CHAP. XV.

We now jogged sociably on, calling at several cottages to distribute some of my uncle’s mites, surveyed the beauties of the surrounding country, and returned home to dinner, well satisfied with our ride; after which my uncle took a short nap to recover the fatigue of his morning jolt, and I amused myself by looking over the library, where I found the highest amusement, till he finished his snore; at which time we retired to make some necessary alteration in our habiliments, and, at six o’clock, set off for our visit to Mr. Macfriz, who received us very politely, and, like Dr. Tonic, introduced us, in the same form, to a room full of company and pictures; for the wainscot was so bedizened with the latter, that I could almost have supposed myself at the Royal Academy.

The first lady to whom we were introduced was Mrs. Macfriz, a most diminutive, ill-built woman; who, when she rose from her chair, appeared to fall upon her knees: her features were extremely plain, and her complexion almost a woman of colour; her dress antiquely grotesque, and her toute ensemble disgusting in the extreme.

Having gone through the ceremony of bowing and courtesying, we were introduced to the rest, in the following order:—Mr. and Mrs. Dashwell, Mr. and Mrs. Downright, Mr. Earwig, Mr. Undermine, Mr. Simon Undermine, and Mr. Consequence.

“You’re late, gentlemen,” observed Mr. Macfriz, drawing his watch; “it wants but a quarter to seven.”

“You are incorrect, Sir,” replied Mr. Dashwell, looking at his repeater; which example was followed by every watch in the room: but none cut so great a dash as Mr. Simon Undermine’s, decorated with three immense large seals, suspended by a flashy chain, which he sat rattling in his hand, like a baby with its coral.

“Yes, indeed, I’m glad the gentlemen are come,” said Mrs. Downright, an elderly woman, the epitome of vulgarity; “for I’m almost starved: I uses myself so to drink tea at five o’clock, that I’m like our black cat—I always looks for it, as the saying is.”

No person made any answer; and Mrs. Macfriz rung the bell, which produced two such high-piled plates of muffins and crumpets as might have victualled a small regiment; and Miss Macfriz was placed at the tea equipage to do the honours, to which her mama seemed incompetent.

A fine Dutch piece, by Teniers, having attracted my notice, I could not help giving praise to the genius of that charming artist.

“Yes, Sir, it’s a beautiful thing,” answered Mrs. Macfriz; “and I haven’t had a little trouble to clean them all: this morning I was three hours mucking over them; for, being a valuable collection, I never suffers nobody to do nothing to them but myself.”

“That’s right,” cried Mrs. Downright: “you’re like me, as I say to my chuck, and there he sits—there’s nothing like doing things one’s-self: I’m sure I’d more plague and mess with the chimbley-sweeps this morning than enough.”

“And what weather we had for our great wash last week,” interrupted the lady of the house.

“Well,” said Mrs. Dashwell, “those are things I never trouble my head about; my constitution is too delicate to permit my attendance to household concerns.”

“It’s lucky you’ve no call to do it,” replied Mrs. Downright: “but I likes it; I loves to be notable; not as I’ve any occasion, as the saying is; for chuck and I don’t want for stuff. We have worked hard; both pulled the same way, and scrope up a good bag of sweepings for our little darling, Jenny. We ben’t musherroons! No, no! We can buy our girl a husband any day. Can’t we, chuck?”

Chuck grinned, and, distending his wide snub from cheek to cheek, gave lovey a nod of approbation, and sat twirling his thumbs, as dumb as an effigy: and the ladies having finished their notable conversation, Mr. Consequence began to expatiate on the various topics of politics; amongst which, arguments strongly enforced, and as strongly defended, the subject of city concerns took its rotation; on which he declaimed with great vehemence, supported by his neighbour, Mr. Undermine, who had been mole-working for his friend, Mr. Penslow, on the late common-council election, by ousting what he termed the old and useless members, such as had grown grey in the service of their constituents, expended their property in support of the rights of the situation, without deriving one penny emolument, and then receiving for their pains the base ingratitude of being denominated deaf, blind, or superannuated, which rendered them ineligible, according to the new system, and erased names from the honourable list that would have honoured a much superior.

As the controversy increased, the gentlemen grew warm; Mr. Consequence declaring, it was highly proper to elect new, young, and able members. “I headed the business in our parish last St. Thomas’s day,” cried Mr. Consequence, “and ousted an old deaf member, who was laid on a sick bed, and, therefore, totally incapable of attending his precinct.”

“Poor man!” said the humane Mrs. Downright, who possessed an excellent heart, which exhibited its virtues on many laudable occasions. “I think, Sir, axing your pardon, you broke your ninth commandment most completely; for it was a very cruel action to a sick neighbour, if he was an honest member of society. My chuck wouldn’t have ficiated in such a piece of treachery for the world: he’d have been ashamed of it.”

“Oh dear! there’s no shame in the case,” observed Mr. Undermine. “My friend Penslow was a much more eligible man; and, therefore, we persevered, night and day, in our canvass, and succeeded to a miracle, compelling him to retire with blighted laurels, because he would not resign, consonant to my friend Consequence’s positive requisition...”

“Pardon me! pardon me!” exclaimed Mr. Dashwell; “Mr. Penslow’s were the blighted laurels, torn from the pillowed brow of a worthy veteran to adorn his own, where they must fade, unenvied and unrespected, as the emblems of corrupt subtlety; for I do hold it an unprecedented piece of iniquity and mean cowardice to attack an individual, merely because he is defenceless, owing to the affliction of Providence. For my part, I’m a common-councilman-maker; but I voted for no “jacks in office!”—not I.”

“Jacks in office!” retorted Mr. Undermine, glancing an important look at his son Simon. “I hope, Sir, you don’t mean to insinuate, that I am a jack in office!”

“I did not make any such pertinent allusion, Sir,” replied Mr. Dashwell: “for, in fact, till you have brought it to my recollection, I had forgot your late lucrative agency; which, to be sure, in the literal sense of the word, is a government dependence, and thereby renders your situation official; which, if I am not mistaken, I have heard disputed, as a point of ineligibility—hey! What say you, Mr. Earwig?”

Mr. Undermine, who had thus undesignedly knotted a lash for his back, because conviction popped the cap on his head, knitted his scowling brow, and, dropping his long chin an inch longer, while it quivered with passion, observed, “that any man who troubled his head with the concerns of another, in which he had no business to interfere, was an ignorant, impertinent fellow, who deserved proper correction.”

“That’s precisely my opinion,” replied Mr. Dashwell; “for, I am well persuaded, one-half of your city meddlers had better attend to their counting-houses, than squabble away the precious hours that ought to be devoted to business.”

“No doubt! no doubt!” cried Mr. Earwig; who, like his insect brother, always creeps into the best situation, and never crawls into a crab-apple while he can glide into a pine—whispers impracticable promises into your ear, and slides his hand into your convenient pocket, with the same effrontery that he introduces himself to every great table; where, perching himself as near the president as an eminent stock of assurance will permit, he seizes his button, which he never relinquishes till fumigated with the effluvia of his snuff; and, bored with his ceaseless half-articulate Champaigne jargon, the disgusted auditor releases his imprisoned button, and resigns his uncomfortable seat to the vice, leaving Mr. Earwig to buz his nonsense to some idle listener. Thus Mr. Earwig lives cheap, boasts innumerable invitations, listens to the commoner, sides with the lord, and loves all great folks and great feasts—considers himself occasional king of the Rose in June and the Canterbury Mail, in which he makes frequent convenient excursions, when the spice business does not require his attendance in London; and, being now on a visit in this village, chance jumbled us together. This intelligence I gained, in a whisper, from my uncle, who had known him many years.

“I assure you,” whispered Simon Undermine to Mr. Macfriz, “father and I took a deal of pains to get in Mr. Penslow; which we never should have done, if the old member hadn’t been too close confined with the gout to hobble round the ward; or else it would all have been dickey; because he was a favourite inhabitant, who had been bred, born, and patronised, as member of the court, near thirty years. Egad! we’d tight work of it.”

“I don’t wonder at that; I never heard of such a thing in my life,” said Mr. Downright, lifting up his hands and eyes. “But I hope the cruel disappointment didn’t kill the poor gentleman: I heartily hope he’s recovered.”

“Oh, yes!” answered Mr. Consequence: “I’ve met him twice since, when I least wished it; and I hear he treats the matter with great contempt.”

“Then, I say, he’s a cock of the game!” vociferated Mrs. Downright; “and I’ll bet a farden he could put half his parish into his pocket; aye, buy ’em, out and out! A rich man has always more enemies than a poor one.”

“Poh!” cried Mr. Undermine: “property’s nothing to do with the common-council.”

“Egad! I believe you,” answered Mrs. Downright: “any thing does now-a-days, if they can but kick up a bother. Lord bless you! they all squeedges in, in hopes of getting the loaves and fishes that’s given away, except my chuck; and everybody knows he wants nothing of nobody. They can’t say, when he was churchwarden, that he ever flashed away with parish property, as many folks do.”

Here Mrs. Downright drew up her head, dragged her pearl satin gown two inches higher into her lap, and took a good bonny mouthful of butter-soaked muffin, desiring her husband to do the same, after spreading his silk handkerchief over his black sattins, which, she boasted, were her own making.

This caused a smile from some, a titter from Miss Macfriz, and a grin simple from Mr. Simon Undermine, whose cassimeres looked, by their dimension, as if he had borrowed them of Messrs. Gog and Magog at Guildhall, where Simon dearly loved to wedge himself in, along with his par, every Lord-Mayor’s day, to a good dinner and dance with the girls; for, being now a man grown, he was occasionally his walking-stick or coachman; with an excellent family character, as a very nice young man, possessing all his father’s virtues, and in a fair train to obtain a wife, whenever he can meet with plenty of money; as none other need apply for that preference, who could not bring at least five thousand; and that’s barely sufficient to help supporting six o’clock dinners, a two-wheeled basket, and a four-legged factotum.

Tea being over, the card-tables were adjusted, consisting of two whist, a speculation game, and a backgammon party, which created as much racket as the Stock Exchange, and highly perplexed Mr. Earwig and Mr. Dashwell: add to which, Mrs. Downright, who was on the losing game, kept repeatedly declaring she hadn’t got a play-first, could turn up nothing but the d—’s bedstead, shuffled nothing but rubbish and Yorkshiremen into her hand, and should not win above two tricks; and, whenever her husband hesitated, “Don’t be afraid; clap a piece of butter on it, my chuck!”

Mr. Consequence and Mr. Undermine both played extremely unsuccessful, and thereby irritated their sour tempers; particularly that of Mr. Consequence, who had been all his life a member of the Snap and Snarl Club; for, though all the parish were compelled to bow to his decree, as its primary deputed guide and guardian, his sullen, morose, and disobliging temper rendered him much more an object of disgust than admiration.