P.S.—A youthful myrmidon of Coavins’s will wait for a reply. Shall we
say, while we are about it, Twenty-five?
* * * * *
_From the Rev. Charles Honeyman to Harold Skimpole_, _Esq._
Cursitor Street, May 1.
MY DEAR SKIMPOLE,—How would I have joyed, had Providence placed it within
my power to relieve your distress! But it cannot be. Like the
Carthaginian Queen of whom we read in happier days at dear old
Borhambury, I may say that I am _haud ignarus mali_. But, alas! the very
evils in which I am not unlearned, make it impossible for me to add
_miseris succurrere disco_! Rather am I myself in need of succour. You,
my dear Harold, have fallen among thieves; I may too truly add that in
this I am your neighbour. The dens in which we are lodged are
contiguous; we are separated only by the bars. Your note was sent on
hither from my rooms in Walpole Street. Since we met I have known the
utmost that woman’s perfidy and the rich man’s contumely can inflict.
But I can bear my punishment. I loved, I trusted. She to whose hand I
aspired, she on whose affections I had based hopes at once of happiness
in life and of extended usefulness in the clerical profession, _she_ was
less confiding. She summoned to her council a minion of the Law, one
Briggs. _His_ estimate of my position and prospects could not possibly
tally with that of one whose _hopes_ are not set where the worldling
places them. Let him, and such as he, take thought for the morrow and
chaffer about settlements. I do not regret the gold to which you so
delicately allude. I sorrow only for the bloom that has been brushed
from the soaring pinions of a pure and disinterested affection. _Sunt
lacrymæ rerum_, and the handkerchief in which I bury my face is dank with
them.
Nor is this disappointment my only _cross_. The carrion-birds of
commerce have marked down the stricken deer from their eyries in Bond
Street and Jermyn Street. To know how Solomons has behaved, and the
_black_ colours in which Moss (of Wardour Street) has shown himself, is
to receive a new light on the character of a People chosen under a very
different Dispensation! Detainers flock in, like ravens to a feast. At
this moment I have endured the humiliation of meeting a sneering child of
this world—Mr. Arthur Pendennis—the emissary of one {151} to whom I gave
in other days the sweetest blossom in the garden of my affections—my
sister—of one who has, indeed, behaved like a brother—_in law_! My word
distrusted, my statements received with a chilling scepticism by this
_Nabob_ Newcome, I am urged to make some “composition” with my creditors.
The world is very censorious, the ear of a Bishop is easily won; who
knows how those who have _envied_ talents not misused may turn my
circumstances to my disadvantage? You will see that, far from aiding
another, I am rather obliged to seek succour myself. But that saying
about the sparrows abides with me to my comfort. Could aught be done,
think you, with a bill backed by our joint names? On July 12 my
pew-rents will come in. I swear to you that they _have not been
anticipated_. Yours afflictedly,