With this, she took my arm, and I attended her home. The mansion

was quite a fine one, and, I believe, furnished in good taste. Of

this latter point, however, I am scarcely qualified to judge; for

it was just dark as we arrived; and in American mansions of the

better sort lights seldom, during the heat of summer, make their

appearance at this, the most pleasant period of the day. In about

an hour after my arrival, to be sure, a single shaded solar lamp

was lit in the principal drawing-room; and this apartment, I

could thus see, was arranged with unusual good taste and even

splendor; but two other rooms of the suite, and in which the

company chiefly assembled, remained, during the whole evening, in

a very agreeable shadow. This is a well-conceived custom, giving

the party at least a choice of light or shade, and one which our

friends over the water could not do better than immediately

adopt.

The evening thus spent was unquestionably the most delicious of

my life. Madame Lalande had not overrated the musical abilities

of her friends; and the singing I here heard I had never heard

excelled in any private circle out of Vienna. The instrumental

performers were many and of superior talents. The vocalists were

chiefly ladies, and no individual sang less than well. At length,

upon a peremptory call for “Madame Lalande,” she arose at once,

without affectation or demur, from the chaise longue upon which

she had sat by my side, and, accompanied by one or two gentlemen

and her female friend of the opera, repaired to the piano in the

main drawing-room. I would have escorted her myself, but felt

that, under the circumstances of my introduction to the house, I

had better remain unobserved where I was. I was thus deprived of

the pleasure of seeing, although not of hearing, her sing.

The impression she produced upon the company seemed

electrical—but the effect upon myself was something even more. I

know not how adequately to describe it. It arose in part, no

doubt, from the sentiment of love with which I was imbued; but

chiefly from my conviction of the extreme sensibility of the

singer. It is beyond the reach of art to endow either air or

recitative with more impassioned expression than was hers. Her

utterance of the romance in Otello—the tone with which she gave

the words “Sul mio sasso,” in the Capuletti—is ringing in my

memory yet. Her lower tones were absolutely miraculous. Her voice

embraced three complete octaves, extending from the contralto D

to the D upper soprano, and, though sufficiently powerful to have

filled the San Carlos, executed, with the minutest precision,

every difficulty of vocal composition—ascending and descending

scales, cadences, or fiorituri. In the final of the Somnambula,

she brought about a most remarkable effect at the words:

Ah! non guinge uman pensiero

Al contento ond ’io son piena.

Here, in imitation of Malibran, she modified the original phrase

of Bellini, so as to let her voice descend to the tenor G, when,

by a rapid transition, she struck the G above the treble stave,

springing over an interval of two octaves.

Upon rising from the piano after these miracles of vocal

execution, she resumed her seat by my side; when I expressed to

her, in terms of the deepest enthusiasm, my delight at her

performance. Of my surprise I said nothing, and yet was I most

unfeignedly surprised; for a certain feebleness, or rather a

certain tremulous indecision of voice in ordinary conversation,

had prepared me to anticipate that, in singing, she would not

acquit herself with any remarkable ability.

Our conversation was now long, earnest, uninterrupted, and

totally unreserved. She made me relate many of the earlier

passages of my life, and listened with breathless attention to

every word of the narrative. I concealed nothing—felt that I had

a right to conceal nothing—from her confiding affection.

Encouraged by her candor upon the delicate point of her age, I

entered, with perfect frankness, not only into a detail of my

many minor vices, but made full confession of those moral and

even of those physical infirmities, the disclosure of which, in

demanding so much higher a degree of courage, is so much surer an

evidence of love. I touched upon my college indiscretions—upon my

extravagances—upon my carousals—upon my debts—upon my

flirtations. I even went so far as to speak of a slightly hectic

cough with which, at one time, I had been troubled—of a chronic

rheumatism—of a twinge of hereditary gout—and, in conclusion, of

the disagreeable and inconvenient, but hitherto carefully

concealed, weakness of my eyes.

“Upon this latter point,” said Madame Lalande, laughingly, “you

have been surely injudicious in coming to confession; for,

without the confession, I take it for granted that no one would

have accused you of the crime. By the by,” she continued, “have

you any recollection—” and here I fancied that a blush, even

through the gloom of the apartment, became distinctly visible

upon her cheek—“have you any recollection, _mon cher ami_, of

this little ocular assistant, which now depends from my neck?”

As she spoke she twirled in her fingers the identical double

eye-glass which had so overwhelmed me with confusion at the

opera.

“Full well—alas! do I remember it,” I exclaimed, pressing

passionately the delicate hand which offered the glasses for my

inspection. They formed a complex and magnificent toy, richly

chased and filigreed, and gleaming with jewels, which, even in

the deficient light, I could not help perceiving were of high

value.

“_Eh bien! mon ami_,” she resumed with a certain _empressment_ of

manner that rather surprised me—“_Eh bien! mon ami_, you have

earnestly besought of me a favor which you have been pleased to

denominate priceless. You have demanded of me my hand upon the

morrow. Should I yield to your entreaties—and, I may add, to the

pleadings of my own bosom—would I not be entitled to demand of

you a very—a very little boon in return?”

“Name it!” I exclaimed with an energy that had nearly drawn upon

us the observation of the company, and restrained by their

presence alone from throwing myself impetuously at her feet.

“Name it, my beloved, my Eugénie, my own!—name it!—but, alas! it

is already yielded ere named.”

“You shall conquer, then, _mon ami_,” said she, “for the sake of

the Eugénie whom you love, this little weakness which you have at

last confessed—this weakness more moral than physical—and which,

let me assure you, is so unbecoming the nobility of your real

nature—so inconsistent with the candor of your usual

character—and which, if permitted further control, will assuredly

involve you, sooner or later, in some very disagreeable scrape.

You shall conquer, for my sake, this affectation which leads you,

as you yourself acknowledge, to the tacit or implied denial of

your infirmity of vision. For, this infirmity you virtually deny,

in refusing to employ the customary means for its relief. You

will understand me to say, then, that I wish you to wear

spectacles;—ah, hush!—you have already consented to wear them,

for my sake. You shall accept the little toy which I now hold in

my hand, and which, though admirable as an aid to vision, is

really of no very immense value as a gem. You perceive that, by a

trifling modification thus—or thus—it can be adapted to the eyes

in the form of spectacles, or worn in the waistcoat pocket as an

eye-glass. It is in the former mode, however, and habitually,

that you have already consented to wear it for my sake.”

This request—must I confess it?—confused me in no little degree.

But the condition with which it was coupled rendered hesitation,

of course, a matter altogether out of the question.

“It is done!” I cried, with all the enthusiasm that I could

muster at the moment. “It is done—it is most cheerfully agreed. I

sacrifice every feeling for your sake. To-night I wear this dear

eye-glass, as an eye-glass, and upon my heart; but with the

earliest dawn of that morning which gives me the pleasure of

calling you wife, I will place it upon my—upon my nose,—and there

wear it ever afterward, in the less romantic, and less

fashionable, but certainly in the more serviceable, form which

you desire.”

Our conversation now turned upon the details of our arrangements

for the morrow. Talbot, I learned from my betrothed, had just

arrived in town. I was to see him at once, and procure a

carriage. The _soirée_ would scarcely break up before two; and by

this hour the vehicle was to be at the door; when, in the

confusion occasioned by the departure of the company, Madame L.

could easily enter it unobserved. We were then to call at the

house of a clergyman who would be in waiting; there be married,

drop Talbot, and proceed on a short tour to the East; leaving the

fashionable world at home to make whatever comments upon the

matter it thought best.

Having planned all this, I immediately took leave, and went in

search of Talbot, but, on the way, I could not refrain from

stepping into a hotel, for the purpose of inspecting the

miniature; and this I did by the powerful aid of the glasses. The

countenance was a surpassingly beautiful one! Those large

luminous eyes!—that proud Grecian nose!—those dark luxuriant

curls!—“Ah!” said I, exultingly to myself, “this is indeed the

speaking image of my beloved!” I turned the reverse, and

discovered the words—“Eugénie Lalande—aged twenty-seven years and

seven months.”

I found Talbot at home, and proceeded at once to acquaint him

with my good fortune. He professed excessive astonishment, of

course, but congratulated me most cordially, and proffered every

assistance in his power. In a word, we carried out our

arrangement to the letter, and, at two in the morning, just ten

minutes after the ceremony, I found myself in a close carriage

with Madame Lalande—with Mrs. Simpson, I should say—and driving

at a great rate out of town, in a direction northeast by north,

half-north.

It had been determined for us by Talbot, that, as we were to be

up all night, we should make our first stop at C——, a village

about twenty miles from the city, and there get an early

breakfast and some repose, before proceeding upon our route. At

four precisely, therefore, the carriage drew up at the door of

the principal inn. I handed my adored wife out, and ordered

breakfast forthwith. In the meantime we were shown into a small

parlor, and sat down.

It was now nearly if not altogether daylight; and, as I gazed,

enraptured, at the angel by my side, the singular idea came, all

at once, into my head, that this was really the very first moment

since my acquaintance with the celebrated loveliness of Madame

Lalande, that I had enjoyed a near inspection of that loveliness

by daylight at all.

“And now, _mon ami_,” said she, taking my hand, and so

interrupting this train of reflection, “and now, _mon cher ami_,

since we are indissolubly one—since I have yielded to your

passionate entreaties, and performed my portion of our

agreement—I presume you have not forgotten that you also have a

little favor to bestow—a little promise which it is your

intention to keep. Ah! let me see! Let me remember! Yes; full

easily do I call to mind the precise words of the dear promise

you made to Eugénie last night. Listen! You spoke thus: ‘It is

done!—it is most cheerfully agreed! I sacrifice every feeling for

your sake. To-night I wear this dear eye-glass as an eye-glass,

and upon my heart; but with the earliest dawn of that morning

which gives me the privilege of calling you wife, I will place it

upon my—upon my nose,—and there wear it ever afterward, in the

less romantic, and less fashionable, but certainly in the more

serviceable, form which you desire.’ These were the exact words,

my beloved husband, were they not?”

“They were,” I said; “you have an excellent memory; and

assuredly, my beautiful Eugénie, there is no disposition on my

part to evade the performance of the trivial promise they imply.

See! Behold! they are becoming—rather—are they not?” And here,

having arranged the glasses in the ordinary form of spectacles, I

applied them gingerly in their proper position; while Madame

Simpson, adjusting her cap, and folding her arms, sat bolt

upright in her chair, in a somewhat stiff and prim, and indeed,

in a somewhat undignified position.

“Goodness gracious me!” I exclaimed, almost at the very instant

that the rim of the spectacles had settled upon my nose—“_My!_

goodness gracious me!—why, what can be the matter with these

glasses?” and taking them quickly off, I wiped them carefully

with a silk handkerchief, and adjusted them again.

But if, in the first instance, there had occurred something which

occasioned me surprise, in the second, this surprise became

elevated into astonishment; and this astonishment was

profound—was extreme—indeed I may say it was horrific. What, in

the name of everything hideous, did this mean? Could I believe my

eyes?—could I?—that was the question. Was that—was that—was that

rouge? And were those—and were those—were those wrinkles, upon

the visage of Eugénie Lalande? And oh! Jupiter, and every one of

the gods and goddesses, little and big!—what—what—what—_what_ had

become of her teeth? I dashed the spectacles violently to the

ground, and, leaping to my feet, stood erect in the middle of the

floor, confronting Mrs. Simpson, with my arms set a-kimbo, and

grinning and foaming, but, at the same time, utterly speechless

with terror and with rage.

Now I have already said that Madame Eugénie Lalande—that is to

say, Simpson—spoke the English language but very little better

than she wrote it, and for this reason she very properly never

attempted to speak it upon ordinary occasions. But rage will

carry a lady to any extreme; and in the present care it carried

Mrs. Simpson to the very extraordinary extreme of attempting to

hold a conversation in a tongue that she did not altogether

understand.

“Vell, Monsieur,” said she, after surveying me, in great apparent

astonishment, for some moments—“Vell, Monsieur?—and vat den?—vat

de matter now? Is it de dance of de Saint itusse dat you ave? If

not like me, vat for vy buy de pig in the poke?”

“You wretch!” said I, catching my breath—“you—you—you villainous

old hag!”

“Ag?—ole?—me not so ver ole, after all! Me not one single day

more dan de eighty-doo.”

“Eighty-two!” I ejaculated, staggering to the wall—“eighty-two

hundred thousand baboons! The miniature said twenty-seven years

and seven months!”

“To be sure!—dat is so!—ver true! but den de portraite has been

take for dese fifty-five year. Ven I go marry my segonde usbande,

Monsieur Lalande, at dat time I had de portraite take for my

daughter by my first usbande, Monsieur Moissart!”

“Moissart!” said I.

“Yes, Moissart,” said she, mimicking my pronunciation, which, to

speak the truth, was none of the best,—“and vat den? Vat you know

about de Moissart?”

“Nothing, you old fright!—I know nothing about him at all; only I

had an ancestor of that name, once upon a time.”

“Dat name! and vat you ave for say to dat name? ’Tis ver _goot_

name; and so is Voissart—dat is ver goot name too. My daughter,

Mademoiselle Moissart, she marry von Monsieur Voissart,—and de

name is bot _ver_ respectable name.”

“Moissart?” I exclaimed, “and Voissart! Why, what is it you

mean?”

“Vat I mean?—I mean Moissart and Voissart; and for de matter of

dat, I mean Croissart and Froissart, too, if I only tink proper

to mean it. My daughter’s daughter, Mademoiselle Voissart, she

marry von Monsieur Croissart, and den again, my daughter’s grande

daughter, Mademoiselle Croissart, she marry von Monsieur

Froissart; and I suppose you say dat _dat_ is not von _ver_

respectaable name.”

“Froissart!” said I, beginning to faint, “why, surely you don’t

say Moissart, and Voissart, and Croissart, and Froissart?”

“Yes,” she replied, leaning fully back in her chair, and

stretching out her lower limbs at great length; “yes, Moissart,

and Voissart, and Croissart, and Froissart. But Monsieur

Froissart, he vas von _ver_ big vat you call fool—he vas von ver

great big donce like yourself—for he lef _la belle France_ for

come to dis stupide Amérique—and ven he get here he went and ave

von _ver_ stupid, von _ver, ver_ stupide sonn, so I hear, dough I

not yet av ad de plaisir to meet vid him—neither me nor my

companion, de Madame Stéphanie Lalande. He is name de Napoleon

Bonaparte Froissart, and I suppose you say dat _dat_, too, is not

von ver respectable name.”

Either the length or the nature of this speech, had the effect of

working up Mrs. Simpson into a very extraordinary passion indeed;

and as she made an end of it, with great labor, she jumped up

from her chair like somebody bewitched, dropping upon the floor

an entire universe of bustle as she jumped. Once upon her feet,

she gnashed her gums, brandished her arms, rolled up her sleeves,

shook her fist in my face, and concluded the performance by

tearing the cap from her head, and with it an immense wig of the

most valuable and beautiful black hair, the whole of which she

dashed upon the ground with a yell, and there trammpled and

danced a fandango upon it, in an absolute ecstasy and agony of

rage.

Meantime I sank aghast into the chair which she had vacated.

“Moissart and Voissart!” I repeated, thoughtfully, as she cut one

of her pigeon-wings, and “Croissart and Froissart!” as she

completed another—“Moissart and Voissart and Croissart and

Napoleon Bonaparte Froissart!—why, you ineffable old serpent,

that’s me—that’s me—d’ye hear? that’s me”—here I screamed at the

top of my voice—“that’s me-e-e! I am Napoleon Bonaparte

Froissart! and if I havn’t married my great, great, grandmother,

I wish I may be everlastingly confounded!”

Madame Eugénie Lalande, _quasi_ Simpson—formerly Moissart—was, in

sober fact, my great, great, grandmother. In her youth she had

been beautiful, and even at eighty-two, retained the majestic

height, the sculptural contour of head, the fine eyes and the

Grecian nose of her girlhood. By the aid of these, of

pearl-powder, of rouge, of false hair, false teeth, and false

tournure, as well as of the most skilful modistes of Paris, she

contrived to hold a respectable footing among the beauties _en

peu passées_ of the French metropolis. In this respect, indeed,

she might have been regarded as little less than the equal of the

celebrated Ninon De L’Enclos.

She was immensely wealthy, and being left, for the second time, a

widow without children, she bethought herself of my existence in

America, and for the purpose of making me her heir, paid a visit

to the United States, in company with a distant and exceedingly

lovely relative of her second husband’s—a Madame Stéphanie

Lalande.

At the opera, my great, great, grandmother’s attention was

arrested by my notice; and, upon surveying me through her

eye-glass, she was struck with a certain family resemblance to

herself. Thus interested, and knowing that the heir she sought

was actually in the city, she made inquiries of her party

respecting me. The gentleman who attended her knew my person, and

told her who I was. The information thus obtained induced her to

renew her scrutiny; and this scrutiny it was which so emboldened

me that I behaved in the absurd manner already detailed. She

returned my bow, however, under the impression that, by some odd

accident, I had discovered her identity. When, deceived by my

weakness of vision, and the arts of the toilet, in respect to the

age and charms of the strange lady, I demanded so

enthusiastically of Talbot who she was, he concluded that I meant

the younger beauty, as a matter of course, and so informed me,

with perfect truth, that she was “the celebrated widow, Madame

Lalande.”

In the street, next morning, my great, great, grandmother

encountered Talbot, an old Parisian acquaintance; and the

conversation, very naturally turned upon myself. My deficiencies

of vision were then explained; for these were notorious, although

I was entirely ignorant of their notoriety, and my good old

relative discovered, much to her chagrin, that she had been

deceived in supposing me aware of her identity, and that I had

been merely making a fool of myself in making open love, in a

theatre, to an old woman unknown. By way of punishing me for this

imprudence, she concocted with Talbot a plot. He purposely kept

out of my way to avoid giving me the introduction. My street

inquiries about “the lovely widow, Madame Lalande,” were supposed

to refer to the younger lady, of course, and thus the

conversation with the three gentlemen whom I encountered shortly

after leaving Talbot’s hotel will be easily explained, as also

their allusion to Ninon De L’Enclos. I had no opportunity of

seeing Madame Lalande closely during daylight; and, at her

musical _soirée_, my silly weakness in refusing the aid of

glasses effectually prevented me from making a discovery of her

age. When “Madame Lalande” was called upon to sing, the younger

lady was intended; and it was she who arose to obey the call; my

great, great, grandmother, to further the deception, arising at

the same moment and accompanying her to the piano in the main

drawing-room. Had I decided upon escorting her thither, it had

been her design to suggest the propriety of my remaining where I

was; but my own prudential views rendered this unnecessary. The

songs which I so much admired, and which so confirmed my

impression of the youth of my mistress, were executed by Madame

Stéphanie Lalande. The eyeglass was presented by way of adding a

reproof to the hoax—a sting to the epigram of the deception. Its

presentation afforded an opportunity for the lecture upon

affectation with which I was so especially edified. It is almost

superfluous to add that the glasses of the instrument, as worn by

the old lady, had been exchanged by her for a pair better adapted

to my years. They suited me, in fact, to a T.

The clergyman, who merely pretended to tie the fatal knot, was a

boon companion of Talbot’s, and no priest. He was an excellent

“whip,” however; and having doffed his cassock to put on a

great-coat, he drove the hack which conveyed the “happy couple”

out of town. Talbot took a seat at his side. The two scoundrels

were thus “in at the death,” and through a half-open window of

the back parlor of the inn, amused themselves in grinning at the

_dénouement_ of the drama. I believe I shall be forced to call

them both out.

Nevertheless, I am _not_ the husband of my great, great,

grandmother; and this is a reflection which affords me infinite

relief;—but I _am_ the husband of Madame Lalande—of Madame

Stéphanie Lalande—with whom my good old relative, besides making

me her sole heir when she dies—if she ever does—has been at the

trouble of concocting me a match. In conclusion: I am done

forever with _billets doux_, and am never to be met without

SPECTACLES.

KING PEST

A Tale Containing an Allegory.

The gods do bear and will allow in kings

The things which they abhor in rascal routes.

—_Buckhurst’s Tragedy of Ferrex and Porrex._

About twelve o’clock, one night in the month of October, and

during the chivalrous reign of the third Edward, two seamen

belonging to the crew of the _>Free and Easy_, a trading schooner

plying between Sluys and the Thames, and then at anchor in that

river, were much astonished to find themselves seated in the

tap-room of an ale-house in the parish of St. Andrews,

London—which ale-house bore for sign the portraiture of a “Jolly

Tar.”

The room, although ill-contrived, smoke-blackened, low-pitched,

and in every other respect agreeing with the general character of

such places at the period—was, nevertheless, in the opinion of

the grotesque groups scattered here and there within it,

sufficiently well adapted to its purpose.

Of these groups our two seamen formed, I think, the most

interesting, if not the most conspicuous.

The one who appeared to be the elder, and whom his companion

addressed by the characteristic appellation of “Legs,” was at the

same time much the taller of the two. He might have measured six

feet and a half, and an habitual stoop in the shoulders seemed to

have been the necessary consequence of an altitude so enormous.

Superfluities in height were, however, more than accounted for by

deficiencies in other respects. He was exceedingly thin; and

might, as his associates asserted, have answered, when drunk, for

a pennant at the mast-head, or, when sober, have served for a

jib-boom. But these jests, and others of a similar nature, had

evidently produced, at no time, any effect upon the cachinnatory

muscles of the tar. With high cheek-bones, a large hawk-nose,

retreating chin, fallen under-jaw, and huge protruding white

eyes, the expression of his countenance, although tinged with a

species of dogged indifference to matters and things in general,

was not the less utterly solemn and serious beyond all attempts

at imitation or description.

The younger seaman was, in all outward appearance, the converse

of his companion. His stature could not have exceeded four feet.

A pair of stumpy bow-legs supported his squat, unwieldy figure,

while his unusually short and thick arms, with no ordinary fists

at their extremities, swung off dangling from his sides like the

fins of a sea-turtle. Small eyes, of no particular color,

twinkled far back in his head. His nose remained buried in the

mass of flesh which enveloped his round, full, and purple face;

and his thick upper-lip rested upon the still thicker one beneath

with an air of complacent self-satisfaction, much heightened by

the owner’s habit of licking them at intervals. He evidently

regarded his tall shipmate with a feeling half-wondrous,

half-quizzical; and stared up occasionally in his face as the red

setting sun stares up at the crags of Ben Nevis.

Various and eventful, however, had been the peregrinations of the

worthy couple in and about the different tap-houses of the

neighbourhood during the earlier hours of the night. Funds even

the most ample, are not always everlasting: and it was with empty

pockets our friends had ventured upon the present hostelrie.

At the precise period, then, when this history properly

commences, Legs, and his fellow Hugh Tarpaulin, sat, each with

both elbows resting upon the large oaken table in the middle of

the floor, and with a hand upon either cheek. They were eyeing,

from behind a huge flagon of unpaid-for “humming-stuff,” the

portentous words, “No Chalk,” which to their indignation and

astonishment were scored over the doorway by means of that very

mineral whose presence they purported to deny. Not that the gift

of decyphering written characters—a gift among the commonalty of

that day considered little less cabalistical than the art of

inditing—could, in strict justice, have been laid to the charge

of either disciple of the sea; but there was, to say the truth, a

certain twist in the formation of the letters—an indescribable

lee-lurch about the whole—which foreboded, in the opinion of both

seamen, a long run of dirty weather; and determined them at once,

in the allegorical words of Legs himself, to “pump ship, clew up

all sail, and scud before the wind.”

Having accordingly disposed of what remained of the ale, and

looped up the points of their short doublets, they finally made a

bolt for the street. Although Tarpaulin rolled twice into the

fire-place, mistaking it for the door, yet their escape was at

length happily effected—and half after twelve o’clock found our

heroes ripe for mischief, and running for life down a dark alley

in the direction of St. Andrew’s Stair, hotly pursued by the

landlady of the “Jolly Tar.”

At the epoch of this eventful tale, and periodically, for many

years before and after, all England, but more especially the

metropolis, resounded with the fearful cry of “Plague!” The city

was in a great measure depopulated—and in those horrible regions,

in the vicinity of the Thames, where amid the dark, narrow, and

filthy lanes and alleys, the Demon of Disease was supposed to

have had his nativity, Awe, Terror, and Superstition were alone

to be found stalking abroad.

By authority of the king such districts were placed under ban,

and all persons forbidden, under pain of death, to intrude upon

their dismal solitude. Yet neither the mandate of the monarch,

nor the huge barriers erected at the entrances of the streets,

nor the prospect of that loathsome death which, with almost

absolute certainty, overwhelmed the wretch whom no peril could

deter from the adventure, prevented the unfurnished and

untenanted dwellings from being stripped, by the hand of nightly

rapine, of every article, such as iron, brass, or lead-work,

which could in any manner be turned to a profitable account.

Above all, it was usually found, upon the annual winter opening

of the barriers, that locks, bolts, and secret cellars, had

proved but slender protection to those rich stores of wines and

liquors which, in consideration of the risk and trouble of

removal, many of the numerous dealers having shops in the

neighbourhood had consented to trust, during the period of exile,

to so insufficient a security.

But there were very few of the terror-stricken people who

attributed these doings to the agency of human hands.

Pest-spirits, plague-goblins, and fever-demons, were the popular

imps of mischief; and tales so blood-chilling were hourly told,

that the whole mass of forbidden buildings was, at length,

enveloped in terror as in a shroud, and the plunderer himself was

often scared away by the horrors his own depreciations had

created; leaving the entire vast circuit of prohibited district

to gloom, silence, pestilence, and death.

It was by one of the terrific barriers already mentioned, and

which indicated the region beyond to be under the Pest-ban, that,

in scrambling down an alley, Legs and the worthy Hugh Tarpaulin

found their progress suddenly impeded. To return was out of the

question, and no time was to be lost, as their pursuers were

close upon their heels. With thorough-bred seamen to clamber up

the roughly fashioned plank-work was a trifle; and, maddened with

the twofold excitement of exercise and liquor, they leaped

unhesitatingly down within the enclosure, and holding on their

drunken course with shouts and yellings, were soon bewildered in

its noisome and intricate recesses.

Had they not, indeed, been intoxicated beyond moral sense, their

reeling footsteps must have been palsied by the horrors of their

situation. The air was cold and misty. The paving-stones,

loosened from their beds, lay in wild disorder amid the tall,

rank grass, which sprang up around the feet and ankles. Fallen

houses choked up the streets. The most fetid and poisonous smells

everywhere prevailed;—and by the aid of that ghastly light which,

even at midnight, never fails to emanate from a vapory and

pestilential atmosphere, might be discerned lying in the by-paths

and alleys, or rotting in the windowless habitations, the carcass

of many a nocturnal plunderer arrested by the hand of the plague

in the very perpetration of his robbery.

But it lay not in the power of images, or sensations, or

impediments such as these, to stay the course of men who,

naturally brave, and at that time especially, brimful of courage

and of “humming-stuff,” would have reeled, as straight as their

condition might have permitted, undauntedly into the very jaws of

Death. Onward—still onward stalked the grim Legs, making the

desolate solemnity echo and re-echo with yells like the terrific

war-whoop of the Indian; and onward, still onward rolled the

dumpy Tarpaulin, hanging on to the doublet of his more active

companion, and far surpassing the latter’s most strenuous

exertions in the way of vocal music, by bull-roarings _in basso_,

from the profundity of his stentorian lungs.

They had now evidently reached the strong hold of the pestilence.

Their way at every step or plunge grew more noisome and more

horrible—the paths more narrow and more intricate. Huge stones

and beams falling momently from the decaying roofs above them,

gave evidence, by their sullen and heavy descent, of the vast

height of the surrounding houses; and while actual exertion

became necessary to force a passage through frequent heaps of

rubbish, it was by no means seldom that the hand fell upon a

skeleton or rested upon a more fleshly corpse.

Suddenly, as the seamen stumbled against the entrance of a tall

and ghastly-looking building, a yell more than usually shrill

from the throat of the excited Legs, was replied to from within,

in a rapid succession of wild, laughter-like, and fiendish

shrieks. Nothing daunted at sounds which, of such a nature, at

such a time, and in such a place, might have curdled the very

blood in hearts less irrevocably on fire, the drunken couple

rushed headlong against the door, burst it open, and staggered

into the midst of things with a volley of curses.

The room within which they found themselves proved to be the shop

of an undertaker; but an open trap-door, in a corner of the floor

near the entrance, looked down upon a long range of wine-cellars,

whose depths the occasional sound of bursting bottles proclaimed

to be well stored with their appropriate contents. In the middle

of the room stood a table—in the centre of which again arose a

huge tub of what appeared to be punch. Bottles of various wines

and cordials, together with jugs, pitchers, and flagons of every

shape and quality, were scattered profusely upon the board.

Around it, upon coffin-tressels, was seated a company of six.

This company I will endeavor to delineate one by one.

Fronting the entrance, and elevated a little above his

companions, sat a personage who appeared to be the president of

the table. His stature was gaunt and tall, and Legs was

confounded to behold in him a figure more emaciated than himself.

His face was as yellow as saffron—but no feature excepting one

alone, was sufficiently marked to merit a particular description.

This one consisted in a forehead so unusually and hideously

lofty, as to have the appearance of a bonnet or crown of flesh

superadded upon the natural head. His mouth was puckered and

dimpled into an expression of ghastly affability, and his eyes,

as indeed the eyes of all at table, were glazed over with the

fumes of intoxication. This gentleman was clothed from head to

foot in a richly-embroidered black silk-velvet pall, wrapped

negligently around his form after the fashion of a Spanish cloak.

His head was stuck full of sable hearse-plumes, which he nodded

to and fro with a jaunty and knowing air; and, in his right hand,

he held a huge human thigh-bone, with which he appeared to have

been just knocking down some member of the company for a song.

Opposite him, and with her back to the door, was a lady of no

whit the less extraordinary character. Although quite as tall as

the person just described, she had no right to complain of his

unnatural emaciation. She was evidently in the last stage of a

dropsy; and her figure resembled nearly that of the huge puncheon

of October beer which stood, with the head driven in, close by

her side, in a corner of the chamber. Her face was exceedingly

round, red, and full; and the same peculiarity, or rather want of

peculiarity, attached itself to her countenance, which I before

mentioned in the case of the president—that is to say, only one

feature of her face was sufficiently distinguished to need a

separate characterization: indeed the acute Tarpaulin immediately

observed that the same remark might have applied to each

individual person of the party; every one of whom seemed to

possess a monopoly of some particular portion of physiognomy.

With the lady in question this portion proved to be the mouth.

Commencing at the right ear, it swept with a terrific chasm to

the left—the short pendants which she wore in either auricle

continually bobbing into the aperture. She made, however, every

exertion to keep her mouth closed and look dignified, in a dress

consisting of a newly starched and ironed shroud coming up close

under her chin, with a crimpled ruffle of cambric muslin.

At her right hand sat a diminutive young lady whom she appeared

to patronise. This delicate little creature, in the trembling of

her wasted fingers, in the livid hue of her lips, and in the

slight hectic spot which tinged her otherwise leaden complexion,

gave evident indications of a galloping consumption. An air of

extreme _haut ton_, however, pervaded her whole appearance; she

wore in a graceful and _dégagé_ manner, a large and beautiful

winding-sheet of the finest India lawn; her hair hung in ringlets

over her neck; a soft smile played about her mouth; but her nose,

extremely long, thin, sinuous, flexible and pimpled, hung down

far below her under lip, and in spite of the delicate manner in

which she now and then moved it to one side or the other with her

tongue, gave to her countenance a somewhat equivocal expression.

Over against her, and upon the left of the dropsical lady, was

seated a little puffy, wheezing, and gouty old man, whose cheeks

reposed upon the shoulders of their owner, like two huge bladders

of Oporto wine. With his arms folded, and with one bandaged leg

deposited upon the table, he seemed to think himself entitled to

some consideration. He evidently prided himself much upon every

inch of his personal appearance, but took more especial delight

in calling attention to his gaudy-colored surtout. This, to say

the truth, must have cost him no little money, and was made to

fit him exceedingly well—being fashioned from one of the

curiously embroidered silken covers appertaining to those

glorious escutcheons which, in England and elsewhere, are

customarily hung up, in some conspicuous place, upon the

dwellings of departed aristocracy.

Next to him, and at the right hand of the president, was a

gentleman in long white hose and cotton drawers. His frame shook,

in a ridiculous manner, with a fit of what Tarpaulin called “the

horrors.” His jaws, which had been newly shaved, were tightly

tied up by a bandage of muslin; and his arms being fastened in a

similar way at the wrists, prevented him from helping himself too

freely to the liquors upon the table; a precaution rendered

necessary, in the opinion of Legs, by the peculiarly sottish and

wine-bibbing cast of his visage. A pair of prodigious ears,

nevertheless, which it was no doubt found impossible to confine,

towered away into the atmosphere of the apartment, and were

occasionally pricked up in a spasm, at the sound of the drawing

of a cork.

Fronting him, sixthly and lastly, was situated a singularly

stiff-looking personage, who, being afflicted with paralysis,

must, to speak seriously, have felt very ill at ease in his

unaccommodating habiliments. He was habited, somewhat uniquely,

in a new and handsome mahogany coffin. Its top or head-piece

pressed upon the skull of the wearer, and extended over it in the

fashion of a hood, giving to the entire face an air of

indescribable interest. Arm-holes had been cut in the sides, for

the sake not more of elegance than of convenience; but the dress,

nevertheless, prevented its proprietor from sitting as erect as

his associates; and as he lay reclining against his tressel, at

an angle of forty-five degrees, a pair of huge goggle eyes rolled

up their awful whites towards the ceiling in absolute amazement

at their own enormity.

Before each of the party lay a portion of a skull, which was used

as a drinking cup. Overhead was suspended a human skeleton, by

means of a rope tied round one of the legs and fastened to a ring

in the ceiling. The other limb, confined by no such fetter, stuck

off from the body at right angles, causing the whole loose and

rattling frame to dangle and twirl about at the caprice of every

occasional puff of wind which found its way into the apartment.

In the cranium of this hideous thing lay quantity of ignited

charcoal, which threw a fitful but vivid light over the entire

scene; while coffins, and other wares appertaining to the shop of

an undertaker, were piled high up around the room, and against

the windows, preventing any ray from escaping into the street.

At sight of this extraordinary assembly, and of their still more

extraordinary paraphernalia, our two seamen did not conduct

themselves with that degree of decorum which might have been

expected. Legs, leaning against the wall near which he happened

to be standing, dropped his lower jaw still lower than usual, and

spread open his eyes to their fullest extent: while Hugh

Tarpaulin, stooping down so as to bring his nose upon a level

with the table, and spreading out a palm upon either knee, burst

into a long, loud, and obstreperous roar of very ill-timed and

immoderate laughter.

Without, however, taking offence at behaviour so excessively

rude, the tall president smiled very graciously upon the

intruders—nodded to them in a dignified manner with his head of

sable plumes—and, arising, took each by an arm, and led him to a

seat which some others of the company had placed in the meantime

for his accommodation. Legs to all this offered not the slightest

resistance, but sat down as he was directed; while the gallant

Hugh, removing his coffin tressel from its station near the head

of the table, to the vicinity of the little consumptive lady in

the winding sheet, plumped down by her side in high glee, and

pouring out a skull of red wine, quaffed it to their better

acquaintance. But at this presumption the stiff gentleman in the

coffin seemed exceedingly nettled; and serious consequences might

have ensued, had not the president, rapping upon the table with

his truncheon, diverted the attention of all present to the

following speech:

“It becomes our duty upon the present happy occasion—”

“Avast there!” interrupted Legs, looking very serious, “avast

there a bit, I say, and tell us who the devil ye all are, and

what business ye have here, rigged off like the foul fiends, and

swilling the snug blue ruin stowed away for the winter by my

honest shipmate, Will Wimble, the undertaker!”

At this unpardonable piece of ill-breeding, all the original

company half started to their feet, and uttered the same rapid

succession of wild fiendish shrieks which had before caught the

attention of the seamen. The president, however, was the first to

recover his composure, and at length, turning to Legs with great

dignity, recommenced:

“Most willingly will we gratify any reasonable curiosity on the

part of guests so illustrious, unbidden though they be. Know then

that in these dominions I am monarch, and here rule with

undivided empire under the title of ‘King Pest the First.’

“This apartment, which you no doubt profanely suppose to be the

shop of Will Wimble the undertaker—a man whom we know not, and

whose plebeian appellation has never before this night thwarted

our royal ears—this apartment, I say, is the Dais-Chamber of our

Palace, devoted to the councils of our kingdom, and to other

sacred and lofty purposes.

“The noble lady who sits opposite is Queen Pest, our Serene

Consort. The other exalted personages whom you behold are all of

our family, and wear the insignia of the blood royal under the

respective titles of ‘His Grace the Arch Duke Pest-Iferous’—‘His

Grace the Duke Pest-Ilential’—‘His Grace the Duke Tem-Pest’—and

‘Her Serene Highness the Arch Duchess Ana-Pest.’

“As regards,” continued he, “your demand of the business upon

which we sit here in council, we might be pardoned for replying

that it concerns, and concerns alone, our own private and regal

interest, and is in no manner important to any other than

ourself. But in consideration of those rights to which as guests

and strangers you may feel yourselves entitled, we will

furthermore explain that we are here this night, prepared by deep

research and accurate investigation, to examine, analyze, and

thoroughly determine the indefinable spirit—the incomprehensible

qualities and nature—of those inestimable treasures of the

palate, the wines, ales, and liqueurs of this goodly metropolis:

by so doing to advance not more our own designs than the true

welfare of that unearthly sovereign whose reign is over us all,

whose dominions are unlimited, and whose name is ‘Death’.”

“Whose name is Davy Jones!” ejaculated Tarpaulin, helping the

lady by his side to a skull of liqueur, and pouring out a second

for himself.

“Profane varlet!” said the president, now turning his attention

to the worthy Hugh, “profane and execrable wretch!—we have said,

that in consideration of those rights which, even in thy filthy

person, we feel no inclination to violate, we have condescended

to make reply to thy rude and unseasonable inquiries. We

nevertheless, for your unhallowed intrusion upon our councils,

believe it our duty to mulct thee and thy companion in each a

gallon of Black Strap—having imbibed which to the prosperity of

our kingdom—at a single draught—and upon your bended knees—ye

shall be forthwith free either to proceed upon your way, or

remain and be admitted to the privileges of our table, according

to your respective and individual pleasures.”

“It would be a matter of utter impossibility,” replied Legs, whom

the assumptions and dignity of King Pest the First had evidently

inspired some feelings of respect, and who arose and steadied

himself by the table as he spoke—“it would, please your majesty,

be a matter of utter impossibility to stow away in my hold even

one-fourth part of the same liquor which your majesty has just

mentioned. To say nothing of the stuffs placed on board in the

forenoon by way of ballast, and not to mention the various ales

and liqueurs shipped this evening at different sea-ports, I have,

at present, a full cargo of ‘humming-stuff’ taken in and duly

paid for at the sign of the ‘Jolly Tar.’ You will, therefore,

please your majesty, be so good as to take the will for the

deed—for by no manner of means either can I or will I swallow

another drop—least of all a drop of that villainous bilge-water

that answers to the name of ‘Black Strap.’”

“Belay that!” interrupted Tarpaulin, astonished not more at the

length of his companion’s speech than at the nature of his

refusal—“Belay that you lubber!—and I say, Legs, none of your

palaver! _My_ hull is still light, although I confess you

yourself seem to be a little top-heavy; and as for the matter of

your share of the cargo, why rather than raise a squall I would

find stowage-room for it myself, but—”

“This proceeding,” interposed the president, “is by no means in

accordance with the terms of the mulct or sentence, which is in

its nature Median, and not to be altered or recalled. The

conditions we have imposed must be fulfilled to the letter, and

that without a moment’s hesitation—in failure of which fulfilment

we decree that you do here be tied neck and heels together, and

duly drowned as rebels in yon hogshead of October beer!”

“A sentence!—a sentence!—a righteous and just sentence!—a

glorious decree!—a most worthy and upright, and holy

condemnation!” shouted the Pest family altogether. The king

elevated his forehead into innumerable wrinkles; the gouty little

old man puffed like a pair of bellows; the lady of the winding

sheet waved her nose to and fro; the gentleman in the cotton

drawers pricked up his ears; she of the shroud gasped like a

dying fish; and he of the coffin looked stiff and rolled up his

eyes.

“Ugh! ugh! ugh!” chuckled Tarpaulin without heeding the general

excitation, “ugh! ugh! ugh!—ugh! ugh! ugh!—ugh! ugh! ugh!—I was

saying,” said he, “I was saying when Mr. King Pest poked in his

marlin-spike, that as for the matter of two or three gallons more

or less of Black Strap, it was a trifle to a tight sea-boat like

myself not overstowed—but when it comes to drinking the health of

the Devil (whom God assoilzie) and going down upon my marrow

bones to his ill-favored majesty there, whom I know, as well as I

know myself to be a sinner, to be nobody in the whole world, but

Tim Hurlygurly the stage-player!—why! it’s quite another guess

sort of a thing, and utterly and altogether past my

comprehension.”

He was not allowed to finish this speech in tranquillity. At the

name Tim Hurlygurly the whole assembly leaped from their name

seats.

“Treason!” shouted his Majesty King Pest the First.

“Treason!” said the little man with the gout.

“Treason!” screamed the Arch Duchess Ana-Pest.

“Treason!” muttered the gentleman with his jaws tied up.

“Treason!” growled he of the coffin.

“Treason! treason!” shrieked her majesty of the mouth; and,

seizing by the hinder part of his breeches the unfortunate

Tarpaulin, who had just commenced pouring out for himself a skull

of liqueur, she lifted him high into the air, and let him fall

without ceremony into the huge open puncheon of his beloved ale.

Bobbing up and down, for a few seconds, like an apple in a bowl

of toddy, he, at length, finally disappeared amid the whirlpool

of foam which, in the already effervescent liquor, his struggles

easily succeeded in creating.

Not tamely, however, did the tall seaman behold the discomfiture

of his companion. Jostling King Pest through the open trap, the

valiant Legs slammed the door down upon him with an oath, and

strode towards the centre of the room. Here tearing down the

skeleton which swung over the table, he laid it about him with so

much energy and good will, that, as the last glimpses of light

died away within the apartment, he succeeded in knocking out the

brains of the little gentleman with the gout. Rushing then with

all his force against the fatal hogshead full of October ale and

Hugh Tarpaulin, he rolled it over and over in an instant. Out

burst a deluge of liquor so fierce—so impetuous—so

overwhelming—that the room was flooded from wall to wall—the

loaded table was overturned—the tressels were thrown upon their

backs—the tub of punch into the fire-place—and the ladies into

hysterics. Piles of death-furniture floundered about. Jugs,

pitchers, and carboys mingled promiscuously in the _mêlée_, and

wicker flagons encountered desperately with bottles of junk. The

man with the horrors was drowned upon the spot—the little stiff

gentleman floated off in his coffin—and the victorious Legs,

seizing by the waist the fat lady in the shroud, rushed out with

her into the street, and made a bee-line for the _Free and Easy_,

followed under easy sail by the redoubtable Hugh Tarpaulin, who,

having sneezed three or four times, panted and puffed after him

with the Arch Duchess Ana-Pest.

THREE SUNDAYS IN A WEEK

“You hard-headed, dunder-headed, obstinate, rusty, crusty, musty,

fusty, old savage!” said I, in fancy, one afternoon, to my grand

uncle Rumgudgeon—shaking my fist at him in imagination.

Only in imagination. The fact is, some trivial discrepancy _did_

exist, just then, between what I said and what I had not the

courage to say—between what I did and what I had half a mind to

do.

The old porpoise, as I opened the drawing-room door, was sitting

with his feet upon the mantel-piece, and a bumper of port in his

paw, making strenuous efforts to accomplish the ditty.

Remplis ton verre vide!

Vide ton verre plein!

“My _dear_ uncle,” said I, closing the door gently, and

approaching him with the blandest of smiles, “you are always so

very kind and considerate, and have evinced your benevolence in

so many—so very many ways—that—that I feel I have only to suggest

this little point to you once more to make sure of your full

acquiescence.”

“Hem!” said he, “good boy! go on!”

“I am sure, my dearest uncle (you confounded old rascal!), that

you have no design really, seriously, to oppose my union with

Kate. This is merely a joke of yours, I know—ha! ha! ha!—how very

pleasant you are at times.”

“Ha! ha! ha!” said he, “curse you! yes!”

“To be sure—of course! I knew you were jesting. Now, uncle, all

that Kate and myself wish at present, is that you would oblige us

with your advice as—as regards the time—you know, uncle—in short,

when will it be most convenient for yourself, that the wedding

shall—shall—come off, you know?”

“Come off, you scoundrel!—what do you mean by that?—Better wait

till it goes on.”

“Ha! ha! ha!—he! he! he!—hi! hi! hi!—ho! ho! ho!—hu! hu! hu!—oh,

that’s good!—oh, that’s capital—_such_ a wit! But all we want

just _now_, you know, uncle, is that you would indicate the time

precisely.”

“Ah!—precisely?”

“Yes, uncle—that is, if it would be quite agreeable to yourself.”

“Wouldn’t it answer, Bobby, if I were to leave it at random—some

time within a year or so, for example?—_must_ I say precisely?”

“_If_ you please, uncle—precisely.”

“Well, then, Bobby, my boy—you’re a fine fellow, aren’t

you?—since you _will_ have the exact time I’ll—why I’ll oblige

you for once.”

“Dear uncle!”

“Hush, sir!” (drowning my voice)—“I’ll oblige you for once. You

shall have my consent—and the _plum_, we mus’n’t forget the

plum—let me see! when shall it be? To-day’s Sunday—isn’t it?

Well, then, you shall be married precisely—_precisely_, now

mind!—_when three Sundays come together in a week!_ Do you hear

me, sir! _What_ are you gaping at? I say, you shall have Kate and

her plum when three Sundays come together in a week—but not

_till_ then—you young scapegrace—not _till_ then, if I die for

it. You know me—_I’m a man of my word_—now be off!” Here he

swallowed his bumper of port, while I rushed from the room in

despair.

A very “fine old English gentleman,” was my grand-uncle

Rumgudgeon, but unlike him of the song, he had his weak points.

He was a little, pursy, pompous, passionate semicircular

somebody, with a red nose, a thick skull, a long purse, and a

strong sense of his own consequence. With the best heart in the

world, he contrived, through a predominant whim of contradiction,

to earn for himself, among those who only knew him superficially,

the character of a curmudgeon. Like many excellent people, he

seemed possessed with a spirit of tantalization, which might

easily, at a casual glance, have been mistaken for malevolence.

To every request, a positive “No!” was his immediate answer; but

in the end—in the long, long end—there were exceedingly few

requests which he refused. Against all attacks upon his purse he

made the most sturdy defence; but the amount extorted from him,

at last, was generally in direct ratio with the length of the

siege and the stubbornness of the resistance. In charity no one

gave more liberally or with a worse grace.

For the fine arts, and especially for the belles-lettres, he

entertained a profound contempt. With this he had been inspired

by Casimir Perier, whose pert little query “A quoi un poete est

il bon?” he was in the habit of quoting, with a very droll

pronunciation, as the ne plus ultra of logical wit. Thus my own

inkling for the Muses had excited his entire displeasure. He

assured me one day, when I asked him for a new copy of Horace,

that the translation of “Poeta nascitur non fit” was “a nasty

poet for nothing fit”—a remark which I took in high dudgeon. His

repugnance to “the humanities” had, also, much increased of late,

by an accidental bias in favor of what he supposed to be natural

science. Somebody had accosted him in the street, mistaking him

for no less a personage than Doctor Dubble L. Dee, the lecturer

upon quack physics. This set him off at a tangent; and just at

the epoch of this story—for story it is getting to be after

all—my grand-uncle Rumgudgeon was accessible and pacific only

upon points which happened to chime in with the caprioles of the

hobby he was riding. For the rest, he laughed with his arms and

legs, and his politics were stubborn and easily understood. He

thought, with Horsley, that “the people have nothing to do with

the laws but to obey them.”

I had lived with the old gentleman all my life. My parents, in

dying, had bequeathed me to him as a rich legacy. I believe the

old villain loved me as his own child—nearly if not quite as well

as he loved Kate—but it was a dog’s existence that he led me,

after all. From my first year until my fifth, he obliged me with

very regular floggings. From five to fifteen, he threatened me,

hourly, with the House of Correction. From fifteen to twenty, not

a day passed in which he did not promise to cut me off with a

shilling. I was a sad dog, it is true—but then it was a part of

my nature—a point of my faith. In Kate, however, I had a firm

friend, and I knew it. She was a good girl, and told me very

sweetly that I might have her (plum and all) whenever I could

badger my grand-uncle Rumgudgeon, into the necessary consent.

Poor girl!—she was barely fifteen, and without this consent, her

little amount in the funds was not come-at-able until five

immeasurable summers had “dragged their slow length along.” What,

then, to do? At fifteen, or even at twenty-one (for I had now

passed my fifth olympiad) five years in prospect are very much

the same as five hundred. In vain we besieged the old gentleman

with importunities. Here was a piece de resistance (as Messieurs

Ude and Careme would say) which suited his perverse fancy to a T.

It would have stiffed the indignation of Job himself, to see how

much like an old mouser he behaved to us two poor wretched little

mice. In his heart he wished for nothing more ardently than our

union. He had made up his mind to this all along. In fact, he

would have given ten thousand pounds from his own pocket (Kate’s

plum was her own) if he could have invented any thing like an

excuse for complying with our very natural wishes. But then we

had been so imprudent as to broach the subject ourselves. Not to

oppose it under such circumstances, I sincerely believe, was not

in his power.

I have said already that he had his weak points; but in speaking

of these, I must not be understood as referring to his obstinacy:

which was one of his strong points—“assurement ce n’ etait pas sa

foible.” When I mention his weakness I have allusion to a bizarre

old-womanish superstition which beset him. He was great in

dreams, portents, et id genus omne of rigmarole. He was

excessively punctilious, too, upon small points of honor, and,

after his own fashion, was a man of his word, beyond doubt. This

was, in fact, one of his hobbies. The spirit of his vows he made

no scruple of setting at naught, but the letter was a bond

inviolable. Now it was this latter peculiarity in his

disposition, of which Kate’s ingenuity enabled us one fine day,

not long after our interview in the dining-room, to take a very

unexpected advantage, and, having thus, in the fashion of all

modern bards and orators, exhausted in prolegomena, all the time

at my command, and nearly all the room at my disposal, I will sum

up in a few words what constitutes the whole pith of the story.

It happened then—so the Fates ordered it—that among the naval

acquaintances of my betrothed, were two gentlemen who had just

set foot upon the shores of England, after a year’s absence,

each, in foreign travel. In company with these gentlemen, my

cousin and I, preconcertedly paid uncle Rumgudgeon a visit on the

afternoon of Sunday, October the tenth,—just three weeks after

the memorable decision which had so cruelly defeated our hopes.

For about half an hour the conversation ran upon ordinary topics,

but at last, we contrived, quite naturally, to give it the

following turn:

CAPT. PRATT. “Well I have been absent just one year.—Just one

year to-day, as I live—let me see! yes!—this is October the

tenth. You remember, Mr. Rumgudgeon, I called, this day year to

bid you good-bye. And by the way, it does seem something like a

coincidence, does it not—that our friend, Captain Smitherton,

here, has been absent exactly a year also—a year to-day!”

SMITHERTON. “Yes! just one year to a fraction. You will remember,

Mr. Rumgudgeon, that I called with Capt. Pratol on this very day,

last year, to pay my parting respects.”

UNCLE. “Yes, yes, yes—I remember it very well—very queer indeed!

Both of you gone just one year. A very strange coincidence,

indeed! Just what Doctor Dubble L. Dee would denominate an

extraordinary concurrence of events. Doctor Dub—”

KATE. (Interrupting.) “To be sure, papa, it is something strange;

but then Captain Pratt and Captain Smitherton didn’t go

altogether the same route, and that makes a difference, you

know.”

UNCLE. “I don’t know any such thing, you huzzy! How should I? I

think it only makes the matter more remarkable, Doctor Dubble L.

Dee—”

KATE. “Why, papa, Captain Pratt went round Cape Horn, and Captain

Smitherton doubled the Cape of Good Hope.”

UNCLE. “Precisely!—the one went east and the other went west, you

jade, and they both have gone quite round the world. By the by,

Doctor Dubble L. Dee—”

MYSELF. (Hurriedly.) “Captain Pratt, you must come and spend the

evening with us to-morrow—you and Smitherton—you can tell us all

about your voyage, and we’ll have a game of whist and—”

PRATT. “Wist, my dear fellow—you forget. To-morrow will be

Sunday. Some other evening—”

KATE. “Oh, no, fie!—Robert’s not quite so bad as that. To-day’s

Sunday.”

PRATT. “I beg both your pardons—but I can’t be so much mistaken.

I know to-morrow’s Sunday, because-”

SMITHERTON. (Much surprised.) “What are you all thinking about?

Wasn’t yesterday, Sunday, I should like to know?”

ALL. “Yesterday indeed! you are out!”

UNCLE. “To-day’s Sunday, I say—don’t I know?”

PRATT. “Oh no!—to-morrow’s Sunday.”

SMITHERTON. “You are all mad—every one of you. I am as positive

that yesterday was Sunday as I am that I sit upon this chair.”

KATE. (Jumping up eagerly.) “I see it—I see it all. Papa, this is

a judgment upon you, about—about you know what. Let me alone, and

I’ll explain it all in a minute. It’s a very simple thing,

indeed. Captain Smitherton says that yesterday was Sunday: so it

was; he is right. Cousin Bobby, and uncle and I say that to-day

is Sunday: so it is; we are right. Captain Pratt maintains that

to-morrow will be Sunday: so it will; he is right, too. The fact

is, we are all right, and thus three Sundays have come together

in a week.”

SMITHERTON. (After a pause.) “By the by, Pratt, Kate has us

completely. What fools we two are! Mr. Rumgudgeon, the matter

stands thus: the earth, you know, is twenty-four thousand miles

in circumference. Now this globe of the earth turns upon its own

axis—revolves—spins round—these twenty-four thousand miles of

extent, going from west to east, in precisely twenty-four hours.

Do you understand, Mr. Rumgudgeon?—”

UNCLE. “To be sure—to be sure—Doctor Dub—”

SMITHERTON. (Drowning his voice.) “Well, sir; that is at the rate

of one thousand miles per hour. Now, suppose that I sail from

this position a thousand miles east. Of course I anticipate the

rising of the sun here at London by just one hour. I see the sun

rise one hour before you do. Proceeding, in the same direction,

yet another thousand miles, I anticipate the rising by two

hours—another thousand, and I anticipate it by three hours, and

so on, until I go entirely round the globe, and back to this

spot, when, having gone twenty-four thousand miles east, I

anticipate the rising of the London sun by no less than

twenty-four hours; that is to say, I am a day in advance of your

time. Understand, eh?”

UNCLE. “But Double L. Dee—”

SMITHERTON. (Speaking very loud.) “Captain Pratt, on the

contrary, when he had sailed a thousand miles west of this

position, was an hour, and when he had sailed twenty-four

thousand miles west, was twenty-four hours, or one day, behind

the time at London. Thus, with me, yesterday was Sunday—thus,

with you, to-day is Sunday—and thus, with Pratt, to-morrow will

be Sunday. And what is more, Mr. Rumgudgeon, it is positively

clear that we are all right; for there can be no philosophical

reason assigned why the idea of one of us should have preference

over that of the other.”

UNCLE. “My eyes!—well, Kate—well, Bobby!—this is a judgment upon

me, as you say. But I am a man of my word—mark that! you shall

have her, boy, (plum and all), when you please. Done up, by Jove!

Three Sundays all in a row! I’ll go, and take Dubble L. Dee’s

opinion upon that.”

VOLUME 4.

THE DEVIL IN THE BELFRY

What o’clock is it?—_Old Saying_.

Everybody knows, in a general way, that the finest place in the

world is—or, alas, _was_—the Dutch borough of

Vondervotteimittiss. Yet as it lies some distance from any of the

main roads, being in a somewhat out-of-the-way situation, there

are perhaps very few of my readers who have ever paid it a visit.

For the benefit of those who have not, therefore, it will be only

proper that I should enter into some account of it. And this is

indeed the more necessary, as with the hope of enlisting public

sympathy in behalf of the inhabitants, I design here to give a

history of the calamitous events which have so lately occurred

within its limits. No one who knows me will doubt that the duty

thus self-imposed will be executed to the best of my ability,

with all that rigid impartiality, all that cautious examination

into facts, and diligent collation of authorities, which should

ever distinguish him who aspires to the title of historian.

By the united aid of medals, manuscripts, and inscriptions, I am

enabled to say, positively, that the borough of

Vondervotteimittiss has existed, from its origin, in precisely

the same condition which it at present preserves. Of the date of

this origin, however, I grieve that I can only speak with that

species of indefinite definiteness which mathematicians are, at

times, forced to put up with in certain algebraic formulae. The

date, I may thus say, in regard to the remoteness of its

antiquity, cannot be less than any assignable quantity

whatsoever.

Touching the derivation of the name Vondervotteimittiss, I

confess myself, with sorrow, equally at fault. Among a multitude

of opinions upon this delicate point—some acute, some learned,

some sufficiently the reverse—I am able to select nothing which

ought to be considered satisfactory. Perhaps the idea of

Grogswigg—nearly coincident with that of Kroutaplenttey—is to be

cautiously preferred.—It runs:—“Vondervotteimittis—Vonder, lege

Donder—Votteimittis, quasi und Bleitziz—Bleitziz obsol:—pro

Blitzen.” This derivative, to say the truth, is still

countenanced by some traces of the electric fluid evident on the

summit of the steeple of the House of the Town-Council. I do not

choose, however, to commit myself on a theme of such importance,

and must refer the reader desirous of information to the

“Oratiunculae de Rebus Praeter-Veteris,” of Dundergutz. See,

also, Blunderbuzzard “De Derivationibus,” pp. 27 to 5010, Folio,

Gothic edit., Red and Black character, Catch-word and No Cypher;

wherein consult, also, marginal notes in the autograph of

Stuffundpuff, with the Sub-Commentaries of Gruntundguzzell.

Notwithstanding the obscurity which thus envelops the date of the

foundation of Vondervotteimittis, and the derivation of its name,

there can be no doubt, as I said before, that it has always

existed as we find it at this epoch. The oldest man in the

borough can remember not the slightest difference in the

appearance of any portion of it; and, indeed, the very suggestion

of such a possibility is considered an insult. The site of the

village is in a perfectly circular valley, about a quarter of a

mile in circumference, and entirely surrounded by gentle hills,

over whose summit the people have never yet ventured to pass. For

this they assign the very good reason that they do not believe

there is anything at all on the other side.

Round the skirts of the valley (which is quite level, and paved

throughout with flat tiles), extends a continuous row of sixty

little houses. These, having their backs on the hills, must look,

of course, to the centre of the plain, which is just sixty yards

from the front door of each dwelling. Every house has a small

garden before it, with a circular path, a sun-dial, and

twenty-four cabbages. The buildings themselves are so precisely

alike, that one can in no manner be distinguished from the other.

Owing to the vast antiquity, the style of architecture is

somewhat odd, but it is not for that reason the less strikingly

picturesque. They are fashioned of hard-burned little bricks,

red, with black ends, so that the walls look like a chess-board

upon a great scale. The gables are turned to the front, and there

are cornices, as big as all the rest of the house, over the eaves

and over the main doors. The windows are narrow and deep, with

very tiny panes and a great deal of sash. On the roof is a vast

quantity of tiles with long curly ears. The woodwork, throughout,

is of a dark hue and there is much carving about it, with but a

trifling variety of pattern for, time out of mind, the carvers of

Vondervotteimittiss have never been able to carve more than two

objects—a time-piece and a cabbage. But these they do exceedingly

well, and intersperse them, with singular ingenuity, wherever

they find room for the chisel.

The dwellings are as much alike inside as out, and the furniture

is all upon one plan. The floors are of square tiles, the chairs

and tables of black-looking wood with thin crooked legs and puppy

feet. The mantelpieces are wide and high, and have not only

time-pieces and cabbages sculptured over the front, but a real

time-piece, which makes a prodigious ticking, on the top in the

middle, with a flower-pot containing a cabbage standing on each

extremity by way of outrider. Between each cabbage and the

time-piece, again, is a little China man having a large stomach

with a great round hole in it, through which is seen the

dial-plate of a watch.

The fireplaces are large and deep, with fierce crooked-looking

fire-dogs. There is constantly a rousing fire, and a huge pot

over it, full of sauer-kraut and pork, to which the good woman of

the house is always busy in attending. She is a little fat old

lady, with blue eyes and a red face, and wears a huge cap like a

sugar-loaf, ornamented with purple and yellow ribbons. Her dress

is of orange-colored linsey-woolsey, made very full behind and

very short in the waist—and indeed very short in other respects,

not reaching below the middle of her leg. This is somewhat thick,

and so are her ankles, but she has a fine pair of green stockings

to cover them. Her shoes—of pink leather—are fastened each with a

bunch of yellow ribbons puckered up in the shape of a cabbage. In

her left hand she has a little heavy Dutch watch; in her right

she wields a ladle for the sauerkraut and pork. By her side there

stands a fat tabby cat, with a gilt toy-repeater tied to its

tail, which “the boys” have there fastened by way of a quiz.

The boys themselves are, all three of them, in the garden

attending the pig. They are each two feet in height. They have

three-cornered cocked hats, purple waistcoats reaching down to

their thighs, buckskin knee-breeches, red stockings, heavy shoes

with big silver buckles, long surtout coats with large buttons of

mother-of-pearl. Each, too, has a pipe in his mouth, and a little

dumpy watch in his right hand. He takes a puff and a look, and

then a look and a puff. The pig—which is corpulent and lazy—is

occupied now in picking up the stray leaves that fall from the

cabbages, and now in giving a kick behind at the gilt repeater,

which the urchins have also tied to his tail in order to make him

look as handsome as the cat.

Right at the front door, in a high-backed leather-bottomed armed

chair, with crooked legs and puppy feet like the tables, is

seated the old man of the house himself. He is an exceedingly

puffy little old gentleman, with big circular eyes and a huge

double chin. His dress resembles that of the boys—and I need say

nothing farther about it. All the difference is, that his pipe is

somewhat bigger than theirs and he can make a greater smoke. Like

them, he has a watch, but he carries his watch in his pocket. To

say the truth, he has something of more importance than a watch

to attend to—and what that is, I shall presently explain. He sits

with his right leg upon his left knee, wears a grave countenance,

and always keeps one of his eyes, at least, resolutely bent upon

a certain remarkable object in the centre of the plain.

This object is situated in the steeple of the House of the Town

Council. The Town Council are all very little, round, oily,

intelligent men, with big saucer eyes and fat double chins, and

have their coats much longer and their shoe-buckles much bigger

than the ordinary inhabitants of Vondervotteimittiss. Since my

sojourn in the borough, they have had several special meetings,

and have adopted these three important resolutions:

“That it is wrong to alter the good old course of things:”

“That there is nothing tolerable out of Vondervotteimittiss:”

and—

“That we will stick by our clocks and our cabbages.”

Above the session-room of the Council is the steeple, and in the

steeple is the belfry, where exists, and has existed time out of

mind, the pride and wonder of the village—the great clock of the

borough of Vondervotteimittiss. And this is the object to which

the eyes of the old gentlemen are turned who sit in the

leather-bottomed arm-chairs.

The great clock has seven faces—one in each of the seven sides of

the steeple—so that it can be readily seen from all quarters. Its

faces are large and white, and its hands heavy and black. There

is a belfry-man whose sole duty is to attend to it; but this duty

is the most perfect of sinecures—for the clock of

Vondervotteimittis was never yet known to have anything the

matter with it. Until lately, the bare supposition of such a

thing was considered heretical. From the remotest period of

antiquity to which the archives have reference, the hours have

been regularly struck by the big bell. And, indeed the case was

just the same with all the other clocks and watches in the

borough. Never was such a place for keeping the true time. When

the large clapper thought proper to say “Twelve o’clock!” all its

obedient followers opened their throats simultaneously, and

responded like a very echo. In short, the good burghers were fond

of their sauer-kraut, but then they were proud of their clocks.

All people who hold sinecure offices are held in more or less

respect, and as the belfry—man of Vondervotteimittiss has the

most perfect of sinecures, he is the most perfectly respected of

any man in the world. He is the chief dignitary of the borough,

and the very pigs look up to him with a sentiment of reverence.

His coat-tail is very far longer—his pipe, his shoe-buckles, his

eyes, and his stomach, very far bigger—than those of any other

old gentleman in the village; and as to his chin, it is not only

double, but triple.

I have thus painted the happy estate of Vondervotteimittiss:

alas, that so fair a picture should ever experience a reverse!

There has been long a saying among the wisest inhabitants, that

“no good can come from over the hills”; and it really seemed that

the words had in them something of the spirit of prophecy. It

wanted five minutes of noon, on the day before yesterday, when

there appeared a very odd-looking object on the summit of the

ridge of the eastward. Such an occurrence, of course, attracted

universal attention, and every little old gentleman who sat in a

leather-bottomed arm-chair turned one of his eyes with a stare of

dismay upon the phenomenon, still keeping the other upon the

clock in the steeple.

By the time that it wanted only three minutes to noon, the droll

object in question was perceived to be a very diminutive

foreign-looking young man. He descended the hills at a great

rate, so that every body had soon a good look at him. He was

really the most finicky little personage that had ever been seen

in Vondervotteimittiss. His countenance was of a dark

snuff-color, and he had a long hooked nose, pea eyes, a wide

mouth, and an excellent set of teeth, which latter he seemed

anxious of displaying, as he was grinning from ear to ear. What

with mustachios and whiskers, there was none of the rest of his

face to be seen. His head was uncovered, and his hair neatly done

up in papillotes. His dress was a tight-fitting swallow-tailed

black coat (from one of whose pockets dangled a vast length of

white handkerchief), black kerseymere knee-breeches, black

stockings, and stumpy-looking pumps, with huge bunches of black

satin ribbon for bows. Under one arm he carried a huge

_chapeau-de-bras_, and under the other a fiddle nearly five times

as big as himself. In his left hand was a gold snuff-box, from

which, as he capered down the hill, cutting all manner of

fantastic steps, he took snuff incessantly with an air of the

greatest possible self-satisfaction. God bless me!—here was a

sight for the honest burghers of Vondervotteimittiss!

To speak plainly, the fellow had, in spite of his grinning, an

audacious and sinister kind of face; and as he curvetted right

into the village, the old stumpy appearance of his pumps excited

no little suspicion; and many a burgher who beheld him that day

would have given a trifle for a peep beneath the white cambric

handkerchief which hung so obtrusively from the pocket of his

swallow-tailed coat. But what mainly occasioned a righteous

indignation was, that the scoundrelly popinjay, while he cut a

fandango here, and a whirligig there, did not seem to have the

remotest idea in the world of such a thing as keeping time in his

steps.

The good people of the borough had scarcely a chance, however, to

get their eyes thoroughly open, when, just as it wanted half a

minute of noon, the rascal bounced, as I say, right into the

midst of them; gave a _chassez_ here, and a _balancez_ there; and

then, after a _pirouette_ and a _pas-de-zephyr_, pigeon-winged

himself right up into the belfry of the House of the Town

Council, where the wonder-stricken belfry-man sat smoking in a

state of dignity and dismay. But the little chap seized him at

once by the nose; gave it a swing and a pull; clapped the big

_chapeau-de-bras_ upon his head; knocked it down over his eyes

and mouth; and then, lifting up the big fiddle, beat him with it

so long and so soundly, that what with the belfry-man being so

fat, and the fiddle being so hollow, you would have sworn that

there was a regiment of double-bass drummers all beating the

devil’s tattoo up in the belfry of the steeple of

Vondervotteimittiss.

There is no knowing to what desperate act of vengeance this

unprincipled attack might have aroused the inhabitants, but for

the important fact that it now wanted only half a second of noon.

The bell was about to strike, and it was a matter of absolute and

pre-eminent necessity that every body should look well at his

watch. It was evident, however, that just at this moment the

fellow in the steeple was doing something that he had no business

to do with the clock. But as it now began to strike, nobody had

any time to attend to his manœuvres, for they had all to count

the strokes of the bell as it sounded.

“One!” said the clock.

“Von!” echoed every little old gentleman in every

leather-bottomed arm-chair in Vondervotteimittiss. “Von!” said

his watch also; “von!” said the watch of his vrow; and “von!”

said the watches of the boys, and the little gilt repeaters on

the tails of the cat and pig.

“Two!” continued the big bell; and

“Doo!” repeated all the repeaters.

“Three! Four! Five! Six! Seven! Eight! Nine! Ten!” said the bell.

“Dree! Vour! Fibe! Sax! Seben! Aight! Noin! Den!” answered the

others.

“Eleven!” said the big one.

“Eleben!” assented the little ones.

“Twelve!” said the bell.

“Dvelf!” they replied perfectly satisfied, and dropping their

voices.

“Und dvelf it is!” said all the little old gentlemen, putting up

their watches. But the big bell had not done with them yet.

“Thirteen!” said he.

“Der Teufel!” gasped the little old gentlemen, turning pale,

dropping their pipes, and putting down all their right legs from

over their left knees.

“Der Teufel!” groaned they, “Dirteen! Dirteen!!—Mein Gott, it is

Dirteen o’clock!!”

Why attempt to describe the terrible scene which ensued? All

Vondervotteimittiss flew at once into a lamentable state of

uproar.

“Vot is cum’d to mein pelly?” roared all the boys—“I’ve been

ongry for dis hour!”

“Vot is com’d to mein kraut?” screamed all the vrows, “It has

been done to rags for this hour!”

“Vot is cum’d to mein pipe?” swore all the little old gentlemen,

“Donder and Blitzen; it has been smoked out for dis hour!”—and

they filled them up again in a great rage, and sinking back in

their arm-chairs, puffed away so fast and so fiercely that the

whole valley was immediately filled with impenetrable smoke.

Meantime the cabbages all turned very red in the face, and it

seemed as if old Nick himself had taken possession of every thing

in the shape of a timepiece. The clocks carved upon the furniture

took to dancing as if bewitched, while those upon the

mantel-pieces could scarcely contain themselves for fury, and

kept such a continual striking of thirteen, and such a frisking

and wriggling of their pendulums as was really horrible to see.

But, worse than all, neither the cats nor the pigs could put up

any longer with the behavior of the little repeaters tied to

their tails, and resented it by scampering all over the place,

scratching and poking, and squeaking and screeching, and

caterwauling and squalling, and flying into the faces, and

running under the petticoats of the people, and creating

altogether the most abominable din and confusion which it is

possible for a reasonable person to conceive. And to make matters

still more distressing, the rascally little scape-grace in the

steeple was evidently exerting himself to the utmost. Every now

and then one might catch a glimpse of the scoundrel through the

smoke. There he sat in the belfry upon the belfry-man, who was

lying flat upon his back. In his teeth the villain held the

bell-rope, which he kept jerking about with his head, raising

such a clatter that my ears ring again even to think of it. On

his lap lay the big fiddle, at which he was scraping, out of all

time and tune, with both hands, making a great show, the

nincompoop! of playing “Judy O’Flannagan and Paddy O’Rafferty.”

Affairs being thus miserably situated, I left the place in

disgust, and now appeal for aid to all lovers of correct time and

fine kraut. Let us proceed in a body to the borough, and restore

the ancient order of things in Vondervotteimittiss by ejecting

that little fellow from the steeple.

LIONIZING

—— all people went

Upon their ten toes in wild wonderment.

—_Bishop Hall’s Satires_.

I am—that is to say I was—a great man; but I am neither the

author of Junius nor the man in the mask; for my name, I believe,

is Robert Jones, and I was born somewhere in the city of

Fum-Fudge.

The first action of my life was the taking hold of my nose with

both hands. My mother saw this and called me a genius—my father

wept for joy and presented me with a treatise on Nosology. This I

mastered before I was breeched.

I now began to feel my way in the science, and soon came to

understand that, provided a man had a nose sufficiently

conspicuous, he might, by merely following it, arrive at a

Lionship. But my attention was not confined to theories alone.

Every morning I gave my proboscis a couple of pulls and swallowed

a half dozen of drams.

When I came of age my father asked me, one day, if I would step

with him into his study.

“My son,” said he, when we were seated, “what is the chief end of

your existence?”

“My father,” I answered, “it is the study of Nosology.”

“And what, Robert,” he inquired, “is Nosology?”

“Sir,” I said, “it is the science of Noses.”

“And can you tell me,” he demanded, “what is the meaning of a

nose?”

“A nose, my father;” I replied, greatly softened, “has been

variously defined by about a thousand different authors.” [Here I

pulled out my watch.] “It is now noon or thereabouts—we shall

have time enough to get through with them all before midnight. To

commence then:—The nose, according to Bartholinus, is that

protuberance—that bump—that excrescence—that—”

“Will do, Robert,” interrupted the good old gentleman. “I am

thunderstruck at the extent of your information—I am

positively—upon my soul.” [Here he closed his eyes and placed his

hand upon his heart.] “Come here!” [Here he took me by the arm.]

“Your education may now be considered as finished—it is high time

you should scuffle for yourself—and you cannot do a better thing

than merely follow your nose—so—so—so—” [Here he kicked me

downstairs and out of the door.]—“so get out of my house, and God

bless you!”

As I felt within me the divine afflatus, I considered this

accident rather fortunate than otherwise. I resolved to be guided

by the paternal advice. I determined to follow my nose. I gave it

a pull or two upon the spot, and wrote a pamphlet on Nosology

forthwith.

All Fum-Fudge was in an uproar.

“Wonderful genius!” said the Quarterly.

“Superb physiologist!” said the Westminster.

“Clever fellow!” said the Foreign.

“Fine writer!” said the Edinburgh.

“Profound thinker!” said the Dublin.

“Great man!” said Bentley.

“Divine soul!” said Fraser.

“One of us!” said Blackwood.

“Who can he be?” said Mrs. Bas-Bleu.

“What can he be?” said big Miss Bas-Bleu.

“Where can he be?” said little Miss Bas-Bleu.—But I paid these

people no attention whatever—I just stepped into the shop of an

artist.

The Duchess of Bless-my-Soul was sitting for her portrait; the

Marquis of So-and-So was holding the Duchess’ poodle; the Earl of

This-and-That was flirting with her salts; and his Royal Highness

of Touch-me-Not was leaning upon the back of her chair.

I approached the artist and turned up my nose.

“Oh, beautiful!” sighed her Grace.

“Oh my!” lisped the Marquis.

“Oh, shocking!” groaned the Earl.

“Oh, abominable!” growled his Royal Highness.

“What will you take for it?” asked the artist.

“For his nose!” shouted her Grace.

“A thousand pounds,” said I, sitting down.

“A thousand pounds?” inquired the artist, musingly.

“A thousand pounds,” said I.

“Beautiful!” said he, entranced.

“A thousand pounds,” said I.

“Do you warrant it?” he asked, turning the nose to the light.

“I do,” said I, blowing it well.

“Is it quite original?” he inquired; touching it with reverence.

“Humph!” said I, twisting it to one side.

“Has no copy been taken?” he demanded, surveying it through a

microscope.

“None,” said I, turning it up.

“Admirable!” he ejaculated, thrown quite off his guard by the

beauty of the manœuvre.

“A thousand pounds,” said I.

“A thousand pounds?” said he.

“Precisely,” said I.

“A thousand pounds?” said he.

“Just so,” said I.

“You shall have them,” said he. “What a piece of virtu!” So he

drew me a check upon the spot, and took a sketch of my nose. I

engaged rooms in Jermyn street, and sent her Majesty the

ninety-ninth edition of the “Nosology,” with a portrait of the

proboscis.—That sad little rake, the Prince of Wales, invited me

to dinner.

We were all lions and _recherchés_.

There was a modern Platonist. He quoted Porphyry, Iamblicus,

Plotinus, Proclus, Hierocles, Maximus Tyrius, and Syrianus.

There was a human-perfectibility man. He quoted Turgôt, Price,

Priestly, Condorcêt, De Staël, and the “Ambitious Student in Ill

Health.”

There was Sir Positive Paradox. He observed that all fools were

philosophers, and that all philosophers were fools.

There was Æstheticus Ethix. He spoke of fire, unity, and atoms;

bi-part and pre-existent soul; affinity and discord; primitive

intelligence and homoömeria.

There was Theologos Theology. He talked of Eusebius and Arianus;

heresy and the Council of Nice; Puseyism and consubstantialism;

Homousios and Homouioisios.

There was Fricassée from the Rocher de Cancale. He mentioned

Muriton of red tongue; cauliflowers with _velouté_ sauce; veal _à

la St_. Menehoult; marinade _à la_ St. Florentin; and orange

jellies _en mosaïques_.

There was Bibulus O’Bumper. He touched upon Latour and

Markbrünnen; upon Mousseux and Chambertin; upon Richbourg and St.

George; upon Haubrion, Leonville, and Medoc; upon Barac and

Preignac; upon Grâve, upon Sauterne, upon Lafitte, and upon St.

Peray. He shook his head at Clos de Vougeot, and told, with his

eyes shut, the difference between Sherry and Amontillado.

There was Signor Tintontintino from Florence. He discoursed of

Cimabué, Arpino, Carpaccio, and Argostino—of the gloom of

Caravaggio, of the amenity of Albano, of the colors of Titian, of

the frows of Rubens, and of the waggeries of Jan Steen.

There was the President of the Fum-Fudge University. He was of

opinion that the moon was called Bendis in Thrace, Bubastis in

Egypt, Dian in Rome, and Artemis in Greece.

There was a Grand Turk from Stamboul. He could not help thinking

that the angels were horses, cocks, and bulls; that somebody in

the sixth heaven had seventy thousand heads; and that the earth

was supported by a sky-blue cow with an incalculable number of

green horns.

There was Delphinus Polyglott. He told us what had become of the

eighty-three lost tragedies of Æschylus; of the fifty-four

orations of Isæus; of the three hundred and ninety-one speeches

of Lysias; of the hundred and eighty treatises of Theophrastus;

of the eighth book of the conic sections of Apollonius; of

Pindar’s hymns and dithyrambics; and of the five and forty

tragedies of Homer Junior.

There was Ferdinand Fitz-Fossillus Feltspar. He informed us all

about internal fires and tertiary formations; about aëriforms,

fluidiforms, and solidiforms; about quartz and marl; about schist

and schorl; about gypsum and trap; about talc and calc; about

blende and horn-blende; about mica-slate and pudding-stone; about

cyanite and lepidolite; about hematite and tremolite; about

antimony and calcedony; about manganese and whatever you please.

There was myself. I spoke of myself;—of myself, of myself, of

myself;—of Nosology, of my pamphlet, and of myself. I turned up

my nose, and I spoke of myself.

“Marvellous clever man!” said the Prince.

“Superb!” said his guests;—and next morning her Grace of

Bless-my-Soul paid me a visit.

“Will you go to Almack’s, pretty creature?” she said, tapping me

under the chin.

“Upon honor,” said I.

“Nose and all?” she asked.

“As I live,” I replied.

“Here then is a card, my life. Shall I say you will be there?”

“Dear Duchess, with all my heart.”

“Pshaw, no!—but with all your nose?”

“Every bit of it, my love,” said I:—so I gave it a twist or two,

and found myself at Almack’s. The rooms were crowded to

suffocation.

“He is coming!” said somebody on the staircase.

“He is coming!” said somebody farther up.

“He is coming!” said somebody farther still.

“He is come!” exclaimed the Duchess. “He is come, the little

love!”—and, seizing me firmly by both hands, she kissed me thrice

upon the nose. A marked sensation immediately ensued.

“_Diavolo!_” cried Count Capricornutti.

“_Dios guarda!_” muttered Don Stiletto.

“_Mille tonnerres!_” ejaculated the Prince de Grenouille.

“_Tousand teufel!_” growled the Elector of Bluddennuff.

It was not to be borne. I grew angry. I turned short upon

Bluddennuff.

“Sir!” said I to him, “you are a baboon.”

“Sir,” he replied, after a pause, “_Donner und Blitzen!_”

This was all that could be desired. We exchanged cards. At

Chalk-Farm, the next morning, I shot off his nose—and then called

upon my friends.

“_Bête!_” said the first.

“Fool!” said the second.

“Dolt!” said the third.

“Ass!” said the fourth.

“Ninny!” said the fifth.

“Noodle!” said the sixth.

“Be off!” said the seventh.

At all this I felt mortified, and so called upon my father.

“Father,” I asked, “what is the chief end of my existence?”

“My son,” he replied, “it is still the study of Nosology; but in

hitting the Elector upon the nose you have overshot your mark.

You have a fine nose, it is true; but then Bluddennuff has none.

You are damned, and he has become the hero of the day. I grant

you that in Fum-Fudge the greatness of a lion is in proportion to

the size of his proboscis—but, good heavens! there is no

competing with a lion who has no proboscis at all.”

X-ING A PARAGRAB

As it is well known that the ‘wise men’ came ‘from the East,’ and

as Mr. Touch-and-go Bullet-head came from the East, it follows

that Mr. Bullet-head was a wise man; and if collateral proof of

the matter be needed, here we have it—Mr. B. was an editor.

Irascibility was his sole foible, for in fact the obstinacy of

which men accused him was anything but his foible, since he

justly considered it his forte. It was his strong point—his

virtue; and it would have required all the logic of a Brownson to

convince him that it was ‘anything else.’

I have shown that Touch-and-go Bullet-head was a wise man; and

the only occasion on which he did not prove infallible, was when,

abandoning that legitimate home for all wise men, the East, he

migrated to the city of Alexander-the-Great-o-nopolis, or some

place of a similar title, out West.

I must do him the justice to say, however, that when he made up

his mind finally to settle in that town, it was under the

impression that no newspaper, and consequently no editor, existed

in that particular section of the country. In establishing ‘The

Tea-Pot’ he expected to have the field all to himself. I feel

confident he never would have dreamed of taking up his residence

in Alexander-the-Great-o-nopolis had he been aware that, in

Alexander-the-Great-o-nopolis, there lived a gentleman named John

Smith (if I rightly remember), who for many years had there

quietly grown fat in editing and publishing the

‘Alexander-the-Great-o-nopolis Gazette.’ It was solely,

therefore, on account of having been misinformed, that Mr.

Bullet-head found himself in Alex—— suppose we call it Nopolis,

‘for short’—but, as he did find himself there, he determined to

keep up his character for obst—for firmness, and remain. So

remain he did; and he did more; he unpacked his press, type,

etc., etc., rented an office exactly opposite to that of the

‘Gazette,’ and, on the third morning after his arrival, issued

the first number of ‘The Alexan’—that is to say, of ‘The Nopolis

Tea-Pot’—as nearly as I can recollect, this was the name of the

new paper.

The leading article, I must admit, was brilliant—not to say

severe. It was especially bitter about things in general—and as

for the editor of ‘The Gazette,’ he was torn all to pieces in

particular. Some of Bullet-head’s remarks were really so fiery

that I have always, since that time, been forced to look upon

John Smith, who is still alive, in the light of a salamander. I

cannot pretend to give all the ‘Tea-Pot’s’ paragraphs verbatim,

but one of them runs thus:

‘Oh, yes!—Oh, we perceive! Oh, no doubt! The editor over the way

is a genius—O, my! Oh, goodness, gracious!—what is this world

coming to? Oh, tempora! Oh, Moses!’

A philippic at once so caustic and so classical, alighted like a

bombshell among the hitherto peaceful citizens of Nopolis. Groups

of excited individuals gathered at the corners of the streets.

Every one awaited, with heartfelt anxiety, the reply of the

dignified Smith. Next morning it appeared as follows:

‘We quote from “The Tea-Pot” of yesterday the subjoined

paragraph: “Oh, yes! Oh, we perceive! Oh, no doubt! Oh, my! Oh,

goodness! Oh, tempora! Oh, Moses!” Why, the fellow is all O! That

accounts for his reasoning in a circle, and explains why there is

neither beginning nor end to him, nor to anything he says. We

really do not believe the vagabond can write a word that hasn’t

an O in it. Wonder if this O-ing is a habit of his? By-the-by, he

came away from Down-East in a great hurry. Wonder if he O’s as

much there as he does here? “O! it is pitiful.”’

The indignation of Mr. Bullet-head at these scandalous

insinuations, I shall not attempt to describe. On the

eel-skinning principle, however, he did not seem to be so much

incensed at the attack upon his integrity as one might have

imagined. It was the sneer at his style that drove him to

desperation. What!—he Touch-and-go Bullet-head!—not able to write

a word without an O in it! He would soon let the jackanapes see

that he was mistaken. Yes! he would let him see how much he was

mistaken, the puppy! He, Touch-and-go Bullet-head, of

Frogpondium, would let Mr. John Smith perceive that he,

Bullet-head, could indite, if it so pleased him, a whole

paragraph—aye! a whole article—in which that contemptible vowel

should not once—not even once—make its appearance. But no;—that

would be yielding a point to the said John Smith. He,

Bullet-head, would make no alteration in his style, to suit the

caprices of any Mr. Smith in Christendom. Perish so vile a

thought! The O forever; He would persist in the O. He would be as

O-wy as O-wy could be.

Burning with the chivalry of this determination, the great

Touch-and-go, in the next ‘Tea-Pot,’ came out merely with this

simple but resolute paragraph, in reference to this unhappy

affair:

‘The editor of the “Tea-Pot” has the honor of advising the editor

of the “Gazette” that he (the “Tea-Pot”) will take an opportunity

in tomorrow morning’s paper, of convincing him (the “Gazette”)

that he (the “Tea-Pot”) both can and will be _his own master_, as

regards style;—he (the “Tea-Pot”) intending to show him (the

“Gazette”) the supreme, and indeed the withering contempt with

which the criticism of him (the “Gazette”) inspires the

independent bosom of him (the “Tea-Pot”) by composing for the

especial gratification (?) of him (the “Gazette”) a leading

article, of some extent, in which the beautiful vowel—the emblem

of Eternity—yet so offensive to the hyper-exquisite delicacy of

him (the “Gazette”) shall most certainly not be avoided by his

(the “Gazette’s”) most obedient, humble servant, the “Tea-Pot.”

“So much for Buckingham!”’

In fulfilment of the awful threat thus darkly intimated rather

than decidedly enunciated, the great Bullet-head, turning a deaf

ear to all entreaties for ‘copy,’ and simply requesting his

foreman to ‘go to the d——l,’ when he (the foreman) assured him

(the ‘Tea-Pot’!) that it was high time to ‘go to press’: turning

a deaf ear to everything, I say, the great Bullet-head sat up

until day-break, consuming the midnight oil, and absorbed in the

composition of the really unparalleled paragraph, which follows:—

‘So ho, John! how now? Told you so, you know. Don’t crow, another

time, before you’re out of the woods! Does your mother know

you’re out? Oh, no, no!—so go home at once, now, John, to your

odious old woods of Concord! Go home to your woods, old owl—go!

You won’t! Oh, poh, poh, John don’t do so! You’ve _got_ to go,

you know! So go at once, and don’t go slow, for nobody owns you

here, you know! Oh! John, John, if you don’t go you’re no

homo—no! You’re only a fowl, an owl; a cow, a sow; a doll, a

poll; a poor, old, good-for-nothing-to-nobody, log, dog, hog, or

frog, come out of a Concord bog. Cool, now—cool! Do be cool, you

fool! None of your crowing, old cock! Don’t frown so—don’t! Don’t

hollo, nor howl nor growl, nor bow-wow-wow! Good Lord, John, how

you do look! Told you so, you know—but stop rolling your goose of

an old poll about so, and go and drown your sorrows in a bowl!’

Exhausted, very naturally, by so stupendous an effort, the great

Touch-and-go could attend to nothing farther that night. Firmly,

composedly, yet with an air of conscious power, he handed his MS.

to the devil in waiting, and then, walking leisurely home,

retired, with ineffable dignity to bed.

Meantime the devil, to whom the copy was entrusted, ran up stairs

to his ‘case,’ in an unutterable hurry, and forthwith made a

commencement at ‘setting’ the MS. ‘up.’

In the first place, of course,—as the opening word was ‘So,’—he

made a plunge into the capital S hole and came out in triumph

with a capital S. Elated by this success, he immediately threw

himself upon the little-o box with a blindfold impetuosity—but

who shall describe his horror when his fingers came up without

the anticipated letter in their clutch? who shall paint his

astonishment and rage at perceiving, as he rubbed his knuckles,

that he had been only thumping them to no purpose, against the

bottom of an empty box. Not a single little-o was in the little-o

hole; and, glancing fearfully at the capital-O partition, he

found _that_, to his extreme terror, in a precisely similar

predicament. Awe-stricken, his first impulse was to rush to the

foreman.

‘Sir!’ said he, gasping for breath, ‘I can’t never set up nothing

without no o’s.’

‘What do you mean by that?’ growled the foreman, who was in a

very ill humor at being kept so late.

‘Why, sir, there beant an o in the office, neither a big un nor a

little un!’

‘What—what the d—l has become of all that were in the case?’

‘I don’t know, sir,’ said the boy, ‘but one of them ere “G’zette”

devils is bin prowling ’bout here all night, and I spect he’s

gone and cabbaged ‘em every one.’

‘Dod rot him! I haven’t a doubt of it,’ replied the foreman,

getting purple with rage ‘but I tell you what you do, Bob, that’s

a good boy—you go over the first chance you get and hook every

one of their i’s and (d——n them!) their izzards.’

‘Jist so,’ replied Bob, with a wink and a frown—‘I’ll be into

‘em, I’ll let ‘em know a thing or two; but in de meantime, that

ere paragrab? Mus go in to-night, you know—else there’ll be the

d—l to pay, and—’

‘And not a bit of pitch hot,’ interrupted the foreman, with a

deep sigh, and an emphasis on the ‘bit.’ ‘Is it a long paragraph,

Bob?’

‘Shouldn’t call it a _wery_ long paragrab,’ said Bob.

‘Ah, well, then! do the best you can with it! We must get to

press,’ said the foreman, who was over head and ears in work;

‘just stick in some other letter for o; nobody’s going to read

the fellow’s trash anyhow.’

‘Wery well,’ replied Bob, ‘here goes it!’ and off he hurried to

his case, muttering as he went: ‘Considdeble vell, them ere

expressions, perticcler for a man as doesn’t swar. So I’s to

gouge out all their eyes, eh? and d-n all their gizzards! Vell!

this here’s the chap as is just able for to do it.’ The fact is

that although Bob was but twelve years old and four feet high, he

was equal to any amount of fight, in a small way.

The exigency here described is by no means of rare occurrence in

printing-offices; and I cannot tell how to account for it, but

the fact is indisputable, that when the exigency does occur, it

almost always happens that x is adopted as a substitute for the

letter deficient. The true reason, perhaps, is that x is rather

the most superabundant letter in the cases, or at least was so in

the old times—long enough to render the substitution in question

an habitual thing with printers. As for Bob, he would have

considered it heretical to employ any other character, in a case

of this kind, than the x to which he had been accustomed.

‘I shell have to x this ere paragrab,’ said he to himself, as he

read it over in astonishment, ‘but it’s jest about the awfulest

o-wy paragrab I ever did see’: so x it he did, unflinchingly, and

to press it went x-ed.

Next morning the population of Nopolis were taken all aback by

reading in ‘The Tea-Pot,’ the following extraordinary leader:

‘Sx hx, Jxhn! hxw nxw? Txld yxu sx, yxu knxw. Dxn’t crxw, anxther

time, befxre yxu’re xut xf the wxxds! Dxes yxur mxther knxw

yxu’re xut? Xh, nx, nx!—sx gx hxme at xnce, nxw, Jxhn, tx yxur

xdixus xld wxxds xf Cxncxrd! Gx hxme tx yxur wxxds, xld xwl,—gx!

Yxu wxn’t? Xh, pxh, pxh, Jxhn, dxn’t dx sx! Yxu’ve gxt tx gx, yxu

knxw, sx gx at xnce, and dxn’t gx slxw; fxr nxbxdy xwns yxu here,

yxu knxw. Xh, Jxhn, Jxhn, Jxhn, if yxu dxn’t gx yxu’re nx

hxmx—nx! Yxu’re xnly a fxwl, an xwl; a cxw, a sxw; a dxll, a

pxll; a pxxr xld gxxd-fxr-nxthing-tx-nxbxdy, lxg, dxg, hxg, xr

frxg, cxme xut xf a Cxncxrd bxg. Cxxl, nxw—cxxl! Dx be cxxl, yxu

fxxl! Nxne xf yxur crxwing, xld cxck! Dxn’t frxwn sx—dxn’t! Dxn’t

hxllx, nxr hxwl, nxr grxwl, nxr bxw-wxw-wxw! Gxxd Lxrd, Jxhn, hxw

yxu dx lxxk! Txld yxu sx, yxu knxw,—but stxp rxlling yxur gxxse

xf an xld pxll abxut sx, and gx and drxwn yxur sxrrxws in a

bxwl!’

The uproar occasioned by this mystical and cabalistical article,

is not to be conceived. The first definite idea entertained by

the populace was, that some diabolical treason lay concealed in

the hieroglyphics; and there was a general rush to Bullet-head’s

residence, for the purpose of riding him on a rail; but that

gentleman was nowhere to be found. He had vanished, no one could

tell how; and not even the ghost of him has ever been seen since.

Unable to discover its legitimate object, the popular fury at

length subsided; leaving behind it, by way of sediment, quite a

medley of opinion about this unhappy affair.

One gentleman thought the whole an X-ellent joke.

Another said that, indeed, Bullet-head had shown much X-uberance

of fancy.

A third admitted him X-entric, but no more.

A fourth could only suppose it the Yankee’s design to X-press, in

a general way, his X-asperation.

‘Say, rather, to set an X-ample to posterity,’ suggested a fifth.

That Bullet-head had been driven to an extremity, was clear to

all; and in fact, since that editor could not be found, there was

some talk about lynching the other one.

The more common conclusion, however, was that the affair was,

simply, X-traordinary and in-X-plicable. Even the town

mathematician confessed that he could make nothing of so dark a

problem. X, everybody knew, was an unknown quantity; but in this

case (as he properly observed), there was an unknown quantity of

X.

The opinion of Bob, the devil (who kept dark about his having

‘X-ed the paragrab’), did not meet with so much attention as I

think it deserved, although it was very openly and very

fearlessly expressed. He said that, for his part, he had no doubt

about the matter at all, that it was a clear case, that Mr.

Bullet-head ‘never could be persuaded fur to drink like other

folks, but vas continually a-svigging o’ that ere blessed XXX

ale, and as a naiteral consekvence, it just puffed him up savage,

and made him X (cross) in the X-treme.’

METZENGERSTEIN

Pestis eram vivus—moriens tua mors ero.

—_Martin Luther_

Horror and fatality have been stalking abroad in all ages. Why

then give a date to this story I have to tell? Let it suffice to

say, that at the period of which I speak, there existed, in the

interior of Hungary, a settled although hidden belief in the

doctrines of the Metempsychosis. Of the doctrines themselves—that

is, of their falsity, or of their probability—I say nothing. I

assert, however, that much of our incredulity—as La Bruyère says

of all our unhappiness—“_vient de ne pouvoir être seuls_.” {*1}

But there are some points in the Hungarian superstition which

were fast verging to absurdity. They—the Hungarians—differed very

essentially from their Eastern authorities. For example, “_The

soul_,” said the former—I give the words of an acute and

intelligent Parisian—“_ne demeure qu’un seul fois dans un corps

sensible: au reste—un cheval, un chien, un homme même, n’est que

la ressemblance peu tangible de ces animaux._”

The families of Berlifitzing and Metzengerstein had been at

variance for centuries. Never before were two houses so

illustrious, mutually embittered by hostility so deadly. The

origin of this enmity seems to be found in the words of an

ancient prophecy—“A lofty name shall have a fearful fall when, as

the rider over his horse, the mortality of Metzengerstein shall

triumph over the immortality of Berlifitzing.”

To be sure the words themselves had little or no meaning. But

more trivial causes have given rise—and that no long while ago—to

consequences equally eventful. Besides, the estates, which were

contiguous, had long exercised a rival influence in the affairs

of a busy government. Moreover, near neighbors are seldom

friends; and the inhabitants of the Castle Berlifitzing might

look, from their lofty buttresses, into the very windows of the

palace Metzengerstein. Least of all had the more than feudal

magnificence, thus discovered, a tendency to allay the irritable

feelings of the less ancient and less wealthy Berlifitzings. What

wonder then, that the words, however silly, of that prediction,

should have succeeded in setting and keeping at variance two

families already predisposed to quarrel by every instigation of

hereditary jealousy? The prophecy seemed to imply—if it implied

anything—a final triumph on the part of the already more powerful

house; and was of course remembered with the more bitter

animosity by the weaker and less influential.

Wilhelm, Count Berlifitzing, although loftily descended, was, at

the epoch of this narrative, an infirm and doting old man,

remarkable for nothing but an inordinate and inveterate personal

antipathy to the family of his rival, and so passionate a love of

horses, and of hunting, that neither bodily infirmity, great age,

nor mental incapacity, prevented his daily participation in the

dangers of the chase.

Frederick, Baron Metzengerstein, was, on the other hand, not yet

of age. His father, the Minister G—, died young. His mother, the

Lady Mary, followed him quickly after. Frederick was, at that

time, in his fifteenth year. In a city, fifteen years are no long

period—a child may be still a child in his third lustrum: but in

a wilderness—in so magnificent a wilderness as that old

principality, fifteen years have a far deeper meaning.

From some peculiar circumstances attending the administration of

his father, the young Baron, at the decease of the former,

entered immediately upon his vast possessions. Such estates were

seldom held before by a nobleman of Hungary. His castles were

without number. The chief in point of splendor and extent was the

“Château Metzengerstein.” The boundary line of his dominions was

never clearly defined; but his principal park embraced a circuit

of fifty miles.