"Well, if a woman hadn't better be in her grave than be married!
That is, if she can't be married to a decent man. No; I don't care
if you are tired, I SHAN'T let you go to sleep. No, and I won't say
what I have to say in the morning; I'll say it now. It's all very
well for you to come home at what time you like--it's now half-past
twelve--and expect I'm to hold my tongue, and let you go to sleep.
What next, I wonder? A woman had better be sold for a slave at once.
"And so you've gone and joined a club? The Skylarks, indeed! A
pretty skylark you'll make of yourself! But I won't stay and be
ruined by you. No: I'm determined on that. I'll go and take the
dear children, and you may get who you like to keep your house. That
is, as long as you have a house to keep--and that won't be long, I
know.
"How any decent man can go and spend his nights in a tavern!--oh,
yes, Mr. Caudle; I daresay you DO go for rational conversation. I
should like to know how many of you would care for what you call
rational conversation, if you had it without your filthy brandy-and-
water; yes, and your more filthy tobacco-smoke. I'm sure the last
time you came home, I had the headache for a week. But I know who it
is who's taking you to destruction. It's that brute, Prettyman. He
has broken his own poor wife's heart, and now he wants to--but don't
you think it, Mr. Caudle; I'll not have my peace of mind destroyed by
the best man that ever trod. Oh, yes! I know you don't care so long
as you can appear well to all the world,--but the world little thinks
how you behave to me. It shall know it, though--that I'm determined.
"How any man can leave his own happy fireside to go and sit, and
smoke, and drink, and talk with people who wouldn't one of 'em lift a
finger to save him from hanging--how any man can leave his wife--and
a good wife, too, though I say it--for a parcel of pot-companions--
oh, it's disgraceful, Mr. Caudle; it's unfeeling. No man who had the
least love for his wife could do it.
"And I suppose this is to be the case every Saturday? But I know
what I'll do. I know--it's no use, Mr. Caudle, your calling me a
good creature: I'm not such a fool as to be coaxed in that way. No;
if you want to go to sleep, you should come home in Christian time,
not at half-past twelve. There was a time, when you were as regular
at your fireside as the kettle. That was when you were a decent man,
and didn't go amongst Heaven knows who, drinking and smoking, and
making what you think your jokes. I never heard any good come to a
man who cared about jokes. No respectable tradesman does. But I
know what I'll do: I'll scare away your Skylarks. The house serves
liquor after twelve of a Saturday; and if I don't write to the
magistrates, and have the licence taken away, I'm not lying in this
bed this night. Yes, you may call me a foolish woman; but no, Mr.
Caudle, no; it's you who are the foolish man; or worse than a foolish
man; you're a wicked one. If you were to die to-morrow--and people
who go to public-houses do all they can to shorten their lives--I
should like to know who would write upon your tombstone, 'A tender
husband and an affectionate father'? _I_--I'd have no such
falsehoods told of you, I can assure you.
"Going and spending your money, and--nonsense! don't tell me--no, if
you were ten times to swear it, I wouldn't believe that you only
spent eighteenpence on a Saturday. You can't be all those hours and
only spend eighteenpence. I know better. I'm not quite a fool, Mr.
Caudle. A great deal you could have for eighteenpence! And all the
Club married men and fathers of families. The more shame for 'em!
Skylarks, indeed! They should call themselves Vultures; for they can
only do as they do by eating up their innocent wives and children.
Eighteenpence a week! And if it was only that,--do you know what
fifty-two eighteenpences come to in a year? Do you ever think of
that, and see the gowns I wear? I'm sure I can't, out of the house-
money, buy myself a pin-cushion; though I've wanted one these six
months. No--not so much as a ball of cotton. But what do you care
so you can get your brandy-and-water? There's the girls, too--the
things they want! They're never dressed like other people's
children. But it's all the same to their father. Oh, yes! So he
can go with his Skylarks they may wear sackcloth for pinafores, and
packthread for garters.
"You'd better not let that Mr. Prettyman come here, that's all; or,
rather, you'd better bring him once. Yes, I should like to see him.
He wouldn't forget it. A man who, I may say, lives and moves only in
a spittoon. A man who has a pipe in his mouth as constant as his
front teeth. A sort of tavern king, with a lot of fools like you to
laugh at what he thinks his jokes, and give him consequence. No, Mr.
Caudle, no; it's no use your telling me to go to sleep, for I won't.
Go to sleep, indeed! I'm sure it's almost time to get up. I hardly
know what's the use of coming to bed at all now.
"The Skylarks, indeed! I suppose you'll be buying a 'Little
Warbler,' and at your time of life, be trying to sing. The peacocks
will sing next. A pretty name you'll get in the neighbourhood; and,
in a very little time, a nice face you'll have. Your nose is getting
redder already: and you've just one of the noses that liquor always
flies to. YOU DON'T SEE IT'S RED? No--I daresay not--but _I_ see
it; _I_ see a great many things you don't. And so you'll go on. In
a little time, with your brandy-and-water--don't tell me that you
only take two small glasses: I know what men's two small glasses
are; in a little time you'll have a face all over as if it was made
of red currant jam. And I should like to know who's to endure you
then? I won't, and so don't think it. Don't come to me.
"Nice habits men learn at clubs! There's Joskins: he was a decent
creature once, and now I'm told he has more than once boxed his
wife's ears. He's a Skylark too. And I suppose, some day, you'll be
trying to box MY ears? Don't attempt it, Mr. Caudle; I say don't
attempt it. Yes--it's all very well for you to say you don't mean
it,--but I only say again, don't attempt it. You'd rue it till the
day of your death, Mr. Caudle.
"Going and sitting for four hours at a tavern! What men, unless they
had their wives with them, can find to talk about, I can't think. No
good, of course.
"Eighteenpence a week--and drinking brandy-and-water, enough to swim
a boat! And smoking like the funnel of a steamship! And I can't
afford myself so much as a piece of tape! It's brutal, Mr. Caudle.
It's ve-ve-ve--ry bru--tal."
"And here," says Caudle--"Here, thank Heaven! at last she fell
asleep."
LECTURE IV--MR. CAUDLE HAS BEEN CALLED FROM HIS BED TO BAIL MR.
PRETTYMAN FROM THE WATCH-HOUSE
"Fie, Mr. Caudle, I knew it would come to this. I said it would,
when you joined those precious Skylarks. People being called out of
their beds at all hours of the night, to bail a set of fellows who
are never so happy as when they're leading sober men to destruction.
I should like to know what the neighbours will think of you, with
people from the police knocking at the door at two in the morning?
Don't tell me that the man has been ill-used: he's not the man to be
ill-used. And you must go and bail him! I know the end of that:
he'll run away, and you'll have to pay the money. I should like to
know what's the use of my working and slaving to save a farthing,
when you throw away pounds upon your precious Skylarks. A pretty
cold you'll have to-morrow morning, being called out of your warm bed
this weather; but don't you think I'll nurse you--not I; not a drop
of gruel do you get from me.
"I'm sure you've plenty of ways of spending your money--not throwing
it away upon a set of dissolute peace-breakers. It's all very well
for you to say you haven't thrown away your money, but you will.
He'll be certain to run off; it isn't likely he'll go upon his trial,
and you'll be fixed with the bail. Don't tell me there's no trial in
the matter, because I know there is; it's for something more than
quarrelling with the policeman that he was locked up. People aren't
locked up for that. No, it's for robbery, or something worse,
perhaps.
"And as you have bailed him, people will think you are as bad as he
is. Don't tell me you couldn't help bailing him; you should have
shown yourself a respectable man, and have let him been sent to
prison.
"Now people know you're the friend of drunken and disorderly persons,
you'll never have a night's sleep in your bed. Not that it would
matter what fell upon you, if it wasn't your poor wife who suffered.
Of course all the business will be in the newspapers, and your name
with it. I shouldn't wonder, too, if they give your picture as they
do the other folks of the Old Bailey. A pretty thing that, to go
down to your children. I'm sure it will be enough to make them
change their name. No, I shall not go to sleep; it's all very well
for you to say, go to sleep, after such a disturbance. But I shall
not go to sleep, Mr. Caudle; certainly not."
"Her will, I have no doubt," says Caudle, "was strong; but nature was
stronger, and she did sleep; this night inflicting upon me a
remarkably short lecture."
LECTURE V--MR. CAUDLE HAS REMAINED DOWNSTAIRS TILL PAST ONE, WITH A
FRIEND
"Pretty time of night to come to bed, Mr. Caudle. Ugh! As cold,
too, as any ice. Enough to give any woman her death, I'm sure.
What!
"I SHOULDN'T HAVE LOCKED UP THE COALS?
"If I hadn't, I've no doubt the fellow would have stayed all night.
It's all very well for you, Mr. Caudle, to bring people home--but I
wish you'd think first what's for supper. That beautiful leg of pork
would have served for our dinner to-morrow,--and now it's gone. _I_
can't keep the house upon the money, and I won't pretend to do it, if
you bring a mob of people every night to clear out the cupboard.
"I wonder who'll be so ready to give you a supper when you want one:
for want one you will, unless you change your plans. Don't tell me!
I know I'm right. You'll first be eaten up, and then you'll be
laughed at. I know the world. No, indeed, Mr. Caudle, I don't think
ill of everybody; don't say that. But I can't see a leg of pork
eaten up in that way, without asking myself what it's all to end in
if such things go on? And then he must have pickles, too! Couldn't
be content with my cabbage--no, Mr. Caudle, I won't let you go to
sleep. It's very well for you to say let you go to sleep, after
you've kept me awake till this time.
"WHY DID I KEEP AWAKE?
"How do you suppose I could go to sleep when I knew that man was
below drinking up your substance in brandy-and-water? for he couldn't
be content upon decent, wholesome gin. Upon my word, you ought to be
a rich man, Mr. Caudle. You have such very fine friends, I wonder
who gives you brandy when you go out!
"No, indeed, he couldn't be content with my pickled cabbage--and I
should like to know who makes better--but he must have walnuts. And
you, too, like a fool--now, don't you think to stop me, Mr. Caudle; a
poor woman may be trampled to death, and never say a word--you, too,
like a fool--I wonder who'd do it for you--to insist upon the girl
going out for pickled walnuts. And in such a night too! With snow
upon the ground. Yes; you're a man of fine feelings, you are, Mr.
Caudle; but the world doesn't know you as I know you--fine feelings,
indeed! to send the poor girl out, when I told you and told your
friend, too--a pretty brute he is, I'm sure--that the poor girl had
got a cold and I dare say chilblains on her toes. But I know what
will be the end of that; she'll be laid up, and we shall have a nice
doctor's bill. And you'll pay it, I can tell you--for _I_ won't.
"YOU WISH YOU WERE OUT OF THE WORLD?
"Oh! yes, that's all very easy. I'm sure _I_ might wish it. Don't
swear in that dreadful way! Aren't you afraid that the bed will open
and swallow you? And don't swing about in that way. THAT will do no
good. THAT won't bring back the leg of pork, and the brandy you've
poured down both of your throats. Oh, I know it, I'm sure of it. I
only recollected it when I'd got into bed--and if it hadn't been so
cold, you'd have seen me downstairs again, I can tell you--I
recollected it, and a pretty two hours I've passed--that I left the
key in the cupboard,--and I know it--I could see by the manner of you
when you came into the room--I know you've got at the other bottle.
However, there's one comfort: you told me to send for the best
brandy--the very best--for your other friend, who called last
Wednesday. Ha! ha! It was British--the cheapest British--and nice
and ill I hope the pair of you will be to-morrow.
"There's only the bare bone of the leg of pork! but you'll get
nothing else for dinner, I can tell you. It's a dreadful thing that
the poor children should go without,--but if they have such a father,
they, poor things, must suffer for it.
"Nearly a whole leg of pork and a pint of brandy! A pint of brandy
and a leg of pork. A leg of--leg--leg--pint--"
"And mumbling the syllables," says Mr. Caudle's MS., "she went to
sleep."