The Fortunes of Nigel Part 16

"Mother, are you serious?" said Jin Vin, unable to trust either his eyes or his ears.

"In troth am I," said the dame; "and will you call me Mother Midnight now, Jin Vin?"

"Mother Midnight!" exclaimed Jenkin, hugging the dame in his transport, and bestowing on her still comely cheek a hearty and not unacceptable smack, that sounded like the report of a pistol,--"Mother Midday, rather, that has risen to light me out of my troubles--a mother more dear than she who bore me; for she, poor soul, only brought me into a world of sin and sorrow, and your timely aid has helped me out of the one and the other. "And the good-natured fellow threw himself back in his chair, and fairly drew his hand across his eyes.

"You would not have me be made to ride the Skimmington then," said the dame; "or parade me in a cart, with all the bra.s.s basins of the ward beating the march to Bridewell before me?"

"I would sooner be carted to Tyburn myself," replied the penitent.

"Why, then, sit up like a man, and wipe thine eyes; and, if thou art pleased with what I have done, I will show thee how thou mayst requite me in the highest degree."

"How?" said Jenkin Vincent, sitting straight up in his chair.--"You would have me, then, do you some service for this friends.h.i.+p of yours?"

"Ay, marry would I," said Dame Ursley; "for you are to know, that though I am right glad to stead you with it, this gold is not mine, but was placed in my hands in order to find a trusty agent, for a certain purpose; and so--But what's the matter with you?--are you fool enough to be angry because you cannot get a purse of gold for nothing? I would I knew where such were to come by. I never could find them lying in my road, I promise you."

"No, no, dame," said poor Jenkin, "it is not for that; for, look you, I would rather work these ten bones to the knuckles, and live by my labour; but--" (and here he paused.) "But what, man?" said Dame Ursley. "You are willing to work for what you want; and yet, when I offer you gold for the winning, you look on me as the devil looks over Lincoln."

"It is ill talking of the devil, mother," said Jenkin. "I had him even now in my head--for, look you, I am at that pa.s.s, when they say he will appear to wretched ruined creatures, and proffer them gold for the fee-simple of their salvation. But I have been trying these two days to bring my mind strongly up to the thought, that I will rather sit down in shame, and sin, and sorrow, as I am like to do, than hold on in ill courses to get rid of my present straits; and so take care, Dame Ursula, how you tempt me to break such a good resolution."

"I tempt you to nothing, young man," answered Ursula; "and, as I perceive you are too wilful to be wise, I will e'en put my purse in my pocket, and look out for some one that will work my turn with better will, and more thankfulness. And you may go your own course,--break your indenture, ruin your father, lose your character, and bid pretty Mistress Margaret farewell, for ever and a day."

"Stay, stay," said Jenkin "the woman is in as great a hurry as a brown baker when his oven is overheated. First, let me hear that which you have to propose to me."

"Why, after all, it is but to get a gentleman of rank and fortune, who is in trouble, carried in secret down the river, as far as the Isle of Dogs, or somewhere thereabout, where he may lie concealed until he can escape aboard. I know thou knowest every place by the river's side as well as the devil knows an usurer, or the beggar knows his dish."

"A plague of your similes, dame," replied the apprentice; "for the devil gave me that knowledge, and beggary may be the end on't.--But what has this gentleman done, that he should need to be under hiding? No Papist, I hope--no Catesby and Piercy business--no Gunpowder Plot?"

"Fy, fy!--what do you take me for?" said Dame Ursula. "I am as good a churchwoman as the parson's wife, save that necessary business will not allow me to go there oftener than on Christmas-day, heaven help me!--No, no--this is no Popish matter. The gentleman hath but struck another in the Park--"

"Ha! what?" said Vincent, interrupting her with a start.

"Ay, ay, I see you guess whom I mean. It is even he we have spoken of so often--just Lord Glenvarloch, and no one else."

Vincent sprung from his seat, and traversed the room with rapid and disorderly steps.

"There, there it is now--you are always ice or gunpowder. You sit in the great leathern armchair, as quiet as a rocket hangs upon the frame in a rejoicing-night till the match be fired, and then, whizz! you are in the third heaven, beyond the reach of the human voice, eye, or brain.--When you have wearied yourself with padding to and fro across the room, will you tell me your determination, for time presses? Will you aid me in this matter, or not?"

"No--no--no--a thousand times no," replied Jenkin. "Have you not confessed to me, that Margaret loves him?"

"Ay," answered the dame, "that she thinks she does; but that will not last long."

"And have I not told you but this instant," replied Jenkin, "that it was this same Glenvarloch that rooked me, at the ordinary, of every penny I had, and made a knave of me to boot, by gaining more than was my own?--O that cursed gold, which Shortyard, the mercer, paid me that morning on accompt, for mending the clock of Saint Stephen's! If I had not, by ill chance, had that about me, I could but have beggared my purse, without blemis.h.i.+ng my honesty; and, after I had been rooked of all the rest amongst them, I must needs risk the last five pieces with that shark among the minnows!"

"Granted," said Dame Ursula. "All this I know; and I own, that as Lord Glenvarloch was the last you played with, you have a right to charge your ruin on his head. Moreover, I admit, as already said, that Margaret has made him your rival. Yet surely, now he is in danger to lose his hand, it is not a time to remember all this?"

"By my faith, but it is, though," said the young citizen. "Lose his hand, indeed? They may take his head, for what I care. Head and hand have made me a miserable wretch!"

"Now, were it not better, my prince of flat-caps," said Dame Ursula, "that matters were squared between you; and that, through means of the same Scottish lord, who has, as you say, deprived you of your money and your mistress, you should in a short time recover both?"

"And how can your wisdom come to that conclusion, dame?" said the apprentice. "My money, indeed, I can conceive--that is, if I comply with your proposal; but--my pretty Marget!--how serving this lord, whom she has set her nonsensical head upon, can do me good with her, is far beyond my conception."

"That is because, in simple phrase," said Dame Ursula, "thou knowest no more of a woman's heart than doth a Norfolk gosling. Look you, man. Were I to report to Mistress Margaret that the young lord has miscarried through thy lack of courtesy in refusing to help him, why, then, thou wert odious to her for ever. She will loathe thee as she will loathe the very cook who is to strike off Glenvarloch's hand with his cleaver--and then she will be yet more fixed in her affections towards this lord. London will hear of nothing but him--speak of nothing but him--think of nothing but him, for three weeks at least, and all that outcry will serve to keep him uppermost in her mind; for nothing pleases a girl so much as to bear relation to any one who is the talk of the whole world around her. Then, if he suffer this sentence of the law, it is a chance if she ever forgets him. I saw that handsome, proper young gentleman Babington, suffer in the Queen's time myself, and though I was then but a girl, he was in my head for a year after he was hanged. But, above all, pardoned or punished, Glenvarloch will probably remain in London, and his presence will keep up the silly girl's nonsensical fancy about him. Whereas, if he escapes--"

"Ay, show me how that is to avail me?" said Jenkin. "If he escapes," said the dame, resuming her argument, "he must resign the Court for years, if not for life; and you know the old saying, 'out of sight, and out of mind.'"

"True--most true," said Jenkin; "spoken like an oracle, most wise Ursula." "Ay, ay, I knew you would hear reason at last," said the wily dame; "and then, when this same lord is off and away for once and for ever, who, I pray you, is to be pretty pet's confidential person, and who is to fill up the void in her affections?--why, who but thou, thou pearl of 'prentices! And then you will have overcome your own inclinations to comply with hers, and every woman is sensible of that- -and you will have run some risk, too, in carrying her desires into effect--and what is it that woman likes better than bravery, and devotion to her will? Then you have her secret, and she must treat you with favour and observance, and repose confidence in you, and hold private intercourse with you, till she weeps with one eye for the absent lover whom she is never to see again, and blinks with the other blithely upon him who is in presence; and then if you know not how to improve the relation in which you stand with her, you are not the brisk lively lad that all the world takes you for--Said I well?"

"You have spoken like an empress, most mighty Ursula," said Jenkin Vincent; "and your will shall be obeyed."

"You know Alsatia well?" continued his tutoress.

"Well enough, well enough," replied he with a nod; "I have heard the dice rattle there in my day, before I must set up for gentleman, and go among the gallants at the Shavaleer Bojo's, as they call him,--the worse rookery of the two, though the feathers are the gayest."

"And they will have a respect for thee yonder, I warrant?"

"Ay, ay," replied Vin, "when I am got into my fustian doublet again, with my bit of a trunnion under my arm, I can walk Alsatia at midnight as I could do that there Fleet Street in midday--they will not one of them swagger with the prince of 'prentices, and the king of clubs-- they know I could bring every tall boy in the ward down upon them."

"And you know all the watermen, and so forth?"

"Can converse with every sculler in his own language, from Richmond to Gravesend, and know all the water-c.o.c.ks, from John Taylor the Poet to little Grigg the Grinner, who never pulls but he shows all his teeth from ear to ear, as if he were grimacing through a horse-collar."

"And you can take any dress or character upon you well, such as a waterman's, a butcher's, a foot-soldier's," continued Ursula, "or the like?"

"Not such a mummer as I am within the walls, and thou knowest that well enough, dame," replied the apprentice. "I can touch the players themselves, at the Ball and at the Fortune, for presenting any thing except a gentleman. Take but this d--d skin of frippery off me, which I think the devil stuck me into, and you shall put me into nothing else that I will not become as if I were born to it."

"Well, we will talk of your trans.m.u.tation by and by," said the dame, "and find you clothes withal, and money besides; for it will take a good deal to carry the thing handsomely through."

"But where is that money to come from, dame?" said Jenkin; "there is a question I would fain have answered before I touch it."

"Why, what a fool art thou to ask such a question! Suppose I am content to advance it to please young madam, what is the harm then?"

"I will suppose no such thing," said Jenkin, hastily; "I know that you, dame, have no gold to spare, and maybe would not spare it if you had--so that c.o.c.k will not crow. It must be from Margaret herself."

"Well, thou suspicious animal, and what if it were?" said Ursula.

"Only this," replied Jenkin, "that I will presently to her, and learn if she has come fairly by so much ready money; for sooner than connive at her getting it by any indirection, I would hang myself at once. It is enough what I have done myself, no need to engage poor Margaret in such villainy--I'll to her, and tell her of the danger--I will, by heaven!"

"You are mad to think of it," said Dame Suddlechop, considerably alarmed--"hear me but a moment. I know not precisely from whom she got the money; but sure I am that she obtained it at her G.o.dfather's."

"Why, Master George Heriot is not returned from France," said Jenkin.

"No," replied Ursula, "but Dame Judith is at home--and the strange lady, whom they call Master Heriot's ghost--she never goes abroad."

"It is very true, Dame Suddlechop," said Jenkin; "and I believe you have guessed right--they say that lady has coin at will; and if Marget can get a handful of fairy-gold, why, she is free to throw it away at will."

"Ah, Jin Vin," said the dame, reducing her voice almost to a whisper, "we should not want gold at will neither, could we but read the riddle of that lady!"

"They may read it that list," said Jenkin, "I'll never pry into what concerns me not--Master George Heriot is a worthy and brave citizen, and an honour to London, and has a right to manage his own household as he likes best.--There was once a talk of rabbling him the fifth of November before the last, because they said he kept a nunnery in his house, like old Lady Foljambe; but Master George is well loved among the 'prentices, and we got so many brisk boys of us together as should have rabbled the rabble, had they had but the heart to rise."

"Well, let that pa.s.s," said Ursula; "and now, tell me how you will manage to be absent from shop a day or two, for you must think that this matter will not be ended sooner."

"Why, as to that, I can say nothing," said Jenkin, "I have always served duly and truly; I have no heart to play truant, and cheat my master of his time as well as his money."

"Nay, but the point is to get back his money for him," said Ursula, "which he is not likely to see on other conditions. Could you not ask leave to go down to your uncle in Ess.e.x for two or three days? He may be ill, you know."

"Why, if I must, I must," said Jenkin, with a heavy sigh; "but I will not be lightly caught treading these dark and crooked paths again."

"Hush thee, then," said the dame, "and get leave for this very evening; and come back hither, and I will introduce you to another implement, who must be employed in the matter.--Stay, stay!--the lad is mazed--you would not go into your master's shop in that guise, surely? Your trunk is in the matted chamber, with your 'prentice things--go and put them on as fast as you can."

"I think I am bewitched," said Jenkin, giving a glance towards his dress, "or that these fool's trappings have made as great an a.s.s of me as of many I have seen wear them; but let line once be rid of the harness, and if you catch me putting it on again, I will give you leave to sell me to a gipsy, to carry pots, pans, and beggar's bantlings, all the rest of my life." So saying, he retired to change his apparel.

CHAPTER XXII.

Chance will not do the work--Chance sends the breeze; But if the pilot slumber at the helm, The very wind that wafts us towards the port May dash us on the shelves.--The steersman's part is vigilance, Blow it or rough or smooth. Old Play.

We left Nigel, whose fortunes we are bound to trace by the engagement contracted in our t.i.tle-page, sad and solitary in the mansion of Trapbois the usurer, having just received a letter instead of a visit from his friend the Templar, stating reasons why he could not at that time come to see him in Alsatia. So that it appeared that his intercourse with the better and more respectable cla.s.s of society, was, for the present, entirely cut off. This was a melancholy, and, to a proud mind like that of Nigel, a degrading reflection.

He went to the window of his apartment, and found the street enveloped in one of those thick, dingy, yellow-coloured fogs, which often invest the lower part of London and Westminster. Amid the darkness, dense and palpable, were seen to wander like phantoms a reveller or two, whom the morning had surprised where the evening left them; and who now, with tottering steps, and by an instinct which intoxication could not wholly overcome, were groping the way to their own homes, to convert day into night, for the purpose of sleeping off the debauch which had turned night into day. Although it was broad day in the other parts of the city, it was scarce dawn yet in Alsatia; and none of the sounds of industry or occupation were there heard, which had long before aroused the slumberers in any other quarter. The prospect was too tiresome and disagreeable to detain Lord Glenvarloch at his station, so, turning from the window, he examined with more interest the furniture and appearance of the apartment which he tenanted.

Much of it had been in its time rich and curious--there was a huge four-post bed, with as much carved oak about it as would have made the head of a man-of-war, and tapestry hangings ample enough to have been her sails. There was a huge mirror with a ma.s.sy frame of gilt bra.s.s- work, which was of Venetian manufacture, and must have been worth a considerable sum before it received the tremendous crack, which, traversing it from one corner to the other, bore the same proportion to the surface that the Nile bears to the map of Egypt. The chairs were of different forms and shapes, some had been carved, some gilded, some covered with damasked leather, some with embroidered work, but all were damaged and worm-eaten. There was a picture of Susanna and the Elders over the chimney-piece, which might have been accounted a choice piece, had not the rats made free with the chaste fair one's nose, and with the beard of one of her reverend admirers.

In a word, all that Lord Glenvarloch saw, seemed to have been articles carried off by apprais.e.m.e.nt or distress, or bought as pennyworths at some obscure broker's, and huddled together in the apartment, as in a sale-room, without regard to taste or congruity.

The place appeared to Nigel to resemble the houses near the sea-coast, which are too often furnished with the spoils of wrecked vessels, as this was probably fitted up with the relics of ruined profligates.-- "My own skiff is among the breakers," thought Lord Glenvarloch, "though my wreck will add little to the profits of the spoiler."

He was chiefly interested in the state of the grate, a huge a.s.semblage of rusted iron bars which stood in the chimney, unequally supported by three brazen feet, moulded into the form of lion's claws, while the fourth, which had been bent by an accident, seemed proudly uplifted as if to paw the ground; or as if the whole article had nourished the ambitious purpose of pacing forth into the middle of the apartment, and had one foot ready raised for the journey. A smile pa.s.sed over Nigel's face as this fantastic idea presented itself to his fancy.--"I must stop its march, however," he thought; "for this morning is chill and raw enough to demand some fire."

He called accordingly from the top of a large staircase, with a heavy oaken bal.u.s.trade, which gave access to his own and other apartments, for the house was old and of considerable size; but, receiving no answer to his repeated summons, he was compelled to go in search of some one who might accommodate him with what he wanted.

Nigel had, according to the fas.h.i.+on of the old world in Scotland, received an education which might, in most particulars, be termed simple, hardy, and unostentatious; but he had, nevertheless, been accustomed to much personal deference, and to the constant attendance and ministry of one or more domestics. This was the universal custom in Scotland, where wages were next to nothing, and where, indeed, a man of t.i.tle or influence might have as many attendants as he pleased, for the mere expense of food, clothes, and countenance. Nigel was therefore mortified and displeased when he found himself without notice or attendance; and the more dissatisfied, because he was at the same time angry with himself for suffering such a trifle to trouble him at all, amongst matters of more deep concernment. "There must surely be some servants in so large a house as this," said he, as he wandered over the place, through which he was conducted by a pa.s.sage which branched off from the gallery. As he went on, he tried the entrance to several apartments, some of which he found were locked and others unfurnished, all apparently unoccupied; so that at length he returned to the staircase, and resolved to make his way down to the lower part of the house, where he supposed he must at least find the old gentleman, and his ill-favoured daughter. With this purpose he first made his entrance into a little low, dark parlour, containing a well-worn leathern easy-chair, before which stood a pair of slippers, while on the left side rested a crutch-handled staff; an oaken table stood before it, and supported a huge desk clamped with iron, and a ma.s.sive pewter inkstand. Around the apartment were shelves, cabinets, and other places convenient for depositing papers. A sword, musketoon, and a pair of pistols, hung over the chimney, in ostentatious display, as if to intimate that the proprietor would be prompt in the defence of his premises.

"This must be the usurer's den," thought Nigel; and he was about to call aloud, when the old man, awakened even by the slightest noise, for avarice seldom sleeps sound, soon was heard from the inner room, speaking in a voice of irritability, rendered more tremulous by his morning cough.

"Ugh, ugh, ugh--who is there? I say--ugh, ugh--who is there? Why, Martha!--ugh! ugh--Martha Trapbois--here be thieves in the house, and they will not speak to me--why, Martha!--thieves, thieves--ugh, ugh, ugh!"

Nigel endeavoured to explain, but the idea of thieves had taken possession of the old man's pineal gland, and he kept coughing and screaming, and screaming and coughing, until the gracious Martha entered the apartment; and, having first outscreamed her father, in order to convince him that there was no danger, and to a.s.sure him that the intruder was their new lodger, and having as often heard her sire e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.e--"Hold him fast--ugh, ugh--hold him fast till I come," she at length succeeded in silencing his fears and his clamour, and then coldly and dryly asked Lord Glenvarloch what he wanted in her father's apartment.

Her lodger had, in the meantime, leisure to contemplate her appearance, which did not by any means improve the idea he had formed of it by candlelight on the preceding evening. She was dressed in what was called a Queen Mary's ruff and farthingale; not the falling ruff with which the unfortunate Mary of Scotland is usually painted, but that which, with more than Spanish stiffness, surrounded the throat, and set off the morose head, of her fierce namesake, of Smithfield memory. This antiquated dress a.s.sorted well with the faded complexion, grey eyes, thin lips, and austere visage of the antiquated maiden, which was, moreover, enhanced by a black hood, worn as her head-gear, carefully disposed so as to prevent any of her hair from escaping to view, probably because the simplicity of the period knew no art of disguising the colour with which time had begun to grizzle her tresses. Her figure was tall, thin, and flat, with skinny arms and hands, and feet of the larger size, cased in huge high-heeled shoes, which added height to a stature already ungainly. Apparently some art had been used by the tailor, to conceal a slight defect of shape, occasioned by the accidental elevation of one shoulder above the other; but the praiseworthy efforts of the ingenious mechanic, had only succeeded in calling the attention of the observer to his benevolent purpose, without demonstrating that he had been able to achieve it.

Such was Mrs. Martha Trapbois, whose dry "What were you seeking here, sir?" fell again, and with reiterated sharpness, on the ear of Nigel, as he gazed upon her presence, and compared it internally to one of the faded and grim figures in the old tapestry which adorned his bedstead. It was, however, necessary to reply, and he answered, that he came in search of the servants, as he desired to have a fire kindled in his apartment on account of the rawness of the morning.

"The woman who does our char-work," answered Mistress Martha, "comes at eight o'clock-if you want fire sooner, there are f.a.gots and a bucket of sea-coal in the stone-closet at the head of the stair--and there is a flint and steel on the upper shelf--you can light fire for yourself if you will."

"No--no--no, Martha," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed her father, who, having donned his rustic tunic, with his hose all ungirt, and his feet slip-shod, hastily came out of the inner apartment, with his mind probably full of robbers, for he had a naked rapier in his hand, which still looked formidable, though rust had somewhat marred its s.h.i.+ne.--What he had heard at entrance about lighting a fire, had changed, however, the current of his ideas. "No--no--no," he cried, and each negative was more emphatic than its predecessor-"The gentleman shall not have the trouble to put on a fire--ugh--ugh. I'll put it on myself, for a con- si-de-ra-ti-on."

This last word was a favourite expression with the old gentleman, which he p.r.o.nounced in a peculiar manner, gasping it out syllable by syllable, and laying a strong emphasis upon the last. It was, indeed, a sort of protecting clause, by which he guarded himself against all inconveniences attendant on the rash habit of offering service or civility of any kind, the which, when hastily snapped at by those to whom they are uttered, give the profferer sometimes room to repent his prompt.i.tude.

"For shame, father," said Martha, "that must not be. Master Grahame will kindle his own fire, or wait till the char-woman comes to do it for him, just as likes him best."

"No, child--no, child. Child Martha, no," reiterated the old miser-- "no char-woman shall ever touch a grate in my house; they put--ugh, ugh--the f.a.ggot uppermost, and so the coal kindles not, and the flame goes up the chimney, and wood and heat are both thrown away. Now, I will lay it properly for the gentleman, for a consideration, so that it shall last--ugh, ugh--last the whole day." Here his vehemence increased his cough so violently, that Nigel could only, from a scattered word here and there, comprehend that it was a recommendation to his daughter to remove the poker and tongs from the stranger's fireside, with an a.s.surance, that, when necessary, his landlord would be in attendance to adjust it himself, "for a consideration."

Martha paid as little attention to the old man's injunctions as a predominant dame gives to those of a henpecked husband. She only repeated, in a deeper and more emphatic tone of censure,--"For shame, father--for shame!" then, turning to her guest, said, with her usual ungraciousness of manner--"Master Grahame--it is best to be plain with you at first. My father is an old, a very old man, and his wits, as you may see, are somewhat weakened--though I would not advise you to make a bargain with him, else you may find them too sharp for your own. For myself, I am a lone woman, and, to say truth, care little to see or converse with any one. If you can be satisfied with house-room, shelter, and safety, it will be your own fault if you have them not, and they are not always to be found in this unhappy quarter. But, if you seek deferential observance and attendance, I tell you at once you will not find them here."

"I am not wont either to thrust myself upon acquaintance, madam, or to give trouble," said the guest; "nevertheless, I shall need the a.s.sistance of a domestic to a.s.sist me to dress--Perhaps you can recommend me to such?"

"Yes, to twenty," answered Mistress Martha, "who will pick your purse while they tie your points, and cut your throat while they smooth your pillow."

"I will be his servant, myself," said the old man, whose intellect, for a moment distanced, had again, in some measure, got up with the conversation. "I will brush his cloak--ugh, ugh--and tie his points-- ugh, ugh--and clean his shoes--ugh--and run on his errands with speed and safety--ugh, ugh, ugh, ugh--for a consideration."

"Good-morrow to you, sir," said Martha, to Nigel, in a tone of direct and positive dismissal. "It cannot be agreeable to a daughter that a stranger should hear her father speak thus. If you be really a gentleman, you will retire to your own apartment."

"I will not delay a moment," said Nigel, respectfully, for he was sensible that circ.u.mstances palliated the woman's rudeness. "I would but ask you, if seriously there can be danger in procuring the a.s.sistance of a serving-man in this place?"

"Young gentleman," said Martha, "you must know little of Whitefriars to ask the question. We live alone in this house, and seldom has a stranger entered it; nor should you, to be plain, had my will been consulted. Look at the door--see if that of a castle can be better secured; the windows of the first floor are grated on the outside, and within, look to these shutters."

She pulled one of them aside, and showed a ponderous apparatus of bolts and chains for securing the window-shutters, while her father, pressing to her side, seized her gown with a trembling hand, and said, in a low whisper, "Show not the trick of locking and undoing them. Show him not the trick on't, Martha--ugh, ugh--on no consideration." Martha went on, without paying him any attention.

"And yet, young gentleman, we have been more than once like to find all these defences too weak to protect our lives; such an evil effect on the wicked generation around us hath been made by the unhappy report of my poor father's wealth."

"Say nothing of that, housewife," said the miser, his irritability increased by the very supposition of his being wealthy--"Say nothing of that, or I will beat thee, housewife--beat thee with my staff, for fetching and carrying lies that will procure our throats to be cut at last--ugh, ugh.--I am but a poor man," he continued, turning to Nigel- -"a very poor man, that am willing to do any honest turn upon earth, for a modest consideration."

"I therefore warn you of the life you must lead, young gentleman," said Martha; "the poor woman who does the char-work will a.s.sist you so far as in her power, but the wise man is his own best servant and a.s.sistant."

"It is a lesson you have taught me, madam, and I thank you for it--I will a.s.suredly study it at leisure."

"You will do well," said Martha; "and as you seem thankful for advice, I, though I am no professed counsellor of others, will give you more. Make no intimacy with any one in Whitefriars--borrow no money, on any score, especially from my father, for, dotard as he seems, he will make an a.s.s of you. Last, and best of all, stay here not an instant longer than you can help it. Farewell, sir."

"A gnarled tree may bear good fruit, and a harsh nature may give good counsel," thought the Lord of Glenvarloch, as he retreated to his own apartment, where the same reflection occurred to him again and again, while, unable as yet to reconcile himself to the thoughts of becoming his own fire-maker, he walked up and down his bedroom, to warm himself by exercise.

At length his meditations arranged themselves in the following soliloquy--by which expression I beg leave to observe once for all, that I do not mean that Nigel literally said aloud with his bodily organs, the words which follow in inverted commas, (while pacing the room by himself,) but that I myself choose to present to my dearest reader the picture of my hero's mind, his reflections and resolutions, in the form of a speech, rather than in that of a narrative. In other words, I have put his thoughts into language; and this I conceive to be the purpose of the soliloquy upon the stage as well as in the closet, being at once the most natural, and perhaps the only way of communicating to the spectator what is supposed to be pa.s.sing in the bosom of the scenic personage. There are no such soliloquies in nature, it is true, but unless they were received as a conventional medium of communication betwixt the poet and the audience, we should reduce dramatic authors to the recipe of Master Puff, who makes Lord Burleigh intimate a long train of political reasoning to the audience, by one comprehensive shake of his noddle. In narrative, no doubt, the writer has the alternative of telling that his personages thought so and so, inferred thus and thus, and arrived at such and such a conclusion; but the soliloquy is a more concise and spirited mode of communicating the same information; and therefore thus communed, or thus might have communed, the Lord of Glenvarloch with his own mind.

"She is right, and has taught me a lesson I will profit by. I have been, through my whole life, one who leant upon others for that a.s.sistance, which it is more truly n.o.ble to derive from my own exertions. I am ashamed of feeling the paltry inconvenience which long habit had led me to annex to the want of a servant's a.s.sistance--I am ashamed of that; but far, far more am I ashamed to have suffered the same habit of throwing my own burden on others, to render me, since I came to this city, a mere victim of those events, which I have never even attempted to influence--a thing never acting, but perpetually acted upon--protected by one friend, deceived by another; but in the advantage which I received from the one, and the evil I have sustained from the other, as pa.s.sive and helpless as a boat that drifts without oar or rudder at the mercy of the winds and waves. I became a courtier, because Heriot so advised it--a gamester, because Dalgarno so contrived it--an Alsatian, because Lowestoffe so willed it. Whatever of good or bad has befallen me, has arisen out of the agency of others, not from my own. My father's son must no longer hold this facile and puerile course. Live or die, sink or swim, Nigel Olifaunt, from this moment, shall owe his safety, success, and honour, to his own exertions, or shall fall with the credit of having at least exerted his own free agency. I will write it down in my tablets, in her very words,--'The wise man is his own best a.s.sistant.'"

He had just put his tablets in his pocket when the old charwoman, who, to add to her efficiency, was sadly crippled by rheumatism, hobbled into the room, to try if she could gain a small gratification by waiting on the stranger. She readily undertook to get Lord Glenvarloch's breakfast, and as there was an eating-house at the next door, she succeeded in a shorter time than Nigel had augured.

As his solitary meal was finished, one of the Temple porters, or inferior officers, was announced, as seeking Master Grahame, on the part of his friend, Master Lowestoffe; and, being admitted by the old woman to his apartment, he delivered to Nigel a small mail-trunk, with the clothes he had desired should be sent to him, and then, with more mystery, put into his hand a casket, or strong-boy, which he carefully concealed beneath his cloak. "I am glad to be rid on't," said the fellow, as he placed it on the table.

"Why, it is surely not so very heavy," answered Nigel, "and you are a stout young man."

"Ay, sir," replied the fellow; "but Samson himself would not have carried such a matter safely through Alsatia, had the lads of the Huff known what it was. Please to look into it, sir, and see all is right-- I am an honest fellow, and it comes safe out of my hands. How long it may remain so afterwards, will depend on your own care. I would not my good name were to suffer by any after-clap."