prohibition. She could not persuade the sugar-eaters that they were
Vampyres;--instead of practising, or even admiring her self-denial,
they laughed at it; and one wicked wag even compared her, in allusion
to her acerbity and her privation, to a crab without _the nippers_.
She persevered notwithstanding in her system; and to the constancy
of a martyr added something of the wilfulness of a bigot:--indeed,
it was hinted by patrons and patronesses of white charities, that
European objects had not their _fair_ share in her benevolence. She
was pre-eminently the friend of the blacks. Howbeit, for all her
sacrifices, not a lash was averted from their sable backs. She had
raised discontent in the kitchen, she had disgusted her acquaintance,
sickened her friends, and given her own dear little nephews the
stomach-ache, without saving Quashy from one cut of the driver’s
whip, or diverting a single kick from the shins of Sambo. Her grocer
complained loudly of being called a dealer in human gore, yet not one
hogshead the less was imported from the Plantations. By an error common
to all her class she mistook a negative for a positive principle; and
persuaded herself that by _not_ preserving damsons, she preserved the
Niggers; that by _not_ sweetening her own cup, she was dulcifying the
lot of all her sable brethren in bondage. She persevered accordingly in
setting her face against sugar instead of slavery; against the plant
instead of the planter; and had actually abstained for six months from
the forbidden article, when a circumstance occurred that roused her
sympathies into more active exertions. It pleased an American lady
to import with her a black female servant, whom she rather abruptly
dismissed, on her arrival in England. The case was considered by the
Hampshire Telegraph of that day, as one of GREAT HARDSHIP; the
paragraph went the round of the papers and in due time attracted the
notice of Miss Morbid. It was precisely addressed to her sensibilities,
and there was a “Try Warren” tone about it that proved irresistible.
She read--and wrote--and in the course of one little week, her domestic
establishment was maliciously but truly described as consisting of “two
white Slaves and a black Companion.”
The adopted protégé was, in reality, a strapping clumsy Negress, as
ugly as sin, and with no other merit than that of being of the same
colour as the crow. She was artful, sullen, gluttonous, and above
all so intolerably indolent, that if she had been literally “carved
in ebony,” as old Fuller says, she could scarcely have been of less
service to her protectress. Her notion of Free Labour seemed to
translate it into laziness, and taking liberties; and, as she seriously
added to the work of her fellow-servants, without at all contributing
to their comfort, they soon looked upon her as a complete nuisance.
The housemaid dubbed her “a Divil,”--the cook roundly compared her to
“a mischivus beast, as runs out on a herd o’ black cattle;”--and both
concurred in the policy of laying all household sins upon the sooty
shoulders--just as slatterns select a colour that hides the dirt.
It is certain that shortly after the instalment of the negress in
the family a moral disease broke out with considerable violence, and
justly or not, the odium was attributed to the new comer. Its name was
theft. First, there was a shilling short in some loose change--next,
a missing half-crown from the mantelpiece--then there was a stir with
a tea-spoon--anon, a piece of work about a thimble. Things went,
nobody knew how--the “Divil” of course excepted. The Cook _could_, the
Housemaid _would_, and Dinah _should_, and _ought_ to take an oath,
declaratory of innocence, before the mayor; but as Dinah did not
volunteer an affidavit like the others, there was no doubt of her guilt
in the kitchen.
Miss Morbid, however, came to a very different conclusion. She thought
that whites who could eat sugar, were capable of any atrocity, and
had not forgotten the stand which had been made by the “pale faces,”
in favour of the obnoxious article. The cook especially incurred
suspicion; for she had been notorious aforetime for a lavish hand in
sweetening, and was accordingly quite equal to the double turpitude of
stealing and bearing false witness. In fact the mistress had arrived
at the determination of giving both her white hussies their month’s
warning, when unexpectedly the thief was taken, as the lawyers say,
“in the manner,” and with the goods upon the person. In a word the
ungrateful black was detected, in the very act of levying what might be
called her “Black Mail.”
The horror of Emilia, on discovering that the Moor had murdered
her mistress, was scarcely greater than that of Miss Morbid! She
hardly, she said, believed her own senses. You might have knocked
her down with a feather! She did not know whether she stood on her
head or her heels. She was rooted to the spot; and her hair, if it
had been her own, would have stood upright upon her head! There
was no doubt in the case. She saw the transfer of a portion of her
own bank stock, from her escritoire into the right-hand pocket of
her protégé--she heard it chink as it dropped downwards--she was
petrified!--dumbfounded!--thunderbolted!--“annilliated!” She was as
white as a sheet, but she felt as if all the blacks in the world had
just blown in her face.
Her first impulse was to rush upon the robber, and insist on
restitution--her second was to sit down and weep,--and her third was
to talk. The opening as usual was a mere torrent of ejaculations
intermixed with vituperation--but she gradually fell into a lecture
with many heads. First, she described all that she had done for the
Blacks, and then, alas! all that the Blacks had done for her. Next she
insisted on the enormity of the crime, and, anon, she enlarged on the
nature of its punishment. It was here that she was most eloquent. She
traced the course of human justice, from detection to conviction, and
thence to execution, liberally throwing dissection into the bargain:
and then descending with Dante into the unmentionable regions, she
painted its terrors and tortures with all the circumstantial fidelity
that certain very Old Masters have displayed on the same subject.
“And now, you black wretch,” she concluded, having just given the
finishing touch to a portrait of Satan himself; “and now, you black
wretch, I insist on knowing what I was robbed for. Come, tell me what
tempted you! I’m determined to hear it! I insist, I say, on knowing
what was to be done with the wages of iniquity!”
She insisted, however, in vain. The black wretch had seriously inclined
her ear to the whole lecture, grinning and blubbering by turns. The
Judge with his black cap, the Counsel and their wigs, the twelve
men in a box, and Jack Ketch himself--whom she associated with that
pleasant West Indian personage, John Canoe--had amused, nay, tickled
her fancy; the press-room, the irons, the rope, and the Ordinary, whom
she mistook for an overseer, had raised her curiosity, and excited
her fears; but the spiritualities, without any reference to Obeah,
had simply mystified and disgusted her, and she was now in a fit of
the sulks. Her mistress, however, persisted in her question; and not
the less pertinaciously, perhaps, from expecting a new peg whereon to
hang a fresh lecture. She was determined to learn the destination of
the stolen money; and by dint of insisting, cajoling, and, above all,
threatening--for instance, with the whole Posse Comitatis--she finally
carried her point.
“Cuss him money! Here’s a fuss!” exclaimed the culprit, quite worn out
at last by the persecution. “Cuss him money! here’s a fuss! What me
’teal him for? What me do wid him? What anybody ’teal him for? Why, for
sure, _to buy sugar_!”
[Illustration: “LAWK! HOW THE BLACKS ARE FALLING.”]
[Illustration: SHORT OF BAIT.--GIVE ME A WORM.]
EPIGRAMS.
COMPOSED ON READING A DIARY LATELY PUBLISHED.
That flesh is grass is now as clear as day,
To any but the merest purblind pup;
Death cuts it down, and then, to make her hay,
My Lady B---- comes and rakes it up.
THE LAST WISH.
When I resign this world so briary,
To have across the Styx my ferrying,
Oh, may I die without a DIARY!
And be interr’d without a BURY-ing!
* * * * *
The poor dear dead have been laid out in vain,
Turn’d into cash, they are laid out again!
THE DEVIL’S ALBUM.
It will seem an odd whim
For a Spirit so grim
As the Devil to take a delight in;
But by common renown
He has come up to town,
With an Album for people to write in!
On a handsomer book
Mortal never did look;
Of a flame-colour silk is the binding!
With a border superb,
Where through flow’ret and herb,
The old serpent goes brilliantly winding!
By gilded grotesques,
And emboss’d arabesques,
The whole cover, in fact, is pervaded;
But, alas! in a taste
That betrays they were traced
At the will of a Spirit degraded!
As for paper--the best,
But extremely hot-pressed,
Courts the pen to luxuriate upon it,
And against ev’ry blank
There’s a note on the Bank,
As a bribe for a sketch or a sonnet.
Who will care to appear
In the Fiend’s Souvenir,
Is a question to mortals most vital;
But the very first leaf,
It’s the public belief,
Will be fill’d by a Lady of Title!
THE SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD.
I once, for a very short time indeed, had the honour of being a
schoolmaster, and was invested with the important office of “rearing
the tender thought,” and “teaching the young idea how to shoot;” of
educating in the principles of the Established Church, and bestowing
the strictest attention to morals. The case was this; my young friend
G----, a graduate of Oxford, and an ingenious and worthy man, thought
proper, some months back, to establish, or endeavour to establish,
an academy for young gentlemen, in my immediate vicinity. He had
already procured nine day-pupils to begin with, whom he himself
taught,--prudence as yet prohibiting the employment of ushers,--when
he was summoned hastily to attend upon a dying relative in Hampshire,
from whom he had some expectations. This was a dilemma to poor G----,
who had no one to leave in charge of his three classes; and he could
not bear the idea of playing truant himself so soon after commencing
business. In his extremity he applied to me as his forlorn hope, and
one forlorn enough; for it is well-known among my friends that I
have little Latin, and less Greek, and am, on every account, a worse
accountant. I urged these objections to G----, but in vain, for he
had no “friend in need,” learned or unlearned, within any reasonable
distance, and, as he said to comfort me, “in three or four days merely
the boys could not _unlearn_ much of anything.”
[Illustration: A BRANCH COACH.]
At last I gave way to his importunity. On Thursday night, he started
from the tree of knowledge by a branch coach; and at nine on Friday
morning, I found myself sitting at his desk in the novel character of
pedagogue. I am sorry to say, not one of the boys played truant, or
was confined at home with a violent illness.--There they were, nine
little mischievous wretches, goggling, tittering, pointing, winking,
grimacing, and mocking at authority, in a way enough to invoke two
Elisha bears out of Southgate Wood. To put a stop to this indecorum,
I put on my spectacles, stuck my cane upright in the desk, with the
fool’s-cap atop--but they inspired little terror; worn out at last,
I seized the cane, and rushing from my dais, well flogged--I believe
it is called flogging--the boy, a Creole, nearest me; who, though far
from the biggest, was much more daring and impertinent than the rest.
So far my random selection was judicious; but it appeared afterwards,
that I had chastised an only son, whose mother had expressly stipulated
for him an exemption from all punishment. I suspect, with the moral
prudence of fond mothers, she had informed the little imp of the
circumstance, for this Indian-Pickle fought and kicked his preceptor
as unceremoniously as he would have scuffled with Black Diana or
Agamemnon. My first move, however, had a salutary effect; the urchins
settled, or made believe to settle, to their tasks; but I soon
perceived that the genuine industry and application belonged to one,
a clever-looking boy, who, with pen and paper before him, was sitting
at the further end of a long desk, as great a contrast to the others,
as the Good, to the Bad Apprentice in Hogarth. I could see his tongue
even at work at one corner of his mouth,--a very common sign of boyish
assiduity,--and his eyes never left his task but occasionally to glance
towards his master, as if in anticipation of the approving smile,
to which he looked forward as the prize of industry. I had already
selected him inwardly for a favourite, and resolved to devote my best
abilities to his instruction, when I saw him hand the paper, with a sly
glance to his neighbour, from whom it passed rapidly down the desk,
accompanied by a running titter, and sidelong looks, that convinced
me the supposed copy was, indeed, a copy not of “Obey your superiors,”
or “Age commands respect,” but of the head of the college, and, as a
glimpse showed, a head with very ludicrous features. Being somewhat
fatigued with my last execution, I suffered the cane of justice to
sleep, and inflicted the fool’s-cap--literally the fool’s--for no clown
in pantomime, the great Grimaldi not excepted, could have made a more
laughter-stirring use of the costume. The little enormities, who only
tittered before, now shouted outright, and nothing but the enchanted
wand of bamboo could flap them into solemnity. Order was restored, for
they saw I was, like Earl Grey, resolved to “stand by my order;” and
while I was deliberating, in some perplexity, how to begin business,
the two biggest boys came forward voluntarily, and standing as much
as they could in a circle, presented themselves, and began to read as
the first Greek class. Mr. Irving may boast of his prophets as much as
he will; but in proportion to the numbers of our congregations, I had
far more reason to be proud of my gabblers in an unknown tongue. I,
of course, discovered no lapsus lingui in the performance, and after
a due course of gibberish, the first class dismissed itself, with a
brace of bows and an evident degree of self-satisfaction at being so
perfect in the present after being so imperfect in the past. I own
this first act of our solemn farce made me rather nervous against the
next, which proved to be the Latin class, and I have no doubt to an
adept would have seemed as much a Latin comedy as those performed at
the Westminster school. We got through the second course quite correct,
as before, and I found, with some satisfaction, that the third was a
dish of English Syntax, where I _was_ able to detect flaws, and the
heaps of errors that I had to arrest made me thoroughly sensible of the
bliss of ignorance in the Greek and Latin. A general lesson in English
reading ensued, through which we glided smoothly enough, till we came
to a sandbank in the shape of a Latin quotation, which I was requested
to English. It was something like this:--“Nemo mortalius omnibus hora
sapit,” which I rendered, “No mortal knows at what hour the omnibus
starts”--and with this translation the whole school was perfectly
satisfied. Nine more bows.
[Illustration: A SECOND COURSE.]
My horror now approached: I saw the little wretches lug out their
slates, and begin to cuff out the old sums, a sight that made me wish
all the slates at the roof of the house. I knew very well that when
the army of nine attacked my Bonnycastle, it would not long hold out.
Unluckily, from inexperience, I gave them all the same question to
work, and the consequence was, each brought up a different result--nor
would my practical knowledge of Practice allow me to judge of their
merits. I had no resource but, Lavater-like, to go by Physiognomy, and
accordingly selected the solution of the most mathematical-looking boy.
But Lavater betrayed me. Master White, a chowder-headed lout of a lad,
as dull as a pig of lead, and as mulishly obstinate as Muley Abdallah,
persisted that his answer was correct, and at last appealed to the
superior authority of a Tutor’s Key, that he had kept by stealth in
his desk. From this instant my importance declined, and the urchins
evidently began to question, with some justice, what right I had to
rule nine, who was not competent to the Rule of Three. By way of a
diversion, I invited my pupils to a walk; but I wish G---- had been
more circumstantial in his instructions before he left. Two of the boys
pleaded sick headaches to remain behind; and I led the rest, through
my arithmetical failure, under very slender government, by the most
unfortunate route I could have chosen,--in fact, past the very windows
of their parents, who complained afterwards, that they walked more like
bears than boys, and that if Mr. G---- had drawn lots for one at a
raffle, he could not have been more unfortunate in his new usher.
[Illustration: DRAWING LOTS.]
To avoid observation, which I did not court, I led them aside into a
meadow, and pulling out a volume of Paradise Lost, left the boys to
amuse themselves as they pleased. They pleased, accordingly, to get up
a little boxing match, à la Crib and Molineux--between Master White and
the little Creole, of which I was informed only by a final shout and
a stream of blood that trickled, or treacled, from the flat nose of
the child of colour. Luckily, as I thought, he was near home, whither
I sent him for washing and consolation, and in return for which, in
the course of a quarter of an hour, while still in the field, a black
footman, in powder blue turned up with yellow, brought me the following
note:--
“Mrs. Col. Christopher informs Mr. G----’s Usher, that as the
vulgar practice of pugilism is allowed at Spring Grove Academy,
Master Adolphus Ferdinand Christopher will in future be educated at
home; particularly as she understands Master C. was punished in the
morning, in a way that only becomes blacks and slaves.--To the new
Usher at Mr. G----’s.”
Irritated at this event and its commentary, I resolved to punish Master
White, but Master White was nowhere to be found, having expelled
himself and run away home, where he complained to his parents of the
new usher’s deficiencies, and told the whole story of the sum in
Practice, begging earnestly to be removed from a school where, as he
said, it was impossible for him to improve himself. The prayer of
the petition was heard, and on the morrow, Mr. White’s son was minus
at Spring Grove Academy. Calling in the remainder, I ordered a march
homewards, where I arrived just in time to hear the sham headaches of
the two invalids go off with an alarming explosion--for they had thus
concerted an opportunity for playing with gunpowder and prohibited
arms. Here was another discharge from the school, for no parents think
that their children look the better without eyebrows, and accordingly,
when they went home for the night, the fathers and mothers resolved to
send them to some other school, where no powder was allowed, except
upon the head of the master. I was too much hurt to resume schooling
after the boys’ bad behaviour, and so gave them a half-holiday; and
never, oh never did I so estimate the blessing of sleep, as on that
night when I closed my eyelids on all my pupils! But, alas! sleep
brought its sorrows:--I saw boys fighting, flourishing slates, and
brandishing squibs and crackers in my visions; and through all,--such
is the transparency of dreams,--I beheld the stern shadow of G----
looking unutterable reproaches.
[Illustration: “COMING EVENTS CAST THEIR SHADOWS BEFORE.”]
The next morning, with many painful recollections, brought one of
pleasure; I remembered that it was the King’s Birthday, and in a fit
of very sincere loyalty, gave the whole school, alas! reduced by one
half, a whole holiday. Thus I got over the end of the week, and Sunday,
literally a day of rest, was spent by the urchins at their own homes.
It may seem sinful to wish for the death of a fellow-creature, but
I could not help thinking of G----’s relative along with what is
called a happy release; and he really was so kind, as we learned by
an express from G----, as to break up just after his arrival, and
that G---- consequently would return in time to resume his scholastic
duties on the Monday morning. With infinite pleasure I heard this good
bad news from Mrs. G----, who never interfered in the classical part
of the house, and was consequently all unconscious of the reduction
in the Spring Grove Establishment. I forged an excuse for immediately
leaving off school; “resigned I kissed the rod” that I resigned, and
as I departed, no master but my own, was overwhelmed by a torrent of
grateful acknowledgments of the service I had done the school, which,
as Mrs. G---- protested, could never have got on without me. How it
got on I left G---- to discover, and I am told he behaved rather like
Macduff at the loss of his “little ones”--but luckily, I had given
myself warning before his arrival, and escaped from one porch of the
Academy at that nick of time when the Archodidasculus was entering by
another, perfectly convinced that, however adapted to “live and learn,”
I should never be able to live and teach.
THE LOST HEIR.
“Oh, where, and oh where
Is my bonny laddie gone?”--OLD SONG.
One day, as I was going by
That part of Holborn christened High,
I heard a loud and sudden cry
That chill’d my very blood;
And lo! from out a dirty alley,
Where pigs and Irish wont to rally,
I saw a crazy woman sally,
Bedaub’d with grease and mud.
She turn’d her East, she turn’d her West,
Staring like Pythoness possest,
With streaming hair and heaving breast
As one stark mad with grief.
This way and that she wildly ran,
Jostling with woman and with man--
Her right hand held a frying pan,
The left a lump of beef.
At last her frenzy seem’d to reach
A point just capable of speech,
And with a tone almost a screech,
As wild as ocean birds,
Or female Ranter mov’d to preach,
She gave her “sorrow words.”
[Illustration: A LOST CHILD ITS OWN CRIER.]
[Illustration: A MONSTER OF INIQUITY.]