The Humors of Falconbridge Part 21

"No, _sir!_" says the grinning servant--"the _gong_--supper's on the table!"

"_Ah_, very well; go ahead; where's the room?"

Conducted to the dining-room, Capt. Fussy's eyes stretch at the wholesale display of table-cloths, arm-chairs, "crockery" and cutlery, mirrors and white-ap.r.o.ned waiters. A seat is offered him, he dumps himself down, amazed but determined to look and act like one used to these affairs, from the hour of his birth!

"I ordered hot steak, poached eggs--hain't you got 'em?"

"Certainly, sir!" says the waiter, and the steak and eggs are at hand.

"Coffee or tea, sir?" another servant inquires.

"Coffee and tea! Humph, I ordered chocolate--hain't you got chocolate?"

"Oh, yes, sir; there it is."

"_Ah_, umph!" and Fussy gazes around and turns his nose slightly up, at the whole concern, waiters, guests, table, steak, eggs, chocolate, and--even the tempting hot rolls--before him.

Fussy calls for a gla.s.s of water, wants to know if there's fried oysters on the table; he finds there is not, and Fussy frowns and asks for a lobster salad, which the waiter informs him is never used at supper, in that hotel.

Eventually, Capt. Fussy being _crammed_, after an hour's diligent feeding, fuss and feathers, retires, asks all sorts of questions about people and places, at the _office_; what time trains start and steamers come, omnibuses here and stages there, all of which he is politely answered, of course, and he finally goes to his room, rings his bell every ten minutes, for an hour, and then--goes to bed; next day puts the servants and clerks over another course, and on the third day--calls for his bill, finds but few extras charged, hands over a _five_, puts on his gloves, seizes his valise, looks savagely dignified and stalks out, big as two military officers in regimentals!

"_Ah_," says Fussy, as he reaches the street, "_I_ put 'em through--_I guess I got the worth of my money!_"

We calculate he did!

"According to Gunter."

Old Gunter was going home t'other night with a very heavy "turkey on"--about a forty-four pounder. Gunter accused the pavements of being icy, and down he came--_kerchug!_ A "young lady" coming along, fidgetting and finiking, she made a very sudden and opposite _ricochet_, on seeing Gunter feeling the ground, and making abortive attempts to "riz." Gunter's gallantry was "up;" he knew his own weakness, and saw the difficulty with the "young lady;" so making a very determinate effort to get on his pins, Gunter elevated his head and then his voice, and says he: "My de-dea-dear ma'm, do-do-don't pu-pu-put yourself out of th-th-the way, on my account!" Tableaux--"young lady" quick-step, and Gunter playing all-fours in the _mud!_

Quartering upon Friends.

City-bred people have a pious horror of the country in winter, and no great regard for country visitors at any time, however much they may "let on" to the contrary.

In rus.h.i.+ng hot weather, when the bricks and mortar, the stagnated, oven-like air of the crowded city threatens to bake, parboil, or give the "citizens" the yellow fever, then we are very apt to think of plain Aunt Polly, rough-hewed Uncle John, and the bullet-headed, uncombed, smock-frocked cousins, nephews, and nieces, at their rural homes, amid the fragrant meadows and umbrageous woods; the cool, silver streams and murmuring brooks of the glorious country. Then, the poetic sunbeams and moons.h.i.+ne of fancy bring to the eye and heart all or a part of the glories and beauties, uses and purposes in which G.o.d has invested the ruraldom.

Now, our country friends are mostly desirous, candidly so, to have their city friends come and see them--not merely pop visits, but bring your whole family, and stay a month! This they may do, and will do, and can afford it, as it is more convenient to one's pocket-book, on a farm, to _quarter_ a platoon of your friends than to perform the same operation in the city, where it is apt to give your purse the tick-dollar-owe in no time.

It was not long since, during the prevalence of a hot summer, that Mrs.

Triangle one morning said to her stewing husband, who was in no wise troubled with a surplus of the circulating medium--

"Triangle, it's on-possible for us to keep the children well and quiet through this dreadful hot weather. We must go into the country. The Joneses and Pigwigginses and Macwackinses, and--and--everybody has gone out into the country, and we must go, too; why can't we?"

"Why can't we?" mechanically echoed Triangle, who just then was deeply absorbed in a problem as to whether or not, considering the prices of coal, potatoes, house-rents, leather, and "dry goods," he would fetch up in prison or the poor-house first! It was a momentous question, and to his wife's proposal of a fresh detail of domestic expense, Triangle responded--

"Why can't we?"

"Yes, that's what I'd like to know--why can't _we_?"

"We _can't_, Mrs. Triangle," decidedly answered her lord and master.

Now Mrs. T., being but a woman, very naturally went on to give Mr. T. a Caudle lecture half an hour long, winding up with one of those time-honored perquisites of the female s.e.x--a good cry.

Poor Triangle put on his hat and marched down to his bake-oven of an "office," to plan business and smoke his cigar. Triangle came home to tea, and saw at a glance that something must be done. Mrs. Triangle was to be "compromised," or far hotter than even the hot, hot weather would be his domicile for the balance of the season. Triangle thought it over, as he nibbled his toast and sipped his hot Souchong.

"My dear," said he, pus.h.i.+ng aside his cup, and tilting himself upon the "hind legs" of his chair--"business is very dull, the weather is intolerable, I know you and the children would be much benefitted by a trip into the country--why can't we go?"

"Why can't we?--that's what I'd like to know!" was the ready response of Mrs. T.

"Well, we can go. My friend Jingo has as fine a place in the country as ever was, anywhere; he has asked me again and again to come down in the summer, and bring all the family. Now we'll go; Jingo will be delighted to see us; and we'll have a good, pleasant time, I'll warrant."

Mrs. Triangle was delighted; soon all the clouds of her temper were dispersed, and like people "cut out for each other," Triangle and his wife sat and planned the details of the tour to Jingo Hill Farm.

Frederic Antonio Gustavus was to be rigged out in new boots, hat, and breeches. Maria Evangeline Roxana Matilda was to be fitted out in Polka boots, gipsey bonnet, and Bloomer pantalettes, with an entire invoice of handkerchiefs, scarfs, ribbons, gloves, and hosiery for "mother," little Georgiana Victorine Rosa Adelaide, and _the baby_, Henry Rinaldo Mercutio. After three days' onslaught upon poor Triangle's pockets, with any quant.i.ty of "fuss and feathers," Mrs. Triangle p.r.o.nounced the caravan ready to move. But just as all was ready, Bridget Durfy, the maid-of-all-work, who was to accompany them on the expedition as supervisor of the children, threw up her engagement.

"Plaze the pigs," said Biddy; "it's mesilf as niver likes the counthry, at all; an' I'll jist be afther not goin', ma'm, wid yez!"

Here was a go--or rather a "no go!" Triangle had bought tickets for all, and ordered the carriage at four; it was now three P. M., of a hot, roasting day. It would be "on-possible," as Mrs. T. said, to go without a girl; so poor, sweltering Triangle rushed down to the "Intelligence Office," where, from the sweating ma.s.s of female humanity awaiting a market for their time and labor, Triangle selected a stout, hearty Irish _blonde_, warranted perfect, capable, kind, honest, and the Lord only knows how many virtues the keeper of an "Intelligence Office" will not swear belong to one of their stock in trade.

Away went Triangle, sweating and swearing; the Irish maiden, swinging a bundle in one hand and a flaring _bandanna_ in the other, following after her patron with a duck-waddle; and finally the carriage came; all got in but Triangle, who started on foot to the depot, carrying his double-barrelled gun and leading an ugly dog, which he rejoiced in believing was a full-blooded _setter_, though the best posted dog-fanciers a.s.sured him it was a cross between a tan-yard cur and a sheep-stealer! But, after a world of motion and commotion--on the part of Triangle, about the dog, tickets and baggage, and Mrs. Triangle, about the children, satchels, her new gown, and the sleepy Irish girl--they found themselves whisked over the rails, and after some three hours' carriage, they were dumped down in the vicinity of Jingo Hall, where they found the "private conveyance" of the proprietor of Jingo Hill Farm waiting to carry them, bandbox and bundle, rag-tag and bobtail, to Jingo Hall.

The carriage being overfull, Triangle concluded to walk up, stretch his legs, try his dog and gun, and have a pop at the game. But, alas, for the villanous dog; no sooner had he got loose and scampered off up the road, than he sees a flock of sheep some distance across the fields, and away he pitched. The sheep ran, he after the sheep; and poor Triangle after his dog.

"Hay! you Ponto--here--hay--Ponto-o-o! Hey, boy, come here, you dog--hi!

hi!--do you hear-r-r?"

But Ponto was off, and after a run of half a mile, he came up with a lamb, and before Triangle could come to the rescue, Ponto had opened the campaign by killing sheep! Triangle was so put out about it that in wrath he up with his gun and was about to terminate the existence of the dog, but compromised the matter by hitting him a whack across the back with the barrels of his shooting-iron; in doing so, he broke off the stock, clean as a whistle! It is useless to deny that Triangle _was_ mad; that he swore equal to an Erie Ca.n.a.l boatman; and that his fury so alarmed the dog that he took to his heels and went--as Triangle hoped--anywhere, head foremost.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "With a presence of mind truly unparalleled, she laid down 'baby' upon the gra.s.s, and made fight with 'the spiteful craturs.'"--_Page_ 169.]

With a face as long as a boot-jack, quite tuckered out and disgusted with things as far as he had got, Triangle reached Jingo Hall, where he met the warm welcome of his friend, Major Jingo, and soon recuperated his good humor and physical activity by the contents of the Major's "well-stocked" _wine-cellar_. Ashamed of the facts of the case, Triangle trumped up a c.o.c.k-and-bull story about the dog and gun.

After a season, the Triangles got settled away, and the first day or two pa.s.sed without anything extraordinary turning up, if we may except the upturning of several flower-pots and hen's nests by the children. But the third day opened ominously. Triangle's dog was found with one of the Major's dead lambs under convoy, and the Irish hostler had caught him, tied him up in the stable, and given him such a dressing that Ponto's soul-case was nearly beaten out of him!

The next item was a yowl in the garden! Everybody rushed out--Mrs.

Triangle in her excitement, lest something had happened to "baby," and Nora, the girl, struck the centre-table, upset the "Astral," and not only demolished that ancient piece of furniture, but spilled enough thick oil over the gilt-edged literature, table-cloth, and carpet, to make a barrel of soft soap.

The Irish girl came bounding, screeching forth! She had been sauntering through the garden, and ran against the bee-hives, when a bee up and at her. With a presence of mind truly unparalleled, she laid down "baby"

upon the gra.s.s, and made fight with "the spiteful craturs;" and of course she got her hands full, was beset by tens and hundreds, and was stung in as many places by the pugnacious "divils." Nora was done for.

She went to bed; "baby" was found all right, laughing "fit to break its yitty hearty party, at naughty Nora Dory," as Mrs. Triangle very naturally expressed it.

These two tableaux had hardly reached their climax, when in rushed Frederic Antonio Gustavus, with his capacious ap.r.o.n full of "birds he killed in the yard, down by the barns." Poor Jingo! and we may add, poor Mrs. Jingo! for a favorite brood of the finest fowls in the country had been exterminated by the chivalrous young Triangle, and in the bloom of his heroic act he dropped the dead game at the feet of his horror-stricken mother, and astonished father, and the Jingos.