The Humors of Falconbridge Part 41

"What? Not so soon?"

"Yes, sir," said Perriwinkle; "that house was a nuisance!"

"A nuisance? Why, I thought you were in raptures with it?"

"Had water every wet spell, knee-deep in the cellar; full of rats, bugs, and foul air."

"You don't say so?"

"Yes, I do," said Perriwinkle, mournfully. "Chimneys smoked, paper peeled off the walls, Mrs. P. got the rheumatics, a turner worked all night, next door, the fellow that had previously lived or stayed in the house, ran off, leaving all his bills unpaid, and our door bell was incessantly kept ringing by ugly and impudent duns, and the creditors of the rascal, whom I did not know from a side of sole leather. I lived there in purgatory!"

"Too bad," said we. "Well, you've moved, eh?"

"Moved--and such an infernal job as it was. You know the two vases I received as a present from my brother, at Leghorn; I wouldn't have taken $100 each, for them--"

"They are worth it; more too."

"The carman dropped one out of his hands, broke it into a half bushel of flinders, and I hit the centre table upon which the other stood, with a chair, and broke it into forty pieces. But, that wasn't any thing, sir.

My wife packed up the elegant set of china presented her by her sister, in a large clothes basket, and set it out in the hall, and while our Irish girl and the carman were carrying out a heavy trunk, the girl lost her balance and fell b.u.mp into the basket. She weighed over two hundred pounds--every article of the china was crushed into powder!"

"This was too bad," said we, condolingly.

"Our carpets were torn in getting them up, for I had them put down fast and tight, never supposing they'd come up until thread-bare and out of fas.h.i.+on; they were stained and daubed. The veneering of the piano and other furniture is scratched and torn; a hundred small matters are mutilated. Franklin thought a few moves was as bad as a fire; one move convinces me that the old man was right. But, my dear fellow, I won't bore you with my miseries. We are now moved, and look comfortable again.

Call and see us, do. Good bye."

About a fortnight after meeting Perriwinkle, one evening we went up town to see him and his lady. Mrs. P., before marriage, was an uncommon even-tempered and most amiable woman. She had now been married about six months. Upon entering the parlor we found Mrs. P. laboring under much "excitement," and poor Peter--he was doing his best to pacify and soothe her--

"Halloo! what's the trouble?"--we were familiar enough to ask the question--as they were alone, without intruding.

"Take a seat, John," said Perriwinkle. "Mrs. P. and the cook have had a misunderstanding. A little muss, that's all."

"Mr. Humphries," responded the irritated wife, "you don't know how one's temper and good nature are put out, sir, by housekeeping; by the impudence, awkwardness, and wasteful habits of servants, sir."

"Oh! yes, we do, Mrs. P.; we've had our experience," we replied.

"Well, sir," she continued, "I have suffered so in ordering, directing, and watching these women and girls--had my feelings so outraged by them, time and again, since we began housekeeping, that I vow I am out of all manner of patience and charity for them. We have had occasion to change our help so often, that I finally concluded to submit to the awkwardness that cost us sets of china, dozens of gla.s.ses, stained carpets, soiled paints, smeared walls, rugs upon the top of the piano, and the piano cloths put down for rugs; Mr. P.'s best linen used for mops, and puddings boiled in night-caps. But, sir, when this evening I found the dough-tray filled with the chambermaid's old clothes, she wiping the lamps with our linen napkins, and the cook was.h.i.+ng out her stockings in the dinner pot--I gave way to my angry pa.s.sions, and cried with vexation!"

And she really did cry, for female blood of Mrs. P.'s pilgrim stock, couldn't stand that, nohow.

P. S.--Perriwinkle and lady sold off, and took rooms at the Tremont House, in order to preserve their morals and money.

Miseries of a Dandy.

That poverty is at times very unhandy--yea, humiliating, we can bear witness; but that any persons should make their poverty an everlasting subject of shame and annoyance to themselves, is the most contemptible nonsense we know of. During our junior days, while officiating as "shop boy," behind a counter in a southern city, we used to derive some fun from the man[oe]uvres of a dandy-jack of a fellow in the same establishment. He was of the bullet-headed, pimpled and stubby-haired _genus_, but dressed up to the _nines_; and had as much pride as two half-Spanish counts or a peac.o.c.k in a barnyard.

Charley was mostly engaged in the ware rooms, laboratory, etc., up stairs. He would arrive about 7 A. M., arrayed in the costume of _the latest style_, as he flaunted down Chestnut Street--by the way, it was a long, idle tramp, out of his road to do so,--his hair all frizzled up, hat s.h.i.+ning and bright as a May morn, his d.i.c.key so stiff he could hardly expectorate over his _goatee_, while his "stunnin'" scarf and das.h.i.+ng pin stuck out to the admiration of Charley's extensive eyes, and the astonishment of half the clerks and all the shop boys along the line of our Beau Brummell's promenade!

It was very natural to conceive that Charley was impressed with the idea, that he was the envy of half the men, and the _beau_ ideal of all the women he met! But your real dandy is no particular lover of women; he very naturally so loves himself that he lavishes all his fond affection upon his own person. So it was with our _beau_--he wouldn't have risked dirtying his hands, soiling his "patent leathers," or disarranging his scarf the thirteenth of an inch, to save a lady from a mad bull, or being run down by a wheelbarrow! Charley, to be sure, would walk with them, talk with them, beau them to the theatre, concert or ball room, provided always--they were dressed all but to within half an inch of their lives! The man who introduced a new and _stunnin_' hat, scarf, or coat, Charley would swear friends.h.i.+p to, on sight! A shabby, genteel person was his abomination; a patch or darn, utterly horrifying!

He lived, moved, breathed--ideally, his ideality based, of course, upon ridiculous superfluities of life--leather and prunella, entirely.

Charley looked upon "a dirty day" as upon a villanously-dressed person, while a bright, s.h.i.+ning morn--giving him amplitude to make a "grand dash," won from him the same encomiums to the producer that he would bestow on the getter-up of an elegant pair of ca.s.simeres--commendable works of an artist! The _genus_ dandy, whether of savage or civilized life, is a felicitous subject for peculiar, speculative, comparative a.n.a.logy or _a.n.a.lysis_; we shall pursue the shadow no farther, but come to the substance.

After arriving at the establishment, Charley would strip off his "top hamper," placing his finery in a closet with the care and diligence of a maiden of thirty, and upwards. Then, donning a rude pair of over-alls and coat, he condescended to go to work. Now, in the said establishment, our _beau_ had few friends; the men, girls, and boys were "down" upon him; the men, because of his dandyism; the females hated him, because Charley stuck his long nose _up_ at "shop girls," and wouldn't no more notice them in the streets, than if they were chimney sweepers or decayed esculents! We boys didn't like him no how, generally, though it was policy for him to treat us tolerably decent, because his pride made it imperiously necessary that some of the "little breeches" should do small ch.o.r.es, errands, bringing water from the street, carrying down to _the shop_ goods, etc., which might otherwise devolve upon himself. But men, girls and boys were always scheming and practising jokes and tricks upon the _beau_. The boys would all rush off to dinner--first having so dirtied the water, hid the towels and soap, that poor Charley would necessarily be obliged to go down into the public street and bring up a bucket of the clean element to wash his begrimed face and hands. And mark the difficulties and _diplomacy_ of such an arrangement. Charley would slip down into the lower entry, peep out to see if any body was looking,--if a genteel person was visible, the _beau_ held back with his bucket; after various reconnaissances, the coast would appear clear, and the _beau_ would dash out to the pump, agitate "the iron-tailed cow"

with the force and speed of an infantile earthquake--s.n.a.t.c.h up the bucket, and with one _dart_ hit the doorway, and glide up stairs, thanking his stars that n.o.body "seen him do it!"

In one of these _forays_ for water, the _beau_ was decidedly cornered by two of the "shop girls." They, sly creatures, observed poor Charley from an upper "landing" of the stairway, in the entry below, watching his chance to get a clear coast to fill his dirty bucket. The moment the beau darted out, down rush the girls--slam to the door and bar it!

The _beau_, dreaming of no such diabolical inventions, gives the pump an awful _surge_, fills the bucket, looks down the street, and--O! murder, there come two ladies--the first _cuts_ of the city, to whom Charley had once the honor of a personal introduction! With his face turned over his shoulder at the _ladies_--his nether limbs desperately nerved for _tall walking_,--he dashes at the supposed open entryway, and--nearly knocked the panel out of the door, smas.h.i.+ng the bucket, spilling the water, and slightly killing himself!

It was almost "a cruel joke," in the girls, who, taking advantage of the stunning effect of the operation, unbarred the door and vanished, before poor Charley picked himself up and scrambled into the lower store to recuperate.

Weeks ran on; the beau had enjoyed a respite from the wiles of his persecutors, when one morning he was forced to come down into the store in his working gear, well be-spattered with oleaginous substances, dust and dirt; in this gear, Charley presented about as ugly and primitive a looking Christian, as might not often--before California life was dreamed of--be seen in a city. We _did_ quite an extensive retail trade--the store was rarely free from _ton_-ish citizens, mostly "fine ladies," in quest of fine perfumes, soaps, oils, etc., to sweeten and decorate their own beautiful selves. But, before venturing in, our _beau_ had an eye about the horizon, to see that no impediments offered; things looked safe, and in comes the beau.

We were upon very fair terms with Charley, and he was wont to regale us with many of his long stories about the company he _faced_ into, the "conquests" he made, and the times he had with this and that, in high life. f.a.n.n.y Kemble was about that time--belle of the season! _Lioness_ of the day! setting corduroy in a high fever, and raising an awful _furore_--generally! Alas! how soon such things--cave in!

Charley got behind the counter to stow away some articles he had brought down, and began one of his usual harangues:

"Theatre, last night, Jack?"

"No; couldn't get off; wanted to," said we.

"O, you missed a grand opportunity to see the fas.h.i.+on beauty and wealthy people of this city! Such a house! Crowded from pit to dome, met a hundred and fifty of my friends--ladies of the first families in town, with all the 'high boys' of my acquaintance!"

"And how did f.a.n.n.y _do_ Juliet?" we asked.

"Do it? Elegant! I sat in the second stage box with the two Misses W.

(Chestnut street belles!) and Colonel S. and Sam. G., and his sister (all _n.o.bs_ of course!), and they were truly entranced with Miss Kemble's Juliet! I threw for Miss G. her elegant bouquet,--f.a.n.n.y kissed her fingers to me, and with a _look_ at me, as I stood up so--(the beau gave a tall _rear up_ and was about to spread himself, when glancing at the door, he sees--two ladies! right in the store!) _thunder!_" he exclaims.

If the beau had been hit by a streak of lightning, he would not have _dropped_ sooner than he did, behind the counter.

The ladies proved to be _n.o.body_ else than those of the very two Misses W. themselves; they lived close by, and frequently came to the store.

Beneath our counter were endless packages, broken gla.s.s, refuse oils, rancid perfumes, dust, dirt, grease, charcoal, soap, and about everything else dingy and offensive to the eye and nose. The place afforded a wretched refuge for a hull so big and nice as our beau's, but there he was, much in our _way_ too, with the mournful fact, for Charley, that if those "fine ladies" stayed less than half an hour, without overhauling about every article in the store, it would be a white stone indeed in the fortunes of the beau! The ladies sat; they d.i.c.kered and examined--we exhibited and put away, the beau lying crouched and crucifying at our feet, and we sn.i.g.g.e.ring fit to burst at the _contretemps_ of the poor victim. Charley stood it with the most heroic resignation for full twenty minutes, when the two Misses W. got up to go. Casting their eyes towards the door, who should be about to pa.s.s but the divine f.a.n.n.y!

f.a.n.n.y Kemble! Seeing the two Misses W., whose recognition and acquaintance was worth cultivating--even by the haughty queen of the drama and belle of the hour; she rushed in, they all had a talk--and you know how women can talk, will _talk_ for an hour or two, all about nothing in particular, except to _talk_. Imagine our beau,--"Phancy his phelinks," as _Yellow Plush_ says, and to heighten the effect, in comes the boss! He comes behind the counter--he sees poor Charley sprawling--he roars out:

"By Jupiter! Mr. Whackstack, are you sick? _dead_?"

"Dead?" utters f.a.n.n.y.

"A man dead behind your counter, sir?" scream the Misses W.!

With one desperate _splurge_, up jumps the beau; rushes out, up stairs--gets on his clothes, and we did not see him again for over two years!