Project Gutenberg's The Fitz-Boodle Papers, by William Makepeace Thackeray This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: The Fitz-Boodle Papers Author: William Makepeace Thackeray Release Date: May 27, 2006 [EBook #2823] Last Updated: March 5, 2018 Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FITZ-BOODLE PAPERS *** Produced by Donald Lainson; David Widger
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* The “Fitz-Boodle Papers” first appeared in Fraser's
Magazine for the year 1842.
Everybody knows that I am a poor man; and so much has Lalouette's luck
drained my finances, that only last week I was obliged to give him that
famous gray cob on which you have seen me riding in the Park (I can't
afford a thoroughbred, and hate a cocktail),—I was, I say, forced to
give him up my cob in exchange for four ponies which I owed him. Thus, as
I never walk, being a heavy man whom nobody cares to mount, my time hangs
heavily on my hands; and, as I hate home, or that apology for it—a
bachelor's lodgings—and as I have nothing earthly to do now until I
can afford to purchase another horse, I spend my time in sauntering from
one club to another, passing many rather listless hours in them before the
men come in.
You will say, Why not take to backgammon, or ecarte, or amuse yourself
with a book? Sir (putting out of the question the fact that I do not play
upon credit), I make a point never to play before candles are lighted; and
as for books, I must candidly confess to you I am not a reading man.
'Twas but the other day that some one recommended me to your Magazine
after dinner, saying it contained an exceedingly witty article upon—I
forget what. I give you my honor, sir, that I took up the work at six,
meaning to amuse myself till seven, when Lord Trumpington's dinner was to
come off, and egad! in two minutes I fell asleep, and never woke till
midnight. Nobody ever thought of looking for me in the library, where
nobody ever goes; and so ravenously hungry was I, that I was obliged to
walk off to Crockford's for supper.
What is it that makes you literary persons so stupid? I have met various
individuals in society who I was told were writers of books, and that sort
of thing, and expecting rather to be amused by their conversation, have
invariably found them dull to a degree, and as for information, without a
particle of it. Sir, I actually asked one of these fellows, “What was the
nick to seven?” and he stared in my face and said he didn't know. He was
hugely over-dressed in satin, rings, chains and so forth; and at the
beginning of dinner was disposed to be rather talkative and pert; but my
little sally silenced HIM, I promise you, and got up a good laugh at his
expense too. “Leave George alone,” said little Lord Cinqbars, “I warrant
he'll be a match for any of you literary fellows.” Cinqbars is no great
wiseacre; but, indeed, it requires no great wiseacre to know THAT.
What is the simple deduction to be drawn from this truth? Why, this—that
a man to be amusing and well-informed, has no need of books at all, and
had much better go to the world and to men for his knowledge. There was
Ulysses, now, the Greek fellow engaged in the Trojan war, as I dare say
you know; well, he was the cleverest man possible, and how? From having
seen men and cities, their manners noted and their realms surveyed, to be
sure. So have I. I have been in every capital, and can order a dinner in
every language in Europe.
My notion, then, is this. I have a great deal of spare time on my hands,
and as I am told you pay a handsome sum to persons writing for you, I will
furnish you occasionally with some of my views upon men and things;
occasional histories of my acquaintance, which I think may amuse you;
personal narratives of my own; essays, and what not. I am told that I do
not spell correctly. This of course I don't know; but you will remember
that Richelieu and Marlborough could not spell, and egad! I am an honest
man, and desire to be no better than they. I know that it is the matter,
and not the manner, which is of importance. Have the goodness, then, to
let one of your understrappers correct the spelling and the grammar of my
papers; and you can give him a few shillings in my name for his trouble.
Begging you to accept the assurance of my high consideration, I am, sir,
Your obedient servant,
GEORGE SAVAGE FITZ-BOODLE.
P.S.—By the way, I have said in my letter that I found ALL literary
persons vulgar and dull. Permit me to contradict this with regard to
yourself. I met you once at Blackwall, I think it was, and really did not
remark anything offensive in your accent or appearance.
Before commencing the series of moral disquisitions, &c. which I
intend, the reader may as well know who I am, and what my past course of
life has been. To say that I am a Fitz-Boodle is to say at once that I am
a gentleman. Our family has held the estate of Boodle ever since the reign
of Henry II.; and it is out of no ill will to my elder brother, or
unnatural desire for his death, but only because the estate is a very good
one, that I wish heartily it was mine: I would say as much of Chatsworth
or Eaton Hall.
I am not, in the first place, what is called a ladies' man, having
contracted an irrepressible habit of smoking after dinner, which has
obliged me to give up a great deal of the dear creatures' society; nor can
I go much to country-houses for the same reason. Say what they will,
ladies do not like you to smoke in their bedrooms: their silly little
noses scent out the odor upon the chintz, weeks after you have left them.
Sir John has been caught coming to bed particularly merry and redolent of
cigar-smoke; young George, from Eton, was absolutely found in the little
green-house puffing an Havana; and when discovered they both lay the blame
upon Fitz-Boodle. “It was Mr. Fitz-Boodle, mamma,” says George, “who
offered me the cigar, and I did not like to refuse him.” “That rascal Fitz
seduced us, my dear,” says Sir John, “and kept us laughing until past
midnight.” Her ladyship instantly sets me down as a person to be avoided.
“George,” whispers she to her boy, “promise me on your honor, when you go
to town, not to know that man.” And when she enters the breakfast-room for
prayers, the first greeting is a peculiar expression of countenance, and
inhaling of breath, by which my lady indicates the presence of some
exceedingly disagreeable odor in the room. She makes you the faintest of
curtsies, and regards you, if not with a “flashing eye,” as in the novels,
at least with a “distended nostril.” During the whole of the service, her
heart is filled with the blackest gall towards you; and she is thinking
about the best means of getting you out of the house.
What is this smoking that it should be considered a crime? I believe in my
heart that women are jealous of it, as of a rival. They speak of it as of
some secret, awful vice that seizes upon a man, and makes him a pariah
from genteel society. I would lay a guinea that many a lady who has just
been kind enough to rend the above lines lays down the book, after this
confession of mine that I am a smoker, and says, “Oh, the vulgar wretch!”
and passes on to something else.
The fact is, that the cigar IS a rival to the ladies, and their conqueror
too. In the chief pipe-smoking nations they are kept in subjection. While
the chief, Little White Belt, smokes, the women are silent in his wigwam;
while Mahomet Ben Jawbrahim causes volumes of odorous incense of Latakia
to play round his beard, the women of the harem do not disturb his
meditations, but only add to the delight of them by tinkling on a dulcimer
and dancing before him. When Professor Strumpff of Gottingen takes down
No. 13 from the wall, with a picture of Beatrice Cenci upon it, and which
holds a pound of canaster, the Frau Professorin knows that for two hours
Hermann is engaged, and takes up her stockings and knits in quiet. The
constitution of French society has been quite changed within the last
twelve years: an ancient and respectable dynasty has been overthrown; an
aristocracy which Napoleon could never master has disappeared: and from
what cause? I do not hesitate to say,—FROM THE HABIT OF SMOKING. Ask
any man whether, five years before the revolution of July, if you wanted a
cigar at Paris, they did not bring you a roll of tobacco with a straw in
it! Now, the whole city smokes; society is changed; and be sure of this,
ladies, a similar combat is going on in this country at present between
cigar-smoking and you. Do you suppose you will conquer? Look over the wide
world, and see that your adversary has overcome it. Germany has been
puffing for threescore years; France smokes to a man. Do you think you can
keep the enemy out of England? Psha! look at his progress. Ask the
clubhouses, Have they smoking-rooms or not? Are they not obliged to yield
to the general want of the age, in spite of the resistance of the old
women on the committees? I, for my part, do not despair to see a bishop
lolling out of the “Athenaeum” with a cheroot in his mouth, or, at any
rate, a pipe stuck in his shovel-hat.
But as in all great causes and in promulgating new and illustrious
theories, their first propounders and exponents are generally the victims
of their enthusiasm, of course the first preachers of smoking have been
martyrs, too; and George Fitz-Boodle is one. The first gas-man was ruined;
the inventor of steam-engine printing became a pauper. I began to smoke in
days when the task was one of some danger, and paid the penalty of my
crime. I was flogged most fiercely for my first cigar; for, being asked to
dine one Sunday evening with a half-pay colonel of dragoons (the gallant,
simple, humorous Shortcut—heaven bless him!—I have had many a
guinea from him who had so few), he insisted upon my smoking in his room
at the “Salopian,” and the consequence was, that I became so violently ill
as to be reported intoxicated upon my return to Slaughter-House School,
where I was a boarder, and I was whipped the next morning for my
peccadillo. At Christ Church, one of our tutors was the celebrated
lamented Otto Rose, who would have been a bishop under the present
Government, had not an immoderate indulgence in water-gruel cut short his
elegant and useful career. He was a good man, a pretty scholar and poet
(the episode upon the discovery of eau-de-Cologne, in his prize-poem on
“The Rhine,” was considered a masterpiece of art, though I am not much of
a judge myself upon such matters), and he was as remarkable for his
fondness for a tuft as for his nervous antipathy to tobacco. As ill-luck
would have it, my rooms (in Tom Quad) were exactly under his; and I was
grown by this time to be a confirmed smoker. I was a baronet's son (we are
of James the First's creation), and I do believe our tutor could have
pardoned any crime in the world but this. He had seen me in a tandem, and
at that moment was seized with a violent fit of sneezing—(sternutatory
paroxysm he called it)—at the conclusion of which I was a mile down
the Woodstock Road. He had seen me in pink, as we used to call it,
swaggering in the open sunshine across a grass-plat in the court; but
spied out opportunely a servitor, one Todhunter by name, who was going to
morning chapel with his shoestring untied, and forthwith sprung towards
that unfortunate person, to set him an imposition. Everything, in fact,
but tobacco he could forgive. Why did cursed fortune bring him into the
rooms over mine? The odor of the cigars made his gentle spirit quite
furious; and one luckless morning, when I was standing before my “oak,”
and chanced to puff a great bouffee of Varinas into his face, he forgot
his respect for my family altogether (I was the second son, and my brother
a sickly creature THEN,—he is now sixteen stone in weight, and has a
half-score of children); gave me a severe lecture, to which I replied
rather hotly, as was my wont. And then came demand for an apology; refusal
on my part; appeal to the dean; convocation; and rustication of George
Savage Fitz-Boodle.
My father had taken a second wife (of the noble house of Flintskinner),
and Lady Fitz-Boodle detested smoking, as a woman of her high principles
should. She had an entire mastery over the worthy old gentleman, and
thought I was a sort of demon of wickedness. The old man went to his grave
with some similar notion,—heaven help him! and left me but the
wretched twelve thousand pounds secured to me on my poor mother's
property.
In the army, my luck was much the same. I joined the —th Lancers,
Lieut.-Col. Lord Martingale, in the year 1817. I only did duty with the
regiment for three months. We were quartered at Cork, where I found the
Irish doodheen and tobacco the pleasantest smoking possible; and was found
by his lordship, one day upon stable duty, smoking the shortest, dearest
little dumpy clay-pipe in the world.
“Cornet Fitz-Boodle,” said my lord in a towering passion, “from what
blackguard did you get that pipe?”
I omit the oaths which garnished invariably his lordship's conversation.
“I got it, my lord,” said I, “from one Terence Mullins, a jingle-driver,
with a packet of his peculiar tobacco. You sometimes smoke Turkish, I
believe; do try this. Isn't it good?” And in the simplest way in the world
I puffed a volume into his face. “I see you like it,” said I, so coolly,
that the men—and I do believe the horses—burst out laughing.
He started back—choking almost, and recovered himself only to vent
such a storm of oaths and curses that I was compelled to request Capt.
Rawdon (the captain on duty) to take note of his lordship's words; and
unluckily could not help adding a question which settled my business. “You
were good enough,” I said, “to ask me, my lord, from what blackguard I got
my pipe; might I ask from what blackguard you learned your language?”
This was quite enough. Had I said, “from what GENTLEMAN did your lordship
learn your language?” the point would have been quite as good, and my Lord
Martingale would have suffered in my place: as it was, I was so strongly
recommended to sell out by his Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief,
that, being of a good-natured disposition, never knowing how to refuse a
friend, I at once threw up my hopes of military distinction and retired
into civil life.
My lord was kind enough to meet me afterwards in a field in the Glanmire
Road, where he put a ball into my leg. This I returned to him some years
later with about twenty-three others—black ones—when he came
to be balloted for at a club of which I have the honor to be a member.
Thus by the indulgence of a simple and harmless propensity,—of a
propensity which can inflict an injury upon no person or thing except the
coat and the person of him who indulges in it,—of a custom honored
and observed in almost all the nations of the world,—of a custom
which, far from leading a man into any wickedness or dissipation to which
youth is subject, on the contrary, begets only benevolent silence, and
thoughtful good-humored observation—I found at the age of twenty all
my prospects in life destroyed. I cared not for woman in those days: the
calm smoker has a sweet companion in his pipe. I did not drink
immoderately of wine; for though a friend to trifling potations, to
excessively strong drinks tobacco is abhorrent. I never thought of
gambling, for the lover of the pipe has no need of such excitement; but I
was considered a monster of dissipation in my family, and bade fair to
come to ruin.
“Look at George,” my mother-in-law said to the genteel and correct young
Flintskinners. “He entered the world with every prospect in life, and see
in what an abyss of degradation his fatal habits have plunged him! At
school he was flogged and disgraced, he was disgraced and rusticated at
the university, he was disgraced and expelled from the army! He might have
had the living of Boodle” (her ladyship gave it to one of her nephews),
“but he would not take his degree; his papa would have purchased him a
troop—nay, a lieutenant-colonelcy some day, but for his fatal
excesses. And now as long as my dear husband will listen to the voice of a
wife who adores him—never, never shall he spend a shilling upon so
worthless a young man. He has a small income from his mother (I cannot but
think that the first Lady Fitz-Boodle was a weak and misguided person);
let him live upon his mean pittance as he can, and I heartily pray we may
not hear of him in gaol!”
My brother, after he came to the estate, married the ninth daughter of our
neighbor, Sir John Spreadeagle; and Boodle Hall has seen a new little
Fitz-Boodle with every succeeding spring. The dowager retired to Scotland
with a large jointure and a wondrous heap of savings. Lady Fitz is a good
creature, but she thinks me something diabolical, trembles when she sees
me, and gathers all her children about her, rushes into the nursery
whenever I pay that little seminary a visit, and actually slapped poor
little Frank's ears one day when I was teaching him to ride upon the back
of a Newfoundland dog.
“George,” said my brother to me the last time I paid him a visit at the
old hall, “don't be angry, my dear fellow, but Maria is in a—hum—in
a delicate situation, expecting her—hum”—(the eleventh)—“and
do you know you frighten her? It was but yesterday you met her in the
rookery—you were smoking that enormous German pipe—and when
she came in she had an hysterical seizure, and Drench says that in her
situation it's dangerous. And I say, George, if you go to town you'll find
a couple of hundred at your banker's.” And with this the poor fellow shook
me by the hand, and called for a fresh bottle of claret.
Afterwards he told me, with many hesitations, that my room at Boodle Hall
had been made into a second nursery. I see my sister-in-law in London
twice or thrice in the season, and the little people, who have almost
forgotten to call me uncle George.
It's hard, too, for I am a lonely man after all, and my heart yearns to
them. The other day I smuggled a couple of them into my chambers, and had
a little feast of cream and strawberries to welcome them. But it had like
to have cost the nursery-maid (a Swiss girl that Fitz-Boodle hired
somewhere in his travels) her place. My step-mamma, who happened to be in
town, came flying down in her chariot, pounced upon the poor thing and the
children in the midst of the entertainment; and when I asked her, with
rather a bad grace to be sure, to take a chair and a share of the feast—“Mr.
Fitz-Boodle,” said she, “I am not accustomed to sit down in a place that
smells of tobacco like an ale-house—an ale-house inhabited by a
SERPENT, sir! A SERPENT!—do you understand me?—who carries his
poison into his brother's own house, and purshues his eenfamous designs
before his brother's own children. Put on Miss Maria's bonnet this
instant. Mamsell, ontondy-voo? Metty le bonny a mamsell. And I shall take
care, Mamsell, that you return to Switzerland to-morrow. I've no doubt you
are a relation of Courvoisier—oui! oui! courvoisier, vous comprenny—and
you shall certainly be sent back to your friends.”
With this speech, and with the children and their maid sobbing before her,
my lady retired; but for once my sister-in-law was on my side, not liking
the meddlement of the elder lady.
I know, then, that from indulging in that simple habit of smoking, I have
gained among the ladies a dreadful reputation. I see that they look coolly
upon me, and darkly at their husbands when they arrive at home in my
company. Men, I observe, in consequence, ask me to dine much oftener at
the club, or the “Star and Garter” at Richmond, or at “Lovegrove's,” than
in their own houses; and with this sort of arrangement I am fain to
acquiesce; for, as I said before, I am of an easy temper, and can at any
rate take my cigar-case out after dinner at Blackwall, when my lady or the
duchess is not by. I know, of course, the best MEN in town; and as for
ladies' society, not having it (for I will have none of your
pseudo-ladies, such as sometimes honor bachelors' parties,—actresses,
couturieres, opera-dancers, and so forth)—as for ladies' society, I
say, I cry pish! 'tis not worth the trouble of the complimenting, and the
bother of pumps and black silk stockings.
Let any man remember what ladies' society was when he had an opportunity
of seeing them among themselves, as What-d'ye-call'im does in the
Thesmophoria—(I beg pardon, I was on the verge of a classical
allusion, which I abominate)—I mean at that period of his life when
the intellect is pretty acute, though the body is small—namely, when
a young gentleman is about eleven years of age, dining at his father's
table during the holidays, and is requested by his papa to quit the
dinner-table when the ladies retire from it.
Corbleu! I recollect their whole talk as well as if it had been whispered
but yesterday; and can see, after a long dinner, the yellow summer sun
throwing long shadows over the lawn before the dining-room windows, and my
poor mother and her company of ladies sailing away to the music-room in
old Boodle Hall. The Countess Dawdley was the great lady in our county, a
portly lady who used to love crimson satin in those days, and
birds-of-paradise. She was flaxen-haired, and the Regent once said she
resembled one of King Charles's beauties.
When Sir John Todcaster used to begin his famous story of the exciseman (I
shall not tell it here, for very good reasons), my poor mother used to
turn to Lady Dawdley, and give that mystic signal at which all females
rise from their chairs. Tufthunt, the curate, would spring from his seat,
and be sure to be the first to open the door for the retreating ladies;
and my brother Tom and I, though remaining stoutly in our places, were
speedily ejected from them by the governor's invariable remark, “Tom and
George, if you have had QUITE enough of wine, you had better go and join
your mamma.” Yonder she marches, heaven bless her! through the old oak
hall (how long the shadows of the antlers are on the wainscot, and the
armor of Rollo Fitz-Boodle looks in the sunset as if it were emblazoned
with rubies)—yonder she marches, stately and tall, in her invariable
pearl-colored tabbinet, followed by Lady Dawdley, blazing like a flamingo;
next comes Lady Emily Tufthunt (she was Lady Emily Flintskinner), who will
not for all the world take precedence of rich, vulgar, kind, good-humored
Mrs. COLONEL Grogwater, as she would be called, with a yellow little
husband from Madras, who first taught me to drink sangaree. He was a new
arrival in our county, but paid nobly to the hounds, and occupied
hospitably a house which was always famous for its hospitality—Sievely
Hall (poor Bob Cullender ran through seven thousand a year before he was
thirty years old). Once when I was a lad, Colonel Grogwater gave me two
gold mohurs out of his desk for whist-markers, and I'm sorry to say I ran
up from Eton and sold them both for seventy-three shillings at a shop in
Cornhill. But to return to the ladies, who are all this while kept waiting
in the hall, and to their usual conversation after dinner.
Can any man forget how miserably flat it was? Five matrons sit on sofas,
and talk in a subdued voice:—First Lady (mysteriously).—“My
dear Lady Dawdley, do tell me about poor Susan Tuckett.”
Second Lady.—“All three children are perfectly well, and I assure
you as fine babies as I ever saw in my life. I made her give them Daffy's
Elixir the first day; and it was the greatest mercy that I had some of
Frederick's baby-clothes by me; for you know I had provided Susan with
sets for one only, and really—”
Third Lady.—“Of course one couldn't; and for my part I think your
ladyship is a great deal too kind to these people. A little gardener's boy
dressed in Lord Dawdley's frocks indeed! I recollect that one at his
christening had the sweetest lace in the world!”
Fourth Lady.—“What do you think of this, ma'am—Lady Emily, I
mean? I have just had it from Howell and James:—guipure, they call
it. Isn't it an odd name for lace! And they charge me, upon my conscience,
four guineas a yard!”
Third Lady.—“My mother, when she came to Flintskinner, had lace upon
her robe that cost sixty guineas a yard, ma'am! 'Twas sent from Malines
direct by our relation, the Count d'Araignay.”
Fourth Lady (aside).—“I thought she would not let the evening pass
without talking of her Malines lace and her Count d'Araignay. Odious
people! they don't spare their backs, but they pinch their—”
Here Tom upsets a coffee-cup over his white jean trousers, and another
young gentleman bursts into a laugh, saying, “By Jove, that's a good 'un!”
“George, my dear,” says mamma, “had not you and your young friend better
go into the garden? But mind, no fruit, or Dr. Glauber must be called in
again immediately!” And we all go, and in ten minutes I and my brother are
fighting in the stables.
If, instead of listening to the matrons and their discourse, we had taken
the opportunity of attending to the conversation of the Misses, we should
have heard matter not a whit more interesting.
First Miss.—“They were all three in blue crape; you never saw
anything so odious. And I know for a certainty that they wore those
dresses at Muddlebury, at the archery-ball, and I dare say they had them
in town.”
Second Miss.—“Don't you think Jemima decidedly crooked? And those
fair complexions, they freckle so, that really Miss Blanche ought to be
called Miss Brown.”
Third Miss.—“He, he, he!”
Fourth Miss.—“Don't you think Blanche is a pretty name?”
First Miss.—“La! do you think so, dear? Why, it's my second name!”
Second Miss.—“Then I'm sure Captain Travers thinks it a BEAUTIFUL
name!”
Third Miss.—“He, he, he!”
Fourth Miss.—“What was he telling you at dinner that seemed to
interest you so?”
First Miss.—“O law, nothing!—that is, yes! Charles—that
is,—Captain Travers, is a sweet poet, and was reciting to me some
lines that he had composed upon a faded violet:—
“'The odor from the flower is gone,
That like thy—,
like thy something, I forget what it was; but his lines are sweet, and so
original too! I wish that horrid Sir John Todcaster had not begun his
story of the exciseman, for Lady Fitz-Boodle always quits the table when
he begins.”
Third Miss.—“Do you like those tufts that gentlemen wear sometimes
on their chins?”
Second Miss.—“Nonsense, Mary!”
Third Miss.—“Well, I only asked, Jane. Frank thinks, you know, that
he shall very soon have one, and puts bear's-grease on his chin every
night.”
Second Miss.—“Mary, nonsense!”
Third Miss.—“Well, only ask him. You know he came to our
dressing-room last night and took the pomatum away; and he says that when
boys go to Oxford they always—”
First Miss.—“O heavens! have you heard the news about the Lancers?
Charles—that is, Captain Travers, told it me!”
Second Miss.—“Law! they won't go away before the ball, I hope!”
First Miss.—“No, but on the 15th they are to shave their moustaches!
He says that Lord Tufto is in a perfect fury about it!”
Second Miss.—“And poor George Beardmore, too!” &c.
Here Tom upsets the coffee over his trousers, and the conversations end. I
can recollect a dozen such, and ask any man of sense whether such talk
amuses him?
Try again to speak to a young lady while you are dancing—what we
call in this country—a quadrille. What nonsense do you invariably
give and receive in return! No, I am a woman-scorner, and don't care to
own it. I hate young ladies! Have I not been in love with several, and has
any one of them ever treated me decently? I hate married women! Do they
not hate me? and, simply because I smoke, try to draw their husbands away
from my society? I hate dowagers! Have I not cause? Does not every dowager
in London point to George Fitz-Boodle as to a dissolute wretch whom young
and old should avoid?
And yet do not imagine that I have not loved. I have, and madly, many,
many times! I am but eight-and-thirty,* not past the age of passion, and
may very likely end by running off with an heiress—or a cook-maid
(for who knows what strange freaks Love may choose to play in his own
particular person? and I hold a man to be a mean creature who calculates
about checking any such sacred impulse as lawful love)—I say, though
despising the sex in general for their conduct to me, I know of particular
persons belonging to it who are worthy of all respect and esteem, and as
such I beg leave to point out the particular young lady who is perusing
these lines. Do not, dear madam, then imagine that if I knew you I should
be disposed to sneer at you. Ah, no! Fitz-Boodle's bosom has tenderer
sentiments than from his way of life you would fancy, and stern by rule is
only too soft by practice. Shall I whisper to you the story of one or two
of my attachments? All terminating fatally (not in death, but in
disappointment, which, as it occurred, I used to imagine a thousand times
more bitter than death, but from which one recovers somehow more readily
than from the other-named complaint)—all, I say, terminating
wretchedly to myself, as if some fatality pursued my desire to become a
domestic character.
* He is five-and-forty, if he is a day old.—O. Y.
My first love—no, let us pass THAT over. Sweet one! thy name shall
profane no hireling page. Sweet, sweet memory! Ah, ladies, those delicate
hearts of yours have, too, felt the throb. And between the last 'ob' in
the word throb and the words now written, I have passed a delicious period
of perhaps an hour, perhaps a minute, I know not how long, thinking of
that holy first love and of her who inspired it. How clearly every single
incident of the passion is remembered by me! and yet 'twas long, long
since. I was but a child then—a child at school—and, if the
truth must be told, L—ra R-ggl-s (I would not write her whole name
to be made one of the Marquess of Hertford's executors) was a woman full
thirteen years older than myself; at the period of which I write she must
have been at least five-and-twenty. She and her mother used to sell tarts,
hard-bake, lollipops, and other such simple comestibles, on Wednesdays and
Saturdays (half-holidays), at a private school where I received the first
rudiments of a classical education. I used to go and sit before her tray
for hours, but I do not think the poor girl ever supposed any motive led
me so constantly to her little stall beyond a vulgar longing for her tarts
and her ginger-beer. Yes, even at that early period my actions were
misrepresented, and the fatality which has oppressed my whole life began
to show itself,—the purest passion was misinterpreted by her and my
school-fellows, and they thought I was actuated by simple gluttony. They
nicknamed me Alicompayne.
Well, be it so. Laugh at early passion ye who will; a highborn boy madly
in love with a lowly ginger-beer girl! She married afterwards, took the
name of Latter, and now keeps with her old husband a turnpike, through
which I often ride; but I can recollect her bright and rosy of a sunny
summer afternoon, her red cheeks shaded by a battered straw bonnet, her
tarts and ginger-beer upon a neat white cloth before her, mending blue
worsted stockings until the young gentlemen should interrupt her by coming
to buy.
Many persons will call this description low; I do not envy them their
gentility, and have always observed through life (as, to be sure, every
other GENTLEMAN has observed as well as myself) that it is your parvenu
who stickles most for what he calls the genteel, and has the most
squeamish abhorrence for what is frank and natural. Let us pass at once,
however, as all the world must be pleased, to a recital of an affair which
occurred in the very best circles of society, as they are called, viz, my
next unfortunate attachment.
It did not occur for several years after that simple and platonic passion
just described: for though they may talk of youth as the season of
romance, it has always appeared to me that there are no beings in the
world so entirely unromantic and selfish as certain young English
gentlemen from the age of fifteen to twenty. The oldest Lovelace about
town is scarcely more hard-hearted and scornful than they; they ape all
sorts of selfishness and rouerie: they aim at excelling at cricket, at
billiards, at rowing, and drinking, and set more store by a red coat and a
neat pair of top-boots than by any other glory. A young fellow staggers
into college chapel of a morning, and communicates to all his friends that
he was “so CUT last night,” with the greatest possible pride. He makes a
joke of having sisters and a kind mother at home who loves him; and if he
speaks of his father, it is with a knowing sneer to say that he has a
tailor's and a horse-dealer's bill that will surprise “the old governor.”
He would be ashamed of being in love. I, in common with my kind, had these
affectations, and my perpetual custom of smoking added not a little to my
reputation as an accomplished roue. What came of this custom in the army
and at college, the reader has already heard. Alas! in life it went no
better with me, and many pretty chances I had went off in that accursed
smoke.
After quitting the army in the abrupt manner stated, I passed some short
time at home, and was tolerated by my mother-in-law, because I had formed
an attachment to a young lady of good connections and with a considerable
fortune, which was really very nearly becoming mine. Mary M'Alister was
the only daughter of Colonel M'Alister, late of the Blues, and Lady Susan
his wife. Her ladyship was no more; and, indeed, of no family compared to
ours (which has refused a peerage any time these two hundred years); but
being an earl's daughter and a Scotchwoman, Lady Emily Fitz-Boodle did not
fail to consider her highly. Lady Susan was daughter of the late Admiral
Earl of Marlingspike and Baron Plumduff. The Colonel, Miss M'Alister's
father, had a good estate, of which his daughter was the heiress, and as I
fished her out of the water upon a pleasure-party, and swam with her to
shore, we became naturally intimate, and Colonel M'Alister forgot, on
account of the service rendered to him, the dreadful reputation for
profligacy which I enjoyed in the county.
Well, to cut a long story short, which is told here merely for the moral
at the end of it, I should have been Fitz-Boodle M'Alister at this minute
most probably, and master of four thousand a year, but for the fatal
cigar-box. I bear Mary no malice in saying that she was a high-spirited
little girl, loving, before all things, her own way; nay, perhaps I do
not, from long habit and indulgence in tobacco-smoking, appreciate the
delicacy of female organizations, which were oftentimes most painfully
affected by it. She was a keen-sighted little person, and soon found that
the world had belied poor George Fitz-Boodle; who, instead of being the
cunning monster people supposed him to be, was a simple, reckless,
good-humored, honest fellow, marvellously addicted to smoking, idleness,
and telling the truth. She called me Orson, and I was happy enough on the
14th February, in the year 18— (it's of no consequence), to send her
such a pretty little copy of verses about Orson and Valentine, in which
the rude habits of the savage man were shown to be overcome by the
polished graces of his kind and brilliant conqueror, that she was fairly
overcome, and said to me, “George Fitz-Boodle, if you give up smoking for
a year, I will marry you.”
I swore I would, of course, and went home and flung four pounds of
Hudson's cigars, two meerschaum pipes that had cost me ten guineas at the
establishment of Mr. Gattie at Oxford, a tobacco-bag that Lady Fitz-Boodle
had given me BEFORE her marriage with my father (it was the only present
that I ever had from her or any member of the Flintskinner family), and
some choice packets of Varinas and Syrian, into the lake in Boodle Park.
The weapon amongst them all which I most regretted was—will it be
believed?—the little black doodheen which had been the cause of the
quarrel between Lord Martingale and me. However, it went along with the
others. I would not allow my groom to have so much as a cigar, lest I
should be tempted hereafter; and the consequence was that a few days after
many fat carps and tenches in the lake (I must confess 'twas no bigger
than a pond) nibbled at the tobacco, and came floating on their backs on
the top of the water quite intoxicated. My conversion made some noise in
the county, being emphasized as it were by this fact of the fish. I can't
tell you with what pangs I kept my resolution; but keep it I did for some
time.
With so much beauty and wealth, Mary M'Alister had of course many suitors,
and among them was the young Lord Dawdley, whose mamma has previously been
described in her gown of red satin. As I used to thrash Dawdley at school,
I thrashed him in after-life in love; he put up with his disappointment
pretty well, and came after a while and shook hands with me, telling me of
the bets that there were in the county, where the whole story was known,
for and against me. For the fact is, as I must own, that Mary M'Alister,
the queerest, frankest of women, made no secret of the agreement, or the
cause of it.
“I did not care a penny for Orson,” she said, “but he would go on writing
me such dear pretty verses that at last I couldn't help saying yes. But if
he breaks his promise to me, I declare, upon my honor, I'll break mine,
and nobody's heart will be broken either.”
This was the perfect fact, as I must confess, and I declare that it was
only because she amused me and delighted me, and provoked me, and made me
laugh very much, and because, no doubt, she was very rich, that I had any
attachment for her.
“For heaven's sake, George,” my father said to me, as I quitted home to
follow my beloved to London, “remember that you are a younger brother and
have a lovely girl and four thousand a year within a year's reach of you.
Smoke as much as you like, my boy, after marriage,” added the old
gentleman, knowingly (as if HE, honest soul, after his second marriage,
dared drink an extra pint of wine without my lady's permission!) “but
eschew the tobacco-shops till then.”
I went to London resolving to act upon the paternal advice, and oh! how I
longed for the day when I should be married, vowing in my secret soul that
I would light a cigar as I walked out of St. George's, Hanover Square.
Well, I came to London, and so carefully avoided smoking that I would not
even go into Hudson's shop to pay his bill, and as smoking was not the
fashion then among young men as (thank heaven!) it is now, I had not many
temptations from my friends' examples in my clubs or elsewhere; only
little Dawdley began to smoke, as if to spite me. He had never done so
before, but confessed—the rascal!—that he enjoyed a cigar now,
if it were but to mortify me. But I took to other and more dangerous
excitements, and upon the nights when not in attendance upon Mary
M'Alister, might be found in very dangerous proximity to a polished
mahogany table, round which claret-bottles circulated a great deal too
often, or worse still, to a table covered with green cloth and ornamented
with a couple of wax-candles and a couple of packs of cards, and four
gentlemen playing the enticing game of whist. Likewise, I came to carry a
snuff-box, and to consume in secret huge quantities of rappee.
For ladies' society I was even then disinclined, hating and despising
small-talk, and dancing, and hot routs, and vulgar scrambles for suppers.
I never could understand the pleasure of acting the part of lackey to a
dowager, and standing behind her chair, or bustling through the crowd for
her carriage. I always found an opera too long by two acts, and have
repeatedly fallen asleep in the presence of Mary M'Alister herself,
sitting at the back of the box shaded by the huge beret of her old aunt,
Lady Betty Plumduff; and many a time has Dawdley, with Miss M'Alister on
his arm, wakened me up at the close of the entertainment in time to offer
my hand to Lady Betty, and lead the ladies to their carriage. If I
attended her occasionally to any ball or party of pleasure, I went, it
must be confessed, with clumsy, ill-disguised ill-humor. Good heavens!
have I often and often thought in the midst of a song, or the very thick
of a ball-room, can people prefer this to a book and a sofa, and a dear,
dear cigar-box, from thy stores, O charming Mariana Woodville! Deprived of
my favorite plant, I grew sick in mind and body, moody, sarcastic, and
discontented.
Such a state of things could not long continue, nor could Miss M'Alister
continue to have much attachment for such a sullen, ill-conditioned
creature as I then was. She used to make me wild with her wit and her
sarcasm, nor have I ever possessed the readiness to parry or reply to
those fine points of woman's wit, and she treated me the more mercilessly
as she saw that I could not resist her.
Well, the polite reader must remember a great fete that was given at B——
House, some years back, in honor of his Highness the Hereditary Prince of
Kalbsbraten-Pumpernickel, who was then in London on a visit to his
illustrious relatives. It was a fancy ball, and the poems of Scott being
at that time all the fashion, Mary was to appear in the character of the
“Lady of the Lake,” old M'Alister making a very tall and severe-looking
harper; Dawdley, a most insignificant Fitzjames; and your humble servant a
stalwart manly Roderick Dhu. We were to meet at B—— House at
twelve o'clock, and as I had no fancy to drive through the town in my cab
dressed in a kilt and philibeg, I agreed to take a seat in Dawdley's
carriage, and to dress at his house in May Fair. At eleven I left a very
pleasant bachelors' party, growling to quit them and the honest, jovial
claret-bottle, in order to scrape and cut capers like a harlequin from the
theatre. When I arrived at Dawdley's, I mounted to a dressing-room, and
began to array myself in my cursed costume.
The art of costuming was by no means so well understood in those days as
it has been since, and mine was out of all correctness. I was made to
sport an enormous plume of black ostrich-feathers, such as never was worn
by any Highland chief, and had a huge tiger-skin sporran to dangle like an
apron before innumerable yards of plaid petticoat. The tartan cloak was
outrageously hot and voluminous; it was the dog-days, and all these things
I was condemned to wear in the midst of a crowd of a thousand people!
Dawdley sent up word, as I was dressing, that his dress had not arrived,
and he took my cab and drove off in a rage to his tailor.
There was no hurry, I thought, to make a fool of myself; so having put on
a pair of plaid trews, and very neat pumps with shoe-buckles, my courage
failed me as to the rest of the dress, and taking down one of his
dressing-gowns, I went down stairs to the study, to wait until he should
arrive.
The windows of the pretty room were open, and a snug sofa, with
innumerable cushions, drawn towards one of them. A great tranquil moon was
staring into the chamber, in which stood, amidst books and all sorts of
bachelor's lumber, a silver tray with a couple of tall Venice glasses, and
a bottle of Maraschino bound with straw. I can see now the twinkle of the
liquor in the moonshine, as I poured it into the glass; and I swallowed
two or three little cups of it, for my spirits were downcast. Close to the
tray of Maraschino stood—must I say it?—a box, a mere box of
cedar, bound rudely together with pink paper, branded with the name of
“Hudson” on the side, and bearing on the cover the arms of Spain. I
thought I would just take up the box and look in it.
Ah heaven! there they were—a hundred and fifty of them, in calm,
comfortable rows: lovingly side by side they lay, with the great moon
shining down upon them—thin at the tip, full in the waist, elegantly
round and full, a little spot here and there shining upon them—beauty-spots
upon the cheek of Sylvia. The house was quite quiet. Dawdley always smoked
in his room—I had not smoked for four months and eleven days.
“IS IT POSSIBLE?”
“There happened at Schloss P-mp-rn-ckel,
A strange mishap our sides to tickle,
And set the people in a roar;—
A strange caprice of Fortune fickle:
I never thought at Pumpernickel
To see a SPECK UPON THE FLOOR!”
LA PERFIDE ALBION; OR, A CAUTION TO WALTZERS.
“'Come to the dance,' the Briton said,
And forward D-r-th-a led,
Fair, fresh, and three-and-twenty!
Ah, girls; beware of Britons red!
What wonder that it TURNED HER HEAD?
SAT VERBUM SAPIENTI.”
“REASONS FOR NOT MARRYING.
“'The lovely Miss S.
Will surely say “yes,”
You've only to ask and try;'
'That subject we'll quit;'
Says Georgy the wit,
'I'VE A MUCH BETTER SPEC IN MY EYE!'”
This last epigram especially was voted so killing that it flew like
wildfire; and I know for a fact that our Charge-d'Affaires at Kalbsbraten
sent a courier express with it to the Foreign Office in England, whence,
through our amiable Foreign Secretary, Lord P-lm-rston, it made its way
into every fashionable circle: nay, I have reason to believe caused a
smile on the cheek of R-y-lty itself. Now that Time has taken away the
sting of these epigrams, there can be no harm in giving them; and 'twas
well enough then to endeavor to hide under the lash of wit the bitter
pangs of humiliation: but my heart bleeds now to think that I should have
ever brought a tear on the gentle cheek of Dorothea.
Not content with this—with humiliating her by satire, and with
wounding her accepted lover across the nose—I determined to carry my
revenge still farther, and to fall in love with somebody else. This person
was Ottilia v. Schlippenschlopp.
Otho Sigismund Freyherr von Schlippenschlopp, Knight Grand Cross of the
Ducal Order of the Two-Necked Swan of Pumpernickel, of the Porc-et-Siflet
of Kalbsbraten, Commander of the George and Blue-Boar of Dummerland,
Excellency, and High Chancellor of the United Duchies, lived in the second
floor of a house in the Schwapsgasse; where, with his private income and
his revenues as Chancellor, amounting together to some 300L. per annum, he
maintained such a state as very few other officers of the Grand-Ducal
Crown could exhibit. The Baron is married to Marie Antoinette, a Countess
of the house of Kartoffelstadt, branches of which have taken root all over
Germany. He has no sons, and but one daughter, the Fraulein OTTILIA.
The Chancellor is a worthy old gentleman, too fat and wheezy to preside at
the Privy Council, fond of his pipe, his ease, and his rubber. His lady is
a very tall and pale Roman-nosed Countess, who looks as gentle as Mrs.
Robert Roy, where, in the novel, she is for putting Baillie Nicol Jarvie
into the lake, and who keeps the honest Chancellor in the greatest order.
The Fraulein Ottilia had not arrived at Kalbsbraten when the little affair
between me and Dorothea was going on; or rather had only just come in for
the conclusion of it, being presented for the first time that year at the
ball where I—where I met with my accident.
At the time when the Countess was young, it was not the fashion in her
country to educate the young ladies so highly as since they have been
educated; and provided they could waltz, sew, and make puddings, they were
thought to be decently bred; being seldom called upon for algebra or
Sanscrit in the discharge of the honest duties of their lives. But
Fraulein Ottilia was of the modern school in this respect, and came back
from the pension at Strasburg speaking all the languages, dabbling in all
the sciences: an historian, a poet,—a blue of the ultramarinest
sort, in a word. What a difference there was, for instance, between poor,
simple Dorothea's love of novel reading and the profound encyclopaedic
learning of Ottilia!
Before the latter arrived from Strasburg (where she had been under the
care of her aunt the canoness, Countess Ottilia of Kartoffeldstadt, to
whom I here beg to offer my humblest respects), Dorothea had passed for a
bel esprit in the little court circle, and her little simple stock of
accomplishments had amused us all very well. She used to sing “Herz, mein
Herz” and “T'en souviens-tu,” in a decent manner (ONCE, before heaven, I
thought her singing better than Grisi's), and then she had a little album
in which she drew flowers, and used to embroider slippers wonderfully, and
was very merry at a game of loto or forfeits, and had a hundred small
agremens de societe! which rendered her an acceptable member of it.
But when Ottilia arrived, poor Dolly's reputation was crushed in a month.
The former wrote poems both in French and German; she painted landscapes
and portraits in real oil; and she twanged off a rattling piece of Listz
or Kalkbrenner in such a brilliant way, that Dora scarcely dared to touch
the instrument after her, or ventured, after Ottilia had trilled and
gurgled through “Una voce,” or “Di piacer” (Rossini was in fashion then),
to lift up her little modest pipe in a ballad. What was the use of the
poor thing going to sit in the park, where so many of the young officers
used ever to gather round her? Whir! Ottilia went by galloping on a
chestnut mare with a groom after her, and presently all the young fellows
who could buy or hire horseflesh were prancing in her train.
When they met, Ottilia would bounce towards her soul's darling, and put
her hands round her waist, and call her by a thousand affectionate names,
and then talk of her as only ladies or authors can talk of one another.
How tenderly she would hint at Dora's little imperfections of education!—how
cleverly she would insinuate that the poor girl had no wit! and, thank
God, no more she had. The fact is, that do what I will I see I'm in love
with her still, and would be if she had fifty children; but my passion
blinded me THEN, and every arrow that fiery Ottilia discharged I marked
with savage joy. Dolly, thank heaven, didn't mind the wit much; she was
too simple for that. But still the recurrence of it would leave in her
heart a vague, indefinite feeling of pain, and somehow she began to
understand that her empire was passing away, and that her dear friend
hated her like poison; and so she married Klingenspohr. I have written
myself almost into a reconciliation with the silly fellow; for the truth
is, he has been a good, honest husband to her, and she has children, and
makes puddings, and is happy.
Ottilia was pale and delicate. She wore her glistening black hair in
bands, and dressed in vapory white muslin. She sang her own words to her
harp, and they commonly insinuated that she was alone in the world,—that
she suffered some inexpressible and mysterious heart-pangs, the lot of all
finer geniuses,—that though she lived and moved in the world she was
not of it, that she was of a consumptive tendency and might look for a
premature interment. She even had fixed on the spot where she should lie:
the violets grew there, she said, the river went moaning by; the gray
willow whispered sadly over her head, and her heart pined to be at rest.
“Mother,” she would say, turning to her parent, “promise me—promise
me to lay me in that spot when the parting hour has come!” At which Madame
de Schlippenschlopp would shriek, and grasp her in her arms; and at which,
I confess, I would myself blubber like a child. She had six darling
friends at school, and every courier from Kalbsbraten carried off whole
reams of her letter-paper.
In Kalbsbraten, as in every other German town, there are a vast number of
literary characters, of whom our young friend quickly became the chief.
They set up a literary journal, which appeared once a week, upon
light-blue or primrose paper, and which, in compliment to the lovely
Ottilia's maternal name, was called the Kartoffelnkranz. Here are a couple
of her ballads extracted from the Kranz, and by far the most cheerful
specimen of her style. For in her songs she never would willingly let off
the heroines without a suicide or a consumption. She never would hear of
such a thing as a happy marriage, and had an appetite for grief quite
amazing in so young a person. As for her dying and desiring to be buried
under the willow-tree, of which the first ballad is the subject, though I
believed the story then, I have at present some doubts about it. For,
since the publication of my Memoirs, I have been thrown much into the
society of literary persons (who admire my style hugely), and egad! though
some of them are dismal enough in their works, I find them in their
persons the least sentimental class that ever a gentleman fell in with.
“THE WILLOW-TREE.
“Know ye the willow-tree
Whose gray leaves quiver,
Whispering gloomily
To yon pale river?
Lady, at even-tide
Wander not near it,
They say its branches hide
A sad, lost spirit!
“Once to the willow-tree
A maid came fearful,
Pale seemed her cheek to be,
Her blue eye tearful;
Soon as she saw the tree,
Her step moved fleeter,
No one was there—ah me!
No one to meet her!
“Quick beat her heart to hear
The far bell's chime
Toll from the chapel-tower
The trysting time:
But the red sun went down
In golden flame,
And though she looked round,
Yet no one came!
“Presently came the night,
Sadly to greet her,—
Moon in her silver light,
Stars in their glitter.
Then sank the moon away
Under the billow,
Still wept the maid alone—
There by the willow!
“Through the long darkness,
By the stream rolling,
Hour after hour went on
Tolling and tolling.
Long was the darkness,
Lonely and stilly;
Shrill came the night-wind,
Piercing and chilly.
“Shrill blew the morning breeze,
Biting and cold,
Bleak peers the gray dawn
Over the wold.
Bleak over moor and stream
Looks the grey dawn,
Gray, with dishevelled hair,
Still stands the willow there—
THE MAID IS GONE!
“Domine, Domine!
Sing we a litany,—
Sing for poor maiden-hearts broken and
weary;
Domine, Domine!
Sing we a litany,
Wail we and weep we a wild Miserere!”
One of the chief beauties of this ballad (for the translation of which I
received some well-merited compliments) is the delicate way in which the
suicide of the poor young woman under the willow-tree is hinted at; for
that she threw herself into the water and became one among the lilies of
the stream, is as clear as a pikestaff. Her suicide is committed some time
in the darkness, when the slow hours move on tolling and tolling, and is
hinted at darkly as befits the time and the deed.
But that unromantic brute, Van Cutsem, the Dutch Charge-d'Affaires, sent
to the Kartoffelnkranz of the week after a conclusion of the ballad, which
shows what a poor creature he must be. His pretext for writing it was, he
said, because he could not bear such melancholy endings to poems and young
women, and therefore he submitted the following lines:—
I.
“Long by the willow-trees
Vainly they sought her,
Wild rang the mother's screams
O'er the gray water:
'Where is my lovely one?
Where is my daughter?
II.
“'Rouse thee, sir constable—
Rouse thee and look;
Fisherman, bring your net,
Boatman your hook.
Beat in the lily-beds,
Dive in the brook!'
III.
“Vainly the constable
Shouted and called her;
Vainly the fisherman
Beat the green alder;
Vainly he flung the net,
Never it hauled her!
IV.
“Mother beside the fire
Sat, her nightcap in;
Father, in easy chair,
Gloomily napping;
When at the window-sill
Came a light tapping!
V.
“And a pale countenance
Looked through the casement.
Loud beat the mother's heart,
Sick with amazement,
And at the vision which
Came to surprise her,
Shrieked in an agony—
'Lor! it's Elizar!'
VI
“Yes, 'twas Elizabeth—
Yes, 'twas their girl;
Pale was her cheek, and her
Hair out of curl.
'Mother!' the loving one,
Blushing, exclaimed,
'Let not your innocent
Lizzy be blamed.
VII.
“'Yesterday, going to aunt
Jones's to tea,
Mother, dear mother, I
FORGOT THE DOOR-KEY!
And as the night was cold,
And the way steep,
Mrs. Jones kept me to
Breakfast and sleep.'
VIII.
“Whether her Pa and Ma
Fully believed her,
That we shall never know,
Stern they received her;
And for the work of that
Cruel, though short, night,
Sent her to bed without
Tea for a fortnight.
IX.
“MORAL
“Hey diddle diddlety,
Cat and the Fiddlety,
Maidens of England take caution by she!
Let love and suicide
Never tempt you aside,
And always remember to take the door-key!”
Some people laughed at this parody, and even preferred it to the original;
but for myself I have no patience with the individual who can turn the
finest sentiments of our nature into ridicule, and make everything sacred
a subject of scorn. The next ballad is less gloomy than that of the
willow-tree, and in it the lovely writer expresses her longing for what
has charmed us all, and, as it were, squeezes the whole spirit of the
fairy tale into a few stanzas:—
“FAIRY DAYS.
“Beside the old hall-fire—upon my nurse's knee,
Of happy fairy days—what tales were told to me!
I thought the world was once—all peopled with princesses,
And my heart would beat to hear—their loves and their distresses;
And many a quiet night,—in slumber sweet and deep,
The pretty fairy people—would visit me in sleep.
“I saw them in my dreams—come flying east and west,
With wondrous fairy gifts—the new-born babe they bless'd;
One has brought a jewel—and one a crown of gold,
And one has brought a curse—but she is wrinkled and old.
The gentle queen turns pale—to hear those words of sin,
But the king he only laughs—and bids the dance begin.
“The babe has grown to be—the fairest of the land
And rides the forest green—a hawk upon her hand.
An ambling palfrey white—a golden robe and crown;
I've seen her in my dreams—riding up and down;
And heard the ogre laugh—as she fell into his snare,
At the little tender creature—who wept and tore her hair!
“But ever when it seemed—her need was at the sorest
A prince in shining mail—comes prancing through the forest.
A waving ostrich-plume—a buckler burnished bright;
I've seen him in my dreams—good sooth! a gallant knight.
His lips are coral red—beneath a dark moustache;
See how he waves his hand—and how his blue eyes flash!
“'Come forth, thou Paynim knight!'—he shouts in accents clear.
The giant and the maid—both tremble his voice to hear.
Saint Mary guard him well!—he draws his falchion keen,
The giant and the knight—are fighting on the green.
I see them in my dreams—his blade gives stroke on stroke,
The giant pants and reels—and tumbles like an oak!
“With what a blushing grace—he falls upon his knee
And takes the lady's hand—and whispers, 'You are free!'
Ah! happy childish tales—of knight and faerie!
I waken from my dreams—but there's ne'er a knight for me;
I waken from my dreams—and wish that I could be
A child by the old hall-fire—upon my nurse's knee.”
Indeed, Ottilia looked like a fairy herself: pale, small, slim, and airy.
You could not see her face, as it were, for her eyes, which were so wild,
and so tender, and shone so that they would have dazzled an eagle, much
more a poor goose of a Fitz-Boodle. In the theatre, when she sat on the
opposite side of the house, those big eyes used to pursue me as I sat
pretending to listen to the “Zauberflote,” or to “Don Carlos,” or
“Egmont,” and at the tender passages, especially, they would have such a
winning, weeping, imploring look with them as flesh and blood could not
bear.
Shall I tell how I became a poet for the dear girl's sake? 'Tis surely
unnecessary after the reader has perused the above versions of her poems.
Shall I tell what wild follies I committed in prose as well as in verse?
how I used to watch under her window of icy evenings, and with chilblainy
fingers sing serenades to her on the guitar? Shall I tell how, in a
sledging-party, I had the happiness to drive her, and of the delightful
privilege which is, on these occasions, accorded to the driver?
Any reader who has spent a winter in Germany perhaps knows it. A large
party of a score or more of sledges is formed. Away they go to some
pleasure-house that has been previously fixed upon, where a ball and
collation are prepared, and where each man, as his partner descends, has
the delicious privilege of saluting her. O heavens and earth! I may grow
to be a thousand years old, but I can never forget the rapture of that
salute.
“The keen air has given me an appetite,” said the dear angel, as we
entered the supper-room; and to say the truth, fairy as she was, she made
a remarkably good meal—consuming a couple of basins of white soup,
several kinds of German sausages, some Westphalia ham, some white
puddings, an anchovy-salad made with cornichons and onions, sweets
innumerable, and a considerable quantity of old Steinwein and rum-punch
afterwards. Then she got up and danced as brisk as a fairy; in which
operation I of course did not follow her, but had the honor, at the close
of the evening's amusement, once more to have her by my side in the
sledge, as we swept in the moonlight over the snow.
Kalbsbraten is a very hospitable place as far as tea-parties are
concerned, but I never was in one where dinners were so scarce. At the
palace they occurred twice or thrice in a month; but on these occasions
spinsters were not invited, and I seldom had the opportunity of seeing my
Ottilia except at evening-parties.
Nor are these, if the truth must be told, very much to my taste. Dancing I
have forsworn, whist is too severe a study for me, and I do not like to
play ecarte with old ladies, who are sure to cheat you in the course of an
evening's play.
But to have an occasional glance at Ottilia was enough; and many and many
a napoleon did I lose to her mamma, Madame de Schlippenschlopp, for the
blest privilege of looking at her daughter. Many is the tea-party I went
to, shivering into cold clothes after dinner (which is my abomination) in
order to have one little look at the lady of my soul.
At these parties there were generally refreshments of a nature more
substantial than mere tea punch, both milk and rum, hot wine, consomme,
and a peculiar and exceedingly disagreeable sandwich made of a mixture of
cold white puddings and garlic, of which I have forgotten the name, and
always detested the savor.
Gradually a conviction came upon me that Ottilia ATE A GREAT DEAL.
I do not dislike to see a woman eat comfortably. I even think that an
agreeable woman ought to be friande, and should love certain little dishes
and knick-knacks. I know that though at dinner they commonly take nothing,
they have had roast-mutton with the children at two, and laugh at their
pretensions to starvation.
No! a woman who eats a grain of rice, like Amina in the “Arabian Nights,”
is absurd and unnatural; but there is a modus in rebus: there is no reason
why she should be a ghoul, a monster, an ogress, a horrid gormandizeress—faugh!
It was, then, with a rage amounting almost to agony, that I found Ottilia
ate too much at every meal. She was always eating, and always eating too
much. If I went there in the morning, there was the horrid familiar odor
of those oniony sandwiches; if in the afternoon, dinner had been just
removed, and I was choked by reeking reminiscences of roast-meat. Tea we
have spoken of. She gobbled up more cakes than any six people present;
then came the supper and the sandwiches again, and the egg-flip and the
horrible rum-punch.
She was as thin as ever—paler if possible than ever:—but, by
heavens! HER NOSE BEGAN TO GROW RED!
Mon Dieu! how I used to watch and watch it! Some days it was purple, some
days had more of the vermilion—I could take an affidavit that after
a heavy night's supper it was more swollen, more red than before.
I recollect one night when we were playing a round game (I had been
looking at her nose very eagerly and sadly for some time), she of herself
brought up the conversation about eating, and confessed that she had five
meals a day.
“THAT ACCOUNTS FOR IT!” says I, flinging down the cards, and springing up
and rushing like a madman out of the room. I rushed away into the night,
and wrestled with my passion. “What! Marry,” said I, “a woman who eats
meat twenty-one times in a week, besides breakfast and tea? Marry a
sarcophagus, a cannibal, a butcher's shop?—Away!” I strove and
strove. I drank, I groaned, I wrestled and fought with my love—but
it overcame me: one look of those eyes brought me to her feet again. I
yielded myself up like a slave; I fawned and whined for her; I thought her
nose was not so VERY red.
Things came to this pitch that I sounded his Highness's Minister to know
whether he would give me service in the Duchy; I thought of purchasing an
estate there. I was given to understand that I should get a chamberlain's
key and some post of honor did I choose to remain, and I even wrote home
to my brother Tom in England, hinting a change in my condition.
At this juncture the town of Hamburg sent his Highness the Grand Duke
(apropos of a commercial union which was pending between the two States) a
singular present: no less than a certain number of barrels of oysters,
which are considered extreme luxuries in Germany, especially in the inland
parts of the country, where they are almost unknown.
In honor of the oysters and the new commercial treaty (which arrived in
fourgons despatched for the purpose), his Highness announced a grand
supper and ball, and invited all the quality of all the principalities
round about. It was a splendid affair: the grand saloon brilliant with
hundreds of uniforms and brilliant toilettes—not the least beautiful
among them, I need not say, was Ottilia.
At midnight the supper-rooms were thrown open and we formed into little
parties of six, each having a table, nobly served with plate, a lackey in
attendance, and a gratifying ice-pail or two of champagne to egayer the
supper. It was no small cost to serve five hundred people on silver, and
the repast was certainly a princely and magnificent one.
I had, of course, arranged with Mademoiselle de Schlippenschlopp. Captains
Frumpel and Fridelberger of the Duke's Guard, Mesdames de Butterbrod and
Bopp, formed our little party.
The first course, of course, consisted of THE OYSTERS. Ottilia's eyes
gleamed with double brilliancy as the lackey opened them. There were nine
apiece for us—how well I recollect the number!
I never was much of an oyster-eater, nor can I relish them in naturalibus
as some do, but require a quantity of sauces, lemons, cayenne peppers,
bread and butter, and so forth, to render them palatable.
By the time I had made my preparations, Ottilia, the Captains, and the two
ladies, had wellnigh finished theirs. Indeed Ottilia had gobbled up all
hers, and there were only my nine in the dish.
I took one—IT WAS BAD. The scent of it was enough,—they were
all bad. Ottilia had eaten nine bad oysters.
I put down the horrid shell. Her eyes glistened more and more; she could
not take them off the tray.
“Dear Herr George,” she said, “WILL YOU GIVE ME YOUR OYSTERS?”
THE HONORABLE GEORGE GORMAND GOBBLETON,
Apician Chambers, Pall Mall.
Or,
SIR AUGUSTUS CARVER CRAMLEY CRAMLEY,
Amphitryonic Council Office, Swallow Street.
or, in some such neat way, Gothic letters on a large handsome crockeryware
card, with possibly a gilt coat-of-arms and supporters, or the blood-red
hand of baronetcy duly displayed. Depend on it plenty of guineas will fall
in it, and that Gobbleton's supporters will support him comfortably
enough.
For this profession is not like that of the auctioneer, which I take to be
a far more noble one, because more varied and more truthful; but in the
Agency case, a little humbug at least is necessary. A man cannot be a
successful agent by the mere force of his simple merit or genius in eating
and drinking. He must of necessity impose upon the vulgar to a certain
degree. He must be of that rank which will lead them naturally to respect
him, otherwise they might be led to jeer at his profession; but let a
noble exercise it, and bless your soul, all the “Court Guide” is dumb!
He will then give out in a manly and somewhat pompous address what has
before been mentioned, namely, that he has seen the fatal way in which the
hospitality of England has been perverted hitherto, accapare'd by a few
cooks with green trays. (He must use a good deal of French in his
language, for that is considered very gentlemanlike by vulgar people.) He
will take a set of chambers in Canton Gardens, which will be richly though
severely furnished, and the door of which will be opened by a French valet
(he MUST be a Frenchman, remember), who will say, on letting Mr. Snorter
or Sir Benjamin Pogson in, that “MILOR is at home.” Pogson will then be
shown into a library furnished with massive bookcases, containing all the
works on cookery and wines (the titles of them) in all the known languages
in the world. Any books, of course, will do, as you will have them
handsomely bound, and keep them under plate-glass. On a side-table will be
little sample-bottles of wine, a few truffles on a white porcelain saucer,
a prodigious strawberry or two, perhaps, at the time when such fruit costs
much money. On the library will be busts marked Ude, Careme, Bechamel, in
marble (never mind what heads, of course); and, perhaps, on the clock
should be a figure of the Prince of Conde's cook killing himself because
the fish had not arrived in time: there may be a wreath of immortelles on
the figure to give it a more decidedly Frenchified air. The walls will be
of a dark rich paper, hung round with neat gilt frames, containing plans
of menus of various great dinners, those of Cambaceres, Napoleon, Louis
XIV., Louis XVIII., Heliogabalus if you like, each signed by the
respective cook.
After the stranger has looked about him at these things, which he does not
understand in the least, especially the truffles, which look like dirty
potatoes, you will make your appearance, dressed in a dark dress, with one
handsome enormous gold chain, and one large diamond ring; a gold
snuff-box, of course, which you will thrust into the visitor's paw before
saying a word. You will be yourself a portly grave man, with your hair a
little bald and gray. In fact, in this, as in all other professions, you
had best try to look as like Canning as you can.
When Pogson has done sneezing with the snuff, you will say to him, “Take a
fauteuil. I have the honor of addressing Sir Benjamin Pogson, I believe?”
And then you will explain to him your system.
This, of course, must vary with every person you address. But let us lay
down a few of the heads of a plan which may be useful, or may be modified
infinitely, or may be cast aside altogether, just as circumstances
dictate. After all I am not going to turn gastronomic agent, and speak
only for the benefit perhaps of the very person who is reading this:—
“SYNOPSIS OF THE GASTRONOMIC AGENCY OF THE HONORABLE GEORGE GOBBLETON.
“The Gastronomic Agent having traversed Europe, and dined with the best
society of the world, has been led naturally, as a patriot, to turn his
thoughts homeward, and cannot but deplore the lamentable ignorance
regarding gastronomy displayed in a country for which Nature has done
almost everything.
“But it is ever singularly thus. Inherent ignorance belongs to man; and
The Agent, in his Continental travels, has always remarked, that the
countries most fertile in themselves were invariably worse tilled than
those more barren. The Italians and the Spaniards leave their fields to
Nature, as we leave our vegetables, fish, and meat. And, heavens! what
richness do we fling away, what dormant qualities in our dishes do we
disregard,—what glorious gastronomic crops (if the Agent may be
permitted the expression)—what glorious gastronomic crops do we
sacrifice, allowing our goodly meats and fishes to lie fallow! 'Chance,'
it is said by an ingenious historian, who, having been long a secretary in
the East India House, must certainly have had access to the best
information upon Eastern matters—'Chance,' it is said by Mr. Charles
Lamb, 'which burnt down a Chinaman's house, with a litter of sucking-pigs
that were unable to escape from the interior, discovered to the world the
excellence of roast-pig.' Gunpowder, we know, was invented by a similar
fortuity.” [The reader will observe that my style in the supposed
character of a Gastronomic Agent is purposely pompous and loud.] “So, 'tis
said, was printing,—so glass.—We should have drunk our wine
poisoned with the villanous odor of the borachio, had not some Eastern
merchants, lighting their fires in the Desert, marked the strange
composition which now glitters on our sideboards, and holds the costly
produce of our vines.
“We have spoken of the natural riches of a country. Let the reader think
but for one moment of the gastronomic wealth of our country of England,
and he will be lost in thankful amazement as he watches the astonishing
riches poured out upon us from Nature's bounteous cornucopia! Look at our
fisheries!—the trout and salmon tossing in our brawling streams; the
white and full-breasted turbot struggling in the mariner's net; the purple
lobster lured by hopes of greed into his basket-prison, which he quits
only for the red ordeal of the pot. Look at whitebait, great heavens!—look
at whitebait, and a thousand frisking, glittering, silvery things besides,
which the nymphs of our native streams bear kindly to the deities of our
kitchens—our kitchens such as they are.
“And though it may be said that other countries produce the freckle-backed
salmon and the dark broad-shouldered turbot; though trout frequent many a
stream besides those of England, and lobsters sprawl on other sands than
ours; yet, let it be remembered, that our native country possesses these
altogether, while other lands only know them separately; that, above all,
whitebait is peculiarly our country's—our city's own! Blessings and
eternal praises be on it, and, of course, on brown bread and butter! And
the Briton should further remember, with honest pride and thankfulness,
the situation of his capital, of London: the lordly turtle floats from the
sea into the stream, and from the stream to the city; the rapid fleets of
all the world se donnent rendezvous in the docks of our silvery Thames;
the produce of our coasts and provincial cities, east and west, is borne
to us on the swift lines of lightning railroads. In a word—and no
man but one who, like The Agent, has travelled Europe over, can appreciate
the gift—there is no city on earth's surface so well supplied with
fish as London!
“With respect to our meats, all praise is supererogatory. Ask the wretched
hunter of chevreuil, the poor devourer of rehbraten, what they think of
the noble English haunch, that, after bounding in the Park of Knole or
Windsor, exposes its magnificent flank upon some broad silver platter at
our tables? It is enough to say of foreign venison, that THEY ARE OBLIGED
TO LARD IT. Away! ours is the palm of roast; whether of the crisp mutton
that crops the thymy herbage of our downs, or the noble ox who revels on
lush Althorpian oil-cakes. What game is like to ours? Mans excels us in
poultry, 'tis true; but 'tis only in merry England that the partridge has
a flavor, that the turkey can almost se passer de truffes, that the jolly
juicy goose can be eaten as he deserves.
“Our vegetables, moreover, surpass all comment; Art (by the means of
glass) has wrung fruit out of the bosom of Nature, such as she grants to
no other clime. And if we have no vineyards on our hills, we have gold to
purchase their best produce. Nature, and enterprise that masters Nature,
have done everything for our land.
“But, with all these prodigious riches in our power, is it not painful to
reflect how absurdly we employ them? Can we say that we are in the habit
of dining well? Alas, no! and The Agent, roaming o'er foreign lands, and
seeing how, with small means and great ingenuity and perseverance, great
ends were effected, comes back sadly to his own country, whose wealth he
sees absurdly wasted, whose energies are misdirected, and whose vast
capabilities are allowed to lie idle. . . .” [Here should follow what I
have only hinted at previously, a vivid and terrible picture of the
degradation of our table.] “. . . Oh, for a master spirit, to give an
impetus to the land, to see its great power directed in the right way, and
its wealth not squandered or hidden, but nobly put out to interest and
spent!
“The Agent dares not hope to win that proud station—to be the
destroyer of a barbarous system wallowing in abusive prodigality—to
become a dietetic reformer—the Luther of the table.
“But convinced of the wrongs which exist, he will do his humble endeavor
to set them right, and to those who know that they are ignorant (and this
is a vast step to knowledge) he offers his counsels, his active
co-operation, his frank and kindly sympathy. The Agent's qualifications
are these:— '1. He is of one of the best families in England; and
has in himself, or through his ancestors, been accustomed to good living
for centuries. In the reign of Henry V., his maternal
great-great-grandfather, Roger de Gobylton' [the name may be varied, of
course, or the king's reign, or the dish invented], 'was the first who
discovered the method of roasting a peacock whole, with his tail-feathers
displayed; and the dish was served to the two kings at Rouen. Sir Walter
Cramley, in Elizabeth's reign, produced before her Majesty, when at
Killingworth Castle, mackerel with the famous GOOSEBERRY SAUCE, &c.'
“2. He has, through life, devoted himself to no other study than that of
the table: and has visited to that end the courts of all the monarchs of
Europe: taking the receipts of the cooks, with whom he lives on terms of
intimate friendship, often at enormous expense to himself.
“3. He has the same acquaintance with all the vintages of the Continent;
having passed the autumn of 1811 (the comet year) on the great Weinberg of
Johannisberg; being employed similarly at Bordeaux, in 1834; at Oporto, in
1820; and at Xeres de la Frontera, with his excellent friends, Duff,
Gordon and Co., the year after. He travelled to India and back in company
with fourteen pipes of Madeira (on board of the Samuel Snob' East
Indiaman, Captain Scuttler), and spent the vintage season in the island,
with unlimited powers of observation granted to him by the great houses
there.
“4. He has attended Mr. Groves of Charing Cross, and Mr. Giblett of Bond
Street, in a course of purchases of fish and meat; and is able at a glance
to recognize the age of mutton, the primeness of beef, the firmness and
freshness of fish of all kinds.
“5. He has visited the parks, the grouse-manors, and the principal gardens
of England, in a similar professional point of view.”
The Agent then, through his subordinates, engages to provide gentlemen who
are about to give dinner-parties—“1. With cooks to dress the
dinners; a list of which gentlemen he has by him, and will recommend none
who are not worthy of the strictest confidence.
“2. With a menu for the table, according to the price which the Amphitryon
chooses to incur.
“3. He will, through correspondence, with the various fournisseurs of the
metropolis, provide them with viands, fruit, wine, &c., sending to
Paris, if need be, where he has a regular correspondence with Messrs.
Chevet.
“4. He has a list of dexterous table-waiters (all answering to the name of
John for fear of mistakes, the butler's name to be settled according to
pleasure), and would strongly recommend that the servants of the house
should be locked in the back-kitchen or servants' hall during the time the
dinner takes place.
“5. He will receive and examine all the accounts of the fournisseurs,—of
course pledging his honor as a gentleman not to receive one shilling of
paltry gratification from the tradesmen he employs, but to see that the
bills are more moderate, and their goods of better quality, than they
would provide to any person of less experience than himself.
“6. His fee for superintending a dinner will be five guineas: and The
Agent entreats his clients to trust ENTIRELY to him and his subordinates
for the arrangement of the repast,—NOT TO THINK of inserting dishes
of their own invention, or producing wine from their own cellars, as he
engages to have it brought in the best order, and fit for immediate
drinking. Should the Amphitryon, however, desire some particular dish or
wine, he must consult The Agent in the first case by writing, in the
second, by sending a sample to The Agent's chambers. For it is manifest
that the whole complexion of a dinner may be altered by the insertion of a
single dish; and, therefore, parties will do well to mention their wishes
on the first interview with The Agent. He cannot be called upon to
recompose his bill of fare, except at great risk to the ensemble of the
dinner and enormous inconvenience to himself.
“7. The Agent will be at home for consultation from ten o'clock until two,
earlier if gentlemen who are engaged at early hours in the City desire to
have an interview: and be it remembered, that a PERSONAL INTERVIEW is
always the best: for it is greatly necessary to know not only the number
but the character of the guests whom the Amphitryon proposes to entertain,—whether
they are fond of any particular wine or dish, what is their state of
health, rank, style, profession, &c.
“8. At two o'clock, he will commence his rounds; for as the metropolis is
wide, it is clear that he must be early in the field in some districts.
From 2 to 3 he will be in Russell Square and the neighborhood; 3 to 3 3/4,
Harley Street, Portland Place, Cavendish Square, and the environs; 3 3/4
to 4 1/4, Portman Square, Gloucester Place, Baker Street, &c.; 4 1/4
to 5, the new district about Hyde Park Terrace; 5 to 5 3/4, St. John's
Wood and the Regent's Park. He will be in Grosvenor Square by 6, and in
Belgrave Square, Pimlico, and its vicinity, by 7. Parties there are
requested not to dine until 8 o'clock; and The Agent, once for all,
peremptorily announces that he will NOT go to the palace, where it is
utterly impossible to serve a good dinner.”
“TO TRADESMEN.
“Every Monday evening during the season the Gastronomic Agent proposes to
give a series of trial-dinners, to which the principal gormands of the
metropolis, and a few of The Agent's most respectable clients, will be
invited. Covers will be laid for TEN at nine o'clock precisely. And as The
Agent does not propose to exact a single shilling of profit from their
bills, and as his recommendation will be of infinite value to them, the
tradesmen he employs will furnish the weekly dinner gratis. Cooks will
attend (who have acknowledged characters) upon the same terms. To save
trouble, a book will be kept where butchers, poulterers, fishmongers,
&c. may inscribe their names in order, taking it by turns to supply
the trial-table. Wine-merchants will naturally compete every week
promiscuously, sending what they consider their best samples, and leaving
with the hall-porter tickets of the prices. Confectionery to be done out
of the house. Fruiterers, market-men, as butchers and poulterers. The
Agent's maitre-d'hotel will give a receipt to each individual for the
articles he produces; and let all remember that The Agent is a VERY KEEN
JUDGE, and woe betide those who serve him or his clients ill!
“GEORGE GORMAND GOBBLETON.
“CARLTON GARDENS, June 10, 1842.”
Here I have sketched out the heads of such an address as I conceive a
gastronomic agent might put forth; and appeal pretty confidently to the
British public regarding its merits and my own discovery. If this be not a
profession—a new one—a feasible one—a lucrative one,—I
don't know what is. Say that a man attends but fifteen dinners daily, that
is seventy-five guineas, or five hundred and fifty pounds weekly, or
fourteen thousand three hundred pounds for a season of six months: and how
many of our younger sons have such a capital even? Let, then, some
unemployed gentleman with the requisite qualifications come forward. It
will not be necessary that he should have done all that is stated in the
prospectus; but, at any rate, let him SAY he has: there can't be much harm
in an innocent fib of that sort; for the gastronomic agent must be a sort
of dinner-pope, whose opinions cannot be supposed to err.
And as he really will be an excellent judge of eating and drinking, and
will bring his whole mind to bear upon the question, and will speedily
acquire an experience which no person out of the profession can possibly
have; and as, moreover, he will be an honorable man, not practising upon
his client in any way, or demanding sixpence beyond his just fee, the
world will gain vastly by the coming forward of such a person,—gain
in good dinners, and absolutely save money: for what is five guineas for a
dinner of sixteen? The sum may be gaspille by a cook-wench, or by one of
those abominable before-named pastry-cooks with their green trays.
If any man take up the business, he will invite me, of course, to the
Monday dinners. Or does ingratitude go so far as that a man should forget
the author of his good fortune? I believe it does. Turn we away from the
sickening theme!
And now, having concluded my professions, how shall I express my
obligations to the discriminating press of this country for the unanimous
applause which hailed my first appearance? It is the more wonderful, as I
pledge my sacred word, I never wrote a document before much longer than a
laundress's bill, or the acceptance of an invitation to dinner. But enough
of this egotism: thanks for praise conferred sound like vanity; gratitude
is hard to speak of, and at present it swells the full heart of
GEORGE SAVAGE FITZ-BOODLE. GEORGE SAVAGE FITZ-BOODLE.
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