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TALES FROM "BLACKWOOD"
Contents of this Volume
_My Friend the Dutchman. By Frederick Hardman, Esq._
_My College Friends. No. II. Horace Leicester._
_The Emerald Studs. By Professor Aytoun._
_My College Friends. No. III. Mr W. Wellington Hurst._
_Christine: a Dutch Story. By Frederick Hardman, Esq._
_The Man in the Bell._
WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
TALES FROM "BLACKWOOD."
MY FRIEND THE DUTCHMAN.
BY FREDERICK HARDMAN.
[_MAGA._ OCTOBER 1847.]
"And you will positively marry her, if she will have you?"
"Not a doubt of either. Before this day fortnight she shall be Madame
Van Haubitz."
"You will make her your wife without acquainting her with your true
position?"
"Indeed will I. My very position requires it. There's no room for a
scruple. She expects to live on my fortune; thinks to make a great catch
of the rich Dutchman. Instead of that I shall spend her salary. The old
story; going out for wool and returning shorn."
The conversation of which this is the concluding fragment, occurred in
the public room of the Hotel de Hesse, in the village of Homburg on the
Hill--then an insignificant handful of houses, officiating as capital
of the important landgravate of Hesse-Homburg. The table-d'hôte had been
over some time; the guests had departed to repose in their apartments
until the hour of evening promenade should summon them to the excellent
band of music, provided by the calculating liberality of the
gaming-house keepers, and to loiter round the _brunnen_ of more or less
nauseous flavour, the pretext of resort to this rendezvous of idlers and
gamblers. The waiters had disappeared to batten on the broken meats from
the public table, and to doze away the time till the approach of supper
renewed their activity. My interlocutor, with whom I was alone in the
deserted apartment, was a man of about thirty years of age, whose dark
hair and mustaches, marked features, spare person, and complexion
bronzed by a tropical sun, entitled him to pass for a native of southern
Europe, or even of some more ardent clime. Nevertheless he answered to
the very Dutch patronymic of Van Haubitz, and was a native of Holland,
in whose principal city his father was a banker of considerable wealth
and financial influence.
It was towards the close of a glorious August, and for two months I had
been wandering in Rhine-land. Not after the fashion of deluded Cockneys,
who fancy they have seen the Rhine when they have careered from Cologne
to Mannheim astride of a steam-engine, gaping at objects passed as soon
as perceived; drinking and paying for indifferent vinegar as
Steinberger-Cabinet, eating vile dinners on the decks of steamers, and
excellent ones in the capital hotels which British cash and patronage
have raised upon the banks of the most renowned of German streams. On
the contrary, I had early dispensed with the aid of steam, to wander on
foot, with the occasional assistance of a lazy country diligence or
rickety _einspänner_, through the many beautiful districts that lie upon
either bank of the river; pedestrianising in Rhenish Bavaria, losing
myself in the Odenwald, and pausing, when occasion offered, to pick a
trout out of the numerous streamlets that dash and meander through dell
and ravine, on their way to swell the waters of old Father Rhine. At
last, weary of solitude--scarcely broken by an occasional gossip with a
heavy German boor, village priest, or strolling student--I thirsted
after the haunts of civilisation, and found myself, within a day of the
appearance of the symptom, installed in a luxurious hotel in the free
city of Frankfort on the Maine. But Frankfort at that season is
deserted, save by passing tourists, who escape as fast as possible from
its lifeless streets and sun-baked pavements; so, after glancing over an
English newspaper at the Casino, taking one stroll in the beautiful
garden surrounding the city, and another through the Jew-quarter--always
interesting and curious, although anything but savoury at that warm
season--I gathered together my baggage and was off to Homburg. There I
could not complain of solitude, of deserted streets and shuttered
windows. It seemed impossible that the multitude of gaily dressed belles
and cavaliers, English, French, German, and Russ, who, from six in the
morning until sunset, lounged and flirted on the walks, watered
themselves at the fountains, and perilled their complexions in the
golden sunbeams, could ever bestow themselves in the two or three
middling hotels and few score shabby lodging-houses composing the town
of Homburg. Manage it they did, however; crept into their narrow cells
at night, to emerge next morning, like butterflies from the chrysalis,
gay, bright, and brilliant, and to recommence the never-varying but
pleasant round of eating, sauntering, love-making, and gambling. Homburg
was not then what it has since become. That great house of cards, the
new Cursaal, had not yet arisen; and its table-d'hôte, reading-room, and
profane mysteries of roulette and rouge-et-noir, found temporary
domicile in a narrow, disreputable-looking den in the main street, where
accommodation of all kinds, but especially for dinner, was scanty in the
extreme. The public tables at the hotels were consequently thronged, and
there acquaintances were soon made. The day of my arrival at Homburg I
was seated next to Van Haubitz; his manner was off-hand and frank; we
entered into conversation, took our after-dinner cigar and evening
stroll together, and by bed-time had knocked up that sort of intimacy
easily contracted at a watering-place, which lasts one's time of
residence, and is extinguished and forgotten on departure. Van Haubitz,
like many Continentals and very few Englishmen, was one of those
free-and-easy communicative persons who are as familiar after twelve
hours' acquaintance as if they had known you twelve years, and who do
not hesitate to confide to a three days' acquaintance the history of
their lives, their pursuits, position, and prospects. I was soon made
acquainted, to a very considerable extent, at least, with those of my
friend Van Haubitz, late lieutenant of artillery in the service of his
majesty the King of Holland. He was the youngest of four sons, and
having shown, at a very early age, a wild and intractable disposition
and precocious addiction to dissipation, his father pronounced him
unsuited to business, and decided on placing him in the army. To this
the _Junker_ (he claimed nobility, and displayed above his arms a
species of coronet, bearing considerable resemblance to a fragment of
chevaux-de-frise, which he might have been puzzled to prop with a
parchment) had no particular objection, and might have made a good
enough officer, but for his reckless, spendthrift manner of life, which
entailed negligence of duty and frequent reprimands. Extravagant beyond
measure, unable to deny himself any gratification, squandering money as
though millions were at his command, he was constantly overwhelmed with
debts and a martyr to duns. At last his father, after thrice clearing
him with his creditors, consented to do so a fourth time only on
condition of his getting transferred to a regiment stationed in the
Dutch East Indies, and remaining there until his return had the paternal
sanction. To avoid a prison, and perhaps not altogether sorry to leave a
country where his cash and credit were alike exhausted, he embarked for
Batavia. But any pleasant day-dreams he may have cherished of tropical
luxuries, of the indulgence of a _farniente_ life in a grass hammock,
gently balanced by Javan houris beneath banana shades, of spice-laden
breezes and cool sherbets, and other attributes of a Mohammedan
paradise, were speedily dissipated by the odious realities of filth and
vermin, marsh-fever and mosquitoes. He wrote to his father, describing
the horrors of the place, and begging to be released from his pledge and
allowed to return to Holland. His obdurate progenitor replied by a
letter of reproach, and swore that if he left Batavia he might live on
his pay, and never expect a stiver from the paternal strong-box, either
as gift or bequest. To live upon his pay would have been no easy matter,
even for a more prudent person than Van Haubitz. He grumbled
immoderately, swore like a pagan, but remained where he was. A year
passed and he could hold out no longer. Disregarding the paternal
displeasure, and reckless of consequences, he applied to the chief
military authority of the colony for leave of absence. He was asked his
plea, and alleged ill health. The general thought he looked pretty well,
and requested the sight of a medical certificate of his invalid state.
Van Haubitz assumed a doleful countenance and betook him to the
surgeons. They agreed with the general that his aspect was healthy:
asked for symptoms; could discover none more alarming than regularity of
pulse, sleep, appetite, and digestion, laughed in his face and refused
the certificate. The sickly gunner, who had the constitution of a
rhinoceros, and had never had a day's illness since he got over the
measles at the age of four years, waited a little, and tried the second
"dodge," usually resorted to in such cases. "Urgent private affairs"
were now the pretext. The general expressed his regret that urgent
public affairs rendered it impossible for him to dispense with the
valuable services of Lieutenant Van Haubitz. Whereupon Lieutenant Van
Haubitz passed half an hour in heaping maledictions on the head of his
disobliging commander, and then sat down and wrote an application for an
exchange to the authorities in Holland. The reply was equally
unsatisfactory, the fact being that Haubitz senior, like an implacable
old savage as he was, had made interest at the war-office for the
refusal of all such requests on the part of his scapegrace offspring.
Haubitz junior took patience for another year, and then, in a moment of
extreme disgust and ennui, threw up his commission and returned to
Europe, trusting, he told me, that after five years' absence, the
governor's bowels would yearn towards his youngest-born. In this he was
entirely mistaken; he greatly underrated the toughness of paternal
viscera. Far from killing the fatted calf on the prodigal's return, the
incensed old Hollander refused him the smallest cutlet, and, shutting
the door in his face, consigned him, with more energy than affection, to
the custody of the evil one. Van Haubitz found himself in an awkward
fix. Credit was dead, none of his relatives would notice or assist him;
his whole fortune consisted of a dozen gold Wilhelms. At this critical
moment an eccentric maiden aunt, to whom, a year or two previously, he
had sent a propitiatory offering of a ring-tailed monkey and a leash of
pea-green parrots, and who had never condescended to acknowledge the
present, departed this life, bequeathing him ten thousand florins as a
return for the addition to her menagerie. A man of common prudence, and
who had seen himself so near destitution, would have endeavoured to
employ this sum, moderate as it was, in some trade or business, or, at
any rate, would have lived sparingly till he found other resources. But
Haubitz had not yet sown all his wild-oats; he had a soul above barter,
a glorious disregard of the future, the present being provided for. He
left Holland, shaking the dust from his boots, dashed across Belgium,
and was soon plunged in the gaieties of a Paris carnival. Breakfasts at
the Rocher, dinners at the Café, balls at the opera, and the concomitant
_petits soupers_ and écarté parties with the fair denizens of the
Quartier Lorette, soon operated a prodigious chasm in the monkey-money,
as Van Haubitz irreverently styled his venerable aunt's bequest. Spring
having arrived, he beat a retreat from Paris, and established himself at
Homburg, where he was quietly completing the consumption of the ten
thousand florins, at rather a slower pace than he would have done at
that headquarters of pleasant iniquity, the capital of France. From
hints he let fall, I suspected a short time would suffice to see the
last of the legacy. On this head, however, he had been less confidential
than on most other matters, and certainly his manner of living would
have led no one to suppose he was low in the locker. Nothing was too
good for him; he drank the best of wines, got up parties and pic-nics
for the ladies, and had a special addiction to the purchase of costly
trinkets, which he generally gave away before they had been a day in his
possession. He did not gamble; he had done so, he told me, once since
he was at Homburg, and had won, but he had no faith in his luck, or
taste for that kind of excitement, and should play no more. He was
playing another game just now, which apparently interested him greatly.
A few days before myself, a young actress, who, within a very short
time, had acquired considerable celebrity, had arrived at Homburg,
escorted by her mother. Fraülein Emilie Sendel was a lively lady of
four-and-twenty or thereabouts, possessing a smart figure and pretty
face, the latter somewhat wanting in refinement. Her blue eyes, although
rather too prominent, had a merry sparkle; her cheeks had not yet been
entirely despoiled by envious rouge of their natural healthful tinge;
her hair, of that peculiar tint of red auburn which the French call a
_blonde hasardé_, was more remarkable for abundance and flexibility than
for fineness of texture. As regarded her qualities and accomplishments,
she was good-humoured and tolerably unaffected, but wilful and
capricious as a spoiled child; she spoke her own language pretty well,
with an occasional slight vulgarism or bit of greenroom slang; had a
smattering of French, and played the piano sufficiently to accompany the
ballads and vaudeville airs which she sang with spirit and considerable
freedom of style. I had met German actresses who were far more lady-like
off the stage, but there was nothing glaringly or repulsively vulgar
about Emilie, and as a neighbour at a public dinner-table, she was
amusing and quite above par. As if to vindicate her nationality, she
would occasionally look sentimental; but the mood sat ill upon her, and
never lasted long: comedy was evidently her natural line. Against her
reputation, rumour, always an inquisitive censor, often a mean libeller,
of ladies of her profession, had as yet, so far as I could learn, found
nothing to allege. Her mother, a dingy old dowager, with bad teeth,
dowdy gowns, a profusion of artificial flowers, and a strong addiction
to tea and knitting, perfectly understood the duties of duennaship, and
did propriety by her daughter's side at dinner-table and promenade. To
the heart of the daughter, Van Haubitz, almost from the first hour he
had seen her, had laid persevering and determined siege.
During our after-dinner tête-à-tête on the day now referred to, my
friend the gunner had shown himself exceedingly unreserved, and, without
any attempt on my part to draw him out, he had elucidated, with a
frankness that must have satisfied the most inquisitive, whatever small
points of his recent history and present position he had previously left
in obscurity. The conversation began, so soon as the cloth was removed
and the guests had departed, by a jesting allusion on my part to his
flirtation with the actress, and to her gracious reception of his
attentions.
"It is no mere flirtation," said Van, gravely. "My intentions are
serious. You may depend Mademoiselle Sendel understands them as such."
"Serious! you don't mean that you want to marry her?"
"Unquestionably I do. It is my only chance."
"Your only chance!" I repeated, considerably puzzled. "Are you about to
turn actor, and do you trust to her for instruction in histrionics?"
"Not exactly. I will explain. La Sendel, you must know, has just
terminated her last engagement, which was at a salary of ten thousand
florins. She has already received and accepted an offer of a new one, at
fifteen thousand, from the Vienna theatre. Vienna is a very pleasant
place. Fifteen thousand florins are thirty-two thousand francs, or
twelve hundred of your English pounds sterling. Upon that sum two
persons can live excellently well--in Germany at least."
Unable to contradict any of these assertions, I held my tongue. The
Dutchman resumed.
"You know the history of my past life; I will tell you my present
position. It is critical enough, but I shall improve it, for here," and
he touched his forehead, "is what never fails me. This letter," (he
produced an epistle of mercantile aspect, bearing the Amsterdam
post-mark), "I received last week from my eldest brother. The shabby
_schelm_ declares he will reply to no more of mine, that his efforts to
arrange matters with my father have been fruitless, and that the old
gentleman has strictly forbidden him and his brothers to hold any
communication with me, a command they seem willing enough to obey. So
much for that. And now for the finances."
He took out his pocket-book, opened and shook it--a flimsy crumpled bit
of paper fell out. It was a note of the bank of France, for one thousand
francs.
"My last," said he. "That gone, I am a beggar. But it won't come to
that, either, thanks to Fraülein Emilie."
"Surely," said I, "you are too reckless of money, too extravagant and
unreflecting. Six months ago, you told me you had twenty such notes."
"Ay, twenty-two exactly, at the end of January, when I left Amsterdam.
But whither was I bound? To Paris; and who can economise there? I've had
my money's worth, and could have had no more, had I dribbled the dirty
ten thousand florins over three years, instead of three months. I take
great credit for making it last so long. Such suppers, and balls, and
orgies, with the pleasantest fellows and prettiest actresses in Paris.
But the louis-d'or roll rapidly in that sort of society. One must be a
Russian prince, or a French _feuilletoniste_, to keep it up. I never
flinched at anything so long as the money lasted. Then, when I found
myself reduced to the last note, I got into the Frankfort mail, and
came to rusticate at this rural roulette-table. My next change will be
to conjugation and Vienna."
"But if you had only a thousand francs on leaving Paris, and have got
them still, how have you lived since?"
"You don't suppose these are the same? There are not many ways of
getting through money here unless one gambles, which I do not; but coin
has somehow or other a peculiar aptitude to slip through my fingers, and
the thousand francs soon evaporated. Meanwhile, I had written dozens of
letters to my brothers, who seldom answered, and to my father, who never
did. I promised reform and a respectable life, if they would either get
me a snug place with little to do and good pay, or make me a reasonable
yearly allowance, something better than the paltry three thousand
florins they doled out to me when I was in the artillery, and on which,
as I could not live, I was obliged to get in debt. They paid no
attention to my request, reasonable as it was. The best offer they made
me was five francs a-day, paid weekly, to live in a Silesian village.
This was adding insult to injury, and I left off writing to them. A few
days afterwards, taking out my purse to pay for cigars, a dollar dropped
out. It was my last. I paid it away, walked home, lay down upon my bed,
smoked and reflected. My position was gloomy enough, and the more I
looked at it, the blacker it seemed. From my undutiful relatives there
was no hope; the abominable Silesian project was evidently their
ultimatum. I had no friend to turn to, no resource left. I might
certainly have obtained the mere necessaries of life at this hotel,
where my credit was excellent, and have vegetated for a month or two, as
a man must vegetate, without ready money. But I had no fancy for such an
expedient, a mere protraction of the agony. I lay ruminating for two
hours, two such hours as I should be sorry to pass again, and then my
mind was made up. I had a brace of small travelling-pistols amongst my
baggage; these I loaded and put in my pocket; and then, leaving the
hotel and the town, I struck across the country for some distance and
plunged into a wood. There I sat down upon a grass bank, my back against
an old beech. It was evening, and the solitary little glade before me
was striped with the last sunbeams darting between the tree-trunks. I
have difficulty in defining my sensations at that moment. I was quite
resolved, did not waver an instant in my purpose, but my head was dizzy,
and I had a sickly sensation about the heart. Determined that the
physical shrinking from death should not have time to weaken my moral
determination, I hastily opened my waistcoat, felt for the pulsations of
my heart, placed the muzzle of a pistol where they were strongest,
steadying it on that spot with my left hand. Then I looked straight
before me and pulled the trigger. There was the click of the lock, but
no report; the cap was bad, and had been crushed without exploding. That
was a horrible moment. I snatched up another pistol, which lay cocked to
my hand, and thrust the muzzle into my mouth. As before, the sharp noise
of the hammer upon the nipple was the sole result. The caps had been
some time in my possession, and had become worthless through age or
damp."
I looked at Van Haubitz, doubtful whether he was not hoaxing me. But
hitherto I had observed in him no addiction to the Munchausen vein, and
now his countenance and voice were serious: there was a slight flush on
his cheek, and he was evidently excited at the recollection of his
abortive attempt at suicide,--perhaps a little ashamed of it. I was
convinced he told the truth.
"I do not know," he continued, "whether, had I had surer weapons with
me, I should have had courage to make a third attempt upon my life.
Honestly, I think not; the self-preservative instinct was rapidly
gaining strength. I walked slowly back to the town, my brain still
confused from the agitating moments I had passed. I was unable quite to
collect my thoughts, and felt as if I had just awakened from a long
heavy sleep. It was now dark; lights streamed from the open windows of
the gambling-rooms; the voices of the croupiers, the stir and hum of
the players and jingling of money were distinctly heard in the street
without. I have already told you I am no gambler, not from scruple, but
choice. Nevertheless, I used often to stroll up to the Cursaal for an
hour of an evening, when the play was at the highest, to look on and
chat with chance acquaintances. Mechanically, I now ascended the stairs.
On the landing-place, I found myself face to face with a man with whom I
was slightly intimate, and who, a few evenings before, had borrowed
forty francs of me. I had not seen him since, and he now returned me the
piece of gold. 'Try your luck with it,' said he; 'there is a run against
the bank to-night, everybody wins, and M. Blanc looks blue.' And he
pointed to one of the proprietors of the tables, who, however, wore a
tolerably tranquil air, knowing well that what was carried away one
night, would come back with compound interest the next. The play was
heavy at the rouge-et-noir table; a Russian and two Frenchmen--the
latter of whom, judging from their appearance, and from the complicated
array of calculations on the table before them, were professional
gamblers--extracted, at nearly every _coup_, notes or rouleaus of gold
from the grated boxes in front of the bankers. I drank a glass of water,
for my lips were dry and hot, and, placing myself as near the table as
the crowd of players and spectators permitted, watched the game. My
hand was in my pocket, the forty-franc piece still between its fingers.
But in spite of the advice of him who had paid it me, I felt no
disposition to risk the coin; not that I feared to lose it, for as my
only one it was useless, but because, as I tell you, I never had the
slightest love of gambling or expectation to win.
"A pause occurred in the game. The cards had run out, and the bankers
were subjecting them to those complicated and ostentatious shufflings
intended to convince the players of the fairness of their dealings.
During this operation the previous silence was exchanged for eager
gossip. The game, it appeared, had come out that night in a peculiar
manner, very favourable to those who had had the address and nerve to
avail themselves of it. There had been alternate long runs upon red and
black.
"'_Mille noms de Dieu!_' exclaimed a hoarse cracked voice just below me.
'What a series of black! Twenty-two, and only three red! And to be
unable to take advantage of it!'
"I looked down, and recognised the grey mustache, wrinkled features, and
snuffy black coat with a ribbon of the Legion of Honour, of an old
French colonel whom you may have seen limping in and out of the Cursaal,
and who ranks amongst the antiquities of Homburg. He served under
Napoleon, was shelved at the peace, and has lived since then on a
moderate annuity, of which one-fifth procures him the barest
necessaries of existence, whilst the other four parts are annually
absorbed in the vortex of rouge-et-noir. When gambling-houses were legal
at Paris, _le colonel rapé_, the threadbare colonel, as he was called,
was one of the most punctual attendants at Frascati's and the Palais
Royal. When they were abolished, he commenced a wandering existence
amongst the German baths, and finally settled down at Homburg, giving it
the preference, as the only place where he could follow his darling
pursuit alike in winter and in summer. From the opening to the close of
the play he is seen seated at the table, a number of cards, ruled in red
and black columns, on the green cloth before him, in which he pricks
with pins the progress of the game. That evening he had been
unfortunate, and had emptied his pocket, but nevertheless continued
puncturing cards with laudable perseverance, of course discovering, like
every penniless gambler, that, had he money to stake, he should
infallibly make a fortune; predicting what colour would come out, and
indulging, when he proved a true prophet, in a little subdued blasphemy
because he was unable to profit by his acuteness.
"'Extraordinary run! to be sure,' repeated the veteran dicer.
'Twenty-two black, and only three red! There'll be a series of red now;
I feel there will, and when I don't play myself, I'm always right. I bet
this deal begins with seven red. Who bets a hundred francs to fifty it
does not?'
"Nobody accepted this sporting offer, or placed upon the colour which
the colonel's prophetic soul foresaw was to come out. The cards were now
shuffled and cut for dealing. The hell relapsed into silence.
"'_Faites le jeu, Messieurs!_' was repeated in the harsh business-like
tones of the presiding demon.
"'Red wins,' croaked the colonel. 'Seven times at the least.'
"Nearly all the players backed the black. By an idle impulse I threw
down my forty francs, my entire fortune, upon the red. The old soldier
looked round to see the judicious individual who followed his advice,
smiled grimly, and nodded approvingly. The next moment red won. I let
the money lie, and walked into the next room. Eighty francs were of no
more use to me than forty, and I felt very sure that another turn of the
card would carry off both stake and winnings. I took up a newspaper, but
soon threw it down again, for my head was not clear enough to read, and
I felt exhausted with the emotions of the day. I was about to leave the
house when I heard a loud buzz in the card-room, and the next instant
somebody clutched my arm. It was the French colonel, in a state of
furious excitement; grinning, panting, perspiring, and stuttering with
eagerness.
"'Seven reds!' was all he could say. 'Seven reds, Monsieur. Take up your
money.'
"I hastened to the table. By a strange caprice of fortune, the colonel's
prophecy had come true. Red had won seven times, and my forty francs had
become five thousand. I took up my winnings, the colonel looking on with
a triumphant smile. This was suddenly exchanged for a portentous frown
and fierce twist of the grey mustache.
"'_Mille millions de tonnerres!_ Not a dollar left to follow up that
splendid run!' And with a furious gesture, he upset his chair, and
dashed his cards upon the ground.
"I took the hint, whether intended or not. I could not do less in return
for the five thousand francs the old gentleman had put in my pocket.
"'If Monsieur,' I said, 'will allow me the pleasure of lending him--'
"'_Impossible, Monsieur!_' interrupted the colonel, looking as stern as
if about to charge single-handed a whole pulk of Cossacks. But I knew my
man. He was the type of a class of which I have seen many.
"'_Cependant, Monsieur, entre militaires_, between brother-soldiers--'
"'_Ah! Monsieur est militaire!_' exclaimed the old gentleman, his
alarming contraction of brow and rigidity of feature instantaneously
dissolving into a smile of extreme benignity. 'That alters the case.
Certainly, between brothers in arms those little services may be
offered and accepted. Although, really, it is encroaching on Monsieur's
complaisance ... at the same time ... a hundred francs ... till
to-morrow ... quarters at some distance ... &c. &c.,' which ended in his
picking up his chair, cards, and pin, and applying all his faculties to
break the bank with ten _louis_ which I lent him, and which I need
hardly say I have not seen from that day to this.
"Such a sudden stroke of good fortune would have made gamblers of nine
men out of ten, but I decidedly want the organ of gaming, for I have
never played since. My narrow escape from suicide had made some
impression on me, and now that I had five thousand francs in my pocket,
I looked back at the attempt as an exceedingly foolish proceeding. For a
month or more, I lived with what even you would admit to be great
economy, writing frequent letters to Amsterdam, and trying to come to
terms and an arrangement with my family. All in vain. They had no
confidence in my promises, proposed nothing I could accept, talked of
Silesian exile--roots and water in the wilderness--and the like
absurdities, until I plainly saw they were determined to cast me off,
and that if I was to be helped at all, it must be by myself. How to do
this was the puzzle. There are few things I can do, that could in any
way be rendered profitable. I can ride a horse, lay a gun, and put a
battery through its exercise; but such accomplishments are sufficiently
common not to be paid at a very high rate; and besides, I had had enough
of garrison duty, even could I have got back my commission, which was
not likely. So I put soldiering out of the question; and yet, when I had
done so, I was puzzled to think of anything better. I had no fancy to
turn rook, and rove from place to place in search of pigeons--no
uncommon resource with younger brothers of an idle turn and exhausted
means. I had fallen in with a few birds of that breed, and had come to
the conclusion that, to save themselves work and trouble, they had
adopted by far the most laborious and painful of all professions. In the
midst of my doubts and uncertainties, the fair Sendel and her mother
made their appearance. The first sight of their names upon the hotel
book was a ray of light to me. Within an hour I made up my mind to
sacrifice my independence to my necessities, and become the virtuous and
domesticated spouse of the charming and well-paid Emilie. A hint and a
dollar to the waiter placed me next her at the table-d'hôte, and I
immediately opened my intrenchments, and began a siege in due form."
"Which you expect will soon terminate by the capitulation of the
garrison?"
"Undoubtedly. The result of the first day or two's operations was not
very satisfactory. I rattled away, and did the amiable to a furious
extent; but the divinity was shy, and the guardian of the temple (an
old gorgon whom I shall suppress before the honeymoon is out) looked
askance at me, and pulled her daughter by the sleeve whenever she seemed
disposed to listen. They evidently thought the rattle might belong to a
snake; did me the injustice to take me for an adventurer. On the third
day, however, the ice had melted. I soon found out the cause of the
thaw. The head-waiter, whom a little well-timed liberality had rendered
my devoted slave, informed me that Madame Sendel had been making minute
inquiries concerning me of the master of the hotel. The worthy man, who
adored me because I despised _vin ordinaire_ and looked only at the
sum-total of his bills, said that I was a son of Van Haubitz, the rich
banker of Amsterdam, which was perfectly true; adding, which was rather
less so, that I was a partner in the house, and a _millionaire_. The
effect of this information upon the speculative firm of Sendel _Mère et
Fille_, was perfectly electric. Medusa smoothed her horrid locks, and
came out at that day's dinner in cherry ribbons and fresh artificials.
Emilie was all smiles and suavity, laughed at my worst jokes, nearly
burst her stays by holding her breath to raise a blush at my soft
speeches, and returned from that evening's promenade talking about the
moon, and leaning tenderly on my arm."
"With such encouragement, I am surprised you did not propose at once."
"So hasty a measure--oh, most unsophisticated of Britons!" replied Van,
with a look of grave pity for my simplicity--"would have greatly
perilled the success of my scheme. Sendel Senior, having only the
innkeeper's report to rely on, would have had her ungenerous suspicions
re-awakened by my precipitation, and have instituted further inquiries;
have written, probably, to some friend in Holland, and learned that the
pretender to her daughter's hand, although unquestionably a son of the
wealthy banker Van Haubitz, is excluded beyond redemption from the good
graces of that respectable pillar of Dutch finance, who has further
announced his irrevocable determination to take not the slightest notice
of him in his testamentary dispositions. The excellent Herr
Bratenbengel, whose succulent dinner we are now digesting, and whose
very laudable _Rudesheimer_ stands before us, had unwittingly laid the
foundation of my success; it was for me to raise the superstructure. Now
it was that I rejoiced at my economy since the lucky hit at the
gaming-table. The greater part of my winnings still remained to me;
golden grain, which I profusely scattered, sure that it would yield rich
harvest. I had already made a favourable impression, and this I took
care to confirm by the liberal expenditure which you, in your ignorance,
have called extravagance; by treating money as if its abundance in my
coffers made it valueless in my eyes, and by delicate generosity in the
shape of presents to mother and daughter. The trap was too well set to
prove a failure; the birds are fairly snared, and to-night, when we take
our usual romantic stroll, I shall raise the fair Sendel to the seventh
heaven of happiness by asking her to become Madame Van Haubitz."
Although the tenor and tone of these confessions by no means tended to
elevate the Dutchman in my opinion, I could not but smile at the
coolness with which they were made, and at the skill of his manoeuvres.
There was some good about the scamp; he had his own code of honour, such
as it was, and from that he would not easily have been induced to
swerve. He would have scorned to do a dirty thing, to cheat at cards, or
leave a debt of honour unpaid; but would readily have got in debt to
tradesmen and money-lenders beyond all possibility of reimbursement. And
as regarded his present conspiracy against the celibacy and salary of
Mademoiselle Sendel, a senate of sages and logicians would have failed
to convince him of its impropriety. He looked upon it as a most
justifiable stratagem, a lawful spoiling of the spoiler, praiseworthy in
the sight of men, gods, and columns, and which he would perhaps have
boasted of to a considerable extent to many besides myself, had not
secresy been essential to the welfare of his combinations. I did not
feel myself bound to betray his plot, or to put the Sendel on her guard
against this snake amongst the roses. And whilst mentally resolving
rather to diminish than increase the intimacy which the confident and
confidential artilleryman had in great measure forced upon me, and which
I, through a sort of easy-going indolence of character, had perhaps
somewhat lightly accepted, I anticipated diversion in watching the
manoeuvres of the high contracting parties. I considered myself as a
spectator, called upon to witness an amusing comedy in real life, and
admitted behind the scenes by peculiar favour of an actor. I resolved to
watch the progress of the intrigue, and, if possible, to be present at
the _dénouement_.
"Are you quite certain," said I to Van, "that Mademoiselle Sendel's
pecuniary position and prospects are so very favourable? The sum you
mentioned is a large one for an actress who has been so short a time on
the stage. Public report, very apt to take liberties with the reputation
of theatrical ladies, often endeavours to compensate them by magnifying
their salaries."
Van, I may here mention, lest the reader should not have perceived it,
had a most inordinate opinion of his own abilities and acuteness. Like
certain Yankees, he "conceited" it was necessary to rise before the sun
to outwit him, and even then your chance was a poor one. He had been in
hot water all his life, never out of difficulties and scrapes--once, as
has been shown, kept from suicide by a mere accident and was now reduced
to the alternative of beggary or of marrying for a living. None of
these circumstances, which would have taken the conceit out of most men,
at all impaired his opinion of his talent and sharpness. Replying to my
observation merely by a slight shrug, and by a smile of pity for the man
who thus misappreciated his foresight, he again produced his
pocket-book, and extracted from its innermost recesses a fragment of a
German newspaper, reputed oracular in matters theatrical. This he handed
to me, tapping a particular paragraph significantly with his forefinger.
The paragraph was thus conceived:--
"THEATRICAL INTELLIGENCE.--That promising young actress, Fraülein Emilie
Sendel--whose first appearance, in the spring of last year, at once
established her in the foremost line of the dramatic genius of the
day--has concluded her twelve months' engagement at the _Hof Theater_ of
B----, where she doubtless considered, and not without reason, that her
talents and exertions were inadequately compensated by a salary of ten
thousand florins. The gay society of that capital will sensibly feel the
loss of the accomplished and fascinating comedian, who has accepted an
engagement at Vienna, on the more suitable terms of fifteen thousand
florins, with two months' _congé_, and other advantages. Before
proceeding to ravish the eyes and ears of the pleasure-loving population
of the _Kaiser-Stadt, la belle_ Sendel is off to the baths, under the
protecting wing of the watchful guardian who has presided at all her
theatrical triumphs."
"Clear enough, I think," said Van, when I raised my eyes from the
protracted periods of the penny-a-liner.
I had nothing to say against the lucidity of the paragraph, nor anything
to urge, at all likely to avail, against the prosecution of Van's
designs upon the lady's hand and fifteen thousand florins, with "two
months' _congé_ and other advantages." No possible sophistry, to which I
was equal, could prove the marriage to be against his interest; and as
to trying him on the tack of delicacy--"imposition on an unprotected
woman, degrading dependence on her exertions," and so forth--I knew the
thick skin and indomitable self-conceit of the gunner would repel such
feather-shafts without feeling them, or that the utmost effect I could
expect to produce would be to get into a quarrel with the redoubtable
native of the Netherlands, a predicament in which, as a man of peace, I
was by no means anxious to find myself. So after hazarding the fruitless
hint with which the reader was made acquainted at the commencement of
this narrative, I abstained from all further intermeddling, and retired
to my apartment, leaving Van Haubitz to con the declaration with which
he was that evening to rejoice the ears of the fair and too-confiding
Sendel.
I went to bed early that night, and saw nothing more of the Hollander
till the next morning, when I was roused from a balmy slumber at the
untimely hour of seven, by his bursting into my room with more
impetuosity than ceremony, with the gestures of a maniac and the mien of
a conqueror. Before my eyes were half open, he was more than half
through the history of his proceedings on the previous evening. His
success had been complete. Emilie had faltered, with downcast eyes, a
sweet assent. The friendly gloom of eve, and the over-arching foliage,
beneath whose shade the momentous question was put, saved her the
necessity of practising upon her lungs to produce a blush. Mamma Sendel
had bestowed her blessing upon the happy pair, and in the ardour of her
maternal accolades had nearly extinguished her future son-in-law's left
ogle with the wire stalk of an artificial passion-flower. The first
burst of benevolence over, and the effervescence of feeling a little
calmed, the bridegroom elect, who could not afford delays, pressed for
an early day. Thereupon Emilie was, of course, horror-stricken, but her
maternal relative, nothing loth to land the fish thus satisfactorily
hooked, and well aware of the impediments that sometimes arise between
cup and lip, ranged herself upon the side of the eager lover, and their
combined forces bore down all opposition. Madame Sendel at first showed
an evident hankering after a preliminary jaunt to Amsterdam and a gay
wedding, graced by the presence of the bridegroom's numerous and wealthy
family. She also testified some anxiety as to the view Van Haubitz
Senior might take of his son's matrimonial project, and as to how far he
might approve of a hasty and unceremonious wedding. But the gallant
artilleryman had an answer to everything. He pledged himself, which he
was perfectly safe in doing, that his father would not attempt in the
slightest degree to control his inclinations or interfere with his
projects, extolled the delights of an autumnal tour with his wife and
mother-in-law before returning to Holland; in short, was so plausible in
his arguments, so specious and pressing, pleaded so eloquently the
violence of his love and inutility of delay, and overruled objections
with such cogent reasoning, that he achieved a complete triumph, and it
was agreed that in one week Van Haubitz should lead his adored Emilie to
the hymeneal altar.
"There will be a small matter to arrange with respect to Emilie," said
Madame Sendel in her blandest tones, and with affectation of
embarrassment. "She has an engagement at the Vienna theatre, which must
of course now be broken off. There is a forfeit to pay, no very heavy
sum," added she----
"Not a word about that," interrupted Van, whose blood curdled in his
veins at the mere idea of cancelling the engagement on which his hopes
were built. "There is no hurry for a few days. Let me once call Emilie
mine, and I take charge of all those matters."
Emilie smiled angelically; Madame patted her considerate son-in-law on
the shoulder, and applied to her snuff-box to conceal her emotion; and
all matters of business being thus satisfactorily settled, the evening
closed in harmony and bliss.
"Are you for Frankfort to-day?" said Van Haubitz, when he had concluded
his exulting narrative, and without giving me time for congratulations,
which I should have been at a loss to offer. "I am off, after breakfast,
to get some diamond earrings and other small matters for my adorable. I
shall be glad of your taste and opinion."
"Diamonds!" I exclaimed. "Farewell, then, to the thousand franc note--"
"Pooh! Nonsense! You don't suppose I throw away my last cash that way.
The Frankfort jewellers know me well, or think they do, which is the
same thing. They have seen enough of my coin since I have been at
Homburg. For them, as for my excellent mother-in-law, I am the wealthy
partner in the undoubted good firm of Van Haubitz, Krummwinkel, & Co. I
never told them so; if they choose to imagine it I am not to blame. My
credit is good. The diamonds shall be paid for--if paid for they must
be--out of Madame Van Haubitz's first quarter's salary."
I was meditating an excuse for not accompanying my pertinacious and
unscrupulous acquaintance on his cruise against the Frankfort
Israelites, when he resumed--
"By the by," he said, "you will come to church with us. I have arranged
it all. Quite private, for reasons good. Nobody but yourself, Madame
Sendel, and Emilie. You shall act as father, and give away the bride."
The start I gave, at this alarming announcement, nearly broke the bed.
This was carrying things rather too far. Not satisfied with rendering
me, by his intrusive and unsolicited confidence, a sort of tacit
accomplice in his manoeuvres, this Dutch Gil Blas would fain make me an
active participator. I drew at sight on my imagination, quickened by the
peril, for a letter received the previous evening from a dear and near
relative who lay dangerously ill at Baden-Baden, and to whose sick-bed
it was absolutely necessary I should immediately repair; and, jumping
up, I began to dress in all haste, rang furiously for the bill and a
carriage, and requested Van Haubitz to present my excuses to the ladies,
my unexpected departure at that early hour depriving me of the pleasure
of taking leave of them. The Dutchman swore all manner of
_donderwetters_ and _sacraments_ that he was grieved at my departure,
trusted I should find my friend better, and be able to return to
Frankfort in time for the marriage, but did not press me to do so, and
in reality was too exhilarated by the success of his machinations to
care a straw about the matter. And saying he must go and write to
Amsterdam, he shook me by the hand and left the room, whistling in loud
and joyous key the burthen of a Dutch march. In less than an hour I was
on the road to Frankfort, and that evening I reached Heidelberg, where
some friends of mine had passed the summer. I expected to find them
still there, but they had left for Baden-Baden. Thither I pursued them,
and--as if it were a judgment on me for my white lie to the
Dutchman--arrived there the morrow of their departure. Baden was
thinning, and they had gone down stream: I must have passed them on the
Rhine. Having strong reasons to see them before they left Germany, I
followed upon their trail. But their movements were rapid and eccentric,
and after tracking them to one or two of the minor baths, the chase led
me back to Frankfort. Here I made sure to catch them, or resolved to
give up the hunt.
A week had been consumed in thus travelling to and fro. I had no great
fancy for returning to Frankfort, lest my friend the Dutchman should
still be there, and press his society upon me, of which, after his
recent revelations, I was anything but ambitious. Upon the whole,
however, I thought it likely he would have departed. I knew he would
accelerate his marriage as much as possible; I had been nine days
absent, which gave him ample time to get over the ceremony and leave the
neighbourhood. By way of precaution I resolved to keep pretty close in
my hotel during the period of my stay, which was not to exceed one or
two days.
On arriving at the "White Swan," I found my friends were staying there,
but had driven over to Homburg. Unwilling to follow them, and risk
meeting my bugbear, I awaited their return, which was to take place to a
late dinner. As usual, there was much bustle at the "Swan;" many goings
and comings, several carriages in the courtyard, others in the street
packing for departure, a throng of greedy _lohn-kutschers_, warm
waiters, and bearded couriers hanging about the door, and running up and
down stairs. I entered the public room. It was past noon, and the tables
were laid for dinner, but there were only two persons in the apartment,
a gentleman and a lady. They stood at a window, outside of which a
handsome Vienna-made berline, with a count's coronet on the panels, was
being got ready for a journey. As I walked up the room, the lady turned
her head, and I was instantly struck by her resemblance to Emilie
Sendel. So strong was it that I for a moment thought I had fallen in
with the very persons I wished to avoid. A second glance convinced me
of my error. The likeness was certainly startling, but there were many
points of difference. Age and stature were the same, so were the hair
and complexion, save that the former was less ruddy, the latter paler
than in the case of the buxom Emilie. And there were grace and
refinement about this person, far beyond any to which the Dutchman's
lady-love could pretend. The expression of the interesting features was
rather pensive than gay, and there was something classical in the arch
of the eyebrow and outline of the face. The lady was plainly but richly
attired in an elegant travelling-dress, and had her hand upon the arm of
a tall and very handsome man, about forty years of age, of singularly
aristocratic but somewhat dissipated appearance. They were talking as I
entered, and a sentence or two of their conversation reached my ear.
They spoke French, with a scarcely perceptible foreign accent.
Curious to know who these persons were, I returned to the court of the
hotel, intending to question a waiter. It was first necessary to catch
one, not easy at that busy time of day; and after several fruitless
efforts to detain the jacketed gentry, I gave up the attempt, and took
my station at the gateway. Scarcely had I done so, when a carriage drove
up at a rattling pace, a small spit of a boy in a smart green suit, and
with an ambiguous sort of coronet embroidered in silver on the front of
his cap, jumped off and opened the door, and there emerged from the
vehicle, to my infinite dismay, the inevitable Van Haubitz. Retreat was
impossible, for he saw me directly; and after handing out Madame Sendel
and her daughter, seized me vehemently by both hands.
"Delighted to see you!" he cried; "I wish you had been a day sooner. We
were married yesterday," he added in a hurried voice, drawing me aside.
"Have left Homburg, paid everything _there_, and leave this to-morrow
for Heaven knows where. Explanations must come first (here he made a
grimace), for my purse is low, and my mother-in-law makes projects that
would ruin Rothschild. Lucky you are here to back me. Come in."
I was fairly caught, and in a pretty dilemma. My first thought was to
knock down the Dutchman, and run for it, but reflection checked the
impulse. Stammering a confused congratulation to the bride and her
mother, and meditating an escape at all hazards, I allowed Madame Sendel
to hook herself on my arm, and lead me into the hotel in the wake of the
newly-wedded pair, who made at once for the public room. A magnificent
courier, in a Hungarian dress, with beard, belt, and hunting-knife,
strode past us into the apartment.
"_Herr Graf_," said the man, addressing the distinguished-looking
stranger who had attracted my attention, "the horses are ready."
The Count and his companion turned at the announcement, and found
themselves face to face with our party. There was a general start and
exclamation from the three women. The strange lady turned very pale and
visibly trembled; Madame Van Haubitz gave a slight scream; her mother
flushed as red as the poppies in her head-dress, and hung like a log
upon my arm, glaring angrily at the strangers. For one moment all stood
still; Van Haubitz and I looked at each other in bewilderment. He was
evidently struck by the extraordinary resemblance I had noticed, and
which became more manifest, now that the two ladies were seen together.
"Come, Ameline," said the Count, who alone preserved complete
self-possession. And he hurried his companion from the room. Madame
Sendel released my arm, and letting herself fall upon a chair with an
hysterical giggle, closed her eyes and seemed preparing for a
comfortable swoon. Her daughter hastened to her assistance and untied
her bonnet; Van Haubitz grasped a decanter of water and made an alarming
demonstration of emptying it upon the full-moon countenance of his
respectable mother-in-law. I was curious to see him do it, for I had
always had my doubts whether the dowager's colours were what is
technically termed "fast." My curiosity was not gratified. Whether from
apprehension of the remedy or from some other cause, I cannot say, but
Madame Sendel abandoned her faint, and after two or three grotesque
contortions of countenance, and a certain amount of winking and
blinking, was sufficiently recovered to take a huge pinch of snuff, and
ascend the stairs to a private room, with her daughter and son-in-law
for supporters, and half-a-score waiters and chambermaids, whom her
hysterical symptoms had assembled, by way of a tail. Seeing her so well
guarded, I thought it unnecessary to add to the escort. As she left the
room, there was a clatter of hoofs outside, and looking through the
window, I saw the coroneted berline whirled rapidly away by four
vigorous posters. Just then the dinner-bell rang, and the obsequious
head-waiter, who with profound bows had assisted at the departure of the
travellers, bustled into the room.
"Who is the gentleman who has just left?" I inquired.
"His Excellency, Count J----," replied the man. It was the name of a
Hungarian nobleman of great wealth, and of reputation almost European as
one of the most fashionable and successful Lotharios of the dissipated
Austrian capital.
"And his companion?"
"The celebrated actress, Fraülein Sendel."
Had the cunning but unlucky Van Haubitz been a regular reader of the
_Theater Zeitung_, or Journal of the Theatres, he would have seen, in
the ensuing number to that whence he derived his information respecting
Mademoiselle Sendel's confirmed popularity and advantageous engagement,
the following short but important paragraph:
"ERRATUM.--In our yesterday's impression an error occurred, arising
from a similarity of names. It is Fraülein _Ameline_ Sendel who has
concluded with the Vienna theatre an engagement equally
advantageous to herself and the manager. Her elder sister, Fraülein
_Emilie_, continues the engagement she has already held for two
seasons, as a supernumerary _soubrette_. The amount stated
yesterday as her salary would still be correct, with the
abstraction of a zero. Talent does not always run in families."
This good-natured paragraph, evidently from the pen of a sulky
sub-editor, smarting under a lashing for his blunder of the preceding
day, did not come to my knowledge till some time afterwards, so that
the waiter's reply to my question concerning Count J----'s
travelling-companion perplexed me greatly, and plunged me into an ocean
of conjectures. In fact, my curiosity was so strongly roused, that
instead of availing myself of the absence of the Dutchman to escape from
the hotel, I sat down to dinner, resolved not to depart till I heard the
mystery explained. I had not long to wait. Dinner was just over, when I
received a message from Van Haubitz, who earnestly desired to see me. I
found him alone, seated at a table, his chin resting on his hand, anger,
shame, and mortification stamped upon his inflamed countenance. A
tumbler half full of water stood upon the table, beside a bottle of
smelling salts; and, upon entering, I was pretty sure I heard a sound of
sobbing from an inner room, which ceased, however, when I spoke. There
had evidently been a violent scene. Its cause was explained to me by Van
Haubitz, at first in rather a confused manner, for at each attempt to
detail the circumstances he interrupted himself by bursts of fury. Owing
to this, it was some time before I could arrive at a clear understanding
of the facts of the case. When I did, I could scarcely help feeling
sorry for the unfortunate schemer, although in truth he richly deserved
the disappointment he had met. Never was there a more glaring instance
of excess of cunning overreaching itself,--for no deception had been
practised by Madame Sendel and her daughter. They doubtless gave
themselves credit for some cleverness and more good fortune in enticing
a rich banker, with more ducats than brains, into their matrimonial
nets; and doubtless Fraülein Emilie put on her best looks and gowns, her
sweetest smiles and most becoming bonnets, to lure the lion into the
toils. But neither mother nor daughter had for a moment imagined that
Van Haubitz took the latter for the celebrated and successful actress
whose name was known throughout Germany, whilst that of poor Emilie,
whose talents were of the most humble order, had scarcely ever
penetrated beyond the wings and greenroom of the theatre, where she
enacted unimportant characters for the modest remuneration of a hundred
florins a month. By no means proud of her position as an actress, which
appeared the more lowly when contrasted with her sister's brilliant
success, Emilie had seldom referred to things theatrical since her
acquaintance with Van Haubitz. On his part, the Dutchman, conscious of
his real motives and anxious to conceal them, abstained from all direct
reference to Mademoiselle Sendel's great talents and their lucrative
results, contenting himself with general compliments, which passed
current without being closely scanned. If he had never heard either his
wife or mother-in-law make mention of Ameline, it was because they were
on the worst possible terms with that young lady, who had lived, nearly
from the period of her first appearance upon the boards, under the
protection of the accomplished libertine, Count J----, over whom she was
said to exercise extraordinary influence. When she formed this
connection, Madame Sendel--who, in spite of her paint and artificial
floriculture, had very strict notions of propriety--wrote her a letter
of furious reproach, renounced her as her daughter, and prohibited
Emilie from holding any communication with her. Emilie, against whose
virtue none had ever found aught to say, sorrowfully obeyed; and, after
two or three ineffectual attempts on the part of Ameline to soften her
mother's wrath, all communication ceased between them. Their next
meeting was that at which Van Haubitz and myself were present. Its
singularity, Madame Sendel's fainting fit, and the resemblance between
the sisters, brought on inquiries and an explanation; and the Dutchman
found, to his inexpressible disgust and consternation, that he had
encumbered himself with a wife he cared nothing for, and a mother-in-law
he detested, whose joint income was largely stated at one hundred and
fifty pounds sterling per annum. In his first paroxysm of rage he
taunted them with the mistake they had made when they thought to secure
the love-sick millionaire, proclaimed himself in debt, disinherited, and
a beggar; and, finally, by the violence of his reproaches, drove them
trembling and weeping from the room.
Van Haubitz had sent for me to implore my advice in his present
difficult position; but was so bewildered by passion, and overwhelmed by
this sudden awakening from his dream of success and prosperity, that he
was hardly in a condition to listen to reason. His regrets were so
selfish as to destroy the possibility of sympathy, and I should have
left him to his fate and his own devices, had I not thought that my so
doing would make matters worse for the poor girl who had thus
heedlessly linked herself to a fortune-hunter. So I remained; after a
while he became calmer, and we talked over plans for the future. By my
suggestion, Madame Sendel and her daughter were invited to the
conference. The old lady was sulky and frightened, and would hardly open
her lips; Emilie, on the other hand, made a more favourable impression
on me than she had ever previously done. I now saw, what I had not
before suspected, that she was really attached to Van Haubitz; hitherto,
I had taken her for a mere adventuress, speculating on his supposed
wealth. She spoke kindly and affectionately to him, smiled through the
tears brought to her eyes by his recent violence, and evidently trembled
each time her mother spoke, lest she should vent a reproach or refer to
his duplicity. She tried to speak confidently and cheerfully of the
future. They must go immediately to Vienna, she said; there she would
apply diligently to her profession; the manager had half promised her an
increase of salary after another year--she was sure she should deserve
it, and meanwhile Van Haubitz, with his abilities, could not fail to
find some lucrative employment. He must get rid of his accent, she added
with a smile (he spoke a voluble but most execrable jargon of mingled
Dutch and German), and then he might go upon the stage, where she was
certain he would succeed. This last suggestion was made timidly, as if
she feared to hurt the pride of the scapegrace by proposing such a
plan. There was not a word or an accent of reproach in all she said, and
I heartily forgave the little coquetry, affectation, and vulgarity I had
formerly remarked in her, in consideration of the intuitive delicacy and
good feeling she now displayed. Truly, thought I, it is humbling to us,
the bearded and baser moiety of humankind, to contrast our vile egotism
with the beautiful self-devotion of woman, as exhibited even in this
poor actress.
Madame Sendel by no means acquiesced in her daughter's project. The
flesh-pots of Amsterdam had attractions for her, far superior to those
of a struggling and uncertain existence at Vienna. She evidently leaned
upon the hope of a reconciliation between Van Haubitz and his father,
and hinted pretty plainly at the effect that might be produced by a
personal interview with the obdurate banker. I could see she was
arranging matters in her queer old noddle upon the approved theatrical
principle; the penitent son and fascinating daughter-in-law throwing
themselves at the feet of the melting father, who, with handkerchief to
eyes, bestows on them a blubbering benediction and ample subsidy. To my
surprise, Van Haubitz also seemed disposed to place hope in an appeal to
his father, perhaps as a drowning man clutches at a straw. He may have
thought that his marriage, imprudent as it was, would be taken as some
guarantee of future steadiness, or at least of abstinence from the
spendthrift courses which had hitherto destroyed all confidence in him.
He could hardly expect his union with a penniless actress to reinstate
him in his father's good graces; but he probably imagined he might
extract a small annuity, as a condition of living at a distance from the
friends he had disgraced. He asked me what I thought of the plan. I of
course did not dissuade him from its adoption, and upon the whole
thought it his best chance, for I really saw no other. After some
deliberation and discussion, he seemed nearly to have made up his mind,
when I was called away to my friends, who had returned from their
excursion.
I was getting into bed that night, when Van Haubitz knocked at my door,
and entered the room with a downcast and dejected air, very different
from his usual boisterous headlong manner.
"I am off to Holland," he said; "'tis my only chance, bad though it be."
"I sincerely wish you success," replied I. "In any case, do not despair;
something will turn up. You have friends in your own country, I have
heard you say. They will help you to occupation."
He shook his head.
"Good friends over a bottle and a dice-box," said he, "but useless at a
pinch like this. Pleasant fellows enough, but scamps like"--myself, he
was going to add, but did not. "I am come to say farewell," he
continued. "I must be off before daybreak. I have debts in Frankfort,
and if my departure gets wind, I shall have a dozen duns on my back.
Misfortunes never come alone. As for paying, it is out of the question.
Amongst us we have only about enough money to reach Amsterdam. Once
there--_à la grace de Dieu!_ but I confess my hopes are small. Thanks
for your advice--and for your sympathy too, for I saw this morning you
were sorry for me, though you did not think I deserved pity. Well,
perhaps not. God bless you."
He was leaving the room, but returned.
"I think you said you should stay at Coblenz before returning to
England."
"I shall probably be there a few days towards the end of the month."
"Good. If I succeed, you shall hear from me. What is your address
there?"
"_Poste restante_ will find me," I replied, not very covetous of the
correspondence, and unwilling to give a more exact direction.
Van Haubitz nodded and left me. At breakfast the next morning I learned
that the Dutch baron, as the waiter styled him, had taken his departure
at peep of day.
The first days of October found me still at Coblenz, lingering amongst
the valleys and vineyards, and loth to exchange them for the autumnal
fogs and emptiness of London. Thither, however, I was compelled to
return; and I endeavoured to console myself for the necessity by
discovering that the green Rhine grew brown, the trees scant of leaves,
the evenings long and chilly. I had heard nothing of Van Haubitz, and
had ceased to think of him, when, walking out at dusk on the eve of the
day fixed for my departure, I suddenly encountered him. He had just
arrived by a steamboat coming up stream; his wife and mother-in-law were
with him, and they were about to enter a fifth-rate inn, which, two
months previously, he would have felt insulted if solicited to
patronise. I was shocked by the change that had taken place in all three
of them. In five weeks they had grown five years older. Emilie had lost
her freshness, her eye its sparkle; and the melancholy smile with which
she welcomed me made my heart ache. Madame Sendel's rotund cheeks had
collapsed, she looked cross and jaundiced, and more snuffy than ever.
Van Haubitz was thin and haggard, his hair and mustaches, formerly
glossy and well-trimmed, were ragged and neglected, his dress, once so
smart and carefully arranged, was soiled and slovenly. My imagination
supplied a rapid and vivid sketch of the anxieties, and disappointments,
and heart-burnings, which, more than any actual bodily privations, had
worked so great a change in so short a time. Van Haubitz started on
seeing me, and faltered in his pace, as if unwilling to enter the
shabby hotel in my presence. The hesitation was momentary. "Worse
quarters than we used to meet in," said he, with a bitter smile. "I will
not ask you into this dog-hole. Wait an instant, and I will walk with
you."
Badly as I thought of Van Haubitz, and indisposed as I was to keep up
any acquaintance with him, I had not the heart, seeing him so miserable
and down in the world, to turn my back upon him at once. So I entered
the hotel, and waited in the public room. In a few minutes he reappeared
with the two ladies, and we all four strolled out in the direction of
the Rhine. I did not ask the Dutchman the result of his journey. It was
unnecessary. His disheartened air and general appearance told the tale
of disappointment, of humiliating petitions sternly rejected, of hopes
fled and a cheerless future. He kept silence the while we walked a
hundred yards, and then, having left his wife and mother-in-law out of
ear-shot, abruptly began the tale of his mishaps. As I conjectured, he
had totally failed in his attempt to mollify his father, who was furious
at his temerity in appearing before him, and whose rage redoubled when
he heard of his ill-omened marriage. Unfortunately for Van Haubitz, the
jeweller and some other tradesmen at Frankfort, so soon as they learned
his departure, had forwarded their accounts to the care of the
Amsterdam firm; and, although his father had not the remotest intention
of paying them, he was incensed in the extreme at the slur thus cast
upon his house and name. In short, the unlucky artilleryman at once saw
he had no chance of a single kreuzer, or of the slightest countenance
from his father. His applications to his brothers, and to one or two
more distant relatives, were equally unsuccessful. All were disgusted at
his irregularities, angry at his marriage, incredulous of his promises
of reform; and, after passing a miserable month in Amsterdam, he set out
to accompany his wife to Vienna, whither she was compelled to repair
under pain of fine and forfeiture of her engagement. Although living
with rigid economy--on bread and water, as Van Haubitz expressed
it--their finances had been utterly consumed by their stay in the Dutch
capital, and it was only by disposing of every trinket and superfluity
(and of necessaries too, I feared, when I remembered the slender baggage
that came up with them from the boat) that they had procured the means
of travelling, in the cheapest and most humble manner, and with the
disheartening certainty of arriving penniless at Vienna. Van Haubitz
told me all this, and many other details, with an air of gloomy
despondency. He was hopeless, heart-broken, desperate; and certain
circumstances of his position, which by some would have been held an
alleviation, aggravated it in his eyes. He said little of his wife;
but, from what escaped him, I easily gathered that she had shown
strength of mind, good feeling and affection for him, and was willing to
struggle by his side for a scanty and hard-earned subsistence. His cares
and irritable mood prevented his appreciating her attachment, and he
looked upon her as an encumbrance, without which he might again rise in
the world. He had always entertained a confident expectation of
enriching himself by marriage; and this hope, which had buoyed him up
under many difficulties, was now gone.
"I have one resource left," said Van Haubitz. "I have pondered over it
for the last two days, and have almost determined on its adoption."
"What is it?" I asked.
"If I decide upon it," he replied, "you shall shortly know. 'Tis a
desperate one enough."
We had insensibly slackened our pace, and at this moment the ladies came
up. Van Haubitz made a gesture, as of impatience at the interruption.
"Wait for me here," he said, and walked away. Without speculating upon
the motive of his absence, I stood still, and entered into conversation
with the ladies. We were on the quay. The night was mild and calm, but
overcast and exceedingly dark. A few feet below us rolled the dark mass
of the Rhine, slightly swollen by recent rains. A light from an
adjacent window illuminated the spot, and cast a flickering gleam across
the water. Unwilling to refer to their misfortunes, I spoke to Emilie on
some general topic. But Madame Sendel was too full of her troubles to
tolerate any conversation that did not immediately relate to them, and
she broke in with a long history of grievances, of the hard-heartedness
of the Amsterdam relations, the cruelty of Emilie's position, her
son-in-law's helplessness, and various other matters, in a querulous
tone, and with frightful volubility. The poor daughter, I plainly saw,
winced under this infliction. I was waiting the smallest opening to
interrupt the indiscreet old lady, and revert to common-place, when a
distant splash in the water reached my ears. The women also heard it,
and at the same instant a presentiment of evil came over us all. Madame
Sendel suddenly held her tongue and her breath; Emilie turned deadly
pale, and without saying a word, flew along the quay in the direction of
the sound. She had gone but a few yards when her strength failed her,
and she would have fallen, but for my support. There was a shout, and a
noise of men running. Leaving Madame Van Haubitz to the care of her
mother, I ran swiftly along the river side, and soon reached a place
where the deep water moaned and surged against the perpendicular quay.
Here several men were assembled, talking hurriedly and pointing to the
river. Others each moment arrived, and two boats were hastily shoved
off from an adjacent landing-place.
"A man in the river," was the reply to my hasty inquiry.
It was so dark that I could not distinguish countenances close to me,
and at a very few yards even the outline of objects was scarcely to be
discerned. There were no houses close at hand, and some minutes elapsed
before lights were procured. At last several boats put off, with men
standing in the bows, holding torches and lanterns high in the air.
Meanwhile I had questioned the bystanders, but could get little
information; none as to the person to whom the accident had happened.
The man who had given the alarm was returning from mooring his boat to a
neighbouring jetty, when he perceived a figure moving along the quay a
short distance in his front. The figure disappeared, a heavy splash
followed, and the boatman ran forward. He could see no one either on
shore or in the stream, but heard a sound as of one striking out and
struggling in the water. Having learned this much, I jumped into a boat
just then putting off, and bid the rowers pull down stream, keeping a
short distance from the quay. The current ran strong, and I doubted not
that the drowning man had been carried along by it. Two vigorous
oars-men pulled till the blades bent, and the boat, aided by the stream,
flew through the water. A third man held a torch. I strained my eyes
through the darkness. Presently a small object floated within a few feet
of the boat, which was rapidly passing it. It shone in the torchlight. I
struck at it with a boat-hook, and brought it on board. It was a man's
cap, covered with oilskin, and I remembered that Van Haubitz wore such a
one. Stripping off the cover, I beheld an officer's foraging cap, with a
grenade embroidered on its front. My doubts, slight before, were
entirely dissipated.
When the search, rendered almost hopeless by the extreme darkness and
power of the current, was at last abandoned, I hastened to the hotel,
and inquired for Madame Sendel. She came to me in a state of great
agitation. Van Haubitz had not returned, but she thought less of that
than of the state of her daughter, who, since recovering from a long
swoon, had been almost crazed with anxiety. She knew some one had been
drowned, and her mind misgave her it was her husband. The foraging-cap,
which Madame Sendel immediately recognised, removed all uncertainty. The
only hope remaining was, that Van Haubitz, although carried rapidly away
by the power of the current, had been able to maintain himself on the
surface, and had got ashore at some considerable distance down the
river, or had been picked up by a passing boat. But this was a very
feeble hope, and for my own part, and for more than one reason, I
placed no reliance on it. I left Madame Sendel to break the painful
intelligence to her daughter, and went home, promising to call again in
the morning.
As I had expected, nothing was heard of Van Haubitz, nor any vestige of
him found, save the foraging-cap I had picked up. Doubtless, the Rhine
had borne down his lifeless corpse to the country of his birth. The next
day Coblenz rang with the death of the unfortunate Dutchman. A stranger,
and unacquainted with the localities, he was supposed to have walked
over the quay by accident. I thought differently; and so I knew did
Madame Sendel and Emilie. I saw the former early the next day. She was
greatly cast down about her daughter, who had passed a sleepless night,
and was weak and suffering, but who nevertheless insisted on continuing
her journey the following morning.
"We must go," said her mother; "if we delay, Emilie loses her
engagement, and how can we both live on my poor jointure? Weeping will
not bring him back, were he worth it. To think of the misery he has
caused us!"
I ventured to hint an inquiry as to their means of prosecuting their
journey. The old lady understood the intention, and took it kindly. "But
she needed no assistance," she said; Van Haubitz (and this confirmed
our strong suspicion of suicide) had given their little stock of money
into his wife's keeping only a few hours before his death.
That afternoon I left Coblenz for England.
* * * * *
On a certain Wednesday, about ten years after the incidents I have
sketched, I had been enjoying the excellent acting of Bouffé in two of
his best characters, and paused for a moment to speak to a friend in the
crowded lobby of the St James's Theatre. Whilst thus engaged, I became
aware that I was an object of attention to two persons, whom I had an
indistinct notion of having seen before, but when or where, or who they
might be, I had not the remotest idea. One of them was a
comfortable-looking, middle-aged man, with a bald head, a smooth,
clean-shaven face, and an incipient ventral rotundity. His complexion
was clear and wholesome, his countenance good-humoured, his whole
appearance bespoke an existence free from care, nights of sound sleep,
and days of tranquil enjoyment. His face was too sleek to be very
expressive, but there was a shrewd, quick look in the eye, and I set him
down in my mind as a wealthy German merchant or manufacturer (some small
peculiarities of costume betrayed the foreigner) come to show London to
his wife--a well-favoured dame, fat, fair, but some years short of
forty--who accompanied him, and who, as well as her better half, seemed
to honour me with very particular notice. My confabulation over, I was
leaving the theatre, when a sleek soft hand was gently passed through my
arm. It was my friend the stout foreigner. I strained my eyes and my
memory, but in vain; I felt very puzzled, and doubtless looked so, for
he smiled, and advancing his head, whispered a name in my ear. It was
that of Van Haubitz.
I started, looked again, doubted, and was at last convinced. _Minus_
mustache and whisker, which were closely shaven, and half his hair, of
which the remainder was considerably grizzled; _plus_ a degree of
corpulence such as I should never have thought the slender lieutenant of
artillery capable of acquiring; his heated, sunburnt complexion and
dissipated look, exchanged for a fresh colour and benevolent
placidity--the Dutchman I had left in the Rhine stood beside me in the
lobby of the French theatre. I turned to the lady: she was less changed
than her companion, and now that I was upon the track, I recognised
Emilie Sendel. By this time we were in the street. Van Haubitz handed
his wife into a carriage.
"Come and sup with us," he said, "and I will explain."
I mechanically obeyed, and in less than three minutes, still tongue-tied
by astonishment, I alighted at the door of a fashionable hotel in a
street adjoining Piccadilly.
A few lines will convey to the reader the substance of the long
conversation which kept the resuscitated Dutchman and myself from our
beds for fully two hours after our unexpected meeting. I had been right
in supposing that he had thrown himself voluntarily into the river;
wrong in my belief that he meditated suicide. An excellent swimmer, he
had taken the water to get rid of his wife. He might certainly have
chosen a drier method, and have given her the slip in the night-time or
on the road; but she had shown, whenever he referred to the possibility
of their separation, such a determination to remain with him at all
risks and sacrifices, that he felt certain she would pursue him as soon
as she discovered his absence. He had formed a wild scheme of returning
to Amsterdam, and haunting his family until, through mere weariness and
vexation, they supplied him with funds for an outfit to Sumatra. There
he trusted to redeem his fortunes, as he had heard that others of no
greater abilities or better character than himself had already done. A
more extravagant project was never formed, and indeed all his acts,
during the six weeks that followed his marriage, were more or less
eccentric and ill-judged. This he admitted, when relating them to me,
and probably would not have been sorry to place them to the score of
actual mental derangement. The redeeming touch in his conduct at that,
the most discreditable period of his life, was his leaving, as I have
already mentioned, what money he had to his wife and her mother,
reserving but a few florins for his own support. With these in his
pocket, he proposed proceeding on foot to Amsterdam. After landing on
the right bank of the Rhine, he walked the greater part of the night as
the best means of drying his saturated garments. When weariness at last
compelled him to pause, it was not yet daylight, no house was open, and
he threw himself on some straw in a farmyard. He awoke in a high fever,
the result of his immersion, of exposure and fatigue, acting on a frame
heated and weakened by anxiety and mental suffering. He obtained shelter
at the neighbouring farm-house, whose kind-hearted inhabitants carefully
tended him for several weeks, during which his life was more than once
despaired of. His convalescence was long, and not till the close of the
year could he resume his journey northwards, by short stages, chiefly on
foot. Unfavourable as his prospects were, his good star had not yet set.
This very illness, as occasioning a delay, was a stroke of good fortune.
Had he at once proceeded to Holland, his family, in hopes to get rid of
him for ever, would probably have given him the small sum he needed for
an outfit to the Indian Archipelago, and he would have sailed thither
before the 31st of December, on which day his father, a joyous liver
and confirmed votary of Bacchus, ate and drank to such an extent to
celebrate the exit of the old year and commencement of the new, that he
fell down, on his way to his bed, in a thundering fit of apoplexy, and
was a corpse before morning. The day of his funeral, Van Haubitz,
footsore and emaciated, and reduced to his last pfenning, walked wearily
into the city of Amsterdam. There a great surprise awaited him.
"Your father had not disinherited you?" I exclaimed, when the Dutchman
made a momentary pause at this point of his narrative.
"He had left a will devising his entire property to my brothers, and not
even naming me. But a slight formality was omitted, which rendered the
document of no more value than the parchment it was drawn upon. The
signature was wanting. My father had the weakness, no uncommon one, of
disliking whatever reminded him of his mortality. He would have fancied
himself nearer his grave had he signed his will. And thus he had delayed
till it was too late. I found myself joint heir with my brothers. By far
the greater part of my father's large capital was embarked in his bank,
and in extensive financial operations, which it would have been
necessary to liquidate at considerable disadvantage, to operate the
partition prescribed by law. Seeing this, I proposed to my brothers to
admit me as partner in the firm, with the stipulation that I should
have no active share in its direction, until my knowledge of business
and steadiness of conduct gave them the requisite confidence in me.
After some deliberation they agreed to this; and three years later their
opinion of me had undergone such a change, that two of them retired to
estates in the country, leaving me the chief management of the concern."
"And Madame Van Haubitz; when did she rejoin you?"
"Immediately the change in my fortunes occurred. Reckless as I at that
time was, and utterly devoid of feeling as you must have thought me, I
could not remember without emotion the disinterested affection,
delicacy, and unselfishness she had exhibited on discovery of my real
circumstances. During my long illness I had had time to reflect, and
when I left my sick-bed in that rude but hospitable German farm-house,
it was as a penitent for past offences, and with a strong resolution to
atone them. Within a week after my father's funeral, I was on my way to
Vienna, to fetch Emilie to the opulent home she had anticipated when she
married me. Her joy at seeing me was scarcely increased when she heard
that I had become the rich banker she had at first thought me."
"And Madame Sendel?"
"Returned to Amsterdam with us. There was good about the old lady, and
by purloining her artificials, limiting her snuff, and soaking her in
tea, she was made endurable enough. Until her death, which occurred a
couple of years ago, she passed her time alternately with us and her
younger daughter."
"She became reconciled to Mademoiselle Ameline?"
"Ameline had been Countess J---- all the time. She was privately
married. For certain family reasons the Count had conditioned that their
union should for a while be kept secret. Seeing that her equivocal
position and her mother's displeasure preyed upon her health and
spirits, he declared his marriage. She left the stage to become a
reigning beauty in the best society of Austria, lady of half-a-dozen
castles, and sovereign mistress of as many thousand Hungarian boors."
Van Haubitz remained some time in London, and I saw him often. He was as
much changed in character as in personal appearance. The sharp lessons
received about the period of our first acquaintance had made a strong
impression on him; and the summer tide of prosperity suddenly setting
in, had enabled him to realise good intentions and honourable resolves,
which the chill current of adversity might have frozen in the germ. Some
of those who read these lines may have occasion, when visiting the
country stigmatised by the snarling Frenchman as the land of _canards_,
_canaux_, and _canaille_, to receive cash in the busy counting-house,
and hospitality in the princely mansion of one of its most respected
bankers. None, I am well assured, will discern in their amiable and
exemplary entertainer any vestige of the disreputable impulses and evil
passions that sullied the early life of "My Friend the Dutchman."
MY COLLEGE FRIENDS.
No. II.
HORACE LEICESTER.
[_MAGA._ AUGUST 1845.]
Oxford! Alma Mater! not to love thee were indeed the ingratitude of a
degenerate son. Let the whiners of the Conventicle rail at thee for a
mother of heretics, and the Joseph Humes of domestic economy propose to
adapt the scale of thy expenses to their own narrow notions--I uphold
thee to be the queen of all human institutions--the incarnated union of
Church and State--royal in thy revenues as in thy expenditure--thy
doctrine as orthodox as thy dinners, thy politics as sound as thy port.
Oxford! who are they that rail at her? who dare to lift their voice
against that seat of high and holy memories? The man who boasts a
private education (so private, that his most intimate friends have never
found it out), who, innocent himself of all academic experiences and
associations, grudges to others that superiority which they never boast
indeed, but to which his secret soul bears envious witness. Or the rich
nonconformist, risen perhaps from obscurity to a rank in society which
gives him the choice of indulging either his spleen or his pride--either
to send his eldest son as a gentleman-commoner to Christ-Church, to
swallow the Thirty-nine Articles with his champagne; or to have his
fling at the Church through her universities--accusing Churchmen of
bigotry, and exclusiveness, and illiberality, because Dissenters do not
found colleges of their own. Or, worse than all, the unworthy disciple
who (like the noxious plant that has grown up beneath the shade of some
goodly tree) has drawn no nobility of soul from the associations which
surrounded his ungrateful youth: for whom all the reality and romance of
academic education were alike in vain: sneering at the honours which he
could not obtain, denying the existence of opportunities which he
neglected; the basest of approvers, he quotes to his own eternal infamy
the scenes of riot and dissipation, the alternations of idleness and
extravagance, which make up his sole recollections of university life:
and looking, without one glance of affection, upon the face of his fair
and graceful mother, makes the chance mole, or the early wrinkle, which
he traces there, the subject of his irreverent jest, forgets the
kindness of which he was unworthy, and remembers for evil the wholesome
discipline which was irksome only to such as him.
"Non hæc jocosæ conveniunt lyræ;"
I admit mine is not the tongue or pen for such a subject; and Oxford
has, I hope, no lack of abler champions. But it was geese, you know, who
once saved the Capitol; and I must have my hiss at the iniquitous
quackeries which people seek to perpetrate under the taking title of
University Reform. And when I, loving Oxford as I do, see some of her
own sons arrayed against her, I can only remember this much of my
philosophy--that there are cases when to be angry becomes a duty. Men
who, knowing nothing of the universities from experience, think proper
to run them down, succeed at all events in exposing one crying evil--the
absurdity of meddling with what one does not understand. We who know
better may afford to smile at once at their spite and their ignorance.
But he who lifts his voice against the mother that bore him, can fix no
darker blot upon her fame than the disgrace of having given birth to
him.
Show me the man who did not like Oxford, and I will show you either a
sulky misanthrope or an affected ass. Many, many indeed, are the
unpleasant recollections which, in the case of nearly all of us, will
mingle with the joy with which we recall our college days. More than the
ghosts of duns departed, perhaps unpaid; more than the heart-burnings
of that visionary fellowship, for which we were beaten (we verily
believe, unfairly) by a neck; more than that loved and lost ideal of a
first class, which we deserved, but did not get (the opinions of our
examiners not coinciding in that point with our own); yes, more than all
these, comes forcibly to many minds, the self-accusing silent voice that
whispers of time wasted and talents misapplied--kind advice, which the
heat of youth misconstrued or neglected--jewels of price that once lay
strewed upon the golden sands of life, then wantonly disregarded, or
picked up but to be flung away, and which the tide of advancing years
has covered from our view for ever--blessed opportunities of acquiring
wisdom, human and divine, which never can return.
Yet in spite of all this, if there be any man who can say that Oxford is
not to him a land of pleasant memories, "Μήτ' ἐμοὶ παρέστιος
γένοιτο"--which is, being freely translated, "May he never put his legs
under my mahogany"--that's all. I never knew him yet, and have no wish
to make his acquaintance. He may have carried off every possible
university honour for what I care; he is more hopelessly stupid, in my
view of things, than if he had been plucked fifteen times. If he was
fond of reading, or of talking about reading; fond of hunting, or
talking about hunting; fond of walking, riding, rowing, leaping, or any
possible exercise besides dancing; if he loved pleasant gardens or
solemn cloisters; learned retirement or unlearned jollification--in a
word, if he had any imaginable human sympathies, and cared for anything
besides himself, he would have liked Oxford. Men's tastes differ, no
doubt; but to have spent four years of the spring of one's life in one
of the most magnificent cities and best societies in the world, and not
to have enjoyed it--this is not a variety of taste, but its privation.
I fancy there is a mistaken opinion very prevalent, that young and
foolish, older and wiser, are synonymous terms. Stout gentlemen of a
certain age, brimful of proprieties, shake their heads alarmingly, and
talk of the folly of boys; as if they were the only fools. And if at any
time, in the fulness of their hearts, they refer to some freak of their
own youth, they appear to do it with a sort of apology to themselves,
that such wise individuals as they are now should ever have done such
things! And as the world stands at present, it is the old story of the
Lion and the Painter; the elderly gentlemen are likely to have it their
own way; they say what they like, while the young ones are content to do
what they like. And the more absurdity a man displays in his teens (and
some, it must be confessed, are absurd enough), the more insupportable
an air of wisdom does he put on when he gets settled. As there is no
hope of these sedate gentry being sent to College again to teach the
rising generation of under-graduates the art of precocious gravity, and
still less hope of their arriving at it of themselves, perhaps there is
no harm in mooting the question on neutral ground, whether such a
consummation as that of putting old heads upon young shoulders is
altogether desirable.
Wherefore, I, Frank Hawthorne--being of the age of nine-and-twenty, or
thereabouts, and of sound mind, and about to renounce for ever all claim
and title to be considered a young man; having married a wife, and left
sack and all other bad habits; having no longer any fellowship with
under-graduates, or army subs, or medical students, or young men about
town, or any other class of the heterogeneous irregulars who make up
"Young England"--being a perfectly disinterested party in the question,
inasmuch as having lost my reputation for youth, I have never acquired
one for wisdom--hereby raise my voice against the intolerable cant,
which assumes every man to be a harebrained scapegrace at twenty, and a
Solomon at forty-five. Youth sows wild oats, it may be; too many men in
more advanced life seem to me to sow no crop of any kind. There are
empty fools at all ages; but "an old fool"----(musty as the proverb is,
it is rather from neglect than over-application). I have known men by
the dozen, who in their youth were either empty-headed coxcombs or noisy
sots; does my reader think that any given number of additional years has
made them able statesmen, sound lawyers, or erudite divines? that
because they have become honourable by a seat in Parliament, learned by
courtesy, reverend by office, they are therefore really more useful
members of society than when they lounged the High Street, or woke the
midnight echoes of the quadrangle? Nay, life is too short for the
leopard to change his spots, or the Ethiopian his skin; one can but pare
the claws of the first, and put a suit of the last European fashion upon
the other.
Let any man run over in his own mind the list of those school and
college companions with whom, after the lapse of ten years or so, he has
still an opportunity of occasionally renewing his acquaintance, and
judging of the effect which time has had upon their habits and
characters. In how many cases can he trace any material alteration,
beyond what results from the mere accidents of time and place? He finds,
it is to be hoped, good principles developed, warm impulses ripened into
active habits, exaggerations softened down (for I am giving him credit
for not choosing his companions, even in youth, among the vicious in
heart and principle); but if he finds in any what he can call a _change_
at all, then I ask, in how many instances is it a change for the better?
or does he not find it rather where there was no sterling value in the
metal, which, as the gloss of youth wears off, loses its only charm?
Thirty is the turning-point of a man's life; when marrying becomes a
now-or-never sort of business, and dinners begin to delight him more
than dancing. As I said just now, then, I stand just at the corner; and,
looking round before I turn it, I own somewhat of a shyness for the
company of those "grave and reverend seniors" who are to be my
fellow-travellers hereafter through life. There are certain points on
which I fear we are scarce prepared to agree. I must have one window
open for the first few miles of the journey at all events--that I may
look behind me. Life's a fast train, and one can't expect to be allowed
to get out at the stations; still less to ask the engineer to put back,
because we have left our youth behind us. Yet there are some things in
which I hope always to be a boy; I hope ever to prefer thoughtlessness
to heartlessness, imprudence to selfishness, impulse to calculation. It
is hard enough to part with all the fiery spirits, the glowing
imaginations, the elasticity of mind and body which we lose as age
creeps on; but if, with the bright summer weather and cloudless skies of
youth, to which we are content to bid farewell, we must lose, too, the
"sunshine of the breast"--the "bloom of heart"--then well might the poet
count him happy who died in early spring--who knew nothing of life but
its fair promises, and passed away in happy scepticism of the winter
which was to come.
Talk of putting old heads upon young shoulders! Heaven forbid! It would
but be making them stoop prematurely. If indeed we could put young
hearts into old bodies occasionally, we might do some good; or if there
could ever be combined in some fortunate individual, throughout his
life, the good qualities peculiar to each successive climacteric; if we
could mix just enough of the acid and the bitter, which are apt to
predominate so unhappily after a long rubbing through the world, to
qualify the fiery spirit of youth, and prevent its sweetness from
cloying, the compound would undoubtedly be a very pleasant one. But
this, it is to be feared, like many other desiderata, is too good to be
attainable; and the experience which we undoubtedly want in early life,
we acquire too often at the cost of that freshness of heart, which
nature intended as a gift still more valuable.
Nowhere does the old Stagyrite display a more consummate knowledge of
what men are made of, than in his contrasted characters of youth and
age. I wonder how many of the old gentlemen who call themselves
philosophers in this degenerate age, ever read or remember what he says
on the subject. It is a great comfort, when one is arguing against so
much collective wisdom, to feel that one has such authority to fall back
upon; and I have the less hesitation in bringing my old friend Aristotle
forward to help me, because I can assure my unlearned readers, ladies
and others, that I am not going to quote any thing nearly so grave and
sensible as modern philosophy. "Stingy, illnatured, suspicious,
selfish, narrow-minded"--these, with scarce a redeeming quality, are
some of the choice epithets which he strings together as the
characteristics of the respectable old governors and dowagers of his
day; while the young, although, as he confesses, somewhat too much the
creatures of impulse, and indebted to it for some of their virtues as
well as vices, are trustful towards others, honest in themselves,
open-handed and open-hearted, warm friends and brave enemies. It is
true, he observes, they have, in a large degree, the fault common to all
honest men, they are "easily humbugged;" an admitted failing which
perhaps may let us into the secret of their sitting down so quietly
under the imputation of a hundred others. He urges, too, elsewhere, a
fact I am not disposed to battle about, that young men do not make good
philosophers; but this is in a book which he wrote for the use of his
own son, wherein he probably thought it his duty to take the conceit out
of his heir-apparent; but if he ever allowed the young philosopher to
get a sight of the other book containing the two characters aforesaid,
it may be doubted whether he found him as "easily humbugged" afterwards.
Remember, reader, as I said before, I claim to occupy neutral ground. If
I essay to defend youth from some injustice which it suffers at the
hands of partial judges, it is as an amateur advocate rather than an
accredited champion--for I am young no longer. If I am rash enough to
couch a lance against that venerable phantom, which, under the name of
Wisdom, hovers round grey hairs, I am but preparing a rod for my own
back--for I feel myself growing old. I admit it with a sigh; but the
sigh is not for the past only, but even more for the present. I mourn
not so much for that which Time has taken away, as for the insufficiency
of that which it brings instead. I would rejoice to be relieved from the
dominion of the hot follies of youth, if I could escape at the same time
the degrading yoke of the cooler vices of maturity. I do not find men
grow better as they grow older; wiser they may grow, but it is the
wisdom of the serpent. We scarce grow less sensual, less vain, less
eager after what we think pleasure; I would we continued as generous and
as warm. We gain the cunning to veil our passions, to regulate even our
vices according to the scale (and that no parsimonious one) which what
we call "society" allows; we lose the enthusiasm which in some degree
excused our follies, with the light-heartedness which made them
delightful. Few men among us are they who can look back upon the years
gone by, and not feel that, if these may justly be charged with folly,
the writing of the accusation that stands against their riper age is of
a graver sort.
It is melancholy, rather than amusing, to hear men of a certain age
rail against the faults and extravagance of their juniors. Angry that
they themselves are no longer young, they visit with a rod of iron such
an intolerable offence in others. Even newspapers are always eloquent
against the disgusting immoralities of breaking knockers and bonneting
policemen. The _Times_ turns censor upon such an "ungentlemanly
outrage;" the _Weekly Despatch_ has its propriety shocked by such
"freaks of the aristocracy;" and both, in their zeal to reprobate
offences so dangerous to the best interests of society, sacrifice
somewhat of that "valuable space" which should have been devoted to the
bulletin of the health, or the history of the travels, of the "gallant
officer" who last deliberately shot his friend in a duel; or the piquant
details of the last _crim. con._, with the extraordinary disclosures
expected to be made by the "noble defendant." Society has no sympathy
with vices to which it has no temptation; it might have done foolish
things in its day, but has long ago seen the folly of them. So we make a
graceful acknowledgment of having been wrong once, for the sake of
congratulating ourselves upon being so very right now.
Let me then, for some few moments, recall those scenes which, on the
stage of life, have passed away for ever; and forgetting, as memory
loves to do, the evil that was in them, let it be not idle repining to
lament the good.
Oh! dark yet pleasant quadrangle, round whose wide area I might wander
now, a stranger among strangers, where are they who once gave life and
mirth to cheer those ancient walls? There were full a score of rooms,
congenial _lares_, in which no hour of day or night would have found me
other than a welcome guest. I had friends, yea, friends, within those
prison-like windows--warm hearts walled in by thy cold grey
stones--friends that had thoughts, and feelings, and pursuits in
common--who were not hospitable in words alone, suffering each other's
presence with well-concealed _ennui_--but friends in something more than
in the name. In vain, among the cold conventionalities of life, shall I
look for the warm and kindly welcome, the sympathy of feeling, the
unrestrained yet courteous familiarity of intercourse, which was part
and parcel of a college life; and if for this only I should say of
Oxford, that I shall not look upon its like again--if for this only, I
doubt whether the years of my youthful pilgrimage were altogether evil,
who shall gainsay me? Where, or in what society of wise, and orderly,
and respectable "grown-up children," shall I find the sincerity and
warm-heartedness that once were the atmosphere of my daily life? Where
is the friend of my maturer choosing, into whose house I can walk at any
time, and feel sure I am no intruder? Where is the man, among those with
whom I am by hard fate compelled to associate, who does not measure his
regard, his hospitality, his very smiles, by my income, my station in
society--anything but by myself? Older and wiser!--oh yes!--youthful
friendship is very foolish in such matters.
But I suppose I must put up, as I best may, with the accumulating weight
of years and wisdom. It won't do to give up one's degree, and begin
again at the university, even if they leave us a university worth going
to. At all events, one could not go back and find there those "old
familiar faces" that made it what it was; and it is more pleasant to
look upon it all--the place and its old occupants--as still existing in
some dream-land or other, than to return to find an old acquaintance in
every stick and stone, while every human face and voice is strange to
us.
Yet one does meet friends in old scenes, sometimes, when the meeting is
as unexpected as delightful. And just so, in my last visit to Oxford,
did I stumble upon Horace Leicester. We met in the quadrangle where we
had parted some six years back, just as we might if we had supped
together the night before; whereas we had been all the time hundreds of
miles asunder: and we met as unrestrainedly, only far more cordially.
Neither of us had much time to spare in Oxford, but we dined together of
course; talked over old friends, and told old stories. As to the first,
it was strange enough to moralise upon the after-fortunes of some of our
contemporaries. One--of whom, for habitual absence from lectures, and
other misdemeanours many and various, the tutors had prophesied all
manner of evil, and who had been dismissed by the Principal at his final
leave-taking, with the remark that he was the luckiest man he had ever
known, inasmuch as he had been perseveringly idle without being plucked,
and mixed up in every row without being rusticated--was now working hard
day and night as a barrister, engaged as a junior on committee business
the whole Session, and never taking a holiday except on the Derby day.
The ugliest little rascal of our acquaintance, and as stupid as a post,
was married to a pretty girl with a fortune of thirty thousand. Another,
and one of the best of us--Charley White--who united the business-habits
of a man with the frolic of a schoolboy, and who ought to have been
added to the roll of the College benefactors, as having been the founder
of the Cricket and the Whist Club, and having restored to its old place
on the river, at much cost and pains, the boat which had been withdrawn
for the last five years, and reduced the sundry desultory idlenesses of
the under-graduates into something like method and order--Charley White
was now rector of a poor and populous parish in Yorkshire, busily
engaged in building a new church and schools, opening Provident
Societies, and shutting up beer-shops, and instructing the rising
generation of his parishioners in catechism and cricket alternately.
While the steadiest (I was very near saying the only steady man) among
our mutual acquaintance, who looked at every sixpence before he spent
it, checked his own washing-lists, went to bed at ten o'clock, and was,
in short, an exemplary character (he was held out to me, on my first
entrance, as a valuable acquaintance for any young man, but I soon
despaired of successfully imitating so bright a model)--well, this
gentleman having been taken into partnership, somewhat prematurely
perhaps on the strength of the aforesaid reputation, by his father's
firm--they were Liverpool merchants of high standing--had thought
proper, disgusted probably with the dissipations and immoralities of
trade, to retire to America in search of purity and independence,
without going through the form of closing his accounts with the house.
The Liverpudleians, indeed, according to Horace's account, gave a
somewhat ugly name to the transaction; he had been cashier to the firm,
they said, who were minus some tens of thousands thereby; but as the
senior partner was known to have smoked cigars at a preparatory school
(thereby showing what he _would_ have done had he been sent to Oxford),
whereas our friend was always "a steady man," I leave the reader to
judge which party is entitled to the most credit.
It was after we had separated that a friend of mine, not an Oxford man,
who had dined with us, and appeared much amused by some of Horace's
reminiscences, asked me the very puzzling question, "Was your friend
Leicester what they call a '_rowing_ man' at College?" Now, I protest
altogether against the division of under-graduates into reading men and
rowing men, as arbitrary and most illogical; there being a great many
who have no claim to be reckoned either in one class or the other, and a
great many who hover between both. And this imaginary distinction,
existing as it notoriously does at Oxford, and fostered and impressed
upon men by the tutors (often unintentionally, or with the very best
intentions), is productive in many cases of a great deal of harm. A man
(or _boy_ if you please) is taught to believe, upon his very first
entrance, that one of these characters will infallibly cling to him, and
that he has only to choose between the two. For the imaginary division
creates a real one; in many colleges, a man who joins a boat's crew, or
a cricket club, or goes out now and then with the harriers, is looked
upon with suspicion by the authorities at once; and by a very natural
consequence, a man who wants to read his five or six hours a-day
quietly, finds that some of his pleasantest companions look upon him as
a slow coach. So, probably before the end of his first term, he is
hopelessly committed, at nineteen, to a consistency of character rarely
met with at fifty. If he lays claim to the reputation of a reading man,
and has an eye to the loaves and fishes in the way of scholarships and
fellowships, he is compelled, by the laws of his _caste_, to renounce
some of the most sensible and healthful amusements which a university
life offers. He must lead a very humdrum sort of life indeed. It is not
enough that he should be free from the stains of vice and immorality;
that his principles and habits should be those of a gentleman; that he
should avoid excesses, and be observant of discipline; this the
university would have a right to expect from all who are candidates for
her honours and emoluments. But there is a conventional character which
he must put on besides this. I say "put on;" because, however natural it
may be to some men, it cannot possibly be so to all. His exercise must
be taken at stated times and places: it must consist principally of
walking, whether he be fond of it or not, varied occasionally by a
solitary skiffing expedition down the river, or a game of billiards with
some very steady friend on the sly. His dress must exhibit either the
negligence of a sloven (in case he be an aspirant for very high honours
indeed), or the grave precision of a respectable gentleman of forty. He
must eschew all such vanities as white trousers and well-cut boots. He
must be profoundly ignorant of all university intelligence that does not
bear in some way on the schools; must be utterly indifferent what boat
is at the head of the river, or whether Drake's hounds are fox or
harriers. He must never be seen out of his rooms, except at lecture,
before two o'clock, and never return to a wine-party after chapel. His
judgment of the merits of port and sherry must be confined principally
to the fact of one being red and the other white, and the compounding of
punch must be to him a mystery unfathomable. Now, if he can be, or
assume to be, all this, then he will be admitted into the most orthodox
and steady set in his college; and if he have, besides, an ordinary
amount of scholarship, and tact enough to talk judiciously about his
books and his reading, he may get up a very fair reputation indeed. And
when at his final examination he makes, as nine-tenths of such men do
make, a grand crash, and his name comes out in the third or fourth
class, or he gets "gulfed" altogether--it is two to one but his friends
and his tutor look upon him, and talk of him, as rather an ill-used
individual. He was "unlucky in his examination"--"the essay did not suit
him"--they were "quite surprised at his failure"--"his health was not
good the last term or two"--"he was too nervous." These are cases which
have occurred in every man's experience: men read ten hours a-day, with
a watch by their side, cramming in stuff that they do not understand,
are talked about as "sure firsts" till one gets sick of their very
names, assume all the airs which really able men seldom do assume, and
take at last an equal degree with others who have been acquiring the
same amount of knowledge with infinitely less pretension, and who,
without moping the best part of their lives in an artificial existence,
will make more useful members of society in the end. "How was it," said
an old lady in the country to me one day, "that young Mr C---- did not
get a first class? I understand he read very hard, and I know he refused
every invitation to dinner when he was down here in the summer
vacation?" "That was the very reason, my dear madam," said I; "you may
depend upon it." She stared, of course; but I believe I was not far out.
Let men read as much as they will, and as hard as they will, on any
subjects for which they have the ability and inclination; but never let
them suppose they are to lay down one code of practice to suit all
tempers and constitutions. Cannot a man be a scholar, and a gentleman,
and a good fellow at the same time?
And, after all, where is the broad moral distinction between these
_soi-disant_ steady men, and those whom they are pleased to consider as
"rowing" characters? it has always seemed to me rather apocryphal. If a
man thinks proper to amuse himself with a chorus in his own rooms at one
o'clock in the morning, it seems hardly material whether it be Greek or
English--Sophocles or Tom Moore. It's a matter of taste, and tastes
differ. Nor do I think the morality of Horace or Aristophanes, or the
theology of Lucretius, so peculiarly admirable, as to render them, _per
se_, fitter subjects for the exclusive exercise of a young man's
faculties than "the Pickwick Papers," or "The Rod and the Gun." I have
heard--(I never saw, nor will I believe it)--of the profanity of certain
sporting under-graduates, who took into chapel the racing calendar,
bound in red morocco, instead of a prayer-book; I hold it to have been
the malicious fiction of some would-be university reformer; but, even if
true, I am not sure that I much prefer that provident piety which I have
noticed getting up its Greek within the same walls by means of a
Septuagint and Greek liturgy. Religion is one thing, classical learning
another, and sporting information another; all totally distinct, and
totally different; the first immeasurably above the other two, but
standing equidistant from both. It does not make a man one whit the
better to know that Coræbus won the cup at Olympia B.C. 776, than it
does to know that Priam did _not_ win the St Leger at Doncaster A.D.
1830; from all I can make out, the Greeks on the turf at present are not
much worse than their old namesakes; I dare say there was a fair amount
of black-legism on both occasions. Men injure their moral and physical
health by reading as much as by other things; it takes quite as much out
of a man, and puts as little in him to any good purpose, to get up his
logic as to pull in an eight-oar.
Besides, if one is to read and enter into the spirit of a dozen
different authors, one dull monotonous round of physical existence seems
ill-fitted to call out the requisite variety of mental powers. I hold
that there are divers and sundry fit times, and places, and states of
mind, suited to different lines of reading. If a man is at work upon
history, by all means let him sport oak rigidly against all visitors;
let him pile up his authorities and references on every vacant chair all
round him, and get a clear notion of it by five or six hours'
uninterrupted and careful study. Or, if he has a system of philosophy to
get up, let him sit down with his head cool, his window open (not the
one looking into quad.), let him banish from his mind all minor matters,
and not break off in the chain of argument so long as he can keep his
brain clear and his eyes open. Even then, a good gallop afterwards, or a
cigar and a glass of punch, with some lively fellow who is no
philosopher, will do him far more good than a fagging walk of so many
measured miles, with the studious companion whose head is stuffed as
full of such matter as his own, and whose talk will be of disputed
passages, and dispiriting anticipations of a "dead floorer" in the
schools. But if a man wants to make acquaintance with such books as
Juvenal, or Horace, or Aristophanes, he may surely do it to quite as
good purpose, and with far more relish, basking under a tree in summer,
or with a friend over a bottle in winter.
The false tone of society of which I have been speaking had its
influence upon Horace Leicester. Coming up to the university from a
public school, with a high character, a fair amount of scholarship, and
a host of acquaintances, he won the good-will at once of dons and of
under-graduates, and bid fair to be as universal a favourite at college
as he had been at Harrow. Never did a man enter upon an academic life
under happier auspices, nor, I believe, with a more thorough
determination to enjoy it in every way. He did not look upon his
emancipation from school discipline as a license for idleness, nor
intend to read the less because he could now read what he pleased, and
when he pleased. For, not to mention that Horace was ambitious, and had
at one time an eye to the class list--he had a taste for reading, and a
strong natural talent to appreciate what he read. But if he had a taste
for reading, he had other tastes as well, and, as he thought, not
incompatible; much as he admired his Roman namesake, he could not devote
his evenings exclusively to his society, but preferred carrying his
precepts into practice occasionally with more modern companions; and he
had no notion that during the next four years of his life he was to take
an interest in no sports but those of the old Greeks and Romans, and
mount no horse but Pegasus. For a term or two, Leicester got on very
well; attended lectures, read steadily till one or two o'clock, when
there was nothing particular going on, kept a horse, hired an alarm, and
seldom cut morning chapel, or missed a meet if within reasonable
distance. It was a course of life which, in after days, he often
referred to with a sigh as having been most exemplary; and I doubt
whether he was far wrong. But it did not last. For a time his
gentlemanly manners, good humour, and good taste, carried it off with
all parties; but it was against the ordinary routine, and could not hold
up against the popular prejudice. The reading men eyed his top-boots
with suspicion; the rowing men complained he was growing a regular
_sap_, always sporting oak when they wanted him. Then his wine-parties
were a source of endless tribulation to him. First of all, he asked all
those with whom he was most intimate among his old schoolfellows to meet
each other, adding one or two of his new acquaintances: and a pretty
mess he made of it. Men who had sat on the same form with him and with
each other at Harrow, and had betrayed no such marked differences in
their tastes as to prevent their associating very pleasantly there, at
Oxford, he found, had been separated wide as the poles by this
invisible, but impassable, line of demarcation: to such a degree,
indeed, that although all had called upon Horace, as they had upon each
other, before it seemed decided on which side they were to settle, yet
when they now met at his rooms, they had become strangers beyond a mere
civil recognition, and had not a single subject to converse upon in
common. In fact, they were rather surprised than pleased to meet at all;
and it was in vain their host tried to get them to amalgamate. Many
seemed to take a pleasure in showing how decidedly they belonged to one
set or the other. One would talk of nothing on earth besides hunting,
and sat silent and sulky when Horace turned the conversation; another
affected an utter ignorance of all that was going on in the University
that was not connected with class-lists, scholarships, &c. What provoked
him most was, that some of those who gave themselves the most pedantic
airs, and would have been double first-class men undeniably, if talking
could have done it, were those whose heads he well knew were as empty as
the last bottle, and which made him think that some men must take to
reading at Oxford, simply because they had faculties for nothing else.
At all events, Horace found the mixed system would not answer for
entertaining his friends. So the next time he asked a few of the reading
men, some of whom he knew used to be good fellows, together; and as he
really had a kindred taste with them on many subjects, he found an hour
or so pass away very pleasantly: when just as he was passing the wine
about the third round, and his own brilliancy and good-humour were
beginning to infect some of his guests--so that one grave genius of
twenty had actually so far forgotten himself as to fill a bumper by
mistake--up jumped the senior man of the party, and declaring that he
had an engagement to walk with a friend at seven, politely took his
leave. This was the signal for a general dispersion; in vain did Horace
assure them they should have some coffee in the course of an hour, and
entreat some one or two to return. Off they all went, with sundry smiles
and shakes of the head, and left their unfortunate host sitting alone in
his glory over the first glass of a newly opened bottle of claret.
I happened to be crossing the quadrangle from chapel in company with
Savile, at the moment when Leicester put his head out of his window as
if to inquire of the world in general what on earth he was to do with
himself for the next hour or two. Savile he hailed at once, and begged
him to come up; and though I knew but little of him, and had never been
in his rooms before, still, as I was one or two terms his senior, there
was nothing contrary even to Oxford etiquette in my accompanying Savile.
We laughed heartily when he explained his disappointment. Savile tried
to comfort him by the assurance that, as he had an hour to spare, he
would sit down and help him to finish a bottle or two of claret with a
great deal of pleasure; and was inclined to attribute the failure of the
evening, in a great measure, to his name not having been included in
the list of invitations--an omission by which he declared all parties
had been the losers; Horace's reading friends standing very much in need
of some one to put a little life into them, and himself, as a candidate
for a degree, having missed a fair opportunity of meeting, among so many
choice fellows, some one to "put him up to the examiners' dodges." But
Leicester was irrecoverably disgusted. Nothing, he declared, would ever
induce him to ask a party of reading men to his rooms again; and from
that hour he seemed to eschew fellowship with the whole fraternity. Not
that he became idle all at once; on the contrary, I believe, for some
time he worked on steadily, or at least tried to work; but he was
naturally fond of society, and having failed to find what he wanted, was
reduced to make the best of such as he could find. So he gradually
became acquainted with a set of men who, whatever their good qualities
might be, had certainly no claim whatever to be considered hard readers,
and who would have considered a symposium which broke up at seven
o'clock as unsatisfactory as a tale without a conclusion. Amongst these,
his gentlemanly manners and kindness of heart made him beloved, while
his talents gave him a kind of influence; and, though he must have felt
occasionally that he was not altogether in his right place, and that,
besides his popular qualities, he had higher tastes and endowments with
which the majority of his companions could hardly sympathise, he was
too light-hearted to philosophise much on the subject, and contented
himself with enjoying his popularity, occasionally falling back upon his
own resources, and keeping up, in a desultory kind of way, his
acquaintance with scholarship and literature. The reading men of course
looked upon him as a lost sheep; the tutors shook their heads about him;
if he did well, it was set down as the result of accident; while all his
misdoings were labouring in his vocation. For, agreeably to the grand
division aforesaid, Horace was now set down as a "rowing-man;" and he
soon made the discovery, and did more thereupon to deserve the character
than he ever would have done otherwise. He was very willing to go on in
his own way, if all parties would but let him alone; he was not going to
be made a proselyte to long walks, and toast and water, nor had he any
conscientious abhorrence of supper-parties; and, as his prospects in
life were in no way dependent upon a class or a scholarship, and he
seemed to be tacitly repudiated by the _literati_ of his college, young
and old, on account of some of his aforesaid heterodox notions on the
subject of study, he accustomed himself gradually to set their opinions
at defiance; while the moderate reading, which encouragement and
emulation had made easy at school, became every day more and more
distasteful.
Horace's tottering reputation was at last completely overset in the eyes
of the authorities by a little affair which was absurd enough, but in
which he himself was as innocent as they were. It happened that a
youthful cousin of his, whose sole occupation for the last twelve months
of his life had been the not over-profitable one of waiting for a
commission, had come up to Oxford for two or three days, pursuant to
invitation, to see a little of the manners and customs of the
inhabitants. I think he had some slight acquaintance with our then
vice-principal--a good-natured, easy man--and Horace had got leave for
him to occupy a set of very small, dark rooms, which, as the college was
not very full, had been suffered to remain vacant for the last two or
three terms; they were so very unattractive a domicile that the last
Freshman to whom they were offered as a Hobson's choice, was currently
reported, in the plenitude of his disgust, to have taken his name off
the books _instanter_. It is not usual to allow strangers to sleep
within college walls at all; but our discipline was somewhat lax in
those days. So Mr Carey had a bed put up for him in the aforesaid
quarters. He was, of course, duly _fêted_, and made much of by Horace
and his friends; and a dozen of us sat down to a capital dinner in the
rooms of the former, on the strength of having to entertain a "stranger
from the country;" the hospitality of Oxford relaxing its rules even in
favour of under-graduates upon such occasions. It must have been
somewhere towards the next morning, when two or three of us accompanied
young Carey down to No. 8; and, after chatting with him till he was half
undressed, left him, as we thought, safe and quiet. However, soon after
we had retired, some noisy individual in the same staircase thought
proper to give a view-hollo out of his window, for the purpose of
wishing the public good-night. Now there was one of the Fellows, a
choleric little old gentleman, always in residence, holding some office,
in which there was as little to do, and as much to get as might be, and
who seldom troubled himself much about college discipline, and looked
upon under-graduates with a sort of silent contempt; never interfering
with them, as he declared himself, so long as they did not interfere
with him. But one point there was, in which they did interfere with his
personal comfort occasionally, and whereby his peace of mind and rest of
body were equally disturbed. Mr Perkins always took a tumbler of negus
at ten precisely, and turned in as the college clock struck the quarter
past; by the half-hour he was generally asleep, for his digestion was
good and his cares few. But his slumbers were not heavy, and anything
like a row in the quadrangle infallibly awoke him, and then he was like
a lion roused. He was wont to jump up, throw up his window, thrust out a
red face and a white nightcap, and after listening a few seconds for
the chance of the odious sounds being repeated, would put the very
pertinent question usual in such circumstances, to which one so seldom
gets an equally pertinent reply--"Who's that?" In case this intimation
of Mr Perkins being wide awake proved sufficient, as it often did, to
restore quiet, then after the lapse of a few more seconds the head and
the nightcap disappeared, and the window was shut down again. But if the
noise was continued, as occasionally it was out of pure mischief, then
in a minute or two the said nightcap would be seen to emerge hastily
from the staircase below, in company with a dressing-gown and slippers,
and Mr Perkins in this disguise would proceed to the scene of
disturbance as fast as his short legs could carry him. He seldom
succeeded in effecting a capture; but if he had that luck, or if he
could distinguish the tone of any individual voice so as to be able to
identify the performer, he had him up before the "seniority" next
morning, where his influence as one of the senior fellows insured a
heavy sentence. But he had been engaged in so many unsuccessful chases
of the kind, and his short orations from his window so often elicited
only a laugh, though including sometimes brief but explicit threats of
rustication against the noisy unknown, strengthened by little expletives
which, when quoted by under-graduates, were made to sound somewhat
doubtfully--that at last he altered his tactics, and began to act in
silence. And so he did, when upon opening his window he saw a light in
the ground-floor rooms of the staircase whence the sounds proceeded on
the evening in question. Carey, by his own account, was proceeding
quietly in his preparations for bed, singing to himself an occasional
stanza of some classical ditty which he had picked up in the course of
the evening, and admiring the power of the man's lungs in the room above
him, when he heard a short quick step, and then a double rap at his
door. He was quite sufficiently acquainted, by this time, with the ways
of the place, not to be much surprised at the late visit, and at the
same time to consider it prudent to learn the name and _status_ of his
visitor before admitting him; so he retorted upon Mr Perkins, quite
unconsciously, his own favourite query--"Who's that?" his first and
obvious impression being that it was one of the party he had just
quitted, coming probably in the plenitude of good fellowship, to bring
him an invitation to wine or breakfast next day.
"It's me, sir--open the door," was the reply from a deep baritone, which
the initiated would never have mistaken.
"Who are you?" said Carey again.
"My name is Perkins, sir: have the goodness to let me in." He was
getting more angry, and consequently more polite.
"Perkins," said Carey, pausing in his operations, in the vain endeavour
to recall the name among the score or two to whom he had been
introduced. "I'm just in bed--were you up at Leicester's?"
"Open the door, sir, if you please, immediately," and then came what our
friend took for a smothered laugh, but was really a sort of shiver, for
there was a draft in the passage playing all manner of pranks with the
dressing-gown, and Mr Perkins was getting cold.
An indistinct notion came into Carey's mind, that some one who had met
him in College might have taken him for a Freshman, and had some
practical joke in view; so he contented himself with repeating that he
was going to bed, and could let no one in.
"I tell you, sir, I'm Mr Perkins; don't you know me?"
"I wish you a very good night, Mr Perkins."
"What's your name, sir? eh? You impudent young puppy, what's your
infernal name? I'll have you rusticated, you dog--do you hear me, sir?"
On a sudden it struck Carey that this might possibly be a domiciliary
visit from one of the authorities, and that his best plan was to open
the door at once, though what had procured him such an honour he was at
a loss to imagine. He drew back the spring lock, therefore, and the next
moment stood face to face with the irate Mr Perkins.
His first impulse was to laugh at the curious figure before him; but
when demands for his name, and threats of unknown penalties, were
thundered forth upon him with no pause for a reply, then he began to
think that he had made a mistake in opening the door at all--that he
might get Leicester into a scrape if not himself--and as his person was
as unknown to Mr Perkins as that gentleman's to him, it struck him that
if he could give him the slip at once it would be all right. In a moment
he blew out his solitary candle, bolted through the open door, all but
upsetting his new acquaintance, whom he left storming in the most
unconnected manner, alone, and in total darkness. Up to Leicester's
rooms he rushed, related his adventure, and was rather surprised that
his cousin did not applaud it as a very clever thing.
What Mr Perkins thought or said to himself, what degree of patience he
exhibited in such trying circumstances, or in what terms he
apostrophised his flying enemy, must ever remain a secret with himself.
Five minutes after, Solomon the porter, summoned from his bed just as he
had made himself snug once more after letting out Horace's out-college
friends, confronted Mr Perkins in about as sweet a temper as that worthy
individual himself, with this difference, that one was sulky and the
other furious.
"Who lives in the ground-floor on the left in No. 8?"
"What, in 'Coventry?' Why, nobody, sir."
"Nobody! you stupid old sinner, you're asleep."
"No, sir, I ain't," and Solomon flashed his lantern in Mr Perkins's face
as if to ascertain whether _his_ eyes were open. Mr Perkins started
back, and Solomon turned half round as if to disappear again.
"Who lives there, Solomon, I ask you? Do you mean to tell me you don't
know? You are not fit----"
"I knows every gentleman's rooms well enough: nobody hasn't lived in
them as you means not these four terms. Mr Pears kept his fox in 'em one
time, till the vice-principal got wind of him. There may be some varmint
in 'em now for all I knows--they a'n't fit for much else."
"There's some confounded puppy of a Freshman in them now--at least there
was--and he lives there too."
"I know there _be'n't_," said the persevering Solomon. And, without
deigning a word more, he set off with his lantern towards the place in
dispute, followed by Mr Perkins, who contented himself with an angry
"Now you'll see."
"Ay, now we shall see," replied Solomon, as, somewhat to Mr Perkins's
astonishment, they found the oak sported. Having made a selection from a
huge bunch of keys, the porter succeeded, after some fumbling, in
getting the door open. The room bore no traces of recent occupation.
Three or four broken chairs and a rickety table were the only
furniture: as far as the light of Solomon's lantern could penetrate, it
looked the very picture of desolation. Solomon chuckled.
"There _is_ a man living here. I'll swear there is. He was undressing
when I came. Look in the bedroom."
They opened the door, and saw a bare feather-bed and bolster, the usual
_matériel_ in an unoccupied college chamber. "Seeing's believing," said
the porter.
But, with Mr Perkins, seeing was not believing. He saw Solomon, and he
saw the empty room, but he did not believe either. But he had evidently
the worst side of the argument as it stood, so he wished the porter a
sulky good-night, and retreated.
The fact was, that the noisy gentleman in the rooms above, as soon as he
caught the tones of Mr Perkins's voice at Carey's door, had entered into
the joke with exceeding gusto, well aware that the visit was really
intended as a compliment to his own vocal powers. Carey's sudden bolt
puzzled him rather; but as soon as he heard Mr Perkins's foot-steps take
the direction of the porter's lodge, he walked softly down-stairs to the
field of action, and, anticipating in some degree what would follow,
bundled up together sheets, blankets, pillow, dressing apparatus, and
all other signs and tokens of occupation, and made off with them to his
own rooms, sporting the oak behind him, and thus completing the
mystification.
As the facts of the case were pretty sure to transpire in course of
time, Horace took the safe course of getting his cousin out of college
next morning, and calling on Mr Perkins with a full explanation of the
circumstances, and apologies for Carey as a stranger unacquainted with
the police regulations of their learned body, and the respect due
thereto. Of course the man in authority was obliged to be gracious, as
Leicester could not well be answerable for all the faults of his family;
but there never from that time forth happened a row of any kind with
which he did not in his own mind, probably unconsciously, associate poor
Horace.
Whether my readers will set down Horace Leicester as a rowing man or
not, is a point which I leave to their merciful consideration: a reading
man was a title which he never aspired to. He took a very creditable
degree in due season, and was placed in the fourth class with a man who
took up a very long list of books, and was supposed to have read himself
stupid.
"He ought to have done a good deal more," said one of the tutors; "he
had it in him." "I think he was lucky not to have been plucked, myself,"
said Mr Perkins; "he was a very noisy man."
THE EMERALD STUDS
A REMINISCENCE OF THE CIRCUIT.
BY PROFESSOR AYTOUN.
[_MAGA._ AUGUST 1847.]
CHAPTER I.
"Hallo, Tom! Are you not up yet? Why, man, the judges have gone down to
the court half an hour ago, escorted by the most ragged regiment of
ruffians that ever handled a Lochaberaxe."
Such was my matutinal salutation to my friend Thomas Strachan, as I
entered his room on a splendid spring morning. Tom and I were early
college allies. We had attended, or rather, to speak more correctly,
taken out tickets for the different law classes during the same
sessions. We had fulminated together within the walls of the Juridical
Society on legal topics which might have broken the heart of Erskine,
and rewarded ourselves diligently thereafter with the usual relaxations
of a crab and a comfortable tumbler. We had aggravated the same grinder
with our deplorable exposition of the Pandects; and finally assumed, on
the same day, the full-blown honours of the Advocate's wig and gown. Nor
did our fraternal parallel end there: for although we had walked the
boards of the Parliament House with praiseworthy diligence for a couple
of sessions, neither of us had experienced the dulcet sensation which is
communicated to the palm by the contact of the first professional
guinea. In vain did we attempt to insinuate ourselves into the good
graces of the agents, and coin our intellects into such jocular remarks
as are supposed to find most favour in the eyes of facetious
practitioners. In vain did I carry about with me, for a whole week, an
artificial process most skilfully made up; and in vain did Tom compound
and circulate a delectable ditty, entitled "The Song of the
Multiplepoinding." Not a single solicitor would listen to our wooing, or
even intrust us with the task of making the simplest motion. I believe
they thought me too fast, and Tom too much of a genius; and, therefore,
both of us were left among the ranks of the briefless army of the stove.
This would not do. Our souls burned within us with a noble thirst for
legal fame and fees. We held a consultation (without an agent) at the
Rainbow, and finally determined that since Edinburgh would not hear us,
Jedburgh should have the privilege of monopolising our maiden eloquence
at the ensuing justiciary circuit. Jedburgh presents a capital field to
the ambition of a youthful advocate. Very few counsel go that way; the
cases are usually trifling, and the juries easily bamboozled. It has
besides this immense advantage--that should you by any accident happen
to break down, nobody will in all probability be the wiser for it,
provided you have the good sense to ingratiate yourself with the
circuit-clerk.
Tom and I arrived at Jedburgh the afternoon before the circuit began. I
was not acquainted with a human being within the parliamentary
boundaries of that respectable borough, and therefore experienced but a
slight spasm of disappointment when informed by the waiter at the inn,
that no inquiries had yet been made after me, on the part of writers
desirous of professional assistance. Strachan had been wiser. Somehow or
other, he had got a letter of introduction to one Bailie Beerie, a
notable civic dignitary of the place; and, accordingly, on presenting
his credentials, was invited by that functionary to dinner, with a hint
that he "might maybe see a wheen real leddies in the evening." This
pointed so plainly to a white choker and dress boots, that Strachan
durst not take the liberty of volunteering the attendance of his friend;
and accordingly I had been left alone to wile away, as I best might, the
tedium of a sluggish evening. Before starting, however, Tom pledged
himself to return in time for supper; as he entertained a painful
conviction that the party would be excessively slow.
So long as it was light, I amused myself pretty well by strolling along
the banks of the river, and enunciating a splendid speech for the panel
in an imaginary case of murder. However, before I reached the peroration
(which was to consist of a vivid picture of the deathbed of a despairing
jury-man, conscience-stricken by the recollection of an erroneous
verdict), the shades of evening began to close in; the trouts ceased to
leap in the pool, and the rooks desisted from their cawing. I returned
to discuss my solitary mutton at the inn; and then, having nothing to
do, sat down to a moderate libation, and an odd number of the
_Temperance Magazine_, which valuable tract had been left for the
reformation of the traveller by some peripatetic disciple of Father
Mathew.
Nine o'clock came, but so did not Strachan. I began to wax wroth,
muttered anathemas against my faithless friend, rang for the waiter,
and--having ascertained the fact that a Masonic Lodge was that evening
engaged in celebrating the festival of its peculiar patron--I set out
for the purpose of assisting in the pious and mystic labours of the
Brethren of the Jedburgh St Jeremy. At twelve, when I returned to my
quarters, escorted by the junior deacon, I was informed that Strachan
had not made his appearance, and accordingly I went to bed.
Next morning I found Tom, as already mentioned, in his couch. There was
a fine air of negligence in the manner in which his habiliments were
scattered over the room. One glazed boot lay within the fender, whilst
the other had been chucked into a coal-scuttle; and there were evident
marks of mud on the surface of his glossy kerseymeres. Strachan himself
looked excessively pale, and the sole rejoinder he made to my
preliminary remark was, a request for soda-water.
"Tom," said I, inexpressibly shocked at the implied confession of the
nature of his vespers--"I wonder you are not ashamed of yourself! Have
you no higher regard for the dignity of the bar you represent, than to
expose yourself before a Jedburgh Bailie?"
"Dignity be hanged!" replied the incorrigible Strachan. "Bailie Beerie
is a brick, and I won't hear a word against him. But, O Fred! if you
only knew what you missed last night! Such a splendid woman--by Jove,
sir, a thoroughbred angel. A bust like one of Titian's beauties, and the
voice of a lovelorn nightingale!"
"One of the Misses Beerie, I presume. Come, Tom, I think I can fill up
your portrait. Hair of the auburn complexion, slightly running into the
carrot--skin fair, but freckled--greenish eyes--red elbows--culpable
ankles--elephantine waist--and sentiments savouring of the Secession."
"Ring the bell for the waiter, and hold your impious tongue. You never
were farther from the mark in your life. The wing of the raven is not
more glossy than her hair--and oh, the depth and melting lustre of those
dark unfathomable eyes! Waiter! a bottle of soda-water, and you may put
in a thimbleful of cognac."
"Come, Tom!--none of your ravings. Is this an actual Armida, or a new
freak of your own imagination?"
"_Bonâ fide_--an angel in everything, barring the wings."
"Then how the deuce did such a phenomenon happen to emerge at the
Bailie's?"
"That's the very question I was asking myself during the whole time of
dinner. She was clearly not a Scotswoman. When she spoke, it was in the
sweet low accents of a southern clime; and she waved away the proffered
haggis with an air of the prettiest disgust!"
"But the Bailie knew her?"
"Of course he did. I got the whole story out of him after dinner, and,
upon my honour, I think it is the most romantic one I ever heard. About
a week ago, the lady arrived here without attendants. Some say she came
in the mail-coach--others in a dark travelling chariot and pair.
However, what matters it? the jewel can derive no lustre or value from
the casket!"
"Yes--but one always likes to have some kind of idea of the setting. Get
on."
"She seemed in great distress, and inquired whether there were any
letters at the post-office addressed to the Honourable Dorothea Percy.
No such epistle was to be found. She then interrogated the landlord,
whether an elderly lady, whose appearance she minutely described, had
been seen in the neighbourhood of Jedburgh; but except old Mrs
Slammingham of Summertrees, who has been bed-ridden for years, there was
nobody in the county who at all answered to the description. On hearing
this, the lady seemed profoundly agitated--shut herself up in a private
parlour, and refused all sustenance."
"Had she not a reticule with sandwiches, Tom?"
"Do not tempt me to commit justifiable homicide--you see I am in the act
of shaving.--At last the landlady, who is a most respectable person, and
who felt deeply interested at the desolate situation of the poor young
lady, ventured to solicit an interview. She was admitted. There are
moments when the sympathy of even the humblest friend is precious. Miss
Percy felt grateful for the interest so displayed, and confided the tale
of her griefs to the matronly bosom of the hostess."
"And she told you?"
"No,--but she told Bailie Beerie. That active magistrate thought it his
duty to interfere. He waited upon Miss Percy, and from her lips he
gathered the full particulars of her history. Percy is not her real
name, but she is the daughter of an English peer of very ancient family.
Her father having married a second time, Dorothea was exposed to the
persecutions of a low-minded vulgar woman, whose whole ideas were of
that mean and mercenary description which characterise the Caucasian
race. Naomi Shekels was the offspring of a Jew, and she hated, whilst
she envied, the superior charms of the noble Norman maiden. But she had
gained an enormous supremacy over the wavering intellect of the elderly
Viscount; and Dorothea was commanded to receive, with submission, the
addresses of a loathsome apostate, who had made a prodigious fortune in
the railways."
"One of the tribe of Issachar?"
"Exactly. A miscreant whose natural function was the vending of cast
habiliments. Conceive, Fred, what the fair young creature must have felt
at the bare idea of such shocking spousals! She besought, prayed,
implored,--but all in vain. Mammon had taken too deep a root in the
paternal heart,--the old coronet had been furbished up by means of
Israelitish gold, and the father could not see any degradation in
forcing upon his child an alliance similar to his own."
"You interest me excessively."
"Is it not a strange tale?" continued Thomas, adjusting a false collar
round his neck. "I knew you would agree with me when I came to the
pathetic part. Well, Fred, the altar was decked, the ornaments ready,
the Rabbi bespoke----"
"Do you mean to say, Strachan, that Lady Dorothea was to have been
married after the fashion of the Jews?"
"I don't know exactly. I think Beerie said it was a Rabbi; but that may
have been a flight of his own imagination. However, somebody was ready
to have tied the nuptial knot, and all the joys of existence, and its
hopes, were about to fade for ever from the vision of my poor Dorothea!"
"_Your_ Dorothea!" cried I in amazement. "Why, Tom--you don't mean to
insinuate that you have gone that length already?"
"Did I say mine?" repeated Strachan, looking somewhat embarrassed. "It
was a mere figure of speech: you always take one up so uncommonly
short.--Nothing remained for her but flight, or submission to the cruel
mandate. Like a heroic girl, in whose veins the blood of the old
crusaders was bounding, she preferred the former alternative. The only
relation to whom she could apply in so delicate a juncture, was an aged
aunt, residing somewhere in the north of Scotland. To her she wrote,
beseeching her, as she regarded the memory of her buried sister, to
receive her miserable child; and she appointed this town, Jedburgh, as
the place of meeting."
"But where's the aunt?"
"That's just the mysterious part of the business. The crisis was so
imminent that Dorothea could not wait for a reply. She disguised
herself,--packed up a few jewels which had been bequeathed to her by her
mother,--and, at the dead of night, escaped from her father's mansion.
Judge of her terror when, on arriving here, panting and perhaps pursued,
she could obtain no trace whatever of her venerable relative. Alone,
inexperienced and unfriended, I tremble to think what might have been
her fate, had it not been for the kind humanity of Beerie."
"And what was the Bailie's line of conduct?"
"He behaved to her, Fred, like a parent. He supplied her wants, and
invited her to make his house her home, at least until the aunt should
appear. But the noble creature would not subject herself to the weight
of so many obligations. She accepted, indeed, his assistance, but
preferred remaining here until she could place herself beneath
legitimate guardianship. And doubtless," continued Strachan with
fervour, "her good angel is watching over her."
"And this is the whole story?"
"The whole."
"Do you know, Tom, it looks uncommonly like a piece of deliberate
humbug!"
"Your ignorance misleads you, Fred. You would not say so had you seen
her. So sweet--so gentle--with such a tinge of melancholy resignation in
her eye, like that of a virgin martyr about to suffer at the stake! No
one could look upon her for a moment and doubt her purity and truth."
"Perhaps. But you must allow that we are not living exactly in the age
of romance. An elopement with an officer of dragoons is about the
farthest extent of legitimate enterprise which is left to a modern
damsel; and, upon my word, I think the story would have told better, had
some such hero been inserted as a sort of counterpoise to the Jew. But
what's the matter? Have you lost anything?"
"It is very odd!" said Strachan, "I am perfectly certain that I had on
my emerald studs last night. I recollect that Dorothea admired them
exceedingly. Where on earth can I have put them?"
"I don't know, I'm sure. I suspect, Tom, you and the Bailie were rather
convivial after supper. Is your watch wound up?"
"Of course it is. I assure you you are quite wrong. It was a mere matter
of four or five tumblers. Very odd this! Why--I can't find my watch
neither!"
"Hallo! what the deuce! Have we fallen into a den of thieves? This is a
nice beginning to our circuit practice."
"I could swear, Fred, that I put it below my pillow before I went to
sleep. I remember, now, that it was some time before I could fit in the
key. What can have become of it?"
"And you have not left your room since?"
"No, on my word of honour!"
"Pooh--pooh! Then it can't possibly be gone. Look beneath the bolster."
But in vain did we search beneath bolster, mattress, and blankets; yea,
even downwards to the fundamental straw. Not a trace was to be seen of
Cox Savoury's horizontal lever, jewelled, as Tom pathetically remarked,
in four special holes, and warranted to go for a year without more than
a minute's deviation. Neither were the emerald studs, the pride of
Strachan's heart, forthcoming. Boots, chambermaid, and waiter were
collectively summoned--all assisted in the search, and all asseverated
their own integrity.
"Are ye sure, sir, that ye brocht them hame?" said the waiter, an acute
lad, who had served his apprenticeship at a commercial tavern in the
Gorbals; "Ye was gey an' fou when ye cam in here yestreen."
"What do you mean, you rascal?"
"Ye ken ye wadna gang to bed till ye had anither tumbler."
"Don't talk trash! It was the weakest cold-without in the creation."
"And then ye had a sair fecht on politics wi' anither man in the
coffee-room."
"Ha! I remember now--the bagman, who is a member of the League! Where is
the commercial villain?"
"He gaed aff at sax preceesely, this morning, in his gig, to Kelso."
"Then, by the head of Thistlewood!" cried Strachan, frantically, "my
ticker will be turned into tracts against the Corn-laws!"
"Hoot na!" said the waiter, "I canna think that. He looked an unco
respectable-like man."
"No man can be respectable," replied the aristocratic Thomas, "who
sports such infernal opinions as I heard him utter last night. My poor
studs! Fred--they were a gift from Mary Rivers before we quarrelled, and
I would not have lost them for the universe! Only think of them being
exposed for sale at a free-trade bazaar!"
"Come, Tom--they may turn up yet."
"Never in this world, except at a pawnbroker's. I could go mad to think
that my last memorial of Mary is in all probability glittering in the
unclean shirt of a bagman!"
"Had you not better apply to the Fiscal?"
"For what purpose? Doubtless the scoundrel has driven off to the nearest
railway, and is triumphantly counting the mile-posts as he steams to
his native Leeds. No, Fred. Both watch and studs are gone beyond the
hope of redemption."
"The loss is certainly a serious one."
"No doubt of it: but a thought strikes me. You recollect the edict,
_nautæ_, _caupones_, _stabularii_? I have not studied the civil law for
nothing, and am clearly of opinion that in such a case the landlord is
liable."
"By Jove! I believe you are right. But it would be as well to turn up
Shaw and Dunlop for a precedent before you make any row about it.
Besides, it may be rather difficult to establish that you lost them at
the inn."
"If they only refer the matter to my oath, I can easily settle that
point," replied Strachan. "Besides, now that I think of it, Miss Percy
can speak to the watch. She asked me what o'clock it was just before we
parted on the stairs."
"Eh, what! Is the lady in this house?"
"To be sure--did I not tell you so?"
"I say, Tom--couldn't you contrive to let one have a peep at this angel
of yours?"
"Quite impossible. She is the shyest creature in the world, and would
shrink from the sight of a stranger."
"But, my dear Tom----"
"I can't do it, I tell you; so it's no use asking me."
"Well, I must say you are abominably selfish. But what on earth are you
going to do with that red-and-blue Joinville? You can't go down to court
without a white neckcloth."
"I am not going down to court."
"Why, my good fellow! what on earth is the meaning of this?"
"I am not going down to court, that's all. I say, Fred, how do I look in
this sort of thing?"
"Uncommonly like a cock-pheasant in full plumage. But tell me what you
mean?"
"Why, since you must needs know, I am going up-stairs to breakfast with
Miss Percy."
So saying, Mr Strachan made me a polite bow, and left the apartment. I
took my solitary way to the court-house, marvelling at the extreme
rapidity of the effect which is produced by the envenomed darts of
Cupid.