fortune ever permit me to embrace my daughter-in-law, and take your children on
my knee? You will speak kindly to them of their grandfather, will you not? Poor
General Baynes, I have heard, used violent and unseemly language regarding me,
which I most heartily pardon. I am grateful when I think that I never did
General B. an injury: grateful and proud to accept benefits from my own son.
These I treasure up in my heart; and still hope I shall be able to repay with
something more substantial than my fondest prayers. Give my best wishes, then,
to Miss Charlotte, and try and teach her to think kindly of her Philip's
father."
Miss Charlotte Baynes, who kept the name of Miss Grigsby, the governess, amongst
all the roguish children of a facetious father, was with us one month, and her
mamma expressed great cheerfulness at her absence, and at the thought that she
had found such good friends. After two months, her uncle Major MacWhirter,
returned from visiting his relations in the North, and offered to take his niece
back to France again. He made this proposition with the jolliest air in the
world, and as if his niece would jump for joy to go back to her mother. But to
the major's astonishment, Miss Baynes turned quite pale, ran to her hostess,
flung herself into that lady's arms and then there began an osculatory
performance which perfectly astonished the good major. Charlotte's friend,
holding Miss Baynes tight in her embrace, looked fiercely at the major over the
girl's shoulder, and defied him to take her away from that sanctuary.
"Oh, you dear, good dear friend!" Charlotte gurgled out, and sobbed I know not
what more expressions of fondness and gratitude.
But the truth is, that two sisters, or mother and daughter, could not love each
other more heartily than these two personages. Mother and daughter forsooth! You
should have seen Charlotte's piteous look when sometimes the conviction would
come on her that she ought at length to go home to mamma; such a look as I can
fancy Iphigenia casting on Agamemnon, when, in obedience to a painful sense of
duty, he was about to?? to use the sacrificial knife. No, we all loved her. The
children would howl at the idea of parting with their Miss Grigsby. Charlotte,
in return, helped them to very pretty lessons in music and French??served hot,
as it were, from her own recent studies at Tours??and a good daily governess
operated on the rest of their education to everybody's satisfaction.
And so months rolled on and our young favourite still remained with us. Mamma
fed the little maid's purse with occasional remittances; and begged her hostess
to supply her with all necessary articles from the milliner. Afterwards, it is
true, Mrs. General Baynes ?? But why enter upon these painful family disputes in
a chapter which has been devoted to sentiment?
As soon as Mr. Firmin received the letter above faithfully copied (with the
exception of the pecuniary offer, which I do not consider myself at liberty to
divulge), he hurried down from Thornhaugh Street to Westminster. He dashed by
Buttons, the page, he took no notice of my wondering wife at the drawing-room
door; he rushed to the second floor, bursting open the school-room door, where
Charlotte was teaching our dear third daughter to play In my Cottage near a
Wood.
"Charlotte! Charlotte!" he cried out.
"La, Philip! don't you see Miss Grigsby is giving us lessons?" said the
children.
But he would not listen to those wags, and still beckoned Charlotte to him. That
young woman rose up and followed him out of the door, as, indeed, she would have
followed him out of the window; and there, on the stairs, they read Dr. Firmin's
letter, with their heads quite close together, you understand.
"Two hundred a year more," said Philip, his heart throbbing so that he could
hardly speak; "and your fifty??and two hundred the Gazette??and??"
"Oh, Philip!" was all Charlotte could say, and then??There was a pretty group
for the children to see, and for an artist to draw!
CHAPTER III. WAYS AND MEANS.
Of course any man of the world, who is possessed of decent prudence, will
perceive that the idea of marrying on four hundred and fifty pounds a year so
secured as was Master Philip's income, was preposterous and absurd. In the first
place, you can't live on four hundred and fifty pounds a year, that is a
certainty. People do live on less, I believe. But a life without a brougham,
without a decent house, without claret for dinner, and a footman to wait, can
hardly be called existence. Philip's income might fail any day. He might not
please the American paper. He might quarrel with the Pall Mall Gazette. And then
what would remain to him? Only poor little Charlotte's fifty pounds a year! So
Philip's most intimate male friend??a man of the world, and with a good deal of
experience??argued. Of course I was not surprised that Philip did not choose to
take my advice: though I did not expect he would become so violently angry, call
names almost, and use most rude expressions, when, at his express desire, this
advice was tendered to him. If he did not want it, why did he ask for it? The
advice might be unwelcome to him, but why did he choose to tell me at my own
table, over my own claret, that it was the advice of a sneak and a worldling? My
good fellow, that claret, though it is a second growth, and I can afford no
better, costs seventy-two shillings a dozen. How much is six times three hundred
and sixty-five? A bottle a day is the least you can calculate (the fellow would
come to my house and drink two bottles to himself, with the utmost nonchalance).
A bottle per diem of that light charet??of that second-growth stuff??costs one
hundred and four guineas a year, do you understand? or, to speak plainly with
you, one hundred and nine pounds four shillings!
"Well," says Philip, "apr?s? We'll do without. Meantime I will take what I can
get!" and he tosses off about a pint as he speaks (these mousseline glasses are
not only enormous, but they break by dozens.) He tosses off a pint of my Larose,
and gives a great roar of laughter, as if he had said a good thing.
Philip Firmin is coarse and offensive at times, and Bickerton in holding this
opinion is not altogether wrong.
"I'll drink claret when I come to you, old boy," he says, grinning; "and at home
I will have whiskey-and-water."
"But suppose Charlotte is ordered claret?"
"Well, she can have it," says this liberal lover; "a bottle will last her a
week."
"Don't you see," I shriek out, "that even a bottle a week costs something
like??sixty by fifty-two??eighteen pounds a year?" (I own it is really only
fifteen twelve; but, in the hurry of argument, a man may stretch a figure or
so.) "Eighteen pounds for Charlotte's claret; as much, at least, you great boozy
toper, for your whisky and beer. Why, you actually want a tenth part of your
income for the liquor you consume! And then clothes; and then lodging; and then
coals; and then doctor's bills; and then pocket-money; and then sea-side for the
little dears. Just have the kin
dness to add these things up, and you will find
that you have about two-and-ninepence left to pay the grocer and the butcher."
"What you call prudence," says Philip, thumping the table, and, of course,
breaking a glass, "I call cowardice??I call blasphemy! Do you mean, as a
Christian man, to tell me that two young people, and a family if it should
please heaven to send them one, cannot subsist upon five hundred pounds a year?
Look round, sir, at the myriads of God's creatures who live, love, are happy and
poor, and be ashamed of the wicked doubt which you utter!" And he starts up, and
strides up and down the dining-room, curling his flaming moustache, and rings
the bell fiercely, and says, "Johnson, I've broke a glass. Get me another."
In the drawing-room, my wife asks what we two were fighting about? And, as
Charlotte is up-stairs, telling the children stories as they are put to bed, or
writing to her dear mamma, or what not, our friend bursts out with more rude and
violent expressions than he had used in the dining-room over my glasses which he
was smashing, tells my own wife that I am an atheist, or at best a miserable
sceptic and Sadducee: that I doubt of the goodness of heaven, and am not
thankful for my daily bread. And, with one of her kindling looks directed
towards the young man, of course my wife sides with him. Miss Char presently
came down from the young folks, and went to the piano, and played us Beethoven's
Dream of Saint Jerome, which always soothes me, and charms me, so that I fancy
it is a poem of Tennyson in music. And our children, as they sink off to sleep
over-head, like to hear soft music, which soothes them into slumber, Miss Baynes
says. And Miss Charlotte looks very pretty at her piano: and Philip lies gazing
at her, with his great feet and hands tumbled over one of our arm-chairs. And
the music, with its solemn cheer, makes us all very happy and kind-hearted, and
ennobles us somehow as we listen. And my wife wears her benedictory look
whenever she turns towards these young people. She has worked herself up to the
opinion that yonder couple ought to marry. She can give chapter and verse for
her belief. To doubt about the matter at all is wicked according to her notions.
And there are certain points upon which, I humbly own, that I don't dare to
argue with her.
When the women of the house have settled a matter, is there much use in man's
resistance? If my harem orders that I shall wear a yellow coat and pink
trousers, I know that, before three months are over, I shall be walking about in
rose-tendre and canary-coloured garments. It is the perseverance which conquers,
the daily return to the object desired. Take my advice, my dear sir, when you
see your womankind resolute about a matter, give up at once, and have a quiet
life. Perhaps to one of these evening entertainments, where Miss Baynes played
the piano, as she did very pleasantly, and Mr. Philip's great clumsy fist turned
the leaves, little Mrs. Brandon would come tripping in, and as she surveyed the
young couple, her remark would be, "Did you ever see a better suited couple?"
When I came home from chambers, and passed the dining-room door, my eldest
daughter with a knowing face would bar the way and say,"You mustn't go in there,
papa! Miss Grigsby is there, and Master Philip is not to be disturbed at his
lessons!" Mrs. Mugford had begun to arrange marriages between her young people
and ours from the very first day she saw us; and Mrs. M.'s ch. filly Toddles,
rising two years, and our three-year old colt Billyboy, were rehearsing in the
nursery the endless little comedy which the grown-up young persons were
performing in the drawing-room.
With the greatest frankness Mrs. Mugford gave her opinion that Philip, with four
or five hundred a year, would be no better than a sneak if he delayed to marry.
How much had she and Mugford when they married, she would like to know? "Emily
Street, Pentonville, was where we had apartments," she remarked; "we were
pinched sometimes; but we owed nothing: and our housekeeping books I can show
you." I believe Mrs. M. actually brought these dingy relics of her honeymoon for
my wife's inspection. I tell you, my house was peopled with these friends of
matrimony. Flies were for ever in requisition, and our boys were very sulky at
having to sit for an hour at Shoolbred's, while certain ladies lingered there
over blankets, tablecloths, and what not. Once I found my wife and Charlotte
flitting about Wardour Street, the former lady much interested in a great Dutch
cabinet, with a glass cupboard and corpulent drawers. And that cabinet was, ere
long, carted off to Mrs. Brandon's, Thornhaugh Street; and in that glass
cupboard there was presently to be seen a neat set of china for tea and
breakfast. The end was approaching. That event, with which the third volume of
the old novels used to close, was at hand. I am afraid our young people can't
drive off from St. George's in a chaise and four, and that no noble relative
will lend them his castle for the honeymoon. Well: some people cannot drive to
happiness, even with four horses; and other folks can reach the goal on foot. My
venerable Muse stoops down, unlooses her cothurnus with some difficulty, and
prepares to fling that old shoe after the pair.
Tell, venerable Muse! what were the marriage gifts which friendship provided for
Philip and Charlotte? Philip's cousin, Ringwood Twysden, came simpering up to me
at Bays's Club one afternoon, and said: "I hear my precious cousin is going to
marry. I think I shall send him a broom to sweep a crossin'." I was nearly going
to say, "This was a piece of generosity to be expected from your father's son;"
but the fact is, that I did not think of this withering repartee until I was
crossing St. James's Park on my way home, when Twysden of course was out of
ear-shot. A great number of my best witticisms have been a little late in making
their appearance in the world. If we could but hear the unspoken jokes, how we
should all laugh; if we could but speak them, how witty we should be! When you
have left the room, you have no notion what clever things I was going to say
when you balked me by going away. Well, then, the fact is, the Twysden's family
gave Philip nothing on his marriage, being the exact sum of regard which they
professed to have for him.
Mrs. Major MacWhirter gave the bride an Indian brooch, representing the Taj
Mahal at Agra, which General Baynes had given to his sister-in-law in old days.
At a later period, it is true, Mrs. Mac asked Charlotte for the brooch back
again; but this was when many family quarrels had raged between the relatives??
quarrels which to describe at length would be to tax too much the writer and the
readers of this history.
Mrs. Mugford presented an elegant plated coffee-pot, six drawing-room almanacs
(spoils of the Pall Mall Gazette), and fourteen richly cut jelly-glasses, most
useful for negus, if the young couple gave evening parties, which dinners they
would not be able to afford.
Mrs. Barndon made an offering of two tablecloths and twelve dinner napkins, most
beautifully worked, and I don't know how much house linen.
The Lady of the Present Writer??Twelve teaspoons in bullion, and a pair of
sugar-tongs. Mrs. Baynes, Philip's mother-in-law, sent him also a pair of
sugar-tongs, of a light manufacture, easily broken. He keeps a tong to the
present day, and speaks very satirically regarding that relic.
Philip's Inn of Court??A bill for commons and Inn taxes, with the Treasurer's
compliments.
And these, I think, formed the items of poor little Charlotte's meagre
trousseau. Before Cinderella went to the ball she was almost as rich as our
little maid. Charlotte's mother sent a grim consent to the child's marriage, but
declined herself to attend it. She was ailing and poor. Her year's widowhood was
just over. She had her other children to look after. My impression is that Mrs.
Baynes thought that she could be out of Philip's power so long as she remained
abroad, and that the general's savings would be secure from him. So she
delegated her authority to Philip's friends in London, and sent her daughter a
moderate wish for her happiness, which may or may not have profited the young
people.
"Well, my dear? You are rich compared to what I was, when I married," little
Mrs. Brandon said to her young friend. "You will have a good husband. That is
more than I had. You will have good friends; and I was almost alone for a
time,until it pleased God to befriend me." It was not without a feeling of awe
that we saw these young people commence that voyage of life on which henceforth
they were to journey together; and I am sure that of the small company who
accompanied them to the silent little chapel where they were joined in marriage
there was not one who did not follow them with tender good wishes and heartfelt
prayers. They had a little purse provided for a month's holiday. They had
health, hope, good spirits, good friends. I have never learned that life's
trials were over after marriage; only lucky is he who has a loving companion to
share them. As for the lady with whom Charlotte had stayed before her marriage,
she was in a state of the most lachrymose sentimentality. She sate on the bed in
the chamber which the little maid had vacated. Her tears flowed copiously. She
knew not why, she could not tell how the girl had wound herself round her
maternal heart. And I think if heaven had decreed this young creature should be
poor, it had sent her many blessings and treasures in compensation.
Every respectable man and woman in London will, of course, pity these young
people, and reprobate the mad risk which they were running, and yet, by the
influence and example of a sentimental wife probably, so madly sentimental have
I become, that I own sometimes I almost fancy these misguided wretches are to be
envied.
A melancholy little chapel it is where they were married, and stands hard by our
house. We did not decorate the church with flowers, or adorn the beadles with
white ribbons. We had, I must confess, a dreary little breakfast, not in the
least enlivened by Mugford's jokes, who would make a speech de circonstance,
which was not, I am thankful to say, reported in the Pall Mall Gazette. "We
shan't charge you for advertising the marriage there, my dear," Mrs. Mugford
said. "And I've already took it myself to Mr. Burjoyce." Mrs. Mugford had
insisted upon pinning a large white favour upon John, who drove from Hampstead:
but that was the only ornament present at the nuptial ceremony, much to the
disappointment of the good lady. There was a very pretty cake, with two doves in
sugar, on the top, which the Little Sister made and sent, and no other hymeneal
emblem. Our little girls as bridesmaids appeared, to be sure, in new bonnets and
dresses, but everybody else looked so quiet and demure, that when we went into
the church, three or four street urchins knocking about the gate, said,"Look at