“The lasses o’ Carel are weel-shap’d an’ bonny,
But he that wad win yen mun brag of his gear,
You may follow and follow till heart sick and weary—
To get them needs siller and fine claes to wear.
“They’ll catch at a reed cwoat leyke as monie mack’rel,
And jump at a fop, or even lissen a fuil,
Just brag of an uncle that’s got heaps of money,
And de’il a bit odds if you’ve ne’er been at schuil.
_The Lasses of Carel._
“Deuce tek the clock! click-clackin’ sae
Ay in a body’s ear,
It tells and tells the teyme is past,
When Jobby sud been here.
* * * * *
“But, whisht! I hear my Jobby’s fit;
Aye, that’s his varra clog!
He steeks the faul yeat softly tui—
_Oh, hang that cwoley dog!_”
_The Impatient Lassie._
If as Mr. Sidney Herbert has informed us this nation be suffering from a
glut of females—if as the commercial editor of the _Economist_ would
say, the extreme depression of our matrimonial markets be due to an
over-production of spinsters—if the annual supply of marriageable young
ladies in this country be greater than the demand for the same on the
part of marriageable young gentlemen—if virgin loveliness is becoming as
cheap as slop shirts in the land, and the market value of heiresses has
fallen considerably below their real value—if Cupid is compelled to
dispose of the extensive stock he has now on hand of last season’s
beauties, at an “ALARMING SACRIFICE,” on account of the “TREMENDOUS
FAILURE” of Hymen—assuredly the Great Exhibition of all Nations was a
wise means of restoring the matrimonial markets of the metropolis to a
healthy equilibrium.
When the philogynic mind—which we take it is a thousandfold better than
the mere philanthropic commodity—is led to consider the vast influx of
susceptible natures that will occur at that eventful period—when we
remember that the most eminent statisticians have calculated, that “a
wave” of a hundred thousand pairs of mustachios will be tossed upon our
shores every week—when we recollect that monster trains, filled with
every kind of “hairy monster,” will deposit, at the London Bridge
terminus, their daily thousands of gynolatrous Frenchmen, with very
large beards, and very small carpet-bags, together with their hundreds
of polygamic Turks, hirsute as handsome, and with turbans as bewitching
to the ladies, as that of the black cymbal-player in the Guards,—when we
reflect, moreover, that as if this superabundance of amatoriness was not
a sufficient boon to the “women of England,” the Iron Duke had, with a
view of creating an _embarras de richesse_ for the ladies, given orders
that an extra body of soldiers—all picked men—should be marched up from
the country, and bivouacked in the neighbourhood of the ladies’ schools,
embellishing the outskirts of the capital—when, too, we call to mind
that the active and vigilant Commissioners of Police have, as a grand
captivating climax to the whole, come to the noble resolution of adding
no less than eight hundred pairs of whiskers to the already strong
amatory power of “the force,”—when, in fine, we come to think upon the
turbans of the Turks—the beards of the Frenchmen—the mustachios of the
soldiers—and the whiskers of the police, that will be all congregated
within the Bills of Mortality, into one vast focus of fascination,—what
maid, what widow shall not be wooed—shall not be won—and after all,
count herself extremely lucky if she’s wed.
* * * * *
While Mr. and Mrs. Sandboys and Miss Elcy sat by the kitchen fire,
anxiously awaiting the return of Jobby from the station, or the arrival
of some tidings from the telegraph, touching their missing boxes, Major
Oldschool was in the parlour, wondering when he should have any news as
to the whereabouts of that “ungrateful young hussy,” his niece, who,
after he had sent for her home from Miss Wewitz’s establishment at
Wimbledon, had returned his kindness by going off with a foreign Count,
with a beard like a Scotchman’s philibeg, and a portmanteau not much
bigger than a sandwich-box. However, he had given information to the
police, and a couple of their most active officers had been despatched
after the fugitives.
At this juncture, one of the Detective Force called at Mrs. Fokesell’s,
to apprise the Major that they had already tracked the runaway Miss. The
maid went out into the area to answer the knock and learn the business
of the visitor. In a few minutes she returned, saying, it was a strange
kind of a man, and that he had a strange kind of a way with him, and had
whispered something to her down the railings that he wanted to see a
gentleman about “summat as was missing.”
The Sandboys no sooner heard this, than they, one and all, started from
their seats, declaring it was the man from the telegraph with news of
poor Psyche and their boxes.
The maid was despatched with directions to bring the messenger down into
the kitchen immediately, and in a minute a pair of heavy boots were
heard descending the stairs.
“Tha’s come about that thar baggage of ourn, haista?” inquired Mr.
Cursty.
The term “baggage” was quite sufficient to assure the Detective that he
was in the presence of the gentleman whose female relative had eloped
with the foreign Count.
“Yes, sir; we’ve got some clue as to what you allude to—we’ve discovered
their whereabouts, at least”—and the cautious and mysterious Officer
winked his eye, and nodded his head knowingly.
“Oh, thar’s a guid man! a guid man!” cried Mrs. Sandboys, with extreme
joy. “So tha’st heard on t’things at last.”
“True, ma’am,” replied the Officer, “when last we heard on—you know—the
things”—and he winked again—“they wasn’t a hundred miles from”—and here
he looked cautiously round the room, and added in a whisper—“Gretna
Green, ma’am.”
“Gertna Gern!” exclaimed Mr. Cursty; “whar on yerth be that?”
“Why, I should think it’s about, as near as may be, three hundred and
fifty miles,” added the Detective, nodding his head knowingly, “from
where you’re a sitting on.”
“Waistoma! waistoma! we shall set e’en on t’things never nae mair,”
shouted Mrs. Sandboys, wringing her hands, as she thought of the
“changeless” state of the family.
“And my poor pet! oh, dear!” interjected Elcy.
Mr. Christopher inquired whether they were in safe custody.
“Why, no, sir, we can’t say as how we’ve got ’em in custody, yet. You
see its rayther nasty work making mistakes in matters of this kind.”
“Then wha in t’ neame of guidness had got how’d of t’ guids,” asked the
wife, in a half-frantic state of alarm.
“Oh, you needn’t be under no fears, ma’am; it’s the same foreign party,”
returned the officer, with another familiar jerk of his head, “as bolted
from London with the ‘bit of goods,’ as you says, ma’am.” And here he
gave another wink.
“Oh, then it be as I ’spected, Cursty,” added Mrs. S., “and I suddent
wonder but t’ nasty, filthy wretch has got on, at this verra teyme, yen
of t’ new shirts I bought thee.”
“And what ever will become of my poor, poor pet?” ejaculated Elcy, with
tears in her eyes, for she could think of nothing else but Psyche. “You
don’t happen to know—do you, sir—whether that horrid, horrid foreigner
is treating the dear thing well, and whether he gives her plenty to
eat?”
“Why, for the matter of that, Miss, I think the party a’nt got over much
for hisself,” and as if the information was very important, the
Detective nodded and winked at the young lady several times in
succession.
“Ah, I thought it would be so,” sobbed the young lady, bursting into a
flood of tears, “and after all the pains I had taken to fatten the
darling. Perhaps you might have heard whether that brute of a foreign
gentleman, sir, allowed the dear to continue her flannel jackets; for if
he’s only made her leave them off, I’m sure the poor creature must have
shivered herself all to pieces by this time.”
“Indeed, ma’am!” exclaimed the astonished Detective, who began to think,
from Elcy’s description, that the missing young lady couldn’t be much of
a beauty—and, like the gallant members of the force, he flattered
himself he was a bit of a judge that way; then, as he heard the
broken-hearted girl sob aloud at the thoughts of the sufferings and
appearance of her darling Psyche, he said to Mr. Sandboys, “The young
lady seems to have been wery much attached to t’other one, sir?”
“Oh, yes,” replied Mrs. Sandboys, “she a’ways wud hev her to sleep at t’
fut of her bed, even though I set mey feace again it, lest there might
be a few stray fleas about t’ creatur, you ken.”
The Detective stared with astonishment, and began to think that the
family were all very strange. However, it was easy to tell by their
conversation that they were fresh from the country, and _that_, in his
mind, made allowance for a great deal. If he had not felt convinced,
however, that he had made no mistake in the number of the house, he
might have had some slight suspicion as to his blunder, but as it was,
he attributed the peculiar character of their conversation to an
ignorance of London ways and manners.
“Oh, sir,” Elcy broke out again, “do—pray, do, sir—try and get my poor,
poor pet back for me.”
“Well, Miss, I think we shall be able to oblige you by and by,” returned
the officer, twiddling his bushy whiskers with self-satisfaction; “I
came to tell you——”
“Yes! yes!”
“That we had just had news up by telegraph from one of our men down in
the North, that she was seen yesterday in company with a queer-kind of a
foreign gentleman—the same party, from all as I can learn, as ran away
with her—that is to say, if the description we’ve got is correct. It
says here,”—and he drew from his pocket a paper, which he began
reading,—’female—small and elegant figure.’”
“Yes, sir; yes, sir!” interrupted the anxious Elcy. “She was an Italian,
sir; and one of the most perfect animals ever seen, sir.”
“Well, my instructions don’t say nothing, Miss, about her being of
Italian extraction; but if she came from that there country, it’s quite
sufficient to account for her being what you says, Miss. But my adwices
runs merely—’female—small and elegant figure,’” continued the officer,
reading.
“Wheyte reet,” interrupted Cursty.
“Rayther fresh colour,” added the Detective.
“Yes, sir, we used to call her foxy—and she had one of the most
beautiful coats of her own you ever saw.”
“No, there ain’t a word here about her having any kind of a coat. But I
know, Miss; you means one of them there kind of hairy coats we sees the
females in Regent Street in, now-a-days.”
“And what was very remarkable about her, sir,” continued Elcy, intent
upon the perfections of her lost pet, “was her nose—it was a beauty, I
do assure you—so long and sharp, and then always so nice and cold, even
in the height of summer.”
The Detective could not help smiling at the country girl’s idea of a
beautiful nose, and again referring to his paper, said, half to himself,
“They’ve got it down here as Grecian, but I suppose that’ll do.”
“Then again, sir, she had one of the smallest waists, and, I really
think, the very thinnest legs you could see anywhere.”
The Policeman started with wonder at what he thought the young lady’s
extreme simplicity, and merely observed, “Our people don’t say nothing
about her legs, Miss;” then, turning to Mr. Sandboys, he inquired
whether he had ever known the Italian to go astray before.
“Why, noa,” returned Cursty; “I never kenned her run after owt, with t’
exception of a young hare yence, as she fell in wi’, down Buttermere
way.”
“Ah, that’s what they’ll all do,” observed the Policeman; “they are all
ready enough to run after the young heirs, sir, in town and country,
too,” he added, smiling at his self-conceited severity on the sex; “and
them Italians, I’m told, sir, is shocking warm-blooded creatures.”
“Warm-blooded!” echoed Cursty; “I’se sure, she always seemed cold enough
wi’ us, for she were sheevering and shecking away from mworning tull
neet, for aw the warl’ as if she was a loomp of penter’s seyze,
(painter’s size.) But they be ongracious things to kip; food seems aw
thworn away on ’em.”
“Yes!” said Mrs. Sandboys, indignantly, “though I ’lowanced her as much
as twa pennywuth of meat every day, forby aw the screps from our tebble,
she never did yen onny justice. If yen had hawf starved her, she cuddent
a bin mair thin than she were.”
The larder-loving Policeman could not help thinking to himself that the
allowance was far from being anything to brag about, nor was he much
astonished, now that he was made acquainted with the diet she had been
used to, at the disappearance of the imaginary young lady.
“If it wer’n’t for puir Elcy, here, I meysel suddent car’ sa varra much
if t’ creature never kem back nae mair, for there beant much ’ffection
in them thar Italians. Now it were on’y last year, she’d twa young
ones.”
The Detective started back with astonishment, and began to think that
such a circumstance fully accounted for “the party” having gone off with
the French gentleman on the present occasion.
“Yes, it’s a fact, she had twa young ones, and didn’t sim to car’ a bit
when I drowned them baith in our pond.”
The Policeman no sooner heard the confession of what he believed to be a
case of infanticide, than he exclaimed “Did I understand you, sir, that
_you_—you yourself drowned the poor little things?”
“Yes,” continued the innocent Sandboys, “I thowt she wuddent be yable to
’tend to them, you ken; so, for her seek, I ’termined on putting them
out of t’ way as whietly as I cud.”
The Detective here assumed a solemn tone, and proceeded to caution Mr.
Sandboys after the custom of his craft, telling him that he was not
called upon to criminate himself, and that whatever he might say on the
painful subject would be used in evidence against him on a future
occasion.
It was now Mr. Sandboys’ turn to stare with the same astonishment at the
Detective, as the “man of peace” had a few moments before looked at him.
“What dost tha mean, man, by t’ painful subject, and yens words being
yused in yevidence against yen?” he hastily inquired.
The Policeman made no more ado, but straightway drew his staff from his
hinder pocket, and told Cursty that he arrested him and the whole family
in the Queen’s name; and, to give additional weight to the announcement,
he added, that he was a Detective Officer, in connexion with her
Majesty’s Metropolitan Police.
The words were no sooner out of “the Authority’s” mouth than Mr.
Sandboys, vividly remembering his railway adventure with a pseudo member
of the same respectable body, seized the kitchen poker, which happened
to be in the fire at that moment, and, without a word, proceeded, with
it in his hand, to chase the startled Official round the kitchen table;
but finding it impossible to get within arm’s length of the Policeman
while that article of furniture stood between them, Cursty stopped,
after a few turns, and placed himself before the doorway, with the
red-hot weapon still in his hand, and vowed that the Detective should
not leave the house until he had given him in charge. Mr. Sandboys told
him he had been taken in by that detective trick once before; and though
he and his family _might_ be fresh up from the country, and the
Londoners _might_ think they could impose upon them as they pleased,
still he’d let them see he was a match for them, this time, “for aw
that.”
The self-possessed policeman, finding himself imprisoned, stepped back a
few paces; and, drawing his rattle from his coat-pocket, proceeded to
spring it with all his force in the middle of the kitchen, amid the
shrieks of Mrs. and Miss Sandboys.
In a minute down came the lodgers “of all nations,” in ready answer to
the summons; and scarcely had the “whir-r” finished, before the kitchen
was filled with the “drawing-rooms,” “the second, and third floors,” and
“the garrets” from every quarter of the globe; and among the number was
Mr. Quinine, who was heard to declare that the sudden alarm had thrown
Mrs. Quinine back—it was impossible for him to say to what extent.
Then, of course, came the humiliating explanation in the presence of the
assembled multitude; and there, amidst the laughter “of all
nations,”—for the foreigners, one and all, would have the circumstance
translated to them,—Mr. and Mrs. Sandboys had to make known the whole of
the mistake, and to tell how Cursty was about to be taken into custody
on a charge of infanticide, for having drowned a couple of puppies. By
the time he had finished what theatrical critics term “the
_éclaircissement_ of the _contretemps_” a body of police, attracted to
the spot by the well-known buzz of a distant rattle, swarmed round the
door like blue-bottles round a butcher’s shop, and there they kept
dabbing at the knocker, very much after the same persevering manner as
belongs to beadles accompanying the parish engine to a chimney on fire.
* * * * *
As we said before, while the Sandboys were in the kitchen, anxiously
looking for some tidings touching their luggage, Major Oldschool was,
immediately overhead, impatiently pacing the parlour, and vowing all
manner of vengeance against his niece for having gone off with a “dirty,
beggarly, skinny vagabond of a Frenchman.” The Major was what is termed
a “good hater” of foreigners.
Major Oldschool was a portly little man, who had left one of his legs
behind him in India, where the better part of his life had been spent,
and where, while attacking one of the bamboo forts of the Burmese, he
had been wounded in his knee-cap in such a manner as to necessitate the
amputation of the limb. In figure he was far from commanding; for the
high living of India had given him so strong a tendency to corpulence,
that he had lost sight of his boot for many years. This obesity was a
great annoyance to the Major, and, to keep his fat within due bounds,
his braided blue surtout was made to fit so tight, that you could not
help fancying but that, with the slightest puncture, he would shrivel up
to a mere bit of skin, like an India-rubber ball. Major Oldschool,
withal, had that “highly respectable” appearance which invariably
accompanies the white hair so peculiar to Bankers, Capitalists, and
Pomeranian dogs. It was the Major’s continual boast, that he was grey
before he was thirty; and so proud was he of his silver locks, that he
wore them half over his face, in the form of whiskers and moustachios,
which met at the corners of his mouth, and gave him very much the look
of a gentleman who had been called away in the middle of shaving, and
had the lather still clinging about his lips and cheeks.
Another striking peculiarity of the Major was, that he _would_ wear
tight black stocking-net pantaloons, and _a_ Hessian boot—for the place
of the other boot, ever since he had been wounded, was supplied by a
wooden leg. And it sounded not a little strange to hear him, as the
night drew in, call for his slipp_er_, or, if he fancied he had taken
cold, talk of putting his _foot_ in hot water; and equally curious was
it when his old housekeeper informed him that really his leg was getting
so shabby, he _must_ have it fresh painted. In his bed-room, against the
wall, stood a range of old boots and shoes—all rights and no lefts—one
Hessian, one dancing-pump, and one carpet slipper; and when he sat down
in his chair, his wooden leg stuck out at right angles to his Hessian
boot, so that it had somewhat the appearance of a gun protruding from a
ship’s side.
The Major had no fixed residence, (he had to come up from Bath within
the last few weeks, to be present at the opening of the Great
Exhibition,) but continually floated about the country in the company of
an old housekeeper, who knowing all his ways, and all his whims, had
grown to be quite indispensable to him. Mrs. Coddle was the lady of a
defunct twopenny-postman, and since the death of the respected twopenny,
she had “took to nussing;” but not liking the dormitory accommodations
usual in “the monthly line,” she had been only too glad to avail herself
of the Major’s offer, after having attended him during a severe bilious
fever, to continue in his service in the capacity of housekeeper. And so
effectually had she performed her duties, and so necessary had she made
herself to his comfort, during her short residence with him in that
capacity, that—having a true sense of her value to him—she always made a
point, when she could not get the Major to do just as she pleased, of
threatening to leave him, saying she could see plainly she was not
wanted, and that he could do well enough without her now; and adding, as
she wiped her eyes with the corner of her white apron, that it might be
a severe struggle for her to leave so kind a master as he’d always been
to her, but, at least she’d have the satisfaction of knowing, when she
was gone, that she wouldn’t be a wherreting on him then, no longer.
Mrs. Coddle was a particularly clean-looking, motherly body. She wore
the whitest of caps, with very deep borders, and the cleanest of aprons,
while her cotton gowns were of the neatest of patterns; and though she
was close upon sixty, her cheeks were almost as rosy as baking apples.
To do her justice, she certainly was a mightily pleasant old dame to
look at, and she was just one of those persons who, by saving a
gentleman every kind of trouble in life, and seeing that he has not to
make the least exertion to gratify a single want, manage to beget such a
habit of indolence and dependence in those upon whom they attend, that
their excess of servitude soon gets to assume the character of the
greatest tyranny.
It was the especial care of Mrs. Coddle that the Major should not be
able to stir his foot, or know where to lay his hands upon the least
article of his own property, without first consulting her—not that she
ever allowed him, indeed, to want for anything that he was in the habit
of requiring. His clean linen, well-aired, and his one sock turned down,
were always ready for him to put on, the morning they were due—and
never, since she had been in the house, had a button been known to be
missing, or to come off in the operation of dressing. His pipe was on
the table ready filled for him, so that he could put it in his mouth the
very moment he had finished his breakfast. When he was ready to take his
morning walk, there was his hat well brushed, and a clean pair of
buckskin gloves, resting on the brim—and when he returned, the bootjack
was on the rug, and his slipper nice and warm, inside the fender, so
that he might not suffer from a damp foot. She never troubled him about
what he would have for dinner, for having made herself acquainted with
all his little likings and dislikings, she knew well what to provide,
and how to tickle his palate with a daily change, or to give an extra
relish to the meal with some agreeable surprise; indeed, it was a creed
with her—as with most ladies—that all men were pigs, and that, like
their brother animals at the Zoological Gardens, the only way to prevent
them being savage was to feed them well. And certainly, it must be
confessed, that the Major, like corpulent gentlemen in general, was
particularly fond of what is termed “the fat of the land.”
At night Mrs. Coddle brewed his toddy for him, and knew exactly the
point in the glass up to which to pour the spirit; and when he had taken
his three tumblers, there stood his bed candlestick at his elbow, to
light him to his room; while on his pillow were his nightcap and
night-shirt, ready for him to put on, with the least possible trouble,
and when the bell sounded to tell Mrs. Coddle that the Major was in bed,
the motherly old dame would come and take his candle—light his
rushlight—and see whether he was quite comfortable, before leaving him
for the night.
Mrs. Coddle, moreover, made herself useful to her master as a kind of
invisible mistress of the ceremonies. Major Oldschool’s long absence
from England, and the alteration of many of the points of politeness,
since he was a “blood upon town,” placed the officer in considerable
doubt as to how he ought to behave in the presence of company. Mrs.
Coddle had “nussed,” to use the lady’s own words, “in the fust of
families,” for her connexion, as she said, being only among carriage
people, she had helped to bring no less than four cornets into the world
in her time, and, she was happy to say, as there weren’t one child among
all her babbies (she had, in her own peculiar language, had as many as
nine confinements every year since poor dear Mr. Coddle’s death), she
was happy to say, as “there wasn’t one child of her nussing what could
be called wulgar born.” Accordingly, Mrs. Coddle considered herself so
well versed in all the social etiquette of the day, that she acted in
the capacity of fashionable governess to the Major, paying particular
attention to his “manners,” and taking care that he made what she termed
“no holes in ’em afore wisitors.” If the Major had a friend to tea with
him, she was continually bobbing in and out of the room, with some
excuse or other, just to see how he was “behaving hisself;” and as she
passed behind his chair, she would whisper in his ear, “Don’t drink your
tea out of your sarcer,—you know I told you scores of times it aint
perlite.” At dinner, while waiting upon him, she would say at one
moment, as she saw him commit one after another the several little
improprieties of the table, “There you are again, eating your fish with
your knife—how often am I to tell you it’s wulgar?” at another, she
would exclaim, “Now, Major, why will you keep scraping your plate round
and round in that there manner, when if there’s one thing that is more
ongenteeler than another, that’s it;” then as she saw him about to lift
the glass to his lips, she would take hold of his arm, and beg of him to
swallow his “victuals” first, saying, he had a dreadful habit of
drinking with his mouth full, and that was the most wulgarest trick of
all the tricks he had.
* * * * *
Now, while the scene previously described was going on down stairs in
the kitchen, another single knock “came” to the door. It was one of the
under-clerks from the railway station who had just “stepped on” to
inform the gentleman from the country that his boxes had come safely to
hand. The Official, however, had no time to deliver his message; for the
Major, who occupied the parlours, and who had just returned from his
morning’s walk, overhearing some one in the passage say that he had come
about something that was missing, popped his white head out of the
parlour door, and making sure that some clue had been obtained to his
runaway niece, requested the young man to step that way.
“So, I suppose you’ve come to tell me, you’ve got hold of that precious
baggage of mine at last, eh?” said the Major, as he paced up and down
the room with delight, and made the floor shake again with the tread of
his wooden leg.
“Yes, sir; they was bwought up by the fust twain this morning, sir,”
said the little gent, as he sucked the horse’s hoof that did duty for a
handle to his short stick. “And a ware lot you have, sir!” added the
young man, smiling, half in joke, at recollection of the
three-and-twenty packages.
“Ah! a rare lot, indeed!” returned the Major, between his teeth, as he
sighed, and thought of the disgrace brought upon the family by the
conduct of his niece. “Never was such a lot, I think.”
“Why, certingly, sir,” replied the “fast” young clerk, who thought it
“spicy” not to be able to sound the r’s properly, “it ain’t the wegular
caper, certingly. But your lady, like the west of them, sir, pewaps
likes to twavel well pewided. You know, sir, when they’re coming up to
the metwopolis, the ladies always will have a change or two.”
“A change or two! hang me, if I don’t think they’re always changing!”
exclaimed the Major, alluding to the inconstancy rather than the love of
dress, which even the advocates of the “rights of women” allow to be a
distinguishing feature of the sex. “Now, I shouldn’t wonder but what,
with all these foreigners here, you have many ‘missing’ cases at your
place!”
“Oh, sir, vewy many cases missing, indeed; and some of ’em woth a good
sum. Why, there was one wun off with, the other day, chock full of
jewels, sir,” added the communicative little clerk, who was delighted to
show off his importance.
“I don’t doubt you, my good sir; those foreign beggars are devils after
the tin,” returned the French-hating Major.
“Oh, yes, most of the missing cases with us are tin cases, I can assure
you, sir; the others, sir, are hardly worth the fellows looking after,
you know; and the worst of it is, sir, that fwequently they bweak their
heads, and plunder them of all that’s valuable belonging to ’em; and
then, maybe, they chuck ’em into the first river they come to.”
“Bless my soul, you don’t say so!” cried the horrified Major; “and these
things going on about us in the nineteenth century!”
“But you need be under no alarm about your lot, sir; we’ve looked well
to ’em, and seen that they’re pwoperly secured.”
“Well, come, that’s right—that’s some little consolation, at any rate,”
exclaimed Major Oldschool, rubbing his hands.
“Yes, sir,” proceeded the loquacious railway clerk, “we’ve had the
biggest done up in stout cords—’cause we were wather afwaid of him, on
account of his twemendous size and weight.”
“Oh, indeed! What, he’s one of your big heavy fellows, is he?—and
covered with hair, of course?”
The railway official, fancying the Major referred to one of the boxes,
replied, glibly, “A wegular hair twunk, sir, and no mistake!”
“Well, I only hope you’ll keep the foreign puppy tied up safe, until I
can give him in charge to those who will take good care of him, I
warrant,” remarked the Major, still referring to the mustachioed Count.
The clerk, however, took the word puppy in its literal sense, and
alluding to the greyhound, said—
“Don’t make yourself uneasy on that score, sir; we’ve got a cord wound
the animal’s neck, and it’s quite impossible for the cweature to get
away. We’ve given him some bwead and water, sir, so that he wont hurt
for a little while.”
“That’s all right, then,” responded Major Oldschool; “bread and water’s
quite good enough for him.”
“I can assure you, sir, he’s considered such a handsome dog by all the
ladies as has seen him since his awival, that it’s been as much as we
could do to get some of them away fwom him, for they, one and all,
declare that he’s the most beautiful Italian they’ve ever beheld, and
that they’ve half a mind to wun away with the pet.”
“Well,” exclaimed the Major, “hang me if I can see what the women can
find to admire in the filthy hairy brutes.”
“They say, sir,” replied the official, “he’s so wemarkably elegant, and
such a beautiful foxy colour. A lady of title, I can assure you, sir,
told me this vewy morning, that if the beautiful dog was hers, the pet
should have nothing but chickens to eat, because meat, she said, always
made their bweath foul.”
Here the Major raved and stormed against the fair sex in general, and
his niece in particular, in such a manner as made the youthful Official
stare again in wonder, at the apparent unmeaningness of his conduct.
When the gentleman had grown a little calm, the clerk ventured, before
taking his leave, to say he was instructed to wequest him to send for
that baggage of his as soon as possible.
Now, the Major, however irate he might have felt against his runaway
niece, was in no way inclined to permit a stranger to apply such a term
to a female member of his family. The consequence was, that the words
were no sooner uttered, than the exasperated soldier rushed at the
terrified young clerk, and shaking him violently by the collar, demanded
to know what he meant by “baggage.”
The youth was only able to stammer out that he alluded to his “heap,” up
at their place.
The term “heap,” applied to a lady, only served to increase the fury of
the Major; so releasing his hold of the young gentleman’s collar, he
proceeded to kick him round and round the room with his wooden leg.
At this moment, the sound of the policeman’s rattle, and the shrieks of
the ladies, were heard from below, and the astonished Major stood for a
minute with his wooden leg suspended horizontally in the air, while the
terrified young clerk for an instant ceased to fly before the enraged
“man of war.” The Major, forgetting his anger in the alarm, hurried down
stairs as fast as his wooden leg would carry him; while the little
railway official no sooner saw the Major turn the corner of the kitchen
stairs, than he retreated rapidly to the street-door, and once safely on
the step, proceeded to make the best use of his heels.
The neighbouring policeman, however, who, in answer to the sound of the
rattle, came streaming in all directions towards the spot, observing the
youth flying from the premises, and naturally viewing the circumstance
as of a most suspicious character, raised a cry of “Stop thief!” and
gave immediate chase to the terrified little Clerk. For a minute, the
railway hobbledehoy was undecided as to his course of action. As he
scampered along, he knew not what to do; to go back was to brave the
terrors of the Major’s wooden leg—while to proceed, was to be hunted
through the London streets as a pickpocket. However, his mind was soon
made up, for seeing in the distance a fashionably dressed young lady,
whose acquaintance he had made at Cremorne, he could not bring himself
to pass her at full speed, with a crowd at his heels, so he turned back
and ran into the arms of the posterior policeman, by whom he was
instantly collared, and dragged towards the house he had left, with a
crowd of boys in his wake.
The scene that followed has already been half described. The explosion
of the double-barrelled blunder was soon over; and then the little
railway clerk was welcomed by the Sandboys as heartily as he had been
kicked by the Major, while the Detective was as well received by the
Major, as he had been insulted by the Sandboys.
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