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warmth of this kind of homage perfectly PH(EBE: GIRL AND WIFE. exquisite; and here she waa now ready to • BY PERCY FITZGERALD, give up her whole little heart, overflowing AUTHOR OF "NEVER FOROOTTJSIT,'* " THE 8BC0MP MRS. TILLOTSON," 4C. &0. with love and gratitude for the preference, to her admirer. She was so entranced, CHAPTER XX. TOM DAWSON. indeed, that she had forgotten what now THAT morning there was shooting for seemed a prosy element in the domestic the gentlemen and driving ont for the life—viz., the expected arrival of "Tom," ladies; the host, in hia quality of pasha, her brother; the same with whom she doing neither, bat going abont all day in had threatened Dean Drinkwater, and who his white hat. One or two of the gentle­ was dae about lunch-hour. A brother men did not go out and shoot, among whom now seemed an insipid idea. were young Pringle and his father—a pair At hinch time, when Phcebe, with flashed that were on rather nnpaternal and most cheeks, attended by the squire, entered the unfilial terms, the former feeling ashamed great dining-room rather behind time— of his progenitor's antics, the latter look­ secretly pleased to be able to exhibit her ing on his son as " a pappy " and " stack- conquest — there was a blunt, well-set, up fellow." He had taken a special dislike wiry - haired, fair - looking young man, to him since he had noted the preference with a terrier - like moustache, already for Phcebe, and the young lady had tried eating his lunch in a sober, steady all her little arts, and exerted herself to fashion. His cheeks had each a little propitiate one who she fondly dreamed pink flush, and his eyes had a slight glare might be, some day, united to her in a or wateriness ; but there was a bluff and near and dear relation. Phoebe, it will solid composure about him that impressed. have been seen, was of the most sanguine This was Tom Dawson, who had been in temperament, and assumed that to pro­ the army, and had "left;" who "had no pose was to dispose ; in the process anni­ money," and yet lived "anyhow and hilating time, space, and possibility. everyhow," as he himself frankly said— The morning seemed to fly by in a sort and did a vast number of other ex­ of dream. To Phoebe it seemed a few pensive things, which only people who minutes, one of the most entrancing have money do. Such was this eminently periods she had ever enjoyed. This to good fellow, Tom Dawson, who rode like other people might seem surprising an Arab, and who had given up a race- enough; for, as was before hinted, Mr. meeting somewhere to come and see his Pringle janior was an ordinary young Phcebe, on whom he literally]; doted. gentleman enough, such as men would Phoebe, in return, loved Tom with her pronounce a feeble sort of fellow. But he whole heart, and nothing -could be done had a power of words, and an artful without Tom's aid, or, at least, advice. vein of compliment; finally, he was bent Tom's life, as wo have said, was almost , on pleasing, and delighted in flirtation. a mystery. He had not a farthing, having Phcebe was a little flower just opening its run through a small patrimony of about leaves to the sun, and thought tho genial fifteen hundred pounds years before. Yet fl it J • * • r rt • ^ 387 cfi= \^ .y 146 [April 29, 1879.] ALL THE TEAB BOUND. [CoDdtisUd by

he lived like a gentleman—comfortably Sam Pringle declared that she " and the aud Inxnrionsly; kept hia horses; went ponies " were welcome to set off whenever on long visits; shot, hnnted, and. waa they pleased; but that ho intended remain­ always in demand, as a good' fellow. ing, and wonld'find it just as agreeable. The truth was, he earned his living " And when I say ' just,' you'll under­ very hardly and laboriously—he was a stand me to mean a good deal more so." dead shot at a pigeon; and at Hurling- At dinner the malicious Sam. Pringle ham and Monaco generally contrived to fonnd an opportunity to revenge .himself, land a good stake. In all the great races and at the firat opening perpetrated the he generally contrived to be "put on'* following wanton outrage : wilh " the party" at some great house, " You'd never suppose, Mrs. Trotter, and, in this way, made money. Should that I was married for my beauty ? Then these things fail him, he had plenty of I can tell you that I was. Ask Mrs. friends, and might end as secretary to P. there. She auccumbed to my charms." a gun club. In short, he had hia wits " Now, Mr. Pringle, do please " to live upon, and very good wits they began his lady, with an angry frown. were. " And more than that. When the bid­ Phcebe flew to Tom, and the latter took dings for me were mounting, and coming her in his arms and kissed her heartily in from right and left, sooner than let me before the whole room, .as unconcernedly go, she made the beat offer, and of coarse as though he were hooking a bet. Phoebe —I was knocked down to her." was in great excitement from her morn­ " Mr. Pringle ! " ing's performance, and said eagerly: " I don't believe a word of it," said Mrs. " Tom, you mnst know Mr. Pringle, a Trotter, bluntly. " That's your vanity, friend of ours, that we met " Mr. Pringle." "All right," said Tom, giving the per­ " Ask her. Look at her,' and the colour son alluded to a nod; but it was plain in her cheeks. I was a lady-killer then. that he did not think much of him, deem­ I don't see anything to blush for in pro­ ing him rather "a finical kind of fellow." posing for a good-looking young fellow. Lord Garterley liked Tom, as being so Aren't the two 'ponies'there the happy re­ sagacious in county matters; and often sult?" thought what a much better adjutant for " Come, dears," said Mrs. Pringle, half the house he wonld be than the Charles rising, "it ia time for ns to go to onr Webbers, who, to say the truth, were now rooms." growing rather stale after their ten years' "Tou are too bad, Pringle," said old service. Bat he dared not discharge those Phipps. "Tou've routed and dispersed worthy assistants; and he had, besides, some your wife and family." feeling of gratitude towards them, for all " I shouldn't mind dispersing my daugh­ their hard and useful toil. They felt their ters," said he, with a grin, " but I'd want power, and were not to be readily dislodged. some nice young fellow to help me." Tom Dawson, still making his lunch " Really, to say such things I " said Mrs. the first consideration, was giving out, for Trotter. "Tou're uncivilised. I know, the entertainment of tho company, an if it was my caae, I'd never open my lips^: account of some hunt or race, in which he to you again." \ had some haii'-breadth 'scape, and which he "Oh!" said old Sam, getting,up and'i recounted with a modest indifference that capering round the back of Mrs. 'Trotter's gained him many admirers. Such cha­ chair; "then, in that case, I'd pine and racters as Tom's are really more successful languish away. Fancy me pining and than far more pretentious people, possibly languishing at your feet! " on account of the high claims of sporting "Besides, it's not true; you know it's matters, whioh seem to level all distinc­ not. And if it were, you ought to be tions, and to be a subject that is a "passe ashamed to say ao." Mra. Trotter waa a partout." rattling, dashing woman, and said what, Sam Pringle was iu a very vicious she thought. " Go back to your seat. humour all this morning, having displayed Tou really are a great old goose." antics at breakfast that drew on him the This rebuke had some effect, and old' bitter reproachesof his family. Infact, Mrs. Sam saw that the feeling of the company Pringle had announced as an ultimatum waa against him, and he began to retract. that she would leave at once on the next " Well, when I say that abont proposing, display of anything like what had occurred. you know how frienda interfere, to forward :^ Oluurlofl DlokeiuL] PHCEBE: GIRL AND WIPE. [April 29, 1S7S.] l-l?

a thing of that kind. Of course tho thing head in perpetual motion, scattering light was settled much in the usual humdrum, and enjoyment. She, however, modestly old-fashioned way." sought the remoter seats, where the op­ " Of courso it was ; wo know that. So portunities for seeing and hearing the per­ you'd better say no more about it." formance were not so good, but where her Sam Pringle was more quiet after this swain presently came up softly and esta­ "ennb." It did him good, everyone said; blished himself, not to bo removed or and he was certainly a little abashed at the ce.ise whispering during the whole even­ reception of his "joke." ing. What that entranced pair really heard Among the new guests on that day of the " reading," or saw. In the way of appointed to refresh the host were Mr. histrionics, from the beginning to the end and Lady Cecilia Shortman—a charmingly of the night, it would be hard to say. Such sounding combination for Pratt-Hawkins, entertainments they sought not, nor did who, within five minutes of arrival, had they bewail their deprivation. But here got himself introduced, and, by the now comes a universal "Hush! " as director mention of " tho dear duchess," had Charles Webber comes forward with a cemented ties of acquaintanceship with pleasant and suitable little speech to set Lady Cecilia. Quite a change came things going. over Pratt-Hawkins in consequence. He It began with "Jockie and Jeannie" from had now got the air suitable for his those hopeless failures, tho doctor and breathing. Lady Cecilia was a person of wife, who had been sinking and sinking what might be called rapturous tastes; deeper with every hour. Charles Webber loving all the arts—poetry, drama, &c.— bad been obliged to send them away with a devotion that waa exactly in pro­ by a regular dismissal; " he feared he portion to her deficiency in the actual would want tho rooms." However, this accomplishments. She worshipped actors, last chance was afforded to them; as they adored singera; and herself, in a private wore there, they could fill up a vacant way, " read " and recited at extraordinary space. Grown desperate and even reck­ lengths. She hiid been specially invited for less, and Inspirited at the prospect ot that night, as there was to be in the great release from the terrible Nessus shirt hall a "penny reading,"given for the benefit they had been wearing In agony for several of tho villagers and genteeler rustics— days, encouraged too by the familiar air i.e., doctor, solicitor, p.arsons' wives and of the audience, like their own rural one, daughters, superior farmers, &c., who our doctor and his lady " came out " with were collected, as it were, by sound of a spirit of dramatic effect that astounded drum, and ordered to come in, fill the everyone, and extorted a burst of applause benches, and be amused. Tho entertain­ and irrepressible encore. The good-natured ment had been planned by the indefati­ lord leaped forward, as his manner was, gable Charles Webbers, with a view to wrung both their hands, and declared that the entertainment of his lordship, and "they must not think of going away to­ to "keeping everything going." Lord morrow." Bnt tho pair had their own Garterley, as we have said, was an elegant pride, and with some stilfneas and dignity poet of the old school, with a genuine taste declared that they must rtturn home. for literature. He was much pleased with Next appeared upon the platform, after thenolim, and was himself going to take due whisperings with the Charles Webbers, a large share in tho entertainment. the grey face of old Phipps, with a roguish twinkle of good-humoured greeting iu tho CHAPIEE XII. THE TEiTSY EEADISG. corner of his eye. Old Phipps had made IN due course the whole distinguished vers do soclcte to his mistress's eyebrows, party, after some waiting and much ex­ as well as to the eyebrows of those of pectation, proceeded to the grand hall, other persona: and had often written i where the rural company were already political squibs "in the days of Fon- I assembled in a fever of anticipated en­ blanque" and Hiokham Frere. Some bitter lines on All the ' Talents, called joyment. The entrance of Lord Garterley, New Brewings, had gone all over Eng­ when he appeared leading the Diva, was land, and been in everyone's mouth. Alas ! the signal for a round of applause. Pratt- the New Brewings had gone to decay Hawkins again contrived to find the only and forgetfulness; and here was " old air that he could breathe, and not only led, Phipps " left behind like " the mouldy bis­ but sat beside "Lady Cecilia;" while Phoobc cuit," overlooked at the bottom of the cask. was greatly excited, her eyea and pretty J^ 148 [April 29,1870.] ALL THE YEAR ROUND. [Conducted t^

However, on this occasion he was spruce in least have brought the police, and, possibly, his velvet collar and blue coat; and,coming the fire-engines, to her aid. All the time forward, told his hearers, with a pleasant Lord Garterley leant enraptured on the confidence, that he was going to recite for grand piano, and stared, open-mouthed, aa them a little trifle of his own, made on a though he wished to gulp down the uotes person they all knew to be their bitterest themselves. At the close,his"Brava,bravifl- enemy, whom they hated with a cordial simas ! " and clappings were obstreperona, detestation, and who was the worst of and the faithful Charles Webbers took men. He need not describe that person. care to make the audience understand they He referred to their host. Lord Garterley, must support the applause heartily. at which little jest a roar of laughter Next came that *' comique," young Sha­ uprose to the ceiling. kerley, who, strange to say, recognised " It was," said old Phipps, " an unpre­ jester as he was, fell flat. He strained too tending parody on oar dear old friend, affectedly at applause; but he afterwards Cock Robin: declared that " a more pig-headed au­ dience " it was impossible to find. Then, " * Who killed doll care ? ' to the horror and agony of his family, old * I,' said Lord Garterley, So kindly and beartily ; Sam must step out to buffoon, and what ' I killed dull care.' did the man select, but a "Curtain Lecture **' Wto gives good dinners ? ' of Mrs. Caudle!" When he capered to the ' I,' says Lord Garterley, centre, and stood smiling at them, there ' Weekly and quarterly, was a roar of delighted anticipation. To saints and einnors.' "We all know Mrs. Caudle," he began j " ' Who sees his neighhoxurs ?' 'I,' says Lord Garterley, "every married man of us at least. Now, ' Not gradging nor tartarly, I think I see some of the young girls in With pipes and irith tabors. '* the comer there looking away; but to that And SO on through many verses, which complexion, my dears, we must all come everyone set down as true London wit. sooner or later—at least all of us as have Old Phipps, who had no vanity, and only good looks. That's the reason I came to"^ wanted to amuse, retired, having made it. Well, now for Mr^. Caudle." friends of the whole audience, particularly And here, amid hardly suppressed at the last verse, where he had to refer to laughter from his friends, he read out a his manuscript, and after puzzling over portion of one of the most amusing dia­ it a moment, declared aloud : "I vow to logues. Then he stopped. goodness I can't read my own writing! " " Well, that's very funny so far. The Now is our host bending and bowing best is I can endorse every word of it. before the portly and majestic Diva, who True to nature, my lord, and ladies, and shakes her head amiably, but seems to gentlemen. Why, I myself have lain give a reluctant consent. Then Lord there, hearing the hours strike, while on it Garterley turns to the audience, and in a went nag-nag, nagging." Here the host loud tone proclaims: " We aro favoured rose, finding it was time to check this too to-night by the presence of one of the familiar mimic, and said, " Thank you, most consummate artists, who now kindly Pringle, that will do now. Lady Cecilia consents to contribute to the pleasure of Shortman will do us the favour of recit­ the evening, by one of thoso magnificent ing the Ancient Mariner." And accord­ performances which have brought kings ingly the Lady Cecilia, "squired" by the and emperors to her feet." assiduous Pratt-Hawkins, who had already The Diva gave him a tap of her fan, secured an invitation to Shortlands, stood and went to the piano, while the crowd forward, and with rolling eyes and the applauded rapturously, having never even true husky " ossuary " voice, modelled on heard the name of this personage, but that of Rachel's, imparted a "creeping" being under a general idea that she must feeling to all listeners. The piece being of be " somebody." Sho accordingly gave great length, and being delivered with a out " Casta Diva," in that horny, rather uniform charnel-house manner from be­ whooping-cough manner, which retired ginning to end, much wearied the au­ Divas, who have only their style left, dience. The lady was then led back to her affect. She travelled up and down what seat by the host, and finally, to the delight are called "runs" with a desperate energy, of all, Lord Garterley himself came forward and wound up with a sort of " cry for in a dramatic scene, from The Good- help," that in a crowded city would at natured Man, in which he himself per- Cbarles DlckeDa.3 PHCEBE: GIRL AND WIFE. [April 29, 1876.] I-IO formed Croaker, and Mr. Charles Webber arm and gone pfi to revel on that most Honeywoo'l. It was done "with great daintiest of dishes to set before a young naturalness and spirit, and was certainly girl—a proposal of marriage, whether the most satisfactory and enjoyable event acceptable or not. But now she was full of the evening. of o.Kultatlon, and wished to make him It would have been awkward to have feel, not that he was distasteful to her, asked tho opinion of two of the company but that another was preferred to him. in reference to this point. They may have So she said, rather pertly : heard, but they certainly heeded not. These " Mr. Sturges, I don't want to go with were Phoebe and her admirer. It had all you. Can't yon see that I'm engaged ? " come to a point in these few hours. Each Ho coloured, made a bow, and went his •was enchanting to the other, and the way. Phcebe turned to her neighbour minutes seemed of gold and silver. The with a look of triumph, as who should say, confidence was delicious and increasing " I did that for you." every moment. Speeches of the most in­ Having thus got rid of the intruder, teresting sort were interchanged. Phcebe Phcebe, for whom that garden adventure seemed to be in Paradise. had all the fascination of a romance, now It was during these ecstatic proceedings began to recall it by putting artful cjues- they were rather startled to find the heavy tions in self-depreciation as to " What ho Mr. Sturges beside them, with his smiling, must have thought of her," and kept still beaming face. Unfortunately, a gentle­ returning to that same fascinating subject man who had been sitting next to Phcebe of "poor Adelaide's" mistake; though had left his pl.ace, and Mr. Sturges in­ Phoebe was a little surprised to find in stalled himself in the vacancy. He did what a tone her admirer repeated the not seem the least jealous, as Phoebe words, " poor Adelaide ! " with an Interest expected he would, but was gooi-humoured and curiosity that surprised her. and pleasant. Neither was he a man that "What has become of her?" he said. could be "snubbed off," or made a butt " There was something strangely in­ of, being too grave and weighty for such teresting about her. A most curious liberties. Phcebe tossed her head, and fascination." was short in her answers, and Mr. Pringle " Oh, you thought so ? " said Phoebe, looked sour and important; bnt nothing tossing her head. " Of course yon must, could ruffle the intruder. or you would not have made appointments " I was so glad to see this seat vacant; with her in that way at the gate." not because I have been standing most of Mr. Pringle coloured. He was such an the night, but because it was beside you." ingrained philanderer that this view had "Oh, a compliment!" said Phoebe, never occurred to him—viz., that ho had spitefully. " Listen, Mr. Pringle ; he is been as devoted to Phoebe's predecessor as paying compliments." he was now to herself. "Let him listen," said the other. " Or " Oh," he said, with hesitation, " that let ns both try and see who can do the was only a little adventure. Tou know she best in that line." is quite a different sort of person ; whereas " Oh, what nonsense," said Phoebe. yon " and he paused. "No, no," said he, significantly; "not Phcebe coloured in her turn. Perhaps a bit. I know what is going on." the crisis was approaching. Phcebe coloured. Mr. Pringle, who " Well," she said, softly, " what am I ? overheard him, was confused. Tou are going to tell me something dis­ " I don't understand you," said she. agreeable, I know." " Come and have some refreshment," he The most practised coquette could not said, rising. "I shall tell you. I am have given a more suitable invitation. sure you must be tired." Tet Phcebe spoke only from nature. "Thank you, no," said Phcebe, curtly. There was a real coquette present, bnt I'd really rather not." of another sex; though he was for tho "Do come," said he, in a still more time as genuine as genial. The luxury pressing way. " I really wish to speak of captivating was to him tho highest to you." pleasure. It was breaking on him that Was it to be a proposal ? Were it he had won this little tender heart; but another occasion, Phoebe would have sim­ he must play with it a little first. " Why pered, and tittered, and looked in this and should you be interested," he asked, " or that direction, and finally have taken his like to know what I think of you ? " y

150 [April 29,1876.] ALL THE TEAB ROUND. [Conducted by

Phcebe repeated these words with a jokes, while preparing to dive into me­ flatter of affected surprise. " Oh, .1 can't taphysics and astrology. Do you wish to say 5 that is, I don't know " know when Romulus was born, if bom, " Would you be sorry that I liked any and when he slew Remus, if slain; and one else ? " what became of the she-wolf, their foster- " Ye—B, but you do. Tou know you mother ? Buy an almanac. Do you wish do. I was your confidante, recollect." to know when to rear silkworms and " I don't now," he said, eagerly ; " upon plant mulberries; when to bottle your my word and honour." wine, and drink it; and when, not "And I can believe you, really ? " drinking it, to use it as vinegar—or wine " Really and truly." for the poor ? Buy an almanac. Do you " Oh," said Phoebe, obeying an impulse wish to know, or not to know, when to that she could not resist—then, turning be philanthropical; how to be witty; how away her head, in a low voice, said, " I to please a lady, without displeasing a am so glad to hear it." gentleman; and how, in case of duels, to give and obtain satisfaction without blood­ All the rest, as might be expected, fol­ shed ? Buy an almanac; buy several io wed, and by the time the Lady Cecilia had almanacs. Do you wish to know, if a concluded her Ancient Mariner, Phcebe capitalist, how to invest your money; and Dawson and Francis Pringle were affianced how, not being a capitalist, to gain money lovers—he, perhaps, for the third or fourth without working for it ? Buy an alaianac, time in his short life. Alas! with Phoebe it and consult it as you would an oracle. was very different; she had never "thrown" Do you wish to know tho new word for before, and she had now staked her whole "Open Sesame"—the words which brought little property of affections on the cast. If good luck to AU Baba in the story of sho lost, she could never throw again ; for the Forty Thieves ? 'Tia a little word she had lost all. So far, then, there was the of seven letters—almanac. The almanac issue of her whole life involved ; and here will cast your nativity and give you the was it to be decided in this trifling, off­ numbers in the state-lottery, by which, if hand way—at a penny reading! yon play long enough, you will make your fortune; and by which, not playing long enough, you will lose your money. The ITALIAN ALMANACS. proper time to play is fifty years. Affcer fifty years you may, in one lucky hit., make THE warof independence in Italy brought amends for the losses of a lifetime, and with it a great shower of almanacs. A get back some of the money you have free people required a free press, and a free staked in weekly tickets. press required almanacs. Not the almanacs of the days of tyranny and foreign inter­ I have au almanac before me which ventions—mediceyal productions, iu which gives information about the origin of saints' names and church festivals absorbed calendars. I learn in it that calendars are the calendar—but progressive and patriotic as old as. tho hills—or nearly so ; but that almanacs: books for students as well as the Arabs, the Chinese, the Japanese, and books for idlers; books costing a franc and other "barbarous peoples " know nothing books costing a soldo; some of them de­ about solar almanacs. This is a mistake voting themselves to history, and others to so far as the Chinese and Japanese are con­ science; and others, again, to literature and cerned, for their almanacs, which divide the the fine arts, commerce, agriculture and year into three hundred and sixty-five days political economy. The enterprising pub­ and a quarter, putting the four quarters lishers of Italy have broken loose from together every leap year, are the ones now the old trammels of the book trade, and in use iu all Christian countries. My author are imitating their brothers of England goes on to say that March was the first and America—if, indued, they are not month in the year in the days of Romulus, beatiug them—in the race for cheapness and that September, as the word implies, and popularity, combined with excellence. was the seventh month, and December the And lo and behold, a land of almanacs! tenth; but how is it that he says nothing A country in which for a halfpoany you about the year having been at that time can take peeps into tho most abstract divided into ten months, March having studies, aud keep pace with the sun and thirty-six days. May twenty-two, June moon, and the world in which you live; thirty-six, August eighteen, September and make the mind merry with riddles and sixteen, October thirty-two, and most of

•i =«3 UliArlu DIUIEOOS. } ITALIAN ALMANACS. [Apnl L'a, 1870.] If,!

the others thirty-nine ? It was Numa Santa Perpetua, Santa Felieita, and San Pompillus who altered all this, and divided Giacomo Maggiore. But the almanac is the year into twelve parts, placing January specially eloquent under the heads of June at the head of the list. and December; and the lives of San Nor- In another almanac I find accounts of berto, and San Tommaso of Canterbury the motive power of steam, tho discovery (known in England as Thomas k Becket, of salt by Taumao-Khan, and the way to Archbishop of Canterbury), are laid bare make black ink. The combustion of a with cutting severity. San Norberto, kilogram of coal wonld suffice to transport after being a libertine at tho court of a person, " in an instant, from the lake of the Emperor Henry, became a pious man, Geneva to the summit of Mont Blano;" and finally a priest. He liked to perform but whether dead or alive, or in how many mass in lonely places ; and one day, while pieces, is not stated. Furthermore, eight singing hymns, a spider fell into tho con­ hundred and thirty-six hectolitres of coal secrated glass, polluting the wine which would suffice to raise, " in an instant," the ho was presently to drink. He drank it great pyramid of Egypt, " which weighs and swallowed the spider, which was six thousand three hundred and eighty mil- venomous as well as filthy. But the saint , lions of kilograms." This marvellous book, sneezed, and so escaped a violent death, which is called the "Almanacco Indis- the spider coming out of his noso ! This pensabile," is nothing if not sententious; denouement puzzles the almanac, and and It tells the world, with startling point elicits some dignified remarks about the and freshness, that the "names of Au­ wickedness and folly of inventing false gustus, of Louis the Fourteenth, and of miracles, when so many miracles of a bona Napoleon Buonaparte are immortal." fide nature are recorded in Christian books. One of the most popular almanacs of But the " Amico di Casa " does not con­ Italy is the " Amico di Ca8a,"the Household fine its attention to religious and anti-reli­ Friend—a book of some hundred and ten gious matters. It talks of natural history, pages, costing twenty-five centesimi (two­ and gives illustrations of birds; it talks pence halfpenny), and containing sixteen of royalty, and gives a portrait of Victor illustrations. This book is one of the Emmanuel; it talks of art and politics, champions of Italian Protestantism, and and gives portraits of Michael Angelo aud by means of satirical accounts of saints, Prince Bismarck. There arc pictures of a attached to the letter-press of each month, shipwreck; of a fat man planting a flower; aims such blows as it can at the institu­ of a peasant-girl, very pretty, feeding tions of the Church of Rome. Under the hens; and of a bishop receiving a letter of head of January we are told that a peasant- supplication from an afflicted woman. The girl named Orlnga (born at Santa Croce, whole book is well got up, and the anec­ on the hanks of the Arno, in the year dotes, the statistics, the hst of reigning 1240), was telnpted by the devil in the sovereigns, and the articles about cookery shape of an old man, and escaped perdition and farming are worth perusal. It is a throngh the instrumentality of a hare, pity, perhaps, that so much petty spite is which showed her the way to escape. indulged in about local superstitions and February introduces the story of St. •abuses, and some of the scriptural quota­ Faustino and St. Giovita, who were so tions, as being out of place, might be struck virtuous that everyone who came near out with advantage. But the book is no them hated them and Ill-used them, con­ hypocrite; it professes to be a fault-finder. demning them to be burnt alive—the fire It Is an anti-popery almanac with mis­ refusing to touch them—and to be de­ cellaneous instruction for the million, and, voured by lions and tigers—the lions and as such, it is a sign of the times. tigers fawning at their feet like dogs; Not the least popular of tho almanacs until, finally, they perished at the hands of of Italy is one called "L'Almanacco di the: executioner, A.D. 122. The almanac Casamia, astrologo e pronostico;" a pro­ asks how it is that a sword could be found phetic almanac in which astrology shines to cut off the heads of saints, whom fire and by its absence, and prophecies are, in wild beasts could not, or would not, injure? many instances, read backwards, like a All the months except three have witch's prayer. We are told on the first satirical memoirs of this kind, tho three page that five thousand six hundred and exceptions being devoted to saints whom thirty-six years have elapsed since the the almanac admits, grudgingly enough, creation of the world; one thousand four to be genuine. These three saints are hundred and fifty-three years since the 152 [April 29, 1876.] ALL THE TEAB ROUND. [Conducted by

foundation of Venice; thirty years since musket. How so ? you ask. By putting the election of Pins the Ninth; and five a firing apparatus into the handle, and years since the fall of the temporal power. calling it, as per advertisements in the If these are prophecies, who among ns are Belgian papers, ' the new Chassepot um­ not prophets? But Casamia goes on to brella for shooting burglars.' The inventor tell us that we shall have a longer year has shot himself." this year than usual, and that February Further on we find tho following: " A has twenty-nine days. This is a distinct priest asked his sacristan one day, why the prophecy. So is the following remark old gentleman who lived at the comer of about the month of August, if August be the street had not attended mass during this year like other Augusts : " We shall the past fortnight. The sacristan looked have some remarkably hot weather this mysterious. ^*What! is it socialism?' month." Highly judicious, too, are the asked tho priest, somewhat alarmed. remarks about the winter : " Cold winds 'Worse than that,' replied the sacristan. may be expected now, and coughs and ' Worse than socialism ? Then it is athe­ warm over-coats will prevail." Under the ism ? * ' Worse than that, reverendo ! It head of July, as an entry for Friday the is rheumatism.' The priest collapsed." 21st, we find the following axiom: "Blessed But the Fool's Almanac does not con­ are those who live in exalted places; they fine itself to anecdotes; it makes pro­ will breathe more freely on the mountains phecies, and gives a list of saints from day than in large cities." Rain is spoken of to day and from month to month, marking as likely to fall in August; and in October the Sundays off with a cross, as days on we are told that hunters "ought to advance whieh people may take holidays, and <&nce, bravely to the good work," and present and go to the theatre. It will be said that their friends with chaffinches, wrens, and Italy is a very wicked country. But mass other birds, that they, the birds, may cannot be celebrated after twelve o'clock, be made into pies. Italians are fond of and vespers are over at six, all the churches eating singing birds, and the " brave being closed at sunset. Almanacs, like sportsman " goes home rejoicing when he straws in the wind, show the current of has quieted for ever the sweet singers of popular feeling, and popular feeling says, the woods, and vulgarised a lark and the " 'Theatres on Sunday evening, and dancing thrush, and, worse still, the robin red breast, and masquerading, during the Sundays of by introducing them into his household, as the Carnival." The Fool's Almanac re­ articles of home consumption. No; let us joices in the fact that the Carnival of beg pardon of the birds; he has vulgarised 1876 is one of the longest on record, himself. Casamia panders to his own taste by beginning on St. St«phen's-day (Anglice, reminding us of the sweetness of thrushes Boxing-day), and ending on the 29th when properly served up in a dish; and February. for this reason, if for no other, Casamia shonld be reprimanded. But those who A very attractive almanac is the one swear by Casamia plead the scarcity of published in Venice with the title of the butchers' meat in country places; and current year, " II1876; lunario per Tutti." what are you to do, says the "brave This book is poetical, historical, statistical, sportsman," if the bullfinch gives you a and comical, aud costs ten centesimi. For song when you want a dinner ? Clearly a penny you have verses for every month you must shoot it. Birds were made for in the year, accounts of the pigeons of man, and man was specially created to St. Mark, famous Italian battles, &c., and shoot birds. anecdotes of the Joe Miller species, some of which are warranted to be quite new. I turn from Casamia to "L'Almanacco The verses are prophetic, like the one Imbecile," or Fool's Almanac ; and here I introducing April: " The sweet zephyrs find (at page thirty-two) an article about of spring will begin now to be felt; the umbrellas. " Man," says the Pool's prudent man waits before he puts on his Almanac, " is a ferocious animal. Pat a light clothes." And the ones for June nightcap in his hand, and he smothers his and July : " Summer will give ns a fiery wife with it: witness Othello. Give him heat, and if the rain does not fall in the jaw-bone of an ass, and he kills three bucketsful, you may expect a boiling hundred Philistines: witness Samson. Pre­ heat, as in the infernal regions. The sent him, finally, with the most prosaic, tho appeased heavens will send down rain, most ridiculous of all human implements but I perceive that the new moon disturbs —an umbrella—and he turns it into a the hopes we had of copious banquets." Tl= =Et. GharleB Dlokeiu.] ITALIAN ALMANACS. CApril 20, 1876.] 153

The statistics are simply wonderful. We Nearly all tho almanacs of Italy devote are told that the world contains fourteen themselves to instruction in some shape or hundred and ninety-one millions of human another, instructing in folly and vanity, if beings, and thirty over. Who aro these they cannot instruct in wisdom. Many of thirty over, and where do they live ? them are consequently in high favour with Europe, says the almanac, contains exactly ladies, especially the almanacs of the three hundred and a half millions of in­ toilette-table and the ball-room, in which habitants ; so we may conclude that the pretty girls are taught how to flirt, and thirty over do not live in Europe. The ugly ones how to become beautiful. And cost of governing Italy is counted with here is the way to flirt, if you wish to be apparent precision, but without much ac­ married. Being a pretty girl, you are curacy, for wo find (at page sixty-two) sure of a score or two of admirers. Hook that no allowance is made for debts and the one you like best—or the one you like shortcomings in the budget. Italy, says least, if he ia richest—and make a slave of the almanac, costs three millions six him. Pet him, flatter him; fawn upon hundred thousand francs a day, for three him if he is conceited; rave about pic­ millions six hundred thousand are paid tures and statues if he likes art; talk daily in taxes—which makes exactly one treason if he is a republican, and quote hundred and fifty thousand francs a sentences in favour of tyranny and minute. Here is an anecdote : " An old blue blood if he is a royalist. Nothing lady died at the age of one hundred and will please him so mnch as this pandering five, leaving an immense fortune. One to his tastes; and if you can manage to clause of her will ran ag follows : ' I leave wear the colours he likes, even to the to my physician, through whose care I tint of your boots, showing as much aa have lived so long and so happily, all the you can of them by way of provocation, contents of a large trunk which will be you advance your interests. But do not found in my dressing-room. The key of forget the true colour of love—the maiden the trunk ia concealed in the mattress of blush. No colour you can buy in the shop my bed.' The box was opened, and was can equal that; and she who, in the cer­ found to contain, untouched, all the drugs tainty of triumph, omits blushing, is as and potions which the physician had pre­ foolish as the girl who cannot laugh, as scribed for the deceased." Here is another sad as the girl who cannot weep, as false anecdote: "An astronomer had a clever as the girl who cannot equivocate. Tears, man-servant, who, after dusting scientific laughter, blushes, and equivocations , are books for years, imbibed notions of as­ the artillery of love. But do not forget tronomy, and wished to become eminent. the buffer, the make-believe. A time 'I have no difficulty,' said he, *in under­ comes when, to secure the man you want, standing how you weigh the sun and you must pretend to be fascinated by some­ moon, and calculate the arrival of comets, one else. Do so, but very carefully; and but the planets puzzle me.' * Why so ? ' when—poor sensitive soul—youhave,dove- inquired the sage. ' Because, the moment like, trembled at the sight of the bird of you look at them with a telescope you find prey, fly to the nest you have chosen in the out their names. Are the names printed arms of the man you love, or don't love, and on the stars ? Or do you find them out by consummate the union on which you have electricity ?'" Here is an advertisement: set your heart. "Undertakers* work promptly and securely done. Coffins warranted not to open by The way to become beautiful in Italy inner pressure. Testimonials from cus­ does not greatly differ from the systems tomers as to length and comfort." The adopted in England and France, and other Lunario winds up with a list of the parts of Europe. It consists in rouging, standing-armies of Europe, showing how larding, and pomading yourself till you are Germany and Prance have an equal number beneath contempt, but not beneath the of soldiers—namely, one million seven prospect of being poisoned by powders and hundred thousand men ; Italy seven hun­ hair-dyes, the death you meet being more dred and sixty thousand; and England or less of your own choosing. Do you five hundred and thirty-five thousand. wish to die of some fulminating brain- The smallest army is that of Greece, which disease ? Put vile concoctions in your hair, consists of fifty-one thousand men, Den­ and turn it from black to yellow, and from mark having fifty-four thousand, and grey to brown, showing how much wiser Portugal seventy-three thousand. you are thau nature who meant you to be fair or dark, as the case may be, and meant =r ^ .**' 1S4 [April 23,1876.] ALL THE TEAR BOUND. t;Ooiuluot«i 1^

you to grow old. Buy your hair at the of two sons, twins, met one of the brothers barber's, who had it from a grave or a in a field one morning. ' Which of you mad-house; and yonr extra six inches of two boys ami speaking to?' asked the height at the bootmaker's—six inches of mother; ' is it you or your brother ?' Why deformity, for which you will physically do you ask ? ' inquired the lad prudently. suffer—and then blush for it. But buy ' Because if it is your brother I will box your blushes where you bay your poisons, his ears.' ' It is not my brother, it ia V and poison yourself and the circle in which ' Then your brother is wearing your coat, you move, by appearing to be what you for your's had a hole in it.' * No, mother, are not—a painted doll without a doU's I am wearing my own coat.* 'Good merits; a thing that squeaks and jabbers heavens !' shrieked the mother, looking at and opens and shuts its eyes, without him intently, ' you are your brother after waiting for its strings to be pulled; a all I '" painted woman, the bane and the scandal The last anecdote with which we have of our modern civilisation. Tes, reader, now to do, for much more might be said this is the way to become beautiful ac­ about Italian almanacs, if space permitted, cording to the teaching of the almanac, is one connected with the subject under but I have put my own interpretation discussion. It is called the "Wife and the upon it, and I trust that what I have said Almanac," and has recently made the tour —surely in no bad spirit—will reach tho of the Italian papers : eyes of those who want the almanac but " The wife of a scientific man, wewy have not yet purchased it. May it never of being neglected, and pining for the fall into their hands ! honeymoon of earlier days, reproved her And now, by way of conclusion, a few husband for his industry. ' Tou do not extracts from smaller and healthier love me,' said the wife, 'you are always almanacs, books intended for the masses looking at maps and books. Oh, why was and not for fashionable ladies and gentle­ I ever married ? I wish at least I were men. Here is a keen bit of satire, an almanac, or something of that kind!' though, it must be said, it is of vener­ ' I wish you were, my dear!' said the able antiquity. " Some Swiss and Aus­ husband, 'I might have a new one eyery^ trian soldiers were at dinner after a year! *" truce in olden times. The Austrians maintained that their system of military government was the best; the Swiss con­ EOTAL RACERS. tested the point, and both parties waxed angry. Finally, an Austrian declared con­ THE appearance of " Purple body ,with j temptuously that the Swiss fought for gold braid, scarlet sleeves, and black money, whereas they, the Austrians, fought velvet cap with gold fringe," in the for honour. ' True!' said a Swiss politely, Racing Calendar as the colours of H.R.H. with his hand on his sword ; ' we both Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, and, fight for what wo have not got.*" Here Duke of Cornwall, &c. Ac, is an eveat is a slap at journalists : "A sub-editor and which awakes many reminiscences, and a reporter were quarrelling one day in the suggests many reflections, pleasant and editor's room. 'Tou are a donkey,' said unpleasant, wise and otherwise. The the sub-editor. ' Tou are another,' re­ colours are brave enough, and the natnial plied the reporter promptly. 'Pooh! tendency of the horse-loving Briton is to pooh ! * retorted the sub-editor, ' you are cry " Hurrah!" and wish them often "first the greatest donkey I know ! ' ' Gentle­ past the post." Persons of decidedly sport­ men ! gentlemen !' said the editor, looking ing proclivities will see in the adhesion of np from his desk, 'you forget, I think, that the Prince of Wales a proof that "bbod lam present!' The sub-editor apologised." will tell," and that, like his predecessors Here is a story for the New Tear: " A fop, of the House of Hanover, and for th«t gorgeously dressed, called on a fashion­ matter of the House of Stuart also, oar able lady to pay his respects on New future king is above all things an English Tear's-day. *! trust,' said the fop, taking gentleman to the backbone, and sympa­ leave after a protracted visit, 'I trust, thises heartily with the amnsements of his madame, that you will allow me to call class. All this is well enough and pleasant again F' *0h yes!* said the lady, * cer- in its way, but unfortunately blood will tainly^—on New-Tear's day.' " Aud here tell, in more ways than one, and the is a atory of two brothers : " The mother most fervent aspiration of Englishmen

"S -:m. Ohkrlee Dlclceiu.] ROTAL RACERS. [AprU 29,1870.] 15-5

will be that the turf days of tho Prince can play who is not in want of money, I of Wales may resemble in no possible way cannot comprehend; sttrely his mind mnst those of the royal racers who have pre­ be strangely framed who requires the ceded him. stimulus of g.^mbling to heighten his Horse-racing, saith the popular clap-trap, pleasures. Some, indeed, may have become is " the sport of kings." To begin with, attached to gaming from habit, and may this is not true—a trifling drawback, I not wish to thi-ow off the habit from the admit, in proverbs or other colloquial difficulty of finding fresh employment for stupidities; but as ono bishop once said of tho mind at an advanced period of life. another bishop's observation in tho House Some may be unfitted by nature or ta.ste of Lords, " it is not only untrue, but the for society, and for such gaming may very reverse of the truth." Horse-racing have a powerful attraction. The mind is kings and princes havo been very rare excited; at the gaming-table all men are phenomena, and have left behind them an equal; no superiority of birth, accom­ odour which is hardly that of sanctity. plishments, or ability avail here ; great The fact is, that racing without stakes noblemen, merchants, orators, jockeys, wonld be a very poor affair to any statesmen, and idlers are thrown together but tho purely stable mind, and that, in levelling confusion; the only pre-emi­ betting once introduced, tbe whole cata­ nence is that of success, the only superi­ logue of meannesses, miseries, and morti­ ority that of temper. But why does a fications which afilict the gambler, descends man play who is blessed with fortune, upon the vfretched racer. But it occurs endowed with understanding, and adorned to me that before proceeding further in with accomplishments which might ensure this moralising vein, I should do well to his success in any pursuit which taste or quote the words of one competent to speak fancy might incite him to follow ? It Is of racing and other gambling from expe­ contrary to reason, but we see such In­ rience. " Every school-boy " knows the stances every day. The passion for play story of the servant, who, on restoring to is not artificial; it must have existed in his master a " fonrpenny-bit" he had certain minds from the beginning; at found in the coalscuttle, was told didacti­ least, some must have been so constituted cally and pompously, "Verygood conduct, that they yield at once to the attraction, James; very honest, my man. Recollect and enter with avidity into a pursuit in always that honesty is the best policy." which other men can never take the least "Tes, sir," answered the man; "yon say interest." so, but I know it. I've tried both." The virtuous servant was a returned convict. It is hardly necessary to remark that There is nothing like experience, where­ this admirable homily was not penned fore I will ask that hardened sinner who after the victories of Mango and Alarm, was Clerk of the Council to King Florizel, but in 1819, and is explained thus: 'I and racing manager to his brother—who have been at Oatlands for the Ascot party. never said " God bless the Regent and the On the course I did nothing. Ever since Duke of Tork " in his life, but put down the Derby ill-fortune has pursued mc, and his private opinion of them in his own I cannot win anywhere." secret memorandum-book—to step iuto the The atmosphere of royal racing seems box and give his opinion of the folly of to have provoked more reflection than re­ those persons, who, having got everything formation in the case of the gentleman in the world that other people wear out who, when on his travels, vowed a silver their lives in acquiring—power, wealth, horseshoe to the Virgin if his mare should and honour—yet imperil, and frequently win a certain match, and paid the debt lose, all three, in deference to some dia­ with sporting punctuality, for we find him bolical impulse. fourteen years later, just after the Derby of 1833, holding forth in the following " Play is a detestable occupation; it ab­ strain : " Trouble, excitement, worry ! sorbs all onr thoughts, and renders us unfit Neither won nor lost. Nothing but the for everything else in life. It is hurtful hope of gain would induce me to go to the mind, and destroys the better feel­ through this demoralising drudgery which ings ; it incapacitates ns for study and reduces me to the level of all that is dis­ application of every sort; it makes us reputable and despicable, for my thoughts thoughtful and nervous; and our cheer­ are eternally absorbed by it. Like dram- fulness depends upon the uncertain event drinking, having once commenced it I of our nightly occupation. How anyone cannot leave it off. Let no man not '-r :^ 1-5G [April 29, 1876.] ALL THE TEAR ROUND. [;(Jonducted by

obliged to grasp at every chance make a became the abode of royal high jinks. It book on the Derby." was swept and garnished, and the new Charles Cavendish Greville's moralising king, volatile Buckingham, godless Roch­ was doubtless kept as carefully to himself ester, "pretty Mistress Nelly," and the rest as his other opinions during his lifetime, of the dicing, swearing, be-ribboued and for he appears to have pursued not only ruddled crowd kept high festival within horse-racing but every other kind of its walls. The little town was beautified, gaming, from whist to macao, and to and even sanitary precautions were not have fared altogether pretty well—better, neglected by the founder of the Royal by far, than the royal racers among whom Society, who caused a common sewer—a he lived and moved, and. In fact, enjoyed wonderful thing iu those days — to be a very pleasant time. Those illustrious built. To the horror of the " crop-eared personages had had but one predecessor crew," who slunk away into quiet corners on the ^turf'—a right noble exemplar of and ate their calves-head, with the bottle kingly virtues, and, to use language of claret poured over its neck, in sulky, germane to the matter, "as queer a yet trembling, triumph on the thirtieth of bred'un as ever trod the turf." "Rowley," January, the cockpit was restored with whose " mile " has immortalised his name increased splendour, and Mistress Nelly on Newmarket Heath, had but the tiniest abode in the "Nunnery" hard by the cross of the Englishman in him. His Palace, with which it was said to have a unfortunate mother was a Frenchwoman, subterranean connection. While at New­ and a half-bred Italian at that — the market the king and his court spent their daughter of Henri Quatre and Marie de time somewhat in this wise: Cocking in the Medicis—whence, perhaps, the dark com­ morning from ten till dinner-time; racing plexion and saturnine visage of the Merry from three to six, and cocking again in the Monarch. On his father's side he inherited evening. Odds and ends of time were em- one single drop of English blood from Lady ployed in congenial fashion. There was Margaret of England, daughter of Henry ombre, a Spanish game at cards, popular Tudor and Ell2;abeth ot Tork—from whom just then; and basset, another delightful sprang, by her union with that King of expedient for getting rid of money. That Scots who fell on the fatal field of Flodden, no minute might be wasted, the gay gallants James the Fifth of Scotland, who married of the time generally had a dice-box and a a princess of the House of Lorraine. Fi-om cast of dice in their pockets. Thia waa this French alliance came Mary Stuart, convenient in the extreme, as, in the queen, first of France, and then of Scot­ intervals of racing, a main could be thrown, land ; then, by her marriage with Darnley, and, when out hunting, a check was looked James the Sixth of Scotland and First of on with no disfavour by those who treasured England—and grandfatherof the first royal every opportunity of " flirting with the racer of whom England can boast. King elephant's tooth." Many a main waa Charles the Second loved Newmarket called as the king's great lumbering coach and Its sports heartily, and was never laboured on its road from Whitehall to happier than when leading a jovial exist­ Newmarket—a road on one notable occa­ ence in the old Palace there—built as a sion shadowed with danger, if the story of hunting-lodge by his grandfather, who the Rye House plot be worthy of more loved the chase as much as he hated tobacco. credence than that of the many apocry­ King Jamie was also a great amateur of phal plots of an age of conspirators. When cocking, and the cockpit formed one of the king exchanged racing for hunting, the the main attractions of Newmarket Palace. same merry train followed him to Win­ In the troubled times which followed the chester. In the quaint old Hampshire reign of that sapient monarch, the Palace town the laughter and racket of New­ underwent sundry alterations, and was put market and Whitehall were sadly out of to uses, which, to a less thick-skinned ruler place and sorely vexed the quaint inhabi­ than Rowley, would have rendered it ab­ tants of the Cathedral Close. "Madam horrent as a place of sojourn. The Puritans Carwell," otherwise Louise de Querouailles, abolished the cockpit, and actually tumed Duchess of Portsmouth, waa a prudent tbe palace into a prison for the " Man of woman as well as an avaricious, and pro-' Sin," who was imprisoned there in the vided herself with a handsome house in dreary days of 1647. Notwithstanding this Winchester, well stored with that rich painful passage in its history, tho Palace, plate concerning which many ugly stories soon after the "glorious Restoration," were bruited abroad. Nell Gwyn, a more

•t' Charles Dickens.l EOTAL RACERS. [April 29,1879.] 157

reckless person, left her lodgings to luck, sand a year melted away to nothing. Little and occasioned thereby a pretty squabble. glimpses of the style of life at the Palace The " Harbinger," whose duty it was to crop up here and there in the oddest way. provide lodgings in a royal progress, duly Lord Albemarle contributes a story told him arrived at Winchester, and marked the by Mr. Richard Tattersall, the grandson prebendal house of Dr. Ken as the abode and successor ot the founder of the famous of Nell. The stout churchman, however, firm, who remembered seeing, when he refused to admit her, and she was forced was a boy ot about nine years, a post- to seek lodgings elsewhere until the com­ chaise driven furiously up to the door of plaisant Dean Meggot built her a room at the palace, with WUliam Windham riding the end of the deanery. Nell sadly re­ leader, while the Prince of Wales, too full gretted her snug "Nunnery" at New­ of port to be " in riding or even in sitting market ; but her sorrow was unavailing, trim, lay utterly helpless at the bottom of for after the fire at the Palace the court the chaise." In the lucid intervals of went no more to the pretty little town. sobriety, there was much horse-racing and Time has brought about its revenges, more dicing. Onee the brothers, the and the stern Puritan has outlasted the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Tork, gallants with their long lovelocks, their went on a royal progress to the North, " lily hands," " their diamonds and their when the doings in the way of eating and spades "—and eke the bucks and bloods of drinking, gambling, betting, and racing, the Regency, in their pea-green coats, were of what the French style "Homeric" leathers, and white hats. These are all character. So far as can be discovered, gone, leaving naught behind save an evil very few of the worshipful company were name ; but the Puritan is yet to the fore. ever sober, but the progress was neverthe­ The site of the old palace of "the un­ less a glorious one, for did not tho appro­ godly " is principally occupied by an Inde­ priately named " Tot " win the Doncaster pendent chapel. Cup, and make such heart as " Fee-fi-fo- Passing over Queen Anne, and other fum " waa endowed withal, swell within royal personages who may be said to have his mighty and well-padded bosom. But taken an interest in racing, and patronised this royal racing saturnalia—not without it in a mild kind of way, we find the next a certain flavour of the Dutch kermess denizen of the Palace at Newmarket a very clinging to it, Vlth its odour of maras- big man Indeed-—a burly gentleman, some chuQO punch, and its perpetual rattle of six feet in height, and stout out of pro­ " the bones "—was doomed to come to a • portion. Prince of Wales, regent, and sudden and inglorious conclusion. This full-blown king, this "horsiest" of men came about through the "Escape affair," was the elder of that pleasant band of which brought the Prince of Wales, or brpthers, of whom Greville remarks that rather his jockey, Chifney, into collision the Duke of Tork was the only one who with the Jockey Club, who, in spite of the had the feelings of an English gentleman. sycophancy of the period, held their own Not an ill-looking man was George, nor as sternly against all the influence that could yetover-bnlky, when hewentto Newmarket be brought to bear upon them. Escape at the age of three-and-twenty, and ran waa an unhappy beast, destined to bring his first horse. Hermit, against Surprise, trouble upon everybody connected with in a match, and lost it. This was in 1784, him. In his youth he contrived to embed and commenced a turf career, which, after his fetlock in the wood-work of his box; many vicissitudes, closed seven years after and the exclamation of the groom, "What in a painful manner. Dui-ing the inter­ an escape! " as he was rescued from his vening period all the training boys at perilous position, gave a name to the ill- Newmarket knew the portly, well-dressed omened racer. He was, as sporting people man, whom they, with true Newmarket have it, a "rabbit," or an " in-and-out run­ impudence, dubbed " Fee-fi-fo-fum ; " ner." Fit one day to " run for a man's life " a nickname rescued from oblivion by —whatever the precise value of a " sporting Byron, who mentions " Fum the Fourth, character's " existence may be—to-day, he onr royal bird." At the palace the doings was " aa slow as a funeral " the day after of " Rowley " were, if possible, outdone by to-morrow. Hence, when everybody ex­ the prince's friends, the Lakes and other pected him to win the Oatlands, his stable "macaronies," who spent their substance companion Baronet won instead; and he recklessly enough, and in whose jovial ultimately convinced the Jockey Club that society the prince's allowance of fifty thou­ he had been " pulled " by Chifney, either on =r lj= 158 [April 29, 1876.3 ALL THE TEAR ROUND. [Oondocted by

his own account, or on that of his employer. could endure tho deliberate viciousness of What the real merits of the case may have his contemptible middle age. A brand-new been, it is now impossible to discover. crown made a difference, of course, and Sporting writers insist in maintaining the the contest concerning the Queen rallied unspotted honour of owner and rider, but the staunch Tories to his side—the whole be the truth what it may, the Jockey Club sad and sickening business being conducted held an opposite opinion, and his royal more as a party measure than a question higbness had no option but to retire from in which actual right and wrong were in­ the turf. volved. Ascot was a great comfort to the The prince shook the dust of the Heath royal sportsman, who would, in spite of from off his feet, and the Rowley Mile his twenty-three stone, ride on to the knew "Fee-fi-fo-fum" no more. Sickened course every day, the ladies coming in of Kewmarket, hopelessly in debt, and carriages. Established in the royal box involved in disreputable alliances of all in a tightly-buttoned surtout, and adorned kinds, Morizel yet could not keep off the with the particular form of hat and wig, tnrf, and commenced a fresh career at to the invention of which he had devoted Brighton, where his now unwieldy figure the whole energy of a mind, unhappily formed the centre around which the sport­ diverted in part from sartorial and ton- ing world revolved. Raikes gives a life­ sorial thoughts by the cares of state, he like picture of him in his green jacket and stood erect and enjoyed the races to hia exquisite " nankeens," the admiration and complete satisfaction. In his own way envy of all but that superb introducer of he was a great man. Besides the hat > starched cravats whom Byron returned first and wig already mentioned, he invented in the race of European celebrities, whom several peculiarly - shaped coats, espe- [ he placed in the following order: Brum- cially that wonderful surtout of semi- mell first, N'apoleon second, Byron third. military aspect, in which elderly gentle­ One Mr. Jerry Cloves was the leviathan men of the last generation but one de­ bettor round of the days before Gully beat lighted to button themselves up until Gregson, and was himself "polished off " th^r cheeks assumed a purple hue, and by the "Game Chicken j" and looked to their bloodshot old eyes goggled apoplec- • that "pale Crichton," Colonel Mellish, as tically at the pretty girls passing by. He the great backer of horses, whose breath invented, moreover, the royal procession made a favonrite. Mellish appears to have up the new mile at Ascot, perhaps one of ; been the "viveurpur sang" of the Regency the most pleasant of royal pageants. He \ —good at all points, handsome, accom­ was very anxious to win the Ascot Cup, plished, brave, active, and utterly reckless. having almost had time to forget his Derby His fine abilities were once concentrated triumph with Sir Thomas, and on one i on the noble task of teaching a pig to rnn occasion bought the Colonel—a famous i for a wager by making him always feed at horse, who had run the dead heat with a certain trough, and letting him loose at Cadland at Epsom—in order to secure the | gradually -increasing distances from it. coveted prize. He was, however, doomed Shortly after achieving this feat, he, to suffer defeat at the hands of the late having got rid of all his property which Lord Chesterfield—then the dandy of the was not strictly entailed, retired into hour—who won the Cup with Zinganee, private life, married, bred shorthorns, the celebrated Gully running second with and died either of tranquillity or his Mameluke. As the king left the course previous excesses. Mellish left no suc­ he was always loudly cheered by the mob, cessor, and by the time George the the cheers, however, being now and then Fourth came to wear his crown, he had tempered by a shout of " Where's the hardly a friend in the world. For years queen? "or "Where's your wife, Georgy?" his life had been passed in selfish seclu­ At the council board itself the horse was sion and abandoned to the most scandalous ever present to the royal mind. In the excesses. The fact is not to be denied words of the critic, who cherished in secret that the aristocracy of England-^—a portion such mighty scorn of him : of whom had, with disgraceful sycophancy, pretended to believe iu the legitimacy of " I was standing close to him at the his connection with Mrs. Pitzherbert—had Council, and he put down his head and at last " cut" him altogether. Many had whispered, 'Which are you for, Cadland closed their eyes to the wildness of his or the mare ? *—meaning the match be­ youth; but none, except a few toadies. tween Cadland and Bess of Bedlam. So I put my head down too, and said, 'The

^- Cbiirles DlolcenB.] PISH FARMS. [April 29, isrc] 159 horse;' and then, as we retired, he said suffering from the family complaint—im­ to the duke, 'A little bit of Newmarket.'" pecuniosity. His seat at Oatlands was tho He had becomereconciled to part, at least, worst-managed establishment in England. of the Jockey Club, for Greville continues : There were plenty of servants, and nobody " Dined yesterday with the king, at St. to wait on the numerous guests invited to the James's—his Jockey Club dinner. There Ascot gatherings. There was a vast number were about thirty people, several not being of horses, and none to ride or drive ; there invited whom he did not fancy. The was plenty of whist-playing, and sometimes Duke of Leeda told me a much greater nothing to eat; there was wine in tho list had been made ont, but he had cellar, but sometimes not a drop of water scratched several out of it. We assembled in the house, the workmen refusing to in thejthrone-room, and found him already put the pipes in order without cash down there, looking very well, and walking on tho spot. The house was in ruins, and about. He soon, however, sat down, and there waa frequently a grand strike of desired everybody else to do ao. Nobody tradespeople, who refused to furnish a spoke, and he laughed and said,' ' This is loaf or a joint until their bills were paid. more like a Quaker than a Jockey Club It waa a fit kind of household to form tho meeting.' We soon went to dinner, which subject of an opera bouffe. Meantime, waa in the great supper-room, aud very the duke cracked his little jokes; played magnificent. He sat in the middle with his whist; ran his hor.'=os; and finally dis­ the Dukea of Richmond and Grafton on appeared from this world, owing his each side of him. I sat opposite to him, jockey, Goodison, three hundred pounds, and he was particularly gracious to me, which George the Fourth never would, talking to me across the table, and recom­ hut William the Fourth actually did, pay. mending all the good things; he made me, The latter prince was hardly a royal racer after eating a quantity of turtle, eat a dish in the strict acceptation of the term. He of crawfish soup; till I thought I should found a stud ready made, and on being have burst. The Duke of Leeda gave asked which of his horses should run for the 'king's health.'" It seems that tbey the Goodwood Cup, replied, " Start the got drunk later on, for the king gave the whole fleet," and ran first, second, and Turf twice, and the Duke of Richmond third, with Fleur-de-lis, Zinganee, and tho gave "the king" a second time. This Colonel; but he cared little for the sport, was one of the last of George's junketings. and often turned his back on the horses Hia iron constitution was showing signs of while they were running. wear and tear at laat, and then he nursed With him died out the royal family of himself with childish care. He led an racers — the breeding establishment at extraordinary life, rising about six in the Hampton Court being the only racing afternoon. His people came and opened property of her present majesty. It the xjurtains at six or seven in the morn­ would be premature to speculate on the ing. He breakfasted in bed, and did possible intention of the Prince of Wales " whatever business he could be brought to run horses in his own name and colours, to transact" in bed also. He then read but should that be his decision, most every newspaper quite through, dozed for Englishmen wiU regret that he should three or four hours, got up in time for have elected to revive tho ill-omened dinner, and returned to bed between ten "purple and red sleeves," with golden and eleven. Thus faded out a king who, appendages, devised, no doubt, after the it he loved anything but himself, certainly severe cogitation the subject merited by loved the turf. his late majesty King George the Fourth. The Duke of Tork, whose monument at the bottom of Waterloo-place excites the wonder of all foreigners and ot some FISH FARMS. Englishmen, was in appearance a true Guelph, and was " seen to the greatest per­ LORD of the earth, imperious man strove fection at the head of a table." He is said from the very first to assert his dominion to have been the last man who could give over the watery world as well, making the toast of "Cardinal Puff " in perfection. river, stream, and sea pay tribute of their He waa every whit as enthusiastic a turfite finny denizens. The same reasons which aa hia big brother, and won the Derby tumed the hunter into a herdsman must, twice, with Prince Leopold and Moses; at a period far beyond the ever-receding bnt, despite these suoeeases, was always dawn of history, have suggested that fish. iy

160 [April 20. 1876.] ALL THE TEAR ROUND. [Oonduotod by

like kine and sheep, should be reared and Wherever the Roman went, along with fattened and kept from straying, for the the remains of his stately aqueducts and delectation of the palate. That ancient carved altara, the teaselated pavements of Egypt had fishponds or tanks of consider­ hia villas, and the herring-bone pattern of able extent, fed from the waters of the hia matchless brickwork, may be fonnd great river to which the land of the traces of the fishponds, whioh were a Pharaohs owed everything, we know. matter-of-course adjunct to the residence Tho two mighty Mesopotamian empires of proconsul or procurator fiscal, gold- had so many mouths to feed, and ao many ringed knight or buskined patrician. pairs of bnsy hands at the command of Cains loved to see the fat fish flap their what waa at any rate an enlightened lazy tails in the still waters of the tank in despotism, that reservoirs or pools for hia impluvium, just aa he liked to watch fish culture are not likely to have been the plump "porcelli" diaporting them­ overlooked, whether at Nineveh or at aelves in piggish happiness outside the Babylon. But as yet the clay tablet, door of that kitchen, where knife and spit whieh shall 'tell us how the waters of awaited the awinish innocenta. Tigris and Euphrates were led into arti­ There ia much plauaibility in the con­ ficial lakes, whence the scaly spoil could jecture that the aacred lamprey itaelf, the he drawn- at will, has not been de­ weight of which waa among Roman ciphered. There were fishponds, under amateurs a subject of boastfulness, was Persian rule, in Magnesia, which province no true lamprey, but the greedy, side- was especially assigned to furnish forth spotted, white-fleshed Silurua glanis of the table of the great king, and fishponds the Danube and the Theisa, the Hun­ in Greece; but these last were in despised garian eel, which our own defunct Ac­ Boeotia, the soil and climate of artistic climatisation Society in vain endeavoured Athens and hardy Sparta being but ill- to introduce into British breads and meres; adapted to such a provision for the future. a supple-skinned giant that would devour To the Roman patrician, whose eclectic fish, frog, or wild fowl, and for whose appetite impressed into ita service all private tooth my lord Cains, of the things eatable within the limits of Rome's Claudian or Julian gens, was popularly conquests, fishponds, salt and fresh, were a believed to toss an occaaional butler or necessity of life. It was not enough that black page into the deep stUl pool of the for him British provincials were scooping outer atrium. up native oysters from what have long China, which so oddly anticipated many been known to us as the Colchester beds; of the inventions of the perfervid Western that Africans were spreading fine nets to mind—which had gunpowder, petards, ensnare the ortolan and beccafico; that rockets, and torpedoes when we put our Illyriana were pushing the tusky boar from trust in arrows; a compasa when we hisfastnesa in the reeds; that Gaul gave him groped onr way by help of the stars; and capons, and Corsica pheasants. He must a printing-press when there was immunity have his preserves of fish as well; the for the clerkly culprit who could write his gigantic lampreys swimming slowly round name—was by many centuries beforehand the marble basin in the court, the huge with us in the matter of fish preserves. pieces of water laid out by the labour of. The carp, which, according to a rhyming his slave-gangs, inthe SouthernMaremma. legend, came into England along with the Juvenal has left us a description—only hop and the turkey, is, in common with too true, it may be—of the anxieties of its cousins the gold and silver fish, and all the poor fisherman who has brought to the tribe of cypriadse, originally from tlis shore a very large fish of rare flavour, Flowery Land. Nor has any country ever and who trembles lest some prying excise­ possessed such vast reservoirs of fish as man or hanger-on of authority should those which from time immemorial have claim the prize as having lately escaped existed in creeks and backwaters of the from the imperial vivaria. There is some­ Tellow River, or ornamental lakes so thing touching, OS well aa grotesque, in large and well stored as those which the poor fellow's breathless eagerness to surround the I'ural palaces of mandarin carry hia finny captive to Casaar'a threa- aud merchant. hold, before the captor ia implicated in The rapid conversion to Christianity of some charge of constructive petty treason the immense population of the Roman against the august wearer of the purple, Empire, stretching, as it did, from the the master whose frown is death. Irish Sea to the Persian frontier, and the

«^= Obarles DlckenB.^] FISH FARMS. [April 29, 18J6.] IGl numerous and severe fasts enjoined by the Garter round hia royal leg, or those at Church, rendered fish an indispensable which Richard the Second showed his article of diet. The rivers yielded but a amber-scented ringlets — dwelt lovingly precarious and scanty supply, while of upon the presence of certain sorts of fish. sea-fish, save in cities so exceptionally There was the still so-called royal cstur- situated as were London and Constanti­ geon, the heavy turbot, the Jean Dorc, nople, we hear but little. Every convent, with his gilded scales and spread of side therefore, had its stewponds, wherein eels fin, and the much-vaunted whale, probably and bream and roach might remain until a small cetacean of the "bottle-nosed" wanted for the refectory table; and no variety that had been unlucky enough to mansion was without its broad moat or come within reach ot an EngUsh harpoon. broader mere, swarming with pike. But after the middle of the sixteenth The pike, indeed, appears to have been century, we seldom find fish mentioned the species of fresh-water fish which, at otherwise than with a sneer. Our hardy least in Western Europe, was in mediieval Cornish and Devon mariners were busy times the most appreciated. He was, then, as they are now, in catching pilchards indeed, and even when at his biggest and to bo cured by the thousand hog.sheads best, a bony and fiavourless fiah, which It for the eating ot the Spanish enemy; and required sauces and stufling to render the same might be said of Spaiu's other palatable; hut he often grew to con­ foes, the tough Dutch boatmen who sup­ siderable dimensions, and figured at feasts plied Castile and Andalusia with salted aa well aa on fast days. Salmon was, stock fish. But though mackerel and like skate, brill, and rock-cod along herrings were hawked about the home the seaboard, absurdly cheap beside a counties at certain seasons, and imme­ salmon river, where its abundance was a morial Billingsgate purveyed for the needs matter for endless wrangling between of London, fish fell into ill repute even thrifty masters and their servants and with the halt-fed population of rustic 'prentices, and practically unattainable England. elsewhere. There must be scores of fair- Thriftier races than ours first addressed sized towns in England, where, eighty themselves to solve tho problem of adding yeara ago, a sole or a turbot wonld have to the national bill of fare, by the syste­ been aa much a rarity as a sturgeon or matic cultivation of what may be not a porpoise. The temptation to break inaptly termed tame fish—of fish that through the rules which enjoined, for should be no longer, like the hare and instance, the long Lenten fast, often grew partridge, fera3 naturae, but as completely to be almost irresistible in the case of under the owner's control aa fowls in a both clergy and laity. It must be remem­ henyard, or rabbits in a hutch. In Eastern bered that many articles of food which France, and still more in Thuringia and appear to us as commonplace and neces­ Saxony, tho growing of fish has, for many sary, were quite beyond the reach of thoso yeara before the commencement of really who lived in the middle ages. They had, scientific fish culture at Huningen, been in winter, little butter, and no sugar, save practised on an extended scale. on high-holiday occasions. Their bread was of the coarsest, and their meat inferior The great merit of fish is, that the finny in quality; while shell-fish, vegetables, tribes feed themselves. The huge salmon and fruit, were acarce and dear. A few that lies amidst lumps of ice on the red-finned roach from tho pond of the marble slab of a West-End fishmonger, is monastery, or a lean pike snared in a worth as much as a calf, yet he has creek, made bnt a sorry dinner for the fattened himself without costing a six­ hungry. pence of outlay to the Scotch duke who took the trouble to send him to market, The Reformation produced a curious and whose rent-roll has been nearly doubled gastronomic reaction in those countries by the harvest of the waters. We cannot all where the reb'gious strife had been hottest. be proprietora of salmon rivers, but a Fish, for a time, seemed to become un­ series of fishponds is within the reach of popular. Ponds were filled up or neg­ all who own or rent a few acres of land lected ; to be an ichthyophagist was to through which the merest brooklet trickles. incur tho suspicion of belonging to the A word, in the first place, as to the losing side in polemics. The chroniclers value of tho projected crop. Here the of old banquets—say those at which statistics of the Halles of Paris prove that Edward the Third sat majestic, the new the supply of fresh-water fish has, since 162 [April 29, 1876.] ALL THE TEAR BOUND. [|Oondi3ctod b; the Revolution, greatly declined. The well known to live for many years 'with­ poor Pans of 1789 consumed fifty per out increasing in weight by a single ounce, cent, more of such fish than the rich Paris the accommodating carp has been known of to-day. The average weight of lake to thrive for months in Holland when hung and river produce thus consumed is four up in a net, frequently moistened, in a cool hundred tons. Its value, pound for pound, cellar, and heedfully fed with barley meal is exactly double that of sea fish, and the and milk before being replaced in atub filled demand very much exceeds the supply. with water. The carp is of all his species In London the principal dealers have been the tamest; will come to be fed at the consistently of opinion that, were there ringing of a bell; will eat bread from the but an adequate supply, the sale of fresh­ fingers that offer it gently by the edge of water fish, now miserably small, might be his sedgy pool; and co-operates in our decupled. efforts to fatten him in a manner worthy The chain of fishponds should consist of of even the pig. three, the upper pond being smallest, the It is not, however, expedient that the middle one half as large again, and the carp should be turned out alone in a pond. lowest in level of twice the size of the We must give him his doctor, and his tax- highest pool. If possible, a stream should gatherer ; or, in other words, we must send furnish a graduated supply of water, but to keep him company the medicinal tench, otherwise shallow channels should be cut and, strange to say, the voracious pike. to carry rainwater to the ponds, which are This latter is required to keep within themselves connected by trenches, each limits what would else be a too-redundant with its sluice, to be closed or open at will. carp-population ; and the toll he levies is The banks should slope gently towards a amply repaid by the better health and central deep of not less than five, or more quicker growth of the survivors. than eight feet. Not a tree or shrub The common carp is inferior to the should be permitted to grow within Spiegel carp, or carpe a miroir, which several yards of the brink, as shade is owes its sobriquet of " looking-glass " to prejudicial both to the spawn and young the glitter of its burnished scales, and of fry; but broad-leaved aquatic plants are a which any quantity can be obtained from real blessing to the fish farmer. Hamburg. The amount of little store- The above arrangements are dictated, fish to be sown, so to speak, in a pond not by fancy, but by experience, the three acres in extent, may be reckoned as experience of hard-handed, hard-headed six hundred carp, sixty tench, and sixty peasant farmers of North Germany, about Lilliputian pike, each fish weighing from as unimaginative and practical a race of one to two ounces, so that the whole con­ men as ever solved the great problem how tingent would scarcely turn the scale at to grow rich by patient industry. It eighty pounds. In three years—for the would be unprofitable to establish fish­ owner should grant this amount of grace ponds in stiff, cold, tenacious clay, which —the average result would be sufficiently is far better left to its natural destination remunerative. Seine and scoop and spoon- as a wheatfield. A light friable sand or net would be filled, again and again, with loam suits fish, which would starve but golden- armoured carp, vermilion - tinted for the worms and larv£8 which abound in tench, and silvery pike; the entire yield porous soil. being a ton and a quarter of fish, or two Well-chosen water-weeds do their duty, thousand eight hundred pounds weight of not merely in sheltering, but in nourishing, carp, tench, and pike, in return for the the scaly shoal beneath their tough stems eighty pounds put in. This produce, at and spreading leaves; but fully three- the Paris market price, would sell for fourths of the nutriment necessary for all two hundred and twenty-four English fish, whether of the salt or the fresh-water sovereigns — a tolerable interest for the varieties, is derived from the destruction capital invested. of animal life. It is well to keep, for breeding, a few of The true pond-fish, the Dorking, so to those gigantic old carp whose life is, like speak, of the aquatic poultry-yard, is un­ that of the raven and the parrot, some­ questionably the gold-scaled carp, of all times prolonged for almost a century. fresh-water fish the most prolific. Its lazy, These patriarchs of the pond are by far stay-at-home habits combine to make it more prolific than younger fish, although patient of contracted limits ; and whereas their flesh, which gradually becomes as trout kept in wells and small cisterns are tough as leather itself, cannot be eaten. .&. Oburlsa Dlokens.] GRIFFITH'S DOUBLE. [.Ipril29, 1876.] 163

But at five yeara of age a carp, like four- and the counting of other people's money, year-old mountain mutton, is at its best the reckoning up and recording of other aa to flavour and profit, and with every people's profits, must be. Without being succesaive year he increaaea in weight but morbidly cynical, or hard on human nature, slowly. Five yeara, in a well-selected, I think we may assume that there are grim pond, ahould bring a "mirror" carp to features in the lives of bankers* clerks, and aome eleven pounds in weight, but only if be glad when thoy have pleasant places to food be plentiful, and over-crowding pre­ go through their monotonous grind in. vented by the ministry of the pike. Hia " Kindersley and Conybeare's was not an value would then be of at least fifteen unpleasant place, though it waa only an un­ shillings, but it would be difiicult to calcu­ pretending county-town bank, with merely late the pecuniary worth, as curiosities, a local reputation to maintain. If you of two enormous carp, captured, thirty had seen Kindersley and Conybeare's as it years ago, in a Saxon pond, and which was in Griffith's early days there, you weighed respectively fifty-five and fifty- would hardly have believed it to be a bank, nine pounds English. one of the highest respectability also, and Ono word as to the reason for preferring doing a business which many of yonr fine a series of ponds. It ia, on account of the palaces of finance with their marbles, and advantage of stocking them separately, gilding, their numerous staff, and their replenishing each pond with atore-fiah electrical apparatus might envy, though after drawing. And the piecea of water they would affect to despise. The old- are ot unequal extent becauae aome truants fashioned bank enjoyed the confidence of of an elder generation alwaya escape from the county, and was regarded as incom­ the higher poola to tho lower, and tho parably safer than the rival establishment presence of large fish among the younger ' of England ' by numbers of substantial one.^ Is injurious to the lattei', unless farmers, who turned up on mai*ket-days, in ample range—which for the self-support­ top-coats which might have emulated the ing fish means abundant nourishment—be British flag in endurance, to deposit in its provided. keeping the contents of fat leather pocket- books, tied round with many coils of whip­ cord, or those of stout little canvas bags, GRIFFITH'S DOUBLE. like miniature corn sacks. The business BY MRS. CASHEL HOET, transacted by Kindersley and Conybeare AUTHOa OF "A HOUSE OF CARDS," &C, iC. enjoyed an enviable tradition of undis­ BOOK IV. AUDREY S NAERATITE. CHAPTEB IV. turbed solidity, and had ramifications NEWS ; AHD NO NEWS. which I do not even now pretend to " AMONG the things which have changed understand. since I was young, is the external appear­ " Tho house was a substantial building ance of banks. I have heard much repro­ of red bi-ick, with white stone edges, bation among elderly shareholders and parapet, and window-frames. The door, tranquil - living individuals who inhabit which was of solid mahogany, divided in country places, of the splendour and the the middle, and had a grotesque bronze magnitude, the luxury and the cost of the knocker grinning in the centre of each great London business houses of the pre­ panel. The house spread widely on either sent time, and caustic calculations of the side of this highly-respbctable portal, and amount of dust, which has no connection the only business symbol about it was the with gold, thrown into the eyes of the word ' Bank' painted in letters of sober public by the liveried officials, the big yellow upon the brown wire blinds, which swinging glass doors, the marble columns, obscured the lower panes of the windows the decorated walls, the grand staircases, on the ground-fioor. A tall arch of ornate the parade of private rooms, and the general ironwork sprang from the base of the iron application of prettineas to business which railings on either sideof the spotless granite are feature of the modern joint-stock steps, and supported a large lamp, which, financial palaces. in the time before gas, had been a public " I am in favour of brightening up the benefit to the street. Kindcrsley's was in aspect of every place in which men have a convenient situation, but the street was to pass many laborious hours on every a quiet one, and there was not much show week-day of their lives, especially when of people, in comparison with the business their occupation is of a depressing nature, done by the bank, except on market-days. as I humbly conceive the stowing away The substantial old house was roomy and ^

164 [April 29. isro.] ALL THE TEAR ROUND. [Oonduotod bj comfortable, and I was not surprised that " ' I certainly conld not,' I replied ; ' but Mr. KIndersley's partner, Mr. Conybeare, I don't know that a man need say pretty liked to live in it, occupying all the upper things, and give up his own way when he portion, in preference to having a cottage ia in love.' of gentility out of the town. Mr. Cony­ " ' Oh, don't, you ? I do,' said Made­ beare was an elderly gentleman, and a leine, with pettiah emphaaia. * I think 'confirmed bachelor,' people said—some nothing of love unless it is very poetical; implying that auch a state of things was and I could not believe in it unless a man very shocking, others that it waa very would sacrifice his prejudices, and his self- sensible;—a description to which Made­ love, and his notions of self-importance, leine Kindersley would have added that he and independence ' Madeleine stopped was also essentially a bear. abruptly, laughed, and said: ' What non­ "Mr. Conybeare had assented heartily sense I am talking ! Neither you nor I to Mr. KIndersley's wishes with regard to know anything abont it, thank goodness! Grifiith, and my brother found him a very There's plenty of time for us to enjoy onr kind friend, lie was not a person likely lives before that comes.' to win golden opinions from young girls " 'People are generally supposed to enjoy on any grounds, and I do not think I ever their lives more after it cornea, are they knew Madeleine Kindersley to be perfectly not ? And I wonld rather a man had not unreasonable about anything except her prejudicea, and aelf-love, and all that, than prejudice against Mr. Conybeare. Ho was that he had to get over them for me.' over forty, and, ot course, seemed dread­ " ' Wonld you ? Well, perhaps so. Mr. fully old to Madeleine and me; but we Conybeare will never get over anything ought to have recognised that aa his mis­ for anybody, that's certain.* fortune. I aaid ao, once, in an access of " Of course, Griffith liked Mr. Cony­ candour, bnt was met by Madeleine with beare, who liked him, and had made the the smart rejoinder that his half-wig. and unaccustomed work of his poat at the his shoes were his fault at all events. Mr. bank easy to him from the first by his Conybeare had no relatives that any of us painstaking teaching; but we were not had ever heard of, and he lived a quiet, infiuenced by this. Griffith had a natural even lonely life in the, handsomely-fur­ liking for fogies. nished rooms over the bank offices. There "I remembered how Madeleine and I waa a general belief, which had been im­ had talked'in this way, as I sat working parted to me by Miaa Minnie Kellett, that that evening, while my father and Mr. Mr. Conybeare waa the only peraon who Lester played at chess. If anything were had ever ' managed' the late Mrs. Kin­ wrong—and I had only a misgiving, not deraley, and also that Mr. Kindersley would a reason for thinking so—Mr. Conybeare have done wisely in taking his partner's and Griffith had been talking it over, no advice in matters concerning his son; doubt. I should tell Madeleine, in my next but these considerations did not infiuence letter, the little incident of the stranger Madeleine and me. When her father was whom I had seen at Mrs. Kellett's. Any­ more than usually out of spirits about thing else ? What had recalled that trivial Clement, we opined that Mr. Conybeare conversation ? No; I would not tell her, had been making him wretched. I wonld not tell anyone that. I wondered "' I know it's vprong to dislike him, why Mr. Lester felt so very sure about Audrey,' Madeleine had admitted to me, Lord Barr and Madeleine. Waa it becauae ' but I cannot help it; he is so even and so he waa ao clear-aighted and quick in ob- measured in hia waya—alwaya right and aervation generally, or had he regarded never fussy, and yet so particular. Of Madeleine with a peculiar interest which course I know he'a very clever, and all made him especially discerning in her case. that, but he ia ao very hard and methodical, There had been a time when this sugges­ and such an intense old bachelor.' tion would have been painful to me for " * Perhaps he had a disappointment in some reason into which I should not have lovd,' I suggested. curiously inquired. It waa not ao now.' " ' Not he. He does not know anything "Nothing came, at the time, of the about love—doesn't believe in it, you may alight incidents which I have set down in bo sure. Just look at him, Audrey, the this portion of my story. The spring ad­ idea is absurd. You couldn't fancy him vanced, and everything was as usual at flaying pretty things and giving up his the Dingle Houae, and at Kinderaley and own way, now, could yon ? ' Conybeare's Bank. Mr. Kindersley re- =fc OkarlM I>lokeii&3 GRIFFITH'S DOUBLE. [April 20, 1S76.] 165 turned from London, leaving Madeleine am away from home, my heart softens to all the pleaanrea of her firat aeaaon even towards that old bear; I think in­ there. Only one untoward circnmatance dulgently of hia wig, and am almost occurred; it waa the postponement of Lord persuaded that ahoea are becoming. He Barr's voyage to the Arctic regions, in haa been intervening, in aome way, be­ consequence of the illness of tho friend tween papa and Clement. I don't know who waa to have accompanied him. Thia any particulars, but that Clement has had implied the loaa of a year in the fulfilment a direct communication from Mr. Cony­ of hia darling project, and was, of course, beare, whieh never happened before in any a disappointment. He took it very well, quarrel or scrape, and that it has had a however, Madeleine said, conaidering how very marked effect upon him. He haa much hia heart had been act upon it. My been obliged to agree to go home when I father amiled at the passage in her letter go, and to stay quietly at Beech Lawn for which dwelt on Lord Barr's resignation to aome time. Of courae, money is at the circumatancea; and, of course, he set it bottom of it. I suppose papa has had to down to her own influence. pay some heavy auma for him ; and that " Lady Olive intended to remain in he haa now really made up his mind that London until late in June—not until the this shall he the last time; that, hence­ formal end of the season. Neither ahe forth, Clement must take the consequences nor Madeleine would have liked to lose of whatever he does. Anyhow, whatever more of the beauty of the summer in the has been said to him, Clement believes it country. It waa very beautiful, though this time, and I conclude that is because Wrottesley had no claim to be classed it has been said by Mr. Conybeare. among especially picturesque or typical " ' I confess it is a great drawback to my places. The homely, tranquil, aunny, pleasure in going home that Clement is to scented loveliness of meadow and hedge­ he at Beech Lawn. He will make himself row, of orchard and winding wood-patha, odious to papa, and me, and everybody. characterised the country around our quiet I wonder why young men are such selfish midland town. We knew it all ao well, and unfeeling creatures ; I don't mean all and loved it so much. Nothing made young men—but those who have so much Madeleine forgetful of her home or in­ to enjoy, and have lite made so easy to different to it. If one half of her letters them? It is horrid to havo to feel that waa filled with accounta of what ahe waa one's only brother is the single drawback seeing and doing in the great world of in one's life. The garden at the Dingle London, the other half was filled with House must be looking lovely. I suppose qnestions, reminiscences, and messages to Agrippa basks in the porch all day. And people at home. Mrs. Frost's chickens?—she could sell " ' Clement has not been very attentive them well here; but don't tell her I hinted to me,' she wrote, not very long before at such a thing. Do you remember Frosty her return. ' I'm afraid he haa no liking iutroducing Lord Barr to the basse-cour ? for respectability, and, as he says, cannot " That's the marchloneas with the stuck- stand the dninesa of it, though I shonld up tail, and the duchess is the lame one; think no house in London is less dull than but the beauty of the lot is Lady Mary." Lady Olive's. I am aorry, for his own '"You must be looking for news from sake, that he doea not come oftener; hut I Australia soon. Be sure to let me know am glad, for my own, for he haa made when it comes.' himaelf very disagreeable more than once; " It was the first week in June, and my and I can see he always produces a bad father and Grifiith expected that letters impression. His manners are so familiar from Australia would reach us about that and so contemptuoua, and he is altogether time. They had been aomewhat aurprised so "slang"—I believe that is the only word that Mrs. Pemberton had not written for what I mean—that I am alwaya un­ sooner to announce her approaching de­ comfortable and ashamed of him. He does parture, as my uncle's letter had informed not care for anything like good society— my father that he had already disposed of calls it a "nuisance," and "all humbug," Mount Kiera Lodge (that was the name and seems to me to be more and more un­ of hia residence), and therefore she would like a gentleman. Papa ia much more have had no troublesome business matters strict with him than he used to be, and I to detain her. The expected letters think he is advised to this both by Lady arrived; and the packet proved much Olive and Mr. Conybeare. Now that I more voluminous than my father was c^ 1G6 [April 29, 1876.] ALL THE YEAR ROpTJD. [Oonducted 1)7

prepared for. Again, it seemed mystery Pemhertons would reach England just tts' was to attend the correspondence from Lady Olive and Madeleine wonld be re­ tho antipodes. The thick packet waa turning to Wrottealey. opened by my father at the breakfast- "' What a difference the baby will table, and Its contents proved to consist make,' aaid I, beginning again with the' of three separate portions; each enclosed topic whioh chiefly interested me. in a wrapper, and marked in succession '"Very considerable,' said my father, I., II., III. gravely, 'and a very deairable one, I ahould " My father opened enclosure No. I. It say. Of course your cousin's fortune will was a letter written by Mrs. Pemberton, bo mnch smaller, whieh I oonaider a great dated from Sydney, and it told my father advantage, and her poaition with her that she had left Mount Kiera Lodge, and atep-mother will be pleasanter and more was about to sail from Sydney in a ahip aecure.' called the Albatross; accompanied by her " 'I have very dim notiona about those step-daughter, two servants, and—an un­ long voyagea,' aaid Griffith, 'but I suppose' expected bit of intelligence this!—her there's information about them in the infant son. Mrs. Pemberton added that Treasury.' By thia name we called a ahe had not had the courage to write in apecial little shelf in my father's room' the interval, or until she could tell us she where he kept guide books, postal guides, waa Stife, and the child living and well. a gazetteer, and other useful but un­ She wrote very cheerfully, and expressed interesting literature. ' Anyhow, Mr. pleasure in the hope of seeing us, and Conybeare is sure to know. Shall you go receiving from us a welcome to England to meet Mrs. Pemberton, sir p ' for her husband's sake. " ' Meet her ? I! I never thonght of " This letter my' father, having glanced such a thing ! It seems unnecessary, for over it, read aloud to Griffith and myself. so short a journey, after ao long a voyage. " ' Wo may look for the Albatross in And yet, I auppose it would be kind too.' three or four weeks,' said Griffith. ' She " The idea was quite startling to me. will arrive at Plymouth, I suppose ? ' My father, who hardly ever went as far as "' How delighted Mrs. Pemberton and Wrottesley, and could not he induced to Ida must be with the baby,' waa my first dine ont of his own house, contemplating comment. a journey. I suppose my countenance " My father did not make any observa­ expressed my surprise, for my father tion in reply to either of us; he was laughed, and said: opening enclosure No. II., which waa " 'Audrey does not seem to think I bulkier than the first, but not so bulky as should be of much use. I entirely agree No. III. with you, my dear. But I don't see why "I had taken up No. I., which my father yon might not go in my place, Griffith. I had laid down on the table, and waa look­ suppose yon conld get leave for a few ing at the handwriting, hut I aaw that the days for the purpose.' packet which he had juat opened con­ " ' I have no doubt of it, sir. I will tained aeveral sheets of paper, and that speak to Mr. Conybeare to-day.' the first at all events was closely written " This was all as it shoiUd be. The over. My father read a few lines, and project I had formed would be most fitly then doubled the sheets, and put them initiated by so proper an attention on together with No. III., unopened, into the Griffith's part; and the first face in which outward cover of all. she should see, the first voice in which " ' These aro merely papers referring to she should hear, a welcome to her father's business matters, which Mra. Pemberton native land, would have a special charm haa sent on to me in advance, as a pre­ for Ida Pemberton. In my eager insiat- caution,' he remarked, dropping the parcel ance upon having everything my own into the capacious pocket of his dressing- way, in my youthful aanguineness, I wonld ' gown. have been ready to descry sound senae in " I was glad he was not going to wrap the argument by which Mias Anaten'a im­ himself up in tho reading of them just mortal Mra. Norris sought to perauade the- then, for I wanted to talk. This would solemn baronet ot ' Mansfield Park,' that be a piece ot news worth writing to the most effectual prevention of love Madeleine. And what a busy and exciting between two cousins was to bring them time we shonld have of it at the find of up together; whereas, if they shonld the month, with all these arrivals. The chance to meet, as strangers, the tender

"1'" Obarles Dlokeju.] GRIFFITH'S DOUBLE. [April 29, 1876.] 167

paaaion wonld inevitably apring into spon­ neither Griffith or I ever saw them .after taneous existence. they had diaappeared into the pocket of " I liko to linger in my recollections of my father'a dressing-gown, nor did he the past over this little episode. The time make any allusion to them. waa almoat ended during which I had the " Lady Olive and Madeleine Kindersley unhesitating confidence of girlhood in the were to reach Wrottesley three daya before future, tho certainty that whatever I very the time when the ahippiug agents advised mnch and very earnestly wanted to happen Griffith that the Albatross might he looked inevitably must come to pass; the time for. Madeleine had had a great deal of waa near beginning which ahould teach going out and gaiety, and I expected to me that the leaat-expected event is the see her looking tired. Her last letter waa likeliest. I walked into the towu with full of her satisfaction at getting back to Griffith that morning, and we talked with Beech Lawn, and candidly avowed that great animation over the prospect of one element in it was a reprieve about Mra. Pemberton'a arrival. I quite envied Clement. He was going to Switzerland Griffith his projected journey to meet the with a ' safe ' friend for six weeks, before travellers. I had never been twenty miles coming to Beech Lawn. beyond Wrottealey in my life, and every­ thing outside that distance was the mag­ " ' It might be all a dream,' said Made­ nificent unknown. leine to me, on the day after her return, when she and I were in my room, in the " Griffith was right. Mr. Conybeare midst of our firat talk, 'and I might knew all about ships from every part of never have stirred from thia chair, at thia the globe. We might confidently look for window. Only that the trees are all in the Albatross at the end of June. And he full dress, and the lawn never looked so had received very gracloualy Griffith's lovely, and the rosea are perfectly delicious, requeat for a short holiday when that and it was all bare when I went away. tlDie should have arrived. Of course But here we aro again, exactly as we were Griffith must meet his relatives on their then; and yet, how much has happened landing, he aaid. The poor widow lady in that time.' would be forlorn indeed, if there should " I looked at her curiously. With my be 110 one to hold out a hand to her on first glance at her had come an impression this side of the world. And Mr. Conybeare that she was changed. Sbe was hand­ himself would do Griffith's work for him. somer, and more self-possessed, though This was very kind on the part of the her old characteristic, ineffable sweetness, bear, and I considered myself bound in was still salient. She had the ' cachet * fairness to communicate it to Madeleine. which only intercourse with society gives. " The lively summer weeks went by. The finished young woman of the great All that the country had to boast of and busy and luxurious world—I had beauty was at its brightest and best. never seen one of the category before, but Beech Lawn waa all in order to receive I knew the specimen when I saw it—must ita yonng mistress, and the Dingle House have contrasted strangely with the mere had been smartened up, to the extent country-girl I was then. of the limited resources at the command " Yes; sho was changed, but only to be of myself and Frosty, in honour of the beautified with new graces; by the re­ unknown gueata who, my father had fining, not the hardening, contact of the decided, muat come to ua in the first world. The transparent simplicity of her inatance at all eventa. Had my uncle character was undimmed. I looked at been iu the case, things would have been her with such hearty admiration that very different, but we conld manage for Madeleine laughed. Mrs. Pemberton, Ida, and one maid. My "' Your big black eyea lump all the com­ father had given me a few emphatic pliments of the aeaaon into one ; and it instructions concerning the an*angementa is the moat acceptable of all,' she said. to be made for their reception, but he said ' Look, Audrey'—and she pointed towards little in reference to them; and the en­ the walk under the wall—' there's more of closures in the packet, which had also it. Lady Olive and your father walking contained Mra. Pemberton'a letter, must together, juat as they did before we went have been of as private and confidential a away.' nature aa poor Mr. Pemberton'a only com­ " I looked out, and there thoy were. munication to his brother-in-law, for In very serious conversation, too, to judge =r ^

168 ALL THE YEAR ROUND. [April 28, 1876.]

by my father'a frequent ahake of his posed to make for my brother's comfort bended head aa he walked by her lady- on the way. ahip'a aide. "Griffith wrote from Plymouth. He " Madeleine and I soon got on the sub­ had seen the shipping people, and they ject of Lord Barr, and ahe waa aa unem­ had told him that the Albatross was a barrassed aa she waa eloquent in his praiae. very fine veaael, and remarkably punctual Of course, she was sorry that he had been They had little doubt of her arrival within disappointed about his trip to the Arctic a day or two. He could pasa the time very regions; but ahe was very glad other­ agreeably in the interval, for to him aU wise, because he wonld be a great deal at waa novelty. Two daya elapaed, and he Wrottesley during tho winter, and he was wrote again. The ahip had not yet arrived j really delightful. but the weather was delightful; and he " ' And he will like it just as well as had been to Mount Edgeoumbe. Two more travelling in all sorts of outlandish places,' daya, and atill the ahip had not arrived. aaid Madeleine ; ' for, after all, the people Three days, and Griffith wrote to Mr. he likea beat in the world aro Lady Olive Conybeare. There waa aome UDeasiness and Mr. Lester, and, I flatter myaelf, I about the ahip, and he waa obliged to ask come next.' for an extension of leave. It waa granted; " I was not much wiser in affairs of the and then there came a few feveriah days, heart than when I had told Mrsv Lipscott when life seemed to be all watching and that I had never seen anybody who waa in waiting; when Madeleine aud I roamed love—not imuch; but I was a little, jnst about together, but very silent; and Lady sufficiently, wiaer, to feel certain that Mr. Olive came and sat or walked with my Lester had been quite right, and that Miss father; and when we were all together Minnie Kellett would never have an op­ we said very little of the apprehension, portunity of seeing Madeleine in the cha­ that waa in the minds of each of ua. racter of a pretty Countess of Linbarr. " At last we had a few lines from Griffith, We got through a great number of topics saying that he would start for home next before we were called down to luncheon; day. He acknowledged that the gravest and on our way Madeleino inspected the apprehensions concerning the fate of the rooma which had been got ready for Mra. ship prevailed. Pemberton and my cousin Ida. " ' I cannot stay here any longer,' he "' I think Madeleine is prettier than added, ' aa it may be weeka before the ever;' I said to Griffith when he came in. truth will be known, if an accident has 'And ahe is just the same, in other respects, occurred. I will make the beat arrange­ as ever. She ia so much interested about ment I can in case the ship comes in all the Pemhertons. We are to dine at Beech right, and settle that I am to be sent for Lawn to-morrow. I am so glad yon will the moment there is any news of her.' aee her before you go.' " Great consternation fell upon us when " ' I have aeon her,' aaid Griffith; ' she this letter came. I never saw my father called at the bank to take Mr. Kindersley so much disturbed. Madeleine came to home.' ua every day, Emd Mr. Leater alao. From " ' And don't you think she is prettier him we learned about the oceana which than ever ? ' the Albatross would have to traverse; and "' No,' said Griffith, ' I do not. Not at when he left us we would conjure up all.' the most harrowing possibilities. So the " He was always more or less annoying lovely summer days went by far otherwise about Madeleine. Just now he waa parti­ than we had dreamed of them. Griffith re­ cularly annoying. turned, and we felt a kind of terror when " Griffith started on the journey which he came back alone, as it he had been waa quite an event in our quiet Uvea. Mr. seeing ghosts. Lester was much amused by tho fuss I " And then—the days grew into weeks; made about it, and the extraordinary pro­ and suspense was unrelieved. No news vision of food and clothing which I pro­ came to ua of the Albatroaa.

The Bight of Translating Articles from ALL THE YEAR KOUND is reserved hy the Authors.

^ PubliBliei at the Office, 26, Welliiiffton St., Strand. Printed by CHAILBB Diczino t ETAJTB, Crystal Palace Press.