THE NEW ADMIRAL.
To me, who am accustomed to myself, it has always seemed much more
wonderful, that my father should deny my peculiar powers, than that I
should possess them. "Go up, Tommy," he has said a thousand times;
"don't be so shy about it, but up with you! The proof of the pudding is
in the eating. Only fly up to the bedroom window sill, as that little
sparrow from the road has done, and I'll own that I'm a fool, and you a
wonder. But, until you have done it, in my sight, my son, I shall stick
to my old experience, that all the human race are liars, but not one of
them a flyer."
His strong opinion proved itself, as the manner of strong opinions is;
and instead of being able to arise, while he was waiting, with his hands
in his pockets, and a pipe in his mouth, I was more inclined to go into
the ground, whenever it happened to be soft.
And so, even now, (when some fifty people had seen me in the air, and
were ready to make oath to a great deal more than I had done) father
stuck to it, that they all were liars, or fools, or crazy, or else tipsy
at the least. But he scarcely knew what to say at first, when just as he
was going to sit down to dinner, a mighty great noise arose under the
window, of sailors hurraing, and the brass-band roaring, and _Grip_ as
loud as any of them, barking at his utmost.
"D--n it," said my father to my mother; "is this the quiet place John
Windsor spoke of? When a man can't even sit down to his dinner----"
"Dinner indeed! Don't think twice of your dinner;" cried mother from the
window, in great excitement, "here is a thing that you never saw before,
and will never see again, if you live to be a hundred. Our Tommy in a
flag, and all the sailors in the kingdom, taking off their hats, and
cheering him, and the dear little poppet as modest as ever, exactly like
an Angel! And a beautiful lady, you can see by the look that all the
place belongs to her--you can tell at a glance who she is, of
course--Bucephalus, how slow you are!"
"Slow, for not knowing at a glance a female, I never saw or heard of, in
all my life! And in a strange place I was never in before! How should I
know her from Adam--or at least, Eve?"
"Bucephalus! Why, of course she must be Lady Towers-Twentifold, widow of
the late, and sincerely lamented, Sir Robert Towers-Twentifold, who
died, after tortures surpassing description, from swallowing his own
corundum tooth. Every stick, and stone, for ten miles in every direction
belongs to him, and he leaves a lovely widow, and an only son, the
present Sir Roland Towers-Twentifold, scarcely any older than our Tommy,
and an only daughter Laura. Bless me, how true everything is coming! I
can believe every word of it, now I see them."
"Including the man with the corundum tooth. In the name of Moses,
Sophy, how the deuce have you found out all this already?"
"I have found out nothing; and I am surprised at your low way of putting
it, Bucephalus. When I met the chambermaid, could I do less than pass
the time of day to her? But look, they have carried our Tommy three
times, with the 'Conquering Hero comes' twice and a half, round the--I
forget what dear Jane Windsor says is the right foreign name for it--and
I think, Mr. Upmore, the least we can do, is to throw up the window, and
bow our acknowledgments gracefully, as the papers say."
"I'm blowed if I'll do anything of the sort. Half a crown's worth of
coppers would be gone in no time. Keep behind the curtain, Sophy; or
back we all go to business to-morrow morning; and I heartily wish we had
never come away. At home, when I am hungry, I can get my dinner."
"Oh dear, he has spoiled his white ducks with tar, and _Grip_ is in a
dreadful mess of wet, and the sailors want to hoist him too, if he would
only let them! I see what it is--how stupid of me! Tommy has been flying
all over the sea, and _Grip_ has been swimming after him! Oh,
Bucephalus, how can you eat your dinner? Is this a proper time, for you
to be devouring dinner?"
"You are right enough there, Sophy;" answered father, "I ought to have
had it five hours ago. I call it tempting Providence with one's
constitution, to go so long after breakfast-time. I only hope, the
zanies won't come wanting to hoist me."
Alas, that the stronger of my parents should have shown such
incredulity! Did it follow that, inasmuch as he was heavy, all his
productions must draw the beam? If so, dead must drop all the wit of
Falstaff, and all the sweet humour of Thackeray. And how could my father
have made light sperm, or the soap, that he labelled "the froth of the
sea"? Such questions, however, come dangerously near to science, and its
vast analogies. Enough, that my father paid dear in the end, for all
this incredulity; as will be made manifest, further on; and sorry shall
I be to tell it.
My dear mother was already of opinion, that it was a crime upon any
one's part, even to attempt to explain my achievements, and downright
treason to deny them. When the beautiful Lady Twentifold--as people
called her for convenience, though her proper name was
_Towers-Twentifold_--came, when the public was tired of shouting, to
learn all that could with propriety be learned, of the origin of her
"great little wonder," few people verily would believe what my mother
was fanciful enough to do. The lady (to whom the hotel belonged, and all
the people there, in my opinion) sat down in the parlour downstairs,
with my hand in hers--for she had taken dear liking to me, because I
resembled a child she had lost--and she begged the landlady to go to my
mother, without any card or formality, and ask whether she might have
the pleasure of seeing, and telling her about her boy.
It is a very clumsy thing for me to find fault with the behaviour of my
parents, and I am not prepared to do so now. There may have been fifty
reasons, clear to people much wiser than myself; but certainly I was
amazed, and angry, when Mrs. Roaker came back to say, that the lady
from London was so fatigued, with the dreadful effects of her journey,
that she begged to thank her ladyship most warmly, for very great
kindness to her dear son; but felt quite unequal to an interview with
her.
"How many of you are there, Tommy?" Lady Twentifold asked, without my
knowing why. But she always went straight to the meaning of things.
"Only me, ma'am, if you please;" I answered, looking up, in fear that
there ought to have been more; "but I did hear a woman say, that there
had been another; but he went to heaven, before me, I believe."
The lady looked at me, with her eyes quite soft, which they had not
been, when she received that message; and she seemed to be uncertain,
whether she was right, in putting her next question.
"Has your father been married more than once, my dear? I mean, is this
lady your own dear mother, or become your mamma, since you can
remember?"
I told her, that I could not remember any one thing about it, though I
often thought. But this was my mother, Mrs. Upmore; everybody said so;
and more than that, there was nobody else in all the world, who made a
quarter so much of me.
"Tommy, I am quite satisfied upon that point," she answered; "there may
be some reason, which I do not know of. Or perhaps your dear mother is
not at all strong. Give her my compliments, and say that I hope she will
be better soon, and the Happystowe air relieve her weakness. Now shake
hands with Roly, and little Laura; and good-bye till we see you again,
flying Tommy."
I had told her that my name was "flying Tommy;" and she was much
pleased to hear it, because it showed, that the Happystowe air was not
to blame, for my adventure. Then Sir Roland came up, and took my hand,
and said that he hoped I would take him for a fly; and then, the most
beautiful child I had ever set eyes on, stole up shyly, and put her
little hand in mine, and left me to say good-bye to her.
On the following day, I felt as heavy as _Grip_ (who weighed half a
pound for every ounce that a human being of his size would weigh), and
my father and my mother agreed, from different points of view, about
me,--that I must be kept indoors, and fed, and put at my books, to
steady me. We had brought some Greek in the bottom of a box, which
father considered great nonsense, though it might be very good for
children. And he told me to find out the Greek for soap, and spermaceti,
and steam-engine, and write them down, so that he could read them; which
I entirely failed to do. Meanwhile he set off, with his Admiral's coat,
to inspect the sea and the shipping, and Mr. Barlow's boiling premises.
The day after that again was Sunday, when the rule of our house, and of
most houses in Maiden Lane, was to lie in bed until nine o'clock, and
have breakfast at ten, and attend to the dinner till dinner-time, and
saunter in the fields towards Highgate, if the weather was fine in the
afternoon, and to go to church, or chapel, sometimes, if there was
nothing else to do in the evening; and then have a good supper, and be
off to bed. But now mother said, and my father was quite unable to
gainsay it, that, being in a country place like this, where everything
depends upon example, with my father acknowledged to be an Admiral--not
only because of his coat, and occasional d--ns, and general demeanour,
but also because he had shaken his head, when requested to look at a
ship through a spy-glass for twopence, and told the ancient tar that he
had seen a deal too much of that--moreover with Tommy adored by all the
aristocracy of the neighbourhood, and by the brave sailors, and people
of less refinement, accepted as an angel, the least we could do was to
make an effort, and try to be at church by eleven o'clock.
My father replied, that as concerned himself there need be no difficulty
whatever, because as soon as he had done his breakfast, his only
preparation was to smoke a pipe; but he did not believe that it was
possible for mother, (who had spent all Saturday in the village-shops,
because she had come in such hurry from home, that she had brought
nothing fit to be seen in) to have all her toggery spick-and-span, and
her hair done up to the nines, so early. But, if only to show him how
little he knew, my mother was ready before he was; and father declared
that she ruined his sleep, having got up to see the sun rise upon the
sea, and stopped up to see herself grow brighter, and brighter, in the
looking-glass. Dear mother had a great mind not to go to church, with
such a wicked story ringing in her ears; until father told her that she
looked stunning, and was fit to be put on a transparent lid--the lid of
a box of transparent soap.
"Dear Bucephalus, now you see," she said, as she placed her primrose
glove, on the sleeve of his blue coat with brass buttons, "one little
portion perhaps of the reason, which led me to decline an interview,
that night, with Lady Towers-Twentifold. My main reason was, of course,
that I knew so thoroughly well what ladies are. If I had allowed her to
see me, and satisfy all her great curiosity, about this wonderful
darling of a Tommy, the chances are ten to one, that her ladyship would
never have invited him to Twentifold Towers. But now, I intend that he
shall go there; and what will the Windsors say to that?"
"Well, that was a very fine reason, Sophy. But I don't see the other,
that I ought to see."
"Then Tommy is sharper than you, ten times. But walk a little better, if
you please, my dear. Who can take you for an Admiral, if you drag your
feet like that?"
From a joke, Mr. Windsor's idea had grown into a great and solid fact.
Mrs. Roaker, and most of the Happystowe people, had made up their minds
by this time, that my father was "Admiral Upmore." He was too honest,
and plain a man, to encourage this mistake for a moment, and, whenever
he got the chance, declared most stoutly, that he was no Admiral. The
public, however, would not believe him, having met with some indications
in commercial dealings with him, that he prized the royal effigy; from
which it was clear, what his motive was in desiring to disguise his
rank. And the Boots of the _Twentifold Arms_ could swear that he saw
_Admiral_ printed, on the back of the label of a hairy trunk, which had
only B. U. on the front of it. And so he did, to a certain extent; for
mother had taken an advertising card beginning with _Admirable_, and
cut it across, and put father's initials on the other side.
"They may call me what they like," my father said, when tired of
contradiction, "so long as they don't charge me for it. _Admiral_ Upmore
serves my turn, uncommonly well, for two things. Billy Barlow would lock
his gate, if he knew that I am only Boiler Upmore; and I am finding out
some fine things there. And again, if any lawyer comes sneaking after my
heels, with that chummy's process, he'll find his mistake in the
visitor's list. But, Tommy, you'll catch it, if you let out a word of
this in Maiden Lane. Why, I never should hear the last of it!"
And so the whole three of us went to church; and the sailors sitting on
the tombstones--most of which were like chests of drawers, but without
any handles to the names below--touched their hats to the Admiral's
lady, and the gallant Admiral himself, and the smart little chap, who
had been for a fly, like the cherub aloft, who smiles luck to poor Jack.
It was one of dear mother's proudest moments--for the men at our works
would never touch their hats, unless they had been tipped a shilling
quite lately--and she bowed with her feathers (which had been a cock's)
throwing off quite a flash, and a rustle; until she was compelled to
look very grave, by the remark of an ancient tar, that he had never seen
so fine a woman.
But alas, how fate does ring her changes with articulate-speaking
mortals--the triumph of the chime, the hesitation of the back-stroke,
and the toll of disappointment! Ere ever the bells in the tower had
ceased, and the organ taken up the tale, dear mother was a
pensive-hearted female, and her feathers out of plume. For in coming up
the aisle, she had whispered to the buxom pew-opener; "Lady
Towers-Twentifold has been seeking to make my acquaintance. Can we sit
anywhere near her pew?"
"Certainly, ma'am;" said Mrs. Button, turning the handle of a large
enclosure; "the Admiral, and yourself, can have her ladyship's pew, this
morning, and this evening too, if you come again. Her ladyship has
fifteen pews, in the fifteen parishes she owns, and she takes them all
in turn; and it won't be our turn, for ten Sundays yet."