Some Roundabout Papers, by William Makepeace Thackeray

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Transcribed from the 1908 T. N. Foulis edition by StephenRice,gift ideas with engineering building kits for toddlers email [email protected] and David Price, [email protected]

SOME ROUND-
ABOUT PAPERS

BY
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE
THACKERAY

T. N. FOULIS
13–15 FREDERICK STREET
EDINBURGH: & 23 BEDFORD
STREET, LONDON, W.C.

1908

ON SOME CARP AT SANS SOUCI

We have lately made theacquaintance of an old lady of ninety, who has passed the lasttwenty-five years of her old life in a great metropolitanestablishment, the workhouse, namely, of the parish of SaintLazarus.  Stay—twenty-three or four years ago, shecame out once, and thought to earn a little money by hop-picking;but being overworked, and having to lie out at night, she got apalsy which has incapacitated her from all further labour, andhas caused her poor old limbs to shake ever since.

An illustration of that dismal proverb which tells us howpoverty makes us acquainted with strange bed-fellows, this poorold shaking body has to lay herself down every night in herworkhouse bed by the side of some other old woman with whom shemay or may not agree.  She herself can’t be a verypleasant bed-fellow, poor thing! with her shaking old limbs andcold feet.  She lies awake a deal of the night, to be sure,not thinking of happy old times, for hers never were happy; butsleepless with aches, and agues, and rheumatism of old age. “The gentleman gave me brandy-and-water,” she said,her old voice shaking with rapture at the thought.  I neverhad a great love for Queen Charlotte, but I like her better nowfrom what this old lady told me.  The Queen, who loved snuffherself, has left a legacy of snuff to certain poorhouses; and,in her watchful nights, this old woman takes a pinch of QueenCharlotte’s snuff, “and it do comfort me, sir, thatit do!”  Pulveris exigui munus.  Here is aforlorn aged creature, shaking with palsy, with no soul among thegreat struggling multitude of mankind to care for her, not quitetrampled out of life, but past and forgotten in the rush, made alittle happy, and soothed in her hours of unrest by this pennylegacy.  Let me think as I write.  (The nextmonth’s sermon, thank goodness! is safe to press.) This discourse will appear at the season when I have read thatwassail-bowls make their appearance; at the season of pantomime,turkey and sausages, plum-puddings, jollifications forschoolboys; Christmas bills, and reminiscences more or less sadand sweet for elders.  If we oldsters are not merry, weshall be having a semblance of merriment.  We shall see theyoung folks laughing round the holly-bush.  We shall passthe bottle round cosily as we sit by the fire.  That oldthing will have a sort of festival too.  Beef, beer, andpudding will be served to her for that day also.  Christmasfalls on a Thursday.  Friday is the workhouse day for comingout.  Mary, remember that old Goody Twoshoes has herinvitation for Friday, 26th December!  Ninety is she, poorold soul?  Ah! what a bonny face to catch under amistletoe!  “Yes, ninety, sir,” she says,“and my mother was a hundred, and my grandmother was ahundred and two.”

Herself ninety, her mother a hundred, her grandmother ahundred and two?  What a queer calculation!

Ninety!  Very good, granny: you were born, then, in1772.

Your mother, we will say, was twenty-seven when you were born,and was born therefore in 1745.

Your grandmother was thirty-five when her daughter was born,and was born therefore in 1710.

We will begin with the present granny first.  My good oldcreature, you can’t of course remember, but that littlegentleman for whom you mother was laundress in the Temple was theingenious Mr Goldsmith, author of a “History ofEngland,” the “Vicar of Wakefield,” and manydiverting pieces.  You were brought almost an infant to hischambers in Brick Court, and he gave you some sugar-candy, forthe doctor was always good to children.  That gentleman whowell-nigh smothered you by sitting down on you as you lay in achair asleep was the learned Mr S. Johnson, whose history of“Rasselas” you have never read, my pour soul; andwhose tragedy of “Irene” I don’t believe anyman in these kingdoms ever perused.  That tipsy Scotchgentleman who used to come to the chambers sometimes, and at whomeverybody laughed, wrote a more amusing book than any of thescholars, your Mr Burke and your Mr Johnson, and your DrGoldsmith.  Your father often took him home in a chair tohis lodgings; and has done as much for Parson Sterne in BondStreet, the famous wit.  Of course, my good creature, youremember the Gordon Riots, and crying No Popery before MrLangdale’s house, the Popish distiller’s, and thatbonny fire of my Lord Mansfield’s books in BloomsburySquare?  Bless us, what a heap of illuminations you haveseen! For the glorious victory over the Americans atBreed’s Hill; for the peace in 1814, and the beautifulChinese bridge in St James’s Park; for the coronation ofhis Majesty, whom you recollect as Prince of Wales, Goody,don’t you?  Yes; and you went in a procession oflaundresses to pay your respects to his good lady, the injuredQueen of England, at Brandenburg House; and you remember yourmother told you how she was taken to see the Scotch lordsexecuted at the Tower.  And as for your grandmother, she wasborn five months after the battle of Malplaquet, she was; whereher poor father was killed, fighting like a bold Briton for theQueen.  With the help of a “Wade’sChronology,” I can make out ever so queer a history foryou, my poor old body, and a pedigree as authentic as many in thepeerage-books.

Peerage-books and pedigrees?  What does she know aboutthem? Battles and victories, treasons, kings, and beheadings,literary gentlemen, and the like, what have they ever been toher? Granny, did you ever hear of General Wolfe?  Yourmother may have seen him embark, and your father may have carrieda musket under him.  Your grandmother may have cried huzzafor Marlborough; but what is the Prince Duke to you, and did youever so much as hear tell of his name?  How many hundred orthousand of years had that toad lived who was in the coal at thedefunct exhibition?—and yet he was not a bit betterinformed than toads seven or eight hundred years younger.

“Don’t talk to me your nonsense about Exhibitions,and Prince Dukes, and toads in coals, or coals in toads, or whatis it?” says granny.  “I know there was a goodQueen Charlotte, for she left me snuff; and it comforts me of anight when I lie awake.”

To me there is something very touching in the notion of thatlittle pinch of comfort doled out to granny, and gratefullyinhaled by her in the darkness.  Don’t you rememberwhat traditions there used to be of chests of plate, bulses ofdiamonds, laces of inestimable value, sent out of the countryprivately by the old Queen, to enrich certain relatives inM-ckl-nb-rg Str-l-tz?  Not all the treasure went. Non omnis moritur.  A poor old palsied thing atmidnight is made happy sometimes as she lifts her shaking oldhand to her nose.  Gliding noiselessly among the beds wherelie the poor creatures huddled in their cheerless dormitory, Ifancy an old ghost with a snuff-box that does not creak. “There, Goody, take of my rappee.  You will notsneeze, and I shall not say ‘God bless you.’ But you will think kindly of old Queen Charlotte, won’tyou?  Ah!  I had a many troubles, a manytroubles.  I was a prisoner almost so much as you are. I had to eat boiled mutton every day: entre nous, Iabominated it.  But I never complained.  I swallowedit.  I made the best of a hard life.  We have all ourburdens to bear.  But hark!  I hear the cock-crow, andsnuff the morning air.”  And with this the royal ghostvanishes up the chimney—if there be a chimney in thatdismal harem, where poor old Twoshoes and her companions passtheir nights—their dreary nights, their restless nights,their cold long nights, shared in what glum companionship,illumined by what a feeble taper!

“Did I understand you, my good Twoshoes, to say thatyour mother was seven-and-twenty years old when you were born,and that she married your esteemed father when she herself wastwenty-five? 1745, then, was the date of your dear mother’sbirth.  I daresay her father was absent in the LowCountries, with his Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland, underwhom he had the honour of carrying a halberd at the famousengagement of Fontenoy—or if not there, he may have been atPreston Pans, under General Sir John Cope, when the wildHighlanders broke through all the laws of discipline and theEnglish lines; and, being on the spot, did he see the famousghost which didn’t appear to Colonel Gardner of theDragoons?  My good creature, is it possible you don’tremember that Doctor Swift, Sir Robert Walpole (my Lord Orford,as you justly say), old Sarah Marlborough, and little Mr Pope, ofTwitnam, died in the year of your birth?  What a wretchedmemory you have!  What? haven’t they a library, andthe commonest books of reference at the old convent of SaintLazarus, where you dwell?”

“Convent of Saint Lazarus, Prince William, Dr Swift,Atossa, and Mr Pope, of Twitnam!  What is the gentlemantalking about?” says old goody, with a “Ho!ho!” and a laugh like a old parrot—you know they liveto be as old as Methuselah, parrots do, and a parrot of a hundredis comparatively young (ho! ho! ho!).  Yes, and likewisecarps live to an immense old age.  Some which Frederick theGreat fed at Sans Souci are there now, with great humps of bluemould on their old backs; and they could tell all sorts of queerstories, if they chose to speak—but they are very silent,carps are—of their nature peu communicatives. Oh! what has been thy long life, old goody, but a dole of breadand water and a perch on a cage; a dreary swim round and round aLethe of a pond?  What are Rossbach or Jena to those mouldyones, and do they know it is a grandchild of England who bringsbread to feed them?

No!  Those Sans Souci carps may live to be a thousandyears old and have nothing to tell but that one day is likeanother; and the history of friend Goody Twoshoes has not muchmore variety than theirs.  Hard labour, hard fare, hard bed,numbing cold all night, and gnawing hunger most days.  Thatis her lot.  Is it lawful in my prayers to say, “Thankheaven, I am not as one of these”?  If I were eighty,would I like to feel the hunger always gnawing, gnawing? to haveto get up and make a bow when Mr Bumble the beadle entered thecommon room? to have to listen to Miss Prim, who came to give meher ideas of the next world?  If I were eighty, I own Ishould not like to have to sleep with another gentleman of my ownage, gouty, a bad sleeper, kicking in his old dreams, andsnoring; to march down my vale of years at word of command,accommodating my tottering old steps to those of the otherprisoners in my dingy, hopeless old gang; to hold out a tremblinghand for a sickly pittance of gruel, and say, “Thank you,ma’am,” to Miss Prim, when she has done reading hersermon.  John! when Goody Twoshoes comes next Friday, Idesire she may not be disturbed by theologicalcontroversies.  You have a fair voice, and I heard you andthe maids singing a hymn very sweetly the other night, and wasthankful that our humble household should be in suchharmony.  Poor old Twoshoes is so old and toothless andquaky, that she can’t sing a bit; but don’t be givingyourself airs over her, because she can’t sing and youcan.  Make her comfortable at our kitchen hearth.  Setthat old kettle to sing by our hob.  Warm her old stomachwith nut-brown ale and a toast laid in the fire.  Be kind tothe poor old school-girl of ninety, who has had leave to come outfor a day of Christmas holiday.  Shall there be many moreChristmases for thee?  Think of the ninety she has seenalready; the four-score and ten cold, cheerless, nipping NewYears!

If you were in her place, would you like to have a remembranceof better early days, when you were young and happy, and loving,perhaps; or would you prefer to have no past on which your mindcould rest?  About the year 1788, Goody, were your cheeksrosy, and your eyes bright, and did some young fellow in powderand a pigtail look in them?  We may grow old, but to us somestories never are old.  On a sudden they rise up, not dead,but living—not forgotten, but freshly remembered.  Theeyes gleam on us as they used to do.  The dear voice thrillsin our hearts.  The rapture of the meeting, the terrible,terrible parting, again and again the tragedy is actedover.  Yesterday, in the street, I saw a pair of eyes solike two which used to brighten at my coming once, that the wholepast came back as I walked lonely, in the rush of the Strand, andI was young again in the midst of joys and sorrows, alike sweetand sad, alike sacred and fondly remembered.

If I tell a tale out of school, will any harm come to my oldschool-girl?  Once, a lady gave her a half-sovereign, whichwas a source of great pain and anxiety to Goody Twoshoes. She sewed it away in her old stays somewhere, thinking here atleast was a safe investment—(vestis—a vest—aninvestment,—pardon me, thou poor old thing, but I cannothelp the pleasantry).  And what do you think?  Anotherpensionnaire of the establishment cut the coin out ofGoody’s stays—an old woman who went upon twocrutches!  Faugh, the old witch!  What? Violence amongst these toothless, tottering, trembling, feebleones?  Robbery amongst the penniless?  Dogs coming andsnatching Lazarus’s crumbs out of his lap?  Ah, howindignant Goody was as she told the story!  To that pond atPotsdam where the carps live for hundreds of hundreds of years,with hunches of blue mould on their back, I daresay the littlePrince and Princess of Preussen-Britannien come sometimes withcrumbs and cakes to feed the mouldy ones.  Those eyes mayhave goggled from beneath the weeds at Napoleon’sjack-boots: they have seen Frederick’s lean shanksreflected in their pool; and perhaps Monsieur de Voltaire has fedthem, and now for a crumb of biscuit they will fight, push,hustle, rob, squabble, gobble, relapsing into their tranquillitywhen the ignoble struggle is over.  Sans souci,indeed!  It is mighty well writing “Sans souci”over the gate; but where is the gate through which Care has notslipped?  She perches on the shoulders of the sentry in thesentry-box: she whispers the porter sleeping in his arm-chair:she glides up the staircase, and lies down between the king andqueen in their bed-royal: this very night I daresay she willperch upon poor old Goody Twoshoes’ meagre bolster, andwhisper, “Will the gentleman and those ladies ask meagain!  No, no; they will forget poor old Twoshoes.”Goody!  For shame of yourself!  Do not becynical.  Do not mistrust your fellow-creatures. What?  Has the Christmas morning dawned upon thee ninetytimes?  For four-score and ten years has it been thy lot tototter on this earth, hungry and obscure? Peace and goodwill tothee, let us say at this Christmas season.  Come, drink,eat, rest awhile at our hearth, thou poor old pilgrim!  Andof the bread which God’s bounty gives us, I pray, brotherreader, we may not forget to set aside a part for those noble andsilent poor, from whose innocent hands war has torn the means oflabour.  Enough!  As I hope for beef at Christmas, Ivow a note shall be sent to Saint Lazarus Union House, in whichMr Roundabout requests the honour of Mrs Twoshoes’ companyon Friday, 26th December.

DE JUVENTUTE

We who lived before railways, andsurvive out of the ancient world, are like Father Noah and hisfamily out of the Ark.  The children will gather round andsay to us patriarchs, “Tell us, grandpapa, about the oldworld.”  And we shall mumble our old stories; and weshall drop off one by one; and there will be fewer and fewer ofus, and these very old and feeble.  There will be but tenpræ-railroadites left: then three—then two—thenone—then 0!  If the hippopotamus had the leastsensibility (of which I cannot trace any signs either in his hideor his face), I think he would go down to the bottom of his tank,and never come up again.  Does he not see that he belongs tobygone ages, and that his great hulking barrel of a body is outof place in these times?  What has he in common with thebrisk young life surrounding him?  In the watches of thenight, when the keepers are asleep, when the birds are on oneleg, when even the little armadillo is quiet, and the monkeyshave ceased their chatter, he—I mean thehippopotamus—and the elephant, and the long-necked giraffe,perhaps may lay their heads together and have a colloquy aboutthe great silent antediluvian world which they remember, wheremighty monsters floundered through the ooze, crocodiles basked onthe banks, and dragons darted out of the caves and waters beforemen were made to slay them.  We who lived before railwaysare antediluvians—we must pass away.  We are growingscarcer every day; and old—old—very old relicts ofthe times when George was still fighting the Dragon.

Not long since, a company of horseriders paid a visit to ourwatering-place.  We went to see them, and I bethought methat young Walter Juvenis, who was in the place, might like alsoto witness the performance.  A pantomime is not alwaysamusing to persons who have attained a certain age; but a boy ata pantomime is always amused and amusing, and to see his pleasureis good for most hypochondriacs.

We sent to Walter’s mother, requesting that he mightjoin us, and the kind lady replied that the boy had already beenat the morning performance of the equestrians, but was most eagerto go in the evening likewise.  And go he did; and laughedat all Mr Merryman’s remarks, though he remembered themwith remarkable accuracy, and insisted upon waiting to the veryend of the fun, and was only induced to retire just before itsconclusion by representations that the ladies of the party wouldbe incommoded if they were to wait and undergo the rush andtrample of the crowd round about.  When this fact waspointed out to him, he yielded at once, though with a heavyheart, his eyes looking longingly towards the ring as weretreated out of the booth.  We were scarcely clear of theplace, when we heard “God save the Queen,” played bythe equestrian band, the signal that all was over.  Ourcompanion entertained us with scraps of the dialogue on our wayhome—precious crumbs of wit which he had brought away fromthat feast.  He laughed over them again as he walked underthe stars.  He has them now, and takes them out of thepocket of his memory, and crunches a bit, and relishes it with asentimental tenderness, too, for he is, no doubt, back at schoolby this time; the holidays are over; and Doctor Birch’syoung friends have reassembled.

Queer jokes, which caused a thousand simple mouths togrin!  As the jaded Merryman uttered them to the oldgentleman with the whip, some of the old folks in the audience, Idaresay, indulged in reflections of their own.  There wasone joke—I utterly forget it—but it began withMerryman saying what he had for dinner.  He had mutton fordinner, at one o’clock, after which “he had tocome to business.”  And then came thepoint.  Walter Juvenis, Esq., Rev. Doctor Birch’s,Market Rodborough, if you read this, will you please send me aline, and let me know what was the joke Mr Merryman made abouthaving his dinner?  Youremember well enough. But do I want to know?  Suppose a boy takes a favourite,long-cherished lump of cake out of his pocket, and offers you abit?  Merci!  The fact is, I don’tcare much about knowing that joke of Mr Merryman’s.

But whilst he was talking about his dinner, and his mutton,and his landlord, and his business, I felt a great interest aboutMr M. in private life—about his wife, lodgings, earnings,and general history, and I daresay was forming a picture of thosein my mind:—wife cooking the mutton; children waiting forit; Merryman in his plain clothes, and so forth; during whichcontemplation the joke was uttered and laughed at, and Mr M.,resuming his professional duties, was tumbling over head andheels.  Do not suppose I am going, sicut est mos, toindulge in moralities about buffoons, paint, motley, andmountebanking.  Nay, Prime Ministers rehearse their jokes;Opposition leaders prepare and polish them: Tabernacle preachersmust arrange them in their minds before they utter them. All I mean is, that I would like to know any one of theseperformers thoroughly, and out of his uniform: that preacher, andwhy in his travels this and that point struck him; wherein lieshis power of pathos, humour, eloquence;—that Minister ofState, and what moves him, and how his private heart isworking;—I would only say that, at a certain time of lifecertain things cease to interest: but about somethingswhen we cease to care, what will be the use of life, sight,hearing?  Poems are written, and we cease to admire. Lady Jones invites us, and we yawn; she ceases to invite us, andwe are resigned.  The last time I saw a ballet at theopera—oh! it is many years ago—I fell asleep in thestalls, wagging my head in insane dreams, and I hope affordingamusement to the company, while the feet of five hundred nymphswere cutting flicflacs on the stage at a few paces distant. Ah, I remember a different state of things!  Crediteposteri.  To see these nymphs—gracious powers, howbeautiful they were!  That leering, painted, shrivelled,thin-armed, thick-ankled old thing, cutting dreary capers, comingthumping down on her board out of time—thatanopera-dancer?  Pooh!  My dear Walter, the greatdifference between my time and yours, who will enter life sometwo or three years hence, is that, now, the dancing women andsinging women are ludicrously old, out of time, and out of tune;the paint is so visible, and the dinge and wrinkles of theirwretched old cotton stockings, that I am surprised how anybodycan like to look at them.  And as for laughing at me forfalling asleep, I can’t understand a man of sense doingotherwise.  In my time, à la bonneheure.  In the reign of George IV., I give you myhonour, all the dancers at the opera were as beautiful asHouris.  Even in William IV.’s time, when I think ofDuvernay prancing in as the Bayadère,—I say it was avision of loveliness such as mortal eyes can’t seenowadays.  How well I remember the tune to which she used toappear!  Kaled used to say to the Sultan, “My lord, atroop of those dancing and singing gurls called Bayaderesapproaches,” and, to the clash of cymbals, and the thumpingof my heart, in she used to dance!  There has never beenanything like it—never.  There never will be—Ilaugh to scorn old people who tell me about your Noblet, yourMontessu, your Vistris, your Parisot—pshaw, the seniletwaddlers!  And the impudence of the young men, with theirmusic and their dancers of to-day!  I tell you the women aredreary old creatures.  I tell you one air in an opera isjust like another, and they send all rational creatures tosleep.  Ah, Ronzi de Begnis, thou lovely one!  Ah,Caradori, thou smiling angel!  Ah, Malibran!  Nay, Iwill come to modern times, and acknowledge that Lablache was avery good singer thirty years ago (though Porto was the boy forme): and they we had Ambrogetti, and Curioni, and Donzelli, arising young singer.

But what is most certain and lamentable is the decay of stagebeauty since the days of George IV.  Think of Sontag! I remember her in Otelloand the Donna del Lagoin’28.  I remember being behind the scenes at the opera(where numbers of us young fellows of fashion used to go), andseeing Sontag let her hair fall down over her shoulders previousto her murder by Donzelli.  Young fellows have never seenbeauty like that, heard such a voice, seen such hair, sucheyes.  Don’t tell me!  A man who has beenabout town since the reign of George IV., ought he not to knowbetter than you young lads who have seen nothing?  Thedeterioration of women is lamentable; and the conceit of theyoung fellows more lamentable still, that they won’t seethis fact, but persist in thinking their time as good asours.

Bless me! when I was a lad, the stage was covered with angels,who sang, acted, and danced.  When I remember the Adelphi,and the actresses there: when I think of Miss Chester, and MissLove, and Mrs Serle at Sadler’s Wells, and her fortyglorious pupils—of the Opera and Noblet, and the exquisiteyoung Taglioni, and Pauline Leroux, and a host more!  Onemuch-admired being of those days I confess I never cared for, andthat was the chief maledancer—a very importantpersonage then, with a bare neck, bare arms, a tunic, and a hatand feathers, who used to divide the applause with the ladies,and who has now sunk down a trap-door for ever.  And thisfrank admission ought to show that I am not your mere twaddlinglaudator temporis acti—your old fogey who can see nogood except in his own time.

They say that claret is better nowadays, and cookery muchimproved since the days of mymonarch—of GeorgeIV.  Pastry Cookeryis certainly not so good.  Ihave often eaten half-a-crown’s worth (including, I trust,ginger-beer) at our school pastrycook’s, and that is aproof that the pastry must have been very good, for could I do asmuch now?  I passed by the pastrycook’s shop lately,having occasion to visit my old school.  It looked a verydingy old baker’s; misfortunes may have come overhim—those penny tarts certainly did not look so nice as Iremember them: but he may have grown careless as he has grown old(I should judge him to be now about ninety-six years of age), andhis hand may have lost its cunning.

Not that we were not great epicures.  I remember how weconstantly grumbled at the quantity of the food in ourmaster’s house—which on my conscience I believe wasexcellent and plentiful—and how we tried once or twice toeat him out of house and home.  At the pastrycook’s wemay have over-eaten ourselves (I have admittedhalf-a-crown’s worth for my own part, but I don’tlike to mention the realfigure for fear of perverting thepresent generation of boys by my monstrous confession)—wemay have eaten too much, I say.  We did; but whatthen?  The school apothecary was sent for: a couple of smallglobules at night, a trifling preparation of senna in themorning, and we had not to go to school, so that the draught wasan actual pleasure.

For our amusements, besides the games in vogue, which werepretty much in old times as they are now (except cricket parexemple—and I wish the present youth joy of theirbowling, and suppose Armstrong and Whitworth will bowl at themwith light field-pieces next), there were novels—ah! Itrouble you to find such novels in the present day!  OScottish Chiefs, didn’t we weep over you! O Mysteries ofUdolpho, didn’t I and Briggs Minor draw pictures out ofyou, as I have said?  Efforts, feeble indeed, but stillgiving pleasure to us and our friends.  “I say, oldboy, draw us Vivaldi tortured in the Inquisition,” or,“Draw us Don Quixote and the windmills, you know,”amateurs would say, to boys who had a love of drawing. “Peregrine Pickle” we liked, our fathers admiring it,and telling us (the sly old boys) it was capital fun; but I thinkI was rather bewildered by it, though “RoderickRandom” was and remains delightful.  I don’tremember having Sterne in the school library, no doubt becausethe works of that divine were not considered decent for youngpeople.  Ah! not against thy genius, O father of Uncle Tobyand Trim, would I say a word in disrespect.  But I amthankful to live in times when men no longer have the temptationto write so as to call blushes on women’s cheeks, and wouldshame to whisper wicked allusions to honest boys.  Then,above all, we had Walter Scott, thekindly, the generous, the pure—the companion of whatcountless delightful hours; the purveyor of how much happiness;the friend whom we recall as the constant benefactor of ouryouth! How well I remember the type and the brownish paper of theold duodecimo “Tales of My Landlord!”  I havenever dared to read the “Pirate,” and the“Bride of Lammermoor,” or “Kenilworth,”from that day to this, because the finale is unhappy, and peopledie, and are murdered at the end.  But“Ivanhoe,” and “Quentin Durward”! Oh! for a half-holiday, and a quiet corner, and one of thosebooks again!  Those books, and perhaps those eyes with whichwe read them; and, it may be, the brains behind the eyes! It maybe the tart was good; but how fresh the appetite was!  Ifthe gods would give me the desire of my heart, I should be ableto write a story which boys would relish for the next few dozenof centuries.  The boy-critic loves the story: grown up, heloves the author who wrote the story.  Hence the kindly tieis established between writer and reader, and lasts pretty nearlyfor life.  I meet people now who don’t care of WalterScott, or the “Arabian Nights”; I am sorry for them,unless they in their time have found theirromancer—their charming Scheherazade.  By the way,Walter, when you are writing, tell me who is the favouritenovelist in the fourth form now?  Have you got anything sogood and kindly as dear Miss Edgeworth’sFrank?  It used to belong to a fellow’s sistersgenerally; but though he pretended to despise it, and said,“Oh, stuff for girls!” he read it; and I think therewere one or two passages which would try my eyes now, were I tomeet with the little book.

As for Thomas and Jeremiah (it is only my witty way of callingTom and Jerry), I went to the British Museum the other day onpurpose to get it; but somehow, if you will press the question soclosely, on reperusal, Tom and Jerry is not so brilliant as I hadsupposed it to be.  The pictures are just as fine as ever;and I shook hands with broad-backed Jerry Hawthorn and CorinthianTom with delight, after many year’s absence.  But thestyle of the writing, I own, was not pleasing to me; I eventhought it a little vulgar—well! well! other writers havebeen considered vulgar—and as a description of the sportsand amusements of London in the ancient times, more curious thanamusing.

But the pictures!—oh! the pictures are noblestill!  First, there is Jerry arriving from the country, ina green coat and leather gaiters, and being measured for afashionable suit at Corinthian House, by Corinthian Tom’stailor.  Then away for the career of pleasure andfashion.  The park! delicious excitement! The theatre! thesaloon!! the green-room!!!  Rapturous bliss—the operaitself! and then perhaps to Temple Bar, to knock down aCharleythere!  There are Jerry and Tom, with theirtights and little cocked hats, coming from the opera—verymuch as gentlemen in waiting on royalty are habited now. There they are at Almack’s itself, amidst a crowd ofhigh-bred personages, with the Duke of Clarence himself lookingat them dancing.  Now, strange change, they are in TomCribb’s parlour, where they don’t seem to be a whitless at home than in fashion’s gilded halls; and now theyare at Newgate, seeing the irons knocked off themalefactors’ legs previous to execution.  Whathardened ferocity in the countenance of the desperado in yellowbreeches!  What compunction in the face of the gentleman inblack (who, I suppose, has been forging), and who clasps hishands, and listens to the chaplain!  Now we haste away tomerrier scenes: to Tattersall’s (ah gracious powers! what afunny fellow that actor was who performed Dicky Green in thatscene in the play!); and now we are at a private party, at whichCorinthian Tom is waltzing (and very gracefully too, as you mustconfess) with Corinthian Kate, whilst Bob Logic, the Oxonian, isplaying on the piano!

“After,” the text says, “the Oxonianhad played several pieces of lively music, he requested as afavour that Kate and his friend Tom would perform a waltz. Kate without any hesitation immediately stood up.  Tomoffered his hand to his fascinating partner, and the dance tookplace.  The plate conveys a correct representation of the‘gay scene’ at that precise moment.  The anxietyof the Oxonianto witness the attitudes of the elegantpair had nearly put a stop to their movements.  On turninground from the pianoforte and presenting his comical mug,Kate could scarcely suppress a laugh.”

And no wonder; just look at it now (as I have copied it to thebest of my humble ability), and compare Master Logic’scountenance and attitude with the splendid elegance of Tom! Now every London man is weary and blasé. There is an enjoyment of life in these young bucks of 1823 whichcontrasts strangely with our feelings of 1860.  Here, forinstance, is a specimen of their talk and walk, “If,’says Logic—‘ifenjoymentis your motto, you may make the most ofan evening at Vauxhall, more than at any other place in themetropolis.  It is all free and easy.  Stay as long asyou like, and depart when you thinkproper.’—‘Your description is soflattering,’ replied Jerry,‘that I do not care how soon the time arrives for us tostart.’  Logic proposed a‘bit of a stroll’ in order to get rid of anhour or two, which was immediately accepted by Tom andJerry.  A turnor two in Bond Street, a strollthrough Piccadilly, a look inat Tattersall’s, a ramblethroughPall Mall, and a struton the Corinthian path, fullyoccupied the time of our heroes until the hour for dinnerarrived, when a few glasses of Tom’s rich wines soon put them on thequi vive.  Vauxhall wasthen the object in view, and the Triostarted, bent upon enjoying the pleasures which this place soamply affords.”

How nobly those inverted commas, those italics, thosecapitals, bring out the writer’s wit and relieve theeye!  They are as good as jokes, though you mayn’tquite preceive the point.  Mark the varieties of lounge inwhich the young men indulge—now a stroll, then alook in, then a ramble, and presently astrut.  When George, Prince of Wales, was twenty, Ihave read in an old Magazine, “the Prince’slounge” was a peculiar manner of walking which the youngbucks imitated.  At Windsor George III. had a cat’spath—a sly early walk which the good old king took inthe grey morning before his household was astir.  What wasthe Corinthian path here recorded?  Does any antiquaryknow?  And what were the rich wines which our friends took,and which enable them to enjoy Vauxhall?  Vauxhall is gone,but the wines which could occasion such a delightful perversionof the intellect as to enable it to enjoy ample pleasures there,what were they?

So the game of life proceeds, until Jerry Hawthorn, therustic, is fairly knocked up by all this excitement and is forcedto go home, and the last picture represents him getting into thecoach at the “White Horse Cellar,” he being one ofsix inside; whilst his friends shake him by the hand; whilst thesailor mounts on the roof; whilst the Jews hang round withoranges, knives, and sealing-wax: whilst the guard is closing thedoor.  Where are they now, those sealing-wax vendors? whereare the guards? where are the jolly teams? where are the coaches?and where the youth that climbed inside and out of them; thatheard the merry horn which sounds no more; that saw the sun riseover Stonehenge; that rubbed away the bitter tears at night afterparting as the coach sped on the journey to school and London;that looked out with beating heart as the milestones flew by, forthe welcome corner where began home and holidays.

It is night now: and here is home.  Gathered under thequiet roof elders and children lie alike at rest.  In themidst of a great peace and calm, the stars look out from theheavens.  The silence is peopled with the past; sorrowfulremorses for sins and shortcomings—memories of passionatejoys and griefs rise out of their graves, both now alike calm andsad.  Eyes, as I shut mine, look at me, that have longceased to shine.  The town and the fair landscape sleepunder the starlight, wreathed in the autumn mists. Twinkling among the houses a light keeps watch here and there, inwhat may be a sick chamber or two.  The clock tolls sweetlyin the silent air.  Here is night and rest.  An awfulsense of thanks makes the heart swell, and the head bow, as Ipass to my room through the sleeping house, and feel as though ahushed blessing were upon it.

ROUND ABOUT THE CHRISTMAS TREE

The kindly Christmas tree, fromwhich I trust every gentle reader has pulled out a bonbon or two,is yet all aflame whilst I am writing, and sparkles with thesweet fruits of its season.  You young ladies, may you haveplucked pretty giftlings from it; and out of the crackersugar-plum which you have split with the captain or the sweetyoung curate may you have read one of those delicious conundrumswhich the confectioners introduce into the sweetmeats, and whichapply to the cunning passion of love.  Those riddles are tobe read at yourage, when I daresay they areamusing.  As for Dolly, Merry, and Bell, who are standing atthe tree, they don’t care about the love-riddle part, butunderstand the sweet-almoned portion very well.  They arefour, five, six years old.  Patience, little people!  Adozen merry Christmases more, and you will be reading thosewonderful love-conundrums, too.  As for us elderly folks, wewatch the babies at their sport, and the young people pulling atthe branches: and instead of finding bonbons or sweeties in thepackets which we pluck off the boughs, we find enclosed MrCarnifex’s review of the quarter’s meat; MrSartor’s compliments, and little statement for self and theyoung gentlemen; and Madame de Sainte-Crinoline’s respectsto the young ladies, who encloses her account, and will sent onSaturday, please; or we stretch our hand out to the educationalbranch of the Christmas tree, and there find a lively and amusingarticle from the Rev. Henry Holyshade, containing our dearTommy’s exceedingly moderate account for the lastterm’s school expenses.

The tree yet sparkles, I say.  I am writing on the daybefore Twelfth Day, if you must know; but already ever so many ofthe fruits have been pulled, and the Christmas lights have goneout.  Bobby Miseltow, who has been staying with us for aweek (and who has been sleeping mysteriously in the bath-room),comes to say he is going away to spend the rest of the holidayswith his grandmother—and I brush away the manly tear ofregret as I part with the dear child.  “Well, Bob,good-bye, since you willgo.  Compliments tograndmamma.  Thank her for the turkey.  Here’s—”  (A slight pecuniary transaction takesplace at this juncture, and Bob nods and winks, andputs his hand in his waistcoat pocket.)  “You havehad a pleasant week?”

Bob.—“Haven’tI!”  (And exit, anxious to know the amountof the coin which has just changed hands.)

He is gone, and as the dear boy vanishes through the door(behind which I see him perfectly), I too cast up a littleaccount of our past Christmas week.  When Bob’sholidays are over, and the printer has sent me back thismanuscript, I know Christmas will be an old story.  All thefruit will be off the Christmas tree then; the crackers will havecracked off; the almonds will have been crunched; and thesweet-bitter riddles will have been read; the lights will haveperished off the dark green boughs; the toys growing on them willhave been distributed, fought for, cherished, neglected,broken.  Ferdinand and Fidelia will each keep out of it (bestill, my gushing heart!) the remembrance of a riddle readtogether, of a double almond munched together, and of the moietyof an exploded cracker. . . .  The maids, I say, will havetaken down all that holly stuff and nonsense about the clocks,lamps, and looking-glasses, the dear boys will be back at school,fondly thinking of the pantomime fairies whom they have seen;whose gaudy gossamer wings are battered by this time; and whosepink cotton (or silk is it?) lower extremities are all dingy anddusty.  Yet but a few days, Bob, and flakes of paint willhave cracked off the fairy flower-bowers, and the revolvingtemples of adamantine lustre will be as shabby as the city ofPekin.  When you read this, will Clown still be going onlolling his tongue out of his mouth, and saying, “How areyou to-morrow?”  To-morrow, indeed!  He must bealmost ashamed of himself (if that cheek is still capable of theblush of shame) for asking the absurd question.  To-morrow,indeed!  To-morrow the diffugient snows will give place tospring; the snowdrops will lift their heads; Ladyday may beexpected, and the pecuniary duties peculiar to that feast; inplace of bonbons, trees will have an eruption of light greenknobs; the whitebait season will bloom . . . as if one need go ondescribing these vernal phenomena, when Christmas is still here,though ending, and the subject of my discourse!

We have all admired the illustrated papers, and noted howboisterously jolly they become at Christmas time.  Whatwassail-bowls, robin-redbreasts, waits, snow landscapes, burstsof Christmas song!  And then to think that these festivitiesare prepared months before—that these Christmas pieces areprophetic!  How kind of artists and poets to devise thefestivities beforehand, and serve them pat at the proper time! Weought to be grateful to them, as to the cook who gets up atmidnight and sets the pudding a-boiling, which is to feast us atsix o’clock.  I often think with gratitude of thefamous Mr Nelson Lee—the author of I don’t know howmany hundred glorious pantomimes—walking by the summer waveat Margate, or Brighton perhaps, revolving in his mind the ideaof some new gorgeous spectacle of faëry, which the wintershall see complete.  He is like cook at midnight (siparva licet).  He watches and thinks.  He poundsthe sparkling sugar of benevolence, the plums of fancy, thesweetmeats of fun, the figs of—well, the figs of fairyfiction, let us say, and pops the whole in the seething cauldronof imagination, and at due season serves up the Pantomime.

Very few men in the course of nature can expect to seeallthe pantomimes in one season, but I hope to the end ofmy life I shall never forego reading about them in that delicioussheet of The Timeswhich appears on the morning afterBoxing-day.  Perhaps reading is even better thanseeing.  The best way, I think, is to say you are ill, liein bed, and have the paper for two hours, reading all the waydown from Drury Lane to the Britannia at Hoxton.  Bob and Iwent to two pantomimes.  One was at the Theatre of Fancy,and the other at the Fairy Opera, and I don’t know which weliked the best.

At the Fancy, we saw “Harlequin Hamlet, or Daddy’sGhost and Nunky’s Pison,” which is all verywell—but, gentlemen, if you don’t respect Shakspeare,to whom will you be civil?  The palace and ramparts ofElsinore by moon and snowlight is one of Loutherbourg’sfinest efforts.  The banqueting hall of the palace isilluminated: the peaks and gables glitter with the snow: thesentinels march blowing their fingers with the cold—thefreezing of the nose of one of them is very neatly anddexterously arranged: the snow storm rises: the winds howlawfully along the battlements: the waves come curling, leaping,foaming to shore.  Hamlet’s umbrella is whirled awayin the storm.  He and his two friends stamp on eachother’s toes to keep them warm.  The storm-spiritsrise in the air, and are whirled howling round the palace and therocks.  My eyes! what tiles and chimney-pots fly hurtlingthrough the air!  As the storm reaches its height (here thewind instruments come in with prodigious effect, and I complimentMr Brumby and the violoncellos)—as the snow storm rises(queek, queek, queek, go the fiddles, and then thrumpty thrumpcomes a pizzicato movement in Bob Major, which sends a shiverinto your very boot-soles), the thunder-clouds deepen (bong,bong, bong, from the violoncellos).  The forked lightningquivers through the clouds in a zig-zag scream ofviolins—and look, look, look! as the frothing, roaringwaves come rushing up the battlements, and over the reelingparapet, each hissing wave becomes a ghost, sends thegun-carriages rolling over the platform, and plunges into thewater again.

Hamlet’s mother comes on to the battlements to look forher son.  The storm whips her umbrella out of her hands, andshe retires screaming in pattens.

The cabs on the stand in the great market-place at Elsinoreare seen to drive off, and several people are drowned.  Thegas-lamps along the street are wrenched from their foundations,and shoot through the troubled air.  Whist, rush, hish! howthe rain roars and pours!  The darkness becomes awful,always deepened by the power of the music—and see—inthe midst of a rush, and whirl, and scream of spirits of air andwave—what is that ghastly figure moving hither?  Itbecomes bigger, bigger, as it advances down theplatform—more ghastly, more horrible, enormous!  It isas tall as the whole stage.  It seems to be advancing on thestalls and pit, and the whole house screams with terror, as theGhost of the Late Hamlet comes in, andbegins to speak.  Several people faint, and thelight-fingered gentry pick pockets furiously in the darkness.

In the pitchy darkness, this awful figure throwing his eyesabout, the gas in the boxes shuddering out of sight, and thewind-instruments bugling the most horrible wails, the boldestspectator must have felt frightened.  But hark! what is thatsilver shimmer of the fiddles?  Is it—can itbe—the grey dawn peeping in the stormy east?  Theghost’s eyes look blankly towards it, and roll a ghastlyagony.  Quicker, quicker ply the violins of PhoebusApollo.  Redder, redder grow the orient clouds. Cockadoodledoo! crows that great cock which has just come out onthe roof of the palace.  And now the round sun himself popsup from behind the waves of night.  Where is theghost?  He is gone!  Purple shadows of morn“slant o’er the snowy sward,” the city wakes upin life and sunshine, and we confess we are very much relieved atthe disappearance of the ghost.  We don’t like thosedark scenes in pantomimes.

After the usual business, that Ophelia should be turned intoColumbine was to be expected; but I confess I was a littleshocked when Hamlet’s mother became Pantaloon, and wasinstantly knocked down by Clown Claudius.  Grimaldi isgetting a little old now, but for real humour there are fewclowns like him.  Mr Shuter, as the gravedigger, was chasteand comic, as he always is, and the scene-painters surpassedthemselves.

“Harlequin Conqueror and the Field of Hastings,”at the other house, is very pleasant too.  The irascibleWilliam is acted with great vigour by Snoxall, and the battle ofHastings is a good piece of burlesque.  Some triflingliberties are taken with history, but what liberties will not themerry genius of pantomime permit himself?  At the battle ofHastings, William is on the point of being defeated by the Sussexvolunteers, very elegantly led by the always pretty Miss Waddy(as Haco Sharpshooter), when a shot from the Normans killsHarold.  The Fairy Edith hereupon comes forward, and findshis body, which straightway leaps up a live harlequin, whilst theConqueror makes an excellent clown, and the Archbishop of Bayeuxa diverting pantaloon, &c. &c. &c.

Perhaps these are not the pantomimes we really saw; but onedescription will do as well as another.  The plots, you see,are a little intricate and difficult to understand in pantomimes;and I may have mixed up one with another.  That I was at thetheatre on Boxing-night is certain—but the pit was so fullthat I could only see fairy legs glittering in the distance, as Istood at the door.  And if I was badly off, I think therewas a young gentleman behind me worse off still.  I own thathe has good reason (though others have not) to speak ill of mebehind my back, and hereby beg his pardon.

Likewise to the gentleman who picked up a party in Piccadilly,who had slipped and fallen in the snow, and was there on hisback, uttering energetic expressions: that party begs to offerthanks, and compliments of the season.

Bob’s behaviour on New Year’s day, I can assure DrHolyshade, was highly creditable to the boy.  He hadexpressed a determination to partake of every dish which was puton the table; but after soup, fish, roast-beef, and roast-goose,he retired from active business until the pudding and mince-piesmade their appearance, of which he partook liberally, but not toofreely.  And he greatly advanced in my good opinion bypraising the punch, which was of my own manufacture, and whichsome gentlemen present (Mr O’M—g—n, amongstothers) pronounced to be too weak.  Too weak! A bottle ofrum, a bottle of Madeira, half a bottle of brandy, and twobottles and a half of water—canthis mixture be saidto be too weak for any mortal?  Our young friend amused thecompany during the evening, by exhibiting a two-shillingmagic-lantern, which he had purchased, and likewise by singing“Sally, come up!” a quaint, but rather monotonousmelody, which I am told is sung by the poor negro on the banks ofthe broad Mississippi.

What other enjoyments did we proffer for the child’samusement during the Christmas week?  A great philosopherwas giving a lecture to young folks at the BritishInstitution.  But when this diversion was proposed to ouryoung friend Bob, he said, “Lecture?  No, thankyou.  Not as I knows on,” and made sarcastic signalson his nose.  Perhaps he is of Dr Johnson’s opinionabout lectures: “Lectures, sir! what man would go to hearthat imperfectly at a lecture, which he can read at leisure in abook?”  Inever went, of my own choice, to alecture; that I can vow.  As for sermons, they aredifferent; I delight in them, and they cannot, of course, be toolong.

Well, we partook of yet other Christmas delights besidespantomime, pudding, and pie.  One glorious, one delightful,one most unlucky and pleasant day, we drove in a brougham, with afamous horse, which carried us more quickly and briskly than anyof your vulgar railways, over Battersea Bridge, on which thehorse’s hoofs rung as if it had been iron; through suburbanvillages, plum-caked with snow; under a leaden sky, in which thesun hung like a red-hot warming-pan; by pond after pond, wherenot only men and boys, but scores after scores of women andgirls, were sliding, and roaring, and clapping their lean oldsides with laughter, as they tumbled down, and their hobnailedshoes flew up in the air; the air frosty with a lilac haze,through which villas, and commons, and churches, and plantationsglimmered.  We drive up the hill, Bob and I; we make thelast two miles in eleven minutes; we pass that poor, armless manwho sits there in the cold, following you with his eyes.  Idon’t give anything, and Bob looks disappointed.  Weare set down neatly at the gate, and a horse-holder opens thebrougham door.  I don’t give anything; againdisappointment on Bob’s part.  I pay a shillingapiece, and we enter into the glorious building, which isdecorated for Christmas, and straightway forgetfulness onBob’s part of everything but that magnificent scene. The enormous edifice is all decorated for Bob andChristmas.  The stalls, the columns, the fountains, courts,statues, splendours, are all crowned for Christmas.  Thedelicious negro is singing his Alabama choruses for Christmas andBob.  He has scarcely done, when, Tootarootatoo!  MrPunch is performing his surprising actions, and hanging thebeadle.  The stalls are decorated.  Therefreshment-tables are piled with good things; at many fountains“Mulled Claret” is writtenup in appetizing capitals.  “Mulled Claret—oh,jolly!  How cold it is!” says Bob; I pass on. “It’s only three o’clock,” saysBob.  “No, only three,” I say meekly. “We dine at seven,” sighs Bob, “and it’sso-o-o coo-old.”  I still would take no hints. No claret, no refreshment, no sandwiches, no sausage-rolls forBob.  At last I am obliged to tell him all.  Justbefore we left home, a little Christmas bill popped in at thedoor and emptied my purse at the threshold.  I forgot allabout the transaction, and had to borrow half-a-crown from JohnCoachman to pay for our entrance into the palace ofdelight.  Nowyou see, Bob, why I could not treat youon that second of January when we drove to the palace together;when the girls and boys were sliding on the ponds at Dulwich;when the darkling river was full of floating ice, and the sun waslike a warming-pan in the leaden sky.

One more Christmas sight we had, of course; and that sight Ithink I like as well as Bob himself at Christmas, and at allseasons.  We went to a certain garden of delight, where,whatever your cares are, I think you can manage to forget some ofthem, and muse, and be not unhappy; to a garden beginning with aZ, which is as lively as Noah’s ark; where the fox hasbrought his brush, and the cock has brought his comb, and theelephant has brought his trunk, and the kangaroo has brought hisbag, and the condor his old white wig and black satin hood. On this day it was so cold that the white bears winked their pinkeyes, as they plapped up and down by their pool, and seemed tosay, “Aha, this weather reminds us of dearhome!”  “Cold! bah!  I have got such a warmcoat,” says brother Bruin, “I don’tmind”; and he laughs on his pole, and clucks down abun.  The squealing hyænas gnashed their teeth andlaughed at us quite refreshingly at their window; and, cold as itwas, Tiger, Tiger, burning bright, glared at us red-hot throughhis bars, and snorted blasts of hell.  The woolly camelleered at us quite kindly as he paced round his ring on hissilent pads.  We went to our favourite places.  Ourdear wambat came up, and had himself scratched veryaffably.  Our fellow-creatures in the monkey room held outtheir little black hands, and piteously asked us for Christmasalms.  Those darling alligators on their rock winked at usin the most friendly way.  The solemn eagles sat alone, andscowled at us from their peaks; whilst little Tom Ratel tumbledover head and heels for us in his usual diverting manner. If I have cares in my mind, I come to the Zoo, and fancy theydon’t pass the gate.  I recognise my friends, myenemies, in countless cages.  I entertained the eagle, thevulture, the old billy-goat, and the black-pated, crimson-necked,blear-eyed, baggy, hook-beaked old marabou stork yesterday atdinner; and when Bob’s aunt came to tea in the evening, andasked him what he had seen, he stepped up to her gravely, andsaid—

“First I saw the white bear, then I saw theblack,
Then I saw the camel with a hump upon his back.

Chorus of Children.

Then I saw the camel with a HUMPupon his back!

Then I saw the grey wolf, with mutton in his maw;
Then I saw the wambat waddle in the straw;
Then I saw the elephant with his waving trunk,
Then I saw the monkeys—mercy, how unpleasantlythey—smelt!”

There.  No one can beat that piece of wit, can heBob?  And so it is over; but we had a jolly time, whilst youwere with us, hadn’t we?  Present my respects to thedoctor; and I hope, my boy, we may spend another merry Christmasnext year.

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