XXII. FYDGET FYXINGTON.[14]

XXII. FYDGET FYXINGTON.^[14]

The doctrine, that “all is for the best,” though cherished in the abstract, is but little practised. The world is much more addicted to its opposite. “All’s for the worst” is a very common motto, and under its influence there are thousands who growl when they go to bed, and growl still louder when they get up; they growl at their breakfast, they growl at their dinner, they growl at their supper, and they growl between meals. Discontent is written in every feature of their visage; and they go on from the beginning of life until its close, always growling, in the hope of making things better by scaring them into it with ugly noises.

The active grumbletonians are a very different race of mortals from the passives. The world is largely indebted to them for every comfort and convenience with which it abounds; and they laugh at the inquiry whether their exertions have conduced to the general happiness, holding it that happiness consists chiefly in exertion—to which the passives demur, as they look back with no little regret to the lazy days of pastoral life, when Chaldean shepherds lounged upon the grass. The actives are very much inclined to believe that whatever is, is wrong; but then they have as an offset, the comfortable conviction that they are able to set it right—an opinion which fire cannot melt out of them. These restless fellows are in a vast majority; and hence it is that the surface of this earthly sphere is such a scene of activity; hence it is that for so many thousand years, the greater part of each generation has been unceasingly employed in labour and bustle; rushing from place to place; hammering, sawing, and driving; hewing down and piling up mountains; and unappalled, meeting disease and death, both by sea and land.

The passive grumbletonian is useless to himself and to others: the active grumbletonian is just the reverse. In general, he combines individual advancement with public prosperity; but there are exceptions even in that class—men, who try to take so much care of the world that they forget themselves, and, of course, fail in their intent.

Such a man is Fydget Fyxington, an amelioration-of-the-human-race-by-starting-from-first-principles-philosopher. Fydget’s abstract principle, particularly in matters of government and of morals, is doubtless a sound rule; but he looks so much at the beginning that he rarely arrives at the end, and when he advances at all, he marches backward, his face being directed towards the starting place instead of the goal. By this means he may perhaps plough a straight furrow, but instead of curving round obstructions, he is very apt to be thrown down by them.

Winter ruled the hour when Fydget Fyxington was last observed to be in circulation—winter, when men wear their hands in their pockets and seldom straighten their backs—a season however, which, though sharp and biting in its temper, has redeeming traits. There is something peculiarly exhilarating in the sight of new-fallen snow. The storm which brings it is not without a charm. The graceful eddying of the drifts sported with by the wind, and the silent gliding of the feathery flakes, as one by one they settle upon the earth like fairy creatures dropping to repose, have a soothing influence not easily described, though doubtless felt by all. But when the clouds, having performed their office, roll away, and the brightness of the morning sun beams upon an expanse of sparkling unsullied whiteness; when all that is common-place, coarse, and unpleasant in aspect, is veiled for the time, and made to wear a fresh and dazzling garb, new animation is felt by the spirit. The young grow riotous with joy, and their merry voices ring like bells through the clear and bracing air; while the remembrance of earlier days gives a youthful impulse to the aged heart.

But to all this there is a sad reverse. The resolution of these enchantments into their original elements by means of a thaw, is a necessary, but, it must be confessed, a very doleful process, fruitful in gloom, rheum, inflammations, and fevers—a process which gives additional pangs to the melancholic, and causes valour’s self to droop like unstarched muslin.

Such a time was it when Fydget was extant—a sloppy time in January. The city, it is true, was clothed in snow, rusty and forlorn in aspect, and weeping, as if in sorrow that its original purity had become soiled, stained, and spotted by contact with the world. Its whiteness had in a measure disappeared, by the pressure of human footsteps; wheels and runners had almost incorporated it with the common earth; and, where these had failed in effectually doing the work, remorseless distributers of ashes, coal dust, and potato peelings, had lent their aid to give uniformity to the dingy hue. But the snow, “weeping its spirit from its eyes,” and its body too, was fast escaping from these multiplied oppressions and contumelies. Large and heavy drops splashed from the eaves; sluggish streams rolled lazily from the alleys, and the gutters and crossings formed vast shallow lakes, variegated by glaciers and ice islands. They who roamed abroad at this unpropitious time, could be heard approaching by the damp sucking sound which emanated from their boots, as they alternately pumped in and pumped out the water in their progress, and it was thus that our hero travelled, having no caoutchouc health-preservers to shield his pedals from unwholesome contact.

The shades of evening were beginning to thicken, when Fydget stopped shiveringly and looked through the glass door of a fashionable hotel—the blazing fire and the numerous lights, by the force of contrast, made an outside seat still more uncomfortable.

The gong pealed out that tea was ready, and the lodgers rushed from the stoves to comfort themselves with that exhilarating fluid.

“There they go on first principles,” said Fydget Fyxington with a sigh.

“Cla’ de kitchen da’,” said one of those ultra-aristocratic members of society, a negro waiter, as he bustled past the contemplative philosopher and entered the hotel; “you ought to be gwang home to suppa’, ole soul, if you got some—yaugh—waugh!”

“Suppa’, you nigga’!” contemptuously responded Fydget, as the door closed, “I wish I was gwang home to suppa’, but suppers are a sort of thing I remember a good deal oftener than I see. Every thing is wrong—such a wandering from first principles!—there must be enough in this world for us all, or we wouldn’t be here; but things is fixed so badly that I s’pose some greedy rascal gets my share of suppa’ and other such elegant luxuries. It’s just the way of the world; there’s plenty of shares of everything, but somehow or other there are folks that lay their fingers on two or three shares, and sometimes more, according as they get a chance, and the real owners, like me, may go whistle. They’ve fixed it so that if you go back to first principles and try to bone what belongs to you, they pack you right off to jail, ’cause you can’t prove property. Empty stummicks and old clothes ain’t good evidence in court.

“What the deuse is to become of me! Something must—and I wish it would be quick and hurra about it. My clothes are getting to be too much of the summer-house order for the winter fashions. People will soon see too much of me—not that I care much about looks myself, but boys is boys, and all boys is sassy. Since the weather’s been chilly, when I turn the corner to go up town, I feel as if the house had too many windows and doors, and I’m almost blow’d out of my coat and pants. The fact is, I don’t get enough to eat to serve for ballast.”

After a melancholy pause, Fydget, seeing the coast tolerably clear, walked in to warm himself at the fire in the bar-room, near which he stood with great composure, at the same time emptying several glasses of comfortable compounds which had been left partly filled by the lodgers when they hurried to their tea. Lighting a cigar which he found half smoked upon the ledge of the stove, he seated himself and puffed away much at his ease.

The inmates of the hotel began to return to the room, glancing suspiciously at Fydget’s tattered integuments, and drawing their chairs away from him as they sat down near the stove. Fydget looked unconscious, emitting volumes of smoke, and knocking off the ashes with a nonchalant and scientific air.

“Bad weather,” said Brown.

“I’ve noticed that the weather is frequently bad in winter, especially about the middle of it, and at both ends,” added Green. “I keep a memorandum book on the subject, and can’t be mistaken.”

“It’s raining now,” said Griffinhoff, “what’s the use of that when it’s so wet under foot already?”

“It very frequently rains at the close of a thaw, and it’s beneficial to the umbrella makers,” responded Green.

“Nothin’s fixed no how,” said Fydget with great energy—for he was tired of listening.

Brown, Green, Griffinhoff, and the rest started and stared.

“Nothings fixed no how,” continued Fydget rejoicing in the fact of having hearers; “our granddads must a been lazy rascals. Why didn’t they roof over the side walks, and not leave everything for us to do? I ain’t got no numbrell, and besides that, when it comes down as if raining was no name for it, as it always does when I’m cotch’d out, numbrells is no great shakes if you’ve got one with you, and no shakes at all if it’s at home.”

“Who’s the indevidjual?” inquired Cameo Calliper, Esq., looking at Fydget through a pair of lorgnettes.

Fydget returned the glance by making an opera glass with each fist, and then continued his remarks; “It’s a pity we ain’t got feathers, so’s to grow our own jacket and trousers, and do up the tailorin’ business, and make our own feather beds. It would be a great savin’—every man his own clothes, and every man his own feather bed. Now I’ve got a suggestion about that—first principles bring us to the skin—fortify that, and the matter’s done. How would it do to bile a big kittle full of tar, tallow, beeswax and injen rubber, with considerable wool, and dab the whole family once a week? The young ’uns might be soused in it every Saturday night, and the nigger might fix the elderly folks with a whitewash brush. Then there wouldn’t be no bother a washing your clothes or yourself, which last is an invention of the doctor to make people sick, because it lets in the cold in winter and the heat in summer, when natur’ says shut up the porouses and keep ’em out. Besides, when the new invention was tore at the knees or wore at the elbows, just tell the nigger to put on the kittle and give you a dab, and you’re patched slick—and so that whole mobs of people mightn’t stick together like figs, a little sperrits of turpentine or litharage might be added to make ’em dry like a house-a-fire.”

“If that fellow don’t go away, I’ll hurt him,” said Griffinhoff sotto voce.

“Where’s a waiter?” inquired Cameo Calliper edging off in alarm.

“He’s crazy,” said Green, “I was at the hospital once, and there was a man in the place who——”

“ ’Twould be nice for sojers,” added Fyxington, as he threw away his stump, and very deliberately reached over and helped himself to a fresh cigar, from a number which Mr. Green had just brought from the bar and held in his hand—“I’ll trouble you for a little of your fire,” continued he, taking the cigar from the mouth of Mr. Green, and after obtaining a light, again placing the borrowed Habana within the lips of that worthy individual, who sat stupified at the audacity of the supposed maniac. Fydget gave the conventional grin of thanks peculiar to such occasions, and with a graceful wave of his hand, resumed the thread of his lecture, “ ’Twould be nice for sojers. Stand ’em all of a row, and whitewash ’em blue or red, according to pattern, as if they were a fence. The gin’rals might look on to see if it was done according to Gunter; the cap’ins might flourish the brush, and the corpulars carry the bucket. Dandies could fix themselves all sorts of streaked and all sorts of colours. When the parterials is cheap and the making don’t cost nothing, that’s what I call economy, and coming as near as possible to first principles. It’s a better way, too, of keeping out the rain, than my t’other plan of flogging people when they’re young, to make their hides hard and waterproof. A good licking is a sound first principle for juveniles, but they’ve got a prejudice agin it.”

“Waiter!” cried Cameo Calliper.

“Sa!”

“Remove the incumbent—expose him to the atmosphere!”

“If you hadn’t said that, I’d wopped him,” observed Griffinhoff.

“Accordin’ to first principles, I’ve as good a right to be here as anybody,” remarked Fydget, indignantly.

“Cut you’ stick, ’cumbent—take you’sef off, trash!” said the waiter, keeping at a respectful distance.

“Don’t come near me, Sip,” growled Fydget, doubling his fist—“don’t come near me, or I’ll develope a first principle and ’lucidate a simple idea for you—I’ll give you a touch of natur’ without no gloves on—but I’ll not stay, though I’ve a clear right to do it, unless you are able—yes, sassy able!—to put me out. If there is anything I scorns it’s prejudice, and this room’s so full of it and smoke together that I won’t stay. Your cigar, Sir,” added Fydget, tossing the stump to Mr. Green and retiring slowly.

“That fellow’s brazen enough to collect militia fines,” said Brown, “and so thin and bony, that if pasted over with white paper, and rigged athwart ships, he’d make a pretty good sign for an oyster cellar.”

The rest of the company laughed nervously, as if not perfectly sure that Fydget was out of hearing.

“The world’s full of it—nothin’ but prejudice. I’m always served the same way, and though I’ve so much to do planning the world’s good, I can’t attend to my own business, it not only won’t support me, but it treats me with despise and unbecoming freedery. Now, I was used sinful about my universal language, which everybody can understand, which makes no noise, and which don’t convolve no wear and tear of the tongue. It’s the patent anti-fatigue-anti-consumption omnibus linguister, to be done by winking and blinking, and cocking your eye, the way the cat-fishes make Fourth of July orations. I was going to have it introduced in Congress, to save the expense of anchovies and more porter; but t’other day I tried it on a feller in the street; I danced right up to him, and began canœuvering my daylights to ask him what o’clock it was, and I’m blow’d if he didn’t swear I was crazy, up fist and stop debate, by putting it to me right atween the eyes, so that I’ve been pretty well bung’d up about the peepers ever since, by a feller too who couldn’t understand a simple idea. That was worse than the kick a feller gave me in market, because ’cording to first principles I put a bullowney sassinger into my pocket, and didn’t pay for it. The ’riginal law, which you may see in children, says when you ain’t got no money, the next best thing is to grab and run. I did grab and run, but he grabb’d me, and I had to trot back agin, which always hurts my feelin’s and stops the march of mind. He wouldn’t hear me ’lucidate the simple idea, and the way he hauled out the sassinger, and lent me the loan of his foot, was werry sewere. It was unsatisfactory and discombobberative, and made me wish I could find out the hurtin’ principle and have it ’radicated.”

Carriages were driving up to the door of a house brilliantly illuminated, in one of the fashionable streets, and the music which pealed from within intimated that the merry dance was on foot.

“I’m goin’ in,” said Fydget—“I’m not afeard—if we go on first principles we ain’t afeard of nothin’, and since they’ve monopolized my sheer of fun, they can’t do less than give me a shinplaster to go away. My jacket’s so wet with the rain, if I don’t get dry I’ll be sewed up and have hic jacket wrote atop of me, which means defuncted of toggery not imprevious to water. In I go.”

In accordance with this design, he watched his opportunity and slipped quietly into the gay mansion. Helping himself liberally to refreshments left in the hall, he looked in upon the dancers.

“Who-o-ip!” shouted Fydget Fyxington, forgetting himself in the excitement of the scene—“Who-o-ip!” added he, as he danced forward with prodigious vigour and activity, flourishing the eatables with which his hands were crammed, as if they were a pair of cymbals—“Whurro-o-o! plank it down—that’s your sort!—make yourselves merry, gals and boys—it’s all accordin’ to first principles—whoo-o-o-ya—whoop!—it takes us!”

Direful was the screaming at this formidable apparition—the fiddles ceased—the waltzers dropped their panting burdens, and the black band looked pale and aghast.

“Who-o-o-p! go ahead!—come it strong!” continued Fydget.

But he was again doomed to suffer an ejectment.

“Hustle him out!”

“Give us a ‘shinplaster’ then—them’s my terms.”

It would not do—he was compelled to retire shinplasterless; but it rained so heavily that, nothing daunted, he marched up the alley-way, re-entered the house through the garden, and gliding noiselessly into the cellar, turned a large barrel over which he found there, and getting into it, went fast asleep “on first principles.”

The company had departed—the servants were assembled in the kitchen preparatory to retiring for the night, when an unearthly noise proceeding from the barrel aforesaid struck upon their astonished ears. It was Fydget snoring, and his hearers, screaming, fled.

Rallying, however, at the top of the stairs, they procured the aid of Mr. Lynx, who watched over the nocturnal destinies of an unfinished building in the vicinity, and who, having frequently boasted of his valour, felt it to be a point of honour to act bravely on this occasion. The sounds continued, and the “investigating committee,” with Mr. Lynx as chairman, advanced slowly and with many pauses.

Lynx at last hurriedly thrust his club into the barrel, and started back to wait the result of the experiment.

“Ouch!” ejaculated a voice from the interior, the word being one not to be found in the dictionaries, but which, in common parlance, means that a sensation too acute to be agreeable has been excited.

“Hey!—hello!—come out of that,” said Lynx, as soon as his nerves had recovered tranquillity. “You are in a bad box whoever you are.”

“Augh!” was the response, “no, I ain’t—I’m in a barrel.”

“No matter,” added Lynx, authoritatively; “getting into another man’s barrel unbeknownst to him in the night-time, is burglary.”

“That,” said Fydget, putting out his head like a terrapin, at which the women shrieked and retreated, and Lynx made a demonstration with his club—“that’s because you ain’t up to first principles—keep your stick out of my ribs—I’ve a plan, so there won’t be no burglary, which is this—no man have no more than he can use, and all other men mind their own business. Then, this ’ere barrel would be mine while I’m in it, and you’d be asleep—that’s the idea.”

“It’s a logo-fogie!” exclaimed Lynx with horror—“a right down logo-fogie!”

“Ah!” screamed the servants—“a logo-fogie!—how did it get out?—will it bite?—can’t you get a gun?”

“Don’t be fools—a logo-fogie is a sort of a man that don’t think as I do—wicked critters all such sort of people are,” said Lynx. “My lad, I’m pretty clear you’re a logo-fogie—you talk as if your respect for me and other venerable institutions was tantamount to very little. You’re a leveller I see, and wouldn’t mind knocking me down flat as a pancake, if so be you could run away and get out of this scrape—you’re a ’grarium, and would cut across the lot like a streak of lightning if you had a chance.”

“Mr. Lynx,” said the lady of the house from the head of the stairs—she had heard from one of the affrighted maids that a “logo-fogie” had been “captivated,” and that it could talk “just like a human”—“Mr. Lynx, don’t have anything to say to him. Take him out, and hand him over to the police. I’ll see that you are recompensed for your trouble.”

“Come out, then—you’re a bad chap—you wouldn’t mind voting against our side at the next election.”

“We don’t want elections, I tell you,” said Fydget, coolly, as he walked up stairs—“I’ve a plan for doing without elections, and police-officers, and laws—every man mind his own business, and support me while I oversee him. I can fix it.”

Having now arrived at the street, Mr. Lynx held him by the collar, and looked about for a representative of justice to relieve him of his prize.

“Though I feel as if I was your pa, yet you must be tried for snoozling in a barrel. Besides, you’ve no respect for functionaries, and you sort of want to cut a piece out of the common veal by your logo-fogieism in wishing to ’bolish laws, and policers, and watchmen, when my brother’s one, and helps to govern the nation when the President, the Mayor, and the rest of the day-watch has turned in, or are at a tea-party. You’ll get into prison.”

“We don’t want prisons.”

“Yes we do though—what’s to become of functionaries if there ain’t any prisons?”

This was rather a puzzling question. Fyxington paused, and finally said:

“Why, I’ve a plan.”

“What is it, then—is it logo-fogie?”

“Yes, it upsets existing institutions,” roared Fyxington, tripping up Mr. Lynx, and making his escape—the only one of his plans that ever answered the purpose.