POSSESSES A KNOWLEDGE
EXTENDING OVER THE WHOLE AREA OF THE
METROPOLIS.
"'Tis not a wonder:
'Tis Nature."—TIMES.
[Illustration:
THE COOK AND HER FAITHFUL ATTENDANT.
]
"SAY YOU DID IT!"
A ROMANCE OF SMILES AND TITTERS.
TITTER THE FIRST.
That ordinary-looking middle-aged gentleman, who is just emerging from
that Jeweller's shop, is Signor Goffoni. He has been there to purchase a
pair of earrings for his pretty young wife, with which he purposes to
bribe her into good-humour with him again. For, to say the truth, the
happy couple have lately been living on the usual matrimonial terms
which follow the union of Signoras, who are scarcely out of their teens,
with Signors, who are half way through their 'tys. And this morning the
conjugal breezes had swollen into a perfect hymeneal hurricane. It had
blown divorces and separate maintenances. The Signora had gone into the
customary hysterics, and the Signor had left the house with that violent
bang of the street-door which is the especial property of enraged
husbands. And "the cause—the cause" was precisely the same as made Mr.
Othello determine to put an extinguisher upon his better-half, instead
of his night-lamp. The green-eyed monster had kittened his horrid
suspicions in Signor Goffoni's bosom, and had lapped up all the milk of
human kindness in the dairy of his heart. He had accidentally discovered
a _billet_—something more than a _doux_—addressed to his black-eyed
young wife, from a gentleman calling himself the Marchese di
Castellinaria, and which expressed a regard for her that—tested by the
very delicate thermometer of the Signor's jealousy—did appear to him not
quite so tepid as mere friendship would dictate. And he had not scrupled
to say as much to the black eyes he had taken for better or for worse.
Whereupon the said ebon optics had looked scissors, though they'd used
none—had vowed eternal separation—_usque ad mensam et torum_—and wound
up with those effective convulsions of which married ladies generally
keep a plentiful supply, ready for use. Jealousy, however, had
galvanized the iron of the Signor's heart, and made it no longer
susceptible of being acted upon by the salt water of his wife's eyes;
so, as we said before, he bounced out of the house with a bang like a
human cracker.
Long before evening, however, Goffoni had relented; he felt convinced
that he had wronged his dear little wife by his unjust suspicions, and
arrived at the sage conclusion that he was a brute and she was an angel;
so that an hour before his usual time for quitting business he hurried
off to the nearest Jeweller's to buy her a pair of earrings, determined
to hasten home and shed over her the diamond drops of repentance. But on
arriving at his domicile, he found the dark-eyed young partner of his
bosom absent from home. Could his unkind treatment have driven her from
his roof? The very thought was stilettoes. He rang furiously and
inquired of the servant concerning her mistress. She had quitted the
house about half an hour ago, leaving directions that the letter which
the maid then presented should be delivered to the Signor immediately on
his return. He seized it. It was unaddressed, and ran as follows:—
"After your insulting conduct I can no longer consent to the
continuance of our acquaintance. I must beg, therefore, that
henceforth we be as Strangers; and that you will never again dare to
offend me with the protestation of your regard, which it is utterly
impossible for me further to acknowledge.
"CARLOTTA."
"Gone! gone!" groaned Goffoni; and he sunk overwhelmed upon the sofa,
and buried his face in his hands. Presently he started up again—buttoned
his coat vehemently—knocked his hat on his head—and dashed from the
house with a wild look of despair and prussic acid.
That miserable-looking middle-aged gentleman, seated on that stone in
the heart of that wood, is Signor Goffoni. And that small phial, which
he takes from his waistcoat-pocket, is labelled "LAUDANUM!" He has
sought out this secluded spot, and purchased this poisonous potion, to
put a premature "finis" to his wretched biography. For "what is the
world now to him?" he says—"a wilderness—a desert. He has lost the angel
who made it a paradise; and as he always felt convinced that there was
not another woman like her upon earth, why should he go dawdling on
alone to the grave? No! he is resolved! Bereft of his Carlotta, he cares
not to live, and fears not to die. She has bidden adieu to him, so he
will bid adieu to the world."
With this brief oration the woe-begone Goffoni drew the stopper from the
phial, and swallowed its contents.
No sooner had he drunk off the deadly draught than a Signor, habited in
a capacious cloak, started up from behind the stone on which Goffoni was
seated, and inquired whether he would save the life of a
fellow-creature?
"I save the life of a fellow-creature!" gasped Goffoni, dropping the
empty phial with amazement from his hand; "I am a dying man myself!"
"Yes! I know that," replied the Signor in the cloak, "and that is the
cause of my making the request. The fact is, the other gentleman, whose
life is in danger, is not quite so tired of his existence as you seem to
be of yours. And since you are determined on going out of the world, you
may as well leave it with the grace of a good action, and let your death
be the salvation of his life."
Goffoni, who was now ready to clutch at any straw that appeared likely
to save him from sinking in the next world, simply asked, "How that
could be?"
"Oh, never mind about that," returned he in the cloak; "only you consent
to do it, and I'll soon tell you how. Come! what do you say? Recollect
'charity covers a multitude of sins,' and you've got a pretty good lot
here to answer for, certainly."
Goffoni felt that he had, and being anxious now to obtain absolution by
any means, he, not very reluctantly, promised to do what the stranger
desired.
Whereupon the Signor in the cloak informed Goffoni that, finding himself
rather short of cash, he had requested the loan of some gold from a
drover whom he had met that evening in the forest; but that the drover
had not only in the most un-gentleman-like manner refused to accommodate
him, but had even been base enough to doubt the honesty of his
intentions. That this had so exasperated him in the cloak that he had
knocked the scoundrel down, and borrowed of him all the money he
possessed. That the cries of the drover had brought the soldiers to his
assistance, when the Signor in the cloak was obliged to run for his
life; but that in his flight he had dropped his hat on the road. That he
had only just succeeded in avoiding his pursuers by secreting himself
behind that stone, when Signor Goffoni had come up and seated himself
upon it. "However," added he, "the soldiers can't be far off; and when
they find I've given them the slip they will be certain to return, for I
know them of old. So that, you see, what I want of you now, my friend,
is, should the rogues come this way again, and question you about that
nonsensical piece of business, that you'll just have the kindness—since
it can't make any difference to you in your present situation—to say you
did it."
Goffoni, when he heard what was required of him, hardly liked the office
he had undertaken to perform. But as it certainly could not make any
difference to him in his present situation, and as he had given his
promise, he told the gentleman in the cloak he would be as good as his
word and say he did it. The stranger thanked Goffoni heartily, called
him his preserver, and many other equally complimentary names, and was
about hurrying off, when a sudden thought detained him, "Stay!" he
exclaimed, "this cloak will make your confession all the more veritable,
while the possession of the identical purse I took from that rascally
drover will put the affair beyond the shadow of a suspicion." And so
saying, he threw the one hastily over the back of Goffoni, and, having
divested the other of its contents, slipped the empty leathern bag into
the breeches-pocket of that poor gentleman, who, by this time, lay
writhing on his stomach, under the painful effects of the deadly draught
he had swallowed.
"And now once more, Addio!" exclaimed the stranger, putting on the hat
of Signor G. as a substitute for the one he had dropped on the road;
"and mind!" he added, "I rely upon you to—say you did it!"
[SECOND TITTER, _page 147_.]
[Illustration:
BLIND BOY'S BUFF AT THE LADIES' SCHOOL.
]
[Illustration:
Bringing her up in the way she should go.
]
[Illustration:
The Heart Breaker.
]
[Illustration:
Getting her French by Heart.
]
A LETTER FROM "LA NATIVE DE PARIS," AT MISS THIMBLEBEE'S ESTABLISHMENT
FOR YOUNG LADIES, TO HER MOTHER IN YORKSHIRE.
"Belle Vue House, Blackheath, Judy Swore.
"MA SHARE MARE,—I take up my _plume_ to inform you that this leaves
me in a state of perfect convalescence, or as we say in French, _sar
var beang havoc more_, as I hope it does _havoc twore_. I pass very
well now for _un Nattif de Parry_. I have combed back my front hair,
_à la Shinwars_; so that I have _tutor fay le hair Fransay_. And,
yet _oh! ma share Mare, say treest!—set hawreeble_, to be compelled
to deny the land of one's birth, and all _poor le daygootang argong
de set mizzyrarble V_! What, after all, too, is 20_l._ a-year _poor
une Damn kom more_? A paltry pittance!—_vollar_ 2. _Apprepo_, I must
tell you of an awkward _wrongconter_ which happened last _Macready
Mattang_, to Miss Thimblebee and _lay Demmozel_. As we were
promenaying on the Heath we came across _dew June Offishya de
Woolwich_. They were dreadfully impudent and frightfully handsome—
Oh, _ma Mare! Kell bell Ome! Kell jolly Moostarch! Kell bows U!_ I
think if you were to send me the Pork Pies you talked of I could
keep them in my _Sharmbrer a Kooshay_, and eat them when I went to
bed, _dong mong Lee_—as we have no pastry here but rice puddings—
_Say malle-roeze!—Ness Pa?_
"And now, _Addèw, ma tray share Mare!_ I have to put the Parlour
Boarders _cheraux ong pappya_. So _Pa plooze a presong_ from _Vòtrer
Ammeroose Feel_,
"CRINOLINE DE CORSET, _nay_ SARAH SKEGGS."
[Illustration:
THE BEST WAY OF ADVERTISING A LADIES' SCHOOL.
]
[Illustration: