Chapter VI (1)

Never go to France,
Unless you know the lingo;
If you do, like me,
You will repent, by jingo;
Staring like a fool,
And silent as a mummy,
There I stood alone,
A nation with a dummy!

“No, Mounseer, not veat--them’s whoats!”]

OUR VILLAGE.

“Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain.”--GOLDSMITH.

I have a great anxiety to become a topographer, and I do not know that I can make an easier commencement of the character, than by attempting a description of our village. It will be found, as my friend the landlord over the way says, that “things are drawn _mild_.”

I live opposite the Green Man. I know that to be the sign, in spite of the picture, because I am told of the fact in large gilt letters, in three several places. The whole-length portrait of “_l’homme verd_” is rather imposing. He stands plump before you, in a sort of wrestling attitude, the legs standing distinctly apart, in a brace of decided boots, with dun tops, joined to a pair of creole-coloured leather breeches. The rest of his dress is peculiar; the coat, a two-flapper, green and brown, or, as they say at the tap, _half-and-half_; a cocked hat on the half cock; a short belt crossing the breast like a flat gas-pipe. The one hand stuck on the greeny-brown hip of my friend, in the other a gun with a barrel like an entire butt, and a butt like a brewer’s whole stock. On one side, looking up at the vanished visage of his master, is all that remains of a liver-and-white pointer--seeming now to be some old dog from India, for his white complexion is turned yellow, and his liver is more than half gone!

The inn is really a very quiet, cozy, comfortable inn, though the landlord announces a fact in larger letters, methinks, than his information warrants, viz., that he is “_Licensed to deal in Foreign Wines and Spirits_.” All innkeepers, I trust, are so licensed; there is no occasion to make so brazen a brag of this sinecure permit.

* * * * *

I had written thus far, when the tarnished gold letters of the Green Man seemed to be suddenly re-gilt; and on looking upwards, I perceived that a sort of sky-light had been opened in the clouds, giving entrance to a bright gleam of sunshine, which glowed with remarkable effect on a yellow post-chaise in the stable-yard, and brought the ducks out beautifully white from the black horse-pond. Tempted by the appearance of the weather, I put down my pen and strolled out for a quarter of an hour before dinner to inhale that air, without which, like the chameleon I cannot feed. On my return, I found, with some surprise, that my papers were a good deal discomposed; but, before I had time for much wonder, my landlady entered with one of her most obliging courtesies, and observed that she had seen me writing in the morning, and it had occurred to her by chance, that I might by possibility have been writing a description of the village. I told her that I had actually been engaged on that very subject. “If that is the case, of course, Sir, you would begin, no doubt, about the Green Man, being so close by; and I dare say, you would say something about the sign, and the Green Man with his top boots, and his gun, and his Indian liver-and-white pointer, though his white to be sure is turned yellow, and his liver is more than half gone.” “You are perfectly right, Mrs. Ledger,” I replied, “and in one part of the description, I think I have used almost your own very words.” “Well, that _is_ curious, Sir,” exclaimed Mrs. L., and physically, not arithmetically, casting up all her hands and eyes. “Moreover, what I mean to say, is this; and I only say that to save trouble. There’s a young man lodges at the Green Grocer’s over the way, who has writ an account of the village already to your hand. The people about the place call him the Poet, but, anyhow, he studies a good deal, and writes beautiful; and, as I said before, has made the whole village out of his own head. Now, it might save trouble, Sir, if you was to write it out, and I am sure I have a copy, that, as far as the loan goes, is at your service, Sir.” My curiosity induced me to take the offer; and as the poem really forestalled what I had to say of the Hamlet, I took my landlady’s advice and transcribed it,--and here it is.

OUR VILLAGE.--BY A VILLAGER.

Our village, that’s to say not Miss Mitford’s village, but our
village of Bullock Smithy,
Is come into by an avenue of trees, three oak pollards, two elders,
and a withy;
And in the middle, there’s a green of about not exceeding an acre
and a half;
It’s common to all, and fed off by nineteen cows, six ponies, three
horses, five asses, two foals, seven pigs, and a calf!
Besides a pond in the middle, as is held by a similar sort of common
law lease,
And contains twenty ducks, six drakes, three ganders, two dead dogs,
four drown’d kittens, and twelve geese.
Of course the green’s cropt very close, and does famous for bowling
when the little village boys play at cricket;
Only some horse, or pig, or cow, or great jackass is sure to come
and stand right before the wicket.
There’s fifty-five private houses, let alone barns and workshops,
and pig-sties, and poultry huts, and such-like sheds;
With plenty of public-houses--two Foxes, one Green Man, three Bunch
of Grapes, one Crown, and six King’s Heads.
The Green Man is reckon’d the best, as the only one that for love or
money can raise
A postillion, a blue jacket, two deplorable lame white horses, and a
ramshackled “neat post-chaise.”
There’s one parish church for all the people, whatsoever may be
their ranks in life or their degrees,
Except one very damp, small, dark, freezing-cold, little Methodist
chapel of Ease;
And close by the church-yard, there’s a stone-mason’s yard, that
when the time is seasonable
Will furnish with afflictions sore and marble urns and cherubims
very low and reasonable.
There’s a cage, comfortable enough; I’ve been in it with Old Jack
Jeffrey and Tom Pike;
For the Green Man next door will send you in ale, gin, or any thing
else you like.
I can’t speak of the stocks, as nothing remains of them but the
upright post;
But the pound is kept in repairs for the sake of Cob’s horse, as is
always there almost.
There’s a smithy of course, where that queer sort of a chap in his
way, Old Joe Bradley,
Perpetually hammers and stammers, for he stutters and shoes horses
very badly.
There’s a shop of all sorts, that sells every thing, kept by the
widow of Mr. Task;
But when you go there it’s ten to one she’s out of every thing you
ask.
You’ll know her house by the swarm of boys, like flies, about the
old sugary cask.
There are six empty houses, and not so well paper’d inside as out,
For bill-stickers won’t beware, but sticks notices of sales and
election placards all about.
That’s the Doctor’s with a green door, where the garden pots in the
windows is seen;
A weakly monthly rose that don’t blow, and a dead geranium, and a
tea-plant with five black leaves and one green.
As for hollyoaks at the cottage doors, and honeysuckles and
jasmines, you may go and whistle;
But the Tailor’s front garden grow two cabbages, a dock, a ha’porth
of pennyroyal, two dandelions, and a thistle.
There are three small orchards--Mr. Busby’s the schoolmaster’s is
the chief--
With two pear-trees that don’t bear; one plum and an apple, that
every year is stripped by a thief.
There’s another small day-school too, kept by the respectable Mrs.
Gaby;
A select establishment, for six little boys and one big, and four
little girls and a baby.
There’s a rectory, with pointed gables and strange odd chimneys that
never smokes,
For the rector don’t live on his living like other Christian sort of
folks;
There’s a barber’s, once a-week well filled with rough black-bearded
shock-headed churls,
And a window with two feminine men’s heads, and two masculine ladies
in false curls;
There’s a butcher’s and a carpenter’s and a plumber’s and a small
green-grocer’s, and a baker,
But he won’t bake on a Sunday, and there’s a sexton that’s a
coal-merchant besides, and an undertaker;
And a toy-shop, but not a whole one, for a village can’t compare
with the London shops;
One window sells drums, dolls, kites, carts, bats, Clout’s balls,
and the other sells malt and hops.
And Mrs. Brown, in domestic economy not to be a bit behind her
betters,
Lets her house to a milliner, a watchmaker, a rat-catcher, a
cobbler, lives in it herself, and it’s the post-office for
letters.
Now I’ve gone through all the village--ay, from end to end, save and
except one more house,
But I haven’t come to that--and I hope I never shall--and that’s the
Village Poor-House!

THE SCRAPE-BOOK.

“Luck’s all!”

Some men seem born to be lucky. Happier than kings, Fortune’s wheel has for them no revolutions. Whatever they touch turns to gold,--their path is paved with the philosopher’s stone. At games of chance they have no chance; but what is better, a certainty. They hold four suits of trumps. They get windfalls, without a breath stirring--as legacies. Prizes turn up for them in lotteries. On the turf, their horse--an outsider--always wins. They enjoy a whole season of benefits. At the very worst, in trying to drown themselves, they dive on some treasure undiscovered since the Spanish Armada; or tie their halter to a hook, that unseals a hoard in the ceiling. That’s their luck.

There is another kind of fortune, called ill-luck; so ill, that you hope it will die;--but it don’t. That’s my luck.

Other people keep scrap-books; but I, a scrape-book. It is theirs to insert bon-mots, riddles, anecdotes, caricatures, facetiæ of all kinds; mine to record mischances, failures, accidents, disappointments; in short, as the betters say, I have always a bad book. Witness a few extracts, bitter as extract of bark.

April 1st. Married on this day: in the first week of the honeymoon, stumbled over my father-in-law’s beehives! He has 252 bees; thanks to me, he is now able to check them. Some of the insects having an account against me, preferred to _settle_ on my calf. Others swarmed on my hands. My bald head seemed a perfect humming-top! Two hundred and fifty-two stings--it should be “stings--and arrows of outrageous fortune!” But that’s my luck. Rushed bee-blind into the horse-pond, and _torn out_ by Tiger, the house dog. Staggered incontinent into the pig-sty, and collared by the sow--sus. per coll. for kicking her sucklings; recommended oil for my wounds, and none but lamp ditto in the house; relieved of the stings at last--what luck! by 252 operations.

9th. Gave my adored Belinda a black eye, in the open street, aiming at a lad who attempted to snatch her reticule. Belinda’s part taken by a big rascal, as deaf as a post, who wanted to fight me “for striking a woman.” My luck again.

12th. Purchased a mare, warranted so gentle that a lady might ride her, and, indeed, no animal could be quieter, except the leather one, formerly in the Show-room, at Exeter Change. Meant for the first time to ride with Belinda to the Park--put my foot in the stirrup, and found myself on my own back instead of the mare’s. Other men are thrown by their horses, but a saddle does it for me. Well, nothing is so hard as my luck--unless it be the fourth flag or stone from the post at the north corner of Harley Street.

14th. Run down in a wherry by a coal-brig, off Greenwich, but providentially picked up by a steamer, that burst her boiler directly afterwards. Saved to be scalded!--But misfortunes with me never came single, from my very childhood. I remember when my little brothers and sisters tumbled down stairs, they always hitched halfway at the angle. _My_ luck invariably turned the corner. It could not bear to bate me a single bump.

17th. Had my eye picked out by a pavior who was _axing_ his way, he didn’t care where. Sent home in a hackney chariot that upset. Paid Jarvis a sovereign for a shilling. My luck all over!

1st of May. My flue on fire. Not a sweep to be had for love or money!--Lucky enough _for me_--the parish engine soon arrived, with all the charity school. Boys are fond of playing--and indulged their propensity by playing into my best drawing-room. Every friend I had dropped in to dinner. Nothing but Lacedemonian black broth. Others have pot-luck, but I have not even pint-luck--at least of the right sort.

8th. Found, on getting up, that the kitchen garden had been stripped by thieves, but had the luck at night to catch some one in the garden, by walking into my own trap. Afraid to call out, for fear of being shot at by the gardener, who would have hit me to a dead certainty--for such is my luck!

10th. Agricultural distress is a treat to mine. My old friend Bill--I must henceforth call him Corn-bill--has, this morning, laid his unfeeling wooden leg on my tenderest toe, like a thresher. In spite of Dibdin, I don’t believe that oak has any heart; or it would not be such a walking tread-mill!

12th. Two pieces of “my usual.” First knocked down by a mad bull. Secondly, picked up by a pick-pocket. Anybody but me would have found one honest humane man out of a whole crowd; but I am born to suffer, whether done by accident or done by design. Luckily for me and the pick-pocket, I was able to identify him, bound over to prosecute, and had the satisfaction of exporting him to Botany Bay. I suppose I performed well in a court of justice, for the next day--“_Encore un coup_!”--I had a summons to serve with a Middlesex jury, at the Old Bailey, for a fortnight.

14th. My number in the lottery has come up a capital prize. Luck at last--if I had not lost the ticket.

A TRUE STORY.

Whoe’er has seen upon the human face
The yellow jaundice and the jaundice black,
May form a notion of old Colonel Case
With nigger Pompey waiting at his back.

Case,--as the case is, many time with folks
From hot Bengal, Calcutta, or Bombay,
Had tint his tint, as Scottish tongues would say,
And show’d two cheeks as yellow as eggs’ yolks.
Pompey, the chip of some old ebon block,
In hue was like his master’s stiff cravat,
And might indeed have claimed akin to _that_,
Coming, as _he_ did, of an old _black stock_.

Case wore the liver’s livery that such
Must wear, their past excesses to denote,
Like Greenwich pensioners that take too much,
And then do penance in a yellow coat.
Pompey’s, a deep and permanent jet dye,
A stain of nature’s staining--one of those,
We call _fast_ colours--merely, I suppose,
Because such colours never _go_ or _fly_.
Pray mark this difference of dark and sallow,
Pompey’s black husk, and the old Colonel’s yellow.

The Colonel, once a penniless beginner,
From a long Indian rubber rose a winner,
With plenty of pagodas in his pocket,
And homeward turning his Hibernian thought,
Deem’d _Wicklow_ was the very place that ought
To harbour one whose _wick_ was in the socket.

Unhappily for Case’s scheme of quiet,
Wicklow just then was in a pretty riot,
A fact recorded in each day’s diurnals,
Things, Case was not accustomed to peruse,
Careless of news;
But Pompey always read these bloody journals,
Full of Kilmany and Killmore work,
The freaks of some O’Shaunessy’s shillaly,
Of morning frays by some O’Brien Burke,
Or horrid nightly outrage by some Daly;
How scums deserving of the Devil’s ladle,
Would fall upon the harmless scull and knock it,
And if he found an infant in the cradle
Stern Rock would hardly hesitate to rock it;--
In fact, he read of burner and of killer,
And Irish ravages, day after day,
Till, haunting in his dreams, he used to say,
That “Pompey could not sleep on _Pompey’s Pillar_.”

Judge then the horror of the nigger’s face
To find--with such impressions of that dire land--
That Case,--his master, was a packing case
For Ireland!
He saw in fearful reveries arise,
Phantasmagorias of those dreadful men
Whose fame associate with Irish plots is,
Fitzgeralds--Tones--O’Connors--Hare--and then
“Those _Emmetts_,” not so “little in his eyes”
As Doctor Watts’s!
He felt himself piked, roasted--carv’d and hack’d,
His big black burly body seemed in fact
A pincushion for Terror’s pins and needles,--
Oh, how he wish’d himself beneath the sun
Of Afric--or in far Barbadoes--one
Of Bishop Coleridge’s new _black beadles_.

Full of this fright,
With broken peace and broken English choking,
As black as any raven and as croaking,
Pompey rushed in upon his master’s sight,
Plump’d on his knees, and clasp’d his sable digits,
Thus stirring Curiosity’s sharp fidgets--
“O Massa!--Massa!--Colonel!--Massa Case,--
Not go to Ireland!--Ireland dam bad place;
Dem take our bloods--dem Irish--every drop--
Oh why for Massa go so far a distance
To have him life?”----Here Pompey made a stop,
Putting an awful period to existence.

“Not go to Ireland--not to Ireland, fellow,
And murder’d--why should I be murder’d, Sirrah?”
Cried Case, with anger’s tinge upon his yellow,--
Pompey, for answer, pointing in a mirror
The Colonel’s saffron, and his own japan,--
“Well, what has that to do--quick--speak outright, boy?”
“O Massa”--(so the explanation ran)
“Massa be killed--’cause Massa _Orange Man_,
And Pompey killed--’cause Pompey not a _White Boy_!”

THE SORROWS OF AN UNDERTAKER.

To mention only by name the sorrows of an Undertaker, will be likely to raise a smile on most faces,--the mere words suggest a solemn stalking parody of grief to the satiric fancy;--but give a fair hearing to my woes, and even the veriest mocker may learn to pity an Undertaker who has been unfortunate in all his undertakings.

My Father, a Furnisher and Performer in the funeral line, used to say of me,--noticing some boyish levities--that “I should never do for an Undertaker.” But the prediction was wrong--my Parent died, and I did for him in the way of business. Having no other alternative, I took possession of a very fair stock and business. I felt at first as if plunged in the Black Sea--and when I read my name upon the shop door, it threw a crape over my spirits, that I did not get rid of for some months.

Then came the cares of business. The scandalous insinuated that the funerals were not so decorously performed as in the time of the Late. I discharged my mutes, who were grown fat and jocular, and sought about for the lean and lank visaged kind. But these demure rogues cheated and robbed me--plucked my feathers and pruned my scarfs, and I was driven back again to my “merrie men,”--whose only fault was making a pleasure of their business.

Soon after this, I made myself prominent in the parish, and obtained a contract for Parochial Conchology--or shells for the paupers. But this even, as I may say, broke down on its first tressels. Having as my first job to inter a workhouse female--Ætat. 96--and wishing to gain the good opinion of the parish, I had made the arrangements with more than usual decency. The company were at the door. Placing myself at the head, with my best burial face, and my slowest solemnity of step, I set forward, and thanks to my professional deafness,--induced by the constant hammering--I never perceived, till at the church gates, that the procession had not stirred from the door of the house. So good a joke was not lost upon my two Mutes, who made it an excuse for chuckling on after occasions. But to me the consequence was serious. A notion arose amongst the poor that I was too proud to walk along with their remains, and the ferment ran so high, that I was finally compelled to give up my contract.

So much for foot funerals. Now for coach work. The extravagant charges of the jobbers at last induced me to set up a Hearse and Mourning Coaches of my own, with sleek ebony long-tailed horses to match. One of these--the finest of the set--had been sold to me under warranty of being sound and free from vice; and so he was, but the dealer never told me that he had been a charger at Astley’s. Accordingly on his very first performance, in passing through Bow,--at that time a kind of Fairy Land,--he thought proper, on hearing a showman’s trumpet, to dance a cotillion in his feathers! There was nothing to be done but to travel on with three to the next stage, where I sold the caperer at a heavy loss, and to the infinite regret of my merry mourners, with whom this exhibition had made him a great favourite. From this period my business rapidly declined, till instead of five or six demises, on an average, I put in only two defuncts and a half per week.

In this extremity a “black job” was brought to me that promised to make amends for the rest. One fine morning a brace of executors walked into the shop, and handing to me the following extract of a will, politely requested that I would perform accordingly--and with the pleasing addition that I was to be regardless of the expense. The document ran thus: “Item, I will and desire that after death, my body be placed in a strong leaden coffin, the same to be afterwards enclosed in one of oak, and therein my remains to be conveyed handsomely to the village of *** in Norfolk, my birth-place; there to lie, being duly watched, during one night, in the Family mansion now unoccupied, and on the morrow to be carried thence to the church, the coffin being borne by the six oldest resident and decayed parishioners, male or female, and for the same they shall receive severally the sum of five pounds, to be paid on or before the day of interment.”

It will be believed that I lost no time in preparing the last solid and costly receptacles for the late Lady Lambert; and the unusual bulk of the deceased seemed in prospective to justify a bill of proportionate magnitude. I was prodigal of plumes and scutcheons, of staves and scarfs, and mourning coaches; and finally, raising a whole company of black cavalry, we set out by stages, short and sweet, for our destination. I had been prudent enough to send a letter before me to prepare the bearers, and imprudent enough to remit their fees in advance. But I had no misgivings. My men enjoyed the excursion, and so did I. We ate well, drank well, slept well, and expected to be well paid for what was so well done. At the last stage it happened I had rather an intricate reckoning to arrange, by which means being detained a full hour behind the cavalcade, I did not reach the desired village till the whole party had established themselves at the Dying Dolphin; a fact I first ascertained from hearing the merriment of my two mutes in the parlour. Highly indignant at this breach of decorum, I rushed in on the offending couple; and let the Undertaking Reader conceive my feelings, when the following letter was put into my hands, explaining at once the good joke of the two fellows, or rather, that of the whole village.

“Sir,--We have sought out the six oldest of the pauper parishioners of this place, namely as follows:--

Margaret Squires, aged 101, blind and bed-rid.
Timothy Topping, aged 98, paralytic and bed-rid.
Darius Watts, aged 95, with loss of both legs.
Barbara Copp, 94 years, born without arms.
Philip Gill, about 81, an Idiot.
Mary Ridges, 79, afflicted with St. Vitus.

“Among whom we have distributed your Thirty Pounds according to desire, and for which they are very grateful.

JOHN GILLS, }
SAM. RACKSTROW, } Overseers.”

Such were the six bearers who were to carry Lady Lambert to the church, and who could as soon have carried the church to Lady Lambert. To crown all, I rashly listened to the advice of my thoughtless mutes, and in an evil hour deposited the body without troubling any parishioner, old or young, on the subject. The consequence is, the Executors demur to my bill, because I have not acted up to the letter of my instructions. I have had to stand treat for a large party on the road, to sustain all the charges of the black cavalry, and am besides minus thirty pounds in charity, without even the merit of a charitable intention!

THE CARELESSE NURSE MAYD.

I sawe a Mayd sitte on a Bank,
Beguiled by Wooer fayne and fond;
And whiles His flatterynge Vowes She drank,
Her Nurselynge slipt within a Pond!

All Even Tide they Talkde and Kist,
For She was fayre and He was Kinde;
The Sunne went down before She wist
Another Sonne had sett behinde!

With angrie Hands and frownynge Browe,
That deemed Her owne the Urchine’s Sinne,
She pluckt Him out, but he was nowe
Past being Whipt for fallynge in.

She then beginnes to wayle the Ladde
With Shrikes that Echo answerde round--
O! foolishe Mayd to be soe sadde
The Momente that her Care was drownd!

TO FANNY.

“Gay being, born to flutter!”--SALE’S GLEE.

Is this your faith, then, Fanny!
What, to chat with every Dun?
I’m the one, then, but of many,
Not of many but the _One_!

Last night you smil’d on all, Ma’am,
That appear’d in scarlet dress;
And your Regimental Ball, Ma’am,
Look’d a little like a _Mess_.

I thought that of the Sogers
(As the Scotch say) one might do
And that I, slight Ensign Rogers,
Was the chosen man and true.

But ’Sblood! your eye was busy
With that ragamuffin mob;--
Colonel Buddell--Colonel Dizzy--
And Lieutenant-Colonel Cobb.

General Joblin, General Jodkin,
Colonels--Kelly, Felly, with
Majors--Sturgeon, Truffle, Bodkin,
And the Quarter-master Smith.

Major Powderum--Major Dowdrum--
Major Chowdrum--Major Bye--
Captain Tawney--Captain Fawney,
Captain Any-one--but I!

Deuce take it! when the regiment
You so praised, I only thought
That you lov’d it in abridgment,
But I now am better taught!

I went, as loving man goes,
To admire thee in quadrilles;
But Fan, you dance fandangoes
With just any fop that wills!

I went with notes before us,
On the lay of Love to touch;
But with all the Corps in chorus,
Oh! it is indeed too much!

You once--ere you contracted
For the Army--seem’d my own;
But now you laugh with all the Staff,
And I may sigh alone!

I know not how it chances,
When my passion ever dares,
But the warmer my advances,
Then the cooler are your airs.

I am, I don’t conceal it,
But I am a little hurt;
You’re a Fan, and I must feel it,
Fit for nothing but a _Flirt_!

I dreamt thy smiles of beauty
On myself alone did fall;
But alas! “Cosi Fan Tutti!”
It is thus, Fan, thus with all!

You have taken quite a mob in
Of new military flames;--
They would make a fine Round Robin
If I gave you all their names!

THE FANCY FAIR.

“It beareth the name of Vanity Fair, because the town where it
is kept is ‘lighter than vanity;’ and also because all that is
there sold, or that cometh thither, is vanity.”--PILGRIM’S
PROGRESS.

“I named this place Boothia.”--CAPTAIN ROSS.

“A Fancy Fair,” said my friend L., in his usual quaint style, “is a fair subject for fancy; take up your pen and try. For instance, there was one held at the Mansion House. Conceive a shambling shock-headed clodpole, familiar with the wakes of Bow, Barnet, and Bartlemy, elbowing his awkward way into the Egyptian Hall, his round eyes and mouth all-agape in the ludicrous expectation of seeing the Lord Mayor standing on his very Worshipful head, the Lady Mayoress lifting a hundred weight by her Right Honourable hair, the Sword-Bearer swallowing his blade of state, the Recorder conjuring ribands from his learned and eloquent mouth, and the Senior Alderman with a painted York-and-Lancaster-face, dancing a _saraband_ à la Pierrot! Or fancy Jolterhead at the fair of the Surrey Zoological, forcing his clumsy destructive course through groups of female fashionables, like a hog in a tulip bed, with the equally laughable intention of inspecting long horns and short horns, prime beasts and lean stock, of handling the porkers and coughing the colts. Nay, imagine our bumpkin at the great Fancy Fair of all, blundering up to a stall kept by a Royal Duchess, and enquiring perseveringly for a gilt gingerbread King and Queen--a long-promised fairing to brother Bill at Leighton Buzzard!”

Little did L. dream during this flourish of fancy, that his whimsical fiction had been forestalled by fact; and a deep shade of vexation passed over his features while he perused the following hints from Hants, as conveyed in a _bonâ fide_ letter to the Editor of the Comic Annual.

HONNORD SUR,

Dont no if you Be a Hamshire man, or a man atacht to the fancy, but
as Both such myself, have took the libberty to write about what is
no joke. Of coarse allude to being Hoaxt up to Lonnon, to sea a
fair no fair at all and About as much fancy as you mite fancy on
the pint of a pin.--

Have follerd the Fancy, ever since cumming of Age, and bean to
every Pugilistical fite, from the Gaim Chicking down to the fite
last weak. Have bated Buls drawd Baggers, and Kild rats myself
meening to say with my Hone Dogs. Ought to no wot Fancy his. Self
prays is no re-comendation But have bean at every Fair Waik or
Revvle in England. Ought to no then wot a Fare is.

Has for the Lonnon job--could Sea nothin like Fancy and nothing
like fare. Only a Toy shop out of Town with a gals skool looking
after it, without a Guvverness and all oglein like Winkin. Lots
of the fare sects but no thimbel rig, no priking in the garter no
nothing. Am blest if our hone little Fare down at Goos Grean don’t
lick it all to Styx. Bulbeating, Baggerdrawing, Cuggleplaying,
Rastlin, a Sopped pigtale, a Mane of Cox Jackasreacing jumpin in
Sax, and a Grand Sire Peal of Trouble Bobs puld by the Collige
youths by way of givin a Bell’s Life to the hole. Call that Fancy.
Too wild Best Shoes, fore theaters besides a Horseplay a Dwarft a
She Giant, a fat Child a prize ox five carriboo savidges, a lurned
Pigg an Albany with wite Hares, a real See Murmad a Fir Eater and
lots of Punshes and Juddis. Call that a Fare.

Now for Lonnon. No Sanderses--no Richardsens no wumwills menageris
no backy boxis to shy for--no lucky Boxis. No poster makin no
jugling or Dancing. Prest one yung laidy in ruge cheaks and
trowsers verry civelly For a bit of a caper on the tite rop--But
miss got on the hi rop, and call’d for a conestubble. Askt annother
in a ridding habbit for the faver of a little horsemunship and got
kicked out of her Booth. Goos Grean for my munny! Saw a yung laidy
there that swallerd a Sord and wasn’t too Partickler to jump threw
a hoop. Dutchesses look dull after that at a Fare. Verry dignified,
but Prefer the Wax Wurk, as a Show. Dont sea anny think in Watch
Pappers cut out by Countisses that have been born with all their
harms and legs--not Miss Biffins.

Must say one thing for Goos Grean. Never got my pockit pict xcept
at Lonnon--am sorry to say lost my Reader and Ticker and every Dump
I had let alone a single sovran. And lost the best part of that
besides to a Yung Laidy that nevver gave change. Greenish enuf says
you for my Tim of Day but I was gammund by the baggidge to bye five
shillin Pin Cushins. Wish Charrity had stayd at Hoam! The ould Mare
got a coald by waiting outside. And the five Charrity pincushins
hadn’t bran enuf in their hole boddys to make her a Mash.

Am told the Hospittle don’t clear anny grate proffits after all is
dun and Like enuff. A Fare should be a Fare and fokes at Room oght
to do as Room does. Have a notion Peeressis that keep Booths wood
take moor Munny if they wasn’t abuv having the dubble drums and
speakin trumpets and gongs. There’s nothin like goin the hole Hog!

Shall be happy, sur, to sea You at Goos Green next Fare and pint
out the Difference. Maybe in Flurtashun and Matchmacking and
getting off Dorters along with the dolls we ar a littel cut out,
but for Ginuen Fancy and Fun and Fair Play its a mear Green Goos to
Goos Green.

Remain Sur,
Your humbel tu command,
JACOB GILES.

P.S. Think Vallintins day wood be a Good fixter for next Fancy
Fare. Shan’t say why. Sniff sumthing of the kind going on amung
our hone Gals--Polly as just begd a sak of bran and she dont keap
rabits. Pincushins and nothin else. Tother day cum across a large
Watchpokit and suspect Mrs. G is at the Bottom of it. No churnin
butter, no packin egs, no setten Hens and crammin Turkis--All
sniping ribbins folding papper sowin up satten and splitting hole
trusses of straw. Am blest if its for litterin down Horsis. Dont no
how its all to be got to markit at Lonnon, the nine Gals and all
’xcept its by a Pickfurd Van.

POEMS BY A POOR GENTLEMAN.

There, in a lonely room, from bailiffs snug,
The Muse found Scroggins stretched beneath a rug.--GOLDSMITH.

Poetry and poverty begin with the same letter, and in more respects than one, are “as like each other as two P’s.”--Nine tailors are the making of a man, but not so the nine Muses. Their votaries are notoriously only water drinkers, eating mutton cold, and dwelling in attics. Look at the miserable lives and deaths recorded of the poets. “Butler,” says Mr. D’Israeli, “lived in a cellar, and Goldsmith in a Deserted Village. Savage ran wild,--Chatterton was carried on St. Augustine’s Back like a young gipsy; and his half-starved _Rowley_ always said Heigho, when he heard of gammon and spinach. Gray’s day’s were ode-ious, and Gay’s gaiety was fabulous. Falconer was shipwrecked. Homer was a blind beggar, and Pope raised a subscription for him, and went snacks. Crabbe found himself in the poor-house, Spenser couldn’t afford a great-coat, and Milton was led up and down by his daughters to save the expense of a dog.”

It seems all but impossible to be a poet, in easy circumstances. Pope has shown how verses are written by Ladies of Quality--and what execrable rhymes Sir Richard Blackmore composed in his chariot; in a hay-cart he might have sung like a Burns.

As the editors of magazines and annuals (save one) well know, the truly poetical contributions which can be inserted, are not those which come post free, in rose-coloured tinted paper, scented with musk, and sealed with fancy wax. The real article arrives by post, unpaid, sealed with rosin, or possibly with a dab of pitch or cobbler’s wax, bearing the impression of a halfpenny, or more frequently of a button,--the paper is dingy, and scant--the hand-writing has evidently come to the author by nature--there are trips in the spelling, and Priscian is a little scratch’d or so--but a rill of the true Castalian runs through the whole composition, though its fountain-head was a broken tea-cup, instead of a silver standish. A few years ago I used to be favoured with numerous poems for insertion, which bore the signature of Fitz-Norman; the crest on the seal had probably descended from the Conquest, and the packets were invariably delivered by a Patagonian footman in green and gold. The author was evidently rich, and the verses were as palpably poor; they were declined, with the usual answer to correspondents who do not answer, and the communications ceased--as I thought for ever, but I was deceived; a few days back one of the dirtiest and raggedest of street urchins delivered a soiled whity brown packet, closed with a wafer, which bore the impress of a thimble. The paper had more the odour of tobacco than of rose leaves, and the writing appeared to have been perpetrated with a skewer dipped in coffee-grounds; but the old signature of Fitz-Norman had the honour to be my “very humble servant” at the foot of the letter. It was too certain that he had fallen from affluence to indigence, but the adversity which had wrought such a change upon the writing implements, had, as usual, improved his poetry. The neat crowquill never traced on the superfine Bath paper any thing so unaffected as the following:--

STANZAS.

WRITTEN UNDER THE FEAR OF BAILIFFS.

Alas! of all the noxious things
That wait upon the poor,
Most cruel is that Felon-Fear
That haunts the “Debtor’s Door!”

Saint Sepulchre’s begins to toil,
The Sheriffs seek the cell:--
So I expect their officers,
And tremble at the bell!

I look for _beer_, and yet I quake
With fright at every _tap_;
And dread a _double-knock_, for oh!
I’ve not a _single rap_!

SONNET.

WRITTEN IN A WORKHOUSE.

Oh, blessed ease! no more of heaven I ask:
The overseer is gone--that vandal elf--
And hemp, unpick’d, may go and hang itself,
While I, untask’d, except with Cowper’s Task,
In blessed literary leisure bask,
And lose the workhouse, saving in the works
Of Goldsmiths, Johnsons, Sheridans, and Burkes;
Eat prose and drink of the Castalian flask;
The themes of Locke, the anecdotes of Spence,
The humorous of Gay, the Grave of Blair--
Unlearned toil, unletter’d labours hence!
But, hark! I hear the master on the stair
And Thomson’s Castle, that of Indolence,
Must be to me a castle in the air.

SONNET.--A SOMNAMBULIST.

“A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.”--BYRON.

Methought--for Fancy is the strangest gadder
When sleep all homely Mundane ties hath riven--
Methought that I ascended Jacob’s ladder,
With heartfelt hope of getting up to Heaven:
Some bell, I knew not whence, was sounding seven
When I set foot upon that long one-pair;
And still I climbed when it had chimed eleven,
Nor yet of landing-place became aware;
Step after step in endless flight seem’d there;
But on, with steadfast hope, I struggled still,
To gain that blessed haven from all care,
Where tears are wiped, and hearts forget their ill,
When, lo! I wakened on a sadder stair--
Tramp--tramp--tramp--tramp--upon the Brixton Mill!

FUGITIVE LINES ON PAWNING MY WATCH.

“Aurum _potabile_:”--Gold biles the pot.--FREE TRANSLATION.

Farewell then, my golden repeater,
We’re come to my Uncle’s old shop;
And hunger won’t be a dumb-waiter,
The Cerberus growls for a sop!

To quit thee, my comrade diurnal,
My feelings will certainly scotch;
But oh! there’s a riot internal,
And Famine calls out for the Watch!

Oh! hunger’s a terrible trial,
I really must have a relief,--
So here goes the plate of your dial
To fetch me some Williams’s beef!

As famish’d as any lost seaman,
I’ve fasted for many a dawn,
And now must play chess with the Demon,
And give it a _check_ with a _pawn_.

I’ve fasted, since dining at Buncle’s,
Two days with true Perceval zeal--
And now must make up at my Uncle’s.
By getting a _duplicate_ meal.

No Peachum it is, or young Lockit,
That rifles my fob with a snatch;
Alas! I must pick my own pocket,
And make gravy-soup of my watch!

So long I have wander’d a starver,
I’m getting as keen as a hawk;
Time’s long hand must take up a carver,
His short hand lay hold of a fork.

Right heavy and sad the event is,
But oh! it is Poverty’s crime;
I’ve been such a Brownrigg’s Apprentice,
I thus must be “out of my Time.”

Alas! when in Brook Street the Upper,
In comfort I lived between walls,
I’ve gone to a dance for my supper;
But now I must go to Three Balls!

Folks talk about dressing for dinner,
But I have for dinner undrest;
Since Christmas, as I am a sinner,
I’ve eaten a suit of my best.

I haven’t a ram or a mummock
To fetch me a chop or a steak;
I wish that the coats of my stomach
Were such as my uncle would take!

When dishes were ready with garnish
My watch used to warn with a chime--
But now my repeater must furnish
The dinner in lieu of the time!

My craving will have no denials,
I can’t fob it off, if you stay,
So go,--and the old Seven Dials
Must tell me the time of the day.

Your chimes I shall never more hear ’em,
To part is a Tic Douloureux!
But Tempus has his edax rerum,
And I have my Feeding-Time too!

Farewell then, my golden repeater,
We’re come to my Uncle’s old shop--
And Hunger won’t be a dumb-waiter,
The Cerberus growls for a sop!

THE LIFE OF ZIMMERMANN.

(BY HIMSELF).

“This, this, is solitude.”--LORD BYRON.

I was born, I may almost say, an orphan; my Father died three months before I saw the light, and my Mother three hours after--thus I was left in the whole world alone, and an only child, for I had neither Brothers nor Sisters; much of my after passion for solitude might be ascribed to this cause, for I believe our tendencies date themselves from a much earlier age, or rather, youth, than is generally imagined. It was remarked that I could go alone at nine months, and I have had an aptitude to going alone all the rest of my life. The first words I learnt to say, were “I by myself, I”--or thou--or he--or she--or it--but I was a long time before I could pronounce any personals in the plural; my little games and habits were equally singular. I was fond of playing at Solitary or at Patience, or another game of cards of my own invention, namely, whist, with _three_ dummies. Of books, my favourite was Robinson Crusoe, especially the first part, for I was not fond of the intrusion of Friday, and thought the natives really were Savages to spoil such a solitude. At ten years of age I was happily placed with the Rev. Mr. Steinkopff, a widower, who took in only the limited number of six pupils, and had only me to begin with; here I enjoyed myself very much, learning in a first and last class in school hours, and playing in play time at hoop, and other pretty games not requiring partners. My playground was, in short, a garden of Eden, and I did not even sigh for an Eve, but, like Paradise, it was too happy to last. I was removed from Mr. Steinkopff’s to the University of Göttingen, and at once the eyes of six hundred pupils, and the pupils of twelve hundred eyes, seemed fastened upon me: I felt like an owl forced into day-light; often and often I shammed ill, as an excuse for confining myself to my chamber, but some officious would-be friends, insisting on coming to sit with me, as they said, to enliven my solitude, I was forced as a last resource to do that which subjected me, on the principle of Howard’s Prison Discipline, to solitary confinement. But even this pleasure did not last; the heads of the College found out that solitary confinement was no punishment, and put another student in the same cell; in this extremity I had no alternative but to endeavour to make him a convert to my principles, and in some days I succeeded in convincing him of the individual independence of man, the solid pleasures of solitude, and the hollow one of society,--in short, he so warmly adopted my views, that in a transport of sympathy we swore an eternal friendship, and agreed to separate for ever, and keep ourselves to ourselves as much as possible. To this end we formed with our blanket a screen across our cell, and that we might not even in thought associate with each other, he soliloquised only in French, of which I was ignorant, and I in English, to which he was equally a stranger. Under this system my wishes were gratified, for I think I felt more intensely lonely than I ever remember when more strictly alone. Of course this condition had a conclusion; we were brought out again unwillingly into the common world, and the firm of Zimmermann, Nobody, and Co., was compelled to admit--six hundred partners. In this extremity, my fellow prisoner Zingleman and myself had recourse to the persuasions of oratory. We preached solitude, and got quite a congregation, and of the six hundred hearers, four hundred at least became converts to our Unitarian Doctrine; every one of these disciples strove to fly to the most obscure recesses, and the little cemetery of the College had always a plenty of those who were trying to make themselves scarce. This of course was afflicting; as in the game of puss in a corner, it was difficult to get a corner unoccupied to be alone in; the defections and desertions from the College were consequently numerous, and for a long time the state gazette contained daily advertisements for missing gentlemen, with a description of their persons and habits, and invariably concluding with this sentence: “of a melancholy turn,--calls himself a Zimmermanian, and affects solitude.” In fact, as Schiller’s Robbers begot Robbers, so did my solitude beget solitudinarians, but with this difference, that the dramatist’s disciples frequented the Highways, and mine the Byeways!

The consequence was what might have been expected, which I had foreseen, and ardently desired. I was expelled from the University of Göttingen. This was perhaps the triumph of my life. A grand dinner was got up by Zingleman in my honour, at which more than three hundred were present, but in tacit homage to my principles, they never spoke nor held any communication with each other, and at a concerted signal the toast of “Zimmermann and Solitude” was drunk, by dumb show, in appropriate solemn silence. I was much affected by this tribute, and left with tears in my eyes, to think, with such sentiments, how many of us might be thrown together again. Being thus left to myself, like a vessel with only one hand on board, I was at liberty to steer my own course, and accordingly took a lodging at Number One, in Wilderness Street, that held out the inviting prospect of a single room to let for a single man. In this congenial situation I composed that my great work on Solitude, and here I think it necessary to warn the reader against many spurious books, calling themselves “Companions to Zimmermann’s Solitude,” as if solitude could have society. Alas, from this work I may date the decline which my presentiment tells me will terminate in my death. My book, though written against populousness, became so popular, that its author, though in love with loneliness, could never be alone. Striving to fly from the face of man, I could never escape it, nor that of woman and child into the bargain. When I stirred abroad mobs surrounded me, and cried, “Here is the Solitary!”--when I staid at home I was equally crowded; all the public societies of Göttingen thought proper to come up to me with addresses, and not even by deputation. Flight was my only resource, but it did not avail, for I could not fly from myself. Wherever I went Zimmermann and Solitude had got before me, and their votaries assembled to meet me. In vain I travelled throughout the European and Asiatic continent: with an enthusiasm and perseverance of which only Germans are capable, some of my countrymen were sure to haunt me, and really showed by the distance they journeyed, that they were ready to go all lengths with me and my doctrine. Some of these Pilgrims even brought their wives and children along with them, in search of my solitude; and were so unreasonable even as to murmur at my taking the inside of a coach, or the cabin of a packet-boat to myself.

From these persecutions I was released by what some persons would call an unfortunate accident, a vessel in which I sailed from Leghorn, going down at sea with all hands excepting my own pair, which happened to have grappled a hen-coop. There was no sail in sight, nor any land to be seen--nothing but sea and sky; and from the midst of the watery expanse it was perhaps the first and only glimpse I ever had of real and perfect solitude, yet so inconsistent is human nature, I could not really and perfectly enter into its enjoyment. I was picked up at length by a British brig of war, and, schooled by the past, had the presence of mind to conceal my name, and to adopt the English one of Grundy. Under this _nom de guerre_, but really a name of peace, I enjoyed comparative quiet, interrupted only by the pertinacious attendance of an unconscious countryman, who, noticing my very retired habits, endeavoured by daily lectures from my own work, to make me a convert to my own principles. In short, he so wore me out, that at last, to get rid of his importunities, I told him in confidence that I was the author himself. But the result was anything but what I expected; and here I must blush again for the inconsistency of human nature. While Winkells knew me only as Grundy, he painted nothing but the charms of Solitude, and exhorted me to detach myself from society; but no sooner did he learn that I was Zimmermann, than he insisted on my going to Lady C----’s rout and his own conversazione. In fact, he wanted to make me, instead of a Lion of the Desert, a Lion of the Menagerie. How I resented such a proposition may be supposed, as well as his offer to procure for me the first vacancy that happened in the situation of Hermit at Lord P----’s Hermitage; being, as he was pleased to say, not only able to bear solitude, but well-bred and well-informed, and fit to _receive company_. The effect of this unfortunate disclosure was to make me leave England, for fear of meeting with the fate of a man or an ox that ventures to quit the common herd. I should immediately have been declared mad, and mobbed into lunacy, and then put into solitary confinement, with a keeper always with me, as a person beside himself, and not fit to be left alone for a moment. As such a fate would have been worse to me than death, I immediately left London, and am now living anonymously in an uninhabited house,--prudence forbids me to say where.

“Sare, I am at where?--”
“Well, I know you be!”
]

THE PORTRAIT:

BEING AN APOLOGY FOR NOT MAKING AN ATTEMPT ON MY OWN LIFE.

The late inimitable Charles Mathews, in one of his amusing entertainments, used to tell a story of a certain innkeeper, who made it a rule of his house, to allow a candle to a guest, only on condition of his ordering a pint of wine. Whereupon the guest contends, on the reciprocity system, for a light for every half-bottle, and finally drinks himself into a general illumination.

Something of the above principle seems to have obtained in the case of a Portrait and a Memoir, which in literary practice have been usually dependent on each other--a likeness and a life,--a candle and a pint of wine. The mere act of sitting, probably suggests the idea of hatching; at least an author has seldom nestled in a painter’s chair, without coming out afterwards with a brood of Reminiscences, and accordingly, no sooner was my effigy about to be presented to the Public, than I found myself called upon by my Publisher, with a finished proof of the engraving in one hand, and a request for an account of myself in the other. He evidently supposed, as a matter of course, that I had my autobiography in the bottle, and that the time was come to uncork and pour it out _with a Head_.