Chapter XX: Cards for a Spread

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THE Major’s ménage not admitting of two such great events as a
hunt and a dinner party taking place on the same day, and market
interfering as well, the hunt again had to be postponed to the
interests of the table. Such an event as a distinguished
stranger—the friend of an Earl, too—coming into the country could
not but excite convivial expectations, and it would ill become a
master of hounds and a mother of daughters not to parade the
acquisition. Still, raising a party under such circumstances,
required a good deal of tact and consideration, care, of course,
being taken not to introduce any matrimonial competitor, at the
same time to make the gathering sufficiently grand, and to
include a good bellman or two to proclaim its splendour over the
country. The Major, like a county member with his constituents,
was somewhat hampered with his hounds, not being able to ask
exactly who he liked, for fear of being hauled over the coals,
viz. warned off the land of those who might think they ought to
have been included, and altogether, the party required a good
deal of management. Inclination in these matters is not of so
much moment, it being no uncommon thing in the country for people
to abuse each other right well one day, and dine together the
next. The “gap” which the Major prized so much with his hounds,
he strongly objected to with his parties.

Stopping gaps, indeed, sending out invitations at all in the
country, so as not to look like stopping gaps, requires
circumspection, where people seem to have nothing whatever to do
but to note their neighbours’ movements. Let any one watch the
progress of an important trial, one for murder say, and mark the
wonderful way in which country people come forward, long after
the event, to depose to facts, that one would imagine would never
have been noticed—the passing of a man with a cow, for instance,
just as they dropped their noses upon their bacon plates, the
suspension of payment by their clock, on that morning, or the
post messenger being a few minutes late with the letters on that
day, and so on. What then is there to prevent people from laying
that and that together, where John met James, or Michael saw
Mary, so as to be able to calculate, whether they were included
in the first, second, or third batch of invitations? Towns-people
escape this difficulty, as also the equally disagreeable one of
having it known whether their “previous engagements” are real or
imaginary; but then, on the other hand, they have the
inconvenience of feeling certain, that as sure as ever they issue
cards for a certain day, every one else will be seized with a
mania for giving dinners on the same one. No one can have an idea
of the extent of London hospitality—who has not attempted to give
a dinner there. Still, it is a difficult world to please, even in
the matter of mastication, for some people who abuse you if you
don’t ask them to dine, abuse you quite as much if you do. Take
the Reverend Mr. Tightlace, the rector, and his excellent lady,
for instance. Tightlace was always complaining, at least
observing, that the Yammertons never asked them to dine—wondered
“_why_ the Yammertons never asked them to dine, was very odd they
never asked them to dine,” and yet, when Miss Yammerton’s best
copper-plate handwriting appeared on the highly-musked best
cream-laid satin note-paper, “requesting, &c.” Tightlace
pretended to be quite put out at the idea of having to go to meet
that wild sporting youth, who, “he’d be bound to say, could talk
of nothing but hunting.” Indeed, having most reluctantly accepted
the invitation, he found it necessary to cram for the occasion,
and having borrowed a copy of that veteran volume, the “British
Sportsman,” he read up all the long chapter on racing and
hunting, how to prepare a horse for a hunting match or plate;
directions for riding a hunting match or plate; of hunting the
hare, and hunting the fox, with directions for the choice of a
hunter, and the management of a hunter; part of which latter
consisted in putting him to grass between May and
Bartholomew-tide, and comforting his stomach before going out to
hunt with toasted bread and wine, or toasted bread and ale, and
other valuable information of that sort—all of which Tightlace
stored in his mind for future use—thinking to reduce his great
intellect to the level of Billy’s capacity.

Mr. and Mrs. Rocket Larkspur, of Ninian Green, were also
successfully angled for and caught; indeed, Mrs. Larkspur would
have been much disappointed if they had not been invited, for she
had heard of Billy’s elegant appearance from her maid, and being
an aspiring lady, had a great desire to cultivate an acquaintance
with high life, in which Billy evidently moved. Rocket was a good
slow sort of gentleman-farmer, quite a contrast to his fast wife,
who was all fire, bustle, and animation, wanting to manage
everybody’s house and affairs for them. He had married her, it
was supposed, out of sheer submission, because she had made a
dead set at him, and would not apparently be said “nay” to. It is
a difficult thing to manouvre a determined woman in the country,
where your habits are known, and they can assail you at all
points—church, streets, fields, roads, lanes, all are open to
them; or they can even get into your house under plea of a
charity subscription, if needs be. Mrs. and Miss Dotherington, of
Goney Garth, were invited to do the Morning Post department, and
because there was no fear of Miss Dotherington, who was “very
amiable,” interfering with our Billy. Mrs. Dotherington’s other
_forte_, besides propagating parties, consisted in angling for
legacies, and she was continually on the trot looking after or
killing people from whom she had, or fancied she had,
expectations. “I’ve just been to see poor Mrs. Snuff,” she would
say, drawing a long face; “she’s looking _wretchedly_ ill, poor
thing; fear she’s not long for this world;” or, with a grin, “I
suppose you’ve heard old Mr. Wheezington has had another attack
in the night, which nearly carried him off.” Nothing pleased her
so much as being told that any one from whom she had expectations
was on the wane. She could ill conceal her satisfaction.

So far so good; the party now numbered twelve, six of themselves
and six strangers, and nobody to interfere with Fine Billy. The
question then arose, whether to ask the Blurkinses, or the
Faireys, or the Crickletons, and this caused an anxious
deliberation. Blurkins was a landowner, over whose property the
Major frequently hunted; but then on the other hand, he was a
most disagreeable person, who would be sure to tread upon every
body’s corns before the evening was over. Indeed, the Blurkins’
family, like noxious vermin, would seem to have been sent into
the world for some inscrutable purpose, their mission apparently
being to take the conceit out of people by telling them home
truths. “Lor’ bless us! how old you have got! why you’ve lost a
front tooth! declare I shouldn’t have known you!” or “Your nose
and your chin have got into fearful proximity,” was the sort of
salute Blurkins would give an acquaintance after an absence. Or
if the “Featherbedfordshire Gazette,” or the “Hit-im and Hold-im
shire Herald” had an unflattering paragraph respecting a party’s
interference at the recent elections, or on any other subject,
Blurkins was the man who would bring it under his notice. “There,
sir, there; see what they say about you!” he would say, coming up
in the news-room, with the paper neatly folded to the paragraph,
and presenting it to him.

The Faireys of Yarrow Court were the most producible people, but
then Miss was a beauty, who had even presumed to vie with the
Yammertons, and they could not ask the old people without her.
Besides which, it had transpired that a large deal box, carefully
covered with glazed canvas, had recently arrived at the Rosedale
station, which it was strongly suspected contained a new dinner
dress from Madame Glace’s in Hanover Street; and it would never
do to let her sport it at Yammerton Grange against their girl’s
rather soiled—but still by candle-light extremely
passable—watered silk ones. So, after due deliberation, the
Faireys were rejected.

The Crickletons’ claims were then taken into consideration.

Crick was the son of Crickleton, the late eminent chiropodist of
Bolton Row, whom many of our readers will remember parading about
London on his piebald pony, with a groom in a yellow coat, red
plush breeches, and boots; and the present Crickleton was now
what he called “seeking repose” in the country, which, in his
opinion, consisted in setting all his neighbours by the ears. He
rented Lavender Lodge and farm, and being a thorough Cockney,
with a great inclination for exposing his ignorance both in the
sporting and farming way, our knowing Major was making rather a
good thing of him. At first there was a little rivalry between
them, as to which was the greater man: Crickleton affirming that
his father might have been knighted; the Major replying, that as
long as he wasn’t knighted it made no matter. The Major, however,
finding it his interest to humour his consequence, compromised
matters, by always taking in Mrs. Crickleton, a compliment that
Crick returned by taking in Mrs. Yammerton. Though the Major
used, when in the running-down tack, to laugh at the idea of a
knight’s son claiming precedence, yet, when on the running-up
one, he used to intimate that his friend’s father might have been
knighted, and even sometimes assigned the honour to his friend
himself. So he talked of him to our Billy.

The usual preponderating influence setting in in favour of
acceptances, our host and hostess were obliged to play their
remaining card with caution. There were two sets of people with
equal claims—the Impelows of Buckup Hill, and the Baskyfields of
Lingworth Lawn; the Impelows, if anything, having the prior
claim, inasmuch as the Yammertons had dined with them last; but
then, on the other hand, there was a very forward young Impelow
whom they couldn’t accommodate, that is to say, didn’t want to
have; while, as regarded the Baskyfields, old Basky and
Crickleton were at daggers drawn about a sow Basky had sold him,
and they would very likely get to loggerheads about it during the
evening. A plan of the table was drawn up, to see if it was
possible to separate them sufficiently, supposing people would
only have the sense to go to their right places, but it was found
to be impracticable to do justice to their consequence, and
preserve the peace as well; so the idea of having the Baskyfields
was obliged to be relinquished. This delay was fatal to the
Impelows, for John Giles, their man-of-all-work, having seen
Solomon scouring the country on horseback with a basket, in
search of superfluous poultry, had reported the forthcoming grand
spread at the Grange to his “Missis”; and after waiting patiently
for an invitation, it at length came so late as to be an evident
convenience, which they wouldn’t submit to; so after taking a
liberal allowance of time to answer, in order to prevent the
Yammertons from playing the same base trick upon any one else,
they declined in a stiff, non-reason-assigning note. This was the
first check to the hitherto prosperous current of events, and
showed our sagacious friends that the time was past for stopping
gaps with family people, and threw them on the other resources of
the district.

The usual bachelor stop-gaps of the neighbourhood were Tom
Hetherington, of Bearbinder Park, and Jimmy Jarperson, of
Fothergill Burn, both of whom had their disqualifications;
Jarperson’s being an acute nerve-shaking sort of laugh, that set
every one’s teeth on edge who heard it, and earned for him the
title of the Laughing Hyæna; the other’s misfortune being, that
he was only what may be called an intermediate gentleman, that is
to say, he could act the gentleman up to a pint of wine or so,
after which quantity nature gradually asserted her supremacy, and
he became himself again.

Our friend Paul Straddler, of Hinton, at one time had had the
call of them both, but the Major, considering that Straddler had
not used due diligence in the matter of Golden-drop, was not
inclined to have him. Besides which, Straddler required a bed,
which the Major was not disposed to yield, a bed involving a
breakfast, and perhaps a stall for his horse, to say nothing of
an out-of-place groom Straddler occasionally adopted, and who
could eat as much as any two men. So the Laughing Hyæna and
Hetherington were selected.

And now, gentle reader, if you will have the kindness to tell
them off on your fingers as we call them over, we will see if we
have got country, and as many as ever the Major can cram into his
diningroom. Please count:—

Major, Mrs., three Misses Yammerton and Fine Billy...6

The Rev. Mr. and Mrs. Tightlace......................2

Mr. and Mrs. Rocket Larkspur.........................2

Mrs. and Miss Dotherington...........................2

Mr. and Mrs. Blurkins................................2

Mr. and Mrs. Crickleton..............................2

The Hyæna, and Hetherington..........................2

18

All right! eighteen; fourteen for dining-room chairs, and four
for bedroom ones. There are but twelve Champagne needle-cases,
but the deficiency is supplied by half-a-dozen ale glasses at the
low end of the table, which the Major says will “never be seen.”

So now, if you please, we will go and dress—dinner being sharp
six, recollect.