Chapter THE EIGHTH (1)

OLIVER WALKS TO LONDON, AND ENCOUNTERS ON THE ROAD
A STRANGE SORT OF YOUNG GENTLEMAN.

Oliver reached the stile at which the by-path terminated, and once more gained the high-road. It was eight o'clock now; and, though he was nearly five miles away from the town, he ran, and hid behind the hedges by turns, till noon, fearing that he might be pursued and overtaken. Then he sat down to rest at the side of a mile-stone, and began to think for the first time where he had better go and try to live.

The stone by which he was seated bore, in large characters, an intimation that it was just seventy miles from that spot to London. The name awakened a new train of ideas in the boy's mind. London!--that great large place!--nobody--not even Mr. Bumble--could ever find him there. He had often heard the old men in the workhouse, too, say that no lad of spirit need want in London, and that there were ways of living in that vast city which those who had been bred up in country parts had no idea of. It was the very place for a homeless boy, who must die in the streets unless some one helped him. As these things passed through his thoughts, he jumped upon his feet, and again walked forward.

He had diminished the distance between himself and London by full four miles more, before he recollected how much he must undergo ere he could hope to reach his place of destination. As this consideration forced itself upon him, he slackened his pace a little, and meditated upon his means of getting there. He had a crust of bread, a coarse shirt, and two pairs of stockings in his bundle; and a penny--a gift of Sowerberry's after some funeral in which he had acquitted himself more than ordinarily well--in his pocket. "A clean shirt," thought Oliver, "is a very comfortable thing,--very; and so are two pairs of darned stockings, and so is a penny; but they are small helps to a sixty-five miles' walk in winter time." But Oliver's thoughts, like those of most other people, although they were extremely ready and active to point out his difficulties, were wholly at a loss to suggest any feasible mode of surmounting them; so, after a good deal of thinking to no particular purpose, he changed his little bundle over to the other shoulder, and trudged on.

Oliver walked twenty miles that day; and all that time tasted nothing but the crust of dry bread, and a few draughts of water which he begged at the cottage-doors by the road-side. When the night came, he turned into a meadow, and, creeping close under a hay-rick, determined to lie there till morning. He felt frightened at first, for the wind moaned dismally over the empty fields, and he was cold and hungry, and more alone than he had ever felt before. Being very tired with his walk, however, he soon fell asleep and forgot his troubles.

He felt cold and stiff when he got up next morning, and so hungry that he was obliged to exchange the penny for a small loaf in the very first village through which he passed. He had walked no more than twelve miles, when night closed in again; for his feet were sore, and his legs so weak that they trembled beneath him. Another night passed in the bleak damp air only made him worse; and, when he set forward on his journey next morning, he could hardly crawl along.

He waited at the bottom of a steep hill till a stage-coach came up, and then begged of the outside passengers; but there were very few who took any notice of him, and even those, told him to wait till they got to the top of the hill, and then let them see how far he could run for a halfpenny. Poor Oliver tried to keep up with the coach a little way, but was unable to do it, by reason of his fatigue and sore feet. When the outsides saw this, they put their halfpence back into their pockets again, declaring that he was an idle young dog, and didn't deserve anything; and the coach rattled away, and left only a cloud of dust behind.

In some villages, large painted boards were fixed up, warning all persons who begged within the district that they would be sent to jail, which frightened Oliver very much, and made him very glad to get out of them with all possible expedition. In others he would stand about the inn-yards, and look mournfully at every one who passed; a proceeding which generally terminated in the landlady's ordering one of the post-boys who were lounging about, to drive that strange boy out of the place, for she was sure he had come to steal something. If he begged at a farmer's house, ten to one but they threatened to set the dog on him; and when he showed his nose in a shop, they talked about the beadle, which brought Oliver's heart up into his mouth,--very often the only thing he had there, for many hours together.

In fact, if it had not been for a good-hearted turnpike-man, and a benevolent old lady, Oliver's troubles would have been shortened by the very same process which put an end to his mother's; in other words, he would most assuredly have fallen dead upon the king's highway. But the turnpike-man gave him a meal of bread and cheese; and the old lady, who had a shipwrecked grandson wandering barefooted in some distant part of the earth, took pity upon the poor orphan, and gave him what little she could afford--and more--with such kind and gentle words, and such tears of sympathy and compassion, that they sank deeper into Oliver's soul than all the sufferings he had ever undergone.

Early on the seventh morning after he had left his native place, Oliver limped slowly into the little town of Barnet. The window-shutters were closed, the street was empty, not a soul had awakened to the business of the day. The sun was rising in all his splendid beauty, but the light only seemed to show the boy his own lonesomeness and desolation as he sat with bleeding feet and covered with dust upon a cold door-step.

By degrees the shutters were opened, the window-blinds were drawn up, and people began passing to and fro. Some few stopped to gaze at Oliver for a moment or two, or turned round to stare at him as they hurried by; but none relieved him, or troubled themselves to inquire how he came there. He had no heart to beg, and there he sat.

He had been crouching on the step for some time, gazing listlessly at the coaches as they passed through, and thinking how strange it seemed that they could do with ease in a few hours what it had taken him a whole week of courage and determination beyond his years to accomplish, when he was roused by observing that a boy who had passed him carelessly some minutes before, had returned, and was now surveying him most earnestly from the opposite side of the way. He took little heed of this at first; but the boy remained in the same attitude of close observation so long, that Oliver raised his head, and returned his steady look. Upon this, the boy crossed over, and, walking close up to Oliver, said,

"Hullo! my covey, what's the row?"

The boy who addressed this inquiry to the young wayfarer was about his own age, but one of the queerest-looking boys that Oliver had ever seen. He was a snub-nosed, flat-browed, common-faced boy enough, and as dirty a juvenile as one would wish to see; but he had got about him all the airs and manners of a man. He was short of his age, with rather bow-legs, and little sharp ugly eyes. His hat was stuck on the top of his head so slightly that it threatened to fall off every moment, and would have done so very often if the wearer had not had a knack of every now and then giving his head a sudden twitch, which brought it back to its old place again. He wore a man's coat, which reached nearly to his heels. He had turned the cuffs back halfway up his arm to get his hands out of the sleeves, apparently with the ultimate view of thrusting them into the pockets of his corduroy trousers, for there he kept them. He was altogether as roystering and swaggering a young gentleman as ever stood three feet six, or something less, in his bluchers.

"Hullo, my covey, what's the row?" said this strange young gentleman to Oliver.

"I am very hungry and tired," replied Oliver, the tears standing in his eyes as he spoke. "I have walked a long way,--I have been walking these seven days."

"Walking for sivin days!" said the young gentleman. "Oh, I see. Beak's order, eh? But," he added, noticing Oliver's look of surprise, "I suppose you don't know wot a beak is, my flash com-pan-i-on."

Oliver mildly replied, that he had always heard a bird's mouth described by the term in question.

"My eyes, how green!" exclaimed the young gentleman. "Why, a beak's a madg'st'rate; and when you walk by a beak's order, it's not straight forerd, but always going up, and nivir coming down agen. Was you never on the mill?"

"What mill?" inquired Oliver.

"What mill!--why, _the_ mill,--the mill as takes up so little room that it'll work inside a stone jug, and always goes better when the wind's low with people than when it's high, acos then they can't get workmen. But come," said the young gentleman; "you want grub, and you shall have it. I'm at low-water-mark,--only one bob and a magpie; but, _as_ far _as_ it goes, I'll fork out and stump. Up with you on your pins. There: now then, morrice."

Assisting Oliver to rise, the young gentleman took him to an adjacent chandler's shop, where he purchased a sufficiency of ready-dressed ham and a half-quartern loaf, or, as he himself expressed it, "a fourpenny bran;" the ham being kept clean and preserved from dust by the ingenious expedient of making a hole in the loaf by pulling out a portion of the crumb, and stuffing it therein. Taking the bread under his arm, the young gentleman turned into a small public-house, and led the way to a tap-room in the rear of the premises. Here, a pot of beer was brought in by the direction of the mysterious youth; and Oliver, falling to, at his new friend's bidding, made a long and hearty meal, during the progress of which the strange boy eyed him from time to time with great attention.

"Going to London?" said the strange boy, when Oliver had at length concluded.

"Yes."

"Got any lodgings?"

"No."

"Money?"

"No."

The strange boy whistled, and put his arms into his pockets as far as the big-coat sleeves would let them go.

"Do you live in London?" inquired Oliver.

"Yes, I do, when I'm at home," replied the boy. "I suppose you want some place to sleep in to-night, don't you?"

"I do indeed," answered Oliver. "I have not slept under a roof since I left the country."

"Don't fret your eyelids on that score," said the young gentleman. "I've got to be in London to-night, and I know a 'spectable old genelman as lives there, wot'll give you lodgings for nothink, and never ask for the change; that is, if any genelman he knows interduces you. And don't he know me?--Oh, no,--not in the least,--by no means,--certainly not."

The young gentleman smiled, as if to intimate that the latter fragments of discourse were playfully ironical, and finished the beer as he did so.

This unexpected offer of shelter was too tempting to be resisted, especially as it was immediately followed up, by the assurance that the old gentleman already referred to, would doubtless provide Oliver with a comfortable place without loss of time. This led to a more friendly and confidential dialogue, from which Oliver discovered that his friend's name was Jack Dawkins, and that he was a peculiar pet and _protegé_ of the elderly gentleman before mentioned.

Mr. Dawkins's appearance did not say a vast deal in favour of the comforts which his patron's interest obtained for those whom he took under his protection; but as he had a somewhat flighty and dissolute mode of conversing, and furthermore avowed that among his intimate friends he was better known by the _sobriquet_ of "The artful Dodger," Oliver concluded that, being of a dissipated and careless turn, the moral precepts of his benefactor had hitherto been thrown away upon him. Under this impression, he secretly resolved to cultivate the good opinion of the old gentleman as quickly as possible; and, if he found the Dodger incorrigible, as he more than half suspected he should, to decline the honour of his farther acquaintance.

As John Dawkins objected to their entering London before nightfall, it was nearly eleven o'clock when they reached the turnpike at Islington. They crossed from the Angel into St. John's-road, struck down the small street which terminates at Sadler's Wells theatre, through Exmouth-street and Coppice-row, down the little court by the side of the workhouse, across the classic ground which once bore the name of Hockley-in-the-hole, thence into Little Saffron-hill, and so into Saffron-hill the Great, along which the Dodger scudded at a rapid pace, directing Oliver to follow close at his heels.

Although Oliver had enough to occupy his attention in keeping sight of his leader, he could not help bestowing a few hasty glances on either side of the way as he passed along. A dirtier or more wretched place he had never seen. The street was very narrow and muddy, and the air was impregnated with filthy odours. There were a good many small shops; but the only stock in trade appeared to be heaps of children, who, even at that time of night, were crawling in and out at the doors, or screaming from the inside. The sole places that seemed to prosper amid the general blight of the place were the public-houses, and in them, the lowest orders of Irish (who are generally the lowest orders of anything) were wrangling with might and main. Covered ways and yards, which here and there diverged from the main street, disclosed little knots of houses where drunken men and women were positively wallowing in the filth; and from several of the doorways, great ill-looking fellows were cautiously emerging, bound, to all appearance, upon no very well-disposed or harmless errands.

Oliver was just considering whether he hadn't better run away, when they reached the bottom of the hill: his conductor, catching him by the arm, pushed open the door of a house near Field-lane, and, drawing him into the passage, closed it behind them.

"Now, then," cried a voice from below, in reply to a whistle from the Dodger.

"_Plummy and slam!_" was the reply.

This seemed to be some watchword or signal that it was all right; for the light of a feeble candle gleamed upon the wall at the farther end of the passage, and a man's face peeped out from where a balustrade of the old kitchen staircase had been broken away.

"There's two on you," said the man, thrusting the candle farther out, and shading his eyes with his hand. "Who's the t'other one?"

"A new pal," replied Jack, pulling Oliver forward.

"Where did he come from?"

"Greenland. Is Fagin up stairs?"

"Yes, he's a sortin' the wipes. Up with you!" The candle was drawn back, and the face disappeared.

Oliver, groping his way with one hand, and with the other firmly grasped by his companion, ascended with much difficulty the dark and broken stairs which his conductor mounted with an ease and expedition that showed he was well acquainted with them. He threw open the door of a back-room, and drew Oliver in after him.

The walls and ceiling of the room were perfectly black with age and dirt. There was a deal-table before the fire, upon which was a candle stuck in a ginger-beer bottle; two or three pewter pots, a loaf and butter, and a plate. In a frying-pan which was on the fire, and which was secured to the mantelshelf by a string, some sausages were cooking; and standing over them, with a toasting-fork in his hand, was a very old shrivelled Jew, whose villanous-looking and repulsive face was obscured by a quantity of matted red hair. He was dressed in a greasy flannel gown, with his throat bare, and seemed to be dividing his attention between the frying-pan and a clothes-horse, over which a great number of silk handkerchiefs were hanging. Several rough beds made of old sacks were huddled side by side on the floor; and seated round the table were four or five boys, none older than the Dodger, smoking long clay pipes and drinking spirits with all the air of middle-aged men. These all crowded about their associate as he whispered a few words to the Jew, and then turned round and grinned at Oliver, as did the Jew himself, toasting-fork in hand.

"This is him, Fagin," said Jack Dawkins; "my friend, Oliver Twist."

The Jew grinned; and, making a low obeisance to Oliver, took him by the hand, and hoped he should have the honour of his intimate acquaintance. Upon this, the young gentlemen with the pipes came round him, and shook both his hands very hard,--especially the one in which he held his little bundle. One young gentleman was very anxious to hang up his cap for him; and another was so obliging as to put his hands in his pockets, in order that, as he was very tired, he might not have the trouble of emptying them when he went to bed. These civilities would probably have been extended much further, but for a liberal exercise of the Jew's toasting-fork on the heads and shoulders of the affectionate youths who offered them.

"We are very glad to see you, Oliver,--very," said the Jew. "Dodger, take off the sausages, and draw a tub near the fire for Oliver. Ah, you're a-staring at the pocket-handkerchiefs! eh, my dear? There are a good many of 'em, ain't there? We've just looked 'em out ready for the wash; that's all, Oliver; that's all. Ha! ha! ha!"

The latter part of this speech was hailed by a boisterous shout from all the hopeful pupils of the merry old gentleman, in the midst of which they went to supper.

Oliver ate his share; and the Jew then mixed him a glass of hot gin and water, telling him he must drink it off directly, because another gentleman wanted the tumbler. Oliver did as he was desired. Almost instantly afterwards, he felt himself gently lifted on to one of the sacks, and then he sunk into a deep sleep.

THE PORTRAIT GALLERY.--No. II.

Dr. Cleaver, whose portrait we next reviewed, displayed a physiognomy widely different from that of DR. DULCET. It did not exhibit any of the milk of human kindness; or, if ever such a benign fluid had circulated in his veins, it had been curded by the rennet of early disappointment in every young hope. The features were stern and inflexible,--cast-iron, moulded by philosophy; a Cynic smile portrayed contempt of the world, or rather of society, such as it then was, is, and most probably ever will be. Yet his rubicond cheeks and vinous nose proclaimed that he was fond of the good things of this perishable globe; and few men, when he had acquired wealth, enjoyed life and its luxuries with greater zest than he did. His maxim was founded on what he would call _the whole duty of man_; which was, _to keep what we get, and to get all we can_.

Edward Cleaver was born in that class of human beings denominated _paupers_. He was ushered into life a burthen on the parish in which he had been found, at the door of a butcher of the name of Cleaver, (whose patronymic was generously bestowed on him,) in a condition as natural as his birth. Cleaver was a man of a _serious_ way of thinking; and, fearing that the adoption of an orphan infant might asperse his sanctimonious character, and thereby injure his trade, very properly sent the child to the parish officers. These worthies would willingly have made him paternise the thing; but he had evidence of its having been found abandoned in the street.

Whether a burthen be carried by a body corporate or an individual, it is nevertheless an obnoxious incumbrance, of which the bearer is anxious to rid himself as soon as he possibly can; and therefore, maugre the puling and mawkish cant of some would-be philanthropic scribblers, a parish has just the same right to grumble at a burthen, and cast it off as feasibly as may be, as a hod-bearer to relieve himself of his load, a donkey of his panniers, or a nursery-maid of a squalling and ponderous brat. Therefore, overseers are perfectly justifiable in having recourse to all the industrious methods that sound political economy can suggest to shake off the taxation imposed upon their parishioners by improvidence and vice. However, all their ingenuity could not prevent the growth of Ned Cleaver, who attained the age of seven, illustrating the fact, that vital air can support the functions of life with the aid of but little sustenance: and the imp was so hale and hearty, that they thought him "ragged and tough" enough for anything, and sent him to sea.

To relate his mishaps as a cabin-boy on board a collier would fill a volume; suffice it to say, the lad was naturally stubborn, and would not be persuaded that he was created to work without sufficient food, and get thrashed in lieu of wages; and finding, to use the old joke, that, although he was _bred_ to the sea, the sea was not _bread_ to him, he decamped at Plymouth, and joined a company of strolling tumblers, hurdy-gurdy players, and mountebanks, that were travelling about the country.

Ned had now attained is sixteenth year, and had perfected himself; in forecastle and caboose, in various accomplishments; he could sing a slang-song, chop his jaws in various modulations, was a very _Moscheles_ on the salt-box, danced a hornpipe, mimicked all sorts of infirmities, and could make the most horrible faces, that would so disfigure him that no one could recognise his natural features, which were uncommonly handsome; so much so indeed, that he became a great favourite of the ladies of the company: but, although he _ruled the roost_ with the fair sex, he was scurvily _basted_ upon every trivial occasion by the gentlemen performers, and was therefore not much better off on land, than when at sea he was flogged up aloft to reef, or flogged down to the salutary exercise of the _holy stone_, which would teach the most impious chap to pray. Cleaver, therefore, betook himself to his _lower extremities_ in the neighbourhood of London; and, once more a _filius populi_, threw himself in the tide of our population in search of work and food. For several days he strayed about this wealthy metropolis, and was well-nigh proving the veracity of those sapient legislators, who maintain that such vagabonds have _no business to live_,--which is indeed a truism. Happily for our young vagrant, he one night fell in with a drunken old man who was endeavouring to chalk upon the walls, in gigantic letters, the name of a celebrated physician. It immediately occurred to Master Ned that, if he could afford assistance to the staggering artist, he, in return, might afford him some relief. It was a providential inspiration. Ned helped his new-made acquaintance to what he politely termed his _boozing ken_,[89] where he was feasted with a _blow-out_ of what his patron called _grub and bub_ (_Anglicè_, victuals and drink); and, after enjoying a delicious night's rest in an Irish _dry lodging_ upon wet straw, he was admitted as an assistant in the chalking line, at sixpence per diem. His master, who when sober could not read, would oftentimes make sad mistakes when he was, in every sense of the denomination, a "_knight of the brush and moon_,"--which, in the language of the holy land, meaneth "_in the wind_,"--and our apprentice soon became an indispensable assistant, since his master could earn six shillings a day, and get as drunk as a lord, by paying him sixpence out of his salary. Now, although our youth was not ungrateful, yet he was ambitious, and he could not see the reason why such a disproportion in the wages of labour should exist; he one morning took it into his head to work on his own bottom, and therefore presented himself to his chief employer, a Dr. Doall, with the abominable intention of basely undermining his benefactor at half-price.

[89] A pot-house lodging.

Doall was much pleased with his appearance and his candour, but still more with his proposal; and Ned was forthwith taken into his service. His occupation _merely_ consisted in cleaning the whole house, answering the door, running errands, helping to cook the dinner, serving at table, pounding medicines, washing dishes, scouring knives and forks, and blacking shoes, _mooning_ about the streets at night chalking his master's name, and during his leisure moments he was advised to study physic, and wash out phials and gallipots; for which services he was put upon board wages, at the rate of ninepence per diem. All these duties he fulfilled most cheerfully, for he had an incentive to his labours. Next to good living--when he could get it--Cleaver was a warm admirer of the fair sex, even when hungry; and, when beauty drank to him with her eyes, he would have pledged her in small-beer as rapturously as in half-and-half. Doall had a daughter, an only child; she was remarkable for her beauty, and no less recommendable by her accomplishments. She was ever engaged in reading novels and plays, could strum upon the guitar, and all day long, was either singing or spouting: our apprentice looked upon her as the paragon all loveliness. If he admired her, he soon perceived that his youth, his innocence, and perhaps his good figure, had produced a favourable impression upon the maiden. A conversation with her father confirmed the surmises of vanity, when he overheard her sweet voice admitting that he was a _monstrous nice_ young fellow, and impressing upon her father the propriety of giving him decent clothes, and making him look like a gentleman.

This conversation had the "desired effect." Ned was sent to suit himself in Monmouth-street, cooky allowed him to dip his crust in the dripping-pan on roasting-days; and, although on board wages, Emmelina, the doctor's lovely daughter, permitted him a fair run of his teeth when her father was out. As the cook was often junketing with her lover, the sexton of the parish, she did not grudge him these little advantages.

One morning, just as he had come home from chalking, the doctor called him, and bidding him be seated, (a most unexpected honour, which nearly drove the lad out of his senses,) he informed him that he was highly satisfied with his conduct, would henceforth allow him four pounds a year wages, and pay him by the job for other services, which were to commence by his _doing fits_; so saying, he gave him a treatise on epilepsy, and bidding him study the symptoms, he left him, slipping half-a-crown into his hand.

The enchanted Cleaver was not long in understanding the doctor's intentions, and sedulously applied himself to acquire the means of qualifying himself for his novel occupation; although he was rather staggered when he read the following: "The patient falls down without any previous notice, his eyes are so distorted that only the whites of them are to be seen, his fists are clenched, he foams at the mouth, thrusts out his tongue, and his body and limbs are agitated and convulsed. After a continuance of this terrific state, the symptoms gradually abate; but the patient continues looking wildly and vacantly around him, perfectly unconscious of what has passed." Cleaver immediately proceeded to make the most awful faces in his looking-glass, till he actually frightened himself into the belief that a real fit was coming on. Delighted with his attempt, no sooner had Doall returned, than Cleaver fell down in the hall, in all the fearful distortions of an epileptic.

"Bravo!--bravo!" exclaimed the doctor;--"admirable!--excellent!"

"Delicious!--wonderful!--he's a very artist. Oh, what a tragedian he would make!" exclaimed the daughter; "how charmingly he would die!

'Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold,--
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes!'"

"I'll be d--d if he hasn't, though!" replied Doall; "and if this chap does not make his way in the world, I'll swallow a peck of my own _anti-omnibus pills_. Now mutter away, my boy--more foam--more foam--that's it!--now for a kick--that's your sort!--clench your fist--capital! capital! Now, my fine fellow, get up, and I'll renovate you with some of my _cardiac anti-nervous balm_;" and, so saying, he took out of his closet a small bottle which contained the aforesaid liquor, which was neither more nor less than a dram for ladies, who dared not indulge in more vulgar potations, and which I afterwards found was composed of cherry-bounce, Curaçoa, Cayenne pepper, ginger, and some other drug of a most stimulating nature, which once recommended a certain holy man to a certain great personage;--a fact which may be now noticed, since both parties are in the _Elysian_ Fields.

It was now settled that the following day at four o'clock, Cleaver was to fall down in a fit in Albemarle-street, at the door of a fashionable family-hotel, the doctor driving past at the very time. In a moment he had collected a crowd around him. One exclaimed, "The fellow's drunk!"--another bystander maintained it was apoplexy; a second, epilepsy; and an old woman assured the group that it was catalepsy. The lad's face was sprinkled with kennel water, hartshorn charitably applied to his nostrils, and a stick humanely crammed between his teeth for fear he should bite his tongue. On a sudden, and to his infinite satisfaction, Doall jumped out of his job-fly, and, after looking at the patient for a moment, observed that it was an _attack of idiopathic epilepsy, arising from a determination of the sanguineous system to the encephalon_. This learned illustration proclaimed the man of science, and every one made way for him with becoming respect. Our esculapius then took out a small phial from his pocket, and, pouring two or three drops into Ned's foaming mouth, he added, "These drops are infallible in recovering people from all sorts of sympathetic, symptomatic, and idiopathic attacks;" when Cleaver immediately opened his eyes, looked around him with a vacant stare, to the great amazement of every one present, and in a stuttering voice asked where he was. The doctor generously told him where he lived in a loud and audible manner, gave him half-a-crown, and was about ascending his pill-box, after bidding him call upon him in a day or two, when a servant in a splendid livery stepped forward from the hotel, and informed him that Lady Coverley wished to see him. He was immediately ushered into the presence of a superannuated countess, just arrived from the country.

"My dear sir!" she exclaimed, "I am positively the most fortunate woman in the world, to have thus accidentally met with such a prodigy. I witnessed your wonderful cure upon that poor creature, and I must absolutely get you to see my daughter Virgy. All the physicians in town have attended her, and I do declare I think they have done her more harm than good. When Lord Coverley arrives with Lady Virginia, Virgy shall see you immediately; I declare she must."

Doall bowed obsequiously, tendered his address, and, slipping half-a-guinea into the footman's hand, drove off, not without having heard the servant proclaim to all around, "that he was the cleverest man in _Lunnun_, and beat out all other doctors by _chalks_;" the fellow being little aware at the time that his vulgar expression was so applicable.

The doctor was fortunate. Lady Virginia, a nervous, romantic fidget, had been reduced by bleeding, starving, and other expedients, to _linger long_; and in a short time Doall, having discovered that she was in love, recommended marriage, with repeated doses of his "_cardiac anti-nervous balm_;" his prescription effected a perfect cure.

Cleaver was now in great favour, and every day proved to him that the doctor's daughter's partiality was assuming a more affectionate character. One morning he was pounding some combustible drugs in a mortar, when Emmelina familiarly entered into conversation with him. After having asked him various questions about his parentage,--when she heard that he was an orphan, she expressed great sympathy. She then reverted to her favourite topic, the drama; and asked him if he often went to the play.

"Only once, miss," he replied.

"And what was the performance?"

"Romeo and Juliet."

"Delightful piece! How did you like the garden scene, Edward?

'See how she leans her cheek upon that hand!
O that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek!'

And tell me, Edward," she continued with great emotion, "did you not weep?"

"Oh, bitterly!" he sighed; "bitterly!"

"I'm sure you did. When he takes the deadly draught, and says,

'Here's to my love! Oh, true apothecary,
Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.'"

Unfortunately the enraptured girl suited her action to the words, and imitating Romeo casting from him the fatal phial, she seized a bottle of some diabolical ingredient, and threw it into the mortar. A tremendous detonation followed, blowing up the stuff Cleaver was pounding, singeing all his hair and burning his face.

Emmelina's terror at this accident was as great as the pain it had inflicted; and Cleaver was bellowing, and stamping, and kicking, when fortunately Doall came in. The poor sufferer expected some immediate relief from his skill, but was amazed to see him draw back with looks of admiration, and exclaim, "Beautiful, by Jupiter!--beautiful!--Oh, what a thought!--what a grand idea!--beautiful!"

Emmelina entreated him to dress Ned's scalds, which he set about doing with hesitation, ever and anon stepping back to gaze upon him with delight; and, having applied some ointment to his face, he thus proceeded:

"Edward, my boy, I love you, I admire you; your fits have worked wonders, and I have now to put your skill to another trial. The accident that has just blown you up, has admirably suited you for my purpose. I shall--what do I say?--_we_ shall make a fortune. I must send you on an important mission: you must know that the very ingredients you were pulverising were for the preparation of a remedy of my invention, which infallibly cures carbuncly noses; when I say cures, I mean white-washing them, that they may break out again as extravagantly as they chuse in other hands. Now, the eldest son of Lord Doodly has a nose--that I must have hold of: oh, such a nose! like--like----"

"A will-o'-the-wisp," exclaimed his daughter.

"A most appropriate simile," rejoined the doctor. "Well, Edward, see here; his conk is nothing to the one you shall wear:" and, so saying, he drew forth from a drawer a most horrible snout of wax, ingeniously fixed upon leather; and, applying it to the youth's face, he was actually struck with horror when he beheld himself in the glass. Emmelina shrieked, and her father roared out in raptures, "Admirable! the scalds on your face will add to the beauty of your countenance."

It was arranged that, on the following day Cleaver was to start by the stage for Southampton, where Lord Doodly and his son resided. He was there to sport his awful nose in churches, theatres, public walks, until the whole town should call him "the wretch with the horrible nose!" According to agreement, after a tender farewell scene with Emmelina, he proceeded on his journey; but as he was stepping into the coach at the Golden Cross, a lady with a child upon her lap shrieked out most vehemently, exclaiming, "Coach! guard! coach! let me out--let me out! I will not travel if that there gentleman comes in, with his nose."

"What! ma'am," replied the coachman: "would you have the gemman travel without his snorter to accommodate you?"

"Oh! I shall faint; I will faint! Oh! sir, take that nose away!"

Cleaver began to wink and blink most awfully.

"Let me out! let me out! Oh Lord! where could a man get such a nose!"

Cleaver pretended to suffer most cruelly, and clapped his handkerchief to his face in apparent agony.

"It's not a nose," exclaimed a gaunt East Indian in a corner, just awaking from a doze: "it's more like the proboscis of a rhinoceros: it is a disease which we call in Bengal an elephantiasis; and, egad! I'll get out of the coach also, for it's the most d--nable infectious disorder next to leprosy."

"Oh, Gracious!" shrieked the lady, rushing out; "my darling infant has caught it; my Tommy, my jewel, will have an elephant's nose!"

"It's a shame," exclaimed the nabob. "I'll complain to the proprietors. One might as well travel with the plague, and go to bed to the cholera morbus. Let me out, coachy! let me out this instant!"

Coachy now began to apprehend the consequences of a complaint from a person of much weight in Southampton, and politely begged of Cleaver to take an outside seat. The travellers on the top of the coach were as much terrified as the inside ones; and Cleaver was forced to sit on the box next to the driver, who sported an enormous mangel-wurzel smeller of his own, and seemed much amused with the terrors of his passengers.

Cleaver's expedition was most prosperous. He terrified gipsy parties at Netly, shocked the members of the Yacht Club, interrupted the sketches of tourists, and kept High-street, above and below bar, in a state of constant consternation, after having been refused admittance into half of the hotels. The very parish beadles seemed to have an eye to his nose. In short, the Strasburg burghers had not been more terrified with the sneezer of Han Kenbergins's traveller, than were the good people of Southampton with that of their visitor. Having thus brought his snout into notoriety, he returned to town on a day when he had discovered that Lord Doodly's butler was going up. The conversation naturally fell upon noses, as the butler declared that he never in all his born days had seen such a pair of nozzles as Cleaver's and his young master's. Our adventurer then informed him that there was only _one doctor upon earth_ who could cure such terrific diseases, and him he was going up to consult. His fellow traveller of course observed, that if he could cure _his_ scent-box he could cure anything; and Cleaver promised him, over a tankard of ale, to let him hear from him if he was so fortunate as to get rid of his distressing disorder.

Two months after, a loud ringing announced a stranger at the gate of Doodly Hall. It was Cleaver, with his natural facial handle, asking for the butler. Overjoyed at a discovery so acceptable to his master, who, in return for his services, might be disposed to overlook his spoliations with more indulgence, Cleaver was introduced by him to the family, who all recollected his former frightful appearance. Lord Impy, the heir of the title and estate, was forthwith sent to London to be placed under Doall's care. Again he had the good fortune to relieve him, and his fame had spread far and near, ere the nasal conflagration broke out again with redoubled virulence.

Cleaver's services were soon requited by the hand of Emmelina, and a partnership in _the board_. He gradually acquired a smattering of medical knowledge; and, being well aware that affable manners bring on conversation, and conversation tends to draw out ignorance, he very wisely assumed a haughty, and at times a brutal manner; making it a rule never to answer a question, and requesting his patients to hold their tongues when they presumed to trespass on their ailments. His unmannerly behaviour was called _frankness_, his silence _erudition_, and his insolence _independence_. He thus became one of the wealthiest quacks in London. His romantic Emmelina for some time rendered him most miserable; but, fortunately for him, she one night set fire to the house while performing "_The Devil to pay_" in her private theatricals, and was duly consumed with the premises. With his usual good luck, they had been insured for three times their value; and the doctor was enabled to move to a more fashionable part of the West End, with the additional _puff of a fire, a burnt wife, and a disconsolate husband_!

The librarian proceeded to relate the adventures of various other medical men; and we then entered an adjoining room, hung round with portraits of distinguished characters, amongst whom I was particularly anxious to learn the history of the once popular patriot, SIR RUBY RATBOROUGH.

PETER PLUMBAGO'S CORRESPONDENCE.

Dear Tom,--I'm aware you will need no apology
For a nice short epistle concerning geology;
The subject perhaps has been worn to a thread,--
But I can't drive _Philosophy_ out of my head!
Before the great meeting in Bristol, no doubt
It was harder to drive such a thing in than out;
But a one-pound subscription once placing it there,
It takes root in the brain, and sprouts faster than hair:
So that, though I get lectures at night from the wife of me,
I can't pluck Philosophy out for the life of me.

Well, Tom,--a prime fellow, brimfull of divinity,
Told jokes about chaos and bones to infinity;
And proved that the world (this he firmly believes)
Long before Adam's day had seen thousands of EVES!
Now, Tom, do you know in this earth that so great a
Proportion of hard rocks inclining in strata
Is caked with dead lizards and crocodiles' bone,
That a singular fact's incontestably shown--
Viz. ALL FLESH (WHICH IS GRASS) MUST IN TIME BECOME STONE!
Either limestone, or crystal, or mineral salt,
(Vide specim.) Lot's wife--crystallized "in a _fault_."
Fancy, Tom, that your skull may come under the chisel,
And turn out a filter for water to drizzle!
Or imagine the rubicund nose of our uncle,
In some fair lady's brooch, blazing forth a carbuncle!
Though learning is grand, and one labours to win it,
There perhaps lurks a something distressing, Tom, in it.
Thus, whate'er our good character while our life lasted,
When turned into rocks, may we not, Tom, be blasted?
However refined were our tastes and behaviour,
When slabs, to be thumped by the vulgarest pavior!
Who knows but that Newton's immortalised pate
May not some day become a dull schoolboy's old slate;
That head, which threw such astonishing light upon
The secrets of nature--a ninny to write upon!
Man's knowledge is ignorance, wisdom is folly;
The more philosophic, the more melancholy.

But, Tom, I've a theory,--my own, Tom,--my pet,
Though not quite mature to be published as yet,
Next year I expect 'twill be brought to perfection,
And be read at the great Geological Section.
The subject of FROGS having pleased the community,
(A subject on which none may gibe with impunity,)
It struck me the cold-blooded matter they own
Must be midway 'twixt animal substance and stone.
They have heads, so have we!--and no tails, so have rocks!--
They've no red blood, like pebbles! but two eyes, like cocks!
Then again,--unlike Christians, with warm, "vital spark,"--
They are cold, so are flints! a strong circumstance--mark!
An argument _some_ use--there is not much in 't,
That stones have no skins--Hah! then what's a _skin flint_?
Every day, Tom, I feel more secure my position,
_Frogs_ are ANIMAL ROCKS _in a state of transition_!
If I prove this,--and savans but act with propriety,--
I'm sure to preside at the Royal Society!
Then think, Tom, the glory of Bristol! a resident
Elected in London, to sit as the President!
Hark! I hear, Tom, my unphilosophic virago
Of a wife! I must finish--
Yours, PETER PLUMBAGO.
October 14th, 1836.

THE BLUE WONDER.[90]
A MARRIAGE ON CREDIT.

[90] This story has been adapted from the German of Zschokke.

Doctor Falcon looked one way, and pretty Susan looked another, as it has been customary for young people to do, from the remotest antiquity. The doctor was a very pretty fellow, had been to two universities, had walked the hospitals of Vienna, Milan, and Pavia, and had learned so much that there was not one of his craft better able than himself to post his patients to a better world according to the most legitimate principles of the most modern systems of the medical art. But science such as this, is not to be acquired for nothing; it had cost our worthy doctor nearly every penny of his modest patrimony. "Never mind!" thought he to himself; "when I get home, I'll marry some rich girl or other, who may take a fancy to become the doctor's lady; and so both our turns will be served."

But what are the wisest resolutions against the eloquence of a pretty face? Susan was as pretty as a lover could wish her; she felt the best disposition in the world to become a doctor's lady, but then she had no money.

"Never mind, my dear Susan!" said the doctor, as he impressed a kiss on the lips of the weeping maid; "you see, a doctor must marry, else people have no confidence in him. You will bring me _credit_, credit will bring me _patients_, the patients money, and, if they should fail, we have good expectations. Your aunt, Miss Sarah Bugle, is forty odd, not far from fifty, and rich enough for the seventh part of her fortune to help us out of all our trouble. We may venture something upon that!"

Heavens! what will a young girl not venture for her lover! Susan's mother had nothing to object, nor her father either, for they were both in heaven; and her guardian was well pleased to see his ward form a respectable connexion. Her aunt, Sarah, was also well-pleased, though, in general, she was little friendly to wedding of any kind: but, as long as Susan remained unmarried, she saw very clearly that she would every year be obliged to make some pecuniary advances to the worthy guardian; and Miss Sarah Bugle was rather stingy, or, as she was herself wont to say, "she had not a penny more than she wanted."

Well: Susan became Mrs. Falcon, and the doctor looked most industriously out of his windows to see the customers pour into his house, on the strength of his increased claims to credit. They came very sparingly; but in their stead there appeared every year, a little merry face that had never been seen in the house before, to augment the parental joys of Doctor Falcon and his lady. Sometimes the doctor would pass his finger, cogitatingly, behind his left ear; but what could that avail him? There was no driving the little Falcons out of the nest. They could not cut their bread into thinner slices, for the children must live; but the doctress made her soups thinner. However, they all seemed to thrive,--father, mother, and the four little ones. They sat on wooden benches and straw chairs as comfortably as they could have done on quilted cushions; they slept soundly on hard mattresses, and wore no costly garments, being well contented if they could keep themselves neatly and respectably clad. And this was an art in which Susan was a perfect adept; everything in her house looked so pretty and neat, that you would have sworn the doctor must have been extremely well off. "How they manage to do it, I can't think!" Aunt Sarah would often exclaim. "It's a blue wonder to me!"

Not that it was always sunshine: there were days when the exchequer was quite exhausted; and sometimes whole weeks would elapse without a single dollar finding its way into the house. But then it was always some consolation to know that Aunt Sarah was rich, and sickly, and growing old; and, the worse matters looked at home, the more hopeful they always became at the maiden's mansion.

EXPECTING HEIRS.

The doctor and Susan reckoned rather too confidently on the inheritance of the aunt; for, even supposing that the dear old lady had been so near to her beatification as her loving friends imagined, still it was matter of speculation whether her dear niece would or would not be her heir. The sighing pair of wedded lovers stood indeed most in need of the inheritance: but it so happened that there was another niece, married to one Lawyer Tweezer; not to speak of two nephews, the Reverend Primarius Bugle, and a certain doctor of philosophy of the same name. Their claims were all as strong as those of Susan and her husband, and all looked forward with equal longing to the ascension of the blessed virgin.

Bugle, the philosopher, had perhaps least cause of all. He was rich enough; and, while enjoying the delicacies of his table, and smacking his lips after his Burgundy, his philosophy was perfectly edifying to his guests. We have a proof of his acuteness in a work of his, in five volumes, now forgotten, but once immortal, entitled "_The Wise Man surrounded by the Evils of Life_;" in which he proved that there was no such thing as suffering in the world; that pain of every kind was the mere creature of imagination; and that all a man had to do, was to contemplate every object on the agreeable side.

Accordingly, he always contemplated his aunt on the _agreeable_, namely, on her _money_ side. He visited her assiduously, often invited her to dinner, sent her all sorts of tit-bits from his kitchen, and was accordingly honoured with the appellation of her "own darling nephew."

He would have succeeded well enough with his philosophy, had not his cousin, the Reverend Primarius Bugle, by means of his theology, exercised great influence over the aunt. She was very pious and devout, contemned the vanities of the world, visited the congregations of the godly, in which the spiritual bugle at times was heard to utter a loud strain, and was mightily comforted by the visits of her reverend nephew, who joined her frequently in her devotions, and gave her pretty clearly to understand, that, without his assistance, she would find it difficult to prepare her soul for its future blissful abode. When, sighing and with weeping eyes, she would come from the edifying discourses of her godly nephew, she would call him the saviour of her soul, her greatest of benefactors, and promise to think of him in her last hour. This was music to the ears of the theologian. "I can scarcely fail to be the sole legatee," he would think to himself; "or, as our pious aunt is wont to say, it would be a blue wonder indeed."

Nor would his calculation have been a bad one, but for his cousin Lawyer Tweezer; whose legal ability made him a man of great importance to the aunt. The chaste Sarah did indeed despise the Mammon of unrighteousness, and sincerely pitied the grovelling children of the world; but on that very account she did her best to detach them from their Mammon, or at least their Mammon from them, which is all the same. She lent money on high interest and good security, and worked so diligently for the salvation of those who borrowed from her, that they were always sure to became poorer and poorer under her ministration. "Blessed are the poor!" she would exclaim when they were paying her interest on interest; "if I could have my way, I would have the whole town poor, that they might all inherit the kingdom of heaven. The less people have in this world, the more they will long for the world to come."

It would sometimes happen, however, that the pious maid was carried too far by her virtuous zeal for the future welfare of her neighbours; so that, what with her securities, and her compound interest, and the wickedness of her debtors, she would occasionally find herself involved in disputes and litigation. Without the aid of Lawyer Tweezer, who was universally looked on as the most cunning pettifogger in the whole town, she would frequently have seen interest and principal slipping through her fingers. But, between her piety, and his cunning and obduracy, a poor debtor was fain to bundle with bag and baggage out of his house, rather than a single guilder she had lent out, should miss its way back to her strong-box.