On Nothing & Kindred Subjects Part 11

5. Vex no man at your door; buy and sell freely.

6. Do not a.s.sociate with Drunkards, Brawlers and Poets; and G.o.d's blessing be with you.

Now when Jack was grown to about thirty years old, he came, most unfortunately, upon a certain Sir John Snipe, Bart., that was a very scandalous young squire of Oxfords.h.i.+re, and one that had published five lyrics and a play (enough to warn any Bull against him), who spoke to him somewhat in this fas.h.i.+on:---

"La! Jack, what a pity you and I should live so separate! I'll be bound you're the best fellow in the world, the very backbone of the country. To be sure there's a silly old-fas.h.i.+oned lot of Lumpkins in our part that will have it you're no gentleman, but I say, 'Gentle is as Gentle does,' and fair play's a jewel. I will enter your counting-house as soon as drink to you, as I do here."

Whereat Jack cried--

"G.o.d 'a' mercy, a very kind gentleman! Be welcome to my house. Pray take it as your own. I think you may count me one of you? Eh? Be seated. Come, how can I serve you?": and at last he had this Jackanapes taking a handsome salary for doing nothing.

When Jack's friends would reproach him and say, "Oh, Jack, Jack, beware this fine gentleman; he will be your ruin," Jack would answer, "A plague on all levellers," or again, "What if he be a gentleman? So that he have talent 'tis all I seek," or yet further, "Well, gentle or simple, thank G.o.d he's an honest Englishman."

Whereat Jack added to the firm, Isaacs of Hamburg, Laroch.e.l.le of Canada, Warramugga of Van Dieman's Land, s.m.u.ts Bieken of the Cape of Good Hope, and the Maharajah of Mahound of the East Indies that was a plaguey devilish-looking black fellow, pock-marked, and with a terrible great paunch to him.

So things went all to the dogs with poor Jack, that would hear no sense or reason from his father's old friends, but was always seen arm in arm with Sir John Snipe, Warra Mugga, the Maharajah and the rest; drinking at the sign of the "Beerage," gambling and dicing at "The Tape," or playing fisticuffs at the "Lord Nelson," till at last he quarrelled with all the world but his boon companions and, what was worse, boasted that his father's brother's son, rich Jonathan Spare, was of the company. So if he met some dirty dog or other in the street he would cry, "Come and sup to-night, you shall meet Cousin Jonathan!" and when no Jonathan was there he would make a thousand excuses saying, "Excuse Jonathan, I pray you, he has married a d.a.m.ned Irish wife that keeps him at home"; or, "What!

Jonathan not come? Oh! we'll wait awhile. He never fails, for we are like brothers!" and so on; till his companions came to think at last that he had never met or known Jonathan; which was indeed the case.

About this time he began to think himself too fine a gentleman to live over the shop as his father had done, and so asked Sir John Snipe where he might go that was more genteel; for he still had too much sense to ask any of those other outlandish fellows' advice in such a matter. At last, on Snipe's bespeaking, he went to Wimbledon, which is a vastly smart suburb, and there, G.o.d knows, he fell into a thousand absurd tricks so that many thought he was off his head.

He hired a singing man to stand before his door day and night singing vulgar songs out of the street in praise of d.i.c.k Turpin and Molly Nog, only forcing him to put in his name of Jack Bull in the place of the Murderer or Oyster Wench therein celebrated.

He would drink rum with common soldiers in the public-houses and then ask them in to dinner to meet gentlemen, saying "These are heroes and gentlemen, which are the two first kinds of men," and they would smoke great pipes of tobacco in his very dining-room to the general disgust.

He would run out and cruelly beat small boys unaware, and when he had nigh killed them he would come back and sit up half the night writing an account of how he had fought Tom Mauler of Bermondsey and beaten him in a hundred and two rounds, which (he would add) no man living but he could do.

He would hang out of his window a great flag with a challenge on it "to all the people of Wimbledon a.s.sembled, or to any of them singly," and then he would be seen at his front gate waving a great red flag and gnawing a bone like a dog, saying that he loved Force only, and would fight all and any.

When he received any print, newspaper, book or pamphlet that praised any but himself, he would throw it into the fire in a kind of frenzy, calling G.o.d to witness that he was the only person of consequence in the world, that it was a horrible shame that he was so neglected, and Lord knows what other rubbish.

In this spirit he quarrelled with all his fellow-underwriters and friends and comrades, and that in the most insolent way. For knowing well that Mr. Frog had a shrew of a wife, he wrote to him daily asking "if he had had a domestic broil of late, and how his poor head felt since it was bandaged." To Mr. Hans, who lived in a small way and loved gardening, he sent an express "begging him to mind his cabbages and leave gentlemen to their greater affairs." To Niccolini of Savoy, the little swarthy merchant, he sent indeed a more polite note, but as he said in it "that he would be very willing to give him charity and help him as he could" and as he added "for my father it was that put you up in business" (which was a monstrous lie, for Frog had done this) he did but offend. Then to Mr. William Eagle, that was a strutting, arrogant fellow, but willing to be a friend, he wrote every Monday to say that the house of Bull was lost unless Mr. Eagle would very kindly protect it and every Thursday to challenge him to mortal combat, so that Mr. Eagle (who, to tell the truth, was no great wit, but something of a dullard and moreover suffering from a gathering in the ear, a withered arm, and poor blood) gave up his friends.h.i.+p and business with Bull and took to making up sermons and speeches for orators.

He would have no retainers but two, whose common names were Hocus and Pocus, but as he hated the use of common names and as no one had heard of Hocus' lineage (nor did he himself know it) he called him, Hocus, "Freedom" as being a high-sounding and moral name for a footman and Pocus (whose name was of an ordinary decent kind) he called "Glory" as being a good counterweight to Freedom; both these were names in his opinion very decent and well suited for a gentleman's servants.

Now Freedom and Glory got together in the apple closet and put it to each other that, as their master was evidently mad it would be a thousand pities to take no advantage of it, and they agreed that whatever bit of jobbing Hocus Freedom should do, Pocus Glory should approve; and contrariwise about. But they kept up a sham quarrel to mask this; thus Hocus was for Chapel, Pocus for Church, and it was agreed Hocus should denounce Pocus for drinking Port.

The first fruit of their conspiracy was that Hocus recommended his brother and sister, his two aunts and nieces and four nephews, his own six children, his dog, his conventicle-minister, his laundress, his secretary, a friend of whom he had once borrowed five pounds, and a blind beggar whom he favoured, to various posts about the house and to certain pensions, and these Jack Bull (though his fortune was already dwindling) at once accepted.

Thereupon Pocus loudly reproached Hocus in the servants' hall, saying that the compact had only stood for things in reason, whereat Hocus took off his coat and offered to "Take him on," and Pocus, thinking better of it, managed for his share to place in the household such relatives as he could, namely, Cohen to whom he was in debt, Bernstein his brother-in-law and all his family of five except little Hugh that blacked the boots for the Priest, and so was already well provided for.

In this way poor Jack's fortune went to rack and ruin. The clerks in his office in the City (whom he now never saw) would telegraph to him every making-up day that there was loss that had to be met, but to these he always sent the same reply, namely, "Sell stock and scrip to the amount"; and as that phrase was costly, he made a code-word, to wit, "Prosperity," stand for it. Till one day they sent word "There is nothing left." Then he bethought him how to live on credit, but this plan was very much hampered by his habit of turning in a pa.s.sion on all those who did not continually praise him. Did an honest man look in and say, "Jack, there is a goat eating your cabbages," he would fly into a rage and say, "You lie, Pro-Boer, my cabbages are sacred, and Jove would strike the goat dead that dared to eat them,"

or if a poor fellow should touch his hat in the street and say, "Pardon, sir, your b.u.t.tons are awry," he would answer, "Off, villain!

Zounds, knave! Know you not that my Divine b.u.t.tons are the model of things?" and so forth, until he fell into a perfect lunacy.

But of how he came to selling tokens of little leaden soldiers at a penny in front of the Exchange, and of how at last he even fell to writing for the papers, I will not tell you; for, _imprimis_, it has not happened yet, nor do I think it will, and in the second place I am tired of writing.

ON A WINGED HORSE AND THE EXILE WHO RODE HIM

It so happened that one day I was riding my horse Monster in the Berks.h.i.+re Hills right up above that White Horse which was dug they say by this man and by that man, but no one knows by whom; for I was seeing England, a delightful pastime, but a somewhat anxious one if one is riding a horse. For if one is alone one can sleep where one chooses and walk at one's ease, and eat what G.o.d sends one and spend what one has; but when one is responsible for any other being (especially a horse) there come in a thousand farradiddles, for of everything that walks on earth, man (not woman--I use the word in the restricted sense) is the freest and the most unhappy.

Well, then, I was riding my horse and exploring the Island of England, going eastward of a summer afternoon, and I had so ridden along the ridge of the hills for some miles when I came, as chance would have it, upon a very extraordinary being.

He was a man like myself, but his horse, which was grazing by his side, and from time to time snorting in a proud manner, was quite unlike my own. This horse had all the strength of the horses of Normandy, all the lightness, grace, and subtlety of the horses of Barbary, all the conscious value of the horses that race for rich men, all the humour of old horses that have seen the world and will be disturbed by nothing, and all the valour of young horses who have their troubles before them, and race round in paddocks attempting to defeat the pa.s.sing trains. I say all these things were in the horse, and expressed by various movements of his body, but the list of these qualities is but a hint of the way in which he bore himself; for it was quite clearly apparent as I came nearer and nearer to this strange pair that the horse before me was very different (as perhaps was the man) from the beings that inhabit this island.

While he was different in all qualities that I have mentioned--or rather in their combination--he also differed physically from most horses that we know, in this, that from his sides and clapt along them in repose was growing a pair of very fine sedate and n.o.ble wings. So habited, with such an expression and with such gestures of his limbs, he browsed upon the gra.s.s of Berks.h.i.+re, which, if you except the gra.s.s of Suss.e.x and the gra.s.s perhaps of Hamps.h.i.+re, is the sweetest gra.s.s in the world. I speak of the chalk-gra.s.s; as for the gra.s.s of the valleys, I would not eat it in a salad, let alone give it to a beast.

The man who was the companion rather than the master of this charming animal sat upon a lump of turf singing gently to himself and looking over the plain of Central England, the plain of the Upper Thames, which men may see from these hills. He looked at it with a mixture of curiosity, of memory, and of desire which was very interesting but also a little pathetic to watch. And as he looked at it he went on crooning his little song until he saw me, when with great courtesy he ceased and asked me in the English language whether I did not desire companions.h.i.+p.

I answered him that certainly I did, though not more than was commonly the case with me, for I told him that I had had companions.h.i.+p in several towns and inns during the past few days, and that I had had but a few hours' bout of silence and of loneliness.

"Which period," I added, "is not more than sufficient for a man of my years, though I confess that in early youth I should have found it intolerable."

When I had said this he nodded gravely, and I in my turn began to wonder of what age he might be, for his eyes and his whole manner were young, but there was a certain knowledge and gravity in his expression and in the posture of his body which in another might have betrayed middle age. He wore no hat, but a great quant.i.ty of his own hair, which was blown about by the light summer wind upon these heights. As he did not reply to me, I asked him a further question, and said:

"I see you are gazing upon the plain. Have you interests or memories in that view? I ask you without compunction so delicate a question because it is as open to you to lie as it was to me when I lied to them only yesterday morning, a little beyond Wayland's Cave, telling them that I had come to make sure of the spot where St. George conquered the Dragon, though, in truth, I had come for no such purpose, and telling them that my name was so-and-so, whereas it was nothing of the kind."

He brightened up at this, and said: "You are quite right in telling me that I am free to lie if I choose, and I would be very happy to lie to you if there were any purpose in so doing, but there is none.

I gaze upon this plain with the memories that are common to all men when they gaze upon a landscape in which they have had a part in the years recently gone by. That is, the plain fills me with a sort of longing, and yet I cannot say that the plain has treated me unjustly. I have no complaint against it. G.o.d bless the plain!"

After thinking a few moments, he added: "I am fond of Wantage; Wallingford has done me no harm; Oxford gave me many companions; I was not drowned at Dorchester beyond the Little Hills; and the best of men gave me a true farewell in Faringdon yonder. Moreover, c.u.mnor is my friend. Nevertheless, I like to indulge in a sort of sadness when I look over this plain."

I then asked him whither he would go next.

He answered: "My horse flies, and I am therefore not bound to any particular track or goal, especially in these light airs of summer when all the heaven is open to me."

As he said this I looked at his mount and noticed that when he shook his skin as horses will do in the hot weather to rid themselves of flies, he also pa.s.sed a little tremor through his wings, which were large and goose-grey, and, spreading gently under that effort, seemed to give him coolness.

"You have," said I, "a remarkable horse."

At this word he brightened up as men do when something is spoken of that interests them nearly, and he answered: "Indeed, I have! and I am very glad you like him. There is no such other horse to my knowledge in England, though I have heard that some still linger in Ireland and in France, and that a few foals of the breed have been dropped of late years in Italy, but I have not seen them.

"How did you come by this horse?" said I; "if it is not trespa.s.sing upon your courtesy to ask you so delicate a question."

"Not at all; not at all," he answered. "This kind of horse runs wild upon the heaths of morning and can be caught only by Exiles: and I am one.... Moreover, if you had come three or four years later than you have I should have been able to give you an answer in rhyme, but I am sorry to say that a pestilent stricture of the imagination, or rather, of the compositive faculty so constrains me that I have not yet finished the poem I have been writing with regard to the discovery and service of this beast."

"I have great sympathy with you," I answered, "I have been at the ballade of Val-es-Dunes since the year 1897 and I have not yet completed it."

"Well, then," he said, "you will be patient with me when I tell you that I have but three verses completed." Whereupon without further invitation he sang in a loud and clear voice the following verse:

_It's ten years ago to-day you turned me out of doors To cut my feet on flinty lands and stumble down the sh.o.r.es.

And I thought about the all in all ..._

"The '_all in all_,'" I said, "is weak."

He was immensely pleased with this, and, standing up, seized me by the hand. "I know you now," he said, "for a man who does indeed write verse. I have done everything I could with those three syllables, and by the grace of Heaven I shall get them right in time. Anyhow, they are the stop-gap of the moment, and with your leave I shall reserve them, for I do not wish to put words like 'tumty tum' into the middle of my verse."

I bowed to him, and he proceeded: