbrellas stuck right against one’s knees, and the dirty boots of
those filthy men wiped right on the flounces of one’s dress--especially,
too, as I knew Mrs. L--ckl--y had too much of the lady in her ever to be
mean enough to accept of my trumpery sixpence towards such a trifle as
the shilling fare. Accordingly, we jumped into the first cab we could
catch, and on the road I made up my mind pretty quickly not to go taking
the thing on to P--rk V--ll--ge, for I saw, as plain as the nose on my
face, that I should have the whole fare to pay if I did, for, of course
it would look just as bad for me to accept of her beggarly sixpence as
it would for her ever to think of taking mine. When the cab stopped at
Mrs. L--ckl--y’s, I told her I would step in and arrange my hair just
for a minute, and of course, I couldn’t do less than _offer_ to pay the
fare, never for an instant fancying that she would be stingy enough to
take advantage of my generosity; but, like a stupid, I must go overdoing
it, for the more she kept refusing, the more I kept pressing, and when
she protested “she wouldn’t listen to such a thing for a moment,” I
(just for the look of the thing) directly declared that I would insist
upon doing it, whereupon, drat it, if her ladyship wasn’t shabby enough
to say, “Well, then, if you _insist_ upon it, my dear, I suppose I must
give way,” and scampered off into the house, leaving me with that
shameful impostor of a cabman, who wouldn’t be satisfied with anything
less than eighteenpence. Augh! it isn’t the trumpery one-and-sixpence
that I grumble about, but the nasty mean spirit in which I was left to
pay it. Thank goodness, _I_ couldn’t be guilty of such meanness--no, not
if I was to die for it to-morrow; but then, you know, some people are so
different to others.
Well, after I had sat for a minute, twiddling my thumbs in Mrs.
L--ckl--y’s front parlour, I said, that as it seemed to be holding up a
little, I thought that if she would be kind enough to lend me an
umbrella, I should be able to get as far as our house without much
inconvenience. So I had my umbrella, and off I started; but then, bother
take the thing! it was one of those thin wiry Germans, with ribs no
thicker than bodkins, and as the wind was rather high, I declare if, at
the very first turning I came to, the trumpery bit of goods didn’t turn
right inside out, and do what I would, I could neither get it down nor
back again into its proper shape, and there was I obliged to go stalking
all up Albany-street, holding up the inverted thing, looking like a
great big funnel, and which, instead of keeping the rain off me, of
course only served to collect all the water over my head like a cistern,
which, being full of holes, of course it let through again, just like a
shower-bath, and while I kept continually looking up to see where the
dickens all the water that was pouring down upon me could come from, I
kept stepping into all kinds of puddles, right up to the cotton tops of
my white silk stockings, so that by the time I got home, I was
positively soaking, and all my hair and things hung about me, for all
the world like the feathers of the cocks and hens on a rainy day.
As soon as I got up-stairs in the bed-room, I rang for Betsy, and asked
her if they’d brought the clean things home from the wash, for I thought
I’d better put on my clean morning wrapper.
“Oh, yes, mum,” she answered; “they brought them an hour or two ago.”
“Then just bring them up-stairs to me, there’s a good girl,” I replied.
“If you please, mum,” she returned, “a man called immediately after
they’d brought them, and said that the wrong basket had been left by
mistake, and took it away, saying he would bring ours in a minute or
two.”
“And do you mean to stand there, woman, and tell me that you were
simpleton enough to give it?” I continued, as the whole truth flashed
upon me; for mother had had the very same wicked trick played off upon
her, and had cautioned me against it herself.
“Yes, mum, I did,” she answered, quite coolly, “and he’s never been back
since.”
“Of course he hasn’t,” I shrieked out, “and never will you set eyes upon
him, or my clean linen again. Oh! you good-for-nothing, shameful,
novel-reading, story-believing hussy. Now, see what your highly exciting
romances have led you to do. Here am I, who have always been the best of
mistresses to you, wet to the skin, and without a clean morning wrapper
to put on, nor even so much as a dress fit to go to church in to-morrow,
to say nothing of the two pairs of beautiful linen sheets that you’ve
wilfully lost for me, and the very white trousers that my husband was
married in, and which I wouldn’t have parted with for untold gold.
There, go down stairs and hide your face, and think how you’ll relish it
when you have to pay for it, and find, as you most assuredly will, that
you haven’t got a penny to receive at the end of the year.”
However, it was useless fretting; there were three of as beautiful
summer dresses as ever were made, and the beautiful afternoon’s ride I
had promised myself after church on the morrow, all gone; for my sweet
pretty Swiss cambric was among the number, and I could never think of
walking in Kensington Gardens in that grubby, seedy, hot, plaid thing,
that I had worn all the winter through. As I said before, it was useless
fretting, so I changed from top to toe, and put on some of the things I
had taken off during the week, which, to say the least, were dry; and,
as I wasn’t in the humour to care a pin how I looked, why, I popped on
my flannel dressing-gown, for, to tell the truth, I felt rather chilly,
and Mr. Edward might tell me, for the hundredth time, that I looked like
an old watchman in it, as much as he pleased, for what I cared.
At dinner, just as we were taking cheese, there came that plaguy
Saturday night ring at our area-bell, and I could have staked my
existence that it was that dirty-faced young monkey of a boy again,
bringing Miss Betsy another pen’orth of her precious “EMILY FITZORMOND,”
and the fifth part of that bothering, vagabond “outcast” of an “ELA.”
It was as much as I could do to prevent myself from jumping off my seat,
and rushing down stairs, and tearing the whole of the high-flown fustian
out of the hussy’s hand, just as she was enjoying that “Sunday Times”
picture, as I knew she was. But, luckily for her, I felt far from
myself, for I was as sure as sure could be that I had caught such a cold
as would play old gooseberry with me,--if I might be allowed so strong
an expression,--and I didn’t take it in time.
Nor was I wrong, for scarcely was the dinner cleared away, than on came
the shivers, just as I expected, and I kept going hot and cold by turns,
and I declare all my joints ached so, that as I walked across the room,
I felt as if I could have fallen down and gone all to pieces, just like
the dancing skeleton in the Fantoccini, while my poor old knees began to
shoot away as if some one was digging a carving-fork into them; and my
wretched back was as cold as though a person was amusing himself by
pouring buckets of spring-water right down between my shoulders; and
though I put on all the shawls and cloaks I had got in the house, and
sat with my nose right in the fire, (if I may be allowed the phrase,)
still I could not get warm. When I complained to Mr. Edward of how ill I
felt, he only answered, “The fact is, my dear, you’ve caught a violent
cold,” (as if I didn’t know that as well as he did, the brute,) “and the
sooner you get yourself up-stairs to bed the better; and if you follow
my advice, you’d have it warmed first, and take a good large basinful of
gruel, with a James’s powder, for supper.”
“Gruel and James’s powder, indeed!” I replied, with much sarcasm; “you
wont gruel and James’s powder me, I can tell you, sir;--as if _I_ didn’t
know what’s good for a cold;--a glass of hot rum-and-water, with a bit
of butter, the size of a walnut; and that’s what _I_ call good for a
cold.”
“For goodness’ sake mind, my love, and tallow your nose as well,”
returned Mr. Knowall.
“Yes, Mr. Edward,” I replied, “I _shall_ tallow my nose as well, and tie
my flannel petticoat round my head into the bargain--that’s what I shall
do.”
“And a lot of good it’ll do you,” he answered. “A pack of old woman’s
rubbish.”
“You call it old woman’s rubbish, do you?--then I don’t,” I continued,
with my customary satire. “I call it an excellent remedy--that’s what I
call it.”
“But how can the tallow on your nose do you any good, I should like to
know!” he returned.
“You’d like to know?” I said, in my bitterest way--“I dare say you
would, but I’m not going to tell you.”
“Yes; but why is it an excellent remedy?” he inquired, grinning in a way
I didn’t half like.
“Because it is,” I replied, with my usual argument.
“Yes; but what on earth do you use it for?” he continued.
“Because I do,” I answered, determined to have the best of it.
As I wasn’t going to stop there wasting my argumentative powers upon a
man who was deaf to reason, I put an end to his sneers by ringing the
bell for that Betsy, and told her to get some boiling water ready as
soon as she could, for I wanted to have my bed warmed, and to be sure
and stand the warming-pan near the fire for a few minutes before putting
the water in it, so that I might have it as hot as I could. We always
used one of the new patent hot-water warming-pans, because with them
one hasn’t that nasty coal-gassy smell that the old-fashioned things
invariably leave behind them; and there’s no chance--even if the pan’s
left to stand a moment in the bed--of having one’s best linen sheets
scorched, and with large brown marks upon them as if they were stuck
over with pancakes.
I thought my lady was taking her time nicely to boil a trumpery kettle
full of water. So, even ill as I was, I couldn’t help just slipping
quietly down stairs, and popping in upon her when she least expected me.
Hoity-toity! was there ever such a sight!--I thought I should have
dropped down when I saw it. My beautiful kitchen for all the world like
a cheap Jack’s cart at a fair--saucepans here, kettles there, crockery
everywhere, while my beauty was sitting with her toes cocked up on the
fender, and that trumpery “GIPSY GIRL OF ROSEMARY DELL” in her hand, as
I live, and crying water-spouts over that stupid, disgusting “OUTCAST”
of an “ELA.” There was our cat, too, right in the frying-pan, and the
house flannel and the scrubbing-brush in the fish-kettle, and that
precious “EMILY FITZORMOND, _or the Deserted One_,” lying on the ground,
with the “RANGER OF THE TOMB” by her side, and “FATHERLESS FANNY, or the
_Mysterious_ Orphan,” as the thing was called, all over grease, and
without even so much as a wrapper to its back, pitched about anywhere.
There were all the dirty plates and dishes besides, just as they had
come down from dinner more than an hour ago, side by side with the
breakfast things, which she had got to wash up before we could have even
a mouthful of tea; and although it was nearly dark, I declare she hadn’t
so much as cleaned a single candlestick all the day through, for they
were standing on the hob with all the hot tallow running out of them,
and dripping into one of my best new block-tin saucepans. As I’m a
Christian, drat the woman, if she hadn’t stuck my beautiful bright
copper warming-pan, too, (that hadn’t been used more than twice, and
which I picked up, quite a bargain, at a broker’s only a year ago,)
right on the top of the oven, and so close to the fire, that, upon my
word, when I went to take hold of it, it was nearly red hot, while of
course her head was so full of her romantic rubbish, that she hadn’t so
much as thought about the hot water; for,
[Illustration: _The Sentimental-Novel Reader._]
instead of putting the kettle on, she hadn’t even taken the nasty,
greasy gridiron on which she had done our pork chops off the fire.
This, I must confess, was more than common flesh and blood like mine
could bear; so I flew at my duchess, and snatching out of her hand her
grand works,--“which should be in every person’s library!” indeed,--I
bundled them all into what, to my mind, was a much fitter place for
them--the fire; and what’s more, I put the kettle right on top of them,
and by the time I had done reading the minx such a lecture as she wont
forget in a hurry, thank goodness I had the kettle boiling away quite
nicely.
All this exertion--ill as I was--took such an effect on my delicate
nerves, that I determined upon going to bed directly. So I told her to
fill the warming-pan, and take it up stairs as quick as she could, while
I went to make myself a glass of nice hot rum-and-water, with a bit of
butter and plenty of sugar in it, and which, with a bit of tallow
(despite all Mr. Edward’s low sneers) just the size of a pea rubbed over
the bridge of my nose, is--as my lady readers will agree with me--as
good a thing as one can fly to when one’s got a nasty cold coming on
one.
When I got up stairs, there was my lady in her sulks, of course, warming
the bed as if she had fallen asleep over it. So as I wasn’t going to put
up with any of her tantrums, I went behind her, and telling her that I
would show her how to warm the bed, I seized hold of her arm and pushed
it backwards and forwards so fast that I could hear all the water wabble
again in it--little dreaming at the time that the solder of the nasty
twopenny halfpenny bit of goods had got melted, all through Miss Betsy’s
standing it so long and so close to the fire as she had, and that I was
actually shaking the water out of it all over my bed, as fast as if the
thing had been a watering-pot. The worst of it was too, that the beastly
new-fangled warming-pan must have held a gallon if it did a spoonful;
and seeing that Miss Betsy wanted to get down stairs again, to some more
of her trumpery novels, as I thought, I wouldn’t let her go, but made
her stand shaking the leaky thing up and down the sheets--particularly
on my side too--until I had tied my flannel petticoat nicely over my
night-cap, and finished all my rum-and-water, and had put all my things
by, just out of aggravation, to keep her up there as long as I could,
and was quite ready to get into bed.
When Miss Betsy had gone, and I had let down the night-bolt--I declare I
had been dawdling about so long in the cold, that I was quite frightened
lest I should have taken another chill--putting out the candle, I jumped
into bed as quick as ever I could. And then, oh lud-a’-mercy me! what a
pretty pickle it was in, to be sure. If the linen sheets weren’t
positively just like sheets of water, and the whole bed as wet as the
bed of the River Thames. I tumbled out again like lightning, as any one
may easily imagine, when, drat it! if all my night clothes weren’t as
wet and cold as a dog’s nose, and the worst of it was, they would keep
clinging to me as if they were so much wet blotting-paper. I rushed to
the bell, and pulled, and pulled, and pulled away, until Mr.
Sk--n--st--n must have thought either that I had set the house on fire,
or overlaid my dear little lamb, or found a brute of a man under the
bed; for up he came, gasping away, crying out, “What on earth is the
matter, Caroline?” and five minutes afterwards, up Miss Betsy sauntered,
as leisurely as if nothing at all had happened.
“The matter,” I cried, pulling off the bed-clothes, and throwing aside
the sheet, that was so wet you might have wrung it--“Look here,” I said,
holding up the soaking blanket; and which, when I let it go, I declare,
fell with a flop upon the ground, for all the world as if it had been a
batter-pudding--“And look here, too,” I cried, showing him the
feather-bed tick, which really looked as dark as a slate with the
wet--“Just come and feel it yourself, and say if it isn’t like a sponge,
and then ask yourself how you’ll like to sleep upon it all night, for
sleep upon it you must, as there isn’t another in the house. What’s
more, too, these are the only sheets that you can have to lie upon
to-night, for, thanks to that Miss Betsy there, she must not only think
fit to give away all the clean ones I had home from the wash this very
day, to the first person that chose to come and ask for them, but to
make the thing complete, she must needs go burning a hole in the hot
water warming-pan, and drenching my only remaining pair; and just
because she knew I had caught a severe cold, and wanted a comfortable
warm bed to set me right again. Oh, you wicked, abominable,
novel-reading hussy you! you’ll be the death of me before you’ve done
with me, you will! How you can have the impudence to stand there and
look me in the face, and not expect the floor to open and swallow you up
for your shameful goings on--and how _you_, too, Mr. Edward,” I
continued, turning to Mr. Sk--n--st--n, “how you can stand there, as
quiet as a common cab-horse, and see your poor wife worried into her
grave in this way by that wicked woman, and not send her about her
business this very moment, is beyond my limited powers to comprehend.”
But of course the only answer my gentleman could make me was to tell
Miss Betsy to go down stairs; and then, if he didn’t turn round as cool
as a cucumber, and tell me to my own face, that it was all my fault (my
fault!--mark, if you please, gentle reader.) But it was just what I had
expected--indeed, I had said as much to myself--of course, it was all
_my_ fault! _I_ had done it all, _I_ had--and that minx of a _Betsy_ had
had nothing to do with it--of course _I_ had burnt the hole in the
warming-pan, and filled it with water, to be sure; and more than that,
_I_ had warmed the bed, I suppose--though, as I very cleverly told my
lord duke, if I _had_, _I_ had done it in my sleep, and there was an end
of it. Then I gave it Mr. Edward so soundly, and told him what I thought
of him so plainly, and made him so heartily ashamed of himself, that,
upon my word, at last he marched up to the drawers, and taking his
razors and a clean nightgown and night-cap, with all the impudence in
the world, told me to my face he was going to sleep out. So I told him
very quietly that he might do just as he pleased about that, but if he
did, to rest assured, that as sure as his and my name were Sk--n--st--n,
I’d never pass another night under his roof. But my gentleman only
turned on his heel and walked himself off as grandly down stairs as if
he were doing some mighty fine action, and thinking, of course, that I
should run after him and call him back. But, oh dear, no!--I wasn’t
going to make such a silly of myself as that--no!--not if he were the
only man in the world.
But, thank goodness, I’ve got a spirit of my own, and however much I
might have felt the absence of the monster, still I was determined not
to show it. So directly I heard the street-door slam, I marched up
stairs, and ringing the bell for Betsy, made her carry down her own
mattress and blankets for me to sleep on, telling her that she might lie
upon the bare bedstead, if she pleased, and that if, in the morning, she
got up and found herself striped all over with the marks of the bits of
wood at the bottom of it, like a herring just taken off a gridiron, why
she needn’t blame me, as she would have only herself to thank for it.
Not so much as a wink of sleep could I get, but did nothing but cry and
fidget all that miserable night through. Not that I cared about Mr.
Edward leaving me all alone in my distress at a time when he didn’t know
whether I had a bed to lie down upon or not, or whether my severe cold
might not take a serious turn, and end in a rheumatic fever, or goodness
knows what,--it wasn’t this I cared about, I say; but it was the nasty,
callous way in which he did it--not even so much as saying where a
person might find him, supposing anything happened to one, and which I
felt I never should be able to forget to my dying day. But I wasn’t
going to submit to be treated worse than a parish orphan, so directly I
heard the chimney-sweeps in the street, I tumbled out of bed, and merely
taking the child and my hair-brush and such things as I couldn’t do
without for a day or two, I went down stairs, and having cut off a slice
of bread-and-butter, just to keep the wind out of my stomach, I wrote my
lord a short letter, telling him that I had left his house
FOR EVER!!!
and signing it--“Your heart-broken and affectionate--though
she-can-never-consent-to-live-with-you-again--wife CAROLINE,” and then
putting the key of the tea-caddy inside the note, I left it with Betsy,
telling her to give it to her master when he came home, and to be sure
and have the breakfast all ready and comfortable for him by nine o’clock
at the latest--and that I was going to Mrs. B--ff--n’s, but on no
account to tell Mr. Sk--n--st--n where I had gone, as I wouldn’t have
him know it for the world. Then off I went, with Kate in my arms and a
tear in my eye, and made the best of my way round to dear mother’s, as I
felt convinced, even if Betsy didn’t tell my husband, _that_ would be
the first place to which he would fly to seek me, and that I should have
him come rushing round to me and begging and praying of me to return to
his disconsolate home, before a couple of hours were over my head.
When I reached my own dear mother’s, and told what had happened, oh, it
would have done any married lady’s heart good to have seen the
affectionate old thing kiss me and fondle me, vowing I had got her own
fine spirit, and that she was so delighted to find I was no worm, and
that the noble way in which I had acted would teach Mr. Sk--n--st--n as
much. When I asked her whether she was perfectly sure that Edward would
come after me, she tried to make my mind easy by telling me that it was
as sure as coals were coals--though this far from quelled my fears; for
from the quality of the ton father had last sent us, I had my doubts
upon that subject. But mother went on, saying, “The men are always sure
to come after one the first time, my angel--though a second, I must
confess, grows a little dangerous; and with a person of Mr.
Sk--n--st--n’s disposition, however much I might recommend you once to
declare you had separated yourself from him for ever, still I should
not, as a mother, like to advise you to try it twice, unless, indeed,
you could get him beforehand to agree to allow you a very handsome
separate maintenance, as the wretch ought to do, my dove. Now, I
recollect about three years after you were born, sweetest, I had a
serious quarrel with Mr. B--ff--n, your father, about the parson’s nose,
I think, of as fine and fat a duck as ever came to table--and which
tit-bit we were both extremely partial to. And the long and short of it
was, he said such things to me that I felt I ought not to stop another
minute in the house of such a man. So, accordingly, since all my
relations lived in Kent, I engaged a small bed out by the night, and
left your wretch of a father, my love--for ever!! But, as I expected, he
soon found out where I had gone to, and, rushing round, he threw himself
at my feet, and began tearing his poor dear bald head so frightfully,
that I was obliged to consent to return to his home, and see whether
the contrition he professed was really sincere or not by the present he
made me; but, when I tell you, my life, that the next day he only
brought me home a trumpery plated ale tankard, which, of course, was
more for himself than it was for me, you will be able to judge of the
deceitfulness of man, and, if you take my advice, you will stipulate to
have from Mr. Sk--n--st--n whatever you may want before you are weak
enough to consent to make him happy by returning home. Remember, my
angel, such chances seldom occur more than once in a poor woman’s
lifetime; so, if you will listen to me, you will not throw away this
golden opportunity, but sit down quietly now, and just turn over in your
mind whether you think you could bring yourself ever to live under the
same roof with Mr. Sk--n--st--n again, even if he were to promise to
insure his life in your favour, so as to make you comfortable after his
death, my angel, or else to double the money he allows you for the
housekeeping every week, or any other little trifling sign of repentance
which you think he ought to show, my poppet. Only mark my words--‘If you
don’t strike the iron whilst it’s hot, you’ll live to repent it, as your
too trusting mother has over and over again done, my lamb!’”
Upon my word, if dear mother wasn’t as good as a witch, for, in about a
couple of hours, round came Mr. Sk--n--st--n all of a fluster. Then, of
course, he was all sorrow and affection, and nothing was _too_ good for
me, and, if I would only _consent_ to come back again, he’d be the
happiest of men. Oh! I was so glad to think that poor _I_ had humbled my
grand lord, no one can tell; and, when I saw that tear twinkling in the
corner of his eye, I really couldn’t for the life of me help smiling
inwardly, with honest pride, to think of the triumph I had gained, and
that I had brought my headstrong gentleman to his proper senses, and
made him conscious of my worth. Though, of course, he must go begging
and praying of me, after a bit, that I would keep all my troubles about
my servants to myself for the future, and not be always tormenting him
with them when he came home of an evening, tired, from business, saying
that then he was sure we should go on so comfortably together. So I told
him that it was foolish of him to expect that we could ever get a good
servant who would do all the work of that great big house, and clean the
boots and knives, and be dressed in the afternoon to answer the door as
well; and, as I saw that he was just in the humour not to refuse me
anything, and I had made up my mind long ago to have a page in the
house, just like the boy at the L--ckl--y’s, directly I could wheedle my
husband into it, I said that, unless some alteration was made in our
establishment, I was sure I should be in my grave before long. And when
he said, “What alteration do you propose, my dear?--for goodness’ sake,
have anything you like, if it will only put an end to these disturbances
between us,”--I pretty soon clenched the business, and got him to
promise I might get a nice genteel youth, and put him in a handsome
livery, who could follow us to church with the prayer-books, (which I do
think looks so respectable;) or, if ever I went out for a walk, could
come trotting after me, and enable me to go past the barracks in
Albany-street without the fear of being insulted by those soldier
fellows!
So we went home so pleasantly together, the reader don’t know; and,
bless my Edward’s kind heart, when I reminded him of the dresses, and
sheets, and things I had lost, if he didn’t give me a very handsome
cheque indeed, to buy some new ones with, though I said at the time,
when I took it, that it was more than I wanted. But, to do my husband
justice, though he is very hasty, I’m sure no one can strive more than
he does to make amends for it afterwards.
I’ll warrant he doesn’t go sleeping out again in a hurry!