Chapter XXIV (2)

The gentle reader, who has overheard their talk, will understand the doubts which pervaded the mind of the lovely Fatima, and the well-nurtured English maiden will participate in the divided feelings which rent her bosom. 'Tis true, that on his departure for the holy wars, Romane and Fatima were plighted to each other; but the folly of long engagements is proverbial; and though for many months the faithful and affectionate girl had looked in vain for news from him, her admirable parents had long spoken with repugnance of a match which must bring inevitable poverty to both parties. They had suffered, 'tis true, the engagement to subside, hostile as they ever were to it; but when on the death of the ninth lady of Barbazure, the noble baron remarked Fatima at the funeral, and rode home with her after the ceremony, her prudent parents saw how much wiser, better, happier for their child it would be to have for life a partner like the baron, than to wait the doubtful return of the penniless wanderer to whom she was plighted.

Ah! how beautiful and pure a being! how regardless of self! how true to duty! how obedient to parental command, is that earthly angel, a well-bred woman of genteel family! Instead of indulging in splenetic refusals or vain regrets for her absent lover, the exemplary Fatima at once signified to her excellent parents her willingness to obey their orders; though she had sorrows (and she declared them to be tremendous), the admirable being disguised them so well, that none knew they oppressed her. She said she would try to forget former ties, and (so strong in her mind was DUTY above every other feeling!--so strong may it be in every British maiden!) the lovely girl kept her promise. “My former engagements,” she said, packing up Romane's letters and presents, (which, as the good knight was mortal poor, were in sooth of no great price)--“my former engagements I look upon as childish follies;--my affections are fixed where my dear parents graft them--on the noble, the princely, the polite Barbazure. 'Tis true he is not comely in feature, but the chaste and well-bred female knows how to despise the fleeting charms of form. 'Tis true he is old; but can woman be better employed than in tending her aged and sickly companion? That he has been married is likewise certain--but ah, my mother! who knows not that he must be a good and tender husband, who, nine times wedded, owns that, he cannot be happy without another partner?”

It was with these admirable sentiments the lovely Fatima proposed obedience to her parents' will, and consented to receive the magnificent marriage-gift presented to her by her gallant bridegroom.

III.

The old Countess of Chacabacque had made a score of vain attempts to see her hapless daughter. Ever, when she came, the porters grinned at her savagely through the grating of the portcullis of the vast embattled gate of the Castle of Barbazure, and rudely bade her begone. “The Lady of Barbazure sees nobody but her confessor, and keeps her chamber,” was the invariable reply of the dogged functionaries to the entreaties of the agonized mother. And at length, so furious was he at her perpetual calls at his gate, that the angry Lord of Barbazure himself, who chanced to be at the postern, armed a cross-bow, and let fly an arblast at the crupper of the lady's palfrey, whereon she fled finally, screaming, and in terror. “I will aim at the rider next time!” howled the ferocious baron, “and not at the horse!” And those who knew his savage nature and his unrivalled skill as a bowman, knew that he would neither break his knightly promise nor miss his aim.

Since the fatal day when the Grand Duke of Burgundy gave his famous passage of arms at Nantes, and all the nobles of France were present at the joustings, it was remarked that the Barbazure's heart was changed towards his gentle and virtuous lady.

For the three first days of that famous festival, the redoubted Baron of Barbazure had kept the field against all the knights who entered. His lance bore everything down before it. The most famous champions of Europe, assembled at these joustings, had dropped, one by one, before this tremendous warrior. The prize of the tourney was destined to be his, and he was to be proclaimed bravest of the brave, as his lady was the fairest of the fair.

On the third day, however, as the sun was declining over the Vosges, and the shadows were lengthening over the plain where the warrior had obtained such triumphs;--after having overcome two hundred and thirteen knights of different nations, including the fiery Dunois, the intrepid Walter Manny, the spotless Bayard, and the undaunted Dugueselin, as the conqueror sat still erect on his charger, and the multitudes doubted whether ever another champion could be found to face him, three blasts of a trumpet were heard, faint at first, but at every moment ringing more clearly, until a knight in pink armor rode into the lists with his visor down, and riding a tremendous dun charger, which he managed to the admiration of all present.

The heralds asked him his name and quality.

“Call me,” said he, in a hollow voice, “the Jilted Knight.” What was it made the Lady of Barbazure tremble at his accents.

The knight refused to tell his name and qualities; but the companion who rode with him, the young and noble Philibert de Coquelicot, who was known and respected universally through the neighborhood, gave a warranty for the birth and noble degree of the Jilted Knight--and Raoul de Barbazure, yelling hoarsely for a two-hundred-and-fourteenth lance, shook the huge weapon in the air as though it were a reed, and prepared to encounter the intruder.

According to the wont of chivalry, and to keep the point of the spear from harm, the top of the unknown knight's lance was shielded with a bung, which the warrior removed; and galloping up to Barbazure's pavilion, over which his shield hung, touched that noble cognizance with the sharpened steel. A thrill of excitement ran through the assembly at this daring challenge to a combat a l'outrance. “Hast thou confessed, Sir Knight?” roared the Barbazure; “take thy ground, and look to thyself; for by heaven thy last hour is come!” “Poor youth, poor youth!” sighed the spectators; “he has called down his own fate.” The next minute the signal was given, and as the simoom across the desert, the cataract down the rock, the shell from the howitzer, each warrior rushed from his goal.

*****

“Thou wilt not slay so good a champion?” said the Grand Duke, as at the end of that terrific combat the knight in rose armor stood over his prostrate foe, whose helmet had rolled off when he was at length unhorsed, and whose bloodshot eyes glared unutterable hate and ferocity on his conqueror.

“Take thy life,” said he who had styled himself the Jilted Knight; “thou hast taken all that was dear to me.” And the sun setting, and no other warrior appearing to do battle against him, he was proclaimed the conqueror, and rode up to the duchess's balcony to receive the gold chain which was the reward of the victor. He raised his visor as the smiling princess guerdoned him--raised it, and gave ONE sad look towards the Lady Fatima at her side!

“Romane de Clos-Vougeot!” shrieked she, and fainted. The Baron of Barbazure heard the name as he writhed on the ground with his wound, and by his slighted honor, by his broken ribs, by his roused fury, he swore revenge; and the Lady Fatima, who had come to the tourney as a queen, returned to her castle as a prisoner.

(As it is impossible to give the whole of this remarkable novel, let it suffice to say briefly here, that in about a volume and a half, in which the descriptions of scenery, the account of the agonies of the baroness, kept on bread and water in her dungeon, and the general tone of morality, are all excellently worked out, the Baron de Barbazure resolves upon putting his wife to death by the hands of the public executioner.)

*****

Two minutes before the clock struck noon, the savage baron was on the platform to inspect the preparation for the frightful ceremony of mid-day.

The block was laid forth--the hideous minister of vengeance, masked and in black, with the flaming glaive in his hand, was ready. The baron tried the edge of the blade with his finger, and asked the dreadful swordsman if his hand was sure? A nod was the reply of the man of blood. The weeping garrison and domestics shuddered and shrank from him. There was not one there but loved and pitied the gentle lady.

Pale, pale as a stone, she was brought from her dungeon. To all her lord's savage interrogatories, her reply had been, “I am innocent.” To his threats of death, her answer was, “You are my lord; my life is in your hands, to take or to give.” How few are the wives, in our day, who show such angelic meekness! It touched all hearts around her, save that of the implacable Barbazure! Even the Lady Blanche, (Fatima's cousin), whom he had promised to marry upon his faithless wife's demise, besought for her kinswoman's life, and a divorce; but Barbazure had vowed her death.

“Is there no pity, sir?” asked the chaplain who had attended her.

“No pity?” echoed the weeping serving-maid.

“Did I not aye say I would die for my lord?” said the gentle lady, and placed herself at the block.

Sir Raoul de Barbazure seized up the long ringlets of her raven hair. “Now!” shouted he to the executioner, with a stamp of his foot--“Now strike!”

The man (who knew his trade) advanced at once, and poised himself to deliver his blow: and making his flashing sword sing in the air, with one irresistible, rapid stroke, it sheared clean off the head of the furious, the bloodthirsty, the implacable Baron de Barbazure!

Thus he fell a victim to his own jealousy: and the agitation of the Lady Fatima may be imagined, when the executioner, flinging off his mask, knelt gracefully at her feet, and revealed to her the well-known features of Romane de Clos-Vougeot.

LORDS AND LIVERIES.

BY THE AUTHORESS OF “DUKES AND DEJEUNERS,” “HEARTS AND DIAMONDS,” “MARCHIONESSES AND MILLINERS,” ETC. ETC.

I.

“CORBLEU! What a lovely creature that was in the Fitzbattleaxe box to-night,” said one of a group of young dandies who were leaning over the velvet-cushioned balconies of the “Coventry Club,” smoking their full-flavored Cubas (from Hudson's) after the opera.

Everybody stared at such an exclamation of enthusiasm from the lips of the young Earl of Bagnigge, who was never heard to admire anything except a coulis de dindonneau a la St. Menehould, or a supreme de cochon en torticolis a la Piffarde; such as Champollion, the chef of the “Traveller's,” only knows how to dress; or the bouquet of a flask of Medoc, of Carbonell's best quality; or a goutte of Marasquin, from the cellars of Briggs and Hobson.

Alured de Pentonville, eighteenth Earl of Bagnigge, Viscount Paon of Islington, Baron Pancras, Kingscross, and a Baronet, was, like too many of our young men of ton, utterly blase, although only in his twenty-fourth year. Blest, luckily, with a mother of excellent principles (who had imbued his young mind with that Morality which is so superior to all the vain pomps of the world!) it had not been always the young earl's lot to wear the coronet for which he now in sooth cared so little. His father, a captain of Britain's navy, struck down by the side of the gallant Collingwood in the Bay of Fundy, left little but his sword and spotless name to his young, lovely, and inconsolable widow, who passed the first years of her mourning in educating her child in an elegant though small cottage in one of the romantic marine villages of beautiful Devonshire. Her child! What a gush of consolation filled the widow's heart as she pressed him to it! How faithfully did she instil into his young bosom those principles which had been the pole-star of the existence of his gallant father!

In this secluded retreat, rank and wealth almost boundless found the widow and her boy. The seventeenth Earl--gallant and ardent, and in the prime of youth--went forth one day from the Eternal City to a steeple-chase in the Campagna. A mutilated corpse was brought back to his hotel in the Piazza di Spagna. Death, alas! is no respecter of the Nobility. That shattered form was all that remained of the fiery, the haughty, the wild, but the generous Altamont de Pentonville! Such, such is fate!

The admirable Emily de Pentonville trembled with all a mother's solicitude at the distinctions and honors which thus suddenly descended on her boy. She engaged an excellent clergyman of the Church of England to superintend his studies; to accompany him on foreign travel when the proper season arrived; to ward from him those dangers which dissipation always throws in the way of the noble, the idle, and the wealthy. But the Reverend Cyril Delaval died of the measles at Naples, and henceforth the young Earl of Bagnigge was without a guardian.

What was the consequence? That, at three-and-twenty, he was a cynic and an epicure. He had drained the cup of pleasure till it had palled in his unnerved hand. He had looked at the Pyramids without awe, at the Alps without reverence. He was unmoved by the sandy solitudes of the Desert as by the placid depths of Mediterranean's sea of blue. Bitter, bitter tears did Emily de Pentonville weep, when, on Alured's return from the Continent, she beheld the awful change that dissipation had wrought in her beautiful, her blue-eyed, her perverted, her still beloved boy!

“Corpo di Bacco,” he said, pitching the end of his cigar on to the red nose of the Countess of Delawaddymore's coachman--who, having deposited her fat ladyship at No. 236 Piccadilly, was driving the carriage to the stables, before commencing his evening at the “Fortune of War” public-house--“what a lovely creature that was! What eyes! what hair! Who knows her? Do you, mon cher prince?”

“E bellissima, certamente,” said the Duca de Montepulciano, and stroked down his jetty moustache.

“Ein gar schones Madchen,” said the Hereditary Grand Duke of Eulenschreckenstein, and turned up his carroty one.

“Elle n'est pas mal, ma foi!” said the Prince de Borodino, with a scowl on his darkling brows. “Mon Dieu, que ces cigarres sont mauvais!” he added as he too cast away his Cuba.

“Try one of my Pickwicks,” said Franklin Fox, with a sneer, offering his gold etui to the young Frenchman; “they are some of Pontet's best, Prince. What, do you bear malice? Come, let us be friends,” said the gay and careless young patrician; but a scowl on the part of the Frenchman was the only reply.

“Want to know who she is? Borodino knows who she is, Bagnigge,” the wag went on.

Everybody crowded around Monsieur de Borodino thus apostrophized. The Marquis of Alicompayne, young De Boots of the Lifeguards, Tom Protocol of the Foreign Office; the gay young Peers, Farintosh, Poldoody, and the rest; and Bagnigge, for a wonder, not less eager than any one present.

“No, he will tell you nothing about her. Don't you see he has gone off in a fury!” Franklin Fox continued. “He has his reasons, ce cher prince: he will tell you nothing; but I will. You know that I am au mieux with the dear old duchess.”

“They say Frank and she are engaged after the duke's death,” cried Poldoody.

“I always thought Fwank was the duke's illicit gweatgwandson,” drawled out De Boots.

“I heard that he doctored her Blenheim, and used to bring her wigs from Paris,” cried that malicious Tom Protocol, whose mots are known in every diplomatic salon from Petersburg to Palermo.

“Burn her wigs and hang her poodle!” said Bagnigge. “Tell me about this girl, Franklin Fox.”

“In the first place, she has five hundred thousand acres, in a ring fence in Norfolk; a county in Scotland, a castle in Wales, a villa at Richmond, a corner house in Belgrave Square, and eighty thousand a year in the three-per-cents.”

“Apres?” said Bagnigge, still yawning.

“Secondly, Borodino lui fait la cour. They are cousins, her mother was an Armagnac of the emigration; the old Marshal, his father, married another sister. I believe he was footman in the family, before Napoleon princified him.”

“No, no, he was second coachman,” Tom Protocol good-naturedly interposed--“a cavalry officer, Frank, not an infantry man.”

“'Faith you should have seen his fury (the young one's, I mean) when he found me in the duchess's room this evening, tete-a-tete with the heiress, who deigned to receive a bouquet from this hand.”

“It cost me three guineas,” poor Frank said, with a shrug and a sigh, “and that Covent Garden scoundrel gives no credit: but she took the flowers;--eh, Bagnigge?”

“And flung them to Alboni,” the Peer replied, with a haughty sneer. And poor little Franklin Fox was compelled to own that she had.

The maitre d'hotel here announced that supper was served. It was remarked that even the coulis de dindonneau made no impression on Bagnigge that night.

II.

The sensation produced by the debut of Amethyst Pimlico at the court of the sovereign, and in the salons of the beau-monde, was such as has seldom been created by the appearance of any other beauty. The men were raving with love, and the women with jealousy. Her eyes, her beauty, her wit, her grace, her ton, caused a perfect fureur of admiration or envy.

Introduced by the Duchess of Fitzbattleaxe, along with her Grace's daughters, the Ladies Gwendoline and Gwinever Portcullis, the heiress's regal beauty quite flung her cousins' simple charms into the shade, and blazed with a splendor which caused all “minor lights” to twinkle faintly. Before a day the beau-monde, before a week even the vulgarians of the rest of the town, rang with the fame of her charms; and while the dandies and the beauties were raving about her, or tearing her to pieces in May Fair, even Mrs. Dobbs (who had been to the pit of the “Hoperer” in a green turban and a crumpled yellow satin) talked about the great HAIRESS to her D. in Bloomsbury Square.

Crowds went to Squab and Lynch's, in Long Acre, to examine the carriages building for her, so faultless, so splendid, so quiet, so odiously unostentatious and provokingly simple! Besides the ancestral services of argenterie and vaisselle plate, contained in a hundred and seventy-six plate-chests at Messrs. Childs', Rumble and Briggs prepared a gold service, and Garraway, of the Haymarket, a service of the Benvenuto Cellini pattern, which were the admiration of all London. Before a month it is a fact that the wretched haberdashers in the city exhibited the blue stocks, called “Heiress-killers, very chaste, two-and-six:” long before that, the monde had rushed to Madame Crinoline's, or sent couriers to Madame Marabou, at Paris, so as to have copies of her dresses; but, as the Mantuan bard observes, “Non cuivis contigit,”--every foot cannot accommodate itself to the chaussure of Cinderella.

With all this splendor, this worship, this beauty; with these cheers following her, and these crowds at her feet, was Amethyst happy? Ah, no! It is not under the necklace the most brilliant that Briggs and Rumble can supply, it is not in Lynch's best cushioned chariot that the heart is most at ease. “Que je me ruinerai,” says Fronsac in a letter to Bossuet, “si je savais ou acheter le bonheur!”

With all her riches, with all her splendor, Amethyst was wretched--wretched, because lonely; wretched, because her loving heart had nothing to cling to. Her splendid mansion was a convent; no male person even entered it, except Franklin Fox, (who counted for nothing,) and the duchess's family, her kinsman old Lord Humpington, his friend old Sir John Fogey, and her cousin, the odious, odious Borodino.

The Prince de Borodino declared openly that Amethyst was engaged to him. Crible de dettes, it is no wonder that he should choose such an opportunity to refaire sa fortune. He gave out that he would kill any man who should cast an eye on the heiress, and the monster kept his word. Major Grigg, of the Lifeguards, had already fallen by his hand at Ostend. The O'Toole, who had met her on the Rhine, had received a ball in his shoulder at Coblentz, and did not care to resume so dangerous a courtship. Borodino could snuff a bougie at a hundred and fifty yards. He could beat Bertrand or Alexander Dumas himself with the small-sword: he was the dragon that watched this pomme d'or, and very few persons were now inclined to face a champion si redoutable.

Over a salmi d'escargot at the “Coventry,” the dandies whom we introduced in our last volume were assembled, there talking of the heiress; and her story was told by Franklin Fox to Lord Bagnigge, who, for a wonder, was interested in the tale. Borodino's pretensions were discussed, and the way in which the fair Amethyst was confined. Fitzbattleaxe House, in Belgrave Square, is--as everybody knows--the next mansion to that occupied by Amethyst. A communication was made between the two houses. She never went out except accompanied by the duchess's guard, which it was impossible to overcome.

“Impossible! Nothing's impossible,” said Lord Bagnigge.

“I bet you what you like you don't get in,” said the young Marquis of Martingale.

“I bet you a thousand ponies I stop a week in the heiress's house before the season's over,” Lord Bagnigge replied with a yawn; and the bet was registered with shouts of applause.

But it seemed as if the Fates had determined against Lord Bagnigge, for the very next day, riding in the Park, his horse fell with him; he was carried home to his house with a fractured limb and a dislocated shoulder; and the doctor's bulletins pronounced him to be in the most dangerous state.

Martingale was a married man, and there was no danger of HIS riding by the Fitzbattleaxe carriage. A fortnight after the above events, his lordship was prancing by her Grace's great family coach, and chattering with Lady Gwinever about the strange wager.

“Do you know what a pony is, Lady Gwinever?” he asked. Her ladyship said yes: she had a cream-colored one at Castle Barbican; and stared when Lord Martingale announced that he should soon have a thousand ponies, worth five-and-twenty pounds each, which were all now kept at Coutts's. Then he explained the circumstances of the bet with Bagnigge. Parliament was to adjourn in ten days; the season would be over! Bagnigge was lying ill chez lui; and the five-and-twenty thousand were irrecoverably his. And he vowed he would buy Lord Binnacle's yacht--crew, captain, guns and all.

On returning home that night from Lady Polkimore's, Martingale found among the many billets upon the gold plateau in his antichambre, the following brief one, which made him start--

“DEAR MARTINGALE.--Don't be too sure of Binnacle's yacht. There are still ten days before the season is over; and my ponies may lie at Coutts's for some time to come.

“Yours,

“BAGNIGGE.

“P. S.--I write with my left hand; for my right is still splintered up from that confounded fall.”

III.

The tall footman, number four, who had come in the place of John, cashiered, (for want of proper mollets, and because his hair did not take powder well,) had given great satisfaction to the under-butler, who reported well of him to his chief, who had mentioned his name with praise to the house-steward. He was so good-looking and well-spoken a young man, that the ladies in the housekeeper's room deigned to notice him more than once; nor was his popularity diminished on account of a quarrel in which he engaged with Monsieur Anatole, the enormous Walloon chasseur, who was one day found embracing Miss Flouncy, who waited on Amethyst's own maid. The very instant Miss Flouncy saw Mr. Jeames entering the Servants' Hall, where Monsieur Anatole was engaged in “aggravating” her, Miss Flouncy screamed: at the next moment the Belgian giant lay sprawling upon the carpet; and Jeames, standing over him, assumed so terrible a look, that the chasseur declined any further combat. The victory was made known to the house-steward himself, who, being a little partial to Miss Flouncy herself, complimented Jeames on his valor, and poured out a glass of Madeira in his own room.

Who was Jeames? He had come recommended by the Bagnigge people. He had lived, he said, in that family two years. “But where there was no ladies,” he said, “a gentleman's hand was spiled for service;” and Jeames's was a very delicate hand; Miss Flouncy admired it very much, and of course he did not defile it by menial service: he had in a young man who called him sir, and did all the coarse work; and Jeames read the morning paper to the ladies; not spellingly and with hesitation, as many gentlemen do, but easily and elegantly, speaking off the longest words without a moment's difficulty. He could speak French, too, Miss Flouncy found, who was studying it under Mademoiselle Grande fille-de-chambre de confiance; for when she said to him, “Polly voo Fransy, Munseer Jeames?” he replied readily, “We, Mademaselle, j'ay passay boco de tong a Parry. Commong voo potty voo?” How Miss Flouncy admired him as he stood before her, the day after he had saved Miss Amethyst when the horses had run away with her in the Park!

Poor Flouncy, poor Flouncy! Jeames had been but a week in Amethyst's service, and already the gentle heart of the washing-girl was irrecoverably gone! Poor Flouncy! Poor Flouncy! he thought not of thee.

It happened thus. Miss Amethyst being engaged to drive with her cousin the prince in his phaeton, her own carriage was sent into the Park simply with her companion, who had charge of her little Fido, the dearest little spaniel in the world. Jeames and Frederick were behind the carriage with their long sticks and neat dark liveries; the horses were worth a thousand guineas each, the coachman a late lieutenant-colonel of cavalry: the whole ring could not boast a more elegant turn-out.

The prince drove his curricle, and had charge of his belle cousine. It may have been the red fezzes in the carriage of the Turkish ambassador which frightened the prince's grays, or Mrs. Champignon's new yellow liveries, which were flaunting in the Park, or hideous Lady Gorgon's preternatural ugliness, who passed in a low pony-carriage at the time, or the prince's own want of skill, finally; but certain it is that the horses took fright, dashed wildly along the mile, scattered equipages, pietons, dandies' cabs, and snobs' pheaytons. Amethyst was screaming; and the prince, deadly pale, had lost all presence of mind, as the curricle came rushing by the spot where Miss Amethyst's carriage stood.

“I'm blest,” Frederick exclaimed to his companion, “if it ain't the prince a-drivin our missis! They'll be in the Serpingtine, or dashed to pieces, if they don't mind.” And the runaway steeds at this instant came upon them as a whirlwind.

But if those steeds ran at a whirlwind pace, Jeames was swifter. To jump from behind, to bound after the rocking, reeling curricle, to jump into it, aided by the long stick which he carried and used as a leaping-pole, and to seize the reins out of the hands of the miserable Borodino, who shrieked piteously as the dauntless valet leapt on his toes and into his seat, was the work of an instant. In a few minutes the mad, swaying rush of the horses was reduced to a swift but steady gallop; presently into a canter, then a trot; until finally they pulled up smoking and trembling, but quite quiet, by the side of Amethyst's carriage, which came up at a rapid pace.

“Give me the reins, malappris! tu m'ecrases le corps, manant!” yelled the frantic nobleman, writhing underneath the intrepid charioteer.

“Tant pis pour toi, nigaud,” was the reply. The lovely Amethyst of course had fainted; but she recovered as she was placed in her carriage, and rewarded her preserver with a celestial smile.

The rage, the fury, the maledictions of Borodino, as he saw the latter--a liveried menial--stoop gracefully forward and kiss Amethyst's hand, may be imagined rather than described. But Jeames heeded not his curses. Having placed his adored mistress in the carriage, he calmly resumed his station behind. Passion or danger seemed to have no impression upon that pale marble face.

Borodino went home furious; nor was his rage diminished, when, on coming to dinner that day, a recherche banquet served in the Frangipane best style, and requesting a supply of a puree a la bisque aux ecrevisses, the clumsy attendant who served him let fall the assiette of vermeille cisele, with its scalding contents, over the prince's chin, his Mechlin jabot, and the grand cordon of the Legion of honor which he wore.

“Infame,” howled Borodino, “tu l'as fait expres!”

“Oui, je l'ai fait expres,” said the man, with the most perfect Parisian accent. It was Jeames.

Such insolence of course could not be passed unnoticed even after the morning's service, and he was chassed on the spot. He had been but a week in the house.

The next month the newspapers contained a paragraph which may possibly elucidate the above mystery, and to the following effect:--

“Singular Wager.--One night, at the end of last season, the young and eccentric Earl of B-gn-gge laid a wager of twenty-five thousand pounds with a broken sporting patrician, the dashing Marquis of M-rt-ng-le, that he would pass a week under the roof of a celebrated and lovely young heiress, who lives not a hundred miles from B-lgr-ve Squ-re. The bet having been made, the earl pretended an illness, and having taken lessons from one of his lordship's own footmen (Mr. James Plush, whose name he also borrowed) in 'the MYSTERIES of the PROFESSION,' actually succeeded in making an entry into Miss P-ml-co's mansion, where he stopped one week exactly; having time to win his bet, and to save the life of the lady, whom we hear he is about to lead to the altar. He disarmed the Prince of Borodino in a duel fought on Calais sands--and, it is said, appeared at the C---- club wearing his PLUSH COSTUME under a cloak, and displaying it as a proof that he had won his wager.”

Such, indeed, were the circumstances. The young couple have not more than nine hundred thousand a year, but they live cheerfully, and manage to do good; and Emily de Pentonville, who adores her daughter-in-law and her little grandchildren, is blest in seeing her darling son enfin un homme range.

CRINOLINE.

BY JE-MES PL-SH, ESQ.

I.

I'm not at libbaty to divulj the reel names of the 2 Eroes of the igstrawny Tail which I am abowt to relait to those unlightnd paytrons of letarature and true connyshures of merrit--the great Brittish public--But I pledj my varacity that this singlar story of rewmantic love, absobbing pashn, and likewise of GENTEEL LIFE, is, in the main fax, TREW. The suckmstanzas I elude to, ocurd in the rain of our presnt Gratious Madjisty and her beluvd and roil Concert Prince Halbert.

Welthen. Some time in the seazen of 18-- (mor I dar not rewheel) there arrived in this metropulus, per seknd class of the London and Dover Railway, an ellygant young foring gentleman, whom I shall danomminate Munseer Jools De Chacabac.

Having read through “The Vicker of Wackfield” in the same oridganal English tung in which this very harticle I write is wrote too, and halways been remarkyble, both at collidge and in the estamminy, for his aytred and orror of perfidgus Halbion, Munseer Jools was considered by the prapriretors of the newspaper in which he wrote, at Parris, the very man to come to this country, igsamin its manners and customs, cast an i upon the politticle and finalshle stat of the Hempire, and igspose the mackynations of the infyamous Palmerston, and the ebomminable Sir Pill--both enemies of France; as is every other Britten of that great, gloarus, libberal, and peasable country. In one word, Jools de Chacabac was a penny-a-liner.

“I will go see with my own I's,” he said, “that infimus hiland of which the innabitants are shopkeepers, gorged with roast beef and treason. I will go and see the murderers of the Hirish, the pisoners of the Chynese, the villians who put the Hemperor to death in Saintyleany, the artful dodges who wish to smother Europe with their cotton, and can't sleep or rest heasy for henvy and hatred of the great inwinsable French nation. I will igsammin, face to face, these hotty insularies; I will pennytrate into the secrets of their Jessywhittickle cabinet, and beard Palmerston in his denn.” When he jumpt on shor at Foaxton (after having been tremenguously sick in the fourcabbing), he exclaimed, “Enfin je te tiens, Ile maudite! je te crache a la figure, vieille Angleterre! Je te foule a mes pieds an nom du monde outrage,” and so proseaded to inwade the metropulus.

As he wisht to micks with the very chicest sosiaty, and git the best of infamation about this country, Munseer Jools of coarse went and lodgd in Lester Square--Lester Squarr, as he calls it--which, as he was infommed in the printed suckular presented to him by a very greasy but polite comishner at the Custumus Stares, was in the scenter of the town, contiggus to the Ouses of Parlyment, the prinsple theayters, the parx, St. Jams Pallice, and the Corts of Lor. “I can surwhey them all at one cut of the eye,” Jools thought; “the Sovring, the infamus Ministers plotting the destruction of my immortial country; the business and pleasure of these pusprond Londoners and aristoxy; I can look round and see all.” So he took a three-pair back in a French hotel, the “Hotel de l'Ail,” kep by Monsieur Gigotot, Cranbourne Street, Lester Squarr, London.

In this otell there's a billiard-room on the first floor, and a tabble-doat at eighteenpence peredd at 5 o'clock; and the landlord, who kem into Jools's room smoaking a segar, told the young gent that the house was friquented by all the Brittish nobillaty, who reglar took their dinners there. “They can't ebide their own quiseen,” he said. “You'll see what a dinner we'll serve you to-day.” Jools wrote off to his paper--

“The members of the haughty and luxurious English aristocracy, like all the rest of the world, are obliged to fly to France for the indulgence of their luxuries. The nobles of England, quitting their homes, their wives, miladies and mistriss, so fair but so cold, dine universally at the tavern. That from which I write is frequented by Peel and Palmerston. I fremis to think that I may meet them at the board to-day.”

Singlar to say, Peel and Palmerston didn't dine at the “Hotel de l'Ail” on that evening. “It's quite igstronnary they don't come,” said Munseer de l'Ail.

“Peraps they're ingaged at some boxing-match or some combaw de cock,” Munseer Jools sejested; and the landlord egreed that was very likely.

Instedd of English there was, however, plenty of foring sociaty, of every nation under the sun. Most of the noblemen were great hamatures of hale and porter. The tablecloth was marked over with brown suckles, made by the pewter-pots on that and the previous days.

“It is the usage here,” wrote Jools to his newspaper, “among the Anglais of the fashonne to absorb immense quantities of ale and porter during their meals. These stupefying, but cheap, and not unpalatable liquors are served in shining pewter vessels. A mug of foaming hafanaf (so a certain sort of beer is called) was placed by the side of most of the convives. I was disappointed of seeing Sir Peel: he was engaged to a combat of cocks which occurs at Windsor.”

Not one word of English was spoke during this dinner, excep when the gentlemen said “Garsong de l'afanaf,” but Jool was very much pleased to meet the eleet of the foringers in town, and ask their opinion about the reel state of thinx. Was it likely that the bishops were to be turned out of the Chambre des Communes? Was it true that Lor Palmerston had boxed with Lor Broghamm in the House of Lords, until they were sepparayted by the Lor Maire? Who was the Lor Maire? Wasn't he Premier Minister? and wasn't the Archeveque de Cantorbery a Quaker? He got answers to these questions from the various gents round about during the dinner--which, he remarked, was very much like a French dinner, only dirtier. And he wrote off all the infamation he got to his newspaper.

“The Lord Maire, Lord Lansdowne, is Premier Ministre. His Grace has his dwelling in the City. The Archbishop of Cantabery is not turned Quaker, as some people stated. Quakers may not marry, nor sit in the Chamber of Peers. The minor bishops have seats in the House of Commons, where they are attacked by the bitter pleasantries of Lord Brougham. A boxer is in the house; he taught Palmerston the science of the pugilate, who conferred upon him the seat,” &c. &c.

His writing hover, Jools came down and ad a gaym at pool with two Poles, a Bulgian, and 2 of his own countrymen. This being done amidst more hafanaf, without which nothink is done in England, and as there was no French play that night, he & the two French gents walked round and round Lester Squarr smoking segaws in the faces of other French gents who were smoaking 2. And they talked about the granjer of France and the perfidgusness of England, and looked at the aluminated pictur of Madame Wharton as Haryadney till bedtime. But befor he slep, he finished his letter you may be sure, and called it his “Fust Imprestiuns of Anglyterre.”

“Mind and wake me early,” he said to Boots, the ony Brittish subject in the “Hotel de l'Ail,” and who therefore didn't understand him. “I wish to be at Smithfield at 6 hours to see THE MEN SELL THEIR WIVES.” And the young roag fell asleep, thinking what sort of a one he'd buy.

This was the way Jools passed his days, and got infamation about Hengland and the Henglish--walking round and round Lester Squarr all day, and every day with the same company, occasionally dewussified by an Oprer Chorus-singer or a Jew or two, and every afternoon in the Quadrant admiring the genteal sosiaty there. Munseer Jools was not over well funnisht with pocket-money, and so his pleasure was of the gratis sort cheafly.

Well, one day as he and a friend was taking their turn among the aristoxy under the Quadrant--they were struck all of a heap by seeing--But, stop! who WAS Jools's friend? Here you have pictures of both--but the Istory of Jools's friend must be kep for another innings.

II.

Not fur from that knowble and cheerflie Squear which Munseer Jools de Chacabac had selacted for his eboad in London--not fur, I say, from Lester Squarr, is a rainje of bildings called Pipping's Buildings, leading to Blue Lion Court, leading to St. Martin's Lane. You know Pipping's Buildings by its greatest ornament, an am and beefouce (where Jools has often stood admiring the degstaraty of the carver a-cuttin the varous jints), and by the little fishmungur's, where you remark the mouldy lobsters, the fly-blown picklesammon, the playbills, and the gingybear bottles in the window--above all, by the “Constantinople” Divan, kep by the Misses Mordeky, and well known to every lover of “a prime sigaw and an exlent cup of reel Moky Coffy for 6d.”

The Constantinople Divann is greatly used by the foring gents of Lester Squar. I never ad the good fortn to pass down Pipping's Buildings without seeing a haf a duzen of 'em on the threshole of the extablishment, giving the street an oppertunity of testing the odar of the Misses Mordeky's prime Avannas. Two or three mor may be visable inside, settn on the counter or the chestis, indulging in their fav'rit whead, the rich and spisy Pickwhick, the ripe Manilly, or the flagrant and arheumatic Qby.

“These Divanns are, as is very well known, the knightly resott of the young Henglish nobillaty. It is ear a young Pier, after an arjus day at the House of Commons, solazes himself with a glas of gin-and-water (the national beveridge), with cheerful conversation on the ewents of the day, or with an armless gaym of baggytell in the back-parlor.”

So wrote at least our friend Jools to his newspaper, the Horriflam; and of this back-parlor and baggytell-bord, of this counter, of this “Constantinople” Divan, he became almost as reglar a frequenter as the plaster of Parish Turk who sits smoking a hookey between the two blue coffee-cups in the winder.

I have oftin, smokin my own shroot in silents in a corner of the Diwann, listened to Jools and his friends inwaying aginst Hingland, and boastin of their own immortial country. How they did go on about Wellintun, and what an arty contamp they ad for him!--how they used to prove that France was the Light, the Scenter-pint, the Igsample and hadmiration of the whole world! And though I scarcely take a French paper now-a-days (I lived in early days as groom in a French famly three years, and therefore knows the languidg), though, I say, you can't take up Jools's paper, the Orriflam, without readin that a minister has committed bribery and perjury, or that a littery man has committed perjury and murder, or that a Duke has stabbed his wife in fifty places, or some story equally horrible; yet for all that it's admiral to see how the French gents will swagger--how they will be the scenters of civilization--how they will be the Igsamples of Europ, and nothink shall prevent 'em--knowing they will have it, I say I listen, smokin my pip in silence. But to our tail.

Reglar every evening there came to the “Constantanople” a young gent etired in the igth of fashn; and indead presenting by the cleanlyness of his appearants and linning (which was generally a pink or blew shurt, with a cricketer or a dansuse pattern) rather a contrast to the dinjy and whistkcard sosaity of the Diwann. As for wiskars, this young mann had none beyond a little yallow tought to his chin, which you woodn notas, only he was always pulling at it. His statue was diminnative, but his coschume supubb, for he had the tippiest Jane boots, the ivoryheadest canes, the most gawjus scarlick Jonville ties, and the most Scotch-plaidest trowseys, of any customer of that establishment. He was univusaly called Milord.

“Que est ce jeune seigneur? Who is this young hurl who comes knightly to the 'Constantanople,' who is so proddigl of his gold (for indeed the young gent would frequinly propoase gininwater to the company), and who drinks so much gin?” asked Munseer Chacabac of a friend from the “Hotel de l'Ail.”

“His name is Lord Yardham,” answered that friend. “He never comes here but at night--and why?”

“Y?” igsclaimed Jools, istonisht.

“Why? because he is engaygd all day--and do you know where he is engaygd all day?”

“Where?” asked Jools.

“At the Foring Office--NOW do you begin to understand?”--Jools trembled.

He speaks of his uncle, the head of that office.--“Who IS the head of that offis?--Palmerston.”

“The nephew of Palmerston!” said Jools, almost in a fit.

“Lor Yardham pretends not to speak French,” the other went on. “He pretends he can only say wee and commong porty voo. Shallow humbug!--I have marked him during our conversations.--When we have spoken of the glory of France among the nations, I have seen his eye kindle, and his perfidious lip curl with rage. When they have discussed before him, the Imprudents! the affairs of Europe, and Raggybritchovich has shown us the next Circassian Campaign, or Sapousne has laid hare the plan of the Calabrian patriots for the next insurrection, I have marked this stranger--this Lor Yardham. He smokes, 'tis to conceal his countenance; he drinks gin, 'tis to hide his face in the goblet. And be sure, he carries every word of our conversation to the perfidious Palmerston, his uncle.”

“I will beard him in his den,” thought Jools. “I will meet him corps-a-corps--the tyrant of Europe shall suffer through his nephew, and I will shoot him as dead as Dujarrier.”

When Lor Yardham came to the “Constantanople” that night, Jools i'd him savidgely from edd to foot, while Lord Yardham replied the same. It wasn't much for either to do--neyther being more than 4 foot ten hi--Jools was a grannydear in his company of the Nashnal Gard, and was as brayv as a lion.

“Ah, l'Angleterre, l'Angleterre, tu nous dois une revanche,” said Jools, crossing his arms and grinding his teeth at Lord Yardham.

“Wee,” said Lord Yardham; “wee.”

“Delenda est Carthago!” howled out Jools.

“Oh, wee,” said the Erl of Yardham, and at the same moment his glas of ginawater coming in, he took a drink, saying, “A voternsanty, Munseer:” and then he offered it like a man of fashn to Jools.

A light broak on Jools's mind as he igsepted the refreshmint. “Sapoase,” he said, “instedd of slaughtering this nephew of the infamous Palmerston, I extract his secrets from him; suppose I pump him--suppose I unveil his schemes and send them to my paper? La France may hear the name of Jools de Chacabac, and the star of honor may glitter on my bosom.”

So axepting Lord Yardham's cortasy, he returned it by ordering another glass of gin at his own expence, and they both drank it on the counter, where Jools talked of the affaers of Europ all night. To everything he said, the Earl of Yardham answered, “Wee, wee;” except at the end of the evening, when he squeeged his & and said, “Bong swore.”

“There's nothing like goin amongst 'em to equire the reel pronounciation,” his lordship said, as he let himself into his lodgings with his latch-key. “That was a very eloquent young gent at the 'Constantinople,' and I'll patronize him.”

“Ah, perfide, je te demasquerai!” Jools remarked to himself as he went to bed in his “Hotel de l'Ail.” And they met the next night, and from that heavning the young men were continyually together.

Well, one day, as they were walking in the Quadrant, Jools talking, and Lord Yardham saying, “Wee, wee,” they were struck all of a heap by seeing--

But my paper is igshosted, and I must dixcribe what they sor in the nex number.

III.

THE CASTLE OF THE ISLAND OF FOGO.

The travler who pesews his dalitefle coarse through the fair rellum of Franse (as a great romantic landskippist and neamsack of mind would say) never chaumed his i's within a site more lovely, or vu'd a pallis more magniffiznt than that which was the buthplace of the Eroing of this Trew Tale. Phansy a country through whose werdant planes the selvery Garonne wines, like--like a benevvolent sarpent. In its plasid busum antient cassles, picturask willidges, and waving woods are reflected. Purple hills, crownd with inteak ruings; rivvilets babbling through gentle greenwoods; wight farm ouses, hevvy with hoverhanging vines, and from which the appy and peaseful okupier can cast his glans over goolden waving cornfealds, and M. Herald meddows in which the lazy cattle are graysinn; while the sheppard, tending his snoughy flox, wiles away the leisure mominx on his loot--these hoffer but a phaint pictur of the rurial felissaty in the midst of widge Crinoline and Hesteria de Viddlers were bawn.

Their Par, the Marcus de Viddlers, Shavilear of the Legend of Honor and of the Lion of Bulgum, the Golden Flease, Grand Cross of the Eflant and Castle, and of the Catinbagpipes of Hostria, Grand Chamberleng of the Crownd, and Major-Genaril of Hoss-Mareens, &c. &c. &c.--is the twenty-foth or fith Marquis that has bawn the Tittle; is disended lenyally from King Pipping, and has almost as antient a paddygree as any which the Ollywell Street frends of the Member of Buckinumsheer can supply.

His Marchyniss, the lovely & ecomplisht Emily de St. Cornichon, quitted this mortial spear very soon after she had presented her lord with the two little dawling Cherrybins above dixcribed, in whomb, after the loss of that angle his wife, the disconslit widderer found his only jy on huth. In all his emusemints they ecumpanied him; their edjacation was his sole bisniss; he atcheaved it with the assistnce of the ugliest and most lernid masters, and the most hidjus and egsimplary governices which money could procure. R, how must his peturnle art have bet, as these Budds, which he had nurrisht, bust into buty, and twined in blooming flagrance round his pirentle Busm!

The villidges all round his hancestral Alls blessed the Marcus and his lovely hoffsprig. Not one villidge in their naybrood but was edawned by their elygint benifisns, and where the inhabitnts wern't rendered appy. It was a pattern pheasantry. All the old men in the districk were wertuous & tockative, ad red stockins and i-eeled drab shoes, and beautiful snowy air. All the old women had peaked ats, and crooked cains, and chince gowns tucked into the pockits of their quiltid petticoats; they sat in pictarask porches, pretendin to spinn, while the lads and lassis of the villidges danst under the hellums. O, tis a noble sight to whitniss that of an appy pheasantry! Not one of those rustic wassals of the Ouse of Widdlers, but ad his air curled and his shirt-sheaves tied up with pink ribbing as he led to the macy dance some appy country gal, with a black velvit boddice and a redd or yaller petticoat, a hormylu cross on her neck, and a silver harrow in her air!

When the Marcus & ther young ladies came to the villidge it would have done the i's of the flanthropist good to see how all reseaved 'em! The little children scattered calico flowers on their path, the snowy-aired old men with red faces and rinkles took off their brown paper ats to slewt the noble Marcus. Young and old led them to a woodn bank painted to look like a bower of roses, and when they were sett down danst ballys before them. O 'twas a noble site to see the Marcus too, smilin ellygint with fethers in his edd and all his stars on, and the young Marchynisses with their ploomes, and trains, and little coronicks!

They lived in tremenjus splendor at home in their pyturnle alls, and had no end of pallises, willers, and town and country resadences; but their fayvorit resadence was called the Castle of the Island of Fogo.

Add I the penn of the hawther of a Codlingsby himself, I coodnt dixcribe the gawjusness of their aboad. They add twenty-four footmen in livery, besides a boy in codroys for the knives & shoes. They had nine meels aday--Shampayne and pineapples were served to each of the young ladies in bed before they got up. Was it Prawns, Sherry-cobblers, lobster-salids, or maids of honor, they had but to ring the bell and call for what they chose. They had two new dresses every day--one to ride out in the open carriage, and another to appear in the gardens of the Castle of the Island of Fogo, which were illuminated every night like Voxhall. The young noblemen of France were there ready to dance with them, and festif suppers concludid the jawyus night.

Thus they lived in ellygant ratirement until Missfortune bust upon this happy fammaly. Etached to his Princes and abommanating the ojus Lewyphlip, the Marcus was conspiring for the benefick of the helder branch of the Borebones--and what was the consquince?--One night a fleat presented itself round the Castle of the Island of Fogo--and skewering only a couple of chests of jewils, the Marcus and the two young ladies in disgyise, fled from that island of bliss. And whither fled they?--To England!--England the ome of the brave, the refuge of the world, where the pore slave never setts his foot but he is free!

Such was the ramantic tail which was told to 2 friends of ours by the Marcus de Viddlers himself, whose daughters, walking with their page from Ungerford Market (where they had been to purchis a paper of srimps for the umble supper of their noble father), Yardham and his equaintnce, Munseer Jools, had remarked and admired.

But how had those two young Erows become equainted with the noble Marcus?--That is a mistry we must elucydate in a futur vollam.

THE STARS AND STRIPES.

THE AUTHOR OR “THE LAST OF THE MULLIGANS,” “PILOT,” ETC

I.

The King of France was walking on the terrace of Versailles; the fairest, not only of Queens, but of women, hung fondly on the Royal arm; while the children of France were indulging in their infantile hilarity in the alleys of the magnificent garden of Le Notre (from which Niblo's garden has been copied in our own Empire city of New York), and playing at leap-frog with their uncle, the Count of Provence; gaudy courtiers, emlazoned with orders, glittered in the groves, and murmured frivolous talk in the ears of high-bred beauty.