In one of the many mansions of the "west end" of London, a lady reclined
one morning on a sofa wishing that it were afternoon. She was a
middle-aged, handsome, sickly lady. If it had been afternoon she would
have wished that it were evening, and if it had been evening she would
have wished for the morning; for Mrs Stoutley was one of those languid
invalids whose enjoyment appears to be altogether in the future or the
past, and who seem to have no particular duties connected with the
present except sighing and wishing. It may be that this unfortunate
condition of mind had something to do with Mrs Stoutley's feeble state
of health. If she had been a little more thoughtful about others, and
less mindful of herself, she might, perhaps, have sighed and wished
less, and enjoyed herself more. At all events her doctor seemed to
entertain some such opinion, for, sitting in an easy chair beside her,
and looking earnestly at her handsome, worn-out countenance, he said,
somewhat abruptly, being a blunt doctor.
"You must go abroad, madam, and try to get your mind, as well as your
body, well shaken up."
"Why, doctor," replied Mrs Stoutley, with a faint smile; "you talk of
me as if I were a bottle of physic or flat ginger-beer."
"You are little better, silly woman," thought the doctor, but his innate
sense of propriety induced him only to say, with a smile, "Well, there
is at least this much resemblance between you and a bottle of flat
ginger-beer, namely, that both require to be made to effervesce a
little. It will never do to let your spirits down as you have been
doing. We must brighten up, my dear madam--not Brighton up, by the way,
we've had enough of Brighton and Bath, and such places. We must get
away to the Continent this summer--to the Pyrenees, or Switzerland,
where we can breathe the fresh mountain air, and ramble on glaciers, and
have a thorough change."
Mrs Stoutley looked gently, almost pitifully at the doctor while he
spoke, as if she thought him a well-meaning and impulsive, but rather
stupid maniac.
"Impossible, my dear doctor," she said; "you know I could not stand the
fatigues of such a journey."
"Well, then," replied the doctor, abruptly, "you must stop at home and
die."
"Oh! what a shocking naughty man you are to talk so."
Mrs Stoutley said this, however, with an easy good-natured air, which
showed plainly that she did not believe her illness likely to have such
a serious termination.
"I will be still more naughty and shocking," continued the doctor,
resolutely, but with a twinkle in his eyes, "for I shall prescribe not
only a dose of mountain air, but a dose of mountain exercise, to be
taken--and the patient to be well shaken while taken--every morning
throughout the summer and autumn. Moreover, after you return to
England, you must continue the exercise during the winter; and, in
addition to that, must have an object at the end of your walks and
drives--not shopping, observe, that is not a sufficiently out-of-door
object; nor visiting your friends, which is open to the same objection."
Mrs Stoutley smiled again at this, and said that really, if visiting
and shopping were forbidden, there seemed to be nothing left but museums
and picture-galleries.
To this the doctor retorted that although she might do worse than visit
museums and picture-galleries, he would prefer that she should visit the
diamond and gold fields of the city.
"Did you ever hear of the diamond and gold fields of London, Miss Gray?"
he said, turning to a plain yet pretty girl, who had been listening in
silence to the foregoing conversation.
"Never," answered Miss Gray, with a look of surprise.
Now, Miss Gray's look of surprise induces us to state in passing that
this young lady--niece, also poor relation and companion, to Mrs
Stoutley--possessed three distinct aspects. When grave, she was
plain,--not ugly, observe; a girl of nineteen, with a clear healthy
complexion and nut-brown hair, cannot in any circumstances be ugly; no,
she was merely plain when grave. When she smiled she was decidedly
pretty, and when she laughed she was captivating--absolutely
irresistible! She seldom laughed, occasionally smiled, and was
generally grave. There was something quite incomprehensible about her,
for she was not an unusually good girl, and by no means a dashing girl,
neither was she an intensely modest girl--and yet, plain Emma Gray had
perhaps driven more young men into a condition of drivelling imbecility
than any acknowledged beauty of the metropolis.
Observe, we say "perhaps," because we lay claim to no superhuman
knowledge in regard to such matters.
"They are rather extensive fields," continued the doctor, "scattered
here and there about the metropolis, but lying chiefly in the city and
on the banks of the Thames. They comprise many picture-galleries, too,
and museums; the latter containing wonderful specimens of old bones and
fossil remains, filth, and miscellaneous abominations, in which the gold
and diamonds are imbedded--sometimes buried,--and the former being hung
with subjects--chiefly interiors--incomparably superior, in respect of
graphic power, to the works of Hogarth."
"Oh! I know what you mean," said Miss Gray, with a little smile.
"Your wits are sharper than mine, Emma," said Mrs Stoutley, with a sigh
and a placid look. "What _do_ you refer to, Doctor Tough?"
"I refer to those districts, madam, chiefly inhabited by the poor, where
there are innumerable diamonds and gold nuggets, some of which are being
polished, and a good many are glittering brightly, though not yet fixed
in their proper setting, while by far the greater number of them are
down in the earth, and useless in the meantime, and apt to be lost for
want of adventurous diggers. They are splendid fields those of London,
and digging is healthful occupation--though it might not seem so at
first sight. Did you ever visit the poor, Mrs Stoutley?"
With a slight elevation of her eyebrows, and the application of a
scent-bottle to her delicate nose, as if the question had suggested bad
smells, the lady said that--Well, yes, she had once visited a poor old
gardener who had been a faithful creature in the family of a former
friend, but that her recollection of that visit did not tend to induce a
wish for its repetition.
"H'm!" coughed the doctor, "well, the taste of physic is usually bad at
first, but one soon gets used to it, and the after effects, as you know,
are exceedingly beneficial. I hope that when you visit the London
diggings you may find the truth of this; but it will be time enough to
speak of that subject when you return from rambling on the glaciers of
Switzerland, where, by the way, the dirt, rubbish, and wrack, called
moraines, which lie at the foot of the glaciers, will serve to remind
you of the gold-fields to which I have referred, for much of what
composes those moraines was once solid rock in a fixed position on the
heights, or glittering ice which reflected the sun's dazzling rays on
surrounding high life, though it lies low in the earth now. To a lady
of your intelligence, madam, I need not expound my parable. There are
many avalanches, great and small, in English society as well as among
the Swiss mountains; and, whether by gradual subsidence or a tremendous
rush, we must all find our places in the moraine at last."
"Really, doctor," said Mrs Stoutley, with a light laugh, "you seem to
have already wandered much among these moral moraines, and to have
acquired some of their ruggedness. How _can_ you talk of such dismal
things to a patient? But are you really in earnest about my going
abroad?"
"Indeed I am," replied the doctor, firmly, "and I advise you to begin
your preparations at once, for you must set out on your travels in less
than a month. I lay the responsibility of seeing my orders carried into
effect on your shoulders, Miss Gray."
So saying, the doctor rose and took his leave. Mrs Stoutley and her
niece immediately began to discuss the subject of Switzerland--the one
languidly, the other with animation. It was plain enough that, although
the invalid protested to the doctor her inability to travel, she really
had no objection, perhaps felt some desire, to go abroad, for when Miss
Gray mentioned the fact that there was a difficulty in the shape of
insufficient funds, she replied with more warmth than usual--
"Now, Emma, what is the use of always bringing up that ridiculous idea?"
"No doubt, auntie," the maiden replied, "it is a little ridiculous to
run short of ready money, considering the style in which we live; but it
would be still more ridiculous, you know, to go to Switzerland without
the means of paying our expenses while there."
"What's that you say about expenses, cousin?" exclaimed a tall handsome
stripling who entered at the moment, and seated himself on the sofa at
his mother's feet.
"Oh, bother the expense!" he exclaimed, when the difficulty had been
explained to him, "it can't cost so much to spend a few months in
Switzerland,--besides, we can do it cheap, you know. Didn't Mr
What's-his-name, our man of business, say that there was a considerable
balance at the banker's, and that if the What-d'ee-call-'em mines paid a
reasonable dividend, we should easily get over our difficulties?"
"He said something of that sort, I believe," replied Mrs Stoutley, with
a sigh.
"I rather think, cousin Lewis," said Emma, endeavouring to repress a
smile, "that he said there was an inconsiderable balance at the bankers,
and that _unless_ the Gorong mine paid a reasonable dividend, we
shouldn't easily get over our difficulties."
Both Lewis and his mother laughed at the quiet way in which this was
said, but, while both admitted that Emma's view of the matter might
perhaps be correct, Lewis held that there was no good reason for
supposing there would be any difficulty in the meantime in obtaining
from their "man-of-business" the paltry sum that was required for a
short tour on the Continent. Indeed Mrs Stoutley regarded this
man-of-business as a mere sponge, who required only to be squeezed in
order to the production of what was desired, and the man-of-business
himself found it no easy matter to convince her that she held erroneous
views on this subject, and that at her present rate of progress, she
would, to use the doctor's glacial simile, very soon topple from the
pinnacle of fashion, on which she sat, and fall with the crash of a
social avalanche into the moraine of ruin.
"What a wise little woman you are, cousin Emma," said Lewis, gaily.
"You ought to have been bred to the law, or trained an accountant.
However, we won't be guided by your advice just now, first, because the
doctor has _ordered_ mother abroad for her health, which is our chief
consideration; and, second, because I wish of all things to see
Switzerland, and climb Mont Blanc. Besides, we are not so poor as you
think, and I hope to add a little to our general funds in a day or two.
By the way, can you lend me ten pounds just now, mother?"
"Why do you want it?" asked Mrs Stoutley, sternly, as if she meant to
refuse, but at the same time opening her purse.
"Don't ask me just now. I will repay you tomorrow, with interest and
shall then explain."
With an easy, languid smile, the carelessly amiable invalid handed her
last ten-pound note to her hopeful son, who had just transferred it to
his pocketbook, when a footman entered and presented a scrap of dirty
paper, informing his lady that the person who sent up the "card" desired
to see her.
"What is this?" said Mrs Stoutley, holding the paper gingerly with the
tips of her fingers, "Wip--Wap--Wopper! What is Wopper? Is the person
a man or a woman?"
The footman, who, although well-bred, found it difficult to restrain a
smile, intimated that the person was a man, and added, that he said he
had come from California, and wanted to see Mrs Stoutley very
particularly.
On hearing this, the lady's manner changed at once, and, with more
animation than she had yet exhibited, she desired that he should be
shown in.
With his large wide-awake in one hand, and a canvas bag in the other,
Captain Wopper entered the drawing-room, and looked around him with a
beaming and rather bashful smile.
"Mrs Stoutley, I believe," he said, advancing, "and Miss Emma Gray, I
suppose," he added, turning with a beaming glance towards the young
lady.
Mrs Stoutley admitted that he was right, and expressed some surprise
that he, a perfect stranger, should be so well acquainted with their
names.
"I am indeed a stranger personally, ma'am," said Captain Wopper,
smoothing the hair down on his rugged brow, "but I may be said to know
you pretty well, seeing that I have for many years been the friend and
messmate of your late husband's brother in Californy."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Mrs Stoutley, with increasing animation, as she
rose and held out her hand; "any friend of my brother-in-law is heartily
welcome. Be seated, Mr Wopper, and let me hear about him. He was very
kind to my dear husband during his last illness--very kind. I shall
never forget him."
"No doubt he was," said the Captain, accepting the chair which Emma Gray
handed to him, with looks of great interest. "Thank 'ee, Miss. Willum
Stout--excuse my familiarity, ma'am, I always called him Willum, because
we was like brothers--more than brothers, I may say, an' very friendly.
Yes, Willum Stout _was_ kind to his brother in his last days. It would
have bin shame to him if he hadn't for your husband, ma'am, was kind to
Willum, an' he often said to me, over the camp-fires in the bush, that
he'd never forget _his_ kindness. But it's over now," continued the
seaman in a sad tone, "an' poor Willum is left alone."
"Is my uncle _very_ poor?" asked Lewis, who had been paying more
attention to the appearance of their rugged visitor than to what he had
said.
"Ay, _very_ poor," replied the seaman, "as regards near relations,
leastwise such as he has seen and known in former days, but he an't poor
as regards gold. He's got lots of that. He and I worked not far from
each other for years, an' he used to hit upon good claims somehow, and
shovelled up the nuggets like stones."
"Indeed! I wish he'd send a few of them this way," exclaimed Lewis,
with a careless laugh.
"No doubt he might do so, young man, if he knew you were in need of 'em,
but your father gave him to understand that his family was rich."
"Rich!" exclaimed Lewis, with a smile, in which there was a touch of
contempt. "Well, yes, we were rich enough once, but when my father was
away these wretched mines became--"
"Lewie!" exclaimed his mother, hastily, "what nonsense you do talk!
Really, one would think from your account that we were paupers."
"Well, mother, so we are--paupers to this extent at least, that we can't
afford to take a run to Switzerland, though ordered to do so for your
health, because we lack funds."
Lewis said this half petulantly, for he had been a "spoilt child," and
might probably have been by that time a ruined young man, but for the
mercy of his Creator, who had blessed him with an amiable disposition.
He was one of those youths, in short, of whom people say that they can't
be spoiled, though fond and foolish parents do their best to spoil them.
"You mis-state the case, naughty boy," said Mrs Stoutley, annoyed at
being thus forced to touch on her private affairs before a stranger.
"No doubt our ready cash is what our man-of-business calls `locked up,'
but that, you know, is only a matter of temporary inconvenience, and
cannot last long."
As Mrs Stoutley paused and hesitated, their visitor placed on the table
a canvas bag, which, up to this point he had rested on one knee.
"This bag," he said, "of nuggets, is a gift from Willum. He desired me
to deliver it to you, Miss Gray, as a _small_ acknowledgment of your
kindness in writin' so often to him. He'd have bought you a silk gown,
or a noo bonnet, so he said, but wasn't sure as to your taste in such
matters, and thought you'd accept the nuggets and buy it for yourself.
Leastwise, that's somethin' like the speech Willum tried to tell me to
deliver, but he warn't good at speech-makin' no more than I at
remembrin', and hoped you'd take the will for the deed."
With a flush of surprise and pleasure, Emma Gray accepted both the will
and the deed, with many expressions of gratitude, and said, that as she
did not require either a silk dress or a bonnet just then, she would
invest her little fortune; she would lend it at high interest, to a lady
under temporary inconvenience, who was ordered by her doctor to
Switzerland for the benefit of her health. To this Mrs Stoutley
protested very earnestly that the lady in question would not accept the
loan on any consideration; that it must not be diverted from its
destined use, but be honestly expended on silk-dresses and new bonnets.
To which Emma replied, that the destiny of the gift, with interest (she
was very particular on that head), should be fulfilled in good time, but
that meanwhile it must be lent out.
In the midst of a cross-fire of this kind the bag was opened, and its
contents poured on the table, to the immense admiration of all the
company, none of whom had, until that day, beheld gold in its native
condition.
"How much may it be worth, Mr Wopper?" asked Lewis, weighing one of the
largest lumps.
"About two hundred pound, I should say, more or less," replied the
seaman.
"Indeed!" exclaimed the youth in surprise--an exclamation which was
echoed by his mother and cousin in modified tones.
While they sat thus toying with the lumps of gold, the conversation
reverted to the sender of it, and the Captain told such entertaining
anecdotes of bush life, in all of which "Uncle Willum" had been an
actor, that the afternoon arrived before Mrs Stoutley had time to wish
for it. They also talked of the last illness of the deceased father of
the family; and when it came out that Captain (they had found out by
that time that their visitor had been a skipper, and, by courtesy, a
captain), had assisted "Willum" in nursing Mr Stoutley, and had
followed him to the grave, Mrs Stoutley's gratitude was such that she
insisted on her visitor staying to dinner.
"Thank 'ee, ma'am," he said, "I've dined. I always dines at one o'clock
if I can manage it."
"But we don't dine till eight," said the lady, "so it will just suit for
your supper."
"Do come," said Emma Gray, "we shall be quite alone, and shall have a
great spinning of yarns over Uncle William and the gold-fields."
"Well, I don't mind if I do," said the Captain, "but before supper I
must go to the docks for my kit and settle my lodgings."
"I am going to the Strand, and shall be happy to give you a lift," said
Lewis.
The Captain accepted the offer, and as they drove along, he and his
young friend became very intimate, insomuch that Lewis, who was
lighthearted, open, and reckless, let him into his confidence, and spoke
quite freely about his mother's difficulties. It is only justice to add
that the Captain did not encourage him in this. When, however, the
youth spoke of himself, he not only encouraged him, but drew him out.
Among other things, he drew out of him the fact that he was in the habit
of gambling, and that he fully expected--if his usual luck attended
him--to assist in adding to the fund which was to take the family
abroad.
The Captain looked at the handsome stripling for a few seconds in silent
surprise.
"You don't mean to tell me," he said slowly, "that you gamble?"
"Indeed I do," replied Lewis, with a bland smile, and something of a
twinkle in his eye.
"For money?" asked the Captain.
"For money," assented the youth; "what have you to say against it?"
"Why, I've to say that it's mean."
"That's strong language," said Lewis, flushing.
"It an't strong enough by a long way," returned the Captain, with
indignation, "it's more than mean, it's contemptible; it's despicable."
The flush on Lewis's face deepened, and he looked at his companion with
the air of one who meditates knocking another down. Perhaps the massive
size and strength of the Captain induced him to change his mind. It may
be that there occurred to him the difficulty--if not impossibility--of
knocking down a man who was down already, and the want of space in a cab
for such violent play of muscle. At all events he did nothing, but
looked "daggers."
"Look 'ee here, my lad," continued the Captain, laying his huge hand on
his companion's knee, and gazing earnestly into his face, "I don't mean
for to hurt your feelin's by sayin' that _you_ are mean, or
contemptible, or despicable, for I don't suppose you've thought much
about the matter at all, and are just following in the wake of older men
who ought to know better; but I say that the _thing_--gambling for
money--is the meanest thing a man can do, short of stealing. What does
it amount to? Simply this--I want another man's money, and the other
man wants mine. We daren't try open robbery, we would be ashamed of
that; we're both too lazy to labour for money, and labour doesn't bring
it in fast enough, therefore we'll go _play_ for it. I'll ask him to
submit to be robbed by me on condition that I submit to be robbed by
him; and which is to be the robbed, and which the robber, shall depend
on the accidental turn of a dice, or something equally trifling--"
"But I don't gamble by means of dice," interrupted Lewis, "I play, and
bet, on billiards, which is a game of skill, requiring much practice,
judgment, and thought."
"That makes no odds, my lad," continued the Captain. "There is no
connection whatever between the rolling of a ball and the taking away of
a man's money, any more than there is between the turning of a dice and
the taking of a man's money. Both are dishonourable subterfuges. They
are mere blinds put up to cover the great and mean fact, which is, that
I want to get possession of my neighbour's cash."
"But, Captain," retorted Lewis, with a smile--for he had now entered
into the spirit of the argument--"you ignore the fact that while I try
to win from my friend, I am quite willing that my friend should try to
win from me."
"Ignore it? no!" cried Captain Wopper. "Putt it in this way. Isn't it
wrong for me to have a longing desire and itching fingers to lay hold of
_your_ cash?"
"Well, put in that simple form," said Lewis, with a laugh, "it certainly
is."
"And isn't it equally wrong for you to have a hungering and thirsting
after _my_ cash?"
"Of course that follows," assented Lewis.
"Well, then," pursued the Captain, "can any agreement between you and
me, as to the guessing of black or white or the turning of dice or
anything else, make a right out of two wrongs?"
"Still," said Lewis, a little puzzled, "there is fallacy somewhere in
your argument. I cannot see that gambling is wrong."
"Mark me, my lad," returned the Captain, impressively, "it is no
sufficient reason for the doing of a thing that you _cannot see_ it to
be wrong. You are not entitled to do anything unless you _see_ it to be
right. But there are other questions connected with gambling which
renders it doubly mean--the question, for instance, whether a man is
entitled to risk the loss of money which he calls his own, but which
belongs to his wife and children as much as to himself. The mean
positions, too, in which a gambler places himself, are numerous. One of
these is, when a rich man wins the hard-earned and much-needed gains of
a poor one."
"But one is not supposed to know anything about the affairs of those
from whom one wins," objected Lewis.
"All the more reason," replied Captain Wopper, "why a man should never
gamble, lest, unwittingly, he should become the cause of great
suffering--it might be, of death."
Still Lewis "could not see" the wrong of gambling, and the discussion
was cut short by the sudden stopping of the cab at a door in the Strand,
over which hung a lamp, on which the Captain observed the word
"Billiards."
"Well, ta-ta, old fellow," said Lewis, gaily, as he parted from his new
friend, "we'll finish the argument another day. Meanwhile, don't forget
the hour--eight, sharp."