Chapter VI

The morning again dawned, and again was Brag “up and stirring.” He read and reread the narrow strip of paper which had been fastened upon him by the emissary from Messrs. Tapps, Tatlock, and Shackleton, of Pump Court, and was very little the wiser for the information he derived from its contents. Instinct, however, made him very much dislike the affair, upon which, he concluded, he must consult some lawyer of his own; but not having such an officer regularly retained in his household, and knowing but little of the routine of legal business, he proceeded, in the first instance, to act upon the directions of the imp from whom he had received the “strip,” and put it into his pocket.

During breakfast he seriously repeated the usual fruitless inquiries after his servant and equipage, and received the anticipated negative to his questions with an affectation of high displeasure, strengthened by one of those brief but emphatic exclamations, which, if uttered before one of his Majesty’s worshipful justices of the peace, would have subjected him to a fine of five shillings.

Having despatched his morning meal, he repaired to the stables, and ran his eye over the horses which were standing in them,—at times looked knowingly at some of the best,—and spoke technically to the coachmen or grooms about some of the worst. One pair of coach-horses particularly struck his fancy:—To whom did they belong?—was his question to a servant, wearing bright orange plush unmentionables, who was, without coat, waiscoat, or jacket, working away at one of them, polishing him up to a degree of brightness and smoothness very difficult of attainment in horse-skins at the sea-side.

“Whose horses did you say these were?” said Jack.

“Mrs. Peckover’s, sir,” said the man.

“What!” said Jack—“the lady of my friend Mr. Heneage Peckover of Womanswould in Kent?”

“The same, sir,” said the servant.

“Is Mr. Peckover dead?” said Jack.

“Not particularly, sir,” said the man, continually rubbing and hissing as hard as he well could; “on the contrary, he is as lively as ever.”

“Because you said Mrs. Peckover’s horses,” said Jack.

“Yes,” said the man, “we calls everything missus’s. What’s master’s is her’s—and what’s her’s is her own, sir. Master don’t much interfere.”

“Where are they staying?” said Jack.

“At that house, sir,” said the man, stepping out of the stable-door and pointing, “with the bow-window there, sir.”

“Oh,” said Jack, “I must go and call on them.—Very fine pair of nags as ever I clapped my eyes upon—good colour, shape, and make: fast trotters, I take it.”

“Uncommon, sir,” said the man, “and step together like winkin’.”

“All right that,” said Jack, “and no mistake:”—and out he walked, not sorry, however much he might wish for retirement, at finding an acquaintance in the place, who was not very well known either to, or by the persons with whom he, for the present, desired to have no particular connexion.

Jack had met Mr. Peckover out with hounds round London. He was a hale, portly man, of some fifty-six, with rosy cheeks and strong limbs; the voice of a Stentor; and a laugh which, when excited, might be heard “a goodly league at sea.”

It is said that men’s characters sometimes agree with their names, although James Smith has given us an excellent song to exhibit “the rule of contraries” in this particular. Certain it is, however, that Heneage Peckover, of Womanswould in the county of Kent, Esq. was—tall as he was, broad as he was, heavy as he was, and loud as he was—the mere slave of his wife, from whom, it may be necessary to observe, he had derived nearly the whole of the fortune which enabled him to make the figure he made in society. What he originally had been, history has not accurately recorded; but the aristocratic character of the former of his two names (christian-name it can scarcely be called) led people to suppose that his connexions must somehow have been of a superior order.

Jack had never seen the lady,—nor indeed had any of the “friends” with whom Mr. Peckover was in the habit of hunting.—Not to hear of her, after having been five minutes in her husband’s society, would have been impossible. It was not enough that she directed his conduct and controlled his actions; nor that he paid her every deference whilst in her society, and followed her instructions with the implicit obedience of a well-broken spaniel, whenever she thought fit to fulminate them. The habit of submission was so strongly impressed upon his mind, that it had induced something like a veneration for her opinions and decisions, by which his whole conduct in life was regulated; so that although, when away from her, he really was what may be called a capital jolly country gentleman; and laughed, and joked, in his way, with the greatest earnestness and fervour, still he had neither taste nor judgment of his own; and his conversation was therefore made up of continued references to “Mrs. Peckover,” and her views, her opinions, her dicta, and her decisions upon all subjects, which were rendered the more strikingly absurd to his ordinary companions, inasmuch as they had never seen the lady, nor ever were likely to see her, since she peremptorily declined receiving her husband’s sporting acquaintance, the exclusion of whom from her house, (as she invariably called it,) was the condition alone upon which she permitted him to enjoy what are called the pleasures of the chase.

The extent of the present scene of action was so small, that all the inhabitants of the comfortable Kraal were visible to each other in the course of any one hour of any one day; and not much more than half that period of time had elapsed, when Jack espied his friend walking with Colonel Stiffkey, whom he also knew, from having met him occasionally at Mrs. Dallington’s. This was rather a drawback to the gratification he experienced in seeing Mr. Peckover, who looked glowingly bright; his rubicund face shining well over a buttoned-up blue coat, “leathers” of the old school, and “tops” to match.

“Bless my soul!—Mr. Brag,” exclaimed Peckover; “who the deuce would have thought of finding you here?”

“I might say the same to you, sir,” said Jack. “How d’ye do, sir? Needn’t ask—charming well, I am sure.”—“How d’ye do, Colonel?” added Brag, waiting to see what sort of recognition the colonel would afford him.

The Colonel’s “Quite well!” was as gracious as possible.

“As for me,” said Peckover, “Mrs. Peckover says she never saw me looking better. True enough;—I’m hearty and hale, and all that—ha, ha, ha! Are you come to stay here, Mr. Brag?”

“For some time, I think,” said Brag. “I have just got away from the Ilfracombes, and the Dawlishes, and Lord Tom, who have been at Dover. Lord Tom wanted me to go to Paris to ride his horses, but I know a trick worth two of that—sure of a wrangle wherever he is concerned; so I backed out, smack, smooth, and no mistake.”

“Mrs. Peckover says,” said Peckover, “that horse-racing is but ticklish work, after all:-too much in the hands of other people—jockeys, trainers, and friends—eh?—ha, ha, ha!”

“I never have been on the turf,” said Stiffkey, with an air of self-satisfaction which would have induced anybody who did not know him, to believe that his abstinence had not proceeded from the positive want of money and horses.

“Mr. Brag,” said Peckover, “is a capital jockey, if you come to that. Well—where do you dine to day?”

This question was asked, first, in the hope that Brag was engaged; and secondly, because Peckover flattered himself that he could prevail upon his lady to admit him and the colonel to her table, by explaining to her that the colonel was not one of his hunting friends, and concealing from her the fact that Brag was.

“I am not engaged anywhere,” said Brag—“I’m at the hotel.”

“So am I,” said the Colonel.

“I’m sure Mrs. Peckover will be delighted to see you,” said Heneage. “She dines at six—‘because,’ as, she says, ‘early hours, good air, and plain feeding, are good for one’s health’—and I believe it to be so—ha, ha, ha!”

“I shall be most happy,” said the Colonel.

“And I,” said Jack.

“That’s a large ship in the offing,” said the Colonel.

“Mrs. Peckover tells me she thinks it’s a man-of-war,” said Peckover. “I don’t know much about ships, but I dare say it is. She has been watching it through her glass.”

“For a sea place,” said Jack, “this is uncommon snug—and I like the look of the country round it.”

“Why,” said Peckover, “Mrs. Peckover’s opinion is, that the mixture of trees, and sea, and corn-fields, and downs, and good roads, and fine cliffs, is extremely beautiful. For my own part, I don’t profess to know much about such things; but I take it all as it comes. Ha, ha, ha!”

“That’s the only way to get on in this world,” said the Colonel. “Pray have you been over to Hurstmonceaux?” added the gallant officer.

“No,” said Peckover; “Mrs. Peckover went there last Tuesday, I think it was. She has great taste for ruins, and remnants, and relics, and all that. She took over two or three young ladies, the Miss Gubbinses, who are here, and there was no room for me in the carriage, so I staid here, and played billiards with the marker’s boy till she came back.”

“There seems to be no news in the London papers this morning?” said the Colonel.

“No,” said his friend; “Mrs. Peckover tells me, that if Russia, Austria, and Prussia were to join against France, the odds would be greatly in favour of the coalition; but I don’t trouble my head much about politics. Ha, ha, ha!”

“Well,” said Brag, “is there anything to see near at hand? Where is what they call ‘South,’ because I suspect my fool of a servant has lost himself and my phaeton, somewhere in the Wilds of Sussex, and I may, perhaps find him stalled up at ‘The Lamb,’ I think the hotel people call it.”

“Oh, ah!” said Peckover; “South—they call it South, Mrs. Peckover tells me, to distinguish it from East, which they call this. Mrs. Peckover gets all our meat from a butcher at South. I’ll walk with you.”

“With all my heart,” said the Colonel.

“That’s right!” said Jack; “I think a toddle along the road will do us good, and no mistake!”

“Mrs. Peckover says walking exercise is the best,” said her husband, “yet, somehow, she generally drives about herself; however, I don’t pretend to understand these matters. Ha! ha! ha! Come, let’s start.”

And away the trio went, Jack extremely well pleased with his reception, and resolved to keep quiet and easy, more than ever struck with his fat friend’s perpetual reference to his better half, and convinced, by Colonel Stiffkey’s manner towards him, that he had not been enlightened in any degree upon the subject of the affair with Mrs. Dallington and Miss Englefield.

The day was delightful, and they had got on the road just as far as where foot passengers generally strike into the fields, when Brag perceived a man, who, by the azure hue of his coat, and the bright orange-colour of his plushes, he knew to be one of Peckover’s footmen, coming at what he considered a splitting pace in pursuit of them.

“One of your servants, I think,” said Jack.

“Oh,” said Peckover, “most probably Mrs. Peckover wishes to be of our party.—Well, Stephen, what is it?”

“My missus, sir,” said Stephen, “wants you to come in, if you please.”

“Oh, come in, does she?” said the Herculean infant;—“Why doesn’t she come out?—it would do her a vast deal more good. What, is she in the house?”

“Yes, sir,” said Stephen, “and bid me say she was waiting.”

“Why, then, gentlemen,” said Peckover, “I am afraid I must leave you. I know she has some project for this morning, but I don’t pretend to know anything of her movements.—I’m coming, Stephen.—I’ll just step home, and if I can get away I’ll follow you—only don’t mind me. Back at six;—don’t forget—punctual to the minute, for as Mrs. Peckover says, you can never expect to have a good dinner or a good cook, if you are not punctual—so mind. Ha, ha, ha!”

“Never fear,” said Jack; “I’ll be at the post, afore the bell rings for saddling, and no mistake.”

“And I will be the very shadow of Mr. Brag,” said the Colonel.

“That’s one of the comforts of matrimony,” said the Colonel, after watching Peckover’s hurried return homewards. “That gentle giant is tied to his lady’s apron string, and beyond its tether, wander he must not.”

“I think,” said Jack, “if I was as big as he, I should try if I couldn’t break it.”

“Did you ever see Mrs. Peckover?” said the Colonel.

“Never set eyes on her,” replied Jack.

“She is a delicate looking woman,” said the Colonel; “her figure small and slight; her nose long, her mouth wide, her voice shrill, and her tongue exhibiting to the curious in ‘natural mechanism’ the long-sought-for desideratum of perpetual motion. The only relief she gives that active member, or her husband, is when she is sulky, upon which occasions she keeps him sitting in her boudoir, or wherever it may be, the whole day, without letting him stir out, or speaking a syllable to him while he stays at home.”

“But why does not he kick?” said Jack;—“rebel; run rusty?”

“Because he believes her to be the cleverest woman in all the world,” said the Colonel. “As for disputing the excellence of her taste, or doubting the infallibility of her opinions, he would as soon think of flying; and such has been the nature of her management in breaking him in, that he does not in the slightest degree consider her tyranny as oppressive; on the contrary, he thinks her so far above every other living creature, that his homage and submission are voluntary tributes to her perfection.”

“I suppose,” said Jack, “we must not venture to contradict anything she says at dinner, even in the way of joke?”

“You need not be apprehensive of her doing anything in that line,” said the Colonel. “I once, and only once, dined with them at their place Womanswould, and she took offence in the early part of dinner because Peckover drank wine with somebody without asking her which wine he ought to drink; and from that moment she stopped her loquacity dead short, and moped for the rest of the evening.”

“Wouldn’t it be a good thing to affront her a little at starting?” said Jack; “perhaps it might give him a chance of throwing in a word.”

“Not a bit,” said the Colonel: “if she won’t speak, he mustn’t; so we should have to keep up the ball between us, unless one or two of those Miss Gubbinses, who are a good deal with her, should happen to be of the party. However, we must trust to Fate.—You say you are just from Dover?”

“Came off the day before yesterday,” said Jack.

“Did you happen to see some old friends of mine there?” said the Colonel—“the Gunnersburys?”

“Oh, yes,” said Jack; “I dined there the day before I left. Very pleasant party. The Dullinghams, and Sir Henry Rockley, and a Mr. and Mrs. Carnaby. What a queer body Lady Gunnersbury is!”

“Monstrous spirits,” said the Colonel.

“Talk of perpetual motion,” said Jack; “I think she’d give Mrs. Peckover two stone and a distance, and beat her in a canter.”

“Yes, she is an entertaining old lady,” said the Colonel.

“To be sure, how she did go on!” said Jack.

“It is through her,” said Stiffkey, “that I am connected with the family. She is my great-aunt; and I mean to pay them a visit before I go to London. Indeed, George Gunnersbury has more than half promised to come over to me here, and in that case we should return together. He is a capital fellow!”

“Oh, very pleasant indeed!” said Jack.

“He has more real fun about him when he is in a good humour, than anybody I know,” said Stiffkey.

“Yes,” thought Jack, may be so—at the same moment congratulating himself that the Colonel’s developement of his connexion with the family, saved him from something very like a repetition of the Dullingham affair, out of which he had so recently escaped.

“By the way,” said the Colonel, wishing, as it should seem, to vary the topics of conversation to suit Jack’s particular taste, “when did you see our fair friends, the widow and her sister?”

“The day before I left town,” said Jack; “I—in fact—I thought it better to—withdraw. I like candour—hate what I call sham-abraham. Give me sincerity—all straight up, right down, and no mistake. And I thought in my own mind that they were playing what I call a shuffling game. It looked somehow like a regular cross.”

“I don’t exactly see,” said the Colonel.

“Why, what I say, Colonel, is this,” said Jack;—“if you mean a thing, say so; and if you don’t mean it, don’t go on worriting and fretting people about nothing. I saw that Lydiard and Rushton,—two deuced good fellows in their way—were making themselves miserable about these two females, so I says to Lydiard, says I, ‘Put a face upon this; don’t be trifled with:’—and I said the same to Rushton:—and, in course,—as I know the sex, and shouldn’t speak without knowing regularly what I was about,—they took my advice: and I’m sure—as you know all the parties, and,—in course, we are tiled—I brought the whole thing about, smack, smooth, and no mistake whatever:—opened their eyes to their own situation; and the night before I left town,—which I did in uncommon high glee at having made up the matter,—I set them down to supper, two regular couple, all wrangles over—and they, matched for life as nice as nip, and no mistake.”

It was Jack’s misfortune, whenever he became eloquent, to fall immediately into his own peculiar style of oratory; and this burst, to which he had been encouraged by the colonel’s evident ignorance of all the real facts, brought the gallant officer’s eyes into an almost full stare of astonishment at the mode in which his voluble, volatile friend expressed himself.

“I have thought sometimes,” said the Colonel, “when I have had the pleasure of meeting you there, that you were in the field yourself. It struck me that you thought Miss Englefield’s singing very charming.”

“So I did,” said Jack, still clinging to the eclat of having been favoured by anything so charming as Blanche, and yet wishing to convey the idea that he had been smiled on by both—“so I did; but then I was taken uncommonly by Mrs. Dallington’s talking. They are both delightful creechurs! No: I admired them both as a friend—a sincere friend—nothing more; and so I thought the best thing I could do was, to pair them off with the men whom they liked, and who liked them.”

“Most marvellous self-denial!” said the Colonel.

By this time they had reached “South,” and the colonel accompanied Brag to “The New Inn,” and thence to “The Lamb,” in order that he might go through the ceremony of enquiring for his “fool of a servant, and his phaeton,” which, to do his acting credit, he performed with the greatest apparent earnestness.

These matters adjusted, they returned by a circuitous route, and as they were wending their way through the open gardens at the back of “The Sea Houses,” they beheld the glittering equipage of Mrs. Peckover trailing along the road, containing herself and her two favourite friends, the Gubbinses, and proceeding towards Westham and Pevensey.

“Our friend, taking the air,” said the Colonel.

“Mr. P. isn’t there?” said Jack.

“No, she very seldom takes him out with her,” said the Colonel. “She says he is too big for the inside of the carriage, and she cannot dispense with her footman, who, upon these occasions, shares the box with the coachman. I dare say we shall find him somewhere about; or perhaps she has sent him to pick up laver for her, which is found here in plenty and perfection.”

“Well,” said Jack, “if I were Mr. Peckover, sooner than stand that, I would dig stones in a quarry on my own account.”

“There is no accounting for taste,” said the Colonel; “besides, there are secrets in all families, and we do not perhaps know what the reciprocal obligations of the parties to each other may be; one thing is certain, he wears his chains merrily. I never saw a man more perfectly happy: however, let us proceed to the library, where, if his lady-wife have not ordered him on some fatigue-party, we shall in all probability find him knocking the balls about as usual, either by himself or with the marker’s boy.”

Anything makes a pursuit at a watering-place. A glassblower, whose performances have been before your eyes for years in London, without exciting your attention in the slightest degree, at a watering-place becomes an object of wonder and surprise;—a sick rattle-snake, who would slumber unseen and disregarded in his flannel waistcoat, at the Zoological Gardens in London, is visited with the greatest avidity: and a fish caught the night before, which happens to be two feet longer, or one foot thicker, than fishes of the same kind generally are, attracts a crowd of astonished spectators, and elicits a thousand interesting remarks and observations.

It turned out that Mr. Peckover was not at the library, nor was he gathering laver; on the contrary, he was sitting on a bench facing the sea, at which he was looking wistfully, and evidently much depressed. When he saw Brag and the colonel advancing, he rose to meet them—and they perceived in a moment that something had worried him.

“I am glad I have found you,” said he. “Upon my life! I am almost ashamed to say what I am going to say:—Mrs. Peckover tells me that she has engaged herself to go to Hastings to buy some French things at a smuggling shop, and that she shan’t be able to have the pleasure of receiving you at dinner to-day.”

“Oh,” said the Colonel, “never mind—don’t care about that:—some other day. As Mr. Brag and I are both staying at the same hotel, we can have our little “portions” tête-à-tête, and you’ll let us come to you when you are quite disengaged.”

“I saw the carriage going along the road,” said Jack:—“capital steppers those bays—never saw better: all right that, sir, and no mistake.”

“Why! Mrs. Peckover tells me,” said the husband, “that the Marquess of Whitechapel says they are the best pair of carriage-horses in London. I don’t trouble myself much about carriage-horses—she does:—ha, ha, ha!”

“But suppose,” said the Colonel, “as Mrs. Peckover will not be back in time for dinner, that you were to join us, en garçon, at the hotel.”

“Why,” said Peckover, “that would be very agreeable; but if that were to be the order of the day, you two might as well dine with me en garçon, at our house; only you see, Mrs. Peckover tells me that she shall be back early, and—”

“Well,” said the Colonel, “but see, if we were to dine with you, we might be in the way of Mrs. Peckover and her dames d’honneur, when they returned, tired, perhaps, with the excursion; but if you came to us—”

“Ah!” said the obedient husband, “I don’t think Mrs. Peckover would like that—no, I must be at home to receive her; besides, there are several letters which Mrs. Peckover has desired me to write—and—no, some other time Mrs. Peckover will be most happy to receive you; so let it be as it is. I am very sorry I did not consult her beforehand. I did not know of her engagement; have you forgiven me, gentlemen?”

“Oh, in course,” said Jack, “and many thanks for your offer.”

“Well,” said the Colonel to Brag, “then we had better go to our inn, and order our dinner; we will dine early, if you please.”

“Whenever you like,” said Jack. “I’m always agreeable, and no mistake.”

Jack—upon whose heart or mind, events which would have been of killing interest to others, made no deep impression—was so pleased by the encouragement of Colonel Stiffkey, that he entirely “forgot his own griefs.” The melancholy fate of his sister, now and then flashed across his mind, but since he had ascertained the nature of her defection, he was less anxious for a letter from his mother, upon the subject. His defeat at the widow’s had almost become a matter of joke with him; his rejection by Lord Tom was counterbalanced by the receipt of the money he had recovered from him, and so upon casting his eye over the balance-sheet, the debtor and creditor sides seemed pretty equal; and just now the turn lay rather on the credit side, since he had made good his footing with his fashionable companion.

Still, one of those clouds which must almost constantly hang over the heads of quacks and pretenders, was rising in the horizon, in the shape of the arrival of young Gunnersbury. To quit Eastbourne, where he had strangely enough secured the society of such a man as Stiffkey, was most painful. Stiffkey looked down with an air of placid contempt upon the few inhabitants of Sea Houses, and yet he strolled about familiarly with Jack. This was agreeable in the highest degree to the little man’s vanity, although really and truly the gay colonel fell into the association without reflecting or thinking about it for one moment. He had met Brag in good society, and in places where he felt evidently at home; he had heard Lord Tom speak of him in high terms, as what is called a “sporting chap,” and, moreover, he was somebody to talk to. There can be little doubt if a more aristocratic friend had arrived, Jack would have been cast off; for the colonel was one of those who, soaring eagle-high above the Brags of Jack’s school, was known as one of the most decided tuft-hunters about town.

The colonel, too, observed with great care the different grades and degrees of the peerage in the selection of the invitations which he received; like Brag, he possessed, only upon the greater scale, what Foote calls, “the paltry ambition of levying and following titles; the poverty of fastening upon men of distinction in public, for no other reason but because of their rank, adhering to Sir John till the baronet is superseded by my lord, quitting the puny peer for an earl, and sacrificing all three to a duke.”

It is greatly to be lamented in the present much-complained-of—how justly I do not pretend to decide—absence of talent in dramatic writing, that the rich and abundant humour of Foote, should, because it is certainly overlaid by much of that, which, in these days of delicacy and refinement would not be endured upon the stage, be altogether lost. Having quoted a line or two from one of his comedies, illustrative of Colonel Stiffkey’s passion for tufts, I cannot resist the temptation of extracting that part of the scene, in the “Lame Lover,” in which he justifies the young lady’s expressed opinion of his addiction to titles, and practically works it out. The passage is curious as well as humorous—humorous, because the satire strikes at all ages; and curious, inasmuch as in twenty lines it familiarises us with customs and habits characteristic of the time at which it was written (the year 1770), of which now no trace or vestige remains.

Sir Luke, the tuft-hunter, is on the stage, with Serjeant Circuit and Charlotte, a servant enters and delivers a card to Sir Luke.

Sir Luke.

(Reads) “Sir Gregory Goose desires the honour of Sir Luke Limp’s company to dine. An answer is desired.”—Gad-so! a little unlucky—I have been engaged for these three weeks.

Serjeant.

I find Sir Gregory is returned for the corporation of Fleece’em.

Sir Luke.

Is he?—Oh, ho!—that alters the case.—George, give my compliments to Sir Gregory, and say I’ll certainly come and dine there.—Order Joe to run to Alderman Inkle’s, in Threadneedle-street: sorry can’t wait upon him; but confined to my bed for two days with the influenza.

Charlotte.

You make light, Sir Luke, of this sort of engagements?

Sir Luke.

What can a man do? These fellows (when one has the misfortune to meet them) take scandalous advantage; teazing one with, “Pray when will you do me the honour, Sir Luke, to take your mutton with me? Do name the day.” What’s to be done?—they are as bad as a beggar, who attacks your coach going up-hill, there’s no getting rid of either without a penny to one, and a promise to the other; not but that upon these occasions there is no man in England more punctual than—

Enter a servant, who gives Sir Luke a letter.—From whom?

Servant.

The Earl of Brentford, Sir Luke. The servant waits for an answer.

Sir Luke.

Answer!—By your leave, Mr. Serjeant and Charlotte. (Reads.) “Taste for music!”—umph!—“Mons. Dupont—fail—dinner upon table at five.” Gad-so!—I hope Sir Gregory’s servant is not gone.

Servant.

Immediately, sir, on receiving the answer.

Sir Luke.

Run after him, as fast as you can. Tell him—“quite in despair:—recollect an engagement that can’t in nature be missed:”—and be back in an instant.

[Servant runs out.

Charlotte.

You see, sir, the knight must give way to my lord.

Sir Luke.

No: it isn’t that, my dear Charlotte. You saw that it was quite an extempore business. No, it isn’t for the title; but, to tell you the truth, Brentford has more talent than any man in the world: it is that, which makes me fond of his house.

Charlotte.

By the choice of his company he gives an unanswerable instance of that.

Sir Luke.

You are right, my dear girl. But now, to give you a proof of his wit:—Brentford’s finances are a little out of repair, which procures him some visits he would very gladly excuse. One morning a Welsh coachmaker came to him with his bill; my lord had him up. “You are called Mr. Lloyd, I think?” said Brentford. “At your lordship’s service, my lord.” “What!—Lloyd with an L?” “With an L, my lord,” said the coachmaker. “—Because,” said my lord, “I have heard that in your part of the world, Lloyd and Floyd are synonymous—the very same names.” “Always, my lord,” said the coachmaker. “That,” says my lord, “is rather unlucky: for, you must know, I am paying off my debts alphabetically; and in four or five years you might have come in with an F; but I can give you very slight hopes for your L.”—Ha, ha, ha!—(Enter a servant abruptly, who runs against Sir Luke.)—Can’t you see where you are running? you rascal!

Servant.

Sir, his grace the Duke of ——

Sir Luke.

Grace!—where is he?—where?

Servant.

In his coach at the door. If you a’n’t better engaged, would be glad of your company to go into the City, and take a dinner at Dolly’s.

Sir Luke.

In his own coach, did you say?

Servant.

Yes, sir.

Sir Luke.

With the coronets—or——?

Servant.

I believe so.

Sir Luke.

There’s no resisting that:—bid John run to Sir Gregory Goose’s.

Servant.

He is already gone to Alderman Inkle’s.

Sir Luke.

Then do you step to the knight’s. Hey!—no—you must go to my lord’s. Hold, hold!—no—I have it:—step first to Sir Greg’s; then pop in at Lord Brentford’s, just as the company are going to dinner.

Servant.

What shall I say to Sir Gregory?

Sir Luke.

Anything!—what I told you before.

Servant.

And what to my lord?

Sir Luke.

What?—why, tell him that my uncle from Epsom——no,—that won’t do,—for he knows I don’t care a farthing for him. Hey!—tell him—hold!—I have it:—tell him, that as I was getting into my chair, to obey his lordship’s commands, I was arrested by a couple of bailiffs, forced into a hackney-coach, and carried to “The Pied Bull” in the Borough.—I beg ten thousand pardons for keeping his grace waiting—but his grace knows my misfor——

And away goes Sir Luke, without taking the slightest notice of either his learned friend the serjeant, or the dear girl Charlotte, both of whom he leaves perfectly satisfied with the justness of the character the latter had drawn of her “lame lover.”

The spirit of this bit, and the peculiarities of contemporaneous society which it exhibits, will perhaps excuse the quotation. The duke inviting the knight to a dinner at Dolly’s; the knight getting into his chair to go to dine with the earl, and resting his apology upon an arrest by bailiffs, and a transfer to “The Pied Bull” in the Borough, all sound marvellously strange to modern ears: and yet there are still those alive who well remember Foote, and who speak of him as a correct painter of manners, and whose inherent humour received additional brilliancy from his unquestioned power of “holding the mirror up to Nature.”

Stiffkey, however, was not Limp, and when he and Jack strolled to the hotel to order their repast, his countenance brightened up considerably when the waiter handed him a letter, which had been sent over by somebody coming from Hailsham, to which place it had been forwarded by the cross-road coach from Dover, and which he in a moment recognised as being from George Gunnersbury. His announcement to Jack of this happy arrival was not quite so well received by the little gentleman in the cords as he imagined it might have been.

Jack walked about the room while his new friend was reading the despatch, very much in doubt what the nature of its contents might be; and hoping, with all possible fervour and earnestness, that at all events it might announce some insurmountable obstacle in the way of the writer’s visit to Eastbourne.

“Gad!” said Stiffkey, “George is a capital fellow; he will be here to-morrow afternoon; he writes the best letter of any fellow I know: he is particularly shy to strangers, but when one knows him thoroughly, his sly humour, that I spoke of this morning, is capital. He gives a description of a dinner party they had the other day, which is admirable. He says, ‘My dear good father, who is certainly the best-disposed general in his Majesty’s service, contrives to pick up the oddest tigers imaginable; we had a day or two ago a German baron, who spoke no English, and, as nobody in our family, except my sister Eliza, understands three words of German, the poor gentleman—or, by courtesy—nobleman, had a bad time of it; but we had also a fellow presented to us, under the fostering protection of a worthy friend of ours, who beat anything I had ever seen out of a travelling caravan,—an animal which certainly talked, and was therefore human, otherwise I should have taken it for an astounding cross in the breed between an ape and a horse-jockey: he affronted half the party, after having disgusted all of it, and made his escape from a pelting of decanters and wine-glasses by affecting to save some people from a stranded brig, near which he never went, but, instead of venturing ancle-deep into the water to rescue the sufferers, retired to bed ‘half-seas-over,’ at least, so I have heard; but of these matters we will discourse more anon. I will be with you by six at the latest.’”

“Capital fun,” said the Colonel, “isn’t it? A cross between an ape and a horse-jockey! uncommon good!”

“Deuced funny, indeed!” said Jack, whipping his boots; “that’s a capital fellow,—eh? straight up, right down, and no mistake. We shall have fun when he comes.”

The detestation which Mr. George Gunnersbury’s personal conduct had engendered in Jack’s heart in the first instance, had now grown to its fullest growth; nor was it in the slightest degree qualified by the accidental omission of his name, or that of his introducer, (as Jack called it,) which would certainly have rendered the rest of the day more disagreeable than it promised to be in the company of the colonel. For the next, Jack, “in course,” was prepared,—a letter from Town would call him away; and so everything seemed at the moment to turn up well, out of all the ills that threatened him; his mother’s answer to his letter from Hythe would, in all probability, come to hand in the morning, which would give an air of consistency to his sudden departure, and satisfy his aristocratic friend of the absolute necessity for breaking up the agreeable party.

After having ordered dinner, the colonel and Jack strolled down on to the sands, wrote words on the sand with their sticks; sat down on the shingle; then wandered towards the watch-house; then came back and talked to the vestals at the baths,—inquired about laver,—found it too early in the season to have it good; then looked at the half-dozen carriages which were standing in the coach-house of the hotel; then went to Weston’s, and bought some gingerbread nuts; then into the Library, and played with a little ball that went into a hole at the top of a twisted tube, and came out at the bottom, and rolled about a little, and at last settled into a hole of its own; then Stiffkey looked through a glass, and saw a schooner pitching disagreeably, and Jack went out and helped a little fat-faced child who wore a straw hat and feather, and trousers, and scarlet morocco slippers, on to the back of a donkey; and then the colonel puffed little pellets out of a pea-shooter, across the shop, at a doll, which one of the young ladies of the establishment immediately removed; and then Jack looked up at a little bay-window where a prettyish girl was sitting, who immediately got up and pulled the blind down; and then they both betook themselves to throwing stones from the beach into the sea, during which operation they had the satisfaction of seeing Mrs. Peckover and her party draw up to the door of her house, it then wanting one hour of their time of dining, and at least two of that, at which Peckover proposed their dining with him. This settled that affair, and convinced them, as Mrs. Peckover intended it should, that into her house no such persons as Jack should set foot. The colonel might have been received; but the moment that Mrs. Peckover, with her lynx eyes, perceived Jack’s unfortunate white cords and tops, from her balcony, his fate was decided. She taxed Peckover with the fact of his being one of his hunting friends, and P. could not endure the trial;—it was so,—and admitted,—but then, Mrs. Peckover knew everything intuitively.

In divers and sundry pursuits, equally interesting and exciting with those which have just been described, the two new friends killed the enemy, until it was time to dress for dinner; they accordingly repaired to their rooms, Stiffkey’s servant being in readiness to attend him, and Jack swearing at the incalculable stupidity of his man who was not there to dress him. Jack affected to bear it all with good-nature and complacency, and it all went very well till he actually found himself alone, and then it was that he began to calculate whither he should next go,—for go he must; the arrival of the hated Gunnersbury would be the signal for his extinction and extermination; but thought Jack, “At all events, I’m safe till the morning; and then the letter, and all that, will get me clear off, if it comes; and if it don’t, I must write one myself.”

Accordingly Jack proceeded to dress, and made himself look uncommon nice, with an olive-green coat, and a Pomona-green waistcoat, and a pair of uncommonly smart black kerseymere trousers, with stockings and shoes to match: in short, he felt that he had done it; and when he made allowance for the absence of a servant, the approbation of his elegant friend would no doubt be unqualified: and so down he went to the dining-room, where, in a few minutes, he was joined by Stiffkey, who without any effort had achieved that, which Jack could never have accomplished with a two-hundred horse power. He looked like a gentleman.

The dinner was served, and put down. Stiffkey proposed some of Toone’s sherry, and one bottle of champaign between the two;—should it be moussu?—well iced;—certainly—the soup was—soup;—the fish not entirely blameable, and whatever other things there were, were all tolerable,—each in its way. Claret followed the champaign; and in about half an hour after they sat down, they were tranquilly sipping their wine, with a few watering-place pears and cricket-ball peaches by way of dessert, discoursing upon topics the most interesting and agreeable.

“If I stayed here,” said the colonel, “I should get some house or lodging; this hotel is all very well, but it isn’t quite the thing; and yet I don’t know about a house for a single man,—and, probably, I shall go back with George in two or three days.”

“There’s certainly a difference,” said Jack, “between this and the ‘Ship’ at Dover: the ‘Ship’ is, in course, the only house fit to go to there: for my own part, I think that is the worst of travelling;—the chances and changes,—and then to be ‘run to earth’ here without a slavey. It is the very deuce,—eh!—uncommon slow, and no mistake.”

“Help yourself to some claret,” said the colonel, cracking a biscuit; “yes,—it is a bore to be sure. I think you live in Grosvenor street, when you are in town?—at least I have seen your name on a door there.”

“Yes,” said Jack; “I’m very little at home;—I’m what you call, everywhere;—I hate being still; whenever I can, I run down to a little place I have out of town, where I shut myself up whenever I am able.”

“Have you much wood about your place?” said Stiffkey.

Jack recollected the carpenter’s-shop, and said, confidently,—“Yes, lots.”

“Well,” said the colonel, “I declare I thought you would have married that Mrs. Dallington.”

“No,” said Jack; “there are many things more than meet the ear;—there are objections,—so I made way for those, who couldn’t make their own.”

At this moment the waiter entered the room, and announced that the London coach had just arrived, and that a lady and gentleman, on the outside, were inquiring for Mr. Brag.

“For me!” said Jack, a thousand horrid ideas rushing into his brain.

“Yes, sir,” said the waiter, “they are in the hall.”

This announcement startled Jack most tremendously:—a lady enquiring for him—just arrived. Who could it be?—neither the widow Dallington nor Miss Blanche Englefield—certainly not. But might it not be Anne—Nancy? That she had been most violently agitated at beholding him, was perfectly certain; that the only account he had received of her feelings or wishes as to breaking off their acquaintance for ever, was derived from her husband, who might have assumed a tone which, after all he was not justified by facts in adopting. Perhaps she still loved him,—still resolved to prove her affection: after struggling for years, her firmness had yielded, and she had eloped from her new husband to pass the rest of her life with him.

The first flash of this thought was delightful: interest—adventure—escape—pursuit—vanity—notoriety—action for crim. con.—damages—a duel—“a bullet in the thorax”—all whirled through his well-curled head, as he jumped from his seat at table to shield and screen the interesting object of his hopes and wishes from the gaze of Stiffkey, until he was quite sure of his bird;—when, before he could reach the door, his eyes were greeted, and his ears astounded, by the appearance of his exemplary mother, and a cry of “Jack, my boy, how are you?” uttered by that respectable matron.

“My dear ma’am,” said Jack, almost petrified, and extending his arms,—not for an embrace, but to endeavour to prevent her farther entrance into the room—“what on earth has brought you here?”

“The stage-coach,” said the old lady. “Come, git out of the way; let us come in and sit down.”

Saying which, she pushed by her son, to the astonishment of Stiffkey, who immediately rose from his seat.

“Don’t disturb yourself, sir,” said the lady; “there’s plenty of room:—only coming outside, the wind blows up all about one, and I’m as cold as charity—though Jim made me have a glass of hot rum and water at the last place we stopped at.”

“Very nice beverage, ma’am,” said Stiffkey, with one of his most graceful bows.

“My dear ma’am,” said Jack, “wouldn’t you rather have another room? We have scarcely finished dinner, and it would be more comfortable to have a sitting-room to yourself.”

“They haven’t got another sitting-room disengaged,” said the lady; “Jim asked them. No matter: what’s good enough for you, Jack, is good enough for me; so this will do for us till bed-time.”

“My dear colonel,” said Jack—

“My dear sir,” said Stiffkey, “no apologies. I am too glad to see any friends of yours—if I don’t intrude.”

“Intrude!” said the lady—“not a bit: we have no secrets, sir. To be sure, things have turned out queerish: however, you have as much right here as we, and we as you—so we won’t make no words of that. Why, you dine late, Jack!”

“No, on the contrary, rather early,” said Jack, perfectly at a loss what to do, overcome by the unexpectedness of the visit, from its being so particularly ill-timed, and by the malicious determination which Stiffkey had too evidently formed of not stirring: indeed, the announcement of the fact, that there was no other sitting-room disengaged, would of itself have justified his remaining in what really was his own apartment, even if he had not wished to stay out a scene which promised him some amusement.

“Jack,” said the lady, “I want you just to look out and see if Jim is getting in all the bundles and things.”

“Who is Jim?” said Jack in an under tone.

“Jim Salmon,” said the lady.

“What! is he with you?”

“Yes,” said his mother, “where else should he be?”

At this moment Jem made his appearance, dressed in a tight light green coat, and a buff-waistcoat, with striped blue and white cotton trousers, made tightish to his plump figure, a coloured check handkerchief round his neck, and a white hat stuck on one side of his head, with a bunch of whitish-red curls sticking out from under it.

“Ah!” said Jem, “Brag, how d’ye do?”—“didn’t expect us. I reckoned—skimming down here—eh? Titsy would come—agreeable surprise—twig?”

“Very agreeable, indeed!” said Brag, drawing back somewhat indignantly from the familiar approach of the ci-devant shopboy.

“Have you got all the parcels up to the bed-room, J. S.?” said the lady.

“Yes, Titsy,” said Jem.

“Got the umbrella, J. S.?” said the lady.

“No, Titsy,” replied Jem, “but I’ll be after it in no time—twig?”

Jack’s dismay and mortification had now risen to a considerable height. What could have induced his mother to make Jem Salmon her travelling companion?—what could have induced her to undertake the journey?—or what Jem could mean by calling his respectable parent “Titsy,” were to him questions unsolvable. One thing, however, appeared necessary: the old lady had evidently planted herself for the evening where she was; Stiffkey, who had scarcely begun his wine, and had no engagement elsewhere, had quietly deposited himself in an arm-chair: Jack, therefore, felt it absolutely essential to introduce the colonel to their fair visiter, resolving, afterwards, to check her in her conversation, so as to prevent the developement of all the real circumstances of the case, and trust to chance and impudence to wriggle through and out of this most “untoward affair.”

“This, Colonel,” said Jack, “is my mother:—Colonel Stiffkey, madam.”

Mutual bows ratified the treaty.

“I say,” said the lady, “put a chair for Jim. P’raps, he is taking a drop of something.”

“Mr. Salmon, ma’am,” said Brag—“is he coming in?”

“I s’pose so,” said the lady.

“Oh!” said Brag.

“Here he is,” said the lady. “All right now, Jim?”

“Yes, Titsy,” said Jem.

Jack’s astonishment at the repetition of this “familiar word” was too great to admit of concealment, and accordingly betrayed itself in his countenance.

“Ah!” said his mother, “that’s it—isn’t it, Jim? He doesn’t know all.”

“No,” said Jem—“don’t twig, Titsy.”

“I told you, John, I should surprise you one of these days,” said his mother:—“J. S. and I are married!”

“Married!” exclaimed Jack.

“Yes,” said Jem, “Titsy is Mrs. Salmon—d’ye twig?”

“My dear mother,” said Jack, “are you serious?”

“No, Jack,” replied Mrs. James Salmon,—for such she really was,—“never less serious in my life since your daddy died. All true:—Jim and I were married last Friday was a week at Hornsey church, and passed the honey-day—we couldn’t stop out longer on account of the business—at ‘The Sluice House.’”

“This is really a surprise!” said Stiffkey, sipping his claret, looking, how—it is impossible to describe.

Jack was, as Major Downing says, “catawampously stumped,” and could say nothing.

“It oughtn’t to be, sir,” said Mrs. Salmon, addressing herself to the dandy. “Jack knowed well enough what a lone life I led. He never came near me—never, except for what you could get, Jack—did you? He advised me to marry, sir—and I could tell you a pretty story about that, if I liked—eh! Jack?—the pickle-shop. Well, so things went on, till at last—praise afore people’s faces sometimes spoils them—I took Jim for better or worse.”

“A very prudent resolve, indeed, ma’am,” said the Colonel, taking a huge pinch of snuff.

“My dear Colonel,” said Jack, “I am sure we ought to apologize for troubling you with our family affairs. I wish—eh!—isn’t there any other room—are you sure?”

“A’nt I?” said Jem—“first thing as I axed about—twig?”

“Get yourself something warm, Jim,” said the ancient bride: “I’m sure if the cold once gets into your poor little stomach, you’ll have no rest all night. I know what it is myself to be troubled with cold:—and I tell you what, Johnny, we shall want a bit of something by way of supper; for though we had three or four mutton-chops at Godstone, which were very nicely done, and fine meat too, and uncommon fat, still that was some time ago—and I get peckish at night somehow.”

“Fat!” said Mr. Salmon—“yes, they were fat—reminded me of the shop, Brag—twig?”

“I should venture to recommend,” said the colonel with the most studied politeness, “something to drink—a glass of claret—or——”

“Oh, Lor’ no!” said Mrs. Salmon, “no claret for me, sir: as I used to say to my poor dear first—Jack’s father—don’t talk to me of claret: it’s a waste of time as well as of money to drink them sort of thin stuffs! If Jack was to have behaved like what he is, he might have asked me to take some kind of refreshment before this; for since the rum and water at—what do they call that last place we stopped at, Jemes?”—

“Wholesome, Titsy,” said the bridegroom.

“Hailsham, mother,—Hailsham,” said Jack, “is the name of the place.”

“I haven’t had the least drop as is, in my mouth, since Godstone,” continued Mrs. Salmon.

“And there,” said Salmon, “the hale was uncommon ’eavy.”

“What! ma’am,” said Stiffkey, “had you a storm, coming down?”

“No, no,” said Jack,—who, although he could not, as his mother would have said, “exasperate” the h himself, was nervously alive to the absurdity of anybody else who laboured under a similar incapacity—“ale—the ale was heavy.”

“Come, Mr. Brag,” said the Colonel, “the wine is with you.”

“Yes,” said Jack, “and I’m not the man to stop it—eh? I like it to go—keep circulating, as we say, right up, straight down, and no mistake?”

“What do they charge, John, for claret here?” said Mrs. Salmon, addressing her son.

“Can’t say, I am sure,” said Jack.

“I say,” said Salmon, leaning over towards his wife, with his hand up to his mouth to hide a very audible whisper—“that’s it—they never pay!—twig? But, I say, Titsy, what will you have—something hot?”

“Whatever you like, dear,” said the respectable matron.

“I tell you what,” said Salmon, “I’ll just go out and brew for you myself. I know your taste—eh?—don’t I? Sugar, rum, nutmeg—eh?—twig?”

With this most affectionate speech Mr. Salmon left the room, Jack regularly used up, and the colonel, who was now convinced that his particular friend must be the identical creature described in Gunnersbury’s letter from Dover, having thrown himself back in his chair, waited to hear what might happen next.

“Sad business about Kitty!” said Mrs. Salmon.

“Yes, mother,” said Jack, “but don’t you think we might as well defer any discussion of that sort till the morning.”

“Why,” said Mrs. Salmon, “I don’t know; if the gentleman is your friend, there’s no harm speaking out before him,—and I can’t stop here long. I thought I would surprise you; and I think a bit of a-washing to-morrow in the sea won’t do me no harm. It’s now two-and-thirty—aye, let me see, more than that—five-and-thirty years since I was in a bath of any kind, and I thought if I could manage to see you, and tell you all about my wedding, and talk over poor Kitty’s business, and get a bit of a wash, all under one, it would be doing a great deal; and as the whole front of the shop has been new painted, and James has had all those dangling dips, which you didn’t like, taken down—I said to him, ‘Jim,’ says I, ‘now we’ve got this letter from John, what d’ye say of a bit of a holiday till the stink of the paint goes off, and then we can tell him all, how, and about it?’ Don’t you think I was right?”

“Perfectly, ma’am,” said Jack, “perfectly—only I don’t quite comprehend what you are talking about.”

“I say, sir,” said Mrs. Salmon, appealing to the Colonel, who was enjoying the scene, and gathering in, all he could collect, wherewith to amuse his friend Gunnersbury when he should arrive—“isn’t that good? John’s father and I carried on a most excellent business for five-and-twenty years:—I’ve got the shop-cards in my pocket now, with the new name introduced ‘Salmon, successor to Brag:’—and yet he doesn’t comprehend what I am talking about when I tell him about new painting the shop, and dowsing the danglers, as Jim says.”

“My dear mother,” said Jack, “hadn’t you better go to bed? I assure you this travelling—eh?—don’t you think—it has upset you—?”

“Upset! no,” said Mrs. Salmon, “I’m not going to bed at half-past seven o’clock to please the pope—no, nor the lord-mayor neither: I’m going to have a nice bit of sum’mut for supper. Here, John, jump up and open the door—I hear Jim knocking: he has got the grog, or whatever it is.”

Jack, utterly discomfited, did as he was bid.

“Scaldings!” cried Mr. Salmon, his father-in-law—“scaldings!—here it is, Titsy, as hot as hot. Mind your eye, Brag—shut the door: that’s right—clever lad—eh?—twig?”

Things had gone so far at this period of the business, that Jack, seeing it was perfectly impossible longer to blind the colonel to the real state of the case, gave himself up in despair, and felt convinced that the morning must afford him safety in flight. The coolness of Stiffkey during the whole of the proceedings, the unbounded civility with which he treated the old lady, the dignified goodnature with which he permitted Mr. Salmon to tread over his feet, and even scatter the “honey-dew” of the hot mixture, which he had himself prepared and brought into the room, over his shins, killed Jack, who knew by experience the mode in which good-breeding receives the coarsenesses and vulgarities of the world, and saw that the whole fabric of his favour with the colonel, in erecting which he had passed the entire day, was fast crumbling to atoms.

“Shall we have some more wine?” said the colonel to Brag, doing the elegant with as much unaffected grace as if Jack’s mother had been a duchess who had married a fool for the sake of his title.

“As you like, colonel,” said Jack, “only I fear—”

“Fear nothing,” said Stiffkey, “I never was happier; and if I don’t bore you——”

“Oh!” said Jack bowing.

“Not in the least, sir,” said Salmon, “we are too happy to have you stay. I’ve always heard say that it is one of the great advantages of these watering-places getting into genteel company—eh!—twig?”

Jack could have annihilated the shopboy, although he was his father-in-law.

“But, as I was saying, John,” said Mrs. Salmon, “because, as the gentleman tells us, we may speak out before him—poor Kitty made a bad mess of it; she was always a wayward girl,—she quite run away from George, at last,—so he writes me,—went and lived with other people,—just as it happened;—all came from drinking, John,” here the old lady mended her draught. “Wasn’t it shocking, sir?”

“Dreadful ma’am!” said Stiffkey, “very dreadful.”

“My dear mother,” said Jack, “don’t trouble the Colonel.”

“The trouble is a pleasure,” said Stiffkey; “some unfortunate creature, who, being in the habit of drinking, I suppose, ran away from her husband: a thing that will happen, ma’am, amongst servants even of the best character.”

“Servants, sir?” cried Mrs. Salmon.

“My dear mother,” said Jack, “never mind.”

“But I do mind, John,” said the lady, who had just arrived at a point of obfuscation, at which the main points under discussion are always forgotten, and the minor incidents shine forth most brilliantly—“why should the gentleman call my daughter Kitty a servant?—she never was a servant! she made a foolish match,—ran away with a serjeant—a reglar common soger,—and then ran away from him,—all ill treatment, sir, and the heat of the climate;—and—” here Mrs. Salmon burst into a flood of tears; whereupon, Jem, in order to enlighten the Colonel, and utterly annihilate Jack, gave him a familiar tap on the shoulder, and said, in a confidential tone, “bolted,—altogether—quite—entirely,—twig?”

The Colonel drew back shrinkingly from the unexpected familiarity, and signified by a distant bow that he was sufficiently aware of the circumstances to which the lady had so feelingly alluded.

“However,” said Mrs. Salmon, recovering, “what’s done can’t be undone; she is now gone to her long home, and it’s of no use raking up old grievances: she had a good education, and made a bad use of it; and what’s more, she was cheated into marrying him; and Nance Brown,—she was at the bottom of it, and yet she has contrived to get up in the world; and so has George himself,—how, I don’t pretend to say.”

“My dear mother,” said Jack, “let us talk of something else; it cannot be very entertaining to the colonel to hear all our grievances.”

“Entertaining!” said Mrs. Salmon, “I’m sure I don’t mean to entertain anybody. When I feels, I speaks; and why shouldn’t I, John?—an’t it natural for a mother to feel?”

“Don’t take on so, Titsy,” said Salmon. “There’s some cold boiled leg of mutton and pickles coming; they are only waiting to get a bit of potato mashed. I didn’t forget to order your early supper,—twig?”

“You are a kind-hearted creetur,” said Mrs. Salmon to her husband, “and that makes one feel neglect from others the more; however, we won’t talk about that. J. S. dear, tell John what alterations we are going to make at home.”

“To be sure,” said Jem. “I say, Brag, you know that big copper on the left-hand of the melting-house? I mean to have that put farther back, and git a door made into the lane, behind the cart-house, so as we can bring the fat in all reg’lar, without coming through the front-shop,—twig?”

“Yes, yes,” said Jack, “a very good arrangement—and no mistake.”

“Then, I mean to clap a sky-light on the top of the back-parlour,” continued Mr. Salmon, “which will make it uncommon lively to what it was. Why, in the old gentleman’s time, when I was a bit of a boy, it used to be as dark and as dismal as the Plenipotentiary on Milbank,—twig?”

“And round it, John,” said Mrs. Salmon, “I mean to have ever so many flower-pots with gerenums, and fooshies, and you can’t think how nice they will look in the summer if the cats don’t knock ’em down in the night.”

“Here’s the mutton, Titsy,” said Jem.

And sure enough, in came the waiter, accompanied by a female assistant with a tray, on which the promised leg appeared, with pickles and other condiments,—a dish of mashed potatoes, and a plate of chopped onions. The maid spread out a second table, and speedily dressed it in a snowy cloth: the waiter handed and arranged the viands; and while doing so, announced that some hot chops were on their way.

“Waiter, why don’t you bring us another bottle of claret?” said Stiffkey, to Jack’s most perfect and entire mortification; who, with all his vanity and self-love, could not shut his eyes to the certainty that his elegant friend Stiffkey was merely prolonging his stay, in order to be amused at his expense; and equally well aware that his mother and the creature whom he was told was his father-in-law, would, in the course of the evening, afford him as much entertainment as he could reasonably expect.

“Now, Titsy,” said Mr. Salmon, “let me put you a chair by the table,—ready ag’in the chops come. I suppose it’s a compliment to ask you to join us?” added the engaging Jem, himself to Colonel Stiffkey and addressing Jack.

“We have just dined,” said Colonel Stiffkey, with the most imperturbable gravity.

The old bride and young bridegroom having drawn close to the board, Jack considered he might contrive to manage a few minutes’ explanatory conversation with the colonel, and therefore drew his chair nearer to him, as if with a view of facilitating, what an Irish gentleman would call,—the circulation of the bottle between the two.

“To be sure,” whispered Jack, whose whole character for smartness and sprightliness, and that sort of slang conversation in which he ordinarily indulged, had been completely destroyed by the appearance of visitors, not only unexpected then, but never to be expected in their present relative position—“To be sure, Colonel, there are odd things in the world. Who, when we sat down here, would have expected this curious coincidence. By Job! what folly,—eh? a woman at her time of life to throw herself away upon a fellow of that sort!”

“Very odd,” said Stiffkey, in an equally low tone of voice; “but, at that time of life, these turns will happen. Of what profession is the young man?”

“A candle-maker,” said Jack, whispering directly in the colonel’s ear; having hoisted up one of his little fat hands, trumpet-wise, to prevent the affectionate chop-eaters from hearing the avowal, and hoping, even at this straw-catching minute, to devolve the whole of the responsibility of so disgraceful a business upon his respectable mother, leaving it to be inferred that she had been love-led into a connexion much beneath herself.

“Oh!” said Stiffkey.

“Love levels ranks: lords down to cellars bears, And bids the candle-maker walk up stairs.”

“Very true,” said Jack, “all right,—and no mistake.”

“I say, John,” said Mr. Salmon, who fortunately had not heard this little colloquy, “just come here: did you ever see closer fat than this cold mutton? I should like to have twenty or thirty ton of it down, ready for melting. I could sport a dash of hog in him, and no fear of spluttering.”

“It’s curious to see,” said Jack, in an under tone to the colonel, “how, when a man sets himself to trade, he turns everything to shop.”

“Very,” said Stiffkey.

And so it is; but it was much more curious to observe the total alteration produced in Jack’s manner and language by the unexpected visitation of his parent, and her hopeful help-mate. It seemed as if he was altogether unstarched; his hair seemed to uncurl itself, and upon his pale cheek, and contracted brow, evidently lay the whole weight of his mortification and dismay.

“Titsy,” said Salmon, “don’t you malt?”

“No, my dear J. S.” replied the lady. “I’m all for something more in the warm line.”

“That’s right;” said Salmon. “Rum and water, hot, I consider,—eh?—twig?”

“Exactly so,” replied Mrs. Salmon. “I can’t think how you two,” turning herself round, and addressing the gentlemen at the other table, “can go on drinking that wishy-washy stuff,—paying, too, so much as you do for it. As I said before, I consider it a dead waste of time,—there’s no goodness, no nourishment in it:—they call riding in a hack cab, taking danger at eight-pence a mile;—but I call claret-drinking getting the stomach-ache at ten shillings a bottle.”

“Little and good is Titsy’s motto,” said Jem.

“Yes, J. S. dear,” said the matron, smiling; “that’s the reason I took you.”

“Well said, Titsy,” said Salmon, “she shan’t be a bad un after all.”

That Mr. John Brag was not blessed by nature with any superabundant proportion of feeling, we have had several opportunities of ascertaining; but it is only fair to say, that during this, in every point of view humiliating scene to the pretender, his uneasiness—misery it might almost be called—upon his own personal account, was not equal to that which he felt on account of his mother. That she had made herself, at her time of life, a fool, by marrying her shop-man, or shop-boy rather, was bad enough; but such things—or things as extraordinary and silly—happen, matrimonially, every day; and besides, he palliated her absurdity in this affair by the reflection that he himself had first advised her to marry somebody, in order to rescue his name from the trammels of trade, and that he had probably accelerated the consummation of her discredit by his facetious pranks upon Waterloo Bridge, when he himself contrived to expose her infirmities for the amusement of his fashionable friends; but, what did nevertheless pain even him, was the sight of his parent—of the being who had given him birth—associated with such a creature as Jem Salmon, and by him and his endearing diminutives and nick-names rendered an object of universal ridicule. To hear this wretched animal calling a woman three times his age and four times his size, Titsy, was really and truly tormenting, separated from any prospective feeling of certainty that the degradation of his once respectable relative would form the subject of Stiffkey’s most animated description of the humours of Eastbourne, to be hereafter given to his expected visitor and surrounding friends.

“I say, John,” said Mrs. Salmon, warming with her refreshment, “John, when you were at home last, you did not think I should get the start of you, however much you advised it. I haven’t heard of your marrying a Lady Sally, or a Lady Susan, with forty or fifty thousand pounds tacked to the title;—I’ve heard of your doings though, in other places.”

“Probably,” said Jack, “one can’t help being talked about.”

“I mean with Mrs. ——, what’s the name? J. S.” said Mrs. Salmon;—“up there, by ——.”

“Dallington, d’ye mean,” said Jem.

“Yes, that’s it,” said the matron; “we heard that story last week—not half a day after it happened.”

“What is that?” said Stiffkey, sotto voce to Brag.

“I’m sure I don’t know what my mother means,” said Jack; nor did he, nor could he comprehend how she came to know the name of the lady.

“Don’t you, Johnny? I do,” said his mother; “so does J. S., don’t you? Now, I think I owe you a turn, for playing me off on the bridge, so I’ll have a laugh at your expense—all in fun, now it’s over.”

“My dear mother,” said Jack, “pray don’t talk about that affair.”

“No, not a syllable,” said Mrs. Salmon; “only we know all about your making love to the two sisters at once—don’t we, Jemes?”

“I believe we do too, Titsy,” said Salmon; “two at a time, that’s all, John—eh—twig?”

“What, ma’am?” said Stiffkey, who found he had completely succeeded in making Mrs. Salmon consider him “quite the gentleman;” “did our friend try his ambidextrous fortune with both ladies?”

“I don’t know,” said Mrs. Salmon, “about whose fortune he tried; all I know he got none—between two stools, Johnny—”

—“I know, my dear mother,” said Jack, “the proverb is by no means new.”

“No,” said the lady, “nor the moral of it neither; the way we come to know of it was through the lady’s housekeeper; they deal with us for coarse stock, stores and rushlights.”

“And ile, Titsy,” said Salmon.

“Yes,” said the lady; “and so Jemes, you see, went round collecting, and so—but you tell the story, J. S., dear.”

“Oh, don’t trouble yourself, sir,” said Jack.

“Pray go on, Mr. Salmon,” said Stiffkey.

“Why, I tell you how it was,” said Salmon; “I was a just stepping round and collecting, as Titsy says,—for we had an unmerciful heavy bill to pay our broker, and I happens to call at Mrs. Dallington’s—so—the family was just gone out o’ town—lets see—when was it, Titsy?—one day late in last week—and so I sees the housekeeper—Mrs. Cropper—I know’d her in her last place—so I tells her about our little account, and she says, says she, looking at the bill, ‘I wonder, now, if your master’s any relation to the little man which my missus sent away a night or two ago, with a flea in his ear.’”

“I must beg,” said Jack,—“I—shall leave the room if this goes on any farther—I don’t want to know the secret history of people of my acquaintance, squeezed out of servants—I don’t want to know about any little man.”

“No, love, do hear,” said Mrs. Salmon; “it only shows how things gits round.”

“So, I says, says I,” continued Salmon, “I can’t judge unless you tell me what sort of a little man he is.—‘Why,’ she says, says she, ‘his name’s Brag—he’s a smartish kind of a chap, with a curly head; and as full of the gab as an egg’s full of meat.’—‘A sporting chap?’ says I.—‘Always a hunting,’ says she.—So then I just rubs up my hair, and puts up my collar, and gives her a bit of a take-off of you, jist after your manner, ‘smack, smooth, right up, straight down, and no mistake.’ Whereupon Mrs. Cropper—she’s an uncommon good-natured old thing—she claps her two hands together and says, says she, ‘By gosh that’s he—that’s the chap as wanted somehow to marry my mistress and her sister too, and got kicked out accordingly,’—twig?”

“Mr. Salmon,” said Brag, trembling with rage, or something else, and looking as white as a sheet, “the unfortunate connexion which my mother has formed with you, keeps me quiet—if—it was not for that——”

“Don’t agitate yourself,” said Stiffkey, with the most perfect sang froid. “Mr. Salmon means no harm, I’m sure.”

“Harm, not he,” said Mrs. Salmon, “he’s only lively, and wants a bit of fun.”

“Fun! the devil, ma’am!” said Jack: “I shall say nothing; but as for staying in this room a minute longer, I will not; nor, ma’am, will I ever set foot in any place in which that person is to be found. I never was consulted in your match—and sure you might run your own race without coming crossing and jostling me on my course. Colonel,” added Jack, “I am quite sure this business must be as disagreeable to you as it is disgusting to me—perhaps you will follow my example. I shall be glad, ma’am, to say a few words to you in the morning—and I wish you a good evening.”

“I am extremely sorry, Mr. Brag,” said the Colonel, “that you are annoyed. It only seems a little playfulness,—it must be all a joke.”

“No joke at all, sir,” said Mrs. Salmon; “it’s all true, only what I say to Jack is, them as throws stones shouldn’t live in glass houses.”

“Well, I’m sure, Titsy,” said Jem. “I’d no notion of this blow up when we came in—I meant to be all pleasant and agreeable.”

“Come, Colonel,” said Jack.

“Good evening, ma’am,” said the Colonel. “I suppose I must go, but I assure you I am particularly sorry to leave such agreeable society.”

“Where’s Jack?” said Mrs. Salmon.

“Gone out, Titsy,” said Jem.

“Like one of his own rushlights, ma’am,” said the Colonel, who immediately followed him, putting his finger to his nose, archly, as he quitted the room.

“Bravo, Colonel,” said Salmon;—“that’s a prime chap, anyhow—eh? Who’d have thought of John’s bristling up in that kind of hedge-hog fashion. I’m sure I only wanted to give the Colonel a little touch of my way of taking off.”

“Yes, my dear J. S.,” said the matron, “and the Colonel seems to have returned the compliment. I’m sorry you offended Jack, for I wanted you to be friends.”

“Then, Titsy, why did you set me on,” said Jem;—“you know’d when once my spirit’s up, I can’t stop it.”

“Why, somehow,” said Mrs. Salmon, “the rum and water was strong.”

“’Twas stiffish—twig?” said Salmon.

“However,” continued the lady, “a fine morning is a good peace-maker, and I dare say we shall all be friends again for the short time we have to stay; besides, to tell you the truth, I never quite believed that Mrs. Cropper’s story.”

“I’d trust her with my life,” said James, “as steady a going cretur, full of fun as she is, as ever trod shoe leather,—takes a tip of two pounds per annum, and is quite satisfied; can’t get off with Mr. Evans, the butler, for twice that. No, no, Titsy, as Jack says, leave me alone to deal with the fair sex.”

“Oh you divil!” said Mrs. Salmon, “ring the bell, J. S., and let us retire for the night; early as it is, I’m tired, and a little vexed into the bargain.”

“Don’t worry yourself, Titsy,” said James. “I dare say it will be all right to-morrow—eh? smack, smooth, and no mistake,—twig?”

“Now, J. S.,” said Mrs. Salmon, “don’t go on doing that, that’s a dear—there’s nothing folks is so sore about, as being taken off in that way—don’t do it.—Johnny lives in good company, as you see; it is true he has got a particular way of talking, and all that you said about what he had done, and all about the ladies, and Cropper and all, never stirred him no more than you could stir a fire without a poker; till you come to mimic him—that it was set his blood up. I saw his little eyes winking, winking, and his face get as white as a sheet, and I’m sure I never meant to put him in a passion—only—no—it was that——”

“Are you cross, Titsy?” said Jem.

“Not a bit cross,” said Mrs. Salmon, “only he’s as touchy as touch-wood—so don’t go and aggravate him to-morrow.”

“I promise and wow, Titsy,” said Salmon, “I will that do—only you see, being as I consider now, his superior, what the sogers call commanding officer, I think he might have treated me with a little more respect.”

“Never mind that,” said the lady, “ring the bell, and let’s bundle. I’m dead tired—the wind blew so fresh—and I can tell you the top of a coach is not as soft to sit on, as the cushion of my arm-chair, I’m all shaken to pieces.”

J. S. did as he was bid, and the chamber-maid speedily appeared to attend the matronly bride to her chamber, J. S. remaining below as he thought it proper to do, until he was summoned to his roost. This dull interval he occupied by imbibing a refreshing glass of some favourite mixture, and in reflecting upon the unexpected sort of reception he had met with from his son-in-law. However, he had scarcely finished his “tipple,” as he called it, when he was summoned by the attendant sylph, the respected Mrs. Salmon not occupying any very considerable period of time in making her preparations for what she called “tumbling in.”—Jem drained his goblet, and ascended the stairs, and “maid-directed,” found the door of the room which contained his treasure.

By a preconcerted arrangement the waiter had been engaged to go, or send over, to the library, whither faute de mieux, the colonel and Jack had retreated from the unbearable fire of Mr. Salmon’s extraordinary liveliness, to let them know when the happy pair were gone to bed, inasmuch as they might return to their temporary domicile, and enjoy a few tranquil moments before they retired to rest. The moment, therefore, that the Salmonean savages had “quitted the ground,” a message was conveyed to the dandy and his friend, informing them that the coast was clear; and this message arrived at the library precisely at the moment when Jack had declined playing any longer billiards, because he knew nothing of the game, and because he preferred ecarté.

The word ecarté sounded mellifluously to the colonel’s ear—he could play the game a little; should they go back to the hotel and try a hand or two—first directing his servant to open the windows and “freshen” the room—order broiled bones at twelve, and not play later than two—positively?

Brag, the moment he heard this proposition from the colonel, was convinced that all was right, and “no mistake;” the absurdities of his poor mother, and the grossnesses of his youthful father-in-law had evidently made no impression. The colonel saw the gentleman in him, and the very suggestion of broiled bones, ventilated rooms, and ecarté till two, settled the affair. It was all arranged, and Stiff key’s man was to teach the willing hostess of the hotel how to concoct a particular sort of punch, which Sir Stumpey Dubs, a wealthy friend of his master, had invented,—of which composition, averse as the colonel was from strong drink, the weakest ingredient was Jamaica rum, the whole compound forming a sort of beverage which reminded you, in the morning, that you had swallowed it the night before, by a sensation very much like that which would have been occasioned by the dislocation of every limb belonging to your body.

Colonel Stiffkey was the most perfect “gentleman”—not to use the term as Brag would use it, but in its purest and most unquestioned shape. He was not brilliant as a wit, but he played his part as well as his associates in the every-day give-and-take conversation of the best society. The immovable quietude and imperturbable civility which he displayed before the bride and bridegroom, were part of his system. Nobody who did not know his heart of hearts could find out whether he was delighted or distressed by that, which was passing before him. His mind, with regard to Brag, had been for some hours made up; and in all probability the next morning would be the last on which he even would endeavour to recollect his name: but before that morning came, there intervened an evening,—that evening was to be passed, somehow. Mr. Brag preferred ecarté; we have seen the preparatory arrangements in consequence of that preference.

Stiffkey and Brag walked back from the library to their sitting-room, whence had been removed, besides the nuisances, which had removed themselves, all the “provender,” upon which they had battened. A card-table had been placed by the colonel’s man, and a small table by the side of it, on which stood two well-sized glasses, out of which they were to imbibe a certain quantity of the West-Indian mumbo-jum, punctiliously prepared according to the recipe of Sir Stumpy.

The room had resumed its former pleasing aspect. Jack found no difference in the manner of his friend, who, in the kindest manner, kept periodically praising England as the only nation perhaps in the world which furnished the brightest ornaments to society from trades and professions—throwing in an agreeable observation now and then, that if such were the facility in other countries, the intellects of the people would prevent their availing themselves of it; and, in short, that what the French sage had said of our population in comparing it with our porter, that the top was all froth, the bottom all dregs, and the middle the “stout and efficient,” was most true. This encouragement, wonderfully aided by the arrival of Stiffkey’s servant with a closely covered jug of the invaluable compound, raised Jack’s spirits so high, that for the moment he threw overboard all the previous occurrences of the evening, and felt satisfied in his own mind that the fact of his mother’s having married injudiciously, could and would have no possible effect upon his future fashionable career.

“Now then,” said the Colonel, “taste that: if you don’t like it, I’m mistaken.”

Jack filled a glass and sipped. “Like it!—Gad! who wouldn’t—eh?—goes down like milk, and no mistake.”

The resumption of his pet phrases, the renewed twiggle of his hair, and the revived pull up of his collars, proclaimed “Johannes redivivus.”

“Well,” said the Colonel, with a tone of perfect indifference, “shall we have a touch at ecarté? The broiled bones will come at twelve.”

“All right, and no mistake,” said Jack.

“What shall we play?” said the Colonel, listlessly shuffling one of the two packs of cards which his servant had put down—“don’t let it be high—five pound points, and ten pound consequences?”

“Anything you like,” said Jack. “I lost twenty pounds to that man at billiards. How he pulled up in his play after the bet!”

“Did he?” said the Colonel—“I didn’t observe. Do try some more of that excellent stuff. We will go to-morrow, if you stay here, to an old friend of mine who lives about five miles from this, and I’ll show you how he drinks it: he’ll be delighted to see you.”

This put Jack upon the top of a pinnacle. Colonel Stiffkey, after all he had seen and heard, proposed the very next day to take him to visit an old friend at his place five miles off! Poor Jack! Colonel Stiffkey had no such friend; neither if he had, would he have taken Jack with him: furthermore, he knew, that which Jack at the moment had himself quite forgotten, that he could not stay out the following day where his mother was: but Stiffkey wanted Jack to play ecarté at his ease—and so he did, knowing no more of the game than a child of ten years old.

The results of the sitting were—broiled bones at half past twelve, more of Sir Stumpy Dubs’s mixture at half past one, and a retreat at half past two o’clock in the morning, at which time Mr. John Brag handed over to Colonel Stiffkey two hundred and fifty pounds of the cash he had received from Lord Tom Towzle two days before; and an I. O. U. for three hundred and forty more, which the gallant colonel, in consideration of the ready money already received, very readily accepted in part payment of a balance of five hundred and ninety pounds, which, under the influence of Sir Stumpy Dubs’s mixture, the curly-headed adept at ecarté had lost to his aristocratic associate.

The friends separated and retired to rest, the colonel’s servant kindly assisting Mr. Brag to his room,—the colonel, who required no assistance, going to his room by himself.

It was not, however, until both these worthies—either of them curiously instructive in his way,—had betaken themselves to their respective beds—that the innate truth of their characters was made manifest. Jack, broken down by the most extraordinary combination of circumstances,—abused, degraded, and exposed by the man whom his mother had by way of an agreeable surprise, brought down to see and present to him, in the hope of conciliating everything, lay desponding, as deeply as he could in his peculiar state, as to the mischief his unhappy parent might have done him by her appearance there; consoling himself, on the other hand, in his blessed ignorance of human nature, with the belief that the colonel was so entirely his friend, that not only what had occurred had made no change in his sentiments, but that not a syllable of the events of the preceding evening would transpire; and absolutely revelling in the idea that the loss of his five hundred and ninety pounds would not only ensure this much-desired secrecy, but cement a long and lasting friendship between them.

The colonel, who, like a skilful practitioner, had carefully abstained from swallowing the draughts which he had prescribed, laid his cool unthrobbing head upon his pillow, perfectly satisfied with having so well executed his ingenuity in the up-turning of kings, and other curious arrangements of the cards; consoling himself with the justice of outwitting so complete a charlatan as his temporary companion of the tallow tribe; and concluding if he never received one farthing’s worth of value for the I. O. U., the worth of which he considered somewhat equivocal, that he had adequately paid himself for the smell of onions and hot rum and water, and the still more oppressive conversation of his friend’s intimate connexions immediately after dinner, by the first receipt of the two hundred and fifty pounds cash in Bank notes.

Such were the thoughts and reflections of Mr. John Brag and his aristocratic friend as they dropped off to their slumber on this memorable night. What visions might have occupied the minds of Mrs. Salmon and her dear J. S. it is not our province even to surmise: they are asleep, and lest the reader should fall into a similar state of quiescence, the chapter ends.

END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.

LONDON: PRINTED BY SAMUEL BENTLEY, Dorset Street, Fleet Street.

Page 33, line 4: miuutes —> minutes (two or three minutes).

Page 291, last line: repectable —> respectable (said the respectable matron).

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