Chapter IV: Part 4

However, when that I was a little tiny boy, I was compelled by family pressure to contract matrimony with an equally juvenile female of eight, and, though circumstances have prevented the second ceremony being celebrated on arriving at the more mature age of discretion, such infant marriage is notwithstanding the binding affair.

What of it? Your overwhelming affection will render you totally indifferent to the unpleasant side of your position as a _sateen_ or rival wife, though it is the antipode of the bed of roses, especially under internecine feuds and perpetual snipsnaps with sundry aunts and sisters-in-law of mine of rather nagging idiosyncracies. But ignorance of language will probably blind your sensitive ears to the sneering and ill-natured tone of their remarks.

I can only say that I am quite ready (if you insist upon it) to fulfil my contract to best ability, and undertake the heavy burden which Providence has, very injudiciously, saddled upon my feeble back. Mr CHUCKERBUTTY RAM, of 15 Jubilee Terrace, Clapham, was present at my first wedding, and will doubtless certify to same on application.

Ever yours faithfully and devotedly,

H. B. J.

In writing the above, I was well aware that there is a strong prejudice in the mind of European feminines in favour of monogamy, and my letter (as will be seen by the intelligent reader) was rather cleverly composed so as to shift the burden of breach of contract from my shoulders to hers.

So that I rubbed my hands with gleeful jubilation on receiving her reply that she was astounded with wonderment at the sublimity of my cheek in supposing that she would play the subordinate fiddle to any native wife, and that she had communicated with CHUCKERBUTTY RAM, Esq., and if my statement _re_ infant marriage (which at present she suspected to be a mere spoof) proved correct, she would certainly decline my insulting offer.

Now as it is the undeniable fact that I was wedded when a mere juvenile, I shall save my brush from this near shave--provided that Mr CHUCKERBUTTY RAM has received my tip in time and does not, like Hon'ble CUMMERBUND, go beyond his instructions.

But this is not reasonably probable, Baboo CHUCKERBUTTY RAM being a tolerably discreet, subtle chap.

XXI

_Mr Jabberjee halloos before he is quite out of the Wood._

Being (to my best of belief) satisfactorily off with the old love, I naturally became as playful as a kitten or gay as a grig. For the most superficial observer, and with the half of a naked optic, could easily discern the immeasurable superiority of Miss WEE-WEE to JESSIMINA in all the refinements and delicacies of a real English lady, and although, up to present date, the timidity of girlishness has restrained Miss ALLBUTT-INNETT from reciprocating my increasing spooniness, her parents and brother are of an overwhelming cordiality, and repeatedly mention their ardent hope that I may become their guest up in the hills some time this autumn.

So that Hope is already recommencing to hop jauntily about the secret chamber of my heart.

For, seeing the magnanimous contempt for the snobbishness of chasing a tuft that actuates their bosoms, I am no longer apprehensive that their affection for this present writer will be at all impaired by the revelation that he is merely a member of nature's nobility. Rather the contrary.

As Poet BURNS remarks with great truthfulness, "_Rank is but a penny stamp and a Man is a Man and all that._" Nevertheless, for the present, I am resolved to remain mum as a mouse.

Since I am now in their pockets for a perpetuity, I was privileged on a recent evening to escort the ALLBUTT-INNETT ladies to the Empire of India Exhibition, upon which I shall now pronounce the opinion of an expert, though space forbids me to describe its multitudinous marvels, save with the brevity of a soul of wit.

In the Cinghalese Palace we beheld a highly pious _Yogi_ from Ceylon, who had trained himself to perform his devotions with one of his legs embracing his neck, or walking upon the caps of his knees with his toes inserted into his waistband. But I am not convinced that such a style of prayer-making is at all superior in reverence to more ordinary attitudes, especially when exhibited publicly for an _honorarium_.

I feel proud to narrate that, at Miss WEE-WEE'S urgent entreaties, I subdued my native funkiness so far as to make the revolution of the Gigantic Wheel, in spite of grave apprehensions that it would prove but a house of cards, or suddenly become totally immobile--though to pass interminable hours at a lofty attitude with such a lively companion might, on secondary thoughts, have possessed pleasing saccharine compensations. Nevertheless, I was relieved when we descended without having hitched anywhere, and I did most firmly decline to fly in the face of Providence for five shillings in the basket of a captive balloon.

The Indian street is constructed with cleverness, but gives a very, very inadequate idea of the principal Calcutta thoroughfares; moreover, to cultivated Indian intellects, the fuss made by English ladies over native artisans and mechanics of rather so-so abilities and appearance seems a little ludicrous!

After dining, we witnessed the Historical Spectacle of India in the Empress Theatre, and Miss WEE-WEE made the criticism that the fall of Somnath was accomplished with a too great facility, since its so-called defenders did lie down with perfect tameness and counterfeit death immediately the army of Sultan MAHMUD galloped their horses through the gateway.

But this appeared to me rather a typical and prudent exercise of their discretion.

It seems--though (in spite of extensive historical researches) I was in previous ignorance of the fact--that Sultan MAHMUD, the Great Mogul AKBAR, and SIVAJI, the Mahratta Chief, were each taken in tow and personally conducted by a trio of Divine Guides, respectively named Love, Mercy and Wisdom, who came forward whenever nothing of consequence was transpiring, and sang with the melodiousness of Paradisiacal fowls.

As for the representation of the Hindu Paradise, I shall confess to some disappointment, seeing that it was exclusively reserved to military masculines--the more highly educated civilian class of Baboos being left out of the cold altogether! Nor am I in love with a future state in which there is so much dancing up and down lofty flights of stairs with terpsichorean energy, and manoeuvring in companies and circles with members of the softer sex. As a philosophical conception of disembodied existence, it is undeniably deficient in repose, though perhaps good enough for ordinary fighting chaps!

I spent a rapturous and ripping evening, however, greatly owing to the condescension of Miss WEE-WEE, who exhibited such entertainment at my comments that I left under the confident persuasion that I was infallibly to be the favoured swain.

On returning to Hereford Road, I found a last letter from JESSIMINA, beseeching me, for the sake of "Old Langsyne," to meet her on the following evening at Westbourne Park Station, and mentioning that certain events had occurred to change her views, and she was now only desirous for an amicable arrangement.

Accordingly, perceiving that I had no longer any reason to dread such an encounter, and not wishing her to peak and pine through my unkindness, I wrote at once accepting the _rendezvous_.

When I duly turned up, lo and behold! I found she was escorted, not only by her eagle-eyed mother (JESSIMINA herself inherits, in _Hamlet's_ immortal phraseology, "an eye like Ma's, to threaten or command"), but also by a juvenile individual with a black neck-tie and Hebrew profile, whom she formerly introduced to me as Mr SOLOMONS.

Though a little hurt by this proof of the rapidity of feminine fickleness, I began to congratulate her effusively on having obtained such an excellent substitute for my worthless self, and to wish the happy couple all earthly felicities, when she explained that he was not a _fiancé_, but merely a sort of friend, and Mrs MANKLETOW severely added that they had come to know whether I still declined to fulfil my legal contract.

Naturally I made the answer that I had recently offered to fulfil same to best ability, but that, my offer having been declined with contumeliousness, the affair was now on its end.

Here JESSIMINA said that she had of course refused to marry a man who declared that he was already the owner of a dusky spouse, but that, on inquiries from Mr CHUCKERBUTTY RAM, she had made the discovery that my said infant wife had popped off with some juvenile complaint or other three or four years ago.

At this I was rendered completely flabaghast--for, although the allegation was undeniably correct, I had confidently hoped that my friend RAM was unaware of the fact, or would at least have the ordinary mother-wit to refrain from blurting it out! "_Et tu, Brute!_" But I must make the dismal confession that my friends are mostly a very fat-witted sort of fellows.

_Que faire?_--except to explain that my melancholy bereavement must have entirely slipped off my memory, and that in any case it had no logical connection with the matter in hand.

Then Mrs MANKLETOW inquired, would I, or would I not, marry her illused child? and stated that all she wished for was a plain answer.

I replied that it was a very natural and moderate desire, and I was prepared to gratify it at once by the plain answer of--_Not on any account._

Whereupon Mr SOLOMONS stepped forward and politely handed me a folded paper, and, observing that he thought there was no need to protract the interview, he lifted his hat and went off with the ladies, leaving myself upon a bench endeavouring to get the sense of the official document into my baffled and bewildered nob.

Eventually, I gathered that it was a Royal command from the Queen-Empress, backed by the Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, that I was to enter my appearance in an action at the suit of JEMIMA MANKLETOW for a claim of damages for having breached my promise to marry!

* * * * *

No matter! Pugh! Fiddle-de-dee! Never mind! Who cares?

Having successfully passed Exam, and been called to the Bar, I am now an _amicus curiæ_, and the friend in Court.

I shall enter my appearance in the forensic costume of wig and gown.

What will be the price of the plaintiff's pleadings _then_, Madams?

XXII

_Mr Jabberjee places himself in the hands of a solicitor--with certain
reservations._

I concluded my foregoing instalment, narrating my service of a writ for breaching a promise of marriage, with a spirited outburst of _insouciance_ and devilmaycarefulness.

But such courage of a Dutch evaporated deplorably on closer perusal of the said writ, which contained the peremptory mandate that I was to enter my appearance within the incredibly short notice of eight days, or the judgment would be given in my absence!

Now it was totally out of the question that I was to prepare a long complicated defence, and have the requisite witnesses, and also perfect myself in the customs and etiquettes of Common Law Procedure, all in such a ridiculously brief period; and yet, if I remained _perdu_ with a hidden head, I could not hope for even the minimum of justice, since, heigh-ho! _les absents ont toujours tort_. So that I shed blistering and scalding tears like a spanked child, to find myself confronting such a devil of a deep sea, and my day was dismal and my night a nonentity, until, by a great piece of potluck, on going up the next morning to the library of my Inn, I espied my young friend HOWARD in the compound, busily employed in a lawn tennis game.

Having partially poured the cat from my bag already into his sympathetic and receptive bosom, I decided to confide to him my hard case in its entirety, and so made him a secret sign that I desired some private confabulations at his earliest conveniency, which he observing, after the termination of the match, came towards the remote bench whereon I was forlornly moping, and sat down kindly by my side.

This young ALLBUTT-INNETT, I am to mention here, had only just missed succeeding in the passing of Bar Exam owing to the inveterate malignancy of his stars and lack of a more industrial temperament; but from the coolness of his cheek, and complete man-of-the-worldliness, is a most judicious and tip-top adviser to friends in tight places.

_Experto crede_, for, when he had heard the latest particulars of my shocking _imbroglio_, he promptly gave me the excellent advice that I was to consult a solicitor; strongly recommending a Mr SIDNEY SMARTLE, who was a former schoolmate of his own, and a good thundering chap, and who (he thought) was not so overburdened as yet by legal business that he could not find time for working the oracle on my behalf.

"And look here, JAB," he added (he has sometimes the extreme condescension to address me as an abbreviation), "I'll trot you up to him at once--and I say, A 1 idea! tell him you mean to be your own counsel, and do all the speechifying yourself. Native prince, in brand-new wig and gown, defending himself single-handed from wiles of artful adventuress--why, you'll knock the jury as if with old boots!"

"Alack," said I, sorrowfully; "though I am quite competent to become the stump orator at shortest notice, I do not see how I can enter my first appearance until I have carefully instructed Misters RAM and JALPANYBHOY in the evidence they are to give and leave untold, &c., and a week is too scanty and fugitive a period for such preparations!"

"Nonsense and stuff!" he replies, "you will have a lot more than that, since the week only applies to entering an appearance--which is a mere farcical formality that old SID can perform in your place on his head." At which I was greatly relieved.

But on arrival at Mr SMARTLE'S office in Chancery Lane, we were disappointed to be informed, by a small, juvenile clerk, that he was absent at Wimbledon on urgent professional affairs, and his return was the unknown quantity. However, after waiting till close upon the hour of tiffin, he unexpectedly turned up in a suit of knickerbockers, carrying a long, narrow bag full of metal-headed rods, and although rather adolescent than senile in physical appearance I was vastly impressed by the offhanded cocksurety of his manner.

My friend HOWARD introduced me, and exhibited my doleful predicament in the shell of a nut, whereupon Mr SMARTLE jauntily pronounced it to be the common garden breach of promise, but that we had better all repair to the First Avenue Hotel and lunch, and talk the affair over afterwards.

Which we did in the smoking-room after lunch, with coffee, liqueurs, and cigars, &c., for which I had to pay, as a Tommy Dod, and the odd man out of pocket.

Mr SMARTLE, after listening attentively to my narrative, said that I certainly seemed to him to have let myself into the deuced cavity of a hole by so publicly proclaiming my engagement, but that my status as an oriental foreigner, and the fact I had asserted--viz., that my promise was extorted from me by compulsion and sheer physical funkiness--might pull me through, unless the plaintiff were of superlative loveliness (which, fortunately, is by no means the case).

He added, that we had better engage WITHERINGTON, Q.C., as he was notoriously the crossest examiner at the Common Bar.

But to this I opposed the _sine quâ non_ that I am to have the sole control of my case in court, and reap the undivided _kudos_, assuring him that I should be able to cross-examine all witnesses until they could not stand on one leg. From some private motives of his own, he sought to overcome my determination, hinting that, as my calling and election to the Bar were not yet an ancient history, I might not possess sufficient experience; and moreover that, by appearing in barristerial garbage, I should infallibly forfeit the indulgence shown by a judge to ordinary litigants; to which I responded by pointing out that I was a typical Indian in the matter of legal subtlety and ready-made wit, and that, if not capable of conducting my _own_ case, how, then, could I be fit to undertake a logomachy for any third parties? finally, that it is proverbially unnecessary to keep a dog when you are equally proficient in the practice of barking yourself.

Whereupon, silenced by my _a fortiori_ and _reductio ad absurdum_, he gave way, saying that it was my own affair, and, anyhow, there would be plenty of time to consider such a matter, since the plaintiff might not choose to do anything further till after the Long Vacation, and we could easily postpone the hearing of the action until the Midsummer of next year.

I, however, earnestly protested that I did not wish so procrastinated a delay, as I desired to make my forensic _début_ at the earliest possible moment, and urged him to leave no stone unturned to get the job finished by November at least, suggesting that if we could ascertain the name and address of the judge who was to try the case, I might call upon him, and, in a private and confidential interview, ascertain the extent of his disposition in my favour, and the length of his foot.

To which Mr SMARTLE replied that he could not recommend any such tactics, as I should certainly ascertain the dimensions of the judicial foot in a literal and painful manner.

Now I must conclude with a livelier piece of intelligence: I am now in receipt of the wished-for invitation to visit the ALLBUTT-INNETT family at the elegant mansion (or--to speak Scottishly--"manse") they have hired for a few weeks in the savage and romantic mountains of Ayrshire, N.B.

Mrs A.-I. wrote that there is no shooting attached to the manse, but several aristocratic friends of theirs own moors in the vicinity, and will inevitably invite them and their visitors to sport with them, so that, as she believed I was the keen sportsman, I had better bring my gun.

Alack! I am not the happy possessor of any lethal weapon, but, having since this invitation practised diligently upon tin moving beasts, bottles, and eggs rendered incredibly lively by a jet of steam, I am at last an _au fait_ with a crackshot, and no end of a Nimrod.

I do not think I shall purchase a gun, for there is a young English acquaintance of mine who is the Devil's Own Volunteer, and who will no doubt have the good nature to lend me his rifle for a week or two.

As to costume, my tailor assures me that it is totally unnecessary to assume the national raiment of a Scotch, unless I am prepared to stalk after a stag. But why should I be deterred by any cowardly fear from pursuing so constitutionally timid a quadruped? I have therefore commissioned him to manufacture me a petticoat kilt, with a chequered tartan, and other accessories, for when we are going to Rome, it is the mark of politeness to dress in the Romish style.

The Caledonian costume is indubitably becoming; but would, I venture humbly to think, be greatly improved by the simple addition of some knee-caps.

XXIII

_Mr Jabberjee delivers his Statement of Defence, and makes his
preparations for the North. He allows his patriotic sentiments to
get the better of him in a momentary outburst of disloyalty--to
which no serious importance need be attached._

My fair plaintiff has not suffered the grass of inaction to grow upon her feet, having already issued her Statement of Claim, by which she alleges that I proposed marriage on a certain date, and did subsequently, on divers occasions, treat her, in the presence of sundry witnesses, as an affianced, after which I mizzled into obscurity, and on various pretexts did decline, and do still decline, to fulfil my nuptial contract, by which conduct the plaintiff, being grievously afflicted in mind, body, and estate, claims damages to the doleful tune of £1000.

(N.B.--I have thought it advisable here and there to translate the legal phraseology into more comprehensible verbiage.)

Now such a claim is to milk a ram, or _prendre la lune avec les dents_, seeing that I am not a proprietor of even one thousand rupees. Nevertheless (as I have informed Mr SMARTLE), my progenitor, the Mooktear, will bleed to any reasonable extent of costs out of pocket.

I have held frequent and lengthy interviews with the said SMARTLE, Esq., who is of incredible despatch and celerity--though I sometimes regret that I did not procure a solicitor of a more senile and sympathetic disposition.

Assuredly had I done so, such an one would not, after perusing my Statement of Defence--a most magnificently voluminous document of over fifty folios, crammed and stuffed with satirical hits and sideblows, and pathetic appeals for the Bench's indulgence, and replete with familiar quotations from best classical and continental authors--such an one, I say, would not have split his sides with disrespectful chucklings, thrown my composition into a wasted paper receptacle, and proceeded to knock off a meagre substitute of his own, containing a very few dry bald paragraphs, in the inadequately brief space of under the hour.

Such, however, was Mr SMARTLE'S course; and the sole consolation is that, owing to his unprofessional precipitation, the action was set down for trial previously to the commencement of the Long Vacation, and my case may come on some time next Term, and I be put out of my misery at the close of the year.

My aforesaid legal adviser, finding that I adhered with the tenacity of bird-slime to my determination to conduct my case in person, did hint in no ambiguous language, that it might perhaps be even better for me to do the guy next November to my native land, and snip my fingers then from a safe distance at the plaintiff.

But it is not my practice to exhibit a white feather (except when prostrated by severe bodily panics), and I am consumed by an ardent impatience to air my fluencies and legal learnedness before the publicity of a London Law Court.

Now, begone dull care! for I am to dismiss all litigious thoughts till October or November next, and become a _Dolce far niente_, chasing the deer with my heart in the Highlands.

My volunteering acquaintance, by the way, has declined to lend me his rifle, on the transparent pretence that it was contrary to regulations, and that it was not the _bon ton_ to pursue grouse-birds and the like with so war-like a weapon.

So, on young HOWARD'S advice, I made the purchase from a pawnbroker of a lethal instrument, provided with a duplicate bore, so that, should a bird happen by any chance to escape my first barrel, the second will infallibly make him bite the dust.

I have also purchased some cartridges of a very pleasing colour, a hunting knife, and a shot belt and pouch, and if I can only procure some inexpensive kind of sporting hound from the Dogs' Home, I shall be forewarned and forearmed _cap à pie_ for the perils and pleasures of the chase.

Miss WEE-WEE did earnestly advise me, inasmuch as I was about to go amongst the savage hill tribes of canny Scotians, to previously make myself acquainted with their idioms, &c., for which purpose she lent me some romances written entirely in Caledonian dialects, also the compositions of Hon. Poet BURNS.

But hoity-toity! after much diligent perusal, I arrived at the conclusion that such works were sealed books to the most intelligent foreigner, unless he is furnished with a good Scotch grammar and dictionary.

And _mirabile dictu!_ though I have made diligent inquiries of various London booksellers, I have found it utterly impossible to obtain such works in England--a haughty and arrogantly dispositioned country, more inclined to teach than to learn!

How many of your boasted British Cabinet, supposed to rule our countless millions of so-called Indian subjects, would be capable to sit down and read and translate--_correctly_--a single sentence from the Mahábhárat in the original?

Not more, I shrewdly suspect, than half a dozen at most!

So it is not to be expected that any more interest would be displayed in the language and literature of a country like Scotland, which is notoriously wild and barren and less densely populated and productive than the most ordinary districts of Bengal.

Oh, you pusillanimous Highland chiefs and other misters! how long will you tamely submit to such offhanded treatment? Will the day never come when, with whirling sporrans and flashing pibrochs you will rise against the alien oppressor, and demand Home Rule, together with the total abolition of present disdainful British _insouciance_?

When that day dawns--if ever--please note this piece of private intelligence from an authorised source: _Young Bengal will be with you in your struggle for Autonomy._ If not in body, assuredly in spirit. Possibly in _both_.

I say no more, in case I should be accused of trying to stir up seditious feelings; but, as a patriotic Baboo gentleman, my blood will boil occasionally at instances of stuck-up English self-sufficiency, and the worm in the bud, if nipped too severely, may blossom into a rather formidable serpent!

As, for instance, when, in the course of an inoffensive promenade, I am addressed by an underbred street-urchin as a "blooming blacky," and cannot induce a policeman to compel my aggressor to furnish me with his name and address or that of his parents, or even to offer the most ordinary apology.

Enough of these rather bitter reflections, however. I omitted to mention that I am also the proprietor (at the same pawnbroker's where I bought my breeches-loader gun) of a very fine second-hand salmon-rod, a great bargain and immense value, with which I hope to be able to catch a great quantity of fishes.

For there is, according to young HOWARD, good fishing in a burn adjoining the Manse, so I shall follow King Solomon's injunctions, and not spare the rod and spoil the salmons, though if I should happen to "spoil" my rod, the salmons would inevitably in consequence be "spared."

This is a sample of the kind of verbal pleasantries in which, when in exhilarated high spirits, I sometimes facetiously indulge.

XXIV

_Mr Jabberjee relates his experiences upon the Moors._

I am now an acclimatised denizen of Caledonia stern and wild; which, however, turns out to be milder and tamer than depicted by the jaundiced hand of national jealousy.

For, since my arrival at this hamlet of Kilpaitrick, N.B., I have not once beheld any species of savage hill-man; moreover, the adult inhabitants are clothed with irreproachable decency, and, if the juveniles run about with denuded feet and heads, where is the shocking scandal?

Mr ALLBUTT-INNETT, sen., did me the honour to appear in person upon the Kilpaitrick platform, and welcome me with outspread arms to his temporary hearth and home, but I shall have the candour of confessing my disappointment with the size and appearance of the same. It appears that a "Manse" is not at all a palatial edifice, furnished with a plethora of marble halls and vassals and serfs, &c., but simply the very so-so and two-storied abode of some local priest!

My gracious hostess was to tender profuse apologies for its homeliness, on the plea that it is refreshing at times to lay aside ceremonial magnificence and unbend in rural simplicity, though it is not humanly possible to unbend oneself upon the thorny bosoms of chairs and couches severely upholstered with the prickling hairs of an extinct horse.

Still, as I assured Miss WEE-WEE, she is the happy owner of a magical knack to transform, by her sheer apparition, the humblest hovel into the first-class family residence with every modern improvement.

With the said Miss I continue on terms of hand and gloveship, with mutual harmless jokes, which would perhaps be as caviare on toast to a general, though I shall venture to recount some examples.

A certain local young laird, of incredible bashfulness and bucolical appearance, is a frequent visitor at the manse, and the fervent admirer of Miss WEE-WEE, who cannot endure the tedium of his society, and is constantly endeavouring to escape therefrom.

Now his name is Mr CRUM, and I have frequently entertained her in private by play upon the word, alluding to him as "Mister CRUST," "Mister OATCAKE," or "the Scotch Bun," and the like; but he informed me that he preferred to be addressed as "Balbannock," and upon my inquiring his reasons for selecting such an alias, he answered that it was because he inhabited a house of that name.

Whereupon I facetiously requested that he would address myself in future as "Mister Seventy-nine, Hereford Road, Bayswater," which stroke of wit occasioned inextinguishable merriment from Miss WEE-WEE, though it did not excite from the aforesaid laird so much as the smallest simper!

From an ingrained love of teasing, and also the natural desire to stimulate her appreciation of my superior fertility in small talk and _l'art de plaire_, I do often slyly contrive to inflict his sole society upon her--to the huge entertainment of her father and mother, who carry on the joke by assisting my manoeuvrings; but, although it affords me a flattering gratification to be plaintively upbraided by Miss WEE-WEE for my cruel desertion, I am resolved not to persist in such heartless pranks beyond her natural endurance.

Shortly after my arrival I heard from my host that he was the recipient of an invitation from a Mister BAGSHOT, Q.C., that he and his son HOWARD would accompany him to a shooting expedition upon some adjacent moors, and that, being now immoderately plump, and past his prime as a potshot, he had requested leave to nominate myself as his _budli_ or substitute, explaining that I was a young Indian prince of great prowess at every kind of big games.

Accordingly, to my great delight, it was arranged that I should take his place.

My young friend HOWARD, beholding me appear at the breakfast-table arrayed in my short kilt and superincumbent belly-purse with tassels, did entreat me to change myself into ordinary knickerbockers, lest I should catch death with a cold.

But I declined, disdaining such dangers, and assuring him that I did not at all dislike the excessive ventilation of my knees.

We drove to Mr BAGSHOT'S residence, Rowans Castle, in a hired machine, and found the gentlemen-shooters gathered outside the portico. Amongst the party I was pleased to observe Hon'ble Justice CUMMERBUND, who, when we were all ascended into the waggonette-break, did rally me very good-humouredly upon some mixed bag of elephants and tigers he had heard (or so he said) I had accomplished in some up-country jungle.

At first, knowing that this was the utter impossibility, I perspired with terror that he was making me the fool, but apparently he was himself under a misunderstanding, for when we had left the vehicle and were preparing to advance, he paid me the distinguished compliment of entreating that I might be awarded the command of one extremity of the line, while he himself was to preside over the opposite end!

And thus we commenced to climb a steep hill, thickly covered with a very pricklesome heather, and black slimy bogs, wherein the varnish of my patent-leather shoes did soon become totally dimmed. So, being gravely incommoded by the shortness of my wind, I entrusted my musket to an under-keeper, begging him to inform me of the early approach of any stag or deer.

However, we saw nothing to shoot at except various sorts of wild poultry, and when some of these flew up immediately in front of me, I was too late, owing to the carriage of my gun by an underling, to do more than fire off a couple of barrels as a declaration of hostility.

But profiting by this lesson in being _semper paratus_, I refused to part again with my deadly instrument, and stumbled manfully onwards with finger upon the triggers, letting them fly instantaneously at the first appearance of any animals _feræ naturæ_.

It is not customary, I was assured, to slay the wild sheep in these districts, though horned, and of an excessively ferocious appearance, and even when firing my bullets at birds, I was subjected to continual reproofs from some officious keeper or other.

For example, I was not to shoot into a flock of partridges, for the superstitious reason, forsooth! that it was still the month of August, which is supposed to be unlucky!

Again, I was rebuked for burning powder at a grey hen, because it is the wife of a black-cock, which may be shot with impunity. Although a highly chivalrous chap in questions of the fairer sex, I am yet to see why it is allowable to render the female bird a bereaved widow, but totally forbidden to make the male a widower! Or why it is permissible to slay a minute bird such as a snipe, while a titlark is on no account to be touched.

Being eventually exasperated by these unreasonable faultfindings, seeing that I had merely emptied my gun-barrels without actually destroying any of these sacred volatiles, I addressed the keeper in the withering tones of a sarcasm: "Mister Keeper," I said, "as I am not the ornithologist or soothsayer to distinguish infallibly every species of bird by instinct when flying with incredible velocity, would it not be better that I should discharge no shots in future?"

To which, abashed by my severity, he replied that he could not just say that it would make any considerable difference whether I fired at all or none.

My fellow-shooters, however, could not refrain from shouting with irrepressible admiration at the intrepidity with which, forestalling the fleetest dogs, I did rush forward to pick up the fallen grouse-birds, and repeatedly exhorted me to take greater care for my own safety.

I cannot say that they exhibited equivalent courageousness, seeing that, so often as I raised my gun to fire, they flung themselves upon their stomachs in the heather until I had finished, upon which I rallied them mercilessly upon their timidity, assuring them repeatedly that they had nothing to fear.

Yet English and Scotch alike accuse us Bengalees of being subject to excessive funkiness. What about the Pot and the Kettle, Misters?

I am to reserve the conclusion of my shooting experiences until a future occasion.

XXV

_Mr Jabberjee concludes the thrilling account of his experiences on a
Scotch moor, greatly to his own glorification._

Now to resume the rather arbitrarily truncated account of my gunnery on Scottish moors.

Before luncheon I ventured to remonstrate earnestly with my entertainer, Mr BAGSHOT, Q.C., concerning the extreme severity with which he chastised a juvenile sporting hound of his for such trivial offences as running after some rabbit, or picking up slaughtered volatiles without receiving the _mot d'ordre_!

"Listen, honourable Sir," I entreated him, "to the voice of Reason! It is the second nature of all such canines to pursue vermins, nor are they at all capable of comprehending the Why and Wherefore of a shocking flagellation. If it is your wish that this hound should play the part of a Tantalus, forbidden even to touch the _bonne-bouches_ with his watering mouth, surely it is possible to restrain him by a more humane method than Brute Force!"

At this mild reproof Mister BAGSHOT became utterly rubescent, murmuring excuses which I did not catch; and I, perceiving that this object lesson of kindness to animals from an Oriental had strongly affected all the shooters, patted the hound on the forehead, consoling him with some chocolate I carried in my cartridge sack.

We picnicked our lunch under a stone wall, and I, becoming an hilarious, rallied my companions unmercifully upon the solemnity with which they had marched in cautious silence, and with stern countenances as to attack some formidable foe--and all to slaughter sundry braces of inoffensive grouse-birds--truly an heroical sort of undertaking!

To which Hon'ble CUMMERBUND replied, with his utterance impeded by cold pie, that I might congratulate myself on having kept my own hands unstained by any grouse's gore.

"True, Mister Ex-Judge," I retorted, "but as you have already testified" (here I hoisted his own petard at him rather ingeniously), "I am more an _au fait_ in the extermination of elephants _et hoc genus omne_, and have hitherto reserved my powder and shot for a stag or some similar monarch of the glen. However, after lunch let us see whether I am not competent to kill, or at least maim, one of these same grouse-fowls, _faute de mieux_!"

A repartee which excited uproarious laughter (at Hon'ble C.'s expense) from all the present company.

Subsequently, we were posted in a row of small fortresses constructed of turfs, to await what is termed a "Drive," _i.e._, until some flock of grouse-birds, exasperated to fury by the cries and blows of certain individuals called "beaters," should attack our positions.

Hearing that the grouses on this moor were of an excessive wildness, I was at first apprehensive that one might fly at my nose or eyes while I was busied in defending myself against its fellows, but the keeper who was with me assured me that such was seldom their custom.

And, indeed, such as came in my direction flew with wings so accelerated by panic that they were invisible before I could even select one as my target, so I was reduced to fire with considerable random. Presently the beaters approached, carrying flags of truce, and we sallied out of our forts to pick up the slain and wounded. After diligent search, I had the happiness to discover a grouse-bird, stone dead, in the heather, and, capering with triumph, called to the keeper to come and see the spoil.

On his arrival, however, he said that he could not just think it would be my bird, as he had not noticed any fall in that direction. But after I had presented him with a piece of silver, he did agree that if I chose to claim the bird as mine, it was not his place to contradict me, and so in great glee I exhibited my prize to the others, appealing to the keeper (who basely remained _sotto voce_) for confirmation.

"A devilish clean shot, Prince!" Sir CUMMERBUND graciously remarked; "why, the bird is stiff and cold already!"

Whereupon I was cordially congratulated, and awarded the tail feathers to decorate my "tommy-shanty," and during the next driving, having now acquired the knack, I rendered several more denizens of the air the _hors de combats_, though--either on account of their great ingenuity in running out of the radius, or creeping into holes, etc., or else the stupidity of the retrieving dogs--their corpses remained irrecoverable.

On taking my leave, I expressed unbounded satisfaction with such sport as I had had, and my fixed intention to assist on some similar shooting-expedition, and Mr BAGSHOT kindly promised to let me know if he should again have vacancy for an additional gun.

I regret to say that young HOWARD, who, having only laid low a couple of black cocks and a blue hare, was immoderately jealous of my superior skilfulness, did seek to depreciate it by insinuating that my grouse was one which, having been seriously wounded by other hands some days previously, had come up to the hills to shuffle off its mortal coil in seclusion, arguing thus from its total absence of heat and suppleness.

This is the merest quibble, and to travel out of the record, since, of course, if a bird is at all of a venerable age, it becomes stiff and deficient in vital warmth long before it is popped off! Moreover, if the grouse were not legitimately my property, why, forsooth, should I be permitted to carry it home?

I presented my trophy and treasure-trove to the fairylike Miss WEE-WEE, who was so overwhelmed by the compliment that she entreated for it to be cooked and eaten _instanter_.

As soon as I have recovered a missing link of my fishing-rod (which it seems has been overlooked by Mister Pawnbroker), and when I have procured some suitable bait, &c., it is my intention to catch a fine salmon out of the burn for my enchanting divinity, and, as I place the fish in her lily-like hands, to strike iron while it is hot and make her the formal proposal of matrimony.

Mister CRUM, hearing of my piscatorial ambitions, has, with almost incredible simplicity, offered to lend me his salmon rod, with a volume of flies, little suspecting that he will be assisting me to catch two fish upon one hook! I am immensely tickled by such a tip-top joke, and can scarcely refrain from imparting it to Miss WEE-WEE herself, though I shall wait until I have first secured the salmon.

I had some valuable remarks upon Scottish idioms and linguistic peculiarities, &c., but these, of course, are to be suppressed _sine die_--unless I am to be permitted to overflow into a special supplement.

XXVI

_Mr Jabberjee expresses some audaciously sceptical opinions. How he
secured his first Salmon, with the manner in which he presented it
to his divinity._

Owing mainly to lack of opportunity, invitations, _et cætera_, I have not resumed the offensive against members of the grouse department, but have rather occupied myself in laborious study of Caledonian dialects, as exemplified in sundry local works of poetical and prose fiction, until I should be competent to converse with the _aborigines_ in their own tongue.

Then (having now the diction of Poet BURNS in my fingers' ends) I did genially accost the first native I met in the street of Kilpaitrick, complimenting him upon his honest, sonsie face, and enquiring whether he had wha-haed wi' Hon'ble WALLACE, and was to bruise the Peckomaut, or ca' the knowes to the yowes. But, from the intemperance of his reply, I divined that he was totally without comprehension of my meaning!

Next I addressed him by turns in the phraseologies of Misters BLACK, BARRIE, and CROCKETT, Esquires, interlarding my speech with "whatefers," and "hechs," and "ou-ays," and "dod-mons," and "loshes," and "tods," _ad libitum_, to which after listening with the most earnest attention, he returned the answer that he was not acquainted with any Oriental language.

Nor could I by any argument convince this beetle-head that I was simply speaking the barbarous accents of his native land!

Since which, after some similar experiments upon various peasants, &c., I have made a rather peculiar discovery.

There is no longer any such article as a separate Scottish language, and, indeed, I am in some dubitation whether it ever existed at all, and is not rather the waggish invention of certain audacious Scottishers, who have taken advantage of the insular ignorance and credulity of the British public to palm off upon it several highly fictitious kinds of unintelligible gibberish!

Nay, I will even go farther and express a grave suspicion whether the Scotland of these bookish romances is not the daring imposture of a _ben trovato_. For, after a prolonged residence of over a fortnight, I have never seen anything approaching a mountain pass, nor a dizzy crag, surmounted by an eagle, nor any stag drinking itself full at eve among the shady trunks of a deer-forest! I have never met a single mountaineer in feminine bonnet and plumes and short petticoats, and pipes inserted in a bag. Nor do the inhabitants dance in the street upon crossed sword-blades--this is purely a London practice. Nor have I seen any Caledonian snuffing his nostrils with tobacco from the discarded horn of some ram.

Finding that my short kilt is no longer the mould of national form, I have now altogether abandoned it, while retaining the fox-tailed belly-purse on account of its convenience and handsome appearance.

Now let me proceed to narrate how I became the captor of a large-sized salmon.

Having accepted the loan of Mister CRUM'S fishing-wand, and attached to my line certain large flies, composed of black hairs, red worsted, and gilded thread, which it seems the salmons prefer even to worms, I sallied forth along the riparian bank of a river, and proceeded to whip the stream with the severity of Emperor XERXES when engaged in flagellating the ocean.

But waesucks! (to employ the perhaps spurious verbiage of aforesaid Poet BURNS) my line, owing to superabundant longitude, did promptly become a labyrinth of Gordian knots, and the flies (which are named _Zulus_) attached their barbs to my cap and adjacent bushes with well-nigh inextricable tenacity, until at length I had the bright idea to abbreviate the line, so that I could dangle my bait a foot or two above the surface of the water--where a salmon could easily obtain it by simply turning a somersault.

However, after sitting patiently for an hour, as if on a monument, I could not succeed in catching the eye of any passing fish, and so, severely disheartened by my ill-luck, I was strolling on, shouldering my rod, when--odzooks! whom should I encounter but Mister BAGSHOT and a party of friends, who were watching his keepers capture salmons from a boat by means of a large net, a far more practical and effectual method than the cumbersome and unreliable device of a meretricious fly with a very visible hook!

And, just as I approached, the net was drawn towards the bank, and proved to contain three very large lively fishes lashing their tails with ungovernable fury at such detention!

Whereupon I made the humble petition to Mister BAGSHOT that, since he was now the favourite of Fortune, he was to remember him to whom she had denied her simpers, and bestow upon me the most mediocre of the salmons, since I was desirous to make a polite offering to the amiable daughter of my host and hostess.

And with munificent generosity he presented me with the largest of the trio, which, with great jubilation, I endeavoured to carry off under my arm, though severely baffled by the extreme slipperiness with which (even after its decease) it repeatedly wallowed in dust, until someone, perceiving my fix, good-naturedly instructed me how to carry it by perforating its head with a piece of string.

I found Miss WEE-WEE in a secluded garden seat at the back of the Manse, incommoded, as usual, by the society of Mister CRUM. "Sir," I said, addressing him politely (for I was extremely anxious for his departure, since I could not well present my salmon to Miss WEE-WEE and request the _quid-pro-quo_ of her affection in his presence), "accept my gratitude for the usufruct of your rod, which has produced magnificent fruit. You will find the instrument leaning against the palings of the front garden." And with this I made secret signals to Miss WEE-WEE that she was to dismiss him; but she remained bashful, and he seemed totally unaware that he was the drug of the market!

At last, weary of concealing my captured salmon any longer behind the small of my back, I was about to inform Mister CRUM that he had Miss LOUISA'S permission to absent himself, when she broke the silence by informing me that, as the old familiar friend of both parties, I was to be the first to hear a piece of news--to wit, that DONALD (Mister C.'s baptismal appellation) and she were just become the engaged couple!

I was so overcome by grief and indignation at her perfidious duplicity (since she had frequently encouraged me in my mockeries of her admirer's uncouthness and rusticity), that I stuck in the throat, and then flung the salmon violently across a boundary hedge into a yard of poultry.

"Madam," I said, "that fish was to have been laid at your feet as the visible pledge of my devotion. You have not only lost the gift of a splendid salmon, but have thrown away the heart of a well-educated native B.A. and Member of the Bar! And you have gained--hoity toity! What? Why, a Scotch Bun!"

But almost immediately I was taken by violent remorse for my presumption, and shed the tears of contrition, entreating forgiveness--nay, more, I scrambled through a hole in a very thorny hedge, and, recovering the salmon (which had not had time to become very severely henpecked), I begged them to accept it between them as a token of my esteem and good wishes, which they joyfully consented to do. I had expected that my worthy host and hostess would have shared my astounded disappointment on hearing of their daughter's engagement; but, on the contrary, they received the news with smiling complacency.

It appears that Mister CRUM, though endowed with a somewhat sheepish and bucolical exterior, is of tip-top Scottish caste and lineage, and the landed proprietor.

I am not to deny the attractiveness of such qualities, though I had hitherto been under the Fool's Paradise of an impression that they would have infinitely preferred this humble self as a son-in-law.

However, I am now emerging from my doleful dumps, with the reflection that, after all, it is contrary to common-sense to drain the cup of misery to the dregs for so totally inadequate a cause as the ficklety of any feminine!

XXVII

_Mr Jabberjee is unavoidably compelled to return to town, thereby
affording his Solicitor the inestimable benefit of his personal
assistance. An apparent attempt to pack the Jury._

The Public will be astounded at the news (which came with the perfect novelty of a surprise upon this insignificant self) that I have ceased to be the cherished guest beneath the hired Scottish roof of Mister LEOFRIC ALLBUTT-INNETT and his bucksome lady.

It fell out after this fashion.

One fine September morning, when I was accoutring myself in order to go out and hunt the robert (N.B. a genuine local Scotticism for individuals belonging to the rabbit genius), there came to me my young friend HOWARD, who was to teach my young idea how to shoot, in great gloom, asking me if it would take me a prolonged period to pack up my _impedimenta_.

I replied that I could do the trick instantaneously, inquiring the reason for his question.

"Because," said he, "if I were you, I should have a wire requiring me to come up to London at once."

"From my solicitor?" I inquired. "Is he then desirous of consulting with me?"

My friend answered me that it was the one object of his present existence.

"In that case," said I, rather spiritedly, "let him come up here, since I am not a mountain that I should obey the becking call of any Mahomet. Moreover, I am impatient to achieve the destruction of some Scottish roberts."

"If you will take my advice," he said, "you will grant them a reprieve, and make a scarcity of yourself. There is a train for Glasgow which you can just catch. I wouldn't distress the Mater and Governor by any farewells, you know."

"But," I objected, "I am not even in receipt of any telegram. Nor can I possibly omit the etiquette of a ceremonious leave-taking with your honourable parents."

"Just as you please," replied he. "Just now the Governor and Mater are in the front sitting-room, engaged in perusing the back numbers of your precious 'Jossers and Tidlers' or whatever you call 'em, which have been thoughtfully forwarded by a relative. I don't think I'd disturb them."

"Are they so hugely interested in the performances of my unassuming _penna_?" I cried, with the gratified simpering of a flattered.

"It looked like it when I left the room," said he; "the Mater was very near rolling on the oilcloth, and the Governor dancing and foaming from his mouth. What an awfully old ass you have been, JAB, to go and blurt out everything in print--about your breach of promise case, and getting to know us, and--worst of all--being merely a bogey prince. Naturally, we don't care about being made to look fools. The dear old Mater, you know, is one of those simple, trusting natures that, if they once discover they have been taken in by a sham title, why, they kick up the row of a deuce! And, as for the Governor, he's the sort of old retiring chap that has a downright loathing of publicity, when it makes him ridiculous. If he came across you just now, there's really no saying what he mightn't do. He's such a devilishly hot-tempered old boy!"

I did not comprehend the reasons for such exuberant anger, but, of course, young HOWARD insisted so urgently on physical dangers to myself if I delayed, that I hastened stealthily to my room by a backstair, and flinging my _paraphernalia_ with incredible despatch into a portmanteau, was so fortunate as to convey it out of the house without attracting the invidious attention of my host and hostess, who were probably still occupied in foaming and rolling upon the carpet like angry waves of the sea.

Young HOWARD accompanied me to the station, though blaming me as the cause of his embroilment with his progenitors, who, it seems, had insisted--quite unjustly--that he must have known from the first that my nobility was merely a brevet rank; and Miss WEE-WEE bade me farewell with a soft and perfectly ladylike cordiality, being too grieved by my departure to make any allusion to the head and front of my offending.