where I am allowed to smoke unmolested; but I have never been able to
admire Dawdley, a sly, sournois, spiritless, lily-livered fellow, that
took his name off all his clubs the year he married.
DOROTHEA.
Beyond sparring and cricket, I do not recollect I learned anything
useful at Slaughter-House School, where I was educated (according to an
old family tradition, which sends particular generations of gentlemen to
particular schools in the kingdom; and such is the force of habit, that
though I hate the place, I shall send my own son thither too, should
I marry any day). I say I learned little that was useful at Slaughter
House, and nothing that was ornamental. I would as soon have thought
of learning to dance as of learning to climb chimneys. Up to the age of
seventeen, as I have shown, I had a great contempt for the female race,
and when age brought with it warmer and juster sentiments, where was
I?--I could no more dance nor prattle to a young girl than a young bear
could. I have seen the ugliest little low-bred wretches carrying off
young and lovely creatures, twirling with them in waltzes, whispering
between their glossy curls in quadrilles, simpering with perfect
equanimity, and cutting pas in that abominable “cavalier seul,” until my
soul grew sick with fury. In a word, I determined to learn to dance.
But such things are hard to be acquired late in life, when the bones and
the habits of a man are formed. Look at a man in a hunting-field who has
not been taught to ride as a boy. All the pluck and courage in the world
will not make the man of him that I am, or as any man who has had the
advantages of early education in the field.
In the same way with dancing. Though I went to work with immense energy,
both in Brewer Street, Golden Square (with an advertising fellow), and
afterwards with old Coulon at Paris, I never was able to be EASY in
dancing; and though little Coulon instructed me in a smile, it was a
cursed forced one, that looked like the grin of a person in extreme
agony. I once caught sight of it in a glass, and have hardly ever smiled
since.
Most young men about London have gone through that strange secret ordeal
of the dancing-school. I am given to understand that young snobs from
attorneys' offices, banks, shops, and the like, make not the least
mystery of their proceedings in the saltatory line, but trip gayly, with
pumps in hand, to some dancing-place about Soho, waltz and quadrille it
with Miss Greengrocer or Miss Butcher, and fancy they have had rather
a pleasant evening. There is one house in Dover Street, where, behind
a dirty curtain, such figures may be seen hopping every night, to a
perpetual fiddling; and I have stood sometimes wondering in the street,
with about six blackguard boys wondering too, at the strange contortions
of the figures jumping up and down to the mysterious squeaking of the
kit. Have they no shame ces gens? are such degrading initiations to be
held in public? No, the snob may, but the man of refined mind never can
submit to show himself in public laboring at the apprenticeship of this
most absurd art. It is owing, perhaps, to this modesty, and the fact
that I had no sisters at home, that I have never thoroughly been able to
dance; for though I always arrive at the end of a quadrille (and
thank heaven for it too!) and though, I believe, I make no mistake in
particular, yet I solemnly confess I have never been able thoroughly
to comprehend the mysteries of it, or what I have been about from the
beginning to the end of the dance. I always look at the lady opposite,
and do as she does: if SHE did not know how to dance, par hasard, it
would be all up. But if they can't do anything else, women can dance:
let us give them that praise at least.
In London, then, for a considerable time, I used to get up at eight
o'clock in the morning, and pass an hour alone with Mr. Wilkinson, of
the Theatres Royal, in Golden Square;--an hour alone. It was “one, two,
three; one, two, three--now jump--right foot more out, Mr. Smith; and if
you COULD try and look a little more cheerful; your partner, sir, would
like you hall the better.” Wilkinson called me Smith, for the fact is,
I did not tell him my real name, nor (thank heaven!) does he know it to
this day.
I never breathed a word of my doings to any soul among my friends; once
a pack of them met me in the strange neighborhood, when, I am ashamed to
say, I muttered something about a “little French milliner,” and walked
off, looking as knowing as I could.
In Paris, two Cambridge-men and myself, who happened to be staying at
a boarding-house together, agreed to go to Coulon, a little creature of
four feet high with a pigtail. His room was hung round with glasses. He
made us take off our coats, and dance each before a mirror. Once he was
standing before us playing on his kit the sight of the little master
and the pupil was so supremely ridiculous, that I burst into a yell of
laughter, which so offended the old man that he walked away abruptly,
and begged me not to repeat my visits. Nor did I. I was just getting
into waltzing then, but determined to drop waltzing, and content myself
with quadrilling for the rest of my days.
This was all very well in France and England; but in Germany what was
I to do? What did Hercules do when Omphale captivated him? What did
Rinaldo do when Armida fixed upon him her twinkling eyes? Nay, to cut
all historical instances short, by going at once to the earliest, what
did Adam do when Eve tempted him? He yielded and became her slave; and
so I do heartily trust every honest man will yield until the end of the
world--he has no heart who will not. When I was in Germany, I say, I
began to learn to WALTZ. The reader from this will no doubt expect
that some new love-adventures befell me--nor will his gentle heart be
disappointed. Two deep and tremendous incidents occurred which shall be
notified on the present occasion.
The reader, perhaps, remembers the brief appearance of his Highness the
Duke of Kalbsbraten-Pumpernickel at B---- House, in the first part of
my Memoirs, at that unlucky period of my life when the Duke was led
to remark the odor about my clothes, which lost me the hand of Mary
M'Alister. I somehow found myself in his Highness's territories, of
which anybody may read a description in the Almanach de Gotha. His
Highness's father, as is well known, married Emilia Kunegunda Thomasina
Charleria Emanuela Louisa Georgina, Princess of Saxe-Pumpernickel, and a
cousin of his Highness the Duke. Thus the two principalities were united
under one happy sovereign in the person of Philibert Sigismund Emanuel
Maria, the reigning Duke, who has received from his country (on
account of the celebrated pump which he erected in the marketplace
of Kalbsbraten) the well-merited appellation of the Magnificent. The
allegory which the statues round about the pump represent, is of a very
mysterious and complicated sort. Minerva is observed leading up Ceres to
a river-god, who has his arms round the neck of Pomona; while Mars (in
a full-bottomed wig) is driven away by Peace, under whose mantle two
lovely children, representing the Duke's two provinces, repose. The
celebrated Speck is, as need scarcely be said, the author of this
piece; and of other magnificent edifices in the Residenz, such as the
guard-room, the skittle-hall Grossherzoglich Kalbsbratenpumpernickelisch
Schkittelspielsaal, &c., and the superb sentry-boxes before the
Grand-Ducal Palace. He is Knight Grand Cross of the Ancient Kartoffel
Order, as, indeed, is almost every one else in his Highness's dominions.
The town of Kalbsbraten contains a population of two thousand
inhabitants, and a palace which would accommodate about six times
that number. The principality sends three and a half men to the
German Confederation, who are commanded by a General (Excellency), two
Major-Generals, and sixty-four officers of lower grades; all noble, all
knights of the Order, and almost all chamberlains to his Highness the
Grand Duke. An excellent band of eighty performers is the admiration of
the surrounding country, and leads the Grand-Ducal troops to battle in
time of war. Only three of the contingent of soldiers returned from the
Battle of Waterloo, where they won much honor; the remainder was cut to
pieces on that glorious day.
There is a chamber of representatives (which, however, nothing can
induce to sit), home and foreign ministers, residents from neighboring
courts, law presidents, town councils, &c., all the adjuncts of a big
or little government. The court has its chamberlains and marshals, the
Grand Duchess her noble ladies in waiting, and blushing maids of honor.
Thou wert one, Dorothea! Dost remember the poor young Englander? We
parted in anger; but I think--I think thou hast not forgotten him.
The way in which I have Dorothea von Speck present to my mind is this:
not as I first saw her in the garden--for her hair was in bandeaux
then, and a large Leghorn hat with a deep ribbon covered half her fair
face,--not in a morning-dress, which, by the way, was none of the newest
nor the best made--but as I saw her afterwards at a ball at the pleasant
splendid little court, where she moved the most beautiful of the
beauties of Kalbsbraten. The grand saloon of the palace is lighted--the
Grand Duke and his officers, the Duchess and her ladies, have passed
through. I, in my uniform, of the --th, and a number of young
fellows (who are evidently admiring my legs and envying my distingue
appearance), are waiting round the entrance-door, where a huge Heyduke
is standing, and announcing the titles of the guests as they arrive.
“HERR OBERHOF- UND BAU-INSPEKTOR VON SPECK!” shouts the Heyduke; and
the little Inspector comes in. His lady is on his arm huge, in towering
plumes, and her favorite costume of light blue. Fair women always dress
in light blue or light green; and Frau von Speck is very fair and stout.
But who comes behind her? Lieber Himmel! It is Dorothea! Did earth,
among all the flowers which have sprung from its bosom, produce ever one
more beautiful? She was none of your heavenly beauties, I tell you. She
had nothing ethereal about her. No, sir; she was of the earth earthy,
and must have weighed ten stone four or five, if she weighed an ounce.
She had none of your Chinese feet, nor waspy, unhealthy waists, which
those may admire who will. No: Dora's foot was a good stout one; you
could see her ankle (if her robe was short enough) without the aid of
a microscope; and that envious little, sour, skinny Amalia von
Mangelwurzel used to hold up her four fingers and say (the two girls
were most intimate friends of course), “Dear Dorothea's vaist is so much
dicker as dis.” And so I have no doubt it was.
But what then? Goethe sings in one of his divine epigrams:--
“Epicures vaunting their taste, entitle me vulgar and savage, Give them
their Brussels-sprouts, but I am contented with cabbage.”
I hate your little women--that is, when I am in love with a tall one;
and who would not have loved Dorothea?
Fancy her, then, if you please, about five feet four inches high--fancy
her in the family color of light blue, a little scarf covering the most
brilliant shoulders in the world; and a pair of gloves clinging close
round an arm that may, perhaps, be somewhat too large now, but that
Juno might have envied then. After the fashion of young ladies on the
continent, she wears no jewels or gimcracks: her only ornament is a
wreath of vine-leaves in her hair, with little clusters of artificial
grapes. Down on her shoulders falls the brown hair, in rich liberal
clusters; all that health, and good-humor, and beauty can do for her
face, kind nature has done for hers. Her eyes are frank, sparkling, and
kind. As for her cheeks, what paint-box or dictionary contains pigments
or words to describe their red? They say she opens her mouth and smiles
always to show the dimples in her cheeks. Psha! she smiles because she
is happy, and kind, and good-humored, and not because her teeth are
little pearls.
All the young fellows crowd up to ask her to dance, and, taking from her
waist a little mother-of-pearl remembrancer, she notes them down. Old
Schnabel for the polonaise; Klingenspohr, first waltz; Haarbart, second
waltz; Count Hornpieper (the Danish envoy), third; and so on. I have
said why I could not ask her to waltz, and I turned away with a pang,
and played ecarte with Colonel Trumpenpack all night.
In thus introducing this lovely creature in her ball-costume, I have
been somewhat premature, and had best go back to the beginning of the
history of my acquaintance with her.
Dorothea, then, was the daughter of the celebrated Speck before
mentioned. It is one of the oldest names in Germany, where her father's
and mother's houses, those of Speck and Eyer, are loved wherever they
are known. Unlike his warlike progenitor, Lorenzo von Speck, Dorothea's
father, had early shown himself a passionate admirer of art; had
quitted home to study architecture in Italy, and had become celebrated
throughout Europe, and been appointed Oberhofarchitect and Kunst- und
Bau-inspektor of the united principalities. They are but four miles
wide, and his genius has consequently but little room to play. What art
can do, however, he does. The palace is frequently whitewashed under
his eyes; the theatre painted occasionally; the noble public buildings
erected, of which I have already made mention.
I had come to Kalbsbraten, scarce knowing whither I went; and having, in
about ten minutes, seen the curiosities of the place (I did not care
to see the King's palace, for chairs and tables have no great charm for
me), I had ordered horses, and wanted to get on I cared not whither,
when Fate threw Dorothea in my way. I was yawning back to the hotel
through the palace-garden, a valet-de-place at my side, when I saw a
young lady seated under a tree reading a novel, her mamma on the same
bench (a fat woman in light blue) knitting a stocking, and two officers,
choked in their stays, with various orders on their spinach-colored
coats, standing by in first attitudes: the one was caressing the
fat-lady-in-blue's little dog; the other was twirling his own moustache,
which was already as nearly as possible curled into his own eye.
I don't know how it is, but I hate to see men evidently intimate with
nice-looking women, and on good terms with themselves. There's something
annoying in their cursed complacency--their evident sunshiny happiness.
I've no woman to make sunshine for ME; and yet my heart tells me that
not one, but several such suns, would do good to my system.
“Who are those pert-looking officers,” says I, peevishly, to the guide,
“who are talking to those vulgar-looking women?”
“The big one, with the epaulets, is Major von Schnabel; the little one,
with the pale face, is Stiefel von Klingenspohr.”
“And the big blue woman?”
“The Grand-Ducal Pumpernickelian-court-architectress and
Upper-Palace-and-building-inspectress Von Speck, born V. Eyer,” replied
the guide. “Your well-born honor has seen the pump in the market-place;
that is the work of the great Von Speck.”
“And yonder young person?”
“Mr. Court-architect's daughter; the Fraulein Dorothea.”
*****
Dorothea looked up from her novel here, and turned her face towards
the stranger who was passing, and then blushing turned it down again.
Schnabel looked at me with a scowl, Klingenspohr with a simper, the dog
with a yelp, the fat lady in blue just gave one glance, and seemed, I
thought, rather well pleased. “Silence, Lischen!” said she to the dog.
“Go on, darling Dorothea,” she added, to her daughter, who continued her
novel.
Her voice was a little tremulous, but very low and rich. For some reason
or other, on getting back to the inn, I countermanded the horses, and
said I would stay for the night.
I not only stayed that night, but many, many afterwards; and as for the
manner in which I became acquainted with the Speck family, why it was
a good joke against me at the time, and I did not like then to have
it known; but now it may as well come out at once. Speck, as everybody
knows, lives in the market-place, opposite his grand work of art, the
town pump, or fountain. I bought a large sheet of paper, and having a
knack at drawing, sat down, with the greatest gravity, before the pump,
and sketched it for several hours. I knew it would bring out old Speck
to see. At first he contented himself by flattening his nose against the
window-glasses of his study, and looking what the Englander was about.
Then he put on his gray cap with the huge green shade, and sauntered
to the door: then he walked round me, and formed one of a band of
street-idlers who were looking on: then at last he could restrain
himself no more, but, pulling off his cap, with a low bow, began to
discourse upon arts, and architecture in particular.
“It is curious,” says he, “that you have taken the same view of which a
print has been engraved.”
“That IS extraordinary,” says I (though it wasn't, for I had traced my
drawing at a window off the very print in question). I added that I was,
like all the world, immensely struck with the beauty of the edifice;
heard of it at Rome, where it was considered to be superior to any of
the celebrated fountains of that capital of the fine arts; finally,
that unless perhaps the celebrated fountain of Aldgate in London
might compare with it, Kalbsbraten building, EXCEPT in that case, was
incomparable.
This speech I addressed in French, of which the worthy Hofarchitect
understood somewhat, and continuing to reply in German, our conversation
grew pretty close. It is singular that I can talk to a man and pay him
compliments with the utmost gravity, whereas, to a woman, I at once lose
all self-possession, and have never said a pretty thing in my life.
My operations on old Speck were so conducted, that in a quarter of an
hour I had elicited from him an invitation to go over the town with
him, and see its architectural beauties. So we walked through the huge
half-furnished chambers of the palace, we panted up the copper pinnacle
of the church-tower, we went to see the Museum and Gymnasium, and coming
back into the market-place again, what could the Hofarchitect do but
offer me a glass of wine and a seat in his house? He introduced me
to his Gattinn, his Leocadia (the fat woman in blue), “as a young
world-observer, and worthy art-friend, a young scion of British Adel,
who had come to refresh himself at the Urquellen of his race, and see
his brethren of the great family of Hermann.”
I saw instantly that the old fellow was of a romantic turn, from this
rodomontade to his lady; nor was she a whit less so; nor was Dorothea
less sentimental than her mamma. She knew everything regarding the
literature of Albion, as she was pleased to call it; and asked me news
of all the famous writers there. I told her that Miss Edgeworth was one
of the loveliest young beauties at our court; I described to her Lady
Morgan, herself as beautiful as the wild Irish girl she drew; I promised
to give her a signature of Mrs. Hemans (which I wrote for her that very
evening); and described a fox-hunt, at which I had seen Thomas Moore
and Samuel Rogers, Esquires; and a boxing-match, in which the athletic
author of “Pelham” was pitched against the hardy mountain bard,
Wordsworth. You see my education was not neglected, for though I have
never read the works of the above-named ladies and gentlemen, yet I knew
their names well enough.
Time passed away. I, perhaps, was never so brilliant in conversation as
when excited by the Asmanshauser and the brilliant eyes of Dorothea that
day. She and her parents had dined at their usual heathen hour; but I
was, I don't care to own it, so smitten, that for the first time in my
life I did not even miss the meal, and talked on until six o'clock, when
tea was served. Madame Speck said they always drank it; and so placing
a teaspoonful of bohea in a cauldron of water, she placidly handed out
this decoction, which we took with cakes and tartines. I leave you to
imagine how disgusted Klingenspohr and Schnabel looked when they stepped
in as usual that evening to make their party of whist with the Speck
family! Down they were obliged to sit; and the lovely Dorothea, for that
night, declined to play altogether, and--sat on the sofa by me.
What we talked about, who shall tell? I would not, for my part, break
the secret of one of those delicious conversations, of which I and every
man in his time have held so many. You begin, very probably, about the
weather--'tis a common subject, but what sentiments the genius of Love
can fling into it! I have often, for my part, said to the girl of my
heart for the time being, “It's a fine day,” or “It's a rainy morning!”
in a way that has brought tears to her eyes. Something beats in your
heart, and twangle! a corresponding string thrills and echoes in
hers. You offer her anything--her knitting-needles, a slice of
bread-and-butter--what causes the grateful blush with which she accepts
the one or the other? Why, she sees your heart handed over to her upon
the needles, and the bread-and-butter is to her a sandwich with love
inside it. If you say to your grandmother, “Ma'am, it's a fine day,”
or what not, she would find in the words no other meaning than their
outward and visible one; but say so to the girl you love, and she
understands a thousand mystic meanings in them. Thus, in a word, though
Dorothea and I did not, probably, on the first night of our meeting,
talk of anything more than the weather, or trumps, or some subjects
which to such listeners as Schnabel and Klingenspohr and others might
appear quite ordinary, yet to US they had a different signification, of
which Love alone held the key.
Without further ado then, after the occurrences of that evening, I
determined on staying at Kalbsbraten, and presenting my card the next
day to the Hof-Marshal, requesting to have the honor of being presented
to his Highness the Prince, at one of whose court-balls my Dorothea
appeared as I have described her.
It was summer when I first arrived at Kalbsbraten. The little court was
removed to Siegmundslust, his Highness's country-seat: no balls were
taking place, and, in consequence, I held my own with Dorothea pretty
well. I treated her admirer, Lieutenant Klingenspohr, with perfect
scorn, had a manifest advantage over Major Schnabel, and used somehow
to meet the fair one every day, walking in company with her mamma in
the palace garden, or sitting under the acacias, with Belotte in her
mother's lap, and the favorite romance beside her. Dear, dear Dorothea!
what a number of novels she must have read in her time! She confesses to
me that she had been in love with Uncas, with Saint Preux, with Ivanhoe,
and with hosts of German heroes of romance; and when I asked her if
she, whose heart was so tender towards imaginary youths, had never had
a preference for any one of her living adorers, she only looked, and
blushed, and sighed, and said nothing.
You see I had got on as well as man could do, until the confounded court
season and the balls began, and then--why, then came my usual luck.
Waltzing is a part of a German girl's life. With the best will in the
world--which, I doubt not, she entertains for me, for I never put the
matter of marriage directly to her--Dorothea could not go to balls and
not waltz. It was madness to me to see her whirling round the room
with officers, attaches, prim little chamberlains with gold keys and
embroidered coats, her hair floating in the wind, her hand reposing upon
the abominable little dancer's epaulet, her good-humored face lighted up
with still greater satisfaction. I saw that I must learn to waltz too,
and took my measures accordingly.
The leader of the ballet at the Kalbsbraten theatre in my time was
Springbock, from Vienna. He had been a regular zephyr once, 'twas said,
in his younger days; and though he is now fifteen stone weight, I can,
helas! recommend him conscientiously as a master; and I determined to
take some lessons from him in the art which I had neglected so foolishly
in early life.