J’ai toujours cru que le bon n’etait que le beau mis en action.
--Rousseau.
Shortly after Russelton’s answer to Sir Willoughby’s eulogistic
observations on his own attire, I left those two worthies till I was
to join them at dinner; it wanted three hours yet to that time, and I
repaired to my quarters to bathe and write letters. I scribbled one
to Madame D’Anville, full of antitheses and maxims, sure to charm her;
another to my mother, to prepare her for my arrival; and a third to Lord
Vincent, giving him certain commissions at Paris, which I had forgotten
personally to execute.
My pen is not that of a ready writer; and what with yawning, stretching,
admiring my rings, and putting pen to paper, in the intervals of these
more natural occupations, it was time to bathe and dress before my
letters were completed. I set off to Russelton’s abode in high spirits,
and fully resolved to make the most of a character so original.
It was a very small room in which I found him; he was stretched in an
easy chair before the fire-place, gazing complacently at his feet,
and apparently occupied in any thing but listening to Sir Willoughby
Townsend, who was talking with great vehemence about politics and the
corn laws. Notwithstanding the heat of the weather, there was a small
fire on the hearth, which, aided by the earnestness of his efforts
to convince his host, put poor Sir Willoughby into a most intense
perspiration. Russelton, however, seemed enviably cool, and hung over
the burning wood like a cucumber on a hotbed. Sir Willoughby came to a
full stop by the window, and (gasping for breath) attempted to throw it
open.
“What are you doing? for Heaven’s sake, what are you doing?” cried
Russelton, starting up; “do you mean to kill me?”
“Kill you!” said Sir Willoughby, quite aghast.
“Yes; kill me! is it not quite cold enough already in this d--d
seafaring place, without making my only retreat, humble as it is, a
theatre for thorough draughts? Have I not had the rheumatism in my left
shoulder, and the ague in my little finger, these last six months? and
must you now terminate my miserable existence at one blow, by opening
that abominable lattice? Do you think, because your great frame, fresh
from the Yorkshire wolds, and compacted of such materials, that one
would think, in eating your beeves, you had digested their hides into
skin--do you think, because your limbs might be cut up into planks for
a seventy-eight, and warranted water-proof without pitch, because of the
density of their pores--do you think, because you are as impervious as
an araphorostic shoe, that I, John Russelton, am equally impenetrable,
and that you are to let easterly winds play about my room like children,
begetting rheums and asthmas and all manner of catarrhs? I do beg, Sir
Willoughby Townshend, that you will suffer me to die a more natural and
civilized death;” and so saying, Russelton sank down into his chair,
apparently in the last state of exhaustion.
Sir Willoughby, who remembered the humourist in all his departed glory,
and still venerated him as a temple where the deity yet breathed, though
the altar was overthrown, made to this extraordinary remonstrance no
other reply than a long whiff, and a “Well, Russelton, dash my wig (a
favourite oath of Sir W.’s) but you’re a queer fellow.”
Russelton now turned to me, and invited me, with a tone of the most
lady-like languor, to sit down near the fire. As I am naturally of a
chilly disposition, and fond, too, of beating people in their own line,
I drew a chair close to the hearth, declared the weather was very cold,
and rung the bell for some more wood. Russelton started for a moment,
and then, with a politeness he had not deigned to exert before,
approached his chair to mine, and began a conversation, which, in spite
of his bad witticisms, and peculiarity of manner, I found singularly
entertaining.
Dinner was announced, and we adjourned to another room--poor Sir
Willoughby, with his waistcoat unbuttoned, and breathing like a pug in
a phthisis--groaned bitterly, when he discovered that this apartment was
smaller and hotter than the one before. Russelton immediately helped
him to some scalding soup--and said, as he told the servant to hand Sir
Willoughby the cayenne--“you will find this, my dear Townshend, a very
sensible potage for this severe season.”
Dinner went off tamely enough, with the exception of “our stout
friend’s” agony, which Russelton enjoyed most luxuriously. The
threatened mutton-chops did not make their appearance, and the dinner,
though rather too small, was excellently cooked, and better arranged.
With the dessert, the poor baronet rose, and pleading sudden
indisposition, tottered out of the door.
When he was gone, Russelton threw himself back in his chair, and laughed
for several minutes with a loud chuckling sound, till the tears ran down
his cheek. “A nice heart you must have!” thought I--(my conclusions of
character are always drawn from small propensities).
After a few jests at Sir Willoughby, our conversation turned upon other
individuals. I soon saw that Russelton was a soured and disappointed
man; his remarks on people were all sarcasms--his mind was overflowed
with a suffusion of ill-nature--he bit as well as growled. No man of the
world ever, I am convinced, becomes a real philosopher in retirement.
People who have been employed for years upon trifles have not the
greatness of mind, which could alone make them indifferent to what they
have coveted all their lives, as most enviable and important.
“Have you read ------‘s memoirs?” said Mr. Russelton. “No! Well, I
imagined every one had at least dipped into them. I have often had
serious thoughts of dignifying my own retirement, by the literary
employment of detailing my adventures in the world. I think I could
throw a new light upon things and persons, which my contemporaries will
shrink back like owls at perceiving.
“Your life,” said I, “must indeed furnish matter of equal instruction
and amusement.”
“Ay,” answered Russelton; “amusement to the fools, but instruction to
the knaves. I am, indeed, a lamentable example of the fall of ambition.
I brought starch into all the neckcloths in England, and I end by tying
my own at a three-inch looking-glass at Calais. You are a young man, Mr.
Pelham, about to commence life, probably with the same views as (though
greater advantages than) myself; perhaps in indulging my egotism, I
shall not weary without recompensing you.
“I came into the world with an inordinate love of glory, and a great
admiration of the original; these propensities might have made me a
Shakspeare--they did more, they made me a Russelton! When I was six
years old, I cut my jacket into a coat, and turned my aunt’s best
petticoat into a waistcoat. I disdained at eight the language of the
vulgar, and when my father asked me to fetch his slippers, I replied,
that my soul swelled beyond the limits of a lackey’s. At nine, I was
self-inoculated with propriety of ideas. I rejected malt with the air
of His Majesty, and formed a violent affection for maraschino; though
starving at school, I never took twice of pudding, and paid sixpence
a week out of my shilling to have my shoes blacked. As I grew up, my
notions expanded. I gave myself, without restraint, to the ambition
that burnt within me--I cut my old friends, who were rather envious
than emulous of my genius, and I employed three tradesmen to make my
gloves--one for the hand, a second for the fingers, and a third for
the thumb! These two qualities made me courted and admired by a new
race--for the great secrets of being courted are to shun others, and
seem delighted with yourself. The latter is obvious enough; who the
deuce should be pleased with you, if you yourself are not?
“Before I left college I fell in love. Other fellows, at my age, in such
a predicament, would have whined--shaved only twice a week, and written
verses. I did none of the three--the last indeed I tried, but, to my
infinite surprise, I found my genius was not universal. I began with
“‘Sweet nymph, for whom I wake my muse.’
“For this, after considerable hammering, I could only think of the rhyme
‘shoes’--so I began again,--
“‘Thy praise demands much softer lutes.’
“And the fellow of this verse terminated like myself in ‘boots.’--Other
efforts were equally successful--‘bloom’ suggested to my imagination
no rhyme but ‘perfume!’--‘despair’ only reminded me of my ‘hair,’--and
‘hope’ was met at the end of the second verse, by the inharmonious
antithesis of ‘soap.’ Finding, therefore, that my forte was not in
the Pierian line, I redoubled my attention to my dress; I coated, and
cravated, and essenced, and oiled, with all the attention the very
inspiration of my rhymes seemed to advise;--in short, I thought the best
pledge I could give my Dulcinea of my passion for her person, would be
to show her what affectionate veneration I could pay to my own.
“My mistress could not withhold from me her admiration, but she denied
me her love. She confessed Mr. Russelton was the best dressed man at the
University, and had the whitest hands; and two days after this avowal,
she ran away with a great rosy-cheeked extract from Leicestershire.
“I did not blame her: I pitied her too much--but I made a vow never to
be in love again. In spite of all advantages I kept my oath, and avenged
myself on the species for the insult of the individual.
“Before I commenced a part which was to continue through life, I
considered deeply on the humours of the spectators. I saw that
the character of the English was servile to rank, and yielding to
pretension--they admire you for your acquaintance, and cringe to you for
your conceit. The first thing, therefore, was to know great people--the
second to controul them. I dressed well, and had good horses--that
was sufficient to make me sought by the young of my own sex. I talked
scandal, and was never abashed--that was more than enough to make me
recherche among the matrons of the other. It is single men, and married
women, to whom are given the St. Peter’s keys of Society. I was soon
admitted into its heaven--I was more--I was one of its saints. I became
imitated as well as initiated. I was the rage--the lion. Why?--was I
better--was I richer--was I handsomer--was I cleverer, than my kind?
No, no;--(and here Russelton ground his teeth with a strong and
wrathful expression of scorn);--and had I been all--had I been a very
concentration and monopoly of all human perfections, they would not have
valued me at half the price they did set on me. It was--I will tell you
the simple secret, Mr. Pelham--it was because I trampled on them, that,
like crushed herbs, they sent up a grateful incense in return.
“Oh! it was balm to my bitter and loathing temper, to see those who
would have spurned me from them, if they dared, writhe beneath my lash,
as I withheld or inflicted it at will. I was the magician who held the
great spirits that longed to tear me to pieces, by one simple spell
which a superior hardihood had won me--and, by Heaven, I did not spare
to exert it.
“Well, well, this is but an idle recollection now; all human power, says
the proverb of every language, is but of short duration. Alexander did
not conquer kingdoms for ever; and Russelton’s good fortune deserted him
at last. Napoleon died in exile, and so shall I; but we have both had
our day, and mine was the brightest of the two, for it had no change
till the evening. I am more happy than people would think for--Je ne
suis pas souvent ou mon corps est--I live in a world of recollections, I
trample again upon coronets and ermine, the glories of the small great!
I give once more laws which no libertine is so hardy not to feel exalted
in adopting; I hold my court, and issue my fiats; I am like the madman,
and out of the very straws of my cell, I make my subjects and my realm;
and when I wake from these bright visions, and see myself an old,
deserted man, forgotten, and decaying inch by inch in a foreign village,
I can at least summon sufficient of my ancient regality of spirit not
to sink beneath the reverse. If I am inclined to be melancholy, why, I
extinguish my fire, and imagine I have demolished a duchess. I steal up
to my solitary chamber, to renew again, in my sleep, the phantoms of my
youth; to carouse with princes; to legislate for nobles; and to wake in
the morning (here Russelton’s countenance and manner suddenly changed to
an affectation of methodistical gravity,) and thank Heaven that I have
still a coat to my stomach, as well as to my back, and that I am
safely delivered of such villainous company; ‘to forswear sack and live
cleanly,’ during the rest of my sublunary existence.”
After this long detail of Mr. Russelton’s, the conversation was but dull
and broken. I could not avoid indulging a reverie upon what I had
heard, and my host was evidently still revolving the recollections
his narration had conjured up; we sat opposite each other for several
minutes as abstracted and distracted as if we had been a couple two
months married; till at last I rose, and tendered my adieus. Russelton
received them with his usual coldness, but more than his usual civility,
for he followed me to the door.
Just as they were about to shut it, he called me back. “Mr. Pelham,”
said he, “Mr. Pelham, when you come back this way, do look in upon me,
and--and as you will be going a good deal into society, just find out
what people say of my manner of life!” [It will be perceived by those
readers who are kind or patient enough to reach the conclusion of this
work, that Russelton is specified as one of my few dramatis personae of
which only the first outline is taken from real life: all the rest--all,
indeed, which forms and marks the character thus briefly delineated, is
drawn solely from imagination.]